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☆ 'We can’t allow the cultural infrastructure to literally crumble': One of London's most popular arts attractions needs a $200 million fix
▼ + stars: | 2024-09-19 | by ( Lucy Handley | In | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +7 min

The exterior of the Hayward Gallery, part of the Southbank Centre. "We can't allow the cultural infrastructure to literally crumble in our hands, because ... without investment, it won't be here," Ball told CNBC. (The neighboring National Theatre and British Film Institute Southbank are not part of the Southbank Centre.) During his first year at the Southbank Centre, he oversaw more than 5,400 events and shows. "Thinking Fountains," an installation by German artist Klaus Weber, outside the Hayward Gallery at the Southbank Centre.

Persons: Norman Engleback, Michelle Obama, Anish Kapoor, Tracey Emin, Nina Simone, Elaine Bedell, Mark Ball, —, Ball, Queen Elizabeth Hall, Purcell, Jack Taylor, Lisa Nandy's, it's, Richard III, Antony Sher, Antony, Gilbert Prousch, George Passmore, Gilbert, George, Marina Abramovic, Elizabeth Hall, Daniel Leal, Igor Levit, Cillian Murphy, Klaus Weber Organizations: Hayward, Southbank Centre, Universal, Getty, Southbank, Conservative, Labour, CNBC, Royal Festival Hall, Queen, National Theatre, British Film Institute, Former U.S, Royal, Hall, Manchester International, Association of, of Britain, Apple, London's Southbank, Ball, Science and Industry, Royal Shakespeare Company, AFP, Artists, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra Locations: London, Manchester, Serbian

☆ How some of the biggest right-wing media stars ended up as unwitting puppets of Russian propaganda
▼ + stars: | 2024-09-07 | by ( Hadas Gold | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +13 min

Now, the Justice Department is alleging that some of the biggest stars in right-wing social media were, unwittingly, part of a sinister Russian operation to influence the 2024 US election. What is Tenet Media? “Overt shilling”The Russians also pushed Tenet to promote videos that were going viral on social media, according to the indictment. Tenet Media has not responded to requests for comment and stopped posting content on Wednesday. After the 2016 US presidential election, congressional and federal investigations showed Moscow had successfully co-opted unwitting Americans to stage protests, run social media accounts and host events at its behest.

Persons: CNN — They’re, weren’t, Tim Pool, Benny Johnson, Lauren Southern, Tayler Hansen, Matt Christiansen, Dave Rubin, Johnson, MAGA influencers, Rubin, Glenn Beck’s, Enrique Tarrio, Jack Posobiec, Pool, Donald Trump, Donald Trump Jr, Christiansen, Lauren Chen, Liam Donovan, Chen, Donovan, ”, Donald Trump’s, Vladimir Putin, Viktor Orban, Evgenia Novozhenina, “, Trump, Q, Justin Trudeau, Putin, Trudeau, Israel, ” Rubin, Eduard Grigoriann, “ Grigoriann, Tenet, Tucker Carlson, Carlson fawned, I’ll, Nina Jankowicz, ’, unvarnished ’, Renee DiResta, Donie O’Sullivan Organizations: CNN, Justice, Justice Department, Tenet Media, Kremlin, Vice Media, Independent, Young Turks, YouTube, Tenet, Google, Proud Boys, Blaze Media, Ukraine, The Justice Department, Republican Party, Trump, Democrats, ”, United, ISIS, Hungary's, Reuters “, Canadian, Hamas, FBI, Fox News, American Sunlight, Media, DOJ, Soviet, Stanford Internet Observatory Locations: Tennessee, Russia, Ukraine, ”, “ Ukraine, United States, Moscow, Russian, Colorado, American

☆ Jessica Fern's 'Polysecure' promised a world beyond monogamy. She didn't say it would be easy.
▼ + stars: | 2024-09-05 | by ( Anna Silman | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +40 min

The psychotherapist's 2020 book, "Polysecure," has become the poly bible for an increasingly queer and fluid generation. As consensual nonmonogamy went mainstream, searches for Fern's "Polysecure" spiked. "I've heard authors joke they get a cup of coffee from their book," Fern said. When Jessica Fern and Dave Cooley opened up their relationship, Cooley was surprised at the "searing anguish" he felt about his wife seeing other men. Fern, Cooley, and Fern's partner bought the property together and settled in, planning to live there long term.

Persons: Jessica Fern, Feeld, Lionel Messi, Fern, John, nonmonogamy, Molly Roden Winter's, Miranda July's, I've, Nielsen BookScan, you've, we're, Hannah, Dave Cooley, Cooley, Esther Perel, Dan Savage, Guralnik —, Ross Geller, it's, butch barista, deblasio, Chirlane McCray, Suki Waterhouse, Allison P, Davis, Clinton, isn't, Gilmore, Diego, — they're, Fern disentangled, polyamory, Julia, Apryl, Jessica, John Bowlby, Mary Ainsworth, Fern's polyamorous, she's, It's, Mike Belleme, Tobias, Lindsay, Molly Roden Winter, compersion, Fern's, —, Abby, she'd, Axios they'd, Christopher Gleason, they'd, Gleason, We've, curt, Escher, Franklin Veaux, Eve Rickert's, Rickert, aren't, I'm, Daniel Lavery, " Lavery, polysecurity hasn't, She's, pats, hasn't, polysecurity, Fern isn't, We're, Myers, Briggs, there's Organizations: New York Times, New York Magazine, SUNY, Kinsey Institute, George Mason University Locations: Costa Rica, North Carolina, Russian, Manhattan, Asheville, patrick, Fort Greene, San Francisco, Cooley, Sheepshead Bay , Brooklyn, British, polyworld, Boulder , Colorado, Vancouver, Brooklyn, COVID, Bahamas, Feeld, Fern

☆ Islamist prisoners slash guards, seize hostages in Russian jail
▼ + stars: | 2024-08-23 | by ( Https | Media-Cldnry.S-Nbcnews.Com Image Upload Newscms | ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +2 min

Knife-wielding prisoners identifying themselves as Islamic State group militants staged a bloody attack on guards in a Russian penal colony on Friday and seized hostages, according to state media and news outlets with ties to the security services. Russian state media said at least one member of the prison staff had been killed, but the video suggested the death toll was almost certainly higher. The prison service said in a statement: “During a session of a disciplinary commission, convicts took staff of the penal institution as hostages. There are casualties.”The prison is designated as a “harsh regime” penal colony with capacity to hold up to 1,241 male prisoners. In June, a bloody ISIS-linked prison uprising took place in the southern region of Rostov, where special forces shot dead six inmates who had taken hostages.

Organizations: Islamic State, ISIS Locations: Russian, Volgograd, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Ukraine, Rostov, Dagestan, Russia, Crocus City, Moscow

☆ Ukraine’s march into Russia exposes Putin’s crisis management problem
▼ + stars: | 2024-08-23 | by ( Clare Sebastian | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +9 min

But his track record of handling recent crises in Russia reveals a different side of his presidential persona: one of paralysis and indecision. Despite a claim of responsibility from ISIS-K, he continued to insist that Ukraine, and the West had played a role. Dmytro Kholod, commander of Ukraine’s “Nightingale” battalion, currently in Kursk, told CNN by phone on Wednesday that he has noticed a shift in the behavior of Russian troops. It is just a strategy for perpetuating war and allowing Russia to wait us all out,” said Ryan. “Now we see that when he’s really presented with a crisis, he’s not a cornered rat, he’s just like an imposter.

Persons: CNN —, Vladimir Putin, Putin, Evgeny Prigozhin, Wagner, ” Putin, Prigozhin, Yan Dobronosov, ”, Boris Bondarev, “, Mick Ryan, Ramzan Kadyrov, don’t, Andrei Belousov, Dmytro Kholod, Ukraine’s “ Nightingale, ” Ryan, he’s, Volodymyr Zelensky, Efrem, Ryan, Bondarev Organizations: CNN, Crocus, Russia’s, ISIS, US, Kyiv, Getty, of Human Rights, ”, Kremlin, Naval, Black, Institute for, Russian MoD, Russia, AP, NATO, Putin Locations: Russia, Russian, Kursk, Ukraine, Crocus City, Moscow, Ukrainian, Sudzha, AFP, Beslan, Kharkiv, Crimea, Kursk Oblast, ”

☆ I stayed at a North Korean summer camp. We polished statues and played a game where we destroyed the White House.
▼ + stars: | 2024-07-03 | by ( Joshua Zitser | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

When I was a kid, I remember watching a TV documentary about North Korea. I tried to find more information, so I subscribed to a group called "Solidarity with North Korea" on VKontakte — Russia's equivalent to Facebook. AdvertisementIn it, the Communist Party of the Russian Federation offered a chance to go to a North Korean children's summer camp for about $300. AdvertisementHowever, the North Korean children in the camp were quite segregated from us, and we only met them once on our last day. I can easily make friends just by talking about my experiences — people just want to hear about North Korea.

Persons: —, Yuri Frolov, Yuri Frolov's, Kim Il, Kim Il Sung, Kim Jong Il Organizations: Service, Korea's, Business, Facebook, Communist Party of, Russian Federation, Communist Party, North Locations: North Korea, Korean, St . Petersburg, Vladivostok, Russia, Pyongyang, Pueblo, Songdowon, Laos, Nigeria, Tanzania, China, North

☆ Russia has seen two terror attacks in just three months. Here’s what we know
▼ + stars: | 2024-06-24 | by ( Kathleen Magramo | Jerome Taylor | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +8 min

In Dagestan, Russian security forces fought an Islamist insurgency in the mountainous region in the 2000s that spilled over from neighboring Chechnya, though attacks have become rarer in recent years. Russian President Vladimir Putin attends a meeting with his election campaign confidants at the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia March 20, 2024. ISIS-K attack on music venueThe coordinated attacks in Dagestan come just weeks after Russia suffered its worst terror attack in decades. For a leader who has long promised security and stability to Russians, the major attack on Russian soil was another powerful blow. In the aftermath of the March attack, Putin called for Russia to remain united.

Persons: Vladimir Putin’s, Putin, Ramzan Kadyrov, Jill Dougherty, Vladimir Putin, confidants, Evgenia Novozhenina, Bashar al, Assad, Prince Mohammed bin Salman, Benjamin Netanyahu, ” Organizations: CNN, ISIS, Ukraine grinds, Russian Jewish Congress, Attackers, TASS, Russian Federation, Soviet, Hamas, Makhachkala Uytash Airport, Kremlin, Reuters, Saudi, Israeli, Central, Migrants, Kazakhstan — Locations: Russia, Russia’s, Dagestan, Moscow, Derbent, Makhachkala –, Makhachkala, Russian, Republic of Dagestan, Russia’s Caucasus, Caucasus, Soviet Union, Chechnya, –, Grozny, Ukraine, ”, Gaza, Israel, CNN Moscow, Reuters Russia, Iran, Soviet, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan

☆ I'm a woman, and my name is Tommie Christopher. People have always assumed I was lying about my name.
▼ + stars: | 2024-06-11 | by ( Tommie Brown | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

You can opt-out at any time by visiting our Preferences page or by clicking "unsubscribe" at the bottom of the email. Being a girl with "Tommie" as a first name is one thing — but having "Christopher" as a middle name turned quirky into confusing. My name is a hand-me-down that came from my dad, Thomas/Tommy, and his late best friend, Christopher. The best names come with history, and my history was of two rowdy fighters who made the streets and concert halls their home. I am grateful to my parents for not only giving me no choice but to challenge social constructs and everyone I encounter.

Persons: Tommie, Christopher, Thomas, Tommy, Tammy, Johnny Cash's, Sue, Mr, Brown Organizations: Service, Social Security Locations: France

At first sight, it looked like a typical party in a nightclub. But the lineup that night, in a concert hall that typically hosts pop artists and rappers, was unexpected: four Ukrainian folk singers, filling the room with their high-pitched voices and polyphonic choruses, accompanied by a D.J. These days, Ukrainian folk music “is becoming something cool,” said Stepan Andrushchenko, one of the singers from Shchuka Ryba, the band onstage that night. “A very cool thing.”More than two years into Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, folk music is enjoying a surge of popularity in the war-torn nation. Faced with Moscow’s efforts to erase Ukrainian culture, people have embraced traditional songs as a way to reconnect with their past and affirm their identity.

Persons: ”, Stepan Andrushchenko, Shchuka Ryba Locations: Kyiv, V’YAVA, Ukrainian, Ukraine

☆ Reconstructing skulls brings Scotland’s ancient faces back to life
▼ + stars: | 2024-05-30 | by ( Ashley Strickland | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +8 min

CNN —As visitors explore the recently opened Perth Museum and Art Gallery in Scotland, they come face-to-face with the past. Perth Museum, Culture Perth & Kinross/Chris Rynn“The excavator speculated that a desperate injury had been inflicted that possibly caused the individual’s death,” according to information that the museum shared. Perth Museum, Culture Perth & Kinross/Chris RynnEach skull took about 50 hours to reconstruct. After reconstructing each skull digitally, Rynn added layers of tissue, estimating tissue depths by studying each skull’s shape. At the end of his reconstructions, Rynn used an algorithm to animate the faces, allowing them to blink or change expressions.

Persons: Chris Rynn, Mark Hall, I’ve, ” Rynn, Hall, we’ve, what’s, ” Hall, you’ve, “ Organizations: CNN, Perth Museum, Art, Perth, Culture, Kinross, of Aberdeen Locations: Scotland, Kinross, Culture Perth, Perth, Perthshire, Scotland’s

☆ No Ordinary Music Gig
▼ + stars: | 2024-05-27 | by ( Sarah Diamond | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Now, instead of formal attire and a brightly lit concert hall, imagine the principal horn player wearing camouflage fatigues, crouching over a loaded rifle at a firing range. For the thousands of classical musicians employed by the U.S. military, this seemingly incongruous image is a reality. The military calls itself the nation’s largest employer of musicians, and its ranks include some of the country’s most coveted musical performance jobs. There are aspects of the job that might require adjustment for a civilian musician, though. My latest story, which published this morning, explores how some musicians become service members.

Persons: Ada Brooks Organizations: U.S ., West

☆ After Outcry, Concertgebouw Will Allow Jerusalem Quartet to Perform
▼ + stars: | 2024-05-16 | by ( Javier C. Hernández | More About Javier C. Hernández | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

The Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, one of the world’s most prestigious concert halls, said Thursday that it would allow the Jerusalem Quartet to perform, two days after it had canceled the ensemble’s concerts amid security concerns related to threatened protests. The Concertgebouw said in a statement that the Jerusalem Quartet would be allowed to perform on Saturday after all, with expanded security measures and a more robust police presence. The ensemble had originally been scheduled to perform on Thursday and Saturday, but the Concertgebouw canceled the engagement, saying it could not ensure the safety of audience members, musicians and employees because of the threat of protests related to the Israel-Gaza war. Simon Reinink, general manager of the Concertgebouw, said in an interview that the hall had reversed course after securing commitments from the police. We were forced to crack the dilemma of security on the one hand and freedom on the other.”

Persons: Simon Reinink, ” Organizations: Concertgebouw, Quartet Locations: Amsterdam, Jerusalem, Israel, Gaza

☆ Daniel Barenboim: What Beethoven’s Ninth Teaches Us - The New York Times
▼ + stars: | 2024-05-06 | by ( Daniel Barenboim | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Ludwig van Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony was first performed exactly 200 years ago Tuesday and has since become probably the work most likely to be embraced for political purposes. (These days the Ninth is being played in concert halls worldwide in commemoration of the premiere. Beethoven might have been surprised at the political allure of his masterpiece. He was interested in politics, but only because he was deeply interested in humanity. I don’t believe, however, that Beethoven was interested in everyday politics.

Persons: Ludwig van Beethoven’s, Leonard Bernstein, ”, Joy, Beethoven, Napoleon —, “ Bonaparte ” —, Napoleon Organizations: European Union Locations: Berlin

☆ A City Scarred by Terrorism Prepares an Olympic Opening Without Walls
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-27 | by ( Catherine Porter | Ségolène Le Stradic | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

A terrorist attack of 2015 that left her city angry and heartbroken persuaded Paris’s mayor, Anne Hidalgo, to campaign for the Olympic Games. “Something that is very powerful, very peaceful and allows us to move forward. So, I threw myself into it.”Nine years later, the Summer Olympics are set to open in Paris in July with France at its highest level of terrorism alert, after the attack on the Moscow concert hall last month. Yet for the first time, the opening ceremony will not be held inside the barricaded confines of a stadium. Instead, athletes will float in boats down the Seine River through the heart of the dense, ancient city before half a million spectators packed into stands and leaning out of windows.

Persons: Paris’s, Anne Hidalgo, “, ”, Charlie Hebdo Organizations: Olympic Locations: Paris, France, Moscow

☆ One for the Ages: Sonia Delaunay’s Wearable Abstractions
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-25 | by ( Walker Mimms | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: 1 min

If Wassily Kandinsky bent the visible world to the whims of his canvas, reducing concert hall scenes to puddles of color and line, Sonia Delaunay seems to have worked the other way around. A fashion and textile designer by trade, the Ukrainian-born Delaunay (1885-1979) filled the world with bold and delightful patterns — with the chevrons and dot grids and floral wiggles of the many scarves and dresses she created in France — then let her paintings reflect the results. Or at least that’s the impression given by the Bard Graduate Center’s “Sonia Delaunay: Living Art,” a playful but rigorous unearthing of 184 garments, artifacts and paintings — most on loan from France — spanning 60 years of Delaunay’s career.

Persons: Wassily Kandinsky, Sonia Delaunay, Delaunay, France —, Center’s “ Sonia Delaunay Organizations: Bard, France Locations: Ukrainian, France

He was a model to me of artistic labor and discipline, even if those early paintings were painfully amateurish. The painting followed me from Amherst to my first job in New York, and on to London and Delhi. IT WASN’T MY intention to start an essay about artistic beginnings with a story of artistic death. I’m especially moved by those first moments of validation by which an artist comes out to himself, as it were. It’s this, the inexorability of the correspondence between an artist and the world, that gives those first steps their magical quality.

Persons: Naipaul, Neil Shah, James Wood —, Zack, who’d, ”, Artemisia Gentileschi, Susanna, Elders ”, I’m, ” Gustave Flaubert, “, ” Zack, it’s, Bruce Chatwin, Paul Gauguin, Salman Rushdie, Somerset Maugham, Kathryn Bigelow, Philip Glass, Arundhati Roy, Booker, Joseph Conrad, Conrad, Jacques, ” Conrad, brimming, ’, ’ ”, Clarice Lispector, Benjamin Moser, ” Lispector, Maugham, eludes, Jan van Kessel, Elder, — Pieter Bruegel, —, Rebecca West —, “ Black Lamb, J.R, Hammond, Wells, Rebecca West ”, sloughed, Henrik Ibsen’s, Rosmersholm ”, Karan Mahajan, Salman Toor, what’s, ” Hemingway, Anoushka Shankar, Ravi Shankar, Harold Bloom, Ravi, Uday, René Daumal, Rasa ”, ” Anoushka, Norah Jones, Norah, I’ve, “ Raphael, Rachel Cusk, Italy ”, Perugino, Raphael, Cusk, J.M, Samuel Beckett, Gabriel García Márquez, Thomas Pynchon’s, James Joyce, Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, Marcel Proust’s, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Read, Emma Kehlbeck, Quinton Kamara Organizations: Amherst College, Elders, Fayerweather, ”, Google, Sunday Times, Somerset, Yugoslavia, The, “, . Locations: Delhi, ”, Massachusetts, Italian, Topeka, Kan, Amherst, New York, London, Patagonia, New Delhi, Torrens, Cambridge, Polish, Ukrainian, Brazil, Flemish, Victorian England, “ H.G, Fairfield, United States, “, East, Lahore, Europe, America, Texas, Side, Manhattan, India, Italy

☆ An ISIS Terror Group Draws Half Its Recruits From Tiny Tajikistan
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-18 | by ( Neil Macfarquhar | Eric Schmitt | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Even though he spent five years in Tajik prisons as a teenager, she said he never exhibited signs of violent extremism. “We need to understand — who is recruiting young Tajiks, why do they want to highlight us as a nation of terrorists?” said the mother, Muyassar Zargarova. Many governments and terrorism experts are asking the same question. Tajik adherents of the Islamic State — especially within its affiliate in Afghanistan known as the Islamic State Khorasan Province (I.S.K.P. ISIS-K is believed to have several thousand soldiers, with Tajiks constituting more than half, experts said.

Persons: ”, Muyassar Organizations: Islamic Locations: Moscow, Tajikistan, Central Asia, Afghanistan, Khorasan Province, Russia, Iran, Turkey, Europe

☆ 3 Reasons This Country Is a Top ISIS Recruiting Ground
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-18 | by ( Neil Macfarquhar | More About Neil Macfarquhar | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

In the past year, jihadists from Tajikistan have been involved in an unusually high number of terrorist attacks or foiled plots linked to the Islamic State. Before that, Tajiks staged bloody assaults in Iran and Turkey, while several schemes in Europe said to involve Tajiks were thwarted. Hundreds of men from Tajikistan — a small, impoverished country in Central Asia controlled by an authoritarian president — have joined an affiliate of the Islamic State in Afghanistan known as the Islamic State Khorasan Province, or ISIS-K, analysts say. Poverty Fuels DiscontentTajikistan ranks among the world’s poorest countries, which drives millions of workers to seek better lives elsewhere. In a country of 10 million people, a majority of working men, estimated at more than two million, toil abroad at any given time.

Persons: — Organizations: Islamic, Fuels Locations: jihadists, Tajikistan, Islamic State, Moscow, Iran, Turkey, Europe, Central Asia, Afghanistan, Khorasan Province

He was a model to me of artistic labor and discipline, even if those early paintings were painfully amateurish. IT WASN’T MY intention to start an essay about artistic beginnings with a story of artistic death. No one captured the massive cultural and economic disparities of my life in Delhi (and his in Lahore) like Toor. But quite unbeknown to me, Toor’s life in New York had opened up a new vein of material. Not everyone who sees a Michelangelo can go off and paint a Michelangelo.”THERE ARE SO many ways to begin.

☆ Opinion: Biden needs to bring US troops back from Iraq, now
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-15 | by ( Opinion Daniel R. Depetris | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +8 min

CNN —The subject of finally concluding America’s counter-ISIS mission in Iraq has been the plot of ongoing deliberations between Washington and Baghdad for the last three years. If the Biden administration’s approach is to wait for the perfect time to get out, then it will wait for eternity. It’s worth remembering why the United States sent troops to Iraq in the first place. The mission — eliminating ISIS’ territorial caliphate — was achieved. US troops should be pulled out of Iraq and Syria now.

Persons: Daniel R, Monday’s, Joe Biden, Mohammed Shia, DePetris, Sudani, ”, Biden, Nouri al, Barack Obama, “, —, Trump, Bashar Al, Assad, Saddam Hussein, territorially, Benjamin Netanyahu’s, Israel, Iran’s Organizations: Defense, Chicago Tribune, The New York Times, Politico, Street, Guardian, CNN, Iraqi, ISIS, “, Islamic State, Maliki, US, US Air Force, State Department, “ ISIS, Twitter Locations: The, Iraq, Washington, Baghdad, Israel, United States, Syria, Iraqi, Mosul, Syrian, Baghouz, Iran, Iranian, Turkey, Russia, Afghanistan, Moscow, Israeli, Tehran

☆ A bloodthirsty ISIS branch is 'on the upswing' after the US left Afghanistan in a lurch, a former top commander says
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-12 | by ( Jake Epstein | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +11 min

AdvertisementIn the years since the US and its NATO allies left Afghanistan, a particularly violent branch of the Islamic State terror group has grown stronger. During the first few years of its existence, ISIS-K attacks were mainly confined to Afghanistan and Pakistan. The first year under the Taliban's rule saw a sharp uptick in terror attacks inside Afghanistan. But that trend has changed in recent months; attacks inside the country declined while attacks beyond its borders have increased. Thus, the conditions inside Afghanistan have awarded the terror group space to develop a greater capacity to stage external attacks.

Persons: —, Joseph Votel, Hamid, Taylor Crul, Michael Kugelman, Kugelman, MARCUS YAM, Votel, that's, Doug Ellis, Qassem, STRINGER, Michael Kurilla, John Kirby, Biden, Kirby Organizations: Service, NATO, 82nd Airborne Division, U.S . Air Force, US Air Force, REUTERS ISIS, Islamic, ISIS, Department of Defense, Hamid, AP, South Asia Institute, Wilson, Kabul International Airport, ANGELES, US Central Command, Security Forces, Staff, Getty, White, National Security, Department, Defense Locations: Afghanistan, Moscow, Kabul, Handout, Khorasan Provence, Iraq, Syria, Pakistan, Washington, Darzab district, Jowzjan province, Mar, Iran, Central Asia, Iranian, Kerman, Europe, Russia, Islamic State, Crocus, American, Achin, Nangarhar Province

☆ What information is the government actually collecting under FISA?
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-11 | by ( Zachary B. Wolf | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +7 min

They scuttled House Speaker Mike Johnson’s plan to extend the FISA Section 702 program with minimal tweaks. It is true that the FBI obtained warrants through FISA to wiretap Carter Page, an adviser to Trump’s first presidential campaign. According to the National Security Agency, 60% of what appears in the Presidential Daily Brief has some data that comes from the 702 program. The 702 program has been updated in the years since its inception, including in 2018, to include new protections to minimize Americans’ communications from being accessed without a warrant. Additionally, these proposals would bar the government from sidestepping warrant requirements by simply buying the data of Americans from so-called data brokers.

Persons: CNN —, Donald Trump, “, Mike Johnson’s, Carter, Trump’s, Trump, Read, Katie Bo Lillis, Johnson, Christopher Wray, ”, Leon Panetta Organizations: CNN, Foreign Intelligence, Trump, FISA, Republicans, FBI, Privacy, Civil, National Security Agency, Center for Justice, New York University, Brennan Center, Intelligence Community, National Intelligence, House, CIA, New Locations: Ukraine, Russia, Moscow, New York City

CNN —Paris police will “considerably boost security measures” for the Champions League quarterfinal between Paris Saint-Germain and Barcelona this week, French Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin told journalists Tuesday. The heightened security presence follows a threat from the Islamic State terror group against the Parc des Princes and other European soccer stadiums hosting Champions League matches, Darmanin said. “We’re aware of online and media reports in relation to calls to target matches across Europe and here in London. Tightened security in the Spanish capitalIn Madrid, Spanish security forces are reinforcing security measures ahead of the city’s two Champions League games at the Bernabéu and Civitas Metropolitano stadiums, police sources told CNN. On Wednesday, 1,275 security personnel are expected to be deployed for a match watched by around 68,000.

Persons: Germain, Gerald Darmanin, Darmanin, ”, Ade Adelekan, “, Clive Mason, Santiago Bernabéu, Francisco Martín Organizations: CNN, Paris, Champions League, Paris Saint, French, League, European, UEFA, London’s Metropolitan Police, Arsenal, Bayern Munich, Emirates, ” Arsenal, Metropolitan Police, Police, Bayern, Real Madrid, Manchester City, Santiago, PSG, Atlético Madrid, Borussia Dortmund, ISIS, Civitas Metropolitano, Spanish Locations: Barcelona, Parc des, London’s, London, Europe, Moscow, Spanish, Madrid, England

☆ Downtown Los Angeles Places Another Big Bet on the Arts
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-09 | by ( Robin Pogrebin | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: 1 min

For decades the effort to revitalize downtown Los Angeles has been tied to arts projects, from the construction of the midcentury modern Music Center in 1964 to the addition of Frank Gehry’s soaring stainless steel Walt Disney Concert Hall in 2003. But the pandemic was tough on downtowns and cultural institutions around the country, and Los Angeles has been no exception. Its downtown office vacancy rates climbed above 25 percent. Homelessness and crime remain concerns. Many arts organizations have yet to recover their prepandemic audiences.

Persons: Frank Organizations: Center, Walt Disney Concert Hall Locations: Los Angeles

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