Anna Gunin

@annagunin.bsky.social

1779 Followers 977 Following

Translator from Russian of Svetlana Alexievich, Pavel Bazhov, Oleg Pavlov and others 🍉 🗝️ 🌻

Q: Can it ever be appropriate for policemen to kick a suspect armed with a knife who is already lying on the ground repeatedly in the head? Would it be a standard professional approach or an effective tactic? Short answer: it would almost never be considered appropriate, standard, or effective for police to repeatedly kick a grounded suspect in the head—even if the person has (or had) a knife. Core principles of police use of force Modern policing frameworks (e.g., the UK’s Criminal Law Act 1967 and Human Rights Act 1998, alongside College of Policing guidance) are built on: Necessity → force only if required Proportionality → match the threat level Reasonableness → judged from the officer’s perspective at the time Force must stop once the threat is controlled. [Response from ChatGPT]
"2024 is the year we learned which of our friends, acquaintances, family members, etc. are cool with ethnic cleansing."
The list of Old English colors is at best a rather short one, and its meagreness is the more striking as soon as we begin to compare it with the richness of color that appears in Chaucer, or the mediaeval romances, or in Shakespeare. The difference is seen not merely in the greater amount of color used by the later poets, but in the greater vividness and freshness with which the color-words are applied. Look for a moment at Chaucer's Prologue, which contains 858 lines. The color-words are indeed simple,-black, white, brown, blue, green, grey, pers (sky-blue), red, yellow,-but they are deliberately employed for a picturesque effect, which is enhanced by the use of comparisons, a device never used for this purpose in Old English poetry. The Frankleyne's beard is as white as a daisy; a purse is as white as morning's milk; the monk's neck is white as the fleur-de-lys.
"Shocked to learn that Amira Al-Ashqar, the one-month-old daughter of one of my neighbors succumbed to the cold." – Mosab Abu Toha
Israel strikes at 'strategic weapons systems' in Syria as Kremlin says Putin personally authorised Assad asylum. Israel has said it has carried out airstrikes on “strategic weapons systems” inside Syria and that ground troop operations on Syrian territory were a “limited, temporary” step, as the Kremlin said it had been Vladimir Putin’s personal decision to grant Bashar al-Assad asylum there. Speaking in Jerusalem, Israel’s foreign minister Gideon Saar said “the only interest we have is the security of Israel and its citizens … that’s why we attacked strategic weapons systems, like, for example, remaining chemical weapons, or long-range missiles and rockets, in order that they will not fall in the hands of extremists.” Earlier Israel’s military issued photographs of IDF troops operating in the region of Mount Hermon, which is to the north-east of the Golan Heights, disputed territory which Israel seized from Syria in 1967 and unilaterally annexed in 1981.
It is obvious that the illegitimate oligarchy, praised by our sworn enemy, who falsified the elections, is trying to seize the reins of power in the country at any cost. Against the backdrop of unprecedented systematic violence against the population of Georgia by the existing ugly system and the criminal change in the constitutional course of the country's development, as well as in the face of the threat of an expected repeat invasion by Russia, the responsibility for the defense of the homeland and the preservation of its independence lies with each of you, especially the senior and highest officers of the General Staff.
Major General of the State Security Service Giorgi Aleksidze addressed the Armed Forces of Georgia: "Gentlemen, today, at an extremely difficult and dangerous moment of independence and future democratic development of our country, I address you, the Armed Forces of Georgia, as the guarantor of Georgia's independence and freedom. Dear officers and generals, I am sure that each of you has chosen this difficult and honorable profession to serve your country and protect it from any danger. In the current situation, it is you who have the direct responsibility, as well as the resources, to protect the political course of development of the country guaranteed by the Constitution and to avoid the threat of repeated intervention in Georgia.
‘What I have lived through these last few days here, has been maybe even worse than everything I experienced in the war in Spain itself. Thousands of people fleeing with nothing other than what they can carry on their bodies, the poorest of the poor, workers, university professors, children, in small rowing boats or on foot, chased by planes that keep spraying their wretched paths with machine-gun fire, in snow and in rain, at night, almost starved, that is how they arrive here. I have seen things which I can never forget, that will weigh on me for ever, I no longer know what to think or feel any more. Dead children in bundles, dying soldiers far from their army hospitals. I have the house full of people. We feel a common bond, we understand each other as though we had always known one another. I couldn’t leave here now, I couldn’t even think of it. I must stay here, till we all know where we can go, I would not wish to abandon my friends …’