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Turkish president to meet Putin with aim of reviving the Ukraine grain export deal

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 16:05:14 GMT

The presidents of Russia and Turkey meet on Monday, with Turkish leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan seeking to persuade Russia to revive an agreement that allowed Ukraine to export grain and other commodities from three Black Sea ports despite the war.Russian President Vladimir Putin in July refused to extend the agreement, which was brokered by Turkey and the United Nations a year earlier.Russia complained that a parallel deal promising to remove obstacles to Russian exports of food and fertilizer hadn’t been honored. It said restrictions on shipping and insurance hampered its agricultural trade, even though it has shipped record amounts of wheat since last year.The leaders are to meet in the Black Sea city of Sochi, where the Russian president has a residence, and a lot is riding on the talks for the world food supply.The meeting takes place against a backdrop of more than 18 months of war and Ukraine’s recent counteroffensive.In the lat...

Labor Day 2023: The unions strike back

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 16:05:14 GMT

More than 500 labor actions, including strikes and protests, have occurred in the United States since Jan. 1, including 22 in Massachusetts, according to Cornell University’s School of Industrial and Labor Relations.From the Teamsters’ settlement with UPS to the ongoing screen actors and writers strikes, more than 320,000 workers have participated in in the actions this year, Cornell research showed.David Jacobs, a management professor at American University, said the current negotiating battles will set a precedent for others.“We have kind of an ‘Empire Strikes Back’ situation, in which we’ve seen enormous organizing and hope on the worker side and a battle in the courts that will determine whether a more progressive labor policy is effectuated,” Jacobs told the Herald.An author and expert in the field of labor, Jacobs noted the rising support unions have from Americans since 2010. Gallup research showed 48% of Americans backed labor unions 13 years ago, a number ...

2023 NFL season preview: Super Bowl predictions, division picks and award winners

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 16:05:14 GMT

The Patriots are still the last team to win back-to-back Super Bowls. The Kansas City Chiefs are looking to change that this season.The Chiefs are favored to win Super Bowl LVIII after head coach Andy Reid and quarterback Patrick Mahomes helped to topple the Philadelphia Eagles in Super Bowl LVII last season. They’re expected to face heavy competition from the Eagles, Buffalo Bills, Cincinnati Bengals and San Francisco 49ers this season, according to oddsmakers.It’s not easy to repeat, and no one has done it in nearly 20 years. The Patriots accomplished the feat in 2003 and 2004. Even Bill Belichick and Tom Brady had to take a year off between wins in their second championship run from 2014 to 2018, however.So, who will win it all this season? Can the Patriots sneak into the wild card? Who’s taking home MVP?The Herald’s Patriots beat writers make their NFL predictions.AFC EastCallahan: Buffalo BillsFor all the Jets’ and Dolphins’ offseason splashe...

Lucas: Questions remain on Biden’s disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 16:05:14 GMT

Nikki Haley, should she become president, ought to appoint her husband as her chief military advisor.He could not do any worse than what we have now.He is South Carolina Army National Guard Maj. Michael Haley who is currently deployed with his unit in Africa in support of the U.S. Africa Command. It is Haley’s second deployment, following the first in Afghanistan in 2016.If elected, President Haley could bring him home, make him a general and rely on him to tell her and the American people the truth.That way she and the American people could at least hope for some accountability surrounding President Joe Biden’s deadly, chaotic and embarrassing withdrawal from Afghanistan two years ago.They are certainly not getting it now.  What they are getting, instead is a massive coverup from Biden and the Pentagon.  Their posture is that these things just happen, you see, and nobody is to blame, even as the country observes the second anniversary of that disaster with no answers.Thirteen Ameri...

German Chancellor Scholz tweets picture of himself with black eye patch after jogging accident

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 16:05:14 GMT

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz on Monday tweeted a pirate-style picture of himself with a black eye patch and dark-red bruises on the right side of his face — the result of a jogging accident on the weekend. “Am excited to see the memes,” the chancellor wrote in the caption. To deflect any possible worries about his health, on the photo, which appears to have been taken at the chancellery, Scholz smiled slightly and also wrote: “Thanks for the well wishes, it looks worse than it is!”Scholz fell while jogging on Saturday and sustained bruises to his face, prompting him to cancel some appointments this weekend, the government said.His spokesperson told reporters in Berlin later on Monday that the chancellor was doing well considering the circumstances.“He was in quite a good mood this morning, but still looks a bit battered,” Steffen Hebestreit said adding that the photo was published “so that everyone can get used to how he will look in the next week or two.”On Sunday, the 65-ye...

Biden heads to Philadelphia for a Labor Day parade and is expected to speak about unions’ importance

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 16:05:14 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden, who often says he’s the most pro-union president in history, is heading to Philadelphia on Monday for the annual Tri-State Labor Day Parade. The Democratic president is expected to speak about the importance of unions in the United States and how the economy is recovering from the crippling coronavirus pandemic. Labor Day, a holiday honoring workers, comes as the U.S. has added jobs and more people have begun looking for work, the most since January, all news Biden is eager to highlight as he seeks reelection in 2024. “As we head into Labor Day, we ought to take a step back and take note of the fact that America is now in one of the strongest job-creating periods in our history,” Biden said Friday from the Rose Garden, where he spoke after the news that America’s employers added 187,000 jobs in August, evidence of a slowing but still-resilient labor market despite the high interest rates the Federal Reserve has imposed. Friday...

Francis opens clinic on the first papal visit to Mongolia. He says it’s about charity not conversion

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 16:05:14 GMT

ULAANBAATAR, Mongolia (AP) — Pope Francis wrapped up the first-ever papal visit to Mongolia on Monday by inaugurating a church-run homeless clinic and shelter, insisting that such initiatives aren’t aimed at winning converts but are simply exercises in Christian charity.Francis toured the House of Mercy, a three-story structure housed in an old school, which the local church has opened as an expression of the roots that it has taken in the three decades that the Catholic Church has had an official presence in Mongolia. It was the final event of an historic four-day visit to a region where the Holy See has long sought to make inroads.Several of the foreign-staffed Catholic religious orders in Mongolia run shelters, orphanages and nursing homes to care for a population of 3.3 million where one in three people lives in poverty. But the new clinic for homeless people, people with disabilities and victims of domestic violence is aimed at showing the outreach of the Mongolian Catholic Chu...

Turkey’s president meets Russia’s Putin and aims to revive the wartime Ukraine grain export deal

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 16:05:14 GMT

Talks between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan began on Monday with the Turkish leader seeking to persuade Russia to revive an agreement that allowed Ukraine to export grain and other commodities from three Black Sea ports.Putin in July refused to extend the agreement, which was brokered by Turkey and the United Nations a year earlier. Russia complained that a parallel deal promising to remove obstacles to Russian exports of food and fertilizer hadn’t been honored. It said restrictions on shipping and insurance hampered its agricultural trade even though it has shipped record amounts of wheat since last year.Opening the talks, Putin said he was open to discussing the grain deal, among other issues.The two leaders met in Russia’s Black Sea resort of Sochi, where the Russian president has a residence. A lot is riding on the talks for the world food supply. The meeting takes place against a backdrop of more than 18 months of war and Ukraine...

France’s World Cup preparations disturbed by calls to drop Chalureau in racism controversy

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 16:05:14 GMT

Only days before the Rugby World Cup starts in France, the home team’s preparations for the tournament have been disrupted by calls to remove one of its players because of a historic racism charge.The controversy started over the weekend after injured lock Paul Willemse was replaced in France’s 33-man squad by Bastien Chalureau.Chalureau’s inclusion was immediately questioned by several left-wing French lawmakers, who said they will ask Sports Minister Amélie Oudéa-Castéra to intervene and make sure the player would not be selected because of a sentencing back in 2020 for racially motivated acts of violence.At the time, Chalureau was tried for an assault on two rugby players, Yannick Larguet and Nassim Arif. Although he admitted to the violence, Chalureau denied the racist nature of the attack and has appealed the six-month suspended prison sentence he was handed.“I’ve got all kinds of stories where I’ve been a jerk, that I accept. But racist? Never,” he told L’Equipe newspape...

Malaysian court unexpectedly dismisses dozens of graft charges against deputy prime minister

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2025 16:05:14 GMT

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (AP) — A Malaysian court on Monday dismissed 47 corruption charges against Deputy Prime Minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi after prosecutors unexpectedly dropped the charges at an advanced stage of his trial.Zahid said the High Court approved the prosecutors’ application for a dismissal but refused to grant him a full acquittal, which means he can still be recharged. But he said he was grateful that the “politically motivated accusations against me have ended.”Zahid heads the United Malays National Organization, and his support has been pivotal in helping Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim form a unity government after last November’s general election led to a hung Parliament. Zahid’s dismissal could further hurt the anti-corruption stance of Anwar’s government. Opposition leaders have alleged that Zahid supported Anwar so the charges against him could be dropped. Monday’s court ruling came just weeks after local elections in which the Islamist-Malay nationalis...