👋 ሰላም ሃለው*
Welcome to Wednesday, where Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny is to be buried at a cemetery in Moscow, Joe Biden is called out by protest voters in his own party over his stance on Gaza, and Apple opts for AI over EV. Meanwhile, German daily Die Welt speaks with Klaus Obermeyer, the 104-year-old inventor of the down jacket who also helped make Aspen the U.S. Mecca of skiing.
[*Selam halewi - Tigrinya, Eritrea and Ethiopia]
✅ SIGN UP
This is our daily newsletter Worldcrunch Today, a rapid tour of the news of the day from the world's best journalism sources, regardless of language or geography.
It's easy (and free!) to sign up to receive it each day in your inbox: 👉 Sign up here
🗞️ FRONT PAGE
Athens-based daily Η Αυγή (I Avgi) asks for “Justice for Tempe” on its front page as Greece marks one year since the deadliest train crash in the country’s history. Last year, a passenger train coming from the Greek capital and bound to the northern city of Thessaloniki collided head-on with a freight train, killing 57 people. With many still seeing the tragic accident as a consequence of decades of neglect of the rail sector, rail workers, seafarers, public servants and school teachers are expected to join in a day of strikes and protests.
🌎 7 THINGS TO KNOW RIGHT NOW
• Navalny to be buried on Friday: Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny will be buried at a cemetery in Moscow on Friday. The service will be held at Borisovskoye Cemetery, after a farewell ceremony in the Maryino district. Navalny's widow, Yulia Navalnaya, as well as several world leaders, have blamed Russian President Vladimir Putin for his death.
• Biden wins Michigan primaries but with signs of a Gaza protest vote: U.S. President Joe Biden easily won the Democratic presidential primary in Michigan on Tuesday, with 80% of the votes but the “uncommitted” exceeded expectations with 13%. In a state with a high percentage of Arab-Americans, voters had been urged to mark their primary ballots as “uncommitted” in protest at Biden's Gaza policy. Meanwhile, former U.S. President Donald Trump won the state's Republican presidential primary by a large margin, as he continues on his way toward the party’s White House nomination.
• Germany and Poland say no to sending troops to Ukraine, after Macron statement: Germany and Poland said that they would not be sending troops to Ukraine, after French President Emmanuel Macron hinted that some Western countries may be considering doing so.
• U.S. extends detention of captain accused of shipping weapons to Houthis: A Pakistani national accused by U.S. officials of carrying Iranian-made missile parts to Houthi rebels in Yemen is to remain behind bars awaiting trial. The suspect was arrested in January amid U.S. efforts to avert the Iran-aligned Houthis targeting of shipping in the Red Sea.
• Guinea appoints former opposition leader Mamadou Oury Bah as prime minister: Former Guinean opposition leader Mamadou Oury Bah has been appointed prime minister by the country's military junta, a week after it abruptly dissolved the government.
• South Korea registers world’s lowest fertility rate, again: South Korea's fertility rate, already the world's lowest, continued its decline in 2023, as women concerned about their career advancement and the financial cost of raising children decided to delay childbirth or to not have babies. The average number of expected babies for a South Korean woman during her reproductive life fell to a record low of 0.72 from 0.78 in 2022 falling below the rate of 2.1 per woman needed for a steady population. And South Korea isn’t the only country struggling with falling birth rates.
• Apple parks its EV project: U.S. tech giant Apple has reportedly canceled its electric car project after a decade of investment into the technology, devoting more resources to artificial intelligence. The halt on the decade-old project, will see employees shifted to the firm’s AI division.
#️⃣ BY THE NUMBERS
72
French police seized 72 firearms and more than 3,000 rounds of ammunition during a search at film icon Alain Delon's estate, south of Paris. A preliminary investigation has been opened into “illegal storage of weapons” and “illegal acquisition and possession of category A, B and C weapons”, as the 88-year-old actor does not hold a permit for any of the guns found. Delon has reportedly been in poor health since suffering a stroke in 2019, with an ensuing bitter succession battle among members of his family.
📰 STORY OF THE DAY
Cool and cozy with Klaus Obermeyer, the 104-year-old Aspen icon and down jacket inventor
Aspen, a former mining town in Colorado, is arguably the most fashionable winter sport destination in the U.S. That is largely thanks to one man: Klaus Obermeyer, originally from southern Germany, the inventor of the down jacket and one of the best-known pioneers of the skiing world. He is now 104 years old — and still on the slopes, where German daily Die Welt reached him.
🏔️ In 1947, when Obermeyer first arrived in Roaring Fork Valley, Aspen was not yet the glamorous Rocky Mountains hotspot that it is today, but a half-deserted ghost town. The doors of the opera house were barricaded, the bars were closed, the legendary Hotel Jerome was still nothing more than a budget hotel. “You could buy a plot of land for 30 dollars, and there were more stray dogs than people among the ruins,” says Obermeyer.
🧥 At the time, there was no such thing as specialist skiwear. Obermeyer says he was always freezing when he made the half-hour journey up the ice-cold Aspen Mountain, so he made himself a down anorak from a quilt. “I looked awful, like a Michelin man. And for three weeks I was finding feathers in my breakfast,” he jokes. “But I wasn’t cold any more!” One of his many students was the Hollywood actor Gary Cooper. He also wanted to avoid freezing on the chairlifts and ordered a down jacket for himself — and thus Obermeyer’s clothing business was born.
⛷️ Obermeyer’s favorite place is Buttermilk. In the 1950s, he was one of those who campaigned for the 3,018-meter-high mountain to be developed for skiers. Buttermilk is a good mountain for beginners, but also for pros: freestyle skiers, snowboarders and snowmobilers come here to perform their impressive flips in the legendary X Games. Up on the mountain, there is a descent that was named after Obermeyer to mark his 100th birthday: Klaus’ Way.
➡️ Read more on Worldcrunch.com
📹 THIS HAPPENED VIDEO — TODAY IN HISTORY, IN ONE ICONIC PHOTO
➡️ Watch the video: THIS HAPPENED
📣 VERBATIM
“Football continues to give me the life I need.”
— Spain's midfielder Jenni Hermoso gave her first international news conference since winning the World Cup, and receiving a non-consensual kiss from former Spanish soccer federation chief Luis Rubiales. The football player told the journalists she was looking forward to being on the field again, competing for a title, after “six very long months.” Spain is facing France in Sevilla on Wednesday for the inaugural Women's Nations League.
✍️ Newsletter by Emma Albright and Laure Gautherin
Let us know what’s happening in your corner of the world!