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Published by DPA Four wheels and a roof over your head: Vehicles like Renault’s Twizy are trying to perfect the art of minimalism (much neglected in the age of the SUV). Renault/dpa Opel’s Rocks-e is a departure from the carmaker’s usual passenger cars. It’s a boxy, compact two-seater that is fully electric – officially classified as a light motor vehicle. It’s a particularly promising area for the carmaker as it seeks to embrace a whole new target group. The vehicle is basically 2.41-metre cube on wheels, on sale for €7,990 ($8,864), making it less expensive than almost all the conventional small cars out there. That makes the Rocks-e one of the cheapest electric vehicles around, and it doesn’t cost more to lease than a monthly pass for the city bus according to the marketing. Plus, drivers are also able to get behind the wheel from age 15, and don’t need a driving licence in many places, just an AM licence, the category that applies to mopeds rather than motorbikes, permitting holders to drive two-wheeled or three-wheeled vehicles. Depending on the model, a moped driving licence is also sufficient. You pay a flat rate for the insurance in some places and it doesn’t cost much, according to Thomas Schuster, a German test engineer. Plus, depending on where you are, you won’t have to pay vehicle tax either. Laws in many European countries define these kind of vehicles as having four wheels, one or two seats, with 4 kW of power, weighing no more than 425 kilograms and designed for a maximum speed of 45 km/h. Fewer crash tests are required, and there are no legal stipulations on standard safety equipment, compared to passenger cars which are required to have airbags, ABS and ESP these days. These vehicles also aren’t required to undergo regular main inspections. However, seat belts and a driver’s airbag are required. These are not a brand new class of cars, and the BMW Isetta and Messerschmitt cab scooters were both popular back in the 1950s. The Class S driving licence came in in 2004 for these kinds of vehicles in 2004, allowing teens as young as 15 in some countries to switch to four wheels at an early age for the first time. But now these vehicles are back in the spotlight, with a wide range of brands particularly from Italy to France, where they are far more common. Vehicle manufacturers such as Ligier, Aixam, Casalini and Piaggio offer a wide range of models for between €10,000 and €20,000, with the spectrum reaching from cool convertibles to handy small trucks. There is also variety when it comes to the drive system, and buyers are able to pick from classic internal combustion engines, hybrids and pure electric vehicles. Electrification in particular is likely to give this class a boost, says Schuster, with an eye on the Rocks-e. “You don’t need big, expensive batteries and nobody expects huge ranges,” he says. Unsurprisingly, given Renault released the Twizy for this vehicle category, the Rocks-e was actually developed as a Citroën Ami. You can find hundreds of them at charging stations in France. You’ll also spot others like Microlino with the electric Isetta or ACM with the City One as similar side entrants to this niche. In the course of their development, some have become bigger, stronger and faster, and like the Microlino with airbags and a top speed of 90 km/h, are coming to resemble “real” cars more closely. But people might want a smaller vehicle, especially in the city. “Regardless of whether it has an electric motor or a combustion engine, it’s crazy how much mass and surface area we use just to get one person from A to B,” says Microlino boss Wim Ouboter, fighting the good fight for light vehicles. Meanwhile Opel spokesperson Harald Hamprecht says parents can relax a good deal more if their youngsters head home from a nightclub in a vehicle like this, rather than a moped or late night bus. These little vehicles might solve a bunch of problems, but of course there are some new ones, too, if you ask experts at the German automobile club. They are not fans of this type of vehicle, saying without official crash regulations, tests about impact protection have delivered very sobering results. When it comes to driving, many of these models are not particularly stable and younger drivers typically lack experience, also as they often get their driving licence on two wheels then switch to four. The problem, however, is not just the technology and the driver’s potential lack of practice, says Schuster. Other road users also have to adapt the way they see these vehicles. “Unlike a moped, you can easily mistake a light vehicle for a conventional small car, and misjudge the speed or acceleration and possibly cause a dangerous accident,” he says. So if you are thinking of buying one of these vehicles, be clear in your mind about how you might drive it before you purchase one, is the advice from the experts. “It makes sense to limit this to the city. Longer cross-country journeys in light vehicles are a no-go and night journeys and trips outside built-up areas are not recommended,” says the German group, whose experts find little more positive to say about this class of vehicle other than that you have a roof over your head. Furthermore, market observers say these smaller cars have an acceptance problem after the initial wave of enthusiasm. “Who would pay four- or even five-figure sums for a vehicle that becomes completely uninteresting by the time the driver reaches their 18th birthday at the latest and can then get a ‘real’ car without a speed limit,” one dealer says. Opel, at least, has considered this factor and offers the Rocks-e primarily as a leasing model. Urban mobility? Especially in urban areas – or more generally – in local transport, small cars like the Opel Rocks-e could play out their advantages. Christian Bittmann/Opel Automobile GmbH/dpa In the 1950s, microcars were far more widespread. Hauke-Christian Dittrich/dpa Some microcars, such as this model by Microlino, are bringing back the same shapes used in historical models. Thomas Geiger/dpa Mini-mobiles like this model from Microcar enable car-like mobility without a full driving licence. Groupe Ligier/dpa Bonjour Mini: Ligier is a microcar brand from France. Groupe Ligier/dpa View the full article

Published by AFP The New York attorney general's lawsuit against NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre, seen here in Oxon Hill, Maryland in 2016, has been allowed to advance New York (AFP) – The National Rifle Association escaped a court-ordered dissolution Wednesday, after a New York judge ruled that alleged self-dealing by the powerful gun lobby’s leader, if proven, would not warrant such a strong penalty. The state’s lawsuit seeking to boot NRA chief Wayne LaPierre from his post will, however, be allowed to proceed. “Allegations in this case, if proven, tell a grim story of greed, self-dealing, and lax financial oversight at the highest levels of the National Rifle Association,” State Supreme Court Justice Joel Cohen ruled in his 42-page decision. Nonetheless, New York Attorney General Letitia James failed to show “the type of public harm that is the legal linchpin for imposing the ‘corporate death penalty,'” Cohen added, referring to James’s request to fully dissolve the 150-year-old organization. “Her allegations concern primarily private harm to the NRA and its members and donors, which if proven can be addressed by the targeted, less intrusive relief she seeks through other claims in her complaint,” Cohen said. James, a Democrat, is seeking monetary penalties from LaPierre, the NRA’s leader since 1991, and three other executives. She also wants to ban them permanently from working for any New York non-profits. In a press release, the attorney general hailed Cohen’s decision to reaffirm her office’s “right to pursue its long-standing claims that fraud, abuse, and greed permeate through the NRA and its senior leadership.” She added that she is “disappointed that the judge ruled against the dissolution portion of the case,” but she will continue to explore legal options. After a 15-month investigation into the NRA, Attorney General James filed a lawsuit in August 2020 alleging wide-spread fraud in the organization and frequent self-dealing by Lapierre — an accusation which he denies. According to James’s court filing, LaPierre often used NRA funds to fly his family to the Bahamas for luxury vacations, among numerous other instances of alleged illegal wrongdoing. The gun lobby almost exclusively supports Republicans and staunchly defends the Second Amendment’s stated right of Americans to bear arms. While legally headquartered in New York, the NRA’s main offices are in Virginia, just outside of Washington. In May 2021, it attempted to reincorporate in Texas and file for bankruptcy, but a US judge blocked the move. View the full article

Published by BANG Showbiz English Jennifer Hudson is getting her own daytime talk show. The Academy Award winner, 40, will be debuting ‘The Jennifer Hudson Show’ on Fox in the autumn. Jennifer said: “I have experienced so much in my life; I’ve seen the highest of the highs, the lowest of the lows, and just about everything in between but as my mother always told me, ‘Once you think you’ve seen it all, just keep on living.'” The ‘Dreamgirls’ star is “so ready” to explore “the things that inspire and move us all” Jennifer said: “People from around the world have been a part of my journey from the beginning – twenty years ago – and I’m so ready to join their journey as we sit down and talk about the things that inspire and move us all.” The ‘Respect’ star “couldn’t be more thrilled” to be showing a newer side of herself. Jennifer said: “I have always loved people and I cannot wait to connect on a deeper level and let audiences see the different sides of who I am, the human being, in return. “And I couldn’t be more thrilled to do it alongside this incredible team. We’re about to have a lot of fun and shake things up a little bit!” The recent NAACP Image Award winner recently gushed about her 12-year-old son Daniel – who she shares with her ex David Otunga – on her Instagram after they attended the NBA’s All Star Weekend in Cleveland and met many basketball legends, such as Shaquille O’Neal. Jennifer wrote: “I’m a boy mom and proud of it!” In another post, she wrote “There’s nothing like seeing life [through] your child’s eyes and watching their dreams come to life. Thank [you] to the whole @NBA for making all my boy’s dreams come true. It’s all about the basketball for the babies but for me, it’s all about the babies and what my kid is into, I’m into!” View the full article

Published by BANG Showbiz English Darren Criss is heartbroken “beyond measure” after his brother Charles died by suicide. The former ‘Glee’ star shared the tragic news – along with a slideshow of the singer and his 36-year-old brother – on social media. The 35-year-old actor wrote on Instagram: “It breaks my heart beyond measure to say that my beloved brother Charles has left us.’ Darren called it a “colossal shock” He continued:“His loss leaves behind a debilitating fracture in the lives of his mother, his brother, his three small children, and their respective mothers.” The ‘American Crime Story’ star has spent time “trying to wrap” his brain around the loss but thinks the question will never leave him. Darren said: “I have spent what feels like a small eternity trying to wrap my head around it, something I suspect I’ll be attempting to do for the rest of my life. “But in the short time that I’ve had to process everything, I’ve managed to put some words together that may help with some of the questions you have. Darren admitted that it gave him “peace” to share both his loss. He said: “And though it’s with the heaviest sadness I’ve ever felt to have to write this, it does give me peace to know I’m putting it out there.” “I’ve learned by now that vagueness can lead to confusion, and provoke ideas far worse than the truth.” “The last several years were increasingly difficult for Chuck as he struggled to find stability during an unfortunate rough patch in his life.” Darren shared that his brother “had a severe depression welling up inside him” that he was good at hiding from his loved ones. “Despite our very vocal concerns about his well-being, and his protestations that everything was fine, it’s crushing to say now that Chuck clearly had a severe depression welling up in him for some time. “A depression that was only worsened by a lifelong struggle he had with expressing his feelings — a dangerous combination only outmatched by his all-too-incredible ability to conceal it.” Darren – who is expecting his first child in the spring with partner Mia Swier – concluded: “Not just from the world at large, but most tragically, from the people who were closest to him.” View the full article

Published by Reuters By Jan Wolfe and Patricia Zengerle WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The congressional committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol on Wednesday said former President Donald Trump may have engaged in criminal conduct in his bid to overturn his election defeat. In a court filing — one of the U.S. House of Represenative’s Select Committee’s most detailed releases of findings yet — the panel said Trump potentially engaged in conspiracy to defraud the United States and may have obstructed an official proceeding. The Select Committee’s members have previously said they will consider passing along evidence of criminal conduct by Trump to the U.S. Justice Department. Such a move, known as a criminal referral, would be largely symbolic but would increase political pressure on Attorney General Merrick Garland to charge the former president and would thrust his department into a political firestorm. “[E]vidence and information available to the Committee establishes a good-faith belief that Mr. Trump and others may have engaged in criminal and/or fraudulent acts,” the committee said in a court filing. “The Select Committee also has a good-faith basis for concluding that the President and members of his Campaign engaged in a criminal conspiracy to defraud the United States,” the filing said. The court document was filed in federal court in Los Angeles as part of the Select Committee’s dispute with John Eastman, a lawyer who advised Trump on a plan to invalidate election results in key battleground states. Eastman sued the committee in December, seeking to block a congressional subpoena requesting that he turn over thousands of emails. Charles Burnham, a lawyer for Eastman, said in a statement on Wednesday that Eastman is abiding by his ethical duty to protect client confidences. “The Select Committee has responded to Dr. Eastman’s efforts to discharge this responsibility by accusing him of criminal conduct,” Burnham said. “Because this is a civil matter, Dr. Eastman will not have the benefit of the Constitutional protections normally afforded to those accused by their government of criminal conduct. Nonetheless, we look forward to responding in due course.” Representatives of Eastman and Trump did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Trump has repeatedly called the Select Committee’s inquiry a politically motivated investigation. The court filing included emails obtained by the Select Committee from the day of the Jan. 6 attack, including one where a lawyer for then-Vice President Mike Pence said no judges would endorse Eastman’s legal strategy for overturning Trump’s election defeat. “Thanks to your bullshit, we are now under siege,” the Pence lawyer, Greg Jacob, wrote to Eastman. “The ‘siege’ is because YOU and your boss did not do what was necessary to allow this to be aired in a public way so the American people can see for themselves what happened,” Eastman replied. The committee’s leaders said in a statement that “Eastman’s emails may show that he helped Donald Trump advance a corrupt scheme to obstruct the counting of electoral college ballots and a conspiracy to impede the transfer of power.” Attorney regulators in California said Tuesday they have been investigating Eastman and whether he acted unethically in his work for Trump. The investigation could lead to disciplinary action against Eastman, such as suspension of his law license. (Reporting by Jan Wolfe and Patricia Zengerle in Washington; Editing by Edwina Gibbs & Simon Cameron-Moore) View the full article

Published by BANG Showbiz English Evan Rachel Wood is set to play Madonna in ‘Weird: The Al Yankovic Story’. Daniel Radcliffe stars as the parody song legend in his upcoming biopic, and now the 34-year-old actress has boarded the cast as The Queen of Pop and wowed with her transformation into the 63-year-old music icon. Evan shared a snap of her in the lace wedding dress-style ensemble, complete with stacked jewellery and the cross earrings, which Madonna wore in her music video for 1984 hit ‘Like a Virgin’, a song which Al famously parodied and turned into ‘Like a Surgeon’. Alongside the snap, Evan wrote: “The secret’s out! I am having WAY TOO MUCH FUN playing the iconic Madonna in @therokuchannel’s WEIRD: The Al Yankovic Story with Daniel Radcliffe.” Looking forward to the project, Al said: “When my last movie ‘UHF’ came out in 1989, I made a solemn vow to my fans that I would release a major motion picture every 33 years, like clockwork. I’m very happy to say we’re on schedule. “And I am absolutely thrilled that Daniel Radcliffe will be portraying me in the film. I have no doubt whatsoever that this is the role future generations will remember him for.” Production is fully underway in Los Angeles, and the movie will be available exclusively on The Roku Channel. Colin Davis, Roku’s head of original scripted programming, said: “There clearly aren’t enough biopic movies about famous musicians and we were excited to shine a light on the incredibly true, unexaggerated story of Weird Al. “This is sincerely the ultimate combination of talent, creativity, and friends, coming together to make something genuinely funny and we could not be prouder to call this film a Roku Original.” Eric Appel, the film’s writer and director, jumped at the chance to turn Weird Al’s life into a film. Eric shared: “When Weird Al first sat me down against my will and told me his life story, I didn’t believe any of it, but I knew that we had to make a movie about it.” View the full article

Published by Reuters By Gabriella Borter (Reuters) – Florida’s Republican-led Senate on Thursday is expected to pass a bill to ban abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy, putting the state one step closer to adopting a gestational limit currently under review by the U.S. Supreme Court. The state’s House of Representatives, which also has a Republican majority, approved the measure last month on a party-line vote. Governor Ron DeSantis, a Republican, is expected to sign it after Senate approval. Enactment of the law would significantly reduce access to late-term abortions for women across the U.S. Southeast, many of whom travel hundreds of miles to end pregnancies in Florida because of stricter abortion laws in surrounding states. The state currently permits abortions up to 24 weeks without a mandatory waiting period, meaning a woman can terminate her pregnancy the day she arrives at a clinic. Florida’s measure, which would take effect on July 1, makes exceptions to the 15-week rule only in cases when the mother is at risk of death or “irreversible physical impairment,” or if the fetus has a fatal abnormality. In a session on Wednesday, lawmakers debated an amendment to the bill that would make exceptions for rape, incest and human trafficking, which ultimately failed. Democratic lawmakers who supported the amendment asked their colleagues to focus on the emotional needs of pregnant victims of sexual assault. “We’re better than this,” state Senator Victor Torres said. The bill’s sponsor, state Senator Kelli Stargel, defended the bill’s exclusion of an exception for rape. She said she rejected the premise that a “child should be killed because of the circumstances in which it was conceived.” Republican lawmakers around the country have introduced bills mirroring a 15-week abortion ban enacted by Mississippi and now being weighed by the Supreme Court after lower courts blocked the measure as unconstitutional. Arizona’s Senate and West Virginia’s House passed similar 15-week abortion bans last month. During oral arguments in December, the Supreme Court indicated its willingness to allow Mississippi’s law to stand. A ruling in Mississippi’s favor would conflict with the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade decision establishing the right to end a pregnancy before the fetus is viable, typically around 24 weeks. Besides seeking reinstatement of its abortion law, the state of Mississippi in Jackson Women’s Health Organization v. Dobbs has asked the high court to overturn Roe altogether. The Supreme Court’s ruling is expected this spring. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Florida said a privacy clause in Florida’s constitution that protects against government “intrusion” in residents’ private lives would be grounds for a lawsuit challenging a 15-week abortion ban, even as the Supreme Court has not yet decided on the constitutionality of the restriction. “Because of the explicit right to privacy in our state constitution, Jackson Women’s Health Organization v. Dobbs will not dictate what happens with Florida’s cruel 15-week abortion ban,” Kara Gross, ACLU Florida’s legislative director, said in a statement. (Reporting by Gabriella Borter; Editing by Colleen Jenkins and Aurora Ellis) View the full article

Published by AFP Ukraine's military authorities said areas in the eastern city of Kharkiv had been 'pounded all night' by indiscriminate shelling Kyiv (AFP) – Russian President Vladimir Putin vowed no let-up in his invasion of Ukraine on Thursday, even as the warring sides met for ceasefire talks and Kyiv appealed for relief supplies to reach shattered cities. After the fall of a first major Ukrainian city to Russian forces, Putin appeared in no mood to heed a global clamour for an end to hostilities as the war entered its second week. “Russia intends to continue the uncompromising fight against militants of nationalist armed groups,” Putin said, according to a Kremlin account of a call with French President Emmanuel Macron. But Ukraine insisted that corridors for medical and other supplies were the bare minimum it expected, as negotiators arrived for the talks at an undisclosed location on the Belarus-Poland border. A first round of talks on Monday yielded no breakthrough, and Kyiv says it will not accept any Russian “ultimatums”. Putin, however, said any attempts to slow the talks process would “only lead to additional demands on Kyiv in our negotiating position”. For his part, Macron said he feared that “worse is to come” in the conflict and condemned Putin’s “lies”, according to an aide. The invasion, now in its eighth day, has created a refugee exodus and turned Russia into a global pariah in the worlds of finance, diplomacy and sports. The UN has opened a probe into alleged war crimes, as the Russian military bombards cities in Ukraine with shells and missiles, forcing civilians to cower in basements. “We will restore every house, every street, every city and we say to Russia: learn the word ‘reparations’,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in a video statement. “You will reimburse us for everything you did against our state, against every Ukrainian, in full,” he said. ‘Just like Leningrad’ Zelensky claims thousands of Russian soldiers have been killed since Putin shocked the world by invading Ukraine, purportedly to demilitarise and “de-Nazify” a Western-leaning threat on his borders. Moscow says it has lost 498 troops and Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Putin would praise their sacrifice at a meeting with his security chiefs. “It’s a huge tragedy,” Peskov told reporters in Moscow. “But we also admire the heroism of our soldiers. Their exploits will enter into the history books, their exploits in the struggle against the Nazis.” The Kremlin has been condemned for likening the government of Zelensky, who is Jewish, to that of Germany in World War II. But Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov kept up a verbal barrage, accusing Western politicians of fixating on “nuclear war” after Putin placed his strategic forces on high alert. While a long military column appears stalled north of Ukraine’s capital Kyiv, Russian troops seized Kherson, a Black Sea city of 290,000 people, after a three-day siege that left it short of food and medicine. Russian troops have been advancing elsewhere on the southern front and are besieging the port city of Mariupol east of Kherson, which is without water or electricity in the depths of winter. “They are trying to create a blockade here, just like in Leningrad,” Mariupol mayor Vadym Boichenko said, referring to the siege of Russia’s second largest city, since re-named Saint Petersburg, by Nazi Germany’s invading army in World War II. Ukrainian military authorities said residential and other areas in the eastern city of Kharkiv had been “pounded all night” by indiscriminate shelling, which UN prosecutors are investigating as a possible war crime. Oleg Rubak’s wife Katia, 29, was crushed in the rubble of their family home in Zhytomyr, west of Kyiv, by a Russian missile strike. “One minute I saw her going into the bedroom. A minute later there was nothing,” Rubak, 32, told AFP, standing stunned and angry amid the ruins in the bitter winter chill. “I hope she’s in heaven and all is perfect for her,” he said, adding through tears, “I want the whole world to hear my story.” Junk status The war has displaced more than one million people, according to the United Nations. The body’s aid chief pleaded on Thursday for civilians in Ukraine to be protected and for humanitarian aid to enter unhindered. “Protect civilians, for God’s sake, in Ukraine; let us do our job”, emergency relief coordinator Martin Griffiths told AFP in Geneva. The UN’s International Atomic Energy Agency urged Russia to “cease all actions” at Ukraine’s nuclear facilities, including the site of the 1986 Chernobyl disaster. Putin now finds himself an international outcast, his country the subject of swingeing sanctions that sent the ruble into further freefall on currency markets on Thursday. Russia’s central bank — whose foreign reserves have been frozen in the West — imposed a 30-percent tax on all sales of hard currency, following a run on lenders by ordinary Russians. The unfolding financial costs were underlined as ratings agencies Fitch and Moody’s slashed Russia’s sovereign debt to “junk” status. Turmoil deepened on markets more broadly. European stocks slid and oil prices approached $120 per barrel. Swedish furniture giant Ikea became the latest to halt operations in Russia, as well as Belarus. Russia’s sporting isolation worsened as it lost the right to host Formula One races. And the International Paralympic Committee, in a U-turn, banned Russians and Belarusians from the Beijing Winter Games. The UN General Assembly voted 141-5 to demand that Russia “immediately” withdraw from Ukraine. Only four countries supported Russia — Belarus, Eritrea, North Korea and Syria. China abstained. Europe stepped up practical support as well as diplomatic. The German government is planning to deliver another 2,700 anti-aircraft missiles to Ukraine, a source said. Leaving everything behind Many Ukrainians have now fled into nearby countries, according to the UN refugee agency’s rapidly rising tally. “We left everything there as they came and ruined our lives,” refugee Svitlana Mostepanenko told AFP in Prague. Nathalia Lypka, a professor of German from the eastern Ukrainian city of Zaporizhzhia, arrived in Berlin with her 21-year-old daughter. “My husband and son stayed… My husband already served in the army, and he had to return to duty,” she said, before boarding a train for Stuttgart where friends were waiting. Putin’s invasion has appeared hamstrung by poor logistics, tactical blunders and fierce resistance from Ukraine’s outgunned military — as well as its ever-swelling ranks of volunteer fighters. Scores of images have emerged of burned-out Russian tanks, the charred remains of transporters and of unarmed Ukrainians confronting bewildered occupation forces. US officials say the massive column of Russian military vehicles amassed north of Kyiv has “stalled” due to fuel and food shortages. Russian authorities have imposed a media blackout on what the Kremlin euphemistically calls a “special military operation”. The Ekho Moskvy radio station — a symbol of new-found media freedom in post-Soviet Russia — said it would shut down after being taken off air over its invasion coverage. But Russians have still turned out for large anti-war protests across the country, in a direct challenge to Putin’s 20-year rule. Thousands of anti-war demonstrators have been detained. “I couldn’t stay at home. This war has to be stopped,” student Anton Kislov, 21, told AFP. burs-jit/dc/gil View the full article

Published by Reuters By Tassilo Hummel and Alasdair Pal PARIS (Reuters) – France and Germany have seized two superyachts owned by Russian oligarchs, French authorities and Forbes magazine said, hitting Russia’s super-rich under sanctions imposed on Moscow over its invasion of Ukraine. At least five other superyachts owned by Russian billionaires are anchored or cruising in the Maldives, an Indian Ocean island nation, ship tracking data showed. The yachts arrived in the Maldives after the West imposed sanctions on Russia. Washington, the European Union and others have said they will target oligarchs who have amassed fortunes and political influence under Russian President Vladmir Putin. “Thanks to the French customs officers who are enforcing the European Union’s sanctions against those close to the Russian government,” Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire said on Thursday after French customs seized the 88-metre “Amore Vero” (True Love). The yacht had been about to flee, he said. It was impounded in the French Riviera port of La Ciotat and belongs to a company whose main shareholder is Rosneft chief Igor Sechin, a close ally of Putin, the finance ministry said. In Germany, a nearly $600 million luxury yacht owned by Russian billionaire Alisher Usmanov was seized in the northern port of Hamburg, Forbes reported. And in another sign of Russian oligarchs feeling the sanctions’ heat, billionaire Roman Abramovich said on Wednesday he would sell the Chelsea Football Club and promised to donate money from the sale to help victims of the war in Ukraine. TRACKING ASSETS The United States is preparing a sanctions package targeting more Russian oligarchs as well as their companies and assets, two sources said on Wednesday, after U.S. President Joe Biden said the United States would work to seize the yachts, luxury apartments and private jets of wealthy Russians. The EU, the United States, Canada and Britain are pooling efforts to examine how oligarchs could find ways to bypass the sanctions and also nail down the role of trust companies in holding assets, an EU official said on Thursday. This task force will aim to close loopholes as they become apparent, the official said. The impact of the sanctions was being widely felt. “There is a significant chilling effect on any new business with Russia,” said Matt Townsend, a sanctions partner at law firm Allen & Overy. “People are concerned about credit risk exposure but are also worried about what’s coming next. Everyone’s eyes are on the next wave of significant sanctions.” READY TO FLEE? The Amore Vero seized in La Ciotat had arrived there on Jan. 3 and was due to stay until April 1 for repairs, the French finance ministry said. On Wednesday, customs officers noted that the yacht was “taking steps to sail off urgently, without the repair works being over”, the statement said. As it was subject to the new sanctions, the officers decided to seize it. Rosneft, a Russian oil giant, did not respond to a request for comment over the seizure. Monaco-based Imperial Yachts told Reuters the yacht was owned by a firm called Kazimo, which had appointed Imperial Yachts as managers of the boat in 2018. “The individual you name is not connected with either Kazimo nor the yacht,” a representative for Imperial Yachts told Reuters when asked about Sechin. The French finance ministry did not immediately return a request for comment. Spanish group MB92, which owns the Ciotat shipyard, said the company was cooperating with the French authorities. In Germany, the 512-foot (156-metre) yacht Dilbar had been undergoing a refit in the shipyards of Blohm + Voss, Forbes said. The German government had frozen the asset and employees working on the ship did not appear for work on Wednesday, Forbes said. A representative of Usmanov said he had no confirmation of the yacht’s reported seizure. Germany’s General Customs office said details of operational measures cannot be made public. A spokesperson for Blohm + Voss declined to comment on the Dilbar, saying only that all orders and projects of its owners, the Luerssen Group, and subsidiaries were treated in accordance with the legal situation. MALDIVES HAVEN? Meanwhile, at least five superyachts owned by Russian billionaires appeared to have found temporary haven in the Maldives, a luxury holiday destination. The superyacht Clio, owned by Oleg Deripaska, the founder of aluminium giant Rusal who was sanctioned by the United States in 2018, was anchored off the capital Male on Wednesday, according to shipping database MarineTraffic. The Titan, owned by Alexander Abramov, a co-founder of Russian steel producer Evraz, arrived on Monday. Three more yachts owned by Russian oligarchs were seen cruising in Maldives waters on Wednesday, the data showed. They included the 88-metre (288-foot) Nirvana owned by Russia’s richest man, Vladimir Potanin. Most of the vessels were last seen anchored in Middle Eastern ports. A spokesperson for the Maldives government did not respond to a request for comment. (Reporting by Reuters in New Delhi, Paris, Berlin, London, Moscow, Brussels and Barcelona, Writing by Ingrid Melander; Editing by Mark Heinrich and Angus MacSwan) View the full article

Published by BANG Showbiz English Lady Gaga, Billy Porter and Eric McCormack will co-host Sir Elton John’s Oscar viewing party. The music legend’s fundraising bash in aid of his Elton John AIDS Foundation will return for the first time as an in-person event since the pandemic on March 27. The glitzy bash where famous faces watch the Academy Awards has raised more than $86 million over the past three decades. As well as the ‘Born This Way’ hitmaker, ‘Pose’ star and ‘Will and Grace’ actor hosting with the ‘Rocket Man’ hitmaker, Brandi Carlile is the special guest performer. Elton’s husband and co-founder of the AIDS Foundation, David Furnish, commented: “Lady Gaga, Billy Porter and Eric McCormack are not only amazingly talented, but have greatly contributed to LGBTQ+ visibility and inclusion in entertainment – both on screen and in music. “I’m honoured to have this group to join me on stage in West Hollywood Park to advocate for all marginalised groups affected by HIV.” Since its inception in 1992, The Academy Awards Viewing Party has supported the Elton John AIDS Foundation’s efforts to raise millions for their lifesaving work. Elton, 74, recently threw his support behind the British government’s vow to end HIV infections and deaths in England by 2030. The government is pumping £23 million into funding for the cause, with an aim of reducing infections by 80 per cent by 2025 and putting an end to all new cases five years later. And the ‘Tiny Dancer’ hitmaker insisted the most vital thing is “testing”. Speaking on World AIDS Day in December, Elton said: “One thing we’ve learned this year is the importance of testing and testing for HIV is at the core of ending new cases of HIV in England. It’s so important for everyone to know their HIV status to protect themselves and others.” View the full article

Published by Reuters By Paresh Dave and Jeffrey Dastin OAKLAND, Calif. (Reuters) – Ukrainians working at Western tech companies are banding together to help their besieged homeland, aiming to knock down disinformation websites, encourage Russians to turn against their government and speed delivery of medical supplies. They are seeking, through email campaigns and online petitions, to persuade firms such as internet security company Cloudflare Inc, Alphabet Inc’s Google and Amazon.com Inc to do more to counter Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. “Companies should try to isolate Russia as much as possible, as soon as possible,” said Olexiy Oryeshko, a staff software engineer at Google and a Ukrainian American. “Sanctions are not enough.” He was one of nine tech activists interviewed by Reuters who are of Ukrainian heritage or are Ukrainian immigrants and are responding to a call by Kyiv to form a volunteer “IT army”. Many companies have severed Russian ties due to new government trade curbs, but the activists are demanding more. They are appealing to cybersecurity companies in particular, asking them to drop Russian clients, especially publishers of what they say is disinformation. If that happens, the publishers would be more vulnerable to online attacks. Igor Seletskiy, chief executive of Palo Alto-based software maker CloudLinux, has pleaded for Cloudflare to drop several Russian news websites. “Given that even Switzerland took sides, I think it would be an important statement if Cloudflare would do the same,” he wrote in an email to top executives, which he shared with Reuters. Cloudflare said it terminated some clients because of sanctions and has begun reviewing accounts flagged in Seletskiy’s email, adding it was proceeding cautiously because cutting ties would jeopardize customer security. Spurred on by bombs exploding outside his parents’ home last week and concerned for the safety of a few of his Ukrainian colleagues who had not recently checked in, Vlad Goloshuk has appealed to a swathe of companies to help pressure Russia. More than a dozen, among them security and web hosting providers, said they would do what they can. Some have dropped Russian customers or were considering doing so, according to replies shown to Reuters by Goloshuk, CEO of Brightest Minds, a company that helps businesses generate sales leads. Philipp Lypniakov, who works for Spanish delivery app Glovo and has supported efforts to take down Russian websites, said he hopes the “IT war” will protect Ukraine. Disruptions will send “a message, starting from average citizens to the high officials that, ‘Hey, this is unacceptable,'” he said. SUSPENSION OF SERVICES URGED At Google, workers including hundreds of Ukrainian heritage have signed an internal letter addressed to CEO Sundar Pichai calling on the search giant to deliver more aid to Ukraine and modify its services such as Maps and advertising tools, according to a company software engineer who spoke on condition of anonymity. Google declined to comment. In recent days, it has barred Russian state media from advertising and distribution tools and increased safety measures for users in Ukraine. Activists also are looking at ways to disrupt the lives of Russian civilians, aiming to weaken support for the war within Russia. An online petition organized by Stas Matviyenko, CEO of restaurant order-ahead company Allset in Los Angeles, has called on U.S. developers of entertainment, payment, dating and other apps to block access in Russia. Big Tech’s financial and supply chain muscle could help, too. Silicon Valley-based humanitarian aid group Nova Ukraine has urged Amazon to donate worker time along with space for bandages and other crucial supplies on its cargo planes and vehicles heading to neighboring countries such as Poland. “They have the scale no one else has,” said Igor Markov, a director of Nova Ukraine and a tech research scientist. Amazon declined to comment. This week it said it would donate up to $10 million to organizations providing support in Ukraine. Organizing aid for Ukraine online has consumed Julia Nechaeva, a product director at Amazon’s live streaming unit Twitch. “I have only opened my working computer three times since last Wednesday,” she said. “To let my manager know that I’ll be off and to use donation matching.” (Reporting by Paresh Dave and Jeffrey Dastin; Additional reporting by Elizabeth Culliford and Sheila Dang; Editing by Kenneth Li, Peter Henderson and Edwina Gibbs) View the full article

Published by DPA A man walks in front of the shelled bridge in Irpin. The Ukrainian front decided to shell the bridge as it is the direct way for the Russian convoy coming from Belarus to storm the capital. Diego Herrera/EUROPA PRESS/dpa The International Criminal Court’s chief prosecutor has launched investigations into possible war crimes committed in Ukraine following Russia’s invasion of the country. Karim Khan on Thursday called on people currently in the war zone to report information on possible crimes to the court in The Hague. The ICC’s top prosecutor is now planning to contact all parties involved in the conflict. He also called on all sides to to abide by the rules of international law. Khan had announced his decision to open investigations on Wednesday evening. “No individual in the Ukraine situation has a licence to commit crimes within the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court,” he said in a statement. The prosecutor said that the investigation was launched following referrals from 39 ICC state parties, including Germany, Britain and Georgia. The prosecution is now looking into possible war crimes and crimes against humanity committed on the territory of Ukraine since November 2013. This includes the bloody suppression of pro-European protests in 2013-2014, the occupation of Crimea in 2014 and fighting in eastern Ukraine since then, as well as possible crimes since Russia’s invasion, which began last week. The prosecutor had already established that there was a legal basis for criminal proceedings in a preliminary investigation before the invasion started. Ukraine is not a party to the Rome Statute of the ICC but the country has accepted the court’s jurisdiction to try war crimes and crimes against humanity on its territory, according to the prosecutor. Russia does not recognize the court. Workers load concrete slabs as a Ukrainian soldier stands. Authorities in Kyiv have declared a curfew in the city in the face of the situation caused by the Russian offensive in the country. Diego Herrera/EUROPA PRESS/dpa View the full article

LGBTQ Conference in UkraineLGBTQ Ukrainians Help Defend Kyiv LGBTQ Ukrainians face significant, potentially deadly, circumstances as their nation battles back against Russian invading forces. But a number of them aren’t backing down from the fight, even as reports of a supposed Russian “kill list” targeted them and other groups continue to flutter amid the fighting. Russian forces continue to mobilize in an effort to take the Ukrainian capital city, Kyiv, as a major facet of its takeover attempt of the Eastern European nation. The Ukrainian army and citizen groups have been able to stave off any takeover of Kyiv so far, and a number of those aiding the fight are from a population that aren’t even guaranteed equal rights under Ukrainian law. Some LGBTQ rights activists doubt the reality of the “kill list,” saying that such a list doesn’t “align with Russia’s approach to LGBT issues.” But former United Nations special rapporteur on the Promotion and Protection of the Right to Freedom of Opinion and Expression David Kaye doesn’t believe that intelligence agencies should let such misalignments with Russian president Vladimir Putin’s practices deter them from monitoring anything that meets the definition of a war crime. “I think [the U.S.] and European allies should be signaling really clearly and publicly that they’re collecting intelligence and they’re continuing to collect intelligence related to all the kinds of activities that constitute war crimes that are being ordered and are being carried out,” Kaye told the Daily Beast. “Everybody who’s in the military chain of command in Russia, you need to know we are watching.” LGBTQ Ukrainians: Previously on Towleroad As Russia Attempts To Take Kyiv, LGBTQ Ukrainians Stand Ready To Fight Brian Bell March 3, 2022 Read More Moscow Hack: Restaurant Reviews Flooded With Photos of Ukraine War Casualties, Shelters, Destroyed Homes to Break Russian News Control Towleroad March 2, 2022 Read More 700K Ukranian Refugees: Poland Says Ignore Russian Racism Propaganda, ‘All Welcome’; Europe Creates ‘Corridor’; 80K Have Returned To Fight Towleroad March 2, 2022 Read More Zelensky Videos: He won Ukraine’s Dancing With The Stars, And Played A Teacher Elected President in a TV Series; On Way To This Weeks Videos Rallying to Resist: WATCH Michael Goff February 27, 2022 Read More Thousands March for Ukraine LGBTQ Rights With Some Opposition Towleroad September 19, 2021 Read More Warrant for Giuliani’s Devices is a PlayBill of the Players In Last Year’s Russian Influenced, Off Broadway Ukraine Flop Towleroad May 3, 2021 Read More Photo courtesy of EsWerUA/Wikimedia Commons View the full article

” Place was nice! However, Putin spoiled our mood by invading Ukraine. Rise up against your dictator.” Published by Reuters UK By Jacob Gronholt-Pedersen (Reuters) – Rather than commenting on the food and service at Russian restaurants and cafes, some users have begun posting online reviews detailing Russian actions in Ukraine to try to smuggle information past the tight control of state media. Russia’s communications regulator has accused 10 local media outlets of falsely depicting what Russia calls a special operation to demilitarise Ukraine. On Tuesday, Russia took radio station Ekho Moskvy off air, because of its coverage of the invasion. But online comments on platforms such as Google Maps and Afisha.ru, a widely… Read More View the full article

Published by AFP The rate of plastic production has grown faster than any other material and is expected to double within two decades, the UN says Nairobi (AFP) – The United Nations on Wednesday agreed to start negotiating a world-first global treaty on plastic pollution in what has been hailed a watershed moment for the planet. Nearly 200 nations at the UN Environment Assembly in Nairobi unanimously agreed to create an intergovernmental committee to negotiate and finalise a legally binding plastics treaty by 2024. UNEA chair Espen Barthe Eide declared the resolution passed with a strike of the gavel as the assembly hall erupted into cheers and applause. “We are making history today. You should all be proud,” said Eide, who is Norway’s climate and environment minister. Negotiators have been given a broad mandate to target plastic trash in all its forms -– not just bottles and straws in the ocean, but invisible microplastics polluting the air, soil and food chain. ‘Historic crossroad’ Supporters described the commitment to take united action on the plastic crisis as the most important environmental decision taken by the UN in years. “We stand at a crossroad in history when ambitious decisions taken today can prevent plastic pollution from contributing to our planet’s ecosystem collapse,” said Marco Lambertini from WWF. The broad treaty framework approved by nations — among them major plastic producers like the United States and China — does not spell out specific policies, with particulars to be negotiated later. But the scope covers the entire life cycle of plastic — a key demand of nations, businesses and environment groups — and could for the first time introduce new rules on the production of new plastic. It also allows for the negotiation of new rules around the design of plastic products — which are made from oil and gas — to make recycling easier, encourage sustainable use, and spur better waste disposal. “This is a clear acknowledgement that the entire life cycle of plastic, from fossil fuel extraction to disposal, creates pollution that is harmful to people and the planet,” said Graham Forbes from Greenpeace. The mandate allows for binding and voluntary measures, and the setting of global targets and obligations, the development of national action plans, and mechanisms for tracking progress and ensuring accountability. It also calls for financial assistance to help poorer countries take action. ‘Landmark’ decision The amount of plastic trash entering the oceans is forecast to triple by 2040, and governments have been under pressure to unite behind a global response to the crisis. The rate of plastic production has grown faster than any other material and is expected to double within two decades, the UN says. But less than 10 percent is recycled and most winds up in landfill or oceans creating what Eide called an “epidemic” of plastic trash. By some estimates, a garbage truck’s worth of plastic is dumped into the sea every minute. Large pieces of plastic are a notorious peril for sea birds, whales and other marine animals. But at the microscopic level, particles of plastic can also enter the food chain, eventually joining the human diet. Environment groups are buoyed by the broad scope given to negotiators but say the strength of the treaty is yet to be determined. The first round of negotiations is set for the second half of this year. Big corporations have expressed support for a treaty that creates a common set of rules around plastic and a level playing field for competition. “This is a landmark decision by UN member states. A legally binding treaty that addresses the full life cycle of plastic will make a dramatic difference in the fight against plastic pollution,” said Richard Slater, chief research and development officer at British consumer goods group Unilever. Big plastic makers have underscored the importance of plastic in construction, medicine and other vital industries and warned that banning certain materials would cause supply chain disruptions. View the full article

Published by Reuters By Luc Cohen NEW YORK (Reuters) – A juror who threw Ghislaine Maxwell’s sex trafficking conviction into doubt by failing to reveal before trial that he had been sexually abused as a child will not answer a judge’s questions on the matter, his lawyer said. Juror No. 50, as he is known in court papers, will invoke his constitutional right against self-incrimination at a scheduled March 8 hearing, lawyer Todd Spodek said in a letter made public on Wednesday. The hearing before U.S. District Judge Alison Nathan in Manhattan follows Maxwell’s Dec. 29 conviction on five of the six counts she faced for helping the late financier Jeffrey Epstein sexually abuse underage girls. Maxwell’s lawyers demanded a new trial after the juror told media including Reuters that he shared with other jurors his history of sexual abuse during deliberations. While denying Maxwell’s request, Nathan said the juror’s statements provided “incontrovertible evidence” that he responded falsely on a screening questionnaire that asked whether he had been sexually abused, denying the defense a chance to question him for bias. Juror No. 50, who identified himself to the media by his first and middle names Scotty David, signed the form under penalty of perjury, meaning he could face legal consequences if he lied. Prosecutors who won Maxwell’s conviction told Nathan they will seek an order to compel Juror No. 50’s testimony. Maxwell, 60, faces up to 65 years in prison. Epstein died by suicide in 2019 at the age of 66 in a Manhattan jail cell while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges (Reporting by Luc Cohen in New York; Editing by Mark Porter) View the full article

Published by Reuters By Hassan Hankir and Hams Rabah SIDON, Lebanon/AMMAN (Reuters) – Syrian refugee Ahmad al-Hariri, who fled the war in his country for neighbouring Lebanon 10 years ago, spent the last decade hoping in vain to escape to a new life in Europe. Watching European nations open their arms to hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians in less than a week, the father of three can’t help but compare their fates. “We are wondering, why were Ukrainians welcome in all countries while we, Syrian refugees, are still in tents and remain under the snow, facing death, and no one is looking to us?” he told Reuters in a refugee centre where 25 families are sheltered on the edge of the Mediterranean city of Sidon. In the Arab world, where 12 million Syrians have been uprooted by war, critics ranging from Hariri to activists and cartoonists contrast the Western reaction to the refugee crisis triggered by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine with the way Europe sought to hold back Syrian and other refugees in 2015. Some recalled images of refugees walking for days in harsh weather, or losing lives in perilous sea crossings as they tried to breach Europe’s borders. On Monday, four days after Russia launched its attack, the European Union said at least 400,000 refugees had entered the bloc from Ukraine, which has land borders with four EU states. Millions more are expected and the EU is preparing measures which would offer temporary residence permits as well as access to employment and social welfare – a swift opening of its doors at odds with its response to wars in Syria and elsewhere. By early 2021, 10 years after Syria’s conflict erupted, EU states had taken in 1 million Syrian refugees and asylum seekers, of which Germany alone took more than half. Most of them arrived before a 2016 deal in which the EU paid billions of euros for Turkey to continue hosting 3.7 million Syrians. This time the welcome has been immediate. “We have here not the refugee wave which we are accustomed to and we do not know what to do with – people with an unclear past,” Bulgaria’s Prime Minister Kiril Petkov said, describing Ukrainians as intelligent, educated and highly qualified. “These are Europeans whose airport has been just bombed, who are under fire,” he said. Bulgaria has said it will help everyone coming from Ukraine, where there are about 250,000 ethnic Bulgarians. Last year 3,800 Syrians sought protection in Bulgaria and 1,850 were granted refugee or humanitarian status. Syrians say most refugees only pass through Bulgaria to wealthier EU states. Poland’s government, which came under heavy international criticism last year for pushing back against a wave of immigrants crossing over from Belarus, mostly from the Middle East and Africa, has welcomed those fleeing the Ukraine war. In Hungary, which built a barrier along its southern border to prevent a repeat of the 2015 influx of people from the Middle East and Asia, the arrival of refugees from neighbouring Ukraine has triggered an outpouring of support and offers of transport, short-term accommodation, clothes and food. “RELATIVELY CIVILISED” Hungary and Poland both say that refugees from the Middle East who arrive at their borders have already crossed other safe countries which have a duty to provide shelter. Hungary’s Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto defended the different approaches. “I must reject drawing comparisons between those fleeing war and those trying to get into the country illegally,” he told a United Nations meeting in Geneva. The welcome has been eased by the fact that Ukraine is home to a large ethnic Hungarian community. Ties like those have led some Western journalists to suggest that the humanitarian disaster in Ukraine is different to crises in Syria, Iraq or Afghanistan, because Europeans could relate more closely to the victims. Their comments sparked a wave of condemnation on social media, accusing the West of bias. Clips of the reports were widely circulated and heavily criticised across the region. For instance, a television reporter on U.S. network CBS described Kyiv as a “relatively civilised, relatively European” city, in contrast to other war zones. Others said Ukraine was different because those fleeing were middle class or watched Netflix. The CBS reporter Charlie D’Agata apologised, saying he had been trying to convey the scale of the conflict. CBS did not immediately respond to a request for further comment. Nadim Houry, executive director of the Arab Reform Initiative, said parts of the media coverage were disturbing and revealed “ignorance about refugees from other parts of the world who also have the same aspirations as Ukrainians”. FIGHTERS Houry and other critics also say some governments are showing double standards on the issue of volunteers who want to fight in Ukraine against Russian forces. Britain’s foreign minister Liz Truss on Sunday backed President Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s appeal for people to join an international force to fight Russian troops. “Absolutely. If people want to support that struggle, I would support them doing that,” she told BBC television. In contrast, British police warned Britons travelling to Syria to help the rebels fighting President Bashar al-Assad eight years ago that they could be arrested on their return, saying they may pose a security risk to the UK. The foreign office did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Truss’s remarks. Defence minister Ben Wallace said the situation was different to fighters who joined groups like Islamic State in Syria, but that the government would discourage people from going to Ukraine. While their sense of abandonment has been heightened by the Ukrainians’ welcome in eastern Europe, several refugees in north Syria, Lebanon and in Jordan told Reuters responsibility for their plight lay with authorities closer to home. Some say Arab countries should have done more to support the military struggle against Assad, which grew out of widespread popular protests against the president in 2011, and helped the refugees more. Apart from Syria’s neighbours Jordan and Lebanon, Arab countries have taken in few of the war’s displaced people. “We do not blame European countries, we blame Arab countries,” said Ali Khlaif, living in a tented camp near the northwestern Syrian town of Azaz. “European countries welcome those from their people. We blame our Arab brethren, not the rest.” (Additional reporting by Gergely Szakacs in Budapest, William James in London, Anna Wlodarczak-Semczuk in Warsaw, Tsvetelia Tsolova in Sofia; Writing by Dominic Evans, Editing by William Maclean) View the full article

Published by Reuters By Andrew Chung and Lawrence Hurley WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Republicans challenging court-drawn congressional district maps in North Carolina and Pennsylvania have asked the conservative-majority U.S. Supreme Court to embrace an esoteric legal theory that could give politicians far greater power over elections. The cases, filed using the court’s emergency “shadow docket” that can allow it to act quickly and without the public deliberation that is a staple of major cases, seek to advance the “independent state legislature doctrine,” a little-known legal theory that could limit the ability of state courts to impose new maps. The 6-3 majority conservative court is considering the Republicans’ emergency requests to block lower court decisions that approved electoral maps for U.S. House of Representatives races replacing ones drawn by the Republican-led legislatures in the two states, where primary elections take place on May 17. The court, which has been increasingly assertive in taking up contentious cases, could act within days. In the North Carolina case in particular, the Republican challengers place front and center the theory that the U.S. Constitution gives state legislatures, and not other entities such as state courts, the power to set rules governing elections, including where district lines are drawn. “They’re very aggressive because they are asserting that legislatures when they are engaged in congressional redistricting are essentially immune from all state law,” said Paul Smith, the senior vice president at Campaign Legal Center, a non-partisan voting rights organization. Critics say the independent state legislature doctrine flouts democratic principles because it could limit the ability of courts to block electoral districts designed to entrench one political party in power, known as gerrymandering. EMPOWERS PARTISANSHIP The doctrine could also stymie challenges on issues such as voter identification, mail-in ballots and drop boxes, which Republicans have sought to restrict in a number of states, and factor into lawsuits that arise in the heat of an election. “It’s dangerous because state politicians are the people most interested in crafting the rules of the game to help themselves and their side continue to win,” said Josh Douglas, a voting rights expert at the University of Kentucky Rosenberg College of Law. In most states, lawmakers control the process of redrawing their congressional maps every 10 years after the U.S. Census has been taken. The Supreme Court in 2019 said federal courts are powerless to intervene to prevent partisan gerrymandering. Republicans need to flip only a handful of seats in November’s midterm elections to recapture control of the U.S. House and hinder much of Democratic President Joe Biden’s legislative agenda. The doctrine, which is gaining traction in conservative legal circles, is based in part on language in the U.S. Constitution that the “times, places and manner” of federal elections “shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof.” The Republican challengers are pressing the theory at a time when the Supreme Court seems more receptive to it. Four of the court’s conservative justices appeared to lend weight to the argument during the flurry of litigation around the 2020 election, when Republican lawmakers or officials sought to block court decisions requiring changes to election deadlines and rules, to account for the coronavirus pandemic. For instance, in a case from Wisconsin last October, Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote in an opinion that “state courts do not have a blank check to rewrite state election laws for federal elections.” Kavanaugh is one of three conservative justices appointed by Republican former President Donald Trump, who has continued to falsely claim that his election defeat to Biden was the result of fraud, inspiring a wave of new restrictions on voting in Republican-led states. The dispute in North Carolina centers on a state supreme court ruling last month that struck down the Republican-dominated legislature’s congressional map as a violation of the state’s constitution. That ruling came in two lawsuits brought by plaintiffs including Democratic voters and an environmental group claiming that the map was biased toward Republicans. A lower court then adopted a remedial map drawn by a bipartisan panel of experts. Republican lawmakers in the state urged the U.S. Supreme Court to intervene, saying the federal Constitution “does not give the state courts, or any other organ of state government, the power to second-guess the legislature’s determinations.” In Pennsylvania, the state supreme court last month approved a new congressional map after Democratic Governor Tom Wolf vetoed one drawn by the majority-Republican legislature, saying it gave an unfair advantage to Republicans. Republicans, including one who is running for office, then sued to block the new map and turned to the U.S. Supreme Court when their efforts failed, saying the state court had “no authority to impose a congressional map” unless the legislature authorized it. Their lawyer, Jonathan Mitchell, told Reuters his argument was not as broad as that made in the North Carolina case because he concedes that courts can intervene when a legislatively enacted map violates the state or federal Constitution. “The problem is that the [Pennsylvania] court acted to impose a map of its choosing, not to remedy a state or federal constitutional violation,” he said. In another redistricting case on a different legal question, the court last month allowed Alabama to use a Republican-backed map, signaling further weakening of the Voting Rights Act enacted to protect minority voters. (Reporting by Andrew Chung and Lawrence Hurley; Editing by Scott Malone and Mark Porter) View the full article

Published by Reuters By Jan Wolfe WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The Texas man who is the first person to stand trial for joining the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the U.S. Capitol told a friend he wanted to drag Democratic House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi out of the building, a prosecutor said on Wednesday. Guy Reffitt, of Wylie, Texas, is the first of some 750 people charged with joining the riot by Donald Trump’s supporters to face trial in Washington. Reffitt has pleaded not guilty to five charges, including carrying a semi-automatic handgun while on Capitol grounds. “The defendant was the tip of this mob’s spear,” federal prosecutor Jeffrey Nestler told jurors in his opening statement, saying Reffitt led a mob of rioters up the Capitol’s stairs to “overwhelm” police and storm the building. Nestler said Reffitt texted a friend about plans to drag Pelosi and other lawmakers from the building. “I just want to see Pelosi’s head hitting every fucking stair” of the building, Reffitt told the friend, according to the prosecutor. Reffitt’s lawyer, William Welch, gave a brief opening statement, addressing jurors for only two minutes. “He exaggerates and he rants,” Welch said of his client. “This trial will be about fact versus hype.” Some 200 defendants have already pleaded guilty to joining the mob, which sent lawmakers running for their lives. Reffitt’s trial is an important test case as the U.S. Justice Department attempts to secure convictions from the hundreds of defendants who have not taken plea deals. They face charges ranging from unlawful picketing to seditious conspiracy, with which 11 people affiliated with the right-wing Oath Keepers were charged in January. One of those 11 defendants, Joshua James, has a plea hearing scheduled for Wednesday at 5 p.m. ET (2200 GMT) — a likely sign that he will plead guilty. Such a guilty plea would be a notable victory for the Justice Department, which hopes to secure a similar conviction against Oath Keepers leader Stewart Rhodes and other defendants in the sedition case. A guilty verdict for Reffitt could motivate defendants to accept plea deals offered by prosecutors. But a verdict in Reffitt’s favor could encourage the hundreds of defendants who have not taken plea deals to roll the dice on a trial. Reffitt also faces charges of obstruction for allegedly threatening his teenage children with harm if they turned him in to authorities. Reffitt’s estranged son Jackson, now 19, turned him into the FBI. The son will testify against his father at trial, Nestler said. Thousands of people stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, after a fiery speech in which Trump falsely claimed his election defeat was the result of widespread fraud, an assertion rejected by multiple courts, state election officials and members of his own administration. Four people died on the day of the violence, one shot dead by police and the other three of natural causes. A Capitol Police officer who had been attacked by protesters died the following day. Four police officers who took part in the defense of the Capitol later took their own lives. More than a hundred police officers were injured in the riot. (Reporting by Jan Wolfe; Editing by Scott Malone, Kenneth Maxwell, Bill Berkrot and Jonathan Oatis) View the full article

Published by Reuters By Joseph Ax WASHINGTON (Reuters) -Republican Texas Governor Greg Abbott and Democrat Beto O’Rourke won their parties’ gubernatorial nominations on Tuesday, as the state’s first-in-the-nation primary contests kicked off the race to the Nov. 8 general election. Abbott, who was endorsed by former President Donald Trump, easily turned back several right-wing challengers. He is favored to beat O’Rourke, who is seeking to become the first Democratic governor of Texas in nearly three decades. Texas voters were also selecting their parties’ nominees on Tuesday for the U.S. House of Representatives. The results could offer clues about the mood of American voters ahead of the November elections that will determine control Congress for the rest of President Joe Biden’s four-year term. Progressive Democrats scored a victory when democratic socialist Greg Casar, an Austin city councilman, beat out fellow Democrat Eddie Rodriguez, a state representative. Another liberal, Jessica Cisneros, was headed toward a run-off with incumbent Henry Cuellar, one of the House’s most conservative Democrats. Both Casar and Cisneros campaigned alongside national progressive figures such as Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez. Meanwhile, Republican state Attorney General Ken Paxton was headed to a May 24 runoff election against Texas Land Commissioner George P. Bush, grandson of former President H.W. Bush, after failing to capture 50% of the vote. Paxton, who had Trump’s support, remains under a 2015 indictment for securities fraud and also faces a federal corruption probe. He has denied any wrongdoing. The election was the first test of new Republican-backed voting restrictions passed in response to Trump’s false claims of election fraud in his 2020 loss to Biden. There were no reports of major problems at polling places, following weeks in which several counties recorded large numbers of rejected mail-in ballots due to new identification requirements. Texas Secretary of State John Scott said Harris County, home to one in six Texans, had informed his office that vote counting was delayed due to “damaged ballot sheets.” Midterm elections typically serve as a referendum on the sitting president, and Republicans are favored to win a majority in at least one of the two chambers of Congress that Democrats control by razor-thin margins. That would allow Republicans to block Biden’s legislative agenda and launch investigations that could damage his administration. ABBOTT PUSHES CONSERVATIVE AGENDA Abbott has pursued increasingly conservative policies during his second term, including opposing COVID-19 vaccine and mask mandates. He also signed the most restrictive abortion ban of any U.S. state and is building a new barrier on the border with Mexico. Last week, he instructed state agencies to consider medical treatment for transgender adolescents as child abuse, days after Paxton issued a legal opinion to that effect. While the full effect of the order remains unclear, transgender advocates decried the move as discriminatory and dangerous. “Abbott has not left much room to the right of him for these competitors to gain any traction,” said James Henson, director of the Texas Politics Project at the University of Texas. O’Rourke, a former congressman, is the state’s most prominent Democrat after losing a close U.S. Senate race in 2018 and then mounting a brief campaign for president. The Democrat has attacked Abbott’s handling of the state’s power grid, which failed during deadly winter storms in February 2021. Among congressional races, Republican-backed redistricting has eliminated virtually every competitive district. Still, some contests gave early looks at how each party is navigating internal tensions. In the 8th District north of Houston, where Representative Kevin Brady is retiring, the Republican primary was seen as a proxy battle between the party’s ideological poles. Former Navy SEAL Morgan Luttrell, backed by House Republican leadership, held a sizable lead over Christian Collins, a conservative activist supported by the House’s far-right Freedom Caucus. In the 3rd District north of Dallas, Republican Representative Van Taylor was forced into a run-off contest. He will face Keith Self, a former county judge who criticized Taylor for supporting a congressional investigation into the Jan. 6, 2020, assault on the U.S. Capitol by Trump supporters. For Democrats, the contest between Cuellar, the lone anti-abortion Democrat left in the House, and Cisneros could leave the party vulnerable to a Republican takeover of the chamber. Federal investigators searched Cuellar’s home recently, though details of the investigation are not clear and he has denied wrongdoing. If Cuellar loses the primary, Cisneros could be targeted by Republicans as being too liberal for Texas. The 15th District, likely the most competitive in Texas in November after incumbent Democrat Vicente Gonzalez opted to run in a neighboring district, had a crowded field for both parties. The Democratic contest will be decided in a runoff, while Republican Monica De La Cruz, who ran for the seat in 2020, won her party’s nomination contest. Republicans are hopeful they can flip the seat after Trump showed unexpected strength among Hispanic voters in 2020. (Reporting by Joseph Ax and Moira Warburton; Additional reporting by Jason Lange; Editing by Scott Malone, Alistair Bell, Ross Colvin and Kim Coghill) View the full article

Published by Reuters By Sarah N. Lynch WASHINGTON (Reuters) -A new U.S. federal “KleptoCapture” task force will work to further strain the finances of Russia’s oligarchs to pressure the country to cease its invasion of Ukraine, the Justice Department said on Wednesday. The interagency law enforcement group will be dedicated to enforcing sanctions, export restrictions and economic countermeasures designed to freeze Russia out of global markets, Attorney General Merrick Garland said in a statement. The task force’s name comes from the word “kleptocracy,” defined as corrupt individuals who misuse their powers to accumulate wealth at the expense of those they govern. “To those bolstering the Russian regime through corruption and sanctions evasion: we will deprive you of safe haven and hold you accountable,” said Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco. “Oligarchs be warned: we will use every tool to freeze and seize your criminal proceeds.” The task force will be run out of Monaco’s office, and will be responsible for investigating and prosecuting violations of sanctions. It will use civil and criminal asset forfeiture laws to seize assets obtained through unlawful conduct. Washington and its allies have sought to up the pressure on Russian President Vladimir Putin and those closest to him to try to force an end to the assault on Ukraine, the worst attack on a European state since World War Two. More than 2,000 civilians have been killed. The Justice Department has long had a team to track down assets belonging to kleptocrats from around the globe that are linked to crimes with an impact on the U.S. financial system, such as money laundering, sanctions evasion or foreign bribes. The new task force will target the crimes of Russian officials and government-connected elites. “Arrests and prosecution will be sought when supported by the facts and the law,” the department said in its announcement. “Even if defendants cannot be immediately detained, asset seizures and civil forfeitures of unlawful proceeds — including personal real estate, financial and commercial assets — will be used to deny resources that enable Russian aggression.” On Tuesday night, President Joe Biden in his State of the Union speech assailed Putin for his country’s attack on Ukraine and put Russian oligarchs and other government leaders he said were corrupt on notice that the Justice Department would be coming for their assets. “We are joining with our European allies to find and seize your yachts, your luxury apartments, your private jets. We are coming for your ill-begotten gains,” Biden said. The task force will be led by a veteran prosecutor in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York who has experience investigating Russian organized crime and recovering illicit assets, the department said. The department did not identify the prosecutor by name. The task force will be staffed by agents and analysts from a variety of law enforcement agencies including the FBI, the U.S. Marshals Service, the Secret Service, the Department of Homeland Security’s Homeland Security Investigations, IRS-Criminal Investigations and the U.S. Postal Inspection Service. (Reporting by Sarah N. Lynch; Editing by Scott Malone and Howard Goller) View the full article

Published by AFP Ukrainians and supporters hold placards and a Ukraine national flag during a demonstration against the Russian invasion of the Ukraine in front of the Greek Parliament in Athens, on March 1, 2022 United Nations (United States) (AFP) – The UN General Assembly on Wednesday overwhelmingly adopted a resolution that “demands” Russia “immediately” withdraw from Ukraine, in a powerful rebuke of Moscow’s invasion by a vast majority of the world’s nations. After more than two days of extraordinary debate, which saw the Ukrainian ambassador accuse Russia of genocide, 141 out of 193 United Nations member states voted for the non-binding resolution. China was among the 35 countries which abstained, while just five — Eritrea, North Korea, Syria, Belarus and of course Russia — voted against it. The resolution “deplores” the invasion of Ukraine “in the strongest terms” and condemns President Vladimir Putin’s decision to put his nuclear forces on alert. The vote had been touted by diplomats as a bellwether of democracy in a world where autocracy is on the rise, and came as Putin’s forces bear down on Kyiv while terrified Ukrainians flee. “They have come to deprive Ukraine of the very right to exist,” Ukraine’s ambassador Sergiy Kyslytsya told the Assembly ahead of the vote. “It’s already clear that the goal of Russia is not an occupation only. It is genocide.” Putin launched the full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24. Moscow has pleaded “self-defense” under Article 51 of the UN Charter. But that has been roundly rejected by Western countries who accuse Moscow of violating Article 2 of the Charter, requiring UN members to refrain from the threat or use of force to resolve a crisis. The European Union’s ambassador to the UN Olof Skoog said the vote was “not just about Ukraine.” “It is about defending an international order based on rules we all have signed up to,” he said in a statement. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said the General Assembly’s message was “loud and clear.” “End hostilities in Ukraine — now. Silence the guns — now,” he said in a statement. “As bad as the situation is for the people in Ukraine right now, it threatens to get much, much worse. The ticking clock is a time bomb.” ‘Who will be next?’ The text of the resolution — led by European countries in coordination with Ukraine — has undergone numerous changes in recent days. It no longer “condemns” the invasion as initially expected, but instead “deplores in the strongest terms the Russian Federation’s aggression against Ukraine.” Nearly every General Assembly speaker unreservedly condemned the war. “If the United Nations has any purpose, it is to prevent war,” the US ambassador, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, said during her speech on Wednesday. She accused Russia of “preparing to increase the brutality of its campaign.” “We’ve seen videos of Russian forces moving exceptionally lethal weaponry into Ukraine, which has no place on the battlefield. That includes cluster munitions and vacuum bombs, which are banned under the Geneva Convention,” Thomas-Greenfield said. Russia’s ally Belarus offered a staunch defense of the invasion, however. Ambassador Valentin Rybakov blasted sanctions imposed by the West on Russia as “the worst example of economic and financial terrorism.” And he followed other Russian allies such as Syria in condemning the “double standards” of Western nations who have invaded countries including Libya, Iraq and Afghanistan in recent decades. Other speakers cited fears of a domino effect should Ukraine fall to Russia. Colombia railed against any return to “empire,” while Albania wondered: “Who will be next?” From the Arab world it was Kuwait, itself the victim of an invasion by Iraq in 1990, whose denunciation of Moscow was the most explicit. China, India abstain Japan and New Zealand led condemnation from Asia, but the continent’s giants — China, India and Pakistan — all abstained. During the debate Beijing had stressed the world had “nothing to gain” from a new Cold War. On the meeting’s sidelines, Washington has taken aim at Russians working at the United Nations, leveling accusations of espionage and demanding expulsions. US President Joe Biden asserted Tuesday in his State of the Union address that Putin had underestimated the response to the invasion. “He rejected efforts at diplomacy… And, he thought he could divide us here at home,” Biden said. “Putin was wrong. We were ready.” View the full article

Published by Reuters (Reuters) – Russian President Vladimir Putin said at the weekend that his nation’s nuclear forces should be put on high alert, raising fears that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine could lead to nuclear escalation. Here is how Russia’s chain of command would work in the event of a nuclear weapon launch. WHO DECIDES TO LAUNCH RUSSIAN NUCLEAR WEAPONS? A 2020 document https://archive.mid.ru/en/web/guest/foreign_policy/international_safety/disarmament/-/asset_publisher/rp0fiUBmANaH/content/id/4152094 called “Basic Principles of State Policy of the Russian Federation on Nuclear Deterrence” says the Russian president takes the decision to use nuclear weapons. A small briefcase, known as the Cheget, is kept close to the president at all times, linking him to the command and control network of Russia’s strategic nuclear forces. The Cheget does not contain a nuclear launch button but rather transmits launch orders to the central military command – the General Staff. IF PUTIN GIVES THE NUCLEAR ORDER, WHAT HAPPENS? The Russian General Staff file:///C:/Users/8011323/Downloads/FOIR1588.pdf has access to the launch codes and has two methods of launching nuclear warheads. It can send authorisation codes to individual weapons commanders, who would then execute the launch procedures. There is also a back-up system, known as Perimetr, which allows the General Staff to directly initiate the launch of land-based missiles, bypassing all the immediate command posts. DID PUTIN’S ‘HIGH ALERT’ ORDER MAKE A LAUNCH MORE LIKELY? Putin said at the weekend that the nation’s nuclear forces should be put on high alert. The following day, Russia’s defence ministry announced that its nuclear missile forces had been placed on “enhanced” combat duty. The phrase enhanced, or special, combat duty does not appear in Russia’s nuclear doctrine, leaving military experts puzzled over what it might mean. Pavel Podvig, a senior researcher at the United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research in Geneva, said on Twitter that the order might have activated Russia’s nuclear command and control system, essentially opening communication channels for any eventual launch order. Alternatively, he said it might just mean the Russians added staff to their nuclear facilities. DO THE RUSSIANS HAVE RULES ON NUCLEAR LAUNCHES? The 2020 doctrine presents four scenarios which might justify the use of Russian nuclear weapons: — the use of nuclear weapons or weapons of mass destruction against Russia or its allies; — data showing the launch of ballistic missiles aimed at Russia or its allies; — an attack on critical government or military sites that would undermine the country’s nuclear forces response actions; — the use of conventional weapons against Russia “when the very existence of the state is in jeopardy”. WHAT NUCLEAR CAPABILITIES DOES RUSSIA HAVE? The Federation of American Scientists https://fas.org/issues/nuclear-weapons/status-world-nuclear-forces estimates that Russia has 5,977 nuclear warheads, more than any other country. Of these, 1,588 are deployed and ready for use. Its missiles can be fired from the land, by submarines and by airplanes. Putin oversaw a coordinated test of Russia’s nuclear forces on Feb. 19 shortly before ordering troops into Ukraine. HAS RUSSIA EVER USED A NUCLEAR WEAPON IN WAR? No. To date, the only use of nuclear weapons during conflict was the atomic bombs dropped on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki by the United States in 1945, at the end of World War Two. (Reporting by Crispian Balmer, Editing by Rosalba O’Brien) View the full article