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Pele is eternal: Brazil says a final goodbye to the soccer legend

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Eva Deschamps / January 3, 2023

 


President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva will be one of the last to pay tribute to Pele on Tuesday as the whole of Brazil prepares to say a final farewell to the soccer legend who will be buried later today.

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Lula, who took office on Sunday, is expected in the city of Santos, in the southeast of the country, to “pay tribute to Pele and in solidarity with his family” at 09:00 local time (12:00 GMT), one hour before the end of the funeral vigil started 24 hours earlier.

 

Pele and in solidarity with his family” at 09H00 local, one hour before the end of the funeral vigil begun 24 hours earlier.

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Then the funeral procession will cross Santos and will pass in particular in front of the house of the mother of Pelé, Celeste Arantes. She is 100 years old but has cognitive problems and is not aware of her son’s death.

 

Pele’s remains will then be taken to his final resting place, a specially erected mausoleum in a cemetery, for a Catholic rite ceremony in strict family privacy.

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On Monday, thousands of fans and soccer dignitaries, including FIFA President Gianni Infantino, gathered in front of Pele’s black coffin set up in the center of the FC Santos stadium, the club where he played from 1956 to 1974.

 

“Pele is eternal. He is a global soccer icon,” Infantino said Monday, noting that soccer’s governing body would ask all member countries to name a stadium after Pele.

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Antonio Carlos Pereira da Silva, a 36-year-old artist, said he arrived at midnight to be among the first to walk past the open casket covered with a tulle veil where the man many consider the greatest footballer in history, the only one to have won the World Cup three times in 1958, 1962 and 1970, lies.

 

“If I said I didn’t cry when he died, I would be lying,” he told AFP. “Pele taught us so many things. Not only in Brazil, but in the whole world.

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Tributes have poured in from around the world since his death, with the biggest names in soccer, both current and former, hailing his genius for the “beautiful game.”

 

Inside the stadium, fans of Pele advanced all day Monday slowly and quietly to the large white canopy where the coffin is displayed.

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Arriving early, Pele’s third wife, Marcia Cibela Aoki, dressed in black and in tears, placed her hand on the head of the footballer she married in 2016. Three of Pele’s six surviving children were present.

 

She also placed a rosary in his coffin draped with the flags of FC Santos and Brazil.

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Relatives paid an emotional tribute to her, holding hands around her coffin in prayer.

 

Dozens of wreaths, sent by soccer personalities like Paris SG star Neymar or foreign clubs like Real Madrid, were placed around the coffin.

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He “inspired all generations, he was always a reference”, said the father of Neymar, the current number 10 of the Seleçao retained in Paris, who equaled the number of goals of Pele in the national team (77) during the recent World Cup in Qatar.

 

In the 16,000-seat Vila Belmiro stadium, three giant banners placed in the stands show Pele’s back with his famous number 10 shirt, and two others with the inscription “Long live the king” and “Pele 82 years ».

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Edson Arantes do Nascimento, known as Pele, spent a month in Albert Einstein Hospital in Sao Paulo until his death on Thursday at 82 years old from kidney and heart failure, bronchopneumonia and adenocarcinoma of the colon, according to the death certificate published by local media.

 

Until the end he remained active on social networks, encouraging Brazil from his hospital bed during the World Cup in Qatar, consoling the seleçao after its defeat in the quarterfinals, three weeks before his death.

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At least 63 employees of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees killed in Gaza

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At least 63 employees of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees killed in Gaza, Magnate Daily
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Eva Deschamps / October 31, 2023

Since the start of the war between Israel and Hamas on October 7, 63 employees of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) have already lost their lives in the Gaza Strip. Ten aid workers have been killed in the last 72 hours, according to this new toll released by the agency on its website on Monday.
 
At least 22 UNRWA staff were also injured. Since October 7, 44 UNRWA facilities have also been destroyed. Of its 22 health centers, only nine are still operational, the UN agency said, warning that the provision of health care is made even more difficult by the very low fuel supply.
 
The UN agency had previously reported that several of its warehouses had been looted. “Due to the very limited aid available and overcrowded shelters, growing tensions are being reported within the displaced communities,” it stressed. Some 672,000 refugees are living in 149 UNRWA facilities across the Gaza Strip, “in increasingly difficult conditions”. “The ability to provide vital assistance was further hampered by the 36-hour communications blackout between October 27 and 29”, UNRWA added.
 
In all, an estimated 1.4 million people have been displaced in the Gaza Strip. Over 120,000 of them have taken refuge in public buildings such as hospitals and schools.
 
“The aid currently available is insufficient to meet the most basic needs of displaced people and the communities hosting them”, warns the UN agency.
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Mouse embryos grown in space for the first time

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Mouse embryos grown in space for the first time, Magnate Daily
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Sylvie Claire / October 31, 2023

This research into mammal reproduction in space could prove crucial for future solar system exploration missions.
 
Mouse embryos were grown on board the International Space Station (ISS) and developed normally, according to a Japanese study published in the scientific journal “iScience” on Saturday, October 28.
 
This is “the very first study to show that mammals might be able to thrive in space”, claim Yamanashi University and the Riken National Research Institute.
 
The researchers, including Teruhiko Wakayama, a professor at Yamanashi University’s Center for Advanced Biotechnology, and a team from the Japanese space agency Jaxa, sent frozen mouse embryos aboard a rocket to the ISS in August 2021. The astronauts thawed the embryos at an early stage, using a specially designed device, and cultured them on board the station for four days.
 
The experiment “clearly demonstrated that gravity had no significant effect”, noted the researchers. After analyzing the blastocysts (cells that develop into fetuses and placentas) that were returned to their laboratories on Earth, they observed no particular changes in the state of DNA and genes.
 
“In the future, it will be necessary to transplant blastocysts grown in microgravity on the ISS into mice to see if the mice can give birth,” in order to confirm that the blastocysts are normal, say Yamanashi University and the Riken Institute.
 
This research could prove crucial for future space exploration and colonization missions. As part of its Artemis program, NASA plans to send humans back to the Moon to learn how to live there in the long term, and to prepare for a trip to Mars in the late 2030s.

 

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Bobi, the world’s oldest dog, died aged 31

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Bobi, the world&#8217;s oldest dog, died aged 31, Magnate Daily
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Steph Deschamps / October 25, 2023

The world’s oldest dog died last weekend in Portugal. Bobi, a purebred Rafeiro de l’Alentejo, was 31 years and 165 days old, reports the British public broadcaster BBC on Monday.
 
Last February, Bobi entered the Guinness Book of Records as not only the oldest living dog, but also the oldest dog of all time.
 
The old record had been held for almost 100 years by Bluey from Australia. He died in 1939 at the age of 29 years and five months.
Bobi has spent his entire life with the Costa family in the village of Conqueiros, near the west coast of Portugal.
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