Brazil's Lula fears 'more ferocious war,' says Zelenskyy was no-show

From Ukraine to China, leftist president's worldview clashes with G-7's

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva speaks during a news conference after attending the Group of Seven Summit in Hiroshima on May 22. 

 © AP

MITSURU OBE, 

Nikkei Asia chief business news correspondent

May 22, 2023

HIROSHIMA, Japan -- As Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy swooped into the Group of Seven weekend in Hiroshima, a focal point was how he would engage with two invited leaders who remain on the fence between Russia and the West -- Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.

Zelenskyy and Modi sat down for what appeared to be a cordial discussion on the impact of Russia's invasion and potential paths forward. On the other hand, no meeting with Lula happened, and when asked if he was disappointed, Zelenskyy shot back that maybe the Brazilians are.

On Monday, Lula told his side of the story: Zelenskyy, he said, did not show up.

"I was going to have a bilateral with Ukraine" on Sunday afternoon, he told to reporters. "We waited. And then we found out that they were running late." Lula said he went ahead and met with Vietnamese Prime Minister Pham Minh Chin for an hour. Still, there was no sign of Zelenskyy.

"Maybe they had another commitment," Lula said. "That's what simply happened."

Lula, a trade unionist and left-wing politician who was president from 2003 to 2010 and returned to power last year, is frequently at odds with the West. The war in Ukraine is a case in point: He has argued that both sides bear responsibility and that Western support is prolonging the conflict and death. Many developing countries have also become weary of the war's resultant spike in food and energy prices.

Asked if he was disappointed, as Zelenskyy had suggested, Lula denied it but said he was "upset a little bit because I would like to enjoy talking with him." He said he is looking for an opportunity to meet the Ukrainian president some other time.

Sergiy Korsunsky, Ukraine's ambassador to Japan, on Monday said he did not know whether it was a "technical" issue that prevented a meeting. "I have no idea, but they didn't talk," he said.

Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and U.S. President Joe Biden speak during the G-7 Summit in Hiroshima on May 21. 

 © Ukrainian Presidential Press Service via Reuters

Korsunsky argued that Lula "should be ready to meet President Zelenskyy at least to understand what's going on." He lamented the attitude of some world leaders, raising the example of what Syrian President Bashar al-Assad did during Zelenskyy's address to the Arab League Summit in Jeddah on Friday. The Syrian president "took off his interpretation headset to send a message that he doesn't want to listen," Korsunsky said.

Calling Brazil a "big important player," he said, "They should meet, they should talk."

But in any conversation, Lula and Zelenskyy would be coming from diametrically opposed perspectives.

While Zelenskyy asks for more advanced weapons to defeat Russia, Lula argues against such assistance. "My fear is that we are moving toward the possibility that we can have a more ferocious war with more powerful weapons," Lula said on Monday.

While Zelenskyy demands a complete withdrawal of Russian troops and restoration of his country's territorial integrity, which he says is not negotiable, Lula is calling for a cease-fire and negotiations.

"Both parties want 100% from each other," Lula said. "Every party will have to concede a little. Russians should not have the right to [invade]. Ukraine is right in defending its own territory. But this will last until they are willing to talk."

Major countries with no direct stake in the war could serve as mediators, Lula added, naming China, India, Indonesia and Brazil.

Lula used his Monday news conference to hammer home a worldview that highlighted other points of friction with the G-7 -- a vision of more autonomy from the U.S. and deeper partnership with China, in contrary to the industrialized economies' efforts to "de-risk" from Beijing.

Lula says he wants the BRICS grouping to create its own currency like the euro. 

(Photo by Kohei Fujimura)

In 2024, Brazil will host leaders of the Group of 20 and BRICS -- two major forums including countries of the so-called Global South. Lula was one of the driving forces behind the creation of BRICS -- Brazil, Russia, India, China and later South Africa.

High expectations for the BRICS economies have soured recently, with Russia under international sanctions while China faces trade restrictions and intensifying competition with the U.S. over emerging technologies. But Lula said Brazil wants to do more business with China, already its top partner, and hopes to create a common BRICS currency.

This is one of several currency ideas he has floated as he seeks to reduce dependence on the dollar. Earlier this year, Brazil and Argentina said they were starting preparatory work on a common currency unit of account for denominating trade, and that they hoped to invite other Latin American nations to join -- a proposal that has met with considerable skepticism and even derision.

While visiting China in April, Lula also called for ending dollar dependence, as Brasilia and Beijing move to enable direct trade in their respective currencies.

"We can't continue to rely on one currency that you can't print," Lula stressed on Monday, referring to the greenback. "I hope that the central banks of the BRICS will create a new currency, like the euro. We can do it."

The first job, he said, is to lay a foundation of the right "political and economic conditions."

Additional reporting by Andrew Sharp.

An empty station, a burning countryside, soot raining from the sky: This is what it's like to ride Laos' gleaming new $6 billion railway in April

Marielle Descalsota/Insider
Mon, May 22, 2023 

Slash and burn in the Laotian countryside.

I traveled to Laos to experience its new China-made railway.


The one-hour trip revealed a countryside that's burned from farming.


The air was so toxic that soot and ash were falling from the sky.

Laos is one of the few remaining communist  STALINIST countries in the world. Some two-thirds of Laotians still live in rural communities. But a shiny new railway funded by China now cuts through the countryside.

The train's driver's cab.

The Laos-China Railway is the biggest infrastructure project in the history of Laos. It's a massive 1,000-kilometer, or 621-mile train network that aims to connect Laos with Thailand and Kunming in southern China.

The railway is controversial. It's been criticized for evicting more than 4,400 Laotian families from their homes in the countryside. Despite being one of the poorest countries in Southeast Asia, Laos took on a $1.8 billion loan from China to build the railway. China paid for the remaining $4.2 billion.

I flew to Laos from Singapore in early April to experience first-hand how the historic railway is developing. It was my first time traveling on a cross-country train since my trip from Chiang Mai to Bangkok on a sleeper train in Thailand.

When I visited Laos, the entire line had not yet been completed. It was only the Laotian portion, that runs from the capital city of Vientiane to the border town of Boten, that I was able to experience. The line opened for cross-border service on April 13.

My journey started in Vientiane, the largest city in Laos where most of the urban population lives.

An aerial shot of Vientiane, Laos.

Laos is popular among backpackers for its natural landscape of waterfalls, mountains, and rivers. It's the only landlocked country in Southeast Asia. On TikTok, travelers share clips of its gorgeous scenery of clear skies and thick jungle. But when I first arrived at Wattay International Airport, I noticed that a thick haze was obscuring views of the dirt roads and clusters of homes made with tin roofs.

On that day in Vientiane, the PSI — or Pollutant Standards Index, which indicates air quality — hovered around 230. The National Environment Agency in Singapore categorizes any reading higher than 200 as "very unhealthy." It turned out that I had visited at the wrong time — there were several active fires during the week that I was in Laos. Vientiane is at the border with the northeastern province of Nong Khai in Thailand, right across the Mekong River. But on that day the border town was hidden behind the haze.

The smell of smog was deeply embedded in nearly everything — from the towels and bedsheets in my hotel room to my clothes and hair. There was no way to escape it, but hundreds of locals were out in the open–air markets, most of whom didn't wear masks.

Vang Vieng, around 80 miles north of Vientiane, was set to be my final destination. I was hoping that there, I would find countryside air that might be cleaner than it was in the city.

A first-class train ticket to Vang Vieng was 200,000 Laotian kip, or around $12.

Vientiane Railway Station.

While a first-class ticket costs just $12, I ended up paying around $7 more as I booked online through 12Go, a Thailand-based travel agency. I overpaid a bit for my convenience, but if you do have time, it's worth heading to the ticket station to buy tickets in person — although it's best if you do it in advance as the seats are often sold out.

The railway is an expensive project – it cost $6 billion to construct. The hefty price tag could be seen in the grandeur of Vientiane Railway Station.

Inside Vientiane Railway Station.

Vientiane's railway station looked to be one of the most modern structures in the entire city, which was reminiscent of an airport terminal. The rail line's ownership is split between three Chinese state-owned companies and the Laotian government.

While most of the travelers were locals, the Chinese influence was ubiquitous as the signs around the station were in Chinese and Lao, and announcements were said in both languages. Some announcements were made in English too — but there were times it was broken and mistranslated.

"We love the train line," one local, who only wanted to be known as Sang, told me. "Last time it took six hours before I could go to Luang Prabang, now it's only two," he said, referring to the city north of Vientiane.

The train to Vang Vieng was punctual. Passengers rushed to line up and board, but it was orderly — no one skipped the lines.

There appeared to be very few tourists taking the train that day, save for a handful of backpackers. Most of the passengers were locals traveling between cities — some of them didn't even have much with them, save for a backpack.

The train was impressive. It looked shiny and new, and there was staff dressed in Lao-inspired uniforms flanking each door.

The entrance to the train's cabins.

The CR200J, which is constructed by state-owned rolling stock manufacturer CCRC, can travel up to 100 miles per hour. It's nicknamed "the Hulk" for its green-colored design, similar to the Marvel superhero.

Inside the cars, dozens of staff greeted passengers, reminiscent of flight attendants on board an aircraft.

I made my way to the first-class cabin in the train's first car. It wasn't luxurious per se, but it was spacious and clean.

The first-class car in the train.

In July last year, I rode on one of Thailand's longest train rides. My first-class cabin wasn't particularly comfortable, considering I had to travel for 13 hours. But here in Laos, I was more comfortable than ever, thanks to the roomy plush seats — which made the short-haul trip a breeze.

The seats in first-class were much wider than in second-class. The latter was more private too, as there were limited seats available in the first car. Apart from that, my seat was basic: it could recline, had a footrest, and foldable a tray table for meals — but for the price, I couldn't complain.

According to online photos of the CR200J cabins in China, some configurations also have sleeper cars, with private cabins and beds.

Each car was replete with a washbasin and bathroom.

The bathroom in the train.

While the toilet was cleaner than the one in Thailand, it still had an unpleasant stench. The bathroom isn't designed with a shower, but for short-haul trips, it worked fine.

As the train began to depart the station, the view revealed trash, dirt, and bald trees.

The view right outside the train station.

The view was a stark contrast to the glitzy train station, including dark-colored water in the canals and half-dead foliage.

The construction of the railway has led to the pollution of local waterways, making it difficult for residents to fish and bathe in the water, according to a 2020 report by Radio Free Asia.

As the train traveled deeper in the Laotian countryside, acres of crop fields could be seen, against the backdrop of smog covering the jungle and sky.

The countryside in Laos.

There wasn't anyone — or anything — out in the field of burned crops, save for a lorry driving through.

Some 63% of Laos' population of 7.5 million people live in rural areas, many of whom work in agriculture. The industry made up around 17.2% of the country's gross domestic product last year, per the Vientiane Times.

Some of the things cultivated in Laos include rice, coffee, and, at one point in time, opium — which was only outlawed in 2006.

The countryside showed how the majority of Laotians live – in houses surrounded by jungle.

What houses look like in the Laotion countryside.

Laos is far from densely populated, so many people live in remote villages, which comprise dozens of families who are often from the same ethnic group. In Vientiane, however, many locals live in apartments, like in other capital cities in the region.

"In the countryside, a very limited number of locals speak English, but they will always make efforts to share something with you: food, beverage, smiles or just time," Mathieu Thaeron, a Frenchman who has lived in Vang Vieng since 2012, told me.

According to a 2015 report by Laotian architect Xayaphone Vongvilay, houses in Laos are influenced by French colonial architecture. A typical home is often made up of a multi-purpose area on the lower level, and a veranda and bedrooms on the upper floor. These homes are often elevated from the ground, although there are exceptions, like the one photographed above.

I had a glimpse of the gorgeous landscapes of Laos, with the edge of the jungle curving into Nam Lik, a river and reservoir.

A highway across a river in Laos.

Like its railway, many of Laos' highways are constructed and funded mostly by China. These highways plan to stretch from Vientiane to Boten — which mirrors the train route — and are expected to cost $7.1 billion.

The Vientiane-Vang Vieng Expressway (pictured above) is owned by state-owned Yunnan Construction Engineering Group, save for a 5% stake by the Laos government.

While thousands of cars are expected to use the massive expressway in the future, I only saw a single car on the road that day.

As the train crept closer to Vang Vieng, the darker side began to emerge — and revealed the cause of the country's thick smog.

Slash and burn in the Laotian countryside.

As the train began to approach Vang Vieng, the PSI was over 320, with active fires just 5 miles away, the reading on the Swiss tech company IQAir's app showed.

Many farmers in Southeast Asia resort to slash-and-burn farming to cultivate their crops — and Laos is no exception. Amidst acres of thick jungle were mounds of burnt ground (pictured above), remnants of forest fires that have been suffocating residents for years.

In late March alone, some 9,600 hotspots, which indicated forest fires, were recorded in Laos, according to Nikkei Asia, citing Thailand's Geo-Informatics and Space Technology Development Agency.

In the aftermath of the forest fire, black-gray soot remained. I spotted a handful of farmers on the burned land, observing their surroundings.

Slash and burn in the Laotian countryside.

"It's been smoggy because the farmers are burning their fields and rice paddies. When they burn the fields, the fire spreads to other places," an official of the Natural Resources and Environment Ministry told Radio Free Asia.

After being burned and cultivated, the land can no longer be used for crops.

The Laos government hasn't released official numbers on how many people have been affected by the smog. But in neighboring Thailand, where slash-and-burn is also commonplace, over 1.7 million people said they experienced issues like respiratory problems and burning eyes, per Nikkei Asia's report.

After around an hour, the train arrived in Vang Vieng. But what I saw was reminiscent of a post-apocalyptic film, with pale-white ash covering everything, from the buildings to the trees.

Vang Vieng covered in ashes.

The town's gorgeous cliffs were also obscured by the dense smog. It was 104 Fahrenheit, which made the thick haze even more suffocating. The heat was immense, unbearable even, and visibility was extremely low. Black soot fell from the sky.

I had left Vientiane to escape the smog, but instead had just gotten closer to it — the tracker on IQAir's app showed there was an active fire just 3.7 miles away.

"What happened this year was truly exceptional; I've never experienced such bad conditions," Thaeron said.

I came to Laos expecting picture-perfect scenery of valleys and limestone cliffs, like the ones I saw in dozens of TikToks. But the tropical landscape looked more like a desert.

Haze in Vang Vieng, where an active fire was just 6 kilometres away.

Having grown up in Singapore, I've had to live with varying degrees of haze almost every year. But this was unlike anything I had ever seen before. Many residents I saw seemed unfazed though, several of whom were still outdoors, without masks or protection from the smog.

Despite the dire weather conditions, many Laotians stayed resilient, still peddling their tuk-tuks, working out in the sun, and serving guests at the hotels. The smog has become so much a part of their lives that they appear to carry on with their daily life unfazed.

But as the region continues to swelter in record-breaking heat waves, I wondered if it's only a matter of time before the smog becomes too much for even the most hardened of locals.

PHOTOS Marielle Descalsota/Insider

SEE

EVEN AND UNEVEN DEVELOPMENT TROTSKY

Filmmakers At Cannes Grapple With 'Tectonic' AI Shift

By Fran BLANDY

May 23, 2023

The generative AI tool ChatGPT is revolutionising filmmaking

At an AI talk on a Cannes beach, a presenter's voice is cloned and used to say a random phrase in three languages, while another's face is replaced live on screen as they speak.

Few of the film buffs attending the premiere industry festival are shocked.

Ever since the artificial intelligence chatbot ChatGPT took the world by storm six months ago, spurring an AI race among tech giants, the technology has shaken up the film industry.

The use of AI to write scripts is one of the leading concerns among Hollywood movie and TV writers who are in their third week of a strike that has upended productions.

However the technology is revolutionising everything from voice acting, to analysing scripts and coming up with a budget, to creating mock-ups of scenes before you even pick up a camera.

"New things are created every single day," says Quinn Halleck, a 25-year-old filmmaker who is about to release a three-part short movie called "./ Sigma_001" which is about a sentient AI being, and uses AI from conception to marketing and distribution.

"It's not just one tool, it's sort of sprinkled throughout the workflow process," he tells AFP on the sidelines of a panel on AI.


The use of AI in scriptwriting is a major concern among striking Hollywood writers

This ranges from asking ChatGPT what a character could be like, what her backstory is, and "riffing" off that to create ideas.

Telling an anecdote about a showrunner who hires writers by giving them the same prompt as he gives ChatGPT and seeing if they perform better, he argues the "bar has been raised" to come up with great ideas.

But while some assistant roles may disappear, he believes a human director remains essential.

"You still have to come up with the ideas, you have to create the prompts and curate the answers."

The world's leading film festival, taking place on the French Riviera, got a hefty dose of AI with a lengthy scene de-aging Harrison Ford, 80, in "Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny".

While producers have ruled out using AI to keep the role going, actors like Tom Hanks believe it will allow him to keep acting long after his death.

Hanks is currently being de-aged in his upcoming movie "Here", with help from deepfake, face-swapping technology from AI firm Metaphysic.

The company's co-founder Tom Graham says technology has bridged the so-called "uncanny valley" -- the visceral human rejection of less-than-realistic androids -- and is now creating deepfakes where you "absolutely can't tell the difference".


"Deepfake" videos that manipulate reality are becoming more sophisticated and realistic

The company is behind Deepfake Tom Cruise, a TikTok account that perfectly imitates the actor, and also created a hyper-real Elvis Presley who morphed into Simon Cowell and his co-judges on an episode of "America's Got Talent".

While filmmakers are brimming with excitement over the technology's potential, questions of its abuse hang over the session.

"This set of technologies represents, you know, a set of tectonic social shifts like the industrial revolution, which will play out over the next 20-50 years and people should be worried about what happens," Graham tells AFP.

"Unfortunately, I don't believe that you can stop the advancement of the technology because a lot of it is open source. There's not really anything to turn off."

His advice: "You should try to own and control the rights to your biometric data, how you sound, how you look, and really kind of lock that down."

Magdalena Zielinska of ElevenLabs in Poland which claims to have created the "most expressive" AI voices available, says tools to check if a voice is synthetic will be essential.

Unlike the robotic AI voices of the past, models have learned to replicate the pace and intonation of human voices.

She says the tool allows directors to see how a scene will sound, or advertisers to see what kind of voice resonates most with clients. It can also be used to fix problems in post-production.

Zielinska says the technology could allow an actor to license their voice and do more projects at the same time.

A voice actor who fled the war in Ukraine was struggling to find work in Poland, and is "now making money", she says, after using the technology to clean up his English accent.

French director Mathias Chelebourg foresees that 90 percent of overall production will eventually be done by AI on movie sets.

"Hire right now an AI specialist in your team, whatever your job is, and hire it now, because in one year you will regret it," he warns.

© Agence France-Presse

US Top Health Official Sounds Alarm On Child Social Media Use

By AFP - Agence France Presse

May 23, 2023

America's top health official said there is growing evidence that social media use is associated with harm to young people's mental health

The top US health official on Tuesday issued a stark warning to parents, tech companies and regulators, saying the evidence is growing that social media use may seriously harm children.

In a lengthy advisory, US surgeon general Vivek Murthy said that while not without benefits, "there are ample indicators that social media can also have a profound risk of harm to the mental health and well-being of children and adolescents."

Social media use by young people in the United States is nearly universal, with up to 95 percent of adolescents reporting using a social platform and more than a third saying they do so "almost constantly," according to the Department of Health and Human Services.

Murthy's report said social media can help children and adolescents find a community to connect, but that it also contains "extreme, inappropriate, and harmful content," which can "normalize" self-harm and suicide.

It can perpetuate body dissatisfaction, eating disorders and depression and expose children to online bullying while they are undergoing a critical stage in brain development, the report warned.

Murthy called on policymakers to strengthen safety standards around social media and urged tech companies to responsibly assess the impact of their products on children and share data with researchers.

He also advised parents to establish tech-free zones at home in order to promote in-person communication, and to educate children by modelling healthy, responsible online behavior.

The report comes at a time when authorities across the United States are searching for ways to regulate social media use, and curb its ill-effects on young people in particular.

Earlier this month, the US state of Montana banned the use of TikTok on its territory. The Chinese-owned video sharing giant is challenging the decision in court. And in March, Utah became the first US state to require social media sites to get parental consent for accounts used by minors.

"We are in the middle of a national youth mental health crisis, and I am concerned that social media is an important driver of that crisis -- one that we must urgently address," Murthy said.

md/ec

© Agence France-Presse

ADDICTION AND EMOTIONAL PLAGUE
Pupil started deadly Guyana dorm fire over confiscated phone: source

Denis Chabrol
Tue, May 23, 2023

Relatives of the school dormitory fire sob during a meeting with Guyana President Irfaan Ali in Mahdia, where the tragedy happened

The weekend school dormitory blaze that killed 19 minors in central Guyana is believed to have been started by a disgruntled pupil angry at having her mobile phone confiscated, a government source told AFP on Tuesday.

Sunday's inferno gutted the building in the regional capital of Mahdia, which housed girls aged 11-12 and 16-17. Some are still hospitalized.

An official police report confirmed that "a female student is suspected of having set the devastating fire because her cellular phone was taken away."

The government source, speaking anonymously, said the teenage pupil in question had admitted to the arson attack and was under police guard at the district hospital in Mahdia.

Police are seeking advice on whether to charge her, the official said.

On Monday, Guyana Police Commissioner Clifton Hicken had already stated that investigators believed the fire was "maliciously set."

According to the government source, students aren't allowed to have phones in the dormitory.

After the staff took away the girl's phone, she "threatened the same night that she will burn down the building and everybody heard her," the government source said.

The official said that minutes later the girl went to the bathroom area and sprayed insecticide on a curtain before lighting a match.

Several pupils had recounted the same version of events, the official said.

The Guyanese government declared three days of mourning after the dormitory fire in Mahdia killed at least 19 people © Keno GEORGE / AFP

- Locked inside -

The girls were locked in for the night, and a house mistress told police that in her panic she could not find the front door key. The building had metal bars on the windows preventing pupils from escaping through them.

The house mistress "locks up every night at nine o'clock to ensure the girls don't get away from the building," the official said.

"According to the female students, they were asleep and were awakened by screams," said the police report.

Despite efforts by other students to extinguish the blaze, the official said the fire quickly swept through the wooden ceiling and eventually engulfed the entire building.

Some pupils, including the girl who allegedly started the fire, managed to escape when some men broke down a door.

"Upon checking, they saw fire/smoke in the bathroom area, which quickly spread in the building, causing several students to receive burns to their bodies and smoke inhalation, while several managed to escape," the police report said.

The police report said there were 57 pupils in the dormitory, which was "a one-flat concrete building measuring about 100 feet by 40 feet, with several windows, all grilled, and five doors."

Firefighters did not arrive on the scene until 25 minutes after the fire took hold.

The house mistress' son apparently also died in the fire.

Thirteen young girls and the boy died in the building, while five more pupils died later at the hospital.

As well as the dead, around 20 children were taken to hospital. Seven remain hospitalized, with two in critical condition, according to a hospital source.

Six autopsies performed so far revealed the minors died from smoke inhalation and burns, according to the police. The other 13 unrecognizable bodies were being transported to the capital, Georgetown, for DNA testing to confirm their identities.

National security advisor Gerry Gouveia said that a forensic team from Barbados had arrived in Guyana to help with the identification. Another team from the United States is expected.

Guyanese President Irfaan Ali said that Cuba also offered to provide medical support.

Guyana, with a population of 800,000, is South America's only English-speaking nation. It is a former Dutch and British colony, which recently discovered it holds the world's largest per-capita oil reserves.

dc-pgf/bc/nro/md

Mexico keeps close watch on ash-spewing volcano

AFP
Tue, May 23, 2023,

A soldier sweeps ash in the street in a town near Mexico's Popocatepetl volcano

A volcano southeast of the Mexican capital spewed more gas and ash into the sky on Tuesday as authorities maintained their warning level at one step below red alert.

Dozens of shelters have been opened near Popocatepetl -- located around 70 kilometers (about 45 miles) from Mexico City -- which has seen various periods of increased activity since awakening from decades-long slumber in 1994.

The government is monitoring Popocatepetl "day and night," President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said after the volcano put on another fiery show overnight.

He said the volcano's activity had decreased slightly since the alert level was raised on Sunday, helping to calm nerves in nearby towns and villages that have been covered with ash.

"Last night I slept a little better because the other three days my house's windows and door vibrated," said Francisca de los Santos, a 56-year-old living in a town close to the volcano.

"We're used to it, but it always scares us a bit," she told AFP, adding that she had no plan to leave her home.

Roughly 25 million people live within a 100-kilometer radius of Popocatepetl, the second tallest volcano in Mexico, rising nearly 5,500 meters (18,000 feet) above sea level.

Mexico's National Center for Prevention of Disasters said Tuesday that over the previous 24 hours, 22 volcanic exhalations of water vapor, volcanic gasses and ash had been detected, along with two explosions.

The increase in the alert level on Sunday to "yellow phase three" came a day after two Mexico City airports temporarily halted operations due to falling ash.

The next level, a red alert, would trigger mandatory evacuations in communities near the volcano, whose name means "smoking mountain" in the indigenous Nahuatl language.

bur-jg/axm/dr/nro/md

PHOTOS

Popocatepetl: Ashes over Mexico – DW – 05/24/2023

SEE

https://plawiuk.blogspot.com/2023/05/silent-b-movie-mexicos-popocatepetl.html

'Modern slavery' most common in North Korea and Eritrea: study
NOT SOCIALISM BUT STALINISM
AFP
Tue, May 23, 2023

The 2023 Global Slavery Index says modern slavery has got worse since its last survey

North Korea, Eritrea and Mauritania have the highest prevalence of modern slavery in the world, according to the 2023 Global Slavery Index published Wednesday, which noted a "worsening" situation globally since its last survey five years earlier.

The report said an estimated 50 million people were "living in situations of modern slavery" in 2021, an increase of 10 million over 2016, when the problem was last measured.

The figure includes some 28 million people in forced labour and 22 million living in a forced marriage.

The situation is worsening "against a backdrop of increasing and more complex armed conflicts, widespread environmental degradation" and impacts from the coronavirus pandemic, among other factors, the investigation said.

Compiled by the human rights charity Walk Free, the report defines modern slavery as encompassing "forced labour, forced or servile marriage, debt bondage, forced commercial sexual exploitation, human trafficking, slavery-like practices, and the sale and exploitation of children."

Slavery's core principle entails "the systematic removal of a person’s freedom" -- from the right to accept or refuse labour to the liberty to determine if, when and whom to marry.

By this benchmark, reclusive and authoritarian North Korea has the highest prevalence of modern slavery (104.6 per 1,000 population), according to the report.

It is followed by Eritrea (90.3) and Mauritania (32), which in 1981 became the last country in the world to make hereditary slavery illegal.

The 10 countries with the highest prevalence of modern slavery have some common characteristics, including "limited protections for civil liberties and human rights".

Many of the countries are in "volatile" regions experiencing conflict or political instability, or home to a large populaton of "vulnerable people" such as refugees or migrant workers.

- 'Mirror held to power' -

Also in the top 10 globally were Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait, where migrant workers' labour rights are restricted by the "kafala" sponsorship system.

Other countries in the top 10 are Turkey, "which hosts million of refugees from Syria", Tajikistan, Russia and Afghanistan.

While forced labour is more common in low-income countries it is "deeply" connected to demand from higher-income countries, the report said, noting that two-thirds of all forced labour cases are linked to global supply chains.

The report said G20 countries -- made up of the EU and the world's 19 top economies -- are currently importing $468 billion worth of goods that are at risk of being produced with forced labour, up from $354 billion in the previous report.

Electronics remain the highest value at-risk product, followed by garments, palm oil and solar panels, in a sign of high demand for renewable energy products.

"Modern slavery permeates every aspect of our society. It is woven through our clothes, lights up our electronics, and seasons our food," the group's founding director Grace Forrest said.

"At its core, modern slavery is a manifestation of extreme inequality. It is a mirror held to power, reflecting who in any given society has it and who does not," she added.

acl/phz/ri

$6 mn raised to preserve Nina Simone's childhood home

AFP
Tue, May 23, 2023

Nina Simone in concert at l'Olympia in Paris, October 22, 1991

An art auction and New York gala have raised nearly $6 million to preserve and restore the childhood home of soul music legend and civil rights activist Nina Simone, organizers said Tuesday.

The twin events brought in some $5.88 million -- far more than the original $2 million organizers hoped to raise to restore the rural North Carolina abode.

"The new funding will meaningfully advance our project goals to complete the full restoration of the house and landscape," said Brent Leggs, executive director of the African American Cultural Heritage Action Fund.

"With this investment, we are well on our way to opening the doors to visitors in 2024."

Four US artists -- Julie Mehretu, Ellen Gallagher, Rashid Johnson and Adam Pendleton -- bought the dilapidated rural home in 2017 for $95,000. They've since worked with Leggs' organization, as well as tennis star Venus Williams, to raise money to turn the house into a cultural and historic site.

The online auction, with works donated by British painter Cecily Brown and American artist Sarah Sze, was organized by Pace and Sotheby's.

Among the 11 works for sale, Mehretu's ink-and-acrylic "New Dawn, Sing (for Nina)" fetched $1.6 million.

Simone, whose songs found renewed resonance during the Black Lives Matter protests of recent years, had a complex, often difficult relationship with the United States, where she was born in 1933, during the era of racial segregation.

Born Eunice Waymon, she spent the first years of her life in the three-room house in Tryon, in the rural southeastern state of North Carolina, with her parents and siblings, and began playing the piano at age three.

But her dream of becoming a classical concert performer was shattered when she was rejected by Philadelphia's prestigious Curtis Institute of Music, an ordeal she attributed to racism.

In the 1960s, Simone was active in the civil rights movement, including through rousing speeches and song.

Her "Mississippi Goddam," was a response to a 1963 fire in an Alabama church started by members of the Ku Klux Klan. Three days after the assassination of Martin Luther King in 1968, she performed "Why? (The king of love is dead)."

Simone eventually left the United States and lived her last years in the south of France, where she died in 2003.

arb/cha/nro/ec

 

 

Nina Simone & Lauryn Hill - The Miseducation of Eunice Waymon (Full Album) | Amerigo Gazaway

Soul Mates Records

 Dec 3, 2018

With his latest Soul Mates Project, Amerigo Gazaway imagines a studio session between The High Priestess of Soul, Nina Simone, and living legend, Lauryn Hill. Continuing the “collaborations that never were” theme of his previous releases, the producer seamlessly connects the dots between Hip-Hop and the genre’s predecessor, Soul.

Back in 2016, I had the pleasure of discussing my conceptual collaboration projects via a roundtable discussion at MoPOP’s annual POP Conference in Seattle. During our discussion, a fellow panelist, writer and professor, Zandria Robinson, posed an interesting question: “where’s your project celebrating women artists?”

Two years later and I’m excited to finally share the answer with my new Nina Simone + Lauryn Hill mixtape, “The Miseducation of Eunice Waymon”. Given the project was, in part, inspired by Zandria’s question, she got the first listen and has written a few words on the album below. -AG

“Soul Mates’ “collaborations that never were” enters new territory with a now familiar deft and verve, this time highlighting intergenerational conjurings between two black women cultural workers from the civil rights and hip-hop generations. With Nina Simone and Lauryn Hill seated together at the table, collaboration transforms into vivid conversation, call and response, and a call to action--private, personal, and public--across space, time, and realm.

With "The Miseducation of Eunice Waymon", Amerigo Gazaway renders listeners children in the backseat of a shiny black Chevy, transfixed by the mysteries of grown women’s conversations. We ride along and listen quietly as Hill drives down South to retrieve Simone from North Carolina and the two travel back north together, to New Jersey and then to New York, and onward to woman-ish soul eternity.

Gazaway does a different kind of labor in this mashup, creating a private, interior space for these women to speak the truths of their lives, both to themselves and to each other. As they come to know each other across the project’s apt sample and song combinations and interview snippets, Simone’s piano accompanies and buoys Lauryn and Lauryn sings back Nina’s words and sounds a resonant understanding with her acoustic guitar. They become gold- and white-framed mirrors, dancing to breakbeats around each other’s personal and political struggles and triumphs with all the freedom being seen, being recognized, brings.

In this curated interior space, audiences are compelled, at last, to listen to all of what and who these women were and are and to really hear those truths: to listen and learn about care, alienation, desperation, motherhood, women’s work; about the unending strivings for interpersonal peace and understanding; and about the necessity for liberation.”  - Zandria Robinson

Watch the teaser video here:   

 • Video  

Stream/download the full album here: https://bit.ly/3MLSOnv

Tracklist:

01. Feeling Good 

02. Ready Or Not feat. The Fugees 

03. Doo Wop (That Thing) 

04. To Zion feat. Carlos Santana 

05. Fu-Gee-La feat. The Fugees 

06. The Sweetest Thing feat. John Forté 

07. Take It Easy 

08. Peace Of Mind 

09. Lost Ones 

10. Killing Me Softly 

11. If I Ruled The World feat. Nas 

12. How Many Mic feat. The Fugees

13. So High feat. John Legend 

14. Care For What 

15. Angel Of The Morning 

16. The Miseducation of Eunice Waymon 

17. Fu-Gee-La (Refugee Camp Remix) [Bonus Track]

Produced by Amerigo Gazaway 

Executive Producer: Rickey Mindlin

Soul Mates 2018

DIY Acapellas by The Goodwill Projects:

http://www.thegoodwillprojects.com

http://amerigomusic.com

http://soulmatesproject.com

World 'failing' to protect civilians in combat zones, UN chief says

AFP
Tue, May 23, 2023

Russian ambassador Vasily Nebenzya sits next to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres at a Security Council meeting on May 23, 2023

The world is failing to protect civilians as the number of people caught up in conflicts and their humanitarian aftershocks skyrocketed last year, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said Tuesday.

In 2022, the United Nations tallied a 53 percent increase in civilian deaths compared to the year prior, with nearly 17,000 civilian deaths recorded across 12 conflicts.

Citing civilian deaths in Ukraine and Sudan, schools destroyed in Ethiopia and damage to water infrastructure in Syria, Guterres warned the UN Security Council that "the world is failing to live up to its commitments to protect civilians; commitments enshrined in international humanitarian law."

Guterres, sitting next to Russian ambassador Vasily Nebenzya, said UN research into the treatment of civilians of war zones showed 94 percent of victims of "explosive weapons" in populated areas were civilians last year, while more than 117 million people faced acute hunger primarily because of war and insecurity.

In Ukraine alone, which has been battling Russia's invasion for over year, the UN recorded nearly 8,000 civilian deaths and over 12,500 injuries, though it added that the actual figures are likely higher.

Worldwide, the number of refugees forced from their homes "due to conflict, violence, human rights violations and persecution" has reached 100 million, the UN chief added.

Also speaking in front of the Security Council on Tuesday was Mirjana Spoljaric, president of the International Committee of the Red Cross, who told members that "as we meet, countless civilians in conflicts around the world are experiencing a living hell."

"Any minute, the next missile can obliterate their home, their school, their clinic and everyone in it," she said. "Any week, they might run out of food or medicine."

Alain Berset, president of Switzerland -- which took up the rotating presidency of the council in May -- said that all parties to a conflict must abide by international humanitarian law.

"Conflicts are the main drivers of hunger," he said. "More and more people are facing acute food insecurity," with most concentrated in conflict zones like the Democratic Republic of Congo, Sudan and the Sahel, "or in other contexts where violence is endemic, such as Haiti."

French ambassador to the UN Nicolas de Riviere singled out alleged rights violations committed by Russia in Ukraine and by the Russian mercenary Wagner group in the Central African Republic and Mali.

The rise in civilians killed in armed conflicts last year is "very troubling," he added.

"Civilians have suffered the deadly effects of armed conflict for too long," Guterres said. "It is time we live up to our promise to protect them."

nr/led/nro/md

International Booker prize announces first ever Bulgarian winner


Georgi Gospodinov’s Time Shelter, translated by Angela Rodel, portrays a ‘clinic for the past’ and was praised as a ‘great novel about Europe’

Sarah Shaffi

Tue 23 May 2023 

Georgi Gospodinov’s Time Shelter, translated by Angela Rodel, has become the first book written in Bulgarian to win the International Booker prize.

Chair of judges Leïla Slimani described Time Shelter as “a brilliant novel full of irony and melancholy”, and added: “It is a very profound work that deals with a contemporary question and also a philosophical question: what happens to us when our memories disappear?”

Time Shelter by Georgi Gospodinov, translated by Angela Rodel

The £50,000 prize, which is split equally between the author and translator, is awarded annually for a novel or short story collection in any language that has been translated into English and published in the UK or Ireland.

Time Shelter is Gospodinov’s fourth book to be translated into English. It concerns the opening of a “clinic for the past” that offers a promising treatment for Alzheimer’s sufferers: each floor reproduces a decade in minute detail, with everything from furniture, cigarettes and drinks from the era, to newspapers that cover each day of the decade. As word spreads, healthy people begin to seek refuge in the clinic to escape the horrors of modern life.

Slimani said the novel “questions the way in which our memory is the cement of our identity and our intimate narrative.

“But it is also a great novel about Europe, a continent in need of a future, where the past is reinvented and nostalgia is a poison,” she continued. “It offers us a perspective on the destiny of countries like Bulgaria, which have found themselves at the heart of the ideological conflict between the west and the communist world.”skip past newsletter promotion

Time Shelter by Georgi Gospodinov review – the dangers of dwelling in the past
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Slimani was joined on the judging panel by Uilleam Blacker, one of Britain’s leading literary translators from Ukrainian, Booker-shortlisted novelist Tan Twan Eng, New Yorker staff writer Parul Sehgal and Frederick Studemann, literary editor of the Financial Times.

Gospodinov is a Bulgarian poet, writer and playwright. When published in Bulgaria, Time Shelter topped the book charts, and won the Strega European prize. Rodel is a musician and literary translator who lives and works in Bulgaria.

Patrick McGuinness in his Guardian review called Gospodinov “a writer of great warmth as well as skill” and said Rodel’s translation was done with “skill and delicacy”.


The 2023 International Booker prize shortlist – review

Time Shelter’s win marks the second year in a row that the award has gone to a book in a language never previously honoured by the prize. Last year’s winner, Tomb of Sand by Geetanjali Shree, translated by Daisy Rockwell, was the first novel translated from Hindi to win.

Fiammetta Rocco, administrator of the International Booker, said “although fiction in translation published in Britain has always been a slightly specialised way of looking at literature, I don’t think that’s the case any more. There is an extraordinary evolution going on. We’re seeing it in the range of independent publishers, the presentation of books in languages we’ve never seen before.”

Gospodinov and Rodel were announced as winners at an event at London’s Sky Garden on Tuesday evening. The pair were up against a shortlist that included Eva Baltasar’s Boulder, translated by Julia Sanches from Catalan, The Gospel According to the New World by Maryse Condé, translated from French by her husband Richard Philcox, Whale by Cheon Myeong-kwan, translated from Korean by Chi-Young Kim, Standing Heavy by GauZ’, translated from French by Frank Wynne and Still Born by Guadalupe Nettel, translated from Spanish by Rosalind Harvey.