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У Сумській області внаслідок обстрілу території підстанції пошкоджено будівлю, що призвело до знеструмлення підстанцій і побутових споживачів
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Washington — Japan’s new prime minister, Shigeru Ishiba, who began his term this week, may advocate for forming a nuclear body with the United States that is similar to an arrangement between the U.S. and South Korea aimed at planning for nuclear warfare contingencies.

“The U.S.-ROK [Republic of Korea, or South Korea] approach is probably a good example of where the U.S. and Japan might go in the future if nuclear threats keep increasing,” said James Schoff, a senior director of the U.S.-Japan NEXT Alliance Initiative at the Sasakawa Peace Foundation USA.

“It’s not about nuclear sharing or Japan building its own nuclear forces — both politically impossible at the moment and not necessary — but [about] the alliance taking more practical steps to be prepared for U.S. nuclear retaliation, if it becomes necessary,” Schoff said.

He said creating such a body would demonstrate resolve, credibility and readiness to any potential adversary and thus deter nuclear use in the first place.

Nuclear talk body

The new body would resemble the Nuclear Consultative Group (NCG) that South Korea and the United States established as part of the Washington Declaration in April 2023. The Washington-Seoul nuclear body is aimed at planning for potential nuclear contingencies caused by North Korea.

A U.S.-Japan nuclear consultative body would focus on nuclear threats from China and Russia in addition to North Korea, analysts say.

In a joint statement issued at their Security Consultative Committee meeting in July, Tokyo and Washington shared concerns over China’s “rapid expansion of its nuclear weapons arsenal” and agreed to strengthen deterrence through their ongoing Extended Deterrence Dialogue.

“Ishiba is likely to continue the strategies of [his predecessor Fumio] Kishida against China, and may in fact try to be bolder,” said Ryo Hinata-Yamaguchi, a nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Indo-Pacific Security Initiative and an associate professor at Tokyo International University.

Countering China

Though he is not entirely anti-China, Ishiba, a former defense minister who analysts say tends to view foreign relations through a security framework, is expected to be tough on China’s military assertions.

“Prime Minister Ishiba has spoken openly about the serious security challenges China poses to Japan,” said Ken Weinstein, the Japan chair at Hudson Institute.

“These challenges lie behind his desire for an Asian NATO and nuclear sharing, neither of which is likely to be policy,” Weinstein continued. “Instead, we are likely to see a change in tone towards the PRC with a tougher line from the Kantei on Chinese provocations than we saw from the more establishmentarian Kishida government.”

The People’s Republic of China (PRC) is the official name of China, and the Kantei refers to the Japanese prime minister’s office.

Before Ishiba was elected, he wrote an article published in September by the Hudson Institute, an American conservative non-profit think tank based in Washington D.C., advocating for an Asian version of NATO that would consider sharing U.S. nuclear weapons or introducing nuclear weapons in the region.

He said if nuclear threats by China and North Korea escalate in the region, “the U.S. extended deterrence in the region will no longer function.”

Extended deterrence involves a U.S. commitment to use all military assets, including nuclear weapons, to defend the region. Such a commitment would deter potential adversaries from causing any conflict.

But in recent years, there has been growing skepticism among U.S. allies over its extended deterrence commitment, leading South Korea to call for its own nuclear weapons.

In January 2023, South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol said South Korea may have to consider developing its own nuclear weapons or ask the U.S. to redeploy nuclear weapons in South Korea.

Yoon later retracted his statement after the NCG was created in April 2023, saying that South Korea will instead focus on enhancing deterrence with the United States to deal with North Korea’s nuclear threat.

Asian NATO

Ishiba’s call for a collective security arrangement like an Asian NATO and nuclear deployment and sharing options stems from uncertainty in relying “solely on the security alliance with the U.S.,” said Daniel Sneider, a lecturer in international policy focusing on Japanese foreign policy at Stanford University.

Ishiba sees “the need to protect Taiwan from Chinese attempts to forcefully reunify” the self-governed island that Beijing considers its own territory. He also wants Japan “to be prepared for any eventualities, including the retreat of the United States from global leadership,” amid concerns over U.S. foreign policy after the presidential election in November, Sneider said.

Before Japan’s own election this month, Ishiba, as a member of the Japanese Liberal Democratic Party, visited Taiwan in August and told Taiwan President Lai Ching-te that enhanced deterrence was necessary to resist China’s aggression in the Taiwan Strait.

The Sasakawa Peace Foundation’s Schoff said Ishiba probably knows that a true Asian NATO is not feasible, but “he is sending a signal to China and Russia that their aggressive use of military forces harassing other countries and penetrating their sovereign space is being noticed and will push Asian countries closer together in collective defense if they keep it up.”

Japan accused a Chinese spy plane of violating its airspace for the first time in August.

Matthew Brummer, a professor at the National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies in Tokyo, said instead of calling for an Asian NATO, Japan will likely increase cooperation with NATO countries, deepening security agreements, especially regarding joint technology sharing and production. 
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MEMPHIS, Tennessee — Three former Memphis police officers were convicted Thursday in the 2023 fatal beating of Tyre Nichols, but were acquitted of the harshest charges they faced for a death that sparked national protests and calls for broad changes in policing.

Jurors deliberated for about six hours before coming back with the mixed verdict for Tadarrius Bean, Demetrius Haley and Justin Smith.

All were convicted of witness tampering related to the cover-up of the beating, but Bean and Smith were acquitted of civil rights charges. Haley was acquitted of violating Nichols’ civil rights causing death, but convicted of the lesser charge of violating his civil rights causing bodily injury. He was also convicted of a conspiracy to witness tamper charge that the others were acquitted of.

The court remained silent as the verdicts were read.

The judge ordered all three officers to be taken into custody. He planned to hold a hearing Monday to hear from the defense lawyers about releasing them pending sentencing. The witness tampering charges carry possible sentences of up to 20 years in prison. The civil rights charge against Haley carries up to 10 years in prison. They had faced up to life in prison if convicted on the harshest charges.

The verdict marked a partial setback for prosecutors who were unable to land a conviction for civil rights violations for two officers who played an active role in the encounter. Jurors repeatedly watched graphic clips from police video that showed the officers punch and kick Nichols and hit him with a police baton just steps from his home, as the 29-year-old called out for his mother.

In a statement, Assistant U.S. Attorney General Kristen Clarke, who oversees the Justice Department’s civil rights division, said “Tyre Nichols should be alive today.”

“We hope this prosecution provides some measure of comfort as the law enforcement officers tied to his death have been held accountable,” Clarke said.

Bean and Smith were seen on video wrestling with Nichols and holding his arms, while also hitting him, but the jury was not convinced those actions amounted to civil rights violations. An FBI agent said Smith told him he punched Nichols, but defense lawyers argued Bean and Smith were merely slapping Nichols’ hands away as they tried to put handcuffs on him.

Rodney Wells, Nichols’ stepfather, told The Associated Press outside the courtroom: “A win is a win. They’re all going to jail.”

Five officers were charged in Nichols’ death, but two pleaded guilty and testified against members of their old crime suppression unit.

Prosecutors argued that Nichols was beaten for running from a traffic stop, saying it was part of a common police practice referred to in officer slang as a “street tax” or “run tax. ” They said the officers lied — to a supervisor, to medical professionals attending to Nichols and in required written reports — about the extent of the force they used.

“This has been a long journey for our family,” RowVaughn Wells, Nichols’ mother, told reporters. “I’m actually in shock right now because I still can’t believe all the stuff that’s going on. But we’re happy that they all have been convicted and they have been arrested.”

Smith’s lawyer declined to comment. Attorneys for Bean and Haley did not respond to requests for comment.

Nichols, who was Black, ran from the traffic stop despite being hit with pepper spray and a Taser. The five officers, who were fired after the beating, also are Black.

Some of the most emotional testimony at trial came from one of the officers, Desmond Mills, who took a plea deal in which prosecutors call for up to 15 years in prison. He testified in tears that he was sorry, that he left Nichols’ young son fatherless and that he wishes he stopped the punches. Later, he testified that he went along with a cover-up in hopes that Nichols would survive and the whole thing would “blow over.”

Nichols died Jan. 10, 2023, three days after the beating. His son is now 7 years old.

The other officer who reached a deal with prosecutors, Emmitt Martin, testified that Nichols was “helpless” while officers pummeled him, and that afterward the officers understood “they weren’t going to tell on me, and I wasn’t going to tell on them.” Under his plea agreement, prosecutors will suggest a prison sentence of up to 40 years.

Defense attorneys sought to portray Martin as a principal aggressor. Martin testified Nichols was not a threat, yet he acknowledged punching and kicking Nichols in the head.

Mills’ lawyer declined to comment. Martin’s attorney did not immediately respond to a phone message.

The police video shows the officers milling about and talking as Nichols struggles with his injuries. An autopsy report shows he died from blows to the head. The report describes brain injuries, and cuts and bruises on his head and other areas.

With the federal criminal trial complete, other investigations and court action still aren’t settled.

The five officers also have been charged with second-degree murder in state court, where they pleaded not guilty, although Mills and Martin are expected to change their pleas. A trial date in state court has not been set.

The U.S. Department of Justice is conducting a “patterns and practices” investigation into how Memphis officers use force and conduct arrests, and whether the department in the majority-Black city engages in racially discriminatory policing.

The Justice Department also has a separate review concerning use of force, de-escalation strategies and specialized units within Memphis police.

Pastor Earle Fisher, a Memphis activist who has long called for investigations of the city’s police, said he hopes the probes “provide for us the remedies we so rightly deserve.”

Additionally, Nichols’ mother filed a $550 million lawsuit against the city and its police chief.

Ben Crump and Anthony Romanucci, lawyers for Nichols’ family, said the verdicts “bring a measure of accountability for his senseless and tragic death.”

“Our fight for justice for Tyre is far from over,” the lawyers said in a joint statement.
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NEW YORK — The 12-month grace period for student loan borrowers ended on September 30. The “on-ramp” period helped borrowers who are struggling to make payments avoid the risk of defaulting and hurting their credit score.

“The end of the on-ramp period means the beginning of the potentially harsh consequences for student loan borrowers who are not able to make payments,” said Persis Yu, Deputy Executive Director at the Student Borrower Protection Center.

Around 43 million Americans have student loan debt, amounting to $1.5 trillion. Around eight million of those borrowers had enrolled in the SAVE plan, the newest income-driven repayment plan that extended the eligibility for borrowers to have affordable monthly student loan payments. However, this plan is currently on hold due to legal challenges.

With the on-ramp period and a separate program known as Fresh Start ending and the SAVE plan on hold, student loan borrowers who are struggling to afford their monthly payments have fewer options, added Yu. Student loan borrowers who haven’t been able to afford their monthly payments must consider their options to avoid going into default.

If you have student loans, here’s what you need to know.

What was the on-ramp period?

The Education Department implemented this grace period to ease the borrower’s transition to make payments after a three-year payment pause during the COVID-19 pandemic. During this year-long period, borrowers were encouraged to keep making payments since interest continued to accumulate.

“Normally, loans will default if you fall about nine months behind on making payments, but during this on-ramp period, missed payments would not move people towards defaulting and then being subject to forced collections. However, if you missed payments, you still be falling behind ultimately on repaying your loans,” said Abby Shaforth, director of National Consumer Law Center’s Student Loan Borrower Assistance Project.

Since this grace period has ended, student loan borrowers who don’t make payments will go delinquent or, if their loans are not paid for nine months, go into default.

Borrowers who cannot afford to make payments can apply for deferment or forbearance, which pause payments, though interest continues to accrue.

What happens if I don’t make my payments?

Borrowers who can’t or don’t pay risk delinquency and eventually default. That can badly hurt your credit rating and make you ineligible for additional aid and government benefits.

If a borrower missed one month’s payment, they will start receiving email notifications, said Shaforth. Once the loan hasn’t been paid for three months, loan servicers notify to the credit reporting agencies that the loan is delinquent, affecting your credit history. Once the borrower hasn’t paid the loan for nine months, the loan goes into default.

If you’re struggling to pay, advisers first encourage you to check if you qualify for an income-driven repayment plan, which determines your payments by looking at your expenses. You can see whether you qualify by visiting the Federal Student Aid website. If you’ve worked for a government agency or a non-profit organization, you could also be eligible for the Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program, which forgives student debt after 10 years.

What happens when a loan goes into default?

When you fall behind on a loan by 270 days — roughly nine months — the loan appears on your credit report as being in default.

Once a loan is in default, it goes into collections. This means the government can garnish wages (without a court order) to go towards paying back the loan, intercept tax refunds, and seize portions of Social Security checks and other benefit payments.

What if I can’t pay?

If your budget doesn’t allow you to resume payments, it’s important to know how to navigate the possibility of default and delinquency on a student loan. Both can hurt your credit rating, which would make you ineligible for additional aid.

If you’re in a short-term financial bind, you may qualify for deferment or forbearance — allowing you to temporarily suspend payment.

To determine whether deferment or forbearance are good options for you, you can contact your loan servicer. One thing to note: interest still accrues during deferment or forbearance. Both can also impact potential loan forgiveness options. Depending on the conditions of your deferment or forbearance, it may make sense to continue paying the interest during the payment suspension.

What is an income-driven repayment plan?

The U.S. Education Department offers several plans for repaying federal student loans. Under the standard plan, borrowers are charged a fixed monthly amount that ensures all their debt will be repaid after 10 years. But if borrowers have difficulty paying that amount, they can enroll in one of several plans that offer lower monthly payments based on income and family size. Those are known as income-driven repayment plans.

Income-driven options have been offered for years and generally cap monthly payments at 10% of a borrower’s discretionary income. If a borrower’s earnings are low enough, their bill is reduced to $0. And after 20 or 25 years, any remaining debt gets erased.

What is the latest with the SAVE program?

In August, the Supreme Court kept on hold the SAVE plan, the income-driven repayment plan that would have lowered payments for millions of borrowers, while lawsuits make their way through lower courts.

Eight million borrowers who had already enrolled in the SAVE plan don’t have to pay their monthly student loan bills until the court case is resolved. Debt that already had been forgiven under the plan was unaffected.

The next court hearing about this case will be held on October 15.

What happened with the Fresh Start program?

The Fresh Start program, which gave benefits to borrowers who were delinquent prior to the pandemic payment pause, also closed on September 30. During this limited program, student loan borrowers who were in default prior to the pandemic were given the opportunity to remove their loans from default, allowing them to enroll in income-driven payment plans, or apply for deferment, among other benefits.
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Голова МВА додав, що поранених госпіталізували, медики надають їм необхідну допомогу
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HORSESHOE BEACH, Florida — It was just a month ago that Brooke Hiers left the state-issued emergency trailer where her family had lived since Hurricane Idalia slammed into her Gulf Coast fishing village of Horseshoe Beach in August 2023. 

Hiers and her husband, Clint, were still finishing the electrical work in the home they painstakingly rebuilt themselves, wiping out Clint’s savings to do so. They will never finish that wiring job. 

Hurricane Helene blew their newly renovated home off its 4-foot-high pilings, sending it floating into the neighbor’s yard next door. 

“You always think, ‘Oh, there’s no way it can happen again,'” Hiers said. “I don’t know if anybody’s ever experienced this in the history of hurricanes.” 

For the third time in 13 months, this windswept stretch of Florida’s Big Bend took a direct hit from a hurricane — a one-two-three punch to an 80-kilometer (50-mile) sliver of the state’s more than 13,500 kilometers (8,400 miles) of coastline, first by Idalia, then Hurricane Debby in August 2024 and now Helene. 

Hiers, who sits on Horseshoe Beach’s town council, said words like “unbelievable” are beginning to lose their meaning. 

“I’ve tried to use them all. Catastrophic. Devastating. Heartbreaking … none of that explains what happened here,” Hiers said. 

The back-to-back hits to Florida’s Big Bend are forcing residents to reckon with the true costs of living in an area under siege by storms that researchers say are becoming stronger because of climate change. 

The Hiers, like many others here, can’t afford homeowners insurance on their flood-prone houses, even if it were available. Residents who have watched their life savings get washed away multiple times are left with few choices — leave the communities where their families have lived for generations, pay tens of thousands of dollars to rebuild their houses on stilts as building codes require, or move into a recreational vehicle they can drive out of harm’s way. 

That’s if they can afford any of those things. The storm left many residents bunking with family or friends, sleeping in their cars or sheltering in what’s left of their collapsing homes. 

Janalea England wasn’t waiting for outside organizations to get aid to her friends and neighbors, turning her commercial fish market in the river town of Steinhatchee into a pop-up donation distribution center, just like she did after Hurricane Idalia. A row of folding tables was stacked with water, canned food, diapers, soap, clothes and shoes, a steady stream of residents coming and going. 

“I’ve never seen so many people homeless as what I have right now. Not in my community,” England said. “They have nowhere to go.” 

The sparsely populated Big Bend is known for its towering pine forests and pristine salt marshes that disappear into the horizon, a remote stretch of largely undeveloped coastline that’s mostly dodged the crush of condos, golf courses and souvenir strip malls that has carved up so much of the Sunshine State. 

This is a place where teachers, mill workers and housekeepers could still afford to live within walking distance of the Gulf’s white sand beaches. Or at least they used to, until a third successive hurricane blew their homes apart. 

Helene was so destructive, many residents don’t have a home left to clean up, escaping the storm with little more than the clothes on their backs, even losing their shoes to the surging tides. 

With marinas washed away, restaurants collapsed, and vacation homes blown apart, many commercial fishermen, servers and house cleaners lost their homes and their jobs on the same day. 

Those who worked at the local sawmill and paper mill, two bedrock employers in the area, were laid off in the past year too. Now a convoy of semi-trucks full of hurricane relief supplies have set up camp at the shuttered mill in the city of Perry. 

Hud Lilliott was a mill worker for 28 years, before losing his job and now his canal-front home in Dekle Beach, just down the street from the house where he grew up. 

Lilliott and his wife, Laurie, hope to rebuild their house there, but they don’t know how they’ll pay for it. And they’re worried the school in Steinhatchee where Laurie teaches first grade could become another casualty of the storm, as the county watches its tax base float away. 

“We’ve worked our whole lives, and we’re so close to where they say the ‘golden years,'” Laurie said. “It’s like you can see the light and it all goes dark.” 

Dave Beamer rebuilt his home in Steinhatchee after it was “totaled” by Hurricane Idalia, only to see it washed into the marsh a year later. 

“I don’t think I can do that again,” Beamer said. “Everybody’s changing their mind about how we’re going to live here.” 

Beamer plans to stay in this river town but will put his home on wheels. He says he’ll buy a camper and build a pole barn to park it under. 

In Horseshoe Beach, Hiers is waiting for a makeshift town hall to be delivered in the coming days, a double-wide trailer where they’ll offer what services they can for as long as they can. She and her husband are staying with their daughter, a 45-minute drive away. 

“You feel like this could be the end of things as you knew it. Of your town. Of your community,” Hiers said. “We just don’t even know how to recover at this point.” 
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WASHINGTON — The devastation wrought by Hurricane Helene has brought climate change to the forefront of the presidential campaign after the issue lingered on the margins for months.

Vice President Kamala Harris traveled to Georgia Wednesday to see hard-hit areas, two days after her Republican opponent, former President Donald Trump, was in the state and criticized the federal response to the storm, which has killed at least 200 people in the Southeast. Helene is the deadliest storm to hit the U.S. mainland since Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

President Joe Biden toured some of the hardest-hit areas by helicopter on Wednesday and Thursday. Biden, who has frequently been called on to survey damage and console victims after tornadoes, wildfires, tropical storms and other natural disasters, traveled to the Carolinas, Florida and Georgia to get a closer look at the hurricane devastation.

“Storms are getting stronger and stronger,” Biden said Wednesday after surveying damage near Asheville, North Carolina. At least 70 people died in the state.

“Nobody can deny the impact of the climate crisis anymore,” Biden said at a briefing in Raleigh, North Carolina. “They must be brain dead if they do.”

Harris, meanwhile, hugged and huddled with a family Wednesday in hurricane-ravaged Augusta, Georgia.

“There is real pain and trauma that resulted because of this hurricane” and its aftermath, Harris said outside a storm-damaged house with downed trees in the yard.

“We are here for the long-haul,” she said.

Storm damage forces discussion

The focus on the storm — and its link to climate change — was notable after climate change was only lightly mentioned in two presidential debates this year. The candidates instead focused on abortion rights, the economy, immigration and other issues.

The hurricane featured prominently in Tuesday’s vice-presidential debate as Republican JD Vance and Democrat Tim Walz were asked about the storm and the larger issue of climate change.

Both men called the hurricane a tragedy and agreed on the need for a strong federal response. But it was Walz, the governor of Minnesota, who put the storm in the context of a warming climate.

“There’s no doubt this thing roared onto the scene faster and stronger than anything we’ve seen,” he said.

Bob Henson, a meteorologist and writer with Yale Climate Connections, said it was no surprise that Helene is pushing both the federal disaster response and human-caused climate change into the campaign conversation.

“Weather disasters are often overlooked as a factor in big elections,” he said. “Helene is a sprawling catastrophe, affecting millions of Americans. And it dovetails with several well-established links between hurricanes and climate change, including rapid intensification and intensified downpours.”

More than 40 trillion gallons of rain drenched the Southeast in the last week, an amount that if concentrated in North Carolina would cover the state in 3 1/2 feet of water. “That’s an astronomical amount of precipitation,” said Ed Clark, head of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Water Center in Tuscaloosa, Alabama.

Candidates make claims, counter claims

During Tuesday’s debate, Walz credited Vance for past statements acknowledging that climate change is a problem. But he noted that Trump has called climate change “a hoax” and joked that rising seas “would make more beachfront property to be able to invest in.”

Trump said in a speech Tuesday that “the planet has actually gotten little bit cooler recently,” adding: “Climate change covers everything.”

In fact, summer 2024 sweltered to Earth’s hottest on record, making it likely this year will end up as the warmest humanity has measured, according to the European climate service Copernicus. Global records were shattered just last year as human-caused climate change, with a temporary boost from an El Niño, keeps dialing up temperatures and extreme weather, scientists said.

Vance, an Ohio senator, said he and Trump support clean air, clean water and “want the environment to be cleaner and safer.” However, during Trump’s four years in office, he took a series of actions to roll back more than 100 environmental regulations.

Vance sidestepped a question about whether he agrees with Trump’s statement that climate change is a hoax. “What the president has said is that if the Democrats — in particular Kamala Harris and her leadership — really believe that climate change is serious, what they would be doing is more manufacturing and more energy production in the United States of America. And that’s not what they’re doing,” he said.

“This idea that carbon [dioxide] emissions drives all of the climate change. Well, let’s just say that’s true just for the sake of argument. So, we’re not arguing about weird science. If you believe that, what would you want to do?” Vance asked.

The answer, he said, is to “produce as much energy as possible in the United States of America, because we’re the cleanest economy in the entire world.”

Vance claimed that policies by Biden and Harris actually help China, because many solar panels, lithium-ion batteries and other materials used in renewable energy and electric vehicles are made in China and imported to the United States.

Walz rebutted that claim, noting that the Inflation Reduction Act, the Democrats’ signature climate law approved in 2022, includes the largest-ever investment in domestic clean energy production. The law, for which Harris cast the deciding vote, has created 200,000 jobs across the country, including in Ohio and Minnesota, Walz said. Vance was not in the Senate when the law was approved.

“We are producing more natural gas and more oil [in the United States] than we ever have,” Walz said. “We’re also producing more clean energy.”

The comment echoed a remark by Harris in last month’s presidential debate. The Biden-Harris administration has overseen “the largest increase in domestic oil production in history because of an approach that recognizes that we cannot over rely on foreign oil,” Harris said then.

While Biden rarely mentions it, domestic fossil fuel production under his administration is at an all-time high. Crude oil production averaged 12.9 million barrels a day last year, eclipsing a previous record set in 2019 under Trump, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

Democrats want to continue investments in renewable energy such as wind and solar power — and not just because supporters of the Green New Deal want that, Walz said.

“My farmers know climate change is real. They’ve seen 500-year droughts, 500-year floods back-to-back. But what they’re doing is adapting,” he said.

“The solution for us is to continue to move forward, [accept] that climate change is real” and reduce reliance on fossil fuels, Walz said, adding that the administration is doing exactly that.

“We are seeing us becoming an energy superpower for the future, not just the current” time, he said.
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17 вересня 2024 року Аділлє Ахтемова повідомила, що її чоловіка вивезли із в’язниці російського Єнісейська у невідомому напрямку
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«Українська розвідка не використовує подібних методів. Ця заява – чергова провокація спецслужб РФ»
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Washington — As the fall semester begins, a women’s college in Boston, Massachusetts, has retooled its media-related curriculum to best reflect the ideals of the school’s namesake, the late journalist Gwen Ifill.

Simmons University announced it would relaunch the media school as the Gwen Ifill School of Media, Humanities and Social Sciences. A search committee also named media scholar Ammina Kothari as the new dean.

The Ifill School’s new structure expands its media curriculum to include humanities and social sciences. The attributes that defined Ifill also shape a new, holistic approach, “An unwavering commitment to accuracy and objectivity, a nuanced understanding of social and historical context and a compassion-based appreciation of policymaking’s real-world implications,” according to a Simmons press release.

“Folks here are very proud of Gwen’s legacy and want to honor it in many different ways,” said Bert Ifill, Gwen’s brother and a longtime university administrator.

A crucial component of the Ifill School is its emphasis on communications, a field Gwen excelled in, Bert told VOA.

After graduating from Simmons in 1977, she had long careers in both print and television journalism, working for The Baltimore Evening Sun, The Washington Post, The New York Times, NBC and PBS. She covered seven presidential campaigns and died in 2016 at age 61.

Ifill was the first African American woman to moderate a vice presidential debate and to coanchor a national newscast, “PBS NewsHour.”

“Gwen valued storytelling, and she was an amazing journalist,” Kothari, the school’s new dean, told VOA. “But she also worked really hard to raise awareness about important social issues and to highlight underrepresented voices.”

Abigail Meyers, a current junior at the Ifill School, admires the journalist’s “groundbreaking work” in both journalism and racial justice, she told VOA. Raised near Baltimore, Maryland, Meyers feels a special connection to Ifill’s work for the Baltimore Evening Sun newspaper.

The school has been instrumental in supporting Meyers’ aspirations to become a professional journalist, she told VOA.

“The support that you get from the faculty and alumni is unlike really any other journalism program,” she said.

Being a double major in communications and political science, Meyers appreciates the new curriculum’s flexibility, as she is able to take classes across different disciplines.

This flexibility will help prime Simmons’ students to achieve success, Kothari said. She believes interdisciplinary training leads to stronger leaders in the world.

“As we think about communications or media, including journalism or social sciences, we need a strong foundation in humanities to understand the historical context for what we see happening today,” Kothari said.

The school’s increased focus on humanities “couldn’t be more timely,” according to the press release. Nearly three of four Americans believe media literacy is an important skill in today’s news landscape, a 2023 Boston University survey found.

However, humanities-focused degree programs like the Ifill School’s receive little recognition. Of all the bachelor’s degrees awarded in 2020, humanities degrees made up less than 10%, a number that has only been decreasing, according to a 2022 MIT study. Meanwhile, science, technology, engineering and math degrees, or STEM, have grown exponentially.

But humanities and STEM shouldn’t be seen as opposites, Kothari said.

She cited the COVID-19 pandemic response as an example. Many precautionary measures such as social distancing were grounded in “amazing scientific research,” but weren’t effectively communicated to the public, she said.

“As we have new knowledge being produced, we also need journalists,” Kothari said. “We need communicators who are able to translate very complex information to the audience so they can see, ‘How does it matter to me? What is the effect for me?’”

Ifill’s legacy is not only celebrated within her namesake school, but also through press freedom organizations around the world.

The Committee to Protect Journalists, a press freedom nonprofit, honors Ifill with the annual Gwen Ifill Press Freedom Award, which is presented to individuals who have “shown extraordinary and sustained achievement in the cause of press freedom,” according to CPJ’s website.

Christophe Deloire, the late director of international media freedom organization Reporters Without Borders, or RSF, received the 2024 Gwen Ifill Press Freedom Award.

“Christophe was one of journalism’s greatest-ever champions,” RSF Executive Director Clayton Weimers told VOA in an email. “There was hardly a fight or an advance in press freedom in the past decade that he wasn’t a part of, if not leading.”

As Ifill’s legacy spreads, there is one person who couldn’t be prouder: her brother, Bert. He told VOA it often seems as though his full-time job is “to talk nicely about Gwen.”

“It’s always a great pleasure and honor for me to talk about her and to talk about her legacy, not only as obviously a very skilled journalist, but as an extraordinary mentor and confidant,” he said.
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The United States’ policy on China has been mostly consistent from the administration of Donald Trump to the White House of Joe Biden — with both presidents viewing China as America’s biggest competitor. But in the race for the next president, Kamala Harris and Donald Trump have slightly different approaches toward the global superpower. VOA’s Elizabeth Lee explains.
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У Харківській області аварійні вимкнення електроенергії запровадили через складну ситуацію в Обʼєднаній енергосистемі України
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NEW DELHI — In the small South Indian village of Thulasendrapuram, where U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris’s maternal grandfather once lived, locals and priests have prayed to the local deity at a Hindu temple for her victory as she runs for the U.S. presidency.

In the capital, New Delhi, many express pride that one of the candidates for the world’s most powerful office has Indian roots – she is the daughter of an Indian mother and Jamaican father.

But Harris has failed to enthuse others who feel she never built on her Indian connection during her vice presidency.

“It’s quite exciting for someone like me who is a common girl around town,” said New Delhi resident, Simran Singh.

Another city resident, Nandita Soni, and her husband watched Harris debate her opponent, former U.S. President Donald Trump, last month.

“I think she won hands down. Of course, there is a sense of pride for us. That she is, firstly, a woman and then of Indian heritage, feels really good,” Soni said.

Harris is not the only Indian connection to the American presidential race. Usha Vance, the wife of Republican vice-presidential nominee J.D. Vance, is also the daughter of Indian immigrants.

Not many in India have heard of Usha Vance. Those who have, see it as a tribute to a country where immigrants can make a mark.

“I think both of them having a role in the elections is a very good thing for our Indian heritage and diaspora, but I think it is much more important for the American system,” said Shyam Bajpai, a retired professional. He praises Harris for “reviving the Democrat Party’s energy after a very difficult moment with Mr. Biden.”

However, the euphoria witnessed in India four years ago when Harris became vice president is missing. She hosted a luncheon for Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi last year during his state visit to Washington, where she spoke of her deep personal connection to India. In interviews she has said that her introduction to the concepts of equality, freedom and democracy came from her Indian grandfather during her visits to her maternal family’s hometown, Chennai, when she was young.

But some point out that she neither visited India during her tenure as vice president nor emphasized her Indian identity much while in office.

“To be honest we did not hear much of her in India, because as vice president, her connections with India were not all that great,” said Pradeep Bhargava, a New Delhi resident. “We were not getting much news about her.”

That may be why many young Indians ask: Who is Kamala Harris?

“I think she is not on social media,” said Simar Kaur, an undergraduate student in Delhi University. “I get most of the news from social media only.”

But IT professionals who have long eyed the United States for career opportunities are excited about the possibility of an American president with roots in India. “I am sure this will help in more job opportunities for Indians in the future,” said software engineer Vishal Chabra. “It will be good for India as well.”

Those who are tracking the U.S. race see Harris’s bid as another huge milestone for its diaspora in Western countries — Rishi Sunak, who became British Prime Minister in 2022 but lost in July, was also of Indian origin. They also point to the success of Indian Americans who have risen to the top of the corporate ladder in the U.S., heading companies like Google.

“With UK also and now America, Indians are all the way, and it is the way to go from them,” said Soni.

 
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President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris on Wednesday visited areas hit hard by Hurricane Helene, where more than a million people remain without power and the death toll is climbing. Biden offered as many as 1,000 active-duty soldiers to support the response effort. VOA’s Anita Powell reports from Washington.
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