Category: Новини

The political dispute over a new election law in the southern state of Georgia has broadened into a debate over whether the United States should participate in a boycott of the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing, China. On Tuesday, State Department spokesperson Ned Price acknowledged the U.S. will discuss with allies whether to jointly boycott the games to protest Beijing’s repression of minorities and major human rights abuses. “A coordinated approach will be not only in our interest but also in the interest of our allies and partners,” he told reporters at a daily briefing. But he stressed that no final decision has been reached. The administration signaled a willingness to consider such a move shortly after conservative Republicans demanded that President Joe Biden justify U.S. participation in the games. The Republican lawmakers were annoyed with Biden’s support for a protest against the Georgia law, including Major League Baseball’s decision to move the All-Star Game out of Atlanta, and claimed the administration was being hypocritical by not boycotting the Olympics. Staff members sit near a board with signs of the 2022 Olympic Winter Games, at the National Aquatics Center, known colloquially as the “Ice Cube”, in Beijing, China, April 1, 2021.Activists around the world have been demanding that countries boycott the Beijing Games to protest the country’s domestic policies, including what the U.S. State Department has called the “genocide” of Muslim Uyghurs in Xinjiang province and its crackdown on the pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong. While there has been some discussion of the possibility of the U.S. boycotting the Winter Olympics or limiting participation, the issue hasn’t had much salience until now. There appears to be a growing effort to change that after Biden said in an interview last week with the sports television channel ESPN that he would back Major League Baseball’s decision to move its annual All-Star Game out of Georgia in response to the state’s new election statute. Voter suppression claims In the wake of surprising Democratic victories in the general election and in two Senate runoff elections — the latter of which gave Democrats complete control of Congress — Georgia’s heavily Republican legislature passed a raft of measures changing the state’s voting laws. While there is debate about how restrictive the rules are, the general consensus is that some elements of the law will make it more difficult to vote in the state’s urban areas, which are racially diverse and skew Democratic, and will widen access in rural and predominantly white areas that favor Republicans. Widespread anger at the law’s impact on minority voters was led in part by highly visible professional athletes. So last week, when Biden sat down for the ESPN interview, he was asked his opinion on what was then only the possibility that Major League Baseball would move the All-Star Game. “I think today’s professional athletes are acting incredibly responsibly,” Biden said. “I would strongly support them doing that.” FILE – Ground crews work at Sun Trust Park, now known as Truist Park, in Atlanta, Oct. 7, 2018. Truist Park lost the 2021 All-Star Game on April 2, when Major League Baseball moved the game over the objections to Georgia’s new election law.Two days later, when the league announced it would shift the All-Star Game out of Atlanta to Denver, Colorado, the condemnation on the political right was swift. Amid the complaints about “cancel culture” and “wokeness,” a number of conservative commentators and elected officials coalesced around the demand that Biden justify U.S. participation in the Olympics, given the Chinese government’s treatment of its own people. “When Joe Biden decides to boycott the Olympics in China, where the Communist Chinese regime is committing genocide, then he can weigh in on Georgia,” Republican Senator Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee wrote on Twitter. “We can’t wait to see what the U.S. President is going to say about China’s voting rules,” The Wall Street Journal editorial board wrote. “There are no lines at polling places in the Middle Kingdom, because there are no polling places, no absentee ballot controversies because there are no ballots. … Perhaps Mr. Biden can compare the voting rules in Georgia to those in the re-education camps in Xinjiang province.” The Journal’s editors say they do not support a boycott, even as they demand Biden explain why he isn’t calling for one. Backing for boycottHowever, there has also been a chorus of opposition to full U.S. participation in the Beijing Games among conservative lawmakers for several years. Recommended actions have included everything from a full-blown boycott to a more limited “diplomatic boycott” that would see a junior member of the Biden administration heading the U.S. delegation to the games, rather than the president or vice president. Last month, Republican Senator Mitt Romney of Utah, who was president and CEO of the Salt Lake Organizing Committee for the 2002 Olympic Winter Games, called for a combined economic and diplomatic boycott of the 2022 Winter games. In a New York Times op-ed, he wrote, “Let us demonstrate our repudiation of China’s abuses in a way that will hurt the Chinese Communist Party rather than our American athletes: reduce China’s revenues, shut down their propaganda, and expose their abuses.” Athletes take part in a curling competition held as a test event for the 2022 Olympic Winter Games, at the National Aquatics Center, in Beijing, China, April 1, 2021.Jules Boykoff, a professor of political science at Pacific University and author of four books about the politics of the Olympics, said, “A lot of the arguments for boycotting the games, or moving them, have actually emerged out of Republican circles. (Florida Senator) Marco Rubio, for example, has been on top of it for a long time, as has (Congressman) Christopher Smith in New Jersey.” Boykoff said there has been some Democratic support as well. “Here in the United States, China has become sort of an all-purpose, bipartisan political punching bag. And so, Democrats also have been speaking out a lot about China in general, and then more recently about this idea of the possibility of boycotting the Olympics. So, there’s bipartisan support for considering the possibility.” Full boycott unlikely Some experts, however, believe there is little likelihood of anything more than the limited diplomatic boycott taking place. Victor A. Matheson, a professor at the College of the Holy Cross in Boston who studies the economics of sports, said that historically, Olympic boycotts have been very unpopular within the country doing the boycotting because “athletes lose the opportunity to compete, and in many sports, this is your only opportunity to monetize your perhaps decades of work.” He added, “I would be very surprised if we boycotted. It would be, I think, very politically difficult for Biden, mainly because so many Americans, their hearts really do go out to the athletes themselves, who would miss this opportunity.” But the fact that the discussion is taking place might be a sign that in the future, human rights abuses could become a major consideration when international organizations are considering bids to host major events. Boykoff said Major League Baseball’s actions in Georgia and the calls to boycott the Beijing Games might be part of a larger trend. While the complexities of derailing the Winter Olympics are orders of magnitude greater than those of moving a single baseball game, he said, he sees them as part of a “larger zeitgeist.” 
 
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From a distance, it looks like college kids in sweat clothes tossing a football around on a campus green space. Draw closer, and it’s apparent this is no sandlot game.  A coach is explaining routes he wants receivers to run on a play he calls “Bingo.” Then he tells his quarterbacks to make quicker decisions. Next, he demonstrates how a receiver in motion sets up as a blocker next to the center and the running back takes a handoff and heads for a hole that should open on the left side. The women Jaison Jones is coaching listen intently and ask lots of questions. More than half showed up at Midland University from faraway places to continue playing the growing sport of flag football at the 1,600-student school in a town of 26,000 nestled in the farmland of eastern Nebraska. Ottawa University women’s flag football team cheers before an NAIA flag football game against Midland University in Ottawa, Kan., March 26, 2021.Allison Maulfair and Spencer Mauk were teammates at their high school in Bradenton, Florida, a state where a nation-high 7,700 girls at 278 schools play varsity flag football. Jones recruited them at summer showcase, and after Maulfair and Mauk made the 1,500-mile drive to Fremont for a visit, they decided it was where they wanted to be. “I’m just really passionate about this sport,” Maulfair said. “I fell in love with it my freshman year of high school and haven’t stopped loving it. It doesn’t matter where I’m at. It just matters playing the game with great people, really.” E’leseana Patterson figured she was done with flag football after she quarterbacked her Las Vegas high school team to a state championship in 2019. Her plan was to stay home, help her mom and take classes at UNLV. On a lark, she went to a showcase in Vegas and ended up impressing Jones. She took a virtual campus tour and knew she wanted to be part of what was happening at Midland, as did four other players she competed against in high school. “Once my mom saw someone wanted me to play the sport I love, she was like, ‘Go,’ ” Patterson said. “I took the chance and came out here. I’d never heard of Midland University. I heard of Nebraska, I heard of Omaha. Not Fremont.”  Ottawa quarterback Madysen Carrera passes to a teammate while pressured by a Midland defender during an NAIA flag football game in Ottawa, Kan., March 26, 2021.Women’s flag football is in its first year of competition in the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics. The NAIA entered a partnership with the NFL and Reigning Champs Experiences, which operates flag football programs across the country. It’s classified as an emerging sport, meaning there’s no NAIA-sponsored championship. Championship status is achieved once there are 40 programs, a threshold flag football could reach in two or three years. The National Junior College Athletic Association recently announced a similar partnership with the NFL and Reigning Champs and intend to start games in spring 2022. The sport is played seven on seven on a field 80 yards long and 40 yards wide. There are four 12-minute quarters. It’s 20 yards instead of 10 for a first down. All players are eligible receivers. Players are “tackled” when a defender pulls one of the three flags attached to the ball carrier’s belt. Midland and 12 other small schools received $15,000 in seed money from the NFL. That’s about half of what it costs per year to operate a program, according to the NAIA, but doesn’t include cost of scholarships. Midland offers 33 sports and more than 70% of its students are athletes. The Warriors have 14 flag football players, and all pay more in tuition than they receive in scholarship aid. Athletic director Dave Gillespie said he expects a strong return on investment. “You’re talking about kids who love playing the sport and probably didn’t think they would have the opportunity to combine it with getting a college degree,” Gillespie said. “I think that’s a strong pull.” The 40-year-old Jones, the Midland coach, played small-college football in Kansas and is defensive coordinator for an Omaha women’s semipro tackle football team in the summer. His day job is general manager for a pest control company. Ottawa quarterback Madysen Carrera (21) is tackled by Midland defender Casey Thompson, left, during an NAIA flag football game in Ottawa, Kan., March 26, 2021.”The sport is going to flourish more than what people think,” Jones said. “I was in Tampa for a showcase about a month ago and there were about 1,500 girls there. You come back to the Midwest and people question you, like, ‘Girls play flag football in college? Is that a thing?’ ” In addition to Florida and Nevada, Jones recruited two players from Alaska. Four Nebraskans also are on the team. “There’s still work to be done, a lot of work getting girls to come in,” Jones said. “It’s a continuous grind to get the program where I want it to be and to have a winning program.” Florida has by far the most girls playing flag football, followed by Nevada (1,900) and California (660), according to the most recent participation numbers provided to the National Federation of State High School Associations. From 2013-18, high school participation increased 27%, to more than 11,000. Midland is 4-7 after a 34-13 home loss to Ottawa University of Kansas last Friday, a better showing than the 39-0 loss to the Braves a week earlier. Ottawa is 7-1 and among the best of the new programs. Only one of the Braves’ 21 players is from Kansas, and their coaches are former San Francisco 49ers assistant Katy Sowers and her sister, head coach Liz Sowers. The competitiveness of games varies. Ottawa beat Milligan (Tennessee) 84-0 but lost 26-25 to Keiser (Florida). Midland has won 88-0 and lost 52-0. Midland receiver-linebacker Casey Thompson, who grew up 30 miles away in Omaha, played basketball two years at Midland before she decided to try football for the first time this spring. “You have some players who are high-level players,” she said, “and then there’s the other ones who aren’t quite up there.” Thompson said she couldn’t imagine doing what many of her teammates did — move across the country to attend a small college, sight unseen in most cases, and play flag football. Maulfair, the receiver and cornerback from Florida, said the pull of the sport was too strong. Her parents and siblings weren’t going to hold her back. “They didn’t know where I was going to go,” Maulfair said, “but once they found out I was going to commit, they were stoked.” 
 
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A famed chess café in New York City called Chess Forum has survived the pandemic. Elena Wolf reports in this story narrated by Anna Rice.Camera: Max Avloshenko  
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North Korea says it will not participate in the upcoming Tokyo Olympics due to concerns about the coronavirus pandemic.  The country’s sports ministry said the decision was made “in order to protect players from the world public health crisis caused by COVID-19,” in a statement dated Monday. If North Korea follows through with the decision, it would be the first time it has skipped an Olympics since 1988, when the games were in Seoul. It is the first country to pull out of this year’s Tokyo games.  The Tokyo games have been delayed a year due to the coronavirus but are set to begin July 23 with strict virus-prevention measures in place. North Korea, which is particularly vulnerable to disease outbreaks, has imposed perhaps the world’s most stringent coronavirus prevention measures.  For more than a year, the country has attempted to almost completely seal its borders and has implemented even stricter than usual domestic travel restrictions.  North Korea insists its border restrictions have succeeded in keeping the virus out of the country — a claim largely dismissed by experts.  Some Korea watchers express concern Pyongyang will use the pandemic to extend its draconian restrictions indefinitely to impose greater control on the population. North Korea has one of the world’s poorest countries, observers say, and does not have adequate health infrastructure. The coronavirus lockdown made things worse, with reports emerging of food and medicine shortages.  Cherry blossom flowers bloom outside the Japan National Stadium, where opening and closing ceremonies and other events for Tokyo 2020 Olympics will be held, as a guard stands along the fence Tuesday, April 6, 2021, in Tokyo. (AP Photo/Kiichiro Sato)Impact on diplomacy The North’s decision to skip the Tokyo Olympics suggests the lockdown will not end anytime soon. But experts say Pyongyang could reverse its decision.  “This seems as much a political decision designed to snub/pressure Tokyo & Seoul as much as it is a public health concern,” tweeted Jean Lee, Director of the Korea Program at The Wilson Center in Washington, D.C.Has any other country announced it would skip #Tokyo2020 Olympics? This seems as much a political decision designed to snub/pressure Tokyo & Seoul as much as it is a public health concern.https://t.co/rzvlS1ZL60— Jean H. Lee (@newsjean) April 6, 2021South Korea had proposed using the summer games as a catalyst for renewed sports diplomacy between the two Koreas.   Such a strategy has worked in the past. In 2018, Seoul successfully converted inter-Korean sports cooperation at the Winter Olympics into a series of North-South meetings, which eventually led to talks between North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and U.S. President Donald Trump.  Those talks have now been stalled for more than a year. North Korea said last month it considers any talks a “waste of time” unless the United States changes its approach.  South Korea’s President Moon Jae-in, leader of the country’s Democratic Party, has less than a year in office and is willing to resume talks with North Korea.North Korea Tops Agenda for US-Japan-South Korea MeetingDiscussions about Pyongyang follow recent provocative missile tests it conducted  Some in South Korea are pushing for South and North Korea to jointly host the 2032 Olympic games, though it is far from clear whether Pyongyang would accept.  
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North Korea says its athletes will not take part in the Tokyo Summer Olympics this year because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The decision was announced Tuesday on the state-operated website Sports in DPRK, using the acronym for the country’s official name, Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. The website said the decision was made after a meeting on March 25 of the North’s Olympic Committee, citing the need to “protect athletes from the global health crisis” caused by the coronavirus. This is the first time North Korea will miss an Olympics since boycotting the 1988 Summer Games in Seoul. The North’s absence is a further blow on South Korea’s hopes to salvage the diplomatic breakthrough between the bitter rivals achieved at the 2018 Winter Olympics, when a large delegation led by Kim Yo Jong, the sister of leader Kim Jong Un, traveled across the border to attend the event hosted in the South Korean city of Pyeongchang. The newly-created detente eventually led to historic talks between Kim Jong Un and then-U.S. President Donald Trump. But those overtures have since faded over the continued stalemate between Pyongyang and Washington over the North’s nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programs. North Korea’s withdrawal from the Tokyo Games could also dampen plans for the two Koreas joint bid to host the 2032 Summer Olympics. South Korea’s Unification Ministry, which handles inter-Korean affairs, issued a statement expressing regret over Pyongyang’s decision, which it said would have provided an opportunity to improve cross-border relations. 
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Ever since the pandemic lockdown began in the U.S. in March 2020, the pet adoption business has been booming.  But trend hasn’t just been good for the animals. Lesia Bakalets has the story, narrated by Anna Rice.Camera: Andrey Degtyarev     
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Pop star The Weeknd has announced he will be donating $1 million to relief efforts in Ethiopia amid the country’s ongoing conflict in the Tigray region.A U.N. statement said his donation, the equivalent of 2 million meals, went to World Food Program USA, the U.S. affiliate of the United Nations World Food Program, and will be put towards providing lifesaving food for those affected.”My heart breaks for my people of Ethiopia as innocent civilians ranging from small children to the elderly are being senselessly murdered and entire villages are being displaced out of fear and destruction,” wrote the Super Bowl half-time singer on Instagram Sunday.The Weeknd, born Abel Makkonen Tesfaye, is the son of Ethiopian immigrants Makkonen and Samra Tesfaye.The conflict in Ethiopia’s northern Tigray region broke out in November when Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) fighters attacked army bases in the region, prompting Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed to launch a military offensive to push the group out.Since then, thousands of civilians in the region have been killed and hundreds of thousands have been displaced from their homes.The Ethiopian government now estimates 4.5 million people are in need of emergency food assistance and have asked the U.N. World Food Program to help support 1.4 million. 
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Tara VanDerveer hugged each of her Stanford players as they climbed the ladder to cut down the nets, capping a taxing whirlwind journey and ending an exhaustive women’s college basketball championship drought for the Cardinal. It took 29 years, that included 10 weeks on the road this season because of the coronavirus, for VanDerveer and the Cardinal to be crowned the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) women’s basketball champions again.  “We had some special karma going for us,” VanDerveer said. “Sometimes you have to be lucky. I’ll admit it, we were very fortunate to win.” Haley Jones scored 17 points and Stanford beat Arizona 54-53 Sunday night, giving the Cardinal and their Hall of Fame coach their first national championship since 1992. “Getting through all the things we got through, we’re excited to win the COVID championship,” VanDerveer said. “The other one was not quite as close, the last one. But we are really excited. No one knows the score, no one knows who scored, it’s a national championship.”Stanford head coach Tara VanDerveer cuts down the net after the championship game against Arizona in the women’s Final Four NCAA college basketball tournament, Sunday, April 4, 2021, at the Alamodome in San Antonio. Stanford won 54-53.It was not a masterpiece by any stretch with both teams struggling to score and missing easy layups and shots, but Stanford did just enough to pull off the win — it is second straight by a point. Stanford (31-2) built a nine-point lead in the fourth quarter before Arizona (21-6) cut it to 51-50 on star guard Aari McDonald’s 3-pointer. After a timeout, Jones answered with a three-point play with 2:24 left. That would be Stanford’s last basket of the game. McDonald got the Wildcats within 54-53 with 36.6 seconds left converting three of four free throws. “I just owe it all to my teammates, they have confidence in me when I don’t have confidence in myself,” said Jones, who was honored as the tournament’s Most Outstanding Player. “I saw they needed me to come up big and I did.” The Cardinal, after another timeout could not even get a shot off, giving Arizona one last chance with 6.1 seconds left, but McDonald’s contested shot from the top of the key at the buzzer bounced off the rim. “I got denied hard. I tried to turn the corner, they sent three at me. I took a tough, contested shot and it didn’t fall,” said McDonald, who fell near midcourt, slumped in disbelief while the Cardinal celebrated. It has been quite a journey for VanDerveer and the Cardinal this season. The team was forced on the road for nearly 10 weeks because of the coronavirus, spending 86 days in hotels during this nomadic season. “It was a long, very difficult journey being on the road, sleeping in hotels, living out of your bag. It is just a lot. You’re on the bus, you’re on planes all the time and there’s just never really an end in sight so it’s difficult,” Jones said.  “But I think from that experience and losing on the road and dropping one at home I think it just really kind of grew this extra like chip on our shoulder almost.” The team did not complain and went about their business and now have another NCAA championship. Along the way the Hall of Fame coach earned her 1,099th career victory to pass Pat Summitt for the most all time in women’s basketball history. Now the 67-year-old coach has a third national title to go along with the ones she won in 1990 and 1992. That moved her into a tie with Baylor’s Kim Mulkey for third most all time behind Geno Auriemma and Summitt. VanDerveer had many great teams between titles, including the ones led by Candice Wiggins and the Ogwumike sisters — Nneka and Chiney, but the Cardinal just could not end their season with that elusive win in the title game until Sunday night. It was the first women’s basketball championship for the Pac-12 since VanDerveer and Stanford won the title in 1992. The last time a team from the conference was in the title game was 2010 when the Cardinal lost to UConn. That game was also played in the Alamodome — the site of every game in this tournament from the Sweet 16 through Sunday’s championship game. The entire NCAA Tournament was played in the San Antonio area because of the COVID-19 pandemic.  While Stanford had history on its side, Arizona has been building under coach Adia Barnes, who was the fourth Black woman to lead her team to the championship game, joining Carolyn Peck, Dawn Staley and C. Vivian Stringer. Peck and Staley won titles. Barnes starred for the Wildcats as a player in the late 90s and came back to her alma mater five years ago. She guided the team to the WNIT title in 2019 and led them to their first NCAA title game ever. This was the team’s first appearance in the NCAA Tournament since 2005 — although the Wildcats would have made the tournament last season had it not been canceled by the coronavirus.  McDonald, who followed her coach from Washington as a transfer, has been a huge reason for the team’s success. The 5-foot-6 guard struggled against the Cardinal, finishing with 22 points while going 5-for-20 from the field. The Wildcats were trying to be only the fourth team to trail by double digits and win a championship.  These teams met twice during the regular season and Stanford rolled past Arizona both times, winning by double digits in each game. This one came down to a final chance for the Wildcats, but they fell just one-point short. 
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Green-Wood Cemetery in New York – one of the oldest and largest American cemeteries – now has its own artist-in-resident.  Anna Nelson tells us more in this report narrated by Anna Rice.Camera: Vladimir Badikov 
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