Amnesty International halts India operations, citing government reprisals
New Delhi, IndiaAP Human rights watchdog Amnesty International said Tuesday that it was halting its operation in India, citing reprisals from the government and the freezing of its bank accounts by Indian authorities. Amnesty International India said in a statement that the organization had laid off its staff in India and paused its ongoing campaign […]
Orthodox church petitions UN over Istanbul’s Hagia Sophia
Ankara, TurkeyAP The Greek Orthodox Church of the United States said on Tuesday it is petitioning United Nations experts to coerce Turkey into protecting Orthodox Christianity’s cultural heritage following the Turkish Government’s conversion of Istanbul’s landmark Hagia Sophia from a museum into a mosque. The Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America said it was pressing UN […]
World Council of Churches expresses “grave concern” over conflict in disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region
The World Council of Churches has expressed “grave concern” over renewed fighting in the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region involving Armenia and Azerbaijan. Scores of people – including some civilians – have reportedly died and many more been injured in fighting since Sunday which the WCC says risks provoking a wider armed conflict in the region. Both sides […]
Explainer: Why the coronavirus death rate still eludes scientists
Reuters Global deaths from COVID-19 have reached one million, but experts are still struggling to figure out a crucial metric in the pandemic: the fatality rate – the percentage of people infected with the pathogen who die. Here is a look at issues surrounding better understanding the COVID-19 death rate. How is a death rate […]
Global coronavirus deaths pass “agonising milestone” of one million
Reuters The global death toll from COVID-19 rose past one million on Tuesday, according to a Reuters tally, a bleak milestone in a pandemic that has devastated the global economy, overloaded health systems and changed the way people live. The number of deaths from the novel coronavirus this year is now double the number of […]
Texas grand jury: No action against killer of church shooter
Fort Worth, Texas, USAP A grand jury in Texas decided Monday to take no action against a man who fatally shot an armed man who killed two people at a Fort Worth-area church in late December, prosecutors said. Jack Wilson, a firearms instructor who trained a volunteer security team at the West Freeway Church of […]
Singapore’s use of facial verification in ID scheme stirs privacy fears
Bangkok, ThailandThomson Reuters Foundation Singapore’s more than four million residents will have to use facial verification technology to access government services through the national identity scheme, a move criticised as intrusive and heavy-handed by privacy advocates. Facial verification, which works by scanning someone’s face and matching it with a database image, is already used widely […]
Solitaire
I’ve been playing solitaire a bit lately. Something about the recent lock-down. PICTURE: Amanda Jones/Unsplash Did you know that if you shuffle a deck of cards, the sequence in your hand has a high probability of being unique? There are more shuffle combinations in a deck of cards than atoms in the universe! As I […]
“Crushing blow”: Pandemic hammers struggling Kashmir tourism
ATHAR PARVAIZ, writing for Thomson Reuters Foundation, reports on how the COVID-19 pandemic – which comes on top of eight months of tight security restrictions – is impacting tourism in the Indian-administered territory of Kashmir…
Starting gun fired on global hunt for hundreds of billions to fund nature protection
Barcelona, SpainThomson Reuters Foundation Protecting the planet’s plants, animals and ecosystems, and repairing the damage done to them by humans will take about $US700 billion a year in extra funding over the next decade, requiring a huge boost in investment by governments and business, officials said on Monday. The call came as Britain and Canada […]