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June
Italy thirsts for tourists as country reopens to Europe
Written by nuke
photo : italy
Italy reopened to travelers from Europe on Wednesday (3/6), three months after going into corona-virus lockdown, but sparse arrivals dimmed hopes of reviving the key tourism industry as the summer season begins. As quoted by AFP.com ( 03/6),Gondolas are ready to punt along Venice's canals; lovers can act out "Romeo and Juliet" on Verona's famed balcony, and gladiator fans can pose for selfies at Rome's Colosseum.Prime Minister of Italy, Giuseppe Conte said that his country was clearly on the mend, adding latest contagion data was "encouraging. He added that the time had come to lure tourists back and there's enthusiasm in the air, a renewed sociability//AFP
June
Mexican zoo saves endangered animals by virus crisis
Written by nuke
photo : gulftoday
Kira, a two and a half year-old tigress, arrived at a zoo in Mexico's northeast in April after her owner could no longer feed her due to the corona-virus-induced economic collapse. As quoted by AFP.com (03/6), the imposing 130-kilogram tigress was sedated and transported in a cage by truck to her new home in Culiacan zoo in Sinaloa state. Her owner had responded to a campaign by Mexico's Association of Zoos, Nurseries and Aquariums (AZCARM) to avoid abandoning wild animals during the lockdown. President of AZCARM, Ernesto Zazueta stated that abandonment happens when people can't cope with their animals any more, and in this pandemic, faced with the lack of economic resources and places to keep them, they prefer to get rid of them//AFP
June
Australia undergoes its first recession within 29 years as March quarter GDP shrinks
Written by nuke
photo : bloomberg
Gross Domestic Products -GDP figures from the Bureau of Statistics show Australia's economy shrank 0.3 per cent in the March quarter amid bushfires and the early stages of the coronavirus pandemic. Economists widely define a recession as two consecutive quarters of GDP contraction, which are now certain to occur. The last time Australia recorded two consecutive negative quarters for GDP: March and June in 1991, dubbed by then treasurer Paul Keating as "The recession we had to have". Even before, the full effect of the coronavirus hit, Australia's economy recorded its slowest annual growth in more than a decade, according to the ABS. During a press confrence in Canberraon Wednesday (03/06/20), The Australian Treasurer, Josh Frydenberg said thatthe economy would shrink even further next quarter, meaning Australia has entered a technical recession.
“…It was in this quarter — the March quarter — that consumer and business confidence fell to its lowest level on record. That the ASX 200 lost a third of its value and, on the 16th of March, saw its biggest daily fall of 9.7 per cent on record. When combined with the ongoing drought, which saw farm GDP fall by 2.4 per cent in the quarter, and the devastating impact of the fires that were raging across many states, one looks back on the March quarter, and there wasn't much good news.Seen in this context, the fact that the Australian economy only contracted by 0.3 per cent shows the Australian economy's remarkable resilience” Frydenberg said.
Josh Frydenberg added that Australia's performance in the March quarter was very good compared to other countries with negative growth of 9.8 per cent in China, 5.3 per cent in France, 2.2 per cent in Germany, 2 per cent in the United Kingdom and 1.3 per cent in the United States. Although the economy fell, Australia enters this crisis moment from position of economic strength.
“…Today national account show once again that in the face of a one in a hundred year global pandemic the Australian economy has been remarkbly resilient. We entered this economic crisis and health crisis from the position of economic stregth. Growth was rising and unemployement had falling to 5,1 percent in february, 1,5 million new job was created and the badge was back in balance for the first time in 11 years. The streght gives us the fiscal fire power to respond as we have done" Frydenberg explain.
The Australian Treasury is contemplating a fall in GDP of more than 20 per cent in the June quarter. This was the economists' version of Armageddon. Partly offsetting the falls were a rise in government spending, which added 0.3 percentage points to growth, and net trade, which contributed 0.5 percentage points as imports slumped while commodity exports held up reasonably well.(NK)
June
Democratic Republic of Congo reports fresh Ebola outbreak
Written by nuke
photo : UNnews
The Democratic Republic of the Congo reported a fresh Ebola outbreak in its northwest on Monday (June1), the latest health emergency for a country already fighting an epidemic of the deadly fever in the east as well as a surging number of coronavirus infections. As quoted by AFP.com, the 11th Ebola outbreak in the vast central African country's history comes just weeks before it had hoped to declare the end of the 10th in the east. Health Minister Eteni Longondo said that "four people have already died" from Ebola in a district of the northwestern city of Mbandaka. Minister Longondo told a press conference on Monday that the National Institute of Biomedical Research (INRB) has confirmed to me that samples from Mbandaka tested positive for Ebola. He said the Ministry will send them the vaccine and medicine very quickly and plan to visit the site of the outbreak at the end of the week//AFP
June
Thousands face homelessness in Greek refugee relocation push
Written by nuke
photo : wesa
Abdelkader Rahmoun hasn't slept in days. The 44-year-old Syrian and his family are among thousands of recognised refugees about to lose the temporary homes they were given under Greece's asylum seeker housing scheme. As quoted by AFP.com as of Monday(June1), authorities will start moving more than 11,200 people out of flats, hotels and camps on the mainland, to make room for other asylum seekers currently living in dismal island camps. Rahmoun's family has been given until the end of June to vacate his small EU-funded flat in the port of Piraeus. But he has little confidence that later they will find alternative accommodation//AFP
June
Clashes outside White House as US cities under curfew
Written by nuke
photo : malaymail
Police fired tear gas outside the White House late Sunday as anti-racism protestors again took to the streets to voice fury at police brutality, and major US cities were put under curfew to suppress rioting. As quoted by AFP.com (June1) with the Trump administration branding instigators of six nights of rioting as domestic terrorists, there were more confrontations between protestors and police and fresh outbreaks of looting. Violent clashes erupted repeatedly in a small park next to the White House, with authorities using tear gas, pepper spray and flash bang grenades to disperse crowds who lit several large fires and damaged property. Local US leaders appealed to citizens to give constructive outlet to their rage over the death of an unarmed black man in Minneapolis, while night-time curfews were imposed in cities including Washington, Los Angeles and Houston//AFP
June
Iran says US talks 'futile', denounces black American's death
Written by Ani Hasanah
People gather outside the Hennepin County Government Center to protest the death of George Floyd, an unarmed black man, arrested by police officers in Minneapolis, Minnesota, US. May 28, 2020. (Reuters/Eric Miller)
Iran's new parliament speaker said Sunday any negotiations with Washington would
be "futile" as he denounced the death of a black American that has led to violent protests across the US.
Mohammad-Bagher Ghalibaf, a former commander of the Revolutionary Guards' air force, was elected speaker on Thursday of a chamber dominated by ultra-conservatives following February elections.
The newly formed parliament "considers negotiations with and appeasement of America, as the axis of global arrogance, to be futile and harmful," he said in his first major speech to the chamber.
Ghalibaf also vowed revenge for the US drone attack in January that killed Qasem Soleimani, the commander of the Guards' foreign operations arm.
"Our strategy in confronting the terrorist America is to finish the revenge for martyr Soleimani's blood," he told lawmakers, pledging "the total expulsion of America's terrorist army from the region".
Ghalibaf has also slammed the US over the death of George Floyd, an unarmed black man, during an arrest in Minneapolis which has led to widespread protests across the country.
Tens of thousands of protesters have taken to the streets from New York to Seattle demanding tougher, first-degree murder charges and more arrests over the death of Floyd, who stopped breathing after Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin knelt on his neck for nearly nine minutes.
Decades-old tensions between Tehran and Washington have soared in the past year, with the sworn arch enemies twice appearing to come to the brink of a direct confrontation.
The tensions have been rising since 2018, when President Donald Trump withdrew the US from a landmark nuclear accord and began reimposing crippling sanctions on Iran's economy.
That was followed by the US drone strike near Baghdad airport in January that killed Soleimani, a hugely popular figure in the Islamic republic.
Days later, Iran fired a barrage of missiles at US troops stationed in Iraq in retaliation, but Trump opted against taking any military action in response.
Ghalibaf called for ties to be improved with neighbours and with "great powers who were friends with us in hard times and share significant strategic relations", without naming them.
The 58-year-old Ghalibaf is a three-time presidential candidate who lost out to the incumbent Hassan Rouhani at the last election in 2017.
The newly elected speaker had also served as Tehran mayor and the Islamic republic's police chief before taking up his latest post.
In a tweet on Saturday, he slammed what he called the United States' "unjust political, judicial, and economic structure".
This had been "pumping war, coups, poverty, indiscrimination, torture, fratricide and moral corruption to the world, and racism, hunger, humiliation, and 'choking by knee' in its own country for hundreds of years", Ghalibaf said.
"What can one call it if not the Great Satan?" he added, using Iran's term for its arch enemy.
Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif echoed his remarks on Twitter.
"Some don't think #BlackLivesMatter. To those of us who do: it is long overdue for the entire world to wage war against racism. Time for a #WorldAgainstRacism," he said.
The post was accompanied by an image of a 2018 statement by US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in which the text was changed to be critical of the United States instead of Iran.
The altered text read: "The US government is squandering its citizens' resources.
"The people of America are tired of the racism, corruption, injustice, and incompetence from their leaders. The world hears their voice."
Pompeo responded to Zarif by tweeting that "you hang homosexuals, stone women and exterminate Jews", without elaborating further. (JP)
May
F1 season to open in Austria after government backs Spielberg double act
Written by nuke
photo : F1 experiences
Formula One's truncated coronavirus-hit season, will finally get underway with the Austrian Grand Prix on July 5, the Austrian government announced on Saturday. The Spielberg circuit has also been given the green light to stage a second race the following weekend. Austrian Health Minister Rudolf Anschober announced that the two Formula One races on July 5 and 12 at Spielberg will be staged without spectators. He said that the two races had been approved after F1 organisers had presented a complete and professional plan, to combat the spread of COVID-19. The F1 season was thrown into chaos, with the cancellation of the traditional curtain-raising Australian Grand Prix in March, only hours before practice was due to begin. Melbourne was one of 10 races either cancelled or postponed, yet F1 boss Chase Carey believes a 15-18 race season is still possible. The 2020 F1 season was to have featured a record 22 races, now it is set to be one of the shortest campaigns for over a decade//AFP
May
NASA resumes human spaceflight from U.S. soil with historic SpaceX launch
Written by nuke
photo : youtube
SpaceX, the private rocket company of billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk, launched two Americans toward orbit from Florida on Saturday, in a mission that marks the first spaceflight of NASA astronauts from U.S. soil in nine years. A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket lifted off from the Kennedy Space Center at 3:22 p.m. EDT or 1922 GMT, launching Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken, on a 19-hour ride aboard the company’s newly designed Crew Dragon capsule bound for the International Space Station. Crew Dragon separated from its second stage booster at 3:35 and minutes later entered orbit. The craft launched from the same pad used by NASA’s final space shuttle flight, piloted by Hurley, in 2011. Since then, NASA astronauts have had to hitch rides into orbit aboard Russia’s Soyuz spacecraft//Reuters
May
Afghan reporter killed as govt says ready for Taliban dialogue
Written by nuke
photo : DW
A roadside bomb killed a television journalist in Kabul on Saturday, soon after a top Afghan official appointed to lead peace talks with the Taliban, said his team was ready for the long-delayed dialogue. The blast, which targeted a minibus carrying 15 employees of private television channel Khurshid TV, was claimed by the Islamic State group, according to SITE Intelligence which monitors jihadist activity. The attack, which the government called "heinous", claimed the lives of a reporter and a driver, and punctuated an overall reduction in violence that has followed on from a three-day ceasefire the Taliban instigated May 24. Just hours before the blast, Afghanistan's former chief executive Abdullah Abdullah, who has been appointed to head talks with the Taliban, said his team was positioned to start dialogue. Abdullah credited the general lull in violence for setting the tone for discussions//AFP