Five Saudi officials face the death penalty for the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi who was dismembered inside the kingdom's Istanbul consulate, but Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman was not involved, the prosecutor said Thursday.
The announcement follows growing international outcry over the killing of Khashoggi, a Washington Post columnist and critic of the Saudi rulers who was last seen entering the consulate on October 2 to obtain paperwork for his marriage.
Khashoggi died after being drugged and then dismembered, a spokesman for the public prosecutor's office said in the first Saudi confirmation of how he was killed.
The journalist's body parts were then handed over to an agent outside the consulate grounds, the spokesman said.
He denied Prince Mohammed had any knowledge of the murder.
The deputy chief of Saudi Arabia's intelligence, General Ahmed al-Assiri, gave the order to repatriate Khashoggi -- and "the head of the negotiating team" that flew to the Istanbul consulate had ordered his murder, the spokesman said.
After repeated denials, Saudi Arabia finally admitted in mid-October that Khashoggi had been murdered at the compound, but blamed it on a "rogue" operation.
The prosecutor has requested the death penalty for the five who "are charged with ordering and committing the crime and for the appropriate sentences for the other indicted individuals," an official statement published by state news agency SPA said.
It said a total of 21 individuals were in custody in connection with the killing, 11 of whom have been indicted with investigations to continue into the others.
Turkey on Wednesday called for an international investigation into the murder.
Ankara has already shared voice recordings linked to the murder with a number of countries including Saudi Arabia, the United States and its Western allies.
- 'Global fallout' -
Khashoggi's killing has plunged the world's top oil exporter into its worst diplomatic crisis since the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States, in which most of the hijackers were identified as Saudi nationals.
After first insisting Khashoggi left the consulate unharmed, Saudi authorities said he was killed in an argument that degenerated into a brawl before finally accepting what Turkey had said virtually from the start -- that he was killed in a premeditated hit.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said the order to murder Khashoggi came from "the highest levels" of the Saudi government.
The global fallout over the murder has tainted the image of 33-year-old Prince Mohammed -- the de facto ruler and heir apparent -- despite persistent Saudi denials that he was involved.
Khashoggi's murder has also led to increased scrutiny of Saudi Arabia's role in the Yemen war, which has pushed the impoverished country to the brink of famine.
The journalist went into self-imposed exile in the United States in 2017 after falling out with Prince Mohammed.
When Yasushi Watanabe bought a cartoon film decades ago as a high school student in the Japanese city of Osaka, he had no idea he was purchasing animation history.
But the modest reel he bought for just 500 yen ($4.40 in today's money) has been revealed as a rare lost cartoon produced by Walt Disney featuring a character that led to the creation of Mickey Mouse.
The discovery was reported by Japan's Asahi Shimbun daily, which Watanabe contacted after reading a book about the history of "Oswald the Lucky Rabbit", the character Disney created in the 1920s.
While Disney created the character, complete with oversized ears and a button nose, he lost the rights to another company, prompting him to develop a new cartoon figure: Mickey Mouse.
The book said seven of the 26 short films featuring Oswald that Walt Disney produced were missing, and Watanabe remembered his childhood reel.
It was labelled in Japanese "Mickey Manga Spide" -- Mickey Cartoon Speedy in English -- and featured a dog policeman on a motorbike chasing Oswald and his girlfriend in a car.
As the trio speed around valleys and along roads, the characters and the vehicles stretched and shrank, the Asahi reported, using a technique that later featured commonly in Disney works.
The newspaper contacted the author of the book and the Walt Disney Archives and confirmed that the reel was indeed one of the missing films, originally titled "Neck 'n' Neck."
"We're absolutely delighted to learn that a copy of the lost film exists," Becky Cline, director of the archives, told the newspaper.
"As I've been a Disney fan for many years, I'm happy I was able to play a role (in the discovery," added Watanabe, an anime history researcher who is now 84.
His childhood purchase is now housed at the Kobe Planet Film Archive, and another film showing 50 seconds of the same cartoon has also been unearthed at the Toy Film Museum in Kyoto, the newspaper said.
In 2014, Norway's National Library announced it had discovered a copy of a Walt Disney cartoon featuring Oswald, which had been thought lost.
The cartoon, titled "Empty Socks," was the first Christmas film made by the US entertainment giant and was discovered during an inventory at the library's facility near the Arctic Circle.
A year later, another short film featuring Oswald was uncovered in Britain and screened for the first time in 87 years.
The number of U.S. troops at the border with Mexico may have peaked at about 5,800, the U.S. commander of the mission told Reuters, noting he would start looking next week at whether to begin sending forces home or perhaps shifting some to new border positions.
The outlook by Lieutenant General Jeffrey Buchanan, while not definitive, suggests that the high-profile military mission could soon achieve its goal of helping harden the border ahead of the expected arrival of caravans of Central American migrants in the coming weeks.
The deployment, which critics have called a pre-election political stunt by President Donald Trump, was initially expected to reach more than 7,000 forces, acting in support of U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP).
U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis authorized the mission through Dec. 15 and while Buchanan did not rule out an extension, he did not think one appeared likely at this point, based on the current set of tasks assigned to the military.
“It is a hard date. And we have no indications that CBP is going to need us to do our work for longer than that,” Buchanan said on Wednesday at Base Camp Donna in Texas, as Mattis toured the site near the Mexico border.
He acknowledged that there could be new requests, saying: “If we get an extension, we get an extension. But I’ve got no indications of that so far.”
Asked whether he thought the troop levels had peaked, Buchanan said: “I do. We might increase by a hundred here or there, but probably not.”
Trump’s politically charged decision to send U.S. troops to the border with Mexico came ahead of U.S. congressional elections last week, as Trump sought to strengthen border security as part of a crackdown on illegal immigration.
Trump’s supporters, including Republicans in Congress, have embraced the deployment.
But critics have said it was designed to drive Republican voters to the polls. They have scoffed at Trump’s comparison of caravans of Central American migrants, including women and children, fleeing poverty and violence, to an “invasion.”
Mattis defended the deployment on Wednesday, saying the mission was “absolutely legal,” justified and was improving military readiness.
‘RIGHTSIZING’
Buchanan also said his mission guidelines were clear - to support CBP personnel. He said his work was apolitical.
“I’m not being directed to do anything unnatural from above me,” said Buchanan, who is commander of U.S. Army North.
The Pentagon says there are no plans for U.S. forces to interact with migrants and instead have been carrying out support tasks for CBP, like stringing up concertina wire and building temporary housing for themselves and CBP personnel.
In recent days, up to 1,000 migrants linked to the caravans have arrived in the Mexican border city of Tijuana, with a similar number expected to arrive in the next day or so. Thousands more could arrive in border towns over the coming days as the bulk of the caravans arrive.
Buchanan estimated that about 5,800 troops were deployed in total, with about 1,500 in California, 1,500 in Arizona and 2,800 in Texas. Buchanan acknowledged he might shift forces east or west along the border if needed.
Mattis told reporters earlier on Wednesday that U.S. soldiers were making rapid progress erecting barriers along the border and estimated the first, construction phase of the U.S. military effort could be completed within 10 days.
Buchanan suggested troops would go home once they had fulfilled requests by CBP.
“At some point in time, I’m not going to keep troops here just to keep them here. When the work is done, we’re going to start downsizing some capability,” Buchanan said.
Buchanan would need to make any recommendations on redeployment of troops to General Terrence O’Shaughnessy, the head of U.S. Northern Command. O’Shaughnessy would then report to Mattis.
He suggested a recommendation could be made in the near future.
“I’m looking as early as next week to start thinking through rightsizing, if we need to change. Or do I need to shift (troops elsewhere on the border),” Buchanan said, without predicting when changes might occur.
Reporting by Phil Stewart; Editing by Mary Milliken and Peter Cooney
China has delivered a written response to U.S. demands for wide-ranging trade reforms, three U.S. government sources said on Wednesday, a move that could trigger more formal negotiations to resolve a withering trade war between the world’s top economies.
U.S. President Donald Trump has imposed tariffs on $250 billion of Chinese imports to force concessions from Beijing on the list of demands that would change the terms of trade between the two countries. China has responded with import tariffs on U.S. goods.
Trump is expected to meet Chinese President Xi Jinping on the sidelines of a G20 summit in Argentina at the end of November and in early December.
The U.S. president has repeatedly railed against Beijing over intellectual property theft, industrial subsidies, Chinese entry barriers to American businesses and the U.S. trade deficit with China.
Three U.S. government sources told Reuters on Wednesday that China had sent a response to U.S. demands on those and other issues, but gave no further details on its contents. It was unclear if the response contained concessions that would satisfy Trump’s demands for change.
While two industry sources familiar with the contents of the response said it was largely a restatement of previous Chinese commitments, it was seen as a necessary starting point for continued negotiations.
The two sides have been far apart during their months-long tariff dispute.
One of the sources briefed on China’s response said it reiterated pledges Xi has made in recent speeches, and demanded that the United States lift tariffs, including those set by the Section 232 investigation into steel and aluminum imports.
“They are not close to a favorable deal on trade. Not in the same universe,” the Washington-based source said.
A U.S. team led by Treasury Under Secretary David Malpass discussed trade issues with a Chinese team via videoconference on Tuesday, a U.S. Treasury spokesperson said on Wednesday.
JANUARY TARIFF TRIGGER
The United States had said it would not start formal negotiations on trade until it saw concrete proposals from China to address its concerns.
Earlier this month, after a phone conversation with Xi, Trump said he thought the United States would make a deal with China on trade but stood ready to levy more tariffs on Chinese goods if no progress is made.
Chinese Commerce Ministry spokesman Gao Feng, asked on Thursday about the Chinese response, said that “high-level” contact had resumed since Trump and Xi spoke by phone.
“Working teams are maintaining close contact to earnestly implement the consensus reached by the two leaders by telephone,” he told a regular weekly briefing.
The tariff rate on $200 billion in Chinese goods is set to increase to 25 percent from 10 percent on Jan. 1. Trump has also threatened to impose tariffs on all remaining Chinese imports, about $267 billion worth, if Beijing fails to address U.S. demands.
Future trade talks could hinge on whether or not tariffs rise on Jan. 1.
One scenario suggested by analysts is that Trump and Xi could agree to a ceasefire in Argentina that would prevent further tariffs from taking effect while negotiations continued.
U.S.-China Business Council President Craig Allen told Reuters last week that he thought it was likely China would withdraw from any process set at the G20 if the Trump administration went forward with raising the tariff rate.
The two countries resumed talks after the call between the two leaders, ending a three month hiatus that saw relations deteriorate as the United States accused China of interfering in U.S. domestic politics and seeking to undermine Trump.
U.S. Vice President Mike Pence said on Tuesday that Beijing needed to change its behavior to avoid a new cold war with the United States.
In comments made before the Chinese response, Wu Baiyi, the director of the Institute of American Studies at the state-run Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said that a Jan. 1 tariff increase would imperil efforts to reverse trade tensions.
“This is one of the major goals that they (Chinese officials) are working hard on – to prevent those tariffs from coming into force early next year. But it will depend on both sides.”
Additional reporting by Steve Holland and David Lawder in WASHINGTON and Michael Martina, Stella Qiu and Se Young Lee in BEIJING; Writing by Simon Webb; Editing by Tim Ahmann, Cynthia Osterman & Simon Cameron-Moore
A defense lawyer for Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman on Wednesday named some of the former close associates of the Mexican drug lord — including his alleged head of operations in Central America — who will likely testify against him at a U.S. trial.
Defense lawyer Jeffrey Lichtman said as part of his opening statement that he expected prosecutors to call Cesar Gastelum, Damaso Lopez and Miguel Angel Martinez, former drug traffickers who are now cooperating with authorities.
Gastelum moved tons of cocaine a week through Central America to Mexico for Guzman’s Sinaloa Cartel, the U.S. Treasury Department said in 2014. Gastelum was later arrested in Mexico and extradited to the United States.
Lopez was at one time seen as Guzman’s right-hand man before the two fell out over control of the cartel, according to media reports.
Prosecutors hope to prove that Guzman, 61, directed the flow of vast quantities of cocaine, marijuana, heroin and methamphetamine into the United States as the leader of the Sinaloa Cartel. He faces life in prison if convicted of the 17 criminal counts against him at a federal court in Brooklyn.
Identities of witnesses in the case had been kept under wraps, but they were disclosed to Guzman’s lawyers shortly before the trial began on Tuesday, a prosecutor said in court.
The trial is expected to last up to four months. Assistant U.S. Attorney Adam Fels told jurors in his opening statement Tuesday that it would trace the story of Guzman’s rise from a low-level marijuana trafficker to one of the most powerful drug lords in Mexico, leaving a trail of horrific violence in his wake.
Prosecutors on Wednesday asked U.S. District Judge Brian Cogan to strike from the record part of the defense’s opening statement in which it said Guzman was merely a scapegoat for Mexican drug lord Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada who was allowed to remain free by corrupt government officials.
Lichtman said the U.S. government and Zambada “work together when it suits them.”
Before summoning the jury into the courtroom, Cogan said he would not strike Lichtman’s statement but would instruct jurors to consider only the evidence of Guzman’s guilt, not prosecutors’ motives or whether they acted improperly.
The judge also warned Lichtman the evidence in the case was unlikely to support many of his claims.
“Your opening statement handed out a lot of promissory notes that your case is not going to be able to cash,” Cogan said.
Guzman was one of world’s most wanted fugitives until he was captured in January 2016 in his native Sinaloa in northwest Mexico. He was extradited to the United States a year later.
As well as smuggling drugs to the United States, the Sinaloa Cartel has played a major role in narco violence between rival gangs that has torn areas of Mexico apart and defied successive governments.
More than 200,000 people have been killed — many in cartel feuds — since the Mexican government sent troops in to take on the drug gangs in 2006.
Reporting by Jonathan Stempel in New York; Editing by Susan Thomas and Alistair Bell
French President Emmanuel Macron said on Wednesday two long-time allies like France and America should treat each other with respect and that France was a U.S. ally but not a vassal state, after U.S. President Donald Trump attacked him on Twitter.
In five posts sent on Tuesday after his visit to France, Trump blasted the key U.S. ally over its near defeat to Germany in two world wars, its wine industry and Macron’s approval ratings.
“At every moment of our history, we were allies, so between allies, respect is due,” Macron said, citing French support for America’s war of independence and U.S. support during the two world wars.
“I don’t think the French expect me to respond to tweets but to continue this important history,” he told TF1 in an interview on the Charles de Gaulle aircraft carrier.
Trump was only playing to a domestic audience, he added.
“I think he’s playing politics, and I let him play politics.”
Asked about his suggestion to build an European army, which Trump criticized in tweets last week, Macron said:
“The United States are our historic ally and will continue to be. It’s the ally with which we take all the risks, with which we carry out the most complicated operations. But being an ally doesn’t mean being a vassal state,” Macron said.
Can you imagine a world without heartbreak? Not without sadness, disappointment or regret – but a world without the sinking, searing, all-consuming ache of lost love. A world without heartbreak is also a world where simple acts cannot be transformed, as if by sorcery, into moments of sublime significance. Because a world without heartbreak is a world without love – isn’t it?
More precisely, it might be a world without love’s most adulated form: romantic love. For many people, romantic love is the pinnacle of human experience. But feelings don’t exist in a cultural void. The heartbreak-kind of love is a relatively new and culturally specific experience, masquerading as the universal meaning of life.
In Western culture, hegemonic romantic love is marked by what the American psychologist Dorothy Tennov in 1979 called ‘limerence’ or all-consuming romantic and sexual passion, which ideally evolves into a monogamous partnership and often marriage. Thus, in increasingly secular, unspiritual and atomised cultures, romantic love becomes deified.
Being in love, according to scientists, does have a biological basis, but how we experience it is not inevitable. For much of human history, what we call romantic love today would have been called an illness; marriage was about assets and reproduction.
The Industrial Revolution changed things. New economic realities and Enlightenment values about individual happiness meant that romantic love mattered. While marriage remained – and remains – closely tied to patriarchal control, it attained a new quality. Lifelong emotional, intellectual and sexual fulfilment – and monogamy for men, not only for women – became the ideal. Ever since, this kind of relationship has been propagated by capitalist culture.
The fact that heartbreak is linked to this recent romantic history is unlikely to be much comfort to those in despair. The fact that emotions are refracted through culture probably won’t reduce their potency.
There is little beside romantic love that many will pursue so doggedly, knowing it is likely to result in agony. Whether through conflict, betrayal or separation, love is almost certain to end in heartbreak. Even in ‘successful’ partnerships, someone’s going to die eventually. It’s no wonder heartbreak is readily accepted as the price of romantic love; we are socialised to believe that this kind of relationship is our raison d’être.
But heartbreak isn’t the only problem with our romantic scripts. Conventional romantic love is rooted in oppressive structures. Burdens of emotional and domestic labour still fall disproportionately on women. White, nondisabled, cis, monogamous, thin, heterosexual couples (ideally married with children) are held up as the loving ideal, with people who don’t fit this mould often discriminated against. Those who don’t have romantic or sexual partnerships at all, whether by choice or not, can feel alienated and alone, despite having other meaningful relationships.
Even if we could salvage romantic love from its worst bedfellows – for example, if we eliminated its heterosexism – the fact remains: it is likely to end in tears, even mental or physical illness. Worse still, perceptions of romantic love as overpowering mean it is used to explain violence.
What if there was a way to reap the depths and heights of love without the heartbreak?
Romantic love has the potential to cause agony because we give such unions immense weight over others. In this culture of love, romantic and sexual partnerships are elevated to such an extent that ‘relationship’ is usually shorthand for romantic. What about all the other relationships we might have in our lives?
The concept of ‘relationship anarchy’, coined in 2006 by the Swedish feminist and computer scientist Andie Nordgren, proposes that how we construct, conduct and prioritise our relationships should be up to us. It is not a libertarian ‘free-for-all’ philosophy, but one with empathy, communication and consent at its heart. It is distinct from nonmonogamy or polyamory; it might or might not contain elements of both. By questioning ‘commonsense’ ways of doing relationships, people can create bonds according to their beliefs, needs and desires. Crucially, relationship anarchy means that traditional romantic love is not automatically placed at the top of a hierarchy of ‘lesser’ relationships.
Although the concept of ‘anarchy’ is a radical one, a person guided by this approach might have a surprisingly ordinary life. For some, it might simply mean looking afresh at a cherished marriage, and deciding that life would be richer if friendships were similarly nurtured. Or realising that ‘the love of your life’ was not still to be found but in fact already there, waiting to be fostered, in yourself or in your community.
For others, engaging with relationship anarchy might mean making and remaking a life’s relationships from scratch. For instance, by freeing yourself from the notion that a romantic partnership must follow a predetermined path, and instead negotiating multiple, loving, ethically nonmonogamous relationships that might ebb and flow over time. It could mean deciding to raise children within a platonic, emotionally intimate relationship between three people, and having sexual connections outside of this – or none at all.
So the idea that everyone is unique becomes extended, and when every relationship is unique the possibilities are endless. Once we permit ourselves to question love, it appears not only ludicrous but authoritarian that the infinitely complex arena of human relationships would suit a ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach.
Courtesy: Reddit
It isn’t hard to see how relationship anarchy might alleviate heartbreak. It is widely accepted that having good friends to ‘fall back on’ helps to heal a broken heart. But in relationship anarchy, friends are more than insurance policy. We wouldn’t drop friends while ‘coupled up’, only to pick them up when sending out wedding invitations, or nursing heartbreak. Instead, we’d consistently honour all our valued bonds. If we granted our varied relationships more of the investment we usually grant disproportionately to one person, those bonds would likely become just as vital to our hearts’ health as any romantic or sexual partner.
Relationship anarchists can create a ‘love life’ that is not dependent on one romantic partner who is ‘their world’, but on a tapestry of profound connections – whether platonic, romantic or sexual. As Nordgren writes in her manifesto, ‘love is abundant’, not a ‘limited resource that can only be real if restricted to a couple’. Redistributing love does not dilute the love we feel for a particular, dear person. Indeed, building a network of intimate connections can strengthen them all – in part because it strengthens our relationship with ourselves.
Relationship anarchy won’t eliminate heartbreak – but we probably wouldn’t want it to. That depth of feeling is often beautiful, and responsible for much of the arts. Like love itself, heartbreak excavates souls and decimates egos, forcing us to look at our deepest crevices and learn things we might not otherwise. In heartbreak’s seemingly merciless grip, we have a rare opportunity for rebirth.
Surely, a world without heartbreak is a world without the kind of vulnerability that makes us know we’re alive. Just as surely, being conscious about how we relate to ourselves and to others – rather than automatically privileging one relationship type – can empower us to build a life so rich that we don’t feel as if we’ve lost ‘everything’ when we lose one love among many.
By Sophie Hemery
This article was originally published at Aeon and has been republished under Creative Commons.
A "super-Earth" has been discovered orbiting the closest single star to our Sun, scientists said Wednesday in a breakthrough that could shine a light on Earth's nearest planetary neighbours.
Astronomers studied Barnard's Star, a red dwarf just six light years away -- practically in our back garden, galactically speaking -- and noticed the presence of a "frozen, dimly lit world" at least 3.2 times heavier than Earth.
The planet, known for now as Barnard's Star b, is the second nearest to Earth outside the solar system and orbits its host star once every 233 days.
"It's important because it's really our next door neighbor and we like to meet our neighbors in general," Ignasi Ribas, from the Institute of Space Studies of Catalonia and Spain's Institute of Space Sciences, told AFP.
Despite being relatively close to its parent star, the planet receives less than two percent of the energy Earth gets from the Sun, and the team estimates it has a surface temperature of -170 degrees Celsius (-274 Farenheit) -- far too cold to support life as we know it.
"It's definitely not in the habitable zone, no liquid water. If it has any water or gas this is probably in solid form so that's why we call it frozen," said Ribas.
- Darkness of a Red Dwarf -
European Southern Observatory/AFP / HandoutDespite being relatively close to its parent star, the planet receives less than two percent of the energy Earth gets from the Sun
In mankind's bid to map the planets in the night sky, most historic research has focused on brighter, newer stars, which produce more light and increase the chances of scientists noticing anything orbiting them.
But since Barnard's Star is a red dwarf, a small and cooling star probably about twice as old as the Sun, it produces relatively little light making it hard to discern any bodies in its orbit.
To find Barnard's Star b, Ribas and the team studied more than 20 years' worth of observations from seven separate instruments.
They then used a phenomenon known as the Doppler effect to track the impact of its gravitational pull on its parent star.
Astronomers can use this technique to measure a planet's velocity and, therefore, mass.
"We have all worked very hard on this breakthrough," said Guillem Anglada Escude, from London's Queen Mary University, who co-authored the study published in the journal Nature.
- 'Mini-Neptune'? -
European Southern Observatory/AFP / HandoutA handout from the European Southern Observatory shows the location (circled in red) of Barnard's Star
The team worked with the European Southern Observatory using astronomical instruments so accurate they can detect changes in a star's velocity as small as 3.5 kilometers (2.2 miles) per hour -- a gentle walking pace.
It's thought that Barnard's Star is tearing through space at around 500,000 km/h, making it the fastest-moving known object in the universe.
Ribas said that although stargazers could predict its size and orbit with relative accuracy using the Doppler effect, any attempt at this stage to find out what the new planet looked like would be "guesswork".
"It's sort of in a fuzzy area with respect to its properties. We've seen planets of this mass be rocky, meaning that it could look like Earth with a solid surface with potentially some atmosphere or some frozen layer on top," he said.
"Or it may be what we call a mini-Neptune, like a scaled-down version of the gas giants of our solar system."
It might be cold, inhospitable and all but invisible but the new planet has one thing going for it: it's really close.
The only known exoplanet closer to Earth was discovered in 2016 orbiting one of a cluster of stars in the Alpha Centauri system, just over four light years away.
"There's not so many stars in our immediate neighborhood. The investment to find them is expensive," said Ribas.
"It's really near and therefore if you have the hope -- like I do -- of eventually seeing these planets to study them in detail we have to start with the immediate ones. It could lead potentially to other discoveries."
U.S. President Donald Trump should have shown some “common decency” and respect France’s day of mourning on the third anniversary of the Nov 13 attacks in Paris, the French government’s spokesman said on Wednesday.
Asked about Trump’s tweets, in which the U.S. leader criticized France’s record in World War One and Two, French government spokesman Benjamin Griveaux said:
“Yesterday was Nov 13, we were commemorating the murder of 130 of our people,” he said. “So I’ll reply in English: ‘common decency’ would have been appropriate.”
The Kremlin hit out Wednesday at the "unpredictability" of the United States under the Trump administration, saying it was causing "deep global concern".
"The fact that America has become unpredictable lately is no secret to anyone," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told Dozhd TV during a visit by President Vladimir Putin to a regional summit in Singapore.
"Such unpredictability from the largest country, the most powerful economy in the world, is the subject of deep global concern," he added.
Peskov's comments come two weeks ahead of a slated face-to-face between President Donald Trump and Putin at a G20 summit in Argentina.
Relations between the two countries have hit new lows with American officials planning to roll out fresh sanctions against Moscow in response to the botched poisoning of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal in Britain.
Western governments have accused Russia of being behind the plot which saw Skripal and his daughter poisoned with a nerve agent. Two British citizens were also poisoned, one of whom died.
Moscow has denied being behind the brazen hit and has condemned efforts to sanction it over the incident.
"We do not recognise these unilateral restrictions... and we consider them illegitimate," Peskov said of the threatened sanctions, adding they would only "further complicate" Russia-US relations.
World leaders are currently meeting in Singapore, which is hosting the annual Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) summit.
Trump is not at the gathering and has sent Vice President Mike Pence instead.
Peskov said "no separate meeting" was currently planned between Putin and Pence. But he added that there was no need for a face-to-face given Trump and Putin will soon meet in Buenos Aires.
The State Board of Education is meeting this week to finalize changes to social studies curriculum, part of an effort that began 10 months ago in response to teacher feedback that the standards included too much material to cover in a school year.
The Texas State Board of Education backed a motion Tuesday evening to reinsert Hillary Clinton into the state's 11th-grade U.S. History standards, two months after voting to remove the 2016 Democratic presidential nominee from the state's curriculum. In a separate action Tuesday, the board backed restoring disability rights advocate Helen Keller to the state's third-grade social studies curriculum standards.
Clinton's deletion from the high school U.S. history curriculum appeared likely to stand Tuesday, as she was not mentioned during the public hearing of the board's Tuesday meeting. But after a lengthy discussion, the board voted 12-2 to back a motion to reinsert Clinton into the curriculum. A final vote on the issue will come Friday.
In response to a motion by Board Member Erika Beltran, D-Fort Worth, to reinsert Clinton into the standards, fellow Board member Marty Rowley, R-Amarillo, referenced “tons of public comment” that he’d received before Tuesday's meeting. “I don’t agree, obviously, with her politics,” said Rowley. “I just think she qualifies as significant.“
The state board is meeting this week to finalize the changes to social studies curriculum, part of a streamlining effort that began 10 months ago in response to teacher feedback that the standards included too much material to cover in a school year. Work groups made up of teachers, historians and curriculum experts were tasked with cutting repetitive and unnecessary requirements out of the social studies standards. The board was set to take preliminary votes on the changes Tuesday after an afternoon discussion.
After hours of public testimony Tuesday, the board approved amendments restoring references to Keller and the importance of Women Airforce Service Pilots, or WASPs, in World War II.
Gabrielle Caldwell, a 17-year-old deaf-blind student, testified before the board with her mother, Robbie, urging board members to reconsider striking Helen Keller’s name from the standards.
“Without broad academic knowledge of Helen Keller, deaf-blind students like my daughter cease to exist,” said Robbie Caldwell, a member of the Deaf-Blind Multihandicapped Association of Texas, a disability rights advocacy group for parents of disabled children.
Gabrielle Caldwell, 17 (right), who testified before the State Board of Education on keeping Helen Keller in mandatory curriculum, is shown with her mother, Robbie, on Nov. 13, 2018. Bob Daemmrich for The Texas Tribune
After the Caldwells’ testimony, board chair Donna Bahorich was visibly emotional as she thanked them for their presence at the board meeting.Even ahead of the vote to restore Helen Keller to the curriculum, board members were expressing a willingness to reconsider her removal.
“I’ve lost a lot of sleep about that,” Pat Hardy, a Fort Worth Republican who represents SBOE District 11, told the Tribune earlier Tuesday. “Helen’s back in.”
Jane O’Brien, who described herself as the parent of a child with a learning difference, called Helen Keller “an important reminder for teachers to not underestimate their students.” Texas has a problematic history with regard to disability rights, said O’Brien, referencing the state’s current legal battle with the U.S. Department of Education for decreasing special education funding.
Thais have reacted with shock and anger after a 13-year-old boxer died during a charity bout, reviving calls for a ban on fights between children in the brutal Muay Thai martial art.
Thai boxing is hugely popular in the country and many fighters enter the sport at a young age in search of fame and fortune.
But the involvement of kids who sometimes start under 10 years of age in bouts that use kicks and elbows to the head -- often without headguards -- has stirred frequent criticism.
More so as the young fighters are often family breadwinners from poor families and bouts are subject to frenzied ringside gambling.
Anucha Tasako collapsed after his opponent delivered several blows to his head at a bout in Samut Prakan province, near Bangkok, on November 10.
AFP/File / MADAREE TOHLALAThai boxing is hugely popular in the country and bouts are subject to frenzied ringside gambling
Smartphone footage shown by local media captured the grim moment he hit the canvas as assistants quickly rushed into the ring to help the motionless Anucha, who fought under the alias Phetmongkol Sor Wilaithong.
He later died from a brain haemorrhage, according to police.
Domestic media said he had been fighting since he was eight and had competed in more than 150 bouts.
His opponent, Nitikron Sonde, is around the same age, police said. He took to Facebook to express his sorrow at the death.
"I regret it," he posted on Tuesday, "but I have to do my duty to win so I can make enough money to sponsor myself through education."
Neither fighter was wearing protective headgear.
A bill to prevent minors aged under 12 from taking part is under consideration.
AFP/File / NICOLAS ASFOURIA bill to prevent minors aged under 12 from taking part in brutal Muay Thai boxing bouts is under consideration in Thailand
The draft bill is likely to gain support after Anucha's death.
Outrage and anger poured in as news of his death spread, with some blaming the referee for not stepping in sooner to end the fight.
"He could barely stand. Why didn't the referee stop the fight but let him continue to be hit until he was knocked down," one Thai Facebook user said.
Thailand's Minister of Tourism and Sports was quoted in local media saying he would submit the draft bill "as soon as possible".
But some defended the practice of starting fighters young.
"I don't agree with the draft law to totally ban boxers who are under 12 years old because 99 percent of the famous Thai boxers and Olympic winners began fighting when they were young," Tawee Umpornmaha, 59, a Thai Olympic medalist, told AFP, describing the boy's death as an accident.
"I began at 12 with more than 200 fights. The question is do we have proper safety measures? We must give importance to safety measures including field doctors," he said.
Three months after her death and 46 years after she first recorded it, Aretha Franklin’s live gospel concert is coming to the big screen.
“Amazing Grace,” filmed in January 1972 when the Queen of Soul was just 29 years old, follows Franklin over two nights giving a concert at the New Missionary Baptist Church in Los Angeles.
Belting out gospel songs like “What a Friend We Have in Jesus,” “Climbing Higher Mountains” and an 11-minute version of “Amazing Grace,” Franklin brought churchgoers and guests (including Rolling Stones frontman Mick Jagger) to their feet.
But Franklin herself stands still, saying little in the 90-minute film.
“It’s a church service. It’s basically just our aunt standing there singing,” Sabrina Owens, Franklin’s niece and executor of her estate, told Reuters Television.
“She doesn’t have much conversation with anybody beyond some of the technical crews that’s around her. At some point she asked about a key and other point she asked about water, but she’s just basically standing there singing, giving her all, doing what she does best,” said Owens, who is also a producer on the film.
The service was released as an album in 1972, becoming a best-seller for Franklin. But the film languished for years over problems with synchronizing the visuals and the audio. Advances in technology made it possible to fix that issue and producer Alan Elliott, who took over the project some 10 years ago, got agreement from Franklin’s estate following the singer’s death in August to finally release the film.
Owens said Elliott told her about the film some three years ago. “I had never even heard about it and he sent me the link, and I was like, ‘Oh wow! This is really good’.”
“Amazing Grace” got its world premiere in New York on Monday, winning warm reviews, and will get a limited release in the city and in Los Angeles in late November and early December, making it eligible for Hollywood’s awards season.
Britain’s Guardian newspaper said the film is “a spine-tingling sensation” while the Hollywood Reporter called it “somewhat shapeless as a movie... But it does contain moments of bliss.”
Reporting by Alicia Powell; Editing by Lisa Shumaker
European Southern Observatory/AFP / Handout
European Southern Observatory/AFP / Handout/https://static.texastribune.org/media/files/2d5779a9ae12175382aa38beee2703fd/SBOE_hearing_1_Nov_13_BD_TT.jpg)
AFP/File / MADAREE TOHLALA
AFP/File / NICOLAS ASFOURI