CNN Student News 201804 10_Looking at upcoming changes to Facebook

CNN Student News - April 10, 2018

The World is Watching What Happens Next in Syria; 

Facebook Moves to Provide Transparency

CARL AZUZ, CNN 10 ANCHOR: Was there an illegal chemical weapons attack in Syria over the weekend? And what could that lead to in the war-torn Middle Eastern country?

These are the questions we`re exploring first today on CNN 10. I`m Carl Azuz.

The civil war in Syria started in 2011. It involves different rebel groups fighting the Syrian government. There are also terrorist groups involved.

But one reason why it`s gotten so much international attention is because it`s torn into a proxy war, with countries outside of Syria supporting different groups inside of Syria. The U.S., for instance, is battling the ISIS terrorist forces in Syria and it`s supported certain rebel groups in the past. Russia and Iran are also involved. They`ve been supporting Syria`s current government and neighboring Israel, whose official stance on the war is neutral, has acknowledged attacking some Syrian military targets.

The United Nations Security Council held an emergency meeting on Monday to talk about a suspected chemical attack that happened on Saturday. Syrian activist groups say helicopters dropped bombs containing a toxic gas on a rebel-held city named Douma. They say dozens of civilians were killed in the attack and they provided graphic video footage of victims.

CNN couldn`t verify whether the video is authentic. The Syrian government and Russia say it`s not but what happens next is anyone`s guess.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

FRED PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: On April 7th, 2018, there was an alleged chemical attack in the rebel enclave called Douma,

just outside of Damascus. The opposition blames Syria government forces for it. Now, the Syrian government denies the allegations, saying that they were fabricated. All of this has big international consequences as well.

The United States came up with a strong statement. President Trump laying the blame on Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and also holding Russian President Vladimir Putin accountable as well. The big question is, what is going to happen next?

Certainly, the U.S. has said that no options are off the table. So, this is something that could include potential cruise missile strikes, potential airstrikes. But, of course, the United States also has to factor in the fact that the dominant power here on the ground in Syria is still the Russians.

The Russians are also issuing a stern warning towards the United States, saying that any sort of intervention on the part of the U.S. could have what they call very grave consequences.

One of the things that has happened is that there were missile strikes on the Syrian military base in the center of the country around Homs. The Russians are saying that they believe the Israelis were behind those strikes. The Syrian government is also holding Israel responsible and says that several people were killed there.

SUBTITLE: Israeli officials have not issued any response to reports of the strike.

PLEITGEN: So, right now, you have a situation on the ground here in Syria where certainly all the players are very nervous. All the players are very close to one another and all the players are very much at odds with one another, which is really something that could make it potentially very, very dangerous, not just for escalation on the ground in the Syrian civil war, but also for the outside powers to come into conflict with one another.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

AZUZ: Tens of millions of people will soon be able to see how they were affected by a data breach of their Facebook account, if they haven`t already. The social media company started rolling out a tool for this Monday.

Controversy erupted last month concerning Facebook users` personal information. Several hundred thousand people downloaded an app years ago, whose developer was allowed to collect information about the users, their friends, their locations and likes. This apparently led to the collection of information about 87 million Facebook users. And that information was provided against Facebook`s rules to a company named Cambridge Analytica.

"The New York Times" reported that Cambridge Analytica used the info to influence how Americans voted. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg is scheduled to discuss the data controversy with Congress on Tuesday. Meanwhile --

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

LAURIE SEGALL, CNN SENIOR TECH CORRESPONDENT: Hey, there.

Well, Facebook announcing a number of changes to combat election meddling. It`s a push for more transparency around advertising, and the social media company will now actually begin labeling all political and issue ads. And they`re also as a part of this going to show who paid for those ads and require anyone who wants to run a political or issue ad to verify their identity and location. So, they`ll have to be approved in order to do this.

Now, this is an expansion from Facebook`s prior moves. These measures would have applied to political ads -- so, ads mentioning candidates. But, you know, this expansion also covers issue ads, which if you think about issue ads, they cover hot button issues that don`t even mention candidates.

So, think gun control or education.

And, you know, as part of this, the company also announced a searchable database where users can actually see how much the ads cost and also what kind of people advertisers are targeting. This is all about more transparency.

And one more move which is actually pretty interesting, the company is going to start verifying the people behind pages, if they have a big following. So, think about pages like the topics or organizations that you like on Facebook. And then think about 2016, Russian trolls actually use pages to pose as Americans on different sides of the political spectrum, to create division in America. Facebook found out about this after the fact.

Now, you know, this news is coming as Sheryl Sandberg made the media rounds. She`s asked a lot of tough questions. One question she was asked about, you know, will the company find more issues when it came to user data. Listen to what she said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SHERYL SANDBERG, CHIEF OPERATING OFFICER, FACEBOOK: What we weren`t focused enough was protecting because that same data that you enable to use social experiences can also be misused.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Do you think there could be other breaches like the one we saw in Cambridge Analytica, where tens of millions of people`s status was accessed improperly?

SANDBERG: We`re doing an investigation. We`re going to do audits and, yes, we think it`s possible. That`s why we`re doing the audit.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SEGALL: And all of this is coming before a monumental week for Facebook. You know, the CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, will be testifying before Congress on Tuesday and Wednesday. You`ll have lawmakers posing very challenging questions to Mark about the company`s use of data in light of the Cambridge

Analytica scandal and everything that`s come out, and also the weaponization of the platform for political purposes.

Back to you.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

AZUZ: We have a new series this year that celebrates student athletes who are making things better in communities around the country. It`s called Positive Athlete. You can nominate someone you know at CNN.com/PositiveAthlete.

Today`s report is about a young man who lives on the Hopi Native American reservation in Tuba City, Arizona. He knows something about perseverance.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BRANDON WHITEROCK, POSITIVE ATHLETE: I started playing sports when I was about third grade. On the health side, I was kind of obese, because on the reservation, there`s a lot of bad things about being obese, and so, my grandma signed up and she said, all right, football would be a good sport to go in. So, I tried it and I liked it a lot.

Football is like an emotional type for me. I get to relieve my stress throughout the whole year.

PERCY PIESTEWA, BRANDON`S GRANDMOTHER: Brandon is a leader. If the football team was down, he`d get up there and he`d give them their pep talk. He does the same thing with the baseball team. Not only that, if some of the kids weren`t on task, he`d go tutor them. He`d help them do their homework, just to keep them eligible.

ANNOUNCER: Academic athlete of the year, Brandon Whiterock.

WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Among the soldiers killed in Iraq was Private First Class Lori Piestewa.

PIESTEWA: He was 3 when his mom died.

WHITEROCK: When I was little, I didn`t know anything. I was like, oh, my mom is in heaven like, so just like it`s a childish stuff.

PIESTEWA: His mother just seemed to have taught him so well just in the very beginning stages of his life.

WHITEROCK: Everyone come to me, your mom is a hero, she did this for us, I used to know her, she always did this for me. And so, my inspiration was like live and be like her.

PIESTEWA: They both can light up your day just by smiling at you. That was Lori`s big thing. She had this awesome smile. And Brandon is the same way.

WHITEROCK: Other kids have idols like LeBron James or Larry Fitzgerald. But I look up to my mom. Every game I always played for her. I played my hardest for her.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

AZUZ: At first, this looks like an elaborate fountain shooting plumes of water into the air. But the plumes are ice and they`re powered by explosives. Winters are cold in the far northeast China where the country borders eastern Russia. And parts of the Heilongjiang River were jammed with ice. So, workers drilled holes along a three-mile section of the river and planted explosives in them to break the ice. It also put on a spectacular snow show.

I bet it was a blast to put together. We hear they really got a charge out of it once they drilled down and planted powdered propellants that powered Porclatones` (ph) blue magic.

There`s a river of puns here. We sent a raft your way. We hope they float your boat. But it`s time for us to set sail on CNN 10.

I`m Carl Azuz.

END 

VOA_Detroit Files for Bankruptcy

VOA_Detroit Files for Bankruptcy
Detroit Đệ Đơn Phá Sản

Detroit Files for Bankruptcy From VOA Learning English, this is the Economics Report.  Detroit Mayor Dave Bing had to report some bad news recently. He said Detroit was seeking bankruptcy protection. The move would give the city court protection from creditors. The decision to declare bankruptcy is an effort to restructure and reduce debt. t comes at a difficult time for Detroit. In March, Michigan Governor Rick Snyder named Kevyn Orr, a bankruptcy expert, to oversee the city's financial problems.    Detroit has been struggling to reduce a budget deficit of more than $300 million.

Detroit Đệ Đơn Phá Sản Chương trình học tiếng Anh qua VOA, đây là Bản Tin Kinh Tế. Gần đây thị trưởng thành phố Detroit Dave Bing đã phải báo cáo một số tin xấu. Ông cho biết Detroit đang tìm kiếm bảo hộ phá sản. Động thái đó sẽ mang lại cho thành phố này sự bảo hộ của tòa án trước các chủ nợ. Quyết định tuyên bố sự vỡ nợ là một nỗ lực nhằm tái cơ cấu và giảm nợ. Sự kiện này xảy ra vào thời điểm khó khăn của Detroit. Vào tháng Ba, thống đốc Michigan Rick Snyder đã chỉ định Kevyn Orr, một chuyên gia trong lĩnh vực vỡ nợ, giám sát các vấn đề tài chính của thành phố này. Detroit đang cố gắng giảm hơn 300 triệu đô thâm hụt ngân sách.

In addition, the city's long-term debt has increased to at least $18 billion. Detroit's problems have grown over many years. Michigan State University professor Eric Scorsone says the city depended too much on one industry: automobile manufacturing. Jobs with car makers were a big reason why Detroit was one of the country's largest cities half a century ago. In the 1950s, it had a population of about 1.8 million people. Today the number is down to less than 800,000. Robin Boyle is a professor of urban planning at Wayne State University. He says, over the years, many Detroit residents moved to areas outside the city or even left the state. That hurt Detroit's ability to invest in itself. It is rare for a large American city of seek bankruptcy protection. In 1975, New York City came close before the federal government agreed to provide money. Detroit, however, is the largest city to seek bankruptcy. Now, a federal judge is to consider Detroit's request. One of the main issues is what to do about the retirement pay of city workers. Currently, there are many more retired workers than those paying into the pension system. For VOA Learning English, I'm Alex Villarreal.

Thêm vào đó, nợ dài hạn của thành phố này  đã tăng ít nhất tới 18 tỉ đô. Các vấn đề của thành phố Detroit đã tăng lên trong nhiều năm nay. Giáo sư Đại học Công lập Michigan Eric Scorsone cho biết thành phố này phụ thuộc quá nhiều vào một nền công nghiệp: công nghiệp chế tạo ô tô. Những công việc mà các nhà sản xuất xe hơi mang lại là một nhân tố chủ yếu làm cho Detroit trở thành một trong những thành phố lớn nhất của Mỹ cách đây nửa thế kỷ. Vào những năm 1950, dân số của thành phố vào khoảng 1,8 triệu dân. Ngày nay con số này giảm xuống còn ít hơn 800 nghìn. Robin Boyle là một giáo sư về quy  hoạch đô thị ở Đại  học Công lập Wayne. Ông cho biết, trong những năm qua, nhiều người dân thành phố Detroit đã chuyển đến các vùng ngoại thành hoặc thậm chí là rời khỏi bang. Điều này đã làm ảnh hưởng đến khả năng của Detroit trong việc tự đầu tư. Rất hiếm khi một thành phố lớn ở Mỹ lại phải tìm kiếm  biện pháp bảo vệ phá sản. Vào năm 1975, Thành Phố New York đã bị đóng trước khi chính phủ liên bang đồng ý cấp tiền. Tuy nhiên, Detroit là thành phố lớn nhất tìm kiếm sự phá sản. Hiện nay, thẩm phán liên bang đang xem xét yêu cầu của Detroit. Một trong những vấn đề chính là làm thế nào với khoản tiền lương hưu cho công nhân thành phố. Hiện tại, có nhiều công nhân về hưu hơn là những người đóng góp vào hệ thống trợ cấp. Trên đây là chương trình học tiếng Anh qua VOA, tôi là Alex Villareal.

CNN 201804 04_THE 50TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE ASSASSINATION OF DR. MARTIN LUTHER KING JR

CNN 10 - April 4, 2018the 50th anniversary of the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr

CARL AZUZ, CNN 10 ANCHOR: Hi. I`m Carl Azuz for CNN 10. This April 4th, 2018, we`re starting with a look back at an event from April 4th, 1968, an event that changed a nation.

Fifty years ago today, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated in Memphis Tennessee. He was a Baptist minister and an activist. He was a writer and a gifted speaker.

He delivered his most famous speech during the march on Washington in 1963. He was named "Time Magazine`s" Man of the Year in 1963. He received a Nobel Peace Prize in 1964.

And today, Dr. King is remembered as being one of the most renowned civil rights leaders in history.

One of his main goals was to use what he called non-violent direct action, peaceful protests like marches and sit-ins to promote equal treatment for African-Americans in the U.S.

Dr. King was no stranger to controversy. He was arrested and jailed in solitary confinement for leading a march in Birmingham in Alabama. He spoke out publicly against U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War, which angered many people in the late 1960s. Some of his activism on behalf of America`s poor failed to get the results that he and his supporters hoped for.

Not long before his assassination, Dr. King said in a sermon, quote: Living every day under the threat of death, I feel discouraged every now and then and feel my work is in vain, but then the Holy Spirit revives my soul again.

A half century later, it`s clear Dr. King`s work was not in vain.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: This is unbelievable. You look up there, it says Mason Temple, this is where Martin Luther King 50 years ago gave his incredible Mountaintop speech.

SUBTITLE: April 2, 1968, King gave an emotional speech at the Mason Temple in Memphis.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., CIVIL RIGHTS LEADER: I just want to do God`s will. And he has allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I`ve looked over. And I`ve seen the Promised Land.

I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the Promised Land!

BASH (voice-over): That night, April 3rd, 1968, King checked in here, to Lorraine Motel.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He gets dressed around 5:45 and he steps outside of the balcony of room 306, and he speaks to other guests that are in the courtyard.

SUBTITLE: April 4, approximately 6:01 p.m., King was shot while standing on this motel balcony.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: At approximately 6:01, the final shot rings out. Dr. King lies mortally wounded on the balcony. He`s taken from the balcony to St. Joseph`s Hospital and he`s pronounced dead at 7:05 p.m.

SUBTITLE: On the night of King`s assassination, President Lyndon B. Johnson addressed the nation.

LYNDON B. JOHNSON, FORMER PRESIDENT: Shocked and saddened by the brutal slaying tonight of Dr. Martin Luther King. I ask every citizen to reject the blind violence that has struck Dr. King, who lived by nonviolence.

SUBTITLE: Fifty years later, a bipartisan group of members of Congress visited the site where MLK Jr. was assassinated.

REP. KEITH ELLISON (D), MINNESOTA: To me, it`s like a return into something rudimentary and fundamental. I mean, this is where Martin Luther King breathe his last breath.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: In honor of, Lorraine Hotel decided not to recheck this room out in Dr. King`s honor and remembrance.

BASH (on camera): This is exactly how it was left?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was left this way.

BASH (voice-over): Right there when it all happened, King`s partner and dear friend, Reverend Ralph Abernathy, his wife Juanita on this pilgrimage 50 years later.

(on camera): The night that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated, you were with his widow.

JUANITA ABERNATHY, FRIEND OF KING FAMILY: Yes.

BASH: Tell me about that.

ABERNATHY: I told Coretta, I said, well, I`ll meet you in your house, and I stayed there that night with her --

BASH: So, did you sleep with her in her bed to comfort her?

ABERNATHY: Yes, right?

BASH: The night that her husband was killed?

ABERNATHY: The night that he died, I slept on his side of the bed and my little children were there with her children.

(SINGING)

BASH: Tell me how you`re feeling. I was watching you standing here.

REP. JOHN LEWIS (D), GEORGIA: Well, you know, it`s very emotional to come here. I was not here that evening.

He changed my life. He inspired me to stand up, to speak up and to never give up.

And when he died, I think something died in all of us.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

AZUZ (voice-over): Ten-second trivia:

Most of the world`s freshwater is used for what?

Agriculture, industry, sewage or bathing?

According to the United Nations, the majority of the world`s freshwater is used for agriculture and irrigation.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

AZUZ: But even in a relatively wealthy nation like the U.S., which uses a relatively high amount of water, getting clean drinking water at home is not a guarantee. Then you got (ph) the pipes that bring Americans water were laid underground almost 100 years ago. They`ve deteriorated since then. Some leak, some don`t have enough water pressure to seal out soil, dirt or chemicals. And some local governments don`t have the money to replace their pipes.

Improving American infrastructure like its water systems is a priority of the federal government. But critics say the problems will cost more to fix than the government provides and in places like Martin County, Kentucky, those problems are literally seeping into homes.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The hills of Appalachia are part of America`s legacy. The people here in Martin

County, Kentucky, proudly self-sufficient, but it`s hard to take care of yourself when you don`t have the most basic of necessities.

HOPE WORKMAN, RESIDENT, MARTIN COUNTY, KENTUCKY: So we have blue water here. That is crazy.

GUPTA: It`s left Hope Workman with no other choice. Twice a week, Hope and her daughter drive up this dirt path on the side of a mountain.

WORKMAN: This is what we go through to get water.

GUPTA: Twenty years ago, she placed this 3-1/2-foot-long pipe into this hillside to tap a spring just to collect clean drinking water because, obviously, no one drinks the water here.

(on camera): Do you drink it?

GARY BALL, EDITOR IN CHIEF, MOUNTAIN CITIZEN: Oh, no. No, no, no, there`s no way that I drink it.

GUPTA (voice-over): Gary Ball is the editor in chief of the local weekly paper, the "Mountain Citizen". Water has been a front page story for most of his career.

(on camera): What`s going on here? I mean, for the citizens, the people who live here and deal with this every day, where do they put this on their list of concerns?

BALL: In 2018, in the very place where LBJ declared war on poverty 54 years ago, water is our number one issue. That`s hard to imagine.

GUPTA: You declare a war on poverty, 54 years later, you come back there and you can`t even reliably get clean water? What progress have we really made?

BALL: It`s like a third world country here as far as water. We let our water system just dilapidate to the point of collapse.

GUPTA: You went how long without water?

WORKMAN: At that time, it was 10 days.

GUPTA (voice-over): To manage that, Hope has turned her pool into a makeshift reservoir, collecting rain water for even the most basic needs.

(on camera): In order to wash your clothes, in order to get water to bathe in, this is what you have to do?

WORKMAN: Yes, I did this in 17-degree weather and we had to take a chainsaw to drill through the ice.

GUPTA: Oh my goodness.

WORKMAN: To get to the water.

GUPTA: So you used the chainsaw to get through the ice.

WORKMAN: Yes.

GUPTA: And then siphoned the water with your mouth out of this hose?

WORKMAN: Yes. Yes.

GUPTA: That`s what it`s come to?

WORKMAN: That`s what it`s come to.

GUPTA (voice-over): In fact, the American Society of Civil Engineers gives the United States drinking water infrastructure a grade of a D.

WORKMAN: This is the water that`s coming out of my bath.

GUPTA: So, how does the water get so contaminated here in Martin County?

It`s worth looking at how we get our water. Here, it comes from the Tug Fork River, where it is then pumped into the Crum Reservoir, and from there, it makes its way to this water treatment center.

(on camera): After getting treated, about 2 million gallons per day of fairly clean water then leaves this treatment facility through a cascade of pipes traveling all over the county.

Problem is, those pipes are all so old and cracked. More than 50 percent of the water leaks out before it gets to the people who need it. Even worse, it`s what`s getting into those pipes and into the water.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

AZUZ: Very different kind of problem concerning water was faced by a family in Sarasota, Florida, recently. There was an uninvited visitor to their backyard swimming pool and it measured 11 feet long. They called police to address the alligator and a trapper was brought in to escort the animal out. It resisted it its arrest a bit, but no one was hurt.

This appears to be an enclosed pool so we`re not sure exactly how it got in. But we bet the family were a reptilian all their friends about it and their pictures proved their stories no croc. If that sort of thing is coming, they may want to move snout. There`s a big difference between a gated community and a gator community and those animals are crocodile- anything but too cool for pool.

I`m Carl Azuz for CNN 10.

END 

VOA_A Way for Some Wealthy Investors to Get US Visas

A Way for Some Wealthy Investors to Get US Visas

VOA_Findings About Soft Drinks and Aggression in Children

VOA_Findings About Soft Drinks and Aggression in Children

CNN Student News 201804 05

CNN Student News 201804 05

CARL AZUZ, CNN 10 ANCHOR: Your objective explanation of world news starts right now. This is CNN 10 and I`m Carl Azuz. I`ll be your host for these

10 minutes.

U.S. President Donald Trump is talking about withdrawing American troops from the war-torn Middle Eastern nation of Syria. The Pentagon has said there are around 2,000 U.S. troops there. Their main mission has been to fight the ISIS terrorist group, which used to control a large amount of territory in Syria.

But according to "The New York Times", a coalition of military forces led by the U.S. has taken back 97 percent of the areas that ISIS once held.

And U.S. President Donald Trump recently said that the American troops there should leave soon. He`s told his advisers to start planning to bring them home, but a date for a U.S. withdrawal hasn`t been set. There`s still some ISIS militants in Syria, and President Trump`s military advisors say the U.S. troops who are there will need to stay for the immediate future.

Some analysts say that if the American forces leave too soon, the country will fall under the influence of Iran and Russia who`ve supported Syria`s current government.

The White House says it`s still committed to getting rid of whatever ISIS pockets remain first.

As far as the future of the war-torn country goes, President Trump says the cost of stabilizing Syria will have to be covered by other countries in the region.

We talked a lot recently about a destructive battle between Syrian government forces and a rebel group in the Syrian capital of Damascus.

That fight looks like it`s winding down.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: We`re at the final entry checkpoint to Douma, which is the last rebel enclave on the eastern outskirts of Damascus. Now, what we`ve been seeing here is several buses with what we believe to be rebel fighters exiting this area. Now, most of those fighters in the past couple of days have been bused to other locations, mostly in the north of Syria. The groups that we saw we`re not sure which rebel group they were from and also, we`re not sure where they were being taken.

But in the past couple of weeks, the rebels have lost a considerable amount of territory here on the eastern outskirts of Damascus. They used to hold a gigantic area, but after extremely heavy fighting, tens of thousands of civilians fled this area and then also thousands of fighters were bused out as well. Now with the rebels only holding one small enclave, many believe that a deal would be reached soon for those rebels to go out as well. So far, it`s unclear when exactly that`s going to happen.

But there do seem to be people here in Damascus who think it will be very soon. In fact, we spoke to people who came here to this checkpoint and said that they had relatives who were kidnapped by the rebels, some of them for years, whom they hope will come out soon.

Here`s what one woman said.

I depend on God, she says. This is my only hope. I will wait here as long as it takes for my father to come out.

Now, the deal to try and get the last rebel group here in this part of Damascus called Jaysh Islam to give up, is being negotiated mostly by the Russians and it certainly seems as though the government of Syria believes that deal will happen soon. In fact, there are already dozens of buses waiting here outside of Douma district ready to take those fighters to the north of Syria, which is essentially would mean that the rebels would no longer hold any sort of significant territory in or outside the Syrian capital.

Fred Pleitgen, CNN, Eastern Ghouta, Syria.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

AZUZ: From the Middle East, we`re taking you to the European country of France, where a strike is causing severe disruptions in the nation`s train services. France`s state-owned rail company says about 87 percent of its high speed trains and 80 percent of its regional rail services were cancelled Tuesday. There were no trains operating to Switzerland, Spain or Italy.

This is a rolling strike. Workers plan to walk out two days a time for a total of 18 walkouts before the end of June. They`re protesting changes to the country`s labor laws that were proposed by French President Emmanuel Macron.

Making changes was one of his campaign promises. But while many French business leaders and economists support his plans, many unions oppose them.

France`s rail company is $56 billion in debt, according to the "Reuters" news agency. President Macron wants to turn it into a profit-making business. But employees are concerned that if that happens, they could lose job security, annual pay raises and the right to early retirement.

And union bosses say that making France`s railways more competitive could mean higher ticket prices.

In previous standoffs between unions and French presidents, the unions have prevailed.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SUBTITLE: French rail workers have kicked off a three-month long strike.

JIM BITTERMANN, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Every time there`s a strike here, I got the impression that people around the world are saying,

why don`t the French just stop whining and get on with the work?

Reforming the economy here closely follows Newton`s first law of motion, inertia. At the root of it, I think the French are very conservative in the classic sense. They view change with suspicion at best and hostility at worst.

And there`s the concept of Droits Acquis, acquired rights. It`s a concept that is deeply ingrained in French society. It`s the feeling that rights once acquired should never ever be abandoned.

Despite appearances to the contrary, French unions by the members are not all that strong.

SUBTITLE: Only around 11 percent of French workers are unionized. That`s roughly the same as the U.S. The difference between France and other countries, though, is that unionized workers are found in very critical areas, transportation, energy production and a like. If they decide to go on strike, it can cause a lot of pain very quickly.

BITTERMANN: There are dozens of other attitudes which can be changed from the longstanding mistrust between employers and employees, through the traditional belief that every gain for the boss is a loss for the workers. In fact, it`s a kind of thing that rightly or wrongly can leave the impression that France is a difficult place to do business.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

AZUZ (voice-over): Ten-second trivia:

Which of these sports venues is about 50 meters long?

NBA basketball court, Olympic swimming pool, NFL football field, or NHL ice hockey rink?

Of these options, only the Olympic swimming pool is 50 meters long.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

AZUZ: And we are diving into one for our next story. It`s part of our ongoing series of positive athletes. These are student athletes from around the U.S. who`ve made some extraordinary accomplishments or just having extraordinarily positive attitude. If that sounds like someone you know, please send in a nomination at CNN.com/positiveathlete.

A great example of one is a swimmer from Georgia named McClain Hermes.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MCCLAIN HERMES, SWIMMER: In the water, you can`t really look at me and tell that I`m blind. So, it`s nice just to be free and to be able to compete against other people.

MATT HERMES, MCCLAIN`S DAD: She`s actually taken kind of what I call a victim mentality of what someone could be into kind of a victor. She hasn`t let it stop her.

MCCLAIN HERMES: I can`t see a lot of my right eye and I can see through like a coffee stirrer or straw. It`s about this big. They`re little, itty bitty hole in my left eye.

Tell me what`s on the 30.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Go.

MCCLAIN HERMES: I was selected as the youngest Team USA athlete to compete at the 2016 Paralympic Games in Rio.

MATT HERMES: To be able to say, you know what? That little one right there, she`s ours. Even just thinking about it now, it kind of gives me chills.

MCCLAIN HERMES: I hope to compete in the 2020 Paralympic Games in Tokyo and medal there.

MATT HERMES: I have a lot of pride with McClain and her swimming accomplishments. I`m just as proud of her with what she`s done with giving back.

MCCLAIN HERMES: My dad and I decided once we got out of our dark time and our lives that we wanted to give back to other people and show them the love and support that we are being given. So, we decided to collect shoes. In December 2016, we donated over 3,500 pairs of shoes to the Atlanta Mission and that brought our grand total to over 19,000 pairs of shoes.

What some might call a disability, I`ve turned it into my ability. So, I`ve taken my blindness and I turned it into my ability in the pool and my ability in my community to help others and inspire others.

MATT HERMES: She doesn`t want her sight back. If you ask her, she would say no, I don`t want my sight back. You know, maybe someday, but today, she`s good.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

AZUZ: If you have seasonal allergies, this is almost enough to make your eyes water. Looks like snow, right? It`s not. It`s pollen. The spores are grains from flowering plants and there was so much of it recently in part of North Carolina that it looked like a heavy snowfall when caught on a man`s home security cameras.

He posted on Facebook that North Carolina is where you can make pollen men, pollen angels and have pollen ball fights. If you wonder why so many people are allergic, that`s one anther.

It`s not fertilie to say that it`s simply a pollen. There`s more than a grain of truth to that. We`d say it`s nothing to sneeze at, but spores it is.

And I`m Carl Achooz for CNN 10.

END

CNN Student News 201804 09_A MASSIVE CRACK IN THE EARTH IN KENYA

CNN STUDENT NEWS -  April 9, 2018 

a massive crack in the earth in Kenya 

+

CARL AZUZ, CNN 10 ANCHOR: Hey. I`m Carl Azuz, kicking off a new week of explaining world news on CNN 10. We hope your weekend was amazing.

And we`re starting this Monday with a follow-up on a story we brought you last week. We reported that U.S. President Donald Trump was sending a number of National Guard soldiers to the border between America and Mexico. Now, we know that number, the president wants to deploy between 2,000 and 4,000 guardsmen there. And the order from Defense Secretary James Mattis is for up to 4,000 National Guard personnel to go and they`re scheduled to be there through the end of September.

President Trump says this will help seal off America`s southern border, providing better security and safety for Americans. Critics of previous deployments like this say they were costly and limited in terms of how effective they were. The border between the U.S. and Mexico is 1,954 miles long. It runs from the Pacific Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico and while most of that border, more than 1,200 miles of it, runs along the U.S. state of Texas, the barriers that are currently there cover 100 miles.

The National Guard has been deployed along the border before. Six thousand soldiers were sent by former President George W. Bush, beginning in 2006.

Twelve hundred soldiers were sent by former President Barack Obama beginning in 2010. And this year, President Trump is planning to deploy guardsmen to the border until his proposed wall is completed.

President Bush signed what was called the Secure Fence Act back in 2006. What that did was authorized more barriers and surveillance equipment at the border. Ten years after that, in 2016, there are around 700 miles of fence along the border. It`s different heights at different places, the tallest parts being 18 feet off the ground.

As far as apprehensions at the border are concerned, the government says almost 304,000 people were arrested or detained for illegally crossing the border in the 2017 fiscal year.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

NICK WATT, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Here in Arizona, we are told that National Guard planners are working over the weekend in advance of the deployment of 150 personnel sometime during next week. Exactly where they will be stationed, we do not know and exactly when they will be deployed, we also do not yet know. Over in Texas, of course, the deployment has already begun.

Now, is this even necessary? Well, opponents will point to the stat back in 2000, 1.6 million people were apprehended on the southwest border and that has fallen to around 300,000 a year. Proponents will say, yes, but this march is up on March 2017, and March was up on February and they will say that more families and more individuals are crossing the border and that is why the Department of Homeland Security is calling what`s happening on this border right now a crisis.

Nick Watt, CNN, Nogales, Arizona.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

AZUZ: The issue of immigration also factors into our next story from the Central European nation of Hungary. It held a general election Sunday that`s expected to give the nation`s incumbent leader, Prime Minister Viktor Orban another term. He and his political party had campaigned on anti-immigration platform. They`ve had enough support in the government to make major changes to Hungary`s laws, increasing governmental control over the media, the bank, the high court and outside organizations.

Hungary is part of the European Union, a political and economic partnership of 28 European countries, but E.U. leaders are concerned that Hungary`s democracy is being weakened by its increasingly powerful government.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

PHIL BLACK, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hungarian politics may not be on your radar, but this E.U. country is starting to drift away from the West, and back into Russia`s sphere of influence.

This is Hungary`s Prime Minister Viktor Orban. Back in 1989, he was calling for Soviet troops to leave the country.

Fast forward, almost 30 years, and here he is, one of Russian President Vladimir Putin`s closest allies.

So, how did Orban go from pro-Western activist to Russian ally?

Orban, like Putin, has consolidated control of the country`s media. And Orban, like Putin, has cracked down on nongovernmental organizations.

Russia`s influence can be seen in other ways, too.

Back in 2014, Moscow made a $10.8 billion to Hungary. Ostensibly, it was to fund the expansion of Hungary`s only nuclear Soviet era power plant.

But critics said it would only increase Hungary`s dependence on Russia. The deal was finally given the go-ahead by the E.U. this year. Orban`s government stands by its record and denies any Russian influence.

ZOLTAN KOVACS, GOVERNMENT SPOKESPERSON: There`s not one element of our policies and not one element of our decisions that can suggest to you that we are closer to Russia and Mr. Putin in any way that any Western European country.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

AZUZ: It`s one thing to patch up a crack in the wall, the floor, or the driveway. But what do you do about this?

The crack in the earth is more than 50 feet wide in some places and 50 feet deep, and it reportedly followed heavy rains and some ground vibration last month in the Eastern African country of Kenya.

Scientists say this is evidence of plate tectonics, the theory that giant chunks of the earth`s crust and upper mantle are slowly shifting and breaking in some places. One area where two such plates are thought to meet is the East African Reef, and that`s near where there is going on.

So, does this mean that part of the African continent will eventually break off? Maybe. But it`s probably nothing for us to worry about.

If this is part of a breakup between the East African Reef and the rest of the continent, scientists say it won`t be complete for tens of millions of years.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

AZUZ (voice-over): Ten-second trivia:

Which of these world capitals has the highest population?

New Delhi, India, Cairo, Egypt, Manila, Philippines, or Moscow, Russia?

These nations are ranked in order from the highest population to the lowest, according to the CIA world fact book.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

AZUZ: With more than 25.7 million people, New Delhi isn`t just one of the world`s most populated cities, it`s also one of the most polluted, and its leaders have tried everything from banning trucks at certain times to shooting water mist cannons to get pollutants out of the air.

The man in our "Tomorrow`s Hero" report has a more conventional solution, a giant air filter.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ANGAD DARYANI, INVENTOR: Growing up, I had asthma, and I was -- I used a lot of breathing problems. In India, I have seen there`s a -- it`s one of the fastest growing economies in the world, which means there`s thousands of cars added to the street every single day.

And with the increasing cars, there`s high levels of air pollution in the city.

Hi. My name is Angad Daryani and I`m 19 years old.

My invention is a large scale air purification system for developing countries like India and China.

I wanted to build something that could actually impact thousands of people in the city who are facing these breathing problems.

What I`ve actually been working on is a 20-foot tower that captures all the solid dust particle that`s rising because of the construction and the economic growth in the city and also the solid carbon particles that humans breathe every single day, which are emitted from trucks and car exhaust pipes.

So, there`s two things that we want to separate. One is dust and other heavy solid particles in the air. And second is microscopic carbon particles. So, if there was a surge (ph) again, it automatically starts stabilizing.

There`s five phases in the tower that all do different specific task and it`s very highly controlled, each phase, so that it`s automatically adopting to its surroundings and temperature in the air, and accounting for the external details while carrying out the cleansing process internally.

There`s something that`s very special about this project, is that there`s no solid replaceable filter used anywhere in the entire project. So, at the bottom of the tower, you have dust and carbon separated in two separate tanks that can be cleaned every week or every two weeks based on how much dust and carbon it captures every single day.

If this tower performs the way that we want it to perform, we will see an overall improvement in the quality of air in the city and also the quality of health of people suffering from breathing problems and other respiratory diseases.

My eventual dream is to build companies that solve problems like this and cleaning the planet of the waste that we humans have caused for hundreds of years. As overly ambitious as it sounds, that`s a dream and that`s what I`m working towards every single day.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

AZUZ: With the weather turning warmer, a lot of Americans are anticipating or dreading cutting their law every week. But you don`t need a mower, you need a goat. Now, you might expect to see them in a major city like Atlanta, Georgia, but near the Mercedes Benz Stadium, 41 ruminants were recently brought in, along with a couple of dogs that guard them to keep a roadside trim with that just mowed look.

Are they quieter than lawn mowers? Usually. What do you call them? Billy. Could they be used in other places? They cud.

What do they drink for refreshment? Milk. And will they ever replace lawn mowers? Ibex they will in some places.

I think we`ve tried just about every other goat pun and that`s all the ruminant we have on today`s show.

I`m Carl Azuz for CNN 10.

END

CNN Student News 201804 08_FALCON 9 ROCKET TAKES OFF IN FLORIDA

CNN STUDENT NEWS  - April 8, 2018 

Falcon 9 Rocket Takes Off in Florida 

CNN Student News 201804 07

CNN Student News 201804 07