charity

UK pandemic hero's daughter slammed by charity probe

  • Moore raised the astonishing sum for UK health service charities by completing 100 lengths of his garden before his 100th birthday in April 2020.
  • The family of a 100-year-old UK war veteran who became a global hero for his fundraising efforts during the Covid pandemic gained "significant" financial benefit from links to a charity set up in his name, a watchdog said Thursday.
  • Moore raised the astonishing sum for UK health service charities by completing 100 lengths of his garden before his 100th birthday in April 2020.
The family of a 100-year-old UK war veteran who became a global hero for his fundraising efforts during the Covid pandemic gained "significant" financial benefit from links to a charity set up in his name, a watchdog said Thursday.
Captain Tom Moore caught the British public's imagination during the Covid-19 lockdown when he took to raising nearly £33 million ($41.7 million) by walking up and down his garden using a walking frame.
Images of the stooped but dapper veteran with his military service medals pinned to his blazer lifted the nation's spirits as it struggled with a mounting death toll and fears about the future.
But in a 30-page report, the Charity Commission said there had been repeated instances of misconduct by Moore's daughter Hannah Ingram-Moore and her husband Colin.
It accused the couple of a misleading implication that they would make sizeable donations from a book deal to the charity.
An advance of around £1.4 million ($1.7 million) was paid to a company of which the Ingram-Moores were directors for a three-book deal, though none of the money went to the foundation, the commission said.
Moore raised the astonishing sum for UK health service charities by completing 100 lengths of his garden before his 100th birthday in April 2020.
Queen Elizabeth II knighted him, making him "Captain Sir Tom", and his death in February 2021 was marked by a nationwide round of applause with Prime Minister Boris Johnson taking part and MPs bowing their heads in parliament.
The commission opened a case into the foundation in 2021, shortly after Moore's death. It launched a formal probe in 2022.
Earlier this year, it also disqualified the Ingram-Moores from being charity trustees.

'Blurring' of interests

In a statement, the Ingram-Moore family rejected the commission's conclusions and said they had been treated "unfairly and unjustly".
They described the process as "excessive" and accused the watchdog of of having a "pre-determined agenda". 
"We remain dedicated to upholding Captain Sir Tom's legacy and want the public to know that there has never been any misappropriation of funds."
David Holdsworth, commission chief executive, said the probe found "repeated instances of a blurring of boundaries between private and charitable interests".
He said this resulted in the couple "receiving significant personal benefit", adding that the failings amounted to "misconduct and/or mismanagement".
The report said it appeared that "Captain Tom himself believed or intended that (his book) 'Tomorrow Will Be A Good Day' would in some way financially support the charity".
"Astonishingly at my age, with the offer to write this memoir I have also been given the chance to raise even more money for the charitable foundation now established in my name," Captain Tom wrote in a prologue.
The report's authors said the inquiry could not see how Moore's words would be "interpreted as anything other" than that proceeds would "flow to the charity".
Literary agent Bev James, however, told the inquiry her understanding was that the Ingram-Moores were "very clear that they did not want the money from the books to go to charity" but that they would make a donation to the foundation.
The report concluded that "the public had a reasonable expectation that the Captain Tom books they purchased... would have financially benefited the charity and... would understandably feel misled given no donation has been made to the charity".
har/phz/js

health

K-drama for mental health? Binge on, one expert says

BY CAT BARTON AND HIEUN SHIN

  • - The idea that a K-drama binge can help with mental health may seem far-fetched, but it chimes with decades-old psychotherapy ideas, one expert said.
  • If you've ever binge-watched an entire season of a K-drama like "Squid Game" or "Crash Landing On You", one Korean-American expert has good news: it's likely improved your mental health.
  • - The idea that a K-drama binge can help with mental health may seem far-fetched, but it chimes with decades-old psychotherapy ideas, one expert said.
If you've ever binge-watched an entire season of a K-drama like "Squid Game" or "Crash Landing On You", one Korean-American expert has good news: it's likely improved your mental health.
High production values, top-notch acting and attractive stars have helped propel South Korean TV shows to the top of global viewership charts, but therapist Jeanie Chang, says there are deeper reasons so many people are hooked.
With soap-like plotlines that tackle everything from earth-shattering grief to the joy of new love, watching K-dramas can help people reconnect with their own emotions or process trauma, she says, giving the shows a healing power that transcends their cultural context.
"We all have family pressures and expectations, conflict, trauma, hope," she said, adding that watching heavy topics being successfully managed on screen can change people's ability to navigate real-world challenges.
For Chang, who was born in Seoul but raised in the United States, K-drama was particularly helpful in allowing her to reconnect with her roots -- which she rejected as a child desperate to assimilate.
But "the messages in Korean dramas are universal," Chang said.
"Mental health is how you're feeling, how you relate to others, psychologically, how your brain has been impacted by things. That's mental health. We see that in a Korean drama."

'Soften my heart'

Global K-drama viewership has exploded in the last few years, industry data shows, with many overseas viewers, especially in major markets like the United States, turning to Korean content during the pandemic. 
Between 2019 and 2022, viewership of Korean television and movies increased six-fold on Netflix, its data showed, and Korean series are now the most watched non-English content on the platform.
American schoolteacher Jeanie Barry discovered K-drama via a family funeral, when a friend recommended a series -- 2020's "It's Okay to Not Be Okay" -- she thought could help her after a difficult time.
"There was something about it, the way that this culture deal with trauma, mental depression, just really struck a chord for me," Barry, who had travelled to South Korea as part of a K-drama tour organised by therapist Chang, told AFP.
"I started to grieve when I had not been. It was a lot of tears during that drama, but it also made me see that there is a light at the end of the tunnel," she said.
Immediately hooked, Barry said she had watched 114 K-dramas since discovering the genre, and effectively given up watching English-language television.
"They let me soften my heart," she said.
Fellow tour member and American Erin McCoy said she had struggled with depression since she was a teenager, but K-drama helped her manage her symptoms.
With depression, "when you live with it that long, you're just numb and so you don't really feel bad necessarily but you don't ever feel good either," she said.
"You just don't feel anything," she said, adding that K-drama allowed her to experience emotions again.
"There're so many highs and lows in every one of them, and as I felt the characters' emotions, it just helped me relate to my own more," she said.
"I feel like I was able to express and experience emotion again." 

 'Art therapy'?

The idea that a K-drama binge can help with mental health may seem far-fetched, but it chimes with decades-old psychotherapy ideas, one expert said.
"Watching Korean dramas can be beneficial for anxiety and depression from the viewpoint of art therapy," Im Su-geun, head of a psychiatry clinic in Seoul, told AFP.
First used in the 1940s, art therapy initially involved patients drawing, but evolved to incorporate other artistic activities.
"Visual media like Korean dramas have significant strengths that align well with psychotherapy," he said. 
K-drama -- or television and cinema generally -- can help viewers "gain insights into situations from a new perspective, fostering healthy values and providing solutions to their issues," he said.
It is unlikely to be prescribed by a doctor, he said, but if a therapist were to recommend a specific drama that related to the patient's case, it could be helpful.
For example, it can provide a roadmap for patients "facing specific situations, such as breakups or loss," he said.
ceb-hs/sn/cwl

tourism

Screen to reality: South Korea targets K-pop, K-drama tourism boom

BY HIEUN SHIN AND CAT BARTON

  • Preserved from the set of popular 2018 historical series "Mr Sunshine", the location in Nonsan, 170 kilometres (106 miles) from Seoul, is replete with painstaking replicas of everything from a turn-of-the-century tram to South Korea's most famous Buddhist bell.
  • Deep in South Korea's hinterlands lies a perfect replica of 1900s Seoul: welcome to Sunshine Land, the latest K-drama theme park to cash in on booming K-culture tourism.
  • Preserved from the set of popular 2018 historical series "Mr Sunshine", the location in Nonsan, 170 kilometres (106 miles) from Seoul, is replete with painstaking replicas of everything from a turn-of-the-century tram to South Korea's most famous Buddhist bell.
Deep in South Korea's hinterlands lies a perfect replica of 1900s Seoul: welcome to Sunshine Land, the latest K-drama theme park to cash in on booming K-culture tourism.
Fans of K-pop mega group BTS have long flocked to the South to see sites associated with the boy band, from the dorms where they slept as trainees to recent music video shoot locations.
But as the popularity of South Korean drama has soared overseas -- it is the most-viewed non-English content on Netflix, the platform's data shows -- more and more tourists are planning trips around their favourite shows.
The idea that foreign tourists would pay good money and drive hundreds of miles out of the capital Seoul to see a K-drama set seemed "crazy" to tour guide Sophy Yoon -- until she saw one of her guests break down in tears at Sunshine Land.
"At that moment, it hit me: For me, it was just a studio, but for them, it was something much more," she said.
Preserved from the set of popular 2018 historical series "Mr Sunshine", the location in Nonsan, 170 kilometres (106 miles) from Seoul, is replete with painstaking replicas of everything from a turn-of-the-century tram to South Korea's most famous Buddhist bell.
"It's like when we go to the Spanish steps in Rome where Audrey Hepburn had ice cream," Yoon said, referring to the 1953 classic movie "Roman Holiday".
For South Korea's growing number of K-drama tourists, "every door, every wall has a meaning from a drama that impacted their lives".
"I get a lot more requests for specific 'K-drama tours' now," she said.

'Felt right'

The rise of South Korea as a global cultural powerhouse "has contributed to the appeal of Korean tourism," said Kwak Jae-yeon, the Hallyu content team director at the Korea Tourism Organization (KTO).
South Korea welcomed 1.4 million tourists in September, up 33 percent year-on-year and the highest since the pandemic, with more than a third saying they had decided to come "after being exposed to Korean Wave content", according to a 2023 KTO poll.
In Seoul's central Jongno district, tourists like Sookariyapa Kakij are typical. Wearing a hanbok, traditional Korean dress, the 40-year-old had travelled from Thailand specifically to see where her favourite dramas were filmed. 
"I want to find locations where 'Itaewon Class' was shot," she told AFP, referring to the popular 2020 drama, filmed largely on location in its namesake district of Seoul.
Jennifer Zelinski told AFP she had never left the United States before, but after she discovered K-drama -- through the 2019 series "Crash Landing on You" -- while stuck at home during the pandemic, she decided to visit South Korea.
"I binged the whole show in a week. I barely slept and went through two whole boxes of tissues," she said. 
This "snowballed" into her watching more and more K-drama, Korean variety shows and listening to K-pop, she said, until finally she "felt like I really wanted to see it in person".
"My family and friends were shocked when I said I was travelling to Korea and on my own," said Zelinski, but for her "it just felt right."

Beyond Seoul

The travel industry is racing to catch up: one South Korean tour company on the travel platform Klook said interest in its BTS day tour has "skyrocketed" recently, and they were "completely booked until next February." 
"We are planning to add additional tours for other K-pop idol groups, including Seventeen and NCT 127," they said.
But most of this new type of tourism is concentrated in Seoul, Jeong Ji-youn, a Kyungpook National University professor, told AFP.
Tourism in rural areas has tended to focus on more traditional Korean experiences, which is not interesting to younger travellers eager to explore the land of K-pop and K-drama.
"There is a need to develop more tourism resources related to contemporary culture that allow people to experience hallyu outside of Seoul," she said.
The port city of Pohang is better known for shipbuilding and steel plants than tourism, but Emma Brown, 30, from Scotland, travelled more than 8,800 kilometres (5,468 miles) to see it because of "When the Camellia Blooms".
The 2019 romance series "changed my life", she told AFP, adding that she felt she "had to feel the drama in person."
"I just couldn't miss the opportunity to visit Pohang when I was already in South Korea," she added.
hs/ceb/sn/lb

bees

Bees help tackle elephant-human conflict in Kenya

BY ROSE TROUP BUCHANAN

  • It is also expensive -- about 150,000 Kenyan shillings ($1,100) to install hives -- well beyond the means of subsistence farmers, though the project organisers say it is still cheaper than electric fences.
  • "We used to hate elephants a lot," Kenyan farmer Charity Mwangome says, pausing from her work under the shade of a baobab tree.
  • It is also expensive -- about 150,000 Kenyan shillings ($1,100) to install hives -- well beyond the means of subsistence farmers, though the project organisers say it is still cheaper than electric fences.
"We used to hate elephants a lot," Kenyan farmer Charity Mwangome says, pausing from her work under the shade of a baobab tree.
The bees humming in the background are part of the reason why her hatred has dimmed.
The diminutive 58-year-old said rapacious elephants would often destroy months of work in her farmland that sits between two parts of Kenya's world-renowned Tsavo National Park.
Beloved by tourists -- who contribute around 10 percent of Kenya's GDP -- the animals are loathed by most local farmers, who form the backbone of the nation's economy.
Elephant conservation has been a roaring success: numbers in Tsavo rose from around 6,000 in the mid-1990s to almost 15,000 elephants in 2021, according to the Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS).
But the human population also expanded, encroaching on grazing and migration routes for the herds.
Resulting clashes are becoming the number one cause of elephant deaths, says KWS.
Refused compensation when she lost her crops, Mwangome admits she was mad with the conservationists. 
But a long-running project by conservation organisation Save the Elephants offered her an unlikely solution -- deterring some of nature's biggest animals with some of its smallest: African honeybees.
Cheery yellow beehive fences now protect several local plots, including Mwangome's. 
A nine-year study published last month found that elephants avoided farms with the ferocious bees 86 percent of the time during peak crop season.
"The beehive fences came to our rescue," said Mwangome.

Hacking nature

The deep humming of 70,000 bees is enough to make many flee, including a six-tonne elephant, but Loise Kawira calmly removes a tray in her apiary to demonstrate the intricate combs of wax and honey.
Kawira, who joined Save the Elephants in 2021 as their consultant beekeeper, trains and monitors farmers in the delicate art.
The project supports 49 farmers, whose plots are surrounded by 15 connected hives. 
Each is strung on greased wire a few metres off the ground, which protects them from badgers and insects, but also means they shake when disturbed by a hungry elephant. 
"Once the elephants hear the sound of the bees and the smell, they run away," Kawira told AFP.
"It hacks the interaction between elephants and bees," added Ewan Brennan, local project coordinator. 
It has been effective, but recent droughts, exacerbated by climate change, have raised challenges.
"(In) the total heat, the dryness, bees have absconded," said Kawira.
It is also expensive -- about 150,000 Kenyan shillings ($1,100) to install hives -- well beyond the means of subsistence farmers, though the project organisers say it is still cheaper than electric fences.

'I was going to die'

Just moments after AFP arrived at Mwanajuma Kibula's farm, which abuts one of the Tsavo parks, her beehive fence had seen off an elephant.
The five-tonne animal, its skin caked in red mud, rumbled into the area and then did an abrupt about-face. 
"I know my crops are protected," Kibula said with palpable relief.
Kibula, 48, also harvests honey twice a year from her hives, making 450 shillings per jar -- enough to pay school fees for her children.
She is fortunate to have protection from the biggest land mammals on Earth.
"An elephant ripped off my roof, I had to hide under the bed because I knew I was going to die," said a less-fortunate neighbour, Hendrita Mwalada, 67.
For those who can't afford bees, Save the Elephants offers other solutions, such as metal-sheet fences that clatter when shaken by approaching elephants, and diesel- or chilli-soaked rags that deter them. 
It is not always enough. 
"I have tried planting but every time the crops are ready, the elephants come and destroy the crops," Mwalada told AFP.
"That has been the story of my life, a life full of too much struggling."
ra-rbu/er/kjm

Global Edition

Australian eyes $30m fine for social media flouting under-16s ban

BY LAURA CHUNG

  • Failing to do so would mean fines of up to Aus$50 million (US$32.5 million).
  • Social media companies could be fined more than US$30 million if they fail to keep children off their platforms, under new laws tabled before Australia's parliament Thursday. 
  • Failing to do so would mean fines of up to Aus$50 million (US$32.5 million).
Social media companies could be fined more than US$30 million if they fail to keep children off their platforms, under new laws tabled before Australia's parliament Thursday. 
The legislation would force social media firms to take steps to prevent those under 16 years of age from accessing platforms such as X, TikTok, Facebook and Instagram.
Failing to do so would mean fines of up to Aus$50 million (US$32.5 million).
Australia is among the vanguard of nations trying to clean up social media, and the proposed age limit would be among the world's strictest measures aimed at children. 
Details about how social media companies are expected to enforce the ban remain unclear. 
The proposed laws would also include robust privacy provisions that require tech platforms to delete any age-verification information collected. 
Minister for Communications Michelle Rowland said Thursday that social media companies had a responsibility for the "safety and mental health" of Australians.  
"The legislation places the onus on social media platforms, not parents or children, to ensure protections are in place," she said. 
Some companies will be granted exemptions from the ban, such as YouTube, which teenagers may need to use for school work or other reasons. 
Rowland said that messaging services -- such as WhatsApp -- and online gaming would also be exempt.
Once celebrated as a means of staying connected and informed, social media platforms have been tarnished by cyberbullying, the spread of illegal content, and election-meddling claims. 
If the proposed law passes, tech platforms would be given a one-year grace period to figure out how to implement and enforce the ban. 
Social media companies have said they will adhere to new legislation but have cautioned the government against acting too quickly and without adequate consultation.
Analysts have also expressed doubt it would be technically feasible to enforce a strict age ban. 
Katie Maskiell from UNICEF Australia said Thursday the proposed legislation would not be a "solve-all" for protecting children and much more needed to be done. 
She added the laws risked pushing young people onto "covert and unregulated online spaces".
Several other countries have been tightening children's access to social media platforms.
Spain passed a law in June banning social media access to under-16s.
And in the US state of Florida, children under 14 will be banned from opening social media accounts under a new law due to come into force in January.
In both cases, the age verification method has yet to be determined.
lec/arb/cwl

rights

US House speaker backs bathroom ban for first openly trans member

  • Earlier this week, Representative Nancy Mace, an ally of President-elect Donald Trump, introduced a resolution that would ban transgender women from using female restrooms in the Capitol.
  • The Republican speaker of the US House of Representatives voiced support Wednesday for banning a newly elected transgender woman from using women's restrooms in the legislature.
  • Earlier this week, Representative Nancy Mace, an ally of President-elect Donald Trump, introduced a resolution that would ban transgender women from using female restrooms in the Capitol.
The Republican speaker of the US House of Representatives voiced support Wednesday for banning a newly elected transgender woman from using women's restrooms in the legislature.
"All single-sex facilities in the Capitol and House Office Buildings -- such as restrooms, changing rooms and locker rooms -- are reserved for individuals of that biological sex," Speaker Mike Johnson said in a statement.
Johnson's remarks come after Democrat Sarah McBride's election as the first openly transgender member of Congress this month. 
She has received a cold welcome from her Republican colleagues, who retained control of the lower chamber in the November election.
Earlier this week, Representative Nancy Mace, an ally of President-elect Donald Trump, introduced a resolution that would ban transgender women from using female restrooms in the Capitol.
The fiery South Carolina congresswoman said "biological men do not belong in private women's spaces. Period. Full stop. End of story," in a post on X.
On Wednesday, Mace doubled down, introducing legislation that would apply the rule to all federal property.
Transgender rights are a hot-button issue in the United States -- with the participation of trans people in competitive sports and the subject of access to gender-affirming care for minors triggering fiery debate.
Democrats and LGBTQ advocates largely denounced Mace's effort, categorizing it as an attack on the dignity of trans people.

McBride to comply

Wednesday was also Transgender Day of Remembrance, held each year on November 20 to honor transgender people murdered on account of their gender identity.
"Too many transgender Americans, including young people, are cruelly targeted and face harassment simply for being themselves," outgoing US President Joe Biden said in a statement, which did not mention the controversy on Capitol Hill.
McBride, who takes office in January, said Wednesday she would comply with the rules set out by Johnson, "even if I disagree with them."
"Each of us were sent here because voters saw something in us that they value," she said on social media. 
"I look forward to seeing those qualities in every member come January. I hope all my colleagues will seek to do the same with me."
Asked earlier this week about Mace's original proposal, Johnson had initially deflected, telling reporters: "This is an issue that Congress has never had to address before, and we're going to do that in deliberate fashion with member consensus."
Johnson suggested in his Wednesday statement that McBride would be limited to using the Capitol's unisex bathrooms or the bathroom in her office.
cjc/nro/des

music

One Direction stars attend Liam Payne's funeral in UK

BY AKSHATA KAPOOR

  • He died from "multiple traumas" and "internal and external haemorrhaging" after the fall from the hotel room, a post-mortem examination found.
  • Family and friends of One Direction star Liam Payne, who died last month after falling from a Buenos Aires hotel room, gathered for his funeral in Britain on Wednesday.
  • He died from "multiple traumas" and "internal and external haemorrhaging" after the fall from the hotel room, a post-mortem examination found.
Family and friends of One Direction star Liam Payne, who died last month after falling from a Buenos Aires hotel room, gathered for his funeral in Britain on Wednesday.
Payne's former bandmates Harry Styles, Niall Horan, Zayn Malik and Louis Tomlinson were among the dozens of mourners at the private service at St Mary's Church in Amersham, Buckinghamshire, just outside London. 
Payne's tearful parents were joined by his two sisters, his girlfriend Kate Cassidy and former partner Cheryl Tweedy, with whom he has a son.
Around a dozen fans watched from behind a nearby cordon as guests hugged each other before walking past floral tributes into the 12th-century church to pay their final respects.
"Because his death was such a public death, to have the funeral in a private way... I think it was very nice," said onlooker Sheila Morris, a 65-year-old from Amersham. 
"It's a beautiful church... it's a very beautiful place for a funeral," she said.
Payne's coffin arrived in a white horse-drawn hearse topped with floral tributes spelling the words "Son" and "Daddy", followed by his parents.
Payne was found dead on October 16 after falling from the balcony of his third-floor room at the Casa Sur Hotel in the Argentinian capital.
His death, at 31, prompted a global outpouring of grief from family, former bandmates and fans, with thousands gathering in cities around the world to offer condolences.

'Completely devastated'

Payne shot to stardom as a teenager alongside Styles, Horan, Tomlinson and Malik after their appearance on the UK talent show "The X Factor" 14 years ago.
He died from "multiple traumas" and "internal and external haemorrhaging" after the fall from the hotel room, a post-mortem examination found.
The balcony attached to his room overlooked a rear patio that was about 14 meters (45 feet) high. 
Hotel staff had called emergency services twice to report a guest "overwhelmed by drugs and alcohol" who was "destroying" a hotel room.
Investigators have said he was alone at the time and appeared to have been "going through an episode of substance abuse".
In a short statement following his death, Payne's family said: "We are heartbroken. Liam will forever live in our hearts and we'll remember him for his kind, funny and brave soul."
One Direction said they had been "completely devastated" by his death.
After forming in 2010, the band went on to release an album of radio-ready songs each year in time for the holiday shopping season and became one of the highest-grossing live acts in the world.
In 2016, after Malik left, the group said it was on an indefinite hiatus but not splitting up.
Payne's first solo single "Strip That Down" peaked at number three on the UK charts and number 10 on the US Billboard top songs list.
But in recent years he had spoken publicly about struggles with substance abuse and coping with fame from an early age.
His last solo work, the single "Teardrops", was released in March, with a second album announced at the time.
Payne was born and raised in Wolverhampton, central England.
aks-pdh/jwp/js

WHO

New WHO financing mechanism put to the test

BY AGNèS PEDRERO

  • Regardless of political shifts in Washington, Thornton stressed that the WHO was intent on seeing the "very important" partnership with the United States continue.
  • The WHO announced late Tuesday that it had raised nearly $4 billion through a new financing mechanism, aimed at securing predictable funding, as shifting political winds threaten cuts from Washington.
  • Regardless of political shifts in Washington, Thornton stressed that the WHO was intent on seeing the "very important" partnership with the United States continue.
The WHO announced late Tuesday that it had raised nearly $4 billion through a new financing mechanism, aimed at securing predictable funding, as shifting political winds threaten cuts from Washington.
The announcement, made on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Rio de Janeiro, came as the stakes have risen substantially for the World Health Organization since Donald Trump won the US presidential election earlier this month.
During his first term in office, from 2017 to 2021, the Republican relentlessly attacked the UN health agency, over its handling of the Covid pandemic especially. It began withdrawing his country -- traditionally the WHO's top donor -- from the organisation.
Although President Joe Biden renewed ties with the agency, there are fears that Trump might slam the door shut again.
The Geneva-based organisation said that pledges from Australia, Indonesia and Spain at the G20 summit, combined with earlier donations and pledges, had yielded $3.8 billion in funding for the next four years -- more than half of the funding gap it needs to fill through 2028. 
Here is an overview of how WHO funding works and what the new mechanism set up in May aims to achieve:

Imbalances

When the WHO was created in 1948, it received all of its funding through so-called assessed contributions, or the membership fees that each member state pays, based on the size of their economies.
"That money was predictable, because you know what you're going to get each year," Daniel Thornton, head of the WHO's Coordinated Resource Mobilisation unit, told AFP. Those funds could also be used flexibly, in line with the organisation's strategy, he added.
However, over the years, the WHO became increasingly reliant on voluntary contributions.
In 2022-2023, membership fees covered just 13 percent of the agency's budget, the remainder covered by voluntary contributions.
Such funds are far less predictable and are typically earmarked for specific projects, giving the Geneva-based organisation little flexibility over how they are used.
This funding imbalance has meant that "generally, communicable diseases are better funded than non-communicable, (even though) the disease burden is much heavier on non-communicable diseases", Thornton said.

Investment round

At the height of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020, the UN health agency created the WHO Foundation to marshal new resources from business and philanthropists.
Two years later, member states agreed to immediately increase the portion of the WHO's biannual budget covered by membership fees to 20 percent, and to gradually raise it further to 50 percent by 2030-31.
The organisation also launched last May a new investment round aimed at securing as much funding as possible up front for its core activities over the next four years (2025-28).
The WHO is not asking for more funds, but "is moving from a process where we get a continuous stream of income to one where we ... want the four years' funding up front", Thornton said. 

$7.1 billion

The WHO estimates it will need $11.1 billion over the coming four years.
The agency expects to secure more than a third of that, some $4 billion, thanks in part to expected membership fee hikes.
That has left it seeking to raise $7.1 billion to close the gap, as it solicits both public and private donors including foundations.
With the latest pledges, it has now covered 53 percent of that amount.
Since the start of the investment round in May, the agency has attracted dozens of new donors, including over a dozen in African nations.
Regardless of political shifts in Washington, Thornton stressed that the WHO was intent on seeing the "very important" partnership with the United States continue.
"That is our priority," he said, stressing that another major concern was to ensure "we've got a broad donor base".
apo/nl/rjm/jj

politics

N. Korea's latest weapon? Bombarding South with noise

BY CLAIRE LEE

  • We just don't know." - '70s horror flick' - The noise tormenting Ganghwa island residents appeared to be a rudimentary mix of clips from a sound library, typically common at any TV or radio broadcasters, audio experts told AFP.  The sound effects are "like something found in a South Korean horror film in the 70s and 80s," said sound engineer Hwang Kwon-ik.
  • Gunshots, screams, eerie laughter: South Korea's border island Ganghwa is being bombarded nightly with blood-curdling sounds, part of a new campaign by the nuclear-armed North that is driving residents to despair.
  • We just don't know." - '70s horror flick' - The noise tormenting Ganghwa island residents appeared to be a rudimentary mix of clips from a sound library, typically common at any TV or radio broadcasters, audio experts told AFP.  The sound effects are "like something found in a South Korean horror film in the 70s and 80s," said sound engineer Hwang Kwon-ik.
Gunshots, screams, eerie laughter: South Korea's border island Ganghwa is being bombarded nightly with blood-curdling sounds, part of a new campaign by the nuclear-armed North that is driving residents to despair.
Before it started, 56-year-old Kim Yun-suk fell asleep to the hum of insects and woke to the chirping of birds. Now, she is kept awake every night by what sounds like the soundtrack of a low-budget horror movie at top volume.
"The peaceful sounds of nature... have now been drowned out," Kim told AFP.
"All we hear is this noise."
The campaign is the latest manifestation of steadily-declining ties between the two Koreas this year, which have also seen Pyongyang test ever more powerful missiles and bombard the South with trash-carrying balloons.
Since July, North Korea has been broadcasting the noises for huge chunks of almost every day from loudspeakers along the border.
The northern point of Ganghwa -- an island in the Han river estuary on the Yellow Sea -- is only about two kilometres (a mile) from the North.
When AFP visited, the nighttime broadcast included what sounded like the screams of people dying on the battlefield, the crack of gunfire, bombs exploding, along with chilling music that started at 11:00 pm.
In the almost pitch-black fields, sinister noises echoed as the stars in the clear night sky shone beautifully alongside the coastal road lights, creating a stark and unsettling contrast.
North Korea has done propaganda broadcasts before, said 66-year-old villager Ahn Hyo-cheol, but they used to focus on criticising the South's leaders, or idealising the North.
Now "there were sounds like a wolf howling, and ghostly sounds", he said. 
"It feels unpleasant and gives me chills. It really feels bizarre."
Ganghwa county councillor Park Heung-yeol said that the new broadcasts were "not just regime propaganda -- it's genuinely intended to torment people".
- Torture - 
Experts said the new broadcasts almost meet the criteria for a torture campaign.
"Almost every regime has used noise torture and sleep deprivation," Rory Cox, a historian at University of St Andrews, told AFP.
"It is very common and leaves no physical scarring, therefore making it deniable."
Exposure to noise levels above 60 decibels at night increases the risk of sleep disorders, experts said, but AFP tracked levels of up to 80 decibels late at night on Ganghwa during a recent trip.
"I find myself taking headache medicine almost all the time," An Mi-hee, 37, told AFP, adding that prolonged sleep deprivation due to the noise has also led to anxiety, eye pain, facial tremors and drowsiness.
"Our kids can't sleep either, so they've developed mouth sores and are dozing off at school."
Distraught and desperate, An travelled to Seoul and got on her knees to beg lawmakers at the National Assembly to find a solution, breaking down in tears as she described the island's suffering. 
"It would actually be better if there were a flood, a fire, or even an earthquake, because those events have a clear recovery timeline," An said.
"We have no idea if this will go on until the person in North Korea who gives the orders dies, or if it could be cut off at any moment. We just don't know."

'70s horror flick'

The noise tormenting Ganghwa island residents appeared to be a rudimentary mix of clips from a sound library, typically common at any TV or radio broadcasters, audio experts told AFP. 
The sound effects are "like something found in a South Korean horror film in the 70s and 80s," said sound engineer Hwang Kwon-ik.
The two Koreas remain technically at war since the 1950 to 1953 conflict ended in an armistice not a peace treaty.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un this year declared Seoul his "principal enemy" and has ramped up weapons testing and built closer military ties with Russia.
The isolated and impoverished North is known to be extremely sensitive about its citizens gaining access to South Korean pop culture. 
Some experts have suggested the latest broadcasts could be aimed at preventing North Korean soldiers from hearing the South's own propaganda broadcasts, which typically feature K-pop songs and international news.
In August, just weeks after South Korea resumed K-pop broadcasts in response to Pyongyang floating trash-carrying balloons south, a North Korean soldier defected by crossing the heavily fortified border on foot.
But Lee Su-yong, an audio production professor at the Dong-Ah Institute of Media and Arts, said "if there is sound coming towards the North that you want to mask, then the sound (you use to cover it) must also be directed toward the North."
"It seems less about masking noise and more about inflicting pain on people in the South," he told AFP.
Choi Hyoung-chan, a 60-year-old resident, said the South Korean government had failed to protect vulnerable civilians on the frontier.
"They should come here and try to live with these sounds for just ten days," he told AFP, referring to officials in Seoul.
"I doubt they could even endure a single day."
cdl/ceb/djw/tym

Palestinians

'They killed her dream': Israel strike leaves woman footballer in coma

BY DYLAN COLLINS WITH JOSEPH ABI CHAHINE

  • Now she is in a medically induced coma, team manager Ziad Saade said.
  • Lebanese footballer Celine Haidar was about to make her dream of playing for the national women's team come true, but debris from an Israeli strike left the 19-year-old in a medically induced coma.
  • Now she is in a medically induced coma, team manager Ziad Saade said.
Lebanese footballer Celine Haidar was about to make her dream of playing for the national women's team come true, but debris from an Israeli strike left the 19-year-old in a medically induced coma.
After full-blown war erupted in September, Haidar's family were among more than a million people who fled south Beirut and other Hezbollah strongholds, as Israeli bombs rained down.
"But Celine had to come back to (south) Beirut for her studies and training," her father Abbas Haidar told AFP.
"She would leave the house after evacuation calls were issued or bombing intensified, then she'd come back home at night to sleep," he said.
Now, she is the latest athlete to become a casualty of Israeli strikes, which already forced the Lebanese Football Association to postpone all domestic football competitions indefinitely.
On Saturday, her father called her to warn of new evacuation orders published by the Israeli military online and she left the house.
But soon after, "my wife called to tell me Celine was in the hospital," he said.
She had been seriously wounded in an Israeli strike on her home neighbourhood of Shiyah, as the air force pummelled Beirut's southern suburbs.

Cracked skull

Footage of Haidar lying unconscious on the ground, her face covered in blood, while a young man beside her cried in pain took Lebanese social media by storm.
"The strike was close and she was hit in the head," her mother Sanaa Shahrour told AFP. "My daughter has a brain haemorrhage, her skull is cracked."
She said her daughter had sent her a message asking her to prepare her favourite dish, but "an hour later her friend called to say she had been wounded".
"My daughter is a heroine," she said, her eyes red with tears.
"She's strong. She will get back up and play again," she said.
"She dreamt of competing abroad. She said she wanted to be like (Cristiano) Ronaldo and (Lionel) Messi... She wanted to be a star and for everyone to talk about her.
"Now everyone is talking about her because she was wounded in a war that she has nothing to do with," she said.
"She has beautiful dreams," she said, but "they killed her dream." 

'A fighter' on the pitch

Haidar was a pillar of her club, Beirut Football Academy (BFA), which won the Lebanese Women's Football League last season without dropping a single point, and was due to don the captain's armband this season.
The midfielder was also part of the national women's Under-18 team that won the 2022 West Asian Football Federation championship.
Now she is in a medically induced coma, team manager Ziad Saade said.
"The doctors are following her very closely," her father told AFP from the Saint George Hospital in Beirut where his daughter is being treated.
"But her injuries are serious, we hope she will gradually heal," he said with tears in his eyes.
"We're paying the price for something that's not our fault."
Lebanese authorities say more than 3,544 people have been killed since Hezbollah began trading fire with Israel in October last year, with most deaths recorded since Israel stepped up its campaign in September.
"On the pitch, she's a fighter, she was the link between defence and attack," coach Samer Barbary said, as he and teammates visited her at the hospital. 
"She is an exceptional girl and an excellent player."
dco-jac/tgg/aya/lg/dcp

conflict

'An inauspicious day': the landmines ruining Myanmar lives

  • She had urged her husband to stay home because the traditional Burmese calendar, which is guided by lunar cycles, planetary alignment and other factors, marked it out as inauspicious.
  • It was an unlucky day in the Burmese calendar, farmer Yar Swe Kyin warned her husband in July, begging him not to go out to check on their crops.
  • She had urged her husband to stay home because the traditional Burmese calendar, which is guided by lunar cycles, planetary alignment and other factors, marked it out as inauspicious.
It was an unlucky day in the Burmese calendar, farmer Yar Swe Kyin warned her husband in July, begging him not to go out to check on their crops.
Hours later he was dead, killed by one of the countless landmines laid by both sides in Myanmar's three brutal years of civil war.
In the evening, "I heard an explosion from the field," she told AFP at her home in the hills of northern Shan state.
"I knew he had gone to that area and I was worried."
She had urged her husband to stay home because the traditional Burmese calendar, which is guided by lunar cycles, planetary alignment and other factors, marked it out as inauspicious.
"He didn't listen to me," she said.
"Now, I only have a son and grandchild left."
Decades of sporadic conflict between the military and ethnic rebel groups have left Myanmar littered with deadly landmines.
That conflict has been turbocharged by the junta's 2021 coup, which birthed dozens of newer "People's Defence Forces" now battling to topple the military.
Landmines and other remnants of war claimed more victims in Myanmar than in any other country last year, according to the International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL), with the Southeast Asian country overtaking war-ravaged Syria and Ukraine.

'Trees were spinning'

At least 228 people -- more than four a week -- were killed by the devices and 770 more were wounded in Myanmar in 2023, it said in its latest report Wednesday.
In eastern Kayah state, a short journey to collect rice to feed his wife and children left farmer Hla Han crippled by a landmine, unable to work and fearing for his family's future.
He had returned home after junta troops had moved out from his village and stepped on a mine placed near the entrance to the local church.
"When I woke up I didn't know how I had fallen down and only got my senses back about a minute later," he told AFP.
"When I looked up, the sky and trees were spinning."
Now an amputee, the 52-year-old worries how to support his family of six who are already living precariously amidst Myanmar's civil war.
"After I lost my leg to the land mine, I can't work anymore. I only eat and sleep and sometimes visit friends -- that's all I can do," he said.
"My body is not the same anymore, my thoughts are not the same and I can't do anything I want to... I can eat like others, but I can't work like them."
His daughter Aye Mar said she had begged him not to go back into the village.
"When my father lost his leg, all of our family's hopes were gone," she said.
"I also don't have a job and I can't support him financially. I also feel I'm an irresponsible daughter."

'Nothing is the same'

Myanmar is not a signatory to the United Nations convention that prohibits the use, stockpiling or development of anti-personnel mines.
The ICBL campaign group said there had been a "significant increase" in anti-personnel mine use by the military in recent years, including around infrastructure such as mobile phone towers and energy pipelines.
The church in Kayah state where Hla Han lost his leg is still standing but its facade is studded with bullet wounds.
A green tape runs alongside a nearby rural road, a rudimentary warning that the forest beyond it  may be contaminated. 
Some villagers had returned to their homes after the latest wave of fighting had moved on, said Aye Mar.
"But I don't dare to go and live in my house right now."
She and her father are just two of the more than three million people the United Nations says have been forced from their homes by fighting since the coup.
"Sometimes I think that it would have been better if one side gave up in the early stage of the war," she said.
But an end to the conflict looks far off, leaving Hla Han trying to come to terms with his fateful step.
"From that instant you are disabled and nothing is the same as before."
str-lpk-rma/slb/djw

sex

Japanese, Koreans bottom of global love life survey

  • The same Ipsos poll also showed that South Koreans feel the least contentment from their "relationships with partners and spouses", with Japanese faring the second worst. 
  • Japanese people are the least satisfied with their sex and romantic lives, closely followed by South Koreans, a global survey by a French research firm showed. 
  • The same Ipsos poll also showed that South Koreans feel the least contentment from their "relationships with partners and spouses", with Japanese faring the second worst. 
Japanese people are the least satisfied with their sex and romantic lives, closely followed by South Koreans, a global survey by a French research firm showed. 
The two Asian rivals are grappling with a similar demographic crisis with their chronically -- and dangerously, as authorities warn -- low birth rates.
The poll of 31 countries, conducted by Paris-headquartered Ipsos, showed this week that just 37 percent of Japanese respondents derive satisfaction from sex and romance, versus the 76 percent of top-ranked Indians and Mexicans. 
Similarly displeased are South Koreans, whose sexual satisfaction was the second worst at 45 percent. 
In June, Japan's health ministry described the nation's birth rate as "critical" as it stood at 1.20 last year, hitting a record low for the eighth straight year. 
But Japan's rate is still above that of neighbour South Korea, which has the world's lowest at 0.72.
The same Ipsos poll also showed that South Koreans feel the least contentment from their "relationships with partners and spouses", with Japanese faring the second worst. 
Asked how much they "feel loved" in life, 51 percent of Japanese said so, again the worst of all, slightly outranked by South Koreans and Italians at 63 percent. 
The discontentment is partly the result of "the personality of Japanese people who aren't good at articulating their emotions and attitudes when it comes to romance", Ipsos said.  
Among efforts to boost Japan's plunging birth rates is a dating app launched earlier this year by authorities in the capital Tokyo. 
Users are required to submit documentation proving they are legally single and sign a letter stating they are willing to get married.
tmo/stu/sn

landmine

Myanmar led world in landmine victims in 2023: monitor

  • Anti-personnel mines and explosive remnants of war killed or wounded 1,003 people in Myanmar in 2023, the International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL) said on Wednesday. 
  • Landmines and unexploded munitions claimed more victims in Myanmar than in any other country last year, a monitor said on Wednesday, with over 1,000 people killed or wounded in the country.
  • Anti-personnel mines and explosive remnants of war killed or wounded 1,003 people in Myanmar in 2023, the International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL) said on Wednesday. 
Landmines and unexploded munitions claimed more victims in Myanmar than in any other country last year, a monitor said on Wednesday, with over 1,000 people killed or wounded in the country.
Decades of sporadic conflict between the military and ethnic rebel groups have left the Southeast Asian country littered with deadly landmines and munitions.
But the military's ouster of Aung San Suu Kyi's government in 2021 has turbocharged conflict in the country and birthed dozens of newer "People's Defence Forces" now battling to topple the military. 
Anti-personnel mines and explosive remnants of war killed or wounded 1,003 people in Myanmar in 2023, the International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL) said on Wednesday. 
There were 933 landmine casualties in Syria, 651 in Afghanistan and 580 in Ukraine, the ICBL said in its latest Landmine Monitor report.  
Myanmar is not a signatory to the United Nations convention that prohibits the use, stockpiling or development of anti-personnel mines.
The ICBL said there had been a "significant increase" of anti-personnel mines use by the military in recent years, including around infrastructure like mobile phone towers and energy pipelines.
Those infrastructure are often targeted by its opponents.
Myanmar's military has been repeatedly accused of atrocities and war crimes during decades of internal conflict.
ICBL said it had seen evidence of junta troops forcing civilians to walk in front of its units to "clear" mine-affected areas.
It said it had reviewed photos that indicated anti-personnel mines manufactured by Myanmar were captured by the military's opponents every month between January 2022 and September 2024, "in virtually every part of the country."
More than three million people have been displaced in Myanmar by the post-coup conflict, according to the UN.
All sides in the fighting were using landmines "indiscriminately," the United Nations Children's Fund said in April.
Rebel groups have told AFP they also lay mines in some areas under their control.
The ICBL said at least 5,757 people had been casualties of landmines and explosive remnants of war across the world in 2023. 
Of those, 1,983 were killed and 3,663 wounded.
Civilians made up 84 percent of all recorded casualties, it said.
At least 4,710 casualties of mines and explosive remnants of war were recorded in 2022, with 1,661 of them killed and 3,015 wounded, according to ICBL. The survival status of 34 casualties was unknown.
bur-rma/sn

Global Edition

Machu Picchu security boosted after visitors spread human ashes

  • The video had a caption about "saying goodbye with much love at Machu Picchu" and hashtags with the words "ashes" and "spreading ashes."
  • Peruvian authorities said Tuesday they have tightened security at the Inca citadel of Machu Picchu after tourists there were filmed dispersing what were believed to be human ashes.
  • The video had a caption about "saying goodbye with much love at Machu Picchu" and hashtags with the words "ashes" and "spreading ashes."
Peruvian authorities said Tuesday they have tightened security at the Inca citadel of Machu Picchu after tourists there were filmed dispersing what were believed to be human ashes.
Last week, citizens in Peru were outraged by a non-dated video on Tiktok in which a woman at the tourist site took ashes from a plastic bag and threw them in the air, then hugged another woman.
The video had a caption about "saying goodbye with much love at Machu Picchu" and hashtags with the words "ashes" and "spreading ashes."
The 30-second video was first shown on the account @IncaGoExpeditions, belonging to a travel agency, before it was removed from TikTok.
Cesar Medina, the head of Machu Picchu archeological park, told AFP that officials were going to hire more guards and install more surveillance cameras.
He said there was nothing in local laws barring people from spreading human ashes in public.
But this will now be barred at Machu Picchu for health reasons, Medina said.
Classified as a UNESCO World Heritage site, the site welcomes an average of 5,600 visitors a day but until now had only four cameras and a small team of security guards.
The ancient citadel, built in the 15th century by Incan emperor Pachacuti, sits at an altitude of 2,438 meters in the Peruvian Andes.
cm/dw/jgc

census

Iraq holds its first census in nearly 40 years

BY SALAM FARAJ AND SHWAN MOHAMMED

  • Iraq has spent much of the past few decades devastated by conflict and sanctions, including a sectarian struggle after the US-led invasion 2003 toppled Saddam and the emergence of the Islamic State group in 2014.
  • Iraq is holding its first nationwide census in nearly four decades this week, a long-awaited count in a nation that has been blighted by sectarian and ethnic divisions.
  • Iraq has spent much of the past few decades devastated by conflict and sanctions, including a sectarian struggle after the US-led invasion 2003 toppled Saddam and the emergence of the Islamic State group in 2014.
Iraq is holding its first nationwide census in nearly four decades this week, a long-awaited count in a nation that has been blighted by sectarian and ethnic divisions.
The census is scheduled for Wednesday and Thursday, and will provide sorely needed up-to-date demographic data for the country which has an estimated population of around 44 million.
It will be the first census to cover all 18 governorates since 1987, when dictator Saddam Hussein was in power, following repeated delays caused by years of war and political tensions between factions.
"More generally across the country, parliamentary representation will change," said Hamzeh Hadad, a visiting fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR).
With one member of parliament allocated by the constitution per 100,000 Iraqis, "having an official census will mean the numbers will have to be adjusted" based on the new demographic breakdown, he said.
A count conducted in 1997 excluded the three northern provinces that make up the autonomous Kurdistan region.
The upcoming census has reignited tensions between Baghdad and Kurdistan over disputed territories in the north.
The census includes religion but does not differentiate between sects, such as Sunni and Shiite Muslims, and, unlike previous counts, it excludes ethnicity.
"There are some crucial details in this census that might be missing to appease all sides to finally allow it to take place," Hadad added.
Iraq has been keen to conduct the census for budgetary reasons.
Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani said the census was important for "development and planning steps in all sectors that contribute to the advancement and progress of Iraq", where electricity is scarce and infrastructure largely in disrepair.

Two-day curfew

During the census a two-day curfew will operate, with families having to stay at home so 120,000 researchers can collect data directly from households.
A questionnaire seen by AFP records the number of people per household, health status, education level, employment status, number of cars and even an inventory of household appliances, so standards of living can be assessed.
Iraq has spent much of the past few decades devastated by conflict and sanctions, including a sectarian struggle after the US-led invasion 2003 toppled Saddam and the emergence of the Islamic State group in 2014.
Demographics are likely to have shifted with the exile of hundreds of thousands of Christians, and also of tens of thousands of Yazidi families who were displaced from Sinjar by atrocities committed by IS extremists.
Iraq has regained some semblance of stability in recent years, despite sporadic violence and political turmoil.
To organise the count, authorities partnered with the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), in an effort to generate "accurate demographic information, facilitating effective policymaking and promoting inclusive growth".
After years of uncertainty, the census will reveal "the reality of Iraq in its smallest details", said planning ministry spokesman Abdel-Zahra al-Hindawi.
"We will be able to diagnose all the problems that paralyse development in the areas of health, education, housing," he added.

Demographic shift

Previous censuses were cancelled mainly because of tensions over disputed territories between the Kurdish, Arab, and Turkoman communities in the northern governorates of Kirkuk and Nineveh.
There is still "a lot of sensitivity over disputed territories", said the ECFR's Hadad.
"It's not just the Arabisation policy under Saddam Hussein. But the reversal of it and Kurdification of disputed territories post-2003. So it's not one-sided."
Fahmi Burhane, a Kurdistan region official focused on the disputed territories, voiced long-standing fears among Kurds about a demographic shift in Kirkuk and other areas claimed by both Baghdad and Arbil.
"If we look at past censuses, the number of Kurds has gradually decreased in the Kurdish regions outside autonomous Kurdistan," he said, referring to the movement of Arabs into areas such as Kirkuk under Saddam.
"Arab neighbourhoods have been built in recent years, which absolutely do not correspond to normal population growth," he said.
In the census, Baghdad has agreed to register only the descendants of families who were present in the disputed territories during the 1957 count, in order to prevent subsequent waves of migration from disrupting the demographic balance. Newcomers will be counted in their province of origin.
Burhane said the Iraqi government has been able to "alleviate certain concerns" over the poll.
sf-cbg/tgg/ysm/srm

music

India's vinyl revival finds its groove

BY ANUJ SRIVAS

  • He sells records for 550-2,500 rupees ($6.50-$30), and believes new vinyl pressed in India will prove popular if it is priced within that bracket.
  • Melting plastic pellets into chunky discs then squashed flat, a worker presses records in what claims to be the first vinyl plant to open in India in decades.
  • He sells records for 550-2,500 rupees ($6.50-$30), and believes new vinyl pressed in India will prove popular if it is priced within that bracket.
Melting plastic pellets into chunky discs then squashed flat, a worker presses records in what claims to be the first vinyl plant to open in India in decades.
Warm music with a nostalgic crackle fills the room -- a Bollywood tune from a popular Hindi movie.
"I'm like a kid in a candy shop," grins Saji Pillai, a music publishing veteran in India's entertainment capital Mumbai, who began pressing inAugust.
The revival of retro records among Indian music fans mirrors a global trend that has seen vinyl sales explode from the United States to Britain and Brazil.
Pillai, 58, entered the music industry as "vinyl was just going out". 
He spent the last few years importing records from Europe for his music label clients.
But he took the decision to open his own plant -- cutting import taxes and shipping times -- to focus on Indian artists and market tastes from Bollywood to indie pop  after recording "growing interest".
Retailers including Walmart have embraced the retro format, and megastars including Taylor Swift, Billie Eilish and Harry Styles have sent pressing plants around the world into overdrive.
In India, the scale of revival is far smaller -- in part due to lower household incomes -- but younger fans are now joining in the trend.
Pillai admitted the industry was still "challenging" but said the market was "slowly growing".

'Show their love'

Vynyl record systems do not come cheap.
A decent turntable, sound system and 10 records cost fans 50,000-100,000 rupees ($600-$1,180), the lower end of which is more than double the average monthly salary.
But for those who can afford it, the old system offers a new experience. 
"You go to the collection, take it out carefully... You end up paying more attention," said 26-year-old Sachin Bhatt
a
design director who grew up downloading songs.
"You hear new details, you make new mental observations... There is a ritual to it."
Vinyl records create a "personal, tangible connection to the music we love", Bhatt added.
"I know a lot of young kids who have vinyl, even if they don't have a player. It's a way for them to show their love for the music."
Vinyl is a "completely different" experience than "shoving his AirPods" into his ears and going for a run, said 23-year-old Mihir Shah, with a collection of around 50 records.
"It makes me feel present," he said.
Catering to these fans is a group of record stores, complementing the old records on sale in alleyway shops and flea markets.

'Romance'

"There's been a huge resurgence," said Jude De Souza, 36, who runs the Mumbai record store The Revolver Club, saying the growing interest dovetailed with the wider availability of audio gear and records.
Listening sessions organised by the store bring in more than 100 fans.
Despite the growth in popularity, India's vinyl sales remain a drop in the global ocean. 
While the world's most populous country has one of the biggest bases of music listeners, with local songs racking up big views on YouTube and music streaming platforms, its publishing industry is small by global revenue standards.
Music publishing revenues hit about $100 million in the 2023 fiscal year -- far smaller than Western markets -- according to accountancy giant EY.
That is partly due to the lower spending power of its fans, coupled with runaway piracy.
At a small roadside store, 62-year-old Abdul Razzak is the bridge between India's old vinyl culture and newer fans, selling up to 400 second-hand recordseach monthto customers aged from 25 to 75.
He sells records for 550-2,500 rupees ($6.50-$30), and believes new vinyl pressed in India will prove popular if it is priced within that bracket.
For Pillai and his small factory, it provides an opportunity.
He could -- if demand was there -- "easily" triple the factory's monthly production capacity of more than 30,000, something he hopes will come.
"Even though people love digital, the touch feel is not there," Pillai said. 
"Here there's ownership, there's love for it, there's romance, there's love, there's life."
asv/pjm/djw

politics

Hong Kong tycoon Jimmy Lai takes witness stand in collusion trial

BY XINQI SU

  • His testimony comes with Hong Kong's political freedoms already under the spotlight, after a court jailed 45 democracy campaigners for subversion in the city's largest national security trial on Tuesday.
  • Pro-democracy Hong Kong tycoon Jimmy Lai will on Wednesday take the stand in his collusion trial, testifying in court for the first time despite five previous trials in almost four years.
  • His testimony comes with Hong Kong's political freedoms already under the spotlight, after a court jailed 45 democracy campaigners for subversion in the city's largest national security trial on Tuesday.
Pro-democracy Hong Kong tycoon Jimmy Lai will on Wednesday take the stand in his collusion trial, testifying in court for the first time despite five previous trials in almost four years.
Lai's case is one of the most prominent prosecuted under the national security law imposed by Beijing in 2020, with Western countries and rights groups demanding his release. 
The 76-year-old founder of the now-shuttered tabloid Apple Daily is accused of colluding with foreign forces, a charge that could carry a sentence of up to life in prison. 
His testimony comes with Hong Kong's political freedoms already under the spotlight, after a court jailed 45 democracy campaigners for subversion in the city's largest national security trial on Tuesday.
Lai's case centres around his newspaper's publications, which supported huge, sometimes violent pro-democracy protests in 2019 and criticised Beijing's leadership.
Lai has been behind bars since December 2020, and concerns have been raised around his health. 
"The case of Jimmy Lai is not an outlier, it's a symptom of Hong Kong's democratic decline," the Committee to Protect Journalists said in a Monday statement. 
"Hong Kong's treatment of Jimmy Lai -- and more broadly of independent media and journalists -- shows that this administration is no longer interested in even a semblance of democratic norms."
Hong Kong and Beijing have refuted the criticism, condemning Lai as "a voluntary political tool of foreign forces trying to curb China through Hong Kong". 
Since the prosecution opened in January, it has alleged that on multiple occasions Lai asked the United States and other countries to impose sanctions "or engage in other hostile activities" against China and Hong Kong.

'Media business as platform'

Lai faces one count of "conspiracy to publish seditious publications" as well as two counts of conspiracy to foreign collusion.  
The case against him revolves around 161 articles published in Apple Daily, as well as his own interviews and social media postings. 
The newspaper was forced to close in 2021 after police raids and the arrests of its senior editors. 
The prosecution accused Lai and six Apple Daily senior executives of using the media business as a platform to "stir up opposition to the government... and to collude with foreign countries".
Dozens of local and foreign politicians and scholars -- including former US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo -- were named by the prosecution as Lai's "agents", "intermediaries" or "collaborators". 
Lai is also accused of supporting two young activists in lobbying for foreign sanctions via a protest group called "Stand With Hong Kong".
The six executives and two activists have pleaded guilty, with five of them testifying against Lai. 

Concerns for health

Last month, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer told parliament that Lai, who holds British citizenship, was "a priority" for his Labour government. 
Starmer raised the issue in a meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping on Monday. 
Lai's son had previously said "much stronger" support from the British government was needed as Lai's health "could get much worse at any moment".
A legal team led by a senior British rights lawyer has filed a number of complaints to the United Nations concerning arbitrary detention and prolonged solitary confinement.
On Sunday, the Hong Kong government condemned the legal team for "spreading misinformation", saying that Lai himself had requested to be kept apart from other inmates.  
"The unfounded remarks... are completely fact-twisting and are merely a despicable political maneuver with malicious intention," the government said in a statement.
Robertsons, a Hong Kong law firm representing Lai in the trial, has also brushed off some of the allegations.
"Mr Lai wishes to make known that he has been receiving appropriate medical attention for conditions suffered by him, including diabetes," the firm said in a statement in September.
"He has access to daylight through the windows in the corridor outside his cell, albeit he cannot see the sky. He exercises for an hour every day in a secure area."
su/reb/dhc

China

Chinese man sentenced to 20 months for Falun Gong harassment in US

  • In addition to 20 months in prison, Chen was sentenced to three years of supervised release and ordered to forfeit $50,000.
  • A 71-year-old Chinese man was sentenced to 20 months in prison on Tuesday for taking part in a plot targeting the Falun Gong spiritual movement in the United States.
  • In addition to 20 months in prison, Chen was sentenced to three years of supervised release and ordered to forfeit $50,000.
A 71-year-old Chinese man was sentenced to 20 months in prison on Tuesday for taking part in a plot targeting the Falun Gong spiritual movement in the United States.
John Chen, of Los Angeles, was convicted of acting as an unregistered agent of the Chinese government and bribing a tax authority agent.
Chen and another Chinese national, Lin Feng, 44, who also lived in Los Angeles, took part in a Chinese government campaign to "repress and harass Falun Gong practitioners" in the United States, the Justice Department said in a statement.
In 2023, Chen and Feng sought to have the Internal Revenue Service strip the tax-exempt status of the Shen Yun Performing Arts Center, which is run by the Falun Gong.
As part of the scheme, they paid a $5,000 cash bribe to a purported IRS agent who was in fact an undercover officer.
In addition to 20 months in prison, Chen was sentenced to three years of supervised release and ordered to forfeit $50,000.
Feng was sentenced in September to time-served of 16 months in prison.
The Falun Gong movement is banned in China and prosecuted by authorities there.
cl/nro

assault

France's Gisele Pelicot says 'macho' society must change attitude on rape

BY DAVID COURBET

  • "It's time that the macho, patriarchal society that trivialises rape changes," said Gisele Pelicot in her closing statement at the trial of her ex-husband and dozens of other men on rape charges. 
  • Gisele Pelicot, the French woman drugged by her ex-husband so she could be raped and sexually abused by him and dozens of strangers, said on Tuesday that it was time for a "macho" society to change its attitude on rape.
  • "It's time that the macho, patriarchal society that trivialises rape changes," said Gisele Pelicot in her closing statement at the trial of her ex-husband and dozens of other men on rape charges. 
Gisele Pelicot, the French woman drugged by her ex-husband so she could be raped and sexually abused by him and dozens of strangers, said on Tuesday that it was time for a "macho" society to change its attitude on rape.
"It's time that the macho, patriarchal society that trivialises rape changes," said Gisele Pelicot in her closing statement at the trial of her ex-husband and dozens of other men on rape charges. 
"It's time we changed the way we look at rape," she said in the southern city of Avignon.
Since early September her ex-husband Dominique Pelicot has been in the dock along with 49 other men. Another defendant is still at large.
Gisele Pelicot has become a feminist icon by refusing to be ashamed and demanding the trial be open to the public to raise awareness about the use of drugs to commit sexual abuse.
Gisele, 71, said the marathon hearings were an examination of the "cowardice" of the men who took part in the rapes organised by her husband.
Dominique Pelicot listened, with his head bowed.
"I've seen people take the stand who deny rape, and some who admit it," Gisele said.
"I want to say to these men: at what point did Mrs Pelicot give you her consent when you entered the room? At what point do you become aware of this inert body? At what point do you not report it to the police?"
None of her abusers alerted the police about the rapes that lasted between 2011 and 2020.
"I can hear this gentleman saying 'a finger is not rape'," Gisele Pelicot said, in reference to testimony.
Investigators have counted around 200 instances of rape, most of them by her husband and more than 90 by strangers.
- 'Scar will never heal' - 
Gisele said her former husband "had a lot of fantasies that I couldn't fulfil".
"But why did it come to this? I think what he wanted was Mrs Pelicot and not someone else," she added.
"As I didn't want to go to a swingers' club, he thought he'd found the solution by putting me to sleep."
"I've lost 10 years of my life that I'll never make up for," she said.
"This scar will never heal," she added, struggling to hold back her anger.
In a closing statement, Dominique Pelicot again admitted to the accusations, saying that his "motive" was wanting to satisfy a "fantasy".
"I came to do what I did through people who willingly accepted what I proposed," he told the court.
Of the co-defendants, only 14 have admitted the charges of aggravated rape, for which most of them face up to 20 years imprisonment if convicted.  
The 35 others deny having raped Gisele Pelicot and maintain that they thought they were taking part in sex games.
Gisele said there was no distinction between them, adding they have "defiled" her.
"They all came to rape me," she said. "I'm going to have to live with this all my life."

'Die in lies'

Gisele's daughter, who uses the pen name Caroline Darian, believes she was assaulted by her father, who also posted intimate photos of her. In 2022, she wrote a book "Et j'ai cesse de t'appeler papa" ("And I stopped calling you dad").
After Dominique Pelicot spoke, family lawyer Antoine Camus said Caroline needed an "audible and human response" to the actions she says she is "convinced" she suffered at his hands.
Dominque Pelicot turned to her directly and said: "Caroline, I have never done anything to you."
But she interrupted, saying: "You lie, you don't have the courage to tell the truth! Even about your ex-wife!" 
"You will die in lies! Alone, alone in lies Dominique Pelicot!"
Gisele Pelicot's life was shattered in 2020 when she discovered that her partner of five decades had for years been secretly administering her large doses of sleeping pills to rape her and invite strangers to join him in their home in the village of Mazan, a list that grew to dozens over time.
Gisele Pelicot has said that she had strange memory lapses and other health problems and thought she might have had Alzheimer's. 
The trial has entered its final stages, with the civil parties set to deliver their closing arguments later this week.
Next week prosecutors are scheduled to give their closing arguments and make their sentencing demands for the defendants. 
The verdict is expected to be delivered by December 20 at the latest.
dac-as-sjw/giv

gender

Trump ally seeks to block trans lawmaker from women's restrooms

  • On Monday, Republican Representative Nancy Mace, a staunch ally of President-elect Donald Trump, introduced the resolution banning transgender women from using female restrooms.
  • Democrats and LGBTQ rights advocates expressed outrage Tuesday after a Republican lawmaker introduced a measure that would ban the first openly transgender person elected to the US Congress from using women's restrooms in the building.
  • On Monday, Republican Representative Nancy Mace, a staunch ally of President-elect Donald Trump, introduced the resolution banning transgender women from using female restrooms.
Democrats and LGBTQ rights advocates expressed outrage Tuesday after a Republican lawmaker introduced a measure that would ban the first openly transgender person elected to the US Congress from using women's restrooms in the building.
The text targets Sarah McBride, who won one of Delaware's seats in the House of Representatives earlier this month and will take her place in Congress come January.
On Monday, Republican Representative Nancy Mace, a staunch ally of President-elect Donald Trump, introduced the resolution banning transgender women from using female restrooms.
The fiery South Carolina congresswoman also explained her thinking on X, posting that "biological men do not belong in private women's spaces. Period. Full stop. End of story."
Transgender rights are a hot-button issue in the United States -- with the participation of trans people in competitive sports and the subject of access to gender-affirming care for minors triggering fiery debate.
Democrats and LGBTQ advocates largely denounced Mace's effort, categorizing it as an attack on trans people.
Calling the proposed resolution "hateful," US House Democrat Becca Balint said there was "no bottom to the cruelty. We have an obligation to push back."
Mark Pocan, chair of the Congressional Equality Caucus, said the resolution was "a pathetic, attention-seeking attempt to grab Trump's eye and the media spotlight."
"Trans people, including trans employees, are paying the price," he said.
Asked Tuesday about the measure, Republican Speaker of the House Mike Johnson deflected, telling reporters: "This is an issue that Congress has never had to address before, and we're going to do that in deliberate fashion with member consensus."
McBride herself wrote on X that the maneuver was "a blatant attempt from far right-wing extremists to distract from the fact that they have no real solutions to what Americans are facing."
While McBride has acknowledged her groundbreaking status as the first openly trans lawmaker, she has said her legislative priorities will remain "affordable child care, paid family and medical leave, housing, health care, reproductive freedom."
cjc/bfm/mlm