United News of Bangladesh

Algerian Minister of Foreign Affairs and National Community Abroad Ramtane Lamamra has recently received the personal envoy of the UN Secretary General for Western Sahara, Shaffan de Mistura who was on a visit to Algeria. The meeting took place in the presence of the Special Envoy in charge of the question of Western Sahara and the Maghreb countries, Amar Belani, said a media release issued by the Algerian Embassy in Dhaka on Thursday. Read: FTA with Algeria to boost bilateral trade: DCCI During the meeting, the two sides examined the latest developments regarding Western Sahara and the prospects for strengthening UN efforts with a view to resuming direct negotiations between the two parties - the Kingdom of Morocco and the Polisario Front, with the objective of reaching a lasting political solution accepted by both parties. They also discussed ways for guaranteeing the Sahrawi people the exercise of their inalienable and imprescriptible right to self-determination, in accordance with the relevant UN resolutions and its doctrine on decolonization, according to the media release.

The final suspect in a stabbing rampage that killed 10 people in and around a Canadian Indigenous reserve died after being arrested by police Wednesday following a three-day manhunt, authorities said. One official said he died of self-inflicted injuries. Myles Sanderson, 32, was caught on a highway near the town of Rosthern in the province of Saskatchewan as officers responded to a report of a stolen vehicle being driven by a man armed with a knife, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police said. Officers forced Sanderson’s vehicle off the road and into a ditch, Assistant Commissioner Rhonda Blackmore, commander of the RCMP in Saskatchewan, said at a news conference. He was detained and a knife was found inside the vehicle she said. She said Sanderson went into medical distress after he was arrested. She said CPR was attempted on him before an ambulance arrived. She said emergency medical personnel then took him to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead. “All life saving measures that we are capable of were taken at that time,” she said. Blackmore gave no details on the cause of death. “I can’t speak to the specific manner of death,” she said. But an official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, earlier said Sanderson died of self-inflicted injuries, without giving any further details. Video and photos from the scene showed a white SUV off to the side of the road with police cars all around. Air bags had deployed in the SUV. Some photos and video taken from a distance appeared to show Sanderson being frisked. Also read: Stabbings in Canada kill 10, hurt 15; suspects at large His death came two days after the body of his brother, 30-year-old Damien Sanderson, was found in a field near the scene of their rampage, which also wounded 18 people. Police are investigating whether Myles Sanderson killed his brother. Blackmore said that with both men dead, authorities will find it hard to figure out what set off the rampage. “Now that Myles is deceased we may never have an understanding of that motivation,” she said. But she started off her remarks that the news conference by stressing that people in Saskatchewan can rest easier. “This evening our province breathing a collective sigh of relief,” Blackmore said.   Later, she added: “I hope that this brings them closure. I hope they can rest easy knowing that Myles Sanderson is no longer a threat to them.” Some family members of the victims arrived at the scene Wednesday, including Brian Burns, whose wife and son were killed. “Now we can start to heal. The healing begins today, now,” he said. The stabbing rampage raised questions of why Myles Sanderson — an ex-con with 59 convictions and a long history of shocking violence — was out on the streets in the first place. He was released by a parole board in February while serving a sentence of over four years on charges that included assault and robbery. But he had been wanted by police since May, apparently for violating the terms of his release, though the details were not immediately clear. His long and lurid rap sheet also showed that seven years ago, he attacked and stabbed one of the victims killed in the weekend rampage, according to court records. Canadian Public Safety Minister Marco Mendicino said there will be an investigation into the parole board’s assessment of Sanderson. “I want to know the reasons behind the decision” to release him, Mendicino said. “I’m extremely concerned with what occurred here. A community has been left reeling.” Investigators have not given a motive for the bloodshed. The Saskatchewan Coroner’s Service said nine of those killed were from the James Smith Cree Nation: Thomas Burns, 23; Carol Burns, 46; Gregory Burns, 28; Lydia Gloria Burns, 61; Bonnie Burns, 48; Earl Burns, 66; Lana Head, 49; Christian Head, 54; and Robert Sanderson, 49, One was from Weldon, 78-year-old Wesley Patterson. Authorities would not say how the victims might be related. Mark Arcand said his half sister Bonnie and her son Gregory were killed. “Her son was lying there already deceased. My sister went out and tried to help her son, and she was stabbed two times, and she died right beside him,” he said. “Right outside of her home she was killed by senseless acts. She was protecting her son. She was protecting three little boys. This is why she is a hero.” Arcand rushed to the reserve the morning of the rampage. After that, he said, “I woke up in the middle of the night just screaming and yelling. What I saw that day I can’t get out of my head.” As for what set off the violence, Arcand said: “We’re all looking for those same answers. We don’t know what happened. Maybe we’ll never know. That’s the hardest part of this.” Court documents said Sanderson attacked his in-laws Earl Burns and Joyce Burns in 2015, knifing Earl Burns repeatedly and wounding Joyce Burns. He later pleaded guilty to assault and threatening Earl Burns’ life. Many of Sanderson’s crimes were committed when he was intoxicated, according to court records. He told parole officials at one point that substance use made him out of his mind. Records showed he repeatedly violated court orders barring him from drinking or using drugs. Many of Canada’s Indigenous communities are plagued by drugs and alcohol. “The drug problem and the alcohol problem on these reserves is way out of hand,” said Ivor Wayne Burns, whose sister was killed in the weekend attacks. “We have dead people, and we asked before for something to be done.” Myles Sanderson’s childhood was marked by violence, neglect and substance abuse, court records show. Sanderson, who is Indigenous and was raised on the Cree reserve, population 1,900, started drinking and smoking marijuana at around 12, and cocaine followed soon after. In 2017, he barged into his ex-girlfriend’s home, punched a hole in the door of a bathroom while his two children were hiding in a bathtub and threw a cement block at a vehicle parked outside, according to parole documents. He got into a fight a few days later at a store, threatening to kill an employee and burn down his parents’ home, documents said. That November he threatened an accomplice into robbing a fast-food restaurant by clubbing him with a gun and stomping on his head. He then stood watch during the holdup. In 2018, he stabbed two men with a fork while drinking and beat someone unconscious. When he was released in February, the parole board set conditions on his contact with his partner and children and also said he should not enter into relationships with women without written permission from his parole officer. In granting Sanderson “statutory release,” parole authorities said: “It is the Board’s opinion that you will not present an undue risk to society.” Canadian law grants prisoners statutory release after they serve two-thirds of their sentence. But the parole board can impose conditions on that freedom, and inmates who violate them — as Sanderson did more than once — can be ordered back to prison. Sharna Sugarman, who was organizing a GoFundMe for the victims, questioned the parole board for releasing him and wondered why Sanderson was still on the loose so many months after he was deemed “unlawfully at large.”   “That’s just egregious to me,” said Sugarman, a counselor who counted one of the stabbing victims as a client. “If they claim that they’ve been looking for him, well, you weren’t looking that hard.”

Former President Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle, returned to the White House Wednesday, unveiling official portraits with a modern vibe in an event that set humor and nostalgia over his presidency against the current harsh political talk about the survival of democracy. While her husband cracked a few jokes about his gray hair, big ears and clothes in his portrait, Mrs. Obama, a descendant of slaves, said the occasion for her was more about the promise of America for people like herself. “Barack and Michelle, welcome home,” declared President Joe Biden as the gathering cheered. Biden, who was Obama’s vice president, praised his former boss’ leadership on health care, the economy and immigration and said nothing could have prepared him any better for being president than serving with Obama for those eight years. “It was always about doing what was right,” he said. The portrait of Obama, America’s 44th and first Black president, doesn’t look like any of his predecessors, nor does Michelle Obama’s look like any of the women who filled the role before her. Obama stands expressionless against a white background, wearing a black suit and gray tie in the portrait by Robert McCurdy that looks more like a large photograph than an oil-on-canvas portrait. The former first lady, her lips pursed, is seated on a sofa in the Red Room in a strapless, light blue dress. She chose artist Sharon Sprung for her portrait. Scores of former members of Obama’s administration were on hand for the big reveal. Obama noted that some of them in the East Room audience had started families in the intervening years and feigned disappointment “that I haven’t heard of anyone naming a kid Barack or Michelle.” He thanked McCurdy for his work, joking that the artist, who is known for his paintings of public figures from Nelson Mandela to the Dalai Lama, had ignored his pleas for fewer gray hairs and smaller ears. “He also talked me out of wearing a tan suit, by the way,” Obama quipped, referring to a widely panned appearance as president in the unflattering suit. Obama went on to say his wife was the “best thing about living in the White House,” and he thanked Sprung for “capturing everything I love about Michelle, her grace, her intelligence -- and the fact that she’s fine.” Michelle Obama, when it was her turn, laughingly opened by saying she had to thank her husband for “such spicy remarks.” To which he retorted, by way of explanation, “I’m not running again.” Then the former first lady turned serious, drawing a connection between unveiling the portraits and America’s promise for people with backgrounds like her own, a daughter of working-class parents from the South Side of Chicago. “For me, this day is not just about what has happened,” she said. “It’s also about what could happen, because a girl like me, she was never supposed to be up there next to Jacqueline Kennedy and Dolley Madison. She was never supposed to live in this house, and she definitely wasn’t supposed to serve as first lady.” Mrs. Obama said the portraits are a “reminder that there’s a place for everyone in this country.” Tradition holds that the sitting president invites his immediate predecessor back to the White House to unveil his portrait, but Donald Trump broke with that custom and did not host Obama. So, Biden scheduled a ceremony for his former boss. Mrs. Obama said the tradition matters “not just for those of us who hold these positions, but for everyone participating in and watching our democracy.” In remarks that never mentioned Trump but made a point as he continues to challenge his 2020 reelection loss, she added: “You see the people, they make their voices heard with their vote. We hold an inauguration to ensure a peaceful transition of power ... and once our time is up, we move on.” McCurdy, meanwhile, said his “stripped down” style of portraiture helps create an “encounter” between the person in the painting and the person looking at it. “They have plain white backgrounds, nobody gestures, nobody — there are no props because we’re not here to tell the story of the person that’s sitting for them,” McCurdy told the White House Historical Association during an interview for its “1600 Sessions” podcast. “We’re here to create an encounter between the viewer and the sitter,” he said. “We’re telling as little about the sitter as possible so that the viewer can project onto them.” Also read: Michelle Obama’s book ‘The Light We Carry’ coming this fall He works from a photograph of his subject, selected from about 100 images, and spends at least a year on each portrait. Subjects have no say in how the painting looks. McCurdy said he knows he’s done “when it stops irritating me.” Obama’s portrait went on display in the Grand Foyer, the traditional showcase for paintings of the two most recent presidents. His portrait replaced Bill Clinton’s near the stairway to the residence, the White House tweeted Wednesday night. George W. Bush’s portrait hangs on the wall opposite Obama’s in the foyer. Mrs. Obama’s portrait was hung one floor below on the Ground Floor, joining predecessors Barbara Bush, Hillary Clinton and Laura Bush, according to the tweet. Two spokespeople for Trump did not respond to emailed requests for comment on whether artists have begun work on White House portraits for Trump and former first lady Melania Trump. Work, however, is underway on a separate pair of Trump portraits bound for the collection held by the National Portrait Gallery, a Smithsonian museum. The White House Historical Association, a nonprofit organization founded in 1961 by first lady Jacqueline Kennedy and funded through private donations and sales of books and an annual Christmas ornament, helps manage the White House portrait process. Since the 1960s, the association has paid for most of the portraits in the collection.   Congress bought the first painting in the collection, of George Washington. Other portraits of early presidents and first ladies often came to the White House as gifts.

The U.S. said Wednesday it has evidence that “hundreds of thousands” of Ukrainian citizens have been interrogated, detained and forcibly deported to Russia in “a series of horrors” overseen by officials from Russia’s presidency. Russia immediately dismissed the allegation as “fantasy,” calling it the latest invention in a Western disinformation campaign. The charge came during a Security Council meeting called by the United States and Albania to discuss Russia’s “filtration operations.” That involves Ukrainians voluntarily fleeing the war in their homeland and those forcibly being moved to Russia passing through a series of “filtration points” where treatment allegedly ranges from interrogations, data collection and strip searches to being yanked aside, tortured, sent to a detention center in Russia and never seen again. US. Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield said estimates from a variety of sources, including the Russian government, indicate that Russian authorities have interrogated, detained and forcibly deported between 900,000 and 1.6 million Ukrainians. She said they are sent to Russia, often to isolated regions in its far eastern regions. Also read: Ukraine's nuclear plant partly goes offline amid fighting “These operations aim to identify individuals Russia deems insufficiently compliant or compatible to its control,” Thomas-Greenfield said. “And there is mounting and credible evidence that those considered threatening to Russian control because of perceived pro-Ukrainian leanings are `disappeared’ or further detained.” Russia’s presidency is not only coordinating filtration operations but is providing lists of Ukrainians to be targeted for filtration, she added. She said estimates indicate thousands of children have been subject to filtration, “some separated from their families and taken from orphanages before being put up for adoption in Russia.” According to U.S. information, “more than 1,800 children were transferred from Russian-controlled areas of Ukraine to Russia” just in July, she said. Russia’s U.N. ambassador, Vassily Nebenzia, accused the West of trying to besmirch his country. He said more than 3.7 million Ukrainians, including 600,000 children, have gone to Russia or Russian-controlled separatist areas in eastern Ukraine, but they “aren’t being kept in prisons.” “They are living freely and voluntarily in Russia, and nobody is preventing them from moving or preventing them leaving the country,” he said. Nebenzia said those Ukrainians went through “a registration rather than filtration procedure” similar to that for Ukrainian refugees in Poland and other countries in the European Union. He said that since “we’ve wasted time talking about the latest conjectures and fantasies” Wednesday, Russia is proposing that the Security Council hold a meeting Thursday “on real threats to international peace and security caused by the supply by foreign states of arms and military goods to Ukraine.” French Ambassador Nicolas De Riviere, the current council president, scheduled the meeting for Thursday afternoon. It will be the third consecutive Security Council meeting on Ukraine. On Tuesday, the council held a meeting at Russia’s request to hear about the situation at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant in southeastern Ukraine. Ukraine and Russia have accused each other of shelling the facility and threatening a possible nuclear catastrophe. Thomas-Greenfield said the United States knew Russia would deny using filtration, “but there’s a simple way to know if any of this is true.” “Let the United Nations in,” she told Nebenzia and other council members. “Give the independent observers access. Give NGOs access. Allow humanitarian access. Let the world see what Is going on.” U.N. political chief Rosemary DiCarlo called for investigations of the “extremely disturbing” and persistent allegations “of forced displacement, deportation and so-called `filtration camps’ run by the Russian Federation and affiliated local forces.” She called for U.N. access to Ukrainians living in Russian-controlled areas and reiterated that the International Committee of the Red Cross and the U.N. Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine “must have unimpeded access to all individuals detained in relation to the ongoing war.” “This includes access to places of internment of Ukrainian prisoners of war and detainees in the Russian Federation,” she said. “Both sides to the conflict must fully abide with their obligations under international law.” Ilze Brands Kehris, the U.N. assistant secretary-general for human rights, urged Russia to provide her Geneva-based office access to all places of detention. She added that any adoptions of Ukrainian children in Russia would violate the Geneva Convention prohibiting the change of a child’s personal status including its nationality. Kehris said the U.N. human rights office “has verified” that Russian armed forces and affiliated armed groups subject civilians to “filtration” security checks, which according to credible reports it received result in numerous human rights violations, including the rights to liberty, personal security and privacy. The human rights office has documented that Russian troops and their affiliates subject Ukrainians to body searches that sometimes include nudity, interrogations about their personal background, family ties, political views and allegiances, and examinations of mobile devices, Kehris said. The office has also documented that men and women perceived to having ties to Ukraine’s military or government, or as having pro-Ukrainian or anti-Russian views “were subjected to arbitrary detention, torture, ill-treatment and forced-disappearance” and were transferred to penal colonies, Kehris said.

OPEC and allied oil-producing countries, including Russia, made a small trim in their supplies to the global economy Monday, underlining their unhappiness as recession fears help drive down crude prices — along with the cost of gasoline, to drivers’ delight. The decision for October rolls back a mostly symbolic increase of 100,000 barrels per day in September. It follows a statement last month from Saudi Arabia’s energy minister that the OPEC+ coalition could reduce output at any time. Oil producers such as Saudi Arabia have resisted calls from U.S. President Joe Biden to pump more oil to lower gasoline prices and the burden on consumers. OPEC+ has stuck with only cautious increases to make up for deep cuts made during the COVID-19 pandemic, which were finally restored in August. Since then, growing worries about slumping future demand have helped send oil prices down from June peaks of over $120 per barrel, cutting into the windfall for OPEC+ countries’ coffers but proving a blessing for drivers in the U.S. as pump prices have eased. Read: Foreign exchange rate stable after Bangladesh Bank tightens spending The supply cut for October is only a small fraction of the 43.8 million barrels per day under OPEC+ production goals, but wrong-footed several market analysts’ predictions of no change in output. The amount of oil per day “may seem negligible, but the message from today’s cut is clear: OPEC+ thinks they’ve fallen enough,” Columbia University energy policy expert Jason Bordoff tweeted. Oil prices jumped after the announcement. U.S. crude rose 3.3%, to $89.79 per barrel, while international benchmark Brent was up 3.7%, to $96.50, after the decision. Oil prices have gyrated in recent months: Recession fears have pushed them down, while worries of a loss of Russian oil because of sanctions over its invasion of Ukraine pushed them up. Recently, recession fears have taken the upper hand. Economists in Europe are penciling in a recession at the end of this year due to skyrocketing inflation fed by energy costs, while China’s severe restrictions aimed at halting the spread of the coronavirus have sapped growth in that major world economy. Those falling oil prices have been a boon to U.S. drivers, sending gasoline prices down to $3.82 per gallon from record highs of over $5 in June and offering a potential boost to Biden as his Democratic Party heads into midterm elections. In June, fears that U.S. and European sanctions would take Russian oil off the market helped push Brent to over $123. Prices have fallen sharply in recent weeks as it became clear that Russia is still managing to sell significant amounts of oil in Asia, albeit at sharply discounted prices. Read: Liz Truss: UK's incoming PM who models herself on Iron Lady Thatcher But concerns about the loss of Russian supply are still out there because European sanctions aimed at blocking most Russian oil imports won’t take effect until the end of the year. Other factors are lurking that could influence the price of oil. For one, the Group of Seven wealthy democracies plan to impose a price cap on Russian oil aimed at battling high energy prices and reducing oil profits that Russia can use for its war in Ukraine. That’s if the cap works as intended. Russia could refuse to supply oil to countries and companies observing the cap, which would take barrels off the market. The price cap has not been set, and its influence on the global price remains unclear. Meanwhile, a deal between Western countries and Iran to limit Tehran’s nuclear program could ease sanctions and see more than 1 million barrels per day of Iranian oil return to the market in coming months. However, tensions between the U.S. and Iran appear to have risen in recent days: Iran seized two U.S. naval drones in the Red Sea, and U.S., Kuwaiti and Saudi warplanes flew over the Middle East on Sunday in a show of force. OPEC+ countries’ energy ministers said Monday that their September increase of 100,000 barrels a day was only for that month and that the group could meet again at any time to address market developments. The group said its chairman could call an extraordinary meeting at any time ahead of the next scheduled meeting Oct. 5.

As a result of continuous and rapid changes in climate, natural disasters - such as sea level rise, floods, droughts, river erosion, cyclones, and salinity - are becoming more extreme and destructive with time. It is affecting all the continents of the world. The impacts of climate change are causing loss of crops, and agricultural productions challenging the food security of the world today. In simple words, climate change is threatening the safety of life and property of people and animals around the world.  To fight these issues, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) comes in. This 27th edition of the climate conference known as COP27 will take place in November, 2022. Let’s focus on what COP27 can achieve for the climate change affected countries. What is COP27? ‘Cop’ means ‘Conference of the Parties. It is a United Nations initiative. In 1995, the first conference of COP was held in Berlin, Germany, which took place in a different country every year.  These conventions serve as the formal meeting of the UNFCCC (Conference of the Parties, COP) parties to discuss progress in attempting to alleviate the effects of climate change, and they began attending discussions beginning roughly in the mid-1990s. The conference also negotiated the Kyoto Protocol with an aim to establish legally binding obligations for developed countries to decrease their greenhouse gas emissions. Read Huge work ahead of COP27; commitments need to turn into action: Robert Dickson This year COP27 will take place at Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt, from November 6 to November 18. However, COP 27 was initially expected to occur from November 8-20, 2021. But, due to covid 19 pandemic, COP 26 was rescheduled from November 2020 to November 2021. That led to COP 27 from November 2021 to November 2022. As of 2019, 197 countries have become UNFCCC members. So, this year it is expected that all the member countries will meet with their valuable proposal for the sake of the environment. UNFCCC COP27 is going to be an important event regarding environmental pollution and climate change. The conference discusses the risks and solutions to climate change. This event is promising because it will help to create a consensus on how to prevent global climate change. Read Bangladesh-UK Partnership: Experts to discuss priority climate actions Friday What Should COP27 Achieve for the Vulnerable Countries? The COP conference should aim to provide a space for vulnerable countries to share their experiences, learn from each other, and create new ideas on how to prevent climate issues. This would help reduce the risk of another devastating conflict in the future. Mitigation COP26 was the very first test of the Paris Agreement’s goal-raising function for mitigating climate change. In other words, preventing and reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Yet it fell short of reaching its objectives. By the end of this century, if member states would implement all changes from the ‘nationally determined contributions or ‘NDCs,’ it would still be predicted that the world’s average temperature would rise by 2.4 degrees Celsius. The COP26 final outcome urges all the parties to increase their targets by 2030 to become compatible with NDCs by 2022. Therefore, COP27 is more significant than the previous COPs. So, COP27 should achieve a mitigation plan so that the vulnerable countries’ risk gets reduced in the long run. Read How Can One Person Reduce Environmental Pollution? Adaptation The COP26 urges the developed countries to double the adaptation financing along with the launch of a two-year work program towards the Global Goal Adaption (GGA). The GGA conducts international support to lessen the vulnerability of countries to climate change and adapt to the environment through holistic, sustainable development. Vulnerable countries have been seeking assistance for decades. And it is expected that COP27 will bring out a proper adaptation plan for the affected countries. Finance The COP26 summit was a major point of frustration and anger for many developing nations. In particular, they expressed frustration and anger at the failure to deliver on promises of regular financing to assist them in adaptation and mitigation efforts. There should be a move toward fulfilling historic pledges to provide annual climate financing of $100 billion from 2020 to 2025 every year, but those commitments are yet to be met. So, COP27 can be a milestone for vulnerable countries in getting their expected financing for mitigation and adaptation plans. Read Effects of Air Pollution on Unborn Children, Neonates, Infants Global Stocktake COP 27 will host a Technical Dialogue as part of the 2021-23 global stocktake (GST). The GST will assess progress towards fulfilling the Paris Agreement, happening every five years in sync with the ratchet mechanism. GST evaluates the progress made toward mitigation, adaptation, and preventive measures, assessing the mechanisms that help lessen climate change and its social effects. COP27 will be a crucial moment for scrutinizing the results of such deals. Hence, this can bring adequate outcomes for the susceptible countries. Compensation for Loss and Damage Loss of or damage to the environment refers to violations of the constraints of the natural environment that cannot be prevented by preventive measures or adaptation. Developing countries that are least responsible for climate change seek financial support for that irreparable loss and damages from the countries that are highly responsible for the climate crisis. So, COP27 should achieve compensation for the affected countries. Read E-Waste Crisis: Effects of Electronic Waste on Environment and Human Health Final Words The COP27 should make progress on agreement signings and declarations, which can help secure more financial support for vulnerable countries. The conference should provide them with new ideas on how to fight climate change, help them build resilience to climate shocks, and give them access to mitigation and adaptation plans. So far, we have discussed what COP27 should achieve for the climate vulnerable countries. Stay with us to know the updates of the COP27 conference in 2022.

Three bottlenose dolphins were released into the open sea in Indonesia Saturday after years of being confined for the amusement of tourists who would touch and swim with them. As red and white Indonesian flags fluttered, underwater gates opened off the island of Bali to allow Johnny, Rocky and Rambo to swim free. The trio were rescued three years ago from their tiny pool in a resort hotel to which they had been sold after spending years performing in a traveling circus. They regained their health and strength at the Bali sanctuary , a floating pen in a bay that provided a gentler, more natural environment. Lincoln O’Barry, who worked with the Indonesian government to set up the Umah Lumba Rehabilitation, Release and Retirement Center, said dolphins are wild animals that should live free. “It was an incredibly emotional experience to see them go,” O’Barrry said. The center was initiated in 2019 by the Bali Forestry Department and the Indonesian Ministry of Forestry. “Umah lumba” means “dolphin” in Indonesian. For some time after the gates opened, the dolphins looked at the opening, uncertain of their next move. But after about an hour, they were on their way, sometimes jumping over choppy waves. The Associated Press watched their release through an online livestream. O’Barry is documenting the release with drones and underwater footage for a film. The Indonesian government supported the dolphins’ rescue, working with Dolphin Project, founded by Lincoln’s father Ric O’Barry, who was also at the release. Ric O’Barry had been the dolphin trainer for the 1960s TV show “Flipper,” but later came to see the toll exacted on the animals. He has since devoted his life to returning dolphins to the wild. Center workers clapped as the dolphins swam out. Wahyu Lestari, rehabilitation coordinator at the center, said she was a bit sad to see them go. “I’m happy they are free, and they are going back to their family,” she said. “They should be in the wild because they are born in the wild.” The freed dolphins will be monitored out at sea with GPS tracking for a year. They can return for visits to the sanctuary, although it’s unclear what they will do. They may join another pod, stay together, or go their separate ways. Dolphins in captivity are carted from town to town, kept in chlorinated water, held in isolation or forced to interact with tourists, often leading to injuries. Read: Sick dolphin calf improves with tube-fed milk, helping hands Johnny, the oldest dolphin, had teeth that were worn down to below the gum line when he was rescued in 2019. Earlier this year, dentists provided him with dolphin-style dental crowns so that he can now clamp down on live fish. Johnny was the first of the three dolphins to swim out to sea. Ric and Lincoln O’Barry have spent half a century working on saving dolphins from captivity in locations from Brazil to South Korea and the U.S. Saturday’s release was their first in Indonesia. The Indonesian government’s decision to rescue the dolphins followed a decade-long public education campaign that included billboards, artwork, school programs and a drive asking people not to buy tickets to dolphin shows. A government minister was at hand to raise the gate at the sanctuary Saturday. Lincoln O’Barry said the Indonesian sanctuary will continue to be used for other captive dolphins. Similar sanctuaries are in the works in North America and Europe, as more dolphin shows close. With virtual reality and other technology, appreciation of nature doesn’t have to involve a zoo or a dolphin show, he said. Yet dolphin shows are still popular in China, the Middle East and Japan. In Japan, the father and son have drawn attention to the dolphin hunt in the town of Taiji, documented in the 2010 Oscar-winning film “The Cove.” Every year, fishermen frighten and corral dolphins into a cove, capture some to sell to dolphin shows and kill others for food. Whale and dolphin meat is considered a delicacy in Japanese culinary tradition. But Taiji has prompted protests by conservationists for years, including some Japanese. The three dolphins released in Indonesia were soon miles (kilometers) away in the waters. But before their departure, they circled around the sanctuary. “They turned back around and came back to us one more time, almost to say thank you and good-bye. And then they headed straight out to open ocean and disappeared,” Lincoln O’Barry said.   “Where they head next, we don’t know. But we wish them a good long life.”

When Mikhail Gorbachev is buried Saturday at Moscow’s Novodevichy Cemetery, he will once again be next to his wife, Raisa, with whom he shared the world stage in a visibly close and loving marriage that was unprecedented for a Soviet leader. “They were a true pair. She was a part of him, almost always at his side,” then-Chancellor Helmut Kohl of Germany said at Raisa’s funeral in 1999, where Gorbachev wept openly. “Much of what he achieved is simply unimaginable without his wife.” Gorbachev’s very public devotion to his family broke the stuffy mold of previous Soviet leaders, just as his openness to political reform did. “He loved a woman more than his work. I think he wouldn’t have been able to embrace her if his hands were stained with blood,” wrote Nobel Peace Prize winner Dmitry Muratov, editor of Russia’s leading independent newspaper, Novaya Gazeta. Co-owned by Gorbachev, it was forced to shut under official pressure after Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine. “We should always remember,” Muratov continued, “he loved a woman more than his work, he placed human rights above the state and he valued peaceful skies more than personal power.” Gorbachev’s open attachment to his family also stands in stark contrast to the secrecy that surrounds the private life of Russia’s current leader, President Vladimir Putin. For her part, Raisa Gorbacheva cut a bold figure for Soviet first ladies — more visible, with a direct way of speaking, a polished manner and fashionable clothes. A sociologist by training, she had met Mikhail at a Moscow university where they both studied. “One day we took each other by the hand and went for a walk in the evening. And we walked like that for our whole life,” Gorbachev told Vogue magazine in 2013. Raisa accompanied him on his travels, and they discussed policy and politics together. Her confident demeanor and prominent public role didn’t sit well with many Russians, who had also soured on Gorbachev and blamed his policies for the subsequent breakup of the Soviet Union. The couple won sympathy, however, in 1999, when it was revealed that Raisa was dying of leukemia. Her husband spoke daily with television reporters, and the sometimes lofty-sounding politician of old was suddenly seen as an emotional, grieving family man. For more than two decades after she was gone, Gorbachev kept Raisa’s memory alive and embraced his status as a lonely widower. He released a CD of seven romantic songs, “Songs for Raisa,” in 2009 on which he sang along with well-known Russian musician and guitarist Andrei Makarevich. Sales went to the charities Raisa had founded. A few years later, he published a book dedicated to her, “Alone with Myself.” Their marriage even became the subject of a popular play in Moscow in 2021, “Gorbachev.” Its point was one noteworthy for Russia: that the country’s leader was a human being who prioritized family, friends and personal obligations. One scene recounted a key moment in Gorbachev’s career when he returned to Moscow after the failed communist coup against him in 1991. Raisa had had a stroke, and instead of immediately stepping back onto the political stage, he went to the hospital to be with her. Read: Mikhail Gorbachev, who steered Soviet breakup, dead at 91 “I was not married to the country — Russia or the Soviet Union,” Gorbachev wrote in his memoirs. “I was married to my wife, and that night I went with her to the hospital.” At the Moscow cemetery, a life-size statue of Raisa has stood for many years now over the grave intended for them both. The Gorbachevs had a daughter, Irina, two granddaughters and a great-granddaughter. Despite his attachment to family, Gorbachev lived out his life in Russia while they live in Germany. Mikhail Khodorkovsky, a businessman in the early post-Soviet days who now lives in exile in London, tweeted this week that one of Gorbachev’s great strengths was his ability to wash away “awe of the person on the throne,” and that his attention to family was part of that.   “With this he changed my life. And also by his attitude toward Raisa Maximovna — a second important lesson,” Khodorkovsky said, using Gorbacheva’s patronymic. “He went to her. Rest in peace.”

Global food prices dropped for a fifth straight month in August, but were still eight percent higher than a year ago, according to the UN food and agriculture agency. The cost of food has been one of the biggest contributors to inflation around the world. FAO's latest global food price index, published Friday, shows that the prices of five commodities – cereals, vegetable oil, dairy, meat and sugar – were lower in August than in July. The index, which measures the monthly change in international prices of a basket of food commodities, averaged 138.0 points last month, down nearly two percent from July, though 7.9 percent above the value a year before. The decline in cereal prices reflected improved production prospects in North America and Russia and the resumption of exports from Black Sea ports in Ukraine. A landmark agreement to unblock Ukraine's grain exports amid the ongoing war was signed in July by the country, Russia, Türkiye and the UN.  Read: UN food price index dropped in July for fourth month Rice prices on average held steady during August, while quotations for coarse grains, such as maize, rose marginally.   Vegetable oil prices fell 3.3 percent, which is slightly below the August 2021 level. The FAO attributed this to the increased availability of palm oil from Indonesia, due to lower export taxes, and the resumption of sunflower oil shipments from Ukraine. Although dairy prices saw a two percent drop, they remained 23.5 percent higher than in August 2021. The price of cheese increased for the tenth consecutive month, though milk prices eased following expectations of increased supplies from New Zealand, even amid projections of lower production in Western Europe and the US. The price of meat dropped by 1.5 percent but remained just over eight percent higher than the value last August. International quotations for poultry fell amid elevated export availability, and bovine meat prices declined due to weak domestic demand in some top exporting countries while pig meat quotations rose. Sugar prices also hit their lowest level since July 2021, largely due to high export caps in India and lower ethanol prices in Brazil. The FAO also issued its global cereal production forecast for this year, which projects a decline of nearly 40 million tonnes or 1.4 percent from the previous year. The bulk of this decline mainly concerns coarse grains, with maize yields in Europe expected to drop 16 percent below their five-year average level due to the exceptionally hot and dry weather conditions affecting the continent. However, the UN agency expects there will be a negligible drop in worldwide wheat production resulting from expected record harvests in Russia and conducive weather conditions in North America.    Global rice production is also expected to decline by 2.1 percent from the all-time high reached in 2021.

Four people were killed and at least 24 others injured when a speedy truck crashed into a commuter bus parked along a busy highway in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh on Saturday. The accident occurred near Mahungupur village in Uttar Pradesh's Barabanki district, some 30 kms from state capital Lucknow, this morning. "The double-decker bus carrying 60 migrant workers from Nepal to the western Indian state of Goa was parked along the highway following a tyre puncture. Unable to spot the bus, the truck driver hit the vehicle from behind," a police officer told the local media. The impact of the crash left the bus driver, who was replacing the punctured tyre, and three passengers dead on the spot. "The 24 other injured occupants of the bus have been hospitalised," the officer said. Local TV channels reported, quoting health officials, that six of the injured passengers were shifted to a government hospital in Lucknow after their condition at Barabanki district hospital worsened. "A probe has been ordered into the accident," the police officer said. Road accidents are common in India, with one taking place every four minutes. These accidents are often blamed on poor roads, rash driving and scant regard for traffic laws. Also read: Two killed, 15 hurt in Bagerhat bus accident The Indian government's implementation of stricter traffic laws in recent years has failed to rein in accidents, which claim over 100,000 lives every year.