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Chinese who reported on COVID to be released after 3 years

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:31:51 GMT

HONG KONG (AP) — Chinese authorities were preparing Sunday to release a man who disappeared three years ago after publicizing videos of overcrowded hospitals and bodies during the COVID-19 outbreak, a relative and another person familiar with his case said.Fang Bin and other members of the public who were dubbed citizen journalists posted details of the pandemic in early 2020 on the internet and social media, embarrassing Chinese officials who faced criticism for failing to control the outbreak. The last video Fang, a seller of traditional Chinese clothing, posted on Twitter was of a piece of paper reading, “All citizens resist, hand power back to the people.”Fang’s case is part of Beijing’s crackdown on criticism of China’s early handling of the pandemic, as the ruling Communist Party seeks to control the narrative of the country. He was scheduled to be released Sunday, according to two people who did not want to be identified for fear of government retribution. One of them s...

Indo-Pacific region wants to sidestep U.S.-China spat: Asian Development Bank head

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:31:51 GMT

OTTAWA — A senior economist whose organization oversees economic-development projects across Asia says Canada’s Indo-Pacific strategy could help the region’s huge infrastructure needs, but risks falling flat if Ottawa tries to wedge countries against China.“It’s great for Canada to develop closer ties with all of the countries in the region,” said Albert Park, chief economist of the Asian Development Bank.“For a lot of leaders in Asia, they don’t want to have to pick sides.”Canada is a founding member of the ADB, which since 1966 has provided loans to businesses from Kazakhstan to Fiji, with much of the financing coming from Japan and the U.S.The bank is known for keeping tabs on each of the region’s economies and recently published a new assessment of macroeconomic trends, along with a forecast of growth and inflation for each country.The ABD expects a boost in growth across the region, and expects inflation to gradually moderat...

Aspen Matis: I was diagnosed with autism at 33. Here is why autism diagnostic tests leave females behind.

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:31:51 GMT

When I was 10, sitting around a picnic table with a bunch of girls from camp, I made a mistake. They were laughing, all making fun of Linda, one of our counselors. Though I didn’t get the jokes, I mimicked their laughter. When Linda walked up to us, I immediately told her what everyone had been saying. I assumed she’d find it funny, too. But she didn’t smile. And the girls became upset and refused to talk to me for the rest of the summer.I didn’t understand what I’d done wrong.Throughout adolescence, I did my best to mirror the social behavior of my most “normal” peers, copying the way they walked and flipped their hair. In the hallways, I avoided eye contact. On sidewalks, I practiced smiling at strangers, and they often smiled back. Still, I felt like an alien impersonating a human.In high school, my social challenges were compounded by increasing academic struggles. When fully focused, I read a page every eight minutes, so I was often up ...

Literary pick for week of April 30

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:31:51 GMT

Wordplay is back in person.Remember that beautiful May day in 2019 when thousands of people gathered in Minneapolis for the Loft Literary Center’s first Wordplay book festival? It was so much fun.The pandemic forced the festival to go virtual in 2020 and 2021, and it paused in 2022 while Arleta Little, the Loft’s executive and artist director, settled into her new position.Now the festival is back live from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. Saturday, July 8, at locations in Minneapolis’ Mill City neighborhood. Wordplay is the largest Minnesota celebration of readers, writers and good books, with this year’s theme being Narrative Power, featuring authors whose books inspire revolution in topics ranging from racial justice and health and wellness to climate change, LGBTQ+ rights, gender equity and equality.There are 35 authors on the program, representing a wide range of genres, backgrounds and perspectives. Among them are award-winning writers like Alexander Chee, Adrian Mate...

Noah Feldman: Can Texas really put the Ten Commandments in public schools?

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:31:51 GMT

Earlier this month, the Texas Senate passed a bill requiring the Ten Commandments to be displayed in every classroom in the Lone Star State. It’s not that surprising in the wake of the Supreme Court’s blockbuster June 2022 decision, Kennedy v. Bremerton, which overturned all existing jurisprudence about the separation of church and state.Before that ruling, the Texas bill would’ve been an obviously unconstitutional establishment of religion, something prohibited by the First Amendment of the Constitution. Now, however, it comes under the disturbing category of “Who knows?”The Texas Senate certainly is trying to establish religion under any ordinary-language use of the term. But because the Supreme Court announced a vague new “history and tradition” test to replace the last 50 years of establishment-clause law, a court could conceivably conclude that mandating the Ten Commandments is just fine — a result that would invite a raft of new ...

‘Forever chemicals’ exacerbate water issues in Lake Elmo, development still on pause

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:31:51 GMT

A well in Cimarron Mobile Home Park was identified last week to contain PFAS, a family of “forever chemicals,” putting more pressure on Lake Elmo’s already strained water-appropriation limits.The city of Lake Elmo is in its fourth year of overpumping its water-appropriation limit, said City Administrator Kristina Handt. As another well is discovered to have PFAS contamination, Handt said the city is hesitant to add more residents to its water supply that is already over its limits and at risk of being fined by the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources to the tune of $40,000 per violation.Under the current permits, Lake Elmo is allowed to pump 260 million gallons of water per year, but Handt said the city reaches that threshold by mid-summer due to its population increasing by 50% since the permit was established in 2014.Lake Elmo is the fastest-growing city in the state, said state Sen. Judy Seeberger, a Democrat who represents the city. At one point, Lake Elmo wante...

Literary calendar for week of April 30

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:31:51 GMT

KRISTIN HANNAH: Bestselling author of “The Nightingale” and “The Four Winds” discusses writing in Friends of the Hennepin Library’s Pen Pals series. 7:30 p.m. Thursday, May 4 and 11 a.m. Friday, May 5 (morning program is sold out). $45-$55. Hopkins Center for the Arts, 1111 Mainstreet, Hopkins. Ticket information: supporthclib.org or call 612-543-8112.LITERARY BRIDGES: Readings by Claire Wahmanholm, Lynette Reini-Grandell, Bryan Thao Worra and Marion Gomez. 2 p.m. Sunday, May 7, Next Chapter Booksellers, 38 S. Snelling Ave., St. Paul.LYNN MILLER: Introduces her short story collection “The Lost Archive,” made up of 22 stories of memories of people searching the archives of their lives. In conversation with Julie Williams, White Bear Lake writer and mixed-media artist whose work includes the award-winning novel-in-poems “Escaping Tornado Season.” 6 p.m. Wednesday, May 3, Next Chapter Booksellers, 38 S. Snelling Ave., St. Paul.EMMA ...

From Afghanistan to downtown St. Paul, a young reporter who fled the Taliban launches news-you-can-use for his people

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:31:51 GMT

It was 2 p.m. on a weekday when the Taliban’s national defense secretary entered the Kabul newspaper office of 8am.media with three armed guards, mincing no words: “If you write anything against us again, we’ll use the gun.”Reporter and editor Hussain Ali Haidari recalled the tension in the room, and the fear in his chest, as his country’s new leadership exerted its influence against his newsroom. It wouldn’t be the last time that the Taliban — whose fundamentalist forces took over Afghanistan’s central government in August 2021 — made an appearance in the halls of the nation’s leading weekly print journal. The then-27-year-old newsman, a former radio reporter and presidential aide, soon realized his time at the paper, and in his country, was over.“Many Afghan journalists were tortured by the Taliban. The Taliban controlled all things,” said Haidari, recalling how the press could publish “nothing against the Taliban, nothin...

Readers and writers: A cozy mystery, the lure of fish, and a tale of a female Viking’s grave

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:31:51 GMT

Murder, fishing, and old Viking bones. Here’s a varied offering of good books for spring reading on the deck (if spring ever comes).Gerry Schmitt (Jean Pieri /(Pioneer Press)“Lemon Curd Killer”: by Laura Childs (Berkley Prime Crime, $28)And the very last thing Nadine was cognizant of before she winked out for good, for all eternity, was being dragged … dragged into a place that was cold and dark and sticky.Theodosia Browning, owner of the Indigo Tea Shop in Charleston, S.C., is catering an event during the old city’s Fashion Week when she steps into the cooler. Since this is Theo, it’s not surprising she finds the body of a woman, face down in a bowl of lemon curd.So begins the 25th installment of this popular cozy series by Minnesotan Gerry Schmitt, writing as Childs. This plot is a little more complicated than previous books in the series, with all kinds of suspects. Nadine, the corpse, is the sister of Theo’s sort-of friend Delaine, owner...

Registration open: Free fishing adventure for kids with special needs

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:31:51 GMT

ALBANY, N.Y. (NEWS10) - C.A.S.T. for Kids invites Capital Region families with special needs children to set sail on a new adventure. Registration is open for participants and volunteers for the Striper Run at Henry Hudson Park in Selkirk on May 7.Link to Register: https://castforkids.org/event/striperrun/?fbclid=IwAR1KEQNNQhGJmLVvzgpWH2KSrgVLllwG03OtJHY5G2xlkIX4Dtlh58oM1TI