Category: Entertainment

Paris — The makers of “Game of Thrones” return with “3 Body Problem,” the adaptation of an iconic Chinese sci-fi trilogy.  

It premieres this weekend at the South by Southwest Festival in Texas before launching on Netflix on March 21. 

Showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss, coming off their huge hit with “Game of Thrones,” have liberally translated from the books by Liu Cixin, which has already been adapted for Chinese TV.  

The trilogy of books, which began with “The Three-Body Problem” in 2008, jumps between countries, eras and protagonists as Earth confronts an existential threat. It is considered a sci-fi landmark.  

“Making ‘Game of Thrones’ was the greatest experience of our lives, but we spent 10 solid years living in that fictional world, so we wanted something that presented a new set of challenges on every level,” Weiss said. 

“It’s the story of an impending threat, but it’s tethered by and centered around this core group of characters,” said Benioff. 

The cast includes three of the main actors from “Game of Thrones”: John Bradley as an Oxford scientist, Liam Cunningham as the head of an intelligence agency and Jonathan Pryce as an oil tycoon.  

The showrunners also brought back key members of the effects and production crew — as well as composer Ramin Djawadi — to try to achieve the same grandiose and polished style.   

It was shot to a speedy nine-month schedule across England, Spain, the United Nations headquarters in New York and Cape Canaveral in Florida.  

“Between climate change and the pandemic, we’ve gotten a glimpse into how people in the world react differently to a global threat,” said Weiss. “We see a similar spectrum of reactions in ‘3 Body Problem,’ which resonates with so many of us now.” 
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Washington — A U.N. report released Friday about the prevalence of female genital mutilation around the globe is drawing attention to the practice among the Dawoodi Bohra community, a Muslim minority sect based in India.

India is not on the UNICEF list of 31 countries released Friday. But the extent of FGM in India, although small relative to its population and long shrouded in secrecy, is coming into the open.

The ritual is mostly practiced by the Dawoodi Bohras, a subsect of the Ismaili branch of Shia Islam with an estimated 1 to 2 million followers around the globe. Recent surveys show that as many as 80% of Bohra girls undergo genital mutilation as a religious right of passage.

“We are still significant, even if our numbers are few,” said Aarefa Johari, a Dawoodi Bohra activist and co-founder of Sahiyo, an anti-FGM advocacy group. “Injustices and harmful practices must be opposed because they are wrong, not because of the number of people they affect.”

Affluent and politically influential, most Dawoodi Bohras live in India’s Gujarat province, with smaller communities thriving in Pakistan, Yemen, East Africa, the Middle East, Australia and North America.

The World Health Organization defines FGM, also known as female genital cutting, as “procedures involving the partial or total removal of the external female genitalia or other injury to the female genital organs for nonmedical reasons.” The organization says the practice has no health benefits and classifies it as a violation of the human rights of girls and women.

The UNICEF report, released on International Women’s Day, shows that more than 230 million girls and women alive today have undergone FGM, an increase of 30 million compared with data released eight years ago. Africa accounts for over 144 million of the total, followed by Asia with over 80 million, and the Middle East with 6 million.

Shelby Quast, an international human rights lawyer, said India should have been “absolutely” included in the UNICEF report.

Noting that FGM is practiced in at least 92 countries, she said the report captures “just the tip of the iceberg.”

“We can’t eliminate FGM by 2030 if we’re not looking at it in all the countries where it exists,” Quast said in an interview.

The method practiced in the Dawoodi Bohra community involves the cutting of a part of the clitoral hood. The Bohras deny it’s a form of genital mutilation. They prefer the term khatna, or female circumcision, and say it is safe. Although not endorsed by most Muslim scholars, the Dawoodi Bohras see it as a religious duty.

Until recent years, the practice was little-known outside the close-knit community. The issue came to light after a 2011 online campaign launched by survivors. Others came forward with harrowing stories of trauma.

Court cases in Australia and the United States exposed its prevalence among diaspora communities.

In 2016, three Dawoodi Bohras in Australia were sentenced to 15 months in prison for violating the country’s FGM ban.

In 2017, four members of the community in the U.S., including two doctors, were charged with performing FGM on at least six minor girls. A federal judge later dismissed the charges as unconstitutional, but the case put the spotlight on the Dawoodi Bohra community’s practice of FGM.

Spurred by the publicity, community activists and human rights advocates sprang into action to shed light on the problem.

Research by Johari’s group revealed that FGM was also practiced by small communities in India’s Kerala state.

Female genital mutilation was long associated with Africa. But the recent “discovery” of FGM in India and other Asian communities has shown that it’s a global problem, Johari said.

“I believe it has important implications for the global movement to end it,” said Johari, herself a survivor.

Like many Dawoodi Bohra girls, Johari was “cut” at the age of 7. The physical effects of the ritual sometimes extend into adulthood. But Johari considers herself among the fortunate; she was spared the complications.

“What impacted me at a later age, however, was the realization and the understanding of what had been done to me,” Johari said via email from Mumbai. “When you are cut as a young child, you have no way of knowing what your original anatomy was like, how much was cut, and how it will affect your sexual experiences later.

“[FGM] supporters in the community like to claim that our type of ‘mild’ cut makes no difference to sexual life; some even claim it enhances sexual pleasure,” Johari said. “But none of them have a frame of reference, and the uncertainty, the not knowing, leaves me feeling frustrated, helpless and angry.”

The discord has divided the community. Syedna Mufaddal Saifuddin, the group’s spiritual leader, has defied calls for a ban.

“Whatever the world says, we should be strong and firm. … It must be done,” he said during a religious sermon in Mumbai in 2016.

Meanwhile, Indian government officials have wavered on the issue, and a push to criminalize FGM has stalled in India’s Supreme Court, according to Lakshmi Anantnarayan, a human rights activist and researcher.

Some officials initially backed a prohibition only to change their position and deny FGM’s existence, Anantnarayan said.

A petition filed in 2017 with India’s Supreme Court demanding an FGM ban has triggered strong pushback from the powerful Bohra community.

The petition calls FGM a discriminatory practice and a gross violation of the rights of women and girls. But Bohra leaders, joined by a group of Bohra women, have defended it as an “essential” religious ritual protected under India’s Constitution.

The Supreme Court has tasked two panels with examining the constitutionality of female genital cutting. A decision in the case is still pending.

The delay “clearly demonstrates the lack of political will amongst legal authorities, policymakers and law enforcement to prioritize protecting girls from FGM in India,” Anantnarayan said in an email. “Like so many other issues of violence against women in India, FGM/C too continues to be practiced with impunity as the country just turns a blind eye to the plight of women and girls.”

The Indian Embassy in Washington did not respond to a request for comment.

India is not the only Asian country without an FGM ban. The ritual persists in at least 10 countries on the continent, all without legal prohibition.

In the face of opposition from the powerful Bohra community, many activists view a ban as unlikely. But they don’t see changing laws as a panacea. Instead, they find hope in shifting mindsets.

Mariya Taher, another co-founder of Sahiyo and herself a survivor, noted that the same survey that revealed an 80% prevalence rate of FGM among the Bohras also found that 81% opposed continuing the tradition.

“The assumption was that everyone thought it was important to continue,” she said in an interview.

She said she learned from talking to fellow Dawoodi Bohras in the U.S. that some mosque leaders have been quietly urging mothers to spare their daughters, despite the group’s official stance.

“I think social change takes a long time, but it’s heartening to see that as this issue gets more attention, we are seeing that attitudes towards it are shifting,” she said.
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WASHINGTON — The Islamic holiday of Ramadan is being observed this year as the Israel-Hamas war surges in Gaza, where the United Nations is warning of a growing humanitarian crisis.

Imam Talib Shareef of Masjid Muhammad, the Nation’s Mosque, in Washington said there will be differences in how Muslims observe this year because of the conflict.

Other than organizing prayers for the community, the mosque is “more engaged in service and feeding; we actually feed at the masjid and [also at] shelters, and we also go to other faith communities,” said Shareef, who served for more than 30 years in the U.S. Air Force and helped to establish the first Islamic military chaplain in 1993.

“I do expect that … religious communities are going to be trying to come together,” he said, noting that his mosque also works with churches and gives food to others in the community.

“Obviously [the conflict] is going to be on people’s hearts, on people’s souls, it’s bothering people,” Shareef said.

Nearly 2 billion Muslims around the world will begin observing the Islamic holiday Ramadan, which is expected to begin on March 10 or 11, depending on the sighting of the moon.

During the month of Ramadan, Muslims abstain from food, drink, smoking, gossip and sexual relations from sunrise to sunset. Fasting is meant to bring Muslims closer to God and help them better empathize with those who are less fortunate.

US Muslims

In the United States, the Muslim population is about 3.45 million, which accounts for slightly more than 1% of the population, according to Pew Research.

Depending on where Muslims live in the United States, their experience can vary. In some rural areas, Muslims may not have access to a mosque or a community where they can practice their faith.

This is particularly true for immigrants who move to areas without a large Muslim population.

Jemal Yasin, who immigrated to the U.S. from Ethiopia in 2008 to do postgraduate research at the University of Vermont, described his first experience in the United States as “a little bit lonely.”

He said there was a community of Somali immigrants, though he didn’t get a chance to pray with them.

During that first year in the States, he said he had to “pray in my room by myself,” which he said was a typical experience of many Muslim immigrants.

Now, Yasin is president of the board of directors of a the First Hijrah Foundation in Washington.

The FHF started as a small organization that aimed to “promote and preserve the Islamic heritage,” and “foster the Islamic principles of brotherhood, equality, mutual assistance and teachings of peace, love and justice,” according to its website.

Initially, the organization didn’t have a building, and members of the foundation would meet at one another’s houses. It wasn’t until 2005 that their current building was officially secured, said Yasin.

“This is a center for Muslims, all Muslims. … So, when you come here, you see [people of many] backgrounds – African Americans, Ethiopians, Somalians, Arabs – they will come pray together and break fast together, so this is a place for everybody,” Yasin said.

He added that the foundation works with the community and organizes events for Muslims, before, during and after Ramadan.

When he moved to Washington later in 2008 Yasin became involved with the foundation and was able to be part of a larger Muslim community.

Ramadan observations are becoming more common in the United States, with many organizations hosting events to observe the month.

Shareef said, “We used to have more … private iftars in the past, and now they’re more open … and we are able to share more.”

After sunset, Muslims typically gather for iftar — the breaking of the fast and the most important meal of the day.

Yasin said the foundation helped organize a bazaar on Sunday to help the community prepare for Ramadan. Traditional clothing, incense and foods, such as dates, were sold.

During Ramadan, the First Hijrah Foundation will be providing free iftars for the community each night.

Ramadan this year

The ongoing Israel-Hamas war is the result of an October 7 terror attack in which Hamas crossed into Israel, killing more than 1,200 people and taking more than 240 civilians hostage. The Israeli military response has killed more than 30,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s health ministry.

Negotiators are pushing for a possible cease-fire in the Israel-Hamas conflict ahead of the start of Ramadan.
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GENEVA — Former Wimbledon and French Open champion Simona Halep had her four-year doping ban cut to nine months by the top court for global sport on Tuesday, making the former world number one eligible to return to competition immediately. 

Halep was initially banned for four years for two separate anti-doping rule violations. But the Lausanne-based Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) ruled that her suspension should be reduced to nine months, a period she has already served. 

“The CAS Panel has unanimously determined that the four-year period of ineligibility imposed by the ITF (International Tennis Federation) Independent Tribunal is to be reduced to a period of ineligibility of nine (9) months starting on 7 October 2022, which period expired on 6 July 2023,” CAS said in a statement. 

The 32-year-old Romanian was suspended in October 2022 after she tested positive for roxadustat – a banned drug that stimulates the production of red blood cells – at the U.S. Open that year. 

She was also charged with another doping offense last year due to irregularities in her athlete biological passport (ABP), a method designed to monitor different blood parameters over time to reveal potential doping. 

Halep had vigorously denied the charges against her. 

Halep blamed contaminated supplements for her positive test at the U.S. Open and accused the International Tennis Integrity Agency (ITIA) of charging her with an ABP violation after the group of experts who assessed her profile learned her identity. 

An independent tribunal accepted Halep’s argument that she had taken contaminated supplements but said the volume she ingested could not have resulted in the concentration of roxadustat found in her positive sample. 

However, the CAS Panel said that while Halep should have been more careful when using the supplement, she did not bear significant fault for the violation.  

Also, the ABP charge was dismissed on the basis that the sample given in late 2022 was shortly after surgery and that Halep had said she was not going to compete for the rest of that year
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LONDON — The estate of Sinead O’Connor asked Donald Trump Monday not to play her music at campaign rallies, saying the late singer considered the former president a “biblical devil.”

Trump has played O’Connor’s biggest hit, “Nothing Compares 2 U,” at events as he campaigns for the Republican presidential nomination.

In a joint statement, O’Connor’s estate and her record label, Chrysalis, demanded Trump “desist from using her music immediately.”

It said the Irish singer, who died last year aged 56, “lived by a fierce moral code defined by honesty, kindness, fairness and decency towards her fellow human beings.”

“It was with outrage therefore that we learned that Donald Trump has been using her iconic performance of Nothing Compares 2 U at his political rallies,” the statement said.

“It is no exaggeration to say that Sinead would have been disgusted, hurt and insulted to have her work misrepresented in this way by someone who she herself referred to as a ‘biblical devil.’ As the guardians of her legacy, we demand that Donald Trump and his associates desist from using her music immediately.”

Fiery and outspoken, O’Connor was a critic of the Roman Catholic Church well before  

allegations of sexual abuse were widely reported, and she was open about her mental health struggles.

She was found unresponsive at her London home in July and pronounced dead at the scene. A coroner ruled that she died of natural causes.

O’Connor joins a growing list of artists who have objected to Trump using their songs, including Rihanna, Neil Young, Linkin Park, the late Tom Petty and Aerosmith’s Steven Tyler.

 
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Jerusalem — Israel on Sunday said it had asked lyricists to revise its proposed Eurovision Song Contest entries, potentially heading off a dispute with organizers over political content.

Authorities last week said Israel would not be able to participate in this year’s edition of the popular competition if organizers rejected the song choice, which reportedly referenced victims of Hamas’s October 7 attack on southern Israel that triggered the ongoing war in Gaza.

Eurovision rules ban political content.

In a statement on Sunday, Israeli public broadcaster Kan said President Isaac Herzog had called for “necessary adjustments” that would ensure Israel’s inclusion in the event, which it has won four times.

This year’s competition is set to be held in Sweden in May.

The Israeli broadcaster “contacted the lyricists of the two selected songs, ‘October Rain’ which was chosen in first place, and ‘Dance Forever’ which came in second place, and asked them to readapt the texts, while preserving their artistic freedom,” the statement said.

“Among the new texts that will be proposed, Kan will choose the song that will be sent to the Eurovision supervisory committee, so that it approves Israel’s participation in the competition.”

The selected song, to be performed by 20-year-old Russian-Israeli singer Eden Golan, will be revealed on March 10, the statement said.

One line from the original lyrics of “October Rain” read: “They were all good children, every one of them.”

“There is no air left to breathe, There is no place for me,” the song ends, according to Kan, which has published the lyrics in full on its website.

Israel in 1973 became the first non-European country to enter Eurovision, and its participation and hosting of the event have regularly run into controversy.

In 2019, Icelandic band Hatari, who previously challenged Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to a Nordic folk wrestling match, made pro-Palestinian statements during the vote count in Tel Aviv.

Organizers also gave US pop icon Madonna a ticking off after her dancers flouted political neutrality rules by wearing Israeli and Palestinian flags on their costumes.

This year’s competition comes against the backdrop of the war, sparked by the Hamas attack which resulted in the deaths of around 1,160 people in Israel, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.

Militants also took about 250 hostages, with 130 still held in Gaza although 31 are believed to be dead, Israeli officials said.

Israel’s military response has killed at least 30,410 people in Gaza, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory.

Kan late last month said it had “no intention to replace the song,” threatening to withdraw unless the European Broadcasting Union which oversees the song contest approves its entry.

But Herzog “emphasized that it is precisely at a time when those who hate us are seeking to repress and boycott the State of Israel” that the country “must raise its voice… loud and clear in every world forum,” Sunday’s Kan statement said.

 
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LONDON — Singer-songwriter Raye was the big winner Saturday at the BRIT Awards, the biggest night in British music, setting a new record for most prizes in one night at the annual ceremony.

Raye won six awards, including for artist of the year, album of the year for My 21st Century Blues and song of the year for Escapism.

The 26-year-old also triumphed in the genre category for R&B act and was named best new artist. Her tally of seven nods had broken the record for the most nominations by a single artist in any one year, according to the annual ceremony’s organizers, the British Phonographic Industry (BPI).

Raye, who parted ways with her record label in 2021 to work as an independent artist after she said the label had withheld her debut album, began early celebrations this week, when she was named BRITs Songwriter of the Year. She is the first woman to win the award since its launch in 2022.

“You just don’t understand what this means to me,” a tearful Raye said in her acceptance speech for album of the year, while standing next to her grandmother, whom she also thanked for “her prayers.”

“I’m so proud of this album. I’m in love with music. All I ever wanted to be was an artist and now I’m an artist with an album of the year.”

Jungle won group of the year, while rock band Bring Me the Horizon won the alternative/rock act category, beating the likes of Blur and The Rolling Stones.

Blur, who had three nominations, went home empty-handed.

Dua Lipa, who also had three nominations, won pop act.

More than half, 55%, of this year’s nominations featured women, either as a solo artist or as part of an all-woman group, the BPI said.

Artist of the year is a gender-neutral category now counting 10 nominees after organizers doubled its number following an outcry over an all-male list of contenders last year.

U.S. singer SZA won the gender-neutral international artist of the year category, which also now counts 10 nominees, beating the likes of Taylor Swift and Miley Cyrus. The latter won international song of the year for her hit Flowers.

Indie rock band boygenius won international group of the year.

Ahead of the awards, Kylie Minogue was named as this year’s BRITs Global Icon, while indie rock band The Last Dinner Party were revealed as winners of the rising star award. 
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VATICAN CITY — Pope Francis, who has been suffering from influenza, said he delegated the reading of a speech at a ceremony Saturday to an aide because he was unable to read it due to bronchitis. 

“I have prepared a speech but as you can see, I am unable to read it because of bronchitis. I have asked Monsignor [Filippo] Ciampanelli to read it for me,” a hoarse-sounding pope said. 

The speech was for the opening ceremony of the judicial year of the Vatican tribunal. 

Afterward, the pope was able to meet German Chancellor Olaf Scholz during an audience at the Vatican. 

Francis, 87, has had several health issues recently. 

On Wednesday he made a brief trip to a Roman hospital for a checkup after he missed reading at his weekly audience, saying he had “a bit of cold.” 

He canceled appointments Monday and last Saturday due to what the Vatican said was a mild flu, but he gave his regular weekly address to the crowds in St Peter’s Square on Sunday. 

The pope was forced to cancel a planned trip to a COP28 climate meeting in Dubai at the start of December because of the effects of influenza and lung inflammation. 

In January, he was unable to complete a speech owing to “a touch of bronchitis.” Later that month he said he was doing better despite “some aches and pains.” 

As a young man in his native Argentina, Francis had part of a lung removed. 
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NEW YORK — Iris Apfel, a textile expert, interior designer and fashion celebrity known for her eccentric style, has died. She was 102.

Her death was confirmed by her commercial agent, Lori Sale, who called Apfel “extraordinary.” No cause of death was given. It was also announced on her verified Instagram page on Friday, which a day earlier had celebrated that Leap Day represented her 102nd-and-a-half birthday.

Born Aug. 29, 1921, Apfel was famous for her irreverent, eye-catching outfits, mixing haute couture and oversized costume jewelry. A classic Apfel look would, for instance, pair a feather boa with strands of chunky beads, bangles and a jacket decorated with Native American beadwork.

With her big, round, black-rimmed glasses, bright red lipstick and short white hair, she stood out at every fashion show she attended.

Her style was the subject of museum exhibits and a documentary film, Iris, directed by Albert Maysles.

“I’m not pretty, and I’ll never be pretty, but it doesn’t matter,” she once said. “I have something much better. I have style.”

Apfel enjoyed late-in-life fame on social media, amassing nearly 3 million followers on Instagram, where her profile declares: “More is more & Less is a Bore.” On TikTok, she drew 215,000 followers as she waxed wise on things fashion and style and promoted recent collaborations.

“Being stylish and being fashionable are two entirely different things,” she said in one TikTok video. “You can easily buy your way into being fashionable. Style, I think is in your DNA. It implies originality and courage.”

She never retired, telling Today: “I think retiring at any age is a fate worse than death. Just because a number comes up doesn’t mean you have to stop.”

“Working alongside her was the honor of a lifetime. I will miss her daily calls, always greeted with the familiar question: “What have you got for me today?” Sale said in a statement. “Testament to her insatiable desire to work. She was a visionary in every sense of the word. She saw the world through a unique lens – one adorned with giant, distinctive spectacles that sat atop her nose.”

Apfel was an expert on textiles and antique fabrics. She and her husband, Carl, owned a textile manufacturing company, Old World Weavers, and specialized in restoration work, including projects at the White House under six different U.S. presidents. Apfel’s celebrity clients included Estee Lauder and Greta Garbo.

Apfel’s own fame blew up in 2005 when the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute in New York City hosted a show about her called Rara Avis, Latin for “rare bird.” The museum described her style as “both witty and exuberantly idiosyncratic.”

“Her originality is typically revealed in her mixing of high and low fashions — Dior haute couture with flea market finds, 19th-century ecclesiastical vestments with Dolce & Gabbana lizard trousers,” it said. The museum said her “layered combinations” defied “aesthetic conventions” and “even at their most extreme and baroque” represented a “boldly graphic modernity.”

The Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Massachusetts, was one of several museums around the country that hosted a traveling version of the show. Apfel later decided to donate hundreds of pieces to the Peabody — including couture gowns — to help them build what she termed “a fabulous fashion collection.” The Museum of Fashion & Lifestyle near Apfel’s winter home in Palm Beach, Florida, also plans a gallery dedicated to displaying items from Apfel’s collection.

Apfel was born in New York City to Samuel and Sadye Barrel. Her mother owned a boutique.

Apfel’s fame in her later years included appearances in ads for brands like M.A.C. cosmetics and Kate Spade. She also designed a line of accessories and jewelry for Home Shopping Network, collaborated with H&M on a sold-out-in-minutes collection of brightly-colored apparel, jewelry and shoes, put out a makeup line with Ciaté London, an eyeglass collection with Zenni and partnered with Ruggable on floor coverings.

In a 2017 interview with AP at age 95, she said her favorite contemporary designers included Ralph Rucci, Isabel Toledo and Naeem Khan, but added: “I have so much, I don’t go looking.” Asked for her fashion advice, she said: “Everybody should find her own way. I’m a great one for individuality. I don’t like trends. If you get to learn who you are and what you look like and what you can handle, you’ll know what to do.”

She called herself the “accidental icon,” which became the title of a book she published in 2018 filled with her mementos and style musings. Odes to Apfel are abundant, from a Barbie in her likeness to T-shirts, glasses, artwork and dolls.

Apfel’s husband died in 2015. They had no children.
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ANCHORAGE, Alaska — The Iditarod, the annual sled dog race celebrating Alaska’s official state sport, is set to get under way Saturday with a new focus on safety after five dogs died and eight were injured in collisions with snowmobiles while training on shared, multiuse trails.

For the first time, mushers who line up for the ceremonial start in Anchorage will have the chance to snag light-up, neon harnesses or necklaces for their dogs before they begin the days-long race that takes the dog-and-human sled teams about 1,600 kilometers over Alaska’s unforgiving terrain.

The 38 mushers will trace a course across two mountain ranges, the frozen Yukon River and along the ice-covered Bering Sea. In about 10 days, they will come off the ice and onto Main Street in the old Gold Rush town of Nome for the last push to the finish line.

Mushers always have contended with Alaska’s deep winter darkness and whiteout conditions. But the recent dog deaths even while training have put a focus on making the four-legged athletes easier to see at all times. Mushers typically wear a bright headlamp for visibility, but that doesn’t protect lead dogs running about 18 meters in front of the sled.

“I can’t make snowmachiners act responsibly, it’s just not going to happen,” said Dutch Johnson, manager of the August Foundation kennel, which finds homes for retired racing sled dogs. “But I can help make dogs more visible.”

Two dogs were killed and seven injured in November on a team belonging to five-time Iditarod champion Dallas Seavey on a remote Alaska highway used as a training trail in the winter. It has recently become more popular with snowmobilers, bikers and other users, making it more dangerous for dogs.

Seavey said in a social media post that the snowmobile was heading in the opposite direction at about 105 kph when it slammed into the lead dogs on the team. The snowmobile driver was later cited for negligent driving.

In December, musher Mike Parker was running dogs for veteran Iditarod competitor Jim Lanier on the Denali Highway when a snowmobile driven by a professional rider struck the dog team. Three dogs died and another was injured. The driver, Erik Johnson, was testing snowmobiles for his employer, Minnesota-based manufacturer Polaris, and both were cited for reckless driving.

Julie St. Louis, the co-founder and director for the August Foundation, is close to the Lanier family and knew the dogs involved. When brainstorming with Johnson, they decided to use the nonprofit foundation to help outfit the dogs with harnesses and necklaces.

“It was one way we could step up and do something that was still within our mission, because we’re all about keeping the dogs safe,” she said.

The August Foundation has since secured an $8,500 grant from the Polaris Foundation and raised another $2,500 to buy 400 light-up harnesses, which were handed out to mushers at sled dog races in Fairbanks and Bethel earlier this winter.

The harnesses burn with bright neon-like colors that help illuminate the dogs in the darkness of the Alaska winter and pierce the clouds of snow sometimes kicked up by snowmachines, what Alaskans call snowmobiles.

They are now accepting donations to outfit as many dog teams as possible. Providing each team with four harnesses or lighted necklaces and one illuminated vest for the musher costs $120. A separate effort, called Light Up the Lead Dogs, is raising money to buy lighted collars for dogs.

In each of the accidents, Johnson said the snowmobile that hit the dogs was riding behind another snowmobile, which obscured visibility by kicking up snow.

“What I’ve witnessed with these harnesses is they make a halo effect in that dust,” Johnson said. “So they do give you some warning of where the lead dogs are.”

Jeri Rodriquez, the vice president of the Anchorage Snowmobile Club, said the multiuser trails are getting busier and all users need to do all they can to be seen.

Johnson will hand out the lighted harnesses Saturday at the Iditarod’s ceremonial start in Alaska’s biggest city. The fan-friendly event includes a musher taking an auction winner in their sled over about 18 kilometers of trail. The race’s real start comes Sunday in Willow, about 121 kilometers north of Anchorage.

The dog deaths are the latest pressure point for the Iditarod, which began in 1973 and has taken hits in recent years from the pandemic, climate change, the loss of sponsors and the retirement of several big-name mushing champions with few to take their place.

The ranks of mushers participating this year dwindled even more last month as accusations of violence against women by two top mushers embroiled the Iditarod. Both were initially disqualified officially for violating the race’s conduct rules. One was reinstated later but wound up scratching because he had leased his dogs to other mushers and could not reassemble his team in time.

Three former champions remain in the race: 2019 champion Pete Kaiser, defending winner Ryan Redington and Seavey, who is looking for a record-breaking sixth championship.
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Exploring the relationship between humanity and nature, the Reach to Forest international festival brings artists together to plant ideas among viewers about the environment and conservation. From the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, VOA’s Cristina Caicedo Smit has the story. Camera: Phillip Datcher
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Paris — The organizers of the Paris Olympics took possession of the newly built athletes’ village on Thursday on schedule, reinforcing growing confidence that they will be ready for the Games.

At an inauguration ceremony in northern Paris, chief organizer Tony Estanguet received a symbolic key for the complex in front of VIPs including President Emmanuel Macron.

“It’s a demonstration that we have honored our commitments,” Macron told reporters, who told workers they should be “proud” of delivering the village “on time and in budget.”

Organisers will spend the next four months fitting out the village with more than 300,000 items of furniture and decoration ahead of the first arrivals by athletes from July 18.

The site comprises around 40 different low-rise tower blocks and will include a 24-hour restaurant, an alcohol-free bar and leisure area, as well as training facilities.

The French state has contributed 646 million euros ($700 million) in public money, with the remainder from France’s biggest real estate companies which have developed different areas of the 52-hectare site.

After the Olympics and Paralympics, a third of the 2,800 apartments will be sold off to private homeowners, a third will be used for public housing, and the rest will be for rent including for students.

Each building is different, with stark differences in facade design and color.

“We wanted architectural diversity which is a feature of European towns,” Nicolas Ferrand, head of the games infrastructure group Solideo, told Macron.

Seine-Saint-Denis is the poorest and most crime-ridden area of mainland France and is the focus of public investment for the Games.
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Srinagar, Indian administered Kashmir — The blanket of snow covering one of the prominent cricket grounds at the Magam neighborhood of Budgam district on the Indian side of Kashmir has melted. The ground is set to host a monthlong local cricket tournament from March 3. Hundreds of youths from various parts of the valley will compete for a $3,000 cash prize.

Cricket, originating in Britain, was historically enjoyed for fitness and leisure. It is the second most popular sport worldwide after soccer with approximately 2 billion fans and is the most commonly played game in the Himalayan region. However, the sport has now become a source of income for thousands of individuals in Kashmir amid rising unemployment.

“Every year hundreds of tournaments are organized by local people without any help from the government. Thousands of people, including players, commentators, broadcasters, umpires, etcetera make a living by being part of these tournaments,” Mushtaq War, a local cricket tournament broadcaster on social media, told VOA. “The match fee varies according to the talent of an individual ranging from $10 to $75 per game,” he added.

According to War, everyone associated with local cricket tournaments makes enough money to support their families.

“Sixty-four teams will be part of the Magam tournament,” War said. “The entire money will be circulated among the people involved in the tournament directly or indirectly,” he added.

Imtiyaz Ahmad Munshi, a member of local cricket organization Cricket Fraternity Dalgate, told VOA that funds to host local tournaments primarily come from tournament fees and sponsorships provided by local businessmen.

“Teams hailing from north, south, and central Kashmir participate in these tournaments after paying the entry fee,” Munshi said. “Local businessmen support organizers by sponsoring these events,” he said, adding that sponsors in return receive benefits such as “tax reductions for promoting sports.”

Munish alleged organizers lack support from the Jammu Kashmir Cricket Association, or JKCA, a registered Society that runs cricket in Jammu and Kashmir, and J&K Sports Council, a government body responsible for the promotion and development of sports in J&K, despite the fact that they are promoting and encouraging youngsters to participate in sports related activities.

Majid Dar, a JKCA Cricket Development official, told VOA that the cricket body of Kashmir only facilities the events affiliated with BCCI, the governing body of Cricket in India. ‘We cannot provide any kind of facility to anyone. We have a busy schedule and besides all this we provide employment to 150 people in Jammu and Kashmir,” Dar said.

“JKCA is not visible when it comes to organizing local cricket tournaments. Moreover, J&K Sports Council charges a hefty amount from organizers to conduct cricket tournaments,” Munshi said. “We don’t refuse to pay the money but we expect the J&K Sports Council to maintain the fields at least,” he said, adding that at present even a brief drizzle renders the grounds unfit for play for several days due to “water accumulation.”

“Players and organizers have on multiple occasions contributed from their own pockets to maintain the condition of the ground,” Munshi said. “Youth expect the same level of commitment from the government,” he added.

Nuzhat Gull, secretary of the J&K Sports Council, told VOA her office collects fees from organizers of commercial tournaments, clarifying that such events do not fall under the Prime Minister’s Sports Development Scheme. The scheme is designed to enhance sports infrastructure and foster sporting activities throughout India.

“We don’t impose fees for non-commercial sporting events,” Gull told VOA. “However, for commercial cricket tournaments organizers are required to cover expenses and the department doesn’t offer exemptions in such instances,” she said.

Faisal Dar, a young cricketer from the Dalgate neighborhood of Srinagar, expressed disappointment and highlighted the disparity between the efforts of local communities and the government in actively involving youth in sports.

“Government officials often only help those they favor leaving the rest feeling ignored,” Dar said. “We would have been happier if the government built better sports facilities and helped folks like us who rely on local tournaments for a living,” he added. Gull told VOA the criticisms of the council are “all baseless,” and refused further comment.

Dar said they approached authorities many times to install high-intensity artificial light to promote night sports in Kashmir, especially in Srinagar and other major cities and towns.

“Not much has been done regarding the installation of the night lights,” Dar said. “Locals are taking on responsibilities that should be handled by the government yet the government claims credit for everything,” he added.

The people organizing local events, Dar said, have saved the lives of many individuals. He said that many athletes were depressed or were using drugs because of unemployment.

“These organizers let them play cricket again and even helped them find jobs thus allowing them a fresh beginning in life,” he said. “If this is not service to humanity, I wonder what is?” he said, adding Kashmir needs such attempts or else people will suffer a lot “physically as well as mentally.” 
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NEW YORK — Leap year. It’s a delight for the calendar and math nerds among us. So how did it all begin and why?

Have a look at some of the numbers, history and lore behind the (not quite) every four-year phenom that adds a 29th day to February.

By the numbers

The math is mind-boggling in a layperson sort of way and down to fractions of days and minutes. There’s even a leap second occasionally, but there’s no hullabaloo when that happens.

The thing to know is that leap year exists, in large part, to keep the months in sync with annual events, including equinoxes and solstices, according to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory at the California Institute of Technology.

It’s a correction to counter the fact that Earth’s orbit isn’t precisely 365 days a year. The trip takes about six hours longer than that, NASA says.

Contrary to what some might believe, however, not every four years is a leaper. Adding a leap day every four years would make the calendar longer by more than 44 minutes, according to the National Air & Space Museum.

Later, on a calendar yet to come (we’ll get to it), it was decreed that years divisible by 100 not follow the four-year leap day rule unless they are also divisible by 400, the JPL notes. In the past 500 years, there was no leap day in 1700, 1800 and 1900, but 2000 had one. In the next 500 years, if the practice is followed, there will be no leap day in 2100, 2200, 2300 and 2500.

Still with us?

The next leap years are 2028, 2032 and 2036.

What would happen without a leap day?

Eventually, nothing good in terms of when major events fall, when farmers plant and how seasons align with the sun and the moon.

“Without the leap years, after a few hundred years we will have summer in November,” said Younas Khan, a physics instructor at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. “Christmas will be in summer. There will be no snow. There will be no feeling of Christmas.”

Who came up with leap year?

The short answer: It evolved.

Ancient civilizations used the cosmos to plan their lives, and there are calendars dating back to the Bronze Age. They were based on either the phases of the moon or the sun, as various calendars are today. Usually they were “lunisolar,” using both.

Now hop on over to the Roman Empire and Julius Caesar. He was dealing with major seasonal drift on calendars used in his neck of the woods. They dealt badly with drift by adding months. He was also navigating many calendars starting in many ways in the vast Roman Empire.

He introduced his Julian calendar in 46 BCE. It was purely solar and counted a year at 365.25 days, so once every four years an extra day was added. Before that, the Romans counted a year at 355 days, at least for a time.

But still, under Julius, there was drift. There were too many leap years! The solar year isn’t precisely 365.25 days! It’s 365.242 days, said Nick Eakes, an astronomy educator at the Morehead Planetarium and Science Center at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill.

Thomas Palaima, a classics professor at the University of Texas at Austin, said adding periods of time to a year to reflect variations in the lunar and solar cycles was done by the ancients. The Athenian calendar, he said, was used in the fourth, fifth and sixth centuries with 12 lunar months.

That didn’t work for seasonal religious rites. The drift problem led to “intercalating” an extra month periodically to realign with lunar and solar cycles, Palaima said.

The Julian calendar was 0.0078 days (11 minutes and 14 seconds) longer than the tropical year, so errors in timekeeping still gradually accumulated, according to NASA. But stability increased, Palaima said.

The Julian calendar was the model used by the Western world for hundreds of years. Enter Pope Gregory XIII, who calibrated further. His Gregorian calendar took effect in the late 16th century. It remains in use today and, clearly, isn’t perfect or there would be no need for leap year. But it was a big improvement, reducing drift to mere seconds.

Why did he step in? Well, Easter. It was coming later in the year over time, and he fretted that events related to Easter like the Pentecost might bump up against pagan festivals. The pope wanted Easter to remain in the spring.

He eliminated some extra days accumulated on the Julian calendar and tweaked the rules on leap day. It’s Pope Gregory and his advisers who came up with the really gnarly math on when there should or shouldn’t be a leap year.

“If the solar year was a perfect 365.25 then we wouldn’t have to worry about the tricky math involved,” Eakes said.

What’s the deal with leap year and marriage?

Bizarrely, leap day comes with lore about women popping the marriage question to men. It was mostly benign fun, but it came with a bite that reinforced gender roles.

There’s distant European folklore. One story places the idea of women proposing in fifth century Ireland, with St. Bridget appealing to St. Patrick to offer women the chance to ask men to marry them, according to historian Katherine Parkin in a 2012 paper in the Journal of Family History.

Nobody really knows where it all began.

In 1904, syndicated columnist Elizabeth Meriwether Gilmer, aka Dorothy Dix, summed up the tradition this way: “Of course people will say … that a woman’s leap year prerogative, like most of her liberties, is merely a glittering mockery.”

The pre-Sadie Hawkins tradition, however serious or tongue-in-cheek, could have empowered women but merely perpetuated stereotypes. The proposals were to happen via postcard, but many such cards turned the tables and poked fun at women instead.

Advertising perpetuated the leap year marriage game. A 1916 ad by the American Industrial Bank and Trust Co. read thusly: “This being Leap Year day, we suggest to every girl that she propose to her father to open a savings account in her name in our own bank.”

There was no breath of independence for women due to leap day.

Should we pity the leaplings?

Being born in a leap year on a leap day certainly is a talking point. But it can be kind of a pain from a paperwork perspective. Some governments and others requiring forms to be filled out and birthdays to be stated stepped in to declare what date was used by leaplings for such things as drivers’ licenses, whether Feb. 28 or March 1.

Technology has made it far easier for leap babies to jot down their Feb. 29 milestones, though there can be glitches in terms of health systems, insurance policies and with other businesses and organizations that don’t have that date built in.

There are about 5 million people worldwide who share the leap birthday out of about 8 billion people on the planet. Shelley Dean, 23, in Seattle, Washington, chooses a rosy attitude about being a leapling. Growing up, she had normal birthday parties each year, but an extra special one when leap years rolled around. Since, as an adult, she marks that non-leap period between Feb. 28 and March 1 with a low-key “whew.”

This year is different.

“It will be the first birthday that I’m going to celebrate with my family in eight years, which is super exciting, because the last leap day I was on the other side of the country in New York for college,” she said. “It’s a very big year.”
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In South Africa, skateboarding is enjoying something of a revolution. The once predominantly male pursuit is attracting more and more women. VOA’s Zaheer Cassim reports from Johannesburg.
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