January 27, 2023

ResMed Appoints Michael Farrell as Chair of its Board of Directors Peter Farrell to Become Chair Emeritus

Michael “Mick” Farrell

Michael “Mick” Farrell, ResMed CEO and board chair

SAN DIEGO, Jan. 26, 2023 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — ResMed (NYSE: RMD, ASX: RMD) today announced ResMed’s board of directors has appointed chief executive officer Michael (“Mick”) Farrell as chair of the board, effective January 25, 2023. Mr. Farrell succeeds current chair Peter Farrell who will become chair emeritus and will remain an active board member.

Mick Farrell became ResMed’s CEO on March 1, 2013, and has served as a member of the company’s board of directors since assuming that role.

“I am honored to expand my role with ResMed as its next chair and to succeed my dad, Peter Farrell, whose vision, leadership, and guidance have helped ResMed become the largest outside-hospital, digital health company in the world,” said Mick Farrell. “I look forward to working with and leading our strong, diverse, and talented board in continued value creation for stockholders and all our stakeholders.”

Peter Farrell

Peter Farrell, ResMed Founder and Chair Emeritus

“I am grateful for the opportunities I have had to lead ResMed and its board over the past many years,” said Peter Farrell. “ResMed is on a clear growth path with strategic priorities intact; it’s the right time for me to step aside and reduce my commitments as chair so I can devote more time to other boards and philanthropic interests. I will remain an active ResMed board member as chair emeritus and will continue to work closely with Mick, ResMed management, and the board as a steward of ResMed’s strategy, innovation, and culture.”

“I’d like to thank Peter for his leadership and many contributions to ResMed over the years,” said Ron Taylor, ResMed’s lead independent director and chair of the nominating and governance committee. “We’re pleased to welcome Mick to the board chair position. Over the past 10 years, the board and I have worked closely with and observed Mick in his role as director and as CEO. Under Mick’s leadership of ResMed these last 10 years, we have seen the market capitalization of the company grow from $6 billion to over $30 billion, delivering a total shareholder return of 507% or 20.0% average annual growth in value over that same period; an excellent return for all our stakeholders. We believe Mick has the right skills and experience, and he has been effective in setting the board agenda, encouraging debate, and connecting the board with management for many years. Combining the chair and CEO roles will allow for streamlining and efficiency and is aligned with the structure held by many of our peers on the S&P 500.¹ I look forward to working with Mick and the rest of the board as we support the company in reaching its goal of changing the lives of 250 million people in 2025.”

¹ Over 40% of the S&P 500 companies combine the chair and CEO roles, including 11 of the 14 other healthcare equipment companies in the S&P 500.

About ResMed
At ResMed (NYSE: RMD, ASX: RMD) we pioneer innovative solutions that treat and keep people out of the hospital, empowering them to live healthier, higher-quality lives. Our digital health technologies and cloud-connected medical devices transform care for people with sleep apnea, COPD, and other chronic diseases. Our comprehensive out-of-hospital software platforms support the professionals and caregivers who help people stay healthy in the home or care setting of their choice. By enabling better care, we improve quality of life, reduce the impact of chronic disease, and lower costs for consumers and healthcare systems in more than 140 countries. To learn more, visit ResMed.com and follow @ResMed.

For investors	For media
Amy Wakeham	Jayme Rubenstein
+1 858.836.5000	+1 858.836.6798
investorrelations@resmed.com	news@resmed.com

Photos accompanying this announcement are available at

https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/6d518d63-ab05-4993-9f71-b8d079726be2

https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/f481d27e-98b8-4fa5-8334-0510de3306a6

GlobeNewswire Distribution ID 8736615

January 27, 2023

Exhibition Hall Featuring Grand Canal Cultural Heritage to Open in China’s ‘Hometown of Martial Arts and Acrobatics’

CANGZHOU, China, Jan. 26, 2023 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — An exhibition hall featuring China’s Grand Canal has been in full swing and is expected to open this year, announced the Cangzhou city government. The Grand Canal carries not only produce and raw materials in Cangzhou but also acrobatics and martial arts in this city of the country’s north Hebei Province.Cangzhou City is historically renowned for both its martial arts practitioners and acrobats. The tradition of practicing martial arts in Cangzhou dates back to the Spring and Autumn Period (770 BC – 476 BC). It rose in popularity during the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) and was renowned at home and abroad by the end of the Qing Dynasty (1645-1911).

A Grand Canal carries half of Chinese history. The Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal, a prestigious cultural heritage, was excavated over 2,500 years ago and ran through the ancient Chinese civilization.

Cangzhou, a coastal town endowed with both the Grand Canal and the Bohai sea, is a stronghold of South-North China, and the vicinity of the national capital. Its particular geographical location, the multi-ethnic settlement, the promotion of imperial civil examination, and many other historical factors have made Cangzhou a hot land of martial arts.

The Annals of Cangzhou show that about 1,937 Martial Scholars and Martial Jurors in the Ming and Qing Dynasties came from Cangzhou, with 53 martial arts or independent boxing types originating or spreading here, accounting for 40 percent of China’s 129 martial arts and boxing types. Cangzhou was officially named among the country’s first batch of the “hometown of martial arts” in 1992. The State Council listed Cangzhou Martial Arts in the first national intangible cultural heritage batch in 2006.

Nearly two million people, or nearly 26 percent of Cangzhou’s population, practice martial arts, which go beyond simple fitness and competition and have become essential in exploring the history and preserving Chinese traditional culture.

In addition to Martial Arts, Wuqiao Acrobatics has given new life and vitality to Cangzhou’s cultural inheritance. The Ministry of Culture officially awarded Wuqiao as “the hometown of acrobatics in China” in 2004. The State Council listed Wuqiao Acrobatics in the first national intangible cultural heritage batch in 2006.

China Wuqiao International Acrobatic Festival, an iconic event with more than 30 years of history, is also known as one of the “three major acrobatic venues in the world,” together with the acrobatic festivals of Monte-Carlo and Paris. Wuqiao Acrobatic World is the world’s leading acrobatic theme park, a national AAAA-level and unique acrobatic tourist attraction.

Since the reopening of the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal in Cangzhou in September 2022, the Grand Canal culture has been revived. Cangzhou will continue to construct the Grand Canal Cultural Belt as the guide, focusing on acrobatics, martial arts, and other special intangible cultural heritage projects, promoting the systematic protection and inheritance of intangible cultural heritage and striving to create a new business card of “China’s Grand Canal Intangible Cultural Heritage City”.

Contact Information:
Sasa Guan
pr
tongguan@xinhuanetus.com
+13307806068

Jiayu Ding
jiayuding06@xinhuanetus.com

This content was issued through the press release distribution service at Newswire.com.

GlobeNewswire Distribution ID 8737509

January 27, 2023

The Metals Company Announces Conference and Event Schedule for Q1 2023

NEW YORK, Jan. 26, 2023 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Following the successful conclusion of the first integrated nodule collection system trials in the Clarion Clipperton Zone of the Pacific Ocean since the 1970s and of the environmental impact monitoring campaign conducted by its subsidiary, Nauru Ocean Resources Inc (NORI)., The Metals Company (Nasdaq: TMC) (“TMC” or “the Company”), an explorer of lower-impact battery metals from seafloor polymetallic nodules, intends to participate at the following in-person conferences and summits being held by leading organizations in the first quarter of 2023:

Conferences
NAATBatt Annual Meeting & Conference
Date: February 20-23, 2023
Format: In-person
Location: Wigwam Resort, Phoenix, Arizona, USA
Attendees: Erica Ocampo, Chief Sustainability Officer
Registration: https://nac.naatbatt.org/naatbatt-annual-conference-2023/registration/

Ditchley Climate and Energy Summit
Date: March 3, 2023
Format: In-person
Location: Chipping Norton, Oxford, UK
Attendees: Erika Ilves, Chief Strategy Officer

Prospectors & Developers Association of Canada (PDAC) Convention
Date: March 5-8, 2023
Format: In-person, company booth, 1x1s available
Location: Metro Toronto Convention Centre, Toronto, Canada
Attendees: Gerard Barron, Chairman & Chief Executive Officer, Craig Shesky, Chief Financial Officer and several additional TMC team members
Registration: https://www.pdac.ca/convention/attend/registration/fee-and-pass-info

The Swiss Mining Institute Conference
Date: March 21-22, 2023
Format: In-person, 1x1s available
Location: Zurich, Switzerland
Attendees: Gerard Barron, Chairman & CEO
Registration: https://swissmininginstitute.ch/registration-march-21-22-2023/

SAFE Summit: A Pathway to Electrification from Minerals to Market
Date: March 28-29, 2023
Format: In-person, company presentation
Location: Washington D.C., USA
Attendees: Gerard Barron, Chairman & CEO and Ambassador Margo Deiye, Nauru’s Permanent Representative to the UN and Nauru’s Ambassador to the ISA
Registration: https://safesummit.org/safe-summit-2023/

121 Mining Investment Las Vegas
Date: March 28-29, 2023
Format: In-person, 1x1s available
Location: Las Vegas, Nevada, USA
Attendees: Craig Shesky, CFO
Registration: https://www.weare121.com/121mininginvestment-las-vegas/registration/register-investor/

About The Metals Company
The Metals Company is an explorer of lower-impact battery metals from seafloor polymetallic nodules, on a dual mission: (1) supply metals for the clean energy transition with the least possible negative environmental and social impact and (2) accelerate the transition to a circular metal economy. The company through its subsidiaries holds exploration and commercial rights to three polymetallic nodule contract areas in the Clarion-Clipperton Zone of the Pacific Ocean regulated by the International Seabed Authority and sponsored by the governments of Nauru, Kiribati and the Kingdom of Tonga.

More information is available at www.metals.co.

Contacts
Media | media@metals.co
Investors | investors@metals.co

GlobeNewswire Distribution ID 8737507

January 27, 2023

Opium production in Myanmar nearly doubles over past 2 years under junta, UN finds

Opium production in Myanmar has nearly doubled since the military coup two years ago, a U.N. report found Thursday, reversing years of declines, as farmers devote more land to growing poppies amid economic turmoil and disruptions.

Estimated potential opium production surged 88% to 790 metric tons in 2022 after having fallen to 400 metric tons in 2020 from 870 metric tons in 2013, the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime found.

The area of poppy cultivation, meanwhile, expanded 33% to more than 40,000 hectares from a year earlier. Production increases were most pronounced in eastern Shan state, which accounted for 84% of the total estimated area of poppy cultivation, the report said.

ENG_BUR_OpiumReport_01262023.yields.jpg Poppies, which can be processed into heroin, are a lucrative crop for farmers desperate to earn money amid the political and economic chaos following the Feb. 1, 2021, military coup. Fresh opium prices jumped 62% and dry opium rose 69%, and farmers are estimated to have earned more than twice as much as the previous year to as much as U.S.$350 million, the report said.

“Economic, security and governance disruptions that followed the military takeover have converged, and farmers in remote, often conflict-prone areas in northern Shan and border states have had little option but to move back to opium,” UNODC Regional Representative Jeremy Douglas said in a statement accompanying the release of the report.

Myanmar is the world’s second-biggest producer of heroin, and the source of most of Southeast Asia’s methamphetamine. Most of the drugs are produced in border regions, outside of government control.

A man lances a poppy in an opium poppy field in Myanmar’s Shan state, Feb. 3, 2019. Credit: AFP

Impact on wider Mekong region

The resurgence of poppy cultivation and production will have a significant impact on the wider drug economy in the lower Mekong region, the U.N. agency warned. It called for a strengthening of the economic resilience and basic livelihoods of farming communities to counter the renewed momentum.

The report attributed the growth to increased size of fields and the detection of “poppy hotspots,” where the crop could thrive, compared to typically small, poorly organized poppy plots with low cultivation density in the past. It also said more sophisticated farming techniques and concentration of production also played a role in the change, as did decreased eradication efforts.

[embedded content]

The average opium yield in 2022 swelled 41% to 19.8 kilograms per hectare over 2021, the report said, making it the highest yield estimate since the beginning of systematic yield surveys in 2002.

“Taken together, it appears that year-over-year declines in poppy cultivation and opium production in Myanmar, which started in 2013, ended around 2020,” the report said.

Douglas predicted that the increases in cultivation and production will continue unless Myanmar becomes more stable.

“At the end of the day, opium cultivation is really about economics, and it cannot be resolved by destroying crops which only escalates vulnerabilities,” he said. “Without alternatives and economic stability, it is likely that opium cultivation and production will continue to expand.”

Douglas told Radio Free Asia that not only the production of opium and heroin is up in Myanmar, but methamphetamines as well.

ENG_BUR_OpiumReport_01262023.cultivation.jpg Responding to UNODC’s findings, Nay Phone Latt, the spokesman of Myanmar’s shadow National Unity Government, told RFA that junta chief Sr. Gen. Min Aung Hlaing “isn’t interested in anything other than the perpetuation of his power.”

He suggested that Min Aung Hlaing has little incentive to curb opium production in the country because “he and his family members are enjoying the benefits of the drug trade.”

Though technically illegal in Myanmar, opium cultivation for the manufacture of heroin has been tolerated and even taxed by corrupt officials in the Myanmar military, the Myanmar Police Force and rebel ethnic armies.

Translated by Myo Min Aung. Edited by Joshua Lipes and Malcolm Foster.

January 27, 2023

Pentagon Chief Set to Reassure South Korea Amid North’s Provocations

South Korean concerns about the U.S. nuclear umbrella are expected to be a major focus of U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin’s upcoming trip to Seoul.

Austin, who arrives in the South Korean capital on Monday, is expected to meet President Yoon Suk Yeol, according to South Korean media.

Earlier this month, Yoon made headlines when he said South Korea could demand the redeployment of U.S. nuclear weapons, or even develop its own nuclear arms, if its security situation with North Korea worsens.

Yoon later walked back those comments. However, the situation underscores growing South Korean worries over North Korea’s quickly expanding nuclear arsenal, as well as questions about the long-term defense commitment of its ally, the United States.

Deputy Pentagon press secretary Sabrina Singh told a briefing Thursday that Austin’s trip will highlight “our commitment to the region,” saying the U.S. commitment to South Korea remains “rock solid.”

Austin’s visit will be closely watched to see whether he addresses Yoon’s comments about nuclear weapons.

“He might make some rhetorical gesture indicating gently in public, and certainly much more strongly behind the scenes, that it would be undesirable for South Korea to have its own nuclear deterrent,” said Mason Richey, an associate professor at South Korea’s Hankuk University of Foreign Studies.

“But I think he would do so in a way that would not be intended to publicly irritate South Korea or to call into question South Korea’s sovereignty or autonomy,” Richey said.

Instead, Austin may highlight U.S.-South Korean efforts to expand defense cooperation, he added.

In recent months, Washington and Seoul have increased joint military drills and agreed to the more frequent deployment of U.S. strategic assets, such as nuclear-capable bombers and aircraft carriers, to the region around the Korean Peninsula.

But Yoon, a conservative who embraces a more aggressive approach to North Korea, thinks more should be done to keep up with North Korean nuclear advancements.

As a presidential candidate, he briefly embraced the possibility of the United States returning tactical nuclear weapons to South Korea.

The United States removed its nuclear weapons from South Korea in the early 1990s. Instead, South Korea is protected by the U.S. nuclear umbrella, under which Washington vows to use all its capabilities, including nuclear weapons, to defend its ally.

Yoon last month suggested such ideas are outdated and that South Korea needs a bigger role in its own defense. As an alternative, Yoon said he envisioned new levels of nuclear cooperation that would have the same effect as nuclear sharing.

North Korea advancements

South Korea’s concerns are driven in large part by North Korea’s rapid expansion of its nuclear weapons program.

In 2022, North Korea launched more than 90 missiles, including short-range weapons designed to evade South Korea’s missile defense systems and long-range weapons that could hit the U.S. mainland.

In a year-end speech, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un vowed to “exponentially” increase production of nuclear warheads and to develop yet another new intercontinental ballistic missile.

U.S. and South Korean officials have also warned for months that North Korea has finished preparations for another nuclear test.

The developments have rattled many in Seoul, who fear the United States may not come to the defense of South Korea if North Korea has the ability to destroy U.S. cities.

Possible steps

A growing number of Washington-based analysts agree that the United States should shore up its defense commitment to South Korea.

In a report last week, the Center for Strategic and International Studies said the allies should consider “tabletop planning exercises for the possible redeployment of U.S. nuclear weapons to South Korea.”

While the CSIS report said the United States should not under current circumstances deploy tactical nuclear weapons, it suggested other steps, including the creation of a “framework for joint nuclear planning,” similar to a U.S. arrangement with NATO.

The report mentioned the possibility of “the continuous presence in the region of either U.S. submarines equipped with nuclear cruise missiles or strategic bombers. It also said South Korea could acquire dual-capable aircraft, which can conduct nuclear or conventional missions.

It is not clear whether U.S. and South Korean officials are discussing any of those proposals.

But Sydney Seiler, the national intelligence officer for North Korea at the U.S. National Intelligence Council, on Thursday praised the CSIS report as “excellent,” saying it laid out a “very persuasive case … on how to maintain deterrence in this environment.”

“It was compelling,” Seiler said during an online forum hosted by CSIS. “And we go back to [the fact that] deterrence has worked for seven decades,” he said. “Why would deterrence not work going forward?”

Source: Voice of America

January 27, 2023

Australia Urged to Boost Military Assistance to Ukraine

Ukraine is urging Australia to increase its military aid ahead of a visit to Europe next week by Australian Foreign Affairs Minister Penny Wong and Defense Minister Richard Marles.

Australia, the largest non-NATO contributor to Ukraine’s war effort, has supplied missiles and Bushmaster armored personnel carriers. They have a special ‘V’-shaped floor designed to spread the impact of an explosion more effectively than a conventional flat floor. A group of up to 70 Australian defense force personnel has also been stationed in Britain to help train Ukrainian troops.

Analysts say the commitment of Germany and the United States to deliver tanks to Ukraine puts pressure on Australia to increase its military assistance to Kyiv.

Vasyl Myroshnychenko, Ukraine’s ambassador to Australia, told the Australian Broadcasting Corp. on Friday he hopes Canberra will boost military assistance to his country.

“Australia can choose to send more Bushmasters,” he said. “What is important is that Australia continues supporting Ukraine. We are extremely thankful for what Australia has done so far, especially the last package, which was announced in October, where another 30 Bushmasters were allocated. The troops, which are now in Britain, will be training Ukrainian soldiers. We are thankful for that. it is really a big help.”

The United States is by far the biggest provider of weapons and equipment to Ukraine, followed by Britain, Poland, Germany and Canada.

Australia also has sweeping sanctions on Russia — the most severe ever imposed on a foreign government.

Since the war began almost a year ago, Australia has granted visas to almost 9,000 Ukrainian refugees.

Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade has said Canberra condemns “Russia’s unilateral, illegal and immoral aggression against the people of Ukraine,” adding that the “invasion is a gross violation of international law.”

Wong and Marles head to France next week to try to repair a diplomatic rift caused by Canberra’s abrupt cancelation in 2021 of a lucrative submarine contract with Paris in favor of a new alliance — the AUKUS pact — with the United States and Britain.

They will also travel to Britain for ministerial talks.

Source: Voice of America