Free Republic

The Australian government was left with almost 46m unusable face masks after handing $100m in Covid contracts to an obscure online retailer, who sourced the equipment via companies registered in the low-tax jurisdiction of Cyprus. The Department of Health awarded the contracts in April and June 2020 to Australian Business Mobiles NSW (ABM), a small company whose experience lay predominantly in selling air fryers, robot vacuum cleaners, bedding and massage guns. ABM sub-contracted the supply of the PPE to two companies registered in Cyprus, owned by twins Ricky and Evan Neumann. The Cyprus-registered companies made about $40m on the deals,...

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) – Concerns around civilian safety spiked in Ukraine on Saturday, as officials announced that an inspection had found nearly a quarter of the country’s air-raid shelters locked or unusable, just days after a woman in Kyiv allegedly died waiting outside a shuttered shelter during a Russian missile barrage. The Ukrainian interior ministry said through its press service Saturday that of the “over 4,800” shelters it had inspected, 252 were locked and a further 893 “unfit for use.”

Sorry I have to say this. But FR has become nearly unusable these days. You used to have a feeling that within 30 seconds to a minute, your page would be resolved and loaded. But no more. I don't know how many times lately, I have hit refresh or picked a new thread only to wait and wait and wait and then I give up and go to another site. The powers that be recommend limiting your window options to twenty. My reply is, if that's the problem, the just taking the option away and making it twenty should be...