- Russia labels reports on troop movements in Ukraine ‘provocation’ Al Jazeera English
- How Ukraine gained a foothold across the river in Kherson Oblast: told by surviving Russian soldiers Yahoo News
- Russia’s Military Announces, Then Backtracks on ‘Regrouping’ in Southern Ukraine The Moscow Times
- Russian State News Agencies Publish, Then Immediately Retract Story On Troops ‘Regrouping’ East Of Dnieper Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty
- Kremlin refuses to comment on Russia’s “regrouping of troops” near Dnipro River Yahoo News
- View Full Coverage on Google News
Tag Archives: movements
Nigerian Military Was Alerted Of Suspicious Movements Of Terrorists In Federal University, Zamfara But They Failed To Mount Vigilance – Northern Coalition – SaharaReporters.com
- Nigerian Military Was Alerted Of Suspicious Movements Of Terrorists In Federal University, Zamfara But They Failed To Mount Vigilance – Northern Coalition SaharaReporters.com
- 24 Female Students Among Dozens Kidnapped By Gunmen At Nigerian University NDTV
- Tinubu orders immediate rescue of abducted Zamfara students Punch Newspapers
- Zamfara: Kidnaping of female students, threat to girl-child education – ACF Vanguard
- Tinubu directs security agencies to rescue remaining female students abducted at Nigerian university Premium Times
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Spontaneous Baby Movements Are Important for Development of Coordinated Sensorimotor System
Summary: A new study reveals the spontaneous, random movements babies make aid in the development of the sensorimotor system.
Source: University of Tokyo
Spontaneous, random baby movements aid development of their sensorimotor system, according to new research led by the University of Tokyo.
Detailed motion capture of newborns and infants was combined with a musculoskeletal computer model to enable researchers to analyze communication among muscles and sensation across the whole body.
Researchers found patterns of muscle interaction developing based on the babies’ random exploratory behavior that would later enable them to perform sequential movements as infants.
Better understanding how our sensorimotor system develops could help us gain insight into the origin of human movement as well as earlier diagnoses of developmental disorders.
Right from birth—and even in the womb—babies start to kick, wiggle and move seemingly without aim or external stimulation. These are called “spontaneous movements,” and researchers believe that they have an important role to play in the development of the sensorimotor system, i.e., the ability to control the muscles, movement and coordination.
If researchers can better understand these seemingly random movements and how they are involved in early human development, we might also be able to identify early indicators for certain developmental disorders, such as cerebral palsy.
Currently, there is limited knowledge about how newborns and infants learn to move. “Previous research into sensorimotor development has focused on kinematic properties, muscle activities which cause movement in a joint or a part of the body,” said Project Assistant Professor Hoshinori Kanazawa from the Graduate School of Information Science and Technology.
“However, our study focused on muscle activity and sensory input signals for the whole body. By combining a musculoskeletal model and neuroscientific method, we found that spontaneous movements, which seem to have no explicit task or purpose, contribute to coordinated sensorimotor development.”
First, the team recorded the joint movements of 12 healthy newborns (less than 10 days old) and 10 young infants (about three months old) using motion capture technology. Next, they estimated the babies’ muscle activity and sensory input signals with the aid of a whole-body, infant-scale musculoskeletal computer model which they had created.
Finally, they used computer algorithms to analyze the spatiotemporal (both space and time) features of the interaction between the input signals and muscle activity.
“We were surprised that during spontaneous movement, infants’ movements ‘wandered’ and they pursued various sensorimotor interactions. We named this phenomenon ‘sensorimotor wandering,’” said Kanazawa.
“It has been commonly assumed that sensorimotor system development generally depends on the occurrence of repeated sensorimotor interactions, meaning the more you do the same action the more likely you are to learn and remember it.
“However, our results implied that infants develop their own sensorimotor system based on explorational behavior or curiosity, so they are not just repeating the same action but a variety of actions. In addition to this, our findings provide a conceptual linkage between early spontaneous movements and spontaneous neuronal activity.”
See also
Previous studies on humans and animals have shown that motor behavior (movement) involves a small set of primitive muscular control patterns. These are patterns that can typically be seen in task-specific or cyclic movements, like walking or reaching.
The results of this latest study supports the theory that newborns and infants can acquire sensorimotor modules, i.e., synchronized muscle activities and sensory inputs, through spontaneous whole-body movements without an explicit purpose or task.
Even through sensorimotor wandering, the babies showed an increase in coordinated whole-body movements and in anticipatory movements. The movements performed by the infant group showed more common patterns and sequential movements, compared to the random movements of the newborn group.
Next, Kanazawa wants to look at how sensorimotor wandering affects later development, such as walking and reaching, along with more complex behaviors and higher cognitive functions.
“My original background is in infant rehabilitation. My big goal through my research is to understand the underlying mechanisms of early motor development and to find knowledge that will help to promote baby development.”
About this neurodevelopment research news
Author: Press Office
Source: University of Tokyo
Contact: Press Office – University of Tokyo
Image: The image is credited to Kanazawa et al
Original Research: The findings will appear in PNAS
Heart attack: Having bowel movements more than once a day increases risk
Coronary heart disease (CHD), also known as ischaemic heart disease, is a major cause of death in the UK and worldwide. CHD describes what happens when your heart’s blood supply is blocked or interrupted by a build-up of fatty substances in the coronary arteries. It’s often a precursor to having a heart attack. CHD is usually brought on by poor lifestyle decisions but research has alighted upon a surprising risk factor – daily bowel movements.
Researchers examined the associations of bowel movement frequency with major vascular and non-vascular diseases outside the digestive system.
To do this, they sifted through data from the China Kadoorie Biobank in which participants from 10 geographically diverse areas across China were enrolled between 2004 and 2008.
For the study, 487, 198 participants aged 30 to 79 years without cancer, heart disease or stroke were included and followed up for an average of 10 years.
What did the researchers learn?
Participants having bowel movements “more than once a day” had higher risks of ischaemic heart disease when compared with the reference group (“once a day”), wrote the researchers.
READ MORE: Doctor warns against ‘suddenly’ stopping statins – the ‘shock’ can be ‘life-threatening’
What’s more, this trend was seen with a range of other chronic complications, such as heart failure, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, type 2 diabetes mellitus and chronic kidney disease (CKD).
In addition, the lowest bowel movement frequency (“less than three times a week”) was also associated with higher risks of ischaemic heart disease, major coronary events, ischaemic stroke and CKD.
The researchers concluded: “BMF [bowel movement frequency] was associated with future risks of multiple vascular and non-vascular diseases. The integration of BMF assessment and health counselling into primary care should be considered.”
The link is not surprising. Constipation, for example, is one of the risks of cardiovascular disease, and patients with cardiovascular disease tend to be constipated.
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Some people don’t know they have CHD before they have a heart attack.
Angina is the term used to describe the most common symptoms of CHD.
According to the British Heart Foundation (BHF), these include:
- Chest pain
- Shortness of breath
- pain travelling through the body
- feeling faint
- Nausea.
How to respond to a heart attack
A heart attack (myocardial infarction or MI) is a serious medical emergency in which the supply of blood to the heart is suddenly blocked, usually by a blood clot.
Passive Exercise Offers Same Brain Health Benefits as Active Movements
Summary: Passive exercise increases cerebral blood flow and improves executive function, providing the same cognitive benefits as more active exercise.
Source: University of Western Ontario
A new study by kinesiology graduate students from Western has found passive exercise leads to increased cerebral blood flow and improved executive function, providing the same cognitive benefits as active exercise.
Published in Psychophysiology, the study is the first to look at whether there would be benefits to brain health during passive exercise where a person’s limbs are moved via an external force—in this case, cycle pedals pushed by a mechanically driven flywheel.
During a 20-minute session with healthy young adults, the team assessed executive function at baseline, before participants exercised, and compared the data post exercise. They found an improvement in executive function of the same magnitude for both the passive and the active exercise conditions, without an increase in heart rate or diastolic blood pressure.
Executive function is a higher-order cognitive ability that allows people to make plans and supports the activities of daily living. People who have mild cognitive impairments, such as people experiencing symptoms of early-stage Alzheimer’s, can find their executive function negatively affected.
Previous research has documented that active exercise, where a person activates their muscles of their own volition, can increase blood flow to the brain and improve executive function. Passive exercise also increases blood flow to the brain, but this is significantly less documented.
“In terms of passive exercise, we could only hypothesize the outcome because this type of research had not been done before,” said Matthew Heath, professor in kinesiology and supervisor of the study.
During passive exercise, a person’s limbs move and their muscle receptors are being stretched. That information is sent to the brain, indicating that more blood is needed in the moving areas of the body and in connected regions of the brain. This increase in cerebral blood flow, while significantly less than with active exercise, produced executive function improvements of a similar magnitude—an exciting result for the researchers.
“The potential impact for people with limited or no mobility could be profound. If done regularly, the increase in blood flow to the brain and resultant improvement in executive function will, optimistically, become a compounding effect that has a significant impact on cognitive health and executive function,” Heath explained.
Further study could be improved by looking at whether the benefit to executive function persists at longer intervals of time post-exercise, as well as by the inclusion of more diverse participants (those who are older or health-compromised, for example).
Heath and team see great potential in using passive exercise in long-term care homes or in rehabilitation programs for people recovering from musculoskeletal injuries, who cannot perform weight bearing exercise.
The study was led by master’s student Mustafa Shirzad, and co-authored by graduate students Benjamin Tar, Connor Dalton, James Van Riesen, and Michael Marsala. Heath was the corresponding author.
About this exercises and brain health research news
Author: Kim McCready
Source: University of Western Ontario
Contact: Kim McCready – University of Western Ontario
Image: The image is credited to University of Western Ontario
Original Research: Closed access.
“Passive exercise increases cerebral blood flow velocity and supports a postexercise executive function benefit” by Mustafa Shirzad et al. Psychophysiology
Abstract
See also
Passive exercise increases cerebral blood flow velocity and supports a postexercise executive function benefit
Executive function entails high-level cognitive control supporting activities of daily living. Literature has shown that a single-bout of exercise involving volitional muscle activation (i.e., active exercise) improves executive function and that an increase in cerebral blood flow (CBF) may contribute to this benefit.
It is, however, unknown whether non-volitional exercise (i.e., passive exercise) wherein an individual’s limbs are moved via an external force elicits a similar executive function benefit. This is a salient question given that proprioceptive and feedforward drive from passive exercise increases CBF independent of the metabolic demands of active exercise.
Here, in a procedural validation participants (n = 2) used a cycle ergometer to complete separate 20-min active and passive (via mechanically driven flywheel) exercise conditions and a non-exercise control condition. Electromyography showed that passive exercise did not increase agonist muscle activation or increase ventilation or gas exchange variables (i.e., V̇O2 and V̇CO2).
In a main experiment participants (n = 28) completed the same exercise and control conditions and transcranial Doppler ultrasound showed that active and passive exercise (but not the control condition) increased CBF through the middle cerebral artery (ps <.001); albeit the magnitude was less during passive exercise.
Notably, antisaccade reaction times prior to and immediately after each condition showed that active (p < .001) and passive (p = .034) exercise improved an oculomotor-based measure of executive function, whereas no benefit was observed in the control condition (p = .85).
Accordingly, results evince that passive exercise ‘boosts’ an oculomotor-based measure of executive function and supports convergent evidence that increased CBF mediates this benefit.
Eye movements could be the missing link in our understanding of memory
Humans have a fascinating ability to recreate events in the mind’s eye, in exquisite detail. Over 50 years ago, Donald Hebb and Ulrich Neisser, the forefathers of cognitive psychology, theorised that eye movements are vital for our ability to do this. They pointed out we move our eyes not only to receive sensory visual input, but also to bring to mind information stored in memory. Our recent study provides the only academic evidence to date for their theory.
It could help research in everything from human biology to robotics. For instance, it could shed new light on the link between eye movements, mental imagery and dreaming.
We can only process information from a small part of our visual field at a time. We overcome this limitation by constantly shifting our focus of attention through eye movements. Eye movements unfold in sequences of fixations and saccades. Fixations occur three to four times per second and are the brief moments of focus that allow us to sample visual information, and saccades are the rapid movements from one fixation point to another.
Although only a limited amount of information can be processed at each fixation point, a sequence of eye movements binds visual details together (for example, faces and objects). This allows us to encode a memory of what we can see as a whole. Our visual sampling of the world – through our eye movements – determines the content of the memories that our brains store.
A trip down memory lane
In our study, 60 participants were shown images of scenes and objects, such as a cityscape and vegetables on a kitchen counter. After a short break, they were asked to recall the images as thoroughly as possible while looking at a blank screen. They rated the quality of their recollection and were asked to select the correct image from a set of highly similar images. Using state-of-the-art eye tracking techniques we measured participants’ scanpaths, their eye movement sequences,both when they inspected the images and when they recalled them.
We showed that scanpaths during memory retrieval was connected to the quality of participants’ remembering. When participants’ scanpaths most closely replicated how their eyes moved when they looked at the original image, they performed their best during the recollection. Our results provide evidence that the actual replay of an sequence of eye movements boosts memory reconstruction.
We analysed different features of how participants’ scanpaths progressed over space and time – such as the order of fixations and the direction of saccades. Some scanpath features were more important than others, depending on the nature of the sought-after memory. For example, the direction of eye movements was more important when recalling the details of how pastries were positioned next to each other on a table than when recalling the shape of a rock formation. Such differences can be attributed to different memory demands. Reconstructing the precise arrangement of pastries are more demanding than reconstructing the coarse layout of a rock formation.
Episodic memory allows us to mentally travel in time to relive past experiences. Previous research established that we tend to reproduce gaze patterns from the original event we are trying to call to mind and that gaze locations during memory retrieval have important consequences for what you remember. Those findings all relate to static gaze, not eye movements.
Donald and Ulrich’s 1968 theory was that eye movements are used to organise and assemble “part images” into a whole image visualised during episodic remembering. Our study showed that the way scanpaths unfold over time is critical to recreate experiences in our mind’s eye.
A step forwards
The results could be important for cognitive neuroscience and human biology research and in fields as diverse as computing and image processing, robotics, workplace design, as well as clinical psychology. This is because they provide behavioural evidence of a critical link between eye movements and cognitive processing which can be harnessed for treatments such as brain injury rehabilitation. For instance, eye movement desensitisation and reprocessing (EMDR) is a well-established psychotherapy treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
In this therapy, the patient is focusing on the trauma and engaging in bilateral eye movements, which is associated with a reduction in the vividness and emotion associated with the memory of the trauma. But the underlying mechanisms of the therapy are not yet well understood. Our study shows a direct link between eye movements and the human memory systems, which may provide an essential piece of the puzzle.
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
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The Anti-Vaccine Movement’s New Frontier
One chilly afternoon this past January, Kennedy took the microphone in front of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, before a crowd of maybe a few hundred people, some of whom carried signs reading, “We will not comply,” “Resist medical tyranny” (accompanied by a swastika) and “Land of the free you can’t mandate me.” A march earlier that day, involving several thousand people, included members of the far-right nationalist group the Proud Boys, firefighters wearing helmets and even a few Buddhist monks from New England. They had gathered for a rally billed as Defeat the Mandates: An American Homecoming. Its speakers included many of the country’s best-known vaccine skeptics: the vaccine researcher Robert Malone; the activist Del Bigtree; and, of course, Kennedy.
“What we’re seeing today is what I call turnkey totalitarianism,” he told his audience. “They are putting into place all these technological mechanisms for control that we’ve never seen before.” He continued: “Even in Hitler’s Germany you could cross the Alps into Switzerland. You could hide in an attic like Anne Frank did.” But no longer, he suggested: “The mechanisms are being put in place that will make it so that none of us can run and none of us can hide.”
Reaction was swift, including from his own wife, the actress Cheryl Hines. On Twitter, she called the Anne Frank reference “reprehensible and insensitive.” But outrage over the allusion to Frank belied the deeper issue, which is just how influential Kennedy and other figures in the anti-vaccine movement have become. Kennedy is chairman of an organization named Children’s Health Defense; it applied for the permit to hold the Washington rally. The nonprofit group, which says it aims to “end childhood health epidemics by working aggressively to eliminate harmful exposures,” churns out online articles that sow doubt about vaccine safety. And it has expanded aggressively during the pandemic. In January 2020, the Children’s Health Defense website received just under 84,000 monthly visits from the United States, according to the tracking firm Similarweb. As of this March, that number had reached more than 1.4 million monthly visits, a 17-fold increase in traffic. (Revenue, coming from donations and fund-raising events, was already surging before the pandemic, according to the group’s tax filings, to $6.8 million in 2020 from just under $1.1 million in 2018.)
By one measure, C.H.D.’s reach now occasionally outstrips that of bona fide news outlets. Indiana University’s Observatory on Social Media, whose CoVaxxy Project follows how vaccine-related content is shared on Twitter, has found that the organization’s vaccine-related posts — these might falsely claim that thousands of people have died from being vaccinated, for example, or that the risks of Covid-19 boosters outweigh the benefits — are frequently shared more widely than vaccine-related items from CNN, NPR and the Centers for Disease Control. In some weeks, the vaccine-related content of the Children’s Health Defense was shared more widely than that of The New York Times or The Washington Post.
Kennedy, who did not respond to questions submitted through his publisher, embodies a seeming contradiction of the anti-vaccine movement that presents a particularly difficult challenge for lay people. He has done important work as an environmental lawyer, and though other members of his family have publicly criticized his anti-vaccine crusade, he still bears the name of one of the country’s best known Democratic political families. He brings a certain amount of credibility to his cause. Many other figures who routinely question the safety and utility of vaccines have credentials that can seem impressive. They include Wakefield; Malone, the researcher who claims to have invented the mRNA vaccine (35 years ago, he and several colleagues published an important paper in the field, but other scientists say that he didn’t “invent” the technology, which hundreds of scientists have since worked on); and Judy Mikovits, a researcher whose 2009 paper linking chronic fatigue syndrome to a viral infection was retracted from the journal Science. Mikovits, who was fired from her job as research director of the Whittemore Peterson Institute for Neuro-Immune Disease in Reno, Nev., has published a best-selling book about supposed malfeasance in science titled “Plague of Corruption.”
Numerous experts told me that a good way to understand what motivates many players in the anti-vaccine movement is through the lens of profit. There are several levels of profiteering. The first involves social media companies. Historically, the algorithms that drive their platforms, some argue, have fed users more and more of what they respond to without regard for whether it’s true. “It’s not some sophisticated technology,” says Hany Farid, a professor at the University of California, Berkeley, who studies misinformation on social media. “It turns out we’re primitive jerks. And the most outrageous stuff, we click on it.”
Facebook and other social media companies have, they claim, taken steps to counter the proliferation of vaccine-related misinformation on their sites. Facebook now says that it is helping to “keep people healthy and safe” by providing reliable information on vaccines. But Farid and others doubt that Facebook, in particular, will ever rid itself entirely of such material because attention-grabbing content is, in the attention economy, immensely valuable. “The business model, that’s really the core poison here,” Farid says. A partial solution, he thinks, would be changes to regulatory laws allowing individuals to hold social media companies legally responsible — through lawsuits — for harm connected to content they promote: “You should be held accountable for what you’re promoting, particularly because they’re making money from it.” Aaron Simpson, a spokesman for Meta, the parent company of Facebook, told me in an email that the company has “every incentive” to purge misinformation from its platforms because it makes money from ads, and advertisers have repeatedly said they don’t want their ads appearing next to misinformation. And yet, in the past, prominent anti-vaccine activists have themselves been advertisers on Facebook.
Russia-Ukraine: Biden announces sanctions, troop movements in response to invasion: LIVE UPDATES
Biden says additional US forces will be used to assist NATO countries
President Biden announced that additional U.S. forces would be on the move to help reinforce the security of NATO countries amid growing tensions between Russia and Ukraine.
“I have authorized additional movements of U.S. forces and equipment already stationed in Europe to strengthen our Baltic allies,” Biden said during an address Tuesday. “Let me be clear, these are totally defensive moves on our part. We have no intention of fighting Russia.”
But Biden said the U.S. wanted to send an “unmistakable message” that the U.S. was willing to “defend every inch of NATO territory.”
Biden calls out Russia for stockpiling blood, arguing it is a clear sign they intend to invade
President Biden noted that the Russian government was moving supplies of blood along with troops and ships near the Ukraine border, arguing it was a clear sign that the Russians intend to start a war in Ukraine.
“You don’t need blood unless you plan on starting a war,” President Biden said of Russia stockpiling blood supplies on the Ukrainian border.
The president also announced new sanctions against Russia in response to their recognition of separatists regions within Ukraine, warning that more measures were to come if Russia proceeded further into Ukrainian territory.
Biden says Russia is ‘beginning’ an invasion, announces sanctions
President Biden said that Russia has begun “invasion” of Ukraine Tuesday while announcing new sanctions aimed at deterring further Russian aggression in Ukraine.
Biden called the sanctions that are “far beyond” the sanctions imposed on Russia during its 2014 annexation of Crimea in Ukraine, saying the U.S. was cutting of Russia’s major financial institutions from the west.
US, Europe prepare for possible refugee wave out of Ukraine
U.S. and European officials are preparing for a possible refugee wave out of Ukraine should Russia
move forward with a full invasion of the Eastern European country – raising fears of a crisis that could eclipse the 2015 Syrian refugee crisis.
“If [Putin] employs that kind of combat power, it will certainly create enormous casualties within the civilian population and so this could create a … tragedy, quite frankly, in terms of refugee flow and displaced people,” Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said on ABC News on Sunday. “So this is potentially very, very dangerous.”
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday announced that he was recognizing two breakaway territories in Ukraine and followed it up with a deployment of troops that the White House has described as an “invasion.”
European countries have been warning for weeks that a flood of Ukrainian refugees could soon follow any invasion by Russia, raising fears of a flood of people that could cause knock-on effects in nearby countries and the continent as a whole. Those fears are shared by American officials.
Click here to read more on Fox News.
Biden to speak in minutes on Russia-Ukraine conflict
President Biden is set to address the nation on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine at 1 p.m. ET.
A White House official tells Fox News’ Patrick Ward that Biden met with his National Security Team this morning.
Click here to watch Biden’s address on Fox News.
European Union: Approved sanctions are going to hurt Russia ‘a lot’
The 27 European Union members nations have unanimously agreed on an initial set of sanctions targeting Russian officials over their actions in Ukraine, according to French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian.
EU foreign affairs chief Josep Borrell said the package approved Tuesday “will hurt Russia, and it will hurt a lot.”
Borrell said the sanctions would affect members of Russia’s lower house of parliament and other individuals involved in approving the deployment of Russian troops to separatist-held regions of eastern Ukraine.
He says the package will also affect Russia’s financing of policies linked to Ukraine by limiting access to EU financial markets.
“This story is not finished,” said Borrell of Russian actions in Ukraine.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
German protesters take to the streets with ‘Stop Putin, Stop War’ banner
Demonstrators stand along the street near the Russian embassy in Berlin on Tuesday to protest the escalation of tensions between Russia and Ukraine.
The scenes come after Germany announced earlier this morning that it was taking steps to halt the certification of the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline from Russia.
Protesters gather outside Russian embassy in Paris
A protestor holds a sign which reads “France is with Ukraine”, during a demonstration in front of the Russian embassy in Paris, France, on Tuesday.
President Biden to speak at 1 p.m. ET on Russia and Ukraine
Click here to watch on Fox News.
WATCH: Putin humiliates spy chief on world stage: ‘Speak, speak, speak plainly!’
Russian President Vladimir Putin
mocked one of his chief officials during a televised meeting Monday, telling the intelligence officer to “speak plainly.”
The Russian president grew testy with Director of Foreign Intelligence Sergey Naryshkin during a tense meeting on Ukraine. Putin was seemingly annoyed at what he characterized as unclear statements of support for declaring the independence of two Ukrainian regions.
“With the suggestion of Nikolai Platonovich, that we could give our, how to say it, Western partners, one last chance. Presenting them with the choice, in the shortest time frame, to force Kyiv to choose peace and implement the Minsk agreements,” Naryshin told the president. “In the worst case, we must make the decision that we are discussing today.”
“What does it mean, ‘in the worst case’? Are you suggesting we start negotiations?” Putin asked. “Or to recognize sovereignty?”
As Naryshkin stuttered, attempting to respond, Putin pressed him harder.
“Speak, speak, speak plainly!” Putin said.
Click here to read more on Fox News.
Putin calls on Ukraine to demilitarize
Russian President Vladimir Putin, during a press conference Tuesday, has called on Ukraine to demilitarize.
Ukraine-Russia crisis could push inflation to 10% if conflict escalates
U.S. inflation is already at the highest level in four decades. The worsening Ukraine-Russia crisis could push it even higher.
That’s because the conflict is threatening to send oil prices above $100 a barrel for the first time since 2014, according to RSM chief economist Joe Brusuelas. Oil prices already surged to a fresh eight-year high on Tuesday after Moscow ordered troops into two breakaway regions in eastern Ukraine, with Brent crude, the global benchmark, hitting $97.63.
A war in Europe – which many foreign policy experts say is a real possibility – could cause oil prices to climb as much as 20% to $120 a barrel, Brusuelas estimated. Should that happen, consumer prices in the U.S. would surge above 10% on an annual basis, the economist said, the highest since October 1981.
“The potential for a broader energy shock to the global and U.S. economies should Russia invade Ukraine has added to a combustible mix of factors that is causing inflation to accelerate in the United States and abroad,” Brusuelas said. “That risk carries with it the potential to slow down growth.”
Click here
to read more on Fox Business.
NATO leader says new Russian troops have arrived in Ukraine
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg told Fox News’ Greg Palkot on Tuesday that further Russian troops have entered Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region last night.
He described the actions as further Russian incursions, noting how Russia has gone from covert to overt with its military actions.
Russian lawmakers give Putin approval to use military force abroad
Lawmakers in Russia have granted President Vladimir Putin
approval Tuesday to use military force outside of its borders, according to the Associated Press.
Members of the upper house, the Federation Council, voted unanimously in their decision — effectively formalizing a Russian military deployment to the rebel regions of Ukraine, where an eight-year conflict has killed nearly 14,000 people.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Lviv mayor tells Fox News that Putin wants to ‘completely destroy Ukraine’
Fox News’ Lucas Tomlinson reports the latest from Lviv, Ukraine.
President Biden to speak about Russia-Ukraine conflict at 1 p.m. ET
President Biden is preparing to speak about the latest developments in Ukraine at 1 p.m. ET.
European Council previews potential sanctions against Russia
The European Council announced Tuesday that it is finalizing a package of sanctions against Russia.
The package, it says, contains proposals to “target banks that are financing Russian military and other operations” in eastern Ukraine, “target the ability of the Russian state and government to access the EU’s capital and financial markets and services” and “target trade from the two breakaway regions to and from the EU, to ensure that those responsible clearly feel the economic consequences of their illegal and aggressive actions.”
Ukraine says two soldiers killed in shelling
Ukraine’s defense ministry said Tuesday that two of its soldiers have died after receiving “shrapnel wounds” as a result of shelling from “Russian occupational forces” in the country’s east.
“Twelve servicemen were wounded with varying degrees of severity and are in medical facilities and six servicemen received combat injuries,” a statement read.
White House now calling Russia’s military activity a Ukraine ‘invasion’
White House officials have confirmed to Fox News on Tuesday that the Biden administration is now calling Russia’s military maneuvers in Ukraine
an “invasion,” following comments Deputy National Security Advisor Jon Finer made during an early morning television interview.
Click here to read more on Fox News.
Fox News’ Mark Meredith contributed to this report.
UK: Sanctions target ‘Putin’s inner circle’, supporters of Crimea occupation
The United Kingdom’s Foreign Office said Tuesday that “oligarchs at the heart of Putin’s inner circle and banks which have bankrolled the Russian occupation of Crimea have been targeted by the first wave of U.K. sanctions in response to Russia’s further violation of Ukraine’s sovereignty.”
“It sends a clear message that the U.K. will use our economic heft to inflict pain on Russia and degrade their strategic interests,” Foreign Secretary Liz Truss said. “And we are prepared to go much further if Russia does not pull back from the brink. We will curtail the ability of the Russian state and Russian companies to raise funds in our markets, prohibit a range of high tech exports, and further isolate Russian banks from the global economy.”
The Foreign Office also said it will “sanction those members of the Russian Duma and Federation Council who voted to recognize the independence of Donetsk and Luhansk in flagrant violation of Ukraine’s territorial sovereignty.”
Ukrainian resident Melaniya Podolyak talks US sanctions, threat of Russian invasion
Melaniya Podolyak, a Ukrainian resident, joins ‘Fox & Friends First’ to talk US sanctions and a possible Russian invasion.
Protest forms outside Russian embassy in Kyiv, Ukraine
Police are seen standing behind an installation of crosses on which is written “Russian occupier” during a rally against Russia in front of Russian Embassy in Kyiv, Ukraine, on Tuesday.
How Russia’s latest actions in Ukraine are impacting the markets
U.S. stocks remained lower Tuesday morning but were off the worst levels of the session as investors weigh earnings from retailers against Russian President Vladimir Putin’s ordering of troops into separatist regions of eastern Ukraine.
Dow futures were down over 100 points, while the S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite saw dips of 0.1% and 0.4%, respectively.
Western powers fear that Russia might use skirmishes in Ukraine’s eastern regions as a pretext for an attack on the democracy, which has defied Moscow’s attempts to pull it back into its orbit.
West Texas Intermediate crude spiked to over $93 per barrel, while Brent, the global benchmark hit $97, as Germany announced plans to halt the process of certifying the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline from Russia because of Moscow’s actions in Ukraine, Chancellor Olaf Scholz announced. Natural Gas prices jumped over 3%.
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Photo shows Ukraine military staging drills
Ukrainian service members ride atop tanks during tactical drills at a training ground in an unknown location in Ukraine, in this handout picture released Tuesday.
Russian troops moved into eastern Ukraine’s breakaway regions, European officials say
Russian troops have arrived in eastern Ukraine hours after President Vladimir Putin announced that he would recognize the independence of two separatist regions, European officials said Tuesday morning.
“Russian troops have entered in Donbas,” the name for the area where the two separatist regions, Donetsk and Luhansk, are located, European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said in Paris. “We consider Donbas part of Ukraine.”
When asked whether Putin’s decision to order Russian troops into the regions amounts to an invasion, Borrell said, “I wouldn’t say that’s a fully-fledged invasion, but Russian troops are on Ukrainian soil.”
Poland’s Defense Ministry and British Health Secretary Sajid Javid also said Russian forces had entered Ukraine’s east. Javid went further, telling Sky News that “the invasion of Ukraine has begun.”
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White House: ‘We will be following up with our own measures today’
White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki, in a tweet Tuesday morning, said President Biden has “made clear that if Russia invaded Ukraine, we would act with Germany to ensure Nord Stream 2 does not move forward.”
Germany earlier this morning said it is taking steps to halt the process of certifying the key Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline from Russia over Moscow’s latest actions in eastern Ukraine.
“We have been in close consultations with Germany overnight and welcome their announcement,” Psaki added. “We will be following up with our own measures today.”
UK sanctions five Russian banks, three wealthy individuals
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson has announced his country’s “first barrage” of sanctions against Russia over their actions in eastern Ukraine.
“Today, the U.K. is sanctioning the following five Russian banks: Rossiya, IS Bank, General Bank, promsvyazbank and the Black Sea Bank,” Johnson told lawmakers. “And we are sanctioning three very high net worth individuals: Gennady Timchenko, Boris Rotenberg, and Igor Rotenberg.”
“Any assets they hold in the U.K. will be frozen, the individuals concerned will be banned from travelling here, and we will prohibit all U.K. individuals and entities from having any dealings with them,” Johnson added.
“This is the first tranche, the first barrage, of what we are prepared to do: we will hold further sanctions at readiness, to be deployed alongside the United States and the European Union if the situation escalates still further,” Johnson also said.
Power, heating plant hit by shelling in eastern Ukraine
Smoke billows from a power and heating plant after it was shelled in Shchastya, in the Luhansk region of eastern Ukraine on Tuesday.
American in Kyiv describes current conditions amid heightened tensions
Tom Sanchez, an American living Kyiv, Ukraine, joins ‘Fox & Friends First’ to describe the heightened tensions as the country awaits Putin’s next move.
Ukraine defense minister reacts to Nord Stream 2 developments
Ukraine defense minister: Putin is a ‘criminal who wants the entire world be his captive’
Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov, in a speech to his country’s military Tuesday, described Russian President Vladimir Putin
as a “criminal who wants the entire world to be his captive.”
“The Kremlin has made yet another step towards resurrection of the Soviet Union… [but] the only thing that stands in between is Ukraine and its army,” Reznikov said.
Reznikov also told his troops that a “tough road lies ahead” with losses, pain and fear, but “the victory shall be our reward. Because we are on our land and the truth is with us.”
When asked by Fox News about military preparations for a potential larger conflict, he said “It’s the job of our army, we are ready.”
Fox News’ Trey Yingst contributed to this report.
Ukraine president: ‘We believe that there will be no war’
Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is continuing to downplay concerns of a potential Russian invasion of his country.
In a speech to Ukraine Monday night, Zelenskyy said “as for martial law… this question is clear to us. We believe that there will be no war, there will be no powerful [war] against Ukraine and there will be no wide escalation by the Russian Federation,” he said, according to Reuters. “If there is a [wide escalation], then martial law will be introduced.”
On Tuesday, Zelenskyy suggested that Ukraine could cut off diplomatic ties with Moscow.
“I’ve received a request from the foreign ministry. I will consider the issue of severing diplomatic relations between Ukraine and the Russian Federation. Immediately after our press conference, I will consider this issue,” Reuters quoted Zelenskyy as saying.
European Union, UK to sanction Russia over moves in Ukraine
European Union foreign ministers have planned a meeting Tuesday to decide what sanctions to impose over Russia’s decision to recognize two separatist regions in eastern Ukraine.
EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said the aim is not to impose the whole range of sanctions that the EU has prepared should Russian invade Ukraine, but rather to address the recognition of Donetsk and Luhansk as independent.
Separately, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said Putin had “completely torn up international law” and incoming British sanctions will target not just the regions of Donetsk and Luhansk but “Russian economic interests as hard as we can.”
Johnson is to set out further details of his country’s sanctions in the House of Commons later Tuesday.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Russia claims breakaway regions should include territory held by Ukrainian military too
Russia on Tuesday said its recognition of independence for two breakaway regions in eastern Ukraine includes territory currently held by Ukrainian forces as well.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that Russia has recognized the rebel regions’ independence “in borders that existed when they proclaimed” their independence in 2014.
Ukrainian forces later reclaimed control of large part of both regions during a nearly eight-year conflict that has killed over 14,000 people.
Late Monday, convoys of armored vehicles were seen rolling across the separatist-controlled territories. It wasn’t immediately clear if they were Russian.
Russian officials haven’t yet acknowledged any troop deployments to the rebel east, but Vladislav Brig, a member of the separatist local council in Donetsk, told reporters that the Russian troops already had moved in, taking up positions in the region’s north and west.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Germany hits the brakes on Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline following Putin’s military moves
Germany on Tuesday is taking steps to halt the process of certifying the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline from Russia because of Moscow’s actions in Ukraine, Chancellor Olaf Scholz announced.
Scholz said that the government had decided to “reassess” the certification of the pipeline, which hasn’t begun operating yet, in light of the latest developments.
“That will certainly take time, if I may say so,” he said.
Germany meets about a quarter of its energy needs with natural gas, a share that will increase in the coming years as the country switches off its last three nuclear power plants and phases out the use of coal. About half of the natural gas used in Germany comes from Russia.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
US ambassador: Putin calling his troops ‘peacekeepers’ is ‘nonsense’
U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Linda Thomas-Greenfield, during a speech to the United Nations Security Council Monday, criticized Russian President Vladimir Putin for recognizing two eastern Ukraine breakaway regions.
“He has since announced that he will place Russian troops in these regions. He calls them peacekeepers. This is nonsense,” she said. “We know what they really are. In doing so, he has put before the world a choice. We must meet the moment, and we must not look away.”
“We do not have to guess at President Putin’s motives,” she added. “Today, President Putin made a series of outrageous, false claims about Ukraine aimed at creating a pretext for war, and immediately thereafter, announced Russian troops are entering the Donbas.”
Breaking News
Russian troops arrive in Ukraine regions, unconfirmed report
Russian forces have arrived in Ukraine’s breakaway regions, European leaders suggested Tuesday morning.
When asked whether Putin’s decision to order Russian troops into these regions amounts to an invasion, European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said, “I wouldn’t say that’s a fully fledged invasion, but Russian troops are on Ukrainian soil.”
Britain’s defense secretary, Ben Wallace, warned of worrying signs that Russia has begun to move forces into Ukraine. He admitted that reports of military equipment moving into Ukraine’s Donbas region need to be verified, however.
Breaking News
Witness sees Russian tanks on outskirts of Donetsk
A witness sent Reuters footage of columns of military vehicles, including tanks and APCs, moving on the outskirts of Donetsk early on Tuesday.
Donetsk is one of the two breakaway regions that Putin recognized on Monday. This move seems to comport with Putin’s orders.
Developing Story
Putin orders troops into Ukraine, UN Security Council meets
Vladimir Putin has ordered Russian troops into the two breakaway regions of Ukraine after recognizing their independence, The Wall Street Journal reported
. The Russian government’s legal portal published his two decrees following a televised address late Monday.
An emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council convened, with the United States and allies seeking to isolate Russia and condemning the deployment of Russian troops. Ukraine requested the late-night meeting.
Invasion imminent?
Russian President Vladimir Putin announced Monday that he will recognize the independence of the Donetsk People’s Republic and Luhansk People’s Republic regions in eastern Ukraine, an apparent signal that he will not back down from a potential invasion.
Russia expert Rebekah Irina Koffler said, “Having recognized the independence of the Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics and signed treaties today, Russia will almost certainly deploy armed forces, imminently, to occupy these breakaway territories. Putin has already authorized the deployment of ‘peacekeeping’ troops into Eastern Ukraine.”
Meanwhile, President Biden signed an executive order Monday imposing economic sanctions on these separatist Ukraine regions, but he stopped short of imposing penalties directly on Russia. A senior administration official tells Fox News that further measures will be taken Tuesday “to hold Russia accountable for this clear violation of international law.”
Biden’s agreement “in principle” to meet with Putin may be off after Russia’s independence declaration. The senior administration official told Fox News that they “can’t commit” to a meeting as Russia continues to prepare for military action.
Cats track their owners’ movements, research finds | Cats
If you’ve ever pondered whether your pet cat gives a whiskers about your whereabouts, research may have an answer: cats appear to track their owners as they move about the house and are surprised if they turn up somewhere they’re not expecting them.
The finding supports the idea that cats retain a mental representation of their owners, even when they can’t see them; a crucial bridge to higher cognitive processes such as forward planning and imagination.
Cats are notoriously inscrutable creatures. Although previous research has suggested that cats will search in the correct place if food is seen to disappear, and expect to see their owner’s face if they hear their voice, it was unclear how this ability translated into real life. “It is [also] said that cats are not as interested in their owners as dogs are, but we had doubts about this point,” said Dr Saho Takagi at the University of Kyoto, Japan.
To investigate, Takagi and colleagues recorded what happened when 50 domestic cats were individually shut inside a room, and repeatedly heard their owner calling their name from outside, followed by either a stranger’s voice, or that of their owner, coming through a speaker on the opposite side of the room they were inhabiting.
Eight “blinded” human observers watched these recordings and ranked the cats’ level of surprise based on their ear and head movements. Only when their owners’ voices suddenly appeared inside the room – implying that they had somehow teleported there – did the cats appear confused.
“This study shows that cats can mentally map their location based on their owner’s voice,” said Takagi, whose research was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. “[It suggests] that cats have the ability to picture the invisible in their minds. Cats [may] have a more profound mind than is thought.”
However, it’s not entirely surprising that cats possess this ability: “That awareness of movement – tracking things they cannot see – is critical to a cat’s survival,” said Roger Tabor, a biologist, author and presenter of the BBC TV series Cats.
“A lot of what a cat has to interpret in its territory is an awareness of where other cats are. It is also important for hunting: how could a cat catch a field vole moving around beneath the grass if it couldn’t use clues, such as the occasional rustle, to see in its mind’s eye, where they are? A cat’s owner is extremely significant in its life as a source of food and security, so where we are is very important.”
Anita Kelsey, a UK feline behaviourist and author of Let’s Talk About Cats, said: “Cats have a close relationship with us and most feel settled and safe within our company so our human voice would be part of that bond or relationship. When I am dealing with cats that suffer separation anxiety, I usually do not advocate playing the owner’s voice in the home as this can cause anxiety with the cat hearing the voice, but not knowing where their human is.”
Curiously, the cats did not show the same surprise response when the owners’ voices were substituted for cat meows or electronic sounds. Possibly, this is because adult cats do not tend to use voice as their primary means of communication with one other, many may rely on other cues such as scent instead.
“The ‘meow’ that we used in this study is a voice signal that is only emitted to humans, except for kittens,” said Takagi. “Cats may not be able to identify individuals from the ‘meow’ of other individuals.”
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