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Auckland, New Zealand — Job losses and wage cuts from China's economic downturn are hitting key industries, according to the South China Morning Post, and analysts say the situation could lead to political difficulties for the ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Rights groups say the situation has triggered a sharp increase in protests and strikes around the country – not enough to threaten the rule of the CCP or President Xi Jinping, but enough that an analyst sees a "hidden danger" for Chinese authorities unless they can rejuvenate the economy. Mr. Wang, in his early 40s, lives in Bao'an District, Shenzhen, in southern China. He was formerly employed at a well-known business travel platform but was laid off earlier this year. He prefers not to disclose his full name or the company’s name due to the matter's sensitivity. Wang tells VOA, "In the area of business travel software, our company is at the forefront of China in terms of R&D and sales, and it is also one of the top 500 private enterprises in China.  But now many companies have run out of money, our sales have plummeted, and the layoffs finally fell on our group of old employees." He compares China’s economic slowdown to a high-speed train suddenly hitting the brakes, and everyone on the train hitting the ground, even those better-off, like himself. China’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth rate has been dropping since hitting 10.6% in 2010, well before the COVID pandemic, which cut growth to 2.2% in 2020, according to the World Bank. The global lender says growth bounced back to 8.4% in 2021 but then fell to 3% in 2022 before a moderate recovery to 5.2% in 2023.  The World Bank expects China’s growth rate to drop back below 5% this year. Several Chinese workers VOA talked with said they were unprepared for the economy to slow so quickly. Two large IT companies laid off Mr. Liu in Guangzhou in the past two years, and his life has turned gloomy.  He also prefers not to disclose his full name due to the matter's sensitivity. Still struggling to find a job, Liu has a second child, and his wife was diagnosed with early-stage breast cancer. "When I was laid off for the first time, I got decent severance pay because I had worked there for a long time," says Liu. "Later, when I came to a large company, I was laid off again, and I felt that I was quite unlucky.  Fortunately, we don't have too much debt." According to South Morning China Post's (SCMP) July analysis of the annual reports of 23 top Chinese companies, 14 of them carried out large layoffs in 2023, with technology and real estate companies among the worst hit amid a glut of empty buildings. The online newspaper reports that one company, Poly Real Estate, laid off 16.3% of its workforce in the past year, or 11,000 people; Greenland Holdings, a Shanghai-based real estate company, also saw a 14.5% drop in the number of its employees. The SCMP reports online retail giant Alibaba cut 12.8% of its workforce, or about 20,000 jobs, in the 2023 fiscal year, while technology conglomerate Tencent's headcount fell 2.8% in 2023 to about 3,000, and in the first quarter of 2024, the company laid off another 630 people. In addition, Chinese internet tech firms ByteDance, JD.com, Kuaishou, Didi Chuxing, Bilibili and Weibo have all conducted layoffs this year. China’s National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) is painting a rosier picture this month, calling employment and the national economy "generally stable" and citing "steady progress."  In June, it showed only a 0.2% drop in urban jobs compared with the same period last year. The NBS also claimed China’s lowest youth unemployment rate this year, 13.2%, after it removed students from the calculation.  The new methodology was introduced after China hit a record high 21.3% youth unemployment in June 2023, prompting authorities to suspend publication of the statistic. Chen Yingxuan, a policy analyst at the Taiwan Institute of National Defense and Security Studies who specializes in Chinese unemployment, tells VOA that Beijing’s job worries have shifted from fresh graduates and the working class to middle class and senior managers. She says many have faced salary cuts or layoffs to reduce costs and increase efficiency as China struggles with a weak housing market, sluggish consumption, high government debt, foreign investment withdrawals, and trade barriers. Even people with relatively stable incomes, such as workers at state-owned enterprises, are feeling the pinch. Ms. Zhang, who works for a state-owned commercial bank in Guangzhou and prefers not to disclose her full name due to the matter’s sensitivity, says many bank employees are seeing paychecks shrink. "State owned banks such as China Construction Bank and Agricultural Bank of China, or joint-stock banks, are now cutting salaries, let alone urban commercial banks in many places," she tells VOA.  "Salary cuts already started last year, and it seems to be worse this year."  She projects the cuts will be 20% to 30% by the end of the year. In July, China's 31 provincial-level administrative regions issued regulations calling for party and government organs to "live a tight life," focusing on budget cuts and reductions in public spending. Analysts say further job and wage cuts could lead to intensified protests and strikes, leading to greater instability. Rights group China Labor Bulletin (CLB) in 2023 counted 1,794 strike incidents in China, more than double the number in 2022. In the past six months alone, the group documented about 1,200 incidents in protest of the wage cuts, unpaid wages, unforeseen layoffs, and unfair compensation, a more than 50% increase from the same period in 2023. CLB estimates "only 5% to 10% of all collective actions of workers have been recorded," suggesting many more protests are taking place. But Chen of the Taiwan Institute of National Defense and Security Studies says the wage cuts and unemployment have not yet been severe enough to spark large-scale protests that threaten the power of the ruling party or President Xi. "Although there has been an increase in protests, they are still relatively sporadic. There are no large-scale incidents, and local governments can easily quell them," she says.  "So, for the legitimacy of the CCP and Xi's third term, it is more of a hidden danger than an imminent crisis." While protests in China are usually by working class people, Wang notes the economic pain is spreading to other, more influential groups. "Whether for blue-collar, white-collar, or even gold-collar workers, the economic losses are now very large," says Wang.  "The worse the economy and the more emergencies there are, the more the CCP will suppress it with high pressure. It's a vicious circle, where people suffer more, and stability is more costly." Meanwhile, analysts say Chinese authorities are struggling to come up with a plan to reverse the unemployment and wage cutting trend. The communiqué of the Third Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, released on July 18, mentioned employment only once, saying "it is necessary to improve the income distribution system and the employment priority policy."

MADRID — The global cruise industry expects to carry 10% more passengers by 2028 than the 31.7 million who took cruise holidays in 2023, when the sector surpassed pre-pandemic levels, but sees some routes exposed to protests over overtourism. Long criticized for its impact on the environment and coastal communities, the industry has ordered 57 more cruise ships in addition to some 300 now in operation to meet the projected demand, said the European director of Cruise Lines International Association (CLIA), Marie-Caroline Laurent. At the same time, companies are working to adapt the ships so they can switch to electricity from highly polluting marine fuel when they are moored at ports and to be ready to comply with EU maritime environment regulations by 2030. But as travel continues to grow, cruise operators face a growing debate about excessive tourist numbers in crowded European port cities such as Spain's Barcelona, the scene of protests this month in which a small group sprayed tourists with water pistols. Cruise ship passengers represent just 4% of all tourists visiting Barcelona, CLIA representatives said. Jaume Collboni, the mayor of Barcelona, which is the biggest cruise ship port in Europe, told Reuters his administration would seek a new deal with the port to reduce the number of one-day cruise calls. CLIA's Laurent said violent protests could have an impact on the itineraries in the future. "There will be some consideration of adapting the itineraries if for some reason we feel that all passengers will not be well-treated," she said. Instead, the industry could offer more cruise holidays in Asia, in northern Europe and the Caribbean in the coming years, as well as different ports in the Mediterranean. The World Travel & Tourism Council expects Spain's tourism revenues to reach nearly 100 billion euros this year, 11% above pre-pandemic 2019 levels. Meanwhile, the cruise industry forecasts a 5% increase in visitors in Spain during 2024, below the 13% increase in summer visitor arrivals projected by Spanish authorities.

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico — Puerto Rico's governor on Wednesday signed a law that prohibits discrimination against people wearing Afros, curls, locs, twists, braids and other hairstyles in the racially diverse U.S. territory. The move was celebrated by those who had long demanded explicit protection related to work, housing, education and public services. "It's a victory for generations to come," Welmo Romero Joseph, a community facilitator with the nonprofit Taller Salud, said in an interview. The organization is one of several that had been pushing for the law, with Romero noting it sends a strong message that "you can reach positions of power without having to change your identity." While Puerto Rico's laws and constitution protect against discrimination, along with Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, a precedent was set in 2016 when a U.S. Court of Appeals dismissed a discrimination lawsuit and ruled that an employer's no-dreadlock policy in Alabama did not violate Title VII. Earlier this year, legislators in the U.S. territory held a public hearing on the issue, with several Puerto Ricans sharing examples of how they were discriminated against, including job offers conditional on haircuts. It's a familiar story to Romero, who recalled how a high school principal ordered him to cut his flat top. "It was a source of pride," he said of that hairstyle. "I was a 4.0 student. What did that have to do with my hair?" With a population of 3.2 million, Puerto Rico has more than 1.6 million people who identify as being of two or more races, with nearly 230,000 identifying solely as Black, according to the U.S. Census. "Unfortunately, people identified as black or Afro descendant in Puerto Rico still face derogatory treatment, deprivation of opportunities, marginalization, exclusion and all kinds of discrimination," the law signed Wednesday states. While Romero praised the law, he warned that measures are needed to ensure it's followed. On the U.S. mainland, at least two dozen states have approved versions of the CROWN Act, which aims to ban race-based hair discrimination and stands for "Creating a Respectful and Open World for Natural Hair." Among those states is Texas, where a Black high school student was suspended after school officials said his dreadlocks fell below his eyebrows and ear lobes, violating the dress code. A March report from the Economic Policy Institute found that not all states have amended their education codes to protect public and private high school students, and that some states have allowed certain exceptions to the CROWN Act. A federal version was passed by the U.S. House of Representatives in 2022, but it failed in the Senate. In May, Democratic lawmakers reintroduced the legislation.

paris — They're often thought to have practically cornered the market on romance, yet they also can bicker and squabble as though they were Olympic sports. They practically wrote the book on fraternity, liberty and equality — words inscribed on their schools and town halls — but also recognize that those ideals aren't always applied to citizens of color. Les Français — the French, as the people of France call themselves — simply don't fit neatly into any one box. Now that they're hosting the Olympics, here's a look at some of the particularities that make the French, well, French:  The basics  France has one of Europe's most diverse populations, thanks to centuries of conquest and, in the last 200 years, immigration from Italy, Spain, eastern Europe and France's former colonies overseas. Although comic-strip hero Asterix the Gaul is something of a national icon, loved by generations of French readers for his feisty ingenuity and pluck, the ancient Gauls who populated much of what is now France more than two millennia ago — and whom some in France still call "our ancestors" — were followed by waves of others. Romans, Franks (from whom France got its name), Normans (who lent their name to what is now Normandy ) and more fought for the rich lands boxed in by the Mediterranean's waters and mountains of the Alps and Pyrenees in the south, the mighty Rhine river in the east, and seas to the west and north. Those natural barriers still largely delineate the borders of what is the largest territory in the European Union and its roughly six-sided shape — the reason the French often refer to their country as "the Hexagon." The national statistics agency, Insee, says France's population at the start of this Olympic year numbered 68.4 million. That includes the 2.2 million inhabitants of five formerly colonized territories in the Caribbean, South America and Indian Ocean that are administered as overseas regions of France — considered as French as Paris, the Olympic host city. By Insee's count, France has 2 million more women than men. But France has never had a female president and counts dozens of women killed in domestic violence each year. Of the 78 luminaries honored by being inducted in the Panthéon, the centuries-old Paris resting place for the good and great of France, just five are women. The first, scientist Marie Curie, wasn't added until 1995.  A colorblind rainbow nation  Officially, France is blind to the many colors of its inhabitants. Intending to treat all equally, the republic doesn't count citizens by race or religion. Some French people, especially those who are white, consider it racist to even discuss skin color. But people of color and human-rights watchdogs say France's ideal of colorblind universalism results in discrimination that goes unmeasured and unsolved. The problem has repeatedly boiled over into violent unrest, often in underprivileged parts of France with immigrant populations. Race bias and religious intolerance have contributed to a deep polarization of French politics. The anti-immigration, far-right National Rally party surged this year in elections marked by unusual violence. Its leaders have long targeted immigrants and their France-born children for supposedly failing to integrate.  A godless nation of many religions  After centuries of religious conflict, modern France is constitutionally secular, with church and state separated. Faiths are kept out of shared public spaces like schools, hospitals, courts and sports fields, where students, staff and players aren't allowed to wear ostentatious crosses, kippahs or Islamic head coverings. France won't allow its Olympians to wear headscarves at the Paris Games — a blanket ban that won't apply to athletes from other nations. But France also legally guarantees the right to believe — or to not believe — and to practice one's faith. Its religious architecture — from Paris' iconic Notre Dame Cathedral to modernist architect Le Corbusier's Chapel of Notre-Dame du Haut in Ronchamp, eastern France — is stunning in its variety, beauty and history. France has about 100,000 places of worship, including those that are no longer used, with the vast bulk of them built for the Catholic faith, according to the Observatory of Religious Patrimony, a preservation group. Quiet churches and busy mosques speak to a changing picture of faith and worship in France. A major and rare public study published by Insee last year, which questioned more than 27,000 adults aged 18-59, found interest in religion fading. Just over half of the respondents declared that they have no faith, a growing trend particularly pronounced among people born in France and without any immigrant backgrounds. Less than one-third identified as Catholic — still the largest single group of believers, although under 10% of them said they were regular churchgoers. Muslims were the second-largest group of believers, accounting for 10% of respondents.  Wine and food  Ah, the reds, whites and rosés! The French used to guzzle their wines without moderation. It wasn't until 1956 that the government barred children — under 14, that is — from being served alcohol in school canteens. But since the 1960s, when French drinkers were downing a woozy 130 or so liters (35 or so gallons) of wines each per year, plus many more liters of beer and cider, they have steadily sobered up, cutting their consumption by around three-quarters and drinking higher-quality wines than the rotgut that washed down older generations' meals, Insee data show. Food habits are changing, too. Schools play a key role in passing from generation to generation France's high regard for freshly cooked meals, with canteens typically offering a starter and a main course followed by a milk product (cheese, yogurt) and/or a dessert. The Agriculture Ministry says about 60% of students eat at their school canteens at least four times a week. Schools also offer tasting classes, and school canteens are obliged to offer at least one vegetarian menu per week. "Does your family pray before eating?" asks one joke about French eating habits. The punchline: "No, we are French, we know how to cook."  The French are just behind the Italians as the least overweight population in the European Union, according to the most recent figures from the EU's statistics agency, from 2019. It found that 47% of French adults were overweight, with a body mass index of 25 or above, compared with 46% of Italian adults.  But French people also have become fans of what they call "le fast food" — burgers, pizzas, kebabs and so forth. In the 45 years since McDonald's opened its first restaurant in France in 1979, the country has become one of its largest markets in Europe, with 1,560 eateries in cities and towns nationwide.

HONOLULU — A Hawaii judge has temporarily blocked the state from enforcing a law requiring the licensing of practitioners and teachers of traditional Native Hawaiian midwifery while a lawsuit seeking to overturn the statute wends its way through the courts. Lawmakers enacted the midwife licensure law, which asserted that the "improper practice of midwifery poses a significant risk of harm to the mother or newborn, and may result in death," in 2019. Violations are punishable by up to a year in jail, plus thousands of dollars in criminal and civil fines. The measure requires anyone who provides "assessment, monitoring, and care" during pregnancy, labor, childbirth and the postpartum period to be licensed. A group of women sued, arguing that a wide range of people, including midwives, doulas, lactation consultants and even family and friends of the new mother would be subject to penalties and criminal liability. Their complaint also said the law threatens the plaintiffs' ability to serve women who seek traditional Native Hawaiian births. Judge Shirley Kawamura issued a ruling late Tuesday afternoon barring the state from "enforcing, threatening to enforce or applying any penalties to those who practice, teach, and learn traditional Native Hawaiian healing practices of prenatal, maternal and child care." Plaintiffs testified during a four-day hearing last month that the law forces them to get licensed through costly out-of-state programs that don't align with Hawaiian culture. Ki'inaniokalani Kahoʻohanohano testified that a lack of Native Hawaiian midwives when she prepared to give birth for the first time in 2003 inspired her to eventually become one herself. She described how she spent years helping to deliver as many as three babies a month, receiving them in a traditional cloth made of woven bark and uttering sacred chants as she welcomed them into the world. The law constitutes a deprivation of Native Hawaiian customary rights, which are protected by the Hawaii constitution, Kawamura's ruling said, and the "public interest weighs heavily towards protecting Native Hawaiian customs and traditions that are at risk of extinction." The dispute is the latest in a long debate about how and whether Hawaii should regulate the practice of traditional healing arts that date to well before the islands became the 50th state in 1959. Those healing practices were banished or severely restricted for much of the 20th century, but the Hawaiian Indigenous rights movement of the 1970s renewed interest in them. The state eventually adopted a system under which councils versed in Native Hawaiian healing certify traditional practitioners, though the plaintiffs in the lawsuit say their efforts to form such a council for midwifery have failed. The judge also noted in her ruling that the preliminary injunction is granted until there is a council that can recognize traditional Hawaiian birthing practitioners. "This ruling means that traditional Native Hawaiian midwives can once again care for families, including those who choose home births, who can't travel long distances, or who don't feel safe or seen in other medical environments," plaintiff and midwife trainee Makalani Franco-Francis said in a statement Wednesday. "We are now free to use our own community wisdom to care for one another without fear of prosecution." She testified last month how she learned customary practices from Kahoʻohanohano, including cultural protocols for a placenta, such as burying it to connect a newborn to its ancestral lands. The judge found, however, that the state's regulation of midwifery more broadly speaking is "reasonably necessary to protect the health, safety, and welfare of mothers and their newborns." The ruling doesn't block the law as it pertains to unlicensed midwives who do not focus on Hawaiian birthing practices, said Hillary Schneller, an attorney with the Center for Reproductive Rights, which represents the women. "That is a gap that this order doesn't address." The case is expected to continue to trial to determine whether the law should be permanently blocked. The state attorney general's office said in an email Wednesday that it was still reviewing the decision.

GENEVA — The founder of the modern Olympics and former International Olympic Committee president Pierre de Coubertin once said women competing in the Games would be "impractical, uninteresting, unaesthetic and improper."  More than a century later, the 2024 Paris Olympic Games are targeting gender parity in the same city where women made their Olympic debut in 1900.  The IOC set a goal of a 50-50 split among the more than 11,000 men and women, including backups, registered to compete from July 26 to August 11. However, the latest numbers from the IOC suggest organizers might fall just short of that target.  More medals at stake for men There is still a slight edge toward men among the 329 medal events at the Paris Olympics. The IOC has said there are 157 men's events, 152 women's events and 20 mixed-gender events.  Of the 32 sports, 28 are " fully gender equal," the IOC said, including the new event of breaking to music. Rhythmic gymnastics is still for women only but men are allowed to compete in artistic swimming.  Mixed-gender team events were strongly pushed. In Tokyo three years ago, vivid images were created by debuts for 4x400 meters mixed relay on the track and 4x100 mixed medley relay in swimming.  "There is nothing more equal than a male and female competing as one team on the same field of play towards the same sports performance," the IOC's sports director, Kit McConnell, has said.  How many athletes entered to compete in Paris?  One week before the opening ceremony, the official IOC database for the Paris Olympics showed 11,215 athletes, including backups, registered to compete: 5,712 in men's events and 5,503 in women's events or a 51-49% split.  In track and field, which has qualifying standards the athletes much reach, there were 50 more registered for the men's events than women's: 1,091-1,041. In swimming, the difference was 464-393.  In soccer, with 16 teams in the men's tournament and just 12 in the women's, the athlete tally was 351-264. The wrestling entry has 193 men and 96 women, with a men-only category in Greco-Roman.  In equestrian, where men and women compete in the same events, entries were 154-96.  No men were registered in artistic swimming or rhythmic gymnastics, which have a total of 200 women. There's no men's category in rhythmic gymnastics.  Which teams have more athletes in women's events?  As the biggest team at the Paris Olympics, the United States has the most competitors in women's events with 338, or 53% of its 638-strong delegation, according to the IOC's games database this week.  The 38 fewer men is partly because the U.S. qualified a squad of 19 in women's field hockey but didn't qualify in the men's competition, and registered nine women in artistic swimming.  France, with invitations to compete in every team event, had 293 female athletes registered. Australia had 276, China 259 and Germany 239.  Other teams, albeit with many fewer athletes, have more women on their squads.  Guam, a U.S. island territory east of the Philippines, led the way with 87.5% women — seven in its team of eight athletes, according to the IOC database. Guam's seven women are in six different sports. Nicaragua is set to arrive with 86% women — six of its seven athletes — and Sierra Leone with 80%.  Kosovo's strength in women's judo — four of its total team of nine athletes — lifts its percentage of women to 77%. North Korea, Laos and Vietnam each has 75% female athletes on their teams.  Which teams have the fewest women?  Six of the 205 official Olympic teams had no elite-level female athlete registered to compete: Belize, Guinea-Bissau, Iraq, Liechtenstein, Nauru and Somalia.  Qatar, which wants to host the 2036 Olympics, has just one woman in its 14-athlete team or 7%. Half the Qatari team represents men's track and field, including the defending champion in high jump Mutaz Essa Barshim.  Mali and South Sudan are at 7%. Mali will send 22 male soccer players and South Sudan 12 athletes in men's basketball.  El Salvador has one woman among eight athletes (12.5%).  Two nonbinary athletes competing  The registered entries to women's events in Paris include two athletes who identify as nonbinary and transgender.  Nikki Hiltz won the 1,500 meters event at the U.S. track and field trials last month and will make their Olympic debut at Stade de France.  Quinn won Olympic gold with the Canadian soccer team in Tokyo three years ago and returns to help defend the title.  When did women first compete in Olympics?  Paris hosted the first female athletes at the 1900 Olympics — in the second modern Games — with 22 of the 997 athletes in competition, or 2.2% of the total. The modern Olympics began in 1896 in Athens.  Women competed in tennis and golf, plus team events of sailing, croquet and equestrian in Paris.  Charlotte Cooper of Britain was the first female individual gold medalist in tennis singles.  Gender parity over the decades  Just 4.4% of the athletes were women when Paris again hosted the Olympics 100 years ago. In 1924 — the games that the movie "Chariots of Fire" centered on — there were 135 women competing among 3,089 athletes, according to the IOC's research.  The number rose to 9.5% at the 1932 Los Angeles Olympics, dropped to 8.4% in Berlin four years later, and got back to 9.5% when the Summer Games were held in London in 1948.  The rise included a bump to 20.7% female athletes in Montreal in 1976 and got close to 23% when the Games returned to Los Angeles in 1984. That's when rhythmic gymnastics and artistic swimming, then called synchronized, made their debuts.  The IOC put pressure on Olympic teams that traditionally sent only men to complete. Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Brunei included women for the first time at the 2012 London Olympics. That's where 44.2% of the athletes competed in women's events at the Olympics. The number rose to 45% in Rio 2016 and reached 48% at the Tokyo Games, where teams were encouraged to select a man and a woman to be flag-bearers at the opening ceremony.  How did we get here?  The IOC formally committed to "foster gender quality" as part of a package of wide-ranging reforms pushed in December 2014 by the recently-elected president Thomas Bach.  The IOC's sports department worked with the sports' governing bodies to remove some men's medal events and add more for women. The federations have since achieved more equity on the field of play for female athletes than for women in their own offices.  A 2020 review of the 31 sports governing bodies at the Tokyo Olympics found only one achieved 40% women on its board and 18 had female representation of 25% or less. 

ABUJA, Nigeria — As the sun blazes down in Abuja, Ahmed Bukar turns on his home air conditioner to a blast of hot air. The cooling gas that the appliance runs on is leaking from the charging valve on the unit. A technician had recently helped him refill the air conditioner with gas, but he didn't test for possible leaks.  In Abuja and across Nigeria, air conditioners sprout from the walls as the appliance turns from a middle-class luxury into a necessity in an increasingly hot climate. The industry is governed by regulations prohibiting the release of cooling gases into the air - for example, by conducting leak tests after an appliance is fixed. Still, routine release of gases into the atmosphere because of shoddy installations, unsafe disposal at the end of use, or the addition of gas without testing for leaks is a common problem in Nigeria, though unlawful.  The cooling gases, or refrigerants, have hundreds to thousands of times the climate warming potency of carbon dioxide, and the worst of them also harm the ozone layer. Following global agreements that promised to limit these gases from being spewed into the air, like the Montreal Protocol and Kigali Amendments, Nigeria has enacted regulations guiding the use of these gases. But enforcement is a problem, threatening Nigeria's commitments to slash emissions.  "Those laws, those rules, nobody enforces them," said Abiodun Ajeigbe, a manager for the air-conditioning business at Samsung in West Africa. "I have not seen any enforcement."  'I was not taught'  The weak regulatory system for the cooling industry in Nigeria is evident in the rampant lack of proper training and awareness of environmental harm caused by refrigerants among technicians, according to Ajeigbe. And it is common to see.  After uninstalling an air conditioner for a client who was moving to another neighborhood, Cyprian Braimoh, a technician in Abuja's Karu district, casually frittered the gas from the unit into the air, preparing it to be refilled with fresh gas at the client's new location.  If he followed the country's regulations, he would collect the gas into a canister, preventing or minimizing the gas's environmental harm. Technicians like Braimoh and those who serviced Bukar's appliance without testing for leaks are self-employed and unsupervised. But they often get customers because they offer cheaper services.  "I was not taught that; I only release it into the air," said Braimoh, who originally specialized in electrical wiring of buildings before fixing air conditioners to increase his income options. He received patchy training that did not include the required safety standards for handling refrigerants. And he still did not conduct a leak test after installing the air conditioning unit at his client's new location, which is required by the country's cooling industry regulations.  Installations done by well-trained technicians who follow environmental regulations can be costlier for customers. It's often the case in Nigeria, where hiring the services of companies like Daibau, who later helped Bukar fix his leaks, could result in higher costs.  Manufacturers who offer direct refrigeration and air-conditioning installation services to big commercial customers have tried to self-regulate with safety training and certifications for their technicians, Ajeigbe said.  Potent greenhouse gases  According to industry professionals and public records, the most common air conditioners in Africa still use what's known as R-22 gas. This refrigerant is less harmful to the ozone layer compared to the older, even more damaging coolants called chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs). CFCs have been largely eliminated, thanks to the 1987 Montreal Protocol, which was created to protect the ozone layer, the vital shield in the atmosphere that protects against cancer-causing ultraviolet rays.  But R-22 is 1,810 times more damaging to the climate than carbon dioxide, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Just one pound of the coolant is nearly as potent as a ton of carbon dioxide, the most common greenhouse gas, but while CO2 can stay in the atmosphere for over 200 years, R-22 stays in the atmosphere for around 12 years. R-22 air conditioners also have low energy efficiency and most of the electricity powering them in Africa is from fossil fuels.  Nigeria plans to phase out the R-22 refrigerant by January 1, 2030. But with lax enforcement, meeting the phaseout target is in doubt, Ajeigbe said.  Newer air conditioners that use a family of gases called hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) don't harm the ozone and consume less electricity. But HFCs are still potent greenhouse gases and account for around 2% of all human-caused warming in the atmosphere.  One HFC, R-410A, which is still a common refrigerant in Europe and the United States, has a warming potential 2,088 times greater than that of carbon dioxide and lasts roughly 30 years in the atmosphere. Air conditioners running on it are the next most common in Africa.  Another HFC, R-32, is 675 times more potent than CO2, lasts about five years in the atmosphere, and is more energy-efficient. But it is just "marginally" in the African market, Ajeigbe said.  Air conditioners running on HFCs are more expensive, meaning they're less popular than the more polluting ones, according to sellers and technicians in Abuja and Lagos.  A wider problem  It's not just Nigeria. In Ghana, the cooling industry also struggles to get technicians to comply with environmental standards.  According to the Environmental Protection Agency, "poor servicing practices prevalent" in the country are largely driven by consumers, who choose low-trained technicians on price considerations and neglect recommended standards.  In Kenya, the demand for cooling systems is growing as temperatures warm, the population grows and electricity access expands. Air conditioners running on R-22 are still very common in Kenya, but the National Environmental Management Authority told The Associated Press there have not been new imports since 2021, in line with 2020 regulations.  The regulations require technicians handling refrigerants and cooling appliances to obtain a license, but that is not enforced, technicians told AP, leaving space for environmentally unsafe practices.  "You just need to be well-trained and start installations. It's a very simple industry for us who are making a living in it," said Nairobi-based technician Jeremiah Musyoka.  One cooling gas that's energy-efficient and less harmful to the atmosphere, R-290, is slowly gaining traction as an alternative for refrigeration and air conditioning in developed markets like the European Union. The demand for efficient heat pumps is rapidly expanding in the EU, but adoption in Africa remains insignificant because of cost barriers and limited awareness.  Countries like Nigeria, Ghana and Kenya have also identified R-290 as the product that will ultimately replace HFCs, but models using it are not commercially available. And they still have to worry about specialized training for technicians because of R-290's high flammability.  "It worries me there is not enough training and existing regulations are not enforced," Ajeigbe, manager at Samsung, said. But he said enforcing the import ban on banned gases and the appliances that use them would make a difference.  Anastasia Akhigbe, a senior regulatory official at Nigeria's National Environmental Standards and Regulations Agency, added that increasing awareness among appliance importers, technicians and consumers about the environmental impacts of certain refrigerants would also help.  "Enforcement is a known challenge, but we are moving gradually," Akhigbe said.

TOKYO — Depending on whom you ask, the bones that have been sitting in a Tokyo repository for decades could be either leftovers from early 20th-century anatomy classes, or the unburied and unidentified victims of one of the country's most notorious war crimes.  Activists, historians and other experts who want the government to investigate links to wartime human germ warfare experiments met last weekend to mark the 35th anniversary of their discovery and renew a call for an independent panel to examine the evidence.  Japan's government has long avoided discussing wartime atrocities, including the sexual abuse of Asian women known as "comfort women" and Korean forced laborers at Japanese mines and factories, often on grounds of lack of documentary proof. Japan has apologized for its aggression in Asia, but since the 2010s it has been repeatedly criticized in South Korea and China for backpedaling.  Around a dozen skulls, many with cuts, and other parts of skeletons were unearthed on July 22, 1989, during construction of a Health Ministry research institute at the site of the wartime Army Medical School. The school's close ties to a germ and biological warfare unit led many to suspect that they could be the remains of a dark history that the Japanese government has never officially acknowledged.  Headquartered in then-Japanese-controlled northeast China, Unit 731 and several related units injected prisoners of war with typhus, cholera and other diseases, according to historians and former unit members. They also say the unit performed unnecessary amputations and organ removals on living people to practice surgery and froze prisoners to death in endurance tests. Japan's government has acknowledged only that Unit 731 existed.  No trials for leaders Top Unit 731 officials were not tried in postwar tribunals as the U.S. sought to get hold of chemical warfare data, historians say, although lower-ranked officials were tried by Soviet tribunals. Some of the unit's leaders became medical professors and pharmaceutical executives after the war.  A previous Health Ministry investigation said the bones couldn't be linked to the unit, and concluded that the remains were most likely from bodies used in medical education or brought back from war zones for analysis, in a 2001 report based on questioning 290 people associated with the school.  It acknowledged that some interviewees drew connections to Unit 731. One said he saw a head in a barrel shipped from Manchuria, northern China, where the unit was based. Two others noted hearing about specimens from the unit being stored in a school building, but had not actually seen them. Others denied the link, saying the specimens could include those from the prewar era.  A 1992 anthropological analysis found that the bones came from at least 62 and possibly more than 100 different bodies, mostly adults from parts of Asia outside Japan. The holes and cuts found on some skulls were made after death, it said, but it did not find evidence linking the bones to Unit 731.  But activists say that the government could do more to uncover the truth, including publishing full accounts of its interviews and conducting DNA testing.  Kazuyuki Kawamura, a former Shinjuku district assembly member who has devoted most of his career to resolving the bone mystery, recently obtained 400 pages of research materials from the 2001 report using freedom of information requests, and said it shows that the government "tactfully excluded" key information from witness accounts.  Vivid descriptions The newly published material doesn't contain a smoking gun, but it includes vivid descriptions — the man who described seeing a head in a barrel also described helping to handle it and then running off to vomit — and comments from several witnesses who suggested that more forensic investigation might show a link to Unit 731.  "Our goal is to identify the bones and send them back to their families," said Kawamura. The bones are virtually the only proof of what happened, he said. "We just want to find the truth."  Health Ministry official Atsushi Akiyama said that witness accounts had already been analyzed and factored into the 2001 report, and the government's position remains unchanged. A key missing link is documentary evidence, such as a label on a specimen container or official records, he said.  Documents, especially those involving Japan's wartime atrocities, were carefully destroyed in the war's closing days, and finding new evidence for a proof would be difficult.  Akiyama added that a lack of information about the bones would make DNA analysis difficult.  Disturbing memory Hideo Shimizu, who was sent to Unit 731 in April 1945 at age 14 as lab technician and joined the meeting online from his home in Nagano, said he remembers seeing heads and body parts in formalin jars stored in a specimen room in the unit's main building. One that struck him most was a dissected belly with a fetus inside. He was told they were "maruta" — logs — a term used for prisoners chosen for experiments.  Days before Japan's August 15, 1945, surrender, Shimizu was ordered to collect bones of prisoners' bodies burned in a pit. He was then given a pistol and a packet of cyanide to kill himself if he was caught on his journey back to Japan.  He was ordered never to tell anyone about his Unit 731 experience, never contact his colleagues, and never seek a government or medical job.  Shimizu said that he could not tell if any specimen he saw at 731 could be among the Shinjuku bones by looking at their photos, but that what he saw in Harbin should never be repeated. When he sees his great-grandchildren, he said, they remind him of that fetus he saw and the lives lost.  "I want younger people to understand the tragedy of war," he said.

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SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA — The International Olympic Committee apologized Saturday for a gaffe during the opening ceremony of the Paris Olympics in which South Korean athletes were incorrectly introduced as North Korean. As the South Korean delegation sailed down the Seine River in the French capital, they were introduced with the official name for North Korea: "Republique populaire democratique de Coree" in French, then "Democratic People's Republic of Korea" in English. "We deeply apologize for the mistake that occurred when introducing the South Korean team during the broadcast of the opening ceremony," the IOC said in a post on its official Korean-language X account. The error sparked displeased reactions in South Korea, a global cultural and technological powerhouse that is technically still at war with the nuclear-armed and impoverished North. South Korea's sports ministry said in a statement it "expresses regret" over the "announcement during the opening ceremony of the 2024 Paris Olympics, where the South Korean delegation was introduced as the North Korean team." Second vice sports minister Jang Mi-ran, a 2008 Olympic weightlifting champion, has asked for a meeting with IOC chief Thomas Bach to discuss the matter, it added. The sports ministry has also asked the foreign ministry to "deliver a strong protest to the French side" over the issue, the statement said. South Korea's National Olympic Committee plans to meet with the Paris Olympics Organizing Committee and the IOC to voice their protest, request measures to prevent a recurrence, and send an official letter of protest under the name of the head of its delegation, the sports ministry said. North Korea was correctly introduced with the country's official name. Relations between the two Koreas are at one of their lowest points in years, with the North bolstering military ties with Russia while sending thousands of trash-carrying balloons to the South. In response, Seoul's military blasts K-pop and anti-regime messages from border loudspeakers and recently resumed live-fire drills on border islands and near the demilitarized zone that divides the Korean peninsula.

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WASHINGTON — In a fresh broadside against one of the world's most popular technology companies, the Justice Department late Friday accused TikTok of harnessing the capability to gather bulk information on users based on views on divisive social issues like gun control, abortion and religion. Government lawyers wrote in a brief filed to the federal appeals court in Washington that TikTok and its Beijing-based parent company ByteDance used an internal web-suite system called Lark to enable TikTok employees to speak directly with ByteDance engineers in China. TikTok employees used Lark to send sensitive data about U.S. users, information that has wound up being stored on Chinese servers and accessible to ByteDance employees in China, federal officials said. One of Lark's internal search tools, the filing states, permits ByteDance and TikTok employees in the U.S. and China to gather information on users' content or expressions, including views on sensitive topics, such as abortion or religion. Last year, The Wall Street Journal reported TikTok had tracked users who watched LGBTQ content through a dashboard the company said it had since deleted. The new court documents represent the government's first major defense in a consequential legal battle over the future of the popular social media platform, which is used by more than 170 million Americans. Under a law signed by President Joe Biden in April, the company could face a ban in a few months if it doesn't break ties with ByteDance. The measure was passed with bipartisan support after lawmakers and administration officials expressed concerns that Chinese authorities could force ByteDance to hand over U.S. user data or sway public opinion towards Beijing's interests by manipulating the algorithm that populates users' feeds. The Justice Department warned, in stark terms, of the potential for what it called "covert content manipulation" by the Chinese government, saying the algorithm could be designed to shape content that users receive. "By directing ByteDance or TikTok to covertly manipulate that algorithm; China could for example further its existing malign influence operations and amplify its efforts to undermine trust in our democracy and exacerbate social divisions," the brief states. The concern, they said, is more than theoretical, alleging that TikTok and ByteDance employees are known to engage in a practice called "heating" in which certain videos are promoted in order to receive a certain number of views. While this capability enables TikTok to curate popular content and disseminate it more widely, U.S. officials posit it can also be used for nefarious purposes. Justice Department officials are asking the court to allow a classified version of its legal brief, which won't be accessible to the two companies. Nothing in the redacted brief "changes the fact that the Constitution is on our side," TikTok spokesperson Alex Haurek said in a statement. "The TikTok ban would silence 170 million Americans' voices, violating the 1st Amendment," Haurek said. "As we've said before, the government has never put forth proof of its claims, including when Congress passed this unconstitutional law. Today, once again, the government is taking this unprecedented step while hiding behind secret information. We remain confident we will prevail in court." In the redacted version of the court documents, the Justice Department said another tool triggered the suppression of content based on the use of certain words. Certain policies of the tool applied to ByteDance users in China, where the company operates a similar app called Douyin that follows Beijing's strict censorship rules. But Justice Department officials said other policies may have been applied to TikTok users outside of China. TikTok was investigating the existence of these policies and whether they had ever been used in the U.S. in, or around, 2022, officials said. The government points to the Lark data transfers to explain why federal officials do not believe that Project Texas, TikTok's $1.5 billion mitigation plan to store U.S. user data on servers owned and maintained by the tech giant Oracle, is sufficient to guard against national security concerns. In its legal challenge against the law, TikTok has heavily leaned on arguments that the potential ban violates the First Amendment because it bars the app from continued speech unless it attracts a new owner through a complex divestment process. It has also argued divestment would change the speech on the platform because a new social platform would lack the algorithm that has driven its success. In its response, the Justice Department argued TikTok has not raised any valid free speech claims, saying the law addresses national security concerns without targeting protected speech, and argues that China and ByteDance, as foreign entities, aren't shielded by the First Amendment. TikTok has also argued the U.S. law discriminates on viewpoints, citing statements from some lawmakers critical of what they viewed as an anti-Israel tilt on the platform during its war in Gaza. Justice Department officials disputes that argument, saying the law at issue reflects their ongoing concern that China could weaponize technology against U.S. national security, a fear they say is made worse by demands that companies under Beijing's control turn over sensitive data to the government. They say TikTok, under its current operating structure, is required to be responsive to those demands. Oral arguments in the case is scheduled for September. 

Give us 5 minutes, and we'll give you the world. Around the clock, Voice of America keeps you in touch with the latest news. We bring you reports from our correspondents and interviews with newsmakers from across the world.

Give us 5 minutes, and we'll give you the world. Around the clock, Voice of America keeps you in touch with the latest news. We bring you reports from our correspondents and interviews with newsmakers from across the world.

Give us 5 minutes, and we'll give you the world. Around the clock, Voice of America keeps you in touch with the latest news. We bring you reports from our correspondents and interviews with newsmakers from across the world.

Give us 5 minutes, and we'll give you the world. Around the clock, Voice of America keeps you in touch with the latest news. We bring you reports from our correspondents and interviews with newsmakers from across the world.