7,000 Santa Clauses ran for the health of young people in Madrid
On Sunday, over 7,000 Spaniards dressed as Santa ran through snow cannons and Christmas decorations in Madrid's annual Santa Run, reports the TV channel Tele Madrid.
The four-kilometer run was organized to raise money for the Red Cross's project to reduce isolation and exclusion among young people.
- I have been training for a few months to get in shape, says participant Alberto Salas according to SVT Nyheter.
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Christmas celebrators in North Korea can be punished with labor camps
Christian American activists have dumped rice bottle mail and USB sticks with Bibles and Christmas carols into the Yellow Sea with the hope that they will reach North Korea, reports Fox News.
- We must do everything we can to get information into North Korea, says Suzanne Scholte, head of the North Korean Freedom Coalition.
It is not clear in the article how the organization views the risks to the intended recipients – Christmas celebrations and other expressions of religion are prohibited in the totalitarian one-party state. They can be punished with prison or labor camps, according to reports from the media and human rights organizations.
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Ukraine moves Christmas as part of resistance: "Far, far away from Moscow"
As a protest against the Russian invasion, this year Ukrainians officially celebrate Christmas on December 25 - instead of January 7 according to the tradition of the Russian Orthodox Church.
Olena, whose son is a doctor on the front line, tells AFP that the new tradition is a mark of "free Ukraine".
- We really believe in celebrating with the rest of the world, far, far away from Moscow, she says.
Already last Christmas, many Ukrainians chose to depart from the January 7 tradition, and in July Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy signed a new law that moved the Christmas celebration to December 25.
The Christmas economy
WSJ: Christmas miracle - inflation cools faster than expected
Maybe it's a Christmas miracle, but inflation seems to be slowing much faster than expected in large parts of the world, writes the Wall Street Journal.
Goldman Sachs economists predict that global inflation will normalize by the end of 2024, breaking the trend of high inflation that prevailed for the past three years.
Core inflation in the US, Europe and several emerging markets is then expected to be in line with the central banks' two percent target. It will both strengthen households' purchasing power and enable the central banks' interest rate cuts, according to the WSJ.
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