Month: April 2018

Beyonce to Donate $100,000 for Scholarships at Black Colleges

On the back of wide praise for her two-hour performance at the Coachella music festival, Beyonce on Monday said she was offering $100,000 in scholarship money to students at four historically black colleges and universities.

The Homecoming Scholars Award Program for the 2018-19 academic year will give away $25,000 in scholarship money to a student at Xavier University of Louisiana, Wilberforce University in Ohio, Tuskegee University in Alabama and Bethune-Cookman University in Florida, the “Lemonade” album singer’s foundation said.

Beyonce’s performance at the Coachella festival in the Southern California desert on Saturday was billed as a homage to education and black American culture, featuring a marching band, performance art, choir and dance. She was supported by more than 150 performers on stage.

It was the first time a black woman headlined the two-weekend festival, one of the biggest U.S. music gatherings of the year.

“We honor all institutions of higher learning for maintaining culture and creating environments for optimal learning which expands dreams and the seas of possibilities for students,” Ivy McGregor, who administers the singer’s BeyGood foundation, said in a statement announcing the scholarship.

The more than 100 historically black U.S. colleges and universities were all established before the Civil Rights Act of 1964, when white-dominated institutions of higher education could bar African-American students.

Last year, the 36-year-old singer established a merit scholarship program to support young women.

The “Formation” singer’s Coachella performance, which was streamed live on YouTube, was hailed as an “unprecedented celebration of black cultural influence in America” by NBC News.

Trade publication Variety called Beyonce’s show, her first in more than a year, a “musical, visual and physical triumph.”

Beyonce will perform again at Coachella this Saturday, and she and her husband, rapper Jay Z, are set to begin a U.S. and European tour together in June.

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Ramaphosa Team to Seek $8 Billion Investment for South Africa

South African President Cyril Ramaphosa appointed a team of business and finance experts on Monday to hunt the globe for 100 billion rand ($8 billion) in investment to boost the ailing economy.

The team of economic envoys includes two former finance ministers — Trevor Manuel and Pravin Gordhan, who now holds the state firms portfolio — as well as a former top banker.

Ramaphosa became president in February after winning the leadership of the ruling African National Congress last year on promises to revive the economy and crack down on corruption.

Monday’s appointments to the team also include economist Trudi Makhaya, who becomes special economic adviser to the president, former Treasury Director General Lungisa Fuzile, ex-Deputy Finance Minister Mcebisi Jonas and former Standard Bank chief executive Jacko Maree.

“These are people with valuable experience in the world of business, investment and finance and they have extensive networks across a number of major markets,” said Ramaphosa before leaving Johannesburg for a Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in London.

Ramaphosa said the envoys would travel to Europe, Asia and across Africa to build an “investment book” to help plug a substantial shortfall of foreign and local direct investment.

“We are modest because we want to overachieve,” Ramaphosa said, explaining why the government was targeting 100 billion rand rather than a much larger sum.

Political and policy uncertainty damaged investment and business confidence during nine-year presidency of Ramaphosa’s predecessor, Jacob Zuma, when South Africa’s credit rating was slashed to junk by two of the top three agencies and economic growth slowed to a crawl.

The tide has begun to turn under Ramaphosa, with Moody’s last month keeping the country at investment grade and changing the outlook to stable from negative.

The economic outlook has also improved, with the World Bank raising its 2018 growth forecast to 1.4 percent this month from 1.1 percent forecast in September, a touch below the Treasury’s projection of 1.5 percent.

Ramaphosa has sacked or demoted a number of ministers allied to his scandal-ridden predecessor, and reinstated Nhlanhla Nene as finance Minister after Zuma fired him in 2015.

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British Facial Recognition Tech Firm Secures US Border Contract

A British technology firm has been awarded a contract by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to use biometric facial verification technology to improve border control, the first foreign firm to win such a contract in the United States.

London-based iProov will develop technology to improve border controls at unmanned ports of entry with a verification system that uses the traveler’s cell phone.

British trade minister Liam Fox said in a statement on Monday that the contract was “one example of our shared economic and security ties” with the United States.

IProov said it was the first non-U.S. firm to be awarded a contract under the Silicon Valley Innovation Program (SVIP), which is run by the DHS Science and Technology Directorate.

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Immune Therapy Scores Big Win Against Lung Cancer in Study

For the first time, a treatment that boosts the immune system greatly improved survival in people newly diagnosed with the most common form of lung cancer. It’s the biggest win so far for immunotherapy, which has had much of its success until now in less common cancers. 

In the study, Merck’s Keytruda, given with standard chemotherapy, cut in half the risk of dying or having the cancer worsen, compared to chemo alone after nearly one year. The results are expected to quickly set a new standard of care for about 70,000 patients each year in the United States whose lung cancer has already spread by the time it’s found.

Another study found that an immunotherapy combo — the Bristol-Myers Squibb drugs Opdivo and Yervoy — worked better than chemo for delaying the time until cancer worsened in advanced lung cancer patients whose tumors have many gene flaws, as nearly half do. But the benefit lasted less than two months on average and it’s too soon to know if the combo improves overall survival, as Keytruda did.

All of these immune therapy treatments worked for only about half of patients, but that’s far better than chemo has done in the past.

“We’re not nearly where we need to be yet,” said Dr. Roy Herbst, a Yale Cancer Center lung expert who had no role in the studies.

Results were discussed Monday at an American Association for Cancer Research conference in Chicago and published by the New England Journal of Medicine. The studies were sponsored by the drugmakers, and many study leaders and Herbst consult for the companies.

About the drugs

Keytruda, Yervoy and Opdivo are called checkpoint inhibitors. They remove a cloak that some cancer cells have that hides them from the immune system. The drugs are given through IVs and cost about $12,500 a month.

Keytruda was approved last year as an initial treatment with chemo for the most common form of advanced lung cancer, but doctors have been leery to use it because that was based on a small study that did not show whether it prolongs life.

The new study, led by Dr. Leena Gandhi of NYU’s Perlmutter Cancer Center, gives that proof. In it, 616 patients were given chemo and some also received Keytruda. Those not given Keytruda were allowed to switch to it if their cancer worsened.

After one year, 69 percent of people originally assigned to Keytruda were alive versus 49 percent of the others — a result that experts called remarkable considering that the second group’s survival was improved because half of them wound up switching.

How much it ultimately will extend life isn’t known — more than half in the Keytruda group are still alive; median survival was just over 11 months for the others.

The Keytruda combo also delayed the time until cancer worsened — an average of nine months versus five months for the chemo-only group.

That’s a big difference for such an advanced cancer, said Dr. Alice Shaw, a Massachusetts General Hospital lung cancer expert and one of the conference leaders. “This is really a pivotal study … a new standard of care,” said Shaw, who has no ties to the drugmakers.

Rates of serious side effects were similar, but twice as many in the Keytruda group dropped out because of them. More than 4 percent of that group developed lung inflammation and three patients died of it.

The competition

Dr. Matthew Hellmann of Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York led a study testing the Opdivo-Yervoy combo versus chemo in a slightly different group of newly diagnosed advanced lung cancer patients.

The study design was changed after it was under way to look at results according to patients’ tumor mutation burden — a measure of how flawed their cancer genes are, according to a profiling test by Foundation Medicine. Medicare recently agreed to cover the $3,000 test for advanced cancers.

Of 679 patients, 299 had a high number of gene flaws in their tumors. In that group, survival without worsening of disease was 43 percent after one year for those on the immunotherapy drugs versus 13 percent of those on chemo. The immunotherapy drugs did not help people with fewer tumor gene flaws.

“We have a tool that helps us determine who are the patients that are most likely to benefit from this combination,” Hellmann said.

The median time until cancer worsened was about 7 months on the immunotherapy drugs versus 5.5 months for chemo. Serious side effects were a little more common in the chemo group.

Another rival, Genentech, recently announced that its checkpoint inhibitor, Tecentriq, improved survival in a study similar to the one testing Keytruda. Details are expected in a couple of months.

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EU Demands Compensation for US Steel Tariffs at WTO

The European Union is seeking compensation from the United States for U.S. tariffs on steel and aluminum, despite Washington’s assertion that they are not subject to World Trade Organization rules, a WTO filing showed Monday.

In a step already taken by China, the EU said it did not accept the “national security” justification for the U.S. tariffs but said they had been imposed just to protect U.S. industry.

“Notwithstanding the United States’ characterization of these measures as security measures, they are in essence safeguard measures,” the EU statement said.

Safeguard tariffs can be imposed on imports of a particular product if a country’s own industry is at risk of serious damage from a sudden surge of imports. In the U.S. case, critics of Trump’s policy say there is no such threat.

The EU said it wanted to hold consultations with the United States as soon as possible.

U.S. President Donald Trump announced the tariffs last month, causing a global outcry because the penalties were seen as unjustified and populist.

Countries can claim exemption from many international trade rules if they can show they are imposing tariffs to protect their national security. But those exemptions do not apply for safeguard sanctions.

The EU and other U.S. allies are not only worried the tariffs will limit the amount of their goods getting into the United States. They also fear steel barred from the United States will flood back into their markets, causing a glut.

China had said it will retaliate by putting duties on up to $3 billion of U.S. imports including fruit, nuts and wine.

The EU is drawing up its own list of duties.

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Scientists: Plastic-Eating Enzyme Holds Promise in Fighting Pollution

Scientists in Britain and the United States say they have engineered a plastic-eating enzyme that could help in the fight against pollution.

The enzyme is able to digest polyethylene terephthalate, or PET — a form of plastic patented in the 1940s and now used in millions of tons of plastic bottles. PET plastics can persist for hundreds of years in the environment and currently pollute large areas of land and sea worldwide.

Researchers from Britain’s University of Portsmouth and the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory made the discovery while examining the structure of a natural enzyme thought to have evolved in a waste-recycling center in Japan.

Finding that this enzyme was helping a bacteria to break down, or digest, PET plastic, the researchers decided to “tweak” its structure by adding some amino acids, said John McGeehan, a professor at Portsmouth who co-led the work.

This led to a serendipitous change in the enzyme’s actions — allowing its plastic-eating abilities to work faster.

“We’ve made an improved version of the enzyme better than the natural one already,” McGeehan told Reuters in an interview.

“That’s really exciting because that means that there’s potential to optimize the enzyme even further.”

The team, whose finding was published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences journal, is now working on improving the enzyme further to see if it could be capable of breaking down PET plastics on an industrial scale.

“It’s well within the possibility that in the coming years we will see an industrially viable process to turn PET, and potentially other [plastics], back into their original building blocks so that they can be sustainably recycled,” McGeehan said.

‘Strong potential’

Independent scientists not directly involved with the research said it was exciting, but cautioned that the enzyme’s development as a potential solution for pollution was still at an early stage.

“Enzymes are non-toxic, biodegradable and can be produced in large amounts by microorganisms,” said Oliver Jones, a Melbourne University chemistry expert. “There is strong potential to use enzyme technology to help with society’s growing waste problem by breaking down some of the most commonly used plastics.”

Douglas Kell, a professor of bioanalytical science at Manchester University, said further rounds of work “should be expected to improve the enzyme yet further.”

“All told, this advance brings the goal of sustainably recyclable polymers significantly closer,” he added.

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Desiree Linden 1st American Woman to Win Boston Marathon Since 1985

An American woman has won the women’s title at the Boston Marathon for the first time since 1985.

Desiree Linden, a two-time Olympian and runner up in the 2011 Boston Marathon, finished the 42-kilometer race in two hours, 39 minutes, 54 seconds – a full four minutes faster than the second-place runner.

The last American woman to win the Boston Marathon was Lisa Larsen Weidenbach.

Japanese runner Yuki Kawauchi won the men’s title Monday, winning his fourth marathon this year and earning Japan’s first Boston Marathon win since 1987.

 

 

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Consumers in China Weigh Options as Trade Frictions Simmer

Simmering U.S.-China trade frictions have stirred up a furious debate among American farmers who are already facing increased tariffs from Beijing on a wide range of products from pork to fruit and nuts.

 

In the Chinese capital, Beijing, however, discussion of the topic is muted by comparison. Chinese state media are publishing lengthy articles about how China will stand its ground, with some even arguing it’s time for Beijing to teach America a lesson.

Consumers are watching the dispute closely. Some are concerned about the impact the trade tensions could have, but most that VOA spoke with were convinced they could weather the storm by buying products from other countries and sources.

 

At an open-air market in downtown Beijing, U.S. imported fruits and nuts are now still competitively priced. But when tariffs start to hit, they are likely to cost even more. One vender VOA spoke with said he is already weighing his options.

 

“I can just stop buying U.S. goods and stop selling products from America,” he said. “I can just buy goods from China. Chinese should eat products made in China.”

Tit for tat tariffs

The United States has said it will place tariffs on more than 1,300 Chinese goods if Beijing does not take steps to further open its markets, address American concerns and do more to protect intellectual property rights.

 

Chinese authorities have repeatedly voiced confidence they are prepared to fight to the end if Washington goes ahead with its tariffs, but neither side knows for certain just how broad an impact either country’s tariffs could have.

 

Both Beijing and Washington are working to minimize the impact on their own economies while working to appear tough and resolved, but tough actions can produce unintended consequences.

 

The Trump administration has already been scrambling to assure U.S. farmers they will be taken care of in the event that trade actions impact their livelihoods.

Even though China has yet to follow through on its pledge to place a 25 percent tax on soybean imports, the threat has begun to hit the price of soybeans and animal feed for pigs and poultry. And because of that, there are concerns the measure aimed at punishing American farmers in areas where political support for Trump was strong could also impact farmers and consumers in China as well.

 

Chinese officials issued a statement last week arguing that would not happen.

Price movement

 

Xiao Guoying, a researcher with the Institute of Subtropical Agriculture under the Chinese Academy of Sciences said that a minor price hike would be unavoidable if a trade war is launched.

 

But he also believes that businessmen in China and the United States are smart and will find ways around the tariffs.

 

“Suppliers still have to find markets to sell their soybeans, even if it means a price cut,” Xiao said. “If global demand and supply [of soybean] remain stable, there won’t be a major price fluctuation.”

 

In Beijing, most residents that VOA spoke with said they hoped the two sides will find a way to work the dispute out. If not, some warned that it is consumers that will end up footing the bill.

 

Miss Wang Chongyun works in the financial sector. She likes to vacation in San Diego and is a fan of Michael Kors’ products. She hopes the two countries sit down and talk soon.

 

If not, the dispute “will have an impact on the Chinese economy and that has an impact on the public’s interests,” she said. “With higher tariffs and prices, we’ll have to spend more.”

 

Ways to cope

Others, however, argue that it is foreign countries that need China more. And hence, any tariffs doomed to fail.

 

“If they [other countries] want to make money here, they have to work together with China because there are a lot of Chinese,” said one young woman.

 

Few that VOA spoke with knew what Washington is demanding or even the huge gap in access that exists between Chinese companies operating in the United States and the gridlock American and other foreign firms face trying to compete in China.

 

One man surnamed Hou, who works in the service sector, sees the trade dispute as an opportunity for China to stand up. He said China still has many weaknesses, but it also needs to improve itself and can’t always be bossed around by the United States.

 

“China’s domestic industries no longer lag behind and it can make whatever its people need,” Hou said. “There’s no need to rely on the U.S., take sports apparel, for example, there are plenty of domestic brands to choose from.”

 

 

 

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Russia Blocks Popular Telegram Messaging App

 Russia began implementing a ban on popular instant messaging service Telegram after the app refused to provide encrypted messages to Russia’s security services. 

Russia’s state telecommunications regulator Roskomnadzor said Monday that it had sent a notice to telecommunications operators in the country instructing them to block the service following last week’s court ruling that sided with the government to ban the app.

“Roskomnadzor has received the ruling by the Tagansky District Court on restricting access in Russia to the web resources of the online information dissemination organizer, Telegram Messenger Limited Liability Partnership. This information was sent to providers on Monday 16th of April,” the watchdog said in a statement.

In a statement posted on social media, Telegram’s founder and CEO Pavel Durov said, “We consider the decision to block the app to be unconstitutional, and we will continue to defend the right to secret correspondence for Russians.”

Durov is a Russian entrepreneur who left the country in 2014 and is now based in Dubai. He has long said he will reject any attempt by Russia’s security services to gain access to the app, arguing such access would violate users’ privacy.

Roskomnadzor is implementing a decision handed down by a Russian court, which ruled on April 13 that Telegram should be blocked. The court said the app was in violation of Russian regulations to provide information to state security.

Telegram is ranked the world’s ninth most popular messaging app with over 200 million users worldwide. It is widely used in countries across the former Soviet Union and the Middle East and is popular among political activists and journalists. Russian authorities said the app is also used by violent extremists.

 

 

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Farmers Go High-Tech to Monitor Their Cows

Farmers in the American South are upgrading their cattle to the 21st Century.  With tech tools like AI (artificial intelligence) and Wi-Fi, they are now able to monitor the herd and keep tabs on the animals that drive their business. Arash Arabasadi reports.

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Eviction Exhibit finds a Home at National Building Museum

Evictions have been called a silent threat to America’s cities. Every week, thousands of Americans are forced from their homes, for non-payment. An exhibit on U.S. housing evictions opens in Washington D.C. this weekend, based on a book by Princeton University professor Matthew Desmond, which explores the problem by following the lives of several families in Milwaukee, Wisconsin as they struggle to pay the rent. From Washington, VOA’s Jill Craig takes a look at the exhibit.

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New AG School Teaches Secrets to Conserving Farmland

Doug Fabbioli is concerned about the future of the rural economy, as urban sprawl expands from metropolitan areas into farm fields and pastureland. The Virginia winery owner decided to be part of the solution and founded The New AG School. As Faiza Elmasry tells us, the school’s mission is raising the next generation of farmers. Faith Lapidus narrates.

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China Eyes Australian Donkey Exports

The Northern Territory government in Australia says it has been approached by nearly 50 Chinese companies looking to buy land to start donkey farms. Demand for donkey products, especially donkey-hide gelatin is increasing in China, while global supplies are falling.

The Northern Territory government has bought a small herd of wild donkeys for its research station near the outback town of Katherine. Earlier this a month of delegation of Chinese business people visited the facility, and up to 50 companies from China have expressed interest in buying land to set up donkey farms.

It is estimated there are up to 60,000 wild donkeys in the Northern Territory. Donkeys were brought to Australia from Africa as pack animals in the 1860s, and many were released when they were no longer needed. For years feral donkeys have been considered a major pest by farmers.The animals trample native vegetation, spread weeds and compete with domestic cattle for food and water.

Now the authorities believe there are economic benefits in captive donkey herds.

Alister Trier, the head of the Northern Territory’s department of primary industry believes the donkey trade has a bright future.

“My feel[ing] is the industry will develop but it will not displace the cattle industry, for example, I just do not think that will happen.What it will do is add some diversification opportunities for the use of pastoral land and Aboriginal land in the Northern Territory,” said Trier.

In China, donkey skins are boiled down to make gelatin, which is then used in alternative Chinese medicines and cosmetics.

Animal rights campaigners are pressuring the authorities not to allow the live export of donkeys to China, claiming that conditions in transit would be cruel and unacceptable.

Activists also insist that donkeys’ health suffers when they are kept in large herds.

The Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals in Australia wants the donkey skin trade stopped altogether because of concerns the animals are being skinned alive overseas and treated with extreme cruelty.

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Full Steam Ahead for Mozambique’s Rail Network

Dozens of passengers line up in single file along the platform in the dead of night, ready to gather their luggage and pile into the ageing railway carriages.

At the small railway station in Nampula, in northeastern Mozambique, the 4:00 a.m. train to Cuamba in the north west is more than full, as it is every day, to the detriment of those slow to board and forced to stand.

In recent years, the government in Maputo has made developing the train network a priority as part of its economic plan.

But mounting public debt has meant that authorities had no choice but to cede control of the project to the private sector.

Seconds before the train — six passenger coaches coupled between two elderly US-made locomotives — leaves Nampula station, the platforms are already entirely empty.

No one can afford to be late.

Inside, the carriages remain pitch dark until the sun rises as the operator has not installed any lighting.

A blast of the horn and the sound of grinding metal marks the train’s stately progress along the 350-kilometre (220-mile) line to Cuamba — more than 10 hours away.

Five or six passengers cram onto benches intended for four without a murmur of complaint.

“The train is always full,” said Argentina Armendo, his son kneeling down nearby.

“Lots of people stay standing. Even those who have a ticket can’t be sure of getting on. They should add some coaches!”

‘Enormous growth potential’

“Yes, but it’s not expensive,” insists the conductor Edson Fortes, cooly. “It’s the most competitive means of transport for the poor. With the train, they are able to travel.”

Sitting in a vast, ferociously air-conditioned office Mario Moura da Silva, the rail operations manager for CDN, the company operating the line, appears more concerned about passenger numbers as a measure of success than perhaps their comfort.

In 2017, its trains carried almost 500,000 — a 265-percent increase on a year earlier.

“Passenger traffic isn’t profitable but it’s a requirement of the contract with the government,” said Moura da Silva.

“It’s not that which earns us money, it’s more the retail,” he added, referring to the company’s commercial operation, which has grown by 65 percent in a year.

Brazilian mining giant Vale, which owns CDN along with Japanese conglomerate Mitsui, began its Mozambican rail venture in 2005.

Having won a contract to run the concession from the government, it restored the former colonial line, which linked its inland coal mines with the port at Nacala.

It now operates a network of 1,350 kilometres (840 miles) following an investment of nearly $5 billion (around 4 billion euros).

“The growth potential is enormous,” said Moura da Silva.

Rail corridors

Mozambique’s government is eyeing the project as a bellwether for the industry.

“We have made infrastructure one of our four investment priorities,” said Transport Minister Carlos Fortes Mesquita.

“Thanks to this investment, the country recorded a strong growth in the railway sector.”

Eight new “rail corridor” projects are now under way in Mozambique, all funded with private capital, as the state grapples with a long-standing cash shortage.

The government has been engulfed in a scandal linked to secret borrowing by the treasury, which is juggling debt amounting to 112 percent of GDP.

As a result, a handful of large companies, attracted by Mozambique’s vast mineral wealth, have taken the lead in developing the country’s rail infrastructure.

But it is unclear if their interest in the sector will continue in the long-term.

Until the coal runs out?

“Today the Nacala line only exists because of coal. But once the mine closes, who will be able to justify continuing operations?” asked Benjamin Pequenino, an economist at the University of Cape Town in South Africa.

“The private sector won’t continue to invest if it knows it will lose money,” he said.

But in the absence of any alternative, former parliament speaker Abdul Carimo accepts that public-private partnerships are the least worst option.

Carimo, who remains close to the ruling party, now heads up the “Zambezi Development Corridor”.

The scheme is managed by Thai group, ITD, and plans to build 480 kilometres of track between Macuse port and the coal mines at Moatize for a price tag of $2.3 billion.

Carimo, who closely follows developments on the project, has vowed that “his” line will not only be used to carry minerals but will stimulate activity across the region it serves.

“I hate coal but I want this infrastructure to relaunch agriculture in Zambezi province,” he said, adding that the region was “one of the richest in the country in the 1970s.”

 

 

 

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‘Make America Smart Again’: Hundreds Rally for US Science

Gesturing towards the White House, home to President Donald Trump who has called himself “a very stable genius,” Isaac Newton begged to differ.

“Knowing many geniuses, and being one myself, I would venture to say that was rather a boastful claim on his part,” said “Newton,” actually Dean Howarth, a Virginia high school physics teacher in period dress.

Howarth was among hundreds of people who turned out to a “March for Science” Saturday in Washington to “create tangible change and call for greater accountability of public officials to enact evidence-based policy,” according to organizers.

That was the formal message of the rally, one of more than 200 events being carried out around the world. 

But as keynote speaker Sheila Jasanoff said, the signs carried by people like Howarth told a more direct and simple story.

Many of those messages, while more restrained than Howarth’s, carried implicit criticism of Trump, who withdrew from the global Paris Agreement on climate change, has defended coal-fired power plants, seeks to roll back environmental regulations, and has yet to name his top science advisor.

“Make America Smart Again,” said a placard carried by one demonstrator, giving an alternative take on Trump’s “Make America Great Again” pledge.

“We’re here because no one wants to be led by the gut feelings of our elected officials,” Jasanoff, a Professor of Science and Technology Studies at Harvard, said in her opening address without specifically referring to Trump’s widely-reported tendency to govern by instinct rather than analysis.

“Good science depends on good democracy. Let me repeat: good science needs good democracy,” she said.

David Titley, a retired rear admiral who led the US Navy’s task force on climate change, told the crowd that science shows we need to “take actions now to avoid the worst of the risks we know are highly likely to appear.”

Many in the crowd listened under the shade of cherry blossom trees beneath the Washington Monument on the first summer-like Saturday of the year.

“Science is what separates facts from fallacies, falsehoods and fanaticism,” Titley said. “If we ignore and denigrate science we do so at our own peril.”

Suzelle Fiedler, 44, a former laboratory worker, told AFP she attended the rally because of the administration’s desire to cut research funding, and “they’re dismissing a lot of scientific facts like climate change.”

Steven Schrader’s sign proclaimed that he is not a “mad scientist. I’m furious.”

Schrader, 66, told AFP the administration “is trying to essentially take science out of decision making.”

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A Treasured Letter Written to a Daughter 75 Years ago is Part of a Digital Exhibition

Betty Rosenbaum was only 2 years old when her mother and brother were sent to a concentration camp in eastern Poland in 1943. She never saw them again. Today, a new digital exhibition at Yad Vashem, Israel’s Holocaust Museum, features a treasured letter her mother wrote to her more than 75 years ago. VOA Correspondent Mariama Diallo reports.

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Taxi Driver Offers Free Rides to Cancer Patients & Cancer Survivors

Auntie Caterina is a regular taxi driver, who offers free rides to cancer patients in the Italian city of Florence. She inherited the taxi when her partner died of cancer 17 years ago and says this is a way to honor his legacy. To show gratitude and support of the Tuscany Region, she was recognized for her work last month as its “Solidarity Ambassador”. VOA Correspondent Mariama Diallo reports.

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NASA’s New Planet Hunter Ready to Launch

The search for new worlds outside our solar system will enter a new phase (April 16), when NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite, or TESS, takes off from Cape Canaveral in Florida. Scientists from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology are working with NASA on the mission. Faith Lapidus reports.

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