In a vast network of tunnels carved into the rocks under the Maltese capital Valletta, faded maps of the Mediterranean hint at the place’s role in directing key battles in World War II.

Malta is now restoring the 28,000 square meters (300,000 square feet) of tunnels, planning to open a huge section to the public.

The compound, hidden under the picturesque port city perched on cliffs above the sea, was built by the British and served as the staging ground for major naval operations. The British military withdrew in 1979 and the compound was abandoned for almost 40 years.

German and Italian forces bombarded Malta intensively between 1940 and 1942 to try gain control of the Mediterranean, but did not manage to force the British out. During the Cold War, the tunnels were used to track Soviet submarines.

Over the years, water and humidity have let rust and mold spread. Some rooms have been vandalized, but traces of the military apparatus that once occupied the complex still remain.

Military cot beds, tangled cables and dust-covered rotary phones litter the rooms.

The Malta Heritage Trust, a non-governmental preservation group, began the multi-million-dollar restoration of the site in 2009.
…

From: MeNeedIt

The music video for the No. 1 hit song Despacito has a new record — it’s become the most popular clip on YouTube of all-time with more than 3 billion views.

YouTube announced Friday that Luis Fonsi’s ubiquitous song with Daddy Yankee has surpassed previous record holder See You Again, the song by Wiz Khalifa and Charlie Puth from the Furious 7 soundtrack.

Despacito became an international smash hit this year, topping the Billboard Hot 100 chart. The record-breaking video does not include the popular remix with Justin Bieber; that version has been viewed more than 464 million times.

The video is also the most liked video on YouTube.
…

From: MeNeedIt

Britain is prepared to pay up to 40 billion euros ($47 billion) as part of a deal to leave the European Union, the Sunday Telegraph newspaper reported, citing three unnamed sources familiar with Britain’s negotiating strategy.

The European Union has floated a figure of 60 billion euros and wants significant progress on settling Britain’s liabilities before talks can start on complex issues such as future trading arrangements.

The government department responsible for Brexit talks declined to comment on the Sunday Telegraph article. So far, Britain has given no official indication of how much it would be willing to pay.

The newspaper said British officials were likely to offer to pay 10 billion euros a year for three years after leaving the EU in March 2019, then finalize the total alongside detailed trade talks.

Payments would be made only as part of a deal that included a trade agreement, the newspaper added.

“We know ([the EU’s] position is 60 billion euros, but the actual bottom line is 50 billion euros. Ours is closer to 30 billion euros but the actual landing zone is 40 billion euros, even if the public and politicians are not all there yet,” the newspaper quoted one “senior Whitehall source” as saying.

Whitehall is the London district where British civil servants and ministers are based.

‘Go whistle’

A second Whitehall source said Britain’s bottom line was “30 billion euros to 40 billion euros,” and a third source said Prime Minister Theresa May was willing to pay “north of 30 billion euros,” the Sunday Telegraph reported.

David Davis, the British minister in charge of Brexit talks, said on July 20 that Britain would honor its obligations to the EU but declined to confirm that Brexit would require net payments.

British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, a leading Brexit advocate, said last month that the EU could “go whistle” if it made “extortionate” demands for payment.

Last week, the Bank of England said Brexit uncertainty was weighing on the economy. Finance Minister Philip Hammond wants to avoid unsettling businesses further.

If Britain cannot conclude an exit deal, trade relations would be governed by World Trade Organization rules, which would allow both parties to impose tariffs and customs checks and leave many other issues unsettled.

The EU also wants agreement by October on rights of EU citizens already in Britain, and on border controls between the Irish Republic and the British province of Northern Ireland, before trade and other issues are discussed.
…

From: MeNeedIt

Kenya’s Elections Observation Group (ELOG) plans to deploy about 5,000 observers to monitor Tuesday’s vote. ELOG also will use Parallel Vote Tabulation (PVT) to monitor the presidential election.

The Elections Observations Group, (ELOG) which is made up of civil society and faith-based organizations, met Saturday in Kenya’s capital, Nairobi, and said it will deploy about 5,700 election observers. Of those, approximately 1,700 observers also will monitor the elections using Parallel Vote Tabulation (PVT).

Simon Wanjiru, the PVT Manager at ELOG, says the group is non-partisan, so its election observers will give independent and authentic results. ELOG began monitoring elections in Kenya in 2010.

​Wanjiru adds that the system will be used as a monitoring mechanism to flag irregularities.

“We want to increase the confidence of the public in the elections and also we want to remove any uncertainties on the people, and they need to believe that now the systems have been done right and we will be able to show if they have been done correctly by the commission,” he said.

ELOG officials say PVT works in five steps. In the first stage, observers go to polling stations and verify whether they have network coverage. Once this is verified the second step entails the observer filling out a simulation form and sending it to the data center. This ensures the observer understands the process of reporting via text message or SMS.

The third step involves the message check, where the data base receives the texts and checks for any errors in answering. The fourth step involves the data reporters contacting observers who have not yet reported, and troubleshoots. The fifth and final step includes a data-quality check where errors and inconsistencies are flagged by the database automatically.

Wanjiru says the monitoring group will abide by constitutional mechanisms in a scenario where results are withheld.

“It’s only the IEBC, [Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission], which is mandated to release the results, but for ELOG we only do the verification so we cannot verify before they have released,” he said. “Remember the constitution says the IEBC has to release the results in seven days. In case it goes beyond seven days, we don’t just say we are going to release but we will compel, we have a court. And we can use the other CSOs [Civil Society Organizations], who can now help beef up and compel the IEBC to have the results out then we can verify.”

Joyce Majiwa, of the Institute for Education in Democracy, (IED) spoke to VOA on the sidelines of the press conference.

According to Majiwa the IED seeks to nurture democracy and good governance in Kenya and Africa. She further notes that the key areas in Tuesday’s polls include electoral rules violations, among others. Majiwa adds that the monitoring will improve systems for future elections.

“We will make recommendations for future preparedness, we can make recommendations if there are violent areas especially women and girls. We can make recommendations for prosecution. We will have to follow up whether prosecutions are happening, and we will make recommendations to political parties as well.”

In 2013, ELOG monitored the elections in Kenya and projected President Uhuru Kenyatta’s victory at 49.7 percent, while the official figures from IEBC stood at 50.07 percent.

Kenya is scheduled to vote August 8.

 
…

From: MeNeedIt

Supporters of the United Auto Workers say they’re not giving up their fight to unionize a Nissan auto assembly plant in Mississippi after a stinging defeat, even as UAW opponents say Friday’s loss proves workers don’t want the union.

More than 62 percent of workers voting in a two-day election at Nissan Motor Co.’s Canton plant voted against the UAW, with 2,244 ballots against the union according to the National Labor Relations Board. Voting for union representation were 1,307 workers, or 38 percent.

“They know we didn’t need it,” said Nissan worker Kim Barber, an outspoken union opponent who said she was celebrating Friday’s result. “We didn’t need outside interference coming into our plant.”

UAW defiant

Amid tears at a union office near the plant just north of Jackson, UAW supporters voiced defiance, with some calling for the election to be rerun after the minimum six-month wait. The union filed charges moments before the polls closed Friday night making new allegations that Nissan had broken federal labor law and intimidated workers into voting “no.” If the labor board agrees, it could order a new election at the plant.

“It hurts,” said union supporter Phillip White. “We ran against a machine; we ran against a monster; we ran against all the lies.”

The UAW has never fully organized an international automaker in the traditionally anti-union South, although it did persuade some maintenance workers to join at a Volkswagen AG plant in Tennessee. The UAW’s lack of influence among southern autoworkers has reduced its bargaining power when Detroit automakers lose market share and close plants. After pouring resources into the organizing drive at Nissan, this loss could leave UAW leaders with tough decisions.

Odds of success 

“The result of the election was a setback for these workers, the UAW and working Americans everywhere, but in no way should it be considered a defeat,” UAW President Dennis Williams said in a statement.

Kristen Dziczek of the Center for Automotive Research said that although the UAW was the underdog, odds were unlikely to improve soon, as President Donald Trump’s appointees take over the National Labor Relations Board. A corruption scandal involving union employees allegedly taking bribes from a former Fiat Chrysler executive also threatened to spread.
…

From: MeNeedIt

The Western state of Utah is home to stunning red rock formations shaped by geological forces over millions of years. Some of the most beautiful are at five of the state’s most popular national park sites, known as “The Mighty 5.” At Arches National Park alone, there are more than 2,000 natural sandstone arches, making up the world’s largest collection. National parks traveler Mikah Meyer shared highlights of his visit to Arches, and two other Mighty 5 sites, with VOA’s Julie Taboh.
…

From: MeNeedIt

Around the world, large cities generate huge amounts of unusable food and other organic waste. While some is recycled into compost, most goes into landfills, and that is wasting a potential source of energy. A pilot project started about three years ago in New York City is adding food scraps to the existing wastewater treatment plant to be turned into biogas, and residents have embraced it with enthusiasm. VOA’s George Putic reports.
…

From: MeNeedIt

The U.S. job market exceeded expectations last month adding 209,000 new workers to the economy in July and lowering the national unemployment rate to 4.3 percent. But wages continue to underperform, as did the nation’s labor participation rate. Economists say that’s because millions of working-age Americans are choosing to remain on the sidelines, some going back to school, others staying at home to take care of their families. Why does that matter? Mil Arcega explains.
…

From: MeNeedIt

A New Orleanslike musical funeral procession with a band set in Vietnam and a transgender fire-eater are all a part of a multimedia traveling exhibit by a Ho Chi Minh City-based artist collective called The Propeller Group.

The exhibit is showing at the Blaffer Art Museum at the University of Houston.

Vietnamese-American Brittany Trinh has seen the exhibit more than once. The film titled, The Living Need Light, The Dead Need Music, is Trinh’s favorite piece in the exhibit.

“First it was the music and then the way that it was being filmed, and I just felt like I was a part of it.” Trinh said, “I just felt really connected to it in a strange way.”

The Propeller Group’s origins

Founded in 2006, three artists make up the core of The Propeller Group: Tuan Andrew Nguyen, Phu Nam Thuc Ha, and Matt Lucero. All have multicultural backgrounds.

Two of these founders were born in Vietnam and had to leave the country with their families because of the Vietnam War. Lucero is Native American with Spanish roots. All three grew up and were educated in countries including the United States and Singapore before going to Vietnam to live and work as artists.

“It was the end of the Vietnam War, and then the Cold War occupied so much of our kind of upbringing until, you know the early ’90s. And so that had always kind of affected how we thought and become something that haunted us,” Nguyen said.

These artists have backgrounds in filmmaking, but they found shooting video in public in Communist Vietnam was difficult, and their cameras were almost confiscated. To work around this, they formed an advertising firm that allowed them more freedom to shoot video in public.

“You’ll see propaganda and really slick advertising, and that was the space that Vietnam was in, and that was the space the Propeller Group came out of, looking at those kind of dichotomies and those collisions and ideologies,” Nguyen said.

“We were doing the advertising, the commercial work by day, and by night we were kind of developing our own artistic conceptual practice,” he said.

US exhibit

While the group rarely is allowed to show its work in Vietnam because of censorship, there is a traveling exhibit of its work showing in the United States. Themes of life and death can be seen in the pieces of multimedia works of art.

One film in the exhibit looks at the Vietnamese rituals surrounding funerals, which includes a transgender fire-eater.

“It’s a moment for them to perform and to express themselves without being stopped by the police. Then it becomes a moment of resistance in public as well, that’s one thing that kind of drew us to looking at these rituals and these traditions,” Nguyen said. “It’s (rituals) something that’s always in flux, and I think part of that comes from the many, many kinds of wars that Vietnam has been engaged in over the last few centuries,” he said.

How people die and live as a result of politics and ideologies and the impact of globalism also are themes seen in a time-lapse video of what happens when a motorcycle called the Honda Dream is left outside overnight in Vietnam. The motorcycle was stripped bare.

“So this motorbike that was once a symbol of the future and of economic mobility now is a symbol for something else. The Honda Dream becomes this physical manifestation of how ideas of capital and communism have kind of shifted over the last 10, 15, 20 years in a communist society,” Nguyen said.

Exhibit well received

The exhibit’s Houston curator says the city’s Vietnamese American community has been especially receptive to this exhibit.

“Houston is one of the most diverse cities in the United States. It’s also one of the cities that has one of the largest populations of Vietnamese. This exhibition will resonate and will bring forth questions and will open conversations about the identity of Vietnamese Americans,” said Javier Sanchez Martinez, Blaffer Art Museum’s Curatorial Fellow.

Nguyen says he hopes the exhibit will inspire the audience to re-examine how they think about history and the different narratives that affect their current way of thought.

The exhibit is organized by Blaffer Art Museum at the University of Houston’s Kathrine G. McGovern College of the Arts, the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, and the Phoenix Art Museum.

The Propeller Group’s exhibit will travel next to the San Jose Museum of Art.
…

From: MeNeedIt

There is an emerging contemporary art scene in Vietnam, and it includes a collective of Ho Chi Minh City-based artists who come from multicultural backgrounds called The Propeller Group. While the group rarely shows its work in Vietnam because of censorship, there is a traveling exhibit of its work in the U.S. VOA’s Elizabeth Lee reports on how themes of the Cold War, life and death are represented in the multimedia exhibit now in Houston’s Blaffer Art Museum at the University of Houston.
…

From: MeNeedIt

Japanese automakers Toyota Motor Corp. and Mazda Motor Corp. said Friday they plan to spend $1.6 billion to set up a joint-venture auto manufacturing plant in the U.S. — a move that will create up to 4,000 jobs. 

The plant will have an annual production capacity of about 300,000 vehicles and will produce Toyota Corollas for the North American market. Mazda will make cross-over models there that it plans to introduce to that market, both sides said.

The companies will split the cost for the plant equally. 

Toyota said that it changed its plan to make Corollas at a plant in Mexico, now under construction, and instead will produce Tacoma pickups there. 

EV rumors

The Japanese automakers were reportedly planning to work together to develop electric vehicles. 

EVs have become an increasingly competitive market segment because of concerns about global warming and the environment.

Japanese rival Nissan Motor Co., which is allied with Renault SA of France and Mitsubishi Motors Corp., is the global leader in electric vehicles.

Better batteries

In the past, Toyota, which makes the Prius hybrid, Camry sedan and Lexus luxury models, was not overly bullish on electric vehicles, noting the limited cruise range of the technology. But recent breakthroughs in batteries allow for longer travel per charge.

In 2015, Toyota and Mazda agreed to find new areas where they can work together, but they had not announced specifics.

Toyota already provides hybrid technology to Mazda, which also makes compact cars for Toyota at its Mexico plant.

Mazda, based in Hiroshima, Japan, used to have a powerful partner in Dearborn-based Ford Motor Co., which bought 25 percent of Mazda in 1979, and raised it to 33.4 percent in 1996. But Ford began cutting ties in 2008, and has shed its stake in Mazda.
…

From: MeNeedIt

Under a best-case scenario, a newly negotiated North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) would not be implemented before the end of next year or the start of 2019, Mexico’s economy minister said Thursday.

Among other issues, NAFTA talks would focus on how to provide more certainty in dispute resolutions, Economy Minister Ildefonso Guajardo said in a radio interview.

“According to the possible calendars of approval, the best of the scenarios that we could have … would be the start of implementation almost at the end of 2018 or the start of 2019,” Guajardo said.

Mexico has set out the goals of prioritizing free access for goods and services, greater labor market integration and a strengthening of energy security.

Last week, U.S. Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue said during a visit to Mexico that he hoped farm business with Mexico would not suffer due to President Donald Trump’s drive to get a better deal for manufacturers.

Speaking in Japan on Thursday, Mexican Foreign Minister Luis Videgaray said the best way to calm Trump’s worries about commerce with Mexico were through more trade, not less.

Videgaray said negotiators would need to be careful not to tweak trade rules on sourcing components too much or they could risk driving up the costs of goods like electronics.

“The important thing that we are not going to do is hurt the region’s competitivity, and much less the region’s consumers,” Videgaray said, according to a transcript.
…

From: MeNeedIt