Month: August 2019

Social media users are fueling a burgeoning appetite for acquiring wild otters and other endangered animals as pets, conservationists say, warning the trend could push species toward extinction.

Popular Instagrammers posting selfies with their pet otter may simply be seeking to warm the hearts of their sometimes hundreds of thousands of followers, but animal protection groups say the trend is posing an existential threat to the silky mammal.

“The illegal trade in otters has suddenly increased exponentially,” Nicole Duplaix, who co-chairs the Otter Specialist Group at the International Union for Conservation of Nature, told AFP.

All Asian otter species have long been listed as vulnerable or endangered after facing decades of shrinking habitats and illegal trade in their pelts.

But conservationists say the recent surge in social media hype around the creatures has sparked such a frenzied demand for baby otters in Asian countries, Japan in particular, that it could drive entire species toward extinction.

Parties to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES), currently in Geneva to evaluate and fine-tune the treaty that manages trade in more than 35,000 species of plants and animals, will consider proposals to hike protection of two particularly imperiled otter species.

Dangerous cute factor

The Asian small-clawed otter and the smooth-coated otter are already listed as threatened under CITES Appendix II, but India, Nepal, Bangladesh and the Philippines are asking that they are moved to Appendix I, which would mean a full international trade ban.

Conservationists insist the move is vital, after both species have seen their numbers plunge at least 30% in three decades, and with the decline believed to have accelerated significantly in the past few years.

“This is especially being fueled by the desire to have otters as an exotic pet, and social media is really driving that,” Cassandra Koenen, who heads the Wildlife Not Pets campaign at World Animal Protection, told AFP.

Paul Todd of the Natural Resource Defense Council (NRDC) agreed.

“It is really remarkable to see how the latest trends in social media and social influencing have a direct correlation with the demise of species on the ground,” he told AFP.

Popular figures on Instagram and Facebook often rake in thousands of gushing comments about their otter pictures, such as “cuteness overload,” “otterly adorable,” and “want one!”

Duplaix acknowledged that otters are “very charismatic creatures,” saying “it is the cute factor that is causing their demise.”

Unseen suffering

The pictures mask the suffering of the naturally social mammals taken from the wild when they are held in captivity and isolation.

Koenen pointed to the numerous “funny videos” posted of pet otters turning in circles, saying that to a trained eye, it is obvious: “The reason the animal is spinning around is that it is in huge distress.”

Amid the growing demand for pet otters, hunters and fishermen in Indonesia and Thailand especially are increasingly killing adult otters and snatching the babies, which are caged and shipped off to become exotic pets.

The main destination is Japan, where one otter pup can fetch up to $10,000 (about 9,000 euros).

Otter cafes

Several “otter cafes” have also popped up in the country, with patrons urged to buy small pieces of food to feed the caged mammals and to snap a selfie with them while drinking a coffee.

“It is a very unnatural environment for them,” Koenen said, maintaining that they are often isolated in individual cages, given poor nutrition and little access to water.

Pet otters may have it better, but they still suffer from being far from their natural environment and away from the large family groups they lived with in the wild, she said.

Koenen also warned that smiling selfies with pet otters provide a “false narrative” about what it is like to live with the wild creatures, which smell and are prone to biting.

“They make very unsuitable pets,” she said.

Social media platforms have meanwhile made it too easy to purchase exotic pets like otters, she said, sparking impulse buys with little reflection over the implications of bringing a wild animal into one’s home.

Otters are not the only species suffering from a booming and often social-media fueled interest in exotic pets.

Among the 56 proposals on the table in Geneva for increased protection listings, 22 involve species, including lizards, geckos, tortoises and spiders, which suffer because of the multibillion-dollar exotic pet trade.

Todd said there was mounting evidence that “a species can go from completely fine to utterly gone in the matter of a few years because of this drive in desire for images.”

“Baby otters are dying, and for what? A selfie,” he said. “We have to stop this.”

…

The one thing Federal Reserve officials were in broad agreement about at their last meeting was this: not tipping their hands about what happens next.

Minutes released Wednesday showed a fractious meeting on many fronts last month when a divided Fed cut interest rates for the first time in a decade. But the consensus to not reveal their intentions was clear, and may show that the steady browbeating by President Donald Trump has begun to influence how the Fed communicates.

Undercommit, and it may throw markets off course and draw more fire from Trump, who has been relentless in demanding not one but a slew of rate cuts and even a return to crisis-era bond buying to supercharge a softening but still-growing economy.

Overcommit, and it looks like capitulation to the White House, a possible blow to the Fed’s perceived status as an independent, technical agency that does not consider politics in its policy decisions.

Trump adamant on rate cuts

Yet Trump has been adamant, particularly as market data has indicated some doubt about the future of the record-setting U.S. expansion, that the Fed should act to bolster an economy that seems on many fronts to be doing fine.

Safer in that situation to “be guided by incoming information and its implications for the economic outlook” and avoid “any appearance of following a preset course” of further rate cuts — in other words to stay mum.

There were serious policy disagreements at the last meeting when the Fed voted to cut the target policy rate 25 basis points, minutes of the meeting released Wednesday show.

Some wanted no cut at all, and two voting members dissented.

Some wanted a half-point cut, and in the last set of policymakers’ economic projections, a near majority said rates should fall again by year’s end.

But since then, in public, even those who wanted deeper cuts have dialed back their language a notch.

In a Financial Times column Wednesday, Minneapolis Fed President Neel Kashkari framed his call for the Fed to use more “forward guidance” in terms of a promise not to raise rates, not a promise to cut them.

In his first comments after the July meeting, St. Louis Federal Reserve president James Bullard said the Fed would not move again in response to changes in trade policy: It had bought its “insurance” against the administration’s trade war by cutting rates once and would now look at how the economic data responds.

All ears on Powell

But a return to “data dependence” at this point poses a dilemma for Fed chairman Jerome Powell, scheduled to speak here Friday in what will be a closely watched appearance at the central bank’s annual policy retreat in the Wyoming mountains.

With bond markets again sending a warning signal about the near-term economic future as short-term rates move above long-term ones, Powell may need to say more about what the Fed plans, or at least what is influencing its thinking.

“(W)hat Powell has to say on Friday is going to be much, much more important than these minutes,” said Mary Ann Hurley, vice president in fixed-income trading at D.A. Davidson in Seattle.

Is it inflation that is too weak, or job gains that may be too strong to sustain? If overseas data matters, would a German recession trigger lower U.S. rates?

“His main message is going to be some combination of trying to arrest the panic in fixed income markets without being seen as pandering to Trump,” said Adam Posen, president of the Peterson Institute for International Economics.

When they cut rates in July, contrary to the usual sense of a strong consensus narrative about the reason why, different policymakers seemed motivated by a hodgepodge of reasons.

Demands from the White House were not among them. Fed officials insist they are not hostages to Trump. But he may be holding their tongue.

…

As a top North Korean military official concluded a visit to China this week in an effort to boost military ties with Beijing, experts said Washington’s big-deal approach could push Pyongyang to deepen its military relations with Beijing, a consequence that could create a rift between Seoul and Washington.

“If we are not going to play a sophisticated strategy … then I guess we’re going to just drive North Korea into the arms of China,” said Ken Gause, director for Adversary Analytics Program at CNA. “It puts China in a greater position to drive a wedge between the United States and South Korea if North Korea is leaning toward China.”

Kim Su Gil, director of the General Political Bureau of the Korean People’s Army (KPA), returned to Pyongyang Tuesday after visiting Beijing to meet with his Chinese counterpart.

During the meeting Saturday with Zhang Youxia, vice chairman of China’s Central Military Commission, Kim said Pyongyang was ready to “strengthen friendly exchanges between the two armed forces” and bring the “two armed forces to a higher level.”

Closer ties with China

The pledge to bolster military ties between Beijing and Pyongyang followed an agreement that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and Chinese President Xi Jinping made during their fifth summit held in June in Pyongyang. The two leaders agreed to “maintain the tradition of high-level exchanges.”

Pyongyang and Beijing renewed relations when Kim and Xi met for their first summit in March 2018. Relations had been rocky since Kim took power in 2011 and carried out nuclear and missile tests despite Beijing’s opposition. The alliance between Beijing and Pyongyang dates to the Korean War in 1950 when the Chinese army fought on the side of North Korea against South Korea and the U.S.

Experts said while the latest military meeting was largely seen as Beijing’s effort to restore its relations with Pyongyang, including military ties, Washington’s so-called “big-deal approach” could prompt North Korea to pivot toward China, which has been more lax about enforcing sanctions.

“We can go and continue with maximum pressure like we are now,” said CNA’s Gause, referring to a key focus of U.S. policy. “And if we do, it’s going to just push China and North Korea closer together.” 

VOA Interview: John Bolton’s Take on World’s Hotspots video player.

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What is ‘big-deal approach’?

White House national security adviser John Bolton reiterated U.S. President Donald Trump’s “big-deal approach” toward resolving nuclear issues with Pyongyang in his interview with VOA last week.

“What President Trump called the big deal, when he met with Kim Jong Un in Hanoi, is to make that strategic decision to give up nuclear weapons, and then implement it, and then all kinds of things are possible after that,” Bolton said.

Washington’s approach involves demanding that Pyongyang give up its entire nuclear program in exchange for sanctions relief while maintaining pressure through sanctions. At the Hanoi summit in February, the “big-deal approach” fell apart when Kim offered only a partial denuclearization.

Earlier this year, Pyongyang said it would give Washington until the end of this year to change its approach.

Missiles fly, talks do not

Talks between Washington and Pyongyang have been stalled since the Hanoi summit in February, but when Trump and Kim held an impromptu summit at the inter-Korean border in June, the two agreed to resume diplomatic efforts.

However, North Korea has launched six missile tests since late July. The series of missile launches suggests that North Korea has advanced its missile technology to the extent that it is capable of evading South Korea’s missile defense system. 

While demonstrating the new weapons, Pyongyang claimed South Korea’s military drills with the U.S. posed a threat to its national security, prompting North Korea to take “self-defense countermeasures” in response. The joint exercises concluded Tuesday.

Amid the missile launches, Kim sent a letter to Trump stating talks would resume once the exercises concluded. At the same time, Pyongyang said it could seek a “new road” in response to military drills. 

Pyongyang has yet to follow through on its promises to hold talks even as U.S. Special Representative to North Korea Steve Biegun is in Seoul, ready to talk with Pyongyang. Biegun arrived in Seoul on Tuesday and is expected to be there until Thursday. Although there has been some speculation that Biegun will continue on to Beijing, he’s expected to return to Washington.

Limited military support

Even if Pyongyang does not want its military, the Korean People’s Army (KPA), to be under Chinese influence because of a reluctance to give Beijing “more control over them,” North Korea could seek Beijing’s limited military support, according to Gause.

Evans Revere, acting assistant secretary for East Asia and Pacific Affairs during the George W. Bush administration, said North Korea “is reluctant to allow Beijing to dictate or dominate [the] KPA.”

However, he continued, “it is reasonable to assume that the North Koreans will press the Chinese for logistical and technical support, and perhaps even ask for more advanced weaponry.”

Scott Snyder, a senior fellow for Korean studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, said, “The KPA may also benefit from better relations with China.”

China may also seek tighter military cooperation with North Korea if the U.S. decides to deploy intermediate-range missiles in Asia. U.S. Defense Secretary Mark Esper said earlier this month that he favored placing the missiles in Asia, which angered China.

“If we are destined for increased U.S.-[China] strategic rivalry, then it would make sense for Beijing to ensure that North Korea remain within its orbit, even while making every effort to wean [South Korea] away from the U.S. alliance structure,” Revere said.

The U.S. consideration for the missile deployment came after it formally withdrew from the Intermediate Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty Aug. 2. Washington said the move was a response to repeated treaty violations by Russia.

The U.S. and former Soviet Union agreed upon the Cold War arms control treaty in 1987. It banned them from deploying their nuclear and conventional land-based missiles with ranges between 480 to 5,500 kilometers anywhere in the world.

Bolton said earlier this month that the U.S. willingness to deploy intermediate-range missiles in Asia is in part an effort to protect South Korea.

“Such a move would increase likelihood of expanded strategic military cooperation among China, North Korea and the Russians,” said Revere, adding, “The ‘great game’ in East Asia is about to get more interesting and dangerous.”

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Mexican musician Celso Pina, famed as “the rebel of the accordion” for mixing eclectic styles with traditional Colombian cumbia, died Wednesday of a heart attack in his hometown of Monterrey, his record label La Tuna Records said.

He was 66 years old, according to local media.

With an interest in genres ranging from ska to hip-hop, Pina collaborated with a number of major Mexican rock artists including Cafe Tacvba, Lila Downs and Julieta Venegas. In 2002 his solo album “Barrio Bravo” was nominated for a Latin Grammy.

The composer and singer began playing music with his brothers growing up in Monterrey near the northern border, according to his official website. He picked up the accordion in his late 20s, and, still in Monterrey, learned Colombia’s celebrated vallenato style, central to the bouncy cumbia genre.

“Nobody can resist cumbia,” Pina wrote in his last tweet before his death, ahead of concerts planned in the United States, one of about 30 countries he had toured, according to his profile on the Spotify music streaming platform.

“The rebel of the accordion has left us. His music united Latin American cultures and captivated Americans,” the U.S. Embassy in Mexico wrote on Twitter.

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President Donald Trump said Tuesday his government is talking to “various representatives” of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, who also confirmed that discussions had been taking place. 
 
In a nationally broadcast appearance hours after Trump spoke, Maduro said that “secret” talks had long been under way between high officials in his government and the U.S. administration.

“I confirm that for months we’ve had contact with senior officials of the U.S. government,” Maduro said, adding that all talks had been carried out under his “direct authorization.”

The Associated Press reported over the weekend that the U.S. has made secret contact with socialist party boss Diosdado Cabello as close allies of Maduro’s inner circle seek guarantees they won’t face prosecution for alleged abuses and crimes if they cede to growing demands to remove him.

Maduro did not name any officials in his government participating in U.S. meetings. The socialist leader said that he’s ready to meet with Trump himself to normalize relations, an offer he’s made before. 

 
Venezuela was one of many topics addressed by Trump when he took questions from reporters earlier Tuesday during his meeting with Romanian President Klaus Iohannis.

Trump, however, refused to say whether such dialogue is being conducted with Cabello, considered the nation’s second most powerful politician after Maduro. 
 
“We’re talking to various representatives of Venezuela,” Trump responded when a reporter asked him whether the White House is talking to Cabello. “I don’t want to say who, but we are talking at a very high level.”

The U.S. considers opposition leader Juan Guaido to be the legitimate president of the country.

An administration official told AP the goal is not to prop up Cabello or pave the way for him to substitute Maduro, but to ratchet up pressure on the regime by contributing to the knife fight the U.S. believes is taking place behind the scenes among competing circles of power within the ruling party.

Norway talks

At a press conference Monday in Caracas, Cabello shied away from discussing any details of the meeting and at one point likened it to “a lie, a manipulation.” But he also said he has long stood welcome to talk to anyone, so long as any discussions take place with Maduro’s approval.

Talks sponsored by Norway between the opposition and government have been slow moving and were suspended this month by Maduro.

Trump repeated Tuesday that his government is helping Venezuela “as much as we can” so that the country resolves its political and financial crises, which he attributed to socialism.

“Fifteen years ago it was one of the wealthiest countries. Now it’s one of the poorest countries,” he said.

The U.N. estimates that at least four million Venezuelans have left their country because of hyperinflation and severe shortages of food and medicine.

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Argentina’s promises to defend its beleaguered peso gained credibility on Tuesday after the central bank poured $112 million of its reserves into dollar auctions, helping to boost the currency about 0.5% a day after steep losses.

In three interventions in the foreign exchange market, the bank acted in concert with statements from officials saying the government’s top priority was to stabilize the peso after it lost 18% of its value against the U.S. dollar last week.

“The interventions pushed the peso through the 55-per-dollar barrier,” to 54.50 pesos to the greenback, Gustavo Quintana, foreign exchange trader with Buenos Aires brokerage PR Corredores de Cambio, told Reuters.

The recession- and inflation-racked country was hit by a wave of uncertainty following an Aug. 11 primary election in which business-friendly President Mauricio Macri got thumped by center-left Peronist challenger Alberto Fernandez, who emerged the clear front-runner ahead of the Oct. 27 general election.

Minutes after being sworn in by Macri on Tuesday, Treasury Minister Hernan Lacunza said the government will stand by the peso and stick to its goal of erasing its primary fiscal deficit, despite a series of tax cuts and spending measures announced last week aimed at spurring growth.

“We want to leave a solid economic platform for whichever candidate wins” the presidential election, said Lacunza, former economy chief for Buenos Aires province. He told a press conference that Argentina had a primary fiscal surplus in July and he expected a surplus in August as well. 

Traders said the peso rallied to close at 54.74 per dollar after falling 1.2 percent in early trade. Local over-the-counter bonds and the Merval stock index remained in negative territory, still stung by the downgrade late on Friday of Argentina’s sovereign debt by ratings agencies Fitch and Standard & Poor’s.

Monday was a holiday in Argentina, forcing investors to wait until Tuesday to react.

Nicolas Dujovne, the former treasury minister, quit on Saturday, saying he believed the country needed “significant renewal” of its economic team.

Macri, struggling to revive his campaign for a second term, is betting the new treasury chief can help stabilize the economy. 

Last week Macri, smarting from his primary election loss, announced a cut in taxes on food and personal income along with increased welfare spending. The measures raised concern his administration will miss fiscal targets agreed with the International Monetary Fund as part of a $57 billion loan deal.

Fernandez told local radio he was concerned about the state of government finances that he might inherit if he wins the presidency and takes office in December.Macri’s emergency relief measures were creating “a fiscal hole,” Fernandez said.

Those measures will have a slight negative fiscal effect, but not enough to further hurt the country’s credit rating, James McCormack, Fitch’s head of sovereign ratings, said on Tuesday.

IMF watching 

“We are closely following recent developments in Argentina and are in ongoing dialogue with the authorities as they work on their policy plans to address the difficult situation that the country is facing,” the IMF said in a statement.

“An IMF staff team will travel to Buenos Aires soon,” said the statement, which was signed by IMF spokesman Gerry Rice.

The IMF’s next review of Argentina’s economy on Sept. 15 should provide a sign of whether the lender of last resort still thinks the country can pay its debt obligations. Government bonds denominated in dollars are harder to pay when the peso weakens.

A crunch point will come in the second quarter of 2020, when Argentina is scheduled to make $20 billion in debt repayments, up sharply from $5.6 billion in the first quarter of next year.

Central bank chief Guido Sandleris told reporters on Tuesday the bank would continue to sell reserves in an effort to halt the peso’s slide.

Including last week’s interventions, the bank had auctioned off $615 million in dollar reserves as of Tuesday afternoon, traders said.

…

Iranian women should be allowed to attend men’s World Cup qualifiers in the Islamic Republic later this year, a top Asian soccer official said Tuesday, ramping up pressure on Tehran to end a long-running ban.

Iranian women have long been barred from watching men’s teams play, but Tehran relaxed the rule last year to allow hundreds of women to watch the Asian Champions League final organized by the Asian Football Confederation (AFC).

The AFC, the Asian football governing body which has 47 members that include Iran, said it was working to help world soccer governing body FIFA find an “amicable solution” that would allow them to attend future games.

“Everybody needs to be catered, it’s an inclusive game. Women play the game in Iran, men play the game, so everybody should be able to watch,” AFC general secretary Windsor John told the Thomson Reuters Foundation in an interview.

“For us at the end of the day, we respect the local law, but we also want to promote the game,” he said at the AFC headquarters in Kuala Lumpur.

Female football fans have long campaigned that the ban, imposed under Iran’s Islamic law after the 1979 revolution, be lifted.

Increased pressure

Last year, some risked arrest by donning fake beards and wigs to attend a major game in Tehran’s Azadi Stadium, while others traveled to Russia for the World Cup, plastering social media with photos of themselves cheering on their team.

FIFA wrote to the Iranian Football Federation in June asking it to provide a timeline toward women being able to buy tickets for the qualifiers, which begin Sept. 5.

John lauded the access for Iranian women at the Asian Champions League final last year, but said the current situation involved “different scenarios.”

“[The concern is] if it starts with football, will there be other ripple effects, will other forces or entities now ask for the same privilege,” said the No. 2 at the AFC.

“A lot of things are on the table at the moment, we really don’t know which direction it is going.”

There were hopes that the breakthrough last November would lead to a loosening of the ban, but female fans have been denied access to matches since.

In June, some were detained by security forces when they went to the Azadi Stadium for a friendly against Syria.

FIFA pledge

John said there was “huge potential” for women’s football to develop in Asia, with attitudes changing even in conservative countries such as Saudi Arabia, which lifted a ban on women attending matches last year.

FIFA has pledged to expand women’s role in the sport, appointing Fatma Samoura in 2016 as its first female secretary general, and this year’s women’s World Cup drew record crowds and television audiences.

John said a Saudi woman would be appointed to the AFC committee overseeing the development of women’s football, though he declined to identify the new member by name.

“It’s a huge, huge positive development for football development in Asia,” he said. 

…

 Mexico’s Zapatista indigenous rebel group announced that it is extending its control over so-called “autonomous” zones to 11 more areas in the southern state of Chiapas.

The Zapatistas do not hide their dislike of President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, but when he was asked about the announcement Monday, Lopez Obrador said the expansion was “welcome.”

“Go ahead, because that means working to benefit the villages and the people,” Lopez Obrador said. “The only thing we don’t want is violence.”

A statement signed by Zapatista “subcommander” Moises and posted over the weekend called it an “exponential growth that allows us to break the blockade again.”

But some of the new autonomous zones are likely to be controversial.  

Some are on land the Zapatistas seized after they staged a brief armed uprising in 1994 to demand greater rights for the indigenous. But at least one of new rebel “autonomous” towns, Nuevo Jerusalen, is located in the ecologically sensitive Lacandon jungle, a nature reserve.

The Zapatistas have suggested in the past that indigenous communities would establish their own reserves, where nature and farming could co-exist. But experts say that slash-and-burn agriculture, cattle and thin jungle soils make it almost impossible to have both settlement and conservation.

The Zapatistas generally forbid law enforcement agencies and government inspectors from entering their communities, and practice traditional forms of self-governance. They also have established their own educational systems.

At least since 2006, the Zapatistas’ leadership has publicly and frequently insulted Lopez Obrador. The statement posted Saturday was no exception; the Zapatistas called him “the new overseer,” and claimed a dozen indigenous activists had been killed since he took office on Dec. 1.

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A Guatemalan court on Monday acquitted a son and a brother of outgoing President Jimmy Morales, after a corruption case that battered his popularity and sparked the leader’s feud with a United Nations-backed anti-corruption commission.

Samuel “Sammy” Morales, the president’s older brother and political adviser, had been on trial on suspicion of fraud and money laundering, while Jose Manuel Morales, the president’s eldest son, was facing fraud charges.

In January 2017, the Attorney General’s office and the International Commission against Impunity in Guatemala (CICIG) accused both men of defrauding the land registry of $12,000 in 2013, using false invoices, before Morales was elected.

The case centered on invoices submitted by the mother of Jose Manuel’s then-girlfriend after she agreed to supply Christmas hampers to officials at the registry.

The woman sent the registry a bill made out in the name of a local restaurant for 564 breakfasts, not Christmas hampers, but witnesses said the breakfasts were never delivered.

Sammy Morales, who had faced up to 11 years in prison, said he helped obtain the invoice from the restaurant as a favor to his nephew, but denied it was fraudulent. Jose Manuel had faced a jail term of up to 8 years over the scandal.

The probe soured the commission’s relations with the president, and later in 2017, the CICIG tried to impeach Jimmy Morales, 50, for alleged campaign finance irregularities.

Unlike his imprisoned predecessor, Otto Perez, who was brought down by a separate CICIG corruption probe in 2015, the president survived a vote in Congress to strip him of immunity.

Morales, whose term in office will end in January, went on to accuse the CICIG of abuse of power, and vowed to expel the commission from the country. Morales succeeded in terminating the CICIG’s mandate, which will end in September.

…

The country’s top reproductive services group, Planned Parenthood, is pulling out of a federal family planning program to avoid abiding by new Trump administration rules on abortion.

The new rule under the Title X program bans grant recipients from referring patients for abortion.

“We will not be bullied into withholding abortion information from our patients,” Planned Parenthood CEO Alexis McGill Johnson said. “Our patients deserve to make their own health care decisions, not to be forced to have Donald Trump or Mike Pence make those decisions for them.”

Planned Parenthood says its clinics will stay open, but they will have to scramble to make up the loss of federal grants.

Along with providing abortions, Planned Parenthood also provides patients access to birth control, testing for sexually transmitted diseases, cancer screening, infertility treatment, and other services. Many of its patients are low-income and minority women. McGill Johnson says they will be the ones to suffer most.

But a Health and Human Services statement says it is Planned Parenthood that is “abandoning their obligations” to their patients by choosing to reject the regulations for accepting grants.

A federal appeals court is considering whether to overturn the restrictions on abortion referrals.

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U.S. President Donald Trump said on Sunday he would likely wait until after Israel’s Sept. 17 elections to release a peace plan for the region that was designed by White House senior adviser Jared Kushner.

Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law, is the main architect of a proposed $50 billion economic development plan for the Palestinians, Jordan, Egypt and Lebanon that is designed to create peace in the region. 

Kushner Unveils $50 Billion ‘Peace to Prosperity’ Plan for Mideast

The White House senior adviser lays out an economic plan, says political peace plan coming

…

Violence was largely averted in Portland, Oregon, where police established concrete barriers, closed streets and bridges, and seized a multitude of weapons to preempt clashes between right-wing groups and anti-fascist counterprotesters. on Saturday. But at least 13 people were arrested and the protesters vowed to return to the West Coast city

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Delegates at a U.N. wildlife conference in Geneva voted Sunday to ban the practice of taking baby elephants from their natural habitat and placing them in zoos and circuses.

Forty-six countries at the UN Convention ion International Trade in Endangered Species voted to outlaw the practice, white 18 voted against it, including the United States. Nineteen abstained.

The ban proclaims entertainment venues to be “unacceptable and inappropriate destinations” for elephants.

“This decision will save countless elephants from being ripped away from their families in the wild and forces to spend their lifetimes imprisoned in substandard conditions at zoos,” the Humane Society International said Sunday. “The capture of baby elephants is horribly cruel and traumatic to both the mothers, their calves and the herds that are left behind.”

Conference to Tackle Illegal Trade in Endangered Species

One of the overarching problems threatening the survival of many wild animals and plants is that of illegal international trade in wildlife with the growing involvement of organized crime

Sunday’s decision specifically targets Botswana, Namibia, South Africa, and Zimbabwe.

CITES says Zimbabwe has sent more than 100 baby elephants to China since 2012, traumatizing the animals who it says are beaten, kicked, and treated cruelly by their handlers. Several have died.

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LOS ALAMOS, NEW MEXICO – Officials at Los Alamos National Laboratory have plans for $13 billion worth of construction projects over the next decade at the northern New Mexico complex as it prepares to ramp up production of plutonium cores for the nation’s nuclear weapons arsenal. 
 
They outlined their plans at a recent meeting attended by hundreds of representatives of construction firms from around the country. 
 
Beyond the new infrastructure related to plutonium assignment, other work most likely will be aimed at serving a growing workforce — from planned housing projects and parking garages to a potential new highway that would reduce commute times from Albuquerque and Santa Fe for the 60% of employees who live outside Los Alamos County. 

2,600 jobs
 
Lab Director Thomas Mason told the Albuquerque Journal the lab has 1,400 openings and plans to add another 1,200 jobs to its workforce of 12,000 by 2026.  
  
“It’s a busy time at the lab,” he said. “We’re probably busier than we have been since the height of the Cold War.” 
 
Mason said $3 billion in spending is planned for improvements to the lab’s existing plutonium facility for the core work. An accelerator project and a new-generation supercomputer also will require major investments. 
 
Roadwork would be the responsibility of surrounding communities or the state, but he said the lab is stressing the importance of transportation infrastructure and needs to communicate to the region about the lab’s growth projections. 
 
One piece of transportation infrastructure — Omega Bridge, which connects the town of Los Alamos with the lab site over Los Alamos Canyon — is owned by the federal government. One possibility is that it’s converted to a “greenway” with a new bridge added nearby.  
  
Mason said the question of what to do with the bridge is a long-term issue. 

Watchdogs have questions
 
Some watchdog groups have been concerned about the federal government’s plans to boost plutonium pit production at Los Alamos given the current infrastructure and the lab’s track record of safety concerns. 
 
Greg Mello with the Albuquerque-based Los Alamos Study Group said “everywhere pit production has been done, in every country, has been an environmental disaster.” 
 
Pits were formerly made at Rocky Flats in Colorado, which was shut down in the early 1990s amid an environmental scandal. 
 
“We think it’s the wrong direction for this region,” Mello said. 
 
The National Nuclear Security Administration is under a mandate from Congress and the Department of Defense to make 80 pits a year by 2030 as part of a plan to modernize the nation’s arsenal. 
 
Only a handful have been produced in recent decades, all of them at Los Alamos. NNSA’s plan calls for making 30 pits a year at Los Alamos and 50 pits a year at the U.S. Energy Department’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina. 
 
A recent congressionally funded study cast doubt on whether the pit production goals can be met and questioned the plan to ramp up production, which is estimated to cost $14 billion to $28 billion. The study stated that “eventual success of the strategy to reconstitute plutonium pit production is far from certain.” 

…

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina — Argentina’s treasury minister, Nicolas Dujovne, resigned Saturday and will be replaced by the economy minister of the country’s most populous state, a senior official in the presidential office said. 
 
The resignation came three days after President Mauricio Macri announced his conservative administration was temporarily increasing the minimum wage, reducing payroll taxes and implementing other steps to help Argentine workers as the country struggles to overcome sizzling inflation, high unemployment and other economic problems. 
 
Macri acted after a leftist presidential slate that includes his predecessor, Cristina Fernandez, turned in a powerful showing last Sunday in primary voting for candidates going into October general elections. Macri’s slate did poorly, and the already weak Argentine peso slumped and stock prices fell sharply as investors worried about the vote results. 
 
In his resignation letter, Dujovne reportedly said the government needed to make “a significant overhaul in the economic area.” He said the administration had made strides in reducing the government’s deficit and reducing taxes, but added that “we undoubtedly made mistakes.” 
 
The presidency official, who agreed to confirm the resignation only if not quoted by name, said Dujovne would be replaced by Hernan Lacunza, the economy minister for Buenos Aires province. Lacunza previously was general manager of the Central Bank. 

…

LONDON – Prime Minister Boris Johnson will tell French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel that his nation’s Parliament cannot stop Brexit and a new deal must be agreed if Britain is to avoid leaving the EU without one. 

In his first trip abroad as leader, Johnson is due to meet his European counterparts ahead of a G-7 summit on Aug. 24-26 in Biarritz, France. 

He will say that Britain is leaving the European Union on Oct. 31, with or without a deal, and that Parliament cannot block that, according to a Downing Street source. 

The United Kingdom is heading toward a constitutional crisis at home and a showdown with the EU as Johnson has repeatedly vowed to leave the bloc on Oct. 31 without a deal unless it agrees to renegotiate the Brexit divorce. 

Refusing to reconsider

After more than three years of Brexit dominating EU affairs, the bloc has repeatedly refused to reopen the Withdrawal Agreement, which includes an Irish border insurance policy that Johnson’s predecessor, Theresa May, agreed to in November. 

The prime minister is coming under pressure from politicians across the political spectrum to prevent a disorderly departure, with opposition leader Jeremy Corbyn vowing to bring down Johnson’s government in early September to delay Brexit. 

It is, however, unclear if lawmakers have the unity or power to use the British Parliament to prevent a no-deal Brexit on Oct. 31 — likely to be the United Kingdom’s most significant move since World War II. 

Opponents of no-deal say it would be a disaster for what was once one of the West’s most stable democracies. A disorderly divorce, they say, would hurt global growth, send shock waves through financial markets and weaken London’s claim to be the world’s preeminent financial center. 

Brexit supporters say there may be short-term disruption from a no-deal exit but that the economy will thrive if cut free from what they cast as a doomed experiment in integration that has led to Europe falling behind China and the United States. 

…

Members of China’s paramilitary People’s Armed Police marched and practiced crowd control tactics at a sports complex in Shenzhen across from Hong Kong in what some interpreted as a threat against pro-democracy protesters in the semi-autonomous territory.

The sound of marching boots and synchronized shouts echoed from the grounds Friday. Officers in green camouflage stood guard at closed entrances. A stadium security guard said “it wasn’t clear” when the paramilitary police would leave the grounds.

Chinese state media have said only that the Shenzhen exercises were planned earlier and were not directly related to the unrest in Hong Kong, though they came shortly after the central government in Beijing said the protests were beginning to show the “sprouts of terrorism.”

From a distance, police could be seen conducting drills in military fatigues, using shields, poles and other riot-control gear. In one exercise, two groups marched in formation with those in front raising shields as if to protect themselves from projectiles. Others behind held red flags and banners. The words “the law” and “prosecuted” could be seen on one.

Outside, dozens of armored carriers and trucks sat in the parking lot of the Shenzhen Bay Stadium, close to a bridge linking mainland China to Hong Kong.

Asked if Hong Kong police could maintain order or if mainland Chinese intervention is becoming inevitable, Hong Kong police commander Yeung Man-pun said that while they face tremendous pressure, “I can tell you we’re confident the police have the capability to maintain law and order.”

Weeks of protest

Germany, meanwhile, said it considers China to be a responsible actor that will respect Hong Kong laws guaranteeing freedom of speech and rule of law.

Government spokesman Steffen Seibert said Friday that Hong Kong’s 1997 Basic Law, under which the city was promised a high degree of autonomy when the former British colony returned to China, “is a Chinese law, and as such we naturally expect that the People’s Republic of China, too, won’t call into question the peaceful exercise of these rights.”

Weeks of protests in Hong Kong have been marked by increasing violence and a shutdown of the Hong Kong airport earlier this week. The demonstrators are demanding expanded political rights and the scrapping of legislation that could have seen criminal suspects sent to mainland China.

A weekend of protests began Friday night with a university student-led “power to the people” rally in Chater Garden, a public square in the financial district.

A pro-democracy march is planned for Saturday along with a separate pro-government “Save Hong Kong” rally, ahead of a major pro-democracy rally called for Sunday. Police have denied permission for the march Sunday, but protesters have ignored such denials in the past.

Airline CEO resigns

China has pressured foreign and Hong Kong companies to support the ruling Communist Party’s position against the protesters.

The CEO of Cathay Pacific Airways, one of Hong Kong’s most prominent companies, resigned Friday following pressure by Beijing on the carrier over participation by some of its employees in the anti-government protests.

Cathay Pacific said Rupert Hogg resigned “to take responsibility” following “recent events.”

The company chairman, John Slosar, said in a statement the airline needed new management because events had “called into question” its commitment to safety and security.

On Monday, Hogg threatened employees with “disciplinary consequences” if they took part in “illegal protests.”

Last week, China’s aviation regulator said Cathay Pacific employees who “support or take part in illegal protests, violent actions, or overly radical behavior” are banned from staffing flights to mainland China.

Message of ‘joy and smile’

On Friday morning, Frenchman Alain Robert, who has been dubbed “spiderman” for his unauthorized climbs of skyscrapers, hung a banner appealing for peace as he scaled the 62-story Cheung Kong Center, a landmark Hong Kong building that is the base for property tycoon Li Ka-shing’s business empire.

The banner showed the Chinese and Hong Kong flags over a handshake and a small yellow sun with a smiley face.

“The banner is to give joy and smile to the people of Hong Kong,” he told the AP as he sat in a taxi about to leave for his climb. He added that he didn’t want to get “mixed up in the political situation.”

Robert, 57, was taken to a police station afterward. It wasn’t immediately clear if he would be charged. He was banned in 2017 from returning to Hong Kong for one year after climbing another building.
 

…

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Friday the U.S.-Israel relationship can withstand the “weakness” of President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who shook diplomatic norms this week in barring two members of Congress from visiting the country.

Pelosi told The Associated Press that the “weakness of Netanyahu and the weakness of Donald Trump combined” into a policy that’s “a no.”

“We have a deep relationship and long-standing relationship with Israel that can withstand Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu,” Pelosi said. “We cannot let their weaknesses stand in the way of our ongoing relationship.”

She said the U.S. commitment to Israel isn’t dependent on either leader, a sign there may not be lasting fallout from this week’s incident, particularly in terms of foreign aid, which must be approved by Congress.

In an extraordinary move, Netanyahu, with a push from Trump, barred entry for Democratic Reps. Rashida Tlaib of Michigan and Ilhan Omar of Minnesota ahead of their planned visit. Tlaib was later granted a humanitarian exception to visit her grandmother in the West Bank, but ultimately decided against the trip .

Trump views the freshmen congresswomen as among his chief opponents — part of the “squad” of newly elected liberal lawmakers — and has called them out at his rallies and in racist tweets as he runs for re-election. Trump describes them as the face of the Democratic Party. 

Trump complained Friday about Tlaib’s decision against taking the trip.

“Rep. Tlaib wrote a letter to Israeli officials desperately wanting to visit her grandmother. Permission was quickly granted, whereupon Tlaib obnoxiously turned the approval down, a complete setup,” Trump tweeted. “The only real winner here is Tlaib’s grandmother. She doesn’t have to see her now!”

The two Muslim lawmakers support a Palestinian-led boycott of Israel, and barring their entry was an escalation of Netanyahu’s attempts to quash the global boycott, divestment and sanctions movement.

Both leaders are up for re-election — Netanyahu in the fall, and Trump next year. Critics of the decision framed it as stoking divisions for short-term political gain at the expense of harming the deep ties that Israel has long enjoyed with both political parties in the U.S.

Pelosi said she had “great, great, great sadness” over the decision, but she was not discouraging other lawmakers from visiting Israel.

“Members will make their own decisions about this, but I would not discourage travel to Israel,” Pelosi said.

“We have a strong relationship with Israel as well as a deep love and respect for the people of Israel. And, again, this is not going to undermine that, try as President Trump will to do that.”

…

The Los Angeles Opera declined Friday to release any details of its promised investigation into allegations of sexual harassment against opera legend Placido Domingo, the company’s longtime general director, including whether it has begun.

Also Friday, the union that represents opera singers said it plans a meeting in Los Angeles next week to address its members’ concerns ahead of the LA company’s season opener Sept. 14.

Len Egert, the executive director of the American Guild of Musical Artists, told The Associated Press that the union has been receiving its own reports from members since an AP story earlier this week detailing accusations against the 78-year-old singing star.

Hours after the AP story was released Tuesday detailing the allegations, the LA Opera announced it would engage outside counsel to investigate the “concerning allegations.”

An open secret

Three of the nine women who accused the singer of harassment and abuse of power described encounters they said took place while working with Domingo at the LA organization. The nine women and dozens of others interviewed said Domingo’s behavior was an open secret in the industry and that he pursued younger women with impunity.

LA Opera would not disclose who would be conducting the investigation, how it would be carried out, when it would start or its expected duration.

A spokeswoman for the company said Friday LA Opera will share details when they have information and that there was currently nothing to add beyond the statement released Tuesday.

LA Opera 

Domingo is widely credited with raising the profile of LA Opera, where he served as an artistic consultant from 1984 to 2000, artistic director from 2000 to 2003 and, finally, general director from 2003 until now. His current contract runs through the 2021-22 season.

In its initial statement, LA Opera said Domingo “has been a dynamic creative force in the life of LA Opera” but that it is committed to ensuring that its employees and artists “be treated respectfully and feel safe and secure.”

Domingo did not respond to detailed questions from the AP about specific incidents. But he issued a statement calling the allegations “deeply troubling, and as presented, inaccurate,” adding “I believed that all of my interactions and relationships were always welcomed and consensual.”

Global discussion

The allegations in the AP story sparked a global discussion among opera singers on social media forums about the culture of sexual misconduct in the classical music world and the belief that opera companies have long been aware of bad behavior and tolerated it, particularly when the accused are people in positions of power.

Aside from LA Opera, the other women quoted in the story recounted incidents they said took place at other venues, including Washington Opera and the Metropolitan Opera in New York, ranging from 1988 into the mid-2000s.

Some of the women told the AP that Domingo used his power at the LA company and elsewhere to try to pressure them into sexual relationships, with several saying that he dangled jobs and then sometimes punished them professionally if they refused his advances.

Some performances canceled

The Philadelphia Orchestra and San Francisco Opera announced they would cancel upcoming performances featuring the star. The Metropolitan Opera said it would await the results of LA Opera’s investigation “before making any final decisions about Mr. Domingo’s future at the Met,” where he is scheduled to appear next month.

The American Guild of Musical Artists issued a statement calling for wider investigations across the opera world.

“AGMA became aware of serious allegations of sexual harassment made by multiple women against Placido Domingo. We have contacted our employers to demand investigations into these allegations,” said the statement issued earlier this week.

Since then, “through our confidential reporting system we have been receiving reports from members,” Egert said Friday. “We are providing timely, confidential advice and guidance to these artists.” He did not elaborate.

Egert said that AGMA will be “closely monitoring the internal LA Opera investigation” and has scheduled a membership meeting in Los Angeles early next week, before the start of rehearsals, to address any member concerns on questions. The LA Opera 2019-2020 season starts Sept. 14 with “La Boheme.”

Asked if the union was aware of Domingo’s alleged behavior previously, he said, “AGMA did not receive complaints from its members prior to the recent news reports.”

…

Spaceport America is no longer just a shiny shell of hope that space tourism would one day launch from this remote spot in the New Mexico desert.

The once-empty hangar that anchors the taxpayer-financed launch and landing facility has been transformed into a custom-tailored headquarters where Virgin Galactic will run its commercial flight operations.

The interior spaces unveiled Thursday aim to connect paying customers with every aspect of the operation, providing views of the hangar and the space vehicles as well as the banks of monitors inside mission control.

Two levels within the spaceport include mission control, a preparation area for pilots and a lounge for customers and their friends and families, with each element of the fit and finish paying homage to either the desert landscape that surrounds the futuristic outpost or the promise of traveling to the edge of space.

From hotel rooms to aircraft cabins, the Virgin brand touts its designs for their focus on the customer experience. Spaceport is no different.

 A social hub includes an interactive digital walkway and a coffee bar made of Italian marble. On the upper deck, shades of white and gray speak to Virgin Galactic’s more lofty mission.

Company officials say the space is meant to create “an unparalleled experience” as customers prepare for what Virgin Galactic describes as the journey of a lifetime.

Timeline not set

Just how soon customers will file into Virgin Galactic’s newly outfitted digs for the first commercial flights to space has yet to be determined. A small number of test flights are still needed.

“We were the first company to fly a commercial space ship to space with somebody in the back who was not a pilot — first time that somebody like that has been able to get out of their seats and float around the cabin,” Virgin Galactic CEO George Whitesides said. “So it’s happening. We have a bit more work to do before we get to commercial service.”

Billionaire Richard Branson, who is behind Virgin Galactic, and former New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, a Democrat, first pitched the plan for the spaceport nearly 15 years ago.

There were construction delays and cost overruns. Virgin Galactic’s spaceship development took far longer than expected and had a major setback when its first experimental craft broke apart during a 2014 test flight, killing the co-pilot.

Critics suggested the project was a boondoggle, but supporters argued that there were bound to be hard and sometimes costly lessons.

Democratic state Sen. George Munoz has enduring concerns about the business model for commercial, low-orbit travel for passengers.

“You can have all the money in the world and come back and say, ‘Was my 30 seconds of fame worth that risk?'” he said.

Munoz says New Mexico’s anticipated return on investment in terms of jobs and visitors is still overdue, with more than $200 million in public funds spent on Spaceport America in cooperation with Virgin Galactic as the anchor tenant.

New facility

At the facility Thursday, the carrier plane for Virgin’s rocket-powered passenger ship made a few passes and touch-and-goes over a runway.

Behind the spaceport’s signature wall of curved glass, mission control sits on the second floor with an unobstructed view of the runway and beyond.

There’s also space behind two massive sliding doors to accommodate two of Virgin Galactic’s carrier planes and a fleet of six-passenger rocket ships.

Virgin Galactic posted on social media earlier this week that its main operating base was now at the spaceport. And Branson said the wing of Virgin’s next rocket ship has been completed.

Chief Pilot Dave Mackay said the crew in the coming days will fly simulated launch missions to ensure in-flight communications and airspace coordination work as planned. The pilots also will be familiarizing themselves with New Mexico’s airspace and landmarks.

“New Mexico is on track to become one of the very few places on this beautiful planet which regularly launches humans to space,” Mackay said.

Whitesides said that once the test flights are complete, commercial operations can begin. He envisions a fundamental shift in humanity’s relationship with space, noting that fewer than 600 people ever have ventured beyond the Earth’s atmosphere.

“We’re going to be able to send way more than that to space from this facility here,” he said. “In another 15 years, I really hope that we’ve had thousands of people go.”

About 600 people have reserved a seat, according to the company, at a cost of $250,000 a ticket.

That buys them a ride on the winged rocket ship, which is dropped in flight from the carrier airplane. Once free, it fires its rocket motor to hurtle toward the boundary of space before gliding back down.

The latest test flight reached an altitude of 56 miles (90 kilometers) while traveling at three times the speed of sound.

…

TALLAHASSEE, FLORIDA – Florida legislators are moving to officially condemn white nationalism, with Democrats and Republicans alike drafting resolutions against hate-spurred violence, but the unity could be short-lived as elected officials plunge into debates over how the government should intervene to prevent more mass killings and rein in white supremacists. 
 
The condemnations come amid an outcry over a mass shooting in El Paso, Texas, in which authorities believe the gunman posted a racist screed online shortly before the attack.  
  
Following the shooting, Florida Senate President Bill Galvano, a Republican, called the violence a “reminder that we have more work to do,” and he called on a legislative committee to review what can be done to address white nationalism.    

Earlier this week, Sen. Kamala Harris of California, a Democratic presidential hopeful, called for a federal “red flag” law that would allow law enforcement to take away guns from white nationalists, if a judge agrees if a person poses an imminent danger. 
 
While Galvano says he’s open to possibly expanding the Florida’s “red flag” laws, he told the Associated Press on Thursday that the two issues should be addressed separately. 
 
“Do both issues need to be considered and talked about? The answer is yes, but I don’t know if you can just merge them,” Galvano said. 
 
Since Florida’s “red flag” law went into effect in March 2018, there have been 2,434 risk protection orders reported to the Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, which prompted the agency to suspend 595 concealed weapons licenses. The protection orders give law enforcement the authority to temporarily confiscate guns. 

Rubio’s call
 
Following the 2018 mass shootings at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio called on Congress to follow his state’s lead in enacting a federal “red flag” law — a call that  he again made following the mass shootings in Texas and Ohio that killed 31 people. 
 
In the wake of those shootings, Florida Republicans have focused their condemnation on hate groups and their attention on keeping guns away from those with mental illness. 
 
A trio of Republican state senators began circulating a resolution on Thursday that rejects white nationalism as “hateful, dangerous and morally corrupt.” 
 
That followed a move earlier in the week by Democrats in the Florida House, who introduced legislation spurning white supremacy as “hateful expressions of intolerance that are contradictory to the values that define the people of Florida and the United States.” 
 
But while both parties were united in their condemnation of race-based hate, it remains to be seen what policy changes will be enacted.  

“We can have lots of discussions about hate as it relates to white supremacy and white nationalism, but it does not get us to the solution of dealing with guns — and that’s the bottom line for any discussion that should be done,” said Sen. Audrey Gibson, the Democratic leader in the Republican-controlled state Senate. 
 
In a letter sent to Galvano on Wednesday, she said it was still too easy to access a gun in Florida. 
 
Gun-control activists are trying to place a measure on the 2020 ballot that would ban assault weapons. 

Common thread
 
“Whether the massacre unfolded in El Paso, Dayton or Las Vegas, Newtown, Parkland or Pulse, the one inescapable common thread that has bound each and every one of these horrific mass shootings is the presence of an assault weapon,” Gibson said. She said the state could do better in controlling access to guns, strengthening background checks for private gun sales and expanding the state’s “red flag” laws to allow relatives, not just law enforcement, to seek a court order when they think a family member might pose a risk. 
 
Galvano said “everything would be on the table” as his chamber begins work on strengthening laws to curb mass violence and to expand the laws enacted in response to the Parkland shootings. But when pressed, Galvano said he would leave it to legislative committees to come up with specific legislation. 
 
“In the best-case scenario, the most effective way to begin to approach the state’s role in these things is to look comprehensively — everything from law enforcement and how we’re doing it, and policy changes in funding, mental health screenings, red flags and gun safety.” 

…

North Korea said Friday it will never sit down with South Korea for talks again, rejecting a vow by the South’s President Moon Jae-in to pursue dialog with Pyongyang made the previous day as he pledged to bring in unification by 2045.

The North has protested joint military drills conducted by South Korea and the United States, which kicked off last week, calling them a “rehearsal for war” and has fired several short-range missiles in recent weeks.

The loss of dialog momentum between the North and South and the stalemate in implementing a historic summit between their two leaders last year is entirely the responsibility of the South, a North Korean spokesman said in a statement.

Blaming US-Korea exercises

The spokesman repeated criticism that the joint U.S.-South Korea drills was sign of Seoul’s hostility against the North.

“As it will be clear, we have nothing more to talk about with South Korean authorities and we have no desire to sit down with them again,” the North’s spokesman for the Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of the Country said.

The committee is tasked with managing the North’s relationship with the South. The rival Koreas remain technically at war under a truce ending the 1950-53 Korean War.

The comments were carried by official KCNA news agency.

Moon and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un have met three times since April last year pledging peace and cooperation but little progress has been made to improve dialog and strengthen exchange and cooperation.

Liberation Day speech

Moon said in a Liberation Day address Thursday marking Korea’s independence from Japan’s 1910-45 colonial rule that it was to the credit of his policy of Korean national peace that dialog with the North was still possible.

“In spite of a series of worrying actions taken by North Korea recently, the momentum for dialog remains unshaken,” Moon said.

The North’s spokesman said it was “delusional” to think that inter-Korean dialog will resume once the military drills with the United States are over.

The spokesman left open the possibility of talks with the United States, speaking of upcoming dialog between the two countries but warned it will have no place for the South.

“South Korea is poking around hoping to reap the benefits of future dialog between the North and the United States, but it will be a good idea to give up such foolishness,” the unnamed spokesman said. 

Trump and Kim have met twice since their first summit in Singapore last year and said their countries will continue talks, but little progress has been made on the North’s stated commitment to denuclearize.

…

KATHMANDU, NEPAL — A Nepal government committee formed after a bad mountaineering season on Mount Everest has recommended requiring climbers to have scaled tall peaks, undergone proper training, and possess certificates of good health and insurance that would cover rescue costs if required. 
 
A report by the committee released Wednesday says people must have successfully climbed a peak higher than 6,500 meters (21,320 feet) before they can apply for permits to scale Mount Everest. Each climber would also be required to have a highly experienced guide. 
 
Of the 11 people who died during the spring climbing season this year, nine were climbing from the southern side of the peak in Nepal, making it one of the worst years on the mountain.  
  
The government was criticized for allowing too many climbers on the world’s highest peak.  
  
Mountaineering authorities were also criticized for not stopping inexperienced climbers who had difficulty coping with harsh conditions on Everest and slowed down other climbers on the trail to the 8,850-meter (29,035-foot) summit. 
 
The government is expected to amend its mountaineering regulations following the recommendations. 
 
The March-May climbing season is when weather conditions are best for climbing the Himalayan mountain. 

…

Christy Lee and Kim Young-gyo contributed to this report which originated on VOA’s Korean Service.

WASHINGTON — The recent missile tests by North Korea, including one Saturday, show potential weapons that are designed to circumvent any preemptive strikes that would destroy them on their launch pads before being fired, experts said.

North Korea wants to “be able to roll out a launcher, fire immediately, and not give the U.S. and South Korea an opportunity to attack the launcher and destroy them before they can launch their missiles,” said Bruce Bennett, a senior defense and analyst at the Rand Corp.

North Korea said Sunday it tested “another new weapons system” with an “advantageous tactical character different [than] the existing weapons systems” through the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).

The statement came the day after North Korea tested two missiles, which South Korean officials described as short-range missiles. Saturday’s test is North Korea’s fifth launch in less than a month.

On Tuesday, Andrea Thompson, undersecretary for Arms Control and International Security at the State Department, said, “We will continue to call out [North Korea] on their missile testing,” expressing concern over the new type of missiles North Korea said it tested.

What kind of missile is it?

According to experts, the latest missiles North Korea launched are similar to the KN-23, which has specifications comparable to the Russian-made Iskander type missile that Pyongyang began testing in May.

“It looks like it is the same diameter as the KN-23, the Iskander look-alike [but] is shorter,” said Jonathan McDowell, an astrophysicist at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. “It is probably in the same family as the KN-12 Iskander-ish missile but with a slightly different role. It is certainly unclear what its role is right now.”

North Korea first tested what are considered KN-23 missiles May 4 and again May 9, calling them “tactical guided weapons.” North Korea first unveiled the then-unnamed solid fuel, short-range missile in 2018 during a February parade to honor the 70th anniversary of the Korean People’s Army. After the two launches in May 2019, the U.S. dubbed the Iskander-like missile, the KN-23.

The missiles North Korea tested July 25, which it again called “tactical guided weapons,” and Aug. 6 are also considered the KN-23, according to Bennett.

Not a new missile

Bruce Bechtol, a former intelligence officer at the Defense Intelligence Agency and now a professor at Angelo State University in Texas, said although North Korea is calling the missiles “new,” they are similar to the missiles modeled after the Iskander.

“People may have been misinterpreting the North Korean statements,” Bechtol said. The statements may have been referring to missiles that are new this summer, he added. “The Iskander is new. They just started testing it. They may have been referring to the same missile.”

McDowell said if the missiles tested Saturday are the KN-23 model, they are “using the similar or the same solid motor” referring to the use of solid-fuel propelled engines in the missiles.

“Solid propellant missiles are easier to deploy operationally than liquid propellant ones because you don’t have to fuel them up,” McDowell said. “They are just ready to go.”

Missiles using solid fuel, Bennett said, can be launched “without having to refuel them after they set them up” on a launch pad. However, the missiles using liquid fuel have to be “set up and then refueled,” and the refueling process “could take half an hour or more, making it vulnerable to a preemptive attack,” according to Bennett.

“If they fuel [the missile], you [have] warning that it [was] potentially going to be launched, and so that was a good time to preempt,” Bennett said.

Launch pads and types of missiles

A preemptive strike is aimed at an enemy’s capabilities before they are launched, depriving it of its ability to attack.

Bennett said, however, North Korea may not have enough launch pads to fire multiple missiles simultaneously.

“If they continue making many more missiles than they make launchers, then a whole bunch of those missiles are sitting somewhere at the time of the first launch,” he said. “Do they also have sufficient launchers to disperse all of the missiles simultaneously? Or do they still have six or eight or 10 missiles per launchers so that a bunch of them are sitting underground somewhere and could be attacked?”

The KN-23 has quasi-ballistic capabilities but can fly lower than shorter-range ballistic missiles and has fins to maneuver, capabilities that make it difficult for a missile defense system to intercept them once they are launched. If the North Korean KN-23s are equipped with a precision guidance system, they could potentially hit their intended targets accurately.

Ballistic characteristics of a missile enable it to fly on a curved trajectory much like a semi-oval path a ball takes from the time it is thrown into the air until it lands. The path is determined by the speed of a missile’s launch and the force of gravity pulling it down.

The missiles North Korea launched July 31 and Aug. 2, which Pyongyang called a “multiple launch guided rocket system” after each launch, are considered artillery missiles that have shorter range than the KN-23, according to Bennett.

Artillery missiles are also smaller in diameter than the KN-23, which means they carry less fuel and travel shorter distances, and are fired from a launcher that can launch four or more missiles simultaneously, Bennett said.

What North Korea called guided rockets are considered missiles if they have guidance technology with maneuvering capabilities.

The South Korean Defense Ministry said Wednesday it plans to ramp up the country’s missile defense system called the Korea Air and Missile Defense (KAMD) to better detect and intercept incoming North Korean missiles.

The five-year plan that begins in 2020 will include upgrading South Korea’s early warning radar system that will expand detection coverage of ballistic missiles. It also includes building more Aegis-equipped ship-based interceptors and deploying improved Patriot Advanced Capability (PAC)-3 interceptors. Aegis-equipped destroyers have wide coverage areas and can intercept incoming missiles that fly high altitudes, and the PACT-3 can intercept missiles directed against smaller areas.
 

…

Thousands of women from across Brazil marched through the capital Wednesday, demanding better working conditions on farms and protesting against right-wing President Jair Bolsonaro. 
 
“We are working from sun to sun, rain to rain, just to be able to bring food to the table,” one woman said, while another appealed to the government “to have mercy and do the original land reform for working people who want a piece of land to work with, raise their children and grandchildren.” 
 
The women also marched against Bolsonaro, who has been long accused of making racist and sexist comments. His cuts to education funding set off another large protest by students and teachers in Brasilia on Tuesday.  
 
Bolsonaro is also facing international criticism for his seeming indifference to Amazon rainforest destruction. 
 
Wednesday’s “March of the Margaridas” is held every four years. It was named for Brazilian union leader Margarida Maria Alves, who was murdered in 1983. 

…

Apple’s AirPods, Apple Watch and HomePod, which have helped the company offset waning sales of its bestselling iPhone this year, are not included in a temporary reprieve on tariffs by the Trump administration and will face a 10% levy on Sept 1.

The administration said on Tuesday that some major items, such as laptops and cellphones, including Apple’s MacBooks and iPhones, will not face tariffs until Dec. 15. 

President Donald Trump said the change was to avoid an impact on U.S. customers during the Christmas shopping season. The tariff delay that affects some of Apple’s biggest-selling products helped send its shares up more than 4% in late trading.

Trump and his administration did not say why some electronics received a reprieve and others did not. Many of the products set to face tariffs on Sept. 1, such as smart watches, fitness trackers, smart speakers and Bluetooth headphones, had been spared once before.

These include popular products from Apple rivals, such as Fitbit smart watches and smart speakers from Amazon.com and Alphabet’s Google. 

The Trump administration had proposed tariffs on those devices to take effect last September, but they were spared at the last moment after Apple, among other companies, told the government that the levies would “result in lower U.S. growth and competitiveness and higher prices for U.S. consumers.”
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Some accessories have been central to Apple’s efforts to diversify revenue beyond its signature iPhone, which pushed the company’s market capitalization past $1 trillion in 2018 though the market cap has slipped this year.

Wearables

In Apple’s latest reported fiscal quarter, the iPhone contributed less than half of company revenues for the first time in seven years. The iPhone’s decline was somewhat offset by a 50% jump in sales of so-called wearables, such as the Apple Watch and AirPods, helping Apple beat Wall Street estimates and boosting its stock.

Apple does not break out by geographic region the sales of products such as wearables.

“We’ve really put large strategic investments and resources and interest into wearables and services,” Apple CEO Tim Cook told Reuters on July 30. “And if you take those two and add them together, they’re now the size of a Fortune 50 company, and they were essentially nascent businesses not that long ago.”

Apple, Fitbit, Amazon and Google did not immediately return requests for comment.

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