Trump: US Tariffs on More Foreign Vehicles Would Have Prevented GM Plant Closures

U.S. President Donald Trump touted the use of U.S. tariffs on foreign small trucks Wednesday, saying their placement on other foreign vehicles would have prevented the closure of several General Motors plants and the loss of thousands of coveted manufacturing jobs.

Trump noted on Twitter that brisk U.S. small truck sales in the country are due to a 25-percent tariff on small truck imports.

The president reiterated on Twitter that “countries that send us cars have taken advantage of the U.S. for decades.” Trump added he has “great power on this issue,” which he said “is being studied now.”

Trump has threatened to eliminate all federal subsidies to GM in response to the company’s planned closure of five plants and the elimination of 14,000 jobs in North America. Questions remain, though, about whether Trump has the authority to act against the automaker without congressional approval.

Federal tax credits of up to $7,500 are available to those who buy GM electric vehicles. Killing the subsidies may have little financial impact on GM because it is on the cusp of reaching its subsidy limit.

Many of the jobs would be eliminated in Midwestern U.S. states, a region where Trump has long promised a manufacturing rebirth.

GM, which said it has invested more than $22 billion in U.S. operations since it came out of bankruptcy in 2009, has tried to appease the Trump administration while justifying its decisions.

“We appreciate the actions this administration has taken on behalf of industry to improve the overall competitiveness of U.S. manufacturing,” GM said in a statement Tuesday.

Before GM can shutter factories next year in Michigan, Ohio and Ontario, Canada, it must reach agreement with the United Auto Workers union. The union has vowed to fight the closures legally and in collective bargaining.

GM’s restructuring reflects changes in buying trends in North America, prompting vehicle manufacturers to shift away from cars and toward SUVs and trucks.

 

 

 

 

 

Powell: Fed’s Gradual Rate Hikes Balance Against Risks

U.S. Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said on Wednesday that while there was “a great deal to like” about U.S. prospects, the Fed’s gradual interest rate hikes are meant to balance risks as it tries to keep the economy on track.

“We know that things often turn out to be quite different from even the most careful forecasts,” Powell said in a speech that comes in the wake of last week’s volatile market selloff. “Our gradual pace of raising interest rates has been an exercise in balancing risks.”

Powell offered few clues on how much longer the U.S. central bank would raise interest rates in the face of a slowdown overseas and market volatility at home. Instead he highlighted a new financial stability report the Fed published earlier on Wednesday.

“My own assessment is that, while risks are above normal in some areas and below normal in others, overall financial stability vulnerabilities are at a moderate level,” he said at an Economic Club of New York luncheon.

With An Eye on Past Problems, Facebook Expands Local Feature

Facebook is cautiously expanding a feature that shows people local news and information, including missing-person alerts, road closures, crime reports and school announcements.

Called “Today In,” the service shows people information from their towns and cities from such sources as news outlets, government entities and community groups. Facebook launched the service in January with six cities and expanded that to 25, then more. On Wednesday, “Today In” is expanding to 400 cities in the U.S. — and a few others in Australia.

The move comes as Facebook tries to shake off its reputation as a hotbed for misinformation and elections-meddling and rather a place for communities and people to come together and stay informed.

Here are some things to know about this effort, and why it matters:

The big picture

It’s something users have asked for, the company says. Think of it as an evolution of a “trending” feature the company dropped earlier this year. That feature, which showed news articles that were popular among users, but was rife with such problems as fake news and accusations of bias.

Anthea Watson Strong, product manager for local news and community information, said her team learned from the problems with that feature.

“We feel deeply the mistakes of our foremothers and forefathers,” she said.

This time around, Facebook employees went to some of the cities they were launching in and met with users. They tried to predict problems by doing “pre-mortem” assessments, she said. That is, instead of a “post-mortem” where engineers dissect what went wrong after the fact, they tried to anticipate how people might misuse a feature — for financial gain, for example.

Facebook isn’t saying how long it has been taking this “pre-mortem” approach, though the practice isn’t unique to the company. Nonetheless, it’s a significant step given that many of Facebook’s current problems stem from its failure to foresee how bad actors might co-opt the service.

Facebook also hopes the feature’s slow rollout will prevent problems.

How it works

To find out if “Today In” is available in your city or town, tap the “menu” icon with the three horizontal lines. Then scroll down until you see it. If you want, you can choose to see the local updates directly in your news feed.

For now, the company is offering this only in small and mid-sized cities such as Conroe, Texas, Morgantown, West Virginia, and Santa Fe, New Mexico. Large cities such as New York or Los Angeles have added challenges, such as an abundance of news and information, and may need to be broken up into smaller neighborhoods.

The posts in “Today In” are curated by artificial intelligence; there is no human involvement. The service aggregates posts from the Facebook pages for news organizations, government agencies and community groups like dog shelters. For this reason, a kid couldn’t declare a snow day, because “Today In” relies on the school’s official page. Discussion posts from local Facebook groups may also be included.

For now, the information is tailored only by geography, but this might change. A person with no kids, for example, might not want to see updates from schools.

Safeguards?

Facebook uses software filters to weed out objectionable content, just as it does on people’s regular news feed. But the filters are turned up for “Today In.” If a good friend posts something a bit objectionable, you are still likely to see it because Facebook takes your friendship into account. But “Today In” posts aren’t coming from your friends, so Facebook is more likely to keep it out.

 

 

Porsche Shows off New Edition of Mainstay 911 Sports Car

Porsche says its future is in electric cars but for now it is rolling out a more powerful version of its internal combustion mainstay, the sleek 911 sports car.

Stuttgart-based Porsche, part of Volkswagen, is to show off the eighth version of its brand-defining model at the Los Angeles Auto Show.

 

The new 911 doesn’t look much different than earlier editions of the car. The new one has bigger wheel housings and a slightly wider body but the same long hood, sloping roof and prominent headlights that have marked successive versions since 1963.

 

The company said in a news release Wednesday that the new 911 Carrera S and 4S have flat six-cylinder turbocharged engines putting out 443 horsepower, 23 horsepower more than the predecessor. The Carrera S has a top speed of 191 mph and accelerates from zero to 60 mph (96.5 kph) in 3.5 seconds.

 

The rear-drive 2020 Carrera S has a base price of $113,200 and the 4S all-wheel drive version starts at $120,600, not including a $1,050 delivery fee. They can be ordered now and will reach dealers in summer 2019.

 

Porsche boss Oliver Blume says that the 911 remains “the core of our brand, we are making it even more emotional.”

 

Blume says nonetheless by 2025 about half of all new Porsche cars and SUVs will have electric motors, whether they are all-electric or hybrids combining batteries with internal combustion engines.

 

He was quoted by the Welt am Sonntag newspaper as saying that the company would be ready for a world in which some cities and countries are talking about banning internal combustion cars in coming decades. “It’s clear, the future belongs to electric mobility,” he said.

 

The company is developing an all-electric sports car, the Taycan, that would compete with sports car offerings by Tesla, BMW and others.

 

 

 

US Charges 2 Iranians in First Online Ransom Case

In the first case of its kind, the U.S. Justice Department announced charges Wednesday against two Iranian hackers for allegedly launching so-called ransomware on the computer networks of U.S. municipalities, hospitals and other public institutions and extorting millions of dollars.

Ransomware is a type of malware used by cybercriminals to lock down computers and extort money from their users in exchange for providing the keys to unlock them. Once used primarily against individuals, ransomware has been increasingly employed in cyberattacks on businesses.

Faramarz Shahi Savandi, 34, and Mohammad Mehdi Shah Mansouri, 27, are accused of creating the SamSam Ransomware in December 2015 and installing it on the computer networks of more than 230 public and private entities in the United States and Canada, according to a 26-page indictment unsealed Wednesday.

With the targeted computer users unable to access their data, Savandi and Mansouri, operating out of Iran, would then demand a ransom payment made in the form of the virtual currency bitcoin in exchange for decryption keys for the encrypted data.

According to the indictment, the two Iranians received more than $6 million in cryptocurrencies from their victims which they converted into Iranian currency, or rial, using Iran-based bitcoin exchanges. About half of the infiltrated entities refused to make a ransom payment and suffered over $30 million in lost data, according to the indictment.

The victims included the cities of Atlanta, Newark and San Diego, the Colorado Department of Transportation, the University of Calgary in Calgary, Canada, and six U.S. public health care-related entities.

Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein announced the six-count indictment at a press conference in Washington.

“Every sector of our economy is a target of malicious cyberactivity,” Rosenstein said. “But the events described in this indictment highlight the urgent need for municipalities, public utilities, health care institutions, universities, and other public organizations to enhance their cybersecurity.”

The two indicted Iranians remain at large and have been placed on the FBI’s wanted list. They’re charged with one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and two counts of intentional damage to a protected computer, among other related crimes.

The indictment marks the first time the Justice Department has brought charges against cybercriminals involved in a ransomware and extortion scheme, according to Rosenstein.  

Ransomware has grown in sophistication and distribution in recent years. According to a report by the cybersecurity firm Bitdefender, ransomware payments were expected to reach a record $2 billion in 2017.

‘Trend’ from Iran

The charges are also the latest in a string of indictments brought against Iranian hackers and cybercriminals in recent months. In March, prosecutors charged nine Iranian hackers with penetrating the computer networks of hundreds of American and foreign universities and other institutions to steal valuable research material. Unlike some of the previously indicted Iranian hackers, however, Savandi and Mansouri are not believed to have ties to Tehran.

“The actions highlighted today, which represent a continuing trend of cybercriminal activity emanating from Iran, were particularly threatening, as they targeted public safety institutions, including U.S. hospital systems and governmental entities,” said Amy Hess, executive assistant director of the FBI. “As cyberthreats evolve and cybercriminals develop more sophisticated techniques, so do we.”

The 35-month computer hacking scheme led by Savandi and Mansouri began in January 2016 with an attack on an unidentified business in Mercer County, New Jersey, and moved on to public entities such as the City of Newark and health care providers such as Kansas Heart Hospital in Wichita, Kansas. 

Assistant Attorney General Brian A. Benczkowski said the Iranian hackers carefully chose their targets. A few days prior to attacking the network of Kansas Heart Hospital, for example, they “conducted online searches concerning the hospital and accessed its website,” he said.

Kimberly Goody, manager of cybercrime analysis at cybersecurity firm FireEye, said the hackers probably chose to target health care and government organizations because “they provide critical services and believed their likelihood of paying was higher as a result.”

The indictment does not name the entities that paid a ransom.

Jeff Seldin contributed to this report.

Scientist Claiming Gene-edited Babies Reports 2nd Pregnancy

A Chinese researcher who claims to have helped make the world’s first genetically edited babies says a second pregnancy may be underway.

The researcher, He Jiankui of Shenzhen, revealed the pregnancy Wednesday while making his first public comments about his controversial work at an international conference in Hong Kong.

He claims to have altered the DNA of twin girls born earlier this month to try to make them resistant to infection with the AIDS virus. Mainstream scientists have condemned the experiment, and universities and government groups are investigating.

The second pregnancy is in a very early stage and needs more time to be monitored to see if it will last, He said.

Leading scientists said there are now even more reasons to worry, and more questions than answers, after He’s talk. The leader of the conference called the experiment “irresponsible” and evidence that the scientific community had failed to regulate itself to prevent premature efforts to alter DNA.

Altering DNA before or at the time of conception is highly controversial because the changes can be inherited and might harm other genes. It’s banned in some countries including the United States except for lab research.

He defended his choice of HIV, rather than a fatal inherited disease, as a test case for gene editing, and insisted the girls could benefit from it.

“They need this protection since a vaccine is not available,” He said.

Scientists weren’t buying it.

“This is a truly unacceptable development,” said Jennifer Doudna, a University of California-Berkeley scientist and one of the inventors of the CRISPR gene-editing tool that He said he used. “I’m grateful that he appeared today, but I don’t think that we heard answers. We still need to understand the motivation for this.”

“I feel more disturbed now,” said David Liu of Harvard and MIT’s Broad Institute, and inventor of a variation of the gene-editing tool. “It’s an appalling example of what not to do about a promising technology that has great potential to benefit society. I hope it never happens again.”

There is no independent confirmation of He’s claim and he has not yet published in any scientific journal where it would be vetted by experts. At the conference, He failed or refused to answer many questions including who paid for his work, how he ensured that participants understood potential risks and benefits, and why he kept his work secret until after it was done.

After He spoke, David Baltimore, a Nobel laureate from the California Institute of Technology and a leader of the conference, said He’s work “would still be considered irresponsible” because it did not meet criteria many scientists agreed on several years ago before gene editing could be considered.

“I personally don’t think that it was medically necessary. The choice of the diseases that we heard discussions about earlier today are much more pressing” than trying to prevent HIV infection this way, he said.

If gene editing is ever allowed, many scientists have said it should be reserved to treat and prevent serious inherited disorders with no good alternatives, such as sickle cell anemia and Huntington’s disease. HIV is not an appropriate candidate because there are already safe ways to prevent transmission, and if contracted it can be kept under control with medications, researchers said.

The case shows “there has been a failure of self-regulation by the scientific community” and said the conference committee would meet and issue a statement on Thursday about the future of the field, Baltimore said.

Before He’s talk, Dr. George Daley, Harvard Medical School’s dean and one of the conference organizers, warned against a backlash to gene editing because of He’s experiment. Just because the first case may have been a misstep “should in no way, I think, lead us to stick our heads in the sand and not consider the very, very positive aspects that could come forth by a more responsible pathway,” Daley said.

“Scientists who go rogue … it carries a deep, deep cost to the scientific community,” Daley said.

Regulators have been swift to condemn the experiment as unethical and unscientific.

The National Health Commission has ordered local officials in Guangdong province to investigate He’s actions, and his employer, Southern University of Science and Technology of China, is investigating as well.

On Tuesday, Qui Renzong of the Chinese Academy of Social Science criticized the decision to let He speak at the conference, saying the claim “should not be on our agenda” until it has been reviewed by independent experts. Whether He violated reproductive medicine laws in China has been unclear; Qui contends that it did, but said, “the problem is, there’s no penalty.”

He called on the United Nations to convene a meeting to discuss heritable gene editing to promote international agreement on when it might be OK.

Meanwhile, more American scientists said they had contact with He and were aware of or suspected what he was doing.

Dr. Matthew Porteus, a genetics researcher at Stanford University, where He did postdoctoral research, said He told him in February that he intended to try human gene editing. Porteus said he discouraged He and told him “that it was irresponsible, that he could risk the entire field of gene editing by doing this in a cavalier fashion.”

Dr. William Hurlbut, a Stanford ethicist, said he has “spent many hours” talking with He over the last two years about situations where gene editing might be appropriate.

“I knew his early work. I knew where he was heading,” Hurlbut said. When he saw He four or five weeks ago, He did not say he had tried or achieved pregnancy with edited embryos but “I strongly suspected” it, Hurlbut said.

“I disagree with the notion of stepping out of the general consensus of the scientific community,” Hurlbut said. If the science is not considered ready or safe enough, “it’s going to create misunderstanding, discordance and distrust.”

Jennifer Doudna and David Liu are paid by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, which also supports AP’s Health & Science Department.

Ikea Moving Into City Centers to Adapt to Consumer Changes

An airport worker drops by Warsaw’s newest Ikea store during her lunch break to finish up plans for a home refurbishment. Around her, people drift in and out of the shop, placing small houseware items in big yellow bags as cafe tables fill up with people just stopping in for lunch.

The store is not one of Ikea’s out-of-the-way, maze-like warehouses that require a car to visit, but a shop like any other in a city center shopping mall. The Swedish retailing giant plans to open 30 such smaller stores in major cities around the world as part of a broader transformation to adapt to changing consumer habits.

Compared with just a decade ago, shoppers are more likely to be living in urban areas and not have a car, and often want a nearby location to look at goods like furniture in person before ordering things online.

“I like the idea because you can come any time,” said 29-year-old Angelika Singh, the airport worker, as she finalized an order for a new kitchen. “Mostly when you go to Ikea you need to have a whole day free, or at least half a day free, because it’s far.”

Warsaw’s store is located on two floors covering nearly 5,000 square meters (54,000 square feet), about one-fourth of a traditional big-box store. Similar stores have also opened in major cities like London and Madrid and more are expected, with one due next year in Paris, among other locations.

Shoppers can buy cushions, curtains and other home items. They can design the layout of bedrooms and kitchens at computer stations. But those hoping to buy a bookcase or bed will not find them stocked in a large warehouse, though they can order them at kiosks and have them delivered to their homes.

As such, it offers a very different shopping experience from the usual visit to one of the large warehouse stores.

“Ikea’s been doing pretty much the same for 70 years. It’s been a cash-and-carry company, and it still is for the majority of its sales,” said Andreas Flygare, the project manager for the Warsaw store. Now, he explained, the company must adapt to a consumer environment that has changed dramatically in the last 10 years.

“You have companies like Amazon and Uber that are raising the bar for what is expected. Because if you can have same-day delivery, or an Uber is two minutes away, it influences other companies, like Ikea,” he said in a recent interview in the store’s cafe. “It can be a quite tough environment. Everything is changing so fast.”

While Ikea is still profitable, its earnings have recently been growing more slowly than expected.

Thomas Slide, senior retail analyst at the market research firm Mintel, described it as a rational response to a “global trend towards urban living and a rebirth of the cities.”

“While Ikea used to be able to build its big blue warehouses on the edge of towns and cities and expect shoppers to come to them, now it has recognized it needs to be more flexible in its approach and take the Ikea experience to them, through digital channels and smaller stores closer to where people live and work,” Slide said.

Ikea isn’t the first to embrace such an approach. In the U.S., retailer Target has rolled out smaller stores to broaden its reach. French hardware store Leroy Merlin has done the same, as have Kingfisher-owned DIY store B&Q and sofa retailer DFS in Britain.

“While Ikea may not be on the cutting edge of this trend, it’s an important strategy to prepare the business for the future,” Slide said. “The challenge will be adding extra services through additional channels while also maintaining profitability.”

Chen Yu Ting, a 25-year-old from Taiwan who studies medicine in Warsaw, said it used to take him 40 minutes by bus to visit one of the large Ikea stores outside the city. But he is a short walk to the new store, and after an initial trip to buy pillows and bed sheets he now returns often for lunch, which is priced right for his budget.

“It’s more convenient, and now I just come here to eat,” he said.

His only complaint? The store doesn’t stock frozen meatballs.

Chinese Scientist Faces Firestorm Over Genetic Editing

A Chinese researcher has publicly defended his claim he has created the world’s first genetically-edited babies.

He Jiankui addressed a crowd of fellow scientists Wednesday at a biomedical conference in Hong Kong, two days after he posted a video online claiming to have used a gene-editing technology dubbed CRISPR to alter the DNA of twin girls born to an HIV-positive father to prevent them from contracting the virus that causes AIDS.

Dr. He said he conducted his research in secret. His work has not been independently verified, and Dr. He has not submitted his report to any scientific journals where it could be examined by experts. But he told his colleagues that he felt “proud…proudest” of his achievement.

His claims have set off a firestorm of skepticism and criticism. The Southern University of Science and Technology, the university in the southern Chinese city in Shenzhen that employs him, says he has been on unpaid leave since February. The school denounced his research for violating “academic ethics and codes of conduct,” and the Chinese government is urging local authorities to launch an investigation into He’s work.

Shortly after He’s speech before the Second International Summit on Human Genome Editing, American biologist David Baltimore, a Nobel laureate in physiology or medicine and a leader of the summit, called Dr. He’s work “irresponsible” and a “failure of self-regulation by the scientific community.”

Genetic editing has the potential to remove inherited diseases from the gene pool, but scientists and ethicists worry it could be used to create so-called “designer babies.” They also worry any genetic changes could lead to other genes being altered in unpredictable ways.

UN Report Says Fragile Climate Puts Food Security at Risk

Feeding a hungry planet is growing increasingly difficult as climate change and depletion of land and other resources undermine food systems, the U.N. Food and Agricultural Organization said Wednesday as it renewed appeals for better policies and technologies to reach “zero hunger.”

 

Population growth requires supplies of more nutritious food at affordable prices, but increasing farm output is hard given the “fragility of the natural resource base” since humans have outstripped Earth’s carrying capacity in terms of land, water and climate change, the report said.

 

About 820 million people are malnourished. The FAO and International Food Policy Research Institute released the report at the outset of a global conference aimed at speeding up efforts to achieve zero hunger around the world.

 

“The call for action is very clear. It is possible in our lifetime and it is also realistic to end hunger and malnutrition,” Inonge Wina, vice president of Zambia, told the gathering.

 

Food security remains tenuous for many millions of people who lack access to affordable, adequately nourishing diets for a variety of reasons, the most common being poverty.

 

But it’s also endangered by civil strife and other conflicts. In Yemen, where thousands of civilians have died in airstrikes by a Saudi-led coalition, the aid group Save the Children says 85,000 children under 5 may have died of hunger or disease in the civil war.

 

In Afghanistan, severe drought and conflict have displaced more than 250,000 people, according to UNHCR, the U.N. refugee agency.

 

FAO Director-General Jose Graziano da Silva noted that the number of hungry and malnourished people in the world has risen to levels last seen a decade ago.

 

“After decades of gains in fighting hunger, this is a serious setback and FAO and the U.N. sister agencies, together with member governments and other partners, are all very concerned,” Graziano da Silva said in a videotaped address to the conference.

 

Hunger is still most severe in Africa, but the largest number of undernourished people live in the Asia-Pacific region, the report said. It said good public policies and technology are the keys to improving the situation.

 

The FAO estimates that global demand for food will jump by half from 2013 to 2050. Farmers can expand land use to help make up some of the difference, but that option is constrained in places like Asia and the Pacific and urbanization is eating up still more land that once may have been used for agriculture.

 

Increasing farm output beyond sustainable levels can cause permanent damage to ecosystems, the report said, noting that it often causes soil erosion, pollution with plastic mulching, pesticides and fertilizers, and a loss of biodiversity.

 

China destroys 12 million tons of tainted grain each year, at a loss of nearly $2.6 billion, according to the report.

 

 

 

 

Seoul’s Telecom Outage Highlights Need for Redundancy in Connected World

Residents in Seoul discovered how fragile their telecommunications system was this past weekend when a fire disrupted service for millions. The government and the provider vowed to implement changes to avoid a repeat of the event, but the system failure demonstrated a need for greater redundancy and preparation for future natural and technological disasters.

The fire affected customers of KT, the nation’s second largest telecommunications company. They found themselves unable to make calls, access the internet, complete ATM or credit card transactions, and watch television. Local media also reported an elderly woman died when she fell ill and her husband wasn’t able to reach emergency services during the service outage.

Lee Manjong, chairman of the Korean Association for Terrorism Studies and professor of the department of Law & Police at Howon University, told VOA that while it is nearly impossible to prevent widespread system outages, certain steps can be taken to avoid catastrophic failures.

“It is necessary to split the public safety net (fire, medical, and police emergency services) and make system backups (redundancies) compulsory,” he said.

Following the blaze, South Korea’s minister of Science and ICT (Information, Communications, and Technology), You Young-min, spoke to the CEOs of South Korea’s three major communication companies (SK Telecom, KT, and LG U+) to discuss their backup plans.

You said the companies “need to swiftly change their contract clauses on compensation issues and also need to come up with plans that would reroute traffic if such accidents, which shouldn’t happen again, happen.”

When asked for specifics on what steps the government planned on taking to prevent a similar event in the future, the ministry declined to offer specifics, stating that responsible parties would prepare fire prevention measures this year and set up a task force to implement recommendations.

Local broadcaster MBC also reported that telecommunication companies and the government held a 20-minute virtual natural disaster drill in May to simulate a system outage, but the simulation proved to be ineffective in real-world situations.

Interconnected services

The Seoul fire and resulting system outage demonstrated how interconnected services are in the 21st century.

“If a network is down, then it affects other networks such as finance, power, energy, and railway,” said Lee.

He said there are multiple ways the electronic infrastructure can be paralyzed. This includes physical damage, natural disasters, and cyber attacks. However, Lee notes disruptions caused by cyber incursions are more effective.

“Cyber attacks are more efficient as they can take place without access to the physical location of the target,” he said.

According to Lee, this is because the government is able to secure physical sites, so cyber-warriors choose “soft targets” connected through the Internet.

A distributed denial-of-service (DDos) attack could be launched from the Internet and attack telecommunication networks. This type of attack floods a computer network with incoming data packets and overwhelms the system, effectively shutting it down. Lee said such attacks on telecom systems could wreak havoc and paralyze communication.

He cautioned that a successful cyber attack on South Korea’s technological infrastructure could yield “unimaginable” damage because of the country’s reliance on networked services.

Fire and recovery

Saturday’s fire struck an underground facility of KT, destroying telephone lines and fiber optic cables, taking about 10 hours to suppress. 

Seoul authorities rate facilities on a scale from A to D. Buildings rated A, B, or C must have adequate fire prevention systems installed, while those receiving a D rating do not.

KT’s Ahyeon facility, where the fire took place, was one of 27 D-rated facilities belonging to the company. As such, fire scene investigators found there were no fire detectors or sprinkler system installed at the Ahyeon facility and only a single fire extinguisher present.

South Korea’s other telecommunication carriers utilize over 800 similar facilities throughout the country, none of which are required to have fire detection equipment or sprinklers installed.

Lee said government regulations must be altered to bridge the gaps to ensure that such facilities are required to have redundant services elsewhere in the event of a natural disaster or cyber attack.

Estimates are the blaze resulted in about $7 million in property damage. KT has announced it would compensate affected customers by awarding them a free month of service for their inconvenience. KB security expects that amount to total about $27.5 million.

In a text message to customers, KT said it was “deeply sorry for the inconvenience. We will adopt preventive measures such as safety inspections… to avoid a recurrence.”

Seoul officials told VOA the cause of the fire remains unknown and the investigation to determine its source could last a month.

Lee Ju-hyun contributed to this report.

Predator Cities Fight for Survival in Peter Jackson’s ‘Mortal Engines’

Oscar-winning filmmaker Peter Jackson is returning to the big screen with adventure fantasy “Mortal Engines,” a post-apocalyptic tale of survival in his first feature film project since his award-winning adaptations of J.R.R. Tolkien’s novels.

The New Zealand-born director, known for his “The Lord of the Rings” and “The Hobbit” trilogies, produced and co-wrote the script for the film, based on the young adult book series by Philip Reeve.

Oscar-winning visual effects artist Christian Rivers, who worked with Jackson on the Tolkien adaptations as well as 2005’s “King Kong” makes his directorial in the film, set hundreds of years after a catastrophic event wipes out civilizations.

“Once ‘The Hobbit’ was done, we were looking forward to getting this made,” Jackson told Reuters at the film’s premiere in London on Tuesday.

“I didn’t want (Rivers) to make his first feature with somebody else … I wanted to be part of helping him get his feature film career off the ground … He’s done an amazing job.”

In the film, humans live in gigantic moving cities which devour smaller towns. A group made up of an outlaw, outcast and mysterious woman lead a rebellion against one such predator city, London.

“It was the fear of saying yes because I knew how much work it would be and it was also a fear of saying no, if I said no and someone else made it and it wasn’t any good, I’d be kicking myself,” Rivers said about directing “Mortal Engines.” “It was a freight train, it was a big film that came in and I had to jump on and take the ride.”

On top of his work in the art department, Rivers was a second unit director on the last two “Hobbit” films, the last of which came out in 2014.

Since then, Jackson directed World War I documentary “They Shall Not Grow Old”, released this month.

“Mortal Engines” features a young cast led by Icelandic actress Hera Hilmar. “Matrix” and “The Hobbit” actor Hugo Weaving also stars in the film.

200 Years of ‘Silent Night’: Singers Mark Carol’s Birthday

One of the most famous songs of Christmas was celebrated Tuesday as it approaches its 200th anniversary, with a concert at the New York City church where “Silent Night” is believed to have been sung in the United States for the first time and where a priest was the first to publish an English translation of the Austrian carol.

 

The performance of the carol by Austria’s Kroell Family Singers and ensembles from Trinity Church took place at the Alexander Hamilton memorial in the Trinity churchyard. The singers stood in front of the memorial in the darkened yard as onlookers gathered and horns from passing cars beeped on nearby streets.

 

The Kroell singers opened the carol with verses in the original German, followed by the Trinity singers with verses in languages including French, Spanish, and finally English. After the outdoor performance, they went inside the church, where the Austrian group sang some other songs before they finished with another rendition of “Silent Night.”

 

The song resonates with people because of its simple melody and straightforward message, said Elisabeth Frontull, a member of the Kroell group.

 

“You sing it from the bottom of your heart; that’s the reason why the song is so popular,” she said.

 

Organizers of the event said it’s believed the song was first sung at the Trinity Church location in 1839 by the Rainer family singers, a traveling singing group from Austria.

 

“Silent Night” initially debuted as a musical piece in December 1818, with words by Joseph Mohr, a priest, and music by Franz Xaver Gruber, in Oberndorf, Austria.

 

In 1859, a priest at Trinity, John Freeman Young, published the first English translation of three verses of the carol, including the well-known first verse that ends with “sleep in heavenly peace.”

 

It has become one of the most recorded songs in the world and declared as part of Austria’s cultural heritage.

 

To mark its anniversary, Austrian tourism organizations put together a number of events in that country, including concert and exhibitions.

 

The concert at Trinity — a historic church and tourist attraction that survived the destruction of the nearby World Trade Center in 2001 — was the only stateside event done through that effort, said Sigrid Pichler, spokeswoman for New York City’s Austrian Tourist Office.

 

“It touches the hearts of people deeply,” she said. “It’s a very simple song, it has an eternal message of peace. It is also something that the whole world needs to hear.”

Stevie Wonder Announces Plan to Help California Fire Victims

Stevie Wonder wants to raise money through his benefit concert for California fire victims impacted by the catastrophic wildfires.

The R&B legend announced his plan Tuesday to also help firefighters and first responders who assisted with the fires through his 22nd annual House Full of Toys Benefit Concert on Dec. 9. The charity billed as “The Stevie Wonder Song Party: A Celebration of Life, Love & Music” will be held at the Staples Center in Los Angeles. 

Concertgoers are being asked to bring an unwrapped toy or other gift. 

“We have to do our best to raise money for those that have been so less fortunate, for those that have lost dreams, lost their homes,” he said. “I am very happy to do this again this year but very, very, very excited to do something to help those in a bigger sense the less fortunate.”

Wonder said his foundation House Full of Hope along with the Entertainment Industry Foundation will also help raise money for those affected by the wildfire.

Nearly 90 people were killed in the massive wildfires as thousands have been displaced from their homes.

After his announcement, Wonder performed a few songs including “My Cherie Amour,” “The Christmas Song (Merry Christmas to You)” and “Golden Lady.”

Wonder also spoke on the importance of taking care of the planet.

“I know we’re dealing with a drought,” he said. “There are some who don’t believe in global warming. I do. We have to protect the planet. We have to be cognizant of what we do. … I pray that all of us, even those who are non-believers, understand that if we don’t love and take care of our planet, we won’t have it.”

The lineup for this year’s charity has not been announced. Last year’s performers included Tony Bennett, Pharrell Williams and Andra Day. 

In San Francisco, This Robot Barista Knows the Way You Like Your Latte

There are plenty of places to get a cup of coffee in San Francisco. But a new kind of café offers espressos and cappuccinos made by a robot. Michelle Quinn stopped by to see if a robot can make a good café latte.

‘The Rider’ Tops Gotham Awards, Kicking Off Awards Season

In the first major soiree of Hollywood’s awards season, Chloe Zhao’s elegiac, lyrical Western “The Rider” took best feature film at the 28th annual Gotham Awards. 

It was a surprising, but far from baffling conclusion to the Gothams, the New York-based gala for independent film, held Monday night at Cipriani’s Wall Street in downtown Manhattan. The awards were generally spread around, including a pair of prizes for Bo Burnham’s coming-of-age directing debut “Eighth Grade” and Paul Schrader’s impassioned Catholic drama “First Reformed.”

But the night’s final honor went to “The Rider,” the second feature by the Chinese-born Zhao, despite no previous awards on the night and only one other nomination: an audience award nod alongside 14 other films. Some may have forgotten it was eligible. Having first premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in May 2017, “The Rider” was nominated by the Gotham’s West Coast corollary, the Independent Film Spirit Awards, in February as one of last year’s best. 

Zhao, too, wasn’t in attendance (she is prepping her next film). And few looked more surprised than the producers — Bert Hamelinck and Mollye Asher — who accepted the award. “This is going to be the worst acceptance speech,” stuttered Hamelinck. 

Yet “The Rider,” filmed with Lakota cowboys on South Dakota’s Pine Ridge Reservation, persevered over a few Oscar favorites, including Yorgos Lanthimos’ period romp “The Favourite” and Barry Jenkins’ James Baldwin adaptation “If Beale Street Could Talk.” 

“The Favourite” still went home with two honorary awards: an award for its acting ensemble, led by Olivia Colman, Emma Stone and Rachel Weisz; and a tribute to Weisz. Jenkins applauded the choice of “The Rider’’ with a standing ovation and a retweet of his earlier praise of the film, in which he called it “ravishing, sublime imagery paired with deeply earnest storytelling.” 

Unpredictability pervaded the ceremony, especially for the winners, themselves. When the Fred Rogers documentary “Won’t You Be My Neighbor” won the Gothams’ audience award (not typically a category for documentaries but “Won’t You Be My Neighbor” proved a modest summer blockbuster), its director Morgan Neville was stunned, partially since he had already lost best documentary to RaMell Ross’ “Hale County This Morning, This Evening.” 

“To say this was a surprise would be an extreme understatement,” Neville said. “Since I didn’t know we were nominated.” 

As an Oscar bellwether, the Gothams, presented by the not-for-profit Independent Film Project , are of little value. Their nominees are chosen by small juries of filmmakers and film critics before some of the fall’s films have been seen. 

But in the early going, any momentum helps an underdog Oscar campaign, and that seemed especially true of “First Reformed” and “Eighth Grade” — both releases from A24, the indie distributor of “Moonlight” and “Lady Bird.” 

“First Reformed” star Ethan Hawke took best actor and its 72-year-old writer-director Schrader (“Taxi Driver,” “Raging Bull”) won best screenplay. 

“Fourteen years. Best attendance. Sunday school,” said Schrader, who chose filmmaking over the seminary but remained gripped by his Calvinist upbringing. “I earned this award.”

Burnham’s “Eighth Grade,” starring 15-year-old Elsie Fisher, won for both breakthrough director and breakthrough actor. 

“I’m pretty sure this was a glitch in the system or something,” began Fisher, who said she had been considering giving up on acting before Burnham cast her. “Me from two years ago would be really proud of me right now.” 

Tributes were also paid to “At Eternity’s Gate” star Willem Dafoe, “22 July” director Paul Greengrass and RadicalMedia founder Jon Kamen. But one of the night’s abiding themes was who wasn’t there. Toni Collette, star of the horror film “Hereditary,” wasn’t on hand to collect her best actress award. And Weisz was the only star of “The Favourite” there for the film’s ensemble award. 

Weisz held up cardboard paddles of Colman and Stone’s faces and read statements from each claiming that they were the real standout in Lanthimos’ triangular tale of a power struggle in Queen Anne’s 18th century court. 

“Considering that I’m the only one to turn up,” Weisz concluded, “I think I might be the favorite.” 

Trump Threatens to Cut GM Subsidies in Retaliation for US Job Cuts

U.S. President Donald Trump threatened on Tuesday to cut subsidies for General Motors after the largest U.S. automaker said it would halt production at five plants in North America and cut nearly 15,000 jobs.

“The U.S. saved General Motors, and this is the THANKS we get! We are now looking at cutting all @GM subsidies, including … for electric cars,” Trump said on Twitter.

Trump has made boosting auto jobs a key priority during his almost two years in office and has often attacked automakers on Twitter for not doing enough to boost U.S. employment.

GM electric vehicles are eligible for a $7,500 tax credit under federal law, but it is not clear how the administration could restrict those credits or if Trump had other subsidies in mind. GM shares extended earlier declines and were down 3.6 percent after Trump’s tweets.

GM declined to immediately comment.

GM Chief Executive Mary Barra spoke to Trump over the weekend to discuss the cuts and was at the White House on Monday to meet with economic adviser Larry Kudlow.

Trump also criticized GM for not closing facilities in Mexico or China.

“General Motors made a big China bet years ago when they built plants there (and in Mexico) – don’t think that bet is going to pay off. I am here to protect America’s Workers!” Trump wrote on Twitter.

GM currently builds just one vehicle in China that it exports to the United States — the Buick Envision — and has sold about 22,000 through September. GM sold nearly 2.7 million vehicles in China through September, nearly all of them built in China for the market.

White House spokesman Sarah Sanders told reporters Tuesday that the president is looking at options.

“The president wants to see American companies build cars here in America, not build them overseas and he is hopeful that GM will continue to do that here,” she said.

GM has been lobbying Congress, along with Tesla, to lift the current cap on electric vehicles eligible for tax credits, but any action by Congress before 2019 is a long-shot, congressional aides said.

Under current law, once a manufacturer sells 200,000 electric vehicles, the tax credit phases out over time starting in the following quarter. GM has said it expects to hit the 200,000-vehicle threshold by the end of the year.

GM announced Monday it will halt production at one Canadian plant and four U.S. factories, including the Detroit-Hamtramck Assembly plant that builds the plug-in hybrid electric Chevrolet Volt. GM is ending production of six vehicles, including the Volt, as it cuts more than 6,500 factory jobs.

GM will continue to build the electric Chevrolet Bolt in Michigan.

Trump told GM on Monday it “better” find a new product for Lordstown Assembly plant in Ohio that will halt production in March. GM has said sagging demand for small cars largely prompted the cuts, but also cited factors including higher costs from U.S. tariffs on steel and aluminum.

GM said it also plans to close two unnamed plants outside North America by the end of 2019.

White House Adviser: US, China Could Reach New Trade Deal

U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping could reach a new trade deal between the world’s two largest economies when they meet in Argentina this weekend, White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow said Tuesday.

“The president said there is a good possibility that we can make a deal and he is open to it,” he said of Trump. But he cautioned that obstacles remain.

Kudlow said the two leaders must resolve the issues of “fairness and reciprocity” at the center of the dispute.

“China should change its practices and come into the community of responsible trading nations,” he said. “Their responses have disappointed because … we can’t find much change in their approach.”

The U.S. and China over several months have imposed tit-for-tat tariffs on hundreds of billions of dollars of imports arriving from each other’s shores.

On Monday, Trump voiced doubts that a deal would be reached when he meets with Xi Saturday night in Buenos Aires on the sidelines of the G-20 summit of the world’s largest economies.

Trump has threatened to impose more tariffs on Chinese exports if the two sides cannot reach what he considers fairer trading between the two countries.

Kudlow said “certain conditions have to be met. … Intellectual property theft must be solved. Forced technology transfers must be solved.”

He said Trump is “not going away” if no deal is reached.

“I hope they understand that,” he added.

Scientists: Mild El Nino Event Likely by Next February

There is a 75 to 80 percent probability of an El Nino weather phenomenon developing within the next three months, the World Meteorological Organization reports.

Global seasonal climate data show precipitation patterns predicted for December to February resemble those normally associated with El Nino, WMO said, adding that it is not expected to be as powerful as the deadly event in 2015 and 2016, which caused droughts, flooding and coral bleaching around the world.

While a weaker El Nino is expected to emerge, WMO scientists warn it still can have a significant impact on rainfall and temperature patterns. They say it could adversely affect agriculture and food security, the management of water resources, and public health.

WMO spokeswoman Claire Nullis tells VOA neutral weather conditions have prevailed for the past few months, with neither El Nino nor its opposite La Nina present. While they are associated with extreme weather events, she says they are not the only factors.

“And we need to bear in mind, we have got climate change,” she said. “So, every El Nino, every La Nina, which takes place now is taking place against a background of the fact that we are living in a dramatically altered climate compared to even 50 years ago. So, the impacts, for instance, on heat waves are likely to be more pronounced than they were several decades ago.”

El Nino and La Nina are phases of what is known as the El Nino-Southern Oscillation cycle, or ENSO. This phenomenon involves fluctuations in temperatures between the ocean and atmosphere in the equatorial Pacific. 

El Nino is sometimes referred to as the warm phase of ENSO, with La Nina acting as its cold opposite. WMO says both events have a major influence on weather and climate patterns over many parts of the world.

China Launches Probe Into ‘First’ Gene-Edited Babies

A Chinese researcher’s surprise claim that he is the first person in the world to successfully edit the genes of a pair of recently born twin girls, making them resistant to HIV, the AIDS virus, has been met with criticism, scorn and denial in China.

 

Provincial health authorities in the southern province of Guangdong released a statement Tuesday announcing that an investigation into the experiment, which involved seven couples and one successful pregnancy, already is under way and being given utmost attention.

 

“Results of the investigation will be promptly released to the public,” the statement said.

 

Continuous denials

 

China’s Ministry of Health said it was placing a high priority on the case and that it ordered the probe. Meanwhile, those who supposedly were involved in approving an ethical review of the experiment that He Jiankui said he conducted are distancing themselves.

 

He is an associate professor at the Southern University of Science and Technology, but his employer has said that the researcher has been on leave without pay since February and that the school was not aware of the experiment.

 

The Shenzhen Health and Family Planning Commission said it had not received an ethical assessment application for the study.

 

According to a form posted online, the city’s science and innovation committee was listed as backing the experiment, something the panel denies.

 

The Shenzhen Harmonicare Hospital was listed as having given ethical approval for He’s experiment, although the hospital is denying this.

 

According to Reuters, Hong Kong-listed Harmonicare Medical Holdings has issued a statement saying the signatures on the form posted online are suspected of having been forged and that “no relevant meeting of the Medical Ethics Committee of the hospital, in fact, took place.”

 

In its exclusive report on the experiment released Monday, the Associated Press noted that He Jiankui gave official notice of his trial to authorities on November 8, long after his research had begun and during the same month that the two baby girls — Lulu and Nana — were born.

 

It was clear from He’s interview with AP, that He knew what he was getting himself into. He told AP he was aware of the possible ramifications for future research.

 

“I feel a strong responsibility that it’s not just to make a first, but also make it an example,” He said.

 

He currently is in Hong Kong and is expected to deliver a speech at the University of Hong Kong on Wednesday at a summit on human genome editing.

Heated debate

 

Revelations of the experiment were quickly met with criticism, both and home and abroad, although in China, the pushback was particularly sharp.

 

Shortly after news broke on Monday, 122 scientists issued an open letter warning that the gene editing tool used in the experiment, the CRISPR-Cas 9 technology, was risky. The scientists also voiced concern the experiment could harm the reputation and development of China’s biomedical community.

 

The Chinese news website the Paper posted a copy of the statement online in which the scientists said, “Pandora’s box has been opened. We still might have a glimmer of hope to close it before it’s too late.”

 

They also said the biomedical ethics review for the so-called research existed only in name.

 

“Conducting direct human experiments can only be described as crazy,” they said.

 

On social media in China, however, some were optimistic and exuberant about the prospects the claimed breakthrough could bring to fighting disease.

 

“What is wrong with replacing old humanity with a new humanity? Who doesn’t want to be smarter, live longer, be stronger and healthier?” one post said. “I never expected to see something like Marvel comics in real life…a rebel eccentric scientist as the protagonist who wants to save all human beings.”

 

Others were worried about the bigger ramifications.

 

“In the future, humans will create humans and the fatality rate will largely decrease; meanwhile there will be less resources and more competition. We cannot go against natural law,” argued one posting. Another quipped: “For the first time I wish it was an academic fraud.”

 

Genetic Frankenstein

 

Liu Wei, a Chinese scientist, said that right now there still are too many uncertainties, adding that the technology has the capability of becoming a genetic version of Frankenstein.

 

“People are not quite clear about the long-term function of every gene yet. Based on the knowledge we have now, modifying the gene could avoid one disease but may bring about other problems,” Liu noted.

He added that since the technology is cutting-edge there is a big risk those involved in the review process lack the understanding needed, which could lead to negligence.

 

“If the technology is mature enough, there will definitely be a huge demand in the market to modify the genes of babies, which could lead to black market exchanges and many other challenges,” he said. “We may need more measures to deal with it and simply advocating ethics will not solve the problem.”

Google Blocks Gender-Based Pronouns From New AI Tool

Alphabet Inc’s Google in May introduced a slick feature for Gmail that automatically completes sentences for users as they type. Tap out “I love” and Gmail might propose “you” or “it.” But users are out of luck if the object of their affection is “him” or “her.”

Google’s technology will not suggest gender-based pronouns because the risk is too high that its “Smart Compose” technology might predict someone’s sex or gender identity incorrectly and offend users, product leaders revealed to Reuters in interviews.

Gmail product manager Paul Lambert said a company research scientist discovered the problem in January when he typed “I am meeting an investor next week,” and Smart Compose suggested a possible follow-up question: “Do you want to meet him?” instead of “her.”

Consumers have become accustomed to embarrassing gaffes from autocorrect on smartphones. But Google refused to take chances at a time when gender issues are reshaping politics and society, and critics are scrutinizing potential biases in artificial intelligence like never before.

“Not all ‘screw ups’ are equal,” Lambert said. Gender is a “a big, big thing” to get wrong.

Getting Smart Compose right could be good for business. Demonstrating that Google understands the nuances of AI better than competitors is part of the company’s strategy to build affinity for its brand and attract customers to its AI-powered cloud computing tools, advertising services and hardware.

Gmail has 1.5 billion users, and Lambert said Smart Compose assists on 11 percent of messages worldwide sent from Gmail.com, where the feature first launched.

Smart Compose is an example of what AI developers call natural language generation (NLG), in which computers learn to write sentences by studying patterns and relationships between words in literature, emails and web pages.

A system shown billions of human sentences becomes adept at completing common phrases but is limited by generalities. Men have long dominated fields such as finance and science, for example, so the technology would conclude from the data that an investor or engineer is “he” or “him.” The issue trips up nearly every major tech company.

Lambert said the Smart Compose team of about 15 engineers and designers tried several workarounds, but none proved bias-free or worthwhile. They decided the best solution was the strictest one: Limit coverage. The gendered pronoun ban affects fewer than 1 percent of cases where Smart Compose would propose something, Lambert said.

“The only reliable technique we have is to be conservative,” said Prabhakar Raghavan, who oversaw engineering of Gmail and other services until a recent promotion.

New policy

Google’s decision to play it safe on gender follows some high-profile embarrassments for the company’s predictive technologies.

The company apologized in 2015 when the image recognition feature of its photo service labeled a black couple as gorillas. In 2016, Google altered its search engine’s autocomplete function after it suggested the anti-Semitic query “are jews evil” when users sought information about Jews.

Google has banned expletives and racial slurs from its predictive technologies, as well as mentions of its business rivals or tragic events.

The company’s new policy banning gendered pronouns also affected the list of possible responses in Google’s Smart Reply. That service allow users to respond instantly to text messages and emails with short phrases such as “sounds good.”

Google uses tests developed by its AI ethics team to uncover new biases. A spam and abuse team pokes at systems, trying to find “juicy” gaffes by thinking as hackers or journalists might, Lambert said.

Workers outside the United States look for local cultural issues. Smart Compose will soon work in four other languages: Spanish, Portuguese, Italian and French.

“You need a lot of human oversight,” said engineering leader Raghavan, because “in each language, the net of inappropriateness has to cover something different.”

Wispread challenge

Google is not the only tech company wrestling with the gender-based pronoun problem. Agolo, a New York startup that has received investment from Thomson Reuters, uses AI to summarize business documents.

Its technology cannot reliably determine in some documents which pronoun goes with which name. So the summary pulls several sentences to give users more context, said Mohamed AlTantawy, Agolo’s chief technology officer.

He said longer copy is better than missing details. “The smallest mistakes will make people lose confidence,” AlTantawy said. “People want 100 percent correct.”

Yet, imperfections remain. Predictive keyboard tools developed by Google and Apple Inc propose the gendered “policeman” to complete “police” and “salesman” for “sales.”

Type the neutral Turkish phrase “one is a soldier” into Google Translate and it spits out “he’s a soldier” in English. So do translation tools from Alibaba and Microsoft Corp. Amazon.com Inc opts for “she” for the same phrase on its translation service for cloud computing customers.

AI experts have called on the companies to display a disclaimer and multiple possible translations.

Microsoft’s LinkedIn said it avoids gendered pronouns in its year-old predictive messaging tool, Smart Replies, to ward off potential blunders.

Alibaba and Amazon did not respond to requests to comment. Warnings and limitations like those in Smart Compose remain the most-used countermeasures in complex systems, said John Hegele, integration engineer at Durham, North Carolina-based Automated Insights Inc, which generates news articles from statistics.

“The end goal is a fully machine-generated system where it magically knows what to write,” Hegele said. “There’s been a ton of advances made but we’re not there yet.”