Mt. Gox head Mark Karpeles aims to make Japan a leader in blockchain tech with new business

Abstract: Mark Karpeles, arrested in Japan after his bitcoin exchange collapsed due to a massive hack, is starting a new business. Karpeles told reporters Wednesday he wants to make Japan a global leader in the blockchain, the technology behind virtual money like bitcoin. The 34-year-old Frenchman was cleared of embezzlement and fraud allegations in March, but is appealing a conviction for manipulating electronic data. Karpeles was arrested in 2015, and spent 11 months in detention. Karpeles received a suspended sentence, meaning he is not serving jail time. Prosecutors had demanded 10 years in prison. His lawyer Nobuyasu Ogata said the verdict highlights legal uncertainties in the new area of cryptocurrency crime.


Dollar firmer above ¥108.20 in late Tokyo trading

Abstract: The dollar was firmer above ¥108.20 in Tokyo trading late Wednesday, helped by a rebound in U.S. long-term interest rates in off-hours trading. At 5 p.m., the dollar stood at ¥108.24-25, up from ¥108.04 at the same time Tuesday. The euro was at $1.1266-1267, up from $1.1262-1262, and at ¥121.96-97, up from ¥121.69. The dollar briefly fell below ¥108 after U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell on Tuesday indicated the possibility of an interest rate cut. “The dollar could fall further, but its downside was supported by higher stock prices,” a think tank official said. “Powell’s comments did not show that he is positive about lowering interest rates, but markets went too far in factoring in a possible rate cut,” a think tank official said. Powell may act to downplay expectations for a rate cut, the official said. The dollar could rise further if the United States and Mexico settle their dispute before U.S. tariffs are raised, an official at a bank-affiliated securities house said.


Shinkansen operator JR Central eyes own cleaning 'miracle' as it competes with rival

Abstract: NAGOYA - In a move to better compete with a rival train operator’s famous “7-minute miracle” for cleaning a shinkansen between its arrival and departure, Central Japan Railway Co. will shave off two minutes from its own bullet train cleaning work, beginning next spring. JR Central plans to complete the cleaning of its 16-car Nozomi bullet trains at Tokyo Station in around 10 minutes, still longer than East Japan Railway Co.’s seven minutes. According to staff at the Nagoya-based train operator, 52 cleaning staff belonging to a subsidiary, Shinkansen Maintenance Tokai Co., take care of the 16-car trains, tidying their seats, mopping the floor and cleaning the toilets after passengers get off and before the next passengers get on. As shinkansen time schedules are tightly managed, cleaning work must be efficient and fast. A video entitled “7-Minute Miracle,” which shows the work of the cleaning crew for JR East’s bullet trains, has gone viral around the world with some 6 million views, and the lightning-fast cleanup has attracted global media attention. JR Central staff said the reduction in cleaning time is necessitated by a plan to increase the number of Nozomi services beginning in spring 2020, requiring a quicker turnaround of trains. Steps to speed up cleaning include reducing the number of times liquid soap containers are refilled in toilets, according to the staff.

shinkansen
jr central
bullet train
jr east
rail


JR East to test hydrogen fuel cell trains

Abstract: East Japan Railway Co., or JR East, has announced a plan to test new electric-powered trains using hydrogen fuel cells from fiscal 2021. The railway operator will spend about ¥4 billion on the development of a two-car setup and test runs, aiming to commercialize such fuel cell trains by fiscal 2024. The trains will be equipped with both fuel cells and lithium-ion rechargeable batteries. The system will have a maximum speed of 100 kilometers per hour and is expected to travel about 140 kilometers per tank of hydrogen. The test runs will take place on several JR East lines, including the Nanbu Line. The company tested a hydrogen fuel cell train some 10 years ago. But it suspended development of such trains due primarily to problems related to the performance of the batteries.


ANA jet makes emergency descent after pressurization system glitches

Abstract: An All Nippon Airways passenger jet made an emergency 10,000-meter descent over the Pacific on Saturday after suffering glitches in both of its two air-conditioning and pressurization systems, Japan’s transport ministry said on Wednesday. The incident occurred at around 2 p.m. when the Boeing 787-8 jet was on its way to Narita International Airport from San Jose, California. None of its 163 passengers and crew were injured. According to the ministry, the air-conditioning and pressurization systems stalled when the ANA plane was flying at an altitude of around 13,000 meters about 580 kilometers northeast of Narita airport. An emergency was declared and the plane descended to an altitude of 3,000 meters in order to keep the air pressure in the cabin stable. After flying at the lower altitude for about an hour, the emergency was lifted and the plane landed at the Narita airport. The transport ministry has recognized the emergency descent as a severe incident. It sent four investigators to the airport on Wednesday.

ana
all nippon airways
boeing
airlines
aviation
aircraft


French finance minister says Renault to bring case against Carlos Ghosn over shady expenses

Abstract: PARIS/FRANKFURT - The French finance minister said Wednesday that Renault SA — in which the French government holds a 15 percent stake — plans to bring a case against former Chief Executive Carlos Ghosn after identifying €11 million (¥1.3 billion) of questionable expenses. The prospect of new legal action backed by France marks a new headache for the former Renault CEO, who was also Nissan chairman in the alliance with the Japanese carmaker, after his arrest in Tokyo in November. “The (French) state will hand over all the elements to the judicial authorities and there will be a complaint,” Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire told BFM TV in an interview. “The state will play its role fully as a Renault shareholder. When the state has a shareholding like it does in Renault, its role is to assure that (corporate) governance works well,” he added. He said the conclusions of an internal audit carried out by Renault had uncovered “reprehensible” facts and it was now up to the judicial authorities to take the next decision. The internal audit conducted by Renault and Nissan Motor Co. identified €11 million of questionable expenses at their Dutch subsidiary RNBV linked to Ghosn. “These findings confirmed the existence of deficiencies within RNBV in terms of financial transparency and procedures for monitoring expenditure,” Renault said in a statement late Tuesday. It said that the company was looking into legal action over Ghosn’s “extra costs of air travel” and other expenses “as well as exploring recovering from Mr Ghosn gifts made to some non-profit organizations.” The 65-year-old Ghosn, who maintains his innocence, is awaiting trial in Japan over charges of underreporting his salary for years while at Nissan and using company funds for personal expenses. Ghosn says the accusations of financial misconduct in Japan are politically driven by enemies at Nissan. Ghosn was credited with leading Renault’s rescue of Nissan from near bankruptcy. Renault board members had met Tuesday to discuss a proposed merger with Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV. Renault said it was studying the offer with interest but would meet Wednesday for more discussions. Fiat Chrysler has resolved key differences with France over its proposed merger with Renault, three sources have said, as talks on the $35 billion tie-up plan progressed toward a possible agreement on Wednesday. An emerging compromise over French influence on a combined FCA-Renault could clear the way for Renault’s board to approve a framework deal and begin the long process of a full merger. FCA, Renault and its 15 percent shareholder, the French state, have been locked in talks over the Italian-American manufacturer’s bid to create the world’s third-biggest carmaker. France has broadly welcomed the deal, on condition it guarantees Renault’s domestic blue-collar jobs and plants. Its directors will “continue to study with interest the opportunity of such a combination,” Renault said in statement. FCA’s proposal would see both companies acquired by a listed Dutch holding company owned 50-50 by current FCA and Renault shareholders, after payment of a €2.5 billion ($2.8 billion) special dividend to FCA shareholders.

renault
carlos ghosn
france
nissan
carmakers
fiat chrysler automobiles
courts
corruption
scandals


Japan eyes legislation to regulate global and domestic tech giants

Abstract: The government said Wednesday it plans to submit a bill to the Diet next year to regulate global and domestic technology giants amid concerns some are stifling fair competition due to their overwhelming market share. The bill to enhance transparency in the business transactions of tech firms will be presented to the ordinary Diet session to be convened in January, according to a draft economic growth strategy shown to a governmental panel. The Cabinet of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is expected to adopt the strategy later this month. The draft says major tech firms, referred to as “platformers” in Japan as they provide digital infrastructure or platforms for the sale of products and services, could disadvantage smaller business partners by unilaterally forcing contract terms and rules on them, and having them shoulder excessive costs. Regarding U.S. tech giants — including Google LLC, Apple Inc., Facebook Inc. and Amazon.com Inc., collectively known as GAFA — the envisioned legislation will oblige such firms to make contract terms public and explain the reasons when they refuse business deals, the draft says. Besides the regulations on IT firms, the draft growth strategy also calls on companies to hire employees until age 70 as part of efforts to address a serious labor crunch amid Japan’s rapidly graying population. Many companies in Japan currently set the retirement age at 60, but employees can work until 65 if they desire and employers are legally obliged to continue hiring them. The draft strategy presents seven options for companies regarding the employment of seniors, including abolishing the retirement age, lifting it to 70, and providing support for retired employees to find new jobs, start their own businesses or work freelance. The draft policy package also includes a plan to secure public transportation in depopulated areas amid a lack of taxi drivers, such as expanding ride-sharing services involving private cars, which are currently banned in most parts of the country. It also aims to relax rules on taxi use and enable customers to share taxi rides with strangers, according to the draft.


South of D-Day beaches, another slaughter is remembered

Abstract: CHAMBOIS, FRANCE - In the spring that followed the terrible battle, the grass grew especially thick and green, fertilized by thousands of corpses that had been plowed into mass graves. It’s hard now — nearly 75 years later, overlooking wheat fields spotted with blood-red poppies and with skylarks singing overhead — to imagine that it was here in August 1944, on a wide, open plain that soldiers nicknamed “the Corridor of Death,” that Adolf Hitler’s armies in Normandy were all but destroyed, clearing the path for the liberation of Paris. With the eyes of the world again turning to Normandy this week for the 75th anniversary of the June 6, 1944, D-Day landings that launched the Allied campaign to liberate Europe, a commemoration Tuesday in the small village of Chambois well south of the beaches served as a reminder that D-Day marked only a beginning. It took many more weeks of vicious fighting to bring the Battle of Normandy to a decisive and bloody conclusion, in mid-August 1944 around the ruins of Chambois and surrounding villages where tens of thousands of German soldiers became trapped in a noose of Allied armor and fire. Gerard and Paulette Gondouin, teenagers then, but now 90 and 88, respectively, were forever scarred by witnessing the destruction unleashed by Canadian, British, American, Polish and French forces that squeezed and bombarded the encircled Germans, cutting off their routes of escape. Allied planes and artillery rained down death. Every August, like a ghost, the slaughter comes back to haunt them. “In the month of August, both of us, we don’t sleep, even at night. We talk, ‘Do you remember this. Do you remember that?’ ” Gerard Gondouin said. “And it’s been like that for 75 years,” Paulette Gondouin interjected. Tens of thousands of German soldiers were killed, injured and captured. Roads became clogged with smashed tanks, other destroyed military hardware and bodies. German losses were so massive that Hitler’s forces in France never recovered. And even in their agony, some German troops sought to leave nothing of use for their enemies. “They destroyed everything they could: their tanks, their lorries, everything. They killed their horses,” Gerard Gondouin recalled. After the battle, villagers buried rotting corpses in mass graves — men and farm animals all interred together. The stench of decay “stuck to us for months,” Paulette Gondouin recalled. “We were afraid of epidemics. It was a very, very, very hot August.” In the following spring of 1945, “in the fields, the grass was thick and a very deep green,” she added. German bodies were later dug up from around the village in the 1960s and reburied with others in a cemetery for thousands of dead. For the Allies, trapping, killing and capturing so many Germans in one place was cause for celebration, a milestone in the Battle of Normandy that had been harder and longer than D-Day planners anticipated. William Tymchuk, 98, fought with Canadian forces around Chambois and still speaks about the battle with pride. Back in the village for Tuesday’s ceremony and the unveiling of a monument, Tymchuk stood to attention with other World War II veterans, their chests full of medals, as a military band played. Making a pincer movement with his hands, Tymchuk demonstrated how Allied forces closed in on all sides on the Germans. His piercing blue eyes teared up as he spoke about comrades who never came back from the fighting among Normandy’s thick hedgerows. “We closed the gap from this side, with the Poles, and the Americans came from the other side,” he said. “It was a very decisive battle.” “We knew the Germans were retreating … We knew they were on the run. So we tried to close as many roads as we could, to stop their tanks and their armor.” Before the final escape routes were squeezed shut, thousands of German troops did manage to throw off the noose. Paulette Gondouin recalled how they slipped away under cover of night. Watching from a roadside bank, fighting not to slip down and be squashed, she saw tanks, halftracks, horses and carts and thousands of troops flee, “everything you need to make an army.” “Every August, I find myself back on that bank,” she said. “It’s a recurrent nightmare. It was atrocious.”

d-day
chambois
france
normandy
u.s .
poland
u.k .
germany
canada


Sudanese protesters reject army's poll plan after 'bloody massacre' killed dozens

Abstract: KHARTOUM - Sudan’s protest movement called Tuesday for fresh rallies and rejected the military rulers’ election plan after about 60 were killed in what demonstrators called a “bloody massacre” by security forces. Protest leaders called on their supporters to take part in “total civil disobedience” to topple the ruling military council following the deadly dispersal Monday of a weeks-long sit-in outside the army headquarters in Khartoum. The Sudan Doctors’ Committee said security forces had killed at least 10 people on Wednesday in Khartoum and its twin city of Omdurman. That came after another 10 people were killed on Tuesday, including five in White Nile state, three in Omdurman and two in Khartoum’s Bahri neighborhood. The doctors’ committee is the medical arm of the Sudanese Professionals Association, which has been spearheading protests against army rule. Among the dead was an 8-year-old child, it added. An 18-year-old was also killed on Tuesday “by the bullets of the military council’s militias” in the southern town of Rebek. The committee accused security forces of attacks on hospitals and staff across the country, and alleged some women had been raped in an area of the capital, without giving details of how the group had learned of the assaults. A bid by the U.N. Security Council to condemn the killing of civilians and call on the military and protesters to work together was blocked by China, who was backed by Russia, during a closed-door meeting on Tuesday. Eight European countries — Belgium, Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Poland, The Netherlands and Sweden — instead issued their own joint statement criticizing “the violent attacks in Sudan by Sudanese security services against civilians.” The United States, Britain and Norway earlier issued a joint statement condemning the military’s election plan. Top U.S. envoy David Hale, under secretary of state for political affairs, also underlined the importance of a transition to a civilian-led government in a phone call with the Saudi deputy defence minister, Khalid bin Salman, the U.S. Department of State said. The Transitional Military Council ousted veteran President Omar al-Bashir in April after months of protests against his authoritarian rule and had agreed a three-year transition period to a civilian administration. But army ruler Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Burhan said the plan had been ditched and an election would take place under “regional and international supervision.” “The military council decides on the following: canceling what was agreed on and stopping negotiating with the Alliance for Freedom and Change, and to call for general elections within a period not exceeding nine months,” Burhan said. The Sudanese Professionals Association (SPA), which spearheaded protests against al-Bashir, rejected the call. “It’s not the putschist council, nor its militias, nor its leaders who decide the fate of the people, nor how it will transition to a civilian government,” it said. The SPA said Monday’s action against the sit-in amounted to a “bloody massacre” and urged the global community “to isolate and stop dealing with the so-called military council.” It also called for an independent investigation into the killings under international supervision. The Transitional Military Council said it “regrets” the events, calling it a “clean-up operation” that went wrong. African and Western governments have been strongly supportive of the protesters but Arab governments, led by Saudi Arabia, have backed the military rulers. Moussa Faki, head of the African Union Commission, also backed “an immediate and transparent investigation.” Tensions remained high across Khartoum Tuesday, with heavily armed members of the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, thought to have been largely behind the crackdown, deployed in large numbers. Protest leaders said the large square outside army HQ where demonstrators had camped out day and night since April 6 had been cleared. Despite the security presence and internet outages, residents of some areas of the capital still came out to mark the Eid festival a day early and to protest. In Omdurman, just across the Nile from Khartoum, a witness said by phone that the Rapid Support Forces were trying to disperse demonstrators who had put up barricades by “firing live rounds in the air.” “We gathered in our square as we usually do every year but the Rapid Support Forces and the police fired teargas and sound bombs at us and after the prayers the youth closed the main street by putting up barricades,” a resident of the Bahri area told AFP. Other streets around the city center were almost deserted, with many markets and shops closed and almost no cars on the roads. Flights into Khartoum were disrupted as airlines monitored developments on the ground.


Acting ICE director looks to step up family deportations

Abstract: WASHINGTON - The new acting director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has signaled his agency is looking to step up deportations of families who are in the United States illegally. Mark Morgan spoke with reporters on Tuesday in his first public comments since taking over the role last week. Morgan says the crisis at the border cannot be solved unless Congress acts. But in the meanwhile, he says his agency will enforce deportations to deter people from making the dangerous journey. That includes families who have been ordered deported by a judge. The Trump administration is managing a growing number of Central American families coming across the border. Hundreds of thousands have been released into the country because of overcrowding at border facilities.

u.s. immigration and customs enforcement


Florida lawmakers demand teen migrant facility be shut down

Abstract: MIAMI - Three Democratic lawmakers demanded Tuesday that the Trump administration shut down the country’s largest child migrant facility in Florida and release hundreds of teens to small shelters or relatives. South Florida U.S. representatives say their decision comes after a recent federal court filing by immigrant advocates with hundreds of pages of teens describing “prison-like” conditions endured in the Homestead, Florida facility. Reps. Debbie Mucarsel-Powell, Donna Shalala and Debbie Wasserman Schultz said the document “provides more disturbing details about the mental and physical damage being inflicted by the prolonged detention of these children.” The children testified they are allowed limited phone calls and told to follow numerous strict rules or risk prolonging their detention or facing deportation. Many said they had limited access to their social workers and described frustration at the process of reunification with relatives or sponsors. “The latest court documents detail heartbreaking conditions that hundreds of children endure there every day. This must come to a quick and sensible end, one that prioritizes the welfare of these young people,” said Rep. Wasserman Schultz in a statement. The motion was filed Friday by the National Center for Youth Law and other organizations in a Los Angeles federal court. Lawyers advocate for the release of the teenagers to state-licensed facilities or relatives within 20 days under a decades-old settlement governing the care of detained immigrant children. The government’s Office of Refugee and Resettlement says that because it is an “influx care facility” on federal property, it is not subject to local licensing standards. A bill by two Democrats — Sen. Jeff Merkley, from Oregon, and Democratic Rep. Judy Chu, from California— already proposed earlier this year outlawing the Homestead facility because of the lack of license. The Florida representatives have paid several visits to the controversial facility pointing out the conditions were harsh and average stay was long. But they had not called for the facility to be closed, expressing concerns about where 2,200 children would go next. The government announced in April it was expanding to possibly house up to 3,200 migrant teens. Last month, the three lawmakers also officially requested a government watchdog agency to investigate how the private contractor, Comprehensive Health Services, tied to former White House Chief of Staff John Kelly secured a no-bid contract to run the facility. The umbrella company, Caliburn International, announced last month that Kelly was appointed to the board of directors.


Alarm as Ebola outbreak reaches 2,000 cases, picks up speed amid atmosphere of mistrust

Abstract: JOHANNESBURG - The deadly Ebola outbreak in eastern Congo has surpassed 2,000 cases and is picking up speed. The number of confirmed cases reached the milestone three times as quickly as it took to reach 1,000, experts said Tuesday. The outbreak declared in August, the second-deadliest in history, has killed more than 1,300 people in a volatile region where rebel attacks and community resistance have hurt containment efforts. The 2,000 figure is a “sad and frustrating milestone. The insecurity is holding us back,” World Health Organization spokesman Tarik Jasarevic told reporters in Geneva. Each attack keeps health workers from the crucial work of vaccinating people and tracking thousands of contacts of victims. Aid groups including the International Rescue Committee and the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies said a “reset” is needed in the response to one of the world’s most dangerous diseases. Misunderstandings have been high in a region that had never experienced an Ebola outbreak until now, and years of rebel attacks have left many residents wary of outsiders, especially ones accompanied by Congolese security forces or United Nations peacekeepers. “This outbreak will only end when communities are engaged and leading the response efforts themselves,” Nicole Fassina, Ebola coordinator with the IFRC, said in a statement. Increasing armed protection for health workers could aggravate the tensions, the statement added. Because of the mistrust many Ebola cases are not being counted and the number of confirmed cases is likely “an underestimate and not a realistic picture of the number of cases out there,” the IRC said in a separate statement. Many people, frightened, are still dying at home instead of presenting themselves at health centers for treatment. Amid the challenges, WHO and others have pointed out signs of progress. Notably, more than 129,000 people have received an experimental but effective Ebola vaccine in its first widespread use.

ebola
congo
red cross
who
conflict
u.n .


Canada will step up on global women's health as other nations step back, Justin Trudeau says

Abstract: VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA - Canada will increase its global spending on women’s and girls’ health as other countries “are stepping back,” Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on Tuesday, citing threats to abortion access and violence against women. Trudeau said the politicization of women’s rights was having “devastating consequences” around the world as he made the commitment, which comes as the United States scales back its support for female sexual and reproductive health worldwide. Canada will increase its spending to 1.4 billion Canadian dollars ($1 billion) by 2023 from C$1.1 billion currently, he announced at the world’s largest conference on gender equality, We Deliver, positioning his country as a leading donor internationally. “Globally and here at home, we’re seeing a push back against women’s rights, whether it’s attacks on a woman’s fundamental right to choose or violence against indigenous women and girls,” Trudeau told a media briefing at the conference in Vancouver. “Canada is stepping up, while other countries are stepping back,” he said. “We understand that investing in maternal, newborn and child health and reproductive health rights and services are essential. “This should not be a political issue,” he said. “These divisions are playing out globally with devastating consequences.” Health advocates say a so-called global gag rule that bans U.S.-funded groups around the world from discussing abortion has led to unwanted pregnancies and deadly and unsafe abortions since it came into effect two years ago. It has also forced clinics and outreach programs that provide an array of health care services to close, they say. Half the money — C$700 million — will go to sexual and reproductive health under Canada’s commitment. A spokesman for Canada’s international development minister said that would be among the largest donor sums internationally but said it was difficult to compare with that of countries such as the United States and Britain. He said it was Canada’s largest spending commitment on women’s and girls’ health. Almost $9 billion in U.S. foreign aid is at stake under the global gag rule imposed by U.S. President Donald Trump that requires nongovernmental organizations working abroad to choose between accepting the abortion-related ban or losing funding. Trudeau again said his government would review recommendations made on Monday by a government inquiry that determined the deaths of more than 1,000 aboriginal girls and women in recent decades was a national genocide. The report blamed the violence on long-standing discrimination against indigenous people and Canada’s failure to protect them.

canada
women
health
justin trudeau
abortion
donald trump
u.s .


Young, pregnant urged to take blood tests for lead after Notre-Dame fire

Abstract: PARIS - Paris health authorities have urged children and pregnant women living around Notre-Dame cathedral to have the levels of lead in their blood checked amid concerns over the impact of the fire. The appeal comes after a child living on the Ile de la Cite island in central Paris where Notre-Dame stands was found to have high levels of lead in a blood test. Some of the hundreds of tons of lead in the spire and the roof melted in the extreme heat from the spectacular blaze. An investigation has been launched to check if the causes of the child’s high lead levels could be other than the April 15 fire, the Paris regional health authority said in a statement late Monday. The child showed a level above the regulatory limit level of 50 micrograms per liter of blood. The authority said that “as a precaution” it was asking families with children aged under seven and pregnant women living on the Ile de la Cite to “consult their GP so they can be prescribed a blood test for lead levels. Authorities acknowledge that the Notre-Dame fire caused lead to seep into the air and ground around the cathedral. They say there is no general risk to the public but certain areas have been closed off while people with apartments close to the cathedral are being given specific advice on how to clean up. Paris remains shaken by the consequences of the damage to one of the city’s best known and loved edifices. The architect in charge of the restoration on Tuesday insisted that an identical spire should be rebuilt, after President Emmanuel Macron mooted an “inventive” reconstruction. The spire — designed by the celebrated 19th-century French architect Eugene Viollet-le-Duc — collapsed as fire ravaged the cathedral. “I think we don’t just have to rebuild a spire, we have to rebuild it in an identical way,” Philippe Villeneuve, a senior French architect specialized in charge of restoration at Notre-Dame, told the Le Figaro daily. The government has announced an architectural competition for the spire with options to have a new one built, an identical restoration or no spire at all. But Villeneuve said: “The great thing about the masterpiece of Viollet-le-Duc is that it is timeless. It integrates into a medieval masterpiece of the 13th century. “This is what we have to create again.” A YouGov survey published at the end of April showed that 54 percent of French people questioned wanted the spire to be rebuilt in an identical way, while just 25 percent were keen on a more modern solution. The issue has been one of acute political controversy in France, which is increasingly torn between respecting historical tradition and projecting a more modern, innovative image. Supporters of a contemporary touch for the new steeple point to the fact that the glass pyramid designed by I.M. Pei outside the Louvre museum in Paris was despised by many when opened in 1989 but is now an attraction in itself. France’s upper house the Senate, when it debated and passed a bill on the reconstruction of Notre-Dame last month, added in the text that the restoration, including that of the spire, should be faithful to the “last visual state that was known.”

health
children
women
france
pollution
pregnancy
notre dame


Deaths from falls among older Americans are on the rise, reach 25,000 yearly

Abstract: CHICAGO - New research shows fatal falls have nearly tripled in older Americans in recent years, rising to more than 25,000 deaths yearly. The findings highlight the importance of fall prevention. A separate study bolsters evidence that programs focusing on improving muscle strength and balance can help achieve that goal. Both studies were published Tuesday in the Journal of the American Medical Association. Circumstances weren’t included in the data, but traumatic brain injuries and hip fractures leading to steep health declines are among causes of death in older adults who fall. “Deaths from falls may have increased because older people are living longer, living longer independently, and are living longer with chronic conditions,” said Elizabeth Burns, a study co-author and health scientist at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s injury center. She noted that some medications also make older adults prone to falls. That includes prescription drugs affecting balance. Burns said research shows their use of certain psychiatric medications that can cause drowsiness and vision problems has increased substantially in recent years. The new analysis included 16 years of U.S. vital statistics data on adults aged 75. Fatal falls increased from 8,600 in 2000 to 25,190 in 2016. Separate CDC data show they climbed even higher in 2017, to almost 26,440 fatal falls in Americans aged 75 and older. The rate in the study more than doubled, from 51 fatal falls per 100,000 people to 122 falls per 100,000. The results echo studies of fatal fall trends in the Netherlands and other European countries. Weight-bearing exercise such as walking; balance exercises; and resistance exercises to strengthen muscles can also reduce risks for falls, said Dr. Marco Pahor of the University of Florida’s aging and geriatric research department, who wrote an accompanying journal editorial. The program studied in the second study involved exercises three times a week at home for a year, with five sessions led by a physical therapist. These include seated and standing leg lifts, knee bends and backward walking, plus walking half an hour at least twice weekly. Participants were 344 Canadian adults aged 70 and older who had experienced a recent fall. Half were randomly assigned to the program plus usual care by a doctor; the remainder received only usual care. There were 236 falls during the study among the exercise group compared with 366 falls among the others. Pahor said many older adults aren’t aware of programs that can help them. Many U.S. communities offer fall prevention exercises programs at senior centers, and the National Council on Aging offers tips online.

falls
balance
cdc
seniors
national council on aging
u.s .


Satellite data show Amazon deforestation rising under Brazil's Bolsonaro

Abstract: BRASILIA - Deforestation of the Amazon rain forest in Brazil sped up in May to the fastest rate in a decade, according to data from an early-warning satellite system, as experts pointed to activity by illegal loggers encouraged by the easing of environmental protections under President Jair Bolsonaro. According to the Brazilian space research institute INPE, the DETER alerting system registered deforestation of 739 sq. km (285 sq. miles) in May, the first of three months in which logging tends to surge following the region’s rainy season. That is up from 550 sq. km in May 2018 and more than double the deforestation detected two years earlier. “If this upward curve continues, we could have a bad year for the Amazon forest,” Claudio Almeida, head of INPE’s satellite monitoring program, said on Tuesday. “It will depend on how much policing there is in the next two critical months,” he added. The data add to concerns from environmentalists who warn that Bolsonaro’s five-month-old government has dismantled conservation agencies, shown skepticism about fighting climate change and cut the budget to enforce environmental laws. Brazil’s environmental protection agency IBAMA, which has been starved of funds in recent years, lost authority when he took office in January, and the forestry commission was moved to the Agriculture Ministry, which is run by farm industry allies. For Marcio Astrini, Greenpeace Brazil’s public policy coordinator, Bolsonaro’s government is “anti-environmental” and has pushed to reduce forest protections without presenting a plan to fight deforestation. “With Bolsonaro, people who destroy forests feel safe and those who protect forests feel threatened,” Astrini said. Bolsonaro’s Environment Minister Ricardo Salles said in an interview with Reuters that Brazil remains as committed as ever to protecting the forests. “We are not going to remove anything. We are going to add more,” he said, denying a report in the Folha de Sao Paulo newspaper on Monday that monitoring by INPE, whose numbers he has said are manipulated, could be replaced with satellite imaging run by a private firm. Salles said a public tender will be issued to hire a company that can do high resolution images in real time. “We want a system that can provide images in real time to better target enforcement operations so that they can be more effective,” the minister said. Officials will watch to see if the preliminary DETER data showing deforestation speeding up in May is confirmed later this year by a more accurate satellite program called PRODES, which serves as the government benchmark. PRODES imaging for the 12 months through July 2018 showed that 7,900 sq. km of forest were cleared in Brazil’s Amazon, equal to nearly the territory of Puerto Rico. Still, deforestation remains well below levels in the early 2000s, before Brazil launched a campaign to fight logging. In 2004, for example, more than 27,000 sq. km were cleared, an area the size of Haiti.

amazon
forests
brazil
jair bolsonaro
nature


Ex-sheriff's deputy charged for lack of response in Florida school massacre

Abstract: MIAMI - The Florida deputy who knew a gunman was loose at the Parkland high school but refused to go inside to confront the assailant was arrested Tuesday on 11 criminal charges related to his inaction during the massacre that killed 17 people. Scot Peterson was on duty as the resource officer at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School on the day of the February 2018 shooting but never entered the building while bullets were flying. He was charged with child neglect, culpable negligence and perjury — allegations that carry a maximum prison sentence of nearly 100 years. Peterson was seen on surveillance video rushing with two staff members toward the building where the shooting happened. When they arrived, he pulled his weapon and went forward but then retreated and took up a position outside, where he stood with his gun drawn. The charges follow a 14-month investigation by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, which conducted interviews with 184 witnesses, reviewed hours of surveillance videos and compiled 212 investigative reports, the agency said. Peterson “did absolutely nothing to mitigate” the shooting, FDLE Commissioner Rick Swearingen said in a statement. “There can be no excuse for his complete inaction and no question that his inaction cost lives.” Lori Alhadeff, whose 14-year-old daughter, Alyssa, was killed, said she was surprised to hear of Peterson’s arrest. She recalled sending a text to her daughter when she heard there was shooting. “I told her to hide, that help was on the way. Well, Peterson was that help, but he froze, and he failed us all that day,” Alhadeff said. “He was supposedly the good guy with the gun who was supposed to go in and meet the threat, and he let us all down.” Tony Montalto, whose daughter Gina Montalto, also 14, died in the attack, said families wanted justice to be done. “We are happy to see some accountability for this tragedy,” said Montalto, president of the Stand With Parkland victim families’ group. Peterson, 56, was jailed on $102,000 bail. If released, he will be required to wear a GPS monitor and surrender his passport and will be prohibited from possessing a gun, the prosecutor said. His lawyer, Joseph DiRuzzo III, said in a statement that Peterson is merely a scapegoat. He called the charges “a thinly veiled attempt at politically motivated retribution.” “We will vigorously defend against these spurious charges that lack basis in fact and law,” he said, arguing that Peterson was not a caregiver, which he said the law defines as a parent, adult household member or other person responsible for a child’s welfare. “The definition of ‘other person responsible for a child’s welfare’ expressly excludes law enforcement officers acting in an official capacity.” It was not immediately clear when Peterson would make his initial court appearance. That typically occurs the day after an arrest. Sen. Rick Scott, a Republican who was Florida governor at the time of the shooting, initiated the law enforcement probe and said Tuesday in a statement that he was glad the investigation was finished. “Now it’s time for justice to be served,” Scott said. After the shooting, Peterson took retirement rather than accept a suspension. He has now been formally fired, according to Broward County Sheriff Gregory Tony. Another deputy, former Sgt. Brian Miller, was also fired, although he faces no criminal charges. “It’s never too late for accountability and justice,” Tony said. David S. Weinstein, a former federal prosecutor now in private practice, said key to the case will be the culpable negligence charge, which essentially means an “utter disregard for the safety of others.” The perjury charge stems from a statement Peterson gave under oath to investigators contending that he did not hear any shots fired after taking up his position outside the school. Investigators determined through video, witnesses and other evidence that was not true. The arrest is the latest fallout from investigations into the shooting. Gov. Ron DeSantis suspended then-Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel for “neglect of duty and incompetence” over the department’s actions that day. Israel is appealing that decision to the state Senate and said he intends to run again next year. The case also spawned a state commission that issued a 458-page report detailing many errors before and during the shooting, including Broward deputies who stayed outside the school building and the policies that led to that, such as Israel’s decision to change guidelines to say that deputies “may” confront an active shooter rather than “shall” do so. The commission also recommended voluntary arming of teachers, which state lawmakers approved this year. The chairman of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Commission, Pinellas County Sheriff Bob Gualtieri, said in an interview that the charges against Peterson were “absolutely warranted.” Peterson “is a coward, a failure and a criminal,” Gualtieri said. “There is no doubt in my mind that because he didn’t act, people were killed.”

florida
florida school massacre
guns
scot peterson
u.s .
mass shootings


Trump ex-campaign chairman Paul Manafort may go to Rikers Island jail: source

Abstract: NEW YORK - Paul Manafort, U.S. President Donald Trump’s former campaign chairman who was convicted of tax and bank fraud, may be transferred to Rikers Island jail in New York to face state criminal charges, a person familiar with the matter said. Manafort, 70, is serving a combined sentence of 7½ years in prison from two separate federal criminal cases, the longest term of anyone stemming from special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. election and contacts between Moscow and Trump’s campaign. The veteran Republican political operative, who was paid millions of dollars for his work for pro-Russian politicians in Ukraine, had been expected to be transferred to New York state custody in June, another person familiar with the matter said. The sources spoke on condition of anonymity. Defendants facing charges brought by the Manhattan District Attorney are typically held at Rikers Island, a troubled jail complex that handles about 9,000 people a day, another city jail known as the Tombs, or Bellevue hospital, if a defendant has a medical condition. According to the New York City Department of Corrections, a judge will decide whether he will be entering their custody. A spokeswoman for the Manhattan district attorney’s office did not immediately respond to requests for comment. A lawyer for Manafort did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Manafort was charged by prosecutors in New York in March with residential mortgage fraud and other felonies, as state lawmakers moved to ensure that he can be prosecuted even if he receives a presidential pardon from Trump. Presidents possess the power to issue pardons for federal crimes, not state crimes. Prosecutors said the charges involved a scheme in which Manafort and others falsified records to obtain millions of dollars related to property loans. Manafort faces up to 25 years in prison on the three most serious charges in the latest indictment, residential mortgage fraud in the first degree. Manafort was convicted by a Virginia jury last year on tax and bank fraud charges and pleaded guilty in Washington to charges including unregistered lobbying and witness tampering.

paul manafort
new york
donald trump
robert mueller
ukraine
u.s .
russia probe


White House tells two ex-aides to defy congressional subpoena

Abstract: WASHINGTON - The White House is again directing former employees not to cooperate with a congressional investigation, this time instructing former aides Hope Hicks and Annie Donaldson to defy subpoenas and refuse to provide documents to the House Judiciary Committee. The letters from the White House to the Judiciary panel are the latest effort by the White House to thwart congressional investigations into President Donald Trump. Trump has said he will fight “all of the subpoenas” as Democrats have launched multiple probes into his administration and personal financial affairs. House Judiciary Chairman Jerrold Nadler issued subpoenas for documents and testimony from Hicks, former White House communications director, and Donaldson, a former aide in the White House counsel’s office, last month. Both are mentioned frequently in special counsel Robert Mueller’s report, along with former White House Counsel Donald McGahn. The White House has also directed former McGahn to refuse to provide documents or testify before the committee. In directing witnesses not to comply, the White House cited executive privilege over documents and testimony, invoking the power to keep information from the courts, Congress and the public to protect the confidentiality of the Oval Office decision-making process. But that only extends so far. Nadler said in a statement Tuesday that, while the White House had instructed the former aides not to turn over materials, Hicks had agreed to turn over documents related to her time on Trump’s presidential campaign. Those materials are not covered by executive privilege. Nadler said he thanked Hicks for “that show of good faith.” But it was unclear how much material the committee would receive. The committee is arguing that the documents would not be covered by executive privilege if they left the White House months ago. “The president has no lawful basis for preventing these witnesses from complying with our request,” Nadler said. “We will continue to seek reasonable accommodation on these and all our discovery requests and intend to press these issues when we obtain the testimony of both Ms. Hicks and Ms. Donaldson.” The subpoenas also demanded that Hicks appear for a public hearing on June 19 and that Donaldson appear for a deposition on June 24. They have not yet said whether they will do so. As the White House has pushed back on the investigations, some Democrats have ramped up their calls for Nadler to open an impeachment inquiry, arguing it would improve congressional standing in the courts as they try to enforce subpoenas. But House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has so far resisted such calls, preferring a slower, more methodical effort. As part of that approach, the House is expected next week to hold McGahn and Attorney General William Barr, who has refused to turn over the full Mueller report, in contempt of Congress. The resolution scheduled for a June 11 vote will allow the Judiciary Committee to seek court enforcement of its subpoenas. Nadler has also said that his panel will launch a series of hearings on “the alleged crimes and other misconduct” in Mueller’s report as Democrats try to keep the public’s focus on his findings in the Trump-Russia investigation. The hearings will serve as a stand-in of sorts for Mueller, who said last week he would prefer not to appear before Congress and would not elaborate on the contents of his report if he were forced to testify. The first hearing, on June 10, looks at whether Trump committed obstruction of justice by intervening in the probe. It will feature John Dean, a White House counsel who helped bring down Richard Nixon’s presidency, though he served a prison term for obstructing justice. Democrats have suggested they will compel Mueller’s appearance if necessary, but it’s unclear when or if that will happen. Negotiations over Mueller’s testimony are ongoing.

congress
donald trump
robert mueller
u.s .
russia probe


Deadly shootings involving 'lone wolf' culprit shake Lebanese city

Abstract: TRIPOLI, LEBANON - Military police and forensics experts in white overalls deployed in the northern Lebanese city of Tripoli on Tuesday after a lone gunman went on an overnight shooting spree, killing four security personnel before blowing himself up in an apartment in a residential building. The rare shooting, in which the gunman used a motorcycle to move around, opening fire on police and army vehicles, shook the predominantly Sunni Muslim coastal city on the eve of the Eid al-Fitr holiday, which marks the end of the holy month of Ramadan. Interior Minister Raya El Hassan told reporters that the gunman, identified as Abdul-Rahman Mabsout, is a former member of the Islamic State group and now a “lone wolf.” She said the situation was under control. The shooting began late Monday with Mabsout first firing at a branch of the Lebanese Central Bank, then driving around, shooting at police and later at an army vehicle, killing four. With police in hot pursuit, opening fire and using tear gas, Mabsout then drove to a residential building, where he shot his way up the stairs and into an empty apartment on the fourth floor and barricaded himself inside. An hours-long standoff ensued, culminating with security forces storming the apartment. Cornered, Mabsout detonated his explosives vest, killing himself instantly. On Tuesday, there were multiple signs of battle. At least four civilian cars and one police car were heavily damaged, their windshields smashed and pocked by bullet holes. Military police and forensics removed bullets from the street. Tear gas canisters were still on the ground. The nine-floor apartment building where Mabsout died was shell pocked and the apartment itself partially destroyed. Mabsout left a message, apparently for the apartment’s owner, on a mirror. “Forgive me my Muslim brother. … God willing. I love you in God, I didn’t mean it.” The owner of the apartment said he and his family were not in the house when the gunman stormed the building, but that his flat was left largely destroyed by the explosion. He said the attacker entered his building after shooting one person in the street. “Thank God there was nobody in the house, and my door is not made of steel, it is a wooden door so I think he broke the door and he walked in,” Kamal Ferri told The Associated Press. Mabsout is a former member of the Islamic State group who fought with the extremist movement in Syria. He had been detained when he returned to Lebanon in 2016 and was released a year later. The attack occurred on the eve of Eid el-Fitr, the feast that marks the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan of fasting. The Lebanese army announced earlier that it has increased security around the country because of the holiday, when people go out to celebrate. Tripoli, which is Lebanon’s second largest city, has in the past sen clashes between rival groups that support or oppose the Syrian government of President Bashar Assad. The city is also home to some extremists who fought against the Lebanese army in the past. The Islamic State group and al-Qaida-linked militants have claimed responsibility over the past years for attacks in different parts of Lebanon that killed dozens of people. Such attacks have been rare recently.


Virginia governor announces special session on gun control in wake of massacre

Abstract: VIRGINIA BEACH, VIRGINIA - Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam announced Tuesday he will summon lawmakers back to the state Capitol to consider a package of gun-control legislation, saying last week’s mass shooting in Virginia Beach calls for “votes and laws, not thoughts and prayers.” Northam, a Democrat confronted with a Republican-controlled General Assembly in the middle of an election year, also said he wants every legislator to go on record for or against his proposals during the special session this summer, rather than avoid tough votes by quietly killing the bills in subcommittee. “The nation will be watching,” the governor said, four days after Virginia Beach employee DeWayne Craddock used two semi-automatic handguns, a silencer and extended ammunition magazines to slaughter 12 people at a municipal building. Craddock was then killed in a gunbattle with police. Northam’s bills include a ban on silencers and high-capacity magazines, as well as a broadening of the ability of local governments to limit guns in city buildings. The governor said he also wants mandatory, universal background checks before gun purchases; a limit of one handgun purchase per month; and a “red flag” law that would allow authorities to seize the weapons of those who are a threat to themselves or others. “I will be asking for votes and laws, not thoughts and prayers,” he said. In a statement, GOP Speaker Kirk Cox dismissed the governor’s call for a special session as “hasty and suspect when considered against the backdrop of the last few months” — a reference to the blackface photo scandal that nearly destroyed Northam’s career. Cox said the Republicans will instead put forward legislation to toughen penalties — including new, mandatory minimum sentences — for those who use guns to commit crimes. “We believe addressing gun violence starts with holding criminals accountable for their actions, not infringing on the constitutional rights of law-abiding citizens,” Cox said. Another top Republican, Senate Majority Leader Tommy Norment, indicated some willingness to debate a ban on large-capacity magazines, according to the Virginia Gazette, but told gun-control advocates outside his office that “nothing would have helped us in Virginia Beach.” Virginia is generally considered a very gun-friendly state and is home to the National Rifle Association’s headquarters. After the 2007 Virginia Tech massacre, in which a student with a history of mental problems shot 32 people to death, the state passed a law prohibiting people adjudicated as seriously mentally ill from buying a gun. But a push at the time for universal background checks failed. Most of the other legislation proposed this time also fell short before in Virginia, where Republicans hold slim majorities in the House and Senate. All 140 legislative seats are up for grabs this year, and the Democrats are thought to have a realistic chance of taking back control of the General Assembly. Northam got a standing ovation from gun-control advocates, state workers and elected officials as he said the massacre in Virginia Beach demands that lawmakers put saving lives ahead of party loyalty. Noting that first responders saved lives in last week’s attack, he said: “Now, I’m calling on the elected officials of this commonwealth to become second responders. Your duty is clear: Rush to the scene and put a stop to this violence. “Show Virginians that it doesn’t matter what party you are in, we all are Virginians first, and we care about the safety and security of every Virginian,” he added. The governor has long advocated stricter gun control and gets an F grade from the NRA. He made the issue a top priority of his 2017 campaign, drawing from his experience as a pediatrician and Army doctor who has treated children and soldiers wounded by gunfire. Craddock appeared to have had no felony record and is believed to have legally purchased his two .45-caliber pistols, authorities said. Friday’s shooting has been Northam’s first major test since a scandal over a racist photo in his medical school yearbook nearly drove him from office four months ago. Northam denied he was in the picture of someone in blackface and another person in a Ku Klux Klan hood and robe. A top gun-rights advocate, Philip Van Cleave, president of the Virginia Citizens Defense League, denounced the special session as “political theater” and said the answer is to make it easier for people to carry weapons. “There’s really nothing other than allowing people to protect themselves until the police get there that would have worked,” he said.

virginia
guns
gun control
ralph northam
dewayne craddock
nra
u.s .
u.s. mass shootings
virginia beach massacre


Some 100,000 join march to demand Czech billionaire prime minister's resignation

Abstract: PRAGUE - Around 100,000 Czechs filled Prague’s Wenceslas Square on Tuesday to demand the resignation of Prime Minister Andrej Babis in the biggest demonstration the country has seen in decades. The 64-year-old billionaire was charged last year in connection with a €2 million ($2.25 million) EU subsidy scam, while an audit by the European Commission ruled that he has a conflict of interest as a politician and entrepreneur. “Andrej Babis gives us a new reason to protest every week,” Benjamin Roll of the Million Moments for Democracy NGO, one of the organizers, told the protesters. “We’ve had enough.” While an AFP correspondent estimated the crowd at 100,000, organizers put the figure at 120,000. Tuesday’s protest was the largest in a series that began in late April against Babis and his justice minister, Marie Benesova, who is suspected of putting the brakes on legal moves against the prime minister. The commission suspects that the Slovak-born Babis, who is the Czech Republic’s second-wealthiest person, still rakes in profits from the company he founded. Brussels has also halted subsidies to the food, chemicals and media Agrofert holding pending the audit verdict. Babis transferred Agrofert to a fund in 2017, months before becoming prime minister, to avoid a conflict of interest. But a public Slovak registry still lists him and his wife as the final benefactors of Agrofert’s units in Slovakia. Brussels is asking the Czech Republic to reimburse 17.4 million euros worth of subsidies, according to a draft text to be finalised in the coming months. Last Friday, Babis vehemently denied any conflict of interest. “This audit is an attack on the Czech Republic. European bureaucrats have disdain for Czech laws,” he told lawmakers on Tuesday.

andrej babis
eu
czech republic
corruption


'Trump Baby' blimp flies in London as protests greet president

Abstract: LONDON - Thousands of protesters greeted President Donald Trump’s U.K. visit with anger and British irony Tuesday, crowding London’s government district while the U.S. leader met Prime Minister Theresa May nearby. Feminists, environmentalists, peace activists, trade unionists and others demonstrated against the lavish royal welcome being given to a president they see as a danger to the world, chanting “Say it loud, say it clear, Donald Trump’s not welcome here.” “I’m very cross he’s here,” said guitar teacher Katie Greene, carrying a home-made sign reading “keep your grabby hands off our national treasures” under a picture of one of Queen Elizabeth II’s corgis. “I find him scary. My sign is flippant and doesn’t say the things I’d really like to say.” A day of protests began with the flying of a giant blimp depicting the president as an angry orange baby, which rose from the grass of central London’s Parliament Square. One group came dressed in the red cloaks and bonnets of characters from Margaret Atwood’s “The Handmaid’s Tale,” which is set in a dystopian, misogynist future America. Demonstrators filled Trafalgar Square and spilled down Whitehall, a street lined with imposing government offices, before marching half a mile to Parliament. Many paused to photograph a robotic likeness of Trump sitting on a golden toilet, cellphone in hand. The robot caught the attention of passers-by with its recitation of catchphrases including “No collusion” and “You are fake news.” “It’s 16 feet high, so it’s as large as his ego,” said Don Lessem from Philadelphia, who built the statue from foam over an iron frame and had it shipped by boat across the Atlantic. Lessem, a dinosaur expert who makes models of prehistoric creatures, said “I’m interested in things that are big, not very intelligent and have lost their place in history.” “I wanted people here to know that people in America do not support Trump in the majority . and humor is my weapon,” he said. Police erected barricades to stop protesters marching past the gates of Downing St., though the shouts and chants could be heard as Trump met May for talks inside the prime minister’s official residence. Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn addressed the crowd, criticizing the “hatreds that are being fueled by the far-right in politics in Britain, in Europe and the United States.” Corbyn declined an invitation to Monday’s banquet for the president at Buckingham Palace, but sought a meeting with Trump — which was refused. “He wanted to meet today or tomorrow and I decided I would not do that,” said Trump, calling Corbyn “somewhat of a negative force.” Labour confirmed that Corbyn had proposed a meeting. Emily Thornberry, Labour’s foreign affairs spokeswoman, said Trump was “a sexual predator” and a racist who did not deserve the honor of a state visit hosted by Queen Elizabeth II. Thornberry told the BBC that the leader of Britain’s most important ally should be stood up to “the way you deal with a bully” because “if you bow down in front of them you just get kicked harder.” There were occasional scuffles as some of the protesters confronted small pockets of Trump supporters. Police moved in to separate the groups, and bundled some of the combatants into a nearby pub. One counterprotester, Lewis Metcalfe, said he had traveled from his home in northern England to show support for the president. “I’m obviously going to be a minority today,” said Metcalfe. “I don’t agree with all his policies. He’s not the greatest president in the world, but he does get things done.” Trump has dined with the queen at Buckingham Palace, took tea with Prince Charles and held talks with May during his three-day state visit, which ends Wednesday with commemorations of the 75th anniversary of D-Day. The president said he was delighted with his reception in Britain, and said he had seen only “a small protest … very small.” He also claimed, exaggeratedly, that there had been “thousands of people on the streets cheering” as he left Buckingham Palace.

london
protests
donald trump
theresa may
jeremy corbyn
u.k .


Joe Biden's $5 trillion climate plan: Net zero emissions by 2050

Abstract: NEW YORK - Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden is pitching a $5 trillion-plus climate proposal that he says would lead the U.S. to net zero emission of carbon pollution by 2050. The former vice president calls for $1.7 trillion in federal spending over 10 years, with the rest of the investments coming from the private sector. Biden proposes covering the taxpayer costs by repealing the corporate tax cuts that President Donald Trump signed in 2017, while eliminating existing subsidies to the fossil fuel companies. Biden’s plan — a mix of tax incentives, federal spending, new regulation and more aggressive foreign policy on climate issues — comes as he pushes back on rivals’ assertions that his environmental agenda isn’t bold enough. Climate activists largely praised his pitch Tuesday, although some said the Democrats’ 2020 front-runner still hasn’t gone far enough to challenge the fossil fuel industry. His proposal calls the Green New Deal pushed by some Democrats on Capitol Hill “a crucial outline” but stops short of some of its timelines for weaning the U.S. economy off power from fossil fuels, even as he promises a “clean energy revolution” nationwide and internationally. “I will lead America and the world, not only to confront the crisis in front us but to seize the opportunity it presents,” Biden says in a campaign video posted online, warning that failure to act threatens “the livability of our planet” and will accelerate natural disasters that are “already happening.” Biden also joined many of his Democratic primary opponents in pledging not to accept campaign contributions from the fossil fuel industry and promising to keep the U.S. in the United Nations climate agreement signed in 2015 while he was vice president under President Barack Obama. Trump, who calls climate science a “hoax,” has pledged to withdraw from that accord. “While we’re standing around not doing much, the rest of the world is moving ahead,” Biden said at a New Hampshire campaign stop Tuesday. But the release of Biden’s plan was not without controversy. The campaign was forced to amend the proposal because a handful of passages did not credit some of its sources. The Biden campaign said “several citations” had been “inadvertently left out.” Biden’s plan is similar in size and scope to what former Texas Rep. Beto O’Rourke has proposed. Its total price tag falls short of Washington Gov. Jay Inslee’s pitch for $3 trillion in federal spending over a decade and Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s $2 trillion green manufacturing plan, also unveiled Tuesday. League of Conservation Voters lobbying executive Tiernan Sittenfeld applauded Biden for “committing to ambitious goals.” Greenpeace, which recently released a scorecard ranking Biden second to last among Democratic candidates, called the outline “a critical step forward,” but spokesman John Noel added that if Biden “wants to become a leader on climate, he needs to outline a plan to phase out fossil fuels.” At the pro-Green New Deal Sunrise Movement, executive director Varshini Prakash called Biden’s plan “a good start.” Prakash also gave climate activists credit for pushing Biden to the left following their outcry after a recent news report asserted Biden was looking for a “middle ground” on climate. Biden disputed the report at the time. As president, Biden says he’d start by reversing many actions of the Trump administration, then turn to necessary congressional action and executive branch regulation, while using U.S. political and economic muscle to limit emissions from other nations. He acknowledges that such an overhaul would affect existing U.S. energy workers — coal miners and power plant operators especially. He calls first for pension and benefit protections for all such workers, and, though short on specifics, he promises an “unprecedented investment” in retraining and redevelopment in those communities. Biden recognizes the “environmental justice” movement that highlights how pollution disproportionately affects poorer, mostly nonwhite communities. He pledges a more aggressive Environmental Protection Agency, clean drinking water for all Americans and a focus on minority communities for initial rounds of federal clean energy spending. He doesn’t offer specific spending amounts for those priorities. Still, Biden’s dual focus on coal towns and nonwhite communities reflects political lessons from 2016 Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton’s loss. Clinton drew ire in coal country when she said as part of a more sweeping statement on energy development that “we’re going to put a lot of coal miners and coal companies out of business.” Meanwhile, Democratic turnout dropped in some cities with high nonwhite populations where aging infrastructure, including in water systems, has become a defining issue. Biden also envisions expanding the nation’s railways, theoretically reducing demand for car and airline travel. Among his ideas for automobiles, Biden calls for fuel economy standards “beyond” the Obama administration’s goal of about 54 miles (87 km) per gallon (3.8 liters). The Trump administration has rolled that back, saying the regulation would increase auto prices. Biden also pitches expanded tax credits for purchases of electric vehicles, along with 500,000 more public charging stations nationwide by the end of 2030. He calls for reducing carbon output from the nation’s buildings by more than 50 percent by 2035, through new construction and tax breaks for retrofitting existing commercial and residential properties. The Energy Department would be tasked with tightening efficiency standards for household appliances and equipment. Like O’Rourke, Biden mentions nuclear energy as a source the federal government should boost with tax incentives. That could put him at odds with some activists on the left who cast nuclear energy as too dangerous. On the international front, Biden calls out China as the world’s biggest coal polluter and says he’d hinge all future bilateral deals with Beijing on carbon reductions. Biden also urges an international alliance that would help other nations afford low-carbon development and pitches a global moratorium on Arctic offshore drilling.

joe biden
emissions
fossil fuels
climate change
2020 u.s. presidential election


Making nice at the end, Trump praises departing May, jokes she should 'stick around' for new trade deal

Abstract: LONDON - Making nice at the end, President Donald Trump eased up Tuesday on his frequent criticisms of outgoing British Prime Minister Theresa May over her handling of the tortured Brexit deal, declaring that history will remember her fondly if the United Kingdom can successfully leave the European Union. The latest chapter in the allies’ storied “special relationship” played out as anti-Trump protesters — with the infamous “Trump baby” balloon bobbing overhead — thronged the streets of nearby central London. The president’s unexpected compliments for May come just days before she was set to resign the leadership of her party after failing to secure a Brexit deal. She will depart as prime minister once her successor has been chosen. “I have greatly enjoyed working with you. You are a tremendous professional and a person who loves her country very much,” Trump told May at a news conference near the prime minister’s Downing Street office. But he couldn’t resist a slight dig, evoking the two years of broadsides he had lobbed at her by recalling that he had urged her to sue the EU rather than try to negotiate a departure. Trump said he would have “sued and settled, maybe, but you never know. She’s probably a better negotiator than I am.” And he added that the deal May came away with was a good one and “perhaps you won’t be given the credit you deserve.” May voiced hope her successor will be able to achieve Brexit. “I still believe —I personally believe— that it is in the best interest of the U.K. to leave the European Union with a deal. I believe there is a good deal on the table,” she said. “Obviously, it will be whoever succeeds me as prime minister to take this issue forward. What is paramount, I believe, is delivering on Brexit for the British people.” Earlier in the day, Trump jokingly suggested that May “stick around” until a new U.S.-U.K. trade deal was brokered. May and her aides chuckled at that. Trump said Britain and the U.S. would be able to strike a “phenomenal trade deal” once the U.K. had left the EU — music to the ears of pro-Brexit Britons. But, in words sure to alarm those in Britain concerned about Brexit, he said that “everything”— including the National Health Service — would be “on the table” in future trade negotiations. In a later interview that will air Wednesday on ITV’s “Good Morning Britain,” Trump appeared to back away from that idea, saying he didn’t envision the health service being part of the talks, adding, “That’s not trade.” Most Britons are protective of the state-run NHS, which delivers free health care to all, and many worry that private U.S. health care firms could try to gain access to chunks of it as a condition of a trade deal. On a separate issue, Trump said he anticipated “no limitations” on the future sharing of intelligence with the U.K. as the U.S. continues to press its longtime ally to ban Chinese company Huawei amid espionage and trade concerns. Traditionally, U.S. presidents avoid injecting themselves into the domestic politics of other nations. But Trump didn’t hold back — right after claiming that he would not comment on Britain’s internal matters. He renewed his praise of Conservative lawmaker Boris Johnson, who is campaigning to replace May as Conservative leader, and of another contender, Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt. He said he’d turned down a requested meeting from Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn and took new swipes at one of his most vocal critics, London Mayor Sadiq Khan. Afterward, Brexit Party leader Nigel Farage and Trump met at the U.S. ambassador’s residence, with Farage tweeting that they’d had a “good meeting.” Trump previously had voiced support for a “hard Brexit,” which could have a devastating impact on the U.K. economy, according to many experts. That stands in contrast to a previous White House position that the departure should be as painless as possible. Others in the U.K. are pressing for a second referendum that could keep Britain in the EU. As the pageantry of Trump’s British state visit gave way to politics, an economic meeting between the leaders at St. James’s Palace brought together 10 leading companies — five from the U.K. and five from the United States. CEOs and senior representatives from BAE Systems, GlaxoSmithKline, National Grid, Barclays, Reckitt Benckiser, JP Morgan, Lockheed Martin, Goldman Sachs International, Bechtel and Splunk were listed as attending. While the corporate leaders gathered, protesters began to assemble across London. Leaders of Britain’s main opposition party joined demonstrators at a rally in Trafalgar Square, just up the street from May’s Downing Street office. Also in Trafalgar Square: a 16-foot robotic likeness of Trump seated on a golden toilet. Trump glossed over the protests, saying he saw “thousands of people in the streets cheering” and waving U.S. and U.K. flags, but just a “very, very small” group of protesters. “There was great love,” he said. Trump and first lady Melania Trump later toured the Churchill War Rooms, the British government’s underground command center during World War II. Then it was time for a fancy reciprocal dinner that the Trumps hosted at the U.S. ambassador’s residence for Prince Charles, his wife, Camilla, and other dignitaries. On the menu: heritage tomatoes with burrata, grilled filet of beef and vanilla ice cream with summer berries. A day earlier, Trump had lunch with Queen Elizabeth II and tea with Prince Charles before a grand state dinner at Buckingham Palace.

trade
donald trump
theresa may
brexit
boris johnson
u.s .
u.k .


U.K. to get new, Brexit-saddled leader by July 26 as candidates make pitch amid accelerated procedure

Abstract: LONDON - Boris Johnson, the front-runner to replace Theresa May as U.K. prime minister, warned Conservative Party colleagues that they face “extinction” if they didn’t deliver Brexit by the current deadline of Oct. 31. “We are facing an existential crisis and will not be forgiven if we do not deliver,” Johnson told a private meeting of Tory members of Parliament, according to his office. “There is a very real choice between getting Brexit done and the potential extinction of this great party.” He was speaking after the Conservatives set out an accelerated procedure for selecting a new leader that will see a prime minister in place by July 26. The party has raised the bar for MPs who wish to run for the job, and two dropped out Tuesday, narrowing the field slightly to 11. The first hustings of the election was held behind closed doors in Parliament on Tuesday evening, as four of the candidates — Sajid Javid, Rory Stewart, Boris Johnson and Andrea Leadsom — addressed the One Nation caucus of Conservatives who want the party to focus on unifying issues of social policy, rather then Brexit. Johnson, who has kept a low profile in recent weeks, has yet to set out how he would achieve his goal, but according to Nicky Morgan, one of the MPs who organized the event, he said the existing deal negotiated by May didn’t work. He also said that while he didn’t want a no-deal Brexit, the country should prepare for one. He ruled out a second referendum or a general election. “Sajid was very responsible, Rory was a direct pitch to colleagues, Boris was more subdued, and Andrea was more optimistic,” Morgan said. Morgan said Johnson had told the room that if the U.K. delayed its departure from the European Union past Oct. 31, “the relevance of the referendum starts to wane.” That is a comment that could come back to haunt him if Britain does end up seeking a further delay. His office didn’t deny he had made the remarks. But Johnson has set his face against such a delay. According to his office, he told the room that the party needed to “stop banging on about Brexit and put that balling baby to bed, pacify it and recapture the political agenda.” In an indication of the concerns that MPs in the room had about what a future prime minister might do, all were asked whether they would suspend Parliament to stop it from trying to block their Brexit plans. All four ruled the option out. All also rejected the idea of an alliance with Nigel Farage’s Brexit Party. Javid, the home secretary, warned his colleagues against choosing “a leader who thinks the way to lead is to exploit divisions,” according to his office. Talking about the drubbing the Tories had received from Farage in last month’s election, he said, “We will not beat the Brexit Party by becoming the Brexit Party.” May is due to submit her resignation as Conservative leader on Friday, though she will stay on as prime minister until her successor is elected. With the party in turmoil about Brexit, multiple members of Parliament have seen their chance. At the start of Tuesday, 13 MPs had declared they were running, and others were waiting in the wings. Faced with the prospect of the contest dragging on for months at a time of national crisis, a meeting of the executive of the rank-and-file Conservative MPs’ 1922 Committee decided to raise the bar for entry and accelerate the voting process. Two candidates, James Cleverly and Kit Malthouse, dropped out in the course of the day. There was to be a further closed-door hustings from the One Nation group on Wednesday. In a speech Wednesday morning another of the candidates, Health Secretary Matt Hancock, was to say the government should encourage the development of a domestic telecommunications industry that would mean it didn’t face the difficult choice about whether to use equipment supplied by Huawei Technologies Co. Under the rules set out by the Conservatives, any MP wanting to be leader now needs eight supporters to put their name in. Nominations will open and close June 10, and Conservative MPs will whittle the field down to two in a series of votes. Voting among MPs is planned for June 13 and then June 18, 19 and 20. Candidates will need to get at least 16 votes to survive the first round, and 32 to survive the second. After that, the candidate with the fewest votes will be excluded in each round. Conservative grassroots members will have a month, from the week beginning June 22 to the week beginning July 22, to choose the winner out of those two in a postal ballot. It is the first time the Conservatives have chosen a prime minister in this way. In 2016, May became leader by default when Leadsom dropped out of the race.

brexit
boris johnson
theresa may
elections
sajid javid
rory stewart
andrea leadsom
eu
u.k .


Italy's Matteo Salvini warns of crisis after prime minister's threat to quit

Abstract: ROME - Italy’s deputy prime minister, Matteo Salvini, warned Tuesday that a government crisis will be unavoidable if his League party cannot start working constructively with the 5-Star Movement, its coalition partner, within two weeks. The warning came a day after Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte threatened to resign unless the two populist parties in the coalition government set aside their differences and continue working on the government program. Salvini insisted he wanted to move forward with the government agenda, but said a breakthrough is needed soon. “If we realize that in 15 days’ time we’re back here saying the same things, with the same delays and the same postponements, then it would be a problem,” Salvini told Italian radio RTL. The right-wing League and the anti-establishment 5-Star Movement have been fighting constantly since they sealed a fragile government pact a year ago. Conte is a lawyer by training and his skills as a mediator were widely touted when he was tapped to head the coalition of two unaligned populist parties. His resignation would pave the way to a government crisis, leading the country to new elections, likely in the fall, just ahead of a critical budget law that needs approval by the end of the year. In a sign of peacemaking, the uneasy coalition allies on Tuesday managed to reach an agreement on launching large-scale public works. But that was just one of the key economic measures the partners disagree on. Italy’s expensive budget plans have already raised the European Commission’s worries and may lead to an excessive deficit procedure as soon as this week, with Rome facing fines for up to €3.5 billion. The Commission warned that, rather than shrinking, Italy’s debt has been on the rise this year and will continue to expand next year. But neither the League nor the 5-Stars seem willing to backtrack on their promises, after May’s European elections drastically changed the balance of power within the government. Salvini’s League doubled its popularity, topping 34 percent in the EU vote, while the 5-Stars lost about half of their support at 17 percent. “Salvini can raise the pressure by asking for more and eventually force the 5-Stars to breakaway,” said Wolfango Piccoli, co-president of political consultancy firm Teneo Intelligence. Political uncertainty also risks sending Italy’s borrowing costs spiraling again. “This government is like the Tower of Pisa: it keeps leaning, but apparently never falls,” said Giovanni Orsina, director of the School of Government at Rome’s Luiss University. “But if Italian borrowing costs spike up again, then it will be really hard to avoid a crisis.”

italy
matteo salvini
5-star movement
elections
eu


Five years after MH17 downing, airline conflict alert system remains patchy

Abstract: SEOUL/MONTREAL - When Pakistan closed its airspace during a conflict with India in February, Malaysia Airlines was not one of the carriers left scrambling to reroute flights because it had already done so two weeks earlier, the carrier’s chief executive said. Nearly five years after Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 was shot down by a missile over Ukraine, killing all 298 people on board, carriers like Malaysia Airlines are increasingly taking steps to uncover any threats to their planes. But concerns persist over governments’ inadequate sharing of intelligence and a reluctance by countries involved in conflict to divulge information or sacrifice overflight fees by shutting their skies, safety experts said. “The wound is still here in the whole organization, and we take safety very seriously,” Malaysia Airlines’ chief executive, Izham Ismail, said on the sidelines of an International Air Transport Association conference in Seoul. Ukraine on Tuesday accused Russia of doing nothing to prevent what it called pro-Moscow separatists’ “acts of terrorism” in eastern Ukraine, including the downing of MH17 on July 17, 2014. Deputy Foreign Minister Olena Zerkal made the claim before judges at the International Court of Justice in The Hague on the second day of arguments in a case brought by Kiev against Moscow. On Monday, Russia argued that Ukraine had failed to present any new evidence against it and called on the court to dismiss the case. Ukraine launched the case against Russia in 2017 under international laws on the financing of terrorism. It is seeking damages for attacks against civilians it says the separatists have carried out in eastern Ukraine. It says Moscow supplied the BUK surface-to-air missile system used to shoot down MH17. In the aftermath of the shooting down of MH17, the aviation industry backed the creation by a U.N. agency of a conflict zone website as a one-stop repository for route planning. But when the site was later closed after complaints from some countries over information-sharing, airlines turned elsewhere for advice. “For the big 50 airlines, they have the resources to dedicate a security department to the job,” said Mark Zee, the founder of OPSGROUP, which launched the free website Safe Airspace to provide guidance after the downing of MH17. “For everyone else — and that is thousands of operators — I can tell you that many of them have a really hard time making a decent risk assessment. I see it in the emails we get every day.” Airlines are spending millions of dollars a year on extra fuel flying roundabout routes in the Middle East and Africa to avoid conflict zones. And carriers still see routes above war-torn countries differently, just like before MH17, when British Airways and Air France avoided eastern Ukraine, but Lufthansa and Singapore Airlines flew over it. “This is where we need better information,” said IATA’s senior vice president for safety and flight operations, Gilberto Lopez-Meyer, in Seoul. Qatar Airways, for one, recently returned to flying over Syria as part of its efforts to grapple with a two-year Persian Gulf dispute that has blocked it from using the airspace of many of its neighbors. CEO Akbar al-Baker said the airline would not fly anywhere that is not safe. The United States and other countries ban their airlines from flying over Syrian airspace at any altitude due to safety risks, according to a European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) website on conflict zones that was set up after MH17. Yet the resources that are available to airlines often communicate changing threat levels too slowly and informally to be of use, according to the Dutch Safety Board, which led the MH17 investigation and released post-crash recommendations in February this year. While the Netherlands shares confidential information on threats to its own carriers on a formal basis, other countries remain reluctant to do so. The site set up after MH17 by the U.N.’s International Civil Aviation Organization closed after “states objected to anybody but themselves publishing information about hazards in their airspace,” said a source involved with the creation of the site who declined to be identified because of the sensitivity of the matter. Instead, the use of commercial services like OPSGROUP grew among airlines polled after MH17, the Dutch Safety Board said. “I think after MH17 people became more aware of the problem. They seek information,” said Mohammed Aziz, a former Lebanese air accident investigator who is now a consultant with Aviation Strategies International. “The problem is before they weren’t seeking information. They were waiting for information to come their way.” Montreal-based ICAO has also called for air traffic service authorities to report conflict zone hazards in notices to pilots. But these new requirements do not take effect until November 2020 and still put the onus on countries to share information. “Rules alone do not change the behavior of states,” said Jeff Poole, director general of the Civil Air Services Navigation Organization. “However, we see that more and more states take the correct responsibility.”


North Korea ignores South's calls for joint efforts in fight against African swine fever

Abstract: SEOUL - Seoul said Wednesday that Pyongyang has so far ignored its calls for joint efforts to stem the spread of highly contagious African swine fever following an outbreak near North Korea’s border with China. South Korea’s Agricultural Ministry on Wednesday said that blood tests of pigs from some 340 farms near the inter-Korean border conducted through Tuesday came back negative. Hundreds of fences and traps have been installed around the farms to prevent pigs from being infected by wild boars that roam in and out of North Korea. But the lack of bilateral cooperation renders South Korea helpless in preventing the disease from reaching North Korean farms near the border. There is concern that an outbreak in South Korea would deal a significant blow to a massive industry that involves 6,300 farms raising more than 11 million pigs. South Korea’s Unification Ministry, which deals with inter-Korean affairs, said the North hasn’t responded to proposals for joint quarantine efforts since it reported an outbreak near its border with China to the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE) last week. The North said 77 of the 99 pigs at the cooperative farm in Jagang province died of the disease and the remaining 22 pigs were culled. The outbreak comes as the North has significantly slowed its engagement with South Korea following the collapse of a February summit between North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and U.S. President Donald Trump over disagreements for sanctions relief in exchange for North Korea’s nuclear disarmament. The disease, which has decimated pig herds in China and other Asian countries, is harmless to humans but for pigs is fatal and highly contagious. There is no known cure or vaccine. North Korean state media in recent weeks have published several articles detailing the spread of African swine fever across Asia, but none of them so far has specifically mentioned that the disease has reached the North. “To prevent African swine fever from spreading, it’s crucial to detect and slaughter the pigs infected with the virus at the right time,” North Korean scientist Jon Sung Chil said in an interview with Pyongyang’s official Rodong Sinmun newspaper, which called for an all-out effort by the North’s farming industry and homes to prevent the spread of the disease. South Korea’s government believes the North raises about 2.6 million pigs in 14 government-run or cooperative farms. Oh Beom-seok, an official from South Korea’s agriculture ministry, said the South is prepared to provide diagnosis kits, disinfectants and other equipment should the North ask for help. “We are trying to gain as much information possible from the OIE or North Korean officials there … but so far, there has been no additional report of an outbreak (in North Korea),” Oh said. The ministry said government workers have caught more than 1,000 wild boars in South Korea for blood tests, which have so far came back negative. While workers plan to test 2,000 more wild boars, the ministry said none of the animals so far was caught from border areas, where a ban on hunting rifles make the animals harder to control. South Korea’s Defense Ministry, which is monitoring the movement of wild boars through heat sensors installed along the border, said it would be difficult for wild boars to cross over the barbed wire fences in the mine-scattered border zone. But government officials say there is still a possibility that the animals could swim across rivers.

north korea
swine fever
south korea
agriculture
pigs
disease
food


U.S. scientist sounds warning on future Everest dangers tied to warming and pollution

Abstract: KATHMANDU - Mount Everest and its surrounding peaks are increasingly polluted and warmer, and nearby glaciers are melting at an alarming rate that is likely to make it more dangerous for future climbers, a U.S. scientist who spent weeks in the Everest region said Tuesday. Professor John All of Western Washington University said after returning from the mountains that he and his team of fellow scientists found there was lot of pollution buried deep in the snow, and that the snow was surprisingly dark when they processed and filtered it. “What that means is there are little pieces of pollution that the snow is forming around, so the snow is actually trapping the pollution and pulling it down,” All said in Kathmandu, Nepal’s capital. All and his team spent weeks testing snow on Everest and its surrounding peaks, as well as plants on the foothills. “The warming temperature is melting the glaciers and the snow around Mount Everest very quickly, so what happens is even when there is a storm it melts in a couple of hours,” he said. “The glaciers are retreating dramatically because of global warming.” He said because the glaciers are getting thinner and smaller, it is making it more dangerous for climbers. The team had been planning to climb both Everest and sister peak Lhotse, but crowding on Everest forced them to change their plans. They climbed up to the last camp at 8,000 meters (26,240 feet), the last point the two mountains share, and only reached the top of Lhotse. Hundreds of climbers had lined up on May 22 and 23 to attempt to reach Everest’s summit, creating a traffic jam that is being blamed for the deaths of several climbers. All said it was too risky for his team to collect samples with that many climbers moving very slowly. The scientists said the samples and data would be processed once they return to United States, and they would then issue a report on their findings. They had done similar research in the area in 2009. “Overall, the past 10 years have seen a lot changes in the mountains, and they all have been for the negative environmentally in terms of long term survivability of the glaciers,” All said.

pollution
mount everest
nepal
climate change


China launches rocket from ship at sea for the first time

Abstract: BEIJING - China successfully launched a rocket from a ship at sea for the first time on Wednesday, state media reported, the latest step forward in its ambitious space program. The Long March 11 rocket blasted off from a platform on a large semi-submersible barge in the Yellow Sea just after midday, state media said. The small rocket, designed to be deployed quickly and from mobile launch sites such as a ship, carried seven satellites, including one that measures sea-surface winds to forecast typhoons. The rocket also carried two communications satellites belonging to China 125, a Beijing-based technology company that plans to launch hundreds of satellites to provide global data networking services. The China National Space Administration said in a statement, “This is the first time that China has … (tested a) launch vehicle at sea.” State broadcaster CCTV, in a post on the Twitter-like Weibo platform, hailed it as “a new launching mode for China to enter space quickly.” According to the Russian company Energia, the majority shareholder in Sea Launch, launching from sea has a number of advantages, such as the ability to send off rockets from a variety of locations on Earth, as well as reduced costs and risks. China has made its space program a top priority in recent years as it races to catch up with the United States and become a major space power by 2030. Beijing plans to begin construction of its own manned space station next year. However, while China has insisted its ambitions are purely peaceful, the U.S. Defense Department has accused it of pursuing activities aimed at preventing other nations from using space-based assets during a crisis. China now spends more than Russia and Japan on its civil and military space programs, unveiling ambitious plans for missions to the moon and beyond in the coming decade. Earlier this year, China became the first nation to land a rover on the far side of the moon. It also unveiled ambitious plans to build a research base on the lunar surface, send a probe to Mars and build the space station. In 2003, China became only the third nation to have the capability of launching humans into space. And with sea launches, China now has the ability to deploy satellites from a mobile platform.