Âu

[Triển]

Môn quyền. Quyền cái cửa.

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EU criticises Poland's abortion ban as it reminds member states to 'respect fundamental rights'


The new law was ruled upon in October but came into effect earlier this year - Copyright Czarek Sokolowski/AP

An EU equality official has criticised the Polish government's decision to ban almost all circumstances of abortion - a decision that has also sparked the country's biggest protests in its post-communist era.

Helena Dalli, a Maltese politician serving as equality commissioner, reminded a European Parliament hearing on Wednesday that member states "must respect fundamental rights."

"As you are well aware, the EU has no competence on abortion rights within a member state and thus, abortion legislation is up to the member states concerned," Dalli said. "However, when making use of the competences, member states must respect fundamental rights which bind them by virtue of the constitutions and commitments under international law.

It is also worth noting that both the Council of Europe human rights commissioner, and a group of UN human rights special mechanisms, have expressed the opinion that this substantial restriction to legal access to abortion goes against Poland's international human rights obligations."

The Polish side, however, defended its decision, with representative Andrzej Marek Sados saying it was the "exclusive responsibility" of a state to regulate what constitutes a legal termination.

He said: "In the Polish legal system, courts and tribunals are an authority that is separate and independent from other authorities. Nonetheless, I would like to point out that in accordance with the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, health policy remains a competence of the member states.

"And it is also the exclusive responsibility of the member states to regulate the issue of the admissibility of the legal termination of pregnancy."

The hearing on Wednesday was also attended by the European Parliament Committee for Women's Rights and Gender Equality, (FEMM), among other committees, and comes after Poland's landmark ruling last year.

In October, the Polish constitutional court found it illegal to abort foetuses that have congenital defects.

This officially took effect earlier this, making the majority of abortions in Poland illegal.

For instance, in 2019, around 98% of all legal abortions were performed on the grounds of foetal malformations.

A woman can now only seek a termination legally under Polish law if her life or health is at risk, or if her pregnancy is result of rape or incest.

'Bring the government to court'

Marta Lempart, a leader of the Polish Women's Strike and who is facing charges for her role in the recent protests, has urged the EU to act and to sanction the Polish government.

"Dear European politicians, I am not asking for your concern," she said. "I am not asking for declarations. I demand actions and that is my role and my right. I am a European citizen.

"Your duty, first, is to me. To fight for me, the European. To stand for my rights, me, the European. To put me first – me, the European. To act. To bring Polish government to court. To sanction them. To impose all the means that need political will, obviously still lacking. Still not enough. Still not brave enough.

"I know this is not diplomatic. I know this is not nice. I don't come nice, that's not my call. We, the people, are not nice. We are angry and scared and brave and strong.

"We, the people, urge you to fight for us, the European citizens, as freedom fighters in Poland, do every day, putting ourselves on the line for the core values that the European Union was built upon.

"The fight is on and out there."

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[Triển]

Nô công

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Italy warns riders 'treated like slaves' by food delivery firms


In this Nov. 5, 2020 file photo, food delivery riders stage a protest against the government restriction measures to curb the spread of coronavirus in Milan, Italy. - Copyright Luca Bruno/Copyright 2020 The Associated Press. All rights reserved

Italy is going after online food delivery companies, with one prosecutor lamenting Wednesday that the cyclists who deliver the food, many of them immigrants, are practically treated like slaves.

Milan prosecutors said that four major delivery companies in Italy have been given 90 days to improve their treatment of riders, including providing them with safe bicycles, accident compensation, job contracts and training, among other work protections.

Authorities also issued a total of 733 million euros in fines. Prosecutor Tiziana Siciliano said the delivers “represent a fundamental link, without which the businesses couldn’t function.”

Italian news agency LaPresse said three of the four companies issued statements expressing surprise and contending that they offer their delivery people flexibility and safety.

With cafes and restaurants closed entirely or partially for months under pandemic lockdown restrictions, riders bearing boxes of takeout food buzzed through big cities and small towns to help keep countless Italians fed and safe in their homes.

The four companies have about 60,000 riders using bicycles and motor scooters, hardly any of them working with any kind of contract, pension contributions, paid holidays, sick leave or accident coverage, the prosecutors in Milan said.

'Citizens, not slaves'

The riders earn about 4 euros ($4.80) for every delivery, Prosecutors said during a news conference Wednesday that the companies use algorithms to determine which riders get assigned more deliveries, and those riders are called for even more work.

“It's no longer the time to say that they are slaves, but it's time to say that they are citizens,'' prosecutor Francesco Greco told reporters. He added that investigators applied ”not a moral approach to the subject but a legal one.''

The probe grew out of a 2019 investigation into street accidents involving the bike delivery workers.

The companies are also under investigation to determine if they might have violated tax laws, the prosecutors said.

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[Triển]

Cá mập.

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Blow for smugglers as Hamburg makes Europe's biggest cocaine seizure



The total haul would have a street value of "several billion euros", authorities say. - Copyright AFP / HAMBURG CUSTOMS INVESTIGATION OFFICE

Customs officers in Germany say they have made Europe's largest-ever seizure of cocaine.

They found more than 16 metric tonnes in containers that had arrived from Paraguay, authorities in Hamburg announced on Wednesday.

The drugs were discovered on February 12 during a search of five shipments that had been flagged as suspicious.

The cocaine was found in more than 1,700 tin cans that had been filled with putty, Hamburg's customs office said.


Over the following days, German and Dutch authorities investigated further and another 7.2 metric tonnes of cocaine were seized on Sunday in the Belgian port of Antwerp.

The total haul of more than 23 tonnes would have had a street value of "several billion euros", officials said.

Over the following days, German and Dutch authorities investigated further and another 7.2 metric tonnes of cocaine were seized on Sunday in the Belgian port of Antwerp.

The total haul of more than 23 tonnes would have had a street value of "several billion euros", officials said.

On Wednesday, Dutch authorities arrested a 28-year-old man from the town of Vlaardingen, near Rotterdam, who is suspected of being responsible for the shipments.

"With this blow against organised narcotics crime ... the German customs have once again impressively demonstrated their clout," said Rolf Bösinger, Germany's State Secretary for Customs at the Federal Ministry of Finance.

Berlin has also thanked the "exemplary cooperation" of European partners in the operation.

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[ốc]

Môn quyền. Quyền cái cửa.

EU criticises Poland's abortion ban as it reminds member states to 'respect fundamental rights'

Cách biểu tình chắc ăn nhất là "bế mông tỏa cẳng" coi ai khổ hơn.

[Triển]

Cách biểu tình chắc ăn nhất là "bế mông tỏa cẳng" coi ai khổ hơn.

Thời lockdown thì cứ cái gì cũng lock. Lock sâu.

[Triển]

Anh trùng bội tinh

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BioNTech founders receive one of Germany's highest honors

Germany's President Frank-Walter Steinmeier will award COVID vaccine developers Özlem Türeci and Ugur Sahin with the Order of Merit for contributing to the "containment of the coronavirus pandemic."


More than 1,300 people from over 60 countries currently work at BioNTech

The founders of BioNTech, Özlem Türeci and Ugur Sahin, will receive the Knight Commander's Cross of the Federal Order of Merit for developing a coronavirus vaccine, Germany's presidential office announced on Friday.

It will be the first Order of Merit German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier awards in person this year.

Steinmeier congratulated the couple, saying that they had made a decisive contribution "to the containment of the coronavirus pandemic," the president wrote on Facebook.

Steinmeier and German Chancellor Angela Merkel are set to attend the award ceremony in Bellevue Palace on March 19.

What is the history of BioNTech?

The husband and wife team started the small biotech firm in the German city of Mainz in 2008.

Together with the American pharmaceutical company, Pfizer Inc, their COVID vaccine was the first authorized for use by the European Union last December.

Türeci is the firm's chief medical officer and a leading cancer researcher and Sahin is the company's chief executive.

"We were only able to do this because we have a fantastic team. A team of international scientists and staff from 60 different countries who have been working with us for years on this topic [mRNA research]," Sahin previously said.

How did BioNTech develop a vaccine?

The couple faced several challenges in getting the mRNA technology behind the vaccine to be recognized while they were racing the pandemic, but they did not give up.

Traditionally, scientists have developed vaccines through a weakened or dead version of a virus to encourage immune systems to fight the disease.

But Sahin and Türeci’s background in mRNA research allowed them to develop the BioNTech-Pfizer vaccine.

The approach takes a small part of the virus' genetic information to spark an immune response through producing protein directly in the cell.

fb/rt (AFP, dpa, KNA)

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[Triển]

Hoọc môn đả tiểu đường & bụng ông địa

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Obesity and diabetes drug could be on the way

The hormones GIP and GLP-1 are important in combating obesity and type 2 diabetes. Researchers from Germany, Switzerland and the US have now conducted mouse experiments that raise hopes for a drug.



Obesity and diabetes are among the biggest health problems in the civilized world

To understand the new findings, one has to take in a bit of basic research. The focus here is on two messenger substances that researchers at Helmholtz Zentrum München, the German Center for Diabetes Research (DZD), ETH Zurich and Indiana University feel show particular promise. These substances are gastric inhibitory polypeptide (GIP) and glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1).

GIP and GLP-1 are produced in the digestive tract and play vital roles in regulating body weight and food intake. A study on their effects now published in the journal Cell Metabolism provides pointers for developing drugs to treat obesity and type 2 diabetes.
Two types of mice in the experiment

GIP acts on receptors of the central nervous system located in the brain, stimulating the release of insulin and lowering blood glucose levels. But how exactly this works has not been clear until now.

First author Qian Zhang and her team had two different types of mice at their disposal for their experiment: normal wild-type mice and specially bred mice that lacked the GIP receptors in the brain. The researchers injected both types with GIP.


Mice naturally have GIP receptors, but for the trial, scientists used specially bred mice without them

It was found that body weight and food intake decreased in the wild-type mice, indicating that the hormone has an effect on appetite regulation. In contrast, food intake remained the same in the special laboratory mice lacking the GIP receptor. Their body weight decreased only minimally.

The researchers also looked at the mice's brain activity. "After administration of GIP, increased neuronal activity was evident in the area of the hypothalamus associated with the control of appetite ," says Christian Wolfrum of ETH Zurich.

Approaches for drugs



As far as the treatment of type 2 diabetes goes, it is GLP-1 that plays an important role. It enhances the glucose-dependent release of insulin from the cells of the pancreas. Diabetics do not produce enough insulin themselves and have to inject it regularly.The problem is that GLP-1 is broken down again very quickly in the body and has to be constantly produced again. A solution to this problem has been available since 2005: a drug called Exenatide from AstraZeneca.

This contains an active ingredient derived from the saliva of the North American Gila monster, a venomous lizard. It acts in a similar way to GLP-1 but is not broken down as quickly by the body.

The active ingredient is therefore an "agonist." This means that it mimics the action of a hormone at a receptor and stimulates the receptor in the same way.

A similar approach using GLP-1 and GIP agonists had already been taken by researchers at Helmholtz Zentrum München together with colleagues from Indiana University. They had combined two hormones in a single molecule that acts on and stimulates both GIP and GLP-1 receptors.

This dual agonist simultaneously lowers weight and improves blood glucose levels. The researchers published their research in Science Translational Medicine in 2013.

The compound has now already entered a phase III clinical trial. It has been shown that the combination drug reduces body weight more than just one molecule does when acting at the GLP-1 receptor.

In the more recent mouse trial, it became clear, however, that the drug had no effect in mice lacking the GIP receptor in the brain. "Our work shows for the first time that the GLP-1/GIP dual agonist requires the GIP receptor in the brain to reduce body weight and food intake," said Timo Müller, last author of the new study and head of the Institute for Diabetes and Obesity (IDO) at Helmholtz Zentrum München.

His next goal is now to find further active substances to improve GIP receptor signaling because these appear to be the central mechanism for treating both conditions.

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[Triển]

Tờ bảo kê.

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Coronavirus: EU leaders consider vaccine passports

EU leaders are meeting to address the slow pace the bloc's vaccine rollout, division over border closure policies and the introduction of vaccine travel certificates.

Leaders from across the 27-nation bloc convened via videoconference on Thursday to thrash out joint approaches to the COVID-19 crisis.

The topics of discussion included unilateral border closures and restrictions, the slowness of the EU's vaccine rollout and the thorny issue of so-called vaccine passports.
The issues discussed

Vaccine passports: Tourist-reliant southern European nations such as Greece and Spain urged the rapid adoption of an EU-wide vaccination certificate for travelers.

Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz backed the idea in an appearance on the online television channel of Germany's Bild newspaper. He said it would enable a restart to free travel in Europe and could help "secure and protect" struggling sectors like the arts, sports and gastronomy.

Manfred Weber, the head of the conservative bloc in the European Parliament, has called for a speedy rollout of a vaccine passport in order to allow freedom of movement in the EU.

"[A] vaccination passport is crucial and is immediately necessary," Weber told DW. "We have to speed up because currently [only tens of thousands] of Europeans are vaccinated every day."

Trying to sort out the paperwork retroactively, Weber said, could prove either difficult or impossible. He suggested issuing a document when people receive their jab.

Greece has indicated it is ready to move faster than its EU peers. It has already reached a bilateral travel agreement with Israel, which has led the world with its vaccination campaign.

Other countries, such as France and Germany, have shown more reluctance, with officials saying it would create de facto vaccination obligation and could prove discriminatory.

Officials and diplomats warned on Wednesday that, although they supported a verifiable vaccination record, it was too early to examine the use of vaccine passports to permit easier travel.

One senior diplomat was quoted acknowledging that all EU countries were "eager" to find a safe way to reopen travel but said "we have to move this forward together."

Border closures: The EU has warned six governments, including Germany, about unilateral border restrictions.

The European Commission has said the recent closure or partial shutting of frontiers by several EU countries to curb the spread of virus variants is disproportionate.

The EU has written warning letters to Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Hungary and Sweden, asking about their measures. It has given them until late next week to respond.

One EU official was quoted by the AFP news agency before the meeting said he expected "quite a lively discussion between the member states" on the issue.

Vaccine rollout: After a slow start to the bloc's vaccination campaign, the EU leaders' debate focused on both the speeding up of vaccine authorizations and the boosting of production rates.

The aim is to do this by creating new manufacturing facilities and cutting delivery bottlenecks.

According to a draft statement, the leaders were expected to say that the crisis was far from over — particularly as the production and supply of vaccine lags.

"We need to urgently accelerate the authorization, production and distribution of vaccines, as well as vaccination. We also need to enhance our surveillance and detection capacity in order to identify variants as early as possible so as to control their spread,'' said a draft statement cited by The Associated Press.

Weber, however, defended the slow pace of Europe's vaccination drive compared to progress seen in other countries such as the United Kingdom and United States, saying that delays are due to a "security first" and "shared liability" approach. While the UK and US are entirely liable for anything that could go wrong, both Pfizer and AstraZeneca share the liability with EU countries.

"We have another approach. We say security first. The liability is fully in the hands of the British state. In our case, in the European case, Pfizer and AstraZeneca also have liability," he told DW.

js,rc/msh (AFP, Reuters)

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Covid-19 : Thượng đỉnh châu Âu bàn về giấy chứng nhận y tế để đi lại


Mở lại các hoạt động và biên giới, chuẩn bị cho mùa hè với việc tái lập tự do đi lại giữa các nước Châu Âu … là những mối quan tâm hiện nay của 27 nước thành viên Liên Hiệp Châu Âu trong khi diễn biến dịch bệnh vẫn còn phức tạp.

Trong cuộc họp thượng đỉnh trực tuyến ngày 25/02/2021, lãnh đạo các nước châu Âu đã thảo luận về vấn đề giấy chứng nhận tiêm chủng để qua lại biên giới. Paris và Berlin ấn định đến hè sẽ áp dụng, trong khi các nước khác muốn đẩy nhanh tốc độ thực hiện.

Thông tín viên Pierre Benazet tại Bruxelles tường trình :

« Từ giờ, các nước châu Âu gọi là chứng nhận y tế. Cụm từ này thay thế cho « hộ chiếu tiêm chủng » mà những nước phụ thuộc vào du lịch khuyên làm. Các giải pháp lựa chọn của 27 nước thành viên là khác nhau. Một mặt vì hiện tại chưa chứng minh được vac-xin tạo miễn dịch lâu dài, mặt khác, theo như tổng thống Pháp, không phải tất cả mọi người đều được tiêm chủng sớm, và như vậy biện pháp trở nên bất công.

Tổng thống Emmanuel Macron không chấp nhận rằng giấy chứng nhận y tế trở thành một điều kiện để có thể qua lại biên giới các nước Châu Âu. Ông lập luận :

« Tất nhiên giữa các nước Châu Âu có vấn đề đạo đức, các vấn đề pháp lý cần phải giải quyết. Đây cũng là vấn đề đối với giới trẻ của chúng ta, bởi vì giấy chứng nhận tiêm chủng không thể là một điều kiện, mà phải nhằm giúp chúng ta tổ chức việc tự do đi lại. Tôi sẽ không chấp nhận một hệ thống theo kiểu phải có chứng nhận này để được vào nước này hay nước khác. Những người trẻ tuổi đến cuối tháng 6 đầu tháng 7 vẫn chưa được tiêm chủng hết. Ta không thể nói với họ rằng các bạn không thể đi từ vùng này sang vùng khác vì các bạn không có giấy chứng nhận tiêm chủng ».

Đức cũng hoài nghi giống như Pháp. Tuy nhiên, các nước Châu Âu cũng đã giao cho Ủy Ban Châu Âu bắt đầu chuẩn bị các loại chứng nhận y tế. Trong vòng 3 tháng nữa, các loại giấy chứng nhận sẽ sẵn sàng. Các nước sống nhờ vào du lịch như Chypre, Hy Lạp không còn là những nước duy nhất muốn có giấy chứng nhận, vì Đan Mạch, Bulgari hay Áo giờ cũng ủng hộ biện pháp này ».

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[ốc]

Lock him up:

Former French president Nicolas Sarkozy sentenced to jail for corruption
https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...for-corruption

France’s president from 2007 to 2012 had played an “active role” in forging a “corruption pact” with his lawyer and a senior magistrate to obtain information on a separate investigation into political donations, the leading judge declared, and there was “serious and concurring evidence” of collaboration between the three men to break the law.

The conviction and sentence were dramatic, unexpected and historic. Sarkozy, 66, had repeatedly declared his innocence and dismissed the charges as an “insult to my intelligence”.

It is, however, unlikely he will spend a day in jail. His lawyer has announced he intends to appeal, a process that would lead to a new trial, and a one-year prison sentence can be served outside jail under certain conditions, including the wearing of an electronic bracelet or limited home confinement.

While Sarkozy was not banned from holding public office, the verdict, delivered on Monday afternoon, is likely to quash his hopes of returning to public life in time for next year’s presidential election. His centre-right Les Républicains party has been struggling to come up with a credible candidate since Sarkozy’s former prime minister François Fillon was engulfed in scandal during the 2017 presidential race, opening the way for Emmanuel Macron to win.

Thời mạt Pháp.

[Triển]

Thời mạt Pháp.

Thượng tôn "Pháp" luật.

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