Month: May 2017

Radical Burmese Buddhist Monk Is Subject of Documentary at Cannes Film Festival

By Uponent | | No Comments | Entertainment

Ashin Wirathu, the Burmese Buddhist monk known for whipping up anti-Muslim sentiment in Myanmar, is the subject of a new documentary airing at France’s renowned Cannes Film Festival, which starts Wednesday.

By filmmaker Barbet Schroeder, “The Venerable W” will appear in a special screening at one of the most prestigious cultural events in the world, marking the culmination of Wirathu’s journey from an obscure rabble-rouser to international infamy.

But his path to notoriety abroad points to questions back home about how much of a role the media have played in fueling his rise. Some believe he has been given too much of a platform for his hateful views or that coverage of his activities merits a more thoughtful approach.

Media attention for anti-Muslim views

“He has been famous because of the interviews and because of the posts in the local media,” said Thitsa Hla Htway, secretary of the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Myanmar.

He urged journalists to not report his more repugnant musings and to report on more diverse issues.

“What I want to stress is that they should just stay away from him and his popularity will go down. There are many important issues in Myanmar which are more important than him,” he said.

In and out of prison

This wasn’t the feeling five years ago, when Myanmar was emerging from military rule and grappling with ascendant Buddhist nationalist forces in the form of the 969 movement and Ma Ba Tha, the Committee to Protect Race and Religion.

Sentenced to prison for 25 years in 2003 for inciting violence, Wirathu was released in an amnesty in 2012, the same year that saw the first of several deadly riots to plague the country’s transition to democracy from nearly five decades of military rule.

‘Time magazine’ interview

Though Myanmar has long struggled to contain religious enmity, the story was not often heard outside of the country due to its isolation. That changed with a 2013 TIME magazine issue that put Wirathu on the cover and sought to explain the man’s connection to the mayhem.

The initial coverage was revealing, but over the years, Wirathu was interviewed by countless journalists, including the author of this article. Doubt crept into the worthiness of the enterprise for many journalists.

Social media star

But his following on social media is enormous, his posts can be inflammatory, and the fact that he has not faced strong pushback implies he has connections.

Thiha Saw, the director of the Myanmar Journalism Institute, said he credits Wirathu’s rise more to the explosion of internet access that has occurred in recent years. He added that mainstream media outlets in Myanmar have been cautious about not giving Wirathu an unnecessary amount of exposure.

Supported military

But his level of influence remains an open question. He supported the military-backed ruling party in a 2015 election contest against Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy, which won easily. This past March, Wirathu was hit with a ban on giving sermons for one year.

Even so, he was allowed to travel to a part of northern Rakhine State this month that has been largely closed off to observers since Rohingya militants attacked border posts in October, killing nine and setting off a crackdown that has resulted in accusations of possible crimes against humanity.

British journalist Oliver Slow, the chief of staff for the weekly magazine Frontier Myanmar, said in his personal opinion there needs to be a mix of scrutiny and restraint in the reporting.

Journalists want more scrutiny of Wirathu

“I think obviously he [Wirathu] needs to be heavily scrutinized. His group and the people behind him have the potential to cause massive issues, so I think it’s important to be reporting on him and what they are doing,” Slow said. “But I think we pretty much know all his views now, they’ve been aired for the past four or five years. His views on Muslims, his views on religion, have been so well aired, I just don’t really see any benefit any more of interviewing him.”

Matthew Smith, executive director of the NGO Fortify Rights, said in an email he isn’t persuaded by arguments the media has disproportionately fueled Wirathu’s rise to power, even if Wirathu has benefited from the attention.

“Wirathu is a populist demagogue with a considerable following and powerful connections behind the scenes,” Smith said. “But he and his followers have unarguably used international media attention to their advantage, to build their prominence and advance nationalist and racist narratives.”

Smith wants more investigative coverage of Wirathu.

“We see the occasional profile piece and don’t find those terribly helpful. Most foreign readers, particularly in the West, regard Buddhism as a tranquil religion of peace, so editors have endless fodder in stories of an extremist monk who preaches hatred.”

Schroeder, the filmmaker, did not immediately respond to a request for an interview sent through his production company.

 
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70th Cannes Film Festival Opens Amid Heavy Security

By Uponent | | No Comments | Entertainment

The 70th Cannes Film Festival is opening Wednesday under sunny Cote d’Azur skies, heavy security and widespread unease in the movie industry.

 

Security was greater than ever at the French festival, with stepped up efforts to restrict access and even an anti-drone system. France remains under a state of emergency since the November 2015 Paris attacks. This is also the first festival held since the nearby Nice attack last year that killed 86 people.

 

Festival organizers have said everything has been done to maintain a balance of safety and the celebratory atmosphere of the world’s most prestigious film festival.

 

This year’s festival has its own anxieties. Television, virtual reality and Netflix are a larger presence than ever before in the program.

 

Arnaud Desplechin’s “Ismael’s Ghosts” will open the festival Wednesday.
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Russia’s Controversial Eurovision Entry Spotlights Disabled

By Uponent | | No Comments | Entertainment

This year’s Eurovision song contest, hosted in Kyiv, saw Portugal crowned the winner.

But Russian officials cried foul even before the competition, as Ukraine banned their last-minute entry of contestant Yulia Samoylova, a singer who is disabled and uses a wheelchair.

“We were all very much surprised,” says chairwoman of the Moscow branch of Russia’s Disabled People Society Nadezhda Lobanova-who is herself in a wheelchair. “We don’t know how they treat their disabled, but it seems to me we wouldn’t have done anything like this. But we were surprised. And we wondered whether they’d let in a healthy singer or whether it was was done only to the disabled person.”

Instead, Samoylova performed on May 9 for Russia’s World War II Victory Day celebration in Russia-annexed Crimea. Her performing in Crimea in 2015 got her blacklisted from entering Ukraine in the first place.

 

Critics say Russia’s choice of a disabled contestant, while knowing she would be banned for breaking Ukrainian law, was a cynical move.

“It was not just tactless, it was so unfair,” says translator and disability expert Veronica Ivanova-who is also disabled and uses a wheelchair. “It was cruel to use a disabled person in their political games knowing in advance the risks. Hoping that the disability would melt the hearts of the European Union and, especially performing in Ukraine, I think that was very cruel.”

It’s not the first political scandal involving the Eurovision contest and Crimea. Last year’s winning song “1944”, by Crimean Tatar Susana Jamaladynova, was about Soviet leader Josef Stalin’s forced deportation of Crimean Tatars. It was seen as a subtle rebuke of Russia’s current occupation of Crimea.

But Russian claims of Kyiv’s discrimination against disabled are even more dubious as Russia itself still struggles to provide for disabled people. It took five years for Ivanova to get a proper ramp installed at her apartment building.

“It takes a long time due to bureaucratic processes but, in the end, it’s possible,” she says. “In the provinces, I am scared even to imagine how to do it.”

Despite a handicapped accessible sign, for Ivanova to enter her local grocery store requires serious help as there is an impassable step before a ramp that is too steep to safely climb in a wheelchair.

Forcing disabled access is still a challenge, grants Lobanova, as owners don’t want to pay for properly equipping their businesses, and apartment buildings require permission from all residents. “That’s rather ridiculous. But often the residents and especially landlords do not understand,” she says. “So there is a problem with the installation of stairlifts because permission must be received from all residents of the building.”

But Moscow has seen a lot of progress since she started working for disabled people three decades ago.

“There were no disabled in Moscow because there was no possibility to move around. Only those who had their own cars had such an opportunity. It was hard to find employment. It was hard to get education. There was no access,” says Lobanova.

 

About 85 percent of Moscow is accessible for the disabled, she says, a much higher rate than most Russian regions.

Today, vehicles and sports for Russia’s disabled are available in most cities, while education and jobs come easier, though not without problems

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“In Moscow it is not such an acute problem as a lot of enlightenment work is carried out among employers by various social bodies,” says Ivanova. “In the regions, it’s worse.”

The controversy over Russia’s Eurovision contestant has had one positive outcome, says Ivanova, it raised more discussion on the plight of Russia’s disabled.

Olga Pavlova contributed to this report.
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Group Behind Leak of Tools Used in Ransomware Attack Says Ready to Sell More Code

By Uponsil | | No Comments | Silicon Valley

The hacker group behind the leak of cyber spying tools from the U.S. National Security Agency, which were used in last week’s “ransomware” cyberattack, says it has more code that it plans to start selling through a subscription service launching next month.

The group known as Shadow Brokers posted a statement online Tuesday saying the new data dumps could include exploits for Microsoft’s Windows 10 operating system, and for web browsers and cell phones, as well as “compromised network data from Russian, Chinese, Iranian or North Korean nukes and missile programs.”

Shadow Brokers tried unsuccessfully last year to auction off cyber tools it said were stolen from the NSA.

The WannaCry ransomware virus exploited a vulnerability in Microsoft’s older Windows XP operation system. The company had largely stopped offering support such as security updates for Windows XP, but did release a patch to protect users against the attack that demanded people pay to avoid losing their data.

There is no definitive evidence yet of who used the NSA tools to build WannaCry.

Cybersecurity experts say the technical evidence linking North Korea to the cyberattack is somewhat tenuous, but Pyongyang has the advanced cyber capabilities, and the motive to compensate for lost revenue due to economic sanctions, to be considered a likely suspect.

Since Friday, the WannaCry virus has infected more than 300,000 computers in 150 countries, at least temporarily paralyzing factories, banks, government agencies, hospitals and transportation systems.

On Monday, analysts with the cybersecurity firms Symantec and Kaspersky Lab said some code in an earlier version of the WannaCry software had also appeared in programs used by the Lazarus Group, which has been identified by some industry experts as a North Korea-run hacking operation.

“Right now we’ve uncovered a couple of what we would call weak indicators or weak links between WannaCry and this group that’s been previously known as Lazarus. Lazarus was behind the attacks on Sony and the Bangladesh banks for example. But these indicators are not enough to definitively say it’s Lazarus at all,” said Symantec Researcher Eric Chien.

Bureau 121

Symantec has linked the Lazarus group to a number of cyberattacks on banks in Asia dating back years, including the digital theft of $81 million from Bangladesh’s central bank last year. 

The U.S. government blamed North Korea for the hack on Sony Pictures Entertainment that leaked damaging personal information after Pyongyang threatened “merciless countermeasures” if the studio released a dark comedy movie that portrayed the assassination of Kim Jong Un. And South Korea had accused the North of attempting to breach the cybersecurity of its banks, broadcasters and power plants on numerous occasions.

Pyongyang is believed to have thousands of highly trained computer experts working for a cyberwarfare unit called Bureau 121, which is part of the General Bureau of Reconnaissance, an elite spy agency run by the military. There have been reports the Lazarus group is affiliated with Bureau 121. Some alleged North Korean-related cyberattacks have also been traced back to a hotel in Shenyang, China near the Korean border.

“Mostly they hack directly, but they hack other countries first and transfer [the data] so various other countries are found when we trace back, but a specific IP address located in Pyongyang can be found in the end,” said Choi Sang-myung, a senior director of the cybersecurity firm Hauri Inc. in Seoul.

Ransom

It is not clear if the purpose of the WannaCry malware is to extort payments or to cause widespread damage.

The WannaCry hackers have demanded ransoms from users, starting at $300 to end the cyberattack, or they threatened to destroy all data on infected computers. So far the perpetrators have raised less than $70,000 according to Tom Bossert, a homeland security adviser for U.S. President Donald Trump.

The countries most affected by WannaCry to date are Russia, Taiwan, Ukraine and India, according to Czech security firm Avast.

Suffering under increased economic sanctions for its nuclear and ballistic missile programs, it would not be surprising for North Korea to attempt to make up for lost revenue through illicit cyber theft and extortion. But the WannaCry ransomware is more advanced than anything North Korean hackers have used in the past.

“Previous ransomwares required people to click an attachment in an email or access a specific website to get infected, but this time [computers] can be infected without getting an email or access to a website, just by connecting an Internet cable,” said Choi.

FireEye Inc., another large cybersecurity firm, said it was also investigating but cautious about drawing a link to North Korea.

In addition to past alleged cyberattacks, North Korea had also been accused of counterfeiting $100 bills which were known as “superdollars” or “supernotes” because the fakes were nearly flawless.

Youmi Kim contributed to this report.
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Artist Carries on the Ancient Tradition of Handmade Korean Paper

By Uponent | | No Comments | Entertainment

Once renowned in Asia for its durability and versatility, traditional Korean paper called Hanji is now produced only in a handful of rural paper mills.

But Korean-American artist Aimee Lee is dedicated to carrying on the 2,000-year old tradition through her artwork and teaching.  And some of the artwork she produces from the famously durable paper are wearable.

“The very first dress that I made out of Hanji was a western dress, but, as I was making more dresses, I thought just in the way that I explored Korean paper… I thought it would be wonderful to explore Korean dresses.”

The dress and other artwork by Lee created with Hanji, traditional Korean paper, are on display in a group exhibition during May at the Korean Cultural Center in Washington to mark Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage month.

“Delicacy and strength is what I found in Korean paper,” says Jeanne Drewes, chief of binding and collections care at the Library of Congress. To Drewes, what the exhibit shows is that paper and fabric can be almost interchangeable. “That comes out in this exhibit.  This exhibit is so wonderful.”

Born in New York, Lee’s dedication to Hanji started in 2008 when she went to Korea with a U.S. Fulbright grant to research the disappearing traditional paper arts.   She apprenticed at a papermill in a remote village. It was run by a fourth-generation family whose patriarch is the Korean National Intangible Cultural Property holder of Hanji making. National intangible property is traditional knowledge that the South Korean government has designated for preservation. And intangible cultural property holders are masters of their crafts.

Lee turned what she learned about paper-making in Korea into a video which can be viewed here.

US Hanji studio

“When I first came back from Korea, I was so, so committed to sharing everything that I learned because it was so compelling, so interesting,” Lee says. “What I like about Hanji is that it’s so versatile.  So you can do so many things. I thought the world really needed to know.”

Working with the Morgan Conservatory, a non-profit arts center in Cleveland, Ohio, Lee built the first U.S. Hanji studio in 2010 to make and share the craft of Korean papermaking.   Each fall, mulberry trees whose inner bark is used to make Hanji, are harvested from the conservatory’s garden.

“I gather raw plant material from outside and then have to go through the process of stripping, sorting the parts you need and cooking it in special solutions and rinsing it, beating it and then making paper.  And then making art from that.  So it is a whole range from scratch.”

The self-appointed Hanji ambassador lectures or teaches workshops at art museums and universities across the country.  Lee’s passion for the paper led to her award-winning book: Hanji Unfurled: One Journey into Korean Papermaking.

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“Actually more people not of Korean descent take my workshops than people of Korean descent.  I think people that come are very open-minded. It is a way to learn about other cultures in a way that is very hands-on.”

Lee also uses natural dyes she makes from kitchen scraps and flowers.  Her artwork ranges from traditional objects to more contemporary woven paper objects. Her series of artists books reside in library collections including Yale University library.

Lee plans to continue making Hanji indefinitely. She says, “I still feel like there are so much I can do and learn.”
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Need a Skateboard? Print it Out!

By Uponsil | | No Comments | Silicon Valley

Motorized skateboards are a simple and affordable form of personal transportation while advanced battery technology considerably extended their range. Now a startup company in Germany offers a skateboard that is almost entirely printed in plastic and has wireless speed control. VOA’s George Putic reports.
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Mexico Expects NAFTA Talks by Late August, Its Economy Minister Says

By Uponbiz | | No Comments | Business

Mexican Economy Minister Ildefonso Guajardo said Tuesday that he expected U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration to tell Congress early next week of plans to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement, a move that would produce talks by late August.

Guajardo said he would have more information after meeting with U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer in Vietnam on Thursday as part of Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meetings.

During the 2016 U.S. election campaign, Trump vowed to scrap the 1994 deal between the United States, Canada and Mexico if he could not adjust it to benefit U.S. interests.

“Probably the notification will be sent to Congress by the U.S. executive at some time early next week,” Guajardo told Mexican reporters, a day after meetings in Washington with U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross and other U.S. officials.

In Washington, Ross declined to predict the timing of the notification, saying that there were more consultations with Congress needed first.

Current format

In a meeting Tuesday, U.S. senators said Ross and Lighthizer expressed their preference to keep the current trilateral format in the NAFTA talks.

Guajardo also said that a dispute over sugar with the United States could be resolved within two weeks, before a June 5 deadline to break the impasse.

The U.S. sugar industry pressed the U.S. Commerce Department late last year to withdraw from a 2014 agreement that sets prices and quotas for U.S. imports of Mexican sugar unless the deal could be renegotiated. The U.S. sugar lobby wants Mexico to export less refined sugar and has become emboldened since Trump took office.

A U.S. Commerce Department spokesman said Ross and Guajardo discussed possible solutions and that they were continuing to work toward a negotiated settlement.

Any deal, however, would need agreement from the U.S. sugar producers who brought an anti-dumping case against Mexican competitors.

On Monday, Mexico’s sugar chamber said no deal had been reached in talks on Monday to resolve the dispute.
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Hackers Mint Crypto-currency with Technique in Global ‘Ransomware’ Attack

By Uponsil | | No Comments | Silicon Valley

A computer virus that exploits the same vulnerability as the global “ransomware” attack has latched on to more than 200,000 computers and begun manufacturing digital currency, experts said Tuesday.

The development adds to the dangers exposed by the WannaCry ransomware and provides another piece of evidence that a North Korea-linked hacking group may be behind the attacks.

WannaCry, developed in part with hacking techniques that were either stolen or leaked from the U.S. National Security Agency, has infected more than 300,000 computers since Friday, locking up their data and demanding a ransom payment to release it.

Researchers at security firm Proofpoint said the related attack, which installs a currency “miner” that generates digital cash, began infecting machines in late April or early May but had not been previously discovered because it allows computers to operate while creating the digital cash in the background.

Proofpoint executive Ryan Kalember said the authors may have earned more than $1 million, far more than has been generated by the WannaCry attack.

Like WannaCry, the program attacks via a flaw in Microsoft Corp’s Windows software. That hole has been patched in newer versions of Windows, though not all companies and individuals have installed the patches.

Suspected links to North Korea

Digital currencies based on a technology known as blockchain operate by enabling the creation of new currency in exchange for solving complex math problems. Digital “miners” run specially configured computers to solve the problems and generate currency, whose value fluctuates according to market demand.

Bitcoin is by far the largest such currency, but the new mining program is not aimed at Bitcoin. Rather it targeted a newer digital currency, called Monero, that experts say has been pursued recently by North Korean-linked hackers.

North Korea has attracted attention in the WannaCry case for a number of reasons, including the fact that early versions of the WannaCry code used some programming lines that had previously been spotted in attacks by Lazarus Group, a hacking group associated with North Korea.

Security researchers and U.S. intelligence officials have cautioned that such evidence is not conclusive, and the investigation is in its early stages.

In early April, security firm Kaspersky Lab said that a wing of Lazarus devoted to financial gain had installed software to mine Moreno on a server in Europe.

A new campaign to mine the same currency, using the same Windows weakness as WannaCry, could be coincidence, or it could suggest that North Korea was responsible for both the ransomware and the currency mining.

Kalember said he believes the similarities in the European case, WannaCry and the miner were “more than coincidence.”

“It’s a really strong overlap,” he said. “It’s not like you see Moreno miners all over the world.”

The North Korean mission to the United Nations could not be reached for comment, while the FBI declined to comment.
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Year-round Flu Vaccination May Prevent Hospitalization of Pregnant Women

By Uponsci | | No Comments | Science

Pregnant women who come down with the flu are at greater risk of illness requiring hospitalization. A new study found that in resource-poor countries, flu vaccination reduced the risk of illness to mother and baby.  

An estimated 40 percent of the world’s population lives in subtropical and tropical zones, where influenza sometimes circulates year-round. Yet influenza vaccine is rarely used.

Mark Steinhoff is director of the Global Health Center at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital in Ohio. He said the influenza virus, which is often mild in healthy people, can result in hospitalization of pregnant women.  

With a growing fetus pressed up against their lungs, Steinhoff says, women with the flu can have trouble breathing.  He also said a pregnant woman is  more susceptible to illness as the growing baby siphons off her natural defenses.

But in a first-of-its-kind study, Steinhoff and colleagues found vaccinating women year-round in a developing country, Nepal near the Indian border, dramatically reduced the incidence of influenza in mothers and benefited their babies.

The study was published in the journal Lancet Infectious Diseases.

“It reduced disease in the mothers and in the infants by about 60 percent reduction in the second year. It’s really quite remarkable. But it also reduced the rate of low birth weight — that is, kids born less than 2.5 kilos. It reduced that by 16 percent,” said Steinhoff.

Babies benefited from the shots because they received antibodies against the illness from their mothers while in the womb.

The study

The study ran between April 2011 and September 2013 and involved a total of 3,693 mothers between the ages of 15 and 40.   

There were two phases of the trial, with one group of women being vaccinated in the first year and a different group of pregnant women the following year.  Half of the women received a placebo.

Because influenza in some countries can circulate year-round, there’s no particular flu season as in more temperate climates. The women were therefore vaccinated at various times with a shot that contained three inactivated flu strains. Each group was followed for up to 180 days to see whether they developed fevers and body aches.

Steinhoff said the benefits of influenza vaccination have long been known in the United States and other Western countries.

“The vaccine you know was developed many years ago. It was known to be safe. There were no bad reactions to it,” Steinhoff said.

He said it’s up to individual countries to decide whether they want to launch influenza vaccination campaigns for pregnant women. In the meantime, he said, researchers will be obtaining additional data on year-round immunization programs in developing countries.
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David Letterman to Receive Nation’s Top Prize for Comedy

By Uponent | | No Comments | Entertainment

Longtime late-night host David Letterman has been honored with the nation’s top prize for comedy.

The Kennedy Center announced Tuesday that the 70-year-old Letterman is this year’s recipient of the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor. He is the 20th humorist to receive the annual prize, which began in 1998. Last fall, he delivered a warm tribute on stage at the Kennedy Center as his frequent guest, Bill Murray, accepted the award.

Letterman hosted more than 6,000 episodes of late-night television, starting in 1982 with NBC’s “Late Night with David Letterman.” He moved to CBS in 1993 and hosted “The Late Show” until his retirement two years ago.

Letterman’s irascible, independent streak inspired fierce loyalty from fans and critics.
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Jimmy Kimmel Set to Return as Host for 90th Oscars

By Uponent | | No Comments | Entertainment

Despite his jokes that he’ll never get asked back, Jimmy Kimmel is set to host the Oscars once more. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences on Tuesday said Kimmel will return for the 90th Oscars with producers Michael De Luca and Jennifer Todd, the team behind this year’s ceremony.

 

Ratings for the 89th Oscars this past February were the lowest since 2008 with 32.9 million viewers tuning in, even with the drama of the envelope gaffe in which Faye Dunaway, reading an incorrect card, announced “La La Land” as the best picture winner. The snafu was corrected on stage and “Moonlight” was given the award.

 

The 90th Oscars will be held on March 4, 2018 in Los Angeles and broadcast live on ABC.

 
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Japan’s Princess Mako to Get Married, Report Says

By Uponent | | No Comments | Entertainment

Princess Mako, the granddaughter of Japan’s emperor, is getting married to an ocean lover who can ski, play the violin and cook, according to public broadcaster NHK TV.

The Imperial Household Agency declined to confirm the report Tuesday.

Kei Komuro, the man who won the princess’ heart, was a fellow student at International Christian University in Tokyo, where Mako, 25, also graduated, NHK said.

They met at a restaurant in Tokyo’s Shibuya about five years ago at a party to talk about studying abroad, and they have been dating several times a month recently, it said.

Komuro has worked as “Prince of the Sea” to promote tourism to the beaches of Shonan in Kanagawa prefecture, the report said.

Women can’t succeed to the Chrysanthemum Throne in Japan. Mako’s father and her younger brother are in line to succeed Emperor Akihito, but after her uncle Crown Prince Naruhito, who is first in line.

Once she marries, Mako will no longer be a princess and will become a commoner.

But the process building up to the wedding is likely to take some time and be full of ritual, as Japanese nuptials, especially royal ones, tend to be.

First there will be an announcement, the equivalent of an engagement, and then a date for the wedding will be picked and the couple will make a formal report to the emperor and empress. NHK said Mako has already introduced Komuro to her parents, and they approve.

Unlike royalty in Great Britain and other European countries, the emperor and his family tend to be cloistered, although they travel abroad and appear at cultural events.

Akihito, 83, is the son of Hirohito, Japan’s emperor during World War II.

Akihito expressed his desire to abdicate last year, and Japan has been preparing legislation especially for him so he can.

Until Japan’s defeat at the end of World War II, Hirohito was viewed as divine, and no one had even heard his voice. But the times are changing, and the Japanese public harbors a feeling of openness and familiarity toward the emperor and his family. People are likely to see Mako’s marriage as a celebration, although the rituals will continue to be tightly orchestrated.
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Cosby Says He Doesn’t Expect to Testify at Sex Assault Trial

By Uponent | | No Comments | Entertainment

Bill Cosby says he doesn’t expect to testify at his Pennsylvania sexual assault trial.

 

The comedian spoke to Sirius radio host Michael Smerconish in an interview being broadcast Tuesday.

 

Smerconish says he agreed to air an uncut, 82-minute conversation between Cosby and his daughters in exchange for the interview.

 

Cosby says his lawyers won’t let him speak about the criminal case. But he says he has “never, never” lost the support of his wife.

 

Daughter Ensa Cosby says she believes “racism has played a role” in the accusations against her father.

 

Bill Cosby replies, “It could be.”

 

Cosby says his health is generally good, but glaucoma has left him legally blind.

 

Cosby says he isn’t trying to influence jurors, who will be selected next week for the June 5 trial.
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Thailand Backs Off Threat to Block Facebook Over Content

By Uponsil | | No Comments | Silicon Valley

Thailand backed off a threat to block Facebook on Tuesday, instead providing the social media site with court orders to remove content that the government deems illegal.

Thailand made the threat last week as it wanted Facebook to block more than 130 posts it considers a threat to national security or in violation of the country’s lese majeste law, which makes insults to the monarchy punishable by up to 15 years in prison. Thailand’s military government has made prosecuting royal insults a priority since seizing power in a coup three years ago.

Takorn Tantasith, secretary-general of Thailand’s broadcast regulator, said Facebook had requested the court orders before it would take action but he expected the social media giant would comply with the government’s demands.

“Facebook have shown good cooperation with us,” Takorn told reporters.

Emails and calls seeking confirmation from Facebook were not immediately returned.

The regulator last week demanded that Facebook remove more than 130 illegal posts by Tuesday or face legal action that could shut down the site. In a change of tactic, Takorn said that Thailand had forwarded 34 court orders to Facebook so far.

“The websites that need to be taken down are not only for those that are a threat to stability but they also include other illegal websites such as porn and websites that support human-trafficking which take time to legally determine,” Takorn said.

Thai authorities try to take pre-emptive actions against material they consider illegal, having local internet service providers block access or reaching agreements with some online services such as YouTube to bar access to certain material in Thailand.

Much of that is content deemed in violation of the country’s lese majeste law, the harshest in the world. The military government has charged more than 100 people with such offenses since the coup and handed down record sentences. Many of those cases have been based on internet postings or even private messages exchanged on Facebook.

Last month, Thai authorities declared it illegal to exchange information on the internet with three prominent government critics who often write about the country’s monarchy.

Facebook, which is blocked in a number of authoritarian countries such as North Korea, has said it relies on local governments to notify the site of information it deems illegal.

“If, after careful legal review, we find that the content is illegal under local law we restrict it as appropriate and report the restriction in our Government Request Report,” Facebook has said in past statements outlining its policy.
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Cholera Outbreak Compounds Hunger Crisis in Southern Somalia

By Uponsci | | No Comments | Science

A regional drought has displaced more than half a million people in Somalia and left the country at risk of famine. A cholera outbreak is further complicating relief efforts, in particular in the southern part of the country where some villages remain under al-Shabab control.

Bay Regional Hospital, the biggest in the southwest federal state, is filled with patients suffering from stomach pain, vomiting, and diarrhea.

Cholera has sickened more than 40,000 people in Somalia since December. More than half of the cases have been in this state. Most of the victims have been malnourished children.

Five-year-old Fatuma was admitted to the cholera treatment ward last night. Her mother Bisharo Mohammed says she can not lose another child.

She says her eldest daughter was suffering from diarrhea, and she died two months ago in Busley village on the outskirts of Baidoa. She says the girl was seven years old.

Cholera treatment

Cholera is treatable. The World Health Organization recommends “prompt administration of oral rehydration salts.” Mohamed says Fatuma is already feeling better with treatment. They hope to be released soon.

But they will not be going home.

Aid agencies say the areas worst hit by cholera and hunger are villages like Busley which are under al-Shabab control. Accessing them is a challenge. Fatuma and her family are among the tens of thousands of people who have walked to government-controlled areas like Baidoa to seek help and are now living in makeshift camps.

World Health Organization cholera expert Dr. Abdinasir Abubakar says the outbreak is getting worse due to security challenges.

“If you look at Bay, Bakool, Middle Juba, Gedo some of those areas where none of us is able to access, the deaths and cases due to cholera is very high, and we expect the situation will get worse,” says Abubakar.

Rains this month in southern and central Somalia have contributed to a surge in cholera cases, according to Bay Regional Hospital cholera treatment ward deputy supervisor Salima Sheikh Shuaib.

She says “the cholera cases were going down, but the past three days we have seen an increase in cholera cases. This morning, we have received 16 cases and most of them are children under the age of five.”

Life in camps

More than 150,000 displaced people are living in the makeshift camps around Baidoa and more continue to arrive.

At the camps, many families do not have plastic tarps or covered places to sleep. Stagnant puddles and mud dot the walkways. There is no regular food provided. Clean water is available, but it is not enough.

Medics supported by UNICEF and the WHO are going to IDP camps around Baidoa to provide oral cholera vaccination to children.

But Abubakar of the WHO says it is hard to contain the spread of cholera so long as the general humanitarian situation is not improving.

“We cannot only solve cholera. We cannot only deal with cholera unless we deal with food insecurity, unless we deal with water issues, malnutrition and I think collectedly both the wash, the health, the nutrition, and the food security partners we are working closely and we are coordinating but again in Somalia one of the challenges. We are facing a shortage of resources to support all these interventions,” says Abubakar.

Somalia continues to report between 200 and 300 cases of cholera nationwide each day.
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Instagram Launches Snapchat-like Filters

By Uponsil | | No Comments | Silicon Valley

Get ready for more rabbit ears, dog noses and funny hats to show up in your Facebook feed.

Facebook’s Instagram service is launching face filters in an effort to keep up with rival, Snap Inc.’s Snapchat.

“From math equations swirling around your head to furry koala ears that move and twitch, you can transform into a variety of characters that make you smile or laugh,” the company wrote on its blog.

The new features will also include the ability to manipulate video, allowing users to play them in reverse.

“Capture a fountain in motion and share a rewind of the water floating back up,” according to the blog post. “Experiment with some magic tricks of your own and defy the laws of physics wherever you are.”

Facebook, the largest social media platform, has been accused of copying features from Snapchat such as “Stories” which allows users to post pictures and videos that are erased after 24 hours.

According to Instagram, 200 million people use Stories daily.

Facebook’s stock price has been hovering around $150 this month, which is near the stock’s all-time high of $153.60.

Last week, Snap stocks cratered by 23 percent after the company posted poorer than expected quarterly results. The company says it has 166 million daily active users as of March 31.

Snap was trading at $20.42 Tuesday, down from an all-time high of $29.44.
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Greek Seamen Extend Strike; No Ferries for 4 Days

By Uponbiz | | No Comments | Business

Greek seamen and journalists walked off the job Tuesday, a day before a nationwide general strike to protest new austerity measures the government is legislating for in return for more bailout funds.

The seamen’s union announced Tuesday afternoon they would extend their strike, originally planned to last 48 hours, for a further two days, leaving ferries servicing Greece’s islands tied up in port until midnight Friday night.

 

The Panhellenic Seamen’s Federation said it was asking “for the understanding and full support of both the traveling public and all Greek workers,” adding that the new measures would lead seamen “to poverty and destitution.”

 

Journalists were holding a 24-hour strike Tuesday, pulling news broadcasts off the air from 6 a.m. (0300 GMT). News websites were not being updated, and no Wednesday newspapers would be printed. Public bus company employees were also holding work stoppages during the day.

 

Wednesday’s general strike is expected to affect services across the country, from schools and hospitals to public transport. Air traffic controllers have declared participation with a four-hour work stoppage, leading to the rescheduling of 99 flights and the cancellation of a further nine by Greece’s Aegean and Olympic Air. Another airline, Sky Express, announced the rescheduling of 41 domestic flights between Athens and the Greek islands.

 

Protest marches have been scheduled for central Athens in the morning.

 

Workers are protesting a new deal with Greece’s international creditors that impose a raft of new tax hikes and spending cuts beyond the end of the country’s third bailout in 2018. The measures, which are to be voted on in parliament at midnight Thursday, will include additional pension cuts in 2019 and higher income tax in 2020.

 

Without the agreement with its creditors, Greece faced the prospect of running out of cash to service its debts this summer, which could have seen it have another brush with bankruptcy.

 

Greece is currently in its third international bailout, which is due to end in mid-2018. It has been dependent on rescue loans from its creditors — mainly other European countries that use the euro, and the International Monetary Fund — since its first bailout in 2010.

 

In return for the funds, successive governments have had to impose repeated waves of reforms, which have included tax hikes and salary and pension cuts. While the country’s finances have improved under the bailouts and the strict supervision they imposed, the belt-tightening has led to spiraling poverty and unemployment rates.

 

Although the jobless rate has been falling from a high of above 27 percent, it still hovers at around 23 percent.
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Uninhabited Island has ‘World’s Worst’ Plastic Pollution

By Uponsci | | No Comments | Science

The beaches on a remote, uninhabited island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean have the highest amount of plastic debris in the world.

Researchers from the University of Tasmania say Henderson Island, which is more than 5,000 kilometer from any major population center, is strewn with roughly 37.7 million pieces of plastic waste.

Put another way, the beaches on Henderson Island are covered with about 671 pieces of plastic litter per square meter, which researchers say is the highest density ever recorded.

“What’s happened on Henderson Island shows there’s no escaping plastic pollution even in the most distant parts of our oceans,” said Jennifer Lavers of the Institute for Marine and Antarctic Studies and lead author of a paper about the pollution in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Henderson Island, which is part of the UK’s Pitcairn Islands territory, sits right in the middle of the Pacific Gyre current, which makes it a “focal point” for garbage from South America as well as from fishing boats.

Researchers say their sampling of the debris at five sites on the island leads them to believe there is more than 17 tons of plastic on the island and around 3,570 new pieces of litter being deposited every day.

Lavers noted, “It’s likely that our data actually underestimates the true amount of debris on Henderson Island as we were only able to sample pieces bigger than two millimeters down to a depth of 10 centimeters, and we were unable to sample along cliffs and rocky coastline.”

Every year, the world produces some 300 million tons of plastic, much of which is not recycled. Plastic disintegrates very slowly, and when it ends up floating in the ocean, it can lead to “entanglement and ingestion” by animals, birds and fish.

“Research has shown that more than 200 species are known to be at risk from eating plastic, and 55 percent of the world’s seabirds, including two species found on Henderson Island, are at risk from marine debris,” Lavers said.
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