198 “We need to stop the current destruction of our planet and sacrificing people to benefit the short-term economic growth and corporate greed,” Thunberg said. Clashes between activists and police have been ongoing this month, and photos from the protests have shown police wearing riot gear to remove the demonstrators. More than 1,000 police officers have been involved in the eviction operation. Most of the village’s buildings have now been cleared and replaced with excavating machines. RWE and Germany’s Green party – a member of the country’s governing coalition – both reject the claim the mine expansion will increase overall emissions, saying European caps mean extra carbon emissions can be offset. But several climate reports have made clear the need to accelerate clean energy and transition away from fossil fuels. Recent studies also suggest that Germany may not even need the extra coal. An August report by international research platform Coal Transitions found that even if coal plants operate at very high capacity until the end of this decade, they already have more coal available than needed from existing supplies.
199 Passive Voice 1. are being detained 2. was released 3. was established 4. was only briefly detained 5. be released 6. was peacefully protested 7. were kettled 8. has been detained 9. were evicted 10. are demolished 11. was detained 12. have been involved 13. have been cleared 14. have replaced Tense • Present Simple*3 • Past Simple*7 • Present Perfect*4 Vocabulary Regular Verb / Irregular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb detained Regular Verb Transitive Verb released Regular Verb Transitive Verb established Regular Verb Transitive Verb protested Regular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb kettled Regular Verb Transitive Verb released Regular Verb Transitive Verb detained Regular Verb Transitive Verb detained Regular Verb Transitive Verb evicted Regular Verb Transitive Verb demolished Regular Verb Transitive Verb detained Regular Verb Transitive Verb involved Regular Verb Transitive Verb cleared Regular Verb Transitive Verb replaced Regular Verb Transitive Verb
200 Husband of missing Massachusetts mother Ana Walshe was accused of threatening to kill her and a friend in 2014, police report shows Nearly a decade before Ana Walshe went missing, the mother of three told police the man who would later become her husband, Brian Walshe, threatened to kill her and a friend, according to a police report. Ana Walshe – who has not been seen since around New Year’s – reported the death threat in 2014, telling police that someone said over the phone he “was going to kill (her) and her friend,” according to a DC Metropolitan Police Department incident report obtained by CNN. The police department confirmed Brian Walshe was the person involved in the report, which was filed by Ana Walshe – then Ana Knipp – when she lived in Washington, DC. The case was later closed because the victim refused to cooperate in the prosecution, police told CNN. CNN has reached out to Brian Walshe’s attorney. Since Ana Walshe, 39, was reported missing by her coworkers on January 4, authorities in the small coastal enclave of Cohasset, Massachusetts, have accused her husband of providing a false timeline of his actions around her disappearance, alleging he intended to hinder their investigation. Brian Walshe told police he last saw his wife the morning of January 1 when she left to fly to Washington, DC, and said he spent the next two days running errands for his mother and spending time with his children, according to a police affidavit. But police allege he lied about the errands, and prosecutors say he was seen the following day at a Home Depot paying cash for about $450 of cleaning supplies. The 47-year-old husband was arrested Sunday on a charge of misleading investigators, to which he has pleaded not guilty. Details of Brian Walshe’s tumultuous legal history have also emerged in recent days, revealing harsh criticisms of him made by a relative and family friends during a 2019 dispute over his father’s will. In affidavits submitted by his father’s nephew and close friends, Brian is described as a dishonest, “very angry and physically violent person.” The two close friends also described him as a “sociopath,” the affidavits show. CNN has reached out to current and previous attorneys for Brian Walshe regarding the claims but has not heard back. So far, investigators have uncovered several pieces of potential evidence in his wife’s disappearance: blood and a bloody knife in the family’s basement, according to prosecutors; Brian Walshe’s internet records showing searches for how to dismember and dispose of a body, according to law enforcement sources; and a hacksaw and apparent bloodstains at a trash collection site, law enforcement sources said. The couple’s three children – between ages 2 and 6 – are in the custody of the Massachusetts Department of Children and Families, according to a spokesperson. Several local
201 families have also offered to take them in so that they can remain together, two of Ana Walshe’s friends, Pamela Bardhi and Natasha Sky, told CNN. Ana Walshe is ‘an absolute radiant spirit,’ friend says An interfaith prayer vigil was held in Cohasset on Thursday for Ana Walshe and her family, as those close to her grapple with the uncertainty of her disappearance. “My stomach went upside down,” Ana Walshe’s friend and former colleague Pamela Bardhi said of hearing she was missing. Walshe is “an absolute radiant spirit, the kind of person that when you walk into a room, you just feel her energy,” Bardhi told CNN’s Don Lemon. “She is all about elevation. She’s a brilliant businesswoman and what I like to call a supermom.” Bardhi said she understood that Walshe would travel to Washington, DC, during the week for her corporate real estate job and return to her family in Massachusetts on the weekends. “Personally, I never saw any indication of any issues at home,” Bardhi said. “She never talked about anything personal,” Bardhi added. “She never talked about pain. She never really talked about her husband much. It was all about her kids and business and elevation and how she could help other people.” Ana Walshe’s family friend Peter Kirby described her as “a beacon of love and Joy” in a statement to CNN. “She lights up every room. We miss her and are doing everything we can to support her 3 beautiful children.” Where the investigation stands In just over a week since Ana Walshe was reported missing, state and local investigators have scoured the town, sifted through heaps of trash and sent several pieces of potential evidence for testing as they try to piece together the facts of the case. A “number of items” that could be evidence were found in searches north of Boston and sent for forensic testing, Norfolk County District Attorney Michael Morrissey said in a statement Tuesday. Brian Walshe told investigators he ran errands for his mother at two stores in Swampscott, about 15 miles north of Boston, on the day he said he last saw his wife, a police affidavit says. Police, however, allege those trips to the shops never happened. And while investigators say Brian Walshe’s claim that he spent the next day with his children is accurate, they allege he also made an undisclosed trip to Home Depot where he was seen on surveillance video wearing a surgical mask and surgical gloves and making a cash purchase. Prosecutors said in court Monday that he bought about $450 worth of cleaning supplies, including mops and tarps. The husband – who must get trips outside his home approved as he awaits sentencing in a prior federal fraud case – made a number of unapproved trips the week of his wife’s disappearance, the affidavit says.
202 Investigators also say Ana Walshe’s phone pinged near the couple’s house on January 1 and 2, according to prosecutor Lynn Beland, despite her husband’s claim that she left to catch a flight to Washington, DC, the morning of January 1. On Monday, investigators placed crime scene tape around dumpsters near the home of Brian Walshe’s mother in Swampscott and dug through trash at a transfer station in nearby Peabody, according to a source with direct knowledge of the investigation. At the Peabody site, they found a hacksaw, torn-up cloth material and what appeared to be bloodstains, law enforcement sources told CNN Tuesday. Further, a search of the Walshe’s home revealed blood stains and a damaged, bloody knife in the basement, according to Beland. Law enforcement sources told CNN that investigators hope to collect blood samples from the couple’s sons so they have a “direct bloodline” sample to compare against bloodied evidence in the case. Brian Walshe is being held on a $500,000 cash bail for the charge of misleading investigators and is set to appear in court on February 9.
203 Passive Voice 1. was accused 2. has not been seen 3. was filed 4. was later closed 5. was reported 6. was seen 7. was arrested 8. is described 9. was held 10. was reported 11. were found 12. is being held Tense • Present Simple • Present Continuous • Present Perfect • Past Simple *9 Vocabulary Regular Verb / Irregular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb accused Regular Verb Transitive Verb seen Irregular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb seen Irregular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb filed Regular Verb Transitive Verb closed Regular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb reported Regular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb arrested Regular Verb Transitive Verb described Regular Verb Transitive Verb held Irregular Verb Transitive Verb reported Regular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb found Irregular Verb Transitive Verb held Irregular Verb Transitive Verb
204 London police officer admits to dozens of offenses against women, including 24 cases of rape A serving officer in London’s Metropolitan Police has admitted to 49 offenses, including 24 counts of rape over an 18-year period, reigniting calls for urgent reform in the United Kingdom’s largest police force. David Carrick appeared at Southwark Crown Court in the British capital Monday to plead guilty to four counts of rape, false imprisonment and indecent assault relating to a 40-year-old woman in 2003, the UK’s PA Media news agency reported. At the Old Bailey criminal court in London last month, Carrick admitted to 43 charges against 11 other women, including 20 counts of rape, between March 2004 and September 2020, according to PA. A series of recent scandals has shed light on what the UK police watchdog called a culture of misogyny and racism in London’s police service. In September 2021, Metropolitan Police officer Wayne Couzens was sentenced to life in prison without parole for the abduction, rape and murder of Sarah Everard, a case that horrified the nation and sparked debate about violence against women. The Metropolitan Police Service Commissioner Cressida Dick resigned from her post in 2022, after a damning review by the Independent Office for Police Conduct issued 15 recommendations “to change policing practice” in the country. London’s Metropolitan Police are now investigating as many as 1,000 sex offenses and domestic abuse claims involving approximately 800 of its officers, the force’s Commissioner Mark Rowley admitted Monday. “That’s 1,000 cases to look at. Some of those will be things of no concern in the end when we look at them because it will be an argument overheard by neighbors where inquiries show there’s nothing to be concerned about,” Rowley said in an interview with UK media. “But in there, I’m sad to say, there will be some cases where in the past we should have been more assertive and looked to throw officers out and we haven’t done.” “We are going to turn all those stones over, we’re going to come to the right conclusions and we’ll be ruthless about rooting out those who corrupt our integrity. You have my absolute assurance on that,” he said ‘Absolutely sickened’ The UK’s Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) called Carrick’s case one of the “most shocking” it’s ever seen. “The scale of the degradation Carrick subjected his victims to is unlike anything I have encountered in my 34 years with the Crown Prosecution Service,” CPS Chief Crown Prosecutor Jaswant Narwal said.
205 “I commend every single woman who courageously shared their traumatic experience and enabled us to bring this case to court and see justice served,” Narwal continued while speaking outside Southwark Crown Court Monday.. The senior investigating officer in the case, Detective Chief Inspector Iain Moor, called Carrick’s crimes “truly shocking.” “The police service is committed to tackling violence against women and girls in all its forms,” Moor said, adding “no one is above the law.” Assistant Commissioner for the Metropolitan Police Barbara Gray also apologized on behalf of the police force to all the victims. Gray said Monday that Carrick “should have been dismissed from the police service a long time ago.” She later added: “We should have spotted his pattern of abusive behavior and because we didn’t, we missed opportunities to remove him from the organization. We are truly sorry that Carrick was able to continue to use his role as a police officer to prolong the suffering of his victims.” “The duration and nature of Carrick’s offending is unprecedented in policing. But regrettably he is not the only Met officer to have been charged with serious sexual offences in the recent past,” she said The Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, said: “Londoners will be rightly shocked that this man was able to work for the Met for so long and serious questions must be answered about how he was able to abuse his position as an officer in this horrendous manner.” Khan commented that work to reform the culture and standards of the Met has already started following an interim review and that a new, anonymous police complaints hotline and anticorruption team has recently been established by Metropolitan Police Commissioner Mark Rowley. “But more can and must be done,” added Khan on Twitter. “It’s vital that all victims of crime have confidence in our police, and we simply must do more to raise standards and empower police leaders to rid the Met and all other police services of those officers who are clearly unfit to serve.” An institution ‘in crisis’ Women’s rights organizations called for an inquiry into the Met following Carrick’s case. UK domestic abuse charity Refuge called Carrick’s crimes “utterly abhorrent.” “When a man who has been charged with 49 offences, including 24 charges of rape, is a serving police officer, how can women and girls possibly be – or feel – safe,” Refuge tweeted Monday. UK organization End Violence Against Women also posted on Twitter: “This is an institution in crisis. That Carrick’s pattern of egregious behaviour was known to the Met and they failed to act speaks more loudly than their empty promises to women.”
206 “Solidarity with the victims & all who are feeling the weight of the traumatic details being reported,” it added. The British Women’s Equality Party tweeted: “The Met knew about the allegations for TWENTY years. They did nothing as a serial rapist abused his power. They are complicit. Misogyny will never be stripped from the police without a nationwide, statutory inquiry.” The Fawcett Society, which campaigns for gender equality and women’s rights, said on Twitter: “Any act of sexual violence is a disgrace. But it is particularly harmful when, yet again, these crimes have been perpetrated by a person who has additional responsibilities to keep the public safe.”
207 Passive Voice 1. was sentenced 2. be concerned 3. is committed 4. have been dismissed 5. be answered 6. has been established 7. be done 8. was known 9. are being reported 10. be stripped 11. have been perpetrated Tense • Present simple*6 • Present Continuous • Past Simple*2 • Present Perfect*3 Vocabulary Regular Verb / Irregular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb sentenced Regular Verb Transitive Verb concerned Regular Verb Transitive Verb committed Regular Verb Transitive Verb dismissed Regular Verb Transitive Verb answered Regular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb established Regular Verb Transitive Verb done Regular Verb Transitive Verb known Regular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb reported Regular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb stripped Regular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb perpetrated Regular Verb Transitive Verb
208 New York man arrested, charged with assault and aggravated harassment in alleged New Year’s Eve anti-Asian attack A New York man has been arrested and charged with felony assault and aggravated harassment after allegedly attacking a woman and then making an anti-Asian remark toward her on New Year’s Eve, the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office said. Christopher McCormack, 55, allegedly pushed a 56-year-old woman to the ground on New Year’s Eve in Manhattan, then made an anti-Asian statement before fleeing the scene, according to the District Attorney’s Office. “Stupid Asian b*tch, do you want another one?” McCormack allegedly said to the victim, according to a complaint from the District Attorney’s Office. McCormack, who is White, was arrested Sunday at a veterans homeless shelter in Queens, a New York Police Department source said. He faces felony charges of third-degree assault as a hate crime and second-degree aggravated harassment, according to the District Attorney’s Office. It does not appear McCormack and the victim knew each other, and they had no prior interactions before he pushed her from behind, police said. The woman suffered a minor injury but refused medical care, police said. CNN has reached out to McCormack’s attorney for comment. The attack is one of the latest amid a swell in anti-Asian discrimination nationwide. In the first quarter of 2021 alone, reported hate crimes against Asians in 16 of the nation’s largest cities and counties rose 164% over the prior year, according to a study from the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University, San Bernardino. The most prominent example may be the fatal 2021 shooting of eight people, mostly Asian women, at Atlanta-area spas in which prosecutors are pursuing hate crimes charges based on the victims’ sex and race. Last week in New York City, a man pleaded guilty to manslaughter as a hate crime and agreed to serve 22 years in prison in the April 2021 assault of a Chinese-American man, while another man pleaded guilty to first-degree manslaughter and got 20 years in prison for striking a Chinese woman in 2021 with a rock. Passive Voice 1. has been arrested 2. was arrested Tense • Past Simple • Present Perfect Vocabulary Regular Verb / Irregular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb arrested Regular Verb Transitive Verb arrested Regular Verb Transitive Verb
209 Opinion: ‘True crime’ makes entertainment of someone else’s tragedy For as long as humans have consumed media, we have been drawn to stories about the dark corners of human experience. Murder ballads and popular songs recount gruesome deaths. In the 18th and 19th centuries, cheap publications detailing scandalous crimes — “Horrid brutish and bloody murder” and promising “Awful disclosures!” — circulated widely. It’s much the same with the “true crime” genre that’s all over cable television, streaming services and podcast charts – stories that detail the actions of the murderous criminal, the vulnerability of his victim and how he almost got away with the evil deed. An unsolved crime troubles our desire for certainty, answers and justice. It’s tempting to go over the facts of the case again and again, hoping to find the one piece of information that will unlock everything and bring closure. That certainly has proved to be the case for the awful murders of the four college students — Kaylee Goncalves, Madison Mogen, Ethan Chapin and Xana Kernodle — stabbed in Moscow, Idaho. Murders have always been a particular subject of public fascination. Homicides that get the most coverage, however, tend to be the least representative. This particular case had many of the hallmarks of the kind of killings that become national obsessions. The murders were brutal, and for many weeks, the suspect remained at large. The victims were heartbreakingly young and had been killed at college, a place that many of us like to imagine as safe. The murderer had, inexplicably, fatally stabbed four roommates but left two others alive. Immersing ourselves in such a horrific story can be an attempt, perversely, to make it less frightening: If we understand what happened, perhaps we can avoid falling victim ourselves. Some true crime enthusiasts I’ve spoken with told me they were driven by empathy. They felt that staying up late, reading about a case, was a way of connecting to the victims, of not letting them be forgotten. Then, of course, there are the less-flattering motivations. For some people, consuming true crime provides an opportunity to indulge their appetites for lurid details. For others, it’s an exercise in superiority: That happened to you because you were careless, or clueless or somehow deserved it. It would never happen to me. True crime stories can bring out our best and worst instincts. Empathy can curdle into voyeurism; a desire for justice can cross the line into demands for vengeance. After I wrote a book about women’s obsession with true crime, I largely stepped away from the genre. I thought I’d gotten over my own fascination, but the story of these four murdered college students got into my head. Before I went to bed, I’d visit various subreddits dedicated to the case — Moscow Murders; Idaho Murders — to see if any new details had turned up. I scrolled through the victims’ social media accounts, staring at pictures of them giddy and full of life, which were almost unbearable to look at. I brought up the crimes at a dinner party
210 before seeing everyone else is stricken facial expressions and realizing, too late, that murders didn’t make for good dinner table conversation. But the more time I spent reading about the case online, the more uneasy I grew. In their hunger for more details, some people seemed to forget that we were talking about a real tragedy that had happened to real people, and not an episode of television. They discussed the case with the fervor of fandom and fumed that the police weren’t releasing more details. They speculated over who the killer’s “target” was, as if the storyline needed a main character. They pounced on anyone who had the bad luck to be loosely tied to the crimes – an awkward neighbor, a guy at the food truck at the same time as two of the victims, a random professor – treating them as potential culprits. These amateur sleuths spun out wild theories, as if they expected a murderer with the convoluted motivation of a villain on an episode of “Criminal Minds.” They picked apart the victims’ lives, scrutinized their romantic choices and publicized their family members’ criminal records. By late December, when police arrested a suspect at his parents’ house in Pennsylvania, national attention to the case had reached a fever pitch. Since his arrest, the suspect has been extradited from Pennsylvania back to Idaho and has been charged with four counts of first-degree murder and one count of burglary. So far, the ultimate twist in the narrative around this case has been that the suspect was studying for his PhD in criminology: He was someone who might have been expected, once his education was completed, to help apprehend criminals. Instead, he has been charged with a horrific quadruple homicide. Attention since the arrest has turned to the surviving roommates, particularly the young woman who, according to police, had seen a stranger leaving the house. Paralyzed by fear at the sight of a masked intruder in her home, she had retreated to her room and locked her door. The way this young woman has been harassed is particularly egregious. It’s impossible for any of us to know how we would’ve responded. But plenty of people felt justified passing judgment on a person they don’t know, someone who just hours earlier had lost four friends in the worst way imaginable. Certainly, fascination with the grisly murders in Idaho is understandable. It was a crime that seemed pulled from nightmares: a stranger coming into your home and killing you in your bed. But the internet and true crime make for a dangerous mix. We’ve grown used to having so much information at our fingertips that our interest can easily slide into entitlement, as if we’re owed invasive details just because we’re curious. Social media’s incentives to maximize engagement spur users to speculate wildly.
211 But the friends, family, neighbors and school community touched by this crime don’t have the luxury of distance; for them, this case is all too real. In our fascination, we sometimes find it easy to forget that our online posts can have real-world consequences. The one certainty is that most of the armchair sleuths and online gawkers will move on, but probably only after the next sensational crime starts making headlines. Passive Voice 1. have been drawn 2. had been killed 3. were driven 4. be forgotten 5. is stricken 6. has been extradited 7. have been expected Tense • Present Simple*2 • Past Simple • Present Perfect*3 • Past Perfect Vocabulary Regular Verb / Irregular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb drawn Irregular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb killed Regular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb driven Irregular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb forgotten Irregular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb stricken Irregular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb extradited Regular Verb Transitive Verb expected Regular Verb Transitive Verb
212 Romanian authorities seize nearly $4 million in assets from Andrew Tate in alleged human trafficking, rape investigation Romanian authorities said they have seized nearly $4 million worth of assets belonging to controversial internet personality Andrew Tate over the past week as he and his brother are investigated on allegations of human trafficking and rape. Roughly 18 million lei, equivalent to $3,942,700, has been seized, the country’s Asset Recovery and Management Agency (ANABI) said in a press release on Saturday. Among the 29 seized assets are motor vehicles, luxury watches and sums of money in several different currencies, ANABI said. The seizures were carried out on orders from prosecutors of the Directorate for Investigating Organized Crime and Terrorism, according to ANABI. Video was published by Reuters on Saturday shows Romanian authorities at a compound emblazoned with a large “Tate” sign seizing several high-value vehicles, including a Rolls Royce, a BMW and a Mercedes Benz. Andrew and his brother Tristan Tate were detained in Romania in December as prosecutors pursued claims of human trafficking and rape. Authorities in Romania said police served search warrants at five homes and took four suspects into custody – two Britons and two Romanians – as part of the investigation. Romania’s Directorate for Investigating Organized Crime and Terrorism (DIICOT) said the four suspects had been detained for an initial 24 hours. A Bucharest court accepted an application by DIICOT to hold Tate and his brother Tristan in custody for a further 30 days, their lawyer Eugen Vidineac said on December 30. DIICOT alleged that the four suspects formed an organized criminal group that stretched from Romania to Britain and the United States, for the purpose of committing the crime of human trafficking. The agency said Thursday that seven more properties had been searched as part of the investigation, bringing the total number of properties probed to 12. The authorities allege that two of the suspects misled the victims “into believing that they intended to enter into a marriage/cohabitation relationship” while transporting victims to Romania and later sexually exploiting them with physical violence and coercion. Authorities also said one of the suspects raped a victim on two separate occasions in March 2022. At least six victims were allegedly “sexually exploited by the organized criminal group,” the DIICOT statement said. Tate known for misogynistic rants Tate, a former professional kickboxer, is known for his viral rants online about male dominance, female submission and wealth. He openly advocates violence against women, and had previously been banned from every major social media platform until Elon Musk reinstated his Twitter account after taking over the company.
213 He rose in prominence earlier this year, with many adults including school teachers voicing alarm about his misogynistic ideas taking root in the minds of countless young boys. Before it was taken down, his TikTok account racked up about 11.6 billion views. He made headlines the week of his arrest for a Twitter interaction with Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg, who told Tate to get a life after he tweeted about his numerous cars “and their respective enormous emissions.” There was speculation online that authorities were alerted to Tate’s presence in Romania by the appearance of a particular pizza box in one of the photos he posted in his spat with Thunberg. But, according to Reuters, a spokesperson for DIICOT said the pizza boxes did not play a role in the detentions.
214 Passive Voice 1. are investigated 2. has been seized 3. was published 4. were detained 5. had been detained 6. had been searched 7. were exploited 8. is known 9. had previously been banned 10. was taken 11. were alerted Tense • Present Simple*2 • Past Simple*5 • Present Perfect • Past Perfect*3 Vocabulary Regular Verb / Irregular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb investigated Regular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb seized Regular Verb Transitive Verb published Regular Verb Transitive Verb detained Regular Verb Transitive Verb detained Regular Verb Transitive Verb searched Regular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb exploited Regular Verb Transitive Verb known Irregular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb banned Regular Verb Transitive Verb taken Irregular Verb Transitive Verb alerted Regular Verb Transitive Verb
215 Russia's war in Ukraine What we're covering Ukraine's interior minister is among at least 14 people were killed after a helicopter was crashed in a Kyiv suburb Wednesday, officials said. President Volodymyr Zelensky called the crash a “tragedy” and authorities have launched an investigation. Zelensky urged Western leaders to make faster decisions to counter Russia’s war and support Kyiv with heavy weaponry, saying in virtual remarks at the World Economic Forum in Davos that "the tyranny is outpacing the democracy.” The US is expected to announce one of its largest military aid packages for Ukraine in coming days, according to officials. Kyiv has been pleading for modern tanks, a request the US is not yet willing to grant, despite the UK and Poland saying they will. Passive Voice 1. were killed 2. was crashed 3. is expected Tense • Present Simple • Past Simple Vocabulary Regular Verb / Irregular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb killed Regular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb crashed Regular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb expected Regular Verb Transitive Verb
216 Society A major oil exporter is hosting a UN climate summit. Opinions are divided This year’s COP28 climate summit is mired in controversy, held in one of the world’s biggest oil exporting nations – the United Arab Emirates – and headed by one of the most prominent faces in its oil industry. Environmental activists have cried foul, arguing that the climate debate has been hijacked by the fossil fuel lobby to protect the profit-maximizing agendas of petrostates. The UAE’s involvement has sparked a discussion on whether there’s a place in the climate space for countries that rely primarily on fossil fuel exports for their income. And opinions are split. Sultan Al Jaber, who will preside over the November summit, wears two very prominent hats in the UAE. Aside from being the CEO of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC), he is also the UAE’s climate envoy, tasked with spearheading its energy policy. He took on the climate portfolio over a decade before becoming a top oil executive, helping launch the state’s clean energy company Masdar in 2006 and bringing the International Renewable Energy Agency’s headquarters to Abu Dhabi in 2009. The message the UAE is sending is that both fossil fuels and renewable energy must be part of the global energy mix, and that one does not have to replace the other. It has argued that given the projected growth in global energy demand, both clean and dirty energy will be needed to power the world, and a hasty transition away from oil and gas could have a detrimental effect on the global economy. “Recent events have shown that unplugging the current energy system before we have built a sufficiently robust alternative puts both economic and climate progress at risk – and calls into question whether we can ensure a just transition that is equitable to all,” Al Jaber wrote last year in an opinion piece for Project Syndicate. The US Energy Information Administration (EIA) estimates a nearly 50% increase in global energy use by 2050, with oil and gas remaining the most-consumed sources of energy. Tom Evans, a policy adviser at the European climate change think tank E3G, told CNN that Al Jaber’s appointment raises questions about the credibility of the UAE’s COP28 presidency. “At face value, the head of a national oil company is obviously facing a massive conflict of interest,” he said. Al Jaber’s dual roles are what make him a “terrific choice,” US Climate Envoy John Kerry was cited as saying by the Associated Press on Monday. The company he leads “knows it needs to transition,” Kerry said. Simon Stiell, the executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) on Monday called the UAE’s hosting of the summit a “unique opportunity” at an environmental summit in Abu Dhabi. The UAE has the expertise “to get every sector, particularly those hard to abate, aligned with 1.5,” he said, referring to the climate goal to stay below 1.5 degrees Celsius of warming.
217 The UAE has touted the mantra of “maximum energy, minimum emissions,” saying that instead of phasing out fossil fuels, it will work on making their extraction cleaner, and reinvest its revenues into renewable energy in an effort to raise its share of the nation’s energy mix. The country is future-proofing its energy sector and will “celebrate” the last barrel of oil it exports, Al Jaber said at an energy summit in Abu Dhabi on Saturday. Over the past 15 years, the UAE has invested $40 billion in renewable energy and clean technology globally, according to the Atlantic Council think tank. Last year, it entered a pact with the United States to invest another $100 billion in clean energy. Al Jaber on Saturday called for a tripling of renewable energy output around the world and twice as much money for adaptation in the global south. But that’s not enough, climate experts say. “Fossil fuel profits are most certainly not powering investments in clean energy,” Assaad Razzouk, a clean energy analyst in Singapore, told CNN. “Just look at the spending of oil and gas companies and how that’s allocated,” Razzouk said. Companies like ADNOC and Saudi Arabia’s Aramco oil company need to stop investing in oil and gas and spend much more on renewables if they are serious about the transition to clean energy, he added. Global campaigner Corporate Accountability in November described the presence of oil lobbyists at climate summits as “a rise in the influence of the fossil fuel industry at the climate talks that are already rife with accusations of civil society censorship and corporate influence.” Climate experts say the UAE’s approach of expanding the use of renewables while continuing to extract fossil fuels defies its own commitments. COP28 didn’t respond to CNN’s request for comment. “The Glasgow Climate Pact agreed at COP26 in 2021 by all countries, including the UAE, calls for a cut of 45% in carbon emissions by 2030,” Mark Maslin, a professor working on climate change at University College London, told CNN. “This can only be achieved if there is no new investment in fossil fuels and the use of all fossil fuels is phased out as soon as possible.” “So it does not make any sense to invest in fossil fuels when the world needs to be net zero emissions before 2050,” he added. But the UAE is doing quite the opposite. One of the few producers in the OPEC oil cartel with the capacity to ramp up production on short notice, the UAE has repeatedly called for more investment in the oil sector to meet global demand, and has embarked on a project to further increase its own capacity. In November, it brought forward its oil production expansion to 2027 instead of 2030, when it will be producing up to 5 million barrels per day (bpd) from about 4 million.
218 The UAE’s approach has been pragmatic, said Amena Bakr, chief OPEC correspondent at Energy Intelligence, adding that Russia’s war on Ukraine led nations to prioritize energy security and realize that the world couldn’t do away with oil and gas so soon. “Renewable energy still cannot meet base-load energy demand – that’s a fact,” she told CNN. For Razzouk, the clean energy analyst, the conflict has “incontrovertibly shown the folly of relying on imported fossil fuels, and the national security risks this entailed.” The digest Iran hangs British citizen on charges of espionage and corruption A dual British-Iranian citizen was hanged by Iran on charges of espionage and corruption, a stateaffiliated media outlet reported Saturday, the latest in a string of executions carried out by a regime grappling with unprecedented protests across the country. Alireza Akbari was executed for crimes including “corruption on earth,” according to the Iranian judiciary-affiliated outlet Mizan. British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said he was “appalled by the execution.” Foreign Secretary James Cleverly said Saturday afternoon that the British government planned to sanction Iran’s Prosecutor General to underline “our disgust at Alireza Akbari’s execution.” Background: Akbari previously served as Iran’s deputy defense minister and was the head of the Strategic Research Institute. He was charged with working as a spy for MI6, the British intelligence agency, and reportedly paid more than $2 million, Iranian state media reported Saturday. He allegedly provided information to foreign officials about 178 Iranian figures, including the country’s chief nuclear scientist, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, who was killed by a remotecontrolled machine gun operating out of a car in 2020. Iran’s top officials accused Israel of masterminding the plot at the time, without providing evidence. Why it matters: Though Iran does not recognize dual nationality, the execution of an individual holding British citizenship will likely further fuel tensions between Tehran and Western nations, which have been critical of the regime’s response to anti-government demonstrations that began in September last year. Iran has long ranked among the world’s top executioners, and Akbari is one of three individuals to receive a death sentence in the first weeks of 2023. More than 80,000 turn out for Tel Aviv protest against Netanyahu government Despite pouring rain, tens of thousands of people protested in Tel Aviv Saturday night against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his government’s proposed changes to the judicial system. Others took to the streets in Jerusalem for parallel protests. Attendees held signs comparing Netanyahu to Russian President Vladimir Putin, and saying Israel was turning into the likes of semi-democratic Hungary and theocratic Iran. Background: The proposed changes, announced last week by Israeli Justice Minister Yariv Levin, would seek to reform Supreme Court nominations via a review committee and enable parliament to overturn Supreme Court rulings. Why it matters: Protesters told CNN they fear for Israel’s future and that they came out to send a message to Netanyahu that the public wouldn’t stand for what they see as the dismantling of Israeli democracy. Esther Hayut, the president of Israel’s Supreme Court, on Thursday attacked the
219 proposed changes as “an unbridled attack on the legal system” and said they were “designed to force a fatal blow on the independence of the judicial system.” Syria sets conditions for rapprochement with Turkey Syrian foreign minister Faisal Mekdad said on Saturday that Turkey would have to end its military presence in his country to achieve a full rapprochement, Reuters reported. “We cannot talk about resuming normal ties with Turkey without removing the occupation, without ending terrorism and returning the relations to the state that they were based on the first place,” he said after meeting his Iranian counterpart in Damascus. Background: Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said on Thursday that he could meet his Syrian counterpart early in February. Syria has made no official comment on the timing of any such meeting, which would mark the highest-level talks between Ankara and Damascus since the Syrian war began in 2011. Why it matters: Turkey has been a major backer of the political and armed opposition to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad during the 12-year conflict in Syria, and has sent its own troops into swathes of the country’s north. But Ankara may be seeking a green light from the Syrian regime and its Russian ally to launch a military operation against Kurdish groups in northern Syria. $30 billion The UAE will invest $30 billion in South Korea, Reuters cited South Korea’s presidential office as saying on Sunday. The decision was announced as South Korea’s President Yoon Suk-yeol met his UAE counterpart, Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan, in Abu Dhabi during a fourday visit. Yoon’s press secretary said the investment will be directed at nuclear power, defense, hydrogen and solar energy industries, among others. What’s trending Saudi Arabia: #Naturalizing_children_of_female_citizens Saudis on Twitter have been discussing a change in the kingdom’s citizenship law that was misinterpreted by some as easing the process of naturalization for the children of Saudi women. In most Arab countries, only men can pass on citizenship to their children automatically, which women’s rights activists have campaigned for decades to change. In Saudi Arabia, the children of Saudi women married to foreigners don’t get Saudi citizenship at birth but have the right to apply for it after the age of 18 if they meet certain conditions. The change in the Saudi citizenship law last week moved the authority to grant citizenship from the interior minister to the prime minister, but didn’t change the rules to obtain citizenship. Some regional news outlets falsely reported that the changes eased the rules of naturalization, prompting the topic to trend on Twitter in Saudi Arabia, with many praising the move and others warning of the demographic imbalance it could cause. The inaccurate reporting however sparked a debate on the topic, with many calling on the government to allow women to pass on citizenship to their children at birth.
220 “I support this move because I consider the Saudi woman to be equal to the Saudi man, with all the rights and obligations as those Saudi men who marry foreign women and naturalize their children,” Saudi writer Mohammed Alkhalid said in a video posted on Twitter. Oil rich Gulf Arab countries have very strict naturalization procedures. Of the six nations of the Gulf Cooperation Council, four have a majority expatriate population, with citizens accounting for less than 20% of the population in countries like the United Arab Emirates and Qatar. Passive Voice 1. are split 2. has been hijacked 3. are divided 4. be needed 5. was cited 6. was hanged 7. was executed 8. was killed 9. was announced 10. be achieved 11. be directed 12. was misinterpreted Tense • Present Simple*5 • Present Perfect • Past Simple*7 Vocabulary Regular Verb / Irregular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb split Irregular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb hijacked Regular Verb Transitive Verb divided Regular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb needed Regular Verb Transitive Verb cited Regular Verb Transitive Verb hanged Regular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb executed Regular Verb Transitive Verb killed Regular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb announced Regular Verb Transitive Verb achieved Regular Verb Transitive Verb directed Regular Verb Transitive Verb misinterpreted Regular Verb Transitive Verb
221 Australian runner aims for world record with 150 marathons in 150 days Australian Erchana Murray-Bartlett completed 150 marathons in 150 days, running 6,300 kilometers (3,900 miles) from the country’s northern tip to the southern city of Melbourne in what could be a new world record. The 32-year-old runner crossed the finish line on Monday after a feat that, if confirmed, will beat the previous world record of 106 consecutive marathons set by British national Kate Jayden last year. CNN has reached out to Guinness World Records to confirm Murray-Bartlett’s official standing. While Jayden sought to raise money for refugees, Murray-Bartlett completed her run – documented on Instagram – to raise awareness of the threats to Australia’s biodiversity. “Australia is fantastic, it’s so beautiful, and that was one of the key things I wanted to get out of this run, it was to showcase Australia’s beauty to the world – we have globally significant national parks, the Great Barrier Reef, and exploring them on foot is such a unique, different way to do it,” Murray-Bartlett told CNN affiliate Nine News. Murray-Bartlett raised more than 118,000 Australian dollars ($82,130) for the Wilderness Society, with all profits going towards conserving Australia’s native animals. Australia, which has one of the world’s worst records on extinctions, last year announced a 10- year plan to try to prevent any more species from dying out in the country. The country’s wildlife has been suffered the effects of natural disasters and the climate crisis, including catastrophic bushfires in 2019-20 that killed or displaced nearly 3 billion animals, according to estimates from the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF). After setting off from Cape York in Queensland in August, Murray-Bartlett ran 42.2 kilometers (26.2 miles) each day, enduring scorching heat and storms as she crossed dirt roads, rivers and beaches. “It’s very exhausting, I’ll give you that but I feel very blessed have been out to get to the finish line,” she said on Monday. While Murray-Bartlett’s run took her from the country’s north to south, another Australian, Nedd Brockmann, ran almost 4,000 kilometers (2,500 miles) over 47 days from west to east in 2022. Brockmann set off from Cottesloe Beach in Perth and was received a hero’s welcome on his arrival at Sydney’s Bondi Beach in October, raising 2 million Australian dollars ($1.26 million) – almost double his initial target – for homeless charity We Are Mobilise. Earlier in 2022, Fay Cunningham and Emma Petrie, both from the United Kingdom, matched the world record for most consecutive days to run a marathon distance in the women’s category, running alongside each other for 106 days between February and June, according to Guinness World Records. Passive Voice 1. was received 2. has been suffered Tense • Present Perfect • Past Simple Vocabulary Regular Verb / Irregular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb received Regular Verb Transitive Verb suffered Regular Verb Intransitive Verb
222 Chile's government distributed faulty birth control pills. Now more than 150 people are pregnant. In Chile's arid Atacama desert, Tabita Daza Rojas is trying to scrape together enough money to finish construction on her home before her baby, due anyday, arrives. Eight hundred kilometers to the south, in La Pintana, a suburb of the capital Santiago, Cynthia González is nursing her 2-month-old boy. But she needs to buy milk to supplement her body's supply, and is worried about how she'll afford it. Rojas and González come from different backgrounds, have different lives and ambitions. Yet they -- and at least 170 other women at the time of writing -- share a common reality: they all claim to have fallen pregnant while taking Anulette CD, an oral contraceptive pill manufactured by Silesia, a subsidiary of the German pharmaceutical company, Grünenthal. Without the option to legally terminate their pregnancies, if they wanted to, or any real accountability from the government or the drug companies, the women, were represented by the Chilean sexual and reproductive rights group Corporación Miles, are preparing to file a class action lawsuit in the civil courts. In a region where barriers to women's reproductive rights are the norm, CNN has identified a government health agency quick to shift the blame to these women, as well as a history of poor production quality and previous issues relating to oral contraceptives in Grünenthal's Chilean factory -- its gateway to Latin America. Tabita Rojas' story In March 2020, after discovering an ovarian cyst her physician worried could have been caused by her contraceptive implant, Rojas's doctor at her local health clinic advised she take the pill instead, prescribing Anulette CD. Rojas didn't give the switch much thought; she had taken oral contraceptives before and agreed it made sense for her health. Plus, after giving up her place on a forensic criminology program at 17 because she'd gotten pregnant, the now 29-year-old was once again excited about her future. "I had to put all that aside and dedicate myself to my son," said Rojas, who had a second child two years later, and provides for her family by doing seasonal work at a grape packing plant. By early 2020, however, things were changing. Her children -- boys now aged 11 and 9 years old, both with learning difficulties -- were more independent, and were spending more time with their father. As part of a government urbanization in her hometown Copiapó, Rojas had been given a small piece of land on which to build a house. She had been saving up money and planned to move out of the home she and her children had been sharing with three other family members. And, she was in love. Early on in the relationship, Rojas and her boyfriend had decided not to have children together. "It was going to be impossible to provide for someone else," she said. But in September 2020, just five months after Rojas began taking Anulette, she found out she was pregnant again. She would later learn, after seeing it posted on Facebook, that her tablets were from a batch that had been recalled by Chile's public health authority, the Instituto de Salud Pública de Chile (ISP) the month before. "I was about to finish the second [box of three prescribed] when I found out about the problem," she said. By then she was already six weeks pregnant. 'I was never happy with this pregnancy' The details may differ but similar scenarios have been playing out across Chile.
223 A mother of four, González, who had been on Anulette for eight months, got pregnant for the fifth time in May 2020. She tells CNN that she took her contraceptive "religiously every morning," before adding: "Because we women set an alarm for those kinds of pills." The news devastated her. Her personal life was complicated and her finances extremely limited after she lost the market stall where she sold second-hand clothes. "I was never happy with this pregnancy," González said. "If you only knew all the nights I spent crying thinking that I didn't want to [have the baby]. I had no options." Alluding to Chile's strict abortion laws that forbid a woman from terminating a pregnancy except for three reasons (if the pregnancy is a result of rape, if the fetus is incompatible with life outside the womb, or if a woman's life is at risk), González spoke about her upset and how she tried to conceal her growing tummy. "I hid the pregnancy for a long time, so that they wouldn't ask me: 'Hey, another child, and whose is it, because you are no longer with your husband' -- and having to explain that we were separated. It was already a complicated situation for me, let alone to go around telling everyone." Anulette CD is a 28-day combined oral contraceptive -- one of the most common forms of birth control. It contains synthetic versions of the hormones estrogen and progesterone, which are produced naturally by the ovaries. The hormones work to prevent ovulation -- meaning no egg is released by the ovaries -- as well as thicken the lining of the cervix to make it harder for sperm to pass through. The pill also makes the lining of the uterus thinner so that if an egg is fertilized it cannot implant and begin to grow. Pill regimens typically involve taking 21 "active" pills that contain the hormones and seven "nonactive" or "placebo" pills, to maintain a daily routine, during which time a person bleeds. How the contraceptive pill works The first batch -- 139,160 packs of Anulette pills, according to its manufacturer -- were recalled on August 24, 2020 after healthcare workers at a rural healthcare clinic complained that they had identified 6 packets of defective pills. In them -- based on information from the ISP -- the placebo (a blue pill) had been found where the active pills (a yellow pill) should have been, and vice versa. In its online notice, published on August 29, the ISP said that the makers of Anulette CD, a company called Laboratorios Silesia S.A. (Silesia), had been made aware and were withdrawing the defective lot. The ISP then advised health centers to quarantine any packets they had from the affected batches. Then, a tweet was sent from the ISP account alerting its followers to the recall. But without a nationwide campaign to more directly inform the public, the recall went largely unnoticed. A week after the first recall, on September 3, the same error was detected in 6 packets from a different batch at a clinic in Santiago. Here, tablets were also missing, but others were crushed, according to the ISP. By the time the problems were flagged, Silesia said it had already distributed 137,730 packs to health centers. This time the ISP said it would be suspending Silesia's registration until the laboratory was able to improve its quality and production processes. But it was too little, too late. In total, according to the manufacturer's own accounts, 276,890 packets of Anulette CD from the two defective lots -- all with a January 2022 expiry date -- had been distributed to family planning centers across Chile.
224 Surprisingly, on September 8, less than a week after Silesia's suspension, the ISP issued another document reversing its earlier decision. In the memo, which was uploaded to its website, the health authority said Anulette CD could once again be distributed. It claimed that the flaws in the packaging could be easily detected, and passed the responsibility of doing so, and of informing users of the service, onto healthcare workers. The Ministry of Health told CNN in an emailed statement that they informed the public health service "to inform users of this situation and take pertinent actions," and said that they provided support and counseling for reproductive health workers to support "women who may have been affected by problems in the quality of contraceptives." But Rojas said she was only informed by her local clinic about the defective pills after she went in for a prenatal checkup. And Rodriguez told CNN no one has contacted her. ISP director Heriberto Garcia defended the decision to put Anulette back on the market, saying in a video interview with CNN: "Just because it [one pack] belongs to the batch doesn't mean it was bad." "We expect that there are many more women with this problem, especially because the State has not claimed any responsibility." So, it was left to Chilean civil society to raise the alarm. The sexual and reproductive rights group, Miles, ran a social media campaign and used its networks to get the word out. "It was after [posting on Instagram] when we started receiving emails from people saying that they were already pregnant because they were consuming Anulette," said Miles' legal coordinator Laura Dragnic. By October 2020, some 40 women had gotten in touch. According to Miles, following multiple media appearances by its staff, another 70 women came forward. The number now stands at 170, but Dragnic expects it to grow as rural women or those without access to the internet or television are still to be reached. "We expect that there are many more women with this problem," she said, "especially because the State has not claimed any responsibility and has not made any statements or any serious compromises [to the abortion rules] for the affected women." Seven days after Dragnic spoke to CNN, and six months after the first recall, the health authorities announced that Anulette's manufacturers had been charged a series of fines totalling approximately 66.5m Chilean pesos (approximately USD $92,000). Miles and their partners are calling for the government to pay financial reparations to the affected women, and to provide access to safe and legal abortions for those who wish to terminate their pregnancy. Multiple recalls at Grünenthal's Santiago factory Grünenthal, in whose Santiago factory Anulette CD is manufactured, began operating in Chile in 1979. The privately-owned German pharmaceutical company, which reported a €340 million (US $405 million) profit in the 2019-2020 fiscal year, is best known for its product tramadol, an opiate pain killer, classified as a controlled substance in numerous countries. In 2017, the company increased its Chilean investments by opening what it called "Latin America's most modern women's health products plant" -- a US $14.5m facility. While only a small part of Grünenthal's portfolio, the investment was enough to place it among "the three biggest pharmaceutical companies in Chile." But CNN has uncovered that production issues began soon after the factory opened, and have affected a range of oral contraceptives marketed not just by Silesia S.A. but also Grünenthal's other Chilean subsidiary, Andrómaco.
225 In 2018, Tinelle, a contraceptive pill from Silesia's portfolio, was voluntarily taken off the market after a decision to switch the sequence of the active and placebo tablets (keeping the same numbers of each but placing them in a different order) which -- by the Grunenthal spokesperson, Florian Dieckmann's admission -- "confused [patients] about the new sequence of the pills." Dieckmann said that the pills were put back on the market after Silesia "further clarified the instruction on the aluminium foil on how to follow the right sequence of tablets." Two further oral contraceptives, Minigest 15 and 20, manufactured by Andrómaco at the Grünenthal Chilean plant, were recalled in October 2020 after the public health authority, the ISP, said that they were found during stability testing to contain an insufficient amount of the active ingredient: the hormones. Grunenthal's spokesperson said that at the time of packaging, the tablets had "the correct amount of active ingredient" in them, adding that the "tablets are exposed to excessive temperatures and humidity over the products entire shelf life under laboratory conditions" and that it is "unlikely that the tablets are exposed to these conditions for a long time in real world circumstances. Based on a Freedom of Information request by Miles, which CNN then followed up on, the production of Anulette CD has had the most problems, according to the ISP's own records. Between August 6 and November 18, 2020, health clinics across Chile reported a wide range of issues with the pills including small holes found in the tablets; pills that had orange and black spots; wet and crushed tablets; and packaging that wouldn't release the entire pill effectively, leaving trace amounts of the pill stuck inside. In total, the ISP received 26 different complaints about 15 different batches of Anulette pills, yet only 2 batches were recalled. "It is important to clarify that not all complaints of the products end in market recalls," the ISP explained. "Those that are withdrawn...are those in which critical defects are detected and this was the case of the recalled batches." Aside from publishing details of the above recalls on its website, the ISP allegedly did little else to notify women, and despite its apparent challenges, Grünenthal remains the Chilean government's leading provider of oral contraceptives. According to the ISP, 382,871 women are prescribed Anulette CD, and between May 2019 and January 2020, Grünenthal secured at least US $2.2 million in contracts that CNN has seen. The Ministry of Health did not answer CNN's written questions and declined an invitation to be interviewed. The blame game While no one is denying the production problems, Grünenthal, its Chilean subsidiaries and government representatives, all seem intent on shifting some of the blame away from the faulty packets of the pill and onto each other. Dieckmann explained that the company discovered that the problems stemmed from an issue on the production line issue which caused some pills to move during the packaging process. That led to some packages with "empty cavities, some tablets misplaced or crushed tablets," he said but stressed that the efficacy of the contraceptive had not been compromised. The spokesperson also pointed out that combined oral contraceptives are not 100% effective. According to the World Health Organization, the combined oral contraceptive pill every year results in less than 1 pregnancy in every 100, "with consistent and correct use." "So I think it's important background, right?" Dieckmann said, noting that those statistics rise when the pill isn't taken consistently or correctly.
226 "I'm not trying to say that it's the woman's fault," Dieckmann said, before adding that correct and consistent use was a "factor that I think we have to look at here." "Women say, 'I was on the pill, I still became pregnant -- why is that?' That's what's happened," he said, referencing the statistics. The Grünenthal spokesperson told CNN that the company could not speak to their individual cases, as it has not been directly contacted by any of the affected women. Addressing the controversy on the Chilean public broadcaster in December 2020, Silesia's medical director, Leonardo Lourtau, said in addition to the company being responsible for visually checking the packaging, health officials should have also done so and, "obviously, the people who take the medicine as well." And Garcia of the ISP suggested it was important to look at how birth control efficacy might change when interacting in the body with other products, such as antibiotics, tobacco or alcohol. "I am not saying that she has drunk a lot of alcohol or that she is a smoker, but I am telling you the background." Despite Garcia's assertions, most reproductive health experts widely agree that there is no evidence to suggest that smoking diminishes the effectiveness of the pill; that alcohol will only do so if a person throws up soon after taking it; and that only one type of antibiotic, those based on rifampicin, can affect oral contraceptives. 'Systemic failures' Drug recalls are not unusual, but it is hard for those campaigning on behalf of the women not to perceive an injustice here: Grünenthal continues to see its factory as the key to reaching 168 million women in Latin America, while the women who take its products have to remain vigilant or risk pregnancy. The risk is heightened, reproductive rights groups say, by the fact that these women, already poor and marginalized, can't count on the robust support of the government should the undesired happen. Paula Avila Guillen, Executive Director at the New York Women's Equality Center, a not-forprofit that advocates for and monitors reproductive rights in Latin America, told CNN that if the recall was about bad meat, the entire country would have known immediately, and the product immediately taken off the market. "But when it comes to women and reproductive health, they just don't care," she lamented. And so, Miles and its partners, writing to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights and to the United Nations, have called the situation "a clear situation of systemic discrimination against women." Meanwhile, back in Copiapó, at 38 weeks pregnant, Rojas has now accepted her fate. She will once again have to put aside her dreams for the future of her child, another baby boy. They'll name him Fernando.
227 Passive Voice 1. have been caused 2. was complicated 3. had been given 4. were recalled 5. had been found 6. had been made 7. was sent 8. was detected 9. were crushed 10. had been distributed 11. was uploaded 12. have been affected 13. was left 14. were found 15. are withdrawn 16. had not been compromised 17. has not been directly contacted 18. is heightened 19. had been recalled 20. are produced 21. is fertilized 22. were flagged 23. be easily detected 24. was only informed Tense• Present Simple*5 • Present Perfect*3 • Past Simple*10 • Past Perfect*6
228 Vocabulary Regular Verb / Irregular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb caused Regular Verb Transitive Verb complicated Regular Verb Transitive Verb given Irregular Verb Transitive Verb recalled Regular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb found Irregular Verb Transitive Verb made Irregular Verb Transitive Verb sent Irregular Verb Transitive Verb detected Regular Verb Transitive Verb crushed Regular Verb Transitive Verb distributed Regular Verb Transitive Verb uploaded Regular Verb Transitive Verb affected Regular Verb Transitive Verb left Irregular Verb Transitive Verb found Irregular Verb Transitive Verb withdrawn Irregular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb compromised Regular Verb Intransitive Verb contacted Regular Verb Transitive Verb heightened Regular Verb Transitive Verb recalled Regular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb produced Regular Verb Transitive Verb fertilized Regular Verb Transitive Verb detected Regular Verb Transitive Verb informed Regular Verb Transitive Verb flagged Regular Verb Transitive Verb
229 Confidence in London’s police force crumbles as sex crime cases against officers pile up In a distinguished 30-year career with London’s Metropolitan Police, Dal Babu has seen his fair share of shocking behavior. Yet the handling of a female recruit’s sexual assault allegedly at the hands of her superior disgusted him so much he has never been forgotten the incident. A detective sergeant had taken a young constable to a call, pulled up into a side area and sexually assaulted her, Babu, a former chief superintendent, claimed. “She was brave to report it. I wanted him sacked but he was protected by other officers and given a warning,” he said. Babu said the sergeant in question was allowed to serve until his retirement, while the woman decided to leave the force. The alleged incident happened around a decade ago, Babu said. He resigned in 2013 after being passed over for a promotion. Yet, despite many public moments of apparent reckoning since, the United Kingdom’s biggest police service continues to be rocked by allegations it’s doing little to ensure citizens are safe from some of its own staff. In the latest case, David Carrick, an officer from the same force, pleaded guilty to 49 offenses against 12 women over an 18-year period, including 24 counts of rape. Carrick’s admission, on January 16, came almost two years after the death of Sarah Everard, a young woman who was snatched from a London street by Wayne Couzens, another officer, who like Carrick, served with the country’s elite parliamentary and diplomatic protection unit. This part of the police is armed, unlike many other UK forces. Everard, 33, was raped and murdered before her body was dumped in woodland around 60 miles from London, in the neighboring county of Kent, where Couzens lived. It later emerged that her attacker had a history of sexual misconduct, just like Carrick, who was subject to multiple complaints before and during his 20-year police career – to no avail. Rotten apples Protesters placed 1,071 imitation rotten apples outside Scotland Yard, the Met Police headquarters, on Friday to highlight the same number of officers that have been placed under fresh review in 1,633 cases of sexual assault and violence against women and girls that were made over the past decade. Met Commissioner Mark Rowley apologized for the failings that led to Carrick not being caught earlier, in an interview distributed to UK broadcasters. Announcing a thorough review of all those employees facing red flags, he said: “I’m sorry and I know we’ve let women down. I think we failed over two decades to be as ruthless as we ought to be in guarding our own integrity.” On Friday evening, Rowley published a “turnaround plan” for reforming the Metropolitan Police, saying that he was “determined to win back Londoners’ trust.” Among his desired reforms over the next two years, he said in a statement, was the establishment of an anti-corruption and abuse command, being “relentlessly data driven” in delivery, and creating London’s “largest ever neighborhood police presence.” Yet Rowley has also bemoaned that he does not have the power to sack dangerous officers, thanks to the fact police can only be dismissed via lengthy special tribunals.
230 Independent inquiries into the Met’s misconduct system have been scathing. A report last fall found that when a family member or a fellow officer filed a complaint, it took on average 400 days – more than an entire year – for an allegation of misconduct to be resolved. For Harriet Wistrich, a lawyer lobbying the government to give its existing inquiries into police misconduct statutory powers to better protect women, the issue of domestic abuse as a gateway towards other serious offenses cannot be overlooked. Wistrich’s Centre for Women’s Justice, a campaign group, first filed a so-called super-complaint in March 2019, highlighting how existing measures designed to protect domestic abuse victims in general were being misused by police, she said, from applications for restraining orders to the use of pre-charge bail. In the three years thereafter, as successive Covid lockdowns saw victims trapped at home with their abusers and prosecutions for such crimes plummeted, Wistrich says she noticed a trend of police officers’ partners contacting her. “We had been receiving a number of reports from women who were victims of police officers, usually victims of domestic abuse who didn’t have the confidence to report or if they did report felt that they were massively let down or victimized and sometimes subject to criminal action against them themselves for reporting,” Wistrich told CNN. “Or (we saw) the police officer using his status within the family courts to undermine her access to her own children.” Wistrich said. “Certainly if anyone’s a victim of a police officer, they’re going to be extremely fearful of coming forward,” she added. Carrick’s history appears to confirm Wistrich’s point. He had repeatedly come to the police’s attention for domestic incidents, and would eventually admit behavior so depraved it involved locking a partner in a cupboard under the stairs at his house. When some of his victims tried to seek justice he abused his position to convince them that their word against that of a police officer would never be believed. Experts say the scale of his offending will further erode trust, particularly among women and as long as the public is unclear about how much risk lies within the ranks of Britain’s 43 police forces, tensions will simmer. Confidence crumbling Polling commissioned by a government watchdog, the Independent Office for Police Conduct, in the aftermath of Everard’s murder found fewer than half of UK citizens had a positive attitude towards the police. The head of that same body himself resigned last month amid an investigation into a historical allegation leveled against him. Other surveys since then have shown confidence has continued to plunge. Even Wistrich is downbeat on whether or not the police will carry out the reforms that are needed. “Over the years we’ve had a series of blows to policing, around the policing of violence against women,” she said. “We’ve had the kind of collapse in rape prosecutions which has been an ongoing issue for a while and then we have had the emergence of this phenomenon of police perpetrated abuse. “But, you know, in a sense it’s amazing how much trust the police have managed to maintain from the general public despite all these stories. So I don’t know how long or how much of a major impact it will have,” she said, referring to Carrick’s recent guilty plea. For Patsy Stevenson, one run-in with the Met was enough to alter her life’s trajectory in an instant.
231 After deciding to take part in a vigil attended by thousands to mark Everard’s death in March 2021, she was pinned to the ground and arrested by Met officers when they stormed the event on the grounds that pandemic rules in place at the time made large gatherings a health hazard and illegal.As a photograph of Stevenson went viral, her flame-red hair tossed about as she was forced to the ground screaming with her hands behind her back, she became both a symbol of militant feminism and the focus of toxic misogyny and death threats. She failed the physics degree she was studying for and is now raising the hundreds of thousands of pounds she said is needed to sue the police for wrongful arrest and assault. In response to a question on Stevenson’s lawsuit, the Metropolitan Police told CNN: “We have received notification of a proposed civil claim and shall be making no further comment whilst the claim is ongoing.” But the fact that the Met Police’s vetting system allowed for men like Carrick and Couzens to remain on the force makes it clear that “the entire system from top to bottom isn’t working,” Stevenson said. “It feels like we’re all screaming out, can you just change before something like this happens? And now it’s happened again.” Minorities unsurprised by police impunity Both Babu, once the Met’s most senior Asian officer, and Stevenson, say the erosion of trust in British policing is not new. Indeed, trust has been declining for years, especially among minority ethnic groups, the LGBTQ+ community and other more vulnerable sections of society, whose treatment at the hands of rogue officers is often underreported in the public domain. In the days since Carrick last appeared in court, two retired policemen were charged with child sex offenses, and a third serving officer with access to schools was found dead the day that he was due to be charged with child pornography-related offenses. Four Met officers are facing a gross misconduct investigation after ordering the strip search of a 15-year-old girl in a south London school last year. A safeguarding report found the decision to search the girl was unlawful and likely motivated by racism. The head teacher of the school in question has now resigned. With the abduction and murder of Everard, a 33-year-old white professional woman, at the hands of an officer abusing his extra powers under Covid restrictions, and the sight of multiple young women, such as Stevenson, later manhandled by the Met under the same rules, fury at this trend of impunity burst forth among a larger swathe of the population. “This has been happening for years and years with minority groups,” Stevenson told CNN. “And only when someone of a certain color or a certain look was arrested in that manner, like myself, then certain people started to wake up to the idea of oh, hold on, this could happen to us. “I’ve had death threats since then. Who can I report that to? The police?” she asked. My own daughters don’t trust the police: ex-police officer Yet Stevenson said up until her arrest she had always trusted the police. “I was the type of person to peek out the windows and see if there’s a domestic [incident] going on, let me call the police to sort it out,” she said. “Nowadays, if I was facing some sort of harassment or something in the street, I wouldn’t go to a police officer.” For Babu’s two adult daughters that’s also the case. Despite growing up with a police officer as a father, he says they have also lost faith in the force.
232 “We talk about it often and, no, I don’t think they do trust the police,” he told CNN. “And let’s be clear this is also a reflection of a wider issue: the appalling failures in this country to deal with sexual violence perpetrated towards women in general. “I’m often worried about my daughters’ safety,” he said. “Whenever they go out, even now, I always ask them to text me to tell me they have made it home safely.” Everard never made it home that night in 2021 as she walked back from a friend’s house in south London, thanks to the criminal actions of a man hired to protect people like her, not prey on them. Until Britain’s police forces radically tackle the scale of possible injustice occurring on the inside, many women – and others – will rightfully be worried.
233 Passive Voice 1. was protected 2. has never been forgotten 3. was allowed 4. was snatched 5. was raped 6. was murdered 7. was dumped 8. have been placed 9. was determined 10. were being misused 11. are needed 12. was forced 13. was found 14. was arrested 15. were made 16. were victimized 17. be believed Tense • Past Simple*14 • Present Perfect*2 • Past Continuous • Present Simple*2 Vocabulary Regular Verb / Irregular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb protected Regular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb forgotten Irregular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb allowed Regular Verb Transitive Verb snatched Regular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb raped Regular Verb Transitive Verb murdered Regular Verb Transitive Verb dumped Regular Verb Transitive Verb placed Regular Verb Transitive Verb determined Regular Verb Transitive Verb misused Regular Verb Transitive Verb needed Regular Verb Transitive Verb forced Regular Verb Transitive Verb found Irregular Verb Transitive Verb arrested Regular Verb Transitive Verb made Irregular Verb Transitive Verb believed Regular Verb Transitive Verb victimized Regular Verb Transitive Verb
234 Every year, ‘Invasion Day’ forces Australia to confront some painful truths Musician Fred Leone sings traditional songs to the steady beat of clap sticks that echo through the empty streets as the sun rises on what he calls a “hard day for Blackfellas.” Leone invited strangers to light candles in a central Brisbane park on January 26, a date Australia’s Indigenous community views each year with dread, as it marks the arrival of British settlers, and the start of suffering for generations of their people. “There’s nothing to be proud about in the sense of the foundations of the country,” said Leone, a descendent of the Butchulla and Garrwa people. On January 26, 1788, the Union Jack was raised at Sydney Cove, beginning the European colonization of a country occupied by the world’s oldest continuous culture for more than 65,000 years. In 1938, Indigenous activists in Sydney declared January 26 a “Day of Mourning,” yet for decades, the nation toasted its success as a young, vibrant multicultural country – waving Australian flags, drinking beer and lighting barbecues – as the country’s original occupants sank deeper into poverty, their lives mired in discrimination. But some recent notable developments suggest change is coming, said historian Kate DarianSmith, from the University of Tasmania. “It’s always been something of a day of protest, certainly throughout the 20th century into the 21st century. But to me, it seems to be ramping up,” she said. This year the federal government and some large companies told employees they could work on January 26, once a hallowed day off. Victoria’s state government called time on Melbourne’s Australia Day parade after two years of Covid cancellations, and Kmart, a normal go-to for party supplies, announced it wouldn’t be stocking traditional Australia Day merchandise – clothing, plates, napkins and other memorabilia draped in the Australian flag. A Kmart spokesperson said in a statement that the company aims to “foster an environment that is inclusive and respectful.” Rival political parties criticized the governments’ decisions, while angry customers threatened to boycott Kmart stores, with one commentator accusing the company of falling into a “woke left trap.” In one local community group, a Facebook post wishing everyone “Happy Australia Day” set off an argument over whether it was harmless fun or a celebration of genocide. Increasingly, how Australians mark January 26 has become an indicator of their politics and attitudes to the country’s colonial past. And this year, those opinions are more pertinent than ever as citizens prepare to vote in a referendum that will determine their relationship with Australia’s Indigenous people for decades to come. Invasion Day rallies About 30 people sit on the damp grass around Leone’s candles at Musgrave Park in central Brisbane, the silence was only broken by his singing and the hum of a city waking up. Christine Cooper, a 60-year-old White woman, is there, having arrived just before 4 a.m. to do something “more healing” than joining the protest rallies she’s been attending for years. “I just felt like it wasn’t getting anywhere,” she whispered in the dark. Cooper is among a growing band of Indigenous allies who now refer to Australia Day as Invasion Day or Survival Day, after learning more about the nation’s history from those who suffered. Using archive material, researchers from the University of Newcastle recently identified the site of more than 400 frontier massacres, defined as deliberate attacks on “six or more undefended
235 people in one operation,” carried out by colonialists between 1788 and 1930. It’s estimated that more than 10,000 Indigenous people died. “While some frontier massacres were widely publicized, in most cases a code of silence was imposed in colonial communities in the immediate aftermath,” the researchers said. As the Indigenous population shrank, strict controls were placed on almost every aspect of their lives. Later, attempts were made to assimilate them by taking their children, and today, the grief of broken families runs deep. For a long time, Australian history was viewed through a colonial lens. “I was brought up in a generation where we weren’t educated about anything of our First Nations history,” Cooper said. “And I feel like I was denied that history and that knowledge.” Hours later, Cooper’s pre-dawn whispers about Australia’s dark past boom through a microphone as speakers address hundreds of people gathered for an Invasion Day march through Brisbane’s city streets. “Always was, always will be, Aboriginal land,” the crowd echoes in response. Similar scenes played out at Invasion Day rallies across the country, while thousands of others attended parties, concerts and other events to mark the day – some with an Indigenous element, and some without. Around 812,000 people in Australia identify as Indigenous, just 3.2% of the country’s population of 25 million. Yet they’re grossly overrepresented in prison populations and have poorer education and health than most other citizens. Every year, Australia Day – or Invasion Day – forces a difficult conversation about those left behind, and what role everyone can play in finding a way forward. “It’s very uncomfortable for all of us, but it does at least focus us on our past, on colonization, on what our society is, on what we might want it to be, and how we, particularly on this day, see and understand and recognize the experiences of First Nations people,” Darian-Smith said. In the last few years, the National Australia Day Council (NADC), a not-for-profit governmentowned company, has attempted to bring people together around the day with community grants of up to 20,000 Australian dollars ($14,000) for Australia Day events – and an extra 10,000 Australian dollars for functions that include an Indigenous element, for example, cultural performances and smoking ceremonies, where native leaves are burned to cleanse bad spirits. Karlie Brand, chief executive of NADC, said the extra funding aims to “have the voice of Aboriginal people heard at that local level.” “It doesn’t have to be a voice that is only seeing Australia Day through the prism of positivity,” she said. “It’s allowed to be a day that is difficult and raw. And it really is for many.” Bringing people together In Newcastle in New South Wales, Tracey Hanshaw, from Indigenous rights group Justice Aunties, said she started her annual “Day of Mourning” four years ago to give her community a safe place to go on January 26. “Most Indigenous people do not come out of their houses on this day. They don’t feel safe in the community. This is the day that they are worst at being victimized,” she said. What started as an event for a few hundred people has since swelled to thousands. “We had 4,000 people there today. It was amazing. All stall holders and artists are already booked in for next year,” Hanshaw, a Awabakal Gaewegal elder, said on Thursday. In the far western Queensland town of Boulia, Beck Britton had been worried that her attempts to throw an Australia Day party could fall flat. Around 30% of the town’s population of 450 residents are Indigenous.
236 “Australia Day tends to end up a very cliquey day where there’s not a lot of togetherness outside of free breakfast on the council,” she said, adding that some long-term residents of the town are very resistant to change. Britton followed her partner, a professional kangaroo-shooter, to the town 15 years ago and recently spent five years living on its outskirts. “The generational trauma that I have just seen in the last five years has been so eye-opening,” she said. “There’s always underlying conflict. It can be quite turbulent, especially around the Christmas period when people don’t have a great deal to do other than to drink.” On January 26, she wanted to show her five sons, aged 8 to 16, the value of community spirit, so they set up bins as wickets in the main street for an old-fashioned game of cricket, encouraging players to wear colorful clothes and tutus. More than 150 locals, young and old, Indigenous and non-Indigenous, joined in. “Some people think it’s just a silly, fluffy event, but there’s always an underlying reason for it,” she said. “Sometimes people use significant days as a platform for bigger issues. And sometimes we just need to step away from that and enjoy each other’s company because at the end of the day, what we all crave is connection.” Defining referendum It wasn’t formally mentioned at Britton’s community cricket match, but one of the big issues dominating Invasion Day events this year was the upcoming vote on the “Voice to Parliament,” the country’s first referendum in 24 years. Though the wording is yet to be finalized, the draft asks for a yes or no response to the following question: “Do you support an alteration to the Constitution that establishes an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice?” A yes vote would allow an Indigenous body to be created to advise the Federal Parliament on policies and projects relating to Indigenous people. Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has implored the nation to say yes despite criticism from political rivals that there’s enough detail for voters to make an informed choice. “If not now, when will this change occur? And if not the people of Australia this year, who will make this change?” Albanese asked reporters on Thursday. “This is an opportunity for Australia. It’s one that I sincerely hope that Australia doesn’t miss. This is a gracious and generous offer to recognize Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as our first peoples.” But some Indigenous groups say it’s not enough – they want Australia to first end its status as the only Commonwealth country not to have signed a treaty with its Indigenous population. “We need to end the war that was declared on our people over 200 years ago,” Greens senator Lidia Thorpe, a DjabWurrung Gunnai Gunditjmara woman, told reporters on Thursday. “Treaty is what will truly unite this nation and everyone in it, and through a treaty we will have something to celebrate.” But for now, the only offer on the table is for the Voice to Parliament, which came about through a process of consultation with hundreds of diverse Indigenous groups who outlined their wishes in the Uluru Statement from the Heart. Historian Darian-Smith said the referendum is a “future-defining moment” that gives Australians “one opportunity to really say what we want for the future of our nation” – and that will influence how Australia views its national day.
237 To pass, the referendum needs to win the majority of votes nationwide, as well as the majority of votes in the majority of states. Only eight of 44 referendums have ever been approved in Australia – and a recent opinion poll shows support for this one is slipping. Hanshaw, from Justice Aunties, said she’ll vote yes but doesn’t think it’ll pass. “Too many racists and too many First Nations people don’t trust the government,” she said. At the vigil, Cooper whispers that she plans to vote yes in the referendum and hopes that other allies do, too. “We’ve waited a hell of a long time already. So I think it’s time. Australia’s mature enough to step up,” she said. “People are ready for change.” Passive Voice 1. was imposed 2. was only broken 3. was raised 4. were placed 5. were made 6. was viewed 7. was brought 8. weren’t educated 9. was denied 10. are burned 11. have ever been approved Tense • Past Simple*7 • Present Simple • Present Perfect Vocabulary Regular Verb / Irregular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb imposed Regular Verb Transitive Verb broken Irregular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb raised Regular Verb Transitive Verb placed Regular Verb Transitive Verb made Irregular Verb Transitive Verb viewed Regular Verb Transitive Verb brought Regular Verb Transitive Verb educated Regular Verb Transitive Verb denied Regular Verb Transitive Verb burned Regular Verb Intransitive Verb approved Regular Verb Intransitive Verb
238 In parts of Ancient Greece, first-cousin marriage was not only allowed but encouraged, DNA shows If you wanted to hang on to your land in Bronze Age Greece, you could do worse than marry your cousin. A team of international researchers analyzing the genomes of ancient human remains has been discovered that, unlike in other European societies of the period, first cousins in Minoan Crete and Mycenaean Greece frequently married each other. Experts from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, together with an international team of partners, analyzed more than 100 genomes of Bronze Age people from the Aegean. The team behind the study, published Monday in the scientific journal, Nature Ecology & Evolution, say their findings provide “exciting insights” into the social order of the Aegean Bronze Age. By analyzing the DNA of people buried in a tomb under the courtyard of a house in a Mycenaean hamlet,on the Greek mainland, the researchers managed to reconstruct the family tree of its inhabitants from the 16th century BCE. Archaeologist Professor Philipp Stockhammer, one of the study’s lead authors, told CNN: “We wanted to have a look at how were people buried together genetically related and about what you can learn about the relevance of the genetic relativeness for the structure of society.” “We managed to construct the first family pedigree for the Mediterranean. We can see who lived together in this house from looking at who was buried outside in the courtyard. “We could see, for example, that the three sons lived as adults in this house. One of the marriage partners brought her sister and a child. It’s a very complex group of people living together.” Even more surprising was the discovery that around half of those living on the islands married their cousins, while the proportion on the mainland was about a third. “It’s not 100%, but not everybody has a cousin,” Stockhammer said. “People have studied thousands of ancestral genomes and there’s hardly any evidence for societies in the past of cousin-cousin marriage. From a historical perspective this really is outstanding,” he added. Stockhammer and his colleagues believe such unions were down to economics, to prevent family land from being divided. He explained: “All of the driving force is to unite the land within the family. If you look at what people were growing, it was grapes and also olives for olive oil, but both grapes and olives might need to be at a certain place for decades.
239 “If you marry in your family it means that you focus on staying in the same area.” He said that, by contrast, in other parts of Bronze Age Europe, women often traveled hundreds of miles in order to marry. Resources in those areas would have been more plentiful, he explained. “In Greece, there’s not much space to grow things and things that you plant need decades to grow,” he said. “We can completely see the cousin to cousin marriage from the genomic evidence. It’s too many people doing it to say it’s pure chance – but it isn’t 100%. I would say it was quite a strict practice. “It’s an unwritten rule because everyone has done it.” Stockhammer explained the significance of the discovery, saying: “With this knowledge we are basically forced to rethink the social organizations in this period and societies that were behind these amazing works of art and architecture. “It’s a society where we have written records about palace administrations but we are now able to say something about the normal people.” Passive Voice 1. was buried 2. was not only allowed 3. has been discovered Tense • Past Simple*2 • Present Perfect Vocabulary Regular Verb / Irregular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb buried Regular Verb Transitive Verb allowed Regular Verb Transitive Verb discovered Regular Verb Transitive Verb
240 No recession after all? Business leaders are more hopeful as China reopens Bullishness about the global economy has been in short supply among business leaders in recent months, with fears of recession clouding the outlook and restraining investment. Now, cautious optimism is peeking through. That’s thanks in large part to China, whose sudden removal of strict coronavirus restrictions late last year is expected to unleash a wave of spending that may offset economic weakness in the United States and Europe. “The reopening of China has to be the major event and it will be a major driver of growth,” Laura Cha, chair of Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing, said at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland on Tuesday. It’s an assessment shared by plenty of others attending the annual gathering of executives, billionaires and politicians in the Swiss mountain resort, in contrast with the WEF’s survey of chief economists published Monday showing two-thirds of them think a recession in 2023 is likely. Douglas Peterson, the chief executive of S&P Global, said that despite his expectations for a shallow recession in Europe, the United Kingdom and the United States this year, China’s more relaxed approach to coronavirus — after three years of strict lockdowns, closed borders and aggressive testing — would help offset the global pain. “There’s pent up savings, there’s pent up demand, so we expect China will see very strong growth, especially as you get later in the year,” Peterson said, adding that he anticipates “net growth globally this year.” China’s zero Covid policies were a drag on global growth in 2022. The world’s second largest economy expanded by just 3%, one of its worst performances in nearly a half century. But Liu He, the country’s vice premier, said in a keynote speech in Davos Tuesday that the country’s reopening would spark a resurgence in activity and economic development. “If we work hard enough, we are confident that in 2023 China’s growth will most likely return to its normal trend and the Chinese economy will see a significant improvement,” Liu said. The expected boost remains difficult to quantify. Near term, China is in the grip of its worst coronavirus outbreak, keeping many people indoors and emptying shops and restaurants in recent weeks. Future waves could have a similar effect. (Liu said Tuesday that the Covid situation “is steadying.”) Splurging by Chinese consumers and businesses could also reignite inflation if demand for fuel and agricultural commodities increases dramatically. Yet to many, the changing situation in China represents a bright spot. “I’m expecting a solid growth number for China in 2023,” said Kevin Rudd, president of the Asia Society and a former prime minister of Australia.
241 Those eager to sound an upbeat message also point to a warmer winter in Europe, which is easing fears of an energy supply crunch, and growing confidence that inflation in the United States has peaked. “I think the economy has been surprising us quarter after quarter,” Mário Centeno, a member of the European Central Bank’s governing council, said Tuesday of the situation in Europe. “Maybe we will be surprised also in the first half of the year.” Averting a global recession is not a done deal, however. In addition to uncertainty over exactly how China’s reopening will play out, questions remain about how high central banks will raise interest rates, how long they will keep them there and the extent to which economies like the United States will slow as a result. Russia’s war in Ukraine is another ongoing source of volatility. A European ban on Russian diesel comes into force next month, threatening to keep prices for the vital fuel at extraordinarily high levels. And while inflation is coming down, Christian Ulbrich, the CEO of commercial real estate giant JLL, told CNN that he’s worried about where it will settle — especially given the trend toward bringing supply chains closer to home, which could lower companies’ exposure to geopolitical risks but add to their costs. If inflation remains stuck between 4% and 7%, it will be “painful for many industries,” he said. The World Bank warned earlier this month that any fresh shock — such as a surprise uptick in inflation or a central bank policy mistake — would likely unleash the second downturn this decade. Passive Voice • is expected Tense • Present Simple Vocabulary Regular Verb / Irregular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb expected Regular Verb Transitive Verb
242 Prosecutors drop charges against NYPD officer accused of acting as foreign agent for China Federal prosecutors in Brooklyn moved to dismiss charges against a New York Police Department officer who had been accused of acting as a foreign agent on behalf of the Chinese government. Baimadajie Angwang was charged in September 2020 with acting as a foreign agent for China without notifying American authorities, wire fraud, making false statements and obstruction of an official proceeding, according to court documents. But on Friday, prosecutors for the US Attorney’s Office of the Eastern District of New York filed a motion to dismiss the indictment. “As a result of our continued investigation, the government obtained additional information bearing on the charges,” prosecutors said in the document. “Having assessed the evidence as a whole in light of that information … the government hereby moves, in the interests of justice, to dismiss the indictment without prejudice.” A federal judge must now sign a court order to officially dismiss the indictment. The US Attorney’s Office declined to comment. Defense attorney John Carman told CNN the government’s motion to dismiss is “appreciated” but “long overdue.” “The anguish and expense that this police officer and Marine Corps veteran has endured is not easily described,” he said. “We are optimistic that the Court will grant the motion and that this great American will have the opportunity to repair untold damage to his life.” The 2020 arrest was one of a number of federal cases brought against Chinese Americans connected to the Trump Administration’s “China Initiative,” a Department of Justice program focused on “countering Chinese national security threats.” The program was scrapped in February 2022 under the Biden Administration after a string of case dismissals and criticisms it fueled suspicion and bias against innocent Chinese Americans. “Anything that creates the impression that the Department of Justice applies different standards based on race or ethnicity harms the department and our efforts, and it harms the public,” assistant attorney general for national security Matthew Olsen said last year in ending the program. Angwang, an ethnic Tibetan, joined the NYPD in 2016 and worked as part of the community affairs unit based in Queens. A naturalized US citizen, he came to the US from China on a cultural exchange visa, overstayed his second visa and eventually applied for asylum, claiming he was “arrested and tortured” in China due in part to his Tibetan ethnicity, according to the complaint. He is a former Marine who served in Afghanistan in 2013, according to his service record. Since 2014, he served as a US Army Reservist, where he was a staff sergeant working as a civil affairs specialist.
243 Prosecutors said in the 2020 complaint an investigation revealed Angwang allegedly acted at the direction and control of Chinese officials to report on activities of ethnic Tibetans in the New York City area to the consulate, and helped spot and assess potential Tibetan intelligence sources. He was suspended at the time of the charges and remains suspended with pay, according to his attorney. In court documents, defense attorneys argued the government had a “hyper-suspicious” view of Angwang’s interactions with the Chinese consulate official and had cherry-picked quotes and cut out others from their conversations. Angwang’s only goal in cultivating a relationship with the official was because the official had power to grant or deny visa applications for New York-based ethnic Tibetans, like himself, trying to return to China, the attorneys wrote. “Mr. Angwang can be seen not only lobbying for his own visa, but for all ethnic Tibetans who desire improved opportunities to visit the place of their birth,” Carman, the attorney, wrote in a February 2021 document. “The idea that Mr. Angwang is an ‘intelligence asset’ collecting information about his fellow Tibetans is simply not borne out by the transcripts of the conversations.” The Chinese consulate in New York issued a statement at the time of Angwang’s arrest, describing its work as “above board and beyond reproach.” “The staffs of the Chinese Consulate General in New York have always been fulfilling duties in accordance with international law and the law of the United States,” the statement said. “They have been conducting normal exchanges with various sectors of society in its consular district, and have been committed to promoting friendly communication and exchanges between the Chinese people and the people from all works of life in its consular district.”
244 Passive Voice 1. had been accused 2. is not easily described 3. was arrested 4. was suspended 5. have been committed 6. was scrapped 7. be seen Tense • Present Perfect *2 • Past Simple*3 • Present Perfect • Past Perfect Vocabulary Regular Verb / Irregular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb accused Regular Verb Transitive Verb described Regular Verb Transitive Verb arrested Regular Verb Transitive Verb suspended Regular Verb Transitive Verb committed Regular Verb Transitive Verb scrapped Regular Verb Transitive Verb seen Irregular Verb Transitive Verb / Intransitive Verb
245 South Korea brought K-pop and K-dramas to the world. The Korean language could be next There’s never been a better time to learn Korean. It’s one of the fastest-growing languages in the world, outpacing traditionally popular rivals like Chinese in multiple markets – reflecting the global phenomenon many call the “Korean wave.” In 2022, Korean was the seventh most-studied language on the learning app Duolingo, according to the company’s annual language report. And it’s seeing particular success in parts of South and Southeast Asia, as the most-studied foreign language in the Philippines, and not far off the top spot in Thailand, Indonesia and Pakistan. Although Chinese – which for years has been considered as the business language of the future – remains the second most be spoken language in the world, thanks in part to the sheer size of China’s population, it has been sat in eighth place on Duolingo for the last several years, lagging behind Korean. Korean is the second most-studied Asian language on Duolingo, only narrowly behind Japanese, according to the language report. Duolingo, which has more than 500 million users internationally, ranks Korean ahead of Chinese, Russian and Hindi, and behind Italian. English and Spanish still sit comfortably in the top two spots. This rise in interest, experts and teachers say, is thanks to the Korean wave, or “hallyu” – the proliferation of Korean culture internationally. The last two decades have seen South Korean exports sweep the world, from K-pop and Korean TV dramas to beauty products, fashion and food. The country has become an international cultural juggernaut – so much so that the Oxford English Dictionary added more than 20 words of Korean origin in 2021, saying in a statement, “We are all riding the crest of the Korean wave.” This phenomenon has been aided by South Korea’s own government, which has worked to spread the country’s cultural influence through music and media since the 1990s. Now, the Korean language could be the next export to go global. “Compared to the time I started my career, the perceptions of Korea as a nation, Korean culture and society, and the Korean language have gone through a significant, positive change,” said Joowon Suh, director of the Korean Language Program at Columbia University. “Now it is perceived more modern, advanced, marketable, cooler, and hipper.” Rise in language classes For decades, East Asian language studies overseas have mostly been limited to Mandarin Chinese and Japanese. But that began to change in the past decade after major hits by Korean artists and directors, such as Psy’s 2012 song “Gangnam Style,” the 2019 thriller “Parasite,” the 2021 Netflix show “Squid Game,” and the emergence of BTS, undoubtedly the biggest global stars of K-pop. Figures show a surge in interest toward the language in the same period.
246 The number of students enrolled in Korean classes at higher education institutions in the United States leapt from 5,211 in 2002 to nearly 14,000 in 2016, according to data analyzed by the Modern Language Association. This jump is striking given Korean isn’t easy for non-native speakers to learn. The US State Department lists Korean as a “super-hard language,” meaning it’s “exceptionally difficult” for English speakers and takes on average 88 weeks to achieve professional working proficiency. Modern Korean follows a phonetic alphabet called Hangul, meaning the syllables are generally pronounced as they are written – unlike non-phonetic languages such as Chinese, which uses symbols to represent specific meanings. Suh, the Columbia instructor, said she first began noticing a rise in interest around 2015 – but it has accelerated in the last three to four years. The number of Columbia students enrolling in Korean courses increased by 50% from the 2017 to 2021 academic years, she said. Other popular languages have seen numbers either plateau or drop over the last decade. US students enrolled in Chinese classes, for instance, jumped significantly from 2002 to 2013, a period marked by China’s massive economic growth and global influence. But enrollments in Chinese had dipped by 2016, according to the Modern Language Association – coinciding with the deterioration of US-China relations, and the worsening perception of China in the West due to its alleged human rights abuses. “Students’ interest in foreign language learning in US higher education tends to depend more on the perception or reputation of a country in terms of economy and geopolitics, such as China, Russia or Portugal,” said Suh. Similarly, in the United Kingdom, the number of higher education students taking Korean courses tripled from 2012 to 2018, according to the University Council of Modern Languages – compared to just a 5% increase for Chinese, and a decline in several European languages like French and German. Government efforts Korean’s newfound popularity was no accident, with South Korean authorities jumping at the chance to promote their language on the back of its more successful exports. “It is the Hallyu that has persuaded Asian countries at the societal level that Korea is really part of the developed, western world,” said John Walsh in his 2014 book on the phenomenon. This shift in perception has in turn boosted the government’s ability to pursue “national interests in the areas of diplomacy, investment, education and trade,” he wrote. Over the last decade, the Ministry of Education has sent Korean teachers overseas, including several dozen to Thailand in 2017 to teach the language at middle and high schools. In more recent years, numerous countries including Laos, Myanmar and Thailand have officially adopted Korean as a foreign language in their school curricula, under agreements signed with the Korean education ministry, according to South Korean news agency Yonhap.
247 Meanwhile, the King Sejong Institute, a government-founded Korean-language brand, has established 244 learning centers worldwide, according to its website. These efforts aim to “keep the interest of Korean language abroad, which has become widely popular with the Korean Wave,” said the education ministry in a 2017 press release. “In the long term, Korean language courses in the local school curriculum will serve as a step to foster Korean experts, and thereby strengthening friendly relationships between Korea and other countries,” it added. Suh cautioned that the Korean wave runs the risk of oversimplifying nuances of Korean culture and society, such as regional differences or class conflicts, while glorifying “anything (Korean) without fully understanding its history.” But, she added, this simplification could actually benefit the South Korean government as it expands its influence, as something “any rising soft power might have to go through.” From K-pop to employment Experts say students come to the table with various reasons for pursuing the Korean language – though certain trends have emerged among regional and ethnic lines. “The Korean wave is an important factor for non-heritage students,” said Suh, referring to those without Korean ethnicity or heritage who are simply interested in Korean cultural products like movies and K-pop. Meanwhile, students of Korean descent tend to take Korean classes for more “integrative” reasons, she said – for instance, wanting to live in South Korea, to better connect with their communities and families, or to explore their own Korean identities. Jiyoung Lee, an adjunct instructor at New York University’s Department of East Asian Studies, pointed to the rise of social media platforms like Instagram and TikTok. These have facilitated international cultural exchanges and “largely influenced” the number of Korean learners, she said. But Lee, who previously taught Korean in Indonesia and South Korea, also noticed differences among students in different parts of the world. US students tend to learn Korean “because they are more interested in enjoying culture … and want to talk to their favorite singers or actors,” she said. By contrast, students in Southeast Asia mostly study Korean to get a job in South Korea, or at a Korean company in their home country, she said, noting the number of Korean brands “establishing themselves not only in Southeast Asia but also in various countries.” For instance, the Korean entertainment giant SM Entertainment is expanding into Southeast Asia with new Singapore headquarters. Meanwhile, the Korean convenience store chain GS25 has more than 180 outlets in Vietnam, and is set to break ground in Malaysia this year, according to Yonhap.