Month: May 2022

WHO Concerned Over Polio Outbreak in Southeastern Africa

The World Health Organization says authorities in Mozambique have declared an outbreak of wild poliovirus type 1 after confirming that a child in the country’s northeastern Tete province has contracted the disease. It becomes the second case of wild poliovirus confirmed in southern Africa this year, following a case in Malawi in mid-February.

In a statement, Dr. Matshidiso Moeti, WHO regional director for Africa, called the outbreak of poliovirus in Mozambique “greatly concerning.”

She added that efforts were underway to help strengthen disease surveillance in Malawi, Mozambique, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe, with plans to reach 23 million children ages five and below with the polio vaccine in the coming weeks.

Dr. Ndoutabe Modjirom, the interim polio program coordinator for the WHO Africa Region, said that the first step is to carry out a quality vaccination campaign. 

“The second measure is to reinforce the surveillance in all our countries so that they will be able to detect very, very quickly all poliovirus circulating in our region,” he said. “We have to extend to all other countries the measure of surveillance. So that measure we have to take very, very quickly to address this situation.”

Dr. Norman Matara, head of the Zimbabwe Association for Doctors for Human Rights, said the outbreaks of diseases may have resulted from the lockdowns that countries around the world instituted while fighting COVID-19. 

“You know with the pandemic, the lockdowns and clinics shutting down, there is a probability some infants and children might have missed their immunizations schedule and thus we now have these emergency outbreaks; measles in Zimbabwe and polio in Mozambique,” he said. “So, we really urge the government that as they fight COVID-19, we should intensify immunization of children especially in those neglected areas so that every child gets immunized. We also urge the government to implement strong surveillance systems.”   

Last week, Zimbabwe declared an outbreak of measles in a province on the border with Mozambique. President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s government said it was working with the WHO to immunize children in the whole country.

UN Floats Plan to Boost Renewables as Climate Worries Mount

The United Nations chief on Wednesday launched a five-point plan to jump-start broader use of renewable energies, hoping to revive world attention on climate change as the U.N.’s weather agency reported that greenhouse gas concentrations, ocean heat, sea-level rise, and ocean acidification reached record highs last year.

“We must end fossil fuel pollution and accelerate the renewable energy transition before we incinerate our only home,” U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said. “Time is running out.”

His latest stark warning about possible environmental disaster comes after the World Meteorological Organization issued its State of the Climate Report for 2021, which said the last seven years were the seven hottest on record. The impacts of extreme weather have led to deaths and disease, migration, and economic losses in the hundreds of billions of dollars — and the fallout is continuing this year, WMO said.

“Today’s State of the Climate report is a dismal litany of humanity’s failure to tackle climate disruption,” Guterres said. “The global energy system is broken and bringing us ever closer to climate catastrophe.”

In his plan, which leans into the next U.N. climate conference taking place in Egypt in November, Guterres called for fostering technology transfer and lifting of intellectual property protections in renewable technologies, like battery storage.

Such ambitions – as with his call for transfers of technologies aimed to fight COVID-19 – can cause innovators and their financial backers to bristle: They want to reap the benefits of their knowledge, investments and discoveries — not just give them away.

Secondly, Guterres wants to broaden access to supply chains and raw materials that go into renewable technologies, which are now concentrated in a few powerful countries.

The U.N. chief also wants governments to reform in ways that can promote renewable energies, such as by fast-tracking solar and wind projects.

Fourth, he called for a shift away from government subsidies for fossil fuels that now total a half-trillion dollars per year. That’s no easy task: Such subsidies can ease the pinch in many consumers’ pockets – but ultimately help inject cash into corporate coffers too.

“While people suffer from high prices at the pump, the oil and gas industry is raking in billions from a distorted market,” Guterres said. “This scandal must stop.”

Finally, Guterres says private and public investments in renewable energy must triple to at least $4 trillion dollars a year. He noted that government subsidies for fossil fuels are today more than three times higher than those for renewables.

Those U.N. initiatives are built upon a central idea: That human-generated emissions of greenhouse gas in the industrial era have locked in excess heat in the atmosphere, on the Earth’s surface, and in the oceans and seas. The knock-on effect has contributed to more frequent and severe natural disasters like drought, hurricanes, flooding and forest fires.

Climate scientist Zeke Hausfather of the tech company Stripe and Berkeley Earth, a nonprofit focused on environmental data science, says a good way to head toward net-zero emissions is “to make clean energy cheap.”

“While rich countries can afford to spend extra on clean energy, poor and middle income countries may be less willing to accept tradeoffs between reducing emissions and lifting millions out of abject poverty,” he said. “If clean energy sources are cheaper than fossil fuels, they become win-win and will be adopted more rapidly.”

The WMO report breaks little new ground in terms of data, but compiles earlier studies into a broader picture of the global climate.

Its secretary-general, Petteri Taalas, pointed to a downward blip in emissions in 2020 when the coronavirus pandemic dampened human activity. But he said that doesn’t change the “big picture” because carbon dioxide – a leading greenhouse gas – has a long lifetime and lingers on, and emissions have been growing since then anyway.

“We have seen this steady growth of carbon dioxide concentration, which is related to the fact that we are still using too much fossil fuel,” Taalas said in an interview. “Deforestation in regions like Amazon, Africa and southern Asia still continue.”

Last year’s U.N. climate conference in Glasgow, Scotland, failed to muster carbon-cutting pledges from the “BRICS” countries — Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa — which threaten a key goal of the 2015 Paris accord to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius, he said.

“We are rather heading towards 2.5- to 3-degree warming instead of 1.5,” Taalas said.

Climate experts lauded the U.N. ambitions and lamented the WMO findings, and said some countries are headed in the wrong direction.

“If climate change is death by one thousand cuts, in 2021 we took our thousandth,” said Rob Jackson, professor of Earth System Science at Stanford University, who also chairs the Global Carbon Project that tracks carbon emissions.

“Dirty coal use roared back through economic stimulation incentives for COVID in China and India. We built more new coal plant capacity worldwide than we took offline,” he added. “How is this possible in 2021?”

Jonathan Overpeck, a professor of environmental education at the University of Michigan, noted that fossil fuels have a role in the Russian government’s war in Ukraine. Russia is a key global producer of oil and gas, including through a pipeline that transits Ukraine to supply homes and businesses in Europe.

“The secretary-general has it right in pointing the blame at fossil fuels. Fossil fuels are creating an ever-worsening climate crisis and all that comes with it,” Overpeck said. “The solution for climate change, the deadly air pollution and true national security is to leave fossil fuels behind in favor of clean renewable energy.”

“It’s getting scary,” he added. “The climate crisis and the European war are a call to action, and to rid the planet of fossil fuels as fast as we can.”

US Congress Looks at UFOs Through Security Lens  

 The U.S. government has often ignored the possibility of unidentified flying objects, even after decades of unexplained sightings, including by U.S. military pilots who sometimes filmed the UFOs, some of which moved with lightning speed and incredible agility. 

On Tuesday, a congressional hearing focused on UFOs for the first time in 50 years, this time looking at their threat to national security — not from people from other worlds, but from potential international adversaries on Earth.  

The hearing came nearly a year after a government report documented more than 140 cases of unidentified aerial phenomena, or UAP, that U.S. military pilots had observed since 2004. 

“They are real. They need to be investigated. And any threats they pose need to be mitigated,” said Representative André Carson, chair of the House Intelligence Subcommittee on Counterterrorism, Counterintelligence and Counterproliferation.

During his testimony, Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence and Security Ronald Moultrie said, “We’re open to all hypotheses. We’re open to any conclusions that we may encounter.”  

“The stigma associated with UAPs has gotten in the way of good intelligence analysis. Pilots avoided reporting or were laughed at when they did,” Carson said. “Today we know better.” 

Moultrie, who oversees the Pentagon-based UAP investigation team, added that “because UAP pose potential flight safety and general security risks, we are committed to a focused effort to determine their origins.”    

The hearing focused on possible foreign adversaries of the U.S. developing secret technologies that could be construed as UFOs and prove detrimental to the United States. 

“The intelligence community has a serious duty to our taxpayers to prevent potential adversaries, such as China and Russia, from surprising us with unforeseen new technologies,” said Republican Representative Rick Crawford.  

While testifying, Deputy Director of Naval Intelligence Scott Bray showed UAP video clips. One showed flashing triangular objects in the sky, later determined to be visual artifacts of light passing through night-vision goggles. In another, a shiny spherical object zipped past a military aircraft’s cockpit window — an observation Bray said remained unexplained. 

Although Bray did not rule out extraterrestrial origins, he said there hasn’t been anything to suggest the sightings are “nonterrestrial in origin.” 

The number of UAPs in the military database has grown to about 400, Bray said.  

They are increasing, he noted, likely because of technological advances, such as better sensors, and expanded drone usage.  

Bray cautioned the committee about the need to balance transparency with the protection of sensitive intelligence information. 

“Given the nature of our business, national defense, we’ve had to sometimes be less forthcoming with information in open forums than many would hope,” he said. “We do not want potential adversaries to know exactly what we’re able to see or understand or how we come to the conclusions we make,” he said. 

 

Nigeria Becoming Destination for Africa’s Promising Tech Startups

In February, the Nigerian technology startup CrowdForce announced a big break: It had received $3.6 million from investors to expand its financial services operations to many more underserved communities.  

Co-founder and Chief Executive Officer Tomi Ayorinde said new funding will boost its mobile agent network from 7,000 to 21,000 this year.

“We were looking to scale faster and really gain market share,” Ayorinde said. “And what we’re doing is also very impact-related because we’re creating jobs, avenues for people to make extra income in their communities. So, it was also very interesting for impact investors to be part of what we’re trying to do.” 

When Ayorinde helped launch CrowdForce seven years ago, he intended it to be a data collection company. But after about two years, the company overhauled its business model when Ayorinde realized it could fill a need for bank accounts.   

“When we collected data of 4.5 million traders what we saw was, a lot of them didn’t have bank accounts and the ones that have bank accounts had a very tough time accessing the cash that was sent to them,” said Ayorinde.”That’s when we kind of realized that there’s a bigger problem to solve here.”

Experts say about 60% of Africa’s 1.2 billion people lack access to banks or financial services. Technology startups in Africa are trying to fix that, said the African Private Equity and Venture Capital Association known as AVCA.   

In a recent report, the industry group said African startups attracted $5.2 billion in venture capital last year, and that West Africa – led by Nigeria – accounted for the largest share of investments.    

AVCA research manager Alexia Alexandropoulou said investors are looking to tap into Africa’s huge population of young people.    

“Africa is the world’s most youthful population, so as the proportion of skilled labor increases, then the result will be more human capital in order to power African businesses and also the industrial development within the continent,” said Alexandropoulou.

AVCA’s report also cites increased internet penetration in Africa and more favorable government policies as contributing to increased investments in financial technology services knwoFintech.  

But Fintech Digital Marketing Expert Louis Dike said there are obstacles to overcome, such as weak currencies and policies.  

“Africa is not a perfect place because it’s still made up of virgin markets,” said Dike. “The standard of living is quite low, our regulations are not consistent, today the government will say this and tomorrow they will change the law and restrict some startup activities.”  

But with new talents emerging in technology, more startups with big dreams are emerging in Nigeria and elsewhere in Africa. 

 

Musk: Doubt About Spam Accounts Could Scuttle Twitter Deal

Tesla CEO Elon Musk says his deal to buy Twitter can’t move forward unless the company shows public proof that less than 5% of the accounts on the social media platform are fake or spam.

Musk made the comment in a reply to another user on Twitter early Tuesday. He spent much of the previous day in a back-and-forth with Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal, who posted a series of tweets explaining his company’s effort to fight bots and how it has consistently estimated that less than 5% of Twitter accounts are fake.

In his tweet Tuesday, Musk said that “20% fake/spam accounts, while 4 times what Twitter claims, could be much higher. My offer was based on Twitter’s SEC filings being accurate.”

He added: “Yesterday, Twitter’s CEO publicly refused to show proof of 5%. This deal cannot move forward until he does.”

Twitter declined to comment.

It’s Musk’s latest salvo over inauthentic accounts, a problem he has said he wants to rid Twitter of.

At a Miami technology conference Monday, Musk estimated that at least 20% of Twitter’s 229 million accounts are spam bots, a percentage he said was at the low end of his assessment.

The battle over spam accounts kicked off last week when Musk tweeted that the Twitter deal was on on hold pending confirmation of the company’s estimates that they make up less than 5% of total users.

Also at the All In Summit, Musk gave the strongest hint yet that he would like to pay less for Twitter than the $44 billion offer he made last month.

Musk’s comments are likely to bolster theories from analysts that the billionaire either wants out of the deal or to buy the company at a cheaper price. His tweet Tuesday came in reply to one from a Tesla news site speculating that Musk “may be looking for a better Twitter deal as $44 billion seems too high.”

“Twitter shares will be under pressure this morning again as the chances of a deal ultimately getting done is not looking good now,” Wedbush Securities analyst Dan Ives, who covers both Twitter and Tesla, said in a research note. He estimated that there’s “60%+ chance” that Musk ends up walking away from the deal and paying the $1 billion breakup fee.

Musk made the offer to buy Twitter for $54.20 per share on April 14. Twitter shares have slid since then. They were down slightly in Tuesday morning trading to $37.28.

To finance the acquisition, Musk pledged some of his Tesla shares, which have slumped by about a third since the deal was announced.

In tweets on Monday, Agrawal acknowledged Twitter isn’t perfect at catching bots. He wrote that every quarter, the company has made the estimate of less than 5% spam. “Our estimate is based on multiple human reviews of thousands of accounts that are sampled at random, consistently over time,” Agrawal wrote.

Estimates for the last four quarters were all well under 5%, he wrote. “The error margins on our estimates give us confidence in our public statements each quarter.”

Twitter has put the under 5% estimate in its quarterly filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission for at least the last two years, well before Musk made his offer last month.

But in the filings, Twitter expressed doubts that its count of bot accounts was correct, conceding that the estimate may be low.

Americans Return to the Office With Willingness and Trepidation 

As cases of coronavirus continue to decline in the United States, many businesses have told their employees it’s time to return to the office.  

Some people are already doing the daily grind, while others are splitting their time between home and the office as part of a hybrid plan.  

The office routine was normal for millions of Americans before the pandemic. Now, some two years later, it is regarded as a new normal, after those employees worked full-time from their residences. 

Morning Consult, a global business intelligence company, has been polling U.S. consumers about returning to the workplace.  

Charlotte Principato, a financial services analyst for the organization, said the latest poll showed 73% of remote workers felt comfortable returning to the office. The remaining 27% wanted to remain at home where, they said, they work more efficiently.  

“The return to the office is experienced differently depending on each person’s situation,” and introverts may have a harder time getting used to it than extroverts, said Debra Kaplan, a therapist in Tucson, Arizona.  

She told VOA many people will experience stress adjusting to an office environment after working from home. 

Mark Gerald, a psychoanalyst in New York, likens it to a child going to school for the first time.  

There’s almost childlike anxiety that’s related to change and fears of going into the world, he said. 

The fears include contracting the coronavirus, as well as being away from family during the workday. 

That’s true for Imani Harris, a federal government employee in Washington who has two young children. 

“I wear a mask at work because I don’t feel safe being at the office,” she said. “I’d rather be at home because I accomplish more, and get to spend quality time with the kids — plus it’s harder financially since I have to spend money on child care.” 

Another drawback is exhaustion.  

“At first, returning to the office can be really draining because you haven’t seen the people you work with in person for a long time,” said Karestan Koenen, a psychiatric epidemiology professor at Harvard University’s School of Public Health. 

“Psychologically and emotionally, the transition is not comfortable but should eventually become more comfortable as time goes on,” she added.  

Still, many workers favor a hybrid approach in which they work more at home than in the office.  

“We tend to see that younger folks are more likely to want a hybrid environment where they feel they’re more productive and have more flexibility and control,” Principato said.  

They also don’t think their jobs need to be done in the office and want to work in a way that feels better for them, Kaplan said.  

For Ethan Carson, who is in his 20s and works for a technology firm in Falls Church, Virginia, going to his office “is more of a bother” than working from home. “I don’t need to be in my building to do my job,” he said, “and the commute is difficult with the horrible traffic.” 

Other employees, however, think it’s easier for them to get their job done around their peers than at home, where there may be more distractions.  

For some, the office makes them feel they are part of a community again.  

“There is a hunger for human connection and sometimes the human touch,” Gerald said.  

“People have realized that socializing is helpful for their mental health,” Kaplan said. “They often feel positive about seeing their colleagues,” talking to them face-to-face, and not just on Zoom, she explained.  

Angela Morgensen, a communications consultant in Bethesda, Maryland, is relieved to be back at the office. 

“I’m enjoying talking to the people I work with and feel more like I’m part of the company again,” she said. “I used to hate meetings, but I’m finding it stimulating to share ideas.” 

Gerald points out that the pandemic has made people think more about a better work-life balance, including how many hours they want to spend in the office. 

“They are not returning as the same person they were before the pandemic happened. Some wonder, ‘Is this job fulfilling and the workplace a good environment for me?'”  

And that’s reflected in seeing hybrid work becoming more of the norm, he said. 

Convicted Killer Turned Tech Whiz Confronts His Sordid Past

When he was 20 years old, Harel Hershtik planned and executed a murder, a crime that a quarter of a century later is still widely remembered for its grisly details.

Today, he is the brains behind an Israeli health-tech startup, poised to make millions of dollars with the backing of prominent public figures and deep-pocket investors.

With his company set to go public, Hershtik’s past is coming under new scrutiny, raising questions about whether someone who took a person’s life deserves to rehabilitate his own to such an extent.

“When I was young, I would say that I was stupid and arrogant,” said Hershtik, now 46. “You can be a genius and yet still be very stupid and the two don’t contradict each other.”

Today, Hershtik is the vice president of strategy and technology at Scentech Medical, a company he founded in 2018, while behind bars, which says its product can detect certain diseases through a breath test.

In a three-hour interview with The Associated Press, he repeatedly expressed remorse for his crime.

Hershtik was convicted of murdering Yaakov Sela, a charismatic snake trapper he met when he was 14. The two had a bumpy relationship.

Sela was known for having numerous girlfriends at once, one being Hershtik’s mother. Hershtik said he felt uneasy with how Sela treated some of the women, including his mother.

In early 1996, Sela discovered that Hershtik had stolen 49,000 shekels (about $15,000 at the time) from him, and the two agreed that instead of involving the police, Hershtik would pay him back double that amount. Court documents say Hershtik instead planned to murder Sela.

Pulled over during a drive to gather the money, an accomplice of Hershtik’s fired three shots at Sela, using Hershtik’s mother’s pistol. He then handed Hershtik the gun, according to the documents, and Hershtik shot Sela in the head at close range.

The pair shoved Sela’s body into the trunk and buried it in a grove in the Golan Heights, according to the documents. Weeks later, hikers saw a hand poking up from the earth, and Sela’s body was found.

The sensational crime gripped the nation.

In court documents, prosecutors say Hershtik lied repeatedly in his attempt to distance himself from the murder.

Hershtik said he was compelled to lie so that he could protect the others involved in the scheme, which included his mother.

Hershtik was sentenced to life in prison for premeditated murder and obstructing justice, among other crimes.

He would serve 25 years, during which time Hershtik earned two doctorates, in math and chemistry, and got married three separate times. He said he established 31 companies, selling six of them.

But prison was also a fraught time for Hershtik. He said he spent 11 years in quarantine because of health issues. He was punished twice for setting up internet access to his cell, in one case building a modem out of two dismantled DVD players.

Last year, a parole board determined he had been rehabilitated and no longer posed a danger to society.

As part of his early release and until 2026, he is under nightly house arrest from 11 p.m. to 6 a.m. He must wear a tracking device around his ankle at all times and is barred from leaving the country.

A free man, Hershtik sat recently with the AP in his office in the central city of Rehovot, Israel.

His start-up is waiting for regulatory approval to merge with a company called NextGen Biomed, which trades on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange and would make Scentech public.

Hershtik said the company’s product is being finalized for detecting COVID-19 through a patient’s breath, and it is working to add other diseases such as certain cancers as well as depression. The product is meant to provide on-the-spot results in a non-invasive way.

The company has received a patent for its technology in Israel and said it is preparing to apply for FDA approval soon.

Hershtik said the merger values the company at around $250 million and that he has raised more than $25 million in funding over the last two years through private Israeli investors. A large part of the investment is from Hershtik’s own money, although he won’t say how much. Prisoners in Israel aren’t barred from doing business, but

Hershtik’s success is rare.

His company is backed by prominent Israeli names, including Yaakov Amidror, who chairs NextGen and is a former chief of the country’s National Security Council.

“According to the rules of the country, the man is allowed to rehabilitate. He paid his price and he rehabilitated. So there is no reason not to help him rehabilitate,” Amidror, who testified to the parole board on Hershtik’s behalf, told the AP.

But Hershtik’s past is already haunting him. Hershtik was demoted from CTO earlier this year to his current position, in part because he didn’t want his crime to scare away investors.

“Harel has always said if for some reason his presence is a problem and the company would be better off without him, that he’s willing to leave the company,” said Drew Morris, a board member and investor.

As Scentech seeks to take its product to market, investors will need to decide whether Hershtik’s rap sheet influences where they put their money.

Ishak Saporta, a senior lecturer at Tel Aviv University’s Coller School of Management, said he believed investors would be drawn to the company’s potential for profit rather than deterred by Hershtik’s history.

“What concerns me here is that he became a millionaire. He paid his debt to society in jail. But does he have a commitment to the victim’s family,” Saporta asked.

Tovia Bat-Leah, who had a child with Sela, suggested he help fund her daughter’s education or create a reptile museum in Sela’s name.

“He served his time but he should also make some kind of reparation,” she said.

Hershtik sees the good that could come about from the company as the ultimate form of repentance. He said he could have used his smarts to create any sort of company with no benefit to society but chose health tech instead.

“Trust me, this is not for the money,” he said.

IBM: 6 Black Colleges Getting Cybersecurity Centers

Six historically Black universities in five Southern states will be getting the first IBM cybersecurity centers aimed at training underrepresented communities, the company said.

The schools are Xavier University of Louisiana, that state’s Southern University System, North Carolina A&T, South Carolina State, Clark Atlanta and Morgan State universities, according to a news release Tuesday.

“Technology-related services are in constant demand, and cybersecurity is paramount,” said Dr. Ray L. Belton, president of the Southern University System based in Baton Rouge.

The centers will give students, staff, and faculty access to modern technology, resources, and skills development, said Dr. Nikunja Swain, chair and professor of the Computer Science and Mathematics Department at South Carolina State, in Orangeburg.

“It will further enhance our ongoing activities on several key areas, including cybersecurity, data science analytics, cloud computing, IOT, blockchain, design thinking, quantum computing, and artificial intelligence,” he said.

IBM said it plans more than 20 such centers at historically Black colleges and universities nationwide.

The company said each school will get customized courses and access to company academic programs. They also will be able to experience simulated but realistic cyberattacks through IBM Security’s Command Center.

The company said it also will provide faculty and students free access to multiple SaaS IBM Cloud environments.

Xavier is in New Orleans, North Carolina A&T in Greensboro and Morgan State in Baltimore.

Iranian Film Workers Arrested, Homes Raided

A renowned Iranian filmmaker has said that the offices and homes of several filmmakers and other industry professionals were raided and some of them arrested in recent days.

Mohammad Rasoulof made the comments on Instagram late Saturday, posting a statement signed by dozens of movie industry professionals.

The statement also claimed that security forces confiscated film production equipment during the raids. It condemned the actions and called them “illegal.”

In a separate Instagram post, Rasoulof identified two of the detained filmmakers as Firouzeh Khosravani and Mina Keshavarz. Rasoulof himself was not targeted in the recent raids.

There were no immediate comments from the Iranian authorities on the raids, and no additional details were immediately available.

Rasoulof won the Berlin Film Festival’s top prize in 2020 for his film “There Is No Evil.” The film tells four stories loosely connected to the themes of the death penalty in the Islamic republic and personal freedoms under oppression.

Rasoulof was sentenced to a year in prison shortly after receiving the award, but his lawyer appealed the sentence. He has been banned from making films and traveling abroad.

Iran occasionally arrests activists in cultural fields over alleged security violations.

Iran’s conservative authorities have long viewed many cultural activities as part of a “soft war” by the West against Iran and an attempt to tarnish the country’s Islamic beliefs.

Eurovision Win in Hand, Ukraine Band Releases New War Video

Ukrainian band Kalush Orchestra, fresh off its Eurovision victory, released a new music video Sunday of its winning hit “Stefania” that features scenes of war-ravaged Ukraine and women in combat gear, as the annual song contest took on ever more political tones given Russia’s war.

“This is how we see Ukrainian mothers today,” Kalush frontman Oleh Psiuk said of the video, which had already racked up millions of views within hours of its release. “We were trying to deliver the message of what Ukraine looks like today.”

The video was released hours after Kalush Orchestra brought Ukraine its third Eurovision win, pulling ahead of Britain in the grand finale thanks to a surge of popular votes from some of the estimated 200 million viewers from 40 participating countries. The win buoyed Ukrainian spirits and represented a strong affirmation of Ukrainian culture, which Psiuk said was “under attack” by Russia’s invasion.

Band members posed for photos and signed autographs outside their three-star Turin hotel Sunday, packing their own luggage into taxis en route to an interview with Italian host broadcaster RAI before heading home. They must return to Ukraine on Monday after being given special permission to leave the country to attend the competition; most Ukrainian men between the ages of 18 and 60 are barred from leaving in case they are needed to fight.

That stark reality made for a bittersweet moment Sunday in Turin, as Kalush vocalist Sasha Tab had to say goodbye to his wife Yuliia and two children, who fled Ukraine a month ago and are living with a host Italian family in nearby Alba. She and the children were at the band’s hotel and she wept as Tab held his daughter in his arms before getting into the cab.

Russia was banned from the Eurovision Song Contest this year after its Feb. 24 invasion of Ukraine, a move organizers said was meant to keep politics out of the contest that promotes diversity and friendship among nations.

But politics nevertheless entered into the fray, with Psiuk ending his winning performance Sunday night with a plea from the stage: “I ask all of you, please help Ukraine, Mariupol. Help Azovstal right now!” he said, referring to the besieged steel plant in the strategic port city.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy hailed the victory, saying he hoped Ukraine would be able to host the contest next year and predicting the “victorious chord in the battle with the enemy is not far off.”

“Stefania” was penned by lead singer Psiuk as a tribute to his mother, but since Russia’s invasion it has become an anthem to the motherland, with lyrics that pledge: “I’ll always find my way home, even if all roads are destroyed.”

The new music video features women soldiers carrying children out of bombed-out buildings, greeting children in shelters and leaving them behind as they board trains. The video credits said it was shot in towns that have seen some of the worst destruction of the war, including Bucha, Irpin, Borodyanka and Hostomel.

The video was clearly made before the band left Ukraine as it features band members and — presumably — actors performing in the rubble.

“Dedicated to the brave Ukrainian people, to the mothers protecting their children, to all those who gave their lives for our freedom,” it said.

Ukrainians cheered the victory Sunday as a much-needed boost, and the national rail operator announced that the train that passes through Kalush, the birthplace of Psiuk, will be renamed the “Stefania Express.”

“Every little victory is important for every Ukrainian, for our Ukraine, for each one of us,” Kyiv resident Svitlana Nekruten said.

Albert Sokolov, an evacuee from Mariupol, said he had no doubt Ukraine would emerge victorious.

“I listened to this song in Mariupol when we were being bombed so I was sure that they would win,” he said Sunday in Kyiv.

Russians said the vote was ultimately political, but also showed that Kalush Orchestra and Ukraine had support.

“Eurovision is always about politicized choices; some situations call for a certain choice,” Moscow resident Olga Shlyakhova said. “Of course, I think most people support Ukrainians. They can’t think differently, because they understand it’s a tragedy. That’s why they chose (the winners) with their hearts.”

Anastasiya Perfiryeva, another Moscow resident, noted the popular vote that was so decisive in the victory.

“It was ordinary people who voted. They supported (the winners). Well done. I think that in any case the team was strong, and the support from outside is always pleasant.”

Kalush Orchestra includes folklore experts and mixes traditional folk melodies and contemporary hip hop in a strong defense of Ukrainian culture that has taken on added meaning as Russia has sought falsely to assert that Ukraine’s culture is not unique.

Psiuk, in his trademark pink bucket hat, said the band isn’t trying to be “cool” with its unusual blend of old and new, but that clearly it hit a chord and found broad popular support that pushed Ukraine to victory.

“We are not trying to be like an American hip-hop band,” he said. “We are trying to present our culture, slightly mixed.”

Russia Artist is 76-Year-Old Voice of Protest on Ukraine

Yelena Osipova barely slept ahead of Russia’s pomp-filled Victory Day celebrations on May 9.

The 76-year-old artist was up late, making placards to protest about the conflict in Ukraine.

But the moment she stepped out of her home in St. Petersburg on her way to demonstrate, two unknown men snatched the work from her and ran off. 

“It was upsetting. I’d worked half the night and really liked those placards,” the white-haired painter told AFP. 

“It’s obvious that it was an organized attack.”

Indefatigable as ever, within an hour, the tiny, stooped woman, who moves with difficulty, already had a new poster and was heading out again to protest.

Osipova is well-known in her hometown.

She has been called the “conscience of St. Petersburg,” Russia’s second city, after two decades spent publicly opposing the rule of President Vladimir Putin.

Since the Kremlin’s forces rolled into Ukraine, she has also become a symbol of Russians standing up against the conflict.

Footage of her frequent detentions by riot police has been widely circulated on social media.

“The main thing is that people should say these forbidden words today: ‘No to war,'” said the former art professor.

But in Russia that is a risky prospect.

Protests have been ruthlessly stamped out and those criticizing the campaign — a “special military operation” in official parlance — risk a 15-year jail term.

‘Silence means agreement’

Osipova first started taking to the streets two years after former KGB agent Putin took power in 2000.

She has been demonstrating ever since against what she says are the crimes committed by the Russian authorities.

She protested in 2014 when Moscow seized the Crimean peninsula from Ukraine and against the fighting sparked in the east of the country.

Now she is focused on Putin’s full-fledged offensive against Russia’s pro-Western neighbor.

“If people accept all this, then it means they are not thinking about their children,” she said as she showed AFP her work in her flat.

“I’m dedicating my placards to this idea: what world are we leaving to our children?”

She shows off one poster with the face of a young girl shouting “No to war” on a yellow and blue background, the colors of the Ukrainian flag. 

Another of a child has the slogan “What world are we leaving behind us?”

“Since 2002 I haven’t been able to stay silent, because silence means agreement with what is happening in my country,” she said.

“That’s why I go to protest.”

Her flat with its decrepit vaulted ceilings is in the heart of Russia’s former imperial capital and has been home to her family for three generations.

Its two rooms are cluttered with pictures and posters with pacifist and anti-Kremlin messages.

“I don’t want to serve as cannon fodder,” reads one poster of a soldier. “Wives and mothers, stop the war,” says another.

A third proclaims: “We are all hostages of the provocative politics of imperial power.”

On one wall hangs a large photo of a young man: her only son, Ivan, who died of tuberculosis in 2009 at 28.

Osipova has been frequently detained by the police, but they now know her so well that they sometimes just take her straight home rather than to the station.

“I’ve long ago stopped being scared for myself,” she said defiantly.

“In your own homeland you should not be afraid, but if you love it you should feel that you are the one in charge.” 

Renovated NYC Museum Hall Showcases Indigenous Perspectives

In his first visit to the American Museum of Natural History, Morgan Guerin had a list. Not of things he wanted to check out, though — a list of things that he hated.

It started with seeing certain regalia from his Musqueam Indian Band — sacred objects not intended for public display — in the museum’s Northwest Coast Hall.

This wasn’t just any visit. Guerin was there at the museum’s invitation in 2017 for the start of a project to renovate the hall, incorporating Indigenous perspectives. For him and representatives of other Indigenous communities in the Pacific Northwest and western Canada, the 5-year, $19-million renovation of the Northwest Coast Hall, which reopened to the public Friday, was an opportunity to tell their stories themselves.

“Our people are very, very tired of being ‘studied,’ because the misconception of who we are has always been the outside community’s downfall,” he said. “We have always been here, ready to tell people who we are.”

The hall was the museum’s first gallery, opened in 1899 under the auspices of Franz Boas, an anthropologist who was deeply interested in the Indigenous cultures of the Northwest and western coastal Canada. Boas was also a proponent of what was then a revolutionary idea that different cultures should be looked at in their own right and not on some kind of comparative scale.

It had largely remained unchanged, though, since the early 1900s. When museum officials decided it was time to renovate, they knew they couldn’t do it without input from the people whose cultures are on display.

“A lot of what we did was trying to bring this historic collection to the 21st century, and that’s by telling new stories with active voices in all of these communities and nations,” said Lauri Halderman, vice president for exhibition.

The museum brought together the representatives of the Indigenous communities to talk about what the gallery should contain and what it should look like for the showcase of 10 Pacific Northwest tribal nations.

It wasn’t a simple process, made even less so by the impact of the pandemic with its forcing of remote instead of in-person collaborations.

The hall includes some iconic pieces that anyone who has been to the museum will remember – including a massive 63-foot-long canoe that for decades was placed outside the hall but has now been brought in and suspended from the ceiling as well as several giant carvings. But its new exhibit, items are accompanied by text in both English and Indigenous languages and includes a gallery section showing how younger Indigenous artists are using motifs and designs from prior generations.

There was also, and continues to be, the fundamental question of whether museums should be holding these collections and trying to tell these stories in the first place, given the role that theft and colonialization has played in building them, and the way Indigenous communities have been treated.

Museums “seem to function as very expensive, and in the case of the American Museum of Natural History, maybe the most expensive, trophy cases in the world,” said Haa’yuups, co-curator of the hall, who is Head of the House of Taḳiishtaḳamlthat-ḥ, of the Huupa’chesat-ḥ First Nation.

He said, “They seem to have a meta language about them or a meta message, ‘Aren’t we powerful? Don’t we go forth and dominate the world?'”

He saw his involvement as a way to help spur a difference, to get people thinking about whether the items on display would be better served by being with the people they came from.

“Does it make sense to have a bunch of people who have nothing to do with objects, to have them spend their lives managing them?” he said. “Or does it make sense to send those treasures back to the communities where they come from?”

It’s an issue the museum has and is continuing to grapple with, said Peter Whiteley, curator of North American ethnology. He said the institution, which has repatriated items over the years, had decided through the renovation process that it was willing to do some additional limited repatriation and develop greater collaboration between the museum and the native tribes.

Deeper questions notwithstanding, those who took part in the process, both from the Indigenous nations and the museum staff, said it was a valuable one in terms of showing what is possible in terms of collaboration and listening to Indigenous voices.

“The best thing about this, the result of these consultants from the different native tribes,” said David Boxley, representing the Tsimshian tribe, “is that it’s our voice speaking.”

Former Test Cricketer Andrew Symonds Dies in Auto Accident

Former Australian test cricketer Andrew Symonds has died after a single-vehicle auto accident near Townsville in northeast Australia. He was 46.

Cricket Australia reported Symonds’ death on its website on Sunday, citing a police statement with details of the accident late Saturday night.

It described Symonds as “a cult hero during the peak of his international playing career and one of the most skilled all-rounders Australian cricket has seen.”

“The Queenslander was a larger-than-life figure who drew a widespread fan base during his peak years for not only his hard-hitting ways but his larrikin persona.”

Symonds played 26 test matches for Australia and posted two centuries, but he was better known as a limited-overs specialist. He played 198 one-day international for Australia and won two World Cups.

After retiring as a player, Symonds became a popular commentator for cricket broadcasters.

Queensland Police said the accident occurred at Hervey Range, about 50 kilometers from Townsville.

“Early information indicates, shortly after 11 p.m. the car was being driven on Hervey Range Road, near Alice River Bridge when it left the roadway and rolled,” a police statement said. “Emergency services attempted to revive the 46-year-old driver and sole occupant. However, he died of his injuries.”

Symonds’ family appealed for privacy.

Former Australian captain Allan Border was among those to pay tribute to Symonds on Sunday.

Border said Symonds “hit the ball a long way and just wanted to entertain.

“He was, in a way, a little bit of an old-fashioned cricketer,” Border told the Nine Network. “He was an adventurer, loved his fishing, he loved hiking, camping. People liked his very laid-back style.”

That style brought Symonds into conflict with authority late in his career. In 2008 he missed Australia’s one-day series against Bangladesh after going fishing when he was required to attend a team meeting. He also was disciplined before the 2009 Twenty20 World Cup for breaching team rules around alcohol.

With dreadlocks and his face daubed with zinc cream, Symonds always cut a flamboyant figure in the Australian team.

His loss is another bitter blow for Australian cricket after the death in Thailand in March of legendary leg-spinner Shane Warne. Wicketkeeper Rod Marsh also died in March aged 74. 

Ukraine’s Kalush Orchestra Wins Eurovision Song Contest

Ukrainian band Kalush Orchestra won the Eurovision Song Contest in the early hours of Sunday in a clear show of support for the war-ravaged nation.

The six-man band that mixes traditional folk melodies and contemporary hip hop in a purposeful defense of Ukrainian culture was the sentimental and bookmakers’ favorite among the 25 bands and performers competing in the grand finale. The public vote from home was decisive in securing their victory.

The band’s front man, Oleg Psiuk, took advantage of the enormous global audience to make impassioned plea to free fighters still trapped beneath a sprawling steel plant in the southern port city of Mariupol following the six-man band’s performance.

“I ask all of you, please help Ukraine, Mariupol. Help Azovstal, right now,” he said to the live crowd of about 7,500, many of whom gave a standing ovation, and global television audience of millions.

The plea to free the remaining Ukrainian fighters trapped beneath the Azovstal plant by Russians served as a somber reminder that the hugely popular and at times flamboyant Eurovision song contest was being played out against the backdrop of a war on Europe’s eastern flank.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy gave signs that he was watching from Kyiv and rooting for Ukrainian band.

“Indeed, this is not a war, but nevertheless, for us today, any victory is very important,” Zelenskyy said, according to a presidential statement. “So, let’s cheer for ours. Glory be to Ukraine!”

25 bands

Kalush Orchestra was among 25 bands performing in the Eurovision Song Contest final in front of a live audience in the industrial northern city of Turin, while millions more watched on television or via streaming around the world.

Fans from Spain, Britain and elsewhere entering the Italian venue from throughout Europe were rooting for their own country to win. Still, Ukrainian music fan Iryna Lasiy said she felt global support for her country in the war and “not only for the music.”

Russia was excluded this year after its Feb. 24 invasion of Ukraine, a move that organizers said was meant to keep politics out of the contest that promotes diversity and friendship among nations.

The band’s song Stefania was written as a tribute to Psiuk’s mother but has transformed since the war into an anthem to the beleaguered nation, as lyrics take on new meaning. “I’ll always find my way home, even if all roads are destroyed,” Psiuk wrote.The six-member, all-male band received special permission to leave the country to represent Ukraine and Ukrainian culture at the music contest. One of the original members stayed to fight, and the others plan to return as soon as the contest is over.

‘World supports us’

Back in Ukraine, in the battered northeastern city of Kharkiv, Kalush Orchestra’s participation in the contest is seen as giving the nation another platform to garner international support.

“The whole country is rising, everyone in the world supports us. This is extremely nice,” said Julia Vashenko, a 29-year-old teacher.

“I believe that wherever there is Ukraine now and there is an opportunity to talk about the war, we need to talk,” said Alexandra Konovalova, a 23-year-old makeup artist in Kharkiv. “Any competitions are important now, because of them more people learn about what is happening now.”

The winner is chosen in equal parts by panels of music experts in each competing nation and votes by the viewing public — leaving room for an upset. Britain’s Sam Ryder and Sweden’s Cornelia Jakobs are each given a 10% shot while the Italian duo of Mahmood & Blanco have a 6% chance of winning.

The winner takes home a glass microphone trophy and a potential career boost.

The event was hosted by Italy after local rock band Maneskin won last year in Rotterdam. The victory shot the Rome-based band to international fame, opening for the Rolling Stones and appearing on Saturday Night Live and numerous magazine covers in their typically genderless costume code.

Twenty bands were chosen in two semifinals this week and were competing along with the Big Five of Italy, Britain, France, Germany and Spain, which have permanent berths because of their financial support of the contest. 

US Abortion Rights Activists Start ‘Summer of Rage’ With Saturday Protests

Abortion rights supporters will protest in cities across the United States on Saturday, kicking off what organizers said would be “a summer of rage” if the U.S. Supreme Court overturns the Roe v. Wade case that legalized abortion nationwide.

Planned Parenthood, Women’s March and other abortion rights groups organized more than 300 “Bans Off Our Bodies” marches for Saturday, with the largest turnouts expected in New York City, Washington, D.C., Los Angeles and Chicago.

The demonstrations are in response to the May 2 leak of a draft opinion showing the court’s conservative majority ready to reverse the 1973 landmark decision that established a federal constitutional right to terminate a pregnancy.

The court’s final ruling, which could give states the power to ban abortion, is expected in June. About half of U.S. states could ban or severely restrict abortion soon after a ruling vacating Roe.  

Organizers said they anticipated hundreds of thousands of people to participate in Saturday’s events, which they said would be the first of many coordinated protests around the Supreme Court’s decision.

“For the women of this country, this will be a summer of rage,” said Rachel Carmona, president of Women’s March. “We will be ungovernable until this government starts working for us, until the attacks on our bodies let up, until the right to an abortion is codified into law.”

Democrats, who currently hold the White House and both chambers of Congress, hope that backlash to the Supreme Court decision will carry their party’s candidates to victory in the November midterm elections.  

But voters will be weighing abortion rights against other issues such as the soaring prices of food and gas, and they may be skeptical of Democrats’ ability to protect abortion access after efforts to pass legislation that would enshrine abortion rights in federal law failed. 

On Saturday, demonstrators in New York City plan to march across the Brooklyn Bridge, while protesters in Washington will meet at the Washington Monument and then head to the Supreme Court. Los Angeles protesters planned to meet at City Hall, and a group in Austin was to convene at Texas’ state capitol.

In the past week, protesters have gathered outside the homes of Supreme Court Justices Samuel Alito and Brett Kavanaugh, who have voted to overturn Roe v. Wade, according to the leaked opinion.

Students for Life of America, an anti-abortion advocacy group with campus chapters across the country, said it was holding counter protests on Saturday in nine U.S. cities, including in Washington.

New Zealand Prime Minister Tests Positive for COVID-19   

New Zealand’s prime minister has tested positive for COVID.

Jacinda Ardern’s office said in a statement Saturday that she has mild symptoms and has been in isolation since Sunday, when her partner, Clarke Gayford, tested positive.

Ardern is required to be in isolation until May 21, preventing her from being in Parliament for the release of the Government’s Emissions Reduction Plan on Monday and the country’s budget on Thursday.

“This is a milestone week for the government, and I’m gutted I can’t be there for it,” Ardern said.

Meanwhile, an Associated Press report says that four U.S. Air Force Academy cadets may not graduate or receive a military commission because they have refused COVID-19 vaccinations.

AP reports that Air Force officials say the cadets may also have to “pay back thousands of dollars in tuition costs.”

The Asian Football Confederation announced Saturday that the Chinese Football Association will not be able to host the 2023 AFC Asian Cup.

The confederation said in a statement that it “acknowledges the exceptional circumstances caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, which led to the relinquishment by China PR of its hosting rights.”

China maintains a zero-COVID policy that has forced thousands of people to go into quarantine for long periods of time.

The Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center reported more than 520 million COVID-19 cases early Saturday and over 6 million deaths.

Storm Chasers Face Host of Dangers Beyond Severe Weather

The deaths of four storm chasers in car crashes over the last two weeks have underscored the dangers of pursuing severe weather events as more people clog back roads and highways searching for a glimpse of a lightning bolt or tornado, meteorologists and chasers say.

Martha Llanos Rodriguez of Mexico City died Wednesday when a semitrailer plowed into her vehicle from behind on Interstate 90 in southwestern Minnesota. The car’s driver, Diego Campos, told the Minneapolis Star Tribune that he and Rodriguez and two other weather experts had been chasing violent weather and were hit after he stopped for downed power lines on the road.

More people are hopping into their cars and racing off after storms, jamming up roads, running stop signs and paying more attention to the sky than traffic, said Marshall Shepherd, director of the atmospheric sciences program at the University of Georgia.

“There is such a volume of chasers out there on some storms sometimes that it creates potential traffic and other hazards,” Shepherd said. “Seeing storms within their natural context has scientific and broader value so I am not anti-chasing, however, there are elements that have become a little wild, wild West-ish.”

Popularized in the 1996 movie “Twister,” storm chasing involves pursuing severe weather events such as electrical storms and tornadoes, often in cars or on foot.

Some are researchers looking to gather data, such as verifying computer models predicting storm behavior. Some are looking to get in touch with nature. Others are photographers. And still others are just looking for a rush, said Greg Tripoli, an atmospheric and oceanic sciences professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison who taught a class on storm chasing.

“Seeing a tornado is a life-changing experience,” Tripoli said. “You want to see one instead of just talking about them. It’s really just one of the excitements of life. You’ve got to take chances and go out there and go after your passions. It’s no different from rock-climbing or deep-sea diving.”

The storms themselves present dangers to inexperienced chasers who get too close. They can get hit by debris, struck by lightning or worse. Tripoli said he decided to stop teaching his storm chaser class and taking students into the field in the early 1990s after university officials stopped insuring the trips.

Nature isn’t the only threat. Storm chasers spend long hours on the road traveling from state to state like long-haul truckers, inviting fatigue. When they catch up to the storms, they can often keep their eyes on the skies instead of the road, sometimes with deadly consequences. Tripoli said he would warn students in his storm chaser class that the most likely way they would get hurt is in a car crash.

Three University of Oklahoma students were killed on April 30 after traveling to Kansas to chase a tornado. According to the Oklahoma Highway Patrol, the students’ car hydroplaned on the interstate in Tonkawa, about 85 miles (137 kilometers) north of Oklahoma City. They slid off and back onto the interstate before a semitrailer hit them.

The University of Oklahoma has a policy stating that anyone who chases storms does so at their own risk and that storm chasing isn’t part of the school’s meteorology curriculum.

The mother of one of the students, 19-year-old Gavin Short of Grayslake, Illinois, told WMAQ-TV that her son loved to chase storms.

“He loved it, and we were so happy for him,” Beth Short said. “And it just, this is just the worst nightmare for us and two other sets of parents.”

Chaser traffic jams are becoming more common, said Kelton Halbert, a University of Wisconsin atmospheric and oceanic sciences doctoral student. He said he’s been chasing storms since he was 16 because he wants to feel closer to nature’s beauty and verify his forecast modeling, mostly by taking video of storms’ behavior.

“Unless you’re with one of these research institutions, storm chasers don’t have the ability to collect a lot of hard data,” he said. “For most … it’s the beauty, it’s the photography and then obviously the thrill seekers and adrenaline seekers. You can have people tailgating you, people in the middle of the road. If you’re in Texas, Oklahoma or Kansas on a high-risk day, yeah, you can see hundreds of them. Given the recent couple weeks, I’ve definitely felt more apprehensive. It brings back to the forefront that every time you do this you’re taking a risk.”

Wednesday’s storm in the Upper Midwest left tens of thousands of homes and businesses without power into Thursday. More potentially severe weather was forecast into Thursday evening that could bring hail, high winds and tornadoes from the Dakotas and Minnesota into other parts of the Midwest, the Storm Prediction Center said.

Interfaith Group Asks Starbucks to Drop Vegan Milk Surcharge

A group of Christian, Hindu, Buddhist and Jewish leaders is asking Starbucks to stop charging extra for vegan milk alternatives, saying the practice amounts to a tax on people who have embraced plant-based lifestyles.

In a statement issued Friday, an interfaith coalition led by Nevada-based Hindu activist Rajan Zed pressed the coffee chain to end the surcharges it called “unethical and unfair.”

“A coffee company should not be in the business of taxing individuals who had chosen the plant-based lifestyle,” said Zed’s statement, which was also signed by Thomas W. Blake, an Episcopal priest; Greek Orthodox clergyman Stephen R. Karcher; Buddhist priest Matthew Fisher; and Jewish rabbi ElizaBeth Webb Beyer.

The religious leaders cited numerous reasons why some Starbucks customers prefer alternatives to dairy, including dietary restrictions, ethical issues, environmental concerns, lactose intolerance, milk allergies and animal welfare.

Those who want plant-based milk should not have to pay more, they said, calling on the Seattle-based company’s CEO, Howard Schultz, and board chair Mellody Hobson to immediately drop the surcharge.

Starbucks outlets in the United States typically charge 50 cents to a dollar more for drinks made with plant-based milks.

Actor Fred Ward, of ‘Tremors,’ ‘The Right Stuff’ Fame, Dies

Fred Ward, a veteran actor who brought a gruff tenderness to tough-guy roles in such films as The Right Stuff, The Player and Tremors, has died. He was 79.

Ward died Sunday, his publicist Ron Hofmann said Friday. No cause or place of death was disclosed per the family’s wishes.

Ward earned a Golden Globe and shared the Venice Film Festival ensemble prize for his performance in Robert Altman’s Short Cuts, and played the title character in Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins. He also reached new heights playing Mercury 7 astronaut Virgil “Gus” Grissom in 1983′s Academy Award-nominated film The Right Stuff.

“Devastated to learn about the passing of my friend, Fred Ward,” tweeted actor Matthew Modine, who co-starred with Ward in Short Cuts and Alan Rudolph’s Equinox. “A tough façade covering emotions as deep as the Pacific Ocean. Godspeed amigo.”

A former boxer, lumberjack in Alaska and short-order cook who served in the U.S. Air Force, Ward was a San Diego native who was part Cherokee. One early big role was alongside Clint Eastwood in 1979’s Escape From Alcatraz.

“I mourn the loss of Fred Ward, who was so kind to me when we worked together on Remo Williams,” actor Kate Mulgrew tweeted. “Decent and modest and utterly professional, he disarmed with a smile that was at once warm and mischievous.”

Ward’s other roles included a rumpled cop chasing a psychotic criminal played by Alec Baldwin in George Armitage’s Miami Blues. He was a formidable and intimidating father to both Freddie Prinze Jr.’s character in Summer Catch and David Spade’s title character in Joe Dirt.

Ward played President Ronald Reagan in the 2009 Cold War espionage thriller Farewell and had a supporting role in the 2013 action flick 2 Guns, starring Denzel Washington and Mark Wahlberg.

In the horror-comedy Tremors, Ward paired with Kevin Bacon to play a pair of repairmen who end up saving a hardscrabble Nevada desert community beset by giant underground snakes.

With the sexually charged, NC-17 Henry & June, Ward showed more than just grit. Based on the book by Anais Nin and directed by Philip Kaufman, Ward played novelist Henry Miller, opposite Maria de Medeiros as Nin and Uma Thurman as Miller’s wife, June. “My rear end seemed to have something to do with (that rating),” he told The Washington Post.

He also reteamed with Altman for the part of a studio security chief in the director’s 1992 Hollywood satire The Player, and played a union activist and Meryl Streep’s workmate in Mike Nichols’ Silkwood in 1983.

Ward demonstrated his comedy chops playing a terrorist intent on blowing up the Academy Awards in Naked Gun 33 1/3: The Final Insult in 1994.

On the small screen, he had recurring roles on NBC’s ER playing the father of Maura Tierney’s Abby Lockhart in 2006-07 and guest starred on such series as Grey’s Anatomy, Leverage and United States of Tara. Ward most recently appeared in the second season of HBO’s True Detective as the retired cop father of Colin Farrell’s Detective Ray Velcoro.

Ward is survived by his wife of 27 years, Marie-France Ward, and his son, Django Ward.

Baby Formula Shortage in the US Challenges Families 

One of the three companies that make baby formula in the U.S. has halted production, adding to what was already a baby formula shortage due to supply chain issues and other factors. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration says it is doing everything in its power to ensure that an adequate supply of the product is available. And even the White House says it’s taking steps to alleviate the crisis. VOA’s Laurel Bowman has more. 

April 2022 Tied for Earth’s 5th Warmest Ever, NOAA Reports

Scientists with the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration reported Friday that April 2022 tied April 2010 as the fifth warmest April on record. 

In a release, NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information said the average global temps in April were 0.85 of a degree Celsius above the 20th century average of 13.7 C. 

NOAA said the global temperature for the year through April 2022 was 0.87 of a degree C above average, making it the fifth warmest such year through April on record. 

They report Asia recorded its warmest April ever this year, with temperatures running 2.62 degrees above average. The agency says unusually high temperatures in India and Pakistan during the month contributed to the region’s record heat. 

The agency’s Global Annual Temperature Rankings Outlook reports there is a virtual certainty — greater than 99% — that 2022 will rank among the 10 warmest years on record. 

NOAA reports that the 10 warmest Aprils globally have all occurred since 2010, with 2014-2022 all ranking among the 10 warmest Aprils on record.