Hello, readers – happy Tuesday! Today, we’ll be talking about the call for a ceasefire in Gaza, hackers, North Korea’s meeting, South Korea’s doctors, Trump’s cases, a social media law in Florida, & a footrace for waiters.
Here’s some good news: the White House has vowed to undo part of the federal budget that prevents LGBTQ Pride flags from being flown over U.S. embassies. A spokesman also noted that the administration was “successful in defeating 50 other policy riders attacking the LGBTQI community.” The White House also announced $6 billion in funding for projects that will help cut emissions from the industrial sector. This marks the largest-ever U.S. investment to decarbonize domestic industry.
“You cannot do a kindness too soon, for you never know how soon it will be too late.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson
U.S. Inaction Un-Shackles The U.N.
(U.N. Security Council by Lev Radin via Getty Images)
On Monday, the United Nations Security Council voted 14-0 in favor of a resolution demanding a ceasefire in Gaza until the end of Ramadan, or the evening of April 9, 2024. The motion passed because the U.S. abstained from voting, as one Washington diplomat said the White House “did not agree with everything” in the resolution’s text.
Up until now, the U.S. has acted as a stalwart defender of Israel on the Security Council, blocking multiple ceasefire resolutions. The move to abstain from voting displays a growing rift between the White House and Netanyahu – Israel quickly responded to the move by canceling a high-level diplomatic visit to the U.S. that would have allowed top Israeli diplomats to explain their plan for a ground invasion of Rafah.
The ceasefire resolution also calls for the immediate, unconditional release of all the people taken hostage by Hamas on October 7, emphasizes “the urgent need to expand the flow of humanitarian assistance” to Gaza, and re-emphasizes the U.N.’s call for “the lifting of all barriers to the provision of humanitarian assistance at scale.” Meanwhile, the U.S., Egypt, and Qatar are still working on a hostage exchange deal that might lead to a longer ceasefire.
Slashing Down The Hackers
On Monday, the U.S. Treasury Department imposed sanctions on Wuhan Xiaoruizhi Science and Technology Company, describing it as a “front company” for China’s Ministry of State Security, and the Justice Department announced charges against seven Chinese nationals who are allegedly part of a group known as Advanced Persistent Threat 31, or APT31.
The White House says that the hacking units, which are allegedly linked to Beijing’s top spy agency, have been trying for years to embed malware in America’s electrical grids and defense systems. The malware would allegedly be activated if the U.S. were to come to the aid of Taiwan if China decides to invade the island nation, tying up crucial American resources to solve domestic problems instead of trying to protect an island halfway across the world.
Meanwhile, the U.K. has alleged that Chinese hackers attempted to steal the voter registration data of tens of millions of Britons and accounts belonging to members of Parliament. There was no evidence that the data was actually manipulated by the hackers, indicating that the intrusion was mainly a test of the hackers’ ability. A spokesman for China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs dismissed the allegations as “fake news” and said the countries are “smearing other countries without a factual basis, not to mention politicizing cybersecurity issues.”
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North Korea’s Diplomatic Bomb
(PM Kishida by JIJI Press via Getty Images)
According to North Korea, Japan’s Prime Minister Fumio Kishida has offered to meet with Kim Jong Un. Japan confirmed the news, saying that Tokyo has been attempting to set up a bilateral summit with the hermit kingdom to discuss North Korea’s past abductions of Japanese nationals. Unfortunately for Japan, Pyongyang has established two tough conditions for such a meeting – Japan must officially accept North Korea’s weapons development program, and ignore its abductions of Japanese citizens.
While Japan’s government wants to re-establish the bilateral meetings after a 20-year hiatus, it has already dismissed Pyongyang’s conditions as unacceptable. “While North Korea may be waiting out elections in South Korea and the United States before reengaging those countries in diplomacy, it probably wants to strengthen its hand by developing weapons and driving wedges between U.S. allies,” said one professor of international studies at Ewha Womans University in Seoul. “Kishida feels political urgency to address the abductions issue and is thus showing diplomatic effort.”
Heavy Hitters Join The Strike
South Korea’s doctors’ strike is widening as medical professors across the nation say they’re going to join the collective action, which currently only involves trainee doctors who are protesting pay disparities and a government plan to sharply increase medical school admissions.
The head of the Medical Professors Association of Korea said that medical professors would begin their strike by scaling back outpatient treatment to focus on patients with critical needs, while some professors are expected to turn in their resignations soon. The professors will be backing trainee doctors’ claims that adding 2,000 additional medical students per year will degrade the quality of Korea’s medical services. President Yoon Suk Yeol’s government has threatened to suspend the licenses of striking doctors and says that new doctors are needed amid an unusually low doctor-to-patient ratio.
Mark your calendars, folks, we have a date for the first criminal trial of a former president in U.S. history – former President Trump’s trial in the New York hush-money case against him will begin with jury selection on April 15, Judge Juan Merchan said Monday. Monday’s hearing was to consider Trump’s motion to dismiss the charges and sanction the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office. Trump is accused of falsifying business records after paying adult film star Stormy Daniels to keep their affair quiet.
Likely a bit more exciting for the former president is the ruling from an appeals court giving him an additional 10 days to post a bond of $175 million. Trump was supposed to pay a $464 million bond by yesterday or risk having his property seized by New York Attorney General Letitia James. Once Trump posts this much-reduced bond, enforcement of the civil fraud judgment against him is paused until at least September.
Ron DeSocial-Media-Restrictor
Yesterday, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis signed a new law that will give parents more control over their teens’ social media accounts. Social media platforms will have to ban kids under 14 from creating accounts and delete existing ones. 14- and 15-year-olds will also need consent from a parent to create or keep an existing account.
Many apps and websites will also now have to verify a user’s age. The age verification rule will only apply to sites with a “substantial portion of material harmful to minors.” Obviously, with Florida’s fairly broad definition of “harmful,” this could get complicated very quickly if, say, a young kid wanted to learn more about sexual orientation or gender identity without their parents finding out.
The 2024 Olympics might be coming to Paris later this summer, but the City of Light is already playing host to some eye-catching feats of athleticism. On Sunday, the city revived the annual Course des Cafés after a 14-year hiatus as a sort of warm-up to the Summer Games. The competition saw Parisian waiters and waitresses wind their way through Paris’ famous boulevards, cheered on by crowds of spectators as they raced to the finish line while balancing a tray with a croissant, a coffee cup, and a glass of water atop it.
The winners of the race were Pauline Van Wymeersch and Samy Lamrous as the fastest waitress and waiter, respectively. “I love it as much as I hate it. It’s in my skin. I cannot leave it,” said Van Wymeersch of her profession. “It’s hard. It’s exhausting. It’s demanding. It’s 12 hours per day. It’s no weekends. It’s no Christmases.”
Anne Hidalgo, the city’s mayor, said in a statement that Paris’ cafes and bistros are “really the soul of Paris,” adding that “the bistrot is where we go to meet people, where we go for our little coffee, our little drink, where we also go to argue, to love and embrace each other … the café and the bistrot are life.”
