Save-Point

Quote:Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., best known for his positions on environmental law and vaccine safety, filed the paperwork to run in the 2024 race for president of the United States on April 5.

He filed as a Democrat, according to a Federal Election Commission (FEC) filing.

“America is enduring an apocalyptic tribal polarization more toxic and dangerous than any time since the Civil War,” Kennedy told The Epoch Times exclusively following the filing of the paperwork.

“And while Democrats battle Republicans, elites are strip-mining our middle class, poisoning our children, and commoditizing our landscapes.

“I will focus my campaign, not on the issues that divide us but the values we have in common.”

Kennedy is the second candidate to declare a run for the Democratic nomination, joining Marianne Williamson.

Kennedy’s father, the late Sen. Robert Kennedy (D-N.Y.), was assassinated when running for the presidency in 1968. His uncle, President John F. Kennedy, was assassinated in Texas in 1963.

Kennedy signaled earlier in March that he planned to run.

Quote:Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas) said that, although military conflict between the United States and China is not something he desires, if Beijing were to attack Taiwan, that option would be “on the table” for Congress.

“Conflict is always a last resort,” McCaul noted from Taipei in a Friday interview with Fox News.

But, he added, “If communist China invaded Taiwan, it would certainly be on the table and something that would be discussed by Congress and with the American people.”

As chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, McCaul led a bipartisan delegation of lawmakers to Taiwan on Thursday in a show of support for the island nation amid its escalating tensions with China.
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Given Washington’s decision not to send troops to Ukraine, some Taiwanese citizens told Fox News that they were skeptical they would receive such support in the event of an attack.

McCaul, however, stressed that the two situations were vastly different.

“Taiwan is in a very different position from Ukraine,” he said. “Number one, they’re not battle tested or ready. They are not prepared for war.”

But Ukraine, the congressman noted, has had the support of NATO to bolster its defenses.

Quote:North Korea has claimed it tested a new type of nuclear-capable underwater drone this week to assess the weapon’s “fatal attack ability.”

State-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said on Saturday that a “Haeil-2” drone was deployed off the coast of South Hamgyong province on April 4 and reached the target in the waters off Ryongdae Port on April 7.

KCNA said the drone cruised 1,000 kilometers (621 miles) of simulated underwater distance in the East Sea of Korea for 71 hours and six minutes before its test warhead was detonated underwater.

“The test perfectly proved the reliability of the underwater strategic weapon system and its fatal attacks ability,” KCNA claimed.

The drone test came just weeks after North Korea claimed to have tested an underwater attack drone named “Haeil” from March 21 to 23, which the regime said was capable of generating a “super-scale radioactive tsunami.”

Quote:Former Theranos executive Ramesh “Sunny” Balwani will be heading to prison later this month after an appeals court rejected his bid to remain free while he contests his conviction for carrying out a blood-testing hoax with his former boss and lover, Elizabeth Holmes.

After the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals issued a decision refusing Balwani’s request, U.S District Judge Edward Davila on Friday ordered him to start his nearly 13-year prison sentence on April 20.

One of Balwani’s lawyers had filed a motion late Thursday seeking nearly two weeks to give Balwani time to make travel arrangements and make other preparations for a trip that will send him to a federal prison in Southern California.

The April 20 reporting date means Balwani will be heading to prison a week before Holmes, Theranos’ founder and CEO, is scheduled to begin a more than 11-year prison sentence after being convicted on four counts of fraud and conspiracy last year.

Holmes, 39, appeared before Davila last month along with her lawyers in an effort to persuade the judge to allow her to remain free while she pursues her own appeal. Davila hasn’t ruled on Holmes’ request yet.
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Although they had separate trials, Holmes and Balwani were accused of essentially the same crimes centered on a ruse touting Theranos’ blood-testing system as a revolutionary breakthrough in health care. The claims helped the company become a Silicon Valley sensation that raised nearly $1 billion from investors.

But its technology never came close to working like Holmes and Balwani boasted, resulting in Theranos’ scandalous collapse and a criminal case that shined a bright light on Silicon Valley greed and hubris.

Quote:A legal battle has erupted in Los Angeles over the release of sensitive information of undercover police officers to a local watchdog group, with multiple claims being filed this week.

On April 5, a day after nearly 400 officers filed legal claims against the City of Los Angeles and the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) regarding the issue, the city sued a Los Angeles reporter and the Stop LAPD Spying Coalition for publishing sensitive information that was released by the city last month from a 2021 public records request.

The coalition published the sensitive information, which includes officers’ email, ethnicity, gender, division, rank, and year they were hired, last month on its newly-established “Watch the Watchers” police surveillance website. Contained in the data dump was also information about undercover officers.
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McNicholas said there have been several suspensions of current undercover cases due to the data leak.

“The real threat here is not Watch the Watchers, the real threat is somebody that is computer savvy that’s already pulled off all that information,” he said. “It’s already been downloaded tens of thousands of times.”
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Shakeer Rahman, the attorney defending the Stop LAPD Spying Coalition against the city, told The Epoch Times in a statement that the information released are “public records that the city itself made public.”

“That means the public has every right to publish them. This lawsuit is an effort to intimidate LAPD’s critics and expand the term ‘undercover’ to mean every single police officer,” he said.
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The LAPD mistakenly released the names and photos in September of every undercover officer—excluding “650” officers, which are officers off the books who do clandestine investigations of other officers—to journalist Ben Camacho from Knock LA, a nonprofit newsroom sprouted from the progressive advocacy organization Ground Game LA.
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Camacho then passed on the information to the police surveillance group, according to McNicholas, which then posted the photos and information of the officers to its website the weekend of March 17.

Quote:A divided three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia on April 7 upheld the U.S. Department of Justice’s novel use of a felony evidence-tampering statute against Jan. 6 criminal-case defendants.

The appeals judges issued a broad interpretation of the crime of “obstruction” that is almost certain to be appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Judge Florence Pan, appointed by President Joe Biden, and Judge Justin R. Walker, appointed by President Donald Trump, voted to reverse the 2022 rulings by U.S. District Judge Carl Nichols dismissing obstruction charges against three Jan. 6 defendants.

Pan and Walker adopted the broad reading of the obstruction statute advanced by the DOJ.

Judge Gregory Katsas, a Trump appointee, dissented. Katsas warned that the interpretation advanced by the majority would, for example, expose protesters standing outside a judge’s home to 20 years in federal prison.

Brushing aside the statute’s history stemming from evidence tampering in the Enron scandal, the majority said the law applies to any effort to obstruct an “official proceeding,” including the ceremonial tallying of Electoral College votes by the U.S. Congress.

Quote:British police charged a 12-year-old boy with murder on Friday after a car plowed into a woman on a city street in northern England.

The woman was found dead Wednesday night at the scene of the crash in Sheffield, South Yorkshire police said. Relatives identified her as 60-year-old Marcia Grant and said she was “a warm, loving and dedicated wife, mother, grandmother, sister, and friend and a pillar of her community.”

The boy was found shortly afterward and arrested, police said.

The suspect can’t be named for legal reasons because of his age. He is due to appear at Sheffield Youth Court on Saturday to face a charge of murder.

In England, children 10 and over can be charged and convicted of crimes. Any sentences are served in secure youth centers rather than adult prisons.

Quote:Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. said on Friday it is implementing a “meaningful” cut in its chip production after profits plunged, and after smaller companies also announced cuts in chip production.

According to a Samsung press release published Friday, the largest memory chipmaker had a profit of 600 billion Korean won ($455 million) for its first quarter of 2023. In the first quarter of 2022, it had a profit of 14 trillion won ($10.6 billion), and in the fourth quarter of 2022, it had a profit of 4 trillion won. This was the biggest decline in profits for the company in 14 years.

Investors speculated the move by the industry leader would support chip prices that had fallen by about 70 percent over the last nine months.

Smartphone and personal computer makers had stocked up on chips during the pandemic when demand for consumer devices surged, but they are now running down inventories as shoppers cut back on purchases amid rising inflation.

Samsung said memory demand had dropped sharply because of a weak global economy and customers slowing purchases as they focused on using up their stocks.

Quote:The presentment released today found, among other things:

· During a 10-month period in 2021, ORR lost contact with nearly 20,000 UAC;
· A report showed HHS and the U.S. Department of Justice received thousands of allegations of sexual abuse;
· Testimony of UAC revealed that a minor was ‘pimped out’ by their ‘aunt’ (whom they did not know prior to arriving in the U.S.), some UAC ran away from sponsors for being sold for sex, and ORR placed a teenage girl in the house of unknown men with no private bedroom;
· ORR discouraged close checking of addresses of sponsors and some sponsors utilized addresses in Jacksonville including a strip club, empty lots surrounded by stacked shipping containers or open fields;
· During the Biden administration, case managers are only performing home studies in approximately 4.5% placements and discretionary home studies in less than one percent of cases.
· One case manager reported having to release a teenage girl to a male sponsor with multiple other unknown males living in the same residence—all unidentified. The presentment stated this is not an isolated incident.
· Criminal history, lack of citizen status and even total refusal to submit to a background check does not disqualify sponsors from receiving a UAC. One sponsor was given custody despite having been to Florida prison before for battery on a child;
· A disturbing pattern emerged with sponsors applying to receive multiple UAC. One address in Texas showed 44 children sent to a single residence. One contractor testified that it placed 598 UAC with only 132 sponsors or each sponsor receiving 4.5 UAC;
· In Florida, neither U.S. Department of Homeland Security or HHS actively coordinates or consults with the state on the UAC resettled in Florida. The state doesn’t receive meaningful notice when UAC are transported here. Florida receives no information on backgrounds, criminal history or immigration status of the UAC brought here, nor does the state have any assurance the UAC are in-fact minors; and
· During a six-month period in 2021, more than 70 airplanes landed at Jacksonville International Airport, arriving in the middle of the night at the commercial terminal with UAC. One of these UAC was actually 24 years old and ended up brutally killing his sponsor. ORR now conceals small groups of UAC on regular commercial flights.

The UAC mentioned above are the migrant minors currently being victimized by their relatives or some other people in the state of Florida.

Quote:On April 6, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis made a two-stop foray into the battleground state of Michigan as he continues to evaluate a run for the GOP nomination for president in 2024.

DeSantis was the keynote speaker at a breakfast to raise money for the Midland County Republican Party.

That afternoon at Hillsdale College, he made two well-attended addresses before jetting home to Florida for the Easter weekend.

All of the day’s events drew large and friendly crowds but his breakfast appearance was greeted by a group of protesters.
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At the start of his remarks to a sell-out crowd of about 600, DeSantis joked that his one disappointment in coming to Midland was that his visit hadn’t attracted “more protesters.”

In a smooth, conversational tone, which some in the crowd likened to the style of Ronald Reagan, DeSantis addressed the topics of restoring prosperity and optimism to America, securing the southern border by “building the wall,” parental rights, reforming the education system, school choice, keeping boys out of girls’ sports, outlawing gender modification for children, and the need to use American oil and natural gas for energy.

One man in the audience told The Epoch Times: “You couldn’t slip a piece of paper in between DeSantis and Trump on the issues. This sounds like a Trump speech.”

DeSantis dismissed Joe Biden as a “floundering, weak president that is controlled by the most radical elements of his own party.”

Quote:The Justice Department has launched an investigation into a possible leak of secret Pentagon documents that seem to detail U.S. and NATO aid to Ukraine, as well as front-line troop and armament positions, that were shared widely on social media.

The documents, dated between Feb. 23 and March 1 and shared on platforms like Twitter and Telegram, appear to show maps and details about deliveries of weapons.

Some of the documents had markings classifying them as “Secret” and “Top Secret,” with some showing what looks like locations for front-line Russian and Ukrainian military units and artillery guns.

Bellingcat analyst Aric Toler posted on Twitter images suggesting that the documents may have been altered.

In at least one case, the documents appear to have been altered to show much lower Russian troop fatality numbers than the 200,000 killed and wounded that U.S. officials have publicly estimated.

That alteration, in particular, has led to speculation that Russia could be behind the leak.

“As many of these were pictures of documents, it appears that it was a deliberate leak done by someone that wished to damage the Ukraine, U.S., and NATO efforts,” Mick Mulroy, former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense, told ABC.

Honestly, my first suspicion would be that there's a mole in the WH or the Pentagon.

Quote:A 52-year-old New Mexico man was fatally shot by police this week after they arrived at the wrong address while responding to a domestic violence call, according to state investigators.

In a statement released on April 6, New Mexico State Police (NMSP) said Robert Dotson was killed Wednesday night after members of the Farmington Police Department responded to a domestic violence call around 11:30 p.m. and went to Dotson’s house instead of a neighboring residence.

Once officers arrived in the neighborhood, they “mistakenly approached 5305 Valley View Avenue instead of 5308 Valley View Avenue,” NMSP said.

Eventually, the unaware homeowner of the wrong address opened the screen door of his house armed with a handgun. At this point, at least one officer fired one round that struck Dotson, body camera footage reviewed by NMSP shows.

Not knowing who was outside their home, the man’s wife returned with a gun and fired at least one round from the doorway, prompting officers to return fire again. State police said the woman put down her gun after realizing the individuals outside her home were police officers.

“Dotson suffered fatal injuries as a result of the shooting and was pronounced dead at the scene,” NMSP said, noting the victim’s wife was unharmed and won’t be charged with a crime.

Normally I'd defend the cops but in this case, I'd fired them and sanction their boss at the state police department as well.  They deserved to be put in jail for sure!

Quote:Carol Lam, a former federal prosecutor in Southern California, told “MSNBC Reports” on Friday that Juan Merchan’s prior political contributions could pose an ethical issue for his continued handling of Trump’s case.

“I think the optics are a bit problematic,” Lam said. “To be clear, the donations were made in 2020 before Judge Merchan had either the Trump Organization case assigned to him, or obviously this case, but it is troubling optics, I think, for any judge to have made a political contribution, and then to have a party who is either the beneficiary or not the beneficiary of that political contribution before that judge in court. Now, it was a trivial amount of money, and this is a trial-level judge.”

“The judge, in this case, is not the ultimate trier of fact, the jury is, but the judge does call some balls and some strikes during the course of the trial, and if there’s a conviction, the judge is responsible for sentencing. That is all subject to review on appeal,” she continued. “However, it is probably not the best course of action for a judge to have made political contributions while a sitting judge, with the possibility that such cases can arise before him.”
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According to a recent review of Federal Election Commission (FEC) records, Merchan donated $15 to “Biden for President”—Biden’s official 2020 presidential campaign.

It also shows two other $10 contributions, one earmarked to the “Progressive Turnout Project,” an organization whose stated mission is to “rally Democrats to vote,” and another to “Stop Republicans,” a subsidiary of the Progressive Turnout Project that describes itself as a “grassroots-funded effort dedicated to resisting the Republican Party and Donald Trump’s radical right-wing legacy.”

Let's face it, the judge made minimal contributions to Biden's campaign, yet, he definitely contributed to his campaign efforts.  It's a serious issue indeed. Now we can't tell anymore if he's doing his job to figure out if Trump is guilty or not guilty of 34 charges on behalf of the court or the Biden administration.

Quote:Swiss authorities have stopped recommending COVID-19 vaccination, including for people who are designated at high risk from COVID-19.

Switzerland’s Federal Office of Public Health now says that “no COVID-19 vaccination is recommended for spring/summer 2023.”

People designated high risk are also not recommended to get a COVID-19 vaccine, authorities said.

They attributed the change to the number of citizens who have received a vaccine, recovered from COVID-19, or both received a vaccine and enjoy natural immunity from post-recovery protection.

“Nearly everyone in Switzerland has been vaccinated and/or contracted and recovered from COVID-19. Their immune system has therefore been exposed to the coronavirus. In spring/summer 2023, the virus will likely circulate less. The current virus variants also cause rather mild illness,” Swiss health officials said.

Seroprevalence data from mid-2022 showed that more than 98 percent of the Swiss population had antibodies against the COVID-19 virus, indicating that people had immunity from prior infection, vaccination, or both.

The Omicron variant of the COVID-19 virus, which started circulating around the world in late 2021, causes less severe cases than its predecessor, Delta. Additionally, the available COVID-19 vaccines have performed increasingly worse against Omicron and its subvariants, providing little or even negative protection against infection and quickly waning shielding against severe disease.

Swiss authorities nodded to the short-lived protection as they noted that people designated at high risk from COVID-19 can still receive a vaccine, despite the lack of recommendation, after consultation with their doctor.

Quote:China reportedly sent 42 warplanes and eight naval vessels toward Taiwan on Saturday in a retaliatory move against the Taiwanese leader’s meeting with the U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) in California.

Taiwan’s military detected the Chinese aircraft and ships at around 11 a.m. (local time), with 29 aircraft spotted crossing the “northern, central, southern median line of the Taiwan Strait,” the Defense Ministry said.

The ministry said the 29 aircraft “attempted coercion on us” by flying into Taiwan’s Air Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ), an area where foreign aircraft are identified before entering a country’s territorial airspace.

“We condemn such an irrational act that has jeopardized regional security and stability,” the ministry said in a statement posted on Twitter.

Earlier in the day, Taiwan detected 13 Chinese warplanes and three vessels near the island at 6 a.m. (local time), with four aircraft spotted crossing the median line of the Taiwan Strait and Taiwan’s southwest ADIZ.

Taiwan responded by deploying aircraft, navy vessels, and land-based missile systems to monitor the Chinese military’s activities.

Quote:The U.S. Navy has deployed a guided-missile submarine capable of carrying up to 154 Tomahawk missiles to the Middle East, a spokesman said Saturday, in what appeared to be a show of force toward Iran following recent tensions.

The Navy rarely acknowledges the location or deployment of submarines. Cmdr. Timothy Hawkins, a spokesman for the 5th Fleet based in the Gulf nation of Bahrain, declined to comment on the submarine’s mission or what had prompted the deployment.

He said the nuclear-powered submarine, based out of Kings Bay, Georgia, passed through the Suez Canal on Friday. “It is capable of carrying up to 154 Tomahawk land-attack cruise missiles and is deployed to U.S. 5th Fleet to help ensure regional maritime security and stability,” Hawkins said.

The 5th Fleet patrols the crucial Strait of Hormuz, the narrow mouth of the Persian Gulf through which 20 percent of all oil transits. Its region includes the Bab el-Mandeb Strait off Yemen and the Red Sea stretching up to the Suez Canal, the Egyptian waterway linking the Mideast to the Mediterranean Sea.

The United States, the UK, and Israel have accused Iran of targeting oil tankers and commercial ships in recent years, allegations denied by Tehran. The U.S. Navy has also reported a series of tense encounters at sea with Iranian forces that it said were being recklessly aggressive.

This week, China dismissed the idea it is the source of Fentanyl Epidemic, this distributed by Mexican cartels where roughly 14,000 pounds (or 6350 Kilos) were seized at border entry points in 2022 alone. Instead, China stated that a counter-narcotics operation exists between they and Mexico, and have no knowledge of any fentanyl seizures by Mexico.

Still, Obrador’s letter (InfoBae link... Spanish dialogue with pic of the letter) came after U.S. lawmakers accused him of not doing enough to stop fentanyl coming across the southern border.

Quote:Acudimos a usted, presidente Xi Jiping, no para pedirle apoyo ante estos groseros amago sino para solicitarle que por razones humanitarias nos ayude a controlar los envios de fentanilo que puedan remitirse de China a nuestro pais.

Con ello nosotros tendríamos un mayor control sobre el ingreso de esta droga que en México sólo está autorizada para fines médicos y curas impotaciones legales son muy pocas.

"We go to you, President Xi Jiping, not to ask for support before these rude threat but to ask you to help us control the fentanyl shipments that can be sent from China to our country.

With this we would have greater control over the entry of this drug that in Mexico is only authorized for medical purposes and legal impositions are very few."

In essence, he is requesting a slowdown from China and admits that there are very legal restrictions in place for Fentanyl in Mexico.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y Wrote:China mainly sends it to Mexico, and it comes across the border. And that’s why we need the DEA involved heavily.

Chinese Spokesperson Wrote:The abuse of fentanyl in the U.S. has become even worse, leading to more deaths. The root cause of the overdose lies in the U.S. itself. The problem is completely ‘made in USA.’ The U.S. needs to face up to its own problems, take more substantial measures to strengthen domestic regulation and reduce demand. It cannot relapse into the illness of ’letting others take the pill when it is sick.’

This accusation came a day after U.S. House lawmakers met with Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen in California over CCP's objections.

Of course, CCP also denies allegations of the Covid-19 virus being made in Wuhan, and had previously stated it was made in the U.S., Italy, and Spain.

Quote:Amid reports that some countries are “de-dollarizing,” French President Emanuel Macron suggested in a new interview that Europe should reduce its dependency on the United States.

There is a “great risk” that Europe “gets caught up in crises that are not ours, which prevents it from building its strategic autonomy,” he told Politico this weekend as he flew on an airplane from Beijing to Guangzhou in China after meeting with Chinese leader Xi Jinping. Xi and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) have backed Macron’s “strategic autonomy” concept...

“The paradox would be that, overcome with panic, we believe we are just America’s followers,” Macron said in the interview. “The question Europeans need to answer … is it in our interest to accelerate [a crisis] on Taiwan? No. The worse thing would be to think that we Europeans must become followers on this topic and take our cue from the U.S. agenda and a Chinese overreaction,” he said.
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Europe must better fund its defense industry, develop nuclear and renewable energy and reduce dependence on the U.S. dollar to limit its reliance on the United States, Macron also said. Macron traveled to China with a 50-strong business delegation including Airbus and nuclear energy producer EDF, which signed deals during the visit.
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“Stability in the Taiwan Strait is of paramount importance,” [European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen] said she told Xi during the meeting in Beijing last week. “The threat [of] the use of force to change the status quo is unacceptable.”
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“Europeans cannot resolve the crisis in Ukraine; how can we credibly say on Taiwan, ‘watch out, if you do something wrong we will be there’? If you really want to increase tensions that’s the way to do it,” [Macron] told the outlet.

While in Taiwan, meanwhile, McCarthy called for “one voice” against CCP aggression and said he wants faster weapons delivery to the island nation. “Don’t send a balloon over our air space. Don’t use authoritarian bully tactics,” he warned the regime. “It won’t go far.”
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“If the tensions between the two superpowers heat up … we won’t have the time nor the resources to finance our strategic autonomy and we will become vassals,” he said.

...Saudi Arabia is also reportedly in active talks with Beijing to price some of its Chinese oil sales in yuan rather than the dollar.

In a statement from Brazil’s government last month, Brazil and China agreed to trade in their own currencies and won’t use the dollar as an intermediary. Instead, they’ll exchange the Chinese yuan with Brazilian reais rather than convert it to the dollar.

That deal came right after the Chinese regime settled its first purchase of liquefied natural gas via the yuan, according to Reuters. That transaction contained approximately 65,000 tons of LNG and was sourced from the United Arab Emirates after the China National Offshore Oil Corp.

Quote:At least 11 cars in a Norfolk Southern train derailed in Alabama, leading to at least two hospitalizations, officials said.

“According to Norfolk Southern, the train crew was briefly trapped in the engine room because the engine tilted over. There were no major injuries, but RPS was called to the scene to evaluate the crew and transported two crew members as a precaution,” police in Jasper, Alabama, wrote in a statement on Saturday.

The statement added that “Jasper Fire called all personnel in to assist the crew in getting out of the train and managing the scene, along with Jasper Police. Norfolk Southern and Walker County EMA are remaining on the scene to return the track to service.”

Norfolk Southern officials told the police department that no hazardous materials were involved in the derailment.

Officials told ABC3340 that several cars went off the tracks and that heavy equipment is on the scene aiding in the cleanup efforts.

Quote:

A Saudi delegation was reportedly in Yemeni capital Sanaa on Sunday to negotiate a potential truce.

An intervention led by Saudi Arabia has been supporting Yemen's internationally recognized government against the Iran-backed Houthi rebel group, which controls the Yemeni capital.

Yemen's government has been at war with the Houthis for eight years.

The AFP news agency cited a Yemeni diplomat as saying that Saudi officials are "in Sanaa to discuss moving forward to create peace in Yemen."
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Omani mediators also arrived in Sanaa on Saturday.

AFP cited an anonymous Yemeni government source as saying that Riyadh and the Houthis had agreed in principle to declare a six-month truce, which would pave the way for three months of negotiations and a two-year "transition" towards peace.

The Houthi group's news agency, Yemen News Agency (SABA), also confirmed the arrival of the Saudi delegation.

Quote:The fire department in the German port city of Hamburg issued a warning on Sunday morning as a large fire billowed out smoke and hazardous gases.

Police said around Sunday afternoon that "currently no elevated readings are detected," according to the DPA news agency, but the official warning remains in place.

The fire and smoke are classified as an "extreme danger" in an official warning.

Two warehouses at a truck stop in the Rothenburgsort district of the city had been in flames since the early hours of the morning, according to German media.

The fire broke out around 4:30 a.m. (0230 GMT), the DPA  reported.

Local public broadcaster NDR reported that hydrogen sulfide was leaking from the site, according to initial investigations. Firefighters were also reportedly only able to be on the scene with respirators.

Firefighters were still tackling the blaze several hours after it was first reported.

Quote:NCAA champion swimmer Riley Gaines blasted a San Francisco State University faculty member following an email sent to students that depicted a "peaceful" protest after her speech Thursday turned violent.

Gaines said she was verbally and physically assaulted by the pro-transgender protesters, which led to her being barricaded in a classroom for three hours. Gaines also noted that she was punched, shoved and hit by the protesters before being barricaded.

City police would eventually be called to get her off campus.
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But SF State’s vice president for student affairs and enrollment management, Jamillah Moore, sent an email that made no mention of an apology to Gaines, or the acts following her speech about saving women’s sports to the university’s chapter of Turning Point USA.
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"Thank you to our students who participated peacefully in Thursday evening’s event. It took tremendous bravery to stand in a challenging space. I am proud of the moments where we listened and asked insightful questions. I am also proud of the moments when our students demonstrated the value of free speech and the right to protest peacefully. These issues do not go away, and these values are very much at our core."
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"I’m sorry did this just say PEACEFUL…. I was assaulted. I was extorted and held for random (sic). The protestors demanded I pay them if I wanted to make it home safely. I missed my flight home because I was barricaded in a classroom…

"We must have different definitions of peaceful."

Gaines also revealed that Moore blocked her on Twitter, adding, "I guess it’s easier for her to ignore me than to denounce violence against women. She won’t be able to ignore my lawsuit."
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"We had great dialogue and listened to each other. But that ambush was the opposite of peaceful."
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"This does not deter me. This assures me that I am doing the right thing," she said Friday on "Tucker Carlson Tonight." "This will not silence me. When they want me to be silenced, it just means I need to speak louder."

Quote:A lone gunman stormed a bank in downtown Louisville, Kentucky, on Monday morning, killing four people and injuring eight others before dying in a confrontation with police.

Officials later identified the suspect as Connor Sturgeon, 23.

Sturgeon worked as a summer intern for the bank for three consecutive years, eventually joining as a commercial development professional in 2021 and a full-time associate and portfolio banker last year, according to his LinkedIn account.

The Louisville Metro Police Department said Sturgeon entered the bank at 8:30 a.m., before it had opened to the public, and started firing.

Witnesses said they spotted Sturgeon with a “long assault rifle” firing several shots on the first floor of the bank building.

Sturgeon, who was live streaming his attack on Instagram, was shot and killed by police after he aimed his rifle at them, police chief Jacquelyn Gwinn-Villaroel said at a Monday afternoon press conference.

Sturgeon had been told he was going to be fired from the bank, according to CNN, who also reported he had left a note for his parents and a friend saying he was going to shoot up the bank.

Rickey Readus, a Louisville resident, told The Post how employees ran out to find shelter at nearby businesses.

Others who were inside the bank said they took shelter in conference rooms and bathrooms as soon as they heard the gunfire.
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University of Louisville Hospital confirmed it received nine patients following the shooting, including two police officers and seven civilians.

Quote:With his just-declared bid for the US presidency, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. sees himself at the forefront of “a new revolution to resurrect American democracy” — but the anti-vaccination crusader will likely have his work cut out for him in convincing Democrats and even members of his own family to vote for him in 2024.

“Most of the Kennedys are disgusted with his attitude,” said Kennedy family biographer Laurence Leamer, referring to Robert’s recent anti-vaccination activism. “They still care about him, but he’s an embarrassment.”

Robert, 69, filed paperwork to run for president with the Federal Election Commission last week.

He plans to formally announce his bid to take on President Biden in a Democratic primary at a hotel in Boston on April 19, according to his Team Kennedy campaign. (Biden told the “Today” show Monday that “I plan on running” in 2024.)

The environmental lawyer and author has earned the disapproval of many of his Kennedy relatives for his controversial views on vaccines and his attacks on former White House medical chief Anthony Fauci, as well as his embrace of his father’s convicted assassin, Sirhan Sirhan.

Robert has said Sirhan did not actually participate in the murder of Sen. Robert F. Kennedy during a Los Angeles presidential campaign stop in 1968.

Robert’s uncle President John F. Kennedy was also assassinated in Dallas in 1963.

Quote:Former President Donald Trump is due back in the Big Apple this week to be grilled for the second time by New York Attorney General Letitia James, who is probing the Trump Organization’s business practices, law-enforcement sources told The Post on Monday.

Trump is expected to plead the Fifth — or refuse to answer questions to avoid potentially incriminating himself — as he did when he was quizzed by the AG’s office in the case last year, sources from multiple agencies said.

He is due to fly up from his home in Florida on Wednesday night for questioning by James’ prosecutors at her Manhattan offices Thursday morning, sources said.
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James is alleging “staggering fraud” within the Trump Organization.

Last year, she filed a $250 million civil case against Trump, his family real-estate company and several others – including three of his children — claiming they inflated company assets to get better deals on loans and insurance.

James’ office launched its probe in 2019 after Congressional testimony from former Trump lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen, who implicated Trump and his business practices.

James then filed a lawsuit in 2020 seeking access to records and depositions claiming that the Trump Organization and Trump family members were stonewalling her investigation.

Quote:"I understand that I am entitled to personally appear before the Court at every stage of the criminal proceedings.

"After reading and understanding the above, I request that the Court permit me to waive a personal appearance in court for the following proceedings: PRELIMINARY HEARING," it concluded.

The judge in the case approved the waiver, meaning Baldwin will not have to physically appear at the Santa Fe County courthouse on May 3. The preliminary hearing in the case is expected to last two weeks.

Baldwin pleaded not guilty to involuntary manslaughter in the death of Hutchins, who died on Oct. 21, 2021, after a gun that Baldwin was holding fired on the set of "Rust." The 65-year-old is also a producer on the film and has denied he pulled the trigger of the gun that killed Hutchins.

The actor also waived his first court appearance in February, which legal experts explained at the time was a "routine court proceeding."

Armorer Hannah Gutierrez-Reed is also charged with involuntary manslaughter. Gutierrez-Reed’s preliminary hearing is on May 3 as well.

"Rust" assistant director Dave Halls was also charged with a misdemeanor of negligent use of a deadly weapon and was sentenced in March to six months of unsupervised probation.

Quote:He addressed his indictment, Biden's overtures toward running for re-election, and much more.

While Biden has informally indicated he wants to seek a second term, he has yet to make an official announcement. However, in an interview Monday with NBC meteorologist Al Roker, Biden declared, "I plan on running," before following up with, "but we're not prepared to announce it yet."
...
Trump replied he found Biden unable to provide cogent answers in his softball interview with Roker, saying it is unclear if the president could handle another campaign.

"Look, I watch him just like you do. And I think it’s almost inappropriate for me to say it – I don’t see how it’s possible," Trump said.

"But there’s something wrong. I saw his answer on television about whether or not he was going to run, to a very nice guy named Al Roker."

Trump said Biden could not have gotten easier questions than those posed by the longtime "Today" weatherman:

"[Biden gave] a long answer about the eggs and this and that -- look, I don’t think he can," he said.

Quote:Taiwanese citizens are rushing to buy a patch worn by members of its air force that mocks Chinese President Xi Jinping amid escalating tensions between the island and mainland China.

The patch shows a Formosan black bear, which is native to Taiwan, holding Taiwan's flag while punching Winnie the Pooh, which Chinese dissidents have increasingly used to mock Xi due to his supposed resemblance to the fictional teddy bear.

The patch has the word, "SCRAMBLE!," at the bottom, which appears to be a nod to the Taiwanese Air Force's efforts to combat near-daily incursions by China's military in recent months.
...
Chinese censors have increasingly cracked down on images that compare Xi to Winnie the Pooh in recent years. Last month, a horror film that features Winnie the Pooh was scrapped in Hong Kong and Macao.
...
In 2018, Disney's animated film "Christopher Robin," which includes Winnie the Pooh as a prominent character, was denied release in Chinese theaters. That same year, China cut off access to HBO after host John Oliver criticized Xi for being sensitive to the comparisons.

Quote:In his lawsuit, the Democratic D.A. said he's taking legal action "in response to an unprecedently brazen and unconstitutional attack by members of Congress on an ongoing New York State criminal prosecution and investigation of former President Donald J. Trump."
...
"Chairman Jordan's subpoena is an unconstitutional attempt to undermine an ongoing New York felony criminal prosecution and investigation," Bragg said. "As our complaint details, this is an unprecedented, illegitimate interference by Congress that lacks any legal merit and defies basic principles of federalism."

"The Manhattan D.A.'s Office focuses on the law and the evidence, not political gamesmanship or threats. We look forward to presenting our case in court to enjoin enforcement of the subpoena."

The case is assigned to U.S. District Mary Kay Vyskocil, a Trump appointee who previously served as a federal bankruptcy court judge.

In recent weeks, the Judiciary Committee issued a subpoena seeking testimony from a former prosecutor, Mark Pomerantz, who previously oversaw the Trump investigation. The committee has also sought documents and testimony about the case from Bragg and his office. Bragg has rejected those requests.
...
"Then, they sue to block congressional oversight when we ask questions about the federal funds they say they used to it," Jordan wrote.

Quote:The Biden administration proposed actions Tuesday that would significantly reduce water supplies in seven western states amid severe drought conditions that stretch back decades.

The Department of the Interior (DOI) released a draft proposal that highlighted two potential actions it could take to combat the Colorado River Basin's deteriorating water levels. The two proposals would each consist of federally-mandated supply reductions for states that are dependent on the river system which provides water for more than 40 million Americans and is vital for western states' economies.

"Failure is not an option," Tommy Beaudreau, the DOI's deputy secretary, said in a statement. "Recognizing the severity of the worsening drought, the Biden-Harris administration is bringing every tool and every resource to bear through the President’s Investing in America agenda to protect the stability and sustainability of the Colorado River System now and into the future."

In addition to the water it supplies to millions of Americans, the 1,450-mile Colorado River supports 5.5 million acres of agricultural lands, provides electricity to millions of residents through hydroelectric dams and has key recreational and ecological uses.

Overall, the river provides water resources to seven states which are divided into two groups: the Upper Basin and Lower Basin. The Upper Basin consists of Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming while the Lower Basin includes Arizona, California, and Nevada.

Quote:Iran allegedly smuggled weapons to Syria through deliveries of relief supplies shipped following a devastating earthquake in February, according to a new report.

"Under the guise of shipments of earthquake aid to Syria, Israel has seen significant movements of military equipment from Iran, mainly transported in parts," an unnamed Israeli defense official told Reuters.

The Feb. 6 earthquake in Turkey and Syria, which measured at magnitude 7.8, required substantial relief from neighboring countries, with hundreds of flights from Iran alone. The planes delivered supplies over the following seven weeks to the Syrian cities of Aleppo, Damascus and Latakia.

Among the supplies, Iran allegedly included advanced communications equipment, radar batteries and spare parts required for a planned upgrade of Syria’s air defense system.

Iran’s mission to the United Nations in New York told Reuters the allegations are "not true."

The story came from a Syrian military defector and a serving Syrian officer, as well as Western intelligence officials and sources close to the Iranian and Israeli leadership.

Iran intended to strengthen defenses against Israel in Syria and improve Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s forces in the ongoing civil war, the sources claimed.

Quote:Former President Donald Trump is suing his ex-lawyer Michael Cohen for more than $500 million, alleging a breach of his attorney-client relationship, unjust enrichment, and more, Fox News Digital has learned.

Trump’s legal team filed the more-than 30-page federal lawsuit in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida on Wednesday.

"This is an action arising from [Cohen’s] multiple breaches of fiduciary duty, unjust enrichment, conversion and breaches of contract by virtue of [Cohen’s] past service as [Trump’s] employee and attorney," the lawsuit states.

The lawsuit alleges Cohen breached his attorney-client relationship by "spreading falsehoods" about Trump that were "likely to be embarrassing or detrimental, and partook in other misconduct," while also breaching contractual terms of a confidentiality agreement he signed as a condition of employment with Trump.

The lawsuit alleges Cohen spread falsehoods about Trump "with malicious intent and to wholly self-serving ends."

The lawsuit details Cohen’s "myriad of public statements, including the publication of two books, a podcast series, and innumerable mainstream media appearances," while ignoring "cease and desist" orders.

It claims Cohen has, in recent months, "increased the frequency and hostility of the illicit acts" and "appears to have become emboldened and repeatedly continues to make wrongful and false statements" about Trump through various platforms.

Quote:Democratic New York City Mayor Eric Adams on Wednesday named Kathleen Corradi, a former elementary school teacher and lifelong anti-rat activist, as the city's first director of rodent mitigation.

Every New York City mayor has waged war — and mostly lost — against one of humanity’s most cunning and enduring foes: rattus norvegicus [brown rat].
...
Mayor Eric Adams introduced a former elementary school teacher and anti-rat activist as his new "rat czar" on Wednesday. Officially, Kathleen Corradi, the mayor's new hire, will be known as the director of rodent mitigation.

Corradi is tasked with battling the potentially millions of rats lurking in myriad urban nooks and crannies, subway tunnels and empty lots.

Hers is a new job, which the city advertised with a help-wanted ad seeking applicants who are "bloodthirsty," possess "killer instincts" and could commit to the "wholesale slaughter" of rats.

"When I first saw this job posting, I wasn’t sure if it was real. ‘Blood thirsty’ is not a word you usually see in a job description and it’s certainly not a word I usually (use to) describe myself," Corradi said in a news conference at a Harlem park.

Certainly,  Cheesie James would disapprove of this initiative in no time.

Quote:Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov made the remarks to Russian news agencies, according to Reuters, as White House National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby told Fox News that the source of the leaks remains unknown.

"It's probably interesting for someone to look at these documents, if they are documents at all, or maybe they are fake, maybe this is a deliberate information dump," Ryabkov reportedly said.

"Since the United States is a party to the [Ukraine] conflict and is in essence waging a hybrid war against us, it's possible such things are being done to mislead the enemy – that is the Russian Federation," he added.

The Kremlin also said Wednesday that it didn’t know "like everyone else" the authenticity of the documents, Reuters reported.

Some of the leaked U.S. Pentagon documents paint a grim picture of Ukraine's air defense outlook, predicting that its S-300 air defense systems could run out of ammunition as early as May 2, and the country's other air defenses could be depleted by May 23.

The documents, dated to late February, state that systems like the S-300 make up some 89% of Ukraine's air defense capability.

Russia currently maintains a fleet of some 485 fighter jets, compared to Ukraine's 85. Should air defense systems go offline, the lopsided numbers game in the air would be Ukraine’s only means of trying to secure the sky over its troops.

Quote:The paper — which was the first to report the existence of the leaks — identified him as a member of the intelligence wing of the Massachusetts Air National Guard, who oversaw a private online group named “Thug Shaker Central.”

Two U.S. officials told the Times that they want to talk to him about the leak, although neither the paper nor officials called him a “suspect.”

One official told the paper that Teixeira might have information relevant to the investigation.

The leaks of hundreds of classified military documents appeared in the small group chat, according to members of the group that the outlet spoke to who referred to Teixeira as the “OG.” Earlier on Thursday, the Washington Post reported that the leaker was identified as “OG” by other members of the group.

The paper reported that while the group members did not identify the group’s leader by name, “a trail of digital evidence compiled by The Times leads to Airman Teixeira.”

The paper also reported it used details found on social media to link Teixeira to details seen in the leaked documents.

It reported that Teixeira is enlisted in the 102nd Intelligence Wing of the Massachusetts Air National Guard and was congratulated on the unit’s official Facebook page for being promoted to Airman First Class in July 2022.

The paper identified Teixeira’s mother, “Dawn,” and visited her home in Massachusetts. She told the Times her son was a member of the Air National Guard, had recently been working overnight shifts at a base on Cape Cod, and had recently changed his number.

 I don't buy this story. For some reason it was QUITE EASY to find the leaker, and he resulted to be a total moron that didn't cover his back at all. After Snowden had accused the US government of spying even on its own allies, nobody could take the inherent risks of leaking classified information so lightly.

Something doesn't add up here.

Quote:China’s Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Wang Wenbin tipped his hand by complaining that the United States is outraged by China’s rampant technology theft and government-sponsored hacking and has convinced its allies that Chinese networking products cannot be trusted. He pointed to the purported Pentagon leak as further proof that “the U.S. is the origin of cyber warfare, the biggest spreader of advanced cyber weapons and the biggest global cyber thief.”

Teed up by a very helpfully phrased question from Chinese media at his press conference, Wang launched into a long diatribe about the Stuxnet virus, the WannaCry ransomware attack (which was based on code stolen from the U.S. National Security Agency), and Edward Snowden’s exposure of classified documents, along with some more fanciful rants about the U.S. supposedly manipulating cybersecurity standards to further its own nefarious hacking ends.

Wang said the alleged Pentagon leak, which included transcripts of conversations between foreign officials that were ostensibly monitored by U.S. intelligence, proved the U.S. only promotes “democratic values” as “a pretext and a tool” for “selfish gains.”

“It is in the international community’s common interest to end the U.S.’s lawlessness on cyber theft and reveal its hypocrisy on cyber security,” he pontificated.

China’s state-run Global Times supported Wang’s tirade on Wednesday by quoting “Chinese experts” who called the largely-unverified Pentagon leak “another PRISM incident,” a reference to the cyber-surveillance program Snowden betrayed.

Definitely,  China has no morals as to claim they're better than the US when Chinese operatives have been stealing technology from the US, Canada and Europe like crazy. They always deny that their laws force companies to submit all kinds of information to the Communist Party as per their request. Oh and they are trying to fool people into thinking they are not using TikTok to spy on Americans, Canadians, Australians and Europeans and still their personal data from their  phones.

Quote:President Joe Biden’s border chief is expanding his migrant transfer camps in Panama, even as he says he will clamp down on the global migrants who are using those camps to help reach the United States.

“I don’t see any indication whatsoever this [migrant traffic in Panama] is stopping,” journalist Michael Yon told Breitbart News shortly after he visited the migrant camps in Panama that are being expanded by homeland secretary Alejandro Mayorkas:

They’re clearly expanding — today, just hours ago, I was in a camp just 300 meters from where I’m sitting, and they’ve got new buildings there and nobody’s slept on the bunks yet. These buildings house about 60 bunk beds each — that’s about 120 [sleepers] per building …

Some of these bunk beds are brand new. They still have the plastic on them. I was in the building today looking at them. And they’re still increasing [capacity]. They’re clearing land right over here, right behind the hotel I’m staying at … to put more buildings. We were in both camps today. They’re both at least twice as big as they were last year.

Invasion camps in Darien, Panama—These new trailers hold about 120 per trailer. The camps are being expanded by US Democrats and others.

In 2022, Mayorkas provided taxpayer-funded aid, security, and buses to bring 250,000 migrants north after they crossed the Panama jungle on the border with South America. The migrants cross the deadly Darien Gap jungle trails after traveling from Colombia on boats protected by U.S.-funded Panamanian security forces.

“Right now, they are [moving north] about 1,200 [migrants per day] … or about 30 buses,” Yon added.

Data from the Panama government says almost 90,000 migrants crossed through the Darien Gap in the first 90 days of the year.

The daily traffic could deliver 430,000 migrants in 2023 into the homes and jobs that would otherwise go to ordinary Americans and their children.

Quote:Japan issued an emergency alert on Thursday to residents of its northernmost island, Hokkaido, urging them to “evacuate immediately” or take shelter from a potential bombing in their respective locations in response to a missile launch from North Korea.

The governments of Japan and South Korea later confirmed a missile launch out of communist North Korea and said evidence suggested that the missile in question was a new ballistic model.

According to South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS), the leaders of the nation’s military, the projectile in question was “an intermediate- or longer-range ballistic missile.” It flew out of the greater Pyongyang area in the early morning hours local time and flew about 620 miles out of North Korea into the East Sea/Sea of Japan. The South Korean news service Yonhap, citing an anonymous South Korean official, said the government believes the missile may be a new model.

Japanese authorities detected the missile immediately after its launch, the Defense Ministry clarified on Thursday, but the missile abruptly disappeared from the country’s radar, prompting the emergency alert in the event that it landed on Hokkaido. Locals were told to evacuate or take shelter for about 20 minutes before the government rescinded the alert.

Japanese Defense Minister Hamada Yasukazu later confirmed that the missile did not land in Japanese waters, Japan’s Kyodo News reported.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Matsuno Hirokazu denounced the missile launch as an “outrage” on Thursday and confirmed that Tokyo had lodged a formal complaint against North Korea with its envoy.

Quote:Brazil’s radical leftist President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva arrived in Shanghai on Wednesday for a two-day visit to China that will conclude with a meeting with dictator Xi Jinping in Beijing on Friday.

The Brazilian government seeks to “relaunch its relations to China,” which has been the South American country’s main trading partner since 2009. Lula’s trip to China was originally scheduled for late March, but was postponed after the Brazilian president was diagnosed with pneumonia.

According to reports from Chinese state media, Brazil may be preparing to join China’s predatory Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) debt trap program.

The Brazilian presidential office informed on Monday that Lula’s agenda in China will kick off in Shanghai on Thursday morning (local time) with his participation in the inauguration ceremony of former Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff as the head of the BRICS trade bloc’s development bank, a competitor to the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF). BRICS is a coalition consisting of Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa.
...
“In Shanghai, the first city of our visit to China, where I will participate in the inauguration of Dilma Rousseff as president of the BRICS Bank,” Lula posted on Twitter upon arriving in the city on Wednesday.

China’s state-run newspaper Global Times reported on Wednesday that Lula will also visit the newly opened research and development center of Brazilian paper and pulp company Suzano located in Shanghai.
...
The use of the Chinese yuan to conduct trade between China and Brazil without the need to convert their respective local currencies to the U.S. dollar, initially agreed upon in March, will be another topic on Lula’s agenda. The Brazilian leftist president has been transparent in his goal to diminish the country’s dependence on the American currency. Chinese state media reported on Tuesday evening that the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China conducted its first cross-border yuan settlement transaction in Brazil via its local branch company.

According to an anonymous source cited by Bloomberg, Lula is slated to visit Huawei’s innovation center during his stay in Shanghai. The Chinese company has been accused by the United States of allowing the Chinese Communist Party to engage in espionage via backdoor access allegedly built into their network devices.

Quote:India Today reported on Tuesday a troubling surge of Chinese troops to the Doklam region, where a deadly hand-to-hand battle was fought between Indian and Chinese troops in 2017.

The Indian military is concerned that the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) has effectively built a small city for its armed forces in the Amo Chu river valley, setting up another attempt to seize the Doklam plateau.

Meanwhile, China is growing increasingly belligerent against Indian efforts to develop its Arunachal Pradesh border province, which China claims under the name “Zangnan” as a southern district of occupied Tibet.

The PLA has not given up on Doklam, despite reaching deconfliction agreements with India after several border brawls. Both sides have traditionally kept their border guards unarmed to avoid military escalation, so skirmishes are fought with bare hands and improvised weapons, with a considerable number of serious and fatal injuries.

India Today published photos that depicted a large, permanent PLA military camp in the Amo Chu valley, featuring dozens of sizable barracks buildings. Also troubling to India are recent statements by its regional security partner, Bhutan, that suggested the Chinese have reasonable claims to parts of the Doklam plateau, and the Bhutanese might be losing their enthusiasm for holding the PLA at bay.

Some Indian observers are reportedly worried that Bhutan might be “willing to hand over to China territories it has lost on its western frontier in an effort to retain areas in the north.”

China is also pressing India hard in Arunachal Pradesh, which was the scene of a border brawl in December. India reportedly outmaneuvered and defeated the PLA invasion force in Arunachal Pradesh with assistance from U.S. satellite intelligence.

Indian Home Minister Amit Shah visited Arunachal Pradesh on Monday to launch a $585 million “Vibrant Villages” development plan, which will focus on adding new homes and infrastructure to border towns. The plan is intended to make these towns more livable by providing better services, creating jobs, and connecting them to the Internet.
...
“The Indian official’s visit to Zangnan violates China’s territorial sovereignty, and is not conducive to the peace and tranquility of the border situation,” said Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Wenbin.

Quote:China’s oil and gas giant Sinopec announced on Wednesday that it had signed a deal with QatarEnergy, which manages the nation’s prodigious supplies of liquefied natural gas (LNG), to become a shareholder in the latter’s North Field East (NFE) expansion project, granting China unprecedented control over an LNG source.

“The total investment of the NFE project is $28.75 billion, which will raise Qatar’s LNG export capacity from the current 77 MTPA to 110 MTPA [million tonnes per annum],” Sinopec detailed in its announcement. “The signing of the agreement makes Sinopec the first Asian shareholder in the NFE project. The cooperation will help Sinopec optimize the energy consumption mix in China and secure long-term and reliable clean energy supply to the nation.”
...
The agreement gives Sinopec, a Chinese government-owned company, a 1.25-percent stake in the project. Other stakeholders including ExxonMobil, Shell, and ConocoPhillips, according to S&P Global. QatarEnergy is owned by the government of that country; Saad al Kaabi, the CEO of QatarEnergy, is also the country’s minister of state for energy affairs.

Sinopec and QatarEnergy have invested years in strengthening ties. In November, the two companies announced an agreement in which the Qatari company agreed to provide Sinopec with 4 million tons of LNG annually for 27 years. The LNG was slated to come from the NFE project that Sinopec announced it now partially owns as of this week.

At the time, the Sinopec deal was viewed as a significant setback for Europe, and specifically Germany, which is heavily dependent on Russian gas and attempted to strike a deal with Qatar, but failed. According to Asian News International (ANI), QatarEnergy was frustrated with Germany for seeking shorter-term arrangements as part of its “green” energy agenda to eliminate LNG entirely.

Al-Kaabi, the Qatari energy minister, also lamented in December that negotiations with Germany were difficult because German leaders openly condemned Qatar’s abhorrent human rights abuses.
...
On Wednesday, al-Kaabi hinted that the major advance of Chinese industry into the Qatari sphere had not reached its conclusion and the two companies would cooperate “even further” in the future. He suggested QatarEnergy would prioritize Sinopec over other potential partners.

The deal represents a significant advance for Beijing’s ambitions in the Middle East and its plans to establish control over critical energy resources. China is the world’s largest importer of LNG and the world’s largest importer of crude oil, as it does not have significant known amounts of reserves of either fuel. China already relies heavily on Saudi Arabia for its oil needs – and recently signed a deal for Saudi-owned Aramco to build new refineries on Chinese soil – but has dedicated the past year to expanding both influence and market presence in the rest of the region.

Quote:Republican lawmakers on Thursday slammed President Joe Biden for allowing Hunter Biden to travel with him to Ireland.

Hunter, who is infamous for peddling his last name for profit, was brought to Ireland for a days-long excursion across the country, while his father holds official business with world leaders.

This is not the first time Joe Biden has brought Hunter abroad. Hunter took 411 trips across 29 countries between 2009 and the middle of 2014, according to Secret Service travel records obtained by Judicial Watch.
...
“I’m sure he’ll make another corrupt deal using his daddy’s name and make sure he kicks back 10% for ‘the big guy,'” Rep. Eli Crane (R-AZ) told Breitbart News.

“The fact that Hunter is still walking the streets as a free man, instead of being locked behind bars, is the most illuminating example of the two-tiered justice system we have here in the U.S.,” he added.
...
On one of Hunter’s 411 trips abroad, he stopped with Joe Biden in Beijing, China. Ten days after the 2013 visit, Hunter secured a ten percent interest in BHR Partners, a Chinese state-backed investment fund. According to his lawyer in November 2021, Hunter divested his ten percent interest in the fund.
...
The business license for Hunter’s company, founded in Washington, DC, which holds the ten percent stake in BHR Partners, Skaneateles LLC, was revoked upon dissolution in September 2021, many months after Joe Biden assumed office.

Chinese records show Skaneateles still owns ten percent of BHR Partners.
...
Despite the national security concerns, Biden praised his son by telling Ireland that he is “proud” of Hunter. A video shows Hunter turning around to wave at the slowly applauding crowd.

Quote:A 14-year-old Brazilian student attacked two nine-year-old girls with an ax at the Alcântara Costa Municipal School in the rural area of the city of Farias Brito in the state of Ceará on Wednesday, gravely injuring one of the girls.

The incident marks the second ax attack in a Brazilian school in a single week after a 25-year-old man killed four children with an axe and injured five more at a Brazilian daycare center on April 5.

It is the fourth school attack in Brazil in less than a month. Also this week, a child reportedly either 12 or 13 years old attacked two students and a teacher at the Adventist Institute of Manaus on Monday. A 13-year-old student stabbed four teachers and a classmate in a school in São Paulo on March 27, killing a 71-year-old teacher.

Brazilian news website UOL reported that the assailant in Wednesday’s attack, who is a ninth grade student of the same school whose identity has not been publicly disclosed, entered the school’s fourth grade classroom and suddenly attacked the victims with the ax he had brought concealed to school. Witnesses stated that the 14-year-old assailant was immobilized and detained by one of the school’s teachers before Brazilian Military Police apprehended him.

One of the girls suffered a superficial injury on the head and was discharged on the same day. The other victim suffered a deep injury on the frontal region of her head that left her skull exposed. She was transferred to the pediatric Intensive Care Unit of the Santo Antônio hospital in Barbalha with stable vital signs and general condition, and underwent surgery Wednesday evening.

The assailant was transferred to the regional police station of Crato, where he will be processed for attempted homicide, according to the Secretary of Public Security of Ceará.

Quote:Germany’s planned shutdown of all of its remaining nuclear power plants risks causing power shortages, one industry group in the country has warned.

The German Chamber of Industry and Commerce (DIHK) has warned that the country’s green agenda-loving government’s plan to close the country’s three remaining nuclear power plants in a few days risks causing energy shortages.

Current plans have the three remaining plants closing forever on April 15, despite the fact that the country is in the midst of an ongoing energy crisis that threatened rolling blackouts last winter.

According to a report by the Rheinische Post, the DIHK warned that the nuclear shutdown would have significant adverse effects on German industry, and that the government was ultimately risking energy shortages with the stunt.

“Despite the drop in gas prices, energy costs remain high for most companies in Germany,” group president Peter Adrian warned. “At the same time, we are not out of the woods when it comes to security of supply.”

Adrian went on to argue that Germany must “expand the supply of energy and not restrict it any further” with the country being heavily reliant on all of its energy sources, including nuclear.
...
Such a warning from the DIHK have also been made by others in Germany, with even one party within the country’s ruling government coalition admitting that the power plant closures are a “strategic mistake“.

Nevertheless, green-obsessed officials have insisted the closures go ahead, with Climate Action minister Robert Habeck dismissing fears over the destruction of nuclear in the country.

Quote:The German reserve forces are only a fraction of the officially stated size, lack equipment and training, and is a force “that still largely exists on paper”, says the chief of the German reserves association.

Berlin is looking to make its armed forces more effective after years of under-investment, and Russian aggression reaching the borders of the European Union. The reserve forces are seen to be an important part of this plan, yet as the leader of the group which represents the interests of reserve soldiers, it is far from being able to meet these goals and appears to resemble more a paper tiger than a valued defence component.

Speaking to German newspaper the Stuttgarter Zeitung, retired Lieutenant Colonel, former conservative (CDU) member of Parliament, and now reserve forces association leader Patrick Sensburg said they are badly run and considerably underfunded.

Far from the official total number of reserves on the books of around 930,000 people — achieved because by law everyone in Germany with past military service is a reservist forever — actually only “around 34,000” of them are in any way active or recently trained. And even those, Sensburg says, are trained under “poor conditions”.

The reserves have to beg the regular forces for uniforms, even routine military training like target shooting practice is difficult to achieve, and have no military vehicles. At best, says the association boss, reservists can use civilian cars and most bizarrely of all, reserve tank commanders don’t get to train in real tanks. Instead, they perform their manoeuvres “on foot”.

Exercises don’t happen often Sensburg revealed, but when they do, morale and interest is so low officers are “happy if only a third of the soldiers notified turn up”.

The reserves would have a wide range of roles in a time of crisis, from guarding power stations and transporting the wounded to filling gaps on the front line, yet at present the force isn’t capable of doing those jobs, says Sensburg. Indeed, it is a “force that still largely exists on paper.”

...Sensburg told the paper that there should at least be a requirement for soldiers in the reserve to put in a fortnight’s training every two years.

In comparison, the British Army Reserve — which is also struggling to recruit — asks its members for 27 days of service a year. If reservists meet this requirement, they get a tax-free cash bonus, known in traditional military parlance as a ‘bounty’.

Quote:French protesters piled trash outside France’s Constitutional Court as anti-Macron riots in the country continue and the body prepared to rule on the legality of Macron’s retirement age reform.

Members of the French public are said to have barricaded the French Constitutional Court with trash on Thursday as others clashed with police on the country’s 12th day of Anti-Emmanuel Macron protests.

The court is expected to declare on Friday whether or not the French government’s pension reforms are legal, with many opposed to the Macron administration urging the court to shoot down the bill in its entirety.

According to a report by Euractiv, some of the 42,000 protesters marching in Paris used bins to blockade the entrances to the French court building, with footage of the riots depicting others as clashing with police.

France’s Interior Ministry has now banned protests outside the building until Saturday in an apparent attempt to keep the peace.

Protesters also reportedly targeted the country’s Central Bank offices, as well as the headquarters of LVMH, the company that owns the designer label Louis Vuitton.

Overall, some 380,000 people are thought to have taken part in Thursday’s demos across France protesting the Macron government.

However, while this remains a very large figure, it marks a considerable downward drift compared to the protests a number of weeks ago.

Quote:Finland's embassy in Moscow has received a letter containing an unknown powder and has reported the matter to the Russian authorities, Russian news agencies reported on Friday.

Relations between Moscow and Helsinki have deteriorated sharply since Finland formally joined NATO on April 4, becoming the 31st member of the US-led military alliance. Finland shares a long land border with Russia.

The embassy received three letters on Thursday, one of which contained a powder, the RIA news agency reported.

"In line with the security rules of the Finnish foreign ministry, the letters in question were handed to official representative organs of Russia which will study the matter," RIA quoted the embassy as saying.

Quote:Controversial pension reforms drawn up by the French government have finally been signed into law by President Emmanuel Macron, despite riots breaking out in Paris and beyond on Thursday and Friday.

Protesters had been hoping that the country’s Constitutional Court would shoot the legislation down or force it to go to referendum, with many arguing that the nature of the bill breached the French constitution.

However, according to a report by Le Figaro, the legal body ruled that the vast majority of points contained in the law were indeed constitutional.

Judges instead only struck out a few far less controversial elements of the bill, some of which were even added in a desperate attempt to place the country’s opposition.

The Parisian public responded to the news with spontaneous protests, some of which reportedly devolved into rioting, with over 100 people being arrested by police in relation to unrest in the city.

Seemingly unperturbed by the violence, Marcon quickly proceeded to make the bill official, signing the reforms into law early on Saturday morning.

Quote:Norway declared 15 Russian diplomats persona non grata on Thursday, foreign minister Anniken Huitfeldt (above, left) saying it had discovered the individuals were actually “intelligence officers” that were either handlers running other spies, or were “specialists” actively intercepting communications. Removing the group had considerably impacted Russia’s ability to spy on Norway, the government said.

Russia itself responded to the expulsion with characteristic bluster and bombast, declaring that in removing Russian citizens Norway had revealed itself to be a hostile state and that repercussions would follow.

The Russian foreign ministry immediately threatened an “appropriate response” after the news emerged on Thursday, before cranking up the rhetoric with a blast from the ministry’s spokesman Maria Zakharova (above, right) on Friday, who said the move was a “serious blow” to relations between the countries which share a long land border in northern Europe.

“Norway confirms its status as a country hostile to Russia”, she said, with the Kremlin official promising a “tough response”. Zakharova blamed a campaign of “fake news” and “disinformation” in the Norwegian media which she said had been coordinated by intelligence agencies to undermine Russian-Norwegian relations.

Quote:The president and CEO of the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation, along with its entire board of directors, resigned on Tuesday blaming “politicization” in the aftermath of bombshell reports the Foundation had taken donations from Chinese billionaire Zhang Bin intended to influence the government of Trudeau’s son, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

“In recent weeks, the political climate surrounding a donation received by the Foundation in 2016 has put a great deal of pressure on the Foundation’s management and volunteer Board of Directors, as well as on our staff and our community,” the Foundation said in a statement on Tuesday.

“The circumstances created by the politicization of the Foundation have made it impossible to continue with the status quo, and the volunteer Board of Directors has resigned, as has the President and CEO,” the statement continued. “We would like to thank Pascale Fournier for her work as President and CEO over the past five years, as well as all the members of the Board of Directors.”

The Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation is a Canadian taxpayer-funded organization that describes itself as “a gateway for bold, cutting-edge doctoral researchers to become Engaged Leaders who have meaningful impact in their communities and institutions.” It is named after the current prime minister’s father, a radical leftist and former prime minister himself.

Quote:The Japanese prime minister, Fumio Kishida, has escaped unhurt after he was apparently targeted by an explosive device on Saturday morning. It comes less than a year after the country’s former prime minister, Shinzo Abe, was shot dead while making a campaign speech.

Kishida was safely evacuated after the incident, while a suspect – named by Japanese media as Ryuji Kimura, 24, a resident of Hyogo prefecture – was arrested at the scene, reports said.

Kishida was visiting Saikazaki port in Wakayama prefecture, western Japan, to support his ruling Liberal Democratic party’s candidate in a local election when a device exploded.

TV footage showed what appeared to be a pipe- or smoke-bomb flying through the air in Kishida’s direction moments before he was due to start his speech. He was shielded by security personnel, while a video clip appeared to show a fisherman tussling with the suspect.

Kishida was seen standing with his back to the crowd in TV footage. When members of his security detail suddenly pointed to the ground near him, he turned around, looking alarmed. The camera quickly switched to the crowd as several people, including uniformed and plainclothes police officers, converged on the suspect, who was wearing a white surgical mask and holding what appeared to be a long silver tube.

As they collapsed on top of the man and tried to remove the tube from his hands, a large explosion was heard near where Kishida had been standing. The crowd scattered in panic as police dragged the man away.

The explosion sent out plumes of white smoke. Footage and photos from the scene showed a silver, pipe-like object on the ground, but it was not immediately clear whether it had caused the blast.

Japan’s public broadcaster NHK said no one was injured in the attack, and Kishida was taken to the Wakayama prefectural police headquarters.

When he resumed his campaign speeches, Kishida said: “Police are investigating the details of the loud explosive sound at the previous speech venue. I am sorry for causing concern to many people. We are in the middle of an important election for our country. We must carry on together.”