the family fishing boat and the Albufera rice fields Valls recalls a “productive” childhood: at ten he helped his grandparents stuff sausages and by twenty he was cooking for the local scout troop At seventeen he first enrolled in front‑of‑house studies gaining a complete grasp of restaurant dynamics In 2011 he joined the Quique Dacosta group to open Vuelve Carolina; seven years later Dacosta handed him the keys of El Poblet With his team he created menus where marinated rabbit eels baked inside giant citrons and “allipebrat” rice with preserved lemons earned the second Michelin star in 2019 and two Repsol “Soles” territory and season”: dishes are born from explorations of dunes then refined in the lab with peanut ferments or long cures in bomba rice Citrus fruits from the Fundación Todolí Citrus form the backbone of the menu; Valls uses them in sauces convinced that “every acid tells a micro‑climate.” Attention to place also shapes the brigade made up of young cooks trained in‑house and encouraged to explore the Valencian countryside to understand raw‑material value In 2023 he received the Premio a la Trayectoria Profesional and was named Cocinero del Año by 7Caníbales honours that highlight his role as an ambassador of the Mediterranean coast Valls describes his cooking as “rich in flavour and memory” capable of evoking in the same bite childhood memories of homemade sausages and contemporary insights into textures and neutral smokes—a project that continues Dacosta’s vision while moving with creative autonomy inside one of Valencia’s most celebrated restaurants Do you want to discover the latest news and recipes of the most renowned chefs and restaurants in the world La nostra società utilizza inoltre cookie funzionali per registrare informazioni sulle scelte dell’utente e per consentire una personalizzazione del Sito; ad esempio Questi cookie possono essere installati dalla nostra società o da Terze parti In caso di disabilitazione di questi cookie la qualità e l’esperienza di navigazione potrebbe non essere soddisfacente Questi cookie sono installati da social media per consentire la condivisione dei contenuti del presente Sito Essi sono in grado di monitorare la navigazione compiuta anche in altri siti e creano un profilo dell’utente sulla base dei suoi interessi Ciò potrebbe avere un impatto sul contenuto e messaggi visualizzati sugli altri siti visitati non sarà possibile utilizzare o visualizzare questi strumenti di condivisione per l’installazione e l’uso di tali cookie occorre il consenso dell’utente Per maggiori informazioni consulta la pagna cookies policy Home 10 Questions with incoming Faculty Senate President Andrew Valls professor of political science in the School of Public Policy especially theories of justice and democracy race and ethnicity and environmental political theory What makes you passionate about higher education I find the process of discovering new ideas and generating insights to be exhilarating No single theory or perspective ever captures all of our data or intuitions and I love living with the discomfort and tension that this creates But I’m also passionate about the role of higher education in a democratic society and its capacity to promote equality of opportunity whose mission is to make higher education available to all What originally brought you to Oregon State and how long have you been here I came to Oregon State from Morehouse College in 2003 so I guess that means I’ve been here for over 20 years were decisive for me both personally and professionally but I wanted to be at an institution where I could do more research What is the most rewarding aspect of being a part of the OSU Faculty Senate I think it would be the opportunity to help solve problems you get to work with lots of terrific people both in the administration and faculty colleagues The university exists in a very dynamic environment We often find that something that used to work well doesn’t anymore or that a change in one practice has unintended consequences that then lead to a need for further changes I love being in the room with all of the stakeholders and decisionmakers represented What advice would you give the younger version of yourself who was just starting college How does the work of the Faculty Senate impact the broader OSU community?  The Faculty Senate is responsible for the curriculum for all the academic regulations and much else It is the main conduit of communication between the university faculty and the administration The administration keeps the faculty informed about what it is doing through the Faculty Senate and faculty members can question administrators at its meetings and express their views As a shared governance partner with the administration the Faculty Senate ensures that the faculty has a say in all important matters affecting the university How does your work as a professor of political science tie in with your work on the senate?  Among the things that political scientists study are processes and institutions and outcomes are more legitimate — and more likely to be equitable — if processes are fair While I certainly have my own views on many matters that come before the senate I see my main role as president as ensuring that all views are heard and that our processes are fair and transparent I received a terrific education at the University of Wisconsin I took many courses in philosophy and political science from giants in their respective fields then I think I would have to say it was the two-semester sequence that I took on constitutional law It convinced me to add political science as a second major which in turn led me to apply to political science graduate programs How do external shifts in the higher education landscape and we are subject to its laws and budgetary decisions as well as to federal law and federally authorized accrediting agencies policies and practices at OSU often follow national trends in higher education and all of this affects the Faculty Senate which will replace the Bacc Core starting next year but it also reflects national concerns about the relevance of higher education for career preparedness In bolstering the requirements for Difference it also takes a stand on a set of issues that have become highly politicized the work of the Faculty Senate both reflects and engages national trends and debates What are some of the biggest challenges you see facing the senate in the coming year  The successful rollout of the new Core Ed curriculum is the first thing that comes to mind Many of our colleagues across campus are working tirelessly to ensure that students entering in the fall will have a robust set of courses that they can take to satisfy the new set of requirements The Faculty Senate is currently operating under the same set of bylaws that have governed it since 1964 I think we need to take a fresh look at how the Faculty Senate functions but I would very much like to work with other partners and stakeholders to make some progress on reform of the senate to make it more efficient and effective What is your favorite non-academic pursuit or passion  My main hobbies are cycling and photography I am not particularly good at either of them [email protected] has hosted its annual massive calçot festival Visitors were able to taste an authentic calçotada for just €15 per ticket Valls welcomed over 30,000 attendees to its Gran Calçotada throughout the weekend with around 3,600 portions dished out The town hopes to maintain these figures in the future according to the Chamber of Commerce president "We would like to think that we do not have to get bigger This year, farmers expect to surpass 18 million calçots harvested One of the highlights of the day was the calçot eating contest with 19 men and one woman attempting to eat the most calçots in 45 minutes Barcelona's Adrià Wegrzyn was crowned the winner after eating 195 calçots weighing 3.275 kilograms which he said he would celebrate with a grilled meat lunch Wegrzyn has won the competition on 13 previous occasions He holds the record for successfully devouring 5.8 kg of onions in 45 minutes Current regulations prevent the winner from taking part the following year so Wegrzyn will have to wait until at least 2027 to add to his titles The champion calçot-eater said he hopes his children will be the ones to dethrone him in the future by holding the green leaves in the center and peeling off the sooty outermost layer are usually provided in restaurants and sometimes gloves are too One of the most important aspects of calçots is the ritual of eating them These barbecued onions served on terracotta tiles are not commonly eaten at home but more so as the centerpiece of events known as calçotades popular social gatherings with friends and family that usually take place from January to March Listen to this episode of our podcast Filling the Sink on Catalonia's onion craze to learn more about calçots. Get the day's biggest stories right to your phone You don't have permission to access the page you requested What is this page?The website you are visiting is protected.For security reasons this page cannot be displayed Please enable JS and disable any ad blocker A 16-year-old girl was reported missing to the Montgomery County Sheriff's Office on March 27th the Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office after she was last seen around 10 a.m that day leaving the Amsterdam High School It was reported that she voluntarily left the school with an adult male acquaintance The Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office reportedly began an investigation to quickly locate both the missing female juvenile and Antonio Valls The Sheriff’s Office and the Sheriff’s Office Criminal Investigations Unit tracked numerous leads and tips into their whereabouts the Sheriff’s Office was notified both parties were in the area of New Milford The female juvenile was safely brought to the Pennsylvania State Police Gibson Barracks and reunited the girl with her legal guardians was taken into custody and charged with one count of Endangering the Welfare of a Child He was arraigned in the Amsterdam Town Court and released pending a later court date The investigation is still on-going with the possibility of more charges The Sheriff’s Office was assisted by the New York State Police and the New York State Missing Persons Clearinghouse talks about the French Pacific territory's political future were progressing slowly between visiting French Minister for Overseas Manuel Valls and all sides of the political spectrum Valls arrived in New Caledonia on Tuesday 29 April 2025 in another bid to pursue and possibly finalise talks about New Caledonia's political future and status a fresh meeting behind closed doors was locally labelled as the first step into negotiations while previous rounds were considered as mere "discussions" which again took place at the French High commission in Nouméa was short-lived: it was suspended after less than two hours and the meeting was adjourned until next week the aborted plenary was switched back to a "bilateral" session with pro-independence parties The suspension was reported as due to fresh "tensions" among political stakeholders some political parties arguing at one stage that they did not have their followers' mandate to further commit During future sessions scheduled to re-start Monday next week Valls was still planning to submit a document that is described as France's proposal on New Caledonia's future political status This includes New Caledonia's future relationship with France its citizenship and the transfer of remaining key powers (defence who is visiting New Caledonia for the third time since February 2025 said he would stay in New Caledonia "as long as necessary" for an inclusive and comprehensive agreement to be reached his stay in the French Pacific archipelago could extend as far as 8 May 2025 with another three full days of plenary meetings planned (Monday 5 to Wednesday 7 May 2025) Valls also likened the current situation as "walking on a tightrope above embers." "The choice is between an agreement and chaos," he told local media local parties are said to be more vigilant than ever They have all stated earlier that bearing in mind their respective demands they were "not ready to sign at all costs." Amid strong opposition and polarisation between pro-independence parties and those who want New Caledonia to remain part of France the talks aim to reach an agreement that would define New Caledonia's political and institutional future Friday's short session of political talks was also the last one to be attended by outgoing French High Commissioner Louis Le Franc who is leaving the French Pacific after over two years of office He was the guest of honour to a function on Friday night Le Franc's tenure was marked by the insurrectional riots that started on May 13 And depending on the political camps in New Caledonia he is regarded in radically different ways His management of the civil unrest was often criticised by pro-independence components who said he had taken excessive measures (such as the curfew the ban on sale and transportation of firearms and ammunition) They had consistently demanded that Le Franc leaves some going as far as stressing he had "saved lives" through his security-focused approach A ban on public demonstrations for the Greater Nouméa area was lifted only recently And a new ban on the consumption of alcohol has been reintroduced for May 2025 a precaution ahead of the first anniversary of the 13 May 2024 riots in an interview with public broadcaster NC la 1ère that a special security set-up was "already in place" for the riots' first anniversary riot squads and 20 Gendarmerie squads (about fifteen hundred personnel) Le Franc's new posting is Prefect of the department of Finistère in North-west mainland France "I did what I had to do" (...) "Very frankly I sincerely believe we have averted a civil war" Le Franc told pro-France Radio Rythme Bleu on 18 April 2025 He said he would certainly come back to New Caledonia as his daughter is married there has extensive military experience and is expected to arrive in Nouméa on Saturday morning During a visit in New Caledonia on Thursday New Zealand's deputy Prime Minister and head of diplomacy Winston Peters met French Minister Valls to cover a wide range of pressing issues labelled "constructive and positive," also included the new President of New Caledonia Peters said he came to New Caledonia "to listen and learn and to demonstrate New Zealand's support for the continuation of dialogue on New Caledonia's institutional future which include all tendencies of New Caledonia's parties "send a positive signal to the Pacific region about the good faith efforts underway to return peace and stability to New Caledonia," Peters says New Zealand has consistently said that no matter your position on New Caledonia's institutional future violence is not the answer - and progress can only be made through careful just like France and all our Pacific partners Peters also met New Zealand Defence Force personnel taking part in the French-hosted military exercise "Croix du Sud" (Southern Cross) 2025 which took place during the second half of April 2025 With a strong focus on humanitarian deployments and disaster relief is hosted by the French Armed Forces in New Caledonia (FANC) It focuses on humanitarian assistance and emergency response with a strong emphasis on the notion of "inter-operability" between all participating forces up to two thousand military personnel and NGOs from 19 countries were taking part in the manoeuvres the aftermath of a devastating cyclone on Wallis Island (near Fiji) and the deployment of air The deployment also included a "special effects" unit (including stocks of fake blood) for volunteers playing the role of affected civilians Minister Valls was to attend the official closing ceremony of "Southern Cross 2025" at the weekend in Nouméa still along the lines of regional security Valls and Peters reaffirmed their "long-standing partnership" on Pacific security issues "We have a shared interest in ensuring that the Pacific Islands region is protected from efforts by external influences to undermine good governance and democratic decision making," Peters said He elaborated in referring to "foreign interference in the Pacific." Since the insurrectional riots erupted on May 13 2024 causing 14 dead and some 2.2 billion Euros in damages France claims that some foreign countries had interfered Based on an investigation conducted late 2024 by French digital watch government agency VigiNum the name of Azerbaijan has been appearing consistently and repeatedly Peters was escorted by New Zealand's Consul General in Nouméa as well as the Wellington-based French Ambassador Laurence Beau and Nouméa-based French Ambassador for the Pacific "France and New Zealand are like-minded countries it's really about how New Zealand can support the French State's commitment in favour of condemning all violence in New Caledonia and supporting dialogue to reach a solution" had to be postponed due to the volatile situation at the time a delegation of Pacific Islands Forum leaders also visited as part of a fact-finding mission in October 2024 The "Troika Plus" Forum mission is expected to present its report on New Caledonia at the next Pacific Islands Forum leaders' summit in Honiara The Deputy Prime Minsiter said the goal was to listen and learn and to demonstrate NZ's support for the continuation of dialogue on New Caledonia's institutional future who is visiting New Caledonia for the third time in two months has again called all sides to live up to their responsibilities Less than a month after his previous visit Manuel Valls intends to further talks on the French Pacific territory's political future UN Human Rights Committee challenges France on security operations and its attitude to decolonisation The New Caledonia Congress President has doubled down on Kanaks' aspirations to seek self-determination and lambasted France for "demeaning" Pacific leaders' mission Pacific RSS Follow RNZ News Sandra Valls studied musical theater with the hopes of performing on Broadway Her debut in 'Real Women Have Curves' brings that dream to life The history of Spanish banking cannot be understood without Luis Valls-Taberner (1926-2006) executive vice-president of Banco Popular since 1957 The banker left an extensive legacy of social action and thousands of people supported by the foundations he promoted Luis Valls-Taberner Arnó, born in Barcelona into a family of family of the Catalan bourgeoisie he was the fifth of six brothers and was six years older than the youngest who would be co-president of Popular with him for years Luis Valls' parents were deep believers, and he studied at the Jesuits, Marists and La Salle Brothers, and then Law at the University of Barcelona. He earned his doctorate and taught at the universities of Barcelona and Madrid. In his early twenties, the young Valls discovered his vocation to Opus Dei and asked for admission as a numerary.  "This way of taking his faith to the ultimate consequences of a vital commitment made him an absolutely atypical banker in his time freedom-loving and with a humanist spirit" Valls helped the Communist Party and Comisiones Obreras as well as religious institutions -especially many convents of nuns-: it was something constant in his social action It became famous the recurrent question that he always asked them "What do you need To learn more about Luis Valls, Omnes spoke with Francisco Aparicio (Cartagena, Murcia, 1955), a lawyer who knew and treated Luis Valls for more than 25 years, and was his executor. They worked together on many projects, and he has succeeded him in the foundations for example and in the management and vision of its social action.  president of Banco Popular for several decades Despite leading one of the most profitable financial institutions in the world Valls did not behave like a typical businessman Affectionately nicknamed "the banker with sandals" by Enrique Castro Valls combined his financial vision with a deep social vocation This nickname was no accident; his commitment to helping others was something that defined him - Luis Valls promoted the creation of several foundations with a clear objective: to help those who truly needed it always separating the actions of the bank from those of the foundations the annual fees they were entitled to receive for being directors The sum of these annual donations was the great source of the foundations the vehicle through which the social action was carried out and throughout more than 50 years of this social action acquaintances and good-hearted people donated large amounts of money as one-time These two sources of income nourished the foundations inspired by Luis Valls to help thousands of people and institutions.   He always understood that Banco Popular's purpose went far beyond just being an example of seriousness Valls wanted to go further with a vision of social banking president of one of the most important banks in the country He was a person totally detached from material things and there are many traits and behaviors that prove it He was the bank president who received the lowest salary in Spain although there is no doubt that his salary was very high his colleagues multiplied his salary by 3 or 4 compared to the Catalan banker (750,000 euros per year compared to more than 3 million euros for the leaders of the banking sector at that time).  If that were not enough, almost all his money Valls was donating during his career to help individuals and institutions. It is well known his austerity in his dress, always elegant and correct, but, it is said, he was only known for 6 suits. Many more examples are recounted in Testimonials at his web page.  All accounts were always supervised by the corresponding public body and by the governing bodies of each foundation Everything is conveniently reflected in the books and is accessible on the foundations' websites - The foundations were governed by some basic principles that are described in detail in the "Criteria for Action" a document that set out their identity and the way to proceed in their management such as the fact that they never wanted to be the only ones to support the initiative; they asked you to look for other travel companions to share the risk I was able to verify that the idea was solid.  Other examples are the insistence on "saying no early if it was not clear to you so as not to make people wait" and not publicizing the approval of a loan to avoid the "call effect" Thousands of people testify to their appreciation for the work of foundations in their lives The work of the foundations was not only to provide financial resources but also advice on the implementation of projects contacts or suppliers and other needs beyond the monetary ones they accompanied people in meeting their challenges and took a long-term interest in the progress and achievement of objectives Valls was extremely careful with the management of resources every donation or loan had to be a carefully considered and absolutely viable decision foundations specialize in topics such as art in the case of the foundations inspired by Valls the focus was on the individual and his or her specific needs It did not matter the area of activity or the personal task that each person carried out only his or her need was relevant and to know if and how he or she could be helped.  There are thousands of actions that foundations have carried out and continue to carry out in these almost 50 years One of the principles of the foundations stands out It was common to find cases in which part of the debt was forgiven in exchange for extraordinary grades It is a gesture that shows how the essence of the foundations and their founding spirit was to help the progress of people always giving the best that we all have inside he took this independence to its ultimate consequences the only one) to grant credit to the Communist Party before the 1978 elections Many other congregations benefited from the sensitivity of Luis Valls and his team of collaborators The recurring question he always asked them Although his origins and a large part of them resided in Barcelona he never lost the link with his mother and siblings The family bond also took shape in the bank was unanimously endorsed by the Board of Directors who worked with Valls for more than 20 years A competent and recognized person in the sector and for those who wanted to look for other relationships when the bank passed into the hands of Banco Santander Some people wondered why his brother Javier but what does seem clear is that the Board of Directors unanimously accepted his resignation and appointed Ángel Ron as Chairman: unanimity in a Board of Directors implies a prior consensus accepted by all a different proposal from the then recently deceased Chairman of the Board was not even discussed and this was not a matter that would have been left to chance.  who do not understand that there are people who can give their life or their time to God and to others they look behind every behavior for profit it may be difficult to imagine that the faithful of Opus Dei are as free as any other Catholic in professional there have been several situations in which two Opus Dei members have coincided on the Board of Directors or among the directors with projects that are not only different but even antagonistic: this is normal since each has his own opinions and his own ways of dealing with the problems of the company.  Some say that he was somewhat dry in his manner since grandiloquence was not his best attribute and It was not easy to know what he was thinking and some claim that he had an intimidating gaze with long silences We are in front of a multifaceted person who was much more than a great banker He was a prudent character and many emphasize that he liked to influence much more than to command Luis Valls created a different way of banking and helping society the media and tens of thousands of beneficiaries through his foundations are witnesses to this and will continue to be so in the years to come thanks to the daily work of the management team of Patronato Universitario Fundación Hispánica and Fomento de Fundaciones Subscribe to Omnes magazine and enjoy exclusive content for subscribers After an inauspicious start when he was verballed publicly by angry loyalists France’s Minister for Overseas Territories Manuel Valls succeeded in holding discussions last week in New Caledonia about future governance It was the first talks attended by all local political parties in four years A “synthesis paper” prepared by France listed options for the future put by the various sides and a basis for future discussion and a possible eventual agreement Valls’ visit got off to a bad start, even though he had carefully set the scene for peaceful discussions at a ceremony commemorating a French policeman killed during the 2024 riots protested loudly with placards and French flags about months of disruptions to physical access to their suburb loyalists and other local party leaders expressed a readiness to participate in talks The hold-out was the hardline independence coalition which since their boycott of the 2021 independence referendum would only talk with France on its own refusing to participate if loyalists attended as well But they finally agreed to participate during Valls’ visit in strict confidentiality and without comment to the media including Australia and other Pacific Islands Forum governments are unlikely to do anything other than closely monitor The resultant synthesis paper basically identifies preferred options of the main groups in key areas of future governance Although not securing agreement in any of these areas the discussions have at least identified a list of the main issues and various proposed options for tackling them Each one of these issues is controversial and sensitive and the options put are at this stage wide apart all of the proposals – ranging from the status quo through to radical change – are presented on a premise that New Caledonia remains within France as often occurred in earlier attempts to parlay As long as talks are proceeding, regional countries, including Australia and other Pacific Islands Forum governments, are unlikely to do anything other than closely monitor how the local parties and France are resolving vital questions about New Caledonia’s future and its relationship with France Maintaining the momentum of collaboration will be critical Valls is expected to return to Noumea later in the month to take the discussions further any formal agreement is likely to take some time The Interpreter features in-depth analysis & expert commentary on the latest international events, published daily by the Lowy Institute as much for its magnificent historic center as for its surroundings: the Albufera You also go back to Valencia to eat: a paella quite different from the ones we are used to To be sure to find it at its best and in a strict traditional interpretation where Sara Martín and her boys prepare it in the only restaurant in the center with a wood-fired paellero perhaps on Wednesdays when they also serve the mouth-watering socarrat where you can eat pop dishes with an international flair another of the creatures of this great Spanish chef who has his three-starred restaurant in Dénia and the kitchen is ruled by Luis Valls Rozalén But what does El Poblet represent for Dacosta “Some people might say that it's just another project of mine or that it doesn't have much gastronomic value because it's a second brand or something like that but I understand that these are preconceived ideas because great chefs often do things like that the case of El Poblet has a decisive peculiarity which is already starting to occur with other great professionals who create a top-level gastronomic project that has 2 or 3 Michelin stars: the chefs behind that project end up giving it a different imprint and DNA so much so that even though they are “their parents' children,” they leave a different mark one that goes beyond what even the creators could have imagined My culinary involvement at El Poblet is very limited I play the role of consultant or artistic director It is true that it is Quique Dacosta's restaurant that it has absolute creative autonomy to develop and build a story that on the other hand is quite different but from the trends that predominate in Spanish cuisines It is a place that I would 1000% recommend to anyone coming to Valencia." And we add that it is a restaurant where territory is not a word because Valls believes in it and was born here because from an early age I experienced and learned from my grandparents aspects of gastronomy that I consider wonderful today such as the tradition of charcuterie production things I still do in moments of creativity." So the passion has accompanied him practically from the beginning: "When I was young I was part of the scouts and was already interested in cooking for the rest of my friends At first I had other professional inclinations but I also really liked helping around the house When I was 17 I enrolled in the dining class because to take the cooking class I would have had to be of age but it was clear that cooking was what I wanted although studying dining service helped me to better understand and consider the dynamics of a restaurant." The main stages of Valls' gastronomic career have developed mainly in Quique Dacosta's group: “In these almost two decades of work I can distinguish at least a couple of significant moments with the opening of the restaurant Vuelve Carolina in 2011 I had already been to several restaurants and when I arrived I found a place where things are done properly when we started flying solo and I started creating my own dishes Luis Valls describes his cuisine as “rich and flavorful I think it reflects an identity based on our territory learn about the seasons and give a new perspective to traditions I like to think that my dishes appeal to taste memory or discover new registers and the culture that distinguishes them depending on where the diner who tastes them comes from.” Ours in which the territoriality of the menu came out in many different shades So much elegance and so much taste together especially in the use of citrus fruits that came from the collaboration with an entity that would deserve a lengthy study on its own a professional who for years was curator of the TateModern in London and in parallel with his work in the art world is involved in the management of a place where there are about 500 varieties of citrus fruits from every part of the planet “By now it is part of the backbone of our menu and to be able to have one like Vicente by my side is a privilege because I feel it enriches me and all of us." The 'Ciutat Vella' (old town) menu begins with a remarkable selection of local artisanal cured meats then moves on to beach cuttlefish and squash a dish in which mollusk and vegetable create a marriage of great finesse Territory and Season is a very fresh composition that precedes the large Eel cooked in giant lemon citron (citrus limonimedica) is a small masterpiece in which the sweetness of the meat is balanced by the fresh note of the citrus distant from our concept of risotto but with a decidedly charming taste and texture that is both creamy and crunchy Wonderful is the Collaret peanut stew with broth and mallard also arrives in a second service ripened in rice Prima dei dolci è la volta del “formaggio” di pecora allo zafferano classico dolce spagnolo con la crosta croccante a bilanciare una sorta di budino di pane conducted with great professionalism by young and very young people skilled at juggling the local labels on a wine list of considerable depth a passionate gourmet who has traveled halfway around the world to learn about haute cuisine C/ de Correus, 8, Ciutat Vella, 46002 València, Valencia, Spain Website Tuesday World Subscribers only Trump-Carney meeting: Canada seeks reconciliation World Subscribers only Friedrich Merz bets on two private sector converts to revive the German economy and reform the state World Subscribers only 'A Pope in the tradition of Francis': From New York to Ghana Catholics hope for continuity at the Vatican World Subscribers only Chancellor Merz's diplomatic first week World Subscribers only Founder of Sant'Egidio community fears next pope could undo Francis's legacy Opinion Subscribers only 'Russian gas and Europe is an old story that ended badly Economy Subscribers only Europe's steel industry flattened by crisis World Subscribers only How European countries plan to fund defense efforts France Subscribers only Macron announces citizens' convention on school schedules France Subscribers only 21 charged over French prison 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private diaries are revealed Magazine Subscribers only For Jewish cartoonist Joann Sfar 2025."> Pixels Subscribers only Golden Owl solution is revealed but leaves players of 31-year hunt disappointed Pixels Subscribers only Secrets of decades-long Golden Owl treasure hunt to be revealed Lifestyle Inside Chanel's French leather workshops Culture Subscribers only The marvelous bronzes of Angkor on display at the Musée Guimet in Paris The former Socialist turned Macron supporter whose 'somewhat kamikaze personality' was hailed by PM François Bayrou was chosen for his expertise on New Caledonia and By Solenn de Royer "Manuel Valls is a bit of a kamikaze personality I like bold personalities," justified Prime Minister François Bayrou on BFM-TV on Monday expressing his "esteem" for the statesman he has entrusted with "one of the most weighty issues." where the human and health situation is critical You have 78.2% of this article left to read Lecture du Monde en cours sur un autre appareil Vous pouvez lire Le Monde sur un seul appareil à la fois Ce message s’affichera sur l’autre appareil Parce qu’une autre personne (ou vous) est en train de lire Le Monde avec ce compte sur un autre appareil Vous ne pouvez lire Le Monde que sur un seul appareil à la fois (ordinateur En cliquant sur « Continuer à lire ici » et en vous assurant que vous êtes la seule personne à consulter Le Monde avec ce compte Que se passera-t-il si vous continuez à lire ici Ce dernier restera connecté avec ce compte Vous pouvez vous connecter avec votre compte sur autant d’appareils que vous le souhaitez mais en les utilisant à des moments différents Nous vous conseillons de modifier votre mot de passe Votre abonnement n’autorise pas la lecture de cet article merci de contacter notre service commercial Petter will represent Arkansas during his second three-year term as a farmer-leader “As a USB board member, Robert continues his advocacy for the interests of Arkansas soybean farmers on a national scale, helping to secure the ongoing success of the state’s soybean industry,” said Brad Doyle, a soybean producer from Poinsett County and Arkansas Soybean Promotion Board chairman I’m committed to advancing Arkansas’s soybean industry on a national scale,” Petter said “With nearly three decades of experience as a producer my goal is to ensure long-term sustainability and growth for our state’s agriculture.” Petter will serve on three key committees within USB he will focus on advancing initiatives that promote the health and nutrition of soybeans within the supply chain He is also a member of the Value Alignment Committee where he works to prevent the duplication of research projects Petter will serve on the Audit & Evaluation Committee where he helps shape the organization’s overall strategies to align its messaging and purpose with USB’s mission The USDA appointed five new farmer leaders and reappointed 12 others 17 directors and alternates from 16 states will begin their terms These farmer-leaders officially assumed their roles during the USB December meeting in St generating an estimated $12.34 in returns for every dollar invested in the soybean checkoff These funds support programs that enhance the preference for U.S soybeans in both domestic and international markets To learn more about the Arkansas Soybean Promotion Board, visit TheMiracleBean.com. We are locally owned and operated and the most complete source of news and information in South Central and Southeast Arkansas We provide top-quality advertising and exposure to small business owners companies and industries in the communities we serve 870.673.1595 stuttgartdailyleader@stuttgartdailyleader.com According to the French online newspaper, the trip was funded by Queen Capital International Limited, an offshore dummy corporation registered in Hong Kong. Participants were paid through a former lawyer for the Bahraini royal family, Philippe Feitussi, who leads a legal action in France in favour of the kingdom Although he had no specific expertise in the matter the former socialist prime minister was mandated to explain to the Bahraini authorities the issues surrounding the opening in France of a preliminary investigation into alleged corruption of magistrates of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in the context of a territorial dispute between Bahrain and Qatar the ICJ rendered a decision that divided the territorial waters around the Hawar Islands which mark the border between the two countries Valls did not respond to Mediapart's requests for comment to explain why he accepted the mission The investigative outlet asked if he did so for financial reasons, despite the state benefits granted to former heads of government in France. Valls racked up public expenses of around $150,000 in 2023, according to Politico Mediapart speculated whether his role was primarily to support the Gulf axis of the UAE Saudi Arabia and Bahrain in a long-running dispute with Qatar or was it chiefly aimed at undermining the International Court of Justice whose referral of a case of genocide brought against Israel was denounced by Valls as "disgraceful" in a January newspaper column In September 2020, following the lead of the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain signed an agreement to normalise its diplomatic relations with Israel, under the aegis of US President Donald Trump While Manama did not initially appeal the ICJ decision, which asserted Doha’s control over the North Field West offshore gas megafield, it began trying to challenge it through various means from 2020, following the blockade of Qatar by Saudi Arabia After a British law firm concluded there was little chance of overturning the ICJ judgment who suggested that they deal with the case from the angle of the alleged corruption of some of the judges who issued the decision Mediapart reports that an investigation by a French intelligence firm headed by a former military man concluded in early 2022 that four international magistrates could have been bribed to deliver this judgment The 800-page report was written under the direction of Prince Nasser ben Hamed Al Khalifa Among the accused ICJ judges were Algerian former minister Mohammed Bedjaoui who sat on the ICJ from 1982 to 2001 and chaired the court for three years Bahrain initially considered filing a complaint in France, where some of the funds from this alleged international corruption could have been laundered through real estate, but did not do so due to the warming of its relations with Qatar on the eve of the FIFA World Cup in late 2022 and then the official restoration of diplomatic relations in April 2023 In the summer of 2022, Bahrain ended Feitussi's mission, but the lawyer continued to work on the case. As revealed by Liberation newspaper to send a report to the National Financial Prosecutor's Office Feitussi was no longer paid by Bahrain but by Queen Capital International Limited The lawyer refused to reveal the identity of its owners and refuted Mediapart’s suggestion that it could be a sockpuppet for Bahrain or another of Qatar’s competitors people who consider that international corruption is not good,” Feitussi told Mediapart The company is at the heart of the organisation of Valls’ trip in July, reported at the time by the Intelligence Online website a geopolitics researcher and the consulting director of a communications agency specialised in legal issues the delegation’s goal was to convince the Bahraini authorities to participate in the judicial case against Qatar The fees related to the July trip - 229,000 euros according to Mediapart - were paid by Queen Capital International Limited to Feitussi were paid by the Bahraini ministry of foreign affairs the French lawyer informed Bahrain of his rapprochement with another declared adversary of Qatar The French-Algerian lobbyist was sentenced to death in absentia by the Qatari criminal court in May 2023 for alleged espionage offences and was indicted in France in 2022 for “corruption” and “active influence peddling” in cases surrounding the Paris Saint-Germain football club (PSG) owned by the Qatar Sports Investments fund When asked by Mediapart if he had a financial interest in leading this case against Qatar the most important thing is that the victim [Bahrain] can have a say in what’s happening today On his LinkedIn account, the lawyer posted several messages sympathising with Israel during its war on Gaza describing the Palestinian group Hamas as a terrorist organisation and showing its commitment in the fight against antisemitism After another unsuccessful attempt to return to French politics during the 2022 legislative elections under the banner of President Emmanuel Macron's party, following his failure in the 2019 Barcelona municipal elections the former prime minister under Francois Hollande no longer holds any elective mandate Last year, Mediapart revealed another campaign led against Qatar in France this time via an influence network operating on behalf of the UAE and executed through a private intelligence company based in Geneva In an investigative series called Abu Dhabi Secrets, the outlet revealed that more than 1,000 people and 400 organisations in Europe including more than 200 individuals and 120 organisations in France had been listed by Alp Services as “Islamists” and linked to the Muslim Brotherhood often wrongly and outside any legal framework Copyright © 2014 - 2025. Middle East Eye Only England and Wales jurisdiction apply in all legal matters Middle East Eye          ISSN 2634-2456                      France’s Minister of the Overseas Manuel Valls arrived in New Caledonia on February 23 to resume crucial talks regarding the French Pacific territory’s political future in the wake of widespread civil unrest that began last May and caused damage estimated at €2.2 billion On the day Valls arrived in the capital Nouméa he made a highly provocative visit to the Kanak centre of Mont-Dore to conduct a ceremony in honour of a French gendarme one of two killed at the height of the riots A further 12 deaths were Kanaks who were victims of France’s brutal military crackdown Valls later travelled to the outer islands to commemorate four French police killed during the 1988 Ouvéa crisis He then went on to the tomb of 19 Kanak activists massacred by French forces during the two-week hostage siege The pro-independence movement has always regarded the actions of French special forces in 1988 as criminal Valls called for every New Caledonia “stakeholder” to “reconcile memories” and sit at the negotiation table “without hatred.” Valls is part of the right-wing minority government of Prime Minister François Bayrou he is the eighth Overseas Minister since Emmanuel Macron became president in 2017 He is likely to have been given the New Caledonia portfolio to provide a “progressive” gloss given his experience overseeing France’s rule in the colony as prime minister under the François Hollande Socialist Party presidency from 2014 to 2016 Valls has adopted a superficially conciliatory approach Interviewed by Le Monde on 12 February ahead of his visit Valls spoke not just about the existing “shared” sovereignty provisions of the 1988 Nouméa Accord but noted the Accord’s reference to eventual “full and complete sovereignty” and decolonisation The first two days of Valls’ visit were disrupted by demonstrations by some 500 pro-France Loyalist leaders Sonia Backes and Nicolas Metzdorf berated Valls claiming he would side with the pro-independence factions following his statements about “decolonisation” and the indigenous Kanak as “the first people” in the French colony at a large meeting in Nouméa on 19 February categorically rejected Valls’ comments on sovereignty maintaining their position that New Caledonia remains within France and “pas de cadeaux” (“no concessions”) to independence parties The Loyalists stressed that three referendums had resulted in consecutive rejections of independence in 2018, 2020, and 2021. The third and final referendum in December 2021 was boycotted by the Kanak community who have since disputed the validity of its result Valls had met in Paris with six delegations of New Caledonian political leaders he held an initial joint meeting with pro-independence and pro-France politicians behind closed doors Valls told media the main themes for the talks would be New Caledonia’s relationship with France its “governance” principles and a supposed new “social” deal to better include the territory’s disenfranchised youth Also up for discussion are the controversial electoral roll conditions of eligibility that sparked the riots “decolonisation” and a transfer of certain powers from France assuring France was “determined to reach an agreement” while emphasising that New Caledonia must remain “united and indivisible.” Valls insisted that all political stakeholders faced an “historic responsibility” and had to “accept to speak to each other and with the government of France.” It remains unclear whether France will actually cede any more powers to the territory’s government The talks follow the collapse of New Caledonia’s first independence-party-dominated government in 20 years on Christmas Eve. The cabinet then installed anti-independence Alcide Ponga as its new president is the first indigenous Kanak to lead the pro-France Le Rassemblement party The change represented a sharp shift to the right within the local political establishment in the wake of the months of rioting The pro-independence movement split into separate factions last year after entering talks with the previous government while striving to keep a lid on the rebellion that had erupted from below and outside their control retiring leader of Union Calédonienne (UC) admitted that during the riots there was “a perception” that calls coming from all political parties were “not heeded” and the insurrection had gotten out of control The two factions are divided over how to deal with the latest talks The main Kanak Socialist National Liberation Front (FLNKS) only confirmed their presence at the last minute They declared they would be at the table to “deepen the discussion,” but flagged several issues including the status of political prisoners arrested during the riots and a supervisory role for the UN The FLNKS want a full independence and sovereignty process with a so-called “Kanaky Agreement” to be signed this September UC leader Emmanuel Tjibaou has described the current French approach as more “positive” compared to previous governments in Paris Meanwhile the breakaway Progressist Union in Melanesia (UPM) and Kanak Liberation Party (PALIKA) are open to a concept of independence “in association with France,” similar to the Cook Islands’ neo-colonial relationship with New Zealand Loyalist political leaders have put forward a proposal for federalism has always been the bastion of anti-independence leadership The Loyalty Islands and the Northern Province have been managed by pro-independence Kanak leaders for more than 30 years Federalism basically envisages that the south should secede from the rest of the country Whatever the outcome the talks will not resolve the deep economic and social crisis hitting the colony and in particular the impoverished working class and youth The issues behind the unrest including poverty unemployment and social desperation remain The rebellion brought a substantial section of Kanak youth into conflict but with the territory’s political establishment including the local government and the FLNKS The economic repercussions of the months of rioting are dire Six hundred businesses were destroyed and looted and an estimated 10,000 people lost their jobs were destroyed and could not reopen for the beginning of the year including 16 percent of the colony’s medical staff with 20-30 percent of the world’s nickel reserves is the backbone of the economy employing thousands of workers but is in crisis The industry was already in decline before the uprising due to global competition from suppliers in China and Indonesia exports have dropped and two of the main smelters are idled in care and maintenance that the company’s subsidiary SLN (Société Le Nickel) in New Caledonia would be among the sites and smelters at risk of being “wiped out… within five years” because of its “lack of competitivity.” Indonesia could end up accounting for more than three-quarters of the world’s highest class of pure nickel “I very much doubt that many governments can be found who still want to massively subsidise… to compete with Indonesian production,” she said the perspective of establishing an “independent” New Caledonia on a capitalist basis is a pipedream Formal independence from France will only mean subordination to one or more other imperialist powers The bourgeois nationalist program is a reactionary political trap for New Caledonia’s workers and poor especially amid the escalating US-led drive to war in the Pacific and global capitalist austerity measures impoverished Pacific countries is fully independent All rely heavily on aid from the imperialist powers and are subject to routine interference from Australia Only the unification of the working class across the region and in the imperialist countries themselves can bring an end to colonial exploitation and lead to genuine equality and freedom for the oppressed peoples of the Pacific and longtime director of the Vatican Press Office the Biomedical University Foundation presented the second International Navarro-Valls Award for Leadership and Benevolence to Lina Tombolato Doris and Nicolò Govoni Nicolò Govoni is the President and CEO of the "Still I Rise" Association "We offer world-class education to children who can never afford it We are the first ones in the world to offer the IB We do this because we believe that education is only powerful as a tool of social change if it challenges the status quo." Lina Tombolato Doris founded the Ennio Doris Foundation in 2022 to honor her late husband The foundation supports disadvantaged children to look to the future with hope and confidence and to plan for tomorrow without getting lost in despair or before the difficulties that are part of life." President of the Biomedical University Foundation "We want to keep remembering Joaquín Navarro-Valls and everything he represented We reward individuals who truly know how to make a positive impact on society and promote good." Nicolò Govoni is the President and CEO of the Still I Rise Association The NGO opens schools for refugee and vulnerable children What changes a life is the ability and the instruments to truly free oneself from any kind of constraints The award ceremony took place at the Protomoteca Hall of the Capitoline Museums in Rome Paola Arriaza Flynn is the Vatican correspondent for EWTN Noticias where she reports on papal affairs and other news related to the Holy See she was Vatican correspondent for NBC's "Noticias Telemundo." Born in El Salvador Arriaza is a graduate of the University of Navarra in Spain where she earned her bachelor's degree in journalism and philosophy Please accept marketing cookies to watch this video France’s Overseas Minister Manuel Valls returned to New Caledonia this week for four days of talks on the French Pacific territory’s future Valls previously visited the capital Nouméa between February 22 and March 1 to convene multi-party discussions ostensibly to initiate a new agreement on the colony’s political status following months of widespread civil unrest by indigenous Kanak youth That meeting involved representatives of all the colony’s establishment parties including pro-France “Loyalists” and factions of the pro-independence movement That had not happened since 2021 following three referenda on self-determination the last of which was boycotted by the Kanak community The participants insisted that the initial round of talks were only “discussions,” not formal negotiations Valls published a “synthesis paper” summing up the pro-France and pro-independence camps’ opposed views which was put forward as a working basis for the more advanced talks a former prime minister during the Hollande Socialist Party presidency has adopted a superficially conciliatory approach Interviewed by Le Monde ahead of his first visit he spoke about the provisions of the 1988 “power sharing” Nouméa Accord noting the Accord’s reference to eventual “full and complete sovereignty” and decolonisation Valls’ statement provoked hostile protests from the Loyalist factions on his previous arrival Valls said the talks had “a clear objective: delineate the fresh horizons of New Caledonia and map out the contours of a shared future after clarifying everyone’s expectations The statement also affirmed President Emmanuel Macron’s priority for France’s Indo-Pacific Strategy declaring: “Our exchanges concerning New Caledonia’s competencies in international relations were marked by a shared commitment: advancing New Caledonia’s interests while ensuring France’s strategic security.” Valls warned that “any actions or alliances that harm France’s strategic interests particularly those that side with foreign powers seeking to weaken us determined to ensure its position as an Indo-Pacific power amid escalating US-led preparations for war against China will not relinquish its hold over the strategically vital territory New Caledonia is home to a major French military base and holds nearly a quarter of the world’s reserves of nickel essential in the manufacture of stainless steel and in the defence industry In an interview with French media outlets in March Valls said the situation in New Caledonia was not yet “appeased” and that a comprehensive agreement on the territory’s future was still remote “Even though we managed to get all political forces to speak to each other again One has to understand the fear all of our compatriots over there And to understand also the Kanaks’ aspiration to emancipation and decolonization,” he added held behind closed doors at the French High Commission reportedly centred on the definition of New Caledonia’s future links with France the possible transfer of powers from Paris and the related question of who is eligible to vote in local elections New Caledonia’s status remains to be determined Options include “shared sovereignty,” “full independence” or a “free association,” similar to New Zealand’s neo-colonial arrangement with its so-called “Realm” countries New Caledonia’s main pro-independence organisation the Kanak Socialist National Liberation Front (FLNKS) issued a blunt statement condemning any move to open up the local electoral roll to recent arrivals from France which continued for months in the face of brutal police-military suppression by the French state Opposing the granting of votes to post-1998 immigrants the FLNKS declared it “rejects the principle of mass naturalisation which would weaken the emancipation project derived from the Nouméa Accord by allowing recent residents to influence the political future of New Caledonia citizenship is not built on residence or taxation alone Valls told the media that “all parties of the political landscape were once again part of the series of round tables.” An official document has been tabled for “a third sequence” of discussions beginning on 29 April is the deep economic and social crisis hitting the colony January saw a sharp shift to the right by the local ruling elite. Following the territorial government’s collapse on Christmas Eve, the new cabinet installed anti-independence loyalist Alcide Ponga the first Kanak to lead the pro-France Le Rassemblement party Ponga replaced Louis Mapou of the pro-independence Parti de Libération Kanak (Palika) who bitterly declared; “It’s a dirty political blow to the country.” Congress last month adopted an austerity budget With businesses failing and thousands unemployed A spokesman for the pro-independence Union Calédonienne (UC) the austerity measures are an attack against the entire working class including workers in France and internationally who are being made to pay for the worsening global economic crisis The crisis in the colony has been exacerbated by the months of violence including the brutal police-military crackdown which resulted in 14 deaths and an estimated €2.2 billion in damages One in five workers has lost all or part of their income and more than half of the 11,000 people who lost their jobs after last May were still unemployed at the start of this year University of New Caledonia economist Séverine Blaise told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation the economic situation was “catastrophic.” She said the local government should focus on strengthening social security for people struggling to make a living and invest in sectors that might promote economic development Migration figures earlier this year showed a net 10,700 people a dramatic population decline for the territory of just 270,000 A shortage of doctors and nurses has left health services on the verge of collapse About 20 percent of the 1,000 locally registered doctors have left according to the French Medical Association of New Caledonia A similar shortage of surgical nurses has forced Nouméa’s hospital to close departments and stop some surgeries which in the past accounted for about 20 percent of GDP and 90 percent of exports It was already in decline before the uprising due to global competition from suppliers in China and Indonesia exports have dropped and two of the main smelters have been idled One of these is Koniambo Nickel SAS (KNS) owned by Swiss mining giant Glencore in a joint venture with Kanak-owned Société Minière du Sud Pacifique SA (SMSP) Last year Glencore announced it would suspend production and sell its stake Koniambo was a product of the “economic rebalancing” agenda of the Nouméa Accord established to provide business opportunities for a privileged Kanak layer Its unviability is testament to the fraudulent promise of Kanak “independence.” Simmering tensions could erupt again at any time up to 400 youths were involved in a public brawl Law enforcement units were called and declared they found themselves in “a dangerous situation” confronted with “hostile” individuals and used teargas and stun-balls The French High Commissioner’s chief of staff Anaïs Aït Mansour told reporters the reintroduction of restrictive measures used under last year’s “insurrectional situation” would again be “under consideration.” either observed and verified firsthand by the reporter or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources Translations may contain inaccuracies—please refer to the original content A man has stunned social media users by showing the striking likeness he shares with his great-great-grandfather While digging through old family photographs, Fox Ryker The photograph—taken in 1900 when Valls was 22 years old—instantly caught Ryker's eye because of the resemblance he has to his ancestor found a photo of himself at the age of 22 and was struck by the likenesses He told Newsweek that prior to finding the 20th-century photograph he "wasn't aware of any similarities." But after seeing them for himself "I was most surprised by how much we look alike given that we're four generations apart and share very little similar DNA." Ryker, interested in seeing if other people noticed the resemblance, shared the two images on Reddit receiving more than 38,000 votes and 750 comments in a number of days Some Redditors joked that Ryker was a reincarnated version of his great-great-grandfather While Ryker was fascinated by the similarities between his and Valls' faces he was also intrigued by the contrasts in the images "The two photos are evidence of how much has changed in time because we both have different hairstyles and the composition of the photos are very different I'm holding a smartphone in my photo," he said Alexander Graham Bell was granted the first U.S. patent for the telephone in 1876—24 years before the photo of Valls was taken and more than a century before phones were used for taking selfies and watching TikTok videos Ryker has been amazed by the overwhelming response but that's the internet for you," he added Among the hundreds of comments, plenty of Redditors pointed out the similarities between the relatives "Apart from the eyes you look completely different to me OP's maternal great-great grandfather!" a commenter added "Imagine if he knew people would look at his picture 120 years after it was taken." Do you have any viral videos or pictures that you want to share Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground Newsletters in your inbox See all This website is using a security service to protect itself from online attacks The action you just performed triggered the security solution There are several actions that could trigger this block including submitting a certain word or phrase You can email the site owner to let them know you were blocked Please include what you were doing when this page came up and the Cloudflare Ray ID found at the bottom of this page New Caledonia remains a tinder box. Local divisions run deep between primarily European loyalist and mainly indigenous independence parties after a contested independence referendum in 2021 led to a standoff, which last year in May erupted into six months of violence The former French prime minister and now France’s Overseas Territories Minister is in New Caledonia this week in an effort to advance talks on an agreement about the territory’s future Local elections are planned for November and the prospect of tensions easing appears remote Independence supporters were incensed in May last year when France unilaterally imposed changes to provisions confining voter eligibility in local elections to longstanding residents Months of destruction and intimidation have heightened sensitivity and fear on both sides with the snap election mid-2024 resulting in no clear majority and ongoing uncertainty Valls is the eighth Overseas France Minister since Emmanuel Macron became president in 2017 himself the sixth prime minister to serve under Macron and a compromise nominee under pressure from France’s divided National Assembly a position advocated by one of the independence parties which was amended to accommodate significant Noumea Accord compromises (including selective voting eligibility provisions) Valls appears to have made a gesture to independence parties’ demands that discussion about the future should take place in Noumea maintaining their position of New Caledonia remaining within France and “pas de cadeaux” (“no concessions”) to independence parties Although the independence parties are divided they welcome Valls’ references to the Noumea Accord as the basis for the future and his framing of sovereignty and the process of decolonisation Valls appears to have made a gesture to their demands that discussion about the future should take place in Noumea have said they are prepared to participate in discussions Valls must walk a fine line between appearing to favour neither group Yet he must also address the loyalists’ deep fears and insecurity and independence party grievances that France has ridden roughshod over Noumea Accord commitments Whether he can pull it off will be determined by the readiness of all the local parties to put the unrest of 2024 and their considerable differences behind them and return to serious negotiation “I just want to remind Mr Valls that he took part in the Left’s destruction under François Hollande betrayed the Socialist party and its candidate Benoît Hamon in 2017 that he went into exile in Spain before getting thrown out; that he sought to rally behind Mr Macron and wasn’t elected France Inter listener Jean-Noël roasted Manuel Valls on air for 30 seconds before being cut by production exploiting the radio station’s offer to give listeners a chance to pose a question to their guest Mr Valls had been invited on the show in his new position as overseas minister in the cabinet of France’s latest prime minister He was due to outline a roadmap of government action in Mayotte the French territory devastated by cyclone Chido Jean-Noël instead aired the thoughts of many on the Left in France: that Valls is little more than a political weathercock an opportunist ready to change tack for his personal advancement a string of assertions Mr Valls had made over the past seven years each contradicted seconds later by a different claim or stance It touched on all of the points Jean-Noël had mentioned The whole of France has become more right wing But the most striking is that the Socialist Party has moved towards the right that François Hollande has moved towards the right and that you – I do not wish to insult you but I think – have moved to the right as well Writer Jean d’Ormesson in 2016 when Mr Valls was prime minister He had the guts to leave the comfort of his family nest in the Marais to move into a shabby concrete building and deal with the suffering of the people living on the housing estates.  three times reserve candidate on Mr Vall’s list in Evry Manuel has one great quality: he's not afraid of situations a friend and an aide to former prime minister Lionel Jospin misses a key part of Mr Valls’ attraction in French politics.  He represents a particular segment of the Socialist Party that is a bastion of fiercely Republican secular and rather pro-business voters with the potential to lean towards the Right Read more: Profile: French scientist Didier Raoult banned from practising medicine but Valls said they wanted their son to be born in Barcelona in an apartment that was also his father’s painting workshop I had to get my two-year carte de séjour,” he told Le Parisien in 2015 explaining what prompted his decision to become a French citizen.  and had to answer questions on my parents and my private life Valls’ binational identity went on to become central to his political ideas; a defence of multiculturalism and a respect for Republican values the largest national student union in France.  he was noticed by members of the Socialist Party and joined although “more a choice by default than a massive adherence to party doctrine,” he said Mr Valls started his political career alongside Michel Rocard He became prime minister Lionel Jospin’s communications adviser in 1997 He became a mainstream figure as mayor of Evry (Essonne) an office he held from 2001 to 2012 over three consecutive terms He saw in Evry a melting pot of the Paris suburbs a form of multiculturalism that bordered or slipped into communitarianism and ended with violence.  A report filmed him touring a farmers’ market in 2009 where he is heard lamenting the city does not have enough white people This is the second central axis of Valls’ political ideas and slowly earned the nickname ‘The Nicolas Sarkozy of the Left’ He was appointed interior minister by François Hollande in 2012 before being offered the job of prime minister in 2014 Hollande gambling on Valls’ popularity in polls and tough stance on security to regain the trust of the French people His tenure was marked by the Charlie Hebdo and Nice terrorist attacks along with his fight to have Dieudonné M’bala M’bala a stand-up comedian convicted for hateful speech and antisemitism Often branded a trublion de la gauche (Left-wing troublemaker) Mr Valls is behind the concept of the ‘two a bon mot he pronounced in February 2016 during a political meeting His theory is that France’s Left is ideologically split between two camps: one pragmatic and open to reforms the other deeply wedded to the socialist class struggle It has become a recurrent point of reference for politicians observers and commentators of French politics Mr Valls lost in the Socialist party primary of 2017 to Benoît Hamon who ultimately finished fifth with 6.36% of the national vote That is partly due to what some see as Mr Valls’ first big political betrayal.  he initially announced he would vote for Hamon but eventually asked voters to endorse Emmanuel Macron instead hoping his support would earn him a cabinet position.  running for mayor in Barcelona in 2019 but finishing fourth.  He had pledged his French political career was over and that he would stay in Barcelona no matter the result he came back to France in 2021 and ran for the legislature in 2022 for Mr Macron’s party – but lost he was hired as a political consultant on TV shows and wrote several op-eds in French newspapers Social media and satirical newspaper Le Gorafi – France’s version of The Onion or Daily Mash – has long used Valls as an easy joke every time a new cabinet is announced forecasting his return through any tactic possible a mayor…This gentleman [Jean-Noël] did not mention [any] of my successes,” Mr Valls hit back on France Inter “It is during the difficult moments of our nation that people with experience should give their all for their country “I am a Republican and a patriot who loves this country profoundly.” Read more: Profile: Mazarine Pingeot, Mitterrand's love child - and where is she now? Three rounds of escalating tariffs will impact €22 billion worth of US goods US president said her embezzlement court case was a ‘witch hunt’ It comes as the RN leader continues to maintain her ‘innocence’ and right-wing politicians have called her conviction ‘an attack on democracy’ We’re happy to welcome Jordi Valls, Director of SITA Innovation Labs as a panelist exploring the future of air travel at the FutureTravel Summit 2024 With over 15 years of experience as a technology executive Jordi has led innovative initiatives across North America and Europe As the founder of several successful ventures Jordi has been at the forefront of innovation in industries from virtual reality to aviation technology Jordi leads a team of aviation professionals and innovators working on cutting-edge projects that explore the future of air travel SITA is a global leader in the aviation industry and Jordi’s leadership has been key in driving forward-thinking solutions for the future of aviation Join us at the FutureTravel Summit to hear Jordi Valls share his insights on the latest trends and technologies shaping the future of aviation and corporates who are transforming the travel industry Search More results... Andrea Valls recently made her professional stage debut in the world premiere of (This is not a) Happy Room at the King’s Head Theatre in London Andrea’s TV credits include Bridgerton East Mode with Nigel Ng Waffle the Wonderdog Valentine Nights and The Midnight Beast Present Valentine’s Day On film her credits include Red White and Royal Blue Comments and reviews are subject to our participation guidelines policy, which can be viewed here Our policy is for readers to use their REAL NAMES when commenting Δdocument.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value" Search Filter by Exact matches only Search in title Search in excerpt Search in contentFilter by Categories London Shows - Now Booking London Shows - Coming Soon Sign-up for Offers Shows | Offers | Musicals | News Please note: All tickets are subject to availability. Ticketing powered by members of the Society of Ticket Agents and Retailers [Read more] Terms & Conditions | Privacy Policy | Cookies Policy The leading authority for the Architecture & Design community Recharge in a Restored Spanish Farmhouse in Menorca Words: Michelle Yee New York-based interior designer and Interior Design Hall of Fame inductee Paul Siskin recently passed away at the age of 77 in Santa Fe Ranked among the country’s top 100 designers by New York Having grown up in his family’s successful furniture business his knowledge of antiques and the decorative arts was prolific,” says Interior Design Editor-In-Chief Cindy Allen He was a master of scale and pattern—beyond chic!—and totally and uniquely Paul.” Cofounder of the firm Siskin-Valls Interior Design which he launched with his late business and life partner Perucho Valls Siskin created spaces that are elegant and functional with a touch of whimsy putting his mark on spaces as diverse as a hotel in Caracas as well as various residences throughout the United States New York—a charming property nicknamed Brokeback Manor that’s perched atop a ridge in a residential enclave known for its largely gay and lesbian community Siskin has called the home “a Palladian pavilion reimagined by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe.” Free-flowing with a loftlike interior dining and living areas are seamlessly integrated and furnished with assorted pieces and unique antiques Siskin collected—a detail also seen in his New York office I still remember how thrilled I was to publish his live/work apartment full of the most eclectic and curated objects he loved (think oversized chemist flasks and a stop dead-in-your-tracks angelic ceiling mural) that somehow all grouped together looked like art,” adds Allen Siskin came from a furniture family dating back to his grandfather one of the largest furniture manufacturers west of the Mississippi before the company expanded into the retail world Interested in pursuing a path in the decorative arts instead Siskin moved to New York in 1974 to study at Parsons School of Design After graduating with a Bachelor of Fine Art in Interior Design, he soon took a job working with Hall of Fame member John Saladino at his firm in 1977, where he would meet lifelong friend and fellow Hall of Famer Laura Bohn keeping in touch even when the former left the firm to start up Siskin-Valls The two would continue to be close friends frequently collaborating on product launches and sharing a love of always “trying something new.” In the spring of 2024 and spent two weeks marveling over the architecture and its 17 bedrooms Bohn recalls Siskin’s keen eye for design stating created with his partner Perucho Valls in 1988 is still legendary.” The room featured an embroidered slip-covered chair with a crinoline train and was an early manifestation of the fashion-décor alliance seen today Siskin relocated from New York to Santa Fe where he continued his interior design practice and promoted his metal furniture collection Siskin continued to combine grandeur with definitive comfort leaving a legacy defined by his creative spark and stellar work and he was really a special kind of designer,” Bohn recalls fondly “He was different from everybody else; he had different tastes and different ideas “Paul wasn’t just my brother; he was my best friend He was a friend to many throughout his life from childhood through his adult and professional life,” Janie Siskin He was also incredibly funny and fun to be around he was exquisitely talented and loved his work New York-based interior designer Paul Siskin launched his own firm Siskin-Valls Interior Design in 1984 After graduating from Parsons School of Design with a BFA in Interior Design what kinds of spaces do Hall of Fame members live in Our roundup of simply amazing projects from Interior Design’s most recently featured projects From an amorphic stained glass sculpture to a pink egg-cluster cabinet see the highlights from Odunpazarı Modern Museum’s exhibit “Creatures of Comfort.” From richly layered interiors to dystopian provocations in botanical gardens these installations captured the spirit of storytelling at Milan Design Week 2025 Experience Reddymade’s immersive installation for India’s Architecture & Design Film Festival Mumbai showcasing the world’s largest paint library who is visiting New Caledonia this week for the third time in two months has once again called all parties to live up to their responsibilities in order to make a new political agreement possible "We'll take our responsibilities, on our part, and we will put on the table a project that touches New Caledonia's society, economic recovery, including nickel, and the future of the younger generation", he told a panel of French journalists on Sunday He said that he hoped a revised version on a draft document - resulting from his previous visits in the French Pacific territory and new proposals from the French government - there existed a "difficult path" to possibly reconcile radically opposing views expressed so far from the pro-independence parties in New Caledonia and those who want New Caledonia to remain part of France The target remains an agreement that would accommodate both "the right and aspiration to self-determination" and "the link with France" then economic and political uncertainty can lead to a new disaster "That is why I have appealed several times to all political stakeholders those for and those against independence," he warned "Everyone must take a step towards each other Valls said this week he hoped everyone would "enter a real negotiations phase" He said one of the ways to achieve this will be to find "innovative" solutions and "a new way of looking at the future" This also included relevant amendments to the French Constitution they agree at least on one thing: they will not sign any agreement "at all costs" Just like has been the case since talks between Valls and local parties began earlier this year the two main opposing camps remain adamant on their respective pre-conditions and sometimes demands largely dominated by the Union Calédonienne held at the weekend a "convention" to decide on whether they would be attending this week's new round of talks with Valls They eventually resolved that they would attend the new roundtables but have not yet decided to call this "negotiations" They said another decision would be made on Thursday 1 May after they have examined Valls's new proposals and documents which the French minister is expected to circulate as soon as he hosts the first meeting the FLNKS reaffirmed their demands for a "Kanaky Agreement" to be signed not later than 24 September 2025 to be followed by a five-year transition period The official line was to "maintain the trajectory" to full sovereignty the main pillar of their stance is the fact that three self-determination referendums have been held between 2018 and 2021 even though the third and last consultation was largely boycotted by the pro-independence camp And that all three referendums have resulted in a vote rejecting full sovereignty Les Loyalistes party and Southern Province President Sonia Backès told a public rally last week they refuse another date for yet another referendum And we don't want to fix the date for civil war So we don't want to fix the date for a new referendum" said they "still want to believe in an agreement" "We're part of all discussions on seeking solutions One of their other proposals was to grant more powers to each of the three provinces of New Caledonia "We don't want differences along ethnic lines We want the provinces to have more powers so that each of them is responsible for their respective society models" any new referendum could only be called by at least three-fifths of the Congress and would no longer pose a "binary" question on yes or no to independence but would consist in endorsing a "project" for New Caledonia's future society repeated this weekend he and his supporters "remain mobilised to defend New Caledonia within France" another scenario could also be that New Caledonia's political stakeholders could find it more appealing or convenient to agree on no agreement at all especially as New Caledonia's crucial provincial elections are in the pipeline and scheduled for no later than 30 November this year Valls repeated that he remained concerned that the situation on the ground remained "serious" "We are walking on a tightrope above embers" He said top of his concerns were New Caledonia's economic and financial situation hatred" as well as a fast-deteriorating public health services situation or the rise in poverty caused by an increasing number of jobless and that is why it is everyone's responsibility to find an agreement And I will stay as long as needed and I will put all my energy so that an agreement takes place Valls also recalled that since insurrectional riots broke out in May 2024 French security and law enforcement agencies are still maintaining about twenty squads of French gendarmes (1500 personnel) deployed there This is on top of the normally-stationed 550 other gendarmes and another 680 police officers Valls said this was necessary because "any time Outgoing French High Commissioner Louis Le Franc said in an interview recently that in case of a "new 13 May" situation the pre-positioned forces could ensure law enforcement "for three or four days" "until reinforcements arrive" reinforcements could be sent again from mainland France and bring the total number to up to six thousand law enforcement personnel a number similar to the level deployed in 2024 in the weeks following the riots that killed 14 and caused some €2.2 billion in material damage Valls said earlier in April the main pillars of future negotiations are articulated around the themes of "democracy and the rule of law" a future "fundamental law" that would seal New Caledonia's future status the powers of New Caledonia's three provinces and a future New Caledonia citizenship with the associated definition of who meets the requirements to vote at local elections Valls already travelled to Nouméa twice this year He left Paris on Monday afternoon (local time) and is scheduled to touch down in New Caledonia on Tuesday Since his last visit that ended on 1 April discussions have been maintained in visio conference mode between local political stakeholders and Valls as well as French Prime Minister François Bayrou's special advisor on New Caledonia the French government's Minister for Overseas says the document is not a "unilateral position" French Minister for Overseas Manuel Valls has returned to Paris Tuesday without any deal as yet regarding the French Pacific territory's political future Islands Business journalist Nic Maclellan is back in Noumea for the first time since the rioting began on 13 May "There's a long way to go before the French can bring people together," he said Audio Veronique Roger-Lacan said the argument of New Caledonia Congress President Roch Wamytan "does not fly" and Paris has a "totally impartial" stance" on the decolonisation process Volume 7 - 2022 | https://doi.org/10.3389/fcomm.2022.910952 Public speaking is fundamental in our daily life and it happens to be challenging for many people these skills should be encouraged early on in educational settings the high number of students per class and the extensive curriculum both limit the possibilities of the training and entail that students give short in-class presentations under great time pressure Virtual Reality (VR) environments can help speakers and teachers meet these challenges and foster oral skills This experimental study employs a between-subjects pre- and post-training design with four Catalan high-school student groups a VR group (N = 30) and a Non-VR group (N = 20) Both groups gave a 2-min speech in front of a live audience before (pre-training) and after (post-training) 3 training sessions (one session per week) in which they practiced public speaking either in front of a VR audience or alone in a classroom (Non-VR) Students assessed their anxiety measures right before performing every speech and filled out a satisfaction questionnaire at the end Pre- and post-training speeches were assessed by 15 raters who analyzed the persuasiveness of the message and the charisma of the presenter Speeches were also analyzed for prosodic features and gesture rate results showed that self-assessed anxiety got significantly reduced at post-training for both conditions acoustic analyses of both groups' speeches show that the VR group has developed a more clear and resonant voice quality in the post-training speeches in terms of higher cepstral-peak prominence (CPP) (although no significant differences in f0- related parameters as a function of training were obtained) as well as significantly less erosion effects than the Non-VR group these differences across groups did not trigger a direct improvement on the participants' gesture rate persuasiveness and charisma at post-training students perceived the training in the VR environment to be more useful and beneficial for their future oral presentations than the Non-VR group short unguided VR training sessions can help students feel less anxious promote a more clear and resonant voice style and can prevent them from experiencing an erosion effect while practicing speeches in front of a real audience time restrictions and the pandemic situation make it difficult for teachers to organize oral practices in front of the classroom The present paper assesses the use of virtual reality technology (henceforth VR) as an alternative and complementary educational method for practicing oral presentations Given the fact that VR can easily simulate traditional training scenarios in a virtual environment the present investigation will determine the effects of a short 3-session VR training with high school students on reducing their public speaking anxiety and enhancing the quality of their oral presentations after training in the following section we assess the previous literature on the value of using VR as a complementary educational tool for providing an appealing setup for practicing audience-based oral presentations and thus boosting public speaking skills they designed 6 individual sessions and 1- and 3-month follow-up sessions Results showed that feedback allowed them to improve their speech and that this contributed to reducing their anxiety an increase in speaking quality was found in terms of a reduction of silent pauses and of word repetitions was conducted with 6 software engineers university students (21 years old) Every participant attended a 1-h individual therapy session where they were told about anxiety and its possible causes and components and they rated their self-perceived anxiety level while imagining giving a speech they performed a brief speech on a controversial topic and rated their self-assessed anxiety with the SUDS at 4 different points during exposure but also lower levels of anxiety after the intervention ended The study concluded that initially more anxious participants significantly improved in self-assessed anxiety scores after having performed in all three VR conditions Their anxiety increased between the first and second session but diminished before and after the third session The authors recommended that future research in that line should include a control group and also pre- and post-training tasks that would include speaking to a live audience in order to compare the reduction of anxiety in virtual and non-virtual public speaking contexts and low immersion environments) and a control condition The VR conditions performed a 5-min speech about their first week at university before a VR audience while the control condition performed the same speech to the researcher Participants filled in anxiety self-assessment questionnaires before and after the speech task Results showed no improvement in PSA reduction and increased VR immersion did not significantly reduce their anxiety either and they were divided into a VR experimental group and a control group They performed a pre-training and a post-training task which consisted of giving a 3-min speech in front of a live audience Trainings consisted of 5 trial sessions with a VR environment for the experimental group whereas for the control group the 5 training sessions were led by an instructor During the training sessions in both conditions the authors included distractors (someone coughing in the audience or someone in the audience asking a question) The study measured self-assessed anxiety and electrodermal activity Results show that VR participants significantly reduced their anxiety levels (in both measures) and that distractors (someone coughing placed at second 40 and someone's question at second 60 in pre- and post-test speeches) proved effective at reducing their anxiety at post-test they conclude that training with distractors is effective and reproduces a more real public speaking situation Participants said that training with VR helped them concentrate made them more confident and made them have less tension To our knowledge, only one study (Kahlon et al., 2019) has previously examined VR effects on PSA reduction in a secondary school setting They studied the PSA of 27 adolescents (aged 13–16) after only a single 90-min VR session in which they performed different speaking or public speaking exercises active maintenance and filled in different anxiety self-assessments A therapist accompanied them throughout the session The authors concluded that one session was enough to reduce PSA of adolescents after 1- and 3-month follow ups although the causes for this PSA reduction are not clear as there were neither control nor comparison groups there is evidence that VR serves as a tool to trigger anxiety during training sessions and eventually reducing anxiety after training are VR public speaking trainings capable of stimulating a higher commitment to learning in particular with respect to high-school students as the target group L2 learners of French) that lasted 9 weeks In order to assess the L2 speech in VR and Non-VR contexts participants were asked to perform four public speaking tasks When French raters assessed the audio files they found that the speech of participants using VR was more comprehensible than the speech of participants performing in-class Given that the studies reported in this section have shown that using VR for public speaking tasks triggers a more listener-oriented speech style it is plausible to expect that a VR-training paradigm will trigger a more audience-oriented speech style in post-training speaking tasks Yet to our knowledge very few studies have assessed the effects of VR on public speaking performance (see the next section) The authors conducted a VR training study with 22 pre-university students across a 2-week period that consisted of three sessions: in the first and third sessions participants were introduced to the different features that an effective speech should include and after the instruction they had to give a 5-min speech in front of their peers The second session was dedicated to performing a 5-min speech within a virtual environment after which in a follow-up third session the VR condition received computer-mediated automatic immediate feedback and the control condition received delayed feedback given by an expert The authors concluded that the VR session together with the given feedback was effective in improving eye contact and pace when delivering a speech in front of a real audience they also pointed out that it is difficult to claim that the results are a direct consequence of the VR practice itself and the independent practice could have had an influence as well Interestingly, in an L2 language learning context, Gao (2022) conducted an 8-week public speaking training study in which 90 Chinese university students participated in either a VR condition or a control condition based on traditional multimedia technology to test their proficiency in spoken English students were tested at post-training with English reading materials and oral presentation of specific topics While participants in both conditions were successful in improving the oral English pronunciation skills (in this study they add the role of speech emotion to the usual pronunciation assessment systems that consider only the tone the VR condition outperformed the control condition Yet to our knowledge no previous investigation has assessed the value of VR training by assessing public speaking performance at post-test by incorporating a full-fledged prosodic analysis of the post-test speeches We expect that the observed effect of VR in triggering an audience-oriented speech style will also carry over into the speakers' post-training speeches still very little is known about the potential boosting effects of practicing oral presentations with VR on developing students' public speaking skills and whether the training has an impact on the prosodic and gestural characteristics of the post-test speeches the main goal of this study is to investigate through a between-subjects training experiment whether training in public speaking with VR environments makes a difference in the overall quality of the oral presentations that students perform in front of an audience after training this is the first VR public speaking training experiment conducted with high school students that investigates not only the effects of training with VR on self-perceived anxiety both in the pre- and a post-training public speaking tasks but also on overall public speaking performance (through the use of persuasiveness and charisma ratings) as well as on oral presentation quality through a systematic analysis of the prosodic and gestural features of those oral presentations the assessment of the two speeches given in front of a live audience we will assess how the speaker feels in terms of self-perceived anxiety we will also include assessments about the persuasiveness of the speakers' charisma by external raters that are blind to the conditions we will assess the prosodic characteristics of these speeches (understood holistically as involving a set of parameters including f0 and the level of participants' own satisfaction after the training The following hypotheses will be tested: (a) Compared to the Non-VR public speech training VR-based speech training will help diminish public speaking anxiety in the post-training public speaking task in front of a real audience (b) VR public speaking training will lead to higher persuasion and charisma ratings (c) VR public speaking training results in prosodic differences compared to the baseline condition of speakers making the resulting speech more audience-oriented (d) The audience-oriented prosody will be associated with a higher number of gestures in the VR condition (e) Participants of the VR condition find more enjoyment and report a higher motivation for their future oral presentations the purpose of this educational intervention was to examine the impact of VR public speaking training on the quality of public speeches performed after training in front of a live audience by comparing it to a Non-VR condition in which speeches were rehearsed individually An important component of this assessment includes a complete analysis of the prosodic features of these speeches we assess the value of a complementary use of a VR tool that can help educators promote the rehearsal of oral presentations and ultimately improve students' oral skills We designed a between-subjects training experiment with a pre- and post-test experimental framework. The public speaking training involved three training sessions, one per week (three for the VR condition and three for the Non-VR condition). Both before and after the training, a public speaking task was performed individually in front of a real audience, see Figure 1 from the pre-training to the post-training public speaking task was 5 weeks 14 participants' data had to be disregarded for one of the following two reasons namely (a) because of participants being absent at one of the training sessions or at the post-training phase or (b) because their speeches at either pre- or post-test did not reach the minimum duration that we established (i.e. 1 min) or because they did not offer a minimum of two arguments to support their persuasive speech The 50 remaining participants (mean age = 16.95 SD = 0.17; 70% female and 30% male) completed all five speeches with the required characteristics Participants were randomly assigned to either the VR group (N = 30) or the Non-VR group (N = 20) All participants were typically developing adolescents and had no history of speech and all participants completed an informed consent form during the initial training session Participants performed their speeches in Catalan All students were bilingual Catalan-Spanish speakers with 89.7% of them naming Catalan as their dominant language The main language of instruction in the target schools is Catalan A total of 5 short public speaking tasks had to be performed individually by each participant, two in front of a real audience (i.e., the pre-training and the post-training public speaking tasks), and three for training purposes. For all the public speaking tasks, participants were given a specific topic and a sheet of instructions (see Appendix) containing a list of arguments they could use in order to prepare a persuasive speech An initial choice of 10 topics was first made based on a long list of suggested topics taken from a website maintained by instructors of public speaking and other communication courses (i.e., www.myspeechclass.com) This initial list of 10 topics was assessed through an online questionnaire which was distributed to mailing lists of 17-year-old boys and girls A total of 58 anonymous students participated in the poll They were asked to vote on their favorite topics from 1 (least liked) to 7 (most liked) The topic selected for both pre-training and post-training public speaking tasks was the same namely: “Do you think that adolescents should spend more time in nature?” In order to minimize the argumentation and expression differences across participants five possible arguments were provided to participants They were also given 2 min to prepare their speech Though they could take notes for that purpose if they wished they were not allowed to use the notes when they delivered their speech to prevent them from reading the whole speech The three topics for each of the three VR and Non-VR training sessions were the following: “What would the house of my dreams be like?” “Is graffiti a form of art?” and “Can happiness be bought?” The instructions given to participants for the preparation of their speeches during the training sessions was the same as the instructions given to them for the pre- and post-test public speaking tasks The structure of this between-subjects training study was a pre-training phase followed by a training period and a post-training phase (see Figure 1) an information session was organized by the experimenter in each of the high-schools and served the purpose of preparing the students for the pre-training session and explaining the experiment's procedure and overall schedule that participants would have to bear in mind when delivering a speech Pre and post-training sessions were also conducted by the experimenter and a research assistant Both the research assistant and the 3-people live audience were blinded to the procedure of the study During the information session participants were instructed on how to use VR and they could familiarize themselves with the VR goggles all participants carried out a post-training which consisted of the same persuasive public speaking task as the pre-training four 17-year-old students participated in a 3-h pilot session in which they were asked to prepare 3 speeches in 2 min to give in front of a small audience following our target set of instructions The instructions informed participants of the amount of time they would have to prepare and to deliver the speech For every speech they were given a written script of ideas related to the topic that they could use to include in their presentations The pilot session contributed to refine and validate the final scripts and the procedure we realized that if speakers were allowed to use their written outline while speaking they were reading from it most of the time we did not allow participants to have the outline with them to prevent them from reading and to enhance their connection with the audience The experiment was performed individually in separate classrooms at the four high schools The first author of the study was the experimenter and in charge of the data collection All 5 public speaking tasks per student (3 during the training phase and 2 at pre- and post-training) were video recorded All participants started with the same pre-training task which consisted of giving a brief speech in front of a live audience participants received a sheet of instructions in which they were asked to prepare and then deliver a 2-min persuasive speech in front of three representatives of the Catalan Department of Education to convince them to increase funding for secondary school field trips to the countryside Participants were allotted 2 min to prepare their speech and did so alone in an empty classroom After the 2 min of preparation had elapsed The procedure was repeated for the post-training public speaking task Note that a timer is also visible in the view provided by the VR headset to allow speakers to monitor their use of time and not exceed the 2-min limit Although we did not control for previous use of VR among participants none reported any kind of discomfort wearing the VR goggles Screenshot of the VR scenario with a virtual audience generated by BeyondVR Participants were given the SUDS assessment sheet just prior to entering the room where they would give their pre- and post-training speeches a brief online satisfaction questionnaire was sent to all participants asking the following three questions: “Did you feel comfortable participating in the experiment?” “Did you have fun?” and “Did you find the experiment useful for your current oral presentations?” They were asked to assess their satisfaction level using a Likert scale that ranged from 1 to 10 Nine (out of the 20) Non-VR participants and 19 (out of the 30) VR participants answered the online survey A total of 100 pre-training and post-training speeches were obtained from the 50 participants (50 participants ×2 pre- and post-training speeches) The target persuasive speeches were assessed for the following features namely (a) persuasiveness and charisma (Persuasiveness and charisma); (b) voice parameters (Voice parameters); (c) manual gesture rate (Manual gesture rate) and a satisfaction questionnaire (Satisfaction questionnaire) Apart from these measures on the actual speeches a self-perceived anxiety SUDS measure and the results of the satisfaction questionnaire were also included in the data analysis They were asked to assess persuasiveness and charisma of the speaker in an intuitive way without carefully analyzing vocabulary nor rhetorical strategies They were asked to rate the speeches as if they were watching TV assessing from 1 to 7 how persuasive the message was and how charismatic they perceived the speaker was Survey questions regarding persuasiveness and charisma the f0 variability (in terms of the standard deviation) one value was determined per prosodic phrase Measured values were checked manually for plausibility Outliers or missing values were corrected by manual measurements all f0 values were recalculated from Hz to semitones (st) relative to a base value of 100 Hz The prosodic domain of calculation for those f0 values was the interpausal unit (IPU) The criterion was the detection of an IPU boundary was the presence of a silent gap interval >= 200 ms with silent gap being defined as a drop in intensity > 25 dB in the sense that higher values (longer mean syllable times) mean less fluent speech” (p All temporal measurements were conducted based on the analyzed presentation as a whole voice-quality measurements were conducted based on the prosodic phrase one value per prosodic phrase was calculated all values were manually checked and corrected This meant that a trained phonetician conducted a visual inspection of the measurement tables and marked potential outliers unplausible values such as “0 Hz” or “600 Hz” for mean f0 and f0 maximum or a F1–F3 formant dispersion of “−1 Hz” these were corrected my manual re-measurements (or deleted from the dataset) First, all communicative gestures were annotated by taking into account the gestural stroke (the most effortful part of the gesture that usually constitutes its semantic unit; (McNeill, 1992; Kendon, 2004)). Non-communicative body movements (self-adaptors, e.g., scratching, touching one's hair; (Ekman and Friesen, 1969)) were excluded Gesture rate was calculated per every speech as the number of gestures produced per speech relative to the phonation time in minutes (gestures/phonation time) The means for each of the three questions of the satisfaction questionnaire and the reliability of the questionnaire (using Cronbach's Alpha) were calculated The statistical analyses were performed using IBM SPSS Statistics 19 A set of GLMMs were run for five independent variables The models include Condition (two levels: VR and Non-VR) and Time (two levels: Time 1-pre-training; Time 2-post-training) and their interactions as fixed factors Pairwise comparisons and post-hoc tests were carried out for the significant main effects and interactions an independent a t-test was performed for each of the three questions in the satisfaction questionnaire To make sure that there was rater interreliability we performed a Reliability Analysis using the Intraclass Correlation Coefficient (ICC) The GLMM analysis for SUDS showed a main effect of Condition [F(1 which indicated that in general (both at pre- and post-training) Non-VR values were higher than VR values (β = 13.792 showing that SUDS values where lower at post-training regardless of the condition (β = 8.292 No significant interaction between Condition and Time was obtained showing that the two conditions were not significantly different in triggering SUDS differences in the post-training public speaking task The GLMM analysis for persuasiveness showed a main effect of Condition [F(1 which indicated that Non-VR values were higher than VR values (β = 9.869 revealing an imbalance in the values at pre-test across groups in the form of an offset toward generally higher persuasiveness ratings in the Non-VR group as compared to the VR group (both at pre and post-test) The interactions between Time and Condition were not significant meaning that the training conditions did not have a significantly different effect on the persuasiveness scores at post-training the GLMM analysis showed a main effect of Condition [F(1 which indicated that in general (both at pre- and post-training) Non-VR values were higher than VR values (β = 12.216 The analysis also showed a significant interaction between Time and Condition [F(1 which indicated that both at pre-training and post-training the scores for Charisma of the Non-VR group were significantly higher than of the VR group: pre-training (β = 13.821 Regarding the f0 domain, five GLMMs were applied to our target variables, namely minimum and maximum f0, f0 variability (in terms of the standard deviation), mean f0 and f0 range. Table 2 shows a summary of those GLMM analyses in terms of main effects (Time and Condition) as well as interactions between Time and Condition a main effect of Time was obtained only for f0 variability meaning that the post-training values in both groups were higher than the pre-training values A main effect of Condition was obtained for 3 variables (namely meaning that the participants in the VR group obtained higher f0 values and larger f0 ranges across both pre- and post-training phases A significant interaction was obtained for f0 range but no significant post-hocs reached significance Summary of the GLMM analyses for the 5 f0 variables Regarding the tempo domain, a set of 7 GLMMs were applied to our target variables, namely total number of syllables, total number of silent pauses, total time of the presentation, total speaking time, the speech rate, the net syllable rate and ASD. Table 3 shows a summary of those GLMM analyses in terms of main effects (Time and Condition) no main effects of Time were obtained for any of the parameters of the duration domain A main effect of Condition was obtained for three variables: speech rate meaning that the participants in the VR group obtained higher speech rate net syllable rate (or articulation rate) values Summary of the GLMM analyses for the 3 duration variables In the domain of voice quality measurements, a set of 9 GLMMs were applied to our target variables, as explained in section Voice parameters above, namely h1*-h2*, h1-A3, CPP, HNR, CoG, formant dispersion, median pitch, shimmer, and jitter. Table 4 shows a summary of those GLMM analyses in terms of main effects (Time and Condition) A set of 9 GLMMs were applied to our target variables a main effect of Time was obtained for 4 variables meaning that pre-training values were lower at pre-training across groups A main effect of Condition was obtained for 4 variables meaning that the participants in the VR group obtained higher values compared to the Non-VR group Summary of the GLMM analyses for the 10 voice variables Mean articulation rate values at pre- and post-training The GLMM analysis showed a significant interaction between Time and Condition [F(1 No main effects of Time and Condition were found Table 5 shows the descriptive results for the 3 questions in the satisfaction questionnaire the responses to the latter two questions yielded higher ratings for the VR group than for the Non-VR group participants of the VR group had on average 0.33 scale points more fun with the training task than their Non-VR counterparts and even considered that the perceived usefulness of the VR training was 1.88 scale points higher than their Non-VR counterparts Yet while the latter difference is statistically significant [t(28) = 2.891 We also assessed the reliability of the questionnaire using Cronbach's Alpha it is considered that a good reliability score is >= 0.5 and the Cronbach's Alpha score obtained was 0.725 Descriptive results of the satisfaction questionnaire separated into the VR and Non-VR conditions The purpose of this experiment was to examine the impact of a 3-session VR public speaking training on the quality of the oral presentations of a group of 50 secondary school participants when speaking in front of a live audience we assessed the value of two complementary ways of rehearsing speeches namely rehearsing with a VR audience or rehearsing alone in a room we designed a between-subjects experiment with a pre-training three training sessions and a post-training so that we could compare pre- to post-training speeches between a VR test condition and a baseline condition of Non-VR training The duration between pre- and post-training was 5 weeks One of the key contributions of this study is that it included a comprehensive assessment of the public speaking performance at pre- and post-trainings specifically by assessing whether presenters in the post-training oral presentation achieved lower levels of anxiety and/or a more audience-oriented speech from the point of view of prosodic and gestural features this result is not consistent with the hypothesis related to the stronger reduction of self-perceived anxiety in the VR group as no differences were obtained for the VR and the Non-VR groups Probably the reason why no differences were found between groups was due to the significant difference at pre-training (a 17-point difference higher for VR) that prevented VR speakers to reduce their self-perceived anxiety to a larger extent which was not found at post-training for any of the conditions Non-VR participants significantly decreased their values meaning that they increased their fluency at post-training but even with this increase were not able to reach the high level of fluency that the VR group was able to maintain at post-training Voice-quality results show how VR speakers increased their CPP levels from pre-training to post-training speeches Higher CPP levels are an indication that speakers' voices got clearer and more resonant and confident after training while the VR speakers significantly increased their clarity and resonance Very likely this is caused by a reduced vocal effort Four variables obtained a main effect of Time h1*-h2* meaning that values of both conditions were lower at pre-training As for a main effect of condition h1*-h2* and median pitch values were generally higher for the VR condition Non-VR speakers significantly raised the articulation rate they spoke at a faster pace in the post-training task meaning that they reduced their fluency at post-training The Non-VR group thus showed talking faster (>art rate) and reduce syllable durations (< ASD) probably as a function of rate and fewer pitch accents this is in our coaching experience the typical constellation of a bored routine presentation—that does not aim to get a message across to an audience but only to put words into sound where the training condition (unlike in our VR condition) included an explicit visualization and color-coded real-time evaluation of speech melody our hypothesis regarding an increase in gesture rate for the VR condition is not supported was not enough to obtain positive results in many of the other variables that were analyzed within prosodic parameters when the VR-trained speakers were in front of a live audience a lower SUDS and a more clear voice quality achieved by the VR group were not enough to boost persuasiveness and charisma scores after the training sessions the match that we expected to see between a more charismatic style in terms of prosodic parameters and the ratings on persuasiveness and charisma was not obtained and we can conclude that the changes in prosodic cues triggered by the VR training were not sufficient to promote a gain in those ratings Future longitudinal studies could be carried out in order to control for the students' perception of enjoyment and usefulness while using VR to ascertain whether the strong value that they assign to VR would remain constant or it is a result of the technology novelty and adding feedback strategies could be regarded as future aims both in research and in practice the results of this study serve as a good starting point to continue developing our knowledge about the relationship between VR public speaking practice in secondary school education self-confidence and the expected improvement in the quality of oral presentations The original contributions presented in the study are included in the article/supplementary material further inquiries can be directed to the corresponding author This study was approved by the Commission Project Ethical Revision (Comissió Institucional de Revisió Ètica de Projectes CIREP-UPF) and Recercaixa Project [2017 ACUP 00249] ethical approval Written informed consent obtained from each participant and/or their legal representative All authors listed have made a substantial and intellectual contribution to the work and approved it for publication This work benefited from funding awarded by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (PGC2018-097007-B-I00 PID2021-123823NB-I00) and the Generalitat de Catalunya (2017 SGR_971) We also acknowledge the support from the Recercaixa Project (RecerCaixa 2017ACUP 00249) and the Department of Translation at Universitat Pompeu Fabra through a 1-year doctoral grant to ÏV-R young girls and boys of the four high-schools for believing in the experiment and being so respectful throughout the study Also to the high-school boards and teachers for being so supportive of the project and Patrick Rohrer (members of the GrEP group) for your help during data collection And also GrEP group colleagues Júlia Florit Pons Xiaotong Xi and Yuan Zhang for your great help with statistics for being so patient and motivated to be part of the experiment and Emma Rodero for contributing to our research as committee members of the MA thesis and Ph.D a special thanks to the 15 raters that assessed the persuasiveness and charisma of all participants Author ON is CEO of the speech-technology company AllGoodSpeakers ApS. Please see https://oliverniebuhr.com/conflict-of-interest.html for further information The remaining authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher 1. ^Anuaris Estadístics de la Ciutat de Barcelona. 1996–2020 (Barcelona's Statistical Annual Directory): https://ajuntament.barcelona.cat/estadistica/catala/Anuaris/Anuaris/anuari19/cap06/C0616010.htm 2. ^https://www.alchemer.com/ 3. ^“The term jitter describes the small period-to-period variation in f0 and hence deviation of a speaker's voice from strict periodicity” (Niebuhr et al., 2020 Audience perceptions of charismatic and non-charismatic oratory: the case of management gurus CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar Projecting sensations to external objects: evidence from skin conductance response “The use of doppelgangers in virtual reality to treat public speaking anxiety: a gender comparison,” in Proceedings of the International Society for Presence Research Annual Conference (Vienna) Google Scholar A historical view of the pedagogy of public speaking CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar Acoustic profiles in vocal emotion expression PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar decision-making errors in the selection of speech introduction strategies and adherence to strategy CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar Effects of public speaking trait anxiety and intensity of speaking task on heart rate during performance CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar “Decision rule orientation and public speaking apprehension,” in Communication Google Scholar Milestones of anticipatory public speaking anxiety CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar PRAAT: Doing Phonetics by Computer (Version 5.2.34) Google Scholar The added benefit of an extra practice session in virtual reality on the development of presentation skills: a randomized control trial CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar Internet-based interventions for social anxiety disorder - an overview CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar “An entrained rhythm's frequency influences temporal sampling of speech,” in Proceedings of Interspeech 2017 (Stockholm) The benefits of nature experience: Improved affect and cognition The effectiveness of verbal self- guidance as a transfer of training intervention: its impact on presentation performance Effects of different types of virtual reality display on presence and learning in a safety training scenario Effects of imagined interactions and rehearsal on speaking performance CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar “Exploring feedback strategies to improve public speaking: an interactive virtual audience framework,” in Proceedings of the 2015 ACM International Joint Conference on Pervasive and Ubiquitous Computing (ACM) (Osaka) Effects of encouraging the use of gestures on speech What are the learning affordances of 3-D virtual environments? 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Available online at: http://www.ifets.info/journals/14_4/16.pdf Google Scholar A pilot of acceptance and commitment therapy for public speaking anxiety delivered with group videoconferencing and virtual reality exposure Behavioral therapy and virtual reality exposure for public speaking anxiety Long-term adaptation to change in implicit contextual learning Instructions for the PRE- and POST-training public speaking tasks Situation: Three representatives of the Education Department have come to your high-school to listen to the proposals of a group of students They're thinking of assigning more budget to school trips Your claim is that adolescents need to spend more time in nature and not so many hours inside the city schools In order to argue in favor of your proposal you have prepared a list of studies with data that will allow you to convince the representatives to assign more budget to this field - More than 50% of the population lives nowadays in urban areas. It is estimated that in 2050 the number will increase up to a 70% (Bratman et al., 2015) - People surrounded of less trees suffer more stress and higher mortality rates - Be surrounded of nature reduces the stress hormone - Be surrounded of nature increases cardiovascular and metabolic health - Strolling in the forest increases creativity vitality and relaxation (Finnish Forest Research Institute) Instructions for the TRAINING 1 public speakingn task Script that can help you prepare the structure and content of the message: - What would be essential to be part of the house - Would you live alone or would you like to share it with other people Instructions for the TRAINING 2 public speaking task - Why are they important/necessary or the opposite - What makes you state that it is art or not and why Instructions for the TRAINING 3 public speaking task - What does money buy and what doesn't - What makes you state or negate the topic sentence - Use examples or experience that can illustrate feelings of happiness Niebuhr O and Prieto P (2022) Unguided virtual-reality training can enhance the oral presentation skills of high-school students Received: 01 April 2022; Accepted: 23 August 2022; Published: 30 September 2022 Copyright © 2022 Valls-Ratés, Niebuhr and Prieto. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY) distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited in accordance with accepted academic practice distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms *Correspondence: Ïo Valls-Ratés, aW8udmFsbHNAdXBmLmVkdQ== †These authors have contributed equally to this work ‡ORCID: Ïo Valls-Ratés orcid.org/0000-0001-9511-6927 Oliver Niebuhr orcid.org/0000-0002-8623-1680 Pilar Prieto orcid.org/0000-0001-8175-1081 Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher 94% of researchers rate our articles as excellent or goodLearn more about the work of our research integrity team to safeguard the quality of each article we publish 2024The succes that Leo Valls has had with skateable architecture in public spaces in his hometown of Bordeaux He just clued us in on this festival the city has coming up CONNECT will feature new skateable sculptures in public spaces skate crews and organizations are confirmed (university of Tokyo Subscribe to our newsletter and stay connected. Be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel for more quality skate content. By Blair Alley is the Content Director for TransWorld SKATEboarding. PRAIRIE COUNTY (KATV) — UPDATE: 1:50 p.m.(7/26/24) ASP held a press conference today at 1:30 p.m. about the shooting that took place July 25 in De Valls Bluff. The suspect was identified as 32 year-old Darrel Lawayne Esau II, who was wanted on warrants for first-degree and attempted murder, and had been wanted by law enforcement for over a year. U.S. Marshals had been searching for Esau for over a year and a half. He had felony warrants in Little Rock, Sherwood, and Pulaski County, and he had been sought after by the Arkansas Division of Community Correction (ACC). U.S. Marshalls identified him and attempted to take him into custody around 9 a.m. There were over 150 law enforcement on the scenes, as they engaged in a shootout with the suspect. The suspect bean firing at law enforcement, and barricaded himself in the house. They attempted to negotiate with him, but negotiations fell apart after two hours. The suspect fired 169 rounds and had 6 weapons, two of which were high-powered rifles. More than 400 rounds were traded between police and the criminal. The weapons of the suspect will be processed by the ATF. Arkansas State Police say a man is dead after exchanging gunfire with law enforcement. ASP says the suspectbarricaded himself inside a home on East Walnut Streetin De Valls Bluff around 9:30 am Thursday. This led to a nearly 4-hour standoff with multiple law enforcement agencies. According to ASP, thesuspect was wanted on multiple felony warrants out of Little Rock, Sherwood, and Pulaski County. De Valls Bluff resident Mary Bryd lives right down the street from the suspect and told KATV she was sitting on her porch this morning when a cop car flew down her street. “I was sitting on the porch, and I saw a police officer go by with his blue lights on,” said Byrd. “He turned down the road from my house. Shortly after that, I heard six to eight gunshots and then here comes a bunch of police.” Debora Kendrick said her parents live three houses down from the shooter and her cousin lives right next door. Kendrick said people in the area were told to either leave their homes or stay inside until the situation was over and her parents decided to stay “I was afraid for my parents and all of these other people that are standing here sightseeing,” said Kendrick. “It is just crazy to think that this is where I grew up at and stuff this serious could be happening here in this small town." ASP’s Criminal Investigation Division will lead the investigation, and the FBI will assist with evidence recovery. First published: November 28, 2024 06:32 PM The 'calçot' season officially kicked off in Catalonia this week, with a harvest of over 18 million predicted. Calçots, a unique variety of onion that can be described as a cross between a leek and a spring onion, are a staple of Catalan culture. Originating from Valls in Tarragona, western Catalonia, calçots will be the highlight of barbecue-style gatherings across the country in the coming weeks. The season for calçots begins in November and ends in April, but its peak time symbolically is in January, with a great feast in Valls.  This year, farmers are anticipating a bumper season in both quality and quantity. Thanks to recent rains, the calçots are expected to be "fantastic," with more than 18 million set to be harvested. Restaurants in Alt Camp hope to host over half a million 'calçotades' -traditional gatherings to eat calçots- slightly surpassing last year’s figures. The season was officially launched by 94-year-old Instagrammer Iaia Angeleta, who honored the legacy of the older generation who dedicated their lives to farming. "The name 'calçots' comes from the word 'calçar,' and 'calçar' means when we plant the leaf and it starts to grow, we cover it to make it grow in a long form," Ricote explains. In English, this technique is known as hilling. The word also means 'to wear on one's foot' or 'to shoe' and it comes from the Latin term 'calceus' for a type of boot worn in ancient Rome. Calçots can get messy. They are eaten in a specific way, by holding the green leaves in the center and peeling off the sooty outermost layer. Dip them in the orange 'salvitxada' sauce, and lower them into your mouth from above. Bibs, called 'pitets', are usually provided in restaurants and sometimes gloves are too, but you should still expect to get dirty. One of the most important aspects of calçots is the ritual of eating them. These barbecued onions served on terracotta tiles are not commonly eaten at home, but more so as the centerpiece of events known as calçotades, popular social gatherings with friends and family that usually take place from January to March. Each year, Valls hosts the 'Gran Festa de la Calçotada', a huge calçot festival, complete with competitions for calçot growers, sauce makers, and of course an eating contest. Listen to this episode of our podcast Filling the Sink to learn more about calçots. A new book accusing Opus Dei of dealing in human trafficking forced labor as well as financial malfeasance by members who held powerful positions in a prominent Spanish bank is “absolute nonsense,” according to the organization Opus Dei says it never hid facts from the writer and chose full transparency only for the author to decide to follow “his own narrative” instead of facts titled “Opus: The Cult of Dark Money Human Trafficking and Right-Wing Conspiracy inside the Catholic Church,” was written by financial journalist Gareth Gore and was released in the United States Oct Following the announcement of the book by publisher Simon & Schuster Opus Dei released a statement April 30 saying that the accusations of human trafficking theft and political conspiracy alleged in Gore’s book were “absolutely false.” Opus Dei said it answered questions from Gore and facilitated contact “with people in London responding to his requests for information and interest in specific topics.” “We regret that the publicity now being put out by the publisher is more typical of a book of conspiracy theories and forced speculation than of the rigorous research we understood the author intended to carry out,” the statement read groups and ecclesial realities within the Catholic Church Opus Dei (Latin for “Work of God”) centers on attaining holiness through ordinary life John Paul II designated Opus Dei as a personal prelature a canonical structure comprised of both laity and clergy and it is the only group in the church with such a distinction the prelature was comprised of an estimated 93,784 people as well as gaining the admiration of several pontiffs throughout the years the prelature has also been at the center of controversies amid speculation about its internal workings It has also faced accusations of sexual abuse and abuse of power along with its alleged support of the right-wing dictatorship of Spanish General Francisco Franco Those controversies gained prominence following the release of Dan Brown’s controversial fiction novel “The Da Vinci Code” and the movie based on the book starring Tom Hanks which featured a devious plot involving Opus Dei the new book’s author told OSV News Sept 25 that he “never set out to write a book about Opus Dei.” What began as a magazine report on the 2017 collapse of Spain’s Banco Popular led him to “a completely unexpected story.” “I simply followed the money and soon found myself in the middle of a completely unexpected story — a real-life conspiracy that for decades had remained hidden in plain sight involving billions of dollars that had been siphoned from the bank to fund Opus Dei’s expansion to every corner of the globe,” Gore said the story Gore captured is much more than a twisted mirror — it’s “gravely calumnious” — the organization said A significant portion of the book revolved around the life of Luis Valls Taberner a member of Opus Dei who served as president of Banco Popular from 1972-2004 Banco Popular was Spain’s fifth largest bank before its collapse Among the allegations made in the book is that Valls Taberner and other Banco Popular executives who belonged to Opus Dei placed the prelature’s interests ahead of the bank he argued that the bank’s structure and its funneling of money to Opus Dei-linked charities and foundations “were a severe constraint on the bank as it struggled to fight for its life and contributed to the eventual collapse of the bank.” Valls Taberner created three charitable foundations: Fundación Hispanica Fomento de Fundaciones and Fundación Patronato Universitario took issue with the accusations made in Gore’s book including that he was essentially stealing money from Banco Popular to give to Opus Dei “This is completely false,” de la Cierva said which means that he was always respecting the interest of the shareholders He also said that donations made to the foundations were “personal donations” and that “board members renounced being paid and asked the bank to pass their own money to the foundations.” De la Cierva also countered the negative portrayal in the book of contributions to Opus Dei from its members likening it to alumni from Harvard or Princeton “who give a lot of money to their alma mater.” “Opus Dei members can give whatever they want to any cause and it’s not suspicious that an Opus Dei member helps an Opus Dei institution Valls Taberner’s portrayal in the book was that of “a weak person (who was) very easily manipulated by Opus Dei.” De la Cierva said the banker was “exactly the opposite.” “was completely open-minded,” a man of personal integrity and honesty who would personally pick up the phone with complaints from clients of his bank to know what could be improved in the institution he ran “The problem with the book is that we introduced him (Gore) to many direct witnesses and he discarded every single witness when it didn’t go with his narrative,” de la Cierva said “This is why I say it is biased and sectarian.” the people interviewed by the author “called the foundation saying ‘I heard that this book is against Luis Valls but he (Gore) told me it was a biography in order to praise” the banker “From an institutional point of view it’s a break of trust,” de la Cierva said “Someone introducing himself as a biographer and then doing the exact opposite — it’s really bad.” I think it is completely abusive to attack someone who cannot defend himself,” he said “It’s nothing more than a character assassination.” He also took issue with the insinuation that Taberner’s affiliation with Opus Dei as well as those of Banco Popular executives “Can we blame Luis Valls for the collapse of the bank?” he asked but he resigned (as the bank’s president) in 2004 which is 13 years” before Banco Popular collapsed “The portrait that Gore is making of Luis Valls is abusive It’s completely wrong,” he added the foundations linked to Valls Taberner said that “to criticize a banker for helping people in need instead of buying himself a yacht or a private plane is absolute nonsense,” adding “To attribute to him the disappearance of the bank thirteen years after his leaving the presidency and eleven years after his death is not only absurd; it is also despicable.” “The story of Luis Valls Taberner is a story of altruism empathy and dedication,” the foundations stressed press officer for Opus Dei said he was struck by several allegations in the book including Opus Dei’s connections with prominent American conservatives and “how evil they are and their program to take away hard-earned rights from people.” One such connection mentioned at length is Leonard Leo co-chairman of The Federalist Society and a conservative legal activist believed to be behind the nomination of several conservative justices to the U.S Supreme Court and who is affiliated with the Opus Dei-run Catholic Information Center in Washington 13 that the book was “awful” and said Gore “doesn’t actually say things very accurately.” “None of the people in those groups that (Gore) mentioned are members of Opus Dei,” Valero said “although some of them do go to the Catholic Information Center” for Mass or various events it hosts Valero also said that due to the fact that Gore is “nonreligious,” it was hard for him to accept “that people join Opus Dei for religious reasons to give themselves to God and to dedicate their lives because God calls them.” In the book “there’s no other explanation for any action of Opus Dei members except money control and recruitment,” Valero told OSV News Gore said the dismissal of his book on grounds that he did not understand the religious organization was dismissive to “more than a hundred victims I spoke to — many of whom have years of formal religious study and several of whom are practicing Catholic priests.” “It’s an attempt to dismiss these very serious allegations without actually engaging with any of the facts — it is lazy and it is disrespectful to the victims,” he told OSV News that Gore’s interpretation of certain events is “a real parody of reality.” Escrivá) saw the terrace of the flat where they were staying was facing the Vatican and he could see the window of the pope he was so moved by this that he started praying for the pope and stayed there praying for the pope all night.” “But in Gore’s retelling,” Valero told OSV News saw that he was opposite the Vatican and spent the night reflecting on how much power he had managed to obtain in less than 20 years and retelling every story of the founder’s life … (it’s) very sad.'” Gore downplayed Opus Dei’s accusations of “grave falsehoods” in the book and said the organization should “actually engage with the shocking allegations of abuse and manipulation detailed in the book.” The book detailed allegations made publicly by former members a women’s branch within the prelature that primarily attends to the domestic needs of Opus Dei centers for both men and women Valero acknowledged that “there have been cases of abuse that relate to members of Opus Dei in the last few years” and that the prelature has established mechanisms for current and former members to report to their safeguarding office and the police Valero told OSV News he took issue with Gore’s depiction of Opus Dei as “this nasty organization there are only four or five cases,” he said they’re just mixed up with so much fiction that it is hard to tell what is fact and what is fiction now.” Gore dismissed Valero’s opinion on the book noting that it included “more than 100 pages of endnotes detailing my sources” and that it was “easy to tell the difference between what is fact and what is fiction.” Foundations close to banker Valls Taberner said however “the author has decided to discard all the good facts and episodes that many witnesses have told him and publish only the voices of the few but inevitable critics that any public figure may have,” voicing concerns about Opus Dei the instances described in the book are “absolute nonsense.”  Print Catholic Review Media communicates the Gospel and its impact on people’s lives in the Archdiocese of Baltimore and beyond Catholic Review Media provides intergenerational communications that inform inspire and engage Catholics and all of good will in the mission of Christ through diverse forms of media Catholic Media Assocation Maryland-Delaware-DC Press Association The Associated Church Press Celebrating Leadership and Inclusion: Second Edition of the Navarro-Valls Award Recognizing the Humanitarian and Educational Commitment in Rome The second edition of the Joaquín Navarro-Valls International Award for Leadership and Benevolence is scheduled for July 8 in Rome Organized by the Biomedical University Foundation this event will highlight outstanding figures for their leadership and significant contributions to society the award seeks to recognize those who promote human well-being and inclusion especially among students from disadvantaged backgrounds The event will take place in the Sala della Protomoteca of the Capitoline Museums in Rome and will feature the participation of a distinguished jury chaired by Federico Eichberg and composed of prominent figures such as Paolo Arullani and Bianca Maria Farina the ceremony will serve as a platform to raise funds for scholarships at the Campus Bio-Médico University of Rome thus supporting the development of deserving and less privileged talents The Navarro-Valls Prize not only celebrates the legacy of its co-founder but also seeks to inspire models of leadership and benevolence that promote a more inclusive and supportive society Recognizing achievements in areas ranging from cultural to scientific this event highlights the importance of responsible and sustainable social commitment in line with values ​​of dignity and respect for all individuals Conclave 2025: More Voters Than Ever to Elect Francis’ Successor On the Road to the Conclave: The Church Prepares to Elect the New Pope on May 7 What are the Congregations before the Conclave Tweets by Pontifex “Benevolence means contributing to the growth of the person in his humanity” the historic spokesman of Pope Saint John Paul II who served as director of the Holy See Press Office from 1984 to 2006 This compassionate disposition towards others combined with a managerial position was a quality of the late Spanish doctor and journalist to whom the "Joaquìn Navarro-Valls International Award for Leadership and Benevolence" has been dedicated The award was established in 2023 by the Biomedical University Foundation a non-profit organization supporting the Campus Bio-Medico University of Rome and the Campus Bio-Medico University Hospital Foundation which Navarro-Valls himself helped to establish in 2015 It is awarded to "eminent personalities” with the aim "of promoting models that contribute to the improvement of society through solidarity and benevolence for a more responsible the objective of the initiative is also the creation of ten scholarships for the most deserving students of the Bio Medico Campus The second edition of the award took place on Monday 8 July in the Statuary Hall of the Capitoline Hill The winner for the senior category this year was  Lina Tombolato Doris who in 2022 created the Ennio Doris Foundation in memory of her husband founder of the Mediolanum bank who had passed away the previous year According to the Biomedical University Foundation Ms Tombolato Doris has promoted “several projects in favour of underprivileged children scholarships for university and technical training provided to young people from disadvantaged backgrounds as well as activities to support families and the elderly  with the desire to accompany people in need." president and founder of the NGO “Still I Rise” was the winner of the award for the junior category Govoni created his association in 2018 on the island of Samos in Greece to address the educational emergency of migrant and vulnerable children Colombia and India and has taken care of the education of approximately 20 thousand children "Nominated for the 2020 Nobel Peace Prize Nicolò Govoni has shown generosity and human consistency over time in his commitment to the issues of education and support for children and adolescents in vulnerable situations" said the Biomedical University Foundation some personalities shared their memories of Mr Navarro-Valls was "El Portavoz" (spokesman He shared with the Pope the same idea of ​​institutional communication and professionalism and leadership united with humanity recalling Navarro-Valls' emotion in front of his colleagues in the Press Office a few hours before the death of St It is not surprising that the journalists’ room at the Holy See Press Office has been named after Navarro-Valls himself since 2019 deputy director of the Dicastery for Communication and in 2019 director of the Press Office Along with his successor Father Federico Lombardi he taught us that information is important for the Church and the Holy See but only interesting and not interesting questions He also highlighted the importance of cordiality with all colleagues ensuring that different roles never result in distance Thank you for reading our article. 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Just click here French Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau leaves after the first Council of Ministers under the new government at the Elysee Palace in Paris French Prime Minister Francois Bayrou unveiled the new government on Dec according to a press release from the Elysee French Prime Minister Francois Bayrou (3rd L front) arrives with government members for the first Council of Ministers under the new government at the Elysee Palace in Paris French Prime Minister Francois Bayrou (3rd R French Prime Minister Francois Bayrou (L) and Minister of Armed Forces Sebastian Lecornu leave after the first Council of Ministers under the new government at the Elysee Palace in Paris French Prime Minister Francois Bayrou leaves after the first Council of Ministers under the new government at the Elysee Palace in Paris French minister for overseas territories and also former prime minister leaves after the first Council of Ministers under the new government at the Elysee Palace in Paris French Minister of Culture Rachida Dati leaves after the first Council of Ministers under the new government at the Elysee Palace in Paris finance and industrial and digital sovereignty arrives for the first Council of Ministers under the new government at the Elysee Palace in Paris French Prime Minister Francois Bayrou (2nd R French minister of justice and also former interior minister Francois Bayrou unveiled the new government on Dec New Zealand Foreign Minister Winston Peters has wrapped up "a constructive and positive visit" to New Caledonia Peters met the French Minister for Overseas Territories Manuel Valls and the New Caledonia government's President Alcide Ponga Peters said the goal was to listen and learn The French territory faced months of rioting over an amendment to its constitution "These institutional discussions in Nouméa over the coming days send a positive signal to the Pacific region about the good faith efforts underway to return peace and stability to New Caledonia," Peters said "We wish everyone involved in the discussions in Nouméa in the coming week well Peters also recommitted New Zealand to helping New Caledonia's development through ongoing constructive but we do have experience over recent decades in promoting economic development across our regions and communities," he said He said economic development is the key to social cohesion and New Zealand hopes there are pragmatic lessons it can share with New Caledonia including through Caledonian entrepreneurs gaining a deeper understanding of the Māori economy Peters and Valls also discussed regional security and foreign interference in the Pacific He said Wellington and Paris have a shared interest in ensuring that the Pacific Islands region is protected from efforts by external influences to undermine good governance and democratic decision making." Peters' office said he also met New Zealand Defence Force (NZDF) personnel taking part in the military exercise Croix du Sud currently under way in New Caledonia and Wallis and Futuna which is focused on humanitarian assistance and emergency response NZDF staff are working alongside forces from other Pacific countries and likeminded partners - hosted by the French Armed Forces in New Caledonia." The New Zealand Deputy Prime Minister travels to Nouméa today where he will hold talks with visiting French Minister for Overseas Manuel Valls Mbappé and Vinícius in Match | Didac Aguirre FIRST TEAM A TV3 Journalist Sows Discord Between Mbappé and Vini After the PenaltyThe Words with Which a Journalist Has Revealed a Supposed Problem Between Kylian Mbappé and Vinicius Júnior06/04/2025 19:00:00h by Didac Aguirre Real Madrid's defeat against Valencia continues to generate various opinions around the world Having had the opportunity to achieve a much more acceptable result Real Madrid failed to secure three important points to an unexpected comment from TV3 journalist Xavier Valls on his X account "Collateral effects of a harmful coexistence," were his words referring to Vinicius Júnior and Kylian Mbappé After the performance of both players during the match Valls claimed that their relationship is being very problematic Although it has been shown that the relationship between Vinicius and Mbappé is quite positive Mbappé and Vinicius Celebrating | Didac Aguirre"Vinicius missing a penalty that Mbappé should've taken," he added to make his stance on this situation clear Considering that Mbappé is a better penalty taker Valls has only focused on stirring up trouble with his comments Since Kylian Mbappé's arrival at Real Madrid last summer With Real Madrid bringing together two of the best players many people thought that Vinicius and Mbappé wouldn't get along it has been the players themselves who have shown their great connection Vinicius and Mbappé are the clear offensive references for Real Madrid Mbappé and Vinicius in Match | Didac AguirreThis situation has only highlighted Valls's poor attempt to destabilize a Real Madrid that has always excelled for its strength With the clear intention of ruining the excellent relationship between Vinicius and Mbappé If there's something the Real Madrid squad has always excelled in it's the ability of its players to face any situation Although Vinicius Júnior missed a penalty that could've changed the match this hasn't caused conflict between him and Kylian Mbappé