Category: Новини

The Kennedy Center Honors will return in December with a class that includes Motown Records creator Berry Gordy, “Saturday Night Live” mastermind Lorne Michaels and actress-singer Bette Midler.Organizers expect to operate at full capacity, after last year’s ceremony was delayed for months and later conducted under COVID-19 restrictions.This 44th class of honorees for lifetime achievement in the creative arts is heavy on musical performers. The honorees also include opera singer Justino Diaz and folk music legend Joni Mitchell.All will be honored on December 5 with a trademark program that includes personalized tributes and performances that are kept secret from the honorees.Deborah Rutter, president of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, said the current plan is to pack the center’s opera house to full capacity and require all attendees to wear masks. But the plans remain fluid and Rutter said they’re ready to adapt to changing circumstances depending on the country’s COVID-19 situation.Time to party”We don’t know for sure what it’s going to be like,” Rutter said in an interview. “But don’t you think we all deserve to have a party?”The 43rd Kennedy Center Honors class was delayed from December 2020 as the center largely shut down its indoor programming. A slimmed-down ceremony was finally held in May of this year, with a series of small socially distanced gatherings and pre-taped video performances replacing the normal gala event.”We know how to do it now. We will make whatever adjustments we need,” Rutter said. “We’re going to be wearing masks right up until we don’t have to.”Midler, 75, has won four Grammy Awards, three Emmys and two Tony Awards, along with two Oscar nominations. Her albums have sold over 30 million copies. In a statement, Midler said she was “stunned and grateful beyond words. For many years I have watched this broadcast celebrating the best talent in the performing arts that America has to offer, and I truly never imagined that I would find myself among these swans.”FILE – Joni Mitchell arrives at the Hammer Museum’s “Gala In The Garden,” in Los Angeles, Oct. 11, 2014.Mitchell, 77, emerged from the Canadian coffee shop circuit to become one of the standard-bearers for multiple generations of singer-songwriters. In 2020, Rolling Stone magazine declared her 1971 album “Blue” to be the third-best album of all time. In a brief statement, Mitchell, said, “I wish my mother and father were alive to see this. It’s a long way from Saskatoon.”The December 5 ceremony will be the centerpiece of the Kennedy Center’s 50th anniversary of cultural programing. The center opened in 1971 and a young Diaz, now 81, actually performed at the grand opening of the opera house.”It’s a very special thing,” said Diaz, a bass-baritone from San Juan, Puerto Rico. “It’s such a great privilege to be able to say I shared this space with all these geniuses.”Gordy, 91, founded Motown Records — the Detroit-based hit factory that spawned what became known as the Motown Sound and launched the careers of a huge list of artists, including Smokey Robinson, Diana Ross, Stevie Wonder, Lionel Ritchie, Marvin Gaye and Martha and the Vandellas.FILE – Berry Gordy attends the the 48th Annual Songwriters Hall of Fame Induction and Awards Gala at the New York Marriott Marquis Hotel in New York, June 15, 2017.Gordy said in an interview that he always held President John Kennedy as one of the greatest leaders in American history.”So to be honored in his name just means the world to me,” he said.Michaels, 76, is a comedy institution unto himself — creating and producing “Saturday Night Live” since 1975 and producing dozens of movies and television shows, including “Wayne’s World,” “Kids in the Hall” and “Mean Girls.” He received the Kennedy Center’s Mark Twain Award for lifetime achievement in comedy in 2004.Not normally an on-stage performer, Michaels recalls the Mark Twain evening as “mostly nerve-racking” because he spent the evening dreading the traditional end-of-night speech he had to deliver.FILE – Producer Lorne Michaels attends the American Museum of Natural History’s 2019 Museum Gala in New York, Nov. 21, 2019.But the Kennedy Center Honors bring no such pressures, and Michaels said he intends to sit back in the special honorees box at the opera house and see what surprises the organizers have in store.”You don’t have to give a speech at the end, which is huge,” he said. “You’re just there with your friends.”
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Barring another postponement, Friday’s opening ceremony of the Tokyo Olympics will launch competitions overshadowed by a pandemic that has already forced a major delay, has interfered with the pageantry ahead of the Games, and will keep spectators from the stands and prevent some athletes from competing at all.For casual observers in the United States, excitement and anticipation are hard to find as the Olympic Games vie for attention with dire domestic and international headlines.”We’ve hardly heard much about it,” Kevin Watson of Alexandria, Virginia, told VOA. “It’s already been a letdown, with few interviews with the athletes or TV commercials to promote the sports.”Even before the pandemic, primetime ratings for the Summer Olympics had been declining.Surfer Carissa Moore of the United States heads into the water for a practice run at Tsurigasaki beach at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, in Ichinomiya, Japan, July 21, 2021.Data compiled by Zeta Global in New York indicated that 60% of Americans were not interested or excited about the Tokyo Games. And at least 45% were not even looking forward to them.No spectatorsAccording to the Zeta Global website, the reasons included last year’s postponement of the Games, less desire to sit in front of the TV after a year of lockdown, and the barring of spectators at the events.”Since there won’t be spectators to watch, cheer, jeer and shout in the stands behind the competitors, that makes the coverage boring,” Alex Willman in Carlsbad, California, said in a VOA interview. “The best part of any sporting event with a large audience is to watch their reaction to the scores.”Eliot Greenwald said he hadn’t paid much attention to the run-up to the Olympics. The avid sailor from Bethesda, Maryland, said he’d probably get more interested in the events once they began, especially watersports like sailing and diving.FILE – Katie Ledecky participates in the women’s 800-meter freestyle during wave 2 of the U.S. Olympic Swim Trials, June 19, 2021, in Omaha, Neb.With some of the athletes testing positive for the coronavirus in Tokyo, some people think the Games should be postponed again.”I love the Olympic Games, but I don’t think they should be happening now,” Barry Hunter, a boxing trainer at Headbangers Gym in Washington, told VOA by phone. He added that because of the pandemic, “the average person in the U.S. is not as excited about them as they normally would be.””They seem less important when there’s a pandemic going on around the world,” said Louise Korver, who lives in Huntersville, North Carolina.However, Jeff Shell, the chief executive of NBCUniversal, the major U.S. television network that is broadcasting most of the Olympics, thinks the time is right for the Games to begin.NBC is airing 7,000 hours of coverage across its multiple television networks. Shell told a virtual conference this week that the Tokyo Games could be the most profitable Olympics in NBC’s history.Some fans are eagerThe lack of enthusiasm is far from universal. Some Americans can’t wait to watch their favorite sports.Luisa Handem Piette in Londonderry, New Hampshire, said she would be among those glued to the TV watching the Olympics. “The U.S. audience will be much larger than anticipated,” she said in a phone interview with VOA.FILE – Signs from the Belgian and Austrian teams hang on the apartment building hosting Olympics participants at the Athletes Village, in Tokyo, July 18, 2021.Bob Mandau, in Chesterland, Ohio, said he “welcomes the Olympics as a much-needed break from the negative politics on TV.”Meanwhile, Rick Kinney from Wellesley, Massachusetts, said Americans like him would watch the Olympics because “people like a feel-good story about how hard the athletes worked to get to the Games.”Sam Doering is on the swim team at Hendrix College in Conway, Arkansas. She will be following American Katie Ledecky, one of the world’s top swimmers and a favorite for top medals at the Games.”I think it’s going to be fantastic watching Ledecky, and hopefully other U.S. swimmers, do well in the swimming competitions,” she said. “And hearing the national anthem being played after they’ve won the medals is really cool.”Of all the events, women’s gymnastics is projected to be the most popular with American viewers. Zeta Global predicted 33% of the people interested in the Olympics would be focusing on that competition.Ashley Umberger, owner and head coach at North Stars Gymnastics Academy in Boonton, New Jersey, said she thought the U.S. women’s team “is going to be the one to watch” as Americans tune in to watch Simone Biles, the top-ranked female gymnast, “who is really breaking barriers.”
 
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Brisbane was picked Wednesday to host the 2032 Olympics, the inevitable winner of a one-city race steered by the IOC to avoid rival bids.The Games will go back to Australia 32 years after the popular 2000 Sydney Olympics. Melbourne hosted in 1956.“We know what it takes to deliver a successful Games in Australia,” Prime Minister Scott Morrison told International Olympic Committee voters in an 11-minute live video link from his office.When the award was later confirmed, winning the vote 72-5, Morrison raised both arms in the air and gave two thumbs up.The victory led to a fireworks display in Brisbane that was broadcast to IOC members in their five-star hotel in Tokyo.Brisbane follows 2028 host Los Angeles in getting 11 years to prepare for hosting the Games. Paris will host in 2024.The 2032 deal looked done months before the formal decision at the IOC meeting, which was held ahead of Friday’s opening ceremony of the Tokyo Games.The IOC gave Brisbane exclusive negotiating rights in February. That decision left Olympic officials in Qatar, Hungary and Germany looking blindsided with their own stalled bidding plans.Though the result was expected, a high-level Australian delegation went to Tokyo amid the COVID-19 pandemic to present speeches, films and promises on stage.The city of Brisbane sent Mayor Adrian Schrinner, the state of Queensland sent Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk and Australia’s federal government sent sports minister Richard Colbeck to woo Olympic voters.They were joined by long-time Australian Olympic official John Coates, now an IOC vice president who shaped the fast-track selection process two years ago.The first-time format, designed to cut campaign costs, gives the IOC more control and removes the risk of vote-buying.The project will see events staged across Queensland, including in Gold Coast, which hosted the 2018 Commonwealth Games.Brisbane’s renowned cricket stadium, known as the Gabba, will be upgraded and may host the sport at the Games. Cricket was played once at the Olympics, at the 1900 Paris Games.The next three Summer Games hosts — starting with Paris in 2024 — are now secured in wealthy and traditional Olympic host nations without any of the trio facing a contested vote.The IOC and its hands-on president, Thomas Bach, have torn up the template of traditional bidding campaigns and hosting votes to lock down preferred cities with the minimum risk.The future hosts offer stability for the IOC, which was stung by the two previous Summer Games contests being tainted by allegations of vote-buying when multiple cities were on the ballot.The 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics and the postponed 2020 Tokyo Olympics are still under investigation by French prosecutors. They have implicated officials who then lost their place in the IOC family as active or honorary members.A low-risk future beckons for the IOC following the often-troubled Tokyo Olympics and the 2022 Beijing Winter Games in February, which will throw scrutiny on China’s human rights record. Key partners have also been secured through 2032. The IOC’s signature broadcasting deal with NBC and top-tier sponsors Coca-Cola, Visa and Omega are tied down for the decade ahead.
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Since the last Summer Olympics in 2016, a global Black Lives Matter protest movement has resurfaced. The “Me Too” movement sprung up in support of women’s rights. And both may influence the Tokyo Games, which are expected to be a major platform for athlete activism.Several high-profile athletes competing at the Games have been at the forefront of progressive causes in their own countries and may make political statements in Tokyo, despite the International Olympic Committee threatening to punish those who speak out.“The more there are vibrant social movements in the streets, the better chances that we will see activism on the Olympic stage,” said Jules Boykoff, a former Olympic soccer player and author of four books on the Olympics. “I think we have a perfect storm, if you will, for an outburst of athlete activism.”Political protests are technically banned at the Games by Olympic Charter Rule 50. Though the rule was loosened earlier this year to allow more athlete expression, it still forbids protests from the medal stand or field of play.Rule 50 was enacted after the 1968 Olympics produced one of the most inspiring athlete protests in Olympic history. That’s when U.S. stars Tommie Smith and John Carlos raised their fists into the sky on the medal stand in a Black Power Salute.FILE – In this Oct. 16, 1968 file photo, U.S. athletes Tommie Smith, center, and John Carlos raise their gloved fists after Smith received the gold and Carlos the bronze for the 200 meter run at the Summer Olympic Games in Mexico City.ContradictionsSmith and Carlos are now widely viewed as icons for their salute. Even the IOC website FILE – Players take a knee before a Euro 2020 soccer championship quarterfinal match between Belgium and Italy at the Allianz Arena in Munich, Germany, July 2, 2021.The newly relaxed Rule 50 is vague about punishment. It’s not clear to what extent it will be enforced.Separately, the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee announced late last year it would no longer punish U.S. athletes who conduct peaceful protests, such as kneeling or raising a fist.Professional U.S. athletes — most prominently basketball players but also others — have attended anti-racism protests and worn Black Lives Matter gear before and during games.U.S. soccer star Megan Rapinoe has also been outspoken for equal pay for women.United States’ Megan Rapinoe gives the victory sign before a women’s soccer match against Sweden at the 2020 Summer Olympics, July 21, 2021, in Tokyo.The British women’s football team has already announced it will take a knee before its matches to protest racism and discrimination.Conservatives, including most notably former U.S. President Donald Trump, often criticize activist athletes, saying players should stick to sports. But even Trump has embraced players who support him and who defend conservative ideals.Intertwined with politics“In reality, there has never been a separation of sport and politics,” said Heather Dichter, a professor of sports history at Britain’s De Montfort University. That’s especially the case with the Olympics, which is full of national flags, symbols, and anthems, Dichter said. “This is the world’s biggest platform,” she added.The ‘No Fun’ Olympics May Struggle to Attract Viewers Organizers hope new tech can spur online fan interaction But not every athlete will feel comfortable speaking out. Wealthier players who receive large salaries from their professional careers may be more likely to risk punishment by speaking their minds.“If you’re an athlete from a lesser-known sport who might get kicked off the team and have their career ended by standing up for politics and lose all your sponsorships, which are the only thing that can keep you going as an athlete, you might be less inclined to speak out,” Boykoff said. Since there is an abundance of professional athletes competing in the Games this year, it’s just more reason to expect protests.“It actually opens the door to the possibility that these athletes might speak out,” he said. “After all, the Olympics need these athletes more than these athletes need the Olympics.”VOA’s Jesusemen Oni contributed to this report.
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Muslims around the world were observing Tuesday yet another major Islamic holiday in the shadow of the pandemic and amid growing concerns about the highly infectious delta variant of the coronavirus.Eid al-Adha, or the “Feast of Sacrifice,” is typically marked by communal prayers, large social gatherings, slaughtering of livestock and giving meat to the needy. This year, the holiday comes as many countries battle the delta variant first identified in India, prompting some to impose new restrictions or appeal for people to avoid congregating and follow safety protocols.The pandemic has already taken a toll for the second year on a sacred mainstay of Islam, the hajj, whose last days coincide with Eid al-Adha. Once drawing some 2.5 million Muslims from across the globe to the holy city of Mecca in Saudi Arabia, the pilgrimage has been dramatically scaled back due to the virus.This year’s hajj has been limited to 60,000 vaccinated Saudi citizens or residents of Saudi Arabia. On Tuesday, pilgrims wearing masks and maintaining social distancing, performed the symbolic stoning of the devil in the valley area of Mina — using sterilized pebbles they received ahead of time.”This is (a) very, very, very big moment for us, for me especially,” said pilgrim Arya Widyawan Yanto, an Indonesian living in Saudi Arabia. He added that he was happy he had the chance to perform the pilgrimage. “Everything was conducted under very strict precautions.”Yanto said he hoped for the pandemic to end and for all Muslims to be able to perform the pilgrimage in a safe way.Indonesia marked a grim Eid al-Adha amid a devastating new wave of coronavirus cases in the world’s most populous Muslim-majority nation. Vice President Ma’ruf Amin, also an influential Islamic cleric, appealed to people to perform holiday prayers at home with their families.”Don’t do crowds,” Amin said in televised remarks ahead of the start of the holiday. “Protecting oneself from the COVID-19 pandemic is obligatory.”The surge is believed to have been fueled by travel during another holiday — the Eid al-Fitr festival in May — and by the rapid spread of the delta variant.In Malaysia, measures have been tightened after a sharp spike in infections despite a national lockdown since June 1 — people are banned from traveling back to their hometowns or crossing districts to celebrate. House visits and customary trips to graveyards are also banned.Healthy worshippers are allowed to gather for prayers in mosques, with strict social distancing and no physical contact. Ritual animal sacrifice is limited to mosques and other approved areas.Health Director-General Noor Hisham Abdullah has urged Malaysians not to “repeat irresponsible behavior,” adding that travel and celebrations during Eid al-Fitr and another festival on the island of Borneo led to new clusters of cases.”Let us not in the excitement of celebrating the Feast of Sacrifice cause us all to perish because of COVID-19,” he said in a statement.Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin urged Muslims to stay home. “I appeal to you all to be patient and abide by the rules because your sacrifice is a great jihad in Allah’s sight and in our effort to save lives,” he said in a televised speech on the eve of the festival.The World Health Organization has reported that globally, COVID-19 deaths had climbed after a period of decline. The reversal has been attributed to low vaccination rates, relaxed mask rules and other precautions, and the delta variant.Lockdowns will severely curtail Eid al-Adha festivities in Sydney and Melbourne, Australia’s two largest cities.Sydney resident Jihad Dib, a New South Wales state government lawmaker, said the city’s Muslims were sad but understood why they would be confined to their homes with no visitors allowed.
“It’s going to be the first Eid in my life I don’t hug and kiss my mum and dad,” Dib told Australian Broadcasting Corp.Iran on Monday imposed a week-long lockdown on the capital, Tehran, and the surrounding region as the country struggles with another surge in the coronavirus pandemic, state media reported. The lockdown begins on Tuesday.Not everyone is imposing new restrictions. In Bangladesh, authorities have allowed an eight-day pause in the country’s strict lockdown for the holiday that health experts say could be dangerous.In Egypt, Essam Shaban travelled to the southern province of Sohag to spend Eid al-Adha with his family. He said ahead of the start of the holiday that he planned to pray at a mosque there on Tuesday while taking precautions such as bringing his own prayer rug and wearing a mask.”We want this Eid to pass by peacefully without any infections,” he said. “We must follow instructions.”Shaban had been looking forward to pitching in with his brothers to buy a buffalo for slaughtering, going door-to-door to give some of the meat to the poor and to the traditional festive meal later in the day with his extended family.”It’s usually boisterous with laughter and bickering with the kids,” he said. “It’s great.”
But others will be without loved ones.In India, where Eid al-Adha starts Wednesday, Tahir Qureshi would always go with his father for prayers and then to visit family and friends. His father died in June after contracting the virus during a surge that devastated the country, and the thought of having to spend the holiday without him is heartbreaking.”It will be difficult without him,” he said.India’s Muslim scholars have been urging people to exercise restraint and adhere to health protocols. Some states have restricted large gatherings and are asking people to observe the holiday at home.Meanwhile the pandemic’s economic fallout, which threw millions of Indians into financial hardship, has many saying they cannot afford to buy sacrificial livestock.In Indian-controlled Kashmir, a disputed, Muslim-majority region, businessman Ghulam Hassan Wani is among those cutting back.”I used to sacrifice three or four sheep, but this year we can hardly afford one,” Wani said.
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Bushra Shah, a 35-year-old Pakistani, says she is realizing a childhood dream by making the great pilgrimage to Mecca, and under new rules she’s doing it without a male guardian.The hajj ministry has officially allowed women of all ages to make the pilgrimage without a male relative, known as a “mehrem,” on the condition that they go in a group.
The decision is part of social reforms rolled out by de facto leader Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who is trying to shake off the kingdom’s austere image and open its oi reliant economy.Since his rise to power, women have been allowed to drive and to travel abroad without a male guardian, even against a backdrop of a relentless crackdown against critics of his rule, including women’s rights activists.”It’s like a dream come true. My childhood dream was to make the hajj,” Shah told AFP, before setting off from her home in Jeddah, the major port city in western Saudi Arabia.The hajj, one of the five pillars of Islam, is a must for able-bodied Muslims with the means to do so at least once in their lifetime.For the young mother, making the pilgrimage with her husband and child would have been a distraction that would have prevented her from “concentrating completely on the rites.”Shah is one of 60,000 pilgrims chosen to take part in this year’s hajj, which has been dramatically scaled down for the second year because of the coronavirus pandemic.Only citizens and residents of Saudi Arabia, chosen in a lottery, are taking part. Officials have said that 40% of this year’s pilgrims are women.”Many women will also come with me. I am very proud that we are now independent and do not need a guardian,” Shah said.Her husband, Ali Murtada, said he “strongly encouraged” his wife to make the trip alone, after the government’s decision to ban children from participating in the hajj this year.
He will stay in Jeddah to look after their child.”We decided that one of us should go. Maybe she will be pregnant next year or maybe the children will still not be allowed to participate,” the 38-year-old said.It was unclear when the hajj ministry lifted the restriction, and some women have reported that travel agencies are still reluctant to accept women travelling without a male companion for the hajj.Some even posted advertisements ruling out groups of unaccompanied women, in a sign of how the dizzying social changes are meeting some resistance in the deeply conservative kingdom.Authorities previously required the presence of a male guardian for any woman pilgrim younger than 45, preventing many Muslim women around the world from making the hajj.That was the case for Marwa Shaker, an Egyptian woman living in the Saudi capital, Riyadh.”Hajj without a guardian is a miracle,” the 42-year-old, who works for a civil society organization, told AFP.Now travelling to Mecca with three of her friends, the mother of three had tried several times to make the pilgrimage before the pandemic. But she was unable to because her husband had already been and was not permitted to go again so soon.”I feel enormously joyful. God has called me despite all the obstacles,” she said.For Sadaf Ghafoor, a British-Pakistani doctor, travelling without a male guardian was the “only option.””We couldn’t leave the children alone,” the 40-year-old said of her three youngsters.  Her husband decided to stay behind, and Ghafoor headed to Mecca with a neighbor.”It was not easy to take the decision to go alone … but we took this opportunity as a blessing,” she said.
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Pastry chef Shimi Aaron fell in love with babkas — a dessert that originated in Eastern Europe in the 19th century. Aaron started making his own, and today he is teaching others how to make this unusual pastry. Genia Dulot met with the chef to hear his story.Camera: Genia Dulot
 
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Danish cartoonist Kurt Westergaard, whose image of the Prophet Muhammad wearing a bomb as a turban was at the center of widespread anti-Danish anger in the Muslim world in the mid-2000s, has died. He was 86. Westergaard’s family announced his death to Danish media late Sunday and told the newspaper Berlingske that Westergaard died in his sleep after a long period of illness. Danish media reported that he died July 14, a day after his birthday. From the early 1980s, Westergaard worked as a cartoonist for Jyllands-Posten, one of Denmark’s leading newspapers, and was associated with the daily until he turned 75.  Westergaard became known worldwide in 2005 for his controversial depiction of the Prophet Muhammad in Jyllands-Posten, which published 12 editorial cartoons of the principal figure of Islam. Muslims consider images of the prophet to be sacrilegious and encouraging idolatry. The images, particularly Westergaard’s, sparked a huge wave of anger in the Muslim world and escalated into violent anti-Denmark protests by Muslims worldwide in 2006.  Several newspapers in neighboring Norway also published the controversial cartoons. Danish and Norwegian embassies in Syria were burned down by angry crowds during the demonstrations.  Political observers in the Nordic countries have described the cartoon incident as one of the most severe foreign policy crises for both Denmark and Norway in their recent histories. In the aftermath of the uproar, Westergaard received several death threats and was forced to have police protection. In 2008, three people were arrested for planning to kill him, and in 2010, a 28-year-old Somali man broke into his home with an ax and knife. The man was later sentenced to 10 years in prison. “I would like to be remembered as the one who struck a blow for the freedom of expression. But there’s no doubt that there are some who will instead remember me as a Satan who insulted the religion of over 1 billion people,” Westergaard said, according to Berlingske. Jyllands-Posten said in an editorial published Monday that with the death of Westergaard “it is more important than ever to emphasize that the struggle for freedom of expression, which became his destiny, is the struggle of all of us for freedom.” Westergaard is survived by his wife and five children, 10 grandchildren and one great-grandchild. Funeral arrangements were not immediately known. 
 
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