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Analysis by Shastri Ramachandaran

The question is no longer whether China can broker peace in Ukraine. More pertinent would be to ask what will follow the Xi-Zelensky talk now that Xi has emerged at the top of the list of prospective peacemakers in Ukraine.

NEW DELHI, 28 April 2023 (IDN) Chinese President Xi Jinpings long and meaningful telephone conversation with President Volodymyr Zelensky in Kyiv on 26 April has set the cat among the pigeons in the U.S.-led West that is fighting a proxy war against Russia in Ukraine.

The question is no longer whether China can broker peace in Ukraine. More pertinent would be to ask what will follow the Xi-Zelensky talk now that Xi has emerged at the top of the list of prospective peacemakers in Ukraine.

Just months ago, few would have seen China as a peace broker between Ukraine and Russia. But after China brought together Saudi Arabia and Iran in Beijing and set the two West Asian powers on the path to normalising their relations, there can be no doubt that China is serious. Xi appears to have a plan, if not a solution, for at least cessation of hostilities if not peace.

Soon after Xis two-day state visit to Moscow last monthduring which he referred to Russian President Vladimir Putin as his dear friend and proposed a general, if not vague, 12-point peace planZelensky invited him to Kyiv for talks. He pointed out that the two had made no contact after the war began in February 2022, although they had been in touch before.

Neither needed to mention that China is Ukraines largest trading partner and has vital economic interests to protect that country. China has also heavily invested in major transport infrastructure projects in Ukraine. These are long-term interests and call for a long-term perspective, which may explain Xis readiness to work towards building strategic ties with Ukraine. And, what better way to do it than as a peace broker at this critical juncture?

Given the growing distrust between Kyiv and Washington and also between the U.S. and its leading allies in Europe, as exposed by the recently leaked Pentagon documents, Zelensky decided to bite the bullet and woo the Chinese president. He had good reasons to, for China proclaimed itself to be firmly on the side of peace, although it had not condemned Russias war in Ukraine. While Xi flaunted his bonds with Putin, he made it known that he was neutral on the Russian military operation in Ukraine.

When Xi said that Kyiv should seize the opportunity and build up favourable conditions for the political settlement, it was, doubtless, a reference to the growing distrust between Ukraine and the U.S.

Substantively, in his talk with Zelensky, Xi reiterated Beijings long-standing position that mutual respect for sovereignty and territorial integrity is the political foundation of China-Ukraine relations. On the Ukraine war, Xi impressed on Zelensky that Chinas core stance is to facilitate talks for peace, as per the 12-point plan set out on February 24. He also made it clear that Beijing would be proactive in pressing for dialogue and negotiation as the only way forward.

Xi proposed that China will make its efforts for an early ceasefire and restoration of peace. Of course, few expect this to happen in the near term. But the fact that China will send a Special Representative on Eurasian Affairs to Ukraine and other countries for in-depth exchanges with all parties on the political settlement of the Ukraine crisis is a clear signal of Xis earnestness.

Taller European leaders such as Frances Emmanuel Macron and Germanys Olaf Scholz may be inclined to support the Chinese initiative, given their explicit aversion to being trapped in the bloc-versus-bloc politics of the U.S.

Note: The author is an Editorial Consultant at WION TV and a Senior Editorial Consultant at IDN-INPS. This story first appeared as Spotlight in WION and is being reproduced with the author's permission. [IDN-InDepthNews]

Image (Left-right): Chinese President Xi Jinping (Xinhua) and President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine (Wikipedia). Collage by IDN-INPS.

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What After Xi Jinpings Overture to Zelensky? - IDN InDepthNews | Analysis That Matters

A new study rejecting research suggestions that Wikipedia content shapes the judgments of Irish High Court judges has been welcomed by the President of the High Court.

Mr Justice David Barniville said those with practical knowledge of judicial decision-making will know that the claim that judges rely on Wikipedia in preparing their judgments in any material way is plainly wrong.

I welcome this detailed analysis which confirms that such claims are wholly inaccurate.

However, Dr Brian Flanagan, the lead author of the disputed research said it was robust and he rejected the claim that his methodology was flawed.

High Court judges in Ireland have repeatedly maintained that submissions from lawyers, not internet searches by judges or their assistants, primarily drive citations in judgments.

Mr Justice David Barniville. Photograph: Dara Mac Dnaill

Compiled by a High Court judge, Mr Justice Richard Humphreys, and a team of serving and former judicial assistants, the new study disputes findings of research by academics at Maynooth University (MU) and two US third level institutions.

The original research paper, published last summer, arose after researchers arranged for 150 new Wikipedia legal articles on Irish Supreme Court decisions to be written by law students. Half were placed online and the rest were kept offline and treated as the control group.

The researchers looked at two measures whether the cases on Wikipedia were more likely to be cited as precedents by subsequent judicial decisions, and whether the argumentation in court judgments echoed the linguistic content of the new Wikipedia pages.

Their key finding was that getting a Wikipedia article increased a cases citations by more than 20 per cent.

When an amended version of the paper was published earlier this year, Dr Flanagan, associate professor of the school of law and criminology at MU and lead author of the research, rejected Mr Justice Humphreys assertion of a watering down of its main findings.

In a press release on Tuesday announcing the new study, Mr Justice Humphreys said there were fundamental problems with the original research paper which render its conclusions unreliable.

[Wikipedia articles 20% more likely to influence legal reasoning of Irish judges, scientists find]

Those problems lay both with a flawed experiment and with flawed speculation, which seemed to derive from a simple lack of knowledge regarding the practical process of judgment production, as to the meaning of the results.

He did not at all believe there was bad faith by the original authors but it was important that public trust in our legal system is not undermined by poor research, he said.

The new study, he outlined, compared citations of cases over a two-year period before Wikipedia articles were created with a two-year period thereafter.

That showed citations in judgments changed by exactly the same amount in respect of cases where articles had been created on Wikipedia as applied where no articles had been created, he said.

The evidence supports the conclusion that there is simply no Wikipedia effect whatsoever.

The study tracked the origin of case citations in a representative group of judgments, and found a large majority of citations arose from written or oral submissions, or materials referred to in such submissions. In virtually all the judgments studied, there was objective evidence for a source of the case citation which had nothing to do with Wikipedia.

[Judges and academics in fresh row over research claiming Wikipedia used for judgments]

The study sets out a detailed critique of the original paper, including concerning the use of distant historic citations which is alleged to undermine its reliability. It describes as problematic the use of a commercial website to obtain citation information rather than the official courts site. The methodology implied by the published data implies it was originally intended to consult the official website but no data on this has been published, it states.

Claims that the conclusions in the original paper had not changed were described as lacking credibility.

The study claims the original papers speculations are exaggerated and not supported by the evidence and that its conclusions are inappropriately moralising.

In a statement reacting to the Humphreys study, Dr Flanagan disputed the methodology used in the research was flawed.

He said the study claims the research methodology was flawed in two respects in particular that commercial data was used instead of the courts own records and that too long a period of citations before the Wikipedia articles was used and that this determined the results.

In fact, our analysis is robust to both these critiques, he said. The commercial data used for the analysis was cross-checked against the courts own records and the researchers found only small differences that didnt change our conclusions.

From the analysis, it was plain to see the treatment (Wikipedia) articles jump in citations immediately after being added to Wikipedia, and this jump is notably different to any period in the two years beforehand, he said.

While we disagree with these headline points from this paper, we also understand that the authors have gathered additional data on the citation context from judgments and we welcome that discussion, Dr Flanagan said.

A summary version of the Humphreys paper was published on Tuesday in the Irish Law Times and the full paper has been submitted, by invitation, to the Cambridge Handbook of Experimental Jurisprudence. The full paper is available online at papers.ssrn.com as is the research paper.

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New study rejects research suggestions that Wikipedia content shapes High Court judgments - The Irish Times

As the world prepares to mark Yom ha-Shoah on Monday night, April 17, thousands of Jewish visitors have descended on Poland for the annual March of the Living. On Tuesday morning, more than 150 Canadian students and adultsincluding seven Holocaust survivorswill be taking part in the large silent march between Auschwitz and Birkenau death camps near Krakow.

The commemoration comes amidst a heated debate over the way the Polish government wants its own version of Holocaust history told. Since 2018, a new law has made it illegal for researchers and academics to say that Poles were collaborators with the Nazis, or that they helped hunt down, round up and murder the countrys three million Jews.

According to criticsincluding Ottawa history professor Jan GrabowksiPolands new feel-good narrative downplays its wartime responsibility in favour of a nationalistic fable that portrays Poles as victims who even helped the Jews.

Grabowski joins The CJN Daily to explain his latest battleground against Holocaust distortion: one thats now taking place on Wikipedia.

What we talked about

Credits

The CJN Dailyis written and hosted by Ellin Bessner (@ebessner on Twitter). Zachary Kauffman is the producer. Michael Fraiman is the executive producer. Our theme music is byDov Beck-Levine. Our title sponsor isMetropia. Were a member ofThe CJN Podcast Network. To subscribe to this podcast, please watch this video. Donate to The CJN and receive a charitable tax receipt by clicking here.

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The Wikipedia fight over Poland's role in the Holocaust sparks death threats against an Ottawa professor - The Canadian Jewish News

Rick Bowmer-Pool // Getty Images

Gwyneth Paltrow entering a courtroom in a blue velvet blazer.

In Tinseltown, nothing beats the Academy Awardsand data from last month proves it.

When its time to catch up on whats happening in the world of the rich and famous, Wikipedias at the top of the fold on the first page of the Google search result. Wikipedia personal life entries also serve as a great entry to celebrity rabbit holes. According to the data, the Oscars dominated the spotlight in March, as four of the five most popular celebrities on the internets favorite website last month came away from the Academy Awards with smiles on their faces.

Besides Hollywoods biggest awards show, television shows The Last of Us and The Mandalorian helped propel a couple of celebs to high on the leaderboard. Big movie releases, namely John Wick: Chapter 4 and Scream VI, also played starring roles in the make-up of Marchs top 20 newsworthy celebrities.

In terms of biggest movers from February to March, comedian Chris Rocks pageviews shot up 1076% in March, thanks in part to his recently released comedy specialalthough it also being the one-year anniversary of the Will Smith slap incident certainly helps too. Ke Huy Quan, who won Best Supporting Actor at the Oscars, also saw huge gains last month; the Everything Everywhere All at Once stars pageviews increased 712% month over month.

Last months chart-topper, Rihanna, rode the Super Bowl halftime show to 5.3 million pageviews in February, but that boost proved to be fleeting. Her Wikipedia pageviews dropped 87% month over month, tumbling her down 40 spots to #41 in March.

So who took the crown from Rihanna in March? Stacker used pageview data from Wikipedia to rank the top 20 newsworthy celebrities in March. Keep on reading to find out.

You may also like: Can you guess which women actors these real Jeopardy! clues are about?

Joe Scarnici/Getty Images for Ralph Lauren // Getty Images

Michael B. Jordan in a black suit.

Wikipedia pageviews in March: 1.0 million Wikipedia pageviews in February: 649,649 Month-over-month change: 57% Trending topic: Starred in Creed III, which premiered in theaters on March 3

Samir Hussein/WireImage // Getty Images

Tom Cruise in a blue suit jacket and white shirt.

Wikipedia pageviews in March: 1.1 million Wikipedia pageviews in February: 857,717 Month-over-month change: 23% Trending topic: Report came out claiming that he has no part in the life of his 16-year-old daughter Suri

Rachpoot/Bauer-Griffin/GC Images // Getty Images

Hailey Bieber in dark clothing and a black leather jacket.

Wikipedia pageviews in March: 1.1 million Wikipedia pageviews in February: 453,643 Month-over-month change: 143% Trending topic: Involved in social media drama with Selena Gomez

Joe Maher // Getty Images

Sarah Shahi in a white strapless gown.

Wikipedia pageviews in March: 1.1 million Wikipedia pageviews in February: 203,432 Month-over-month change: 457% Trending topic: Starred in Sex/Life, which released its second (and final) season on Netflix on March 2; shes also announced to star and produce the Judgement pilot for ABC

SUZANNE CORDEIRO/AFP // Getty Images

Taylor Swift in a sparkly costume onstage with a pink background.

Wikipedia pageviews in March: 1.1 million Wikipedia pageviews in February: 833,493 Month-over-month change: 37% Trending topic: Latest tour, the Eras Tour, began on March 17, marking the start of her first tour in five years

You may also like: The richest rock stars

Joseph Okpako/WireImage // Getty Images

Justin Bieber performing shirtless onstage.

Wikipedia pageviews in March: 1.1 million Wikipedia pageviews in February: 392,862 Month-over-month change: 192% Trending topic: Revealed he was diagnosed with Ramsay Hunt syndrome, a virus that has left his face partially paralyzed

Mike Marsland/WireImage // Getty Images

Sylvester Stallone in a dark blue suit.

Wikipedia pageviews in March: 1.2 million Wikipedia pageviews in February: 792,131 Month-over-month change: 54% Trending topic: The Rocky franchises Creed III premiered in theaters on March 3, although he did not appear in the movie

Cindy Ord // Getty Images

Selena Gomez in a black strapless top and pants.

Wikipedia pageviews in March: 1.2 million Wikipedia pageviews in February: 626,735 Month-over-month change: 98% Trending topic: Reached 400 million followers on Instagram

Rick Bowmer-Pool // Getty Images

Gwyneth Paltrow in a black suit.

Wikipedia pageviews in March: 1.3 million Wikipedia pageviews in February: 260,788 Month-over-month change: 403% Trending topic: Won a court case over her 2016 ski collision

Lia Toby // Getty Images

Jonathan Majors in a black suit onstage.

Wikipedia pageviews in March: 1.4 million Wikipedia pageviews in February: 818,600 Month-over-month change: 70% Trending topic: Arrested on assault charges on March 26

You may also like: Celebrity stage names vs. their real names

Neilson Barnard // Getty Images

Chris Rock in a blue velvet suit on stage.

Wikipedia pageviews in March: 1.4 million Wikipedia pageviews in February: 119,348 Month-over-month change: 1076% Trending topic: His comedy special Chris Rock: Selective Outrage released on Netflix on March 4; the Academy Awards marked the first anniversary of the Will Smith slapping incident

Rich Fury // Getty Images

Bruce Willis in a black suit and bowtie.

Wikipedia pageviews in March: 1.5 million Wikipedia pageviews in February: 1.5 million Month-over-month change: 1% Trending topic: Turned 68 on March 19

Dominik Bindl/FilmMagic // Getty Images

Jenna Ortega in a white plunging strapless dress.

Wikipedia pageviews in March: 1.8 million Wikipedia pageviews in February: 1.1 million Month-over-month change: 68% Trending topic: Starred in Scream VI, which premiered in theaters on March 10

Axelle/Bauer-Griffin/FilmMagic // Getty Images

Keanu Reeves in a black suit.

Wikipedia pageviews in March: 1.9 million Wikipedia pageviews in February: 616,067 Month-over-month change: 203% Trending topic: Starred in John Wick: Chapter 4, which premiered in theaters on March 24

Axelle/Bauer-Griffin/FilmMagic // Getty Images

Bella Ramsey in a pale pink suit.

Wikipedia pageviews in March: 2.1 million Wikipedia pageviews in February: 2.4 million Month-over-month change: -9% Trending topic: Stars on HBOs The Last of Us, which aired its first season finale in March

You may also like: Freddie Mercury: The life story you may not know

Rodin Eckenroth // Getty Images

Jamie Lee Curtis in a sparkly gown posing with an Academy Award.

Wikipedia pageviews in March: 2.5 million Wikipedia pageviews in February: 487,087 Month-over-month change: 416% Trending topic: Won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress

Jeff Kravitz/FilmMagic // Getty Images

Ke Huy Quan in a black suit smiling with an Academy Award.

Wikipedia pageviews in March: 3.0 million Wikipedia pageviews in February: 373,887 Month-over-month change: 712% Trending topic: Won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor

David Livingston/WireImage // Getty Images

Pedro Pascal in glasses and a brown cardigan.

Wikipedia pageviews in March: 3.2 million Wikipedia pageviews in February: 3.4 million Month-over-month change: -6% Trending topic: Stars on TV series The Mandalorian, which had its third season premiere in March, and The Last of Us, which aired its first season finale in March

Emma McIntyre // Getty Images

Michelle Yeoh in a white strapless feather gown posing with an Academy Award.

Wikipedia pageviews in March: 3.3 million Wikipedia pageviews in February: 634,919 Month-over-month change: 415% Trending topic: Won the Academy Award for Best Actress

Alberto Rodriguez/Variety // Getty Images

Brendan Fraser in a black suit holding an Academy Award.

Wikipedia pageviews in March: 3.5 million Wikipedia pageviews in February: 871,821 Month-over-month change: 303% Trending topic: Won the Academy Award for Best Actor

You may also like: Americas 50 favorite actors who are men

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Who were March's most newsworthy celebrities, according to the ... - KTVZ

Twitter recently labeled NPR "US state-affiliated media" before changing its label to "government-funded media" amid backlash. Andrew Kelly/Reuters

Twitter relies on a Wikipedia page to help inform its decision on what news organizations' accounts get labeled as "government-funded media."

Elon Musk told as much to NPR reporter Bobby Allyn, and Twitter's Help Center page about government and state-affiliated media labels confirmed the policy.

"Government-funded media is defined as outlets where the government provides some or all of the outlet's funding and may have varying degrees of government involvement over editorial content. We may use external sources similar to this one in order to determine when this label is applied," the Twitter page says.

Twitter recently slapped a "state-affiliated media" label on NPR's Twitter account. The label is usually reserved for the likes of Russia Today, which is funded by the Russian government,andChina's Xinhua News Agency, the official state news agency of the Chinese government.

Musk reportedly later admitted adding the "state-affiliated media" label to NPR's account might have been a mistake.

"The operating principle at new Twitter is simply fair and equal treatment, so if we label non-US accounts as govt, then we should do the same for US, but it sounds like that might not be accurate here," Musk reportedly told Allen.

Twitter has since changed the label on NPR's account to say "government-funded media."

NPR's website says, on average, less than 1% of its annual operating budget comes from federal agencies and departments and grants from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which wascreated byCongress's Public Broadcasting Act of 1967.

When told that the government doesn't have influence over NPR's editorial decisions, Musk said, "If you really think that the government has no influence on the entity they're funding then you've been marinating in the Kool-Aid for too long," according to Allyn.

NPR did not immediately respond to a request for comment. When contacted for comment, Twitter replied with an automated message that did not address the question.

In a statement previously shared with Insider about Twitter's initial "state-affiliated media" label on the organization's account, NPR President and CEO John Lansing said, "NPR and our Member stations are supported by millions of listeners who depend on us for the independent, fact-based journalism we provide. NPR stands for freedom of speech and holding the powerful accountable. It is unacceptable for Twitter to label us this way. A vigorous, vibrant free press is essential to the health of our democracy."

NPR spokesperson Isabel Lara said the organization will not resume tweeting until its label is removed, as any tweets posted in the interim would carry a "false disclaimer."

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Twitter using Wikipedia to decide what is 'government-funded media' - Business Insider