In-ear headphones can be great — especially the coveted AirPods — but the one thing they can’t provide you with is long-lasting comfort. After hours of use, those earbuds can start to hurt, and you’re forced to take them out even though you're only halfway through that podcast episode. Stop punishing yourself and snag a pair of headphones that will stay comfortable all day.
The Skullcandy Hesh 2 wireless over-ear headphones are a great option, and they're currently on sale for 50% off on Amazon — dropping their price down to just $50.
Skullcandy is known for their lineup of stellar sound products, and the Hesh 2 headphones are no exception. Using Supreme Sound technology, the Hesh 2 headphones produce high-fidelity sound all the way from the bass to the vocals. Read more...
Chief Product Officer Chris Cox who has been with the company since 2005 and is a top aide to CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced his departure from Facebook. Recently, Cox was in charge of managing services like Instagram and Messenger. The other executive leaving Facebook is Chris Daniels. For the past year, he has been helping run WhatsApp on Facebook's platform. Read more...
Apple isn't nearly done with the iPad, and that's more evident now as they launched/revived two new iPad models, the Air and mini. They both flex Apple's A12 Bionic chip, Pencil support, and other goodies. Read more...
At this point in the 'Harry Potter' franchise, do we really need to know about wizard sex?
J.K. Rowling's latest take on how Dumbledore and Grindlewald supposedly had an 'intense love' and 'sexual' relationship feels like another groan-worthy round in a very bad game show — What Will J.K. Rowling Retcon Next?
Every time she hits us with a fake-woke Potterverse fun fact, a phoenix loses one of its feathers. Even for all the galleons and sickles in the world, fans just aren't buying it.
But Twitter has made it clear that wizard sex is probably at bottom on the list in terms of wizarding world lore we'd like to know about. Read more...
Take some time today to create an out-of-this-world meme.
Co – Star, the astrology app known mainly for its extremely bizarre push notifications, is finally getting the meme treatment. To participate, simply craft your own wild push notification using Co – Star's "Your day at a glance" format.
The more dramatic the better!
Me:
Co-Star: Your day at a glance. Run yourself over with a car, you single bitch.
The point of the meme is to play up Co – Star's wild and extreme personalized horoscopes. So people trolling the app are doing their best to imagine hilarious and dark as hell push notifications. Read more...
Archivists are racing to preserve Google+ before it shuts down next month.
In a post on Reddit, the Archive Team announced its mission to preserve and backup Google+ content to the Internet Archive. Google will commence the shutdown of its failed social network project on April 2.
According to the archivists, only public Google+ posts will be saved. Private posts and posts that have previously been deleted will not be archived. If a Google+ user does not want their content archived, the team behind the project recommends putting in a request to remove specific pages with the Internet Archive. Read more...
The Chicago River was dyed green for St. Patrick's day. And for the memes.
Every year, Tom Rowan dyes the Chicago River in honor of St. Patrick's day. It's a tradition that started in the 1960s when the mayor decided he wanted to do something festive for the holiday. The vivid color is the result of 40 pounds of orange "Leprechaun Dust" that turns electric green upon hitting the water.
It just so happens to be the same green hue used for green screen purposes.
Twitter user Donnacha Kenny decided to see what kind of special effects magic he could whip up by turning the river itself into a green screen. Kenny transformed real footage of the river into several different scenes including flowing hot lava and a clip from Star Wars. Read more...
Dancing is good. Dancing with baby animals is better. Dancing with wee little lambs in slow motion is best.
The dancing lamb is named Ursula. She was captured shaking her groove thang in this slow motion video by the Longview Animal Care and Adoption Center, in Longview, Texas. Mad props are also given to Ursula's dancing partner, the other half of this dynamic duo, a vet tech named Erin Dryden who adopted Ursula at birth.
Happy Monday! Maybe Ursula can teach the chickens how to really shake a tail feather next Read more...
So, you’ve done your taxes and now you’ve got budgeting on your mind. If you got a big refund and you don’t know the best use for it or you ended up owing more than you planned, it doesn’t hurt to invest in a budgeting tool.
With Quicken Deluxe you’re able to import your checking and credit card bank transactions safely and automatically, making it easy to see where your money is going. Transactions are automatically categorized to make budgeting simpler. Import your loan, investment, and retirement accounts for an even fuller picture of your money situation — plus, Quicken even shows you how to pay off loans faster and save money by tracking principal and interest payments. Read more...
Weighted blankets are the sleep aid you never knew you needed. They're those things that make you believe in love at first try, and you'll immediately wonder how you ever lived without them.
Weighted blankets have enjoyed mainstream popularity in recent years, and are now being celebrated by people who experience sleeplessness, stress, and anxiety — so like, basically everyone.
While most weighted blankets would require you to fork over hundreds of dollars, the Puro Down Weighted Blanket is the more affordable option.
Glass beads are sewn into small compartments and are then weaved into the Puro. When you cocoon yourself inside, it grounds your body while you're snoozing and produces a calming effect, allowing you to wake up feeling refreshed and well-rested. It also minimizes your movement and noise while you're sleeping, so you can ask your partner to retire their earplugs now. Read more...
It is universally acknowledged that Sundays are the worst. Every Sunday afternoon, as the evening approaches, an imaginary dark cloud appears and thrusts us all into a state of anxiety and agitation. This phenomenon is called the Sunday Blues or Sunday Scaries, and it's very real. It's so real that Prince even wrote a song about it.
Many have tried to fight this overwhelming feeling of dread, but most efforts have been rendered futile. A company called Sunday Scaries, however, is on a mission to help humankind combat it. The fight against Sunday-induced melancholy comes in the form of CBD gummies, and you can snag a bottle on sale for $29.99 and save $10. Read more...
The weekend is over, but we have a deal to help you start the week with a skip in your step.
You can now secure Sticky Password Premium for just £34.99 until March 25. That's 70% cheaper than the usual list price of £114.99, saving you a massive £80. This offer is valid for one user over a whole lifetime.
So what exactly is Sticky Password? Put simply, it's the ultimate password manager. Put less simply, Sticky Password manages all your passwords and personal data, automatically logs you in to sites, fills in every form for you, and generates extra-strong new passwords for you.
You are right to worry about your data, but you needn't fret with Sticky Password. Your data is secured with military-grade AES-256 encryption. This is the world’s leading standard of encryption, meaning your master password for the manager is not known to anyone – not even to Sticky Password. Read more...
The story of Elizabeth Holmes and the years-long fraud she perpetuated should be a big warning for all of Silicon Valley, according to the director of HBO's new Theranos documentary.
Alex Gibney, the director of The Inventor: Out for Blood in Silicon Valley, says Silicon Valley's "fetishization of the entrepreneur" is the reason why Holmes was able to get away with her lies for so long.
By now, the story is well-known. After years of lying about what her blood testing startup was capable of, Holmes, who was once routinely compared to Steve Jobs, is staring down fraud charges from the SEC.
While Gibney's documentary explores the rise and fall of Holmes and Theranos, it's also a searing indictment of a startup culture that was so desperate for a fresh-faced visionary that it refused to question whether or not she could deliver in her promises. Read more...
Just imagine for a moment waking up in the morning or coming home at night to the smell of fresh bread baking in your kitchen. How nice would that be?
Having healthy and tasty homemade bread doesn't have to be a figment of your imagination, though. It's also no longer a difficult and messy task that requires professional techniques to master. You can now enjoy homemade bread, using your own healthy ingredients, with the Panasonic SD-2501WXC automatic breadmaker.
You can now buy this breadmaker for £85.99, reduced from £139.95. This deal expires at midnight on March 18, and saves you over £50. You are getting an awful lot of features for under £100: Read more...
It's not every day that you can save £200 on an electric toothbrush. It's even rarer to have four toothbrush heads and a USB travel case thrown in with the deal too, for good measure.
You can now pick up an Oral-B Genius 9000 CrossAction electric toothbrush, with multiple heads and a travel case, for £99.99. This would usually cost £299.99, saving you a massive £200 on list price. Not only that, but you can take your pick from five colours on Amazon UK.
The Oral-B Genius 9000 uses an intelligent brushing system that helps you brush like you actually should. The Genius 900 also helps you protect your delicate gums with the proprietary SmartRing and pressure control technology that reduces brushing speed and alerts you to be gentler if you brush too hard. Read more...
We're not saying this is the only deals round-up out there that includes a neck massager and a pressure washer side-by-side, but there probably aren't many others.
We have tracked down the best deals on an eclectic mix of products including cleaning equipment, home entertainment technology, and personal care devices. You can pick up an electric toothbrush, robotic vacuum cleaner, TV, smart remote, and more, all in one place.
This is your chance to save on leading brands like LG, Samsung, Bose, Philips, Kärcher, and plenty others. These are the best deals from across the internet for March 18. Read more...
A week ahead of a scheduled services-focused event in Cupertino, Apple has launched two new iPad models: a 10.5-inch iPad Air and a 7.9-inch iPad mini, both with Pencil support and Apple's A12 Bionic chip, the same one used in the company's iPhone XS and XS Max phones.
The duo of devices are a sort of throwback to the past. The original iPad Air was a 9.7-inch tablet that lived to see one iteration (the iPad Air 2) before it was replaced by the somewhat confusingly named iPad. The return of the "Air" moniker (no number this time) is an interesting twist for Apple, as it establishes a new mid-range line of devices in the company's tablet lineup. Read more...
You might be really into wine, with an impressive selection of bottles stocked up, but if you don't have quality accessories then you could still end up with cork in your glass.
The Le Creuset wine accessories Activ-Ball gift set includes the original Activ-Ball corkscrew, an Activ-Ball foilcutter, a wine preservation pump, and three stoppers. With 71 percent of Amazon customers giving the set a rating of five-starts, you should feel fairly confident that this is a quality product.
This set is normally listed at £62, but is currently reduced by 61% to just £23.99. This "Lightning Deal" expires on March 18, so you'll have to act fast if you want the set at the reduced price. Read more...
Is it ever okay for someone to be publicly shamed?
That's the tricky question tackled by John Oliver on Sunday's edition to Last Week Tonight. As part of the deep dive, Oliver goes through some recent examples of times a single person has faced widespread wrath — from the woman wrongfully accused of being the "worst aunt ever" to the actors embroiled in the recent college admissions scandal.
To finish, Oliver interviews Monica Lewinsky — a woman he describes as someone who "might actually be the perfect person to remind all of us what the consequences can be to a mis-directed flood of public anger." Read more...
Not all heroes wear capes. But, some of them wield eggs as their weapon of choice.
ICYMI, an Australian teenager was filmed egging senator Fraser Anning over his Islamophobic response to the mass shooting in Christchurch, New Zealand. The teen has since been dubbed #EggBoy on social media.
#EggBoy has now had a mural painted in his honour to immortalise his moment of triumph.
For those who missed it, Egg Boy smashed an egg on Anning's head. Anning immediately turned around an struck the teen. Police later released the teen without charges being filed, according to reports. Read more...
A good night sleep can be affected by many small habits we have before we go to bed: checking Instagram, drinking coffee, hammering down pints of Guinness or tossing and turning throughout the night.
If your sleep is bothered by an uncomfortable mattress, Amazon has discounted Nectars memory foam mattresses with a bonus of two free pillows included. These are soft enough to be gentle and firm enough to provide support. Sleep easy since Nectar offers a 180 night home trial and a forever warranty.
Several years ago, Fisker was considered a viable Tesla competitor — but after problems with its Karma electric luxury sedan, it slipped out of the limelight.
But on Monday, the company from iconic car designer Henrik Fisker, announced it was ready to take on Tesla again. It unveiled an unnamed electric SUV priced at $40,000. It's supposed to be the first of three "affordable" electric vehicles coming from the car maker.
Although details are scarce this early in the process, Fisker made the announcement just days after Tesla unveiled its Model Y compact SUV. The pricing for Tesla's newest car? It starts at $39,000. Read more...
If you've been anywhere near Twitter in the past 24 hours, you've likely heard about J.K. Rowling's latest Fantastic Beasts comments — the ones where she described, in a DVD feature for The Crimes of Grindelwald, the "incredibly intense" "love" relationship Dumbledore shared with his rival.
Chances are you've read some of the backlash, too.
In the hours since the interview gained traction, there were a number of tweets about Rowling's remarks that went viral. And quite a few of them highlighted the difference between the Harry Potter author's words and what is featured in the Fantastic Beasts movies themselves. Read more...
Apple Store is down, and you know what that (usually) means: New Apple hardware.
And while Apple hasn't officially announced any new hardware, there are a few hints that point to the company refreshing its iMac and iPad lineup of products.
On March 25, Apple is having an event that's unlikely to be hardware focused; the company will probably launch new subscription services instead.
But Bloomberg analyst Mark Gurman tweeted on Sunday that new iPad and iMac announcements this week would "make a real statement about how much it wants to focus its March 25th event on its news and video services." Read more...
It's a peculiar observation, but when ex-Theranos receptionist Cheryl Gafner makes it, it's hard to shake — Elizabeth Holmes, the fraudster behind the now defunct blood testing company Theranos, doesn't blink.
Or at least when she does blink, it is done with purpose, a cool and calculating gesture that accompanies a specific word or phrase. To Holmes, blinks are seemingly for conveying sincerity and establishing trust, not an involuntary response to, y'know, having eyeballs.
It's an unsettling behavior to witness, particularly when put in the context of Holmes' dangerous multi-million dollar fraud. But gaining awareness of creepy details like this one is an essential part of The Inventor: Out for Blood in Silicon Valley viewing experience. Read more...
Can simply "being mindful" while, say, sipping a kale smoothie, constitute a mindfulness practice? Some experts say, yes!
But what being mindful means to you — especially when you're posting about that moment on Instagram — may constitute a different version of mindfulness than the one that has prompted medical studies and attracted serious adherents across the globe.
The recent explosion in popularity of mindfulness is a well-documented phenomenon. One place in particular where mindfulness — or what some people think of as mindfulness — is enjoying a boom is on Instagram. Currently, there are over 11.8 million posts tagged with the hashtag #mindfulness; there are hundreds of thousands more with variations like #mindful or #mindfulnesspractice. Read more...
You've got a little under a month to file your taxes in the US. Most people should be able to file their taxes digitally and painlessly for free, but plenty will end up paying for the privilege anyway.
A roundup of the most interesting, thought-provoking and surprising questions that our favorite columnists (and subreddits) addressed in recent days.
Thousands have been evacuated and large swaths of Nebraska and other nearby states have been left underwater as the Missouri River overcame its levees, causing intense flooding.
For people with a rare condition known as misophonia, certain sounds like slurping, chewing, tapping and clicking can elicit intense feelings of rage or panic.
Federal Aviation Administration managers pushed its engineers to delegate wide responsibility for assessing the safety of the 737 MAX to Boeing itself. But safety engineers familiar with the documents shared details that show the analysis included crucial flaws.
The UK is in a panic over voters' decision to withdraw from the EU. But the pugnacious millionaire whose donations — and Trumpian scare tactics — helped sway Britons has no regrets.
Cloud development architects can command six figure salaries, and most companies are figuring out ways to migrate their services over — this Complete Microsoft Azure Certification Prep Bundle 2019 trains you in the skills needed to take and pass the Microsoft certification exam, and develop secure Azure-based infrastructure for $19.
Smoky, oaky, spicy and sweet, bourbon is excellent on its own, but this new cocktail book will inspire you to add a little something to your next drink.
Dick Dale, the "King of the Surf Guitar" who formulated the sound and attack of the Southern California-bred instrumental style in the early '60s, has died. He was 81.
Facebook says that it removed 1.5 million videos of the New Zealand attacks. It blocked 1.2 million of the videos at upload, meaning they would not have been seen by users, but did not say how many people had seen the remaining 300,000 videos. https://t.co/jviJ73njSr
Latest image of flooding at Offutt AFB. A lone E-4 is on the upper ramp. No idea if any jets are in the E-4 or Bennie Davis hangars. Approach end of Rwy 30 is submerged.
U.S. President Donald Trump (L) listens next to Acting U.S. Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan during a Cabinet meeting on day 12 of the partial U.S. government shutdown at the White House in Washington, U.S., January 2, 2019. REUTERS/Jim Young
* This week was expected to see Acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan official nominated for the top spot at the Pentagon. * But lawmakers grilled Shanahan, and remains unclear when the Pentagon will have a formal leader.
A good number of people in the defense community thought this would be the week that Patrick Shanahan finally escaped the dubious distinction of being America's longest-running acting secretary of defense. It was expected that President Donald Trump would officially nominate Shanahan to replace James Mattis as Pentagon chief on Friday.
Didn't happen. Even though there was a meeting at the Pentagon on Friday that featured the administration's national security heavyweights—Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, National Security Advisor John Bolton, as well as Shanahan and the president himself—more than two months after Mattis's last day, his formal successor remains a mystery.
WNU Editor: It appears that Acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan does not have much support in the US Senate .... something that he will need if he is to be confirmed as Secretary of Defense. So is it is not Acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan, who will it be? I have no clue on who that may be.
A demonstrator with a drawing depicting French President Emmanuel Macron stands near a burning barricade during a demonstration by the "yellow vests" movement in Paris, March 16. REUTERS/Philippe Wojazer
Offutt Air Force Base is succumbing to the massively swollen Missouri River and things could get worse before they get better.
The home to America's prized RC-135 "Rivet Joint" strategic reconnaissance and E-4B "Nightwatch" Advanced Airborne Command Post aircraft, as well as others, and the headquarters of U.S. Strategic Command (STRATCOM), is flooding with water from a swollen Missouri River.
Offutt Air Force Base sits near Omaha, Nebraska and is considered one of the most critical installations in the U.S. Air Force's portfolio. Not only does it house extremely high-value, but low density reconnaissance and command and control aircraft—massively expensive platforms that are essential to national security—but it is also the beating heart of STRATCOM that oversees America's strategic nuclear forces. In fact, a brand new command bunker, buried underground at the base, was just opened in January—which sounds far less than ideal considering water is now nearly covering the end of the base's runway.
The U.S. military is reportedly making plans to keep almost 1,000 troops in Syria, several months after President Trump said he was removing all U.S. forces from the country.
Citing U.S. officials, The Wall Street Journal reported Sunday that the Trump administration plans to continue supporting Kurdish fighters in Syria.
The officials reportedly added that the plan could keep as many as 1,000 forces across the country, but said the specific number of troops that will remain is still being determined.
The U.S. will start withdrawing hundreds of troops after it defeats the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS), according to the Journal.
Next week's visit to Italy by Chinese Premier Xi Jinping has nearly everyone jittery. The recent announcement by Five Star Movement Leader Luigi Di Maio that his country is prepared to sign a Memorandum of Understanding with China to be a part of China's ambitious Belt and Road Initiative has set off a firestorm of response from Donald Trump to Angela Merkel to Di Maio's own coalition partner, Lega leader Matteo Salvini.
But, don't let the wrapper fool you on this. Di Maio's announcement I don't think it 'blindsided' Salvini as this Reuters article suggests, as much as Merkel and Trump.
BAGHOUZ, Syria (Reuters) - Falling bombs raised smoke over Islamic State's last enclave in east Syria on Sunday, obscuring the huddle of vehicles and makeshift shelters to which the group's self-declared "caliphate" has been reduced.
Air strikes and artillery began hitting the area and smoke billowed overhead late in the afternoon as U.S.-backed forces resumed their weeks-long attack, a Reuters reporter said.
After dark, a Kurdish TV channel broadcast live footage showing fires raging and the swift glow of rockets pounding into the enclave accompanied by the sound of intense gunfire.
During an earlier lull in fighting, tiny figures of people still inside were clearly visible walking among hundreds of trucks, cars and minibuses clustered around a few concrete buildings by the bank of the Euphrates.
* Military source said aim is to extend Tokyo's shooting range to more than 400km as China improves its naval capabilities
Japan has decided to develop for the first time air-to-ship long-range cruise missiles to be carried by fighter jets and capable of attacking a warship from outside the range of an enemy's weapons, government sources said on Sunday.
The plan is aimed at boosting Japan's deterrence by extending the shooting range to more than 400km as China has been improving its naval capabilities, the sources said.
The forthcoming development will be based on Japan's supersonic XASM-3 air-to-ship missiles, which are said to have a range of not more than 200km, they said.
The frigates will have a displacement of up to 7,000 tonnes
MOSCOW, March 17. /TASS/. The Northern design bureau has started developing the construction documentation for modernized frigates of Project 22350M capable of carrying up to 48 Kalibr cruise missiles, a source in the defense and production sector told TASS on Sunday.
"The Northern design bureau has completed designing frigates of Project 22350M and is now developing working design documentation for these vessels in line with the customer's tactical and technical order," the source said.
The frigates will have a displacement of up to 7,000 tonnes. The vessels will also carry Zircon hypersonic cruise missiles.
No sailors were injured when a fire broke out aboard the minesweeper USS Devastator on Thursday, according to 5th Fleet.
The ship was docked at Naval Support Activity Bahrain when the fire broke out about 8 p.m. local time, a 5th Fleet news release says. Sailors from four other ships and the base fire department were able to extinguish the blaze within an hour.
While the extent of the damage caused by the fire is still being determined, the Devastator is able to float on its own, the vessel did not take on any water, and its hull has not been compromised, 5th Fleet spokeswoman Lt. Chloe Morgan told Task & Purpose on Saturday.
* Arrival is ahead of NATO exercise in Georgia, a show of force against Vladimir Putin's neighbouring Russia * Exercise comes 11 years after the two countries - former Soviet Union partners - fought a nine-day war * NATO said exercise's aim, which begins tomorrow, 'is to improve interoperability between NATO and Georgia'
This is the incredible moment enormous American B-52 bombers land at a RAF base in the largest US bomber deployment to the UK since the Iraq war.
Amazing photos and video footage have captured the impressive US planes landing at RAF Fairford, in Gloucestershire, their new temporary base.
Their arrival on Thursday and Friday came ahead of a NATO exercise in Georgia, which will be a show of force against Vladimir Putin's neighbouring Russia - though it is unclear if the B-52s will be involved.
NEW DELHI/ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - The sparring between India and Pakistan last month threatened to spiral out of control and only interventions by U.S. officials, including National Security Advisor John Bolton, headed off a bigger conflict, five sources familiar with the events said.
At one stage, India threatened to fire at least six missiles at Pakistan, and Islamabad said it would respond with its own missile strikes "three times over", according to Western diplomats and government sources in New Delhi, Islamabad and Washington.
The way in which tensions suddenly worsened and threatened to trigger a war between the nuclear-armed nations shows how the Kashmir region, which both claim and is at the core of their enmity, remains one of the world's most dangerous flashpoints.
The exchanges did not get beyond threats, and there was no suggestion that the missiles involved were anything more than conventional weapons, but they created consternation in official circles in Washington, Beijing and London.
* Collin Koh writes that a political solution is the way to win trust in the disputed maritime region as China's naval force grows more powerful and modern.
As the PLA Navy stands poised to celebrate its 70th anniversary, there is much to be happy about, especially where capability modernisation is concerned.
The navy by 2000 had mustered a total of 57 submarines, only six of which were built in the 1990s and could have been considered modern and up-to-date. The same applied to only four of the total of 20 destroyers and frigates in the navy's fleet at the time.
Fast forward to today's PLA Navy. According to the International Institute of Strategic Studies' 2019 assessment of global military capabilities and defence economics, 51 of China's 59 submarines are viewed as modern and up-to-date. Meanwhile, 67 of its 86 destroyers and frigates – mostly commissioned in recent years – are top-of-the-line.
WNU Editor: I have zero faith that China is interested in achieving a political agreement on the South China Sea, or with any other border dispute. The primary objective of China's military buildup has always been to intimidate its neighbours to not contest its claims, and if they do, to show them what happens when they do so .... Vietnam Accuses China of Ramming Vessels in S. China Sea (VOA).
The upgrade of Russia's far northern airfields is almost competed and the naval air force has got enhanced capability to neutralize threats. That includes the ones located under the ice.
The comprehensive construction and upgrade of new airfields in the high Arctic has been practically completed and we are flying there and back, says Mayor General Igor Kozhin, leader of the Russian Naval Air Force.
Russia has over the last years invested heavily in military bases all over its wide-stretched Arctic, and there are now potent forces deployed all the way from the westernmost archipelago of Franz Josef Land to the Wrangle Island near the Bering Strait. In addition comes the bases on Novaya Zemlya, Severnaya Zemlya and the New Siberian Island. New bases and air fields are also located on the Arctic mainland, from the Kola Peninsula to Cape Shmidt in the Chukotka Peninsula. The new base in Tiksi, was started in fall 2018 and is planned completed already in the course of the first half year of 2019.
An F/A-18F Super Hornet launches from the aircraft carrier USS Harry S. Truman, October 19, 2018. US Navy/Mass Comm. Specialist 2nd Class Thomas Gooley
* The Navy is planning on spending more time in the Arctic. * But it hasn't done sustained operations up there in decades, and it's having to relearn tactics needed for that environment. * One thing crews will have to deal with is ice buildup, but sailors have an old trick for that.
It's not often sailors get permission to take a baseball bat to a multimillion-dollar aircraft carrier.
But when the Navy's aircraft carrier Harry S. Truman sailed into the Arctic Circle for the first time in nearly three decades, its crew was ordered to do just that.
The Truman sailed into the Arctic Circle on Oct. 19 to conduct operations in the Norwegian Sea. After years of operations in warmer climates, leaders had to think carefully about the gear they'd need to survive operations in the frigid conditions.
First he came for Georgia, then for Ukraine. Vladimir Putin's next target is likely to be a non-NATO nation in the EU.
Not many observers would consider the world's coldest shipping lane a geopolitical hotspot. But that may be about to change. Last week, reports emerged that a new Kremlin policy will require all international naval ships to give Russia 45 days' notice before entering the Northern Sea Route, which connects the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans via the Arctic waters north of Siberia. Every vessel on the route, where Russia has invested heavily in sophisticated military infrastructure, will also be required to have a Russian maritime pilot on board. Ships found in violation of these restrictions may be forcibly halted, detained, or—in unspecified "extreme" circumstances—"eliminated."
The Kremlin's latest threat has gone largely unnoticed, perhaps because it's no surprise. Russian officials justify the new naval restrictions with a familiar explanation, claiming that "the more active naval operations in the Arctic of various foreign countries" require such a response.
WNU Editor: The above author is Mikheil Saakashvili, the former President of Georgia who is now wanted in his former country after being convicted of a number of crimes. His hostility towards Russia is also well known. But as to his theory that the next countries that Russia will "move against" are Finland or Sweden, I am deeply skeptical. There is no border dispute that I am aware of between Finland and Russia, and as for Russia invading and seizing the Swedish island of Gotland, that is wild speculation.
Poland has a history of being caught in the crossfire. It happened during the world wars between global powers. It happened again during the decades of the Cold War. And today's era of continually rising tensions between the United States and Russia is no exception, as new developments point to the skies over Eastern Europe as a new tripwire for WWIII.
Bring on the Base
The biggest news came today, when senior Pentagon leadership revealed progress in a plan to build an American airbase in Poland. State Department negotiators are still working out the details, but Acting Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs Kathryn Wheelbarger said a basing agreement is on the horizon. "We're looking at probably six months to a year," she said.
An X-47B Unmanned Combat Air System demonstrator launches from the flight deck of the aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush (CVN 77), 2013. Photo: Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Tony D. Curtis (U.S. Navy)
Last week, the Pentagon was abuzz with the news that the U.S. Navy had offered up a sacred cow: the early retirement of an aircraft carrier as a way to save money. The loss of the USS Truman would cut America's carrier fleet down to 10 flat-tops, violate federal law, and stir howls of protest from Congress. Does this mean the carrier is no longer at the top of the heap, naval power-wise? Is the concept of the aircraft carrier itself as a viable weapon system headed for the chopping block?
WNU Editor: You do not need a 100,000 ton aircraft carrier to carry drones and aircraft. I personally believe there is a future in aircraft carriers, but smaller ones.
India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi waits to receive Chinese President Xi Jinping in the western Indian city of Ahmedabad, September 17, 2014. Amit Dave/Reuters
* Spring 2019 will bring elections in some of the world's richest and most populous countries. * More than one-third of the world's population will be affected by the voting.
Over the next 11 weeks, there will be eight important elections globally covering populations of more than 2.2 billion people.
ACTOR and UFC minority owner Sylvester Stallone says he believes Conor McGregor is at a crossroad in his life after the MMA fighter's latest arrest and an earlier loss to Khabib Nurmagomedov.
ITALY is likely to risk the European Union's wrath by signing up to China's monumental global investment plan when President Xi Jinping visits Rome later this week, as Brussels braces itself for rebellion among frustrated member states which feel let down by years of the bloc's austerity.
TODAY'S Google doodle celebrates Japanese inventor Seiichi Miyake, whose desire to help a close friend improved the lives of the visually impaired around the world.
THE owner of "Gun City" in Christchurch has said the store sold four weapons and ammunition online to the suspected mosque shooter who massacred 50 people at two mosques on Friday.
(BEIJING) — China has arrested nearly 13,000 people it describes as terrorists and has broken up hundreds of “terrorist gangs” in Xinjiang since 2014, the government said in a report Monday issued to counter international criticism of its system of internment camps and other oppressive security in the traditionally Islamic region.
The lengthy report said the government’s efforts have curbed religious extremism but as in past statements, gave little evidence of what crimes had occurred. The far northwestern region is closed to outsiders, but former residents and activists abroad say Muslim identity itself is punished.
Criticism has grown over China’s internment of an estimated 1 million members of the Uighur (WEE-gur) and other predominantly Muslim ethnic groups. China describes the camps as vocational training centers and says participation is voluntary. Former detainees say they were held in abusive conditions, forced to renounce Islam and swear allegiance to China’s ruling Communist Party.
The camps sprang up over the past two years at extraordinary speed and on a massive scale, as monitored by satellite imagery. China maintains a massive security presence in Xinjiang and efforts to independently verify claims by Uighur activists are routinely blocked.
The new report said “law-based de-radicalization” in Xinjiang has curbed the rise and spread of religious extremism.
It said 1,588 terrorist gangs have been crushed and 12,995 terrorists seized since 2014. Over that time, 2,052 explosive devices were seized and more than 30,000 people punished for taking part in almost 5,000 “illegal religious activities,” the report said. It added that 345,229 copies of “illegal religious publicity materials,” were also seized.
It has spent decades trying to suppress pro-independence sentiment fueled in part by frustration about an influx of migrants from China’s Han majority. Beijing Authorities say extremists there have ties to foreign terror groups but have given little evidence to support that.
Despite the region’s religious, linguistic and cultural differences with the rest of country, China says Xinjiang has been Chinese territory since ancient times.
In addition to their answering concerns about violence, experts and Uighur activists believe the camps are part of an aggressive government campaign to erode the identities of the Central Asian groups who called the region home long before waves of Han migrants arrived in recent decades.
Monday’s paper sought to underplay Islam’s role in the region’s historical makeup, saying that while it “cannot be denied that Xinjiang received the influence of Islamic culture,” that did not change the “objective fact” that Xinjiang’s culture is merely a facet of Chinese culture.
“Islam is not the natural faith of the Uighurs and other ethnicities, nor is it their only faith,” the report said.
China has sought to defend itself in the media and at international forums against charges of cultural genocide, painting its critics as biased and seeking to smear China’s reputation and contain its rise as a global power.
Despite those efforts, its reputation for taking a hard-line against religious minorities and Muslims in particular has drawn global attention.
The man arrested in the New Zealand mosque attacks said in his online manifesto that China is the nation that most aligns with his political and social values.
In November, China rejected criticism of its treatment of ethnic Muslims, telling the United Nations that accusations of rights abuses from some countries were “politically driven.”
At a U.N. review of the country’s human rights record, China characterized Xinjiang as a former hotbed of extremism that has been stabilized through “training centers” which help people gain employable skills.
More recently, a U.S. envoy on religion last week called for an independent investigation into the detentions and for the release of those being held, calling China’s the situation in Xinjiang “horrific.”
Sam Brownback, U.S. ambassador-at-large for international religious freedom, said China has done nothing to assuage concerns from the U.S. and others over the detention of Uighurs, Kazakhs and members of other Muslim minority groups.
Brownback appeared undeterred by Beijing’s complaints over his earlier comments, describing China’s explanation of the reasons behind the camps as “completely unsatisfactory answers.”
China is already listed by the U.S. among the worst violators of religious freedom, and Brownback held open the possibility of sanctions and other punitive measures “if corrective actions aren’t taken.”
While making no commitments, Brownback held open the possibility of action toward individuals involved in the internments under The Global Magnitsky Act of 2016.
The Philippines officially withdrew from the International Criminal Court (ICC) on Sunday, a year after President Rodrigo Duterte announced the country would leave the organization.
Duterte’s decision became final over the weekend when the Supreme Court of the Philippines declined to grant an injunction requested by a group of human rights activists.
Duterte had announced plans to leave the organization after the ICC announced a preliminary investigation into allegations that he and his government have committed crimes against humanity and mass murder during his so-called war on drugs.
Romel Bagares, a lawyer for the rights activists, called the decision “a terrible setback in the long fight against impunity in the country,” according the New York Times, adding that the ICC was the country’s last resort given that the government has failed to stop thousands of deaths in Duterte’s bloody drug war.
Duterte began a crackdown against the sale and use of illegal drugs shortly after taking office in 2016. Critics have accused Duterte of using the campaign, which has reportedly killed thousands of people, as cover for a politically motivated attempt to consolidate power and silence his opponents.
Just last week, the president of the Philippines publicly named 46 politicians who he says are involved in the drug trade.
Amnesty International condemned the Philippines’ ICC departure in a statement on its website. “The cynical withdrawal of the Philippines from the ICC is a futile attempt to evade international justice and to halt the ICC’s work,” the statement said.
The International Criminal Court is an Hague-based intergovernmental organization “established to investigate, prosecute and try individuals accused of committing the most serious crimes of concern to the international community as a whole.” The court focuses on crimes like genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes.
Burundi was the first and only other member to leave the ICC in 2017, after an investigation was opened into human rights abuses in the country.
(JAYAPURA, Indonesia) — Flash floods and mudslides triggered by downpours tore through mountainside villages in Indonesia’s easternmost province, killing at least 58 people, disaster officials said. An earthquake triggered a landslide that hit a popular waterfall on the Indonesian tourist island of Lombok, killing at least two and damaging hundreds of homes.
Floodwaters and landslides destroyed roads and bridges in several areas of Papua province’s Jayapura district following days of torrential rains, hampering rescue efforts, Sutopo Purwo Nugroho, the National Disaster Mitigation Agency spokesman, said Sunday.
The dead included three children who drowned after the floods began just after midnight Saturday.
Nugroho said 58 bodies had been pulled from the mud and wreckage of crumpled homes by Sunday. Another 74 people were hospitalized, many with broken bones and head wounds.
Nugroho said the number of dead and injured would likely increase since many affected areas had not been reached.
“We are overwhelmed by too many injuries,” said Haerul Lee, the head of the Jayapura health office, adding that some medical facilities had been hit by power outages. “We can’t handle it alone.”
Papua military spokesman Col. Muhammad Aidi said rescuers saved two injured infants who had been trapped for more than six hours. The parents of one of the babies were washed away and died.
Worst hit was Sentani subdistrict, where a landslide early Sunday was followed minutes later by a river that burst its banks, sweeping away residents in a fast-moving deluge of water, heavy logs and debris, said the local disaster mitigation agency head, Martono.
Martono, who goes by a single name, said rescuers evacuated more than 4,000 people to temporary shelters as more than 300 houses were damaged.
Television footage showed hundreds of rescuers and members of the police and military evacuating residents to shelters at a government office. Others were carrying bodies in black and orange body bags. Ambulances and vehicles were seen carrying victims on muddy roads to several clinics and hospitals.
Seasonal downpours cause frequent landslides and floods and kill dozens each year in Indonesia, a chain of 17,000 islands where millions of people live in mountainous areas or near fertile flood plains.
Meanwhile, a moderately strong earthquake triggered a landslide on Lombok island on Sunday. The U.S. Geological Survey said the quake had a magnitude of 5.5 and struck at a depth of 23 kilometers (15 miles).
The earthquake was felt across the island, located next to Bali, panicking residents still recovering from a major quake last August that killed more than 300 people and left thousands homeless.
Sunday’s quake triggered a landslide from Mount Rinjani and hit dozens of tourists at the Tiu Kelep waterfall located in the foothills of the active volcano, said Nugroho, the disaster agency spokesman.
Two Malaysians, including a 14-year-old boy, were killed in the landslide, Nugroho said.
He said rescuers managed to evacuate 22 Malaysians and 14 Indonesians from the waterfall site, and 50 others — mostly local surveyors from government institutions, the military and the police — from the mountainous area.
Forty-four people were injured in the quake, including eight Malaysians, Nugroho said. About 500 homes were damaged, including 32 that were flattened.
Indonesia sits on the “Pacific Ring of Fire” and has frequent earthquakes and volcanic eruptions.
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said the United Nations was ready to help Indonesia cope with the disasters.
“The United Nations expresses its solidarity with the Indonesian authorities and stands ready to work with them as they respond to the humanitarian needs resulting from both natural disasters,” the spokesman for the secretary-general said in a statement.
Every school kid in Christchurch descended on the city’s Al Noor mosque after class on Monday, bringing flowers, teddy bears and messages of love on paper chains, while linking arms to sing traditional Maori songs in tribute to the 50 dead and 34 wounded in Friday’s terrorist attack.
The moving scenes typified the stirring response “the Garden City” has embraced following the attacks on its Muslim community, which began with the slaying of 43 worshippers at Al Noor mosque, and continued with seven more murders at the Linwood mosque across the city. One of the victims of the rampage, which was wrought by a lone gunman armed with assault rifles and broadcast live on social media, died at Christchurch Hospital.
“The community here is very close,” says dad-of-two Asif Ahmed, 42, who moved to New Zealand from Bangladesh five years ago and lost several close friends in the attack. “New Zealand is a very good, peaceful country. Everyone has been calling to ask how I feel, can they help, so the friendship here is very strong.”
Brenton Harrison Tarrant, 28, of Grafton, Australia, appeared in court Saturday morning charged with murder, was remanded without bail and will next appear in court in April. Tarrant, an avowed white supremacist, had an ordinary gun license from 2017 and was able to purchase five firearms despite a brazenly xenophobic social media presence.
Change is already on the horizon after the country’s worst ever massacre. Following a cabinet meeting about gun laws on Monday, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said that within 10 days of the attack, “we will have announced reforms which will, I believe, make our community safer.” Local online retailer Trademe.co.nz has already voluntarily banned the sale of automatic weapons and gun parts.
Christchurch Mayor Lianne Dalziel says she’s taken pride in how both the nation and the city have responded to the tragedy. Orthodox Jews, Hindus, Christians and Sikhs have all rallied around to help survivors and victims’ families.
“I have friends in the Muslim community, and they’ve reached out and talked me through some of the pain that’s being felt at the moment,” Dalziel tells TIME in an interview. “But they are also telling me that they’re feeling the love and support of their city and country.”
Dalziel was an MP on Feb 22, 2011, when a 6.2 magnitude earthquake convulsed New Zealand’s second city, killing 185 and toppling many downtown buildings. She says she decided to run for local office precisely because of the “need for a particular approach to recovery after a disaster.”
Still, Friday’s events were far from any tragedy she ever envisaged might be inflicted on this isolated nation of five million in the South Pacific, which constantly ranks as one of the world’s safest.
“Would I have ever have imaged a terror attack on our own city?” she asks. “No, that would have been so far from my mind. I wouldn’t have mentioned it as a possibility.”
More tales of heroism have emerged from Friday’s carnage. Haji-Daoud Nabi, 71, had escaped the Al Noor mosque and was helping people jump over a rear fence when he heard a pause in the shooting. He went back inside to help more people escape, but tragically the gunman was only reloading.
“The gunman came back with another round of fire, so my father jumped on a Fijian boy to save him and got hit,” Nabi’s son, a 43-year-old auto repairman Omar, tells TIME.
“He saved the younger soul, for his own soul, knowing that if he died, the gates of paradise are open for him. He did not care; he’s 71 years old, he’s not going to run. Other people aren’t used to gunfire, my father is.”
Nabi came to Christchurch from Afghanistan in 1986, founded the city’s first mosque on Tuam Street, and helped secure the replacement site for Al Noor after that building was sold. An engineer by trade, his is a typical immigrant story here — one of so many intertwined with the history of this leafy city of 400,000.
“We’ve been utterly dependent on people coming from outside and we’ll continue to be so,” says Dalziel. “I conduct a citizenship ceremony every month; it’s usually about 180 people. Each person in the ceremony becomes a citizen of our city, of our country.”
Dalziel also warns against a rising tide of intolerance that has infected political discourse across Western society. In the U.S., for one, President Donald Trump has warned of an “invasion” of immigrants crossing America’s border with Mexico. Asked whether he believed white nationalism was a problem, the former reality television star denied that it was.
“This [attack] was an invasion — of an extremist into our community, our private space,” says Dalziel. “And people like [the gunman] will find comfort in the words of those who tolerate those extreme views.”
—With reporting from Elizabeth Thomson, Harry Poland and Connor Stirling / Christchurch
A gun show in Auckland, New Zealand’s most populous city, has been cancelled in the wake of the terror attack in the city of Christchurch that left at least 50 people dead on Friday.
The Kumeu Militaria Show, billed as the largest gun show in the country, was scheduled to take place this Saturday.
Organizers said the event was cancelled “in respect for the victims” of the shooting and due to “elevated security risks.”
The show attracts thousands of attendees yearly and has been held at the Kumea Showgrounds since 2014. Boasting militaria displays, historical re-enactments and family entertainment, the annual event is branded as a way to promote an interest in the country’s military history.
“We regret the inconvenience caused to all involved with the running of the show, the military vehicle owners, memorabilia collectors and exhibitors, defense force members, community groups, vendors, and support organizations,” the organizers said in a Facebook post.
In the post’s comments, a number of social media users credited the organizers for the decision and said it was the right thing to do.
Gun control laws in New Zealand, which are relatively lax, have been scrutinized since the attack.
New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said during a press conference in Wellington the morning after the attack that the laws “will change.” Brenton Harrison Tarrant, the 28-year-old Australian man arrested and charged in relation to the massacre, allegedly had five guns with him, including two semi-automatic weapons and two shotguns.
Thirty-four people among the 50 injured remain in Christchurch Hospital, including 12 in intensive care.
CHRISTCHURCH, New Zealand (AP) — A Christchurch gun shop on Monday acknowledged selling guns online to the 28-year-old white supremacist accused of killing 50 people in mosque shootings that have upturned New Zealand’s reputation as among the world’s most tolerant and safe nations.
At a news conference, Gun City owner David Tipple said the store sold four guns and ammunition to Brenton Harrison Tarrant through a “police-verified online mail order process.” The store “detected nothing extraordinary,” about the buyer, he said.
Separately, New Zealand’s prime minister Jacinda Ardern said gun law reforms would be announced within 10 days and an inquiry conducted into intelligence and security services who failed to detect the risk from the attacker or his plans. There have been concerns intelligence agencies have been overly focused on the Muslim community in detecting and preventing security risks.
The police commissioner Mike Bush said police are certain Tarrant was the only gunman but aren’t ruling out that he had support.
“I would like to state that we believe absolutely there was only one attacker responsible for this,” he told a news conference. “That doesn’t mean there weren’t possibly other people in support and that continues to form a very, very important part of our investigation.”
None of the guns sold to Tarrant were military-style, semi-automatic weapons, according to Tipple. It was not clear if any of the firearms Tarrant purchased from Gun City were used in Friday’s shootings.
In vowing to tighten gun laws, Ardern has said the attacker used five guns, two of them semi-automatic, which were purchased with an ordinary gun license and modified.
Tipple said he felt no responsibility for the tragedy and refused to say whether he believed gun ownership laws should change in New Zealand, insisting a debate over guns should be held at another time.
“This man wrote in his manifesto that the purpose of using a firearm was to divide us,” Tipple said. “If we allow him to make changes in our ideology, in our behavior, he’s won.”
His store has been criticized for leaving out a roadside advertising billboard that shows a parent helping children with rifle target practice in the wake of the shootings.
Three days after the attack, New Zealand’s deadliest shooting in modern history, relatives were anxiously waiting for word on when they can bury their loved ones. Islamic tradition calls for bodies to be cleansed and buried as soon as possible after death, usually within 24 hours.
Aya Al-Umari, whose older brother Hussien Al-Umari died at the Al Noor mosque, wept as she talked about a kind man, a quintessential big brother who delighted in teasing his little sister.
On Monday, the family was still waiting for the release of Hussein’s body. They have tried to be patient, and understand that police have a job to do, but they are growing weary of the lack of information.
“It’s very unsettling not knowing what’s going on, if you just let me know — is he still in the mosque? Is he in a fridge? Where is he?” Aya said. “I understand the police need to do their job because it’s a crime scene, but you need to communicate with the families.”
Members of the Muslim community and police were at a cemetery which has been fenced off and obscured with white netting. Backhoes had stopped digging and police officers said they were setting up a media area inside the cemetery.
Kawthar Abulaban, 54, who survived the shooting at the Al Noor Mosque, came to the burial site to see the preparations. She did not mind the row of photographers and reporters lined up outside the cemetery.
“It’s good for the world to see what’s happened because people around the world, they thought we were terrorists because some stupid people, they said they are Muslims, they go and kill innocent people, they thought we are terrorists,” said Abulaban who emigrated to New Zealand from Jordan 17 years ago.
“I will not change my opinion about New Zealand. It’s my country,” she said. “You know I have lots of support, lots of love, lots of kindness from all of the New Zealand people.”
Ardern has said authorities hoped to release all the bodies by Wednesday and police said authorities were working with pathologists and coroners to complete the task as soon as they could.
Tarrant, an Australian citizen who lived in New Zealand, appeared in court on Saturday where the judge read one murder charge and said more charges would likely follow. The New Zealand Herald reported Monday that he had dismissed his appointed lawyer and plans to defend himself.
Tarrant had posted a muddled, 74-page anti-immigrant manifesto online before the attacks and apparently used a helmet-mounted camera to broadcast live video of the slaughter.
Facebook said it removed 1.5 million videos of the shootings during the first 24 hours after the massacre. The revelation in a tweet provided a chilling snapshot of how quickly provocative and often disturbing images circulate on the internet.
Thousands of people struggling to make sense of the tragedy have paid tribute to the victims at makeshift memorials in Christchurch, a leafy city of 400,000 people known for its English heritage and the river that meanders through it.
Hundreds of flowers were piled up amid candles, balloons and notes of grief and love outside the Al Noor mosque and the city’s botanic gardens.
Some people sang tributes and others prayed as camera crews from around the world filmed the moving scenes.
“We are a nation who will never accept acts like this!!!,” said a poster-sized message decorated with hearts attached to the iron fence of the botanic gardens. “We stand with the Muslim community. We will always fight for the safety of our community. We will always stand as one.”
Among the victims killed in the horrific shootings at two Christchurch, New Zealand, mosques on March 15 are a goalkeeper for the national futsal team, a Pakistani academic who tried to stop the gunman and dozens of others, many of them immigrants to New Zealand.
50 people were killed in the attacks, which were carried out as the victims gathered at the two mosques for Friday prayers. 36 more are still in the hospital, with 11 in critical condition, according to New Zealand Police.
The attack is the deadliest in New Zealand’s modern history, and its apparent ties to a toxic online culture of hate and extremism, have left the island nation and the rest of the world reeling.
Here’s what we know about the victims so far:
Naeem and Talha Rashid
Father and son Naeem Rashid, 50, and Talha Rashid, 21, were two of nine Pakistanis killed in Friday’s mosque attacks, according to a statement released by the Pakistani Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Naeem Rashid’s brother, Dr. Khurshid Alam, told CNN that Rashid was an academic who had spent the past seven years living in New Zealand.
Rashid was killed while trying to tackle the gunman, according to Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan, and the Pakistani government plans to recognize his bravery with a posthumous award.
“We stand ready to extend all our support to the families of Pakistani victims of the terrorist attack in Christchurch,” Pakistan’s Prime Minister tweeted. “Pakistan is proud of Mian Naeem Rashid who was martyred trying to tackle the White Supremacist terrorist.”
We stand ready to extend all our support to the families of Pakistani victims of the terrorist attack in Christchurch. Pakistan is proud of Mian Naeem Rashid who was martyred trying to tackle the White Supremacist terrorist & his courage will be recognized with a national award.
Sohail Shahid, Syed Jahandad Ali, Syed Areeb Ahmed and Mahboob Haroon
Among the seven other Pakistani nationals killed were Sohail Shahid, Syed Jahandad Ali, Syed Areeb Ahmed and Mahboob Haroon Pakistan’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Shah Mahmood Qureshi tweeted.
“To their families, I express my deepest sympathies and promise to facilitate them to the best of our abilities,” Qureshi tweeted,
My heart is filled with sorrow as I confirm the deaths of the following Pakistanis who embraced Shahadat in the horrific terrorist attack in Christchurch, New Zealand. To their families, I express my deepest sympathies and promise to facilitate them to the best of our abilities. pic.twitter.com/cQkzYg9gWX
Three additional Pakistani victims were listed as “missing” by the Pakistani Ministry of Foreign Affairs in their statement released March 16. They were later confirmed to all be members of the same family — Zeeshan Raza, his father Ghulam Hussain and mother Karam Bibi, according to Mohammad Faisal, spokesman for Pakistan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Mr Zeeshan Raza, his father Mr Ghulam Hussain and mother Ms. Karam bibi have now been confirmed to have embraced shahadat in the terrroist attack in #NewZealand. We are in touch with their family. A total of 9 Pakistanis embraced shahadat in #NewZealandTerrorAttack
Atta Elayyan, 33, the goalkeeper for New Zealand’s national futsal team, the Futsal Whites, was among the victims of Friday’s Christchurch massacre, according to New Zealand Football.
QUOTE | @NZ_Football Futsal Development Manager @margetts_josh: “To Atta’s family, we are deeply sorry for your loss. We can’t imagine what you are going through, but please know we love you and we are here for you during this incredibly difficult time.” #RIPAtta@MainlandFootypic.twitter.com/tCcileWiUK
“My heart goes out to the futsal community,” said New Zealand Football Interim Chief Executive Andrew Pragnell according to New Zealand Football. “They are a very tight-knit group and this news of Atta’s death will be devastating for all involved in the game. We feel their pain and their grief.”
Elayyan, who was born in Kuwait, leaves behind his wife Farah and his young daughter Aya, according to New Zealand Football.
Daoud Nabi
Daoud Nabi was killed in the attacks after fleeing Afghanistan more than 40 years ago. He sought asylum in New Zealand with his two sons and had lived in Christchurch since 1977, according to CNN. His son, Yama Nabi, confirmed his death to CNN.
Mucaad Ibrahim
Mucaad Ibrahim was only 3 years old when he was killed on Friday. He is the youngest known victim of Christchurch’s mass shooting, according to the Associated Press. Ibrahim had been sitting with his father and older brother during services. When the gunman started shooting, the young child became separated from his family. His brother Abdi Ibrahim confirmed that the younger Ibrahim had been killed in the attack.
“My mum, she’s been struggling,” Abdi Ibrahim said, according to the Associated Press. “Every time she sees other people crying, emotional, she just collapses.”
Khaled and Hamza Mustafa
Khaled Mustafa and his son Hamza Mustafa, 14, were both killed in Friday’s attacks. Khaled Mustafa, a Syrian refugee, had come to New Zealand with his wife and three children last year, according to Syrian Solidarity New Zealand.
Mustafa’s younger son Zaid Mustafa, 13, has been hospitalized and is in stable condition, according to a Syrian Solidarity Facebook post. It also says Khaled Mustafa’s wife and daughter have been left “in total shock, [devastation] and horror.”
Mounir Sulaiman, Ahmed Jamal Aldean Abdulghani, Ashraf al-Morsi and Ashraf al-Masri
Four Egyptian nationals, Mounir Sulaiman, 68, Ahmed Jamal Aldean Abdulghani, 68, Ashraf al-Morsi and Ashraf al-Masri, were confirmed to be among the victims of Friday’s mass shooting by the Egyptian Immigration Ministry, according to CNN.
Maheboob Khokhar, Ramiz Vora, Asif Vora, Ansi Alibava and Ozair Kadir
Five Indian nationals were also killed in Christchurch’s mass attack. According to the Indian High Commission in New Zealand, the five victims were Maheboob Khokhar, Ramiz Vora, Asif Vora, Ansi Alibava and Ozair Kadir. The commission also stated that it had set up a dedicated page to expedite visas for family members of the victims.
With a very heavy heart we share the news of loss of precious lives of our 5 nationals in ghastly terror attack in #Christchurch Mr. Maheboob Khokhar Mr. Ramiz Vora Mr. Asif Vora Ms Ansi Alibava Mr. Ozair Kadir@kohli_sanjiv@MEAIndia@SushmaSwaraj 1/3
Lilik Abdul Hamid was also among the victims of Friday’s attacks, according to the Indonesian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
“Our prayers for the deceased and the family left behind,” the ministry said in a translated tweet.
Four Jordanian Nationals
Four Jordanian nationals were killed in the Christchurch attacks, according to Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi. In a tweet, the Foreign Minister said that both Jordan and New Zealand “stand united against terrorism & hate speech which we condemn in all forms.”
Jordan, #NewZealand stand united against terrorism & hate speech which we condemn in all forms. Exchanged condolences with FM @winstonpeters over victims of barbaric terrorist attack against innocent worshippers in which we lost 4 citizens. Asked we be informed of investigation.
(LONDON) — British police say a stabbing west of London in which a man attacked a teenager with a baseball hat and knife while hurling racist abuse is being treated as a terrorist incident “inspired by the far-right.”
A 50-year-old man from the village of Stanwell, near Heathrow Airport, was arrested Saturday on suspicion of attempted murder and racially aggravated public order offenses. A 19-year-old man was taken to the hospital with non-life-threatening injuries.
Neil Basu, head of counter-terrorism policing, said Sunday that while the investigation was just beginning, the incident had “hallmarks of a terror event.” He added “police are committed to tackling all forms of toxic extremist ideology.”
(ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia) — Preliminary information from the flight data recorder of an Ethiopian Airlines plane that crashed a week ago and killed 157 people shows “clear similarities” with an earlier disaster involving the same kind of Boeing aircraft in Indonesia, Ethiopia’s transport minister said Sunday.
The disclosure came as thousands marched in the capital of Addis Ababa, accompanying 17 empty caskets at a funeral for the Ethiopian victims of Flight 302. The caskets were empty because authorities have said that recovering and identifying the remains will take months.
The crash of Ethiopian Flight 302 on March 10 and that of a Lion Air plane in Indonesia in October — both of them Boeing 737 Max 8 jetliners — have prompted the United States and other countries to ground the aircraft.
The flight recorders from Flight 302 that went down shortly after takeoff from Addis Ababa for Nairobi were recovered “in a good condition that enabled us to extract almost all the data inside,” Transport Minister Dagmawit Moges told reporters.
Information collected so far from the flight data recorder has indicated “clear similarities” between both crashes, she said. Both the flight data recorder and the cockpit voice recorder were sent to Paris for analysis by the French air accident investigation agency BEA
The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration already has said satellite-based tracking data showed that the movements of Flight 302 were similar to those of Lion Air Flight 610, which crashed off Indonesia, killing 189 people.
Both planes flew with erratic altitude changes that could indicate the pilots struggled to control the aircraft. Shortly after their takeoffs, both crews tried to return to the airports but crashed.
Suspicions emerged that faulty sensors and software may have contributed to the crashes.
Moges said the Ethiopian government intends to release detailed findings within a month.
At the memorial service earlier in the day, some of the relatives who marched behind the flag-draped coffins were overcome with grief and fainted.
The service came one day after officials began delivering bags of scorched earth from the crash site to family members of the victims because of the problems with identifying the remains.
Family members said they were given a 1-kilogram (2.2-pound) sack of dirt from the crash site. Many relatives already have gone to the dusty field outside Addis Ababa where the plane went down to pay their respects.
Mourner Elias Bilew said he had worked with one of the victims, Sintayehu Shafi, for the past eight years.
“He was such a good person,” Bilew said. “He doesn’t deserve this. He was the pillar for his whole family.”
In the aftermath of the Friday massacre at two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, a clear profile of the gunman is still being put together — but the man charged with murder appears to have posted a manifesto online before the shooting, writing: “For once, the person that will be called a fascist, is an actual fascist.”
The link between fascism and religiously and racially-motivated violence is one of the constants of the 100-year existence of fascism, say experts on its history. At the same time, the suspect’s apparent declaration highlights a recent and troubling change in the idea’s place in the world.
Almost exactly a century ago, on March 23, 1919, Italian dictator Benito Mussolini started a group called the Fasci Italiani di Combattimento, which led to the founding of the original National Fascist Party in 1921. He became Prime Minister a year later, and by 1925, he had ushered in the world’s first fascist dictatorship. The world is greatly changed since then, but the approach of violently attacking people perceived to be enemies remains a thread throughout the history of the idea on which Mussolini seized.
“In its essence, fascism is violence against people who you target as enemies,” says Ruth Ben-Ghiat, an expert on fascism and Professor of Italian and History at New York University. “You don’t discuss with your enemies, you just use violence against them, and this is how fascism rose to power in Italy.”
Specifically, Ben-Ghiat says, fascist governments and groups target people who threaten their power. From the beginning, that idea has been tied to threats to white supremacy; Mussolini himself was preoccupied with the idea that white people in Italy were dying out and being replaced by the minority groups who were the targets of his hatred.
“One core of fascism that hasn’t changed is this creation of a sense of emergency around whiteness,” she says. “If we don’t understand that racism was embedded in fascism from the start, we are getting an incomplete picture.”
Mussolini attracted followers, mostly veterans of World War I and businessmen, by encouraging the systematic assault and killing of socialists, who were viewed as disloyal for having opposed the war and whom factory-owners saw as a threat to their power over labor. Mussolini’s regime also targeted people in Italy’s African colonies in the 1930s and Slavs during border conflicts that ensued as Italy tried to expand its territory.
While the suspected shooter seems to have been motivated by anti-Muslim, anti-immigrant sentiment, historian Robert O. Paxton, author of The Anatomy of Fascism, says Mussolini was in some ways gripped by an opposing fixation, as he was more preoccupied with who was moving away than who was coming to Italy.
“They did not have an immigration program, they had an emigration problem, which is totally different,” he says. “Mussolini tried to prevent [Italians] from leaving because it was humiliating that Italy couldn’t employ its own.”
Paxton says that someone declaring himself to be an anti-Muslim, anti-Immigrant fascist is more an ideological descendant of the Nazi Party than of the original Italian Fascist Party, as Hitler’s followers trumpeted the idea of guarding against feared outsiders who, in being cast as threats, ended up targets.
“Nazism is a kind of fascism and that’s also how it began, with Hitler wanting to adapt what Mussolini had created 100 years ago,” Ben-Ghiat says. The Nazis wouldn’t have called themselves fascists, though, because “Hitler didn’t want to be seen as a disciple of Mussolini and thought of the Italians as second to Germans,” Paxton says.
Even extremists today are often reluctant to self-label as fascists, he notes, but “the Italian fascists who invented the term used it with pride.” Particularly vocal fascists known as the squadrists demonstrated this pride by donning black shirts and marching in parades or beating up socialists.
It was after the term became associated with loss in World War II and the atrocities of the Holocaust that it became “completely tainted” even among those who still held its violent beliefs, he says. “[Modern] far-right parties generally avoid the term like the plague,” and tend to use coded replacement words. That’s also because they can get in trouble with the law. After World War Il, Germany and Italy passed laws aimed at banning propaganda promoting the Fascist and Nazi Parties. While such measures were supposed to “make sure these movements didn’t come back,” as Ben-Ghiat puts it, efforts to police them have varied, and such substitute language has enabled their ideas to come back in different forms.
Recently, however, it appears that even the desire not to be publicly associated with Mussolini and Hitler is fading in some corners of the world. The apparent words of the New Zealand suspect display that shift in stark and troubling relief.
“Fascism is taboo right after World War II but, since the 1990s and especially after 2000, when strongmen come to rule, it’s been rehabbed for a new generation,” Ben-Ghiat says.
The more time that has passed since World War II, the more Paxton thinks the term has been used more to refer to “generic tough guys.” Self-labeling can be more abstract, declaring how one feels and one’s distance from societal norms, rather than declaring an affiliation to a particular political party.
“[‘Fascist’] is rarely used for one’s self because it’s a very negative word,” he adds. “Self-labeling doesn’t really mean much of anything — except as a statement of extreme alienation.”
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Maybe you feel like your friends have suddenly hit a growth spurt and you're lagging seriously behind. Maybe the rest of your family is really tall and you're wondering if you can do anything to catch up. The truth is that a person's height is mostly determined by things out of their control, such as genes. There are many factors that affect height during your teen years that can be controlled, such as diet and activity levels.
Consume a balanced diet. A person will look a lot shorter when having a plump body. Not only that, being fit by eating right will make you taller and feel better!
Eat plenty of lean protein. Lean protein, such as beans, soy, and nuts, helps promote muscle growth and healthy bones. Simple carbohydrates such as pizza, cakes, sweets, and soda, are the stuff to stay away from.
Eat plenty of calcium. Calcium, found in leafy green vegetables such as spinach and kale, and in fortified foods, helps promote healthy bones.
Get enough zinc. Studies, although they have been inconclusive so far, point to a possible link between zinc deficiencies and stunted growth in boys. Good sources of zinc include wheat germ, pumpkin and squash seeds and peanuts.
Get enough vitamin D. Vitamin D promotes bone and muscle growth in children and a deficiency has been shown to stunt growth and cause weight gain in teenage girls. Modest amounts of Vitamin D can be found in alfalfa and mushrooms, as well as Vitamin D-fortified foods such as some milks and cereals. However, the vast majority of your Vitamin D comes from sunlight exposure. Just 15 minutes a day out in the sun (on average) can ensure you get enough Vitamin D.
Exercise throughout the teen years and in puberty. Getting regular exercise may help you to grow taller during your teen years. Get out and work your muscles for at least 60 minutes/one hour each day.
Join a gym. Joining a gym will help give you access to a lot of great exercising and muscle-building machines. It will also keep you motivated to work out (you'll feel silly if you're in the gym but not exercising).
Join a sports team. People who join sports teams can use their natural competitiveness to burn extra calories and hopefully get their bodies taller. The great thing about team sports is that half the time, you don't even realize that you're exercising.
If nothing else, walk around. If you can't find the time to do anything else, get up and walk around. Walk to the grocery store. Walk to the library. Walk to school.
Get adequate sleep each night. Sleeping is the time when your body grows, so having plenty of sleep is equivalent to giving your body more time for growth. Get between 9 and 11 hours of sleep per night if you're a preteen or still younger than 20.
The human growth hormone (HGH) is produced naturally in our bodies, especially during deep or slow wave sleep.Getting good, sound sleep will encourage the production of HGH, which is created in the pituitary gland.
Understand that height is often determined through genetics. Scientists reckon that 60% to 80% of your height is determined by genes. Unfortunately, either you have the tall gene or you don't. That's not to say that you can't grow tall if you have parents who are on the shorter side; it just means that having shorter parents means you're more likely to be on the short side.
Try not to stunt your growth. There might not be a lot you can do to increase your height, but you can take several steps to make sure your natural height isn't shortened by environmental influences. Drugs and alcohol are both thought to contribute to stunted growth if they're ingested while you're young, and malnutrition can keep you from reaching your full height, as well.
Does caffeine really stunt your growth? Scientific study shows that, no, caffeine does not stunt growth. Caffeine does, however, have a higher chance of keeping you from sleeping soundly and regularly. Kids and adolescents needs about 9-10 hours of sleep, and caffeine may hurt your ability to get that much sleep.
Does smoking really stunt your growth? The effects of smoking and second-hand smoke on body mass index (BMI) are inconclusive. According to Columbia University's Internet Health Resource, "Although the studies that have been done are largely inconclusive, the available research suggests that children who smoke or who are exposed to second-hand smoke are shorter than those who do not smoke or are children of non-smokers."]
Do steroids really stunt your growth? Absolutely. Anabolic steroids inhibit bone growth in young children and teens, along with lowering sperm count, decreasing breast size, elevating blood pressure and putting you at higher risk of heart attack. Children and teens who suffer from asthma and use inhalers that dispense small doses of the steroid budesonide are, on average, half an inch shorter than those not treated with steroids.
Expect to be in your twenties when you stop growing. A lot of young kids look at themselves and ask, "Have I finished growing yet?" If you're under 18, the answer is probably "No!" If you haven't stopped puberty yet, then you haven't stopped growing. Try to be thankful that you have a little time to grow taller instead of worrying about how tall you will be.
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An Investor has to be observant in cases where the promoter pledge is more than 50% and if the pledge proportion crosses the 75% threshold over a period of time then it is essential to be extra vigilant and cautious.
Of the total 3.98 lakh units sold in sub Rs 40 lakh category, NCR and MMR hold 57 percent share, says a reportrnrn 
Rebalancing is mostly considered for lumpsum investments and with a long tenure in mind.
Production cut comes amidst falling sales in current financial year when domestic sales grew only 6.2 percent YoY.
Skoda Octavia Corporate Edition launched in India, starting at Rs 15.49 lakh
According to Angel Broking, EURUSD appreciated by 0.7 percent last week while EURINR appreciated by 0.32 percent the same time frame.
According to Angel Commodities, MCX cotton jumps more than 2% last week tracking reports of export demand coming from China.
The Goa chief minister#39;s body has been kept at the BJP office in Panaji for the party leaders and workers to pay their last respects.
