The World Health Organization says nearly half of the world’s population is at risk of contracting malaria. Efforts to fight the disease take two paths, fighting the disease itself and fighting the mosquitos that carry the disease. University of Maryland researchers are testing a novel new way to kill mosquitos in Burkina Faso. VOA’s Kevin Enochs reports.
Month: June 2019
Muslims started settling in America in the 1600s. From the Northeast to Midwest, they have left their mark on U.S. history. Even in some Midwestern states where few Muslims live, there are historic milestones of their presence. Muslim homesteaders in Ross, North Dakota, built a mosque in the 1920s, making it one of the first mosques built in America. Saqib Ul Islam gives us a look in this report.
This Sunday, Istanbul votes again in a mayoral election, after authorities voided an opposition victory that ended 15 years of control by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s AKP Party. Dorian Jones reports from Istanbul, Turkey’s largest city, on an election that has become more than just about who runs the city.
Hong Kong police sharply criticized anti-government protesters for besieging their headquarters but refrained from using force to disperse them, in a contrast to the violence that erupted in the city last week.
The protesters ended their overnight siege of the police headquarters building Saturday morning, leaving peacefully after a night of throwing eggs and drawing graffiti on the walls of the complex.
“Police have shown the greatest tolerance to the protesters who assembled outside PHQ, but their means of expressing views have become illegal, irrational and unreasonable,” a police statement said.
Hong Kong police were criticized for using force last week, when they sprayed tear gas and shot rubber bullets at protesters. The violence left dozens injured on both sides.
Demonstrators are demanding the full withdrawal of a controversial extradition bill and the resignation of the territory’s pro-Beijing leader Carrie Lam.
Mostly peaceful protest
On Friday, thousands of mostly student protesters dressed in black set up roadblocks in a generally peaceful protest. The protests again forced the temporary closure of Hong Kong’s government offices over security concerns.
Friday’s demonstrators also urged Hong Kong officials to retract the description of the June 12 protest as a riot; to release all the protesters arrested and drop charges against them; and to conduct an inquiry into the use of force by police during recent protests. The government has not responded directly to these demands.
On Tuesday, Lam had offered an apology for the political crisis and unrest sparked by the proposed law.
Challenge to Xi
The Hong Kong protests pose the greatest challenge to Chinese President Xi Jinping since he took office in 2012. The Chinese government had supported the extradition proposal and accused protest organizers of colluding with Western governments.
U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has said President Donald Trump plans to discuss the Hong Kong issue with Xi at the upcoming Group of 20 summit in Japan, June 28-29.
Join us every Wednesday as Shaka and his guests discuss topics of special interest to Africans, including politics, economic development, press freedom, health, social issues and conflict resolution.
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In the competitive and changing television industry, nothing is more valuable for job-seekers than “real world” experience. The Straight Talk Africa internship program offers motivated and outstanding students exciting opportunities to experience practical journalism. In addition to helping to get our weekly studio programs on-the-air, interns also produce a final project for their portfolios. Projects include writing and producing promos, stories, and even full-length documentary or magazine shows.
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Attention to Roblyn Hymes.
If you want to know what’s trending in news, health, sports and lifestyle, then tune in to Africa 54. Airing Monday through Friday, this 30-minute program takes a closer look at the stories Africans are talking about, with reports from VOA correspondents, and interviews with top experts and analysts. Africa 54 also serves viewers with timely information about health, education, business and technology. And for the young and young at heart, Africa 54 provides a daily dose of pop culture, including music, fashion and entertainment.
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Vincent Makori is the Managing Editor of Africa 54, Voice of America’s daily TV program for Africa. He also serves as a producer and writer for Africa 54. Vincent is a versatile journalist with 20 years of experience, working in Africa, Europe and the U.S. He has been at VOA for more than 11 years.
Vincent has covered a wide range of stories including the Africa Union Summit in Lusaka, Zambia, The U.N. General Assembly in New York, International Trade and Technology Fairs in Berlin and Hanover Germany. The International AIDS Conference, in Mexico City, Mexico, and the G-20 Summit in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
He has interviewed people of all walks of life, including high ranking officials and presidents, among them, former U.S. President George W. Bush, President Bingu wa Mutharika of Malawi, former President of Ghana John Kufuor, President Ifikepunye Pohamba of Namibia ; Noble Laureate Wangari Maathai and academic luminaries like Professor Ali Mazrui.
He holds a post-graduate degree in mass communication from the School of Journalism of the University of Nairobi and a Bachelor of Arts Degree, majoring in English Literature from Moi University, Kenya. He has attended numerous training programs in journalism, in Kenya, Germany and the U.S.
Linord Moudou is the producer & host of the Africa Health Network on Africa 54. She also produces and hosts Health Chat on the Voice of America radio, a live call-in program that addresses health issues of interest to Africa.
She started her career with Voice of America television as the producer & host of Healthy Living, a weekly health news magazine covering African health issues including malaria, TB and HIV/AIDS. She also shared new discoveries and medical breakthroughs, and provided tips and advice on how to prevent diseases and live a healthier life.
Before joining VOA, Linord worked as a broadcast and print journalist, traveling between Africa, Europe and the United States. In 2000, she created, produced, and hosted “Spotlight on Africa,” a bilingual (French-English) television and radio program on Public Access Television and New World Radio in Washington, D.C. With “Spotlight on Africa,” Linord dedicated herself to promote a more positive image of Africa internationally, through information and entertainment.
Her print experience includes “Africa Journal,” a Corporate Council on Africa publication, and AMINA Magazine, a Paris-based magazine about women of Africa and the Diaspora.
Linord Moudou was born and raised in Côte d’Ivoire. She holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in journalism and media productions from George Mason University, and a certificate in television and radio productions from the Columbia School of Broadcasting. The veteran broadcaster is fluent in French, English and conversational in Spanish and Creole.
Internship Opportunities
In the competitive and changing television industry, nothing is more valuable for job-seekers than “real world” experience. The Straight Talk Africa internship program offers motivated and outstanding students exciting opportunities to experience practical journalism. In addition to helping to get our weekly studio programs on-the-air, interns also produce a final project for their portfolios. Projects include writing and producing promos, stories, and even full-length documentary or magazine shows.
For more information and/or send your resume to:
africatv@voanews.com,
Attention to Clara Frenk.
Each morning, Daybreak Africa looks at the latest developments on the continent, starting with headline news and providing in-depth interviews, reports from VOA correspondents, sports news as well as listener comments.
The rivers of the world are full of antibiotics. That’s the headline of a new survey that sampled rivers all over the world. VOA’s Kevin Enochs reports.
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Spanish tennis star Rafael Nadal has won his record extending 12th French Open title, defeating Dominic Thiem of Austria in fours sets Sunday 6-3, 5-7, 6-1, 6-1
It is the second straight year Nadal has defeated Thiem for the championship on the clay courts at Roland Garros. With the win, Nadal becomes the first player in tennis history to win 12 titles at a single Grand Slam event. In total, the Spaniard now has 18 Grand Slam title wins, two behind all-time leader Roger Federer.
In Sunday’s match, Nadal and Thiem split the first two sets that featured hard hitting and long rallies. But Nadal went on to dominate the next two on his way to victory.
Nadal said “It’s a dream to win again, an incredible moment.” He also paid tribute to his opponent.
“I want to say congratulations to Dominic. I feel sorry as he deserves to win it as well,” Nadal said after the match.
The 25- year old Theim said he will try again next year and he praised Nadal for being an “amazing champion.”
“To win 12 times, it’s unreal” Theim said.
The 33 year old Nadal, seeded number two, extended his record at the French Open to 93 wins and just two losses.
In the Women’s draw Saturday, Australia’s Ashleigh Barty defeated Marketa Vondrousova of the Czech Republic in straight sets, 6-1, 6-3. It was Barty’s first Grand Slam title.
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Former Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson is stepping up his campaign to be Britain’s next prime minister by challenging the European Union over Brexit terms.
Johnson told the Sunday Times he would refuse to pay the agreed-upon 39 billion-pound ($50 billion) divorce settlement unless the EU offers Britain a better withdrawal agreement than the one currently on the table.
The contest for leadership of the Conservative Party officially begins Monday. The post was vacated Friday by Prime Minister Theresa May, who will serve as a caretaker until a new leader is chosen and moves into 10 Downing Street.
The party expects to name its new leader in late July.
Johnson, the early frontrunner in a crowded field, told the newspaper he is the only contender who can triumph over the Labour Party led by Jeremy Corbyn and Nigel Farage’s Brexit Party.
Johnson is a hard-line Brexit advocate who vows to take Britain out of the EU on the Oct. 31 deadline even if there is no deal in place.
He and other contenders say they can get better terms from EU leaders in Brussels than the deal that May agreed to but was unable to push through Parliament. Those failures led to her decision to resign before achieving her goal of delivering Brexit.
But EU officials have said they are not willing to change the terms of the deal May agreed to.
One of Johnson’s main rivals for the post, Environment Secretary Michael Gove, continued to be sidetracked Sunday by questions about his acknowledged cocaine use when he was a youthful journalist.
He told BBC Sunday that he was “fortunate” not to have gone to prison following his admission of cocaine use. He said he was “very, very aware” of the damage drugs can cause.
Nominations for the leadership post close Monday afternoon.
U.S. Treasury chief Steven Mnuchin said Sunday President Donald Trump would be “perfectly happy” to tax more imports from China if he cannot reach a trade deal with Chinese President Xi Jinping.
Both presidents are scheduled to meet later this month at the Group of 20 meeting in Japan.
“We made enormous progress, I think we had a deal that was almost 90% done,” Mnuchin told CNBC. “China wanted to go backwards on certain things” — a charge Beijing denies.
“We’ve stopped negotiating,” Mnuchin said, with the next steps depending on Trump’s meeting with Xi in Osaka at the G-20 summit of leaders of major economies June 28-29.
“The president will make a decision (on tariffs) after the meeting,” Mnuchin said. “I believe if China is willing to move forward on the terms that we were discussing, we’ll have an agreement. If they’re not, we will proceed with tariffs.”
Trump has already imposed tariffs on $200 billion worth of Chinese goods, but now is thinking about taxing an additional $325 billion worth of Chinese products. That would include nearly everything China exports to the U.S. The world’s two biggest economies have sparred for months over a trade deal, but have not been able to reach an agreement.
Trump’s threatened tariff hike came as G-20 finance ministers meeting in Fukuoka, Japan, said trade and geopolitical conflicts are risking global economic growth, but at the U.S. insistence, dropped a call to “recognize the pressing need to resolve trade tensions.”
“Global growth appears to be stabilizing and is generally projected to pick up moderately later this year and into 2020,” the finance chiefs, including Mnuchin, said in an end-of-meeting communique. “However, growth remains low and risks remain tilted to the downside. Most importantly, trade and geopolitical tensions have intensified. We will continue to address these risks and stand ready to take further action.”
The International Monetary Fund warned last week that a continuing U.S.-China standoff on tariffs could cut a half-percentage point from the global economy in 2020.
Meanwhile, China vowed Sunday to build what it calls a strong firewall against attempts to restrict its ability to technologically innovate.
“China … will never allow certain countries to use China’s technology to contain China’s development and suppress Chinese enterprise,” the main state-run newspaper declared.
China plans to announce details of its plans in the near future.
The Chinese statement did not mention any country by name, but the United States has restricted U.S. firms from selling technology to China’s Huawei, suspecting the company of building spyware into its telecommunications products.
The U.S. has also warned its allies against the alleged risk in buying Huawei technology.
One of the ways astronomers learn about planets beyond Earth is by studying our own. And there are satellites doing just that, monitoring the Earth’s health, and our own. VOA’s Kevin Enochs reports.
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Online data is at risk. Hackers are getting smarter and companies across the globe are facing a shortage of trained professionals who can help protect their data. To fill this gap, the U.S. government is beefing up its efforts to recruit the next generation of cybersecurity professionals. VOA’s Sahar Majid has more.
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The giant e-commerce technology company, Amazon, has announced that it expects to start delivering orders to shoppers’ homes by drones in the coming months. The details are still in the works, but the innovation could change the way we get packages. VOA’s Kevin Enochs reports.
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Sir Winston held off the favorites with a bold move from the inside rail Saturday to capture the 151st Belmont Stakes, the third leg of the Thoroughbred racing’s Triple Crown.
Sir Winston, ridden by Joel Rosario, at one point was pinched on the rail but then made a wide move to the outside followed by a storming charge to the finish line. The winning time at Belmont Park was 2 minutes, 28.30 seconds.
Sir Winston, a 10-1 long shot, won for the third time in the last 10 starts, beating out runner-up and pre-race favorite Tactitus and third-place Joevia.
The Belmont Stakes came five weeks after this year’s controversial Kentucky Derby which was won by Country House after Maximum Security became the first horse in history to be disqualified from the iconic American race.
Country House did not race on Saturday.
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Ash Barty knew she needed a break from tennis, from the pressure and expectations, from the week-in, week-out grind. So she stepped away in 2014 and wound up trying her hand at cricket, joining a professional team at home in Australia.
After almost two years away, Barty was pulled back to the tour. Good choice. Now she’s a Grand Slam champion.
Taking control right from the start of the French Open final and never really letting go, the No. 8-seeded Barty capped a quick-as-can-be rise in her return to the sport by beating unseeded 19-year-old Marketa Vondrousova of the Czech Republic, 6-1, 6-3, Saturday for her first major championship.
“I never closed any doors, saying, ‘I’m never playing tennis again.’ For me, I needed time to step away, to live a normal life, because this tennis life certainly isn’t normal. I think I needed time to grow as a person, to mature,” Barty said.
And as for why she came back three years ago?
I missed the competition. I missed the one-on-one battle, the ebbs and the flows, the emotions you get from winning and losing matches,'' said Barty, who will jump to a career-best No. 2 in the rankings Monday behind Naomi Osaka.They are so unique and you can only get them when you’re playing and when you put yourself out on the line and when you become vulnerable and try and do things that no one thinks of.”
That last part is an apt description of how she approaches each point, looking for just the right angle or speed, understanding where an opponent might be most vulnerable at any given moment. After using her slice backhand, topspin forehand and kick serve to do just that to Vondrousova, she called it a “kind of ‘Ash Barty brand’ of tennis.”
Vondrousova’s take
“She’s mixing things up. And she has a huge serve,” Vondrousova said. “So it’s all, like, very tough to play against.”
Barty raced to a 4-0 lead and then held on, showing that she learned her lesson after blowing a 5-0 edge in the opening set of her quarterfinal victory a day earlier against another unseeded teenager, 17-year-old American Amanda Anisimova.
“An absolute roller-coaster,” Barty called it.
Her coach, Craig Tyzzer, said the two of them huddled with Ben Crowe, who helps Barty with the mental side of things, and they had a “really good discussion about it” to make sure she’d avoid that sort of trouble in the final.
Neither Barty, 23, nor Vondrousova had ever played in a Grand Slam final before. Neither had even been in a major semifinal until this week, either. But it was only Vondrousova who seemed jittery at the outset; she was playing at Court Philippe Chatrier for the first time.
Barty wound up with a 27-10 edge in winners to become the first Australian to win the trophy at Roland Garros since Margaret Court in 1973.
“I played the perfect match today,” Barty said.
The women’s final started about 1½ hours later than scheduled because it followed the resumption of Dominic Thiem’s 6-2, 3-6, 7-5, 5-7, 7-5 victory over Novak Djokovic in the men’s semifinals, a match suspended Friday evening because of rain.
Thiem will face 11-time French Open champion Rafael Nadal on Sunday in a rematch of last year’s final.
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Rising trade tensions between the U.S. and China have sparked worries about the 17 exotic-sounding rare earth minerals needed for high-tech products like robotics, drones and electric cars.
China recently raised tariffs to 25% on rare earth exports to the U.S. and has threatened to halt exports altogether after the Trump administration raised tariffs on Chinese products and blacklisted telecommunications giant Huawei.
With names like europium, scandium and ytterbium, the bulk of rare earth minerals are extracted from mines in China, where lower wages and lax environmental standards make production cheaper and easier.
But trade experts say no one should panic over China’s threats to stop exporting the elements to the U.S.
There is a U.S. rare minerals mine in California. And Australia, Myanmar, Russia and India are also top producers of the somewhat obscure minerals. Vietnam and Brazil both have huge rare earth reserves.
The sky is not falling,'' said Mary B. Teagarden, a China specialist, professor and associate dean at the Thunderbird School of Global Management in Phoenix.There are alternatives.”
Simon Lester, associate director of the center for trade policy studies at the Cato Institute think tank in Washington, agreed. “Over the short term, it could be a big disruption, but companies that want to stay in business will find a way,” he said.
Although the U.S. is among the world’s top 10 countries for rare earths production, it’s also a major importer of the minerals, looking to China for 80% of what it buys from other countries, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. China last year produced 120,000 metric tons of rare earths, while the United States produced 15,000 metric tons.
Mountain Pass Mine
The United States also depends on China to separate the minerals pulled from Mountain Pass Mine, the sole rare earths mine in the U.S., which was bought two years ago by the Chicago-based JHL Capital Group LLC .
“We need to develop a U.S.-based supply chain so there is no possibility we can be threatened,” said Ryan S. Corbett, managing director of JHL Capital.
The mine’s top products are neodymium and praseodymium, two elements that are used together to make the lightweight magnets that help power electric cars and wind turbines and are found in electronics such as laptop hard drives.
Mountain Pass, located in San Bernardino County, Calif., was once the top supplier of the world’s rare earth minerals, but China began taking over the market in the 1990s and the U.S. mine stopped production in 2002.
Mountain Pass later restarted production, only to close again amid a 2015 bankruptcy. Corbett said extraction resumed last year after JHL Capital purchased the site with QVT Financial LP of New York, which holds 30%, and Shenghe Resources Holding Co. Ltd. of China, a nonvoting shareholder with 9.9%.
Since then, Mountain Pass has focused on achieving greater autonomy with a $1.7 billion separation system set to go online late next year that would allow it to skip sending rare earths ore to China for that step.
China could hurt itself in the long run by cutting off the U.S., specialists said.
David Merriman, a rare earths analyst for Roskill commodity research in London, said that during a similar trade flap with China in 2011, Japan began looking to other countries, including Australia, for the minerals needed to manufacture electronics.
Australian rare earths production giant Lynas Corp. Ltd. this month announced a proposed deal with Blue Line Corp. of Texas for a separation facility at an industrial site in Hondo, Texas.
Other deposits
There may be other options, too. Deposits of rare earths have been detected in other U.S. states, including Wyoming and Alaska, as well in several remote areas of Canada. The Interior Department is calling for more prospecting and mining of “critical minerals,” including on public lands currently considered off-limits, and even in oceans.
We have to be more forward-thinking,'' said Alexander Gysi, an assistant professor in geology and geological engineering at the Colorado School of Mines in Golden.It would be better for the U.S. to have a greater range of sources for rare earths.”
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It was a bad day 70 million years ago for a triceratops dinosaur, whose remains are displayed beneath a fossilized Tyrannosaurus Rex skeleton — posed as if it were still alive and ready for dinner.
Huge dinosaurs and other ancient creatures like an elephant-sized ground sloth are part of a remarkable new fossils exhibition that opened June 8 at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History in Washington.
Instead of the typical static poses usually seen in museums, the new exhibition has positioned the animals so they look more real and animated — like a Dire Wolf that appears to be chasing prey.
“Did you know that all birds descended from dinosaurs?” said Matthew Carrano, the Curator of Dinosaurs.
”We now know dinosaurs were fast growing, and very lively animals,” Carrano said. “Many of the dinosaurs you see here didn’t necessarily live together. Each species lasted a million years ago or so and then another species would appear. So many different dinosaur ecosystems in the world, just like there’s many different ecosystems in the world today.”
Located in the large, newly restored fossil hall, the exhibition called Deep Time is all about ancient life on earth, and how its climate, ecosystems and geology evolved over 3.7 billion years. It contains over 700 fossils, including plants, insects, reptiles, and mollusks going back billions of years.
A fossilized palm tree unearthed in the Arctic shows that area used to be tropical. A tiny ancestor of today’s horses lived 52 million years ago. There’s even some fossilized dinosaur feces.
While wandering through the variety of ecosystems, modern interactive exhibits allow visitors to learn more about the earth’s past, and a glass-walled lab where they can see fossils being prepared for scientific study.
But among these remains is an underlying message about the future and the importance of protecting the Earth.
“We explain and let you explore for yourself what the meaning is in something that might have happened 55 million years ago to tell us a lot about the impact we are having now, because it’s not just a past story it’s also our story right now,” explained Sioban Starrs, the exhibition project manager.
The objects on display illustrate how much the Earth has changed, affected by shifts in the climate. Scientists say 66 million years ago, the impact of a huge asteroid transformed the environment so much the dinosaurs and most other forms of life couldn’t survive. But today the exhibition points out, humans are the culprit that are causing devastating environmental problems.
“It’s a scientific fact and there’s evidence showing that we are having an impact on this planet that’s unprecedented,” Starrs said. “It’s unprecedented in the scale, and in the rate, and it’s unprecedented that it’s one singular species causing all of these changes.”
“There’s lots of specific things you can do to ameliorate the impacts of climate change,” said Kirk Johnson, the head of the museum. “Decrease climate change and help preserve species and habitats. There’s a lot of things that are happening in the world today that don’t have to be happening.”
Starrs hopes the 5 million people visiting the exhibition each year will think about what they can do to help.
“I would really like to see people getting connected to this story of the impact that we’re having on the planet, and to really wake up and start making smart choices,” she said. “Start looking at the things that people are doing around the world to direct our planet toward a hopeful, positive future.”
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