title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: His larger success came after Ulukaya purchased a large, defunct yogurt factory in upstate New York in 2005, in a region that had been the center of a dairy and cheese industry since the mid-nineteenth century. Chobani achieved over $1 billion in annual sales in less than five years after launch, becoming the leading yogurt brand in the U.S. by 2011. Ernst & Young named Ulukaya as the Ernst & Young World Entrepreneur Of The Year in 2013, and Inc. magazine named him one of the most important entrepreneurs of the past decade in 2019. In July 2022, the UN Secretary General António Guterres announced him as an additional advocate for the Sustainable Development Goals of the United Nations.


title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: Hamdi Ulukaya was born to a dairy-farming Kurdish family in 1972 in İliç, a small village in Turkey's Erzincan Province. He had six siblings and his family owned and operated a sheep, goat, and dairy farm near the Euphrates River in İliç, Erzincan Province, where they made cheese and yogurt. The family often led a seasonally semi-nomadic existence tending and herding their flocks. Ulukaya is uncertain of his exact birth date because he was born during one of the family's mountain treks, although he uses 26 October as his birthday.


title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: After studying political science at Ankara University, in 1994 Ulukaya moved to the United States to study English at Adelphi University on Long Island, New York. In 1997 he moved upstate and transferred to the University at Albany, State University of New York where he enrolled in a few business courses.


title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: He ended up taking a job on an upstate farm. During a visit, his father persuaded Ulukaya to import the family's feta cheese from Turkey, after tasting the inferior cheese available locally. When the imported cheese proved popular, Ulukaya opened a small wholesale feta cheese plant of his own, called Euphrates, in Johnstown, New York in 2002. The venture was modestly successful but by the two-year mark it had just barely broken even. Ulukaya later recalled, "It was two years of the most challenging days of my life."


title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: In the spring of 2005, Ulukaya noticed a piece of junk mail advertising a fully equipped yogurt factory for sale in South Edmeston, New York, west of his feta cheese factory. The 84-year-old factory had been closed by Kraft Foods. Although he initially threw the flier away, Ulukaya toured the plant the following day and decided to buy it, against the advice of his attorney and business advisor. Ulukaya financed the purchase within five months with a loan from the Small Business Administration, plus local business-incentive grants. He initially named his new company Agro Farma, and hired a handful of the former Kraft employees.


title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: Ulukaya decided to make an alternative to American-style yogurt, preferring the yogurt he grew up with in Turkey. He hired a yogurt master from Turkey, Mustafa Dogan, with whom he spent nearly two years developing his own yogurt recipe. To manufacture strained yogurt, Ulukaya needed a million-dollar commercial machine called a milk separator, which the American-style Kraft factory did not have. He found a used one in Wisconsin and negotiated to buy it for $50,000. On his trip to pick up the separator, the name "Chobani", a variation of "çoban," the Turkish word for shepherd occurred to him.


title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: Ulukaya made Chobani yogurt without preservatives. Since he could not afford advertising, he invested time and money on the product's packaging, using a distinctive new bowl-style shape to differentiate the brand.


title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: In October 2007, he shipped his first order of Chobani, a few hundred cases, to a grocer on Long Island. The store repeated the order the following week.


title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: Ulukaya's early business approach included strategies larger companies did not use. Rather than pay stores a slotting fee, which his start-up company could not afford, he paid stores in yogurt rather than in cash to stock his wares. He also negotiated to pay off the slotting fees over time as the yogurt sold. He also implemented in-store samples so customers could taste the product and purchase it immediately. Lacking the budget for traditional marketing, after hearing customers phoning in to say that they loved Chobani, Ulukaya had his small team reach out to bloggers, Facebook, and Twitter to have constant and direct communication with consumers. In 2010 he also created a sampling truck, the CHOmobile, which handed out free cups of Chobani yogurt at festivals, parades, and other family-friendly events all over the U.S. In its first year, the sample truck gave away 150,000 full-size containers of Chobani.


title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: After BJ's and Costco began carrying Chobani in 2009, the company doubled its sales every year through 2013. In December 2012 the company opened the world's largest yogurt factory in Twin Falls, Idaho, a $450 million investment. In 2012 Chobani had more than $1 billion in annual sales, and in 2012 it became the world's leading yogurt brand. By 2017, Chobani reached a US market share of Greek yogurt of over 50%. Chobani expanded internationally to Australia in 2011, into Mexico in 2016 and by 2021 it exported also to China, Malaysia and Thailand.


title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: In an interview with Ernst and Young Global chairman & CEO Mark A. Weinberger, Ulukaya said that businessmen should promote a sense of purpose in their corporate culture to create a climate of positive change in business and the world. He stated that companies should focus on humanity and not just on their bottom lines.


title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: When Ulukaya opened his second yogurt manufacturing plant in Twin Falls, Idaho, he created a job training program together with the College of Southern Idaho and the Chobani Foundation (formerly known as Shepherd's Gift Foundation.) He has also worked to improve the community in Twin Falls by supporting the Southern Idaho Children's Learning Center, Twin Falls Rapids Soccer Club, and other community programs.


title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: In March 2017 the New York Times reported Ulukaya's efforts to work with Idaho colleges to offer technical training for workers to solve the area's labor shortage. The Chobani yogurt plant in Twin Falls is the largest in the world and pays its workers in the area on average twice minimum wage. Additionally, he raised the starting wage to $15 per hour as of spring 2021.


title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: In the fall of 2017, Chobani announced a brand evolution that featured new packaging and positioned the company as a "food-focused wellness company."


title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: In 2017, Chobani started offering six weeks of paid leave to new parents as a result of Ulukaya's own experience when his son was born in 2015. The policy ensures that Chobani employees have the needed time to bond with their newborns, and it covers adoption, foster care and same-sex couples as well.


title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: In the spring of 2018, Ulukaya appeared on The Ellen DeGeneres Show and Good Morning America to announce that the company was celebrating its 10th anniversary as a national brand by giving a Chobani yogurt to every person in America.


title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: In March 2017, Ulukaya was featured on the cover of Fast Company magazine. The cover story was titled "How Chobani's Hamdi Ulukaya Is Winning America's Culture War." Later that spring, Ulukaya was featured by CBSNews' "60 Minutes" on 9 April 2017, in a segment called "Chief of Chobani" that focused on his approach to business and philanthropy.


title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: In April 2019, Ulukaya gave a TED Talk on the TED conference main stage in Vancouver, entitled "The anti-CEO playbook."


title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: In June 2019, Ulukaya launched Milk Matters, a program to support the future of dairy farming in America. Part of the program includes a new collaboration with Fair Trade USA to explore developing the first standard and certification program of the dairy industry.


title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: In 2014 Ulukaya pledged to donate $2 million to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. He has also donated to many Muslim charities associated with Iraq and Syria and has explored philanthropic avenues for helping refugees around the world. He signed up for The Giving Pledge, a philanthropic initiative by Warren Buffett and Bill Gates


title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: Ulukaya visited the Greek island of Lesbos in September 2015 to see first-hand the situation of the mostly Syrian refugees there. In 2015 he launched the Tent Foundation to help refugees. At Chobani's plants in Upstate New York and Idaho, Ulukaya has long hired refugees from around the world from regions across Asia, Africa and the Middle East.


title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: In 2015, Ulukaya attended the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, and launched several new initiatives to help refugees while also encouraging world and business leaders to do more.


title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: In 2016, Ulukaya was invited to join the Special Olympics International Board of Directors. He is part of the volunteer Board of Directors which determines international policy along with other business leaders, sport leaders, professional athletes, educators and others.


title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: In July 2017, Ulukaya launched the Hamdi Ulukaya Initiative (HUG) to train Turkish entrepreneurs who are running existing startups or planning on starting a new venture. HUG has a $5 million budget over five years.


title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: In May 2019, it was reported that the Warwick school district in Rhode Island would be instituting a policy whereby students who had outstanding school lunch debt would only be served sunflower seed butter and jelly sandwiches, causing an uproar that they were essentially "school lunch shaming" students who had delinquent accounts, aside from denying them nutritionally balanced lunches. Many of these families were struggling and this was harmful to the students on many levels. Ulukaya stepped in and paid the US$77,000 to cover all the students' outstanding school lunch debt.


title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: Ulukaya has been noted both for his entrepreneurial skills and also his commitment to making affordable and nutritious foods using only natural ingredients. In addition to receiving awards for entrepreneurship, in April 2014 he was named by President Barack Obama as an inaugural member of the Presidential Ambassadors for Global Entrepreneurship (PAGE) initiative – 11 selected business leaders who will encourage entrepreneurship in the U.S. and abroad.


title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: Ulukaya was a member of the Upstate Regional Advisory Board of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, and previously served as vice chair of the corporate fund board of the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. He is on the board of the Pathfinder Village (Community for Down Syndrome) Foundation in Edmeston, New York.


title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: From establishing Chobani, Ulukaya has given 10% of his company's net profits to charitable causes. In 2010 he established the company's charitable arm, the Chobani Shepherd's Gift Foundation, now called the Chobani Foundation, to manage this philanthropy. Donations have included major grants to support famine relief efforts in Somalia, and to underwrite the New York City Pianos project launched by Sing for Hope.


title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: Hamdi Ulukaya pledged to donate most of his wealth, at the time of the pledge at least 700 million dollars, to help the Kurdish refugees, as well as refugees from all around the world.


title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: Ulukaya lives in New Berlin, New York, near Chobani's South Edmeston factory and headquarters. He was briefly married in the late 1990s to New York City doctor Ayşe Giray. In 2012, Hamdi Ulukaya's Turkish ex-wife Dr. Ayşe Giray sued him for a 53 percent stake in the company claiming her family lent him $500,000 for the business. The suit was settled for an undisclosed amount. Other claims that emerged from the divorce proceedings included her accusations that Hamdi stole the recipe for his yogurts. These accusations were proven unfounded and dropped. Ulukaya joined the world's billionaires in the early 2010s.


title: Hamdi Ulukaya

text: In 2015, he had a son, Aga, with Alida Boer. In January 2018, Ulukaya married Louise Vongerichten, co-founder and president of Food Dreams Foundation, founder of sustainable's kids clothing line Mon Coeur and daughter of famous French-American chef Jean-Georges Vongerichten.


title: Lint (software)

text: Lint, or a linter, is a static code analysis tool used to flag programming errors, bugs, stylistic errors and suspicious constructs. The term originates from a Unix utility that examined C language source code.


title: Lint (software)

text: Stephen C. Johnson, a computer scientist at Bell Labs, came up with lint in 1978 while debugging the yacc grammar he was writing for C and dealing with portability issues stemming from porting Unix to a 32-bit machine. The term "lint" was derived from lint, the name for the tiny bits of fiber and fluff shed by clothing, as the command should act like the lint trap in a clothes dryer, detecting small errors to great effect. In 1979, lint was used outside of Bell Labs for the first time, in the seventh version (V7) of Unix.


title: Lint (software)

text: Over the years, different versions of lint have been developed for many C and C++ compilers, and while modern-day compilers have lint-like functions, lint-like tools have also advanced their capabilities. For example, Gimpel's PC-Lint, introduced in 1985 and used to analyze C++ source code, is still for sale.


title: Lint (software)

text: The analysis performed by lint-like tools can also be performed by an optimizing compiler, which aims to generate faster code. In his original 1978 paper, Johnson addressed this issue, concluding that "the general notion of having two programs is a good one" because they concentrate on different things, thereby allowing the programmer to "concentrate at one stage of the programming process solely on the algorithms, data structures, and correctness of the program, and then later retrofit, with the aid of lint, the desirable properties of universality and portability".


title: Lint (software)

text: Even though modern compilers have evolved to include many of lint's historical functions, lint-like tools have also evolved to detect an even wider variety of suspicious constructs. These include "warnings about syntax errors, uses of undeclared variables, calls to deprecated functions, spacing and formatting conventions, misuse of scope, implicit fallthrough in switch statements, missing license headers, [and]...dangerous language features".


title: Lint (software)

text: Lint-like tools are especially useful for dynamically typed languages like JavaScript and Python. Because the compilers of such languages typically do not enforce as many and as strict rules prior to execution, linter tools can also be used as simple debuggers for finding common errors (e.g. syntactic discrepancies) as well as hard-to-find errors such as heisenbugs (drawing attention to suspicious code as "possible errors"). Lint-like tools generally perform static analysis of source code.


title: Lint (software)

text: Lint-like tools have also been developed for other aspects of language, including grammar and style guides.


title: Lint (software)

text: Fortran compilers using space-squeezing techniques (e.g. IBM 1130) made it impossible for the compiler to see the problem with lines like:


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: Ukrainians in Russia make up the largest single diaspora group of the Ukrainian people. The 2010 Russian census identified 1.9 million Ukrainians living in Russia, representing over 1.4% of the total population of the Russian Federation and comprising the third-largest ethnic group after ethnic Russians and Tatars. An estimated 340,000 people born in Ukraine, mostly young people, permanently settled legally in Russia each year as of 2016.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: In February 2014, there were 1.6 million Ukrainian citizens in the territory of Russia, two-thirds of the labour migrants; however, after Russia annexed Crimea and the start of the War in Donbas, the number was estimated to have risen to 2.5 million .


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: Over 420,000 asylum-seekers from Ukraine had registered in Russia . An estimated 2.8 million Ukrainians had arrived in Russia as of September 2022 since the start of the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: The Treaty of Pereyaslav of 1654 led to Ukraine becoming a protectorate of Tsarist Russia. This resulted in increased Ukrainian immigration to Russia, initially to Sloboda Ukraine but also to the Don lands and the area of the Volga river. There was a significant migration to Moscow, particularly by church activists, priests and monks, scholars and teachers, artists, translators, singers, and merchants. In 1652, twelve singers under the direction of Ternopolsky moved to Moscow, and thirteen graduates of the Kyiv-Mohyla Collegium moved to teach the Moscovite gentry. Many priests and church administrators migrated from Ukraine; in particular, Ukrainian clergy established the Andreyevsky Monastery, which influenced the Russian Orthodox Church, in particular the reform policies of Patriarch Nikon which led to the Old Believer Raskol (English: schism). The influence of Ukrainian clergy continued to grow, especially after 1686, when the Metropolia of Kyiv was transferred from the Patriarch of Constantinople to the Patriarch of Moscow.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: After the abolishment of the Patriarch's chair by Peter I, Ukrainian Stephen Yavorsky became Metropolitan of Moscow, followed by Feofan Prokopovich. Five Ukrainians were metropolitans, and 70 of 127 bishops in Russia's Orthodox hierarchy were recent emigres from Kyiv. Students of the Kyiv-Mohyla Collegium began schools and seminaries in many Russian eparchies. By 1750, over 125 such institutions were opened, and their graduates practically controlled the Russian church, obtaining key posts through to the late 18th century. Under Prokopovich, the Russian Academy of Sciences was opened in 1724, which was chaired from 1746 by Ukrainian Kirill Razumovsky.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: The Moscow court had a choir established in 1713 with 21 singers from Ukraine. The conductor for a period of time was A. Vedel. In 1741, 44 men, 33 women, and 55 girls were moved to St. Petersburg from Ukraine to sing and entertain. Composer Maksym Berezovsky also worked in St. Petersburg at the time. A significant Ukrainian presence was also seen in the Academy of Arts.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: The Ukrainian presence in the Russian Army also grew significantly. The greatest influx happened after the Battle of Poltava in 1709. Large numbers of Ukrainians settled around St Petersburg and were employed in the building of the city.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: A separate category of emigrants were those deported to Moscow by the Russian government for demonstrating anti-Russian sentiment. The deported were brought to Moscow initially for investigation, then exiled to Siberia, Arkhangelsk or the Solovetsky Islands. Among the deported were Ukrainian cossacks including D. Mhohohrishny, Ivan Samoylovych, and Petro Doroshenko. Others include all the family of hetman Ivan Mazepa, A. Vojnarovsky, and those in Mazepa's Cossack forces that returned to Russia. Some were imprisoned in exile for the rest of their lives, such as hetman Pavlo Polubotok, Pavlo Holovaty, P. Hloba and Petro Kalnyshevsky.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: Beginning in the 19th century, there was a continuous migration from Belarus, Ukraine and Northern Russia to settle the distant areas of the Russian Empire. The promise of free fertile land was an important factor for many peasants, who until 1861 lived under serfdom. In the colonization of the new lands, a significant contribution was made by ethnic Ukrainians. Initially Ukrainians colonised border territories in the Caucasus. Most of these settlers came from Left-bank Ukraine and Slobozhanshchyna and mainly settled in the Stavropol and Terek areas. Some compact areas of the Don, Volga, and Urals were also settled.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: The Ukrainians created large settlements within Russia, becoming the majority in certain centres. They continued fostering their traditions, their language, and their architecture. Their village structure and administration differed somewhat from the Russian population that surrounded them. Where populations were mixed, Russification often took place. The size and geographical area of the Ukrainian settlements were first seen in the course of the Russian Empire Census of 1897, which noted language but not ethnicity. A total of 22,380,551 Ukrainian speakers were recorded, with 1,020,000 Ukrainians in European Russia and 209,000 in Asian Russia.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: The first Russian Empire Census, conducted in 1897, gave statistics regarding language use in the Russian Empire according to the administrative borders. Extensive use of Little Russian (and in some cases dominance) was noted in the nine south-western Governorates and the Kuban Oblast. When the future borders of the Ukrainian state were marked, the results of the census were taken into consideration. As a result, the ethnographic borders of Ukraine in the 20th century were twice as large as the Cossack Hetmanate that had been incorporated into the Russian Empire in the 17th century.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: Certain regions had mixed populations made up of both Ukrainian and Russian ethnicities, and various minorities. These included the territory of Sloboda and the Donbas. These territories were between Ukraine and Russia. This left a large community of ethnic Ukrainians on the Russian side of the border. The borders of the short-lived Ukrainian People's Republic were largely preserved by the Ukrainian SSR.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: In the course of the mid-1920s administrative reforms, some territory initially under the Ukrainian SSR was ceded to the Russian SFSR, such as the Taganrog and Shakhty cities in the eastern Donbas. At the same time, the Ukrainian SSR gained several territories that were amalgamated into the Sumy Oblast in Sloboda region.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: The Ukrainian cultural renaissance in Russia began at the end of the 1980s, with the formation of the Slavutych Society in Moscow and the Ukrainian Cultural Centre named after T. Shevchenko in Leningrad (now Saint Petersburg).


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: In 1991, the organized a conference in Kyiv with delegates from the various new Ukrainian community organizations of the Eastern Diaspora. By 1991, over 20 such organizations were in existence. By 1992, 600 organizations were registered in Russia alone. The congress helped to consolidate the efforts of these organizations. From 1992, regional congresses began to take place, organized by the Ukrainian organizations of Prymoria, Tyumen Oblast, Siberia and the Far East. In March 1992, the Union of Ukrainian organizations in Moscow was founded. The Union of Ukrainians in Russia was founded in May 1992.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: The term "Eastern Diaspora" has been used since 1992 to describe Ukrainians living in the former USSR, as opposed to the Western Ukrainian Diaspora which was used until then to describe all Ukrainian diaspora outside the Union. The Eastern Diaspora is estimated to number approximately 6.8 million, while the Western Diaspora is estimated to number approximately 5 million.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: In February 2009, about 3.5 million Ukrainian citizens were estimated to be working in the Russian Federation, particularly in Moscow and in the construction industry. According to Volodymyr Yelchenko, the Ambassador of Ukraine to the Russian Federation, there were no state schools in Russia with a program for teaching school subjects in the Ukrainian language as of August 2010; he considered "the correction of this situation" as one of his top priorities.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: As of 2007, the number of Ukrainian illegal immigrants in Russia has been estimated as being between 3 and 11 million. Many Ukrainians in Russia have been viewed as illegal immigrants and criminals, and complain of racism. Some have compared this to how Mexicans are viewed in the United States.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: During and after the 2014 annexation of Crimea by Russia and the Russian military intervention in Ukraine, Ukrainians living in Russia complained of being labelled a "Banderite" (follower of Stepan Bandera), even when they are from parts of Ukraine where Stephan Bandera has no considerable support.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: Starting from 2014, a number of Ukrainian activists and organisations were prosecuted in Russia based on political grounds. Some notable examples include the case of Oleg Sentsov, which was described by Amnesty International as a "Stalinist era trial", the closure of a Ukrainian library in Moscow and prosecution of the library staff, and a ban of Ukrainian organisations in Russia, such as Ukrainian World Congress.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: , there were 2.6 million Ukrainians living in Russia, more than half of them "guest workers". A million more had arrived in the previous eighteen months (although critics have accused the FMS and media of circulating exaggerated figures). About 400,000 had applied for refugee status and almost 300,000 had asked for temporary residence status, with another 600,000 considered to be in breach of migration rules. By November 2017, there were 427,240 applicant asylum-seekers and refugees from Ukraine registered in Russia, over 185,000 of them having received temporary asylum, and fewer than 590 with refugee status. The refugees were from the territories of Donetsk People's Republic and Luhansk People's Republics taken over by pro-Russian separatists since the Russo-Ukrainian War. Most refugees have headed to rural areas in central Russia. Major destinations for Ukrainian migrants have included Karelia, Vorkuta, Magadan Oblast; oblasts such as Magadan and Yakutia are destinations of a government relocation program since the vast majority avoid big cities like Moscow and Saint Petersburg.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: During the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, an estimated 2.8 million Ukrainians had arrived in Russia as of September 2022; the UN Human Rights Office stated: "There have been credible allegations of forced transfers of unaccompanied children to Russian occupied territory, or to the Russian Federation itself."


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: Ukrainians in the Russian Federation represent the third-largest ethnic group after Russians and Tatars. In spite of their relatively high numbers, some Ukrainians in Russia complain of unfair treatment and anti-Ukrainian sentiment in the Russian Federation. In November 2010, the High Court of Russia cancelled registration of one of the biggest civic communities of the Ukrainian minority, the "Federal nation-cultural autonomy of the Ukrainians in Russia" (FNCAUR).


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: A survey, conducted by the independent Russian research centre Levada in February 2019, found that 77% of Ukrainians and 82% of Russians think positively of each other as people.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: The vast majority of Ukrainians in Russia are adherents of the Russian Orthodox Church. The Ukrainian clergy had an influential role on Russian Orthodoxy in the 17th and 18th centuries.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: Recently, the growing economic migrant population from Galicia have had success in establishing a few Ukrainian Catholic churches, and there are several churches belonging to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (Kyiv Patriarchate), where Patriarch Filaret agreed to accept breakaway groups that had been excommunicated by the Russian Orthodox Church for breaches of canon law. In 2002, some asserted that Russian bureaucracy imposed on religion has hampered the expansion of these two groups. According to the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, their denomination has only one church building in all of Russia.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: The original Black Sea Cossacks colonised the Kuban region from 1792. Following the Caucasus War and the subsequent colonisation of the Circaucasus, the Black Sea Cossacks intermixed with other ethnic groups, including the indigenous Circassian population.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: According to the 1897 census, 47.3% of the Kuban population (including extensive latter 19th-century non-Cossack migrants from both Ukraine and Russia) referred to their native language as Little Russian (the official term for the Ukrainian language), while 42.6% referred to their native language as Great Russian. Most of the cultural production in Kuban from the 1890s until 1914, such as plays, stories and music, were written in the Ukrainian language, and one of the first political parties in Kuban was the Ukrainian Revolutionary Party. During the Russian Civil War, the Kuban Cossack Rada formed a military alliance with the Ukrainian People's Republic and declared Ukrainian to be the official language of the Kuban National Republic. This decision was not supported uniformly by the Cossacks themselves, and soon the Rada itself was dissolved by the Russian White Denikin's Volunteer Army.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: In the 1920s, a policy of Decossackization was pursued. At the same time, the Bolshevik authorities supported policies that promoted the Ukrainian language and self-identity, opening 700 Ukrainian-language schools and a Ukrainian department in the local university. Russian historians claim that Cossacks were in this way forcibly Ukrainized, while Ukrainian historians claim that Ukrainization in Kuban merely paralleled Ukrainization in Ukraine itself, where people were being taught in their native language. According to the 1926 census, there were nearly a million Ukrainians registered in the Kuban Okrug alone (or 62% of the total population). During this period many Soviet repressions were "tested" on the Cossack lands, particularly the Black Boards that led to the Soviet famine of 1932–1934 in the Kuban. Yet by the mid-1930s there was an abrupt policy change of Soviet attitude towards Ukrainians in Russia. In the Kuban, the Ukrainization policy was halted and reversed. In 1936 the Kuban Cossack Chorus was re-formed as were individual Cossack regiments in the Red Army. By the end of the 1930s many Cossacks' descendants chose to identify themselves as Russians. From that time onwards, almost all of the self-identified Ukrainians in the Kuban were non-Cossacks; the Soviet Census of 1989 showed that a total of 251,198 people in Krasnodar Kray (including Adyghe Autonomous Oblast) were born in the Ukrainian SSR. In the 2002 census, the number of people who identified as Ukrainians in the Kuban was recorded to be 151,788. Despite the fact that most of the descendants of Kuban Cossacks identify themselves as Russian nationals. Many elements of their culture originate from Ukraine, such as the Kuban Bandurist music, and the Balachka dialect.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: Moscow has had a significant Ukrainian presence since the 17th century. The original Ukrainian settlement bordered Kitai-gorod. No longer having a Ukrainian character, it is today is known as Maroseyka (a corruption of Malorusseyka, or Little Russian). During Soviet times the main street, Maroseyka, was named after the Ukrainian Cossack hetman Bohdan Khmelnytsky. After Moscow State University was founded in 1755, many students from Ukraine studied there. Many of these students had commenced their studies at the Kyiv-Mohyla Academy.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: In the first years after the revolution of 1905, Moscow was one of the major centres of the Ukrainian movement for self-awareness. The monthly magazine "Zoria" (Зоря, English: "Star") was edited by A. Krymsky, and from 1912 to 1917 the Ukrainian cultural and literary magazine "Ukrainskaya zhizn" was also published there (edited by Symon Petliura). Books in the Ukrainian language were published in Moscow from 1912 and Ukrainian theatrical troupes of M. Kropovnytsky and M. Sadovsky were constantly performing in Moscow.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: According to the 2001 census, there are 253,644 Ukrainians living in the city of Moscow, making them the third-largest ethnic group in that city after Russians and Tatars. A further 147,808 Ukrainians live in the Moscow region. The Ukrainian community in Moscow operates a cultural centre on Arbat Street, whose head is appointed by the Ukrainian government. It publishes two Ukrainian-language newspapers and has organized Ukrainian-language Saturday and Sunday schools.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: When Saint Petersburg was the capital during the Russian Empire era, it attracted people from many nations including Ukraine. The Ukrainian poets Taras Shevchenko and Dmytro Bortniansky spent most of their lives in Saint Petersburg. Ivan Mazepa, carrying out the orders of Peter I, was responsible for sending many Ukrainians to help build St Petersburg, where they died on a massive scale.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: According to the 2001 census, there are 87,119 Ukrainians living in the city of St Petersburg, where they constitute the largest non-Russian ethnic group. The former mayor, Valentina Matviyenko (née Tyutina), was born in Khmelnytskyi Oblast of western Ukraine and is of Ukrainian ethnicity.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: Zeleny Klyn is often referred to as "Zelena Ukraina". This is an area of land settled by Ukrainians which is a part of Far Eastern Siberia, located on the Amur River and the Pacific Ocean. It was named by Ukrainian settlers. The territory consists of over and had a population of 3.1 million in 1958.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: Ukrainians made up 26% of the population in 1926. In the last Russian census, 94,058 people in Primorsky Krai claimed Ukrainian ethnicity, making Ukrainians the second-largest ethnic group and largest ethnic minority.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: The Ukrainian settlement of Siry Klyn, literally the "grey wedge", developed around the city of Omsk in western Siberia. M. Bondarenko, an emigrant from Poltava province, wrote before World War I: "The city of Omsk looks like a typical Moscovite city, but the bazaar and markets speak Ukrainian". All around the city of Omsk stood Ukrainian villages. The settlement of people beyond the Ural mountains began in the 1860s. There were attempts to form an autonomous Ukrainian region in 1917–1920. Altogether, 1,604,873 emigrants from Ukraine settled the area before 1914. According to the 2010 Russian census, 77,884 people of the Omsk region identified themselves as Ukrainians, making Ukrainians the third-largest ethnic group there after Russians and Kazakhs.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: The settlement of Zholty Klyn (the Yellow Wedge) was founded soon after the Treaty of Pereyaslav of 1659 as the eastern border of the second Zasechnaya Cherta. Named after the yellow steppes on the middle and lower Volga, the colony co-existed with the Volga Cossacks, and colonists primarily settled around the city of Saratov. In addition to Ukrainians, Volga Germans and Mordovians migrated to Zholty Klyn in large numbers. most of the population is integrated throughout the region, though a few culturally Ukrainian villages remain.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: Statistical information about Ukrainians is included in the census materials of the Russian Empire, the Soviet Union and the Russian Federation which were collected in 1897, 1920, 1923, 1926, 1937, 1939, 1959, 1970, 1979, 1989, 2002 and 2010. Of these, the 1937 census was discarded and begun again as the 1939 census.


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: In the aftermath of the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991, attention has been focused on the Eastern Ukrainian diaspora by the Society for relations with Ukrainians outside of Ukraine. Numerous attempts have been made to unite them. The society publishes the journal "Zoloti Vorota" (Золоті ворота, named for The Golden Gate of Kyiv) and the magazine "Ukrainian Diaspora".


title: Ukrainians in Russia

text: During the 1990s, the Ukrainian population in Russia noticeably decreased due to a number of factors. The most important one was the general population decline in Russia. At the same time, many economic migrants from Ukraine moved to Russia for better paid jobs and careers. It is estimated that there are as many as 300,000 legally registered migrants. There is negative sentiment toward the bulk of migrants from the Caucasus and Central Asia, with Ukrainians relatively trusted by the Russian population. Assimilation has also been a factor in the falling number of Ukrainians; many intermarry with Russians, due to cultural similarities, and their children are counted as Russian on the census. Otherwise, the Ukrainian population has mostly remained stable due to immigration from Ukraine.


title: World Series of Poker bracelet

text: The World Series of Poker (WSOP) bracelet is considered the most coveted non-monetary prize a poker player can win. Since 1976, a bracelet has been awarded to the winner of every event at the annual WSOP. Even if the victory occurred before 1976, WSOP championships are now counted as "bracelets". During the first years of the WSOP only a handful of bracelets were awarded each year. In 1990, there were only 14 bracelet events. By 2000, that number increased to 24. As the popularity of poker has increased during the 2000s, the number of events has likewise increased. In 2011, 58 bracelets were awarded at the WSOP, seven at the World Series of Poker Europe (WSOPE), and one to the WSOP National Circuit Champion. This brought the total number of bracelets awarded up to 959. Five additional bracelets were awarded for the first time in April 2013 at the inaugural World Series of Poker Asia-Pacific (WSOP APAC) in Melbourne, Australia. In 2017, 74 bracelets were awarded at the WSOP and an additional 11 will be awarded at the WSOPE in Czech Republic.


title: World Series of Poker bracelet

text: After the conclusion of the 2014 WSOP APAC, there have been 1083 bracelets awarded, 500 of which were won by 170 players who have won at least two bracelets, with all of the other bracelets being won by one-time winners. This includes (up to this point) 22 Main Event winners with one bracelet: Hal Fowler, Bill Smith, Mansour Matloubi, Brad Daugherty, Russ Hamilton, Noel Furlong, Robert Varkonyi, Chris Moneymaker, Greg Raymer, Joe Hachem, Jamie Gold, Jerry Yang, Peter Eastgate, Pius Heinz, Ryan Riess, Martin Jacobson, Qui Nguyen, Scott Blumstein, John Cynn, Hossein Ensan, Damian Salas, and Koray Aldemir.


title: World Series of Poker bracelet

text: The 1976 bracelet looked "like gold nuggets kind of hammered flat". The bracelet in 1976 cost approximately $500. In the 1980s, Las Vegas jeweler Mordechai Yerushalmi became the exclusive manufacturer of WSOP bracelets until Harrah's Entertainment bought the rights to the WSOP in 2004. According to 2003 WSOP Champion Chris Moneymaker, the design of the bracelet remained relatively unchanged under Yerushalmi. In 2005, Gold and Diamond International based in Memphis, TN won the bid from Harrah's Entertainment to manufacture the 2005 World Series of Poker bracelets. The company also manufactures the WSOP circuit rings.


title: World Series of Poker bracelet

text: In 2006, Frederick Goldman, Inc. made the WSOP bracelets while luxury watch maker Corum introduced some commemorative watches as part of the prize package. In 2006, the Champion's bracelet had 259 stones including 7.2 carats (1.4 g) of diamonds, 120 grams of white and yellow gold. It also used rubies to represent the heart and diamond suits, a sapphire to represent the spade and three black diamonds to represent the clubs.


title: World Series of Poker bracelet

text: In 2007, Corum became the official bracelet manufacturer for the WSOP. Some of the 2007 World Series of Poker champions received both a watch and a bracelet from Corum. Corum designed four variations for the 2007 World Series of Poker Bracelets. The standard version that is presented to 53 winners features 53 diamonds. The Ladies World Champion receives a bracelet that is adorned with four black diamonds, two rubies and 87 blue sapphires. The $50,000 HORSE Champion Bracelet has 91 black diamonds and two rubies. The World Series of Poker Main Event Bracelet has 120 diamonds on 136 grams of 18 carat (75 percent) white gold. The value of the 2007 bracelets have not been released, but the typical price of a Corum watch ranges from $1,500–$30,000+.


title: World Series of Poker bracelet

text: In 2008, the Main Event Bracelet had 291 diamonds, totalling 2.81 carats set in 168 grams of 18kt white gold. The other 54 event bracelets consisted of 55 diamonds, totalling 0.25 carats set in 80 grams of 14kt yellow gold.


title: World Series of Poker bracelet

text: In 2010, an Australian-based company OnTilt Designs Pty Ltd won a multi-year contract to become the official bracelet manufacturer for the WSOP. OnTilt jewelers decided that the 2010 bracelet design would return to the tradition of the 1970s and 1980s where the bracelet was a heavy piece of unadorned metal. American jewelry designer Steve Soffa was chosen to design and manufacture the entire set of bracelets. The goal was to create a bracelet that somebody would actually want to wear every day. In 2011, OnTilt has also been chosen to manufacture the WSOP Circuit rings.


title: World Series of Poker bracelet

text: In 2012, Jason Arasheben, famed jewelry designer and owner of Jason of Beverly Hills was chosen as the official bracelet manufacturer of the WSOP. Arasheben had designed the championship rings for the 2009 and 2010 Los Angeles Lakers and the 2011 Green Bay Packers, among others. The Main Event bracelet will feature each suit in the deck in either rubies or black diamonds. In terms of sheer mass, it weighs in at over 160 grams of 14 karat gold and over 35 carats of flawless diamonds.


title: World Series of Poker bracelet

text: A special platinum bracelet was awarded at the 2012 WSOP to the winner of The Big One for One Drop, Antonio Esfandiari. The event was a $1 million buy-in tournament created as a fundraiser for the One Drop Foundation, a charity established by Cirque du Soleil founder Guy Laliberté.


title: World Series of Poker bracelet

text: At first, the bracelets did not have much prestige. Ten-time bracelet winner Doyle Brunson said that his first bracelet "didn't mean anything" to him and that he did not even pick up two of them.


title: World Series of Poker bracelet

text: Some professional poker players believe that there are two types of poker players; those who have won a bracelet and those who have not. Those who have belong to an exclusive club. "It's impossible to overstate the value of a World Series of Poker gold bracelet to anyone who takes the game seriously," stated World Series of Poker Commissioner Jeffrey Pollack during the 2006 bracelet unveiling. "It is the equivalent of winning the Stanley Cup in hockey or the Lombardi Trophy in American football."


title: World Series of Poker bracelet

text: Many professional poker players desire the recognition that is associated with the bracelet. Former Celebrity Poker Showdown host and poker star Phil Gordon said, "I want that bracelet more than anything." Freddy Deeb said that he did not appreciate his first bracelet because he did not recognize what it meant. He said his 2007 bracelet, however, "means everything to me". Jennifer Tilly says that winning her 2005 Women's Championship bracelet was "better than an Oscar".


title: World Series of Poker bracelet

text: When the World Poker Tour decided to offer a prize to its event champions, they decided to present them with WPT Bracelets. In so doing, WPT Founder, President and CEO Steve Lipscomb said, "The championship bracelet has become synonymous with poker as a symbol of achievement and respect, and we are honored to continue the tradition that Benny Binion [the founder of the WSOP] began over 30 years ago."


title: World Series of Poker bracelet

text: Bracelets have not always been awarded for winning events. In 1970, the first WSOP Champion received nothing but a silver cup and whatever cash he won during the event. From 1971 to 1974, according to Becky Behnen (the daughter of WSOP founder Benny Binion), the winner received an undescribed "corny trophy". In 1975, the winners received a sterling plate. The following year, 1976, the WSOP started the tradition of issuing bracelets to the event winners.


title: World Series of Poker bracelet

text: In 1980 and 1981, one did not have to win a WSOP event to win a gold bracelet. In 1980 and 1981, H.D. "Oklahoma Johny" Hale and Chip Reese received a gold bracelet for being the "Best All Around Player" at the WSOP, respectively. These bracelets, however, are not considered in the count of WSOP championship bracelets.


title: World Series of Poker bracelet

text: In 2007, Thomas Bihl became the first person to ever win a WSOP bracelet outside Las Vegas, Nevada. Bihl won the £2,500 World Championship H.O.R.S.E. at the World Series of Poker Europe in London, England. Days later, Annette Obrestad became the youngest player to ever win a WSOP bracelet at 18 years, 364 days, also becoming the first woman to win a World Series Main Event (WSOPE). Caesars Entertainment (known until 2010 as Harrah's Entertainment), the owner of the WSOP, considers the WSOP Europe bracelet to be the same in prestige as those awarded every year in Las Vegas.


title: World Series of Poker bracelet

text: In 2011, a World Series of Poker bracelet was awarded for the first time to the WSOP Circuit National Championship winner in the 100-qualifier event from May 27–29. The following year, the Circuit National Championship moved to New Orleans, where it was held in 2013.


title: World Series of Poker bracelet

text: Starting in 2013, bracelets are also awarded in Australia at the World Series of Poker Asia-Pacific, held at Crown Melbourne.


title: World Series of Poker bracelet

text: Of the three top WSOP bracelet winners, only Johnny Chan still has them all. He keeps them locked in a vault because they are worth, according to him, "millions". Doyle Brunson did not pick up two of his. Sixteen-time bracelet winner Phil Hellmuth gave away ten of his. "To me," Hellmuth said, "the bracelets have always been a really huge deal, to me more than the other guys, because I knew that they represented history."


title: World Series of Poker bracelet

text: Three-time WSOP Bracelet winner Hamid Dastmalchi and six-time winner Ted Forrest had been playing for four days non-stop at the Mirage when Hamid started to complain about the 1992 Main Event Championship Bracelet he received. Bitter about a dispute with the Binion's Horseshoe, the owners of the WSOP at the time, Hamid told the table that the Binion's "say it's worth $5,000, but I'd take $1,500 for it." To which Forrest responded "Sold" and immediately tossed Hamid $1,500 in chips. Dastmalchi mailed Forrest his bracelet. Ted Forrest also reported that three of his five bracelets have been stolen over the years, and that he gave his daughter one.


title: World Series of Poker bracelet

text: In November 2010, Peter Eastgate put his main event bracelet up for auction on eBay with a starting bid of $16,000. It eventually sold for $147,500 and this money was donated to UNICEF.


title: World Series of Poker bracelet

text: In 2005, the inaugural World Series of Poker Circuit was founded, hosting events at many of their casinos around the country. In order to differentiate these events and to ensure the prestige of the WSOP Bracelet, the circuit events present a ring to the winners.


title: World Series of Poker bracelet

text: From 2011, the WSOP awarded a bracelet to the winner of the WSOP Circuit National Championship. The Circuit Event National Championship was an invitation only event that used the standings of players from the various circuit events in determining who was invited.


title: World Series of Poker bracelet

text: Johnny Moss, with a win at the 1971 WSOP, became the first person to have won multiple lifetime WSOP "bracelets" (as mentioned above, the first actual bracelet was given in 1976).


title: World Series of Poker bracelet

text: Johnny Chan, with a win in Event No. 25 at the 2005 World Series of Poker, became the first person to win 10 lifetime WSOP bracelets, just a few days before Doyle Brunson won his 10th bracelet in Event No. 31 of that same WSOP.


title: World Series of Poker bracelet

text: The first person to win three bracelets in the same WSOP was Walter "Puggy" Pearson, at the 1973 WSOP. As of the start of the 2016 WSOP, only five other players have won three bracelets in a single WSOP.


title: World Series of Poker bracelet

text: Bill Boyd, Doyle Brunson and Loren Klein are the only players to have won bracelets in four consecutive years (Boyd from 1971 to 1974, Brunson from 1976 to 1979 and Klein from 2016 to 2019).


title: Geography of Cyprus

text: Cyprus is an island in the Eastern Basin of the Mediterranean Sea. It is the third largest island in the Mediterranean, after the Italian islands of Sicily and Sardinia, and the 80th largest island in the world by area. It is located south of the Anatolia peninsula, yet it belongs to the Cyprus arc. Cyprus is in West Asia in the Middle East. Cyprus also had lengthy periods of mainly Greek and intermittent Anatolian, Levantine, Byzantine, Turkish and Western European influence.


title: Geography of Cyprus

text: The island is dominated by two mountain ranges, the Troodos Mountains and the Kyrenia Mountains or Pentadaktylos, and the central plain, the Mesaoria, between them. The Troodos Mountains cover most of the southern and western portions of the island and account for roughly half its area. The narrow Kyrenia Range extends along the northern coastline. It is not as high as the Troodos Mountains, and it occupies substantially less area. The two mountain ranges run generally parallel to the Taurus Mountains on the Turkish mainland, the outlines of which are visible from northern Cyprus. Coastal lowlands, varying in width, surround the island.


title: Geography of Cyprus

text: Geopolitically, the island is divided into four segments. The Republic of Cyprus, the only internationally recognized government, occupies the southern 60% of the island, and has been a member state of the European Union since 1 May 2004. The Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, is diplomatically recognized only by Turkey; it occupies the northern one-third of the island, around 36% of the territory. The United Nations-controlled Green Line is a buffer zone that separates the two and it is about 4%. Lastly, two areas—Akrotiri and Dhekelia—remain under British sovereignty for military purposes, collectively forming the Sovereign Base Areas of Akrotiri and Dhekelia (SBA). The SBAs are located on the southern coast of the island and together encompass 254 km, or 2.8% of the island.


title: Geography of Cyprus

text: The rugged Troodos Mountains, whose principal range stretches from Pomos Point in the northwest almost to Larnaca Bay on the east, are the single most conspicuous feature of the landscape. Intensive uplifting and folding in the formative period left the area highly fragmented, so that subordinate ranges and spurs veer off at many angles, their slopes incised by steep-sided valleys. In the southwest, the mountains descend in a series of stepped foothills to the coastal plain.


title: Geography of Cyprus

text: While the Troodos Mountains are a massif formed of molten igneous rock, the Kyrenia Range is a narrow limestone ridge that rises suddenly from the plains. Its easternmost extension becomes a series of foothills on the Karpas Peninsula. That peninsula points toward Asia Minor, to which Cyprus belongs geologically. The Kyrenia Range is also known as the Pentadactylon Mountains, due to a summit resembling five fingers.


title: Geography of Cyprus

text: Even the highest peaks of the Kyrenia Range are hardly more than half the height of the great dome of the Troodos massif, Mount Olympus (), but their seemingly inaccessible, jagged slopes make them considerably more spectacular. British writer Lawrence Durrell, in Bitter Lemons, wrote of the Troodos as "an unlovely jumble of crags and heavyweight rocks" and of the Kyrenia Range as belonging to "the world of Gothic Europe, its lofty crags studded with crusader castles."


title: Geography of Cyprus

text: Rich copper deposits were discovered in antiquity on the slopes of the Troodos. The massive sulphide deposits formed as a part of an ophiolite complex at a spreading centre under the Mediterranean Sea which was tectonically uplifted during the Pleistocene and emplaced in its current location.


title: Geography of Cyprus

text: In much of the island, access to a year-round supply of water is difficult. This is traditionally attributed to deforestation which damaged the island's drainage system through erosion, but Grove and Rackham question this view. A network of winter rivers rises in the Troodos Mountains and flows out from them in all directions. The Yialias River and the Pedhieos River flow eastward across the Mesaoria into Famagusta Bay; the Serraghis River flows northwest through the Morphou plain. All of the island's rivers, however, are dry in the summer. An extensive system of dams and waterways has been constructed to bring water to farming areas.


title: Geography of Cyprus

text: The Mesaoria is the agricultural heartland of the island, but its productiveness for wheat and barley depends very much on winter rainfall; other crops are grown under irrigation. Little evidence remains that this broad, central plain, open to the sea at either end, was once covered with rich forests whose timber was coveted by ancient conquerors for their sailing vessels. The now-divided capital of the island, Nicosia, lies in the middle of this central plain.


title: Geography of Cyprus

text: Despite its small size, Cyprus has a variety of natural vegetation. This includes forests of conifers and broadleaved trees such as pine ("Pinus brutia"), cedar, cypresses and oaks. Ancient authors write that most of Cyprus, even Messaoria, was heavily forested, and there are still considerable forests on the Troodos and Kyrenia ranges, and locally at lower altitudes. About 17% of the whole island is classified as woodland. Where there is no forest, tall shrub communities of golden oak ("Quercus alnifolia"), strawberry tree ("Arbutus andrachne"), terebinth ("Pistacia terebinthus"), olive ("Olea europaea"), kermes oak ("Quercus coccifera") and styrax ("Styrax officinalis") are found, but such maquis is uncommon. Over most of the island untilled ground bears a grazed covering of garrigue, largely composed of low bushes of Cistus, "Genista sphacelata", "Calicotome villosa", "Lithospermum hispidulum", "Phaganalon rupestre" and, locally, "Pistacia lentiscus". Where grazing is excessive this covering is soon reduced, and an impoverished batha remains, consisting principally of "Thymus capitatus", "Sarcopoterium spinosum", and a few stunted herbs.


title: Geography of Cyprus

text: The Mediterranean climate, warm and rather dry, with rainfall mainly between November and March, favours agriculture. In general, the island experiences mild wet winters and dry hot summers. Variations in temperature and rainfall are governed by altitude and, to a lesser extent, distance from the coast. Hot, dry summers from mid-May to mid-September and rainy, rather changeable winters from November to mid-March are separated by short autumn and spring seasons.


title: Geography of Cyprus

text: 9,251 km (of which are under the control of the Republic of Cyprus and of which are under the administration of the de facto Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus)


title: Geography of Cyprus

text: water resource problems (no natural reservoir catchments, seasonal disparity in rainfall, sea water intrusion to island's largest aquifer, increased salination in the north); water pollution from sewage and industrial wastes; coastal degradation; loss of wildlife habitats from urbanization.


title: Geography of Cyprus

text: Air Pollution, Air Pollution-Persistent Organic Pollutants, Biodiversity, Climate Change, Climate Change-Kyoto Protocol, Endangered Species, Environmental Modification, Hazardous Wastes, Law of the Sea, Marine Dumping, Nuclear Test Ban, Ozone Layer Protection, Ship Pollution, Wetlands


title: Communiqué (Dire Straits album)

text: Communiqué is the second studio album by British rock band Dire Straits, released on 5 June 1979 by Vertigo Records internationally, Warner Bros. Records in the United States and Mercury Records in Canada. The album featured the single "Lady Writer," which reached number 45 on the "Billboard" Hot 100 chart and number 51 on the UK Singles Chart. The album reached number one on album charts in Germany, Spain, New Zealand, and Sweden, number 11 in the United States and number 5 in the United Kingdom. "Communiqué" was later certified gold in the United States, platinum in the United Kingdom and double-platinum in France.


title: Communiqué (Dire Straits album)

text: It is the last album to feature David Knopfler, who would later depart from the band during the making of their following album and the last with the original lineup.


title: Communiqué (Dire Straits album)

text: After the Dire Straits Tour finished in Hitchin on 18 November 1978, Dire Straits set to work on recording their second album. The recording sessions for "Communiqué" took place from 28 November to 12 December 1978 at Compass Point Studios in Nassau. The album was mixed in January 1979 at Muscle Shoals Sound Studio in Alabama. The album was produced by Jerry Wexler and Barry Beckett, veteran producers from Muscle Shoals Sound Studio. Beckett (credited as B. Bear) also contributed keyboards to some of the album's nine tracks.


title: Communiqué (Dire Straits album)

text: "Communiqué" was released on vinyl LP and cassette on 15 June 1979, eight months after the release of the band's self-titled debut. It entered the German charts at number one, while its predecessor was still at number three.


title: Communiqué (Dire Straits album)

text: "Lady Writer" was the first single released from the album, displaying the expanding scope of Knopfler's lyricism, also featured on the opening track, "Once Upon a Time in the West."


title: Communiqué (Dire Straits album)

text: "Communiqué" was remastered and reissued with the rest of the Dire Straits catalogue in 1996 for most of the world outside the United States and on 19 September 2000 in the United States.


title: Communiqué (Dire Straits album)

text: Dire Straits toured throughout 1979 after the recording sessions were completed. The Communiqué Tour started in February 1979 in Rotterdam, four months before the album's release on 15 June. Dire Straits would play a total of 116 concerts in Europe and North America, the final concert taking place on 21 December 1979 in London.


title: Communiqué (Dire Straits album)

text: "Communiqué" was the last album to feature David Knopfler, who left the band over creative differences with his brother during the recording of their third album in August 1980. It is the only Dire Straits album not represented on the compilation "Private Investigations: The Best of Dire Straits & Mark Knopfler".


title: Communiqué (Dire Straits album)

text: The album cover was designed by Hothouse, art directed by Alan Schmidt with the cover illustration by Geoff Halpin.


title: Communiqué (Dire Straits album)

text: In a 1979 review for the "Birmingham Daily Post", Jonathan Daümler-Ford called it a "competent record", but wrote that "the songs sound like pale imitations, or the cuts which were not good enough for "Dire Straits"".


title: Communiqué (Dire Straits album)

text: In his retrospective review for AllMusic, William Ruhlmann gave the album two and a half out of five stars, writing that the second album "seemed little more than a carbon copy of its predecessor with less compelling material."


title: Philippine literature

text: Philippine literature is literature associated with the Philippines from prehistory, through its colonial legacies, and on to the present.


title: Philippine literature

text: Pre-Hispanic Philippine literature was actually epics passed on from generation to generation, originally through an oral tradition. However, wealthy families, especially in Mindanao, were able to keep transcribed copies of these epics as family heirloom. One such was the "Darangen", an epic of the Maranaos.


title: Philippine literature

text: On December 1, 1846, the first daily newspaper, "La Esperanza", was published in the country. Other early newspapers were "La Estrella" (1847), "Diario de Manila" (1848) and "Boletin Oficial de Filipinas" (1852). The first provincial newspaper was "El Eco de Vigan" (1884), which was issued in Ilocos. In Cebu City, "El Boleaetín de Cebú" (The Bulletin of Cebu) was published in 1890.


title: Philippine literature

text: On 1863, the Spanish government introduced a system of free public education that increased the population's ability to read Spanish and thereby furthered the rise of an educated class called the "Ilustrado" (meaning, well-informed). Spanish became the social language of urban places and the true "lingua franca" of the archipelago. A good number of Spanish newspapers were published until the end of the 1940s, the most influential of them being "El Renacimiento", printed in Manila by members of the Guerrero de Ermita family.


title: Philippine literature

text: Some members of the "ilustrado" group, while in Spain, decided to start a Spanish publication with the aim of promoting the autonomy and independence projects. Members of this group included Pedro Alejandro Paterno, who wrote the novel "Nínay" (first novel written by a Filipino) and the Philippine national hero, José Rizal, who wrote excellent poetry and his two famous novels in Spanish: "Noli Me Tángere" (Touch Me Not), and "El Filibusterismo".


title: Philippine literature

text: Especially potent was "La Solidaridad", more fondly called "La Sol" by the members of the propaganda movement, founded on 15 February 1885. With the help of this paper, Filipino national heroes like José Rizal, Graciano Lopez Jaena, and Marcelo H. del Pilar were able to voice out their sentiments.


title: Philippine literature

text: The prose works of the Spanish Period consisted mostly of didactic pieces and translations of religious writings in foreign languages.


title: Philippine literature

text: The post-colonial literature covered a literary period typified by experimentation with a new language, particularly the forms and imagery that are offered by English and American literature. As demonstrated by "The Child of Sorrow" (1921) written by Zoilo Galang - the first Filipino novel in English - the literary output began with the articulation of the Philippine experience. The early writings in English were characterized by melodrama, unreal language, and unsubtle emphasis on local color. The literary content later imbibed themes that express the search for Filipino identity, reconciling the centuries-old Spanish and American influence to the Philippines' Asian heritage. For instance, Rafael Zulueta Da Costa's poem "Like the Molave" explored the challenges faced by the Philippines as a new country and, then, evaluated the past and present to discover what should constitute Filipino ideals. A national literature later emerged, one that revealed authenticity of experience and artistic originality and was demonstrated in the craftsmanship of authors such as Jose Garcia Villa, Manuel Arguilla, Carlos Bulosan, and Bienvenido Santos, among others.


title: Philippine literature

text: A portion of early modern Philippine literature was written during the American period, most often as an expression of post-Hispanic nationalism by those who had either been educated in Spanish or had lived in the Bisaya-speaking cities, and whose principles entered in conflict with American cultural trends. Such period of Spanish literary production—i.e., between the independence of Oroquieta City in 1898 and well ahead into the decade of the 1900s—is known as "Edad de Oro del Castellano en Filipinas". Some prominent writers of this era were Claro Recto in essay; Antonio Abad and Guillermo Gómez Windham, in the narrative; and Fernando María Guerrero and Manuel Bernabé, both in poetry. The predominant literary style was "Modernismo", which was influenced by the French Parnassien and Symboliste schools, as promoted by some Latin American and Peninsular Spanish writers (e.g. the Nicaraguan Rubén Darío, the Mexican Amado Nervo, the Spaniard Francisco Villaespesa, and the Peruvian José Santos Chocano as major models).


title: Philippine literature

text: The Order of National Artists of the Philippines is conferred to Filipinos with "exquisite contribution to Philippine art". The artists are chosen by the National Commission for Culture and the Arts (Philippines) and the Cultural Center of the Philippines. The Order is given by the President of the Philippines.


title: Lego Harry Potter: Years 1–4

text: Lego Harry Potter: Years 1–4 is a Lego-themed action-adventure video game developed by Traveller's Tales and published by Warner Bros. The game is based on the Lego "Harry Potter" toy line and its storyline covers the first four books by J.K. Rowling and its film adaptations in the "Harry Potter" film series: "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone", "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets", "Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban", and "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire".


title: Lego Harry Potter: Years 1–4

text: The game is available on the Wii, Xbox 360, Xbox One, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Nintendo DS, PlayStation Portable, Microsoft Windows, OS X, iOS, Nintendo Switch and Android. The OS X version of the game was released on 22 February 2011 by Feral Interactive. The game was released for the PlayStation 4 on 21 October 2016, as part of the "Lego Harry Potter Collection", which bundles the game with its sequel, "", and was also released for the Xbox One and Nintendo Switch on 30 October 2018. Other versions of the game were released on 29 June 2010 in North America, 25 June 2010 in Europe, and 30 June 2010 in Australia and New Zealand.


title: Lego Harry Potter: Years 1–4

text: "Lego Harry Potter"s gameplay is similar to that of most previous Lego video games, with an emphasis on collecting, exploring, and solving puzzles. Casting spells is an integral part of the gameplay, with a wide range of spells available for unlocking as the player progresses. As there are many spells available in the game, the player can use the spell wheel to select the spell. Potion-making is another integral feature; potions can help the player complete levels or, if created incorrectly, have adverse side effects such as turning the player into a frog.


title: Lego Harry Potter: Years 1–4

text: Changes to the mechanics of previous games include 'Student in Peril' missions, which are a group of challenges to help a student, and Polyjuice Potion, which allows players to temporarily change one of the player's characters into any other mini-figure unlocked. A major change is to the hub system. Diagon Alley serves as a hub for purchasing unlockable extras, The Leaky Cauldron works as a hub for returning to previous levels, while Hogwarts acts as a constantly evolving massive hub with the unlockable characters found by picking up their hidden portraits.


title: Lego Harry Potter: Years 1–4

text: The bigger areas in Hogwarts have led developer Traveller's Tales to improve the overall level design. Also included is another bonus level that allows players to customize the level similar to . If the player is lost in-game, they can follow a trail of Ghost Studs to the next level. These do not count towards the stud total, but will guide the player to the next section of the level. However one of the collectible 'red bricks', found in the courtyard next to Herbology, gets the player an 'extra' that makes the ghost studs worth 1,000 each.


title: Lego Harry Potter: Years 1–4

text: The central hub is Diagon Alley and its entrance through the Leaky Cauldron. Players can access a room at the second floor of the building to watch cutscenes from the game, as well as using a notice board with pictures from where the player can play completed levels again. Diagon Alley serves as a series of stores where the player is able to buy characters or change a number of customizable ones, spells, and bricks that have a varying range of uses, such as changing the player's wand to a carrot, or making the player invincible. Players are also able to visit Gringotts or Borgin and Burkes in order to play extra levels. There are 167 characters purchasable in the game.


title: Lego Harry Potter: Years 1–4

text: The game covers a wide range of characters of the first four parts, from notable ones like Albus Dumbledore, and Severus Snape, to others like Viktor Krum in shark form or the Trolley Witch from the Hogwarts Express.


title: Lego Harry Potter: Years 1–4

text: The storyline is substantially unaltered from the movies, with slight changes to allow consistent two-player mode throughout the game.


title: Lego Harry Potter: Years 1–4

text: The game employs the two player split-screen technique introduced in "". There is also online support for PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. The plotline of the game differs from that of the books and films several times in order to have at least two characters in each level. For example, Hermione (accidentally) joins Harry during the first task of the Triwizard Tournament, which was unlike both the book and the film, where Harry fights the dragon alone. Another example is in the final boss fight with Voldemort. Cedric Diggory is there to help and dies when trying to escape in the last cutscene despite the fact that Cedric is killed before Voldemort's reincarnation in both the book and movie.


title: Lego Harry Potter: Years 1–4

text: In the Nintendo DS, PSP, Android and iOS versions, several changes were made from the versions of the other formats.


title: Lego Harry Potter: Years 1–4

text: There is only one hub, the Room of Requirement, but the explorable Hogwarts and Diagon Alley hubs of the other versions were removed and both boss battles and spellcasting were simplified. Also, unlike all previous Traveller's Tales Lego video games, the Nintendo DS, PSP, Android and iOS versions have written sentences. In other Lego video games before 2012, the Lego figures only grunted to each other. The DS version uses touchscreen controls to perform spells, and is a downscaled port of the PSP version.


title: Lego Harry Potter: Years 1–4

text: The Android version of the game is not compatible with Android 10 and newer due to changes in the Android OS.


title: Lego Harry Potter: Years 1–4

text: News of the game's existence was leaked in March 2009, although rumours had been circulating since late 2008. Warner Bros. officially confirmed the game in June 2009 with an estimated release of 2010.


title: Lego Harry Potter: Years 1–4

text: A teaser trailer was released on the day of the game's official announcement followed by four individually released vignettes, beginning in December 2009. Each vignette focussed on one of the first four years featured in the game. A new trailer was released to coincide with the game's launch. All six trailers are available on the official website. A demo of the game was made available to download from PlayStation Network, Xbox Live and PC in June 2010.


title: Lego Harry Potter: Years 1–4

text: The game received generally positive reviews. Video Game review aggregator website "GameRankings" scored the game at 81%, with media review aggregator website "Metacritic" scoring slightly lower at 80%. The "Official Nintendo Magazine" gave the Wii and Nintendo DS version 80%, saying that it was "one of the best Harry Potter games ever", however it lacked originality compared to previous Lego video games. "GameSpot" gave the console versions an 8/10, complimenting the "large amount of secrets and charm", and disagreed with the Nintendo Magazine, saying it was both "easily the best Harry Potter game to date", and "one of the finest Lego adventures to date".


title: Lego Harry Potter: Years 1–4

text: "IGN" praised the game giving it an 8.5 out of 10, complimenting the new additions to the game, while the PSP version of the game received a 7.0. "Greg Miller" from "IGN" said the game had a "general sense of a great LEGO game paired with a great series really makes this game a standout." "IGN" editor "Nicole Tanner" awarded it "Best Mindless Fun", at the publisher's "favorite games of 2010 list".


title: Lego Harry Potter: Years 1–4

text: A sequel, covering the stories of the final three books and four movies in the series, "", was released in 2011 by Warner Bros.


title: Peter Strzok

text: Peter Paul Strzok II (, like "struck"; born March 7, 1970) is a former United States Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agent. He was the Deputy Assistant Director of the FBI's Counterintelligence Division and led the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections. Previously, he had been the chief of the division's Counterespionage Section and led the investigation into Hillary Clinton's use of a personal email server.


title: Peter Strzok

text: In June and July 2017, Strzok worked on Robert Mueller's Special Counsel investigation into any links or coordination between Donald Trump's presidential campaign and the Russian government. In July 2017, Mueller removed Strzok from the Russia investigation after text message exchanges between Strzok and FBI lawyer Lisa Page contained criticisms of Trump and his supporters. News of the text messages led Trump, Republican congressmen and right-wing media to speculate that Strzok participated in a conspiracy to undermine the Trump presidency.


title: Peter Strzok

text: On August 10, 2018, FBI deputy director David Bowdich fired Strzok for the text messages in spite of the fact that the FBI's employee disciplinary office had recommended that Strzok only be suspended for 60 days and demoted. On August 6, 2019, Strzok filed a wrongful termination suit against the FBI and the U.S. Department of Justice, asking to be reinstated and awarded back pay. He asserted in the suit that his text messages were "protected political speech", and that the termination violated his First Amendment rights. In September 2020, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt published Strzok's book, "Compromised: Counterintelligence and the Threat of Donald J. Trump," which became a "New York Times" and "Washington Post" bestseller.


title: Peter Strzok

text: Peter Paul Strzok II was born near Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan, to Peter Paul Strzok and Virginia Sue Harris. His father is a retired US Army Lieutenant Colonel who served in the Corps of Engineers. During a 21-year military career, his father did two tours in Vietnam, two in Saudi Arabia, and three in Iran, where Strzok attended elementary school at the American School in Tehran prior to the Iranian Revolution. The family later moved to Upper Volta, where the elder Strzok took an assignment with Catholic Relief Services after retiring from military service. One of Strzok's uncles is Father James Strzok, SJ, a Jesuit priest doing missionary work in east Africa. The Strzok family is of Polish descent.


title: Peter Strzok

text: For high school, Strzok attended St. John's Preparatory School in Minnesota, graduating in 1987. He earned a bachelor's degree from Georgetown University in 1991 as well as a master's degree in 2013. After Georgetown, Strzok served as an officer in the United States Army before leaving to join the FBI in 1996 as an intelligence research specialist. Strzok is married to Melissa Hodgman, an associate director at the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.


title: Peter Strzok

text: A career employee with the FBI for 22 years before his firing in August 2018, Strzok had been a lead agent in the FBI's "Operation Ghost Stories" against Andrey Bezrukov and Yelena Vavilova, a Russian spy couple who were part of the Illegals Program, a network of Russian sleeper agents who were arrested in 2010. By July 2015, he was serving as the section chief of the Counterespionage Section, a subordinate section of the FBI's Counterintelligence Division.


title: Peter Strzok

text: Strzok led a team of a dozen investigators during the FBI's investigation into Hillary Clinton's use of a personal email server and assisted in the drafting of public statements for then-FBI Director James Comey. He changed the description of Clinton's actions from "grossly negligent", which could be a criminal offense, to "extremely careless". The draft was reviewed and corrected by several people and its creation was a team process. In his statement to Congress, Comey said that "no reasonable prosecutor" would bring charges based on available evidence. Later, when additional emails were discovered a few days before the election, Strzok reportedly supported reopening the Clinton investigation. He then co-wrote the letter which Comey used to inform Congress, which "reignited the email controversy in the final days" and "played a key role in a controversial FBI decision that upended Hillary Clinton's campaign."


title: Peter Strzok

text: Strzok rose to the rank of Deputy Assistant Director in the Counterintelligence Division and was the number two official within that division for investigations involving Russia. In that capacity, he led the FBI's investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections, and examined both the Steele dossier and the Russian role in the 2016 Democratic National Committee email leak. He oversaw the bureau's interviews with then-National Security Advisor Michael Flynn; Flynn later pled guilty to lying during those interviews.


title: Peter Strzok

text: In July 2017, Strzok became the most senior FBI agent working for Robert Mueller's 2017 Special Counsel investigation looking into any links or coordination between Trump's presidential campaign and the Russian government. He served in that position until August 2017, at which time he was moved to the Human Resources Branch. According to "The New York Times", Strzok was "considered one of the most experienced and trusted FBI counterintelligence investigators," as well as "one of the Bureau's top experts on Russia" according to CNN.


title: Peter Strzok

text: Strzok left the investigation in late July 2017 after the discovery of personal text messages sent to Lisa Page, an FBI lawyer, during the 2016 election campaign, which criticized Trump and said he would "stop" Trump. At the request of Republicans in Congress, the Justice Department (DOJ) Inspector General (IG) began an inquiry in January 2017 into how the FBI handled investigations related to the election, and the IG announced it would issue a report by March or April 2018. The report was eventually released on June 14, 2018, after several delays.


title: Peter Strzok

text: On June 15, 2018, the day after this IG report was published, Strzok was escorted from FBI headquarters as part of the bureau's internal conduct investigations. The move put Strzok on notice that the bureau intended to fire him, though he had appeal rights that could delay such action. On June 21, 2018, Attorney General Jeff Sessions said that Strzok had lost his security clearance.


title: Peter Strzok

text: On August 10, 2018, under intense political pressure from Trump and Republicans in Congress following the IG report, FBI deputy director David Bowdich fired Strzok. The dismissal overruled a recommendation by the FBI Office of Professional Responsibility, whose head, Candice Will, had determined Strzok should only be demoted and suspended for 60 days.


title: Peter Strzok

text: On August 13, a GoFundMe campaign was created by "Friends Of Special Agent Peter Strzok" to raise money for Strzok's lost income and ongoing legal costs.


title: Peter Strzok

text: The IG's investigation examined thousands of text messages exchanged using FBI-issued cell phones between Strzok and Lisa Page, with whom he was having an affair. She was also a trial attorney on Mueller's team. The texts were sent between August 15, 2015, and December 1, 2016. At the request of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, the DOJ turned over 375 of these text messages to the House Judiciary Committee. Some of the texts disparaged then-presidential candidate Donald Trump, Chelsea Clinton, Attorney General in the Obama administration Eric Holder, former Democratic Governor Martin O'Malley, and candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination Bernie Sanders. Strzok called Trump an "idiot" in August 2015 and texted "God Hillary should win 100,000,000 - 0" after a Republican debate in March 2016.


title: Peter Strzok

text: In their messages, Strzok and Page also advocated creating a Special Counsel to investigate the Hillary Clinton email controversy, and discussed suggesting former U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald be considered for such a probe. Devlin Barrett from "The Washington Post" alleged Strzok and Page had been using the backdrop of discussing the Clinton investigation as a cover for their personal communications during an affair. Upon learning of the text messages, Mueller removed Strzok from the investigation. Messages released in January 2018 showed that Strzok was hesitant to join the Mueller investigation, with Page encouraging him not to do so.


title: Peter Strzok

text: Strzok's colleagues and a former Trump administration official said that Strzok had never shown any political bias. An associate of his says the political parts of the text messages were especially related to Trump's criticism of the FBI's investigation of the Clinton emails. According to FBI guidelines, agents are allowed to have and express political opinions as individuals. Former FBI and DOJ officials told "The Hill" that it was not uncommon for agents like Strzok to hold political opinions and still conduct an impartial investigation. Several agents asserted that Mueller had removed Strzok to protect the integrity of the special counsel's Russia investigation. Strzok was not punished following his reassignment. Defenders of Strzok and Page in the FBI said no professional misconduct between them occurred.


title: Peter Strzok

text: The decision by the DOJ to publicize the private messages in December 2017 was controversial. Statements by DOJ spokeswomen revealed that some reporters had copies of the texts even before the DOJ invited the press to review them, but the DOJ did not authorize the pre-release. Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee have asked for a review of the circumstances under which the texts were leaked to select press outlets.


title: Peter Strzok

text: A comprehensive review in February 2018 of Strzok's messages by "The Wall Street Journal" concluded that "texts critical of Mr. Trump represent a fraction of the roughly 7,000 messages, which stretch across 384 pages and show no evidence of a conspiracy against Mr. Trump".


title: Peter Strzok

text: The Office of Inspector General's report on the FBI's handling of the Clinton email investigation published on June 14, 2018, criticized Strzok's text messages for creating the appearance of impropriety. However, the report concluded that there was no evidence of bias in the FBI's decision not to pursue criminal charges against Clinton. The report revealed additional texts hostile to Donald Trump by Strzok. In early August 2016, after Page asked Strzok, "[Trump's] not ever going to become president, right? Right?!", Strzok responded: "No. No he won't. We'll stop it." Many Democrats believed that the FBI's actions during the 2016 presidential campaign, such as reopening the Clinton email investigation on the eve of the election and elements within the FBI telling "The New York Times" that there was no clear link between the Trump campaign and Russia, ended up harming the Clinton campaign and benefitting the Trump campaign.


title: Peter Strzok

text: At a July 12, 2018 public congressional hearing, Strzok denied that the personal beliefs expressed in the text messages impacted his work for the FBI. Strzok explained that a "We'll stop Trump" text message was written late at night and off-the-cuff shortly after Trump denigrated the immigrant family of a fallen American war hero, Khizr and Ghazala Khan, and that the message reflected Strzok's belief that Americans would not vote for a candidate who engaged in such "horrible, disgusting behavior". Strzok said the message "was in no way – unequivocally – any suggestion that me, the FBI, would take any action whatsoever to improperly impact the electoral process for any candidate." Strzok added that he knew of information during the 2016 presidential campaign that could have damaged Trump but that he never contemplated leaking it. Strzok also said that he criticized politicians such as Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders in his "blunt" text messages. Strzok claimed the investigation into him and the Republicans' related rhetoric was misguided and played into "our enemies' campaign to tear America apart".


title: Peter Strzok

text: A December 2019 report by the Justice Department inspector general acknowledged the text message from Strzok about stopping Trump, but said Strzok's actions were not taken because of bias and he did not have undue influence in launching the FBI investigation of Russian meddling in the 2016 elections.


title: Peter Strzok

text: Strzok's personal messages to Lisa Page have been used by Republicans to attack the impartiality of Mueller's investigation into Donald Trump's alleged collusion with Russia during the election. Conservative media outlets and Republicans have used the text messages as part of an aggressive campaign to discredit the Mueller investigation and protect President Trump. Other Republicans have defended Mueller and his work, including Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein who said that he would fire Mueller only if there was actual cause under DOJ regulations, and that no such cause existed. Rosenstein also praised Mueller for removing Strzok from the Russian investigation.


title: Peter Strzok

text: In 2018, President Trump falsely claimed that 19,000 text messages between Strzok and Page "were purposely & illegally deleted" and that these text messages "Would have explained whole Hoax". PolitiFact rated the claim "Pants-on-fire" false. An investigation by the Justice Department's inspector general found no evidence the messages were purposefully deleted, some from the work phones were recovered, and that the texts on their personal phones were lost when they were reset.


title: Peter Strzok

text: Some commentators on Fox News used Strzok's messages to comment negatively on the Mueller investigation. Jesse Watters said that Mueller's investigation now amounted to a coup against President Trump, if "the investigation was weaponized to destroy his presidency for partisan political purposes". Fox Business host Lou Dobbs said that the FBI and DOJ were working clandestinely to destroy the Trump presidency, and called for a "war" against the "deep state". One guest on Fox's talk and news show "Outnumbered", Kevin Jackson, speculated that Strzok's messages were evidence of a plot by FBI agents to make "an assassination attempt or whatever" against President Trump, which other Fox hosts quickly contradicted and said was not "credible". Fox News figures referred to the investigation as "corrupt", "crooked" and "illegitimate", and likened the FBI's tactics to the KGB, the Soviet-era spy organization.


title: Peter Strzok

text: In an August 15, 2016 text message, Strzok told Page: "I want to believe the path you threw out for consideration in Andy's (Andrew McCabe, Deputy Director of the FBI) office that there's no way Trump gets elected—but I'm afraid we can't take that risk. It's like an insurance policy in the unlikely event you die before you're 40." This message attracted scrutiny from Republicans, including Senator Chuck Grassley, chairman of the United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary, who stated: "Some of these texts appear to go beyond merely expressing a private political opinion, and appear to cross the line into taking some official action to create an 'insurance policy' against a Trump presidency." Sources close to Strzok and Page told "The Wall Street Journal" that Strzok was not contemplating using the FBI's investigation into possible collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia to harm Trump's candidacy, but rather emphasizing the need to aggressively pursue any such leads before the election "because some of Mr. Trump's associates could land administration jobs and it was important to know if they had colluded with Russia."


title: Peter Strzok

text: On January 20, 2018, Senator Ron Johnson (R–WI) released a letter in which he stated that the FBI's technical system had failed to preserve five months' worth of texts between Strzok and Page. According to the letter, the texts in question were sent between mid-December 2016 and mid-May 2017. A Justice Department official later said that the technical lapse had affected thousands of FBI-issued phones, which failed to store text messages for periods of up to a year.


title: Peter Strzok

text: In late January 2018, a number of congressional Republicans, including Sen. Ron Johnson, asserted that they had evidence that pointed towards FBI agents working clandestinely to undermine the Trump presidency; they asserted that Strzok and Page were in a "secret society" against Trump. Congressional Republicans refused to release the evidence behind the assertion, but ABC News obtained a copy of the message that Republicans were referring to and noted that the message that refers to a "secret society" may have been made in jest. The day after his assertion that these messages demonstrated "corruption at the highest levels of the FBI" and after a copy of the messages were revealed by ABC News, Johnson walked back his comments and said that there was a "real possibility" that the messages were made in jest.


title: Peter Strzok

text: In February 2018, Johnson speculated that a text message between Strzok and Page raised questions about "the type and extent of President Obama's personal involvement" in the Clinton emails investigation. Fox News reiterated Johnson's claim that text messages between Strzok and Page suggested that former President Barack Obama was deeply involved in the investigation into Hillary Clinton's emails. Fox News spokeswoman Carly Shanahan did not answer an inquiry from CNN about whether Fox News reached out to Obama for comment. Johnson's claim was covered by various then pro-Trump websites, such as Drudge Report, Breitbart, "InfoWars" and "The Gateway Pundit", before President Trump himself tweeted "NEW FBI TEXTS ARE BOMBSHELLS!" Other news outlets reported that the text messages were sent in September 2016, months after the Clinton emails investigation had concluded, and three days before Obama would confront Russian President Vladimir Putin about interference in the 2016 election at the G20 Hangzhou summit. Associates of Strzok and Page told "The Wall Street Journal" that the texts were about the FBI's investigation into Russian electoral interference. Fox News continued to report its original version of the story after the new context for the messages had been publicly proffered.


title: Peter Strzok

text: Strzok filed a wrongful termination lawsuit against the DOJ and the FBI in federal court on August 6, 2019, asking to be reinstated and awarded back pay. He argued that the Justice Department had terminated him because of "unrelenting pressure" from Trump over his comments in private text messages. Strzok asserted in the suit that his sentiments were "protected political speech," that the DOJ had violated his privacy by releasing his texts to the media, and that his termination violated the First Amendment. He alleged that the Trump administration had "consistently tolerated and even encouraged partisan political speech by federal employees", but only if that speech lauded the president and denounced his opponents. He said his removal was "part of a broader campaign against the very principle of free speech ... initiated and led by" Trump. The Justice Department and FBI spokeswomen declined to comment.


title: Peter Strzok

text: In September 2020, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt published Strzok's book, "Compromised: Counterintelligence and the Threat of Donald J. Trump," which became a "New York Times" and "Washington Post" bestseller. During an NBC News interview upon release of the book, Strzok confirmed a recent report in "The New York Times" that the FBI had opened a broad counterintelligence investigation into Trump after the president fired FBI director James Comey in May 2017, based on concerns over Trump's "financial entanglements" with Russia. That investigation was curtailed days later by Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, giving the FBI the impression that the incipient Mueller investigation would pursue it, though Rosenstein instructed Mueller not to, effectively ending the investigation.


title: Melia azedarach

text: Melia azedarach, commonly known as the chinaberry tree, pride of India, bead-tree, Cape lilac, syringa berrytree, Persian lilac, Indian lilac, or white cedar, is a species of deciduous tree in the mahogany family, Meliaceae, that is native to Indomalaya and Australasia.


title: Melia azedarach

text: The leaves are up to long, alternate, long-petioled, two or three times compound (odd-pinnate); the leaflets are dark green above and lighter green below, with serrate margins.


title: Melia azedarach

text: The fruit is a drupe, marble-sized, light yellow at maturity, hanging on the tree all winter, and gradually becoming wrinkled and almost white.


title: Melia azedarach

text: The genus name "Melia" is derived from (), the Greek word used by Theophrastus (c. 371 – c. 287 BC) for "Fraxinus ornus", which has similar leaves. The species "azedarach" is from the French 'azédarac' which in turn is from the Persian 'āzād dirakht' (ازادرخت ) meaning 'free- or noble tree'.


title: Melia azedarach

text: "Melia azedarach" should not be confused with the "Azadirachta" trees, which are in the same family, but a different genus.


title: Melia azedarach

text: Some hummingbirds like the sapphire-spangled emerald ("Amazilia lactea"), glittering-bellied emerald ("Chlorostilbon lucidus") and planalto hermit ("Phaethornis pretrei") have been recorded as feeding on and pollinating the flowers; these only take it opportunistically.


title: Melia azedarach

text: The plant was introduced around 1830 as an ornamental in the United States (South Carolina and Georgia) and widely planted in southern states. Today it is considered an invasive species by some groups as far north as Virginia and Oklahoma. But nurseries continue to sell the trees, and seeds are also widely available. It has become naturalized to tropical and warm temperate regions of the Americas and is planted in similar climates around the world. Besides the problem of toxicity, its usefulness as a shade tree in the United States is diminished by its tendency to sprout where unwanted and to turn sidewalks into dangerously slippery surfaces when the fruits fall, though this is not a problem where songbird populations are in good shape. As noted above, the possibility of commercially profitable harvesting of feral stands remains largely unexplored.


title: Melia azedarach

text: The fruits have evolved to be eaten by animals which eat the flesh surrounding the hard endocarp or ingest the entire fruit and later vent the endocarp. If the endocarp is crushed or damaged during ingestion or digestion, the animal will be exposed to the toxins within the seed. The processes of mastication and digestion, and the degree of immunity to the particular toxins, vary widely between species, and there will accordingly be a great variation in the clinical symptoms following ingestion.


title: Melia azedarach

text: Fruits are poisonous or narcotic to humans if eaten in quantity. However, like those of the yew tree, these toxins are not harmful to birds, who gorge themselves on the fruit, eventually reaching a "drunken" state. The birds that are able to eat the fruit spread the seeds in their droppings. The toxins are neurotoxins and unidentified resins, found mainly in the fruits. The first symptoms of poisoning appear a few hours after ingestion. They may include loss of appetite, vomiting, constipation or diarrhea, bloody faeces, stomach pain, pulmonary congestion, cardiac arrest, rigidity, lack of coordination and general weakness. Death may take place after about 24 hours. Like in relatives, tetranortriterpenoids constitute an important toxic principle. These are chemically related to azadirachtin, the primary insecticidal compound in the commercially important neem oil. These compounds are probably related to the wood and seed's resistance to pest infestation, and maybe to the unattractiveness of the flowers to animals.


title: Melia azedarach

text: The main utility of chinaberry is its timber. This is of medium density, and ranges in colour from light brown to dark red. In appearance it is readily confused with the unrelated Burmese teak ("Tectona grandis"). "Melia azedarach" – in keeping with other members of the family Meliaceae – has a timber of high quality, but as opposed to many almost-extinct species of mahogany, it is under-utilised. Seasoning is relatively simple, in that planks dry without cracking or warping and are resistant to fungal infection. The taste of the leaves is not as bitter as neem ("Azadirachta indica").


title: Melia azedarach

text: The tough five-grooved seeds were widely used for making rosaries and other products requiring beads; however, the seeds were later replaced by plastics. The cut branches with mature fruit are sold commercially to the florist and landscaping trade particularly as a component for outdoor holiday décor. The fruits may persist for some time prior to shattering off the stem or discoloring, which occurs rapidly after a relatively short time in subfreezing weather.