Finalist cities chosen
The International Olympic Committee confirms that Oslo, Almaty and Beijing are the three official candidates to host the 2022 Winter Olympic Games. IOC President Thomas Bach:
The IOC Executive board has selected the cities of Oslo, Almaty and Beijing as candidate cities for the Olympic Winter Games 2022…The IOC is very happy to see three very different approaches with regard to the organisation of the games. This gives the IOC a choice between three diverse bids, with different legacy plans, with different approaches, with different budgets.
Escape from captors
The 62 women and girls who were kidnapped in Nigeria last month escape from Boko Haram militants. The women were able to escape when their captors left the camp to attack military and police in Damboa. Bukar Kyari, a local vigilante fighting Boko Haram in Maiduguri, says:
The women seized that rare opportunity to escape when they realized they were alone in the camp. But we still have five women, including a nursing mother, missing.
This group is believed to still be holding 200 missing schoolgirls that were abducted 80 days ago in Chibok.
Cavendish out of race
As a result of the crash on the first day of the race, Cavendish dislocated his shoulder and is out of the race. In a Twitter post, his team, Omega Pharma-QuickStep (OPQS), confirms that the MRI scan shows torn ligaments and an AC-joint dislocation. Cavedish says:
Normally I bounce well but when I was on the floor I knew something was wrong. My shoulder was sticking out the way it shouldn’t. I had some optimism that it would just be swelling but this morning was worse. I’m gutted.
Nibali wins second stage
Nibali of Italy wins the second stage of the race through the Yorkshire countryside and receives his first yellow jersey.
It was a fabulous day for me, I led a good action. It was difficult. There was a lot of headwind … I had the luck to attack at the right moment.
Russian separatists regroup at rally
Russian separatists regroup in the city of Donetsk after being driven out of Sloviansk by rebels. In front of a crowd of thousands, they are vowing to renew their fight against the government in Kiev. Pavel Gubarev, the self-described governor of the Donetsk People’s Republic, tells the crowd:
We will begin a real partisan war around the whole perimeter of Donetsk. We will drown these wretches in blood.
Lawyers criticize broadcast
Pistorius’ lawyer, Brian Webber, criticizes Australia’s Channel Seven for showing a video of Pistorius re-enacting the killing of his girlfriend, Reeva Steenkamp.
iPhone 6 made by 10,000 robots
Foxconn announces at a shareholder meeting that it plans to use 10,000 top-of-the-line manufacturing robots to meet the demand for the iPhone 6. A Foxconn financial report explains that this is done in an effort to cut labor costs:
To remain cost competitive, we have been continuously controlling manufacturing overhead to attain better operating leverage and improving efficiency and yield rate through automation using robot arms and industrial engineering methods like production cell management.
Fights anti-obesity softening
The First Lady is fighting a House Republican effort to soften a central part of her anti-childhood obesity campaign. She says she’s ready “to fight until the bitter end.” She mocks the GOP in an opinion column in The New York Times:
Remember a few years ago when Congress declared that the sauce on a slice of pizza should count as a vegetable in school lunches? You don’t have to be a nutritionist to know that this doesn’t make much sense. Yet we’re seeing the same thing happening again with these new efforts to lower nutrition standards in our schools.
Race starts in Yorkshire
Thousands of spectators line the streets in Yorkshire, England to watch the start of the race. 198 riders will participate in this year’s race. The Duke and Dutchess of Cambridge, along with Prince Harry, attend. Kate and some of the lead riders cut the ribbon, signifying the start of the race. Yorkshire is hosting the first stage of the 101st Tour de France, and the cyclists will wind through many towns and villages along the 190km route. The race will go through the Yorkshire Dales to Harrogate on July 5, 2014, and then from York to Sheffield, through the Peak District, on July 6, 2014.
Reclaims Sloviansk
After a night of fighting, President Poroshenko and a rebel spokesperson report the Ukranian flag is now flying over Sloviansk. The city had been under rebel control since April 12, 2014. The military reports it destroyed a tank and four other armored vehicles during the overnight battle. A spokesman for the National Security and Defense Council:
Sloviansk is under siege. Now an operation is going on to neutralize small groups hiding in buildings where peaceful citizens are living.
Indian nurses arrive home
After being trapped for more than a week in Tikrit, an area that had been seized by Sunni militant forces, the group of 46 nurses arrives home to India. It is not yet clear if they were abducted or trapped and unable to leave the area. One of the nurses says:
They didn’t do anything, they didn’t disturb us and they didn’t harm anyone. They didn’t touch even. They talked nicely.
Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi video
A video showing someone who is thought to be the leader of the Islamic State extremist group delivering a sermon at a mosque in Mosul is posted online. Al-Baghdadi is rarely seen in public, with only a few photographs of him in existence. Although the video appears on a site that is connected to the group, there has been no official verification of whether or not he is the one in the video.
The Wines of Westeros
The Wines of Westeros, a line of red and white wines named for the show’s feuding clans, is released. The wines will be supplied by Australian winemakers and include Sauvignon Blancs, Pinot Noirs, Merlots, Chardonnay, Cabernet Sauvignons and Shiraz wines. They are available for pre-order and will launch in time for the new season expected to air next year.
Whether this becomes a coveted item for the fans or a bottle that is opened with every episode, this wine is made to be drunk with friends and to help soften the blow of the shock and heartache as our favorite characters are slowly killed off.
Khatallah’s role outlined
Katallah’s detention motion says that in the days preceding the attack, the defendant “voiced concern and opposition to the presence of an American facility in Benghazi.” According to the motion, a group of 20 or more “armed men,” including militia members, assembled outside the U.S. compound at 9:45 p.m. the night of September 11, 2012, and “aggressively breached” the gate. They carried rifles, handguns and rocket-propelled grenade launchers. After breaching the gate, they stole a U.S. vehicle, “forcibly entered” buildings and stole U.S. property.
During this initial attack, buildings within the Mission were set on fire, and that ultimately led to the deaths” of U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens and Information Management Officer Sean Smith.
Los Jets
Los Jets will premier on July 16, 2014 on NuvoTv. Lopes is the executive producer of this six-part documentary about a group of outcasts that come together as a soccer team. The series was filmed in the fall of 2013.
Trapped nurses fly home
An Indian official says that the Indian nurses who are stranded in Iraq will be flying home to India this week. The 46 nurses, who were stranded at a hospital in the city of Tikrit, which was captured by Sunni militants last month, were moved to Mosul earlier this week. Oommen Chandy, Chief Minister of Kerala state in India, says the nurses will return home on a special aircraft arranged by the Indian government:
We are thankful to the government of India.
Al-Maliki won’t withdraw from PM race
Hours after a lawmaker had said al-Maliki agreed not to run for another term as the country’s prime minister, al-Maliki announces he will not withdraw his name from the candidacy. On a state-run TV station broadcast, he says:
I will never back down nominating myself as prime minister. No one has the right to place any conditions.
Calls for closer US ties
In a Fourth of July message to President Obama, Putin says he hopes for better ties with the US. According to the Kremlin’s website, Putin:
expressed a hope for the successful development of the relationship between both countries, based on equal rights and utilitarianism, despite all the difficulties and disagreements they are facing at the moment
The response from The White House from National Security Council spokeswoman Caitlin Hayden:
We’ve seen the message but have no particular comment.
Airstrikes target ISIS
Government airstrikes kill at least 30 insurgents who are trying to gain control of the Beiji oil refinery. A government plane targeted eight vehicles that were attacking government forces at the facility yesterday. The militants have taken control of Qaim, which controls a border crossing with Syria, last month during their blitz across Iraq, and now control a vast stretch of territory straddling Iraq and Syria.
Veteran employment push
Tesla announces its plans to become one of America’s leading employers of military veterans. Tesla’s workforce is increasing rapidly as it expands production of its Model S, prepares its launch of the Model X crossover SUV and enters new overseas markets. The company now has more than 6,000 employees, and of those, 300 — or roughly 5 percent — are veterans, including its logistics director, former Navy officer Adam Plumpton. An additional 600 veteran candidates are in the hiring pipeline. The Company says:
We want to be known throughout the veteran community as a great place to work.Veterans are a great source of talent for Tesla, and we’re going after it.