I pushed For Press Freedom In Hong Kong. The Wall Street Journal Fired Me.

2019 Hong Kong Protests (Wikipedia)

BY SELENA CHENG

After 2019, as China tightened its grip on Hong Kong and mass protests gripped the city, police raided the Apple Daily and Stand News newsrooms and prosecuted their top editors with national security crimes. Several smaller media outlets shut down rather than risk similar treatment.

It was the beginning of a chill for journalists.

First as a local news reporter, and later at the Wall Street Journal, I witnessed the trials and sentencing of almost twenty journalists, citizen reporters, editors, and commentators.

Daily life for the remaining reporters fell into a new rhythm. Slow. Careful. Some reporters and editors from shuttered newsrooms started new media ventures, YouTube channels, and podcasts. Many steered clear of the city’s politics and focused instead on pop culture or lifestyle reporting.

Even at news publications, there were vastly fewer revelatory stories on sensitive political issues and investigations on abuses of public power. Journalists shifted uncomfortably in their seats when they heard story ideas they felt could touch a nerve in the government. I saw editors press for extra-solid sourcing in anticipation of government condemnation.

When Taiwan held a presidential election—a sensitive event in China, which covets the island—reporters murmured about how to handle sound bites and footage differently depending on whether Beijing’s preferred candidate won. (They didn’t.)

The Hong Kong Journalists Association became an important defense against the erosion of an effective press—and a frequent target for the ire of the Chinese government.

The association advocates the rights and interests of journalists—it issues a widely read annual index on the state of press freedom and works against legislation that would further erode it. It financially supports journalists who are in legal trouble. It is fifty-six years old, which makes it older than the government it so often critiques (which was formed in 1997 when the governance of Hong Kong was passed from Britain to China).

Despite the fact that members of press associations had been expelled from the country previously, the Journal wanted its reporters in Hong Kong to sign up for the HKJA—so they could be protected, and to have press cards that could help mitigate highly charged moments with police. During 2019, as other outlets followed suit, HKJA’s membership swelled.

I had been on its board for three years when, in May, I decided to run for its chair. I wanted to show reporters in the city that they could continue to report because someone was still willing to defend their rights.

Three weeks ago, my editor at the Wall Street Journal found out about my candidacy and immediately directed me to withdraw from the election. She said that the role would be incompatible with my job as a Journal reporter.

The Journal, she said, continues to report on incidents related to press freedom in the city, such as trials against the press, so having its employees advocating for press freedom publicly would create a conflict. The Journal, my supervisor said, did not want its reporters seen calling for greater freedoms—because, unlike in Western nations, it is not an established principle in Hong Kong.

Because I was the only candidate running for chair, my withdrawal would have meant that union operations were paralyzed. So when I won, I stayed on. For three weeks I existed in a kind of limbo. And then, on July 17, I was fired. The Journal told me it was restructuring. When two previous rounds of layoffs affected more than a dozen journalists and editors, I had been told my position was secure. But this round there was one layoff: me.

The Global Times, controlled by the Chinese state, said that the Journal’s decision was intended to distance it from our union, because we “wantonly defame[d]” the government.

​​My situation was not unique. I had fielded resignations from other board members who faced similar pressure from their employers. Journalists and employers who sought support from us are now understandably wary of potential backlash by association.

And I am without a job. A striking contrast sprang to mind. Over the past year the Journal rallied its entire staff to a campaign for the release of Evan Gershkovich, who was handed a sixteen-year sentence by a Russian court Friday, after a sham three-day trial and unlawful detention for more than a year.

The Journal’s staff in Hong Kong, myself included, participated in a “Run for Evan” event along Hong Kong’s harbor, which was initiated and organized by the company. The Journal also called for solidarity with Evan at the Society of Publishers in Asia Awards, held in Hong Kong.

If press groups like HKJA cease to exist, as the Chinese government—and perhaps foreign news outlets—would find convenient, there will be fewer protections for reporters doing the same job as Evan, in similar circumstances, here in Hong Kong.

Not to mention fewer communities for weary correspondents to recharge with a drink, find solace among peers, and regain the strength to keep on reporting against odds that only seem to grow steeper.

Selina Cheng is a former Wall Street Journal correspondent in Hong Kong.

READ ORIGINAL STORY HERE

Stocks Fall On Wall Street On Renewed Fears About Banks

A woman wearing a face mask looks at an electronic foreign currency exchange rates in downtown Seoul, South Korea, Wednesday, March 15, 2023. Asian stock markets rebounded Wednesday after Wall Street stabilized following sharp declines for bank stocks and U.S. inflation eased but stayed high. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man)

BY STAN CHOE

NEW YORK (AP) — Stocks are back to falling on Wall Street Wednesday as worries worsen about the strength of banks on both sides of the Atlantic.

The S&P 500 was 1.5% lower in morning trading, while markets in Europe fell more sharply as shares of Switzerland’s Credit Suisse tumbled to a record low. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 482 points, or 1.5%, at 31,672 as of 10:15 a.m. Eastern time, while the Nasdaq composite was 1.2% lower.

Credit Suisse has been fighting troubles for years, including losses it took from the 2021 collapse of investment firm Archegos Capital. Its shares in Switzerland sank more than 22% following reports that its top shareholder won’t pump more money into its investment.

Wall Street’s harsh spotlight has intensified across the banking industry recently on worries about what may crack next following the second- and third-largest bank failures in U.S. history last week. Stocks of U.S. banks tumbled again Wednesday after enjoying a brief, one-day respite on Tuesday.

The heaviest losses were focused on smaller and mid-size banks, which are seen as more at risk of having customers try to pull their money out en masse. First Republic Bank sank 7.7%, a day after soaring 27%. Huntington Bancshares dropped 5.7%

Larger banks weren’t hit as hard but still fell. JPMorgan Chase slid 3.6%.

Much of the damage is seen as the result of the Federal Reserve’s fastest barrage of hikes to interest rates in decades. The Fed has pulled its key overnight rate to a range of 4.50% to 4.75%, up from virtually zero at the start of last year, in hopes of driving down painfully high inflation.

Higher rates can tame inflation by slowing the economy, but they raise the risk of a recession later on. They also hurt prices for stocks, bonds and other investments. That latter factor was one of the issues hurting Silicon Valley Bank, which collapsed Friday, because high rates forced down the value of its bond investments.

The U.S. government announced a plan late Sunday to protect depositors at Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank, which regulators shut over the weekend, in hopes of shoring up confidence in the banking industry. But markets have since swung from fear to calm and back again.

Some of this week’s wildest action has been in the bond market, where traders are rushing to guess what all the chaos will mean for future Fed action. On one hand, stress in the financial system could push the Fed to hold off on hiking rates again at its meeting next week, or at least refrain from the larger rate hike it had been potentially signaling.

On the other hand, inflation is still high. While taking it easier on interest rates could give more breathing space to banks and the economy, the fear is such a move by the Fed could also give inflation more oxygen.

Weaker-than-expected economic reports released Wednesday may have allayed some of those worries. One showed that inflation at the wholesale level slowed by much more last month than economists expected. It’s still high at a 4.6% level versus a year earlier, but that was better than the 5.4% that was forecast.

Other data showed that U.S. spending at retailers fell by more than expected last month, though spending in prior months was revised up. Manufacturing in New York state, meanwhile, is weakening by much more than forecast. Such data could raise worries about a recession on the horizon, but they may also take some pressure off inflation in the near term.

That caused the yield on the two-year Treasury to plummet. It tends to track expectations for the Fed, and it dropped to 3.79% from 4.25% late Tuesday. That’s a massive move for the bond market. The two-year yield was above 5% just a week ago, at its highest level since 2007.

The yield on the 10-year Treasury dropped to 3.41% from 3.69%. It helps set rates for mortgages and other important loans.

The weak economic data pushed traders to build bets that the Fed may end up holding rates steady next week. That’s a sharp turnaround from earlier this month, when the only options seemed to be another hike of 0.25 percentage points or an acceleration to 0.50 points.

In Europe, indexes tumbled on weakness from banks. France’s CAC 40 dropped 3.5%, and Germany’s DAX lost 3%. The FTSE 100 in London fell 3.1%.

They followed up on gains across much of Asia.

On Wall Street, companies in the oil and gas business also tumbled as the price of crude dropped more than 3%. They led a near wipeout within the S&P 500, where 90% of the stocks fell.

Halliburton fell 8.2%, and Schlumberger dropped 5.7%

AP Business Writers Joe McDonald and Matt Ott contributed.

Africa Debt Boom May Store Up Trouble For The Future

The National Heroes Stadium in Lusaka, Zambia. The country is in talks with China about renegotiating its bilateral debts. Image: Waldo Swiegers/Bloomberg News

BY ANNA ISAAC


Cheap borrowing has fueled bond issuance, but repayment deadlines in coming years are raising concerns

African countries have loaded up on dollar debt, leading some to worry that a tightening of global financial conditions could trigger borrowing problems in coming years.

In the decade through 2019, debt levels in sub-Saharan countries excluding South Africa have risen 23 percentage points to around 50% of gross domestic product, according to the Institute of International Finance, a banking industry research group. Much of that issuance has occurred in dollar- or euro-denominated bonds issued in the past three years.

Driving the issuance: copious demand from international investors for higher-yielding debt, combined with a slide in local currencies and commodity prices that has crimped government revenues.

The oil-rich West African nation of Gabon is looking to be the latest issuer of an international bond from the region. The country is canvassing investors this week to gauge interest in a $1 billion of bonds, according to a person familiar with the sale.

“What worries me is whether or not we’ve put these countries into a new kind of debt problem,” said Elina Ribakova, deputy chief economist at the IIF.

She noted that repayments of African sovereign bonds will start to cluster in 2024. The concern is pressure will build on already heavily indebted countries, particularly if foreign investors turn sour on the region or retreat to home markets in a broad market downturn.

Countries such as Zambia are showing signs of starting to struggle, she said. For instance, Zambia’s dollar bonds due in 2027, yield more than 17%, up from around 9% when issued, according to FactSet. The country has entered into talks with China about how to renegotiate the terms of bilateral debts.

“They need supportive, calm climates in financial markets because most investors don’t know these countries,” said Ms. Ribakova.

As bond yields in developed economies have touched record lows, investor demand for higher-yield assets has risen, helping to support demand for the flood of bond issuance by countries such as Nigeria, Ivory Coast, and Angola, especially in the past few years.

“Overall, high growth and higher yields still appeal,” said Kaan Nazli, portfolio manager for emerging markets debt at Neuberger Berman.

Mr. Nazli said he had favored Ivory Coast in recent years due to its sound economic management, but was concerned about levels of public debt in Angola and Mozambique.

Sub-Saharan African bond repayments are set to peak in 2024 and 2025, at $6.6 billion and $7.4 billion, respectively, according to the IIF.

Meanwhile, among the IIF’s sixteen-country sample, collective interest costs have climbed from $1.6 billion five years ago to $4.3 billion in 2020.

Borrowing costs have been mostly steady. An S&P index of dollar-denominated debt issued by African nations shows an average yield of around 5.8%, similar to three years ago. The index’s spread over Treasurys, a measure of the risk markets assign these bonds compared with safe U.S. government debt, is around 4 percentage points, about 0.4 percentage points higher than before the bond issuance boom started in 2017.

Do you think sub-Saharan Africa can hold foreign investors’ attention? Why or why not? Join the conversation below.

However, because the debts are denominated in foreign currencies, the bonds expose the countries to foreign exchange risks. High fiscal and current-account deficits mean that countries will need to attract more investment from overseas or risk sharp depreciations in their currencies, adding to the cost of debt repayments.

Investors should be checking how the money is being used, said Jacques Nel, chief economist for South and East Africa at South Africa-based NKC African Economics.

“The most obvious way to see if this money has been spent well, is if the infrastructure is working. Are we seeing rail, roads, being completed on time?” he said, adding that the train line from Kenya’s capital Nairobi to the port of Mombasa was an example of a project that has faced revenue generation problems.

Write to Anna Isaac at anna.isaac@wsj.com


SOURCE: WSJ

Clinton's Impeachment Was Dignified

President Donald Trump greets former President Bill Clinton at the Inaugural Luncheon in January 2017. Image: Aaron P. Bernstein/Getty

BY KARL ROVE

There are always tensions between the House and the Senate, even when the same party controls both chambers. Each views the other, and its rules, procedures and attitudes, with some disdain. But the normal friction between the bodies has increased since the House began its effort to impeach President Trump.

There was intense partisan wrangling in the House during its brief Intelligence Committee hearings, the Judiciary Committee’s rapid-fire action, and the single day of floor debate on its impeachment measure. Congress is already at Defcon 2, and that could escalate. Speaker Nancy Pelosi now insists she won’t send the impeachment articles to the Senate until its majority leader, Mitch McConnell, agrees to her conditions for Mr. Trump’s trial. She’s threatening to raise the acrimony to a new level.

This is no normal back-and-forth about versions of a bill Congress is considering. Mrs. Pelosi is venturing into treacherous constitutional territory. Article I gives the House “the sole power of impeachment” and the Senate “the sole power to try all impeachments.” By attempting to prevent the process from proceeding unless Mr. McConnell acquiesces to her demands for additional witnesses and documents, Mrs. Pelosi is attempting to intrude on the Senate’s constitutional prerogatives and create a role for herself in the trial that the Founders didn’t intend.

Mrs. Pelosi presumes to be the arbiter of whether the Senate has a “fair process.” She told reporters: “So far, we haven’t seen anything that looks fair to us.” This is more than an invitation to Mr. McConnell to hear her out—it’s a demand that he clear his plans with her before proceeding. She imagines herself as Ulysses S. Grant at Fort Donelson in February 1862, and while Mr. McConnell is a Kentuckian like Simon Bolivar Buckner, his position is stronger than that of the surrounded Confederate general—strong enough to beat back Mrs. Pelosi’s demand of unconditional surrender.

Mr. McConnell, the wiliest Majority Leader since Lyndon B. Johnson in the 1950s, won’t capitulate. He occupies the high ground of precedent, saying the Senate should proceed as it did with President Clinton. The Senate adopted rules for his trial by a 100-0 vote with the support of freshman Sen. Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.), now minority leader.

Mr. McConnell is aided by the perception that Mrs. Pelosi has made Mr. Schumer look like her puppet. That’s never a good thing for any senator, even if the representative in question is the speaker.

Mrs. Pelosi’s approach is also creating more political difficulties for Democrats. The House acted hastily compared with previous impeachments, as its leaders claimed the president’s removal was urgently needed. Mrs. Pelosi herself opened the House debate on the impeachment resolution last week by calling the president “an ongoing threat to our national security.”

Suddenly, however, Mrs. Pelosi wants to hurry up and wait. She’s content to let this national security “threat” linger in the Oval Office until she gets her way. And while impeachment has spun up activists in both parties, ordinary Americans, especially swing voters who will decide the 2020 contest, appear to be losing interest. It’s not only because of the holidays. Washington is always infected with some amount of tomfoolery, but Mrs. Pelosi and the Democratic impeachment tactics have heavily taxed the tolerance of everyday Americans.

The speaker’s spin squad has worked overtime to sell her as an adroit leader. She’s made some wise moves, like replacing the hapless Jerry Nadler with the ambitious Adam Schiff as the chief Democratic inquisitor. She’s also mostly struck the right tone, saying, “This is a very sad time for our country . . . we must be somber, we must be prayerful.” However, Mrs. Pelosi’s hand has been often forced by the Democratic Party’s left-wing base, driven so much by such hatred for the president that it doesn’t care if the impeachment process is debased in the pursuit of removing him from office.

Zealotry comes at a cost. Impeachment has already overpowered the messages of the Democratic presidential campaigns as the Iowa caucuses approach. Some Democrats are now pushing the ludicrous idea that Mrs. Pelosi should hand Mr. McConnell the impeachment resolution as the president arrives at the Capitol Feb. 4 to deliver his State of the Union address.

Americans deserve a dignified conclusion to impeachment, as the Senate gave them with Mr. Clinton in 1999. Impeachment always inflicts trauma on the nation. We can accept that. What the country shouldn’t accept is a continuation of this Democrat-led circus.

Mr. Rove helped organize the political-action committee American Crossroads and is author of “The Triumph of William McKinley” (Simon & Schuster, 2015).

SOURCE: THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

A White Woman Searches for Her Black Family

Christen Jacobsen. Image: Natalie Keyssar/The Wall Street Journal

BY AMY DOCKSER MARCUS

Christine Jacobsen grew up thinking she was white. She was raised by white parents. One day, she took home a DNA test.

Ms. Jacobsen, 67, learned she has West African ancestry, which led her to the discovery that her biological father, a man she never knew, was black. She has been trying to reconcile those facts ever since.

Her journey has led to both painful and revelatory experiences—with new relatives and existing ones, especially her 31-year-old son, Alek Marfisi. He disagrees with Ms. Jacobsen’s idea that her African ancestry changes her identity from what it has always been, a white woman.

Along the way, Ms. Jacobsen acknowledges, she has stumbled. She pushed a new relative to take a DNA test, and then felt remorseful when it revealed a family secret. She bought an African head wrap and skirt and wore the ensemble to a local cultural event, intending to show affirmation and celebration of her paternal ancestry, she said. She was taken aback when her son and some of her new relatives criticized her choice.

“Race is not biology or genetics, it is your experience in this world,” Mr. Marfisi says he told his mother. “She has had no experience as someone who is black.”

Ms. Jacobsen said she feels the DNA results matter, not just her life story, which in fundamental ways was incomplete. “In my heart, I feel a connection.”

The growing popularity of consumer DNA tests has allowed millions of people to trace their ancestry and learn more about family history. It has also prompted difficult questions about one of the nation’s most fraught issues—racial identity.

Ms. Jacobsen took her first consumer DNA test in 2016. When the test revealed 22% African ancestry, it appeared to confirm a story she was told, once, when she was 16 years old.

She grew up in Queens, N.Y., the only child of parents born in Denmark who immigrated to the U.S. in 1949. Her mother, Jytte Jacobsen, was a beautician whose alcoholism eventually prevented her from working. Jack Jacobsen, her father, was a sound engineer, who worked on the Oscar-winning movie “Apocalypse Now,” among others. Her parents had other relationships, she said.

The couple went out frequently to jazz clubs and nightclubs, making a point to meet the performers after the show. The party often continued back at the Jacobsen home.

One afternoon in May 1968, when she was 16, Ms. Jacobsen returned home from school and got into an argument with a man she knew was her mother’s lover. In the heat of the moment, she recalled, the man blurted out a secret her mother had confided in him: Ms. Jacobsen’s biological father wasn’t the man raising her. Her actual father was black.

Ms. Jacobsen’s mother, upset, started pacing around the room, but said it was possible. She pulled out a picture tucked inside a book. It was a publicity photo of a man, a dancer. The man was from the Bahamas, her mother said. His name was Paul. Ms. Jacobsen remembers thinking he had a beautiful smile, and a face that felt familiar in a way she found difficult to express.

“I think this might be your father,” her mother said.

The incident shocked Ms. Jacobsen. Later that evening, after her father got back from work, she recounted what happened. Her father dismissed the idea out of hand, telling Ms. Jacobsen it couldn’t possibly be true, and that she looked just like his own mother.

The next morning, Ms. Jacobsen went hunting for the photo but it was gone. She never discussed the subject with either of her parents again.

“I loved my father. He was the most important person in my life,” said Ms. Jacobsen. “I recognized that the only semi-stable person in the whole dynamic was my father, Jack, and I didn’t want to lose that.”

After the 2016 DNA test, Ms. Jacobsen came to believe her mother had been telling the truth. But she didn’t know how to verify the identity of her biological father. Her parents were both dead.

The DNA report noted she had relatives who shared common DNA segments, but none close enough to offer clues to her paternity. When she contacted three new distant cousins through the testing-company site, trying to figure out how they might be related, no one responded, she said.

She told her family and close friends about the test results. When she “found out her father wasn’t her father, her whole life changed,” said Angelo Marfisi, Ms. Jacobsen’s husband of 34 years.

Based on huge advances in genetic research, many scientists today believe there is hardly any connection between genes and race.

In 2003, scientists from the Human Genome Project announced they had essentially completed mapping of the human genome. The resulting genetic blueprint indicated that humans are 99.9% identical. The remaining hundredth of a percentage point, scientists said, likely contains clues explaining differences such as skin color or increased risk of certain diseases.

Some of those are connected to ancestry—where your predecessors came from thousands of years ago. Race, on the other hand, researchers say today, is a complex combination of factors from physical appearance to family stories and how people are treated as they move through the world. In other words, for many people, it is in large part subjective, not measurable.

After consumer DNA tests took off, customers have found themselves armed with increasingly specific details about their historical relatives. People don’t just have European ancestry; it can be broken down into a British or German component. Or they may be told their ancestry traces to Congo, not only Africa.

The information is based on migration patterns that happened thousands of years ago, through regions and among populations whose names, members, and borders have changed, says Wendy D. Roth, associate professor of sociology at the University of Pennsylvania, who studies the effect of DNA tests on racial and ethnic identity. “But the tests present it as if it determines who you are today,” she said.

As Ms. Jacobsen found out, these kinds of results, when they reveal an ancestry that seems at odds with racial identity, can unsettle a life that had been stable for decades.

In May 2018, she decided to take another DNA test. She wanted to learn whether her African ancestry raised her risk of potential health issues.

To her surprise, she matched with someone in the company’s database who shared enough DNA segments in common with her to likely be a first cousin. Ms. Jacobsen was thrilled. A first cousin would share her grandparents and might know her father.

She sent a note through the testing-company’s website asking to try to figure out how they were related. She says a woman wrote back, asking “What are the names of your parents?”

“I am not sure of my bio dad’s name,” Ms. Jacobsen wrote, “but I think he was from the Bahamas.”

The woman responded that her family was from the Bahamas.

“I’m from New York,” Ms. Jacobsen continued. “My mother told me she had an affair with a dancer who was from the Bahamas.”

“My mom’s brother was a dancer from the Bahamas,” the woman responded, “so I’m 99% sure your dad was my uncle Paul.”

Uncle Paul was Paul Meeres. This man, Ms. Jacobsen concluded, must be her biological father. She considered it convincing information, even though it wasn’t absolute confirmation.

He had died in 1986. Armed only with the name, Ms. Jacobsen started piecing together the history of her biological father’s family.

She reached out to a Bahamian genealogist, Phil Roberts, who had created an extensive Meeres family tree. He told her that her grandfather, Preston Paul Meeres, was from the Bahamas but left for work in the U.S., where he met his wife, Thelma. The couple started dancing together, appearing on stage as Meeres and Meeres.

In the press, “they were the Negro Astaires of the 1920s,” said La Vinia Delois Jennings, a professor of 20th-century American literature and culture at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. The couple danced at the Cotton Club.

Despite their fame, like black performers of that era, when Meeres and Meeres danced at a club, they had to go somewhere else to get their meals “because they didn’t have the freedom to rub elbows with the wealthy white patrons who came to the clubs,” said Prof. Jennings.

Ms. Jacobsen found a newspaper clipping stating that the couple had two children, Paul K. Meeres, who she believes is her biological father, and a daughter, Gloria.

The couple divorced in 1930 and Preston Paul Meeres went to Europe, where he danced—and was photographed—with Josephine Baker. He eventually returned to the Bahamas in 1939 and opened up a night club in Nassau that drew celebrities including Elizabeth Taylor.

His son, Paul, became a professional dancer too, appearing in clubs in Europe and the U.S., including the Cotton Club. He was a stuntman in “Bronco Billy,” a Clint Eastwood movie, and at the time of his death at age 61, worked as a dancer and musician in a Titusville, Fla., restaurant, according to his obituary.

Ms. Jacobsen spent hours every day researching the Meeres family and the Harlem Renaissance. She read books about African-American history, and took the train from her home in Goshen, N.Y., into New York City to pore over archival photos of her biological grandparents and father in their dancing costumes, kept in collections at libraries such as the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture and the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts.

Ms. Jacobsen contacted anyone she could find online who might have known Mr. Meeres. She tracked down one of his old friends and, after finding records online for previous marriages, located a former wife.

They filled in the personal details she craved. Her father liked to eat a spicy dish of pigeon peas and rice and spoke five languages. He played the conga drums and knew how to tune a piano. He had a temper but was also charming and a ladies’ man.

One time, she was told, Mr. Meeres got pulled over by the police for driving erratically and to prove he wasn’t drunk, did a headstand on the roof of the car. The police fined him $35 for disorderly conduct.

Most of all, Ms. Jacobsen wanted to meet members of the Meeres family. When her parents died, she said she felt like an orphan. Now she found the obituary for Mr. Meeres that listed four children, who she believed were her half-siblings.

One was deceased, and two she couldn’t locate.

Another half-sibling, Paula, lived in Queens, N.Y., around two hours drive from her home.

She wanted to meet Paula, but was afraid to go. She didn’t know how she might react to her showing up.

In August 2018, Ms. Jacobsen was visiting a friend in Long Island. She learned her half-brother was buried in a cemetery there and decided to visit, bringing sunflowers that she placed on his grave. “I wanted to pay my respects,” she said, “and see if I felt some kind of connection.”

From the cemetery, on a whim, she drove to Paula’s home in Queens and knocked on her door.

There was no answer. Disappointed, Ms. Jacobsen started walking back to her car. Suddenly, she heard a voice coming from a small window in the basement, asking who was outside.

“My name is Christine,” Ms. Jacobsen said she answered. “I am looking for Paula.” She waited while the woman climbed the stairs. “I know this is going to sound really weird,” Ms. Jacobsen said, when the door opened. “But I did DNA testing and…”

After a few minutes of conversation, the two figured out they were likely sisters, talked about getting lunch and exchanged phone numbers. Ms. Jacobsen took a selfie of the two of them.

In a phone call the next day, Ms. Jacobsen described her research. She says Paula told her that she knew Paul Meeres was her father, but he didn’t raise her.

Paula shared some medical information, Ms. Jacobsen recalls, and then said something that took her by surprise.

“She told me I had a good life and a husband and son, and shouldn’t look for more family because it was going to make me sad,” said Ms. Jacobsen.

In her journal, Ms. Jacobsen recognized her pursuit inevitably affected other people’s lives. “My desire to know can clash with your desire to forget,” she wrote in one entry. “My neediness conflicting with another’s fear of connection. My fear of connection conflicting with another’s neediness.”

Paula didn’t respond directly to interview requests from the Journal. Through Ms. Jacobsen she said she didn’t want to comment.

Soon after, Ms. Jacobsen’s research led her to another possible relative, who was also searching for information. Marcia Meeres posted on an online genealogical site that she was hoping to find out more about the family of her father, who was a son of Paul Meeres.

Ms. Jacobsen sent a message on Facebook to Ms. Meeres and explained she had taken a DNA test and believed that Paul Meeres was her father. “So ur my aunt?” Ms. Meeres wrote back.

Ms. Meeres, who is African-American, told Ms. Jacobsen she met Paul Meeres once, when she about 12. He was her grandfather. “Paul was excited to meet us. He showed us off. He took us around Brooklyn to meet the family,” she said.

Almost immediately after connecting, Ms. Jacobsen asked Ms. Meeres if she would take a DNA test. She wanted to be sure they were related. Ms. Meeres agreed.

When the DNA test results came back, Ms. Meeres learned she had no DNA in common with Ms. Jacobsen, or any of the other members of the Meeres family she thought were her relatives.

Ms. Meeres confronted her mother with the DNA results. Her mother brushed them off, saying she knew who Ms. Meeres’s father was. Then she cried. Ms. Meeres’s mother died from cancer soon after, so she never got answers about the identity of her biological father.

Ms. Jacobsen felt guilty that she had broken open a family secret.

Ms. Meeres didn’t see it that way. “I know that put Christine in an awkward position,” she said. “Here she comes into my life and pushes this DNA test on me and now my world is upside down. I had to reassure her, no, you came into my life and you brought truth.”

Hoping to celebrate her newly discovered ancestry, Ms. Jacobsen bought an African skirt and head wrap, and studied YouTube videos to learn how to properly wrap it. In March, when her local Toastmasters club sponsored a cultural awareness evening, she wore the outfit.

When she texted a photo of herself to her son, Alek Marfisi, he told her he was upset. Ms. Jacobsen argued that African ancestry was part of her heritage, and the clothes were a way of expressing appreciation for and identification with her newfound identity. Their differing viewpoints about the incident remain a point of contention.

“The luxury we have is we can sift through the culture and only take the good, but there is so much else that goes with being black or African that we don’t have to participate in,” Mr. Marfisi said. “It’s not right to take some ownership in culture and not take the whole thing.” He felt his mother’s choice of adornment would be considered insulting to many people.

“My mother wants to get a sense of belonging to something,” said Mr. Marfisi, who is her only child. “We all need to belong, but that’s not the way to do it.”

Ms. Jacobsen’s husband, Angelo Marfisi, said after she got the test results, she was constantly doing research. When she tracked down family in the Bahamas, they went to visit.

Mr. Marfisi, who was born in Tripoli, Libya, always felt he had a large family. During their stay in the Bahamas, he said he realized, “Christine has the biggest family.”

In April, they visited Nassau in the Bahamas, where Ms. Jacobsen’s grandfather operated his nightclub and many family members still live. She met Antonio Aranha, a cousin with whom she shares great-grandparents, and his extended family.

During the visit, Mr. Aranha showed her photos of the Meereses that belonged to his mother. Ms. Jacobsen never discussed her racial identity or asked him about his. Mr. Aranha said, “I consider Christine mixed. We are mixed as well.” He said he has white aunts and black uncles and black aunts and white uncles.

One of Mr. Aranha’s nieces thought she and Ms. Jacobsen looked so similar, they took a picture cheek-to-cheek. “We consider Christine and Angelo family,” Mr. Aranha said. “We got together and we had a great time.”

After Ms. Jacobsen’s visit to Nassau, she went to Florida, where she and her husband own a condominium. Ms. Meeres, whose family secret was revealed by the DNA test, lives in Florida and the two finally met in person.

The women sat close together, on a sofa, talking after a meal. They discussed the death of Ms. Meeres’s mother, and her grief. At one point, Ms. Meeres tried to reassure Ms. Jacobsen of their connection, despite the DNA test that showed they weren’t related.

“You are still my aunt,” Ms. Meeres said.

“You are still my niece,” Ms. Jacobsen replied.

Ms. Jacobsen said her DNA test also turned up new relatives of European ancestry on her mother’s side, but she hadn’t pursued those relationships the way she had with the Meeres family.

Ms. Meeres didn’t find that surprising. “She knows about white people. She grew up as a white woman. She was more intrigued by the African side of her,” said Ms. Meeres.

When Ms. Jacobsen shared the story of wearing the African head wrap, and her son’s criticism, Ms. Meeres agreed with the son.

“You are wearing it because you are fascinated,” Ms. Meeres said, “but these are the same things blacks are vilified for.”

Last year, Ms. Jacobsen was looking through military records online, trying to learn more about Mr. Meeres’s service in the Marines from 1943 to 1946, when she noticed he had been demoted from corporal to private. “I wondered is that normal?” she said. “It bothered me. It kept gnawing at me.”

Ms. Jacobsen said she feels shame that she never thought about the black experience until she learned that her biological father was black. She knew racism existed, but didn’t consider it a problem relevant to her life. Now she wondered how it had affected her father.

She obtained a copy of Mr. Meeres’s death certificate by filling out a form online stating she was a family member. With the death certificate, she was able to get his discharge records from the National Archives.

One afternoon, she wandered into a photo exhibition in Brooklyn that included photos shot by Marines. She struck up a conversation with a Marine who was there and told him the story of her father’s demotion. He asked where her father served. She told him he had trained during the 1940s at Camp Montford Point in North Carolina.

Montford Point had been a segregated training base during World War II, before the integration of the U.S. armed services.

“That was a special group of Marines,” he responded.

When Ms. Jacobsen got home, she went online to learn more. Congress authorized the Congressional Gold Medal be awarded to the Montford Point Marines in recognition of their service and valor. “I wondered if he could be awarded the medal,” she said.

The head of the New York Metro chapter of the Montford Point Marine Association told her that if she provided documentation, such as Mr. Meeres’s discharge papers, she and her family members could receive his gold medal posthumously at a ceremony in November.

Ms. Jacobsen never got a clear answer about the demotion. His military record states it came after Mr. Meeres was AWOL for an hour. During war, infractions could bring about harsh punishment. In some cases, prejudice also played a role. “People brought their prejudices with them into the military,” said Master Gunnery Sergeant James Carr, president of the association’s New York Metro Chapter-3.

The demotion shouldn’t take away from Mr. Meeres’s service, he added. Mr. Meeres was honorably discharged.

Ms. Jacobsen invited Paula, her half-sibling, to come with her to the recognition ceremony. She also wanted her son to attend.

The ceremony brought up complicated feelings for Mr. Marfisi. When his mother invited him, “the first thought that went through my head is I know there are other people who exist who have some sort of closer connection to him. Why is my mother receiving the medal?” He didn’t share that thought with his mother and agreed to attend.

The medal recognized the achievements of a group of black Marines, who fought who fought with valor during World War II. This time, Mr. Marfisi felt his mother’s claim to the medal was stronger than for wearing the African head wrap. They were at the ceremony because of his mother’s research. By contributing to Mr. Meeres’s story, and bringing him recognition he wouldn’t otherwise have received, she now had a personal stake in it.

“The fundamental difference here is she’s connecting with a person rather than connecting with a race,” he said.

After the ceremony, Ms. Jacobsen drove Paula home and walked her to the door. Paula didn’t ask about keeping the medal, and Ms. Jacobsen didn’t offer to share. “I felt the medal was mine,” she said. “This is part of me reclaiming my identity.”

Another moment from the same evening stands out. In a video of the event, Ms. Jacobsen and Paula waited together at the front of the packed room.

The women look overwhelmed, like they might cry. They stood side-by-side, and, as sisters often do, held hands.

Write to Amy Dockser Marcus at amy.marcus@wsj.com

SOURCE: WALL STREET JOURNAL

White House Shifted Authority Over Ukraine Aid Amid Legal Concerns

The White House Building. Image: White House.

BY ANDREW DUEHREN, GORDON LUBOLD

WASHINGTON (THE WALL STREET JOURNAL) -- The White House gave a politically appointed official the authority to keep aid to Ukraine on hold after career budget staff members questioned the legality of delaying the funds, according to people familiar with the matter, a shift that House Democrats are probing in their impeachment inquiry.

President Trump’s order to freeze nearly $400 million in aid to Ukraine in mid-July is at the center of House Democratic efforts to investigate allegations that Mr. Trump used U.S. foreign policy powers to benefit himself politically. The hold came days before Mr. Trump’s request, on a July 25 call, that the Ukrainian president work with Rudy Giuliani and Attorney General William Barr to conduct investigations into former Vice President Joe Biden, a Democratic presidential hopeful.

Mr. Trump has said he ordered the aid frozen because he wanted European countries to do more to support Ukraine. He has also said he didn’t make the aid to Ukraine contingent on the country’s cooperation in an investigation of Democrats. A rough transcript of the July 25 call released by the White House doesn’t show Mr. Trump explicitly linking the aid to an investigation.

A Justice Department spokeswoman has said the president never asked Mr. Barr to make the call nor did he ask the attorney general to investigate Mr. Biden.

The president has the authority to delay the release of money in certain instances, according to the Congressional Research Service, a nonpartisan research agency, including if there has been an unexpected change in circumstances for the program. But without being provided explanation or justification about why the administration was delaying the aid, some career officials at the Office of Management and Budget became worried they didn’t have the legal authority to hold up the funds, according to the people familiar.

While career civil servants put an initial hold on the aid, Michael Duffey, associate director of national security programs in OMB, was given the authority for continuing to keep the aid on hold after the career staff began raising their concerns to political officials at OMB, according to the people familiar with the matter. Mr. Duffey also began overseeing the process for approving and releasing funds, called apportionment, for other foreign aid and defense accounts, according to a public document indicating the change.

Some people familiar with the change said Mr. Duffey, previously a high-ranking Pentagon official and the executive director of the Wisconsin Republican Party, took on the role because he was new to the job and wanted more insight into the apportionment process. Acting Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vought has the authority to delegate responsibility for approving funds to different staff members as he sees fit.

A political official like Mr. Duffey signing off on apportionments is unusual, according to several former OMB officials. Career staff below the political level at OMB with years, and sometimes decades, of technical knowledge of the funding process have historically overseen the routine process, according to the former officials. Career staff remain involved in preparing the apportionments, while Mr. Duffey now reviews and signs off on them, according to some of the people.

“The idea that administration officials would not be involved in budget execution, including apportionment authority, after decades of precedent, is absolutely ludicrous,” Rachel Semmel, a spokesperson for OMB, said in a statement after publication of this story. “It is absurd to suggest that the president and his administration officials should not play a leadership role in ensuring taxpayer dollars are well spent.”

At least five House committees are looking into the delay in the aid, and the House Foreign Affairs, Intelligence, and Oversight committees sent a subpoena to Mr. Vought and to Defense Secretary Mark Esper this week for records about the funds. House investigators are requesting documents related to any discussion of the legality of withholding the funds and the change in apportionment authority.

Mr. Trump has also repeatedly said that concerns about corruption in Ukraine spurred the desire to hold up the funds. Mr. Trump, then-national security adviser John Bolton and Mr. Esper began discussing in June the prospect of putting a hold on the funds while the administration reviewed them, according to a senior administration official, the Journal has previously reported.

In May, the Defense Department, working with the State Department, certified that Ukraine “has taken substantial action to make defense institutional reforms for the purposes of decreasing corruption” in approving $125 million of the aid, according to documents reviewed by the Journal. Congress approved the money in recent years via several bills, and then the Pentagon and State Department initially approved its release.

Some career staff at OMB were worried that the delay to Ukraine didn’t meet the legal standards necessary for holding up congressionally approved money. “Those decisions were made pretty high up, with some concern by people who are career employees who were not super comfortable,” said one individual familiar with the matter.

The Democratic leaders of the House Budget and Appropriations committees, which are also probing the delay in the aid to Ukraine, called the involvement of a political official in the apportionment process “seemingly unprecedented” in a letter requesting documents from OMB. Those committees have received some documents from OMB that they requested.

The administration released the aid to Ukraine in mid-September after bipartisan scrutiny of the decision to delay the funds.

“I gave the money because Rob Portman and others called me and asked. But I don’t like to be the sucker and European countries are helped far more than we are,” Mr. Trump said last week, referencing Sen. Rob Portman (R., Ohio).

The delay on the aid to Ukraine came as the White House was seeking to cut a broad set of foreign aid programs, which prompted similar pushback on Capitol Hill. But the administration abandoned its effort to cut those other foreign assistance programs by Aug. 22, while the hold on the aid to Ukraine remained for several more weeks.

Officials on Capitol Hill became concerned that the administration wouldn’t release the Ukraine money before the end of the fiscal year on Sept. 30, effectively canceling it. A short-term spending bill passed by Congress and signed by Mr. Trump last month extends the administration’s ability to spend the Ukraine funding.

Write to Andrew Duehren at andrew.duehren@wsj.com and Gordon Lubold at Gordon.Lubold@wsj.com

Zuckerberg Meets With Trump, Faces Tough Questions From Senators

Image: Zach Gibson/Getty

BY JOHN D. MCKINNON, LINDSAY WISE, REBECCA BALLHAUS

WASHINGTON (WALL STREE JOURNAL)—With his company under a regulatory spotlight, Facebook Inc. Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg scored a meeting at the White House with President Trump Thursday—but faced a chillier reception from lawmakers on Capitol Hill.

A spokesman for Facebook said Mr. Zuckerberg was visiting Washington to meet with policy makers “to hear their concerns and talk about future internet regulation.” The spokesman said Mr. Zuckerberg’s meeting with the president was “constructive.”

Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law and senior adviser, and White House social media director Dan Scavino also joined the meeting, a person familiar with the meeting said.

“Nice meeting with Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook in the Oval Office today,” Mr. Trump posted Thursday night on his Facebook and Twitter accounts, along with a photo of the president and Mr. Zuckerberg shaking hands.

On Capitol Hill, Mr. Zuckerberg received an earful of complaints, and two and two influential lawmakers couldn’t find the time to meet with him.

Sen. Josh Hawley (R., Mo.) said he challenged Mr. Zuckerberg to spin off its Instagram and WhatsApp units—two acquisitions that are now part of a government antitrust probe into Facebook.

“I said to him, ‘Prove that you’re serious…sell WhatsApp, and sell Instagram,’” Mr. Hawley said following his afternoon meeting with Mr. Zuckerberg. “I think it’s safe to say that he was not receptive to those suggestions,” he added.

Mr. Zuckerberg, clad in a dark suit and tie, was trailed throughout his Capitol Hill visit by a swarm of reporters and camera crews. He declined to comment.

On Wednesday night, Mr. Zuckerberg kicked off the trip by sparring with a group of senators at a private dinner. One attendee, Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D., Conn.), described the meeting as a mix of criticism and constructive dialogue over the tech industry’s “repeated failures” to protect election security and consumer privacy.

“We had [a] serious, substantive conversation even when we may have differed,” Mr. Blumenthal said in a statement. He added that he welcomed “the strong, constructive interest shown by Mr. Zuckerberg.”

Mr. Blumenthal has been sharply critical of Facebook, particularly over its privacy and election missteps of recent years.

Facebook declined to comment beyond a statement it issued on Wednesday saying that Mr. Zuckerberg would be in Washington “to meet with policy makers and talk about future internet regulation.”

Mr. Zuckerberg even had a few expected get-togethers fall through, mainly because Senate leaders decided not to hold votes on Thursday, leading many senators to head for the airport.

Sen. Jerry Moran (R., Kan.), who heads the Senate consumer protection subcommittee, had planned to meet with Mr. Zuckerberg but decided to catch an early flight home instead. “They will definitely try and meet the next time he [Mr. Zuckerberg] is here,” a spokesman said.

Sen. Brian Schatz (D., Hawaii), the top Democrat on the Senate’s technology and internet subcommittee, also had been expected to meet with Mr. Zuckerberg, but they were unable to find a time to get together due to scheduling conflicts. Mr. Schatz had recently met with Mr. Zuckerberg in the senator’s Honolulu office, however.

Mr. Zuckerberg’s meetings were aimed at giving the Facebook co-founder a chance to pitch his own vision for moderate internet regulation and seek to placate lawmakers who are weighing stricter standards for lightly regulated platforms.

In the wake of a series of disclosures about questionable practices at Facebook and other internet companies, lawmakers have been considering stringent new regulation of platforms in areas such as user privacy and content moderation.

No action appears imminent on any of the measures. But one idea that has gained attention is placing new limits on the sweeping legal immunity that platforms enjoy for harms caused by their users. Mr. Hawley has been among those advocating such an approach.

Mr. Zuckerberg was also expected to pitch lawmakers on a different vision of internet regulation, one that includes more self-regulation by the companies. The visit also gave Mr. Zuckerberg a chance to tout progress in Facebook’s compliance with a recently announced $5 billion settlement with the Federal Trade Commission over privacy missteps.

Among the lawmakers who met with Mr. Zuckerberg was Sen. Mike Lee (R., Utah), who is chairman of the Senate antitrust subcommittee. Facebook is under antitrust investigation by the FTC, and could soon face a separate investigation by the Justice Department. Mr. Lee has raised concerns about possible duplication of effort by the federal agencies.

Mr. Zuckerberg also met with Sen. Maria Cantwell (D., Wash.), the top Democrat on the powerful Commerce Committee. The two discussed data privacy and election security.

The visit represents Mr. Zuckerberg’s first foray into Capitol Hill since two days of hearings in spring 2018. At the time, following damaging revelations about Facebook’s privacy practices, Mr. Zuckerberg said that it was “inevitable that there will need to be some regulation.” But he also cautioned lawmakers, “You have to be careful about what regulations you put in place.”

Write to John D. McKinnon at john.mckinnon@wsj.com, Lindsay Wise at lindsay.wise@wsj.com and Rebecca Ballhaus at Rebecca.Ballhaus@wsj.com

SOURCE: WSJ

Decades Of Neglect Threatened Notre Dame, Well Before It Burned

Charred rubble piled high inside Notre Dame Cathedral after its devastating roof fire. Image: Ludovic Marin/AFP/Getty Images

BY VALENTINA POP, DREW HINSHAW & NICK KOSTOV

PARIS, FRANCE (WALL STREET JOURNAL) —Years before flames ravaged Notre Dame Cathedral, the landmark’s custodians realized they had a problem.

In 2013, the cathedral hired Didier Dupuy and his son to scale the building and install lightning rods at different points, including its central spire. Gaping holes and cracks they discovered in the lead roofing shocked them. Just below was a dry and dusty space of timber beams, known as “the forest,” that had supported Notre Dame’s roof for centuries.

A job that was supposed to last a couple of weeks took three months as the duo performed emergency repairs before quitting in frustration.

“We told them, you need professionals for this. We can weld, but it’s not pretty,” said Mr. Dupuy, who removed 110 pounds of rust from the cross atop the spire. “The cross was in very bad shape.”

On Monday, Notre Dame’s forest caught fire, incinerating the central spire and most of the cathedral’s roof in a disaster that dismayed the world. Notre Dame, with its limestone facade and stained-glass rose windows, was a resplendent jewel of medieval architecture to most who saw it. On closer inspection, according to church officials, contractors and donors, the cathedral was deteriorating from decades of neglect.

The flying buttresses that sustain its massive limestone walls were weakening. The spire, a fixture on the Paris skyline for nearly two centuries, was taking on water and rotting from the inside out.

Now investigators are looking into whether a project to renovate and reinforce Notre Dame somehow led to the blaze, questioning those who were at the site in the hours before it broke out. André Finot, a spokesman for the cathedral, said workers were inside the forest that day, reinforcing the framing so they could finish erecting a massive scaffold on top of it.

The scaffold was specially designed to put very little weight on the cathedral’s structure and not interfere with views of its flying buttresses. “The scaffolding adhered to the most incredible security norms,” Mr. Finot said. The main contractor said the firm had followed all safety requirements.

The inquiry is just beginning, with debris and damage complicating the task. Authorities say evidence so far points to an accident, but they aren’t discarding any avenue of inquiry. Police have seen signs that joy seekers scaled the scaffolding in the months before the fire. Some posted YouTube videos from the cathedral’s top.

Behind the renovation was a push to line up funding and finish tens of millions of dollars worth of repairs in time for Paris to host the 2024 Olympics. The cathedral was counting on The Friends of Notre Dame, a group of American and French benefactors, to deliver funding and pressure the building’s owner, the French state, to make matching donations. Notre Dame doesn’t charge general admission, even though it is a tourist magnet that receives 30,000 daily visitors, more than the Eiffel Tower.

“For sure if the cathedral had been maintained regularly, with a higher level of funding, we would have avoided this,” said Michel Picaud, senior adviser to The Friends of Notre Dame. “The more you wait, the more risks you have.”

Notre Dame battled decay over the long history of upheaval in France. Built in the 12th and 13th centuries, it was desecrated during the French Revolution and consigned to decrepitude when Victor Hugo wrote the novel that immortalized the cathedral.

In 1905, France passed a law that made all churches built before that year government property. State ownership of churches became increasingly burdensome as the government grew cash-strapped in more recent decades. Meanwhile, church attendance was falling.

“It’s a fact of life that many of these churches are in need of upkeep,” said David Sheppe, president of American Friends for the Preservation of Saint Germain des Prés, the city’s oldest church. “Passing the plate around, it may cover operational costs. It does not cover maintenance.”

To receive government funding for repairs, churches were required to go before a committee at the culture ministry. Notre Dame fundraisers said committee members told them the cathedral was one of nearly a hundred Gothic cathedrals across France the ministry had to look after.

The state pushed Notre Dame to follow the example set by other historic churches that charge an entrance fee. Monsignor Patrick Chauvet, rector of Notre Dame, pushed back, according to a fundraiser present at the meetings, wary of turning a place of worship into another commercial tourist stop.

When a culture ministry official visited the cathedral during a religious feast day one year, Msgr. Chauvet gestured toward the crowds. “Who are the tourists here?” he asked. “Can you pick out who I should charge?"

“Keeping the cathedral free has always been the wish of the clergy,” said Mr. Finot, the Notre Dame spokesman.

In 2015, an American art historian, Andrew Tallon, climbed Notre Dame with a tripod-mounted laser to create a precise digital model of the building. He found grave structural weaknesses and decay. Gargoyles on the roof were propped up with plastic piping. Stone chunks of the roof had fallen off, ending up in a space one person involved with restoration called “a graveyard for architecture.”

A rooster-shaped weather vane that contained a thorn said to be from the crown Jesus wore at his crucifixion was broken. Cracks in the lead panels that coated the spire were allowing water to seep into its wood-frame core, testing the welding that held it together.

Most concerning were the flying buttresses, rib-like supports made of limestone that prop up the walls, a medieval innovation that allowed the church to have towering walls with stained-glass windows. Acid from Paris’s air pollution was eating at the buttresses. Flying buttress No. 10 was so weak that experts warned a wall was at risk of collapse.

Mr. Tallon, who died last year, rallied a group of French and American art lovers to create a nonprofit, with a board that included executives and a retired French ambassador to the U.S. They pushed the French government to match any funds they raised up to a certain point.

The group didn’t start raising money in earnest until late 2017. It held soirées in the French embassy in Washington and the consulate in New York. The auction house Christie’s also co-hosted an event.

Notre Dame didn’t wait for the funding to be in place. Instead, the government published a call for bids in July 2017 to renovate the spire, the roof and the timber framing underneath. The estimated cost of the work authorized in 2017 was €4.3 million.

The flying buttresses represented the greatest structural risk, according to fundraisers. Church officials wanted to tackle the spire first.

“The spire was the most urgent thing,” said Mr. Finot, the spokesman. “It’s made of lead, and the lead was disappearing.”

Bidders had to take into account the cost of complying with a thicket of regulations that accompany work on a historical landmark. The construction site required fire safety inspectors to make daily rounds, checking every piece of electrical equipment. A detailed plan for various disasters was mandatory. Workers weren’t allowed to leave tools on the site.

Welders were required to check that their work had cooled off two hours after finishing. For lunch breaks, one crew member was expected to stay behind and watch for hazards.

The spire presented unique challenges. Scaffolding needed first to reach the cathedral’s roof, 50 meters off the ground, and then rise another 50 meters to the top of the spire, encircling the ornate structure without touching it.

Bidders also had to consider plans to expand the scaffolding later to reach the weathered lead roof, the timber framing beneath it and the weakened flying buttresses. The scaffolding alone, the government estimated, would cost €1.8 million.

“Monumental, the largest scaffolding ever put on top of the cathedral,” said Francois Leterme, whose company, Layher, was among the bidders. Mr. Leterme knew Notre Dame well because he had built a smaller scaffold there in 2009.

Gwenael Jousselme, who lost out in bidding to replace the spire’s lightning rod as part of the project, said he proposed a costly method of welding that reduced fire risks. The contract went instead to Mr. Dupuy, the man who discovered the cracks in 2013. Mr. Dupuy said he puts safety first.

The big winner was a family firm based in northeastern France. Le Bras Freres won contracts to erect the scaffolding around the spire, to fix the leaky roof and to repair the timber framework. Cathedral spokesman Mr. Finot said the winning design for the scaffolding was a technical marvel, resting on legs that reached to the ground without stressing the cathedral’s structure.

“Nobody has got such a contract in 150 years,” Julien Le Bras, a representative of the contractor, told a local newspaper at the time. “It is really something to say that it’s us who will do it. We are not working with a decade-long commitment to this, we’re envisioning the next 150 years.”

Jean-Michel Leniaud, an architecture expert, said it was unusual for a single contractor to win all three tenders—scaffolding, roofing and woodwork. Usually there is a separate company for each, he said.

Mr. Le Bras said: “All safety devices and procedures were respected.”

The schedule was tight. The government wanted the scaffolding completed by July 2019, according to Marc Eskenazi, a Le Bras Freres spokesman. That would allow work on the roof and framing to begin a month later.

By the start of April, work on the scaffold appeared to have fallen behind schedule, said Mr. Leterme, the bidder. It had reached the base of the spire, and the work was becoming more challenging.

Also, people had been sneaking up the scaffolding in off-hours, according to a police officer briefed on the matter. An empty whiskey bottle was found on site, he said.

“The deadline was July. They could have still made it,” Mr. Eskenazi of Le Bras Freres said.

On April 11, workers in hazmat suits were filmed removing 16 life-size copper statues of the Apostles and Evangelists from the cathedral for restoration and allowing the scaffolding to advance. Philippe Villeneuve, the project’s chief architect, toured the scaffolding, smiling as a crane plucked one of the statues from the rooftop.

“It’s one of the most magnificent days of my life,” Mr. Villeneuve said. “We are finally working on the cathedral I adore.”

On April 15, a dozen workers from Le Bras Freres were working on the scaffolding, according to Mr. Eskenazi.

The last one on the site left at 5:50 p.m., turning off the electricity, locking the door and giving the key to a church official in charge of the building, Mr. Eskenazi said. About half an hour later, the first fire alarm went off.

Nigeria Moves To Calm Investors After Attacks...

Officials Move to Bolster Security Around Abuja Just Weeks Before the Capital Hosts World Economic Forum Meeting

Workers cleaned up Tuesday at the site of a bomb blast that killed 75 people, many of them children and commuters, at a bus station in the Nigerian capital, Abuja. Agence France-Presse/Getty Images

ACCRA, GHANA (WALL STREET JOURNAL)—Hit by a wave of insurgent attacks, Nigeria raced Tuesday to secure the country's capital just weeks before it hosts a global showcase intended to trumpet its arrival into the club of big emerging economies.

Nigerian troops erected checkpoints on key roads and officials promised more police on the streets, one day after an explosion at a suburban Abuja bus station killed 75 people. Many of the dead were children and commuters on their way to school and work. 

Hours later, Islamist militants in the northeast drove trucks through the gates of a boarding school where teenage girls had been studying for final exams. Insurgents carried away more than 100 students at gunpoint, according to neighbors and a police official.

Last Thursday and Friday, the insurgency known as Boko Haram was blamed for attacks in northeastern villages that killed 217 people. The sect burned down four villages and shot civilians, according to Sen. Ahmed Zanna, the leading legislator from Borno state, which is the epicenter of Boko Haram's war to impose Quranic law across Africa's biggest economy. 

The display of carnage, which has become tragically commonplace in Nigeria's north, comes at a delicate moment for the government. The country's oil-rich economy just surpassed South Africa as the continent's largest, but the attacks are raising doubts among the very people Nigeria needs to fuel future growth: foreign investors.

Some are now saying they are still weighing participation in the three-day World Economic Forum meeting set to convene in Abuja on May 7.

"It depends on what's going to happen—whether or not it is an isolated event," said Paul Gomes, president of oil and gas advisory firm Constelor Investment Holdings. "I've learned to factor in the risk when it comes to Nigeria." 

On late Monday, the country's finance minister countered those misgivings, saying her government would station 6,000 police and soldiers along the leafy boulevards of Nigeria's capital. It "will be the largest security operation ever mounted in this country for an international summit," according to a statement from Minister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala.

Spokesmen for the World Economic Forum didn't immediately respond to requests for comment.

Yvonne Ike, the chief executive of Renaissance Capital, West Africa, said curiosity among many investors in Nigeria's big fast-growing market will probably outweigh security concerns. Still, businesspeople will closely watch whether the Nigerian government can prevent another massive attack, according to the investment banker.

"If there isn't some sort of upscaling of security…then a lot of questions will come up," Ms. Ike said.

The attacks ahead of the economic forum show the dilemma troubling Nigeria. It is a nation battling insurgents with one hand of the government, and welcoming investors with the other. This month, the country of 174 million people became the largest economy in Africa—24th biggest in the world—capping a decade of growth that averaged 7.9% a year, according to the International Monetary Fund.

The forum was supposed to fête Nigeria's economic success, but it has raised questions about whether the country has the institutional strength to safeguard its capital from a few thousand insurgents.

Nigeria spends a fifth of its massive budget on security, and the government has more personnel under arms than South Africa. Its military hardware includes warships, fighter jets and cargo planes.

And yet a sect that trains in the woods has killed hundreds of people a week, largely in a bid to rid the country of English-language education.

Boko Haram fighters have killed more than 1,500 people so far this year in towns and villages scattered across the predominantly Muslim north, according to Amnesty International. Army leaders say they can't possibly protect so many hundreds of tiny towns from a sect so willing to gun down civilians. 

Monday's attack—a 15-minute drive from Nigeria's presidential palace—has now forced this government to confront the possibility, long feared in the west, that Boko Haram could turn its weaponry onto the foreign visitors eager to play a part in this country's growth.

On Tuesday, the U.S. State Department warned its citizens to stay away from Abuja's malls and hotels. The United Kingdom followed suit, asking its citizens to avoid the neighborhood where Monday's attack occurred.

"There is a high threat from terrorism in Nigeria," the U.K. advisory said.

The group has no track record of killing foreigners. But the group's leader, Abubakar Shekau, has goaded Western governments and leaders. 

In YouTube videos, he has laughed about the $7 million bounty for his arrest offered by the U.S. State Department. He has cursed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, and even the late British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. In one video, his troops shoot rifles at scraps of paper labeled "Obama" and "Kansas."

Last month he added another target, declaring: " Queen Elizabeth, you are in trouble."

Write to Drew Hinshaw at drew.hinshaw@wsj.com

Iran Talks Showed New French Assertiveness In Mideast

 Influence Is Increasing at a Time When Washington Is Treading Softly

BY STACY MEICHTRY, WSJ

NOVEMBER 12, 2013 

French troops operate in Mali as the country increasingly intervenes in the Middle-east and other regions. Image: ECPAD/Zuma Press.

PARIS—At the nuclear talks last weekend in Geneva, France's foreign minister warned publicly that world powers risked being sucked into a "fool's game" by Iran. That resistance helped upend a landmark deal that would have offered Iran some relief from punishing international sanctions in return for suspending elements of its nuclear program. 

France's hard line in the talks showcased the country's growing influence and assertiveness in Middle East affairs. Its increasingly interventionist stance on the world stage—and in the Middle East in particular—is a stark departure from the country's stalwart opposition to the Iraq war a decade ago. 

With Washington playing the role of peace broker in the closely held nuclear discussions, Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius's warning positioned France as a pivotal arbiter on whether the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council plus Germany grant Iran sanctions relief.

"The role of France is to be the bad cop," said Alexandre Vautravers, a military analyst at the Geneva Centre for Security Policy.

France wanted Iran to hand over its stockpile of uranium enriched to 20%, approaching the level where it could be used to fuel a nuclear bomb. 

Paris also sought to stop Iranian plans to build a heavy-water reactor near the city of Arak. 

Iran insists the reactor, and its entire nuclear program, is for peaceful purposes, though the West suspects the program is geared toward building a bomb.

Mr. Fabius warned Monday that the Arak reactor, if completed, could generate greater amounts of fuel necessary for producing a bomb than conventional reactors.

France's stance won kudos from some of the more hawkish members of Congress, who are pushing to toughen sanctions against Iran further.

"Vive la France!" Sen. John McCain (R., Ariz.) tweeted after Mr. Fabius raised the alarm on the agreement with Iran.

France's burgeoning role has positioned it to act as a diplomatic megaphone for traditional U.S. allies—such as Israel and Saudi Arabia—who have grown frustrated with Washington's overtures to Iran and reversal on plans to strike Syria.

France is "trying to get close to other Gulf nations after the Americans made it clear they're not as interested in the Mideast as before," said Sara Bazzobandi, a Middle East analyst with London-based Chatham House.

French diplomats have brushed aside Iranian accusations that Paris scuttled a potential deal. "The whole world wants a deal, including us," a senior French diplomat said on Tuesday. 

France has backed up its assertive diplomacy with a stronger war footing. The country has intervened in former African colonies such as Mali and the Ivory Coast in the past four years.

But France has also showed a willingness to tread outside its traditional sphere of influence. With the U.K., it led an air campaign to oust Libya's Moammar Gadhafi while the U.S. opted to play a supporting role.

Such meddling seemed unthinkable in 2003 when France led international efforts to dissuade the U.S. from invading Iraq, arguing that there was no justification for launching a war against Saddam Hussein's regime.

In the years that followed, France found common cause with the U.S. in efforts to get Iran to suspend its nuclear activities. 

Between 2003 and 2005, Iran negotiated a deal to suspend its nuclear program and allow U.N. inspectors to closely monitor its facilities. The agreement was brokered by Tehran's lead negotiator at the time and future president, Hasan Rouhani.

The election of then-President Mahmoud Ahamedinejad in 2005, however, foiled the arrangement and left Western diplomats feeling whiplashed as successive talks took a radically different tone.

Jacques Chirac, who was French president at the time, pushed a successful international campaign to adopt economic sanctions against Iran. When a set of U.N. sanctions were adopted in December 2006, Iran made no secret of its enmity for France.

"France deserves better leaders than its current ones," Mr. Ahmadinejad said on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly.

President Barack Obama's election in 2008, however, changed the diplomatic chessboard. 

In Mr. Obama, Paris was suddenly confronted with a war-wary American leader who shared its criticisms of the Iraq intervention. And Mr. Obama showed a willingness to make overtures to Iran.

That left France and its then-president Nicolas Sarkozy defending a tougher line.

"We were caught wrong-footed because Paris sounded menacing when Washington appeared ready to compromise" said a French diplomat, who advised Mr. Sarkozy at the time.

U.S. Takes New Look at Africa Threats

Attack in Kenya, Nigeria Put Washington's Trade Focus on Back Burner

By Siobham Goeman and Drew Hinshaw
WSJ

The four-day siege on a Kenyan mall is prompting U.S. counterterrorism officials to review their assessment of al Qaeda's East African affiliate and what the U.S. should be doing to counter that threat, U.S. officials said on Tuesday.

Civilian massacres like the one in Kenya and another in Nigeria last week, meanwhile, are shifting the focus on the continent just as the Obama administration looks to spend more time discussing business in Africa. Taken together, the Kenyan and Nigerian appeals for U.S. assistance that followed the massacres could speed up U.S. engagement in the continent's terrorism problems.

 

AP

 

Boko Haram was blamed for a suicide bombing outside state police headquarters in Kano, Nigeria, in 2012.

 

U.S. officials on Tuesday were shipping law-enforcement equipment to local police in Nairobi, two U.S. officials said. Both said they expected Kenya to formalize more-specific requests for counterterrorism assistance, after Kenya's government regroups from a four-day militant siege at Nairobi's upscale Westgate mall that ended late Tuesday, leaving 61 civilians dead.

U.S. diplomats and law-enforcement officials have provided tactical guidance to manage the crisis as well as medical assistance for the victims, a senior administration official said. Intelligence cooperation, which has long been a staple of the U.S.-Kenyan relationship, has also stepped up.

The consensus view among U.S. intelligence analysts has been that the al Qaeda affiliate claiming responsibility for the attack, al-Shabaab, has been weakened considerably by infighting and a joint Kenyan, Ethiopian and African Union counterterrorism effort that began two years ago.

After the bloody attack at the Nairobi mall, U.S. counterterrorism officials are working to gauge whether the attack reflects a shift in strategy or capabilities as al-Shabaab adapts in the face of that regional offensive, which has retaken much of the territory al-Shabaab had laid claim to in its Somali home.

U.S. counterterrorism officials are also looking at whether the attack indicates a new target set for the terrorist group.

The commando-style attack on the shopping mall has renewed fears among intelligence officials that terrorist groups will increase their focus on so-called soft targets—highly public venues that aren't well-fortified like hotels and shopping centers, the senior administration official said

Mitchell Silber, a former intelligence official in the New York Police Department, compared it with the 2008 attack in Mumbai and the more recent Algerian gas-field attack, targets that hold appeal for terror groups. "For propaganda purposes, it's a multiday event," he said. "That's something a singular bombing doesn't give you."

U.S. counterterrorism officials expected al-Shabaab to increase its attacks outside Somalia, said Daniel Benjamin, a former State Department counterterrorism chief.

"I haven't seen anything that suggests this is a new al-Shabaab," said Mr. Benjamin, who is now director of the Dickey Center for International Understanding at Dartmouth College. "I don't see anything to suggest vastly improved tradecraft."

"In some ways, al-Shabaab is leaner and meaner. Although regional military pressure has deprived the group of funds and fighters, internal squabbles have weeded out less extreme members," said a U.S. official, adding that "the organization's committed core remains intact."

The Pentagon has sought to expand its role on the continent, principally in the area of training, to help regional allies counter terrorist threats themselves.

Last week, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel met with Somalia's president and his top advisers to discuss how the Pentagon could step up training of Somali forces to fight al-Shabaab.

Meanwhile, Nigeria's President Goodluck Jonathan met with President Barack Obama in New York on Monday and asked him to provide more military intelligence and training of troops for Nigeria, said Reuben Abati, his spokesman. The country is at war with an Islamic insurgency called Boko Haram, whose latest skirmish with soldiers left 87 people dead in the northern village of Benisheik last week.

"For you to fix the world, you must fix Africa," President Jonathan said to President Obama and a handful of reporters who were at the meeting. "For you to fix Africa, you must fix Nigeria."

In New York, Presidents Jonathan and Obama had been scheduled to discuss trade and energy policy. But after the events in Kenya, the two spent most of the conversation talking about terrorism, U.S. and Nigerian officials said.

Many U.S. diplomats are eager to push economic matters higher on the agenda—the continent is home to several of the world's fastest-growing economies—and yet a spree of car bombs and shootouts in varied corners of the continent keeps interrupting that dialogue.
"Any conversation with Kenya or Nigeria will focus almost immediately on the tragic loss of life," said Johnnie Carson, former assistant secretary of state for African affairs, and a senior adviser at the U.S. Institute of Peace. But, he added, "The way these things are dealt with over the long term is by strengthening democratic institutions and values, and by strengthening economic opportunities."

In Kenya and Nigeria, the U.S. also has complicated ties.

Kenya's President Uhuru Kenyatta faces a trial in the International Criminal Court for backing ethnic violence that left hundreds dead in late 2007. The charges, which he denies, have added an awkwardness to the U.S. relationship.

Nigeria, too, remains a close U.S. partner, one that has lent its troops to fight terrorism in Mali, and to peacekeeping missions around the world. Back home in Nigeria, though, those troops are broadly accused of human-rights abuses, limiting U.S. military training with the country. Nigerians say those charges are overblown.

Write to Siobhan Gorman at siobhan.gorman@wsj.com and Drew Hinshaw at drew.hinshaw@dowjones.com