第三週 (電影) 救救菜英文

Film Review: English Vinglish 

10/9/2012 by Lisa Tsering

Indian screen legend Sridevi triumphs in a gentle, but affecting, story of a woman’s awakening self-respect. 

Fans of Indian cinema need no introduction to Sridevi, the star of more than 200 movies: admired for her sparkling comic timing, dancing prowess and acting chops, “Sri” ruled the marquee from the mid-‘70s to the early ‘90s before settling down to raise two daughters with her husband, producer Boney Kapoor.

It took a very special project indeed to lure this very special talent back to the big screen, and English Vinglish is it.

Directed and written by Gauri Shinde, the film depicts the transformation of Shashi, a meek, put-upon Indian housewife who speaks only Hindi, into a confident citizen of the world, over the length of a four-week crash course in English.

The Eros release, which enjoyed acclaim (and according to reports, a standing ovation) at the Toronto International Film Festival, is up against strong competition from the satire Oh 

My God and India’s foreign language Oscar submission, Barfi!, but its universal message — conveyed with wit and heart — is persuasive enough to draw a sizable audience nevertheless. 

Indeed, a recent San Francisco Bay Area screening found the audience packed with families and young children, a heartening prospect given the film’s positive message encouraging diversity and tolerance.

STORY: India Chooses 'Barfi!' for Oscars Foreign-Language Entry

Shashi is a dedicated mother and gifted cook, the wife of a busy executive in the western Indian city of Pune. Her laddoos (a golden, sweet snack ball) earn raves and she even runs a small catering business, but her family treats her like a servant. Her teenaged daughter treats her with contempt, while the casually masked cruelty of her husband’s words (Adil Hussain) cut her to the core: “My wife was born to make laddoos!” he gloats.

When Shashi is called upon to fly to New York City — solo — to help her sister arrange a niece’s wedding, she is terrified (look for Amitabh Bachchan in a short, but memorable, scene onboard her flight). Once in New York, the Hindi-speaking Shashi is faced with ever-mounting humiliations, in a series of beautifully mounted, yet squirm-inducing scenes.

It is at this point that Shashi realizes that her lack of English skills is holding her back, and so when she spies an ad for an English class on a passing city bus, she decides to sneak out of her relatives’ house and navigate New York City’s subways and buses to get there.

Her fellow international students include a Pakistani cab driver, a South Indian engineer, a Mexican nanny and a smitten French man (Mehdi Nabbou), also a cook, who tastes her laddoos and tells her, “You are an artist.” Shashi retorts, “When a man cooks, it’s an art. When a woman cooks, it’s just her duty.”

It’s no surprise that by the end of the film, Shashi will conquer her fears, but the route Shinde takes to get her there is distinctively Shashi’s. The image of the newly confident Shashi striding down a Manhattan street, a takeout coffee in hand and a trench coat belted over her sari, will make you smile days after you leave the theater.

There is a growing body of work that shows Indian female characters flexing their muscles: Gurinder Chadha’s Bend It Like Beckham; Deepa Mehta’s Water; the late Jagmohan Mundhra’s Provoked: A True Story, starring Aishwarya Rai; and Amol Palekar’s Anaahat/Eternity, starring Sonali Bendre, spring to mind. And the work of Indian female filmmakers like Chadha, Mehta, Mira Nair and most recently Zoya Akhtar (Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara) is always worth a look.

With English Vinglish, female director Shinde — known for her documentaries and commercials — brings her own lifetime of experience into the picture. “It is my way of saying ‘Sorry’ and ‘Thank you’ to my mother, and a tribute to women,” Shinde writes in the film’s press notes.

Ultimately, what make English Vinglish memorable are the small, step-by-step choices Shashi makes to transforms herself. Yes, there’s grit there, but it’s tempered with compassion and dignity. The way the character has been crafted by Shinde, and interpreted by Sridevi, is gloriously feminine, and uniquely Indian.

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/review/film-review-english-vinglish-377518

Structure of the Lead:

WHO        Shashi, a Indian woman
WHAT     How did she learn English
WHY        her husband and daughter ridicule her because she coudln't speak English
WHERE  India and New York
WHEN    not given
HOW      she joined a English class

keyword:

1. lure 誘惑

2 mounting 羞辱

3 sneak out  偷偷溜走

4 navigate 導航

5 striding down 大步向前

6(gloriously)feminine(光榮的)女人的

第二週 朴謹惠密友干政

Ex-South Korean president Park Geun-hye arrested in corruption probe

   30 March 2017 Asia

Ousted South Korean President Park Geun-hye has been arrested and taken into custody over a corruption scandal that led to her dismissal.

The 65-year-old was driven to a detention centre south of Seoul after a court approved her arrest.

She is accused of allowing her close friend Choi Soon-sil to extort money from companies, including Samsung, in return for political favours.

Ms Park, who was removed from office earlier this month, denies the claims.

She is the third former president of South Korea to be arrested over criminal allegations, Yonhap reports.

The Seoul Central District Court earlier issued a warrant to detain Ms Park while she is investigated on charges of bribery, abuse of authority, coercion and leaking government secrets.

It followed a nearly nine-hour court hearing on Thursday that Ms Park attended.
"It is justifiable and necessary to arrest [Ms Park] as key charges were justified and there is risk of evidence being destroyed," the court said in a statement.

Live television footage showed a black sedan carrying her to the detention facility from the prosecutor's office where she had been waiting.

Despite the early hour, some 50 supporters, waving national flags and demanding her release, were at the gate to greet her, the AFP news agency reports.

Ms Park can be held for up to 20 days before being formally charged.

If convicted she could face more than 10 years in prison.

Ms Park lost her presidential immunity and was dismissed from her post when the constitutional court upheld a decision by parliament in December to impeach her.

Ms Choi is accused of using her presidential connections to pressure companies to give millions of dollars in donations to non-profit foundations she controlled.

Ms Park is alleged to have been personally involved in this, and to have given Ms Choi unacceptable levels of access to official documents.

Judges had said the former president had broken the law by allowing Ms Choi to meddle in state affairs, and had breached guidelines on official secrets by leaking numerous documents.

Ms Choi and Samsung's acting head Lee Jae-yong, also involved in the scandal, are being held in the same detention centre to where Ms Park has been sent. They are also being tried separately.

Hwang Kyo-ahn, who is loyal to Ms Park, is now the acting president and an election is to be held by 9 May.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-39449681

Structure of the Lead:

WHO         Ex-South Korean president
WHAT      She has been arrested and taken into custody over a corruption scandal that led to her dismissal.
WHERE   south Korea
WHY         She is accused of allowing her close friend Choi Soon-sil to extort money from companies, and she also be is investigated on charges of bribery, abuse of authority, coercion and leaking government secrets.
WHEN     not given
HOW       not  given

Keyword:

1. custody (n.)拘留 監禁(+in/into)

2. dismissal (n.)免職 解除

3. political favours  政治利益

4. allegations (n.) 申述；主張

5. coercion (n.)強迫；高壓政治

6. justifiable (a.)可辯護的 

7. detention (n.)滯留；拘留

第一週 菲國掃毒(28)

The Killing Time: Inside Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte's War on Drugs

Rishi Iyengar / Manila

Aug 25, 2016

Just hours earlier, the Philippines’ new President, 71-year-old Rodrigo Duterte, had given his inaugural State of the Nation address, in which he repeated the vow that saw him elected by a landslide in early May.

“We will not stop until the last drug lord ... and the last pusher have surrendered or are put either behind bars or below the ground, if they so wish,” said Duterte.

The director general of the Philippine National Police (PNP), Ronald dela Rosa, told a Senate hearing on Aug. 22 that 712 people had been killed in police operations in the seven weeks since the crackdown began, and that another 1,067 had died at the hands of vigilantes. By one account, there is official pride in the death toll.

Nobody can claim to be surprised. The carnage is exactly what Duterte promised. “All of you who are into drugs, you sons of bitches, I will really kill you,” he said before his election, in April. A month later, when he was President-elect, Duterte offered medals and cash rewards for citizens that shot dealers dead.

“Do your duty, and if in the process you kill 1,000 persons because you were doing your duty, I will protect you,” he told police officers on July 1, the day after his inauguration. He was speaking at a ceremony installing dela Rosa, his loyal henchman, as the nation's top cop.

“If you know of any addicts, go ahead and kill them yourself as getting their parents to do it would be too painful,” he was quoted as saying to another crowd that day.

And so the killing time began.

The Philippines is hardly alone. Executing people for drug-related offenses, judicially or otherwise, is characteristic of the region. According to a report last year by drug policy NGO Harm Reduction International, the only countries other than Iran and Saudi Arabia known to have executed drug traffickers since 2010 are all Asian: China, Malaysia, Vietnam, Singapore and Indonesia.

Thailand conducted its own war on drugs in 2003 under then Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, and the events then — more than 13,000 arrests, over 36,000 cases of people surrendering to police, and nearly 1,200 deaths in its first month — will feel eerily familiar to Filipinos.

Two decades earlier, a wave of extrajudicial executions took place in Indonesia under its autocratic leader Suharto. They came to be known as the petrus killings after the Indonesian acronym for penembak misterius (mysterious gunmen) and had as their supposed aim a reduction in crime. Thousands were murdered in the period between 1983 and 1985.

Now, it’s the Philippines’ turn, and Duterte's war may turn out to be the most ferocious yet. “This fight against drugs will continue to the last day of my term,” he said.

That day is six years away.

“I don’t care about human rights, believe me”

Duterte got elected because he promised to be tough on crime. But how bad is crime in the Philippines, and is reducing it worth the summary massacre that is now taking place?

The Philippines is not listed in all columns of this U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) survey of global reported crimes from 2003 to '14. But comparisons can be made using figures from a 2015 report issued by the Philippine Statistics Authority.

There were 232,685 cases of crimes against persons involving physical injury reported in the Philippines in 2014, for a population of 98 million. By comparison, the UNODC says there were, in the same year, nearly 375,000 cases of assault in the U.K., which, with a population of 64 million, has far fewer people.

In 2014, there were 10,294 reported cases of rape in the Philippines. But there were more than 30,000 cases in the U.K.; 12,157 in France (which has a roughly similar population to the U.K. at 66 million); and 6,294 in Sweden, for a population of just 9.5 million.

That same year, there were 52,798 reported robbery cases in the Philippines. That's about as many as there were in Costa Rica (52,126 cases) but Costa Rica, with 4.7 million people, has less than a 20th of the population of the Philippines, so the Philippine rate is much lower. The total is also far fewer than the 171,686 cases reported in Belgium (population 11.2 million).

Neither is firearm ownership high in the Philippines. According to the University of Sydney's School of Public Health, which researches the number of privately owned firearms worldwide, there are 4.7 guns per 100,000 people in the Philippines, putting it at a lowly 105th place in a list of 179 countries. Finland has 45.3 guns per 100,000 people, Canada has 30, and Australia has 15.

Unsurprisingly, while the Philippines can be a deadly place, it is not especially so. According to World Bank data, the Philippine rate of 9 intentional homicides per 100,000 people in 2013 makes it only slightly more dangerous than Lithuania (7) or Mongolia (7), and puts it on a par with Russia (9). The U.S. figure is 4.

In the five years from 2010 to '15, PNP figures show that total murders across the nation's top 15 cities averaged 1,202 a year. But many more people have already died in the first seven weeks of Duterte's drug war.

Duterte once vowed to kill his own children, if he caught them using drugs. Now he sanctions the killing of other people's children, on the grounds that drug use is unforgivable moral laxity, robbing men and women of their rectitude, and the country of its silver. The overlords of the Philippine drug trade, he claims, are all in China — the ultimate destination, allegedly, of the grubby funds that furtively change hands on street corners across the land.

But how bad is the Philippine drug problem? According to UNODC data, the highest ever recorded figure for the prevalence of amphetamine use (expressed as a percentage of the population aged 15 to 64) in the Philippines is 2.35. That is a high figure, but then the equivalent figure for the U.S. is 2.20, and the world's real amphetamine crisis is among Australian males, where the prevalence is 2.90.

When it comes to illicit opioid use, the Philippine prevalence rate is just 0.05, compared to 5.41 in the U.S., and 3.30 in Australia. For cocaine, the Philippine figure is only 0.03. In the U.K., it is 2.40, in Australia 2.10 and in the U.S. also 2.10.

In other words, the statistics show what any visitor to the country may easily see: Filipinos are not degenerates, who need to be protected from themselves, but are mostly a nation of decent, sober, law-abiding and God-fearing people. The most revealing Philippine statistic is this: 37% of Filipinos attend church on a weekly basis. Less than 20% of Americans do.

Nonetheless, Duterte has succeeded in convincing large numbers of his people that drug use constitutes such an emergency that the very existence of the nation is threatened, and that only his rule can save the Philippines. It's the oldest autocratic trick in the book.

“We’re on a slippery slope towards tyranny,” Philippine Senator Leila de Lima tells TIME.

A week after he took office, a poll conducted by Philippine research firm Pulse Asia showed that an astonishing 91% of Filipinos had a “high degree of trust” in Duterte. Among them are people like Ray Antonio Nadiera, a 33-year-old maintenance worker in the country’s second largest city Cebu, who says that by the time Duterte's campaign is over, “all the addicts will be straightened out.” In 

Manila's Pasig Line district, local resident Jamie Co says, “The people killed are the dirt of society. What Duterte’s doing, his war on illegal drugs, is right. It’s good.”

“In the opinion of many Filipinos, law and order is a major issue and previous administrations weren't effective or dedicated in addressing it,” Richard Javad Heydarian, a professor of political science at Manila’s De La Salle University, tells TIME in an email. Duterte, he says, “has a lot of political capital to dispense with.”

But that was before the bodies began to pile up. Now, less than two months later, many others are appalled at the forces that have been unleashed. There is also deep shock at the drug war's financial implications: Duterte has given huge funding boosts to the police and military by slashing the country's health budget by 25%, and reducing expenditure on critical sectors like agriculture, labor, employment and foreign affairs. On the other hand, the budget for the presidential office has increased tenfold, and now includes a provision of $150 million for “representation and entertainment.”

“Whether it’s state-sanctioned or not, I would say at the very least all of these killings are state-inspired,” says de Lima.

http://time.com/4462352/rodrigo-duterte-drug-war-drugs-philippines-killing/?iid=sr-link1

Structure of the Lead:    

WHERE  Philippine

WHAT    The Killing Time:Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte's War on Drugs

WHEN    when he was President-elect

WHY      drug use is unforgivable moral laxity, robbing men and women of their rectitude, and the country of its silver.

WHO      all the people who took drugs

HOW      not given

Keyword:

1.drug lord                毒梟

2.vigilantes               治安維持者

3.inauguration          就職典禮

4.firearm ownership火器(槍枝)所有權

5.prevalence rate    流行率

6. on the grounds     以...為理由

on the grounds of + N/ on the grounds that + S + V

阿里辭世

Muhammad Ali Funeral 2016 Event of the Year

Muhammad Ali Funeral 2016 Event of the Year – On June 3rd of 2016 the world lost the “Greatest”, Muhammad Ali.

Dec 30 2016

Boxing’s greatest icon had passed and the boxing world mourned. Of course, there were memories of Ali’s marvelous in-ring career and his bombast as an athlete. Also remembered was how Ali transcended beyond boxing to become a cultural icon that helped to change the world in the 1960’s and 1970’s. Notable too was the sharing of many personal and touching moments from throughout Ali’s life from people from all walks of life, revealing more about the man who was already one of the most public figures in modern times.

Younger people who perhaps did not witness Ali at the pinnacle of all his powers may recall his poignant 1996 appearance at the Olympic Games in Atlanta where a fading Ali, already visibly suffering from Parkinson’s Disease, lit the torch during the opening ceremonies.

Ali’s appearance at the games was the last time the entire world watched Ali while he was alive, and to many it seemed almost like a farewell from Ali to the world. For the next 20 years he never stopped being Muhammad Ali, but the ravages of Parkinson’s saw him in public less and less.

Muhammad Ali Funeral 2016 Event of the Year

Ali’s passing was obviously met with tears throughout the boxing world but if anyone thought that too much time had passed since his heyday and that he was starting to be forgotten, Muhammad Ali’s June 10th funeral showed how the image of Ali still resonates on a world-wide level.

On June 10th, 2016 the entire world stopped to pay their final respects to Ali. Around the world billions stopped to view the solemn procession, and the ceremonies in Ali’s hometown of Louisville, Kentucky was attended by the boxing world, by celebrities and even heads of state as well as throngs of ordinary, everyday people all pausing to pay their respects.

Young and old alike all paid their respects to a man many called simply “The Greatest” as Ali stopped the world one final time before taking his rest.

When the world said good-bye to Muhammad Ali is your 2016 Event of the Year.

http://www.boxingchannel.tv/muhammad-ali-funeral-2016-event-year/

Structure of the Lead:
WHO      Muhammad Ali
WHAT    the entire world stopped to pay their final respects to Ali.
WHERE  in Ali’s hometown of Louisville, Kentucky.
WHY      He is Boxing’s greatest icon.
WHEN   On June 10th, 2016
HOW     Around the world billions stopped to view the solemn procession, and the ceremonies in Ali’s hometown of Louisville, Kentucky was attended by the boxing world, by celebrities and even heads of state as well as throngs of ordinary, everyday people all pausing to pay their respects.

Keyword:

1 funeral 葬禮

2 marvelous (a) 不可思議 令人驚嘆的

3 Parkinson’s Disease 帕金森氏症

4 ravages (n) 蹂躪 摧殘

5 heyday 全盛時期

6 resonates (v)使共鳴

7 solemn (a) 莊重 莊嚴的

英國脫歐

David Cameron Says He Will Resign As U.K. Prime Minister After Brexit Vote

The resignation casts Britain into further uncertainty following its referendum to leave 

the European Union.

Jun 24, 2016

British Prime Minister David Cameron announced he would resign his post on Friday morning, after his country voted to leave the European Union, adding political leadership to the United Kingdom’s growing list of uncertainties. Cameron promised to stay in office until October and help “steady the ship” before a new leader is chosen.

“On questions about the arrangements for how we are governed, there are times when we should ask the people themselves,” the Conservative Party leader said outside his prime ministerial home, 10 Downing Street. “The British people have asked to leave ... their will must be respected.”

Cameron, in power since 2010, had called the Brexit referendum of his own accord after promising conservative factions of his party in 2013 that he would hold such a vote if he won re-election last year. Thursday’s referendum badly weakened Cameron and means Britain will be the first country to withdraw from the 28-member EU.

“Now the decision has been made to leave, we need to find the best way,” an emotional Cameron said. “I will do everything I can to help. I love this country and I feel honored to have served it. I will do anything I can in future to help this great country succeed.”

Cameron had spent months advocating that citizens vote to remain in the union, and warned a decision to leave would drastically harm the economy. Voters ultimately spurned his appeals, with about 52 percent favoring Brexit.

“I held nothing back, I was absolutely clear in my belief,” he said. “The British people have made a very clear decision to take a different path.”

Cameron’s dire economic warnings appear to have been founded. After the BBC called the referendum, the British pound plummeted to a 31-year low, pushing down global stock prices and bewildering investors.

The prime minister said he would meet with the European Council next week to explain the decision and begin the process toward the ultimate exit of the U.K. However, Cameron said such talks would be best undertaken by a new leader.

“I do not think it would be right for me to be the captain that steers our country to its next destination,” he said.

Cameron had pledged before the vote to stay in office whatever the results. He had considered stepping down if 2014’s independence referendum in Scotland was successful, but the Scottish people ultimately decided to remain in the U.K.

Cameron had previously led the Conservative Party to a hearty electoral victory during last year’s election, unseating political opponents in what The Guardian called probably “the biggest surprise in a general election since 1945.”

 This story has been updated to include remarks from David Cameron’s resignation speech.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/david-cameron-resigns_us_576ca4a9e4b017b379f583e5http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/david-cameron-resigns_us_576ca4a9e4b017b379f583e5

Structure of the Lead:
WHO       British Prime Minister David Cameron
WHAT     He Will Resign As U.K. Prime Minister After Brexit Vote
WHERE  British
WHY       He do not think it would be right for him to be the captain that steers their country to its next destination
WHEN   on Friday morning(after his country voted to leave the European Union)

HOW     not given

Keyword

1. Brexit 脫歐 (Bremain留歐) 

2 10 Downing Street 唐寧街10號

3 referendum 人民公投

4 withdraw(V.)離開.退出(+from

5 drastically(ad.)激烈的

6 dire(ad.)可怕的

7 plummeted to a (31-year) low  跌至(31年裡)最低

8 pledged(v.)保證 給予誓言(+to-v)(+that

尼斯恐攻

Nice attack: What we know about the 

Bastille Day killings

19 August 2016

by BBC NEWS

Dozens of people were killed, including children, when a lorry ploughed into a large crowd watching a fireworks display in Nice to mark the Bastille Day holiday.

The driver also fired shots, before being killed by police. This is what we know about what happened.

Who was the attacker?

The driver of the lorry was identified as Mohamed Lahouaiej-Bouhlel, a 31-year-old Tunisian man.

Paris prosecutor Francois Molins says Lahouaiej-Bouhlel was divorced with three children. His ex-wife was taken into custody along with four other people believed to be linked to him. A flat he lived in near Nice railway station was searched by police.

Lahouaiej-Bouhlel was "totally unknown" to security services, and investigations are continuing into whether he acted alone, Mr Molins said.

Lahouaiej-Bouhlel is said to have hired the lorry from a rental company in Saint-Laurent-du-Var, a town to the west of Nice, on 11 July. He had been due to return it on 13 July.

Police said that, at the time of the attack, Lahouaiej-Bouhlel was in possession of an automatic pistol, bullets, a fake automatic pistol and two replica assault rifles (a Kalashnikov and an M16), an empty grenade. Also in the lorry with him were a driving licence and a bank card.

Who were the victims?

Eighty-six people were killed, all but three of them at the time of the attack. The dead included 10 children and teenagers.

A total of 303 people were taken to hospital for medical treatment. A man who was badly injured in the assault died on 4 August, taking the total number of those killed to 85.

In the hours after the attacks, worried relatives posted images on social media of the missing.

Among the dead was Fatima Charrihi, whose son said she was the first to die.

Another victim, according to reports, was the assistant head of the Nice border police, Jean-Marc Leclerc.

An American 11-year-old boy, Brodie Copeland, and his father, Sean, were also killed. They had been on holiday in Nice.

Three people on a school trip from Germany were unaccounted for.

Who was behind the attack?

French security officials are still assessing whether the driver of a truck was working alone or in a group.

So-called Islamic State later claimed one of its followers carried out the attack.

A news agency linked to the group, Amaq Agency, said: "He did the attack in response to calls to target the citizens of the coalition that is fighting the Islamic State."

Officials said it bore the hallmark of a terrorist organisation.

President Hollande said it was "an attack whose terrorist nature cannot be denied".

Mr Molins said the attack was "in line with the constant calls to kill" from militant Islamist groups, and the investigation would be seek to find out whether Lahouaiej-Bouhlel had ties to Islamist militants.

French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said Lahouaiej-Bouhlel seemed to have been "radicalised very quickly".

Anti-terrorist prosecutors in Paris have launched an inquiry for murder and attempted murder as part of an organised terrorist strike.

France's DGSI internal security organisation warned of the danger of further attacks from Islamist militants with "booby-trapped vehicles and bombs".

The so-called Islamic State has targeted France on several occasions since January 2015.

Only hours before the Nice attack, President Hollande had announced that France's state of emergency would be removed later this month. After the attack in Nice he announced it was being extended.

What happened on the promenade?

The terror began a little after 22:30 on 14 July, shortly after thousands of people had watched a firework display on the seafront.

There had been a mood of celebration and the crowd had enjoyed an air force display. Families strolled along the city's renowned Promenade des Anglais.

A large white lorry was seen driving erratically a couple of streets away from the seafront promenade. "He was speeding up, braking, speeding up again and braking again. We thought it was weird," said Laicia Baroi. She described how the lorry then turned on to the promenade heading south-west towards the airport.

But it was not for another half hour before the attack began. A German journalist saw events unfold from a hotel balcony, as the lorry doubled back from the direction of the airport, breaching the barriers erected on the promenade opposite the Lenval children's hospital.

"He was driving really slowly, that's what was astonishing," said Richard Gutjahr, who described seeing the lorry being tailed by a motorcyclist. "The motorcyclist tried to overtake him and even tried opening the lorry driver's door," he told AFP news agency. At that point the motorcyclist fell under the wheels of the lorry.

When two police officers opened fire on the lorry, the driver accelerated and careered at full speed towards the crowd.

The vehicle mounted the kerb then went back on the road, zigzagging for up to 2km (1.25 miles), as the driver deliberately drove into people.

A local MP spoke of hundreds of people being run over. Others scrambled to safety, on to the beach or into nearby hotels.

"I was opposite the Palais de la Mediterranee [hotel] when I saw a lorry at high speed running over people. I saw it with my own eyes, people tried to stop it," said one witness.

Police finally managed to bring the lorry to a halt near the luxury hotel.

Paris Prosecutor Francois Molins says the driver fired repeatedly on three policemen, who returned fire and pursued him for hundreds of metres.

Mobile phone footage appeared to show the moment the driver was shot.

Images from the scene showed the windscreen and front of the lorry raked with bullets. Interior ministry officials later confirmed that the attacker had been "neutralised".

How have the authorities reacted?

It soon became clear that many people had died, although the full scale of the disaster was unclear. The dead and injured were taken to the local Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Nice.

In the area around Nice, the anti-terror alert was raised to its highest level.

President Francois Hollande was flown back to Paris from a visit to Avignon, joining Prime Minister Manuel Valls in a crisis room. Mr Valls declared three days of mourning.

The pair then travelled to Nice, where the interior and health ministers were already involved in crisis meetings with local officials.

Mr Hollande met his defence and security chiefs and cabinet ministers.

Later, Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve called on "patriotic citizens" to become reservists to boost security across the country.

He also reiterated a pledge made by Mr Hollande to call up France's current squad of reservists, which total some 12,000 volunteers.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-36801671

Structure of the Lead:

  WHO        Mohamed Lahouaiej-Bouhlel, a 31-year-old Tunisian man.
  WHEN      not given
  WHAT     Dozens of people were killed, including children, when a lorry ploughed into a large crowd watching a fireworks display in Nice to mark the Bastille Day holiday.   

  HOW       The vehicle mounted the kerb then went back on the road, zigzagging for up to 2km (1.25 miles), as the driver deliberately drove into people.  

 WHERE    Nice's Promenade des Anglais
 WHY         Islamic State later claimed one of its followers carried out the attack.

Keyword:

1.Bastille Day 法國國慶日

2.prosecutor 檢察官

3.lorry(n.)卡車

4. automatic pistol 自動手槍

5.assault rifles衝鋒槍

6.radicalism 激進份子

7. accelerate 加速

8.mourning 哀悼 

美古關係

Barack Obama: 'Change is going to happen in Cuba'

21 March 2016 

by BBC NEWS 

President Barack Obama is in Cuba for a historic three-day visit to the 

island and talks with its communist leader.

He is the first sitting US president to visit since the 1959 revolution, which heralded decades of hostility between the two countries.
Mr Obama said change would happen in Cuba and that Cuban President Raul Castro understood that.

The two leaders met to talk about trade and held a joint news conference.Mr Castro denied that there are political prisoners in Cuba, telling journalists to "give him a list" and then they would be released "tonight".

He also defended Cuba's record on human rights and pointed to problems in the US.
"We defend human rights, in our view civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights are indivisible, inter-dependent and universal," Mr Castro said.

"Actually we find it inconceivable that a government does not defend and ensure the right to healthcare, education, social security, food provision and development."
Mr Obama said the trade embargo would be fully lifted in Cuba, but he could not say exactly when.
"The reason is what we did for 50 years did not serve our interests or the interests of the Cuban people," he said.

Why is the visit groundbreaking?

For a US president to touch down at Jose Marti airport in Havana and be warmly greeted by Cuban's foreign minister was until recently unthinkable.
For decades, the US and Cuba were engaged in a bitter stand-off, triggered by the overthrow of US-backed Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista by Communist leader Fidel Castro in 1959.

The US broke off diplomatic relations and imposed a trade embargo.
But President Obama undertook two years of secret talks which led to the announcement in December 2014 that the two countries would restore diplomatic relations.

Since then, there have been a series of symbolic moments, such as the first formal meeting of Presidents Obama and Castro at a regional summit in Panama and the opening of embassies in Havana and Washington DC.

What have been the highlights of the visit so far?

Presidents Obama and Castro shook hands at the Palace of the Revolution in Havana ahead of their bilateral meeting on Monday.
They seemed visibly more relaxed than at their first official meeting at a regional summit in Panama just under a year ago and smiled broadly.

Following his arrival on Sunday, the first stop on President Obama's tour had been the newly re-opened US embassy in Havana, where he told staff it was "wonderful to be here".

But it was the visit to Havana's old town which brought home the long way US-Cuban relations have come since the thaw was announced 15 months ago.

While the plan to interact with Cubans in the streets was disrupted by a tropical storm, the image of the US president and his family braving the rain demonstrated to many Cubans his commitment to the new, warmer relationship.

What else is in store?

The two leaders' meeting at the Palace of the Revolution will be closely scrutinised for signs of how much practical progress has been made.

Ahead of the meeting, President Obama said he believed that "change is going to happen here and I think that Raul Castro understands that".

He also told US broadcaster ABC that he would be announcing that Google had made a deal with the Cuban authorities to expand Cuba's poor wi-fi and broadband access.

Internet access still restricted in Cuba

There have been a series of other agreements between the two countries since the thaw was announced, including commercial deals on telecoms and a scheduled airline service, increased co-operation on law enforcement and environmental protection.

Many Cubans are hoping their economy will receive a further boost from further openness and reforms as well as US investment.
Cuban officials are banking on a growth in US tourists visiting the island as restrictions on US citizens travelling there are eased further.

On Sunday, US hotel company Starwood announced it had become the first US firm to agree a deal with the Cuban authorities since the revolution of 1959.
The company said it would be making a "multimillion-dollar investment" to bring three Cuban hotels "up to our standards".

What could possibly go wrong?

While President Obama's agenda was carefully discussed with Cuban officials, one thing the White House has insisted on is a meeting between the president and Cuban dissidents, whether the Cubans like it or not.
Among them are expected to be members of the Ladies in White, a group which campaigns for the release of political prisoners.

Only hours before Mr Obama touched down, dozens of their members were arrested during their weekly protest in Havana.

The meeting between the dissidents and Mr Obama is scheduled for Tuesday.
Another main sticking point between the two countries is the 54-year-old US trade embargo.While strolling through Havana's old town on Sunday, one Cuban shouted: "Down with the embargo!"

The problem for Mr Obama is that it can only be lifted by the US Congress, which is controlled by Republicans who have expressed their opposition to its removal.On the Cuban side, analysts say there are conflicting sentiments within the Communist Party over hosting Mr Obama.

The Director General of the US division at the Cuban Foreign Ministry told the BBC's Will Grant that "matters of sovereignty of the Cuban people" would remain firmly off the agenda.

Many observers have also noted that Mr Obama is not scheduled to meet Raul Castro's older brother, the leader of the Cuban revolution, Fidel Castro.

The elder Castro has only made one official statement about the thaw in relations, and it was hardly a ringing endorsement: "I don't trust in the United States' policy, nor have I exchanged a word with them".

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-35856126

Structure of the Lead:

  WHO         Presidents Obama and Castro

  WHEN       March 2016
  WHAT       President Barack Obama is in Cuba for a historic three-day visit to the 

island and talks with its communist leader.

  HOW        The two leaders met to talk about trade and held a joint news conference.

  WHERE    in Cuba
  WHY         The US broke off diplomatic relations and imposed a trade embargo.

Keyword:

1. political prisoners 政治犯

2. journalist(n.) 新聞記者

3. inconceivable(a.) 無法想像的 

4. trade embargo. 貿易禁運

5. undertook(v.)  著手進行

6. regional summit  地區峰會

7. restriction (n.) 限制約束