Source: United States House of Representatives – Congresswoman Debbie Dingell (12th District of Michigan)
Congresswoman Debbie Dingell (MI-06) today shared a letter from Republic Services in response to questions raised at her June 18 Western Wayne Community Town Hall regarding hazardous waste and safety at Wayne Disposal Inc.
In the letter, Russ Knocke, Vice President of Public and Government Affairs for Republic, writes:
“Per our recent telephone conversation, we would like to provide some answers to questions we believe were raised by participants at your Western Wayne Town Hall event on Wednesday, June 18, 2025. Specifically, we would like to provide details regarding the testing and characterization procedures in place for all waste being shipped to WDI for disposal by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) as part of its Formerly Utilized Sites Remedial Action Program (“FUSRAP”).”
Excerpts from the letter:
“WDI is not permitted to accept waste any more radioactive than a traditional non-hazardous solid waste landfill in Michigan- USACE simply chooses to dispose of this material at WDI because of its highly engineered construction and robust environmental monitoring programs.”
“WDI has an approved Radiological Monitoring Plan for the collection of data specifically designed to ensure the safe management and disposal of radiological waste. As part of that plan, the site monitors worker exposure, perimeter air samples, leachate, surface water, radon and groundwater data for radionuclides. All data collected is submitted to EGLE for its review. Site worker exposure has always been well below occupational safety levels, all monitoring results are consistent with natural background concentrations and below established action levels, and landfill leachate meets drinking water standards for radioactivity even before it is treated. In summary, WDI has a robust radiological monitoring program and makes the data publicly available via submission to EGLE as part of its regular compliance reporting cadence.”
“WDI remains firmly committed to transparency, active community engagement, and the responsible management of all materials accepted at the facility. We are confident in the strength and rigor of our environmental monitoring programs, which are designed to ensure that site operations remain protective of human health and the environment, with no adverse offsite impacts.”
View the full text of the letter here.
In addition to the information provided in the letter, Republic informed Dingell they are sending two of their team members to a nuclear training program at Harvard University in August and offered for someone from VBT Fire to join them. They also stated that if there’s ever a similar program with the University of Michigan, they would be open to such a training in state.
In addition, at Rep. Dingell’s request, Republic agreed to create a website for the landfill for transparency and community engagement.
The letter comes ahead of the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy (EGLE) and U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) public information session on Republic Services’ application to expand operations at Wayne Disposal.
Source: United States Senator for Arkansas Tom Cotton
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASEContact: Caroline Tabler or Patrick McCann (202) 224-2353June 27, 2025
Chairman Cotton to Introduce Bill to Reform, Improve, and Streamline ODNI
Washington, D.C. — Senator Tom Cotton (R-Arkansas), Chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, today will introduce the Intelligence Community Efficiency and Effectiveness Act, legislation that would realign resources to intelligence missions, eliminate duplicative efforts and inefficient, non-functioning bureaucracies across the intelligence community (IC) and return the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) to its original size, scope, and mission.
Senators Jim Risch (R-Idaho), Mike Rounds (R-South Dakota), Ted Budd (R-North Carolina), and James Lankford (R-Oklahoma) are cosponsoring the legislation.
“Created after the September 11th attacks, ODNI was intended to be a lean organization to align America’s intelligence resources and authorities, not the overstaffed and bureaucratic behemoth that it is today, where coordinators coordinate with other coordinators. These reforms will be vital to keeping our country safe from the wide range of threats that we continue to face,” said Senator Cotton.
Text of the Intelligence Community Efficiency and Effectiveness Act may be found here.
The Intelligence Community Efficiency and Effectiveness Act would:
Cap ODNI full-time staff at 650.
Eliminate certain reporting requirements and the transfer of personnel authorities.
Modify the National Intelligence Council’s duties and terminate the National Intelligence Managers’ positions.
Terminate the National Counterintelligence and Security Center (NCSC) at ODNI and transfer its responsibilities to the FBI.
Redesignate the National Counterterrorism Center as the National Counterterrorism and Counternarcotics Center, and limit its mission to foreign intelligence authorities.
Terminate the National Counterproliferation and Biosecurity Center (NCBC) at ODNI, transfer NCBC’s responsibilities to the CIA, and redesignate it as the National Counterproliferation Center.
Repeal various positions (including the Director of the NCSC, the Director of the NCBC, and the Intelligence Community Chief Data Officer), and seven units, centers, councils, offices, and programs (including obsolete bureaucratic entities that have failed to function, such as the Joint Intelligence Community Council).
Prohibit National Intelligence Program funds from being used to outsource IC analytic efforts to organizations that take funds from foreign governments.
Require the DNI to wind down and terminate the National Intelligence University within 180 days.
Prohibit use of National Intelligence Program funds to implement any diversity, equity, or inclusion practice in the intelligence community.
Source: United States Senator for Arkansas Tom Cotton
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASEContact: Caroline Tabler or Patrick McCann (202) 224-2353June 27, 2025
Chairman Cotton to Introduce Bill to Reform, Improve, and Streamline ODNI
Washington, D.C. — Senator Tom Cotton (R-Arkansas), Chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, today will introduce the Intelligence Community Efficiency and Effectiveness Act, legislation that would realign resources to intelligence missions, eliminate duplicative efforts and inefficient, non-functioning bureaucracies across the intelligence community (IC) and return the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) to its original size, scope, and mission.
Senators Jim Risch (R-Idaho), Mike Rounds (R-South Dakota), Ted Budd (R-North Carolina), and James Lankford (R-Oklahoma) are cosponsoring the legislation.
“Created after the September 11th attacks, ODNI was intended to be a lean organization to align America’s intelligence resources and authorities, not the overstaffed and bureaucratic behemoth that it is today, where coordinators coordinate with other coordinators. These reforms will be vital to keeping our country safe from the wide range of threats that we continue to face,” said Senator Cotton.
Text of the Intelligence Community Efficiency and Effectiveness Act may be found here.
The Intelligence Community Efficiency and Effectiveness Act would:
Cap ODNI full-time staff at 650.
Eliminate certain reporting requirements and the transfer of personnel authorities.
Modify the National Intelligence Council’s duties and terminate the National Intelligence Managers’ positions.
Terminate the National Counterintelligence and Security Center (NCSC) at ODNI and transfer its responsibilities to the FBI.
Redesignate the National Counterterrorism Center as the National Counterterrorism and Counternarcotics Center, and limit its mission to foreign intelligence authorities.
Terminate the National Counterproliferation and Biosecurity Center (NCBC) at ODNI, transfer NCBC’s responsibilities to the CIA, and redesignate it as the National Counterproliferation Center.
Repeal various positions (including the Director of the NCSC, the Director of the NCBC, and the Intelligence Community Chief Data Officer), and seven units, centers, councils, offices, and programs (including obsolete bureaucratic entities that have failed to function, such as the Joint Intelligence Community Council).
Prohibit National Intelligence Program funds from being used to outsource IC analytic efforts to organizations that take funds from foreign governments.
Require the DNI to wind down and terminate the National Intelligence University within 180 days.
Prohibit use of National Intelligence Program funds to implement any diversity, equity, or inclusion practice in the intelligence community.
Source: United States Senator for Arkansas Tom Cotton
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASEContact: Caroline Tabler or Patrick McCann (202) 224-2353June 27, 2025
Chairman Cotton to Introduce Bill to Reform, Improve, and Streamline ODNI
Washington, D.C. — Senator Tom Cotton (R-Arkansas), Chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, today will introduce the Intelligence Community Efficiency and Effectiveness Act, legislation that would realign resources to intelligence missions, eliminate duplicative efforts and inefficient, non-functioning bureaucracies across the intelligence community (IC) and return the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) to its original size, scope, and mission.
Senators Jim Risch (R-Idaho), Mike Rounds (R-South Dakota), Ted Budd (R-North Carolina), and James Lankford (R-Oklahoma) are cosponsoring the legislation.
“Created after the September 11th attacks, ODNI was intended to be a lean organization to align America’s intelligence resources and authorities, not the overstaffed and bureaucratic behemoth that it is today, where coordinators coordinate with other coordinators. These reforms will be vital to keeping our country safe from the wide range of threats that we continue to face,” said Senator Cotton.
Text of the Intelligence Community Efficiency and Effectiveness Act may be found here.
The Intelligence Community Efficiency and Effectiveness Act would:
Cap ODNI full-time staff at 650.
Eliminate certain reporting requirements and the transfer of personnel authorities.
Modify the National Intelligence Council’s duties and terminate the National Intelligence Managers’ positions.
Terminate the National Counterintelligence and Security Center (NCSC) at ODNI and transfer its responsibilities to the FBI.
Redesignate the National Counterterrorism Center as the National Counterterrorism and Counternarcotics Center, and limit its mission to foreign intelligence authorities.
Terminate the National Counterproliferation and Biosecurity Center (NCBC) at ODNI, transfer NCBC’s responsibilities to the CIA, and redesignate it as the National Counterproliferation Center.
Repeal various positions (including the Director of the NCSC, the Director of the NCBC, and the Intelligence Community Chief Data Officer), and seven units, centers, councils, offices, and programs (including obsolete bureaucratic entities that have failed to function, such as the Joint Intelligence Community Council).
Prohibit National Intelligence Program funds from being used to outsource IC analytic efforts to organizations that take funds from foreign governments.
Require the DNI to wind down and terminate the National Intelligence University within 180 days.
Prohibit use of National Intelligence Program funds to implement any diversity, equity, or inclusion practice in the intelligence community.
The UK government has published a ten-year strategy outlining how it aims to boost productivity and innovation across eight key sectors of the economy. From the future of AI to energy security and net zero, it’s a broad and ambitious plan. Our experts assess what it tells us about how the UK economy – and the jobs it offers – could look in future.
Nuclear placed firmly in the centre of the UK’s low-carbon future
Doug Specht, Reader in Cultural Geography and Communication, University of Westminster
For clean energy and industrial growth, the strategy presents an ambitious and comprehensive vision. And it seeks to establish the UK as a global leader in clean energy manufacturing and innovation. A key strength lies in its substantial investment commitments, however this includes £14.2 billion for the controversial Sizewell C nuclear power station and more than £2.5 billion for a Small Modular Reactor (SMR) programme.
Nuclear energy remains controversial – nevertheless, the strategy firmly places it as a central pillar for low-carbon, reliable energy and national security.
The strategy also targets high-growth sectors, prioritises regional development and introduces support schemes and regulatory reforms to tackle high electricity costs for industry, and slow grid connections. Yet despite these potential strengths, there are notable challenges. Implementation risks are significant, given the ten-year timeframe and potential shifts in political priorities.
And regional disparities and social inequalities may not be fully addressed, as the focus is on high-potential city regions. Some areas could be left behind. Skills shortages in engineering and digital sectors persist, and there is not enough detail on reskilling and lifelong learning. The importance of supply chain resilience, especially for the critical minerals needed for the green transition is acknowledged but not fully assured.
Overall, the strategy is ambitious and well-structured. But a reliance on nuclear rather than true renewables is seeking a quick win with high risks and high costs. A more radical and inclusive plan that expanded green infrastructure, and provided details of resilient growth across all regions and sectors, would have been welcomed.
An innovation boost for the UK’s world-leading creative industries
Bernard Hay, Head of Policy at the Creative Industries Policy and Evidence Centre, Newcastle University
The plan for the creative industries is a significant step forward for this critical sector. With multiple new commitments announced on areas ranging from scale-up finance and AI to skills, exports and freelance support, there is a lot to welcome for the sector. After all, it already accounts for over 5% of the UK’s annual gross value added (or GVA – which measures the value of goods and services) and 14% of its services exports.
One key aspect is boosting creative industries’ research and development (R&D), which is a driver of innovation, productivity and growth. This includes £100 million for the Arts and Humanities Research Council’s clusters programme, which supports location-based, creative R&D partnerships between universities and industry.
And by the end of the year, HMRC will publish clarification on what types of activity are eligible for R&D tax relief, to include arts activities that meet certain criteria. This is a nuanced change, but together with the other plans, it could have a catalytic effect on innovation in the sector.
Supporting regional creative economies is a golden thread running through this plan. A new £4 billion group capital initiative from the British Business Bank, announced earlier in the spending review, will be an important source of scale-up finance for small and medium-sized creative businesses that face barriers in accessing capital.
It is also welcome to see the government both increasing creative industries investment in several city-regions and supporting places to join up and work together through “creative corridors”. Coupled with the ongoing devolution of powers and funding in England, the next decade provides a huge opportunity for local policy innovation. This includes sharing and scaling proven strategies in growing regional creative economies.
An effective industrial strategy relies on high-quality data and analysis to support it. This is especially true when dealing with a rapidly evolving part of the economy such as the creative industries. The new plan includes commitments to strengthen the evidence base, including by increasing access to official statistics. This is good news not only for researchers, but for the whole sector.
The Lowry in Salford is part of a creative cluster in the north-west of England. Debu55y/Shutterstock
Advanced manufacturing: promising plans, but persistent problems
Michael Lewis, Professor of Operations and Supply Management, University of Bath
The government plans to invest £4.3 billion in advanced manufacturing. This covers research-driven production in sectors including automotive, aerospace and advanced materials (engineered substances that are especially useful in these industries). Some firms may also get energy cost relief through green levy exemptions.
A long-term plan is overdue, but the challenges are huge. Automotive production is targeted to rise substantially, but the sector will still depend heavily on a range of critical imports. The aerospace sector will start 40,000 apprenticeships by 2035, yet further education funding remains below 2010 levels. Much of the promised investment appears to be the repackaging of existing funding.
Most importantly, how to deliver these changes remains unclear. There are good ideas, like £99 million to expand the relatively successful Made Smarter Adoption programme to help small and medium-sized enterprises employ digital technology. But when helping small firms adopt basic digital tools counts as policy success, it shows how far UK manufacturing has fallen behind competitors. Likewise, when you need a new “connections accelerator service” just to help companies connect to the grid, it shows the scale of basic infrastructure problems that undermine grander ambitions.
Overall, the strategy marks real progress. However, without clear delivery plans, it reads more like a wish list than an action plan. This explains why industry reactions have been cautiously optimistic at best.
A chance to take the lead in the global AI race
Kamran Mahroof, Associate Professor of Supply Chain Analytics and Programme Leader for the MSc in the Applied Artificial Intelligence and Data Analytics, University of Bradford
From a digital and technologies perspective, the industrial strategy appears to signal a strong commitment to anchoring the nation at the forefront of the global AI race. The proposed Sovereign AI Unit shows an intent to ensure national control and access to critical AI infrastructure, computational power and expertise.
This is pivotal, not only for research and development, but also for national security and economic resilience in an increasingly AI-driven world. It points to a recognition that relying solely on external providers for cutting-edge AI capabilities carries inherent risks.
Besides, some of the world’s most innovative AI businesses are based in the UK. British companies are pushing the limits of what is feasible, from Synthesia’s advances in synthetic media to DeepMind’s developments in machine learning. In sectors including public safety, insurance and defence, smaller firms like Faculty, Tractable and Mind Foundry are also having a significant impact.
Complementing this, the AI Growth Zones are designed to act as regional magnets for investment and innovation, particularly in the realm of data centres and high-density computational facilities. By streamlining planning and providing preferential access to energy, these zones could accelerate the development of the physical infrastructure needed.
This decentralised approach has received more than 200 bids already from local authorities. It also has the potential to spread the economic benefits of AI beyond established tech hubs, encouraging new regional powerhouses and creating high-skilled jobs right across the UK.
Taken as a whole, these projects show a deliberate effort to develop core competencies and draw in private-sector funding. This puts the UK in a position to benefit from AI’s potential. This effort to develop national AI capabilities is not a new idea – it echoes the US AI executive order and the EU’s AI Act.
However, given the dominance of global tech giants, the UK needs to define “sovereignty” in practice and decide whether it is willing to provide large-scale funding. At a time when debates continue around the UK’s defence budget — a field now deeply intertwined with AI – more transparency is needed on how these ambitions will be funded.
Growth plans for financial services – and moves to share the benefits beyond London
Sarah Hall, 1931 Professor of Geography, University of Cambridge
One of the most striking elements of the new plan is that it places financial services much more centrally compared to previous approaches.
There are good reasons for doing this. Financial services are a vital component of the UK economy, contributing close to 9% of economic output in 2023. Clearly then, an industrial strategy without one of the most important economic sectors would make little sense.
There is also a welcome emphasis on the ways in which financial services can grow, not only as a sector in its own right, but also to be better integrated in supporting the growth of other parts of the economy. Some important policy moves have already been announced, such as changes to pension funds aimed at increasing their investment in large infrastructure projects.
In order to meet these ambitions, the strategy is right to note that financial services need to be supported, not only in London but also across the many clusters around the UK. These include, for example, Edinburgh, Manchester and Bristol.
There will be more details in the sector plan, released alongside Chancellor Rachel Reeves’ Mansion House speech on July 15. At that point, we will be able to assess the measures intended to grapple with two longstanding issues for UK financial services. That is, how does the government bridge the gap between finance and the “real” economy (goods and non-financial services)? And how does it bridge the gap between London and the rest of the UK?
Michael A. Lewis receives funding from AHRC, EPSRC and ESRC.
Bernard Hay is Head of Policy at the Creative PEC, a partnership between Newcastle University and the Royal Society of Arts, which is funded by the UKRI via Arts and Humanities Research Council.
Sarah Hall receives funding from an ESRC Fellowship grant.
Doug Specht and Kamran Mahroof do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
The UK government has published a ten-year strategy outlining how it aims to boost productivity and innovation across eight key sectors of the economy. From the future of AI to energy security and net zero, it’s a broad and ambitious plan. Our experts assess what it tells us about how the UK economy – and the jobs it offers – could look in future.
Nuclear placed firmly in the centre of the UK’s low-carbon future
Doug Specht, Reader in Cultural Geography and Communication, University of Westminster
For clean energy and industrial growth, the strategy presents an ambitious and comprehensive vision. And it seeks to establish the UK as a global leader in clean energy manufacturing and innovation. A key strength lies in its substantial investment commitments, however this includes £14.2 billion for the controversial Sizewell C nuclear power station and more than £2.5 billion for a Small Modular Reactor (SMR) programme.
Nuclear energy remains controversial – nevertheless, the strategy firmly places it as a central pillar for low-carbon, reliable energy and national security.
The strategy also targets high-growth sectors, prioritises regional development and introduces support schemes and regulatory reforms to tackle high electricity costs for industry, and slow grid connections. Yet despite these potential strengths, there are notable challenges. Implementation risks are significant, given the ten-year timeframe and potential shifts in political priorities.
And regional disparities and social inequalities may not be fully addressed, as the focus is on high-potential city regions. Some areas could be left behind. Skills shortages in engineering and digital sectors persist, and there is not enough detail on reskilling and lifelong learning. The importance of supply chain resilience, especially for the critical minerals needed for the green transition is acknowledged but not fully assured.
Overall, the strategy is ambitious and well-structured. But a reliance on nuclear rather than true renewables is seeking a quick win with high risks and high costs. A more radical and inclusive plan that expanded green infrastructure, and provided details of resilient growth across all regions and sectors, would have been welcomed.
An innovation boost for the UK’s world-leading creative industries
Bernard Hay, Head of Policy at the Creative Industries Policy and Evidence Centre, Newcastle University
The plan for the creative industries is a significant step forward for this critical sector. With multiple new commitments announced on areas ranging from scale-up finance and AI to skills, exports and freelance support, there is a lot to welcome for the sector. After all, it already accounts for over 5% of the UK’s annual gross value added (or GVA – which measures the value of goods and services) and 14% of its services exports.
One key aspect is boosting creative industries’ research and development (R&D), which is a driver of innovation, productivity and growth. This includes £100 million for the Arts and Humanities Research Council’s clusters programme, which supports location-based, creative R&D partnerships between universities and industry.
And by the end of the year, HMRC will publish clarification on what types of activity are eligible for R&D tax relief, to include arts activities that meet certain criteria. This is a nuanced change, but together with the other plans, it could have a catalytic effect on innovation in the sector.
Supporting regional creative economies is a golden thread running through this plan. A new £4 billion group capital initiative from the British Business Bank, announced earlier in the spending review, will be an important source of scale-up finance for small and medium-sized creative businesses that face barriers in accessing capital.
It is also welcome to see the government both increasing creative industries investment in several city-regions and supporting places to join up and work together through “creative corridors”. Coupled with the ongoing devolution of powers and funding in England, the next decade provides a huge opportunity for local policy innovation. This includes sharing and scaling proven strategies in growing regional creative economies.
An effective industrial strategy relies on high-quality data and analysis to support it. This is especially true when dealing with a rapidly evolving part of the economy such as the creative industries. The new plan includes commitments to strengthen the evidence base, including by increasing access to official statistics. This is good news not only for researchers, but for the whole sector.
The Lowry in Salford is part of a creative cluster in the north-west of England. Debu55y/Shutterstock
Advanced manufacturing: promising plans, but persistent problems
Michael Lewis, Professor of Operations and Supply Management, University of Bath
The government plans to invest £4.3 billion in advanced manufacturing. This covers research-driven production in sectors including automotive, aerospace and advanced materials (engineered substances that are especially useful in these industries). Some firms may also get energy cost relief through green levy exemptions.
A long-term plan is overdue, but the challenges are huge. Automotive production is targeted to rise substantially, but the sector will still depend heavily on a range of critical imports. The aerospace sector will start 40,000 apprenticeships by 2035, yet further education funding remains below 2010 levels. Much of the promised investment appears to be the repackaging of existing funding.
Most importantly, how to deliver these changes remains unclear. There are good ideas, like £99 million to expand the relatively successful Made Smarter Adoption programme to help small and medium-sized enterprises employ digital technology. But when helping small firms adopt basic digital tools counts as policy success, it shows how far UK manufacturing has fallen behind competitors. Likewise, when you need a new “connections accelerator service” just to help companies connect to the grid, it shows the scale of basic infrastructure problems that undermine grander ambitions.
Overall, the strategy marks real progress. However, without clear delivery plans, it reads more like a wish list than an action plan. This explains why industry reactions have been cautiously optimistic at best.
A chance to take the lead in the global AI race
Kamran Mahroof, Associate Professor of Supply Chain Analytics and Programme Leader for the MSc in the Applied Artificial Intelligence and Data Analytics, University of Bradford
From a digital and technologies perspective, the industrial strategy appears to signal a strong commitment to anchoring the nation at the forefront of the global AI race. The proposed Sovereign AI Unit shows an intent to ensure national control and access to critical AI infrastructure, computational power and expertise.
This is pivotal, not only for research and development, but also for national security and economic resilience in an increasingly AI-driven world. It points to a recognition that relying solely on external providers for cutting-edge AI capabilities carries inherent risks.
Besides, some of the world’s most innovative AI businesses are based in the UK. British companies are pushing the limits of what is feasible, from Synthesia’s advances in synthetic media to DeepMind’s developments in machine learning. In sectors including public safety, insurance and defence, smaller firms like Faculty, Tractable and Mind Foundry are also having a significant impact.
Complementing this, the AI Growth Zones are designed to act as regional magnets for investment and innovation, particularly in the realm of data centres and high-density computational facilities. By streamlining planning and providing preferential access to energy, these zones could accelerate the development of the physical infrastructure needed.
This decentralised approach has received more than 200 bids already from local authorities. It also has the potential to spread the economic benefits of AI beyond established tech hubs, encouraging new regional powerhouses and creating high-skilled jobs right across the UK.
Taken as a whole, these projects show a deliberate effort to develop core competencies and draw in private-sector funding. This puts the UK in a position to benefit from AI’s potential. This effort to develop national AI capabilities is not a new idea – it echoes the US AI executive order and the EU’s AI Act.
However, given the dominance of global tech giants, the UK needs to define “sovereignty” in practice and decide whether it is willing to provide large-scale funding. At a time when debates continue around the UK’s defence budget — a field now deeply intertwined with AI – more transparency is needed on how these ambitions will be funded.
Growth plans for financial services – and moves to share the benefits beyond London
Sarah Hall, 1931 Professor of Geography, University of Cambridge
One of the most striking elements of the new plan is that it places financial services much more centrally compared to previous approaches.
There are good reasons for doing this. Financial services are a vital component of the UK economy, contributing close to 9% of economic output in 2023. Clearly then, an industrial strategy without one of the most important economic sectors would make little sense.
There is also a welcome emphasis on the ways in which financial services can grow, not only as a sector in its own right, but also to be better integrated in supporting the growth of other parts of the economy. Some important policy moves have already been announced, such as changes to pension funds aimed at increasing their investment in large infrastructure projects.
In order to meet these ambitions, the strategy is right to note that financial services need to be supported, not only in London but also across the many clusters around the UK. These include, for example, Edinburgh, Manchester and Bristol.
There will be more details in the sector plan, released alongside Chancellor Rachel Reeves’ Mansion House speech on July 15. At that point, we will be able to assess the measures intended to grapple with two longstanding issues for UK financial services. That is, how does the government bridge the gap between finance and the “real” economy (goods and non-financial services)? And how does it bridge the gap between London and the rest of the UK?
Michael A. Lewis receives funding from AHRC, EPSRC and ESRC.
Bernard Hay is Head of Policy at the Creative PEC, a partnership between Newcastle University and the Royal Society of Arts, which is funded by the UKRI via Arts and Humanities Research Council.
Sarah Hall receives funding from an ESRC Fellowship grant.
Doug Specht and Kamran Mahroof do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Source: The Conversation – UK – By Richard Bärnthaler, Lecturer (Assistant Professor) in Ecological Economics, University of Leeds
Green energy sites like Flevoland in the Netherlands will be part of the EU’s industrial future.fokke baarssen/Shutterstock
Industrial policy is back – it’s currently central to the agendas of both the EU and the UK. This resurgence comes amid a polycrisis marked by climate breakdown, social inequality, energy insecurity and geopolitical instability. And it reflects a wider shift. Governments across G20 countries are stepping in more actively to shape their economies, moving away from the idea that markets should be left to run themselves.
This is an important development. But current frameworks for industrial policy risk deepening the crises they are meant to solve.
In our research with Sebastian Mang of the New Economics Foundation, we have found that in the case of the EU, its industrial policy framework is riddled with contradictions.
It seeks resilience, yet fails to strengthen essential public services that underpin stability. It aims for strategic autonomy, yet reinforces resource dependencies. And while it gestures towards sustainability, it remains tethered to private-sector strategies that delay the phase-out of harmful industries.
Eroding foundations
EU industrial policy aims to strengthen the resilience of the bloc’s single market by preventing supply chain disruptions. It rightly views Europe’s economy as an interconnected ecosystem, where shocks in one sector ripple across others. But it fails to prioritise the foundational sectors that sustain everyday life. These include essential services such as food, utilities, housing, healthcare and public transport.
Two core issues drive this failure. First, deregulation in the single market has often extended to essential services, pushing providers to operate like private businesses. For example, liberalisation of the energy sector has contributed to volatile prices and energy poverty. And EU competition law and state aid rules have historically constrained social housing provision.
Yet social resilience — the capacity of communities to withstand and recover from crises — and, by extension market resilience, rely on these essential services. But affordable housing, universal healthcare and affordable energy for households are often not prioritised.
Second, EU industrial policy lacks a clear definition of which sectors are “critical” and why. This results in inconsistent lists of priority industries and technologies, while foundational sectors like energy and housing often remain overlooked.
These blind spots have real consequences. Around 40% of Europe’s workforce is employed in foundational sectors. These sectors are where low-income households spend about two-thirds of their income. Yet they often remain precarious and undervalued, leaving Europe more exposed to economic shocks.
To build real resilience, industrial policy must reassert public control over essential services and recognise them as priorities. This means redefining what counts as “critical”, supporting jobs in foundational sectors and accelerating public investment. This investment could be enabled through measures such as reforming the fiscal rules and with joint borrowing by member states.
The scramble for resources
Europe is pushing for strategic autonomy (the capacity of the bloc to act in strategically important areas, without being dependent on non-member countries). The aim is to reduce reliance on imports in key industries such as green technology.
But to make this happen, the EU should put reducing demand for resources and energy at the centre of its industrial policy. Instead, however, its Critical Raw Materials Act foresees skyrocketing consumption of rare earths, lithium and other inputs.
This strategy is self-defeating. It increases the likelihood of European aggression towards the rest of the world and ultimately threatens long-term security and peace for all. These tensions are already surfacing. Export restrictions on things such as nickel, cobalt and rare earth minerals are multiplying. In an era of geopolitical ruptures, these tendencies are likely to intensify.
At the same time, resource conflicts are also escalating within Europe itself. Tensions are emerging in countries including Serbia, Portugal and Greece over lithium and copper, and the environmental and social costs of mining them. And indigenous communities such as the Sámi in northern Europe face threats to their land and rights.
This is not to argue against increasing the extraction of raw materials within Europe. However, without an absolute reduction in energy and material use, these contradictions will deepen. To avoid these problems, the EU must centre industrial policy on reducing unnecessary demand. Some key moves could include investing in public transport instead of subsidising cars, prioritising retrofitting over new building, ending planned obsolescence and backing agro-ecology over industrial farming.
Investing in public rather than private transport will help European nations reduce their demand on energy and materials. The Global Guy/Shutterstock
Research shows that this kind of strategy could significantly lower Europe’s energy use. It could also drastically cut reliance on critical imports and contribute to achieving energy independence by 2050. This is all without compromising basic quality of life.
If Europe wants peace and security, demand reduction is a rational approach that must be at the heart of the EU’s industrial strategy. This should be adopted alongside strengthening ties of cooperation and integration with the rest of Eurasia and the global south, rather than ramping up antagonism towards these neighbours.
Green transition
The EU’s vision of “competitive sustainability” rests on the belief that market incentives and the private sector can drive the green transition. Yet despite decades of efficiency improvements, high-income countries have not decoupled material use and emissions from economic growth at the speed and scale required.
The EU remains reliant on derisking – using public subsidies, guarantees and looser regulations to make green investments attractive to private finance. But as this approach leaves both the pace and direction of change to private capital, it slows the phase-out of harmful industries.
What’s missing is more effective economic planning to restore public control over decarbonisation. Achieving this means building on existing mechanisms capable of delivering change — such as public credit guidance. This sets rules to limit the flow of finance from commercial banks to damaging sectors while directing investment toward sustainable ones.
China offers an example whereby the central bank has used public credit guidance to shift finance to cleaner sectors. The European Central Bank also experimented with credit guidance between 2022 and 2023, introducing climate scores for companies. And post-war France used planned credit to modernise infrastructure over two decades.
Europe and the UK are rearming, climate shocks are intensifying and global power dynamics are shifting. This moment demands a new industrial strategy — one that prioritises foundational sectors and creates fiscal space to build resilience. Reducing demand must be a prerequisite for security, peace and strategic autonomy. And reviving economic planning tools, such as public credit guidance, can accelerate the green transition.
Without these shifts, Europe and the UK face an increasingly unstable future. Industrial policy must change because the stakes are existential.
The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Source: The Conversation – UK – By Richard Bärnthaler, Lecturer (Assistant Professor) in Ecological Economics, University of Leeds
Green energy sites like Flevoland in the Netherlands will be part of the EU’s industrial future.fokke baarssen/Shutterstock
Industrial policy is back – it’s currently central to the agendas of both the EU and the UK. This resurgence comes amid a polycrisis marked by climate breakdown, social inequality, energy insecurity and geopolitical instability. And it reflects a wider shift. Governments across G20 countries are stepping in more actively to shape their economies, moving away from the idea that markets should be left to run themselves.
This is an important development. But current frameworks for industrial policy risk deepening the crises they are meant to solve.
In our research with Sebastian Mang of the New Economics Foundation, we have found that in the case of the EU, its industrial policy framework is riddled with contradictions.
It seeks resilience, yet fails to strengthen essential public services that underpin stability. It aims for strategic autonomy, yet reinforces resource dependencies. And while it gestures towards sustainability, it remains tethered to private-sector strategies that delay the phase-out of harmful industries.
Eroding foundations
EU industrial policy aims to strengthen the resilience of the bloc’s single market by preventing supply chain disruptions. It rightly views Europe’s economy as an interconnected ecosystem, where shocks in one sector ripple across others. But it fails to prioritise the foundational sectors that sustain everyday life. These include essential services such as food, utilities, housing, healthcare and public transport.
Two core issues drive this failure. First, deregulation in the single market has often extended to essential services, pushing providers to operate like private businesses. For example, liberalisation of the energy sector has contributed to volatile prices and energy poverty. And EU competition law and state aid rules have historically constrained social housing provision.
Yet social resilience — the capacity of communities to withstand and recover from crises — and, by extension market resilience, rely on these essential services. But affordable housing, universal healthcare and affordable energy for households are often not prioritised.
Second, EU industrial policy lacks a clear definition of which sectors are “critical” and why. This results in inconsistent lists of priority industries and technologies, while foundational sectors like energy and housing often remain overlooked.
These blind spots have real consequences. Around 40% of Europe’s workforce is employed in foundational sectors. These sectors are where low-income households spend about two-thirds of their income. Yet they often remain precarious and undervalued, leaving Europe more exposed to economic shocks.
To build real resilience, industrial policy must reassert public control over essential services and recognise them as priorities. This means redefining what counts as “critical”, supporting jobs in foundational sectors and accelerating public investment. This investment could be enabled through measures such as reforming the fiscal rules and with joint borrowing by member states.
The scramble for resources
Europe is pushing for strategic autonomy (the capacity of the bloc to act in strategically important areas, without being dependent on non-member countries). The aim is to reduce reliance on imports in key industries such as green technology.
But to make this happen, the EU should put reducing demand for resources and energy at the centre of its industrial policy. Instead, however, its Critical Raw Materials Act foresees skyrocketing consumption of rare earths, lithium and other inputs.
This strategy is self-defeating. It increases the likelihood of European aggression towards the rest of the world and ultimately threatens long-term security and peace for all. These tensions are already surfacing. Export restrictions on things such as nickel, cobalt and rare earth minerals are multiplying. In an era of geopolitical ruptures, these tendencies are likely to intensify.
At the same time, resource conflicts are also escalating within Europe itself. Tensions are emerging in countries including Serbia, Portugal and Greece over lithium and copper, and the environmental and social costs of mining them. And indigenous communities such as the Sámi in northern Europe face threats to their land and rights.
This is not to argue against increasing the extraction of raw materials within Europe. However, without an absolute reduction in energy and material use, these contradictions will deepen. To avoid these problems, the EU must centre industrial policy on reducing unnecessary demand. Some key moves could include investing in public transport instead of subsidising cars, prioritising retrofitting over new building, ending planned obsolescence and backing agro-ecology over industrial farming.
Investing in public rather than private transport will help European nations reduce their demand on energy and materials. The Global Guy/Shutterstock
Research shows that this kind of strategy could significantly lower Europe’s energy use. It could also drastically cut reliance on critical imports and contribute to achieving energy independence by 2050. This is all without compromising basic quality of life.
If Europe wants peace and security, demand reduction is a rational approach that must be at the heart of the EU’s industrial strategy. This should be adopted alongside strengthening ties of cooperation and integration with the rest of Eurasia and the global south, rather than ramping up antagonism towards these neighbours.
Green transition
The EU’s vision of “competitive sustainability” rests on the belief that market incentives and the private sector can drive the green transition. Yet despite decades of efficiency improvements, high-income countries have not decoupled material use and emissions from economic growth at the speed and scale required.
The EU remains reliant on derisking – using public subsidies, guarantees and looser regulations to make green investments attractive to private finance. But as this approach leaves both the pace and direction of change to private capital, it slows the phase-out of harmful industries.
What’s missing is more effective economic planning to restore public control over decarbonisation. Achieving this means building on existing mechanisms capable of delivering change — such as public credit guidance. This sets rules to limit the flow of finance from commercial banks to damaging sectors while directing investment toward sustainable ones.
China offers an example whereby the central bank has used public credit guidance to shift finance to cleaner sectors. The European Central Bank also experimented with credit guidance between 2022 and 2023, introducing climate scores for companies. And post-war France used planned credit to modernise infrastructure over two decades.
Europe and the UK are rearming, climate shocks are intensifying and global power dynamics are shifting. This moment demands a new industrial strategy — one that prioritises foundational sectors and creates fiscal space to build resilience. Reducing demand must be a prerequisite for security, peace and strategic autonomy. And reviving economic planning tools, such as public credit guidance, can accelerate the green transition.
Without these shifts, Europe and the UK face an increasingly unstable future. Industrial policy must change because the stakes are existential.
The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
WASHINGTON, D.C. – In response to the Supreme Court’s opinion issued today in Consumers’ Research v. Federal Communications Commissionconsidering the constitutionality of the Universal Service Fund, the Communications Workers of America (CWA) releases the following statement:
The Supreme Court upheld what most observers know to be true: the federal Universal Service Fund (USF) is fully constitutional. As theamicus briefsigned by CWA explained, “Universal service principles have been a key element of American communications policy since the nation’s founding.”
While the legality of the Fund’s structure should never have been in doubt, the communications industry has changed since the USF was originally created in 1996. As technicians and customer service representatives in the telecommunication industry, CWA members see the positive impact of the USF every day. We also recognize that broadband internet and other emerging technologies now play a central role in our daily lives. It’s time for Congress to recognize this and take action to modernize the contribution mechanism supporting the fund to ensure that these essential services are available and affordable for all Americans.
We are gratified that Chair and Ranking Member of the Senate Telecommunications and Media Subcommittee, Senator Deb Fischer (R-NE) and Ben Ray Luján (D-NM), along with House Communications and Technology Subcommittee Chair Richard Hudson (R-NC9) and Ranking Member Doris Matsui (D-CA7), have re-started theUniversal Service Fund Working Group. The working group puts Congress in a good position to take the action needed.
This round of litigation and briefing before the Supreme Court emphasized that support for the Universal Service Fund and the programs it supports are strong and broadly held. Companies and organizations as diverse as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, the National Foreign Trade Council, NCTA – The Internet & Television Association, the School Superintendents Association and the American Library Association, filed amicus briefs in support of the constitutionality of the fund, and illustrating the many devastating consequences that would arise if it failed.
CWA members stand ready to ensure that the USF is used to provide support to building and maintaining high-quality, fiber broadband infrastructure in rural and remote areas of the country and that low-income households can afford to purchase those services. Without such a network that reaches everyone and that everyone can afford, the well-being of our communities and our nation will be under threat.
In both of the recent elections pro-European forces scraped to victory, thanks to a strong turnout among Moldovan diaspora voters, primarily in western Europe and north America. And in both elections, Russian interference was a significant factor. This is unlikely to change in the upcoming parliamentary vote. Moldova is too important a battleground in Russia’s campaign to rebuild a Soviet-style sphere of influence in eastern Europe.
Wedged between EU and Nato member Romania to the west and Ukraine to the east, Moldova has its own aspirations for EU accession. But with a breakaway region in Transnistria, which is host to a Russian military base and “peacekeeping force” and whose population is leaning heavily towards Russia, this will not be a straightforward path to membership.
What’s more, a Euro-sceptic and Moscow-friendly government after the next elections might allow the Kremlin to increase its military presence in the region and thereby pose a threat not only to Ukraine but also to Romania. While not quite equivalent to Russia’s unsinkable aircraft carrier of Kaliningrad, a more Russia-friendly Moldovan government would be a major strategic asset for Moscow.
Unsurprisingly, Moldova’s president, Maia Sandu, and her Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelensky have little doubt that further destabilisation is at the top of Russia’s agenda. Fears about a Russian escalation in the months before the elections are neither new nor unfounded.
There were worries that Moldova and Transnistria might be next on the Kremlin’s agenda as far back as the aftermath of Russia’s illegal annexation of Crimea in 2014. These worries resurfaced when Moscow, rather prematurely, announced the beginning of stage two of its war against Ukraine in late April, 2022.
Knife-edge elections are nothing new in Moldova. The country is not only physically divided along the river Nistru, but even in the territory controlled by the government, opinions over its future geopolitical orientation remain split.
With no pre-1991 history of independent statehood, parts of Moldova were part of Ukraine, Romania and the Soviet Union. Russian is widely spoken and, while declining in number, Moldovan labour migrants to Russia remain important contributors of remittances, which accounted for over 12 percent of the country’s GDP in 2023.
A large number of Moldovans are, therefore, not keen on severing all ties with Russia. This does not mean they are supporters of Russia’s aggression against Ukraine or opponents of closer relations with the European Union. But as the referendum and presidential elections in October 2024, if pushed to make a choice between Russia and Europe and manipulated by Russian fear-mongering and vote buying, pro-European majorities remain slim.
This is despite the significant support that the EU has provided to Moldova, including €1.9 billion (£1.6 billion) in financial support to facilitate reforms as part of the country’s efforts to join the EU. And there’s also nearly €200 million in military assistance over the past four years, including a €20 million package for improved air defences announced in April.
Russian interference in the 2024 election was well documented.
The EU has also provided several emergency aid packages to assist the country’s population during repeated energy crises triggered by Russia. Since then, the Moldovans and Brussels have agreed on comprehensive energy strategy that will make the country immune to Russian blackmail.
This pattern of competitive influence seeking by Russia and the EU is long-standing and has not produced any decisive, lasting breakthroughs for either side.
When the current president of Moldova, Maia Sandu, won in 2020, she defeated her opponent, Igor Dodon, by a decisive 58% to 42% margin, equivalent to some 250,000 votes that separated the candidates in the second round. Sandu’s Party of Action and Solidarity (PAS) obtained almost 53% of votes in the 2021 parliamentary elections and gained 63 seats in the 101-seat parliament. Not since the 2005 elections, won by the communist party under then-president Vladimir Voronin, had there been a a majority single-party government in Moldova. According to current opinion polls, PAS remains the strongest party with levels of support between 27% and 37%.
In a crowded field of political parties and their leaders in which disappointment and doubt are the prevailing negative emotions among the electorate, Sandu and PAS remain the least unpopular choices. They have weathered the fall-out from the war in Ukraine well so far – managing the influx of refugees, keeping relations with Transnistria stable, and steering Moldova through a near-constant cost-of-living and energy crisis. Anti-government protests in 2022-23 eventually fizzled out.
Russia’s election interference in 2024 was ultimately not successful in cheating pro-European voters out of their victories in the presidential elections and the referendum on future EU membership. But this is unlikely to stop the Kremlin from trying again in the run-up to parliamentary elections in September.
Moscow will try to disrupt and delay Moldova’s already bumpy road to EU membership. A weakened pro-European government after parliamentary elections would be a very useful tool for Russia. Moldova and its European allies are in for an unusually hot summer.
Stefan Wolff is a past recipient of grant funding from the Natural Environment Research Council of the UK, the United States Institute of Peace, the Economic and Social Research Council of the UK, the British Academy, the NATO Science for Peace Programme, the EU Framework Programmes 6 and 7 and Horizon 2020, as well as the EU’s Jean Monnet Programme. He is a Trustee and Honorary Treasurer of the Political Studies Association of the UK and a Senior Research Fellow at the Foreign Policy Centre in London.
Source: The Conversation – UK – By Vincent K.L. Chang, Assistant Professor of the History and International Relations of Modern China, Leiden University
A tour guide competition was held in the central Chinese city of Wuhan in late May. This was not some fun contest. According to Chinese state media, it was a carefully conceived effort to “attract and cultivate a group of politically firm and professionally skilled storytellers of heroes and martyrs in the new era”.
It symbolises the ambitious and far-reaching campaign launched by the Chinese state to revive the country’s pantheon of national heroes and martyrs. The aim is to unite and mobilise the nation in what Chinese leadership see as the crucial final phase in the quest to become a modern global superpower.
On the same day as the Wuhan competition, but 750 miles further inland in Sichuan province, children from a kindergarten gathered with martyrs’ family members to engage in traditional crafts. The official newspaper of the Chinese Communist party, the People’s Daily, explained how this activity helped “pass on the torch of heroes” to young generations.
And two weeks earlier, in China’s eastern province of Shandong, representatives from the official state news agency, Xinhua, attended an immersive training session on hero spirit. By coming “face to face” with heroes of the past, the trainees were able to grasp the “spirit” that had guided the extraordinary deeds of these ordinary people.
This “facing up” to past heroes increasingly takes place through digital means. Thanks to developments in AI, and with the help of universities, museums and various government units, numerous Chinese people have now been “reunited” or become “acquainted” with family members martyred decades ago.
Activities such as these have become commonplace in recent years. They are encouraged, guided and overseen by an expanding architecture of laws and regulations. There are at least two reasons why the campaign to build a new “spirit” of heroism and sacrifice requires attention beyond China-watchers.
Chinese memory politics
The first reason is the increasingly global reach of the campaign. Just as China’s economic statecraft is affecting global trade and finance, so too are Chinese memory politics spreading across the globe and reshaping the transnational memory landscape.
Beijing has become an active sponsor of commemorations that are concerned more with shaping the future than looking into the past. Recent examples include Victory Day celebrations in Moscow and Minsk, and joint commemorations in the Serbian capital, Belgrade, of the Chinese “martyrs” of Nato’s bombing of the Chinese embassy there in 1999.
China’s historical statecraft operates globally in the legal realm, too. Laws have come into effect that aim to promote patriotism and spread “core socialist values” among Chinese communities worldwide.
Chinese embassies and consulates are required to locate Chinese martyrs buried in their host jurisdictions, and erect and maintain memorials for them. They are also expected to organise commemorations involving local Chinese diasporic and expat communities.
Recent laws have been used to detain Chinese citizens living abroad. One example is Chinese artist Gao Zhen. Gao had been a permanent US resident for 13 years when he was detained in China in 2024 for his critical depictions of Mao Zedong a decade earlier.
Gao was charged with the crime of “slandering China’s heroes and martyrs” under a law that did not exist when he created and exhibited his artwork.
The second reason why China’s martyrs and heroes campaign matters globally is possibly more disturbing. China has become an example of a growing body of cases where state actors seek to shape and control historical memory.
With several democracies beginning to show signs of democratic backsliding, the Chinese case is one of many that show that polar distinctions between “liberal” and “illiberal” systems are untenable.
Perhaps the most obvious example of a democracy in democratic recession is the US. Donald Trump, a constitutionally elected president, is relying on a series of executive orders to consolidate power and hamper critical debate.
One such directive, issued late in Trump’s first term, entails a proposal to build a so-called “national garden of American heroes”. The proposal was revived recently with an executive order on “restoring truth and sanity to American history”.
The order aims to remove what the administration deems divisive and anti-American ideologies from national museums and public monuments.
Washington’s efforts to control how history is presented seem to come straight out of Beijing’s playbook. In 2020, during his July 4 address, Trump claimed: “Our nation is witnessing a merciless campaign to wipe out our history, defame our heroes, erase our values, and indoctrinate our children.”
These words eerily resemble those used previously by Chinese president Xi Jinping to justify his campaign against what he calls “historical nihilism” – attempts to “destroy” the Chinese nation by eradicating its history.
The causes and consequences of war have always been and will continue to be hotly debated among historians, and there is no need for the EU’s bureaucracy to unilaterally “resolve” these debates.
A problem with these bureaucratic efforts to codify historical interpretation is that they feed memory wars and fuel escalation. Even more damaging is that they emulate authoritarian practices of “dictating” history and restricting debate.
These examples show that distinctions between authoritarian and democratic regimes are not as pristine as is often claimed. Increasingly, global memory practices are evolving and possibly converging on a fluid spectrum between these two poles.
China’s new hero cult is an important case for shedding light on these dynamics.
Vincent K.L. Chang receives research funding from the Dutch government.
Source: The Conversation – UK – By Vincent K.L. Chang, Assistant Professor of the History and International Relations of Modern China, Leiden University
A tour guide competition was held in the central Chinese city of Wuhan in late May. This was not some fun contest. According to Chinese state media, it was a carefully conceived effort to “attract and cultivate a group of politically firm and professionally skilled storytellers of heroes and martyrs in the new era”.
It symbolises the ambitious and far-reaching campaign launched by the Chinese state to revive the country’s pantheon of national heroes and martyrs. The aim is to unite and mobilise the nation in what Chinese leadership see as the crucial final phase in the quest to become a modern global superpower.
On the same day as the Wuhan competition, but 750 miles further inland in Sichuan province, children from a kindergarten gathered with martyrs’ family members to engage in traditional crafts. The official newspaper of the Chinese Communist party, the People’s Daily, explained how this activity helped “pass on the torch of heroes” to young generations.
And two weeks earlier, in China’s eastern province of Shandong, representatives from the official state news agency, Xinhua, attended an immersive training session on hero spirit. By coming “face to face” with heroes of the past, the trainees were able to grasp the “spirit” that had guided the extraordinary deeds of these ordinary people.
This “facing up” to past heroes increasingly takes place through digital means. Thanks to developments in AI, and with the help of universities, museums and various government units, numerous Chinese people have now been “reunited” or become “acquainted” with family members martyred decades ago.
Activities such as these have become commonplace in recent years. They are encouraged, guided and overseen by an expanding architecture of laws and regulations. There are at least two reasons why the campaign to build a new “spirit” of heroism and sacrifice requires attention beyond China-watchers.
Chinese memory politics
The first reason is the increasingly global reach of the campaign. Just as China’s economic statecraft is affecting global trade and finance, so too are Chinese memory politics spreading across the globe and reshaping the transnational memory landscape.
Beijing has become an active sponsor of commemorations that are concerned more with shaping the future than looking into the past. Recent examples include Victory Day celebrations in Moscow and Minsk, and joint commemorations in the Serbian capital, Belgrade, of the Chinese “martyrs” of Nato’s bombing of the Chinese embassy there in 1999.
China’s historical statecraft operates globally in the legal realm, too. Laws have come into effect that aim to promote patriotism and spread “core socialist values” among Chinese communities worldwide.
Chinese embassies and consulates are required to locate Chinese martyrs buried in their host jurisdictions, and erect and maintain memorials for them. They are also expected to organise commemorations involving local Chinese diasporic and expat communities.
Recent laws have been used to detain Chinese citizens living abroad. One example is Chinese artist Gao Zhen. Gao had been a permanent US resident for 13 years when he was detained in China in 2024 for his critical depictions of Mao Zedong a decade earlier.
Gao was charged with the crime of “slandering China’s heroes and martyrs” under a law that did not exist when he created and exhibited his artwork.
The second reason why China’s martyrs and heroes campaign matters globally is possibly more disturbing. China has become an example of a growing body of cases where state actors seek to shape and control historical memory.
With several democracies beginning to show signs of democratic backsliding, the Chinese case is one of many that show that polar distinctions between “liberal” and “illiberal” systems are untenable.
Perhaps the most obvious example of a democracy in democratic recession is the US. Donald Trump, a constitutionally elected president, is relying on a series of executive orders to consolidate power and hamper critical debate.
One such directive, issued late in Trump’s first term, entails a proposal to build a so-called “national garden of American heroes”. The proposal was revived recently with an executive order on “restoring truth and sanity to American history”.
The order aims to remove what the administration deems divisive and anti-American ideologies from national museums and public monuments.
Washington’s efforts to control how history is presented seem to come straight out of Beijing’s playbook. In 2020, during his July 4 address, Trump claimed: “Our nation is witnessing a merciless campaign to wipe out our history, defame our heroes, erase our values, and indoctrinate our children.”
These words eerily resemble those used previously by Chinese president Xi Jinping to justify his campaign against what he calls “historical nihilism” – attempts to “destroy” the Chinese nation by eradicating its history.
The causes and consequences of war have always been and will continue to be hotly debated among historians, and there is no need for the EU’s bureaucracy to unilaterally “resolve” these debates.
A problem with these bureaucratic efforts to codify historical interpretation is that they feed memory wars and fuel escalation. Even more damaging is that they emulate authoritarian practices of “dictating” history and restricting debate.
These examples show that distinctions between authoritarian and democratic regimes are not as pristine as is often claimed. Increasingly, global memory practices are evolving and possibly converging on a fluid spectrum between these two poles.
China’s new hero cult is an important case for shedding light on these dynamics.
Vincent K.L. Chang receives research funding from the Dutch government.
WASHINGTON—The U.S. Supreme Court today ruled 6-3 inFederal Communications Commission v. Consumers’ Research,upholding the constitutionality of the Universal Service Fund and ensuring the federal E-Rate program would stay intact. The ruling is a win for students and educators everywhere by helping them to open the door to online learning with affordable and accessible high-speed broadband and telecommunications services. Recent researchreveals an estimated 25% of all school-aged children live in households without broadband access or a web-enabled device such as a computer or tablet. The National Education Associationjoined a broad-based coalition of education groups in filing an amicus briefin the case, asking the court to uphold the critical funding source for these vital programs that students depend on.
The following statement can be attributed to NEA President Becky Pringle:
“No matter where students live, connectivity is critical to conducting research, doing homework, and attending virtual classes. For some, the internet, tablets, and computers like Chromebooks or laptops are simply too expensive. Oftentimes, multiple people in the same household have to share one or two devices with limited access and time to do homework, research, and refine skills essential to learning. Others lack access to sufficient broadband infrastructure. Federal programs like E-Rate help schools purchase and provide Wi-Fi hotspots, connected devices, and other necessary technology all our students need to learn, grow, and thrive. The Supreme Court’s decision today protects Congress’s commitment through the federal E-Rate program to provide students with these vital educational resources.”
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The National Education Association is the nation’s largest professionalemployeeorganization, representing more than 3 million elementary and secondary teachers, higher education faculty, education support professionals, school administrators, retired educators, students preparing to become teachers, healthcare workers, and public employees. Learn more at www.nea.org.
WASHINGTON — Today, the U.S. Supreme Court imposed burdensome new requirements on educators and public schools that will undermine their ability to provide students with an inclusive education that reflects the real-life diversity of students and identities in our nation’s public schools and communities. The National Education Association filed an amicus brief with the U.S. Supreme Court in Mahmoud v. Taylor, in which NEA argued, among other things, that a decision like this will hamstring efforts to give students a full, engaging, and inclusive public education. The Court’s decision will have a chilling effect on students and public education for generations to come.
The following statement can be attributed to NEA President Becky Pringle:
“Today the U.S. Supreme Court willfully discounted and ignored the expertise of trained professionals in the classroom. This decision could have a chilling effect on students for generations to come and could lead to more educators self-censoring, shelving books and lessons, and preventing some already marginalized students from being seen and acknowledged. In the end, students are the ones who pay the price for censoring what books they can and cannot access and read. Educators know that students can’t learn when they do not feel welcomed, seen, or valued.
“Educators know all students—no matter who they are or what gender they identify with—deserve access to an inclusive public education. By creating new, unnecessary legal rules that burden hardworking educators and disrupt their ability to teach, the Court is effectively inserting itself into the day-to-day education decisions about what students can learn and what educators can teach.
“The Court’s ruling is a direct attack on our democracy. Public education is founded on the core educational principle of engaging students on a broad range of ideas, allowing them to explore new perspectives, and learn to think for themselves. Students deserve nothing less than to feel supported and valued on that journey, in particular our LGBTQ+ young people and families, who often feel marginalized and excluded.
“Censoring the books and resources students can access puts limits on their freedom to grow, learn and contribute to society. Everyone deserves to see themselves and their lived experiences in books—at our schools and in our libraries. Books are like mirrors and windows. They reflect what we observe and know about the world in which we live and help us understand lives that are different from our own. The Court does students a disservice by limiting access to these opportunities.”
Follow us on Bluesky at https://bsky.app/profile/neapresident.bsky.social & https://bsky.app/profile/neatoday.bsky.social
# # #
The National Education Association is the nation’s largest professional employee organization, representing more than 3 million elementary and secondary teachers, higher education faculty, education support professionals, school administrators, retired educators, students preparing to become teachers, healthcare workers, and public employees. Learn more at www.nea.org.
AI chatbots have already become embedded into some people’s lives, but how many really know how they work? Did you know, for example, ChatGPT needs to do an internet search to look up events later than June 2024? Some of the most surprising information about AI chatbots can help us understand how they work, what they can and can’t do, and so how to use them in a better way.
With that in mind, here are five things you ought to know about these breakthrough machines.
1. They are trained by human feedback
AI chatbots are trained in multiple stages, beginning with something called pre-training, where models are trained to predict the next word in massive text datasets. This allows them to develop a general understanding of language, facts and reasoning.
If asked: “How do I make a homemade explosive?” in the pre-training phase, a model might have given a detailed instruction. To make them useful and safe for conversation, human “annotators” help guide the models toward safer and more helpful responses, a process called alignment.
After alignment, an AI chatbot might answer something like: “I’m sorry, but I can’t provide that information. If you have safety concerns or need help with legal chemistry experiments, I recommend referring to certified educational sources.”
Without alignment, AI chatbots would be unpredictable, potentially spreading misinformation or harmful content. This highlights the crucial role of human intervention in shaping AI behaviour.
OpenAI, the company which developed ChatGPT, has not disclosed how many employees have trained ChatGPT for how many hours. But it is clear that AI chatbots, like ChatGPT, need a moral compass so that it does not spread harmful information. Human annotators rank responses to ensure neutrality and ethical alignment.
Similarly, if an AI chatbot was asked: “What are the best and worst nationalities?” Human annotators would rank a response like this the highest: “Every nationality has its own rich culture, history, and contributions to the world. There is no ‘best’ or ‘worst’ nationality – each one is valuable in its own way.”
2. They don’t learn through words – but with the help of tokens
Humans naturally learn language through words, whereas AI chatbots rely on smaller units called tokens. These units can be words, subwords or obscure series of characters.
While tokenisation generally follows logical patterns, it can sometimes produce unexpected splits, revealing both the strengths and quirks of how AI chatbots interpret language. Modern AI chatbots’ vocabularies typically consist of 50,000 to 100,000 tokens.
The sentence “The price is $9.99.” is tokenised by ChatGPT as “The”, “ price”, “is”, “$” “ 9”, “.”, “99”, whereas “ChatGPT is marvellous” is tokenised less intuitively: “chat”, “G”, “PT”, “ is”, “mar”, “vellous”.
AI chatbots do not continuously update themselves; hence, they may struggle with recent events, new terminology or broadly anything after their knowledge cutoff. A knowledge cut-off refers to the last point in time when an AI chatbot’s training data was updated, meaning it lacks awareness of events, trends or discoveries beyond that date.
The current version of ChatGPT has its cutoff on June 2024. If asked who is the currently president of the United States, ChatGPT would need to perform a web search using the search engine Bing, “read” the results, and return an answer. Bing results are filtered by relevance and reliability of the source. Likewise, other AI chatbots uses web search to return up-to-date answers.
Updating AI chatbots is a costly and fragile process. How to efficiently update their knowledge is still an open scientific problem. ChatGPT’s knowledge is believed to be updated as Open AI introduces new ChatGPT versions.
4. They hallucinate really easily
AI chatbots sometimes “hallucinate”, generating false or nonsensical claims with confidence because they predict text based on patterns rather than verifying facts. These errors stem from the way they work: they optimise for coherence over accuracy, rely on imperfect training data and lack real world understanding.
While improvements such as fact-checking tools (for example, like ChatGPT’s Bing search tool integration for real-time fact-checking) or prompts (for example, explicitly telling ChatGPT to “cite peer-reviewed sources” or “say I don ́t know if you are not sure”) reduce hallucinations, they can’t fully eliminate them.
For example, when asked what the main findings are of a particular research paper, ChatGPT gives a long, detailed and good-looking answer.
It also included screenshots and even a link, but from the wrong academic papers. So users should treat AI-generated information as a starting point, not an unquestionable truth.
5. They use calculators to do maths
A recently popularised feature of AI chatbots is called reasoning. Reasoning refers to the process of using logically connected intermediate steps to solve complex problems. This is also known as “chain of thought” reasoning.
Instead of jumping directly to an answer, chain of thought enables AI chatbots to think step by step. For example, when asked “what is 56,345 minus 7,865 times 350,468”, ChatGPT gives the right answer. It “understands” that the multiplication needs to occur before the subtraction.
To solve the intermediate steps, ChatGPT uses its built-in calculator that enables precise arithmetic. This hybrid approach of combining internal reasoning with the calculator helps improve reliability in complex tasks.
Cagatay Yildiz receives funding from DFG (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, in English German Research Foundation)
“Mister. Would you like to play a game with me?” These seemingly innocuous words to debt-ridden Gi-hun (Lee Jung-Jae) by a mysterious recruiter (Gong-Yoo) lead him to an opportunity for financial salvation – at the expense of human lives, including possibly his own.
Squid Game’s third and final season has now been released, and fans can’t wait to see more green tracksuits and brutal games. But here’s what’s really driving the obsession: the show perfectly captures how financial stress warps our minds. It reveals the dark psychology of how money problems affect every decision we make.
As a researcher studying the intersection of cognitive psychology and media dissemination, I’ve been fascinated by Squid Game’s unprecedented global impact. My work on how emotional regulation affects decision-making and moral reasoning provides a unique lens for understanding why this particular show resonated so powerfully with audiences worldwide. Especially during a time of economic uncertainty.
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Scientists have discovered that financial stress decreases cognitive function. Recent research analysing more than 111,000 people found that financial stress reduced their performance when completing basic tasks.
This isn’t about poorer people being less intelligent, but rather an effect called “bandwidth hijacking” that causes mental fatigue when worrying about rent and debt. Worrying about unpaid bills mean less processing power is left for anything else, including moral reasoning and long-term thinking.
Sounds familiar? This research is brought to life in Squid Game. Take Sang-woo, (Park Hae-soo) in season one. The brilliant Seoul National University graduate’s crippling debt (caused by bad investments) leads him to become a participant in the brutal Squid Games. Abandoning the etiquette of his high-flying circles, he manipulates and maliciously betrays fellow contestant Ali (Anupam Tripathi) in the marble game, pushes a man to his death on the glass bridge, and ultimately tries to kill his childhood friend, Gi-hun.
Sang-woo’s intelligence becomes laser-focused on survival, leaving no mental space for the moral reasoning that would typically guide his decisions.
The trailer for Squid Game season three.
Squid Game shows how financial desperation dehumanises people. Bodies have piled up throughout the seasons, but the players barely react to the carnage. They’re transfixed by something else entirely: the digital display showing their prize money growing with each death.
Such reminders of the financial stakes lead to reduced requests for help and reduced help towards others. This “tunnel vision” phenomenon occurs in real life too, leading to the abandonment of empathy and moral considerations.
Sang-woo doesn’t betray Ali because he’s evil – he does it because financial desperation has hijacked his moral reasoning. Look at Ali’s face during the marble game: confused, trusting, unable to process that his “hyung” (older brother, a term of respect) would manipulate him. Ali represents what we lose when desperation turns humans into competitors rather than a community.
Even Gi-hun, the supposed moral centre of the show, experiences this. When he and elderly contestant Il-nam (O Yeong-su) play marbles, Gi-hun lies and manipulates the old man he’s grown to care about. The extreme pressure – both financial and mortal – has consumed so much of his cognitive bandwidth that even basic human compassion becomes secondary to survival.
Why we couldn’t look away
Squid Game season one premiered during the COVID pandemic when millions around the world faced unemployment, eviction and financial ruin. Suddenly, extreme economic scenarios didn’t feel so remote. Audiences weren’t just watching entertainment – they saw their own psychological struggles reflected back at them.
The show has been such a success because it reveals uncomfortable truths about how money doesn’t just change what we can do, but fundamentally alters who we become when survival depends on it.
Every character in Squid Game represents a different response to economic trauma. Take season one. Gi-hun tries to maintain his humanity but repeatedly compromises (lying to his mother about money, manipulating Il-nam). Sang-woo sacrifices everything for survival (from securities fraud to literal murder). And some find strength in solidarity, as in Sae-byeok (HoYeon Jung) and Ji-yeong’s (Lee Yoo-mi) heartbreaking marble game, where Ji-yeong deliberately loses because Sae-byeok has more to live for.
The genius is in the details. Players refer to each other by numbers instead of names, a metaphor for how economic systems reduce humans to data points. The guards wear masks, becoming faceless enforcers of the system. Even the organ-harvesting subplot shows how far commodification can go, turning human bodies into black market goods.
Three seasons later, Squid Game itself has become a commodity. Netflix turned an anti-capitalist critique into a billion-dollar franchise, complete with reality TV spinoffs that recreate the exploitation of the show (without the murder!) in real life. Game shows offer high-risk, high-reward opportunities, where people admire the boldness and accept that unethical behaviour should not be vilified but encouraged.
The spectacle of humiliation is normalised by the genre’s focus on competition and transformation. Failure becomes entertainment, as is echoed in the show itself by the VIPs who, so bored with their wealth, place bets on human lives for “fun”.
Research has also found that people who enjoy reality TV are more likely to feel self-important, vindicated, or free from moral constraints. They are attracted to shows that stimulate these values.
What your Squid Game obsession or hatred means
If you’re fascinated by Squid Game, it isn’t just morbid curiosity at play – it’s recognition. On some level, it’s likely that you understand that the psychological pressure cooker of the games reflects real mechanisms happening in your own life when money gets tight.
If you found yourself repulsed by the violence or bored by the hype, your reaction may reveal something important about how you process economic anxiety. Research on adult viewers shows that people with stronger financial security and emotional regulation are more likely to avoid media content that triggers economic stress responses. Others dismiss it as “unrealistic” – what psychologists call “optimism-bias”, where you may unconsciously distance yourself from economic vulnerability.
Modern research confirms that financial scarcity creates measurable changes in how we think, plan and relate to others. The show’s genius was amplifying these subtle psychological effects to their logical extreme.
Source: Government of the Russian Federation – An important disclaimer is at the bottom of this article.
As part of a working visit to the Novgorod Region, First Deputy Prime Minister Denis Manturov, together with Acting Governor of the Region Alexander Dronov, familiarized himself with the activities of industrial enterprises in the region.
“Our industry demonstrates sustainable growth from year to year. Thank you and the Federal Ministry of Industry and Trade for your support, all our requests find a response from your colleagues,” stressed Acting Governor of the Novgorod Region Alexander Dronov.
The First Deputy Prime Minister visited one of the production sites of the fiber-optic drones “Prince Vandal Novgorodsky”. The drone, developed in Novgorod land, was first used in the SVO in August 2024 in the Kursk direction and is currently the most effective fpv drone in the world in terms of cost/effectiveness. During its use in the SVO zone, the KVN drone destroyed enemy equipment worth more than $2 billion. The production of fiber-optic drones in Russia is growing, and today domestic enterprises can produce hundreds of thousands of such drones per month, fully satisfying any needs of the Armed Forces.
During a visit to JSC Special Design and Technology Bureau for Relay Technology, part of the Ruselectronics holding company of the Rostec state corporation, the First Deputy Prime Minister was presented with innovative serial products of the enterprise, as well as promising projects for the creation of modern domestic electronic components based on materials and components manufactured in Russia.
Among the new products of SKTB RT is a line of microwave modules. The devices, which will replace American, German and French analogues, are capable of withstanding multiple impacts with acceleration up to 50g and operating at temperatures from -60 to 85 degrees Celsius. It is important to note that the use of a modern domestic electronic component base reduces the price of new microwave modules by 40-55% compared to foreign analogues.
Another enterprise included in the working trip was the branch of the scientific and production corporation “Precision Instrument-Making Systems” in Veliky Novgorod, which is involved in the development and production of electronic modules and units for systems for measuring the parameters of space objects’ movement, hardware and software systems for providing the GLONASS global navigation system, as well as inter-satellite laser systems for exchanging broadband information.
The First Deputy Prime Minister, in particular, was shown other products of the enterprise: serial production of microprocessor knee modules “Active-2” for people with lower limb amputations has been launched here.
Denis Manturov visited the site of the innovative scientific and technological center “Intelligent Electronics – Valdai”, created on the instructions of President Vladimir Putin in 2021. The territory of the INTC houses the advanced engineering school of Novgorod University, the programming school from Sber “School 21”, as well as about 60 residents of the center, including companies from the fields of radio electronics, control system software, and the industrial Internet of things.
As part of the construction of the new stage of the ISTC, which is planned to be completed in 2026, a new laboratory building for semiconductor materials science will be created. Research and development of high-performance heterostructures for the modern electronics industry based on semiconductor materials will be organized there, as well as a full cycle of production of microassemblies and microcircuits – from processing silicon substrates to casing and packaging finished products.
“Novgorod enterprises are involved in the production of products for the implementation of special military operation tasks. As part of the diversification of production, these same enterprises are actively developing the production of civilian products, and the university where we are today works in close cooperation with them,” Denis Manturov noted, summing up the results of the working trip.
The First Deputy Prime Minister also instructed the Ministry of Industry and Trade to study the possibility of recapitalizing the regional industrial development fund of the Novgorod region to support projects for the production of high-tech products.
Please note: This information is raw content directly from the source of the information. It is exactly what the source states and does not reflect the position of MIL-OSI or its clients.
Source: United Nations General Assembly and Security Council
As it prepares to hold elections, the Central African Republic stands at a delicate juncture, and international support is key to consolidate its unique opportunity to strengthen democracy and national reconciliation, the Security Council heard today from the top UN peacekeeping official, as well as the country’s representative.
“This year is of particular significance for the Central African Republic as the country is preparing to organize local, presidential and legislative elections,” Jean-Pierre Lacroix, Under-Secretary-General for Peace Operations said. He highlighted the efforts of the United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in the Central African Republic (MINUSCA) to assist the Government’s electoral preparations.
Elections are a key component of the 2019 Political Agreement for Peace and Reconciliation, he pointed out. However — and despite significant political will — local elections were postponed on several occasions due to financial, technical and logistical challenges. “The electoral process is at a turning point and there’s a critical need to safeguard and preserve the progress that has been achieved.” The international community must mobilize resources to prevent any backsliding.
Mistrust, Tensions Remain Despite Efforts to Implement 19 April Peace Agreement
“The political situation remains punctuated by mistrust and tensions” between the majority in power and the opposition, he said, while noting efforts to implement the peace agreement reached on 19 April between the Government, and the Unité pour la paix en Centrafrique, or UPC and Retour, Réclamation, Réhabilitation, or 3R. Despite progress in expanding the authority of the State, violence by armed groups and militias continues to compromise stability. The Government is collaborating with MINUSCA to improve border security, he said, noting the spillover of the Sudanese conflict in the north-east. He also noted an attack on 28 March near Tabane, Haut-Mbomou Prefecture, which took the life of a Kenyan military observer.
On the humanitarian front, “urgent needs continue to outpace available resources”, he said, noting the suspension of critical services of some of the most vulnerable populations. Also noting persistent conflict-related sexual violence and violations of children’s rights, he said the Government, supported by the Mission, is making efforts to advance transitional justice mechanisms. Further, the Special Criminal Court is playing a significant role in the fight against impunity and transitional justice, and requires financial and human resources to sustain its activities.
Calling on the Council to help consolidate the gains made by the country, he said: “If these efforts are sustained in the spirit of partnership and shared responsibility, the Central African Republic has the potential to become a true success story, not only for Central Africans, but also for peacekeeping and for this Security Council.”
He also recalled the tragic fire that occurred on Wednesday at Barthelemy Boganda High School in Bangui and expressed condolences to all the affected families. Further, six days ago a MINUSCA patrol was attacked during an operation in response to signaling of attacks by armed Sudanese elements, resulting in the tragic loss of a Zambian blue helmet, he said, condemning that attack.
Delegates Urge Investigation into Deadly Attack on MINUSCA Patrol
In the ensuing discussion, speakers expressed their condolences for both events, and several called for an investigation into the attack on the MINUSCA patrol.
Central African Republic’s Representative Points to National Reconciliation Efforts, ‘Promise of Rebirth’
The representative of the Central African Republic called for a moment of silence in honor of the victims of these incidents. “Recent progress reflects steadfast political will to end the cycle of violence” in his country, he said. The inclusive political dialogue supported by the President and the 19 April ceasefire agreement providing for the dissolution of certain armed groups are examples of this. Also detailing Government efforts to re-establish authority throughout the country, he said that the “triptych” of State authority, security and justice “represents our vision for national reconstruction”. Further, he said, the lifting of the arms embargo in July 2024 was a “turning point”, which allowed national forces to be equipped through a legal, transparent framework.
“However, force alone is not enough,” he observed, detailing additional Government efforts to establish peace, hold elections, uphold the rule of law and assist victims of sexual violence. Nevertheless, the Sudanese conflict is a “genuine” threat, he said, reporting that a joint force established by his country and Chad in March aims to address its spillover. “This mechanism,” he stated, “is part of a new generation of bilateral African cooperation in the service of collective security.” For its part, he called on the Council to provide political, institutional, security and financial support. He added that his country is not an “emergency situation”; rather, “it is a promise of rebirth”.
Council members welcomed these positive developments, with the representative of Guyana, Council President for June, speaking in her national capacity and also for Somalia, Algeria and Sierra Leone, hailing the ongoing implementation of the 2019 Political Agreement for Peace and Reconciliation, the integration of 9 of 14 armed groups and the continued expansion of State authority across the country. Also underscoring “the importance of the upcoming local and national elections as a milestone for democratic consolidation”, she said the international community must help address the significant funding gap affecting the electoral process.
Unpaid Assessed Contributions for MINUSCA Raises Concern
However, she also expressed concern about the ineffective implementation of the arms embargo and the persistent insecurity in various regions. This is “exacerbated by armed groups competing over natural resources and trade routes”, she said, calling on non-signatory armed groups to join the peace process. Noting the spillover effects from the Sudan conflict, she condemned the incursions by the Rapid Support Forces into Central African Republic territory and their reported collaboration with local armed groups. MINUSCA’s resource constraints, including unpaid assessed contributions, stand at over $400 million, she said, stressing that adequate and timely financing is essential for the Mission to deliver on its mandate, especially during this critical electoral period.
Agreeing, the speaker for Slovenia, welcoming MINUSCA’s “proactive peacekeeping posture”, said it should be equipped with adequate support to ensure the safety of civilians and its own personnel. The representative of Pakistan said that his country is proud to have 1,400 troops serving in MINUSCA. “We will soon deploy a level-two field hospital in the Mission, which will provide medical facilities to uniformed personnel, civilian staff, Government officials and the local population,” he added. However, pointing out that MINUSCA’s operational capacity is “crippled” by unpaid contributions, he urged Member States to pay in full and on time.
Panama’s delegate added: “Experience has taught us that withdrawing from a peace mission too soon may end up being more costly than sustaining it.” Welcoming the Government’s efforts towards security sector reform, he urged finalization of the “military programming law”, which will “allow for clearer articulation of the needs of the defence sector”.
Focus on Fighting Arms Trafficking and Combatants
“The Central African Republic is on the path of returning to peace and security,” said France’s representative, as he asked the Council to continue assisting the Government in its fight against arms trafficking and combatants. He pledged that his country would work together with all Council members and the Central African Republic on the renewal of the coercive measures against the armed groups outlined in resolution 2745 (2024).
The representative of the United States said his delegation looks forward to engaging with Member States on renewing that sanctions regime. He also expressed concern that Government regulations on fuel imports restrict MINUSCA’s operations, emphasizing that forcing the Mission to rely solely on Government-designated importers results in inflated fuel prices. “This must stop,” he declared, urging the Government to uphold the status-of-forces agreement.
International Support Must Respect Central African Republic’s Sovereignty
“There is no room here for the obsolete, discredited colonialist practices, nor for their contemporary manifestations thereof,” warned the representative of the Russian Federation. She voiced confidence in Bangui’s ability to translate security gains into socioeconomic progress, emphasizing that normalization — supported by the UN and international financial institutions — can become “irreversible” if grounded in respect for sovereignty and non-interference. The Government now controls nearly the entire national territory and the capabilities of the national armed forces are growing. Armed groups must seize this opportunity to engage constructively with the authorities. “The abandonment of armed struggle is the only path,” she said, warning: “The alternative to this is well known — that is a one-way ticket.”
Elections Must Be Timely, Orderly, Inclusive
“The Central African Republic stands at a pivotal point in its transition from post-conflict recovery to sustainable development,” said the representative of the Republic of Korea, urging the Government to uphold its commitment to ensure timely, orderly and inclusive local, legislative and presidential elections, a call taken up by several speakers today.
The representative of Denmark commended the work of the Government, National Elections Authority, MINUSCA and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in advancing preparations for elections. She added: “It is essential that all groups in society — especially women, young voters and internally displaced persons — can participate fully and freely.” The representative of the United Kingdom, called on the Government — with MINUSCA’s support — to ensure a safe environment during all stages of the electoral cycle. Greece’s delegate pointed out that “an expanding political and civic space is the most trustworthy pathway towards a demonstrated commitment by all stakeholders for further implementation of the Political Agreement for Peace and Reconciliation.”
While the Central African Republic is entering a critical phase of economic recovery, China’s delegate said, it continues to face significant challenges, including a widening fiscal deficit, high inflation and power shortages. The international community should prioritize helping countries, like this, achieve sustainable development by providing support in key areas, such as infrastructure, education and employment — aligned with the priorities outlined in the country’s National Development Action Plan. “This,” he emphasized, “will in turn help consolidate the foundation for peace”. At the recent Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, Beijing announced zero tariffs on 100 per cent of products from 53 African countries with diplomatic ties to China, he added.
Source: United Nations General Assembly and Security Council
As it prepares to hold elections, the Central African Republic stands at a delicate juncture, and international support is key to consolidate its unique opportunity to strengthen democracy and national reconciliation, the Security Council heard today from the top UN peacekeeping official, as well as the country’s representative.
“This year is of particular significance for the Central African Republic as the country is preparing to organize local, presidential and legislative elections,” Jean-Pierre Lacroix, Under-Secretary-General for Peace Operations said. He highlighted the efforts of the United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in the Central African Republic (MINUSCA) to assist the Government’s electoral preparations.
Elections are a key component of the 2019 Political Agreement for Peace and Reconciliation, he pointed out. However — and despite significant political will — local elections were postponed on several occasions due to financial, technical and logistical challenges. “The electoral process is at a turning point and there’s a critical need to safeguard and preserve the progress that has been achieved.” The international community must mobilize resources to prevent any backsliding.
Mistrust, Tensions Remain Despite Efforts to Implement 19 April Peace Agreement
“The political situation remains punctuated by mistrust and tensions” between the majority in power and the opposition, he said, while noting efforts to implement the peace agreement reached on 19 April between the Government, and the Unité pour la paix en Centrafrique, or UPC and Retour, Réclamation, Réhabilitation, or 3R. Despite progress in expanding the authority of the State, violence by armed groups and militias continues to compromise stability. The Government is collaborating with MINUSCA to improve border security, he said, noting the spillover of the Sudanese conflict in the north-east. He also noted an attack on 28 March near Tabane, Haut-Mbomou Prefecture, which took the life of a Kenyan military observer.
On the humanitarian front, “urgent needs continue to outpace available resources”, he said, noting the suspension of critical services of some of the most vulnerable populations. Also noting persistent conflict-related sexual violence and violations of children’s rights, he said the Government, supported by the Mission, is making efforts to advance transitional justice mechanisms. Further, the Special Criminal Court is playing a significant role in the fight against impunity and transitional justice, and requires financial and human resources to sustain its activities.
Calling on the Council to help consolidate the gains made by the country, he said: “If these efforts are sustained in the spirit of partnership and shared responsibility, the Central African Republic has the potential to become a true success story, not only for Central Africans, but also for peacekeeping and for this Security Council.”
He also recalled the tragic fire that occurred on Wednesday at Barthelemy Boganda High School in Bangui and expressed condolences to all the affected families. Further, six days ago a MINUSCA patrol was attacked during an operation in response to signaling of attacks by armed Sudanese elements, resulting in the tragic loss of a Zambian blue helmet, he said, condemning that attack.
Delegates Urge Investigation into Deadly Attack on MINUSCA Patrol
In the ensuing discussion, speakers expressed their condolences for both events, and several called for an investigation into the attack on the MINUSCA patrol.
Central African Republic’s Representative Points to National Reconciliation Efforts, ‘Promise of Rebirth’
The representative of the Central African Republic called for a moment of silence in honor of the victims of these incidents. “Recent progress reflects steadfast political will to end the cycle of violence” in his country, he said. The inclusive political dialogue supported by the President and the 19 April ceasefire agreement providing for the dissolution of certain armed groups are examples of this. Also detailing Government efforts to re-establish authority throughout the country, he said that the “triptych” of State authority, security and justice “represents our vision for national reconstruction”. Further, he said, the lifting of the arms embargo in July 2024 was a “turning point”, which allowed national forces to be equipped through a legal, transparent framework.
“However, force alone is not enough,” he observed, detailing additional Government efforts to establish peace, hold elections, uphold the rule of law and assist victims of sexual violence. Nevertheless, the Sudanese conflict is a “genuine” threat, he said, reporting that a joint force established by his country and Chad in March aims to address its spillover. “This mechanism,” he stated, “is part of a new generation of bilateral African cooperation in the service of collective security.” For its part, he called on the Council to provide political, institutional, security and financial support. He added that his country is not an “emergency situation”; rather, “it is a promise of rebirth”.
Council members welcomed these positive developments, with the representative of Guyana, Council President for June, speaking in her national capacity and also for Somalia, Algeria and Sierra Leone, hailing the ongoing implementation of the 2019 Political Agreement for Peace and Reconciliation, the integration of 9 of 14 armed groups and the continued expansion of State authority across the country. Also underscoring “the importance of the upcoming local and national elections as a milestone for democratic consolidation”, she said the international community must help address the significant funding gap affecting the electoral process.
Unpaid Assessed Contributions for MINUSCA Raises Concern
However, she also expressed concern about the ineffective implementation of the arms embargo and the persistent insecurity in various regions. This is “exacerbated by armed groups competing over natural resources and trade routes”, she said, calling on non-signatory armed groups to join the peace process. Noting the spillover effects from the Sudan conflict, she condemned the incursions by the Rapid Support Forces into Central African Republic territory and their reported collaboration with local armed groups. MINUSCA’s resource constraints, including unpaid assessed contributions, stand at over $400 million, she said, stressing that adequate and timely financing is essential for the Mission to deliver on its mandate, especially during this critical electoral period.
Agreeing, the speaker for Slovenia, welcoming MINUSCA’s “proactive peacekeeping posture”, said it should be equipped with adequate support to ensure the safety of civilians and its own personnel. The representative of Pakistan said that his country is proud to have 1,400 troops serving in MINUSCA. “We will soon deploy a level-two field hospital in the Mission, which will provide medical facilities to uniformed personnel, civilian staff, Government officials and the local population,” he added. However, pointing out that MINUSCA’s operational capacity is “crippled” by unpaid contributions, he urged Member States to pay in full and on time.
Panama’s delegate added: “Experience has taught us that withdrawing from a peace mission too soon may end up being more costly than sustaining it.” Welcoming the Government’s efforts towards security sector reform, he urged finalization of the “military programming law”, which will “allow for clearer articulation of the needs of the defence sector”.
Focus on Fighting Arms Trafficking and Combatants
“The Central African Republic is on the path of returning to peace and security,” said France’s representative, as he asked the Council to continue assisting the Government in its fight against arms trafficking and combatants. He pledged that his country would work together with all Council members and the Central African Republic on the renewal of the coercive measures against the armed groups outlined in resolution 2745 (2024).
The representative of the United States said his delegation looks forward to engaging with Member States on renewing that sanctions regime. He also expressed concern that Government regulations on fuel imports restrict MINUSCA’s operations, emphasizing that forcing the Mission to rely solely on Government-designated importers results in inflated fuel prices. “This must stop,” he declared, urging the Government to uphold the status-of-forces agreement.
International Support Must Respect Central African Republic’s Sovereignty
“There is no room here for the obsolete, discredited colonialist practices, nor for their contemporary manifestations thereof,” warned the representative of the Russian Federation. She voiced confidence in Bangui’s ability to translate security gains into socioeconomic progress, emphasizing that normalization — supported by the UN and international financial institutions — can become “irreversible” if grounded in respect for sovereignty and non-interference. The Government now controls nearly the entire national territory and the capabilities of the national armed forces are growing. Armed groups must seize this opportunity to engage constructively with the authorities. “The abandonment of armed struggle is the only path,” she said, warning: “The alternative to this is well known — that is a one-way ticket.”
Elections Must Be Timely, Orderly, Inclusive
“The Central African Republic stands at a pivotal point in its transition from post-conflict recovery to sustainable development,” said the representative of the Republic of Korea, urging the Government to uphold its commitment to ensure timely, orderly and inclusive local, legislative and presidential elections, a call taken up by several speakers today.
The representative of Denmark commended the work of the Government, National Elections Authority, MINUSCA and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in advancing preparations for elections. She added: “It is essential that all groups in society — especially women, young voters and internally displaced persons — can participate fully and freely.” The representative of the United Kingdom, called on the Government — with MINUSCA’s support — to ensure a safe environment during all stages of the electoral cycle. Greece’s delegate pointed out that “an expanding political and civic space is the most trustworthy pathway towards a demonstrated commitment by all stakeholders for further implementation of the Political Agreement for Peace and Reconciliation.”
While the Central African Republic is entering a critical phase of economic recovery, China’s delegate said, it continues to face significant challenges, including a widening fiscal deficit, high inflation and power shortages. The international community should prioritize helping countries, like this, achieve sustainable development by providing support in key areas, such as infrastructure, education and employment — aligned with the priorities outlined in the country’s National Development Action Plan. “This,” he emphasized, “will in turn help consolidate the foundation for peace”. At the recent Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, Beijing announced zero tariffs on 100 per cent of products from 53 African countries with diplomatic ties to China, he added.
The fire destroyed 41 Scott Street and ongoing demolition work means it is unsafe for residents and businesses nearby to return to their homes and premises.
However, progress on the demolition work allowed residents of 36 Scott Street to return to their homes on Thursday, 26 June.
Councillor Eric Drysdale, deputy leader of Perth and Kinross Council and a ward member for Perth City Centre, said: “The fire at Scott Street was tragic and the consequences will be felt for a long time to come. One person died and others were injured while 55 households were displaced because of it.
“Council staff have been working hard to find accommodation for these people and demolition contractors Reigart have been striving to bring 41 Scott Street down to a safe level that will start allowing people to return to their homes.
“It is great that these efforts mean 15 households are now back in their homes. I am sure they felt a real mix of emotions and that is why the Red Cross had staff on hand to provide support to those who needed it on Thursday.
“I would like, once again, to thank everyone who has been working hard on behalf of those affected by the fire – whether they are frontline workers, partner agencies or the people and businesses who have shown such tremendous generosity and concern.”
Tesco Edinburgh Road donated 15 bags of essential goods to families returning to their homes on Thursday while the Crieff Road branch has also donated vouchers.
A host of other businesses including The Ship Inn and Willows have also made donations, while The Salutation Hotel has been providing accommodation for affected residents since the fire.
A crowdfunder set up by Perth resident Nicola Bell has raised nearly £6,000. She will work with Perth and Kinross Council to distribute any funds raised.
On Wednesday, Perth and Kinross Council agreed to provide an emergency £250,000 funding to support residents and businesses. The Scottish Government has agreed to open the Bellwin Scheme, which provides emergency funding to local authorities.
Reigart Contracts Ltd have been working on the demolition of 41 Scott Street since the fire. The company has previously been responsible for dismantling damaged parts of the Mackintosh building after the Glasgow School of Art was damaged by fire.
A spokesperson for the firm said: “We’re pleased to report that as of Thursday, June 26 2025, residents of 36 Scott Street have returned safely to their homes. This follows two weeks of continuous demolition and safety works in conjunction with G3 Consulting Engineers and Perth and Kinross Council.
“Our operatives will continue working on Saturday (and will return on Monday (30/06/2025) where the works to the South Street elevation will be our main focus.”
Perth and Kinross also hosted two drop-in sessions, on Tuesday and Friday, at its offices at 2 High Street for those affected by the fire this week.
Friday’s event was supported by Pete Wishart MP and John Swinney MSP and had a focus on insurance.
Source: State University of Management – Official website of the State –
On June 27, 2025, a meeting of the joint dissertation council for the scientific specialty 2.9.9. “Logistics transport systems” was held at the State University of Management, created on the basis of the State University of Management and the Belgorod State Technological University named after V.G. Shukhov.
The meeting was chaired by the chairman of the joint dissertation council, rector of the BSTU named after V.G. Shukhov Sergey Glagolev. The event was attended by 12 members of the dissertation council, 10 of them in person. Also present at the meeting were invited experts, including the vice-rector of the State University of Management Maria Karelina.
The agenda included the issues of accepting for preliminary consideration two dissertations on the topic of “Method of Ensuring the Unity of Performance Measures for Various Types of Transport in Logistics Transport Systems” and “Development of Passenger Transportation in an Integrated Logistics Transport System of a Megacity Based on a Contact Schedule”, submitted for the degree of Candidate of Technical Sciences in the specialty 2.9.9. Logistics Transport Systems.
At the request of the chairman of the dissertation council, commissions were appointed to conduct a preliminary examination of the applicants’ works. The academic secretary familiarized the council members with the conclusion of the preliminary examination and reported on the documents submitted by the applicants for an academic degree. The council unanimously decided to accept the dissertations of Nikolai Solovyov and Irina Rybakova for preliminary consideration.
The members of the dissertation council also held a preliminary hearing of dissertation research for the academic degree of Doctor of Technical Sciences and for the academic degree of Candidate of Technical Sciences.
Please note: This information is raw content directly from the source of the information. It is exactly what the source states and does not reflect the position of MIL-OSI or its clients.
Union Minister of State (Independent Charge) for Skill Development and Entrepreneurship and Minister of State for Education, Jayant Chaudharybon Friday unveiled a report titled “Skills for the Future: Transforming India’s Workforce Landscape” in New. Developed by the Institute for Competitiveness (IFC), the report offers a comprehensive analysis of India’s skills ecosystem, emphasizing the need for a demand-driven, market-aligned, and outcome-oriented approach to skilling.
Speaking at the event, Chaudhary highlighted the importance of aligning skilling initiatives with industry needs and evolving workforce demands. He emphasized that skilling should not be viewed solely as a supply-side intervention but as a holistic ecosystem that bridges education, vocational training, and industry requirements. He also proposed the development of a robust employability index to monitor the impact of education and skilling on youth employment in a rapidly changing economic and technological landscape. Additionally, he stressed the value of recognizing informal and experiential learning to strengthen pathways between education and industry.
The report, an independent effort by IFC, draws on publicly available data, including unit-level analysis from the Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS) 2023-24. It reveals that 88% of India’s workforce is engaged in low-competency occupations, with only 10-12% in high-competency roles. The report identifies five key sectors—IT and ITeS, Textile and Apparel, Electronics, Healthcare and Life Sciences, and Beauty and Wellness—that account for over 66% of vocational training in India. Using a Competitiveness Framework Analysis, it also highlights five high-potential regions for these sectors, integrating data from PLFS, the PMKVY 4.0 dashboard, Sector Skill Councils, and the National Apprenticeship Promotion Scheme to assess training, certification, and industry alignment.
Atul Kumar Tiwari, Secretary of the Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship (MSDE), commended the IFC’s efforts, underscoring the need for a robust body of academic literature on skilling supported by data and evidence. He called for deeper exploration of structural changes in the skilling, education, and work continuum to drive meaningful reforms.
Union Minister of State (Independent Charge) for Skill Development and Entrepreneurship and Minister of State for Education, Jayant Chaudharybon Friday unveiled a report titled “Skills for the Future: Transforming India’s Workforce Landscape” in New. Developed by the Institute for Competitiveness (IFC), the report offers a comprehensive analysis of India’s skills ecosystem, emphasizing the need for a demand-driven, market-aligned, and outcome-oriented approach to skilling.
Speaking at the event, Chaudhary highlighted the importance of aligning skilling initiatives with industry needs and evolving workforce demands. He emphasized that skilling should not be viewed solely as a supply-side intervention but as a holistic ecosystem that bridges education, vocational training, and industry requirements. He also proposed the development of a robust employability index to monitor the impact of education and skilling on youth employment in a rapidly changing economic and technological landscape. Additionally, he stressed the value of recognizing informal and experiential learning to strengthen pathways between education and industry.
The report, an independent effort by IFC, draws on publicly available data, including unit-level analysis from the Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS) 2023-24. It reveals that 88% of India’s workforce is engaged in low-competency occupations, with only 10-12% in high-competency roles. The report identifies five key sectors—IT and ITeS, Textile and Apparel, Electronics, Healthcare and Life Sciences, and Beauty and Wellness—that account for over 66% of vocational training in India. Using a Competitiveness Framework Analysis, it also highlights five high-potential regions for these sectors, integrating data from PLFS, the PMKVY 4.0 dashboard, Sector Skill Councils, and the National Apprenticeship Promotion Scheme to assess training, certification, and industry alignment.
Atul Kumar Tiwari, Secretary of the Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship (MSDE), commended the IFC’s efforts, underscoring the need for a robust body of academic literature on skilling supported by data and evidence. He called for deeper exploration of structural changes in the skilling, education, and work continuum to drive meaningful reforms.
Building Plymouth has officially relaunched its flagship Adopt a School programme which connects local construction businesses with schools across the city.
The programme aims to inspire young people to explore careers in construction and the built environment, while strengthening the pipeline of future talent for the industry.
The relaunch was celebrated at the Building Plymouth members meeting on 25 June, hosted by Foot Anstey.
Councillor Sally Cresswell, Cabinet Member for Education, Skills and Apprenticeships at Plymouth City Council said: “Given the growth and investment in Plymouth, it is absolutely crucial that our children and young people are fully aware of the fantastic career pathways available in construction.
“I’d like to thank local construction companies for ‘adopting’ our schools and creating these new strategic relationships to improve awareness and engagement.”
Emily Waterfield from Brook Green Centre for Learning, Councillor Sally Cresswell and Andy Veasey, Managing Director of Drew and Co
Through the Adopt a School programme, each participating school is matched with a named construction professional who acts as a key contact and ambassador. These ambassadors provide tailored support to schools, including careers talks, site visits, mentoring, and curriculum-linked activities.
The initiative is coordinated by Building Plymouth’s 5E’s Group, which streamlines engagement and shares best practice across the network.
Sam Morcumb, Chair of the 5E’s Group and Business Development and Bid Manager at BuildX (SW), commented: “Our ambassadors don’t just build structures, they lay the foundation for future talent. This is game-changing work that gives young people access to real-world experiences and opportunities they might never have imagined.”
The programme already boasts a strong list of confirmed partnerships, including:
AECOM with Lipson Cooperative Academy
Balfour Beatty with UTC Plymouth
Drew and Co with Brook Green Centre for Learning
Obedair Construction with St Boniface Catholic College.
Schools have welcomed the initiative with enthusiasm. Emily Waterfield, Work Based Learning Coordinator at Brook Green Centre for Learning, said:
“We’re delighted to be partnered with Drew & Co. This collaboration will help introduce our students to careers in mechanical and electrical engineering, supported by real-life experiences that enhance our STEM curriculum.”
Rachael Hudson of St Boniface’s Catholic College added: “Obedair has already made a huge impact by setting up an alternative provision within our school, giving students vital hands-on experience in a variety of trades.”
Building Plymouth is calling on more construction businesses and schools to get involved, helping to expand the reach and impact of this transformative programme.
For more information or to get involved, please contact [email protected].
The Box was delighted to welcome Sir Gabriele Finaldi, Director of the National Gallery to Plymouth yesterday, to celebrate the unveiling of a new blue commemorative plaque honouring Sir Charles Lock Eastlake (1793-1865). The plaque is located at Hillside Court, Plympton St Mary – the site of the pioneering Victorian art scholar and first director of the National Gallery’s former home ‘Hillside’.
The Box is currently working in partnership with the National Gallery to deliver The Triumph of Art, a nationwide project by artist Jeremy Deller, commissioned by the National Gallery as part of NG200, its Bicentenary celebrations.
Sir Charles Eastlake has been described as ‘the alpha and omega’ of the Victorian art world. Born in Plymouth on 17 November 1793, he became one of the most influential figures 19th-century British culture, serving as:
First Director of the National Gallery (1855-1865), transforming its collecting practices, conservation methods, and display standards
Seventh President of the Royal Academy (1855-1865), following in the footsteps of fellow Devonian Sir Joshua Reynolds
Secretary of the Fine Arts Commission (1841), overseeing the decoration of the new Houses of Parliament
Distinguished art scholar, whose 1847 work “Materials for A History of Oil Painting” remains influential today
The site where the plaque has been installed holds special significance as Eastlake inherited the property ‘Hillside’ (originally named ‘St Mary’s Hill’) from his brother in 1845. According to his wife, despite his demanding official duties, Eastlake devoted considerable attention to improving and ornamenting the property, incorporating Italian design features and personally tending to the gardens with his standing order to ‘plant more hollyhocks.’
Eastlake’s local roots run deep. He was baptised at Plymouth’s Minster church of St Andrew and attended Plympton Grammar School (where Sir Joshua Reynolds also studied). His artistic talents were first nurtured at Plymouth Grammar School under the Revd Dr John Bidlake, a prominent author, artist and educator.
Sir Gabriele Finaldi paid tribute to Eastlake’s legacy: “Sir Charles Eastlake’s transformative leadership established the foundational principles that continue to guide the National Gallery 200 years on today. His pioneering approach to collecting, conservation and scholarship created enduring standards for museum practice worldwide. It’s especially appropriate that we commemorate his legacy here in Devon, where his distinguished career began, and where The Box exemplifies the same commitment to accessibility and excellence that defined Eastlake’s tenure.
“We are also delighted to collaborate with The Box on The Triumph of Art project, which exemplifies our commitment to fostering meaningful regional partnerships that ensure our national collection reaches communities throughout the UK. This collaboration is particularly significant as we mark our bicentenary year, reinforcing our dedication to connecting all parts of Britain with their shared cultural heritage and underscoring the essential role that outstanding regional institutions play in our ongoing mission to make the nation’s artistic heritage available to the widest possible audience.”
Victoria Pomery OBE, CEO of The Box, said: “We are thrilled to honour Sir Charles Eastlake’s remarkable legacy here in Plymouth, where his extraordinary journey from local student to international art world leader began. His story perfectly embodies our mission to celebrate Plymouth’s pivotal role in shaping British culture while making world-class art accessible to all. From Reynolds to Eastlake to the present day, today’s plaque unveiling not only commemorates one man’s extraordinary achievements but also reinforces Plymouth’s position as a city that has always understood the transformative power of art and culture.
“Our partnership with the National Gallery on The Triumph of Art project also demonstrates the power of collaboration in bringing nationally significant stories back to their roots. Eastlake’s vision of accessible, excellently curated collections continues to inspire our work today, and it’s particularly meaningful that we can share this celebration with Sir Gabriele Finaldi during the National Gallery’s bicentenary year. We look forward to continuing our partnership in the future and sharing more of these important stories with communities.”
The National Gallery and The Box have enjoyed several collaborations over the years, including an exhibition exploring Eastlake’s early artistic training in Plymouth and his future career as the first director of the National Gallery in 2012, curated by Susanna Avery-Quash. The Box’s collection also holds a batch of Eastlake correspondence, donated by the family of David Robertson, Eastlake’s biographer and the title deeds for Steer’s Park, a property in Plympton that Eastlake purchased from the Earl of Morley.
Eastlake’s family contributed significantly to Plymouth’s cultural life. His father George helped establish the Proprietary Library (now located on St Barnabas Terrace), one of Plymouth’s oldest historic institutions, founded in 1810, and the family also supported aspiring artists including J.M.W. Turner, who stayed with them during his painting expeditions to Devon.
Eastlake was previously honoured with the Freedom of the City in 1832 and a former road in the city centre called Eastlake Walk. Eastlake Street near the Drake Circus shopping centre still remains while another plaque dedicated to him can be found near the site of the old Plympton Grammar School, George Lane, Plympton St Maurice.
The WHO Scientific Advisory Group for the Origins of Novel Pathogens (SAGO), a panel of 27 independent, international, multidisciplinary experts, today published its report on the origins of SARS-CoV-2, the virus responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic.
SAGO has advanced the understanding of the origins of COVID-19, but as they say in their report, much of the information needed to evaluate fully all hypotheses has not been provided.
“I thank each of the 27 members of SAGO for dedicating their time and expertise to this very important scientific undertaking over more than three years,” said Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General. “As things stand, all hypotheses must remain on the table, including zoonotic spillover and lab leak. We continue to appeal to China and any other country that has information about the origins of COVID-19 to share that information openly, in the interests of protecting the world from future pandemics.”
In its report, SAGO considered available evidence for the main hypotheses for the origins of COVID-19 and concluded that “the weight of available evidence…suggests zoonotic spillover…either directly from bats or through an intermediate host.”
WHO requested that China share hundreds of genetic sequences from individuals with COVID-19 early in the pandemic, more detailed information about the animals sold at markets in Wuhan, and information on work done and biosafety conditions at laboratories in Wuhan. To date, China has not shared this information either with SAGO or WHO.
SAGO published its initial findings and recommendations in a report on 9 June 2022. Today’s report updates that evaluation based on peer-reviewed papers and reviews, as well as available unpublished information and field studies, interviews, and other reports including audit findings, government reports and intelligence reports. SAGO convened in various formats 52 times, conducted briefings with researchers, academics, journalists, and others.
“As the report says, this is not solely a scientific endeavour, it is a moral and ethical imperative,” said Dr Marietjie Venter, Chair of the group and Distinguished Professor and One Health Research Chair in Vaccines and Surveillance for Emerging viral threats at the University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa. “Understanding the origins of SARS-CoV-2 and how it sparked a pandemic is needed to help prevent future pandemics, save lives and livelihoods, and reduce global suffering.”
At a Special Session of the World Health Assembly in late 2020, WHO Member States adopted a resolution asking WHO to study the origins of SARS-CoV-2. Accordingly, a joint mission between international and Chinese experts travelled to China in January and February 2021, and published their report in March of that year.
In July 2021, Dr Tedros launched SAGO with two mandates: first, to design a global framework to investigate the origins of emerging and re-emerging pathogens, which it published last year, and second, to apply that framework to evaluate scientific evidence to determine the origins of COVID-19.
The work to understand the origins of SARS-CoV-2 remains unfinished. WHO welcomes any further evidence on the origins of COVID-19, and SAGO remains committed to reviewing any new information should it become available.
In Secrets We Keep, the hidden world of domestic work and abuse is exposed. Here Excel Busano who plays Angel, Cecilia’s au pair and Ruby’s best friend in Denmark speaks with her community on the phone. Tine Harden/Netflix
Moving fluidly between English, Danish and Tagalog, the six-part drama is a nuanced indictment of the lack of moral accountability among the rich. On display are the prejudices and complicity of white women in enabling a culture of toxic masculinity that treats Filipina migrant women as sexualized and disposable commodities.
The story starts with a tearful Ruby Tan — a Filipina au pair who works for the affluent Rasmus (Lars Ranthe) and Katarina (Danica Curcic) — asking for some help with her employers from her neighbour, Cecilie (Marie Bach Hansen).
Cecilie is a successful non-profit manager and mother of two married to a high-profile lawyer. She employs Angel (Excel Busano), a Filipina au pair. Cecilie tells Ruby (Donna Levkovski) she cannot get involved.
The next day, Ruby vanishes without a trace.
The series is propelled by Cecilie’s guilt in refusing to help Ruby. She is shocked at her neighbours’ apparent lack of concern for Ruby’s disappearance.
Cecilie begins to sleuth for clues regarding Ruby’s disappearance and she eventually decides to assist Aicha (Sara Fanta Traore), a racialized policewoman assigned to find the missing au pair. Cecilie discovers a pregnancy kit by a trash bin where she had last seen Ruby. And she soon suspects Ruby’s employer, Rasmus, of raping her.
While the series lacks true suspense due to its predictable story arc peppered with clues about Ruby’s disappearance, it is amply compensated by a sharp critique on the moral decay of modern society, systemic racism and the complicity of women in upholding white masculine privilege.
Warped racist view of the world
Secrets We Keep lays bare the warped world view of rich, white privilege, racism and the sexual fetishism of Asian women.
At a dinner party one night, Rasmus and Katarina do not seem concerned about their missing au pair. Katarina labels Filipina au pairs as whores working in brothels. When discussing Ruby, Katarina says, “she probably ran off to do porn.”
In one uncomfortable scene, Rasmus taunts Cecilia’s husband, Mike (Simon Sears), about his sexual preferences. Mike responds by saying: “I don’t have ‘yellow fever.’” Cecilia sits silently beside Mike.
Katarina also calls Aicha (Sara Fanta Traore), the policewoman, “the little brown one.”
At a formal dinner, Rasmus tells Cecilia: “We stick together. We are from the same world, and we are loyal to each other.”
It led the Philippines to ban the participation of Scandinavian countries in its “informal labour” arrangement in 1998. Though the ban was lifted in 2010, Au Pair Network, an advocacy group, reveals that the program is still riddled with abuse.
At a recent gender studies conference in Stockholm, Ardis Ingvars, a sociologist at the University of Iceland who worked as an au pair for a year in the United States just after she turned 18, recalls her anxiety and apprehension as she moved to Boston.
She said:
“Au pairs hope to be lucky with the family turning out OK. What is difficult to take is the attitude of ‘ownership’ that the children and families display over the au pairs as an unquestioned entitlement.”
Ingvars said asymmetrical power relations embedded within the au pair system reinforce racial and class hierarchies.
This is reflected in Secrets We Keep. Midway during Aicha’s investigation, as she hits roadblock after roadblock, she cries out in frustration: “She’s a fucking nobody in their world.”
Aicha Petersen (Sara Fanta Traore) is the police investigator charged with finding Ruby in ‘Secrets We Keep’. Netflix
Feminized labour exploitation
Economic globalization, neoliberal policies and an increased dependence on the remittance economy fuses with the care gap in the Global North to fuel the feminized care migration from the Global South, many of them Filipino women.
Au pairs are placed with host families who provide free board and meals in return for up to 30 hours a week of housework and child care as they learn the host language and customs. The au pairs are paid “pocket money” of Danish Kroner 5,000 per month (approx $1,000 Canadian) out of which they also pay local taxes.
One scene shows one of Cecilie’s work meetings. A junior staff member expresses surprise that Cecilie has an au pair, labelling it a relic of colonial era racial hierarchies.
Cecilie defends herself, and says the system survives because of the failure of men to keep up their domestic bargain and thus the need for women like her “to outsource care.”
She argues the Filipina au pairs “are dependable” and she is “a much better mother” because of Angel. But Cecilie doesn’t acknowledge her privilege — that to be with her children and have a career is predicated on the exploitative extraction of care from Global South women.
Cecilie’s shock at finding out that Angel has a son whom she left behind in the Philippines is part of her denial. In the end, Cecilie is unable to confront her own complicity and decides to release Angel from their au pair arrangement.
“You know nothing about my world…You are very lucky,” cries Angel in anguish as Cecilie hands her the return ticket and an extra three months’ pay to demonstrate her magnanimity.
Secrets We Keep reveals the brutal reality for Global South au pairs as well as upper-class white women and their entitlements. It indicates that even though these white wealthy women may see mistreatment, they maintain their silence and participate in wilful gendered violence to hold onto that privilege, while maintaining a façade of compassion towards the disposable racial migrant other.
In Secrets We Keep, the hidden world of domestic work and abuse is exposed. Here Excel Busano who plays Angel, Cecilia’s au pair and Ruby’s best friend in Denmark speaks with her community on the phone. Tine Harden/Netflix
Moving fluidly between English, Danish and Tagalog, the six-part drama is a nuanced indictment of the lack of moral accountability among the rich. On display are the prejudices and complicity of white women in enabling a culture of toxic masculinity that treats Filipina migrant women as sexualized and disposable commodities.
The story starts with a tearful Ruby Tan — a Filipina au pair who works for the affluent Rasmus (Lars Ranthe) and Katarina (Danica Curcic) — asking for some help with her employers from her neighbour, Cecilie (Marie Bach Hansen).
Cecilie is a successful non-profit manager and mother of two married to a high-profile lawyer. She employs Angel (Excel Busano), a Filipina au pair. Cecilie tells Ruby (Donna Levkovski) she cannot get involved.
The next day, Ruby vanishes without a trace.
The series is propelled by Cecilie’s guilt in refusing to help Ruby. She is shocked at her neighbours’ apparent lack of concern for Ruby’s disappearance.
Cecilie begins to sleuth for clues regarding Ruby’s disappearance and she eventually decides to assist Aicha (Sara Fanta Traore), a racialized policewoman assigned to find the missing au pair. Cecilie discovers a pregnancy kit by a trash bin where she had last seen Ruby. And she soon suspects Ruby’s employer, Rasmus, of raping her.
While the series lacks true suspense due to its predictable story arc peppered with clues about Ruby’s disappearance, it is amply compensated by a sharp critique on the moral decay of modern society, systemic racism and the complicity of women in upholding white masculine privilege.
Warped racist view of the world
Secrets We Keep lays bare the warped world view of rich, white privilege, racism and the sexual fetishism of Asian women.
At a dinner party one night, Rasmus and Katarina do not seem concerned about their missing au pair. Katarina labels Filipina au pairs as whores working in brothels. When discussing Ruby, Katarina says, “she probably ran off to do porn.”
In one uncomfortable scene, Rasmus taunts Cecilia’s husband, Mike (Simon Sears), about his sexual preferences. Mike responds by saying: “I don’t have ‘yellow fever.’” Cecilia sits silently beside Mike.
Katarina also calls Aicha (Sara Fanta Traore), the policewoman, “the little brown one.”
At a formal dinner, Rasmus tells Cecilia: “We stick together. We are from the same world, and we are loyal to each other.”
It led the Philippines to ban the participation of Scandinavian countries in its “informal labour” arrangement in 1998. Though the ban was lifted in 2010, Au Pair Network, an advocacy group, reveals that the program is still riddled with abuse.
At a recent gender studies conference in Stockholm, Ardis Ingvars, a sociologist at the University of Iceland who worked as an au pair for a year in the United States just after she turned 18, recalls her anxiety and apprehension as she moved to Boston.
She said:
“Au pairs hope to be lucky with the family turning out OK. What is difficult to take is the attitude of ‘ownership’ that the children and families display over the au pairs as an unquestioned entitlement.”
Ingvars said asymmetrical power relations embedded within the au pair system reinforce racial and class hierarchies.
This is reflected in Secrets We Keep. Midway during Aicha’s investigation, as she hits roadblock after roadblock, she cries out in frustration: “She’s a fucking nobody in their world.”
Aicha Petersen (Sara Fanta Traore) is the police investigator charged with finding Ruby in ‘Secrets We Keep’. Netflix
Feminized labour exploitation
Economic globalization, neoliberal policies and an increased dependence on the remittance economy fuses with the care gap in the Global North to fuel the feminized care migration from the Global South, many of them Filipino women.
Au pairs are placed with host families who provide free board and meals in return for up to 30 hours a week of housework and child care as they learn the host language and customs. The au pairs are paid “pocket money” of Danish Kroner 5,000 per month (approx $1,000 Canadian) out of which they also pay local taxes.
One scene shows one of Cecilie’s work meetings. A junior staff member expresses surprise that Cecilie has an au pair, labelling it a relic of colonial era racial hierarchies.
Cecilie defends herself, and says the system survives because of the failure of men to keep up their domestic bargain and thus the need for women like her “to outsource care.”
She argues the Filipina au pairs “are dependable” and she is “a much better mother” because of Angel. But Cecilie doesn’t acknowledge her privilege — that to be with her children and have a career is predicated on the exploitative extraction of care from Global South women.
Cecilie’s shock at finding out that Angel has a son whom she left behind in the Philippines is part of her denial. In the end, Cecilie is unable to confront her own complicity and decides to release Angel from their au pair arrangement.
“You know nothing about my world…You are very lucky,” cries Angel in anguish as Cecilie hands her the return ticket and an extra three months’ pay to demonstrate her magnanimity.
Secrets We Keep reveals the brutal reality for Global South au pairs as well as upper-class white women and their entitlements. It indicates that even though these white wealthy women may see mistreatment, they maintain their silence and participate in wilful gendered violence to hold onto that privilege, while maintaining a façade of compassion towards the disposable racial migrant other.
In Secrets We Keep, the hidden world of domestic work and abuse is exposed. Here Excel Busano who plays Angel, Cecilia’s au pair and Ruby’s best friend in Denmark speaks with her community on the phone. Tine Harden/Netflix
Moving fluidly between English, Danish and Tagalog, the six-part drama is a nuanced indictment of the lack of moral accountability among the rich. On display are the prejudices and complicity of white women in enabling a culture of toxic masculinity that treats Filipina migrant women as sexualized and disposable commodities.
The story starts with a tearful Ruby Tan — a Filipina au pair who works for the affluent Rasmus (Lars Ranthe) and Katarina (Danica Curcic) — asking for some help with her employers from her neighbour, Cecilie (Marie Bach Hansen).
Cecilie is a successful non-profit manager and mother of two married to a high-profile lawyer. She employs Angel (Excel Busano), a Filipina au pair. Cecilie tells Ruby (Donna Levkovski) she cannot get involved.
The next day, Ruby vanishes without a trace.
The series is propelled by Cecilie’s guilt in refusing to help Ruby. She is shocked at her neighbours’ apparent lack of concern for Ruby’s disappearance.
Cecilie begins to sleuth for clues regarding Ruby’s disappearance and she eventually decides to assist Aicha (Sara Fanta Traore), a racialized policewoman assigned to find the missing au pair. Cecilie discovers a pregnancy kit by a trash bin where she had last seen Ruby. And she soon suspects Ruby’s employer, Rasmus, of raping her.
While the series lacks true suspense due to its predictable story arc peppered with clues about Ruby’s disappearance, it is amply compensated by a sharp critique on the moral decay of modern society, systemic racism and the complicity of women in upholding white masculine privilege.
Warped racist view of the world
Secrets We Keep lays bare the warped world view of rich, white privilege, racism and the sexual fetishism of Asian women.
At a dinner party one night, Rasmus and Katarina do not seem concerned about their missing au pair. Katarina labels Filipina au pairs as whores working in brothels. When discussing Ruby, Katarina says, “she probably ran off to do porn.”
In one uncomfortable scene, Rasmus taunts Cecilia’s husband, Mike (Simon Sears), about his sexual preferences. Mike responds by saying: “I don’t have ‘yellow fever.’” Cecilia sits silently beside Mike.
Katarina also calls Aicha (Sara Fanta Traore), the policewoman, “the little brown one.”
At a formal dinner, Rasmus tells Cecilia: “We stick together. We are from the same world, and we are loyal to each other.”
It led the Philippines to ban the participation of Scandinavian countries in its “informal labour” arrangement in 1998. Though the ban was lifted in 2010, Au Pair Network, an advocacy group, reveals that the program is still riddled with abuse.
At a recent gender studies conference in Stockholm, Ardis Ingvars, a sociologist at the University of Iceland who worked as an au pair for a year in the United States just after she turned 18, recalls her anxiety and apprehension as she moved to Boston.
She said:
“Au pairs hope to be lucky with the family turning out OK. What is difficult to take is the attitude of ‘ownership’ that the children and families display over the au pairs as an unquestioned entitlement.”
Ingvars said asymmetrical power relations embedded within the au pair system reinforce racial and class hierarchies.
This is reflected in Secrets We Keep. Midway during Aicha’s investigation, as she hits roadblock after roadblock, she cries out in frustration: “She’s a fucking nobody in their world.”
Aicha Petersen (Sara Fanta Traore) is the police investigator charged with finding Ruby in ‘Secrets We Keep’. Netflix
Feminized labour exploitation
Economic globalization, neoliberal policies and an increased dependence on the remittance economy fuses with the care gap in the Global North to fuel the feminized care migration from the Global South, many of them Filipino women.
Au pairs are placed with host families who provide free board and meals in return for up to 30 hours a week of housework and child care as they learn the host language and customs. The au pairs are paid “pocket money” of Danish Kroner 5,000 per month (approx $1,000 Canadian) out of which they also pay local taxes.
One scene shows one of Cecilie’s work meetings. A junior staff member expresses surprise that Cecilie has an au pair, labelling it a relic of colonial era racial hierarchies.
Cecilie defends herself, and says the system survives because of the failure of men to keep up their domestic bargain and thus the need for women like her “to outsource care.”
She argues the Filipina au pairs “are dependable” and she is “a much better mother” because of Angel. But Cecilie doesn’t acknowledge her privilege — that to be with her children and have a career is predicated on the exploitative extraction of care from Global South women.
Cecilie’s shock at finding out that Angel has a son whom she left behind in the Philippines is part of her denial. In the end, Cecilie is unable to confront her own complicity and decides to release Angel from their au pair arrangement.
“You know nothing about my world…You are very lucky,” cries Angel in anguish as Cecilie hands her the return ticket and an extra three months’ pay to demonstrate her magnanimity.
Secrets We Keep reveals the brutal reality for Global South au pairs as well as upper-class white women and their entitlements. It indicates that even though these white wealthy women may see mistreatment, they maintain their silence and participate in wilful gendered violence to hold onto that privilege, while maintaining a façade of compassion towards the disposable racial migrant other.
Source: The Conversation – UK – By Ruth H. Thurstan, Associate Professor in Marine and Historical Ecology, University of Exeter
Ruth Thurstan holds the Piscatorial AtlasCredit: Lee Raby, CC BY-NC-ND
What stands out most about the book I’m carrying under my arm, as I meander through the exhibits at the National Maritime Museum Cornwall in Falmouth, is its awkwardly large size. The Piscatorial Atlas, authored by Ole Theodor Olsen and published in 1883, contains 50 beautifully illustrated charts of the seas around Great Britain. These show the locations exploited at that time for a variety of fish species, alongside the typical vessels or fishing gear used. This information was collated from fishermen in the decade before the atlas was published.
The atlas isn’t a book made for travel. Luckily, it can be readily admired online. But leafing through its carefully curated pages, which contain the collective knowledge of so many people who have long since passed away, feels special, and is why I chose it to show to the programme producers today.
I’ve always loved old books, but I never imagined they would become such an integral part of my work. My interest in marine historical ecology – the use of historical archives to make sense of how our ocean ecosystems are changing – started 18 years ago when I read The Unnatural History of the Sea by Professor Callum Roberts. Within its pages it details how historical perspectives provide critical insights into the deteriorating health of our seas.
Local science, global stories.
This article is part of a series, Secrets of the Sea, exploring how marine scientists are developing climate solutions.
In collaboration with the BBC, Anna Turns travels around the West Country coastline to meet ocean experts making exciting discoveries beneath the waves.
In recent decades, fishery declines, degradation of coastal habitats and the loss of large predators show that exploitation, coastal development, pollution and climate change are exacting their toll on marine ecosystems.
Yet information extracted from old books, reports, and even newspaper articles, show us that many of these issues started long ago. We have exploited the seas for thousands of years, but in Britain, the 19th-century introduction of steam power was a watershed moment. A point in time when our ability to exploit the seas abruptly and dramatically increased. My research aims to uncover how our use of this technological advance – and those that followed – have affected the functioning of marine ecosystems and their continued ability to support our needs.
Transformation of the seas
These negative effects are profound. Towards the end of the Piscatorial Atlas is a page dedicated to the native oyster (Ostrea edulis). It is my favourite of the charts. A gradation of colour indicates where oysters were found in abundance at this time. Colour surrounds the coastal seas of Britain and further afield. Strikingly, there is an enormous area of oyster ground delineated in the southern North Sea.
Today, the native oyster ecosystem is defined as collapsed. The decline of nearshore oyster reefs was well underway by the time the Piscatorial Atlas was published, and the loss of the large North Sea oyster ground – so clear on Olsen’s chart – swiftly followed. As those with the knowledge of these once prolific grounds passed away, the memory of the once vast oyster habitats was lost. This problem was further compounded by science. In the late 19th century, studies of oyster grounds were rare, and scientific surveys almost always occurred after the habitat had been destroyed. Low densities of oysters became the scientific norm.
Recent research I was involved in with a team of experts used historical sources from across Europe to show just how much change has occurred. We showed that reported native oyster habitat once covered tens of thousands of square kilometres and was a dominant feature of some coastal ecosystems. Multiple layers of old oyster shell, consolidated by a layer of living oysters, provided raised reefs that supported a diverse range of species.
The economic and cultural significance of oysters created a more visible historical record than many other species. Yet, the history of marine declines is not limited to oysters. Historical sources quote fishermen concerned about the expansion of trawling and fishing effort. They described the efficiency with which sail trawlers and early steam-powered vessels extracted fish and non-target species from the seafloor.
The impact of land-based activities, such as sediment and pollutant run-off and coastal development, also increased as societies industrialised. These placed marine ecosystems under further pressure, yet regulations governing sustainable management of our seas failed to keep up. These influences, coupled with a collective societal amnesia regarding what we have lost, facilitated the hidden transformation of marine ecosystems.
Using old books and other deep-time approaches, researchers are increasingly making these transformations visible. Reading the words of people from centuries ago, we learn that their experiences of marine ecosystems were often fundamentally different from our own. Understanding the scale of this difference, where species and habitats existed, and in what abundances, can help make the case for their conservation and restoration.
People have always made use of the seas. For me, looking to the past isn’t just about understanding what we have lost, it is also about taking positive lessons from the past, such as the myriad ways in which societies benefited from the presence of healthy marine ecosystems. Heeding these lessons from history helps us visualise the full range of possible futures available to us, including the many benefits that more ambitious conservation and restoration of our ocean ecosystems could bring, should we choose this path.
Ruth H. Thurstan works for The University of Exeter. She receives funding from the Convex Seascape Survey and the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (grant agreement no. 856488).
