Gdansk deal and birth of Poland's Solidarity

THE VATICAN CIA VERSION

Issued on: 29/08/2020 - 12:58

Striking workers at the Lenin shipyard in Gdansk, Poland, on August 20, 1980 

JORMA PUUSA LEHTIKUVA/AFP/File

Warsaw (AFP)

Forty years ago, on August 31, 1980, strikers at Poland's Gdansk shipyard and the communist regime signed an historic deal enabling the creation of Solidarnosc (Solidarity), the Soviet bloc's first independent trade union.

Unthinkable weeks earlier, the Gdansk agreement followed two months of social unrest across the central European country, which was sparked in July by an increase in meat prices.

Protests intensified on August 14, as 17,000 workers at the Lenin shipyard in Gdansk went on strike to demand, among other things, reinstatement of an employee, Anna Walentynowicz, who had been fired. Their demands for trade union freedom spread.


- Lech Walesa: charismatic orator -

Lech Walesa, a 35-year-old electrician at the yard who had been fired four years earlier for activism, scaled the huge site's outer wall and took the lead of the strikers, emerging as a charismatic speaker.

The management gave in very quickly on several points, but the strikers wanted more, and in particular the creation of free unions.

The strike quickly took on a political dimension with the arrival on site of dissident intellectuals, who adopt an advisory role to the strikers.

The workers had in their minds the bloody repression of the strikes of December 1970 -- the uprising at the Gdansk shipyards had led to the fall of the leader of the Communist Party, Wladyslaw Gomulka.

They were also well aware of the intervention by the Soviet leaders of the communist bloc in 1956 in Hungary and in 1968 in Czechoslovakia.

But they were spurred on by the legendary words "be not afraid" spoken a year earlier by Polish pope, John Paul II, during a visit to Warsaw, capital of the deeply Catholic country.

On August 17, the Interfactory Strike Committee (MKS) led by Walesa said 191 workplaces were on strike. By the end of the protests they would total 700.

Day and night the families and supporters pressed themselves against the closed gates of the shipyard bearing food, drinks, flowers and offering moral support.

Holy images lined the outer walls of the industrial site. Across the country masses were held in support of the strike.

"There was something behind our struggle, something like the will of God, in particular concerning my own role," Walesa, a staunch Catholic, would later say.

On August 22, deputy prime minister Mieczyslaw Jagielski headed a government delegation to Gdansk to negotiate. The talks were broadcast to the shipyard by loudspeakers.

- Accord on independent trades union -

On August 31, an AFP bulletin wrote of "an agreement between the authorities and the strike committee in Gdansk, Walesa announced".

On television Walesa then declared the end of the strike. He burst into the national anthem, with the deputy prime minister singing along with him.

"We have not got everything we wanted. But we have got what was possible in the current situation. And we will get the rest later," Walesa said.

The accord authorised an independent union -- a first in the entire Soviet bloc -- provided for the right to strike, a limit on censorship, salary increases, the broadcast of a Sunday mass on radio-television and the freeing of political prisoners.

"Up to now there was an understanding, in Poland as in all the other socialist countries, that the working class, being itself in power, had no reason to go on strike, nor to set up unions independent of the party it represents," AFP wrote at the time.

Signing of the agreement took place "in the shipyard's big conference room, decorated with a crucifix and a bust of Lenin, under the rattle of flashes and the roaring of television cameras from several countries," AFP reported. Walesa signed the document with a pen bearing the effigy of the pope.

The final negotiations were followed "by workers clumped together around the shipyard's loudspeakers, sitting on a pile of bricks, perched on makeshift benches," AFP wrote.

Some 18 months later, General Wojciech Jaruzelski decreed martial law to ban the union, which had managed to unite 10 million members.

Tens of thousands of union activists were arrested, including Walesa, who was detained for 11 months.

The union continued its activities underground before being legalised in 1989 as the communist bloc crumbled.

In October 1983 Walesa received the Nobel Peace Prize, before being elected president of Poland in 1990 at the country's first democratic election.

© 2020 AFP

Pence Praised A DHS Officer Killed During A Protest. He Didn't Mention He Was Allegedly Killed By A Far-Right Extremist.

Dave Patrick Underwood was allegedly killed by a gunman with ties to right-wing extremists during protests against police violence in Oakland.

Posted on August 27, 2020, at 12:16 a.m. ET

Vice President Mike Pence denounced "rioting and looting" while accepting his nomination during the Republican National Convention on Wednesday, but when he pointed to a federal officer killed in Oakland, he failed to mention that officer was allegedly killed by a far-right extremist.

Pence offered a message of "law and order" Wednesday night even as cities across the US continue to face massive protests against police killings of Black people, and attacked the Democratic nominee Joe Biden for not talking about the violence cities have faced.

"President Trump and I will always support the right of Americans to peaceful protest," Pence said. "Rioting and looting is not peaceful protest. Tearing down statues is not free speech. Those that do so will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law."

Pence praised law enforcement and then referenced Dave Patrick Underwood, an officer with the Department of Homeland Security's federal protective service who was shot and killed in May.

"He was shot and killed during the riots in Oakland, California," Pence said. "Dave's heroism is emblematic of the heroes that serve in blue every day."

The vice president's claim seemed to insinuate Underwood was killed as a result of or even at the hands of Oakland demonstrators who were marching against police brutality. What Pence didn't acknowledge, however, was that the suspect behind Underwood's killing is believed to have been a member of the right-wing extremist "boogaloo" movement and that, according to federal prosecutors, targeted the federal officer and used the cover of the protest hoping to spark anger, civil unrest, and a second Civil War.

But Pence made no mention of the suspected shooter's ties to right-wing extremists, and instead denounced violence that has erupted during Black Lives Matter protests.

"Last week, Joe Biden didn't say one word about the violence and chaos engulfing cities across the country," Pence said. "Let me be clear: The violence must stop — whether in Minneapolis, Portland, or Kenosha. Too many heroes have died defending our freedoms to see Americans strike each other down."

RNC Video Showing Rioters In “Biden’s America” Is Actually Spain

The video is part of a pattern of Trump and his supporters portraying BLM protests as violent.

Jane LytvynenkoBuzzFeed News Reporter
Posted on August 26, 2020, at 8:27 p.m. ET

Republican National Convention / Via youtube.com

On the first night of the Republican National Convention, the party aired a segment featuring Catalina and Madeline Lauf warning of dire consequences if Democratic candidate Joe Biden is elected president.

“This is a taste of Biden’s America,” one sister says in a voiceover as images of protests play onscreen. “The rioting, the crime. Freedom is at stake now and this is going to be the most important election of our lifetime.”

The problem is that one of the images in the segment doesn’t show the US at all — it shows Spain.

As first reported by Catalonian public broadcaster CCMA and independently verified by BuzzFeed News, one of the four images of protests was filmed in October 2019 in Barcelona. Protests broke out in the city after Spanish courts sentenced Catalan separatist activists to prison. The image used during the RNC video showed fires burning in the streets. One of those same streets can be seen as being in Barcelona by using Google Street View.

Other images of protests in the segment show footage of a march in Brooklyn, a car on fire in Chicago, and drone footage of a tree on fire in an intersection in New York. The final, and most striking, shot is the one from Barcelona.


Screenshot / Shutterstock / Via shutterstock.com

BuzzFeed News was able to find identical footage on Shutterstock, a website that’s a common source for stock images and videos. In this case, the Barcelona footage used in the RNC segment is described as “Young rebel riot revolutionary anarchist.” Although that video doesn’t specify the location it was shot in, another angle shot by Getty Images does.

The Trump campaign did not respond to a request for comment.


Screenshot / Shutterstock / Via shutterstock.com

Protests have been raging around the country and the world since May, spurred by the police killing of George Floyd. Protests being portrayed as cities in chaos is a consistent frame from Republicans and the Trump administration, despite people on the ground saying it does not match reality. While some protesters do vandalize property or set fires, people (in Portland, for example) have said that it’s law enforcement exacerbating conflicts.

In some instances, violent actions have been attributed to white supremacists attempting to cause more violence. Yet the portrayal of the protests as violent has also led to armed counterprotesters taking to the streets and resulted in numerous clashes.

In Kenosha, Wisconsin, protests broke out this week after Jacob Blake, a Black man, was shot several times from behind by a police officer while his children watched. During the third night of the Kenosha protests, a gunman carrying a semi-automatic weapon shot three people, two of whom died. The suspect was named as Kyle Howard Rittenhouse, a 17-year-old who supported the pro-police Blue Lives Matter movement and President Donald Trump. In one video, a person believed to be Rittenhouse confirms that he’s holding a lethal weapon. Rittenhouse was sitting in the front row of a Trump rally in January.

'Tips' campaign helped more than 1M in U.S. quit smoking, CDC says

The CDC's 'Tips' campaign has helped inspire more than 1 million smokers to quit, a new analysis found. Photo by StockSnap/Pixabay

Aug. 27 (UPI) -- More than 1 million American adults quit smoking between 2012 and 2018 after seeing messages from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's "Tips From Former Smokers" campaign, according to figures released Wednesday by the agency.

Those who saw public service announcements, or PSAs, created through the initiative were nearly 20% more likely than others to attempt smoking cessation, the data showed.

Up to 40% of smokers attempted to quit after seeing the PSAs, while roughly one-third of smokers who didn't see the messaging attempted to quit during the seven-year periods they aired on television and elsewhere, the agency researchers said.

The findings were published by the CDC's electronic, peer-reviewed journal, Preventing Chronic Diseases.

RELATED One in three U.S. high school students vaped in 2019, CDC says

"This study reinforces that mass media campaigns can increase quits and quit attempts as part of a comprehensive approach to reducing smoking-related disease and premature death in the United States," Rebecca Murphy-Hoefer, lead evaluator of the CDC campaign, told UPI.

"Research shows that emotionally evocative, evidence-based campaigns are effective in raising awareness about the dangers of smoking and encouraging people who smoke to quit," she said.

The CDC launched the national Tips From Former Smokers -- or Tips -- campaign in 2012 to encourage smokers to quit by showing real-life heath consequences of tobacco use and promoting evidence-based resources for quitting.

RELATED U.S. lung cancer rates among Black women now lower than White women

The campaign aired PSAs featuring former smokers and their families on television, as well as online and in print publications.

"Decades of research have demonstrated that more tailored ... promotional messaging will always be more successful than approaches that are less tailored, personalized or relevant to the audience," a spokeswoman for the Truth Initiative, another well-known smoking cessation campaign, told UPI.

"Storytelling and personal narratives are widely regarded as compelling and powerful ways of engaging audiences, [so] it seems natural that testimonials from former smokers could be a meaningful way to persuade others to quit," she said.

RELATED Vaping increases COVID-19 risk among teens, young adults, study finds

Nearly 70 percent of adult smokers say they want to quit, and more than half make a serious quit attempt each year, according to the Truth Initiative.

Although tobacco use has declined in the United States over the past 40 years, more than 30 million Americans still smoke, the CDC estimates, and recent research shows that as many as one in four teens use e-cigarettes.

To assess the the Tips campaign, Murphy-Hoefer and her colleagues with the CDC's Office on Smoking and Health surveyed nearly 10,000 adults who were current and former smokers. Participants were asked about their smoking history and knowledge of the Tips campaign, the researchers said.

Based on participants' exposure to the campaign, it served as the impetus behind more than 16 million quit attempts nationwide between 2012 and 2018, the data showed.

In the end, the campaign helped inspire 1,005,419 adults nationally to successfully quit smoking during the same period, the researchers said.

upi.com/7033819

When hospital patients are moved to a skilled nursing facility, they are too often given a prescription for a high-dose opioid painkiller, new research suggests.

For the study, researchers at the Oregon State University College of Pharmacy looked at nearly 4,400 hospital patients in Portland sent to nursing facilities to receive either short-term rehabilitative care or long-term care in a residential setting.

The investigators found that seven out of 10 of these patients received an opioid prescription when they left the hospital, and most were for oxycodone, or OxyContin.

Over half of the prescriptions dispensed were high-dose -- equivalent to 90 milligrams of morphine or higher -- a threshold that the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention advises doctors to "avoid" prescribing, according to a university news release.

RELATED NSAID painkillers less harmful, just as effective as opioid drugs, studies show

Most of the patients who received an opioid prescription were over 65 years of age, an age group that is highly vulnerable to opioid-associated harm, the study authors noted.

The findings were published online recently in the journal Pharmacoepidemiology and Drug Safety.

The results emphasize the need for more attention to be paid to safely managing the pain of this patient group, the researchers concluded.

RELATED Opioid prescriptions after knee, hip replacement on rise, study finds

"Increased efforts are likely needed to optimize opioid prescribing among patients transitioning from hospitals to skilled nursing facilities," said study author Jon Furuno, an associate professor at the university and the interim chair of the department of pharmacy practice.

Furuno pointed out that patients in nursing facilities may also be undertreated for their pain, showing the complexity of this issue.

"Prescribers and pharmacists need to work together to ensure patients' pain is managed safely, and knowing which patients are most at risk can inform the best use of resources like medication counseling and other interventions," Furuno said.

RELATED 1 in 10 Americans uses a prescription painkiller, CDC says

More information

There's more about opioid safety at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

Copyright 2020 HealthDay. All rights reserved.

Upi.com/7034351

COVID-19 raised mental health issues for people with financial hardships

The pandemic has raised mental distress among many Americans, particularly service workers who have faced financial hardships. Photo by Jesús Rodríguez/Unsplash

Aug. 27 (UPI) -- COVID-19 has highlighted and worsened the mental health challenges faced by those struggling to make ends meet across the United States, experts said Thursday.

Nearly 70% of hourly workers in a "large U.S." city have lost income since the start of the pandemic, and that roughly 60% have lost their jobs, according to a survey conducted by researchers at Duke University and accepted for publication by the journal Pediatrics.

Concerns over financial well-being were among the reasons why up to one-third of all respondents reported "negative moods" some or all of the time since the start of the pandemic, the data showed.
"Back in 2019, we were already seeing there were regular changes to people's work schedules that happened at the last minute and were completely unanticipated -- [and] those work schedule changes have nearly doubled [during the pandemic]," co-author Anna Gassman-Pines said on a call with reporters.

"When you don't know when you're going to be working or for how long, that's creating a tremendous amount of additional stress for these families [because] for hourly workers, if they don't work, they don't have earnings," said Gassman-Pines, an associate professor of public policy psychology at Duke University.

Concerns over the spread of COVID-19 and its impact on American society compounded the stress, researchers at Johns Hopkins University said during another call with reporters Thursday.

For a study published in July by the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, researchers surveyed more than 6,300 adults across the United States between March 10 and 31 -- the early stages of the outbreak in most regions of the country.

Over that three-week period, time spent on social media increased by approximately 50%, from 50 minutes to 76 minutes per day. Survey participants also raised their consumption of "traditional media" print, online and TV news -- by about 33% -- from an average of roughly 2.3 sources to three sources per day, the data showed.

This rise in media consumption was associated with "increased mental distress," the researchers said.

Ongoing research being conducted by the same team has observed an increase in substance abuse generally among American adults since the start of the pandemic, according to Johannes Thrul, an assistant professor in the department of mental health at Johns Hopkins.

Another Johns Hopkins-led study, which will be published in October by the journal Preventive Medicine, found that 15% of nearly 10,000 U.S. adults surveyed in late March had symptoms of "psychological distress," with higher rates reported by those who saw the virus as a "threat" to their personal health and finances.

"This pandemic is impacting our lives in so many ways, socially, financially and in [mental] health," Elizabeth A. Stuart, Bloomberg Professor of American Health at Hopkins, said during the Thursday call.

WE NEED #WAGESFORHOUSEWORK

The Duke researchers surveyed 645 adults working in hourly service-industry positions in retail, food service or hotel industries in an unidentified U.S. city. Nearly half of the participants were Black Americans and 23% were Hispanic Americans, and 83% were women, the researchers said.

The mean annual household income among participants was less than $27,000, the researchers added.

In addition to the disruptions in employment -- and income -- caused by the pandemic, 45% said increased time spent caring for children home from school because closures related to containing the virus were impacting their ability to work and provide for their families, the data showed.
Although some of the "initial spikes" in mental health issues seen at the start of the pandemic have started to flatten, they still haven't returned to pre-COVID levels, said Stuart, of Johns Hopkins. The longer the crisis continues, the more likely it will have an impact on mental health, she said.

All of the researchers agreed some positives emerged, though. The pandemic has highlighted the need to recognize mental distress and address it, either through treatment or by engaging in "self-care," like proper sleep and increased exercise and physical activity, experts said.

In addition, the rise of telemedicine -- consultations with health professionals either by phone or online -- has increased access to mental health services for many people, particularly those in more rural areas, Stuart said.

Access to mental healthcare was an issue for many Americans, particularly the poor, prior to the pandemic, Duke's Gassman-Pines said.

"For low-income folks in the United States in particular, but for all of us, mental health treatment was already difficult to access before the pandemic," she said.

"Can we be thinking about transforming our mental health system [and] long term about really investing in supporting the mental health of the people in our communities?"
upi.com/7033890

Senators call for probe of hydroxychloroquine use in nursing homes


Recent state inspection reports have revealed that nursing homes in Pennsylvania and Texas treated residents with hydroxychloroquine without state authorization and without the informed consent of those it was being administered to. Photo by Caroline Blumberg/EPA-EFE

Aug. 27 (UPI) -- Three Democratic senators on Thursday called for an investigation into the experimental use of hydroxychloroquine in nursing homes to treat COVID-19 patients following reports its was administered to residents without their informed consent and proper approvals.

In a letter sent to Christi Grimm, inspector general of the Department of Health and Human Services, Sens. Bob Casey, D-Pa.; Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., and Ron Wyden, D-Ore.; requested she investigate whether the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services properly monitored the drug's off-label use to treat COVID-19 in nursing homes, whether proper steps were taken to ensure the patients were protected and to see to what extent it was administered without proper approval or consent.

Citing recent state inspector reports, the senators said a Pennsylvania nursing home administered the medicine without proper state approval to 205 of its 435 residents. In Texas, state inspection officials found a nursing home treated a cognitively impaired patient for COVID-19 with hydroxychloroquine without the consent of the individual's guardian.

The senators said that with regular inspections suspended and visits restricted by families and the ombudsman due to the pandemic, other such instances of the drug's improper use may have occurred without notice.

"The use of this experimental treatment on patients without proper approval and without their consent is a violation of patient rights," they wrote.

A drug used to treat Lupus and malaria, hydroxychloroquine gained national attention after President Donald Trump mentioned it as a possible medicine to be used to combat COVID-19 in March and in May said that he was taking the experimental treatment.

The senators have called for Grimm to investigate whether nursing homes received informed consent to administer the drug, whether staff tracked and reported adverse effects caused by the drug, whether CMS acted to ensure the nursing homes followed all Medicare and Medicaid requirements and whether

They also sent letters to the heads of the Food and Drug Administration and CMS requesting information concerning hydroxychloroquine.

In the letter, the senators accused the Trump administration of issuing "misleading statements" concerning hydroxychloroquine, stating it is "doubling down" on its promotion of it early in the pandemic despite growing scientific evidence demonstrating it is not an effective treatment against COVID-19.

"This mixed messaging from the administration, coupled with an absence of clear guidance, has led to the drug's continued use, even after the FDA issued warnings about its safety," the letter to Stephen Hahn of the Food and Drug Administration said.

U.N. chief Antonio Guterres urges India to end use of coal

Haze from air pollution is seen in New Delhi, India. Guterres said Friday that investments in clean energy in India can create millions of jobs and expand electricity access to hundreds of millions.

Aug. 28 (UPI) -- United Nations Secretary-general Antonio Guterres called on India Friday to stop using coal as a source of affordable energy, saying it must end the fossil fuel if it truly wants to be a global superpower.

Guterres made his comments virtually during the annual Darbari Seth Memorial Lecture.

The U.N. chief said India needs to cease building any new coal-fired plants after 2020 and begin phasing it out altogether. He said India is in an ideal position to profit economically and fight climate change.

"Investments in renewable energy, clean transport and energy efficiency during the recovery from the [COVID-19] pandemic could extend electricity access to 270 million people worldwide -- fully a third of the people that currently lack it," Guterres said.

"These same investments could help create 9 million jobs annually over the next three years. Investments in renewable energy generate three times more jobs than investments in polluting fossil fuels."

Guterres added that nations like Britain, South Korea and Germany, plus the European Union, have all increased the pace of removing carbon emissions from their economies.

"They are shifting from unsustainable fossil fuels to clean and efficient renewables, and investing in energy storage solutions, such as green hydrogen," he said. "And it is not just developed economies stepping up. Many in the developing world are leading by example -- countries such as Nigeria, which has recently reformed its fossil fuel subsidy framework."

Navroz Dubash, a professor at the Center for Policy Research, said a departure from coal in one of the largest nations on Earth would be difficult.

"Instead of more targets and pledges, India needs to actively plan to hasten and smoothen the path from coal to renewable energy," Dubash said. "This means planning for new livelihood opportunities in coal mining areas to ensure a just transition, ensuring the robustness of the grid, and making sure the costs of transition are not borne by poor consumers."

Amnesty Int'l: India police 'indulged' in violence, torture during protests

A riot police officer is seen among debris at an area that was damaged by clashes between activists and police officers in New Delhi, India, on February 27. Activists protested a controversial citizenship law that offers amnesty to refugees from neighboring nations. File Photo by EPA-EFE

Aug. 28 (UPI) -- Amnesty International on Friday accused police in India of human rights violations in dealing with activists during mass demonstrators this year that resulted in more than 50 deaths, mostly among minority Muslims.

The protests in February opposed a controversial citizenship law in India that offers amnesty to refugees from neighboring nations, as long as they aren't Muslim. The law angered many in India's largest minority religious community


Amnesty International India said in a 20-page report Friday that it examined claims from dozens of activists, witnesses, attorneys and police officers.

"[Our] investigation has documented several human rights violations committed by the Delhi police," the report states. "These violations include Delhi police officers indulging in violence with the rioters; torturing in custody; using excessive force on protesters; dismantling protest sites used by peaceful protesters and being mute bystanders as rioters wreaked havoc."
The organization said it used open-source and digital investigation tools to corroborate the videos, and called on India's government to begin an impartial investigation.

Avinash Kumar, executive director of Amnesty International India, said there have been no efforts yet to punish officers who might have acted with excessive and unnecessary force.

"The Delhi police report to the Union Ministry of Home Affairs and it is shocking that there has been no attempt by the MHA to hold the Delhi police accountable [until] now," Kumar said in a statement.

"This, despite several of their violations being live-streamed on social media platforms. There have been several news and fact-finding reports published during these six months documenting the violations."

Dolphin die-offs on the rise in Mauritius following oil spill

A man holds open the mouth of a dead Melon-headed whale on Thursday. Marine animals including dolphins, fish and crabs have been found dead following an oil spill involving a Japanese-owned ship off the coast of Mauritius. File Photo by Laura Morosoli/EPA-EFE

Aug. 27 (UPI) -- Dead dolphins are washing onshore in Mauritius following a massive oil spill involving a Japanese-owned ship in July.

As many as 18 dolphins have been found dead along the coast of the island country, prompting calls for an investigation, Al Jazeera reported.

"This is a deeply sad and alarming day for the people of Mauritius," said Happy Khambule, the senior climate and energy campaign manager for Greenpeace Africa, on Wednesday.

"Greenpeace appeals to the authorities to carry out a swift, transparent and public autopsy on the bodies collected."

The ship MV Wakashio, was carrying about 3,800 tons of fuel oil when it ran aground. The vessel struck coral reef on the southeast coast of Mauritius on July 25.

Oil began to leak on Aug. 6. The ship later broke in half, spilling 1,000 tons of fuel oil.

Opinion is divided over whether the oil spill is responsible for the deaths of the dolphins.

Mauritius' fisheries minister said that "at first glance" the deaths appear to be unconnected to the oil, the BBC reported.

Oceanographer Vassen Kauppaymuthoo, who works with coastal fishing communities to prepare for climate change, said the dolphins smelled of fuel.

"In my opinion, this situation will continue to deteriorate as time goes on," Kauppaymuthoo said, according to local media in Mauritius.

Residents of Mauritius say they are devastated by the news of the dead dolphins. Fish and crabs have also been discovered dead by locals.

"Waking up this morning to witness so many dead dolphins on our seashore is worse than a nightmare," said Nitin Jeeha, according to the BBC. "I have seen around eight to 10 dead dolphins. Are there more in the lagoon?"