Saturday, January 29, 2022

North Korean state-run newspaper Rodong Sinmun reported yesterday that high-ranking political and military official Ri Yong-mu died of acute myocardial infarction on Thursday morning at age 97.

Ri held positions in the State Inspection Commission, the Ministry of Public Security, the Traffic Commission and in the General Political Bureau of the Korean People’s Army (KPA). Ri also held for almost 20 years the position of vice-chairman of the National Defence Commission, according to the Rodong Sinmun.

The paper described Ri as being “a revolutionary soldier loyal to President Kim Il-sung and Chairman Kim Jong-il and a veteran revolutionary who lived a worthwhile life under the great trust and care of the respected Comrade Kim Jong-un”. The article continued by qualifying his work as “feats […] performed with total dedication to the [Workers’ Party of Korea] and the revolution [that] will be remembered long by our people and the officers and men of the People’s Army”.

State-run radio Voice of Korea reported that current leader Kim Jong-un visited the grave of the deceased, expressing “deep condolences on the occasion of his demise”. Senior Party and KPA officials Jo Yong-won, Kim Tok-hun, Pak Jong-chon, Ri Il-hwan, Ri Yong-gil and Kwon Yong-jin accompanied leader Kim to Ri Yong-mu’s grave. Voice of Korea described Ri as being “a precious revolutionary comrade who made strenuous efforts for the strengthening and development of the Party, state and revolutionary armed forces until the last moment of his life”.

A Yonhap News Agency article reported Ri Yong-mu was awarded the Order of Kim Il-sung in 1992, the Order of Kim Jong-il in 2012. Ri was also a recipient of the honorary title Hero of the Republic.

Wednesday, May 23, 2012

Abdelbaset al-Megrahi has been buried in the town of Janzur, west of the Libyan capital Tripoli. He was the only individual convicted in association with the Lockerbie bombing of 1988. He died at his residence Sunday, aged 60.

The bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 from London to New York resulted in 270 fatalities, including all 259 of the airplane’s occupants and eleven individuals on the ground. 189 of those who died in the incident were US citizens. The death toll for this terrorist incident is larger than that for any other which has occurred in the United Kingdom thus far.

Abdelbaset al-Megrahi was placed on trial in May 2000 in the Netherlands alongside Al Amin Khalifah Fhimah. While Fhimah was found not guilty on all charges placed against him, al-Megrahi was found guilty of his and sentenced to at least 27 years imprisonment. Having been initially placed in HM Prison Barlinnie, al-Megrahi was transferred to Greenock in 2005.

In 2002, an appeal against his conviction was unsuccessful. Five years later, senior judges in Scotland were to review his case, but he dropped the appeal. Due to suffering from prostate cancer, he was granted a compassionate release from Scottish prison two days later.

Current UK Prime Minister David Cameron commented on his belief that al-Megrahi “should never have been released from prison” and said his death was an occasion “to remember the 270 people who lost their lives in what was an appalling terrorist act”. According to Alex Salmond, First Minister of Scotland, the investigation into the Lockerbie bombing is ongoing. Salmond also called for remembrance of those killed. Prosecutors, he said, had always thought there were others besides al-Megrahi involved in the attack.

US citizen Susan Cohen, the mother of one of those killed in the Lockerbie bombing, thought of al-Megrahi as “a mass murderer” who “deserved to die”, adding to CNN: “I feel no pity around him. He got to die with his family around him. My daughter [Theodora], at age 20, died a brutal, horrible death”. However, UK citizen Jim Swire, father of another victim of the bombing, believes al-Megrahi was not guilty. He described al-Megrahi’s death as “a sad time”, telling the BBC he was “satisfied for some years that this man was nothing to do with the murder of my daughter”.

Abdelbaset al-Megrahi has consistently denied responsibility for the attack. In his final recorded interview in December 2011, he insisted he was “an innocent man” who was “about to die and I ask now to be left in peace with my family.” His brother Mohammed al-Megrahi claimed “[t]here never was exact proof” and said al-Megrahi’s “pain is over now – he is with God”.

Wednesday, March 3, 2010

General Motors (GM) announced on Tuesday a recall of 1.3 million Chevrolet and Pontiac cars in the US, Mexico, and Canada over problems with the power steering system.

The models, the 2005–2010 Chevrolet Cobalt and 2007–2010 Pontiac G5 in the US, the 2005–2006 Pontiac Pursuit in Canada and the 2005–2006 Pontiac G4 in Mexico, were affected by a fault that causes the power steering in the vehicles to fail. The company says that cars can still be safely controlled even after the loss of power steering, although more effort to turn the car would be required.

GM is currently working on developing a fix for the problem, after having conducted an internal investigation for more than a year, beginning last January. In addition to GM’s investigation, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration also conducted an investigation on the Cobalt, which began in January 2010. The investigation was begun after more than a thousand complaints about the model were received by the agency, including reports of 14 crashes caused by the fault. GM contacted the NHTSA about the problem on Monday.

GM blamed the issues on an external supplier partially owned by Toyota, another company currently in the process of a major recall of more than eight million vehicles. According to GM vice-chairman Bob Lutz, the supplier, which was not named, had not met “all requirements for reliability and durability.” In his comments, given at the Geneva Motor Show, Lutz also said that financial responsibility for the recalls had yet to be determined.

• A Chevrolet Cobalt

• A Pontiac G5

Monday, June 14, 2021

Arthur Oliver Kostendt, a candidate running in the mayoral election of the US city of Cleveland, Ohio set to take place November 2, discussed his campaign and policies with Wikinews this spring.

According to Cleveland Scene, 29-year-old Kostendt is a member of the Cuyahoga County, Ohio Republican Party but has referred to his campaign as “casual”. According to his web site’s personal biography, he was a cadet for the Army Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC), scout platoon leader for the 2nd Squadron of the 107th Cavalry Regiment of the Ohio Army National Guard and logistics officer for the 1st Battalion of the 145th Armored Regiment. He served in Kuwait, Iraq, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia and assisted coalition force detachments in Southeast Asia.

Kostendt is a graduate of the University of Notre Dame and summa cum laude graduate of Cleveland State University. He writes he uses an apostrophe to abbreviate his middle name as “Arthur O’Kostendt” instead of the customary period after the O to emphasise his Irish heritage.

A poll published May 5 by Baldwin Wallace University, which does not feature Mr Kostendt, has Dennis Kucinich and Basheer Jones leading in the mayoral race by 17.8 and 13.3 points, respectively, with a margin of error of up to five per cent either way. 48% of those surveyed were undecided. Incumbent mayor Frank G. Jackson, who won the 2017 Cleveland mayoral election with 59% of the vote, is eligible for a fifth term but announced on May 6 he would retire.

Thursday, December 22, 2022

The United States Postal Service (USPS) released plans Tuesday to switch to an all-electric fleet, including a commitment to purchase only electric vehicles starting in 2026.

Under the strategy, USPS is expected to purchase 106,000 vehicles, including 60,000 electric vehicles (EVs), by 2028. By then, the agency anticipates it will be operating 66,000 EVs in total: 45,000 of the Next Generation Delivery Vehicle (NGDV) model and 21,000 generic EVs.

USPS expects a cost of 9.6 billion USD; the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 will provide 3 billion USD for this purpose.

USPS’ electrification of the fleet is already underway: in July, the agency estimated it would buy 50,000 vehicles by the end of 2022, 50% of which would be EVs, a 3 billion USD expenditure.

The USPS fleet, 220,000 vehicles strong, is the largest of any federal agency-comprising 1/3 of the US government’s fleet (itself the largest governmental fleet in the world)-and it is the oldest.

The Grumman LLV remains USPS’ standard delivery vehicle, despite its manufacturer having ceased production of the LLV in 1994.

The LLV receives 10 miles per gallon (about 16.1 kilometers per gallon), low by today’s standards. It also does not have air conditioning, which Vox reported “is…a serious concern…[s]evere heat is a major problem on mail routes, and postal workers have died delivering mail during heat waves.”

In 2021, USPS estimated that, if given “the right level of Congressional support” it could fully electrify its fleet by 2035 for a cost of 8 billion USD.

United States Postmaster General Louis DeJoy declared that year that 90% of vehicles USPS would be purchasing “over the next decade” would be nonrenewable energy vehicles. At the time, the agency, which does not receive tax revenue and sustains itself by imposing fees on its customers, was facing severe financial trouble: a 2006 law forced USPS to “prepay” retired employees’ healthcare compensation before it was repealed in 2022.

DeJoy’s 90% decision put USPS at odds with US President Joe Biden’s administration, which does not directly oversee the operations of USPS. However, in a 2021 executive order, Biden instructed all federal agencies (including USPS) to buy only electric vehicles from 2035.

Brenda Mallory, chair of the Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ), and the Environmental Proection Agency (EPA) urged DeJoy earlier this year to electrify the USPS fleet, citing environmental concerns.

When DeJoy announced the electrification at a press conference outside of USPS headquarters in downtown Washington, D.C., he framed it as a cost reduction measure to keep USPS operating effectively.

“We have a statutory requirement to deliver mail and packages to 163 million addresses six days per week and to cover our costs in doing so — that is our mission…if we can achieve those objectives in a more environmentally responsible way, we will do so.”

He declared John Podesta, who coordinates the White House’s green energy policy “collaborative”, adding, “These professionals have demonstrated a real appreciation and understanding for how vehicle electrification can be incorporated into the Postal Service’s mission and transformation, while not distracting from it.”

“Every dollar that I spend, I burn carbon [sic]…So every dollar that I save actually reduces carbon,” he explained.

USPS also unveiled two NGDVs at Tuesday’s press conference.

The White House thanked USPS for pursuing electrification, as did Mallory, the CEQ head, who declared the move “sets the pace for other leading public and private sector fleets. It is clear that the future of transportation is electric — and that future is here.”

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