Before the emergence of the new coronavirus, which has sparked worldwide panic, other epidemics had struck earlier in the 21st century, but were less deadly than the previous century's pandemics.
An overview.
- 21st century epidemics -
- 2013-2016: Ebola -
The deadliest epidemic of the haemorrhagic fever Ebola broke out in West Africa in December 2013 and lasted more than two years, killing more than 11,300, mainly in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone.
First identified in 1976, Ebola is less contagious than other viral diseases, but is particularly lethal, killing around 40 percent.
The virus re-emerged in August 2018 in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo where it has so far killed more than 2,200.
- 2009-2010: Swine flu -
The World Health Organization (WHO) says 18,500 died of so-called "Swine flu", or H1N1, which was first uncovered in Mexico and the United States in March 2009.
AFP/File / LUIS ACOSTA The World Health Organization (WHO) says 18,500 died of so-called "Swine flu", or H1N1, which was first uncovered in Mexico and the United States in March 2009
The Lancet medical review, however, puts the toll at between 151,700 and 575,400.
The pandemic alert was launched on June 11, 2009 and lifted on August 10, 2010 but the virus turned out to be not as deadly as first feared.
Vaccines were rushed out, but in hindsight, the West, particularly Europe, and the WHO were criticised for overreacting at a time annual influenza epidemics every year kill between 250,000 and 500,000, according to the Geneva-based UN health agency.
- 2002-2003: SARS -
Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome first emerged in Guangdong in southern China in November 2002 before sparking a health crisis in mid-2003, in particular traumatising Asia.
AFP/File / SAMANTHA SIN Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome first emerged in Guangdong in southern China in November 2002 before sparking a health crisis in mid-2003, in particular traumatising Asia
It killed 774, four fifths of whom were in China and Hong Kong. It was transmitted to man from horseshoe bats, eventually spreading to around 30 countries. It had a mortality rate of 9.5 percent.
- 2003-2004: Bird flu -
The deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu killed more than 400 people, mainly in Southeast Asia, after appearing in 2003. It first ravaged poultry farms in Hong Kong, before being transmitted to humans. The WHO declared a global health emergency, but the toll remained limited.
- 20th century's big pandemics -
- 1981-to date: AIDS -
By far the most deadly epidemic of modern times: according to UNAIDS some 32 million people around the world have died of the disease which affects the immune system and leaves people vulnerable to opportunistic infections.
AFP/File / Dibyangshu SARKAR AIDS, by far the most deadly epidemic of modern times: according to UNAIDS some 32 million people around the world have died of the disease
Today around 24.5 million people have access to retroviral drugs which when taken regularly efficiently stop the illness in its tracks and heavily reduce the risk of contamination.
- 1968-1970: The Hong Kong flu -
Around one million people died of this disease, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
Transmitted around the world between mid-1968 and early 1970, it in particular killed many children. It first started in Hong Kong, spread through Asia and reached the United States in late 1968. After lying low for several months it then hit Europe in late 1969.
For epidemic experts, this flu went down in history as the first of the modern era, due to the advent of high-speed air travel.
- 1957-1958: Asian flu -
Around 1.1 million people died of Asian flu, according to the CDC.
The pandemic hit in two aggressive waves. The virus first appeared in southern China in February 1957. Several months went by before it reached America and Europe.
The disease, which results in serious lung complications, in particular affected the elderly.
- 1918-1919: Spanish flu -
Spanish flu hit a large part of the world's population in the wake of World War I, killing up to 50 million people, according to the CDC.
AFP/File / - Spanish flu hit the world's population in the wake of WWI, killing up to 50 million, according to the CDC, and is considered the most deadly in history over such a short period
Striking between September 1918 and April 1919, it is considered the most deadly in history over such a short period.
Five times more people died of it than did in World War I. The first victims were recorded in the United States, before it spread to Europe and then around the world.
Its mortality rate was estimated at more than 2.5 percent, according to the CDC.
A baby in China's epidemic-hit Wuhan city has been diagnosed with the novel coronavirus just 30 hours after being born, Chinese state media reported Wednesday.
The infant is the youngest person recorded as being infected by the virus, which has killed nearly 500 people since emerging late last year.
CCTV quoted experts as saying it may be a case of "vertical transmission", referring to infections passed from mother to child during pregnancy, childbirth or immediately after.
The mother had tested positive for the virus before she gave birth.
The official Xinhua news agency reported Monday that a baby born last week to an infected mother had tested negative.
The disease is believed to have emerged in December in a Wuhan market that sold wild animals, and spread rapidly as people travelled for the Lunar New Year holiday in January.
China's national health commission said on Tuesday that the oldest person diagnosed with the virus is a 90-year-old, and that 80 percent of reported deaths have been of patients 60 years of age and older.
Canada's federal court on Tuesday denied a bid by indigenous tribes to block a long-delayed expansion of an oil pipeline, dismissing their claim that they had not been adequately consulted on the project.
The decision is a win for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, whose government in 2016 approved the project connecting the Alberta oil sands to the Pacific coast for crude shipment to new overseas markets.
It also risks, however, turning climate activists who supported Trudeau's administration against him.
The federal court said the Coldwater Indian Band and other tribes had not proved that Ottawa "failed to meet its duty to consult and accommodate during the re-initiated consultations."
"Although indigenous peoples can assert their uncompromising opposition to a project, they cannot tactically use the consultation process as a means to try to veto it," said chief justice Marc Noel.
Natural Resources Minister Seamus O'Regan said the government had held "the most comprehensive consultation ever undertaken for a major project in Canada's history" with indigenous people.
"This project is in the public interest," he said, pointing to its "creation of thousands of good, well-paying jobs" and "getting more of our valuable natural resources to global markets."
According to Alberta Premier Jason Kenney the ruling "removes the last remaining legal obstacle" to the construction of the Trans Mountain pipeline.
The tribes, however, vowed to bring their fight to the Supreme Court.
"We say this project cannot go through," Leah George-Wilson, chief of the Tsleil-Waututh Nation, told a nationally-televised news conference.
- 'Australia is burning' -
Khelsilem Tl'akwasik'an of the Squamish Nation said further development of the oil sands made possible through the expansion of pipeline capacity would exacerbate global warming.
"We are risking unstable climate for future generations," he said. "Australia is burning... and yet this government wants to double down on building more oil pipelines."
The Trans Mountain project would expand an existing 715-mile (1,150 kilometer) conduit to move 890,000 barrels of oil a day across the Rocky Mountains to the Pacific coast, replacing a smaller, crumbling conduit built in 1953.
Indigenous groups had argued that a second consultation with them on the project's impacts on wildlife and the environment, mandated by law, had been inadequate.
The project was delayed several years by protests and legal challenges by environmental activists and indigenous tribes.
They contended that increased shipping along the Pacific coast could impede the recovery of killer whale populations, and risked contaminating the tribes' aquifer.
In 2018, the government stepped in to buy the troubled project for Can$4.4 billion (US$3.3 billion) from Kinder Morgan.
After fresh court-ordered consultations with indigenous groups affected by its construction, the government announced in June 2019 that it was moving forward.
The decision drew criticism from environmental groups that had traditionally sided with Trudeau, while supporters lamented how long the pipeline was taking to get built.
Canada is the world's fourth largest oil exporter but sells almost all of it to the US.
By the end of this month, Ottawa must decide whether or not to approve another controversial oil project in Alberta, a Can$21 billion oil sands mine proposed by Teck Resources.
Hong Kong's flagship carrier Cathay Pacific is asking its entire workforce to take up to three weeks of unpaid leave, its CEO announced Wednesday, as the airline faces a crisis in the wake of the new coronavirus outbreak.
The request lays bare desperate times at Cathay, which was hammered last year by months of political chaos and protests in Hong Kong and is now being further hurt by the fallout from the virus outbreak.
In a video message to the company's 27,000 employees, airline boss Augustus Tang said they were being asked to take up to three weeks leave with no pay between March and June.
"I am hoping all of you will participate, from our frontline employees to our senior leaders, and share in our current challenges," he said.
The coronavirus, which was first detected in the central Chinese city of Wuhan late last year, spread over the Lunar New Year holiday, which would normally be one of the busiest times for regional airlines.
Instead, dozens of international carriers have reduced or suspended flights to China in a bid to halt the pathogen's spread and as passenger numbers fall off a cliff.
Tang warned Cathay was experiencing "one of the most difficult Chinese New Year holidays we have ever had" because of the virus.
"And we don't know how long it will last," he added. "With such an uncertain outlook, preserving our cash is now the key to protecting our business."
- 'Difficult to hear' -
He announced a series of measures to tackle the crisis, including asking staff to voluntarily take unpaid leave.
"I realize this is difficult to hear, and we may need to take further steps ahead, but by supporting the special leave scheme you will be helping at our time of need," he told staff.
He also asked suppliers to reduce their prices, and said the airline would make short-term adjustments to its capacity -- including an already announced move to cut flights 30 per cent worldwide for two months, including a 90 per cent cut to mainland China.
The last time Cathay asked staff to take unpaid leave was in 2009 in the wake of the global financial crash.
"The situation now is just as grave," Tang said.
Hong Kong's economy is currently in recession, battered by the US-China trade war, the protests
The protests, the US-China trade war, and the virus outbreak have hit the tourism and entertainment industries especially hard.
So far 18 people have tested positive for the virus, one of whom died on Tuesday.
Rather than focusing on a solid if unspectacular first quarter, Siemens chief executive Joe Kaeser faced environmental protests inside and outside the group's annual shareholder meeting Wednesday.
Outraged by the group's sticking to a contract to supply rail equipment to a massive Australian coal mining project, demonstrators were rallying outside the Munich Olympiahalle ahead of the 10:00 am (0900 GMT) kickoff.
A group of around 100 were on the scene from early in the morning, some forming a human chain.
Late Tuesday, Greenpeace had draped a banner from the company's headquarters reading "Bush fires start here".
"We will continue our protests for as long as Siemens doesn't back down," said Helena Marschall, a representative of the movement, at a Tuesday press conference.
Marschall herself is slated to speak inside the venue later Wednesday, while the demonstrators plan to urge the company to "abandon coal" at a larger protest in the afternoon.
Kaeser kept activists and observers on tenterhooks for weeks as he decided whether to uphold a contract with India's Adani group related to its Carmichael mine project in Australia.
In the end, he stuck to Siemens' agreement to supply the rail signalling equipment for the massive open-cast mine, not far from the iconic natural landmark of the Great Barrier Reef.
- 'Fulfil contractual obligations' -
Groups like Extinction Rebellion and Fridays for Future have homed in on the shareholder meeting as an opportunity to renew the pressure on Siemens.
"What's more important: a small financial loss in the short term, or the disastrous consequences such a project will have for generations?" Marschall said.
She and other environmentalists have been invited to speak inside the cordon by a group of Siemens shareholders.
In mid-January, CEO Kaeser met leading German Fridays for Future activist Luisa Neubauer after protests across the country against Siemens.
But he later said in a statement: "We must fulfil our contractual obligations" relating to the 18-million-euro ($22 million) deal.
"Only being a credible partner whose word counts also ensures that we can remain an effective partner for a greener future," Kaeser insisted.
Nevertheless, the company plans to create a "Sustainability Committee" with powers to block environmentally questionable projects.
Siemens says it backs the 2015 Paris Agreement and aims to become carbon-neutral by 2030.
- 27 mn tonnes of coal -
The open-cut Carmichael mine is set to become operational next year and produce up to 27 million tonnes of coal annually.
Adani spent years trying to secure private finance for the coal mine before announcing in 2018 it was self-financing a trimmed-down, $2 billion version of the project.
Supporters say the mine will bring hundreds of much-needed jobs to rural Queensland in eastern Australia.
But conservationists say the project threatens local vulnerable species and notes that the coal will have to be shipped from a port near the already damaged Great Barrier Reef.
Much of the coal from the mine will be burned in India, a country with some of the world's highest levels of air pollution.
The number of people infected in China by the coronavirus outbreak jumped on Wednesday to nearly 500, after Hong Kong reported its first death from the disease and millions more in China were ordered to stay indoors.
The confirmed toll in mainland China rose to 490 after hardest-hit Hubei province reported 65 more people had died -- the biggest single-day tally since the first fatalities emerged last month.
More than 20 countries have confirmed cases of the virus, prompting the World Health Organization (WHO) to declare a global health emergency, several governments to institute travel restrictions, and airlines to suspend flights to and from China.
The WHO said Tuesday that the dramatic measures taken by China had provided a "window of opportunity" to halt transmission, while calling for more global solidarity to combat the virus.
AFP / Thomas SAINT-CRICQ Chart showing cumulative number of people infected by the 2019 Novel Coronavirus in China and other countries, territories or areas, based on data from national authorities
The novel coronavirus has continued to spread with Singapore, Malaysia, and Thailand on Tuesday reporting new infections that were not imported from China.
In a sign of growing concern about a spread to other densely-populated Chinese metropolitan areas, authorities in three cities in eastern Zhejiang province -- including one near Shanghai -- limited the number of people allowed to leave their homes.
Three districts in Hangzhou -- including the area where the main office of Chinese tech giant Alibaba is based -- now allow only one person per household to go outside every two days to buy necessities, affecting some three million people.
The city is only 175 kilometres (110 miles) southwest of the financial hub of Shanghai, which has reported more than 200 cases, including one death.
Zhejiang has confirmed 829 cases -- the highest number outside the central province of Hubei, whose capital Wuhan is the epicentre of the outbreak.
AFP / STR A doctor speaks with a patient during an online consultation session at a hospital in Shenyang in China's northeastern Liaoning province
The disease is believed to have emerged in December in a Wuhan market that sold wild animals, and spread rapidly as people travelled for the Lunar New Year holiday in January.
China has struggled to contain the virus despite enacting unprecedented measures, including virtually locking down more than 50 million people in Hubei.
The WHO has said the outbreak does not yet constitute a "pandemic".
The head of the organisation, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, accused wealthy countries of falling short on their duties in sharing data, stating that: "Of the 176 cases reported outside China so far, WHO has received complete case report forms for only 38 percent."
- Hong Kong's first death -
The death of the 39-year-old man in Hong Kong came as the semi-autonomous city closed all but two land crossings with the Chinese mainland.
AFP / STR Workers set up beds at an exhibition centre converted into a hospital in Wuhan in China's central Hubei province
Hong Kong media said the man had underlying health issues. He had visited Wuhan last month and his 72-year-old mother was also infected.
The financial hub has been particularly on edge over the virus as it has revived memories of the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) outbreak of 2002-03, which killed nearly 300 people in the city and 349 people in the mainland.
Health officials noted that the mortality rate for the new coronavirus stood at 2.1 percent, with most victims either old or with underlying health problems.
SARS killed nearly 10 percent of patients.
- New foreign cases -
Singapore confirmed the first four cases of people being infected locally, taking the total number of infections in the city-state to 24.
AFP / Behrouz MEHRI Japan has quarantined a cruise ship carrying 3,711 people and was testing those on board for the new coronavirus
In another example of growing global anxiety, Japan has quarantined a cruise ship carrying 3,711 people and was testing those onboard for the virus after a former passenger was diagnosed with the illness in Hong Kong.
Macau, China's semi-autonomous gambling hub that is popular with mainland Chinese visitors, decided to temporarily close all of its casinos for at least two weeks.
And the UK Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab on Tuesday advised Britons to leave China, "if they can", to minimise their risk of exposure to the virus.
The United States, meanwhile, acknowledged that the outbreak may delay Beijing's plans to purchase American goods under the terms of a deal meant to end the two countries' trade war.
- Beijing admits 'shortcomings' -
China's Communist leadership made a rare admission of fallibility earlier this week, acknowledging "shortcomings and difficulties exposed in the response to the epidemic".
The elite Politburo Standing Committee called for improvements to the "national emergency management system" at the meeting, according to the official Xinhua news agency on Monday.
The government also said it "urgently" needed medical equipment such as surgical masks, protective suits, and safety goggles as it battles the outbreak.
Most of the deaths have been in Wuhan and the rest of surrounding Hubei province, which has largely been under lockdown for almost two weeks.
A 1,000-bed field hospital in Wuhan built from scratch within two weeks to relieve overburdened medical facilities started receiving patients on Tuesday, with a second makeshift hospital due to open later this week.
A cultural building, an exhibition centre and a gymnasium have also been converted into improvised clinics with 3,400 beds.
State media reported that the city planned to convert an additional eight facilities into hospitals.
Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner is taking heat from key allies of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as the "peace plan" he helped design spirals further down the drain.
While the plan had previously been praised by the Israeli government even as it was widely panned by neighboring Arab governments, the Washington Post reports that Yesha Council Chairman David Elhayani is furious about the White House's efforts to discourage Netanyahu from immediately annexing large portions of the West Bank from the Palestinians.
"Kushner took a knife and put it in Netanyahu’s back," Elhayani tells the Washington Post. "Kushner misled the prime minister. He misled everybody. He knew for a long time that Netanyahu wanted to declare sovereignty over the Jordan Valley and northern Dead Sea — he said it many times over the last year. Gentlemen just don’t act this way."
Elhayani also worried that putting a temporary halt on the annexations could do political damage to Netanyahu and cause him to lose upcoming elections that are scheduled for next month.
The plan put forward by Kushner and the Trump administration has already been condemned by Palestinian officials who are furious that the United States is giving Israel the right to unilaterally annex their lands.
Republican party Sinn Fein have surged into first place with just days until Ireland goes to the polls in a general election, according to a new survey.
Sinn Fein were at 25 per cent, ahead of opposition party Fianna Fail on 23 per cent, the final Irish Times/Ipsos MRBI opinion poll said on Monday night.
The poll was conducted from January 30 to February 1 among 1,200 adults at 120 locations in every constituency. Its results suggest an historic shift in sentiment.
Sinn Fein’s flagship policy is uniting the republic with the British province of Northern Ireland and dissolving a border erected in the partition of 1921.
But that could be overshadowed as the more immediate issues of housing, healthcare and homelessness have come to dominate the campaign.
Sinn Fein have also historically under-performed at previous elections compared to opinion polling.
More particularly, the all-island party is fielding just 42 candidates in the election and will not be able to form a majority government even if all are elected.
But they could still play a key role in any coalition government.
Sinn Fein in leaders debate
The latest poll forced state broadcaster RTE to invite Sinn Fein leader Mary Lou McDonald to a leaders debate on Tuesday night, because of what it said was a “notable change in the dynamic of the campaign on the ground”.
It was originally planned as a face-off between Varadkar and Fianna Fail leader Micheal Martin.
McDonald said she was “pleased to accept” the invitation.
Irish governments have been dominated by the duopoly of the centre-right Fine Gael and Fianna Fail parties since its foundation.
Varadkar opened campaigning touting his success in Brexit negotiations for Britain’s departure from the European Union and appealing to the public that the process is ongoing.
But polls suggest the issue does not rank as a concern for voters.
Fianna Fail has propped up Varadkar’s minority government in parliament through a confidence and supply agreement since the 2016 election.
This potentially links them to the perceived failings of the incumbent government.
Fianna Fail also still bears the blame of leading Ireland into a ruinous recession in 2008 following the boom period dubbed the “Celtic Tiger”.
Whether President Donald Trump was being investigated by Democrat-led committees in the U.S. House of Representatives or by former Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s office, a name that has often come up in connection with the president is Deutsche Bank — an institution known for dealing with businesses that other large banks shy away from. And Trump’s extensive dealings with Deutsche Bank are the focus of an in-depth article by journalist David Enrich for the New York Times.
Trump’s relationship with Deutsche Bank, Enrich explains, is a “very long, very complicated” one that goes back to 1998.
“Over the course of two decades, the bank lent him more than $2 billion — so much that by the time he was elected, Deutsche Bank was by far his biggest creditor,” Enrich reports. “Against all odds, Trump paid back most of what he owed the bank.”
According to Enrich, that relationship “cemented Deutsche Bank’s reputation as a reckless institution willing to do business with clients nobody else would touch” and has “made the company a magnet for prosecutors, regulators and lawmakers hoping to penetrate the president’s opaque financial affairs.”
In April 2019, Enrich notes, House Democrats “subpoenaed Deutsche Bank for its records on Trump, his family members and his businesses” — and the Trump/Deutsche Bank relationship has been investigated by prosecutors at the state level as well. The bank’s connection to the Trump Organization, according to Enrich, “extended well beyond making simple loans” — and Deutsche Bank “managed tens of millions of dollars of Trump’s personal assets.”
“Deutsche Bank’s envelope-pushing helped it become the global power player it is today, but it also left the company dangerously frail,” Enrich observes. “Its books remain stuffed with trillions of dollars of risky derivatives, the sort of instruments that many other banks have disposed of since the 2008 financial crisis.”
But despite its vulnerabilities, Enrich stresses, Deutsche Bank (which was founded in 1870 and is headquartered in Frankford, Germany) has enjoyed considerable growth in recent decades.
“Until the 1990s, Deutsche Bank was a provincial German company with a limited presence outside Europe,” Enrich reports. “Today, it is a $1.5 trillion colossus, one of the world’s largest banks, with offices in 59 countries — and, thanks to its well-documented pattern of violating laws, an international symbol of greed, recklessness and hubris.”
"Their use anywhere, anytime, and by any actor remains completely unacceptable to the European Union."
The European Union on Tuesday condemned U.S. President Donald Trump's decision last week to roll back restrictions on the American military's use of landmines despite the deadly history of the weapons around the world.
Virginie Battu-Henriksson, spokesperson for the E.U.'s diplomatic service, said in a statement that Trump's rescission of an Obama administration order banning landmine use outside of the Korean peninsula "undermines the global norm against anti-personnel mines."
That international norm, said Battu-Henriksson, "has saved tens of thousands of people in the past twenty years."
"The conviction that these weapons are incompatible with International Humanitarian Law has led 164 states to join the Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention."
—Virginie Battu-Henriksson, European Union
"The majority of mine victims are children," Battu-Henriksson added. "The conviction that these weapons are incompatible with International Humanitarian Law has led 164 states to join the Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention, including all member states of the European Union. Their use anywhere, anytime, and by any actor remains completely unacceptable to the European Union."
The E.U.'s statement came days after the TrumpWhite House announced Friday that it officially canceled the previous administration's policy restricting landmine use by the U.S. military, a move arms control groups and peace activists warned could lead to an increase in civilian deaths and set back the global movement to rid the planet of the dangerous weapons of war.
"Mr. Trump's policy rollback is a step toward the past, like many of his other decisions, and sends exactly the wrong message to those working to rid the world of the scourge of landmines," anti-war activist Jody Williams, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1997 for her work to ban landmines, toldCommon Dreams in an email last week.
Leading 2020 Democratic presidential candidates joined the chorus denouncing Trump's decision.
In a tweet on Saturday, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) called the move "abhorrent" and vowed to "reverse this decision and work with our allies to eliminate landmines."
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), in a statement to Vox on Monday, said "Trump's landmine policy reversal is barbaric, weakens America's moral leadership, and is quite simply a giveaway to the military-industrial complex."
If elected, Sanders said his administration would "reinstate the ban on their production and use outside of the Korean peninsula, and also work to achieve a North-South Korean peace agreement that would ultimately result in their being withdrawn from the Korean peninsula as well."
A court in central Germany on Tuesday rejected a case calling for a local church associated with Protestant firebrand Martin Luther to remove an ancient anti-Semitic carving from its wall.
Widely known the as "Judensau" (Jews' sow), the 13th-century bas relief on the church in eastern German town Wittenberg depicts a rabbi peering into a pig's anus, while other figures suckle milk from its teats.
The hateful symbolism is that Jews obtain their sustenance and scripture from an unclean animal.
A panel of judges at Saxony-Anhalt state's superior court in Naumburg found the image "did not harm Jews' reputation" because it was "embedded" in a wider memorial context, presiding judge Volker Buchloh said, according to regional broadcaster MDR.
After failing at a lower court with his claim that the sculpture was insulting to Jews and should be removed, a local Jewish man had appealed the decision.
Announcing Tuesday's ruling, Buchloh said "anyone looking at the relief cannot fail to see the memorial and the information sign the parish put up in 1988," placing it in the proper context.
Johannes Block, the pastor at the Wittenberg Stadtkirche (City Church), told Munich-based daily Sueddeutsche Zeitung on Monday that the image was a "repulsive and tasteless" attack on Jews that "fills me with shame and pain".
"We did not ask for this sculpture, but are trying to handle this difficult inheritance responsibly," he added, saying he was in talks with Germany's Central Jewish Council on how to update the memorial.
Many churches in the Middle Ages had similar "Judensau" carvings, which were also aimed at sending the stark message that Jews were not welcome in their communities.
Another example can be seen at the world-famous Cologne cathedral.
But the importance of the Wittenberg relief is tied to Luther, himself a notorious anti-Semite, who preached there two centuries later.
It was in Wittenberg that Luther is said to have nailed his 95 theses to another church's door in 1517, leading to a split with the Roman Catholic Church and the birth of Protestantism.
The theologian argued that Christians could not buy or earn their way into heaven but only entered by the grace of God, marking a turning point in Christian thinking.
But Luther also came to be linked to Germany's darkest history, as his later sermons and writings were marked by anti-Semitism -- something that the Nazis would later use to justify their brutal persecution of the Jews.
The superior court's decision not to order the relief removed can still be appealed to Germany's highest court, the Federal Court of Justice.
A passenger jet taking winter-weary Canadians to Jamaica for a sunny holiday was forced to turn back after a passenger falsely claimed to have the coronavirus, the airline said Tuesday.
The Westjet flight to Montego Bay was diverted to Toronto on Monday "due to an unruly guest," spokesman Morgan Bell told AFP.
"Out of an abundance of caution, our crew followed all protocols for infectious disease on board, including sequestering an individual who made an unfounded claim regarding coronavirus," he said.
According to reports, the man stood almost halfway through the four-hour flight carrying 243 passengers and, while taking selfies, declared that he had contracted the virus that has infected more than 20,400 and killed 425.
Flight attendants gave him a mask and gloves and ordered him to the back of the plane.
"I guess this guy thought it was a funny joke but it's just really weird. We were all very frustrated, to just displace 240 people ... it's just so selfish," passenger Julie-Anne Broderick told public broadcaster CBC.
"We've lost a day of our vacation," she lamented.
Police and public health officials met the flight on arrival in Toronto.
Peel Regional Police confirmed a 29-year-old man from Thornhill, Ontario was arrested and has been charged with mischief.
Meanwhile, another flight was booked to take the passengers to Jamaica Tuesday morning and bring back those left stranded in Montego Bay after their return flight on Monday was also cancelled.
When Charles Dickens died, he had spectacular fame, great wealth and an adoring public. But his personal life was complicated. Separated from his wife and living in a huge country mansion in Kent, the novelist was in the thrall of his young mistress, Ellen Ternan. This is the untold story of Charles Dickens’s final hours and the furore that followed, as the great writer’s family and friends fought over his final wishes.
My new research has uncovered the never-before-explored areas of the great author’s sudden death, and his subsequent burial. While details such as the presence of Ternan at the author’s funeral have already been discovered by Dickensian sleuths, what is new and fresh here is the degree of manoeuvring and negotiations involved in establishing Dickens’s ultimate resting place.
Dickens’s death created an early predicament for his family. Where was he to be buried? Near his home (as he would have wished) or in that great public pantheon, Poet’s Corner in Westminster Abbey (which was clearly against his wishes)?
“The Inimitable” (as he sometimes referred to himself) was one of the most famous celebrities of his time. No other writer is as closely associated with the Victorian period. As the author of such immortal classics as Oliver Twist, David Copperfield and A Christmas Carol, he was constantly in the public eye. Because of the vivid stories he told, and the causes he championed (including poverty, education, workers’ rights, and the plight of prostitutes), there was great demand for him to represent charities, and appear at public events and visit institutions up and down the country (as well as abroad – particularly in the United States). He moved in the best circles and counted among his friends the top writers, actors, artists and politicians of his day.
Dickens was proud of what he achieved as an author and valued his close association with his public. In 1858 he embarked on a career as a professional reader of his own work and thrilled audiences of thousands with his animated performances. This boost to his career occurred at a time when his marital problems came to a head: he fell in love with Ternan, an 18-year-old actress, and separated from his wife Catherine, with whom he had ten children.
On Wednesday June 8 1870, the author was working on his novel Edwin Drood in the garden of his country home, Gad’s Hill Place, near Rochester, in Kent. He came inside to have dinner with his sister-in-law, Georgina Hogarth, and suffered a stroke. The local doctor was summoned and remedies were applied without effect. A telegram was sent to London, to summon John Russell Reynolds, one of the top neurologists in the land. By the following day the author’s condition hadn’t changed and he died at 6.10pm, on June 9.Dickens was careful to keep his love affair private. Documentary evidence of his relationship with Ternan is very scarce indeed. He had wanted to take her with him on a reading tour to America in 1868, and even developed a telegraphic code to communicate to her whether or not she should come. She didn’t, because Dickens felt that he could not protect their privacy.
Accepted wisdom concerning Dickens’s death and burial is drawn from an authorised biography published by John Forster: The Life of Charles Dickens. Forster was the author’s closest friend and confidant. He was privy to the most intimate areas of his life, including the time he spent in a blacking (boot polish) warehouse as a young boy (which was a secret, until disclosed by Forster in his book), as well as details of his relationship with Ternan (which were not revealed by Forster, and which remained largely hidden well into the 20th century). Forster sought to protect Dickens’s reputation with the public at all costs.
Last Will and Testament
In his will (reproduced in Forster’s biography), Dickens had left instructions that he should be:
Buried in an inexpensive, unostentatious, and strictly private manner; that no public announcement be made of the time or place of my burial; that at the utmost not more than three plain mourning coaches be employed; and that those who attend my funeral wear no scarf, cloak, black bow, long hat-band, or other such revolting absurdity.
Forster added that Dickens’s preferred place of burial – his Plan A – was “in the small graveyard under Rochester Castle wall, or in the little churches of Cobham or Shorne”, which were all near his country home. However, Forster added: “All these were found to be closed”, by which he meant unavailable.
Forster claims in the biography that the media led the way in agitating for burial in the abbey. He singles out The Times, which, in an article of January 13 1870, “took the lead in suggesting that the only fit resting place for the remains of a man so dear to England was the abbey in which the most illustrious Englishmen are laid”. He added that when the Dean of Westminster, Arthur Penrhyn Stanley, asked Forster and members of the Dickens family to initiate what was now Plan C, and bury him in the abbey, it became their “grateful duty to accept that offer”.Plan B was then put into action. Dickens was set to be buried in Rochester Cathedral, at the direction of the Dean and Chapter (the ecclesiastical governing body). They had even dug a grave for the great man. But this plan too was scuppered, in favour of interment in Poets’ Corner, in Westminster Abbey – the resting place of Geoffrey Chaucer, Samuel Johnson, and other literary greats.
The private funeral occurred early in the morning of Tuesday June 14 1870, and was attended by 14 mourners. The grave was then left open for three days so that the public could pay their respects to one of the most famous figures of the age. Details of the authorised version of Dickens’s death and burial were carried by all the major and minor newspapers in the English-speaking world and beyond. Dickens’s estranged wife Catherine received a message of condolence from Queen Victoria, expressing “her deepest regret at the sad news of Charles Dickens’s death”.
The effect that Dickens’s death had on ordinary people may be appreciated from the reaction of a barrow girl who sold fruits and vegetables in Covent Garden Market. When she heard the news, she is reported to have said: “Dickens dead? Then will Father Christmas die too?”
The funeral directors
My investigation has revealed, however, how Dickens’s burial in Poets’ Corner was engineered by Forster and Stanley to satisfy their personal aims, rather than the author’s own. While the official story was that it was the “will of the people” to have Dickens buried in the Abbey (and there were articles in The Times to this effect), the reality was that this alteration suited both the biographer and the churchman.
Forster could conclude the volume he was contemplating in a fitting manner, by having Dickens interred in the national pantheon where so many famous literary figures were buried. He thus ensured that a stream of visitors would make a pilgrimage to Dickens’s grave and spread his reputation far and wide, for posterity.
Stanley could add Dickens to his roll of famous people whose burials he conducted. They included Lord Palmerston, the former UK prime minister, mathematician and astronomer Sir John Herschel, missionary and explorer David Livingstone, and Sir Rowland Hill, the postal reformer and originator of the penny post.
The efforts of Forster and Stanley to get Dickens buried exactly where they wanted enhanced the reputations of both men. For each of them, the interment of Dickens in the abbey might be considered the highlight of their careers.
The new evidence I have found was gathered from libraries, archives and cathedral vaults and prove beyond a doubt that any claims about the Westminster burial being the will of the people are false.‘Mr Dickens very ill, most urgent’
What emerges is an atmosphere of urgency in the Dickens household after the author collapsed. Dickens’s son Charley sent the telegram to the author’s staff in London, requesting urgent medical assistance from the eminent neurologist, John Russell Reynolds:
Go without losing a moment to Russell Reynolds thirty eight Grosvenor St Grosvenor Sqr tell him to come by next train to Higham or Rochester to meet… Beard (Dickens’s physician), at Gadshill … Mr Dickens very ill most urgent.
Dickens’s sister-in-law, Georgina Hogarth, who ran his household and cared for his children after the separation from Catherine, was clearly disappointed that the specialist could do nothing for her much-adored brother-in-law. She sent a note to her solicitor with the doctor’s fee: “I enclose Dr Reynolds’ demand (of £20) for his fruitless visit.”
Dean Stanley had met Dickens in 1870, after being introduced by the churchman’s brother-in-law, Frederick Locker, who was a friend of the novelist. Stanley confided to his private journal (now housed in the archives of Westminster Abbey) that he was “much struck” by his conversation with Dickens and appreciated the few opportunities he had to meet the author before he died.
When the end came, Locker conveyed the news to his brother-in-law on that very day – June 9. The Dean wrote to Locker to say:Locker’s memoir also records an interesting conversation he had with Stanley before this 1870 meeting, which sheds light on the Dean’s attitude towards the novelist, his death and funeral. Locker writes about talking to Stanley “of the burials in the abbey” and they discussed the names of some “distinguished people”. Stanley told him there were “certain people” he would be “obliged to refuse” burial, on account of personal antipathies. But his attitude changed when the name of the author “came up” and he said he “should like to meet Dickens”. Then, to “gratify” Stanley’s “pious wish”, Locker asked Dickens and his daughter to dine. Thus even while Dickens was still alive, Stanley privately expressed a desire to bury him.
Alas! – how soon we have been overtaken by the event which we were anticipating as so distant. I cannot amply thank you for having given me the opportunity of having met Charles Dickens while there was yet time. You will gather from what I have already said that I am quite prepared to raise any proposals about the burial that may be made to me.
The letter is fascinating. On the very day of the famous author’s death, the Dean was already thinking about burial in the Abbey. But there was a catch: Stanley could only entertain such a proposal if it came from the family and executors. He could not act unilaterally.
Locker quickly seized the opportunity hinted at in Stanley’s letter and sent a copy of it to Charley Dickens (the author’s son) on June 10. He wrote in his covering note: “I wish to send you a copy of a letter that I have just received from Dean Stanley and I think it will explain itself. If I can be of any use pray tell me.”
False claims and ambition
Meanwhile, the idea of getting Dickens to Poets’ Corner was growing in Stanley’s imagination. He wrote to his cousin Louisa on Saturday June 11 to say “I never met (Dickens) till this year… And now he is gone … and it is not improbable that I may bury him”. It’s interesting how quickly the plan crystallised in the Dean’s mind. Within the space of 48 hours, he went from hypothetical proposals from the family for burial, to foreseeing a key role for himself in the proceedings.
However, an answer from Charley Dickens wasn’t forthcoming. Stanley waited until the morning of Monday June 13, before seeking another way of making his wishes known to the family. He got in touch with his friend Lord Houghton (formerly Rickard Monckton Milnes – a poet, politician and friend of Dickens), reiterating his preparedness “to receive any proposal for (Dickens’s) burial in the Abbey” and asking Houghton to “act as you think best”.
It was at this point in the proceedings that Forster took charge of the planning. He had been away in Cornwall when Dickens died and it took him two days to reach Gad’s Hill. When he reached Dickens’s country home on Saturday June 11 he was overcome with grief at the death of his friend and clearly unprepared for the suddenness with which the blow was struck. His first thoughts, and those of the immediate family, were to accede to Dickens’s wishes and have him buried close to home. While the official account, in his Life of Dickens, claims that the graveyards in the vicinity of his home were “closed”, an examination of the records of the churches in Cobham and Shorne demonstrate this to be false.
The proposed burial in Rochester Cathedral was not only advanced, but in fact finalised, costed, and invoiced. The Chapter archives demonstrate that a grave was in fact dug in St Mary’s Chapel by the building firm Foord & Sons. The records also show that the Cathedral authorities “believed, as they still believe (after Dickens was buried in the Abbey), that no more fitting or honourable spot for his sepulture could be found than amidst scenes to which he was fondly attached, and amongst those by whom he was personally known as a neighbour and held in such honour”.
These views are reinforced by the claims of Hogarth, Dickens’s sister-in-law, in a letter to a friend:
We should have preferred Rochester Cathedral, and it was a great disappointment to the people there that we had to give way to the larger demand.
Let (Dickens) lie in the Abbey. Where Englishmen gather to review the memorials of the great masters and teachers of their nation, the ashes and the name of the greatest instructor of the nineteenth century should not be absent.
Despite this appeal appearing in the press, Stanley’s private journal records that he still “had received no application from any person in authority”, and so “took no steps” to advance his burial plan.
Stanley’s prayers must have seemed answered, then, when Forster and Charley Dickens appeared at the door of the Deanery on that same day. According to the Dean, after they sat down, Forster said to Stanley: “I imagine the article in the ‘Times’ must have been written with your concurrence?” Stanley replied: “No, I had no concern with it, but at the same time I had given it privately to be understood that I would consent to the interment if it was demanded.” By this Stanley meant the letter he had sent to Locker, which the latter had forwarded to Charley. Stanley of course agreed to the request from Dickens’s representatives for burial in Poets’ Corner. What he refrains from saying is how much he personally was looking forward to officiating at an event of such national significance.
While it’s clear, from the private correspondence I have examined, that Stanley agitated for Dickens’s burial in the abbey, the actions of Forster are harder to trace. He left fewer clues about his intentions and he destroyed all of his working notes for his monumental three volume biography of Dickens. These documents included many letters from the author. Forster used Dickens’s correspondence liberally in his account. In fact, the only source we have for most of the letters from Dickens to Forster are the passages that appear in the biography.
But as well as showing how Forster falsely claimed in his biography that the graveyards near his home were “closed”, my research also reveals how he altered the words of Stanley’s (published) funeral sermon to suit his own version of events. Forster quoted Stanley as saying that Dickens’s grave “would thenceforward be a sacred one with both the New World and the Old, as that of the representative of the literature, not of this island only, but of all who speak our English tongue”. This, however, is a mis-quotation of the sermon, in which Stanley actually said:
Many, many are the feet which have trodden and will tread the consecrated ground around that narrow grave; many, many are the hearts which both in the Old and in the New World are drawn towards it, as towards the resting-place of a dear personal friend; many are the flowers that have been strewed, many the tears shed, by the grateful affection of ‘the poor that cried, and the fatherless, and those that had none to help them’.
Stanley worked with Forster to achieve their common aim. In 1872, when Forster sent Stanley a copy of the first volume of his Life of Dickens, the Dean wrote:
You are very good to speak so warmly of any assistance I may have rendered in carrying out your wishes and the desire of the country on the occasion of the funeral. The recollection of it will always be treasured amongst the most interesting of the various experiences which I have traversed in my official life.
For the ages
My research demonstrates that the official, authorised accounts of the lives and deaths of the rich and famous are open to question and forensic investigation – even long after their histories have been written and accepted as canonical. Celebrity is a manufactured commodity, that depends for its effect on the degree to which the fan (which comes from the word “fanatic”) can be manipulated into believing a particular story about the person whom he or she adores.
In the case of Dickens, two people who had intimate involvement in preserving his reputation for posterity were not doing so for altruistic reasons: there was something in it for each of them. Stanley interred the mortal remains of Dickens in the principal shrine of British artistic greatness. This ensured that his tomb became a site of pilgrimage, where the great and the good would come to pay their respects – including the Prince of Wales, who laid a wreath on Dickens’s grave in 2012, to mark the bicentenary of his birth.
Such public commemorations of this Victorian superstar carry special meaning and mystique for his many fans. This year, on February 7 (the anniversary of his birth), Armando Iannucci (director of the new film adaptation The Personal History of David Copperfield) is scheduled give the toast to “the immortal memory” at a special dinner hosted by the Dickens Fellowship – a worldwide association of admirers. The 150th anniversary of his death will be observed at Westminster Abbey on June 8 2020.
Whether it’s the remembrance of the author’s death or his birth, these public acts symbolise how essential Dickens is to Britain’s national culture. None of this would have been possible, however, had it not been for the involvement of Dickens’s best friend and executor, John Forster. Forster organised the private funeral in Westminster Abbey in accordance with Dickens’s wishes, and ensured that his lover Ellen Ternan could discreetly attend, and that his estranged wife would not. But he is also the man who overruled the expectations of the author for a local burial. Instead, through an act of institutionally sanctioned bodysnatching, the grave in Poets’ Corner bound Dickens forever in the public mind with the ideals of national life and art and provided a fitting conclusion to Forster’s carefully considered, strategically constructed biography. It ends with these words:
Facing the grave, and on its left and right, are the monuments of Chaucer, Shakespeare, and Dryden, the three immortals who did most to create and settle the language to which Charles Dickens has given another undying name.
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