It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
Wednesday, June 02, 2021
Erdogan accuses US of supporting ‘terrorists’ against Turkey
“What is the reason for our tensions (with the US)? The so-called Armenian genocide,” said Erdogan who is to meet the US president June 14.
Wednesday 02/06/2021
A file picture shows Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan speaking to the Justice and Development Party (AK Party) members in Ankara. (AFP)
ISTANBUL--Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Tuesday warned that the United States risked “losing a precious friend” if it tries to corner his country, speaking two weeks before his first meeting with US counterpart Joe Biden.
Already tense, relations between the two NATO states have further deteriorated since Biden replaced Erdogan’s ally Donald Trump in January, with the new president making a point of highlighting Turkey’s dire human rights record.
When asked about Ankara-Washington relations, Erdogan said in an interview with Turkish state broadcaster TRT on Tuesday that “those who corner the Republic of Turkey will lose a precious friend”.
Erdogan’s combative stance comes ahead of the first meeting between the two leaders on the sidelines of a NATO summit in Brussels on June 14.
Biden was in no rush to speak with the Turkish leader after taking office, waiting three months before calling Erdogan in April.
That call was also on the eve of Biden’s historic decision to recognise the Armenian genocide by the Ottoman empire during World War I, a move that outraged Turkey which rejects that term.
“What is the reason for our tensions (with the US)? The so-called Armenian genocide,” Erdogan said on Tuesday.
“Don’t you have any other problems to deal with rather than advocating for Armenia?”
He also listed several issues that have strained relations since 2016, including US support for Kurdish militias in Syria that Turkey deems “terrorists”.
“If the United States is indeed our ally, should they side with the terrorists or with us? Unfortunately, they continue to support the terrorists,” he said.
Erdogan had previously indicated he intended to mend ties with Biden, last week saying their meeting will be a “harbinger of a new era” in US-Turkey relations.
On Tuesday Erdogan, who has ruled Turkey since 2003, said he has always managed to work with the person in the White House “whether he is a Republican or a Democract”.
World at risk of reaching climate temperature limit in 5 years
'It is a wakeup call the world needs to fast-track commitments to slash greenhouse gas emissions,' says WMO official
Handan Kazanci |27.05.2021
ISTANBUL
The world is closer than ever to reach an annual average global temperature of 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit), according to a report on Thursday, the lower of the two temperature limits set by the landmark Paris Agreement.
“There is a 90% likelihood of at least one year between 2021-2025 becoming the warmest on record, which would dislodge 2016 from the top ranking, according to the Global Annual to Decadal Climate Update,” the Geneva-based World Meteorological Organization (WMO) said.
“There is about a 40% chance of the annual average global temperature temporarily reaching 1.5°C above the pre-industrial level in at least one of the next five years – and these odds are increasing with time,” according to WMO’s new climate report.
Over 2021-2025, high-latitude regions and the Sahel are likely to be wetter and there is an increased chance of more tropical cyclones in the Atlantic compared to the recent past (defined as the 1981-2010 average), according to the report.
The annual report gathers expertise from scientists around the world. Led by UK’s Met Office, the climate prediction groups from Spain, Germany, Canada, China, the US, Japan, Australia, Sweden, Norway, and Denmark joined the report this year.
Quoting WMO Secretary-General Petteri Taalas, the statement added: “This study shows – with a high level of scientific skill – that we are getting measurably and inexorably closer to the lower target of the Paris Agreement on Climate Change.”
“It is yet another wakeup call that the world needs to fast-track commitments to slash greenhouse gas emissions and achieve carbon neutrality,” Taalas added.
He underlined the need for climate adaptation.
“Only half of 193 WMO members have state-of-the-art early warning services. Countries should continue to develop the services that will be needed to support adaptation in climate-sensitive sectors – such as health, water, agriculture and renewable energy – and promote early warning systems that reduce the adverse impacts of extreme events.”
The Paris Agreement is considered a landmark document in global climate change efforts and a legally binding treaty.
It entered into force in 2016 and has been adopted by over 190 parties, aiming to curb global warming compared to pre-industrial levels to well below 2, preferably 1.5, degrees Celsius.
UK investors urge G7 to force firms to reveal their climate change exposure
Investment Association also called on most developed economies to help firms meet Paris Agreement climate goals
The world’s glaciers are melting, distorting weather patterns around the globe. Photograph: Aumphotography/Getty Images
An influential group of UK investors are urging G7 leaders to follow the UK’s lead by forcing firms to come clean about their exposure to climate risks.
In a letter to ambassadors and high commissioners sent ahead of the G7 summit in Cornwall, the Investment Association (IA) also called on the world’s largest developed economies to issue sector-by-sector guidance to help firms plan to meet Paris Agreement climate goals, which aim to limit global heating to 1.5 degrees celsius.
G7 members – which include Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the UK and the US – should coordinate and standardise climate reporting standards, the IA added. The group represents asset managers including Legal & General, Schroders and Aviva, which together have a combined £8.5tn under management.
The climate recommendations are part of the UK trade body’s efforts to help its members decarbonise their investment portfolios, a task which has been complicated by a lack of information on climate risks linked to the companies they invest in. With more data, investment chiefs can pressure individual companies that are failing to transition to a climate-friendly business model. They can also threaten to pull their cash altogether.
IA members with more than £5tn in assets under management – including Allianz Global Investors, Jupiter Asset Management, and M&G Investments – have pledged that their portfolios’ carbon emissions will reach net zero by 2050.
“The meeting of the G7 is a prime opportunity for the world’s largest economies to take a coordinated, global approach to tackling climate change,” Chris Cummings, chief executive of the Investment Association, said.
“As an industry which invests in companies around the world on behalf of both UK and overseas savers and investors, investment managers have a vital role to play in the shift to a more sustainable global economy.
“Ensuring high-quality and comparable data on the risks that companies face from climate change is key to achieving this and meeting the net zero targets.”
The IA now wants all G7 countries to make similar commitments, and set reporting standards that will make it easier to compare the progress made by companies in different countries.
Together, IA members have about £3.7tn invested in foreign assets, including stocks and bonds. The lobby group has said comparable data is “vital” for keeping tabs on international firms within their investment portfolios, and making informed decisions on behalf of pension schemes and savers.
The lobby group also wants leaders to agree on common standards for green government bonds, which are meant to fund renewable or clean energy projects. It comes amid growing demand for environmentally friendly investments.
A number of G7 countries, including France, Italy and Germany, have issued green sovereign bonds. The UK government is due to issue its first green bond this year.
“In isolation, these measures are to be welcomed but we must not forget that both financial markets and climate-related risk are global,” the IA letter said. “It is vital, therefore, that forums such as the G7 consider how to take action which is coordinated and global in outlook.”
Tories hint at secret corporate courts in UK-Australia trade deal
The plans could allow Australian energy firms to sue the UK for taking climate action.
The UK-Australia trade deal could allow Australian companies to sue the British government through a system of secret courts, the government has revealed.
Campaigners have warned that the measure could tie the hands of governments ‘for a generation or more’ with legally binding tribunals allowing corporations to extract ‘eye-watering payouts’ from taxpayers – with companies potentially able to sue the government for taking robust climate action.
Ministers have suggested that an Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) system could be included in the UK-Australia trade deal, allowing companies to sue the government through a corporate tribunal system when they believe policies have harmed their profits.
Trade campaigners, environmental charities, and unions have lashed out at the proposals, which could give companies free rein to ignore climate or humanitarian obligations, Global Justice Now has warned.
ISDS cases are heard in a secretive tribunal system separate from a country’s own legal system, which campaigners say is anti-democratic.
The courts could threaten environmentalists’ demands to abandon projects like the Cumbrian Coal mine. If the government scraps the mine after entering a deal including ISDS, EMR capital, the Australian owner of West Cumbria Mining, could sue for huge sums of money.
Recent ISDS cases include Swedish energy company Vattenfall suing Germany for policies that cut water pollution; German energy companies RWE and Uniper suing the Netherlands over phasing out of coal power, and Lone Pine suing Canada over a fracking moratorium.
Philip Morris famously attempted to sue the Australian government through ISDS for enacting a plain packaging law for tobacco products.
When asked by the SNP’s Drew Hendry if ISDS would be included in the UK-Australia trade deal, trade minister Greg Hands responded “It is a live negotiation. There will be a chapter on investment. We are huge investors in each other’s markets. And I’ll remind him the UK has never lost an ISDS case.”
The government’s new foreign investment council includes a branch of German energy giant RWE, which is currently suing the Dutch government through ISDS for phasing out coal power, OpenDemocracyrevealed last month.
Nick Dearden, Director of Global Justice Now, said: “Greg Hands has confirmed our worst fears – that, just as most countries are moving away from the toxic corporate court system, the British government wants to turbo-charge it.
“These courts would allow Australian companies to extract eye-watering pay-outs from the government for taking action on anything from climate change to workers’ rights, tying the hands of governments for a generation or more.
“The Australian company behind the Cumbrian coal mine could sue our government in an exclusive, secretive tribunal for halting or delaying the project for environmental reasons. Right now, the Dutch government is being sued in these courts for daring to phase out coal power, so we know fossil fuel companies won’t hold back.
“ISDS gives corporations free rein to ignore climate or humanitarian obligations, safe in the knowledge they can recover their dirty investments through courts that are shielded from the accountability of public legal systems. It’s anti-democratic and should be nowhere near any of our trade deals.”
When tobacco giant Philp Morris tried to sue Australia after it sought to pass plain packaging legislation to protect public health, it cost the the Australian taxpayer AUS $24 million fighting the case – even though the Australian government won. Unison is among trade unions to raise concerns about including ISDS in the Australia trade deal.
Leah Sullivan, Senior Trade Campaigner at War on Want, said: “Including ISDS in this deal would be a disaster for our climate goals. The UK is claiming climate leadership this year, and yet launching into deals that will hand over power to corporations for sue countries for climate action.
“It was ISDS that enabled an Australian investor to sue the government of Pakistan for 6 billion USD for a mine that was never even built – ISDS allows wealthy investors to extract billions from developing countries.”
Extinction Rebellion (XR) has revealed its plans for action for this month’s G7 Summit in Cornwall.
The series of protests will be focused on the failure of G7 nations to respect the global climate commitments they made in Paris in 2015.
XR activists are urging the leaders meeting at Carbis Bay in Cornwall to act ‘immediately’ to address the climate and ecological emergency.
Beginning on June 1st, Extinction Rebellion’s ‘G7 Rebellion’ will kick off with a series of actions in towns and cities across the UK, which will culminate with three days of protests in Cornwall. The group said that it expects around 1,000 protesters to make their way to St Ives for the summit.
The G7 Summit of leading economies – held from the 11th to 13th June – is seen as a key staging post before the UN conference on climate change (COP26) in Glasgow this November.
There are widespread calls for G7 countries to increase their ambitions for emissions reduction and climate finance assistance to developing countries ahead of the UN conference.
Melissa Carrington, a former environmental consultant from Dorset, says: “The reality is that none of the G7 nations are delivering on the promises they made in Paris in 2015. All claims of climate leadership are farcical, when no major economy has implemented policies consistent with limiting global heating to 1.5 degrees Celsius.
“G7’s recent statements are the bare minimum that they can get away with. We need to see much greater ambition including an immediate end to financing and subsidies for all forms of fossil fuel and a massive scaling up of climate finance assistance to developing countries.”
G7 environment ministers have recently agreed that they will deliver climate targets in line with limiting the rise in global temperatures to 1.5C and end direct funding of coal-fired power stations in poorer nations by the end of 2021.
CO2 emissions dipped slightly worldwide in 2020, largely due to the global Covid shutdown, but nowhere near enough to meet climate targets.
The information below is from Extinction Rebellion. The plans for Cornwall
Friday 11th June: Sound the Alarm March, St Ives
On the first day of the G7 Summit Extinction Rebellion plans to hold a ‘creative and noisy’ protest march through the centre of St. Ives. Supporters are invited to ‘sound the alarm’ for climate justice by making as much noise as possible with air horns, drums, rattles and other instruments. The march will feature a large samba band and many pop up theatrical actions.
The theme for the day’s events is a reference to the fact that a wealthy minority of the world’s countries and corporations are the principal cause of the climate and ecological crisis, while its adverse effects fall first and foremost on the poor who have done least to contribute to the crisis.
Extinction Rebellion has requested that a delegation of activists from XR and associated movements is allowed inside the security corden surrounding the Carbis Bay hotel to deliver messages from communities on the front line of the climate and ecological emergency to the G7 summit.
Cathy Allen from Extinction Rebellion said: “The delegation is symbolic. It attempts to give voice to the anger of climate vulnerable communities who are not represented at the G7 summit to enable their stories to be heard by the world’s leaders.
“We face a situation of barbaric inequity, where the 50% of the world who contributed so little to our collective climate crisis (7%), are the ones facing the brunt of its impacts, and are also, as usual, the ones who have no voice at all at the G7 table.”
Protesters will gather from 11am at St. Ives Leisure Centre for speeches, before marching to Porthminster beach.
Speakers include Lily Stevens, a young climate activist from Cornwall, Dr Mya-Rose Craig, Rob Hopkins and Dr. Gail Bradbrook.
Saturday 12th June: G is for Greenwash, Falmouth
On the second day of the G7 summit, the focus of Extinction Rebellion protests will switch to Falmouth, where the group plans to hold another creative, non-violent march through the town. There will be creative art installations, speeches and theatrical performances, interspersed with singing and choir performances.
The theme for the day is government’s greenwashing of the Climate and Ecological Emergency. “The narrative from governments, corporates and the media has changed. They might appear to be saying some of the right things about climate action, but their words are often a cover for lies, half truths and disinformation,” XR said.
The actions for the day will focus on ‘calling out the greenwash wherever we see it’, including ‘fossil fuel companies trying to convince us they are part of the solution, banks promising Net Zero while pumping trillions into new fossil fuel projects and the UK government as greenwasher- in-chief, claiming climate leadership while simultaneously increasingly their support for the fossil fuel industry.’
Nat Squire, 24, an Osteopath from Falmouth said: “Our government claims to be a climate leader while every decision they make takes us closer to climate and ecological collapse. This is worse than greenwash, it’s a massive fraud and people my age will end up paying the price.”
Protesters will meet at 11:30am at Kimberly Park in Falmouth, before a march through Falmouth from midday. The protest will return to Kimberly Park from 3:15pm.
Speakers include Dr Mya-Rose Craig, Skeena Rathor and Dr. Rupert Read.
Sunday 13th June: All Hands On Deck, St Ives
On the final day of the G7 summit the Extinction Rebellion protest will return to St. Ives where a day of creative beach-based actions is planned, including art installations, music, speakers and ‘discobedience’.
The theme for the day is “All hands on Deck” a reference to Extinction Rebellion’s third demand for a Citizens’ Assembly on climate and ecological justice to move beyond our broken parliamentary democracy and place power in the hands of citizens.
In the afternoon, the focus will return to the G7 summit and the main theme of “Drowning in Promises”. A creative art installation will feature a wooden model of the official G7 summit logo sinking beneath the waves as dancing rebels collapse on the sand in a die-in.
Activists will gather from 10am until 6pm at Porthmeor, Town Harbour and Porthminster beaches.
Speakers include Dr Mya-Rose Craig, Rob Hopkins, Mothiur Rahman and Dr. Gail Bradbrook.
UK actions
1st – 10th June: Blooming Greenwash. A group of cyclists are departing Shoreham on the 1st June and travelling 300 miles to the G7 Summit in Cornwall, to arrive on the 10th. With their boat, the “Bloomin’ Adur Too”, they will travel around 30 miles a day along the south coast. They will be performing plays and circus acts along the way to highlight government inaction on the climate and ecological emergency and false claims of climate leadership (“greenwash”).
5th – 10th June: Plymouth to Carbis Bay – Protect the Earth March. Groups from across the south west will come together to march across Cornwall to arrive in time for the G7 Summit. The focus for the march is global solidarity with front line activists and ‘earth defenders’ who are risking their lives in order to fight ecological destruction caused by foreign companies operating in their communities.
7th-10th June: Make the Wave. Four days of nationwide UK outreach actions for local groupsto get involved with, forming a ‘wave’ around the coastline that ‘will surge into an unstoppable force for change’.
10th June, 10:00pm. Light the Beacons. Campaigners will light the Jubilee Beacons or those on old Beacon hills as we urge world leaders to take the actions needed to save the planet.
The US labor shortage is 'national economic emergency' getting worse by the day, the Chamber of Commerce said. In some states, there are more job vacancies than available workers. gdean@insider.com (Grace Dean) 50 mins ago Like1 Comment| 1
The US Chamber of Commerce called the current labor shortage an "emergency."
The Chamber described the shortage, hitting multiple industries, as a threat to US economic recovery.
In South Dakota, Nebraska, and Vermont, there are more job vacancies than available workers, it said.
The current US labor shortage, which is hitting industries from education and healthcare to hospitality and ride-hailing apps, is holding back the nation's economic recovery from the pandemic, the US Chamber of Commerce said Tuesday.
In some states and some industries, there are fewer available workers than there are vacancies, according to a new report by the Chamber.
INCREASE PAY AND BENEFITS INSTEAD OF DRIVING WORKERS TO STARVATION
BY CUTTING BENEFITS MANY STATES ALREADY HAVE LOW UI THE FED TOP UP MADE THOSE JUST BAREABLE
"The worker shortage is real - and it's getting worse by the day," Suzanne Clark, president and CEO of the Chamber, said in a statement. "The worker shortage is a national economic emergency, and it poses an imminent threat to our fragile recovery and America's great resurgence," she said.
The Chamber said that being unable to hire qualified workers is "the most critical and widespread challenge" businesses currently face. It said that businesses that don't have enough employees are forced to reduce their hours, scale down operations, and, in some cases, permanently close. There are 1.4 available workers per job opening in the US, according to the Chamber, which used the most recently available data from March. This rate is just half the average of the last 20 years - and the Chamber said it's continuing to fall.
The ratio is much lower in some sectors than others. In professional and business services, private educational services, and private health services, there are less available workers than job openings, according to the report. And for government vacancies, this rate - known as the worker availability ratio (WAR) - falls to just 0.16.
Some states have been worse hit than others. In South Dakota, Nebraska, and Vermont, there is fewer than one available worker per vacancy, per the report.
In comparison, at the peak of the financial crisis in 2009, the WAR across the US was almost eight.
In a May survey of state and local chambers of commerce leaders, 90.5% said that the "lack of available workers" was slowing their local economies. In comparison, half as many - 44.9% - said that COVID-19 was holding the economy back.
And in the Chamber's survey of top trade association economists, 88% said it was at least "somewhat difficult" for businesses in their industry to find workers. The Chamber is calling on federal policymakers to invest more in employer-led job education and training programs, expand access to childcare for working parents, and reform the legal immigration system to help employers meet demand for high-demand jobs in labor-strapped sectors.
Bank of America expects the job market to recover by early 2022.
Hong Kong's Tiananmen museum shut down amid investigation
HONG KONG (AP) — A Hong Kong museum commemorating China's deadly 1989 crackdown on pro-democracy protests closed Wednesday three days after opening as the ruling Communist Party tries to stamp out the last traces of public discussion of the event.
Hong Kong was the last place on Chinese soil where the party's attack on protests centered on Beijing's Tiananmen Square was commemorated with candlelight vigils and other events. But authorities have banned public ceremonies for the second year amid a campaign by Beijing to crush pro-democracy activism in the territory.
Organizers of the June 4 Museum said it closed after authorities investigated whether it had licenses to conduct public exhibitions. The Hong Kong Alliance of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China said it wanted to protect staff and visitors while the group sought legal advice.
Public memorials have long been banned on the mainland. Relatives of people who were killed in the crackdown often are detained or harassed by authorities ahead of the anniversary.
The group, which has organized candlelight vigils in Hong Kong in past years that attracted thousands of people, said the museum received more than 550 visitors since it opened Sunday.
Beijing is tightening control over Hong Kong, prompting complaints it is eroding the autonomy promised when the former British colony returned to China in 1997 and hurting its status as a financial center. Pro-democracy activists have been sentenced to prison under a national security law imposed following anti-government protests that began in 2019.
In past years, thousands of people gathered in Hong Kong’s Victoria Park to light candles and sing in memory of people killed when the military attacked protesters in and around Tiananmen Square, killing hundreds and possibly thousands of people.
Hong Kong authorities have banned the vigil for the second consecutive year, citing social distancing restrictions and public health risks from the coronavirus pandemic.
Critics say authorities use the pandemic as an excuse to silence pro-democracy voices in Hong Kong.
Last year, thousands gathered in Victoria Park despite the ban and police warnings. Weeks later, more than 20 activists who took part in the vigil were arrested. This year, organizers have urged residents to mark June 4 by lighting a candle wherever they are.
Zen Soo, The Associated Press
CRIMINAL CAPITALI$M Ex-banker convicted in massive German tax evasion scheme
BERLIN (AP) — A court in Germany convicted a former private banker of five counts of tax evasion Tuesday in a case linked to a far-reaching scheme involving hundreds of suspects.
The regional court in Bonn sentenced the defendant, a former employee of Hamburg-based bank M.M. Warburg, to five years and six months in prison and ordered him to repay 100,000 euros ($122,000). Due to the length of the proceedings, the court credited the banker time months of time served.
A court spokesperson, Saskia Wielpuetz, said the verdict can be appealed.
The defendant, whose name wasn’t released for privacy reasons, allegedly took part in so-called cum-ex transactions in which participants loaned each other shares to collect reimbursement for taxes they hadn’t paid.
Hundreds of bankers allegedly were involved in the scheme and reportedly defrauded taxpayers of billions of euros. Opposition parties have accused the German government of for many years turning a blind eye to legal loopholes that made the cum-ex transactions possible.
Warburg said in a statement that the Bonn court's verdict would have no economic impact on the banking group. The bank has filed legal appeals challenging decisions by German tax authorities' holding it liable for tax repayments.
Warburg is also demanding compensation from the individuals allegedly involved in the scheme and denies wrongdoing.
A related trial in Bonn last year resulted in suspended sentences for two British bankers after they agreed to provide detailed information about the fraud scheme.
Numerous further trials against bankers and lawyers allegedly involved in the scheme are expected.
The Associated Press
Coffee is the latest commodity to hit multi-year highs as Brazil drought sends prices soaring
wdaniel@businessinsider.com (Will Daniel)
Juancho Torres/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images
Coffee prices hit ar high on Friday extending their rise to nearly 70% in the past year.
Dr. Michaela Helbing-Kuhl, an agriculture analyst at Commerzbank, says Brazil's persistently dry weather is to blame.
The drought is expected to continue through August which is "not a good sign for the 2022/23 crop," according to Dr. Helbing-Kuhl.
Prices of arabica coffee moved above $1.60 per pound last Friday for the first time since the fall of 2016.
Coffee prices have risen nearly 70% in the past year and currently trade around $1.66 per pound.
According to Dr. Michaela Helbing-Kuhl, an agricultural analyst at Commerzbank, global coffee production has been hurt by persistently dry weather in Brazil.
Brazil's Paraná Basin, which is home to Minas Gerais, the country's biggest coffee-producing state, has been hit with a drought that forecasters expect to continue through August, according to a recent commodities report from Commerzbank.
2021 was anticipated to be a strong year for Brazilian coffee producers, but many have experienced weak yields as a result of the drought.
Dr. Helbing-Kuhl said the dry weather is "not a good sign for the 2022/23 crop" either, which begins flowering in September. Protests in Columbia have also hampered the transport of Brazil's already weak harvest.
Coffee is the latest commodity to hit multi-year highs as the global economy reopens.
From lumber to copper, commodity prices have been on the rise this past year amid record demand and supply chain disruptions brought about by the current bust to boom cycle.
Lumber futures rose as high as $1,670.50 per thousand board feet in early May, although they've now fallen back to $1,265. Even with the price drop, however, lumber futures are still up roughly 260% in the past year.
Similarly, copper futures are up 88% since this time last year amid surging demand. Bank of America commodity strategist Michael Widmer said copper is "the new oil" in a recent note to clients and claimed it could hit $20,000 per ton due to surging demand.
Oil prices also neared 2-year highs on Tuesday as investors are expecting OPEC+ to confirm it will continue restricting supply at a key meeting.
Despite rising commodities prices in 2021, there are some signs of a let-up for businesses and consumers. New data from Bloomberg shows hedge funds have cut their bullish bets on commodities in recent weeks.
According to data from the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission and ICE, hedge-fund holdings in 20 of the 23 commodities tracked in the Bloomberg Commodity Index fell by the most since November this week.
No longer 'the disappeared': Mourning the 215 children found in a mass grave at Kamloops Indian Residential School
While we currently have no evidence to determine the cause of death for each child, we know that they died a political death — these children were the disappeared. Colonial population management projects
Indigenous lives were broken down, sterilized of any trace of the gifts inherited from their parents and ancestors and re-packaged into Canadian bodies.
Like branch plants in a vast production scheme, the state made good use of the extensive church network to co-ordinate the extraction of raw material—Indigenous children.
But the revelation of a mass disposal site for children — unrecorded and hidden — on the grounds of the Kamloops Indian Residential School tells us that the regulation of Indigenous life extended into death
A fact many Indigenous people understand is that life’s benefits and burdens are shot through the colonial prism. As we go through life, we quickly learn that the weight of history’s finger is pressing firmly on the scale.
What is often overlooked is how that uneven distribution in life carries on through death.
“(W)hat commemoration often involves is much more than remembering the dead. It requires a serious engagement with the things that ghosts and ancestors want: a proper burial, a pot of beer, a feast, money, a fitting grave-stone, the blood of a reindeer, the blood of kin.”
Until their remains were recently located, the Catholic church was content to leave 215 children as ‘disappeared.’
The disappeared — those that have been secretly disposed — produce a unique grieving. They leave families and communities in a state of suspended mourning, never sure whether their loved one is alive or dead, or where their remains have been left.
It is life abandoned to death with no chance of the living to intervene.
Now that they have been located, the surviving families, communities and Nations can begin to think about custodianship of the remains, mourning and memorialization. That much is up to them and every support and resource ought to be provided.
If you are an Indian Residential School survivor, or have been affected by the residential school system and need help, you can contact the 24-hour Indian Residential Schools Crisis Line: 1-866-925-4419 This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Veldon Coburn receives funding from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council.
Buffy Sainte-Marie On Being An Advocate For Indigenous Community
Duration: 01:40
June 1 marks the beginning of National Indigenous History Month. Award-winning singer-songwriter and Canadian trailblazer, Buffy Sainte-Marie, discusses being a prominent advocate in the Indigenous community and shares a piece of advice for young women wanting to follow in her footsteps.
Calls for Canada to recognize and document its racist foundations
Duration: 02:24
As Canada grapples with the horrific discovery of 215 children at suspected burial sites of a former B.C. residential school, there are calls for the country to do more to address the racist policies and actions of the country’s past. As Eric Sorensen reports, Indigenous leaders say the country needs to stop celebrating historic figures responsible for the residential school system.
Turbulence in interstellar gas clouds reveals multi-fractal structures
In interstellar dust clouds, turbulence must first dissipate before a star can form through gravity. A German-French research team has now discovered that the kinetic energy of the turbulence comes to rest in a space that is very small on cosmic scales, ranging from one to several light-years in extent. The group also arrived at new results in the mathematical method: Previously, the turbulent structure of the interstellar medium was described as self-similar - or fractal. The researchers found that it is not enough to describe the structure mathematically as a single fractal, a self-similar structure as known from the Mandelbrot set. Instead, they added several different fractals, so-called multifractals. The new methods can thus be used to resolve and represent structural changes in astronomical images in detail. Applications in other scientific fields such as atmospheric research is also possible.
The German-French programme GENESIS (Generation of Structures in the Interstellar Medium) is a cooperation between the University of Cologne's Institute for Astrophysics, LAB at the University of Bordeaux and Geostat/INRIA Institute Bordeaux. In a highlight publication of the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics, the research team presents the new mathematical methods to characterize turbulence using the example of the Musca molecular cloud in the constellation of Musca.
Stars form in huge interstellar clouds composed mainly of molecular hydrogen - the energy reservoir of all stars. This material has a low density, only a few thousand to several tens of thousands of particles per cubic centimetre, but a very complex structure with condensations in the form of 'clumps' and 'filaments', and eventually 'cores' from which stars form by gravitational collapse of the matter.
The spatial structure of the gas in and around clouds is determined by many physical processes, one of the most important of which is interstellar turbulence. This arises when energy is transferred from large scales, such as galactic density waves or supernova explosions, to smaller scales. Turbulence is known from flows in which a liquid or gas is 'stirred', but can also form vortices and exhibit brief periods of chaotic behaviour, called intermittency. However, for a star to form, the gas must come to rest, i.e., the kinetic energy must dissipate. After that, gravity can exert enough force to pull the hydrogen clouds together and form a star. Thus, it is important to understand and mathematically describe the energy cascade and the associated structural change.
IMAGE: RESEARCHERS COMBINED SATELLITE IMAGES OF TACOMA, WASHINGTON, WITH SEATTLE AND BEIJING TO CREATE A COMPOSITE IMAGE, AND THEN IDENTIFIED DIFFERENCES BETWEEN THE FALSE AND TRUE IMAGES. view more
CREDIT: CHENGBIN DENG
Can you trust the map on your smartphone, or the satellite image on your computer screen?
So far, yes, but it may only be a matter of time until the growing problem of "deep fakes" converges with geographical information science (GIS). Researchers such as Associate Professor of Geography Chengbin Deng are doing what they can to get ahead of the problem.
Deng and four colleagues -- Bo Zhao and Yifan Sun at the University of Washington, and Shaozeng Zhang and Chunxue Xu at Oregon State University -- co-authored a recent article in Cartography and Geographic Information Science that explores the problem. In "Deep fake geography? When geospatial data encounter Artificial Intelligence," they explore how false satellite images could potentially be constructed and detected. News of the research has been picked up by countries around the world, including China, Japan, Germany and France.
"Honestly, we probably are the first to recognize this potential issue," Deng said.
Geographic information science (GIS) underlays a whole host of applications, from national defense to autonomous cars, a technology that's currently under development. Artificial intelligence has made a positive impact on the discipline through the development of Geospatial Artificial Intelligence (GeoAI), which uses machine learning -- or artificial intelligence (AI) -- to extract and analyze geospatial data. But these same methods could potentially be used to fabricate GPS signals, fake locational information on social media posts, fabricate photographs of geographic environments and more.
In short, the same technology that can change the face of an individual in a photo or video can also be used to make fake images of all types, including maps and satellite images.
"We need to keep all of this in accordance with ethics. But at the same time, we researchers also need to pay attention and find a way to differentiate or identify those fake images," Deng said. "With a lot of data sets, these images can look real to the human eye."
To figure out how to detect an artificially constructed image, first you need to construct one. To do so, they used a technique common in the creation of deep fakes: Cycle-Consistent Adversarial Networks (CycleGAN), an unsupervised deep learning algorithm that can simulate synthetic media.
Generative Adversarial Networks (GAN) are a type of artificial intelligence, but they require training samples -- input -- of whatever content they are programmed to produce. A black box on a map could, for example, represent any number of different factories or businesses; the various points of information inputted into the network helps determine the possibilities it can generate.
The researchers altered a satellite image of Tacoma, Washington, interspersing elements of Seattle and Beijing and making it look as real as possible. Researchers are not encouraging anyone to try such a thing themselves -- quite the opposite, in fact.
"It's not about the technique; it's about how human being are using the technology," Deng said. "We want to use technology for the good, not for bad purposes."
After creating the altered composite, they compared 26 different image metrics to determine whether there were statistical differences between the true and false images. Statistical differences were registered on 20 of the 26 indicators, or 80%.
Some of the differences, for example, included the color of roofs; while roof colors in each of the real images were uniform, they were mottled in the composite. The fake satellite image was also dimmer and less colorful, but had sharper edges. Those differences, however, depended on the inputs they used to create the fake, Deng cautioned.
This research is just the beginning. In the future, geographers may track different types of neural networks to see how they generate false images and figure out ways to detect them. Ultimately, researchers will need to discover systematic ways to root out deep fakes and verify trustworthy information before they end up in the public view.
"We all want the truth," Deng said.
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ALS development could be triggered by loss of network connections in the spinal cord
UNIVERSITY OF COPENHAGEN - THE FACULTY OF HEALTH AND MEDICAL SCIENCES
IMAGE: THE SPINAL CORD OF A MOUSE WITH ALS. THE GREEN CELLS ARE INHIBITORY INTERNEURONS. view more
CREDIT: ILARY ALLODI, UNIVERSITY OF COPENHAGEN
ALS is a very severe neurodegenerative disease in which nerve cells in the spinal cord controlling muscles and movement slowly die. There is no effective treatment and the average life expectancy after being diagnosed with ALS is usually short. Because of this, new knowledge about the disease is urgently needed.
Now, researchers from the University of Copenhagen have gained new insights about ALS, by investigating the early development of the disease in a mouse model.
"We have found that networks of nerve cells in the spinal cord called inhibitory interneurons lose connection to motor neurons, the nerve cells that directly control muscle contraction. We do not yet know if these changes cause the disease. But the loss of the inhibitory signal could explain why the motor neurons end up dying in ALS", says first and co-corresponding author to the new study Ilary Allodi, Assistant Professor at the Department of Neuroscience.
A lot of ALS research have focused on the motor neurons themselves, but the research group at the University of Copenhagen had a different approach.
"It is only natural that motor neurons have received major attention. They control our muscles, which is the challenge for ALS patients. Here, we wanted to investigate the circuit of interneurons in the spinal cord because they determine the activity of motor neurons. Since we found that there is a loss of connections between inhibitory interneurons and motor neurons that happens before the motor neuron death, we think that this loss could be a possible explanation for why the motor neurons ends up dying in ALS patients", says Ole Kiehn, senior, co-corresponding author and Professor at the Department of Neuroscience.
Fast-twitch first
In ALS patients, the degeneration typically starts with what is called the fast-twitch motor neurons and then goes on to other motor neurons. This means that certain muscles and bodily functions are affected before others. Normally, patients lose coordination and speed in movement before more basic functions such as breathing. This is mirrored in the new findings, according to the researchers.
"In our mouse model, we show that the loss of connection happens to fast motor neurons first and then slow motor neurons later on involve a particular type of inhibitory neurons, the so called V1 interneurons", says Roser Montañana-Rosell, who is PhD student and shared first author on the study.
"The V1 interneuron connectivity loss is paralleled by the development of a specific locomotor deficit in the pre-symptomatic phase with lower speed and changes in limb coordination in the ALS mice that is dependent on V1 interneuron connections to motor neuron", says Ole Kiehn.
Expanding the window of opportunity
The researchers underline that the mechanisms should be investigated in human patients as well. However, they do not have any reason to believe that the same or similar biological mechanisms are not at play in humans.
Given the new understanding of the disease, Ilary Allodi hopes further research into the signaling process could reveal how to repair the nerve cell connection loss in ALS.
"We definitely hope that our findings can contribute with a new way of thinking about ALS development. With a distinct focus on interneurons, we might be able, in future experiments, to increase the signaling processes from the interneurons to the motor neurons and prevent or delay the motor neuron degeneration from an early stage," ends Ilary Allodi.
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Read the entire study in Nature Communications: "Locomotor deficits in a mouse model of ALS are paralleled by loss of V1-interneuron connections onto fast motor neurons"
Protecting the intellectual abilities of people at risk for psychosis
A UNIGE team has found that a class of drugs can protect the development of intellectual abilities in people at risk of psychosis, if prescribed before adolescence
IMAGE: EFFECTS OF SSRIS ON BRAIN AND INTELLECTUAL DEVELOPMENT. ON THE LEFT SIDE: BRAIN MAP SHOWING REGIONS OF THE BRAIN PROTECTED BY THE PROLONGED ADMINISTRATION OF SSRIS COMPRISING A NETWORK OF... view more
CREDIT: VALENTINA MANCINI
One person in 2000 suffers from a microdeletion of chromosome 22 that can lead to the development of psychotic disorders, such as schizophrenia, in adolescence. In addition to symptoms such as hallucinations or delusions, psychotic disorders also comes with a progressive decline in intelligence quotient (IQ). If current drug treatments are successful in containing psychotic symptoms, nothing can be done to prevent the deterioration of intellectual skills that leads to loss of autonomy. Researchers at the University of Geneva (UNIGE), Switzerland, have discovered that prescription of selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) - a class of drugs used to treat anxiety and depression -in late childhood can reduce the deterioration of intellectual abilities, and have a neuroprotective effect on some of the brain regions affected by the psychotic illness. This study, to be read in the journal Translational Psychiatry, opens up a new field of research and new hope for people affected by the microdeletion of chromosome 22.
The average IQ is around 100 points. However, for people who may develop a psychotic illness, such as those with a microdeletion of chromosome 22, the average drops to 70-80 points. "The problem is that when a psychotic disorder occurs, such as schizophrenia, the brain frontal lobe and the hippocampus are particularly affected, which leads to the gradual deterioration of already below-average intellectual capacities", explains Valentina Mancini, a researcher in the Department of Psychiatry at UNIGE Faculty of Medicine and first author of the study. From then on, the average IQ drops to around 65-70 points, leading to a loss of autonomy that requires a protected environment. "At present, drug treatments manage to contain psychotic symptoms, such as hallucinations, anxiety or distortion of reality, but there is no treatment that can reduce the deterioration of affected people's intellectual capacities", notes the Geneva researcher.
200 patients followed over a 20 years period reveal a possible solution
Yet the physicians noted that two to three teenagers a year are exceptions, and even gained IQ points. Why? "We made a comprehensive analysis of these patients' medical data to find out any common feature in the treatments prescribed to them by their GP", explains Valentina Mancini. Two observations caught their attention.
Once the results of this study are confirmed, the effect of SSRIs could be tested on other types of patients and possibly prescribed preventively to people at risk of intellectual deterioration, such as individuals with other genetic syndromes like Fragile X or Down's syndrome, or children of schizophrenic parents. "We also want to investigate whether the 3% to 4% of adolescents in the general population who develop psychotic symptoms would see this risk reduced by taking this drug", continues Valentina Mancini.
The Geneva team will now compare the results obtained from their research cohort with international databases in order to confirm the neuroprotective role induced by these treatments prescribed at the end of childhood, adolescence being the critical phase for the onset of psychotic diseases.
