The U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill Wednesday that would force short-video app TikTok, used by about 170 million Americans, to separate from its Chinese owner, ByteDance, or face a ban. VOA Congressional Correspondent Katherine Gypson says the Senate may not approve the bill.
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The Nigerian film industry, often referred to as Nollywood, is the second largest moviemaker in the world in terms of volume, and is making strides both in terms of art and in popularity at the box office. Timothy Obiezu reports from Abuja.
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Tokyo — A rocket made by a Japanese company exploded just after launch on Wednesday, with public broadcaster NHK showing footage of the fiery failure.
Tokyo-based startup Space One had been aiming to become the first Japanese private firm to successfully place a satellite into orbit.
Its 18-meter solid-fuel Kairos rocket blasted off from the startup’s own launch pad in Wakayama prefecture in western Japan, carrying a small government test satellite.
But seconds after the launch, the rocket erupted into a ball of flame, with black smoke filling the launch pad area.
Burning debris was seen falling onto the surrounding mountain slopes as sprinklers began spraying water.
“The launch of the first Kairos rocket was executed, but we took a measure to abort the flight,” Space One said in a statement, adding that “details are being investigated”.
The failure marks a blow to Japan’s efforts to enter the potentially lucrative satellite-launch market.
The government wants to assess if it can quickly launch temporary, small satellites when and if its existing spy satellites malfunction.
Kairos had been hoped to put the satellite into orbit around 51 minutes after launch.
Space One was established in 2018 by a team of major Japanese tech businesses, including Canon Electronics, IHI Aerospace, construction firm Shimizu and the government-owned Development Bank of Japan.
Last July another Japanese rocket engine exploded during a test around 50 seconds after ignition.
The solid-fuel Epsilon S was an improved version of the Epsilon rocket that had failed to launch the previous October.
Its testing site in the northern prefecture of Akita was engulfed in flames and a huge plume of grey smoke rose into the sky.
The malfunction came after Tokyo in March 2023 had seen its second attempt to launch its next-generation H3 rocket fail after liftoff.
Last month though Japan’s space agency toasted a successful blast-off for its new flagship rocket, the H3, after years of delays and two previous failed attempts.
The H3 launched from the Tanegashima Space Center in southwestern Japan, sparking cheers and applause at JAXA control center.
It has been mooted as a rival to SpaceX’s Falcon 9 and could one day deliver cargo to bases on the moon.
That followed Japan’s successful landing in January of an unmanned probe on the moon, albeit at a wonky angle, making it just the fifth country to achieve a “soft landing” on the lunar surface.
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WASHINGTON — The U.S. House of Representatives is expected to approve legislation Wednesday that would force the popular TikTok video app to either separate from its Chinese-owned parent company ByteDance or sell the U.S. version of the software.
The bipartisan Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act “gives TikTok six months to eliminate foreign adversary control — which would include ByteDance divesting its current ownership — to remain available in the United States,” said Representative Mike Gallagher, chairman of the House Select Committee on Strategic Competition Between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party, and Representative Raja Krishnamoorthi, the top Democrat on the committee.
“All TikTok would have to do is separate from CCP-controlled ByteDance. However, if TikTok chose not to rid itself of this CCP control, the application would no longer be offered in U.S. app stores. But TikTok would have no one but itself to blame,” the lawmakers said in a prepared statement.
Here’s what we know about the legislation and what happens next in the U.S. Senate.
Why is TikTok under scrutiny?
“The concern is that TikTok could transfer personal information to its parent company ByteDance, who in turn could transfer it to the Chinese government,” Caitlin Chin-Rothmann, a fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told VOA.
Chin-Rothmann said concerns by some members of Congress about the Chinese Communist Party potentially controlling TikTok’s algorithm for propaganda purposes have not yet been proven.
“That’s not to say that, in the future, there’s not a risk that the Chinese government could exert pressure,” she said.
What does TikTok say about the legislation?
TikTok on Monday called the legislation a “ban” and has repeatedly denied the allegations against it. In a statement last week on X, formerly Twitter, the company said the “legislation has a predetermined outcome: a total ban of TikTok in the United States.”
How do lawmakers view the legislation?
The bill has strong support from House Democrats and Republicans, despite congressional offices receiving floods of phone calls from Americans concerned about losing access to the social media app.
House Speaker Mike Johnson told reporters last week, “It’s an important bipartisan measure to take on China, our largest geopolitical foe, which is actively undermining our economy and security.”
What about the Senate?
The bill could face a much harder road to passage in the Democratic-controlled Senate, where Majority Leader Chuck Schumer has said it will face consideration in the appropriate committees.
“I will listen to their views on the bill and determine the best path,” Schumer said in a statement.
Some Senate Democrats, including Mark Warner, chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, have expressed doubts about the legality of singling out a social media app in legislation. He has introduced alternative legislation more broadly targeting apps that collect personal data.
But Warner told CBS News on Sunday that the TikTok app is a serious national security concern.
“If you don’t think the Chinese Communist Party can twist that algorithm to make it the news that they see reflective of their views, then I don’t think you appreciate the nature of the threat,” Warner said.
How do the leading 2024 presidential candidates feel about the bill?
The White House said it welcomes the legislation, even though the Biden campaign joined TikTok recently as an effort to reach out to younger voters.
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters the bill ensures “ownership isn’t in the hands of those who may do us harm.”
Former President Donald Trump — who initially called for a ban of the app in 2020 — has now changed course, arguing that Facebook will be empowered if TikTok is no longer available.
“There’s a lot of good, and there’s a lot of bad with TikTok. But the thing I don’t like is that without TikTok, you’re going to make Facebook bigger,” the presumptive 2024 Republican presidential nominee told U.S. cable network CNBC in a phone interview this week.
What happens once the bill passes the House?
Apart from constitutional concerns over preventing U.S. citizens from exercising their right to free speech, the bill could also be difficult to legally enforce and face challenges in U.S. courts.
“Chinese export control laws could potentially prevent the sale of TikTok’s algorithm,” Chin-Rothmann said. “A divestiture would be very logistically difficult, in general. TikTok is one of the largest companies in the world. So, any buyer would have to be very large, as well. They would have to have a strategic interest in purchasing TikTok, and then the merger would have to not raise antitrust concerns in the United States.”
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Scientists in Alaska are developing a cloud-based approach to storing and analyzing data about volcanoes, in hopes of increasing the speed with which they can predict eruptions. Phil Dierking has our story. (Camera and Produced by: Philip Dierking)
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Taipei — During China’s top legislative meetings this year, which wrapped up Monday, Chinese leader Xi Jinping ordered the military to develop what he called “new quality combat capabilities,” a phrase analysts say highlights a focus on the use of artificial intelligence, high-tech and intelligent warfare. It also could signal, they say, plans to build forces of unmanned ships and submarines to support military operations.
Speaking at a gathering of the People’s Liberation Army or PLA and Armed Police Force delegates to the National People’s Congress late last week about “new quality combat capabilities,” Xi called on the military to deepen its reforms and promote innovation to enhance strategic capabilities in emerging areas.
During the meeting, six representatives from the military spoke about a range of topics from defense capabilities in cyberspace and the application of AI to the development and use of unmanned combat capabilities.
Chung Chieh with the National Policy Foundation in Taipei said that based on Xi’s remarks at the meeting and comments in past speeches, his “new quality combat capability” seems to refer to intelligent combat capabilities.
“His (Xi’s) current goal is to achieve the so-called integrated development … as fast as possible,” Chieh said.
With the use of AI, for example, militaries are looking to speed up the pace of combat, shorten the time it takes for a range of tasks, such as discovering targets, carrying out strikes as well as near instant operations and even simultaneous control of many unmanned combat vehicles, he said. For major military powers, whoever can master the new combat mode first will gain the upper hand.
A report Sunday in the PLA Daily said that following the meeting, lawmakers highlighted the need to make technology a “core capability” to enhance China’s strategic power.
One lawmaker, Hao Jingwen, talked about how drone swarm technologies in air, sea and land have been developed and successively deployed in regional conflicts.
“China needs to realize the important roles, emerging areas and new quality combat capabilities could play in modern warfare, be aware of their development trends, plan battlefield applications of advanced technologies in advance, and conduct active research in fields such as big data, the Internet of Things and AI, so as to be able to win future warfare,” the PLA Daily quoted Hao as saying.
Ying-Yu Lin, an assistant professor at the Graduate Institute of International Affairs and Strategic Studies at Tamkang University, said that while “new quality combat capabilities” seek to draw on scientific and technological capabilities, it’s hard to say how they’d be used to meet Xi’s standards — or how widely used the capabilities might be in the future.
“In fact, China itself is still trying to figure out how to do it, and it cannot clearly point out what its new quality combat capabilities are. If it wants to fight technological warfare in the future, its training methods and the talents it needs will definitely be a little different from the past,” Lin told VOA.
Lin believes that since new quality combat capabilities are based on technological development, it is bound to eliminate the traditional mentality of military training and recruit high-tech professional talents. However, he said, such talents may have better options with foreign companies or private enterprises and may not want to join the PLA.
During the plenary meeting, Xi also emphasized the need to coordinate preparation for maritime military conflicts, the protection of maritime rights and interests, maritime economic development, and to enhance maritime strategic capabilities.
Analysts said Xi’s remarks revealed Beijing’s ambitions to become a sea-power country and control sea communication lines.
Chieh said taken together the remarks about “new quality combat capability” and “preparation for maritime military conflicts” are a sign that unmanned autonomous ships will be a key development project for the PLA.
“Maybe in the future, at sea, or even in distant oceans, the Chinese Communist Party will use a large number of unmanned vehicles, such as unmanned ships and even unmanned submarines, to support its maritime operations and control of sea lines of communication,” he said.
Adrianna Zhang from VOA’s Mandarin Service contributed to this story.
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NEW YORK — Former President Donald Trump said Monday that he still believes TikTok poses a national security risk but is opposed to banning the hugely popular app because doing so would help its rival, Facebook, which he continues to lambast over his 2020 election loss.
Trump, in a call-in interview with CNBC’s “Squawk Box,” was asked about his comments last week that seemed to voice opposition to a bill being advanced by Congress that would effectively ban TikTok and other ByteDance apps from the Apple and Google app stores as well as U.S. web hosting services.
“Frankly, there are a lot of people on TikTok that love it. There are a lot of young kids on TikTok who will go crazy without it,” Trump told the hosts. “There’s a lot of good and there’s a lot of bad with TikTok. But the thing I don’t like is that without TikTok you’re going to make Facebook bigger, and I consider Facebook to be an enemy of the people, along with a lot of the media.”
“When I look at it, I’m not looking to make Facebook double the size,” he added. “I think Facebook has been very bad for our country, especially when it comes to elections.”
Trump has repeatedly complained about Facebook’s role during the 2020 election, which he still refuses to concede he lost to President Joe Biden. That includes at least $400 million that its founder, Mark Zuckerberg, and his wife donated to two nonprofit organizations that distributed grants to state and local governments to help them conduct the 2020 election at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The donations — which were fully permitted under campaign finance law — went to pay for things like equipment to process mail ballots and drive-thru voting locations.
TikTok, a video-sharing app, has emerged as a major issue in the 2024 presidential campaign. The platform has about 170 million users in the U.S., most of whom skew younger — a demographic that both parties are desperately trying to court ahead of November’s general election. Younger voters have become especially hard for campaigns to reach as they gravitate away from traditional platforms like cable television.
Biden’s 2024 campaign officially joined TikTok last month, even though he has expressed his own national security concerns over the platform, banned it on federal devices and on Friday endorsed the legislation that could lead to its ban.
The bill passed unanimously by the U.S. House Energy and Commerce Committee calls on China’s ByteDance to divest its ownership of TikTok or effectively face a U.S. ban. Top Republicans, including House Speaker Mike Johnson, support the bill. Johnson has indicated it will soon come up for a full vote in the House.
As president, Trump attempted to ban TikTok through an executive order that called “the spread in the United States of mobile applications developed and owned by companies in the People’s Republic of China (China)” a threat to “the national security, foreign policy and economy of the United States.” The courts, however, blocked the action after TikTok sued, arguing such actions would violate free speech and due process rights.
Pressed on whether he still believed the app posed a national security risk, Trump said Monday: “I do believe it. And we have to very much go into privacy and make sure that we are protecting the American people’s privacy and data rights.”
“But,” he went on to say, “you have that problem with Facebook and lots of other companies, too.” Some American companies, he charged, are “not so American. They deal in China. And if China wants anything from them they will give it. So that’s a national security risk also.”
Biden in 2022 banned the use of TikTok by the federal government’s nearly 4 million employees on devices owned by its agencies, with limited exceptions for law enforcement, national security and security research purposes.
He also recently signed an executive order that allows the Department of Justice and other federal agencies to take steps to prevent the large-scale transfer of Americans’ personal data to what the White House calls “countries of concern,” including China.
Both the FBI and the Federal Communications Commission have warned that TikTok owner ByteDance could share user data — such as browsing history, location and biometric identifiers — with China’s authoritarian government. TikTok said it has never done that and wouldn’t do so if asked. The U.S. government also hasn’t provided evidence of that happening.
Trump had first voiced support for the app in a post on his Truth Social site last week. “If you get rid of TikTok, Facebook and Zuckerschmuck will double their business. I don’t want Facebook, who cheated in the last Election, doing better,” he wrote. “They are a true Enemy of the People!”
Trump, in the interview, said he had not discussed the company with Jeff Yass, a TikTok investor and a major GOP donor. Trump said the two had recently met “very briefly” but that Yass “never mentioned TikTok.”
Trump also confirmed he met last week with Elon Musk, the billionaire CEO of Tesla and SpaceX who has increasingly aligned himself with conservative politics. Trump said he didn’t know whether Musk would end up supporting his campaign, noting they “obviously have opposing views on a minor subject called electric cars,” which Trump has railed against.
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Beijing, China — China has intensified efforts to block software that enables internet users to access banned websites during a top political meeting this week, a leading provider of firewall-leaping software told AFP.
Beijing operates some of the world’s most extensive censorship over the internet, with web users in mainland China unable to access everything from Google to news websites without using a virtual private network (VPN).
And as thousands of delegates gather in Beijing this week for the annual “Two Sessions” meeting, VPN software has increasingly struggled to circumvent the censorship while outages have become much more frequent, even when compared to previous sensitive political events.
“Currently, there is increased censorship due to political meetings in China,” a representative of the Liechtenstein-based service Astrill — one of the most popular VPN services for foreigners in China — confirmed to AFP.
“Unfortunately, not all VPN protocols are functioning at this time,” they said. “We are working intensively on bringing all services back to normal, but currently have no ETA.”
The use of a VPN without government authorization is illegal in China, as is using the software to access blocked websites.
State media workers and diplomats, however, are allowed to access prohibited websites such as X, formerly Twitter.
Security has tightened across Beijing throughout the Two Sessions, with security officers patrolling streets with sniffer dogs and elderly volunteers in red armbands monitoring pedestrians for suspicious behavior.
Chinese social media giant Weibo has also been quick to block sensitive topics.
All hashtags discussing Beijing’s decision to call off a traditional news conference by the country’s premier were quickly removed from search results.
And another, a reference to China’s economic woes declaring “middle class children have no future” was also removed.
China’s domestic media is state-controlled and widespread censorship of social media is often used to suppress negative stories or critical coverage.
Regulators have previously urged investors to avoid reading foreign news reports about China.
In a speech last year, President Xi Jinping said the ruling Communist Party’s control of the internet had been “strengthened,” and that it was crucial that the state “govern cyberspace.”
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Los Angeles — As Universal Pictures prepared for a big night at the Academy Awards with “Oppenheimer,” the studio also celebrated the No. 1 debut of “Kung Fu Panda 4,” which collected $58.3 million in domestic theaters over the weekend, according to estimates Sunday.
“Kung Fu Panda 4,” the first film in the DreamWorks Animation franchise since the third installment in 2016, got off to a better start than all but the 2008 original. That “Kung Fu Panda,” which began the mystical adventures of Jack Black’s panda warrior Po, launched with $60.2 million.
Working in favor of “Kung Fu Panda 4”: It’s the first big family movie since “Migration” and “Wonka” hit theaters in December. “Kung Fu Panda 4” added $22 million internationally.
The news was just as good for last week’s top film, “Dune: Part Two.” Denis Villeneuve’s sci-fi epic sequel held strongly in its second week, dropping a modest 44%. It grossed $46 million in its second week, bringing its domestic cumulative total to $157 million for Warner Bros. and Legendary Pictures.
Riding strong reviews, great word-of-mouth and plenty of sandworms, “Dune: Part Two” appears well set up for a long theatrical run. Most of Sunday’s Oscar nominees have already moved on to home viewing platforms, but “Dune” could wind up at next year’s Academy Awards.
Opening in third place was the Lionsgate, Blumhouse horror release “Imaginary,” about a sinister teddy bear. It debuted with $10 million.
Following it was “Cabrini,” a portrait of the 19th century Catholic missionary Saint Frances Xavier Cabrini (played by Cristiana Dell’Anna). The film, released by the Christian-based company Angel Studios, the studio behind the 2023 surprise hit “Sound of Freedom,” collected $7.5 million.
A24 also debuted the critically acclaimed neo-noir “Love Lies Bleeding,” starring Kristen Stewart, on five screens in New York and Los Angeles. It grossed $167,463 for a good per-screen average of $33,493.
Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to Comscore. Final domestic figures will be released Monday.
“Kung Fu Panda 4,” $58.3 million.
“Dune: Part Two,” $46 million.
“Imaginary,” $10 million.
“Cabrini,” $7.6 million.
“Bob Marley: One Love,” $4.1 million.
“Ordinary Angels,” $2 million.
“Madame Web,” $1.1 million.
“Migration,” $1.1 million.
“YOLO,” $840,000
MET Opera: “La Forza del Destino,” $768,000.
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Los Angeles — Hollywood’s glitterati gather on Sunday to celebrate the best performances in film at the annual Academy Awards, a ceremony expected to turn into a toast to blockbuster atomic bomb drama “Oppenheimer.”
Talk show host Jimmy Kimmel returns for the fourth time to emcee the film industry’s highest honors from the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles.
“Oppenheimer,” the three-hour drama directed by Christopher Nolan, leads the field with 13 nominations. The movie is the frontrunner to win the prestigious best picture prize, capping its sweep of other major awards this year.
“If the best picture isn’t ‘Oppenheimer,’ it will be one of the biggest upsets, if not the biggest upset, in the history of the Oscars,” said Scott Feinberg, executive editor for awards at The Hollywood Reporter.
After 2023 was marred by actors and writers strikes, the Oscars give Hollywood a chance to celebrate two global hits. “Oppenheimer” and feminist doll adventure “Barbie,” another best picture nominee, brought in a combined $2.4 billion in a summer box office battle dubbed “Barbenheimer.”
Oscar producers said they have planned unannounced cameos and other surprises to entertain audiences at home.
“My biggest hope is that they go through a range of emotions with us, that they feel happiness and joy, that we maybe make them shed a tear,” Executive Producer Raj Kapoor said. “And then they somehow feel connected and inspired to also live their dreams.”
Supporting actor nominee Ryan Gosling will sing the ’80s-style rock anthem “I’m Just Ken” from “Barbie.” Members of the Osage Nation will perform the nominated “Wahzhazhe (A Song for My People)” from “Killers of the Flower Moon.”
Cillian Murphy, the Irish actor who played physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer as he led the race to build the first atomic bomb, is considered the favorite for best actor. Murphy’s main competition, according to awards pundits, is “The Holdovers” star Paul Giamatti.
Best actress may go to Lily Gladstone of “Killers of the Flower Moon,” the real-life story about a murder plot to take over lucrative Osage oil rights in 1920s Oklahoma. If she prevails, Gladstone would be the first Native American actress to win an acting Oscar.
Gladstone’s rivals include previous Oscar winner Emma Stone, nominated this year for playing a woman revived from the dead in the dark and wacky comedy “Poor Things.”
The supporting actor race features “Oppenheimer” star Robert Downey Jr., who played the scientist’s professional nemesis, and Sterling K. Brown from “American Fiction.”
Da’Vine Joy Randolph, praised for her role as a grieving mother in “The Holdovers,” vies for best supporting actress against Danielle Brooks from “The Color Purple” and others.
“Barbie,” last year’s No. 1 film with $1.4 billion in global ticket sales, may be shut out of the top awards. Billie Eilish’s “Barbie” ballad “What Was I Made For?” is likely to win the original song prize, Feinberg said, and could snag the awards for costumes and production design.
For Nolan, the night could bring his first directing Oscar, as well as the award for adapted screenplay. The director of “The Dark Knight” trilogy, “Inception” and other acclaimed films has never had a movie win best picture.
The ceremony may end with “the industry-wide coronation for Christopher Nolan,” Feinberg said. With “Oppenheimer,” “he has he has made his best possible argument yet for why he is worthy of this recognition.”
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New York — Six years ago, Nachiket Chanchani visited Angkor Wat for the first time. Inspired, the architectural historian began thinking about the relationship between the complexities of modern post-genocide Cambodia and the ancient temple complex.
Chanchani, an associate art history professor at the University of Michigan, kept reflecting on Angkor Wat, juxtaposing the temple complex against art created since the Khmer Rouge killed nearly 2 million Cambodians between 1975 and 1979.
During the pandemic, his thoughts crystallized amid worldwide suffering, anxiety and fear. “I thought that this art, both from the deep past and from more recent times in Cambodia, can teach us lessons of how to kind of stay stable, find some way forward,” he told VOA Khmer Service via Zoom.
The University of Michigan Museum of Art, or UMMA, one of the largest university museums in the United States, is now exhibiting 80 pieces of Cambodian art in a show guest curated by Chanchani in Ann Arbor. Titled “Angkor Complex: Cultural Heritage and Post-Genocide Memory in Cambodia,” it opened February 3 and runs through July 28. Featured artists Vann Nath, Sopheap Pich, Svay Sareth, Amy Lee Sanford and Leang Seckon, who live in Cambodia and the U.S., have pieces in the exhibit.
The Angkor Archaeological Park, a UNESCO World Heritage site, covers more than 400 square kilometers (155 square miles). Once a city of nearly a million people, the site contains some of Cambodia’s most famous structures, including those recognized worldwide after being seen in movies such as “Lara Croft: Tomb Raider and In the Mood for Love.”
Playing with the dictionary meanings of “complex” such as “a whole made up of complicated or interrelated parts,” “a building or group of buildings housing related units” or “a group of repressed desires and memories that exerts a dominating influence upon the personality,” Chanchani saw how the exhibit could “allow us to think about these different layers, these different kinds of ideas of complexness.”
Today, “Cambodians regard Angkor Wat as a sacred center, a national symbol, and a site of memory,” according to the exhibition guide.
“Like Angkor Wat’s bullet-ridden walls, contemporary artworks from Cambodia and its diaspora bear the scars of a genocide and of related upheavals,” said Chanchani, adding that as a non-Cambodian outsider, he was aware of the exhibition’s sensitive nature. “It’s not as if this is something that happened a thousand years ago that you can just say, it happened,” he said. “The survivors are still there.”
Chanchani hoped bringing Cambodian art to the U.S. would console viewers.
But what could the U.S., one of the biggest economic and military powers learn from Cambodia, a small southeast Asian country, other than how to move on from painful memories and what the exhibition catalog describes as the current interwoven global crises of “public health, economic instability, authoritarian regimes, racial injustice and climate change?”
And how does one nation heal from an event like the Khmer Rouge killing nearly a quarter of the population in its quest to create an agrarian utopia for worker-peasants?
For some Cambodians, it can seem as if, 40 years later, the nation can barely move on or show off a new face when it is still being referred to in the context of the past suffering, especially on the international stage.
Reaksmey Yean, a Cambodian art writer, curator and researcher in Phnom Penh, applauded the Michigan show, but added it is a “cliche” because Angkor Wat and the Khmer Rouge have been overused to identify Cambodia.
“An exhibition about Cambodia, its history and culture is rare in the U.S., so I think it is important to have the exhibition to put Cambodia on the map,” Reaksmey Yean told VOA Khmer Service. “However, it is a cliche for me because it’s been more than 20 years when our civil war completely ended and there are so much in our cultures that can be shown.”
Museum Director Christina Olsen said the audience will have a chance to learn about the “distinct cultural and political [significance] of Cambodia” through the historical and contemporary arts by Cambodian and diasporic artists.
“At the same time, the exhibition invites consideration of today’s broader cultural, social and political happenings and fosters dialogue about the lessons that can be taken from the pain and resilience of the Cambodian people,” she added in the press release.
Svay Sareth is a Cambodian artist whose works in sculpture, installation and durational performance “are made using materials and processes intentionally associated with war — metals, uniforms, camouflage and actions requiring great endurance,” according to the Richard Koh Gallery in Singapore. Sareth’s interest in how Cambodia was affected by war and how its people are moving on has informed his art.
“I want the audience in the U.S. [to] see how the post genocide in Cambodia affect the intergeneration,” Sareth said.
Another work, “Full Circle,” by Khmer American artist Amy Lee Sanford, is comprised of 40 broken clay pots, repaired and installed in a circle. She is known for her “Break Pot” performance pieces where she would drop the clay pot from a height, then glue all the pieces back together, an effort to show how situations can change in seconds and even when repaired, can never be the same again.
Sanford said she hopes the Michigan exhibition will show that Cambodians “have a memory of some of the important architectural and religious structures … and that also that there are contemporary artists now doing things related to history and related to looking forward as well.”
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MUMBAI, India — Krystyna Pyszková of the Czech Republic was crowned Miss World at a glittering contest held in India on Saturday night.
Yasmina Zaytoun of Lebanon was the first runner-up among 112 contestants in the competition held in Mumbai, India’s financial and entertainment capital.
“Being crowned Miss World is a dream come true. I am deeply honored to represent my country and the values of ‘beauty with a purpose’ on a global platform,” Pyszkova said.
After the reigning Miss World, Karoline Bielawska of Poland, passed the crown to her, Pyszková waved to the large crowd at the Jio World Convention Center and hugged some of the other contestants.
The event showcased the rich tapestry of India’s culture, traditions, heritage, arts and crafts, and textiles to a massive global audience. The participants wore heavily embroidered skirts and blouses and danced to popular Bollywood songs.
The beauty competition returned to India for the first time in 28 years.
India’s Sini Shetty exited after making it to the final eight. Six Indian women have won the title, including Reita Faria (1966), Aishwarya Rai (1994), Diana Hayden (1997), Yukta Mookhey (1999), Priyanka Chopra (2000) and Manushi Chillar (2017).
The 71st Miss World beauty pageant was hosted by Bollywood filmmaker Karan Johar and Miss World 2013 Megan Young from the Philippines.
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BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS — Microsoft said Friday it’s still trying to evict the elite Russian government hackers who broke into the email accounts of senior company executives in November and who it said have been trying to breach customer networks with stolen access data.
The hackers from Russia’s SVR foreign intelligence service used data obtained in the intrusion, which Microsoft disclosed in mid-January, to compromise some source-code repositories and internal systems, the software giant said in a blog and a regulatory filing.
A company spokesperson would not characterize what source code was accessed and what capability the hackers gained to further compromise customer and Microsoft systems. Microsoft said Friday that the hackers stole “secrets” from email communications between the company and unspecified customers — cryptographic secrets such as passwords, certificates and authentication keys — and that it was reaching out to them “to assist in taking mitigating measures.”
Cloud-computing company Hewlett Packard Enterprise disclosed on January 24 that it, too, was an SVR hacking victim and that it had been informed of the breach — by whom it would not say — two weeks earlier, coinciding with Microsoft’s discovery it had been hacked.
“The threat actor’s ongoing attack is characterized by a sustained, significant commitment of the threat actor’s resources, coordination and focus,” Microsoft said Friday, adding that it could be using obtained data “to accumulate a picture of areas to attack and enhance its ability to do so.”
Cybersecurity experts said Microsoft’s admission that the SVR hack had not been contained exposes the perils of the heavy reliance by government and business on the Redmond, Washington, company’s software monoculture — and the fact that so many of its customers are linked through its global cloud network.
“This has tremendous national security implications,” said Tom Kellermann of the cybersecurity firm Contrast Security. “The Russians can now leverage supply chain attacks against Microsoft’s customers.”
Amit Yoran, the CEO of Tenable, also issued a statement, expressing alarm and dismay. He is among security professionals who find Microsoft overly secretive about its vulnerabilities and how it handles hacks.
“We should all be furious that this keeps happening,” Yoran said. “These breaches aren’t isolated from each other, and Microsoft’s shady security practices and misleading statements purposely obfuscate the whole truth.”
Microsoft said it had not yet determined whether the incident is likely to materially affect its finances. It also said the intrusion’s stubbornness “reflects what has become more broadly an unprecedented global threat landscape, especially in terms of sophisticated nation-state attacks.”
The hackers, known as Cozy Bear, are the same hacking team behind the SolarWinds breach.
When it initially announced the hack, Microsoft said the SVR unit broke into its corporate email system and accessed accounts of some senior executives as well as employees on its cybersecurity and legal teams. It would not say how many accounts were compromised.
At the time, Microsoft said it was able to remove the hackers’ access from the compromised accounts on or about January 13. But by then, they clearly had a foothold.
It said they got in by compromising credentials on a “legacy” test account but never elaborated.
Microsoft’s latest disclosure comes three months after a new U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission rule took effect that compels publicly traded companies to disclose breaches that could negatively affect their business.
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