Day: July 25, 2021

A man accused of attempting to stab Mali’s interim President Assimi Goita last week has died in hospital while in the custody of security services, the government said in a statement on Sunday.

Goita, a special forces colonel who orchestrated two coups in the last year, escaped unharmed after the assailant tried to stab him during prayers at a mosque in the capital Bamako on Tuesday.

Security agents threw a man into the back of a military pickup truck, video obtained by Reuters showed, as Goita was ringed by bodyguards.

“During the investigations … his state of health deteriorated,” the statement said. He was taken to hospital, where he died, it said.

An investigation is underway to determine the cause of death.

Mali, the theatre of French-supported operations against al Qaeda and Islamic State-linked insurgents for a decade, was thrown into political turmoil after a military junta led by Goita toppled President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita in August 2020.

Goita served as vice-president to transitional leader Bah Ndaw until the latter’s ouster in May.  

 
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After much lobbying, Australia’s Great Barrier Reef will not appear on a list of “in danger” World Heritage Sites. Environmentalists call this a “terrible” decision fueled by political pressure. VOA’s Arash Arabasadi reports.
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Dr. Anthony Fauci, the top U.S. infectious disease expert, sounded new alarms Sunday about the surge in coronavirus cases in the country, especially in regions where people have been resistant to getting vaccinated even as the delta variant spreads rapidly.“We’re going in the wrong direction,” Fauci said on CNN’s “State of the Union” show. “Fifty percent of the country is not vaccinated. That’s a problem.”“We’re putting ourselves in danger,” said Fauci, the top medical adviser to President Joe Biden.In the United States, hospitalizations and deaths are far below their peaks last winter. But the number of new infections has been rising sharply in parts of the country where skepticism about the need to get vaccinated, the safety of the vaccines and resistance to government suggestions to get inoculated remain a potent force.More than 51,000 new infections were recorded in the U.S. on Saturday, a 172% increase over the last two weeks, and more than 250 deaths have been occurring daily in recent weeks.As it stands, the government says more than 162 million Americans have been fully vaccinated, which corresponds to 49% of the country’s population and nearly 60% of adults.But polls have shown that as many as 80% of unvaccinated Americans say they definitely will not get inoculated or are unlikely to, no matter how many officials urge them to get the shots.Many conservative politicians previously had adopted a more cautious approach toward vaccinations or said whether to get inoculated was a matter of personal choice. Now some are voicing their exasperation at those refusing to get vaccinated.Republican Governor Kay Ivey of Alabama said last week of the unvaccinated, “These people are choosing a horrible lifestyle.”Another Republican governor, Asa Hutchinson of Arkansas, has long urged vaccinations in his southern state but it still has one of the lowest rates of inoculations. Two adolescents recently died of COVID-19 in his state. COVID-19 is the disease caused by the coronavirus.“These are alarm bells,” he told CNN. Nonetheless, he noted, “Certainly the resistance (to inoculations) has hardened.”Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson shows a chart on vaccination rates at a town hall meeting in Batesville, July 12, 2021.But Hutchinson voiced optimism that the unvaccinated will change their minds. “People can change their resistance,” he said. “That should be our focus.”Fauci said those vaccinated “are highly protected,” including against the delta variant. But the pace of vaccinations has dropped in the U.S. by more than 80% since mid-April.Some cities, including Los Angeles in the West and St. Louis in the middle of the country, have imposed new orders for people to wear masks in public indoor spaces regardless of vaccination status. Other cities are considering similar directives. 
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On this first World Drowning Prevention Day, the World Health Organization offers life-saving solutions to prevent most of the 236,000 estimated deaths from drowning every year.  The United Nations General Assembly passed a resolution in April establishing this international day to raise awareness of drowning as a serious problem.Summertime has been celebrated in song as the season when the living is easy. On a less celebratory note, summertime in the northern hemisphere also is the peak season for deaths by drowning.Over the past decade, the World Health Organization reports 2.5 million people have died in drowning incidents.  It says more than half of all drowning deaths are among people under age 30, with the highest rates among children under the age of five.David Meddings, a WHO medical officer, said drowning is the second leading cause of death among children and youth under age 19 in wealthy countries such as the United States, Switzerland, and France. He notes, though, drowning disproportionately affects the poor and the marginalized.“The rates for drowning in low- and middle-income countries are three times higher than the rates we observe in higher-income countries.  And so, it is really the populations with the least resources to be able to adapt to the threats around them that are at highest risk for drowning.  The Western Pacific region has the world’s highest drowning rates followed by the African region,” he said.WHO reports more than 90% of drowning deaths occur in rivers, lakes, wells, irrigation canals and even domestic water storage vessels in the poorer countries. It says children and adolescents in rural areas are disproportionately affected.Meddings said national surveys in Africa show most drownings occur among young adult men out on fishing vessels.“For example, there was a study done in Tanzania among lakeside communities that show that the risk of death from drowning exceeded the risk of death in that population for death from HIV, TB or malaria.  So, 80% of deaths occurring in young adult men who are in a sense obligated to go out on fishing vessels that often are inherently unsafe watercraft without advance weather warning and without knowing how to swim,” he said.The report does not include statistics on flood-related mortality, deaths due to water transport mishaps such as capsized ferry boats, or migrant deaths that occur while crossing the perilous Mediterranean Sea.WHO recommends a number of cost-effective life-saving measures. It says children should be taught basic swimming and water safety skills, wells and potentially dangerous water areas should be fenced off, and bystanders should be trained in safe rescue and resuscitation. It says safe boating and ferry regulations should be enforced and calls for flood risk management to be improved. 
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Experts have said that rare footage of an endangered marsupial in outback Australia is a sign that native animals are beginning to recover from years of feral cat predation.Feral cats threaten the survival of over 100 native species in Australia, according to federal environment officials.The opportunistic predators have caused the extinction of some ground-dwelling birds and small to medium-sized mammals.Experts have said they have been a “major cause of decline” for many endangered marsupials, including the bilby, bandicoot, bettong and numbat.In the northern state of Queensland, though, there are signs that some native animals are beginning to recover.At the Astrebla Downs National Park, 1,500 kilometers northwest of Brisbane, 3,000 feral cats have been removed since 2013.Licensed hunters have said that thermal imaging technology, rather than powerful spotlights, have helped them control the wild cat population by making it easier to find them hiding in vegetation.A recent survey in the region revealed a record number of 471 bilbies, one of Australia’s best-known marsupials.Also, for the first time in a decade, researchers managed to film a threatened desert marsupial in outback Queensland in June.“It is called a kowari,” said ecologist John Augusteyn, who shot the footage. “They are a little, tiny carnivorous marsupial that lives in outback, or arid, western Queensland and also down in South Australia. They are a very charismatic little guy. Very fast, very inquisitive.”Ecologists say that decent rainfall has also helped to boost marsupial numbers.Nearly 3 billion animals in Australia were killed or displaced by the devastating “Black Summer” bushfires in 2019 and 2020, according to scientists.They have said that the biggest cause of species decline in Australia is habitat loss. 
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Skateboarding made its historic debut on the Olympic stage early Sunday, with men’s street heats kicking off the sport’s four-day competition under Tokyo’s blazing sun.

The inaugural event marks a turning point for skateboarding, which has its roots in youth street culture and has influenced everything from art to fashion.

The men’s street competition on Sunday will be a star-studded affair, with who’s who of international skating competing.

But all eyes will be on Nyjah Huston of the United States and hometown favorite Yuto Horigome, who will skate on a concrete course designed with rails and benches emblazoned with the five Olympic rings.

By adding skateboarding to its roster, the International Olympic Committee hopes it can tap into its legions of young fans worldwide, who have built skateboarding into a multibillion-dollar industry.

For skating giant Tony Hawk, the sport’s inclusion into the Olympics is long overdue.

Tony Hawk, who is in town to act as a TV commentator, tried out the new waterfront bowl in Ariake this week and said he was surprised it took so long for the Olympics to embrace skateboarding.

“As a kid that was mostly lambasted for my interest in skateboarding, I never imagined it would be part of the Olympic Games,” Hawk wrote below an Instagram video he posted earlier this week.

Skateboarding, though extremely popular in Japan, is still discouraged in most parks and it’s uncommon to see skaters cruising down a street.

Just outside the skate park where the Olympic finals is taking place on Sunday, a poster taped to the exterior white fence banned skateboarding for locals. 
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Jackie Mason, a rabbi-turned-comedian whose feisty brand of standup comedy led him to Catskills nightclubs, West Coast talk shows and Broadway stages, has died. He was 93. 

Mason died Saturday at 6 p.m. ET at Mt. Sinai Hospital in Manhattan after being hospitalized for more than two weeks, celebrity lawyer Raul Felder told The Associated Press. 

The irascible Mason was known for his sharp wit and piercing social commentary, often about the differences between Jews and gentiles, men and women and his own inadequacies. His typical style was amused outrage. 

“Eighty percent of married men cheat in America. The rest cheat in Europe,” he once joked. Another Mason line was: “Politics doesn’t make strange bedfellows, marriage does.” About himself, he once said: “I was so self-conscious, every time football players went into a huddle; I thought they were talking about me.” 

Religious roots

Mason was born Jacob Maza, the son of a rabbi. His three brothers became rabbis. So did Mason, who at one time had congregations in Pennsylvania and North Carolina. Comedy eventually proved to be a more persistent calling than God.  

“A person has to feel emotionally barren or empty or frustrated in order to become a comedian,” he told The Associated Press in 1987. “I don’t think people who feel comfortable or happy are motivated to become comedians. You’re searching for something and you’re willing to pay a high price to get that attention.” 

Mason started in show business as a social director at a resort in the Catskills. He was the guy who got everybody up to play Simon Says, quiz games or shuffleboard. He told jokes, too. After one season, he was playing clubs throughout the Catskills for better money.  

“Nobody else knew me, but in the mountains, I was a hit,” Mason recalled.  

In 1961, the pint-sized comic got a big break, an appearance on Steve Allen’s weekly television variety show. His success brought him to The Ed Sullivan Show and other programs.  

He was banned for two years from the Sullivan show when he allegedly gave the host the finger when Sullivan signaled to him to wrap up his act during an appearance on Oct. 18, 1964.  

Mason’s act even carried him to Broadway, where he put on several one-man shows, including Freshly Squeezed in 2005, Love Thy Neighbor in 1996 and The World According to Me in 1988, for which he received a special Tony Award. 

“I feel like Ronald Reagan tonight,” Mason joked on Tony night. “He was an actor all his life, knew nothing about politics and became president of the United States. I’m an ex-rabbi who knew nothing about acting and I’m getting a Tony Award.”  

Mason called himself an observer who watched people and learned. From those observations he said he got his jokes and then tried them out on friends. “I’d rather make a fool of myself in front of two people for nothing than a thousand people who paid for a ticket,” he told the AP.  

A reliable presence

His humor could leap from computers and designer coffee to then-Sen. John Kerry, former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Donald Trump. He was able to articulate the average Joe’s anger, making the indignities of life seem funny and maybe just a little bit more bearable. 

“I very rarely write anything down. I just think about life a lot and try to put it into phrases that will get a joke,” he said. “I never do a joke that has a point that I don’t believe in. To me, the message and the joke is the same.”  

On TV, Mason was a reliable presence, usually with a cameo on such shows as 30 Rock or The Simpsons or as a reliable guest on late night chat shows. He performed in front of Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II, and his show Fearless played London’s West End in 2012.  

He portrayed a Jewish ex-pajama salesman in love with an Irish-Catholic widow portrayed by Lynn Redgrave in a series called Chicken Soup in 1989, but it didn’t last. During the O.J. Simpson murder trial, the British Broadcasting Corp.’s Scottish service hired Mason as a weekly commentator. 

Mason’s humor sometimes went too far, as when he touched off a controversy in New York while campaigning for GOP mayoral candidate Rudolph Giuliani against Democrat David Dinkins, who was Black. Mason had to apologize after saying, among other things, that Jews would vote for Dinkins out of guilt.  

Felder, his longtime friend, told the AP that Mason had a Talmudic outlook on life: “That whatever you would say to him, he would start an argument with you.”  

He is survived by his wife, producer Jyll Rosenfeld, and a daughter, Sheba. 
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Tens of thousands of people protested in Australia, France, Italy and Greece on Saturday, sparking clashes with police as they railed against COVID-19 measures and government sanctions against the unvaccinated aimed at prodding more people into getting their shots.Dozens of protesters were arrested after an unauthorized march in Sydney, with the city’s police minister calling those who took part “morons.”Organizers had dubbed the protest a freedom rally. Attendees carried signs and banners reading “Wake up Australia” and “Drain the Swamp.”In France, where police deployed tear gas and a water cannon against some protesters, an estimated 160,000 took to the streets in nationwide protests against President Emmanuel Macron’s health pass that will drastically curtail access to restaurants and public spaces for unvaccinated people.’Don’t touch our children'”Freedom, freedom,” chanted demonstrators in France, carrying placards denouncing “Macron, Tyrant,” “Big Pharma shackles freedom” or saying “No to the pass of shame.”The demonstrations highlight the conflict globally between the advice of the World Health Organization and other public health agencies and people who for one reason or another refuse to be vaccinated.In Indonesia and the United Kingdom, governments have eased pandemic restrictions even in the face of surging cases of coronavirus infection.Meanwhile, around 5,000 people demonstrated in Athens, carrying placards touting slogans such as, “Don’t touch our children,” according to an AFP journalist at the scene.Thousands of people protested in at least 80 cities across Italy as Rome tries to slow an upturn in COVID-19 infections. Most were not wearing masks.The Green Pass, an extension of the EU’s digital COVID certificate, will be required starting Aug. 6 for anyone who wants to enter cinemas, museums, indoor swimming pools or sports stadiums, or eat indoors at restaurants.It will serve as proof bearers have either been vaccinated, undergone a recent negative COVID-19 test, or recovered from a coronavirus infection.The decision Thursday to make the pass mandatory for many activities saw a boom in vaccine bookings, up 200% in Italy’s smaller regions, according to COVID-19 emergency chief Francesco Figliuolo.Half of Australia in lockdownEarlier in Sydney, demonstrators pelted officers with potted plants and bottles of water as they defied a monthlong stay-at-home order, a day after authorities suggested the restrictions could remain in place until October.New South Wales state Premier Gladys Berejiklian said she was “utterly disgusted” by the protesters whose “selfish actions have compromised the safety of all of us.”Police said they issued nearly 100 fines and arrested 57 people.In Melbourne, six people were arrested. police said.New South Wales Police Minister David Elliott said a team of detectives would be scouring footage to identify and charge as many people as possible in the coming days.”Sydney isn’t immune from morons,” he said.Sydney, a city of more than 5 million people, is struggling to contain an outbreak of the delta variant, first identified in India and now spreading globally.After escaping much of the early pandemic unscathed, about half of Australia’s 25 million people are now in lockdown across several cities.There is growing anger at the restrictions and the conservative government’s failure to provide adequate vaccine supplies.Just 11% of the population is fully vaccinated.Harder to put off shotsIn France, as elsewhere in Europe, the government is making it harder for reluctant citizens to put off getting their shots.Legislation now being considered by lawmakers will make vaccinations compulsory for certain professions, while the controversial health pass will severely restrict social life for holdouts starting at the end of this month.There were signs the tougher measures announced on July 13 were having the desired effect: 48% of the population were fully vaccinated as of Friday, up 8 percentage points from July 10.While more than three-quarters of French people backed Macron’s measures, according to a July 13 Elabe poll for BFMTV, a sizeable and vocal minority do not.Elodie, 34, a care assistant at a Strasbourg nursing home, denounced “the blackmail of caregivers who were at the front line” during the first wave and who are now threatened” with “no more pay” and even being fired.”They’ve been lying to us since the beginning,” she said. 
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