African Week

Birth Pains
By Bobby Ghosh Monday, Sep. 27, 2010

Time Magazine

Many cattle keepers refused to surrender their weapons during the last disarmament program. According to them, they have to remain armed to defend themselves during cattle raids. Further complicating the likely secession are the multiple tribes and internal feuding among the cattle herders.

Countries are often forged in fire and blood, and it now looks inevitable that violence will attend the birth of the world's newest nation. As Sudan prepares for a January referendum that is almost certain to give its southern region independence — local authorities have already launched a contest to compose a national anthem — the world is bracing for conflagration. U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has described the situation as a "ticking time bomb." President Obama will attend a special U.N. meeting on Sept. 24 to discuss Sudan's future.
Some battle lines are well-worn: the Muslim-majority north is loath to give up the oil-rich south, where most of the population is Christian or follows traditional faiths. The two regions were locked in conflict for decades — by some estimates, more than 2.5 million were killed and twice that number displaced — until a 2005 peace deal between the government in Khartoum and southern rebel groups led by the Sudan People's Liberation Army set the stage for the January referendum. President Omar Hassan al-Bashir, indicted by the International Criminal Court in July on charges of war crimes in the western Darfur province, has said he will respect the vote, but his army and the SPLA have both been rearming. Clinton said the south should be prepared to make "accommodations" with the north, "unless they want more years of warfare."

Word List

to be forged - ser forjado (construido)

blood - sangue

conflagration - conflagração (incêndio destrutivo)

loath - contrário (averso)

displaced - deslocado

indicted - indiciado

warfare - guerra, combate, hostilidade

google tradutor

 - Leiam e discutam as perguntas abaixo (postem suas ideias e respostas, clicando em "COMENTÁRIOS"):

1. How do the cattle keepers justify their non disarmment?
2. What is Sudan preparing for?
3. What seems to be the general opinion about the south region independence? Why?
4. What is the reason for the North and South war?
5. What do you think Clinton meant by "accommodations"?

Brazil Oil Week

Brazil Needs Billions to Drill Really Deep

Newsweek

August, 29th

By Mac Margolis

Brazil has a sunken-treasure problem. The discovery three years ago of a huge offshore stash of oil unleashed a gusher of nationalist euphoria. At somewhere between 9 billion and 15 billion barrels, it was the largest find in the Western Hemisphere in more than a quarter century. President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva hailed the find as a ticket to Brazil’s “second independence,” and called on the country’s legislators to tighten state control over the oil industry.

Since then, things have become more difficult. Brazil’s treasure lies deeper (4.5 miles) and farther from shore (200 miles) than any oil being commercially exploited today. To tap that undersea wealth, state oil company Petrobras says it needs cash up front: some $224 billion over the next five years. It has planned a massive stock offering for September. Problem is, the complicated financial transaction will only add to Petrobras’s already heavy debt load (34 percent of net assets), which could move ratings firms to downgrade the company. That would drive up borrowing costs and sour the deal. Brazil could share the burden by calling on international oil majors as risk investors, but that would mean easing its grip on the industry. In the run-up to the Oct. 3 presidential elections, that’s not happening.
 
Word List
Hail - greet, signal, adress, acclaim
Deep - profound, penetrating, submerged
Far - at a distance, extremely
Downgrade - to lower, to degrade (antonym - improve, upgrade_
Borrowing costs - the cost of mony taken from a bank or financial institution
Grip - hold, embrace, to have perception of, to control

Tradutor

 - Leiam e discutam as perguntas abaixo (postem suas ideias e respostas, clicando em "COMENTÁRIOS"):

1. What is Brazil's sunken problem?
2. Why is the new finding complicated?
3. How much cash does Petrobras need?
4. What is Petrobras' plan to get the cash?
5. What is wrong with the plan? 

World Cup Week

Loaned goals

Footballers from all over the world are about to take part in the sport’s greatest festival. Their employers may be watching with mixed feelings.

Jun 3rd 2010

The Economist: World Cup

 

 

 

 

 

 FOR a month, starting on June 11th, the eyes of half the world will be rolling in exasperation, boredom or indifference. The eyes of the other half will be glued to television and computer screens in living rooms, bars and (admit it) offices, watching soccer matches beamed from South Africa. The FIFA World Cup, the biggest international festival of the most popular sport on the planet, is about to kick off.

Because a vast, global audience is worth a fortune in broadcasting and marketing rights, FIFA, football’s global governing body, can expect a healthy profit from Africa’s first World Cup, even though it recently had to find an extra $100m to make sure everything would be ready on time. Citigroup, a bank, estimates that the previous tournament, in Germany in 2006, yielded $1.8 billion. Most of what FIFA makes is reinvested in the game—for example, in coaching youngsters.

The players in South Africa are employed not by FIFA or the 200-odd national federations affiliated to it but by clubs, chiefly in Europe. Some, such as Lionel Messi, of Barcelona and Argentina (pictured), joined their clubs as boys. There are few other industries in which businesses must lend their employees to a higher authority, but FIFA obliges clubs to do just that. In effect, argues Stefan Szymanski, an economist at City University’s Cass Business School, FIFA and its affiliates can use their monopoly over football to borrow clubs’ best assets (and sometimes return them tired or damaged). Like it or not, the clubs must comply. Mr Szymanski says this arrangement is “a bit like the Mafia”. 

Players must be released not only for the World Cup and its qualifying matches, but also for regional tournaments and friendlies (matches unrelated to a competition). Clubs face losing players to international calls from all parts of the globe, not just to their own national teams. The damage to the club can be severe. Michael Essien, a Ghanaian star, has not played for Chelsea, his London club, since being crocked in training for the Africa Cup of Nations in January. It is not the first time he was injured while playing for his country. He is missing the World Cup too. 

Word list
boredom -chateação, desanimo
to be glued - estar colado
to beam - transmitir
broadcasting - teletransmissões
tournament - disputa, competição
to borrow - pegar emprestado
to comply - cumprir (permitir)
to be released - ser liberado
to miss - perder (sentir falta)

Tradutor: http://www.google.com/language_tools


- Leiam e discutam as perguntas abaixo (postem suas ideias e respostas, clicando em "COMENTÁRIOS"):

1. Why will the eyes of half the world be glued to the television?
2. What does the world cup have to do with marketing?
3. What is FIFA's demand of players release compared to?
4. What is the main criticism about the world cup in the text? Explain:

PUBLIC HEALTH WEEK

AIDS Programs Hit Setbacks in Africa

One year ago, Obama unveiled a new $63 billion global health initiative. So why are advocacy groups raising the alarm about HIV treatment shortages?

By Katie Paul | Newsweek Web Exclusive

Apr 27, 2010
http://www.newsweek.com/id/237037

Peter Mugyenyi runs the Joint Clinical Research Center (JCRC), one of the most successful AIDS-treatment providers in Uganda. Back in 2003, he went to Washington on a day's notice to help the Bush administration draft its plan for what would become PEPFAR (the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief), the most ambitious public-health initiative ever to tackle the AIDS crisis, then sat beside Laura Bush at the State of the Union address when the program was announced. In the years since, he has been applauded when he exceeded his enrollment targets.
But today, despite treating 32,000 AIDS patients, he does not have a message of success. Instead, he was back in Washington in March, this time to warn that the stagnation of PEPFAR funding is beginning to "result in chaos." At the beginning of April he was quoted in The Boston Globe, announcing that he had received word not to enroll new patients unless they are replacing others who have left or died. Midmonth, Health GAP, an independent activist organization, reported that antiretroviral-treatment programs at the JCRC and other clinics in Uganda were being "precipitously" transferred to government hospitals, which did not have the drugs to handle them. On Monday, Mugyenyi was again raising the alarm, having penned the introduction to a new report put out by the International Treatment Preparedness Coalition that warns of a global backslide in the AIDS fight.

Word list

setback - obstáculo
to draft - desenhar, fazer um rascunho inicial
to tackle - tentar resolver, manejar
stagnation -estaguinação
to enroll - admitir, matricular
precipitously -precipitadamente
to handle - lidar, manejar
to pen - redigir
backslide - retrocesso

Tradutor: http://www.google.com/language_tools


- Leiam e discutam as perguntas abaixo (postem suas ideias e respostas, clicando em "COMENTÁRIOS"):

1. Why has Peter Mugyenyi been applauded?
2. What are the setbacks mentioned in the text?
3. How are patients being handled in the antiretroviral-treatment programs at the JCRC?

Earthquake Week

The Cause of Haiti's Latest Earthquake: Is the Worst Yet to Come? A Look at the Seismic Science in the Caribbean.

Newsweek
Posted Wednesday, January 20, 2010 7:27 AM 
Link: http://blog.newsweek.com/blogs/thehumancondition/archive/2010/01/20/the-cause-of-haiti-s-latest-earthquake-is-the-worst-yet-to-come-a-look-at-the-seismic-science-in-the-caribbean.aspx

Jeneen Interlandi

In the seven days since a 7.0 earthquake struck the island of Haiti and decimated its capital city, at least 14 aftershocks measuring 5 or above have been recorded by the United States Geological Survey—including a 6.0 quake in Haiti just this morning. The event confirms a new report by Woods Hole seismologists which found that not only would such shocks be likely to continue, but the already devastated island nation would face great risk of significant future calamity.

Haiti and its neighbors sit above two tectonic plates (the North American and the Caribbean) that slide awkwardly past one another in an east-west direction at about an inch a year. The 100-mile border between these two plates, known as the Enriquillo-Plaintain fault line, extends from the Dominican Republic through Haiti all the way to Jamaica. Last Tuesday’s rupture occurred when a segment of the plates that had been stuck together since 1751 (when the last earthquake occurred) jerked themselves free, releasing 250 years of built-up friction from the earthquake’s epicenter and displacing just enough ground to topple Haiti’s fragile and ill-prepared capital.

Word list

aftershocks- terremotos recorrentes (normalmente após um terremoto maior)
to slide- escorregar
awkwardly- de modo esquisito/estranho
inch- polegada
to jerk oneself free - soltar-se
to topple- derrubar

Tradutor: http://www.google.com/language_tools


- Leiam e discutam as perguntas abaixo (postem suas ideias e respostas, clicando em "COMENTÁRIOS"):

1. What did geological surveys discovered?
2. Why is Haiti area prone to earthquakes? Will it happen again?
3. Does it seem (from the text tone) that Haiti was prepared for it? Why? Why not?

Asian Week

Google and China - Flowers for a funeral

Censorship and hacker attacks provide the epitaph

Jan 14th 2010 | BEIJING | From The Economist print edition
Full text: http://www.economist.com/displayStory.cfm?story_id=15270952

“WE’RE in this for the long haul,” wrote a Google executive four years ago when the company launched a self-censored version of its search engine for the China market. Now Google says it might have to pull out of the country because of alleged attacks by hackers in China on its e-mail service and a tightening of China’s restrictions on free speech on the internet. Its change of heart, as the company rightly points out, could have “far-reaching consequences”.

Google’s “new approach to China”, as the company’s chief legal officer, David Drummond, called it on January 12th on the company’s official blog, will certainly infuriate China’s government. The authorities are sensitive to foreign complaints about internet controls in China. In November, during a visit by President Barack Obama, his obliquely worded criticism of Chinese online censorship was itself censored from official reports. If it does close down in China, Google would be the first big-brand foreign company to do so citing freedom of speech in many years.

Word list
for the long haul: viagem longa e difícil
to pull out of the country: deixar o país (retirar seu negócio do país)
tightening: estreitamento (tornar mais rigoroso)
change of heart: mudar de idéia
infuriate: enfurecer
big-brand foreign company: empresa estrangeira de nome (marca conhecida)
freedom of speech:liberdade de expressão

Tradutor: http://www.google.com/language_tools


- Leiam e discutam as perguntas abaixo (postem suas ideias e respostas, clicando em "COMENTÁRIOS"):

1) What does the title "Flowers for a funeral" suggest? Why?

2) What is the main subject of the text?

3) Does the text suggest that "freedom of speech" is important? Why?

4) In your opinion, what could be the impact over a country of a company like Google leave it?