Battle of Leuctra

The Battle of Leuctra (, "Leûktra") was a battle fought on 6 July 371 BC between the Boeotians led by the Thebans, and the Spartans along with their allies amidst the post-Corinthian War conflict. The battle took place in the neighbourhood of Leuctra, a village in Boeotia in the territory of Thespiae. The Theban victory shattered Sparta's immense influence over the Greek peninsula, which Sparta had gained long before its victory in the Peloponnesian War a generation earlier.
Prelude.
In 371 BC, the newly established democracy of Thebes had elected four Boeotarchs, the traditional title of the generals of the Boeotian League, and so proclaimed their intention of reconstituting the aforementioned league that Sparta had disbanded. During this period, Thebes had an ally in Athens, but Athens was far from happy with the treatment Plataea had received. When it came to swearing an oath to respect the treaty, Sparta swore on behalf of itself and its allies. When Epaminondas came forward, asking to swear on behalf of the whole Boeotian League, the Spartans refused, saying he could swear as the representative of Thebes or not at all. This Epaminondas refused. (According to Xenophon, the Thebans signed as "the Thebans", and asked the next day to change their signature to "the Boeotians", but one of the Spartan kings, Agesilaus II, would not allow it.) In this, Sparta saw an opportunity to reassert its shaky authority in central Greece. Hence, the other Spartan king, Cleombrotus I, marched to war from Phocis.
Rather than take the expected easier route into Boeotia through the usual defile, the Spartans marched over the hills via Thisbae and took the fortress of Creusis (along with twelve Theban warships) before the Thebans were aware of their presence, and then proceeded to Leuctra where they were confronted by the Boeotian army. Initially, the six Boeotian generals (i.e. the Boeotarchs) present were divided as to whether to offer battle, with Epaminondas being the main advocate in favor of battle. Only when a seventh arrived, who sided with Epaminondas, was the decision made. In spite of inferior numbers and the doubtful loyalty of their allies, the Boeotians would offer battle on the plain before the town.
The size of the armies.
Several ancient writers give figures for one or both of the armies, but, unfortunately, they are contradictory and, in some cases, unbelievable. Modern scholars' estimates have varied from 6,000 to 9,000 for the Boeotian force. For the Spartan side, most modern scholars favor Plutarch's figure of 10,000 in infantry and 1,000 cavalry.
Battle.
The battle opened with the Spartans' mercenary peltasts (slingers, javeliniers, and/or skirmishers) attacking and driving back the Boeotian camp followers and others who were reluctant to fight. According to Xenophon, the Boeotian camp followers were trying to leave the field, as they did not intend to fight; this Spartan action drove them back into the Theban army, inadvertently making the Theban force stronger. There followed a cavalry engagement, in which the Thebans drove their enemies off the field. Initially, the Spartan infantry were sent into disarray when their retreating cavalry hopelessly disrupted Cleombrotus's attempt to outflank the Theban left column. At this point the Theban left hit the Spartan right with the Sacred Band of Thebes, led by Pelopidas, at its head. The decisive engagement was then fought out between the Theban and Spartan infantry.
The normal practice of the Spartans (and, indeed, the Greeks in general) was to establish their heavily armed infantry in a solid mass, or phalanx, some eight to twelve men deep. This was considered to allow for the best balance between depth (the pushing power it provided) and width (i.e., area of coverage of the phalanx's front battle line). The infantry would advance together so that the attack flowed unbroken against their enemy. In order to combat the phalanx's famous right-hand drift, Greek commanders traditionally placed their most experienced, highly regarded and, generally, deadliest troops on the right wing, as this was the place of honor. By contrast, the shakiest and/or least influential troops were often placed on the left wing. In the Spartan battleplan, therefore, the hippeis (an elite force numbering 300 men) and the king of Sparta would stand on the right wing of the phalanx.
In a major break with tradition, Epaminondas massed his cavalry and a fifty-deep column of Theban infantry on his left wing, and sent forward this body against the Spartan right. His shallower and weaker center and right wing columns were drawn up so that they were progressively further to the right and rear of the proceeding column, in an Echelon formation. The Theban center and right were held back, screened by skirmishers and cavalry. The infantry engaged, and the Thebans smashed the Spartan right wing. The Spartans' twelve-deep formation on their right wing could not sustain the heavy impact of their opponents' 50-deep column. The Spartan right was hurled back with a loss of about 1,000 men, of whom 400 were some of Sparta's most experienced soldiers, including King Cleombrotus I.
Wilhelm Rüstow and Hermann Köchly, writing in the 19th century, believed that Pelopidas led the Sacred Band out from the column to attack the Spartans in the flank. Hans Delbrück considered this to be a mere misreading of Plutarch. Plutarch does indeed describe Pelopidas leading the Band and catching the Spartans in disorder, but there is nothing in his account that conveys anything other than the Sacred Band being the head of the column, and the Spartans were disordered not because they were taken in the flank but because they were caught in mid-maneuver, extending their line.
Seeing their right wing beaten, the rest of the Peloponnesians, who were essentially unwilling participants, retired and left the enemy in possession of the field.
Aftermath.
The arrival of a Thessalian army under Jason of Pherae persuaded a relieving Spartan force under Archidamus not to heap folly on folly and to withdraw instead, while the Thebans were persuaded not to continue the attack on the surviving Spartans. The Thebans somewhat bent the rules by insisting on conditions under which the Spartans and allies recovered the dead and by erecting a permanent rather than perishable trophy - something that was criticized by later writers.
Historical significance.
The battle is of great significance in Greek history.
The use of these tactics by Epaminondas was, perhaps, a direct result of the use of some similar maneuvers by Pagondas, his countryman, during the
Battle of Delium. Further, Philip II of Macedon, who studied and lived in Thebes, was no doubt heavily influenced by the battle to develop his own, highly effective approach to tactics and armament. In turn, his son, Alexander, would go on to develop his father's theories to an entirely new level. Many innovations of Philip and Alexander are traced to this battle. Concentration of force, refused flank, and combined arms were tactics that they used in many of their battles. Philip's victories against the Illyrians and at Chaeronea and Alexander's triumphs at the Granicus, Issus, Gaugamela, and the Hydaspes owe credit to the tactical maneuver used to vanquish the Spartans.
Historians Victor Davis Hanson and Donald Kagan have argued that Epaminondas' oblique formation was not an intentional and preconceived innovation in infantry tactics, but was rather a clever response to circumstances. Because Epaminondas had stacked his left wing to a depth of fifty shields, the rest of his units were naturally left with far fewer troops than normal. This means that their maintenance of a depth of eight to twelve shields had to come at the expense of either number of companies or their width. Because Epaminondas was already outnumbered, he had no choice but to form fewer companies and march them diagonally toward the much longer Spartan line in order to engage as much of it as possible. Hanson and Kagan's argument is therefore that the tactic was more dilatory than anything else. Whatever its motivation, the fact remains that the tactic did represent an innovation and was undoubtedly highly effective.
The battle's political effects were far-reaching: the losses in material strength and prestige (prestige being an inestimably important factor in the Peloponnesian War) sustained by the Spartans at Leuctra and subsequently at the Battle of Mantinea were key in depriving them forever of their supremacy in Greece. Therefore, the battle permanently altered the Greek balance of power, as Sparta was deprived of its former prominence and was reduced to a second-rate power among the Greek city-states.
Theban supremacy in Greece was short-lived, as it was subsequently lost to the Macedonians, led by Philip II.
In popular culture.
The battle is fictionalized, though in some detail, in David Gemmell's book, "Lion of Macedon", which includes the significant deviation from historical canon in that it is credited to a young Parmenio(n) instead of Epaminondas, who serves merely to gain permission to carry out the echelon tactic. The battle is also the subject of Victor Davis Hanson's 2011 historical fiction novel, "The End of Sparta". The battle was also featured in an episode of the BBC's "Time Commanders". It was also featured in the historical fiction graphic novel "Serpent and Prey", which takes few creative liberties with the battle's portrayal.
References.
Notes
Bibliography


Fu Zuoyi

Fu Zuoyi () (June 2, 1895 − April 19, 1974) was a Chinese military leader. He began his military career in the service of Yan Xishan, and he was widely praised for his defense of Suiyuan from the Japanese. During the final stages of the Chinese Civil War, Fu surrendered the large and strategic garrison around Beiping to Communist forces. He later served in the government of the People's Republic of China as Minister of the Hydraulic Ministry.
Biography.
Early military career.
Fu began his career as an officer in Yan Xishan's Shanxi army. He served with distinction during the 1927–1928 Northern Expedition, after Yan declared his allegiance to the Kuomintang. Fu fought for Yan in the 1929–1930 Central Plains War, when Yan attempted to form a central government with himself as president. Yan's forces were easily routed by the forces of Chiang Kai-shek, and Yan was forced to live for a short period in exile.
Defense of Suiyuan.
After Yan returned to Shanxi in 1931, Fu led Yan Xishan's efforts to "colonize" and take control over the Inner Mongolian province of Suiyuan. Most of the work and settlement of Suiyuan at this time was done by Shanxi farmer-soldiers under Fu's direction. The activities of Fu's farmer-soldiers included mining Suiyuan's iron deposits (24% of all in China) and bringing over of farmland under cultivation for the first time. Fu cultivated a close relationship with Zhang Xueliang in order to increase the legitimacy of Yan's control over Suiyuan.
In March 1936, Manchukuo troops occupying Chahar invaded northeastern Suiyuan, contesting Fu's control. These Japanese-aligned troops seized the city of Bailingmiao in northern Suiyuan, where the pro-Japanese Inner Mongolian Autonomous Political Council maintained its headquarters. Three months later, the head of the Political Council, Prince Teh (Demchugdongrub) declared that he was the ruler of an independent Mongolia (Mengguguo), and organized an army with the aid of Japanese equipment and training. In August 1936 Prince Teh's army attempted to invade eastern Suiyuan, but it was defeated by Yan's forces under the command of Fu Zuoyi. Following this defeat, Prince Teh planned another invasion while Japanese agents carefully sketched and photographed Suiyuan's defenses.
In November 1936 the army of Prince Teh presented Fu Zuoyi with an ultimatum to surrender. When Fu responded that Prince Teh was merely a puppet of "certain quarters" and requested that Teh submit to the authority of the central government, Prince Teh's armies launched another, more ambitious attack. Teh's 15,000 soldiers were armed with Japanese weapons, supported by Japanese aircraft, and often led by Japanese officers. (Japanese soldiers fighting for Mengguguo were often executed by Fu after their capture as illegal combatants, since Mengguguo was not recognized as being part of Japan).
In anticipation of the Second Sino-Japanese War, Japanese spies destroyed a large supply depot in Datong and carried out other acts of sabotage. In order to defend Suiyuan, Yan placed his best troops and most able generals, including Zhao Chengshou and Yan's son-in-law, Wang Jingguo, under Fu's command. During the month of fighting that ensued, the army of Mengguguo suffered severe casualties. Fu's forces succeeded in occupying Bailingmiao on November 24, 1936, and was considering invading Chahar before he was warned by the Kwangtung Army that doing so would provoke an attack by the Japanese Army. Prince Teh's forces repeatedly attempted to retake Bailingmiao, but this only provoked Fu into sending troops north, where he successfully seized the last of Teh's bases in Suiyuan and virtually annihilated his army. After Japanese were found to be aiding Teh, Yan publicly accused Japan of aiding the invaders. Fu's victories in Suiyuan over Japanese-backed forces were praised by Chinese newspapers and magazines, other warlords and political leaders, and many students and members of the Chinese public. Fu's victories in Suiyuan greatly increased his prestige, and the prestige of Yan Xishan.
Defense against the Communists and Japanese.
During the Second Sino-Japanese War, Fu held numerous commands in North China. As Commander of 7th Army Group he fought in Operation Chahar, the Battle of Taiyuan and the 1939–1940 Winter Offensive, in which he was responsible for winning the Battle of Wuyuan. Fu ended the war as Commander of the 12th War Area, comprising Jehol, Chahar, and Suiyuan.
During the Chinese Civil War, Fu's forces (500,000 men) controlled the critically important Suiyuan-Peiping Corridor that separated Manchuria from China proper. After the Communists captured the Manchurian provinces in late 1948, Communists infiltrated Fu's inner circle and pressured Fu to negotiate a peaceful solution for the inevitable Communist take over. At the same time, Fu became increasingly disillusioned with Chiang. Fu's personal estrangement from Chiang reaching a climax in October 1948, when Chiang suddenly withdrew from a critical meeting on the defense of territory under Fu's command without giving any immediate explanation.
The circumstances for Chiang's sudden departure were not discovered until later. Sometime earlier Chiang's son, Chiang Ching-kuo, had arrested and refused to release his cousin, Kung Ling-kan (孔令侃), as part of a broader effort to punish economic and financial criminals. Realizing that her nephew could be executed for his crimes, and that Chiang Ching-kuo was highly likely to execute Kong to set an example, Soong Mei-ling begged her husband Chiang Kai-shek to fly immediately to Shanghai to rescue Kung. Chiang Kai-shek agreed to save Kong, and left in the middle of the most important stage of defensive planning. Chiang's sudden departure was a great blow to Nationalist morale and left an impression on Fu and many other Nationalist commanders that Chiang had placed the welfare of his family above the welfare of the nation.
Communist agents active within Fu's inner circle included Fu's own daughter, (傅冬菊), and Fu's most trusted personal secretary, Major General (閻又文), who was from the same hometown as Fu (Ronghe, in Yuncheng). Fu Dongju, Yan Youwen, and other agents pressured Fu to surrender and repeatedly passed vital intelligence to the Communists. Fu began secret negotiations with Lin Biao, in which he arranged the surrender of the Beiping garrison, totaling a quarter of a million men, on January 31, 1949. Yan Youwen acted as Fu's representative during Fu's communication with Lin, but Fu did not know the true allegiance of Yan until after the establishment of the People's Republic of China.
Life in Communist China.
Fu’s contributions to the Communist Party of China's success were rewarded with high posts, including the Minister of Hydraulics, which he kept until 1972, as well as posts in the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference. During the Cultural Revolution (1966–1975) Fu was part of a list of people drafted by Zhou Enlai and approved by Mao to be protected, and was moved to Jingxi Hotel for safeguarding. Fu's daughter, Fu Dong was not impacted by the upheaval as well.
In 1982, Fu Dong became assistant chief editor of Xinhua News Agency's Hong Kong branch. She retired in 1995. She died in 2007.


Hedong Commandery

Hedong Commandery () was a historical region in the Qin and Han dynasties of ancient China.
Hedong was located to the east of the Yellow River in Shanxi (around present-day Yuncheng).
History.
Hedong Commandery was established by the Qin state during the Warring States Period. Its seat was Anyi, the former capital of Wei. During the Western Han dynasty, It administered 24 counties: Anyi (安邑), Dayang (大陽), Yishi (猗氏), Xie (解), Puban (蒲反), Hebei (河北), Zuoyi (左邑), Fenyin (汾陰), Wenxi (聞喜), Huoze (濩澤), Duanshi (端氏), Linfen (臨汾), Yuan (垣), Pishi (皮氏), Changxiu (長脩), Pingyang (平陽), Xiangling (襄陵), Zhi (彘), Yang (楊), Beiqu (北屈), Puzi (蒲子), Jiang (絳), Hunie (狐讘) and Qi (騏). In 2 AD, the commandery had a population of 962,912, in 236,896 households.
During the Cao Wei dynasty, a separate Pingyang Commandery was formed from several counties of Hedong. In early Jin dynasty, Hedong administered nine counties, including Anyi, Wenxi, Yuan, Fenyang, Dayang, Yishi, Xie, Puban and Hebei. In the Northern dynasties, part of the commandery was separated to form the new Hebei Commandery, and several counties became part of other commanderies.
In 583, the commandery was merged into Pu Prefecture (蒲州). Later, Hedong Commandery would become an alternative name of Pu. In 742, the population was 469,213, in 70,800 households.


Political riots


Boris Berman (chekist)

Boris Davidovich Berman (; 15 May 1901 22 February 1939) was a leading member of the NKVD, who played a prominent role in the Great Purge before he was himself arrested and shot.
Early career.
Berman was born in Andiranovka, Chita, Transbaikal Oblast, to a Jewish brickyard owner. At the age of ten, Boris Berman was sent to work as a shop assistant. He fought in the civil war as a teenager. He joined the OGPUin 1921 and held a succession of posts. In 1928-31, he was based in Russian Central Asia, and for about three years, was an OGPU resident in Germany. In 1934, he was appointed deputy head of the OGPU Foreign Department, shortly before it was reorganized as the NKVD.
Role in the Great Terror.
When the NKVD was preparing the first of the Moscow Show Trials, by forcing confessions out of prisoners, Berman was the interrogator who induced the Old Bolshevik Vagarshak Ter-Vaganyan to sign a false confession and appear in the dock, telling him that he would be spared the death penalty. Ter-Vaganyan was shot, though it may be that Berman did not know what would be the outcome. During preparations for the second trial, he handled the interrogation of Karl Radek. When Nikolai Bukharin was arrested early in 1937, Berman led the team who searched his apartment. According to Bukharin's widow, Anna Larina:
In May 1937, Berman was appointed head of the NKVD in Belorussia (Belarus). In this role, he is said to have been the first official to order his staff to use torture, and was "sadistic even by NKVD standards". His victims included a group of former high ranking communists, writers and poets, executed on 29–30 October 1937. In January 1938, he reported at a conference of regional NKVD chiefs that his staff had arrested 60,000 people over the previous eight months. Berman's mass killings in Belarus purposefully targeted the educated elite and representatives of Belarusian culture. Simultaneously, Berman supervised the Polish Operation of the NKVD in Belarus, in which over seventeen thousand people were sentenced to death, most of them Poles. Many of Berman's mass executions were large scale, and were carried out at the Kurapaty mass killing site.
On December 19, 1937, Berman was awarded the Order of Lenin. In May 1938, he was promoted to head the NKVD Third Directorate. Still, he was arrested on September 24, 1938, in the same week that Lavrentiy Beria officially took control of the NKVD. Berman was executed on February 22, 1939, in Kommunarka, Moscow Oblast. He was not rehabilitated in 1956.
Family.
Berman was the younger brother of Matvei Berman, who was head of the Gulag (the Soviet prison camps) in the 1930s. His wife, M.A.Bak, was also an NKVD official, and the sister of Boris Bak (1897-1938), who was head of the Middle Volga NKVD during the period when the peasants were resisting being forced onto collective farms. In January 1930, he oversaw the deportation of ten thousand families. He was head of the NKVD in the Northern Province until his arrest on 13 August 1937. He was shot in June 1938. Brother of Berman's wife M.A.Bak, Solomon (1902–40), also held senior NKVD posts in the regions until his arrest in October 1938 and execution on 19 January 1940.
References.


Vipers (Ambazonian militia)

The Vipers are an Ambazonian separatist militia. Described as a local self-defense group, they cooperate with the larger Ambazonia Defence Forces and SOCADEF. The group was founded early in the Anglophone Crisis, and by December 2017 they commanded between ten and 30 fighters.
The Vipers have claimed responsibility for burning down government buildings. In May 2018, they were blamed for the burning down of an examination center in Bamenda.
References.


Abdulaziz al-Omari

Abdulaziz al-Omari (, , also transliterated as Alomari or al-Umari; May 28, 1979 – September 11, 2001) was a Saudi airport security guard and imam who was one of five hijackers of American Airlines Flight 11 as part of the September 11 attacks.
Omari arrived in the United States in June 2001, on a tourist visa, obtained through the Visa Express program. On September 11, 2001, Omari boarded American Airlines Flight 11 and assisted in the hijacking of the plane, which was crashed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center, as part of the coordinated attacks.
Early life and education.
Little is known about al-Omari's life, and it is unclear whether some information refers to Omari or another person by that name. He had used the birth date May 28, 1979.
It is alleged al-Omari graduated with honors from high school, attained a degree from Imam Muhammad ibn Saud Islamic University, was married and had a daughter briefly before the attacks.
Career.
He is alleged to have often served as an imam at his mosque in Saudi Arabia and is believed by American authorities to have been a student of Saudi cleric Sulaiman Al-Alwan, whose mosque is located in Al-Qassim Province.
According to Walid bin Attash, Omari was one of a group of future hijackers who provided security at Kandahar airport after their basic training at an al-Qaeda camp. During the 2000 Al Qaeda Summit in Kuala Lumpur, American authorities state that immigration records show that a person named Abdulaziz al-Omari was visiting the country, although they say they are not sure that this was the same person.
In the autumn of 2001, after the September 11 attacks, al Jazeera television broadcast a tape they claim was made by Omari. The speaker made a farewell suicide video. In it he read, "I am writing this with my full conscience and I am writing this in expectation of the end, which is near. . . God praise everybody who trained and helped me, namely the leader Sheikh Osama bin Laden."
According to FBI director Robert Mueller and the 9/11 Commission, Omari entered the United States through a Dubai flight on June 29, 2001, with Salem al-Hazmi, landing in New York. He had used the controversial Visa Express program to gain entry. He apparently stayed with several other hijackers in Paterson, New Jersey, before moving to his own place at 4032 57th Terrace, Vero Beach, Florida. On his rental agreement form for that house, Omari gave two license-plates authorized to park in his space, one of which was registered to Atta.
Omari obtained a fake United States ID card from All Services Plus in Passaic County, New Jersey, which was in the business of selling fake documents, including another to Khalid al-Mihdhar. He was married and had a daughter.
Attacks.
On September 10, 2001, Mohamed Atta picked up Omari from the Milner Hotel in Boston, Massachusetts, and the two drove their rented Nissan to a Comfort Inn in South Portland, Maine, where they spent the night in room 232. In the afternoon he and Atta visited the Longfellow House in Portland, where they took part in a guided tour. Omari emphatically shook the guide's hand three times to thank her at the end of the tour. It was initially reported that Adnan and Ameer Bukhari were the two hijackers who had rented and driven the car.
In the early hours of September 11, they boarded a commuter flight back to Boston to connect to American Airlines Flight 11. American 11 was hijacked 15 minutes after the flight departed by Omari and four other hijackers, which allowed trained pilot Mohamed Atta to crash the Boeing 767 into the North Tower of the World Trade Center as part of an attack that killed thousands of people.
Legacy.
Mistaken identity.
Controversy over Omari's identity erupted shortly after the attacks. At first, the FBI had named Abdul Rahman al-Omari, a pilot for Saudi Arabian Airlines, as the pilot of Flight 11. It was quickly shown that this person was still alive, and the FBI issued an apology. It was also quickly determined that Mohamed Atta was the pilot among the hijackers. The FBI then named Abdulaziz al-Omari as a hijacker.
A man with the same name as those given by the FBI turned up alive in Saudi Arabia, saying that he had studied at the University of Denver and his passport was stolen there in 1995. The name, origin, birth date, and occupation were released by the FBI, but the picture was not of him. "I couldn't believe it when the FBI put me on their list", he said. "They gave my name and my date of birth, but I am not a suicide bomber. I am here. I am alive. I have no idea how to fly a plane. I had nothing to do with this."


United States Mission to the United Nations

The United States Mission to the United Nations (USUN) serves as the United States' delegation to the United Nations. USUN is responsible for carrying out the nation's participation in the world body. In 1947 the United States Mission was created by an act of Congress to assist the President and the Department of State in conducting United States policy at the United Nations. Since that time, USUN has served a vital role as the Department of State's UN branch. Today, USUN has approximately 150 people on staff who serve to represent the United States’ political, economic and social, legal, military, public diplomacy and management interests at the United Nations.
USUN is divided into the following sections: Executive; Washington; Political; Management and Reform; Economic and Social; Legal; Military Staff; Public Affairs; Host Country; Management; and Security.
The United States Mission to the United Nations is located at 799 United Nations Plaza (between E. 44th and E. 45th on First Ave) across the street from United Nations Headquarters.
Leadership.
There are several major leadership roles in the US Mission. The primary role, United States Ambassador to the United Nations, is the leader of the U.S Mission to the United Nations. The position is more formally known by the exact title:
The position is also known as simply the US Permanent Representative, or "Perm Rep", to the United Nations.
The U.S. Permanent Representative, currently Linda Thomas-Greenfield, is charged with representing the United States on the UN Security Council and during almost all plenary meetings of the General Assembly, except in the rare situation in which a more senior officer of the United States (such as the U.S. Secretary of State or the President of the United States) is present. Like all United States ambassadors, he or she must be nominated by the U.S. President and confirmed by the Senate.
Many prominent U.S. politicians and diplomats have held the post, including Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr., Adlai Stevenson, George H. W. Bush, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, Dr. Jeane Kirkpatrick, Richard Holbrooke, Dr. Madeleine Albright, Bill Richardson and John Danforth.
It was a cabinet-level position under the Clinton administration and the Obama administration, but no longer holds that status under the Trump administration. It was returned to this position under the Biden Administration. It was not a cabinet-level position under the George W. Bush administration (from 2001 to 2009).
The other leadership roles are also known as UN ambassadors, but with specific titles as related to which offices of the UN they handle.
Congressional Representatives to the United Nations.
The U.S. president also appoints two members of the United States House of Representatives and two Senators – one Democrat and one Republican from each chamber – as Congressional Representatives to the United Nations General Assembly. The position is regulated by Section 2(a) of the United Nations Participation Act, which stipulates that the President can appoint no more than five members of Congress to the General Assembly with the advice and consent of the Senate and that members appointed to the Assembly can not be compensated for their service in the Assembly. The duties of Congressional Representatives are not specified by the UNPA, but they generally act as observers in the committee proceedings and formal gatherings of UNGA members and heads of state.
Building.
The new building housing the United States Mission to the United Nations, at First Avenue and East 45th Street in Turtle Bay, Manhattan, was dedicated on March 29, 2011. The lead architect was Charles Gwathmey of Gwathmey Siegel & Associates Architects who died in 2009, approximately two years before the structure was completed. Former U.S. Permanent Representative Susan Rice thanked Gwathmey in her remarks at the dedication ceremony.


Andrei Zhdanov

Andrei Alexandrovich Zhdanov (; – 31 August 1948) was a Soviet Communist Party leader, former academic of theology, and cultural ideologist. After World War II, Zhdanov was thought to be the successor-in-waiting to Joseph Stalin but died before Stalin. He has been described as the "propagandist-in-chief" of the Soviet Union from 1945 to 1948.
Early life.
Andrei Zhdanov was born in Mariupol, Ukraine, where his father was a school inspector. His maternal grandfather was the former rector of the Moscow Theological Academy. He studied at the Moscow Commercial Institute. In 1914, he was drafted into the Russian army, graduated from an officers' school and served in the reserves. He joined the Bolsheviks in 1915. In 1917, he was chairman of the Shadrinsk committee of the Bolsheviks). He was a political commissar in the Red Army during the Russian Civil War and was elected chairman of the Tver soviet in 1923. From 1924 to 1934, he was First Secretary of the Nizhny Novgorod provincial party committee.
Party secretary.
Zhdanov's first major promotion came at the end of the 17th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, in February 1934, when he was transferred to Moscow as a Secretary of the Central Committee, responsible for ideology. In that capacity, he inserted his protégé, Aleksandr Shcherbakov, as Secretary of the Soviet Writers' Union, and gave the opening address to the first Soviet Writers' Congress in August 1934. In his speech, as well as paying tribute to "the guiding genius of our great leader and teacher, Comrade Stalin", he repeated Stalin's famous line that writers are "engineers of human souls". He declared that the only good literature was political:
Zhdanov's second great promotion followed assassination of Sergei Kirov in December 1934, when he succeeded Kirov as First Secretary of the Leningrad (Saint Petersburg) provincial party and was co-opted as a candidate member of the Politburo. Early in 1935, he and the head of the Leningrad NKVD, Leonid Zakovsky, organised the deportation of 11,702 so-called 'Leningrad aristocrats', people who had belonged to the nobility or the middle class before the revolution. They also hunted any current or former party members suspected of having supported Leon Trotsky or the former Leningrad party boss, Grigory Zinoviev.
Role in the Great Purge.
Zhdanov has been described by John Arch Getty as a key figure in the Great Purge, who advocated an approach that would make the party a vehicle for political education, ideological agitation and cadre preparation on a mass scale. Zhdanov's encouragement of rank-and-file mobilisation helped create momentum for the Great Terror. Though somewhat less active than Vyacheslav Molotov, Joseph Stalin, Lazar Kaganovich and Kliment Voroshilov, Zhdanov was a major perpetrator of the Great Terror and personally approved 176 documented execution lists.
On a holiday with Stalin in August 1936, he cosigned the telegram that brought about the dismissal of the head of the NKVD, Genrikh Yagoda, who was accused, among other failings, of having impeded Zhdanov and Zakovsky in their purge of the Leningrad party organisation. During a Central Committee plenum in March 1937, Zhdanov announced that all provincial party secretaries were to be subject to re-election, a device that was used to remove them. Zhdanov was the only provincial party leader in Russia to remain in post throughout the Great Purge.
In May 1937, he called leaders of the Leningrad party together to tell them that the longtime second secretary of the provincial party, Mikhail Chudov, and the former Mayor of Leningrad, Ivan Kodatsky, had been arrested. When an Old Bolshevik, Dora Lazurkina, went up to him afterwards to vouch for Kodatsky, Zhdanov warned her that such talk "will end badly for you". She was arrested and survived 17 years in the gulag.
After the Great Purge.
In September 1938, Zhdanov was appointed head of the reorganised Central Committee Directorate for Propaganda and Agitation, which brought all branches of the news media and arts under centralised party control. He was also Chairman of the Supreme Soviet of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic from July 1938 to June 1947 and from 1938 he was on the military council of the Soviet Navy.
His rise coincided with the fall of Nikolai Yezhov. At the 18th Party Congress, Zhdanov noted that "other means apart from repression" could be used to enforce "state and labour discipline". Zhdanov gave a key speech in which he proposed "to abolish mass Party purges... now that the capitalist elements have been eliminated". He declared that the purges had been co-opted by "hostile elements" to "persecute and ruin honest people".
At the conclusion of the Congress in March 1939, Zhdanov was promoted to full membership of the Politburo. He was still one of four secretaries of the Central Committee - the others being Stalin, Andrey Andreyev and Georgy Malenkov - but Malenkov was not a Politburo member of the Politburo, which meant that Zhdanov had replaced Lazar Kaganovich as Stalin's deputy in the party apparatus and appeared to be his most likely successor.
On 29 June 1939, he had a signed article in "Pravda" in which he expressed what he called his "personal" view "with which my friends do not agree" that Britain and France did not seriously want a military alliance with the Soviet Union. In retrospect, it was the first public hint of the Soviets signing the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact three months later.
Wartime.
Zhdanov was very publicly associated with the decision to invade Finland in November 1939. In December, he signed the treaty between the Soviets and Finland's government in exile, headed by Otto Kuusinen. As the Leningrad party boss and the official overseeing the navy, he had an interest in increasing the Soviet presence in the Baltic Sea at the expense of Finland, Estonia and Latvia. The final peace treaty between Finland and the Soviet Union was signed by Zhdanov on 12 March 1940.
In June 1940, Zhdanov was sent to Estonia to supervise the establishment of the Estonian Soviet Socialist Republic and its annexation by the Soviet Union. He was one of those accused during the United States House of Representatives' 1953–1954 Kersten Committee investigation into the annexation of the Baltic States.
The Finnish debacle weakened Zhdanov's political standing. In September 1940 he was removed from direct control of the Propaganda Department of the Central Committee, which was taken over by Georgy Aleksandrov, an ally of his rival Malenkov. He was undermined further by the German invasion of the Soviet Union because he had been so publicly associated with the failed pact with Hitler. He was excluded from the State Defence Committee (GOKO), which directed the war effort and was initially controlled by Malenkov and Lavrentiy Beria. According to the historian Anton Antonov-Ovseyenko:
Along with Georgy Zhukov, Zhdanov took a leading role during the Siege of Leningrad in the Second World War. In August 1941, he created a City Defence Council but was ordered by Stalin to disband it. When the siege was lifted, he was not officially given credit for saving the city.
After the ceasefire agreement between Finland and the Soviet Union was signed in Moscow on 4 September 1944, Zhdanov directed the Allied Control Commission in Finland to the Paris Peace Treaty in 1947. That meant that he had to spend several months in Helsinki and relinquish his position as head of the Leningrad party organisation, which he had held for nine years, but he was able to leave it in the hands of his ally, Alexey Kuznetsov. In January 1945, when "Pravda" celebrated the lifting of the Siege of Leningrad, it emphasised that Malenkov and Vyacheslav Molotov had been dispatched to the city in 1941 and implied that they shared the credit with Zhdanov.
Postwar ascendancy.
Zhdanov made a political comeback during 1946, when his main rival, Malenkov, temporarily lost his position as a party secretary. For the next two years, he was delegated by Stalin to direct the Soviet Union's cultural policy and to handle relations with the Eastern European states under or coming under communist control. He formulated what became known as the Zhdanov Doctrine ("The only conflict that is possible in Soviet culture is the conflict between good and best"). In December 1946, he launched the attack on Anna Akhmatova and Mikhail Zoshchenko, two writers living in Zhdanov's former Leningrad fiefdom. He described Akhmatova, argubly then the greatest living Russian poet, as "half nun, half whore".
In 1947, he organised the Cominform, which was designed to coordinate and control the communist parties around the world. At a famous speech at Szklarska Poręba in September 1947, Zhdanov warned his fellow communists that the world was now split into two hostile camps and that the Cominform was needed to oppose the "frank expansionist programme" of the US.
In January 1948, he presided over a three-day conference in the Kremlin, to which more than 70 composers, musicians and music critics, including Dmitri Shostakovich, Sergei Prokofiev, Aram Khachaturian, and Nikolai Myaskovsky were summoned to be lectured by Zhdanov on why they should avoid "formalism" is music. A persistent story is that Zhdanov played the piano during the conference to demonstrate how music should be written, but years later that story was furiously denied by Shostakovich, who attributed it to "toadies". Zhdanov's cultural policy rested on the Soviets' "critically assimilating the cultural heritage of all nations and all times" to "take what was most inspiring".
Fall from power and later life.
In June 1948, Stalin sent Zhdanov to the Cominform meeting in Bucharest. Its purpose was to condemn Yugoslavia, but Zhdanov took a more restrained line than his co-delegate and rival, Georgy Malenkov. That infuriated Stalin, who removed Zhdanov from all his posts and replaced him with Malenkov. Zhdanov was soon transferred to a sanatorium.
Zhdanov died on 31 August 1948 in Moscow of heart failure. It is possible that his death was the result of an intentional misdiagnosis.
Legacy.
Despite his bullying of Akhmatova, Shostakovich, Prokofiev and other cultural figures, and the apparent threat that the founding of Cominform posed to peace, Zhdanov is reckoned by many Soviet scholars to have been a "moderate" within the context of the post-war Stalinist regime. The worst events of Stalin's final years, such the rift with Yugoslavia, the Leningrad affair, the show trials in Bulgaria, Hungary and Czechoslovakia, and the anti-Semitic Doctors' plot all occurred after Zhdanov was dead. The Leningrad Affair was a brutal purge of Zhdanov's former allies, notably Kuznetsov and Nikolai Voznesensky. The most notable survivor of that purge was future Prime Minister Alexei Kosygin.
In "Khrushchev Remembers", Nikita Khrushchev recalled that Zhdanov was an alcoholic and that during his last days, Stalin would shout at him to stop drinking and insist on him drinking only fruit juice. Stalin had talked of Zhdanov being his successor, but Zhdanov's ill health gave his rivals in the Politburo, Lavrentiy Beria, Georgy Malenkov, and Nikita Khrushchev, an opportunity to undermine him. Stalin would later blame Zhdanov's death on Kremlin doctors and "Zionist" conspirators.
Zhdanovshchina.
Zhdanovshchina was the emphasis on purified communist ideology developed during the war by Zhdanov. It emerged from his arguments inside the party hierarchy opposing the pragmatist faction of Georgii Malenkov. Malenkov stressed the universal values of science and engineering, and proposed to promote the technological experts to the highest positions in the Soviet administrative elite. Zhdanov's faction said proper ideology trumped science and called for prioritizing political education and ideological purity.
However, the technocrats had proven amazingly successful during the war in terms of engineering, industrial production, and the development of advanced munitions. Zhdanov sought to use the ideological purification of the party as a vehicle to restore the Kremlin's political control over the provinces and the technocrats. He worried that the provincial party bosses and the heads of the economic ministries had achieved too high a degree of autonomy during the war, when the top leadership realized the urgent necessity of maximum mobilization of human and material resources. The highest priority in the postwar era was physical reconstruction after the massive wartime destruction.
The same argument that strengthened the technocrats continued to operate, and the united opposition of Malenkov, the technocrats, the provincial party bosses, and the key ministries doomed Zhdanov's proposals. He therefore pivoted to devote his attention to purification of the arts and culture.
Cultural standards.
Originating in 1946 and lasting until the late 1950s, Zhdanov's ideological code, known as the Zhdanov Doctrine or Zhdanovism ("zhdanovshchina"), defined cultural production in the Soviet Union. Zhdanov intended to create a new philosophy of artistic creation valid for the entire world. His method reduced all of culture to a sort of chart, wherein a given symbol corresponded to a simple moral value.
Zhdanov and his associates further sought to eliminate foreign influence from Soviet art, proclaiming that "incorrect art" was an ideological diversion. This doctrine suggested that the world was split into two opposing camps, namely the "imperialistic", led by the United States; and the "democratic", led by the Soviet Union. The one sentence that came to define his doctrine was "The only conflict that is possible in Soviet culture is the conflict between good and best".
This cultural policy became strictly enforced, censoring writers, artists and the intelligentsia, with punishment being applied for failing to conform to what was considered acceptable by Zhdanov's standards. This policy officially ended in 1952, seen as having a negative impact on culture within the Soviet Union. The origins of this policy can be seen before 1946 when critics proposed (wrongly according to Zhdanov) that Russian classics had been influenced by famous foreign writers, but the policy came into effect specifically to target "apolitical, 'bourgeois', individualistic works of the satirist Mikhail Zoshchenko and the poet Anna Akhmatova", respectively writing for the literary magazines "Zvezda" and "Leningrad". On 20 February 1948, Zhdanovshchina shifted its focus towards anti-formalism, targeting composers such as Dmitri Shostakovich. That April, many of the persecuted composers were pressed into repenting for displaying formalism in their music in a special congress of the Union of Soviet Composers.
Zhdanov was the most openly cultured of the leadership group and his treatment of artists was mild by Soviet standards of the time. He even wrote a satirical sketch ridiculing the attack on modernism.
Family ties.
Zhdanov's son Yuri (1919–2006) married Stalin's daughter Svetlana Alliluyeva in 1949. She described the Zhdanov household as imbued with "an inveterate spirit of bourgeois acquisitiveness ... There were trunkloads of possessions ... The place was presided over by Zinaida Zhdanov, the widow, and the ultimate embodiment of this mixture of Party bigotry and the complacency of the bourgeois woman." In 1952, Yuri Zhdanov was raised to membership of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, as head of its Department of Science and Culture, but was sacked very soon after Stalin's death. That marriage ended in divorce in 1952. They had one daughter, Yekaterina.
Honours and awards.
Zhdanov's birthplace, Mariupol, was renamed Zhdanov in his honor at Joseph Stalin's instigation in 1948 and a monument to Zhdanov was built in the central square of the city. The name reverted to Mariupol in 1989 and the monument was dismantled in 1990.


262 Southwest Anatolia earthquake

The 262 Southwest Anatolia earthquake devastated the Roman city of Ephesus along with cities along the west and south coasts of Anatolia in year 262, or possibly 261. The epicenter was likely located in the southern Aegean Sea. Reports note that many cities were flooded by the sea, presumably due to a tsunami.
Nicholas Ambraseys, who performed the most comprehensive assessment of ancient earthquakes in the Mediterranean, traces the original source of most literary references to this quake to an account in the "Augustan History" purportedly written by Trebellius Pollio. This source is problematic, as the veracity of much of its supposed biographical details is doubtful. However, there is some reason to give credence to the history's accounts of natural disasters. Trebellius's account also reports the southwest Anatolia earthquake in conjunction with one that hit Cyrene, Libya the same year. The two events appears to have been unrelated, but it has been difficult for historians to disentangle the exact effects of each based on the classical sources.
Tectonic setting.
There are many faults in the Aegean Sea and the adjacent coastal areas of Anatolia, caused by the African Plate being subducted beneath the Aegean Sea Plate. These faults result in frequent earthquakes. Ephesus, which sustained considerable damage in the 262 AD earthquake, was also struck by earthquakes in AD 17, sometime before AD 30, c. AD 42, c. AD 46–47, c. 150–155, 358–366, 614, and the tenth or eleventh century. One fault in the southern part of the region stretches from the island of Rhodes in present-day Greece northeastwards to Burdur in present-day Turkey.
Damage.
Trebellius wrote that the cities of Roman Asia reported the worst damage from the earthquake: "In many places the earth yawned open, and salt water appeared in the fissures. Many cities were even overwhelmed by the sea." He records that this damage occurred took place during the consulship of Gallienus and Fausianus. The latter appears to be Lucius Mummius Faustianus who was a consul in the year 262.
Much of the Library of Celsus at Ephesus (including all the books) were destroyed by fire in or around 262. The cause of the fire has been attributed either to this earthquake or to an invasion by the Goths (sometimes incorrectly identified as Scythians). Ephesus's Temple of Artemis, one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, was also destroyed around the same date, although some sources attribute this to a Gothic invasion in 267 or 268. There is some archeological evidence at Ephesus supporting the date implied by Trebellius's account. Stefan Karwiese of the Austrian Archaeological Institute at Athens reports that ceramics found near the library and temple can be dated to the second half of the third century.
A study of geological processes in Roman cities concludes that 11 major buildings at Ephesus required rebuilding after the 262 earthquake: the terrace houses, Temple of Serapis (Serapeion), Stoa of Damianus, Harbor Baths (also known as the Great Baths or Baths of Constantius), Baths of Varius and Scholastica Baths, Magnesian Gate, Medusa Gate, Lower Agora (also known as the Tetragonos Agora), Library of Celsus, theatre and stadium.
Account by "Trebellius Pollio".
The "Augustan History" contains a biography of Gallienus titled "The Two Gallieni" and ascribed to Trebellius Pollio, likely a pseudonym. The writer appears to have been aiming to retrospectively malign the character of Gallienus. Among the descriptions of his frivolity and military defeats is a section that relates several natural disasters of the time. Romans frequently saw these as omens and it was not unusual to conflate several events from the same year.


Economy of Serbia and Montenegro

Serbia and Montenegro was a confederated union which existed between 2003 and 2006. The two republics initially formed the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia in 1992.
The economy of Serbia and Montenegro entered a prolonged decline in 1989. Exacerbated by the economic embargo imposed during the Bosnian war, the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY) economy's downward spiral showed no real sign of recovery until 1995. GDP was nowhere near its 1990 level, but the 1999 NATO bombing of Yugoslavia of the basic infrastructure of the country and many factories, as well as a renewed embargo, caused a further huge drop in GDP in relation to the 1991 level. The first sign of an economic recovery occurred in 2001 after the overthrow of Slobodan Milošević on 5 October 2000. A vigorous team of economic reformers worked to tame inflation (non-energy inflation is less than 9% in 2002, down from over 120% two years earlier) and rationalize the Serbia and Montenegro economy. As of January 2005, GDP has recovered to 55-60% of its 1990 level, due to GDP growth of 8.5% in 2004.
Currency Problems.
The FRY's monetary unit, the dinar, remained volatile throughout Milošević's rule. Alarmed FRY officials took several steps to tighten monetary policy in 1998, including ruling out a devaluation in the near term, increasing reserve requirements, and issuing bonds. During this period, Montenegro rejected the dinar and adopted the Deutsche Mark (now replaced by the euro) as its official currency. As 1999 began, the damage control operation had succeeded in returning the exchange rate to reasonable levels. However, it was not until 2002, after intense macroeconomic reform measures, that the dinar became convertible—a first since the Bretton Woods Agreements laid out the post-World War II international exchange rate regime.
Stabilization Efforts.
Privatization efforts have not succeeded as well as macroeconomic reform. The process of privatization was not popular among workers of large socially owned companies, and many citizens appeared to believe the tendering process was overly centralized and controlled from Belgrade. Furthermore, international investment was lagging in Serbia and Montenegro, as a result of both domestic and international investment climates. Managers tended to blame the dearth of interest on the current negative business climate in Serbia and Montenegro.
Statistics.
Gross Domestic Product.
Purchasing power parity - $25.98 billion (2004 est.)<, $27.5 Billion predicted for 2005 br>
Real growth rate: 8.5% (2004 est.), 6.5% (2005 est)

Real GDP Per capita - nominal: $2900 (2004 est.), $3200 (2005 est.)

Composition by sector:
Economic Situation.
Population below poverty line: 10%

Inflation rate (consumer prices): 12-13% (2004 est.)

Labor force: 3,596,282 (2005 est.)

Budget:
Industrial Situation.
Industries:
Industrial production growth rate: 6.5% (2004 est.)
Electricity.
Production: 31,710 GWh (2001)

Production by source (2001):
Consumption: 32,370 GWh (2001)

Exports: 446 GWh (2001)

Imports: 3,330 GWh (2001)
Oil.
Production: 2001

Consumption: 2001

Exports: NA (2001)

Imports: NA (2001)

Proved reserves: January 2002
Natural Gas.
Proved reserves: 24.07 km³ (January 2002 est.)
Agricultural Produce.
Cereals, fruits, vegetables, tobacco, olives; cattle, sheep, goats.
Exports.
Total: $5.5 billion f.o.b. (2004 est.)(goods and services)

Commodities: manufactured goods, food and live animals, raw materials

Partners: Bosnia and Herzegovina 19%, Italy 12%, Germany 12%, Republic of Macedonia 8%, Russia 4% (2004)
Imports.
Total: $11.5 billion f.o.b. (2004 est.)(goods and services)

Commodities: machinery and transport equipment, fuels and lubricants, manufactured goods, chemicals, food and live animals, raw materials

Partners: Russia 13%, Germany 13%, Italy 9%, China 5%, USA 4% (2004)
Debt.
External: $12.6 billion (2004 est.)

"-As a percentage of GDP:" 55-60% (2004 est.)

Economic aid - recipient: $2 billion pledged in 2001 (disbursements to follow for several years)
Currency.
Serbian dinar (CSD). Note - in Montenegro the euro is legal tender; in Kosovo both the euro and the Yugoslav dinar are legal (2002)

Code: YUM

Exchange rates: Serbian dinara per US dollar - official rate: 60 (2004);
Fiscal year: calendar year


.yu

.yu was the Internet country code top-level domain (ccTLD) that was assigned to Yugoslavia and was mainly used by the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and its successor states from 1994 and 2010. After Serbia and Montenegro acquired separate .rs and .me domains in 2007, a transition period started, and the .yu domain finally expired on 30 March 2010.
History.
The .yu ccTLD was assigned originally to the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, during the government project for the development of scientific-technological information (SNTIJ). The official registrants were the University of Maribor and the Jožef Stefan Institute, which were located in Slovenia. Computer scientist, Borka Jerman Blažič, registered the domain in 1989, which allowed Yugoslavia to have an Internet connection.
When the SFR Yugoslavia dissolved, Slovenia and Croatia registered their own ccTLDs (.si and .hr). Serbia and Montenegro formed the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, but was under international sanctions at the time because of ongoing Yugoslav wars. The old .yu domain registry had been left in Slovenia, and the domain became a succession matter when the Slovenians refused to relinquish the domain name to the University of Belgrade in Serbia, which had requested they do so.
In 1994, the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority finally decreed that the domain should pass to FR Yugoslavia. After that, the domain was managed by the YUNET Association, an organization based in the Faculty of Electrical Engineering at the University of Belgrade.
The FR Yugoslavia renamed itself Serbia and Montenegro in February 2003. The code YU was replaced by CS in July 2003 following the official name change, and the ccTLD .cs was reserved for Serbia and Montenegro after the name change. However, .cs was never actually used, and .yu remained one of the few ccTLDs that did not correspond to a current ISO 3166-1 two-letter code.
The state union of Serbia and Montenegro was dissolved in July 2006, and in September 2006, ISO accordingly proposed the replacement the codes RS for Serbia and ME for Montenegro. On 26 September 2006 the ISO 3166 Maintenance Agency agreed on the change of ISO 3166-1 Alpha-2 code CS to RS. The new domains .rs for Serbia and .me for Montenegro became active shortly thereafter.
In September 2007 ICANN resolved that the .yu domain would be operated temporarily under the Serbian National Register of Internet Domain Names, operators of the new .rs domain registry. A two-year transition period started, and the .yu domain was scheduled to expire on 30 September 2009. However, the Serbian registrar requested an extension and ICANN decided to extend the transition deadline another six months away. Finally, the Serbian registrar declared the end of the .yu domain at 12:00 CEST on 30 March 2010. All .yu websites were wiped out, including those carrying content about the NATO bombing during the Kosovo war.
Former use of .yu domains.
All of the domains directly under .yu were reserved for legal entities only. Top level domain was reserved for federal institutions and official governmental institutions, as well as Internet service providers. The Serbian Orthodox Church was also allowed to use .yu domain.
The second-level domains under .yu included:
Montenegrin websites often used subdomain .cg.yu which was given for free to customers of a Montenegrin ISP which registered the domain, making it a popular option for those who opt not to register a domain for their website.
In the media.
The domain is part of the story in the film, "From Yu to Me" (2013).


Corbyn wreath-laying controversy

On 15 August 2018, a British political controversy was initiated when the "Daily Mail" said that, prior to becoming Labour Party Leader, Jeremy Corbyn had been present at a 2014 wreath-laying at a cemetery which contained the graves of many Palestinian activists including Salah Khalaf and Atef Bseiso, both of whom were alleged members of the Black September Organization and were allegedly behind the Munich massacre of Israeli athletes at the 1972 Summer Olympics. Khalaf said in his memoir that he hand-picked two of the gunmen for the Munich Massacre and provided weapons and grenades during the attack. The wreath-laying took place during a commemorative ceremony for victims of the 1985 Israeli air strikes on the PLO headquarters in Tunis, Tunisia, which had been widely condemned at the time, including by the U.S. Government. Corbyn and the Conservative peer Baron Sheikh had been in Tunisia to attend the "International Conference on Monitoring the Palestinian Political and Legal Situation in the Light of Israeli Aggression." The controversy was considered to be part of a wider series of issues relating to claims of antisemitism in the Labour party and Corbyn's personal position on the Middle East, which have escalated since Corbyn became a front-runner for Labour Party leader in August 2015.
Conference.
Corbyn, Conservative peer Lord Sheikh and Liberal Democrat peer Baron Andrew Phillips were attending the "International Conference on Monitoring the Palestinian Political and Legal Situation in the Light of Israeli Aggression" in Tunis, organised by the Centre for Strategic Studies for North Africa. According to Sheikh, representatives of Hamas may have been present but he did not meet them. Conservative MPs Robert Halfon (a member of the Conservative Friends of Israel) and Zac Goldsmith called for a party investigation into his attendance, arguing that it breached the party's code of conduct and that a failure to investigate it would be hypocritical. Lord Sheikh denied any wrongdoing, calling the complaints "trivial" and "politically motivated" following Sheikh's condemnation of Johnson's controversial remarks regarding the niqab/burqa.
Ceremony.
On 15 August 2018 the "Daily Mail" claimed that Corbyn had instead been pictured 15 yards (14 m) away from the memorial for the air strike victims while holding a wreath near the graves of Salah Khalaf and Atef Bseiso (senior leaders of Fatah and PLO in the early 1970s) who were accused of having links to the Black September Organization responsible for the Munich massacre at the 1972 Summer Olympics, in which eleven Israeli Olympic team members were taken hostage and killed in addition to a West German police officer. In a 2014 write-up of the event for the "Morning Star", Corbyn wrote that "wreaths were laid at the graves of those who died on that day and on the graves of others killed by Mossad agents in Paris in 1991". Corbyn has not confirmed who he was referring to in this article (Bseiso was killed in Paris in 1992, and Khalaf was assassinated in Tunisia in 1991).
Also on 15 August 2018 the BBC News filmed a report from inside the Hamman Chott Cemetery, showing where Corbyn would have likely stood within the designated area where all dignitaries typically stand on an annual basis to remember those who were killed in the Israel airstrike in 1985 and for senior members of the Palestine Liberation Organization, under the small covered area of the enclosed Palestinian section of the cemetery, which also covers the graves of Bseiso and Khalaf.
There was condemnation from some of the British and Jewish press, as well as from some members of the Labour Party and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Jonathan Goldstein, the head of the Jewish Leadership Council, said Corbyn's alleged participation in an event honoring the Munich terrorists is a "defining moment, typifying and showing his great hostility towards Israel and, through Israel, to the Jewish people". Goldstein criticized Corbyn's refusal to apologise to the Munich Massacre widows and called it "un-British". A Labour party spokesperson stated "Jeremy did not lay any wreath at the graves of those alleged to have been linked to the Black September organisation or the 1972 Munich killings. He of course condemns that terrible attack, as he does the 1985 bombing." Corbyn stated "I was there because I wanted to see a fitting memorial to everyone who has died in every terrorist incident everywhere".
The Labour Party made a complaint to the press watchdog Independent Press Standards Organisation regarding stories in the "Daily Mail", "The Sun", "The Times", "The Daily Telegraph", the "Daily Express" and the "Metro" newspapers, arguing that these organisations "seriously misrepresented the event" and "underplayed the role of mainstream Palestinian leaders conducting the ceremony", although the complaint was later dropped.
Funding of trip.
In August 2018 Corbyn was reported to Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards following claims that he failed to declare who paid for his Tunisia trip in accordance with parliamentary requirements. The Labour Party stated that the costs of the trip were under the £660 limit at which a declaration should be made. Sheikh, who traveled to Tunis to attend the same conference, but has stated that he was unaware of a wreath laying ceremony, reported that the Tunisian government underwrote his expenses.
E-mails, revealed in April 2019 by the Guido Fawkes blog, showed that Corbyn had asked his staff to "keep it cheap" in order to not hit the £660 limit, which would possibly lead the trip to "be referred to debates etc".


Ida Braiman

Ida Braiman (died February 5, 1913) (sometimes spelled Brayman, Breiman, or Braeman) was a Ukrainian Jewish garment worker killed while on strike for better working conditions in Rochester, New York. Her death brought statewide attention to the 1913 Rochester Garment Workers' Strike.
Early life.
Not much is known about Braiman's life before she arrived in New York State as an immigrant to the United States from Zhitomyr, Ukraine. Her age at the time of her arrival is given variously as 17 or 18 years old.
Rochester strike.
Ida Braiman and her father were participants in a citywide strike of the United Garment Workers of America only months after her arrival in the United States. On February 5, 1913, she was part of a group of strikers going to small textile factories encouraging workers their to join the strike. The strikers, a crowd of some seven hundred people, picketed a tailor shop owned by Valentine Sauter. When picketers began to throw stones, Valentine Sauter used a shotgun to fire into the crowd, killing Braiman and injuring three others. Although Sauter was arrested and charged with first-degree murder, a grand jury declined to indict him. Several strikers from the crowd were also arrested for rioting.
Braiman's death became a rallying point for the striking workers, and garnered support for the strike from middle- and upper-class women's suffrage organizers. Five thousand people attended her funeral and processed behind the hearse carrying her body to the graveyard. She was buried in the Waad Hakolel Jewish cemetery in Rochester.
Legacy.
In 2013 Braiman was honored by Rochester labor organizations on the 100th anniversary of her death. The memorial card that was distributed after her death was adopted by the women's liberation movement of the 1970s as a symbol of feminist history, and reprinted as a poster by the Times Change Press in New York City


Pan-African Congress

The Pan-African Congress – following on from the first Pan-African Conference of 1900 in London – was a series of eight meetings, held in 1919 in Paris (1st Pan-African Congress), 1921 in London (2nd Pan-African Congress), 1923 in London (3rd Pan-African Congress), 1927 in New York City (4th Pan-African Congress), 1945 in Manchester (5th Pan-African Congress), 1974 in Dar es Salaam (6th Pan-African Congress), 1994 in Kampala (7th Pan-African Congress), and 2014 in Johannesburg (8th Pan-African Congress) that were intended to address the issues facing Africa as a result of European colonization of most of the continent.
The Pan-African Congress gained the reputation as a peace maker for decolonization in Africa and in the West Indies. It made significant advance for the Pan-African cause. One of the demands was to end colonial rule and end racial discrimination, against imperialism and it demanded human rights and equality of economic opportunity. The manifesto given by the Pan-African Congress included the political and economic demands of the Congress for a new world context of international cooperation.
Background.
Colonial powers in Africa wanted native Africans to wait patiently for limited political concessions and better career opportunities. Due to their exclusion from the negotiations of the 1919 Treaty of Versailles – the most important of the peace treaties that brought World War I to an end – black ex-servicemen and educated urban classes became disillusioned. Because colonialism had been built on the foundation of capitalism, socialist ideas of equality and global collaboration appealed to these budding revolutionaries.
A letter from Jamaican writer and socialist Claude McKay to Leon Trotsky in 1922 refers to the experience of black soldiers:
1st Pan-African Congress.
In February 1919, the first Pan-African Congress was organized by W. E. B. Du Bois and Ida Gibbs Hunt, wife of US Consul William Henry Hunt, who was at that time working at the American consulate in Saint-Étienne, France. Gibbs and Du Bois were seen as ambassadors of Pan-Africa. Also, Gibbs acted as the primary translator at the Congress. There were 57 delegates representing 15 countries, a smaller number than originally intended because British and American governments refused to issue passports to their citizens who had planned on attending. Their main task was petitioning the Versailles Peace Conference held in Paris at that time. Among their demands were that:
Delegates.
Among the delegates were:
2nd Pan-African Congress.
In 1921, the Second Pan-African Congress met in several sessions in London, Brussels and Paris, during August (28, 29, and 31) and September (2, 3, 5 and 6). As W. E. B. Du Bois reported in "The Crisis" in November that year, represented at this congress were "26 different groups of people of Negro descent: namely, British Nigeria, Gold Coast and Sierra Leone; the Egyptian Sudan, British East Africa, former German East Africa; French Senegal, the French Congo and Madagascar; Belgian Congo; Portuguese St. Thomé, Angola and Mozambique; Liberia; Abyssinia; Haiti; British Jamaica and Grenada; French Martinique and Guadeloupe; British Guiana; the United States of America, Negroes resident in England, France, Belgium and Portugal, and fraternal visitors from India, Morocco, the Philippines and Annam." There was an Indian revolutionary who took part, Shapurji Saklatvala, and a journalist from the Gold Coast named W. F. Hutchinson who spoke. This session of the Congress was the most focused for change of all the meetings thus far. At the London session, resolutions were adopted, later restated by Du Bois in his "Manifesto To the League of Nations":
The only dissenting voices were these of Blaise Diagne and Gratien Candace, French politicians of African and Guadeloupean descent, who represented Senegal and Guadeloupe in the French Chamber of Deputies. They soon abandoned the idea of Pan-Africanism because they advocated equal rights inside the French citizenship and thought the London Manifesto declaration too dangerously extreme.
The Brussels sessions were hosted at the Palais Mondial.
3rd Pan-African Congress.
In 1923, the Third Pan-African Congress was held in London and in Lisbon. This meeting was totally unorganized. This meeting also repeated the demands such as self-rule, the problems in the Diaspora and the African-European relationship. The following was addressed at the meeting:
Before the Congress met in London, Isaac Béton of the French Committee wrote a letter to Du Bois, telling him that the French group would not be sending delegates. However, in one of the reports he published in "The Crisis", Du Bois drew on words spoken by Ida Gibbs Hunt and Rayford Logan to imply that the French Committee had sent delegates. As long-time African-American residents of France, Hunt and Logan had travelled independently to the meeting, and Hunt and Béton were perturbed that Du Bois had implied they represented France.
4th Pan-African Congress.
In 1927, The Fourth Pan-African Congress was held in New York City and adopted resolutions that were similar to the Third Pan-African Congress meetings.
5th Pan-African Congress.
The Fifth Pan-African Congress was held in Manchester, United Kingdom, from 15–21 October 1945. It followed the foundation of the Pan-African Federation (PAF) in Manchester in 1944. The Congress took place at the Chorlton-upon-Medlock Town Hall on the outskirts of the city centre. The building was decorated with the flags of the Ethiopia, and Liberia and the Republic of Haiti. These three black nations were the only ones under self-governance at the time. The Lord Mayor of Manchester, Conservative, Alderman W.P. Jackson, opened the Congress at the afternoon session on October 15th. John McNair, secretary of the Independent Labour Party also addressed the Congress.
Historian Hakim Adi writes in "The 1945 Manchester Pan-African Congress Revisited" that "The previous four Pan-African Congresses had been largely organised by the African-American writer and activist Dr W.E.B. Du Bois and the National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People (NAACP), based in the United States.” According to Adi, "The [Fifth] Congress was dominated by British-based organisations and activists" with Du Bois playing a minor role in the preparations.
The Fifth Congress is widely viewed by commentators as the most significant, being held just months after the end of the World War II.The War had been fought in the name of freedom, however around the globe, millions of Africans and Afro-Diaspora populations lived under European colonial rule. Historian Marika Sherwood writes in her book "Manchester and the 1945 Pan-African Congress": "In 1945, at the end of World War II, some 700 million people around the world lived under imperial rule. They were 'subject people', with no freedoms, no parliaments, no democracy, and no trade unions to protect workers."
Historian Christian Høgsbjerg writes in his essay "Remembering the Fifth Pan African Congress" that the aftermath of World War II gave rise to a "new mood of militancy among colonial Africans, Asians and West Indians." According to Høgsbjerg, many felt betrayed after being promised movement towards self-government if they fought for the British and French empires during World War I – only to have such promises later denied. Høgsbjerg writes that "many were determined not to be fooled again." The Congress made demands for Independence as well as condemning imperialism, racial discrimination, and capitalism.
George Padmore, Dr Peter Milliard and T. Ras Makonnen are viewed by commentators as the primary organisers of the Fifth Pan-African Congress.
Delegates.
Historian Marika Sherwood writes in "Manchester and the 1945 Pan-African Congress" that “With the aid of the London-based League of Coloured Peoples, the PAF had asked organisations from the US, the West Indies, British West Africa, South Africa, Belgian Congo, Ethiopia, Somalia, Sudan and South and Central America to send representatives.” According to Sherwood, “unfortunately many of these organisations were unable to send delegates.”
However, the Fifth Congress was unique in comparison to the four earlier Congresses. Historian Simon Katzenellenboggen comments that “Unlike the four earlier congresses, the fifth one involved people from the African Diaspora; not just Africans, but Afro-Caribbeans and Afro-Americans." Katzenellenboggen also points out that "There were a lot of people of African descent who were resident in Manchester that got involved. The 1945 Congress, although within the larger Pan-African movement that had started at the beginning of the century, was organised by people in Manchester, and they brought in the people from all over the world."
Commentators estimate between 87–90 delegates in attendance at the Congress representing some 50 organisations, with a total of 200 audience members present.
Marika Sherwood notes that "There were also eleven listed 'fraternal delegates', from Cypriot, Somali, Indian and Ceylonese (Sri Lankan) organisations, as well as the Women's International League and two British political parties, the Common Wealth Party and Independent Labour Party." According to Sherwood "Three unlisted Manchester 'fraternals' were Wilf Charles, Pat Devine and Len Johnson of the Communist Party. As far as known, of these fraternal delegates, only John McNair of the IPL and Surat Ali of the Federation of Indian Associates were allowed to address the delegates from the platform."
Historian Saheed Adejumobi writes in "The Pan-African Congresses, 1900–1945"  that “While previous Pan-African congresses had been controlled largely by black middle-class British and American intellectuals who had emphasized the amelioration of colonial conditions, the Manchester meeting was dominated by delegates from Africa and Africans working or studying in Britain.”  Adejumobi notes that “The new leadership attracted the support of workers, trade unionists, and a growing radical sector of the African student population. With fewer African American participants, delegates consisted mainly of an emerging crop of African intellectual and political leaders, who soon won fame, notoriety, and power in their various colonized countries.”
Notable delegates in attendance include:
Issues addressed.
Among the issues addressed at the conference were:
Women's Contributions.
Women played an important role in the Fifth Congress. Amy Ashford Garvey chaired the opening session and Miss Alma La Badie, a Jamaican member of the Universal Negro Improvement Association, spoke about child welfare. Women also supported in behind-the-scenes roles, organising many of the social and other events outside the main sessions. Historian's Marika Sherwood and Hakim Adis have specifically written about women involved in the Fifth-Congress.
Reception.
The British press scarcely mentioned the conference. However, "Picture Post" covered the 5th Pan African Congress in an article by war reporter Hilde Marchant titled "Africa Speaks in Manchester", published on 10 November 1945. "Picture Post" was also responsible for sending John Deakin to photograph the event.
Archives.
Archive material relating to the 1945 and the subsequent celebratory events in 1982 and 1995 are held at the Ahmed Iqbal Ullah Race Relations Resource Centre at Manchester Central Library. Len Johnson's papers at the Working Class Movement Library has records and documents from the 1945 Congress.
The significance of the Pan-African movement and the Fifth Congress.
Pan-Africanism is aimed at the economic, intellectual and political cooperation of the African countries. It demands that the riches of the continent be used for the enlistment of its people. It calls for the financial and economic unification of markets and a new political landscape for the continent. Even though Pan-Africanism as a movement began in 1776, it was the fifth Pan-African congress that advanced Pan-Africanism and applied it to decolonize the African continent.


Gahcho Kue Aerodrome

Gahcho Kue Aerodrome is an airport located east southeast of the Gahcho Kue Diamond Mine Project, Northwest Territories, Canada. The airport is owned and operated by De Beers Canada and serves the Gahcho Kue Diamond Mine Project. The airport originally was an ice runway on Kennady Lake and was in length and numbered 08/26. The ice runway was only open from January to April.


Later Han (Five Dynasties)

The Later Han () was founded in 947. It was the fourth of the Five Dynasties, and the third consecutive sinicized Shatuo ethnicity state, however, other sources indicate that the Later Han emperors claimed patrilineal Han Chinese ancestry. It was among the shortest-lived of all Chinese regimes, lasting for slightly under four years before it was overcome by a rebellion that resulted in the founding of the Later Zhou.
Establishment of the Later Han.
Liu Zhiyuan was military governor of Bingzhou, an area around Taiyuan in present-day Shanxi that had long been a stronghold of the sinicized Shatuo. However, the Later Jin he served was weak and little more than a puppet of the expanding Khitan empire to the north. When the Later Jin finally did decide to defy them, the Khitan sent an expedition south that resulted in the destruction of the Later Jin.
The Khitan force made it all the way to the Yellow River before the emperor decided to return to his base in present-day Beijing, in the heart of the contentious Sixteen Prefectures. However, following constant harassment from the Chinese on the return route, he died of an illness in May 947. The combination of the fall of the Later Jin and the succession crisis among the Khitan resulted in a power vacuum. Liu Zhiyuan was able to fill that void and founded the Later Han.
Sources conflict as to the origin of the Later Han and Northern Han Emperors, some indicate Shatuo ancestry while another claims that the Emperors claimed patrilineal Han Chinese ancestry.
Territorial extent.
Liu Zhiyuan established his capital at Bian, present day Kaifeng. The Later Han held essentially the same territory as the Later Jin. Its southern border with the southern states stretched from the East China Sea about halfway between the Yellow River and the Yangtze River before dipping south toward the Yangtze at its mid reaches before turning northwest along the northern border of Sichuan and extending as far west as Shaanxi. In the north, it included much of Shaanxi and Hebei except the Sixteen Prefectures, which were lost by the Later Jin to what was by this time known as the Liao Dynasty.
Short-lived dynasty.
The Later Han was among the shortest-lived regimes in the long history of China. Liu Zhiyuan died the year following the founding of the dynasty, to be succeeded by his teenaged son. The dynasty was overthrown two years later when a Han Chinese named Guo Wei led a military coup and declared himself emperor of the Later Zhou.
Northern Han.
The remnants of the Later Han returned to the traditional Shatuo stronghold of Shanxi and established the Northern Han kingdom, sometimes referred to as the Eastern Han. Under Liao dynasty protection, it was able to remain independent of the Later Zhou. The Song Dynasty emerged from the ashes of the Later Zhou in 960 and emerged as a strong, stabilizing presence in northern China. Though they had been successful in bringing the southern states under its control, a process essentially completed in 978, the Northern Han were able to hold out due to help from the Liao Dynasty. In fact, the continued existence of the Northern Han was one of the two thorns in the side of Liao-Song relations. Finally, the Song Dynasty was able to incorporate the Northern Han into its territory in 979, essentially completing the reunification of China, with the exception of the Sixteen Prefectures, which would remain in the hands of the Liao dynasty.
Later Han and Northern Han emperors family tree.
 - Later Han emperors; - Northern Han emperors


Minas Gerais Province


United Nations resolutions on Abkhazia

The Security Council of the United Nations passed 32 resolutions where it recognizes Abkhazia as an integral part of Georgia and supports its territorial integrity according to the principles of the international law. The UN is urging both sides to settle the Georgian–Abkhazian conflict through peaceful means by intensifying diplomatic dialogue and ratifying the final accord about the status of Abkhazia in the Georgian Constitution. Moreover, United nations calls for immediate return of all expelled ethnic Georgians (approximately 250,000) and determining the final status of Abkhazia as maximum autonomy or federative structure within the borders of the Georgian state. The resolutions also commend Russia's role as a peacekeeper and facilitator towards a resolution of the conflict. Resolution 1716 also urges Georgia to ensure that no troops are present in the Kodori Gorge and asks Georgia to refrain from provocative actions in the Kodori Gorge.
Many of the resolutions relate to the establishment and extension of the United Nations Observer Mission in Georgia.
On May 15, 2008, the United Nations General Assembly adopted a non-binding resolution recognising the right of all refugees (including victims of reported “ethnic cleansing”) to return to Abkhazia and their property rights. It "regretted" the attempts to alter pre-war demographic composition and called for the "rapid development of a timetable to ensure the prompt voluntary return of all refugees and internally displaced persons to their homes."
The following are United Nations resolutions adopted by the Security Council with regards to Abkhazia:


Order of Elizabeth

The Imperial Austrian Order of Elizabeth (German: "Kaiserlich österreichischer Elizabeth-Orden"), founded in 1898 by Francis Joseph, Emperor of Austria and King of Hungary, was an order created for women. The order was the namesake of Saint Elisabeth of Hungary, but it was created to honor and memorialize Franz Joseph's late wife, Empress-Queen Elisabeth.
The order, which only existed until the end of the monarchy in 1918, was divided into three classes: Grand Cross, first and second classes. There was also an Elizabeth Medal for civil merit.
Significance of Saint Elizabeth.
Saint Elisabeth (1207–1231) was a Hungarian princess, the daughter of King Andrew II of Hungary. Married at age thirteen to Louis IV, Landgrave of Thuringia (ca. 1220), she spent her life giving alms to the poor and sick. After her husband's death, she gave away the vast majority of his estate to build hospitals and to aid in the relief of her starving subjects. After dying of natural causes in 1231, she was canonized by Pope Gregory IX, in 1235. She is considered the patron saint of bakers, beggars, and charities. Given her status as Hungarian royalty, her patronage of charities, and the fact that the Holy Relics attributed to her resided in Vienna, Saint Elizabeth made for a perfect choice for the award's name.
Empress Elizabeth "Sisi".
"Née" Duchess Elisabeth in Bavaria (1837–1898), "Sisi" was a cousin of King Ludwig II of Bavaria. She married the 24-year-old Emperor Francis Joseph in 1854. Despite a cold start to their marriage, the two eventually reconciled, and fell in love. Theirs was a classic, mid-19th century, courtly relationship, where occasional infidelity by one or both parties was discreetly accepted. They were, for the most part, "happy" by the standards of the day, and were married for over 44 years. When Elisabeth was assassinated in 1898, the widowed emperor was devastated by the loss. Creating the Order of Elisabeth was as much a public show of affection as his memorial to her as it was to honor Saint Elisabeth.
The Order.
According to medal expert and collector Yuri Yashnev:
The award was intended for ladies, regardless of social status or religion, for merits in religious and charitable work. The award had four degrees - the Grand Cross, I Degree and II Degree, and also a cross of merit... Awards were made, personally, by the emperor... the badges and insignia of the Order were to be returned to the state upon the death of the member, or upon the advancement from a lower degree to a higher degree... There were 81 awards of the Grand Cross, 332 awards of the I Degree, 500 awards of the II Degree, and 208 awards of the Elizabeth Medal for merit, between 1898 and 1918, when the Order was disbanded with the collapse of the monarchy.


Embargoed

Embargoed is a UK-based human rights organisation campaigning to bring an immediate and unconditional end to all embargoes against the people of Northern Cyprus. Embargoed does not proscribe any political remedy, but considers the embargoes on the people of Northern Cyprus to be unjust and immoral. It does not consider itself a nationalist organisation, and its manifesto commits it to being multi-cultural, and avoiding politics. The group also campaigns for 1964 to be recognised as the start of the embargoes, this being the year of the breakdown of the power sharing between Greek and Turkish Cypriots (see Cyprus dispute).
Activities include organising marches and demonstrations to raise public awareness.
In the UK the campaign has received the backing of the Communication Workers Union and Sarah Ludford a UK Member of the European Parliament.


Labour Leave

Labour Leave is a Eurosceptic campaign group in the United Kingdom. The group is unofficially affiliated with the Labour Party, and campaigned for the United Kingdom to vote to withdraw from the European Union, in the June 2016 EU Referendum. The group was led by eurosceptic Labour MPs: Graham Stringer, Kelvin Hopkins, and Roger Godsiff.
Kate Hoey was another co chair in the group, until she reportedly resigned in February 2016. Labour MP Gisela Stuart did not participate in the group, instead chairing the official leave campaign, Vote Leave.
John Mills officially resigned as chairman of Labour Leave, in July 2018. The supporters page of the website, in January 2019, listed only Brendan Chilton (chair) and MPs, Kate Hoey and Frank Field (on 30 August 2018, Field had resigned the Labour whip). Chilton is also the general secretary, and the only director of "Labour Leave Limited". The group is still active, as of .
Position within Vote Leave.
The organisation's position within the Vote Leave campaign has been seen as precarious, a source close to the campaign told the "Morning Star", due to a perceived domination of the Vote Leave campaign by Conservative and UKIP officials. Of Vote Leave's seventeen strong governing board, only two members (Mills and Stringer) are members of Labour Leave.
In response to this, the idea of a campaign wholly independent of both Vote Leave and Leave.EU had been suggested by Hoey and Hopkins, among others.
Funding For The Group.
Adam Barnett, on the left wing political blog, "Left Foot Forward", wrote that Labour Leave's two biggest funders were Conservative Party donors, and its third biggest funder was the official campaign group for Brexit, Vote Leave, an organisation which is (mostly) Conservative.
The Electoral Commission shows Labour Leave received £15,000 from Vote Leave in February. It also received £50,000, from donor of the Conservatives, Jeremy Hosking, who had given the Conservatives almost £570,000, by June 2016.
Hosking donated £100,000 to the Conservative Party in April 2015, and donated £50,000 in March 2016 (the same month he gave £50,000 to Labour Leave). Labour Leave took a further £150,000 in May from Richard Smith, believed to be the owner of 55 Tufton Street in Westminster (home of several right wing groups).
Barnett attributed this collaboration, between opposing political organisations, to a desire by the Conservatives to split the vote, on the Labour EU Referendum, as it was alleged that Labour members were unsure, of their party's position on Brexit.
Labour Leave continue to raise money, from crowd sourcing campaigns, and from direct donations from their supporters and members. Labour Leave was fined £9,000 in March 2019, by the Electoral Commission, for an inaccurate campaign spending return, and inaccurate donation reports, at the 2016 EU Referendum.


Newham Monitoring Project

Newham Monitoring Project (NMP) was a grassroots community-based anti-racist organisation in the London Borough of Newham, London, England. Its aim was to provide support work against racial discrimination and violence, police misconduct and around civil rights issues. It provided advice, support, advocacy and a 24-hour emergency helpline to members of the black community facing racism. It undertook community outreach and educational projects and campaign work around issues arising from its casework.
The patron of NMP was the poet and author Benjamin Zephaniah.
History.
NMP was formed in 1980 from a community campaign for justice following the murder of a local teenager, Akhtar Ali Baig, in East Ham, East London. NMP's initial purpose was to monitor racist attacks and the response of statutory authorities such as the police or local authority.
Shortly after its formation, the organisation extended its remit beyond monitoring racist attacks to include reports of police harassment and misconduct within the local the black community. NMP began documenting case examples and published yearly reports that argued the existence of institutional racism and how this in turn shaped what it perceived as the societal criminalisation of black people. It also aligned with a series of community campaigns which claimed to be for progressive social change and justice, such as the right to self-defence by members of the black community in response to racist attacks.
In 1983, NMP initiated a 24-hour emergency helpline run by trained volunteers to provide immediate assistance to people with complaints of racial violence.
Although self-organisation of black communities was central to its founding aims, it worked with white people who defined as 'anti-racists' in order to align its work with wider demands for social justice.
NMP was associated with justice campaigns such as those of the Newham 7 and Newham 8, Stephen Lawrence and many involving deaths in police custody such as Ibrahima Sey and Shiji Lapite. It also worked alongside many other organisations working with the black community such as Newham Asian Women's Project, Southall Black Sisters and the United Friends and Families Campaign, other organisations within the anti-racist movement such as the Institute of Race Relations and Campaign Against Racism and Fascism (CARF) as well as organisations working on a broader level for justice such as INQUEST.
NMP closed in September 2016 due to lack of funds.
NMP was one of only a small number of independent community organisations providing specialist casework support around racial discrimination in the UK. Research indicates that independent community groups provide avenues of support not available from racial equality councils, housing departments or police, to the black community to combat racist incidents.
The organisation publicly argued racism remains rooted in the fabric of British society, as shown by the recent anti-terrorism legislation and stop and search powers, which disproportionately affect black communities. It maintained that the experiences of its individual cases reflect the broader reality of racism, therefore campaigns rooted in this way have a real base within the black community and are able to mobilise support in a way that high-profile but largely media-focused campaigns cannot.
NMP has supported other active campaigns such as that led by the family of Jean Charles de Menezes, an innocent Brazilian man shot to death by police in 2005 during an anti-terror operation for which no individual officer has ever been charged.
It has worked with the families involved in the near fatal 2 June 2006 Forest Gate raid, standing alongside the local community in condemning the actions of the police and calling for a full and fair independent investigation and for officers to be held accountable. NMP worked with a number of other local organisations to organise a demonstration about this issue on 18 June 2006.
NMP submitted a report to the Metropolitan Police Authority criticising the Metropolitan Police Service's media and communications handling of this incident.
Other projects included involvement in organising discussion based events for the local community alongside Newham Bookshop with authors such as Moazzam Begg, Rageh Omaar, Gary Younge, Jocelyn Hurndall, who is the mother of Tom Hurndall, and Clive Stafford Smith to highlight related issues of public concern that engage with similar themes of the organisation's work around racism, human rights, policing and justice.