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AP PHOTOS: Guatemala-born designer links history and culture with current trends in fashion show

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 12:58:04 GMT

BROWNSVILLE, Texas (AP) — A Guatemala-born designer combined Indigenous weaving technique, modern clothing design and colorful history from her native country in a recent runway showcase in Brownsville, Texas. The display offered a taste not only of Elena De León’s artistic vision, but of work by Guatemalan mothers, including some in the U.S. and others who remained at home to support their families.The Costumes of the Americas Museum in the border city hosted the May 12 event with assistance from the Guatemalan Consulate in nearby McAllen and Maryland, where De León lives after migrating to the U.S. seven years ago.“I’m a woman thinking of the needs of her community and Guatemalan towns,” De León told the crowd before models wearing clothes made by Guatemalan women sashayed down the runway.Applause, cheers and intermittent flashes from photos were heard throughout the fashion show as women, children and men walked to fast-tempo music while in deep red, woven fabric often displaying...

EU hits Meta with record €1.2B privacy fine

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 12:58:04 GMT

U.S tech giant Meta has been hit with a record €1.2 billion fine for not complying with the EU’s privacy rulebook.The Irish Data Protection Commission announced on Monday that Meta violated the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) when it shuttled troves of personal data of European Facebook users to the United States without sufficiently protecting them from Washington’s data surveillance practices. It’s the largest fine imposed under the bloc’s flagship General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) privacy law and it comes on the eve of the fifth anniversary of the law’s enforcement on May 25. Amazon was previously fined €746 million by Luxembourg and the Irish regulator also imposed four fines against Meta’s platforms Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp ranging between €405 million and €225 million in the past two years.The Irish privacy watchdog said that Meta’s use of a legal instrument known as standard contractual clauses (SCCs) to move data ...

Russian business titans demand 6-day work week to cope with sanctions

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 12:58:04 GMT

A Russian business association has called on the labor ministry to consider moving to a six-day work week so they can better deal with fallout from Western sanctions, Kremlin-controlled media reported Monday.With sanctions straining the Russian economy, “Our financial and economic system is still in need of additional investments,” the Avanti business club said in a letter to the labor minister, Anton Kotyakov, according to Russian outlet Izvestia.Russia has been under international sanctions since 2014 when the Kremlin’s troops invaded Crimea, and Western countries have ratcheted up their sanctions effort since Moscow initiated its full-scale invasion of Ukraine last February.The EU is currently discussing an 11th round of sanctions against Russia, which could include measures targeting countries that continue doing business with Moscow, thus allowing it to bypass the sanctions.Created in 2014, the Avanti entrepreneurs group has members from the business sector bu...

Belgian unions demonstrate in Brussels to demand better worker protection

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 12:58:04 GMT

BRUSSELS (AP) — Belgium’s trade unions are mounting a major demonstration on Monday to protest what they see as increasingly bad working conditions and the erosion of their right to strike. Action by transport workers is paralyzing subway and other traffic in Brussels. The trade unions are irked by companies that seek to impose new contracts on their workers that impact their social rights, affect their working conditions and cut their pay. They are specifically protesting the decision by the Delhaize supermarket chain to change the store management setup, directly cutting into the income and rights of staff. “We don’t want second-class employees. We want respect and equal rights for all,” the socialist ABVV union said in a statement.The unions are also protesting management measures to stifle strike action through court injunctions against the blocking of company premises, among other issues. “The defense of our social and trade union rights is being made impossible,” t...

Iran’s president appoints new official in powerful security post, replacing long time incumbent

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 12:58:04 GMT

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iran’s president on Monday appointed a new official to take over the post of secretary of the country’s Supreme National Security Council, replacing the longtime powerful official Ali Shamkhani. The decree by President Ebrahim Raisi will see Shamkhani replaced after he had been linked to an alleged British-Iranian spy recently executed. However, Shamkhani also had key in negotiations with Gulf Arab states as they sought to de-escalate tensions with Tehran, including being on hand for the announced détente between Iran and Saudi Arabia reached in Saudi Arabia. Shamkhani’s replacement will be Ali Akbar Ahmadian, the former chief of the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard’s strategic center. The decree, reported by the state-run IRNA news agency, offered no explanation for the change. Shamkhani had served in the position for just under a decade. The Associated Press

B.C. company denies misleading First Nation about rail terminal expansion plans

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 12:58:04 GMT

The owner of a rail terminal in British Columbia’s Interior says a lawsuit launched by the Bonaparte First Nation is a “collateral attack” on the company’s “numerous” grants, permits, and licenses to operate the expanding facility.The nation’s claim filed last month alleges the facility operated by Ashcroft Terminal Ltd. has been developed without proper consultation, while unearthing and disturbing human remains on the nation’s ancestral territory.The Bonaparte First Nation alleges it was misled about the full scope of the terminal’s expansion plans, “adamantly” denying ever receiving the full build-out details, the nation’s lawyer Jason Gratl said. In its response filed in British Columbia Supreme Court earlier this month, the company denies misleading Bonaparte, saying it “extensively engaged” the nation over its development plans as well as “archeological issues of concern.” The termi...

Canadian public pension fund investments in China draw heightened scrutiny

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 12:58:04 GMT

MONTREAL — Investments in China by Canada’s largest public pension funds are facing increased scrutiny amid worsening relations between the two countries and allegations that some of those investments are funding the oppression of China’s Uyghur minority. Recently, representatives of the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan and the British Columbia Investment Management Corporation, which manages the pensions of B.C. public sector workers, told a parliamentary committee studying Canada-China relations that they had paused new direct investment in China because of the increasing risks associated with that country. That pause came amid allegations of Chinese foreign interference in the 2019 and 2021 Canadian elections, and of Chinese state actors allegedly harassing Canadians who oppose the Communist Party. Earlier this month, Canada expelled a Chinese consular official, and China retaliated within hours, expelling a Canadian diplomat and saying that Canada had “sabo...

Dignity denied as more than 3,000 schools in South Africa still use pit toilets

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 12:58:04 GMT

GA-MASHASHANE, South Africa (AP) — At a high school in rural northern South Africa, more than 300 students and their teachers share three toilets, and that woefully lopsided figure isn’t the worst problem. The three toilets are pit latrines, effectively 10-feet-deep holes in the ground that students line up during a lunch break to use. The pit toilets at Seipone Secondary School in the village of Ga-Mashashane at least are covered by white toilet seats and enclosed by brick structures. Some of the pit toilets still used at more than 3,300 schools in poor, mostly rural areas across South Africa aren’t.It’s a shameful situation for a country referred to as the most developed in Africa, and an indicator of its profound problems with poverty and inequality, say human rights groups pushing the South African government to do away with the sub-standard facilities in schools forever.Unhygienic, the latrines also present a much more direct danger.The sight that greeted Jame...

Daily horoscope for May 22, 2023

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 12:58:04 GMT

Moon Alert: There are no restrictions to shopping or important decisions today. The Moon is in Cancer.Happy Birthday for Monday, May 22, 2023:You are proactive, confident and upbeat. You are also persuasive when you want to be. This is a year of reflection. Expect to explore belief systems, philosophies and religions in order to find a way for you to get closer to the true meaning of your life.ARIES(March 21-April 19) ★★★The pace of your days will accelerate in the next several weeks with your busy schedule of meetings, errands, appointments, plus taking short trips. You want to talk to everyone, especially neighbors, relatives and siblings. Busy you! Tonight: Play!TAURUS(April 20-May 20) ★★★★Thankfully, Mercury is no longer retrograde, which means things are flowing a bit easier. This is timely, because in the next four weeks, your focus on finances, earnings and cash flow will be stronger than usual. Respect your moneymaking ideas. Tonight: Home improvements.GEMINI(May 21-June 20)...

Pope asks Italian cardinal to carry out Ukraine peace mission

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 12:58:04 GMT

Pope Francis asked Cardinal Matteo Zuppi (pictured) to lead a peace mission in Ukraine to end the conflict, the Vatican announced on Saturday (20 May).Francis spoke first cryptically about his intention to launch a mission last month, when he returned from a visit to Hungary. He did not give any details.Zuppi, according to a Vatican diplomatic source, will try to meet separately both with the Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and Russian president Vladimir Putin.According to the Vatican, Zuppi will carry out his mission in line with the Vatican Secretariat of State. "He is expected to contribute in reducing tensions of conflict in Ukraine in the hope that the Holy Father never gives up on the possibility of peace processes being initiated."On April 30, after returning from a visit to Hungary, Francis made a intriguing statement about the Vatican's involvement in a mission that aimed to end the conflict."There's a mission under way, but it hasn't been made public yet. I will ma...