Heatwave in Paris exposes city's lack of trees



Thu, August 4, 2022 
By Manuel Ausloos

PARIS (Reuters) - As a third heatwave baked France this week, the heat radiating off the asphalt outside the Garnier Opera house in Paris hit 56 degrees Celsius on urban planning expert Tangui Le Dantec's thermometer. Shade was non-existent with barely a tree in sight.

The Place de l'Opera is one of numerous so-called urban heat islands in the French capital, lacking the trees that cool cities down by providing shade and seen as a key line of defence against climate change and increasingly hot summers.

Just a minute's walk away, in the shade along the tree-lined Boulevard des Italiens, Le Dantec's thermometer gave a reading of 28C (82 degrees Fahrenheit).

"Immediately there's a bit of a breeze. You can breathe," Le Dantec, who founded Aux Arbres Citoyens, an action group opposed to tree felling.

Paris ranks poorly among global cities for its green cover. According to data from the World Cities Culture Forum, only 10% of Paris is made up of green space such as parks and gardens compared to London at 33% and Oslo at 68%.

Last month was the hottest July on record in France, according to the national weather agency Meteo France, the searing temperatures underlining the need to strengthen the capital's natural defences against global warming.

Paris City Hall wants to create "islands of freshness" and plans to plant 170,000 trees by 2026. It is also ripping up the concrete in dozens of school yards and laying down soil and vegetation.

"It's a massive tree and vegetation-planting project that is underway, much bigger than under previous administrations," said Jacques Baudrier, deputy Paris mayor tasked with the green energy transition in buildings.

However, City Hall's green ambitions have provoked some protests. Le Dantec and other ecology campaigners say the local authorities have been felling scores of decades-old trees to make way for garden spaces.

In redrawing the city's landscape, the felling of mature trees runs counter to the authorities' own ambitions as saplings are more vulnerable to drought and less useful in fighting heat radiation, green activists say.

In April, green activist Thomas Brail shot video of more than 70 trees being felled on the city's northern outskirts to make way for Mayor Anne Hidalgo's vision for a "green belt" around the city.

City Hall's urban planners say Paris cannot be redesigned to better confront climate change without felling some trees.

But Brail said: "These trees had a role to play."

(Reporting by Manuel Ausloos and Lea Guedj; Editing by Richard Lough and Janet Lawrence)

Sydney realtor says deaths of Saudi sisters not random crime


An apartment building stands on a corner in a Sydney suburb on Thursday, Aug. 4, 2022. The Sydney apartment where the bodies of two Saudi sisters were found in June is back on the rental market with a real estate ad advising their deaths were "not a random crime and will not be a potential risk for the community." (AP Photo/Rick Rycroft)More

ROD McGUIRK
Thu, August 4, 2022

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — The Sydney apartment where the bodies of two Saudi sisters were found in June is back on the rental market with a real estate ad advising their deaths were “not a random crime and will not be a potential risk for the community.”

Asra Abdullah Alsehli, 24, and her 23-year-old sister Amaal Abdullah Alsehli, were found dead June 7 in separate bedrooms of the apartment in the southwest suburb of Canterbury.

Police believe they died in early May. The decomposed state of their remains complicated the task of determining the causes of death.

The first-floor Canterbury Road apartment was open for inspection on Monday with rent set at 520 Australian dollars ($362) a week. That is AU$40 ($28) more than the sisters were charged.

An online ad said the apartment had been designated a crime scene and the mysterious deaths remained under police investigation.

“According to the police, this is not a random crime and will not be a potential risk for the community,” the ad said.

But police would not confirm or deny the realtor’s advice.

“As the investigation is ongoing, police continue to appeal for information in relation to the deaths of the two women,” a police statement said. “No further information is available at this stage.”

Police released the sisters’ names and photographs last week in an appeal for more public information about how they died, but investigators have remained tight-lipped about many details, including how the sisters came to Australia as teenagers in 2017, their visa status and how they earned money.

Multiple sources with knowledge of the case said the sisters had been seeking asylum in Australia, The Sydney Morning Herald reported. They had worked for a time as traffic controllers, a common job for backpackers and new immigrants. They drove a luxury BMW 5 Series coupe, the newspaper reported.

Police Detective Inspector Claudia Allcroft said their family in Saudi Arabia was cooperating with police and there was “nothing to suggest” that they were suspects.

She described the decomposition of the bodies as “problematic.” Police last week had yet to see the results of toxicology tests.

There was no evidence of forced entry to the apartment, where the sisters kept to themselves, Allcroft said.

“The deaths are suspicious in nature as we don’t know the cause of death,” Allcroft said.

“The girls were 23 and 24 years old and they have died together in their home. We don’t know the cause of death, it’s unusual because of their age and the nature of the matter,” Allcroft added.

The sisters seemed fearful and suspicious that food delivered to their apartment had been tampered with, unidentified associates told Sydney media.

An unidentified senior police source told Sydney’s The Daily Telegraph: “It really does appear to be a tragic suicide.”

The sisters were able to show “significant savings” in a bank account when they applied to lease their apartment, property manager Jay Hu told the newspaper, but they had stopped paying rent early this year.

“They had always paid on time before then. ... They were good tenants,” Hu told the newspaper.

The overseas-based landlord had begun legal action to recoup the unpaid rent before the sisters’ bodies were found, Hu said.

The real estate ad said the apartment’s bedrooms both had new flooring.

Occidental to cut debt and distribute cash, won't raise oil output

Equipment used to process carbon dioxide, crude oil and water is seen at an Occidental Petroleum Corp enhanced oil recovery project in Hobbs

Wed, August 3, 2022 
By Sabrina Valle

HOUSTON (Reuters) -Occidental Petroleum Corp plans to use the bonanza from high oil and gas prices to accelerate debt payments and cash distribution to shareholders but will not raise oil production, Chief Executive Vicki Hollub said on Wednesday.

White House officials have been urging oil producers to invest in more oil production to bring fuel prices down to consumers. The top oil producers in the U.S. and Europe posted record earnings in the second quarter, but kept a check on investments.

Occidental on Tuesday posted higher than expected earnings in the second quarter, but cut its 2022 output outlook for the main unconventional basin in the United States, knocking its shares down more than 6% to close at $60.99.


The company also said it resumed a buyback program after reaching its short-term debt reduction goals in the second quarter. With a cleaner balance sheet, the U.S. oil producer said it can now slightly raise dividends and sustain stock repurchases "over the next few years".

Occidental also said it wants to accelerate a three-year target to bring debt down to $15 billion, from more than $21 billion now. Investment targets were unchanged.

"We don't feel the need to grow production until we get beyond that point," Hollub told analysts on a webcast to discuss second quarter earnings. "Because we feel like one of the best values right now is investment in our own stock."

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Wednesday slammed the "grotesque greed" of oil companies, urging governments globally to "tax these excessive profits" to support the most vulnerable people.

The Permian basin this year should deliver around 521,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day (boed) for the company, from around 532,000 boed projected in May, it said.

The reduction follows third party processing issues and a partial Permian production transfer to Colombian oil producer Ecopetrol, with whom Occidental signed a joint venture.

Total 2022 production outlook was kept stable at around 1.55 million boed, with higher production in the Rockies and the Gulf of Mexico basins offsetting losses in the Permian.

(Reporting by Sabrina Valle; Editing by Jonathan Oatis, Alexander Smith and Deepa Babington)

‘There’s no path out of economic oblivion for Russia’: New report reveals how corporate exodus has already wiped out decades of post–Cold War growth

Yvonne Lau
Thu, August 4, 2022

Over the past six months, Russia has fortified its economic defenses after Western countries pummeled it with sanctions over its invasion of Ukraine.

Despite the crackdown, the Kremlin continues to rake in billions in oil and gas revenues, which helped the ruble rally to become the world’s best-performing currency this year.

But all is not well with the Russian economy.

The Western sanctions and widespread corporate exodus from Russia since Feb. 24 have ravaged the Russian economy—and its future prospects look even bleaker, according to a new report from Yale University researchers and economists led by Jeffrey Sonnenfeld, Yale School of Management professor and senior associate dean for leadership studies. It’s now become clear that the Kremlin’s “finances are in much, much more dire straits than conventionally understood” and that the large-scale “business retreats and sanctions are catastrophically crippling the Russian economy,” the researchers wrote.
Deterioration

As of Aug. 4, over 1,000 companies, including U.S. firms like Nike, IBM, and Bain consulting, have curtailed their operations in Russia. Though some businesses have stayed, the mass corporate exodus represents 40% of Russia’s GDP and reverses 30 years’ worth of foreign investment, says the Yale report.

The international retreat is morphing into a larger crisis for the country: a collapse in foreign imports and investments.

Russia has descended into a technological crisis as a result of its isolation from the global economy. It’s having trouble securing critical technology and parts. “The domestic economy is largely reliant on imports across industries…with few exceptions,” says the report. Western export controls have largely halted the flow of imported technology from smartphones to data servers and networking equipment, straining its tech industry. Russia’s biggest internet company, Yandex—the country’s version of Google—is running short of the semiconductor chips it needs for its servers.

At the same time, Russia’s “domestic production has come to a complete standstill—with no capacity to replace lost businesses, products, and talent,” the Yale report said. Russian producers and manufacturers are unable to fill the gaps left by the collapse of Western imports. Russia’s telecom sector for instance, now hopes to lean on China, India, and Israel to supply 5G equipment.

In the weeks following the Ukraine invasion, the Kremlin largely prevented a “full scale financial crisis” owing to quick and harsh measures, like restricting the movement of money out of the country and imposing a 20% emergency interest rate hike, Laura Solanko, senior adviser at the Bank of Finland Institute for Emerging Economies in Transition, an organization that researches emerging economies, told Fortune last month. The ruble even rebounded from a March low, when it was valued at less than one U.S. cent.

Yet Russia’s financial markets are the worst-performing in the world this year, the report noted. “Putin is resorting to patently unsustainable, dramatic fiscal and monetary intervention to smooth over these structural economic weaknesses,” which has led to a government budget deficit for the first time in years and drained the Kremlin’s foreign reserves even with its continued inflow of petrodollars, the researchers wrote. The Russian government is giving subsidies to businesses and individuals to mitigate any economic shocks caused by sanctions. This “inflated level” of fiscal and social stimulus, on top of military expenditures, is “simply unsustainable for the Kremlin,” the report said.

And the ruble’s recent dramatic turnaround doesn’t indicate a strong Russian economy, but marks something far worse: the clear collapse of foreign imports. Sergei Guriev, scientific director of the economics program at Sciences Po, in France, and a research fellow at London-based think tank the Centre for Economic Policy Research, previously told Fortune that it represents a “very bad” situation for the nation.

The EU is now phasing out Russian energy, which could hit the Kremlin’s oil and gas profits. Such a scenario would severely strain the Kremlin’s finances, since Western countries have frozen half of its $300 billion in foreign reserves.
Heading toward economic oblivion

Russia’s precarious economic position means that it faces even more dire, long-term challenges ahead.

Sanctions aren’t designed to cause an immediate financial crisis or economic collapse, but are long-term tools to weaken a nation’s economy while isolating it from global markets, the report said. And the sanctions are doing exactly that for Russia.

The country is losing its richest and most educated citizens as its economy crumbles. Most estimates say that at least 500,000 Russians have fled the country since Feb. 24, with the “vast majority being highly educated and highly skilled workers in competitive industries such as technology,” the report said. Many wealthy Russians who flee are taking their money with them. One estimate is that 20% of Russia’s ultra-high-net-worth individuals have left this year. In the first quarter of 2022, official capital outflows stood at $70 billion, according to Bank of Russia estimates—but this figure is likely to be a “gross underestimate” of the actual amount of money that has left the country, the Yale team wrote.

Russian citizens are also set to become poorer, despite Putin’s minimum wage and pension income hikes. A former Putin aide predicts that the number of Russians living in poverty will likely double—and perhaps even triple, as the war continues. Russia “hasn’t seen the worst yet,” Russian political scientist Ilya Matveev, told Fortune last month.

“There is no path out of economic oblivion as long as the allied countries remain unified in maintaining and increasing sanctions pressure against Russia,” the researchers wrote.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

Who benefits from renewable energy subsidies? In Texas, it's often fossil fuel companies that are fighting clean energy elsewhere


Nathan Jensen, Professor of Government, The University of Texas at Austin College of Liberal Arts

 Isabella Steinhauer, Master of Public Affairs Candidate and Graduate Research Assistant, The University of Texas at Austin College of Liberal Arts
Thu, August 4, 2022 
THE CONVERSATION

Texas is the No. 1 wind power producer in the U.S. 

Greg Smith/Corbis SABA via Getty Images

Texas is known for fiercely promoting its oil and gas industries, but it’s also the No. 2 renewable energy producer in the country after California. In fact, more than a quarter of all the wind power produced in the United States in 2021 was generated in Texas.

These projects benefit from a lucrative state tax incentive program called Chapter 313. That incentive program expires on Dec. 31, 2022, and the rush of applications for wind and solar energy projects to secure incentives before the deadline is providing a rare window into a notoriously opaque industry.

By reviewing the applications and ownership documents, we were able to track who actually builds and owns a large portion of the nation’s renewable energy, when and how those assets change hands, and who ultimately benefits from the tax incentives.

The results might surprise you. The majority of utility-scale solar and wind energy projects in Texas aren’t owned by companies focused on renewable energy – they’re owned by energy companies or utilities that are better known for fossil fuels, including some that have aggressively opposed renewable energy and climate policies in other states and nationally.

The policy implications of these findings are complex. While these subsidies might lead some energy companies to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions, they also can allow energy companies to continue polluting from existing fossil fuel assets while collecting the subsidy benefits.

A subsidy program that saves companies billions

Chapter 313 limits how much companies have to pay in property taxes for schools if those companies build infrastructure and agree to create jobs. The Texas Legislature passed it in 2001 when a number of large companies, including Intel and Boeing, were considering Texas for an investment location.

Companies using this program can save billions of dollars in local property taxes. However, investigations have revealed high costs per job and minimal requirements for companies. The state’s school funding system also suffered.

The program wasn’t renewed, but companies that applied for the incentive by Aug. 1, 2022, could grandfather in their investments for 10 years of tax benefits. That led to the rush of applications, including for wind and solar projects.
Who’s proposing renewable energy projects?

We reviewed 191 wind and solar project applications filed in 2022. If built, these projects would almost double the number of renewable energy projects in Texas.

It is notoriously difficult to track the owners of renewable energy projects in the U.S., because most are structured as limited liability companies, or LLCs. However, the application for Texas incentives requires not only information on the owner, but also a signature of an individual representative of the owners. That provides a glimpse into the impact that subsidies can have and who benefits.

We found that just over a third – 69 out of 191 proposed projects – are owned by renewable energy companies, such as Danish company Ørsted and Recurrent Energy, owned by Canadian Solar.

Over half the proposals – 101 – were submitted by energy companies known more for oil and gas, or utilities with fossil fuel assets. This includes the renewable energy subsidiaries of oil supermajors such as Total and BP, and utility owners including EDF, AES and Engie, all of which are major global players.

Some project applications came from investment groups such as DeShaw Group, Cardinal Investment Group and Horus Capital. Apex Clean Energy, a renewable energy subsidiary of the major investment manager Ares Management, frequently showed up in applications.

New owners take over

The proposed projects provide a snapshot of the renewable energy projects’ developers – but what happens after these projects are built?

To figure that out, we also looked at all renewable energy projects completed in 2020 and 2021 that participated in the Chapter 313 incentive program.

To our surprise, almost half of the projects built in 2020 or 2021 had changed hands by 2022. Some were due to company acquisitions. Many other projects were sold.

This changed the composition of owners. While renewable energy companies owned roughly half the projects at the application stage, by 2022, two-thirds of the projects were owned by utilities and energy companies with fossil fuel assets.

The original developers may have benefited from the first year or so of the tax break, but the new owners are poised to reap the majority of the remaining years of the 10-year property tax incentive.

The most common pattern of sales was a renewable energy developer selling a project to an energy company or utility. For example, Duke Energy purchased a solar project originally owned by Recurrent Energy, and Alpin Sun sold a solar project to BP.

We found that ownership by self-described “venture capitalists” and other investors was rare before 2022. The lucrative and expiring incentive program likely led to a gold rush of applications, including by some companies with limited experience in renewable energy.
When renewable incentives become subsidies to fossil fuel companies

Many of the owners benefiting from these subsidies have parent companies with high carbon emissions and a history of fighting climate policies.

For example, the company with the most renewable energy projects subsidized under Chapter 313 from 2020 to 2022 is NextEra. NextEra is also the parent company of Florida Power and Light, a utility that has campaigned against rooftop solar in Florida and sued to block hydropower imports in Massachusetts. In Texas, however, NextEra lobbied for a continuation of Chapter 313 incentives.

Other major energy companies in the owner list include France’s Total Energy, BP, Duke Energy and Savion, which is owned by Shell.

The data suggests some possible tensions within green energy policy.

Environmentalists have long argued for federal and state subsidies for renewable energy as a means of combating climate change, including in the climate- and inflation-focused bill currently in Congress.

However, as our data analysis shows, the owners who benefit from renewable energy incentives can in some cases be the same fossil fuel companies that actively oppose a green energy transition. The results of a 2021 study, using data released by energy companies on earnings calls, also suggest that energy company investments in renewable energy projects are often simply diversification strategies – they aren’t replacing fossil fuels.

Our analysis is based on one program in Texas, but with the size of the Texas renewable energy sector, and the companies involved, it can offer insights for broader renewable energy policies.

Key to any subsidy program is clearly articulating the goals and tracking success in meeting them. If the goal is to reduce greenhouse as emissions, that means examining who is benefiting and determining if the subsidies are actually leading to a transition away from fossil fuels.

Our data begins to shine a light on the answer.

This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts. It was written by: Nathan Jensen, The University of Texas at Austin College of Liberal Arts and Isabella Steinhauer, The University of Texas at Austin College of Liberal Arts.

Read more:

3 reasons US coal power is disappearing – and a Supreme Court ruling won’t save it

The US just set ambitious offshore wind power targets – what will it take to meet them?

Nathan Jensen previously received funding from John and Laura Arnold Foundation for peer-reviewed research on the Texas Chapter 313 Program.

Former Puerto Rican Governor Vazquez arrested for accepting political favors



Thu, August 4, 2022 
By Ivelisse Rivera and Kylie Madry

SAN JUAN (Reuters) - U.S. authorities on Thursday announced criminal charges against former Puerto Rico Governor Wanda Vazquez, who was in office from 2019 to 2021, for alleged corruption during her 2020 election campaign.

The former governor is charged with conspiracy, federal programs bribery and honest services wire fraud, the Department of Justice (DOJ) said in a statement.

Vazquez told reporters she was innocent following her initial hearing on Thursday afternoon.

"I have not committed any crime," she said. "They have committed a great injustice by filing these charges."

According to authorities, a Venezuelan-Italian bank owner and a former FBI agent paid some $300,000 to political consultants supporting Vazquez's campaign in exchange for political favors.

Authorities allege that the owner of the bank Bancredito, which was under investigation by the island's regulatory authority, indirectly asked Vazquez to replace the regulator's head with a hand-picked leader to head off the audit.

Bancredito's owner, Julio Martin Herrera Velutini, allegedly coordinated with one of Vazquez's campaign workers, former FBI agent Mark Rossini, to carry out the bribe. Both have been charged alongside Vazquez.

Investigators say that after Vazquez's primary election loss in 2020, Herrera then attempted to bribe her successor, named in the indictment only as "Public Official A."

Puerto Rico's current governor, Pedro Pierluisi, is not under investigation, authorities said.

Herrera's attempts to bribe the current governor to end the audit of Bancredito were unsuccessful, authorities say, as his contact allegedly representing the governor was actually acting on behalf of the FBI.

Two others pleaded guilty for their involvement in the scheme in March. Frances Diaz, former president and chief executive officer of Bancredito, conspired with Herrera and others to bribe the current governor, officials say.

Meanwhile, another of Vazquez's campaign coordinators, John Blakeman, conspired with Herrera and Rossini to bribe Vazquez and with Herrera to bribe her successor, according to the Department of Justice.

The two face up to five years in prison, though their sentencing hearings have not yet been scheduled.

Vazquez, as well as Herrara and Rossini, could face up to 20 years in prison if convicted, U.S. Attorney for the District of Puerto Rico Stephen Muldrow said.

In Vazquez's first appearance in court, U.S. Magistrate Judge for the District of Puerto Rico Camille Velez-Rive ruled the former governor could be released on $50,000 bail on the condition she hand over her passport.

(Reporting by Ivelisse Rivera and Kylie Madry; Editing by Daniel Wallis)

Ex Puerto Rico Gov. Wanda Vázquez charged with bribery




 Governor Wanda Vazquez gives a press conference to announce the extension of the COVID-19 curfew, while detailing the new sectors of the country that may resume operations, as part of a new executive order in San Juan, Puerto Rico, Thursday, May 21, 2020. According to an official who was not authorized to talk about the federal case, Vazquez was arrested on Aug. 3, 2022 in the U.S. territory on federal corruption charges. (AP Photo/Carlos Giusti, file)More

DÁNICA COTO
Thu, August 4, 2022 

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — Former Puerto Rico Gov. Wanda Vázquez was arrested Thursday on bribery charges linked to the financing of her 2020 campaign, the latest hit to an island with a long history of corruption that brought fresh political upheaval to the U.S. territory.

Vázquez is accused of engaging in a bribery scheme from December 2019 through June 2020 — while she was governor — with several people, including a Venezuelan-Italian bank owner, a former FBI agent, a bank president and a political consultant.

“I am innocent. I have not committed any crime,” she told reporters. ”I assure you that they have committed a great injustice against me.”

The arrest embarrassed and angered many in Puerto Rico who believe the island's already shaky image has been further tarnished, leaving a growing number of people who have lost faith in their local officials to wonder whether federal authorities are their only hope to root out entrenched government corruption. Concern over previous corruption cases led to a delay in federal aid for Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria as the U.S. government implemented more safeguards.

Thursday's arrest also was a blow to Vázquez's pro-statehood New Progressive Party, which is pushing to hold a referendum next year in a bid to become the 51st U.S. state.

Vázquez, 62, was the second woman to serve as Puerto Rico’s governor and the first former governor to face federal charges. Former Gov. Aníbal Acevedo Vilá of the opposing Popular Democratic Party was charged with campaign finance violations while in office and was found not guilty in 2009. He had been the first Puerto Rico governor to be charged with a crime in recent history.

“For the second time in our history, political power and public office are used to finance an electoral campaign,” said José Luis Dalmau, president of Acevedo's party. “Using the power of the government to advance political agendas is unacceptable and an affront to democracy in Puerto Rico."

Vázquez's consultant, identified as John Blakeman, and the bank president, identified as Frances Díaz, have pleaded guilty to participating in the bribery scheme, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.

In early 2019, the international bank owned by Julio Martín Herrera Velutini was being scrutinized by Puerto Rico’s Office of the Commissioner of Financial Institutions because of transactions authorities believed were suspicious and had not been reported by the bank.

Authorities said Herrera and Mark Rossini, the former FBI agent who provided consulting services to Herrera, allegedly promised to financially support Vázquez’s 2020 campaign for governor in exchange for Vázquez dismissing the commissioner and appointing a new one of Herrera’s choosing.

Authorities said Vázquez accepted the bribery offer and in February 2020 demanded the commissioner’s resignation. She then was accused of appointing a former consultant for Herrera’s bank as the new commissioner in May 2020. After the move, officials said Herrera and Rossini paid more than $300,000 to political consultants to support Vázquez’s campaign.

A flurry of messages exchanged during that time between people involved in the case included a heart emoji attached to the commissioner's resignation letter and three sealed lips emojis when someone provided Rossi's name to Vázquez, who requested the name of “the guy from the FBI.” In addition, Herrera texted Rossini about the need for a campaign manager and said he didn't want “a monkey from Puerto Rico.”

After Vázquez lost the primary to current Gov. Pedro Pierluisi, authorities said Herrera then allegedly sought to bribe Pierluisi to end an audit into his bank with favorable terms. Herrera is accused of using intermediaries from April 2021 to August 2021 to offer a bribe to Pierluisi’s representative, who was actually acting under FBI orders, according to the indictment.

Officials said Herrera then ordered a $25,000 payment to a political action committee in hopes of trying to bribe Pierluisi.

Stephen Muldrow, U.S. Attorney for Puerto Rico, said Pierluisi is not involved in the case.

Vázquez, Herrera and Rossini are each charged with conspiracy, federal programs bribery and honest services wire fraud. If they are found guilty on all counts, they could face up to 20 years in prison, officials said.

Meanwhile, Díaz and Blakeman could face up to five years in prison, officials said.

Muldrow said officials believe Herrera is in the United Kingdom and Rossini in Spain. It wasn’t clear if the U.S. would seek to extradite them.

Rossini resigned from the FBI in November 2008 as part of a plea deal in which he pleaded guilty to criminally accessing a sensitive FBI database for personal purposes. Many of the searches were related to Anthony Pellicano, an infamous private eye for celebrities who was charged in 2006 with wiretapping certain stars and bribing a police officer.

Attorneys for the other suspects charged in the case could not be immediately reached for comment.

In mid-May, Vázquez's attorney told reporters that he and his client were preparing for possible charges as the former governor at the time denied any wrongdoing.

Vázquez was sworn in as governor in August 2019 after former Gov. Ricardo Rosselló stepped down following massive protests. She served until 2021, after losing the primaries of the pro-statehood New Progressive Party to Pierluisi.

In a statement Thursday, Pierluisi said his administration will work with federal authorities to help fight corruption.

“No one is above the law in Puerto Rico,” he said. “Faced with this news that certainly affects and lacerates the confidence of our people, I reiterate that in my administration, we will continue to have a common front with federal authorities against anyone who commits an improper act, no matter where it comes from or who it may implicate.”

Vázquez previously served as the island’s justice secretary and a district attorney for more than 30 years.

She became governor after Puerto Rico’s Supreme Court ruled that the swearing in of Pierluisi — who had only been nominated as secretary of state — as governor was unconstitutional. Vázquez at the time said she was not interested in running for office and would only finish the nearly two years left in Rosselló’s term.

Rosselló had resigned in late July 2019 after tens of thousands of Puerto Ricans took to the street, angry over corruption, mismanagement of public funds and an obscenity-laced chat in which he and 11 other men including public officials made fun of women, gay people and victims of Hurricane Maria, among others.

Shortly after she was sworn in, Vázquez told the AP that her priorities were to fight corruption, secure federal hurricane recovery funds and help lift Puerto Rico out of a deep economic crisis as the government struggled to emerge from bankruptcy.

During the interview, she told the AP that she had long wanted to be in public service: as a girl, she would stand on her balcony and hold imaginary trials, always finding the supposed defendants guilty.

Nuclear threats are increasing – here's how the US should prepare for a nuclear event


Cham Dallas, University Professor Department of Health Policy & Management, University of Georgia
Thu, August 4, 2022 

THE CONVERSATION

A visitor to the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum views a photo of the aftermath of the 1945 bombing. Carl Court/Getty Images

Because several generations have passed since the atomic bombings at Hiroshima and Nagasaki – the only use of nuclear weapons in warfare – some may think the threat from nuclear weapons has receded. But international developments, including nuclear threats from Russia in the war in Ukraine, have brought a broader awareness of the vulnerability to global peace from nuclear events.

I’ve been studying the effects of nuclear events – from detonations to accidents – for over 30 years. This has included my direct involvement in research, teaching and humanitarian efforts in multiple expeditions to Chernobyl- and Fukushima-contaminated areas. Now I am involved in the proposal for the formation of a Nuclear Global Health Workforce, which I proposed in 2017.

Such a group could bring together nuclear and nonnuclear technical and health professionals for education and training, and help to meet the preparedness, coordination, collaboration and staffing requirements necessary to respond to a large-scale nuclear crisis.

What would this workforce need to be prepared to manage? For that we can look back at the legacy of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, as well as nuclear accidents like Chernobyl and Fukushima.

What happens when a nuclear device is detonated over a city?

Approximately 135,000 and 64,000 people died, respectively, in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The great majority of deaths happened in the first days after the bombings, mainly from thermal burns, severe physical injuries and radiation.

The great majority of doctors and nurses in Hiroshima were killed and injured, and therefore unable to assist in the response. This was largely due to the concentration of medical personnel and facilities in inner urban areas. This exact concentration exists today in the majority of American cities, and is a chilling reminder of the difficulty in medically responding to nuclear events.

What if a nuclear device were detonated in an urban area today? I explored this issue in a 2007 study modeling a nuclear weapon attack on four American cities. As in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the majority of deaths would happen soon after the detonation, and the local health care response capability would be largely eradicated.

Models show that such an event in an urban area in particular will not only destroy the existing public health protections but will, most likely, make it extremely difficult to respond, recover and rehabilitate them.

Very few medical personnel today have the skills or knowledge to treat the kind and the quantity of injuries a nuclear blast can cause. Health care workers would have little to no familiarity with the treatment of radiation victims. Thermal burns would require enormous resources to treat even a single patient, and a large number of patients with these injuries will overwhelm any existing medical system. There would also be a massive number of laceration injuries from the breakage of virtually all glass in a wide area.

Getting people out of the blast and radiation contamination zones

A major nuclear event would create widespread panic, as large populations would fear the spread of radioactive materials, so evacuation or sheltering in place must be considered.

For instance, within a few weeks after the Chernobyl accident, more than 116,000 people were evacuated from the most contaminated areas of Ukraine and Belarus. Another 220,000 people were relocated in subsequent years.

The day after the Fukushima earthquake and tsunami, over 200,000 people were evacuated from areas within 20 kilometers (12 miles) of the nuclear plant because of the fear of the potential for radiation exposure.

The evacuation process in Russia, Ukraine, Belarus and Japan was plagued by misinformation, inadequate and confusing orders and delays in releasing information. There was also trouble evacuating everyone from the affected areas. Elderly and infirm residents were left in areas near radioactive contamination, and many others moved unnecessarily from uncontaminated areas (resulting in many deaths from winter conditions). All of these troubles lead to a loss of public trust in the government.

However, an encouraging fact about nuclear fallout (and not generally known) is that the actual area that will receive dangerous levels of radioactive fallout is actually only a fraction of the total area in a circle around the detonation zone. For instance, in a hypothetical low-yield (10 kiloton) nuclear bomb over Washington, D.C., only limited evacuations are planned. Despite projections of 100,000 fatalities and about 150,000 casualties, the casualty-producing radiation plume would actually be expected to be confined to a relatively small area. (Using a clock-face analogy, the danger area would typically take up only a two-hour slot on the circle around the detonation, dictated by wind: for example, 2-4 o'clock.)

People upwind would not need to take any action, and most of those downwind, in areas receiving relatively small radiation levels (from the point of view of being sufficient to cause radiation-related health issues), would need to seek only “moderate shelter.” That means basically staying indoors for a day or so or until emergency authorities give further instructions.

The long-term effects of radiation exposure

The Radiation Effects Research Foundation, which was established to study the effects of radiation on survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, has been tracking the health effects of radiation for decades.

According to the Radiation Effects Research Foundation, about 1,900 excess cancer deaths can be attributed to the atomic bombs, with about 200 cases of leukemia and 1,700 solid cancers. Japan has constructed very detailed cancer screenings after Hiroshima, Nagasaki and Fukushima.

But the data on many potential health effects from radiation exposure, such as birth defects, are actually quite different from the prevailing public perception, which has been derived not from validated science education but from entertainment outlets (I teach a university course on the impact of media and popular culture on disaster knowledge).

While it has been shown that intense medical X-ray exposure has accidentally produced birth defects in humans, there is doubt about whether there were birth defects in the descendants of Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bomb survivors. Most respected long-term investigations have concluded there are no statistically significant increases in birth defects resulting in atomic bomb survivors.

Looking at data from Chernobyl, where the release of airborne radiation was 100 times as much as Hiroshima and Nagasaki combined, there is a lack of definitive data for radiation-induced birth defects.

A wide-ranging WHO study concluded that there were no differences in rates of mental retardation and emotional problems in Chernobyl radiation-exposed children compared to children in control groups. A Harvard review on Chernobyl concluded that there was no substantive proof regarding radiation-induced effects on embryos or fetuses from the accident. Another study looked at the congenital abnormality registers for 16 European regions that received fallout from Chernobyl and concluded that the widespread fear in the population about the possible effects of radiation exposure on the unborn fetus was not justified.

Indeed, the most definitive Chernobyl health impact in terms of numbers was the dramatic increase of elective abortions near and at significant distances from the accident site.

In addition to rapid response and evacuation plans, a Nuclear Global Health Workforce could help health care practitioners, policymakers, administrators and others understand myths and realities of radiation. In the critical time just after a nuclear crisis, this would help officials make evidence-based policy decisions and help people understand the actual risks they face.

What’s the risk of another Hiroshima or Nagasaki?

Today, the risk of a nuclear exchange – and its devastating impact on medicine and public health worldwide – has only escalated compared to previous decades. Nine countries are known to have nuclear weapons, and international relations are increasingly volatile. The U.S. and Russia are heavily investing in the modernization of their nuclear stockpiles, and China, India and Pakistan are rapidly expanding the size and sophistication of their nuclear weapon capabilities. The developing technological sophistication among terrorist groups and the growing global availability and distribution of radioactive materials are also especially worrying.

In recent years, a number of government and private organizations have held meetings (all of which I attended) to devise large-scale medical responses to a nuclear weapon detonation in the U.S. and worldwide. They include the National Academy of Sciences, the National Alliance for Radiation Readiness, National Disaster Life Support Foundation, Society for Disaster Medicine and Public Health, and the Radiation Injury Treatment Network, which includes 74 hospitals nationwide actively preparing to receive radiation-exposed patients.

Despite the gloomy prospects of health outcomes of any large-scale nuclear event common in the minds of many, there are a number of concrete steps the U.S. and other countries can take to prepare. It’s our obligation to respond.

This article is an update to an article originally published in 2015 that includes links to more recent research and updated information on the threat of nuclear incidents. It was updated again in August 2022 to add a reference to nuclear threats related to war in Ukraine.

This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts. It was written by: Cham Dallas, University of Georgia.

Read more:

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Cham Dallas has received funding from: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS), through the State of Georgia Division of Public Health (DPH), Georgia Emergency Preparedness (Hospital Preparedness and Ebola Emergency Training) U.S. Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response (ASPR), through the State of Georgia Division of Public Health (DPH), “Georgia Hospital Emergency Preparedness Exercises” U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS), through the Georgia Emergency Management Agency (GEMA), “Veterinary Medicine Training for the AMA Basic Disaster Life Support (BDLS) Curriculum United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), “FSIS/FERN Food Emergency Management Program Cooperative Agreement” U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS)/ Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), “Center for Mass Destruction Defense, a CDC Specialty Center for Public Health Preparedness” U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response (HRSA #BTCDP 05-080), “Bioterrorism Training and Curriculum Development Program He is affiliated with: Senator Max Cleland (D-GA); Senator Sam Nunn (D-GA); Congressman Paul Broun (R-GA); Congressman Jody Hice (R-GA)

77 years ago atomic bomb fueled by Hanford dropped on Japan. Remembering it in Richland

Tri-City Herald staff
Thu, August 4, 2022 

The atomic bombing of Nagasaki, Japan, will be commemorated in Richland with two events, both at 8 p.m. Tuesday, Aug. 9.

The bomb dropped on Nagasaki 77 years ago, helping end World War II, was fueled with plutonium produced at the Hanford nuclear reservation site just north of Richland, Wash.

The Manhattan Project National Historical Park will join with the Pearl Harbor National Memorial for “Lights for Peace” at the fingernail stage off Lee Boulevard in Howard Amon Park.

The national park includes B Reactor at Hanford, which produced plutonium for the nation’s nuclear weapons program starting in World War II.


The Mid-Columbia Mastersingers will perform and visitors can walk a path lit with luminarias for a quiet, contemplative experience based on their personal reasons for participating.

World Citizens for Peace will hold its 40th annual Atomic Cities Peace Memorial ceremony nearby in the Activity Room of the Richland Community Center, 500 Amon Park Drive, in Howard Amon Park.

 In this Dec. 7, 1941, file photo, smoke rises from the battleship USS Arizona as it sinks during a Japanese surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. (AP Photo, File)

The program will include song, comments and prayer focused on remembering the past with hope for the future.

The model of the “Bell of Peace” given to the people of Richland by the mayor of Richland will be rung in memory of Americans who died at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, and the Japanese who died in Nagasaki.

The Bell of Peace was recovered from the ruins near ground zero in Nagasaki and rung each day to console survivors of the atomic bombing.

A photo from the U.S. Signal Corps shows the devastation shortly after an. atomic bomb with Hanford plutonium exploded over Nagasaki, Japan on Aug. 9, 1945.

Atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki left survivors wrestling with spiritual questions – here's how Buddhists and Catholics responded


Yuki Miyamoto, Professor of Religious Studies, DePaul University
Thu, August 4, 2022

THE CONVERSATION

Priests from several religions pray for the victims of the atomic bomb in Nagasaki upon the 60th anniversary. Koichi Kamoshida/Getty Images

It has been over seven decades since the atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki on Aug. 6 and Aug. 9, 1945. The U.S. attack left between 110,000 and 220,000 people dead, and hundreds of thousands more who survived the bomb but suffered its effects – people known in Japan as “hibakusha,” many of whom died of related illnesses.

Yet the production and possession of nuclear weapons has not stopped. In the United States, they hold an important place in the national psyche, regarded as ultimate protection.

For years, hibakusha have shared their testimonies and memories with the public. However, as an ethicist working on nuclear discourses in the U.S. and Japan, I have been frustrated to see that their philosophical, religious and spiritual perspectives on the matter are largely overlooked in English-language literature. Popular culture seems to value their tragic stories, but not their struggle to come to terms with the event.

Religious leaders’ understandings, rooted in their own experiences living in post-atomic Hiroshima and Nagasaki, offer insights into our violent world. At times, their interpretations of the bombings have been used to promote political agendas. Nonetheless, their interpretations allow people today to reconsider the ethics of responsibility in the atomic age.
Punishment from above

Hiroshima, where the first of the two bombs was dropped in Japan, has historically been known for the True Pure Land school of Buddhism, or Shin Buddhism, the largest Buddhist institution in Japan. Its Hiroshima adherents are called “aki monto.”

One of them was Kōji Shigenobu, who grew up to become a Shin Buddhist priest. He and other schoolchildren had been evacuated from the city during the war but lost family members in the inferno. Eventually, he developed a perspective on the bombing that represented many Hiroshima residents’ frame of mind, as I describe in my book “Beyond the Mushroom Cloud.”

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A Japanese man sits in a Buddhist temple in Hiroshima in front of ceremonial boxes containing ashes of victims of the blast. Corbis Historical via Getty Images

In his essay, Kōji viewed the atomic bombing as representing three circles of sins: the sins of Hiroshima residents, of Japanese nationals and of humanity as a whole. He failed to mention that the city was one of Japan’s military bases sending soldiers to occupied lands and battlefields across Asia. However, Kōji criticized Hiroshima citizens as selfish, writing that they had abandoned the injured after the bombing; condemned Japan for its military aggression; and lamented that humans had become warmongers. Such human nature, according to Kōji, invited the atomic bombing.

His critical self-reflection and attempts to go beyond a black-and-white understanding of good and evil – such as Japanese vs. Americans or victims vs. victimizers – may offer an insightful perspective on how to escape cycles of violence.

On the other hand, his understanding of Buddhist doctrine, which interpreted a particular historical incident as a universal sin of humankind, may have diverted attention from the Japanese government’s responsibility. Moreover, it exonerated the U.S. of its responsibility for using indiscriminate weapons – which continued to be tested and produced in the U.S. mainland and its territories.
Sacrificial lambs

Nagasaki, about 200 miles west of Hiroshima, has a long history of Catholicism. In the 16th century, in many parts of the Japanese archipelagos, local lords converted to Christianity, leading to mass conversions in their domains. But the following 250 years saw foreign priests expelled and converts persecuted for their faith.

Even after Christianity was forbidden, as worship of a “foreign” god, political leaders viewed Catholics as posing a high risk to the stability of the country. Hence, the Catholic community in Nagasaki, which clandestinely carried on its faith, was forced to live next to that of the “burakumin,” a social group that was traditionally outcast as “untouchables.”

This history helps to explain the particular interpretation presented by one Catholic convert, a medical doctor and professor in Nagasaki: Nagai Takashi.

Three months after the bombing, a requiem Mass for the dead was held at the site of the Urakami Cathedral, the closest landmark to the center of the blast, and Nagai was asked to deliver a speech. He crafted his remarks on a conversation he had with a former student who was agonized by people telling him that he lost his family and community because of his faith in a foreign god, disrespecting Japanese gods and the emperor.

A child hurt in the atomic bomb blast at Hiroshima, Japan, receives care from her mother and a nurse’s aide. Corbis Historial via Getty Images

In the speech, Nagai responded that those killed by the bombs were sacrificial lambs, chosen by God because of their unblemished nature. Thanks to their sacrifice, he noted, the war ended – whereas those who survived, like him, had to endure defeat and destruction. Nagai portrayed the hardships as an entrance exam to heaven to reunite with loved ones.

Perhaps it is understandable that the Nagasaki Catholics, whose history is rife with persecution and martyrdom, embraced Nagai’s message to help them come to terms with the loss of their loved ones. And it is not entirely far off from the Catholic approach to theodicy – the question of why God allows human suffering.

Like Kōji’s interpretation, however, this one could invite a victim-blaming attitude, disregarding the effort to assign responsibility to the actual perpetrators. If their message of self-critical reflection had been adopted not by the victims alone, but also by those who inflicted the harm, perhaps the world could have avoided creating more victims from the production and tests of nuclear weapons.

On this anniversary, we should remember not only those who suffered from the atomic bombing in Japan – including 12 American prisoners of war, other POWs and people from Japan’s colonies in the Korean Peninsula. We should remember all who have suffered the effects of this atomic age, including uranium miners in New Mexico, Americans living downwind of test sites in Nevada and Washington state, and citizens of the Marshall Islands.

This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts. It was written by: Yuki Miyamoto, DePaul University.

Read more:

Operation Gunnerside: The Norwegian attack on heavy water that deprived the Nazis of the atomic bomb

Japan’s Shinto religion is going global and attracting online followers

Yuki Miyamoto receives funding from DePaul University's Humanity Center fellowship, DePaul's University Council Research summer grant, and a board member of an NPO group, named CORE (Consequences of Radiation Exposure), founded by Hanford downwinders.

Clergy, bags of cash set off new sectarian brawl in Lebanon


 - A former soldier with the South Lebanon Army who fled to Israel picks up his daughter, holding a cross and an olive tree branch, as they look at the Israel-Lebanon border guarded by Israeli soldiers, near the northern Israeli town of Metula, Aug. 15, 2000. The brief detention of a Lebanese archbishop who was caught with more than $450,000 in cash as he crossed from Israel to Lebanon is further stoking sectarian tensions in his crisis-hit homeland. The archbishop says he was carrying donations from exiled Lebanese Christians in northern Israel to relatives in Lebanon. 

AP Photo/Yaron Kaminsky, 

KAREEM CHEHAYEB
Wed, August 3, 2022 

BEIRUT (AP) — A Lebanese archbishop who carried more than $460,000 from Israel to Lebanon is at the center of the latest sectarian showdown in crisis-hit Lebanon, and the case could even spill over into presidential politics.

The situation has ramped up discord between two powerful political camps: Lebanon’s Shiite Muslim Hezbollah group and the Maronite Church.

The clergyman was briefly detained last month by Lebanese border agents who confiscated 20 suitcases stuffed with cash and medicine, arguing he violated Lebanon's strict laws against normalization with Israel.

Hezbollah's opponents say the Iran-backed group has sway over Lebanese institutions and security agencies, and have used them to target the Maronite Church. The archbishop, Moussa el-Hajj, is a senior member of the Maronite Church, whose patriarch has become increasingly critical of the Iran-backed Hezbollah and its growing influence in Lebanon.

Much of the Christian community saw the archbishop’s detention as an attack on the church.

In a sermon late last month, Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rai denounced the legal proceedings against el-Hajj as a fabrication, arguing that the money was for charity. He demanded that the charges be dropped and that the military judge who presides over the case resign.

Al-Rai was met with a standing ovation and protesters gathered the following week at his summer residence to rally in support of the church.

Underlying the dispute are decades of hostile relations between Israel and Lebanon. The two countries have formally been at war since Israel's founding in 1948, and Lebanon has tough anti-normalization laws on the books. The border remains closed, though several top Lebanese Christian officials have permission to cross on occasion to visit their flock in Israel, the Palestinian territories and Jordan.

On July 20, Lebanese border agents held el-Hajj for eight hours after he returned from Israel with 20 suitcases of medicine and cash. El-Hajj said he was delivering money and assistance from Lebanese Christians in northern Israel to their relatives in the cash-strapped country. The agents confiscated the money, the medicine, el-Hajj’s cellphone and passport.

Hezbollah officials saw el-Hajj's act as normalization with Israel and accused him of delivering money from Lebanese affiliated with a militia that once fought alongside Israel.

Thousands of Lebanese moved to Israel after it ended an 18-year occupation of parts of southern Lebanon in 2000. Many of those who fled to Israel were linked to the main pro-Israeli militia in the region, the South Lebanon Army, which collapsed after Israeli troops withdrew.

The case could have wider political implications.

The country for months has been without a fully functional government and is expected to hold presidential elections before the end of October.

Under Lebanon’s sectarian power-sharing system, its president must always be a Maronite. Incumbent President Michel Aoun is an ally of Hezbollah, but the Maronite patriarch's increasingly vocal criticism of Hezbollah suggests there is no guarantee the next president will continue an alliance with the militia.

Lebanon’s parliament once had a clear majority for Hezbollah and its allies but since elections in May it now stands neck and neck with some of its staunchest opponents, most notably the Christian Lebanese Forces party.

Most Christian members of parliament and legislators of other sects who oppose Hezbollah rallied to back the archbishop and the Maronite church.

“We agree with everything they have said, whether it’s their calls for removing the judge, or the selectivity in how the archbishop was treated,” said Elias Hankash, a Christian legislator of the Kataeb Party. ”They (Hezbollah officials) shouldn’t just take out their anger on a religious official to send their message to the patriarch.”

Imad Salamey, a political science professor at the Lebanese American University in Beirut, said much is at stake for Hezbollah.

“We’re coming to a presidential election and following that we have to form a new government, and set a government policy to negotiate with the IMF (International Monetary Fund,” he said. “I think Hezbollah wants to send all kinds of messages at the moment, and is determined to show it continues to be the major player among all.”

Hezbollah’s leadership didn’t comment. Its leader Hassan Nasrallah in a recent interview denied the group’s influence in security agencies and the judiciary. “In Lebanon there are laws, and the security agencies take action towards any collaborator or possible collaborator,” he said.

The head of Hezbollah’s block in parliament Mohammad Raad was more explicit, saying the archbishop’s delivery of money and medicine was normalization, which he called a “national betrayal and a crime.”

A person close to el-Hajj's case told The Associated Press that authorities offered to al-Rai to return the archbishop's confiscated passport and phone, but keep the bags of cash and medicine. Al-Rai reportedly refused and the archbishop will not attend any hearings

Meanwhile, poverty deepens for millions of Lebanese, about three-quarters of its population. Rampant power cuts, breadlines and inflation plague households across the country’s mosaic of 18 religious sects following decades of nefarious economic mismanagement and corruption from Lebanon’s ruling parties.

People demand accountability and reform, so divisive political tension could be a good smokescreen, said Mohanad Hage Ali, research fellow at the Carnegie Middle East Center.

“The political class is resorting to the old method of sectarian polarization,” Hage Ali said. “It has been effective, and I think it will continue to be effective.”