1.

India Railroad to Kashmir Close to Completion

Indian Railways is getting closer to finishing work on a new rail line connecting Indian-
controlled Kashmir to the rest of India.

Officials say the line could bring big changes to the area. They say it will permit faster
movement of people, goods, and security workers.

Indian-controlled Kashmir shares a border with India’s two main competitors, Pakistan and
China.

Darshana Jardosh is India’s minister of state for railways. During a visit to check on progress
on the line, she said the railway network is important for security.

Officials say the 272-kilometer Udhampur-Srinagar-Baramulla Rail Link (USBRL) project

involves highly advanced engineering knowledge. The line runs through a mountainous
area.

Irfan Mushtaq, a contractor for Konkan Railways, is building a railway station at Reasi, near
the southern end of the line. He told VOA that it had been one of the most challenging
projects he has ever worked on because of the terrain, lack of skilled laborers and bad
weather.

“We have worked day and night for this project to complete. This project will benefit the
locals of Reasi and the people of the region as a whole,” he said.

The USBRL was declared a “national project” in 2002.

Officials say the line will contain the world’s highest rail bridge, 38 tunnels and 931 bridges.
The Chenab Bridge crosses the Chenab River at a height of 366 meters. The tunnels will
have a combined length of 119 kilometers. The system will include the two longest
transportation tunnels in India at 12.75 and 11.2 kilometers.

The project also includes the Anji Khad Bridge, Indian Railway’s first cable-supported rail
bridge. The 750-meter bridge will cross high above the Anji Khad River. The part supported
by cables will be 473 meters long.

India created a rail connection to Jammu after gaining independence from British rule in
1947. The first passenger train arrived at Jammu station in December 1972. But it has taken
another 50 years for Indian Railways to build the rail line through to the Kashmir Valley.

Devendra Sharma is a site engineer with the company Afcons Infrastructure Ltd. It has been
building a bridge at Reasi since 2016. He praised the jobs created by the project and noted
that the company hires local workers.

“On average, we employed 700-800 laborers daily to complete this bridge, which we expect
to complete by the end of May,” Sharma said.
Officials say the railway line will also increase tourism in the region and give local farmers
access to a larger market.

However, some Kashmiris are concerned the project could harm the area. It currently is
India’s only Muslim majority region. Some local Muslims worry that the rail line could change
that.

Some also oppose the increased military presence in the area that is expected as a result of
the project.

I’m Faith Pirlo.

2. Food Prices Fall on World Markets but not for Most People

The global market prices of grains, vegetable, milk-based and other agricultural products
have been falling. The price drops, however, have not yet made it to everyday buyers
around the world. Around the world, food prices are staying painfully high.

Food prices were already high when Russia invaded Ukraine in February of 2022. The
invasion caused major problems to the grain and fertilizer trade. Food prices rose quickly.

But on a global level, that price shock ended a while ago. The United Nations says global
food prices have fallen for 12 straight months. Good harvests in places like Brazil and
Russia and a wartime agreement that permitted grain shipments out of the Black Sea helped
lead to the drop in food prices.

Yet, prices at food stores are still rising. And that affects people everywhere, from the United
States and Europe to struggling countries in the developing world.

Food prices were 19.5 percent higher in the European Union last month compared to a year
earlier and 19.2 percent higher in Britain.

Joseph Glauber is former chief economist at the U.S. Department of Agriculture. He said that
the cost of agricultural products is just one reason for the continued high cost of food.

In the United States, food prices were up 8.5 percent last month compared to one year
earlier. Glauber said that “75 percent of the costs are coming after it leaves the farm.”

He added, “It’s energy costs. It’s all the processing costs. All the transportation costs. All the
labor costs.”

Food inflation, Glauber said, “will come down, but it’s going to come down slowly, largely
because these other factors are still running pretty high.”

Another reason for high food prices in the United States, observers say, is a wave of
mergers that have reduced competition in the food industry.
White House officials last year noted that just four companies control 85 percent of the U.S.
beef market. Beef is meat that comes from cows. Similarly, just four companies control 70
percent of the pork market and 54 percent of the poultry market. Pork meat comes from pigs;
poultry is meat from birds including chickens and ducks.

Those companies, critics say, can use their market power to raise prices.

Glauber, who is now a researcher at the International Food Policy Research Institute, is not
sure that mergers are the reason for high food prices. He agreed that big agribusinesses can
bring in profits when prices rise. But things usually even out over time. And their earnings go
down in other times.

“I couldn’t point my finger at the fact that we just have a handful of meat producers,” Glauber
said.

In other countries, Glauber said, a strong U.S. dollar is to blame for keeping food prices high.
In other high food price times, the dollar was not as strong.

Glauber said prices for corn and wheat are given in dollars per ton. Because of the strong
dollar, people in other countries have not felt the price drops that have shown up in global
food markets.

In Hungary, people are increasingly unable to deal with the biggest increases in food prices
in the E.U., reaching 45 percent in March.

Joszef Varga is a fruit and vegetable seller in Budapest historic Grand Market Hall. He said
wholesale costs have risen by 20 to 30 percent. All his buyers have felt the increased prices
– some more than others.

“Those with more money in their wallets buy more, and those with less buy less,” he said.

In Pakistan, store owner Mohammad Ali said some customers are no longer buying meat.
They buy more vegetables and beans instead. But even the price of vegetables, beans, rice
and wheat are up as much as 50 percent.

Sitting in her home outside Pakistan’s capital of Islamabad, 45-year-old Zubaida Bibi said,
“Our life was never easy, but now the price of everything has increased so much that it has
become difficult to live.”

I’m Gregory Stachel

3. Report: 25% of Jobs Will Change in the Next Five Years

A new study has found that about 25 percent of jobs are going to change in the next five
years. The finding comes from a survey of employers published Monday by the World
Economic Forum (WEF). The organization is best known for its yearly meeting in Davos,
Switzerland.
About 69 million jobs will be created and 83 million removed by 2027, it said. That will result
in a total decrease of 2 percent of current employment, the Future of Jobs report said.

The survey is based on data from about 800 companies employing more than 11 million
workers. It used data from 673 million jobs.

Technology and digitalization can lead to both the creation of jobs and the destruction of
jobs, a summary of the report said.

Companies are looking to increase their use of new technologies like artificial intelligence
(AI), cloud computing and big data, the study found. More than 75 percent of companies say
they will be using those technologies in the next five years. About 86 percent of companies
surveyed said they want to use more digital platforms and mobile apps.

Machines already do a large amount of work. The companies surveyed estimated that 34
percent of tasks are done by machines, with 66 percent of tasks competed by humans. AI is
expected to be used by 75 percent of surveyed companies in the coming years.

As a result, the fastest growing jobs are related to technology.

The fastest declining jobs will be those that can be automated, like secretaries and bank
tellers. The demand for AI machine learning specialists and cybersecurity experts is
expected to grow greatly, the report said.

I’m Ashley Thompson.

4. 83-year-old Hopes to Run Olympic ‘Marathon for All’ in Paris

At age 83, Barbara Humbert dreams of taking part in next year's 'Marathon for All’ race at
the Paris Olympic Games.

It is the first event of its kind, permitting amateur athletes to run the same race path as the
Olympic marathon athletes.

Humbert has a history of success suggesting she could beat some runners half her age.

Not your usual great-grandmother, the German-born Frenchwoman runs 50 kilometers a

week. She has competed in many marathons - and has the medals to show for it.

"It's extraordinary to have the Olympics in Paris," said Humbert at her home in Eaubonne.
The town is one hour's drive north of Paris. "It would be a gift for my 60th marathon," she
added. "For me it would be a crowning achievement."

However, Humbert is unsure if she will get to compete in the race because the number of
runners is limited.
In marathons, runners often receive race bibs – a piece of paper with a number on it to
identify the runner. Race bibs for the Marathon for All will be limited to 20,024, to be chosen
in a random draw.

Humbert’s husband Jacques is her biggest supporter. He is helping where he can. He is

waiting to hear from the sports ministry about the request to reserve a bib for his wife. The
ministry was not immediately available for comment to the Reuters news agency.

Many medals hang in the entrance of Barbara and Jacques’ home.

They remind Barbara of all the races she has been part of, from Athens to Boston and many
other cities. She estimates that she has run about 8,000 kilometers in those races.

More than 40 years after she first started racing, Humbert beat a world record in her group
during the French athletics championships last year.

She ran 125 kilometers in 24 hours.

How did she do it? By training a lot, and being careful with her diet, she said.

Humbert wants others to follow in her footsteps. She said of running, "It gives you balance.
You run, you empty your head, you feel so much better afterwards."

Barbara is not planning to stop anytime soon. "As long as my joints don't cry out in pain, I will
keep running," she said.

I’m John Russell.

5. US Company Aims to Reopen a Retired Nuclear Power Plant

About one year ago, a company that usually takes apart closed nuclear power centers,
bought one in the state of Michigan.

Holtec Decommissioning International purchased the Palisades Nuclear Generating Station

in the western part of Michigan.

The company planned to take radioactive materials from the center, make the buildings safe
and prepare the land along Lake Michigan for future use.

A new plan

But after a short time, company leaders started thinking about restarting energy production
at the plant.

That is because a law passed by the U.S. Congress and signed by President Joe Biden in
late 2021 included $6 billion to keep older nuclear plants open.
Those who run Holtec thought they could use some of that money to fix some of the plant’s
problems and reopen it.

Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer and other Michigan leaders supported Holtec’s plan.
So, the company wrote a letter to U.S. Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm and asked
the federal government for money to help bring the plant back into operation.

Local leaders said the power plant will bring jobs back to the area. State leaders, such as
Whitmer, said the power from the plant would be important for Michigan’s economy.

Critics promise to fight

But critics of the plant said it had many problems when it was opened under the earlier
owner, Entergy.

In fact, Entergy closed the center earlier than planned because a Nuclear Regulatory
Commission (NRC) report showed many problems. One of the problems was with a device
that controls the plant’s nuclear reaction.

Kevin Kamps opposes the plan to reopen the Palisades plant. He works for the nonprofit
group Beyond Nuclear. He said he would “fight this proposal at every turn” and said the plan
was risky.

Independent experts say reopening a nuclear plant like Palisades would be difficult.

Jacopo Buongiorno is a nuclear engineering professor at the Massachusetts Institute of

Technology. He said restarting the plant would be “a massive challenge.”

But it is costly to build new nuclear plants. And there are not yet other methods that can
equal the production of a nuclear plant like Palisades that are as clean.

While there are safety concerns about nuclear power, it does not produce any pollution. The
Biden administration is looking for ways to cut the pollution linked to energy.

Money and more

One way to reduce pollution is to extend the life of older nuclear plants. In 2022, the
Department of Energy awarded a plant in California $1.1 billion to stay open. It was to be
closed down starting in 2024.

Holtec believes it will need a similar amount of money to reopen Palisades. It applied for a
$1 billion loan from the U.S. government and asked Michigan for $300 million.

Kelly Trice is Holtec’s president. He said the company will need help. For example, he said
Holtec would need a utility company to buy the power from the plant. Trice did not say the
exact cost of reopening the plant.
Kraig Shultz lives about 80 kilometers from the plant. He thought he did not have to worry
about an accident any longer.

He likes being close to the lake and enjoying nature. So, he is worried that an accident
would make him move his family away from a place he loves.

Shultz said: “We’re playing a losing game when we keep running something until it fails.”

I’m Jill Robbins. And I’m Dan Friedell.

6. Will changing offices to housing help the US Market

Officials in many American cities say they want companies to turn empty office buildings into
housing.

These housing plans, known as office-to-housing conversions, can help downtown business
areas that became empty as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Some policy makers consider conversions a way to increase the supply of less costly, or
affordable, housing. Critics doubt the positive effects of these changes.

The push to change office buildings to housing

In the fall of 2022, the Congressional Research Services, or CRS, released a report. The
report noted that housing costs in the United States have become a big issue. That is
because housing prices are high, housing supplies are limited, and mortgage interest rates
are rising.

The report noted that there have been some increases in new house building activities. But
problems related to rising building costs and the availability of labor and materials remain.

At the same time, vacancy rates at downtown office buildings continue to rise. Vacancy rates
show how much unused office space there is. The real estate business CBRE said the
vacancy rate was 12.2 percent in the last three months of 2019. The number increased to
17.8 percent in the first three months of 2023. Some places with the lowest use of office
space include San Francisco with a vacancy rate of 29.4 percent, Houston at 23.6 percent,
Philadelphia at 21.7 percent and Washington, D.C. at 20.3 percent.

As a result of limited housing supply and the increasing number of empty office buildings, a
number of cities are offering lower taxes for building developers. These tax breaks aim to
increase office-to-housing conversions. One requirement is that a set percentage of
apartments are offered at below-market prices.

In January, Pittsburgh announced it was accepting ideas to produce more affordable

housing through the “conversion of...underutilized office space.” Underutilized means that
the space is not being used.

In October, Boston released a plan aimed at improving downtown. The plan included a push
for more housing, some of which would come from office conversions.
And Seattle in Washington state launched a competition in April for downtown building
owners and design companies to come up with conversion ideas.

In Washington DC, Mayor Muriel Bowser wants office-to-housing conversions to help

repopulate the downtown area. Her plan, announced earlier this year, seeks to add 15,000
new residents downtown, adding to the approximately 25,000 who already live here.

“We’re not going to have as many workers downtown as we had before the pandemic,”
Bowser said earlier this year. “Our job is to make sure that we are getting more people
downtown.

7. Finnish Paper Uses Video Game to Avoid Russia’s Press Restrictions

Finland's largest daily newspaper, Helsingin Sanomat, marked World Press Freedom Day
on May 3 by using a popular online video game to get around Russian media restrictions.

Editor-in-chief Antero Mukka said the paper has hidden stories about Russia's war in
Ukraine in the game Counter-Strike. The game is popular worldwide and among young
Russian men.

Russia has restricted independent news sources in the country since its invasion of Ukraine.
Since last year, the government has banned free reporting and blocked Russians from
getting independent media content produced in other countries.

In answer to laws restricting press freedom in Russia, Helsingin Sanomat began publishing
some of its Ukraine and Russia-related news in Russian last year. But Russia quickly
restricted the content.

Mukka told Reuters reporters, "…We decided that maybe it's possible to find some new
channels to provide Russian audience with some reliable, independent journalism for
example about the situations in Ukraine.”

So they turned to Counter-Strike. The game was released in 2012 by U.S.-based private
game maker Valve Corporation. It ranks among the world's top 10 most popular computer
games, data from the research firm Newzoo shows.

The newspaper built a map of an unspecified war-torn Slavic city and named it “de_voyna.”
The word “voyna” in Russian means war. The term is banned in Russia as a description of
the conflict in Ukraine. The Russian government instead calls the war a “special military
operation.”

The map hides a secret room where the paper keeps images and stories of the cruelties
witnessed by its reporters and photographers in Ukraine.

Mukka said the Finnish newspaper did not seek Valve's permission to add its content to the
game. Counter-Strike lets users create and add their own content to its platform.
Mukka said, "If some young men in Russia, just because of this game, happen to think for a
couple of seconds what is going on in Ukraine then it's worth it.”

I'm Ashley Thompson.

8. Three Jailed Iranian Female Journalists Win United Nations Prize

The United Nations announced on Tuesday that its prize for press freedom has been
awarded to three imprisoned Iranian female journalists “for their commitment to truth and
accountability.”

The winners are Niloufar Hamedi, Elaheh Mohammadi and Narges Mohammadi.

Hamedi and Elaheh Mohammadi covered the story of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old woman
who died while being held by Iran’s morality police last September. She had been accused
of wearing her head covering too loosely.

Hamedi broke the news of Amini’s death and Elaheh Mohammadi wrote about her funeral.
Both women were arrested for their reporting work.

The news of Amini’s death led to months of protests in many cities across Iran. One of the
media professionals who chose the winners, Zainab Salbi, said the brave work of the
winners “led to a historical women-led revolution.”

The third prize winner, Narges Mohammadi, has worked for many years as a journalist and
is one of Iran’s most well-known activists. She has won numerous international awards for
her activism against the death penalty in Iran. She has been repeatedly detained and
imprisoned for her work. The UN’s cultural organization, UNESCO, says Mohammadi is
currently serving a 16-year prison term in Iran’s Evin Prison.

Audrey Azoulay is the director-general of UNESCO. At an award ceremony in New York on

Tuesday, Azoulay said: “Now more than ever, it is important to pay tribute to all women
journalists who are prevented from doing their jobs and who face threats and attacks on their
personal safety.”

The prize is officially known as the UNESCO/Guillermo Cano World Press Freedom Prize. It
is named for Guillermo Cano, a Colombian journalist who was killed in front of his
newspaper’s office in 1986.

The prize is given each year on May 3, World Press Freedom Day.

I’m Dan Friedell.

9. Iran Closing Businesses Not Following Hijab Law

Iranian officials have been shutting down businesses that they say violate the law requiring
women to wear head covers called hijabs.
Ali Akbar Javidan is the police commander of Kermanshah Province. He said the Public
Places Supervision Department, along with other agencies, has begun enforcing “the
chastity and hijab plan."

Javidan said 45 businesses were closed after ignoring warnings to follow the hijab law.

Iran recently launched a new surveillance program for enforcing that law.

Many women in Iran have publicly opposed the law since the death last September of
Mahsa Amini. The 22-year-old Kurdish woman died while in police detention. She had been
arrested for not wearing the head cover. Her death led to nationwide protests.

Security forces violently suppressed the demonstrations. A report by the Human Rights
Activists News Agency in early January found that 516 protesters have been killed, including
70 children.

The U.S.-based group said about 19,200 people also were arrested, including almost 700
students.

Homayoun Katouzian is an Iranian studies professor at Oxford University. He criticized Iran's

law requiring the hijab in an interview with VOA.

"When prayer and fasting are not compulsory, and there is no crime for not doing them, why
should the hijab be compulsory?"

Iranian Interior Minister Ahmad Vahidi has threatened those who do not follow the law with
"deprivation of public services." The minister formerly served as commander of Iran's Islamic
Revolutionary Guard Corps.

I’m Caty Weaver.

Dan Novak adapted this story for VOA Learning English based on reporting by the VOA
Persian Service.

10. Texas Town Considers Closing Library to Ban Some Books

The American Library Association (ALA) reported in March that attempts to ban books in
libraries and schools in the United States set a record last year.

The group said there were 1,269 attempts to “censor library books and resources in 2022.”
That is almost double the number of attempts from the year before. And it is the highest
number reached in more than 20 years.

The ALA reported that a record 2,571 books were targeted. The large majority of those
books were written by or about members of the LGBTQIA+ community and people of color,
the report says.
Deborah Caldwell-Stone is head of the ALA’s Office for Intellectual Freedom. She said, "The
choice of what to read must be left to the reader or, in the case of children, to parents. That
choice does not belong to self-appointed book police.”

But conservative lawmakers and supporters say they want to ban some books to protect
children from harmful materials.

A new law in the midwestern state of Missouri has resulted in several books being removed
from libraries. In the state of Florida, lawmakers recently passed three new laws related to
controlling reading material.

In the northwestern state of Idaho, Republican lawmakers have proposed legislation that
would ban public libraries from holding material judged harmful to minors.

And one town in the state of Texas is considering going a step further — closing the public
library.

'A book's never hurt anybody'

Llano is a rural town 120 kilometers from Austin, the state capital. There, officials proposed
closing the library system after a federal judge ruled against the local lawmakers' decision to
remove some books.

"A book's never hurt anybody," said J.R. Decker, who noted that his family has lived in Llano
for generations. "My government's telling me the only thing they can protect my child from is
books. They should be worried about gun violence and school safety."

Decker was among the people who protested at a recent meeting regarding the attempt to
close the library.

Among those who spoke was Suzette Baker, a former Llano County librarian who says she
was fired after refusing to remove some books.

"I would like to know how the 'History of the KKK' is pornographic? 'How to be an Anti-
Racist,' how is that pornographic? It's not," Baker said at the hearing.

"This is not about taking away rights. This is not a communist nation. This is not a Nazi
nation. You do not get to pick our reading material, it is ours."

Book-ban supporter Rhonda Schneider defended the effort. She listed a number of books in
the Llano library that she said contain graphic sexuality.

"It is not a safe space for kids,” Schneider argued.

Emmett McPherson did not get called to speak at the hearing. But he said he agreed that the
library’s books are unsafe for children. "I am willing to close the whole library to keep them
out of my children's hands," he said.
Shirley Robinson leads the Texas Library Association. She said while some of the books
cited at the meeting may be objectionable to some, they are not pornographic.

"So first of all, there is a legal definition of pornography," said Robinson. "And there are
never any materials in any library — school, public or academic — that would meet that legal
definition of pornography."

Texas book ban efforts

Robinson said attempts to ban some books in Texas began in 2021. A lawmaker contacted
libraries asking if they had any books among a list of nearly 850 titles. Many of the titles were
LGBTQ-related or were written by or about people of color, she added.

Robinson said there are 40 proposed bills relating to libraries in the state legislature at the
moment. Some of the bills open the possibility of criminal charges against librarians.

"Librarians are leaving the profession because there is this threat of potential criminal
prosecution or just harassment within their communities," Robinson said.

One librarian who quit is Lee Glover, who was an elementary school librarian in the Houston,
Texas, area.

She said there was a process in place to follow before she could put a book into the library.
"But now they want me to have parents come and review them before I order them?"

The students are the losers in the book-banning battle, Glover added. "We are the lifeline for
so many kids.”

For now, the Llano County library system remains open. At its recent meeting, county
leaders voted to delay the decision while they appeal the federal order to return the books to
the local library. That decision is expected in autumn.

I'm Caty Weaver.