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Довідкове значення курсу гривні до долара встановлене на рівні 26 гривень 64 копійок.

28 травня курс долара вперше з кінця квітня сягнув 27 гривень. Після цього його вартість стабільно знижувалася.
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Turkish police on Monday detained two journalists for questioning as part of an investigation into alleged “political and military espionage,” the state-run Anadolu Agency said.The two journalists — Ismail Dukel, the Ankara representative of TELE1 television channel, and Muyesser Yildiz of the OdaTV news website — were being questioned by anti-terrorism police, the agency reported.OdaTV said Yildiz, who has reported on military issues, was detained following a raid on her home. Police searched her house and confiscated electronic material, the website reported.Last month, authorities charged seven journalists — including two OdaTV editors and a reporter — with violating laws governing the intelligence agency, for stories on the death of an intelligence officer who was reportedly killed in Libya. The journalists will go on trial later this month.The New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists ranks Turkey among the top jailers of journalists worldwide, alongside China and Saudi Arabia.As many as 85 journalists and other media workers are currently in jail under Turkey’s broad anti-terrorism laws, according to the Turkish Journalists Syndicate, including many who were detained in a crackdown following a 2016 coup attempt.Turkey maintains that the journalists are prosecuted for criminal acts and not for their journalistic work.Separately, prosecutors issued warrants to detain 149 people — most of them former police officers — for alleged links to a network led by U.S.-based Muslim cleric, Fethullah Gulen.Anadolu Agency said 74 people, including six former police chiefs, were being sought by prosecutors in the western province of Balikesir, 42 were sought be authorities in northwestern Bursa province while 33 of the suspects were detained in Gaziantep, near the border with Syria.Turkey blames Gulen’s network for the failed 2016 coup. About 77,000 people have been arrested and around 130,000 others, including military personnel, have been dismissed from state jobs in the ongoing crackdown on Gulen’s network.Gulen, who has been in self-imposed exile in the U.S. since 1999, denies involvement in the coup attempt, which killed about 250 people and injured around 2,000 others.
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In the two weeks since George Floyd’s killing, police departments have banned chokeholds, Confederate monuments have fallen and officers have been arrested and charged amid large global protests against violence by police and racism.The moves are far short of the overhaul of police, prosecutors’ offices, courts and other institutions that protesters seek. But some advocates and demonstrators say they are encouraged by the swiftness of the response to Floyd’s death — incremental as it may be.”Everywhere you look, you see something that gives you hope,” said Frank James Matthews, 64, an activist in Alabama. “But we have no illusions because something that’s embedded like racism is hard to kill.”Matthews spent years pushing for the removal of a Confederate monument in Birmingham near the site where four black girls died in a racist church bombing in 1963. The city took down the obelisk last week after protesters tried to remove it themselves during one of the many nationwide demonstrations over Floyd’s killing by police in Minneapolis.At a memorial for Floyd on Monday in Houston, Bracy Burnett said it was hard to tell if the changes that have taken place since Floyd’s death will last.”It’s a start, but you can’t expect an oppression of 400 years to be eliminated in a few months, a few years,” Burnett, 66, said.Tancey Houston Rogers, 49, said she’s seen more progress in addressing racism and police brutality in the last two weeks than she’s seen in the past.”Now, we’ve got to take it forward,” she said.Floyd died May 25 after a white Minneapolis police officer pressed his knee into Floyd’s neck for several minutes even after Floyd stopped responding. Prosecutors have charged that officer, Derek Chauvin, with second-degree murder. Three other officers at the scene were charged with aiding and abetting.Minneapolis has since banned chokeholds, and a majority of the City Council has vowed to dismantle the city’s 800-member police agency. Police in Denver  have also banned the use of chokeholds and required officers who intentionally point their gun at someone to notify a supervisor and file a report.Police officers have also faced charges for violent conduct during protests.Savano Wilkerson said he worries about a backslide on reform if national attention shifts away from Floyd’s case. He’s also concerned about convictions against the officers charged in Floyd’s death.”It’s not really a win yet because they could easily get off,” the 22-year-old resident of West Palm Beach, Florida, said during a phone interview on Monday.The recent protests are the country’s most significant demonstrations in a half-century — rivaling those during the civil rights and Vietnam War eras.During the push for civil rights in the 1960s, activists also won some quick concessions from authorities, said Ashley Howard, an assistant professor of history and African American studies at the University of Iowa.”If you want to take the cynical view, cities want to get back to business as usual,” she said. “They don’t want property defaced. They don’t want to be on the front page of the newspaper.”But Howard said she sees perseverance and a long-term vision for a “radical alternative” among the marchers and is hopeful for more substantive changes.Civil rights icons Xernona Clayton and Andrew Young also predicted a broader impact from the protests.”There’s going to be a new consensus emerging about how to maintain law and order in a civilized society,” said Young, a confidant of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. who went on to become a congressman, United Nations ambassador and Atlanta mayor.Young said organizing protests during the civil rights era was harder, so that delayed some of the movement’s victories.Clayton said another difference was how receptive people in power were to demonstrators.”They’re at least talking about making the change and wanting to make the change,” said Clayton, who served as King’s office manager in Atlanta and organized protest marches and fundraisers. “The people who have been the perpetrators — as I call them — are talking differently.” 
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School children in South Africa are returning to class amid the COVID-19 outbreak that has closed schools for several weeks.  The first group of students, 7th and 12th graders, returned to class Monday as part of a gradual loosening of coronavirus restrictions. The restart of the school year was delayed after the teacher’s union attempted to create a work stoppage, telling teachers the school system was not equipped with sufficient masks and gloves. The parent of one 7th grader, speaking to a reporter said, “How can we be safe when teachers are not even sure that they are safe, do you understand. We take our children to those schools knowing that the teachers are not safe.”The temperature of a grade 7 pupil is taken as she returns to the Meldene Primary School in Johannesburg Monday, June 8, 2020.Although school staff checked the temperature of children entering schools and masks and gloves were handed out, some parents were not sure the schools were ready. South Africa Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga said no school will resume if not ready. She also said the school system will make alternative arrangements for schools unable to reopen.  The schools are reopening, with South Africa confirming more than 50,000 COVID-19 cases and just over 1,000 deaths. 
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The Democratic candidates vying to take on Republican Sen. David Perdue of Georgia in November face off in a primary election Tuesday after weeks of delay caused by the coronavirus pandemic. But the state’s chief election officer has warned that voters could face long lines and results may be slow to be reported, as poll closures and virus restrictions complicate in-person voting and counties work to process a huge increase in paper ballots received by mail. Top Democrats in the Senate primary include former congressional candidate Jon Ossoff, former Columbus Mayor Teresa Tomlinson and former candidate for lieutenant governor Sarah Riggs Amico. Perdue, a close ally of President Donald Trump, is seeking a second term in November as Republicans look to hold the White House and Senate majority. He drew no GOP primary opposition. The race has proven to be anything but predictable, with election day postponed and campaigns forced almost entirely online because of the coronavirus and the final days seeing widespread protests and civil unrest following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. Criticism of the Trump administration’s response on both fronts has added fuel to Democrats’ ambitions of winning in Georgia, where Republicans still dominate statewide elections, but Democrats are increasingly making gains. If no candidate receives more than 50% of votes, the top two finishers will advance to an Aug. 11 primary runoff. Other Democrats in the race include former ACLU of Georgia head Maya Dillard Smith, Air Force veteran James Knox and another hopeful, Marckeith DeJesus.Courtney Parker votes on a new voting machine, Tuesday, Nov. 5, 2019, in Dallas, Ga.Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger said Monday that voters should expect to face longer lines. He also said his office won’t begin to release partial results until “the last precinct has closed” and predicted that the winners may not be known for days thereafter. “To get a good concept of where we are with the election — who won, who lost, or who’s in the runoff, things like that — I would think that could take upward of a couple days in some of these really tightly contested elections,” Raffensperger said. Voters will also select party nominees for U.S. House races and for state House and Senate. Other state and local races are on the ballot as well. Ossoff entered the Senate race in September with the endorsement of civil rights icon Rep. John Lewis, as well as some built-in name recognition from his highly publicized 2017 special election loss to Republican Karen Handel for an Atlanta-area U.S. House seat. The young media executive has led in fundraising and has made fighting inequality and corruption a core part of his message. Tomlinson, who was the first woman elected mayor of Columbus in 2010, has racked up a slate of endorsements of her own, including civil rights leader and former Atlanta Mayor Andrew Young. She touts her experience in office, saying she’s “the only one in this race who has ever won an election and governed,” and says that experience can help her cut through dysfunction in Washington. Amico previously served as an executive in her family’s car-hauling company. Best known for her 2018 run for lieutenant governor, which she lost to Republican Geoff Duncan, she often discusses the experience of helping to steer the company through bankruptcy, noting that executives fought to preserve jobs. Amico’s campaign has locked down the endorsement of several labor unions with a strongly pro-union pitch. More than 1.2 million Georgians have already voted early, Raffensperger said Monday. A majority of those ballots were cast absentee by mail after the Republican elections chief sent absentee ballot applications to 6.9 million active registered voters, hoping to ease pressure on in-person poll operations. Georgia postponed primary elections twice because of the pandemic. The state’s March 24 presidential primaries were first moved to May 19, when voters were set to choose party nominees for other 2020 races. As coronavirus infections and deaths mounted, election day was pushed back again to Tuesday. 
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Міжнародний валютний фонд 9 червня розгляне нову кредитну програму для України – про це свідчить календар засідань ради директорів МВФ.

Як йдеться у плані роботи ради МВФ, на засіданні у вівторок ухвалюватиметься рішення щодо нової програми stand-by для України й оцінки виконання попередньої програми від 2015 року.

Влада України і менеджмент МВФ у грудні 2019 року попередньо домовилися про відкриття нової трирічної програми EFF на 5,5 мільярда доларів.

Але 7 травня речник МВФ Джеррі Райс повідомив, що фокус переговорів між Україною і Міжнародним валютним фондом змістився з трирічної програми співпраці EFF на 18-місячну програму stand-by.

Він вказав на «безпрецедентну невизначеність щодо економічних і фінансових перспектив і необхідність зосередити політичні пріоритети на короткостроковому стримуванні та стабілізації».

22 травня стало відомо, що Міжнародний валютний фонд (МВФ) домовився із владою України на рівні персоналу про нову угоду на суму 5 мільярдів доларів, щоб допомогти Києву впоратися з економічними наслідками від пандемії коронавірусу.

 
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With Nigerian businesses struggling because of coronavirus lockdown measures, the use of mobile money and “no touch”, cashless transactions in business is growing rapidly.  The use of mobile money grew by almost 15 percent in March, and experts say the practice is expected to become even more common as the pandemic continues.  “Cashless Payments Only” is an inscription at the entrance of Washme laundry in Nigeria’s capital, Abuja.    Laundry manager Paul Godiya says it’s a recent measure to limit physical contact with cash to prevent the spread of COVID-19.  “There are different people that come here from different places and money is generally accepted which is coming from different people and is circulating from different angles. It may be that Mr. A has this disease or Mr. B has this disease. So, in the process of circulating it may get to me and affect me,” Godiya said.  With more businesses like this Abuja laundry switching to payment technology to ensure health and safety during the coronavirus pandemic, the mobile money industry is experiencing significant growth.   Analysis by the Nigeria Interbank Settlement Scheme (NIBSS) shows mobile money transactions went up by 14.5 percent between February and March – a period when the virus was first reported in Nigeria. Mobile money agents like Isaac Odah, whose business has been booming say the trend has continued to increase since the pandemic. “We are rendering essential services, so our services are not something you can do without because people transact, people pay for one or two things every day, and will need money to carry out such transactions. That’s why our services are booming during this pandemic,” Odah said.As Africa’s largest nation, Nigeria is a huge market for mobile money and financial technology operators. But for many years restrictive government regulatory policies limited investment in this sector.   In 2018, Nigeria’s Central Bank relaxed the restrictions, with the aim of having 80 percent of Nigerian adults use mobile money by 2020. Last December, it issued license to fifteen mobile money operators. Financial technology expert, Raphael Inusa, says the pandemic could fast track this goal.  “There has been a steady growth or increase in the fintech sector. And even way before the coronavirus hit Nigeria, the fintech sector had attracted a lot of foreign investments, from VISA investing in Interswitch, to Flutter wave to several other fintech companies. But the coronavirus pandemic has accelerated a whole lot, we now have increased transactions online,” Inusa said.Apart from favorable government policies, the expansion of Nigeria’s internet penetration by about 20 percent in the last two years is also enabling the mobile money industry to thrive in the West African nation.   
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In the states of Texas and North Carolina hundreds gathered to say their final goodbyes to George Floyd a man who died after being in police custody in the state of Minnesota. While in Washington, D.C., House Speaker Nancy Pelosi introduced sweeping legislation to combat police violence and racial injustice. VOA correspondent Mariama Diallo reports.
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‘Black Lives Matter’ protestors took to the streets of European cities again at the weekend in solidarity with demonstrations in the United States, which were triggered by the death of 46-year-old black man George Floyd two weeks ago in Minneapolis. The protestors in Britain, and in other European cities, have tapped into deep-rooted anger over a perceived lack of understanding of their countries’ colonial histories, as Henry Ridgwell reports from London.Camera: Henry Ridgwell  Produced by: Jason Godman
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New York City began a gradual restart of its economy Monday, three months after shutting down all but the most essential businesses in order to contain the coronavirus pandemic. “This is a powerful day,” Mayor Bill de Blasio said at an outdoor news conference at the Brooklyn Navy Yard marking the launch of Phase One of the city’s restart. “Day 100 of the coronavirus crisis and it is the day we start to liberate ourselves from this disease.” He said he expects between 200,000 and 400,000 workers will start returning to their workplaces in the construction, manufacturing, wholesale supply and non-essential retail sectors. Shoppers will still have to pick up their purchases curb side, on-site shopping is not slated to return until the second phase of the four-stage reopening in approximately two weeks. Local hospitals have also been given the go ahead to resume elective surgeries.  Multani Singh, owner of J&M sneakers, talks about keeping his business alive during nearly three months of shutdown, June 8, 2020, in the Sunset Park neighborhood of the Brooklyn borough of New York.The city of 8.6 million has been one of the hardest hit anywhere in the world. There have been more than 200,000 confirmed cases of COVID-19, the disease caused by the virus, and nearly 22,000 deaths attributed to it.  “We have been the epicenter of this crisis, this is the place where it was going to be the hardest to make a comeback, and yet, New York City is so strong and resilient we are making that comeback,” de Blasio said.  He urged residents not to forget lessons learned, including the need for face coverings and social distancing.  Indicators the city uses to gauge the rate of transmission are all dramatically down, but the health commissioner cautioned that the virus is still in what she characterized as a “moderate” transmission phase.  Most New Yorkers rely on public transportation to get to and from work and many are still jittery about taking the subway. Pre-pandemic 5.5 million people rode the subway in often overcrowded cars each day, making it an ideal super spreader of the virus. The transit system has remained open for essential workers with scaled-back service throughout the pandemic, but saw ridership plummet nearly 90% and the transit agency has sought billions of dollars in federal aid.  New York Governor Andrew Cuomo took a ride on the subway Monday to raise rider confidence. He wore the mandatory face covering.  If it wasn’t safe, I wouldn’t ask anyone to go on the subway.
Remember: If you’re riding, you MUST wear a mask. It’s mandatory & shows respect for fellow riders. pic.twitter.com/IH0Ue3p7Cr
— Andrew Cuomo (@NYGovCuomo) Dominique Simonneaux, owner of Les Petits Chapelais, works to fulfill online orders at her store in the Soho neighborhood of New York, June 8, 2020.In Manhattan, major retailers including Macy’s at Herald Square and Saks Fifth Avenue did not reopen on Monday.  Construction was also allowed to resume and trucks and workers in hard hats appeared busy at several local work sites.  There will be at least two weeks between phases as the city aims to reopen a wider range of businesses in the next phase, including financial and real estate companies. In the third phase, the hospitality sector will return to full service —restaurants will be allowed to have indoor diners, and hotels, which are considered essential and have remained open, will be able to expand their services. In the final phase, schools, museums and entertainment are expected to reopen. But the smooth progression of the four phases is contingent on the virus indicators remaining at or below acceptable levels. 
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On Healthy Living this week, a look at how some African countries such as Côte d’Ivoire are trying to get back to normal life after easing Coronavirus lockdowns. Amanda McClelland, Senior Vice President of Prevent Epidemics and Resolve to Save Lives at Vital Strategies, gives her take on the best time for countries to reopen. In “tips and advice,” California dentist Dr. Nammy Patel shares how to deal with bad breath when wearing a mask. These topics and more on the show this week. S1, Ep48
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Kenya’s chief justice has accused President Uhuru Kenyatta of disregarding court orders, failing to approve the appointment of new judges, and threatening the constitution.Speaking to reporters Monday, Chief Justice David Maraga called on the president to appoint some judges forwarded by the judicial service commission. “The constitution does not donate any mandate to the president to perform any other act upon [receiving] the names recommended by the JSC except to appoint them,” he said. The names of the 41 judges were forwarded to Kenyatta for appointment in mid-2019. FILE – Kenya’s President Uhuru Kenyatta speaks at Nyayo Stadium in the capital Nairobi, Feb. 11, 2020.Through the attorney general, Kenyatta questioned the integrity of some judges, but twice, the court ruled in their favor. 
 
Maraga said the delay in approving and swearing in the jurists has made work difficult for the courts. 
 
“If you file a land case in the environment and land court (ELC) at Milimani court Nairobi today, the earliest your case will be heard is in 2022. This is because we have a total of 31 ELC judges in the country against the case backlog of 16,457 as of 31st March this year,” he said. “The situation is probably worse at the court of appeal, which has 15 judges serving the whole republic.” When contacted, the president’s office said it did not wish to comment on the judiciary’s accusations. Bob Mkangi, one of the authors of the 2010 constitution, said the executive branch was “endeavoring to claw back some of the powers that were taken away by the 2010 constitution.” Having an independent judiciary was one of the ways to end Kenya’s cycle of political violence, according to some analysts. 
 
“Right now, the judiciary reads mischief in the entire procedure because there is already a Supreme Court judge who has retired from service, there are two judges who are coming up for retirement, as well as the chief justice himself,” said Joy Mdivo, a political commentator. “This is significant because it’s the Supreme Court that determines if there is a dispute in the presidential election, and so repopulating the Supreme Court is critical not just for the justice system, but clearly it’s critical for in the political arena.” In the 2017 presidential election, the Supreme Court, led by Maraga, nullified the vote for failing to meet the threshold for a credible election, a decision that has angered the ruling Jubilee party. Kenyatta won a new term in a rerun of the election. 
 
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