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Opinion
Adelle Chua, Editor mst.daydesk@gmail.com
EDITORIAL
TRANSITIONS
IT’S NEVER ALIENS By Pecier Decierdo
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personal life as well as their professional one. In the end, it is not that video of the First Lady rapping on the Internet or dancing on a TV show, or the image of the President shooting baskets or poking fun at his staff, that would linger. It is how they viewed and made people view the privilege of public service— and managed the transition from one administration to the next.
NITED States President Barack Obama made his farewell remarks last week as he steps down this week to make way for his successor, the Republican Donald Trump. own final speech at a gathering of educators. She underscored the importance of education and told her audience that anybody—regardless of color, gender, religion and disposition—could succeed if they worked had enough. She and her husband were proof of that. As a result, social media has been gushing about the Obama couple who will leave the White House after two terms marked by decency. Aside from not figuring in a scandal of whatever nature, the Obamas are perceived as modern, progressive, even fun in their
The Obamas campaigned hard for Trump’s opponent, Hillary Clinton, who won the popular vote even as the electoral college system worked in Trump’s favor. In his speech, Obama outlined his administration’s successes in the past eight years. He emphasized that it was the people’s ability to bring about change on their own that mattered. And even as it was the candidate of another party who was assuming his role, Obama pointed out that this was democracy at its best, at work. Americans should not criticize their leaders without evaluating their own role in the choice of those leaders, he reminded the people. Meanwhile, First Lady Michelle Obama delivered her
RECENTLY, mysterious signals from outer space called fast radio bursts (FRBs) made the news. FRBs probably have nothing to do with aliens. In fact, scientists have this rule of thumb when it comes to detecting strange signals from outer space: “It’s never aliens.” That is not a statement of conviction. Rather, it is a statement of caution and methodology. It is a reminder to exhaust all possible alternative explanation first before concluding that something unlikely is going on, something as unlikely as detecting signals from aliens. How unlikely is detecting signals from extraterrestrials anyway? Although we might not know the answer to that question, we now have the tool to approach the question in a scientific manner. It’s called the Drake equation, named after scientist Frank Drake, who formulated it in 1961. When scientists say, “It’s never aliens,” that does not mean they think there are no aliens out there. In fact, if you press any respectable scientist what they think, almost all of them will guess that there probably are aliens out there. The universe is simply so vast and full of possibility for life to arise elsewhere. In our Solar System alone, we are contemplating the possibility of life on Mars; Jupiter’s moons Europa and Ganymede; and Saturn’s moons Enceladus and Titan. Now if there’s intelligent life out there, what are the chances that we will detect signals coming from them? That’s where the Drake equation comes in. According to the equation, the number of alien civilizations in our galaxy capable of communicating to us via radio signals is equal to a product of several terms. The first term is the average number of stars formed per year in our galaxy. That is, how many stars get born per year. We know the answer to this: It’s around 20. If we want to be a little conservative and only consider stars like the Sun—other stars might be too hot or too cold— there are two born per year. The second term is the fraction of those stars that have planets. When this equation was first formulated, we do not know of any planet outside our Solar System. Now we know thousands. We now think that almost all stars have at least one planet going around them. One estimate is that close to 20
The Obamas champion diversity in America, because as the President pointed out, democracy requires a basic sense of solidarity. “For all our outward differences, we’re all in this together, that we rise and fall as one.” It may just be the characteristic Obama eloquence, but it may also be the truth, not just in the US but in many other societies where diversity is— as it should be— celebrated.
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FOOD COMMA: US SUBURBAN RESTAURANTS POP GOES THE WORLD JENNY ORTUOSTE
SAN FRANCISCO BAY AREA—Here’s another issue of Food Comma, my column within a column, where I write about one of my greatest concerns and largest pleasures— food. Back in Manila, not too long
ago, I enjoyed trying out the latest affordable restaurants with my family and friends, tasting the latest dishes and the new flavors that chefs and restaurateurs come up with. When Shi Lin opened at Circuit Makati and brought along their
delectable xiao long bao, I was one of their biggest customers over the first three or four months. I ate there every weekend and brought guests over when I needed to entertain. (I was unimpressed by Din Tai Fung’s much-hyped version of XLB.) Shi Lin’s
prawn in salted egg and mushroom and vegetable dumpling are also must-haves. K-Pub is one of the best venues for authentic Korean cuisine and they do birthday greetings up on their giant video screen (impressive Turn to B2
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FOOD...
WHY TRUMP CAN’T JUST SAY ‘YOU’RE FIRED’ TO THIS OFFICIAL
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if it’s your teenage daughter’s birthday and she’s brought along her friends—you’re instantly cool mom/cool dad). My point is, the dining scene in Manila is pretty good, overall, and there are a lot of cuisines to choose from as well as a lot of price points. There’s something for everyone. It was a terrible shock, then, to move to suburban Northern California and find that the restaurants in the area don’t come up to the standards we’re used to in Manila. Most little cities and towns in the suburbs have strip malls and fewer have large malls with department stores. The big-box malls don’t have much in the way of dining, it’s mostly shopping, and they have food courts selling corn dogs, bland sushi, and Panda Express that is not real Chinese food: It’s American Chinese food, and there’s a huge difference. The strip malls have the big chain restaurants. IHOP and Denny’s serve stereotypical American fare— pancakes, turkey, ham, chicken, and sides of vegetables and carbs, usually steamed broccoli or fries. It’s a great experience the first few times, and the food is filling, but it’s not for regular consumption. Pancake House dishes up better pancakes— fully cooked and without that moist inner layer that means they didn’t stay on the griddle long enough. Chili’s, popular with Filipinos, is also often located at strip malls, and they have a lot of the dishes we are used to at Chili’s Philippines. Here, we order their Caribbean Salad with Seared Shrimp and Molten Chocolate Cake each time we visit. Our choice of entrees vary, from burgers to chicken, but my favorite is the Ancho Salmon on a bed of brown rice and broccoli on the side. The salmon is always (so far) fresh and done well without being overcooked. I hate rubbery fish that’s been baked or pan-fried to a sorry demise. Applebee’s and Olive Garden are also common chain restaurants, but we haven’t tried those yet. There are also the independent Japanese restaurants run by Koreans and Chinese (haven’t eaten at one run by Japanese yet), but the sushi at such places is mostly rice and the fillings are lackluster. Fuddruckers, which you might see here and there occasionally, serves gut-busting burgers in different sizes, grilled to your taste and served on sesame seed buns. The fun part comes at the condiment station, where you can pile on the fresh veggies sky high—lettuce, tomatoes, onions, and pickles. You add taste through ketchup, mayo, mustard, and cheese sauce. Without sauces, it’s all just freshness. Just like in Manila, there’s a Starbucks cafe almost everywhere here, too. It’s popular but in a more functional kind of way. In the suburbs, it’s not so much as a place to relax and chat with friends, but a place to get caffeinated for work. A lot of business is done through their drivethroughs, with people passing for their regular quad shot or tea on the way to the office in the morning. In the city, people do meet at a Starbucks to talk business but they don’t linger; they come in and go as soon as they’re done. In any case, Starbucks tastes the same here and there, so if you’re looking for consistency and the familiar, have your after-meal coffee and dessert here. If there’s something I really miss about the Philippines, other than my loved ones, it’s the food. There’s always something new to try and the flavors are always interesting and appetizing. Here in the Northern California suburbs it’s hit-and-miss; we go through a lot of experimentation (and dollars) to find the good ones and the ones to avoid. There are fancy restaurants up in the city and we’ve tried a few of them, but that’s a story for another time. For now, I leave you with the thought that Manila and other places in the Philippines are a food lover’s paradise. Other places aren’t as blessed. Enjoy! Dr. Ortuoste is a Californiabased writer. Follow her on Facebook: Jenny Ortuoste, Twitter: @jennyortuoste, Instagram: @ jensdecember
By Cass R. Sunstein REPUBLICANS are putting a great deal of pressure on President-elect Donald Trump to fire Richard Cordray, director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. He should resist that pressure. Any effort to discharge Cordray would be illegal—and it might even precipitate something close to a constitutional crisis. Here’s the legal background. Most federal agencies count as “executive,” meaning that their heads serve at the pleasure of the president. But some agencies are “independent”—meaning that by law, the people in charge of them can be removed only for good cause, which Congress often specifies to mean “inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance in o ffi ce.” The Federal Reserve Board, the Federal Trade Commission and the Federal Communications Commission are independent agencies—and so is the CFPB. Under the law, Cordray’s five-year term extends until July 2018. Both Republican and Democratic presidents have not
loved the idea of independent agencies, operating outside of their daily control. But in 1935, the Supreme Court unanimously agreed that the Constitution gives Congress the power to create such entities. The court has stuck with that position ever since—and for decades no president has even tried to remove the heads of independent agencies. To be sure, some people believe that the 1935 decision was wrong. Suppose President Trump shares that belief and asserts his authority to fire Cordray. On the day of his removal, Cordray would be within his rights to go to court to seek a judgment that the president acted beyond his constitutional authority. This would be quite a spectacle. As the law now stands, Cordray would almost certainly win. Things could get pretty ugly. Would a lower court issue an injunction against the president? Would he comply with it? The Trump administration could make a less ambitious argument. It could concede the legitimacy of independent agencies in general, but attack
the independence of the CFPB in particular, because it is headed by a single person (rather than the more usual multimember commission) and because of the sheer breadth of its authority over the economy. That’s an adventurous argument, but it’s not outlandish. In fact, a three-judge panel of the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia accepted it a few months ago. But it’s just too early for the Trump administration to act on the basis of that ruling. The panel’s decision has been stayed pending the CFPB’s petition for review by the full court. Until its judgment goes into effect, Trump is bound by the law that Congress enacted. Emphasizing Republican objections to Cordray’s performance, Trump might try one final argument. He might claim that Cordray has been guilty of inefficiency, neglect of duty or malfeasance in office— and hence that the legal standard for discharge has been met. Good luck with that one. No one seriously argues that Cordray has essentially failed to show
up for work (“inefficiency”), ignored the law (“neglect of duty”) or engaged in corruption (“malfeasance”). Strong policy disagreements are not a lawful ground for dismissing the CFPB director. If Trump wants to control the agency, he has much better options. He can work with Congress to scale back its powers. His administration can try to convince the federal courts, including the Supreme Court, that the Constitution forbids Congress from making the CFPB independent. There is even an argument, not yet tested, that the president has the authority to direct the CFPB to consult with the White House before it issues expensive regulations. But discharging Cordray would be beyond the pale. It is already clear that the Trump administration will ignite more than its share of controversies, and face numerous challenges in federal court. It would be a big mistake for it to choose, right out of the gate, to start a fight that it is overwhelmingly likely to lose. Bloomberg
UNCERTAINTY FILLS THE TAIWAN STRAIT By Noah Feldman THE world’s most dangerous flashpoint got much more dangerous this week when China sent its lone aircraft carrier into the Taiwan Strait and Taiwan scrambled fighter jets in response. This is how accidental wars start: provocation and counterprovocation in an environment with too much uncertainty. The uncertainty arises from not knowing the Donald Trump administration’s answer to a pressing foreign policy question: Would the US defend Taiwan from a Chinese attack? The answer as a matter of US policy has long been complicated. Legally, the US has no treaty obligation to defend Taiwan, and the Taiwan Relations Act of 1979 says only that the US would view an attack with “grave concern.” Analysts refer to this as a policy of “strategic ambiguity.” In practice, however, the diplomatic and defense establishments have long assumed that the US would defend Taiwan as vigorously as it would Japan or South Korea, with which it has mutual defense treaties—for the simple reason that failing to defend Taiwan would be seen as a signal that the US might not defend its official Pacific friends. Trump’s election may well change this calculus—and no one in the region, or the US, knows for sure. On the one hand, Trump’s secretary of state nominee, Rex Tillerson, took a tough line at the beginning of his Senate confirmation hearings Wednesday. He compared China’s expansive, aggressive actions in the South China Sea to Russia’s in Crimea, which certainly would go along with a commitment to defend Taiwan. On the other hand, Trump himself was dismissive of a recent Chinese military provocation, the seizing of a water-borne US
drone from near a naval warship in December, commenting that China could keep it. That implied a shift from past US policy: Where George W. Bush and Barack Obama sought to contain China militarily while welcoming its economic growth, Trump seems inclined to go the other way. He sees China as an economic threat while appearing thus far uninterested in military confrontation. And his generally isolationist-tilting foreign policy views would similarly suggest a disinclination to defend Taiwan. In other words, Trump’s administration may be readying itself for a historic shift in US defense posture toward China in the Pacific. Or maybe not. The point is that the heightened uncertainty has practical implications. China can be expected to keep on testing Trump, especially given his anti-Chinese rhetoric during the campaign and his appointment of a staunchly anti-Chinese academic, Peter Navarro, to lead his trade council. From China’s perspective, military and economic confrontation can be deployed as useful proxies for each other. When Trump challenges China on trade, as with the Navarro appointment, China can respond by revealing anti-aircraft guns on its newly created islands in the South China Sea—or by sending a carrier into the Taiwan Strait. Neither of these upsets China’s precarious domestic economy, but each is intended to send Trump a message. As uncertainty makes China more aggressive, it will have an identical reciprocal effect on Taiwan. Taiwan’s leadership cannot know exactly how far China is prepared to go. Without the high probability of US support, Taiwan must try to deter China’s behavior by itself. Mutual provocation is scary, because it can lead to accidents. Planes and ships can smash
IT’S... From A1 percent of Sun-like stars has a planet about the size of Earth. The third term is the average number of planets that can support life. We don’t know the answer to this yet. In fact, this problem is a field of intense research. There are several ways scientists go about attacking this problem. One is to search for Earth-like planets inside the so-called “Goldilocks zone.” This is the region not too close nor too far from the parent star, where it is neither too hot nor too cold. Another way is to try to determine what makes a planet habitable in the first place. Can life exist on Mars? How about in the icecovered seas of Jupiter’s moon
The universe is simply so vast and full of possibility for life to arise elsewhere. Europa or the methane lakes of Saturn’s moon Titan? The succeeding terms are even more problematic. The fourth term is the fraction of habitable planets—say Earthlike planets in the Goldilocks zone—that actually develop life. The thing is, we don’t even know how likely life on Earth is. Are we a very, very lucky fluke, a one-in-a-billion occurrence? In a vast universe, very unlikely things happen all the time. Or are we inevitable? Does life always
into each other, and split-second decisions can lead to disaster. What’s more, uncertainty itself can contribute to wars that both sides would rather not fight. According to one classic account, one reason rational countries nevertheless go to war is when each side has its own assessment of the relative strengths and weaknesses. Different assessments can lead to situations where the only way to find out who is right is to fight the war and see who wins. If China and Taiwan have strongly different assessments of what Trump’s policy would be, that increases the odds of war between them. What makes this high-risk environment into something like a perfect storm is the presidency of Tsai Ing-wen, who took office last May. Tsai and her Democratic Progressive Party are far more independence-oriented than any of her predecessors. To be sure, Tsai has tried to tread carefully since her election, avoiding direct provocation of China, which views Taiwan as ultimately part of China. Yet in the final analysis, the existence of Tsai’s party depends on the basic assumption that Taiwan is an independent country—and a democracy. That vision puts Taiwan on a collision course with Chinese President Xi Jinping’s vision of an increasingly nationalist and expansionary China. In 2013, when I was trying to imagine the highest risk scenario for a China-Taiwan war, I postulated one in which Tsai was president of Taiwan and China sent its new carrier into the Taiwan strait. That’s now happened. The question is what, if anything, Trump is going to do about it. The answer is much more important for the world than anything in the disputed dossier that’s dominating the headlines. Bloomberg
arise wherever and whenever it can? In other words, is this fraction very close to 0 (life is highly improbable) or very close to 1 (life is almost inevitable), or anywhere in between? The fifth term is the fraction of planets with life that develop intelligent life. One very big problem with this term is that we haven’t even fully understood our own intelligence, let alone that of hypothetical extraterrestrials. The sixth term is the fraction of intelligent life that develop civilizations, that in turn develop the technology to communicate via radio signals (the best way to do it). The last term is the punch line—the length of time such civilizations release radio signals. In our case, we have been sending intentional radio signals
into outer space only since 1974. How long do advanced civilizations usually last? How long will we last? “Are we alone in the universe?” That is an extremely deep, extremely interesting question. But by asking this out-of-this-world question, we are forced to look at ourselves to ask questions fundamental to our origins, our place in the universe, and our destiny as a species. That is why searching for extraterrestrial intelligence is one of the most important scientific endeavors. And although it is never aliens, one day, it might finally be. Pecier Decierdo is resident physicist and astronomer of The Mind Museum.
World JAPAN’S ABE PUSHES PACIFIC TRADE DEAL IN AUSTRALIA SYDNEY, Australia—Japan and Australia will work together to ensure the Trans-Pacific Partnership free trade deal comes into force, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said Saturday, making no mention of strong US opposition. After talks with Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, Abe took the lead on the trade pact covering 12 Pacific Rim nations that was ratified by Japan’s parliament last month. “We agreed that we should demonstrate anew to the world the importance of free trade,” Abe told reporters. “We confirmed that we would coordinate for the early entry into force of the TPP.” The two men later released a joint statement which “stressed that implementing the TPP remains an indispensable priority because of the significant economic and strategic benefits it offers.” Turnbull noted, “For both of our nations the United States remains the cornerstone of our strategic and security arrangements. We will work closely with the incoming administration, as we have been (doing), to advance the region’s interest and our shared goals.” AFP
EBOLA’S LONGTERM EFFECTS REVEALED
SPAIN, HUNGARY ARREST 5 WITH IS TIES M
adrid—Five people with suspected links to Islamic State jihadists were arrested over the weekend in separate incidents in Spain and Hungary, with several weapons also being seized, authorities said. Spain’s interior ministry said police detained a Moroccan man with Dutch identity documents in the northwestern city of Figueras suspected of belonging to IS who recently returned to Spain from Turkey. The authorities are investigating whether his return “was motivated by a desire to carry out some sort of action in Europe,” the ministry said in a statement. The ministry said Spanish po-
lice were able to locate the man thanks to the help of Dutch authorities and of the intelligence services of several unnamed countries. “Investigators are currently trying to determine the degree of radicalization of the detainee, his possible links in Europe, the activities he has been carrying out for Daesh and what his purpose was since his arrival in Spain,” the statement said, using an Ara-
bic acronym for IS. In a separate operation, police detained two Spanish men who were part of a group “that had reached a very high level of determination to carry out terrorist activities.” The group was “fully aligned with the strategy of the terrorist organization Daesh,” the ministry said in a separate statement. Police seized a long gun and three knives during searches of six houses carried out as part of the operation in Ceuta, the tiny Spanish territory bordered by Morocco on one side and the Mediterranean Sea. Meanwhile, Hungarian authorities said they arrested two young women from France and Belgium allegedly seeking to join IS in Syria.
PARIS—People who survive Ebola may still battle debilitating health problems a year after being declared infectionfree, according to an ongoing trial in Guinea which highlighted the need for patient followup. Three-quarters of survivors had postEbola symptoms when they enrolled for the trial about a year, on average, after they were discharged from hospital, researchers reported Saturday. Eighteen percent experienced eye problems, including eight individuals who went blind, a team wrote in The Lancet Infectious Diseases. Two percent – 19 people – were deaf. This is the largest and longest-running assessment of Ebola survivors to date. Nearly one in four participants, the study said, suffered joint and muscle pain, 35 percent had headaches, and 22 percent stomach pain when they enrolled. Seventeen percent had symptoms of depression. The study also confirmed previous observations that Ebola virus can remain in the semen of infected men for 18 months or longer, raising the spectre of sexual transmission. In 2015, a study in Sierra Leone said nearly 80 percent of some 277 survivors experienced joint pain four months after their hospital discharge, 60 percent had vision problems and a quarter hearing difficulties. The Guinean trial aims to monitor patients for two years. AFP
BANGLADESH ARRESTS ANOTHER PLOTTER IN CAFE SIEGE DHAKA—Bangladesh police Saturday said they have arrested an Islamist extremist accused of being one of the “masterminds” of last year’s deadly siege at a Dhaka cafe where 22 hostages were killed. A police spokesman said Jahangir Alam was detained Friday night by counter-terrorism forces in Elenga, a town some 120 kilometers (63 miles) north of the capital. “He is one of the main masterminds of the Holey Artisan Bakery (cafe) attack,” Yusuf Ali, an additional deputy commissioner of the Dhaka police force, told AFP. “He was a member of a new faction of Jamayetul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) and was directly involved in the murder of at least 22 religious minorities including Hindu priests and a Christian and foreigners (at the cafe),” he said. Japanese and Italian diners were among the 18 foreigners shot and hacked to death in the attack on July 1 last year. The siege lasted for 10 hours until army commandos, using armoured vehicles, stormed the compound. AFP
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SUNDAY, JANUARY 15, 2017 mst.daydesk@gmail.com
FAITH. A Sri Lankan Hindu devotee offers prayers at a Hindu temple in Colombo on January 14, 2017. AFP
ZOE SALDANA: HOLLYWOOD BULLIED TRUMP LOS ANGELES, United States—It isn’t an opinion heard frequently in the famously liberal Hollywood, but sci-fi queen Zoe Saldana has spoken out against the acting community for bullying abrasive Donald Trump. The “Star Trek,” “Avatar” and “Guardians of the Galaxy” star – who is not a supporter of the Republican president-elect – believes insults flung at him during the race for the White House turned off much of middle America. “We got cocky and became arrogant and we also became bullies,” the 38-year-old actress said of Trump, who has been frequently berated himself for bullying tactics, including seemingly mocking a reporter with disabilities. “We were trying to single out a man for all these things he was doing wrong... and that created em-
pathy in a big group of people in America that felt bad for him and that are believing in his promises,” she added. Saldana’s analysis echoes comments made by Hawaiian-born Australian actress Nicole Kidman, who told the BBC’s “Victoria Derbyshire” show this week it was time Americans got behind Trump, who takes office on January 20. “I just say he’s now elected and we as a country need to support whoever’s the president because that’s what the country’s based on. However that happened, he’s there, and let’s go,” Kidman said. Saldana, who plays a Cuban gangster’s moll in Ben Affleck’s prohibition era gangster movie “Live by Night,” has spoken out frequently against prejudice in Hollywood. One of the movie’s most pleasing
aspects, she says, was its unflinching depiction of racism in the Deep South that was so ingrained that police officers and judges were proud to call themselves members of the Ku Klux Klan, the white supremacist hate group. The Trump campaign that defeated Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton was criticized for stoking racial tensions with its rhetoric against Mexicans and Muslims, but Saldana is hopeful the country will never return to the dark days of segregation. “I’m learning from (Trump’s victory) with a lot of humility,” the mother of two-year-old twin boys told AFP. “If we have people continue to be strong and educate ourselves and stand by equal rights and treat everyone with respect, we won’t go back to those times.” AFP
The Belgian, 18, and the French national, 19, were trying to cross into Serbia early Friday, a police spokesperson told Hungarian news agency MTI. The women, who were not named, were travelling on a bus from Vienna to Sofia from where they planned to reach Syria and join IS. Spanish police have arrested 181 people accused of connections to Islamist militant groups since 2015 when Spain raised its terror alert level to four on a scale of five following deadly attacks in France, Tunisia and Kuwait. It is the highest alert level since Al-Qaeda-inspired bombers blew up four packed commuter trains and killed 191 people in Madrid on March 11, 2004. AFP
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SUNDAY, JANUARY 15, 2017 Cesar Barrioquinto, Editor
World
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TRUMP MAY SCRAP RUSSIA SANCTIONS W
ashington, United States— President-elect Donald Trump has hinted that he may lift sanctions on Russia and won’t stand by the “One China” policy unless Beijing improves its currency and trade practices.
HEADING. President-elect Donald Trump raises a fist to supporters in the lobby of Trump Tower on January 13, 2017 in New York. AFP
Trump told The Wall Street Journal in an interview that he would keep intact “at least for a period of time” sanctions President Barack Obama’s administration imposed on Russia last month over Moscow’s alleged cyberattacks to influence the US election. But, if Russia helps the US on key goals such as fighting violent extremists, Trump suggested he may scrap the punitive measures altogether. He also said he was prepared to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin after taking office January 20. Trump, who sees an opportunity to cooperate with Moscow in fighting jihadist groups like Islamic State, has expressed admiration for Putin, and only reluctantly accepted US intelligence’s conclusion that Russian hackers acting on Putin’s authority interfered in the US elections. Turning to the longstanding US practice of not recognizing Taiwan diplomatically, Trump said: “Everything is under negotiation, including One China.” Trump has already irked China by accepting a congratulatory phone call from Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-Wen after he won the election, upending decades of diplomatic precedent in which the White House has foregone direct communication with the island’s leader. He defended that move in his interview with the Journal, saying: “We sold them $2 billion of military equipment last year. We can sell them $2 billion of the latest and greatest military equipment but we’re not allowed to accept a phone call. First of all, it would have been very rude not to accept the phone call.” Beijing considers the island to be a breakaway province to be brought back within its fold, by force if necessary. Trump has threatened to get tough with what he sees as unfair Chinese trade practices, and suggested that the “One China” policy could become a bargaining chip in other disputes. AFP
TOXIC CHEMICALS DETECTED AT TOKYO’S NEW FISH MARKET SITE TOKYO—High levels of toxic chemicals were found in groundwater tests at a new facility scheduled to replace Tokyo’s Tsukiji fish market – the world’s largest – clouding the costly relocation plan, news reports said Saturday. The controversial project has been delayed over fears about toxic contamination, which also impacted the 2020 Olympics to be hosted by the Japanese capital. The megacity’s new governor, Yuriko Koike, has said she would postpone the move originally set for November last year, as she awaits final groundwater
testing results at the new site, a former gas plant. The relocation plan has been marred by problems, including the discovery that contractors had inexplicably failed to fill in a basement at the new site with clean soil as a buffer against underground pollution. Results of the final testing showed that levels of toxic materials, including benzene, detected in underground water at the new site were above nationally set limits, the Yomiuri Shimbun and Jiji Press said. AFP
RELIGIOUS CEREMONY. An Indian sadhu or Hindu holy man walks back after taking a holy bath in the Bay of Bengal and perform rituals at the mouth of the river Ganges on Sagar Island, around 150km south of Kolkata, on January 14, 2017. More than 700,000 Hindu pilgrims and sadhus are expected to gather at the confluence of the River Ganges and the Bay of Bengal during the Gangasagar Mela to take a “holy dip’”in the ocean on the occasion of Makar Sankranti. AFP
SHRINKING SNOWS PROOF OF CLIMATE CHANGE CARLINI BASE, Antarctica—Vast icy rock peaks tower above Argentina’s Carlini research base in Antarctica. But scientists who have worked here for decades say the glaciers are less icy than they once were. For international experts stationed at the base, the frozen southern continent is a good gauge of climate change. “When I used to come to Antarctica in the 1990s, it never used to rain,” said Rodolfo Sanchez, director of the Argentine Antarctic Institute (IAA). “Now it rains regularly – instead of snowing,” he told AFP during an Argentine government visit to King George Island, off the tip of the western Antarctic peninsula. Scientists monitoring conditions at the base say the average temperature here has increased by 2.5 degrees Celsius (4.5 degrees Fahrenheit) over the past century. “The glacier used to reach all the way to the shore,” Sanchez says. “Now there is a 500-meter (550-yard) wide beach.” AFP
THAI PILOT KILLED IN JET CRASH DURING AIR SHOW
BANGKOK—A Thai military air show for children was marred by tragedy Saturday when a fighter jet plunged from the sky and burst into flames, killing the pilot. Families were gathered at the airport in the southern city of Hat Yai to watch the show put on for Thailand’s annual Children’s Day. Footage of the accident captured shrieks from a startled crowd as the jet took a nosedive and crashed near the airport’s runway, releasing fiery plumes of smoke. “One pilot was killed in the accident this morning,” defense ministry spokesman Major General Kongcheep Tantravanich told AFP. The cause of the crash was under investigation, he added. No one else was harmed in the incident, according to an airport official, as the audience was gathered a considerable distance away from the crash site. AFP
EU WANTS FINANCE SECTOR DEAL AMID BREXIT LONDON—The European Union’s chief Brexit negotiator has told colleagues that they need to strike a “special” deal with Britain’s finance sector in order to keep credit flowing to the continent, the Guardian reported Friday. Michel Barnier said he wanted to guarantee that banks, businesses and governments from the other 27 member nations will still have access to the City of London after Britain leaves the bloc, according to unpublished minutes of the private meeting seen by the British newspaper. However, a European Commission spokesman told the newspaper that the minutes did not “correctly reflect what Mr Barnier said.” Barnier has so far taken a hard line on potential negotiations, and any concession that the EU may need to compromise over vital issues in the divorce proceedings will be viewed as a climbdown. AFP