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NASA Telescope Reveals Record-Breaking Exoplanet Discovery

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NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope has revealed the first known system of seven Earth-size planets around a single star. Three of these planets are firmly located in the habitable zone, the area around the parent star where a rocky planet is most likely to have liquid water.

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South Sudan has huge areas of fertile land but many of its people are dying from hunger.

The crisis is man-made, following years of civil war and a collapsing economy.

Government leaders and the United Nations have declared famine conditions in Unity State in the north where around 100,000 people are on the verge of starvation.

The UN says five million South Sudanese - that's about half the population - are in need of urgent help. Around a quarter of a million are severely malnourished.

Is the world failing to help?

Presenter: Laura Kyle
Guests:
Hussein Mar Nyuot - South Sudan's minister of humanitarian affairs

Mawan Muortat - Political commentator

George Fominyen - UN World Food Programme

Source: Al Jazeera News

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Who is to blame for famine in South Sudan?

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South Sudan has huge areas of fertile land but many of its people are dying from hunger. The crisis is man-made, following years of civil war and a collapsing economy. Government leaders and the United Nations have declared famine conditions in Unity State in the north where around 100,000 people are on the verge of starvation.

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NEW YORK (AP) - The playwright who inspired the Oscar-nominated movie "Moonlight" has won a prize from PEN America, the literary and human rights organization.

Tarell Alvin McCraney received an award for best mid-career playwright, PEN announced Wednesday. McCraney's "In Moonlight Black Boys Look Blue" is the basis for the acclaimed movie drama, which is up for eight nominations at Sunday night's Academy Awards. McCraney is also known for his acclaimed "The Brother/Sister" trilogy.

Suzan-Lori Parks, winner of the Pulitzer Prize for her play "Topdog/Underdog," received a PEN award for "Master American Dramatist." Thomas Bradshaw, whose works include "Burning" and "The Bereaved," was named best emerging playwright.

Other honors included the PEN/John Kenneth Galbraith Award for Nonfiction, given to Matthew Desmond for "Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City." The Bosnian-born Aleksandar Hemon won the Jean Stein Grant for Literary Oral History, for "How Did You Get Here?: Tales of Displacement." Named for the author of "Edie" and other oral histories, the Stein grant is a $10,000 award "for an unpublished literary work of nonfiction that uses oral history to illuminate an event, individual, place or movement."

The PEN/ESPN Award for Literary Sports Writing went to Joe Nocera and Ben Strauss for "Indentured: The Inside Story of the Rebellion Against the NCAA." British author Helen Oyeyemi's "What Is Not Yours Is Not Yours" won the PEN Open Book Award for "an exceptional book-length work of literature by an author of color."

"As global and national political discourse turn toward exclusion, PEN America continues to uphold the humanities' place in fostering coherent dialogue," the organization's president, Andrew Solomon, said in a statement. "Many of this year's honored books explore the social themes that are at the surface of our nation's consciousness." A dozen emerging writers received $2,000 prizes for outstanding debut short stories, including Angela Ajayi for "Galina," Amber Caron for "The Handler" and Emily Chammah for "Tell Me, Please."

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A complete list of awards can be found on https://pen.org

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Playwright who inspired 'Moonlight' wins PEN award

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NEW YORK (AP) - The playwright who inspired the Oscar-nominated movie "Moonlight" has won a prize from PEN America, the literary and human rights organization. Tarell Alvin McCraney received an award for best mid-career playwright, PEN announced Wednesday.

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BRASILIA (Reuters) - A Senate committee cleared President Michel Temer's nominee for Brazil's Supreme Court on Tuesday despite criticism the choice of his justice minister was aimed at helping shield cabinet members from corruption investigations.

The Constitution and Justice Committee voted 19-7 to accept the appointment of 49-year-old lawyer and law professor Alexandre Moraes to sit on the top court. The full Senate is expected to confirm him Wednesday.

Before becoming minister last year, Moraes was public security secretary in the Sao Paulo state government of the centrist PSDB party, a key ally in Temer's coalition government.

In the 10-hour confirmation hearing, leftist senators slammed his appointment as a move to protect Temer's government from the sprawling Car Wash graft and political kickbacks investigation that has implicated leaders of his PMDB party.

Six members of Temer's cabinet, and the president himself, have been named in plea bargain testimony by defendants in Brazil's biggest corruption scandal and any of the ministers could possibly end up on trial before the Supreme Court.

Moraes, who took leave as minister when he was nominated two weeks ago, vowed to be "absolutely independent and impartial."

But he declined to answer when questioned if he would recuse himself if a case against the Temer involving illegal campaign funds during the 2014 election, in which Temer was impeached leftist Dilma Rousseff's running mate, came to the Supreme Court on appeal.

Moraes denied plagiarizing a Spanish jurist in one of his law books. He also refuted allegations his law firm in Sao Paulo defended a transport company linked to one of Brazil's largest criminal organizations, the First Command of the Capital gang, known in Brazil by the acronym PCC.

If confirmed, Moraes would take the seat left by Justice Teori Zavascki, who died in a small plane crash last month.

Zavascki handled the cases of politicians involved in the Car Wash probe. But his case load was taken over by another of the 11 justices and Moraes would be in a different chamber.

A source in the PSDB said the party proposed Moraes for justice minister in the Temer cabinet last year with the idea that he should move on to the Supreme Court when a seat opened.

Temer has sought to deepen his alliance with the PSDB to shore up support for reforms he needs to push through Congress to restore fiscal discipline and business confidence in a stagnant economy.

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judicial process / court cases / court decisions

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Brazil Senate committee approves Temer pick for Supreme Court

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BRASILIA (Reuters) - A Senate committee cleared President Michel Temer's nominee for Brazil's Supreme Court on Tuesday despite criticism the choice of his justice minister was aimed at helping shield cabinet members from corruption investigations. The Constitution and Justice Committee voted 19-7 to accept the appointment of 49-year-old lawyer and law professor Alexandre Moraes to sit on the top court.

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VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Pope Francis appealed for humanitarian assistance to South Sudan where famine threatens the lives of millions of people already suffering due to a three-year civil war.

In the "martyred South Sudan," he said, "a fratricidal conflict is compounded by a serious food crisis, which has struck the Horn of Africa and condemns millions of people to starve to death, among them many children," the pope said.

At the end of his weekly general audience at the Vatican Feb. 22, the pope said that a solid commitment from the international community to assist South Sudan is crucial "now more than ever."

The United Nations Feb. 21 declared a famine in two counties of South Sudan, adding that the catastrophic food shortages will continue to spread, threatening millions of lives.

Civil war has destabilized the world's youngest country for more than three years due to a political power struggle between President Salva Kiir and former Vice-President Riek Machar.

"This famine is man-made," said Joyce Luma, director of the U.N. World Food Program.

Despite efforts to hold off the famine, she added, "there is only so much that humanitarian assistance can achieve in the absence of meaningful peace and security, both for relief workers and the crisis-affected people they serve."

Pope Francis urged governments and international organizations to "not stop at just making statements," but take concrete steps so that necessary food aid "can reach the suffering population."

"May the Lord sustain these, our brothers and sisters, and those who work to help them," Pope Francis said.

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Follow Arocho on Twitter: @arochoju.

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Pope appeals for aid as famine grips South Sudan

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VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Pope Francis appealed for humanitarian assistance to South Sudan where famine threatens the lives of millions of people already suffering due to a three-year civil war. In the "martyred South Sudan," he said, "a fratricidal conflict is compounded by a serious food crisis, which has struck the Horn of Africa and condemns millions of people to starve to death, among them many children," the pope said.

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The technological advancement, that is drone's' ability to pick up 10 pounds, is being used for ISIS's terrorizing scenarios. Brazil's senate confirmed presidents choice to fill vacant senate seat. This is controversial because a number of court ruling leaders face corruption allegations. Tarrell Alvin McCraney received an award for best mid career playwright. He was set up for 8 nominations at the Academy Awards. The Pope has appealed for aid within South Sudan as the country's people suffer from a civil-war induced famine.

Astronomers have just identified a nearby solar system hosting seven Earth-sized planets. Most intriguing: Three planets that orbit its central star — known as TRAPPIST-1 — may even be within a habitable zone. That means they fall within a region that could support life as we know it.

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South Sudan is the youngest country on Earth. The nation became independent from Sudan on July 9, 2011, preceded by political conflict.

South Sudan’s president, Salva Kiir, and his long time enemy, vice-president Reik Machar, have been the source of conflict since the former accused the latter of an attempted illegal seizure of power. As a result, forces from both sides began a revolution.

Behind the political causes that may have trigged the explosion, lies a strong ethnic conviction. President Kiin belongs to the largest ethnic group in South Sudan, the Dinka, while Machar belongs to a group known as Nuer. These two groups are widely known rivals. The civil war resulted in the assassination of more than 50,000 individuals and more than 2 million were displaced. A peace treaty signed on 2015 relocated Machar to his post, while troops loyal to him are stationed in Juba. Now the fear is, that this young country could slide back to war and chaos.
The Trump Administration claimed that the president supports a two-state solution when he hosted Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House. But such agreement is not as simple as it may seem, since the Palestinians and Israelis claim Jerusalem, as a whole, or part of it, as their capital. This conflict has not been able to be resolved, since questions as: where would you draw the line between an Israeli state and a Palestinian state? may arise.