Author: Worldcrew

Few US Doctors Discuss Cancer Costs With Patients, Study Finds

Posted by Worldcrew On 18/05/2017

Most doctors did not discuss the cost of cancer treatment with patients, spent less than two minutes on it when they did, and usually did so only after patients brought it up, a study that taped hundreds of visits at several large hospitals finds.

Cancer patients are three times more likely to declare bankruptcy than people without cancer are, but many doctors are not having the conversations that might help prevent this and sometimes don’t know the cost themselves, the results suggest.     

 

“That would not occur in any other industry I can think of” where a service or product is sold, said the study leader, Dr. Rahma Warsame of the Mayo Clinic.

Results were released Wednesday by the American Society of Clinical Oncology and will be discussed next month at its annual meeting in Chicago.

The study has some limitations – it’s not nationwide, and it includes newly diagnosed patients, where cost is most likely to come up, as well as others further along in treatment who may have discussed this earlier.

 

But the larger point is clear, Warsame said: The “financial toxicity” of treatments that can cost more than $100,000 a year is growing, and talks about that aren’t happening enough.

 

“I’ve had people say ‘no’ to really life-extending therapies” because of worries about bankrupting their family, she said.

 

For the study, researchers taped 529 conversations between doctors and patients with various types of cancer at three outpatient clinics – the kind of places chemo often is given – at Mayo, Los Angeles County Hospital and the University of Southern California’s Norris campus in Los Angeles.

 

Patients and doctors knew they were being taped but didn’t know why. Cost came up in 151 of the visits. Patients brought it up in 106 cases and doctors did in 45.

 

Appointments lasted about 15 minutes on average at the two California hospitals and half an hour at Mayo, but cost discussions ran only one to two minutes when they occurred at all.

 

Even when doctors acknowledged a cost concern, they rarely acted on it. Only six patients were referred to social services to seek help with affording care.

 

“Maybe a lot of patients don’t know to ask questions” about cost, said Karla Mees, 63, a nursing instructor from Rochester, Minnesota, who was treated for breast cancer at Mayo Clinic.

 

Doctors warned her in advance that she might have to pay $4,500 for gene tests on her tumor to help determine care, but she never knew how much chemo and radiation would cost until the bills came.  

 

“I just remember thinking, ‘I need the stuff, I’ll worry about payment later,’” she said, thankful that her insurance capped her annual out-of-pocket costs at $2,500.

 

Doctors also may be reluctant to talk money and have to give medical issues top priority in the short time they have during patient visits, said Dr. Lowell Schnipper, a cancer expert at Boston’s Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and head of the cancer group’s panel on value in cancer care.

 

“Most of us are not very well skilled in bringing it up,” he said. “In school you’re trained to simply take the best care you can of your patient and not worry about anything other than doing exactly that.”

 

In 2015, the cancer society launched a tool to help doctors and patients decide whether a cancer drug is worth it – the amount of benefit it gives versus its cost. It’s a good starting point for money talks, he said.
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Tensions Persist After Erdogan-Trump Meeting

Posted by Worldcrew On 17/05/2017

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is attempting to put a positive spin on his Washington encounter with his U.S. counterpart Donald Trump, calling it a “new awakening” in bilateral relations.

But behind joint commitments “to work together in the war against terrorism,” reaction has been cool in Turkey, with a recognition that the much-heralded “pivotal” encounter failed to deliver any breakthrough in ongoing points of bilateral tension.

“Trump, Erdogan seek to strengthen ties: White House,” read a less than enthusiastic headline of the pro-Erdogan Turkish Yeni Safak newspaper. 

“It was an important meeting, but to qualify it as pivotal, some long-lasting big-time decisions have to be made. This was no such meeting,” said Sinan Ulgen, a visiting scholar of the Carnegie Institute in Brussels, adding, “On many issues which continue to divide Turkey and the U.S., there does not seem to be a particular convergence.”

Erdogan had pledged to seek to reverse Trump’s decision to arm the Syrian Kurdish militia, the YPG, in its fight against the Islamic State. Ankara accuses the militia of being a terrorist organization affiliated with the PKK, which is fighting the Turkish State.

“Erdogan was hoping to use his much-vaunted persuasive skills in high-level meetings when he met Trump,” noted Atilla Yesilada, a political consultant of Global Source Partners.

But the Turkish president had little opportunity to persuade Trump, with his meeting lasting only a reported 22 minutes. The two leaders’ meeting was followed by a luncheon involving officials from both sides. 

“The fact the initial meeting was so short is another indication that this was essentially a preparatory meeting where many issues on the bilateral relationship were not discussed in depth,” noted analyst Ulgen.

Gulen remains an issue

Erdogan’s calls for the extradition of Islamic cleric Fethullah Gulen, too, appears to have made little headway. Ankara blames Gulen for masterminding last July’s failed coup attempt. “Possible steps” were discussed on the issue, wrote Ibrahim Kalin, Erdogan’s top adviser, in a statement. Ankara is also reportedly pressing for Gulen’s detention ahead of extradition hearings.

The failure to make any breakthrough on key issues of dispute was widely predicted, but resolving such disputes may not have been the main purpose of Erdogan’s visit.

“The single most important outcome from the Turkish perspective of this visit was clear — that is, to garner international legitimacy for the referendum results and the Erdogan presidency,” said former senior Turkish diplomat Aydin Selcen, who served in Washington and Iraq. “Of course the U.S. being sole global power, to have the photograph at the Oval Office was the sole target of Erdogan’s visit. From that perspective, it was a success.”

YPG at status quo

Last month, Erdogan narrowly won a controversial referendum victory extending his powers.  Allegations of vote rigging continue to dog the result, with Trump remaining the only western ally to congratulate Erdogan’s success.

During talks with Erdogan, Trump reportedly did not raise human rights concerns and an ongoing crackdown on dissent, despite more than 60 members of Congress expressing their concern over the deteriorating situation.

The U.S. president also extended support to Ankara’s war against the PKK. “They will have no safe quarter,” Trump said.

“All talk, no walk. That support was already there,” noted former Turkish diplomat Selcen. “Does that entail a green light from Washington for Turkey to carry out similar airstrikes as Ankara did against the YPG? I don’t think so.”

Erdogan has warned that his forces are ready to launch cross-border operations against the Kurdish rebels based in Iraq. Just hours before Erdogan sat down with Trump, Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim made a less than thinly veiled warning of military incursions if Washington fails to address Turkish concerns.

Turkish military forces remain massed on both the Syrian and Iraqi borders close to position of the YPG.  Last month, Turkish forces struck YPG targets in Syria and Iraq, in the face of U.S. opposition, with one strike narrowly missing U.S. special forces. “I would expect more of the same. The same tensions will continue,” predicted former diplomat Selcen, “yet at the same time, some sort cooperation will continue concerning Syria and Iraq, as well.”

But such differences with Washington will be tempered by Ankara’s increasingly vulnerable position.

“From Erdogan’s perspective and Ankara’s perspective, the relationship with the U.S. is at a critical importance, at a time when Turkey’s relationships with its other partners in the West have entered a period of acrimony and difficulty. Therefore, the relationship with Washington and the need for a sound relationship with the new U.S. president is now more important than ever,” said analyst Ulgen.
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Norwegian Man Freed From DRC Jail

Posted by Worldcrew On 17/05/2017

A man who was sentenced to life in prison for murder and espionage in the Democratic Republic of the Congo has been freed and has returned to Norway, Norwegian newspaper Verden Gang reported Wednesday.

Joshua French, who has dual British and Norwegian citizenship, was serving a life sentence after he and a fellow Norwegian, Tjostolv Moland, were convicted of murdering their driver in Congo in 2009 and spying for Norway — charges they both denied. They originally were sentenced to death, but their sentences were commuted.

French and Moland were in Congo researching ideas for an extreme tourism company when they were charged with and found guilty of the murder of Abedi Kasongo. The two men said their car had been ambushed by gunmen and that their driver had been shot.

The men also were charged with espionage because they were carrying military ID cards at the time. The Norwegian government denied that the men were spies.

Moland found dead

In August 2013, Moland was found dead in his prison cell. A Congolese military court found French guilty of strangling Moland, but a Norwegian forensics team assisting French informed the court that Moland had hung himself.

Earlier this year, Congolese Justice Minister Alexis Thambwe Mwamba told Norway’s largest media organization, NRK, that French would be released this year.

French’s mother, Kari Hilde French, wrote on her blog that her son’s health recently has been “very bad,” and that his most recent stint in the hospital had lasted 4½ months.

“Our greatest wish is to get Joshua French home alive before it is too late,” she wrote.
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Philippines Declines EU Aid After Securing Billions From China

Posted by Worldcrew On 17/05/2017

The Philippine government has told the European Union it will no longer accept development aid from the bloc, putting at risk programs to assist poor and

conflict-hit regions in the country’s south, Europe’s ambassador said on Wednesday.

Ambassador Franz Jessen said the decision to cut aid from the EU, a strong critic of President Rodrigo Duterte’s drugs war, would mean the loss of about 250 million Euros ($278.73 million) worth of grants mostly allocated to Muslim communities.

Manila’s move comes days after Duterte won billions of dollars in pledges from China after attending the Belt and Road summit in Beijing.

“The Philippine government has informed us they no longer accept new EU grants,” Jessen said without elaborating.

The EU will issue a statement on Thursday, officially announcing the end of its funding agreement with the Philippines.

There was no immediate response from the Philippines’ foreign ministry.

Duterte says European nations don’t understand the extent of the narcotics problem in the Philippines.

Almost 9,000 people, many small-time users and dealers, have been killed in the Philippines since Duterte took office on June 30. Police say about a third of the victims were shot by officers in self-defense during legitimate operations.

The EU has been providing support to Manila’s efforts to end nearly 50 years of Muslim rebellion in a conflict that has killed more than 120,000 people, displaced 1 million and stunted growth in one of the country’s resource-rich regions.

It granted the Philippines 130 million euros in development assistance between 2007-2013. In 2015, it pledged 325 million euros over four years to finance projects in Muslim Mindanao after Manila signed a peace deal with rebels in March 2014.

($1 = 0.8969 euros)
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Circus Program Teaches Teens Lessons in Balance, Life

Posted by Worldcrew On 17/05/2017

The classroom isn’t the only place where kids can learn. The circus can also provide an education. Not only to master acrobatic tricks and skills, but to discover how to walk across the social divide that separates poverty and privilege. Faiza Elmasry has more details.
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Mexico Expects NAFTA Talks by Late August, Its Economy Minister Says

Posted by Worldcrew On 17/05/2017

Mexican Economy Minister Ildefonso Guajardo said Tuesday that he expected U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration to tell Congress early next week of plans to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement, a move that would produce talks by late August.

Guajardo said he would have more information after meeting with U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer in Vietnam on Thursday as part of Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meetings.

During the 2016 U.S. election campaign, Trump vowed to scrap the 1994 deal between the United States, Canada and Mexico if he could not adjust it to benefit U.S. interests.

“Probably the notification will be sent to Congress by the U.S. executive at some time early next week,” Guajardo told Mexican reporters, a day after meetings in Washington with U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross and other U.S. officials.

In Washington, Ross declined to predict the timing of the notification, saying that there were more consultations with Congress needed first.

Current format

In a meeting Tuesday, U.S. senators said Ross and Lighthizer expressed their preference to keep the current trilateral format in the NAFTA talks.

Guajardo also said that a dispute over sugar with the United States could be resolved within two weeks, before a June 5 deadline to break the impasse.

The U.S. sugar industry pressed the U.S. Commerce Department late last year to withdraw from a 2014 agreement that sets prices and quotas for U.S. imports of Mexican sugar unless the deal could be renegotiated. The U.S. sugar lobby wants Mexico to export less refined sugar and has become emboldened since Trump took office.

A U.S. Commerce Department spokesman said Ross and Guajardo discussed possible solutions and that they were continuing to work toward a negotiated settlement.

Any deal, however, would need agreement from the U.S. sugar producers who brought an anti-dumping case against Mexican competitors.

On Monday, Mexico’s sugar chamber said no deal had been reached in talks on Monday to resolve the dispute.
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Hundreds of West African Immigrants in US to Lose Immigration Status

Posted by Worldcrew On 17/05/2017

Hundreds of Africans living in the northern U.S. state of Minnesota are about to lose their temporary immigrant status.

As many as 5,000 people were granted the special protected status in 2014 when an Ebola epidemic hit three West African nations, allowing residents from the impacted countries to live and work in the U.S. legally until the outbreak was contained.

Last year, those countries were declared Ebola free. Now, those with temporary immigrant status must either return home or obtain legal status, Minnesota Public Radio reported this week.

Abdullah Kiatamba, executive director of African Immigrant Services in Brooklyn Park, Minnesota, who along with other immigration leaders is calling the termination premature, says Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone are still recovering from the outbreak, so it’s still not safe to go home.

John Keller, executive director of the Immigrant Law Center of Minnesota, said health care systems in the countries hit hardest by Ebola were already delicate before the outbreak. “It’s great these countries have been declared Ebola free, but the toll that fighting Ebola took on the countries, you have to take that into effect, too,” he said.

Kiatamba estimates that between 200 and 500 people will be affected. Officials haven’t released numbers, and it is unclear how many of the immigrants have returned home or found other ways to make their immigration status permanent.

Kiatamba said that more than 11,000 people died during the Ebola outbreak, but that its impact goes beyond the health care system.

“The employment system, economic system, social system, health have all collapsed,” he said. “Their coming to the U.S. was a very important humanitarian step, and I think the reason for their coming has totally not been eliminated.”

The temporary immigration status was originally issued for an 18-month period. It was extended twice, each time for six months.
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Demonstrations Outside White House as Trump, Erdogan Meet

Posted by Worldcrew On 17/05/2017

Supporters and protesters of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan demonstrated in Lafayette Park outside the White House as U.S. President Donald Trump hosted Erdogan, in Washington on Tuesday.
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From Hiding, Journalist Who Exposed Chechnya’s Gay Purge Sees ‘Culture of Impunity’ Ending

Posted by Worldcrew On 16/05/2017

After breaking the story about the systemic torture and extrajudicial killings of gay men by Chechen security officials in an unofficial prison outside Grozny, Elena Milashina of the Russian-language Novaya Gazeta newspaper has been forced into hiding.

Faced with a fatwa by Chechen clerics who have vowed to kill the reporter along with any journalists associated with her publication, Milashina recently agreed to speak with VOA from an undisclosed location via Skype.

Like her late colleague Anna Politkovskaya, the Novaya Gazeta investigative reporter who was gunned down in the doorway of her Moscow apartment building in 2006, Milashina has reported on numerous human rights violations under Chechnya’s pro-Kremlin leader, Ramzan Kadyrov.

Although the Russian Embassy in Israel on Thursday said a recently completed Kremlin probe had disproved Milashina’s report, the gruesome details of covert Chechen concentration camps for gays have been corroborated by multiple international news outlets and human rights organizations.

Saying she was prepared to die in the line of journalistic duty, Milashina told VOA why Chechnya’s treatment of gays marked the end of a Kremlin-backed “culture of impunity” that has flourished in the deeply conservative, predominantly Muslim North Caucasus republic, which she describes as Kadyrov’s own feudal kingdom.

The following transcript has been edited for brevity.

VOA: As someone who has covered Chechnya since 2004, how does this latest story on Chechen human rights abuses stand apart? What has the impact been regionally?

Elena Milashina (EM): This was about a campaign in Chechnya that was organized in the end of February and lasted throughout the whole of March against men in Chechnya who were suspected of being gay. And this was the only reason they were legally detained and put in secret prisons and tortured, and some of them were killed. The only reason why they were tortured with electricity twice daily was to get information about other gays. This is the only reason. First of all, we were able to save a lot of people by eventually publishing a hotline for victims, through which some gay man began applying for help. So far, we’ve saved more than 100 people who were tortured and detained and had other problems with the Chechen police. Now they’re in a safe place, and now we’re trying to help them escape Russia. That’s the main result.

The other result is that the whole world, through this story, has refocused on human rights [abuses against] the Chechen people, and what kind of regime the Kremlin has established there over the past decade. It has also put pressure on the Russian government to start preliminary steps toward an investigation that may lead to a criminal case, which would be the first time that’s happened since Kadyrov has ruled over Chechnya. And that’s the biggest result.

VOA: Do you think most people understand what is happening in Chechnya? That it has basically become a state within a state?

EM: In Russia, people understand. And that’s why Chechnya continues to be a high-level news item in Russian media. Because people in Russia are very afraid of Kadyrov’s Chechen regime; they’re afraid of Kadyrov himself and his [officials], their ability to go anywhere and commit crimes without punishment. This fear explains their interest in news from Chechnya, and the Russian government understands this. I’m very sure about this.

As for international society and governments: Just over the past two years we’ve seen this huge number of Chechen refugees trying to get to Europe. And European countries won’t give them visas. They don’t want to let them in. [European officials] were saying, actually, that Chechnya is a peaceful region, that there is no war there, everything is good, that life is OK, and so [the refugees] should go back. Now, after this story, nobody is saying this anymore.

VOA: How are gay people living today in Chechnya now? Those who didn’t escape?

EM: They’re in hiding. They trust no one, and it’s very hard to convince them to contact the hotline we arranged for victims. They’re terrified, and I think they’re still in grave danger. When Chechen authorities decide to do something, they will do it no matter what. So, if they decide to cleanse Chechen society of gays, they will do it, and nobody can push them not to do this. Even if they’re stopped, [Chechen authorities] will wait for a while, then start again. There is a big threat for Chechen gays, and the Chechen gays understand this. That’s why a lot of them call us for help, but still there are a lot of gay Chechens in hiding who trust nobody but themselves, who try to manage their problems alone.

VOA: Many people outside Chechnya, accurately or not, still think of Chechnya as only a breeding ground for radical Islamist militants. Some critics of Kadyrov have said he abuses the counterterror mandate to attack anyone he chooses. But does domestic terrorism remain a problem, or is it time to look at this from a different angle?

EM: I would say that this cliche is coming away because the level of terroristic threats have been coming down for the whole North Caucasus region, and we have far fewer attacks than we used to have. And now a lot of Russians are scared of Chechen people, because it’s the Russian opinion that Chechens can do anything and get away with it. For Russian society, this is scarier than terrorism.

VOA: You’ve seen many horrifying stories in Chechnya over the past 12 years — people disappearing, people tortured, families torn apart. As such, did this story still shock you?

EM: For me, it doesn’t matter if the person is gay or suspected of being a terrorist or a Salafist or a drug user. I see them all equally because, in Chechnya, all those people can be illegally detained, tortured, even killed. I see how this situation is developing. For me, the attacks on gays by Chechen authorities is a logical end to the culture of impunity. When a lot of other Chechens were detained, tortured, killed — the world was silent. But this crime is something special. We’ve never had this in Russian history; we’ve never had this in the history of Russian-Chechen relations — during two wars, even. This is a crime against humanity. Because this was sanctioned by authorities, because it was produced by Chechen police, and because of the motive — that the only guilt of these people is that they are gay — it is an absolutely textbook definition of a crime against humanity. And I don’t think Russian authorities understood this from the beginning, but now they’re starting to realize that if they won’t do anything about this, they are implicitly covering up crimes against humanity. And, if that’s the case, nobody can know what’s next in Chechnya. As I said, it was a logical, step-by-step situation development in Chechnya. It went from targeting anyone suspected of being terrorists to targeting gays.

VOA: Do you see other groups or minorities being threatened?

EM: It depends on Ramzan Kadyrov, whatever or whomever he would like to target next. If he decides it’s Chechen lesbians, then we’ll have a campaign against Chechen lesbians. If he decides tomorrow that the target is children whose drawings offend him. … Anything can be a target, because only one man is deciding. That is the problem of Chechnya. One man can order his police or his army to take, detain and torture people — and for what? For whatever he deems harmful to Chechen traditions.

VOA: About your personal safety: Have things improved? Can you work or even go out in the open?

EM: The problem is that no matter what President Vladimir Putin might tell Ramzan Kadyrov about stopping aggressive behavior toward journalists, we’re not sure whether Kadyrov would obey, because of his impunity. So we’re not sure about our safety, because we’re not sure if [Kadyrov is] even under control. That’s why we’re deciding to take security measures. I actually moved out of the country for a while. I will definitely continue developing this story on gays in Chechnya, and we’ll continue our work covering Chechnya, but we’re taking measures.

This report originated in VOA’s Russian service.
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‘El Daily Stormer’: Neo-Nazi Website Now in Spanish, Too

Posted by Worldcrew On 16/05/2017

How does a leading neo-Nazi website that has railed against Hispanic immigrants expand its audience beyond a loyal base of U.S. white supremacists? By publishing a Spanish-language edition, of course.

 

The Daily Stormer — infamous for orchestrating internet harassment campaigns by its “Troll Army” of readers — recently launched El Daily Stormer as a “news portal” tailoring its racist, anti-Semitic content for readers in Spain and Latin America.

 

Andrew Auernheimer, a notorious computer hacker and internet troll who writes for the English-language site, says the Spanish edition fits their mission to spread Hitlerism across the world.

 

“We want our message to reach millions more people,” he said in a telephone interview.

 

Hate sites have realized that the U.S. has no monopoly on white nationalists and other far-right extremists, says Heidi Beirich, director of the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Intelligence Project. Others, such as Stormfront, already created multilingual forums.

 

“The white supremacist movement has really viewed itself as past borders, reaching out to white people in other countries,” Beirich said.

 

The law center represents a Montana real estate agent who sued The Daily Stormer’s founder, Andrew Anglin, last month for unleashing an anti-Semitic “campaign of terror” against her family.

 

Anonymous trolls bombarded Tanya Gersh’s family with hateful and threatening messages after Anglin published the family’s personal information in a December post that accused Gersh and other Jewish residents of Whitefish, Montana, of engaging in an “extortion racket” against the mother of white nationalist Richard Spencer.

 

Anglin’s site takes its name from Der Stürmer, a newspaper that published Nazi propaganda. It includes sections called “Jewish Problem” and “Race War.”

 

El Daily Stormer titles its anti-Semitic section “Judiadas,” an offensive term with roots in medieval Spain, where it was invoked to justify genocidal attacks on Jews.

 

The Spanish site also includes appeals for donations and unpaid articles, and a forum where people complain about Chile and Argentina filling up with “negros,” referring to people from Peru, Bolivia, Paraguay.

 

Auernheimer, known online as “weev,” said a team of volunteers is writing original content for the Spanish-language site. The site’s appeal for unpaid collaborators says being a dissident “has never been a lucrative activity,” and that it is looking for writers “willing to risk everything for the survival of our race.”

 

“We have a big Spanish-speaking population on our forums, so it was an easy direction to branch out into,” he said.

 

About 40 percent of The Daily Stormer’s 3.2 million unique monthly visitors are in the U.S.; the Spanish edition has added fewer than 10,000 since its recent launch, Auernheimer said.

 

Surpassing Stormfront as the top U.S. hate site hasn’t been a financial boon for The Daily Stormer, which calls itself “100 percent reader-supported.” Anglin complained in January that a Ukrainian advertising company had banned them, leaving an Australian electrician as the site’s only advertiser.

 

“We don’t have revenue commensurate with a publication of our size,” Auernheimer said.
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UN Security Council Rips North Korea Missile Test, Threatens New Sanctions

Posted by Worldcrew On 16/05/2017

The U.N. Security Council has strongly condemned North Korea’s latest ballistic missile test, in a lengthy statement that also threatens to impose fresh sanctions on the North for its “flagrant and provocative defiance” of earlier demands to end all nuclear testing.

In a unanimous statement late Monday backed by China, the Council voiced “utmost concern” about Sunday’s launch, described by Pyongyang as a mid-to-long range missile that traveled 787 kilometers (490 miles) before plunging into the Sea of Japan.

The Council statement called the launch “highly destabilizing behavior” that “is greatly increasing tension in the [East Asia] region and beyond.” It further called on all countries to implement the six North Korean sanctions resolutions already adopted by the world body “in an expeditious and serious manner.”

South Korean president deploys envoys

Earlier Monday, South Korean President Moon Jae-in said he is sending special envoys around the world in a push to strengthen Seoul’s global ties in the wake of the launch. The president said the envoys will meet with high-ranking officials to exchange ideas and explain the new South Korean government’s policy plans.

North Korea boasted early Monday that the latest launch was personally supervised by leader Kim Jong Un. The official North Korean news agency KCNA said the launch aimed at showing the technical capability to carry a “large scale heavy nuclear warhead.”

KCNA also quoted Kim as accusing the United States of “browbeating” countries that “have no nukes,” and said Kim warned Washington “not to misjudge the reality that its mainland is in the North’s sighting range for [a] strike.”

International reaction

Russian President Vladimir Putin called North Korea’s latest missile test “counter-productive, harmful and dangerous.”

Speaking Monday in Beijing, Putin said, “We are categorically against the expansion of the club of nuclear powers.” He also urged other world leaders to “stop intimidating North Korea and find a peaceful solution to the problem.”

The test, according to a White House statement, should “serve as a call for all nations to implement far stronger sanctions against North Korea.”

U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley said Sunday it is time for many nations to “send a strong, unified message that this is unacceptable, and I think you’ll see the international community do that.” She said the United States will continue to “tighten the screws” against Pyongyang.

U.S. President Donald Trump said earlier this month he would be “honored” to meet with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un “under the right circumstances,” but Haley said that “having a missile test is not the way to sit down with the president, because he’s absolutely not going to do it.”

History of defiance

Pyongyang conducted two unauthorized nuclear test explosions last year and about two dozen rocket launches, in a years-long push to expand its nuclear weapons and ballistic missile capabilities.

North Korean leader Kim declared in a speech on New Year’s Day that his country’s program to build intercontinental ballistic missiles had “reached its final stage.”

Pyongyang has been under U.N. sanctions since 2006, along with an international arms embargo aimed at slowing the development of its banned nuclear and missile programs.

Since then, Washington and a host of world governments have repeatedly demanded that the North denuclearize the Korean peninsula. World leaders, however, have yet to devise a plan that would either compel the North to cooperate or create incentives for it to do so.

Margaret Besheer contributed to this report.
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Hillary Clinton Unveils New Political Action Committee

Posted by Worldcrew On 16/05/2017

Former Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton on Monday announced her new political action committee, which she said she hopes will encourage people to get involved and even run for office.

“In recent months, we’ve seen what’s possible when people come together to resist bullying, hate, falsehoods and divisiveness, and to stand up for a fairer, more inclusive America,” Clinton tweeted.

Her new PAC, called “Onward Together,” will use Clinton’s fundraising skills to provide support for groups that support Democrats.

They include Color of Change, which fights for voting and policy reforms to end discrimination against African Americans.

Clinton did not mention Donald Trump by name in her tweets. But she did note that she won 66 million votes in the November election, which is more than Trump, who won the Electoral College and the White House.

“This year hasn’t been what I envisioned,” Clinton wrote. “But I know what I am still fighting for: a kinder, big hearted, inclusive America. Onward.”
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White House Denies Trump Leaked Highly Classified Intelligence to Russian Officials

Posted by Worldcrew On 16/05/2017

U.S. National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster and other members of the Trump administration have denied the accuracy of published reports that the president revealed highly classified information to Russian officials in the Oval Office.

The original story, first reported by the Washington Post, “is false,” McMaster told reporters on the White House grounds late Monday. “At no time were intelligence sources or methods discussed and the president did not disclose any military operation that was not already publicly known,” he added.

“I was there. It didn’t happen,” McMaster concluded, then turned around and re-entered the West Wing without answering reporters’ questions.

Tillerson backs up McMasters

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, who said he also attended the May 10 meeting with the Russian foreign minister and Russian ambassador, backed up McMaster’s characterization of the conversation, adding in a statement that “a broad range of subjects were discussed, among which were common efforts and threats regarding counterterrorism.”

Several U.S. news organizations reported that the president, in the Oval Office meeting, disclosed information considered highly classified.

The information Trump revealed could jeopardize a critical source of intelligence about Islamic State and the manner in which it was collected, according to reports by the Post, the New York Times and others.

A U.S. president has the power to declassify nearly any information, so what Trump did does not appear to be illegal. But intelligence officials, quoted by the newspapers, expressed concern that the information, provided by a U.S. partner government, could harm crucial relationships.

The Central Intelligence Agency and National Security Agency declined immediate comment when contacted by VOA.

Alarm from Capitol Hill

The president, in the meeting with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Ambassador Sergey Kislyak, appeared to be boasting about inside knowledge of a looming threat to aviation, according to the Washington Post.

The information, which was deemed to be especially sensitive, had not even been shared widely within the U.S. government or shared with other allies, according to the New York Times.

Those reports prompted immediate bipartisan alarm on Capitol Hill.

“I am shocked by reports that President Trump revealed highly classified information to Russian diplomats last week. This certainly raises questions about whether the president recognizes the serious implications of disclosing such sensitive information to an adversary,” said Democratic Representative Eliot Engel, the ranking member on the House Committee on Foreign Affairs. “I will be meeting later this week with National Security Adviser McMaster in a classified session, and will seek answers about what was revealed and how it could damage American national security.”

‘Inexcusable’

The vice chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, Democrat Mark Warner, said on Twitter that “risking sources and methods is inexcusable, particularly with the Russians.”

Trump’s comments, if true, are a “slap in the face” to the U.S. intelligence community, Warner added.

“The White House has got to do something soon to bring itself under control and in order,” the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Republican Bob Corker, told reporters. “Obviously they’re in a downward spiral right now and they have to figure out ways to come to grips with all that’s happening.”

The story broke as the White House remains embroiled in controversy over last week’s firing by the president of FBI Director James Comey. That occurred one day prior to the Oval Office meeting with the Russians.

FBI probe looks at link

The FBI is investigating alleged links between Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign and Russia.

In a joint statement, the top Democrats on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee and the House Judiciary Committee, Elijah Cumming and John Conyers, called for the release of any audio recordings of Trump’s meeting last week with the Russians.

“After an unprecedented week in which many thought it would be impossible for President Trump to be any more irresponsible, he now may have sunk to a dangerous new low,” the two Democrats concluded.

Jeff Seldin and Katherine Gypson contributed to this report.
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Macron Calls for EU Reforms, Vows to Work Closely with Germany

Posted by Worldcrew On 15/05/2017

French President Emmanuel Macron spent his first full day in office traveling to Germany, telling Chancellor Angela Merkel he wants to work closely with her to create “deep reforms” to the European Union.

Macron said in Berlin Monday there must be a “less bureaucratic” Europe and that he is ready to change EU treaties if needed.

He also said France will push for economic reforms in the country to bring down unemployment and implement a reform agenda “not because Europe requests it, but because France needs it.”

Macron said he does not favor European countries taking joint responsibility for old debts and that he has never pushed for jointly issued eurobonds. Germany, which has Europe’s largest economy, has always opposed taking direct responsibility for weaker EU countries’ debts.

Merkel told Macron “Europe will only do well if there is a strong France, and I am committed to that.”

The German chancellor said she and Macron agreed to develop a medium-term road map on how to deepen European Union integration. She said Germany would also be willing to change EU treaties if the changes make sense. But the two countries should first work on what they want to reform, she added.

She said the French and German governments would hold a meeting on key issues in July.

The visit to Germany marked Macron’s first foreign trip after his inauguration on Sunday, continuing a tradition of French presidents making their first international trip to Germany.

In his inaugural address, Macron vowed to restore France’s place in Europe and the world.

Macron, a centrist, was elected last week, defeating anti-EU, anti-immigrant candidate Marine Le Pen. The campaign exposed deep splits in France over the country’s role in Europe.
…

Nearly 30 Years Ago, Soviet Union Extricated Itself From Afghan Conflict

Posted by Worldcrew On 15/05/2017

On May 15, 1988, the Soviet Union began withdrawing from Afghanistan after eight years of military intervention that cost an estimated 10,000 to 15,000 Soviet soldiers their lives and killed or displaced millions of Afghans.

Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev described the Afghan intervention, which began in  late 1979, as a costly drain on the Soviet economy with no clear victory in sight.

Soviet troops entered Afghanistan en masse in December 1979, following infighting involving communist factions that had culminated with the ouster of the country’s president, Nur Mohammad Taraki, by supporters of a more radical rival, Hafizullah Amin. The invading Soviet forces killed Amin and replaced him with a Soviet loyalist from a rival faction.

The intervention came at the height of the Cold War, with the Soviets seizing large swaths of the country. The Soviet occupation further strained relations with the United States.  

President Jimmy Carter responded by implementing economic and other sanctions against the Soviet Union, as well as holding up arms control talks and barring American athletes from attending the 1980 Olympic Games in Moscow.

The U.S. armed the Mujahideen, along with other interested countries, among them Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and China.

For Afghanistan, the Soviet withdrawal did not mean an end to the fighting, however. By 1996, the strict Islamic rebels known as the Taliban, who had been trained in religious schools across the border in Pakistan, took control of the Afghan capital, Kabul.

In a twist of historical irony, the very Afghan rebels the United States armed to oust the Soviets would ultimately harbor al-Qaida, the terrorist network led by Osama bin Laden, that orchestrated the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks on New York and Washington. 
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Trump Taps Callista Gingrich to be Ambassador to Vatican

Posted by Worldcrew On 15/05/2017

The Trump administration has tapped the wife of former House Speaker Newt Gingrich to be the next U.S. ambassador to the Vatican, days before President Donald Trump embarks on his first foreign trip.

 

Trump will nominate Callista Gingrich for the post, two people with direct knowledge of the discussions said Monday. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly before an official announcement.

 

Trump’s foreign trip this month includes a stop at the Vatican.

 

Callista Gingrich is president of Gingrich Productions and has produced a number of documentaries, including one about Pope John Paul II.

 

She also served on the House Committee on Agriculture, where she worked as chief clerk until 2007. She was a key figure in her husband’s 2012 bid for the Republican nomination.

 

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

 

Trump’s vision for foreign relations and diplomacy has been starkly different to that promoted by the vastly popular Pope Francis. Francis has spoken of the need for bridges between nations, while Trump has advocated for walls and travel restrictions as a means of national security.

 

Francis has previously remarked that anyone who wants to build walls to keep migrants out is “not Christian.”

 

Francis also has called for an end to the use of fossil fuels, while Trump has pledged to cancel payments to U.N. climate change programs and pull out of the Paris climate accord.

 

But both share a populist appeal and speak with a down-to-earth simplicity that has endeared them to their bases of supporters. And both share a common concern about the plight of Christians in the Middle East at the hands of Islamic militants.

 

Speaking to reporters while traveling home Saturday from a trip to Portugal, Francis said he would listen respectfully to what Trump has to say when the two meet later this month. Trump will call on Francis mid-way through his first foreign trip, after visiting Saudi Arabia and Israel and before attending a NATO summit in Brussels and a G7 summit in Italy.

 

“I never make a judgment about a person without hearing him out,” the pope said.

 
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Torch-wielding Group Protests Confederate Statue Removal

Posted by Worldcrew On 15/05/2017

A group that included a well-known white nationalist carried torches and chanted “you will not replace us” at a weekend protest in Virginia over plans to remove a monument of a Confederate general.

The protesters on Saturday evening called on officials to halt the removal of a Gen. Robert E. Lee statue in Charlottesville and were swiftly condemned by the city’s mayor, who said the event appeared to hearken “back to the days of the KKK,” the Daily Progress newspaper reported. 

Among those at the protest were Richard Spencer, a while nationalist who popularized the phrase “alt-right” and is a leading figure in a fringe movement that has been described as a mix of racism, white nationalism and populism.

“We will not be replaced from this park,” Spencer told the crowd at a different rally held hours earlier in Charlottesville on Saturday. “We will not be replaced from this world. Whites have a future. We have a future of power, of beauty, of expression,” he said.

Spencer, an outspoken supporter of President Donald Trump, hosted a postelection conference in the nation’s capital last November that ended with audience members mimicking Nazi salutes after Spencer shouted, “Hail Trump, hail our people, hail victory!” Spencer also has advocated for an “ethno-state” that would be a “safe space” for white people

Charlottesville Mayor Mike Signer said in a statement that Saturday’s protest was either “profoundly ignorant” or meant to instill fear in minorities “in a way that hearkens back to the days of the KKK.”

“I want everyone to know this: We reject this intimidation,” Signer said in a statement. “We are a welcoming city, but such intolerance is not welcome here.”

Erich Reimer, chairman of the Charlottesville Republican Party, said in a statement that the “intolerance and hatred” that the protesters are seeking to promote is “utterly disgusting and disturbing beyond words,” The Daily Progress reported.

The debate over Confederate symbols has swept through cities across the South since the 2015 massacre of nine black parishioners at a South Carolina church. The gunman was a self-avowed white supremacist.

In Virginia, Republican Corey Stewart’s vocal support for the Lee statue also has pushed the issue into the state’s high-profile race for governor. Stewart has pledged that no Confederate monuments would be removed if he is elected. 

In New Orleans, workers on Thursday removed a statue of Confederate President Jefferson Davis, the second of four monuments to Confederate era figures the city has voted to remove. Late last month, the city removed a 35-foot tall granite obelisk tribute to whites who battled a biracial Reconstruction government installed in New Orleans after the Civil War.

The Charlottesville City Council voted last month to sell the Lee statue, but a judge has agreed to a temporary injunction that blocks Charlottesville from moving the statue for six months, The Daily Progress reported. The city also plans to rename Lee Park and another park named after another famed Confederate, Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson.
…

Austrian Party Picks New Leader, Early Elections Likely

Posted by Worldcrew On 15/05/2017

Austria’s junior government coalition partner chose a new leader Sunday and gave him the unprecedented authority he demanded as a condition for leading his party into expected early elections this fall.

Foreign Minister Sebastian Kurz told reporters that senior officials of his People’s Party agreed to let him choose all ministers of any government he would head, as well as to nominate candidates for parliament that would include party outsiders.

Speaking after a closed meeting, Kurz said that the gathering also agreed to contest at least the next elections under a name change. Instead of the People’s Party, Kurz and other candidates would now run under the “List Sebastian Kurz – the new People’s Party.”

“We have decided to start a movement,” Kurz told reporters.  “We’re going to rely on proven forces from within the People’s Party, but at the same time we’re going to bring new people on board.”

The power grab is significant in a party where provincial governors have historically had an outsize say in running federal affairs, including pushing through ministerial appointments and overriding major policy decisions by the federal leader.

With few exceptions, that has led party heads to resign in frustration in recent decades. The latest, Reinhold Mitterlehner, threw in the towel Wednesday after less than three years as party leader and vice chancellor.

The center-right People’s Party is now a distant third among voters. But Kurz, a telegenic 30-year old, regularly tops political popularity polls.

That is due in part for his embrace of a harder line on immigrants and other positions of the right-wing Freedom Party, which leads in voter support. But he avoids that party’s xenophobic polemics, as he walks the line between keeping People’s Party supporters and attracting Freedom Party backers.

Acceptance of Kurz’s demands reflects recognition by the party’s power-brokers that refusal would mean an almost certain slide in voter support.

The often cantankerous People’s Party-Social Democratic coalition has shown increased signs of fraying over the past months. Still, Social Democratic Chancellor Christian Kern had resisted People’s Party calls to move up elections from next year.

But as People’s Party officials gathered Sunday he told state broadcaster ORF: “I assume that there will certainly be an election this fall.”
…

With Macron, Paris 2024 Olympic Bid Is ‘Ready Right Now’

Posted by Worldcrew On 15/05/2017

Paris bid leaders want to capitalize on the sense of optimism surrounding new President Emmanuel Macron to beat Los Angeles and secure the Olympic Games in 2024 — not 2028.

With the IOC currently assessing a proposal to award the next two Olympics — one to each city — Paris officials insist the French capital city is the right choice for 2024.

The 39-year-old Macron, France’s youngest-ever president, officially took office on Sunday as the IOC evaluation commission started a three-day visit to Paris.

“Our team has a new member, the new President of France, Emmanuel Macron,” bid leader Tony Estanguet said on Sunday. “He’s been a fantastic supporter of our bid from the beginning. He will be with us all the way to Lima and hopefully beyond.”

Los Angeles and Paris are the only two bidders left for the 2024 Games, which will be awarded in September at a meeting of Olympic leaders in Peru. The race began with five cities, but Rome, Hamburg, Germany, and Budapest, Hungary, all pulled out.

The IOC has four vice presidents looking into the prospect of awarding the 2024 and 2028 Games at the same time in September.

“We have one goal during these few days: to convince you that Paris is the right city, with the right vision, at the right moment,” Paris mayor Anne Hidalgo said. “The right city with world-class venues and accommodation, and the best public transport in the world, ready right now.”

International Olympic Committee members were in Los Angeles earlier this week to meet with the U.S. bid leaders and inspect their planned venues. While Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti appeared at least willing to consider hosting the 2028 Olympics if the city isn’t awarded its first choice of 2024, Hidalgo said Paris is set for the earlier edition.

“With financial and political stability and support, we are ready right now,” Hidalgo said. “At the right moment, as the no risk option.”

Patrick Baumann, the chair of the IOC evaluation commission, said Sunday’s discussions with Paris leaders focused solely on their project for 2024.

“Right now we are still in a process where we assess a potential candidacy for 2024,” Baumann told a press conference. “2024-2028 was not a matter of discussion.” 

The French government has pledged one billion euros ($1.1 billion) of support for the Paris bid and Macron is expected to confirm that amount. If Paris is awarded the 2024 Games, the infrastructure budget is expected to total 3 billion euros, with operational costs of 3.2 billion euros.

Paris is also betting on the compactness of its plans to make the difference. According to the bid dossier, 84 percent of the athletes will be able to reach their competition venues in less than 25 minutes, and more than 70 percent of the proposed venues are existing facilities, with a further 25 percent relying on temporary structures.

Paris, which last staged the Olympics in 1924, failed in bids for the 1992, 2008, and 2012 Games.

With the pro-business and pro-EU Macron, Paris bid leaders have a strong supporter. The new president has already thrown his weight behind Paris’ bid, telling IOC President Thomas Bach over the phone of its “expected benefits for all French people.”    

Macron did not attend Sunday’s night gala dinner with IOC members in Paris but invited the evaluation commission on Tuesday to the Elysee Palace before they leave.

Meanwhile, the Paris team added another high-profile figure to their list of backers on Sunday as it unveiled France soccer great Zinedine Zidane as their latest ambassador.

“I was involved in several bids, but this one is really close to our hearts,” said Zidane, who also supported the Qatar bid to host soccer’s 2022 World Cup and was involved in Paris’s 2008 and 2012 failed bids.  

IOC members started their visit with a full day of discussions on Paris’ proposals that will be followed by venue visits on Monday and further meetings on the final day.

“Our friends of Paris 2024 presented us with an exceptional and well detailed bid presentation,” Baumann said. “We have two cities with a wonderful Olympic spirit. It’s difficult to give them less than 10 out of 10.”
…

Tillerson: Trump Concerned About Moving Embassy to Jerusalem

Posted by Worldcrew On 15/05/2017

U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson says President Donald Trump’s is concerned about how moving the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem would affect the Mideast peace process.

“I think it’ll be informed, again, by the parties that are involved in those talks and most certainly…whether Israel views it as being helpful to a peace initiative or perhaps a distraction,” Tillerson told NBC’s Meet the Press Sunday.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reacted immediately.

“Moving the American embassy to Jerusalem will not harm the peace process. It will do the opposite,” his office said in a statement. “It will advance it by righting an historical wrong and by shattering the Palestinian fantasy that Jerusalem is not the capital of Israel.”

Israel annexed Jerusalem in 1967 and regards the entire city as its eternal capital. It has long urged the international community to relocate embassies there.

The Palestinians want East Jerusalem as the capital of their future state, and Israel’s allies have been reluctant to move their embassies.

Trump promised to relocate the U.S. embassy as one of his campaign pledges. He has yet to make any concrete moves toward carrying out that promise.

Trump will meet with Israeli and Palestinian leaders as part of his first foreign trip as president later this week.
…

US Supreme Court Could Signal View on Trump Immigration Plans

Posted by Worldcrew On 15/05/2017

Supreme Court decisions in a half-dozen cases dealing with immigration over the next two months could reveal how the justices might evaluate Trump administration actions on immigration, especially stepped up deportations.

Some of those cases could be decided as early as Monday, when the court is meeting to issue opinions in cases that were argued over the past six months.

The outcomes could indicate whether the justices are retreating from long-standing decisions that give the president and Congress great discretion in dealing with immigration, and what role administration policies, including the proposed ban on visits to the United States by residents of six majority Muslim countries, may play.

President Donald Trump has pledged to increase deportations, particularly of people who have been convicted of crimes. But Supreme Court rulings in favor of the immigrants in the pending cases “could make his plans more difficult to realize,” said Christopher Hajec, director of litigation for the Immigration Reform Litigation Institute. The group generally supports the new administration’s immigration actions, including the travel ban.

For about a century, the court has held that, when dealing with immigration, the White House and Congress “can get away with things they ordinarily couldn’t,” said Temple University law professor Peter Spiro, an immigration law expert. “The court has explicitly said the Constitution applies differently in immigration than in other contexts.”

Cases before court

Two of the immigration cases at the court offer the justices the possibility of cutting into the deference that courts have given the other branches of government in this area. One case is a class-action lawsuit brought by immigrants who’ve spent long periods in custody, including many who are legal residents of the United States or are seeking asylum. The court is weighing whether the detainees have a right to court hearings.

In the other case, the court has taken on a challenge to an unusual federal law that makes it easier for children born outside the United States to become citizens if their mother is an American and harder for them if their father is the U.S. citizen. Even after legislation in 1986, children of American fathers face higher hurdles claiming citizenship for themselves.

Both cases were argued before Trump became president in January, and the Obama administration opposed the detainees’ claims and the citizenship challenge.

Even if the positions haven’t changed, the context has, Spiro said.

“The court has got to be conscious of how these rulings are going to apply to Trump administration activity,” Spiro said.

The decisions may directly affect people who are targeted by immigration authorities for quick deportation, or expedited removal, and immigrants who were brought to the United States as children and offered protection from deportation by the Obama administration, said Steven Vladeck, a University of Texas law professor.

“An open question in immigration law concerns how much authority the government has and how strong the Constitution is as a constraint,” Vladeck said. For Trump, he said a major question is how much discretion the president has. “It’s at the heart of a lot of what the Trump administration wants to do,” Vladeck said.

Other cases involve discrete sections of the immigration law in which the decisions either will free or constrain immigration authorities from deporting people convicted of certain crimes.

In one case, a Mexican immigrant is facing deportation after he was convicted in California of having sex with someone under 18 and more than three years younger than he was. The charge covered a period before and after his 21st birthday when the woman, his girlfriend, was 16. That’s a crime in California, but not in most of the rest of the country and the immigrant says it should not count as sexual abuse of a minor, which under immigration law would subject him to deportation.

In another case, an immigrant convicted of burglary is challenging a provision of immigration law that counts the crime as serious enough to warrant automatic deportation. Several federal appeals courts have sided with immigrants who have contended the provision is too vague.

Another issue before the court also involves sending people back to their native countries, in a case in which an immigrant received bad legal advice that led to a guilty plea and certain deportation.

Immigration almost certainly will continue to be a very active part of the Supreme Court’s docket. The travel ban itself could be at the court in the coming months. On Monday, the federal appeals court in San Francisco is hearing the administration’s appeal of an order striking down the ban. Appellate judges in Richmond, Virginia, heard a similar case last week.
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Merkel’s Conservatives Win German State Election

Posted by Worldcrew On 14/05/2017

German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservatives defeated their center-left rivals in a key state election Sunday in the country’s most populous region.

Exit polls showed Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union with a strong surge of support in North Rhine-Westphalia, the home state and traditional stronghold of her chief rival, Social Democrat Martin Schulz, who is challenging the German leader in the national election in late September.

Schulz conceded Sunday’s loss, saying, “This is a difficult day for the Social Democrats, a difficult day for me personally as well.  I come from the state in which we took a really stinging defeat today.”

He urged his party to focus on the September 24 vote, saying, “We will sharpen our profile further.  We have to as well.”

The exit polls showed the Christian Democrats winning 34.5 percent of the vote in North Rhine-Westphalia, home to 17.9 million people, nearly a quarter of the German population, with the Social Democrats at 30.5 percent.  Other parties trailed far behind the two leaders.

The conservatives’ general-secretary, Peter Tauber, said the Christian Democratic Union “has won the heartland of the Social Democrats.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
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Where Global Cyberattack Has Hit Hardest

Posted by Worldcrew On 14/05/2017

Here is a look at some of the places hit by the global cyberattack.

European Union — Europol’s European Cybercrime Center, known as EC3, said the attack “is at an unprecedented level and will require a complex international investigation to identify the culprits.”

Britain — Britain’s home secretary said the “ransomware” attack hit one in five of 248 National Health Service groups, forcing hospitals to cancel or delay treatments for thousands of patients — even some with serious aliments like cancer.

Germany — The national railway said Saturday departure and arrival display screens at its train stations were affected, but there was no impact on actual train services. Deutsche Bahn said it deployed extra staff to help customers.

Russia — Two security firms — Kaspersky Lab and Avast — said Russia was hit hardest by the attack. The Russian Interior Ministry, which runs the country’s police, confirmed it was among those that fell victim to the “ransomware,” which typically flashes a message demanding payment to release the user’s data. Spokeswoman Irina Volk was quoted by the Interfax news agency Saturday as saying the problem had been “localized” and that no information was compromised. Russia’s health ministry said its attacks were “effectively repelled.”

United States — In the U.S., FedEx Corp. reported that its Windows computers were `”experiencing interference” from malware, but wouldn’t say if it had been hit by ransomware. Other impacts in the U.S. were not readily apparent.

Turkey — The head of Turkey’s Information and Communication Technologies Authority or BTK says the nation was among those affected by the ransomware attack. Omer Fatih Sayan said the country’s cyber security center is continuing operations against the malicious software.

France — French carmaker Renault’s assembly plant in Slovenia halted production after it was targeted. Radio Slovenia said Saturday the Revoz factory in the southeastern town of Novo Mesto stopped working Friday evening to stop the malware from spreading.

Brazil — The South American nation’s social security system had to disconnect its computers and cancel public access. The state-owned oil company Petrobras and Brazil’s Foreign Ministry also disconnected computers as a precautionary measure, and court systems went down, too.

Spain — The attack hit Spain’s Telefonica, a global broadband and telecommunications company.
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Portugal’s Sobral Wins Eurovision Contest With Tender Ballad

Posted by Worldcrew On 14/05/2017

Portugal’s Salvador Sobral won the Eurovision Song Contest on Saturday with a gentle romantic ballad that challenged the event’s decades-long reputation for cheesy, glittery excess.

Sobral sang his Amar Pelos Dois (Love For Both) in a high, clear tenor accompanied by quiet strings and a piano. Unlike the 25 other competitors who performed on a wide stage backed by flashing lights, bursts of flames and other effects, Sobral sang from a small elevated circle in the middle of the crowd, an intimate contrast to others’ bombast.

“Music is not fireworks, music is feeling,” he said while accepting the award.

Runner-up Kristian Kostov of Bulgaria wasn’t short on feeling — his power-ballad “Beautiful Mess” was awash in melodrama, the singer appearing almost wrung out by romantic turmoil.

Moldova’s Sunstroke Project finished a surprising third, with a bouncy, jazzy song called “Hey Mama”‘ that featured a clever stage routine in which the female backup singers hid their microphones in bridal bouquets.

Francesco Gabbani of Italy had led bookmakers’ tallies for most of the days leading up to the final, but he ended up placing sixth even though his act seemed the epitome of Eurovision’s cheerfully tacky aesthetics — singing a driving number about spirituality while accompanied by someone in a gorilla suit.

Eurovision, in its 62nd year, is aimed at apolitical entertainment. But the sweet intentions were soured this year when Russia’s participation was scuttled by host Ukraine over the two nations’ diplomatic and military conflict.

Russia is one of Eurovision’s heavy hitters, tied with Sweden for the most top-five finishes this century. But this year’s Russian entrant, Yuliya Samoylova, was blocked from competing by Ukraine because she had toured in Crimea after Russia’s 2014 annexation of the peninsula.

In response, Russia’s state-owned Channel 1 television is refusing to broadcast the contest, replacing Saturday’s final with a screening of the film “Alien.”

The Moscow-Kyiv split is a headache for Eurovision’s producer, the European Broadcasting Union, which strives mightily to keep pop and politics separate. Overtly political flags and banners are banned, and lyrics are monitored for provocative content.

In 2009, the EBU nixed the Georgian entry “We Don’t Wanna Put In,” a dig at Russian President Vladimir Putin. The union, however, has been criticized for not barring “1944” last year, allowing Russia-Ukraine tensions to fester.

The acrimony is ironic, since Eurovision was founded in 1956 to bring the recently warring countries of Europe together. It launched a year before the foundation of the European Economic Community, forerunner of the European Union.

From its launch with seven countries, Eurovision has grown to include more than 40, including non-European nations such as Israel and — somewhat controversially — far-off Australia.

The contest helped launch the careers of Sweden’s ABBA — victors in 1974 with “Waterloo” — Canada’s Celine Dion, who won for Switzerland in 1988, and Irish high-steppers Riverdance, the halftime entertainment in 1994.
…

Ransomware Attack Could Herald Future Problems

Posted by Worldcrew On 14/05/2017

Tech staffs around the world worked around the clock this weekend to protect computers and patch networks to block the computer hack whose name sounds like a pop song — “WannaCry” — as analysts warned the global ransomware attack could be just the first of a new wave of strikes by computer criminals.

The United States suffered relatively few effects from the ransomware that appeared on tens of thousands of computer systems across Europe and into Asia, beginning Friday. Security experts remained cautious, however, and stressed there was a continuing threat.

In contrast to reports from several European security firms, a researcher at the Tripwire company on the U.S. West Coast said late Saturday that the attack could be diminishing.

“It looks like it’s tailing off,” said Travis Smith of Tripwire.

“I hope that’s the case,” Smith added. The Oregon firm protects large enterprises and governments from computer security threats.

Ransomware attack

The code for the ransomware unleashed Friday remains freely available on the internet, experts said, so those behind the WannaCry attack — also known as WanaCryptor 2.0 and a variety of other names — could launch new strikes in coming days or weeks. Copycat attacks by other high-tech criminals also are possible.

“We are not out of the woods yet,” said Gary Davis, chief consumer security evangelist at McAfee, the global computer security software company in Santa Clara, California. “We think it’s going to be the footprint for other kinds of attacks in the future.”

The attack hit scores of countries — more than 100, by some experts’ count — and infected tens of thousands of computer networks.

Industry reports indicate Russia, Taiwan, Ukraine and Britain were among the countries hit hardest, and more hacking reports can be expected when offices reopen for the new workweek Monday or, in some parts of the world, Sunday.

One of the weapons used in the current attack is a software tool reportedly stolen from the U.S. National Security Agency and published on the internet by hackers last month.

The tool affords hackers undetected entry into many Microsoft computer operating systems, which is what they need to plant their ransomware. However, Microsoft issued patches to fix that vulnerability in its software weeks ago that could greatly reduce the chances of intrusion.

Outdated operating systems

The crippling effects of WannaCry highlight a problem that experts have long known about, and one that appears to have hit developing countries harder.

Some organizations are more vulnerable to intrusion because they use older or outdated operating systems, usually due to the cost of upgrading software or buying modern hardware needed to install better-protected operating systems. Companies like Microsoft eventually stop updating or supporting older versions of their software, so customers using those programs do not receive software patches or security upgrades.

Much of the ransomware’s spread around the world occurred without any human involvement. The WannaCry malware self-propagates, copying itself to all computers on a network automatically.

When a demand for ransom payments appears on a user’s screen — $300 at first, doubling to $600 in a few days — it’s usually too late: All files on that computer have been encrypted and are unreadable by their owners.

The hackers said they would reverse the effect of their software once they received the payments they demanded.

Microsoft patched the “hole” in the newest versions of its operating software — Windows 10 for most home users — in March, three weeks before the stolen NSA exploit software was published on the internet. Since Friday, the company dropped its refusal to update old versions of its programs and issued patches specifically written for use in Windows XP and several other systems.

Microsoft declined a request for an interview, but a statement on the company’s blog said: “Seeing businesses and individuals affected by cyberattacks, such as the ones reported today, was painful. We are taking the highly unusual step of providing a security update for all customers to protect Windows platforms that are in custom support only, including Windows XP, Windows 8, and Windows Server 2003.”

“A lot of people in the security community were impressed with Microsoft’s speed, but it highlights an ongoing challenge we have,” said Stephen Cobb, a senior security researcher with ESET, a global security software company. “If a malicious code outbreak breaks out tomorrow, and targets unsupported operating systems, Microsoft may have to go there again.”
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‘Perfect Storm’ of Conditions Helped Cyberattack Succeed

Posted by Worldcrew On 14/05/2017

The cyberextortion attack hitting dozens of countries spread quickly and widely thanks to an unusual confluence of factors: a known and highly dangerous security hole in Microsoft Windows, tardy users who didn’t apply Microsoft’s March software fix, and a software design that allowed the malware to spread quickly once inside university, business and government networks.

Not to mention the fact that those responsible were able to borrow weaponized software code apparently created by the U.S. National Security Agency to launch the attack in the first place.

Other criminals may be tempted to mimic the success of Friday’s “ransomware” attack, which locks up computers and hold people’s files for ransom. Experts say it will be difficult for them to replicate the conditions that allowed the so-called WannaCry ransomware to proliferate across the globe.

But we’re still likely to be living with less virulent variants of WannaCry for some time. And that’s for a simple reason: Individuals and organizations alike are fundamentally terrible about keeping their computers up-to-date with security fixes.

The worm

One of the first “attacks” on the internet came in 1988, when a graduate student named Robert Morris Jr. released a self-replicating and self-propagating program known as a “worm” onto the then-nascent internet. That program spread much more quickly than expected, soon choking and crashing machines across the internet.

The Morris worm wasn’t malicious, but other nastier variants followed — at first for annoyance, later for criminal purposes, such as stealing passwords. But these worm attacks became harder to pull off as computer owners and software makers shored up their defenses.

So criminals turned to targeted attacks instead to stay below the radar. With ransomware, criminals typically trick individuals into opening an email attachment containing malicious software. Once installed, the malware just locks up that computer without spreading to other machines.

The hackers behind WannaCry took things a step further by creating a ransomware worm, allowing them to demand ransom payments not just from individual but from entire organizations — maybe even thousands of organizations.

Perfect storm

Once inside an organization, WannaCry uses a Windows vulnerability purportedly identified by the NSA and later leaked to the internet. Although Microsoft released fixes in March, the attackers counted on many organizations not getting around to applying those fixes. Sure enough, WannaCry found plenty of targets.

Since security professionals typically focus on building walls to block hackers from entering, security tends to be less rigorous inside the network. WannaCry exploited common techniques employees use to share files via a central server.

“Malware that penetrates the perimeter and then spreads inside the network tends to be quite successful,” said Johannes Ullrich, director of the Internet Storm Center at the SANS Institute.

Persistent infections

“When any technique is shown to be effective, there are almost always copycats,” said Steve Grobman, chief technology officer of McAfee, a security company in Santa Clara, California. But that’s complicated, because hackers need to find security flaws that are unknown, widespread and relatively easy to exploit.

In this case, he said, the NSA apparently handed the WannaCry makers a blueprint — pre-written code for exploiting the flaw, allowing the attackers to essentially cut and paste that code into their own malware.

Mikko Hypponen, chief research officer at the Helsinki-based cybersecurity company F-Secure, said ransomware attacks like WannaCry are “not going to be the norm.” But they could still linger as low-grade infections that flare up from time to time.

For instance, the Conficker virus, which first appeared in 2008 and can disable system security features, also spreads through vulnerabilities in internal file sharing. As makers of anti-virus software release updates to block it, hackers deploy new variants to evade detection.

Conficker was more of a pest and didn’t do major damage. WannaCry, on the other hand, threatens to permanently lock away user files if the computer owner doesn’t pay a ransom, which starts at $300 but goes up after two hours.

The damage might have been temporarily contained. An unidentified young cybersecurity researcher claimed to help halt WannaCry’s spread by activating a so-called “kill switch.” Other experts found his claim credible. But attackers can, and probably will, simply develop a variant to bypass this countermeasure.

Fighting back

The attack is likely to prompt more organizations to apply the security fixes that would prevent the malware from spreading automatically. “Talk about a wake-up call,” Hypponen said.

Companies are often slow to apply these fixes, called patches, because of worries that any software change could break some other program, possibly shutting down critical operations.

“Whenever there is a new patch, there is a risk in applying the patch and a risk in not applying the patch,” Grobman said. “Part of what an organization needs to understand and assess is what those two risks are.”

Friday’s attack might prompt companies to reassess the balance. And while other attackers might use the same flaw, such attacks will be steadily less successful as organizations patch it.

Microsoft took the unusual step late Friday of making free patches available for older Windows systems, such as Windows XP from 2001. Before, Microsoft had made such fixes available only to mostly larger organizations that pay extra for extended support, yet millions of individuals and smaller businesses still had such systems.

But there will be other vulnerabilities to come, and not all of them will have fixes for older systems. And those fixes will do nothing for newer systems if they aren’t installed.
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