#2014 AP Assembly Elections

[brexiiton]

Over 100 schoolchildren abducted by gunmen in fresh school attack in Nigeria

By Associated Press 9:25am Mar 8, 2024

Gunmen attacked a primary school in Nigeria's northwest region on Thursday morning and abducted at least 100 pupils as they were about to start the school day, local residents and authorities told The Associated Press, marking the second mass abduction in the West African nation in less than a week.

Abductions of students from schools in northern Nigeria are common and have become a source of concern since 2014 when Islamic extremists kidnapped over 200 schoolgirls in Borno state's Chibok village.

In recent years, the abductions have been concentrated in northwestern and central regions, where dozens of armed groups often target villagers and travellers for huge ransoms.

Chibok school girls in 2017, after they were freed from Nigeria Extremists after years in captivity. Abductions have been a source of growing concern since the 2014 abductions made global headlines in 2014. (AP)

Authorities were still trying to confirm the exact number of pupils abducted in the attack but it was "far more than 100", according to Salasi Musa, chairman of the Chikun council area in Kaduna state, where the incident happened.

The assailants stormed a government primary school in Chikun's Kuriga town shortly after morning assembly at 8am, taking almost 200 pupils hostage before any help could come, said Joshua Madami, a local youth leader.

Security forces and a government delegation arrived in the town several hours later as a search operation widened, while community members and parents gathered to wait for news.

"The government is trying everything possible with the security agencies to see how we can rescue them," said Musa, the council chairman.

The attack occurred days after more than 200 people, mostly women and children, were abducted by extremists in northeastern Nigeria.

Women, children and students are often targeted in the mass abductions in the conflict-hit northern region and many victims are released only after paying huge ransoms.

Observers say both attacks are a reminder of Nigeria's worsening security crisis which resulted in the deaths of several hundred people in 2023, according to an AP analysis.

Parents of abducted schoolchildren of Salihu Tanko Islamic School wait for news on their children in following their abduction on June 1, 2021. (AP)

Bola Tinubu was elected president of Nigeria last year after promising to end the violence.

But there has been "no tangible improvement in security situation yet" under Tinubu, said Oluwole Ojewale, West and Central Africa researcher with the Africa-focused Institute for Security Studies.

[wikiuntamed]

Five steps of Wikipedia for Sunday, 5th November 2023

Welcome, Selam, Bienvenida, Benvenuto 🤗 Five steps of Wikipedia from "Puthumbaka Venkatapathi" to "1951 Indian general election in Madras". 🪜👣

Start page 👣🏁: Puthumbaka Venkatapathi "Puthumbaka Venkatapathi served as the Member of the Legislative Assembly for Sattenapalli constituency in Andhra Pradesh, India, between 1985 and 1989. They represented the Communist Party of India (Marxist)...."

Step 1️⃣ 👣: Andhra Pradesh "Andhra Pradesh (English: , Telugu: [aːndʱrɐ prɐdeːʃ] abbr. AP) is a state in the southern coastal region of India. It is the seventh-largest state with an area of 162,970 km2 (62,920 sq mi) and the tenth-most populous state with 49,577,103 inhabitants. It has shared borders with Chhattisgarh,..."

Image licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0? by Nikhilb239

Step 2️⃣ 👣: 2014 Andhra Pradesh Legislative Assembly election "The Andhra Pradesh Legislative Assembly election, 2014 took place on 30 April and 7 May 2014 to elect members to the legislatures of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana. It was held concurrently with the Indian general election. The results were declared on 16 May 2014. The Telugu Desam Party led by N...."

Image by Srinath66

Step 3️⃣ 👣: 1937 Madras Presidency Legislative Assembly election "The first legislative assembly election for the Madras Presidency was held in February 1937, as part of the nationwide provincial elections in British India. The Indian National Congress obtained a majority by winning 159 of 215 seats in the Legislative Assembly. This was the first electoral victory..."

Image licensed under GODL-India? by India Post, Government of India

Step 4️⃣ 👣: 1946 Madras Presidency Legislative Council election "The second legislative council election for the Madras Presidency after the establishment of a bicameral legislature by the Government of India Act of 1935 was held in March 1946. The election was held after 6 years of Governor's rule starting from 1939, when the Indian National Congress government..."

Step 5️⃣ 👣: 1951 Indian general election in Madras "The 1951 Indian general election was the first democratic national election held in India after Independence, and the polls in Madras state were held for 62 constituencies with 75 seats. This State had the second largest number of seats, after Uttar Pradesh. The result was a victory for Indian..."

Image by USSR Post

[ajamseo]

Great honors and Recognition for N. Chandrababu Naidu Achievements

Since 2014, Mr. Nara Chandrababu Naidu, an Indian senior politician, A former chief minister of the state of Andhra Pradesh. Also, he has preliminarily held the positions of Chief Minister from 1994 to 2004 and Leader of the Opposition from 2004 to 2014. At present, he succors as the Telugu Desam Party's National President. For more developments and achievements of TDP visit our site

Mr. Nara Chandrababu Naidu is the National President of the Telugu Desam Party (TDP). He also served as the summon of the National Democratic Alliance (NDA). He endures a major political setback in the 2019 AP state Legislative Assembly Elections by conquering only 23 seats out of the 175 assembly segments. To know more about the TDP MLA news reach our website.

 He was the minister and youthful member of the Assembly at age 28. Before the creation of the new Indian State of Telangana, he held the position of Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh for the longest.

 The Agriculture Leadership Award was established in 2008 to honor excellence and leadership places played by individualities and organizations for the commission of growers and development of pastoral substance, following a report from the Indian Chamber of Food and Agriculture (ICFA) to the Chief Minister's Office. To stay up to date on TDP live updates visit our site.

 Former Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav entered the honor in 2015, followed by Shivraj Singh Chouhan of Madhya Pradesh in 2016 and Manohar Lal Khattar of Haryana in 2017.

Chandrababu Naidu has been presented with the Transformative Chief Minister Award in the US for his sweats to strengthen ties between the two countries at the state position.

The award by the US- India Business Council (USIBC) presented history to Mr. Chandrababu Naidu during the USIBC West Coast Summit in Silicon Valley. You can get the TDP latest news by visiting our site.

 “Transformative Chief Minister Award in the US”. The award acknowledges excellence in public service and recognizes

 • On September 24, 1998, Jim Edgar, who was the governor of Illinois at the time, established a  Naidu day in his honor.

 • named as the Millennium's Stylish Indian in IT by India Today and 2020 Media.

 • Time magazine in the USA fete him South Asian of the Time in 1999.

 • Profit, a yearly publication by the US- grounded Oracle Corporation, named him one of the"     Seven working prodigies around the world" in 2001.

 • The Economic Times Business Person of the Time.

 • In association with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) School of Governance, Bharatiya Chatra Sansad awarded him the" Aadarsh Mukhyamantri Puraskar"(Model CM Award) in 2016.

 •In 2017 former CM Shri N. Chandrababu Naidu was honored with Golden Peacock Award for Leadership in Economic Transformation and Public Service.

 • The Global Agriculture Policy Leadership Award was presented in 2018 by the Indian Council of Food and Agriculture (ICFA).

 • Honorable Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh State, N. Chandrababu Naidu, entered the 2017 Golden Peacock Award for Leadership in Public Service & Economic Transformation.

[newstfionline]

Tuesday, October 18, 2022

Biden turning to Trump-era rule to expel Venezuelan migrants (AP) Two years ago, candidate Joe Biden loudly denounced President Donald Trump for immigration policies that inflicted “cruelty and exclusion at every turn,” including toward those fleeing the “brutal” government of socialist Nicolas Maduro in Venezuela. Now, with increasing numbers of Venezuelans arriving at the U.S.-Mexico border as the Nov. 8 election nears, Biden has turned to an unlikely source for a solution: his predecessor’s playbook. Biden last week invoked a Trump-era rule known as Title 42—which Biden’s own Justice Department is fighting in court—to deny Venezuelans fleeing their crisis-torn country the chance to request asylum at the border. The rule, first invoked by Trump in 2020, uses emergency public health authority to allow the United States to keep migrants from seeking asylum at the border, based on the need to help prevent the spread of COVID-19.

Brazil’s da Silva, Bolsonaro clash in 1st one-on-one debate (AP) Brazil’s former President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and incumbent Jair Bolsonaro clashed in their first one-on-one debate Sunday, two weeks before the presidential election’s runoff. The two repeatedly called each other liars during an encounter lasting about 1 ½ hours. The term was used more than a dozen times by each of the candidates in the TV Band debate that, otherwise, was less aggressive than many analysts had expected. “You are a liar. You lie every day,” da Silva said during one exchange. Bolsonaro frequently said: “You can’t come here to tell people these lies.” Earlier this month, da Silva, who is universally known as Lula, won the election’s first round with 48% of the vote compared to Bolsonaro’s 43%. Polls indicate the leftist former president, who governed between 2003-2010, remains the frontrunner, though his lead has shrunk considerably.

Tens of Thousands March in Paris to Protest Rising Living Costs (NYT) Tens of thousands of people marched in Paris on Sunday to protest rising living costs, amid an increasingly tense political atmosphere marked by strikes at oil refineries and nuclear plants that threaten to spread further. The march had been planned long before the strikes by a coalition of left-wing parties eager to capitalize on the cost-of-living crisis and assert itself as the leading opposition force to President Emmanuel Macron. But on Sunday, organizers signaled that they intended to build momentum from the climate of social unrest to increase pressure on Mr. Macron’s government. Mr. Macron finds himself in a perilous situation. He is simultaneously facing discontent over shortages at gas stations, along with labor strikes and a fierce opposition in the National Assembly, the lower and more powerful house of Parliament, which may try to bring down his government this week over a disputed budget bill.

Strikes Hit Staging Ground for Troops in Russia’s Border Region (NYT) Struggling on the battlefield in southern and eastern Ukraine, Russia felt war on its own territory on Sunday as more than a dozen explosions ripped through a Russian border region, and a series of blasts severely damaged the offices of Russia’s puppet government in the Ukrainian city of Donetsk. The strikes in the Belgorod region next to Ukraine and the destruction of the municipal administration building in Donetsk, a city firmly controlled by Russia and its proxies since 2014, sent a powerful signal that the mayhem unleashed by President Vladimir V. Putin’s invasion is spreading far beyond the front lines. The blasts, which Russia attributed to Ukrainian shelling, came a day after another sign of disarray in Russia’s once-vaunted military machine: Two men opened fire on fellow Russian soldiers at a training camp in the Belgorod region, killing 11 and wounding 15 before being killed themselves. The episodes, along with an Oct. 8 attack on Russia’s only bridge to Crimea, a region occupied by Moscow since 2014, added to a growing impression that what Mr. Putin declared a “special military operation” in February has spiraled in dangerous new directions.

Russia’s Chaotic Draft (NYT) A half-dozen Russian soldiers talk about being shipped to an area of intense fighting in eastern Ukraine just 11 days after their mobilization. Asked about his shooting practice, a bearded conscript says, “Once. Three magazines.” In a town near Yekaterinburg, in central Russia, newly mobilized men march in place in their street clothes. “No machine guns, nothing, no clothes, no shoes,” says an unidentified observer. “Half of them are hungover, old, at risk—the ambulance should be on duty.” Elsewhere, scores of relatives of freshly drafted Russian soldiers crowd outside a training center, passing items through its fence to the recruits—boots, berets, bulletproof vests, backpacks, sleeping bags, camping mats, medicine, bandages and food. “This is not how it’s done,” a woman named Elena told the news outlet Samara Online. “We buy everything.” Despite draconian laws against criticizing the “special military operation” in Ukraine, Russian social media is awash with scenes like those above captured in widely circulating videos. “They are giving them at best basics and at worst nothing and throwing them into combat, which suggests that these guys are just literally cannon fodder,” said William Alberque, a specialist in the Russian armed forces and the director of the arms control program at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, a research organization based in London.

Pregnant women struggle to find care after Pakistan’s floods (AP) The first five months of Shakeela Bibi’s pregnancy were smooth. She picked out a name, Uthman, made him clothes and furniture. She had regular checkups at home and access to medicine. Then an ultrasound revealed the baby was upside down. The doctor told Bibi to take extra care and rest. And then came this summer’s massive floods. Bibi’s home in the southern Pakistani city of Rajanpur was inundated. When she spoke to The Associated Press last month, she was living in a camp for displaced families. With her due date approaching, she was afraid over the possibility of a breech birth with almost no health care accessible. Pregnant women are struggling to get care after Pakistan’s unprecedented flooding, which inundated a third of the country at its height and drove millions from their homes. There are at least at least 610,000 pregnant women in flood-affected areas, according to the Population Council, a U.S.-based reproductive health organization.

Crystal meth pours into Iraq across porous borders with Iran (Washington Post) Iraq is in the throes of an addiction epidemic as parts of a generation impoverished by war and neglect is turning to the drugs that are now flooding the country. Basra’s understaffed and underfunded counternarcotics squad is overwhelmed. At the center of this blight is the cloying heat and crushing poverty of Basra, where jail cells are full and dealers have police on their payroll so kingpins remain untouched. But the origins are far away, in the cool mountains of Afghanistan and the underground laboratories of Iran where new supplies and techniques have led to a flourishing trade. “We have a disaster here,” said Col. Ehab, a career intelligence officer who was directing house raids on a recent night. Since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion opened Iraq’s border with Iran, there has been a constant flow of people, religious pilgrims, trade—and smuggling, including of drugs. But it was around 2017 that a new menace appeared: crystal meth. A domestic crackdown on Iran’s own growing drug problem was making the basic ingredients difficult to come by when producers in Afghanistan unlocked the secret to extracting a key component of methamphetamine, ephedrine, from the local ephedra plant. Today, the fruits of that discovery are found throughout the region.

Kakao is Korea’s app for almost everything. Its outage forced a reckoning. (Washington Post) In South Korea, Kakao is ubiquitous. Nearly everyone, from schoolchildren to the elderly, uses the Korean tech company’s apps for messaging, taxis, navigation and payments. It’s Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, Uber, Google Maps and Venmo wrapped into one. So when a fire broke out this weekend at the building where the company’s servers are run, disabling its apps, people joked that the country would shut down. But the outage forced a serious reckoning over security and monopoly concerns in Korea, where a handful of giant conglomerates hold dominance over the country’s economy. (Hyundai, known for its cars in the United States, operates apartment complexes and department stores here; Samsung, the technology giant, also sells insurance and owns a high-end clothing company.) Kakao said in a presentation to investors in August that its customer base had grown to 53.3 million active users, with 47.5 million of those in South Korea—striking dominance in a country of more than 51 million. Many stores accept Kakao Pay, most of the taxis across the Seoul metropolitan area run on Kakao T, the company’s ride-hailing app, and friends, companies and even the government use Kakao Talk to exchange messages.

American technology boosts China’s hypersonic missile program (Washington Post) Military research groups at the leading edge of China’s hypersonics and missile programs—many on a U.S. export blacklist—are purchasing a range of specialized American technology, including products developed by firms that have received millions of dollars in grants and contracts from the Pentagon, a Washington Post investigation has found. The advanced software products are acquired by these military organizations through private Chinese firms that sell them on despite U.S. export controls designed to prevent sales or resales to foreign entities deemed a threat to U.S. national security, the investigation shows. Scientists who work in the sprawling network of Chinese military research academies and the companies that aid them said in interviews that American technology—such as highly specialized aeronautical engineering software—fills critical gaps in domestic technology and is key to advances in Chinese weaponry. This creates the specter of the Pentagon subsidizing Chinese military advances.

Film festival gives Gazans a rare taste of the movies (Reuters) Film buffs in the Gaza Strip, who for decades have been deprived of going to the movies due to the destruction of cinemas during bouts of unrest in the enclave, are enjoying a rare chance to see a slate of films on the big screen. Cinema once flourished in Gaza, with audiences flocking to see Arab, Western and Asian films but the movie houses were torched in the First Intifada in 1987 and then burned down again in 1996 during another wave of internal violence. Since then, Gazans have had to rely on television and online streaming services and the chance to see films on the big screen offered a rare treat for people living under a border blockade imposed by neighbouring Israel and Egypt. The Red Carpet Human Rights Film Festival, which opened on Thursday, is showing around 40 films at a recently renovated culture centre.

Flooding in Nigeria kills 500, displaces 1.4 million, government says (Washington Post) Widespread flooding caused by extreme rainfall and the release of excess water from a dam in neighboring Cameroon has left 1.4 million Nigerians displaced and claimed 500 lives, according to government officials. The floods also injured 1,546 people, inundated 70,566 hectares of farmland and “totally damaged” 45,249 homes, said Nasir Sani-Gwarzo, the permanent secretary in Nigeria’s Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development. Flooding has affected 27 of Nigeria’s 36 states, officials said.

[xtruss]

Sanctions on Russia ‘Irresponsible’, Adviser to Brazil’s Lula Says! Russia’s Economy Is Too “Big and Strategic” to Isolate, Celso Amorim told Bloomberg

Celso Amorim speaks to journalists at the Ministry of Defense, in Brasilia, Brazil, March 11, 2014 © AP / Eraldo Peres

Celso Amorim, Brazil’s former foreign minister and current foreign policy adviser to presidential frontrunner Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, has condemned the West’s sanctions on Russia and said that should Lula take office, Brazil would chart a different course.

In an interview with Bloomberg published on Friday, Amorim claimed that the West’s response to Russia’s military operation in Ukraine – sanctions on Russia and billions of dollars worth of weapons for Ukraine – have made nuclear war a real possibility.

“For the first time since the Cuban missile crisis we see articles about the risk of nuclear weapons published on a weekly basis,” he said, arguing that “it’s irresponsible not to seek peace.”

Amorim’s argument mirrors that of Lula himself. Back in May the former Brazilian leader told Time magazine that he sees Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky as equally responsible for the conflict in Ukraine, and condemned Washington for encouraging him to oppose Russia.

“The United States has a lot of political clout. And Biden could have avoided [the conflict], not incited it,” Lula argued at the time.

From the perspective of the US, Amorim questioned the logic of driving Russia into a deeper partnership with China, another economic and military rival of America.

“I have nothing against China,” he stated, adding that both are part of the BRICS group, but said that he “can’t understand the interest of the US in strengthening the China-Russia relationship.”

This relationship aside, Amorim told Bloomberg that an economy as large as Russia’s is “too big and strategic” to isolate, and that Lula’s administration would not pursue such policies if the two-term leftist president is elected in October. Speaking to Time in May, Lula said that “many different countries” are having to “foot the bill” for Washington’s hardline anti-Russia policies, and that if he is elected, “Brazil will again become a protagonist on the international stage and we will prove that it’s possible to have a better world.”

Lula is currently polling 11 points ahead of incumbent President Jair Bolsonaro, according to an aggregate compiled by the US-based Americas Society. Should he triumph in October, Amorim will likely be influential in setting his administration’s foreign policy, having served as Brazil’s foreign minister during Lula’s two terms in office from 2003 until 2010.

Bolsonaro has not followed the US’ lead on Ukraine either. Despite Brazil voting in the UN General Assembly to condemn Russia over the conflict, the president has refused to sanction Moscow and announced his intention to keep purchasing fertilizer from Russia and sign a new deal to import Russian diesel.

Like Lula, Bolsonaro also partly blamed Kiev for the conflict. Ukrainians, he said in February, had “Trusted a Comedian with the Fate of a Nation,” referring to Zelensky.

— RT | August 06, 2022

© Getty Images/Rodrigo Paiva

Brazil's Lula Names Those Responsible For Ukraine Conflict! Western Leaders Should Have Negotiated With Russia, Former Brazilian President Says

Brazilian presidential frontrunner Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva told Time magazine on Wednesday that he believes the Western narrative on the Ukraine crisis is simplistic and fails to reflect the reality behind the situation. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is “as responsible as [Russian President Vladimir] Putin for the war,” he outlined, insisting that there is never just one guilty party in a conflict.

Zelensky “could have said: ‘Come on, let’s stop talking about this NATO business, about joining the EU for a while. Let’s discuss a bit more first,’” Lula said, while arguing that US President Joe Biden, too, could have averted the crisis. “The United States has a lot of political clout. And Biden could have avoided [the conflict], not incited it.”

Lula believes the privileged position handed Zelensky by all western politicians is unjustifiable, noting that while he sees “the president of Ukraine, speaking on television, being applauded, getting a standing ovation by all the [European] parliamentarians,” Zelensky is “as responsible as Putin for the war,” and it is irresponsible for the West to embrace him without qualification.

“You are encouraging this guy, and then he thinks he is the cherry on your cake. We should be having a serious conversation. OK, you were a nice comedian. But let us not make war for you to show up on TV.”

Instead of implicitly promising the Ukrainian leader his heart’s desires, the US and EU should have reassured Russia that Ukraine would not join NATO, Lula argued, drawing parallels with the compromises made during the 1962 Cuban missile crisis, in which both the US and USSR agreed to deescalate by removing missiles from each other’s effective backyards. Such security guarantees have repeatedly cropped up during negotiations between Russia and NATO, only to be repeatedly scrapped by the West.

“War is no solution,” Lula repeated. “And now we are going to have to foot the bill because of the war on Ukraine. Argentina, Bolivia will also have to pay. You’re not punishing Putin. You’re punishing many different countries, you’re punishing mankind.”

The conflict in Ukraine has pulled up the curtain on the abject failure of the UN as a global body, Lula suggested, claiming “today’s United Nations doesn’t represent anything anymore. Governments don’t take the UN seriously today, because they make decisions without respecting it. We need to create a new global governance.”

“Brazil will again become a protagonist on the international stage and we will prove that it’s possible to have a better world,” Lula told the US outlet.

One of the most popular Brazilian politicians ever, Lula was president from 2003 to 2010. He was released from prison just over a year ago, after the Brazilian Supreme Court annulled his 2018 conviction on corruption charges, finding a biased judge had compromised his right to a fair trial. A political showdown looms between him and current leader Jair Bolsonaro in October’s election, with Lula currently polling ahead of his rival by 11 points.

[alexsmitposts]

Great Britain and Racism In recent decades, the concept of racism has become a painful topic in many countries of the world, and which many now perceive to be, in large part, oppression by white people of members of other races. Anglo-Saxons annihilated Indians, the French and Spanish – Africans, and the Dutch – inhabitants of Africa and Indonesia. And, toward the end of the 19th century, all of them together tried to bring China to its knees. For several weeks now the US has undergone protests against racism and police brutality, which quite swiftly spread to Great Britain. That is not at all surprising. People have forgotten the impression that grew about contemporary Europe being founded through empires, which created colonies all over the world via the slave trade and exploitation of labor. Indeed, it was Europe that over centuries seized lands for colonization, and oppressed other races. And so members of the #BlackLivesMatters movement have been protesting against systemic racism. Destructive riots have broken out in London and throughout the country. Attacks have been inflicted on statues of political figures, who are associated with the slave trade, racism, and the politics of empire. Many statues have sustained damage, including those of Winston Churchill, where remnants of scrawls “racist” can still be seen. The word “murderer” appeared on the base of the monument to Britain’s Queen Victoria. In Bristol, tearing down the statue of the slave trader Edward Colston also became a vivid symbol of protests against racism in the United Kingdom. Removal of statues of “racists” has found public support among Labourites and a former Home Secretary, Pakistani on his father’s side. According to Home Secretary Priti Patel, in just the first week of June, more than 135 thousand Britons took part in protest demonstrations, and 135 were arrested. Boris Johnson’s administration is trying to placate the demonstrators, but his efforts are having the opposite effect. In recent days, tens of thousands of new protestors poured out onto streets of British cities. They were led by such celebrities as John Boyega (“Star Wars”), or former soccer player for Manchester United, Rio Ferdinand. On June 15, Boris Johnson announced the creation in the UK of a Cross-Government Commission on Racism and Discrimination of ethnic minorities. Yes, today, perhaps for the first time since the breakup of the socialist camp, it’s possible to observe a truly massive popular campaign to destroy historical objects. Only now monuments to socialism are not on the receiving end, but statues to heroes of America’s and England’s past. But has it really only today become clear that racism was for several centuries the foundation of British and American society? It is the same Great Britain that instilled among people the belief that Germany was birthplace of Nazism and racial intolerance. In 1863, however, almost 100 years before the idea broke out in Germany, an English scientist, Dr. James Hunt, began to promote ideas of racial superiority. Having presented a sensational report at a Royal scientific society in Newcastle, he declared that, “he succeeded in distinguishing a distinct animal species of an interim stage between humans and apes, and they are called negroes.” Additionally, he mentioned that, among white-skinned people, there are “evolutionary dead-ends,” who, if they can be called people, are second rate. These ideas of race spread very quickly throughout the UK, and were echoed at that time by many other British scientists, who placed English people at the apex of the racial pyramid. It was on the British isles where the so called science of “eugenics” originated, which explained how to conduct selective breeding on humans to achieve the ideal race. Its leader was Charles Darwin’s cousin, Francis Galton, who coined the term “eugenics.” He intended to make it “part of the national consciousness, like a new religion”. To develop this theory further, in 1912, British “intellectual”, biologist, and mathematician, Karl Pearson, dedicated his book Darwinism, Medical Progress and Eugenics. In 1932, to solve the problem of “worthless races”, the British Union of Fascists was created. The British aristocrat, Sir Oswald Mosley, became its leader. By the way, having become the most far-reaching fascist organization during the interwar period, this English fascist party obtained recognition a year before the German Social Democrats won its elections. After the Second World War, those in academic circles began to view eugenics as the theoretical foundation for Nazism’s crimes, racial politics, and destruction of “undesirable” ethnic and social groups. To prevent the rehabilitation of Nazism and racism, various international institutes have previously proposed the passage of universal regulatory documents for that purpose. For example, in 2014, the UN General Assembly adopted a resolution that condemned Nazism’s rehabilitation. However, to the surprise of many, voting in support of this resolution was not unanimous. 54 (!) countries abstained, including all European Union countries. Moreover, the US voted completely against the resolution, justifying its action by explaining that the “resolution against defacement of memorials to antifascists limits the rights of citizens to express their personal opinion.” In July of 2019, the Committee on Democracy, Human Rights and Humanitarian Questions of the Parliamentary Assembly (PA) of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) rejected the resolution proposed by the Russian Federation’s delegation, “Regarding the struggle against xenophobia, aggressive nationalism, and related intolerance.” According to the draft of the rejected resolution, the OSCE PA was required to express deep concern over the “spread of the theory of racial superiority based on race, national origin, religion, or culture, including within the OSCE region,” and also recognize that neo-Nazism is a “dangerous occurrence of today,” against which policy makers must show resistance. However, a number of delegations spoke out with criticism of the document, in particular, Lithuania, Ukraine and also – Great Britain!

[thatisymagazine-blog]

Pawan Kalyan can change to changing times!

With changing times, people do change and Pawan Kalyan is no exception to it. His support at the time of 2014 elections towards the TDP and BJP has certainly backlashed.   Pawan’s belief and support motivated people to vote TDP-BJP alliance in AP. Then what changed in 4 years? Jana Sena Chief now confess it is practically impossible to fulfill the promises mentioned in their manifesto. He asserts…

[avanthisrinivas]

Avanthi Srinivas

AP Tourism Minister is popularly known as Avanthi Srinivas and full name Muttamsetti Srinivasa Rao. He is an Indian Educationalist and Politician.

He was the MLA (Member of the Legislative Assembly) from Bheemili, Andhra Pradesh.

He successfully operates Avanthi Education Institutes in Visakhapatnam, Andhra Pradesh, and Telangana.

Personal life of Avanti Srinivas:

Avanthi Srinivas was born on 12 June 1967, Eluru, West Godavari district, Andhra Pradesh, India to his father Muttamsetti Venkata Narayana’s mother Nageswaramma.

He married Gnaneswari and had two children daughter named Priyanka and a son named Nandish.

Political Entry of Avanthi Srinivas:

Avanthi Srinivas was a member of the Andhra Pradesh Legislative Assembly between 2009, 2014 elected to the 16th Lok Sabha.

He was a member of the Rules, Standing Committee on Industry, and the Consultative Committee, Ministry of HRD (Human Resource Development).

In February 2019, he quit the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) to join the YSR Congress Party(YSRCP)

He was elected in the Bheemili constituency as a member of the legislative assembly for the second time in the 2019 elections and also won in the same constituency in 2009.

He was appointed AP Minister for Tourism, Culture, and Youth Advancement of the Government of Andhra Pradesh.

Achievements:

Avanthi Srinivas Launched a New Oxygen Plant (Capacity of 20 KL) in Visakhapatnam VIMS with 200+ ICU beds and also concreated City Central Diagnostic center.

[orbemnews]

Raul Castro Fast Facts - CNN Pool/Getty Images South America/Getty Images HAVANA, CUBA – Former president Raul Castro addresses the National Assembly after Diaz-Canel was elected as the nation’s new president at Convention Palace on April 19, 2018, in Havana, Cuba Diaz-Canel will be the first non-Castro Cuban president since 1976. Raul Castro steps down after 12 years in power. (AP Ramon Espinosa/Pool/Getty Images ) (CNN) —   Here’s a look at the life of Raúl Castro, former President of Cuba. Birth date: June 3, 1931 Birth place: Birán, Cuba Birth name: Raúl Modesto Castro Ruz Father: Ángel Castro, a wealthy Spanish landowner Mother: Lina Ruz, a cook and maid to Angel Castro’s first wife Marriage: Vilma Espin (1959-2007, her death) Children: Mariela, Nilsa, Deborah and Alejandro Education: Attended the University of Havana 1953 – Attempts, along with his older brother Fidel Castro, to overthrow the dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista, after which both are sentenced to 15 years in prison. They are released less than two years later as part of an amnesty for political prisoners. Both go into exile in Mexico. January 1, 1959 – The Castros successfully overthrow the Batista government. January 1959 – Three weeks after taking power, Fidel Castro states that his brother is to be his successor, telling supporters, “Behind me are others more radical than I.” October 1959 – Fidel appoints Raul to several prominent roles in his government including defense minister. April 1961 – Castro’s troops defeat the CIA-led Bay of Pigs invasion. 1962 – Becomes deputy prime minister. July 1962 – Visits the Soviet Union and signs a draft treaty agreeing to allow Soviet nuclear missiles to be installed in Cuba. This development leads to the US-Cuban Missile crisis. 1970s – Is involved in the military conflicts in Angola and Ethiopia. 1972 – Appointed first deputy prime minister (later called vice president). 1991 – Helps Cuba navigate a severe financial crisis after the fall of the Soviet Union. October 1997 – Cuba’s Communist Party officially designates Raul as Fidel’s successor should he die or be unable to perform his duties. 2001 – In an interview with Cuban state television, Castro says he’d like to see Cuba improve its relationship with the United States: “I am among those who believe that it would be in imperialism’s interest to try, with our irreconcilable differences, to normalize relations as much as possible during Fidel’s life.” July 31, 2006 – Fidel temporarily hands over power to Raul while undergoing intestinal surgery. February 19, 2008 – Fidel, in a letter, resigns from office. This paves the way for the National Assembly to select Raul as Cuba’s new leader. February 24, 2008 – Castro is chosen by Cuba’s National Assembly to be the country’s new president. December 2008 – Makes first international trip as president, visiting Venezuela’s president Hugo Chavez. March 2, 2009 – Reorganizes his Cabinet, replacing long-time aides to Fidel. April 6, 2009 – Meets with visiting members of the US Congressional Black Caucus. April 19, 2011 – Elected to succeed Fidel as first secretary of the Communist Party. March 2012 – Pope Benedict XVI visits Cuba and meets Castro. The pontiff prays for “those deprived of freedom” and talks about human rights throughout his tour of the country. February 24, 2013 – After being reelected by the National Assembly, Castro announces he will step down in 2018, at the end of his second five-year term. December 17, 2014 – Cuba and the United States announce plans to renew diplomatic relations after a half-century of tension. April 12, 2015 – Castro meets with US President Barack Obama during the Summit of the Americas in Panama. May 10, 2015 – Meets Pope Francis. They talk for 50 minutes at the Vatican. Castro thanks the Pope for facilitating talks between Cuba and the United States. He later says he may rejoin the Catholic Church. March 20-22, 2016 – During a historic trip to Cuba, Obama visits Castro to discuss human rights and ending the economic embargo. Obama is the first sitting president to visit Cuba since 1928, when Calvin Coolidge traveled to the island via boat. November 25, 2016 – Announces the death of Fidel. December 21, 2017 – Cuban officials announce that Castro will not retire as planned when his presidential term ends on February 24, 2018. Due to ongoing issues related to recovery from Hurricane Irma, the naming of Castro’s successor will be delayed until April 19, 2018, according to Cuban state-run media. April 19, 2018 – Castro steps down as president of Cuba. After handing over the presidency to Miguel Díaz-Canel, Castro gives a speech at the Cuban National Assembly and says that presidential terms in Cuba should be limited to two 5-year terms. April 10, 2019 – Speaking at a government event to ratify a new constitution, Castro criticizes increased US sanctions against Cuba and its ally Venezuela. Source link Orbem News #Castro #CNN #Facts #Fast #Raul

[newstfionline]

Tuesday, September 13, 2022

Americans give health care system failing mark: AP-NORC poll (AP) When Emmanuel Obeng-Dankwa is worried about making rent on his New York City apartment, he sometimes holds off on filling his blood pressure medication. “If there’s no money, I prefer to skip the medication to being homeless,” said Obeng-Dankwa, a 58-year-old security guard. He is among a majority of adults in the U.S. who say that health care is not handled well in the country, according to a new poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. The poll reveals that public satisfaction with the U.S. health care system is remarkably low, with fewer than half of Americans saying it is generally handled well. Only 12% say it is handled extremely or very well. Americans have similar views about health care for older adults. Overall, the public gives even lower marks for how prescription drug costs, the quality of care at nursing homes and mental health care are being handled, with just 6 percent or less saying those health services are done very well in the country.

U.K.’s money, stamps, and more to feature King Charles III after queen’s death (Washington Post) The face of Queen Elizabeth II, who reigned for 70 years, is arguably among the most recognized in the world. Her name—and insignia—are displayed throughout Britain, looming large on buildings or subtly present on coins inside pockets. But with the queen’s death on Thursday, Britons will need to swiftly adjust to seeing the face of King Charles III on national symbols. “With the queen’s exceptionally long reign, few have experienced a regime change. It’s hard to quantify the effect the change of a monarch’s portrait will have on the nation,” said Dominic Chorney, a council member of the British Numismatic Society. (Numismatics is the study or collection of currency.)

Populists At The Pole (Guardian) Sweden became the latest testing ground for far-right populism on Sunday as the country voted to elect 349 new members of its parliamentary body, the Riksdag. The turn to the right comes as the country’s main conservative bloc joined with the far-right Sweden Democrats in order to gain back power from the incumbent center-left Social Democrats. The country faces rising gang violence and shootings, rising inflation, and an energy crisis caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The Social Democrats have controlled the Swedish government through a coalition since the 2014 election.

Catalan separatists rally as movement frays 5 years on (AP) Around 150,000 Catalan separatists rallied in Barcelona on Sunday, trying to reignite the independence movement that is fraying as it nears the five-year anniversary of its failed breakaway bid from Spain. For the past decade, the Sept. 11 rally held on Catalonia’s main holiday has been the focal point of the wealthy northeast region’s separatist movement. It has drawn in several hundreds of thousands of people clamoring to create a new country in the western Mediterranean. But the unity between pro-independence political parties and the civil society groups that led the October 2017 independence push, which received no international support and was quickly quashed, is in danger of falling apart due to conflicting views on how to go forward. The Catalan National Assembly (ANC), a civil group that organizes Sunday’s march, is strongly opposed to the talks that the Catalan government is holding with Spain’s central government in Madrid. The influential organization says it has lost faith in political parties and is ready to move on without them toward a new attempt at breaking with Spain.

U.S. Military Aid To Ukraine Grows To Historic Proportions—Along With Risks (The Intercept) Since Russia’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine in February, the U.S. government has pumped more money and weapons into supporting the Ukrainian military than it sent in 2020 to Afghanistan, Israel, and Egypt combined—surpassing in a matter of months three of the largest recipients of U.S. military aid in history. Because the assistance is drawn from a variety of sources—and because it’s not always easy to distinguish between aid that’s been authorized, pledged, or delivered—some analysts estimate the true figure of the U.S. commitment to Ukraine is up to $40 billion in security assistance, or $110 million a day over the last year. The relentless stream of funding announcements, in the absence of any public discussion of what the U.S. is doing to seek an end to the conflict, has signaled to critics a recognition that there is no end in sight to the war, and that the U.S. is committed to supporting Ukrainian defense efforts for the long haul rather than pursue a negotiated end to it. “The U.S. is really preparing for a long war. … It’s actually preparing for endless war in Ukraine,” said Stephen Semler, co-founder of the Security Policy Reform Institute, a grassroots-funded U.S. foreign policy think tank that has been tracking the assistance. “They’re saying, ‘We’re only doing this long-term approach because Putin is the one insisting on doing so.’ And that could be right—but at the same time, it’s not like the U.S. is expressing much confidence in its diplomatic skills to end the conflict, rather than just trying to outlast Putin.” And some critics are worried about the number of weapons flooding Ukraine, particularly as Ukraine has historically been a hub in the illicit arms trade, with weapons smuggled through Ukraine ending up in conflicts from Afghanistan to West Africa.

Russia’s Retreat in Ukraine Pokes Holes in Putin’s Projection of Force (NYT) Ukraine’s rout of Russian forces this weekend is creating a new kind of political challenge for President Vladimir V. Putin: It undercuts the image of competence and might that he has worked for two decades to build. On Sunday, the Russian military continued to retreat from positions in northeastern Ukraine that it had occupied for months. State television news reports referred to the retreat as a carefully planned “regrouping operation,” praising the heroism and professionalism of Russian troops. But the upbeat message did little to dampen the anger among supporters of the war over the retreat and the Kremlin’s handling of it. And it hardly obscured the bind that Mr. Putin now finds himself in, presiding over a six-month war against an increasingly energized enemy and a Russian populace that does not appear to be prepared for the sacrifices that could come with an escalating conflict. It was unclear how far Russia—with its cyber, chemical and nuclear arsenals—might be willing to go to halt Ukraine’s momentum, even as the scale of the battlefield setback became clearer and more evidence emerged of disarray inside Russia’s ruling class.

Pakistani PM says his flooded country faces food shortages (AP) Pakistan is grappling with food shortages after deadly floods left the impoverished country’s agriculture belt underwater, the prime minister told the Turkish president by phone, as authorities scaled up efforts Monday to deliver food, tents and other items. Shahbaz Sharif spoke to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan overnight to thank Turkey for dispatching food, tents and medicine by 12 military aircraft, four trains and Turkish Red Crescent trucks. More than 660,000 people, including women and children, are living at relief camps and in makeshift homes after floods damaged their homes across the country and forced them to move to safer places. Pakistan heavily relies on its agriculture and occasionally exports its surplus wheat to Afghanistan and other countries. Now it is in talks to import badly needed wheat and vegetables, including to people not directly affected by floods.

Stuck in China’s covid lockdown, people plead for food, medical care (Washington Post) Frantic appeals for food and medical care are spreading across China in a grim deja vu, as tens of millions of people are put under weeks-long coronavirus lockdowns ahead of a key meeting of the ruling Communist Party. Some of the worst reports are coming out of Ili prefecture in China’s northwestern Xinjiang region, where a lockdown began early last month. “We’ve been locked up in our home for more than 40 days. We are short of everything, especially food,” said Gulnazar, an Ili resident, who gave only one name because of security concerns. “There are so many difficulties, I feel like crying just by mentioning them.” Gulnazar said local authorities locked their apartment door from the outside and opened it only when medical workers came to do coronavirus tests. In some cities, neighborhood committees have delivered free groceries to those in lockdown. But Gulnazar said their neighborhood committee has been offering only to sell them food at higher-than-normal prices, and it didn’t do so often. The last time the committee came to Gulnazar’s door was 11 days ago, she said. Others in Ili posted online about being unable to take sick children to hospitals, as well as about the deaths of family members in lockdown.

Philippines extending state of calamity for virus pandemic (AP) Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. is extending a state of calamity declared by his predecessor more than two years ago to deal with continuing concerns over the coronavirus pandemic, an official said Monday. Press Secretary Trixie Cruz-Angeles also said a previously announced plan to lift the compulsory wearing of masks outdoors will take effect immediately throughout the country, except in crowded areas where people cannot observe social distancing. The Philippines and Myanmar were the last two countries in Southeast Asia that still required the wearing of masks outdoors, Philippine officials said. Previous President Rodrigo Duterte placed the entire Philippines under a state of calamity in March 2020 because of the coronavirus, and then extended it to allow emergency funds to be disbursed rapidly.

In parts of Mideast, power generators work 24/7 (AP) They literally run the country. In parking lots, on flatbed trucks, hospital courtyards and rooftops, private generators are ubiquitous in parts of the Middle East, spewing hazardous fumes into homes and businesses 24 hours a day. As the world looks for renewable energy to tackle climate change, millions of people around the region depend almost completely on diesel-powered private generators to keep the lights on because war or mismanagement have gutted electricity infrastructure. Experts call it national suicide from an environmental and health perspective. “Air pollution from diesel generators contains more than 40 toxic air contaminants, including many known or suspected cancer-causing substances,” said Samy Kayed, managing director and co-founder of the Environment Academy at the American University of Beirut in Lebanon. The reliance on generators results from state failure. In Lebanon, Iraq, Yemen and elsewhere, governments can’t maintain a functioning central power network, whether because of war, conflict or mismanagement and corruption.

Mobile school offers hope to nomad children in Chad (Reuters) In a makeshift open-air classroom, dozens of children sat squeezed together on a mat and watched as their teacher chalked simple sums on a blackboard—a rare chance of education for their nomadic community in Chad. Around 7% of the central African nation’s population of about 16 million are nomads, who move hundreds of kilometres from the south with their herds every year when seasonal rains turn the semi-arid central regions green with fresh pasture. This way of life is centuries-old but incompatible with Chad’s formal education system. According to the Copenhagen-based International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs, fewer than 1% of nomad boys and “virtually zero” nomad girls were registered for school as of 2018. Teacher Leonard Gamaigue was inspired to set up a mobile school for them, and travels with the nomads. Nearly three years on, his school—which follows the community when they move on every two months or so—has 69 pupils of various ages and basic supplies thanks to donations. “They had never been to school before, none of them ... today they can already write their name correctly, express themselves in French, do sums,” Gamaigue said with pride.

Tigrayan forces say ready to accept an AU-led peace process in Ethiopia (Reuters) Forces in northern Ethiopia's Tigray region that have been fighting the central government for nearly two years said on Sunday they are ready for a ceasefire and would accept an African Union-led peace process. "We are ready to abide by an immediate and mutually agreed cessation of hostilities," the Tigrayan forces said in a statement. Tigray has set up a negotiation team that is ready to be deployed "without delay", the statement said. The Ethiopian federal government said in June that the African Union (AU) should facilitate peace talks. The government has previously said it is willing to enter talks without preconditions.

[xtruss]

Race ‘Double Standard’ Clear in Rioters’ Capital Insurrection

— BY AARON MORRISON

NEW YORK (AP) — Black Lives Matter protests, 2020: Overwhelming force from law enforcement in dozens of cities. Chemical dispersants. Rubber bullets and hand-to-hand combat with largely peaceful crowds and some unruly vandals and looters. More than 14,000 arrests.

The U.S. Capitol, Jan. 6, 2021: Barely more than a few dozen arrests. Several weapons seized, improvised explosive devices found. Members of a wilding mob escorted from the premises, some not even in handcuffs.

The key difference? The first set of protesters were overwhelmingly Black Americans and their allies. The second group was overwhelmingly white Americans who support outgoing President Donald Trump’s baseless claims of election fraud.

The violent breaching of the halls of power on Capitol Hill by the insurrectionist mob on Wednesday, which left one woman dead of a police gunshot wound, represents one of the plainest displays of a racial double standard in both modern and recent history.

“When Black people protest for our lives, we are all too often met by National Guard troops or police equipped with assault rifles, shields, tear gas and battle helmets,” the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation said in a statement.

“When white people attempt a coup, they are met by an underwhelming number of law enforcement personnel who act powerless to intervene, going so far as to pose for selfies with terrorists,” it said.

Broad and bipartisan condemnation of the insurrectionist mob came swiftly as they had a nearly unhindered, hours-long run of the Capitol building complex, the Senate chamber and the House speaker’s office. The ordeal drew expressions of bewilderment and disbelief from some observers who believed such a display was impossible in a democracy as revered as America’s.

However, the response to the mayhem is consistent with a long pattern of society’s coddling of racists and downplaying the violent white supremacist ideology that routinely places the grievances of white people above those of their Black, often disenfranchised and downtrodden countrymen and women.

Since the founding of the democracy in the blood and secession of the American Revolution, white people’s destructive and obstructionist conduct has been couched in patriotism. It’s been a fundamental part of a national myth about whose dissent and pursuit of redress for grievance is justified, and whose is not.

Newly sworn-in St. Louis Rep. Cori Bush, who was among the protesters to face down police and National Guardsmen in 2014 after police killed Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, told The Associated Press that the race of the Capitol rioters played a big part in their ability to breach the congressional fortress.

Had the mob been Black, “we would have been laid out,” Bush said.

“The thing is, these are the same people who called us terrorists,” Bush continued. “Confederate flags, ‘don’t tread on me,’ ‘blue lives matter’ flags, the Trump flags — all of it symbolizes the same thing. It symbolizes racism and white supremacy.”

The show of force by law enforcement at the Capitol bore little resemblance to the lines of National Guardsmen and other police forces that assembled last year to protect luxury brand retailers against looting, government buildings against breaching and highways against marching by demonstrators across the country.

Rashad Robinson, president of Color of Change, the nation’s largest digital racial justice advocacy group, told the AP that he sees it as “a clear example of how racism works in this country and the clear ways there are different sets of rules and different sets of outcomes based on what race you are.”

Although Wednesday’s events represented one of the most alarming attacks on democratic institutions in recent memory, it wasn’t the only seen that day. Apparent Trump supporters forced disruptions at statehouses across the country, including in Georgia, New Mexico and Ohio.

And that wasn’t the first time that such a disparate law enforcement response to such attacks drew national outrage and criticism of police. Last May, a large group of mostly white men carrying long rifles stormed the Michigan Statehouse building in Lansing over the governor’s coronavirus pandemic shutdown mandates. There were few arrests and little condemnation from the White House.

In June, Trump administration officials had federal officers clear BLM protesters with flash bang grenades and tear gas, to facilitate a now infamous photo-op in front of a church near the White House.

BLM protesters and their supporters in Portland, Oregon, quickly pointed out Wednesday the huge disparity between Trump’s response to racial justice protests in the Pacific Northwest city and his encouragement of the violence in D.C.

On July 27, following his deployment of U.S. agents to quell weeks of demonstrations, Trump tweeted: “Anarchists, Agitators or Protestors who vandalize or damage our Federal Courthouse in Portland, or any Federal Buildings in any of our Cities or States, will be prosecuted under our recently re-enacted Statues and Monuments Act. MINIMUM TEN YEARS IN PRISON. Don’t do it!”

The thousands of Capitol building rioters, many who were egged on by the president’s speech at a Wednesday afternoon rally over his election loss, heard a much more compassionate message from their leader, albeit a defiant one.

“I know your pain, I know your hurt,” Trump said in a now-deleted video posted to his Twitter account. “You have to go home, now. … We love you. You’re very special.”

On Thursday, President-elect Joe Biden noted the double standard, saying he had received a text message from his granddaughter, Finnegan, of a photo showing “military people in full military gear — scores of them lining the steps of the Lincoln Memorial” during a BLM protest last year.

“She said ‘Pop, this isn’t fair.’” the president-elect recounted.

“No one can tell me that if it had been a group of Black Lives Matter protesting yesterday ... they would have been treated very, very differently than a mob of thugs that stormed the Capitol,” Biden said.

“We all know that’s true. And it is unacceptable,” he added.

Former presidents Barack Obama, George W. Bush, Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter also weighed in with expressions of consternation, some of them placing blame squarely on Trump.

Adding to the cruelty of it all, some observers have noted, is the Capitol building’s history. It was built with help from enslaved Africans, whose blood and sweat later allowed the union to meet there and strategize its battle against pro-slavery Confederates. On Wednesday, images emerged showing custodial staffers of color in the Capitol sweeping up the shards of glass and trash left behind by the rioters.

NAACP President Derrick Johnson said the people who violated the Capitol on Wednesday should not be seen as patriotic.

“This is not protesting or activism; this is an insurrection, an assault on our democracy, and a coup incited by President Trump,” Johnson said.

— Associated Press writers Gillian Flaccus in Portland, Oregon, and Padmananda Rama in Washington, and Michelle Price in Las Vegas contributed. Morrison is a member of the AP’s Race and Ethnicity team. Follow him on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/aaronlmorrison.

[techcrunchappcom]

New Post has been published on https://techcrunchapp.com/egypts-el-sissi-frances-macron-at-odds-over-human-rights-world-news/

Egypt's El-Sissi, France's Macron at odds over human rights | World News

PARIS (AP) — French President Emmanuel Macron acknowledged Monday “disagreements” with Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi over human rights, but said it will not prevent France from reaching economic and defense deals with the North African country, which has seen the heaviest crackdown on dissent in its modern history.

In an unusual exchange following their high-level meeting in Paris, both heads of state also expressed opposing views in a firm but polite, almost philosophical discussion about the role of religious values in society.

Macron welcomed el-Sissi at the Elysee Palace at the start of the Egyptian president’s two-day state visit to France. They discussed human right issues in addition to talks on fighting terrorism, the conflict in Libya and other regional issues.

In a joint news conference, Macron said “we have disagreements on that topic (human rights) and we talk about it very frankly.”

Macron called for a greater inclusiveness of civil society in political decision-making process in Egypt, saying it is a better way to fight extremism than “political repression.”

El-Sissi has overseen the toughest crackdown on critics in Egypt in living memory, jailing thousands of Islamists along with pro-democracy activists, reversing freedoms won in the 2011 Arab Spring uprising, silencing critics and placing draconian rules on rights groups.

On Monday, an Egyptian court extended the detention of an activist and researcher who previously worked for one of the country’s most prominent rights groups.

Yet Macron ruled out making France’s cooperation with Egypt on economy and defense conditional on human rights issues, because Egypt is France’s key partner in the fight against extremism and for the stability of the region.

El-Sissi’s state visit was maintained amid the coronavirus pandemic as both countries seek to strengthen their strategic partnership, with a focus on joint efforts to curb insecurity in the Mediterranean and the Middle East. France also ensured Egypt of its support in the health care sector.

Over 20 human rights groups denounced in a joint statement France’s strategic partnership with Egypt as the North African country “is abusively using counter-terrorist legislation to eradicate the legitimate work in favor of human rights and suppress all peaceful dissent in the country.”

They called for a demonstration on Tuesday near the National Assembly in Paris.

With a straightforward tone rarely heard in public, el-Sissi and Macron expressed opposing views in a spirited exchange on what should prevail between religious and human values — while both strongly condemning any extremist attack.

In reference to the publication in France of caricatures depicting the Prophet Muhammad, considered blasphemous by Muslims, el-Sissi said “it’s very important that when we’re expressing our opinion, that we don’t, for the sake of human values, violate religious values.”

“The rank of religious values is much higher than human values … they are holy and above all other values,” he added.

Macron responded: “We consider human values are superior to everything else. That’s what was brought by the philosophy of the Enlightment and the foundation of the universalism of human rights.”

Under France’s secularism, blasphemy is allowed in France, Macron stressed.

“When there’s a caricature … this is not a message from France toward your religion and the Muslim world, this is the free expression of someone who is, indeed, provoking, blaspheming. It is allowed in my country,” he said.

Days before El-Sissi’s arrival in France, amid pressure from U.N. and Western activists, Egyptian authorities released three workers with one of the last rights groups still functioning in Egypt. The three staffers of the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights, who were detained in November following a meeting with diplomats from Western countries, were released Thursday pending an investigation into charges of belonging to a terrorist group and spreading false news.

El-Sissi often warns that his tough hand ensuring stability is necessary, pointing to war and destruction in Syria, Yemen and Libya as the alternative.

Egypt is a U.S. ally and has deep economic ties with European countries. French authorities see Egypt as a key country in efforts to stabilize the troubled region, and Macron has warned that in the absence of Western support, Egypt could turn to the West’s authoritarian rivals China and Russia.

Egypt has concluded several arms deals with France since 2015, including the purchase of two French-made Mistral-class helicopter carriers and two dozen French Rafale advanced fighter jets.

El-Sissi, as a defense minister, led the military’s 2013 ouster of a freely elected but divisive president. He was elected in 2014 and, and won a second term in 2018, running virtually unopposed. Last year, constitutional amendments approved in national referendum, allowed him to stay in power possibly until 2030.

——————

AP Writers Angela Charlton in Paris and Samy Magdy in Cairo, Egypt, contributed.

Copyright 2020 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.

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[armeniaitn]

Lockdown-hit Indian farmers take protest over state capital relocation plan online

New Post has been published on https://armenia.in-the.news/politics/lockdown-hit-indian-farmers-take-protest-over-state-capital-relocation-plan-online-39768-27-07-2020/

Lockdown-hit Indian farmers take protest over state capital relocation plan online

NEW DELHI: Nearly 30,000 Indian farmers, the majority of them illiterate, have taken to social media to protest against relocation plans for the state capital of Andhra Pradesh (AP).

Due to the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak and social-distancing measures, thousands of growers from the southeast Indian state have had no choice but to go online, many for the first time, in order to continue their demonstrations.

Using Facebook and Twitter, they have been rallying global support for their objection to proposals for a decentralized three-city capital for the state instead of original plans to build a new high-tech center in Amaravati.

“Circumstances forced us to weaponize our mobile phones and social media sites and use them to protest against the AP government’s decision to shift the capital from Amaravati,” said P. Bava Sudhakar, of the Amaravati farmers’ joint action committee (JAC).

He told Arab News that farmers from 29 villages in AP’s Amaravati district had been protesting for the past 223 days against the local government’s decision. Up until March they had been organizing sit-in demonstrations and rallies to press for their demands but had to rethink their protest strategy after a nationwide lockdown was imposed on March 25 over the COVID-19 pandemic.

Villagers had learnt to use video communication apps such as Zoom to organize conferences and share grievances with supporters around the world.

In 2014, AP was divided into two separate states – Telangana and Andhra Pradesh – with a plan for Telangana to keep Hyderabad as its capital while AP would have a new capital by 2024.

AP’s previous local government zeroed in on centrally located Amaravati and thousands of farmers donated their land for the construction of the new capital which would have been built with the support of Singapore companies.

However, Chief Minister Y. S. Jagan Mohan Reddy, who was elected to office last May, decided to cancel the project calling it “too ambitious and an unnecessary expense for a debt-ridden state.”

In December, Reddy instead announced plans to create three capitals, with the coastal city of Vishakapatnam to be the executive capital with all government offices, Kurnool to become the judicial capital, with courts, and Amaravati to be the legislative capital.

“The earlier government pegged the estimated cost of building Amaravati’s basic infrastructure at 1,090 billion rupees ($14.5 billion), while the spending capacity of any state government is only 5 billion rupees. At 10 percent of the estimated cost, we can develop places that already have basic infrastructure into capitals,” he had said in the assembly in December.

Since then, thousands of farmers have been demanding a rollback of the decision.

One of them, Pudota Sneha, 22, of Pedaparimi village, near Amaravati was helping her illiterate mother master the use of social media.

“We had three acres of land, and we gave two acres for the building of the capital with the hope that we would be part of the development of the new high-tech city. Now my family is left with just one acre of land, which is not adequate to live and earn,” she told Arab News.

Sneha said her mom had joined countless others on the 200th day of the protests when farmers held a Zoom session with expatriate Telugus in 35 other countries.

Another protester, Sudhakar, who donated 12 acres of land, said: “The idea is to organize opinion of fellow Telugus worldwide and put together a joint campaign against the AP government’s decision to annul the capital project.

“We have at least 100 million Telugu speakers worldwide, and they are all emotionally attached to their motherland. They are also unhappy with the government’s decision.”

The opposition Telugu Desam Party (TDP) of AP has described the chief minister’s move as “vendetta politics.”

TDP spokesperson, Pattabhi Ram Kommareddy, told Arab News: “The decision to make Amaravati the capital was taken after the recommendation of a committee and after proper survey. People came out openly to support the project and gave their land without any dispute. But the chief minister (Reddy) is guided by narrow political vision.”

Analysts said that the issue had now become more complicated. “Political rivalry has got in the way of the development of a new capital,” AP-based political analyst, Sreedharan Jayaram, told Arab News.

“The farmers gave their lands in the larger interests of the nation, but politics has put paid to their hopes. The livelihoods of many farmers are now at stake. This is not good for the development of the state and its people,” he added.

Read original article here.

[biofunmy]

Ukrainian leaders feel demands by Trump and Giuliani for Biden probe leave Kiev trapped

Ukrainian soldiers are seen Friday in exercise Rapid Trident 2019 near the western city of Lviv. Rapid Trident is aimed at building interoperability among the forces of Ukraine, the United States, NATO and other nations friendly to Kiev. (Mykola Tys/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock)

KIEV, Ukraine — Ukrainian leaders are trapped in the middle of a very Washington firefight, facing mounting pressure from President Trump and his allies to investigate the son of political rival Joe Biden, and are searching for a way to escape.

They could give in to Trump’s demand to open an inquiry into the Ukrainian business dealings of Hunter Biden and risk the anger of Democrats and others for engaging in what those interests would see as interference in the 2020 elections. Or the Ukrainians could defy Trump and face the wrath of a president who had frozen $250 million of crucial military assistance for mysterious reasons before releasing it earlier this month.

Either way, they risk cracking the bipartisan consensus that has firmly supported Ukraine against Russia since 2014, when the Kremlin annexed Ukraine’s Crimea region and stoked war in Ukraine’s east. If Ukraine becomes associated with one U.S. political party or the other, it could jeopardize ties with its most important security backer.

“It’s a diplomatic disaster for our relations with the United States,” said Alyona Getmanchuk, the director of the New Europe Center, a Kiev-based foreign policy think tank. “I don’t know what could be the way out of this story.”

The predicament could come to a head Wednesday, when Trump is to sit down, for the first time, with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in New York.

Zelensky has sought the meeting for months, seeing it as a way to demonstrate U.S. support for a country that is still fighting a war in its east and enduring Russia’s annexation of Crimea. Trump has been reluctant, and he pressed Zelensky about Biden in a July phone conversation that is the subject of an extraordinary intelligence community whistleblower complaint.

In an interview with Ukrainian television station Hromadske on Saturday, Foreign Minister Vadym Prystaiko denied that Trump had pressured Zelensky during the phone call.

“I know what the conversation was about, and I think there was no pressure,” he said. “There was talk, conversations are different, leaders have the right to discuss any problems that exist. This conversation was long, friendly, and it touched on a lot of questions, including those requiring serious answers.”

Diplomats, politicians and analysts inside and outside Ukraine said Saturday that Ukraine was in a precarious position.

“Really couldn’t get worse” for Kiev, said a senior European diplomat, speaking on the condition of anonymity to avoid aggravating the situation.

“I’m afraid to do even more harm to Ukraine,” said a normally gregarious former policymaker, turning down a request for comment.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky plans to meet with President Trump this week during the United Nations General Assembly in New York City. (Craig Ruttle/AP)

President Trump has accused rival Joe Biden of shielding his son from an investigation in Ukraine when the elder Biden was U.S. vice president. (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)

Zelensky — who until recently was a comedian with no political experience — will have to tread carefully. A misstep could further inflame the situation in Washington, costing Ukraine its ties either to Republican or Democratic lawmakers. 

Since Trump has embraced Russian President Vladimir Putin and questioned both NATO and the reasons to support Ukraine, the bipartisan backing for the country in Congress has come to represent the main U.S. security guarantee for Kiev. If that were eroded, Ukraine could be in an especially dangerous position.

“Our vital interest is to ensure and to protect and to strengthen the bipartisan support for Ukraine,” said Danylo Lubkivsky, a former Ukrainian deputy foreign minister. “This is not all about Ukraine. Don’t impose some domestic issues, problems on Ukraine, while Ukraine fights against Russia’s aggression and struggles for its independence and freedom.”

[Trump’s freeze on Ukraine aid draws new scrutiny amid push for Biden investigation]

Zelensky is also talking about meeting with Putin as well as with the leaders of France and Germany in the coming weeks to try to hammer out a settlement to the conflict that is in its fifth year. That makes the uproar in Washington especially unsettling, because it weakens Ukraine’s negotiating position.

Zelensky has been more open to Russia than his predecessor, negotiating a major prisoner swap with the Kremlin in addition to suggesting discussions with Putin.

“The ultimate beneficiary of all this story is Russia,” said Daria Kaleniuk, the executive director of the Anti-Corruption Action Center, a clean-governance organization in Kiev.

Already, some Ukrainians worry that Zelensky may have offered too much to Trump’s team.

“Just stay away from it. It is not our story. There is nothing to gain, there is lots to lose,” said Victoria Voytsitska, a former Ukrainian lawmaker who was swept into office in 2014 in a wave of Western-oriented activists who entered politics after the political upheavals that year.

Using an investigation “as a tool to say we’re reopening this to provide a benefit, leverage to a particular candidate, would be a mistake,” she said.

Ukrainian policymakers and analysts worry that their leader is walking into an ambush by meeting Trump on Wednesday. They fear it could set back efforts to improve the rule of law made since the 2014 revolution, which overthrew a deeply corrupt leader.

One irony is that U.S. resources have been poured into Ukraine since its 1991 independence from the Soviet Union to try to foster an independent judiciary, one that could stand up to political pressure — the exact sort of pressure Trump is now applying, Getmanchuk said.

Capitulating “would be a disrespect to all the Americans who gave funds and investment from U.S. taxpayers for 28 years for reforms,” she said.

A pro-Russian rally in front of the Crimean parliament building in Simferpol, Crimea, in March 2014, ahead of a referendum that endorsed Crimean secession from Ukraine and union with Russia. (Monique Jaques/Corbis via Getty Images)

Days after the July phone conversation between Trump and Zelensky, Trump’s personal lawyer Rudolph W. Giuliani followed up with an in-person meeting with Andriy Yermak, a top Zelensky aide, in Madrid, Giuliani said. Giuliani said that he met with Yermak to suggest two matters for investigation and that Yermak indicated the Ukrainians were open to pursuing the investigations. Yermak did not respond to a request for comment.

[How Trump and Giuliani pressured Ukraine to investigate the president’s rivals]

The first matter concerned allegations that Ukraine’s government colluded with Democrats in 2016 to try to derail Trump’s presidential bid.

During the 2016 presidential campaign, the release of a ledger documenting millions of dollars of off-books payments from the former Ukrainian government to Paul Manafort helped lead to Manafort’s ouster as Trump’s campaign chairman. Manafort had been a consultant to Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych, the Russia-friendly leader who was forced to resign in 2014. 

Giuliani said that the release of that information was part of a coordinated campaign by the Ukrainian government to help Democrats. He offered no evidence.

Serhiy Leshchenko, the Ukrainian lawmaker who revealed the ledger, says he released the information to try to fight corruption in Ukraine, not intervene in U.S. politics.

The second matter raised by Giuliani involved a probe of the Ukrainian gas tycoon who put Hunter Biden on the board of his company Burisma.

Viktor Shokin (Sergei Chuzavkov/AP)

In 2016, then-Vice President Biden demanded the ouster of Ukraine’s top law enforcement official, Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin.

Trump and Giuliani have accused the elder Biden of pushing for Shokin’s dismissal to protect Hunter Biden from an investigation into Burisma.

But it is unclear how seriously Shokin was pursuing Burisma at the time he was forced out. Diplomats said at the time that Shokin’s ouster was tied to Western worries about corruption in Ukraine’s justice system. Washington’s concerns were widely shared by Ukraine’s European partners, and they embraced Shokin’s departure.

“The Fake News Media and their partner, the Democrat Party, want to stay as far away as possible from the Joe Biden demand that the Ukrainian Government fire a prosecutor who was investigating his son,” Trump wrote Saturday on Twitter.

Biden said Saturday that he had never spoken with his son about his business in Ukraine and accused Trump of “doing this because he knows I will beat him like a drum.”

Read more

Trump pressed Ukrainian leader to probe Biden’s son, say people familiar with the matter

Trump defends call with Ukrainian president, calling it ‘perfectly fine and routine’

As vice president, Biden said Ukraine should increase gas production. Then his son got a job with a Ukrainian gas company.

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Wednesday, December 2, 2020

Canada unveils largest economic relief package since WW2 (BBC) Canada's federal government will spend C$100bn ($77bn, £58bn) to kick-start the country's post-pandemic economy. It is "the largest economic relief package for our country since the Second World War", Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland said on Monday. The spending will bring the deficit to a historic C$381.6bn by March 2021. The wide-ranging plan includes targeted relief for hard-hit business sectors, investments in long-term care homes and distribution of a Covid-19 vaccine.

Study: Students falling behind in math during pandemic (AP) A disproportionately large number of poor and minority students were not in schools for assessments this fall, complicating efforts to measure the pandemic’s effects on some of the most vulnerable students, a not-for-profit company that administers standardized testing said Tuesday. Overall, NWEA’s fall assessments showed elementary and middle school students have fallen measurably behind in math, while most appear to be progressing at a normal pace in reading since schools were forced to abruptly close in March and pick up online. The analysis of data from nearly 4.4 million U.S. students in grades 3-8 represents one of the first significant measures of the pandemic’s impacts on learning. But researchers at NWEA, whose MAP Growth assessments are meant to measure student proficiency, caution they may be underestimating the effects on minority and economically disadvantaged groups. Those students made up a significant portion of the roughly 1 in 4 students who tested in 2019 but were missing from 2020 testing. NWEA said they may have opted out of the assessments, which were given in-person and remotely, because they lacked reliable technology or stopped going to school. The NWEA findings show that, compared to last year, students scored an average of 5 to 10 percentile points lower in math, with students in grades three, four and five experiencing the largest drops.

Coronavirus emerged earlier than thought (WSJ) The new coronavirus infected people in the U.S. in mid-December 2019, a few weeks before it was officially identified in China and about a month earlier than public health authorities found the first U.S. case, according to a government study published Monday. The findings significantly strengthen evidence suggesting the virus was spreading around the world well before public health authorities and researchers became aware, upending initial thinking about how early and quickly it emerged. Scientists at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found evidence of infection in 106 of 7,389 blood donations collected by the American Red Cross from residents in nine states across the U.S., according to the study published online in the journal Clinical Infectious Diseases.

Brazen gun battle in Brazil bank heist leaves cash scattered on road (Reuters) Bank robbers in southern Brazil blasted explosives and fired high-caliber weapons at police late on Monday, in an audacious heist that injured two people and left reams of cash in the streets to be pocketed by locals. The robbery began just before midnight on Monday in the southern city of Criciúma and lasted nearly two hours, according to a statement from military police in Santa Catarina state. Terrifying images shared on social media showed armed men firing automatic weapons on the city streets, taking hostages and then making their getaway in a fleet of cars. In their wake, the robbers left cash strewn across the streets. Residents soon spread out to snatch up the notes, television footage showed. Authorities have located 810,000 reais ($152,660), police said. Local media reported that there were 30 robbers involved in the heist. Brazil has a long history of bank heists, and major lenders have struggled with a wave of violent robberies in recent years as criminals have mastered the use of explosives to access cash.

Scottish independence (Foreign Policy) Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has called for an independence referendum “in the early part of the new parliament,” ahead of Scottish parliamentary elections in May. Sturgeon made the remarks in an address at a Scottish National Party (SNP) conference. Although Scottish voters rejected independence by a 55-45 percent margin in 2014, recent polls show a majority in favor of secession, likely due to the strong support for the European Union among Scots. Westminster would have to give Edinburgh permission to hold another referendum, and Sturgeon has said she will take the British government to court if they block a vote.

NATO Searches For Meaning (Foreign Policy) Foreign ministers of NATO member nations meet today for a two-day conference to discuss the future of the alliance as the organization searches for relevance ahead of the impending Joe Biden presidency. The alliance has spent the last two decades finding purpose in its Afghanistan mission, but with U.S. interest waning, and troops departing, it’s in search of a new raison d’être. The group appears to have found its motivation in a challenger thousands of miles from its borders. A new report due to be reviewed at today’s meeting calls for fresh thinking on dealing with a rising China, including deepening ties with Asian allies and increasing technological capabilities.

Animal attacks taking their toll in Kashmir (AP) Amid the long-raging deadly strife in Indian-controlled Kashmir, another conflict is silently taking its toll on the Himalayan region’s residents: the conflict between man and wild animals. According to official data, at least 67 people have been killed and 940 others injured in the past five years in attacks by wild animals in the famed Kashmir Valley, a vast collection of alpine forests, connected wetlands and waterways known as much for its idyllic vistas as for its decades-long armed conflict between Indian troops and rebels. The Himalayan black bear is at the heart of this trouble. Experts say over 80% of the deaths and maulings are due to attacks by black bears. Nestled between mountain peaks and plateaus, Kashmir has witnessed a rapid change in how people are using the land. Vast paddy fields have been converted into mostly apple orchards. New neighborhoods have popped up around wetlands and forest areas. In turn, experts say, animals are approaching human settlements in search of food and shelter, leading to a sharp increase in attacks.

Angry Farmers Choke India’s Capital in Giant Demonstrations (NYT) Mewa Singh said he wasn’t going anywhere. On Monday afternoon, Mr. Singh, who farms a small plot of land in northern India, sat in the back of a mud-splattered farm trailer, heaps of rice, lentils, fresh garlic and other spices piled around him, blocking one of the main arteries into India’s capital. Part of an army of thousands of angry farmers who have encircled New Delhi, Mr. Singh vowed to keep protesting for however long it takes for India’s government, led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, to reverse recently passed agricultural policies. “Our land is our mother,” said Mr. Singh, growing emotional as he talked about the new policies, which he saw as part of an effort to hand farmers’ land over to big business. “It was passed on to us from our parents, who got it from their parents, and now Modi wants to acquire it and give it away to his rich friends.” Even though Mr. Modi’s political party firmly controls the government, the growing farmers’ rebellion seems to have rattled his administration. In India, more than 60 percent of the population depends on agriculture to make a living. Farmers are a huge political constituency.

In Asia, Pro-Democracy Forces Worry About Biden (NYT) Pro-democracy campaigners from Hong Kong are championing President Trump’s claims of an electoral victory. Human rights activists and religious leaders in Vietnam and Myanmar are expressing reservations about President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s ability to keep authoritarians in check. It might seem counterintuitive that Asian defenders of democracy are among the most ardent supporters of Mr. Trump, who has declared his friendship with Xi Jinping of China and Kim Jong-un of North Korea. But it is precisely Mr. Trump’s willingness to flout diplomatic protocol, abandon international accords and keep his opponents off-balance that have earned him plaudits as a leader strong enough to stand up to dictators and defend democratic ideals overseas, even if he has been criticized as diminishing them at home. As President-elect Biden assembles his foreign-policy team, prominent human rights activists across Asia are worried about his desire for the United States to hew again to international norms. They believe that Mr. Biden, like former President Barack Obama, will pursue accommodation rather than confrontation in the face of China’s assertive moves.

China lands a spacecraft on moon for third time (Washington Post) China landed a spacecraft on the moon Tuesday on a mission to mine rocks and soil and return them to Earth, the latest in a series of lunar missions demonstrating the country’s emergence as a force in space exploration. The landing, without a crew aboard, was China’s third on the lunar surface since 2013 and came almost two years after China pulled off a historic first—landing a spacecraft on the far side of the moon. If China’s Chang’e-5 mission succeeds, it would mark the first time a nation has retrieved samples from the moon since the United States and Soviet Union did it several decades ago. The mission, which includes a lander, an ascent vehicle, a service capsule and a return capsule, was launched Nov. 23 on China’s powerful Long March-5 rocket. On the lunar surface, the probe is expected to dig about seven feet deep, collecting as much as 4.5 pounds of rocks and lunar soil into the ascent vehicle, which would then meet up with the service capsule in lunar orbit and return to Earth.

Nike ad showing racial discrimination faced by Japanese girls provokes backlash (Washington Post) A Nike advertisement highlighting racial discrimination faced by schoolgirls in Japan, and suggesting they can overcome it through sports, has provoked a fierce debate and backlash in a nation unaccustomed to openly discussing such issues. The video showing three young soccer players is based on the “real life experience of athletes,” Nike Japan said, conveying how they “overcome their daily struggles and conflicts to move their future through sports.” The ad has been viewed about 25 million times across Twitter and YouTube. It has been shared or liked nearly 80,000 times on Twitter, but negative reactions accelerated this week, with likes only outnumbering dislikes on YouTube by a few thousand. Japan’s national identity is based partly on a myth of itself as a monoethnic country. This has fueled the marginalization of the indigenous Ainu people in the past, and discrimination against ethnic Koreans and Chinese, biracial Japanese people and immigrants.

Radioactive water (Hakai Magazine) Radioactive water is accumulating at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant as workers have pumped water into the destroyed buildings to keep the site cool for the past ten years. After coming into contact with the reactors, the water has to be stored, and while operator Tokyo Electric Power Company has built tanks for this exact purpose, there are over one million tonnes of water in those tanks as of this year. By 2022, they believe they’ll run out of room for new tanks. There are potentially 62 radioactive elements in that wastewater, and as of 2018, some particularly gnarly isotopes were still exceeding safe levels, even after cleaning. The Japanese government will eventually have to decide what to do with this waste, which could include slowly dumping it into the ocean. That’s banned by the London Protocol, and the United Nations International Maritime Organization will likely have some very strong feelings about any such plan.

[k12academics]

Nazareth Academy High School began as an idea of Mother Mary Frances Siedliska, Foundress of the Sisters of the Holy Family of Nazareth. She wanted to establish a convent in Philadelphia after establishing the first province in Chicago. While on a train ride to visit Mother Katherine Drexel in 1893, she viewed the land near the Torresdale train station. Her vision was fulfilled on December 6, 1920 when the twenty-three acre Middleton Estate was procured by the Congregation. Four years later, the Sisters purchased the adjoining property. A groundbreaking ceremony was conducted on April 24, 1927 on a building that would serve as a provincial home, a novitiate and a high school. His Eminence Dennis Cardinal Dougherty dedicated the building on October 7, 1928. Nazareth Academy High School welcomed 10 students in the Fall of 1928. From the beginning the academic program of the high school was college preparatory. In 1930, the school accepted day students and boarders. Nazareth Academy’s future was assured when the Pennsylvania Department of Public Instruction granted approval to Nazareth Academy as a Four Year high school on May 2, 1931. Graduation Exercises for the first ten students took place on June 19, 1932. The Chapel underwent renovations in 1939 along with the auditorium, located in what today is known as the Performing Arts Center. Seniors and Juniors selected the first school ring in 1939 and to add to the school spirit that engulfed the school, Sister M. Callista composed the School Song “I Love My School A Million” which is still sung today at every school assembly. The 1940s were filled with Nazareth Academy High School firsts. The first yearbook, The Dale was published in 1940. The name was changed to The Marygold in 1946. In 1941 organized sports made their debut. The Mother’s Guild, precursor to today’s Parents Association, was established in 1946. Enrollment continued to grow and by 1948, 350 students were in the Academy. In the 1950s the school’s curriculum grew to keep pace with the growing enrollment. In 1952, Nazareth Academy underwent its first Middle States accreditation and has been reaccredited continuously since then. Extracurricular activates were added to address the interests and needs of the students. Intramural and varsity athletics expanded. The new gym/cafeteria building, erected in 1954, gave the basketball team a beautiful home court. The 1960’s saw the addition of several new athletics teams, such as softball and volleyball. The Guidance Center opened a Counseling Center for College and Career Information in 1967 to better aid the students in their college application or career choices. The 1970’s saw an increase in the number of lay faculty, the introduction of computerized report cards, and the election of the school mascot, The Panda. The 1980s witnessed the advent of technology at Nazareth Academy High School. Communications technology produced WNAZ, a closed circuit television program produced by Nazareth students. Community Service Corps (CSC) became a key goal for our students during this decade initiating its annual toy and food drives, in an effort to reach out through service to the school and local communities. On April 23, 1989, Mother Mary Frances, whose vision inspired Nazareth Academy High School, was honored by Pope John Paul II with beautification. Blessed Mary of Jesus the Good Shepherd continues to inspire and bless the Nazareth Academy school community. A Technology and Communications Upgrade which began in the late 1990s, was completed in the early 2000s. Every classroom and office became Internet accessible and each classroom was outfitted with a Smartboard and computer network. The Office for Institutional Advancement was established for fundraising, public relations, alumnae relations and Admissions. In the present decade, since the last MSA Evaluation, Nazareth Academy has acquired an additional 59,324 square footage of space within the Provincial building. This has enabled the school to begin converting areas for academic and student activity usage, such as Music and Guidance Centers, new Student Dining room including a renovated kitchen. In 2015, the student food services were contracted out to Brock, Inc. There has been an increase in the Honors programs and AP courses offered as part of the curriculum made possible by the building expansion. In 2014, Nazareth Academy began accepting International students. In 2017 – 2018, the most significant change in the governing of the school has been the changeover to the President/Principal Model. We saw the installation of Mrs. Denise LePera as Nazareth Academy’s first President. Finally, as the MSA Evaluation comes to fruition, in 2018-2019, Nazareth Academy High School will welcome its first lay Principal. The school climate continues to be one of a college preparatory curriculum, as well as forming a family atmosphere in which each person is valued and encouraged to grow. The intellectual, cultural, moral and spiritual foundations of a Nazareth Academy High School education have inspired and empowered our graduates, during the past 90 years, to locally and globally serve humankind as personified by our Mission.

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Nazareth Academy High School Nazareth Academy High School began as an idea of Mother Mary Frances Siedliska, Foundress of the Sisters of the Holy Family of Nazareth.