Elon Musk’s Starlink satellite systems are being used by Ukrainian forces on all front lines in the war with Russia, the country’s spy chief has said.

“They have proven themselves on the front lines. You can say what you want about whether [Starlink systems] are good or bad, but facts are facts. Absolutely all front lines are using them,” Kyrylo Budanov, head of the Main Ukrainian Intelligence Directorate, said Saturday, according to Interfax Ukraine.

Budanov was speaking at the annual Yalta European Strategy meeting organized by the Victor Pinchuk Foundation.

The spy chief also gave a positive account of the difference Starlink is making in the war.

“They have played and continue to play a significant role, because so many systems use the antennas, use the Starlink systems themselves, for communications, for drone transmissions, especially in terms of a remote command post and so on.”

Budanov also said Starlink coverage “did not work for some time” in Russian-occupied Crimea, without elaborating.

“I can absolutely confirm that Starlink systems did not work for a certain period of time near Crimea. We immediately realized that there was simply no coverage there. That’s probably all I can tell you,” Budanov said.

The spy chief’s speech follows revelations about the satellite system’s use in the war made in a new biography of Starlink’s owner, written by Walter Isaacson and titled simply “Elon Musk.”

According to an excerpt from the book, Musk secretly ordered his engineers to turn off his company’s Starlink satellite communications network near the Crimean coast last year to disrupt a Ukrainian sneak attack on the Russian naval fleet.

As Ukrainian submarine drones strapped with explosives approached the Russian fleet, they “lost connectivity and washed ashore harmlessly,” Isaacson writes.

Musk’s decision, which left Ukrainian officials begging him to turn the satellites back on, was driven by an acute fear that Russia would respond to a Ukrainian attack on Crimea with nuclear weapons, a fear driven home by Musk’s conversations with senior Russian officials, according to Isaacson.

“There was an emergency request from government authorities to activate Starlink all the way to Sevastopol,” Musk posted on X. Sevastopol is a port city in Crimea.

“The obvious intent being to sink most of the Russian fleet at anchor. If I had agreed to their request, then SpaceX would be explicitly complicit in a major act of war and conflict escalation.”

Barcelona teenager Lamine Yamal came off the substitutes’ bench against Georgia on Friday to make history twice.

The forward was introduced in the 44th minute to become, aged 16 years and 57 days, Spain’s youngest men’s player, breaking the record previously held by Gavi who had made his international debut in 2021, aged 17 years and 62 days.

The teenager then completed the scoring for Spain in the 74th minute for a 7-1 Euro 2024 qualifying win, becoming his country’s youngest scorer and breaking another record which was held by Barcelona teammate Gavi.

In August, Yamal made his full debut for Barcelona to become the youngest player to start a La Liga match in the 21st century, and he was named the league’s U23 player for that month.

When he made his debut for Barcelona in April aged 15, he became the club’s youngest player in more than a century.

Álvaro Morata scored a hat trick for Spain, while an own goal from Solomon Kverkveila and goals from Dani Olmo and Nico Williams secured a thumping win for the Spaniards.

Spain is second in Group A, nine points behind Scotland with the Scots having played two games more.

Michelle Yeoh could soon become a member of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) after the Oscar winner was among eight candidates nominated by the organization’s executive board.

Her proposed membership is set to be ratified at an IOC session in Mumbai, India, next month.

In March, Yeoh won best actress at the 95th Academy Awards for her acclaimed performance in “Everything Everywhere All at Once,” becoming the first woman of Asian descent to win the award. She was also the first Malaysian-born performer to be honored with a best actress Oscar.

Yeoh, 61, is a former Malaysian junior squash champion and joins Israel’s first Olympic medallist Yael Arad, Hungarian businessman Balázs Furjes, Peruvian politician and former Olympian Cecilia Roxana Tait Villacorta and German sports entrepreneur Michael Mronz as the five proposed individual members.

In a statement, IOC President Thomas Bach said: “These candidates bring added value to the work of the IOC because of their experience and diverse expertise in different walks of life.

“What they all have in common is their love of sport and their strong belief in the Olympic values and what the IOC stands for.”

Movie credits for Yeoh, who is widely considered an icon of martial arts cinema, also include Marvel Studio’s “Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings” (2021), “Crazy Rich Asians” (2018), “The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor” (2008), “Memoirs Of A Geisha” (2005) and “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon” (2000).

She made her name in Hong Kong action movies of the 1980s and 90s, before her breakthrough international role in 1997 opposite Pierce Brosnan in the James Bond film “Tomorrow Never Dies.”

Moldovan soccer player Violeta Mitul has died aged 26 in a “tragic accident,” European soccer’s governing body UEFA announced on Friday.

“The 26-year-old defender was involved in a tragic accident while on a mountain hike with club-mates,” UEFA said in a statement.

During her career, the defender became one of Moldova’s leading players, UEFA said, winning 40 caps for her country and playing soccer for clubs across Europe.

Mitul joined Icelandic club Einherji earlier this year but had previously played for clubs in Spain, Italy, Ukraine and Kazakhstan. Earlier in her career, she also won the Moldovan and Romanian Cups while playing for Alga Tiraspol and Vasas Femina respectively.

Moldova did not qualify for this year’s Women’s World Cup but Mitul played in all 10 of her country’s qualifying matches.

Category 3 Hurricane Lee remains hundreds of miles east of the Caribbean on Saturday morning, yet forecasters say the storm’s effects may have an impact on the US Atlantic seaboard as early as this weekend.

Lee was just shy of 350 miles east-northeast of the northern Leeward Islands as of 11 a.m. ET Saturday, whipping up maximum sustained winds of 115 mph, according to the US National Hurricane Center. The major hurricane, which earlier reached Category 5 status, is expected to maintain its strength Saturday but is forecast to restrengthen over the weekend.

It’s still too early to determine whether the core of the storm will directly impact the US mainland, but Lee is expected to rip currents and large waves to most of the East Coast of the United States on Sunday and Monday and worsen through the week, the hurricane center said.

“Lee is moving toward the west-northwest near 12 mph (19 km/h), and this motion is expected to continue through early next week with a significant decrease in forward speed beginning later today and Sunday,” the hurricane center said in its 11 a.m. ET advisory. “Hazardous beach conditions expected to develop around the western Atlantic through next week.”

Caribbean islands will be similarly impacted by the storm as it moves slowly west-northwest through the Atlantic. Lee is expected to pass “well to the north” of Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands and the northern Leeward Islands, forecasters said.

“Swells generated by Lee are affecting portions of the Lesser Antilles,” the hurricane center warned Friday night. The British and US Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, Hispaniola, the Turks and Caicos Islands, the Bahamas and Bermuda will also face swells this weekend that can bring life-threatening surf and rip conditions.

The National Weather Service office in San Juan, Puerto Rico, said waves breaking at 6 to 10 feet were forecast for Sunday. Larger waves were expected next week along east- and north-facing beaches.

“Beach erosion and coastal flooding is possible,” the office posted on X, formerly known as Twitter.

Lee enters rare company

Lee hit a rare strength that few storms have ever achieved. Only 2% of storms in the Atlantic reach Category 5 strength, according to NOAA’s hurricane database. Including Lee, only 40 Category 5 hurricanes have roamed the Atlantic since 1924.

Lee, which was a Category 1 storm Thursday, intensified with exceptional speed in warm ocean waters, more than doubling its wind speeds to 165 mph in just a day.

The storm’s winds increased by 85 mph in a 24-hour period, which tied it with Hurricane Matthew for the third-fastest rapid intensification in the Atlantic, according to NOAA research meteorologist John Kaplan. The monstrous hurricane struck Haiti in 2016, killing hundreds in the Caribbean nation while also wreaking havoc on parts of the US Southeast.

Category 5 is the highest level on the hurricane wind speed scale and has no maximum point. Hurricanes hit this level when their sustained winds reach 157 mph or higher. A 165-mph storm like Lee is in the same category as Hurricane Allen, the Atlantic’s strongest hurricane on record, which topped out at 190 mph in 1980.

Hurricanes need the perfect mixture of warm water, moist air and light upper-level winds to intensify enough to reach Category 5 strength. Lee had all of these, especially warm water amid the warmest summer on record.

Sea-surface temperatures across the portion of the Atlantic Ocean that Lee is tracking through are a staggering 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) above normal after rising to “far above record levels” this summer, according to David Zierden, Florida’s state climatologist.

Reaching Category 5 strength has become more common over the last decade. Lee is the 8th Category 5 since 2016, meaning 20% of these exceptionally powerful hurricanes on record in NOAA’s hurricane database have come in the last seven years.

The Atlantic is not the only ocean to have spawned a monster storm in 2023. All seven ocean basins where tropical cyclones can form have had a storm reach Category 5 strength so far this year, including Hurricane Jova, which reached Category 5 status in the eastern Pacific earlier this week.

How close will Hurricane Lee get to the US?

Computer model trends for Lee have shown the hurricane taking a turn to the north early next week. But exactly when that turn occurs and how far west Lee will manage to track by then will play a huge role in how close it gets to the US.

Several steering factors at the surface and upper levels of the atmosphere will determine how close Lee will get to the East Coast.

An area of high pressure over the Atlantic, known as the Bermuda High, will have a major influence on how quickly Lee turns. The Bermuda High is expected to remain very strong into the weekend, which will keep Lee on its current west-northwestward track and slow it down a bit.

As the high pressure weakens next week it will allow Lee to start moving northward.

Once that turn to the north occurs, the position of the jet stream – strong upper-level winds that can change the direction of a hurricane’s path – will influence how closely Lee is steered to the US.

Scenario: Out to Sea

Lee could make a quick turn to the north early next week if high pressure weakens significantly.

If the jet stream sets up along the East Coast, it will act as a barrier that prevents Lee from approaching the coast. This scenario would keep Lee farther away from the US coast but could bring the storm closer to Bermuda.

Scenario: Close to East Coast

Lee could make a slower turn to the north because the high pressure remains robust, and the jet stream sets up farther inland over the Eastern US. This scenario would leave portions of the East Coast, mainly north of the Carolinas, vulnerable to a much closer approach from Lee.

All these factors have yet to come into focus, and the hurricane is still at least seven days from being a threat to the East Coast. Any potential US impact will become more clear as the Lee moves west in the coming days.

Coco Gauff, the world No. 10 women’s singles player, has defeated 2nd-ranked Aryna Sabalenka 2-6, 6-3, 6-2, with a dramatic comeback in the women’s US Open final.

The star-studded crowd erupted with applause after Gauff’s home-turf victory at Arthur Ashe Stadium in Queens. The win is 19-year-old Gauff’s first career grand slam and makes her the first American teenager to win the US Open since 23-time major champion Serena Williams took the title in 1999.

“I feel like I’m in shock at this moment,” said an emotional Gauff after her win. “God puts you through tribulations and trials, and that makes this moment sweeter than I would have imagined.”

She thanked her family, her team, and “the people who didn’t believe in me.”

Bidding for her second major title of the year, the soon-to-be women’s world No. 1 Sabalenka made quick work in the first set, breaking Gauff’s serve three times to win 6-2 in dominant fashion.

However, with the packed crowd chanting “Let’s go Coco,” Gauff raised her level in the second set, going up a break before eventually taking it 6-3 to force a deciding third set.

A locked-in Gauff took control in the third set, going up a double break to inch ever closer to her maiden grand slam title. Although Sabalenka took the next two games, Gauff closed out the match to become the 12th teenager in US Open history to win the title.

“I don’t know, I just knew that if I didn’t give it my all, I had no shot at winning,” Gauff said on how she found the strength to rally after dropping the first set.

In her run to the final, the athlete twice lost the first set of a match, once in the first round against Laura Siegemund and again in the third round against Elise Mertens.

With the victory, Gauff becomes the third American teenager to win the US Open title, joining Williams and Tracy Austin. She is set to move up to No. 3 in the WTA singles rankings, and co-No. 1 in doubles along with compatriot Jessica Pegula.

After clinching the victory, Gauff dropped to the ground before getting up to hug Sabalenka. Afterward, Gauff was overcome with emotion and knelt down to take in the moment.

Gauff poked fun at her father after the match as she thanked her family. “Thank you first to my parents,” she said. “Today was the first time I’ve ever seen my dad cry. He doesn’t want me to tell y’all that, but he got caught in 4K!”

Meanwhile, despite the loss, the Belarusian star will move to No. 1 in the WTA singles rankings on Monday, ending Iga Świątek’s 75-consecutive week reign.

Sabenka congratulated her competitor, saying, “I hope we play in many more finals” and calling Gauff “amazing.”

The American in turn congratulated Sabenka on her rise to the No. 1 position. “Aryna is an incredible player,” she said. “Congratulations on the no. 1 ranking, it’s well deserved.”

At a news conference after the match, Sabalenka said the loss was a “lesson” for her and she had started “overthinking” during the second set.

“It’s me against me,” she said. Gauff “was moving really and defending better than anybody else.”

“I was playing against the crowd,” she added.

A first grand slam for Gauff

The last time Gauff and Sabalenka met was in the quarterfinals of Indian Wells in March, with the Belarusian winning comfortably, 6-4 6-0. Saturday’s final was an altogether different contest, however, with Gauff improving rapidly in the six months that have passed since that defeat.

The 19-year-old has won three WTA titles this season, including the biggest of her career in Cincinnati just before the US Open, and has won 17 of her last 18 matches. She is the youngest American woman to reach the US Open final since a 17-year-old Serena Williams did so in 1999.

“Serena is Serena. She’s the GOAT. I hope to do half of what she did,” Gauff said, per the WTA.

The competition was the second grand slam final of Gauff’s career after reaching the French Open final in 2022, where she was swiftly defeated by Iga Świątek.

But following her 6-4 7-5 semifinal win over Karolína Muchová, Gauff spoke about the improvement in her mentality, going from somebody blighted by imposter syndrome to now believing she is capable of contending with the best players in the world.

“I think it’s [imposter syndrome] still a part of me,” she said. “It’s something I’m doing better with, definitely. Even after [winning Washington] DC, I still was like: ‘Well, I beat some good people, but maybe I caught them on off days.’

“It’s still definitely a part of me, but I do think I’m giving myself more credit more and speaking things into existence is real. I’ve been trying to speak more positively of myself and actually telling myself that I’m a great player.”

The sixth seed told reporters that after her first-round Wimbledon loss she was “preparing for next year,” before adding she was “really proud of myself” for the way she has performed at Flushing Meadows.

“I have been focusing more on myself and my expectations of myself,” said Gauff, per Reuters. “I really believe that now I have the maturity and ability to do it.”

‘Just keep fighting’

Until her semifinal against Madison Keys, Sabalenka had been dominant in New York – not dropping a set and never losing more than five games in a match.

However, she was pushed all the way by the American on Thursday and had to bounce back from a brutal 6-0 first-set loss, eventually winning 0-6 7-6 (7-1) 7-6 (10-5).after two-and-a-half hours of grueling tennis.

Such was the likelihood of a Keys victory late in the second set, Gauff was even asked about the prospect of facing her fellow American in her post-match press conference.

Sabalenka’s run to the final of the US Open caps off a remarkable year in which she won three titles – including her first grand slam at the Australian Open and her sixth Masters 1000 title in Madrid.

Despite winning the last time they met, Sabalenka heralded Gauff’s development this season and says she is a “much better” player now than she was six months ago.

“She’s improved a lot,” Sabalenka told reporters after her semifinal. “So it’s a different player – we don’t really like thinking about that match.

“Going into this final, I think I just have to focus on myself and prepare myself for another fight. No matter what, just keep fighting and keep playing my best and do my best.

“You know, there is nothing much you can, what else can you do? You just have to be there and you have to fight for it.”

Sabalenka will no doubt have to play before a partisan crowd in Saturday’s final, but having already overcome an intense atmosphere against Keys on Thursday, she said she felt confident of handling the occasion.

“Of course, I would prefer [to] have someone else or [the] crowd be a little bit the same to both players, but today’s match I think is gonna help me in the final because I’ll be fine with this support. I’ll be all right,” she said.

“I’m still hoping that probably some of them will be supporting me – just a little bit. Just sometimes, please. Please,” she laughed.

San Francisco is undeniably having a moment.

Over the past year, headlines claiming the city is caught in a spiraling “doom loop” have become so prominent that a city commissioner decided to cash in on downtown San Francisco’s storefront vacancies, homelessness and opioid issues by anonymously advertising an hour-and-a-half long tour showcasing “doom and squalor.” For $30 a person, you could see the city’s “open-air drug markets” and “abandoned tech offices” first-hand.

However, just before it was scheduled to take place, the tour was canceled (and the commissioner ultimately resigned). Instead a more “positive” walk organized by a local nonprofit guided participants through the city’s Tenderloin, highlighting a neighborhood that’s long been a poster child for the city’s hardships.

While people sleeping on sidewalks and drug use were still visible, it focused on the community’s more positive attributes, including a rich history, art and a career center that’s working to get struggling San Franciscans back on their feet.

Still, for many would-be visitors, it’s San Francisco’s more discernible difficulties that are the real deterrents.

“My clients who’ve recently been to San Francisco have never said they felt unsafe,” says Alana Scalise Livingston, owner of Wander Spokane tours in Spokane, Washington (and a former San Francisco resident). “They just say it’s not as nice as it used to be, and there are many homeless people flooding the streets.”

Joshua Hirsch, owner of Sidewalk Food Tours SF, has received much of the same feedback. “According to our tour participants, the homeless people in cities like San Francisco and New York seemed to have become more brazen and outspoken since the pandemic,” he says. “They think it’s their neighborhood, and you don’t even have the right to be walking on the sidewalk.”

Additionally, there’s the city’s so-called “death spiral” or “doom loop” touted by news outlets (including the city’s own) – in which remote work leads to empty real estate, resulting in less foot traffic and then shuttered restaurants and reduced public services. This in turn leads to more overt drug activity as well as unhoused individuals congregating in front of unoccupied spaces.

It’s not that the tales of downtown retail stores closing in bulk and vacant office buildings are untrue, nor are the stories of drugstore chains such as Walgreens locking up most everything in the store behind see-through cabinets, though the latter is occurring in other big cities nationwide.

San Francisco has also been experiencing a rash of car break-ins, including this SF Whole Foods garage break-in video that went viral in Indonesia, that many fear could have long-lasting effects on the city’s tourism.

This past June, the investment firm behind the Hilton San Francisco Union Square (at 1,921 rooms, it’s the city’s largest hotel) and the nearby Parc 55 hotels announced that it is stopping payments on a $725 million loan and surrendering the remaining debt to its lender. Tech companies such as Red Hat and the SF Bay Area’s own Meta have decided to cancel their 2024 conferences in San Francisco as well, citing ongoing concerns over safety and the cleanliness of downtown streets.

‘It felt vibrant and alive’

It seems like everywhere you turn, the news about San Francisco just keeps getting worse. Or is it just the news we’re reading?

“We definitely feel like there is a significant misconception of what is really happening on the ground,” says Dina Belon, chief operating officer at Staypineapple Hotels, which has a property in San Francisco’s Union Square district.

Yuki Hayashi, a Toronto-based marketing writer and editor who visited San Francisco in late July for the city’s annual marathon, agrees. “Based on what we saw on Reddit, my family and I thought the city had turned into some post-apocalyptic hell zone,” she says. “But instead it felt vibrant and alive.”

The San Francisco hoteliers and restaurateurs interviewed for this article acknowledge that a drop in the city’s tourism this summer has been evident. That’s the result of a combination of factors, they say. They include the negative headlines and fewer full-time office workers, “which has significantly reduced our business and corporate travel,” says Belon. There’s also the absence of Chinese tourists — which pre-pandemic was one of the city’s top international markets — because of Covid and flight restrictions.

But they also agree that many of the gloomy headlines have been misleading.

“Yes, there are parts of San Francisco that need work,” says Marc Zimmerman, owner and executive chef at Gozu, a modern Japanese eatery located in the city’s East Cut neighborhood. “I don’t think we should pretend that the city doesn’t have issues. But the whole idea that, you know, everybody’s just laying around every SF street with needles hanging out of their arms is definitely a stretch.”

Ben Parks, board chair for San Francisco City Guides, feels similarly.

“It’s like, if the negative media coverage is all you pay attention to,” he says, “you just really miss out on everything the city has to offer.”

His all-volunteer organization has been leading free walking tours citywide for nearly five decades and currently has 79 offerings. Parks says that these days, their attendance has actually been increasing, with what the organization suspects are more local residents interested in learning about the city’s neighborhoods, which in many cases are where San Francisco continues to impress.

“There are so many good things happening in many of our neighborhoods and communities,” Grace Horikiri, executive director of San Francisco’s Japantown Community Benefit District, “and it often gets overshadowed by all the non-positive news.”

Within the past year, Japantown has welcomed new restaurants such as Copra and Fermentation Lab, saw the opening of the Kimpton Hotel Enso in its former Buchanan Hotel space and watched the growth of its popular monthly Mini Art Market in the community’s Japantown mall.

New businesses, new life

The city is also seeing new life in some of its major tourism hubs.

This August, IKEA bucked the trend of major retailers moving out of downtown and opened a San Francisco store focusing on small-space living along Market Street (between Sixth and Fifth streets), while more than 15 local small businesses, including Devil’s Teeth bakery, Holy Stitch! apparel and The Mellow, are setting up pop-up shops in vacant downtown storefronts, beginning mid-September.

Over in Fisherman’s Wharf, San Francisco’s iconic Ghirardelli Chocolate Company hosted the grand reopening of its Original Ice Cream and Chocolate Shop in July after a six-month renovation. The city’s LUMA hotel, which opened in 2022 adjacent to the city’s Chase Center sports and entertainment area, even won Tripadvisor’s 2023 Travelers’ Choice Best of the Best award, despite San Francisco’s negative narrative.

Chinatown, a neighborhood especially hard-hit by the pandemic, is hosting a series of new festivals, including a Halloween Festival on October 28. In January, the community also saw the long-awaited opening of its Rose Pak Muni metro station, providing Muni light-rail riders direct access to the heart of Chinatown’s streets.

Whether it’s Golden Gate Park’s 1.5-mile stretch known as JFK Promenade, with its Adirondack chairs; street art and playable pianos, which became permanently vehicle-free during the pandemic; or city stalwarts such as Amoeba Records in the Haight-Ashbury (which Santa Cruz bookseller Liz Pollock says is still filled with people “flipping through LPs” every time she visits), the city is in many ways just going about its business.

‘We needed a kick, and we got it’

Homelessness has been an ongoing issue in San Francisco, with thousands of homeless people sleeping on the streets on any given night, and the effects of the pandemic have brought it even more to the city’s forefront. “The challenges that San Francisco has always had are just more visible,” says Belon.

However, when it comes to violent crimes in US cities, San Francisco’s numbers are comparatively low. Larceny, such as car thefts and break-ins, is what really drives up crimes figures in the city and at the same time drives away visitors.

“We can’t just act like nothing is wrong,” says Zimmerman, “but for whatever reason, that’s the direction we went. But I feel like we needed a kick, and we got it. This is a great and resilient city, and now we’re seeing a big push to bring it all back.”

To help curb auto break-ins, the San Francisco Police Department is beginning to deploy bait cars that can help identity and arrest thieves, notably in tourist areas such as the Palace of Fine Arts, Alamo Square and Fisherman’s Wharf.

Getting homeless people off the streets and into places where they can get viable help (mental and physical) isn’t so easy, but that’s not to say efforts aren’t being made. In December 2022, a federal judge effectively barred the city from breaking up or sweeping tent encampments until there are more shelter beds than individuals, but the issue isn’t so cut and dry.

While the San Francisco Homeless Outreach Team works collaboratively with the Department of Public Health’s Street Medicine team to address the medical and behavioral health needs of many of the city’s homeless residents and also to offer them volunteer overnight shelter, many would rather stay on the streets for reasons such as feeling unsafe in shelter and the inability to keep their belongings with them.

Still, says Zimmerman, “It’s a different experience for those of us who walk around San Francisco every day. Yes, there are parts of the city that need work. But just in the neighborhood of Gozu, you’ve got Salesforce Park that is beautiful. The ballpark is beautiful. This is the perfect opportunistic position for San Francisco to bounce back.”

While raising capital for his newest venture, Yokai, a new hi-fi listening bar with cocktails and food that’s scheduled to open just a short walk from Gozu in mid-September, Zimmerman first heard a term that he’s since adopted as his own: “SF long,” which investors and other long-term San Francisco residents have been using to show their commitment to the city.

“It means, ‘we’re weathering this out together, and we’re not going anywhere. We’re in it for the long haul,’ ” Zimmerman said.

For all of San Francisco’s perceived and more evident troubles, the city still has a lot going for it.

“We have the geography,” says Zimmerman, “the location — with both Napa and Sonoma both an hour north — the restaurant scene, some great museums, and this awesome cultural melting pot of people. The whole thing is very unique.” 

Others such as Belon, Pollock and Livingston feel the same. “It’s the whole experience of it,” says Pollock, “and you can’t find it anywhere except San Francisco.”

Laura Kiniry is a freelance journalist and 28-year resident of San Francisco. She lives in the Haight-Ashbury neighborhood.

Myanmar’s already dire human rights situation is deteriorating and the junta should release all political prisoners, the United Nations’ chief said Wednesday, as a leading local news outlet revealed one of its journalists had been jailed for 20 years for covering the aftermath of a cyclone.

UN Secretary General António Guterres said he remains “deeply concerned about the worsening political, humanitarian, and human rights situation in Myanmar, including Rakhine state, and the plight of the massive number of refugees living in desperate conditions.”

Speaking on the last days of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Summit in Indonesia’s capital Jakarta, Guterres reiterated his “urgent call on the military authorities of Myanmar to listen to the aspirations of its people, release all political prisoners, and open the door to a return to democratic rule.”

Since the Myanmar military seized power in a coup in 2021, the country has been rocked by violence and instability and plunged into economic chaos. Fighting between junta troops and resistance groups under the People’s Defense Forces (PDF) unfolds almost daily across the country.

Thousands of civilians have been killed in junta airstrikes and ground attacks, according to monitoring groups, and many more – including journalists, activists and anyone accused of dissent – have been arrested.

On Wednesday, independent local media outlet Myanmar Now said one of its photojournalists was sentenced to 20 years in prison with hard labor by a military court on a raft of charges, including sedition.

Sai Zaw Thaike was in western Rakhine state to report on the aftermath of the devastating Cyclone Mocha, which killed over 140 people and caused widespread destruction. He was arrested by junta soldiers in the state capital Sittwe on May 23, Myanmar Now reported.

“All of Sai Zaw Thaike’s colleagues at Myanmar Now and I are deeply saddened to hear of the lengthy sentence handed down to him,” the outlet’s editor-in-chief Swe Win said in a statement.

“His sentencing is yet another indication that freedom of the press has been completely quashed under the military junta’s rule, and shows the hefty price independent journalists in Myanmar must pay for their professional work.”

In the aftermath of the cyclone Myanmar’s junta suspended humanitarian access to parts of Rakhine state, where more than 1 million people were in urgent need of aid, the UN’s humanitarian office said at the time.

The decision to stop aid access in the already-impoverished state paralyzed the humanitarian response to Cyclone Mocha and crippled life-saving aid distributions to storm-hit communities.

Myanmar Now said though Sai Zaw Thaike’s initial charges included misinformation, incitement, and sedition, it was not clear what he was convicted of.

Sai Zaw Thaike was not allowed access to a lawyer during his detention and there were no hearings – the verdict took place in a closed-door military compound in Yangon’s notorious Insein Prison, according to the media outlet.

The Committee to Protect Journalists said it was the longest known prison sentence given to a journalist since the February 2021 coup.

“Myanmar authorities’ grotesque 20-year sentencing of Myanmar Now journalist Sai Zaw Thaike on blatantly bogus charges is an outrage and should be immediately reversed,” Shawn Crispin, CPJ’s senior Southeast Asia representative said in a statement.

“Myanmar’s junta must stop imprisoning members of the press for merely doing their jobs as reporters.”

According to data from the Detained Journalist Group, more than 150 journalists have been arrested, and four media workers have lost their lives since the coup, Myanmar Now reported.

Meanwhile, Myanmar’s highest profile prisoner Aung San Suu Kyi remains locked up and facing the prospect of decades without liberty, amid reports her health is ailing.

Reuters reported that a request for an outside physician to see the ousted state counselor was denied by the junta, citing a source familiar with the matter and the shadow government.

Deputy spokesperson for the UN secretary general Farhan Haq on Wednesday called for Suu Kyi’s release saying, “everyone in detention should be able to have access to health care, that is a basic right.”

Leaders of the ASEAN member states met this week in Jakarta and Myanmar’s deteriorating security and humanitarian situation was high on the agenda. It’s the second consecutive year that Myanmar was not invited to the regional summit following the coup.

But the bloc has faced criticism for its failure to get Myanmar’s military leaders to stop the violence and human rights violations in the country and a five-point consensus agreed by ASEAN leaders and Myanmar junta chief Maj. Gen. Min Aung Hlaing in 2021 as a roadmap toward peace has floundered.

ASEAN leaders said they were “gravely concerned by the lack of substantial progress on its implementation” but maintained the consensus “remains as ASEAN’s main reference to address the political crisis in Myanmar,” according to the chairman’s statement.

Myanmar was supposed to hold the annual rotating ASEAN chairmanship in 2026 but regional leaders said the Philippines will take the role instead.

US Vice President Kamala Harris, who also attended the summit, said the United States will continue to press the Myanmar regime “to end the horrific violence, to release all those unjustly detained and to reestablish Myanmar’s path to inclusive democracy.”

Children are migrating through Latin America and the Caribbean in record numbers, driven by gang violence, poverty, instability and climate change, the United Nations reported Wednesday.

In the first seven months of 2023, more than 60,000 children crossed the Darien Gap, a major migration route and treacherous stretch of jungle that connects South and Central America, more than any other year on record, said the UN’s Children Fund, UNICEF.

Younger children were making these dangerous journeys at an increasing rate, UNICEF added, with those under 11 years old now accounting for up to 91% of all children moving through key transit points in the region.

“More and more children are on the move, at an increasingly young age, often alone and from diverse countries of origin, including from as far away as Africa and Asia,” said Garry Conille, director of UNICEF Latin America and the Caribbean.

“When they cross several countries and sometimes the entire region, disease and injury, family separation and abuse may plague their journeys and, even if they make it to their destination, their futures often remain at risk.”

Globally, children make up around 13 per cent of the migrant population, but they account for 25 per cent of people on the move in Latin America and the Caribbean – the highest proportion in the world.

“The unprecedented scale of the child migration crisis in Latin America and the Caribbean urgently requires a stronger humanitarian response as well as the expansion of safe and regular migration pathways for children and families to help protect their rights and their futures, no matter where they are from,” Conille said.

“Even if children make it to their destination, their futures often remain at risk.”

The trek across the Darién Gap, a stretch of remote, roadless, mountainous rainforest connecting South and Central America, is one of the most popular and perilous walks on earth.

The 66-mile (106-kilometer) hike brings migrants from Colombia to Panama and is a crucial passage for those hoping to reach the United States and Canada.

Almost 250,000 people made the crossing in 2022, fueled by economic and humanitarian disasters – nearly double the figures from the year before, and 20 times the annual average from 2010 to 2020.

The unprecedented movement of people in the Western Hemisphere has placed immense pressure on the Biden administration, which – despite rolling out a series of measures to stem migration – is still facing potentially thousands more people arriving at the US southern border this fall, placing a politically delicate issue at the forefront on the cusp of a presidential election.

Already, border officials are seeing an increasing number of daily encounters at the border compared to earlier this summer. In July, the number of families apprehended at the border – one of the most vulnerable populations – nearly doubled compared to June, raising concerns within the Biden administration.

Mary Achieng’s family is in the malaria ward at Nightingale Hospital in western Kenya almost every month. On this visit in late August, she’s being treated along with her two sons, aged 4 and 12. All three are recovering from a disease that has long devastated their region.

Achieng lives in Kisumu, Kenya, a hot and humid lakeside region where conditions are ideal for malaria-transmitting mosquitoes. She’s one of 14 million Kenyans who live in areas where malaria is endemic and who struggle with the burden of a disease which kills an estimated 10,000 people in the country each year.

Now there are fears that the malaria is spreading to new communities in the country – and just at a time when the development of the world’s first mosquito vaccine is raising hopes the deadly disease could one day be eradicated.

The reason: climate change.

A breeding ground for mosquitoes

Mosquitoes thrive in warm and humid conditions and the human-caused climate crisis is fueling more frequent and severe heat waves as well as storms that leave behind pools of water where the insects love to breed.

In Kenya, as elsewhere in Africa, it means malaria-transmitting mosquitoes are threatening communities where outbreaks have previously been rare.

Scientists from Kenya Medical Research Institute (KEMRI) are investigating reports of malaria cases in people who had not recently traveled out of areas previously considered “malaria-free.”

This includes places like the Kikuyu highlands, on the outskirts of the capital Nairobi, where scientists found malaria-transmitting mosquitoes for the first time. A significant increase in temperatures in the area – about 1.3 degrees Celsius over the last 60 years- could be a driving factor, they said in a recent report.

Steve Ngugi, a 45-year-old Kikuyu resident, was shocked to learn he had tested positive for malaria in February despite not having traveled to a malaria zone. It was the first time in his life that he contracted the disease. With little or no immunity, malaria left him extremely sick, weak, and fearing for his life for three months.

It is a problem that affects many countries in Africa, which shoulders 95% of malaria infections, killing more than 600,000 people annually – most of them children.

A recent report found that malaria-transmitting mosquitoes have reached new heights in sub-Saharan Africa, on average climbing 21 feet in elevation every year over the last 120 years. It’s a pace that follows climate change, according to the report authors.

“Where cooler places now are becoming warmer, we are seeing increased malaria rate in those areas because of mosquito multiplication,” said Richard Munang, climate change program coordinator for the UN’s environmental agency.

Experts warn other continents are at risk too, as the climate crisis accelerates.

“What is happening in Africa will gradually see itself elsewhere, because with a warming climate, with the changing temperatures, malaria mosquitoes are migrating to other areas that are conducive for them,” said Munang. As the insects move to different territories, people will be displaced, he said.

There is good news when it comes to combating malaria. Scientists and health experts have made strides in tackling the disease over the last two decades using a wide range of preventative measures.

In Kenya, increased distribution of insecticide-treated bednets, preventative doses of antimalarial drugs, and nation-wide awareness campaigns have contributed to a dramatic decrease in malaria.

Now with the introduction of the world’s first malaria vaccine, hailed as a breakthrough, there is talk of one day reaching eradication.

Around 1.7 million children in Kenya, Ghana, and Malawi have benefited from the vaccine since its pilot roll-out in 2019, resulting in a substantial drop in severe malaria and child deaths.

So it’s a bitter irony that as Kenya celebrates hard-earned gains, new malaria species and cases are popping up in areas historically deemed low-risk.

“We were at the verge of bringing cases to minimum, to non-detectable levels,” said Damaris Matoke-Muhia, principal research scientist at the KEMRI’s Malaria Lab.

If global temperatures keep rising, Matoke-Muhia said, “it’s likely that our story will change about malaria.”

“If this continues like this” she added, “we have to go back to the drawing board, start thinking of novel interventions.”