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LONDON (AP) — London police say they have arrested a 24-year-old-man who allegedly tried to climb a wall outside Buckingham Palace on Sunday night. The Metropolitan Police said Monday the suspect didn't have any weapons on him and "the incident is not being treated as terrorist related." He was arrested on suspicion of trespass and suspicion of possessing a controlled substance. The department said its Royalty and Specialist Protection Command arrested the man after he allegedly stepped over a low fence and tried to scale a wall outside the palace. Buckingham Palace is the official home of Britain's Queen Elizabeth II, although she is often at one of her other residences. Police say he was given a mental health assessment and released on conditional bail. He must report to London police in January.

PRINCE WILLIAM COUNTY, Va.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Apr 23, 2018--Prince William County today congratulated three science start-ups – ISOThrive, LLC, Virongy, LLC and Ceres Nanosciences, Inc., – on recent business successes leading from the Prince William Science Accelerator. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180423006276/en/ Prince William Science Accelerator Lab 1.(Photo: Business Wire) All three start-up enterprises have gained significant momentum, leading to expansion into new commercial lab space, increased R&D and the potential for new employment opportunities. ISOThrive recently expanded into new lab space within the Accelerator, Virongy has extended its lease for another year, while Ceres Nanosciences became the first start-up to successfully graduate into commercial space within Innovation Park, a premier corporate research park anchored by George Mason University’s SciTech Campus. “We are very proud of the significant strides being made by our tenant companies at the Prince William Science Accelerator and congratulate all three companies on their commendable progress,” said Jeff Kaczmarek, Executive Director, Prince William County Department of Economic Development. “What we are seeing is the gradual realization of the vision, formulated by the Prince William Board of County Supervisors, for Prince William County to be a catalyst for the growth and development of the life sciences ecosystem that our businesses are benefitting from today,” he added. ISOThrive recently expanded its footprint at the facility, now occupying two lab spaces. Through this expansion, the company will accelerate its work in leveraging the gut microbiome to prevent and treat cancer, with an initial focus on colon cancer. The company intends to recruit three new staff to support this new R&D effort that is expected to result in new U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved cancer treatment modalities. In addition to its new lease, ISOThrive has also opted to extend its existing lease for another three years to support the growth of its initial core business that produces OTC and Medical Food microFood products targeted at a variety of chronic health issues. “Locating in the Prince William Science Accelerator has been instrumental to our company’s success. Having easy access to cost competitive, state-of-the-art wet lab facilities, expert technical support, all within a research university setting has allowed us to conduct research, fine tune our business model and achieve a level of commercialization within a relatively short space of time,” said Jack Oswald, Chief Executive Officer, ISOThrive. Virongy has recently renewed its lease for another year. The company’s groundbreaking work has received the endorsement of the National Institute of Health through the award of a Phase I Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) grant for $220,000. The award supports additional R&D, in addition to funding commercialization efforts. “Locating in the Prince William Science Accelerator has allowed us to cultivate and leverage strategic partnerships with George Mason University. Proximity to the university has also allowed us to recruit from its pool of graduates skilled in life sciences,” said Dr. Yuntao Wu, Founder, Virongy. Most recently, Ceres Nanosciences expanded into commercial space within Innovation Park. The company is known for its work in the development of diagnostic products using its unique and proprietary Nanotrap® particles. First established in 2014, the Prince William Science Accelerator is designed to provide an innovative environment for entrepreneurial research and product development, nestled strategically in Innovation Park near George Mason University, SciTech Campus. Today, the County is home to approximately 9,000 businesses, an increase of 40% over the past ten years. Want more Prince William County? Check out our latest video, sign-up for newsletters or visit us at: www.PWCEconDev.org or @PWCDED. View source version on businesswire.com:https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180423006276/en/ CONTACT: Prince William County, Virginia Department of Economic Development Ginny Person Main: 703-792-5500 Direct: 703-792-5518 gperson@pwcgov.org KEYWORD: UNITED STATES NORTH AMERICA VIRGINIA INDUSTRY KEYWORD: HEALTH ONCOLOGY RESEARCH CONSTRUCTION & PROPERTY COMMERCIAL BUILDING & REAL ESTATE SCIENCE GENERAL HEALTH SOURCE: The Prince William County Department of Economic Development Copyright Business Wire 2018. PUB: 04/23/2018 02:27 PM/DISC: 04/23/2018 02:27 PM http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180423006276/en

JERUSALEM (AP) — The Israeli government has acknowledged it cannot expel African migrants against their will and has canceled all pending deportation orders. In a statement to the Supreme Court on Tuesday, the state says: "It is not possible to implement expulsions to a third country without (migrants') consent." Some 35,000 African migrants, mostly from Sudan and Eritrea, are in Israel. The government wants most of them to leave, but has not been able to find a way to expel them lawfully. Last month, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reached a deal with the U.N. to resettle half of the migrants in Western nations and absorb the rest. But hours later, he called it off, caving in to nationalist critics who said it wasn't enough.

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — Officials say a woman caught trying to smoke on a Southwest flight has been arrested after shouting she was going to kill everyone on the plane. Sacramento County sheriff's spokesman Shaun Hampton said Monday that 24-year-old Valerie Curbelo was arrested on the tarmac when the plane landed Saturday. Hampton says when the crew stopped Curbelo from having a cigarette in the plane's bathroom, she threatened to kill all the passengers and crew and became combative. Southwest said in a statement that the flight from Portland, Oregon, received priority treatment from air traffic control and landed safely in Sacramento. In a jailhouse interview with KOVR-TV, Curbelo, of Sandy, Oregon, said anxiety drove her to smoke. She said she didn't know why she made the death threats, adding that it wasn't typical behavior for her.

HAMILTON, Bermuda (AP) — Bermuda police confirm they have found the body of missing US student Mark Dombroski, no cause of death announced.

TRENTON, N.J. (AP) — Chris Christie is known for speaking his mind. Now, he'll get paid to do it. The former Republican governor of New Jersey on Tuesday made his first appearance as a political contributor for ABC News. Christie was characterized on "Good Morning America" as a friend and adviser to President Donald Trump. Christie will appear during the network's coverage of Trump's State of the Union address on Tuesday night. Christie said Trump should use the speech to turn the page to things the American people really care about. Christie was succeeded after eight years in office on Jan. 16 by Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy.

BERLIN (AP) — A vast trove of art which a German collector kept hidden from the world for decades will be shown simultaneously at museums in Switzerland and Germany later this year. Collector Cornelius Gurlitt died in May 2014, months after German authorities announced they stumbled upon more than 1,000 artworks at his Munich apartment while investigating a tax case. Switzerland's Kunstmuseum Bern, which Gurlitt designated as his sole heir, announced Wednesday it would co-host the "Dossier Gurlitt" shows together with the Bundeskunsthalle in Bonn. The Bern museum will focus on art considered "degenerate" during the Nazi period, while the Bonn show will focus on art stolen from Jewish owners. The art will be on show from November through March 2018. It's the first time the collection will be shown to the public.

BOSTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Apr 24, 2018--Appcues, the user experience layer, today announced Appcues for NPS, helping businesses accelerate Net Promoter Score (NPS) survey response quality and completion rates through in-product deployments. Two thirds of Fortune 1000 companies today use NPS to gauge customer satisfaction, however, most receive low quality responses as a result of inopportune timing. The significance of Appcues for NPS is it’s delivered natively within a product, supporting a customer-centric strategy that drives users to complete an NPS survey intermittently during their customer lifecycle. By delivering NPS surveys to users in a native, frictionless way, product teams benefit from immediate, authentic product sentiment which contributes to improving the user experience as a whole. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180424005416/en/ Appcues Launches Native Net Promoter Score Product to Improve Response Quality for Businesses (Photo: Business Wire) Key benefits of Appcues for NPS include: Easy setup and deployment with Javascript Native, in-product surveys that are delivered intermittently during the customer lifecycle supporting a customer-centric strategy A comprehensive dashboard that displays data analysis on customer sentiment and satisfaction Survey reminders that can be set based on customer preference “NPS is a metric that product-led companies naturally value as it’s critical in measuring customer satisfaction,” said Jonathan Kim, CEO and co-founder, Appcues. “Companies that hold NPS to a high standard are ones that view their customers as the key to their business success. By natively integrating NPS into the product experience, these companies can leverage the intelligence gained from every interaction to further enhance their business. For this reason, we’re excited to deliver Appcues for NPS as it helps businesses receive more immediate and useful feedback that ultimately leads to a better overall brand experience.” “Appcues for NPS took merely minutes to setup and deploy. The tool instantly segmented out users appropriately and the improved response quality that we’ve seen so far is fascinating to our team,” said Neel Desai, Product Manager, ProfitWell. “As a customer-centric business, product sentiment and satisfaction are always top priorities for our product team, so it’s essential that we invest in tools that offer us accurate, data-rich insight into overall product happiness, ultimately improving our brand’s bottom line.” To learn more about Appcues for NPS, visit: https://www.appcues.com/nps-survey-software About Appcues Appcues is a user experience layer that accelerates growth for companies by helping them put their products to work. By creating unique user interface patterns that are customized and on-brand, Appcues enables anyone to improve conversion and reduce churn by making their product experiences user-friendly and personalized. With Appcues, any company that is investing in its product can make it more usable and feature-rich for customers. Founded in 2013 in Boston, Massachusetts, companies depend on Appcues to improve user engagement and product adoption rates. Learn more at www.appcues.com and follow us on Twitter @Appcues. View source version on businesswire.com:https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180424005416/en/ CONTACT: Appcues Kate Gundry, 617-797-5174 appcues@pluckpr.com KEYWORD: UNITED STATES NORTH AMERICA MASSACHUSETTS INDUSTRY KEYWORD: TECHNOLOGY DATA MANAGEMENT SOFTWARE COMMUNICATIONS ADVERTISING SOURCE: Appcues Copyright Business Wire 2018. PUB: 04/24/2018 09:01 AM/DISC: 04/24/2018 09:01 AM http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180424005416/en

COPENHAGEN, Denmark (AP) — After impressing at the World Cup, Iceland goalkeeper Hannes Halldorsson has been sold by Danish team FC Randers to Azerbaijan champion Qarabag. Iceland exited the tournament at the group stage but Randers' sporting director Soeren Pedersen says the performance of the 34-year Icelander "hasn't gone unnoticed." Halldorsson's tournament was highlighted by saving a penalty kick from Lionel Messi in a 1-1 draw with Argentina. Pedersen said Wednesday that the club got "a concrete bid from Qarabag, which we have accepted." Details of the deal were not released. Halldorsson, who played 69 games for the team, said "it is time for me to try something else and embark on a new adventure."

NORTH ROYALTON, Ohio (AP) — Authorities in Ohio say a man charged in the deaths of five people in two cities is set for a hearing on the latest charges. Police say 45-year-old George Brinkman Jr. will be in Parma Municipal Court Thursday. He was charged Wednesday with aggravated murder, kidnapping and tampering with evidence in the deaths of 45-year-old Suzanne Taylor and her daughters, 21-year-old Taylor Pifer and 18-year-old Kylie Pifer. Their bodies were found Sunday in their North Royalton home. Police haven't said how they died. Brinkman was charged Tuesday with murder in the slayings of his employers, 71-year-old Rogell Eugene John and 64-year-old Roberta Ray John. Their bodies were found Monday in their North Canton home. Authorities say they apparently were shot. It couldn't be determined immediately if Brinkman has an attorney.

LAS VEGAS (AP) — Claire Foy says the controversy over her pay for the Netflix series "The Crown" has changed her approach to Hollywood. Foy says it opened her eyes about what she's "allowed to have an opinion about." A producer disclosed last month that Foy, who starred as Britain's Queen Elizabeth II, was paid less than Matt Smith, who played Prince Philip, because Smith was better known. Foy was in Las Vegas promoting "The Girl in the Spider's Web," which completed filming this month. It's based on the fourth book in Stieg Larsson's popular Millennium series revolving around hacker Lisbeth Salander, previously been played in movies by Noomi Rapace and Rooney Mara.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Trump to herald 'New American Moment' for US and call on parties to come together, in excerpts of State of Union speech.

PARIS (AP) — Hundreds of white-jacketed chefs and other French dignitaries are paying tribute to Paul Bocuse, often referred to as the "pope of French cuisine." Bocuse died Jan. 20 at 91 in Collonges-au-Mont-d'or, where he was born and had his temple to French gastronomy, L'Auberge du Pont de Collonges. Renowned chefs lined the pews of the Saint-Jean Cathedral in the culinary mecca of Lyon for Friday's funeral. Speakers celebrated "Monsieur Paul" and his contribution to French cuisine and its global image as both refined and convivial. He was a pioneer in branding his cooking and image, and creating a worldwide restaurant empire. A fan of butter and fresh produce, Bocuse's specialties included truffle soup topped with a golden bubble of pastry and fricassee of Bresse chicken served in cream with morilles.

HONOLULU (AP) — A former Hawaii state worker who sent a false missile alert last month said Friday that he's devastated for causing panic but was "100 percent sure" at the time that the attack was real. The man in his 50s spoke to reporters on the condition that he not be identified because he fears for his safety after receiving threats. He says the on-duty call he received on Jan. 13 didn't sound like a drill. However, state officials say other workers clearly heard the word "exercise" repeated several times. He said it felt like he had been hit with a "body blow" when he realized it was just a drill and he has had difficulty eating and sleeping since. The Hawaii Emergency Management Agency fired him. The man's superiors said they knew for years that he had problems performing his job. The worker had mistakenly believed drills for tsunami and fire warnings were actual events, and colleagues were not comfortable working with him, the state said. His supervisors counseled him but kept him for a decade in a position that had to be renewed each year. The ex-worker disputed that, saying he wasn't aware of any performance problems. While working at the state warning site in a former bunker in Honolulu's Diamond Head crater on Jan. 13, the man said, he took a call that sounded like a real warning from U.S Pacific Command. He said he didn't hear that it was a drill. But the problems at the agency went beyond the one employee. Federal and state reports say the agency had a vague checklist for missile alerts, allowing workers to interpret the steps they should follow differently. Managers didn't require a second person to sign off on alerts before they were sent, and the agency lacked any preparation on how to correct a false warning. Those details emerged Tuesday in reports on investigations about how the agency mistakenly blasted cellphones and broadcast stations with the missile warning. It took nearly 40 minutes for the agency to figure out a way to retract the false alert on the same platforms it was sent to. "The protocols were not in place. It was a sense of urgency to put it in place as soon as possible. But those protocols were not developed to the point they should have," retired Brig. Gen. Bruce Oliveira, who wrote the report on Hawaii's internal investigation, said at a news conference. Hawaii Emergency Management Agency Administrator Vern Miyagi resigned as the reports were released. Officials revealed that the employee who sent the alert was fired Jan. 26. The state did not name him. The agency's executive officer, Toby Clairmont, said Wednesday that he stepped down because it was clear action would be taken against agency leaders after the alert. Another employee was being suspended without pay, officials said.

LOS ANGELES (AP) — The Los Angeles Dodgers placed right-hander Kenta Maeda on the 10-day disabled list Wednesday with a mild left hip strain, leaving the club with four of their five starters from the opening-day roster sidelined with an injury. Also on the DL are Clayton Kershaw (left biceps strain), Rich Hill (left middle finger blister) and Hyun-Jin Ryu (left groin strain). Kershaw is expected to return from the DL on Thursday and start against the Philadelphia Phillies. Maeda was removed from his start Tuesday against the Phillies in the second inning. He received a visit on the mound from the team's medical staff on consecutive batters and came out of the game after striking out pitcher Jake Arrieta. Manager Dave Roberts sounded optimistic that Maeda would miss just one start, but admitted that he would not rush his right-hander's return. "I felt the sensation at the end of my last outing and worked on it between starts," Madea said through a team interpreter. "I thought I could pitch through it but as I was in a game situation, I felt it getting worse and worse and I think my teammates and coaches started to realize that." The Dodgers recalled right-hander Dennis Santana from Triple-A Oklahoma City to take Maeda's spot on the active roster. It is Santana's first time on a major league roster. Roberts said Santana would be available out of the bullpen immediately and could be in line for a start when the team heads out on a six-game road trip starting Friday at Colorado. Santana has a combined 10 starts at Double-A and Triple-A this season, posting a 2.54 ERA. ___ More AP baseball: https://apnews.com/tag/MLBbaseball

TOKYO (AP) — Asian shares skidded Tuesday following Wall Street's biggest loss in more than four months. KEEPING SCORE: Japan's Nikkei 225 index lost 1.4 percent to 23,286.05 and Hong Kong's Hang Seng dropped 0.8 percent to 32,693.43. South Korea's Kospi sank 1.0 percent to 2,569.94. The Shanghai Composite index fell 0.7 percent to 3,497.00 and Australia's S&P ASX 200 gave up 0.9 percent to 6,020.20. Shares were lower in Taiwan, Singapore and Indonesia. WALL STREET: The sell-off was led by technology stocks, the biggest gainers in 2017, which accounted for much of the slide. Energy companies also fell as crude oil prices finished lower. Utilities and other rate-sensitive sectors declined as bond yields hit their highest level in almost four years. The Standard & Poor's 500 index fell 0.7 percent to 2,853.53 and the Dow Jones industrial average also dropped 0.7 percent, to 26,439.48. The Nasdaq composite lost 0.5 percent, to 7,466.51. The Russell 2000 index of smaller-company stocks gave up 0.6 percent to 1,598.11. Losers outnumbered gainers almost five-to-one on the New York Stock Exchange. TRUMP: Also on investors' radar: Tuesday night's State of the Union address by President Donald Trump, and a two-day meeting of the Federal Reserve's policymaking committee that wraps up Wednesday. "This is one of the few prepared speeches that the president will give, so the progress on NAFTA and trade with China is something the market is going to watch carefully," said Mike Baele, senior portfolio manager at U.S. Bank Private Wealth Management. JAPAN: Data for December released Tuesday showed the jobless rate rising to a still low 2.8 percent and retail sales coming in stronger than expected. But household spending and willingness to spend fell, underscoring the need for wage increases during the annual spring labor negotiations that are underway. ANALYST'S VIEWPOINT: "Asian markets are set to see further pullback in the day, caught in the crosswind of the overnight action. In particular, the performance of Apple Inc.'s regional supply chain is expected to come into focus as reports of a production reduction to the company's leading iPhone X floated to the market," Jingyi Pan of IG said in a commentary. ENERGY: Benchmark U.S. crude fell 52 cents to $65.04 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. It lost 58 cents, or about 1 percent, to settle at $65.56 a barrel on Monday. Brent crude, used to price international oils, dropped 38 cents to $68.82 a barrel. It fell $1.06, or 1.5 percent, to close at $69.46 per barrel on Monday. CURRENCIES: The dollar, which fell sharply last week, declined to 108.76 yen from 108.96 yen late Monday. The euro fell to $1.2376 from $1.2383. BITCOIN: The price of bitcoin fell 1.3 percent Monday to$11,018.88, according to the tracking site CoinDesk. Bitcoin futures on the Cboe Futures Exchange fell 2.5 percent to $10,920.

WASHINGTON (AP) — A Republican legislator from Arizona said any "illegal aliens" who attend Tuesday's State of the Union address should be arrested and deported. More than 20 Democratic lawmakers are inviting "Dreamers," immigrants who were brought to the United States as children and are living here illegally. "Of all the places where the rule of law needs to be enforced, it should be in the hallowed halls of Congress," Rep. Paul Gosar tweeted. "Any illegal aliens attempting to go through security, under any pretext of invitation or otherwise, should be arrested and deported." A number of Dreamers have been invited to the speech as guests of high-profile Democrats including House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and potential 2020 presidential candidates such as New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker and California Sen. Kamala Harris. President Donald Trump has announced plans to end Obama-era protections for such immigrants. He now says he wants to grant them a path to citizenship, but Congress has so far been unable to come up with a legislative solution for an issue at the center of the recent government shutdown. Dreamers are set to lose protection from deportation in March. Gosar's suggestion drew a quick rejoinder from Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., who tweeted back: "This is why we can't have nice things..."

LAS VEGAS (AP) — Winning a Stanley Cup isn't meant to be easy, something that even the novice hockey fans in Las Vegas now surely understand. No need to tell it to the Washington Capitals. They've spent 43 seasons chasing the elusive Cup, only to find an expansion team — of all things — in the way of finally ending the drought. The battle for hockey supremacy heads to the nation's capital all tied up 1-1 after a pair of games as entertaining as anything on the Las Vegas Strip. The goals keep coming and so do the hits, including one Wednesday night on Evgeny Kuznetsov that both knocked him out of the game and seemed to wake Washington out of its daze. Their top playoff scorer out, the Caps rallied for three straight goals that stopped — at least for a moment — a team that has been virtually unstoppable throughout the playoffs. "It galvanized us as a group," Caps coach Barry Trotz said. "I think it might be a turning point for us." On a night when Alex Ovechkin scored the first Stanley Cup Final goal of his 13-year NHL career to give the Caps a lead they somehow managed to hold onto even while being outplayed and outshot by the Knights in the third period, Washington won a final-round game for the first time ever to make the flight back home a lot sweeter. For the Capitals it means service held, with the next two games in far friendlier confines at home. For the Knights, it was a golden opportunity gone awry. They were 7-1 in the playoffs at home, 11-1 overall when scoring the first goal. So when James Neal scored barely eight minutes into the game, the party was on. And then, suddenly, it was off. At least for now. Credit some of that to the resilience of the Caps, who were down a goal when Kuznetsov was knocked out of the game. Give a tip of the hat to Ovechkin, too, who scored the go-ahead goal in the second period. But when the story of this Cup Final is finally written it may hinge on a hit by Brayden McNabb on Kuznetsov as he had the puck along the boards late in the first period. McNabb slammed into Kuznetsov with a high check and Kuznetsov immediately bent over holding his arm with what appeared to be a wrist injury. Another team might have folded in front of the raucous crowd of 18,702. But the Caps have been resilient all the way through the playoffs, and this game was no exception. "It was all about commitment. We blocked shots and played for each other," forward Nicklas Backstrom said. "It's good to win and go back to Washington." On a 98-degree day in Las Vegas, the action on the ice was as hot as the weather outside. The Knights dominated play at times and outshot the Caps 39-26, but could not deliver on a 5-on-3 power play in the scoreless third period. When Alex Tuch was denied on a spectacular stick save with 1:59 to play by Braden Holtby, the Knights would not be lucky on this night in the biggest game of chance on the Strip. Their Game 1 win, after all, included the Caps' Lars Eller missing a wide-open net from point-blank range in the final minutes. "To me it was the hockey gods evening it up from the last game," Trotz said. "Once he made that save I knew we were going to win the game." Las Vegas pulled out all the stops to make the first two games as memorable off the ice as they have been on the ice. The Imagine Dragons — a Vegas Born group — sang just before the puck dropped and a flyover by the Air Force's latest F-35 jets shook the building, as did the applause later between periods when the pilots appeared in front of the Knight's faux castle to cheer the team on. But just as Game 1 seemed to shift in the Knights' favor after Jonathan Marchessault was knocked to the ice on what appeared to be a late hit by Washington's Tom Wilson, this game seemed to turn on that hit by McNabb with the Knights up 1-0. Not only did Washington score three straight goals, one of them came from the player who must be spectacular if the Capitals are forced to play without Kuznetsov for any length of time in the finals. Ovechkin has toiled for the Capitals since being picked first in the 2004 draft, but had never played in a Stanley Cup Final until Game 1 — and never scored in one until Wednesday. "He's the heart and soul of this team," Washington defenseman John Carlson said. "He does so much and doesn't get credit. We love him to death. He's our leader and it's nice to see him get that big goal for us." For the Knights it was a rare whiff in a season like no other. They've been one of the great stories in sports, an expansion team in its first season playing for the championship of the NHL. But every great story needs a great ending, and for the Knights to write one they're now going to have to win at least one game on the road. "It's the Stanley Cup final, it's little things," said Knights forward Erik Haula. "Nobody said it's gonna be a 4-0 series. It's gonna be ups and downs. We've been here before, we've been good on the road. Just put this behind us, just learn from your mistake." ____ Tim Dahlberg is a national sports columnist for The Associated Press. Write to him at tdahlberg@ap.org or http://twitter.com/timdahlberg

WASHINGTON (AP) — With the government's budget deficit rising, the Treasury Department announced Monday that it expects to borrow $441 billion in the current January-March quarter, the largest amount in eight years. The Treasury said this figure compares to actual borrowing of $282 billion in the October-December quarter. It will be the largest borrowing need since the government borrowed $483 billion in the January-March quarter of 2010, a period when the government was using stimulus spending to try to lift the country out of the Great Recession and provide support to the banking system after the worst financial crisis in seven decades. The government's borrowing needs have been rising as federal deficits have increased. The deficit for the 2017 budget year, which ended last September, totaled $665.8 billion. Private forecasters believe this year's deficit will climb to around $765 billion, and some are forecasting deficits for next year could once again top $1 trillion. Those projections reflect growing costs for Social Security and Medicare as the baby boom generation retires and the costs of the big tax cut that President Donald Trump pushed through Congress last month, a package estimated to boost deficits by $1.5 trillion over the next decade. To cope with the higher borrowing needs, Treasury has asked Congress to raise the borrowing limit, which is currently $20.5 trillion. The government has continued borrowing money during the impasse but Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin's will run out of room to use various bookkeeping maneuvers to stay under the current debt limit probably by early March. Treasury on Wednesday will release the specific details of what types of securities it plans to sell this quarter to meet its borrowing needs.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Amid heightened tensions, President Trump recognizes North Korean defector in attendance at State of the Union.

NEW CONCORD, Ohio (AP) — At age 87, Norman Stout may not have a lot of time left to see the execution of the man who killed his wife more than three decades ago. He's determined to be there if possible. "I want to make damn sure that it finally is accomplished," Stout said. The state of Ohio wants the execution to happen, as well, and says it finally has the means to put condemned killer John Stumpf to death after years of trying to obtain lethal drugs. Whether that three-drug combination is constitutional is before a federal appeals court whose ruling will help decide whether Stumpf's execution — now scheduled for November of next year — can take place at last. Stumpf was sentenced to die in 1984 for the slaying of Mary Jane Stout, shot four times at the couple's home outside of New Concord in eastern Ohio, about 70 miles (110 kilometers) east of Columbus. Of the more than two dozen Ohio inmates with active execution dates, Stumpf has been on death row the longest — more than 12,000 days. Six presidents have served. More than 30 new countries have come into existence. The population of the U.S. has grown by a third. Stumpf's situation is not unique. Six Alabama inmates have been on death row more than 30 years, including one inmate who arrived there in 1979. Texas houses more than a dozen inmates whose capital crimes occurred more than three decades ago. Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson cited long delays faced by victims' families when he pushed for eight executions in 11 days in April. Ultimately, four men were put to death. As has been the case elsewhere, court appeals and Ohio's struggle to find lethal drugs have helped delay Stumpf's execution. That includes a reprieve from Gov. John Kasich in May when he moved Stumpf's execution from January of next year to November to allow more time for legal arguments over Ohio's new lethal injection process. The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati heard arguments Wednesday for and against that process and is expected to rule soon. Ohio's first execution in more than three years is set for late next month. Seemingly endless appeals and roller-coaster rulings are a hallmark of death sentences in the U.S., frustrating proponents who say capital punishment moves far too slowly to ensure justice. But, opponents argue, those same appeals protect suspects' constitutional rights and sometimes free the innocent. Complicating matters, drugmakers and distributors have put the drugs used for decades off limits, setting off a scramble to find alternatives and often delaying executions while they search and argue in the courts. At issue in Ohio is the effectiveness of the first drug in the state's three-drug method, a sedative called midazolam that has been used in problematic executions in Arizona, Arkansas and Ohio in which inmates didn't appear fully sedated before the second and third drugs took effect. "More politics," said Norman Stout, recalling his reaction when he heard of the latest delay. Stout is waiting for a conclusion to the events of May 14, 1984, which he recalls as if they happened yesterday. He and his wife, Mary Jane, had just finished dinner when two men came to the door asking if they could use the phone. Once inside, they announced a robbery. As Stumpf held the couple at gunpoint, Clyde Wesley ransacked the house, according to court records. When Norman Stout made a move toward Stumpf, the gunman shot him twice in the head. Five fragments of lead remain beneath his skin. After Stout regained consciousness, he heard two male voices in the next room, then the four shots that killed his wife. Stumpf, sentenced to death by a three-judge panel, has always maintained Wesley shot Mary Jane Stout. Wesley is serving 35 years to life. The driver of the car that day, Norman Edmonds, served about 10 years before being paroled to his home state of Texas. At Wesley's trial, prosecutors argued Wesley shot Mary Jane Stout, while Wesley testified it was Stumpf. Wesley received a life sentence with parole eligibility; his next hearing is in 2027. Over the years, courts upheld and later rejected Stumpf's argument that it was improper for prosecutors to argue that Stumpf shot Mary Jane Stout yet contend at a separate trial that Wesley was the triggerman. Stumpf, now 56, has no current appeals pending, said David Stebbins, his public defender, who declined to comment further. Norman Stout met his wife while stationed at the now-closed Sampson Air Force Base in western New York state. After a teaching stint in Rochester, the couple moved to Ohio, where Norman Stout was a heavy equipment operator until the shooting. Mary Jane Stout was an avid collector of Holly Hobbie memorabilia. Norman Stout expanded her collection in her honor and now maintains a gallery in New Concord full of hundreds of Holly Hobbie figurines, plates, greeting cards, puzzles and board games. Showing a visitor around, Norman Stout speaks evenhandedly of his shooting and his wife's death. But it's clear he has little sympathy for arguments about the risk of execution to Stumpf. "I can't imagine the pain that my wife went through when she was shot," he said. "I want him to feel some pain." ___ Andrew Welsh-Huggins can be reached on Twitter at https://twitter.com/awhcolumbus. His work can be found at http://bigstory.ap.org/content/andrew-welsh-huggins

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Lin-Manuel Miranda, "Game of Thrones" and a key figure in the #MeToo movement are among the winners of this year's Webby Awards. Miranda won the Webby for public service and social activism for his work raising money for charities assisting Puerto Rico in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria. Susan Fowler, the former Uber employee whose harassment revelations helped lead to the ouster of the company's CEO and bolstered the #MeToo movement, was named Webbys person of the year. The awards, which honor internet excellence, were announced Tuesday and will be presented May 14 at a New York ceremony hosted by comedian Amber Ruffin. Winners from music include Jay-Z, Katy Perry and Lada Gaga. "Game of Thrones" won for best overall online presence, and the video game phenomenon Fortnite won for best multiplayer competitive game.

AMERICAN LEAGUE Toronto 000 002 002—4 6 1 Boston 001 012 02x—6 11 1 Gaviglio, Oh (7), Tepera (8) and Maile; Rodriguez, Barnes (7), Johnson (9), Kimbrel (9) and C.Vazquez. W_Rodriguez 6-1. L_Gaviglio 2-1. Sv_Kimbrel (18). HRs_Toronto, Hernandez (8). Boston, Nunez (4), Martinez (18). ___ Chicago 000 000 001—1 5 2 Cleveland 205 200 00x—9 13 0 Lopez, Volstad (3), Avilan (4), Rondon (5), Fry (6), N.Jones (7), Soria (8) and Narvaez; Kluber, Beliveau (7), Marshall (8), B.Taylor (9) and Gomes. W_Kluber 8-2. L_Lopez 1-4. HRs_Chicago, Sanchez (3). Cleveland, Ramirez (17), Encarnacion (13). ___ Houston 000 020 001—3 7 0 New York 100 022 00x—5 8 1 Keuchel, McHugh (6) and Stassi; L.Severino, Robertson (8), Chapman (9) and Romine. W_L.Severino 8-1. L_Keuchel 3-7. Sv_Chapman (12). HRs_Houston, Stassi (5). ___ INTERLEAGUE Washington 001 000 100—2 7 0 Baltimore 000 000 000—0 4 0 Scherzer, Doolittle (9) and P.Severino; Hess, Castro (7), Hart (8), Wright Jr. (9) and Sisco. W_Scherzer 9-1. L_Hess 2-2. Sv_Doolittle (13). HRs_Washington, Harper (18). ___ NATIONAL LEAGUE St. Louis 000 000 200—2 8 1 Milwaukee 000 010 20x—3 10 1 Reyes, Gant (5), Lyons (7), Tuivailala (7) and Kelly; Guerra, Jeffress (7), Hader (8), Knebel (9) and Kratz, Pina. W_Jeffress 5-0. L_Tuivailala 1-1. Sv_Knebel (5). HRs_St. Louis, Bader (5). Milwaukee, Yelich (7). ___ Cincinnati 000 402 001—7 12 0 Arizona 301 000 000—4 13 1 Romano, W.Peralta (6), Hughes (7), Garrett (7), Iglesias (8) and Barnhart; Corbin, Salas (7), Chafin (8), McFarland (9) and Murphy. W_Romano 3-6. L_Corbin 5-2. Sv_Iglesias (9). HRs_Cincinnati, Schebler (6), Duvall (10). Arizona, Goldschmidt (7), Murphy (7). ___ Chicago 100 000 000—1 9 1 Pittsburgh 110 000 00x—2 9 0 Hendricks, Rosario (6), Mazzoni (7), Wilson (7) and Contreras; Musgrove, Crick (8), F.Vazquez (9) and Cervelli. W_Musgrove 2-0. L_Hendricks 4-4. Sv_F.Vazquez (10). HRs_Pittsburgh, Harrison (2).

OXON HILL, Md. (AP) — The dramatic final rounds of the Scripps National Spelling Bee are set to begin. Forty-one spellers advanced to Thursday's finals out of a field of 516 — by far the largest in the 93-year history of the competition. Scripps started a wild-card program this year that created a path to nationals for spellers who didn't win their regional bees, and some of the finalists got to the bee that way. The past 13 champions and 18 of the last 22 have been Indian-American, and that trend could easily continue. Most of the consensus favorites in this year's bee have Indian heritage.

GENEVA (AP) — Swiss pharmaceuticals company Roche saw a modest 3 percent rise in its underlying profits last year, largely as a result of a strong performance in the United States. Roche, which does not break out its fourth-quarter results, also projected sales growth in the high single-digits in percentage points in 2018. The Basel-based company, which employs 94,000 worldwide, said core operating profit rose to 19.01 billion Swiss francs ($20.4 billion) in 2017, up from 18.42 billion francs a year earlier. Net profit fell 9 percent to 8.825 billion francs as a result of a series of charges. Roche said recently launched multiple sclerosis medicine Ocrevus, cancer immunotherapy Tecentriq and lung cancer treatment Alecensa contributed 1.4 billion francs in new sales, or nearly two-thirds of growth in the pharmaceuticals division.

EDITOR'S NOTE — Early on the morning of Jan. 31, 1968, as Vietnamese celebrated the Lunar New Year, or Tet as it is known locally, Communist forces launched a wave of coordinated surprise attacks across South Vietnam. The campaign — one of the largest of the Vietnam War — led to intense fighting and heavy casualties in cities and towns across the South. While battles raged for more than a month in some places like the city of Hue, the Tet Offensive was from a strictly military standpoint a defeat for the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong forces. Yet the campaign had a profound impact on the U.S. war effort, stunning leaders in Washington and leaving the American public questioning their country's involvement in the overseas campaign. Fifty years after their original publication, The Associated Press is making available four stories from Jan. 31, Feb. 2 and Feb. 21, 1968, written by AP journalists Peter Arnett, Edwin Q. White and John Lengel documenting the offensive. The package includes a Pulitzer Prize-winning photograph by the AP's Eddie Adams. ___ Jan. 31, 1968 By PETER ARNETT SAIGON (AP) — The Communists have paid with nearly 5,000 dead in their frenzied guerrilla strikes at Saigon and other major centers throughout South Vietnam this week, the U.S. Command said Thursday. A soaring general casualty toll was announced as the third day of the coordinated Communist campaign brought new clashes in outlying sections of Saigon and heavy action in other parts of the country. Some Viet Cong soldiers and agents were reported circulating openly in some crowded sections of Saigon, knocking on doors and telling occupants, "We have come to liberate Saigon." There were reports that the Communist National Liberation Front was claiming formation of a revolutionary council to run Saigon. Command spokesman said 4,959 enemy were killed in action from 6 p.m. Monday to midnight Wednesday. Another 1,862 persons were seized as Viet Cong suspects. U.S. casualties for the period were listed as 232 killed and 929 wounded. South Vietnamese government casualties were 300 killed and 747 wounded, a spokesman said. Other allied casualties were put at three killed and 22 wounded. South Vietnamese authorities said 660 Viet Cong were killed in Saigon alone in less than two days of fighting. There was no immediate word on the number of civilian casualties in the capital or elsewhere across the nation, but they were believed to have been heavy. Downtown Saigon was quiet early Thursday, but skirmishing continued in suburban areas, and bands of Viet Cong, some disguised in government uniforms, roamed the city. The Communists captured part of Hue, the old imperial capital 400 miles north of Saigon, and seized control of half of Kon Tum in the central highlands. Two other major cities along the coastline in the north, Nha Trang and Qui Nhon, came under fresh mortar attacks and ground probes. President Nguyen Van Thieu declared martial law throughout the nation in the wake of the Wednesday attacks against the U.S. embassy and military and civilian installations from Hue to the Mekong Delta. Traffic began to move on Saigon streets on Thursday, and some shops and offices cautiously opened their doors. Military and police patrols were heavy throughout the city, however, and streets were crisscrossed by barbed-wire barricades and checkpoints. During the morning Thursday, a Vietnamese police precinct station in Saigon's Chinese sector, Cholon, came under heavy attack, and sharp exchanges of fire were reported in areas of Gia Dinh, the province that surrounds Saigon. Troops and aircraft also swept parts of sprawling Tan Son Nhut air base on the edge of the capital, where heavy fighting occurred Wednesday. During the night, one spectacular clash took place in the old French national cemetery only about 12 blocks from downtown Saigon. Persons living in the area said roving bands of Viet Cong surged through, pounding on doors and trying to arouse residents. Government troops rushed in, and the Viet Cong slipped into the cemetery, where many heroes of Vietnam's wars are buried. Helicopter gunships were called in, and the cemetery and nearby residential streets were hit by rocket and machine-gun fire before the Viet Cong fled. There was no report on casualties from that clash. Similar incidents occurred in other areas of the capital. Small paper red, green and yellow Viet Cong flags were found fluttering in parts of the city at daylight Thursday. ___ Feb. 2, 1968 By EDWIN Q. WHITE SAIGON (AP) — Widespread, savage fighting ranged into the fifth day in key South Vietnamese cities Saturday. The U.S. Command reported 12,704 enemy had been killed since Monday evening in allied counterattacks that were said to be crushing the biggest Communist offensive of the war. Fresh fighting broke out in parts of Saigon, and masses of civilians were reported fleeing a battle in a northern suburb of the capital. At Hue, the old imperial capital far to the north, South Vietnamese forces reported capturing an airfield inside the city's walled citadel. The Communists launched heavy ground assaults on at least six provincial capitals and district towns in the rice-growing Mekong Delta below Saigon and in the provinces just north of the city. Enemy gunners hit the U.S. air base at Da Nang with 40 rocket rounds. Damage to the base and its planes were reported light. It was the third attack on the base in the last five days. The Viet Cong killed six American missionaries in the Central Highlands, a missionary organization announced. The U.S. Command said enemy fighters were killed at a rate of 124-plus per hour during the 102-hour period from 6 p.m. last Monday through Friday midnight, making the total 12,704. Allied forces also reported they detained 3,576 enemy suspects. A total 983 allied troops were killed in the 102-hour period, including 318 Americans and 661 South Vietnamese. Allied wounded totaled 3,483, of whom 1,639 were Americans and 1,792 South Vietnamese. While the Communists held parts of several cities and towns across the country, President Nguyen Van Thieu declared: "The back of the Viet Cong attack has been broken. We can consider they have been totally defeated." Thieu and U.S. Ambassador Ellsworth Bunker appeared on television Friday to tell the people that the guerillas and their North Vietnamese allies were being beaten with unprecedented losses. A battalion of South Vietnamese Rangers was reported moved into Saigon to reinforce security units. The U.S. Command reported heavy contact with the Viet Cong about daybreak Saturday in the Gia Dinh area on the northern edge of Saigon. It said the enemy was blocked by a South Vietnamese force on the northeast and a U.S. force on the southwest. The Viet Cong were said to be trying to escape past the South Vietnamese troops, some of them in small boats on the Saigon River. In the Chinese Cholon section of the capital, fighting broke out in front of a children's hospital. Cholon was hit by six Viet Cong mortar shells during the night. At Hue, a main gate of the citadel was reported wrested from Communist control. The U.S. Command said the enemy withdrew into the northern part of the old walled areas under repeated strafing and rocket raids by allied fighter-bombers. Among the targets of the allied planes were anti-aircraft guns the Communists had mounted on the towers of the citadel's outer wall. Earlier, the U.S. Command had reported that the enemy was holding onto two corners of the citadel. The allies reported killing more than 300 enemy in bitter fighting at Hue, Friday. One illustration of the tremendous property damage the Communist offensive has caused was a report from President Johnson on the toll of aircraft at American fields across Vietnam. He said 16 planes and 23 helicopters were destroyed and about 100 other planes so severely damaged that they would have to be replaced. The average cost of American warplanes is estimated at $2 million. ___ Feb. 2, 1968 By JOHN LENGEL HUE, VIETNAM (AP) — Four battalions of Communist troops control most of the streets of Hue, Vietnam's ancient imperial capital. They are resisting allied forces with machine guns, mortars and rockets. The enemy fire was so intense today that two U.S. helicopters attempting to run the gauntlet to collect wounded were shot down over the city. U.S. Marines and infantrymen and South Vietnamese troops are battling more to maintain their positions than to oust the enemy. The Viet Cong-North Vietnamese force deployed through the city holds a major part of the old walled Citadel, formerly the seat of kings but now a pile of ruins, and the headquarters of the South Vietnamese army's 1st Infantry Division. South Vietnamese troops hold a small part of the Citadel. The Americans are fighting from a half-block square compound that houses U.S. advisory headquarters. The city is now in its fourth day of virtual siege. Refugees have poured in, swelling the normal 40,000 population enormously. Civilian casualties are believed to be extremely high. The allies also control the bridge across the Perfume River that joins the city. The Communists burst upon Hue four days ago, and both the province chief, Lt. Col. Phan Van Khoa, and a senior American civilian adviser for pacification may be in enemy hands, Americans at this compound believe. A platoon of U.S. Marines fought its way to within sight of the American adviser's house three days ago, but Viet Cong soldiers were surrounding the building. American and South Vietnamese planes strafed and rocketed Communist positions in the heart of Hue today. There were reports they had been ordered not to drop bombs because of the civilians. At one point during the afternoon, American Marines and U.S. Army advisers were directing huge volumes of fire onto the street from this three-story building on the western edge of the town. They were trying to cover the dash of four armored trucks to evacuate wounded Americans at a boat ramp at the edge of the Perfume River. In addition to the senior pacification adviser, concern is also felt for nine other American civilians in the city. Some of the U.S. Marine companies have reportedly suffered heavy casualties. At least 10 Marines are known to have died, and another 108 have been wounded. There have been heavier casualties among the South Vietnamese troops, U.S. advisers say. No one really controls the city. There are islands of government resistance and islands of Viet Cong strength. The South Vietnamese battalions are fighting in the northwest portion of the city, where the old imperial Citadel is located. Viet Cong flags can be seen flying from some of the ancient battlements. The intense fire has ripped the branches from the trees and stripped the bark. The streets leading from the American compound are completely deserted and littered with debris. The roof has been blown off the high school across from the compound. The Viet Cong are thought to be in control of the province headquarters, the central market and the main hospital. "We had only one street, the street we were standing on," said Marine Lance Cpl. Dwight Foster of Marianna, Ark., after one foray. Foster and his platoon were caught in a big firefight and pulled back to the third floor of an old hotel which is part of the U.S. compound. It had previously been the non-commissioned officers club. Foster and his men peeked out of windows, fired at the Communists and ducked back. When a sniper appeared across the street, a tank opened up with a barrage of .50-caliber machine-gun fire. The scene was repeated all over the compound. ___ Feb. 21, 1968 By PETER ARNETT SAIGON (AP) — Suddenly, no place was safe. Saigon became as dangerous as the Ca Mau Peninsula. The idyllic resort of Da Lat in the central highlands became a prison for vacationers as 4th Vietnam suffered its bloodbath in the first days and nights of the lunar new year. Nearly 140,000 persons died in 10 days, official figures show — a bloodletting that must rank with the great slaughters of Vietnam's tortured 4,000-year history. The catalyst was a bold Communist attack on all the city strongholds below the 17th parallel. The resultant conflict has changed the pattern of the war. It emerged from the jungles, swamps and villages where it was fought for years, and came to the cities. Black-clad guerrillas who dwelt in the dark rain forests of the Communist war zone marched across broad paddy fields and unprotected hamlets into the capital itself. Turmoil and destruction invaded the homes of hundreds of thousands who thought they had escaped war's horrors in the security of the major towns. Two weeks of carnage indicated that all that had gone before might merely be the curtain raiser to the main event. The Communists swarmed over a metropolitan Vietnam that was sleeping off the happiest holiday of the year. Ironically, the allied high command was well aware that the Communists were on the move somewhere. Driblets of intelligence collected in all parts of the country indicated the drift of Communist units toward the cities. Little notice was taken. The euphoria of the lunar new year had overtaken everyone except the American field forces that clung tightly to their firebases in expectation of a lunar truce, and the Communists, who had no intention of observing the holidays or the truce. They struck while Saigon rocked to firecrackers and the revelries of Vietnamese holiday bacchanal. Jungle soldiers who had never worn shoes dug their toes into thonged rubber sandals to protect their feet against the hard city streets. Weapons and ammunition that had been surreptitiously buried inside coffins during mock funerals in previous weeks were dug up from city cemeteries. The Communist infrastructure, those hundreds of outwardly loyal citizens who comprise the hidden apparatus of the enemy, led to assembly points the troops they had concealed. The attacks were coordinated on a master plan. First, the sappers launched suicide assaults against the most important buildings. Then shock troops lashed at peripheral military installations. The battle was on — at Saigon, at My Tho, in the Delta, the Highlands, the Coastal Plains. The cities and towns not attacked in the first day were hit the second or third day. Death plucked at every layer of Vietnamese and American life. It sometimes came to those who panicked. A wealthy Chinese importer gunned his late-model French car through a Saigon intersection instead of heeding the stop whistle of a U.S. military policeman. He was shot dead by the nervous sentry. Two American employees of Pacific Architects and Engineering, Doyle V. Clark, 33, from Covina, Calif., and Billy C. Stein, Sacramento, Calif., both entomologists, leaped into their Jeep when fighting erupted near their home beside the Saigon gold course. Both were killed 20 yards from their gate. A neighbor, Mike Mealey, a young Californian, elected to stay under his bed for 29 hours. He survived. The communists sometimes picked their victims at random. At the Central Highlands city of Ban Me Thuot, they overran the Christian and Missionary Alliance and killed five American missionaries, three men and two women. Yet inside the city they occupied the home of a U.S. education specialist, Dr. Jane Ford, and let her live. They used her home as a command post. In the delta city of Chau Phu, the Viet Cong pushed half a dozen American nurses into the bathroom and locked them in for the 36 hours they held the houses. But in a nearby province, New Life hamlet specialist Hugh Lobit, a big, rangy Texan in his mid-30s, was gunned down in his favorite pacified village. Other foreigners just disappeared, like a reputed millionaire Australian who made his money in duck feathers, Keith Hyland, a trim, debonair 54, who visited his factory in the Chinese suburb of Cholon. He was captured by the Viet Cong and hasn't been seen since. Or civilian and official Mike Benge, from Heppner, Ore., an expert on Montagnard affairs, who disappeared into Viet Cong captivity in the Central Highlands. ___ The AP Corporate Archives contributed to this report.

NEWPORT BEACH, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Apr 24, 2018--PogoTec, Inc. (PogoTec™), an innovator in electronic wearables that attach to eyewear with a special focus on enhancing visual experiences, today unveiled the design of PogoAR™ – a unique approach to augmented reality. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180424005772/en/ Without (Photo: Business Wire) PogoAR is being developed as a first-of-its-kind binocular augmented reality (“AR”) system that works seamlessly with most existing eyewear styles to provide a convenient, fashionable and easily portable AR platform. PogoAR is being built with a proprietary binocular vision system, while maintaining the fashionable look when attached to eyewear. With PogoAR, eyewear (new and old) can be made AR-ready by attaching a small proprietary AR system to the top of the eyeglass frame. “There are 2.6 billion wearers of prescription eyewear in the world today and far more if non-prescription sunglasses are included and every year over 300M pair of new eyewear are sold,” said Brendan Sheil, PogoTec’s Chief Executive Officer. “PogoAR is a natural extension of PogoTec’s product strategy, enabling consumers with another innovative wearable device attachable to eyewear.” PogoTec combines its deep expertise in eyewear, electronics, vision and optics with patent-pending intellectual property to deliver a high-quality AR experience. PogoAR is being designed for the consumer and enterprise markets. The company recently announced the hiring of Svetlana Samoilova as Vice President of Augmented Reality (AR). Ms. Samoilova was previously Senior Director of Engineering of HoloLens at Microsoft where she was responsible for system integration of HoloLens, engineering of advanced and new technologies, early prototyping, HoloLens peripherals, firmware development and hardware design verification. Samoilova also spent more than eight years at Apple Inc. as Director of Mobile Devices of the iPod/iPhone division. “Augmented Reality is changing the way we see our world and the market for AR is growing significantly,” said Samoilova. “I’m excited to lead the team that is creating the first consumer friendly, lightweight and economical binocular AR system that is attachable to nearly all eyewear.” With PogoAR one or two SKUs can attach to the vast majority of eyeglass frame styles. PogoAR can work with clear prescription eyeglasses and non-prescription sunglasses. Multiple patent applications have been filed. PogoTec launched PogoCam™ – its first electronic wearable device attachable to eyewear – this past November. PogoCam is a small, lightweight, easily removable eyewear camera that captures photos and HD videos. PogoAR represents the company’s next exciting initiative, positioning itself uniquely in the anticipated $100B+, high-growth augmented reality marketplace. About PogoTec PogoTec™, Inc. is currently a privately-owned company incorporated in Delaware. PogoTec is an innovator in electronic wearables that attach to eyewear with a special focus on enhancing visual experiences. PogoTec’s product offerings consist of PogoCam: the small, light, and easily removable eyewear camera perfect for every lifestyle; PogoTrack: a proprietary attachment meant for attaching electronic wearable devices to eyewear while maintaining the fashion look of eyewear; and PogoLoop: a proprietary universal adapter which is attachable to virtually all eyewear. PogoTec is developing a breakthrough AR system attachable to most eyewear (new and old). PogoTec’s AR system is being designed for the consumer market and enterprise. PogoTec’s management team and Board of Directors have extensive experience in creating and commercializing innovation. PogoTec has been extremely diligent in protecting its intellectual property and has numerous patent applications filed around the world with multiple patents already granted and others anticipated shortly. This IP is broken into six comprehensive IP families. For more information about PogoTec, please visit www.PogoTec.com. View source version on businesswire.com:https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180424005772/en/ CONTACT: Ketchum Zito Deborah Kostroun, 201-403-8185 deborah.kostroun@ketchumzito.com KEYWORD: UNITED STATES NORTH AMERICA CALIFORNIA INDUSTRY KEYWORD: TECHNOLOGY CONSUMER ELECTRONICS HARDWARE AUDIO/VIDEO OTHER TECHNOLOGY HEALTH OPTICAL MOBILE/WIRELESS RETAIL SPECIALTY SOURCE: PogoTec, Inc. Copyright Business Wire 2018. PUB: 04/24/2018 09:00 AM/DISC: 04/24/2018 09:01 AM http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180424005772/en

BEIJING (AP) — A top Chinese diplomat sought Friday to allay concerns about his country's increasingly prominent activities in the Arctic, saying Beijing won't interfere in the interests of nations in the region. Vice Foreign Minister Kong Xuanyou (SHWEN'-yo) said China is interested in participating in scientific studies and the exploitation of new sea routes that have opened up with the receding of sea ice. The involvement and contributions of the Chinese government and companies would "bring opportunities to the Arctic," Kong said at a news conference called to introduce the government's first comprehensive report on its Arctic policy. "Regarding the role China will play in the Arctic affairs, I want to emphasize two points. One is that we will not interfere; second is that we will not to be absent," Kong said. "Not being an Arctic country, China will not interfere the affairs that are exclusive to the Arctic countries and inside Arctic region." China's presence in the Arctic has raised fears among some countries, mainly that it is seeking to grab resource-extraction opportunities resulting from climate change. It has established especially close relations with Iceland's support, with whose support it was granted observer status in 2013 at the Arctic Council, whose core members are Canada, Denmark, Finland, Sweden, Norway, Russia, the United States and Iceland. Iceland has granted the state-owned China National Offshore Oil Company permission to explore in Iceland's waters and is cooperating on an observatory to study the magnetic phenomena known as the Northern Lights. China also operates a research station in Norway. Suspicions about China's role in the region manifested themselves in 2011, Iceland blocked an attempt by a Chinese businessman a 300 square kilometer (120 square mile) chunk of its territory to build an eco-resort. Public sentiment ran strongly against the proposed deal, in part because no foreign buyer had ever bought so much land. Suspicion also lingered when the Aurora Observatory was announced for a sparsely populated region 250 miles (400 kilometers) northeast of Iceland's capital, Reykjavik. Pascal Heyman, a former official at the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, said in 2014 that the Chinese might want to use the equipment to keep an eye on NATO airspace.

WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) — The Kiribati government says a ferry that sank this month near the remote Pacific nation had been damaged and was ordered not to carry passengers before it sailed. Authorities say about 80 people are missing, although they haven't confirmed the exact number. A New Zealand military plane used its radar system to find seven survivors on a small wooden dinghy Sunday. Government spokesman Tearinibeia Enoo-Teabo said Wednesday that Kiribati maritime authorities had ordered the MV Butiraoi, a 17.5-metre (57-foot) wooden catamaran, not to carry any passengers because it was seriously damaged. It's unclear if the damage to the navigational system, rudders and hull had been repaired. He says investigators are going to the island to find out more about the passenger count and why the ferry left despite the orders.

NEW YORK (AP) — Fox News host Sean Hannity's Twitter account was compromised and was unavailable for a few hours on Saturday, inspiring speculation by his conservative followers that a government cabal they call the "deep state" or a rogue employee could be to blame. After Hannity's verified Twitter account posted a message that simply and cryptically said "Form Submission 1649," visitors said they were getting a "Sorry, that page doesn't exist" error message. By the time Hannity's account was back up later in the morning, speculation was rampant about the mysterious disappearance. Fox News referred questions to Twitter, which confirmed the account had been compromised. "While we normally do not discuss individual accounts, for privacy and security reasons, we have permission from the account owner to confirm that account was briefly compromised," Twitter said by email, without elaborating. Some Hannity followers blamed shadowy "deep state" government figures looking to take down Hannity, who's a big supporter of President Donald Trump. "The Deep State is in panic!" tweeted Alex Jones, a far-right radio show host. "Hannity disappears from Twitter after eerie tweet." WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange took to Twitter to observe how Hannity had his account "mysteriously disappear." Other users were rooting for the theory that a rogue Twitter employee was behind the deactivation. That was Twitter's explanation for an 11-minute outage that took down the Republican president's twitter account in November. At the time, Twitter blamed a customer support worker on his or her last day on the job and said it was implementing safeguards to prevent the situation from happening again.

NEW YORK (AP) — The Brooklyn Nets have hired former NBA player and Argentine guard Pablo Prigioni as an assistant coach. The Nets also announced Tuesday that former Spurs center Tiago Splitter was hired as a pro scout. Prigioni spent most of his professional career in Spain and won a bronze medal with Argentina in the 2008 Olympics before coming to the New York Knicks in 2012 as a 35-year-old rookie. He spent four years in the NBA with the Knicks, Rockets and Clippers. Splitter helped San Antonio win the 2014 NBA championship before spending the final two seasons of his seven-year career with Atlanta and Philadelphia. The Nets said Splitter, who also played for Brazil's national team, will have added duties related to player on-court development. ___ For more AP NBA coverage: https://apnews.com/tag/NBAbasketball

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Treasury Department just gave Republicans ammunition that their tax cuts would pay for themselves. But the one-page memo relies on a mathematical gimmick: It includes an assumption that tax cuts and other Trump administration policies would cause the economy to expand at a 2.9 percent annual pace over 10 years. Economic growth at that level would, in theory, be enough to keep the national debt from rising. But most analyses have concluded that the Senate tax overhaul would add at least $1 trillion to budget deficits in the next decade because the analyses foresee significantly less growth resulting from the tax cuts. The Treasury Department report enables President Donald Trump to claim that the Senate tax overhaul would pay for itself, even though outside analyses show otherwise. When the same report tries to estimate how much growth the tax cuts would actually produce, it also finds that the national debt would likely increase by at least $1 trillion during the next decade. Many economists and tax experts were quick to dismiss the Treasury memo. "It's a joke," David Kamin, a law professor at New York University and former economic policy aide in the Obama White House, said on Twitter. Sen. Ron Wyden, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, said, "It's no more than a thinly veiled attempt by the Trump administration to cover up an economic agenda that showers corporations with goodies while taking money and health care away from those who need it most." Most economic analyses — including one by Congress' Joint Committee on Taxation — assume that the tax cuts would cause the debt to rise significantly because the cuts would fail to deliver significantly faster growth. An analysis of the Senate plan released Monday by the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center found that even after factoring in additional economic growth, deficits would rise by $1.5 trillion over the next 10 years when including the additional interest costs. A separate analysis by the Penn Wharton Budget Model found a similarly sized increase in budget deficits. None of the top academic economists surveyed by the University of Chicago said the tax cuts would likely generate enough growth to pay for themselves. The Treasury Department report, though, might provide a tool for Republican lawmakers to sell to a skeptical public tax cuts that largely help corporations and the wealthy. Both Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and House Speaker Paul Ryan have said that the tax cuts wouldn't add to budget deficits.

PODGORICA, Montenegro (AP) — Montenegrin lawmakers have voted to lift the immunity of two senior opposition politicians allegedly involved in a pro-Russian plot to overthrow the government over its NATO bid. The move paves the way for the detention of Andrija Mandic and Milan Knezevic, key opposition leaders suspected in the Oct. 16 coup attempt that included plans to kill a then-prime minister and take over power. Several hundred opposition supporters protested outside the parliament building on Wednesday as lawmakers from the ruling coalition unanimously approved the motion. Montenegro's special prosecutor said the two are suspected of criminal conspiracy and inciting "acts against constitutional order and security of Montenegro." Some 20 people — including two Russian citizens — have been accused in the foiled coup said to be orchestrated by Russian and Serbian nationalists.

Excerpts from recent editorials in the United States and abroad: ___ Jan. 31 The Boston Herald on U.S. Rep. Joe Kennedy's Democratic rebuttal to the State of the Union: Democratic leaders chose wisely to pass last night's torch to a new generation — and to a Kennedy, no less. And while U.S. Rep. Joe Kennedy's Democratic rebuttal to the State of the Union, delivered from the Diman Regional Technical School in Fall River, contained a good many of the false choices such speeches are prone to, it also struck a tone his party would be wise to emulate. "We all feel the fault lines of a fractured country," Kennedy said "We hear the voices of Americans who feel forgotten and forsaken." It was a message certainly not delivered by the party's presidential nominee in 2016 — and wasn't that the problem? But the speech was more. And it was more than a whacking around of the president, although it surely was that too. It was a celebration of the American way of life and of the newly found activism of the past year. "You fight your own quiet battles every single day," Kennedy said. "You serve, you rescue, you help, you heal. That — more than any law or leader, any debate or disagreement — that is what drives us toward progress." It's also what wins elections — if only the gerontocracy that is the Democratic congressional leadership would step aside and allow a new generation to take charge. Online: http://www.bostonherald.com/ ___ Jan. 31 Los Angeles Times on Berkshire Hathaway, Amazon and JPMorgan Chase forming a company to address health care costs for their U.S. employees: Berkshire Hathaway Chairman Warren Buffett is known as a "value" investor — someone who buys into companies that are selling for less than they're really worth. When his company provides its workers health care benefits, however, Buffett isn't paying for value. Instead, employers like Berkshire, which owns a diverse portfolio of financial and industrial companies, are paying ever-higher amounts for their workers' policies and getting less coverage in return. That problem helped drive Berkshire Hathaway to announce plans Tuesday to join forces with online retail giant Amazon and Wall Street powerhouse JPMorgan Chase & Co. to create an independent venture that aims to reduce their health care costs while improving employee satisfaction. Notably, they said the new company will be "free from profit-making incentives and constraints." What this new company will do, though, is anybody's guess. "Our group does not come to this problem with answers," Buffett conceded. Nevertheless, it's a welcome signal that companies are finally trying to rein in the rising cost of health care, rather than simply passing more of the pain on to their employees. For a country that spends so much on health — Milken Institute health care economist Hugh Waters pegged it at $3.3 trillion in 2016, or $10,348 per person — we've managed to do surprisingly little about rising costs besides complain. Fears of rationing care keep federal and state governments from responding aggressively to higher drug and treatment costs, and a whole host of factors have led millions of Americans to fall into the trap of costly and preventable chronic illnesses, such as diabetes. With more than 1.2 million employees worldwide combined, Amazon, Berkshire and JPMorgan Chase have the kind of bargaining power that could make a dent in what their workers are spending on hospitals, prescription drugs and outpatient care. But let's be realistic. Even employers this large don't have a lot of leverage over the sole manufacturer of a blockbuster drug, or the only obstetrician in a rural county, or the dominant hospital chain in a region. That's why the other aspect of the companies' effort — using technology to help employees better manage and obtain care — may be more promising. Because part of the solution is to reduce the demand for care by helping Americans stay healthier, and to increase competition by helping people shop more intelligently for health care services. The latter is extremely hard today, given the complexity and opacity in health care pricing. If these companies struck a blow for transparency in that area, we'd all be better off. Amazon already sells plenty of medical devices and fitness products, and it's reportedly looking to compete with local pharmacies for the retail sale of prescription drugs. If this new effort helps Amazon's more than 540,000 employees stay healthier and find high-quality, lower-priced services, it could ultimately offer consumers something better than step trackers and Ace bandages. But we won't know until we see the answers the three companies and their new venture eventually have to offer. Online: http://www.latimes.com ___ Jan. 30 The Washington Post on "#ReleaseTheMemo": Far Be it from us to oppose the disclosure of sensitive government information, subject to appropriate, and appropriately limited, national security considerations. Sunlight can indeed be the best disinfectant. Yet no one should confuse the House Intelligence Committee's decision to release a much-ballyhooed "memo," written by Republican staff and purportedly describing malfeasance at the Justice Department and Federal Bureau of Investigation, with a good-faith exercise in legislative oversight. This looks instead like a mischievous attempt to discredit the institutions responsible for assisting special counsel Robert S. Mueller III's investigation of Russia's interference in the 2016 election and any connection Donald Trump's campaign might have had to it. Promoted by the actions of committee Chairman Devin Nunes (R-Calif.), the "#ReleaseTheMemo" campaign is not just partisan but hyperpartisan, a pet cause of GOP House ultras and their media cheering section that appalls more sober Republicans in the Senate and executive-branch agencies. No doubt there is cause for legitimate concern in the politically tinged text messages exchanged by now-sidelined FBI official Peter Strzok and FBI lawyer Lisa Page, who, in conducting an extramarital affair, discussed both that and their worries that Mr. Trump might win in 2016, in writing. There might similarly be cause for concern if the Justice Department unduly relied on dubious, Democrat-funded sources in its request for a warrant to conduct surveillance on Carter Page, a Trump campaign official whose murky ties to Russia aroused suspicion in intelligence circles in the United States and abroad. These are said to be the issues raised in the now-notorious memo — though for all we know, the actual accusations, if and when we finally see them, may prove to be overblown, not "shocking," as Republican House members claim. The committee's Republican majority has denied Democrats a chance to publish their competing take on the intelligence simultaneously with the GOP version of events, which does not inspire confidence in the objectivity of the latter. The way for Congress to investigate all of this should have been aggressively but soberly, seeking cooperation from the agencies involved and maintaining a bipartisan spirit on the committee. Instead, Mr. Nunes has maximized the hullabaloo surrounding the events in a manner plainly calculated to inflame public opinion. The release of the memo, in fact, constitutes the apparent first-ever exercise of the Intelligence Committee's declassification authority concerning such documents. And the GOP majority acted in the face of a Justice Department official's warning that release of the material "would be extraordinarily reckless" in terms of potential harm to intelligence-gathering, unless the department and FBI had an opportunity to review it in advance. Damage is also being done to the political independence, real and perceived, of federal law enforcement. House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) might have called a halt to this, but instead on Tuesday he chose to enable it, endorsing the release of the memo while feebly insisting that it is "completely separate" from Mr. Mueller's inquiry. Now the White House has less than five days to object to the release of the memo or approve it, which means that the last check against any possible abuse of this process will be the good judgment of President Trump. Online: https://www.washingtonpost.com/ ___ Jan. 31 The New York Times on the university where Larry Nassar worked: Larry Nassar had a day of reckoning last week for his years of molesting young gymnasts and other athletes, and he will spend the rest of his life in prison. But the leaders of Michigan State University, where he worked, have yet to take full responsibility for their failures to protect those girls, or to even learn what went wrong and regain the trust of the public. To ensure real accountability, the university's board of trustees, who pick the university's president, oversee its administration and set policy, should resign to make way for new leadership unencumbered by the Nassar scandal and the recent report by ESPN that the university concealed allegations of sexual violence by members of its prized football and basketball programs. If the trustees refuse to do so, Michigan's governor, Rick Snyder, and its Legislature ought to remove them. For about two decades, university officials — administrators, coaches, trainers, even police officers — either dismissed or silenced Dr. Nassar's victims, allowing him to abuse several generations of athletes at the university and U.S.A. Gymnastics. When one victim filed a complaint with M.S.U. in 2014, the inquiry said his action was medically appropriate. So officials continued to let him treat young women, even while campus police followed up on the complaint. Separately, ESPN quoted a former sexual-assault counselor at Michigan State who described a pattern of disturbing behavior in which senior university officials hid information about sexual-assault complaints against student-athletes and protected them from punishment. What is particularly distressing about all of this is that Michigan State's leaders seem to have learned little from the abysmal response by universities like Penn State and Baylor to reports of sexual abuse in sports programs. Its eight trustees stood behind its embattled president, Lou Anna Simon — who was aware of the 2014 complaint — until just before her resignation last week. She was embattled because she did not appear to take the Nassar scandal seriously and seemed callous toward the victims. Even her resignation letter struck a tone of defensiveness. "As tragedies are politicized, blame is inevitable," she wrote. The board's vice chairman, Joel Ferguson, defended Ms. Simon on a radio show last week by arguing, among other things, that she was a great fund-raiser and "there's so many more things going on at the university than just this Nassar thing." The university resisted commissioning an independent investigation and gave the public the impression that it had hired Patrick Fitzgerald, a respected former United States attorney, to run one. It turned out that Mr. Fitzgerald was representing, not investigating, the school. Belatedly, on Friday, the board said it would "bring in an independent third party to perform a top-to-bottom review of all our processes relating to health and safety." But the term "health and safety" suggests that this inquiry may not be as comprehensive as the one Penn State commissioned from Louis Freeh, the former F.B.I. director, after the university failed to stop the abuse of boys by Jerry Sandusky, the assistant football coach. Michigan State's board on Wednesday appointed John Engler, a former Republican governor, as interim president. Many faculty members and students, angered at not being consulted, opposed the move, and some disrupted a board meeting where the decision was made. The first thing the board ought to do is commission a thorough and impartial investigation by someone of Mr. Freeh's stature. The university cannot outsource its responsibility to the state attorney general, the federal Department of Education and the National Collegiate Athletic Association — all of which have said they are investigating the university. While the state attorney general can bring criminal charges and the Education Department and N.C.A.A. can demand policy changes, only Michigan State's leaders can make far-reaching changes to the university's culture and practices. University trustees, who are elected to staggered eight-year terms, have no credibility to help the university regain trust. Mr. Snyder could remove the trustees by conducting a public inquiry, and the Legislature could do so after impeachment proceedings. Both could take months. The two trustees who are up for re-election this year have said they will not run again, but all of them should leave. Many young Americans probably cannot remember a time when sports did not play an outsized role in campus life and university administration. But the federal and state governments created Michigan State, Penn State and other land grant universities more than a century ago to extend higher education to more Americans. Now more than ever, the leaders of these universities need to place that core mission at the top of their priority list, above winning championships and signing lucrative TV contracts. Online: https://www.nytimes.com/ ___ Jan. 27 The News & Observer of Raleigh, North Carolina on Democrats and gerrymandering: The term "gerrymander" arose from an 1812 Massachusetts state Senate district so convoluted for partisan advantage that a cartoonist depicted it as a salamander. Since the mapmaking was done under the control of Gov. Elbridge Gerry, the new political creature was labeled a gerrymander. Two centuries later, it's clear the artist saw the outline of the wrong reptile. For what politically contorted districts really resemble is a chameleon. When the party in power shifts, the districts change color. Republicans and Democrats alike decry gerrymandering when they are in the minority and then impose it with gusto once they regain control. The phenomenon has recently been intensified by advances in computer-assisted mapmaking and Republican willingness to stretch the tactic to the verge of creating a one-party state. This aggressive gerrymandering has fed political polarization at the federal and state level, contributing to gridlock and a loss of public confidence in the democratic process. But now there are signs that the excess may bring an end to politicians picking their voters. Federal courts in Wisconsin, North Carolina and Maryland and the state Supreme Court in Pennsylvania have all found partisan gerrymandering a violation of constitutional rights. Ultimately, the U.S. Supreme Court will have to decide the legality, but it's encouraging that the high court even is considering it. Traditionally, gerrymandering was considered a spoil of political victory and perfectly legal unless it violated the civil rights of minorities. Now gerrymandering in any form is coming under legal scrutiny. While politicians on both sides await the outcome of the legal challenges, it is not too early for Democrats in North Carolina to commit to ending gerrymandering here. Republicans, who enjoy veto-proof majorities in both legislative chambers and dominate the state's congressional delegation 10 to 3, won't give up the redistricting power that supports their advantage. It's up to Democrats to pledge now that they will support an end to gerrymandering should they regain the majority. North Carolina State Sen. Jeff Jackson, a Charlotte Democrat, has moved in that direction by proposing an amendment to the state Constitution that would establish an independent redistricting commission. Republicans, however, dismiss the proposal because it allows the governor an appointment that could tilt the commission in his party's favor. Since Gov. Roy Cooper is a Democrat, as most North Carolina governors have been, some Republican lawmakers are scoffing at the idea. The Republican skepticism is understandable. Any commission that includes a partisan advantage defeats the purpose of such a commission. The key is to create a commission in which partisanship is balanced and softened by the inclusion of nonpartisan members. In California, for instance, the 14-member Citizen Redistricting Commission consists of five Republicans, five Democrats and four commissioners of neither major party. One better approach to redistricting is found in Iowa, where partisanship has been drained out of the process almost entirely. Iowa's legislative and congressional districts are drawn by a nonpartisan state agency without regard to voter registration data or previous election results. The legislature has up to three opportunities to approve the districts. If it fails, the state Supreme Court decides, but since the nonpartisan approach was adopted in 1980 the legislature has always approved the maps. Jackson is willing to try whatever improves North Carolina's contentious and unfair approach, an approach that has triggered 16 legal challenges since 2000, according the N.C. League of Women Voters. "I'm open to any ideas - so long as we finally end the corruption of gerrymandering on which both parties have relied," Jackson said. His Democratic colleagues should share his open commitment to finding a better way. Wayne Goodwin, head of the N.C. Democratic Party, should push to have nonpartisan redistricting as part of the party's platform and make candidates pledge to support it as a condition of party support. Given the direction of the political tides - and court rulings potentially forcing less gerrymandered maps - Democrats may win control of the legislature before the next redistricting in 2021. But it will be a loss for everyone if under Democratic control the gerrymander, chameleon-like, turns blue. Online: http://www.newsobserver.com ___ Jan. 31 The Telegraph of London on President Donald Trump's first State of the Union address: For a president who enjoys confrontation, Donald Trump's first state of the union address was unusually emollient and conciliatory. After a year in office, he seems ready to try to generate some of the plaudits he feels should be forthcoming for the country's economic success. In truth, much of the increase in employment dates from before he became president but the art of politics is to claim credit even when it is not fully deserved. Still, Mr. Trump's tone and demeanour were noticeably different in the Capitol on Monday night, as though he was making a deliberate, almost Herculean, effort to be nice. It could all be undone with a moment's tweeting, of course; but if the president really is serious about mending the deep societal divisions in America, which he personifies, then he should surely be encouraged in that endeavour. As was noted by observers, his speech contained less about himself than any other he has made. He used the word "we" 130 times and "I'' just nine. For Trump watchers who see him as an egomaniac this must have come as a shock. For Democrats whose recovery relies upon exploiting the deep antipathy to the president among a section of the population, it must have been alarming. Mr. Trump shored up his base by promising to keep open Guantánamo Bay (which Barack Obama failed to close after eight years) and reaffirming his pledge to crack down on immigration. But he showed a willingness to pivot to the centre, easier now Steve Bannon, his former chief strategist, has left the White House. With midterm elections later this year, Mr. Trump is playing a better political game than his detractors expected. Online: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/

LONDON (AP) — London fire commissioner says the edges of high-rise building in inferno not safe.

President Donald Trump's call for unity in his first State of the Union address struck an us-versus-them tone for many minorities. For many people of color, Trump's address before Congress hardly reflected a shift in his ideology, or his bruising style of governance. It was not lost on them that the president simply softened the way he said what he's been saying all along, and sought to add a veneer of tolerance by using the stories of several people of color to illustrate his points. The speech was a reminder for some of Trump's fraught record on race as president, though he has denied accusations that he is a racist. Democratic Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey says Trump "isn't doing anything real to bring us together."

ALEXANDRIA, Va. (AP) — The first law enforcement officer in the U.S. ever to be charged with a terrorism offense is again scheduled for trial. Jury selection begins Monday afternoon in federal court in Alexandria, Virginia, in the case against Nicholas Young, who was a police officer in the region's Metro system when he was arrested last year in a government sting. Prosecutors say Young bought nearly $250 in gift cards he intended for the Islamic State group, giving the cards to an individual who turned out to be an FBI source. Young's lawyers say the sting amounts to entrapment after their client was under surveillance for six years. Documents show Young had been under surveillance since 2010. The trial had been expected to begin last week but was delayed when new evidence emerged.

SEOUL, South Korea--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Apr 24, 2018--Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd., the world leader in advanced memory technology, today announced that it has begun mass producing 10-nanometer (nm)-class* 16-gigabit (Gb) LPDDR4X DRAM for automobiles. The latest LPDDR4X features high performance and energy efficiency while significantly raising the thermal endurance level for automotive applications that often need to operate in extreme environments. The 10nm-class DRAM will also enable the industry’s fastest automotive DRAM-based LPDDR4X interface with the highest density. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180424006733/en/ Samsung 10nm-class 16Gb LPDDR4X DRAM for Automobiles (Photo: Business Wire) “The 16Gb LPDDR4X DRAM is our most advanced automotive solution yet, offering global automakers outstanding reliability, endurance, speed, capacity and energy efficiency,” said Sewon Chun, senior vice president of memory marketing at Samsung Electronics. “Samsung will continue to closely collaborate with manufacturers developing diverse automotive systems, in delivering premium memory solutions anywhere.” Moving a step beyond its 20nm-class ‘Automotive Grade 2’ DRAM, which can withstand temperatures from -40°C to 105°C, Samsung’s 16Gb LPDDR4X is Automotive Grade 1-compliant, raising the high-end threshold to 125°C. By more than satisfying the rigorous on-system thermal cycling tests of global auto manufacturers, the 16Gb LPDDR4X has enhanced its reliability for a wide variety of automotive applications in many of the world’s most challenging environments. Adding to the degree of reliability under high temperatures, production at an advanced 10nm-class node is key to enabling the 16Gb LPDDR4X to deliver its leading-edge performance and power efficiency. Even in environments with extremely high temperatures of up to 125°C, its data processing speed comes in at 4,266 megabits per second (Mbps), a 14 percent increase from the 8Gb LPDDR4 DRAM that is based on 20nm process technology, and the new memory also registers a 30 percent increase in power efficiency. Along with a 256 gigabyte (GB) embedded Universal Flash Storage (eUFS) drive announced in February, Samsung has expanded its advanced memory solution lineup for future automotive applications with the 10nm-class 16Gb LPDDR4X DRAM, commercially available in 12Gb, 16Gb, 24Gb and 32Gb capacities. While extending its 10nm-class DRAM offerings, the company also plans on bolstering technology partnerships for automotive solutions that include vision ADAS (Advanced Driver Assistance Systems), autonomous driving, infotainment systems and gateways. About Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. Samsung inspires the world and shapes the future with transformative ideas and technologies. The company is redefining the worlds of TVs, smartphones, wearable devices, tablets, digital appliances, network systems, and memory, system LSI, foundry and LED solutions. For the latest news, please visit the Samsung Newsroom at http://news.samsung.com. *Editor’s Note: 10nm-class is a process node between 10 and 19 nanometers View source version on businesswire.com:https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180424006733/en/ CONTACT: for Samsung Semiconductor, Inc. John E. Lucas, APR, 925-872-2287 j.lucas@partner.samsung.com KEYWORD: UNITED STATES ASIA PACIFIC NORTH AMERICA CALIFORNIA SOUTH KOREA INDUSTRY KEYWORD: TECHNOLOGY CONSUMER ELECTRONICS DATA MANAGEMENT ELECTRONIC DESIGN AUTOMATION HARDWARE INTERNET NANOTECHNOLOGY SEMICONDUCTOR MOBILE/WIRELESS AUTOMOTIVE PERFORMANCE & SPECIAL INTEREST GENERAL AUTOMOTIVE SOURCE: Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. Copyright Business Wire 2018. PUB: 04/24/2018 10:00 PM/DISC: 04/24/2018 10:00 PM http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180424006733/en

LONDON (AP) — With smoke still swirling around the charred remains of Grenfell Tower in west London, residents and community leaders demanded to know Wednesday how a ferocious fire could have swept through the high-rise apartment block with such speed that it killed at least 12 people. The anger was particularly strong since activists had warned just seven months ago that fire safety procedures were so lax that only a catastrophic blaze would bring the scrutiny needed to make the building safe. WHAT HAPPENED? Fire and police officials have not specified what went wrong, but extensive video footage shows the flames climbing the exterior of the building at a remarkable pace. "I've never seen a fire like that in my life," said Joe Ruane, the former deputy chief fire officer for U.S. Air Force bases in Britain. "I've never seen that in a residential block." The 24-story public housing complex is owned by the local government council in the borough of Kensington and Chelsea and was completed in the 1970s. It is managed by the Kensington and Chelsea Tenant Management Organization, which spent 10 million pounds ($12.8 million) refurbishing the building over the last two years. The renovation project included installation of insulated exterior cladding, double-glazed windows and a communal heating system. Investigators need to look at what materials were used in the project and who approved their use, Ruane said. But he said the speed with which the fire spread suggests that more than one fire protection safeguard failed. "It's not just one thing," Ruane said. "It's multiple issues." WHAT WAS THE FIRE PROCEDURE AT THE BUILDING? Some residents suggested that Grenfell Tower's policies were to blame for the disaster. A newsletter put out by the building's tenant organization told tenants to follow a "stay put" policy and remain in their apartments during a fire unless the blaze was inside their apartment or in their hallway or until they were told to evacuate by officials. This policy is in place "because Grenfell was designed according to rigorous fire-safety standards," according to the 2014 newsletter about the renovation project. New front doors in each apartment could withstand a fire for up to 30 minutes, "which gives plenty of time for the fire brigade to arrive," the newsletter said. That policy, often followed in high-rise hotels, may be effective in lesser fires. In this case, however, the fire seemed to climb the exterior of the tower so quickly that it overwhelmed protective systems like fire doors. People who initially remained in place may have been unable to escape later because the hallways and fire escapes were filled with heavy smoke and flames. The London Fire Brigade said crews were on the scene within six minutes of the first reports of the fire, but they were unable to reach people on higher floors to prevent fatalities. WHO IS TO BLAME? While investigations are underway to determine what went wrong, tenants said repeated complaints were ignored. Survivor Edward Daffarn said the Kensington and Chelsea Tenant Management Organization, or KCTMO, which manages the Grenfell Tower as well as other buildings in the area, is responsible because it ignored numerous warnings. The management organization's annual accounts for the year ending March 31, 2016, indicate that the company has been cited for fire-safety issues in the past. Following an October 2015 arson fire at one of the buildings it manages, the 14-story Adair Tower, the London Fire Brigade issued an enforcement notice to install self-closing devices on the front doors of all 78 apartments and to improve fire safety in staircases used for escape, the organization said in the report. The Fire Brigade issued a similar notice for another KCTMO-managed building, Hazelwood Tower. The upgrades were scheduled to be completed by 2016, the report said. The Grenfell Tower disaster is uncomfortably similar to a fast-moving blaze at another London-area public housing project, Lakanal House, that killed six people, including three children, eight years ago. In that July 2009 fire, smoke and flames quickly engulfed the 14-story building. A coroner's inquest found that a series of failures contributed to the loss of life and made a number of recommendations to help prevent future disasters. Investigators probing the Grenfell Tower fire will have to look at which of those recommendations were implemented in the building and which were not, said Jim Fitzpatrick, a former firefighter who now serves in the House of Commons. "These will be matters for the scientists and the engineers ... to find out exactly how the fire started, why it spread so quickly and what could have been done to prevent it," Fitzpatrick told Sky News. A local community organization, the Grenfell Action Group, had warned about fire dangers at the building since 2013. In a series of blog posts, the group raised concerns about testing and maintenance of fire-fighting equipment and blocked emergency access to the site. "All our warnings fell on deaf ears, and we predicted that a catastrophe like this was inevitable and just a matter of time," the group said in a blog post Wednesday. KCTMO said it is cooperating with investigators and that it was aware of tenant complaints. "We always take all concerns seriously and these will form part of our forthcoming investigations," it said in a statement. The Kensington and Chelsea Council promised a full investigation into Wednesday's tragedy and a public accounting. The UK government also ordered checks at tower blocks that have had or are going through similar renovations as those at Grenfell Tower.

WASHINGTON (AP) — A top Republican congressman, members of the U.S. Capitol Police, a congressional aide and a lobbyist were injured when a gunman opened fire at a baseball practice. The assailant later died after the incident. — Rep. Steve Scalise, R-La., House Majority Whip and third in leadership. Elected in 2008, he represents a district in Louisiana that includes New Orleans suburbs and the southwest part of the state. — Matt Mika, former aide to Rep. Tim Walberg, R-Mich., who said Mika is a graduate of Adrian College and a former baseball player who worked as a volunteer at Wednesday's practice to help the congressional team get ready for the game. His family released a statement saying paramedics told them Mika was shot multiple times and is in critical condition. Mika is director of government relations for Tyson Foods Washington, D.C., office and has worked for the company for more than six years. — Zachary Barth, legislative aide for Republican Rep. Roger Williams of Texas. Williams says Barth is doing well and is expected to make a full recovery. — Special Agents David Bailey and Crystal Griner, members of the U.S. Capitol Police whose actions Speaker Paul Ryan credited with saving lives. The shooter in the attack has been identified as James. T. Hodgkinson, a resident of Illinois. After an exchange of gunfire with police, the shooter died.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The man who shot a congressman and four other people had apparently volunteered for Bernie Sanders' 2016 presidential campaign, the Vermont senator said before assailing violence as "unacceptable in our society." "I am sickened by this despicable act," Sanders said Wednesday. Sanders, 75, unsuccessfully sought the Democratic nomination against Hillary Clinton. Sanders, an independent, ran a passionate, anti-establishment campaign that won support from many younger, liberal voters and gave Clinton a closer race than many expected, but he eventually backed her candidacy. The senator spoke hours after a man identified as James T. Hodgkinson of Belleville, Illinois, opened fire on Republican lawmakers, aides and others practicing baseball in suburban Alexandria, Virginia. Officers shot Hodgkinson, who later died. Sanders issued a two-paragraph statement on the shooting and read it nearly verbatim on the Senate floor. He ignored a reporter's attempt to ask him questions, walking briskly out of the Capitol after a vote. "Violence of any kind is unacceptable in our society, and I condemn this action in the strongest possible terms," Sanders said. "Real change can only come about through nonviolent action, and anything else runs against our most deeply held American values." Robert Becker, director of Sanders' Iowa campaign, said staff workers could not recall Hodgkinson. Hodgkinson was said to have been among 1,000 volunteers around Davenport, but Becker said, "Nobody has a recollection of this guy coming in." Conservatives immediately seized on Hodgkinson's support for Sanders, with commentator Ann Coulter, a frequent voice on conservative cable news and talk radio, describing the gunman as "some nut Bernie Sanders supporter." Other conservatives praised Sanders for not using his time on the Senate floor to call for tougher gun restrictions. Unlike some liberals, Sanders has a complicated record on guns. Sanders has opposed some gun restrictions, including the Brady Bill requiring background checks for individuals buying firearms. Clinton criticized Sanders on the issue as her husband, Bill Clinton, signed the bill in 1993. The issue played well for Clinton with liberals, particularly African-American voters who ultimately tilted the nomination to her. Sanders defended his record on gun restrictions, arguing that residents of the more rural states like Vermont view guns differently than many urban voters. Mark Longabaugh, who worked on Sanders' presidential campaign, said the senator struck the right tone in his comments after the shooting, avoiding finger-pointing and not arguing for any legislative action. "I think it's a sad state of affairs for people to exploit a tragedy like this for their own political ends," he said. ___ Barrow reported from Atlanta.

SAN DIEGO (AP) — Nick Faldo wanted his "Faldo Series" to have a global reach, and he thought he achieved that last year when he took four juniors from his program to South Africa to play against four juniors from the Ernie Els & Fancourt Foundation. Turns out that was just the start. One year later, he is in the final stages of the "Major Champions Invitational," which will have close to 20 teams represented by major champions. Each team will have two boys and two girls from their junior programs, each wearing team colors with their champions' name on the side of the sleeve. It is scheduled for March 12-14 at Bella Collina, not far from Orlando, Florida, where the Arnold Palmer Invitational is being played. Jordan Spieth, Henrik Stenson, Adam Scott and Rory McIlroy are among those who will be sending juniors, along with Annika Sorenstam and Justin Rose. The Seve Ballesteros Foundation is supporting a team representing the great Spaniard, while Southern Company will have a team in honor of the late Payne Stewart. Faldo ran into McIlroy last year in South Africa during the early stages of planning. He said McIlroy asked him the age limit, and Faldo told him it likely would be between 16 and 21. "He said, 'I've got a really good 15-year-old.' And I said, 'Guess what? The age limit is now 15,'" Faldo said. "The bottom line is they have a player they think should be there, then they should be invited." Faldo said the players in town for Bay Hill likely will come by for the 54-hole event that ends on Wednesday, or at least for a dinner. He said Stenson has agreed to do a clinic, and Sorenstam and Scott also have offered help. "The idea is there's no heavy lifting," Faldo said. He said the tournament will offer world amateur ranking points. "What I think is cool is we all do our bit for communities in our areas of the world," Faldo said. "This is a carrot of the kids. 'Hey, you impress me, we've got this event going on.' Our goal in one year is we get this established. We will have hand-picked some of the best amateurs in the world." Faldo said the ultimate goal is for the participants to make a name for themselves down the road. He referenced Hideki Matsuyama, who twice won the Asia Pacific Amateur, which awards a spot in the Masters. Matsuyama made the cut both times he played as an amateur. "That gets on the radar very quickly," he said. A one-hour show of the tournament will be broadcast on Aug. 11, on CBS Sports, preceding coverage of the PGA Championship. ___ BAD TIMING: Golf has a short history of having a large audience fall into its lap only for the product to be far from appealing. The most recent example was the Farmers Insurance Open. The final round at Torrey Pines was supposed to go off the air at 6:30 p.m. EST, a half-hour before the Grammys on CBS. The round took longer, mainly because of 25 mph Santa Ana wind; C.T. Pan having to go back to the tee twice on the par-3 third hole because of a tee shot into the hazard (he was two shots behind and made 8); and the final threesome hitting it off the map, which required rulings and drops on the 14th hole. That set the stage for J.B. Holmes, who likely will be remembered more for taking 4 minutes to make a decision in the 18th fairway than for his four PGA Tour victories or the two winning Ryder Cup teams on which he played. Torn between a 3-wood (too much) and a 5-wood (not enough) to get over the water for a chance at eagle to get into a playoff, viewers tuning in ahead of the Grammys saw Holmes stand at his bag and do nothing. And then he laid up. It wasn't a good look. It was reminiscent of the final round of the 2005 U.S. Women's Open, the only compelling sporting event on TV that Sunday with three teens in contention — Michelle Wie (15), Morgan Pressel (17) and Paula Creamer (18). The rough was so nasty at Cherry Hills that Wie shot 82 and Creamer shot 79. Lorena Ochoa duck-hooked her tee shot into the water on 18. Pressel shot 75 and had to watch from the 18th fairway as Birdie Kim holed a bunker shot to win. Go back a little further. Ty Votaw, then commissioner of the LPGA Tour, was in the media center an hour before the "Battle at Bighorn" on Monday night in 2000 that featured Tiger Woods and Annika Sorenstam against David Duval and Karrie Webb. He said — and he was right — there would be more eyeballs on the LPGA Tour than ever. Thirty minutes before it began, a vicious Santa Ana wind arrived without warning and Bighorn turned into a brute. The golf wasn't pretty, and it finished 80 minutes over schedule. ___ PRO-AM MODEL: The Waste Management Phoenix Open is among at least eight PGA Tour events that is keeping four amateurs for the Wednesday pro-am and switching to a new model that the tour hopes will lead to a more productive time for players and their amateurs. For tournaments that have four amateurs in a group, players can sign up to go only 9 holes, and then swap out the other 9 with a different player. Players still have the option to play all 18 holes with four amateurs if they don't mind the long rounds (five-plus hours) or need to see the entire course. The format was texted last year at the FedEx St. Jude Classic and was deemed a success. "We think the amateurs are going to enjoy getting to spend time with two professionals," said Andy Pazder, the tour's chief of operations. So what happens if the amateurs get Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson, Jordan Spieth or another big star? Pazder said that during the test run at the St. Jude Classic, Mickelson and Rickie Fowler were among those who went 9 holes before switching out and the amateurs had no complaints. The two players who are splitting up the pro-am are packaged that way during the draw party. ___ FOWLER AT TORREY: Rickie Fowler is the star of plenty of commercials for Farmers Insurance. It's been a different story in the Farmers Insurance Open. Fowler grew up an hour away from Torrey Pines — it's the closest PGA Tour stop to his hometown of Murrieta — and was one of only three amateurs to make the cut there in the 2008 U.S. Open. In his rookie year, he tied for fifth at Torrey. The next three years, he never finished out of the top 20. But with rounds of 72-72, Fowler missed the cut on Friday for the third straight year, and the fourth time in the last five years. The exception was a tie for 61st. ___ DIVOTS: KPMG, Dow, Kia Motors America and XL Catlin have pledged support to launch the LPGA Women's Network, a digital platform to help nurture female interest in the game for golfers of all skill levels and backgrounds. ... This was the eighth consecutive year that the winner at Torrey Pines began the tournament on the South Course. ... Golf's only true mixed event is in Australia this week. Men and women tee off alternately at Beach Golf Links in the Vic Oates Open and play for equal money. ... Phil Mickelson makes his 29th start at the Phoenix Open, breaking the record he shared with Gene Littler. ___ STAT OF THE WEEK: Five of the seven winners from the fall earned a spot in the Masters. The four winners to start 2018 were already exempt. ___ FINAL WORD: "I'm very motivated to get back to the No. 1 spot, and I know that the only way to get back to the No. 1 spot is win." — Jason Day.

New York (AP) — Gold futures trading on the NY Merc Tuesday: (100 troy oz.; dollars per troy oz.)

MINNEAPOLIS & REHOVOT, Israel--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Apr 23, 2018--Stratas y s Ltd. (NASDAQ: SSYS), a global leader in additive technology solutions, today further pushed the envelope of what’s possible with 3D printed prototypes - empowering customers to deliver highly realistic, vibrantly-colored parts at speeds up to 5x - 10X faster and more cost effective than traditional manufacturing. Designed to shrink development cycles and time-to-market, the enhanced Stratasys J750 3D Printer - alongside the new Stratasys J735 3D Printer - enables designers and engineers to build highly realistic prototypes with streamlined design-to-prototype workflows, thus decreasing both time-to-market and time-to-revenue. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180423005543/en/ Stratasys vivid colors, color matching, and clear with texture functionality is well-suited to meet the 3D printed prototype demands of auto manufacturers (Photo: Business Wire) Now offering in excess of 500,000 color combinations via a new vivid color package, highly accurate color matching, and advanced clear with texture functionality - the PolyJet-driven systems create prototypes that look, feel and operate like finished products. Eliminating costly requirements for painting, assembly, or post-processing – both systems shrink prototype cycles by producing parts that are both reliable and consistent, print-after-print. Enhanced GrabCAD Print software - now also available for the Connex3 3D Printer - further improves workflows and functional prototyping for parts requiring ABS-level plastic simulation and tear-resistant rubber-like parts. “With the new vivid colors solution on the J750 3D Printer, we are able to produce prototypes with incredible realism, such as the transparent multi-color covers for our tail lights. This can offer the texture and color-matching requirements to meet our design approval process,” says Reinhard Schiechel & Dr. Tim Spiering, Audi Model shop and 3D printing center. “This ability to produce transparent multi-color prototypes that so closely mimic the final part, in a single print, might significantly reduce time and cost required for each design process. Consequently, we could free capacities to run through more iterations and improve overall design, while accelerating our time-to-market.” The newly advanced J750 and J735 are engineered to power prototype creation in industries ranging from automotive and consumer goods to research and education. Building true representations of final products for successful design verification, functional performance testing and fit/form applications, both PolyJet 3D Printers simulate parts with full color and textures - ranging from rigid to flexible, transparent to opaque. Additionally, two new materials - VeroYellowV and VeroMagentaV - deliver enhanced red/orange/yellow colors with next stage translucency, a perfect match for consumer goods and models used to represent automotive lights and housing. These advanced colors are available both on the J750 and J735 3D Printers - and now the Connex3 3D Printer. “Some of the biggest challenges designers and manufacturers face are 3D printed prototypes that fail to deliver the realism necessary to make them actionable. The advanced Stratasys J750 and newly announced Stratasys J735 3D Printers were engineered to eliminate these roadblocks,” said Rich Garrity, President Americas, Stratasys. “When combined with a GrabCAD Print solution that further improves design-to-3D print processes - it’s now easier than ever before for manufacturers to create better prototypes, more accurately and on-demand. This shrinks the entire design-to-final part manufacturing process.” The power of PolyJet is actively being used by award-winning stop-motion animators at LAIKA – who count on Stratasys to ensure naturalistic facial animation for its puppets - as seen in such critically-acclaimed films as “Coraline” and “Kubo and the Two Strings.” According to Brian McLean, Director of Rapid Prototype for LAIKA, enhanced colors and voxel-level control are essential for the characters in their unannounced, and highly anticipated new stop-motion animated film. “Being able to have a 3D printer like the Stratasys J750 that’s dimensionally-accurate, repeatable and with an improved range of color has allowed us to break down creative, and technical barriers,” McLean noted. “For our next film, unannounced, we used Stratasys’ new color 3D printing technology and another voxel slicing software package. This combination of hardware and software allowed us to achieve a level of detail and subtlety in facial animation that was previously unattainable.” Taking the power of the Stratasys J750 and J735 3D Printers - and now the Connex3 - one step further is GrabCAD Print™, allowing designers to 3D print directly from native CAD formats and saving time typically used to convert and fix STL files. The software also has new ability to 3D print VRML files to power more realistic textures, images and graphics on-part. Detailed views of model, tray and slice preview further shrink time-to-design to make adjustments before going to final 3D print. Stratasys is exclusively showcasing its advanced solutions - alongside its wealth of part realism, clear with texture functionality and advanced part profiles - this week at Rapid + TCT 2018: the 3D printing and additive manufacturing event at the Fort Worth Convention Center in Fort Worth, TX. For more information, please visit Stratasys at Booth No. 1104. Stratasys (NASDAQ: SSYS) is a global leader in additive technology solutions for industries including Aerospace, Automotive, Healthcare, Consumer Products and Education. For nearly 30 years, a deep and ongoing focus on customers’ business requirements has fueled purposeful innovations—1,200 granted and pending additive technology patents to date—that create new value across product lifecycle processes, from design prototypes to manufacturing tools and final production parts. The Stratasys 3D printing ecosystem of solutions and expertise—advanced materials; software with voxel level control; precise, repeatable and reliable FDM and PolyJet 3D printers; application-based expert services; on-demand parts and industry-defining partnerships—works to ensure seamless integration into each customer’s evolving workflow. Fulfilling the real-world potential of additive, Stratasys delivers breakthrough industry-specific applications that accelerate business processes, optimize value chains and drive business performance improvements for thousands of future-ready leaders. Corporate headquarters: Minneapolis, Minnesota and Rehovot, Israel. Online at: www.stratasys.com, http://blog.stratasys.com and LinkedIn. Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements The statements in this press release relating to Stratasys’ beliefs regarding the benefits our customers will experience from the J750, J735, and GrabCAD Print are forward-looking statements reflecting management’s current expectations and beliefs. These forward-looking statements are based on current information that is, by its nature, subject to rapid and even abrupt change. Due to risks and uncertainties associated with Stratasys’ business, actual results could differ materially from those projected or implied by these forward-looking statements. These risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to: the risk that customers will not perceive the benefits of the J750, J735, and GrabCAD Print to be the same as Stratasys does; and other risk factors set forth under the caption “Risk Factors” in Stratasys’ most recent Annual Report on Form 20-F, filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on February 28, 2018. Stratasys is under no obligation (and expressly disclaims any obligation) to update or alter its forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as otherwise required by the rules and regulations of the SEC. View source version on businesswire.com:https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180423005543/en/ CONTACT: Stratasys Corporate & North America Craig.Librett@stratasys.com +1 518 424 2497 Joe.Hiemenz@stratasys.com +1 952 906 2726 or Europe, Middle East, and Africa Incus Media Jonathan Wake / Miguel Afonso, +44 1737 215200 stratasys@incus-media.com or Greater China, Southeast Asia, ANZ, and India Alison.Yin@stratasys.com + 86-21-33196051 or Japan and Korea Aya.Yoshizawa@stratasys.com +81 3 5542 0042 or Mexico, Central America, Caribe and South America Yair.Canedo@stratasys.com +52 55 4169 4181 or Brazil GP Communications Caio.Ramos@GPcom.com.br Nando@GPcom.com.br +55 (11) 3129 5158 KEYWORD: UNITED STATES NORTH AMERICA MINNESOTA MIDDLE EAST ISRAEL INDUSTRY KEYWORD: TECHNOLOGY ELECTRONIC DESIGN AUTOMATION HARDWARE SOFTWARE HEALTH DENTAL OTHER HEALTH MANUFACTURING AEROSPACE AUTOMOTIVE MANUFACTURING CHEMICALS/PLASTICS ENGINEERING PACKAGING DEFENSE OTHER DEFENSE SOURCE: Stratasys Ltd. Copyright Business Wire 2018. PUB: 04/23/2018 10:00 AM/DISC: 04/23/2018 10:01 AM http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180423005543/en

WASHINGTON (AP) — After nearly three weeks out of sight, Melania Trump tried to put to rest speculation about her health and even her whereabouts as she continues to recover from medical treatment for a kidney condition. It didn't completely work. Mrs. Trump tweeted Wednesday that she's "feeling great" and is at the White House working hard for children and American families. But she still didn't make a public appearance, leaving some skeptics still wondering about her condition and plenty more. The first lady's tweet landed while her husband was participating in a White House event that seemed tailor-made for a first lady, as famous athletes joined President Donald Trump and his daughter and senior adviser Ivanka Trump on the South Lawn to promote youth sports and fitness. "I see the media is working overtime speculating where I am & what I'm doing," Mrs. Trump said on Twitter. "Rest assured, I'm here at the @WhiteHouse w my family, feeling great, & working hard on behalf of children & the American people!" The first lady's absence from public view has spawned all sorts of wild theories on social media and elsewhere: Has she moved back to Trump Tower in New York City? Is she cooperating with the special counsel's Russia investigation? Is her health in jeopardy? Has she entered the witness protection program? And so on. Mrs. Trump has not appeared in public since the wee hours of May 10, when she accompanied the president to a military base in Maryland to welcome home three Americans who had been released from detention in North Korea. Four days later, the White House announced that the 48-year-old first lady had successfully undergone an "embolization" procedure to treat a benign kidney condition, and that there were no complications. She spent five nights at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in nearby Bethesda, Maryland. Some doctors familiar with the procedure but not involved in her care said people treated with embolization typically are sent home the same day or the next. First ladies are under no obligation to make their medical histories public, and the White House has said nothing more about Mrs. Trump's condition. On Friday, the president tried to assure reporters that his wife was doing fine. Asked about the first lady's health before he boarded the presidential helicopter on the South Lawn, Trump pointed to the second floor of the White House and said: "She's doing great. Right there. She's doing great. She's looking at us, right there." Despite Trump's assurances, reporters didn't see any sign of the first lady watching from above. Mrs. Trump is often viewed as a reluctant first lady, but her lengthy absence from public view comes after what was probably her most high-profile period in the role to date. In April, she alone represented the administration at the Houston funeral of former first lady Barbara Bush. She joined the president to host the Japanese prime minister for talks at the Trumps' estate in Florida. That was followed by the French president's three-day state visit to the White House, which included the first state dinner planned under her watch for more than 100 guests. Mrs. Trump capped it off in early May with a splashy Rose Garden rollout for her "Be Best" campaign to teach kindness to children. Trump watched from the audience. Her popularity is rising, according to a recent CNN poll that found 57 percent of those surveyed saying they have a favorable impression of her, up from 47 percent in January. A week after the first lady announced "Be Best," she was in the hospital. She's been heard from — including tweets about the Texas school shooting, the newest Medal of Honor recipient and Memorial Day — but not seen since. The first lady's longtime friend, Paolo Zampolli, thinks "she wanted to spend some quality time with her family." Her spokeswoman, Stephanie Grisham, said the first lady has been meeting with her staff on the "Be Best" initiative and working on upcoming projects like the annual White House picnic for members of Congress in June and Fourth of July festivities. Grisham said the first lady would like to be "out and about promoting her initiatives" but "her health comes first." Jean Harris, who teaches political science and women's studies at the University of Scranton in Pennsylvania, said people so far seem to be giving the first lady "her space for a whole bunch of reasons." But Harris said Mrs. Trump could end up being hurt by the fact that she made the long-waited announcement about her initiative — and then disappeared. "If there's not that follow-up, I think people will begin to be a bit more critical than they have been," Harris said. ___ Follow Darlene Superville on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/dsupervilleap

LONDON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jul 4, 2018--Quantzig, a pure-play analytics solutions provider, has announced the completion of their latest churn analytics study on the wireless communication industry. A world-famous wireless communication provider wanted to profile customers who are vulnerable to churn and develop effective retention strategies. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180704005123/en/ Wireless Communication Provider Leverages Quantzig’s Churn Analytics to Tap into the Behavior of the Customers. (Graphic: Business Wire) According to the experts at Quantzig, “Organizations in the wireless telecommunication space should look to guarantee better security in terms of maintaining and handling data.” Over the past couple of years, wireless communication has proven to be effective for the sustenance of businesses as it enables effective communication with end-users globally. Due to the increasing innovations in the telecom industry, firms have started opting for the Internet of Things in their applications to restructure their operations and bring effective services. Besides, the rapid growth of the wireless telecommunication market can be credited to the growing internet penetration, ease of admission to smart mobile devices, and advances in wireless technology. to see how Quantzig’s solutions can help you. The churn analytics solution helped the client to understand the customer’s behavior and establish processes to identify early signs of churn. The client was able to see a sizable reduction in churn. This churn analytics solution provided benefits that helped the client to: Identify the key areas to enhance the business value Optimize sales and marketing campaigns To know more about the benefits of churn analytics, This churn analytics solution offered predictive insights on: Understanding customer needs and preferences Boosting their retention capabilities To gain relevant insights and understand the scope of our research, View the complete churn analytics study here: About Quantzig Quantzig is a global analytics and advisory firm with offices in the US, UK, Canada, China, and India. For more than 15 years, we have assisted our clients across the globe with end-to-end data modeling capabilities to leverage analytics for prudent decision making. Today, our firm consists of 120+ clients, including 45 Fortune 500 companies. For more information on all of Quantzig’s services and the solutions they have provided to Fortune 500 clients across all industries, please contact us. View source version on businesswire.com:https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180704005123/en/ CONTACT: Quantzig Anirban Choudhury Marketing Consultant US: +1 630 538 7144 UK: +44 208 629 1455 hello@quantzig.com https://www.quantzig.com/contact-us KEYWORD: INDUSTRY KEYWORD: TECHNOLOGY TELECOMMUNICATIONS MOBILE/WIRELESS SOURCE: Quantzig Copyright Business Wire 2018. PUB: 07/04/2018 08:36 AM/DISC: 07/04/2018 08:36 AM http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180704005123/en

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia (AP) — Ten Westerners arrested in Cambodia for allegedly posting photos on social media showing themselves engaged in sexually suggestive dancing may have offended local standards of morality, but should be expelled from the country rather than jailed, their lawyer said Tuesday. The 10 — from the United Kingdom, Canada, Norway, the Netherlands and New Zealand — were arrested last Thursday when police raided a party at a rented villa in the northwestern town of Siem Reap and found people "dancing pornographically" at an event organizers called a pub crawl. Siem Reap is near the famous Angkor Wat temple complex. Lawyer Sourng Sophea said he did not know what conditions were like for his detained clients since he had not yet met them in jail. They face up to a year in prison if convicted, and if they go to trial, it would likely happen in the next few months. He said the families of some of the detainees have contacted him by phone from overseas, but none had come yet to visit. Sourng Sophea said some of the photos posted by his clients showed them at a party, some drinking by a swimming pool and some of the women in bikinis, but none showed them having sex or exposing themselves. According to the law, he said, they should be deported or have their visas canceled, but should not be held in pretrial detention. "I admit that they have done something wrong according to morality in Cambodian society, but their crimes did not warrant them being charged or put in jail," Sourng Sophea said by phone. He said that when the 10 had been taken into custody but not yet charged, he sent a three -page note to the Siem Reap provincial police and prosecutors, asserting that they had not committed any serious wrongdoing, were innocent of producing pornography, and should be released, but was turned down.

READING, Pa. (AP) — Police in a small Pennsylvania city haven't identified any suspects in a quadruple homicide that's believed to be among the deadliest shootings in the area in recent history, officials said Monday. The victims, all men, were shot several times, and their bodies were found Sunday evening in the first-floor apartment of a row home, said James Marasco Jr., deputy chief of the Reading Police Department. The department does not believe the killings were random, he said. "We cannot remember any time in recent history when this many people were shot at one time," Marasco said. Three of the victims have been identified: Jarlyn Lantigua-Tejada, 20; Juan Rodriguez, 23, and Joshua Santos, 20. The fourth man has not yet been named, though he is believed to be in his early 20s. About a dozen mourners gathered in front of the apartment around noon Monday. They lit white prayer candles near the doorway of the building and released white, star-shaped balloons as music played and police shuffled in and out of the home. One woman struggled to stand after falling to her knees on the sidewalk in a fit of tears. She screamed, "Why?" The crowd grew visibly angry with the throng of news crews at the scene, cursing at reporters and pushing camera lenses away. Anabell Dealba, 34, said she knew one of the men through her husband and went to the home Monday with her two children so they could pay their respects. She said people in the neighborhood called one of the men "King Spaz." "I can't believe this really happened," she said as one of her sons stood at the front door of the building and peered inside at police. "The kids are really hurt by the whole thing. It puts you in a bad place as a mom." One of her sons, Jose Santiago, said he was stunned when his father called him last night to tell him his friend was dead. "He's a little too smart to be in this situation," said Santiago, 19, tears welling up in his eyes. Neighbors described a chaotic scene Sunday night as police cruisers descended on the home and officers canvassed the area, knocking on doors to see if residents knew anything about what happened. A woman who didn't want to give her name said officers pulled three body bags from the house around 3 a.m. Officials are urging people to contact authorities with any information about the shooting. It was the second quadruple shooting in the state on Sunday. In the western Pennsylvania community of Melcroft, a gunman killed four people and injured a fifth person at a car wash. Family members say the shooter was a jealous ex-boyfriend of one of the victims. Reading has a population of about 88,000 people and is roughly 50 miles northwest of Philadelphia.

LEWISTON, Maine (AP) — U.S. family-owned promotional products company Geiger is buying the largest family-owned promotional products distributor in the United Kingdom. CEO Gene Geiger said Monday the merger with BTC Group expands the company's footprint in Europe. The new company, Geiger BTC Group, will have nearly 400 employees. Financial terms weren't disclosed. Geiger told the Sun Journal newspaper that the two companies have collaborated in the past, and that BTC's owners let it be known that they were ready to sell. Both management teams are staying in place. Geiger will be CEO of the parent company and Frank Murphy, BTC Group's managing director, will run the U.K. subsidiary when the deal closes next month.

New York (AP) — Cocoa futures trading on the IntercontinentalExchange (ICE) Tuesday: (10 metric tons; $ per ton) Open High Low Settle Change Mar 1994 Up 25 Mar 1944 1988 1943 1970 Up 24 May 1971 2010 1967 1994 Up 25 Jul 1982 2022 1981 2008 Up 27 Sep 1999 2038 1998 2024 Up 28 Dec 2027 2061 2023 2048 Up 29 Mar 2044 2081 2044 2069 Up 29 May 2055 2090 2055 2078 Up 27 Jul 2097 2097 2081 2088 Up 26 Sep 2074 2109 2074 2097 Up 24 Dec 2108 Up 21

OXON HILL, Md. (AP) — The Latest on the Scripps National Spelling Bee (all times local): 6:05 p.m. Forty-one spellers have advanced to the finals of the Scripps National Spelling Bee out of a field of 516, by far the biggest in the 93-year history of the competition. The finalists were announced Wednesday after two days of onstage spelling during which nearly 200 spellers were eliminated for getting words wrong. Scores on a written spelling and vocabulary test determined who advanced to the finals. There were no perfect scores on the test. Bee executive director Paige Kimble says, "We thought it was an easy test. We were wrong." The top scorers were Shruthika Padhy, Aisha Randhawa and Karthik Nemmani. Shruthika already came into the bee as one of the favorites, having finished in seventh place last year. The past 13 champions and 18 of the last 22 have been Indian-American. 5:19 p.m. With the Scripps National Spelling Bee extended to three days this year, longtime pronouncer Jacques Bailly finally needed some help. Bailly's understudy for the past 16 years, the Rev. Brian Sietsema, filled in for him during portions of Wednesday's competition. Sietsema is a Greek Orthodox priest from Michigan, as well as a former linguistics professor and lexicographer. Bailly is the longtime public face of the bee. He says it was hard to take his first-ever break, but he knew it was necessary. This year's bee nearly doubled in size because Scripps started a wild-card program that allowed kids who didn't win their regional bees to get to nationals. More than 500 spellers competed over two days of preliminary rounds. No more than 50 finalists were to be announced later Wednesday.

Recording Academy President Neil Portnow is facing criticism for his comments after the 60th annual Grammy Awards ended with only two female winners on stage and lingering questions about the choice of performers. Following the awards show Sunday, many music fans and critics questioned whether the Time's Up movement was just given lip service when the only woman nominated for album of the year, Lorde, didn't perform. Instead, multiple minutes on the telecast was given to male artists who weren't nominated, such as Sting and the band U2. While the red carpet was filled with artists sporting white roses to symbolize support of gender equality, backstage after the show wrapped Portnow was questioned about Lorde's absence from the stage, as well as the fact that only two women were shown on TV accepting awards. "It has to begin with women who have the creativity in their hearts and their souls, who want to be musicians, who want to be engineers, who want to be producers, who want to be part of the industry on an executive level, to step up," Portnow said backstage after the show. "Because I think they would be welcome. I don't have personal experience of those kind of brick walls that you face. It's us as an industry making a welcome mat very obvious — creating mentorships, creating opportunities for all people who want to be creative, and, really, paying it forward, and creating that next generation of artists who feel like they can do anything, say anything." Criticism for Portnow's comments was swift. Grammy-winning singer Sheryl Crow tweeted Monday: "I wish the #Grammys would return to female/male categories. Who will young girls be inspired by to pick up a guitar and rock when most every category is filled with men? I'm not sure it is about women needing to "step up", (as said by the male in charge). #GrammysSoMale" Actress Debra Messing joined in the criticism, writing on Twitter: "This is incredibly dismaying to say the least" in regards to Portnow's comments. The Recording Academy did not immediately return an email seeking comment Monday. There were no women nominated in the record of the year category and the only male to be nominated in the best pop solo performance, Ed Sheeran, won. Alessia Cara won best new artist and Rihanna also got to take the stage when she and Kendrick Lamar won best rap/sung performance for "LOYALTY." As for why Lorde didn't get to perform solo, Portnow said, "We have a wealth of riches every year and it's hard to have a balanced show and have everybody involved. Every year's different. We can't have a performance from every nominee. We have over 80 categories. And so we have to realize that we've got to create something that has balance and so on and so forth, and what you saw was our best judgment on how to do that." As for Lorde, she seemed to address the controversy when she tweeted Monday morning, "If you're debating whether or not I can murder a stage... come see it for urself." ___ For full coverage of awards season, visit: https://apnews.com/tag/AwardsSeason

HERNDON, Va.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Apr 23, 2018--Although every elementary school has different student needs its teachers must support, each needs an extensive library of books for its students. Wake County Public School System (WCPSS) in Cary, NC, the 15 th largest school district in the United States, has 114 elementary schools. Curating a vast library to address different reading levels, interests, and languages at each school was expensive, and students could only check out books when school is in session. To give students access to a vast library of books they can access anywhere and at any time, WCPSS turned to the online literacy platform Big Universe® from Fuel Education® (FuelEd ® ) for its elementary schools. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180423005454/en/ (Photo: Business Wire) Big Universe provides schools with an affordable, comprehensive literacy solution featuring a ready-made library of more than 13,000 high-quality leveled eBooks from well-known publishers. The mobile platform includes integrated tools such as embedded assessments, a student recommendation engine, analytics to demonstrate reading growth, and engaging reading practice opportunities. With Big Universe, WCPSS is leveraging eBooks in several different ways across the district. Big Universe is a big part of the district’s summer Reading Camp for students in grades 1-3. As part of the state’s Read to Achieve Act, the district hosts the camp for students who are not reading on grade level based on state assessments. During the three-week camp, students read books around a central theme, participate in read-aloud sessions, and complete “I-Wonder” projects during which they create their own research question around the theme and read books to find the answer. “Big Universe was a perfect answer to two questions: ‘How do we give these hundreds of students at our reading camp access to books?’ and ‘How do we give all students – whether they are in summer reading camp or not – access to books over the summer?’” said Sherri Miller, Director of K-12 Literacy at WSPSS. “Now we have fewer students losing ground over the summer because they can access books anywhere, 24/7 with any device, including a family member’s phone.” Miller says the online platform has also helped the district’s educators incorporate reading across the curriculum. Using Big Universe’s search functions, Wake County’s elementary curriculum developers search for titles at different reading levels that relate to a lesson, create custom-curated bookshelves, and embed the link to the bookshelves into lessons. This has been especially helpful in science and social studies lessons, as well as English Language Arts. The district implemented an English Language Arts curriculum called Expeditionary Learning Education (EL Education), that requires students to engage in independent reading both for pleasure and to learn about topics being studied. Big Universe’s search functionality has also helped English as a Second Language (ESL) teachers provide students with books in different languages. Most importantly, the online nature of the platform gives students access to books anytime – before school, during school, after school, on holidays and in the summer. When the local YMCA and Boy & Girls Club and the City of Raleigh, all of which serve WCPSS students, said they wished they had access to books for more literacy-focus programming, Miller told them every WCPSS elementary school student has access to Big Universe. So as long as the organizations are able to provide internet access and devices, students have access to thousands of books. “Big Universe has become a big part of our elementary school instruction because as our needs grow, so does the platform’s functionalities and selection of titles,” said Miller. “They seek our input. When we needed more books, decodable readers to help students practice phonetic patterns, or text-to-speech features, they listened. Many of the product features Big Universe has added came to fruition because they reached out to their end-users. To us, they’re not a vendor. They’re a partner.” Click here to read more about how the WCPSS uses Big Universe. About Fuel Education Fuel Education ® partners with school districts to fuel personalized learning and transform the education experience inside and outside the classroom. The company provides innovative solutions for pre-K through 12th grade that empower districts to implement successful online and blended learning programs. Its open, easy-to-use Personalized Learning Platform, PEAK™, enables teachers to customize courses using their own content, FuelEd courses and titles, third-party content, and open educational resources. Fuel Education serves more than 2,000 school districts, offering one of the industry’s largest catalogs of K–12 digital curriculum, certified instruction, professional development, and educational services. To learn more, visit fueleducation.com and Twitter. ©2018 Fuel Education LLC. All rights reserved. Fuel Education, FuelEd, and Big Universe are trademarks of Fuel Education LLC or its affiliates. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. View source version on businesswire.com:https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180423005454/en/ CONTACT: Fuel Education Media: Beth Halloran, 703-436-3263 bhalloran@fueleducation.com or Rachael Ballard, 410-975-9638 Rachael@kehcomm.com KEYWORD: UNITED STATES NORTH AMERICA VIRGINIA INDUSTRY KEYWORD: EDUCATION PRIMARY/SECONDARY OTHER EDUCATION PRESCHOOL SOURCE: Fuel Education Copyright Business Wire 2018. PUB: 04/23/2018 08:00 AM/DISC: 04/23/2018 08:01 AM http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180423005454/en

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — An Afghan council of 100 prominent clerics has condemned the militant attacks that have killed scores across the country this month. Qyamuddin Kashaf, chief of the clerical council, told the clerical gathering held on Tuesday in Kabul that suicide attacks target only the innocent. He said suicide bombings are against Islam and against humanity. After the conference, the clerics lined up to donate blood to the hundreds of injured in Kabul hospitals. But the clerics refused to discuss the Taliban and the rival Islamic State extremist group and would not comment on President Donald Trump's statement in which he ruled out peace talks with the Taliban. Trump on Monday railed against "atrocities" in Afghanistan and the United States would not engage in any future talks with the Taliban.

BUCHAREST, Romania (AP) — Britain's defense minister says Russian aggression toward NATO is increasing and the alliance was right to have agreed to a "very high readiness taskforce." Michael Fallon said Thursday that Russia had annexed Crimea, threatened the Baltic states, and interfered in the democratic processes in Western Europe with "propaganda and other means," in the past three years. He also accused Russia of "aggression in the eastern Mediterranean, prolonging the conflict in Syria," adding "the threat to NATO particularly to the southeastern flank is growing." He said the alliance had rightly agreed to "a very high readiness taskforce which is ....demonstrating the rapid response that NATO requires." Fallon is on a two-day visit to Romania, where he has stressed that Britain, which will leave the European Union, remains committed to European security.

ALEXANDRIA, Va. (AP) — The gunman who wounded a top Republican congressman and several others during an early morning baseball practice had apparently been living out a white cargo van for months and was frequently seen working on a computer at a nearby YMCA, where he kept mostly to himself. James T. Hodgkinson shot House Rep. Steve Scalise on Wednesday before he was fatally shot by police who had been guarding the House majority whip on the Alexandria, Virginia, baseball field, officials said. Authorities believe the 66-year-old had been living out of a van in northern Virginia since March after leaving his southern Illinois home. The man expressed grievances online about President Donald Trump and Republicans, but authorities said they're still working to determine a motive. Hodgkinson was spotted regularly over the past several weeks at the YMCA next to the site of the shooting, sitting with a computer in the lobby or at a table in an exercise area that looked out onto the baseball field. Former Alexandria Mayor Bill Euille, who chatted with Hodgkinson at the gym, said he assumed the man was homeless because he wore pretty much the same outfit every day and carried a bag full of extra clothes. Hodgkinson rarely joined in the political discussions often set off by the television in the room and never showed any signs that he was troubled, Euille said. "I never saw him get mad when people were talking good, bad or ugly about any of the political parties," Euille told The Associated Press. "He was just a very calm, rational person, I thought," he said. Stephen Brennwald, another YMCA member, said he never saw Hodgkinson talk to anyone and figured the man was a "loner." Brennwald thought it was odd he never saw Hodgkinson exercise or wear workout clothes and considered asking a staffer about him but never did, he said. "There's just no way that I would have guessed that this guy would be shooting at law enforcement and a congressman," said Brennwald, an attorney. Hodgkinson, who was armed with a handgun and a rifle, died from multiple gunshot wounds to his torso, the FBI said. Federal investigators are working to trace his weapons to find out where they were purchased and other details about their history. Texas Rep. Roger Williams said one of his aides, Zack Barth, was shot but was doing well and expected to recover fully. Two Capitol Police officers sustained relatively minor injuries. A former congressional aide was hospitalized. The FBI said authorities are speaking with people who knew Hodgkinson or who may have encountered him. FBI agent Tim Slater said the FBI needs the public's help in piecing together Hodgkinson's whereabouts and activities while he was in Alexandria. "We're just not sure at this time" how he spent his time, he said. Kristina Scrimshaw, a bartender at the Pork Barrel BBQ restaurant a few blocks from the shooting scene, said Hodgkinson had become something of a regular in recent weeks. He always drank Budweiser from a can and drank alone, barely speaking to anyone, including the bartenders. "I didn't like him from the beginning," she said. "Nothing I can really put my finger on, but he was just not a pleasant person." The gunman's brother told The New York Times that the man was upset about Trump's election and recently went to Washington to protest, but Michael Hodgkinson said he didn't know why the man stayed in the area. "I know he wasn't happy with the way things were going, the election results and stuff," the shooter's brother told the newspaper. Until recently, Hodgkinson ran a home-inspection business out of his house in southern Illinois. His Facebook page shows he was a fan of Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, who last year made an unsuccessful bid for the Democratic presidential nomination. Sanders acknowledged Wednesday that Hodgkinson had apparently been among many volunteers on his 2016 campaign. A search of online newspapers shows that Hodgkinson frequently wrote letters to his local newspaper, the Belleville News-Democrat, which published nearly two dozen of them between 2010 and 2012. Many included complaints about the same theme: income inequality. Hodgkinson also had arrests in his background for a series of minor offenses and at least one more serious matter. Court records show that his legal trouble started in the 1990s with arrests for resisting police and drunken driving. In 2006, he was arrested on a battery charge after allegedly punching a woman in the face, then striking her boyfriend in the head with the wooden stock of a 12-gauge shotgun before firing a round at the man, according to a sheriff's department report. While trying to drive away from that confrontation, the report said, Hodgkinson used a pocket knife to cut a seat belt. The charges were dismissed later that year, according to the court clerk. Though no other legal problems are listed in St. Clair County, which includes Belleville, since 2011, Hodgkinson did come to the attention of local law enforcement as recently as last spring. On March 24, Bill Schaumleffel recalled hearing shots being fired outside his house, which stands about 500 feet behind Hodgkinson's home. When he went outside, he saw Hodgkinson shooting a rifle into a cornfield. He was squeezing off five or six rounds at a time, according to the report of the incident, and fired about 50 shots in all. "I yelled, 'Quit shooting toward the houses,'" Schaumleffel said. When Hodgkinson refused to stop, Schaumleffel called the sheriff's department. St. Clair County Sheriff Rick Watson said Wednesday that Hodgkinson showed the deputy all required firearms licenses and documentation for the high-powered hunting rifle, which he said he was simply using for target practice. The deputy cautioned Hodgkinson about shooting around homes, given that the rounds can travel up to a mile. No charges were filed. ___ Richer reported from Richmond, Virginia. Sarah Rankin in Richmond; Matt Barakat in Alexandria, Virginia; Don Babwin in Chicago; John O'Connor in Springfield, Illinois; Jim Suhr in Kansas City, Missouri; Jake Pearson in Washington and Associated Press Researcher Rhonda Shafner in New York also contributed to this report.

UDINE, Italy (AP) — Udinese has fired coach Massimo Oddo after 11 straight losses in Serie A. The decision was expected after Sunday's 2-1 loss to Crotone left the team four points above the relegation zone. The 41-year-old Oddo replaced Luigi Delneri in November and won his first five league matches, including a 3-1 victory at Inter Milan. Udinese has not immediately announced a replacement but former Juventus defender Igor Tudor is favored to take over until the end of the season. The former Croatia international began his senior coaching career in 2013 at Hajduk Split, where he won the Croatian Cup. He has also coached PAOK Thessaloniki, Karabukspor and Galatasaray.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Hospital says Rep. Steve Scalise is in critical condition following surgery for gunshot.

MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) — Police say 2 gunmen killed in Somalia restaurant attack as 10 hostages freed; siege continues.

As credit card rewards rates and bonuses skyrocket in value, they've fattened the wallets of many creditworthy consumers. But one group especially can benefit from these ever-growing offers: millennials. For folks in their 20s to mid-30s, credit card rewards can trim expenses and make travel affordable at a time when income often flows to other financial priorities. "Without miles and points, I probably wouldn't have gone on half the (trips) I've gone on," says Deric Poldberg, 26, of Carter Lake, Iowa, who works as a banker. As the founder of the award travel blog PassengerPoldberg.com, he often uses rewards to book ambitious international getaways. It's generally easy to come out ahead on credit card reward offers, as Poldberg has, if you can manage your spending well and pay down your balances every month to avoid interest. If that's doable, those rewards are well worth your attention. REWARDS OFFER FINANCIAL WIGGLE ROOM Starting out on your own is often a financial juggling act. Suddenly, your paycheck might be going to student loans, rent and an emergency fund, leaving little left over. Rewards earned on credit cards offer some financial breathing room, and they don't necessarily have to cost you. Sign-up bonuses earned on cards with no annual fees, for example, are often worth $150 or $200. If those rewards come in the form of cash back, that's enough to cover a few date nights, a week of groceries or a new piece of furniture. You'll also earn ongoing rewards when using a rewards card — whether it's a cash-back or travel card — often getting about 1 to 2 percent back on each purchase. "Just having that extra . designated amount of money that allows you to do things you normally wouldn't do, I think, is really beneficial," says Britany Ederveen, 27, a high school English teacher in Parker, Colorado , who blogs about travel and other topics. She carries a card that earns flexible rewards redeemable for travel, among other things. TRAVEL BECOMES MORE AFFORDABLE For many millennials, travel is a part of life, and rewards earned on a credit card can trim expenses significantly. Ederveen, for example, recently used her credit card points to cover hotel stays when visiting Germany and Austria with her boyfriend, making the trip much more affordable. Points and miles can even come in handy for those who don't go on big trips. Some flexible travel rewards also cover rides on Uber or Lyft, campground fees, train and bus fares and other travel-related expenses. Plus, most travel cards with annual fees also tend to come with large bonuses, often worth $500 or more when redeemed for travel. Blogger Matt Kepnes of Austin, Texas, began traveling internationally at age 23. But it wasn't until a few years later that he found out how useful credit card rewards could be. On his blog, Nomadic Matt, he writes about his travels and explains how to benefit from these rewards programs . "I realized, 'I've been flying around the world and not collecting any points and miles. I'm a huge idiot,'" says Kepnes, now 36. "So I really started investigating the points and miles system." He recommends putting everyday spending on a rewards credit card if you can qualify for one. MORE FLEXIBILITY, MORE OPPORTUNITIES You might not have a plump savings account as a millennial, but time is often on your side. And in the world of credit card rewards, that can be an enormous advantage, especially for young people willing to jump through a few hoops . "When you're young, you don't have as many obligations. You're a little more apt to take a trip over a long weekend to another country," says Poldberg. In 2016, he and his girlfriend did just that when they traveled to Paris with rewards , after snagging an outstanding deal on the flight. Even for millennials with less flexible schedules, there are opportunities to score extra rewards. If you shop online and don't mind trying out different retailers, you could earn more rewards by shopping through credit card bonus malls. Or you could maximize a rotating rewards category on a card by timing a large purchase for the quarter when you'll earn the most cash back. It's usually not quick or easy to squeeze the most value possible out of credit card rewards. But for young folks who have the flexibility and willingness to experiment, such efforts can pay off. _________________________________________________________________________________________________ This article originally appeared on the personal finance website NerdWallet. Claire Tsosie is a writer at NerdWallet. Email: claire@nerdwallet.com. Twitter: @ideclaire7. RELATED LINKS: NerdWallet: The secret to optimizing credit card rewards? Be disloyal https://nerd.me/optimize-credit-card-rewards Nomadic Matt: How I earn 1 million frequent flier miles each year https://www.nomadicmatt.com/travel-blogs/travel-hacking-1-million-miles-per-year/ Passenger Poldberg: How I booked my first award ticket to Paris https://passengerpoldberg.com/home/how-i-booked-my-first-award-ticket-to-paris,2,2016

BELFAST, Maine (AP) — A Norwegian firm says it has bought land in Maine that it intends to use to build one of the world's largest land-based salmon farms. Nordic Aquafarms says it has signed an agreement to buy 40 acres on the outskirts of Belfast. It says the initial project phase will include a $150 million investment, employ 60 people and take about two years to complete. Maine Gov. Paul LePage says he's supporting the project, which he says will grow the economy and seafood industry in the state's mid-coast region. Nordic Aquafarms chief executive officer Erik Heim says Maine is the best location for the firm to expand in the U.S. Maine and New Brunswick, Canada, are home to longstanding salmon farming operations. Norway, Chile, and Scotland are other big producers of salmon.

Two-time world champion ski racer Erik Guay of Canada says he will not be able to compete at the Pyeongchang Olympics because of a back injury. Guay announced Wednesday on social media that he'll sit out the Winter Games, which open next week in South Korea. He said he has had "a difficult season battling back problems" and his withdrawal from the Olympics comes "with a heavy heart." Guay might have been one of Canada's leading medal hopes among the men in Alpine skiing. He won gold medals at the world championships in downhill in 2011 and in super-G last year, when he also took home a silver in the downhill. Guay also has 24 top-three finishes in World Cup races. ___ More AP Olympic coverage: https://wintergames.ap.org

LOS ANGELES--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Apr 23, 2018--In an era before HTML5 games had become fashionable and Flash games were spread all over the world and considered the only avenue for game production, Steve Jobs had already perceived the infinite potential of HTML5 and foreseen the not-too-distant future. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180423006199/en/ First-class cross-platform system - Egret Engine (Photo: Business Wire) In a 2010 article entitled "Thoughts on Flash" which appeared on Apple's official website, Jobs described the status quo of the current technology applications and denounced the six major mishaps that were caused by the bottleneck problem in Flash technology. In the article, Jobs reiterated the transformation of the current technology and people's infinite expectations about technological openness and convenience. His critique of the current technology demonstrated perfectly the "more advanced technology" that was distinguishable from flash. It also brought the term HTML5 to the attention of the public for the first time. In 2014, the trends of HTML5 were gradually engulfing the gaming industry, and the game "Catch the Cat" popularized by Egret Technologies coincided with the first year of HTML5 games. The multitude of HTML5 game developers, communities, and channels that have emerged all over the world testify to the boom of the HTML5 gaming industry. In a short 4-year period, the HTML5 game market scale in China has jumped from 50 million RMB in the first year to 6 billion RMB today. This growth represents a 120-fold increase and establishes the enormous blue ocean market covered by HTML5 technology. Despite the rapidly developing bull market of HTML5 games, it is undeniable that the current HTML5 games still have many pain points regarding performance and compatibility. The lack of HTML5 development tools, the immaturity of the eco-environment and technical support and a series of irrelevant factors have hindered developers' progress in creating genuinely unique HTML5 games. As the world's first HTML5 blockchain service platform and ecosystem, Egretia officially announced today it is cooperating with world-class HTML5 technology service provider Egret Technologies. Egretia will use blockchain technology and the most advanced development suites to break down the developmental pain points of HTML5 games one by one. Furthermore, our interface framework, shall not only supports Egretia’s own public chain, but also can be extended to support Ethereum, EOS and other public chains in the future! Solution 1: Creating The World's Most Complete HTML5 Blockchain Workflow - Egretia Blockchain Lab Egretia's partner Egret Technologies has already solved the challenges of HTML5 game performance, compatibility, and operating environment. The world's first HTML5 workflow created by Egret Technologies, including the free open source HTML5 Egret Engine, Egret Wing, Dragon Bones, Egret Runtime and other tools, will bring prosperity to the HTML5 mobile ecosystem. As the world's first HTML5 blockchain service platform and ecosystem, Egretia will integrate blockchain technology into the mature HTML5 development workflow of Egret Technologies. Based on Egret's proven workflow, Egretia will provide new front and back-end services that encapsulate complex blockchain technology into HTML5 interfaces. Through accessing these interfaces, developers can quickly create HTML5 games that provide a unified digital wallet pass, smart contracts, transactions and other blockchain features, instead of spending extraneous time on studying underlying blockchain technology. Egretia aims to bring the existing 200,000 developers and 1 billion mobile terminal equipment into the blockchain world! Solution 2: First-class cross-platform system - Egret Engine Egret Engine is a game engine that complies with the HTML5 standard, resolves HTML5 performance problems and fragmentation issues, and its flexibly meets the needs of developers in developing 2D or 3D games. Egret Engine has a robust cross-platform operating capability and can help developers quickly and efficiently develop HTML5 games, and publish them on iOS, Android, Windows, Mac and other platforms with one click. Currently, Egret Engine has more than 200,000 loyal developers worldwide. By combining with Egret Engine’ BaaS SDK, Egretia allows all HTML5 games to access the blockchain world easily. The BaaS SDK is simple and efficient. Developers only need to apply the Egretia BaaS SDK to the game development and connect the API interface according to the official guide. This efficient and intuitive process will then quickly create an HTML5 game with blockchain technology. Solution 3: Visual Game Editor - Egret Wing Egret Wing is a powerful, intelligent integrated development environment (IDE) launched by Egret Technologies. It supports mainstream development languages and frameworks. It also provides smart coding assistance functions to help developers improve game development efficiency through visual editing. Egret Wing supports Node.js development extensions to improve the customization of content. Developers can use Egret Wing to create HTML5 blockchain games visually and efficiently by combining the Egretia BaaS SDK into game development. Solution 4: Efficient Game Animation Creation Tool - Dragon Bones Dragon Bones is the world's number one influential game animation creation brand and is the only HTML5 authoring tool released by the International Telecommunication Union (T.621). As the creative role in the HTML5 blockchain workflow, Dragon Bones can produce a variety of output formats, videos, web pages, animation data and can be used for almost all current mainstream game engines and programming languages. It can allow developers to create more vivid blockchain game animations with less graphic design cost. Solution 5: HTML5 Game Accelerator - Egret Runtime Egret Runtime is an accelerator component released by Egret Technologies to increase the speed and stability of HTML5 games. It is an HTML5 game accelerator that supports 3D and can solve the inadequate support and poor experience of low-end machines in handling HTML5. It can adapt to different systems and significantly enhance the performance of HTML5 games. Egret Runtime and the well-known mobile phone manufacturer Xiaomi have already reached strategic cooperation. In 2017, global shipments of Xiaomi's mobile phones reached 92.4 million units. Egret Runtime is not only built into the bottom level of the Xiaomi mobile MUI system but also embedded in thousands of super grade Apps. To date, Egret Runtime has been incorporated into more than 1 billion mobile terminal devices worldwide. Egretia Lab has integrated blockchain technology into Egret Runtime and given it a complete upgrade. The upgraded version Egret Runtime not only fully supports the original Runtime functionality but has also integrated Egretia's blockchain module and embedded its core function more securely in the bottom level of the app. The Egretia BaaS Module allows developers to easily invoke the Egretia blockchain interface during game development. It also fully supports the DPoS mechanism and implements blockchain accounting and data exchange based on the underlying Runtime. Egretia will leverage Egret’s tremendous value by migrating its own developers, users, and content to Egretia’s workflow and blockchain; in turn, exponentially increasing its own potential. We firmly believe that this new HTML5 blockchain game platform will create a brand-new, comprehensive, user-friendly and mutually beneficial ecosystem for the entire HTML5 industry. Official website: http://egretia.io Egretia Social Media: Telegram: t.me/Egretia Twitter: https://twitter.com/Egretia_io Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Egretia.io/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/egretia/ Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/user/Egretia/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/egretia_io/ Weibo: https://weibo.com/u/6501970811 WeChat: Egretia View source version on businesswire.com:https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180423006199/en/ CONTACT: Egretia Edison Chen,media@egretia.io KEYWORD: UNITED STATES NORTH AMERICA CALIFORNIA INDUSTRY KEYWORD: ENTERTAINMENT ELECTRONIC GAMES TECHNOLOGY OTHER ENTERTAINMENT CONSUMER ELECTRONICS SOFTWARE GENERAL ENTERTAINMENT SOURCE: Egretia Copyright Business Wire 2018. PUB: 04/23/2018 01:35 PM/DISC: 04/23/2018 01:35 PM http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180423006199/en

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Marvel Studios has built a movie empire that has not only proved crowd-pleasing, but has also racked up box-office profits to the tune of nearly $15 billion in the 10 years since "Iron Man" was released. The 2008 film starring Robert Downey Jr. as Iron Man proved that superheroes not named Spider-Man, Superman and Batman could find massive audiences. "Avengers: Infinity War," the 19th film in the Marvel Studios universe arrives Friday, and may break box-office records in its opening weekend. The third Avengers film assembles characters and story lines developed over the years, including Captain America, Thor, the Guardians of the Galaxy and this year's sensation, the Black Panther. The following is a look at how Marvel has built its cinematic version of the Hulk, with the film's title, release date, domestic gross and total worldwide box office, as compiled by comScore: ___ "Iron Man," May 2008, $318.6 million, $582 million "The Incredible Hulk," June 2008, $134.8 million, $263.3 million "Iron Man 2," May 2010, $312.4 million, $623.7 million "Thor," May 2010, $181 million, $448.7 million "Captain America: The First Avenger," July 2011, $176.7 million, $371 million "Marvel's The Avengers," May 2012, $623.4 million, $1.52 billion "Iron Man 3," May 2013, $409 million, $1.2 billion "Thor: The Dark World," November 2013, $206.4 million, $645 million "Captain America: The Winter Soldier," April 2014, $260 million, $714.3 million "Guardians of the Galaxy," August 2014, $333.2 million, $773.3 million "Avengers: Age of Ultron," May 2015, $459 million, $1.4 billion "Ant-Man," July 2015, $180.2 million, $519.3 million "Captain America: Civil War," May 2016, $408.1 million, $1.15 billion "Doctor Strange," May 2016, $232.6 million, $677.6 million "Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2," May 2017, $390 million, $863.6 million "Spider-Man: Homecoming," July 2017, $334.2 million, $880.2 million "Thor: Ragnorak," November 2017, $314 million, $852.7 million "Black Panther," February 2018, $681.4 million, $1.4 billion ___ Source: comScore

BLOOMINGTON, Minn. (AP) — James Harrison and Malcolm Butler can probably trade notes when it comes to Super Bowl-changing defensive plays. The two New England Patriots teammates are the authors of perhaps the two most memorable from the first 51 Super Bowls. One a game-sealing interception and the other a 100-yard return that provided a 14-point swing. "They're both all-time great plays," said NFL Network analyst Willie McGinest, who played in four Super Bowls with the Patriots. "I don't want to rank them against each other. They both were game-changers." Butler's interception at the goal line that turned what looked like a Seattle repeat title into the fourth championship for Tom Brady and the Patriots three years ago might be the most impactful play of any kind in the Super Bowl when it comes to determining the champion. "It feels like yesterday, but life goes that fast," Butler said. Butler was an unlikely hero that game. He played just one-sixth of New England's defensive snaps all season and was on the field for just 17 defensive plays before being put in on the goal line at the end of the game. He then stepped in front of Ricardo Lockette on a slant pattern and intercepted Russell Wilson's pass to stake his place in Super Bowl history. "Just be ready. Just be ready," he said of his attitude that day. "I might not play, but I'm going to prepare like I'm going to play and I got the result." Harrison's impact was much less of a surprise considering he was the AP Defensive Player of the Year in 2008 when he helped lead the Steelers to the Super Bowl. Arizona appeared set to take the lead in the closing seconds of the first half when Harrison stepped in front of Anquan Boldin and intercepted a pass at the goal line before racing 100 yards for a touchdown on the final play of the half to put Pittsburgh up 17-7. While the Steelers still needed a last-minute TD pass from Ben Roethlisberger to Santonio Holmes to win 27-23, Harrison's play was still one of the biggest in Super Bowl history, providing a potential 14-point swing. Here are some other memorable defensive plays in Super Bowl history: VON STRIP-SACK: Von Miller set the tone for the Super Bowl two years ago on Carolina's second drive of the game. Miller sped past helpless right tackle Mike Remmers and ripped the ball away from league MVP Cam Newton on the sack. Malik Jackson pounced on the ball in the end zone to give Denver a 10-0 lead. Miller later iced the game with another strip-sack in the fourth quarter to earn Super Bowl MVP honors. PICK-SIX: Peyton Manning had the Colts driving for a potential tying touchdown late in the game played in 2010 against New Orleans when everything changed on one play. With Indianapolis facing a third-and-5 at the Saints 31, Manning looked for favorite target Reggie Wayne over the middle. Tracy Porter stepped in front of Wayne to intercept the pass and raced 74 yards for the title-sealing touchdown. GOAL-LINE STOP: Few Super Bowl endings have been as dramatic as the one between the St. Louis Rams and Tennessee Titans in the game played in 2000. The Titans rallied back from a 16-point deficit to tie the game only to have the Rams take the lead on the next play from scrimmage on a 73-yard pass from Kurt Warner to Isaac Bruce. Steve McNair took over with less than two minutes left and drove Tennessee down to the 10 with time for one more play. McNair found Kevin Dyson on a short slant and for an instant it looked as if he might be able to run it in the end zone, but Mike Jones wrapped him up for the tackle at the 1 , just short of a potential tying score. MOMENTUM-CHANGER: Having lost three straight Super Bowls, the Buffalo Bills took a 13-6 halftime lead against Dallas in trip four and started with the ball in the third quarter. But instead of adding to the lead, the Bills lost it when Leon Lett stripped Thurman Thomas of the ball and safety James Washington scooped it up and weaved his way to a 46-yard touchdown . Emmitt Smith added two TD runs to earn MVP honors as Dallas ran away for a 30-13 win, but it was Washington's play that was most important. ROCKET SCREEN: Washington trailed the Raiders 14-3 late in the first half of the game played in 1984 when the Redskins took over at their 12 with 12 seconds to play. Rather than taking a knee, Washington coach Joe Gibbs called "Rocket Screen," a play that had led to a big gain late in the half in the regular season against the Raiders. Los Angeles was ready this time, putting backup linebacker Jack Squirek in place of starter Matt Millen just for this moment. Joe Theismann faked a pass to his right before floating a screen to Joe Washington to his left. Before the ball could reach Washington, Squirek grabbed it and walked for a 5-yard score that set the scene for a second-half blowout. ___ AP Sports Writer Kyle Hightower contributed to this report ___ For more AP NFL coverage: http://pro32.ap.org and http://twitter.com/AP_NFL

DETROIT (AP) — Toyota is recalling about 645,000 vehicles worldwide to fix an electrical problem that could stop air bags from inflating in a crash. The recall covers certain Toyota Prius and Lexus RX and NX SUVs. Also covered are some Toyota Alphard, Vellfire, Sienta, Noah, Voxy, Esquire, Probox, Succeed, Corolla, Highlander, Levin and Hilux models. All were produced from May of 2015 to March of 2016. The automaker says an open electrical circuit could occur over time. That would set off an air bag warning light and could stop the side and front air bags from deploying. Dealers will inspect serial numbers on sensors and replace them if necessary at no cost to owners. Toyota will notify owners by letter in starting in late March.

ISTANBUL (AP) — The Latest on Russian President Vladimir Putin's Mideast tour (all times local): 10:15 p.m. Russian President Vladimir Putin has criticized the U.S. recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital, warning that it could destabilize the region and derail the Middle East peace process. Speaking Monday after a hectic day that took him from a Russian base in Syria to Cairo and Ankara, Putin said the U.S. move "doesn't help the Mideast settlement and, just the other way round, destabilizes the already difficult situation in the region." The Russian leader added that it may "finish prospects for the Palestinian-Israeli peace process." He added that Moscow believes that the status of Jerusalem should be settled through talks between the Palestinians and Israel in line with United Nations resolutions. The Palestinians claim east Jerusalem as the capital of their future state. ___ 8:20 p.m. Russian President Vladimir Putin has arrived in Ankara to meet his Turkish counterpart, following visits to Syria and Egypt. Putin and President Recep Tayyip Erdogan are meeting Monday evening to discuss developments in Syria and the Middle East, as well as bilateral relations, according to the Turkish president's office. Putin and Erdogan met several times this year and regularly talk on the telephone as they and Iran work to broker a solution in Syria. Relations between the two countries were tense after Turkey shot down a Russian fighter jet for violating its airspace in 2015. But the two have since restored bilateral relations. Putin and Erdogan are expected to hold a joint news conference after their meeting.

LONDON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jul 4, 2018--The global industrial automation market in food safety and inspection is expected to register a CAGR of close to 6% during the period 2018-2022, according to the latest market research report by . This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180704005171/en/ Technavio has published a new market research report on the global industrial automation market in food safety and inspection from 2018-2022. A key factor driving the market’s growth is the significant cost savings in operations due to process control. Machine vision systems are employed in the initial stages of production. With the help of machine vision systems, defective components are removal instantly from the process. At times, the removed parts can be reintroduced into the production process. This saves materials. Defective parts do not continue to the subsequent manufacturing phase and thus, do not lead to further costs. This market research report on the provides an analysis of the most important trends expected to impact the market outlook during the forecast period. Technavio predicts an emerging trend as a major factor that has the potential to significantly impact the market and contribute to its growth or decline. This report is available at a USD 1,000 discount for a limited time only: In this report, Technavio highlights the MDX technology for food inspection systems as one of the key emerging trends in the global industrial automation market in food safety and inspection: Global industrial automation market in food safety and inspection: MDX technology for food inspection systems The Material Discrimination X-ray technology is an upgraded X-ray technology. Like traditional X-ray systems, MDX involves the use of a generator to project an X-ray beam onto a detector and pass a product through the beam. The difference between X-ray inspection and MDX is the use of two energy spectrums to discriminate between high-and low-channel X-rays, as well as a dual-layer detector by MDX. “MDX technology, in general, eliminates most of the effect of product thickness variations and leaves an image that shows density difference based on chemical composition,” says a senior market research analyst at Technavio. Global industrial automation market in food safety and inspection: Segmentation analysis This market research report segments the global industrial automation market in food safety and inspection into the following products (machine vision systems, X-ray inspection systems, and metal detection systems) and key regions (the Americas, APAC, and EMEA). The machine vision systems segment held the largest market share in 2017, accounting for nearly 32% of the market. This product segment is expected to dominate the global market throughout the forecast period. The Americas held the highest share of the global industrial automation market in food safety and inspection in 2017, accounting for a market share of approximately 37%. The market share occupied by this region is anticipated to increase during 2018-2022. Looking for more information on this market? Technavio’s sample reports are free of charge and contain multiple sections of the report such as the market size and forecast, drivers, challenges, trends, and more. Some of the key topics covered in the report include: Market Landscape Market ecosystem Market characteristics Market segmentation analysis Market Sizing Market sizing Market size and forecast Five Forces Analysis Market Segmentation Geographical Segmentation Regional comparison Key leading countries Market Drivers Market Challenges Market Trends Vendor Landscape Vendors covered Vendor classification Market positioning of vendors Competitive scenario About Technavio is a leading global technology research and advisory company. Their research and analysis focuses on emerging market trends and provides actionable insights to help businesses identify market opportunities and develop effective strategies to optimize their market positions. With over 500 specialized analysts, Technavio’s report library consists of more than 10,000 reports and counting, covering 800 technologies, spanning across 50 countries. Their client base consists of enterprises of all sizes, including more than 100 Fortune 500 companies. This growing client base relies on Technavio’s comprehensive coverage, extensive research, and actionable market insights to identify opportunities in existing and potential markets and assess their competitive positions within changing market scenarios. If you are interested in more information, please contact our media team at . View source version on businesswire.com:https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180704005171/en/ CONTACT: Technavio Research Jesse Maida Media & Marketing Executive US: +1 844 364 1100 UK: +44 203 893 3200 www.technavio.com KEYWORD: UNITED KINGDOM EUROPE INDUSTRY KEYWORD: RETAIL COMMUNICATIONS MARKETING FOOD/BEVERAGE SOURCE: Technavio Research Copyright Business Wire 2018. PUB: 07/04/2018 09:33 AM/DISC: 07/04/2018 09:33 AM http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180704005171/en

LONDON (AP) — Chelsea finally signed a back-up for Marcos Alonso at left wing back by bringing in Emerson Palmieri from Roma on the next-to-last day of the January transfer window. Palmieri, a former Brazil Under-17 international who has since switched his international allegiance to Italy, has been restricted to just two appearances in all competitions this season following a serious knee injury. "English football is something I have been watching since I was 15 years old," he said Tuesday. "It is a really beautiful game over here, but it is going to be even more beautiful to play it." Alonso has been Chelsea's only senior left wing back this season after manager Antonio Conte missed out on signing any cover last summer. Everton striker Sandro Ramirez will join Sevilla on loan for the rest of the season subject to a medical, while Leicester forward Ahmed Musa joined former club CSKA Moscow on loan for the rest of the season. Watford signed Belgium Under-21 winger Dodi Lukebakio on a 4 1/2-year deal and allowed Mauro Zarate to join Velez Sarsfield on loan until the end of the season.

BC-BBA--Top Ten BASEBALL'S TOP TEN By The Associated Press AMERICAN LEAGUE G AB R H Pct. Betts Bos 48 184 52 66 .359 Brantley Cle 44 181 30 62 .343 Altuve Hou 57 233 33 78 .335 Simmons LAA 54 201 32 67 .333 Segura Sea 51 218 37 72 .330 Castellanos Det 52 209 28 68 .325 MMachado Bal 56 219 30 71 .324 JMartinez Bos 53 205 36 66 .322 MDuffy TB 39 156 10 49 .314 Ramos TB 42 159 16 49 .308 Home Runs Trout, Los Angeles, 18; JMartinez, Boston, 18; JoRamirez, Cleveland, 17; Betts, Boston, 17; MMachado, Baltimore, 16; Gallo, Texas, 15; Judge, New York, 15; KDavis, Oakland, 13; Encarnacion, Cleveland, 13; 5 tied at 12. Runs Batted In JMartinez, Boston, 47; MMachado, Baltimore, 45; JoRamirez, Cleveland, 40; Judge, New York, 40; Lowrie, Oakland, 39; Haniger, Seattle, 39; Moustakas, Kansas City, 39; KDavis, Oakland, 38; Benintendi, Boston, 38; Betts, Boston, 37. Pitching Severino, New York, 8-1; Kluber, Cleveland, 8-2; Morton, Houston, 7-0; Porcello, Boston, 7-2; Verlander, Houston, 7-2; Happ, Toronto, 7-3; Snell, Tampa Bay, 7-3; Rodriguez, Boston, 6-1; Tanaka, New York, 6-2; 2 tied at 6-3.

NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — The world's last male northern white rhino, Sudan, has died after 'age-related complications'

NEW YORK (AP) — Allen Crabbe and Caris LeVert each scored 22 points and the Brooklyn Nets beat the Memphis Grizzlies 118-115 on Monday night. Rondae Hollis-Jefferson had 16 points and 12 rebounds, and DeMarre Carroll scored 18 points for the Nets, who have two straight wins for the first time since Jan. 19-21. Andrew Harrison, who missed Memphis' last nine games due to a right wrist injury, scored 19 points, and Brionte Webber had a career-high 15. The Grizzlies have lost 20 of 21. Memphis was without Marc Gasol due to flu-like symptoms. The team has lost 15 straight games on the road since a Christmas Eve victory at Sacramento. Brooklyn trailed 94-87 heading into the fourth quarter before turning it around against the NBA's second-worst team. Carroll capped a string of three straight 3s to tie it at 97 with 8:45 remaining in the final period. After a three-second defensive technical free throw by Harrison gave the Grizzlies a 101-100 lead with 6:54 left, the Nets scored nine straight points highlighted by LeVert's dunk with 4:07 left to lead 109-101. Crabbe increased Brooklyn's advantage 116-108 with 38 seconds left, but Memphis made it interesting. Wayne Selden Jr., who scored 17 points of the bench, hit a 3, and JaMychal Green made a layup to make it 117-115 with 12 seconds left. Spencer Dinwiddie then hit a free throw to extend the Nets' lead to 118-115 with 11 seconds to go before Harrison missed a potential tying 3 with 0.4 seconds remaining. TIP-INS Grizzlies: Tyreke Evans (inactive) did not play. He was replaced by Harrison in the starting lineup. ... Deyonta Davis started at center in place of Gasol. It was just his third start of the season. ... Green had a double-double with 14 points and 16 rebounds. Nets: Crabbe moved into second place for the most 3-pointers in a season by a player in franchise history. His first 3-pointer of the night gave him 163, passing Joe Johnson. The 25-year-old is now three shy of Deron Williams' record of 169 set during the 2012-13 season. UP NEXT Grizzlies: Continue their three-game trip at Philadelphia on Wednesday night. Nets: Host Charlotte on Wednesday night to close their three-game homestand. ___ More AP basketball: https://apnews.com/tag/NBAbasketball

A middle-aged man was silently learning how to make coffee in a small coffee shop tucked in an alley of Tainan, a city in southeast Taiwan. As he looks graceful and a little shy, no one would associate him with a Nepali Sherpa, who has led mountain climbers to reach the summit of Mount Everest three times. Rinji Sherpa, 43, who lives in a far-off mountainous region of Nepal, began to work as a porter bearing a 20-kilogram burden for visitors at altitudes over 14,000 feet (4,300 meters) for a meager reward of less than US$3 a day when he was 11 years old. Rinji used to be an uneducated illiterate who could hardly spell his own name. Ten years of work as a bearer has enabled him to speak English and French, and during his work study in India, he learned how to speak Hindi. On top of Nepalese and his native Sherpa language, Rinji can speak a total of five languages. As he has been adapted to inclement weather associated with high altitudes, he let nature take its course and became a mountain guide in Nepal. “It was 2008 when I first led a group of visitors to reach the top of Mount Everest,” Rinji recalled, adding that nine mountaineers and four Sherpas went on the expedition from Lukala and spent 40 days. People who have seen the movie “Everest” know that help from Sherpas is indispensable for mountaineers who wish to scale the highest mountain in the world and the cost is so enormous that many adventurers have to save for years to make such a trip. Moreover, there is no guarantee that the trip will be successful. However, income for Sherpas who serve as mountain guides and protectors for the adventure seekers is not high. Rinji said his first expedition to reach Mount Everest summit in 2008 only brought him US$1,000. Even so, a grand is still considered high income for relatively poor Nepalese. Rinji said he has led mountaineers into the Mountain Everest area five times, three of which were successful. To mountain climbers, being able to reach the tallest point on earth is a pride of life, and being there three times is an incredible record. Rinji learned of Taiwan when he served for Taiwanese mountaineers. He said he had no idea of where Taiwan is located before they introduced him to the country. However, even after that, Rinji said he could barely make out that Taiwan is not far from Hong Kong, but was not sure of the country's exact location. His service for the Taiwanese visitors started his connection with Taiwan. A major earthquake in Nepal in 2015 badly damaged Rinji’s and many other Nepalese homes. After the tremor, Taiwanese mountaineers raised fund to help Rinji rebuild his home, and made possible his sightseeing trip to Taiwan at the end of that year. Rinji's home was badly damaged in the 2015 Nepal earthquake. This year Rinji made a second trip to Taiwan, and now he stays at the home of a Taiwanese friend he acquainted during a mountaineering journey. He has spent most of his time at a coffee shop learning how to make coffee, or visiting a scarce number of Sherpas who have settled in Taiwan. As Taiwan is also a mountainous country, Rinji took a trip to set foot on the summit of the 3,416-meter-high (11,207 ft) Hehuanshan. Rinji said Taiwan is a good place, and compared with Nepal’s, Taiwan’s traffic is orderly and that during his stay in Taiwan he had never encountered bad people. He added that he is learning Chinese and hoped that one day he can settle down in the country.

New York (AP) — Petroleum futures trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange Tuesday: (1,000 bbl; dollars per bbl.)

Two-time defending champion Oracle Team USA has unveiled the 50-foot catamaran it will sail in the 35th America's Cup in Bermuda. Skipper Jimmy Spithill says the boat, which is just longer than 49 feet, is more refined than the 45-foot cat the syndicate has been training in. Says Spithill: "Now it really starts for this boat. There are 100 days to go and the clock's ticking. We really need to put some hours on it." Qualifying races begin May 26. The America's Cup match, between Oracle and the winner of the challenger series, begins June 17. Oracle unveiled its new catamaran Tuesday night. It will launch and christen it with champagne on Wednesday, and begin dockside testing. It will go for its first sail as soon as the weather permits.

PARIS (AP) — A digital gallery in Paris is making art an immersive experience for visitors who can walk into and over paintings projected around a warehouse. The Atelier des Lumieres, or Studio of Lights, opened this month with an inaugural exhibit featuring Austrian painter Gustav Klimt's work not hanging on walls, but lighting up floors, ceilings and walls in a colorful, 35-minute moving sequence. Gallery director Michael Couzigou says: "We use photos scanned in high definition to make this digital exhibition a universe of music and sound." The show, set to classical music, attracted 60,000 visitors in its first 10 days. Organizers say the gallery is the biggest of its kind in the world. It has 140 fixed video projectors installed across the 3,300-square-meter (35,521-square-foot) space.

NEW YORK (AP) — The 25th South by Southwest Film Festival will kick off with John Krasinski's third directorial effort: the supernatural thriller "A Quiet Place." The Austin, Texas, festival announced its slate Wednesday, starting with the opening selection of Krasinksi's film, which stars himself and Emily Blunt, his wife. The festival is known for its robust genre selections and expansive indie offerings. The 2018 edition is full of both. Premiering in Austin will be the Leslie Mann-John Cena comedy, "Blockers," about parents trying to keep their daughters from losing their virginity; "You Can Choose Your Family," with Jim Gaffigan as a father with a secret family; and "Boundaries," starring Christopher Plummer as a pot-dealing grandfather.

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Anton Forsberg made 42 saves, Vinnie Hinostroza had a goal and an assist, and the Chicago Blackhawks beat the Nashville Predators 2-1 on Tuesday night. Last-place Chicago, which needs a big finish to get into the playoffs, returned from the All-Star break with its second straight win. David Kampf also scored for the Blackhawks. Kyle Turris had Nashville's only goal and Juuse Saros made 29 saves. The Predators lost in regulation for the first time since Jan. 2. Kampf got the lead for the Blackhawks at 3:03 of the first. On the right boards, Tomas Jurco knocked down an attempted clear by Saros and kicked the puck toward Hinostroza in the right circle. Hinostroza poked the puck off Nashville defenseman Roman Josi, and Kampf beat Saros with a wrist shot high to the glove side. Turris tied it with his ninth goal 2:12 into the second. Craig Smith forced a turnover by Forsberg behind the Chicago net. Smith passed to Scott Hartnell below the goal line, and he fed Turris all alone in the slot for his first goal since Dec. 29. Hinostroza got the eventual game-winner at 14:33 of the second. Nick Schmaltz carried the puck into the Nashville zone on the right side and sent a pass to Hinostroza at the top of the right faceoff circle. Aided by a screen from Predators defenseman Matt Irwin, Hinostroza fired a one-timer by Saros on the far side. Forsberg denied Calle Jarnkrok from the low slot with 1:30 remaining to preserve the win for Chicago. NOTES: Nashville RW Miikka Salomaki played his 100th career NHL game. ... The Predators are 0-10-2 when trailing after two periods this season. ... Hinostroza has points in three consecutive games. ... All four games in this season's series between the teams have been decided by one goal, with each team winning two games. UP NEXT Blackhawks: At Vancouver on Thursday. Predators: Host Los Angeles on Thursday.

LAREDO, Texas (AP) — Authorities say a semitrailer driver is in custody after he was found to be transporting 76 immigrants in Texas. The U.S. Border Patrol said in a statement Monday that the immigrants were discovered Friday at a checkpoint on U.S. 83, about 35 miles (56 kilometers) north of Laredo in South Texas. The semitrailer stopped in the checkpoint's primary lane where the driver, a U.S. citizen, was questioned about his immigration status. His rig was kept for further inspection, and agents found the immigrants inside the trailer. The immigrants are from Mexico, Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala. Thirteen were unaccompanied minors. The Border Patrol says all of them are in good health. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement spokeswoman Nina Pruneda says the driver's identity and other details about the case are being withheld at this time.

BEIRUT (AP) — Kazakhstan says it has postponed talks aimed at firming up a Syrian cease-fire by one day. The Kazakh Foreign Ministry says the talks, to be held in preparation for U.N.-brokered Syria negotiations in Geneva, will be postponed until Thursday. The ministry did not give a reason for the delay. The two-day conference is aimed at bolstering a Dec. 30 cease-fire ahead of the U.N. talks slated to begin Feb. 23. Kazakhstan hosted talks between rebels and the Syrian government in January to pave the way for the resumption of the U.N. process, which has been on hold since last April. Rebels will send the same delegation to Thursday's talks, headed by Mohammad Alloush of the Islam Army rebel group.

LONDON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jul 4, 2018-- analysts forecast the global iodine market to grow at a CAGR of close to 4% during the period 2018-2022, according to their latest market research report. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180704005164/en/ Technavio has published a new market research report on the global iodine market from 2018-2022. (Graphic: Business Wire) Recycling of iodine is one of the major trends being witnessed in the . Many iodine producers have recycling facilities. In such recycling facilities, iodine and its derivatives are recovered from iodine waste streams. In 2017, iodine recycling accounted for 17% of world iodine sales. In 2017, countries such as Japan held a major share of 70% of the total iodine recycled. This report is available at a USD 1,000 discount for a limited time only: In this report, Technavio analysts highlight the growth of the smartphone industry as a key factor contributing to the growth of the global iodine market: Global iodine market: Growth of the smartphone industry The display in smartphone touchscreens consists of liquid crystals that are activated by the electric current. Depending on the activation state of the crystals, these liquid crystals block or allow polarized light to pass through. According to a senior market research analyst at Technavio, “Polarizing films are used to increase the visibility of the image created on the liquid crystal display. Iodine-containing polarizing films are made by absorbing iodine onto a stretched polyvinyl alcohol surface.” Global iodine market: X-ray contrast media segment leads the market This market research report segments the global iodine market into the following applications (X-ray contrast media, pharmaceuticals, LCD and LED screens, and nutrition) and key regions (the Americas, APAC, and EMEA). It provides an in-depth analysis of the prominent factors influencing the market, including drivers, opportunities, trends, and industry-specific challenges. Of the four major applications, the X-ray contrast media segment held the largest market share in 2017, contributing to nearly 23% of the market. The market share occupied by this segment is expected to increase by 2022. EMEA was the leading region for the global iodine market in 2017. It accounted for a market share of approximately 42%. It was followed by APAC and the Americas. APAC is expected to project the fastest growth during the period 2018-2022. Looking for more information on this market? Technavio’s sample reports are free of charge and contain multiple sections of the report such as the market size and forecast, drivers, challenges, trends, and more. Some of the key topics covered in the report include: Market Landscape Market ecosystem Market characteristics Market segmentation analysis Market Sizing Market sizing Market size and forecast Five Forces Analysis Market Segmentation Geographical Segmentation Regional comparison Key leading countries Market Drivers Market Challenges Market Trends Vendor Landscape Vendors covered Vendor classification Market positioning of vendors Competitive scenario About Technavio is a leading global technology research and advisory company. Their research and analysis focuses on emerging market trends and provides actionable insights to help businesses identify market opportunities and develop effective strategies to optimize their market positions. With over 500 specialized analysts, Technavio’s report library consists of more than 10,000 reports and counting, covering 800 technologies, spanning across 50 countries. Their client base consists of enterprises of all sizes, including more than 100 Fortune 500 companies. This growing client base relies on Technavio’s comprehensive coverage, extensive research, and actionable market insights to identify opportunities in existing and potential markets and assess their competitive positions within changing market scenarios. If you are interested in more information, please contact our media team at . View source version on businesswire.com:https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180704005164/en/ CONTACT: Technavio Research Jesse Maida Media & Marketing Executive US: +1 844 364 1100 UK: +44 203 893 3200 www.technavio.com KEYWORD: UNITED KINGDOM EUROPE INDUSTRY KEYWORD: TECHNOLOGY TELECOMMUNICATIONS OTHER TECHNOLOGY MANUFACTURING CHEMICALS/PLASTICS SOURCE: Technavio Copyright Business Wire 2018. PUB: 07/04/2018 09:17 AM/DISC: 07/04/2018 09:16 AM http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180704005164/en

WASHINGTON (AP) — At a potentially pivotal moment of diplomacy with North Korea, the Pentagon said Monday that annual U.S.-South Korean military exercises that had been postponed for the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics will begin April 1. In a brief statement, the Pentagon said Defense Secretary Jim Mattis and his South Korean counterpart, Song Young-moo, agreed to go forward with the maneuvers, known as Foal Eagle and Key Resolve, "at a scale similar to" that of previous years. North Korea has been notified of the schedule "as well as the defensive nature" of the exercises, the Pentagon said. The timing and size of the annual maneuvers are especially sensitive this year because of heightened tension over the North's accelerated work last year on a nuclear-armed missile potentially capable of reaching the United States - followed, unexpectedly, by prospects for a diplomatic solution to the nuclear crisis. North Korea typically objects to U.S.-South Korean military exercises, calling them dress rehearsals for an invasion. Washington and Seoul insist they are defensive and are needed to keep allied forces combat-ready. After recent high-level talks with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, South Korean officials said Kim indicated his acceptance of the maneuvers. Kim also offered to meet personally with President Donald Trump to discuss giving up his nuclear weapons on unspecified terms, and Trump quickly agreed. The time and place of the unprecedented talks have not been set, but the White House indicated the summit would happen by May. South Korean President Moon Jae-in is scheduled to set the stage for that summit by meeting with Kim in April in the Demilitarized Zone, which separates the two Koreas. It had been widely expected that the U.S.-South Korean military exercises would go ahead, even with the new prospects for diplomacy. Some have speculated that the maneuvers would be scaled back, but the Pentagon said they would be conducted at "the same scale, scope and duration" as in previous years. The larger of the two exercises, Foal Eagle, is a field training exercise with about 11,500 U.S. troops and about 290,000 South Korean troops, according to a Pentagon spokesman, Marine Lt. Col. Christopher Logan. The other, known as Key Resolve, will involve about 12,200 U.S. troops and about 10,000 from South Korea. "To avoid compromising exercise objectives, specifics regarding the exercise scenarios will not be discussed," Logan said, adding that the purpose is to "enhance" the ability of the U.S.-South Korean alliance to defend South Korean territory. The U.S. has about 28,500 troops permanently stationed in South Korea and is obligated by treaty to defend the South in the event it is attacked by the North. The two Koreas are still technically at war because their 1950-53 war ended in an armistice, not a peace treaty.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Looking for a little publicity? President Donald Trump's re-election campaign is trying to raise cash from his first State of the Union speech and giving donors a taste of the spotlight. Those who contribute will have their names displayed under the livestream of the speech on the campaign's website Tuesday night. Trump's middle son, Eric, says in a fundraising email that, "Even if you choose to only give $1, the proof of your support will send shockwaves around the world as they see every American who proudly stands behind our President." The government watchdog group Public Citizen is criticizing the campaign for using the speech as a campaign fundraising event. The group's president, Robert Weissman, says Trump "is commercializing and corrupting yet another national institution."

ATHENS, Greece (AP) — The European Union's financial affairs chief is in Greece for talks on the bailout-dependent country's slow-moving negotiations with its international creditors. Pierre Moscovici met Greek Finance Minister Euclid Tsakalotos Wednesday, and was due to hold talks later with Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras. Tsipras' left-led government was hoping by next week to conclude dragging negotiations on spending cuts and reforms demanded by Greece's European creditors and the International Monetary Fund. An agreement would allow the country to join the European Central Bank's bond-buying program, and ease its way to tapping bond markets again later this year. But Athens refuses to introduce new austerity measures, and next week's meeting of eurozone finance ministers is not expected to provide a full breakthrough in the talks. Greece has depended on international bailouts since 2010.

BOSTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Apr 24, 2018--Fuze, the leading cloud-based communications solution provider for the modern global enterprise, today released the ‘Game Changers’ Report that showcases examples of how CIOs and other IT leaders are assuming more strategic, impactful roles and leading projects that are transforming organizations from business, technology, and workforce standpoints. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180424005205/en/ Fuze Unveils Report Showcasing IT ‘Game Changers’ in Action (Graphic: Business Wire) The report profiles 12 visionary technology leaders, exploring how these game changers are making their marks. These CIOs and heads of IT come from different-sized organizations and industries, ranging from pro sports and apparel to construction materials. What the game changers share is a willingness to disrupt the business and a commitment to leverage cutting-edge technology to change the way their companies operate; how their employees collaborate, communicate, and get work done; and the overall customer experience. “CIOs are facing major challenges preparing their businesses to compete in a digital world,” said Colin Doherty, CEO of Fuze. “We’ve heard hundreds of stories from CIOs about how they’ve succeeded in taking cloud-first approaches and equipping the modern workforce with tools that empower them to work the way they want to work. This report highlights some of the most inspirational examples of game changers in action.” Studies show that historically, CIOs were viewed as “order takers” whose duties focused more on “ keeping the lights on ” than on playing a leadership role in their companies’ strategies. Now, they are stepping up as transformation agents, driving digital innovation and acting as positive catalysts for change. Today’s CIOs understand the importance of digital to any business and the opportunity it presents. Fuze’s Breaking Barriers 2020: How CIOs are Shaping the Future of Work study shows 76 percent of CIOs believe adoption of new technology is a crucial business strategy and 80 percent say IT’s ability to innovate is critical to the success of the business. “Now, Information Technology is playing more of an advisory role,” said Jennifer Terrill, CIO of iPayment, one of the IT leaders profiled in the ‘Game Changers’ Report. “We can collaborate and strategize on delivery options, adoption execution, and operational success criteria instead of what hardware and software to buy. The business mindset at iPayment is successfully adapting to meet the challenges of rapid technology changes.” Resources See all of the ‘Game Changers’ Report content here Click here for an infographic and video illustrating how our game changers are innovating and staying ahead of the industry If you are interested in meeting a game changer, join us for our ‘Game Changers’ live events in Boston San Francisco , and Chicago Read the Fuze Breaking Barriers report About Fuze Fuze is a global, cloud-based unified communications platform that empowers productivity and delivers insights across the enterprise by enabling simplified business voice communications, flexible video conferencing, and always-on collaboration. Formerly ThinkingPhones, Fuze allows the modern, mobile workforce to seamlessly communicate anytime, anywhere, across any device. Headquartered in Boston, MA, Fuze has additional locations including New York, San Francisco, Seattle, Ottawa, London, Amsterdam, Aveiro (Portugal), Madrid, Paris, Munich, Zurich, Copenhagen, and Sydney. For more information, visit www.fuze.com. View source version on businesswire.com:https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180424005205/en/ CONTACT: PAN Communications for Fuze Emily Featherston, 617-502-4300 fuze@pancomm.com KEYWORD: UNITED STATES NORTH AMERICA MASSACHUSETTS INDUSTRY KEYWORD: TECHNOLOGY CONSUMER ELECTRONICS INTERNET TELECOMMUNICATIONS OTHER TECHNOLOGY MOBILE/WIRELESS VOIP COMMUNICATIONS OTHER COMMUNICATIONS SOURCE: Fuze Copyright Business Wire 2018. PUB: 04/24/2018 09:00 AM/DISC: 04/24/2018 09:01 AM http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180424005205/en

ISLAMABAD (AP) — Pakistan is still mulling Afghanistan's recent overtures, including an invitation that Pakistani prime minister visit Kabul. Analysts widely see the offer as a good sign, underscoring that dialogue between the two often uneasy neighbors is key to defeating militants on both sides of the border. Pakistan, however, says it wants to consult the country's political and military leadership before accepting Afghan President Ashraf Ghani's invitation. The invitation follows a visit last weekend to Kabul by Pakistan's National Security Adviser Nasser Janjua and also last month's offer by Ghani of unconditional talks with the Taliban. The Taliban have not responded yet. Pakistan's foreign ministry spokesman Moahmmad Faisal said on Tuesday the country's political and military leaders are carefully considering the invitation in order "to prepare a brief for the prime minister."

BRITAL, Lebanon (AP) — To bird lovers, the scenes are upsetting. Dozens of dead buzzards lie on a carpet of feathers on a rocky hill in northern Lebanon. Hunters pose with their catch — scores of calandra larks, known for their melodious birdsong, arranged neatly on the hoods of their Land Rovers. Great white pelicans, protected both in Europe and Lebanon, soar overhead, then with a crack of rifle fire, tumble down into the shrubs below. Posted on Lebanese social media in recent months, the images point to the enormity of the task facing authorities as they try to clamp down on hunting practices more at home in the "Wild West" than a country run by law. Lebanon lies along key migratory routes for millions of European birds, including protected and endangered species, that winter in the Persian Gulf and Africa. But even with a new law in place banning the hunting of protected species, conservationists say overhunting in Lebanon is undermining their efforts. "Everybody hunts and they're not going to be able to put limits on it," said Wissam Arif, a hunter from Lebanon's eastern Bekaa Valley. "Sure, there should be licenses, but no one does anything about it." A 2015 study by the conservation society Birdlife International estimated that 2.6 million birds are shot down in Lebanon each year. Per capita, that's second most in the eastern Mediterranean region, after Cyprus. "European birders have invested a lot of time, tax money, and other resources to protect the last remaining breeding pairs, and this is all for nothing if the birds don't fly back," said Axel Hirschfeld, of the Germany-based Committee Against Bird Slaughter. Conservationists credit Lebanese Environment Minister Tarek Khatib for bringing into force a 2004 hunting law that, they say, is as strict as any in Europe. Last September, Khatib opened the country's first official hunting season in at least two decades, with the requirement that hunters take tests to get their licenses. The ministry awarded more than 18,000 hunting licenses. But a month later, hunters from the town of Brital in the Bekaa Valley set up electronic bird callers and spinning lures to coax the birds down - a technique prohibited under the law. None of the hunters in the valley could show a license to an Associated Press crew visiting the area, and nearly all declined to be identified by name because of the new hunting regulations. A 53-year-old local said he would shoot down between 100 and 150 skylarks and chaffinches on a good day, but high winds and an intermittent drizzle meant he would catch just a fraction that morning. The legal limit is 50 per hunt. In Lebanon, these small birds are typically prepared in a frying pan with a marinade of pomegranate molasses, wrapped in warm pita bread and eaten whole — the tiny bones giving the delicacy a pleasant crunch. "That's a hawk," said a police deputy, pointing over the crop-less fields. The bird swayed as a rifle shot rang out, but stayed in the sky. "They shouldn't be shooting that." The deputy, who was also hunting that day, said he was assigned to prison duty and that it wasn't his job to enforce hunting regulations. Nearly every man hunting that morning had some sort of connection to the security forces - including a police investigator who said he would not report his friends. But as this hunting season draws to an end next week, Khatib said he was positive about the law's impact. "They are beginning to follow the law ... we've created a cultural change among the Lebanese," he told the AP. For many Lebanese, hunting is a tradition passed down from father to son and an autumn ritual for men to pass weekend nights with friends before hunting at dawn. Smaller birds are usually cooked and eaten but the larger ones, including migratory birds, are shot just for sport. "They bring in all types of birds," said Rabih Danaf, a taxidermist in the town of Bhamdoun, 23 kilometers (14 miles) east of Beirut. "The hunters make a mockery of the law." Danaf's Facebook page displays stuffed harriers, pelicans, storks, falcons and colorful hoopoes — including at least two ringed in Europe for scientific study, according to Hirschfeld, the German conservationist, who said he checked the tags in an international database. There is no law against taxidermy, said Roger Saad, an activist with the Lebanese Bird Conservation Coalition. Saad, who manages a hardware store in an industrial district in eastern Beirut, keeps a handwritten list of the hunting violations he has seen on social media and those that have been reported to him through the Coalition's network. An amateur sleuth, he has reported more than 70 cases to the Environment Ministry, including data on alleged violators. He said he was pleased to hear some have been fined, while others have gotten away with just a warning. The Environment Ministry says it has forwarded some 40 cases to prosecutors for legal action, and it encourages the public to report violations directly to the police. Khatib said he is waiting for Parliament to allocate funds for a ranger force that would enforce hunting laws. In a country plagued by rolling power cuts and a trash-strewn coastline, many Lebanese shrug off concerns about overhunting. "People think: 'It's not connected to me, so it's not my problem,'" said Saad. But birds hunt pests, which in turn helps farming — the fifth largest employing sector in this tiny country. "It's a cycle," he said. With elections slated for May, a new government could mean changes at the Environment Ministry, disrupting conservation efforts. "We have birds passing through here that do not pass through anywhere else in the world, and instead of looking at them, we shoot them," said Saad. "Someone needs to speak for them."

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The United Nations Staff Union says 32 people working for the world body were killed in the line of duty in 2016, including 26 peacekeepers. The union's security committee said Tuesday that in the past five years almost 240 U.N. personnel have died in deliberate attacks. Last year's death toll was lower than in 2015, when at least 51 U.N. and associated personnel were killed in the line of duty, the highest number ever recorded by the committee. For the third year in a row, the committee said, the greatest loss of life in 2016 was in Mali, where at least 23 U.N. personnel were killed by ambushes, landmines and bombings. The committee called on Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to mobilize resources to ensure the safety of U.N. personnel.

SYDNEY (AP) — Raelene Castle will take over as chief executive officer at Rugby Australia next month, becoming the first woman to lead one of the major national unions in world rugby. Castle, who has been CEO at Netball New Zealand and at the Canterbury Bulldogs in Australia's National Rugby League, will replace Bill Pulver on Jan. 15. Rugby Australia Chairman Cameron Clyne announced the appointment Tuesday, saying Castle was the standout applicant among more than 200 candidates. "I am especially looking forward to getting out into the rugby communities across Australia and meeting the diverse range of people that make the game tick," Castle said in a statement. "Having followed rugby closely for over 30 years and having worked in the New Zealand and Australian sporting environments for the past 10, there is no doubt Australian rugby has a clear international and domestic offering for both male and female athletes that can be further developed and strengthened." Castle's other governance roles in sport have included serving as a board director of the International Federations of Netball Associations and as chair of the NRL club CEOs leadership group. Clyne said Castle would bring "a fresh set of eyes to the challenges and opportunities at Rugby Australia, bringing to us her learnings from other codes." "Through her most recent roles as CEO of the Bulldogs and Netball New Zealand, Raelene has led sporting organizations at both a national and club level, giving her an in-depth understanding of what it takes to run a national sporting body as well as the unique challenges for clubs and the importance of building strong relationships and a unity of purpose within," the sport, Clyne said. "Raelene is an extremely impressive executive who covered every base as far as what the board was looking for in a chief executive officer to lead our game into an important new chapter." Castle was born in Australia and moved to New Zealand as a child, returning to Sydney in 2013 to take the job at the Bulldogs. Castle is the first woman to lead one of Australia's four national football governing bodies, and Rugby Australia said she is the first woman to lead one of the world's top-tier rugby national governing bodies.

COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — Virtual reality, neural feedback and digital therapy are among five ideas to help solve the U.S. opioid crisis that have won a global technology challenge in Ohio. Hundreds of researchers, caregivers, service providers and individuals from Ohio, other states and nine countries participated in the competition. Winners received $10,000 to take ideas into development. The state is offering the $8 million challenge and $12 million in research-and-development in a two-pronged strategy aimed at driving scientific breakthroughs to address the deadly epidemic tied to prescription painkillers. Republican Ohio Gov. John Kasich (KAY'-sik) called for the investment as the state has been among the hardest hit. Winning ideas included using virtual reality for addiction prevention, using neural feedback to support surgical patients through physical therapy and digital addiction therapy based on mindfulness theory.

YEREVAN, Armenia (AP) — Armenia's government and the country's opposition are taking part in events to mark the massacre of 1.5 million Armenians a century ago by Ottoman Turks. Tuesday's commemoration of the massacre that began 103 years ago —viewed by Armenians and many historians as genocide — comes after the country's prime minister resigned in a surprise move following days of anti-government protests. Armenia's acting prime minister and other officials laid flowers at a hilltop memorial complex in Armenia's capital Tuesday morning along with thousands of residents. Leaders of the opposition and their supporters were marching to the memorial later on Tuesday. Turkey, the successor to the Ottoman Empire, vehemently denies that the massacre was genocide and insists it was part of the violence during World War I.

WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — Multiple chances were missed to save a 3-year-old Wichita boy before he was found encased in concrete, a former Kansas welfare official said. Dianne Keech, the Department of Children and Families deputy director from 2013 to 2015, said the "point of no return" was when the agency failed to call 911 last April after receiving a report that Evan Brewer had hit his head while taking a bath and "had no pulse" before being revived, The Wichita Eagle reported. The person making the report said Evan and his mother, Miranda Miller, were domestic violence victims and that someone would "take life from them" before "bringing them back." His mother's live-in boyfriend, Stephen Bodine, allegedly bragged about choking Evan and his mother and strangling the boy until he became unconscious, according to records that Keech reviewed after they were released earlier this month. Keech said that instead of calling 911 and flagging the report to administrators as a "critical incident," it was placed on hold for six days. The case was closed April 28, records show. Evan's body was found in September, and Miller and Bodine are charged with murder. "If they don't do the right thing there," Keech said, "it seals his doom. They never recovered from that point on." Evan is the paternal grandson of former Wichita Mayor Carl Brewer, a Democratic candidate for governor this year. Evan had been the subject of a custody battle for months between his mother and father, Carlo Brewer, who had contacted state officials and local police over the welfare of his son. Too often, DCF took the word of the 3-year-old's mother that he was OK, said Keech, who served on the state Child Death Review Board during part of her DCF tenure and now works as a child-protection consultant. Keech counted six separate reports of abuse that the agency received from July 21, 2016, to May 14, 2017, before Evan's death. Her analysis shows the agency failed to adequately address all safety and risk concerns with five of the six reports. She also found that DCF failed to collect all relevant information in at least four of the six reports. "This is not Monday-morning quarterbacking," Keech said. "This is how cases should be handled in the moment. I am reviewing this case based on investigative procedures that used to be standard for the agency." Shayla Johnston, a Brewer family spokeswoman and attorney, agrees with Keech that DCF failed. With anyone who looks at Evan's case, Johnston said, "you can agree that bureaucracy killed Evan." DCF spokeswoman Theresa Freed said the agency could not comment on the case. "Given the Brewer family's stated desire to pursue litigation against the Kansas Department for Children and Families, we are not in a position to address each point alleged," she said in an email. ___ Information from: The Wichita (Kan.) Eagle, http://www.kansas.com

WARSAW, Poland (AP) — Pope Francis' decision to move the World War II-era head of Poland's Catholic Church a step closer to possible sainthood has hit a stumbling block, after two leading Jewish organizations and even Polish Catholic publications called him out for anti-Semitic views. It's not clear if the protests will derail the sainthood cause of Cardinal August Hlond, but in the past the Vatican has taken such protests seriously and at the very least put the cases up for closer review. In May, Francis approved a decree recognizing Hlond's "heroic virtues." Now the Vatican must confirm a miracle attributed to Hlond's intercession for him to be beatified, and a second one for him to be made a saint. Hlond was the highest-ranking Polish church official from 1926 to his death in 1948.

LOS ANGELES--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Apr 24, 2018--Don Lee Farms has sold more than a million Organic Plant-Based Burgers in less than sixty days, becoming the fastest growing product in its category. “Interest in our Organic Plant-Based Burger has just exploded,” said Donald Goodman, President, Don Lee Farms. “We are just keeping up with demand and are implementing plans to expand distribution every week.” This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180424005065/en/ Don Lee Farms' Breakthrough Organic Plant-Based Burger “The fact that our Organic Plant-Based Burger is made with plants and not with science has resonated with people. No one wants to eat a burger hidden with artificial or modified ingredients if they have the choice,” said Danny Goodman, Don Lee Farms. “They want natural. They want organic. They want real.” The Don Lee Farms’ burger “bleeds” organic beet juice and sizzles on the grill from organic vegetable-based fats just like raw beef. It is the only burger in its category to qualify for the Organic Seal certified by USDA. The new burger launched to rave reviews. CookingLight Magazine proclaimed, “This burger was really delicious. I’d buy these again,” after tasting the top three leading brands. “Having sold a million burgers this quickly has exceeded everyone’s expectations,” continued Donald. “The excitement around this burger has been overwhelming. We are now expanding availability in club stores and will be introducing the burger in restaurants and other retail markets in the upcoming months.” About Don Lee Farms Established in California in 1982, Don Lee Farms is a family-owned food manufacturer and leading national supplier of organic and conventional food products. They are the leading national producer of organic veggie burgers. Don Lee Farms produces meat, vegetarian and plant-based foods for retail, club, foodservice and school foodservice markets. Consumer products and end items are sold at major retailers nationwide such as Costco Wholesale®, Whole Foods Markets® and Walmart® under the Don Lee Farms label, private brands and under brands of their partners. For more information, visit www.donleefarms.com and follow Don Lee Farms on Facebook and Twitter, @DonLeeFarms. View source version on businesswire.com:https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180424005065/en/ CONTACT: Don Lee Farms Maria Aguilar maria@donleefarms.com KEYWORD: UNITED STATES NORTH AMERICA CALIFORNIA INDUSTRY KEYWORD: RETAIL FOOD/BEVERAGE SUPERMARKET SOURCE: Don Lee Farms Copyright Business Wire 2018. PUB: 04/24/2018 08:00 AM/DISC: 04/24/2018 08:01 AM http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180424005065/en

LAS VEGAS (AP) — The famous neon sign of a cowgirl in downtown Las Vegas has been taken down as part of the construction of a planned casino-resort. After more than two decades on Freemont Street, "Vegas Vickie" was dismantled Tuesday. Casino owner Derek Stevens says his company is looking for a home for the neon sign. It was created in 1980 and originally dubbed "Sassy Sally" after a casino of that name. Stevens' company is planning to transform the space previously occupied by the Las Vegas Club.

TORONTO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 30, 2018--Bloom Burton & Co. (“Bloom Burton”) is pleased to announce that Michael J. Brown, CFA®, has been appointed as Portfolio Manager and Chief Executive Officer of Bloom Burton’s asset management affiliate firm, Bloom Burton Investment Group Inc. (“BBIG”). BBIG is now registered as an Investment Fund Manager, Portfolio Manager and Exempt Market Dealer in Ontario, an Investment Fund Manager and Exempt Market Dealer in Québec, and Exempt Market Dealer in Alberta, British Columbia and Saskatchewan. Mr. Brown, CFA®, has a 20-year track record in the Canadian alternative investments industry, having most recently served as President, Chief Compliance Officer and Portfolio Manager at Scale Capital Management Inc.. In addition, TwoThree Capital Health Care Market Neutral LP, a global healthcare fund managed by Mr. Brown and Jason Lin, will join the Bloom Burton platform. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180530005920/en/ Michael J. Brown, Portfolio Manager and CEO of Bloom Burton Investment Group (Photo: Business Wire) The addition of Mr. Brown will expand Bloom Burton’s ability to serve Canadian institutional and accredited investors as they consider the important and growing pharmaceutical, biotechnology and healthcare sectors. Mr. Brown will broaden the product offering and distribution of Bloom Burton’s investments, as well as help raise the profile of events such as the firm’s flagship and highly coveted Bloom Burton & Co. Healthcare Investor Conference. Later this summer, subject to unitholder approval, Bloom Burton Investment Group Inc. will assume management of the Bloom Burton Canadian Healthcare Fund LP, the Bloom Burton Healthcare Lending Trust and the Bloom Burton Healthcare Lending Trust II. This transition will simplify the management of these portfolios. “I am extremely excited to join Canada’s leading healthcare investment firm,” said Mr. Brown. “I know of no other platform in Canada that offers the same unique value proposition. Bloom Burton, with its scientific and medical professionals, offers unparalleled access to Canadian healthcare champions and tomorrow’s leaders. I look forward to meeting with all of the innovative companies in the portfolio and being a part of Bloom Burton’s continued growth across its platform.” Brian Bloom, Chairman and CEO of Bloom Burton commented, “We are thrilled to partner with Michael to internalize our successful direct investing activities. These portfolios have in aggregate, outperformed the Canadian Hedge Fund industry, and we are excited to be able to offer these funds to a wider array of Canadian investors.” About Bloom Burton & Co.: Bloom Burton & Co. is a firm dedicated to accelerating returns in the healthcare sector for both investors and companies. Bloom Burton has an experienced team of medical, scientific, pharmaceutical, legal and capital markets professionals who perform a deep level of diligence, which combined with our creative and entrepreneurial approach, assists our clients in achieving the right monetization events. Bloom Burton and its affiliates provide capital raising, M&A advisory, equity research, business strategy and scientific consulting, advisory on direct investing and company creation and incubation services. Bloom Burton Securities Inc. is a member of the Investment Industry Regulatory Organization of Canada (IIROC) and is also a member of the Canadian Investor Protection Fund (CIPF). Please visit www.bloomburton.com to learn more. View source version on businesswire.com:https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180530005920/en/ CONTACT: Bloom Burton & Co. Brian Bloom, 416-640-7580 or Michael Brown, 416-551-1659. KEYWORD: NORTH AMERICA CANADA INDUSTRY KEYWORD: HEALTH BIOTECHNOLOGY MEDICAL DEVICES PHARMACEUTICAL OTHER HEALTH PROFESSIONAL SERVICES FINANCE HUMAN RESOURCES SOURCE: Bloom Burton & Co. Copyright Business Wire 2018. PUB: 05/30/2018 10:10 AM/DISC: 05/30/2018 10:10 AM http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180530005920/en

LOS ANGELES--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Apr 24, 2018--At the upcoming Advanced Clean Expo (ACT) Expo 2018 from April 30 to May 3 in Long Beach, California, AVM (Advanced Vehicle Manufacturing) will be unveiling the first vehicle in its line of all-electric, mid-size shuttle buses, the EV27. In about the same time it takes to fill up a gas tank, AVM’s 100% electric, low-floor EV27 shuttle is fully charged and ready to go, maximizing on-duty time. Also available in 21 and 33 foot lengths, AVM’s EV27 is ideal for loop-based routes supporting corporate and school campuses, hotels and rental car facilities, airports, and affording “first/last mile” solutions to private communities. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180424005935/en/ AVM’s exclusive joint venture is powered by Yinlong Energy, one of the world’s leading energy manufacturers and innovators. AVM shuttles are powered by Yinlong’s proprietary lithium–titanate battery (LTO) technology. An extremely safe and long-lasting lithium-based technology, LTO cells can endure more than 20,000 cycles, ensuring the batteries’ lifespan exceeds that of the vehicle. This robust and proven technology takes full advantage of AVM’s 350 kW CCS 2.0 high-powered charger, enabling the EV27’s rapid charge time. Having a vehicle charge fully in less than ten minutes not only maximizes the total time in service for operators, but also eliminates the range anxiety often associated with electric vehicles. While most routes serviced by mid-size shuttles accommodate ten-minute breaks every three to four hours, the EV27, when coupled with AVM’s 350 kW CCS 2.0 charger, has effectively unlimited range under those conditions. Needing only ten minutes every few hours reduces the number of chargers required compared to an overnight or multiple-hour charging scheme. AVM’s EV27 saves operators as much as 50% in overall total cost of ownership due to reduced maintenance, fuel and other costs and provides greater reliability and longevity. Plus, the EV27 affords a quiet, zero-emission solution for neighborhoods, urban areas, and anywhere else air and noise pollution are concerns. The EV27’s unprecedented value equation enables operators to switch to an all-electric solution better aligned with green initiatives and environmental mandates. “With the debut of the EV27, AVM is making electric-powered commercial shuttles practical as well as truly desirable,” says Larry Brennan, CEO of AVM. “With such a competitive pricing model, short charge-time and proven technology, we’ve removed any remaining deterrents. Moving from traditional combustion-power to 100% electric is finally not just an environmental consideration — it’s the smart business decision.” Every AVM vehicle connects to AVM’s real-time, cloud-based “smart” technology. Operators can select and customize ridership experience with features such as USB charging and Wi-Fi, fleet management, navigation, route optimization, and unparalleled, remote-access, data-collection opportunities. A portfolio company of the Los Angeles Cleantech Incubator (LACI), AVM has commitments from launch customers in the U.S. and abroad for more than 250 vehicles. AVM is continuing the momentum of the EV27 launch and will be rolling out a full range of additional commercial electric vehicles including vans, transit buses, school buses, and tour coaches, in a variety of lengths and capacities. For more information, visit www.avmfg.com. About AVM Headquartered in Los Angeles, Advanced Vehicle Manufacturing (AVM) is the first company to make electric-powered commercial vehicles the preferred solution for short-range routes. AVM provides 100% electric, zero-emission, smart commercial vehicles that can charge in less than ten minutes. Its unsurpassed battery life, powerful 350 kW CCS 2.0 charging station, and competitive overall pricing creates an irresistible value equation for operators. Along with its key partners, Yinlong, Wamar and Havenrock, AVM is disrupting the commercial electric vehicle industry. www.avmfg.com. View source version on businesswire.com:https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180424005935/en/ CONTACT: Crier Communications JP Lincoln, 310-274-1072 x 201 JP@crierpr.com KEYWORD: UNITED STATES MEXICO NORTH AMERICA CENTRAL AMERICA CANADA CALIFORNIA INDUSTRY KEYWORD: ENERGY ALTERNATIVE ENERGY TRANSPORT OTHER TRANSPORT PUBLIC TRANSPORT AUTOMOTIVE OTHER AUTOMOTIVE SOURCE: Advanced Vehicle Manufacturing Copyright Business Wire 2018. PUB: 04/24/2018 12:00 PM/DISC: 04/24/2018 12:01 PM http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180424005935/en

DEMOTTE, Ind. (AP) — A northwest Indiana woman has honored her father's memory with a humorous obituary that recounts his fondness for his family and details how he left behind 32 jars of Miracle Whip, 17 boxes of Hamburger Helper and other items that could prove helpful in a zombie apocalypse. The obituary for Terry Ward also says he "escaped this mortal realm" with a belief that "The Blues Brothers" was the best movie ever. It recounts how he drove one of his Illinois high school teachers to an early retirement, volunteered to serve in the U.S. Army and worked "39 years of begrudging service" for AT&T. It also includes a long list of things he loved — including "free beer" and "discussing who makes the best pizza" — and says he was known for doling out ice cream sandwiches to his grandchildren. Jean Lahm said she wrote the obituary for her father with a bit of humor because he "lived to make other people laugh." She said she began writing the obituary Tuesday after the 71-year-old died from a massive stroke. "I wrote it myself and I didn't tell anyone I was going to make it funny," said Lahm, who added that her family thought the obituary was perfect. The obituary has gotten attention online and Lahm said she's read comments from others saying, "I wish I would have known him." She said she's just happy to have been able to "get his personality across." "He cared about the things that truly mattered. A lot of people can relate to that. A lot of people have these great dads that are just like that. Good guys. That's what he was," Lahm said.

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — Authorities are awaiting autopsy results to determine what caused the death of a transgender woman who was in the custody of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Federal authorities say the 33-year-old woman from Honduras died early Friday at an Albuquerque hospital, where she was admitted after showing symptoms of pneumonia, dehydration and complications associated with HIV. The woman was identified by activists as Roxana Hernandez. They say she was part of a caravan of Central American migrants that traveled to the U.S. border through Mexico. Federal authorities listed her name as Jeffry Hernandez and said she was first detained May 13 in San Diego. She was later transferred to El Paso, Texas, and then to a detention center in western New Mexico where she was housed in the transgender unit.

LOS ANGELES (AP) — U.S. officials are taking steps to stem a surging backlog in asylum applications to prevent fraud and enable those genuinely fleeing persecution to settle here. U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services said Wednesday that it will start reviewing more recent applications first and push those already waiting a long time toward the back of the line. It aims to prevent immigrants from applying for asylum to bide their time and obtain work permits when they don't qualify for the protection. Immigration attorneys said the move was absurd and would force those already waiting three or four years to wait even longer for their cases to be heard. The agency has more than 300,000 pending asylum applications, compared with 16,000 in July 2012.