AP Source: NFL to play Black anthem before national anthem

“Lift Ev’ry Voice and Sing” will be performed live or played before “The Star-Spangled Banner” prior to each NFL game during Week 1 and the league is considering putting names of victims of police brutality on helmet decals or jersey patches, a person familiar with the discussions told The Associated Press.

The person said the league is working collaboratively with players to recognize victims of systemic racism throughout the season in a variety of ways. The person spoke to the AP on Thursday on condition of anonymity because discussions between the league and the NFL Players Association are ongoing.

Lift Ev’ry Voice and Sing” is traditionally known as the Black anthem. It’ll be played first when the Super Bowl champion Kansas City Chiefs host the Houston Texans to kick off the NFL regular season on Sept. 10.

REALLY I THOUGHT THIS WAS THE BLACK AMERICAN ANTHEM 

AFTER WHICH THEY COULD PLAY HENDRIX VERSION OF STAR SPANGLED BANNER


JIMI'S BLACK LIFE MATTERED 
VERSION BY STEVIE RAY VAUGHN

Belgium takes down statue, king regrets colonial violence

THE ACT OF CUTTING OFF THE HAND, USED IN RWANDA WAS INTRODUCED BY THE KING OF BELGIUM AS A SOLUTION TO SLAVE REVOLTS IN 19TH CENTURY CONGO

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A bust of Belgium's King Leopold II, is hoisted off of its plinth by a crane as it's removed from a park in Ghent, Belgium on Tuesday, June 30, 2020. Protests sweeping the world after George Floyd's death in the U.S. have added fuel to a movement to confront Europe's role in the slave trade and its colonial past. Leopold II is increasingly seen as a stain on the nation where he reigned from 1865 to 1909 with some demonstrators calling for his removal from public view. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)

BRUSSELS (AP) — Belgium confronted its colonial past and looked toward reconciliation Tuesday, with the king expressing regret for the violence carried out by the country when it ruled over what is now Congo. Later in the day, the bust of a former monarch held responsible for the death of millions of Africans was taken off public display.

As Belgium marked the 60th anniversary of the end of its colonial rule in Congo, King Philippe’s words had resounding significance since none of his predecessors went so far as to convey remorse.

In a letter to the Congolese president, Felix Tshisekedi, Philippe stopped short of issuing a formal apology, but proclaimed his “deepest regrets” for the “acts of violence and cruelty” and the “suffering and humiliation” inflicted on Belgian Congo.

The removal of King Leopold II’s statue took place only hours after Philippe’s letter was published. The monarch, who ruled Belgium from 1865-1909, plundered Congo as if it were his personal fiefdom, forcing many of its people into slavery to extract resources for his own profit.

The early years after he laid claim to the African country are especially infamous for killings, forced labor and other forms of brutality that some experts estimate left as many as 10 million Congolese dead.

Following a short ceremony punctuated by readings, Leopold’s bust in Ghent was attached to a crane with a strap and taken away from the small park where it stood amid applause. It will be transferred to a warehouse of a Ghent city museum pending further decision from a city’s commission in charge of decolonization projects.

“Removing statues does not erase history, it rectifies history and makes new history that rightly calls into question dominant narratives,” said Mathieu Charles, an activist from the Belgian Network for Black Lives.

Belgium has long struggled to come to terms with its colonial past, instead focusing on the so-called positive aspects of the colonization. But the international protests against racism that followed the May 25 death of George Floyd in the United States have given a new momentum to activists fighting to have monuments to Leopold removed.

Earlier this month, about 10,000 people gathered in Brussels despite the social distancing measures implemented to fight the spread of COVID-19, with many protesters chanting anti-colonialist slogans.

The Leopold statue in Ghent was vandalized several times in the past and again after Floyd, a handcuffed Black man, died after a white Minneapolis police officer knelt on his neck. Several other monuments of the former king scattered across Belgium were defaced over the past few weeks and a statue of the monarch in the port of Antwerp was removed from a marketplace by local authorities.

Meanwhile, regional authorities also promised history course reforms to better explain the true character of colonialism while the federal Parliament decided that a commission would look into Belgium’s colonial past.

Belgium Prime minister Sophie Wilmes has called for “an in-depth” debate conducted “without taboo.”

“In 2020, we must be able to look at this shared past with lucidity and discernment,” she said Tuesday. “Any work of truth and memory begins with the recognition of suffering. Acknowledging the suffering of the other.”

After Leopold’s claimed ownership of Congo ended in 1908, he handed it over to the Belgian state, which continued to rule over the colony 75 times Belgium’s size until the African nation became independent in 1960.

In his letter Philippe stressed the “common achievements” reached by Belgium and its former colony, but also the painful episodes of their unequal relationship.

“At the time of the independent State of the Congo, acts of violence and cruelty were committed that still weigh on our collective memory,” Philippe wrote, referring to the period when the country was privately ruled by Leopold II from 1885 to 1908.

“The colonial period that followed also caused suffering and humiliation,” Philippe acknowledged. “I want to express my most deepest regrets for these wounds of the past, the pain of which is today revived by discrimination that is all too present in our societies,”

Philippe also congratulated Tshisekedi on the anniversary of Congo’s independence, ruing that he was not able to attend the celebrations to which he had been invited due to the coronavirus pandemic.

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Women taken from African mothers by Belgium now want redress

IMPERIALIST PRACTICE USED AGAINST ALL INDIGENOUS POPULATIONS WHERE COLONIALISM EXISTS

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In this photo taken on Monday, June 29, 2020, clockwise from top left, Simone Ngalula, Monique Bitu Bingi, Lea Tavares Mujinga, Noelle Verbeeken and Marie-Jose Loshi pose for a group photo during an interview with The Associated Press in Brussels. Five women who were taken from their families as children in Belgian Congo and placed in a religious mission run by Catholic nuns have filed a lawsuit seeking reparations from Belgium. The women were among thousands of biracial children seized from their mothers and separated from their African roots by Belgian authorities ruling over the area from 1908-1960. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)NEDER-OVER-HEEMBEEK, Belgium (AP) — Monique Bitu Bingi was only 4 years old when she was taken from her family in Belgian Congo and locked up in a religious mission run by Catholic nuns. Her friend Lea Tavares Mujinga was even younger the day her mother was forced to give her up: just a 2-year-old toddler.

Born from a white settler father and a Black mother — and despised because of their biracial heritage — both girls were seized from their mothers and separated from their African roots by Belgian authorities that ruled over the area from 1908-1960.

During colonial times, they, like thousands of other biracial children known as “métis,” were taken away and raised in Belgian institutions as the colonial power promoted a strict separation of white and Black people and systematically tried to prevent interracial unions.

At the St. Vincent de Paul sisters’ mission, they went through years of deprivation and abuse that have left indelible scars.

“We have been destroyed, both morally and psychologically,” Bitu Bingi told The Associated Press on Monday, the eve of the 60th anniversary of Congo’s independence on June 30, 1960. “We have lost our identities. Excuses are not enough.”

Now in their 70s, Bitu Bingi and Tavares Mujinga want reparations. Along with three other biracial women born between 1945 and 1950 in the African country, they have filed a lawsuit in Brussels targeting the Belgian state for crimes against humanity.

Their complaint comes amid growing demands that Belgium reassess its colonial past. In the wake of protests against racial inequality in the United States, several statues of King Leopold II, who is blamed for the deaths of millions of Africans during Belgium’s colonial rule, have been vandalized and a petition has demanded that Belgium remove all of his statues.

Last year, the Belgian government apologized for the state’s role in taking thousands of babies from their African mothers. And for the first time in the country’s history, a reigning king expressed regret Tuesday for the violence carried out by the former colonial power. In a letter to Congolese President Felix Tshisekedi, Belgium’s King Philippe conveyed his “deepest regrets” for the “acts of violence and cruelty” and “suffering and humiliation” inflicted on Belgian Congo.

Bitu Bingi, Tavares Mujinga and the three other women now live in Belgium and France after emigrating from Congo and have requested compensation of 50,000 euros ($55,000) each but are are also seeking broad reparations for all children seized from their mothers and placed in institutions during the colonial era.

“There were official documents from the administration, it’s a state crime that was organized by the Belgian colonial administration,” said Christophe Marchand, a lawyer representing the women.

Tavares Mujinga said she was taken away from her family while her father, a Portuguese man who worked in the cotton industry, had left the country for a holiday. Bitu Bingi’s father worked for the Belgian administration.

According to legal documents, in all five cases the fathers did not exercise parental authority and the Belgian administration threatened the children’s Congolese families with reprisals if they refused to let them go.

Time has passed since the five women were forced to cut ties with their relatives, but the trauma they went through has never been fully addressed, and their pain remains immense. None of them have ever received psychological assistance.

“When we talk about it, we cry,” Noelle Verbeeken, one of the five plaintiffs, told the AP on the outskirts of Brussels.

“We have no identity. We don’t know where we come from. ... We are nothing. Just the ‘children of sin,’” Verbeeken said, quoting the expression used to describe the children when they arrived at the religious mission in the Congolese town of Katende. There, Tavares Mujinga was reunited with her older brother, who had been seized a few years earlier.

The women lived in the mission with 20 other biracial children and Black orphans in very harsh conditions. Bitu Bingi recalls that food was scarce, and rare were the days when she could properly wash.

“We did not know how chicken tasted. And one of the doors of our dormitory was overlooking the morgue,” she said.

The girls did receive an education. Tavares Mujinga, who went on to marry a Belgian airplane pilot, became a primary teacher while Verbeeken studied Greek humanities and became a nurse.

“They wanted to make nuns out of us. We had other plans,” Bitu Bingi said.

The women’s traumatic journey took a turn for the worse several months after independence, when they and the other children were abandoned by both the Belgian authorities and the Catholic Church. The nuns and other mission personnel were evacuated amid political upheaval and the children were left on their own.

“There was no room for us,” Bitu Bingi said, recalling mutilated bodies around the mission during the post-independence unrest.

She doesn’t dwell on the sexual abuse and rape by Congolose militia fighters after the nuns left that is described in the lawsuit, which says the militiamen sent to the abandoned mission to look after the young girls molested them instead. Bitu Bingi was only 11.

To this day, she says she can’t help but think of the militia trucks whenever she hears the sound of a truck engine.

She found solace during a trip to South America decades later after finding out that her father had emigrated to Argentina to start a new life. She traveled there and finally met that branch of her family, a trip she said eased her suffering.

“My father was already dead, but I received a warm welcome,” she said.

Bitu Bingi and the women she calls “sisters” now hope their lawsuit will lead Belgium to finally recognize its responsibility in their suffering and in the pain of the thousands of other children who were snatched away.

“What we expect, and what they expect, is a reparation law, a strong decision,” said Jehosheba Bennett, another lawyer for the women. “Telling the stories of what happened during the colonization is really important, because now there is not much awareness about this.”

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Union tells actors not to work on pandemic film “Songbird”
 In this March 8, 2020 file photo, Michael Bay attends the world premiere of "A Quiet Place Part II" in New York. The union that represents film actors is telling its members not to work on the pandemic thriller “Songbird," one of the first films in production after coronavirus closures. The Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Actors issued a do not work order Thursday, saying the filmmakers have not been transparent about safety protocols and had not signed the proper agreements with the union. The movie, produced by Michael Bay and directed by Adam Mason, had reportedly been preparing its actors remotely under locked down conditions for the shoot. (Photo by Charles Sykes/Invision/AP, File)

LOS ANGELES (AP) — The union that represents film actors told its members Thursday not to work on the upcoming pandemic thriller “Songbird,” saying the filmmakers have not been up-front about safety measures and had not signed the proper agreements for the movie that is among the first in production after coronavirus closures.

Actors had reportedly been rehearsing remotely for the film produced by Michael Bay and directed by Adam Mason.

The film’s pre-production listing on IMDbPro.com says its stars include Demi Moore, Peter Stormare and Craig Robinson, and gives the description, “In a post-pandemic world, an even more serious virus continues to mutate.”

But the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Actors issued a do-not-work order to its members, saying the production company “has failed to complete the signatory process,” and working on the film could result in disciplinary action.

“The producers have not been transparent about their safety protocols and that is something we obviously take very seriously,” a SAG-AFTRA spokesperson said in a statement. “Also, as noted in the Do Not Work order, the producers have not yet become signatory to our agreement. We have no further comment.”

The small film was among the first to attempt to resume production after the long closure. California Gov. Gavin Newsom gave film and television productions the green light to resume shooting in the state starting June 12, so long as strict coronavirus restrictions were in place.

Messages seeking comment from the film’s production companies and representatives for Bay and Mason were not immediately returned.

One of the companies, Invisible Narrative, told Deadline, “We are actively working to resolve this paperwork issue with the guild.”

Fish more vulnerable to warming water than first thought

This 2014 microscope photo provided by Dr. F. Dahlke shows 1.5 mm diameter eggs of Atlantic cod (Gadus morhua). Global warming looks like it will be a far bigger problem for the world’s fish species than scientists first thought, since a study led by Dahlke released on Thursday, July 2, 2020 shows that when fish are spawning or are embryos they are far more vulnerable to hotter water. (Dr. F. Dahlke via AP)

Global warming looks like it will be a bigger problem for the world’s fish species than scientists first thought: A new study shows that when fish are spawning or are embryos they are more vulnerable to hotter water.

With medium-level human-caused climate change expected by the end of the century, the world’s oceans, rivers and lakes will be too hot for about 40% of the world’s fish species in the spawning or embryonic life stages, according to a study in Thursday’s journal Science. That means they could go extinct or be forced to change how and where they live and reproduce.

Until now, biologists had just studied adult fish. For adult fish, around 2% to 3% of the species would be in the too-hot zone in the year 2100 with similar projected warming. So using this new approach reveals a previously unknown problem for the future of fish, scientists said.

In a worst-case climate change scenario, which some scientists said is increasingly unlikely, the figure for species in trouble jumps to 60%.

These vulnerable times in the life of a fish make this a “bottleneck” in the future health of species, said study co-author Hans-Otto Portner, a marine biologist at the Alfred Wegener Institute in Germany.

A marine heatwave last year, known as a blob, caused large numbers of migrating salmon to die throughout Alaska’s rivers. It also killed off cod eggs, showing what a warmer future might be like, said study lead author Flemming Dahlke, a marine biologist at the institute.

“With spawning fish and embryos most sensitive to warming waters, it means fish populations won’t be able to replace themselves,” said Rutgers University ecologist Malin Pinsky, who wasn’t part of the study but praised it. “Without reproduction and offspring, we have no fish, no fishing and no fish on our plates.”

In studying 694 species, Dahlke and Portner found some of the fish likely to be hardest hit by this phenomenon include Alaska pollock — the biggest fishery in the United States and the source of fast food fillets — and well-known species such as sockeye salmon, brown trout, bonito, barracuda and swordfish.

“The more we allow temperature to change ... the more we will lose the natural foundation of human life, including food from the sea,” Portner said.

When it gets too warm for spawning, the species could still possibly move to someplace cooler or spawn at another time, but that’s not easy, Dahlke said. “This could mean a lot of problems to many species.”

 This July 2019 photo provided by Peter Westley shows the carcass of a chum salmon along the shore of the Koyukuk River near Huslia, Alaska, July 2019 was the hottest month ever recorded in the state. Global warming looks like it will be a far bigger problem for the world’s fish species than scientists first thought, since a study led by Dr. Flemming Dahlke released on Thursday, July 2, 2020 shows that when fish are spawning or are embryos they are far more vulnerable to hotter water. (Peter Westley/University of Alaska Fairbanks via AP)
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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

Bolivia tries to hold elections amid pandemic, risking chaos

Public transport drivers take part in a protest demanding an increase in fares because quarantine measures to curb the spread of the new coronavirus have decreased their income, in La Paz, Bolivia, Wednesday, July 1, 2020. (AP Photo/Juan Karita)

A public transport driver, wearing a protective face mask emblazoned with an image of Lionel Messi, attends a protest demanding an increase in fares because quarantine measures to curb the spread of the new coronavirus have decreased his income, in La Paz, Bolivia, Wednesday, July 1, 2020. (AP Photo/Juan Karita)
LA PAZ, Bolivia (AP) — Deserted during months of quarantine, the streets of Bolivia are roiling again with protests that have forced the government into an uncomfortable challenge: trying to resolve the country’s long-term political crisis with elections in the middle of a rising pandemic.

If plans hold, Bolivia will conduct presidential elections in September, giving former President Evo Morales’ leftist party a chance to return to power after he resigned and fled the country at the end of 2019. The looming vote is increasing political tensions in Bolivia just as the novel coronavirus overwhelms the health system.

The capital, La Paz, and other major cities see demonstrations near daily in defiance of antivirus measures. On Tuesday, teachers protested in La Paz. On Wednesday, health workers marched in Santa Cruz, and the streets of Cochabamba were blocked by a variety of groups decrying the government.

Protesters rarely follow requirements for social distancing and pack closely together unmasked as they shout anti-government slogans. Police presence is at a minimum because much of the force is sick with the coronavirus.

After a year of protests and crises across Latin American and the Caribbean, Bolivia is one of several countries that put politics on hold to grapple with the new coronavirus, and it will be one of the first to attempt a return to some semblance of political normality. The Dominican Republic holds delayed elections on Sunday. Chile put off an April referendum on a new constitution until October, with many predicting further delays.

Bolivia is the country that appears to have the greatest immediate potential for chaos. The country is deeply polarized between Morales’ supporters and those who accused him of fraud in October 2019 elections and worked to push him from power after 14 years in office.


A homeless man sleeps at San Francisco square amid a government ordered lockdown to contain the spread of the new coronavirus, in La Paz, Bolivia, Thursday, June 25, 2020. (AP Photo/Juan Karita)Pressured by Morales’ Movement toward Socialism party, which still controls the legislature, and weakened by the pandemic and an accompanying economic crisis, interim President Jeanine Añez accepted elections on Sept. 6.

After a decade of growth under Morales, Bolivia’s economy began to slump and the coronavirus pandemic is expected to cut gross domestic product 5.9% this year, the first recession in four decades.

“We want the government to reactivate the economy,” small-business leader Juan Carlos Apaza said during a recent demonstration in La Paz. “Hunger can do more damage than the coronavirus.”

With over 70% of the population in informal day jobs, a 71-day quarantine has pushed many to desperation that’s fueling the daily protests.

“Confronting the political crisis first makes sense,” said independent journalist and political analyst Andrés Gómez.

Other analysts say trying to resolve the political crisis amid a raging epidemic could worsen the country’s instability.

Low turnout due to voters fearful of contagion could undercut the legitimacy of the vote, warned Franklin Pareja, a political scientist at the University of San Andrés.

Luis Larrea, president of the Medical College of La Paz, agreed, contending the vote could worsen the disease crisis.

“Holding a vote in the middle of a pandemic is irresponsible on the part of the politicians,″ he said. “Health comes first.″

Bolivia has had more than 32,000 diagnosed cases of the new coronavirus and more than 1,000 deaths, and the numbers are expected to peak around the time of the presidential election.

The country’s weak medical system is already overwhelmed, with intensive-care units full, patients dying in hospital lobbies or at home and protests from under-equipped and under-financed medical workers.

In Cochabamba, a series of coronavirus patients have died in the street for want of hospital beds and funeral homes have declared a crisis because the city’s crematorium can only cremate four bodies a day, a third of the current demand.

Morales remains in exile in Argentina and is wanted in Bolivia on charges of sedition, terrorism and electoral fraud, but polls have shown a double-digit lead for his party’s candidate, Luis Arce, a former economy minister. Centrist former President Carlos Mesa appears to be in second place, with Añez in third.

The weakened economy, a failing pandemic response and accusations of corruption in the health ministry’s purchase of respirators at triple the world price have damaged her credibility and contributed to her trailing badly.

The latest figures show Arce’s lead is likely narrow enough to require a second round of voting and Mesa, who ran against Morales last year, gaining ground.

“The people want answers from those making decisions confronting the pandemic,″ Mesa said.

Morales, a leader of the coca-growers’ unions, become the country’s first Indigenous president in 2006. His three terms in office coincided with a boom in natural gas and other commodities that allowed him to cut extreme poverty in half, to 17% of the population.

He lost popularity, particularly among the middle class, amid corruption scandals and his desire to seek a fourth term amid a political battle over term limits.

“Clean and transparent elections will be the way forward that the country needs,″ said María Teresa Zegada, a political scientist at the University of San Simón. “Afterward, we’ll need to leave confrontation behind and reach political consensus that will allow the new administration to govern.”

OUSTED BY A COUP 

Exiled Morales pulling Bolivian political strings as polls loom

Issued on: 02/07/2020 -

Former Bolivian president Evo Morales takes part in a meeting in Argentina in support of MAS candidate Luis Arce in March 2020 Andres Larrovere AFP/FileLa Paz (AFP)

From exile in Buenos Aires, former leftist president Evo Morales continues to influence Bolivian politics and is plotting his party's return to power in September elections, analysts say.

Though banned from running in the poll and facing arrest if he returns, the 60-year-old -- Bolivia's first indigenous president -- is masterminding opposition to right-wing interim leader Jeanine Anez.

"At this time when Evo Morales is in exile, outside of power, he has become a kind of kingmaker," political scientist Carlos Cordero told AFP.

Morales last year hand-picked economist Luis Arce as the man who can win back the presidency for his Movement for Socialism (MAS) party.

To do so he faced down grassroots members who favored former foreign minister David Choquehuanca or young coca-growers' leader Andronico Rodriguez.

Arce, however, has slowly won over the doubters and is riding high in opinion polls, which if confirmed in the September 6 elections, would hand the presidency back to MAS a year after Morales' tumultuous resignation.

The polls give Arce 33 percent and centrist ex-president Carlos Mesa just over 18 percent, while Anez trails with nearly 17 percent.

- 'Polarizing factor' -

Maria Teresa Zegada, a sociologist at the state-run Universidad Mayor de San Simon, says Morales is a key player in the electoral campaign, despite his absence.

"I believe that he will continue to play an important role, as long as he continues to be a polarizing factor in the country's politics. There are important sectors that support MAS and that is where Morales' presence lies."

Ahead of the pandemic, the ex-president frequently convened meetings with MAS leaders in Argentina, but that direct communication has been frustrated by the pandemic lockdowns.

These days he issues instructions via social media.

"We will come back stronger and we will restore freedom and dignity to the Bolivian people," said a message on his Twitter account.

Morales on Wednesday condemned what he said was an attempt by Anez to get the courts to outlaw his party and remove Arce from the electoral race.

"The de facto government initiated a judicial strategy with political ends to disqualify our candidate and MAS and prevent us from participating in the elections," he tweeted.

Anez has accused Morales of conspiring to damage her electoral chances by sending overpriced Spanish ventilators for COVID-19 patients into the country as part of a relief operation during the pandemic.

Zegada said Morales has benefited from the errors and scandals that have tainted his adversaries in power.

- 'Messianic leadership' -

Morales fled the country after three weeks of protests over his controversial re-election in October 2019 in a poll in which he was constitutionally barred from participating.

He had tried to cling to power but lost the backing of the country's military after an Organization of American States audit found clear evidence of election fraud.

He initially fled to Mexico, which sent a government plane to pick him up, before settling later in Argentina, home to a large Bolivian population.

Most of Morales' cabinet fled with him, leaving behind a power vacuum in the bitterly divided country. Anez -- a hitherto little known conservative senator -- assumed the presidency the following month.

Her government accuses him of sedition and terrorism for allegedly urging his supporters to lay siege to major cities such as La Paz.

However, Morales, a member of the Aymara indigenous community, has built up a "messianic leadership -- which is why his voice continues to carry so much weight, even in exile," said Cordero, a professor at the Catholic University in La Paz.

"These leaders become political professionals... Their life is simply doing politics, that's the psychological profile of these people," he said.

Morales is a colossus of his own party, whose support comes mainly from indigenous people and poor farmers, and there is no one in the party ranks to overshadow him.

According to Zagada, his broader influence has waned, however.

"We have a gravitating figure, but at the same time one that is worn out, and he is no longer the figure he was when he was president of the country," she said.

Under Morales' 14-year rule, Bolivia's 36 indigenous groups -- which account for 62 percent of the country's more than 11 million people -- were constitutionally recognized.

The country also reduced extreme poverty from 38 percent to 17 percent, and achieved an average economic growth rate of 4.8 percent.

© 2020 AFP

Australian court upholds Geoffrey Rush’s defamation payout

CORRECTS THE AMOUNT TO MILLION, NOT BILLION -FILE - In this Aug. 2, 2012, file photo, Australian actor Geoffrey Rush arrives for the opening of the Melbourne International Film Festival in Melbourne, Australia. An Australian court on Thursday, July 2, 2020, rejected a newspaper publisher's appeal against Oscar-winning actor Rush's $2.9 million Australian dollars ($2 million) payout for defamation. (AP Photo/Paul Jeffers, File)

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — An Australian court on Thursday rejected a newspaper publisher’s appeal against Oscar-winning actor Geoffrey Rush’s $2.9 million Australian dollars ($2 million) payout for defamation.

Three Federal Court judges ruled that articles published by Sydney’s The Daily Telegraph newspaper in 2017 conveyed the imputation that Rush was a pervert and that the trial judge had correctly included the actor’s loss of earnings in calculating damages.

The Australian actor, who turns 69 on July 6, did not attend the Sydney court to hear the verdict.

News Corp.-owned Nationwide News appealed trial judge Michael Wigney’s ruling last year that Rush was defamed by newspaper reports saying he had been accused of inappropriate behavior by actor Eryn Jean Norvill. She played the daughter of Rush’s starring character in a Sydney theater production of “King Lear” in 2015 and 2016.

The publisher also appealed against the amount of Rush’s payout, including almost AU$2 million for past and future economic loss, for two articles published in the newspaper and a billboard poster that Wigney found portrayed him untruly as a pervert and a sexual predator.

David English, the newspaper’s editor, said he was disappointed by the appeals court ruling that highlighted the need for Australia to change its defamation laws.

“The Rush case exposes the inadequacies of Australia’s defamation laws and heightens the need for urgent legislative reform to enable public debate and to encourage women to come forward with their concerns,” English said in a statement.

“We will continue to report on the issues such as these which are of great concern to the Australian public,” he added.

Rush’s lawyer did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The publisher’s lawyer Tom Blackburn told the two-day appeal hearing that the trial judge “cobbled together” speculation and inference to find Rush was unable to work because of his state of mind following the publications and had fewer job offers since then.

The actor’s lawyer Bret Walker replied that Rush testified about the devastating effects the publications had on his mental state while other evidence heard during the trial supported conclusions that he was unable to work and had fewer job offers.

Rush received the best actor Oscar in 1996 for his portrayal of pianist David Helfgott in “Shine” and was nominated for roles in “Shakespeare In Love,” ″Quills” and “The King’s Speech.” He is also famed for his portrayal of Captain Barbossa in the “Pirates of the Caribbean” films.

He received Australia’s highest civilian honor in 2014, the Companion of the Order of Australia, for service to the arts.

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This story has been revised to correct the payout amount to millions, not billions.

A pinch where it hurts: Can Facebook weather the ad boycott?

In this Oct. 25, 2019, file photo, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg speaks at the Paley Center in New York. On Wednesday, July 1, 2020, more than 500 companies kicked off an advertising boycott intended to pressure Facebook into taking a stronger stand against hate speech. Zuckerberg has agreed to meet with its organizers early the following week. (AP Photo/Mark Lennihan, File)
On Wednesday, more than 500 companies officially kicked off an advertising boycott intended to pressure Facebook into taking a stronger stand against hate speech. CEO Mark Zuckerberg has agreed to meet with its organizers early next week.

But whether Zuckerberg agrees to further tighten the social network’s carefully crafted rules probably boils down to a more fundamental question: Does Facebook need big brand advertisers more than the brands need Facebook?

In a broad sense, the current boycott, which will last at least a month, is like nothing Facebook has experienced before. Following weeks of protests against police violence and racial injustice, major brands have for the first time joined together to protest still-prevalent hate speech on Facebook’s platforms by taking aim at the social network’s $70 billion in annual ad revenue.

After years of piecemeal measures to address hate, abuse and misinformation on its service, Facebook’s critics hope that pinching the company where it hurts will push it toward more meaningful change. As of Wednesday, 530 companies have signed on — and that’s not counting businesses like Target and Starbucks, which have paused advertising but did not formally join the “Stop Hate for Profit” campaign, which calls its action a “pause” rather than a boycott.

“Many businesses told us how they had been ignored when asking Facebook for changes,” campaign organizers wrote in a letter to advertisers this week. “Together, we finally got Facebook’s attention.”

But Facebook’s already-tarnished public image may sustain more damage than its business. If the ad pause lasts one month, Citi Investment Research analyst Jason Bazinet estimates, the likely impact on Facebook’s stock will be $1 per share. Based on Wednesday’s closing price of $237.92, that’s a decline of less than half a percent.

If the businesses extend their boycott indefinitely, Bazinet suggests the likely impact would be $17 a share, or about a 7% decline. That’s less than the 8% drop Facebook shares sustained on Friday after global consumer-products maker Unilever said it would pause advertising on Facebook and Instagram for the rest of the year.

Also, Facebook shares have already bounced back from that dip.

On Wednesday, Nick Clegg, Facebook’s vice president of global affairs and communications, tried to reassure businesses that Facebook “does not benefit from hate” and said the company has every incentive to remove hate speech from its service. He acknowledged that “many of our critics are angry about the inflammatory rhetoric President Trump has posted on our platform and others, and want us to be more aggressive in removing his speech.”

Clegg, however, offered few concessions, and instead repeated Zuckerberg’s frequent talking point that “the only way to hold the powerful to account is ultimately through the ballot box.” He pointed to Facebook’s get-out-the-vote efforts as evidence of the company’s commitment, along with the billions of dollars, tens of thousands of content moderators and other investments it has made in trying to improve its platform.

While Facebook is making efforts to hear out its critics, it remains clear that ultimate decisions will always rest with its founder and CEO, who holds the majority of the company’s voting shares and could effectively run the company for life, should he desire to.

It’s not clear that he’ll see any reason to bend further to meet protesters’ demands.

“Data of past boycotts suggests the observable impact is relatively mild,” said Brian Wieser, global president of business intelligence at GroupM, advertising holding company WPP’s media agency arm.

At the same time, he added, given these “extraordinary times,” it’s possible that a long-term, pervasive boycott could shift advertising dollars away from Facebook to other companies.

Beyond bad PR, though, experts say the protest isn’t likely to make a lasting dent in Facebook’s ad revenue, in part because plenty of other advertisers can step in. Stifel analysts said in a note to investors this week that “well over” 70% of Facebook’s advertising dollars come from small and medium-sized businesses and “these advertisers may be less concerned with the optics of where their ads are placed than large brands.” Citing data from Pathmatics, Stifel said the top 100 brands spent roughly $4.2 billion on Facebook ads last year, representing around 6% of the company’s nearly $70 billion of total ad revenue in 2019.

Facebook hosts more than 8 million advertisers, according to JPMorgan. “We do not expect significant risk to numbers for Facebook as many other marketers ... will take advantage of potentially lower-priced inventory,” JPMorgan analyst Doug Anmuth wrote in an investor note.

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AP technology writer Mae Anderson contributed to this story.

California sues Cisco for bias based on Indian caste system

By TALI ARBEL July 1, 2020

 In this Oct. 3, 2018, file photo, the Cisco logo appears on a screen at the Nasdaq MarketSite in New York's Times Square. California regulators have sued Cisco Systems for discriminating against an engineer at the company's headquarters because he is a Dalit Indian. India’s caste system has long placed Dalits at the bottom of a social hierarchy. California's lawsuit says Cisco broke the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and California’s Fair Employment and Housing Act. (AP Photo/Richard Drew, File)

NEW YORK (AP) — California regulators have sued Cisco Systems, saying an engineer faced discrimination at the company’s Silicon Valley headquarters because he is a Dalit Indian.

India’s caste system long placed Dalits at the bottom of a social hierarchy, once terming them “untouchables.” Inequities and violence against Dalits have persisted for decades after India banned caste discrimination.

The engineer worked on a team at Cisco’s San Jose headquarters with Indians who all immigrated to the U.S. as adults, and all of whom were of high caste, according to the lawsuit filed Tuesday by the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing .

The “higher caste supervisors and co-workers imported the discriminatory system’s practices into their team and Cisco’s workplace,” the lawsuit says.

It says Cisco’s treatment of the employee, who is not named, violated the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and California’s Fair Employment and Housing Act.

The Civil Rights Act bans employment discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex and national origin. The lawsuit notes the employee is Dalit Indian, and that he is darker-complexioned than non-Dalit Indians.

“It is unacceptable for workplace conditions and opportunities to be determined by a hereditary social status determined by birth,” said DFEH Director Kevin Kish.

Two men who were Cisco supervisors and higher-caste Indians, Sundar Iyer and Ramana Kompella, are named in the suit for discriminating and harassing the employee. The employee received less pay and fewer opportunities, and when he opposed “unlawful practices, contrary to the traditional order between the Dalit and higher castes, Defendants retaliated against him,” the lawsuit says.

Cisco did not steps to prevent this discrimination, the suit says.

The suit says that Iyer told other workers that the employee was Dalit and enrolled at India’s prestigious Indian Institute of Technology through affirmative action. The employee contacted Cisco human relations, wanting to file a discrimination complaint against Iyer, and then Iyer took away his responsibilities and made other changes that reduced the employee’s role and made him feel isolated from his coworkers. The suit says Iyer disparaged the employee to coworkers and said they should avoid him.

After Iyer stepped down, Kompella replaced him, and the suit says Kompella “continued to discriminate, harass, and retaliate” against the employee, including by “giving him assignments that were impossible to complete under the circumstances.”

The lawsuit says that Cisco investigated and did not “substantiate any caste-based or related discrimination or retaliation” against the employee.

Cisco Systems Inc., a major supplier of computer networking gear that makes the internet work, said in a statement that it is committed to an inclusive workplace.

It said it has “robust processes to report and investigate concerns raised by employees,” which it followed in this case, and that it is in compliance with all laws and its own policies. The company said will defend against the allegations in the complaint.

Cisco spokeswoman Helen Saunders declined to say if Iyer and Kompella were still at Cisco, referring a reporter to LinkedIn.

Japanese firm to pay damages for harassment of ethnic Korean employee

IMPERIALISM = RACISM

The Osaka District Court ordered a local company on Thursday to pay damages for verbally attacking an ethnic Korean employee. File Photo by Keizo Mori/UPI | License Photo

July 2 (UPI) -- A Japanese real estate company has been ordered to pay about $10,000 in damages for harassing an ethnic Korean employee.

The Osaka District Court ruled Thursday the plaintiff, identified as a woman in her 50s, is to receive compensatory damages from Fuji Corp. Ltd., after she suffered from emotional distress and sued the Japanese firm for about $300,000, Kyodo News reported.

According to the court ruling, in 2013 Fuji Corp. began to distribute racist books and magazines targeting ethnic Korean and Chinese people in Japan.

Two years later, the employee sued the company, citing human and civil rights violations.

The company is accused of retaliating with the distribution of a document that slandered the employee, an ethnic Korean. The document referred to the employee as a "fool who repays kindness with inimicality," according to Kyodo.

The Osaka Court said the company's actions were a violation of law because they did not treat the employee respectfully and raised concerns of discrimination by nationality.

Anti-Korean demonstrations, targeting immigrants, occur across Japan, but some cities are taking action to penalize protests that endorse discrimination against minority groups.

On Wednesday, the city of Kawasaki in Kanagawa Prefecture began to enforce a law against "hate speech" protests.

The new law against protests that target ethnic minorities comes after the city began to fine individuals and groups about $4,600 for holding anti-Korean and other racist rallies, South Korean newspaper Hankook Ilbo reported.

Groups that engage in hate speech are banned in the city from using loudspeakers, carrying banners, distributing flyers or setting up tents, according to the report.

RELATED Asian Americans take campaign against 'Kung Flu' slur to the streets

Anti-Chinese sentiment may also be growing in Japan in the wake of the global coronavirus pandemic.

Earlier this year, a Japanese man in Kyoto was arrested after targeting Chinese nationals in the city and posted anti-Chinese flyers on a telephone pole in a residential neighborhood.

The flyers read, "Don't let in infected Chinese," according to Kyodo.