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described what he saw and then we would have prayer and he would always say in these words when we got to the top of the bridge down below we saw this sea of blue Alabama state troopers all in blue uniform and behind the state troopers where the sheriff's posse on horseback and we continued to walk no one saying word and we came within hearing distance of the state troopers and this major identified himself and said our major John Clow of the Alabama state troopers this is an unlawful march you will not be allowed to continue I'll give you three minutes to disperse and go back to your church Jose William said major give us a moment to pray and before they could pass word back for people troopers all these men putting on their gas masks with nightsticks horses and releasing the tear gas and then John Lewis said I was hit in the head by a state trooper with a night stick the gospel according to John Lewis let us pray in this season of Len this season of reflection on your darling son our Lord Jesus Christ suffering unto death we return in pause to remember the lives of those who also suffered in an early linen season 58 years ago with this very place not only the birthplace of America's democracy but also the Calvary of America's democracy as Christ offered his flesh for the sins of the world upon Calvary Hill these foot soldiers upon this hill at the top of this bridge offered their flesh for the sins of America and for America's original sin of racism enslavement and disenfranchisement Lord bless those who've returned the Calvary without an ounce of fear bless those who return to live again the trauma bloody Sunday Lord we give thanks to them and we give thanks for you for never leaving us and never forsaking us Lord you said your son Jesus to be a living these foot soldiers to be also living ransom living reparations for America move us all now to repair this place to repair the city of Selma to repair those harmed by the tornado and to bring this city the life it deserves Lord make this the day we never leave Selma behind Lord make this the day Selma and everything Selma could be and everything Selma deserves to be remains with us and remains in our hearts make this the day we decide to never stop until Selma is rebuilt until Selma is restored until Selma is repaired and until Selma is resurrected and until Selma has her own Easter as one of our sacred and holy ground Lord bless all the organizers of the Selma Brits crossing Jubilee but especially bless the founders your children hank and pyro Lord bless all the elected officials a black congresswoman that those who bloody these foot soldiers never meant to be yet you made her so Lord in the city that once would not allow the ever dream of high office and hill Reverend Jesse Jackson from the crown of his head to the souls of his people bless the most powerful elected official in the world for the witness today the truth in your word the truth that the government would be on your shoulders on the shoulders of who suffered like Christ in Selma no Selma shoulders no Jimmy Carter no Selma shoulders Selma shoulders no Barack Obama no Selma shoulders no Kamala Harris and no Selma shoulders Lord no Joe Biden Lord continue to guide this president speed in order his step here in the name of democracy during the season of lift 58 years ago Lord we invoke the name of the first to give his life for America during this season of Lent 253 years ago this very day our ancestor Christmas addicts what is upon they hold these ancestors shoulders their sturdy shoulders we all now stand and it is their eternal vigilance we pray Lord you will make us worthy to emulate make us eternally vigilant to fulfill full voting rights amidst those who would suppress us in gerrymandering us make us unafraid to teach and remember our history while those would have us not make us unafraid to say the word reparation make us worthy Lord to continue to serve to continue to pray to continue to walk together not get wary on this bridge leading on to that great camp meeting in the promised land we offer this prayer in the name of the one who like us was poor in the name of the one who like us was displaced without a home in the name of the one who like us was duped and scorned in the name of the one who like us had no citizenship in the name of the one who like us was hunted and pursued by the authorities in the name of the one who like Amar Arbery whose brothers here today was hunted and pursued by vigilante in the name of the one who like us suffered and died but also who like us was a revolutionary and who like us rose again. It is in the matchless name of Jesus. We pray and all of God's people said,


You know, we've done two weeks now. We play our first game on Wednesday night against MacArthur. So, you know, all the players are looking forward to that, and that's all in preparation, obviously, for our ACL quarter-final. And, you know, it's something that is special for the club and for the players, and they're all keen to be involved in it. It's our first hit out as a squad. You know, we look forward to the first test and, you know, getting all our fans there and, I guess, back into the swing of things. But a game in a couple of weeks against the Asian champions, so, you know, I think we're well ahead of where we were this time last year, so it's good science. You know, the opponent is an excellent team. They're a fantastic manager and they won everything last year and they won the ACL. So, we know what we're up against, and we're doing our very best to prepare as well as we can. We'll have no competitive games before it, which is difficult for the league teams, but, you know, it's no excuse for us, and we're going to go in there and give it our very best, and we want to get through to a semi-final. Yeah, it's going to be very difficult. There's no doubt, but we look at it as a good challenge. You know, it's an opportunity for us as a club to put ourselves on the world map and test ourselves against the best of Asia, so we're looking forward to it. We've never gone into any game expecting to lose or being content to lose, and, you know, we went into the group stages. We lost our first game, and everyone expected us to not go through the round of 16. We did that. We had a tough tie against San Freche, and odds were against us in that as well, and we got through. The odds are against us again, but, you know, we'll go in with a lot of belief. Still early stages, and, you know, the players have been excellent in their attitude thus far, and, you know, they'll all look eager and anticipating another good season for the Wanderers. We've had a fairly major restructure of the squad. We lost a lot of good players last season, but, you know, the boss is bringing in some players that I'm sure will do a great job and add to the team's quality. You know, we've got very high standards of ourselves within the group, and everyone's held accountable, so, you know, we'll be striving hard to maintain that. We've still got some positions available, and I wouldn't say in particular that we're looking for a marquee. We're just looking for good players that can improve our squad. You know, we know what we need, but we won't be rushed into any decisions, and we're certainly on the lookout. We debuted two 16-year-olds last year, so we're not afraid to play the youngsters. We've just got two of our young boys back from a successful tour with the young soccerers, so we look forward to seeing them today and seeing how their progression is going, and we'd love to see a few more get debuts in this season. Well, in the first year we did come first in the league. We came second in year two, and we've got two grand finals and a quarter final in the ACL, so, you know, we've had a pretty successful time with the Wanderers, and, you know, we obviously want to be challenging for others every year. We don't shy away from that statement, and we want to do the same again. We hold ourselves to pretty high standards every day. You know, it's always about getting better and improving, and if everyone buys into that as a squad, you know, there's the only way up. Well, there's a lot of belief within the club and the playing group. You know, we've had a taste of what success is now, and we want some more. Obviously, every other team wants to be at the top. They're all improving, and we have to improve to stay there, and, you know, we will not stand still. We'll do everything we can to be challenging for others once more. You know, we'll keep working very hard to improve every day, and that is to achieve a goal, which is to win a championship.


Welcome to what TF is going on in Latin America and the Caribbean. CodePink's weekly YouTube program of hot news out of the region. In partnership with friends of Latin America, Massachusetts Peace Action, and Task Force on the Americas, we broadcast every Wednesday at 4.30 p.m., 7.30 p.m. Eastern Time on CodePink YouTube Live. Today's episode is titled Food Sovereignty, Nicaragua's No Hunger Program. The crisis in Ukraine has created conditions for loss of farming production and global food distribution. Already there exists a shortage of fertilizer and an increase in energy costs that will affect production, transportation and distribution. Today's the second of an informal series of conversations we will have about the importance of food sovereignty and how different countries, organizations, and institutions are attempting to guarantee the right to food. Our guest today are Nicaragua's Minister of Finance, Ivana Costa, who will be familiar to you from a previous episode of WTF. Today we will also be talking with the Minister of Family Economy, Husta Pérez. They'll be talking to us about the economy of Nicaragua. Thank you and welcome to our program today. Good afternoon, Terry. It's a pleasure to be connected to you today from Managua, Nicaragua. It's a pleasure to be here and we have Minister of the Family Economy, Husta Pérez, who is involved in small scale and cooperative production from these small peasant production. Thank you to most of the people who are engaged in the Nicaraguan economy today. So here is Minister Husta Pérez. Thank you so much. This is going to be a very timely conversation full of important information. I wonder whether we should start hearing from both of you or whether one of you would like to speak first telling us about the programs that the Sandinista government historically implemented, or perhaps we should start with what you have worked on in particular with regard to food production. And also speak specifically about the global situation, particularly as regards problems stemming from the crisis in Ukraine, which certainly does mean that fertilizers are less available globally and the rapidly increasing cost of fuels. We know that this affects production costs and food production and distribution. Thank you. I think that that's a very good and timely question to talk about food sovereignty and the impact that this will have on distribution, particularly amongst the poorest population of countries. In addition, it is also important to analyze the impact that external shocks are having on countries that import petroleum products, fertilizers, and raw materials for production. For Nicaragua, clearly, we don't just view this problem in terms of the crisis in Europe or the Ukraine conflict. The issue of food sovereignty is an endemic one. It is one that certainly we were aware of around 1800, but particularly during the Somoza dictatorship of the 20th century, the Somoza dictatorship abandoned the countryside and farming and had terms of trade that were against farmers. We could say that it was an anti-peasant production policy. And how does this affect the terms of trade and how this affects production? More than half of the population were peasants at that time. And they, just as today, were producing the most important items in Nicaragua, which was part of our culture, in exchange for the beef, pork, rice, and beads production. They just covered about eight basic products. So the people who produced these basic food stuffs could only get basic things, such as salt, kerosene, radio, and flashlight batteries, a little bit of soap, and some medicine. These are the items that they would need to trade or buy. That was the situation in the countryside in Nicaragua prior to the revolution. So they just used their machetes to produce. So we have to remember that that has nothing to do with the war in Ukraine. This was the situation in a countryside that was in extreme poverty. And we were then 1990, 1992, there was about 100% poverty in the countryside. And widespread poverty in the country was at about 80%. Now, measures of poverty was at those levels around 1992, but production transformed the model of serving peasant farmers. First of all, those who produced should be given lands. It's incredible for us to be able to think that somebody could produce food without having land. Now land and the means of production are in peasant hands and in the hands of their cooperatives. We should also remember that the largest exporters, there were basically three products, coffee, sugar, and cotton. This was in the hands of large producers or farm workers. But coffee, the one that since the 1870s had been exported, it's in the hands of about 40,000 producers. And 90% of these were small peasants with less than five months on as of land. That's what existed prior to the revolution. And that is where in 1979, we made a major effort to bring education to these people. What was the first thing that was done to educate the population so that people could really bring about change? The first thing was to teach people how to learn. The literacy crusade of 1980. And this transformed the lives of many Nicaraguan citizens. About 80% of people did not know how to read and write, but it also transformed the lives of hundreds of thousands of young people from urban young people who went into the countryside and met the people who economically and socially sustained their country. These young people did not understand how food got produced where and how people who produced this food lived. It's very important to understand how the people who grow food live. You can't have public policies and production policies after turning your back to the people who make the greatest efforts and the greatest commitment to production. We are an agro-export country and basically a rural country. I'm talking about 1979. Now that was the experience that led to the conditions to transformations in the countryside looking at sugar. Imagine where a country that was a major sugar producer. But peasants didn't consume sugar themselves. They ate things unsweetened. And they didn't even get to drink good coffee. They just had burnt corn. So it was a country that is very different from what's happening in 2022. The revolution brought about major transformations. Now, I think this was a long introduction but just to understand the country that we inherited of major inequalities and injustices. And we went on the path set forth by the revolution and which was to give high priority to public policies aimed at reducing poverty in order to understand why the public policy against to combat poverty and extreme poverty is so fundamental to the country. You have to understand that about 70% of the population was living in poverty. In the countryside it was over 80%. People who produce beef, pork, rice, beans, platanos, coffee, corn. So that was the reality. We had to transform the model and first ensure that they had enough production to feed themselves. So we're talking about food security and food sovereignty now. This means that you have to, we can import it about 60% of our rice and there was a trend for all of the vegetables and all of our productive capacity was complimented with imports. You may recall the Washington consensus. That infamous consensus was to leave the countryside and make an effort to have free trade zones, particularly in textiles, but to abandon the countryside and that left people very poor. What makes the countryside poor? If you don't have resources or income to buy food, if I'm a peasant and what I produce does not feed me, then I am not gonna have enough money to buy it at the supermarket. It's a very simple equation. It's much easier for people to produce food and sell their surplus than to not produce food and try to find a job in urban areas, which did not exist in the 1990 when the Washington consensus rained. They were called the poor people at selling things at the street lights. That's what we saw in Nicaragua between 1990 and 2006. Poverty wasn't just hidden, but was rather expressed essentially in the urban spaces on the Pacific side in 2007 when we came into office. We wanted to give capital to the countryside. The production bonus moved more than 250,000 production bonuses, which is the famous program of giving people a spragnant sow, hens and other things to produce, to begin the production, a renewed production process that would allow families to have food to eat and surplus for other Nicaraguans families, but particularly by trying to have better markets because it's no use to have producers if there's no market. They might produce and that might seem like a curse because if the prices are too low in the local market. So we had to provide capital to small producers in the countryside with the production bonus and to finance the urban and semi-urban areas with the zero hunger program and try to have better markets. We had a very big import program through the Petro Paribe process. We imported a lot and transferred this to the poor sector. So the production bonus and zero usury were the basic programs that targeted the large majorities of our society, but we came to realize that it wasn't enough to provide capital. If we wanted to have a major transformation in the countryside, we also had to bring progress to the countryside, energy, health and education and transport without all of these things, we couldn't make sure that there weren't losses in the dairy sector. For example, if you have perishable goods, if you can't sell it or refrigerate it, it's a big loss to peasant producers. So therefore by bringing more public investment and economic and production related investment, these programs would not have worked, but also the president organized and instructed this ministry to be in charge, to be systematically in charge of small scale production and major programs have been developed. We have the MAFCA, we strengthen the technical cooperation training program and we need to have public spending, but also bring science technology to these sectors of production. This is what has enabled us to take a major leap forward because virtually about 90% of the country's food needs are met here. Ambassador Campbell will remind us whether we have a program to produce shrimp and also our daily rice and beans, our gallo pinto, our plantains and the Nicaragua and the Catamal. All of this is produced with national or domestic corn and pork production. So this has a major impact when you look at the figures in terms of reducing poverty from 48.3 to 24.9. That's a significant impact. But I was also saying in 2000 to 2002 that hunger perpetuates poverty and causes people to lose their potential. And it slows down the progress of society but poverty causes endemic hunger. We had to fight that the fight against poverty is also a matter of attacking the endemic hunger of those families that are still living in extreme poverty, extreme poverty in the country as about 6.8 or 6.9% which for Central America is pretty good but it's really bad because that means about 350,000 people. 6.9% might sound like that much but 350,000 families living in extreme poverty is bad. So in terms of Central America that's a very small figure. All of the countries around us have higher figures than that in terms of extreme poverty but we are concerned for this 6.9% of our families. We need to reduce this to zero. Hunger and poverty are not just health problems. It's not a disease. It's a problem of the proper application of public policy to rapidly reduce these problems. The biggest drop in poverty in our country's history was between 2007 and 2017. It's very important to be aware of this. This speaks very well of the FSLN's government the government president Daniel Ortega and vice president Rosario Murillo. She has been directly involved this program. She has been following it on a daily basis looking at marketing and trade. There is part of the country's cabinet that is looking at consumption, marketing and above all the fight against poverty. I think I've spoken enough Terry. Now let's let Husta give her presentation. Thank you so much. My greetings to the team and also to Francesco who I know is out there and went to thank you for the opportunity to speak to you about what our good government has been doing side by side with our people and families. The Ministry of Finance gave an excellent presentation and we should acknowledge that without political will from the government it is hard to win the fight against poverty and reduce hunger. This is what commandante Daniel and compañera Rosario's team have been doing. They've laid out a national strategy for food security and food sovereignty. Its basic premise is the allocation of resources a policy of allocating significant resources. Without this you cannot talk about food security without talking about the more than 3000 kilometers of roads that the FSLN government has been able to provide through road building and rehabilitation. You cannot talk about food security without taking into account the entire health model that has been built up through communities, municipalities and on a national level through reference hospitals that ensure proper care. We cannot talk about food security without acknowledging all of the efforts that this government has done to give land titles to people. The land that was redistributed in the 1980s is now being properly titled to Nicaraguan families. In our view, that is extremely important. And also a coverage by the electricity grid is very important. More than 99% of Nicaraguan families have electricity in their home. Drinking water, we have made significant strides in establishing drinking water for families. It's grown by more than 26% thanks to all of these efforts. We also should point out this strategy of food security has included the participation of families themselves. It wasn't all done by the government. The government has proposed policies, programs and projects, but Nicaraguan families have been the ones to put it into practice. In this regard, we created my ministry, the Ministry of Family, Community, Cooperative and Associative Economy as a result of this strategy as is the national system for the production and marketing of products. This is what the state has been encouraging for families. Within the family agriculture program for food security is a flagship program. Ivan mentioned that this has to do with the zero hunger program that we continue to build through other modalities. From 2007 to 2017, thousands of production bonuses worth more than 2 billion portables have been provided to families to provide them capital for production. We have also mapped this out, and you can see there, you can see the small family farming in the hands of Nicaraguan families. And this is where you see these important institutions have more than 125,000 protagonists working in family agriculture above all by promoting some nature and ecology friendly practices that preserve biodiversity. We also have the dry corridor, which is part of Central America. And we also have tropical forest. And we have been working on feeding people and continuing to produce despite variations in climate. We have been stressing this strategy throughout 2022, which has to do with promoting not only food security, which is the production of our basic grains, rice, beans, corn, and vegetables. We're also promoting other crops that can be exported. So we are stressing increased production of coffee, cacao, and beekeeping, and improving beef production, pork production, and sesame, harvest, and other additional crops, such as cardamom and pumpkins, and increasing our capacity to produce starch. We produce a lot of root crops and have made progress with some initiatives that have ensured that our country can provide pitaya and other products for small scale production. We have also been supporting families in the establishment of family gardens. These use small spaces to also allow people to not have to buy these fruits and vegetables that we use in our kitchen, such as tomatoes, onion, peppers, lettuce. So families can produce this in their own backyard gardens. And we're also working on training. Through technical education, we're having an impact. So we also have a national impact of technical schools in the countryside that allow people to have access to specialized courses to increase their yield. We also have something that is very important in terms of all of this when we talk about climate change, is that the recovery and care of our native seeds. Families are involved in establishing seed banks that allow us to continue to produce even in the face of currents. And our Minister of Finance explained to you, we have been working strategically in a way that is consistent with our strategy. We're also promoting fowl production so that we have more poultry available, and that also ensures food security. And we're enhancing the skills of farmers so that we can have artisanal incubators and also make the use of yellow corn and other crops that improve the diet of our cattle so that it has less of an impact on people's food. And so these farm animals do not need commercial products for their feed. And we also see that there are farms that produce poultry, beef, and pork. And we also support families with genetic improvement of their livestock. This is replies to goat, beef, and pork production. Our major exports are thanks to a lot of these agricultural improvement. We're about nine in terms of pork production. And also we have a lot of dairy products, including cheeses, that are being exported. There's a lot of demand for this in international markets. We have also developed our developing technical skills for small apiaries that produce good quality honey in our country. And we're supporting the conduction of ponds for small-scale fish production to ensure more varied diets and surpluses for families. And all of this is part of the national strategy. There's also plantain production as a basic food stuff for our families and also with surplus for export. In this way, we have several strategies and actions that are being implemented with an eye to ensuring that families can improve their output capacity and have a larger output of good quality products that are coming out of our countryside. But we're also working on initiatives to have added value with these products. So as a country, we are a little bit different from what they say about us in the international media. We have been working with Nicaraguan families to significantly reduce poverty and hunger. And we have been thinking of and applying new strategies to enable our families to live and enjoy greater well-being so that they can live well. So I'd just like to point out that we have technical packages that allow families to plant a greater variety of crops on their land. And we also have the Healthy Family Garden program that has to do with this small-scale production. We can provide the details about the production bonus for food. And we also are promoting the use of environmentally-friendly, sustainable practices. And these are some areas. We are exporting coffee and cacao. And these are being produced in a way that reduces carbon emissions. And we're also working on renewing the coffee plants by using varieties of coffee that adapt well to climate change. And we're also diversifying this production with other kinds of plants and also with certified plants and developing community seed banks and promoting environmentally-friendly practices not only with bamboo, but also to add value to some of our products. And we also have hydroponic production, genetic improvement, conserving soil and water-covered vegetable production, and also artisanal egg production, and also creative use of plants and livestock using even wildlife. And all of this is out of love for Mother Earth. Also, part of this strategy is the Solidarity Credit. Since 2007, we have had the Zero Usury Program, which helps urban and semi-urban families, as well as some in the countryside, start businesses or add new projects to existing small-family businesses. So we consider this to be part of our Christian Solidarity approach to give a lot of money to strengthen these families' capacity to run their businesses. In summary, what we are highlighting is that if we have good political will and a decision to work with and for the people, this means that you not only have to have political will, but you have to have the allocation of resources to ensure that this strategy can be used by families and they can move towards developing this. What a lot of people talk about, but very few people are actually implementing. So I want to thank you for listening. Thank you so much. This is a very informative and powerful conversation, and it raises many questions and many thoughts in my mind after listening to you. First of all, for our audience, I want to clarify a term that both of you used. You talked about creating and improving connectivity. I assume that you're talking about infrastructure, such as roads, which makes it possible to have more successful and easier and quicker transport of products to market. Could you just clarify that that's where you're talking about? Minister Acosta, yes, when we talk about connectivity, we're talking about the cost of transactions for peasants and small producers. Reducing transaction costs not only facilitates production, but also transport logistics and allows them or the product to reach market more quickly. This is very important for dairy products and vegetables. These products without a good transporting connectivity program, they will have lots of losses. According to a study by the Inter-American Development Bank with produce, 40% of losses are caused in transport. So it's important to have good cold chain and good roads, getting them to market as quickly as possible. So that's terrific. And it's impressive. I can share something with you. I've been in Nicaragua six or seven times since the 1980s. On various trips until 2010. And now I see that you have the best roads in the Americas, even better than some roads in the United States. So I'm wondering whether either of you could talk about, as we're talking about connectivity, getting product to market more efficiently and more quickly. I wonder how this is affecting how the increase in fuel prices is affecting farmers in Nicaragua and how it's affecting their ability to feed the people of Nicaragua. So have the increased fuel prices impacted this? Minister Acosta, these are outside factors caused by bottlenecks with exports and the imposition of sanctions on gas and oil. We are importers of these products. We will feel an impact from the impact of petroleum products, but the government has a program for food security. And this is approached as a central strategy that goes back to the UN proposals that the issue of production, availability, and access is key in order to have a successful policy at the critical moment. The government takes all of this into account. If we're talking about production, that's production and also availability and access in addition to consumption and what is biological use. So we have to look at public policies and make an effort to have some forecasting. Now, where does this come in? We have done an assessment of the recent programs that MEFCA and other programs have participated in in terms of various products and agricultural security to determine the demand for fertilizers in these areas, how much is available in the country for the production and how much this is in storehouses, how much has to come in and what effort does the country need to make in order to bring this to the providers because the supply chain is having problems. How can we make sure that we're not missing specialized feeds and fertilizers and fertilizer compounds? This is not just because the European crisis. Well, the Europeans have caused a slouch of crises in the last 100 years. But we also look at climate change. We might have too much rain or too much drought. And we have to look at what makes sure that we don't have a big gap in production because of these things. So the first thing has to do with the agricultural side. You have to make sure that the supply of fertilizers, the procurement and logistics and having technology bonus programs, this turns out to be like a subsidy for poor people but also for large scale production, ensure availability to ensure not only food security but we should also remember that agro export production is vital. We make sure that sugarcane is properly handled and that coffee is as well. So is our peanuts. And we have to make sure that there is enough food for cattle feed. We have to have good pasture. We have to have good fertilizer in the grasses so that the almost $1 billion or a little bit more than $1 billion of dairy and beef exports. So that's an important part of our economy. But we were very specific and saying, Terry, we're talking about oil and fuel because these are some things that I've never seen in Washington. We know that it's about 505 the gallon in Washington. That's what we hear from the ambassador but in Nicaragua it's been cheaper but now most of our gas pumps are selling it for less than that. It's because of what I said at the beginning. We're making sure that all of the machinery of production has to do with fertilizers, transport, all of the logistics chain and industry and textile industry. All of these first of all have energy at appropriate prices. And furthermore, we're making sure that these external shocks, according to our fiscal policies, can help our economy continue to produce and create jobs and to buffer these negative shocks. For example, those who monitor oil prices, in this case diesel, about 70% of national fuel consumption is in diesel. And last week it had the same price as the previous week because we have current public policies doing this. We're making sure that there is no oil refinery shock that will impact industry, transport, energy or other sectors. And so that's the same as true with fertilizers. I could share some data that is linked to production but is also linked to household consumption. Since 2019, there has been no increase in electricity rates regardless of the external shocks that occurred before the war in Ukraine. It has been going up, but also the pandemic and refining went down and that's also impacted oil prices which were over $100 a barrel, but Nicaragua because of its very effective policies has been able to have renewable energy and we have more and more renewable energy. And we were able to have very positive negotiations between the public and private sector in the country. This means that since 2019, electricity prices have not gone up and that is good news for a country that has been react rating itself in 2021 and continues to go down the path of reactivation and growth in 2022. Remember that for us, oil has become a fundamental input so the cost of transport, energy and to industry and for the processing of products, they are all impacted on this that would make the prices go up and this is true anywhere in the world. But since we are very clear on these impacts, we have had this institutional policy and the instruction handed down from the president of public, we have been ensuring stability with our economy and that's where we are. You can observe that the price at the pump is not going up very quickly and electricity rates have remained very stable and flat and also fertilizers for the first crop in that zone in May, we have some provisions so that if there are any additional impacts, we will have fertilizers on hand, our inventory will be ready beforehand for the country. We're going through all markets and using the private sector to try to get good prices to procure them ahead of time and we're making sure that we don't have supply chain problems in order to keep production going. Now to get back to food security, if we don't do all this with production, you can't have food security. You know, Minister Acosta, we've discussed these issues before specifically unilateral coercive measures that are improperly called sanctions. We've talked about the importance of energy sovereignty through renewable energy. We know that Nicaragua has a lot of renewable energy and also food security. We always talk about this vis-a-vis the sanctions in order to protect itself against the sanctions. This is what Nicaragua has done, but now given the situation in Europe, our audience can see how all of these alternative efforts have been so important to allow Nicaragua to withstand these external shocks. That is to say making a better effort to produce domestic renewable energy and food sovereignty. You have been almost invincible in terms of preserving your national sovereignty, so that Nicaraguan families suffer less. This is really an emblematic case with Nicaragua in the face of sanctions. Now with the crisis in Europe, this is having an impact on the global distribution and cost of energy throughout the world. We see that Nicaragua actually isn't a unique and I would say successful position and is a great example. Yes, thanks to the country's efforts and the leadership of President Ortega. Well, in 2007 he proposed the Human Development Plan. These are a couple of central elements and now we're reaping the benefits of this. The first thing was to ensure a transformation of our energy grid and something else that's not said. First of all, we don't produce much of our own petroleum-based energy and we didn't have enough energy and we said that we really had to move forward with renewable energy because people... We had only 24 hours of electricity every 76 hours and now it's much higher. Then we also look at the Central American grid and we're going to have 85-15 or 85-20 and we also import some renewable energy and that keeps our electricity bills down and it also means that we are not so dependent on oil but at any rate transport is 100% petroleum-based. We only have four electric vehicles so far. We do have a new law to encourage the import of electric vehicles. I think it's going to go into effect in 30 or 40 days and certainly in future years we'll have a larger fleet of electric vehicles which will also free us from vulnerability to oil shocks. When you talk about sanctions and certainly the people of the United States and of Europe are seeing what sanctions mean. I sanction this country and I pay the price for it at the gas pump. That is very bad for the population of their countries but just imagine how bad it is for people who are not in conflict, how bad it might be for other people. Look at the case of Nicaragua. Ours is a country which per capita is most sanctioned. We have just 6.5, 6.7 million population and in terms of per capita sanctions we really have a high number of sanctions. It's extremely high but that is not so relevant when you look at the major efforts of public policies and our country's commitment to focusing the efforts of producers and merchants and people in the transport sector, people who own these companies. They do enjoy good economic conditions in terms of debt. We have the lowest COVID-19 pandemic debt. We in Guatemala have the lower debt rates but we also have the biggest reduction in poverty. So behind debt is a lot of poverty. It is also important to see that our fiscal policies are aligned with this and you can see that this has been appreciated by international organizations. In addition, I don't know whether you're aware of this but I'm going to say it now. During the years of the pandemic the most critical point for the western economies and we are the country that had the most reactivation of our economy, at least of all of the countries in the west or in Latin America. We had some negative growth but now we've had over 8% growth. In Latin America the average is about 4% looking at the impact of the pandemic from 2020 to 2021. So this shows you the tremendous production capacity and the coordination of all the economic system. We are able to be market oriented but also in terms of food security. Another issue, I'm talking about 2021. The problem is to not forget that the biggest pandemic that the people of Nicaragua suffered was the failed coup attempt of 2018 in which they destroyed 7.5% of our GDP but destroyed 27 billion in financial transactions. In other words, money that never came in which had been projected to come in in 2020 and 2021. So that was a very big shock and I think there has been a lack of solidarity from other states and recognition of the country's major effect to maintain peace, security and the fight against poverty under the major banner of economic growth. Recall that in 2006 we were the poorest country in Tierra firme in the Americas and 15 years later we have the best human development indexes of our neighbors and have had the fastest growth and also another very important thing. We are the safest country in all of Central America. Absolutely the safest in Central America. We have 103 municipalities that have had no homicides. That's incredible. And that's only found in some Nordic countries and in the safest countries of Latin America. I think that only two other Latin American countries have better indicators and we're very closely reaching the international average. So this all means that we're on the right path to ensure good living for our population and it's very expensive. We need to make sure that people have good government which affords them not government public policies that provide opportunities. We don't want just more government which is what the neoliberals say. It's not a problem having more government. You need to have a better government but government that's for the great majority of people. That's the issue there. And I believe and I've seen sometimes sometimes we see a light at the end of the tunnel. Some U.S. official was talking about imposing sanctions on another country and that they might be reconsidered and that everything's on the table. I think that maybe there is a light at the end of the tunnel there and so perhaps there is something. I think that the political leaders of people that sanction other countries are beginning to see, appreciate the difference in perception and differences in belief. One cannot believe that sanctions will affect all of the population. They know it will affect the entire population just to have an impact on the leading class. That's not very Christian. We're going to punish 6.7 people to be able to punish our political leaders because we have different foreign policy and general policies. So I think that this is something that really argues against in sanctions and you have to look at who they really have an impact on. Sanctions always hurt the poorest people in society. So we will make people poor with sanctions and take away their food security or take away their electricity or force them to buy it at higher market prices. All of this shows that this is a very uncivilized approach to impose sanctions. I'm trying to say this all politely. That's a tactful way to say it. It truly is warfare at the end of the day. It is truly a war. Yes, please go ahead, Minister Usta Pérez. It is important for us to point out that despite all of these sanctions, these unilateral coercive measures, that in addition to terrorism and aggression, since 2021 we have going through a democratic exercise in which the people of Nicaragua have ratified their approval of the model of government that they have, which is being built by the Sandinista Front under the leadership of Comandante Daniel Ortega and Vice President Rosario Murillo. For us, this is an indicator that tremendous effort has been made by our teams and by the country, but our will and our priorities will continue to be the people of Nicaragua and to ensure that we can mitigate these sanctions. We will continue to work to make sure that our families no longer depend on chemical inputs. Instead, we're looking for more environmentally friendly agro-ecological solutions that we can supply ourselves and the government has supported this. And so we continue to offer stability in our electricity bills. And we do this by finding alternative sources of electricity. And now more than 99% of our people have access to this. Our people continue to be the priority. They know this and that is why on November 7th, 2021, the overwhelming majority of the population ratified, in other words, voted in favor of this model, which does not necessarily follow the capitalist model. So we continue to try to make a difference. And here a decision has been made. There is a preference for the majority, a preference for the poor, and there is firm determination to eliminate poverty and inequality. Certainly more sanctions will become as long as some government leaders in other countries fail to understand this. They will impose more sanctions, but our people understand it. There is a preference for peace, stability, and the well-being of Nicaraguan families. It's so true. And thank you very much. I wish to clarify with our audience, when Minister Justa Perez talks about November 7th, she is talking about Election Day when the people of Nicaragua re-elected President Ortega and Vice President Rosario Murillo. They won by a sizable margin. I was in attendance. I was there as an elections observer. And it's true. I think that our audience has been able to see Code Pink reporting on this. I think that the two of you agree with the fact that since October or November of 2020, with all of the elections that have taken place throughout Latin America and Caribbean since then, with the exception of Ecuador, regional elections in Venezuela, the presidential elections in Honduras, regional elections in Mexico, people have been directly responding to the U.S. intervention. People have been defending their national sovereignty over their national resources, and people have been voting for governments that seek to implement a model that will benefit the majorities in their country. This is particularly true in Nicaragua. But throughout the Americas, I think that the people are choosing this kind of model. We should do so in the United States as well. But what you have done is very profound, what you have done on behalf of your government and in favor of your people. This is an example of what is possible and what can be accomplished when a joint effort is made and the government focuses on people. So it's a two-way streak. You are working together to bring about these successful efforts. You should be very proud of this. And it is a tremendous inspiration. So I thank both of you very much for being with us today. I truly appreciate the time you have devoted to this this afternoon. Are there any final words you would like to share with our audience before we close? I want to thank the audience, Terry and your team for this today. We appreciate your efforts to bring the truth about Nicaragua into many households in many countries that may be listening today. It is relevant to learn about the truth in our country. And we also want to invite you all to come visit our country and to look at how our economy is doing, how social programs are doing and how society is doing. Nicaragua is full of people with open arms and I don't want to miss this opportunity to invite all of you to come. We want you to go into Nicaragua to see with your own eyes what is really happening to see whether what we're saying is true. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you. I am very pleased to have been able to talk to you today. I wish to remind our audience that you have been watching what WTF is happening in Latin America and the Caribbean. The weekly YouTube broadcast of Co-Pink, we transmit every Wednesday evening at 7.30 p.m. Eastern time. And we also broadcast at 9.00 Eastern time. And you can also listen to us tonight. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for joining us again today at 8.30 Eastern time. And you can also listen to us on podcasts. Thank you very much, Minister Acosta and Minister Paris. It's been lovely chatting with you. We'll see you all next week. Thank you for tuning in.


And now for your US Army Europe spotlight. Soldiers from the 12th Combat Aviation Brigade based in Ansbach, Germany, along with members of the Royal Netherlands Army, train together on air assault operations. Exercise Saker Falcon was executed at Varpoloade Training Area, Hungary. Any time that we deploy together to different regions of the world, it's critical that we understand common operating procedures and that we're able to integrate forces so that we can accomplish common objectives. Dutch Army participants practiced US rapid insertion and air assault operations with help from US Army UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters. The two-week event was designed not only to build and strengthen interoperability, but to train and validate the Royal Netherlands Army Air Mobile Brigade as a future NATO immediate response force. For more information visit www.er.army.mil. Thank you.


Item Number – SCP-287 Object Class – Safe Special Containment Procedures SCP-287 is stored in a climate-controlled secure locker in Site-22, in order to prevent additional deterioration. At this time, no additional testing is required, but may be approved by Dr. Sigurd Olofsson. Decisions of electricity are to be kept away from SCP-287's locker at all times. If testing with SCP-287 is required, insulated gloves are to be worn to prevent accidental discharge into the hilt. SCP-287-1's remains are to be kept in storage until further notice. Research requests for SCP-287-1 can be routed to Dr. Zarshan and are restricted to Level 2 Personnel or Level 2 Personnel from the Exobiology Department. Description – SCP-287 is a Viking arming sword, measuring 78 cm from pommel to tip and weighing 1077 grams. SCP-287 is in a state of significant decay due to exposure to outside elements for anywhere from 900 to 1100 years. SCP-287 was found in Rwanda, Iceland, alongside several written records. SCP-287 is comprised primarily of iron, with several potentially anomalous components incorporated into its structure. Several of these materials have been detected by Foundation probes traveling within extra solar regions of our galaxy, as well as probes which were found. Carbon dating has placed SCP-287's creation to around the early 10th century CE. Samples of exoplanetary metals and materials have proven to be more difficult to date, and analysis is ongoing. SCP-287's anomalous effect can be observed when an electrical current is applied through the metallic portions of the hilt, exposed just below the guard. These exposed elements are in a noticeably better state than the iron portions of SCP-287. SCP-287's internal components will begin to emit several frequencies of EM radiation and varying sounds, invariably described as distressing by research staff and test subjects. Radiation produced by SCP-287 causes all humans who are exposed to it to experience acute audiovisual hallucinations and severe headaches. SCP-287's specific hallucination takes the form of translucent human-like figures in the immediate vicinity, invariably outfitted as members of an armed force. The armament and armor worn by SCP-287's hallucinations varies by subject, but with a general trend towards the individual's perception of what they consider to be modern armament. Testing with animals as well as non-anomalous EM fields and sounds of the exact same frequencies do not produce the same effect in any combination of cases. Higher amperage currents have increased this effect to a maximum of 437 individual hallucinations. Further testing was deemed unnecessary. SCP-287-1 is believed to be an extraterrestrial organism found in the same location as SCP-287. The exact origin of SCP-287-1 is unknown at this time. A full report on SCP-287-1 can be found in document R27-287-1. SCP-287-1's potential spacecraft, designated SCP-287-2, appears to be completely destroyed. The current working hypothesis for SCP-287-2 is that it was intended as some form of escape pod from a larger vessel. Discovery. SCP-287 was recovered from a burial mound, outside of Rhine, Iceland, on January 1, 2001. The remains found within the tomb proved to be non-human, and the foundation took custody of SCP-287, and the remains were designated SCP-287-1. SCP-287-1's remains are skeletal and are humanoid, though significantly different from human skeletal structure. Additionally, several written sources were found within the tomb, and acquired by the foundation. Dr. Sigurd Olofsson was consulted to help translate the writing enclosed in Addendum A. Addendum A. Prepared by the Department of Terra Linguistics, the discovery of SCP-287 was predicated upon reports of ghost soldiers in an area outside of Rhine, Iceland. A recent storm had struck the burial mound containing SCP-287, conducting current into SCP-287 through a crude lightning rod made of iron. The hallucinations created by SCP-287 affected an amateur film crew. The crew informed local authorities, and Foundation information gathering subroutines flagged these reports as potentially anomalous. Keywords, Ghost, Spectre, Crazy, Kids, Hallucination, with a double correlation factor of Gamma 6. Class A amnestics were administered to all witnessing parties, and the burial site was declared a heritage dig site through a Foundation Shell Corporation. Within the burial mound, Foundation agents discovered SCP-287, SCP-287-1, and additional written materials dating back to the early 10th century CE. A transcription was created by Dr. Sigurd Olofsson. Unintelligible sections are most likely proper nouns, with no direct translation. I am Hallvor Scottison, scald of unintelligible, and I've been trusted with the Tale of Thors Champion, the Meteor Lord. In the depths of winter, the year after the Great Raid, we saw a fiery meteor in the sky. It landed deep in the heart of the northern wastes, and we followed it. A wondrous thing it was, gleaming and covered in ghost lights. We approached, and found a man standing in a heavy cloak, examining the meteor. The ghost lights went dark, and the figure pressed his hand to the outside of the star. A wondrous light filled our eyes, as the star opened. He disappeared into the meteor, and emerged to look at us with such fiery determination in his eyes. We knew he could only be a king, sent to us from Odin himself. He would protect us from the Raids, and we would know prosperity again. Our prayers had been answered. Daily did the elders of our village come to his resting site, but his tongue was blessed only to speak the language of the Aesir. This passed, as he learned our language. When he learned of our plight, he appeared to grow angry, and charged back to the meteor to fashion himself a mighty weapon with which to defend the village. Weeks later he emerged, with a sword in his hand, gleaming and mighty. He held it aloft, and his power was made manifest. Many warriors, heroes from Valhalla stood around him, brandishing weapons. We threw ourselves to the ground, our heads aching with the glory of these Valhalla warriors, and this pleased the meteor lord. For years, when the Raids came, we ran in supplication to the meteor lord. He emerged, and all fled from his flashing blade and burning eyes. We marked the way to the meteor lord's home with the cairn stones. In the battle of Unintelligible, the meteor lord's fall came. His powers failed him, and Odin recalled him to Valhalla. We buried him with all the honor we could muster, and fashioned a conduit for the great storms from Thor. On stormy nights, the heroes still come and watch over our village, their glory splitting the head of any man who dare look upon them. Addendum B. Here by the Department of Exolinguistics. Tracing back from the story presented in the included writings, foundation agents tracked down the meteor mentioned in the epic translated by Dr. Olofsson. Excavating the object in question led to an almond-shaped craft made of an unknown material. Research regarding this craft can be found in document R27-287. Within the craft, several records were found, written in an unknown language upon crude paper. It is hypothesized that this is some kind of journal of SCP-287-1. An exact translation is nearly impossible, however, using a partial translation has been attempted. Time stamp, unknown symbology, unknown place, unknown people, primitive, violent, untranslated didn't survive. Everything is lost. Don't find a way back, too many counting on me. Time stamp, unknown symbology, theorized to be several days later. They found me, managed to put together untranslated hood. They won't see me, must learn their language, must keep them away from me. Unknown biology, may infect. Time stamp, unknown symbology, theorized to be several weeks later. I see their weapons, mine non-functional. Made one like theirs, used last of the untranslated, tuned to alien brain chemistry. Hope it scares them off. Not sure how much longer I can work on untranslated. Not having most likely a proper noun, nearby is unbearable, dying, breaking. Time stamp, unknown symbology, unknown time. They came back. I use the weapon, scares them. Untranslated, almost done, may be able to leave. Down to sixteen, cells, items, spheres, time stamp, unknown symbology, unknown time. They brought others. I scared them again. Not sure if I can repair the untranslated. Thought I had enough. First match was a chemical formula matching SCP-148. Used most likely a proper noun, necklace, still not enough. Time stamp, unknown symbology, theorized to be several years later. Won't stop coming. Only one cells, items, spheres, left. Time running out. Power nearly gone. I can't repair untranslated. Too many. Unit of time. It is hypothesized that at this point, whatever power source SCP-2871 was using to activate SCP-287 ran out. SCP-2871 was most likely killed during the next raid, without SCP-287 to protect them. Lesson complete. If you missed the previous orientation, go watch SCP-286, the brother's game, right now. Or for the complete course, watch this playlist.


What makes for excellence in heart care? It starts with one of the most amazing teams of heart surgeons and cardiologists that I've seen assembled under one roof and the region's leading technology in a new 40 million dollar facility. This is the nationally recognized Heart and Vascular Institute of Eastern Kentucky at Pikeville Medical Center. The Pikeville Police Department had one of their best years ever statistically in 2022. The men and women of Pikeville PD put themselves out there to make the streets and cities safer. 2022 was the best year we've had for statistics here at the department. We had the most indictments, we had the most cases, we had the most citations written. We had the best year we've ever had for our outreach program with the fundraising that entails our Chris was the first responder, it also entails giving back to the schools, things like that. So we had a great year all around for this department. The department made over 1900 arrests, wrote over 3100 citations, served over 800 warrants and much more. They also collected nearly $56,000 in fundraising money for their community outreach programs. From my aspect of it and also from the chiefs, we think the department, it excelled. We want to go bigger and better. We're going to hire a few more officers, make each shift, have more people on it, more individuals on it. Also, we want to have, get the numbers up more. As 2023 ramps up, the department looks forward to getting bigger and better numbers, both for law enforcement and fundraising for the community outreach programs they do. For Mountaintop News, I'm Kelcie Dean.


Thank you. So I am Martin organ of Lund University and I'll be presenting our paper on the distribution of linear biases more specifically I will be going through three different examples of what can happen inside block ciphers in terms of linear crypt analysis This is joint work with Mohammed Ahmed Abdul Rahim Peter Bellen and Gregor Leander at DTU So the outline of my talk is as follows first the general setting which is block ciphers and linear crypt analysis and Then the problem as we see it with a state of art in terms of knowledge about what happens here How block ciphers behave and Then three different examples ranging from toy cipher to real-world block cipher proposal Each of these examples tells us something about block ciphers and linear crypt analysis that we hope can improve Our knowledge about this problem Then finally I will conclude the talk So first of all the general framework that we will be considering here. So we have block ciphers We just fix the random unknown key and consider the function F. So it's a permutation over n bits now we Studied this function F using linear approximations. So these brackets here are used to denote the canonical inner product Meaning we take the input to the function the x and we take a bit string alpha and then When we multiply this together. Well, we simply pick bits from x as Specified by alpha and we add them together and get a new bit We do the same with the output f of x using a bit mask beta and then we had this equation saying that Alpha times x is equal to beta times f of x now Obviously, this is a half decent block cipher. This won't happen with probability one but some probability One half plus an epsilon and this is the bias of this approximation And it's useful also to talk about the correlation, which is simply twice the bias So the general idea is that the designer of the block ciphers want to make sure that all these biases for all these possible Alphas and betas are small while the attacker wants to find some alpha and beta where there is a large bias And what is small and large? It depends on several things, so I'll just talk about small and large and That should be sufficient for this talk So a block cipher typically is constructed using a round function which we apply our times and What can we then say about linear approximations? Well, we can consider a trail Meaning that when we go from alpha on the input to beta on the output We pass through several intermediate states where we have intermediate bit masks And for each such possible choice of intermediate bit masks, we say that we have a trail There are typically a large number of trails going from alpha to beta and The correlation of such a trail we define simply as the The product of the correlation of the individual round functions What's nice about this definition of the correlation of trail is that then the correlation of the correlation of the Unapproximation is simply the sum over all trails of The correlations of each trail now a block cipher not only typically looks like this, but also like this so we have Linear round key additions in between each of these rounds and Then we update This slide slightly namely the correlation of a trail is the product as previously of the correlations, but which then Flip the sign we choose the sign depending on the particular key that we are using and Then this summation formula is updated Accordingly so we add together all these correlations of the trail But with change signs depending on the key and this is usually referred to as the linear hull equation so What about the problem that I told what do we know and what do we not know about how this behaves? So what we can do is we can bound the correlation of a single trail That's usually very straightforward. We just count the S boxes basically or study how much non-linearity is introduced here at the minimum What we cannot do is bound the Correlation for a linear approximation That is when we sum all of these trails together in a key dependent way. What happens? Do they cancel out to zero more or less or do they somehow magically all get the same sign contribution? So it becomes this huge number. Well We don't really know There is clearly a distribution when we pick a key we get some bias, but what does this distribution look like? So the first and sort of obvious solution to this is well basically ignore the whole problem Just deal with single trails we find the trail that has the largest correlation and then when we sum over all the trails we Assume that basically all other trails add up to zero so we just get basically the contribution from the largest trade And this might Work in a sense, but we don't really know if it's correct We can model the situation Somehow for example assuming that all of these trails are independent So this sum of trails is a sum of a a lot of independent stuff, and that's usually easy to handle So we might reach some conclusion there if we are even more advanced we might perform simulations to somehow verify those results of this modeling This is usually difficult in a computational sense So one studies a smaller state version of the block cipher, and then of course the question is these simulation results are they at all? Valid when we consider the actual block cipher with a larger state So on the let's say to-do list of the communities to develop a reasonable framework for studying this and We claim that it hasn't been done before it's difficult sure and We also think that well, we didn't really try very hard so far. So then we Will give the contribution here which is three different examples of what can happen inside a block cipher in this sense of the correlations First of all, we'll give a counter example to an earlier result and then two other examples and All in all we believe that this give an idea of what you can and cannot hope to prove in the situation And hopefully this will serve as inspiration for future work so the examples First of all the cube cipher, which is just a toy cipher, but it does tell us something interesting There is a result by them and Raymond saying that if we have an n-bit block cipher with independent from keys a Huge number of non-zero trails and all of those trails have the same absolute correlations So all of those correlations are just plus or minus some constant Then when we pick a key well, what bias do we get what distribution is there? And the theorem says that the bias distribution tends to a normal distribution as we increase n so for a large enough block size the distribution will looks sufficiently much like a Like a normal distribution namely If we plot the bias against the number of keys most of the keys will provide a bias Centered let's say around zero then there will Be some keys that give a larger bias in absolute terms, but there will be this normal distribution Which sort of makes sense when we have this summation formula with some a huge number of variables which have the same absolute value and We assumed independence in the keys. So it's basically a sum of independent variables, right? And we get this question so however, let's look at The cube cipher where each round function is a cubing in a finite field and There are only two rounds. So this is clearly a toy cipher. There is a lot of structure here. It's subject to various attacks, but It has independent run keys It has a huge number of non-zero trails and they all have the same absolute correlation So still while this is a toy cipher it should behave according to the theorem But it doesn't while the theorem suggests this nice bell curve What we get is this very let's say discrete distribution of just five distinct values for the correlation For all values of n. So no matter how much we increase the block size block size the distribution Will look like this Which is not a normal distribution So there is something wrong in that theory for sure Now the next two examples deal with the key scheduling That is how you pick your round keys One common analysis is well assume independent round keys Do some modeling for example getting this Gortion on the previous slide And then you replace your independent run keys with Dependent keys coming from some key schedule, and then the question is how valid is your analysis? I Will be presenting two examples of what can happen when you have clearly dependent round keys, but still So you replace these independent run keys with dependent from keys first of all Present which is a well-known block cipher If you are familiar with it it looks like this if you're not familiar You don't need to look at this at all We just note that there are brown functions round keys the usual stuff and The distribution is close to normal. So this is What the distribution looks like for 17 rounds of present. It's a nice Gortion That's good. Now what we do is we replace all of these Run keys which are usually non-linearly related With a constant run key and just to get rid of some trivial attacks. We introduce round counters So we have a constant run key and some round counters, and then what happens to the bias distribution We get this red curve, which is sort of flatter and wider. That is it has a larger variance so in particular if we study a Large bias so far to the right here While with the original key scheduling we have virtually no keys yielding this large bias now There is actually a substantial fraction of keys that has such a large place meaning This cipher is less secure. We need more round functions We need more computations basically we get worse efficiency So clearly here the key schedule influences the behavior in terms of linear crypt analysis the conclusion being that this present with constant run keys is Not secure or not as secure as original present It's worth noting that the hash function spongent which is sort of based on present does not have this Xbox so This does not give any attack or anything on spongent indeed This is the very reason that spongent has another S box But more rounds help with more rounds we squeeze together this distribution we the variance becomes smaller. So Everything still works given sufficiently many rounds So then for the third example where the number of rounds will turn out to be Well, it's not a parameter. Basically, we will not be able to fix things using more rounds This is print cipher and again, if you're not familiar with it don't look too much at the details We'll just note that last year at crypto Leander and France presented an invariant subspace attack this means that we consider a subspace and or actually a coset of a subspace and If the input to the round function is in this coset then the output of the round function will also be in this coset Now this is not affected by round counters or anything. So this holds for all rounds Meaning that if the plain text is in this coset Then so is the cipher text and This happens for some keys which we call weak keys Now this is clearly bad because it gives a distinguish you just try a few plain text and cipher text And then you know if you have this type of key But let's see Okay, so yeah, this extends to the entire print cipher So let's see what happens to the distribution of linear biases So this is a plot of it We have well the bias against the number of keys where we go through all all different keys here And it looks sort of like a Gaussian, but there is also some small bubble out to the left Looking closer at this This is another Gaussian, which is much smaller And it turns out that these two Distinct Gaussians correspond to the weak keys and the non weak keys So for the good keys, we have a bias centered at around zero. Everything is working as it should and the way it matches the Independence analysis pretty nicely, but when we have these weak keys We have another Smaller bubble out of the left with a large bias. So this bias is actually large enough to break print cipher in this cryptanalysis sense So that's still not good We'll try to Explain that and we do that by turning to the correlation matrix now This is a concept introduced by Damon and friends So you make this huge matrix where you take all possible alphas and all possible betas So you derive all possible correlations and then you put them in a matrix in a structured way and This is a nice tool to analyze these functions in particular It turns out that when you have an invariant subspace like this Then what happens is that in this? Correlation matrix there appears an eigenvector with value eigenvalue one and a very nice structure of the eigenvector The eigenvalue one essentially means that we have a non-zero limit of this matrix to the power r That is applying r rounds of this cipher So this this is basically trade trade clustering. Everything is adding up The eigenvector is a constant times this plus minus pattern and this gives the matrix power limit as a constant times a very nice plus minus one pattern there is really only one way you can pick this constant and This eigenvector analysis Suggests that all these biases when you increase the number of rounds will tend to two to the minus sixteen plus or minus And actually that is what happens For the for the food print cipher. It turns out that we have this large Biases plus or minus is two to the minus sixteen which is way too large for print cipher So that's pretty bad But we were also able to show that there is actually an equivalence here So the the good thing here is that if you do not have an invariant subspace which Let's say a good Pseudo random function student then you do not have this kind of trade clustering Then you do not have this eigenvector with this eigenvalue where everything just adds up to this large biases Clearly other things can certainly go wrong. So this is if you don't have an invariant subspace It's not a promise that everything is perfectly fine To conclude this talk We saw that well assessing security against linear kryptonites. It's sort of tricky There's a lot of hand-waving you make a lot of assumptions derive your conclusions and then you Don't bother about the assumptions anyway, you introduce dependency and so on and what happens is an open question At least we managed to show that an old theorem is not entirely correct New results or new attempts to describe what happens with this distribution need to somehow deal with the cube site either by describing what happens there or by somehow Removing the cube cipher from the context of the theorem. It is a toy cipher and it's In well, it's not really interesting. So if you exclude it entirely from the theorem, you might be able to say useful things still Now with identical round keys bad things happen So one lesson here might be don't use identical round keys so then the question still is how How dependent keys can you use them? What do you need non-linearity? How much non-linearity do you need and so on and there are Yeah, in short a lot of things to do still about linear kryptonites Thank you Thank you very much


Rocío, would you like to clarify something you said? Yeah, please accept my apologies. I am so tired and forgetful that I made a mistake. A small, big mistake, and a colleague of mine told me in the bibliography and the Soviet archive, it's both Farul, not Boraful. I made a mistake, and I put these two things together. If you took photos or copied the name, please accept my apologies. I have read this book like 300 times, but welling is also to put the blame on for this, because I'm so tired. Good afternoon. First and foremost, I would like to say thanks to the four panelists, because they did wonderful presentations. I love them all. I have a question for Professor Velasco. With regards to the participation of Arabs in international brigades, has the silence been done in purpose, or is it because I lack of knowledge that I don't know it? Because this morning, when I saw about the participation of Arabs, people from Arab origin in the international brigade, I had no idea. I didn't know that they participated. So was this oblivion made in purpose or not? Whether it's been in purpose or not, I don't know. We should ask those who kept it silent. But it's true that this is just an emerging topic of study. In 1984, there was this PhD, and the first Monsalin work is from the 1980s. It's still starting out. There's no school, there's no continuity in many of these studies. And in some of these countries, the current situation doesn't allow scholarship, scholars to do what they should sometimes. But in November last year, I was at the Arab Hispanist experts in that conference, there were very interesting studies on Spanish in the concentration camps during the Civil War and the Second World War. And the Arabs that could have participated in the Spanish Civil War and the Second World War. This is the first steps. We're just facing the early steps of the Arab history and the Spanish conflict. But well, whether it was done in purpose or not, our world is so fast, so quick. We have fast food, fast media sometimes, fast news. And it's much easier and simple to reinforce our own identity through this division between us and them. And by having a homogeneous side versus another, we don't speak about all the non-religious Arab world and the amount of prisoners. It's much more convenient to show the Arab world as a single image where the Islam is at the core and everyone is Muslim without challenging some other ideas as the activism of some Arabs. I'm not saying that it's intentional, but I'm saying that this happens with many more news. Latin America, for example. There's also a terrible treatment. So it's this quick consumption speech where things have to be simplified. And of course, there is Islamophobia. There are some biases and so on. I would like to ask Professor de Ruin how we should treat volunteers, Spanish volunteers, against fascism, like my dad, because the brigades were against fascism. But this link, there must be a link uniting them all. That is to say, the fighters against fascism in Spain are the same as the international brigades. So how should we call them volunteers against fascism or international brigades? Or do they belong to a wider concept, which is anti-fascist volunteers? Could you clarify this? How should we call them? I don't know. The question is how we call brigaders, Spanish people within the brigades? What do you mean exactly? I haven't understood your question. There are volunteers against fascism that did not belong to the international brigades, but he was a volunteer. Some were volunteers, some were not. But I don't know. That depends. Those are historians who should say. But to me, they're just Republican, loyal troops, maybe volunteers, maybe not. Some of them joined voluntarily. And even some joined the brigades. I have some gages of Spaniards in the brigades. But in the brigades, they were brigaders. But how are Spaniards called after the campaign, when there are no more volunteers? How do we call the Spaniards? And Catalans at the end of the Ebro war, who end up in the brigade units, like the man we had this morning in the morning session. So Spaniards are just loyal militias at the beginning, then Republican, loyal soldiers. And then anti-fascist activists, or communists, or socialists, or whatever. Of course, we could have a discussion on the fact that brigaders in their brigader ID, when they came to Spain, they had to write down that they were anti-fascist. They couldn't say communist or socialist. They had to write down anti-fascist. Because in that way, they were highlighting the fact that fighting against fascism was the key. And at the beginning, they did not show how many communists there were. So anti-fascism can be used in different scenarios. I have a question for Dr. Robert Cole. In the Lincoln Brigade, there were white race and black race brigaders. And there was a commander, Oliver Lo, who was black.  Did the racial problems that we suffered in America at the time, did they happen in the brigades or not? Or did they coexist regardless of race without any problems? Looking at the history of the American participation in the Spanish Civil War in the brigades, the first military unit formed by Americans was composed by white and black alike in the Lincoln Brigade. But then the first North America, Afro-American, North American to be leading was Oliver Lo, who was involved in the Brunete battle, who was dead in the Brunete battle. So the Communist Party policy in the states, even before the Civil War, was integration and equality among races. And the policy that they implemented at the brigades was exactly the same as the Communist Party in the United States. This is why we have both races. But brigaders continued in the 1960s. They were in the first line in the fight for racial integration and to avoid segregation in the South, especially. So we have some testimonials from Afro-American brigaders in the American battalion. And they say that in Spain, it was the only moment of their lives when they felt like a full man and nobody would disrespect them or treat them as an inferior being because of the race. Of course, there are some anecdotes that I could quote in another conference in Paris. Counsel Carter, I mentioned his story. He was an Afro-American who worked as a technician in surgical teams in the Medical Medical Bureau. And there was another volunteer who came from Peru and he worked with Mojizboji. You asked about Greta before, didn't you? Well, he had a relative who was a surgeon in the brigade. And he saw Nilo. And at the team, there was this man from Peru. And he said that when they went to the Little Sound Spaniards were surprised by the skin color of the black volunteer. Why he was not washing himself so often, they were just not used to seeing black people. As for racism, there is a story of a doctor, a volunteer doctor in the American Medical Service, a service that was organized by Dr. Batsky. And this doctor came from the South of the United States. And apparently, there's a discussion on whether this happened or not, but the doctor did not want to be on the same table in the board that would take them to France and then to Spain with a black nurse. So volunteers against fascism, like this rejection of salaria, the political views of the brigaders, the American brigaders, 70% would come from the Communist Party while in the medical service, only 25% of nurses were communists before getting to Spain. So there was less activism among doctors, but apparently, there was a case of racism within the medical services. But only one case, only one, in as far as I know. But these 80, 120 Afro-American members of the Lincoln Battalion, they were working, most of them are doing mechanical tasks. And there's a documentary film. I don't know if you saw it, Invisible Heroes, on the participation of Afro-American in the Lincoln Brigade. I wanted to talk about anti-fascism. But in reality, when we talk about anti-fascism in Spain, there are two types of it. The anti-fascism by anti-fascists, not only communists. And I don't refer to the official discourse, like in the States, for example, the guy who helped the most was Dubinsky, the chief of the Workers' Union for Women. It was a very anti-chemist and strong institution. And also, in France, the leader of the CGT, fighting against communists. And he helped, indeed, an awful lot, Spain. So this is a more important movement. And of course, amongst communists, there were anti-fascists communists. But the other side, the other type of anti-fascism, it's only a word for the coming-turn propaganda. It's not a coincidence that only anti-fascism is the word. I believe it was you who mentioned the lists that we found in Moscow. So there is the official discourse, which is not really political, because there are women who have come to Spain because they love liberties and anti-fascists, of course. But on the other side, there's a very precise signaling or identification of people. But I would like to add Nios and its killings. No, sorry, I believe that one of the reasons at the end of the Spanish Civil War is the fact that communists listed people. I'm talking about the French case, not the Germans. That's a special case. And it's the fact that we can see anarchists and a good soul, dear, for example. Of course, he's not an anarchist. It only means that he is a man who says what he thinks. But I believe it's interesting that if we write down a document on this individual being an anarchist and good soldier before the German-Soviet agreement, i.e. in Spain, I believe the communists or the communitarn and the political, the communist parties, knew that there was going to be another struggle. And for this one, not only communists were going to be needed. And this is a very important point. And I will finish with this idea. All the time, we talk about the international brigaders' retirement, sorry, leaving Spain is treason by Stalin. This is not true. It's survivors who need to rescue survivors because they are these survivors after all the ones being killed in Spain, because we might need them for future battles. This is not univocose. There is a common moment. It's the Soviet-German agreement where all this has been forgotten about. But this link between these two struggles is established. So it's difficult when it comes to vocabulary issues, but also we need to pay attention to all these different nuances. Let's be aware. Just a little sentence to add an idea. I remember about those years of the Moscow archives. I remember one brigader I met in 1930. It said he's not very politicized, even sort of infantile, even this person stayed as the Communist Party member until 1995. So, well, he was not really a little bit politicized. So in the US case, these subjective ideas had been done by two US members of the parties. So many different nuances could be there, not even the strictly political criteria.


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