| Trump thanks GOP senator for pushing Russian disinformation Posted: 02 Dec 2019 10:13 AM PST  President Trump praised Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., for pushing the theory that Ukrainian interference in the 2016 presidential election was equivalent to Russian efforts.
|
| Family attacked in Mexico has had "a few run-ins" with drug cartels Posted: 01 Dec 2019 08:58 PM PST  The family is part of a group of fundamentalist Mormons who migrated to Mexico after polygamy was outlawed in the U.S. in the 1800s.
|
| Tennessee prepares to execute blind death row inmate Posted: 02 Dec 2019 12:29 PM PST  The execution of a blind man in Tennessee this week would mark only the second time in recent decades that a person without vision has been put to death in the U.S., the death row inmate's lawyers say. Lee Hall, 53, is scheduled to be electrocuted Thursday in a state that has accelerated the pace of its executions over the past year. Hall had his sight when he entered death row nearly three decades ago, but attorneys for the condemned prisoner say he's since become functionally blind due to improperly treated glaucoma.
|
| White House hopeful Warren takes aim at unpredictable work schedules Posted: 03 Dec 2019 06:01 AM PST  The proposal is modeled after a bill that Warren, a U.S. senator from Massachusetts, introduced in Congress called the Schedules that Work Act, to require employers in the food service, retail, cleaning, hospitality and warehouse industries to give employees two weeks' notice of their work schedules. If an employee seeks a change to accommodate caring for a family member, attend training or educational classes or a second job, employers would have to accede to the request unless they provide a "legitimate business reason" why not, according to a preview of the plan Warren detailed on the website Medium. "Many employers - especially in the retail and service industries - have adopted 'just in time' scheduling practices that use algorithms to assign workers hours in real time," Warren wrote.
|
| The 2019 Los Angeles Auto Show Goes Electric Posted: 02 Dec 2019 02:20 PM PST |
| Georgia governor's Senate appointment defies Trump Posted: 02 Dec 2019 07:42 AM PST  Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp is expected to appoint financial services executive Katie Loeffler to fill the state's vacant Senate seat, according to Politico. Georgia Sen. Johnny Isakson announced earlier this year that he would be leaving the Senate at the end of 2019 for health reasons.
|
| Palmerston, the Foreign Office cat, returns to work after six months off for stress Posted: 02 Dec 2019 01:37 AM PST  Palmerston, the Foreign Office cat, has returned to work after six months recovering from stress caused by civil servants constantly picking him up and overfeeding him. Those working in the department have been warned not to touch the cat unless approached, and to stop feeding him treats. In July, the cat was taken to the house of Sir Simon McDonald's Private Secretary in order to recover from stress; the mouser was overweight and had groomed all of the hair off his front legs. Sir Simon, a senior civil servant, is in charge of Palmerston's well-being and on Monday morning issued a strict letter to staff, warning them that if they do not change their behaviour towards the cat, he may be retired for good. Mystery has surrounded Palmerston's extended break, with some worrying the cat was gravely unwell and close to death. However, these rumours were unfounded and the animal is happy and back to full health. The letter reads: "He is happy, healthy and full of energy. His pelt is glossy and mostly grown back (over grooming is, I'm told, a similar habit to human's nail-biting; the habit can take a while to kick). His diet is regulated and free of Dreamies. We need now to keep him that way!" I am happy to announce that I will be returning to my Chief Mouser duties at the @foreignoffice this week! New guidance - the Palmerston Protocols - will govern my care in the FCO to make sure it's working for me. (1/4) pic.twitter.com/j2AFKI0DGN— Palmerston (@DiploMog) December 2, 2019 Staff have been given four rules now the cat is back. Sir Simon wrote: "First, no-one (apart from his carers) should feed Palmerston. No Dreamies. No bowls of food under the desk for if he happens to drop by. Nothing! "Second, everyone must help keep Palmerston in the 'Palmerston Zone'. Cats are territorial. They fret when their territory is bigger than they can manage. They can cope with an ever smaller territory as they age. Palmerston has been king of King Charles Street, roaming from basement to fourth floor (with quad, Downing Street and occasionally St James's Park thrown in) for nearly four years. We think he's about six years old, ie entering feline middle age. "With the vet's help we have mapped a more manageable territory: the offices and area surrounding the Grand Staircase. Heavy doors mark the limits, now with (discreet) stickers proclaiming, 'You are entering/leaving the Palmerston Zone'. Please respect the Zone and return Palmerston if you find him straying further afield. Bear in mind that he loves to sit beside the door and dart through, if given half a chance. "Third, everyone must respect Palmerston's personal space. Allow Palmerston to choose whether he wants to interact with you: offer your hand as if you were introducing yourself to a stranger, and allow Palmerston to make the first move. Don't wake him if he is sleeping. He has full choice and control of who he deigns to greet or imperiously ignores. "Fourth, my staff office will serve as both my Outer Office and as Palmerston's refuge: Palmerston HQ. If he is in Palmerston HQ, he is not to be disturbed. Palmerston is a friendly, outgoing cat, but we all need our privacy. Like Greta Garbo, sometimes he wants to be alone."
|
| Note to Trump: China Is Considering Buying More Russian Su-35 Jet Fighters Posted: 02 Dec 2019 02:00 PM PST  It's just that good.
|
| Trump mocks FBI's Lisa Page, again citing debunked text-message conspiracy Posted: 02 Dec 2019 12:21 PM PST  The president lashed out yet again at former FBI lawyer Lisa Page after she granted an interview to the Daily Beast.
|
| 2 of the men who took down the London Bridge terrorist were convicted felons, including a murderer in the final stages of his sentence Posted: 02 Dec 2019 02:55 AM PST  A group of civilians including James Ford and Marc Conway fought off London Bridge terrorist Usman Khan, and detained him until police arrived.
|
| Govt: Upgraded indictment likely against Giuliani associates Posted: 02 Dec 2019 01:34 PM PST  An upgraded indictment is likely in the criminal case against two Rudy Giuliani associates with ties to Ukraine, a prosecutor said Monday. Assistant U.S. Attorney Douglas Zolkind made the prediction during a pretrial hearing in the case against Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman. "We think a superseding indictment is likely, but no decision has been made," Zolkind told U.S. District Judge J. Paul Oetken, who is presiding over the case.
|
| Wisconsin police officer shoots student who pulled gun, refused to drop it, officials say Posted: 02 Dec 2019 04:44 PM PST  The student reportedly brought the gun to school. The suspect is in custody and the building is secure, according to the Waukesha Police Department.
|
| What Adam Schiff Doesn’t Get About Watergate Posted: 03 Dec 2019 02:02 AM PST  He sees Howard Baker as a noble, bipartisan impeachment hero. In reality, he was just another attack dog for Nixon. Here's why Democrats need to get their history right.
|
| French police clear 600 Tibetan migrants from camp outside Paris Posted: 03 Dec 2019 05:54 AM PST  French authorities said Tuesday that they removed some 600 asylum-seekers from Tibet from a camp on the edge of a forest outside Paris, which had grown into a rallying point for Tibetans in exile in recent years. The camp sprang up last August, the latest to emerge after several others were evacuated near Acheres, some 30 kilometres (20 miles) northwest of the capital. The area began attracting Tibetans after 2010, when a local aid association started offering meals, showers and help with their asylum requests.
|
| Republican privacy bill would set U.S. rules, pre-empt California: senator Posted: 02 Dec 2019 02:02 PM PST  A draft consumer privacy bill written by Republican U.S. Senator Roger Wicker's staff would set nationwide rules for handling of personal information online and elsewhere and override state laws, including one in California set to take effect next year. Wicker, who chairs the Commerce Committee, said in an interview on Monday the 25-page draft bill is "better, stronger, clearer" than the California privacy law that will start to take effect at the beginning of 2020. Compared with California's law, the staff bill has more detailed consumer protections, covers more companies and has more explicit requirements that companies collect the minimum amount of personal data needed for their purpose, Wicker said.
|
| Mexico Offers Compromise to End Impasse with U.S. Over New Nafta Posted: 03 Dec 2019 08:04 AM PST ![Mexico Offers Compromise to End Impasse with U.S. Over New Nafta]( "Mexico Offers Compromise to End Impasse with U.S. Over New Nafta") (Bloomberg) -- Terms of Trade is a daily newsletter that untangles a world embroiled in trade wars. Sign up here. Mexico is offering an olive branch to U.S. Democrats after rejecting a demand they say is key to approving a new North American trade agreement.President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said he's willing to allow panels with U.S. and Mexican judges to resolve labor disputes at specific factories.He made that promise at his morning press conference on Tuesday, when he firmly rejected requests by Democrats in the House of Representatives to allow international inspectors to enter Mexican factories to ensure they're complying with labor laws.Democrats are negotiating with Mexico and Canada changes to the new trade agreement known as USMCA which they consider vital for passage of the accord. USMCA has been approved by leaders of all three nations, but only Mexico's Senate has ratified it."We don't accept a kind of inspector to see that companies are carrying out what's established in the law," Lopez Obrador said. "What's being proposed is that, if there's a dispute with a company, we accept that there could be a panel, which is different, where we participate together."The inspectors were meant to ensure the implementation of a new Mexican law requiring that workers vote for their unions and labor contracts. Before the law was ratified in May, workers often weren't aware that a union represented them.To contact the reporters on this story: Nacha Cattan in Mexico City at ncattan@bloomberg.net;Lorena Rios in Mexico City at lriost@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Daniel Cancel at dcancel@bloomberg.net, ;Juan Pablo Spinetto at jspinetto@bloomberg.net, Walter BrandimarteFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
|
| How Chief Justice John Roberts would lead the Senate impeachment trial Posted: 02 Dec 2019 01:28 PM PST  As American politics has grown more polarized, Roberts has tried to recede from view rather than become more prominent. But many expect President Trump would try to turn impeachment proceedings into a circus. And it may be then that Roberts would be forced to have a stronger hand, if only to maintain order.
|
| How Good Is Taiwan's New Hypersonic Missile? Posted: 02 Dec 2019 10:00 AM PST  A concern for China?
|
| California Rep. Hunter admits misusing campaign funds Posted: 02 Dec 2019 09:49 PM PST  California Rep. Duncan Hunter gave up his year-long fight against federal corruption charges and pleaded guilty Tuesday to misusing his campaign funds, paving the way for the six-term Republican to step down. Hunter changed his not guilty plea at a federal hearing in San Diego on Tuesday in a dramatic reversal. For more than a year, Hunter had insisted that criminal charges against him and his wife were the result of a conspiracy of the "deep state" meant to drive him from office in the Democrat-dominated state.
|
| Maxine Waters’ new challenge: AOC and freshman upstarts Posted: 02 Dec 2019 02:02 AM PST  Some progressives have openly lamented the committee's leanings toward more moderate, business-friendly Democrats who dominate its ranks.
|
| Typhoon Kammuri kills two in Philippines, closes Manila airport Posted: 02 Dec 2019 04:53 PM PST  Typhoon Kammuri killed at least two people in the Philippines on Tuesday as it tore roofs off houses and forced the international airport in Manila to shut down. The storm roared ashore late Monday and passed south of Manila -- home to 13 million people -- and thousands of athletes at the regional Southeast Asian Games. Just before it exited into the South China Sea, the typhoon killed two people in the central island of Mindoro, where one man was crushed by a falling tree and another killed by a flying piece of lumber, police said.
|
| Turkey says new Russian missile deal to happen before too long: RIA Posted: 02 Dec 2019 01:30 AM PST  Turkey's presidential administration has said that the purchase date for more S-400 missile systems from Russia is just a technicality and that it thinks a deal will happen before too long, the RIA news agency reported on Monday. Moscow hopes to seal a deal to supply Turkey with more S-400 missile systems in the first half of next year, the head of Russian state arms exporter Rosoboronexport said last month.
|
| 4 Decades of Inequality Drive American Cities Apart Posted: 02 Dec 2019 11:53 AM PST  In 1980, highly paid workers in Binghamton, New York, earned about 4 1/2 times what low-wage workers there did. The gap between them, in a region full of IBM executives and manufacturing jobs, was about the same as the gap between the workers near the top and the bottom in metro New York City.Since then, the two regions have diverged. IBM shed jobs in Binghamton. Other manufacturing disappeared, too. High-paying work in the new knowledge economy concentrated in New York City, and so did well-educated workers. As a result, by one measure, wage inequality today is much higher in New York City than it is in Binghamton.What has happened over the last four decades is only partly a story of New York City's rise as a global hub and Binghamton's struggles. Economic inequality has been rising everywhere in the United States. But it has been rising much more in the booming places that promise hefty incomes to engineers, lawyers and innovators. And those places today are also the largest metros in the country: New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Jose, Houston, Washington.Data from a recent analysis by Jaison Abel and Richard Deitz of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York captures several dynamics that have remade the U.S. economy since 1980. Thriving and stagnant places are pulling apart from each other. And within the most prosperous regions, inequality is widening to new extremes. That this inequality now so clearly correlates with city size -- the largest metros are the most unequal -- also shows how changes in the economy are both rewarding and rattling what we have come to think of as "superstar cities."In these places, inequality and economic growth now go hand in hand.Back in 1980, Binghamton's wage inequality made the region among the most unequal in the country, according to the Fed analysis. It ranked 20th of 195 metros as measured by comparing the wages of workers at the 90th percentile with those at the 10th percentile of the local wage distribution, a measure that captures the breadth of disparities in the local economy without focusing solely on the very top. In 1980, New York City was slightly less unequal, ranking 44th by this measure.Forty years ago, none of the country's 10 largest metros were among the 20 most unequal. By 2015, San Francisco, New York, Houston, Los Angeles, Dallas and Washington had jumped onto that list, pulled there by the skyrocketing wages of high-skilled workers. Binghamton over the same period had become one of the least unequal metros, in part because many IBM executives and well-paid manufacturing workers had vanished from its economy.In effect, something we often think of as undesirable (high inequality) has been a signal of something positive in big cities (a strong economy). And in Binghamton, relatively low inequality has been a signal of a weak economy. (The Fairfield-Bridgeport, Connecticut, metro stands out in either era because the deep poverty of its urban core is surrounded by particularly rich suburbs.)These patterns are hard to reconcile with appeals today for reducing inequality, both within big cities and across the country. What are Americans supposed to make of the fact that more high-paying jobs by definition widen inequality? Should New Yorkers be OK with growing inequality in New York if it is driven by rising wages for high-skilled workers, and not falling wages for low-skilled ones?"That's more of a political question," said Nathaniel Baum-Snow, an economist at the University of Toronto. "That's a question of what we decide our values should be as a society."Tom VanHeuvelen, a sociologist at the University of Minnesota who has also researched these patterns, said: "It seems obvious to me that it doesn't need to be the way that it is right now. This isn't the only inevitable outcome we have when we think about the relationship between cities, affluence and inequality."Economists say that the same forces that are driving economic growth in big cities are also responsible for inequality. And those forces have accumulated and reinforced each other since 1980.High-skilled workers have been in increasing demand and increasingly rewarded. In New York, the real wages for workers at the 10th percentile grew by about 15% between 1980 and 2015, according to the Fed researchers. For the median worker, they grew by about 40%. For workers at the 90th percentile, they nearly doubled.That is partly because when highly skilled workers and their firms cluster in the same place today, they are all more productive, research shows. And in major cities, they are also tied directly into the global economy."If you're someone who has skills for the new economy, your skills turn out to be more valuable in bigger cities, in a way that wasn't true 30 to 40 years ago," Baum-Snow said.It is no surprise, then, that high-skilled workers have been sorting into big, prosperous cities, compounding the advantages of these places (and draining less prosperous places of these workers).At the same time, automation, globalization and the decline of manufacturing have decimated well-paying jobs that once required no more than a high school diploma. That has hollowed out both the middle class in big cities and the economic engine in smaller cities. The result is that changes in the economy have disproportionately rewarded some places and harmed others, pushing their trajectories apart.Add one more dynamic to all of this: Inequality has been rising nationally since the 1980s. But because the Bay Area and New York regions already had more than their fair share of one-percenters (or 10 percenters) in 1980, the national growth in income inequality has been magnified in those places."We've had this pulling apart of the overall income distribution," said Robert Manduca, a doctoral student in sociology and social policy at Harvard University who has found that about half of the economic divergence between different parts of the country is explained by trends in national inequality. "That overall pulling apart has had very different effects in different places, based on which kinds of people were already living in those places."Manduca says national policies like reinvigorating antitrust laws would be most effective at reducing inequality (the consolidation of many industries has meant, among other things, that smaller cities that once had company headquarters have lost those jobs, sometimes to big cities).It is hard to imagine local officials combating all these forces. Increases to the minimum wage are likely to be swamped -- at least in this measure -- by the gains of workers at the top. Policies that tax high earners more to fund housing or education for the poor would redistribute some of the uneven gains of the modern economy. But they would not alter the fact that this economy values an engineer so much more than a line cook."If you brought the bottom up, it would be a better world," said Richard Florida, a professor at the University of Toronto who has written extensively about these trends. "But you'd still have a big rise in wage inequality."This article originally appeared in The New York Times.(C) 2019 The New York Times Company
|
| The US military is talking about tinkering with soldiers' brains to let them control drones, weapons, and other machines with their minds Posted: 02 Dec 2019 12:48 PM PST  The US military sees a not-too-distant future where "cyborg soldiers" can control drones and other machines with neural implants
|
| Trump rips French leader for "nasty" remark as NATO summit starts Posted: 03 Dec 2019 02:14 AM PST  President Trump, who has repeatedly threatened to withdraw from NATO, surprised many by affirming the alliance's purpose.
|
| With This 6th-Generation Jet, Europe Plans To Make The F-35 Obsolete Posted: 02 Dec 2019 06:00 PM PST  Wish them luck.
|
| 9 family members killed in South Dakota plane crash Posted: 02 Dec 2019 06:04 AM PST  Federal investigators are expected to arrive Monday at the South Dakota site where nine members of an extended Idaho family were killed in a plane crash.
|
| Schools, offices close as long-lived storm clobbers US East Posted: 02 Dec 2019 02:45 AM PST  A seemingly endless winter storm that hindered travel across most of the country over the long holiday weekend is delivering a last wallop as it swoops through the Northeast, dumping heavy snow, shuttering hundreds of schools and bedeviling commuters in the region Monday. The storm dropped more than a foot of snow on parts of the region late Sunday and Monday and could bring 10 to 24 inches (25 to 60 centimeters) total by Tuesday from Pennsylvania to Maine, forecasters said. Heavy snow was also expected in the Appalachian Mountains down to Tennessee and North Carolina.
|
| US city to pay reparations to African-American community with tax on marijuana sales Posted: 03 Dec 2019 06:47 AM PST  A city in Illinois has announced it will create a reparations fund for its African American community through a new tax on marijuana sales. Recreational use of the drug will become legal in the state from January and officials in Evanston, which is 12 miles north of Chicago, have voted to approve a 3 per cent tax on the sales to fund a local reparations programme. The tax is expected to generate between $500,000 and $750,000 annually for the reparations fund, which will be capped at $10 million over the next ten years. The city's lawmakers will meet next week to determine exactly how the fund will be distributed, but one idea being proposed is for the money to go towards things like skills training or financial assistance for down payments on a home in the area. The fund will be available to all of the city's black residents, rather than merely those who can prove they had an ancestor who was enslaved, as long as they can meet certain residency criteria. The move comes amid a renewed national debate over whether the federal government should pay reparations to the descendants of former slaves. Congress heard arguments on a reparations commission this summer Credit: Reuters This summer the House of Representatives held a hearing on a bill which would establish a commission to study how a restitution programme would work, and several Democratic presidential candidates have indicated their support for the idea. However polling suggests the majority of the American public opposes monetary reparations, while President Donald Trump and other senior Republicans have publicly criticised the idea. Robin Simmons, the alderman who proposed the reparations bill, said the hope was to "implement funding to directly invest in black Evanston". Ms Simmons said the source of the reparations fund was fitting, given the federal government's "war on drugs" campaign disproportionately affected African Americans for several decades. African Americans accounted for 71 per cent of all those arrested for marijuana possession in Evanston during the past three years - a trend which mirrors the national picture. Ms Simmons added that the reparations plan would also help African Americans who have been priced out of the city by high property taxes and racially biased lending practices. US census figures show Evanston's black population fell from around 22.5 per cent in 2000 to under 17 per cent in 2017. "This [reparations fund] is something radical to preserve the black population and let the black community know that we see the flight," Ms Simmons told theWashington Post However, not all of the city's lawmakers support the measure. Alderman Thomas Suffredin voted against the proposal, arguing more detail was needed on how the funding will be dispensed. "In a town full of financial needs and obligations, I believe it is bad policy to dedicate tax revenue from a particular source, in unknown annual amounts, to a purpose that has yet to be determined," he said in a message to his constituents. Ms Simmons said she wants the reparations to be distributed as direct payments to black residents, rather than "another diversity policy". City officials and national reparations advocates will decide on the details of the programme at a town hall meeting on December 11.
|
| Russia link to Berlin murder hardens: reports Posted: 03 Dec 2019 06:04 AM PST  German prosecutors in charge of intelligence cases are due to take over an investigation into the killing of a former Chechen rebel, suspecting that Russia could be behind the murder, German media reported on Tuesday. Some German politicians and media have already blamed Moscow for the assassination of 40-year-old Georgian national Zelimkhan Khangoshvili -- though Russia denies the claims. Khangoshvili was shot twice in the head at close range in Berlin's Kleiner Tiergarten park on August 23, allegedly by a man on a bicycle who was later seen throwing a bag into a river.
|
| North Carolina panel of judges rule in favor of new congressional map Posted: 02 Dec 2019 02:27 PM PST  The same three-judge Wake County Superior Court panel several weeks ago blocked the state from using a congressional map created in 2016 in next year's elections, suggesting that map's boundaries were gerrymandered to favor Republicans. Monday's decision clears the way for candidates for the U.S. House of Representatives to file their paperwork to represent new districts drawn on Nov. 15 by North Carolina's Republican-controlled General Assembly. "The net result is the grievous and flawed 2016 map has been replaced," Judge Paul Ridgeway said during a hearing, the Charlotte Observer newspaper reported.
|
| 'It was chaos': 10 wounded, no arrests made after New Orleans shooting rampage Posted: 02 Dec 2019 09:07 AM PST  More than a day after 10 people were wounded when gunshots lit up a crowded tourist area of New Orleans, police announced no arrests and no motive.
|
| Chicago mayor fires city’s top cop over ‘ethical lapses’ Posted: 02 Dec 2019 08:54 AM PST  Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot fired the city's retiring police superintendent Monday, citing "ethical lapses" that included telling lies about a recent incident in which Eddie Johnson was found asleep at the wheel of his car after having drinks. Johnson "engaged in a series of actions that are intolerable for any leader or position of trust, particularly the head of the Chicago Police Department," the mayor said.
|
| Kellyanne Conway's husband mocks her on Twitter while slamming Trump over impeachment scandal Posted: 02 Dec 2019 01:26 PM PST  A prominent Washington attorney married to White House senior adviser Kellyanne Conway seemingly mocked his wife in a tweet that also derided Donald Trump over the impeachment inquiry against him.George Conway, a frequent critic of the president, appeared to publicly hit out at his wife on Monday afternoon for the first time since she began working for Mr Trump's 2016 presidential campaign.
|
| With This Technology, The Navy May Want To Rethink Its Nuclear Submarines Posted: 02 Dec 2019 09:30 PM PST  AIP subs are affordable and deadly.
|
| The decade in cartoons: Best of Andy Marlette Posted: 03 Dec 2019 05:33 AM PST  The decade in cartoons: A look back at the past decade through the eyes of America's top cartoonists
|
| Mass protest breaks out in Chinese province near Hong Kong Posted: 01 Dec 2019 02:43 PM PST  Chinese police clashed with protesters in a southern province near Hong Kong over the weekend, in a rare case of public dissent that saw hundreds demonstrate against the building of a crematorium.
|
| British teenager tells court she 'couldn't breathe' during alleged Cyprus gang-rape by Israeli tourists Posted: 03 Dec 2019 07:07 AM PST  A British teenager has for the first time described in explicit detail how she was allegedly gang-raped by a group of Israeli tourists in Cyprus – an assault that police and prosecutors say she invented. The young woman says she was raped by the Israelis in a hotel room in the beach resort of Ayia Napa in July. Two weeks later, after an eight-hour questioning by Cypriot police without a lawyer, she signed a retraction statement in which she said she concocted the story. Twelve Israeli men who had been arrested for the alleged attack were immediately released and allowed to fly home. She is on trial in a court room in Paralimni, a town a few miles from Ayia Napa, for causing public mischief with the allegedly false claim and faces up to a year in prison if found guilty. Tourists in the main square of Ayia Napa Credit: AFP/Getty Her team of British and Cypriot lawyers say she signed the retraction under duress at a time when she was suffering from panic attacks and post-traumatic stress disorder. She felt frightened and intimidated after police allegedly threatened to arrest her friends, they say. The defence insists the gang rape took place and that the 19-year-old should be found not guilty. As the trial nears its end, the teenager was given the choice of remaining silent during Tuesday's hearing, presenting a written statement to the court or undergoing cross-examination by the prosecution. She chose the latter, saying she has nothing to hide and wants the truth of the alleged rape known. Dressed in black trousers and a green jumper and speaking on the witness stand, the young woman blinked back tears as she described being pinned down and raped multiple times. She said that she had initially agreed to have sex with one of the Israelis, a 21-year-old named Sam whom she had met in Ayia Napa, where she was embarking on a working holiday. But his friends then allegedly barged into the room and joined in without her consent. "I told them they had to go. Sam told me to lie on the bed and … put his knees on my shoulders. "There was a lot of shouting in Hebrew. I couldn't breathe. I tried to throw my head about and his friends were coming in all shouting and jeering. "I tried to cross my legs. I was trying to throw my arms about. I don't know how many of them raped me. I couldn't see." The Israelis were shouting and arguing in Hebrew, she told the court. "Sam still had his knees of my shoulders. I was gasping for air. I managed to get away and I was shouting and screaming. I was in an absolute state. I ran downstairs out of the room." She fled the hotel and went to a clinic, where she was examined by doctors. The police were then called. "I was so scared that I passed out twice. I couldn't sit upright in the police car." The court has previously heard from a witness that the Israeli teenagers had targeted the teenager, bragging that they were going to "do orgies" with her. Following her retraction, she was jailed for more than a month in a prison in Nicosia, the capital of Cyprus. She was released on bail at the end of August but had her passport confiscated and has had to remain on the island ever since. The trial was adjourned until Friday.
|
| Taiwan charges ex-officer, father with spying for China Posted: 03 Dec 2019 02:53 AM PST  Taiwanese prosecutors on Tuesday charged a former lieutenant colonel and his father with spying for China in the latest allegations of espionage on the island. The men are accused of threatening national security by sharing information and recruiting others in exchange for gifts, the Tainan district prosecutor's office said. The younger man, identified by local media as Cheng Chih-wen, helped recruit Taiwanese soldiers "to develop networks to seriously affect national security and damage military discipline", prosecutors said in a statement.
|
| Russia's Putin signs law to label people foreign agents Posted: 02 Dec 2019 10:49 AM PST  Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday signed legislation allowing individuals to be labeled foreign agents, drawing criticism from rights groups that say the move will further restrict media freedoms in the country. An initial foreign agent law was adopted by Russia in 2012, giving authorities the power to label non-governmental organizations and human rights groups as foreign agents - a term that carries a negative Soviet-era connotations. Several rights groups, including Human Rights Watch, had called for the initiative to be dropped as it was being approved by lawmakers.
|
| Winter storm could still dump up to 2 feet of snow from Pennsylvania to Maine Posted: 03 Dec 2019 05:44 AM PST  Schools across much of the Northeast were shuttered Tuesday as a winter storm pounded the region with more than a foot of snow, ice and high winds.
|
| Trump deploys 'surge' of park rangers to patrol Mexican border Posted: 03 Dec 2019 03:00 AM PST  Diverting rangers is a way to direct federal resources to the border without the need for congressional approval * Help us cover the critical issues of 2020. This Giving Tuesday, consider making a contributionMountain ridges in Zion national park, Utah. Photograph: Cheri Alguire/Getty Images/iStockphotoThe Trump administration is sending a new "surge" of rangers from US national parks such as Zion, Yosemite and the National Mall to patrol the southern border for crossings by illegal immigrants.Continuing a controversial policy initiated in 2018, rangers who work in law enforcement will be dispatched to Organ Pipe Cactus national monument on the Arizona and Mexico border as well as Big Bend national park on the border in south-west Texas. Donald Trump has been unable to obtain funding for his border emergency plan, which includes an increase in immigration enforcement officials as well as large sums for border wall construction. Diverting rangers from national parks is a way to direct federal resources to the border without the need for congressional approval.Valerie Naylor, a former National Park Service (NPS) superintendent who worked for the agency for 31 years, said she was troubled by the idea of rangers being tasked with arresting migrants instead of protecting the parks where they work."My concern is sending rangers from parks that are already understaffed specifically to work with border patrol in areas that are outside the mission of the National Park Service," she said. "This potentially puts visitors at risk, certainly resources at risk, in the parks they are leaving."Since the fiscal year 2011, the National Park Service has seen an 11% reduction in staff while experiencing a 19% increase in visitation. Trump's proposed 2020 budget, which includes considerable increases in border security spending, cuts the NPS budget cut by $481m."This is coming at a time when national parks are experiencing the most significant staff and funding shortages in American history," said Laikal Jordahl, borderlands campaigner for the Center for Biological Diversity who previously worked for the NPS for two years. "It's a publicity stunt with genuine consequences."The "pilot" program was initially set to last just 90 days but has been extended into the fall of 2020, according to High Country News. Federal officials have been tight-lipped about the number of rangers taking part in three-week rotations at national parks on the border. The NPS declined to provide the number of rangers reassigned to these duties since 2018 to the Guardian.. "The National Park Service continues to support our federal partners by deploying law enforcement personnel to Department of the Interior managed lands along the southern border," said a spokesperson. "Due to operational security, we will not be disclosing any additional information about our officers assisting in the operations."A recent investigation by USA Today found that numerous parks are involved in the program, including the Great Smoky Mountains national park in North Carolina, Wrangell-St Elias national park in Alaska, the National Mall in Washington DC, and Zion national park.Andrew Fitzgerald, deputy chief ranger at Zion national park, confirmed to the Guardian that they would be sending three rangers to the border by the end of the year for three-week rotations. Critics have questioned the efficacy of these rotations, because while national park law enforcement rangers are trained to enforce federal laws, they are not necessarily well versed in the complexities of immigration enforcement."This new directive rotates rangers from places like the National Mall, Redwood Park and Yosemite," said Jorhdahl, referring to national parks not located along the border. "They are essentially sending people down there that have no idea how to do the job."Naylor said that "rangers are exceptionally well trained". The problem is of a different kind. Rangers are commonly redeployed from one park to another to deal with a crisis – a fire, for instance. "Whether sending them [rangers] to the border meets that need, that criterion – well, I would question that," she said.
|
| This One Thing Could Make the F-35 Replace All F-22s Posted: 02 Dec 2019 07:47 AM PST  It's all about the money.
|
| Utah officer helping to save lives at crash scene again Posted: 02 Dec 2019 09:31 AM PST  A Salt Lake police officer can't explain his habit of arriving at the right time, but there are now two crash victims who benefited from him being in the right place when they needed him. In 2011, Officer Kevin Peck crawled under a crashed bus in Utah to hold a woman's hand until she was rescued. Last month, he helped save another crash victim, this time while he was in Europe.
|
| Catholic schools in New York City are banning braids on black male students, and it's all perfectly legal Posted: 02 Dec 2019 09:35 AM PST  City and state laws that ban discrimination against natural hairstyles in New York offer exemptions for religious organizations.
|
| Roman Empire did not fall because of plague, study claims Posted: 02 Dec 2019 12:01 PM PST  A bubonic plague which was thought to have wiped out half of the world's population and helped topple the Roman Empire was far exaggerated by scholars, a new study claims. The Justinianic Plague which preceded the Black Death by more than 800 years plague was thought to have killed around 50 million people across the Roman and Byzantine Empires between 541-750 AD. The plague, spread in part by rats along trade routes, was believed to leave the Roman Empire vulnerable after the population loss hit its trade and military might across the Medeteranian, Africa and the East. An international team of scholars led by researchers from the University of Maryland have now called into question the scale of the plague, as the available evidence paints a different picture. Lead author, Lee Mordechai, from of Princeton's Climate Change and History Research Initiative, said: "If this plague was a key moment in human history that killed between a third and half the population of the Mediterranean world in just a few years, as is often claimed, we should have evidence for it but our survey of datasets found none." The researchers analysis ancient texts alongside, pollen samples, plague genomes and the archeology around graves to debunk previous consensus around the scale of the outbreak. At a glance | Plague facts Several sources across antiquity that had attributed important world events to the outbreak of the plague, such as the fall of the Roman Empire. However, the researchers found that previous scholars had focused on evocative written accounts, ignoring hundreds of contemporary texts that did not mention the outbreak. "We found no reason to argue that the plague killed tens of millions of people as many have claimed," said co-author Timothy Newfield. "Plague is often construed as shifting the course of history. It's an easy explanation, too easy. It's essential to establish a causal connection," he said. Analysis of evidence such as pollen samples and burial sites also found that the millions of supposed deaths did not quite add up. Where there should be more mass graves and less pollen from the lack of farming as a result, the researcher's findings showed no evidence of the mass deaths. Co-author of the study, Janet Kay, said: "We investigated a large dataset of human burials from before and after the plague outbreak, and the plague did not result in a significant change whether people buried the dead alone or with many others. "The Black Death killed vast numbers of people and did change how people disposed of corpses."
|
No comments:
Post a Comment