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14 Juneteenth cookout recipes, including ribs, slaw and red velvet cake
Mon, 17 Jun 2024 16:23:54 +0000
Celebrate Juneteenth with these cookout recipes, including barbecued and grilled meats, flavorful sides, thirst-quenching beverages and crowd-pleasing desserts.
Match ID: 0 Score: 50.00 source: www.washingtonpost.com age: 1 day
qualifiers: 30.00 food, 20.00 recipes
‘It’s a flavour-bomb!’ The rise and rise of the dip
Wed, 19 Jun 2024 11:00:34 GMT
It started with tzatziki and taramasalata, now it’s all whipped feta and truffle hummus. How did Britain get such an appetite for the scoopable stuff?
On 30 May 1987, Waitrose announced the introduction of a new range of dips: tzatziki, taramasalata and hummus. This was the first time they had appeared on supermarket shelves in the UK and they were so novel that they needed explaining. Hummus “is a traditional Middle Eastern hors d’oeuvre made with chickpeas and sesame seeds,” the label advised, under an illustration of palm trees and minarets. Fast forward 36 years, and our appetite for dips appears bottomless. They – and their partners in crime, crispy snacks – are a shopping basket and restaurant staple, and not a summer or Christmas goes by without a new limited-edition dip causing a storm online.
They’ve become “mandatory”, says restaurateur David Carter, whose latest opening Oma has received rave reviews of its “showstopping” hummus.
Continue reading...A delicious but varied Persian dip or side dish of aubergine, garlic, yoghurt and onion tested and bested by the expert hands of a perfectionist
Borani, in the Iranian sense at least, is a rich, creamy, cooked vegetable salad that’s said to be named after a 7th-century Persian queen, AKA Pourandokht, who was, it is claimed, extremely fond of the yoghurt that is the dish’s defining ingredient. A millennium and a half later, her tastes live on in the form of this recipe, which is also popular in Turkey.
To British eyes, borani looks most like what we’d call a dip, and indeed it does pair well with flatbreads as a starter or light lunch, but it’s also eaten as an accompaniment to grilled meats, rice dishes or other main courses. As Nader Mehravari explains, “a Persian sofreh – the physical table setting, and the people gathered around it for a meal – is unthinkable without a bowl of some kind of yoghurt-based accompaniment”. Just ask Queen Pourandokht.
Continue reading...Farming is key here but many people are struggling to put bread on the table, and crying out for politics to engage with a system in crisis
“Farmers certainly don’t want to see food poverty – we want to see food that’s affordable,” says Ian Harvey, a dairy farmer. “But at the same time, we want to ensure that there’s absolute fairness throughout the supply chain.” Farms are under extraordinary financial pressure, he says.
On Wiggaton Farm, near North Petherwin in the North Cornwall constituency, about 170 Holstein friesian and Ayrshire cows are nosing between tufts for the sweet new grass they like the most. “It’s amazing how they don’t pull the grass out of the ground,” Harvey says. “They wrap their tongue around it and then tear it off.”
Continue reading...Photographer Hannah Norton’s The Community Cook Up: I Wish You Were Still Here features visitors to a neighbourhood food and support project based in Tottenham, north London between 2017 and 2023. The Cook Up provided a warm welcome, company and a hot meal for the community. For a year, every week, she pictured members of the group and talked to them about their lives and experiences
At least eight Filipinos were reportedly injured in the South China Sea clashes, including one who reportedly lost a thumb
At least eight Filipino navy personnel were injured this week – including one who lost a thumb – in a confrontation with the Chinese coast guard while, delivering food and other supplies to a military outpost at a disputed South China Sea shoal, Philippine security officials said.
The Philippine foreign ministry denounced what it described as China’s “illegal and aggressive” actions, adding that “dialogue and consultation” could not be achieved if “China’s words do not match their actions on the waters.”
Continue reading...From Girls to Andor to The Dropout, he is one of the best character actors around – now with the Emmy to prove it. He discusses stress, fantasy and why he will happily work until he keels over
The prevailing school of thought around Ebon Moss-Bachrach is that mainstream culture slept on him for too long. For the best part of 25 years he was a jobbing actor, grafting away, acclaim, fame and big money roles eluding him. There were moments of broader recognition, but for the most part he was underutilised and underappreciated. Then, in 2022, enter The Bear, FX’s phenomenally successful TV show about a dysfunctional found family of chefs struggling to keep a rundown sandwich joint afloat. As the disruptive, loudmouth “cousin” Richie, he stole pretty much every scene he was in, walking away with an Emmy in the process. Finally, Moss-Bachrach had arrived.
That’s the trope anyway: struggling artist finally comes good. But the 47-year-old actor doesn’t see it that way. “There’s a convenient narrative I find myself trying to resist that people often like to imprint, that’s like, I’ve been waiting in the wings or something,” he says. “And that’s just kind of romantic and stupid and oversimplified. I mean, I’ve been, in my mind, pretty successful. I don’t know what percentage of my union works, but it’s very small. And yeah, I’ve never had anything connect like The Bear, but I’ve been fine.”
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Food Foundation says height of five-year-olds falling, child obesity up by a third and type 2 diabetes by a fifth
Children across the UK are getting shorter, fatter and sicker amid an epidemic of poor diets, food insecurity and poverty, according to a report warning that millions are facing a “timebomb” of avoidable health conditions.
The average height of five-year-olds is falling, obesity levels have increased by almost a third and the number of young people being diagnosed with type 2 diabetes has risen by more than a fifth, the report by the Food Foundation said.
Continue reading...  | submitted by /u/fattyfoods [link] [comments] |
Two officials assaulted and held while inspecting avocados in Michoacán in incident ‘unconnected to industry’
An attack on two employees of the US agricultural department prompted a temporary suspension of safety inspections on avocados and mangoes in Mexico, potentially disrupting a $2.4bn industry between the two countries.
Ambassador Ken Salazar said in a statement that the two officials were assaulted and temporarily held by assailants while they were inspecting avocados in the Mexican state of Michoacán.
Continue reading...In the run-up to July's election, the Guardian video team is touring the UK looking at issues that matter to communities. In the town of Port Talbot, in the Aberafan Maesteg constituency, many voters are worried about the future of the steelworks where at least 2,800 jobs are on the line. We spoke to businesses, food banks and charities and politicians, all worried about the knock-on effect on families who have been steelworkers for generations. We also heard voters' other concerns and asked politicians what people were saying about the steelworks on the doorstep
Continue reading...Joining Grace this week is one of Ireland’s most acclaimed comics and host of the award-winning podcast My Therapist Ghosted Me, Joanne McNally. With a number of sell-out shows and tour dates in the US later this year, they discuss how Joanne uses comedy to process difficult periods in her life, how her mum is her favourite cocktail buddy, and what exactly she stole to get herself kicked out of the Scouts. Hot off her stint on the latest series of Taskmaster, and with an upcoming show at the Edinburgh festival fringe, the real question is: what is the banger of a sandwich Joanne McNally turns to whenever she’s shut off from the outside world and has a rare moment of peace?
New episodes of Comfort Eating with Grace Dent will be released every Tuesday
Continue reading...People across Ukraine have united in the face of the Russian threat and its Vietnamese community is no exception
When Russia invaded Ukraine two years ago, Tung Nguyen drove his parents from their home, in the city of Chernihiv, to the border with Poland. Then, he returned to Kyiv and began to volunteer, bringing food and medicines to under-siege Chernihiv. Before long, he had decided to sign up and fight in the Ukrainian army.
Nguyen is part of Ukraine’s Vietnamese community, a sizeable but often hidden minority in the country. Some Vietnamese people left Ukraine after the Russian invasion, but others have stayed, particularly those from the younger generation, many of whom were born in Ukraine and are Ukrainian citizens.
Continue reading...Millions face disaster as Sudanese army and RSF accused of using food access as a weapon in on-going war
Sudan is facing a famine that could become worse than any the world has seen since Ethiopia 40 years ago, US officials have warned, as aid deliveries continue to be blocked by the warring armies but arms supplies to both sides continue to flow in.
With much of the world’s attention focused on Gaza, the scene of another human-made famine, Sudan is already the worst humanitarian crisis in the world and is slipping towards a humanitarian disaster of historic proportions, with far less media coverage and global concern. A UN humanitarian appeal for the country has received only 16% of the funds it needs.
Continue reading...“I felt helpless watching my family dying and not able to help them. It is a nightmare that I will never wake up from.”
The post These “Tent Massacre” Survivors Couldn’t Afford to Leave Rafah. The Next Israeli Attack Nearly Wiped Their Family Out. appeared first on The Intercept.
From the jump, the lawsuit challenging the legality of mifepristone was a cynical, propagandistic endeavor. In a 9-0 opinion, the Supreme Court threw it out.
The post GOP States Double Down on Fighting Medication Abortion After Supreme Court Keeps It Legal appeared first on The Intercept.
Dan Osborn, running as an independent, has racked up endorsements in a race that could help determine Senate control in 2024.
The post UAW Endorses Nebraska Underdog Threatening to Unseat a Republican Senator appeared first on The Intercept.
A weekly email from Yotam Ottolenghi, Meera Sodha, Felicity Cloake and Rachel Roddy, featuring the latest recipes and seasonal eating ideas
Each week we’ll send you an exclusive newsletter from our star food writers. We’ll also send you the latest recipes from Yotam Ottolenghi, Nigel Slater, Meera Sodha and all our star cooks, stand-out food features and seasonal eating inspiration, plus restaurant reviews from Grace Dent and Jay Rayner.
Sign up below to start receiving the best of our culinary journalism in one mouth-watering weekly email.
Continue reading...Michelle Roach bought a used ice-cream van in order to bring cheap, affordable food to Liverpool's struggling communities. She wanted a vehicle with freezers built in for frozen food, and also something cheerful that was able to break down stigmas around food poverty. Using a '10 items for £5' model, Michelle sources discount food from supermarket surplus and donations.
The Guardian's Christopher Cherry follows Michelle and the van on its rounds, with the service struggling to meet overwhelming demand as the cost of living crisis deepens, and the UK's general election fast approaches.
Continue reading...South Africa's case against Israel over allegations of genocide before the international court of justice has raised a central question of international law: what is genocide and how do you prove it? It is one of three genocide cases being considered by the UN's world court, but since the genocide convention was approved in 1948, only three instances have been legally recognised as genocide. Josh Toussaint-Strauss looks back on these historical cases to find out why the crime is so much harder to prove than other atrocities, and what bearing this has on South Africa's case against Israel and future cases
What is the genocide convention and how might it apply to the UK and Israel?
‘Famine is setting in’: UN court orders Israel to unblock Gaza food aid
Video:
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On the last day of his Huginn mission, ESA astronaut Andreas Mogensen takes us on a tour of the place he called home for 6 months: the International Space Station. From the beautiful views of Cupola to the kitchen in Node 1 filled with food and friends and all the way to the science of Columbus, the Space Station is the work and living place for astronauts as they help push science forward.
Style, with substance: what’s really trending this week, a roundup of the best fashion journalism and your wardrobe dilemmas solved, direct to your inbox every Thursday
Style, with substance: what’s really trending this week, a roundup of the best fashion journalism and your wardrobe dilemmas solved, delivered straight to your inbox every Thursday
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Imagine a world in which you can do transactions and many other things without having to give your personal information. A world in which you don’t need to rely on banks or governments anymore. Sounds amazing, right? That’s exactly what blockchain technology allows us to do.
It’s like your computer’s hard drive. blockchain is a technology that lets you store data in digital blocks, which are connected together like links in a chain.
Blockchain technology was originally invented in 1991 by two mathematicians, Stuart Haber and W. Scot Stornetta. They first proposed the system to ensure that timestamps could not be tampered with.
A few years later, in 1998, software developer Nick Szabo proposed using a similar kind of technology to secure a digital payments system he called “Bit Gold.” However, this innovation was not adopted until Satoshi Nakamoto claimed to have invented the first Blockchain and Bitcoin.
A blockchain is a distributed database shared between the nodes of a computer network. It saves information in digital format. Many people first heard of blockchain technology when they started to look up information about bitcoin.
Blockchain is used in cryptocurrency systems to ensure secure, decentralized records of transactions.
Blockchain allowed people to guarantee the fidelity and security of a record of data without the need for a third party to ensure accuracy.
To understand how a blockchain works, Consider these basic steps:
Let’s get to know more about the blockchain.
Blockchain records digital information and distributes it across the network without changing it. The information is distributed among many users and stored in an immutable, permanent ledger that can't be changed or destroyed. That's why blockchain is also called "Distributed Ledger Technology" or DLT.
Here’s how it works:
And that’s the beauty of it! The process may seem complicated, but it’s done in minutes with modern technology. And because technology is advancing rapidly, I expect things to move even more quickly than ever.
Even though blockchain is integral to cryptocurrency, it has other applications. For example, blockchain can be used for storing reliable data about transactions. Many people confuse blockchain with cryptocurrencies like bitcoin and ethereum.
Blockchain already being adopted by some big-name companies, such as Walmart, AIG, Siemens, Pfizer, and Unilever. For example, IBM's Food Trust uses blockchain to track food's journey before reaching its final destination.
Although some of you may consider this practice excessive, food suppliers and manufacturers adhere to the policy of tracing their products because bacteria such as E. coli and Salmonella have been found in packaged foods. In addition, there have been isolated cases where dangerous allergens such as peanuts have accidentally been introduced into certain products.
Tracing and identifying the sources of an outbreak is a challenging task that can take months or years. Thanks to the Blockchain, however, companies now know exactly where their food has been—so they can trace its location and prevent future outbreaks.
Blockchain technology allows systems to react much faster in the event of a hazard. It also has many other uses in the modern world.
Blockchain technology is safe, even if it’s public. People can access the technology using an internet connection.
Have you ever been in a situation where you had all your data stored at one place and that one secure place got compromised? Wouldn't it be great if there was a way to prevent your data from leaking out even when the security of your storage systems is compromised?
Blockchain technology provides a way of avoiding this situation by using multiple computers at different locations to store information about transactions. If one computer experiences problems with a transaction, it will not affect the other nodes.
Instead, other nodes will use the correct information to cross-reference your incorrect node. This is called “Decentralization,” meaning all the information is stored in multiple places.
Blockchain guarantees your data's authenticity—not just its accuracy, but also its irreversibility. It can also be used to store data that are difficult to register, like legal contracts, state identifications, or a company's product inventory.
Blockchain has many advantages and disadvantages.
I’ll answer the most frequently asked questions about blockchain in this section.
Blockchain is not a cryptocurrency but a technology that makes cryptocurrencies possible. It's a digital ledger that records every transaction seamlessly.
Yes, blockchain can be theoretically hacked, but it is a complicated task to be achieved. A network of users constantly reviews it, which makes hacking the blockchain difficult.
Coinbase Global is currently the biggest blockchain company in the world. The company runs a commendable infrastructure, services, and technology for the digital currency economy.
Blockchain is a decentralized technology. It’s a chain of distributed ledgers connected with nodes. Each node can be any electronic device. Thus, one owns blockhain.
Bitcoin is a cryptocurrency, which is powered by Blockchain technology while Blockchain is a distributed ledger of cryptocurrency
Generally a database is a collection of data which can be stored and organized using a database management system. The people who have access to the database can view or edit the information stored there. The client-server network architecture is used to implement databases. whereas a blockchain is a growing list of records, called blocks, stored in a distributed system. Each block contains a cryptographic hash of the previous block, timestamp and transaction information. Modification of data is not allowed due to the design of the blockchain. The technology allows decentralized control and eliminates risks of data modification by other parties.
Blockchain has a wide spectrum of applications and, over the next 5-10 years, we will likely see it being integrated into all sorts of industries. From finance to healthcare, blockchain could revolutionize the way we store and share data. Although there is some hesitation to adopt blockchain systems right now, that won't be the case in 2022-2023 (and even less so in 2026). Once people become more comfortable with the technology and understand how it can work for them, owners, CEOs and entrepreneurs alike will be quick to leverage blockchain technology for their own gain. Hope you like this article if you have any question let me know in the comments section
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The edited videos are often posted to question the US president’s mental fitness at 81
Joe Biden wandered off.
Standing among the west’s major leaders in Italy last week, the US president turned away, seemingly in confusion, and had to be alerted back to the group to take a photo – at least, that’s what rightwing media showed.
Continue reading...The fishing villages, clifftop paths and sandy coves of the Breton coast provide the perfect backdrop for a five-day hike
They say walking is the best medicine and you could spend months walking off your troubles along the sentier des douaniers (customs officers’ path), which winds for more than 1,240 miles (2,000km) around the bays and headlands of the Breton coast. However, me and my perennial walking companion, an Irishman who lives in Bath, settled for a five-day, 55-mile stretch along the southern Crozon peninsula.
As we agreed not to fly, he took the train to Plymouth, the ferry to Roscoff and buses from there, while I took the train from Barcelona and, after a night in Paris, another train to Quimper and a bus to our starting point at Camaret-sur-Mer.
Continue reading...Year of heavy weights resistance training around retirement age has long-lasting benefits, research suggests
Lifting heavy weights three times a week around the age of retirement could dramatically preserve your leg strength long into the later stages of life, research suggests.
People naturally lose muscle function as they get older, and experts say faltering leg strength is a strong predictor of death in elderly people.
Continue reading...
“I don’t want to be working on something that can turn around and be used to slaughter innocent people."
The post “Utterly Dismayed”: Air Force Engineer Resigns as Dissent Against Gaza War Slowly Spreads Within Military appeared first on The Intercept.
The task force revealed its plans not in a communiqué to faculty and students — but instead in an Israeli newspaper article.
The post Columbia Task Force Finally Weighs In: Yes, Anti-Zionism Is Antisemitism appeared first on The Intercept.
Public polling is a critical function of modern political campaigns and movements, but it isn’t what it once was. Recent US election cycles have produced copious postmortems explaining both the successes and the flaws of public polling. There are two main reasons polling fails.
First, nonresponse has skyrocketed. It’s radically harder to reach people than it used to be. Few people fill out surveys that come in the mail anymore. Few people answer their phone when a stranger calls. Pew Research reported that 36% of the people they called in 1997 would talk to them, but only 6% by 2018. Pollsters worldwide have faced similar challenges...
The board had proposed appending a statement that would have undermined a Palestinian scholar’s article. The students rejected it.
The post Columbia Law Review Is Back Online After Students Threatened Work Stoppage Over Palestine Censorship appeared first on The Intercept.
The fishing villages, clifftop paths and sandy coves of the Breton coast provide the perfect backdrop for a five-day hike
They say walking is the best medicine and you could spend months walking off your troubles along the sentier des douaniers (customs officers’ path), which winds for more than 1,240 miles (2,000km) around the bays and headlands of the Breton coast. However, me and my perennial walking companion, an Irishman who lives in Bath, settled for a five-day, 55-mile stretch along the southern Crozon peninsula.
As we agreed not to fly, he took the train to Plymouth, the ferry to Roscoff and buses from there, while I took the train from Barcelona and, after a night in Paris, another train to Quimper and a bus to our starting point at Camaret-sur-Mer.
Continue reading...When Robbie Lawrence travelled the world photographing the tournament, he soon realised he was actually examining what it means to be Scottish
Continue reading...When I boarded the train at Beijing I felt timid, a cautious traveller. But a chaotic and vodka-soaked party set me off on a very different path
In 2001, after spending a year studying in Beijing as part of our degree, two friends and I decided to travel to Mongolia and Russia on the Trans-Siberian Railway. We did everything as cheaply as possible, to the extent that I was terrified we were going to be flung off the train at the Mongolia-Russia border, because we’d got our visas from a tiny, dodgy-looking agency in a random tower block in Beijing.
Being worried was pretty much my default state at that time. I found talking to strangers difficult, and struggled to raise my hand in class. I was always terrified of making mistakes. Though it wasn’t a devastating shyness, I envied the way that friends and classmates always seemed at home in different groups and situations – a feeling that had always eluded me.
Continue reading...There is a lot written about technology’s threats to democracy. Polarization. Artificial intelligence. The concentration of wealth and power. I have a more general story: The political and economic systems of governance that were created in the mid-18th century are poorly suited for the 21st century. They don’t align incentives well. And they are being hacked too effectively.
At the same time, the cost of these hacked systems has never been greater, across all human history. We have become too powerful as a species. And our systems cannot keep up with fast-changing disruptive technologies...
Every 21 June for over 10 years, Claudine Doury has traveled from St Petersburg to Maloyaroslavets in Russia, to the island of Lake Ives in Belarus, and to Kaunas, Vilnius and the Polish and Latvian countryside, to witness the summer solstice. The night of the solstice is a traditional celebration whose roots lie in pagan festivals closely linked to the forces of nature and the worship of the sun
Continue reading...“I felt helpless watching my family dying and not able to help them. It is a nightmare that I will never wake up from.”
The post These “Tent Massacre” Survivors Couldn’t Afford to Leave Rafah. The Next Israeli Attack Nearly Wiped Their Family Out. appeared first on The Intercept.
“One side or the other is going to win,” Alito told a person he thought was a right-wing activist.
The post Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito Caught on Secret Audio appeared first on The Intercept.
Ahead of the election in India, the Guardian’s video team travelled through the country to explore how fake news and censorship might shape the outcome.
Almost one billion people are registered to vote. The country's prime minister, Narendra Modi, has been in power for more than 10 years, and his Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata party (BJP) is seeking a third term.
But critics of Modi and the BJP say his government has become increasingly authoritarian, fracturing the country along religious lines and threatening India’s secular democracy. At the same time, the space for freedom of speech has been shrinking while disinformation and hate speech has exploded on social media.
From biking adventures to city breaks, get inspiration for your next break – whether in the UK or further afield – with twice-weekly emails from the Guardian’s travel editors. You’ll also receive handpicked offers from Guardian Holidays.
From biking adventures to city breaks, get inspiration for your next break – whether in the UK or further afield – with twice-weekly emails from the Guardian’s travel editors.
You’ll also receive handpicked offers from Guardian Holidays.
Continue reading...South Korea says 10,000 containers carry suspected North Korean arms for Russia; claim that Russians beheaded captured defender. What we know on day 847
A Ukrainian defence source confirmed a drone attack was used to blow up oil storage tanks near the town of Azov in Rostov, southern Russia. Agence France-Presse said the defence source described it as a “successful” attack and said it caused “powerful fires in the installations”. The Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) “will continue to impose ‘drone sanctions’ on Russia’s oil refining complex and reduce the enemy’s economic potential, which provides the aggressor with resources to wage war against Ukraine”.
Video published by Russia’s emergencies ministry showed thick smoke and flames billowing out of what appeared to be multiple oil storage tanks over a large area. About 200 Russian firefighters and emergency personnel were sent in. The Rostov region sits directly across the border from Ukraine and is home to the operational headquarters overseeing Russia’s invasion.
A Russian drone attack left a man, 70, in hospital and damaged a multi-storey residential building in Lviv city, Andriy Sadovyi, the mayor, said on Wednesday. It hit the village of Malekhiv within the city district and damaged many windows in other residential buildings, he said. The city is the administrative centre of the Lviv oblast in western Ukraine, on the border with Nato member Poland.
Ukraine said Russian forces were fighting to enter the outskirts of Chasiv Yar in the Donetsk region. “The enemy keeps trying to advance to the micro-district Novy in the town of Chasiv Yar,” a Ukrainian military official said in a briefing.
Farther south, the military said Moscow’s forces were also pushing towards Pokrovsk, threatening a key road, which could complicate Ukrainian supply lines.
Ukraine’s air force said it downed 10 Shahed attack drones launched by Russian forces over Monday night into Tuesday.
Ukraine’s prosecutor general accused Russian forces of beheading a Ukrainian serviceman in the eastern Donetsk region. “The fact of decapitation of a Ukrainian defender was recorded in the Donetsk region,” said Andriy Kostin. He said Ukraine had documented nearly 130,000 war crimes committed by Russia.
National grid operator Ukrenergo said Ukraine would face rolling electricity blackouts throughout Wednesday after Russian strikes on Ukrainian power plants.
The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, said China’s support for Russia’s defence industry was prolonging the Ukraine war and “has to stop”. Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Lin Jian earlier urged Nato to “stop shifting blame” over the Ukraine war after the alliance’s chief, Jens Stoltenberg, accused Beijing of worsening the conflict through support of Russia.
The South Korean defence minister, Shin Wonsik, told Bloomberg News that South Korea had identified at least 10,000 shipping containers suspected to be containing artillery ammunition and other weapons sent from North Korea to Russia. Those containers could contain up to 4.8m shells, Shin said. Vladimir Putin, the Russian president, is visiting North Korea. “Putin is expected to seek closer security cooperation with North Korea, especially military supplies such as artillery shells that are necessary to seize a chance to win,” Shin told Bloomberg.
Ukrainian officials have already started preparatory work to organise a second peace summit, the Ukrainian president’s chief of staff, Andriy Yermak, has said after the first conference led by Ukraine was held over the weekend in Switzerland. Yermak said a joint plan needed to be figured out by member states first, a process he expected to take several months.
Continue reading...Robert O’Brien says US should abandon moratorium but experts say proposal would hasten global nuclear arms race
Donald Trump’s former national security adviser Robert O’Brien, widely tipped to play a leading role in a second Trump presidency, has advocated the resumption of nuclear testing, and the possible renewed production of plutonium and weapons-grade uranium.
Arms control experts said O’Brien’s proposals would accelerate the global nuclear arms race and backfire in terms of US security, handing greater advantages to Russia and China.
Continue reading...The edited videos are often posted to question the US president’s mental fitness at 81
Joe Biden wandered off.
Standing among the west’s major leaders in Italy last week, the US president turned away, seemingly in confusion, and had to be alerted back to the group to take a photo – at least, that’s what rightwing media showed.
Continue reading...Netherlands PM will replace Jens Stoltenberg after making promise not to deploy Hungarian forces in Ukraine
Mark Rutte, the outgoing Dutch prime minister, is expected to become the next head of Nato after winning over Hungary’s prime minister with a promise not to deploy Budapest’s forces or spend its money supporting Ukraine.
Viktor Orbán, the leader in Nato seen as closest to Russia, announced he had dropped his objections after discussions with Rutte, prompting the current secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, to declare that the selection process would end “very soon”.
Continue reading...Donald Trump’s military ran a covert campaign to discredit China’s Sinovac vaccine at the height of the pandemic
In July 2021, Joe Biden rightly inveighed against social media companies failing to tackle vaccine disinformation: “They’re killing people,” the US president said. Despite their pledges to take action, lies and sensationalised accounts were still spreading on platforms. Most of those dying in the US were unvaccinated. An additional source of frustration for the US was the fact that Russia and China were encouraging mistrust of western vaccines, questioning their efficacy, exaggerating side-effects and sensationalising the deaths of people who had been inoculated.
How, then, would the US describe the effects of its own disinformation at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic? A shocking new report has revealed that its military ran a secret campaign to discredit China’s Sinovac vaccine with Filipinos – when nothing else was available to the Philippines. The Reuters investigation found that this spread to audiences in central Asia and the Middle East, with fake social media accounts not only questioning Sinovac’s efficacy and safety but also claiming it used pork gelatine, to discourage Muslims from receiving it. In the case of the Philippines, the poor take-up of vaccines contributed to one of the highest death rates in the region. Undermining confidence in a specific vaccine can also contribute to broader vaccine hesitancy.
Continue reading...Agreement by Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong-un to come to each other’s aid will add to growing alarm in west
The Russian president, Vladimir Putin, and the North Korean leader, Kim Jong-un, have signed a pact that includes a clause requiring the countries to come to each other’s aid if either is attacked.
The inclusion of a mutual defence clause in their comprehensive strategic partnership, which Kim described as an “alliance”, will add to the west’s alarm over growing economic and military ties between North Korea and Russia. The deal was finalised on Wednesday after hours of talks in the North Korean capital, Pyongyang. It is Putin’s second summit with Kim in nine months.
Continue reading...Kim enjoys the recognition and backs Putin in Ukraine. Putin’s war, meanwhile needs North Korean weapons. It’s a dangerous alliance
They make an odd couple. One is smiley-faced and chubby. The other is thin-lipped and scowls a lot. Both are dictators, sinister, brutal and unaccountable in their different ways. Both have made it their mission in life to overturn the post-1945 global order, defying the US, its chief patrolman. And both are sanctioned, ostracised and a little bit feared by the countries of the west.
Those fears are likely to intensify after today’s Pyongyang summit, both symbolic and substantive, between this unofficial Laurel and Hardy tribute act. North Korea’s leader, Kim Jong-un – the plump one – and Russia’s Vladimir Putin – the skinny one – have a shared aim: consolidating their place in a bullish anti-western, anti-democratic alliance, ostensibly representing a “new world order”, reaching from China to Iran.
Simon Tisdall is the Observer’s Foreign Affairs Commentator
Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.
Continue reading...Russia’s president was greeted by cheering crowds on his visit to Pyongyang, where the North Korean leader, Kim Jong-un, expressed ‘full support’ for Russia’s war in Ukraine and pledged stronger strategic ties with Moscow
Continue reading...Russian president makes first visit to country in 24 years as anti-west relationship deepens
Vladimir Putin has arrived in North Korea for a summit with Kim Jong-un, amid US warnings against any agreement that could add to military pressure on Ukraine and raise tensions on the Korean peninsula.
Making his first visit to the reclusive country since 2000, the Russian president flew to Pyongyang to be greeted by huge welcome banners, cheering crowds and Russian flags.
Continue reading...This live blog is closed
China has urged Nato to “stop shifting blame” over the war in Ukraine after the western military alliance’s chief accused Beijing of worsening the conflict through support of Russia.
Nato’s secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, on Monday called for China to face consequences for what US officials have called a major export push to rebuild Russia’s defence industry.
There are reports Putin will be staying at the Kumsusan guesthouse in Pyongyang, which also housed Chinese leader Xi Jinping during a 2019 state visit to North Korea in 2019.
The mansion is located near the Kumsusan Palace of the Sun, where Kim Jong-un’s father Kim Jong Il, and grandfather Kim Il Sung, lie in state.
Continue reading...There is a lot written about technology’s threats to democracy. Polarization. Artificial intelligence. The concentration of wealth and power. I have a more general story: The political and economic systems of governance that were created in the mid-18th century are poorly suited for the 21st century. They don’t align incentives well. And they are being hacked too effectively.
At the same time, the cost of these hacked systems has never been greater, across all human history. We have become too powerful as a species. And our systems cannot keep up with fast-changing disruptive technologies...
The tacky ex-president loves the overrated Impressionist. Personally, I can only take so many portraits of dough-faced women
Donald Trump has criminally bad taste in just about everything. He orders his steaks well done and drowns them in ketchup. His Manhattan penthouse is gold and famously gaudy. He wears shiny suits that never seem to fit properly. And then there’s his taste in art: the man loves himself a bit of Pierre-Auguste Renoir. For years, Trump had what he liked to boast was an “original Renoir” on his private jet. That has been proven to be nonsense: the original of the painting in question – Two Sisters (On The Terrace) – is in a Chicago gallery and Trump has a fake. Still, he likes it very much and has now relocated it to Trump Tower. Melania Trump also has a fake Renoir in her office.
The tasteless Trumps might enjoy Renoir, but so do a lot of people. Why am I slandering the French Impressionist? I’ll tell you why: I recently visited the Barnes Foundation in Philadelphia (home to the world’s single largest collection of Renoirs) and, after looking at 10 million pictures of dough-faced women, I had something of a revelation: Renoir is incredibly overrated.
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Sussan Ley says Coalition nuclear policy will be a ‘sensible proposition’
I just wanted to return to Sussan Ley’s appearance on Sky News this morning, where she was asked how a potential future Coalition nuclear policy would circumvent nuclear bans:
We’ll work through all that. We have a sensible proposition to put to the Australian people and I know that when we talk about nuclear people are starting to tune in, understanding that if 19 of the 20 biggest economies in the world are using nuclear, if it makes sense for cleaner baseload power, because it’s zero emissions, if it helps us get to 2050 net zero, if it does all of the things that we want it to do in terms of emissions, and in terms of securing affordable cheaper power for Australians … why would people not consider it? And I believe they will.
Now, the government says it’s renewables only. We can see that that’s actually not going to happen. The government talks about hydrogen, it’s not at scale. It’s not even something they can demonstrate works in that short timeframe and they talk about batteries that aren’t going to provide the storage for their renewables.
So, they are in a complete mess over this, and they need to be put on the sticky paper and asked what they are going to do for families, households and manufacturing businesses.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Defamation trial judge found on balance of probabilities Lehrmann was ‘recklessly indifferent to whether or not there was consent’
Bruce Lehrmann was not “indifferent” to Brittany Higgins consenting to sexual intercourse, but instead knew she was not consenting, Lisa Wilkinson’s lawyers have told the federal court in fresh arguments ahead of the former Liberal staffer’s defamation case appeal.
In April Justice Michael Lee found the former Liberal staffer was not defamed by Wilkinson and Ten when The Project broadcast an interview with Higgins on Monday 15 February 2021 in which she alleged she was raped in Parliament House.
Continue reading...Judge says it would make ‘a nonsense’ of law enforcement conduct commission’s role if it was not provided with all relevant material
Internal materials relating to the death of a woman who was shot with a bean-bag gun must be handed over to the police watchdog, a court has ruled.
Krista Kach, 47, died after a 10-hour standoff with police in Newcastle in September 2023 after a bean-bag round punctured her body and affected her heart.
Continue reading...“I don’t want to be working on something that can turn around and be used to slaughter innocent people."
The post “Utterly Dismayed”: Air Force Engineer Resigns as Dissent Against Gaza War Slowly Spreads Within Military appeared first on The Intercept.
I am delighted to have joined the Guardian as a women’s football writer with the aim to cover the good, the bad and the ugly of an ever-expanding game
The first time I reported on an England women’s international fixture from the press box in a stadium rather than from the distant vantage point of a desk in a far-away office next to a television, the Lionesses were playing a friendly against Italy in April 2017 at Port Vale’s Vale Park, a ground which – please forgive me, any Vale fans reading this – I think it’s fair to say could have benefited from a little TLC, compared to the facilities the European champions have become accustomed to more recently.
Such was the relative informality of the occasion, I found a parking spot down a rather poorly-lit side road in Burslem behind some rusting garages and quickly realised that one of the England team’s family members was reversing to try and fit into the small space immediately behind me. After the match – a rather forgettable yet interesting 1-1 draw attended by 7,181 fans – half a dozen reporters sat around a small table with chairs hastily arranged for an impromptu post-match chat with the coach, Mark Sampson. The BBC’s very dedicated women’s sports reporter Jo Currie conducted broadcast interviews, but that aside, it was a quiet press room. All of these things felt perfectly normal at the time, for the level of media attention the national squad were receiving.
Continue reading...Party removes support for Andy Brown, standing for Aberdeenshire North and Moray East, after reported posts about novichok poisonings
Labour has suspended one of its candidates after reports that he shared pro-Russian material online.
The shadow chancellor, Rachel Reeves, said she “hadn’t heard of” the candidate Andy Brown until the disciplinary action was taken, but said it was “absolutely right” Labour swiftly removed support for him.
Continue reading...Inter midfielder’s partnership with Jorginho is earning media plaudits after Euro 2024 win over Albania
Nicolò Barella did not relish being reminded he has scored more international goals than any other player in Italy’s squad at Euro 2024. “That worries me a bit,” he said when the detail was put to him at the end of the 2-1 win against Albania on Saturday. “It means I’m getting old.”
At 27, Barella is hardly in the twilight of his career. There are plenty of older players representing the Azzurri in Germany, and yet only one outfielder, Jorginho, has been capped more times. The Arsenal player made his 55th Italy appearance against Albania. Barella is on 54.
Continue reading...When I boarded the train at Beijing I felt timid, a cautious traveller. But a chaotic and vodka-soaked party set me off on a very different path
In 2001, after spending a year studying in Beijing as part of our degree, two friends and I decided to travel to Mongolia and Russia on the Trans-Siberian Railway. We did everything as cheaply as possible, to the extent that I was terrified we were going to be flung off the train at the Mongolia-Russia border, because we’d got our visas from a tiny, dodgy-looking agency in a random tower block in Beijing.
Being worried was pretty much my default state at that time. I found talking to strangers difficult, and struggled to raise my hand in class. I was always terrified of making mistakes. Though it wasn’t a devastating shyness, I envied the way that friends and classmates always seemed at home in different groups and situations – a feeling that had always eluded me.
Continue reading...There are numerous terms to describe the wide array of far right parties, but what do all they mean – and do we always use the right ones?
They are known, variously, as far right, national-conservative, radical right, anti-Islam, nativist, and Eurosceptic. Also as extreme right, populist, “alt-right”, neofascist, anti-immigration, nationalist, authoritarian, and assorted combinations of the above.
As the dust settles on the results of this month’s European parliamentary elections, it is worth examining what some of the terms routinely used to describe Europe’s wide array of far-right parties mean – and whether they are always the right ones.
Continue reading...Thaksin appears in court accused of lese-majeste relating to 2015 interview with South Korean media
The former Thai prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, a powerful backer of the ruling government, has been formally indicted for allegedly insulting the monarchy almost two decades ago.
One of Thailand’s most influential political figures, Thaksin, 74, appeared at Bangkok’s Ratchada criminal court accused of lese-majeste. The case relates to an interview he gave to South Korean media in 2015. He was granted bail on Tuesday.
Thaksin was ousted by a military coup in 2006 and spent 15 years in self-imposed exile to avoid charges he said were politically motivated. He returned to Thailand last year, arriving back in the country on the same day his party Pheu Thai formed an unlikely coalition with his former enemies from the conservative military establishment – a deal that was in both sides’ interest because it kept a popular, youthful pro-reform party out of power.
Continue reading...Every 21 June for over 10 years, Claudine Doury has traveled from St Petersburg to Maloyaroslavets in Russia, to the island of Lake Ives in Belarus, and to Kaunas, Vilnius and the Polish and Latvian countryside, to witness the summer solstice. The night of the solstice is a traditional celebration whose roots lie in pagan festivals closely linked to the forces of nature and the worship of the sun
Continue reading...In today’s newsletter: The war has devastated Sudan, destroying much of the country and leaving 18 million facing acute hunger
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Good morning.
The war in Sudan has caused destruction throughout much of the country. And with every passing week the conflict seems to get worse between the Sudanese army and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) – a paramilitary group who say their main goal is to establish democracy, though the frequent human rights abuses they commit do not support this claim.
Conservatives | Jeremy Hunt said Liz Truss’s economic ambitions were a “good thing to aim for” and her disastrous mini-budget hadn’t left an impact on the economy, according to two leaked recordings obtained by the Guardian. The chancellor was recorded at a meeting of students when he said he was “trying to basically achieve some of the same things” as the former prime minister, but that he was doing it “more gradually”.
Israel | Benjamin Netanyahu has dissolved the Israeli war cabinet that had been overseeing the conflict in Gaza, rebuffing his far-right allies who had been seeking seats, and apparently moving to solidify his grasp on decision-making over the fighting with Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah across the Lebanese border.
Italy | At least 10 people died and dozens were missing after two separate shipwrecks close to the Italian coast, rescuers said. Ten bodies were found on Monday in the lower deck of a wooden boat in the central Mediterranean by rescuers from Nadir, a ship operated by the German charity ResQship.
Germany | Eight alleged members of the German far-right Reichsbürger are to go on trial accused of a plot to violently overthrow the state, in the third in a row of similar court cases being held across the country. The defendants, including a GP, a celebrity chef and an astrologer, are accused of serving as the plot’s leadership council and, prosecutors say, were set to become a cabinet in waiting if the group’s plan overthrow the government had succeeded.
UK news | Officers who hit an escaped cow with a car “probably did the right thing at the time” even if it looks “horrendous”, a union leader and farmer has said. A video showing a police car hitting the calf on Friday night on a residential street in Staines-upon-Thames was met with widespread outrage, including from the RSCPA which criticised it as “disproportionate”.
Continue reading...People across Ukraine have united in the face of the Russian threat and its Vietnamese community is no exception
When Russia invaded Ukraine two years ago, Tung Nguyen drove his parents from their home, in the city of Chernihiv, to the border with Poland. Then, he returned to Kyiv and began to volunteer, bringing food and medicines to under-siege Chernihiv. Before long, he had decided to sign up and fight in the Ukrainian army.
Nguyen is part of Ukraine’s Vietnamese community, a sizeable but often hidden minority in the country. Some Vietnamese people left Ukraine after the Russian invasion, but others have stayed, particularly those from the younger generation, many of whom were born in Ukraine and are Ukrainian citizens.
Continue reading...UAVs continually kill civilians, but the U.S. military wants to expand its arsenal with an army of new, mass-produced kamikaze AI drones.
The post Cheap and Lethal: The Pentagon’s Plan for the Next Drone War appeared first on The Intercept.
Housebuilder aims to create 4,000 private rental homes in UK capital and south-east over next decade
The housebuilder Berkeley is to go back into the private rental market for the first time in a decade by launching a build-to-rent arm to tackle the “severe shortage” of properties in and around London.
The company, which built 3,500 private-sale homes last year, will establish the build-to-rent business, which aims to create 4,000 homes in London and the south-east over the next decade.
Continue reading...Rachel Reeves warns cost of living crisis is not over, as inflation hits official target for first time in three years
The shadow chancellor, Rachel Reeves, has said pressure on household finances remains “acute” despite official figures showing inflation fell to 2% in May, returning to the official target rate for the first time in nearly three years.
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) said the consumer prices index (CPI) had eased in May, down from 2.3% in April, raising expectations of a cut in borrowing costs by the Bank of England.
Continue reading...It will take time for voters to forget the financial toll from the highest inflation in four decades – and time is not on the PM’s side
After almost three years, the UK’s annual inflation rate is back to the government’s 2% target. That ought to be good news for Rishi Sunak and the Conservatives – but given the state of the opinion polls it looks like being far too little, far too late.
First the good news. The latest figures from the Office for National Statistics show price pressures are continuing to abate. The headline rate of inflation fell from 2.3% in April to 2% in May and there were also declines in two closely watched measures of underlying inflation.
Continue reading...From community arts to theatre to ceramics, projects across the Potteries are bringing energy and optimism to a city still reeling from decades of decline
On the edge of Hanley, one of Stoke-on-Trent’s six towns, sits a little patch of five streets of Victorian terraces that were once marked for demolition. But that plan foundered, and instead, in 2013, the council decided to sell the homes – bought under the compulsory purchase scheme – for £1 each. One of those who bought a house was the artist Anna Francis. A few years later, fellow artist Rebecca Davies moved there too. Now they are running one of the most remarkable community arts projects I have ever seen.
Francis, Davies and their neighbours are turning an old pub into a creative centre for the people of this place – people who have been through a tough time as, in the long wake of the decline of Stoke-on-Trent’s ceramics, steel and mining industries, their area was condemned to oblivion and its amenities stripped away. But that hardly begins to describe the energy and optimism of the Portland Inn Project. It is an urban regeneration scheme that actually asks the people who live here what they want, rather than chasing them out, building more expensive homes, and replacing them with shinier, better-off people.
Charlotte Higgins is the Guardian’s chief culture writer
Continue reading...Issuing licences in the North Sea without accounting for environmental impact was unlawful, Oceana UK says
A marine conservation group has initiated legal action against the UK government, claiming the Conservatives’ decision to issue North Sea oil and gas licences without taking into account their impact on the environment was unlawful.
Oceana UK, part of an international conservation organisation, said that in issuing 82 licences, Claire Coutinho, the secretary of state for energy security, and the North Sea Transition Authority, ignored advice from independent government experts about the potential effects on marine protected areas (MPAs).
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Increasing use of fans, air coolers and air conditioners is placing ‘serious’ strain on grid in north of country
Engineers in India have warned of the possibility of prolonged power outages in the north, where a heatwave has brought misery for millions of people.
Demand for electricity has soared due to fans, air coolers and air conditioners being run constantly, placing a strain on the grid in Delhi and elsewhere in the north. Manufacturers of air conditioners and air coolers report sales rising by 40-50% compared with last summer.
Continue reading...Last week more than 400 scientists signed an open letter to political parties urging ambitious action on the environment to prevent making Britain and the world ‘more dangerous and insecure’.
Now that the main parties’ manifestos have all been released, Ian Sample is joined by the global environment editor, Jon Watts, and the biodiversity reporter, Phoebe Weston, to find out what the manifestos have to say about nature and climate, and whether anyone is promising the level of action scientists are asking for
Find more analysis of how the UK parties rate on their environmental manifesto pledges
Continue reading...Mozilla, the maker of the popular web browser Firefox, said it received government demands to block add-ons that circumvent censorship.
The post Firefox Browser Blocks Anti-Censorship Add-Ons at Russia’s Request appeared first on The Intercept.
Dan Osborn, running as an independent, has racked up endorsements in a race that could help determine Senate control in 2024.
The post UAW Endorses Nebraska Underdog Threatening to Unseat a Republican Senator appeared first on The Intercept.
Public polling is a critical function of modern political campaigns and movements, but it isn’t what it once was. Recent US election cycles have produced copious postmortems explaining both the successes and the flaws of public polling. There are two main reasons polling fails.
First, nonresponse has skyrocketed. It’s radically harder to reach people than it used to be. Few people fill out surveys that come in the mail anymore. Few people answer their phone when a stranger calls. Pew Research reported that 36% of the people they called in 1997 would talk to them, but only 6% by 2018. Pollsters worldwide have faced similar challenges...
“One side or the other is going to win,” Alito told a person he thought was a right-wing activist.
The post Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito Caught on Secret Audio appeared first on The Intercept.
Twelve jurors in New York have presented their fellow Americans with a simple question: are you willing to elect a convicted criminal to the White House?
On Thursday, Donald Trump was found guilty of all 34 counts of falsifying business records in a criminal hush-money scheme to influence the outcome of the 2016 election. The verdict makes him the first president, current or former, to be found guilty of felony crimes in the US's near 250-year history. Regardless, the conviction does not disqualify Trump as a presidential candidate or bar him from again sitting in the Oval Office.
Trump, who opted not to take the stand during the trial, has denied wrongdoing, railed against the proceedings and ahead of the verdict compared himself to a saint: “Mother Teresa could not beat these charges. The charges are rigged,” he said on Wednesday. Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee, is expected to appeal the verdict.
The Guardian’s Sam Levine has been in court over the last several weeks covering all the developments – here are three testimonies he found most memorable.
Could Trump go to prison? Here’s what happens next after the guilty verdict
The U.S. has trained 15 coup leaders in recent decades — and U.S. counterterrorism policies in the region have failed.
The post After Training African Coup Leaders, Pentagon Blames Russia for African Coups appeared first on The Intercept.
In an exclusive interview with the Guardian, the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, revealed the tactics and traits that help him face the daily frustrations of leading a country at war for more than two years.
Within a ceremonial room inside Kyiv’s presidential compound, Zelenskiy spoke for nearly an hour with a Guardian team, including the editor-in-chief, Katharine Viner. The interview took place during perhaps the toughest time for Ukraine since the early days of the war. Russia is on the offensive in Kharkiv, an advance that follows months of delay in the US Congress over the passing of a major support package, limiting Ukraine’s battlefield capabilities
Continue reading...Experts at Northumbria University are winning millions in funding to find new ways to tackle the climate crisis, including using solar power to create water, and to train the next generation of carbon champions
An estimated 1.8 billion people around the world live in homes without a water supply, according to research by Unicef and the World Health Organization (WHO). Collecting water is a daily task that falls to women and girls in 70% of those households, and often involves long, dangerous journeys that take them away from education, work and leisure. It’s an issue that’s exacerbated by climate change and war. Experts warn that efforts to tackle water scarcity need to accelerate significantly if the UN’s sixth sustainable development goal – universal access to water – is to be achieved by 2030.
But what if there was a way to harness the energy of the sun to create clean, safe drinking water from thin air? It sounds like a magic trick but that’s precisely what Dr Muhammad Wakil Shahzad, associate professor in Northumbria University’s department of mechanical and construction engineering, has devised with his team. Their portable Solar2Water system uses solar energy to extract moisture from the air and turn it into water – up to 500 litres a day, depending on the size of the unit. It is being seen as a game changer for displaced communities in refugee camps, disaster zones and other remote locations, primarily because it can produce a constant amount of water independently of the humidity in the air.
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