Hong Kong's famous Tiananmen Square 'Pillar of Shame' statue removed from university

22nd December 2021

Credit: Anthony Kwan/Getty Images

By Helen Regan, Wayne Chang, Teele Rebane, Karen Smith, 

CNN Hong Kong

For more than 20 years the "Pillar of Shame" sculpture stood as a memorial to the victims of the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre, in which the Chinese military crushed protests led by college students in Beijing with deadly force.

Atop a podium in the University of Hong Kong's (HKU) campus, the 26-foot-tall (8 meter) statue of contorted human torsos was one of the last iconic memorials to victims of the bloody crackdown remaining on Hong Kong soil.

But around midnight on Thursday, yellow construction barriers were erected around the statue and the sounds of cracking and demolition were heard as the sculpture was removed under the cover of darkness.

Images taken during the removal process show workers wrapping the statue in protective film and lifting it out of the campus on a crane in two distinct parts. The HKU Council, the university's governing body, said in a statement the sculpture will be held in storage.

Two children look at the "Pillar of Shame" statue at the Hong Kong University campus on October 15, 2021 in Hong Kong. 

Credit: Louise Delmotte/Getty Images AsiaPac/Getty Images

A witness said Thursday morning the site of the sculpture is now empty and students have been seen crying on campus following the removal. CNN agreed to not disclose the name of this witness because the person feared retribution from authorities.
That fear of retribution is common among those who speak out against authorities in Hong Kong since Beijing imposed the National Security Law on the city in 2020, punishing offenses such as subversion and secession with sentences of up to life in prison.

The HKU Council said in a statement the removal "was based on external legal advice and risk assessment for the best interest of the university."

Hong Kong national security police investigate Tiananmen Square vigil organizers
The sculpture, which stood in the Haking Wong Building of the university, was part of a series of works by Danish artist Jens Galschiøt created in 1997 -- the year Hong Kong was returned to China after more than 150 years of British rule. The sculpture includes the inscription: "The old cannot kill the young forever," and was built to serve "as a warning and a reminder to people of a shameful event which must never reoccur," according to the description on Galschiøt's website.

For three decades, Hong Kong has been the only place on Chinese-controlled soil where an annual mass vigil has been held to mark the events in and around Tiananmen Square on June 4, 1989.

The clampdown remains one of the most tightly censored topics in mainland China, with discussions of it scrubbed from mass media. Chinese authorities have not released an official death toll, but estimates range from several hundred to thousands.

Security guards stand in front of barriers erected around the 26-foot-tall "Pillar of Shame."

 Credit: Peter Parks/AFP/Getty Images

After the 1997 handover, the continuation of the vigil and similar memorials were seen as a litmus test for Hong Kong's ongoing autonomy and democratic freedoms, as promised in its de facto constitution.

However, in the wake of national security law, scores of prominent pro-democracy politicians and activists have been jailed or fled the city, and numerous civil society groups have disbanded.

The last two June 4 vigils have been banned by police, citing coronavirus restrictions. Prominent activists, including Joshua Wong and Media tycoon Jimmy Lai, were later jailed for participating in commemoration events in 2020.

A Hong Kong museum dedicated to the victims of June 4 was forced to close earlier this year and moved its entire collection online citing "political oppression."

A security guard stands in front of a shipping container as barriers and security people guard "Pillar of Shame" at Hong Kong University, as the sculpture is removed.

 Credit: Peter Parks/AFP/Getty Images

Following news the sculpture was being dismantled, the artist Galschiøt wrote on his Twitter account, "I'm totally shocked that Hong Kong University is currently destroying the pillar of shame. It is completely unreasonable and a self-immolation against private property in Hong Kong."

"We encourage everyone to go out to Hong Kong University and document everything that happens with the sculpture," he added in a statement. We have done everything we can to tell the University of Hong Kong that we would very much like to pick up the sculpture and bring it to Denmark."

In its statement, HKU Council said, "No party has ever obtained any approval from the University to display the statue on campus, and the University has the right to take appropriate actions to handle it at any time."

A close-up of the "Pillar of Shame." 

Credit: Louise Delmotte/Getty Images AsiaPac/Getty Images

It added the university "is also very concerned about the potential safety issues resulting from the fragile statue. Latest legal advice given to the University cautioned that the continued display of the statue would pose legal risks to the University based on the Crimes Ordinance enacted under the Hong Kong colonial government."

Efforts to preserve the memory of the sculpture are already underway, with art-activist group Lady Liberty Hong Kong creating a 3-D model made using more than 900 photos in October.

"The idea is that everyone can print a copy it and place it wherever they want," said Alex Lee, the founder of the group. "In the digital age, there's no limitation of what you can do with virtual or physical objects -- (the hope is) for everyone to try to preserve this symbol."

Workers remove part of the "Pillar of Shame" statue into a container at University of Hong Kong on December 23. 

Credit: Anthony Kwan/Getty Images

On Sunday, Hong Kong's first "China patriots only" legislative election witnessed a record low turnout, reflecting a steep decline in civic and political engagement following Beijing's overhaul of the city's electoral processes earlier this year.
Following the vote, Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam traveled to Beijing and met with Chinese Leader Xi Jinping, who endorsed her administration and praised her for moving the city "from chaos to order," according to a government statement of the meeting.

Calling the election -- in which turnout was just 30.2% -- a "success" Xi said the city had "made solid progress in promoting democratic development that suits Hong Kong's reality."

"The democratic right of Hong Kong compatriots has been shown," Xi said.
A number of Hong Kong activists who fled abroad labeled the election -- in which prospective candidates were first screened by the government -- as a "sham," a criticism echoed by many rights groups and international observers.

Top image: Workers remove part of the "Pillar of Shame" into a container at the University of Hong Kong on December 23, 2021

Fauci: 'Dangerous' to assume Omicron's apparent mildness means the end of the pandemic is in sight

David Knowles
·Senior Editor
Wed, December 22, 2021

While Dr. Anthony Fauci pointed on Wednesday to two new studies showing that the hypercontagious Omicron variant of the coronavirus is less deadly than the Delta variant, he cautioned against drawing the conclusion that the data might be a sign that the pandemic was drawing to a close.

At a briefing by the White House COVID-19 response team, Fauci, President Biden’s chief medical adviser, was asked about the belief among some South Korean health officials that Omicron was a blessing in disguise given its apparent heightened degree of transmissibility and diminished overall severity.

“I would hate to say a ‘blessing in disguise.’” Fauci replied. “I never thought of a virus that can infect and kill people as a blessing in any way. But if you’re talking about would it be preferable to have Omicron be totally pervasive and be a relatively low degree of severity, yes, obviously that would be preferable. But it’s dangerous business to be able to rely on what you perceive as a lower degree of severity.”

Earlier in the briefing, Fauci discussed two new studies that showed that Omicron appears to result in less serious illness than those infected by the Delta variant.

“It appears that in the context of South Africa, there is a decrease in the severity compared to Delta, both in the relationship in the ratio between hospitalizations and the number of infections, the durations of hospital stays and the need for supplemental oxygen therapy,” Fauci said of findings from researchers in South Africa, where Omicron was first discovered.

Fauci then referenced the findings of a separate study conducted by researchers in Scotland that “appears to validate and verify the data that are in South Africa.”

“This is good news. However, we must wait to see what happens in our own population, which has its own demographic considerations,” Fauci added. “I would point out that even if you have a diminution in severity, if you have a much larger number of individual cases, the fact that you have so many more cases might actually obviate the effect of it being less severe.”

Dr. Anthony Fauci. (Kevin Lamarque/Reuters)

Omicron now accounts for more than 73 percent of U.S. COVID-19 cases, Dr. Rochelle Walensky, director of the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, said at the briefing, and cases nationwide have increased by 25 percent over the past week. Deaths from the disease caused by exposure to the coronavirus were up 3.5 percent over the prior week, though those fatalities were believed by many experts to have been from people who had contracted the Delta strain.

If the affects of Omicron can be controlled through vaccination, boosters and antiviral drugs like the Pfizer pill approved on Thursday, this variant may prove manageable and ultimately less deadly than those that preceded it. Yet with Omicron currently racing across the globe, health officials have not yet begun celebrating.

Fauci acknowledged the premise that diminished health risks from Omicron could, if the data confirms it, signal a welcome development in the pandemic. Still, with different strains of the virus continuing to circulate widely, further mutations are likely, which may be why Fauci hedged on declaring that that end of the pandemic was in sight.

“It’s conceivable, but you don’t want to count on it,” Fauci said on the conclusion being drawn about the findings. “You don’t want to count on anything when you’re dealing with a virus that has fooled us so many times before.”

Darkness caused by dino-killing asteroid snuffed out life on Earth in 9 months

Mindy Weisberger  Live Science

The years following the asteroid impact that wiped out non-avian dinosaurs were dark times — literally. Soot from raging wildfires filled the sky and blocked the sun, directly contributing to the wave of extinctions that followed, new research has found.

 Following the asteroid impact that wiped out the dinosaurs, parts of the planet would have been plunged into darkness.

After the asteroid struck, around 66 million years ago, the cataclysm extinguished many forms of life instantly. But the impact also caused environmental changes leading to mass extinctions that played out over time. One such extinction trigger may have been the dense clouds of ash and particles that spewed into the atmosphere and spread over the planet, which would have enveloped parts of Earth in darkness that could have persisted for up to two years.

During that time photosynthesis would have failed, leading to ecosystem collapse. And even after sunlight returned, this decline could have persisted for decades more, according to research presented Dec. 16 at the annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union (AGU), held in New Orleans and online.

The Cretaceous period (145 million to 66 million years ago) ended with a bang when an asteroid traveling at approximately 27,000 mph (43,000 km/h) slammed into Earth. It measured about 7.5 miles (12 kilometers) in diameter, and left behind a scar known as the Chicxulub crater, which lies underwater in the Gulf of Mexico near the Yucatán Peninsula and spans at least 90 miles (150 km) in diameter. The impact eventually snuffed out at least 75% of life on Earth, including all non-avian dinosaurs (the lineage that produced modern birds is the only branch of the dinosaur family tree that weathered the extinction).

Clouds of pulverized rock and sulfuric acid from the crash would have darkened skies, cooled global temperatures, produced acid rain and sparked wildfires, Live Science previously reported. Scientists first proposed the post-asteroid "nuclear winter scenario" in the 1980s; this hypothesis suggested that darkness played a part in the mass extinctions after the Cretaceous impact, said Peter Roopnarine, a curator of geology in the Department of Invertebrate Zoology and Geology at California Academy of Sciences, and a presenter at the AGU meeting.

However, it's only in the past decade or so that researchers developed models showing how that darkness may have impacted life, Roopnarine told Live Science in an email.

"The common thinking now is that global wildfires would have been the main source of fine soot that would have been suspended into the upper atmosphere," Roopnarine said. "The concentration of soot within the first several days to weeks of the fires would have been high enough to reduce the amount of incoming sunlight to a level low enough to prevent photosynthesis."
Dark days

long-term darkness by reconstructing ecological communities that would have existed at the time of the asteroid impact. They used 300 species known from the Hell Creek Formation, a fossil-rich expanse of shale and sandstone that dates to the latter part of the Cretaceous and extends over parts of Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wyoming.

"We focused on that region because the fossil record is well-sampled and well-understood ecologically, so we could reconstruct the paleocommunity reliably," Roopnarine said.

They then created simulations that exposed their communities to periods of darkness lasting from between 100 and 700 days, to see which intervals would produce the rate of vertebrate extinction that was preserved in the fossil record — about 73%, according to the presentation. The onset of post-impact darkness would have been rapid, reaching its maximum in just a few weeks, Roopnarine said in the email.

The researchers found that ecosystems could recover after a period of darkness that lasted up to 150 days. But after 200 days, that same community reached a critical tipping point, where "some species went extinct and patterns of dominance shifted," the scientists reported. In the simulations where darkness lasted for the maximum duration, extinctions spiked dramatically. During a darkness interval of 650 to 700 days, extinction levels reached 65% to 81%, suggesting that the Hell Creek communities experienced about two years of darkness, according to the models.

"Conditions varied across the globe because of atmospheric flow and temperature variation, but we estimated that the darkness could have persisted in the Hell Creek area for up to two years," Roopnarine said, adding that these findings are preliminary and

Once an ecosystem reached that tipping point, it could eventually rebound with a new distribution of species; however, that process would have taken decades, the researchers found. Extended stimulations of Hell Creek communities that went dark for 700 days showed that after the darkness lifted, it took 40 years for conditions in the ecosystem to start to rebound, the scientists reported at the conference.

Originally published on Live Science.

PROOF OF INDEPENDENCE

Why Puerto Rican Christmas Carols Are a Symbol of Patriotism

Frances Solá-Santiago

For all the political limbo Puerto Ricans have endured in the last 500 years, one thing is clear: come Christmas, we’ll cook lechón asado, improvise patriotic trovas, and drink pitorro. Despite the pervasiveness of American capitalism and influence on the archipelago, Navidad is a piece of Puerto Rican culture that hasn’t perished at the mercy of U.S.-style malls and English-language pop songs.

While the season is a time of reverence in Christianity, ​​Christmas in Puerto Rico is also synonymous with patriotism. It’s the one time a year when we fully acknowledge—no matter what political party or ideology we are aligned with—that we are proud to be Puerto Rican. Despite our colonial status, we enter a boricua utopia where music comes from a cuatro—the Puerto Rican autochthonous guitar—and food is arroz con gandules. In doing so, we’ve made Santa Claus and the Three Kings—the Christmas traditions we’ve inherited from the United States and Spain—mere commodities of the season, not the protagonists.

We revel in this boricua Eden as long as possible; after all, Puerto Rico is famous for having the longest holiday season, spanning from Thanksgiving Day to las octavitas, which is celebrated in mid-January. It’s as if come the new year, we don’t want to wake up to the realities of an oversight board, a second-class citizenship, two national anthems, and an economic crisis—just listen to our música navideña.

I grew up in a family that heralded música navideña as one of its main pillars. Every Christmas party included hours-long sessions of trova and aguinaldos. Tío Gerardo was on the cuatro, my primo Gerardito on the guitar, and my primo Luigi was the musical director. We’d sing through our well-rehearsed repertoire that started with “El Coquí” by Danny Rivera, a call to Puerto Ricans to preserve our culture and traditions amid colonialism, and came to height with “Canción de los Carreteros” by Tony Croatto, an ode to the archipelago’s rural working class. At some point in the night, tío Victor would stand in the middle of the crowd to sing the revolutionary anthem “Coño Despierta Boricua” by Andrés Jiménez; other times, titi Magie would sing a solo of the poor man’s “Allá en la Altura” by Francisco Roque Muñoz.

Looking back, this repertoire was the foundation of my own Puerto Rican patriotism, one that fuels nostalgia for the days of trullas and fogón from my current apartment in Manhattan. Every year, come November, I turn to the tunes of my childhood via a Spotify playlist, listening to songs like “Cantares de Navidad” by el Trío Vegabajeño, “Alegre Vengo,” and “Dame La Mano, Paloma.” And I’m not alone.

Growing up in Carolina, Puerto Rico, Johnny Irizarry remembers there was always music playing in the background during the Christmas season. “We listened to salsa the most and some merengue,” he says. “But, at some point in the night, Asalto Navideño—the Christmas album by Willie Colón and Héctor Lavoe—would come on.” This two-part album series—released in 1970 and 1973, respectively—are at the core of many Puerto Rican Christmas celebrations. It combines trova and salsa traditions in songs that evoke both the joy and patriotic sentiment of the season. In “Canto a Borinquen,” Lavoe professes his love for Puerto Rico, saying, “Borinquen, soy tu hijo y no voy a olvidarte.” Today, much like Lavoe in the ‘70s, Irizarry lives in Florida. But he still turns to trova and Christmas classics to engulf his nostalgic feelings for home with songs like “Defensa al Jíbaro,” written by Quique Domenech and performed by Tony Croatto, “El arbolito” by El Gran Combo, and “Aires de Navidad” by Héctor Lavoe and Willie Colón. “I think it influences that love and pride toward la patria, toward the people that build it every day,” he says.

Press play on any Puerto Rican Christmas record, and you’ll find a reference to the archipelago’s history and traditions. Unlike U.S. Christmas music, which relies heavily on the image of peace, tranquility, family, and Christianity, Puerto Rican música navideña is sprinkled with folkloric and political connotations. Take, for example, “El Coqui,”’ one of the archipelago’s most popular Christmas songs, which urges boricuas to preserve their traditions, from music like danza and bomba to the calls of the coquí. “Tienes que preservar tú la tradición porque si no el coquí no cantará,” the chorus reads. “Yo soy como el coquí que me amanezco, que la noche va alegrando, que en Borinquen he vivido, que soy nativo de aquí, coquí.”

Then, there’s also trova, a folkloric musical tradition that was born in Cuba but adopted by rural Puerto Rican communities. It relies on written and improvised poetry, as well as instruments like the cuatro, to narrate stories about daily struggles of life in el campo, patriotic sentiment, and political consciousness. According to statistics by the Instituto de Cultura Puertorriqueña, the genre generates more than $23 million annually with 70-plus festivals performed across the archipelago. Still, come November, trova becomes synonymous with Christmas.

As a kid, I always marveled at my cousins’ talent to come up with original décimas; some were rehearsed and others were improvised, but every single one evoked a sense of pride in the traditions we carried and our national identity. There were also songs that taught me to value el campo and its ways of life. In “Allá en la altura,” for example, lyricist Francisco Roque Muñoz contrasts the luxuries of modern life with the rustic lifestyle of rural Puerto Rico, saying, “Yo vivo aquí en la altura mejor que un adinerado.” Others like Andrés Jimenez’s “Coño Despierta Boricua” and “La Estrella Sola” push back against colonialism and rally Puerto Ricans to look for a better future independently. All of this in the middle of Christmas dinner.

For Patricia Ruiz, música navideña shaped how she identifies as a Puerto Rican today. Growing up in Yauco, Puerto Rico, Ruiz says she felt a strong affinity to “Villancico Yaucano.” The song, popularized by Danny Rivera, narrates a Yaucano’s devotion for Jesus, as well as his town pride, saying, “Soy del pueblo del café, por si quieres dos saquitos, también, yo, te los traeré.” While she now lives in Texas and married an American, she says the best way to teach her community and her husband about where she comes from is have them listen to Puerto Rican Christmas carols.

“Explaining our history to him through music makes me feel so good,” she says. “I’m sure that once we have kids it’ll be the same and will continue to be an important part of our family.”

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Inspiration for the movie 'The Exorcist' has been identified as former NASA engineer

The boy who provided inspiration for the movie ‘The Exorcist’ has been identified as a former NASA engineer who died last year at the age of 85.

Ronald Hunkeler and William Bowdern.

Relatives say Ronald Edwin Hunkeler, who was previously known only as Ronald Doe, underwent exorcisms in Cottage City, Maryland, and in St. Louis, Missouri in 1949, as a 14-year-old.

A NASA engineer for 40 years, Hunkeler contributed to the the Apollo missions in 1960s and even patented a technology that allowed space shuttle panels to tolerate excessive heat.

PUBERTY PRODUCES POLTERGEIST PHENOMENA

When he was a teenager, family members reported noticing strange phenomenon in Hunkeler’s wake, according to the magazine Skeptical Inquirer. As he moved across a room, chairs around him scattered, Hunkeler’s family minster wrote to the Parapsychology Laboratory at Duke University. His bed, claimed Rev. Luther Schulze, rattled when he lay down on it.

The family floor was “scarred from the sliding of heavy furniture” and, at one point, a chair “threw him out,” the letter said.

Schulze’s letter describes seeing a framed picture of Jesus Christ on the wall tremble in Hunkeler’s presence.

Priests carry out exorcisms via cellphone thanks to internet access and booming demand

World's top exorcist saw the Devil in Harry Potter, yoga, and thousands of middle-aged, middle-class women

The boy’s mother worried the frightening spells were related to his recently deceased Aunt Tillie, a spiritualist who showed him how to used an Ouija board to communicate with otherworldly spirits, according to the podcast The Devil in the Details.

Hunkeler would live his life in fear that his NASA colleagues may discover the movie ‘The Exorcist’ was based, in part, on his life, a companion told the New York Post.

“On Halloween, we always left the house because he figured someone would come to his residence and know where he lived and never let him have peace,” she said. “He had a terrible life from worry, worry, worry,” she added.

After a series of medical and psychological tests failed to find anything out of the ordinary, his family appealed to religious elders.

“The family was Lutheran and they went through all the stages you see in the film: They went to doctors, clinics and finally went back to their own pastor in the Lutheran church, who recommended they see a priest,” William Friedkin, director of the Exorcist, told Entertainment Weekly in 2012.

Eventually, they sought the help of William Bowdern, a Jesuit who would perform at least 20 exorcisms on the teen in a span of three months. Bowdern’s diary describes the boy entering a trance-like state in front of more than dozen witnesses during one exorcism.

It says his mattress started shaking while there was the sound of a “scratching which beat out a rhythm as of marching soldiers.

“(A) second class relic of St. Margaret Mary was thrown on the floor,” it goes on to say. “The safety pin was opened but no human hand had touched the relic. R. started up in fright when the relic was thrown down.”

© Wikimedia Alexian Brothers Hospital. Wikimedia

Hunkeler was eventually taken to St. Louis, to expel the evil spirits said to inhabit him.

“On one evening the word ‘Louis’ was written on the boy’s ribs in deep red [scratches]. Next, when there was some question of the time of departure, the word ‘Saturday’ was written plainly on the boy’s hip,” wrote Bowdern. “As to the length of time the mother and boy should stay in St. Louis, another message was printed on the boy’s chest, ‘3 1/2 weeks.’ The printing always appeared without any motion on the part of the boy’s hands. The mother was keeping him under close supervision.”

In March 1949, Hunkleler was admitted to the Alexian Brothers Hospital in St. Louis, where, consumed in one of his fitful spasms, he broke a priest’s nose.

Less than a month later, according to the podcast The Devil in the Details, Hunkeler claimed he saw St. Michael holding a flaming sword in a vision and that he was free of the devil.

© File The Exorcist.

“In all except the last of these (exorcisms), the boy broke into a violent tantrum of screaming, cursing and voicing of Latin phrases – a language he had never studied – whenever the priest reached the climactic point of the ritual, ‘In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost, I cast thee (the devil) out,’” a 1999 Washington Post article quotes Father Raymond Bishop, a Catholic priest, as saying.

The priest kept a diary of events on which the author William Peter Blatty would base his 1971 horror novel.

Hunkeler’s companion told the Post he was not religious and had later admitted to her that he was never actually demented.

“He said he wasn’t possessed, it was all concocted,” said the companion. “He said, ‘I was just a bad boy’.”

But, she said, something occurred shortly before his death last year that she couldn’t account for.

A Catholic priest arrived at Hunkeler’s door to perform last rites, she told the Post, adding that she hadn’t called for him.

“I have no idea how the Father knew to come,” she said, “but he got Ron to heaven. Ron’s in heaven and he’s with God now.”

Scientists discover microplastics in 'pristine' Pyrenees mountain air

Amanda Kooser

Humanity's obsession with plastics has consequences. Microplastics -- tiny plastic fragments that often come from products like packaging, clothing or cosmetics -- have been found everywhere from the deepest ocean to near the top of Mount Everest. Microplastics have now been discovered in what was thought to be "pristine" mountain air in the French Pyrenees

.

This is the intake for a fine particle pump located at the Pic Du Midi Observatory in the French Pyrenees. Jeroen Sonke

"While posing no direct threat, its presence far from sources of pollution is nonetheless surprising," the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS) said in a statement on Tuesday.

An international team of researchers analyzed air samples gathered at the Pic du Midi Observatory, which sits perched atop a mountain at an altitude of 9,440 feet (2,877 meters). They found microplastics -- mostly polystyrene or polyethylene -- that likely originated from packaging that's broken down. Polyethylene, for example, is often used for plastic wrap, bags and bottles.

The team published a paper on the findings in the journal Nature Communications this week. The study seeks to understand how airborne microplastics travel.

It seems the Pic du Midi plastics weren't coming from close by. "Mathematical models of air mass trajectories used by the scientists indicate that the particles originated in Africa, North America, or the Atlantic Ocean, which indicates intercontinental atmospheric transport of microplastic," CNRS said. The science team called for more research into how the plastic particles are reaching remote areas.

From the Mariana Trench to the highest mountains, it may be there are no more truly pristine places left.

KENTUCKY

9 days after tornado, cat found in rubble of building

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) — Nine days after a tornado demolished his three-story office building in downtown Mayfield, Kentucky, Sonny “Hoot” Gibson was standing in the rubble when he thought he heard a faint meow.

It instantly gave him hope that his office cat, Madix, who hadn't been seen since before the storms hit, was alive. Gibson said he had tried to find the solid black cat with yellow eyes that liked to greet customers of his rental business, but had given up after a few days.

“I don't know how anything could’ve survived not just the tornado but the destruction that came along with it,” he said.

Gibson was standing in the rubble Sunday afternoon when he heard the faint noise.

“I thought I heard a meow, and I thought my mind’s playing tricks on me so I hollered his name out, and he meowed again,” Gibson said.

The noise was stifled and he couldn't locate Madix immediately so he called some employees who came to help search. Soon after, they found the cat in a hole beneath the rubble.

“It was just an incredible feeling to put him in my arms," Gibson said. “If cats actually have nine lives, he probably used up about eight of them in that nine-day period.”

Other than being very hungry and thirsty, Madix was unscathed. Gibson said he took Madix home, where he will live out the rest of his days as a house cat.

Gibson said the story of Madix the survivor is becoming popular around the town of Mayfield, where a long-track tornado demolished huge parts of the community.

“It’s a blessing for people to hear the story so they can take that and realize that great things can come out of terrible situations. If it's uplifting to one person, then Madix has served his purpose on this planet.”

Rebecca Reynolds, The Associated Press

SHOOTING THE MESSANGER

Google CEO blames employee leaks to the press for reduced 'trust and candor' at the company

insider@insider.com (Isobel Asher Hamilton) 
\

 Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google and Alphabet. 

REUTERS/Yves Herman/File Photo

Google's CEO addressed a staff concern that the company has become less honest with employees.
Pichai said trust has to go both ways, referring to employees leaking information to the press.

The pandemic and the Google's size resulted in answers from management feeling "canned" he added.

Google CEO Sundar Pichai was confronted with an employee question earlier this month asking whether Google plans to more honest and direct with its staff.

CNBC obtained audio from an end-of-year all-hands meeting hosted by Google CEO Sundar Pichai earlier this month. During the meeting Pichai read out an employee question which had been submitted via the company's internal system Dory.

The question was: "It seems like responses to Dory have gotten increasingly more lawyer-like with canned phrases or platitudes, which seem to ignore the questions being ask [sic]. Are we planning on bringing candor, honesty, humility and frankness back to Dory answers or continuing down a bureaucratic path?"

Google employees are able to vote on questions submitted through Dory, and per CNBC the question received 673 votes.

Pichai appeared to blame leaks to the press as one reason why speakers' answers at meetings might seem artificial.

"Sometimes, I do think that people are unforgiving for small mistakes. I do think people realize that answers can be quoted anywhere, including outside the company. I think that makes people very careful," he said.

"Trust and candor has to go both ways," Pichai added.

Pichai also said the company's massive size and the pandemic forcing meetings to be held virtually were contributing factors.

"I've noticed more people reading off screens during the pandemic and so I think some of it contributes to answers feeling canned," Pichai said. "I think people are always nervous to answer in this setting," he added.

Per CNBC, Pichai said the concern raised was "good feedback."

Google has faced widespread employee discontent before the pandemic. In 2018 over 20,000 Google employees staged a walkout in protest against the company's handling of sexual harassment.

Google employees formed their first-ever union in January of this year. The union called on the company to change how it handles sexual misconduct claims in July.

Sri Lanka will use tea to pay off its $251 million oil debt to Iran
insider@insider.com (Carla Mozée) 

Tamil women pick tea leaves in the highlands of Nuwara Eliya, Sri Lanka.

 Getty Images

Sri Lanka reached an agreement to send tea to Iran to settle a $251 million oil debt, according to reports.

Sri Lanka wasn't able to pay the debt via other means as US sanctions prohibit dealings with Iranian banks.

But Sri Lanka said its tea-barter plan does not violate UN or US sanctions against Iran.

Sri Lanka will send tea to Iran to clear its debt for past oil imports, with the south Asian country turning to the commodity as a payment method in the face of shrinking foreign reserves and sanctions on Iran, according to news reports Wednesday.

Representatives from the two countries on Tuesday signed a memorandum of understanding that stipulates Sri Lanka will settle $251 million in oil import dues to Iran by bartering tea, the Tehran Times reported, citing Iran's Trade Promotion Organization.

Sri Lanka plans to send $5 million worth of tea to Iran each month until the debt is settled, said Ramesh Pathirana, head of Sri Lanka's plantation ministry, according to a BBC News report.

State-run Ceylon Petroleum Corp. has a $250.9 million debt to the National Iranian Oil Co. Sri Lanka wasn't able to settle the debt through other means as US sanctions prohibit dealings with Iranian banks, but the country said the new arrangement will not violate US or UN sanctions,

Tea "has been categorized as a food item under humanitarian grounds while none of the black-listed Iranian Banks will be involved in the equation," said Pathirana, according to the news site EconomyNext.

The barter agreement also comes as Sri Lanka is undergoing severe financial stress. It's facing a fall in foreign-exchange reserves against high external debt payments and limited financing inflows, Fitch Ratings said last week in downgrading Sri Lanka's sovereign rating to CC from CCC. The downgrade reflects Fitch's view that Sri Lanka, which is among the world's top tea producers, has an increased probability of a default event in the coming months.

The country's foreign exchange reserves have dropped by roughly $2 billion since August, to $1.6 billion at end of November, or the equivalent to less than one month of current external payments, said Fitch. The ratings group said Sri Lanka faces foreign-currency debt service payments of $6.9 billion in 2022.

The country's external finances are also challenged in part by a slide in remittances and the blow dealt by the coronavirus pandemic to the economy, as tourism is a key driver, said Fitch.
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DOESN'T REPLACE SEX ED & FREE BIRTH CONTROL

After SCOTUS hearing, a new look at baby 'safe haven' laws

PHOENIX (AP) — For years, Nicole Olson had longed for a baby and gone through a rigorous and emotional adoption process. Then Olson and her husband got a call asking if they'd like to adopt a newborn. That day. As soon as possible

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© Provided by The Canadian Press

The baby had been relinquished through what’s known as a safe haven law. Such laws, which exist in every state, allow parents to leave a baby at a safe location without criminal consequences. The laws began to pass in state legislatures in the early 2000s in response to reports of gruesome baby killings and abandonments, which received copious media attention. Infants are at the highest risk of being killed in their first day of life, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Olson rushed to a Target, filled four carts with baby stuff and was home with the newborn boy by dinnertime. Ten years later, the baby Olson and her husband, Michael, named Porter is thriving. He's athletic, funny and has adjusted well after a rough time during the pandemic, Olson said.

Safe haven laws drew attention this month when U.S. Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett raised the role they play in the debate around abortion rights. Barrett made the comments during a hearing this month on a Mississippi law that would ban most abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy — and possibly upend abortion rights established by the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion throughout the United States, and upheld by the court's 1992 ruling in Planned Parenthood v. Casey.

Barrett, with a long record of personal opposition to abortion, zeroed in on a key argument against forcing women into parenthood, suggesting safe haven laws address those concerns. “Why don’t the safe haven laws take care of that problem?” she asked.

Julie Rikelman, the attorney arguing against the Mississippi law, rebutted that argument, saying abortion rights are not just about forced motherhood but about forced pregnancy.

“It imposes unique physical demands and risks on women and, in fact, has impact on all of their lives, on their ability to care for other children, other family members, on their ability to work. And, in particular, in Mississippi, those risks are alarmingly high,” said Rikelman, of the Center for Reproductive Rights.

In a traditional adoption, a family knows who the mother is. They have her medical history and often keep a relationship with her.

That’s what Olson, a Phoenix-area high school teacher, was expecting when she and her husband worked with a private agency after years of trying other routes. Their son, Paul, who was 7 years old at the time, was also eager for a sibling.

But when they met their newborn, the couple didn’t know his exact date of birth, his race, or any pertinent medical information.

“We didn’t really know what we were walking into. It’s just one of those things where it’s a total leap of faith,” Olson said. “But I feel like that’s true of any child, whether it’s your biological or adopted.”

It’s hard to find critics of safe haven laws, and advocates say if they save even one baby from being killed, they are worthwhile.

But some question their efficacy.

Adam Pertman, president and CEO of The National Center on Adoption and Permanency, said the laws' effectiveness, including in preventing death, aren’t studied enough.

“It’s flawed from the get-go because a woman who would put her kid in a trash can is not instead going to see a sign and say ‘Oh I’ll go to the police station instead,’” he said, adding that a woman in that situation is “not cogent enough to make a decision, or she wouldn’t put her kid in the trash can.”

Pertman said safe haven laws don’t address the needs a woman might have if she were in such a crisis that she’d hurt her child, nor do they provide resources for someone in need.

Pertman says further restricting abortion access, or overturning Roe v. Wade altogether, could result in more children being left at safe havens and not adopted the traditional way — with medical background and thorough health information.

There isn’t a national database that tracks the number of babies turned over through safe haven laws, but the National Safe Haven Alliance, a nonprofit that promotes the laws and provides resources to parents in need, collects figures from most states each year.

Slightly over 4,000 babies have been surrendered since the first law took effect in 1999, according to both the organization and the CDC, which put out a report in 2020.

The CDC found that a majority of infant homicides that take place on the day of birth are committed by young, unmarried mothers with lower education levels who had not sought prenatal care, and that they’re often associated with a hidden, unplanned pregnancy and with giving birth at home.

The study found that the overall infant homicide rate was 13% lower in the years since safe haven laws were adopted nationwide. The study compared data from 1989 to 1998 to data from 2008 to 2017. Every state had adopted safe haven laws by 2008.

The number of babies killed during their first day of life dropped by nearly 67%, according to the study. But most homicide victims were too old to have been relinquished under safe haven laws at the time of their deaths. In 11 states and Puerto Rico, only infants who are 72 hours old or younger can be relinquished to a designated safe haven, while 19 states accept infants up to 1 month old, and other states have varying age limits in their statutes.

The CDC recommends that states “evaluate the effectiveness of their Safe Haven Laws and other prevention strategies to ensure they are achieving the intended benefits of preventing infant homicides.”

A vast majority of child welfare advocates praise safe haven laws, saying they keep babies alive and safe when a birth parent isn’t able to care for them. The babies are adopted quickly, rarely going through foster care.

But many caution that safe haven placement as an alternative to abortion is flawed: It doesn’t consider the health and economic risks a woman faces in pregnancy, nor does it account for the risks of childbirth in the nation with the highest maternal mortality rate among developed countries.

Olson helps with an organization that advocates for safe haven laws and hopes more people learn about them.

“The biggest message I’ve been trying to send out is when you have a desperate situation, somebody will be there to help," Olson said.

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Galván writes about issues impacting Latinos in the U.S. for the AP’s Race and Ethnicity team. Follow her on Twitter.

Astrid Galvan , The Associated Press