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Boeing lawyers have publicly disclosed the strategy to transfer the cases out of the U.S., which could save the company millions.
November 10, 2019Read More
The announcement comes after an audit found “clear manipulation” of a computer system, which affected the final count of October’s vote. Unrest prompted by fraud allegations has led to three deaths.
November 10, 2019Read More
CIDAHU, Indonesia — Thousands of children with crippling birth defects. Half a million people poisoned. A toxic chemical found in the food supply. Accusations of a government cover-up and police officers on the take.This is the legacy of Indonesia’s mercury trade, a business intertwined with the lucrative and illegal production of gold.More than a hundred nations have joined a global campaign to reduce the international trade in mercury, an element so toxic there is “no known safe level of exposure,” according to health experts.But that effort has backfired in Indonesia, where illicit backyard manufacturers have sprung up to supply wildcat miners and replace mercury that was previously imported from abroad. Now, Indonesia produces so much black-market mercury that it has become a major global supplier, surreptitiously shipping thousands of tons to other parts of the world.Much of the mercury is destined for use in gold mining in Africa and Asia, passing through hubs such as Dubai and Singapore, according to court records — and the trade has deadly consequences.”It is a public health crisis,” said Yuyun Ismawati, a co-founder of an Indonesian environmental group, Nexus3 Foundation, and a recipient of the 2009 Goldman Environmental Prize. She has called for a worldwide ban on using mercury in gold mining.Mercury can be highly dangerous as it accumulates up the food chain, causing a wide range of disorders, including birth defects, neurological problems and even death.Today, despite the risks, small-scale miners using mercury operate in about 80 countries in Asia, Africa and the Americas. They produce up to 25% of all gold sold.As gold makes its way around the world, so too does mercury — poisoning the air and food of people thousands of miles away. Small-scale gold mining is the largest single source of mercury pollution.A recent study of women on 24 remote islands found that more than half displayed high mercury levels. The women lived far from sources of mercury pollution but ate a diet rich in fish. In the United States, contaminated fish is the No. 1 source of mercury poisoning.Indonesia, the world’s fourth most populous nation, stands out for its huge number of outlaw gold miners and for concerns that some law enforcement officials assigned to police the trade are instead profiting from it.As much as anyone, Cece Rifa’i, a former miner, is responsible for Indonesia’s mercury boom and spreading the scourge of contamination across the country.But he has no regrets.”I don’t feel guilty about anything,” he said from the veranda of his two-story home on the island of Java.For years, Cece was a pioneer in a network of illegal mercury producers, traders and smugglers who supply gold miners across Indonesia with mercury, used to extract gold from crushed ore.On a single day, operating a furnace he constructed in his backyard, he could produce a ton of black-market mercury worth more than $20,000, he said.For decades, Indonesia got most of its mercury legally from the United States and Europe. But recognizing the harm it was doing, Western countries began reducing mercury exports six years ago.Since 2013, 114 countries, including Indonesia, have signed on to the Minamata Convention, a treaty that took effect in 2017 and that requires participating nations to reduce the export and use of mercury in a variety of industries.Nevertheless, United Nations trade data shows that Indonesia became a significant exporter of mercury from 2015 to 2017, peaking at more than 320 tons in 2016.Yuyun, the environmentalist, estimates that illicit manufacturers in Indonesia produce more than 10,000 tons of mercury a year. About a third is used in gold mining in Indonesia, she said, the rest smuggled overseas.The government banned the use of mercury in gold mining in 2014, but has done little to curb its use, clean up contaminated sites or warn the public of the danger.In surveys of 24 hot spots, the Nexus3 Foundation and a team of independent doctors found more than 700 cases of suspected mercury poisoning, including children with birth defects and villagers with irreversible neurological disorders. At least 45 have died.Based on these studies, the environmental group estimates that decades of mining have poisoned 500,000 people.The mercury trade is lucrative, but the gold business it supports is far more profitable. By some estimates, Indonesia’s illicit small-scale gold miners produce as much as $5 billion a year.Poverty is widespread in Indonesia, and many people, jobless and desperate, have flocked to the gold fields.As miners, they often live outside the law, digging for ore on land without permission or government permits, sometimes in national parks and protected areas.To extract gold, the miners mix liquid mercury with crushed ore. Gold in the ore binds with the mercury to produce an amalgam of the metals. The miners heat the small lump with a blowtorch, sending mercury vapors into the air and leaving the gold behind.Many miners like the method because it gives them a quick return.But in mining communities, airborne mercury levels can be dangerously high. Wastewater containing mercury finds its way into fields, streams and bays, contaminating rice, fruit and fish, studies show.Government officials have known about mercury-related health problems in the gold fields since at least 2012, Yuyun said, but they have not warned residents about the dangers of consuming potentially contaminated rice and fish.Last year, Indonesia’s Ministry of Environment and Forestry conducted tests in seven mining communities and identified 558 adults and children with high mercury levels, many with severe exposure. The sampling also found high levels in rice.But the ministry has yet to notify subjects of their test results or issue a public warning for fear of setting off panic over the safety of the food supply.”It’s a crime to deliberately conceal the damning results,” said Yuyun, the lead researcher on small-scale mining at the International Pollutants Elimination Network. “People are dying and have little access to any effective treatment. The government has to stop the mercury trade and clean up the mess.”Environment Ministry officials declined to be interviewed and did not respond to written questions.Officials in the office of Indonesia’s president, Joko Widodo, acknowledged that mercury contamination is a serious problem and said he had issued a national action plan that calls for cleaning up four hot spots.The president also has directed police and military commanders to take action against personnel found to be involved in the illegal metals trade. Officials said they were unaware of anyone being disciplined. Spokesmen for the national police and the military declined to be interviewed.Officials say the public has been warned about mercury’s dangers, but there is little evidence of this in mining areas. Many miners insist it is not hazardous.The role of corrupt officials in the gold and mercury trade is widely recognized but seldom addressed by the government.Some members of the police and military are said to finance gold mining operations, extort protection money, oversee their own mines and ensure the safe transit of mercury and gold. Many tons of mercury seized by the police have gone missing.”When we went to the field and talked to the people there, they admitted that the police gave them the mercury,” said Putu Selly Andayani, head of the West Nusa Tenggara Province Trade Agency. “They said the police helped them to set up the illegal mining.”Throughout the country, miners work with mercury in plain sight without fear of punishment. The occasional arrests of furnace workers and smugglers have barely dented the supply.Mercury remains cheap and plentiful in the gold fields, where it is sold in mining supply shops or by dealers who travel from village to village. Dozens of Indonesian websites offer mercury for sale.One international smuggler arrested last year was Chander Hass Khera, an Indian citizen. Seized documents show that he shipped 9.7 tons of mercury to South Africa, Thailand and India in 2017.Last year, he bought an additional 3.8 tons from a dozen traders, said Dyah Paramita, a researcher at the Center for Regulation Policy and Governance in West Java, who reviewed court records.Soon after the smuggler’s arrest, most of his confiscated mercury disappeared from police custody. The police told the court they were investigating.Khera was sentenced to 18 months in prison for trying to ship mercury produced without proper permits.Like methamphetamine labs in rural America, mercury distillation often takes place in remote areas, far from prying eyes.Cece, 64, the prolific backyard mercury producer, began mining gold as a young man.In 2010, as wildcat mining boomed, he said he started searching for cinnabar, the ore from which liquid mercury is produced.Inspired by his years vaporizing mercury by blowtorch, he constructed a simple concrete furnace with a narrow trench in the center for a wood fire, steel buckets to heat the reddish ore and fixtures to capture the mercury as it cooled and liquefied.His home in Sukabumi Regency in western Java is an unlikely spot for this backyard industry. A picturesque area of rice paddies and simple villages, there is no cinnabar ore or nearby highway. There is not even a road to Cece’s house in Cidahu village.But on his patio, Cece built a furnace so large it could produce a ton of mercury in 24 hours.He arranged to have cinnabar shipped from distant islands, often using express courier services.He hired local men — “robbers, thieves and hit men,” he called them — to work the furnace.Local police officers and health officials visited frequently, sometimes taking water samples. On each visit, he said, he gave them “pocket money.”The inspectors found no health problems.On one occasion, he said, he demonstrated his furnace to a high-ranking police official from Jakarta.Soon dozens of copycat furnaces began appearing in Sukabumi and on islands closer to the cinnabar mines, helping flood the black market with cheap mercury.”We all know that he is the pioneer,” said, Alung, 35, who learned the business working for Cece. Like many Indonesians, he uses one name.The police cracked down on mercury producers in Sukabumi in 2017, shutting down three dozen furnaces and arresting about 100 people, including Cece.He and nearly all the others avoided jail by agreeing to stop making mercury. Cece dismantled his furnace.The police seized nearly a ton of mercury from three furnaces in the village. Cece and Alung suspect the police sold it because they brought their own containers to haul it away.Before the crackdown, mercury production meant jobs.Whatever the health hazard, the work paid better than anything else, and they were disappointed when the furnaces were shut down.”We know it’s dangerous,” Alung said. “But we’re sad. We no longer have the income.”This article originally appeared in The New York Times.(C) 2019 The New York Times Company
November 10, 2019Read More
By calling Warren’s approach “condescending,” “angry” and elitist, Biden and his allies are making a risky case against a female candidate. He says the criticism has nothing to do with gender.
November 10, 2019Read More
A roadside blast wounded five Italian military members Sunday in northern Iraq as they returned from a mission aimed at helping Iraqi troops combat the Islamic State group, Italian military officials said. The Italian Defense Ministry said three of th…
November 10, 2019Read More
Protesters displayed the balloon of a giant baby Donald Trump during the president’s visit to a football game in Alabama.
November 10, 2019Read More
The United States is seemingly running out of time to re-establish talks with North Korea, and South Korea says Washington is “very actively” trying to make that doesn’t happen.A year-end deadline for the U.S. to show more flexibility in denuclearization talks with North Korea set by Pyongyang earlier this year is fast approaching. Chung Eui-yong, a South Korean national security adviser, said Sunday that Seoul is taking the date “very seriously,” adding that the government was in coordination with the United States. But, so far, after the most recent round of talks failed in October, there hasn’t been much movement. “Only if talks between high-rank officials happen and lead to substantial progress, will the third North Korea-United States summit be possible,” Chung told reporters, per Reuters.North Korea acknowledged Friday that the window for talks was indeed closing. Pyongyang, however, did not elaborate on what would happen after the deadline, so it’s unclear if there would be any chance of reviving talks at a later date. Of course, it’s possible that it’s mainly a negotiating tactic, though it sounds like Washington and Seoul would prefer not to wait and see. Read more at Reuters.More stories from theweek.com Schiff rejects GOP requests for Hunter Biden, whistleblower to testify 5 brutal cartoons about Trump’s environmental assault Someone made a font out of gerrymandered congressional districts
November 10, 2019Read More
(Bloomberg) — German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government struck a compromise deal on a basic pension, a key issue for the Social Democrats that was threatening the stability of the ruling coalition.The agreement to bolster retirement income for as m…
November 10, 2019Read More
With lockdown drills now commonplace in public schools, experts question if they’re doing more harm than good. “We don’t light a fire in the hallway to practice fire drills,” one professor tells NPR.
November 10, 2019Read More
Kentucky football coaches elected to stick with Lynn Bowden at quarterback against Tennessee. Can they do so in the final three games?
November 10, 2019Read More
1.House Intelligence Committee Chair Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) on Saturday denied House Republicans’ request to bring Hunter Biden and the anonymous whistleblower, whose complaint about President Trump’s phone call in July with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky spurred the House impeachment inquiry, to the witness stand in the inquiry’s upcoming public hearings. Schiff said the committee will neither “facilitate efforts” to “threaten, intimidate, and retaliate against the whistleblower,” nor serve as “a vehicle to undertake the sham investigations into the Bidens.” Schiff did say, however, that the committee is reviewing the other possible witnesses proposed by Rep. Devin Nunes (D-Calif.), the top Republican on the Intelligence Committee, in a letter sent Saturday to Schiff. [Axios, Fox News] 2.President Trump told reporters Saturday he is planning to release the transcript of a second phone call he had with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, likely on Tuesday. “We have another transcript coming out that is very important,” Trump said. “They ask for it, and I gladly give it.” The call took place in April just after Zelensky won the Ukrainian presidential election and it was reportedly mainly a congratulatory call, though little is known about its contents. Of course, the phone call between the two leaders that took place in July was the catalyst for the impeachment inquiry Trump now faces. [The Guardian, Politico] 3.Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) directly challenged billionaire Michael Bloomberg during a Democratic presidential campaign speech Saturday in Iowa. “Our campaign is going to end the grotesque level of income and wealth inequality which exists in America today,” Sanders said. “So tonight we say to Michael Bloomberg and other billionaires: Sorry, you ain’t going to buy this election.” Bloomberg is contemplating a run at the Democratic nomination and filed for the Alabama primary Friday. Sanders also criticized Bloomberg’s plan, if he runs, to bypass early voting states like Iowa and New Hampshire in favor of focusing on Super Tuesday states. [The New York Times, The Washington Post] 4.Pro-democracy, anti-government protests continued in Hong Kong on Sunday, one day after thousands gathered for a peaceful vigil mourning Chow Tsz-lok, a 22-year-old university student who fell to his death this week after police were attempting to disperse a rally. The Sunday crowds continued to honor the student, but the day has reportedly been more active than Saturday with messages circulating online calling for people to occupy shopping malls. There have also been calls for a general strike and class boycott Monday with plans to disrupt train service in the city in the early morning. In related news, seven pro-democracy lawmakers were detained or faced arrest Saturday. They could spend up to a year in jail if convicted for allegedly “assaulting, obstructing, or molesting” three pro-Beijing lawmakers. [The South China Morning Post, Deutsche Welle] 5.Saudi Aramco published a 658-page prospectus for its initial public offering Saturday. The document revealed that retail investors will be offered up to 0.5 percent of the offering, but it did not unveil what percentage will be sold to institutions. Investors were ultimately left to guess the number of shares on offer, the price range, and when the listing will officially go forward, though The Wall Street Journal notes that it isn’t uncommon for an IPO when demand for the offering is unclear. The prospectus also highlighted the risks in investing in the state-owned oil giant, which include the involvement of the Saudi royal family, climate change, and antitrust suits in the United States connected to Saudi Arabia’s OPEC membership. [The Wall Street Journal, The Financial Times] 6.Voters are heading to the polls Sunday for the fourth time since 2015 in Spain where they will decide the outcome of the country’s general election. Surveys are predicting the vote will result in a fractured parliament without an absolute majority in a continuation of the norm since 2017 as the Spanish government has struggled to broker deals. The Socialist Party is expected to remain the largest vote-getter, but only at around 27 percent, which will make it unlikely to form a majority government. Meanwhile, the country’s far right party, Vox, is also likely to continue to make gains thanks to a rise in support from conservatives angered by the ongoing secession crisis in Catalonia, and the Socialist Party’s decision to allow the exhumation of former dictator General Francisco Franco. [El Pais, Al Jazeera] 7.Bolivian President Evo Morales said Sunday he plans to call for new elections after weeks of protests in the country calling for his resignation. Morales’ announcement came shortly after the Organization for American States recommended new elections and the annulment of the previous results from Oct. 20, which were considered fraudulent by Morales’ opposition. As Bolivians marched in protest throughout the weekend, there were reports that some members of the police joined the demonstrators with some reportedly refusing to guard the square where the presidential palace is located. Members of an elite tactical operations unit were reportedly among those who withdrew in solidarity with the protests. [France 24, Reuters] 8.A cold front emerging from Siberia is expected to reach the United States next week, with temperatures possibly dipping to record lows for November from New England to Texas. The cold front is expected to hit the northern Plains and Upper Midwest on Sunday before heading south, potentially bringing below freezing temperatures even to the Gulf Coast. The expected temperatures are reportedly closer to those that normally occur in January and could wind up being 30 degrees below what is usually expected for this time of year. Some snowfall is anticipated earlier in the week, but will likely taper off even as temperatures remain frigid. [CBS News, The Washington Post] 9.Leaders from Germany, Poland, Hungary, Slovakia, and the Czech Republic attended a ceremony Saturday in Berlin honoring the 30th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, which is viewed as one of the pivotal moments in the final stages of the Cold War. The leaders placed roses in the remnants of the barrier that once divided the city. “The Berlin Wall, ladies and gentleman, is history,” German Chancellor Angela Merkel announced. “It teaches us: No wall that keeps people out and restricts freedom is so high or so wide that it can’t be broken down.” President Trump congratulated Germany on the anniversary, saluting the “courageous men and women from both East and West Germany” who united to “tear down a wall that stood as a symbol of oppression.” [The Associated Press, The Week] 10.In one of the most anticipated matchups of the college football season, No. 2 Louisiana State University defeated the third-ranked University of Alabama, in a 46-41 barn burner on Alabama’s home turf. The two teams were unbeaten going into the game, and while they both remain in contention for the College Football Playoff, it wound up being a statement win for LSU, who had gone eight straight tries without beating Alabama. The Tigers were led by quarterback and leading Heisman candidate Joe Burrow who threw for 393 yards and three touchdowns. Alabama was down 33-13 at halftime and rallied back, but LSU answered the challenge and survived. Alabama quarterback Tua Tagovailoa, one of the nation’s top draft prospects, threw for 418 yards and four touchdowns, but was hampered by an interception and a fumble. [ESPN]More stories from theweek.com Schiff rejects GOP requests for Hunter Biden, whistleblower to testify The return of honor politics How the tech duopoly killed the headphone jack
November 10, 2019Read More
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