What a sinking euro means for consumers in Europe and US

As the euro slumps to parity with the US dollar, currency traders say the slide is unlikely to stop there. While a weakened euro should worry European consumers, US travelers visiting Europe could benefit.

A weak euro will further drive up inflation in the eurozone

The euro has taken a major beating against its US peer since Russia's invasion of Ukraine in February, falling to its lowest level in 20 years as surging gas prices and uncertainty around the Russian energy supply stoke recession fears in the eurozone.

The shared European currency fell to as low as $0.9998 on Wednesday — a swift slide from the $1.15 level before Russia launched the war in Ukraine. The sharp drop means the euro has hit parity against the US dollar for the first time since late 2002.

Why is the euro falling?

The general worsening of the eurozone's outlook amid soaring gas prices and fears of Russia cutting off natural gas supplies is dragging down the shared currency. The oversized reliance of major economies such as Germany and Italy on Russian gas has left investors unnerved, with economists forecasting a much quicker and more painful recession in the euro area than in the US.

Added to that is the difference in interest rate levels in the US and the eurozone. The US Federal Reserve has been raising interest rates aggressively to bring down inflation, while the European Central Bank (ECB) has so far resisted steep hikes.

"The interest rate in the US is expected to go up to 3% versus 1% in Europe. So, the money would go to the place with a higher yield," Carsten Brzeski, chief economist for Germany and Austria at ING, told DW.

The US dollar is also benefiting from its safe-haven appeal. Amid all the gloom and doom and uncertainty around the global economy, investors are taking comfort in the relative safety the dollar offers being less exposed to some of the big global risks right now.

What is dollar parity and why is it a big deal for the euro?

Parity basically means that $1 buys €1. It is nothing more than a psychological threshold for market participants who are well-known for their fondness for round figures.

"Financial markets always love to find some kind of symbolic meaning," Brzeski said.

Viraj Patel, a foreign exchange strategist at Vanda Research, said the parity level could be a point at which the euro bulls and bears lock horns to determine which way the currency goes from there.

"More recently, we've started to see investors betting on the euro falling below parity. But you can equally imagine that more investors will start buying euros as we get closer to that level," he told DW. 

How does a weaker euro impact consumers?

A sliding euro will add to the burden on European households and businesses already reeling from record-high inflation. A weaker currency would make imports, which are mostly denominated in dollars, more expensive. When those items are raw materials or intermediate goods, their higher costs can further drive up local prices.

In normal times, a weak currency is viewed as good news for exporters and export-heavy economies such as Germany, because it boosts exports by making them cheaper in dollar terms. But then these are hardly normal times thanks to global supply chain frictions, sanctions and the war in Ukraine.

"In the current situation with geopolitical tensions, I think the benefits from a weak currency are smaller than the disadvantages," Brzeski said.

For US travelers heading to Europe this summer though, a weak euro is a blessing. For example, at the parity level, theoretically they would be able to exchange their $1,000 for €1,000 instead of less than €900 in February. In other words, their dollar would be worth a lot more. For businesses importing European goods, things would be cheaper in dollar terms.

Where is the euro's bottom?

Bets that the euro would continue its fall below parity have increased in recent days as the energy crisis in Europe worsens.

"The euro is trading as if a crisis in Europe is on the doorstep. So, you need to see more bad news now in terms of that whole narrative around gas supplies and potentially geopolitics for the euro to weaken beyond parity," Patel said.

Nomura International strategists forecast that the euro could fall to as low as $0.95. Deutsche Bank's head of foreign exchange research, George Saravelos, has a similar prediction. A "move down to $0.95-$0.97 would match the all-time extremes seen in exchange rates since the end of Bretton Woods in 1971," he wrote in a July 6 note to clients.

What does a weaker euro mean for the ECB?

A weak euro and the additional inflation that it brings adds to the challenges of the ECB, which is already under scrutiny for being slow off the blocks in its fight against inflation.

To make matters worse for the central bank that has the mandate to tame inflation, the euro hasn't just weakened against the dollar but also against other currencies like the Swiss franc and the Japanese yen.

"This is now starting to become a bit more broad-based euro weakness and therefore it becomes more of an inflation problem for the ECB," Patel said.

The ECB intends to raise its benchmark interest rates by 25 basis points next week, its first increase in over 10 years.

"A weaker euro supports the view of a more aggressive rate hike," Brzeski said. "The argument behind it would be that if we go for a 50 basis points hike next week rather than 25, that could immediately stop the fall of the euro because it would surprise financial markets."

However, some experts say an economic downturn will put the bank in a bind, holding it back from any aggressive monetary policy tightening. That in turn would ensure that interest rates in the eurozone remain suppressed vis-a-vis the US. Such an expectation is already playing a role in the euro's fall.   

Edited by: Tim Rooks

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Record-breaking heat waves show we need to adapt to the climate crisis now

High temperatures have caused deaths in eastern China. In Europe, a scorching heat wave has sparked wildfires. As extreme heat becomes more frequent around the world, how can affected areas adapt to remain livable?


Workers use their helmets to pour water to cool themselves off near a construction site on a hot summer day on the outskirts of Ahmedabad, India

Flooding and extremely high temperatures have caused multiple deaths in eastern China, where record-high temperatures of above 42 degrees Celsius (107 degrees Fahrenheit) were recorded. Firefighters across Portugal and western Spain battled wildfires amid a heat wave that pushed temperatures above 45 degrees Celsius.

Earlier this spring, the effects of India's heat wave, one of dozens just this year, were all-encompassing. Temperatures topping 40 degrees Celsius across the country put millions at risk for heat-related illnesses, decimated wheat crops, intensified a power crisis and interrupted schooling.

India is not alone. Neighboring Pakistan was also battling scorching temperatures before summer has even begun. And earlier this year, central South America was the hottest place on the planet before Western Australia claimed the title.

As the climate crisis exacerbates heat waves around the world and temperatures increasingly soar unseasonably early, countries are faced with the question of how to remain livable.
It comes down to wealth and preparedness

Ramping up electricity bills with air conditioning, cooling down with fans, working indoors — these options are only available to a privileged few.

"The story of climate change is one of high inequality and we're seeing that playing out already in the poorest and hottest regions of the world," said Tamma Carleton, assistant professor of economics at UC Santa Barbara's Bren School of Environmental Science and Management.

Carleton co-authored a 2022 study that distilled a city's ability to minimize deaths during extreme temperatures to two main factors: affluence and the number of hot days it experiences.

Money decides which technologies a city can afford to shield its most vulnerable. And when these adaptation costs aren't covered by the state, the burden falls on individuals to finance their own protection, says Carleton. A situation that leaves the poorest high and dry.

But even wealthy cities can suffer if they are caught off guard without an action plan. That happened in the Pacific Northwest of the US, a wealthy region known for its temperate climate, where more than 100 people were killed in last year's heat wave.

"We tend to see in our projections of climate change into the future that poorer places are going to be facing a really large increase in death risk and wealthier places are going to see an increase in adaptation costs," said Carleton.


Outdoor workers are especially vulnerable to heat waves
Spurring into heat action

Just how high this death risk is in developing countries became clear when Ahmedabad, a city in western India's Gujarat state, lost more than 1,344 people as thermometers hit 47 Celsius in 2010.

The toll spurred the city into action. In 2013, it rolled out a plan that has prevented about 1,100 heat induced deaths each year since, according to a study.

The first heat action plan in South Asia, it includes an early warning system, community outreach to vulnerable populations and education for health staff about possible signs of heat exposure. It also organizes cooling centers in buildings such as temples and malls as well as reduced or staggered working times for outdoor laborers, among other things.

As India's temperatures consistently surpass the baseline in spring and summer months, the Ahmedabad heat plan has since served as a template for similar models in 23 of the country's 28 states.


But as high temperatures persist, these models undergo regular updates, according to Polash Mukherjee, who heads Air Pollution and Climate Resilience at the Natural Resources Defense Council's India program. The non-profit helped develop Ahmedabad's heat action plan.

"The focus has shifted significantly in the last couple of years from merely protecting human health and mortality against extreme heat to more proactive measures," said Mukherjee. "These include changing building by-laws so that new constructions are better insulated, and the cool roofs program."

A low-cost solution to reduce indoor temperatures, the cool roofs program primarily targets badly insulated houses in slums where informal workers and other vulnerable groups reside. When a roof is coated with materials like lime-based whitewash or white tarp, it becomes more reflective and absorbs less heat.
Cool pavements and green passages

Ideas like these are budding around the world. The Japanese capital Tokyo has introduced cool pavements, which work with thermal-barrier coating, for example. Medellin in Colombia has planted "green corridors," vegetated passages that offer more shade in public spaces, while the city of Toronto, Canada, offers grants for people to install green or cool roofs.

Some cities have introduced heat officers, whose task it is to coordinate the response to rising temperatures.

Eugenia Kargbo became Africa's first heat officer when she took the post in Freetown, Sierra Leone. A goal of hers is to provide reflective market shade covers that protect women selling produce outdoors. To make the capital more livable, she has also introduced a tree planting program, in which planters can collect micro-payments on an app.

"This is the future I envision for my children and all the children in Freetown: A safe environment not limited by the risk of extreme heat," she told DW's EcoAfrica.

Focus on the climate crisis

Even as some regions find ways to alleviate some of the effects of scorching heat waves, many scientists emphasize that governments shouldn't forget the root cause of the rising temperatures: the climate crisis.

Aditi Mukherji, who co-authored the water chapter in the IPCC's assessment on "Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability," says the onus to come up with solutions shouldn't be on the most affected, who historically have emitted the least amount of CO2.

"I feel that when it comes to these kinds of heat extremes, the only solution is that the high emitting countries stop emissions immediately and stop burning fossil fuels," she said.

Edited by: Tamsin Walker

IN PICTURES: INDIA SWELTERS AS SEVERE HEAT WAVE SWEEPS REGION
Skyrocketing temperatures sweep country
A girl uses sunglasses, a mask, a long cloth and an umbrella to protect herself from the sun on her way to school in Prayagraj, Uttar Pradesh. In April, northwest and central India recorded average maximum temperatures of 35.9 and 37.78 Celsius (96.6 and 100 Fahrenheit) respectively, the highest since the Indian Meteorological Department began keeping records 122 years ago.
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This article was orginally published on May 3 and was updated on July 14.

‘Out of control’ wildfires raging in southwestern France amid intense heatwave • 
Jul 14, 2022

FRANCE 24 English

About 1,000 firefighters, supported by six water-bomber aircraft, were battling on Thursday to bring under control two wildfires in southwestern France that have already burnt almost 4,000 hectares. "The fires are still not under control, no casualties were have been reported", said the local authority for the Gironde department, where the blazes, which started on Tuesday, were raging.

Webb begins hunt for the first stars and habitable worlds

Issam Ahmed and Lucie Aubourg
Thu, July 14, 2022 

The first stunning images from the James Webb Space Telescope were revealed this week, but its journey of cosmic discovery has only just begun.

Here is a look at two early projects that will take advantage of the orbiting observatory's powerful instruments.

- The first stars and galaxies -

One of the great promises of the telescope is its ability to study the earliest phase of cosmic history, shortly after the Big Bang 13.8 billion years ago.

The more distant objects are from us, the longer it takes for their light to reach us, and so to gaze back into the distant universe is to look back in the deep past.
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"We're going to look back into that earliest time to see the first galaxies that formed in the history of the universe," explained Space Telescope Science Institute astronomer Dan Coe, who specializes in the early universe.

Astronomers have so far gone back 97 percent of the way back to the Big Bang, but "we just see these tiny red specks when we look at these galaxies that are so far away."

"With Webb, we'll finally be able to see inside these galaxies and see what they're made of."

While today's galaxies are shaped like spirals or ellipticals, the earliest building blocks were "clumpy and irregular," and Webb should reveal older redder stars in them, more like our Sun, that were invisible to the Hubble Space Telescope.

Coe has two Webb projects coming up -- observing one of the most distant galaxies known, MACS0647-JD, which he found in 2013, and Earendel, the most distant star ever detected, which was found in March of this year.

While the public has been enticed by Webb's stunning pictures, which are shot in infrared because light from the far cosmos has stretched into these wavelengths as the universe expanded, scientists are equally keen on spectroscopy.

Analyzing the light spectrum of an object reveals its properties, including temperature, mass, and chemical composition -- effectively, forensic science for astronomy.

Science doesn't yet know what the earliest stars, which probably started forming 100 million years after the Big Bang, will look like.

"We might see things that are very different," said Coe -- so-called "Population III" stars that are theorized to have been much more massive than our own Sun, and "pristine," meaning they were made up solely of hydrogen and helium.

These eventually exploded in supernovae, contributing to the cosmic chemical enrichment that created the stars and planets we see today.

Some are doubtful these pristine Population III stars will ever be found -- but that won't stop the astronomical community from trying.

- Anyone out there? -

Astronomers won time on Webb based on a competitive selection process, open to all regardless of how advanced they are in their careers.

Olivia Lim, a doctoral student at the University of Montreal, is only 25 years old. "I was not even born when people started talking about this telescope," she told AFP.

Her goal: to observe the roughly Earth-sized rocky planets revolving around a star named Trappist-1. They are so close to each other that from the surface of one, you could see the others appearing clearly in the sky.

"The Trappist-1 system is unique," explains Lim. "Almost all of the conditions there are favorable for the search for life outside our solar system."

In addition, three of Trappist-1's seven planets are in the Goldilocks "habitable zone," neither too close nor too far from their star, permitting the right temperatures for liquid water to exist on their surface.

The system is "only" 39 light year away -- and we can see the planets transit in front of their star.

This makes it possible to observe the drop in luminosity that crossing the star produces, and use spectroscopy to infer planetary properties.

It's not yet known if these planets have an atmosphere, but that's what Lim is looking to find out. If so, the light passing through these atmospheres will be "filtered" through the molecules it contains, leaving signatures for Webb.

The jackpot for her would be to detect the presence of water vapor, carbon dioxide and ozone.

Trappist-1 is such a prime target that several other science teams have also been granted time to observe them.

Finding traces of life there, if they exist, will still take time, according to Lim. But "everything we're doing this year are really important steps to get to that ultimate goal."

ia/dw

Why the new James Webb Space Telescope images are so important for science

The first images from the Webb Telescope have wowed the world with their beauty. But what do they mean for the future of astronomy?



The James Webb Space Telescope images are much more than just pretty pictures.

Planet Earth had its head in the sky when the James Webb Space Telescope's first images of the cosmos were revealed.

Five stunning images showcased the telescope's capabilities, capturing views of stars being born and a group of galaxies locked in a cosmic dance. The pictures are the deepest and sharpest color images of the universe so far.

While celebrating the beauty of the images, scientists have been keen to point out the scientific significance of the international project, which is a collaboration between NASA, the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Canadian Space Agency (CSA).

"These images show us that Webb works incredibly well. Webb will help us to study our universe in much more detail," said Kai Noeske, an astronomer and communications officer at the European Space Operations Centre (ESOC).

INSIDE THE COSMOS: JAMES WEBB SPACE TELESCOPE'S FIRST IMAGES
The invisible made visible
What might look like a glittering moutainous landscape is actually the edge of a young star-forming region called NGC 3324 in the Carina Nebula. The Webb Telescope image reveals for the first time areas of star birth that were previously invisible.
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Looking back in time

Webb's first image was a deep field image of a tiny spec of the vast universe, showing distant galaxy clusters. Some of these galaxies are more than 13 billion years old and were created when the universe was in its infancy.

"It is light from the early universe, in its first 500 million years, which is reaching us today," Noeske told DW.

Light from these galaxies is up to 13 billion years old, only reaching Webb in the last weeks

The curious effect of looking back in time is caused by the speed of light and how long light takes to reach us. Light travels at 300,000 kilometers every second (about 670 million miles per hour). This is extremely fast. But space is really big, so it can still take a long time for light to travel.

For example, the sun is about 150 million kilometers (93 million miles) from Earth, and it takes around eight minutes for light to reach us from our sun.

The objects in Webb's images are many billions of light-years away. One light-year is the distance traveled by light in one year, which is about 9.5 trillion kilometers.

This means the light has traveled through space and time to reach us over billions of years. We would have to wait another 13 billion years to see these galaxies as they are today.

The scale of these distances is difficult to imagine, but it certainly makes a walk to the store feel rather short by comparison.
Making the invisible visible

In the kaleidoscopic images of the Carina Nebula and Stephan's Quintet, Webb shows us emerging stellar nurseries where stars are being born and developing. Scientists have never been able to observe galaxies interacting in this much detail.

The five galaxies of Stephan’s Quintet in a cosmic dance

It's thanks to Webb's infrared cameras that we're able to see the stars in all their glory.

"Infrared gives us a lot more information on the young universe than was possible before. The light from these galaxies was stretched as it traveled to us. Webb lets us see that," says Noeske.

The colors in the Cosmic Cliffs were artificially added to the original image by Webb’s science team. However, that's not to say the colors are not there. In fact, the light emitted from stars contains information far richer than we can see with the human eye.

Researchers use data about light emitted from stars to understand how galaxies form, grow, and merge with each other, and in some cases why they stop forming stars altogether.

For example, blue galaxies contain stars but very little dust. The red objects are enshrouded in thick layers of dust, while green galaxies are populated with hydrocarbons and other chemical compounds.

"Webb will address some of the great, open questions of modern astrophysics: What determines the number of stars that form in a certain region? Why do stars form with a certain mass?" NASA said in a press release on Tuesday.
Richer information about the universe

It will take weeks and months to analyze the first images and demonstrate more of what Webb is capable of doing in the future.

Each photo we see is a composite of many hours of imaging. Study teams will "slice and dice" the information into many images for detailed study, much like clinicians do with magnetic resonance imaging (MRI).

"It was a big step forward from what Hubble showed us. The sharpness and level of detail made it clear how much potential Webb has for scientific research. Webb not only looks further back in time, but also in higher detail," Noeske told DW.

Webb will help scientists to answer questions about how planets, stars, galaxies, and ultimately the universe itself, are formed.
Finding Earth 2.0?

While less beautiful than the Cosmic Cliffs, Webb's spectrographic analysis of the exoplanet WASP-96 b's atmosphere is an example of perhaps more exciting information to come in the future.

WASP-96 b is a type of gas giant around 1,150 light-years away that bears little similarity to the planets in our solar system. Webb's team has analyzed the planet's transmission spectrum, measuring starlight filtered through the planet's atmosphere like a barcode.

Analysis of light emitted through the atmosphere of WASP-96 b shows it contains water

"This is an amazing trick that astronomers use. The planet passes in front of its star — a bit of light passes through the planet's atmosphere, and that light shining contains the chemical signature of the atmosphere imprinted into it like a barcode," said Noeske.

The analysis showed the planet has an atmosphere that contains water, along with clouds and haze. But WASP-96b won't be supporting life as we know it any time soon, as the planet is made of gas and orbits its star extremely closely, making it an extremely hot and hostile environment.

The analysis of WASP-96 b provides a hint of what Webb has in store for exoplanet research. Exactly what will happen is yet to be determined.

The telescope is open to proposals from worldwide scientific communities about which exoplanets to study in the future.

Edited by: Louisa Wright

US doctor under investigation after abortion for child rape victim

"This is a horrible, horrible scene caused by Marxists and socialists and those in the White House who want lawlessness at the border"

Thu, July 14, 2022 


Authorities in Indiana said they are investigating a gynecologist who performed an abortion on a 10-year-old girl who had been raped -- a flashpoint case in the wake of the US Supreme Court's decision to overturn the federal right to end a pregnancy.

Caitlin Bernard said earlier this month that she had treated the girl in Indianapolis after being contacted by a colleague in neighboring Ohio.

A trigger law banning all abortions after six weeks, with no exceptions for rape or incest, came into force in Ohio last month after the nation's high court ended decades of constitutional protection for the right to end a pregnancy.


The girl, who was raped in May by a man who was arrested on Tuesday, was past the six-week cut-off. To get an abortion, she traveled to Indiana, where the procedure is legal up until 21 weeks.

But authorities in the mainly Republican state oppose abortion and are now considering banning the procedure.

Indiana attorney general Todd Rokita criticized Bernard on Wednesday evening, accusing her of not alerting the authorities to the case of the girl, as state law requires in case of sex crimes involving minors.

"We have this abortion activist acting as a doctor with a history of failing to report," Rokita said on Fox News.

"So we're gathering the information. We're gathering the evidence as we speak and we're going to fight this to the end, including looking at her licensure, if she failed to report," he added.

President Joe Biden spoke of the Ohio rape victim during a July 8 ceremony at which he signed reproductive right protections into law and urged Congress to codify Roe v. Wade, the 1973 ruling that established the nationwide right to abortion.

"Just last week it was reported that a 10-year-old girl was a rape victim in Ohio -- 10 years old -- and she was forced to have to travel out of the state, to Indiana, to seek to terminate the pregnancy," Biden said.

Until the suspect was arrested, right-wing media and several Ohio authorities questioned whether the story was true.

Now, opponents of abortion are accusing abortion rights advocates of using the girl to promote their cause and blaming the tragedy on Biden's immigration policy because the detainee is a Guatemalan who entered the country illegally.

"This is a horrible, horrible scene caused by Marxists and socialists and those in the White House who want lawlessness at the border," Rokita said.

chp/dw/sst

CRIMINAL CAPITALI$M

Intimidation, crackdowns blow the lid off Chinese rural banking scandal

WITH CHINESE CHARACTERISTICS

A massive scandal worth tens of billions of yuan is rocking the critical rural banking sector in China. Authorities blame a "criminal gang" for illegally siphoning off depositors’ money and preventing more than a hundred thousand Chinese from accessing their accounts for months.© Via Reuters - Social Media

Sébastian SEIBT 

Authorities in China’s central Henan province, located around 680 kilometres south of Beijing, finally issued a promise this week. Days after security officials violently broke up a protest of angry bank customers, Henan authorities said they would begin reimbursing account holders at the heart of one of China’s largest financial scandals in recent years.

The pledge however is unlikely to reassure hundreds of thousands of account holders denied access to their funds for months, the South China Morning Post reported on Wednesday.

For starters, the reimbursements only concern small account holders, whose bank deposits do not exceed 50,000 yuan (7,414 euros). For customers with larger deposits, their redressal time has been postponed to a hypothetical "near future".

More alarming though are the reports of harassment and intimidation that customers have faced for daring to publicly voice their grievances. "I received a call from the police urging me to express my 'concerns' in a legal manner and not to participate in demonstrations that could be considered riots," Wang, a customer of one of the banks, told the South China Morning Post.

Police and local Chinese Communist Party officials also visited other customers to warn them that protesting could cost them their jobs. A woman who was injured during a protest on Sunday told Reuters that men in black arrived at her house on Tuesday to try to intimidate her. Others said party officials were harassing their families and some were even going to their children’s schools to get the kids to tell their parents to back off.
Covid app turns ‘red’ – and sparks national outcry

But when the authorities began using China’s mandatory anti-Covid app for less than sanitary purposes, they crossed a threshold.

The Chinese Covid-19 prevention app displays a "green" status for those who are not sick and "red" for those infected with the virus as well as contact cases. Several customers of the troubled banks discovered that their status had suddenly turned “red”, severely restricting their ability to travel and preventing them from ... protesting.

"It was the misuse of the app, much commented on social networks for more than a month, that transformed this case, initially a regional issue, into a national scandal," explained a Chinese national who preferred to remain anonymous for security reasons.

In late June, Henan authorities sacked five officials suspected for tampering with the anti-Covid app.

By Sunday, July 10, the Henan bank customers case made the international news when roughly 1,000 bank customers gathered in front of the headquarters of the Bank of China subsidiary in Zhengzhou, capital of Henan province.

This was not the first time in recent months that protesters demanding access to their money had gathered in Zhengzhou. But on Sunday, the protest was violently broken up by plainclothes police charging at the demonstrators. Video clips of the clashes promptly went viral.

An extraordinary criminal case

Chinese authorities, obsessed with maintaining social order at all costs, urgently need to find a way out of this scandal, which is undermining the weakest link in the Chinese financial chain: village or township banks.

In April, customers of four banks – Yuzhou Xinminsheng Rural Bank, Shangcai Huimin Rural Bank, Zhecheng Huanghuai Rural Bank, and Guzhen Xinhuaihe Rural Bank – suddenly discovered they could no longer withdraw their money. "In fact, there are two more banks in the neighbouring province of Anhui that are also affected, but they have a small number of customers,” reported The Paper, an independent Chinese news site.

The official reason supplied at the time was that an update of the bank’s internal network had blocked account access from outside the network. But four months later, the explanation lacks credibility.

Things got more bizarre the next month when Chinese banking authorities announced that they had opened an investigation into several of the shareholders of the banks’ holding company, the Henan Xincaifu Group. To the distress of customers deprived of access to their savings, an extraordinary criminal case was opened.

After two months of investigation, the Chinese police "were able to confirm that a criminal gang, led by the suspect Lu Yi, was able to use the Henan Xincaifu Group since 2011 to control the banks in question and influence and manipulate the bank staff [to enrich themselves]", reported Ycai Global, a Chinese business news media outlet.

The charges against Lu Yi, who is currently on the run, suggest a massive fraud was premeditated and planned in great detail, according to Ycai Global.

The suspect allegedly obtained the operating rights for highway tolls in the Henan region in 2004. He then used the prospect of juicy profits from these tolls to convince a bank to grant him a large loan. The funds were used to set up a vast network of front companies that bought stakes in several financial institutions, including the Henan Xincaifu Group.

The criminal mastermind, according to the official explanation, then sought to recruit more and more customers for these four banks by promising interest rates far higher than those offered by similar financial institutions. "That's how these banks were able to get customers all over China, not just from local communities as is the norm for these village banks," said Xin Sun, an expert on the Chinese economy at King's College London.

In total, more than 100,000 Chinese people across the country have accounts in these banks, whereas similar small local financial institutions usually have only a few thousand clients at most.

Lu Yi and his accomplices would then have diverted part of the funds to finance their own investments, pushing these banks to the brink of bankruptcy. No one really knows the extent of this financial disaster. Several media outlets have estimated that 39 billion yuan (5.75 billion euros) have been deposited in the blocked bank accounts. “The Paper”, which was able to analyse some of the accounts, estimates the sums at stake "at a maximum of 20 billion yuan (2.95 billion euros)".
Banks tasked with ‘revitalising’ rural China

Henan authorities on Monday announced that they had arrested some of the suspects and were on the trail of the money to replenish the coffers. "The aim is clearly to make this story an isolated case linked to a purely criminal matter, whereas it is symptomatic of wider problems," said Xin.

The rural banks scandal illustrates the fragility of the network of local banks, which are important tools in Chinese President Xi Jinping's economic policy. "There are more than 1,600 of them all over the country, and they are supposed to facilitate the rural revitalisation programme deemed important by the government," he added.

Rural China is one of the great losers of the national economic miracle, prompting President Xi to vow in 2021 that he would do everything possible to close the gap between the countryside and the cities.

The rural banks have been given a very political mission without necessarily having the means to carry it out. "These are often institutions with weak governance rules, so they usually serve the interests of major shareholders and local authorities. It's usually this kind of illegitimate influence that leads to the problems we are seeing here," said Xin.

The London-based economist believes other local Chinese banks are also involved in the misuse of their clients' funds. But the irregularities have been on a smaller scale compared to the Henan banks.

As long as China was experiencing healthy economic growth, these manipulations went unnoticed since there was sufficient money to cover up the schemes of unscrupulous shareholders.

"The economic slowdown and the crisis in the real estate sector have accelerated the problems," explained Xin. The financial health of Chinese banks heavily depends on loans granted for real estate projects and their repayment. With the economy slowing down, the defaults have been multiplying.

The banks are then crushed by the increasing weight of bad debts. If they are in the hands of shareholders, as they are in Henan, the banks can quickly find they have completely empty coffers. That’s a similar fate facing small rural customers who thought their money was safe in the banks.

The Israel-India-UAE-US relationship is now a strategic fact -analysis

By SETH J. FRANTZMAN - JERUSALEM POST

A virtual summit during US President Joe Biden’s visit to Israel – including Biden, Prime Minister Yair Lapid, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and United Arab Emirates President Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan – represents a huge strategic shift.


© (photo credit: EVELYN HOCKSTEIN/REUTERS)

US President Joe Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid attend the first virtual meeting of the "I2U2" group with leaders of India and the United Arab Emirates, in Jerusalem, July 14, 2022

It has been years in the making, as Israel and India were already strategic partners, and the Abraham Accords brought in the UAE.

The new summit, called I2U2 – India and Israel, and the UAE and the US – began as a virtual meeting. The cement and foundation that has been built around this, however, has major potential for the region, and also links up with the group members’ other partnerships.

Groupings of countries matter in today’s world more than ever, because countries are trying to challenge US hegemony.

Russia’s leader, for instance, is also coming to the region to meet with the presidents of Turkey and Iran. That is one grouping. China and Iran have a new 25-year deal, while Turkey works closely with Malaysia and Pakistan.

Israel is also part of the Negev Summit format, which has included the meeting of foreign ministers from Bahrain, Egypt, Morocco, the UAE and the US. This is a grouping as well.


© Provided by The Jerusalem Post

When we look at the overall framework of the I2U2 concept and the Negev framework – as well as Israel having recently signed agreements with Greece and Cyprus – a picture is emerging of a partnership that links the US and Israel with all of these regional powers and countries.

A broad swath of partnerships now reaches from Washington to Athens, Athens via Nicosia to Cairo and Jerusalem, and then to Abu Dhabi, Manama and New Delhi.
Regional partnerships

Each of these capitals, in turn, has its partners, whether it is the Quad of the US, India, Australia and Japan, or the Gulf ties that bring together Saudi Arabia, UAE, Bahrain, Egypt and others.

These partnerships are not simple. Their members are not all democracies. They combine different types of countries and different types of people. They are not like the Five Eyes network of English-speaking countries; they are not NATO or the EU.

But they are also not the authoritarian agenda that appears to unite Russia, Turkey, Iran and China. This does not mean that these groupings, including I2U2, are opposed to any country. It is clear that India does not share Israel’s concerns about Iran, for instance; and the UAE is not taking sides in Ukraine.

What matters here is deeper. According to India’s External Affairs Ministry, “the I2U2 grouping was conceptualized during the meeting of the foreign ministers of the four countries held on 18 October 2021. Each country also has sherpa-level interactions regularly to discuss the possible areas of cooperation.”

The countries seek joint investment in “six mutually identified areas, such as water, energy, transportation, space, health and food security,” it said in a statement. “It intends to mobilize private-sector capital and expertise to help modernize the infrastructure, [initiate] low-carbon development pathways for our industries, improve public health, and promote the development of critical emerging and green technologies.”

They also include discussions about other issues of mutual interest, the statement said, adding: “These projects can serve as a model for economic cooperation and offer opportunities for our businesspersons and workers.”

In a statement following the important virtual summit, the White House said that the US reaffirms “our support for the Abraham Accords and other peace and normalization arrangements with Israel. We welcome the economic opportunities that flow from these historic developments, including for the advancement of economic cooperation in the Middle East and South Asia, and in particular, for the promotion of sustainable investment amongst the I2U2 partners.

“We reaffirm our support for the Abraham Accords and other peace and normalization arrangements with Israel.”White House statement

“We also welcome other new groupings of countries, such as the Negev Forum for regional cooperation, which recognize the unique contributions of each partner country, including Israel’s ability to serve as an innovation hub connecting new partners and hemispheres to strategically address challenges that are too great for any one country to manage alone.”

IT IS clear from Washington’s statement that this I2U2 gathering is all about cementing these new types of overlapping groups. There is also talk of a Middle East Air Defense alliance.

The potential for another type of grouping that involves the US, Saudi Arabia and potentially Israel and others is important, but there are already emerging lobbies against any kind of new structure.

They are linked to the pro-Iran-deal types in the US who now work at think tanks, and put out talking points against any type of relationship between Washington and Riyadh or any kind of joint work in the region. They want Iran to continue to grow its tentacles inside Lebanon, Iraq, Yemen and Syria.

Of course there are voices opposing these growing partnerships – those same voices worked for years to appease Iran and isolate Israel. They would also put out talking points against “war” or against normalization until there were two states; they would claim Iran was being provoked, or “escalated” against.

But as new groupings in the region emerge, the band of “realists” – who thought Iran having a nuclear weapon would bring “stability” to the region – have been proven wrong. They tried to keep Israel and the Gulf apart; they used to back Saudi Arabia against Israel, but when Riyadh moved close to Jerusalem, they decamped to begin backing China, Russia, Iran and whoever else was belligerent.
Regional shift

The region is now shifting. This shift began slowly and goes back decades. The Abraham Accords opened up new opportunities that have seen exponential growth. Defense Minister Benny Gantz has talked about huge defense trade with the Gulf, and has also talked up the idea of regional air-defense friendships.

Israel and US Central Command are doing new work together. The two allies share interests in the region and also discuss Syria. The US-led coalition downed drones targeting Israel earlier this year.

The Red Sea is now in the spotlight of US Naval Forces Central Command (NAVCENT), the US Navy element of US Central Command. Jerusalem has sold unmanned aerial vehicles and anti-drone systems to Bahrain, The Wall Street Journal reported.

The rapidly moving ties and relationships all point to an unprecedented shift both in the region and globally, as the US works to shore up friends and allies, and as friends and partners understand they have to work together more closely. They cannot just wait for Washington to decide; they have to form their own working groups and push for more summits. Washington is listening and taking part, but its regional partners are doing the heavy lifting.

That’s what the US wanted as it sought to dial back its role in wars like Afghanistan and Iraq. Some said: “Stop the endless wars.” Others said: “Stop the waste of blood and treasure.” What the new partnerships and groupings show is that the US can focus on its own domestic issues and the economy, and rely on friends, such as I2U2, to do the heavy lifting.

Washington can work by, with and through its partners in other places in the region as well, and through that, can keep an eye on the hinges of strategic importance to maintain a global role, with regional friends at the helm.

THE KA RETURNS NEVER TO LEAVE

Ghost of serial killer Aileen Wuornos haunting dive bar?
Brad Hunter - Yesterday 

Serial killer Aileen Wuornos was the last woman executed in Florida.

Owners of a Florida dive bar where notorious serial killer Aileen Wuornos knocked back Budweisers and Marlboros are claiming her spirit haunts the joint.

Wuornos was executed via lethal injection on Oct. 9, 2002 for the murders of six men who had allegedly propositioned her for sex.

But barflies at The Last Resort in Port Orange, near Daytona Beach, say her spirit lives on. After all, the spot is where detectives arrested her.

According to the Miami New Times , on Jan. 8, 1991, Wuornos — a 34-year-old sex worker — had just been dumped by her girlfriend and was too broke to afford a $15 flop at a hotsheet motel. She did have enough for a few bottles of Bud.

The Last Resort is a seedy biker bar that only takes cash. Wuornos was known as a quiet regular who would shoot pool and spin country songs on the jukebox. A favourite was Randy Travis’ Digging Up Bones.


Owners and patrons say The Last Resort bar in Florida is haunted by serial killer and former regular Aileen Wuornos. FACEBOOK

She was arrested there the next day.

“She kept to herself. She was quiet, and never messed with anyone,” owner Al Bulling told New Times, adding that pretty girls sometimes “feel her brush their hair.”

After Wuornos’ execution, staff and patrons began experiencing what they called “paranormal activity.”

“Around Oktoberfest, there was a Dollar Tree skeleton and the arm would always be missing — it kept falling off and we’d find it in weird places,” longtime regular Ted E. Bear told the paper.

“It was always the left arm. I’d ask, ‘Why the left arm?’ That’s where they put the lethal injection — into her left arm.”

The bar — whose slogan is “Home of ice cold beer and killer women” — was also featured in the Wuornos biopic, Monster, starring Charlize Theron.



“There’s a bell that rings every now and then,” Bulling said. “I once had a barmaid swearing there’s someone in the bar even though there was no one in there.”

Bear added: “She likes to mess with me when I’m airbrushing. All of a sudden the airbrush goes off on its own midair. I said, ‘Aileen, let it go.'”

Some of Wuornos’ ashes were scattered under a tree behind the bar.

“She comes here,” Bulling said, “because she never left.”

Ted E. Bear adds: “Oh, Aileen lets you know she’s here alright. You can feel her presence.”

bhunter@postmedia.com
@HunterTOSun

What happened at Arthur's Stone? 5,000-year-old monument connected to King Arthur excavated

Saleen Martin, USA TODAY - Yesterday 

© The University of Manchester

Researchers from the University of Manchester and English Heritage, the charity that cares for Arthur’s Stone in the West Midlands of England, are conducting an excavation of the site in the hopes of finding traces of the Neolithic Britons who built and used the chambered tomb.

Some say King Arthur slew a giant there. Others say he knelt in prayer and his knee print indentations are forever etched into the stone.

Archaeologists set out to find out what really happened at Arthur's Stone, a 5,000-year-old Neolithic chambered tomb in Herefordshire, England, near the border of Wales.

On July 1, a team of researchers began excavating the site, said Julian Thomas, an archaeology professor at the University of Manchester who leads the project.

They'll be on site for the next four weeks, Thomas said.

After looking at other sites in the area, researchers realized there was probably much more activity there than they initially thought.

"We found that there were more expansive traces of the monument," Thomas said.

Thomas said his team found evidence of "a small, low-turf mound with a timber palisade around it," as well as traces of an "avenue of upright timbers in a series of postholes," which could indicate the presence of a ceremonial path leading to the monument.

Team member Mary Elizabeth Ong said their findings contrast with what she learned about people's movements.

"What we have is evidence of the fact that these people were here way before it was originally reported to be," Ong said


Arthur's Stone is more than meets the eye

Arthur's Stone was built around 3,700 B.C., at the beginning of the Neolithic period, and has inspired tales passed down through generations, Thomas said.

It was a time "of great change in this country when domesticated plants and animals were being introduced for the first time," he said. "We have a whole series of these various kinds of megalithic tombs and long barrows, which are the funerary monuments of this period."

Thomas said that when most people see photos of Arthur's Stone, they're probably looking at the chamber, a large capstone that weighs about 25 tons and measures about 13 feet long and 7 feet wide.

The capstone is held up on a series of upright stones, he said.

The structure as a whole may be part of a mound that's at least 100 feet long.

"That chamber is set within a very much larger mound," he said. "It is possible that there were other chambers in that mound. That's something we're looking at."

He said the monument could be elongated, oval-shaped or even a trapezoid, broader at one end than the other.

Though the team isn't the first to excavate the site, it's a "great honor" to work there because the area isn't well-understood, Thomas said.

He stressed that the team isn't interfering with human remains in any way.

"We're not working in the chamber," he said. "We're working on the periphery of the mound, and we're trying to understand the construction of the mound. We're doing that with great respect and reverence. We're certainly not, in any sense, grave-robbers or trying to mess around with any human remains that may have been deposited here at any point."

From California to England

The team is made up of about 55 people, including Ong, 20, who goes to El Camino College in the Alondra Park area of California.

She joined the project through the Institute for Field Research, a nonprofit that helps students get fieldwork training.

"I worked on the trenches and cleaned and basically dug a little deeper on what was surrounding Arthur's Stone," she said. "We found modern stones, and by removing them, we were able to see the soil underneath which is covered in quartz. There may be a mound underneath the Neolithic stone."

The dig, which is co-directed by archaeologist Keith Ray from Cardiff University, is a team effort between the University of Manchester, Historic England and English Heritage, a charity that manages historic monuments.

Thomas said the latest dig came about as part of the Beneath Hay Bluff project, a program that has been investigating prehistoric southwest Herefordshire since 2010.

Saleen Martin is a reporter on USA TODAY's NOW team. She is from Norfolk, Virginia – the 757 – and loves all things horror, witches, Christmas and food. Follow her on Twitter at @Saleen_Martin or email her at sdmartin@usatoday.com.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: What happened at Arthur's Stone? 5,000-year-old monument connected to King Arthur excavated

Four companies are top sources of US greenhouse gas, methane emissions: report

Zack Budryk - THE HILL 




Four energy companies — Exxon Mobil, ConocoPhillips, Hilcorp and Occidental Petroleum — are the top sources in the U.S. of both greenhouse gas emissions in general and methane emissions, according to a report issued Thursday by environmental groups Ceres and the Clean Air Task Force.


FLARING CREATES GHG

The report, based on data submitted to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) from major oil and gas producers, found wide variation in emissions among companies, with the highest-emitting companies producing methane emissions nearly 24 times more intense than those with the lowest emissions.

Hilcorp led for total methane emissions in 2020, followed by Exxon, Occidental and ConocoPhillips, according to the research. The companies collectively reported more than 300,000 metric tons in methane emissions.

The report found equipment operation was also a major determinant of emissions intensity. For example, it found companies that practice flaring, or burning off extra natural gas, had more intense carbon dioxide emissions, and those that used pneumatic controllers — which control for factors like pressure and temperature but emit natural gas in the process — comprised 62 percent of methane emissions.

Related video: Study Finds US Emissions Responsible for $2 Trillion in Damage to Other Nations

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The organizations only analyzed statistics oil and gas companies are required by law to divulge to the EPA. It does not include data on other sources of emissions such as so-called super-emitters, which comprise 8 to 12 percent of methane emissions from the industry.

Methane emissions have been the subject of increased scrutiny in recent years, as the gas is both more than 80 times as potent as carbon dioxide in its first 20 years and the source of about 0.5 degrees Celsius in global warming to date. Due to its short atmospheric life relative to other greenhouse gases, climatologists have identified methane reduction as one of the easiest paths to emissions reduction and warming mitigation.

“This new report makes clear what experts have long known: There are clear steps oil and gas producers can take to reduce their methane and other greenhouse gas emissions,” Lesley Feldman, a senior analyst at the Clean Air Task Force, said in a statement. “Some are taking those steps while others are not, and federal and state regulations are key to ensuring we can standardize best practices across the industry.”

“The report reflects some of the great progress that we are making to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from our operations. We are actively implementing aggressive plans to further reduce Scope 1 and 2 greenhouse emissions from our operations,” an Exxon spokesperson told The Hill. “ExxonMobil has announced its global ambition to achieve net zero Scope 1 and Scope 2 greenhouse gas emissions from major operated assets by 2050.”

The Hill has reached out to ConocoPhillips, Occidental and Hilcorp for comment.

For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to The Hill.

Venezuela hits back at 'crazy' former U.S. adviser Bolton's coup-plotting admission

CARACAS (Reuters) - A Venezuelan government official on Thursday called former White House national security adviser John Bolton "crazy" after his admission this week that he had tried to plot foreign coups, including backing an unsuccessful bid to oust socialist President Nicolas Maduro.


Former national security advisor John Bolton in Durham, North Carolina

Earlier this week, Bolton said in the interview with CNN that he had helped plan coups d'etat. He did not go into detail but mentioned Venezuela, where the United States supported opposition leader Juan Guaido's failed bid to oust President Nicolas Maduro in 2019.

Jorge Rodriguez, head of Venezuela's government-controlled congress, responded to Bolton's comments during a congressional session, saying that the United States had been stirring unrest.

"What was in the mind of this crazy John Bolton was that the violence would accelerate so that they could have an excuse for the invasion... a military invasion in Venezuela," he said.

Venezuela's Communication and Information Ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

(Reporting by Deisy Buitrago; Writing by Carolina Pulice; Editing by Rosalba O'Brien)