AUSTRALIA
Conspiracists say lasers and exploding smart meters used to start bush fires to make way for a new train network

15 Jan, 2020 

Thousands of Australians appear to believe lasers and exploding smart meters are being used to start fires to make way for a new train network. Photo / Supplied
news.com.au 

By: Ben Graham and Peter Bodkin


Thousands of Australians appear to believe lasers and exploding smart meters are being used to start our bushfires to make way for a new train network.

A Storyful investigation with news.com.au has found the conspiracy theory has spread far and wide on social media — with "directed-energy weapons" (DEWs) posts being shared tens of thousands of times in the past few weeks.

Those who believe the theory say the bushfires in this unprecedented season are being started using weapons which harness the focused power of technology such as lasers or microwaves, news.com.au reports.

And, many of the posts claim the fires have been deliberately started by a shadowy global elite in order to clear land for a high-speed rail network from Brisbane to Melbourne.

The deadly bushfires have also been seized on by networks of local and international conspiracy theorists, many of whom claim the fires are part of UN-led global plot to depopulate the world and seize control for a one-world government under the guises of climate change.

Conspiracy theorists claim Australia's bush land is being cleared for a high-speed rail network. Photo / Supplied

As part of this wider conspiracy, theorists believe the alleged high-speed rail network will force all of us into big cities where we can be controlled by the government.

Posts to Facebook show bright lines — supposedly laser beams — emanating from unsourced and unverified pictures of Australia's bushfires to back up their argument.

The admin of one of the largest Facebook conspiracy pages wrote that residents in bushfire-affected communities say forests around their homes "just exploded out of no-where".

Theorists have also been sharing maps that show parallels between the locations of the fires and the supposed high-speed rail network.

One blog post from a fringe conspiracy theory site State of the Nation linking the bushfires to the "global warming hoax" has made a huge impact on social media.

It is unclear if this pic has been doctored. Photo / Supplied

The article titled 'OPERATION TORCH AUSTRALIA: A Special Report on the Geoengineered Firestorms and DEW-triggered Arson Fires' claimed to draw "striking parallels" between the fires and previous wildfires in California.

The post, alongside others from the site linking the Australian fires to directed-energy weapons, had been shared thousands of times on Facebook.

They were spread through a network of local and international pages, many of which were themed around deep state conspiracy theories, chemtrails or 5G networks.

And it's not just Star Wars-style lasers they reckon are starting the fires.

In one case, a Facebook user whose profile said they lived in Byron Bay shared a post to the Stop 5G Mid North Coast group with the comment: "Smart meters can be activated to explode."

It is claimed these bright lines are created by high-powered weapons. Photo / Supplied

One of the most active pages in Australia sharing conspiracy theories linking the fires to directed-energy weapons and various alleged government plots has been the Higgins Storm Chasers page which, despite having only around 10,000 followers, generates thousands of shares and reactions for its posts.

Several of these posts claimed to display evidence of energy weapons being used in the fires – such as photos of trees burning on the inside – with one post adding it showed "geoengineering not climate change".

While Facebook has moved to crack down on misinformation around some topics such as vaccinations, there appears to be little stopping the spread of conspiracy theories surrounding bushfires on the platform.

Similarly, conspiracy theories around the fires have flourished on YouTube, with some videos also running ads on the platform, allowing channels to make money while spreading misinformation around the bushfires, including that they were designed to make way for a planned high-speed rail link between Australia's cities.

Australian conspiracy theorist Max Igan, who has generated nearly a million views for his series of videos decrying the "Australian Holocaust".

'Exploding smart meters' have been blamed for the fires. Photo / Facebook

In one, Mr Igan claimed that an unspecified cabal had been "spraying this country with accelerants" while also deliberately drying the continent to create "the perfect storm".

"They're going to blame all this on climate change … they intend to genocide this country," he told viewers.

The video had been shared more than 12,000 times on Facebook alone.

Dr Will Grant – a senior lecturer in science communication at the Australian National University – believes these theories were being spread by the far right.


"The theory aligns with ideas there's a deep state (a clandestine government) out there armed with secret weapons," he said.

Dr Grant believes it is gaining traction because of the "extreme" polarisation between the political left, often associated with city living, and right, often associated with rural living.

"This high-speed rail conspiracy comes out of the idea the left and the government want us to live in cities with a smaller carbon footprint and closer to work, and many on the left say this is a good thing," he said.

"However, what we're seeing here is the far right taking this to an extreme – saying 'they're forcing us to be vegan and live in apartment' – which is obviously not true."

It's claimed that this picture (of unknown origin) proves trees were ignited from the inside. Photo / Supplied

He said the theories around "exploding smart meters" and 5G being used for nefarious purposes play into "legitimate" concerns around big corporations and the data they have on us.

"We should be careful, because this is ripe ground for a conspiracy theorist," he said. "What they are doing is taking a legitimate truth and playing it up, adding paranoia, and making it into something else."


Another concern is that foreign governments are spreading these conspiracies to exploit cracks in Western nations about climate change.

"We've seen this with the Russian troll army in the US," Dr Grant said.

"Now we're not America in terms of size and influence. But what's obvious is that, right now, there's a huge crack in Australian society about climate change and how to deal with it.

"It could be exploited as another crack in the ability of Western countries to have democracy, so I wouldn't be surprised if a state actor was interested in this."

Blazes destroying Brazil's national parks, threaten tropical wetlands
14 Sep, 2020

 

Birds fly past as a fire consumes the Pantanal wetlands near Pocone, Mato Grosso state, Brazil. AP Photo / Andre Penner

By: Dbora Alvares of AP

A vast swath of a vital wetlands is burning in Brazil, sweeping across several national parks and obscuring the sun behind dense smoke.

Preliminary figures from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, based on satellite images, indicate that nearly 1.5 million hectares have burned in the Pantanal region since the start of August — an expanse comparable to the area consumed by the historic blazes now afflicting California. It's also well beyond the previous fire season record from 2005.

Brazil's National Institute for Space Research, whose satellites monitor the fires, said the number of Panantal fires in the first 12 days of September was nearly triple the figure for the same period last year. From January through August, the number of fires more than tripled, topping 10,000.

Fernando Tortato, who has been working and living near the Encontro Das Aguas reserve since 2008, said he's never seen the fires as bad as this year.

A volunteer tries to douse the fire on the Transpantaneira road in the Pantanal wetlands in Brazil. AP Photo/Andre Penner

"It is an immense area that has been burned and consumed by the fire. And we still have another two, three or four weeks without rain" ahead, he said.

Firefighters, troops and volunteers have been scrambling to find and rescue jaguars and other animals before they are overtaken by the flames, which have been exacerbated by the worst drought in 47 years, strong winds and temperatures exceeding 40C.

While illegal logging, mining and farming operations have been blamed for most of the fires in the Amazon region to the north, a spokesman for Mato Grosso state's firefighters, Lieutenant Colonel Sheila Sebalhos, said one of the causes of this year's Pantanal fires is the practice of burning roots to smoke wild bees from their hives to extract honey.

An recently burned area at the Encontro das Aguas park at the Pantanal wetlands near Pocone, Mato Grosso state, Brazil. AP Photo / Andre Penner

The Pantanal holds thousands of plant and animal species, including 159 mammals, and it abounds with jaguars, according to the World Wildlife Fund. During the rainy season, rivers overflow their banks flood the land, making most of it accessible only by boat and plane.

In the dry season, wildlife enthusiasts flock to see the normally furtive jaguars lounging on riverbanks, along with macaws, caimans and capybaras.

About 200 jaguars in the area already have been injured, killed or forced from their territories by the fires, according to Panthera, an international wild cat conservation organisation.

Veterinarians treat an injured bird rescued from an area affected by the fires at the Pantanal wetlands. AP Photo / Andre Penner

Firefighters and the Mato Grosso environment ministry have created a centre for rescued animals.

"We feel a little discouraged, but we try to have hope to rescue the few animals we can," said veterinarian Karen Ribeiro, 26, who was treating an injured bird on Friday.

On Friday, Brazil's navy used a helicopter to rescue a burned jaguar cub and take it to a veterinary hospital. - AP

Tiny island Kastellorizo at centre of growing confrontation between Greece and Turkey

14 Sep, 2020 

The Greek island of Kastellorizo, the most southeastern inhabited Greek island in the Dodecanese, situated two kilometres off the south coast of Turkey. Photo / Getty

news.com.au

 

By: Benedict Brook

Kastellorizo, lying in the crystal clear waters of the eastern Mediterranean, is an idyllic, bijou beauty.

Fishing boats bob in its calm harbour and colourful houses give way to olive tree flecked hills.

The petite 12 sqm gem is the "remote treasure of the Aegean" says a tourism website.

But trouble is brewing in the sun splashed seas that surround Kastellorizo and two European nations, officially allies, are bracing for battle, news.com.au reported..

Already ships from Greece and Turkey have collided. One expert has said the pair are once again on the "brink of war," yet this time there seems to be little appetite to slam on the brakes.

It's a conflict that has now sucked in France, Libya, Egypt, Israel, the US and more nations besides.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has demanded Greece enter talks, or else.

"They're either going to understand the language of politics and diplomacy, or in the field with painful experiences," he said.

Photo / Google Maps

The issue is as clear as day in Kastellorizo, also known as Megisti. The island – part of the Dodecanese chain – is Greece's most easterly inhabited point. It lies more than 550 kilometres from the capital, Athens. But just 2kms from the coast of Turkey. On a clear day you cannot only see Turkey, you could probably swim over for a spot of lunch.

Both countries are members of the NATO military alliance, but both have longstanding animosities. One of the main grumbles is just how close scores of Greek islands, like Kastellorizo, are to Turkish soil.

It's a simmering tension that goes back a century or more. But the hornet's nest has recently been disturbed by the discovering of potentially vast amounts of gas in the eastern Mediterranean.

The question is who is entitled to the reserves – Greece or Turkey? 

BOAT AT THE CENTRE OF FEUD

 

    

   

"Turkey and Greece have been at loggerheads in the Aegean (a sea that is part of the wider Mediterranean) since the mid-1970s but have abstained from unilateral actions that might result in full conflict. They have been able to defuse several escalations," says academic Cihan Dizdaroglu from the UK's Coventry University inThe Conversation.

"Adding the eastern Mediterranean into the mix complicates matters though. The two sides appear to have opened Pandora's box."

Ground zero for the international spat is a boat – the Oruc Reis. Painted with a giant Turkish flag, this research vessel has been busy surveying the seabed off the Turkish coast looking for likely gas deposits.

Last month, the Greek military was scrambled as it sailed in waters close to Kastellorizo.

Greece sent naval ships to shadow the Oruc Reis, which was being escorted by Turkish military vessels.

Turkish research vessel the Oruc Reis which has been sailing into waters claimed by Greece. Photo / Getty

On 10 August, a Greek frigate collided with one of the Turkish military escorts between the Greek island of Crete and Cyprus. It was a big escalation that prompted France to send one of its own frigates and two fighter jets to the area to support Greece.

Greek news publication Protothema showed a large gouge in the side of the Turkish vessel.

At the heart of the issue is how you divide up the waters of both the Aegean and the eastern Mediterranean seas.

The collapse of the Ottoman Empire, the forerunner of modern Turkey, in the early 20th century led some of its former lands to be officially divided up between countries it once ruled.

The 1924 Lausanne Treaty formalised Greece's control of almost all of the major islands off the coast of Turkey as far east as Kastellorizo.

The maritime borders, however, are trickier. It's generally accepted that nations have exclusive economic zones (EEZ) that extend a distance from their coasts.

Damage sustained by the Turkis vessel which came into contact with a Greek frigate, from Greek news publication Protothema. Photo / Supplied

TRILLIONS OF DOLLARS

Ankara claims the Greek islands box Turkey in and effectively bar it from large areas of the sea that are rightfully its to exploit. Kastellorizo's position, to the south of Turkey, potentially gives Greece control over a huge stretch of the eastern Mediterranean.

"Greece claims 40,000 square kilometres of maritime jurisdiction area due to this tiny island," Cagatay Erciyes, a Turkish foreign ministry official, said of Kastellorizo.

Not so, says Athens. Given the islands are Greek territory they have EEZs that extend deep into the sea and that should be respected.

It's not a new argument and generally it's just bubbled quietly away. Until riches were found beneath the seabed.

"Large reserves of oil and gas were discovered in the region a decade ago. The estimates are worth trillions of dollars to the surrounding countries even at today's prices," said Clemens Hoffman, a lecturer in politics at Britain's Stirling University.

'BRINK OF WAR'

Last year, Greece and a number of Mediterranean governments including Cyprus, Israel, Egypt and Palestine, signed a deal to co-operate on exploiting the gas reserves. A pipeline, to transport the gas to Europe, bypassing Turkey, is on the cards.

Turkey reacted to this snub by signing a deal with the UN backed Libyan government – there are several governments in Libya – to create an EEZ stretching across the Mediterranean. If accepted, this would both block the pipeline and see Turkey potentially drilling just off the coast of several Greek islands.

So Greece declared an EEZ between its islands and Egypt straight through the line Turkey and Libya had just drawn.

It's left research vessels and warships bobbing around the Mediterranean in waters claimed by one another. Greece has already held naval exercises with some EU countries and the United Arab Emirates.

"Greece and Turkey have endured plenty of incidents that brought them to the brink of war, particularly in the Aegean Sea, but these were eased through dialogue and mediation," said Professor Dizdaroğlu in The Conversation.

"There is no dialogue mechanism established for a conflict over the eastern Mediterranean and that really matters in this conflict-ridden region."

The stoush is about hydrocarbons, for sure, but there's a large streak of nationalism running through it too, fanned by Turkey's President Erdogan.

"We are defending our blue homeland," said Cem Gürdeniz, a former Turkish admiral.

"It is a defensive doctrine after our continental shelf was stolen by Greece and Cyprus and represents the greatest geostrategic challenge of the century."

To some in Turkey, the Lausanne Treaty was a capitulation that saw a new nation blindsided and hastily, and unnecessarily, sign away the islands.

The Greek island of Kastellorizo, the most southeastern inhabited Greek island in the Dodecanese, situated two kilometres off the south coast of Turkey. Photo / Getty

FRANCE AND US ENTER THE FRAY

On Thursday, French President Emmanuel Macron met Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis and declared he was siding with his European Union partner over a NATO ally.

Turkey was "no longer a partner" in the eastern Mediterranean, President Macron said.

"We Europeans must be clear and firm, not with Turkey as a nation or as a people, but with the government of President Erdogan."

Turkey has fumed at the comments and called Macron "arrogant" and his remarks "colonial reflexes".

Erdogan's top press aide, Fahrettin Altun, took a swipe at Macron in a tweet, describing him as a "wannabe Napoleon" on a Mediterranean campaign.

The Greek PM has urged the EU to impose "meaningful sanctions" on Ankara if there is no change to the impasse by the end of the month.

"If Europe wants to exercise true geopolitical power, it simply cannot afford to appease a belligerent Turkey," said Mr Mitsotakis.

The US has now entered the fray, with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo saying he will intervene to seek a "diplomatic and peaceful" resolution.

The waters of Kastellorizo remain calm and clear. But one more collision, unwanted incursion or stray bullet, and this tiny island could find itself at the centre of a European battle.

IT WAS THE TINY NATION OF FERDINAND POO THAT WAS INVADED AS A FALSE FLAG OP THAT BEGAN THE WAR IN ILLUMINATIS

Fernando Poo | The Illuminatus! Trilogy Wiki | Fandom

illuminatus.fandom.com › wiki › Fernando_Poo

In the book the name of the island is changed from Po to Poo, why this is is not certain, it could be down to a spelling error. The relevance of the original spelling ...

POO IS OBVIOUSLY BATHROOM HUMOUR

Bioko - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org › wiki › Bioko

Bioko is an island 32 km (20 mi) off the west coast of Africa and the northernmost part of ... In 1494 it was renamed Fernando Pó in his honor after being claimed as a colony by the Portuguese. ... Fernando Poo (sic) is the setting for a Cold War standoff in Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson's Illuminatus Trilogy.

In Beirut, a rescued pelican becomes symbol of hope in crisis-stricken Lebanon

Restaurant mascot Ovi is a small piece of joy in a city ravaged by economic woes and last month's explosion


Ovi attracts lots of interest from customers eating at Abou Mounir Fish cafe as he comes in for his fish supper. Elizabeth Fitt for The National








Three times a day a large white pelican waddles up to a seaside restaurant on Beirut’s Corniche for a snack of fresh fish, its wellbeing closely guarded by locals and the fishermen who found him dying in the open sea last February.

In a country reeling from multiple crises, the fate of the gentle pelican brings joy and hope to customers who watch him as he is hand-fed several kilograms of fresh fish every day.

“He struts in like a lady and eats and checks everybody out,” laughed Ali Bazzi, 65, a regular at Abou Mounir restaurant. “When he doesn’t like the fish, he throws it to the floor.”

Lebanon has been sinking deeper into its worst economic crisis over the last year and there is no end in sight. The general feeling of despair has been compounded by the coronavirus pandemic and the explosion in early August of 2,750 tonnes of ammonium nitrate at Beirut port.

At least 190 people died as a result of the blast and the local authorities said that the chemicals had been stored unsafely for seven years. On Thursday, a little more than a month later, a massive fire erupted at the port, stoking fears that hazardous materials were still being stored there without proper security measures. More explosives were later discovered there.


Amid the daily news reports of economic hardship and social unrest, videos of the pelican have gone viral.

“So I was having a bite with a couple of friends by the Corniche when this fella wonders in,” tweeted Beirut-based Bloomberg journalist Lin Nouheid on Wednesday. “And for a few minutes, the world was beautiful again. #Beirut”.


So I was having a bite with a couple of friends by the corniche when this fella wonders in. Apparently, he's been visiting for the past month, looked after by the cafe owner and fishermen. And for a few minutes, the world was beautiful again. #Beirut pic.twitter.com/EGQSnq0gXE– Lin Noueihed (@LinNoueihed) September 9, 2020

After the pelican was found last winter, he was nursed back to health by the owners of Abou Mounir restaurant with the help of Lebanese Wildlife, an NGO that rescues wild animals in Lebanon.

Omar Al Aoud, the 17-year-old son of one of the restaurant’s managers and a passionate advocate of animal rights, nicknamed the pelican Ovi.

“It comes from oviraptor, because birds descend directly from dinosaurs,” he said.

Ovi now lives a few metres away from the restaurant in a fishermen’s bay, and enjoys swimming close to their boats.

“This is the most ideal situation. It would be abusive to put him in a cage,” said Alexandra Youssef, vice-president of Lebanese Wildlife.

But the pelican’s newfound popularity worries Omar.

“I have mixed feelings about it. I don’t want too many people knowing about him. I don’t want him to get stressed,” he said.

Clients are not allowed to touch Ovi, who likes being scratched on the back and chest by restaurant staff but shies away from people he does not know.

“One client tried to force his beak open to put a fish in it. I kind of had a small problem with that,” said Omar.

The pelican is particularly afraid of children, because they have attacked him in the past with sticks.

But Omar and his father, Ali, 54, feel that his presence is also helping locals better respect wildlife in a country where three million birds are hunted illegally every year.

“We told them not to pat him; he’s not a dog, or cat. They understand. The fishermen love him and feed him too,” said Ali Al Oud. “Everyone here takes care of him. He’s become the symbol of this place.”

“Hopefully, he won’t become domestic and will migrate again. We want him to have a life that a pelican should have,” said Ali.

But Ali’s hopes will probably never materialise, warned Ms Youssef.

Ovi’s flight wings had been clipped when he was found. That means that he was probably captured for sale for up to $300 (Dh,1,100) as a pet or for taxidermy on the black market, she said.

A pelican’s wings take six months to a year to regrow. But during this time, Ovi will have become used to humans, meaning that he can never be return to the wild. “He might fall in the wrong hands,” Ms Youssef said.

Hundreds of thousands of birds suffer similar fates to Ovi’s and are killed or captured every year as they fly the dangerous route between Europe and Africa.

“Lebanon is the second most important route of bird migration in the world, and one of the worst countries for hunting, along with Italy, Egypt, and Syria,” Ms Youssef said.

“A lot of people here treat animals brutally,” Mr Bazzi agreed.

“Look, we had a war for 15 years,” he continued, referring to the 1975-1990 civil war. “This became a culture for people. And then successive governments didn’t address the problem. Maybe they built real estate, but the people were not taken care of.”

“We are still suffering, but you find good people who love animals, nature and the environment. They want life,” he said.

“But some don’t. They are still in the fabric of war, 15 years of war. Nothing happened to teach them something new."

Quoting a song by famed Syrian-Egyptian singer Farid Al Atrash, Mr Bazzi said that "life is beautiful if we understand it".

"Life is birds, animals, fish, trees, the sea, and the river. That’s life. And we have to understand it to live," he said.


Updated: September 13, 2020  THE NATIONAL UAE

Margaret Atwood honoured with Dayton Literary Peace Prize


'The Handmaid’s Tale' author's lessons are 'more vital than ever' says chairwoman of the prize

  

Margaret Atwood, author of 'The Testaments' and 'The Handmaid's Tale', is this year's winner of a lifetime achievement award celebrating literature's power to foster peace, social justice and global understanding, officials of the Dayton Literary Peace Prize officials announced on Monday, September 14, 2020. AP Photo


Margaret Atwood, whose sweeping body of work includes The Handmaid’s Tale, a depiction of a nightmarish totalitarian future for the United States, is this year’s winner of a lifetime achievement award that celebrates literature’s power to foster peace, social justice and global understanding.

The Canadian writer and teacher has earned the Richard C Holbrooke Distinguished Achievement Award, officials of the Dayton Literary Peace Prize officials announced Monday. The award is named for the late US diplomat who brokered the 1995 Bosnian peace accords reached in the Ohio city. It celebrates literature's power to foster peace, social justice and global understanding.

Margaret Atwood continues to remind us that ‘It can’t happen here’ cannot be depended upon

Sharon Rab, the founder and chairwoman of the Dayton Literary Peace Prize Foundation

Atwood – a prolific writer of poetry, fiction, nonfiction, essays, comic books and, as of late, tweets – in recent years has drawn a new round of acclaim for her bestselling 1985 novel of a dystopian future in which women are subjugated after an overthrow of the US government.

Some readers of The Handmaid's Tale saw in the leaders of authoritarian Gilead similarities to the rise of Republican Donald Trump to president in the election of 2016. The television adaptation on Hulu starring Elisabeth Moss generated yet more commentary, and women dressed in red cloaks and white bonnets, as the handmaids were depicted in the book and TV series, have shown up at political demonstrations.

“You're not there yet, or else you wouldn’t be talking to me,” Atwood said to a male Associated Press reporter, laughing over the phone. “You'd probably be in an isolation prison or something or dead ... How dare you talk to a female person over the phone and write about them?


“And if I were a betting person, which naturally I kind of am, I would bet on American orneriness and refusal to line up,” she added. “So I don’t think you’re going to get people marching in lockstep easily ... You could get it, but it would be hard.”  

'The Handmaid's Tale' by Margaret Atwood. Courtesy Penguin UK

Atwood also thinks people are “alert to the dangers” of undermining the US constitution.

“That is what stands between you and an absolutist dictatorship,” she said.

Sharon Rab, the founder and chairwoman of the Dayton Literary Peace Prize Foundation, praised Atwood for popular success with writing that also educates people about pressing social justice and environmental issues.

“Margaret Atwood continues to remind us that ‘It can’t happen here’ cannot be depended upon; anything can happen anywhere given the right circumstances, and right now, with scorn for democratic institutions on the rise, her lessons are more vital than ever," Rab told The AP by email.

While not all books are conducive to peace and understanding, Atwood said, fiction can help people “learn what it is to be a person different from ourselves, so that might cause you to have more empathy with people who aren’t exactly like you.”

The Toronto resident's longtime partner, novelist Graeme Gibson, died at age 85 a year ago this month. Atwood, 80, said she tried to keep herself busily distracted after the loss, doing book promotions and other travel until the pandemic grounded her in March. She has since signed thousands of inserts and bookplates to support independent booksellers, and has given talks via Zoom.

She considers herself “a realist, but on the optimistic side, because if you’re pessimistic, you don’t do anything.”


She says: “I think it’s people who are realistic but inclined towards optimism who actually try to change direction.”

Atwood published her first book of poetry, Double Persephone, in 1961, and her other books have included Cat's Eye (1988), Alias Grace (1996), The Blind Assassin (2000), and The MaddAddam Trilogy (2003-2013). The Testaments, her 2019 sequel to The Handmaid's Tale, quickly joined her bestsellers.

The Dayton lifetime achievement award carries a $10,000 (Dh36,700) prize. Previous winners include Studs Terkel, Taylor Branch, John Irving, Gloria Steinem and Elie Wiesel.

The awards gathering originally planned for October is being rescheduled for spring 2021 because of pandemic precautions. Atwood will be joined by the 2020 winners of awards for fiction and nonfiction; finalists for those will be announced next month.




Updated: September 14, 2020 09:27 AM