title: Kenny Johnson

text: In August 2010, Johnson appeared in the Fox series "Lie to Me", along with several fellow cast members from "The Shield". In 2011, Johnson appeared in Lifetime's series "The Protector", with fellow "Sons of Anarchy" co-star Ally Walker. Johnson also appeared as a regular in NBC's crime drama series "Prime Suspect", playing the contractor boyfriend of the lead character, Detective Jane Timoney (Maria Bello). Also in 2011, Johnson starred as Frank Connor, a convicted drug smuggler who leaves prison after 22 years for one youthful mistake, in "Few Options". In 2012, he guest starred as Tyler Gray in the sixth season of "Burn Notice", and as Greg Marshall in the fourth season of "The Mentalist". That following year, Johnson portrayed U.S. Marshal Max Clayton in the eighth and final season of "Dexter".


title: Kenny Johnson

text: Johnson appeared as Caleb Calhoun, the estranged brother of Norma Bates (Vera Farmiga), in the A&E drama-thriller series "Bates Motel". He recurred in the second season, became a main cast member for the third season, and guest starred in the fourth and fifth seasons. He was then a recurring cast member in the fifth season of "Covert Affairs", playing former CIA paramilitary operative James Decker. Johnson co-starred in the 2015 thriller film "Solace". In August 2015, it was reported that Johnson would be part of the main cast for the second season of ABC's anthology series "Secrets and Lies".


title: Kenny Johnson

text: As of autumn 2017, Johnson portrays Officer Dominique Luca in the CBS drama series "S.W.A.T.", based on the 2003 film of the same name, but the series also closely follows the original 1975-76 ABC series, also of the same name.


title: Kenny Johnson

text: He married his long-term girlfriend, Cathleen Oveson on December 21, 2005. They have one child, Angelica Scarlet (born 7 May 2009). Angelica is also an actress, most notably in a recurring role on "S.W.A.T." as Kelly, where the character played by the elder Johnson, Dominique Luca, becomes her mentor.


title: Kenny Johnson

text: On July 18, 2018, Johnson suffered unspecified injuries while filming the premiere episode of the second season. The scene involved Johnson simulating Luca hanging from the landing gear of a helicopter while the helicopter flies away. Johnson later sued the production company, Sony, over the incident, the case, as of July 2022, is still pending.


title: Mixed martial arts weight classes

text: Mixed martial arts weight classes are weight classes that pertain to the sport of mixed martial arts.


title: Mixed martial arts weight classes

text: Prior to state sanctioning, weight classes were not mandatory since the competitions were held without the approval of the athletic commissions. For instance, the Ultimate Fighting Championship introduced two weight classes at "UFC 12": heavyweight, which grouped competitors above 200 lb (91 kg), and lightweight, which grouped competitors under 200 lb.


title: Mixed martial arts weight classes

text: Weight classes underwent many changes in the ensuing years, but the ability of promotions to autonomously decide their own weight classes eventually disappeared after athletic commissions began supervising mixed martial arts.


title: Mixed martial arts weight classes

text: In 2000, the Unified Rules of Mixed Martial Arts were codified by the New Jersey State Athletic Commission. The California State Athletic Commission had worked extensively on regulation, but their sanctioning of MMA was not implemented due to state governmental issues surrounding the process. California officially sanctioned MMA on December 28, 2005, using the ruleset it helped devise five years previously.


title: Mixed martial arts weight classes

text: Since then, to create uniformity, all state commissions in the United States that regulate mixed martial arts have assimilated these rules into their existing unarmed combat competition rules and statutes. For a promotion to hold mixed martial arts events in a state-sanctioned venue, the promotion must abide by the state athletic commission's body of rules for weight limits.


title: Mixed martial arts weight classes

text: The Unified Rules designate limits for fourteen different weight classes in mixed martial arts; all definitions and measurements are in pounds. The strawweight class was added in 2015. The super lightweight, super welterweight, super middleweight, and cruiserweight classes were added in July 2017.


title: Mixed martial arts weight classes

text: With no state or government laws regarding weight class restrictions, organizations in other countries are free to schedule bouts with little regard for weight differential. However, due to the increasingly competitive and international nature of the sport, weight limits have been set by the promotions themselves, usually in alignment with the Unified Rules, as maintaining standard weight classes is seen as fair and standard for all competitors. Singapore-based ONE Championship banned weight-cutting by dehydration in December 2015 and holds fights based on a competitor's "walking weight", rather than pre-fight weigh-ins. The change took place after 21-year-old Yang Jian Bing died due to dehydration by weight-cutting earlier that month. The new system has been well-received by athletes and other stakeholders in the MMA industry.


title: Mixed martial arts weight classes

text: Weight limits in women's MMA mostly follow the Unified Rules' limits, but organizations that recognize women's championships usually only have titles at the lower end of the table. UFC, for example, recognizes women's titles in the strawweight, flyweight, bantamweight and featherweight classes. Some organizations that recognize women's championships also sanction a separate atomweight title with a limit.


title: Renault Clio

text: The Renault Clio () is a supermini car (B-segment), produced by French automobile manufacturer Renault. It was launched in 1990, and entered its fifth generation in 2019. The Clio has had substantial critical and commercial success, being consistently one of Europe's top-selling cars since its launch, and it is largely credited with restoring Renault's reputation and stature after a difficult second half of the 1980s. The Clio is one of only two cars, the other being the Volkswagen Golf, to have been voted European Car of the Year twice, in 1991 and 2006.


title: Renault Clio

text: The car is named after Clio, one of the nine Muses in Greek mythology. In Japan, it is sold as the Renault Lutecia because Honda retains the rights to the name Clio after establishing the "Honda Clio" sales channel in 1984. Lutecia is derived from the name of "Lutetia", an ancient Roman city that was the predecessor of Paris. The Renault Lutecia was formerly available through Yanase Co., Ltd., but in 1999 Renault purchased a stake in Japanese automaker Nissan. Following Renault's takeover, distribution rights for the Lutecia were handed over to Nissan locations in 2000 and sold at "Nissan Red Stage" locations.


title: Renault Clio

text: Renault had replaced its R5 supermini with a completely redesigned model (which had similar styling to the 1972 original) in 1984, but soon afterwards began working on an all-new supermini to take the company into the 1990s. It was eventually decided that the new car would feature a name designation, rather than the numeric model designations which Renault had traditionally used – this would be adopted across the entire Renault range by 1995. Cars like the Fuego coupe (launched in 1980) had been an exception to this rule, and the last "numeric" Renault was the 19, launched in 1988, and by the end of 1996 the numeric model designations had completely disappeared from the Renault range in Western Europe.


title: Renault Clio

text: The Clio was introduced at the Paris Motor Show in June 1990 and sales in France and the rest of the continent began then, although sales in right-hand drive Britain did not begin until March 1991. The Clio was the replacement to the hugely successful Renault 5, although this car remained in production until 1996 at a factory in Slovenia, where some versions of the Clio were later built. The Clio's suspension and floorpan were largely the same as the R5, which was derived from the R9 saloon of 1981 and R11 hatchback of 1983 – not that of the original 1972 Renault 5, despite the later R5 visually resembling the original model.


title: Renault Clio

text: The suspension uses half-width torsion bars (full-width on higher spec models) with trailing arms at the rear, and coil sprung MacPherson struts, attached to a thick pressed steel subframe at the front. The engine range available at launch included 1.2 L and 1.4 L E-type "Energy" petrol inline-four engines (first seen in the Renault 19) and 1.7 L and 1.9 L diesel engines, both based on the F-type unit. The petrol engines gradually had their carburettors replaced with electronic fuel injection systems by the end of 1992, in order to conform to ever stricter pollutant emission regulations brought in by the EEC.


title: Renault Clio

text: A minor trim facelift occurred after only a year of being on sale. A new "smooth" version of the Renault diamond badge (the previous "ribbed" badge was being phased out at the time) and a new front seat design were the only changes. The altered design did not constitute a new "phase". In March 1994 (at the Geneva Motor Show), the phase two model was launched, with small updates to the exterior and interior of the Clio. Most noticeable was the change in the front grille from two metal ribs to a single colour-coded slat. The bump strips were made slightly larger and rounder and had the car's trim level badge incorporated into them. The badges on the tailgate strip were moved up onto the tailgate itself and the tailgate strip was given a carbon fibre look. The rear light clusters were given a slightly more rounded bubble shape, giving the Clio a more modern look. The clusters, however, are physically interchangeable with phase ones'.


title: Renault Clio

text: In May 1996, with the arrival of the phase three facelifted Clio, the 1.2 L Energy engine was replaced by the 1,149 cc D7F MPi (multi point injection) DiET engine, first used in the Renault Twingo; for some time also, versions were available with the older 1239 cc "Cléon" unit from the original Twingo. The cylinder head design on the 1.4 L E-type was also slightly altered for the phase three models in a bid for better fuel economy. This resulted in the engines producing slightly less power than their earlier versions.


title: Renault Clio

text: The phase three Clios have a slightly more noticeable update than the phase twos. The phase three has different, more rounded headlights, incorporating the turn signal in the unit with the headlight, and the bonnet curves more around the edges of the lights. The tailgate incorporates a third brake light and a new script "Clio" name badge, following the same typeface as contemporary Renaults. Some mechanical improvements were also made, as well as the introduction of side impact bars and airbags, which were now common features on mainstream cars across Europe.


title: Renault Clio

text: Renault also released a hot hatch version of the Clio in 1991. It was aesthetically very similar, but with the addition of a 1.8 L eight-valve engine, side skirts and disc brakes on all wheels. This, with multi-point fuel injection, was badged as the RSi. From 1991 a lighter tuned version of this 1.8 litre engine (with single-point injection) joined the earlier 1.7 used in the very luxurious Baccara version which was sold in some continental European markets. In addition to this reasonably powerful engine, the Baccara has a luxurious interior with much leather and wood, as well as power windows, locks, etc. The Baccara was renamed "Initiale" in 1997, in line with other Renaults, differing from the Baccara mainly in the wheel design.


title: Renault Clio

text: During 1991, a fuel injected 1.8 L 16-valve engine producing (which had debuted on the Renault 19) capable of propelling the car to was introduced to the Clio engine range, known simply as the Clio 16S in France (S for "soupapes", the French word for valves), and Clio 16V in export markets. It was the successor to the Renault 5 GT Turbo, which was discontinued that year as the R5 range was pruned back. As well as having a higher top speed than a regular Clio, the 16S sports wider plastic front wings, an offset bonnet vent, wider rear arches and uprated suspension and brakes, and colour-coded front mirrors and bumpers. The RSi side skirts were omitted, however. Inside, the 16V model has an extended instrument panel that houses dials for engine oil pressure, oil temperature, and oil level (which only indicates on engine start). The seats are also more supportive to match the sporting nature of the model. The non-catalyzed versions, still available in some markets, offer and marginally higher performance with top speeds up to and the 0–100 km/h (62 mph) time dropping from 8 to 7.8 seconds.


title: Renault Clio

text: In December 1990, the Clio was voted European Car of the Year for 1991, and soon became one of Europe's best-selling cars, as well as the first Renault to be consistently among the top-10 best sellers in the United Kingdom, where it was selling in excess of 50,000 units a year by 1995. UK sales were helped by a famous television advertising campaign by Publicis shot in France, featuring the two main characters of Nicole (played by Estelle Skornik) and Papa.


title: Renault Clio

text: From 1991 to 1993, trim levels were identical in every European country. Starting in 1993, trim levels designations became more varied across the various markets. The car was sold as the Renault Lutecia (from "Lutetia", the Latin name for Paris) in Japan, as "Clio" was used there by Honda for one of their domestic marketing networks.


title: Renault Clio

text: In 1993, Renault launched the Clio Williams as a limited edition of 3,800 cars (1,300 more than they needed for homologation purposes) with each car bearing a numbered plaque on the dash. These sold out so quickly that Renault ended up building 1,600 more.


title: Renault Clio

text: After the first series, due to the demand, Renault built the Williams 2 and 3, with more than 12,000 eventually being built. However, many new road cars were directly converted to race cars and when damaged replaced with another converted road car, which means that the actual number of road cars is significantly lower than the figures suggest.


title: Renault Clio

text: The car was named after the then Renault-powered Formula One team WilliamsF1, though Williams had nothing to do with the design or engineering of this Clio. The modifications to the Clio 16S on which it was based were the work of Renault Sport, Renault's motorsport division. Nevertheless, this car had a Formula One link by being the sport's Safety Car in 1996.


title: Renault Clio

text: The naturally aspirated DOHC 4 valves per cylinder fed by Multipoint fuel injection Inline-four engine, was rated at at 6,100 rpm and at 4,500 rpm of torque. It has a top speed of equipped with performance-tuned ride and handling. Renault later released the Williams 2 and Williams 3 special editions, much to the chagrin of those owners who had been assured of the exclusivity of the "original" Williams. One common mistake people can make is thinking that the 2.0 16V (F7R) used in the Williams is simply a bored out 1.8 16V (F7P), whereas, in reality the large engine had different size valves, cams, stroked crank and engine oil cooler. Other differences between the Williams and the Clio 16S it is based on include a wider front track with wishbones similar, but not the same as the Renault 19, wider Speedline alloys, uprated (JC5) gearbox, bespoke four-to-one manifold, firmer suspension, and some cosmetic differences on the exterior and interior.


title: Renault Clio

text: The differences between the three versions of the Williams were largely a reflection of phase changes across the Clio range, e.g. the gradual addition of enhanced safety features and cosmetic variations. Other than this, the Williams 1 and 2 had no sunroof and were painted in 449 Sports Blue. The final Williams 3 was painted in a slightly brighter shade of blue (432 Monaco Blue) and finally gained a sunroof which had long been standard on virtually all previous Clios. The original Williams was the lightest of the three, lacking the electrics necessary for the sunroof or the mirrors, and was the only one to support a metal plaque stating the build number.


title: Renault Clio

text: The Renault Clio Williams was and still is a very popular rally car. The basic racing version (Gr.N) had racing suspension, different engine management, and a more free flowing exhaust. Power output was around . Roll cage was made by Matter France. Bucket seats were made by Sabelt.


title: Renault Clio

text: The next step up was the Gr.A car, which was fitted with 16″ Speedline 2012 rims (with optional extractors), further improvements on suspension and more tuned engine producing between . Front brakes were also updated with 323 mm discs and four-pot Alcon brake calipers.


title: Renault Clio

text: The final evolution was the Renault Clio Williams Maxi kit-car with wider arches and 17″ Speedline 2012 rims and improved Proflex suspension. Sodemo engine was further tuned to .


title: Renault Clio

text: Development of the X65 commenced in 1991, a year after the May 1990 launch of the Clio. In 1992, Pierre Beuzit became project manager of the X65 programme. In December 1993, a final design developed under Patrick Le Quément was approved, with development for production commencing, so in 1994 Renault rented a 129,600-square-foot building in Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines, west of Paris. More than 600 people from Renault and its suppliers went to work there. The X65 project team became a laboratory for Renault's Guyancourt technical center. Forty teams were created, each responsible for a section of the car. In February 1997, management moved market launch by nearly a month from 15 March 1998 to 11 April 1998. Development ended in 1997, as pre-production units began to be constructed at Flins.


title: Renault Clio

text: The second generation of the Clio was launched on 9 March 1998 and sold for less than €8,000, with considerably more rounded and bulbous styling than its predecessor. Part of the radical concept of the new Clio were many components made of unusual materials to save in weight and repair costs. For instance, the front wings were made of plastic (following criticisms of corrosion in this part of the previous model and based on technology developed for the Renault Espace) and the material of the bonnet was aluminium in some versions. Originally the engine lineup was similar to before, with 1.2 L, 1.4 L and 1.6 L petrol engines and a 1.9 L diesel. The project manager from 1992 to 1998 for the Clio II was Pierre Beuzit.


title: Renault Clio

text: In early 2000, a sportive 16V version equipped with a new 1.6 L 16-valve engine was introduced, and eventually, all the older petrol engines were upgraded to more powerful and more economical 16-valve versions.


title: Renault Clio

text: In 1998, Renault launched the Clio Renault Sport (also known as Clio RS for short, named Clio Renault Sport 172 in the UK and sold for less than €17,500 – 172 coming from the DIN method metric horsepower measurement), with a 2.0 L 16-valve engine and a top speed of . The standard Clio RTE powered with by the 1.2 engine could reach 160 km/h. The top-of-the-range Clio, however, was the 2001 mid-engined, rear-wheel drive Clio V6 Renault Sport, originally engineered by Tom Walkinshaw Racing for a one-make racing series, which placed a 3.0 L V6 engine, sourced from the Renault Laguna, behind the front seats, with a top speed of . Production was at the TWR factory in Sweden. Production over 3 years was approximately 1513 vehicles with 256 sold in the UK.


title: Renault Clio

text: In 2000, a few minor changes were made to the Clio range, which included revised specification levels, a new instrument cluster, and a passenger airbag fitted as standard for all models. The Clio achieved a four-star Euro NCAP rating in 2000, which was class-leading at the time.


title: Renault Clio

text: In Japan, Renault was formerly licensed by Yanase Co., Ltd., but in 1999, Renault purchased a stake in Japanese automaker Nissan after Nissan had faced financial troubles following the collapse of the Japanese asset price bubble in 1991 and subsequent Lost Decade. As a result of Renault's purchase of interest, Yanase canceled its licensing contract with Renault in the spring of 2000, and Nissan took over as the sole licensee, hence sales of the Lutecia II in Japan were transferred from "Yanase Store" locations to "Nissan Red Stage Store" locations.


title: Renault Clio

text: An electric version of the Clio was developed by Renault for an electric carshare project in Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines in 1998. Fifty cars were produced, and could be charged by plugging in or by an induction pad located in some of the town's special locations. The electric Clio had a claimed top speed of 60 mph and a range of 35–40 miles. The scheme was branded Praxitèle and membership was charged at £10/month and around £3 for a 30-minute trip.


title: Renault Clio

text: A major facelift occurred in June 2001 (Phase 2) which saw the exterior restyled (most visibly the headlights were made more angular), the interior quality improved with a new dashboard and centre console including the availability of digital climate control air-conditioning and satellite navigation on top models and a 1.5 L common rail Diesel engine added.


title: Renault Clio

text: Major revisions were made to the mid-engine 3.0 litre V6 model in line with the facelift introduced to the regular models in 2001 including revised frontal styling, new dashboard and higher equipment levels including climate control, cruise control and xenon headlights. The power output of the engine was raised by to , giving it a top speed of and a 0–62 mph (100 km/h) time of 5.8 seconds. Emissions are 285g/km and meet Euro IV standards 2 years before the implementation deadline. The chassis was also significantly revised with a slightly longer wheelbase and revised suspension together with larger 18 inch alloy wheels. For the Phase 2 V6, production was transferred from TWR's Swedish factory to the dedicated Renault Sport Alpine factory at Dieppe in Northern France. Production from 2003 to the end of 2005 was approximately 1309 vehicles of which 354 were sold in the UK.


title: Renault Clio

text: On ordinary cars, an interior equipment specification change was made from this model year – fitment of a CD player as standard (as opposed to cassette) on Expression and Dynamique. It remained optional on Authentique and its Rush derivative.


title: Renault Clio

text: In 2004, Phase 3 followed starting on a 53 Plate, this was just some small changes to bring it up to date. The front bumper was changed giving it a wide lower grille and the foglights were bulged out at the side (cars not equipped with foglights remained using the older ph2 bumper), the upper grille was changed and the headlights (which previously had black background) now had grey. The 15" alloy wheels were changed and were now a 15" version of the facelift 172 model on Dynamique and Extreme models. Clear side repeaters were added, as was a colourcoded rear spoiler (again on Dynamique spec cars). In the South American market, the facelifted Clio continued to use the dashboard of the 1998 model and was never updated, except for the Colombian 2008 model that included the same interior of the European version with little changes, and continued having the same exterior as the phase II model.


title: Renault Clio

text: On the inside the pattern on the seats was changed for a simpler one, and the dials were changed to do away with the fuel and water temperature needles and now featured a larger screen that included a digital version of these gauges as well as the mileage and trip computer. Climate control equipped cars were given a vent in the back of the glove box so it could be climate controlled. Under the bonnet a new dCi engine was available (the 1.2 16v also received a new engine developed with Nissan). Rear disks were fitted on 1.6 16v models and DCi 100 models equipped with ESP. On this second facelift, the Clio Renault Sport's power was improved to (in the UK, the designation RS 182 was adopted). For the first time there were two options in chassis stiffness for the RS model. the standard Settings (different from the non-sport models), and CUP badge chassis, 20 mm lower, larger stabilizer bars, and stiffer suspension with dark graphite alloy wheels.


title: Renault Clio

text: At the 2006 Paris International Agricultural Show, Renault exhibited a Hi-Flex Clio II with a 1.6 L 16-valve engine. This vehicle, which addresses the Brazilian market, features Renault-developed flex-fuel technology, with a highly versatile engine that can run on fuel containing a blend of petrol and ethanol in any proportion (0% to 100% of either).


title: Renault Clio

text: The Phase 4 Clio II, known as the Clio Campus, was introduced in 2006 and had a restyled rear end, the number plate moving from boot to bumper, and a better specification on all models. This car stopped being sold in the UK in late 2008, and a revised front end was then released in April 2009 (Phase 5).


title: Renault Clio

text: The last units of the Clio II built in Mexico featured the headlights used on the Nissan Platina, thus becoming the third headlight design to be used in the car. This version lasted a month (January 2010) on sale, before both the Clio and Platina being replaced by the Logan and Sandero due to quality issues. The second generation Clio was marketed until 2012 in France as the Clio Campus, or in Slovenia as the Clio Storia. It is still marketed in Colombia also as Clio Campus since 2012, with the same interior as the pre-facelifted model and a very basic equipment, without airbags or foglights.


title: Renault Clio

text: In October 2012, a new version of the Clio II, called Clio Mío, was introduced at the São Paulo Motor Show, featuring the brand's new design theme. Intended to be the lowest priced Renault model available in Latin America, it was manufactured in Córdoba, Argentina, and featured additional styling and equipment updates. It kept the dashboard of the pre-facelift version, but with new gauges and optional colour matching inserts.


title: Renault Clio

text: The Phase 6 Clio II was also offered in Maghreb, where it kept the name Clio Campus. It was finally retired from production in October 2016.


title: Renault Clio

text: The Clio Mio in its most basic version for Latin America with no airbags received 0 stars for adult occupants and 1 star for infants from Latin NCAP in 2013.


title: Renault Clio

text: In 1999, Renault launched the saloon version of the Clio II, named Clio Symbol in Turkey and Eastern Europe, Thalia in Central Europe, Clio Classic in Asia and North Africa, Clio Sedan in Brazil and Paraguay, or Symbol in the rest of South America (except Argentina where it was called Clio). The car was intended for sale in developing countries, where saloons were traditionally preferred over hatchbacks, most notably in Eastern Europe, where the Thalia was cheaper than the Clio, but was still about 30% more expensive than the Dacia Logan, also sold by Renault as a low cost model. In some Latin American markets the sedan was offered as the Nissan Platina (manufactured in Aguascalientes, Mexico), with slight changes in the front of the car to make it resemble the Nissan Altima. The sedan version of the Clio was facelifted in 2002, with new exterior similar to the facelifted Clio, better equipment and safety levels.


title: Renault Clio

text: In the fall of 2006, an improved Clio sedan has been offered, renamed in Eastern Europe as Renault Symbol. This model featured the interior of the facelifted Clio II with very minor parts commonality with Megane II, as well as new standard and optional equipment, such as automatic air conditioning and a CD player. The model earned moderate reception in the domestic market.


title: Renault Clio

text: Renault introduced the second generation of the Symbol model at the 2008 Moscow Motor Show. This new model featured chrome-trimmed front grille and rear fascia, while powered by similar engines as the Dacia Logan range. It was designed for the Eastern and Central Europe, Russia, Turkey and North Africa, and it was also manufactured in Argentina for South America.


title: Renault Clio

text: In April 2006, the BBC's consumer affairs programme "Watchdog" aired details of over 1,000 incidents involving Clio IIs in which the bonnet flew open without warning while still being driven, usually at high speeds, and sometimes writing the cars off. The problem was found to be caused by the catch not being cleaned and lubricated during servicing causing it to stick in the open position. Renault investigated the issue with the aid of the Vehicle and Operator Services Agency (VOSA) and a "task force" of Renault departments to test the design but found no problem with the bonnet catch and so would not issue a recall. Renault instead wrote to owners of the model and offered to "remedy for free any catches where there has been poor maintenance".


title: Renault Clio

text: "Watchdog" has since claimed other experts have contacted them with accusations that Renault was expecting people to maintain a flawed part that would corrode over time and could cost lives. David Burrowes, MP, Chair of the Government's Road Safety Group, later tabled a motion in the House of Commons urging further action. Renault was accused by its Press Relations Manager Graeme Holt, who quit in protest, of downplaying the serious "fault" and putting customers' lives in danger.


title: Renault Clio

text: The Clio III uses the Nissan B platform, co-developed with Nissan (which Renault has a share in), that is shared with the Renault Modus, the Nissan Micra, and the Nissan Note. It is considerably larger and heavier as well as being more expensive than the Clio II and, at nearly in length, has almost outgrown the supermini class.


title: Renault Clio

text: This was the result of a decision to move the Clio upmarket. It also brings the trademark "Renault Card" keyless immobiliser to the Clio for the first time. The Clio III achieved a 5-star EuroNCAP safety rating. Sales began throughout Europe in October 2005.


title: Renault Clio

text: Clio came with several trims, with the Dynamique having the most variations as it comes with 4 versions, namely the Dynamique, Dynamique S, Dynamique SX and Dynamique TomTom. The Clio Dynamique S comes with 4-wheel disc brakes and 16-inch alloys. Several options were offered, with others that could be added later on, like a sport exhaust made by Sebring, or rear "becquet" (spoiler), to provide a sporty look.


title: Renault Clio

text: It was voted European Car of the Year 2006, becoming the first car to win twice, defeating the rival Volkswagen Passat by just 5 points. The Clio was described by several people as the new benchmark for its category and by one judge as a "great little car that should inspire bigger ones". The trophy for the award was presented in January 2006 to the Renault chief executive at a ceremony in Italy organized by "Auto Magazine".


title: Renault Clio

text: In June 2006 the sales of the third generation Clio Renault Sport started in France for the price of €23,000. The Clio Renault Sport is equipped with a new naturally aspirated 16-valve 2.0 L engine based on the earlier version used in the second generation Clio Renault Sport and a 6-speed manual gearbox. The engine develops at 7250 rpm. The top speed is and 0–100 km/h (62 mph) takes 6.9 seconds.


title: Renault Clio

text: An estate version called Sport Tourer in the UK was unveiled in March 2007. All Clio Estate were built in Turkey by Oyak-Renault. At the same time, Renault replaced the 1.4 L atmospheric engine with a new turbocharged 1.2 TCe version, with and of torque. In the 2nd, 3rd and 4th gears over 4500 rpm the turbocharger adds 5 extra HP.


title: Renault Clio

text: Unlike its predecessors, the Japanese-spec Renault Lutecia III was not available at any Yanase Co., Ltd. dealership location, as Yanase had ended its import rights for Renault after Renault had acquired a stake in Nissan when the Lutecia II was still in production. Instead, the Renault Lutecia III was sold exclusively through "Nissan Red Stage Store" locations.


title: Renault Clio

text: It features better quality materials used in the interior and is better equipped than the pre-facelift model.


title: Renault Clio

text: It is also introduced with a new "Clio RS" variant, intended to slot between the regular Clio and the "Clio 182 RS".


title: Renault Clio

text: The "Clio GT" has a new aggressive front end styling incorporating a black grille, extended side sills, suspension settings unique to the "RS" variant, and a twin tailpipe design with a lip spoiler on the rear end.


title: Renault Clio

text: The Renault Clio III also became the basis for the Renault Clio Gordini 20–34 (limited edition) introduced in the United Kingdom in 2010. The Clio Gordini 200 is equipped with a 2.0L F4R engine which develops . However, the limited edition is priced as low as the usual version.


title: Renault Clio

text: The range was reduced in late 2012, due to the launch of the Clio IV. However, in France and Spain it remained in the range as the Clio Collection and was in production until 2014.


title: Renault Clio

text: The Clio IV was first featured in a Facebook post from September 2011 by Renault which was deleted afterward, with Autoblog calling it a "concept car".


title: Renault Clio

text: The production model was introduced at the September–October 2012 Paris Motor Show, and began marketing a month later. It is available in hatchback body style and starting from early 2013 also as an estate. It is manufactured in Flins, France, and in Bursa, Turkey (main production site), where the estate will particularly be assembled.


title: Renault Clio

text: The Clio IV is only available with five doors, with "hidden" rear door handles near the windows. Another notable difference from the previous generation is the wheelbase, which has been significantly extended and is now near to the one of a compact car. The length and the width have also been increased, but less significantly.


title: Renault Clio

text: The RS version was launched in Mexico in 2014, and was the only French-made product in Renault's Mexican lineup.


title: Renault Clio

text: Revealed at the 2012 Paris Motor Show, the fourth-generation model eliminates manual transmission in favor of a 6-speed EDC dual-clutch transmission (Efficient Double Clutch) developed by Renault Sport engineers. The new model now comes with a DIG-T Nissan MR16DDT inline-four engine, which develops and of torque. It is available exclusively as a five-door model for the first time.


title: Renault Clio

text: In 2016 Renault released a face-lifted version featuring new LED headlights and other minor improvements. There's also a Trophy version that has an improved engine that produces and In 2018, Renault released a limited edition R.S. 18. This model is only available in black with livery inspired by the colour scheme of the company's Formula 1 race car.


title: Renault Clio

text: The Clio IV features new equipment such as hands-free, rear camera connectivity with more than 50 applications (Renault R-Link 7-inch infotainment system, powered by Android & TomTom) and a six-speed dual-clutch transmission that will be available starting early 2013.


title: Renault Clio

text: The range of petrol engines consists of three options: a 1.2-litre 16 valve straight-four engine, with a maximum power output of , a turbocharged 0.9-litre 12 valve straight-3 engine, developing , which can have a emission level of 99 g/km and a 1.2 litre turbocharged engine which produces . A turbocharged 1.6-litre four-cylinder engine, capable of producing , will be featured on the Renault Sport version.


title: Renault Clio

text: The diesel range has two versions of the 1.5 dCi straight-4 engine, one of and one of , which can have a emission level of 83 g/km.


title: Renault Clio

text: In August 2016, the Phase 2 was launched. This introduced a mild cosmetic refresh including new LED headlights and tail lights (standard on high spec models and optional on mid spec), restyled front and rear bumpers, new alloy wheel designs, LED front fog lights and a new front grille. Inside, Clio received a retrimmed steering wheel, updated versions of the MediaNav and R-Link systems (including the addition of DAB digital radio), new interior door panels including a new 4-way mirror adjustment control (the first time this saw a new design since Clio II), and a new gear knob.


title: Renault Clio

text: In 2018, the Clio IV range for the UK market was significantly condensed. The trim levels were reduced to: Play, Iconic and GT Line. The 1.6-litre RS model was dropped from the lineup, as were both 1.2-litre petrol engines and the 110 hp diesel. This left the engine range at the 0.9 TCe petrol engine available with either 75 hp or 90 hp, and the 1.5 dCi 90 hp diesel.


title: Renault Clio

text: In France, despite being replaced by the fifth generation in 2019, the Clio IV (marketed as Renault Clio Génération) remained on offer until August 2020. It is still manufactured in Turkey for some markets until May 2021. After this date, the Clio IV only stays assembled in Algeria for the domestic market.


title: Renault Clio

text: The car is available with many choices of engines & gearboxes. The new modular CMF-B platform also helps to improve efficiency in the new Clio, which offers the option of a hybrid powertrain for the first time. Available from 2020, the E-Tech hybrid drivetrain combines a new-generation 1.6-litre petrol engine with two electric motors, a multi-mode gearbox, and a 1.2-kWh battery. No exact specs of the Clio E-Tech have been released but the hybrid setup is said to provide "maximum efficiency in use with class-leading responsiveness, limited energy waste and quick battery charging when decelerating".


title: Renault Clio

text: The conventional engine lineup includes new turbocharged petrol (1.0 TCe 100 and 1.3 TCe 130) engines, along with the naturally aspirated 1.0 SCe, as well as the Blue dCi 1.5-litre diesel with an output of 85 hp. In total, customers will be able to choose from nine engine/gearbox combinations.


title: Renault Clio

text: The new model comes with an interior that uses higher quality material and finishes (for higher trim levels), sporty seats, a large 9.3-inch touch screen display (with the Easy Link system, compatible with Android Auto and Apple CarPlay and featuring Google Maps and TomTom navigation), customizable driver screen (instrument cluster) that utilizes TFT display, a redesigned, more compact steering wheel, electric handbrake (for the RS Line equipment level), wireless smartphone charger (option for the RS Line trim level), LED headlights (with automatic main beam activation, on select models), hands free parking, 360-degree system of four cameras, lane keeping assistant, adaptive cruise control and road sign recognition, blind spot warning and automatic emergency braking.


title: Renault Clio

text: The Clio has competed in various well-known races and championships such as the Spa 24 hours and British GT. The car competed in the Spa 24 hour race in 1991, 1992, 1993, 1995, 1999 and 2000. Atlanta Motorsport competed in the GT Cup class in 2003 and 2004, both times at Donington Park. The Clio has also been entered in the Nürburgring 24 Hours and Zolder 24 Hours with varying amounts of success.


title: Renault Clio

text: In 2001, Rob Collard entered the BTCC with a Renault Clio in the Production class, which were made up of slower, smaller cars like the Peugeot 306 GTi, the Ford Focus and Honda Accord. Throughout the season, Collard was a common contender in the middle of the field in most races. He was often seen amongst the lower-scoring Peugeot 306s like Tom Boardman and Paul O'Neill. At the end of the season, despite not participating in nine races and getting only eight finishes, initially, he finished 12th with 51 points, but due to a penalty of 5 points, his final position in the championship standings was 13th with 46 points. He scored one podium in the first race at Snetterton, with a 5th-place finish.


title: Renault Clio

text: In 2002, Collard entered again with the Clio for the next season. Unfortunately, out of the ten races he was entered in, he only started four, with the three he finished resulted in him ending up on the podium with a 2nd place in class (7th overall) and a 1st place in class (9th overall) at the first event of the season. After four non-starts at Oulton Park and Thruxton, Collard finished 2nd in class (14th overall) at Silverstone in the first race, later retiring from the second. His last entry in the Clio was at Croft where he didn't start either race. By the end of the season, he initially had 39 points, but 5 were redacted, he remained in his 12th-place finish in the championship standings with 34 points.


title: Renault Clio

text: Versions of the mark-five Clio, the Renault Clio Rally4 and the Renault Clio Rally5, have been produced by Renault Sport for the Rally4 and Rally5 tiers of the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile's Rally Pyramid. Both are wider than their consumer counterpart, which is taller than the rally versions. Both are two-wheel drive, and have a front-axle track of .


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: The Soviet invasion of Poland was a military operation by the Soviet Union without a formal declaration of war. On 17 September 1939, the Soviet Union invaded Poland from the east, 16 days after Nazi Germany invaded Poland from the west. Subsequent military operations lasted for the following 20 days and ended on 6 October 1939 with the two-way division and annexation of the entire territory of the Second Polish Republic by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union. This division is sometimes called the Fourth Partition of Poland. The Soviet (as well as German) invasion of Poland was indirectly indicated in the "secret protocol" of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact signed on 23 August 1939, which divided Poland into "spheres of influence" of the two powers. German and Soviet cooperation in the invasion of Poland has been described as co-belligerence.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: The Red Army, which vastly outnumbered the Polish defenders, achieved its targets, encountering only limited resistance. Some 320,000 Poles were made prisoners of war. The campaign of mass persecution in the newly acquired areas began immediately. In November 1939 the Soviet government annexed the entire Polish territory under its control. Some 13.5 million Polish citizens who fell under the military occupation were made Soviet subjects following show elections conducted by the NKVD secret police in an atmosphere of terror, the results of which were used to legitimise the use of force. A Soviet campaign of political murders and other forms of repression, targeting Polish figures of authority such as military officers, police and priests, began with a wave of arrests and summary executions. The Soviet NKVD sent hundreds of thousands of people from eastern Poland to Siberia and other remote parts of the Soviet Union in four major waves of deportation between 1939 and 1941.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: Soviet forces occupied eastern Poland until the summer of 1941, when Germany terminated its earlier pact with the Soviet Union and invaded the Soviet Union under the code name Operation Barbarossa. The area was under German occupation until the Red Army reconquered it in the summer of 1944. An agreement at the Yalta Conference permitted the Soviet Union to annex territories close to the Curzon Line (which almost coincided with all of their Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact portion of the Second Polish Republic), compensating the Polish People's Republic with the greater southern part of East Prussia and territories east of the Oder–Neisse line. The Soviet Union appended the annexed territories to the Ukrainian, Byelorussian and Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republics.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: After the end of World War II in Europe, the Soviet Union signed the Polish–Soviet border agreement of August 1945 with the new, internationally recognized Polish Provisional Government of National Unity on 16 August 1945. This agreement recognized the status quo as the new official border between the two countries, with the exception of the region around Białystok and a minor part of Galicia east of the San River around Przemyśl, which were later returned to Poland.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: In early 1939, several months before the invasion, the Soviet Union began strategic alliance negotiations with the United Kingdom and France against the crash militarization of Nazi Germany under Adolf Hitler. In August 1939 the USSR made an offer to the United Kingdom and France to send "120 infantry divisions (each with some 19,000 troops), 16 cavalry divisions, 5,000 heavy artillery pieces, 9,500 tanks and up to 5,500 fighter aircraft and bombers on Germany's borders". Since the USSR shared no border with Germany, this would effectively mean an overwhelming occupation of the territories of Poland by the Red Army, which was previously the site of the Polish–Soviet War in 1920. The negotiations failed.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: As the terms were rejected, Joseph Stalin pursued the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact with Adolf Hitler, which was signed on 23 August 1939. This non-aggression pact contained a secret protocol, that drew up the division of Northern and Eastern Europe into German and Soviet spheres of influence in the event of war. One week after the signing of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, German forces invaded Poland from the west, north, and south on 1 September 1939. Polish forces gradually withdrew to the southeast where they prepared for a long defense of the Romanian Bridgehead and awaited the French and British support and relief that they were expecting, but neither the French nor the British came to their rescue. On 17 September 1939 the Soviet Red Army invaded the Kresy regions in accordance with the secret protocol.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: At the opening of hostilities several Polish cities including Dubno, Łuck and Włodzimierz Wołyński let the Red Army in peacefully, convinced that it was marching on in order to fight the Germans. General Juliusz Rómmel of the Polish Army issued an unauthorised order to treat them like an ally before it was too late. The Soviet government announced it was acting to protect the Ukrainians and Belarusians who lived in the eastern part of Poland, because the Polish state had collapsed – according to Soviet propaganda, which perfectly echoed Western sentiment that coined the term "Blitzkrieg" to describe Germany's "lightning war" crushing defeat of Poland after just weeks of battle – and could no longer guarantee the security of its own citizens. Facing a second front, the Polish government concluded that the defense of the Romanian Bridgehead was no longer feasible and ordered an emergency evacuation of all uniformed troops to then-neutral Romania.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: The League of Nations and the peace treaties of the 1919 Paris Peace Conference did not, as it had been hoped, help to promote ideas of reconciliation along European ethnic lines. Epidemic nationalism, fierce political resentment in Central Europe (Germany, Austria, Hungary) where there was strong popular resentment to the War Guilt Clause, and post-colonial chauvinism (Italy) led to frenzied revanchism and territorial ambitions. Józef Piłsudski sought to expand the Polish borders as far east as possible in an attempt to create a Polish-led federation, capable of countering future imperialist action on the part of Russia or Germany. By 1920 the Bolsheviks had emerged victorious from the Russian Civil War and, de facto acquired exclusive control over the government and the regional administration. After all foreign interventions had been repelled, the Red Army, commanded by Trotsky and Stalin (among others) started to advance westward towards the disputed territories intending to encourage Communist movements in Western Europe. The border skirmishes of 1919 progressively escalated and eventually culminated in the Polish–Soviet War in 1920. Following the Polish victory upon the Battle of Warsaw, the Soviets sued for peace and the war ended with an armistice in October 1920. The parties signed a formal peace treaty, the Peace of Riga, on 18 March 1921, dividing the disputed territories between Poland and Soviet Russia. In an action that largely determined the Soviet-Polish border during the interwar period, the Soviets offered the Polish peace delegation territorial concessions in the contested borderland areas, that closely resembled the border between the Russian Empire and the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth before the first partition of 1772. In the aftermath of the peace agreement, the Soviet leaders steadily abandoned the idea of international Communist revolution and did not return to the concept for approximately 20 years. The Conference of Ambassadors and the international community (with the exception of Lithuania) recognized Poland's eastern frontiers in 1923.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: German troops occupied Prague on 15 March 1939. In mid-April, the Soviet Union, Britain and France began trading diplomatic suggestions regarding a political and military agreement to counter potential further German aggression. Poland did not participate in these talks. The tripartite discussions focused on possible guarantees to participating countries should German expansionism continue. The Soviets did not trust the British or the French to honour a collective security agreement, because they had refused to react against the Nationalists during the Spanish Civil War and let the occupation of Czechoslovakia happen without effective opposition. The Soviet Union also suspected that Britain and France would seek to remain on the sidelines during any potential Nazi-Soviet conflict. Stalin, however, had through his emissaries, been conducting secret talks with Nazi Germany as early as 1936 and according to Robert C. Grogin (author of "Natural Enemies"), a mutual understanding with Hitler had always been his preferred diplomatic solution. The Soviet leader sought nothing short of an ironclad guarantee against losing his sphere of influence, and aspired to create a north–south buffer zone from Finland to Romania, conveniently established in the event of an attack. The Soviets demanded the right to enter these countries in case of a security threat. Talks on military matters, that had begun in mid-August, quickly stalled over the topic of Soviet troop passage through Poland in the event of a German attack. British and French officials pressured the Polish government to agree to the Soviet terms. However, Polish officials bluntly refused to allow Soviet troops to enter Polish territory upon expressing grave concerns that once Red Army troops had set foot on Polish soil, they might decline demands to leave. Thereupon Soviet officials suggested that Poland's objections be ignored and that the tripartite agreements be concluded. The British refused the proposal, fearing that such a move would encourage Poland to establish stronger bilateral relations with Germany.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: German officials had secretly been forwarding hints towards Soviet channels for months already, alluding that more favourable terms in a political agreement would be offered than Britain and France. The Soviet Union had meanwhile started discussions with Nazi Germany regarding the establishment of an economic agreement while concurrently negotiating with those of the tripartite group. By late July and early August 1939, Soviet and German diplomats had reached a near-complete consensus on the details for a planned economic agreement and addressed the potential for a desirable political accord. On 19 August 1939, German and Soviet officials concluded the 1939 German–Soviet Commercial Agreement, a mutually beneficial economic treaty that envisaged the trade and exchange of Soviet raw materials for German weapons, military technology and civilian machinery. Two days later, the Soviet Union suspended the tripartite military talks. On 24 August, the Soviet Union and Germany signed the political and military arrangements following the trade agreement, in the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact. This pact included terms of mutual non-aggression and contained secret protocols, that regulated detailed plans for the division of the states of northern and eastern Europe into German and Soviet spheres of influence. The Soviet sphere initially included Latvia, Estonia and Finland. Germany and the Soviet Union would partition Poland. The territories east of the Pisa, Narev, Vistula, and San rivers would fall to the Soviet Union. The pact also provided designs for the Soviet participation in the invasion, that included the opportunity to regain territories ceded to Poland in the Peace of Riga of 1921. The Soviet planners would enlarge the Ukrainian and Belarusian republics to subjugate the entire eastern half of Poland without the threat of disagreement with Adolf Hitler.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: One day after the German-Soviet pact had been signed, French and British military delegations urgently requested a meeting with Soviet military negotiator Kliment Voroshilov. On 25 August Voroshilov acknowledged, that ""in view of the changed political situation, no useful purpose can be served in continuing the conversation."" On the same day, however, Britain and Poland signed the British-Polish Pact of Mutual Assistance, which adjudicated, that Britain commit itself to defend and preserve Poland's sovereignty and independence.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: Hitler tried to dissuade Britain and France from interfering in the upcoming conflict and on 26 August 1939 proposed to make "Wehrmacht" forces available to Britain in the future. At midnight of 29 August, German Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop handed British Ambassador Nevile Henderson a list of terms that would allegedly ensure peace with regard to Poland. Under the terms, Poland was to hand over Danzig (Gdańsk) to Germany and within a year there was a plebiscite (referendum) to be held in the Polish Corridor, based on residency and demography of the year 1919. When the Polish Ambassador Lipski, who met Ribbentrop on 30 August, declared that he did not have the authority to approve of these demands on his own, Ribbentrop dismissed him and his foreign office announced that Poland had rejected the German offer and further negotiations with Poland were abandoned. On 31 August, in a false flag operation German units, posing as regular Polish troops, staged the Gleiwitz incident near the border town of Gleiwitz in Silesia. On the following day (1 September) Hitler announced, that official military actions against Poland had commenced at 4:45 a.m. German air forces bombarded the cities Lwow and Łuck. Polish security service personnel carried out arrests among Ukrainian intelligentsia in Lwow and Przemysl.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: On 1 September 1939 at 11:00 a.m. Moscow time, the counselor of the German embassy in Moscow, Gustav Hilger arrived at the People's Commissariat of Foreign Affairs and formally annunciated the beginning of the German–Polish War, the annexation of Danzig (Gdańsk) as he conveyed a request of the chief of the OKL General Staff that the radio station in Minsk provide signal support. The Soviet side partially adhered to the request. On the same day an extraordinary session of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union confirmed the adoption of its ""Universal Military Duty Act for males aged 17 years and 8 months old"", by which the service draft act of 1937 was extended for another year. Furthermore, the Politburo of the Communist Party approved the proposal of the People's Commissariat of Defense, which envisaged that the Red Army's existing 51 rifle divisions were to be supplemented to a total strength of 76 rifle divisions of 6,000 men, plus 13 mountain divisions and another 33 ordinary rifle divisions of 3,000 men.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: On 2 September 1939 the German Army Group North carried out a maneuver to envelop the forces of the Polish (Pomorze Army) that defended the "Polish Corridor", with the result that the Polish commander General Władysław Bortnowski lost communication with his divisions. The break-through of armored contingents of the German Army Group South near the city of Częstochowa sought to defeat the Polish 6th Infantry Division south of Katowice where the German 5th Armored Division had broken through towards Oświęcim, that captured fuel depots and seized equipment warehouses. To the east detachments of 18th corps of the German 14th Army crossed the Polish–Slovak border near Dukla Pass. The government of the Soviet Union issued directive No. 1355-279сс that approved of the ""Reorganization plan of the Red Army ground forces of 1939–1940"", which regulated detailed division transfers and updated territorial deployment plans for all the 173 future Red Army combat divisions. In addition to the reorganized infantry, the number of corps artillery and the reserve of the Supreme High Command artillery was increased while the number of service units, rear units and institutions was to be reduced. By the evening of 2 September enhanced defense and security measures were implemented at the Polish–Soviet border. Per instruction No. 1720 of the border troop commander in the Belorussian Military District, all detachments were set to permanent combat-ready status.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: The governments of allied Britain and France declared war on Germany on 3 September, but neither undertook agreed-upon military action nor provided any substantial support for Poland. Despite notable Polish success in local border battles, German technical, operational and numerical superiority eventually required the retreat of all Polish forces from the borders towards shorter lines of defense at Warsaw and Lwów. On the same day (3 September), the new Soviet Ambassador in Berlin handed his letter of credence to Adolf Hitler. During the initiation ceremony Shkvartsev and Hitler reassured each other on their commitment to fulfill the terms of the non-aggression agreement. Foreign minister Joachim von Ribbentrop commissioned the German Embassy in Moscow with the assessment of and the report on the likelihood of Soviet intentions for a Red Army invasion into Poland.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: On 4 September 1939 all German navy units in the northern Atlantic Ocean received order "to follow to Murmansk, via the northernmost course". On the same day, the Central Committee of the Communist Party and the government of the Soviet Union approved of the People's Commissar of Defense Kliment Voroshilov's orders to delay retirement and dismissal of Red Army personnel and young commanders for one month and to initiate full-scale training for all air defense detachments and staff in Leningrad, Moscow, Kharkov, in Belorussia and the Kiev Military District.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: On 5 September 1939 the People's Commissar of Foreign Affairs Vyacheslav Molotov received the German Ambassador Friedrich Werner von der Schulenburg. Upon the ambassador's inquiry with regards to a possible deployment of the Red Army into Poland, Molotov answered that the Soviet government ""will definitely have to... start specific actions"" at the right time. ""But we believe that this moment has not yet come"" and ""any haste may ruin things and facilitate the rallying of opponents"".


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: On 10 September, the Polish commander-in-chief, Marshal Edward Rydz-Śmigły, ordered a general retreat to the southeast towards the Romanian Bridgehead. Soon after, Nazi German officials further urged their Soviet counterparts to uphold their agreed-upon part and attack Poland from the east. Molotov and ambassador von der Schulenburg discussed the matter repeatedly but the Soviet Union nevertheless delayed the invasion of eastern Poland, while being occupied with events unfolding in the Far East in relation to the ongoing border disputes with Japan. The Soviet Union needed time to mobilize the Red Army and utilized the diplomatic advantage of waiting to attack after Poland had disintegrated.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: On 14 September, with Poland's collapse at hand, the first statements on a conflict with Poland appeared in the Soviet press. The undeclared war between the Soviet Union and the Empire of Japan at the Battles of Khalkhin Gol had ended with the Molotov–Tojo agreement, signed on 15 September as a ceasefire took effect on 16 September. On 17 September, Molotov delivered a declaration of war to Wacław Grzybowski, the Polish Ambassador in Moscow:


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: Molotov declared via public radio broadcast that all treaties between the Soviet Union and Poland had become void, that the Polish government had abandoned its people as the Polish state had effectively ceased to exist. On the same day, the Red Army crossed the border into Poland.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: On the morning of 17 September 1939, the Polish administration throughout the whole territory of the six eastern voivodeships was still fully operational and functioned partly in several additional five voivodeship territories of eastern Poland as schools remained open in mid-September 1939. Polish Army units concentrated their activities on two areas – on southern (Tomaszów Lubelski, Zamość, Lwów) and central (Warsaw, Modlin, and the Bzura river). Due to determined Polish defense and a lack of fuel, the German advance had stalled and the situation stabilized in the areas east of the line Augustów – Grodno – Białystok – Kobryń – Kowel – Żółkiew – Lwów – Żydaczów – Stryj – Turka. Rail lines were operational in approximately one-third of the territory of the country as both, cross-border passenger and cargo traffic, was maintained with five neighboring countries (Lithuania, Latvia, Soviet Union, Romania, and Hungary). In Pińsk, assembly of the PZL.37 Łoś planes continued in a PZL factory that had been moved out of Warsaw. A French Navy ship carrying Renault R35 tanks for Poland approached the Romanian port of Constanta. Another ship, with artillery equipment, had just left Marseilles. Altogether, seventeen French cargo ships were sailing towards Romania, carrying fifty tanks, twenty airplanes, and large quantities of ammunition and explosives. Several major cities were still in Polish hands, such as Warsaw, Lwów, Wilno, Grodno, Łuck, Tarnopol and Lublin (captured by German troops on 18 September). According to historian and author Leszek Moczulski, approximately 750,000 soldiers remained active in the Polish Army, whereas Czesław Grzelak and Henryk Stańczyk arrived at an estimated strength of 650,000 troops.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: On 17 September 1939 the Polish Army, although weakened by weeks of fighting, still was a coherent force. Moczulski asserted, that the Polish Army was still bigger than most European armies and strong enough to fight the Wehrmacht for a long time. On the Baranowicze – Łuniniec – Równe line, rail transport of troops from the northeastern corner of the country towards the Romanian Bridgehead resumed day and night (among these troops were the 35th Reserve Infantry Division under Colonel Jarosław Szafran, the so-called "Grodno Group" ("Grupa grodzieńska") of Colonel Bohdan Hulewicz) and the second largest battle of the September Campaign – the Battle of Tomaszów Lubelski, started on the day of the Soviet invasion. According to Leszek Moczulski, around 250,000 Polish soldiers were fighting in central Poland, 350,000 were getting ready to defend the Romanian Bridgehead, 35,000 were north of Polesie, and 10,000 were fighting on the Baltic coast of Poland, in Hel and in Gdynia. Due to the ongoing battles in the area around Warsaw, Modlin, the Bzura, at Zamość, Lwów and Tomaszów Lubelski, most German divisions had been ordered to fall back towards these locations. The area that remained under control of the Polish authorities encompassed around – approximately wide and long – from the Daugava in the north to the Carpathian Mountains in the south. Radio Baranowicze and Radio Wilno ceased to broadcast on 16 September after having been bombed by German Luftwaffe units, while Radio Lwów and Radio Warsaw II still aired as of 17 September.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: A Red Army force of seven field armies with a combined strength between around 450,000 and 1,000,000 troops entered eastern Poland on two fronts. Polish sources give a number of over 800,000. Marshal Semyon Timoshenko commanded the invasion on the Ukrainian Front and General Mikhail Kovalyov led the Red Army on the invasion on the Belarusian Front.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: When drawing up the defensive Plan West of 1938, Poland's military strategists assumed the Soviet Union would remain neutral during a conflict with Germany. As a result, Polish commanders focused on massive troop deployment designs and elaborate operational exercises in the west in order to successfully counter all German invasion attempts. This concept, however, would only leave a Border Protection Corps of approximately 20 under-strength battalions with a maximum strength of 20,000 troops assigned to defend the entire eastern border. During the Red Army invasion on 17 September, most Polish units had engaged in a fighting retreat towards the Romanian Bridgehead, where, according to overall strategic plans all divisions were to regroup and await new orders in coordination with allied British and French forces.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: Commander-in-chief Edward Rydz-Śmigły was initially inclined to order the eastern border forces to oppose the invasion, but was dissuaded by Prime Minister Felicjan Sławoj Składkowski and President Ignacy Mościcki. At 4:00 a.m. on 17 September, Rydz-Śmigły ordered the Polish troops to fall back, stipulating that they only engage Soviet troops in self-defense. However, the German invasion had severely damaged the Polish communication systems and caused command and control problems for the Polish forces. In the resulting confusion, clashes between Polish and Soviet forces occurred along the border. General Wilhelm Orlik-Rückemann, who took command of the Border Protection Corps on 30 August, received no official directives after his appointment. As a result, he and his subordinates continued to actively engage Soviet forces, eventually dissolving the unit on 1 October.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: The Polish government refused to surrender or negotiate peace and instead ordered all units to leave Poland and reorganize in France. The day after the Soviet invasion had started, the Polish government withdrew into Romania. Polish units proceeded to manoeuvre towards the Romanian bridgehead area, repulsing German attacks on one flank and clashing occasionally with Soviet troops on the other. In the days following the evacuation order, the Germans defeated the Kraków Army and the Lublin Army at the Battle of Tomaszów Lubelski.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: Soviet units would meet their German counterparts during the advancement from opposite directions. Notable occurrences of co-operation in the field among the two armies were reported, for example, as "Wehrmacht" troops passed the Brest Fortress, which had been seized after the Battle of Brześć Litewski to the Soviet 29th Tank Brigade on 17 September. German General Heinz Guderian and Soviet Brigadier Semyon Krivoshein on 22 September held a joint parade in the town. Lwów (now Lviv) surrendered on 22 September, several days after German troops had abandoned their siege operation and allowed Soviet forces to take over. Soviet forces took Wilno (now Vilnius) on 19 September after a two-day battle, and Grodno on 24 September after a four-day battle. By 28 September, the Red Army reached the Narew – Western Bug – Vistula – San rivers line – the border that had been agreed upon in advance with Germany.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: Despite a tactical Polish victory on 28 September at the Battle of Szack, the outcome of the larger conflict was never in doubt. Civilian volunteers, militia contingents and regrouped army units held out against German forces in and around of the Polish capital, Warsaw, until the end of September, as the Modlin Fortress, north of Warsaw, surrendered after an intense sixteen-day battle. On 1 October, Soviet troops pushed Polish units into the forests at the battle of Wytyczno, during one of the last direct confrontations of the campaign. Several isolated Polish garrisons managed to hold their positions long after being surrounded, such as those in the Volhynian Sarny Fortified Area which only surrendered on 25 September. The last operational unit of the Polish Army was General Franciszek Kleeberg's Independent Operational Group Polesie. Kleeberg surrendered on 6 October after the four-day Battle of Kock, effectively ending the September Campaign. On 31 October, Molotov reported to the Supreme Soviet: "A short blow by the German army, and subsequently (by) the Red Army, was enough for nothing to be left of this (lit.) bastard (state) (), created at the Treaty of Versailles".


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: The response of non-ethnic Poles to the situation caused considerable complications. Many Ukrainians, Belarusians and Jews welcomed the invading troops. Local Communists gathered people to welcome the Red Army troops in the traditional Slavic way by presenting bread and salt in the eastern suburb of Brest. A sort of triumphal arch on two poles, decked with spruce branches and flowers was fashioned for this occasion. A slogan in Russian on a long red banner, glorifying the USSR and welcoming the Red Army, crowned the arch. The event was recorded by Lev Mekhlis, who reported to Stalin that the people of the West Ukraine welcomed the Soviet troops "like true liberators". The Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists rebelled against Polish rule and Communist partisans stirred up local revolts, such as in Skidel.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: France and Britain refrained from a critical reaction to the Soviet invasion and annexation of Eastern Poland since neither country expected or wanted a confrontation with the Soviet Union at that time. Under the terms of the Polish-British Common Defence Pact of 25 August 1939, Britain had promised assistance if a European power attacked Poland. A secret protocol of the pact, however, specified that the European power referred to Germany. When Polish Ambassador Edward Raczyński reminded Foreign Secretary Lord Halifax of the pact, he was bluntly told that it was Britain's exclusive right to declare war on the Soviet Union or not. British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain considered making a public commitment to restore the Polish state but eventually issued only general condemnations. This stance represented Britain's attempt at balance as its security interests included trade with the USSR that would support its war effort and might lead to a possible future Anglo-Soviet alliance against Germany (which indeed happened two years later). Public opinion in Britain was varied among expressions of outrage at the invasion on the one hand and a perception that Soviet claims in the region were reasonable on the other.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: While France had made promises to Poland, including the provision of air support, these were not honoured. A Franco-Polish Military Alliance was signed in 1921 and amended thereafter. The agreements were not strongly supported by the French military leadership, though and the relationship deteriorated during the 1920s and 1930s. The French correctly considered the German-Soviet alliance to be fragile and overt denunciation of, or action against the Soviet Union would serve neither France's nor Poland's best interests. Once the Soviets had occupied Poland, the French and the British realized there was nothing they could do for Poland on short notice and plans for a long-term victory were devised instead. The French forces, that had advanced tentatively into the Saar region in early September, retreated behind the Maginot Line upon the Polish defeat on 4 October.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: On 1 October 1939, Winston Churchill stated in public: Since the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact was not an official alliance, modern scholarship has described the German and Soviet cooperation in the invasion of Poland as co-belligerence.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: In October 1939, Molotov reported to the Supreme Soviet that the Red Army had suffered 737 deaths and 1,862 wounded men during the campaign, a casualty rate that widely contradicted Polish specialist's claims of up to 3,000 deaths and 8,000 to 10,000 wounded. On the Polish side, 3,000 to 7,000 soldiers died fighting the Red Army as between 230,000 and 450,000 men were taken prisoners. The Soviet troops regularly failed to honour commonly accepted terms of surrender. In some cases, after Polish soldiers had been promised to retreat freely Soviet troops arrested them once they had laid down their arms.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: The Soviet Union had ceased to recognise the Polish state upon the start of the invasion. Neither side issued a formal declaration of war. This decision had significant consequences and Rydz-Smigly would be later criticised for it. The Soviets killed tens of thousands of Polish prisoners of war during the campaign itself. On 24 September, the Soviet soldiers killed 42 staff and patients of a Polish military hospital in the village of Grabowiec, near Zamość. Soviet troops also executed all the Polish officers they captured at the Battle of Szack on 28 September 1939. The NKVD killed 22,000 Polish military personnel and civilians in the Katyn massacre in 1940. Torture was widely used by the NKVD in various prisons, especially in small towns.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: On 28 September 1939, the Soviet Union and Germany signed the German–Soviet Treaty of Friendship, Cooperation and Demarcation, readdressing the secret terms of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact. Lithuania was incorporated into the Soviet sphere of influence and the border within Poland was shifted to the east, increasing German territory. By this arrangement, often described as a fourth partition of Poland, the Soviet Union secured almost all Polish territory east of the line of the rivers Pisa, Narew, Western Bug and San. This amounted to about territory, inhabited by 13.5 million Polish citizens. The border created in this agreement roughly corresponded to the Curzon Line drawn by the British in 1919, a point that would successfully be utilized by Stalin during negotiations with the Allies at the Teheran and Yalta Conferences. The Red Army had originally sown confusion among the population, claiming that they had come to save Poland from Nazi occupation. Their advance surprised Polish communities and their leaders, who had not been advised on how to respond to a Soviet invasion. Polish and Jewish citizens might initially have preferred Soviet rule to Nazi German rule. However, the Soviet authorities quickly imposed Communist ideology and administration upon their new subjects and suppressed the traditional ways of life. For instance, the Soviet government confiscated, nationalized and redistributed all private Polish property. During the two years following the annexation, the Soviet police forces arrested approximately 100,000 Polish citizens.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: The Poles and the Soviets re-established diplomatic relations in 1941, following the Sikorski–Mayski Agreement. The Soviets broke off talks again in 1943 after the Polish government had demanded an independent examination of the recently discovered Katyn burial pits (Katyn massacre).


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: Due to denied access to secret Soviet archives, estimates of the number of Polish citizens deported to Siberia and the total number of perished persons under Soviet rule, remained guesswork for decades after the end of the war. Estimates among the numerous publications varied between 350,000 and 1,500,000 for civilians deported to Siberia and between 250,000 and 1,000,000 for the total number of civilians who had died. With the opening of the Soviet secret archives after 1989, more realistic and potentially smaller numbers were established. In August 2009, on the occasion of the 70th anniversary of the Soviet invasion, the Polish Institute of National Remembrance announced that research estimates on the number of people deported to Siberia and those who had perished under Soviet wartime rule amounted to around a total of 150,000 Polish citizens.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: According to the last official Polish census the 13.5 million inhabitants in the newly annexed territories consisted of 38% Poles (5,1 million), 37% Ukrainians (4,7 million), 14.5% Belarusians, 8.4% Jews, 0.9% Russians and 0.6% Germans.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: The elections of 26 October in the Belorussian and Ukrainian communities were utilized to bestow some degree of legitimacy upon the annexation. The Belarusians and Ukrainians in Poland had been alienated by the former Polonization policies of the Polish government and the repression of separatist movements and thus felt little loyalty towards the Polish cause. Not all Belarusians and Ukrainians, however, trusted the Soviet regime. In practice, the poor generally welcomed the Soviets, and the elites tended to join the opposition, despite supporting the reunification itself. The Soviets eventually introduced complete Sovietization policies in Western Belorussia and Western Ukraine, including compulsory collectivization throughout the whole region. In the process, all political parties and public associations were ruthlessly destroyed and their leaders imprisoned or executed as "enemies of the people". The Soviet authorities also suppressed the anti-Polish Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists for an independent and undivided Ukrainian state, that had actively resisted the Polish regime since the 1920s. The unifications of 1939 nevertheless proved to be decisive events in the history of the Ukraine and Belarus, as these created the precursors to the two republics, that eventually achieved independence after the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: Politburo jargon would stylize the invasion a "liberation campaign" from its inception. The term would consequently be utilized throughout Soviet history among official references and publications. Despite the 1979 publication of a recovered copy of the secret protocols of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact in the western media, the Soviet Union continued to deny their existence until 1989.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: Attempts to record the factual and fully detailed history of the 1939 Soviet invasion and its consequences have only been made after the fall of the USSR. Soviet censorship and inaccessible archives prevented serious historic research until 1991. Censorship was also applied in the People's Republic of Poland in order to preserve the image of "Polish-Soviet friendship" which was promoted by the two Communist governments. Accounts of the 1939 campaign were to portray the invasion in accord with the Soviet Politburo narrative – a reunification of the Belarusian and Ukrainian peoples and the liberation of the Polish people from "Oligarchic Capitalism". The authorities strongly discouraged any study in depth and the teaching of the subject. Various underground publishers and artists addressed the issue, as in the 1982 protest song "Ballada wrześniowa by Jacek Kaczmarski.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: In a 2009 letter to the Polish daily newspaper "Gazeta Wyborcza", Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin stated that the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact of August 1939 was "immoral". In 2015, however, as President of the Russian Federation, he commented: "In this sense I share the opinion of our culture minister (Vladimir Medinsky praising the pact as a triumph of Stalin's diplomacy) that this pact had significance for ensuring the security of the USSR".


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: In 2016, the Russian Supreme Court upheld the sentence of a lower court, that had found blogger Vladimir Luzgin guilty of the "rehabilitation of Nazism" after he had posted a text on social media that characterized the invasion of Poland in 1939 as a joint effort by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union.


title: Soviet invasion of Poland

text: On September 17, 2021, Russia's Foreign Ministry marked the 82nd anniversary of the Soviet invasion of Poland with a Twitter post describing it as a "campaign of liberation", stating that "...peoples of Western Belorussia and Western Ukraine greeted the Soviet soldiers with rejoicing".


title: Primark

text: Primark Stores Limited (; trading as Penneys in the Republic of Ireland) is an Irish multinational fast fashion retailer with headquarters in Dublin, Ireland. It has stores across Europe and in the United States. The Penneys brand is not used outside of Ireland because it is owned elsewhere by American retailer J. C. Penney.


title: Primark

text: The company's first store, named Penneys and still in operation, was established by Arthur Ryan in June 1969 on behalf of the Weston family (who had founded Associated British Foods in 1935) at 47 Mary Street in Dublin. Success in the Republic of Ireland led to expansion into Northern Ireland, with Penneys opening a large store in Belfast city centre in 1971.


title: Primark

text: The company subsequently expanded outside of Ireland with a Primark store in Derby, England, in 1973. The company could not use the name "Penneys" in Europe outside Ireland, as it was registered by J. C. Penney. The name "Primark" was then invented to use outside Ireland.


title: Primark

text: Primark opened its current headquarters in 2015 in a redeveloped Dublin building, Arthur Ryan House, formerly Chapel House.


title: Primark

text: In 2019, Primark opened its new flagship store in the former Pavilions Shopping Centre site in Birmingham, England. It is the world’s biggest Primark store at , and across its five floors includes a beauty salon, Disney-themed café and a barbershop. This was supplemented with the world's largest Greggs bakery (trading as ‘Tasty by Greggs’) in February 2022.


title: Primark

text: In 2021, Primark unveiled a sustainability strategy that sets targets to reduce textile waste, halving CO2 emissions and improving the life of Primark workers.


title: Primark

text: In November 2022, Primark announced it was going online with a new click-and-collect service. This announcement came after the company lost more than £1 billion in sales during the pandemic, when its stores had to be closed, while the competitors with online stores had smaller or no financial losses. The click-and-collect service was launched as a trial in 25 stores in north-west England, Yorkshire and north Wales for children's products only. However, on the day of launch of the new service, the company's website crashed, causing the issues for people trying to access it.


title: Primark

text: Primark offers a diverse range of products, including: baby and children's clothing, womenswear, menswear, homeware, accessories, footwear, beauty products and confectionery. The chain sells clothes at prices below those typically charged.


title: Primark

text: From 2014, Primark began selling makeup products. Primark started selling vegan snacks from January 2018. Laura O' Sullivan, co-founder of Primark, expressed her support of the new snacks.


title: Primark

text: Along with retailers such as Zara and H&M, Primark contributes to the contemporary fast fashion trend. According to an article about Primark in "The Economist", "For many shoppers, Primark has an irresistible offer: trendy clothes at astonishingly low prices. The result is a new and even faster kind of fast fashion, which encourages consumers to buy heaps of items, discard them after a few wears and then come back for another batch of new outfits."


title: Primark

text: In 2020, Primark launched their Wellness collection which includes 80 eco-conscious products. All of the products are made of organic, sustainable or recycled materials. This is part of the retailer's commitment to be more responsible for its footprint.


title: Primark

text: The company's first store, still in operation, was opened in June 1969 on 47 Mary Street, Dublin under the Penneys brand, which continues to be the company's trading name in the Republic of Ireland. Penneys opened its first store in Northern Ireland in 1971, with a large store in Belfast city centre. The company opened its first store outside of the island of Ireland in Derby, England, in 1973, under the new Primark brand. The company expanded rapidly in the UK in the mid-2000s. In 2005, it bought the Littlewoods retail stores for £409 million, retaining 40 of the 119 stores and selling the rest.


title: Primark

text: In May 2006, the first Primark store in mainland Europe opened in Madrid, Spain. In December 2008, Primark opened in the Netherlands, followed by Portugal, Germany and Belgium in 2009. Primark opened its first store in Austria on 27 September 2012, in Innsbruck. It expanded to France in 2013, in Marseille. The first Italian store opened in 2014.


title: Primark

text: In 2015, Primark opened its first United States store in Downtown Crossing, Boston, in the location that was once the flagship store of Filene's, later New York City, Philadelphia, and Danbury.


title: Primark

text: After 10 years of constructing a chain of around 40 stores in Spain, Primark opened another store in Madrid in October 2015, the second biggest in the chain. In July 2018, it was announced that Primark would open a store in Poland. The largest Primark store opened in Birmingham on 11 April 2019, occupying the former Pavilions Shopping Centre of . On 13 June 2019 Primark expanded to Slovenia with a store in Ljubljana. It has signed a lease for its first stores in Warsaw, Poland, Prague, the Czech Republic, and Bratislava, Slovakia.


title: Primark

text: In July 2019, Primark announced its U.S. market expansion to Chicago with a three-level flagship location on State Street. The location opened in March 2021 and was its first store in Illinois.


title: Primark

text: On 23 March 2020, the company announced that they would be closing their 189 UK stores until further notice, as a result of government lockdown during the COVID-19 outbreak. The chain's 153 stores in England re-opened on 15 June 2020. As a result of the lockdown, the company reported a sales loss of £430 million.


title: Primark

text: On 10 August 2020, Primark opened the first store in Poland in Galeria Młociny, Warsaw, marking the 13th international market for the company. In 2021, Primark opened their second store in Poznań.


title: Primark

text: In December 2020, Primark said it would lose an additional £220 million in sales as more stores are forced to close under new restrictions to control the spread of COVID-19 in the UK. In January 2021, this figure was raised to over £1 billion.


title: Primark

text: In June 2021, Primark opened the first store in the Czech Republic in Prague, making it the fourteenth market that Primark has entered. Occupying the area of in the Flow Building on the Wenceslas Square, this store also serves as a flagship store for the region of Central and Eastern Europe. This is also the only store in the region located on a high street instead of a shopping centre.


title: Primark

text: On 14 September 2022 Primark has opened its second store in Brno, Czechia. This marks the brands 406th store worldwide.


title: Primark

text: On 15 December 2022 Primark is set to open the first store in Romania in ParkLake Shopping Centre, Bucharest making it the fifteenth market.


title: Primark

text: The new store in Bratislava, Slovakia was due to open in 2022, however it has been delayed until 2 April 2023. This will be Primark's sixteenth market.


title: Primark

text: In 2023, Primark is scheduled to open four more stores in the cities Krakow, Katowice, Wroclaw and Lodz in Poland.


title: Primark

text: Primark announced that it would invest 100 million euros in Spain and create 1,000 jobs with the opening of at least eight new stores, including one in Toledo, and the enlargement of an existing store within the next two years.


title: Primark

text: In 2006, Primark joined the Ethical Trading Initiative (ETI), a collaborative organisation bringing together businesses, trades unions and NGOs to work on labour rights issues in their supply chains. ETI members commit to working towards the implementation of a code of conduct based on the International Labour Organization's core conventions.


title: Primark

text: In December 2008, the UK charity War on Want launched a new report, Fashion Victims II, that showed conditions had not improved in Bangladeshi factories supplying Primark, two years after the charity first visited them.


title: Primark

text: On 9 January 2009, a supplier was forced by ETI to remove its branding from Primark stores and websites following a BBC/"The Observer" investigation into the employment practices. The investigation alleged the use of illegal immigrant labour and argued that the workers were paid less than the UK legal minimum wage.


title: Primark

text: On 16 June 2011, the BBC Trust's Editorial Standards Committee (ESC) published its findings into a "Panorama" programme "Primark: On the Rack", broadcast in June 2008. The programme was an undercover investigative documentary examining poor working conditions in Indian factories supplying Primark. Although Primark subsequently stopped doing business with the Indian supplier, the ESC concluded that footage in the programme was 'more likely than not' to have been fabricated. The ESC directed the BBC to make an on-air apology and to ensure that the programme was not repeated or sold to other broadcasters. Primark created a specific website to deal with the issues around the programme.


title: Primark

text: In June 2013, two labels both stitched with alleged SOS messages were separately found in garments purchased from a store in Swansea, Wales. Primark argued the supply chain showed these label messages were a hoax.


title: Primark

text: Also in June 2014, a customer from Ireland allegedly found an SOS note wrapped in a prison ID card in the pocket of trousers purchased from a Primark store several years earlier. The letter was written in Chinese and said to report that prisoners were forced to work "like oxen" making fashion clothes for export for 15 hours per day and that the food they were given would not be fit for animals.


title: Primark

text: A year and a half later an alleged SOS note from a Chinese torture victim was found in socks purchased from Primark.


title: Primark

text: In December 2018, a bone was found by a customer in a sock purchased in the shop's Colchester branch.


title: Habsburg monarchy

text: The Habsburg monarchy (, ), also known as the Danubian monarchy (, ), or Habsburg Empire (, ), was the collection of empires, kingdoms, duchies, counties and other polities that were ruled by the House of Habsburg, especially the dynasty's Austrian branch.


title: Habsburg monarchy

text: The history of the Habsburg monarchy can be traced back to the election of Rudolf I as King of Germany in 1273 and his acquisition of the Duchy of Austria for the Habsburg in 1282. In 1482, Maximilian I acquired the Netherlands through marriage. Both realms passed to his grandson and successor, Charles V, who also inherited the Spanish throne and its colonial possessions, and thus came to rule the Habsburg empire at its greatest territorial extent. The abdication of Charles V in 1556 led to a division within the dynasty between his son Philip II of Spain and his brother Ferdinand I, who had served as his lieutenant and the elected king of Hungary and Bohemia. The Spanish branch (which held all of Iberia, the Netherlands, Burgundy, and lands in Italy) became extinct in 1700. The Austrian branch (which ruled the Holy Roman Empire, Hungary, Bohemia and various other lands) was itself split into different branches in 1564 but reunited 101 years later.


title: Habsburg monarchy

text: The Habsburg monarchy was a personal union of crowns, with no uniform laws or shared institutions other than the Habsburg court itself; the territorial possessions of the monarchy were thus united only by virtue of a common monarch. The Habsburg realms were unified in 1804 with the formation of the Austrian Empire and later split in two with the Austro-Hungarian Compromise of 1867. The monarchy began to fracture in the face of inevitable defeat during the final years of World War I and ultimately disbanded with the proclamation of the Republic of German-Austria and the First Hungarian Republic in late 1918.


title: Habsburg monarchy

text: In historiography, the terms "Austria" or "Austrians" are frequently used as shorthand for the Habsburg monarchy since the 18th century. From 1438 to 1806, the rulers of the House of Habsburg almost continuously reigned as Holy Roman Emperors. However, the realms of the Holy Roman Empire were mostly self-governing and are thus not considered to have been part of the Habsburg monarchy. Hence, the Habsburg monarchy (of the Austrian branch) is often called "Austria" by metonymy. Around 1700, the Latin term "monarchia austriaca" came into use as a term of convenience. Within the empire alone, the vast possessions included the original hereditary lands, the "Erblande", from before 1526; the lands of the Bohemian crown; the formerly Spanish Netherlands from 1714 until 1794; and some fiefs in Imperial Italy. Outside the empire, they encompassed all the lands of the crown of Hungary as well as conquests made at the expense of the Ottoman Empire. The dynastic capital was Vienna, except from 1583 to 1611, when it was in Prague.


title: Habsburg monarchy

text: The first Habsburg who can be reliably traced was Radbot of Klettgau, who was born in the late 10th century; the family name originated with Habsburg Castle, in present-day Switzerland, which was built by Radbot. After 1279, the Habsburgs came to rule in the Duchy of Austria, which was part of the elective Kingdom of Germany within the Holy Roman Empire. King Rudolf I of Germany of the Habsburg family assigned the Duchy of Austria to his sons at the Diet of Augsburg (1282), thus establishing the "Austrian hereditary lands". From that moment, the Habsburg dynasty was also known as the House of Austria. Between 1438 and 1806, with few exceptions, the Habsburg Archduke of Austria was elected as Holy Roman Emperor.


title: Habsburg monarchy

text: The Habsburgs grew to European prominence as a result of the dynastic policy pursued by Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor. Maximilian married Mary of Burgundy, thus bringing the Burgundian Netherlands into the Habsburg possessions. Their son, Philip the Handsome, married Joanna the Mad of Spain (daughter of Ferdinand II of Aragon and Isabella of Castile). Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, the son of Philip and Joanna, inherited the Habsburg Netherlands in 1506, Habsburg Spain and its territories in 1516, and Habsburg Austria in 1519.


title: Habsburg monarchy

text: At this point, the Habsburg possessions were so vast that Charles V was constantly travelling throughout his dominions and therefore needed deputies and regents, such as Isabella of Portugal in Spain and Margaret of Austria in the Low Countries, to govern his various realms. At the Diet of Worms in 1521, Emperor Charles V came to terms with his younger brother Ferdinand. According to the Habsburg "compact" of Worms (1521), confirmed a year later in Brussels, Ferdinand was made Archduke, as a regent of Charles V in the Austrian hereditary lands.


title: Habsburg monarchy

text: Following the death of Louis II of Hungary in the Battle of Mohács against the Ottoman Turks, Archduke Ferdinand (who was his brother-in-law by virtue of an adoption treaty signed by Maximilian and Vladislaus II, Louis's father at the First Congress of Vienna) was also elected the next King of Bohemia and Hungary in 1526. Bohemia and Hungary became hereditary Habsburg domains only in the 17th century: Following victory in the Battle of White Mountain (1620) over the Bohemian rebels, Ferdinand II promulgated a "Renewed Constitution" (1627) that established hereditary succession over Bohemia. Following the Battle of Mohács (1687), in which Leopold I reconquered almost all of Hungary from the Ottoman Turks, the emperor held a diet in Pressburg to establish hereditary succession in the Hungarian kingdom.


title: Habsburg monarchy

text: Charles V divided the House in 1556 by ceding Austria along with the Imperial crown to Ferdinand (as decided at the Imperial election, 1531), and the Spanish empire to his son Philip. The Spanish branch (which also held the Netherlands, the Kingdom of Portugal between 1580 and 1640, and the Mezzogiorno of Italy) became extinct in 1700. The Austrian branch (which also ruled the Holy Roman Empire, Hungary and Bohemia) was itself divided between different branches of the family from 1564 until 1665, but thereafter it remained a single personal union.


title: Habsburg monarchy

text: The territories ruled of the Austrian monarchy changed over the centuries, but the core always consisted of four blocs:


title: Habsburg monarchy

text: Over the course of its history, other lands were, at times, under Austrian Habsburg rule (some of these territories were secundogenitures, i.e. ruled by other lines of Habsburg dynasty):


title: Habsburg monarchy

text: The boundaries of some of these territories varied over the period indicated, and others were ruled by a subordinate (secundogeniture) Habsburg line. The Habsburgs also held the title of Holy Roman Emperor between 1438 and 1740, and again from 1745 to 1806.