River Plate were awarded a penalty by VAR in the 86th minute, which was eventually converted five minutes into stoppage time
Riot police had to protect referee Andres Cunha as River Plate beat Gremio with a late penalty in an incredible Copa Libertadores semi-final.
Gonzalo Martinez scored the spot-kick, given via the video assistant referee, in the fifth of 14 added minutes.
Defender Bressan, who conceded the penalty for handball, was sent off as he remonstrated with Cunha, with play held up as Gremio’s players protested.
River Plate won the second leg 2-1 and went through on the away goals rule.
The Argentine side, beaten 1-0 at home in the first leg, went further behind when Leo Gomes scored for the Brazilian holders after 35 minutes in Porto Alegre.
River Plate were still two goals behind on aggregate with nine minutes of normal time left, but then Rafael Borre scored.
Uruguayan Cunha then sparked the penalty drama in the 86th minute and was surrounded by Gremio players, with riot police entering the field to protect him during the nine-minute delay that followed before the kick was taken.
Victory for River Plate sets up the possibility of an all-Argentine final against Boca Juniors, who play Palmeiras in Sao Paulo on Wednesday, having won the home leg 2-0.
In a year full of Marvel mayhem and Game of Thrones anticipation, it can be hard to remember that Queer Eye Season 1 just came out this past February. Fresh off of three Emmy wins and the release of a surprise Season 2, the Fab Five have even more planned for the last few months of their jam-packed 2018.
Antoni Porowski, Tan France, Karamo Brown, Bobby Berk, and Jonathan Van Ness collaborated with reporter Monica Corcoran Harel to create QUEER EYE: Love Yourself, Love Your Life—a lifestyle book that Van Ness promises covers how to “break up with your hairdresser” and Porowski assures gives “a general guide” on how each of the five live their lives.
In honor of their new book (out November 13) we did a rapid-fire Q&A with the Fab Five on a few projects they didn’t create. From Lena Dunham on the Iron Throne to not getting the totally deserved call to collaborate on Netflix’s Dogs, here are a whole bunch of Fab Five opinions you knew you wanted, but didn’t know you needed.
Who is the best dressed/best groomed Avenger?
Antoni Porowski: I would say Iron Man just because his apartment has all kinds of awesome, really cool mid century French modern pieces. And he has amazing suits. He has really nice Brioni suits I think.
Tan France: Chris Hemsworth! Because his hair is nice, his skin’s nice.
Bobby Berk: His body is nice.
AP: The new Spider-Man as well. He’s got really great style.
TF: Yeah! Tom Holland.
Aside from Queer Eye, which show or movie has been the best of 2018 so far?
Jonathan Van Ness: Probably the Olympics from this year. Olympic figure skating was just a battle of the titans. You had Zagitova and Medvedeva battle to the gold. It made us laugh, it made us cry.
“It was depicted in a really lovely way by super talented actors. Even Nicole Kidman’s wig.”
AP: Bobby and I were lucky enough to see a preview of Boy Erased and we were really touched by the story of conversion therapy. I didn’t realize how prevalent it was. It is still going on. It is still heavily funded. It is still very popular among certain groups of people. It was really concerning and really eye-opening.
It was depicted in a really lovely way by super talented actors. Even Nicole Kidman’s wig. It’s a wonderful, wonderful film. She has a great performance.
TF: I think Season 2 of The Crown came out in 2018. It is my favorite show. I think Claire Foy is a national treasure.
AP: I’m also really excited because, I don’t know if you saw, but there is a documentary coming out on Netflix about dogs. It’s called Dogs and it’s about dogs.
And there is like a Pixar (sic) movie coming out about Corgis? Which I’m very excited for.
Who do you think is ending up on the Iron Throne?
JVN: I feel like it’s going to be just like really out of right field. No one ever saw it coming. Like that Lena Dunham lookalike. I think that lady from that Iron… the Iron…?
AP: What about the big guy who saves the really pretty little girl and then was like in the convent with all the other grays?
BB: It’s the Lena Dunham girl. It’s the Iron Islands woman.
What are your Hogwarts houses?
TF: I’ve never even seen Harry Potter.
BB: I haven’t seen Harry Potter.
JVN: Wait, wait! Karamo! Somebody said based on our outfits for the Emmys that we looked like certain ones.
Karamo Brown: Oh, that we were… Gryffindor and Hufflepuff?
JVN: No, Slytherin.
KB: We were Gryffindor and Dumbledore?
JVN: We’re so connected with pop culture. We’re really on the pulse.
AP: We have no idea what’s going on.
If you could cameo or collaborate on any other project, what would you pick?
“I’m kind of disappointed Netflix didn’t contact me to narrate the Dogs documentary.”
JVN: I would help US Gymnastics get a clue. I would be so dedicated. I would be their hype-man. I would get their form together. US Gymnastics!
BB: I want to do something on Broadway.
JVN: Oh, I would love you on Broadway! I love that!
AP: I’m kind of disappointed Netflix didn’t contact me to narrate the Dogs documentary. I feel like it would have been a really organic fit and I think it was a really missed opportunity on their end. It’s kind of unfortunate.
TF: I want to go on as a contestant on The Great British Baking Show.
JVN: Also, just to put it out there… To get to be a contestant on The Price Is Right and get Plinko, win your Showcase Showdown, and make it in the around the world Showcase Showdown challenge would also be something that I would live for.
AP: And I just found out that that show still exists.
JVN: It does. It’s so good!
In light of Antoni’s Patrick Bateman impression, which horror icons are your favorites?
AP: I’m actually terrified of horror films. I don’t understand why anyone would want to intentionally be scared.
TF: Stop, stop, stop, stop.
“Speaking of blondes, the mom from The Exorcist, the original Exorcist. I love that.”
AP: Tan loves horror films. For me, I think… I’d love to go in like a really crowded space basically dressed as Jason. Or anything with a mask.
JVN: For me, it’s Drew Barrymore in Scream. I just love that iconic character and she’s got that strong blonde fringe. I wanna scream.
TF: Speaking of blondes, the mom from The Exorcist, the original Exorcist. I love that.
BB: I don’t think… I’ve ever seen a horror movie.
AP: I don’t like evil stuff!
KB: Oh, It. Pennywise, the clown. That’s all.
This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has unveiled a 182-metre statue, the world’s tallest, to honour Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, one of the country’s founding fathers and its first home minister.
The $430m Statue of Unity, built on an island in Narmada river, was inaugurated by Modi on Wednesday in the western Indian state of Gujarat, home to both Patel and Modi.
Patel was deputy to Jawaharlal Nehru, India‘s first prime minister, also the great grandfather of current Congress party president, Rahul Gandhi.
Patel’s legacy has been frequently used by Modi to undermine his chief political rivals, the Gandhi-Nehru family, which gave India three prime ministers.
Speaking at the inauguration, Modi, who had commissioned the statue in 2010 when he was Gujarat state’s chief minister, said, “Events like today are very very important in a country’s history and such events are difficult to erase. It is an historic and inspiring occasion for all Indians.”
“Patriotism is the foundation on which our culture is built,” the Hindu nationalist leader said.
Around 3,500 workers and 250 engineers worked to build the gigantic statue made of concrete, steel and bronze panels, located on the island called ‘Sadhu Bet’, around 200km from Gujarat’s capital city, Ahmedabad.
There will be a viewing gallery some 153 metres up, near the chest of the towering statue, which, critics say, is part of a larger right-wing project of revising India’s history to suit the Hindu nationalist agenda.
Ironic that a statue of Sardar Patel is being inaugurated, but every institution he helped build is being smashed. The systematic destruction of India’s institutions is nothing short of treason. #StatueOfUnity
The project includes appropriating the legacy of freedom fighters and leaders from the liberal opposition Congress, who do not belong to the Nehru-Gandhi family.
Another controversial statue, that of 17th century Maratha warrior, Shivaji Bhosle, is currently being built in Mumbai.
Both the statues dwarf the Statue of Liberty in height and together cost almost $1bn.
Why Patel?
Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, also known as the “Iron Man of India”, persuaded feuding states to merge and become part of the Indian union after independence from the British rule in 1947.
Patel worked alongside Nehru to build the nation after the Indian subcontinent was divided into India and Pakistan, one of the bloodiest events in South Asia that resulted in nearly a million deaths and displaced 15 million people.
Historians like AG Noorani say Nehru and Patel held divergent views on how the young Indian republic is to be shaped, despite being members of the same Congress party, with the latter perceived by some as “more pro-Hindu“.
While the majority of Indians are Hindus, Muslims and people of other faiths account for some 240 million, or a fifth, of the populace.
Thousands of Gujarat’s tribals in villages near the site protested against the million-dollar statue [Sam Panthaky/AFP]
Modi and his BJP party are at loggerheads with the secular ethos that largely shaped a post-colonial India governed by Nehru and the Congress for more than half a century. They believe Patel would have made a better leader.
“Every Indian regrets Sardar Patel did not become the first prime minister. Had he been the first prime minister, the country’s fate and face would have been completely different,” Modi has said repeatedly in the past few years.
Facing a series of state elections in the coming months before a national election due by May, the ruling BJP believes there is much to be gained from appropriating Patel’s legacy.
Rakesh Sinha, lawmaker and member of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), the BJP’s ideological mentor, says the Hindu supremacist organisation is “the true successor” of Patel’s legacy.
“Patel had a home-grown concept of nationalism. While others like Nehru advocated a European idea of nationalism, Patel valorised the Indian tradition of civilisational nation state. This meant ‘one nation, one people’. Our government is guided by this ideology,” Sinha told Al Jazeera.
‘Battle of ideas’
Analysts say it suits Modi and the BJP to take refuge in Patel’s colossal shade, invoking his efforts in integrating erstwhile princely states into the Indian republic.
“The eulogies being paid to Patel are merely a cover. All they want is to malign India’s left-leaning social democrat founding father Nehru. It is a battle of ideas,” Aditya Mukherjee, professor of history at Jawaharlal Nehru University, told Al Jazeera.
Others warn the ambitions of Hindu nationalists extend beyond holding political power and includes shaping of a national identity to match the idea that India is a nation of and for Hindus.
“The Hindu nationalists believe Nehru and [Mahatma] Gandhi didn’t allow India to become a Hindu state. So, a conservative Hindu Patel was the natural choice to counterbalance Gandhi,” Manimugdha Sharma, political analyst in New Delhi, told Al Jazeera.
Commentators also refer to the irony of Modi supporting Patel, who helped ban the RSS after Nathuram Godse, who historians say was linked to the Hindu supremacist organisation, assassinated Mahatma Gandhi in 1948.
“It’s a different matter that Patel was staunchly against a Hindu nation and had famously said in February 1949: ‘Hindu rule is a mad idea. It will kill the soul of India’,” Sharma said.
Politics over statues
Mumbai’s planned $515m statue of Shivaji reveres a regional ruler who challenged the medieval Mughal empire and today stands as a symbol of Hindu pride.
Critics say a debate over such statues is necessary at a time when ruling BJP is erasing Indian history of its Muslim heritage by renaming roads and railway stations, and rewriting of textbooks.
Earlier this month, the Islamic name of a north Indian city, Allahabad, was changed to Prayagraj, which has Hindu associations.
“It’s a paradox that the Statue of Unity is leading to disunity. The politics behind these statues is obvious: to lionise someone by demonising someone else,” said Sharma.
Historians like Mukherjee say the Hindu nationalists want a “monochromatic, homogenous” India, “which this land never was”.
“They want to wash over the entire medieval period because they are irritated that some Muslim rulers were around. For them there’s ancient India and then suddenly we jump over to post-independence India,” he said.
But the RSS says such statues set a western idea of nationalism right.
“When you write artificial history intended to support a western version of nationalism, it will not be accepted. If there are versions of history that were concocted, we will set it right,” Rakesh Sinha told Al Jazeera.
The costly statue projects have also been criticised as being unnecessary in a nation where one-third of the 1.2 billion people live in abject poverty.
Local organisations claim as many as 75,000 tribal people were displaced from their lands by the Statue of Unity project, which has been financed by government and public donations.
The chiefs of nearly two dozen villages around the Patel statue had warned Modi to stay away from the inauguration.
Posters of Modi with Gujarat chief minister Vijay Rupani were torn down or had their faces blackened over the weekend, AFP news agency reported.
Activists said about a dozen of their leaders were detained ahead of the opening of the statue.
Anand Mazgaonkar, a community leader in Narmada district, told AFP that police in plain clothes took away 12 people late on Tuesday to the local police headquarters.
Authorities denied the allegations, but admitted that they took no chances.
“More than 5,000 police personnel were deployed at various points in the 10km radius of the statue site,” Narmada police inspector general Abhay Chudasama told AFP.
Analysts say the government should have its priorities cut out.
“A country struggling to create jobs amid a sluggish economy could have surely avoided this wasteful expenditure. India needs gigantic growth, not gigantic statues,” said Sharma.
Fikayo Tomori has made one appearance for Chelsea, while Mason Mount is yet to feature for the senior team
On Wednesday, Mason Mount and Fikayo Tomori face the curious case of playing against the club who employ them.
Both are on loan at Championship side Derby County from Chelsea, who meet in the Carabao Cup fourth round, and – if selected – can play at Stamford Bridge.
Players out on loan cannot face their parent club in Premier League matches – of which more later – but they can do in English Football League competitions, provided permission is given, and that is what Chelsea have done.
Chelsea say the experience of “facing top-level opposition” will benefit 19-year-old midfielder Mount – called up to the England squad earlier this season – and defender Tomori, 20.
Derby boss Frank Lampard, Chelsea’s all-time leading scorer, called it a “classy” move.
“I am really pleased for these young Chelsea lads who have come through the system and whose dream it is to play at Stamford Bridge,” said Lampard.
“I have to completely say thank you to Chelsea because it was their call, their decision. I think they have seen the bigger picture in terms of what a great experience it will be for their players.”
But will the decision come back to haunt the Premier League club? Here are seven lessons they may have learned from previous loan escapades.
Loan sharks can strike early
Patrick Roberts scored four minutes into his return to Etihad Stadium
Mount and Tomori will no doubt feel they have a point to prove against their parent club, just as Patrick Roberts did when sent on loan to Celtic from Manchester City.
When the Scottish champions faced City in the Champions League group stages in December 2016, Roberts took all of four minutes to score a smart solo goal at Etihad Stadium.
City were already through and Celtic eliminated, but the winger had no qualms about celebrating his effort in 1-1 draw.
Will Mount and Tomori celebrate if they net against Chelsea? Well, why not?
It can happen to Europe’s biggest clubs
Five years and three Champions League winners’ medals into his Real Madrid career, Fernando Morientes found himself playing back-up at the Bernabeu to Brazil striker Ronaldo – the latest addition to the Galactico pack in 2002.
Come the 2003-04 campaign, he opted for a loan move to Ligue 1 side Monaco, helping them to an unlikely spot in the Champions League final and finishing as the competition’s top scorer with nine goals.
Two of those came against his parent club in the quarter-finals.
Real were not fazed by Morientes’ first, a late header in a 4-2 defeat at the Bernabeu, but it proved crucial as Monaco staged a dramatic comeback at Stade Louis II to win 3-1 and go through on the away goals rule, with the aggregate score 5-5.
The Spaniard set up Ludovic Giuly, who scored twice, and also scored himself as Monaco progressed, losing to Jose Mourinho’s Porto in the final.
Fernando Morientes did not hold back when celebrating his goal in the second leg against parent club Real Madrid
Learn from your mistakes
The Morientes saga might have prompted Real Madrid to limit the chance of a repeat scenario, but 14 years later, they almost got bitten again.
Real agreed a fee of up to £71m with Monaco for World Cup Golden Boot winner James Rodriguez in 2014, but after three stuttering seasons, the Colombia playmaker was shipped out on a two-year loan to Bayern Munich.
Predictably, Real drew the German giants in the Champions League semi-final, with Rodriguez setting up Joshua Kimmich as Bayern slipped to a 2-1 home defeat in the first leg. He went one better at the Bernabeu, netting Bayern’s second goal.
Rodriguez refused to celebrate his effort and thanked fans for the “ovation” he received in Madrid, with Bayern ultimately beaten as Zinedine Zidane’s Real secured a 2-2 draw to reach the final.
And talking of learning from your mistakes…
Fool me once…
Thibaut Courtois impressed in both legs of Atletico’s Champions League semi-final win over Chelsea
Wednesday’s Carabao Cup tie will neither be the first nor the most high-profile case of an on-loan Chelsea player lining up against their parent club.
After joining Chelsea in 2011, goalkeeper Thibaut Courtois spent three seasons on loan at Atletico Madrid, playing three times against the Blues in Europe – starting with a 4-1 Super Cup win in 2012.
However, it was Courtois’ role in the Champions League semi-finals the following season that sparked much debate. It also led to Uefa overruling an agreement in the loan deal that would have required Atletico to pay Chelsea a reported £5m fee to allow him to feature in both legs.
Uefa said any private contract between clubs which might influence player selection was “null, void and unenforceable”, so Courtois played, and played well, as the sides drew 0-0 in Madrid before stunning Jose Mourinho’s side with a 3-1 win at Stamford Bridge to reach the final.
Super subs pose a threat
Bayern Munich have done pretty well out of long-term loan deals for some of the world’s top young talents. Before Rodriguez, there was Kingsley Coman.
The French winger joined the Bundesliga side on a two-year loan from Juventus in August 2015 and faced the Italians later that season in the Champions League last 16.
Both legs finished 2-2 after 90 minutes – meaning extra time. After Thiago Alcantara had edged Bayern ahead, 19-year-old Coman put the tie beyond his parent club with a fourth goal.
Mount has scored twice in three Carabao Cup rounds so far, as well as netting from the spot in the penalty shootout out victory at Manchester United last time out.
The England youth international is an fitness doubt for Derby’s trip to Stamford Bridge – perhaps he’ll pose a threat from the bench instead?
The LuaLua Rule
Lomana LuaLua celebrates his goal for Portsmouth against parent club Newcastle
A lot of ‘ifs’ here, but should Derby County get promoted and Mount and Tomori head back to Pride Park on loan, then they would not be able to feature against Chelsea in the Premier League.
The reason? Lomana LuaLua.
Having failed to find the net for Newcastle all season, the Congo winger was sent on a 90-day loan to Harry Redknapp’s Portsmouth in February 2004. However, Newcastle failed to include a clause saying LuaLua could not play against them.
Less than a month after his loan move, he volleyed in an 89th-minute equaliser in a 1-1 draw with Newcastle, whose manager Bobby Robson bemoaned that “one of our players” had scored against his side.
LuaLua celebrated by somersaulting across the pitch before pointing to the name on the back of his shirt and ripping it off.
He did apologise to the Newcastle supporters, but added he was glad to be “somewhere where someone wants me”.
It led to a change in FA and Premier League legislation, meaning on-loan players could not play against their parent clubs in league fixtures.
Don’t ‘ruin’ a country’s national team
At least the Derby loanees are unlikely to face the sort of backlash that greeted South Korea’s Ahn Jung-hwan when he scored the winner against Italy in the last 16 of the 2002 World Cup.
Ahn was on loan at Serie A side Perugia from South Korea’s Busan Daewoo Royals and, with Italy’s World Cup exit sparking outrage back home, was cast as the villain.
Perugia chairman Luciano Gaucci told Italian newspaper La Gazzetta dello Sport: “That gentleman will never set foot in Perugia again.” He added that he “had no intention of paying a salary to someone who has ruined Italian soccer”.
Gaucci then bizarrely backtracked and tried to take up the option of signing the forward on a permanent basis, but Ahn rejected, saying the club “attacked my character”.
You’ve likely been flooded with information about the newest rap feud brewing between Cardi B and Nicki Minaj.
The beef hit a flashpoint in September when Cardi B threw a shoe at Nicki Minaj during New York Fashion Week, and tempers have been hot ever since.
But what do our elders have to say about it all? Jimmy Kimmel went down to a farmer’s market to ask our most experienced for advice. The response is suitably less than enthusiastic, which is fair enough TBH.
Al Qaim, Iraq – The vast Anbar desert stretches across almost a third of Iraq, 138,000 square-kilometres of no man’s land to the country’s west.
Here, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant group (ISIL, also known as ISIS) sleeper cells use the remote area’s mountain ranges, valleys and caves to plan and launch their attacks from.
The Iraqi military and US-led coalition are hesitant to give exact numbers but estimate that a few hundred fighters clustered in groups as small as two are all that remains of the group.
In remote parts, ISIL fighters have stopped their aggressive tactics of killing and abducting locals. Instead, a few fighters will show up from time to time to seek food and supplies.
The challenge
This is not an easy area for the authorities to search and monitor. The rugged terrain makes manning checkpoints and surveillance posts extremely challenging, as does the vastness of the area; the Iraq- Syria border alone stretches about 612 kilometres.
Iraqi forces say they are doing all they can to prevent these areas from becoming safe havens for ISIL.
There are plans to invest over $3m in building a border fence equipped with advanced surveillance and watchtowers.
ISIL fighters still operate around Anbar
The US-led coalition is supporting these efforts, pushing to take advantage of ISIL’s shift from an organised force to an unpredictable and weakened insurgency.
US Colonel Sean Ryan, spokesperson for Combined Joint Task Force, told Al Jazeera: “There are pockets of ISIS we knew and we saw where some of them escaped to. The ironic thing is that they planned for their failure four years ago; Anbar was their final destination if this caliphate did not work out, which it didn’t.”
But some Iraqis in remote parts are not feeling as confident, saying that while security forces may control the day, the night still belongs to ISIL.
Iraq’s security forces say that’s changing. Mohammed al-Askari, a senior adviser in Iraq’s defence ministry, told Al Jazeera: “To some extent, I would agree that sometimes ISIL has the night and security forces have the day. But such things are in the past; it used to happen during ISIL reign when it controlled Mosul, Ramadi, Fallujah and Al-Qaim.”
The spokesperson for the Iraqi Combined Operations Command, Brigadier General Yahya Rasoul, is adamant that after the Iraqi army’s victory, ISIL’s presence on the ground has been routed.
“Iraqi forces are continuing military operations to hunt down ISIL militants south of Kirkuk, the Hawijah mountain ranges, Hamrin basin, several areas in Diyalah and the desert areas in Salahuddin and Anbar.
“Near the Iraq-Syria border, these divisions are conducting search ops, raids and arrests backed by intelligence.”
Building trust
People in remote parts of Salahuddin, Anbar and Nineveh – predominantly Sunni areas – have told Al Jazeera that they are afraid to identify themselves because they fear reprisals, both from returning ISIL fighters and from security forces for speaking out about their dissatisfaction.
But Iraqi forces say that too is changing as their efforts to build confidence and gain the trust of the people take root, adding that Iraqis are no longer demanding that security forces leave their neighbourhoods as they used to in the past.
Many of these predominantly Sunni areas are under the control of Iran-backed Shia militias – also known as the Hashd or popular mobilisation units – which were the spearhead in defeating ISIL but have also been accused of human rights violations, arbitrary arrests, torture, and killings. Although they have been brought under the control of the prime minister’s office, its widely believed that they draw their strength and orders from across the border.
Major General Tahseen al-Khafaji, spokesperson for Iraq’s defence ministry, says: “It is very important for people in these remote areas to become better educated to gain awareness and a different culture. Those same people have witnessed ISIL’s havoc and destruction – they lived under ISIL rule in the past three years and witnessed atrocities.
“That is why it is key to have the security apparatuses strengthen their relationship with the people who will, in turn, compare the dark times under ISIL and the current situation that has better security and stability.
“We admit that the security sometimes has flaws… but we are at the same time monitoring as the Ministry of Defence and as an intelligence and military establishment to catch anyone who is trying to do bad things and degrade the relationship between us and the people. Spreading awareness is key, but the most important thing is building trust.”
Machine gun post Iraq [Osama Bin Javaid/Al Jazeera]
Boots on the ground
The US-led coalition against ISIL is one of the largest in terms of number of countries united to fight a single enemy. While many Iraqis haven’t forgotten the invasion of Iraq and its aftermath, there are many others who are thankful for the US’s help in the fight against ISIL.
These days the coalition’s mission in Iraq is to advise, assist and train. But because of the nature and size of the terrain in Anbar, al-Khafaji says air cover is crucial.
ISIL fighters’ families held against their will in Iraq and Syria
“All we need from the coalition is training, arming and enhancing our air force – we have advanced air force capacity and fighter jets but we need more air force efforts and training. We need at least 4-5 years to establish a strong and independent air force unit. That is why we crucially need air force support.”
Boots on the ground, however, remain a touchy subject: “We do not need foreign ground troops, we have all the troops we need in order to track down the remnants of ISIL, all we need is proper training. We have a plan that was initiated in 2017 when the coalition and NATO took on the responsibility to train our forces,” al-Khafaji says.
“2018 is a year of building and training. In 2019, our own trainers [trained by] by the coalition will begin supervising our troops. By 2020, the Iraqi Ministry of Defence will take care of training our forces and the role of the coalition will become supervisory. By 2021, Iraq’s military establishment will be divided into divisions including north, central and south. All this will be done in cooperation with the coalition,” he added.
Stopping the resurgence
ISIL has been carrying out up to five attacks every month and continues to kill and maim Iraqi soldiers and militia fighters.
The threat of ISIL regrouping in the desert and making a comeback is still a reality because of the difficulty in tracing and identifying their desert hideouts.
Iraqi forces dismiss the criticism that they and their militia counterparts are untrained to hold the peace, that they lack local knowledge or that the trust gap with local communities is a hindrance against ISIL.
Al-Askari says: “ISIL, since its rise and until its eventual fall, in Iraq fully depends on misinformation, brainwashing and falsifying ideologies. ISIL is not giving up easily, it is a relentless enemy and we know that.
“That is why ISIL is in the phase of trying to rebuild its capacity, to try to resurface with a new method and new leaders. We have accurate info that ISIL – despite its efforts to resurface – is still collapsing. We are tracking down how money is reaching ISIL through money laundering.”
Iraqis suffer with no water or electricity after ISIL’s defeat
Lewis Hamilton’s successful quest for a fifth world title, I suggest to him, can be distilled down to one simple phrase: Ferrari dropped the ball and he knocked it out of the park.
Hamilton chuckles a little at the suggestion, and then says: “The description is not too bad.”
“It’s been an incredible season – mentally and physically, for everyone in the team,” he adds, as he reflects on the ups and downs of what will surely come to be remembered as his finest achievement yet – winning the title against four-time champion Sebastian Vettel in a car that was, for at least half the races, faster than his own.
“On the drivers’ side,” Hamilton says, “the mental side has been the key. Ferrari were so strong at certain points of the year – particularly in the first half of the season – we didn’t know how it was going to end.
“But the best parts of the season have been when we’ve been on the back foot and it’s not looked great – but we managed to claw our way back and collectively do a better job overall [than] their team and their driver.
“That’s really what’s made the difference this year, which is something the whole team can be really proud of.”
Hamilton is in expansive and revelatory form as we discuss the year and cover among other topics:
where his stand-out performances come from
the psychology of the battle with Vettel
his spirituality and how it impacts his racing
his growth as a sportsman since his electrifying debut in 2007
an insightful anecdote from inside a drivers’ briefing
A battle of minds as well as talent
This year started as a contest between Hamilton and Vettel to see who would become the first man of his generation to win a fifth world title.
For much of the year, it was impossible to predict how it was going to end. The Ferrari has been a faster car than the Mercedes at least as often as it has been the other way around but at key moments Hamilton has excelled and Vettel and/or Ferrari have messed up.
Hamilton sees the three defining moments of the season as:
The German Grand Prix, when Vettel crashed out of the lead as Hamilton closed in rapidly in a late-race rain shower and the Mercedes driver went on to win
The Italian Grand Prix, when Ferrari’s failure to impose team orders on their front-row starting drivers allowed Hamilton to pass Vettel on the first lap, and take a brilliant victory chasing down the German’s team-mate Kimi Raikkonen
Singapore, where a lap for the ages from Hamilton put him on pole on a track where Mercedes have traditionally struggled
Hamilton believes Monza was “probably the biggest psychological blow” for Ferrari, to lose after they had locked out the front row.
But he adds: “They’d had a couple – Seb’s psychologically difficult time when he made a personal mistake [in Germany]. As a driver, when the team makes a mistake, it’s painful. But when it’s you, when it’s in your control, that’s a horrible feeling. He would have taken that to heart.
“Then we had that fight at Monza. That would have been a team blow for them. But we didn’t get complacent after that great result for us. We knew we still had to execute, going to places like Singapore where Ferrari usually destroy us. And what a weekend it was.
“None of us predicted that we would’ve won in Hockenheim or Monza or particularly Singapore. Collectively we’ve done an amazing job in this team.”
Those ‘Lewis Hamilton moments’
The championship should have been close to the end, so evenly matched have Mercedes and Ferrari been.
That it was not is partly down to the errors that have defined Vettel’s season and at least as much to the remarkable performances Hamilton has produced, often when on the back foot.
His pole lap at Silverstone when Ferrari seemed to have the faster car; the race in Germany when he took seconds a lap out of Vettel’s lead in the rain before his rival crashed; winning in Hungary when the Ferrari was much quicker; his exquisite demonstration of all the qualities that define a world-class driver in Monza; and that unbelievable qualifying lap in Singapore.
Hamilton has always produced moments like this, but he agrees there have been more of them this year.
“Definitely,” he says. “What you don’t get to see is I have this large group of people to utilise. They’re my tools, my soldiers, whatever you want to call them.
Pot washing & for sale signs: How Hamilton conquered F1 as only working class driver
“We all individually think we’re operating at the highest but one of us can lean against another and pull more out of them.
“My job is to try to extract the most from every single person there. So, how you debrief, how you understand personally, how you engage with everyone when you have a bad weekend, how you lift everyone up. How you nurture that and build upon it has been key this year.
“If I didn’t get those guys in the right positions, I wouldn’t be able to extract what I have in me. I have always had what I have in the way I am driving but if they mess up or slip or didn’t do something right, I can’t unlock the potential in the car, and that’s why it’s a collective group.”
Once out on his own in the car, he says: “It’s all about seizing the moment. When it rains in Budapest, for example, I would imagine it is easy to look at it and think, ‘Shoot, that makes it much harder for us all.’ That is looking at the glass half-empty. I look at it the other way, like ‘This is an opportunity for me. Great. They were actually quicker in the dry. Now I know I can make the difference in the wet if I put it together.’
“Now, knowing it initially and actually doing it is two different things. Then I go into the zone of how am I going to put this lap together to make sure I’m ahead.”
It’s a head space you get into?
“I think it’s a head space, yeah.”
Whatever it is, it has led to moments in which he has excelled himself. In Germany, he closed dramatically on Vettel as rain began to fall late in the race – and the Ferrari driver ended up crashing out, causing a 32-point swing in the championship.
“I didn’t know it was going to rain,” Hamilton says, “so you are progressing mentally in the race. But then when it started to rain, I’m like: ‘OK, I’m gonna catch him.’ And I also know that he’s thinking I’m gonna catch him. I’m sure they’re telling him where I am.”
The day had started with Hamilton in 15th on the grid because of a hydraulics failure in qualifying – a disappointment he likens to missing out on pole at the 2015 British Grand Prix after erroneously bailing on his final lap in changeable conditions.
“The night before, recovering from the loss… a bit like at Silverstone in ’15 when Nico [Rosberg] got pole. I was distraught but came back the next day and won.
“In that race [Germany], qualifying I was out, he was on pole. ‘How do I minimise the loss?’ It’s how you recover from those. That psychological operation for me is the most powerful.”
A sense of the otherworldly
Hamilton is religious; he has said he prays every day.
After the race in Germany he made a number of remarks that hinted at his faith. “My prayers were really answered,” he said at the time. “It freaks me out a little bit more than normal.”
Three months on, he reflects on what he meant.
“I don’t pray to win,” he says. “I don’t pray for fortune. I always just ask – whether you’re talking to yourself or someone’s hearing you – but ‘I want to be able to live to my potential today. Allow me to live to my potential today. I know I can be great but certain things get in the way and you’re not always able to be great. Just allow me to run free.’”
Boos from the partisan crowd also played their part.
“Also in Hockenheim there was so much negativity. For me, that’s like the devil. Let me shine on this and turn that darkness – that booing, which is all dark.
“For me, the sun was shining even though it was raining.”
Hamilton produced one of the best laps of his career to take pole in Singapore
After the race, there was a torrential downpour.
“For me that felt biblical,” he says, “if you knew the stuff that I’d said in my prayer – and it was not predictable. Those things I had asked to work against. I didn’t ask for the rain at the end of the race. That was almost like… if you ever asked for a sign of something, that was a sign.”
Then there was his Instagram description of his qualifying lap in Singapore as “heaven-sent”.
He explains: “I’m not saying that’s controlled from above or anything. When I say it’s heaven-sent, it’s just you’re always searching for perfection. You never get close to it. But that was the closest I felt. The lap just went. It was awesome. For me, that was one of the best laps I’ve ever done.”
Only “one of the best”? Why not “the best”?
“Because I’ve got a really bad memory and can’t remember all my pole laps. I don’t want to be absolute about it and then remember, ‘Oh yeah there was another lap.’
“But from what I currently have stored in my mind, yeah, it was the best.
“But when I say it’s heaven-sent, it’s just about setting yourself goals and that feeling you have. Think of heaven – heaven’s a perfect place and on that lap I felt I was in a perfect place. In a beautiful place, an amazing feeling, balanced and at my best.”
The psychology of battle
Not only has Hamilton won the battle with Vettel over a year, he has, at crucial moments, beaten him in a straight fight on track, too.
Vettel passed Hamilton easily on the straight to win the Belgian Grand Prix, but Hamilton’s moves on his rival on the first lap in Italy, and after losing a place at the pit stops in Russia, were more defining.
Hamilton has been involved in several battles with Vettel throughout the season
The impression is that Hamilton knows he can pass Vettel when he needs to, and it’s not one he tries to diminish.
“I never ever think: ‘I own you,’” he says. “I don’t use that mentality. But if you imagine, erm, look at [Floyd] Mayweather as he goes into the ring. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him not look like he knows he’s going to win. Even if the opponent is taller or whatever.
“It’s the same when I look at different athletes and I’m wondering what’s the difference between them and how they are not nervous because they know what the other person may or may not do.
“But when I came out behind, I know where his strengths are, I know where his weaknesses are and I know where I’m better. So it’s game on. I’m like, ‘Let’s dance. You might get the better of me [in] this bit but I know how to get by you.”
Behind the scenes with the drivers
Although Hamilton won the battle with Vettel in Russia, he was not happy with the Ferrari man’s driving, feeling he had made an illegal second move when defending before Hamilton passed two corners later.
Hamilton brought it up in the drivers’ briefing with FIA F1 director Charlie Whiting at the next race in Japan. He takes up the story, which includes an amusing pop at Red Bull’s Max Verstappen.
“It wasn’t really an argument,” he says. “It was a different opinion about how you see and interpret the rule book.
“You ask things to Charlie and he says one thing but it means another. Sometimes. So I said, ‘Charlie, are you allowed two moves under braking? Is it one move or two moves? The rules say one but that was a two-move thing and you look at the footage and in my eyes that’s two moves.’”
Hamilton is referring to the moment during the race when Hamilton was closing on Vettel on the straight down towards the de facto first corner. Vettel moves to his right to defend. He stops moving, and then moves again, squeezing Hamilton towards the wall on the inside, and forcing him to brake to back out of the overtake.
Hamilton continues: “Charlie said, ‘Yeah but if you look from the front, it looks like he turns and then slows down and then keeps going, so it’s still one move.’
“So I’m like, ‘OK, in the future, if I move, as long as I keep a bit of angle on the car, it’s still one move then I’m going to be fine? But it’s actually two.’ I’m saying, ‘You’re setting a precedent.’
“I asked all the drivers, ‘What do you think?’ And there was only one driver really that looked at it and saw two moves but said it was OK, and that was Max. Because he does two moves!”
Hamilton laughs out loud. “So, I was laughing and saying ‘Max, you’re the one that started this whole two-move thing. You’re the king of the double move.’ It’s just trying to understand it.”
Personal development
It’s not been a perfect season and Hamilton admits he has had some bad races. China, early on, he calls “a shocking weekend,” for example, adding: “The first half of the season wasn’t great.”
But, in contrast to Vettel, what has been striking is his lack of errors, which he says has “allowed me to enjoy the highs more”. In achieving this, he says, “discipline is very much key, how you study and prepare for the race”.
It is in this way, he says, that he has come on from the raw talent who shocked Fernando Alonso in his debut season, when they were McLaren team-mates.
“2007 me wouldn’t have a chance [against 2018 Hamilton],” he says. “And he was still very quick.”
Hamilton says he feels “people underestimate that season”, adding: “Being in a top team straight away and having to try to deliver against a two-time world champion who has been through what I have been through to this point almost, is a huge demand and it was one of the toughest years of my life.”
Now, he says, he is on “a much, much different level. Last year, I was trying to figure out this amazing year and how can I improve on that.
“When you have won the championship, it is easy to just ride the wave and think it’s great. But I am always wanting to raise the bar.”
Five titles and 71 wins and counting. Lewis Hamilton is a long way from finished yet.
Apple released watchOS 5.1 on Tuesday alongside a major software update for iOS, but it’s already been pulled.
The decision came following a handful of reports of bricked Apple Watches on Twitter and reddit, with users reporting that their devices were stuck on the Apple logo while booting up.
“Due to a small number of Apple Watch customers experiencing an issue while installing watchOS 5.1 today, we’ve pulled back the software update as a precaution,” the statement reads.
“Any customers impacted should contact AppleCare, but no action is required if the update installed successfully. We are working on a fix for an upcoming software update.”
watchOS 5.1 brought updates to emoji, refreshed watch faces, support for group FaceTime audio, as well as some minor bug fixes. Looks like Apple Watch owners will have to hold on for just a little while longer.
Officials say an Afghan army helicopter carrying senior officials has crashed, killing all 25 on board.
Naser Mehri, a spokesman for the governor of western Farah province, said two army helicopters were on their way to neighbouring Herat province when one lost control.
Among the dead were the deputy army corps commander for western Afghanistan and head of the Farah provincial council, Mehri said.
Provincial council member Dadullah Qaneh said the helicopter hit a mountain peak in poor weather en route to neighbouring Herat province.
A Taliban spokesperson said fighters belonging to the armed group shot it down.
Senior Afghan government and military officials often travel by helicopter in regions where the Taliban has a large presence.
Ariana Grande is super into Halloween, haunted houses, and escape rooms, so James Corden invited the pop star to a combination of the three.
As an addition to The Late Late Show‘s “Carpool Karaoke” segment with Grande, Corden decided to book a session at 60OUT Escape Rooms in Los Angeles, picking the horror themed room.
It looks downright terrifying, and Grande spends the entire time being understandably beside herself.
“That’s not an escape room, that’s one of the seven gates to hell,” she said.
At least know we know how she injured her hand — running away from whatever the hell that is in the clip.
trendynewsday 