Selected News Items For Dec 22 – 28

This thread is for the busy bees at S&L to post news items themselves.

In order to make the articles as readable as possible, please try to stick to the format described in the first of these weekly editions here.

Of course articles that fit under the topic of a recent thread should be posted there. As always, remember to excerpt heavily and to provide a link to the original source.

(By the way, the flower in the photo is a Christmas Rose.)