Ankara: After the massive February 6 earthquakes that hit Turkey and Syria killing 59,259 people and damaging millions of buildings, the government in Ankara is building tens of thousands of housing and infrastructure projects in the region round the clock to meet the pledge of completing them within one year.
However, the government faces a big challenge to reach the goal set by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan due to a severe labour shortage in recent years, and the problem is likely to worsen as the number of constructions sharply increased after the catastrophe, reports Xinhua news agency.
More than 13 million people living in 11 provinces were affected by the destructive earthquakes, and a large number of survivors were still homeless, according to the country’s Disaster and Emergency Management Authority (AFAD).
“We will completely revive our earthquake cities by building 650,000 new houses. We are carrying out comprehensive urban transformation projects to prepare our whole country for earthquakes,” Erdogan said.
The government aims to finish 319,000 of the houses by the end of May, Turkish Environment, Urbanization and Climate Change Minister Murat Kurum said last week.
But construction industry veterans pointed out that the workforce is not sufficient to meet the demand for so many projects.
As a structural problem in the sector, the labour shortage needs to be addressed as soon as possible by training new workers and improving working conditions.
In 2018, the number of construction workers in the country was nearly 2.3 million, but this number plummeted to nearly 1.5 million after the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic, Hasan Kirlangic, chairman of the Construction Workers’ Union, told Xinhua.
He noted that construction workers have fled the sector for higher-paying or less physically demanding jobs in other industries or countries.
“Construction is a heavy industry and the labour force is dwindling due to relatively low wages. Besides, there is a shortage of new workers due to a lack of training,” Kirlangic explained.
Meanwhile, the earthquakes further complicate the labour shortage of the sector, and the number of construction workers will not be enough for the target of building more than 600,000 houses, Kirlangic warned.
Kirlangic urged the government to take urgent measures if it wants to meet its commitment to building new homes for quake victims in one year.
“If wages, safety, healthcare, and housing conditions are improved, the previous boom in the labour force can be restored,” he said.
Erdal Eren, president of the Turkish Contractors Association, told the Turkish parliamentary inquiry commission earlier this month that the country does not have the workforce to build permanent residences in the earthquake zone by the deadline set by the government.
Peel and finely dice a medium-sized shallot, one of the banana variety. Warm 2 tbsp of olive oil in a large, deep pan over a moderate heat. Stir in the chopped shallot and let it cook for 7 minutes or so until it is soft, but not coloured – keep stirring it so that it doesn’t brown.
Squash 1 large clove of garlic flat with a pestle or the side of a heavy knife, then stir into the shallot with ½ a tsp of dried, hot chilli flakes and the finely grated zest of 1 medium-sized lemon.
Now add a couple of bay leaves (fresh or dried) and two 400g cans of drained butter beans orjudion beans. Pour in 500ml of stock (vegetable or chicken) and bring to the boil.
Roughly chop a large handful of parsley leaves. Turn the heat up, add 500g of small clams to the pan and a splash of white vermouth or white wine and cover tightly with a lid. Cook for 4-5 minutes until the clam shells have opened, then lift the lid, toss in the parsley and a grinding of black pepper.
Ladle the clams, beans and broth into soup bowls, trickle over a little olive oil and eat. Enough for 2
I have erred on the mild side here. Add more chilli flakes if you wish.
Mussels are also good here if you can’t get clams.
Offer spoons for the shellfish broth and perhaps some bread.
Use chickpeas if you prefer.
We aim to publish recipes for seafood rated as sustainable by the Marine Conservation Society’s Good Fish Guide
Follow Nigel on Instagram @NigelSlater
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( With inputs from : www.theguardian.com )
The British government hasn’t yet succeeded in passing its flagship piece of internet regulation, but it’s about to introduce a second. Hot on the heels of the online safety bill comes the digital markets, competition and consumer bill, introduced today “to crack down on rip-offs, protect consumer cash online and boost competition in digital markets”.
From our story:
Major tech firms face the threat of multibillion-pound fines for breaching consumer protection rules under new legislation that will tackle issues including fake online reviews and subscriptions that are difficult to cancel.
The digital markets, competition and consumers bill will empower the UK’s competition watchdog to tackle the “excessive dominance” that a small number of tech firms hold over consumers and businesses.
Firms that are deemed to have “strategic market status” – such as tech firms Google and Apple, and online retailer Amazon – will be given strict rules on how to operate under the bill and face a fine representing up to 10% of global turnover if they breach the new regime.
Just like the online safety bill, this is multiple pieces of regulation squashed together in a somewhat ungainly fashion.
One – undoubtedly the most important – part of the bill is aimed at beefing up the Competition and Markets Authority, the UK’s competition regulator. It finally gives statutory powers to the “digital markets unit” (DMU), a subgroup of the CMA formed to monitor and regulate, well, digital markets – specifically, the largely American mega-platforms whose scale and heft defines the contours of the internet and, increasingly, society in general.
The DMU was first announced almost two and a half years ago, after the government revealed plans to empower the unit to write and enforce a new code of practice for technology companies. And it’s been reannounced every year since then: in 2021, the CMA announced it would set up the unit “later this year”, which it duly did. But the unit wasn’t given any actual power, so in May 2022 the government announced that ministers would introduce legislation to bestow it the ability to actually issue fines and create rules.
That legislation has finally been introduced. The government simply needs to pass it, a task that should be trivial for a party with a parliamentary majority of 67 but is frequently beyond the ken of this one (as anyone who has followed the online safety bill through its half-decade history will be all too aware).
Once (if?) it passes, the DMU will be empowered to regulate a tiny number of enormous companies – an FT report (£) on a leaked draft of the bill suggests that the threshold for coverage will be £1bn of UK revenue, or £25bn of global revenue. That would include giants like Apple, Meta and Microsoft, but exclude still very large companies like Spotify, Epic Games (of Fortnite fame) and TikTok.
Those tech titans will be deemed to have “strategic market status”, opening themselves up to handcrafted rules designed “to provide more choice and transparency to their customers”. It’s too soon to know what those rules might be, but expect this to be the mechanism by which the UK state begins putting pressure on companies over their app stores, marketplaces and advertising offerings: all the parts of a massive platform that don’t easily fall under traditional competition policy but do, at the scale of these businesses, have a substantial economic impact.
The DMU will have teeth, theoretically: breaches of its rules can come with a fine of up to 10% of global turnover. It will also be able to “carry out targeted interventions”, the government says, “opening up new paths for start-ups or smaller firms that have previously struggled to grow and compete in these markets”. Think, for instance, requiring a market leader to reduce barriers to building services on top of its platform.
The second part of the bill is distinct but overlapping, giving the CMA itself more powers to directly enforce consumer law. At the moment, an awful lot of its functions require a lengthy court process, and the government wants to give it the ability to directly impose penalties for breaching consumer law, again with a fine of up to 10% of a company’s global turnover.
And then, awkwardly tied to the CMA part of the bill, is the rest of it. This is the stuff that has made the headlines in the consumer press: a ban on fake reviews, a policy to end “subscription traps”, and a new requirement to advise customers when a free trial or introductory offer is coming to an end.
Those policies are good popular reforms, but are unlikely to have anywhere near the impact of the meatier regulatory side of the bill. The consumer rights group Which? supports them, at least:
Whether it’s fake reviews by dishonest businesses or people getting trapped in unwanted and costly subscriptions, our consumer protections are overdue an upgrade. Which? has long campaigned for stronger powers for the Competition and Markets Authority, including tough enforcement and the ability to fine firms that break the law directly.
In the meantime, the online safety bill trundles ever onwards. Last week it was reintroduced to the House of Lords, where it is winding through committee stage. WhatsApp and Signal have united and implied they may withdraw from the country entirely if it passes unchanged. The government doesn’t appear to care. Politics!
Once, there was no verification on Twitter. All accounts were as one.
Then people began impersonating celebrities, and the threat of lawsuits prompted the introduction of a verification programme, placing a checkmark beside the name of users who had proved their identity.
The programme grew to encompass a broad swathe of notable users, including many journalists, in part because it was effectively administered by businesses who would work to verify their staff.
A “blue tick” became a desirable mark of status – or a divisive sign of elitism.
Elon Musk buys Twitter, and begins selling the ability to “verify” your account to end the “lords and peasants” system. No verification occurs, but accounts with a phone number attached are eligible for a checkmark. A few hundred thousand sign up.
Some of the newly verified users express annoyance at the older, “legacy” verified users receiving the same status for free. Musk announces that they will have that status stripped from them on 20 April, a date known for its significance in weed culture.
The legacy checkmarks are removed. Only people who pay are marked out. This immediately becomes a source of embarrassment. A grassroots campaign begins to block anyone with a paid-for mark.
Celebrities with more than one million followers wake up to find they have had the mark forced on them – with a public explanation claiming they paid for it, even though they did not. Some discover they can’t remove it even if they try.
Elon Musk takes a break from blowing up rockets to tweet a laughing-face emoji and the words “A troll, me??”
It’s like selling Nobel prizes to raise revenue, then taking all the Nobel prizes you had previously awarded back and wondering why a Nobel prize isn’t impressive any more. Truly genius stuff.
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( With inputs from : www.theguardian.com )
Ben is one of hundreds of volunteer pilots in the US flying people across state lines in their small private planes so they can obtain abortion healthcare. He’s part of an Illinois-based group called Elevated Access that connects pilots with patients. Since the overturning of Roe v Wade in 2022 dismantled 50 years of legal protection around abortion access in the US, thousands of patients are now forced to travel to obtain the healthcare they need – which can be expensive, time consuming and risky
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( With inputs from : www.theguardian.com )
Mumbai: The rupee traded in a narrow range and settled on a flat note at 81.92 (provisional) against the US dollar amid rising crude oil prices and foreign fund outflows.
At the interbank foreign exchange market, the local unit opened at 81.95 against the US currency and finally closed at 81.92 (provisional) against the greenback, unchanged from its previous close.
During the session, the rupee touched a high of 81.86 and a low of 81.96 against the dollar. The rupee on Monday settled at 81.92 against the US dollar.
According to Jateen Trivedi, VP Research Analyst at LKP Securities, the rupee traded range bound near 81.90 as the dollar index was in the consolidation range.
“The rupee replicated peers by staying in the range of 81.85-81.95. The US GDP data is the next key trigger for the traders to watch out for, till then the range for the rupee can be seen in 81.75 – 82.10,” Trivedi said.
The dollar index, which gauges the greenback’s strength against a basket of six currencies, rose 0.06 per cent to 101.40.
Global oil benchmark Brent crude futures declined 0.39 per cent to USD 82.41 per barrel.
On the domestic equity market front, the 30-share BSE Sensex advanced 74.61 points or 0.12 per cent to end at 60,130.71 points and the broader NSE Nifty gained 25.85 points or 0.15 per cent to 17,769.25 points.
Foreign institutional investors were net sellers in the capital market on Monday as they offloaded shares worth Rs 412.27 crore, as per exchange data.
Mumbai: The rumour mill is buzzing with reports of a sizzling romance between South Indian actress Tamannaah Bhatia and Bollywood‘s talented actor Vijay Varma. The alleged couple has been seen on several occasions, including in a viral kissing video earlier this year. They’ve been spotted on numerous dinner dates and outings together since then.
The couple was recently seen leaving a restaurant after their dinner date on April 24th. They were seen waving to the paparazzi with smiles on their faces and leaving in the same car together, fueling speculation about their relationship.
According to sources close to the stars, the couple met on the sets of Sujoy Ghosh’s ‘Lust Stories 2’, in which they both star. While they clicked right away, they are taking their time getting to know each other before taking their relationship to the next level.
Rumour mills also suggest Tamannaah is planninh to walk down the aisle soon. The actress has kept her personal life private, but sources say she has been discussing her plans to settle down with her family and close friends. While it is unclear whether Vijay Varma is the man in her life, fans are eagerly awaiting confirmation from the actress.
On the work front, Tamannaah’s next film will be Bole Chudiyan, in which she will star alongside Nawazuddin Siddiqui. Vijay Varma, on the other hand, will star alongside Kareena Kapoor and Jaideep Ahlawat in Sujoy Ghosh’s The Devotion of Suspect X. Despite their hectic schedules, the alleged couple appears to be making time for each other, and fans are excited to see what their future holds.
The final number of casualties is not quite confirmed but it is guaranteed to hurt. According to Christian Day, general secretary of the Rugby Players’ Association, at least 100 current Premiership squad members will shortly be left without a contract, victims of the stark financial realities gripping the English club game. “The market is incredibly squeezed,” says Day. “We’re looking at 10 senior players per squad not being there next year.”
Maybe one or two will be fortunate and find a summer trial somewhere. The implications of the Premiership’s reduced £5m salary cap, however, threaten to wreck a lot of dreams. Some clubs have been shedding truckloads of academy pros, others have made derisory offers that no full-time athlete could reasonably accept. “The last two years have been the most testing and challenging for rugby union as a professional sport since the early days when everyone was flying blind,” says Day. “We’re trying to help with that.”
But even as Day spells out his determination to negotiate for a proper minimum wage and a benevolent fund for past players, a much bigger truth is increasingly hard to ignore. There is foolhardy and then there is the bone-headed stupidity of those who think pro rugby alone will set them up for life. Rarely has there been a worse time to put all your eggs in rugby’s increasingly wobbly basket.
To the RPA’s credit, things have come on slightly since Day started as a young pro in 2003. Back then there was barely any support or pastoral care for those suddenly deemed surplus to requirements. This year 91% of players in the league expressed an interest in developing themselves beyond rugby and 62% of those enrolled on educational or vocational courses. More than 100 education grants have also been approved to help players prepare for life outside the dressing room bubble.
In many ways, though, that is the easy bit. Tick the box and on we go. Rather harder for those tiptoeing back into the real world is to replicate the weekly adrenaline rush to which they have become addicted. Or, tougher still, to peel back the layers of their institutionalised past and find something that might yield lasting happiness and long-term fulfilment.
Luckily there are people like Geoff Griffiths around to offer a helping hand. In a former life, Griffiths played in the back three for, among others, Blackheath, Esher, Plymouth Albion, Rotherham and Bedford. These days he is the owner and chief executive of the digital marketing agency Builtvisible and also specialises in assisting players who find themselves at a crossroads in their lives.
Together with his sister Nicola, a clinical psychologist, he has launched Tackling Transition to help professional athletes to take control of their transition out of sport. He reckons there remains a significant need for it. “I’ve got a couple of retired Premiership players who say they wish there was something like this before. One of them was bumbling his way through in a dead-end job that he didn’t really care about. Another told me he felt like he was just an academy player again. One minute he’d been playing in front of 80,000 people for Harlequins, the next he was stuck in an office somewhere.”
Everyone knows playing rugby cannot last for ever but, equally, it is possible to be pigeonholed once you stop. “What happens in rugby, in particular, is that people get pushed into finance or brokerage … things where you’re classically going to be good at because of your transferable skills.” But what if they had thought about things a little bit more and stopped to consider what their real passion might be? Acting? Writing? One of Griffiths’s former teammates is the BBC’s Ukraine correspondent James Waterhouse, with whom he played at Rotherham, Plymouth and Esher. Another is Ben Mercer, author of the excellent rugby book Fringes. All of them were sufficiently smart to understand the need to look beyond rugby even when they were fully immersed in it.
Worcester in action at Sixways in 2021. The Warriors’ collapse offered a sobering reminder of rugby’s finances. Photograph: Nathan Stirk/Getty Images
Something else Griffiths mentions strikes a chord. He spent eight years playing in the Championship and National One and reckons the best times he had were at Blackheath in National One. “I had a balance because I was building a career and using rugby as an escape rather than it being all-consuming. As a result I played better rugby. Being more well-rounded is obviously of enormous benefit and will actually improve your performance because you can switch off. A more balanced person is a better athlete.”
It became obvious to him, too, that players from Premiership clubs who pitched up on loan often fell into one of two categories: those who made the effort to engage and socialise and those who were simply marking time. “You knew the ones who would be successful people and you knew the ones who were chasing a rugby career. The former are doing better now than the ones who maybe got a handful of Premiership starts but were never going to be world-beaters. The interesting thing with rugby is that the financials aren’t really good enough to justify being all-in. Who’s making forever money in rugby?”
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It is among the lessons he now tries to pass on, to avoid players ending up completely lost. “When [France’s] Christophe Dominici passed away in 2020 it really brought it home. I don’t think that’s the norm but there are countless stories of people struggling after their career is over. I think psychology is becoming a bigger thing on the performance side but there is a gap when a player’s career ends. Brutally, that’s not something the clubs are tasked with doing.”
Which is why Griffiths wants to try to alert them to their hidden potential. “I was talking to another guy who has just retired from the Premiership. He was saying that a lot of stuff around transition comes across as very negative. We want it to be a positive. The empowerment thing is massive. The better you understand yourself while you’re in rugby, the better armed and equipped you are. And the sooner you do something the better. Anything’s better than it being too late.” Plenty to ponder there, even for those still clinging to a Premiership contract.
In the UK, the charity Mind is available on 0300 123 3393 and Childline on 0800 1111. In the US, Mental Health America is available on 800-273-8255. In Australia, support is available at Beyond Blue on 1300 22 4636, Lifeline on 13 11 14, and at MensLine on 1300 789 978
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( With inputs from : www.theguardian.com )
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin
Seoul: North Korea vowed on Tuesday to strengthen its ties with Russia on the occasion of the fourth anniversary of the first summit between the leaders of the two nations.
Vice Foreign Minister Im Chon-il issued a statement confirming “mutual support and solidarity” between Pyongyang and Moscow, marking the anniversary of the 2019 summit between North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, held in Vladivostok, reports Yonhap News Agency.
“The two countries are strengthening mutual support and solidarity in the struggle to resolutely smash the dangers of war and military threats from the outside,” Im said.
The official stressed the North will “(invariably) stand to elevate the long-standing and traditional relations of friendship” between the two nations.
The North has been strengthening its close ties with Russia despite international condemnation over Moscow’s war with Ukraine.
The North has denied allegations that it has provided arms to Russia for use in the Ukraine war.
North Korean arms exports are banned under UN Security Council resolutions over Pyongyang’s nuclear and missile programs.
Bagalkote: Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Tuesday defended the BJP government’s decision in Karnataka of scrapping the four per cent quota for Muslims saying the party never believed in religion-based reservation’.
The former BJP chief also took a dig at Congress for its stand that the quota would be restored if it is voted to power in the state after the May 10 Assembly polls.
“There was a religion-based reservation of four per cent for Muslims. Without falling for the vote bank politics, the BJP government abolished the Muslim reservation,” he said addressing a public meeting at Terdal in this district.
“We believe that religion-based reservation should not happen,” Shah opined.
The Minister added that after abolishing Muslim reservation, the BJP government increased the reservation for the Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, Vokkaligas and Lingayats.
Referring to the Basavaraj Bommai government’s decision to increase the SC reservation from 15 per cent to 17 per cent, Shah noted that the internal reservation of SC (Left) now stands at six per cent, SC (Right)- 5.5 per cent and other SCs 5.5 per cent.
Responding to Congress president D K Shivakumar who has promised to restore the Muslim reservation if his party comes to power, Shah sought to know whose quota the party will scrap if it manages to form the government in Karnataka.
“Whose reservation will be decreased if four per cent reservation for Muslims is restored? Will it be Vokkaligas or Lingayat, Dalits, Scheduled Tribes or the Other Backward Castes?” the Minister asked.
At the fag end of its term, the BJP government decided to abolish the four per cent reservation for Muslims under 2-B category. The four per cent was later split into two and distributed among Vokkaligas in 2-C category and Lingayats in 2-D category.
Vokkaligas and Lingayats are the two major dominant communities of Karnataka. Shah’s statement came on a day when the Supreme Court directed that the state government’s decision of scrapping the quota for Muslims will not be implemented till May 9.
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