| Coronavirus in Kenya: How it turned classrooms into chicken coops Posted: 24 Aug 2020 05:10 PM PDT  Some Kenyan private schools have found new sources of income after they were forced to close.
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| Global Specialty Printing Consumables Industry Posted: 24 Aug 2020 05:07 PM PDT |
| AP FACT CHECK: Trump's fiction on health care, voting fraud Posted: 24 Aug 2020 05:05 PM PDT  President Donald Trump made a dizzying array of misleading claims about voting fraud and falsely asserted that he was the one who ensured that people with preexisting medical problems will be covered by health insurance in opening remarks at the Republican National Convention. People with preexisting medical problems have health insurance protections because of President Barack Obama's health care law, which Trump is trying to dismantle.
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| Redwoods survive wildfire at California's oldest state park Posted: 24 Aug 2020 04:19 PM PDT  When a massive wildfire swept through California's oldest state park last week it was feared many trees in a grove of old-growth redwoods, some of them 2,000 years old and among the tallest living things on Earth, may finally have succumbed. Among the survivors is one dubbed Mother of the Forest. "That is such good news, I can't tell you how much that gives me peace of mind," said Laura McLendon, conservation director for the Sempervirens Fund, an environmental group dedicated to the protection of redwoods and their habitats.
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| 10 years after migrant massacre, Mexico pledges justice Posted: 24 Aug 2020 04:02 PM PDT  Mexico's president said Monday the United Nations would be welcome to come to Mexico to investigate any rights violation like the Aug. 24, 2010 massacre of 72 migrants in the northern town of San Fernando. Speaking on the 10th anniversary of the slaughter of mostly Central American migrants, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador said he has proposed legal changes to make international investigations possible from the start, especially in cases of forced disappearances. "We are about to send a bill approved by the executive branch to the Senate ... so that in cases of forced disappearance, in every case that represents a violation of human rights, the U.N. could intervene with no limitations," López Obrador said.
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| UN rights agency: Mexico must investigate journalist death Posted: 24 Aug 2020 03:48 PM PDT |
| UN: Over 10,000 Islamic State fighters active in Iraq, Syria Posted: 24 Aug 2020 03:31 PM PDT |
| Global Data Center Blade Server Industry Posted: 24 Aug 2020 03:27 PM PDT |
| UVA-Led Research Team Finds Reliance on Negative Emissions Technologies to solve Climate Crisis is Risky Posted: 24 Aug 2020 02:06 PM PDT |
| U.S. judge overseeing criminal case against Halkbank will not recuse himself Posted: 24 Aug 2020 01:41 PM PDT  Turkish state lender Halkbank has lost a bid to have the U.S. judge overseeing a criminal case accusing it of helping Iran evade American sanctions recuse himself. U.S. District Judge Richard Berman in Manhattan said in an order on Monday that Halkbank's recusal motion had no substantive merit, rejecting claims by the bank that he was not impartial. Halkbank co-defendant Reza Zarrab unsuccessfully made a similar bid to recuse Berman four years ago, the order noted.
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| Local virus cases in Gaza raise fears of a wider outbreak Posted: 24 Aug 2020 01:13 PM PDT  Authorities in the Gaza Strip on Monday announced the first coronavirus cases spread through the community, raising fears of a potentially devastating outbreak in the impoverished Palestinian territory blockaded by Israel and Egypt. Until now, all the cases reported in Gaza were linked to quarantine facilities for residents returning from abroad. The Health Ministry said four people from the same family have tested positive for the virus in central Gaza and investigations were underway to track the source of the infection.
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| Moscow 'outraged' after Austria expels Russian diplomat for spying Posted: 24 Aug 2020 12:38 PM PDT  Austria on Monday expelled a Russian diplomat for reported industrial espionage, prompting protests and a tit-for-tat response from Moscow. The Austrian foreign ministry said the diplomat's behaviour was "not in accordance with the Vienna Convention", without providing further details. But the local tabloid Kronen Zeitung said the diplomat had for years worked as an intelligence handler, running a source in a major technology company who recently confessed to espionage. The Russian Embassy said it was "outraged by the unfounded decision of the Austrian authorities, which is damaging to constructive relations". Moscow's foreign ministry later said it would expel an Austrian diplomat in response. Austria and Russia have relatively warm ties. Two years ago Karin Kneissl, then the Austrian Foreign Minister, raised eyebrows when she invited Vladimir Putin to her wedding and shared a dance with the Russian President (below).
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| Global Medical Plastics Industry Posted: 24 Aug 2020 12:27 PM PDT |
| Germany Says Alexey Navalny Was Likely Poisoned Posted: 24 Aug 2020 12:22 PM PDT  Germany's government says it's "fairly likely" that Russian opposition leader Alexey Navalny was poisoned. A spokesperson for Chancellor Angela Merkel said Monday he'll need special protection due to the suspected poisoning. Navalny was hospitalized last year for another suspected poisoning, but doctors said it was an allergic attack.
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| Germany Says Alexey Navalny Was Likely Poisoned Posted: 24 Aug 2020 12:22 PM PDT Germany's government says it's "fairly likely" that Russian opposition leader Alexey Navalny was poisoned. A spokesperson for Chancellor Angela Merkel said Monday he'll need special protection due to the suspected poisoning. Navalny was hospitalized last year for another suspected poisoning, but doctors said it was an allergic attack.
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| Approval of a coronavirus vaccine would be just the beginning – huge production challenges could cause long delays Posted: 24 Aug 2020 12:17 PM PDT  The race for a SARS-CoV-2 vaccine is well underway. It's tempting to assume that once the first vaccine is approved for human use, all the problems of this pandemic will be immediately solved. Unfortunately, that is not exactly the case.Developing a new vaccine is only the first part of the complex journey that's supposed to end with a return to some sort of normal life. Producing hundreds of millions of vaccines for the U.S. – and billions for the world as a whole – will be no small feat. There are many technical and economic challenges that will need to be overcome somehow to produce millions of vaccines as fast as possible.I am a professor of health policy and management at the City University of New York (CUNY) School of Public Health and have been working in and studying the worlds of vaccine development, production and distribution for over two decades. The issues the world is facing today regarding the coronavirus vaccine are not new, but the stakes are perhaps higher than ever before.There are four main challenges that must be addressed as soon as possible if a vaccine is to be produced quickly and at a large scale. Existing manufacturing capacity is limitedThe shrinking and outsourcing of U.S. manufacturing capacity has reached into all sectors. Vaccines are no exception.The number of U.S. biotech and pharmaceutical companies involved in vaccines development and production has fallen from 26 in 1967 to just five in 2004. There are many causes – relatively low profit margins, smaller markets compared to those of other medications, corporate mergers, liability risks and the anti-vaccination movement – but the result is that in some years, companies have struggled to meet need even for existing vaccines. Just take a look at the flu vaccine shortages of 2003-2005 and the childhood vaccine shortages of the early 2000s. When a coronavirus vaccine is approved, production of other vaccines will need to continue as well. With the flu season each year and children being born every day, you can't simply reallocate all existing vaccine manufacturing capacity to COVID-19 vaccine production. New additional capacity will be needed. The type of vaccine is still unknownWhile there are a few frontrunners at the moment, it is still unknown which of the more than 160 vaccines in development will get approval first, and therefore, what kind of manufacturing needs to be put in place. Producing a COVID-19 vaccine will not be the same as adding a new strain to an existing flu vaccine or simply tweaking how other existing vaccine are made. Most existing vaccines, like those for flu and measles, use either inactivated or weakened forms of those specific viruses to generate immunity, but researchers can't simply swap the flu virus for SARS-CoV-2. Additionally, a SARS-CoV-2 vaccine may not even use inactivated or weakened virus, but instead could incorporate a protein or genetic material from the coronavirus. Manufacturing such pieces of the virus in large amounts may require new processes that never been tried before, since the Food and Drug Administration hasn't ever approved any DNA vaccines for human use.Some companies are developing mRNA or DNA vaccines. Others are working with inactivated SARS-CoV-2 or even other types of viruses like the chimp adenovirus. Then there are those targeting different protein subunits of the virus. Each vaccine may have very different manufacturing requirements and it is impossible to know which of these candidates will reach the market and when. Governments and other funders face a difficult choice. If they gamble and provide funding to scale up manufacturing for a particular vaccine now, they could save time and thus lives. Picking wrong, though, could end up costing much more in money, suffering and lives. Ultimately, manufacturers will seek financial assurances – like upfront payments or commitments to buy the vaccine when it is available – from governments and funders to make sure that the time, effort and resources dedicated to vaccine development and manufacturing will not be wasted. For example, the U.S. government's US$2.1 billion deal with Sanofi and GSK will include scaling up of manufacturing capacity and the purchase of 100 million doses of the vaccine. The size of the problem is unprecedentedAs the saying goes, knowing is not the same as doing. Producing a completely new vaccine at such a large scale so quickly is unprecedented. Numerous delays occurred in the production of the H1N1 flu vaccine in 2009. Consider what may happen with a novel vaccine that could require new reagents, production processes, equipment and containers, among other things. Rollouts of the smallpox and polio vaccines occurred decades ago with less urgency and when populations were significantly smaller. Today, assuming that the herd immunity threshold is at least 70%, manufacturers would need to produce at least 230 million doses to cover the U.S. population and over 5.25 billion doses to cover world's population. And that's if only one dose is required. Requiring two doses per person would double the doses needed.Never before has humanity tried to produce something for every person on Earth as quickly as possible. There are going to be problems. Economic poker gameUltimately, most potential vaccine manufacturers are businesses, seeking to minimize costs and maximize revenue where possible. They will want incentives to forego other more lucrative opportunities, such as continuing to develop or produce medications that have higher profit margins. For example, companies may not readily reveal current and potential manufacturing capacity. After all, these can be major bargaining chips in negotiating contracts with governments and other possible funders. Revealing that you have too little capacity right now may jeopardize confidence in your ability to make the vaccine. Revealing that you already have enough capacity can hinder your bargaining for more funding and resources.During the 2009 H1N1 flu pandemic while I was working within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, we had to continuously deal with changing vaccine production schedules as manufacturers continued to renegotiate the terms with the government. Moreover, the extent of the pandemic brings this poker game to the world stage. Different countries may be negotiating with or even against each other and manufacturers. For example, high-income countries may be angling to get ahead of other countries seeking to receive vaccines. A plan and a systems approachUltimately, vaccine production is only one part of a complex, interconnected system whose ultimate goal is to prevent people from getting a disease. [Deep knowledge, daily. Sign up for The Conversation's newsletter.]The type of vaccine developed, size and location of the initial target populations, the way the vaccine is administered, the number of doses and the storage requirements for the vaccine are all interconnected and just some of the factors that affect the production requirements. For example, work done by my team at the City University of New York has shown that that the number of vaccine doses that you put in a single vial can have a variety of cascading effects on vaccination and disease control programs.People's lives, and life as we know it, are on the line. All of the complexities of producing a vaccine need to be addressed through open worldwide discussions and extensive mapping and modeling of these scenarios. Without proper planning and preparation, society may be left in a situation where production cannot meet demand or vaccines are shoddily produced. And even when enough vaccines are manufactured, there's still the challenge of actually getting them into hundreds of millions of people in the U.S. and billions around the world. There are worries that there won't be enough glass vials to store the vaccines or syringes to administer them, as well as concerns about the temperature controlled supply chain. These challenges of production and distribution, though large, are not insurmountable. The more planning governments and businesses do now, the better they will be able to deliver the vaccines the world so desperately needs.This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts.Read more: * Getting a flu shot this year is more important than ever because of COVID-19 * Labs are experimenting with new – but unproven – methods to create a coronavirus vaccine fastBruce Y. Lee receives funding from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ), and the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). He has also received funding from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), and various vaccine manufacturers to use computational modeling to find ways to improve vaccine development, production, delivery, implementation, and administration.
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| The Earth is losing ice at a "mind-blowing" rate, scientists warn Posted: 24 Aug 2020 12:12 PM PDT |
| Global Computer Graphics Industry Posted: 24 Aug 2020 12:07 PM PDT |
| Eleven Charged With Staging Truck Accidents In New Orleans Posted: 24 Aug 2020 12:05 PM PDT  The U.S. Attorney's Office in New Orleans late last week indicted 11 individuals in connection with a scam to create crashes between cars and 18-wheelers and cash in on insurance payments.The indictment, handed down by U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Louisiana Peter Strasser is for alleged "staged" accidents with tractor-trailers going back to 2017.The indictment alleges seven counts of mail fraud against each of the individuals because the funds used to pay them were sent via the U.S. Postal Service.The latest indictments follow a guilty plea by Damian Labeaud earlier this month to one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud. Press coverage in New Orleans at the time of Labeaud's guilty plea made several references to the prospect that he had agreed to plead guilty to only one charge because he was cooperating with prosecutors in identifying other individuals involved.The Labeaud guilty plea follows earlier indictments that had caught up six individuals connected to the scheme. The latest indictment handed down Friday makes for some intriguing reading, spelling out the way the plan allegedly worked. It involved individuals who were classified as "slammers," described in the indictment as "an individual who drove a vehicle and intentionally collided with 18-wheel tractor-trailers in order to stage accidents," and "spotters," described as "an individual who would follow a slammer in a separate vehicle and would pick up the slammer after the staged accident in order to flee the scene and evade detection."Louisiana's high truck insurance rates recently led the state to implement several tort reform steps that the Louisiana Motor Trucking Association supported. The indictment also says the operation was directed by five attorneys who are not identified by name but were said to be personal injury lawyers in the state, spread out over two separate law firms. The attorneys are identified only as A, B, C, D and E. New Orleans television station WWL has reported that New Orleans attorney Daniel Patrick Keating is likely one of the attorneys who had been in regular contact with Lebeaud at the time of the staged accidents, based on cellphone records and civil suit documents. The television station reported that Keating has declined several requests to comment.Lebeaud is identified by name in the latest indictment but is not a defendant, having pleaded out. But the recap of what the indicted individuals are charged with spell out how he worked with some of them in what the indictment says was "scheme and artifice to defraud."According to the indictment, Labeaud and defendant Roderick Hickman would get $1,000 per passenger for accidents with tractor-trailers and $500 per passenger for accidents that did not involve tractor-trailers. The indictment says the pair brought 20 cases to the attorneys. But that's just a small portion of what the indictment said were 100 accidents that the pair staged.Attorneys, Labeaud and Hickman would communicate using fishing terms, the indictment said. The indictment gives some examples of text messages between Labeaud and one of the attorneys: "How u doin today homie? I got 2 real nice big one for u rite now bro I will see u n about 1 hour OK?" According to the indictment, this exchange took place soon after one of the staged accidents.The attorneys "directed Labeaud to change the locations of the staged accidents, to vary the number of passengers, to avoid talking to the police and to avoid cameras," the indictment said.The rest of the indictment is filled with stories that are sure to leave truck drivers shaking their heads in disbelief. Labeaud allegedly saw a Freightliner pulling onto a highway and intentionally collided with it. He did the same with a 2017 Peterbilt. In both cases, there were passengers in the car who the indictment said were part of the scheme. They allegedly would change seats in the car after the crash so that different individuals would appear to be the driver in all cases, while Labeaud would get away from the site.According to a prepared statement released by the U.S. Attorney's Office, the lawyers "in some cases ... knew that the participants were uninjured but referred them to medical providers for treatment to increase the value of subsequent lawsuits."As a result, the U.S. Attorney's Office said, insurers and trucking companies paid out $277,500 because of these "fraudulent claims." More articles by John KingstonUber, Lyft get months to comply with driver classification rulingAppeals court agreed Amazon can't force Flex drivers into arbitrationUpdate: FMCSA poses questions on broker reporting requirementsSee more from Benzinga * Qantas Consolidates Units In Response To Depressed International Market * Environmental Groups, States Sue Feds Over LNG By Rail * Ports Closed As Tropical Cyclones Approach U.S. (With Forecast Video)(C) 2020 Benzinga.com. Benzinga does not provide investment advice. All rights reserved.
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| Russia, Expecting Plaudits for Vaccine, Is Miffed by Its Cool Reception Posted: 24 Aug 2020 11:44 AM PDT  MOSCOW -- It was with great fanfare that President Vladimir Putin and other officials announced this month that 1 billion doses of a Russian vaccine for the new coronavirus would soon be rolled out, supposedly putting an end to the worst pandemic in a century.But rather than taking a bow for saving the world with their vaccine, which they call Sputnik V, Russian health officials have found themselves on the defensive."Some foreign colleagues, who must have felt certain competition and competitive edges of Russia's product, have been trying to express opinions that we find totally groundless," the minister of health, Mikhail Murashko, told a news conference in Moscow.Most of those "opinions" are based on the fact that Sputnik V has not been tested in late-stage, large, randomized control trials that are critical in establishing a vaccine's safety and effectiveness. By skipping such trials, Russia is potentially endangering people to score propaganda points, health experts warn."If we wanted to take the chance of hurting a lot of people or giving them something that doesn't work, we could start doing this, you know, next week if we wanted to," said Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and the United States' leading infectious disease expert.Russian scientists have dismissed such criticism as sour grapes. Alexander Gintsburg, the director of the Gamaleya Institute, the scientific body that designed the vaccine, said the pushback was merely "a fight for market share" of coronavirus vaccines."We are certain we have the best, most tested and most effective vaccine in the world," said Kirill Dmitriev, the head of a state-controlled investment fund financing the vaccine. "Our competitors understand this perfectly and fear a strong position of Russia in the vaccine market."The world's major powers are racing to develop and produce a vaccine that, if successful and accepted by their own citizens and other countries, will earn geopolitical and economic benefits for the winner, along with prestige. The U.S. has poured billions of dollars into an effort called Operation Warp Speed.Currently, eight vaccines are further along than Russia's in late-stage trials, including ones produced by Moderna in the U.S., by Oxford University and AstraZeneca in Britain, and several in China.Vaccines generally go through three stages of human testing before they can gain approval. The first two phases test the vaccines on small numbers of people to see whether they stimulate an immune response or cause harm.The last phase compares the vaccine to a placebo in tens of thousands of people, to determine whether it works in preventing disease. The final phase could also highlight potentially disastrous side effects, such as rendering those inoculated more vulnerable to severe forms of COVID-19. Russia began late-stage trials this month, after approving the vaccine.Dmitriev, the investor in the vaccine, has said that Russian scientists had confidence in it because they had used the same approach on a successful Ebola vaccine. And starting last September, just months before the pandemic began, they had fortuitously been studying in clinical trials a vaccine against Middle East respiratory syndrome, which is caused by a similar coronavirus. Russia is in talks on exporting the vaccine or licensing production with 20 countries, including Brazil, Cuba, the Philippines and Saudi Arabia.The Ministry of Health said the first doses would go to Russian medical workers and teachers, and Putin said one of his daughters had already taken the vaccine.But even Russian doctors have been reluctant customers.The chair of the ethics committee in the Ministry of Health, Dr. Alexander Chuchalin, quit as the ministry was in the process of approving the vaccine. Reached by telephone, Chuchalin declined to comment.In an online survey, only 24% of 3,040 doctors said they would administer the new vaccine to their patients.Four Russian trade unions representing doctors and teachers have recommended their members not take the vaccine.The Kremlin approved it prematurely in a "political decision" for purposes of prestige and to revive the economy, said Anastasia Vasilyeva, the director of one of the unions, Doctor's Alliance, which is affiliated with a Russian political opposition group."Doctors are not stupid," she said in an interview. "They understand what an untested medicine can do."The unusual route to approval has roots in Russia's long history of vaccine development. In the 1950s, a family of Russian scientists tested an ultimately successful polio vaccine on their own children.In 1969, Dr. Alexander Butenko quickly designed a vaccine against Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fever to quell an outbreak in southern Russia. He injected himself first, following a Russian tradition for medical scientists, then tested it on a small number of people. Soviet health authorities approved the vaccine to halt the spread of the disease though it had not undergone late-stage clinical trials. In that case, the vaccine worked.Such rapid approval "isn't just done for sporting interest," said Butenko, who is now retired. "It's always done in a crisis," when the risks of a new vaccine are weighed against the harm from an epidemic.So far, scientists have found no indications that vaccines against the new coronavirus could cause an enhancement of the disease, Johan Neyts, a professor of virology at the University of Leuven in Belgium, said in a telephone interview. "But this is something that should be kept in mind."One reason for concern, he noted, is a decades-old study by Dutch virologists who developed an experimental vaccine against a strain of coronavirus that infects cats. When the animals were subsequently exposed to the feline virus, they died more quickly than cats given a placebo.In their study, published in the Journal of Virology in 1990, the researchers called it "early death syndrome.""This is one of the main reasons everyone is vigilant," Neyts said.This article originally appeared in The New York Times.(C) 2020 The New York Times Company
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| German hospital confirms Putin critic was poisoned, says he remains in coma Posted: 24 Aug 2020 11:25 AM PDT  A German hospital confirmed Monday that Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny was poisoned, fueling suspicions that the Kremlin may be involved with a murder attempt against him. Alexei Navalny, one of the fiercest critics of President Vladimir Putin's administration, remains in a medically induced coma, though his condition is not life-threatening, the Charité hospital said in a statement. Hospital officials said an "extensive examination" conducted over the weekend indicates he was poisoned with "cholinesterase inhibitors," a broad range of substances that are found in several drugs, nerve agents and pesticides.
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| U.N. nuclear agency head visits Iran amid US sanctions push Posted: 24 Aug 2020 11:18 AM PDT  The head of the U.N.'s atomic watchdog agency arrived in Iran on Monday to press for access to sites where authorities are thought to have stored or used undeclared nuclear material. The visit comes as the U.S. is pushing to "snapback" U.N. sanctions on Iran for allegedly violating its 2015 nuclear deal with world powers, which the Trump administration unilaterally withdrew from more than two years ago. Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany, the other signatories to the deal, have declared the U.S. action illegal, saying it can't withdraw from a deal and then use the U.N. resolution that endorsed it to re-impose sanctions.
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| Sudan's Jabal Maragha: Illegal gold diggers destroy ancient site Posted: 24 Aug 2020 11:16 AM PDT  The 2,000-year-old Jabal Maragha site was thought to have been a small settlement or a checkpoint.
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| Scientists say Hong Kong man got coronavirus a second time Posted: 24 Aug 2020 11:13 AM PDT  University of Hong Kong scientists claim to have the first evidence of someone being reinfected with the virus that causes COVID-19. Genetic tests revealed that a 33-year-old man returning to Hong Kong from a trip to Spain in mid-August had a different strain of the coronavirus than the one he'd previously been infected with in March, said Dr. Kelvin Kai-Wang To, the microbiologist who led the work. The man had mild symptoms the first time and none the second time; his more recent infection was detected through screening and testing at the Hong Kong airport.
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| Mali coup: No deal on transitional government Posted: 24 Aug 2020 11:03 AM PDT  A regional delegation failed to convince the military leaders to reinstate the deposed president.
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| Global Wireless Sensors Industry Posted: 24 Aug 2020 10:47 AM PDT |
| Civil rights group pushes back at GOP condemnation Posted: 24 Aug 2020 10:34 AM PDT  Republican National Committee delegates approved a resolution condemning the Southern Poverty Law Center, calling the legal advocacy group dedicated to fighting extremism "a far-left organization with an obvious bias." The resolution was approved over the weekend ahead of the start of the Republican National Convention on Monday in Charlotte and escalates a long-held battle between conservative groups and the SPLC. "The SPLC is a radical organization, and that the federal government should not view this organization as a legitimate foundation equipped to provide actionable information to DHS or any other government agency," said the resolution, which challenged the legitimacy of the organization to identify hate groups.
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| California justices toss death penalty for Scott Peterson Posted: 24 Aug 2020 10:28 AM PDT  Scott Peterson's conviction for killing his pregnant wife will stand, but the California Supreme Court on Monday overturned his 2005 death sentence in a case that attracted worldwide attention. The justices cited "significant errors" in jury selection in overturning the death penalty but welcomed prosecutors to again seek the sentence if they wish. Laci Peterson, 27, was eight months pregnant with their unborn son, Connor, when she was killed.
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| Israeli rivals agree to stick together, prevent new election Posted: 24 Aug 2020 10:19 AM PDT  Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his chief coalition partner agreed Monday to delay a fateful budget vote, averting the collapse of their fractious alliance and preventing a fourth election in less than two years. The twin announcements by Netanyahu and the alternate prime minister, Benny Gantz, cleared the way for parliament to delay the budget vote until December. The late-night vote, coming two hours before a midnight deadline, left what has been a troubled alliance intact for at least a few more months.
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| Police shooting lays bare Wisconsin's deep partisan divide Posted: 24 Aug 2020 10:10 AM PDT  The shooting by police in Wisconsin of a Black man sparked strong words of condemnation and a demand for Republicans to take action from the state's Democratic governor, who said he stood by those who demand justice. Republicans and the police union countered Monday that the governor went too far, urging caution in making any judgments about what sparked the shooting. The divergent reactions to the shooting Sunday by Kenosha police is just the latest example of the deep divide in Wisconsin, a key presidential battleground state that has been at the forefront of partisan battles for the past decade ranging from redistricting to union rights.
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| Putin critic Navalny was poisoned, German hospital says Posted: 24 Aug 2020 09:53 AM PDT  A Russian hospital claimed last week that a leading critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin wasn't poisoned — but a hospital in Berlin says tests suggest that he was.Charite Hospital in Berlin on Monday said that Alexey Navalny, the Russian opposition leader and Putin critic who fell ill last week, is suffering from "intoxication by a substance from the group of cholinesterase inhibitors," CNN reports. It did not identify the substance he was allegedly poisoned with.Navalny was hospitalized last week after falling ill on a flight to Moscow from Siberia, and his press secretary said at the time that "we suspect that Alexei was poisoned by something mixed into [his] tea." A state-run hospital in Siberia, however, subsequently said that "we do not believe that the patient has suffered poisoning," claiming that he suffered from "a sudden drop in blood sugar" due to a "metabolic disorder," CBS News reports.The Russian doctors at that point were not permitting Navalny to be transferred to a hospital in Germany, saying he was too unstable, but he later did arrive in Berlin to be treated. Charite Hospital on Monday said that Navalny is still in a coma and that "his state of health is serious, but there is currently no acute danger to his life."German Chancellor Angela Merkel in a statement on Monday said that after the hospital's findings, "those responsible must be identified and held accountable." More stories from theweek.com Melania Trump reportedly taped making 'disparaging' remarks about president and his children Florida judge blocks state's school reopening order, saying it 'disregards safety' Jerry Falwell Jr. says his wife had an affair with the Florida 'pool boy,' claims they were being blackmailed
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| Global Medium Density Fiberboard (MDF) Industry Posted: 24 Aug 2020 09:47 AM PDT |
| Pompeo shattering precedent, sparking fury with RNC speech Posted: 24 Aug 2020 09:42 AM PDT  Mike Pompeo's planned speech to the Republican National Convention this week has sparked a fury of criticism for breaking decades of precedent for sitting secretaries of state avoiding overt partisan political activity. Despite State Department assurances that Pompeo will be speaking in his personal capacity and won't violate prohibitions on federal employees participating in public political events on duty, Democrats and others have cried foul. Four teams of lawyers, including the State Department legal counsel, have reviewed the speech that will be recorded in Jerusalem and broadcast in prime time at the Republican convention on Tuesday to ensure that it does not cross ethical lines, according to a person close to Pompeo who was not authorized to discuss the matter publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.
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| US and Canada Dragon Fruit Market Forecast to 2027 - COVID-19 Impact and Country Analysis by Type ; Distribution Channel Posted: 24 Aug 2020 08:25 AM PDT |
| German doctors say tests indicate Russian opposition leader Navalny was poisoned Posted: 24 Aug 2020 08:25 AM PDT  Russian opposition activist Alexei Navalny was poisoned with a substance that can be used as a nerve agent before falling into a coma last week, German doctors treating him said Monday. The fierce critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin collapsed on a plane in Russia last Thursday. Russian officials deny that, and the Russian doctors who initially treated him said they found no signs of poisoning during tests last week.
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| Foreign Secretary 'will be asked to mediate in Middle East peace process' on Israel visit Posted: 24 Aug 2020 08:10 AM PDT  Britain's Foreign Secretary will be asked to act as a "bridge" between Israelis and Palestinians to mediate in the stalled Middle East peace process during a joint visit to Jerusalem and the Occupied Territories on Tuesday. Amid rising security tensions in the Gaza Strip, Dominic Raab is due to meet with both Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, and will urge renewed dialogue between their governments in favour of a peaceful two-state solution, the Foreign Office said. Israel's foreign ministry on Monday hailed the "unique timing" of the visit, a day after US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo met with Mr Netanyahu to discuss the Trump administration's own "deal of the century" peace plan, which has been roundly rejected by the Palestinian leadership. While Mr Pompeo did not meet with Palestinian leaders, Mr Raab's visit presented "a good opportunity to ask the British to impress upon the Palestinians to come to the negotiating table with us… it's good timing," said Anna Azari, Israel's deputy director general for European affairs. Mr Raab's trip was previously postponed due to the coronavirus pandemic, and now comes shortly after the United Arab Emirates (UAE) became only the third Arab country to normalise relations with Israel, amid a US-led drive to counter Iran's influence in the region. "The UK remains committed to Israel's security and stability, and the recent normalisation of relations between Israel and the UAE was an important moment for the region," Mr Raab said in a statement. The UAE-Israeli deal has been loudly celebrated by President Trump but has been condemned by the Palestinians, as well as regional powers such as Iran, Saudi Arabia and Turkey. As part of the agreement, Mr Netanyahu has paused his controversial planned annexation of parts of the occupied West Bank that Palestinians consider integral to their proposed future state. "Israel's suspension of annexation is an essential step towards a more peaceful Middle East," Mr Raab added. "It is important to build on this new dynamic, and ultimately only the government of Israel and the Palestinian Authority can negotiate the two-state solution required to secure lasting peace." During his visit, the Foreign Secretary is also due to meet Benny Gantz, the opposition leader who now shares power with Mr Netanyahu as defence minister and alternate prime minister in an uneasy coalition. Speaking after his own meeting with the Israeli prime minister in Jerusalem, Mr Pompeo said on Monday that he was confident other nations would soon follow the UAE in agreeing official diplomatic ties with Israel. But both he and Mr Netanyahu criticised the lack of international support for Washington's call to restore United Nations sanctions against Iran. The Trump administration has been pushing the UN Security Council to impose "snapback" sanctions over what the United States claims are Iran's violations of the 2015 nuclear deal with world powers, which Britain, France and Germany have been trying to salvage despite America pulling out in 2018. "We are determined to use every tool that we have to ensure they can't get access to high-end weapon systems," Mr Pompeo said. "The rest of the world should join us." As well as visiting the UAE and Bahrain, Mr Pompeo is also due to visit Sudan later this week, where the Arab League's historic 1967 policy of refusing to recognise Israel was originally signed, but which is now considered the next country most likely to normalise relations. "I am hopeful that we will see other Arab nations join in this," Mr Pompeo said on Monday, while publicly reassuring Mr Netanyahu that Israel could maintain its "qualitative military edge" over Arab rivals, despite the prospect of future US arms sales to the UAE. The Palestinian militant group Hamas meanwhile called on regional leaders to reject any ties with Israel and to "break their silence" on the blockade of Gaza, which has intensified in recent weeks after fire bomb and rocket attacks were launched into Israeli territory. The Israeli military said on Monday that fighter jets, tanks and aircraft had struck "military posts and an underground infrastructure" belonging to Hamas in the southern Gaza Strip in response to "arson balloons" launched into Israel the day before, and rocket attacks on Friday.
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| German Doctors Say Their Tests Indicate Putin Critic Aleksey Navalny Was Poisoned Posted: 24 Aug 2020 08:02 AM PDT  The German hospital where Russia's most prominent opposition leader Aleksey Navalny is being treated has run tests that confirm what was widely suspected: that he was likely poisoned.The Charité hospital said in a statement Monday morning that the team of doctors who have been treating Navalny since he arrived from Russia this weekend have found evidence of "cholinesterase inhibitors" in his system. Nerve agents are among the poisons that can inhibit cholinesterase—but the hospital's statement cautioned that its doctors have yet to identify the exact substance that has caused Navalny's hospitalization.In the latest update on his condition, the hospital said the Putin critic remains in intensive care with no "acute danger to his life" as of Monday morning, but warned that his prognosis remains "uncertain." "Long-term consequences, especially in the area of the nervous system, cannot be ruled out at this point in time," the hospital added.Navalny was transported out of Siberia to Berlin on Saturday after he fell ill due to the suspected poisoning of his tea last week. His relatives insisted he be moved after a top doctor at the Siberian hospital where he was being treated claimed that Navalny was not poisoned, raising suspicions that the medics were being directed by the Kremlin.Navalny's spokeswoman Kira Yarmysh reacted to the hospital's latest statement with a tweet that read: "We've said that Alexei was poisoned from the very beginning despite the statements from the Omsk doctors and government propagandists... Now our words have been confirmed by analyses by an independent laboratory. Navalny's poisoning is not a hypothesis, it is a fact."Although it's still unclear exactly what substance caused Navalny's sickness, the test results heighten existing fears that it was some kind of nerve agent—a family of highly toxic chemicals that prevent the body's nervous system from working as it should.Dan Kaszeta, a former chemical and biological weapons adviser to the White House, wrote following the hospital's statement Monday morning: "It may very well have been a nerve agent of some description that got Navalny. In which case, Omsk [the hospital in Siberia] was negligent and should've picked up on it. Could be any one of a number of organophosphate or carbamate compounds, not just the military agents."Meanwhile, the German government has confirmed that Navalny is now under military protection due to the suspected poisoning. "The suspicion is that Mr. Navalny was poisoned given that unfortunately recent Russian history has had several such suspected cases," said Chancellor Angela Merkel's chief spokesman, Steffen Seibert. He added: "Because one can say with near certainty that it was a poisoning attack, protection is necessary."As yet, Russia has made no comment on the German statement or on the test results from the German hospital.Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.
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| Official says Falwell leaving Liberty; Falwell says he's not Posted: 24 Aug 2020 07:31 AM PDT  Jerry Falwell Jr.'s future at evangelical Liberty University was unclear late Monday, with a senior school official saying he had resigned from his leadership post but Falwell telling several news outlets that he does not plan to leave permanently. A formal announcement from the school was expected later in the day, according to the school official, who spoke with The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the matter.
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| AP-NORC poll: Trump faces pessimism as GOP convention opens Posted: 24 Aug 2020 07:30 AM PDT  President Donald Trump is promising to outline an optimistic vision for America at this week's Republican convention. Most Americans think there isn't enough being done to help individual Americans, small businesses or public schools as the pandemic stretches on, according to a new poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. The public's negative assessment of how Trump is handling the crisis puts him on the defensive as his November face-off against Democrat Joe Biden nears.
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| Russian opposition leader Navalny shows indications of poisoning - German hospital Posted: 24 Aug 2020 07:24 AM PDT |
| Tito Mboweni: South Africa's president lambasts minister over Zambia tweets Posted: 24 Aug 2020 07:00 AM PDT  Tito Mboweni caused a diplomatic incident by telling Zambia's president "hell is on its way".
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| California wildfires: Prepare to be away from home for days Posted: 24 Aug 2020 06:20 AM PDT  California fire officials are cautiously optimistic after dodging a major lightning storm, but they are pleading with residents to stay out of evacuation zones and prepare for days away from home as three massive San Francisco Bay Area wildfires rage on, suffocating the region with smoky air. Gov. Gavin Newsom said this week will be critical as more than 14,000 firefighters battle 17 major fire complexes, largely in Northern California where wildfires have surrounded the city of San Francisco on three sides, singeing coastal redwoods that have never been burned.
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| Global Chemical Sensors Industry Posted: 24 Aug 2020 06:07 AM PDT |
| Space Wars: Why Top Military Leaders Say US Must Prep for Battles Beyond Earth Posted: 24 Aug 2020 05:45 AM PDT  China, Russia and Iran have watched how U.S. forces use space-based technologies on the battlefield.
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| Top Trump aide Kellyanne Conway to leave White House Posted: 24 Aug 2020 05:13 AM PDT  Kellyanne Conway, one of President Donald Trump's most influential and longest serving advisers, announced Sunday that she would be leaving the White House at the end of the month. Conway, Trump's campaign manager during the stretch run of the 2016 race, was the first woman to successfully steer a White House bid, then became a senior counselor to the president. Conway cited a need to spend time with her four children in a resignation letter she posted Sunday night.
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| Jim Bakker gets PPP loans during legal fight on fraud claims Posted: 24 Aug 2020 05:06 AM PDT  When the U.S. government extended pandemic hardship loans to thousands of religious institutions, Jim Bakker and Morningside USA, his ministry in Blue Eye, Missouri, were among the most high-profile recipients. Weeks before, the Missouri attorney general filed a complaint, the New York attorney general sent a cease-and-desist warning and the Federal Drug Administration and Federal Trade Commission sent warning letters alleging Bakker engaged in deceptive practices by touting purported health benefits of a silver product on The Jim Bakker Show — including a suggestion it could be used to treat or prevent COVID-19 infection, something the FDA says is false.
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| The U.S. Needs a Realistic Russia Strategy Posted: 24 Aug 2020 05:00 AM PDT |
| The Latest: Kirk says Trump guarding 'Western civilization' Posted: 24 Aug 2020 04:49 AM PDT  The president of the pro-Trump organization Turning Point USA is calling the president "the bodyguard of Western civilization." Kirk said at the start of the evening portion of the Republican National Convention on Monday that President Donald Trump had reclaimed the U.S. government "from the rotten cartel of insiders that have been destroying our country."
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| Global Courier, Express & Parcel Services Industry Posted: 24 Aug 2020 04:47 AM PDT |
| After Beirut explosion, helpers tend to shock and trauma Posted: 24 Aug 2020 04:31 AM PDT  When a massive explosion ripped through Beirut this month, Yorgo Younes scurried to flee his building. A clinical psychologist, Younes thought of the toll this moment would exact. "Already, we were going through a very tough period in Lebanon," he said.
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