Latest news with #BalticSea
Daily Mail
5 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Daily Mail
Ashley Judd, 57, makes rare move of posing in a swimsuit as she shares inspiring note about being 'unselfconscious'
Ashley Judd was seen in a cute black swimsuit while on the beach in a new Instagram video this week. Her mood was playful as she splashed around, did handstands and backflips. The 57-year-old Hollywood icon also shared an inspiring comment about being 'unselfconscious.' 'WE DON'T CARE CLUB✨ founded by @justbeingmelani - BALTIC SEA EDITION,' she began her caption. ''Cause menopause (peri - post) is human biology. It is universal to females & global. What can be a hope of 'We Don't Care Club?' What will I, with my freedom & mirth, when I let go of caring about stupid, controlling norms about my female body, be free to enJOY? 'Play! Be silly! Have Fun! Feel Boundless Joy! I bask in the unselfconscious being-ness of my True Self. My Inner Child is free to emerge. She feels confidence & glee.' Judd added, 'If you let yourself be free, how would your True Self & Inner Child spend your Carefree Timelessness? How can you let go of what others expect, think, need, want? 'What do YOU feel, need, want, from yourself? Thank you, @justbeingmelani for getting us all started, Introducing, the: 'Make Stuff Up' Club 'MSU' Inner Children have such beautiful, creative imaginations. 'They want to be seen, heard, be safe, & play. 'If as an adult, I am caught up in what others think of me, I ignore, neglect, & abandon my own tender Self. 'Today, that's off the table. Into the Sea for me, to splash & play! Love, Ashley.' Judd was an A-list movie star who worked on blockbuster films with big-name costars for over a decade. She was paired with the best: Al Pacino, Robert De Niro and Matthew McConaughey, to name a few. 'WE DON'T CARE CLUB✨ founded by @justbeingmelani - BALTIC SEA EDITION,' she began her caption Her female costars were just as impressive: Sandra Bullock, Natalie Portman and the inimitable Salma Hayek. Judd even played the biggest pinup Hollywood has ever seen - Marilyn Monroe - in 1996's Norma Jean & Marilyn. For the past decade she has been in supporting roles, though she has had some big hits like The Dog's Way Home in 2019. But since she injured her leg in 2021 in the Republic of the Congo, the bombshell daughter of Naomi Judd has slowed down. She has also been in school: Judd graduated from the University of Kentucky in 2007, earned a Master of Public Administration (MPA) from Harvard's Kennedy School of Government in 2010 and enrolled at UC Berkeley in 2016 to pursue a PhD in Public Policy. But she still posts often on Instagram proving she looks fabulous even in her mid-50s. In April 2024, Judd delivered a poignant speech about suicide prevention as she opened up about the sudden passing of mother Naomi Judd who died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. The star appeared alongside other notable suicide prevention advocates - including singer Aloe Blacc and campaigner Shelby Rowe - at the event at the White House complex in Washington. She opened up about her mother's struggles with mental health, saying that on the day Naomi took her own life 'the disease of mental illness was lying to her and with great terror [had] convinced her that it would never get better.' It comes after Ashley recounted the heartbreaking moment she discovered her mom's body after she took her own life aged 76 on April 30, 2022. Ashley took to the stage in a flowing white summer dress but wrapped a hessian blanket over her legs as she took the microphone in hand. She began: 'I'm here because I am my beloved mother's daughter and on the day she died, which will be the two-year anniversary in one week, the disease of mental illness was lying to her and with great terror convinced her that it would never get better... 'I have a firm belief that we deserve to be remembered not just for how we died but how we lived.' Ashley went on to share details about her mom as she divulged: 'She also lived most of her life with an untreated and undiagnosed mental illness that lied to her and stole from her. 'It stole from our family and she deserved better.' Naomi died from a single gunshot to the head and left a suicide note near her body at at her home in Leiper's Fork, Tennessee. She had battled with 'significant' anxiety, depression and bipolar disorder, according to an autopsy report. Ashley dished on her own experience with depression as she explained: 'I'm also here because I was molested by a man for the first time that I remember when I was seven years old. 'That's when I had onset of childhood depression and I know the feeling of not wanting to be here but I had a different experience because I went to treatment in 2006 for unresolved childhood grief and sexual trauma. 'I've been in good recovery for 18 years and I've had a different outcome than my mother. I carry a message of hope and recovery.' Elsewhere, Ashley discussed the details of her 'chosen family' who she described as being 'so tightly knit and bonded.' She shared how they had 'walked beside her through the entire experience' of losing her mom. The White House held the event on the day the annual National Strategy for Suicide Prevention was released to highlight efforts to tackle the mental health crisis and beat the overdose crisis. In January, Ashley appeared on an episode of CNN 's All There Is with Anderson Cooper to discuss her mother's death. Ashley said: 'It was traumatic and unexpected because it was death by suicide and I found her' but added she was 'so glad' she was there for her mother after her death. 'Even when I walked in that room and I saw that she had harmed herself, the first thing out of my mouth was, "Momma, I see how much you've been suffering and it is okay... I am here, and it is okay to let go."' Meanwhile, in 2022 Ashley Judd talked about her traumatic accident in the Congo in 2021. She could have died. The siren shattered her right leg in four places during a hike through a forest in the Democratic Republic of the Congo in Feb. 2021. Judd told Kate Roberts on her podcast Sex, Body & Soul, Judd said that she barely survived the 55-hour rescue and was in awful pain. 'I don't know how the mind and the body and the soul come together to manage to endure the unendurable,' she said. 'I bit a stick, I screamed, I howled, I convulsed. I never did pass out — I wished that I could.' Judd was lying on the forest floor for five hours before she was rescued by her 'Congolese brothers.'
Forbes
a day ago
- Business
- Forbes
Iran's Strategic Loss Could Become Russia's Energy Gain
TIKHVIN, RUSSIAN FEDERATION: A special lifting crane installs a segment of the North European Gas ... More pipeline (NEGP) near the town of Tikhvin in the Leningrad region, 04 February 2006. Russia plans to finish building the first section of a pipeline to take natural gas direct to Europe across the Baltic Sea floor in June, Ria-novosti news agency reported. Construction under the 4.7-billion euro project, which is managed by Russian energy giant Gazprom, began last year. The pipeline, which is to include two parallel legs measuring 750 miles each, will connect the Baltic seashore near the Russian city of Vyborg with the Greifswald region on the German coast. AFP PHOTO / SERGEY KULIKOV (Photo credit should read SERGEY KULIKOV/AFP via Getty Images) Israel's recent military campaign may have succeeded in striking a body blow to Iran's nuclear ambitions. But the twelve-day war waged by Jerusalem (and assisted by Washington) could end up paying real dividends for another member of the so-called 'axis of authoritarians.'After years of delays, Beijing appears once again to be interested in building a pipeline to transport additional Russian natural gas to China. The revival of the 'Power of Siberia 2'– a proposed 1,600-mile gas route from Russia's Yamal Peninsula into the PRC – is now expected to feature prominently on the agenda during Russian President Vladimir Putin's upcoming state visit to China this renewed interest comes amid fresh concerns about the reliability of energy supplies from the Middle East. There's good reason for officials in Beijing to worry. Natural gas from the region accounts for some 30% of China's imports of liquified natural gas, with Qatar and the United Arab Emirates serving as its principal suppliers. At the same time, China is deeply dependent on Iranian oil; Beijing buys roughly 90% of the crude exported by the Islamic Republic, purchasing it at a rate of nearly 1.4 million barrels daily during the first half of this year. All of which has left the PRC uniquely vulnerable to a cutoff of supplies from the region – and leery that such a disruption could actually remains a real possibility. During the recent conflict, as part of its potential retaliation to Israeli air strikes and American bombardment, the Islamic Republic is said to have contemplated closing the Strait of Hormuz. And while Iran stopped short of interfering with energy transit through the waterway, via which one-fifth of world oil passes, China's leaders appear to have become convinced that it would be prudent to explore potential alternatives."The volatility and unpredictability of the military situation have shown the Chinese leadership that stable land-based pipeline supply has geopolitical benefits," Alexander Gabuev of the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center tells the Wall Street Journal. 'Russia could benefit from that.'Indeed it could. If revived, the "Power of Siberia 2" would be nothing short of a boon for Moscow, which has grappled with the loss of Europe as an energy market ever since the start of its war on Ukraine some three-and-a-half years ago. An additional pipeline could serve as a significant input to Russia's ailing economy, even as it expands China's current dependence on Russian energy still further. (The original 'Power of Siberia' pipeline, stretching more than 1,800 miles from eastern Siberia to northeast China via Russia's Amur region, was inaugurated back in 2019 and now provides nearly a tenth of the PRC's natural gas. China also buys about one-fifth of its oil from Russia.)Strategically, meanwhile, it would help strengthen Moscow's ties to Beijing – and do so at precisely the time that the United States needs to disrupt the 'no limits' partnership that has developed between the two significant impediments remain. Moscow and Beijing have disagreed in the past about ownership of the project, as well as pricing for the gas it would transport. And experts estimate that construction on the 'Power of Siberia 2,' if it does materialize, would take five years or even means the energy route can't be a quick fix for Russia's current, dire economic condition. But if it ends up becoming a reality, the 'Power of Siberia 2' would serve as another link binding the authoritarians in Moscow and Beijing together – and yet another complication that the West will need to contend with.
Bloomberg
a day ago
- Business
- Bloomberg
Russia's Ust-Luga Port Orders Vessel Checks After Mystery Blasts
Ust-Luga, Russia's largest port in the Baltic Sea, is insisting that ships' hulls are inspected before the vessels are allowed to enter the facility, a sign of how a string of mystery blasts involving tankers that went to Russia are affecting the nation's commodity trade. The decision to start vetting vessels' below-surface parts was taken earlier this month, according to people familiar with the matter who asked not to be identified because the matter isn't public. Ust-Luga is also insisting that arriving vessels must have Russian protection and indemnity insurance cover against risks including spills and collisions.
New York Times
a day ago
- Business
- New York Times
Canadian Company Claims to Find Large Oil Reserves in Poland
The fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 raised hopes for oil and gas exploration by Western companies in the former Soviet bloc in Europe, but a burst of drilling activity by companies like Chevron and Exxon Mobil in the 2010s produced mostly disappointment. Now, explorers from a small Canadian company say they have found in Poland what could be the largest petroleum discovery in Northern Europe in more than a decade in the shallow waters of the Baltic Sea near the border with Germany. The oil company, Central European Petroleum, said in a news release that recent drilling at a well near Swinoujscie, in northwest Poland, has revealed an estimated 200 million barrels of 'recoverable' oil and natural gas. If confirmed, this trove would be welcome in Poland, which consumes 740,000 barrels a day of oil. Like most European Union members, Poland relies mostly on imports. But the prospect of a new oil development on the Baltic coast has already led to environmental concerns in neighboring Germany. The chief executive of Central European Petroleum, Rolf G. Skaar, said in an interview that the field might eventually produce up to 40,000 barrels of oil a day. 'It's quite a surprise for this to come in offshore Poland,' said Lewis Lawrence, an analyst at Wood Mackenzie, an energy consulting firm. 'It's not an area where there has been that much offshore activity.' Mr. Lawrence said that the find, known as Wolin East, would be the largest in northern Europe since 2013 if it proves out and could strengthen what had been weak interest in exploration in Europe, especially in the Baltic. The European Union has seen a steady decline in oil production in recent decades, partly because of objections to drilling on environmental concerns. The Polish discovery was the result of around two decades of exploration, including digging into geological records from the Soviet era, Mr. Skaar said. He said that Alula Damte and Peter Putnam, the president and chairman of the company, went to 'old libraries, both in old East Germany and in Poland, scouring for data.' The company also drilled several wells in Germany, before figuring that there were likely to be larger hauls across the border in Poland. 'We've also been able to get hold of data on both sides of the border, which means we see the bigger picture,' he said. The company is backed by money from family offices in Norway and Canada as well as other private investors, said Mr. Skaar, an oil industry veteran. Other investors, though, would probably be brought in to aid in developing the discovery. Mr. Lawrence of Wood Mackenzie estimated that the development costs would be around $1 billion. The field should be relatively easy to bring online because it is in shallow water about 30 feet deep. It is also only roughly four miles from Swinoujscie, a port that could be used as a base for construction. Swinoujscie already has a liquid natural gas receiving terminal built by Poland to help break its energy dependence on Russia. Mr. Skaar said that one approach being considered would involve building an artificial island at the site. The discovery provoked dismay in Germany, where authorities and locals on the island of Usedom, home to a popular seaside resort, expressed concern that an oil platform visible from the beach would keep tourists away, depriving the region of a crucial source of income. 'The project represents a backward-looking industrial policy in terms of climate policy, which runs counter to environmental and tourism interests on the German side,' said Till Backhaus, the minister for the environment of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, the state with jurisdiction over the island.
Irish Times
a day ago
- Politics
- Irish Times
What is behind the suspicious and bizarre behavior of Russian ships around Ireland?
Earlier this month, a tanker laden with thousands of tonnes of crude oil, which had set off from a Russian port on the Baltic Sea, sailed down the west coast of Ireland. The decision by the Sierra, a 250-metre tanker which was destined for India, to sail around the British Isles and into the North Atlantic, rather than take the more direct route through the English Channel, has caused confusion and concern among maritime and naval experts. The tanker, which passed by the west coast of Ireland on July 10th, was just one of the rising number of sanctioned Russian ships, known as shadow fleet vessels, to sail through Irish-controlled waters in recent months. The suspicious and bizarre behaviour of these vessels has prompted the Irish Defence Forces and Government to step up maritime monitoring because of environmental and national security concerns. READ MORE What is this Russian shadow fleet and why are some of their vessels taking the longer route around the Irish coast and sailing outside recognised shipping lanes? And what are the security and environmental risks posed by these ships? Today, on In The News, why is a Russian 'shadow fleet' sailing around Ireland? Irish Times crime and security correspondent Conor Gallagher discusses the dramatic increase in the number of sanctioned Russian ships sailing through Irish-controlled waters. Presented by Sorcha Pollak. Produced by Suzanne Brennan and Andrew McNair.
