The N.F.L. espoused racial unity and praised health care workers. But its inaction on racial diversity, its stereotypic imagery and its decision to host a potential superspreader event said something different.
— NYT: Top Stories
Author: Michelle Dryden
- Phase III study ARANOTE to be initiated in metastatic hormone-sensitive prostate cancer (mHSPC) assessing the androgen receptor inhibitor (ARi) in combination with standard androgen deprivation therapy (ADT)
- Start of patient enrollment expected by the end of Q1 2021
- Study adds to the robust development program for NUBEQA, exploring an opportunity to help even more patients with prostate cancer
WHIPPANY, N.J. — (BUSINESS WIRE) — Bayer and Orion Corporation are expanding the global clinical development program for the oral androgen receptor inhibitor (ARi) NUBEQA® (darolutamide) in prostate cancer. A new Phase III study ARANOTE will investigate NUBEQA in addition to androgen deprivation therapy (ADT) versus placebo plus ADT in men with metastatic hormone-sensitive prostate cancer (mHSPC). The study builds on the robust development program comprising multiple studies, including the Phase III study ARASENS, which investigates NUBEQA combined with ADT and docetaxel compared to docetaxel and ADT alone in men with mHSPC.
“NUBEQA has already shown in men with non-metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer (nmCRPC) that it extends metastasis-free and overall survival,” said Scott Z. Fields, M.D., Senior Vice President and Head of Oncology Development at Bayer’s Pharmaceutical Division. “Given the encouraging results that we have seen with NUBEQA so far, it is important that we also evaluate the potential of NUBEQA in other stages of prostate cancer that may offer men with mHSPC a new treatment option.”
In 2019, NUBEQA was approved in the U.S. for the treatment of patients with nmCRPC. The ARAMIS study demonstrated proven efficacy and tolerability, including significant improvement in metastasis-free survival (MFS). NUBEQA plus ADT showed the same low rate of permanent discontinuation due to adverse reactions compared to ADT alone (9% versus 9%). The most frequent adverse reactions requiring discontinuation in patients who received NUBEQA included cardiac failure (0.4%), and death (0.4%). Adverse reactions occurring more frequently in the NUBEQA arm (≥2% over placebo) were fatigue (16% versus 11%), pain in extremity (6% versus 3%) and rash (3% versus 1%). NUBEQA was not studied in women and there is a warning and precaution for embryo-fetal toxicity.1
About the ARANOTE Trial
The ARANOTE trial will be a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled Phase III study of NUBEQA in addition to androgen deprivation therapy (ADT) versus placebo plus ADT in men with metastatic hormone-sensitive prostate cancer (mHSPC). The primary endpoint of this study is radiological progression-free survival (rPFS), as measured as the time from the date of randomization to the date of first documentation of radiological progressive disease or death due to any cause, whichever occurs first. The trial is expected to enroll about 555 men, with the first patients enrolled by the end of Q1 2021.
Data from the Phase III ARAMIS Trial
Previously published in The New England Journal of Medicine, results in 1,509 patients from the Phase III ARAMIS trial demonstrated a highly significant improvement in the primary efficacy endpoint of metastasis-free survival (MFS), with a median of 40.4 months (n=955) with NUBEQA plus androgen deprivation therapy (ADT), more than double the 18.4 months (n=554) for placebo plus ADT (p<0.001). MFS is defined as the time from randomization to the time of first evidence of blinded independent central review (BICR)-confirmed distant metastasis or death from any cause within 33 weeks after the last evaluable scan, whichever occurred first.1
Additionally, NUBEQA plus ADT showed a statistically significant improvement in the secondary endpoint of overall survival (OS) compared to placebo plus ADT, with a 31% reduction in risk of death (HR=0.69, 95% CI 0.53-0.88; p=0.003). OS was statistically significant despite 31% (n=170) of patients in the ADT arm crossing over to NUBEQA. In total, 55% (n=307) of patients in the ADT arm crossed over to NUBEQA or received another life-prolonging therapy prior to this analysis.1
Dose interruptions due to an adverse reaction occurred in 13% of patients treated with NUBEQA. The most frequent adverse reactions requiring dosage interruption in patients who received NUBEQA included hypertension (0.6%), diarrhea (0.5%), and pneumonia (0.5%). Dose reductions due to an adverse reaction occurred in 6% of patients treated with NUBEQA. The most frequent adverse reactions requiring dosage reduction in patients treated with NUBEQA included fatigue (0.7%), hypertension (0.3%), and nausea (0.3 %).1
About NUBEQA® (darolutamide)1
NUBEQA is an androgen receptor inhibitor (ARi) with a distinct chemical structure that competitively inhibits androgen binding, AR nuclear translocation, and AR-mediated transcription.1 A Phase III study in metastatic hormone-sensitive prostate cancer (ARASENS) is ongoing. Information about this trial can be found at www.clinicaltrials.gov.
Developed jointly by Bayer and Orion Corporation, a globally operating Finnish pharmaceutical company, NUBEQA is indicated for the treatment of men with nmCRPC.1 The approvals of NUBEQA in the U.S., European Union (EU), and other global markets have been based on the pivotal Phase III ARAMIS trial data evaluating the efficacy and safety of NUBEQA plus androgen deprivation therapy (ADT) compared to ADT alone.1 Filings in other regions are underway or planned.
INDICATION FOR NUBEQA (darolutamide)
NUBEQA® (darolutamide) is an androgen receptor inhibitor indicated for the treatment of patients with non-metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer.
IMPORTANT SAFETY INFORMATION FOR NUBEQA (darolutamide)
Embryo-Fetal Toxicity: Safety and efficacy of NUBEQA have not been established in females. NUBEQA can cause fetal harm and loss of pregnancy. Advise males with female partners of reproductive potential to use effective contraception during treatment with NUBEQA and for 1 week after the last dose.
Adverse Reactions
Serious adverse reactions occurred in 25% of patients receiving NUBEQA and in 20% of patients receiving placebo. Serious adverse reactions in ≥1 % of patients who received NUBEQA were urinary retention, pneumonia, and hematuria. Overall, 3.9% of patients receiving NUBEQA and 3.2% of patients receiving placebo died from adverse reactions, which included death (0.4%), cardiac failure (0.3%), cardiac arrest (0.2%), general physical health deterioration (0.2%), and pulmonary embolism (0.2%) for NUBEQA.
Adverse reactions occurring more frequently in the NUBEQA arm (≥2% over placebo) were fatigue (16% vs 11%), pain in extremity (6% vs 3%) and rash (3% vs 1%).
Clinically significant adverse reactions occurring in ≥2% of patients treated with NUBEQA included ischemic heart disease (4.0% vs 3.4% on placebo) and heart failure (2.1% vs 0.9% on placebo).
Drug Interactions
Effect of Other Drugs on NUBEQA – Combined P-gp and strong or moderate CYP3A4 inducers decrease NUBEQA exposure, which may decrease NUBEQA activity. Avoid concomitant use.
Combined P-gp and strong CYP3A4 inhibitors increase NUBEQA exposure, which may increase the risk of NUBEQA adverse reactions. Monitor more frequently and modify NUBEQA dose as needed.
Effects of NUBEQA on Other Drugs – NUBEQA inhibits breast cancer resistance protein (BCRP) transporter. Concomitant use increases exposure (AUC) and maximal concentration of BCRP substrates, which may increase the risk of BCRP substrate-related toxicities. Avoid concomitant use where possible. If used together, monitor more frequently for adverse reactions, and consider dose reduction of the BCRP substrate.
NUBEQA inhibits OATP1B1 and OATP1B3 transporters. Concomitant use may increase plasma concentrations of OATP1B1 or OATP1B3 substrates. Monitor more frequently for adverse reactions and consider dose reduction of these substrates.
Review the prescribing information of drugs that are BCRP, OATP1B1, and OATP1B3 substrates when used concomitantly with NUBEQA.
For important risk and use information about NUBEQA, please see the accompanying full Prescribing Information.
About Metastatic Hormone-Sensitive Prostate Cancer
Prostate cancer is the second most commonly diagnosed malignancy in men worldwide. In 2018, an estimated 1.2 million men were diagnosed with prostate cancer, and about 358,000 died from the disease worldwide.2
At the time of diagnosis, most men have localized prostate cancer, meaning their cancer is confined to the prostate gland and can be treated with curative surgery or radiotherapy.3,4 Upon relapse when the disease will metastasize or spread, androgen deprivation therapy (ADT) is the cornerstone of treatment for this hormone-sensitive disease. Approximately five percent of men will already suffer from prostate cancer with distant metastases when first diagnosed. Men with metastatic hormone-sensitive prostate cancer (mHSPC) will start their treatment with hormone therapy, such as ADT, androgen receptor inhibitor (ARi) plus ADT or a combination of the chemotherapy docetaxel and ADT. Despite this first-line treatment, most men with mHSPC will eventually progress to metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer (mCRPC), which can impact survival.5,6
About Oncology at Bayer
Bayer is committed to delivering science for a better life by advancing a portfolio of innovative treatments. The oncology franchise at Bayer now expands to six marketed products and several other assets in various stages of clinical development. Together, these products reflect the company’s approach to research, which prioritizes targets and pathways with the potential to impact the way that cancer is treated.
About Bayer
Bayer is a global enterprise with core competencies in the life science fields of health care and nutrition. Its products and services are designed to benefit people by supporting efforts to overcome the major challenges presented by a growing and aging global population. At the same time, the Group aims to increase its earning power and create value through innovation and growth. Bayer is committed to the principles of sustainable development, and the Bayer brand stands for trust, reliability and quality throughout the world. In fiscal 2019, the Group employed around 104,000 people and had sales of 43.5 billion euros. Capital expenditures amounted to 2.9 billion euros, R&D expenses to 5.3 billion euros. For more information, go to www.bayer.us.
© 2021 Bayer
BAYER, the Bayer Cross and NUBEQA are registered trademarks of Bayer.
Forward-Looking Statements
This release may contain forward-looking statements based on current assumptions and forecasts made by Bayer management. Various known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors could lead to material differences between the actual future results, financial situation, development or performance of the company and the estimates given here. These factors include those discussed in Bayer’s public reports which are available on the Bayer website at www.bayer.com. The company assumes no liability whatsoever to update these forward-looking statements or to conform them to future events or developments.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________
References
- NUBEQA® (darolutamide) tablets [Prescribing Information]. Whippany, NJ: Bayer HealthCare Pharmaceuticals, January 2021.
- GLOBOCAN 2018: Estimated Cancer Incidence, Mortality and Prevalence Worldwide in 2018. CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.3322/caac.21492. Accessed February 2021.
- Cancer.Net 2020: Prostate Cancer Statistics. https://www.cancer.net/cancer-types/prostate-cancer/statistics. Accessed February 2021.
- American Cancer Society: Hormone Therapy for Prostate Cancer. https://www.cancer.org/cancer/prostate-cancer/treating/hormone-therapy.html. Accessed February 2021.
- Siegel DA, O’Neil ME, Richards TB, Dowling NF, Weir HK. Prostate Cancer Incidence and Survival, by Stage and Race/Ethnicity — United States, 2001–2017. MMWR Morb Mortal Wkly Rep 2020;69:1473–1480. http://dx.doi.org/10.15585/mmwr.mm6941a1.
- Ng, K., Smith, S., Shamash, J. Metastatic Hormone-Sensitive Prostate Cancer (mHSPC): Advances and Treatment Strategies in the First-Line Setting. Oncol Ther 8, 209–230 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40487-020-00119-z.
PP-NUB-US-0940-1
Contacts
Rose Talarico, Tel. +1 862.404.5302
E-Mail: rose.talarico@bayer.com
FILE – This Aug. 28, 2020, file photo shows the federal prison complex in Terre Haute, Ind. Biden, the first sitting U.S. president to openly oppose the death penalty, has discussed the possibility of instructing the Department of Justice to stop scheduling new executions, officials said. Action to stop scheduling new executions could take immediate pressure off Biden from opponents of the death penalty. But they want him to go further, from bulldozing the federal death chamber in Terre Haute, Ind., to striking the death penalty from U.S. statutes. (AP Photo/Michael Conroy, File)
CHICAGO (AP) — Joe Biden, the first sitting U.S. president to openly oppose the death penalty, has discussed the possibility of instructing the Department of Justice to stop scheduling new executions, officials have told The Associated Press.
If he does, that would end an extraordinary run of executions by the federal government, all during a pandemic that raged inside prison walls and infected journalists, federal employees and even those put to death.
The officials had knowledge of the private discussions with Biden but were not authorized to speak publicly about them.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki, when asked Friday about Biden’s plans on the death penalty, said she had nothing to preview on the issue.
Action to stop scheduling new executions could take immediate pressure off Biden from opponents of the death penalty. But they want him to go much further, from bulldozing the federal death chamber in Terre Haute, Indiana, to striking the death penalty from U.S. statutes entirely.
A look at the steps Biden could take and the challenges he would face:
Q: WHY THE PUSH FOR ACTION NOW?
A: While the coronavirus pandemic and election coverage dominated the news last year, many Americans who paid close attention to the resumption of federal executions under President Donald Trump were dismayed by their scale and the apparent haste to carry them out.
The executions, beginning July 14 and ending four days before Biden’s inauguration on Jan. 20, were the first federal executions in 17 years. More were held in the last six months under Trump than in the previous 56 years combined.
Executions went ahead for inmates whose lawyers claimed were too mentally ill or intellectually disabled to fully grasp why they were being put to death.
Lawyers for Lisa Montgomery, convicted of killing a pregnant Missouri woman and cutting out her baby, said her mental illness was partly triggered by years of horrific sexual abuse as a child. On Jan. 13, she became the first woman executed federally in nearly 70 years.
Q: WOULD A DECISION TO STOP SCHEDULING EXECUTIONS END THE PRACTICE?
A: Biden can guarantee no federal executions during his presidency by simply telling the Justice Department never to schedule any. But that would not prevent a future president who supports capital punishment from restarting them.
Barack Obama, for whom Biden served as vice president, did place an informal moratorium on carrying federal executions out when he was president, ordering a review of execution methods in 2014 after a botched state execution in Oklahoma.
But Obama never took any steps toward ending federal executions for good. That left the door open for Trump to resume them. Death penalty critics want Biden to slam shut that door.
Q: WHAT ARE BIDEN’S RANGE OF OPTIONS?
A: The surest way to prevent a future president from again restarting executions is to sign a bill abolishing the federal death penalty. That would require Congress to pass such a bill.
Thirty-seven members of Congress urged Biden in a Jan. 22 letter to support the Federal Death Penalty Prohibition Act, sponsored by Rep. Ayanna Pressley, D-Mass., and Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill.
But Biden would have to persuade Republicans. In the 22 states that have struck the death penalty from their statutes, none succeeded in passing the required laws without bipartisan support.
Biden could draw immediately on his presidential powers and do what Obama did not: commute the death sentences of 50-some inmates still on death row in Terre Haute to life in prison. None of the death sentences could ever be restored.
Commutations in themselves would not stop prosecutors from seeking death sentences in new cases. That would require an instruction to Biden’s Justice Department to never to authorize prosecutors to seek them.
Death Penalty Action has called on Biden to order the razing of the Terre Haute death-chamber building. Demolishing the bleak, windowless facility, argued Abe Bonowitz, director of the Ohio-based group, would symbolize Biden’s commitment to stopping federal executions for good.
Q: DID THE TRUMP EXECUTIONS REENERGIZE DEATH PENALTY OPPONENTS?
A: The breakneck pace and the government’s relentless push in the courts to get them done did galvanize opponents — and also attracted new adherents to their cause, said Robert Dunham, director of the Death Penalty Information Center.
“Trump demonstrated more graphically than at any other time what the abuse of capital punishment would look like,” he said. “It has created a political opportunity, which is why death penalty opponents want the president to strike while the iron is hot.”
Death Penalty Action, which organized protests outside the U.S. penitentiary in Terre Haute during the executions, saw numbers of those donating, signing petitions or requesting information soar from 20,000 to 600,000 over the past six months.
Bonowitz said interest spiked after reality TV star Kim Kardashian pleaded on Twitter for Trump to commute Brandon Bernard’s death sentence to life. Bernard was executed anyway on Dec. 10.
Q: WILL BIDEN GET PUSHBACK IF HE SEEKS TO END THE FEDERAL DEATH PENALTY?
A: Yes, and not just from death penalty proponents in the Republican Party. It could also come from some members of his own party who will see bids to abolish capital punishment as a losing issue politically.
Clearing death row would also mean sparing the lives of killers such as Dylann Roof, the white supremacist who in 2015 shot dead nine Black members of a South Carolina church during a Bible study. Biden would be placed in the uncomfortable position of having to explain to victims’ families why Roof and others killers should not die.
While support for the death penalty overall has plummeted to just over 50% in recent years, many Americans may not want to preclude the possibility of a death sentence in terrorism cases such as the Boston Marathon bombing. Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was convicted in that attack, which killed three people and injured hundreds.
The Supreme Court is currently considering an appeal from the Trump administration that sought to reverse a ruling by a lower court tossing Tsarnaev’s death sentence. The Biden administration may have to decide soon whether to continue that appeal or tell the high court the government now accepts the lower court’s decision.
Q: ARE THERE CLUES ABOUT WHAT BIDEN MIGHT DO?
A: Biden hasn’t spoken at any length about the death penalty since becoming president. And he didn’t make the death penalty a prominent feature of his presidential campaign.
On a campaign webpage on criminal justice reform, Biden did pledge “to pass legislation to eliminate the death penalty at the federal level, and incentivize states to follow the federal government’s example.” He offered no specifics.
Biden may also feel an obligation to do something big on the death penalty, given his past support for it. He played a central role as a senator in the passage of a 1994 crime bill that greatly expanded the number of federal crimes for which someone can be put to death. Several inmates executed under Trump were convicted and sentenced under provisions in that bill.
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Associated Press writer Michael Balsamo in Washington contributed to this report.
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Follow Michael Tarm on Twitter at http://twitter.com/mtarm
— Associated Press
FILE – In this Jan. 6, 2021, file photo, President Donald Trump arrives to speak at a rally in Washington. Arguments begin Tuesday, Feb. 9, in the impeachment trial of Donald Trump on allegations that he incited the violent mob that stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin, File)
WASHINGTON (AP) — This matters.
The outcome may seem preordained in the unprecedented second impeachment trial of Donald Trump.
Democrats prosecuting the former president for inciting a deadly insurrection at the U.S. Capitol will struggle to persuade at least 17 Republicans to convict Trump and bar him from office. Forty-five of the 50 Republican senators backed a bid last month to dismiss the trial, essentially telegraphing how the final vote will play out.
But the trial set to begin Tuesday is ultimately a test of whether a president, holding an office that many of the nation’s founders feared could become too powerful in the wrong hands, is above the law. Senators will be forced to sit still, listen to evidence and wrestle with elemental questions about American democracy. There will be visual, visceral evidence, and the American people will also be sitting in their own form of judgment as they watch.
The verdict and the process itself will be scrutinized for generations.
“For historians, what that trial does is to provide additional evidence and documentation under oath,” said Carol Anderson, a professor of African American studies at Emory University. “It also gives us a sense of the strength, or the weakness, in American democracy as the senators are confronted with this evidence.”
That record is certain to be grisly, a reminder on a human level of the horror at the Capitol on Jan. 6.
Senators will review Trump’s call that morning to “fight like hell” before the mob of loyalists showed up to Capitol Hill to do just that. Senators will be reminded of the rioters’ chants calling for then-Vice President Mike Pence’s hanging. House prosecutors could resurface the image of a police officer crushed between doors, blood trickling from his mouth, as the violent crowd moved in. There might be additional evidence of how another officer, Brian Sicknick, died defending the building.
If that’s not enough, senators will be reminded of their own vulnerability as they fled the mob entering their chamber — one of the most rarefied spaces in Washington — in fear of their lives.
And then they’ll have to decide whether there should be consequences. But the potential of an acquittal doesn’t mean the trial should be abandoned before it begins, said Rep. Val Demings, who was an impeachment manager in Trump’s first trial.
“The jury not convicting is always a possibility,” the Florida Democrat said, recalling her previous career as the chief of the Orlando Police Department. “But decisions are never made solely on that.”
Nearly two-thirds of Americans believe Trump bears at least a moderate amount of responsibility for the riot, according to a poll released last week by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. That includes half who say Trump bears a great deal or quite a bit of responsibility.
Most Republicans absolve him of guilt, but about 3 in 10 think he bears at least a measure of blame for the events.
Of course, Congress has more on its plate than another fight over the previous president. In the early days of his administration, President Joe Biden is pushing a $1.9 trillion package to confront the coronavirus pandemic. He’s also pressing lawmakers on immigration, health care and climate change.
Lee Hamilton, a former Democratic congressman from Indiana who served during President Bill Clinton’s impeachment, said a trial could be a “distraction” from larger priorities. He suggested censure could be a better use of time and that the historical record could be achieved through the creation of a commission like the one he helped lead to investigate the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
But, he said, that only works if Congress is united on the need for a thorough investigation of what happened during the insurrection and provides the resources to back it up.
“If you’re going to do it, do it right,” Hamilton said.
As much as the trial is about history, the implications are just as powerful in the present moment. Leaders in capitals across the world are watching what happens in Washington to assess whether the U.S. remains committed to democratic principles. Steadfast American allies, including Germany and the United Kingdom, expressed shock at the insurrection.
U.S. foes seized on the violence to say that the United States could not now lecture others on the sanctity of democracy.
“American democracy is obviously limping on both feet,” Konstantin Kosachev, head of the foreign affairs committee in Russia’s upper house of parliament, said after the riot. “America no longer charts a course and therefore has lost all rights to set it — and even more so to impose it on others.”
It’s telling that Republicans aren’t going into the trial with a robust defense of Trump. Few are publicly defending his behavior in the runup to the insurrection, whether it’s his baseless insistence that the election was “stolen” or his more specific — and troubling — calls to supporters to rally on his behalf.
Instead, the GOP is narrowly focused on a more technical constitutional issue, arguing that a president can’t face an impeachment trial once out of office, a path they believe is easier to defend than trying to rationalize Trump’s actions.
Anticipating that posture, Democrats filed a pretrial brief noting there’s no “January exception” in the Constitution.
“Presidents do not get a free pass to commit high crimes and misdemeanors near the end of their term,” the House impeachment managers wrote.
The trial comes as the GOP is struggling with its future.
Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican leader, has flirted with the possibility of purging Trump from the party. If Trump is convicted, the Senate could vote to bar him from seeking office again, a notable punishment for someone who has dangled the potential of a 2024 presidential run to keep bending the party to his will.
McConnell hasn’t yet said how he’ll vote, and, so far, only a few moderate Republicans seem certain to convict. They’re running into the reality that Trump’s supporters remain a dominant force in the party.
The trial “really will only reinforce what we already know about American politics,” said Brendan Buck, a top adviser to former House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis. ”And in that, I mean we are so tribal and divided that there’s really no question where people will fall down on something that should generate thoughtful discourse and reflection about a fundamental democratic principle.”
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EDITOR’S NOTE — Political Editor Steven Sloan has covered politics for The Associated Press since 2018. Follow him at http://twitter.com/stevenpsloan
— Associated Press
She’s the latest descendant in a lineage of Republican women who embrace a boffo radicalism.
— NYT: Top Stories
He was an Olympic champion with few pro fights under his belt when he surprised the world by beating the champ in 1978. Things did not go smoothly after that.
— NYT: Top Stories
Greek Olympic sailing champion Sofia Bekatorou poses for a photograph during an interview for the Associated Press, at Agios Kosmas marina in southern Athens, Thursday, Feb. 4, 2021. Bekatorou is the most successful female athlete in Greek sporting history who recently revealed that she was the victim of a sexual assault, allegedly by a senior sports official in 1998. In an interview with The Associated Press, Bekatorou said she was glad those revelations are having an impact in a country long accustomed to cronyism and senior-level impunity. (AP Photo/Thanassis Stavrakis)
ATHENS, Greece (AP) — Before she could join sailing classes near her home in Athens, Sofia Bekatorou had to show an instructor she could tie a basic knot properly. Passing the test at age 8 changed her life.
Bekatorou spent her first afternoons in a bathtub-sized sailboat stuck in circles, but coaches took note of the girl’s determination. By her 12th birthday, she was outperforming the boys in competitive races and on a path to winning gold medals as a world champion and at the Olympics.
But the most successful woman in modern Greece’s sporting history revealed in January that an incident almost 23 years ago had marred much of her personal happiness and professional career — an alleged sexual assault by a Greek sailing federation official at a hotel in Palma de Mallorca, Spain.
Her disclosure was made at a little-advertised online sports seminar, but it gained national attention and elicited statements of support for Bekatorou from the country’s prime minister and first female president. It was followed by dozens of public claims of sexual misconduct and workplace intimidation in the worlds of elite sports, the performing arts, and academia.
Bekatarou, 43, said she hoped the reaction marked a turning point for Greek society, which often seems resigned to official cronyism and impunity.
“I’m very happy that they came forward and spoke out,” she said in an interview with The Associated Press,. “We need to embrace people who have lived through such experiences, because it’s a very big step, even talking about it.”
Bekatorou won a gold medal in the women’s double-handed dinghy event with teammate Emilia Tsoulfa at the 2004 Summer Olympics, which was held in Athens.
Greeks caught televised glimpses of the many successes that followed: the keelboat race that returned her to an Olympics podium four years later in Beijing, and opening the parade of nations for the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Summer Games as the first female flag-bearer ever to lead the Greek Olympic team.
Bekatorou dedicated the honor at Maracana Stadium to her older sister, Varia, who had died of brain cancer four months earlier. Her long run in top-tier competition included a battle with a career-threatening back injury and, as she recently revealed, years of therapy. Reserved and soft-spoken, Bekatorou says the sailing federation official sexually assaulted her in 1998, on the day she celebrated qualifying for the Sydney Olympics. Neither she nor prosecuting authorities have publicly identified the accused official, who has denied the allegations.
Along with her Olympic medals, Bekatorou brought home four World Championship titles and a shelfful of national and European trophies. She was twice named World Sailor of the Year. In recognition of her accomplishments, she was given the rank of major in the Greek army.
But she alleges that the the official who assaulted her also undermined her position on the national sailing team over nearly 20 years, arguing that priority should be given to younger competitors.
“It’s a very big weight that we carry in our personal life. And these are things that can actually put you in a deep depression for a very long time,” Bekatorou said. “And unless you have the (right) help and environment, it’s not easy to overcome it and move on.”
The accused official was fired last month from senior posts at the Hellenic Sailing Federation and the Hellenic Olympic Committee. He called Bekatorou’s allegations “defamatory and deceitful.”
The alleged assault has exceeded a 15-year statute of limitations, but a public prosecutor has agreed to examine the case for other possible victims.
Greek Justice Minister Kostas Tsiaras said the government planned to make legal changes to make it easier for sexual assault victims to report crimes.
Bekatorou said the impact of her revelations had taken her by surprise.
She smiled when asked about future plans and the test given to her when first learning to sail. Demonstrating her knowledge, and the skill she picked up as an 8-year-old, she looped a piece of microphone cable into a bowline knot.
“I’ll have to sail on bigger boats that are less physically demanding, but I don’t really like the idea of being called a former competitor.”
She is happy, she said, to be associated with the #MeToo movement that followed the allegations of past sexual misconduct that exploded in 2017 and the subsequent conviction of Hollywood film producer Harvey Weinstein.
When the allegations emerged in the entertainment industry, “I was feeling, you know, something really strong coming from inside, but I wasn’t ready to deal with it. And I didn’t want just to talk about it. I wanted to change something,” Bekatorou said.
“And I knew that in order to change something, I had to be ready, whether someone would follow me or no one would….Now, I’m ready.”
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Follow Gatopoulos at https://twitter.com/dgatopoulos and Tongas at https://twitter.com/theodoratongas
— Associated Press
Guy Warein, a 70-year-old retiree, works on model trains in his home in Richebourg, northern France, Wednesday, Jan 27, 2021. The old-school pastimes of making scale models and playing with miniature trains are making a comeback as a form of therapy against the pandemic blues. Sales are booming as locked-down families glue and paint models and dust off train sets. (AP Photo/Michel Spingler)
PARIS (AP) — He hunches at the dining room table, putting the finishing touches on his miniature World War II tank. Deep in concentration, he keeps his hand steady as he works to make the scaled-down plastic model look as realistic as possible.
And as he does so, Maxime Fannoy — locked-down husband and father riding out the coronavirus with his family in Belgium — feels the outside world’s unremitting pandemic nightmare slip thankfully out of focus.
“It’s an escape. When you are building a kit or a scene, you really plunge into it,” Fannoy says. “Everything else loses its importance, and in the current context, that is a real help.”
Rejuvenated by quarantines and lockdowns, the old-school pastime of creating miniature worlds by assembling and decorating scaled-down models or running mini trains on mini tracks is enjoying a revival — plastic therapy against the pandemic blues.
Sales are booming as families shorn of their social lives keep idle hands and minds busy by making models and dusting off train sets. British brand Airfix saw a run on plastic kits for Spitfires, the iconic World War II fighter plane. Hornby, which owns Airfix and also makes an array of model trains and cars under other brands, has become profitable again with sales soaring.
The analog pleasures of gluing and painting, fixing and fiddling, are also peeling some members of the digital generation away from their screens. Teens are catching the modeling bug from parents and grandparents who suddenly find themselves with time again to indulge in hobbies many had been too busy to pursue since childhood.
In France, 70-year-old retiree Guy Warein says his lockdown-time renovations on a model train set that had been gathering dust in his attic have helped him connect with his video-gaming grandkids, pulling them “from the virtual world to reality.”
On a visit when school was out, the eldest, aged 16, said: “‘Come on Grandpa, let’s go and see the trains and make them work.’ So we put them together and did things together,” Warein says. “It’s a coming together of generations, and that can only be beneficial.”
So he repaired the HO-scale locomotives and rolling stock inherited from his father-in-law and fixed up the room where he intends to run them on a U-shaped track layout that he’s designing. The activity helped Warein, a former educator and municipal councilor, tune out the pandemic and its anxieties.
“You fill your time and forget what’s happening around you,” he says. “Turning on the radio or the television is like being hit with a truncheon, because they systematically talk about the virus and the misfortunes it has brought. … Having a hobby allows me to think of other things.”
Manufacturers have struggled to meet the global surge in interest. Hornby’s CEO, Lyndon Davies, says he had to airfreight 10,000 Spitfire kits from a factory in India when Airfix’s stocks ran dry for the first time in the company’s 71-year history.
“What you don’t want of your kids, your grandchildren, is them sitting watching the TV or staring at phones all the time. This pandemic has really brought families together at home,” he says. “They have used the types of products we make to try and forget what was going on in the outside world.”
Another British manufacturer, Peco, has hired extra staff to satisfy surging orders — up by 50% in some markets — for its miniature trains, tracks and modeling accessories.
“This is happening everywhere: Our markets in the UK, across Europe, in Australia, North America, in China,” says Steve Haynes, the sales manager. “People are making far greater use of their spare time, their free time, their enforced time stuck at home to tackle the boredom, to tackle the isolation and do something creative.”
In Belgium, Fannoy calls himself a “model-maker made from lockdown.” He had long bought plastic kits, because they reminded him of childhood, but had never had time to build them. Instead, he hoarded them away in a wardrobe.
When the pandemic shut down his busy life and forced him to do his job as a business developer from home, he set to work on his stash, stocking up on brushes and paints in the final days before lockdown.
He first completed a series of 1/24th-scale rally cars. A WWII Tiger tank, painted to look weathered and mounted in a wintry scene with troops and a jeep, followed at the end of 2020. He posted photos of the diorama, the fruit of 50 hours of handiwork, on Facebook.
“I generally start in the evenings at around 8 p.m. and stop around 11 p.m. to midnight,” Fannoy says. “I can no longer do the things I would normally do. So what do I do? I open a kit and work on it. In fact, it’s my wife who comes and pulls me out of this mini-world I live in.”
“The hours fly by. It’s a form of meditation,” he says. “It has helped enormously in getting me through the past year.”
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Follow AP coverage of the coronavirus pandemic at https://apnews.com/hub/coronavirus-pandemic and https://apnews.com/UnderstandingtheOutbreak
— Associated Press
In this Feb. 2, 2021, photo, Virginia Sen. Amanda Chase and Republican gubernatorial candidate, speaks from her desk at the Science Museum of Virginia in Richmond, Va. The national Republican Party is at war with itself, struggling to reconcile a bitter divide between former President Donald Trump’s fierce loyalists and those who want Trumpism purged from their party. Chase is a polarizing state senator who seems to have won the hearts and minds of the Trump faithful with her fiercely anti-establishment, pro-gun positions and her embrace of the false notion that Trump is the legitimate winner of the November election. (AP Photo/Ryan M. Kelly)
RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — The national Republican Party in Washington is at war with itself, struggling to reconcile a bitter divide between former President Donald Trump’s fierce loyalists and those who want Trumpism purged from the GOP.
They need only look across the Potomac River into Virginia to see the dangers that lurk if they cannot correct course.
In just nine months, Virginia voters will elect a new governor in what marks the first significant test of the Republican Party’s strength in the post-Trump era.
Although the state had a Republican governor as recently as 2014, it has trended solidly Democratic in recent years as the suburban counties outside Washington, swelling in population with a diverse blend of highly educated, well-to-do voters, have rejected the harsher edges of the GOP agenda in general, and Trump, in particular.
Republicans also will be closely watching whether the governor’s race serves as a portent of their party ahead of next year’s midterm elections as GOP leaders work to ease exploding tensions between mainstream conservatives and pro-Trump adherents. The party’s future success — and maybe its survival — depends on whether Republicans in competitive states like Virginia can re-create a coalition that moves beyond Trump’s hardcore base.
So far, that playbook does not exist.
And the challenges are coming from within. Two high-profile Republicans are threatening third-party bids that would effectively kill the GOP’s chance to reclaim the governor’s office. Several other candidates are trying to cobble together a coalition that features both pro-Trump extremists and mainstream moderates, an ideological blend for which there is no successful model.
At the center of the Virginia GOP’s challenge sits gubernatorial candidate Amanda Chase, a polarizing state senator who seems to have won the hearts and minds of the Trump faithful with her fiercely anti-establishment, pro-gun positions and her embrace of the false notion that Trump is the legitimate winner of the November election.
Nicknamed “Trump in heels,” Chase emulates the former president in manner and policy. She was censured by Democrats and Republicans in the state legislature just last week for exhibiting a pattern of “conduct unbecoming of a senator,” including an allegation that she described the pro-Trump mob that invaded the U.S. Capitol last month as “patriots.”
And yet, in the Republican Party remade in Trump’s image over the last five years, Chase is considered a serious contender for the gubernatorial nomination.
“I like to think I’m a little more polished than President Trump. I’m a little bit more diplomatic, but I am not afraid to speak my mind,” Chase said in an interview.
Democrats have an entirely different issue. Former Gov. Terry McAuliffe headlines a slate of candidates competing in a quieter nomination contest. McAuliffe, whose ties to his party’s establishment have come under attack from his left flank, is quick to highlight the progressive policies he would pursue and to condemn the Republican field.
The former Democratic governor described Chase as “the Republican front-runner” during an interview.
“You’ve got a bunch of candidates all trying to out-Trump each other,” McAuliffe told The Associated Press. “2021 will be a key test for if Trumpism is still alive.”
McAuliffe, a key ally of President Joe Biden who enjoys a massive fundraising advantage and near-universal name recognition in Virginia, is navigating a crowded primary contest of his own that features three African Americans — state senator Jennifer McClellan, former state delegate Jennifer Carroll Foy and Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax — plus a self-described democratic socialist, Lee Carter.
Meanwhile, the state GOP is disorganized and broke.
Moving away from a traditional statewide primary election, the party plans to hold an in-person nominating convention on May 1, though the state’s social-distancing rules would make such a gathering illegal. Party leaders are leaning toward an “unassembled” satellite convention but have not ruled out letting the state GOP’s 12-member executive committee pick the nominee.
Chase is openly threatening to run as a third-party candidate if she believes the rules are being manipulated against her.
“If they disenfranchise the people of Virginia, I will declare the Republican Party is dead,” Chase warned. “I will start the Patriot Party of Virginia. And I won’t look back.”
She is not alone.
Former Republican congressman Denver Riggleman, who has repeatedly railed against Trump and his acolytes since leaving office last month, also raised the possibility of pursuing a third-party run for governor in recent days.
A third-party bid from either contender would split the Republican electorate and make it all but impossible for Republicans to win this fall.
Meanwhile, the Republican field features a handful of candidates who are sticking with their party. They include Kirk Cox, the former state House speaker; northern Virginia businessman Pete Snyder, who previously lost a bid for lieutenant governor; and political newcomer and former private equity CEO Glenn Youngkin.
Cox is trying to focus the election on local issues instead of Trump. He described Biden as “the legitimate president” in an interview and disavowed the pro-Trump conspiracy theory known as QAnon.
Cox also declined to say whether he’d want Trump to campaign in Virginia on his behalf.
“I would like to see everyone turn and focus on Virginia and Virginians,” he said.
Trump adviser Jason Miller said it was “too early to tell” what role the former president or his high-profile surrogates would or would not play in the Virginia contest.
John Fredericks, who twice served as Trump’s Virginia state director, described the state GOP as “a dumpster fire.” He predicted that Trump would get involved personally, though more likely in the general election than the Republican nominating contest.
As for Chase, Trump’s most passionate ally in the race, Fredericks fears that she’s not viable in a general election because of her “shenanigans.”
“The word I get from Republicans is that she’s exhausting,” he said. “They’ve had enough.”
Chase insists she has a history of winning “impossible races.” She was first elected to the General Assembly in 2015 after she knocked off a longtime incumbent who had far outraised her in the primary.
Despite her combative social media presence and the fact that she’s suing the Senate itself, she’s typically peppy and warm in personal interactions. During floor sessions, she sits behind a plexiglass shield erected because she refuses to wear a mask. Chase, who has previously said she doesn’t “do COVID,” was awaiting the results of a test Friday after a possible exposure.
Since late 2019, she’s engaged in what her critics see as increasingly bizarre, radical behavior.
In an interview, Chase declined to disavow QAnon, questioned her colleagues’ mental health after they questioned hers in floor speeches last week and refused to say that Trump lost the November election.
“I believe the election was stolen nationwide,” she insisted, though later in the interview she said she did accept the election results.
In December, she called on Trump to declare martial law rather than leave office.
While Fredericks said Chase could win as much as one-third of the vote in a traditional Republican primary, she’s almost completely alienated from Republican officials inside the state Capitol. She’s been booted from her own local party and in late 2019 decided to stop caucusing with fellow Senate Republicans.
Democrats are optimistic they can capitalize on the Republican chaos. But history is against them. Over the last four decades, Virginia voters have elected a governor from the party that does not win the White House in every election but one.
McAuliffe also believes that Trump’s absence will make it more difficult for Democrats to energize their coalition later this year in Virginia and beyond.
“I tell Democrats all the time: Trump is now gone. And he has been a major driver of our turnout. He’s not on the ballot anymore,” McAuliffe said. “We’ve got to be on our game.”
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Peoples reported from New York.
— Associated Press
A migrant wearing a face mask stands behind a fence inside a refugee camp in Kokkinotrimithia outside of capital Nicosia, Cyprus, Friday, Feb. 5, 2021. Cyprus’ Interior Minister Nicos Nouris said this week that the east Mediterranean island nation whose closest point to Syria is around 150 kilometers (93 miles) remains first among all other European Union member states with the most asylum applications relative to its population. Last year, the country of around 1.1 million people racked up 7,000 asylum applications – most of them from Syrians (AP Photo/Petros Karadjias)
NICOSIA, Cyprus (AP) — Emmanuel Conteh negotiates the muddy, rutted pathways in shorts and torn plastic flip-flops and says he can’t sleep in his heavy canvas tent at night because of the cold.
He laments the “hellish” conditions in ethnically divided Cyprus’ cramped Pournara migrant reception camp, where he’s been living for the past two months after flying to the breakaway Turkish Cypriot north and then clandestinely crossing into the internationally recognized south.
He says he fled his native Sierra Leone because he was persecuted for refusing to follow in his father’s footsteps and practice a kind of witchcraft.
“The head of this society, they want to train me, but I refused,” said Conteh.
He wants Cypriot authorities to swiftly process his asylum application and let him and others out of the razor-wire-encircled former military camp near the industrial western fringes of the capital Nicosia that he says feels like prison.
“We’re not prisoners. We’re asylum-seekers. Let them finish our process and then (free) us,” Conteh said. “That’s all we’re asking.”
The small eastern Mediterranean island republic is trying to cope with a huge backlog of asylum applications and despite government efforts to expedite the process, migrants say they feel literally left out in the cold.
Designed to accommodate 1,000 people at the most, Pournara is a “first instance” camp where in theory asylum-seekers are initially processed and released after three days. But it now houses 1,500 people, some of whom have been there for months.
Interior Minister Nicos Nouris said this week that Cyprus remains first among all other European Union member states in asylum applications relative to its population.
Last year, the country of around 1.1 million racked up 7,000 asylum applications — most of them from Syrians. Nouris said the government is doing its best to speed up the application process to let in those who qualify and to send back migrants whose application is turned down.
Like Conteh, most asylum-seekers enter the island from the Turkish Cypriot north and cross a porous, United Nations-controlled buffer zone into the south. Many hope to transfer to another EU country on the continent.
But asylum-seekers say the process is just taking too long amid a slow-down in application processing brought on by COVID-19 restrictions. They insist that they’ve tested negative numerous times for the coronavirus and want authorities to open the camp’s gates so they can seek better accommodation.
Hansoa Anyan from Cameroon says the camp’s overcrowded conditions, compounded by asylum processing delays, have caused friction between African and Syrian migrants.
He claimed that authorities are favoring Syrians, letting them out of the camp sooner and more frequently than Africans.
That frustration boiled over earlier this week when African migrants tried in protest to block Syrians from exiting.
Cypriot government officials deny there’s any discrimination regarding the timing of migrants’ release. Interior Ministry spokesman Loizos Michael said releases must be done gradually and in order of priority, starting with women, children and minors.
He said a daily stream of arrivals to the camp is making conditions tougher on those living there, but camp authorities are making “herculean efforts” to improve the situation.
But Corina Droushiotou who heads the Cyprus Refugee Council — a group that offers legal help to migrants with their asylum applications — said the migrants’ “de facto detention” at Pournara is “completely unnecessary” and is fanning anger among the migrants, some of whom have been living there for as many as five months.
Droushiotou said despite continued, island-wide COVID-19 restrictions including a night-time curfew, authorities could have eased tensions by allowing people who found a place to stay outside the camp to leave. Others could have been permitted to leave for short periods on condition they return before the start of curfew.
“The situation in Pournara signals a failure by the authorities to effectively address ongoing issues related to migrants and refugees,” said Droushiotou, adding that the government lacks a comprehensive migration and integration strategy.
— Associated Press