Category: World

Argentina’s economy ministry said on Sunday it will purchase just over $1.5 billion from the central bank to pay the total interest on the country’s “Globales” and “Bonares” bonds due in January 2025.
The operation will use part of the financial surplus achieved in the first half of the year, which had accumulated to 2.3 trillion Argentine pesos ($2.5 billion) by May, the ministry said in a statement.

The ministry added that $1.528 billion will be deposited in an account at trustee Bank of New York and will be available only to be used for paying the interest on the bonds.
The announcement came a day after the government of libertarian President Javier Milei outlined a plan to stop expanding the monetary base in order to combat annual inflation close to 300%.
Milei, a free-market economist, has embarked on an at-times painful austerity drive since taking office, cutting state spending and pledging to rebuild the country’s depleted foreign exchange reserves.

A senior Hamas official said on Sunday that the Islamist group has not withdrawn from ceasefire talks with Israel after this weekend’s deadly attacks in Gaza that Israel said had targeted the group’s military leader Mohammed Deif.
But Izzat El-Reshiq, a member of the political office of Hamas, accused Israel of trying to derail efforts by Arab mediators and the United States to reach a ceasefire deal by stepping up its attacks in the enclave.

Saturday’s strike in the Khan Younis area of Gaza, in which at least 90 Palestinians were killed, according to local health authorities, has put the ceasefire talks in doubt.
There had been increasingly hopeful signs in recent days that a deal could be reached to halt fighting and return hostages held in Gaza.
Two Egyptian security sources at ceasefire talks in Doha and Cairo said on Saturday that negotiations had been halted after three days of intense talks.Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was expected to convene his close circle of ministers later on Sunday to discuss the talks.
The strike on Saturday which targeted Deif killed Rafa Salama, commander of Hamas’ Khan Younis brigade, the Israeli military said on Sunday, but there was no confirmation about the fate of Deif.
“The strike in Khan Younis was a result of surgical intelligence,” the head of the Shin Bet domestic security service said in a video released by the service from Rafah. He said 25 Hamas operatives who took part in the deadly Oct. 7 attack in southern Israel that triggered the war had been killed in the past week.

Two sources told NBC News that the Secret Service flagged a building near the rally site as a security concern. Investigators will be scrutinizing how a gunman was allowed to scale it.

The rooftop where a gunman shot at former President Donald Trump during a campaign rally was identified by the Secret Service as a potential vulnerability in the days before the event, two sources familiar with the agency’s operations told NBC News.

The building, owned by a glass research company, is adjacent to the Butler Farm Show, an outdoor venue in Butler, Pennsylvania. The Secret Service was aware of the risks associated with it, the sources said.

“Someone should have been on the roof or securing the building so no one could get on the roof,” said one of the sources, a former senior Secret Service agent who was familiar with the planning.

Understanding how the gunman got onto the roof — despite those concerns — is a central question for investigators scrutinizing how a lone attacker managed to shoot at Trump during Saturday’s campaign event.

The Secret Service worked with local law enforcement to maintain event security, including sniper teams poised on rooftops to identify and eliminate threats, Secret Service spokesman Anthony Guglielmi said. But no officers were posted on the building used by the would-be assassin, outside the event’s security perimeter but only about 148 yards from the stage — within range of a semiautomatic rifle like the one the gunman was carrying.

Suspected gunman was on a roof near where Trump spoke

The Secret Service had designated that rooftop as being under the jurisdiction of local law enforcement, a common practice in securing outdoor rallies, Guglielmi said.Butler County District Attorney Richard Goldinger said his office maintains an Emergency Services Unit team, which deployed four sniper teams and four “quick response teams” at the rally. But he said the Secret Service agents were in charge of security outside the venue.

“They had meetings in the week prior. The Secret Service ran the show. They were the ones who designated who did what,” Goldinger said. “In the command hierarchy, they were top, they were No. 1.”

Goldinger said the commander of the Emergency Services Unit told him it was not responsible for securing areas outside the venue. “To me, the whole thing is under the jurisdiction of the Secret Service. And they will delineate from there,” he said.

The former senior Secret Service agent also said that even if local law enforcement “did drop the ball,” it’s still the agency’s responsibility “to ensure that they are following through either beforehand or in the moment.”

“Just because it is outside of the perimeter, it doesn’t take it out of play for a vulnerability, and you’ve got to mitigate it in some fashion,” the source added.

A volley of shots rang out minutes into Trump’s speech. He reached for his right ear — he said later it was pierced by a bullet — then dropped to the ground as Secret Service agents rushed to shield him. Trump emerged with blood on his ear and his face. One attendee was killed, and two others were injured.Witnesses listening to Trump’s speech from outside the event’s security perimeter recalled pointing out the gunman to law enforcement a couple of minutes before the shooting began. After the gunfire started, Secret Service personnel shot and killed the 20-year-old gunman, Thomas Matthew Crooks.

The clamor over the Secret Service’s biggest failure since the shooting of President Ronald Reagan in 1981 is coming from both political parties, from former agents and from security experts.

Source: https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/trump-rally-shooting-secret-service-identified-rooftop-security-flaw-rcna161783

An inspired Barbora Krejcikova etched her name onto Wimbledon’s famed honours board alongside her late mentor Jana Novotna after the seasoned Czech survived a stirring fightback from Jasmine Paolini to seal a 6-2 2-6 6-4 victory in the final on Saturday.
The 2021 French Open champion added the Venus Rosewater Dish to her bulging trophy cabinet that also includes 10 Grand Slam doubles prizes besides an Olympic doubles gold medal from the Tokyo Games three years ago.

Alec Baldwin should have the “human decency to say ‘I’m sorry'”, a lawyer for the family of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins has said.

Gloria Allred, who is representing the sister and parents of Ms Hutchins in a civil trial seeking damages, made the comment after a criminal manslaughter case against the actor fell apart.

It comes as Baldwin shared his first comment since the case was dismissed on Friday.

“There are too many people who have supported me to thank just now,” he wrote in a post on Instagram.

“To all of you, you will never know how much I appreciate your kindness toward my family,” he added.

The involuntary manslaughter case against Baldwin over the fatal shooting of Ms Hutchins on the set of Rust was dismissed yesterday.

The award-winning actor, 66, broke down in tears and hugged lawyers following judge Mary Marlowe Sommer’s decision.

She agreed with his lawyers that prosecutors and police withheld evidence about the source of the live ammunition that killed 42-year-old Ms Hutchins in 2021.

She threw out the case three days after the trial began in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and 18 months after charges were filed.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/alec-baldwin-should-have-the-human-decency-to-say-sorry-says-lawyer-for-family-of-halyna-hutchins-13177525

John Hunt and his daughter Amy issued a statement after the murders of Carol, 61, Louise, 25, and Hannah, 28. Kyle Clifford, who is suspected of killing the commentator’s wife and children, was detained by police on Wednesday.

Sky Sports commentator John Hunt said he and his family are “devastated” over the murders of his wife and two daughters.

Carol Hunt, 61, Louise, 25, and Hannah, 28, were killed in a crossbow attack at a house in Ashlyn Close, in Bushey, Hertfordshire, this week.

In a statement, the BBC and Sky Sports racing commentator and daughter and sister Amy said: “The devastation that we are experiencing cannot be put into words.

“We would like to thank people for their kind messages and for the support we have received in recent days. These have provided great comfort to us for which we are very grateful.

“As you can imagine, this is an extremely difficult time for us, and we need time and space to come to terms with what has happened and start the grieving process.

“While this is happening, we would ask that our privacy and that of our wider family and relations be respected at this time. Thank you.”

It comes after the man suspected of killing the three women in Hertfordshire was arrested.

Kyle Clifford, 26, was detained by police on Wednesday afternoon.

He has been treated for injuries in hospital since then but was only arrested today on suspicion of the murders.

Sky News pictures showed him being stretchered out of Lavender Hill Cemetery in Enfield. He remains in a serious condition.

Hertfordshire Police say a crossbow has been recovered as part of the investigation. They also believe other weapons could have been used in the killings.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/family-of-bushey-triple-murder-victims-say-they-are-devastated-by-attack-13177401

Elon Musk fully endorsed Donald Trump just moments after the former president was shot in the ear at a rally in Pennsylvania on Saturday.

“I fully endorse President Trump and hope for his rapid recovery,” he said on X.

In a subsequent post, Musk wrote, “Last time America had a candidate this tough was Theodore Roosevelt.”

Musk, who reportedly donated a “sizable amount” to a pro-Trump super PAC recently, also shared a photo of Trump being escorted off stage after several shots rang out from the crowd. The image shows the former president with blood on his face while holding his fist in the air.

The incident took place during a campaign rally, in the midst of Trump’s speech, on Saturday. Following the attack on Trump, 78, nine shots rang out and the former president ducked for cover.

After Secret Service agents quickly surrounded him, Trump was rushed off stage.

The Secret Service has said that Trump is safe, and a campaign spokesperson said he is fine. He’s also being checked out at a local medical facility, according to The New York Post.

Police sources also said that the shooter had been “neutralized” by the Secret Services’ counter assault team.

Richard Goldinger, the District Attorney of Butler County — where the rally took place — further revealed that an audience member also died, according to ABC News.

Source: https://pagesix.com/2024/07/13/celebrity-news/elon-musk-praises-tough-donald-trump-after-former-president-is-shot-at-rally/

Legendary fitness instructor Richard Simmons has died, according to TMZ.

Law enforcement sources told the news outlet that police responded to a call from his housekeeper before 10 a.m. on Saturday. They later pronounced him dead at the scene.

While Simmons reportedly fell in the bathroom of his home on Friday evening, no foul play is suspected at this time, the report further claims. It’s also not clear if the bathroom is where his housekeeper found him.

Simmons’ rep did not immediately respond to Page Six’s request for comment.

Simmons, who just turned 76 on Friday, stepped away from the spotlight 10 years ago. However, he took part in a rare interview with People recently, saying he would blow out a candle to celebrate his birthday.

“But the candle will probably be on a zucchini,” Simmons said. “You know, I’m a vegetarian.”

When asked how he felt about turning 76, he said, “I am grateful that I’m here, that I am alive for another day. I’ll spend my birthday doing what I do every day, which is to help people.”

Simmons’ death comes months after he suffered a health scare.

In March, the “Sweatin’ to the Oldies” instructor told his Facebook followers that he had been diagnosed with skin cancer.

“Mirror mirror on the wall what’s that blemish which is so small? There was this strange looking bump under my right eye. I had a tube of neosporin which I would put on in the morning and the evening…. it was still there. It was time to call my dermatologist,” Simmons wrote in a lengthy post at the time.

“I sat in his chair and he looked at it through a magnifying mirror. He told me he would have to scrape it and put it under the microscope. Now I am getting a little bit nervous.

“He comes back about 20 minutes later and says the C word. You have cancer,” he continued. “I asked him what kind of cancer and he said. Basel Cell Carcinoma. I told him to stop calling me dirty names. He laughed.”

Simmons said he was asked to seek treatment from a “cancer doctor” who had to “burn” his skin with a small instrument to “remove the cancer cells.”

After three painful procedures, the doctors “got all the cancer cells out.”

News of his diagnosis came one day after Simmons worried his fans by revealing he was “dying.” He later backtracked and apologized for any “confusion,” saying “it was a message about saying how we should embrace every day that we have.”

Source: https://pagesix.com/2024/07/13/entertainment/richard-simmons-dead-at-76/

Ruth Westheimer, who brought frank talk about sex into America’s living rooms for the first time as radio and television talk show host Dr. Ruth, has died. She was 96.

Westheimer died on Friday at her home in New York City, a spokesperson told the New York Times.

The diminutive educator with a thick German accent was known for dispensing explicit, down-to-earth advice on matters that weren’t previously discussed on-air.

Westheimer hosted at least five shows on Lifetime and other cable stations from 1984 to 1993, and wrote dozens of books on sex.

The college professor was already in her 50s when she started her radio show on New York radio station WYNY in 1980. She later said that being middle-aged probably helped her be accepted as an expert rather than a sex object, as discussing erotic pleasure was largely taboo on radio and television before her show.

Debuting as a 15-minute segment at midnight on Saturdays, the advice show quickly gained popularity and by 1984 it was syndicated nationwide as “The Dr. Ruth Show.”

That same year, she moved to television and began hosting Lifetime’s “Good Sex! With Dr. Ruth Westheimer,” which became “The Dr. Ruth Show” when it expanded the next year to a full hour. In 1987, she began another half hour syndicated series called “Ask Dr. Ruth.”

Westheimer went on to host “The All New Dr. Ruth Show” and teen advice shows “What’s Up, Dr. Ruth” and “You’re on the Air With Dr. Ruth.”

During the 1980s and 1990s she was a bona fide media personality, appearing frequently on “The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson” and “Late Night With David Letterman,” as well as on “Hollywood Squares,” in an episode of “Quantum Leap” and on TV commercials.

Born in Wiesenfeld, Germany, in 1928 to an Orthodox family, her father was taken away by the Nazis after Cristellnacht and was later killed at Auschwitz. At age 10, her family sent her to a Swiss orphanage to keep her safe, where she borrowed books from the boys to continue her education, which was forbidden to girls. After she stopped receiving letters from her mother and grandmother, she never heard from them again.

She emigrated to Palestine at the age of 17, where she trained as a scout and sniper and was seriously wounded by a shell. After moving to Paris with her first husband, she began studying psychology before moving to New York, where she earned her masters in sociology in 1959. She later earned a PhD in education.

Source: https://variety.com/2024/tv/news/dr-ruth-westheimer-dead-sex-therapist-1236071098/

Donald Trump was whisked off the stage after shots were fired at his Butler, Pennsylvania rally on Saturday. The former president confirmed that a bullet grazed the upper part of his right ear. The Secret Service, meanwhile, confirmed that the shooter and one bystander died during the incident, which was condemned by leaders from all over the world.

Donald Trump was whisked off the stage after shots were fired at his Butler, Pennsylvania rally on Saturday. The former president confirmed that a bullet grazed the upper part of his right ear. The Secret Service, meanwhile, confirmed that the shooter and one bystander died during the incident, which was condemned by leaders from all over the world.

The Simpsons had previously – in a 2015 episode titled ‘BART To the Future’ – depicted a flying past a sign in the background that reads ‘Trump 2024.’ About seven years later, the Republican actually made his run for 2024 official. After Saturday’s shooting, users on X, platform formerly known as Twitter, posted images from The Simpsons. They claimed that the Trump ‘assassination attempt’ was predicted.

Source: https://www.timesnownews.com/world/us/us-news/did-the-simpsons-predict-donald-trumps-assassination-attempt-theories-emerge-after-butler-pennsylvania-rally-shooting-article-111723630

The deceased, Aurangzeb, a resident of Cattle Colony, was under treatment at the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre (JPMC) in Karachi.

The deceased, Aurangzeb, a resident of Cattle Colony, was under treatment at the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre (JPMC) in Karachi.

The youth had gone for a picnic with friends at a farm house in Quaidabad on July 7, where they swam in the pool. He started showing symptoms on July 8, including fever, headache, and nausea. He was admitted to the hospital on July 10, and the virus was confirmed on July 11, ARY News reported.

He was the third victim of the deadly infection this year in the city, with the other two cases reported in Korangi and Malir. The health department has confirmed that the virus was responsible for the deaths.

Last year, at least 10 people died of Naegleria fowleri that’s responsible for the disease called Primary Amoebic Meningoencephalitis (PAM).

The infection is fatal in 98 per cent of the cases.

A free-living amoeba, Naegleria, is commonly found in warm fresh water (such as lakes, rivers, and hot springs) and soil. Only its one species, Naegleria fowleri, infects people. It infects people when water containing the amoeba enters the body through the nose. This typically happens when people go swimming, diving, or when they put their heads under fresh water, like in lakes and rivers.

Source: https://www.timesnownews.com/world/asia/brain-eating-amoeba-kills-pakistan-man-after-he-went-swimming-third-such-death-in-karachi-article-111723589

Attack on Donald Trump: PM Narendra Modi said violence has no place in politics.

In his first reaction to the assassination attempt on former US President Donald Trump, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday said he was deeply concerned by the attack on his “friend”. PM Modi, who is known to share a good rapport with the business tycoon-turned-politician, said violence has no place in politics and democracies.

“Deeply concerned by the attack on my friend, former President Donald Trump. Strongly condemn the incident. Violence has no place in politics and democracies. Wish him a speedy recovery,” PM Modi wrote on X.

PM Modi also showed solidarity with the people of America.

“Our thoughts and prayers are with the family of the deceased, those injured and the American people,” he added.

Donald Trump, the Republican presidential candidate, was addressing a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania when a shooter fired several bullets targeting him in an assassination attempt. One spectator was dead and two were injured in the shooting.

The sleuths of the United States Secret Service shot dead the shooter. The identity and the motivation of the shooter are being ascertained by the US authorities.

As soon as the first shots were fired, Donald Trump clutched his ear. Dark-suited agents covered him. They whisked him away from the rally venue to a waiting SUV.

Before that, in a show of strength, Donald Trump, whose face was bloodied due to an injury in the ear, pumped his fist in the air and mouthed “fight”.

Source: https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/pm-narendra-modi-reacts-to-attack-on-friend-donald-trump-deeply-concerned-101720925058462.html

Former first daughter Ivanka Trump shared an emotional message on Instagram Saturday shortly after her dad, Donald Trump, was nearly assassinated at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.

“Thank you for your love and prayers for my father and for the other victims of today’s senseless violence in Butler, Pennsylvania,” the former White House top adviser wrote.

“I am grateful to the Secret Service and all the other law enforcement officers for their quick and decisive actions today. I continue to pray for our country.”

“I love you Dad, today and always,” the 42-year-old wrote.

Ivanka’s heartfelt message comes after her brother Eric shared an exclusive comment with Page Six.

“Toughest man I have ever met,” Eric said of his father, 78.

Several shots rang out as Donald was speaking at his rally on Saturday. Video shows the former president ducking for cover after getting hit in the ear with a bullet.

Almost immediately after Donald hit the ground, he was surrounded by secret service agents. As he got up and was whisked away, he was seen with blood on the side of his face.

Rally attendees were eventually escorted out of the event, too, as the premises had become an active crime scene.

The former president later responded to the assassination attempt with a statement shared on his Truth Social page.

“I want to thank the United States Secret Service, and all of law enforcement for their rapid response to the shooting that just took place in Butler, Pennsylvania. Most importantly, I want to extend my condolences to the family of the person at the rally who was killed and also the family of another person that was badly injured,” he wrote.

“It is incredible that such an act can take place in our country. Nothing is known at this time about the shooter, who is now dead. I was shot with a bullet that pierced the upper right part of my ear.”

Source: https://pagesix.com/2024/07/13/celebrity-news/ivanka-trump-sends-love-to-dad-donald-after-assassination-attempt/

Former Prime Minister Imran Khan and his third wife were acquitted on charges of marrying unlawfully by a Pakistan court on Saturday, yet he will not be freed after authorities issued fresh orders to arrest him.
The ruling came a day after his Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party won more seats in parliament, ramping up pressure on the country’s fragile ruling coalition which is grappling to stabilise a broken economy.
The couple were sentenced to seven years in February when a court found them guilty of breaking Islamic law by failing to observe the required interval between the divorce from a previous marriage of Bushra Khan, also known as Bushra Bibi, and her marriage to Khan.
They had filed an appeal against their convictions.
“Both the appellants are acquitted of the charges,” said an order by the appeal court seen by Reuters.

Source: https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/pakistan-court-acquits-ex-pm-imran-khan-wife-unlawful-marriage-case-lawyer-says-2024-07-13/

One of America’s most valuable defenders against fentanyl trafficking at the Mexico border uses his nose to root out illicit drugs, an old-school technique that authorities say is a key to reducing the flow of deadly synthetic opioids.
Goose, an enthusiastic Golden Retriever, weaves through a sea of idling cars on a warm afternoon at San Diego’s massive legal border crossing, one of the most transited in the world with roughly 100,000 people entering the U.S. each day.

Goose sits when he finds the toy planted on a random volunteer crossing the border. Mission accomplished.

The Golden Retriever is one of 536 U.S. Customs and Border Protection canines trained to sniff out drugs, guns, ammunition, money and hidden passengers at America’s land border crossings, airports and seaports. The rise of illicit fentanyl and the epidemic of related overdoses prompted CBP to take the then-unprecedented step in 2017 of training drug-sniffing dogs to detect it, a program that has proved crucial to the agency’s efforts.

Despite millions of dollars in technology that allows CBP to scan vehicles and data analytics that help target possible smugglers, a dog’s sense of smell remains a vital tool for uncovering fentanyl and other narcotics.
Fentanyl is a powerful synthetic opioid that was approved by U.S. authorities for use as an anesthetic in 1968, but a spike in clandestine production and fatal overdoses in the past decade has made it a priority for law enforcement and health providers.
An estimated 75,000 people, opens new tab died from synthetic opioid overdoses in 2023, mostly involving fentanyl, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The vast majority of CBP fentanyl seizures occur at legal border crossings in Arizona and California, according to CBP statistics. Most convicted fentanyl traffickers in recent years have been, opens new tab U.S. citizens, U.S. Sentencing Commission figures show.

CBP Office of Field Operations canines have been involved with seizing more than 63,000 pounds [28,576 kg] of fentanyl since the program started, according to agency statistics.
President Joe Biden, a Democrat running for another term in Nov. 5 elections, has called on Republicans in Congress to increase funding for border security, including counter-fentanyl efforts at legal border crossings. CBP officials say the funding could help expand the use of canines, which includes a pilot program that has trained six dogs to smell for “precursor” chemicals used to make fentanyl.
Sidney Aki, the CBP field office director for the San Diego area, worked as a canine handler at the start of his career in the 1990s. Speaking to Reuters at the San Ysidro port of entry in late May, he said the dogs operated in conjunction with scanners and data analytics to root out fentanyl and other contraband.
“Of course, if we had more canines, if we had more personnel partnered up with canines, we would continue to do more and more,” he said.
STRONG MOTIVATION
At CBP’s canine academy in Front Royal, Virginia, customs officers from around the country are paired with their new four-legged partners, part of a four- to six-month process to teach the dogs to seek out contraband.
The drug-sniffing dogs are trained to detect six substances: marijuana, cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine, ecstasy and fentanyl, initially by filling chew toys with “pseudo-narcotics” that smell like the actual drug.
“That toy, that’s all they’re thinking about,” said Donna Sifford, the academy’s director, during an exclusive tour of the facility in mid-June. “When they smell those odors and sit, all they want to do is play with that toy.”
The academy – located on a picturesque 300-acre property in the Shenandoah River Valley – has training areas that simulate what will become the dogs’ real-world work environments, including an airport baggage screening room, mail room conveyor belt and an outdoor parking lot with dozens of dusty cars.

The dogs tend to be German Shepherds, Labradors, Dutch Shepherds and German Shorthaired Pointers, Sifford said. Goose is one of three Golden Retrievers in the program.

Most come from breeders in Europe, mainly Germany and the Czech Republic, while a smaller portion are American. They cost on average $11,000-$12,000 per dog and tend to retire when they reach age 8 or 9, she said.

While other hard drugs can have distinct scents – heroin sometimes smells like vinegar, for instance – fentanyl is usually odorless, at least to humans.

Dogs can learn to detect a new scent in three days on average, Sifford said, but before CBP could start training on fentanyl, the agency needed to develop safety protocols. Trainers always carry four doses of the opioid overdose drug Naloxone – which can also be administered to dogs – although they have not yet needed it, she said.

CBP has heard from authorities in other countries who want to learn about the fentanyl training techniques, including from recent outreach from Argentina and France, Sifford said. They have also had requests from U.S. states and localities.

Sifford acknowledges the work can be challenging for dogs at the border who have to deal with seasonally high temperatures, long work days and the stress of navigating traffic but said the work matches their breeding and temperament.
“When we’re selecting the dogs to go down to the southwest border, we’re looking for the higher-drive dogs that we know can actually work in that environment and maintain that pace,” she said.
‘BEST TECHNOLOGY’
Dogs have a sense of smell that is exponentially more powerful than humans with up to 200 times more olfactory receptors, according to a 2022 study published in the peer-reviewed Journal of Neuroscience.
Dogs can rapidly sweep through vehicle traffic, search suspicious cars and check lines of passengers. They are particularly useful for uncovering fentanyl, which can be moved in small quantities as pills or powder.
“They’re like biosensors,” said Michael Gould, a founding member of the New York City Police Department’s canine unit who now works as an expert witness in legal cases involving police dogs. “It’s really the best technology that’s available.”
The dogs do have limitations. They can typically only be out searching vehicles or people for about 20 minutes in warmer weather before they need a break, officials said. Drug-sniffing canines can also send false alarms, with studies showing a range of effectiveness.
And while CBP’s fentanyl seizures increased in recent years, the agency only appears to intercept a small percentage coming into the U.S.

Source: https://www.reuters.com/world/us/americas-front-line-against-fentanyl-is-golden-retriever-named-goose-2024-07-13/

Amelie Oudea Castera took the plunge in Paris, where she was joined by Paralympic triathlon champion Alexis Hanquinquant.

France’s sports minister has swum in the River Seine, with authorities hoping the move will show it is clean enough to stage swimming events at the Olympics.

Amelie Oudea Castera took the plunge into the capital’s famous river, where she was joined in the water by Paralympic triathlon champion Alexis Hanquinquant, who won gold in the men’s PTS4 event at Tokyo 2020.

Amid polllution concerns, Ms Oudea Castera posted a video on X of her diving in near the Alexandre III and Invalides bridges in Paris on Saturday, along with photos of her and the athlete clasping hands in and out of the water.

A caption in the post read: “Promise kept! [along with a swimmer emoji].

“With @AHanquinquant, our Paralympic triathlon champion, who celebrated his role as flag bearer at Paris.”

The triathlon and marathon swimming legs are scheduled to take place in the Seine near the Alexandre III bridge during the Olympics, which run from 26 July to 11 August, and the Paralympics, which are from 28 August to 8 September.

France’s President Emmanuel Macron and Paris mayor Anne Hidalgo have said they will swim in the waterway to show their citizens and visiting athletes that all is well.

Ms Hidalgo initially planned to swim in the Seine last month – prompting an online campaign by her critics threatening to defecate in the river on the day of her dip.

But she postponed the swim after Mr Macron announced snap legislative elections that have plunged France into political tensions and eclipsed pre-Olympic excitement for many people.

The mayor said on Wednesday that she would swim in the river in the coming days in a bid to show its suitability for the games.

She told France Inter radio that she would “dive in next week” and the water would be “depolluted, that’s for sure”.

Mr Macron has yet to announce a date for him to take a dip.

Late last month into July, unsafe levels of E.coli were found in the river for a third successive week.

The test results by monitoring group Eau de Paris showed that for all but one day from 26 June to 2 July, contamination levels were below the safe limit of 900 colony-forming units per 100 millilitres determined by the World Triathlon Federation for competitions.

But later, regional authorities released new results showing an improvement.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/paris-2024-olympics-frances-sports-minister-swims-in-river-seine-amid-pollution-concerns-ahead-of-games-13177396

Shots were fired during a rally speech by Donald Trump, in an incident that investigators are treating as a possible assassination attempt on the former president. Here are some notable examples of shootings involving US presidents or presidential candidates:

RONALD REAGAN (1981)

President Reagan was shot and seriously wounded as he left an event at the Hilton hotel in Washington. The attacker was John Hinckley Jr, who was granted unconditional release in 2022. Reagan spent twelve days in the hospital. The incident boosted Reagan’s popularity, as he displayed humor and resilience during his recovery.

 GERALD FORD (1975)

President Ford was left unscathed in two separate assassination attempts by women in September 1975, both in California and within a span of just 17 days.

GEORGE WALLACE (1972)
While campaigning for the Democratic presidential nomination, Wallace was shot four times and paralyzed for life at a shopping mall in Laurel, Maryland. The assassination attempt on Wallace, who was known for his segregationist views and populist appeal, highlighted the ongoing political tensions in the US and potential for domestic violence in the Vietnam war era.

 ROBERT F. KENNEDY (1968)

President John F. Kennedy’s brother Robert, who was running for the Democratic presidential nomination, was shot and killed at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles, California. The assassination had a profound impact on the 1968 presidential race and occurred just two months after the killing of civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr, adding to the political turmoil of the late 1960s.

 JOHN F. KENNEDY (1963)

Riding in his motorcade with his wife Jackie, President Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas by Lee Harvey Oswald. The Warren Commission investigating the assassination concluded in 1964 that Lee Harvey Oswald, a former marine who had lived in the Soviet Union, had acted alone. Many Americans believe the death of JFK began a more violent period in US politics and society, with the Vietnam War build up and the civil rights struggle as a backdrop.

President Biden was speaking at a press briefing about the shooting at a Donald Trump rally in Pennsylvania – in which Trump appeared injured. He is said to be “fine” and safe.

President Biden has said there is “no place in America for this kind of violence” after an apparent assassination attempt on Donald Trump.

“It’s sick. Sick,” he said in a press briefing in Delaware, following the attack on the Trump event in Pennsylvania.

The US Secret Service confirmed a suspected gunman fired “multiple shots” from an “elevated position outside of the rally venue”.

Trump shooting latest: Rifle and body pictured on roof

They said the gunman had been “neutralised” and was now dead. The agency also confirmed a spectator had been killed and two others critically injured.

“We cannot allow for this to be happening,” President Biden said.

He thanked the Secret Service, adding: “Everyone must condemn it.”

Mr Biden said he had tried to contact Trump following the shooting.

“I tried to get a hold of Donald – he’s with his doctors,” said the president. “Apparently, he’s doing well. I hope I get to speak to him tonight.”

The Secret Service said Trump was now “safe” and that it had implemented protective measures around him.

It said it was treating the incident as an assassination attempt.

Trump wrote on social media that a bullet had pierced the upper part of his ear.

“I knew immediately that something was wrong in that I heard a whizzing sound, shots, and immediately felt the bullet ripping through the skin,” he said on his Truth Social platform.

“Much bleeding took place, so I realised then what was happening.

“I want to thank The United States Secret Service, and all of law enforcement, for their rapid response,” he added.

“Most importantly, I want to extend my condolences to the family of the person at the rally who was killed, and also to the family of another person that was badly injured.

“It is incredible that such an act can take place in our country.”

Trump’s campaign said he was “fine” following the incident.

“President Trump thanks law enforcement and first responders for their quick action during this heinous act,” spokesman Steven Cheung said.

“He is fine and is being checked out at a local medical facility. More details will follow.”

The incident happened as the former president was speaking at a rally in Pennsylvania. Suddenly, he appeared to fall to the ground clutching his ear.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/no-place-in-america-for-this-kind-of-sick-violence-says-biden-after-trump-rally-shooting-13177664

A New Mexico judge on Friday brought a sudden and stunning end to the involuntary manslaughter case against Alec Baldwin, dismissing it in the middle of the actor’s trial and saying it cannot be filed again.

Judge Mary Marlowe Sommer dismissed the case based on misconduct of police and prosecutors over the withholding of evidence from the defense in the 2021 shooting of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins on the set of the film “Rust.”

Baldwin cried, hugged his two attorneys, gestured to the front of the court, then turned to hug his crying wife, Hilaria, the mother of seven of his eight children, holding the embrace for 12 seconds. He climbed into an SUV outside the Santa Fe County courthouse without speaking to the media.

“The late discovery of this evidence during trial has impeded the effective use of evidence in such a way that it has impacted the fundamental fairness of the proceedings,” Marlowe Sommer said. “If this conduct does not rise to the level of bad faith it certainly comes so near to bad faith to show signs of scorching.”

The case-ending evidence, revealed during testimony Thursday, was ammunition that was brought into the sheriff’s office in March by a man who said it could be related to Hutchins’ killing. Prosecutors said they deemed the ammo unrelated and unimportant, while Baldwin’s lawyers alleged they “buried” it and filed a motion to dismiss the case.

Barack Obama and Nancy Pelosi have spoken privately about Joe Biden and the future of his 2024 campaign. Both the former president and ex-speaker expressed concerns about how much harder they think it’s become for the president to beat Donald Trump. Neither is quite sure what to do.

Democrats are desperate for the dispiriting infighting to end so they can get back to trying to beat the former president. And they’re begging either Obama or Pelosi to help them get there, aware that Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer doesn’t have the trust of Biden and that House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries doesn’t have the depth of relationship to deliver the message.

CNN spoke with more than a dozen members of Congress, operatives and multiple people in touch with both Obama and Pelosi, many of whom say that the end for Biden’s candidacy feels clear and at this point it’s just a matter of how it plays out, even after Thursday night’s news conference.

And if those two feel otherwise, several leading Democrats say, they need to say that clearly as soon as possible before even more damage is done less than four months before the election.

Many of Pelosi’s colleagues are hoping that she can bring an end to the turmoil that has engulfed Democrats for the last two weeks. And to a good chunk of them, that end can come if and when she tells Biden that he has to drop out.

Pelosi has spoken to Biden since the debate, but in the time since, the California Democrat has made clear that she does not see Biden’s decision to stay in the race as final. But she, through an aide, declined to comment further.

Obama’s decision not to make any public comment for two weeks has left a number of leading Democrats feeling like he has left them flailing by holding to the same posture that has largely defined his post-presidency. After the debate, he posted on X, “Bad debate nights happen. Trust me, I know,” reiterating that sentiment at a fundraiser in New York for House Democrats the night after Biden’s performance. The former president hadn’t even planned to make any public statement, but Biden and Obama aides coordinated to get that post out in a way that reflected Biden campaign talking points that Obama’s first reelection debate in 2012 went badly, too, and it didn’t end up ending his campaign.

But Obama’s deepening skepticism about his friend’s ability to win reelection is one of the worst kept secrets in Washington.

When the history of this extraordinary two-week period of American politics is written, the fingerprints of Obama and Pelosi will be far more apparent than currently known, people familiar with the matter tell CNN, as the Democratic elders have served as a guidepost for a party in panic.

“They are watching and waiting for President Biden to reach a decision on his own,” one longtime Democrat close to all of them told CNN, speaking on condition of anonymity to avoid being seen as disrespectful to Biden.

The Biden campaign declined to comment.

While not contesting that the former speaker and Obama have spoken about Biden, a Pelosi spokesperson told CNN after this article first published, “There is no member of Congress who would have any knowledge of any conversation that Speaker Pelosi would have with President Obama. Anyone who says they do is not speaking the truth.”

Obama has been fielding more calls than he’s making, people who have spoken to him say. When he does talk to anxious Democratic donors and officials, he’s been listening more than talking, carefully avoiding taking positions that he assumes would quickly leak.

That was also Obama’s approach to the call he had with Biden after the debate, which the current president has suggested to others included the former president being supportive of him riding out the turmoil. According to others familiar with the call, though, Obama stuck to his posture of being a “sounding board and private counselor.” He prodded. He played devil’s advocate. But he did not take a position.

In conversations with some Democrats over the past two weeks, Obama has swatted away the notion that he could push Biden one direction or the other even if he wanted to, which underscores their long-running complicated, yet loyal, relationship. And it’s been complicated even further during their time apart: since leaving office behind – and their weekly lunches at the White House for eight years – the two have spoken far less than some of their advisers have often intimated.

If the former president did try to steer Biden to get out, people who know Obama say, he is aware the prism through which it could be seen. Biden has written that he felt Obama was not encouraging of his jumping in late to the Democratic primaries in the months after his son Beau died in 2015. Though Obama believes that he was trying to help his then-vice president focus on his grief and not wade into what would have been an incredibly hard primary campaign against Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders, that may not be how another conversation would go.

“Biden would say, ‘Well, Mr. President, you already used that chip in 2015 and it got us Donald Trump,’” speculated a longtime 2020 campaign aide. “I think it would harden him more.”

Obama is also loath to give Trump, who is forever triggered by him, any new material by getting actively involved.

In the past — including during the 2020 Democratic primaries — Obama has seen his role as being the unifier who can help validate the direction of the party to whichever parts of the party remain skeptical. So far, he has not committed to having that role in the turmoil over whether Biden should remain the nominee, what happens if he stays, or what happens if he changes course and decides to go. “Well he’s known as no-drama Obama,” said Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, a Missouri Democrat. “So if there’s drama, then he’s the one to deal with it.”

Obama’s hands-off approach — at least publicly — has been seen by some close to him as a way to keep his powder dry in case he needs to have a blunt, difficult conversation with Biden.

“He is going to be all in for the Democratic ticket. No matter who our nominee is, he will be busting his a** helping to make sure that person wins in November,” said one person who speaks with Obama regularly.

Obama has been at Biden’s side during two fundraising events this year, including at the Los Angeles event last month at which George Clooney would later acknowledge he was alarmed by how Biden carried himself.

Biden woke up in Italy the day before the fundraiser — after several days of G-7 meetings — and had to fly overnight across five time zones to get there, because campaign co-chair Jeffrey Katzenberg was eager to do the Hollywood-themed event, and Clooney told the campaign there was only one day he was available, given his shooting schedule.

Even on the way there, Obama questioned the thinking of putting any presidential candidate through the wringer of that kind of scheduling.

“He was the same man we all witnessed at the debate,” Clooney wrote in an essay in The New York Times this week, imploring Biden to step aside.

It was those words that infuriated some Biden loyalists, who suggested that Obama was behind Clooney’s op-ed. The former president, who is friendly with the actor, was aware that it was coming but did not try to stop it. To some Obama defenders, that was a way of preserving his neutrality, but to some Biden loyalists, it was a mark of deep betrayal.

Obama was backstage and on stage with Biden for much longer than Clooney was. Others around at the time chalked up the shape the president was in to jet lag. The infamous video of Obama leading Biden off stage, people familiar say, was more a function of the former president wanting to leave.

An Obama aide declined to comment and also declined to say whether his own assessment of Biden’s condition remained that it was about jet lag.

Source: https://edition.cnn.com/2024/07/11/politics/obama-pelosi-biden-democrats-2024/index.html

Building collapses are becoming common in Nigeria, Africa’s most populous country, with more than a dozen such incidents recorded in the last two years.

Twenty-two pupils have been killed after a two-storey school collapsed in Nigeria.

The Saints Academy college in the north-central Plateau state’s Busa Buji community collapsed shortly after pupils, many of whom were 15 years old or younger, arrived for classes.

A total of 154 pupils were trapped with 132 rescued and treated for injuries in various hospitals, a police spokesman said.

Twenty-two pupils were killed.

Rescue and health workers as well as security forces had been deployed at the scene, according to aid Nigeria’s National Emergency Management Agency.

“To ensure prompt medical attention, the government has instructed hospitals to prioritise treatment without documentation or payment,” Plateau state’s commissioner for information Musa Ashoms said in a statement.

The state government blamed the tragedy on the school’s “weak structure and location near a riverbank”.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/twenty-two-pupils-killed-as-nigeria-school-building-collapses-13177324

Intense. Impatient. Sleep-deprived. Step into the relentless world of Volodymyr Zelenskiy, Ukraine’s wartime president.
The 46-year-old said his ambition when he was elected in 2019 had been to help Ukraine become a modern democracy, before that mission was shattered by Russia’s invasion in 2022.
“All I wanted five years ago was a very liberal country with a liberal economy,” Zelenskiy, a former stand-up comic, told Reuters in an interview in May on the fifth anniversary of his inauguration.

A smoking laptop in a passenger’s bag prompted an evacuation on an American Airlines flight headed to Miami from San Francisco International Airport Friday, according to the airline.

One person sustained minor injuries while exiting that required transport to a hospital, the airline said. Passengers evacuated via emergency slides and a jet bridge.

Two other passengers also reported minor injuries, according to the San Francisco Fire Department, which responded to the incident.

Crews reported the smoking laptop as passengers were boarding, the airline said.

American Airlines flight 2045 was scheduled to depart San Francisco at 12:15 p.m. for Miami. The flight will depart later Friday.

Steve Kulm, a spokesperson with the Federal Aviation Administration, said the agency will investigate.

Source: https://apnews.com/article/american-airlines-flight-smoking-laptop-san-francisco-449d04bdd66ad411fa024799045e1992

The president’s first press conference this year was broadcast on eight different TV news networks

President Joe Biden’s press conference on Thursday drew an estimated 24.2 million viewers, according to Nielsen figures.

Biden’s first solo press conference of the year aired from around 7:30 p.m. ET to 8:30 p.m. ET and was broadcast on eight difference television networks. That includes ABC, which delayed the start of its ESPYs sports awards coverage as a result.

A majority of the viewership was in the 55+ age range, where 19.2 million viewers watched the event live. In the 18-34 age range, just over 1 million viewers saw the event, and of adults in the 35-54 age range, 3.6 million viewers watched live.

Breaking down the ratings, Fox News topped all news networks with 5.67 million total viewers and 835,000 in the 25-54 demographic. ABC News came in second with 4.98 million total viewers — however, the broadcast network topped Fox News in the 25-54 demographic with 879,000 viewers. CBS News came in third, drawing 3.60 million total viewers, and 611,000 viewers in the 25-54 age range.

NBC News drew 3.55 million total viewers and 319,000 in the 25-54 demo, while MSNBC drew 2.52 million total viewers and 319,000 in the demo, giving NBCUniversal a wide reach across its platforms that would put it in second to Fox News when combined. With viewership from CNBC added in, NBC’s networks drew 6.25 million viewers. CNN saw 2.22 million total viewers and 439,000 in the demo.

In comparison, Biden’s debate against Republican candidate Donald Trump in June, which reignited fears about the president’s capabilities, drew over 51.3 million total viewers across all broadcast and cable networks that simulcasted the debate.

Source: https://www.thewrap.com/biden-press-conference-ratings-24-million/

Donald Trump holds a 4 percentage point lead over Joe Biden in the 2024 presidential race, according to new Pew Research Center polling released Thursday. The temperature check is the latest in a growing pile of bad polls for Biden as fights to preserve his candidacy for reelection after a poor debate performance.

The Pew survey found that 63% of voters describe both Biden and Trump as embarrassing. Only about a quarter (24%) of voters said they consider Biden “mentally sharp” — down from 53% in 2021 — while 58% said they would describe Trump that way.

Meanwhile, several close allies of the president reportedly told NBC he has no chance of winning reelection.

“He needs to drop out,” one Biden campaign official said. “He will never recover from this.”

The Pew poll, which was conducted from July 1 to 7, found that 44% of registered voters would vote for Trump if the election were held today. Biden netted 40% of the hypothetical vote, and third-party candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. another 15%.

Source: https://www.semafor.com/article/07/11/2024/biden-behind-trump-new-pew-polling-embarrassing-characteristics

Alec Baldwin urged Hilaria, kids to visit before he knew Hutchins died

Jurors will learn that Alec Baldwin urged his wife and kids to visit him in Santa Fe for a “good time,” hours after he accidentally shot Halyna Hutchins and Joel Souza on a movie set, according to a ruling Thursday.

Baldwin, 66, hadn’t yet learned that Hutchins was dead but knew that she and Souza had been taken to a hospital when he called his wife, Hilaria, from a New Mexico sheriff’s office Oct. 21, 2021.

“He’s speaking to his wife, and he has her on FaceTime so we can actually hear her. We can hear her responses. And then he’s speaking to another person,” prosecutor Kari Morrissey told the judge during a hearing outside the earshot of jurors.

“And he is explaining that he wants that person to try to convince his wife to still come to New Mexico because they can’t get their money back for the plane tickets, and they’d like to go ahead and have a good time.”

Hilaria and their kids had previously planned to visit Baldwin one day after the tragic accident.

But rather than call off their trip after the shooting, Baldwin urged them to visit.

Morrissey argued the statement should be allowed after defense attorney Alex Spiro elicited testimony about Baldwin’s state of mind from Santa Fe Sheriff’s Deputy Nicholas Lefleur.

Spiro had asked whether Baldwin appeared upset after the accidental shooting, which the deputy confirmed.

Judge Mary Marlowe Sommer ruled prosecutors could introduce his conversations with Hilaria, which were captured on video hours after the accident as Baldwin sat alone in a police interview room.

Later that evening, Baldwin told Det. Alexandria Hancock, “You live a very, very difficult but ultimately very narrow life.”

Sommer said that statement can also be disclosed to jurors.

The third day of Baldwin’s involuntary manslaughter trial in the First Judicial District Court kicked off with cross-examination of the state’s fourth witness, forensic technician Marissa Poppell.

During the brutal hours-long questioning by Spiro, Poppell admitted she didn’t conduct an exhaustive search for live ammunition at a warehouse for the film’s prop supplier after having stated the opposite on direct examination.

Source: https://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/alec-baldwin-trial-jurors-learn-actor-urged-wife-visit-have-good-time-day-shooting

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Thursday embraced the support of allies who have provided substantial new military aid and a path to joining NATO, even as he emphatically pushed for the help to arrive faster and for restrictions to be lifted on the use of U.S. weapons to attack military targets inside Russia.

“If we want to win, if we want to prevail, if we want to save our country and to defend it, we need to lift all the limitations,” Zelenskyy said alongside NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg in the final hours of a summit that saw Ukraine receive fresh commitments of weapons and other support to firm up its defense against Russia.

The summit unfolded against the backdrop of a tumultuous American political cycle, with mounting angst among Democrats about President Joe Biden’s ability to serve another four years following a shocking debate flop two weeks ago that threw the future of his presidency into doubt.

Source: https://apnews.com/article/nato-summit-ukraine-russia-china-biden-66656f03cd5e203d4074bdb2ead8abd8

Actress Shelley Duvall was a protege of the filmmaker Robert Altman, starring in seven of his films, including Nashville, 3 Women and Popeye. But she is best known for her performance as the tormented Wendy Torrance opposite Jack Nicholson in The Shining.

Shelley Duvall, the actress best known for her performance in psychological horror The Shining, has died at the age of 75.

It is her screaming face that makes up half of the film’s most iconic image, as an axe wielded by co-star Jack Nicholson smashes through the door next to her.

She also starred in films including Popeye, alongside Robin Williams, and Woody Allen’s Annie Hall, and worked frequently with the filmmaker Robert Altman.

The actress died in her sleep at her home in Blanco, Texas, overnight, her partner told Sky News’ US partner network NBC News. She had been receiving hospice care after suffering complications from diabetes for the past few months.

“My dear, sweet, wonderful life, partner, and friend left us last night,” Dan Gilroy said in a statement. “Too much suffering lately, now she’s free. Fly away, beautiful Shelley.”

The couple had been together for 34 years. Speaking to NBC, Gilroy said: “I can’t tell you how much I miss her. This is a great little community here, and lots of people are just so supportive. We have good friends right here, so there’s a support system in place… I’m happy for her that she’s not suffering.”

She also starred in films including Popeye, alongside Robin Williams, and Woody Allen’s Annie Hall, and worked frequently with the filmmaker Robert Altman.

The actress died in her sleep at her home in Blanco, Texas, overnight, her partner told Sky News’ US partner network NBC News. She had been receiving hospice care after suffering complications from diabetes for the past few months.

“My dear, sweet, wonderful life, partner, and friend left us last night,” Dan Gilroy said in a statement. “Too much suffering lately, now she’s free. Fly away, beautiful Shelley.”

The couple had been together for 34 years. Speaking to NBC, Gilroy said: “I can’t tell you how much I miss her. This is a great little community here, and lots of people are just so supportive. We have good friends right here, so there’s a support system in place… I’m happy for her that she’s not suffering.”

Duvall was attending junior college in Texas when she encountered some of Altman’s crew members at a party in Houston in 1970.

She was cast in the fantasy comedy Brewster McCloud and went on to become his protege. The pair worked together on seven of his films in total, including Popeye, in which she starred as Olive Oyl opposite Williams.

The star gained widespread recognition in Altman movies such as Nashville and 3 Women – with the latter earning her the best actress award at the Cannes Film Festival. She also starred in Jane Campion’s The Portrait Of A Lady, opposite Nicole Kidman and John Malkovich.

But it is her iconic performance as a terror-stricken wife and mother in classic 1980 horror The Shining for which she is best known, playing tormented Wendy Torrance in the Stanley Kubrick adaptation of the Stephen King novel.

Kubrick, a famous perfectionist, was notoriously hard on the actress during production of the film, set in the creepy Overlook Hotel, with one distressing scene reportedly performed in 127 takes.

In an interview with People magazine in 1981, Duvall said she was crying “12 hours a day for weeks on end” while filming. “I will never give that much again,” she said.”If you want to get into pain and call it art, go ahead, but not with me.”

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/shelley-duvall-the-shining-actress-dies-aged-75-13176677

Ukraine on Thursday urged NATO allies to lift restrictions on its use of long-range weapons against targets in Russia, saying that would be “game-changer” in its war with Moscow, while China slammed NATO criticism of its support for Russia as biased and malicious.
NATO members issued a declaration in support of Ukraine at a summit in Washington on Wednesday, promising additional aid and pledging to back its “irreversible path” to NATO membership.

“At this summit we are turning a corner and putting in place the foundations for Ukraine to prevail,” NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg told a news conference after a three-day meeting in Washington of the 32 NATO states.
“Today, we send a strong message of unity and resolve to Moscow that violence and intimidation do not pay, and that Ukraine can count on NATO now for the long haul.”
Near the end of the summit on Thursday, U.S. President Joe Biden mistakenly referred to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy as “President Putin,” before correcting himself, in a mix up likely to add fuel to calls for him to quit the 2024 presidential race.

NATO members have taken different approaches to how Ukraine can use weapons they donate. Some have made clear Kyiv can use them to strike targets deep inside Russia while the United States has taken a narrower approach, allowing its weapons to be used only just inside Russia’s border against targets supporting Russian military operations in Ukraine.
Biden told the press conference the United States had allowed Zelenskiy to use American weapons in a limited way within Russia’s borders.
“If he had the ability to strike Moscow, strike the Kremlin, would that make sense? It wouldn’t,” he added.
Biden said he and U.S. military and intelligence officials were making decisions on “a day-to-day basis on how far they should go in. That’s a logical thing to do.”
The United States and its allies have used this week’s summit to try to project unity in the face of what they see as a rising threat to Europe from Russia and China.
However, NATO member Hungary said ahead of a meeting of NATO members with partners from the so-called Indo-Pacific Four – Australia, Japan, New Zealand and South Korea – that it does not want NATO to become an “anti-China” bloc, and will not support it doing so.
Hungary’s Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto also told Hungarian state television that Ukraine’s admission to the military alliance would weaken unity in the group.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban irked other NATO members with surprise visits to Kyiv, Moscow and Beijing in the past two weeks on a self-styled “peace mission”. He and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump will meet on Thursday at the latter’s Florida home, according to three people with knowledge of the matter.
Orban’s meeting in Moscow with Russian President Vladimir Putin in particular angered some fellow NATO allies, who said the trip handed legitimacy to Putin’s claims to Ukrainian territory seized since Russia’s 2022 invasion.
Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, told a public forum he would not speculate on whether Orban’s trip to Moscow was coordinated with Trump, Biden’s rival in the November U.S. election, but said the Ukrainians had grave misgivings about any effort to negotiate a peace deal without them.
“So whatever adventurism is being undertaken without Ukraine’s consent or support is not something that’s consistent with our policy, the foreign policy of the United States,” he said.
ANGRY WORDS FROM CHINA
Wednesday’s NATO declaration included sharp words about China, calling it “a decisive enabler” of Russia’s war in Ukraine, and said Beijing continues to pose systemic challenges to Europe and to security.
China’s Foreign Ministry said the declaration was biased and “sowing discord” and its mission to the European Union described it as being “full of Cold War mentality and belligerent rhetoric, and China-related content full of provocations, lies, incitement and smears.”
At the news conference, Stoltenberg recalled language in the declaration by saying that “China cannot continue to fuel the largest military conflict in Europe without this impacting Beijing’s interests and reputation.”
China has repeatedly lashed out at NATO criticisms and has warned against its expansion into the Indo-Pacific.
Japan, South Korea, New Zealand and Australia have forged stronger ties with NATO amid rising concerns over China’s pressure on rival claimants in disputed waters in the region and on democratic Taiwan, the global hub of cutting-edge chip production, which Beijing claims as its own.

Source: https://www.reuters.com/world/nato-back-ukraine-biden-faces-growing-pressure-drop-out-presidential-race-2024-07-11/

Mette Frederiksen said allies need to “pay more attention to our responsibility as Europeans” and step up to ensure Ukraine wins in its war against Russia.

Europe has not prioritised its security enough for “many, many years”, the Danish prime minister has warned.

Speaking from the NATO summit in Washington DC, Mette Frederiksen said the military alliance’s European members need to step up their efforts to help Ukraine and secure peace.

“Different American presidents have been putting the same message on the table – you have to do more, you have to take care of your own security, you have to bring bigger commitments,” she told Sky’s diplomatic editor Dominic Waghorn.

“I have to say I agree with them.”

The Danish prime minister was asked about reports that Donald Trump could allow Russia to keep parts of Ukraine it has taken by force and commit to not expanding NATO eastwards if he is elected into the White House once again in November.

But she said there were “too many ifs” in this discussion and “no matter what will happen in the US, I think we have a lot of homework to do in Europe”.

She continued: “We have to be honest that we have not prioritised security for many, many years. We need to pay more attention to our responsibility as Europeans.”

Part of this, she said, involves providing more support to Ukraine as it battles to stave off Russia’s invasion.

The full-scale invasion began in 2022 and Russia now controls large swathes of eastern and southern Ukraine – in total, about 18% of the country.

Moscow appears to have had the upper hand in recent months, advancing north of Ukraine’s second-biggest city Kharkiv and earlier this week launching a deadly attack on the capital which hit a children’s hospital and killed at least 36 people.

Ms Frederiksen said the situation on the battlefield is “terrible” and the “main focus” for European leaders should be to provide Ukraine with weapons and ammunition.

Denmark, the Netherlands, Belgium and Norway agreed to supply about 80 F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine.

Waghorn asked whether this would make enough of a difference, given Russia has more than 800 fighter jets and warplanes at its disposal.

The prime minister said it was “totally right” that Ukraine needs more, saying: “All weapons are better used in Ukraine than in our own countries.

“When it comes to air defence, I would rather see Patriot systems in Ukraine than in the western part of NATO.”

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/europe-hasnt-prioritised-security-enough-and-should-take-more-responsibility-danish-pm-warns-13176797

The possibility of hydrogen-powered flight means greater opportunities for fossil-free travel, and the technological advances to make this happen are moving fast. New studies from Chalmers University of Technology, in Sweden, show that almost all air travel within a 750-mile radius (1200 km) could be made with hydrogen-powered aircraft by 2045, and with a novel heat exchanger currently in development, this range could be even further.

“If everything falls into place, the commercialisation of hydrogen flight can go really fast now. As early as 2028, the first commercial hydrogen flights in Sweden could be in the air,” says Tomas Grönstedt, Professor at Chalmers University of Technology, and Director of the competence centre TechForH2* at Chalmers.

Some of these technological advances can be seen inside the Chalmers wind tunnels, where researchers test airflow conditions in cutting edge facilities. Here, more energy-efficient engines are being developed that pave the way for safe and efficient hydrogen flight for heavy-duty vehicles.

Future of short-range hydrogen aviation for Nordics

For hydrogen-powered aviation, short and medium-range flights are the closest to being realised. A recently published study from Chalmers shows that hydrogen-powered flights have the potential to meet the needs of 97 percent of all intra-Nordic flight routes and 58 percent of the Nordic passenger volume by 2045.

For this study, the researchers assumed a maximum flight distance of 750 miles and the use of an existing aircraft model adapted for hydrogen power. The study, led by doctoral student Christian Svensson in Tomas Grönstedt’s research group, also showcased a new fuel tank that could hold enough fuel, was insulated enough to hold the super-cold liquid hydrogen and at the same time was lighter than today’s fossil-based fuel tank systems.

For this study, the researchers assumed a maximum flight distance of 750 miles and the use of an existing aircraft model adapted for hydrogen power. The study, led by doctoral student Christian Svensson in Tomas Grönstedt’s research group, also showcased a new fuel tank that could hold enough fuel, was insulated enough to hold the super-cold liquid hydrogen and at the same time was lighter than today’s fossil-based fuel tank systems.

Novel heat exchangers for better fuel consumption
Heat exchangers are a vital part of hydrogen aviation, and they are a key part of the technological advancements taking place. To keep the fuel systems light weight, the hydrogen needs to be in liquid form. This means that the hydrogen is kept supercool in the aircraft, typically around -250 degrees Celsius. By recovering heat from the hot exhausts of the jet engines, and by cooling the engines in strategic locations they become more efficient. To transfer the heat between the supercool hydrogen and the engine, novel types of heat exchangers are needed.

To meet this challenge, researchers at Chalmers have been working for several years to develop a completely new type of heat exchanger. The technology, which is now patent pending by partner GKN Aerospace, takes advantage of hydrogen’s low storage temperature to cool engine parts, and then uses waste heat from the exhaust gases to preheat the fuel several hundred degrees before it is injected into the combustion chamber.

“Every degree increase in temperature reduces fuel consumption and increases range. We were able to show that short- and medium-haul aircraft equipped with the new heat exchanger could reduce their fuel consumption by almost eight percent. Considering that an aircraft engine is a mature and well-established technology, it is a very good result from a single component,” says Carlos Xisto, Associate Professor at the Division of Fluid Mechanics at Chalmers, and one of the authors of the study.

The researchers also note that with more optimisation, this type of heat exchanger technology in a regular Airbus A320 commercial aircraft could provide an improved range of up to ten percent, or the equivalent of the Gothenburg-Berlin route (approximately 450 miles).

Sweden pledges big investments, despite challenges
The work to develop solutions for hydrogen aviation of the future is taking place on a broad front, with governments, universities and private companies working together. In Sweden, the innovation cluster, Swedish Hydrogen Development Centre (SHDC), brings together key players, including industry leaders and experts from academia. At a recent SHDC seminar, researchers from Chalmers presented their work and several commercial companies testified to major investments in hydrogen flights in the coming years. Whilst the technology is well advanced, the challenges lie rather in the large investments required, and in developing infrastructure, business models and partnerships to be able to produce, transport and store the hydrogen so that the transition to hydrogen flight is possible. A total transition is expected to require around 100 million tonnes of green hydrogen annually.

“There are industry expectations that 30–40 percent of global aviation will be powered by hydrogen by 2050. It is likely that for a number of years to come, we will need a mix of aircraft that run on electricity, less environmentally harmful e-jet fuel and hydrogen. But every aircraft that can be powered by hydrogen from renewable energy reduces carbon dioxide emissions,” says Tomas Grönstedt.

Within TechForH2, there are good conditions to take on the hydrogen challenge, and with a budget of SEK 162 million (equivalent USD 15.5 million), the competence centre can contribute to the development of a number of different research areas that link hydrogen and heavy transport.

More about the scientific articles
The article “Hydrogen fuel cell aircraft for the Nordic market” has been published in the International Journal of Hydrogen Energy and is written by Christian Svensson, Amir A.M Oliviera and Tomas Grönstedt. The researchers are active at Chalmers University of Technology and the Federal University of Santa Catarina in Brazil.

Source: https://studyfinds.org/hydrogen-flight-ready-for-take-off/

An Australian soldier and her husband have been arrested and each charged with spying for Russia.

Investigators say the couple – both Russian-born Australian citizens – obtained Australian Defence Force (ADF) material to share with Moscow.

However, Australian police say “no significant compromise” of military secrets has been identified.

It is the first time stricter foreign interference laws – introduced by Australia in 2018 – have been used to lay espionage charges.

Kira Korolev, a 40-year-old army private, and her 62-year-old husband Igor Korolev will face court in Brisbane on Friday, each on one count of preparing for an espionage offence – which carries a maximum 15-year jail sentence.

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said he had been “briefed extensively” by the nation’s security agencies but would not comment on the case directly as it is now before the courts.

Australian Federal Police (AFP) Commissioner Reece Kershaw said the couple had been in Australia for more than a decade before the alleged offending and had both become citizens several years ago.

Igor worked as a self-employed labourer, and Kira was an information systems technician in the army, a role for which she had obtained a security clearance, police say.

Mr Kershaw alleged she secretly travelled to Russia while on leave from the ADF, then instructed Igor to access her work account and send sensitive material so that she could forward it on to Russian authorities.

An investigation in to whether any of the material was ever delivered to them is still underway, Mr Kershaw said, adding that the charges could be upgraded.

Both Mr Kershaw and Australia’s spy agency boss Mike Burgess – who addressed media together on Friday – declined to answer questions about the nature of the documents or how authorities were tipped off about the alleged crimes.

Source: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c51yl3pvl1xo

A pod of 77 pilot whales has died after washing ashore on a beach in Orkney in what could be the biggest mass stranding for decades.
The British Divers Marine Life Rescue (BDMLR) had established 12 of the animals at Tresness Beach on the island of Sanday were still alive when they came out of the water.
However the decision was taken to euthanise them after refloating efforts failed.
The pod included male whales up to seven metres (22ft) long as well as females, calves and juveniles.
Experts say it is too early to know what has caused the stranding, but it is likely one of the whales got into trouble and the rest of the pod tried to help.
Members of the public are being asked to stay away from the area while post mortem examinations are carried out.

It is thought to be the largest stranding event in Scotland since at least 1995, when the Scottish Marine Animal Stranding Scheme (SMASS) was founded – though strandings of a similar scale have been seen in recent years.
Last year an entire pod of 55 pilot whales died following a stranding on Lewis.
Only 15 of the whales were alive when they were washed ashore. One was successfully re-floated while the rest had to be euthanised.
Between 60-70 of the animals came into shallow waters in Sutherland in 2011.
According to the Natural History Museum, the largest UK stranding took place in 1927 when 126 out of more than 130 false killer whales died in the Dornoch Firth in the Highlands.

Experts from the BDMLR, the Scottish SPCA and marine vets from the Scottish mainland travelled to Sanday to assess whether any of the whales could be saved.
The area was cut off by the high tide and the sand on the beach where they were stranded proved too soft to allow the mammals to be righted.
The whales needed to be moved back into an upright position as quickly as possible if there is to be any chance of saving them.
But the soft sand meant the whales fell back over when the rescuers attempted to right them.
Emma Neave-Webb from the BDMLR said early on that while these experiences are difficult, the thinking had to be “realistic”.

‘Hugely emotional’
BDMLR medics were brought in from mainland Orkney and Inverness to help with the rescue attempt, but Ms Neave-Webb said it appeared the whales had been stranded for “quite some time”.
She described the scene as “really quite horrible” and “hugely emotional”.
Rescuers attempted to keep the whales alive by pouring sea water over them, but the decision was later taken to euthanise them.

Source: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c3g6xzrxy35o

Ukraine on Thursday (Jul 11) urged NATO allies to lift restrictions on its use of long-range weapons against targets in Russia, saying that would be a “game-changer” in its war with Moscow, while China slammed NATO criticism of its support for Russia as biased and malicious.

NATO members issued a declaration in support of Ukraine at a summit in Washington on Wednesday, promising additional aid and pledging to support its “irreversible path” to NATO membership.

“At this summit, we are turning a corner and putting in place the foundations for Ukraine to prevail,” NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg told a news conference after a three-day meeting in Washington of the 32 NATO states.

“Today, we send a strong message of unity and resolve to Moscow that violence and intimidation do not pay and that Ukraine can count on NATO now for the long haul.”

Near the end of the summit on Thursday, United States President Joe Biden mistakenly referred to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy as “President Putin”, before correcting himself, in a mix-up likely to add fuel to calls for him to quit the 2024 presidential race.

In a press conference shortly after, Biden made another verbal slip, referring to Vice President Kamala Harris as “Vice President Trump”.

Zelenskyy earlier called on allies to preserve their unified support of Ukraine and said new aid had to be delivered quickly.

“If we want to win, if we want to prevail, to save our country and to defend it, we need to lift all the limitations,” he said.

Zelenskyy’s cabinet chief Andryi Yermak told a public forum Russia had no restrictions on its use of weapons and it would be “a real game-changer” if Ukraine’s allies could lift all limits on the use of those they supply to Ukraine.

NATO members have taken different approaches to how Ukraine can use the weapons they donate. Some have made clear Kyiv can use them to strike targets deep inside Russia while the US has taken a narrower approach, allowing its weapons to be used only just inside Russia’s border against targets supporting Russian military operations in Ukraine.

Biden told the press conference the US had allowed Zelenskyy to use American weapons in a limited way within Russia’s borders.

“If he had the ability to strike Moscow, strike the Kremlin, would that make sense? It wouldn’t,” he added.

Biden said he and US military and intelligence officials were making decisions on “a day-to-day basis on how far they should go in. That’s a logical thing to do”.

The US and its allies have used this week’s summit to try to project unity in the face of what they see as a rising threat to Europe from Russia and China.

However, NATO member Hungary said ahead of a meeting of NATO members with partners from the so-called Indo-Pacific Four – Australia, Japan, New Zealand and South Korea – that it does not want NATO to become an “anti-China” bloc, and will not support it doing so.

Hungary’s Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto also told Hungarian state television that Ukraine’s admission to the military alliance would weaken unity in the group.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban irked other NATO members with surprise visits to Kyiv, Moscow and Beijing in the past two weeks on a self-styled “peace mission”.

Source: https://www.channelnewsasia.com/world/ukraine-war-russia-nato-weapons-restrictions-china-joe-biden-trump-election-4473896

Taiwan’s defence ministry said on Thursday (Jul 11) it had detected 66 Chinese military aircraft around the island in a 24-hour window, a record-high this year, a day after it said Beijing was conducting exercises in nearby waters.

China – which maintains a near-daily military presence around Taiwan – claims the self-ruled island as part of its territory and has said it will never renounce the use of force to bring it under its control.

Thursday’s record comes a day after Taipei spotted Chinese aircraft around the island that it said were headed to the western Pacific for exercises with the PLA aircraft carrier Shandong.

“66 PLA aircraft and seven PLAN vessels operating around Taiwan were detected up until 6am today,” the defence ministry said in Thursday’s statement, adding it has “responded accordingly”.

Fifty-six of the Chinese aircraft crossed the sensitive median line bisecting the Taiwan Strait – a narrow 180km waterway separating the island from China.

An illustration it released showed some of the aircraft came within 61km of Taiwan’s southern tip.

The year’s previous record was in May, when Beijing sent 62 military aircraft and 27 naval vessels around Taiwan.

That occurred in the middle of war games Beijing launched on the heels of the inauguration of Taiwan President Lai Ching-te, who Beijing regards as a “dangerous separatist”.

Military expert Su Tzu-yun said China’s latest show of force was a reaction to recent political developments, including Washington’s new de facto ambassador to Taiwan meeting with and expressing support for Taipei during a meeting with Lai on Wednesday.

“Beijing puts pressure on Taiwan in order to express its displeasure at the support it enjoys,” said Su of Taiwan’s Institute for National Defence and Security Research.

Defence minister Wellington Koo on Wednesday noted that the Shandong had not passed “through the Bashi Channel”, the area off Taiwan’s southern tip where Chinese ships typically transit en route to the Pacific Ocean.

Instead, it “went further south through the Balintang Channel towards the Western Pacific,” he said, referring to a waterway just north of the Philippines’ Babuyan Island – about 250km south of Bashi.

Neighbouring Japan on Tuesday confirmed that four PLA navy vessels – including the Shandong – were sailing 520km southeast of Miyako island.

Source: https://www.channelnewsasia.com/east-asia/66-chinese-aircraft-surround-taiwan-biggest-sortie-year-4472296

Heavy rains associated with Hurricane Beryl and the earlier Tropical Storm Alberto have led at least 200 crocodiles to enter urban areas in the northern Mexican state of Tamaulipas, across from Texas, state and federal authorities said this week.

So far, authorities say they have captured and relocated around 200 of the big reptiles since Alberto pelted the region with rain in June. Beryl brushed the same area before making landfall in south Texas earlier this week.

Authorities said the heavy rains raised water levels in coastal lagoons, leading the animals to crawl into cities like Tampico and the nearby cities of Ciudad Madero and Altamira, where at least 165 crocodiles have been captured and relocated.

The head of Tamaulipas state environment department, Karina Lizeth Saldívar, said in a statement that “the recent rains have increased the water levels in the lagoon systems, which had led to an increase in the sightings of crocodiles.”

The federal Attorney General’s Office for Environmental Protection said about 40 more crocodiles had been captured in the area in June and were relocated to appropriate habitat outside populated areas.

Source: https://apnews.com/article/mexico-beryl-alberto-heavy-rains-crocodiles-be09688b23e134798e2b0f4069878b5b

Milan fashion mainstay Giorgio Armani celebrated his 90th birthday on Thursday just like any other day —at work.

“I couldn’t live my life any other way,’’ Armani told the Milan daily Corriere della Sera. “It wouldn’t be me if I stopped. When I was younger, I thought that at 80 I would be on permanent vacation. But the work is so exciting, energizing, that I really can’t leave it.”

The newspaper reported that Armani was meant to spend the day celebrating with friends and family in the south of France. Instead, energized by the recent success of the Armani Prive’ couture during Paris Fashion Week, he has set to work on his next womenswear collection, which will be unveiled in October in New York City.

Armani’s office confirmed that the designer who helped propel Milan ready-to-wear into a global industry was working a regular week, with appointments scheduled for Friday at 9:30 a.m.

While Armani celebrates his 90th birthday, his namesake brand Giorgio Armani next year marks its 50th year. His group also includes Emporio Armani, the official outfitter of the Italian Olympic team, and Armani Prive couture.

While he shows no signs of slowing down, Armani has indicated that his succession plan include his closest confidantes and collaborators, including Pantaleo (Leo) Dell’Orco and his niece Silvana Armani, who respectively head the menswear and womenswear collections for all of his brands.

Source: https://apnews.com/article/giorgio-armani-90th-birthday-2b77a70478ff034c8c1baa19c5aa5c38

Poland needs to prepare its soldiers for all-out conflict, its armed forces chief of staff said on Wednesday, as the country boosts the number of troops on its border with Russia and Belarus.
Poland’s relations with Russia and its ally Belarus have deteriorated sharply since Moscow sent tens of thousands of troops into neighbouring Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022, starting a war that is still being fought.

South Korea will deploy laser weapons to shoot down North Korean drones this year, becoming the world’s first country to deploy and operate such weapons in the military, the country’s arms procurement agency said on Thursday.
South Korea has called its laser programme the “StarWars project”.
The drone-zapping laser weapons the South Korean military has developed with Hanwha Aerospace (012450.KS), opens new tab are effective and cheap, with 2,000 won ($1.45) per shot, but quiet and invisible, the Defense Acquisition Program Administration (DAPA) said in a statement.

Irish authorities were urged to intervene after Tori Towey was charged with trying to take her own life after allegedly being attacked. The 28-year-old, who works in the United Arab Emirates as an airline cabin crew member, was taken to a police station and her passport blocked from use.

An Irish woman who was charged with attempting suicide by a Dubai court will be allowed to return home, Ireland’s prime minister has said, as the case against her is closed.

Tori Towey, from Boyle in County Roscommon, says she tried to take her own life after allegedly being attacked and left with severe bruising and other injuries.

Irish authorities were urged to intervene after the 28-year-old, who works in the United Arab Emirates as an airline cabin crew member, was taken to a police station and her passport blocked from use.

The Dubai government has now confirmed the attempted suicide charges have been dropped.

It said the case has been closed and she can now “return to normal life”.

Taoiseach Simon Harris says the travel ban imposed by Dubai authorities has also been lifted.

He said: “I’ve just been informed that the travel ban has been lifted, that the embassy will take Tori to the airport as soon as she is ready to go and that the embassy, of course, will continue to follow up on the case, which is still active as of now.”

Ordeal ‘unimaginable’ says Irish PM

Earlier, Mr Harris described Ms Towey’s ordeal as “unimaginable” and said it was “utterly, utterly unacceptable how an Irish citizen is being treated”.

He added: “A woman who has been a victim of a brutal attack found herself waking up not in hospital, but in a police station. It’s my absolute priority as the taoiseach of this country, to get Tori back home to Roscommon.”

He thanked the Irish embassy in the UAE for its work on the case.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/tori-towey-irish-woman-charged-with-attempting-suicide-in-dubai-has-travel-ban-lifted-13176079

Since 2000, China’s R&D has grown 16-fold. The country is producing promising research in chemistry and physics, and has increased its contribution to prestigious journals.

Bengaluru: China now produces the largest number of patents. Its Chang’e 6 lunar robotic spacecraft has hoisted the Chinese flag on difficult terrain of the Moon and its research and development (R&D) has grown 16-fold since 2000. The Western media is catching all that.

But this is the result of years of sustained investments in homegrown research and academia.

The meeting comes after Sir Keir held talks with other world leaders, including Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelenskyy, as he arrived in Washington DC for NATO’s 75th anniversary summit.

Sir Keir Starmer has met Joe Biden at the White House for formal talks after the prime minister’s debut on the world stage.

The pair were pictured sitting together, and at one point laughing, as the prime minister said the “special relationship with the US is so important and stronger than ever”.

Mr Biden went on to call the US and UK the “best of allies” and described Britain as “the transatlantic knot” that ties NATO together.

To cement the two countries’ relationship, Sir Keir gifted Mr Biden a personalised Arsenal shirt – printed with his surname and the number 46 on the back, a nod to his presidential number.

The prime minister is an Arsenal season ticket holder and the team in Downing Street hoped the shirt made for a “personal gift” as the two leaders met in the Oval Office.

The UK leader is also giving his counterpart a copy of the Atlantic Charter which paved the way for the formation of NATO, complete with then Labour leader Clement Attlee’s amendments.

‘Is football coming home, prime minister?’

Commenting on England’s latest success at Euro 2024, after the Three Lions beat the Netherlands to reach the tournament’s final, Mr Biden asked Sir Keir if football is coming home.

“It looks like it,” the prime minister replied, to which the US leader said: “It’s because of the prime minister.”

In a slight boast, Sir Keir added: “Not lost a game under the Labour government in 2024.”

Their White House meeting comes after Sir Keir met the US president on Wednesday at the NATO summit in Washington, which is marking the alliance’s 75th anniversary.

He also held talks with other world leaders, including Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

The prime minister – who has been in the role for less than a week – said he used his talks with Mr Zelenskyy to stress that the change of government in the UK “makes no difference to the support that we will provide”.

He told reporters in the US capital that his talks with world leaders were “an opportunity to make sure that those relationships are reset, for me to be able to say that our position on the world stage – leading on issues like defence and security, on climate change, and on energy – are so important”.

The summit is expected to confirm what US and European officials have described as Ukraine’s “irreversible” path to NATO membership, but the alliance is also planning how to “Trump-proof” its future in case the former US president returns to the White House after November’s election.

Mr Biden’s re-election effort has been under intense scrutiny since a disastrous performance in a debate with Trump last month – which has sparked concern for his health and age among Democrats.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/starmer-says-us-relationship-is-stronger-than-ever-as-he-meets-biden-in-white-house-with-the-help-of-personalised-gift-13176286

US secretary of state Antony Blinken made the announcement at an event at this week’s NATO summit in Washington.

F-16 fighter jets will be flying in Ukrainian skies this summer, the US secretary of state Antony Blinken has said.

Speaking at an event on the sidelines of the NATO summit in Washington, Mr Blinken said the jets are en route to Ukraine from Denmark and the Netherlands.

He added that a robust package for Ukraine will be unveiled over the next couple of days that will build a clear bridge for Ukraine’s NATO membership.

“Those jets… will be flying in the skies of Ukraine this summer to make sure that Ukraine can continue to effectively defend itself against the Russian aggression,” Mr Blinken said.

Norway is also set to donate six F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine to defend itself from Russian attacks, the country’s Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store said.

No date was announced for when Norway will donate the six jets, but Mr Gahr Store said: “We aim to start the donations during 2024.”

Ukraine has long pleaded for the sophisticated fighter planes to give it a combat edge against Russian firepower.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy posted on social media he was “grateful to the United States, Denmark, and the Netherlands for taking practical steps to achieve the goal of all Ukrainians: To strengthen the Ukrainian airforce with F-16s.”

“F-16s bring just and lasting peace closer,” he said.

He also thanked Belgium and Norway for their commitment to send the jets.

Meanwhile, NATO members have announced the delivery of five additional Patriot and other strategic air defence systems to help Ukraine.

More aid announcements are expected at this week’s summit in Washington, which marks the alliance’s 75th anniversary.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/f-16-fighter-jets-from-denmark-and-netherlands-in-ukraines-skies-this-summer-13176172

While millions of Americans vacation on beaches every year to seek out sun, sand, and the sea, many might not realize how dangerous digging holes in the sand can be. In February 2024, a 7-year-old girl died after an approximately 5-foot (1.5-meter) hole she and her brother dug in the sand collapsed in on her, burying her alive.

As a coastal science researcher who’s been studying beaches for many years, I was called in to help investigate the girl’s death. While many people nearby stepped in to try to free the girl after the sand hole collapsed, local firefighters couldn’t arrive until several minutes after the incident – too late to resuscitate the victim.

Digging holes in sand might seem innocent, but if the hole is deep enough and collapses on a person, it is extremely difficult to escape. In fact, research suggests more people die from sand burial suffocation than from shark attacks.

Sand basics
Sand isn’t actually a type of material. It’s a category of material size ranging from 0.0025 to 0.08 inches (0.06 to 2 millimeters) in diameter. The type of sand is determined by the materials making it up. Quartz sand, made up of silicon dioxide, is the most common sand found on beaches, except at tropical coasts where coral sand beaches, made up of calcium carbonate, are found.

Material coarser than sand is not soft to the touch – it doesn’t make sturdy sandcastles. Silt and clay, which are finer than sand, make water murky and are commonly called mud.

Sand’s weight depends on the materials it’s made of. Pure quartz sand beaches, which have very white sand, weigh around 90 pounds per cubic foot when dry.

But most beaches contain a mixture of minerals, creating a tan or brown appearance. The minerals that darken the sand are much heavier – sand on most beaches would weigh up to 130 pounds per cubic foot when dry.

Dry, loose grains of sand will form a pile with a slope angle of about 33 degrees, termed its angle of repose. The angle of repose is the steepest angle at which a pile of grains remains stable, and the force of friction between each grain determines that stability.

Sand is more stable when it’s wet because the surface tension between water and sand grains can hold the pile of sand in place vertically. But once it dries, the pile will collapse, as there’s no more surface tension.

So, if you dig a hole in the beach, it’ll stay stable for as long as the sand stays moist. Once it dries, the hole collapses.

Sand is unstable
When either the sand forming the hole dries out, or someone stands near the edge of the hole, adding extra weight, the sand hole collapses in, and the heavy grains fill all open spaces in the hole. This leaves no air available for a trapped person to breathe.

While skiers trapped in avalanches can cup their hands to form an air pocket because snow is light, but that’s not the case when sand collapses.

Rescuing someone from a collapsed sand hole is very difficult because sand is both heavy and unstable. As rescuers scoop away sand to free the victim, the hole will continue to collapse under the rescuers’ weight and refill with sand. Rescuers have only about three to five minutes to save a person who is trapped in a sand hole before they suffocate.

Professionals like firefighters will place boards across the hole when rescuing someone from a sand hole collapse. This way, they can reach down and use tools to remove the sand without putting any weight directly on the edge of the hole.

Experts recommend never digging a hole deeper than the knee height of the shortest person in your group – with 2 feet (0.6 meters) being the maximum depth.

Source: https://studyfinds.org/sand-hole-danger-beaches/

Affleck, party of seven!

Before Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck were hit with split speculation while living separately in 2024, the couple tied the knot twice and blended their families.

The “Gigli” co-stars were both previously married to other people with whom they welcomed children.

The “Let’s Get Loud” singer was married to Marc Anthony from 2004 to 2014, and they welcomed twins Max and Emme in 2008.

Meanwhile, the “Argo” actor, director and producer was married to Jennifer Garner from 2005 to 2018. They welcomed Violet in 2005, Seraphina in 2009 and Samuel in 2012.

Here’s what we know about the five children from Lopez and Affleck’s previous marriages.

Maximilian David Muñiz

Max was born on Feb. 22, 2008 and bears a striking resemblance to his father, with Lopez even calling him a “mini-Marc” in 2015 (via SCMP).

The teen made his screen debut in his mother’s 2022 romantic comedy “Marry Me” and had “a great time” filming,” according to Lopez.

“He wants to do it more,’” she told El Gordo y la Flaca (via Hola!). “He wants to be an actor. It’s not that he’s shy, but I think he wants to be more of a voice actor because he has a very different voice, and he can do very different voices.”

A source told In Touch Weekly in June 2021 that Max and Affleck bonded over “movies and video games.”

Emme Maribel Muñiz

Emme — whom Lopez revealed goes by “they/them” pronouns — is Max’s twin and a singer who hit the stage with their mom during the 2020 Super Bowl halftime show.

“It was insane that it happened ’cause, you know, it’s not very common for someone my age to be on that stage,” Emme told “Entertainment Tonight” of the moment. “It was a crazy experience, but it was all really fun ’cause my friend was there at the Super Bowl with me. She was dancing, and yeah, it was really great.”

Emme previously went viral for covering Alicia Keys’ 2003 hit “If I Ain’t Got You.”

In addition to their music aspirations, the teen is also an author, writing the children’s book “Lord Help Me: Inspiring Prayers for Every Day,” which was published in 2020.

Whether Emme sticks with music, literature or both, Lopez has vowed to stand behind her child.

“Listen, if [they were] going to do it, there’s nothing I could do to stop [them],” she told “Entertainment Tonight” about Emme in 2019. “I would never push [them] in any direction. I’d always help [them] as much as I can and give [them] as much counsel and advice as I can and mentor in the best ways I know how to navigate.”

Violet Affleck

The eldest daughter of Affleck and Garner, Violet was born on Dec. 1, 2005.

Affleck gushed over his daughter’s fluency in Spanish during an appearance on “The Drew Barrymore Show” in 2020.

“She’s always been a very good student, and she’s been interested in Spanish, and so I would often help her. Now, all of a sudden, she’s gotten into the grade where she’s, like, in the harder Spanish classes and she’s getting better,” he said. “She’s right at the point where I think she might be passing me.”

When Violet graduated from high school in May 2024, Garner posted crying pictures via Instagram. Affleck attended her first graduation party solo but put on a united front with Lopez at the second.

While Violet has not confirmed her college plans, she appears to be Yale bound.

The teen spoke out against mask bans at a Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors meeting in July 2024, calling for a mask mandate in county medical facilities, free testing and more in the wake of her own “post-viral condition.”

Source: https://pagesix.com/article/jennifer-lopez-and-ben-afflecks-kids-meet-their-5-children/

Facing an alarming rise in bear attacks, Japan wants to make it easier to shoot the animals in residential areas – but hunters say it is too risky.

In the year to April, there were a record 219 bear attacks in the country – six of them fatal, according to official data.
Deadly attacks have continued to occur in recent months, as bears increasingly venture into populated areas. Some are now even thought to see humans as prey.
Bear numbers have revived as Japan’s human population ages and shrinks, especially outside cities. The consequences have been dangerous, although usually resulting in injury not death.
Under the current law, licensed hunters can fire their guns only after the approval of a police officer.
The government plans to revise the law at its next parliamentary session so the weapons can be used more freely. For instance, hunters will be allowed to shoot if there is a risk of human injury, such as when a bear enters a building.
But hunters are wary. “It is scary and quite dangerous to encounter a bear. It is never guaranteed that we can kill a bear by shooting,” said Satoshi Saito, executive director of the Hokkaido Hunters’ Association.
“If we miss the vital point to stop the bear from moving… it will run away and may attack other people,” he added. “If it then attacks a person, who will be responsible for that?”
Hokkaido has come to exemplify Japan’s growing bear problem.
The country’s northernmost major island is sparsely populated – but its bear population has more than doubled since 1990, according to government data. It now has around 12,000 brown bears, which are known to be more aggressive than black bears, of which there are around 10,000 in Japan by experts’ estimates.
Local governments have tried different strategies to keep bears away.
Some have turned to odd guardians – robot wolves, complete with red eyes and spooky howls, while elsewhere in the country they are testing an artificial intelligence warning system.
The town of Naie in Hokkaido has been trying to hire hunters for 10,300 yen ($64; £50) a day to patrol the streets, lay traps and kill the animals if necessary.
But there are few takers – it’s a high-risk job, the pay is not attractive enough and many of the hunters are elderly.
“It is not worth the trouble because confronting a bear will put our lives on the line,” a 72-year-old hunter from the area told The Asahi Shimbun newspaper, likening an encounter with a brown bear to “fighting a US military commando”.
In May, two police officers in northern Akita prefecture were seriously injured by a bear while trying to retrieve a body from the woods after a suspected fatal bear attack.
“The bears know humans are present and attack people for their food, or recognise people themselves as food,” local government official Mami Kondo said.
“There is a high risk that the same bear will cause a series of incidents.”
As bear numbers have grown, more of them have moved from the mountains into flatlands closer to human populations. Over time, they have become used to the sights and sounds of humans, and less afraid of them.
There are also fewer humans around as young people move to big cities, leaving whole towns nearly empty. When bears do encounter humans, it can turn violent.
“Bears that enter urban areas tend to panic, increasing the risk of injury or death to people,” said Junpei Tanaka from the Picchio Wildlife Research Center in Japan.

Source: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c19kvevezlwo

A New Mexico prosecutor on Wednesday said Alec Baldwin broke “cardinal rules” for handling guns in the 2021 killing of “Rust” cinematographer Halyna Hutchins, while his lawyer said he was failed by the movie’s set safety experts who already have been convicted in the case.
The 66-year-old Baldwin, on trial in Hollywood’s first on-set shooting fatality in three decades, took notes at the defense table and listened calmly in his involuntary manslaughter trial. The prosecution is largely unprecedented in U.S. history, holding an actor criminally responsible for a gun death during filming.

Baldwin’s wife Hilaria Baldwin sat in the second row of the public gallery, his brother Stephen Baldwin in front of her.

His lawyer Alex Spiro pointed to “Rust” armorer Hannah Gutierrez – head of gun safety – and first assistant director Dave Halls – responsible for overall set safety. Both have been convicted in the shooting, and Spiro said they did not check the rounds in the gun to ensure it was safe for Baldwin to use.

“There were people responsible for firearms safety, but actor Alec Baldwin committed no crime,” said Spiro.
Hutchins was killed, and director Joel Souza wounded when Baldwin’s reproduction 1873 Single Action Army revolver fired a live round, inadvertently loaded by Gutierrez.

Since a police interview on Oct. 21, 2021, the day of the shooting, Baldwin has argued the gun just “went off.”
In an ABC News interview two months later, Baldwin told George Stephanopoulos he did not pull the trigger. A 2022 FBI test found the gun was in normal working condition and would not fire from full cock without the trigger being pulled.
In a sign the defense was backing away from that position, Spiro said that even if Baldwin pulled the trigger, it was not a crime. He said it was the job of Gutierrez and Halls to safely allow an actor “to wave it, to point it, to pull the trigger, like actors do.”
“On a movie set you’re allowed to pull the trigger, so even if he intentionally pulled the trigger, as prosecutors said, that doesn’t mean he committed a homicide,” said Spiro.
State prosecutors charged Baldwin with involuntary manslaughter in January 2022. They dropped charges three months later after Baldwin’s lawyers presented photographic evidence the gun was modified, arguing it would fire more easily, bolstering the actor’s accidental discharge argument.
Prosecutors called a grand jury to reinstate the charge in January after an independent firearms expert confirmed the 2022 FBI study.
“He pointed the gun at another human being, cocked the hammer and pulled the trigger in reckless disregard for miss Hutchins’ safety,” Johnson said.
Armorer Gutierrez, whose job on the set of “Rust” included managing firearms safely, was convicted of involuntary manslaughter in March for loading the live round.

Source: https://www.reuters.com/world/us/alec-baldwin-rust-jurors-hear-opening-statements-2024-07-10/

Some dairy farmers are resisting Michigan’s nation-leading efforts to stop the spread of bird flu for fear their incomes will suffer from added costs and hurt rural America.
The government’s restrictions, which include tracking who comes and goes from farms, are rekindling unwanted memories of COVID-19 in Martin and other small towns in central Michigan.
The state has two of the four known cases in humans, all dairy workers, since federal authorities confirmed the world’s first case in U.S. cattle in late March. The state has tested more people than any of the 12 states with confirmed cases in cows, according to a Reuters survey of state health departments. Testing policies vary by state.

Public health experts fear the disease has the potential to turn into another pandemic just a few years after COVID-19. As those worries mount, the acceptance and success or failure of Michigan’s proactive response is being watched by other states looking for a roadmap that goes beyond federal containment recommendations.
More than a dozen interviews with Michigan producers, state health officials, researchers and industry groups, along with preliminary data, so far show limited dairy farmer participation in efforts to stem and study the virus. In some cases, calls from local health officials go unanswered, money for dairy farm research is left unclaimed, and workers still milk cows without extra protective gear.

The United States will start deploying longer range missiles in Germany in 2026, the two countries announced at a meeting of the NATO alliance on Tuesday, a major step aimed at countering what the allies say is a growing threat Russia poses to Europe.
The decision will send Germany the most potent U.S. weapons to be based on the European continent since the Cold War, in a clear warning to Russian President Vladimir Putin.

A U.S.-German statement said the “episodic deployments” were in preparation for longer-term stationing in Europe of capabilities that would include SM-6, Tomahawk and developmental hypersonic weapons with greater range.
The move would have been banned under the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty signed by the U.S. and the Soviet Union in 1987 but that collapsed in 2019.
“We cannot discount the possibility of an attack against Allies’ sovereignty and territorial integrity,” the allies said in a communique released on Wednesday.

More aid was headed to Ukraine as the allies bolster Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy.
A communique said the allies intend to provide Ukraine with at least 40 billion euros ($43.28 billion) in military aid within the next year, but stopped short of the multi-year commitment NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg had sought.
The document also strengthened past NATO language on China, calling it a “decisive enabler” of Russia’s war effort in Ukraine and saying Beijing continues to pose systemic challenges to Euro-Atlantic security.

Stoltenberg told reporters it was the first time the 32 allies had jointly labeled China a decisive enabler of Russia’s war and called it an important message.
He said NATO was not an organization that imposes sanctions, but added: “At the end of the day, this will be for individual allies to make decisions, but I think the message we send from NATO from this summit is very clear.”
The communique called on China to cease material and political support for Russia’s war effort and expressed concern about China’s space capabilities, referenced rapid expansion of its nuclear arsenal, and urged Beijing to engage in strategic risk reduction talks.
NATO, ‘THE GREATEST ALLIANCE”
Biden hosted NATO partners and allies at a dinner at the White House on Wednesday to celebrate what he called “the greatest alliance the world has ever known.”
Biden said in a speech on Tuesday that NATO was “stronger than it’s ever been” and that Ukraine can and will stop Russian leader Putin “with our full, collective support.”

On Wednesday, he said he was pleased all NATO members were pledging to expand their industrial bases and to develop plans for defense production at home.
“We cannot allow the alliance to fall behind,” Biden said. “We can and will defend every inch of NATO territory and we’ll do it together.”
At the White House, Biden and new British Prime Minister Keir Starmer had a back-and-forth exchange and shared laughs and congratulations over England’s 2-1 win over the Netherlands in the Euro 2024 soccer tournament.
Biden described the United Kingdom as the “knot” tying together the trans-Atlantic NATO alliance and said that the two countries must continue to cooperate.
He also met at the summit venue with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau of Canada and Finland’s President Alexander Stubb of Finland to discuss strengthening their trilateral cooperation on economic issues and on defense industrial production.
Biden, 81, has faced questions about his fitness for office after fumbling a June 27 debate and hopes the NATO spotlight will help him stage a comeback of sorts, surrounded by allied leaders he has spent his three years in office cultivating.
However, November’s U.S. presidential election could presage a sharp change in Washington’s support for Ukraine and NATO. Republican candidate Donald Trump, 78, has questioned the amount of aid given to Ukraine to fight Russia’s invasion and U.S. support for allies generally.
TRUMP WEIGHS IN
On Wednesday, Trump told Fox News Radio he would not pull the U.S. out of NATO but reiterated that he wanted members to pay more. “I just want them to pay their bills. We’re protecting Europe. They take advantage of us very badly,” he said.
Trump had pressed congressional Republicans to stall military aid for Ukraine before later reversing course.

Source: https://www.reuters.com/world/biden-nato-poised-unveil-ukraine-aid-reiterate-membership-pledge-summit-2024-07-10/

U.S. President Joe Biden pledged to forcefully defend Ukraine against Russia’s invasion at the NATO summit in Washington on Tuesday, using the global stage to try to show allies at home and abroad that he can still lead.
Biden, 81, has endured 12 days of withering questions about his fitness for office as some of his fellow Democrats on Capitol Hill and campaign donors fear that he will lose the Nov. 5 election after a halting debate performance on June 27.

On Tuesday, Biden spoke off of a teleprompter with a strong and confident voice and largely avoided the verbal flubs and signs of confusion that marked his debate performance.

Biden was framed by the gilded walls of the federal hall where the treaty creating NATO was signed, his speech bookended by stirring musical performances by the U.S. Marine Corp band.

“Today NATO is stronger than it’s ever been in its history,” he said.

They said additional strategic air defense systems would be announced this year.
Zelenskiy, who arrived in Washington on Tuesday and is due to meet with Biden on Thursday, has said Ukraine needs a minimum of seven Patriot systems, a goal met by the fresh deliveries announced on Tuesday.
“We are fighting for additional security guarantees for Ukraine – and these are weapons and finances, political support,” he said on social media.
Ukraine ultimately wants to join NATO to ward against further future attacks by Russia but candidates have to be approved by all of the alliance’s members, some of which are wary of provoking a direct conflict with Russia.
Some members want the alliance to make clear Ukraine is moving toward NATO “irreversibly” and are keen for language in a summit statement beyond the alliance’s pledge last year that “Ukraine’s future is in NATO.”
BIDEN’S STAYING POWER?
NATO, celebrating its 75th anniversary, has found new purpose in opposing Putin’s Ukraine invasion and the grinding war will dominate private conversations between the leaders of the countries.
Those leaders, already anxious about the prospect of Trump’s return, came to Washington with fresh concern about Biden’s staying power, according to diplomats from their countries.
Biden will hold a rare solo press conference on Thursday, also aimed at quieting concerns.
As Biden tried to rally allies and domestic support, several high-ranking European officials met with a top foreign policy adviser to Trump during the summit.
NATO leaders face political uncertainty in Europe, with paralysis looming in France after gains for left and far right parties and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s coalition weakened after a poor showing in European Parliament elections.

Source: https://www.reuters.com/world/us/biden-nato-summit-chance-show-voters-allies-he-can-still-lead-2024-07-09/

U.N. Security Council members confronted Russia on Tuesday over a missile strike the previous day that destroyed part of Ukraine’s largest children’s hospital, pouring out condemnations at an emergency meeting chaired by Moscow’s own ambassador.

Russia denies responsibility for the strike at the hospital, where at least two staffers were killed.

France and Ecuador asked for the session at the Security Council, but Russia led it as the current holder of the council’s rotating presidency, putting Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia on the receiving end of the criticism.

“Mr. President, please stop this war. It has been going on for too long,” Slovenian Ambassador Samuel Zbogar appealed.

U.S. Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield told colleagues that they were there “because Russia, a permanent member of the Security Council, current rotational president of the Security Council, attacked a children’s hospital.”

“Even uttering that phrase sends a chill down my spine,” she added.

Nebenzia characterized the slew of criticism as “verbal gymnastics” from countries trying to protect Ukraine’s government. He reiterated Moscow’s denials of responsibility for the hospital attack, insisting it was hit by a Ukrainian air defense rocket.

Later, he heard people crying out for help from beneath the rubble. Most of the over 600 young patients had been moved to bomb shelters, except those in surgery, Zhovnir said. He said over 300 people were injured, including eight children, and two adults died, one of them a young doctor.

Acting U.N. humanitarian chief Joyce Msuya stressed to the Security Council that intentionally attacking a hospital is a war crime. She called Monday’s strikes “part of a deeply concerning pattern of systematic attacks harming health care and other civilian infrastructure across Ukraine.”

Since Russia’s February 2022 invasion of Ukraine, the U.N. World Health Organization has verified 1,878 attacks affecting health care facilities, personnel, transport, supplies and patients, she said.

Even against that backdrop, several council members pronounced Monday’s strike shocking.

British Ambassador Barbara Woodward called it “cowardly depravity.” Ecuadorian envoy José De La Gasca described it as “particularly intolerable.” To Slovenia’s Zbogar, it was “another low in this war of aggression.”

Source: https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-strike-hospital-security-council-20ce0a8e1f69b8040f47522ca039bd52

Sinn Fein leader Mary Lou McDonald has urged the Irish Prime Minister Simon Harris to “urgently intervene” in the case and ensure that Ms Towey can return to Ireland.

The Irish government is being urged to intervene in the case of a woman who has been charged with attempting suicide by a court in Dubai.

Tori Towey, from Boyle in County Roscommon, works in the United Arab Emirates as an airline cabin crew member and says she tried to take her own life after allegedly being attacked and left with severe bruising and other injuries.

The 28-year-old survived but was taken to a police station where she was told she was being charged with attempted suicide and abusing alcohol. Her passport was blocked from use, and she cannot return to Ireland.

“She’s under incredible stress”, said Sinn Fein leader Mary Lou McDonald in the Irish parliament today. “Tori is a Roscommon woman, and she wants to come home.”

Ms McDonald urged the Irish Prime Minister Simon Harris to “urgently intervene” in the case and ensure that Ms Towey could return to Ireland.

Mr Harris told the Irish parliament that he was not fully appraised of the case, but would be happy to work with Ms McDonald and others “to intervene and see how we can support an Irish citizen in what sounds to be, based on what you tell me, the most appalling circumstances”.

Ireland’s Department of Foreign Affairs told Sky News it is “aware of the case and is providing consular assistance”.

It added: “As with all consular cases, the department does not comment on the details of individual cases.”

Ms Towey is currently staying in a rented property in Dubai with her mother Caroline, who travelled to be with her daughter. The family are being assisted by the Detained In Dubai advocacy group.

“We are calling on Dubai authorities to urgently drop the charges against Tori, remove the travel ban and let her fly home to Ireland with her mother”, said Radha Stirling, CEO of Detained In Dubai.

“She has been charged with attempted suicide and alcohol consumption”, said Ms Stirling.

“Strangely, the UAE has gone to great public relations efforts to promote alcohol as legal in the country. In reality, people are still regularly charged with alcohol consumption and possession.

“Tori’s experience is nothing short of tragic and quite frankly, she is lucky to be alive.”

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/tori-towey-irish-woman-charged-with-attempting-suicide-in-dubai-13175687

The original screenwriter, director and producer are all in talks to return but it is unclear how many of the key cast members may appear. Anne Hathaway previously dismissed the idea of a sequel in an interview earlier this year.

A sequel to The Devil Wears Prada, the hit 2006 film featuring Meryl Streep and Anne Hathaway, is reportedly in development.

One of the original screenwriters Aline Brosh McKenna is in talks to write the follow-up, which reportedly follows Streep’s character, magazine editor Miranda Priestly, as she confronts the decline of print publications in the digital age, Variety reported.

It is unclear how many of the original cast members may return for the sequel, which US news outlet Deadline reported will be made by Disney.

However, the film’s original director David Frankel and producer Wendy Finerman are in talks to return, Deadline added.

The matriarch elephant reportedly became “agitated” when she saw the man approaching her three young calves – which is a normal reaction after a perceived threat.

A Spanish tourist has been trampled to death by elephants at a wildlife reserve in South Africa.

The 43-year-old man was targeted by the animals after leaving his vehicle to take photographs at Pilanesberg National Park in the country’s North West province, police and local government authorities said on Tuesday.

The matriarch elephant reportedly became “agitated” when she saw the man approaching her three young calves, Pieter Nel, conservation manager for the North West Provincial Parks and Tourism Authority, told Spanish newspaper La Vanguardia.

He said it is normal for elephants to “defend their young” and tourists visiting Pilanesberg are told they are not allowed to leave their vehicles while driving through the park and must sign forms showing they understand the rules.

“In some cases, people are oblivious to the dangers in the parks,” Mr Nel said. “We must remember that you are entering a wild area.”

Wildlife experts often warn elephants are especially protective of their young and can react aggressively to a perceived threat.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/spanish-tourist-killed-by-elephant-defending-its-young-after-man-left-vehicle-to-take-photos-13175650

A jury has been chosen in the Santa Fe, N.M., trial of Alec Baldwin, who faces up to 18 months in prison if convicted in the accidental death of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins.

After a day of questioning, the attorneys selected 12 jurors and four alternates, comprised of 11 women and five men. The trial is set to begin Wednesday with opening statements.

Judge Mary Marlowe Sommer began the process by asking a group of 70 people if they had seen or heard anything about the case. Only two people said they had not. Two others said they had read extensively about the case and could not be fair.

Prosecutor Kari Morrissey focused largely on whether the media coverage had influenced jurors’ opinions about the case. She also asked if the potential jurors own guns or work in the film industry. The prosecutors were assisted by Lela Hunt, a jury consultant.

In the afternoon session, defense attorney Alex Spiro offered a preview of his trial argument. He asked the panel if it is reasonable, when dealing with guns, to rely on experts. One person pushed back on that idea.

“It doesn’t take a brain scientist to make sure a gun is not loaded,” the person answered. “You should not be relying on an expert in that case.”

A couple of others said they had been taught to treat all guns as if they were loaded, a common gun safety rule that is included in Safety Bulletin #1, the film industry guidelines for firearm use.

The defense also looked to screen for anyone who had strong feelings about Baldwin. Baldwin’s public image — including his brash, liberal politics and his long-running impression of former President Trump on “Saturday Night Live” — can have a polarizing effect. When Spiro asked if anyone felt they could not be fair to him because of his persona, no one raised their hand.

Baldwin was holding a replica of a vintage Colt .45 revolver when it fired during preparation for a scene in October 2021. He has maintained that he did not pull the trigger, but prosecutors have hired experts to show that the gun would not have fired without a trigger pull.

The trial is scheduled to run for eight court days, ending on July 19. Jury deliberations may run into the following week.

Baldwin and his legal team arrived at the Judge Steve Herrera Judicial Complex in a pair of black Chevy Suburbans around 8 a.m. Tuesday. Baldwin’s wife Hilaria was also present, along with the couple’s infant child, whom she handed off to a nanny before entering the courthouse.

Source: https://variety.com/2024/film/news/alec-baldwin-trial-jury-selection-1236063347/

Since her husband’s death, Mrs Navalnaya has vowed to continue his work and fight against the Russian regime under Vladimir Putin.

A Moscow court has issued an arrest warrant for Yulia Navalnaya, the widow of Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny.

The court accused Mrs Navalnaya, who lives outside Russia, of participating in an “extremist” group.

The warrant is for arrest in absentia, meaning she would almost certainly be detained if she were to set foot in Russia.

Mrs Navalnaya, 47, stepped into the spotlight after she vowed to continue her husband’s work after his death in an Arctic penal colony in February.

Following her arrest warrant, Mrs Navalnaya remained defiant of the Russian regime, writing on social media platform X: “When you write about this, please don’t forget to write the main thing: Vladimir Putin is a murderer and a war criminal.

“His place is in prison, and not somewhere in The Hague, in a cosy cell with a TV, but in Russia – in the same (penal) colony and the same 2×3 metre cell in which he killed Alexei.”

While Mrs Navalnaya’s spokesperson, Kira Yarmysh, described the court’s ruling as a recognition of Mrs Navalnaya’s “merits”.

Other Navalny allies have also been targeted since his death.

In April two Russian journalists, Konstantin Gabov and Sergey Karelin, were arrested on “extremism” charges, accused of preparing materials for a YouTube channel run by Navalny’s Foundation for Fighting Corruption, which has been outlawed by Russian authorities.

Mr Navalny died while serving a 19-year sentence on extremism charges that he condemned as politically motivated.

His death certificate said he died of natural causes at the age of 47.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/russian-court-orders-arrest-of-yulia-navalnaya-on-extremism-charges-13175701

Russian President Vladimir Putin hailed PM Narendra Modi and his dedication towards India during their ‘private meeting’ at the former’s residence.

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday night interacted with Prime Minister Narendra Modi over a “private engagement” at his official residence at Novo-Ogaryovo, during which he praised the Indian leader for his dedication towards his country’s progress, and for devoting his life to the people of India.

Russia’s President Vladimir Putin and India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi walk during their meeting at the Novo-Ogaryovo state residence near Moscow (Reuters)(via REUTERS)
Russia’s President Vladimir Putin and India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi walk during their meeting at the Novo-Ogaryovo state residence near Moscow (Reuters)(via REUTERS)
As the two leaders held an informal meeting outside Moscow during Modi’s visit to Russia, Vladimir Putin told the prime minister, “I would like to congratulate you on your reelection as prime minister. I think this is not an accident, but the result of your work over many years.”

“You have your own ideas. You are a very energetic person, able to achieve results in the interests of India and the Indian people,” Putin said. “The result is obvious… India firmly ranks as the world’s third-largest economy,” Putin was quoted as saying by state-run Tass news agency.

The Russian president said Modi devoted his whole life to the people of India and they can feel it. To this, Modi talked about the recent general elections and said the “the people of India gave him a chance to serve the Motherland”.

“You have devoted your entire life to serving the Indian people, and they can feel it,” Putin said. “You are right, I have only one goal: It is the people and my country,” Modi replied, as quoted by Tass.

Source: https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/russias-putin-praises-pm-narendra-modi-during-meeting-devoted-whole-life-to-people-101720485780612.html

Tropical Storm Beryl brought howling winds and torrential rain to southeast Texas on Monday, killing at least three people, flooding highways, closing oil ports, canceling more than 1,300 flights and knocking out power to more than 2.7 million homes and businesses.
Beryl, the season’s earliest Category 5 hurricane on record, weakened from a hurricane after pounding the coastal Texas town of Matagorda with dangerous storm surges and heavy rain before moving across Houston, the U.S. National Hurricane Center (NHC) said. The agency said conditions could spawn tornadoes in Texas, Louisiana and Arkansas.

Oil refining activity slowed and some production sites were evacuated in the state that is the nation’s biggest producer of U.S. oil and natural gas.

“For those of you in northeast Texas, be aware. You will have tropical storm winds, maybe as late as midnight or 1 a.m. You will have flooding, you will have rain, and you need to stay off the roads,” Patrick said.

State officials had yet to assess the economic damage as officials remained on a rescue footing while powerful winds continued to blow. Restoring power would take several days, said Thomas Gleeson, chair of the Texas Public Utility Commission.

More than 2,500 first responders were deployed statewide, said Nim Kidd, chief of the Texas Division of Emergency Management.
Following warnings that it could be a deadly storm for communities in its path, people rushed to board up windows and stock up on fuel and other essential supplies.
Before daybreak, strong gusts and torrential rain lashed cities and towns such as Galveston, Sargent, Lake Jackson and Freeport, television video showed. By late morning, many fallen trees blocked roads in Houston as the worst of the storm passed, with persisting winds and some road flooding, rendering lanes on major freeways impassable. The city barricaded flooded areas.
Crews using a life jacket and ladder fire truck rescued a man from a truck on a flooded stretch of freeway, video posted on social media by Houston’s local ABC station showed. Patrick said there were several other rescues.

Flood waters exceeded 10 inches (25 cm) across most of Houston, Mayor John Whitmire said.
“We’re literally getting calls across Houston right now asking for first responders to come rescue individuals in desperate life safety conditions,” Whitmire said.
The storm had strengthened to a Category 1 hurricane as it crossed the warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico before making landfall. But the NHC said it was expected to weaken into a tropical depression overnight and a post-tropical cyclone on Tuesday.
That was still enough to deliver more heavy rain as it moved northeastward from eastern Texas on Monday afternoon, across Arkansas on Tuesday, into the Lower Ohio Valley on Tuesday
night, and finally into the Lower Great Lakes on Wednesday, the U.S. National Weather Service said.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and the U.S. Coast Guard had positioned staff to assist with search and rescue efforts. FEMA also readied water, meals and generators to boost local response efforts, according to the Biden administration.
Schools said they would close as the storm approached. Airlines canceled more than 1,300 flights, and officials ordered a smattering of evacuations in beach towns. Small businesses in Houston, including package delivery services and chiropractors, delayed openings or were closed on Monday.

Source: https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/hurricane-beryl-expected-weaken-quickly-it-churns-across-texas-2024-07-08/

South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol said he would discuss with NATO leaders the distinct threat North Korea poses to Europe by deepening military ties with Russia, warning that Moscow must choose between the two Koreas where its true interests lie.
It “depends entirely” on Russia where it wants to take future ties with South Korea, Yoon said, adding that Seoul would make a decision on weapons support for Ukraine based on how a new military pact between Moscow and Pyongyang plays out.

The Spice Girls singer was awarded the doctorate for her domestic violence campaigning – as she revealed she had finished studying a trauma care course.

Spice Girl Melanie Brown is set to receive an honorary doctorate for her campaigning efforts – as she revealed she has completed an “intense” trauma care course.

The singer, also known as Mel B and Scary Spice, will be given the award from Leeds Beckett University in recognition of her work advocating for domestic abuse victims.

The 49-year-old said she was “so honoured” and “proud” that she completed the course and is being awarded a doctorate.

New analysis of the version of bird flu which has spread to cattle on more than 100 farms in the US suggests that the virus has mutated, which could eventually lead to it being spread to humans by breathing.

The cow flu virus that has spread through US dairy herds may have taken a “dangerous” step towards being able to infect humans through respiratory infections, scientists have warned.

The H5N1 virus, more commonly found in birds, has so far been confirmed in cattle on more than 100 farms in 12 states, with inactivated fragments of the strain being found in pasteurised milk on supermarket shelves.

Four people working with animals have so far been infected, though symptoms were mild and they did not pass the virus on to anyone else.

Now detailed analysis by scientists at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in the US shows viral samples taken from cows were able to attach to receptors found on cells in the human respiratory tract.

The version of H5N1 found in birds is unable to do that, suggesting the bovine virus has mutated.

Further tests on ferrets, which are commonly used in flu research, found the cow virus could not spread easily by breathing.

However, Dr Ed Hutchinson, from the Medical Research Council and University of Glasgow Centre for Virus Research, said there were still “reasons to be concerned”.

‘Urgent’ action needed

“When they compared their cow flu isolate to bird flu they found that it had already begun to gain some of the properties that would be associated with the ability to spread effectively through respiratory infections in humans,” Dr Hutchinson, who was not involved in the study, said.

“To be clear, it does not appear to be doing this yet, and none of the four human cases so far reported have shown signs of onward transmission.

“However, this new H5N1 influenza virus would be even harder to control, and even more dangerous to humans, if it gained the ability for effective respiratory spread.

“Although it is good news that cow flu cannot yet do this, these findings reinforce the need for urgent and determined action to closely monitor this outbreak and to try and bring it under control as soon as possible.”

Unlike normal human flu, which is contained within the respiratory tract, H5N1 is able to spread to other organs in the body, with as-yet unknown effects.

The US government recently gave COVID vaccine manufacturer Moderna £139m to develop an H5N1 jab.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/bird-flu-spread-to-cows-takes-dangerous-step-towards-infecting-humans-through-respiration-scientists-warn-13175177

Prejudice against fat people is endemic in our society and public health initiatives aimed at reducing obesity have only worsened the problem, according to a U.S. academic.

In her new book Why It’s OK To Be Fat, Rekha Nath, an Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of Alabama, argues for a paradigm shift in how society approaches fatness.

According to Nath, society must stop approaching fatness as a trait to rid the population of, and instead fatness should be approached through the lens of social equality, attending to the systematic ways that society penalizes fat people for their body size.

Nath explains: “Being fat is seen as unattractive, as gross even. We view fat as a sign of weakness, of greediness, of laziness. And we have made the pursuit of thinness, bound up as it is with health, fitness, beauty, and discipline into a moralized endeavor:  making the ‘right’ lifestyle choices to avoid being fat is seen as a duty we each must fulfill.

The 81-year-old president has told his party it is time to “come together” after a shaky debate performance against Donald Trump last month led to concerns about his capability to run.

Joe Biden has said he is “not blind” to concerns about his age but has told critics it is “time to end” speculation about his future in the US presidential race.

In a letter to Democrats in Congress, the US president said he was “firmly committed” to his re-election campaign and vowed to remain in the contest against Donald Trump.

“I want you to know that despite all the speculation in the press and elsewhere, I am firmly committed to staying in this race, to running this race to the end, and to beating Donald Trump,” Mr Biden wrote.

The president ends his letter by saying: “The question of how to move forward has been well-aired for over a week now. And it’s time for it to end.”

Around the same time the letter was published, the US president phoned in to MSNBC’s Morning Joe program and said he is confident the “average voter out there” still wants him on the Democrat ticket.

Mr Biden said: “I am not going anywhere.”

He added that losing is “not an option” in the upcoming election and that he hasn’t “lost to Trump”.

Mr Biden also told MSNBC he is not going to “explain any more about what I should or shouldn’t do”, saying: “I am running.”

Performance described as ‘slow-motion car crash’

There have been concerns about the health and capability of the 81-year-old president after a shaky performance in a debate with Trump last month.

Democrats described Mr Biden’s performance as an “unmitigated disaster”, “a meltdown”, and “a slow-motion car crash”.

Even some of Mr Biden’s closest political allies, including the former speaker of the US House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi, have raised questions about his health.

Mr Biden was hesitant during the debate, sometimes stumbling over his words and at one point appearing to freeze, less than 10 minutes in.

At one point, he attacked Trump over having the largest national debt of any president and insisted he would fix the tax system. But while saying his administration was “making sure that we’re able to make every single solitary person eligible for what I was able to do with the COVID,” Mr Biden stumbled.

He continued to say “excuse me – with dealing with everything we have to do with – look – if we finally beat Medicare,” before pausing until the end of his allotted time.

Biden ‘frustrated’ by calls from party officials

The US president has said he is “frustrated” by calls from party officials for him to step aside.

“They’re big names, but I don’t care what those big names think,” Mr Biden said.

He also said those in the party who are calling for him to quit should “challenge me at the convention”.

The Democratic National Convention in August is when delegates will officially select the party’s presidential and vice presidential nominees.

When Luca was born in a Perth hospital two years ago, it flipped his parents’ world in ways they never expected.
With the joy came a shocking diagnosis: Luca had cystic fibrosis. Then Australia – Laura Currie and her husband Dante’s home for eight years – said they couldn’t stay permanently. Luca, his parents were told, could be a financial burden on the country.
“I think I cried for like a week – I just feel really, really sorry for Luca,” Ms Currie says. “He’s just a defenceless two-and-a-half-year-old and doesn’t deserve to be discriminated against in that way.”

Australia has form when it comes to its strict immigration policies. It had its own version of “stop the boats”, which sent people arriving by boat to offshore detention centres in Papua New Guinea and the Pacific Island of Nauru and made controversial headlines in recent years. It was only in the 1970s that it entirely rid itself of the “White Australia” policy that started in 1901 with the Immigration Restriction Act, which limited the number of non-white immigrants.
The disability and health discriminations, which also date back to 1901, are still in place, says Jan Gothard, an immigration lawyer: “We still treat people with disability in the same way as we did in 1901 and we think they’re not people who are welcome in Australia.”
She is part of Welcoming Disability, an umbrella group that’s been pressuring the government to overhaul the law. Surprisingly, Australia’s Migration Act is exempt from its own Disability Discrimination Act.
Put simply, it doesn’t matter how long you’ve lived in Australia, if you were born in Australia, if you have private health insurance or even if you can pay for the support yourself – if you are deemed too much of a financial burden, you will fail the health requirement.
The government says that 99% of visa applicants meet the health requirement – 1,779 of them did not meet the bar between 2021 and 2022, according to official figures.
Immigration minister Andrew Giles, who declined to be interviewed, recently said that “any child born in Australia and adversely affected by the migration health rules can apply for ministerial intervention”, and that he himself had “positively intervened” in cases.
But families say that the process is gruelling at an already difficult time.

A French court ruled on Monday that the American man accused of sexually assaulting a Pennsylvania college student in 2013 and later sending her a Facebook message that said, “So I raped you,” can be extradited to the United States.

Ian Cleary, 31, of Saratoga, California, was detained in April in the city of Metz in northeastern France after a three-year search. He has been held in custody pending extradition proceedings since his arrest.

The Court of Appeal in Metz said that Cleary can be extradited. When asked if he wished to be extradited or not, in line with French law, Cleary refused, prosecutors said in a statement Monday. His refusal may delay the extradition process, but it won’t stop it.

The ruling is final. Cleary’s case is now the responsibility of the French Justice Ministry, which must prepare and submit the extradition order for the French prime minister. While he awaits the prime minister’s signature, Cleary remains detained in France.

Justice Ministry officials didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

Cleary had been the subject of an international search since authorities in Pennsylvania issued a 2021 felony warrant in the case weeks after an Associated Press story detailed the reluctance of local prosecutors to pursue campus sex crimes.

The Conservatives used Labour’s softer stance on Brexit as an attack line during the election campaign. Sir Keir says he wants to renegotiate Boris Johnson’s “botched” deal with Europe.

Labour is already working to build closer ties with the European Union, Sir Keir Starmer has said as he continues his tour of the UK.

The new prime minister has been on a visit to Scotland today where he has met with both the leader of Scottish Labour Anas Sarwar and First Minister John Swinney.

Following the meeting with Mr Swinney, Sir Keir spoke to broadcasters and talked down the likelihood of any negotiations on independence.

The SNP lost the vast majority of their seats in last week’s election.

Sir Keir added that he took the opportunity to “reset relations” with the first and deputy first ministers.

He conceded there were “clearly differences of opinion” between them on constitutional matters, but the meeting was still constructive.

Mr Swinney repeated his claim that his party losing 39 of their 48 seats did not equate to a removal of their mandate for independence.

But he did say the party intends to focus on issues like economic growth, child poverty, public services and net zero ahead of securing independence.

Sir Keir travelled to Northern Ireland later on Sunday, and will be meeting with the first minister, deputy first minister and opposition leaders on Monday.

A ‘botched’ Brexit deal

While on the visit to Scotland, Sir Keir went on the offensive over the way Boris Johnson negotiated the initial Brexit deal with the European Union – describing it as “botched”.

The new prime minister said he wants to have a closer relationship with Brussels.

Sir Keir said: “We intend to improve our relationship with the EU and that means closer trading ties with the EU, it means closer ties in relation to research and development and closer ties in relation to defence and security.

“Obviously, there are many discussions to be had and negotiations to be had.

“But I do think that we can get a much better deal than the botched deal that Boris Johnson saddled the UK with.”

He said any agreement depends on “respectful relationships, talking to leaders across the EU and of course that work has already begun”.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/sir-keir-starmer-says-work-is-under-way-for-closer-ties-with-eu-and-to-fix-uks-botched-brexit-deal-13174866

The British tennis star was beaten in three sets by New Zealand-born Sun, who won the fourth-round match 6-2, 5-7, 6-2, on Centre Court.

Emma Raducanu has been knocked out of Wimbledon after losing to qualifier Lulu Sun in the fourth round.

Raducanu was beaten in three sets by New Zealand-born Sun, who won the match 6-2, 5-7, 6-2, on Centre Court.

The British number three, who had a medical time-out early in the deciding set after slipping on the grass, was aiming to reach the quarter-finals of the women’s singles at Wimbledon for the first time.

The 21-year-old had pulled out of her mixed doubles match with Sir Andy Murray on Saturday due to stiffness in her wrist – which denied him the chance of another match at his final Wimbledon.

The former US Open champion received plenty of criticism, with Judy Murray branding the decision “astonishing” before insisting on Sunday she was being sarcastic.

Raducanu shrugged off the intervention, saying: “I’m sure she didn’t mean it.”

‘I stand by the decision’

She insisted it was not a mistake to accept the invitation, saying: “I was feeling fine, then yesterday morning just woke up with stiffness. I have to prioritise myself, my singles and my body.

“I think it was the right decision. I stand by the decision. Obviously it was a tough decision, though, because it’s something that I’ve always wanted to do.”

She added: “Of course, I didn’t want to take his last match away from him. But, at the end of the day, I think a lot of the players in a similar situation would have done the same thing.

“Going into the tournament, I wasn’t expecting to make fourth round. So, for me, it was a no-brainer [to accept the invitation]. He didn’t ask me, ‘If you’re still in the singles, are you going to play?’ Given how I woke up yesterday morning, it was for me a no-brainer.”

Raducanu, currently ranked 135 in the world, had been the last remaining Briton in either singles draw at the All England Club.

For Sun, it was the first time she had played on Centre Court.

After her victory, she said: “It was a great match. I really dug deep to get the win.

“I really had to fight tooth and nail against her [Raducanu] because she was obviously going to run for every ball and fight until the end. I don’t even have the words right now.”

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/emma-raducanu-knocked-out-of-wimbledon-after-defeat-in-fourth-round-match-13174801

Travis Barker was a proud husband at his inaugural “Run Travis Run” event in Los Angeles over the weekend.

The rocker hosted and ran a 5K event at the Kia Forum in Inglewood, Calif., on Saturday, where he was joined by his wife, Kourtney Kardashian. The run and wellness experience kicked off just eight months after Kardashian gave birth to the couple’s first child together, a baby boy named Rocky.

“My wife’s a beast!” Barker exclusively told Page Six. “She’s never done this [before]. She thinks I’m crazy because some mornings I’ll wake up and she’ll be like, ‘Where are you going?’ I’m like, ‘I heard there’s a 5K, babe, I’m gonna run it.’”

The two made their entrance into the event hand-in-hand and continued to pack on the PDA in front of the crowd of hundreds both watching and taking part in the 5K.

Barker, 48, completed the full 3.1 miles in under 20 minutes and adorably watched in awe as Kardashian, 45, walked the finish line with some friends.

“It was really cool to have her be a part of it,” he gushed. “It was awesome. It was everything I imagined.”

“Run Travis Run” – which benefits the Boys & Girls Club – kicked off hours before Barker hit the stage with Blink-182 for their “One More Time” tour stop at SoFi Stadium. The drummer has made running a pre-show ritual over the years – and told us he’s thrilled to have discovered a way to now include fans in on the experience.

“I feel great, I’m just on that natural high after you run. I do this every day … just not at this pace though,” he said of his lifestyle. “But once you’re around all of these people, you can’t help but be hyped and motivated.”

Everyone who participated in the 5K received a limited-edition shirt, medal and entrance into the revival zone, which featured wellness activations and exclusive access to brands like Alo, Barker Wellness, Lemme, New Balance, Liquid Life IV and more. VIP guests also received a swag bag and a special meet-and-greet experience with Barker himself.

“For me, it was like, ‘I run every day, so I should just invite people to run with me.’ But I found that it wasn’t that easy,” Barker told Page Six, of how the event came to be.

“My manager was like, ‘Oh, you actually can’t do that, you have to have permits [at the] venue.’ So I did all the things and partnered with Mascot [Sports] to bring this event together and it was amazing,” he added. “It’s just the best feeling. I love bringing all sorts of people out to run or walk and just come together.”

Barker made a commitment to his personal health and wellness lifestyle following a 2008 plane crash that left him and Adam “DJ AM” Goldstein (now deceased) in critical condition. The four other passengers on board the private aircraft, headed from South Carolina to LA, tragically died in the incident.

“More than 70 percent of my body was burnt and I was told by doctors that I may never be able to walk or play drums the same again. I was never athletic and I never played sports but I immediately had this urge to prove everyone wrong including myself,” Barker explained in a statement on the “Run Travis Run” website, recalling the 11+ weeks he spent in hospitals and burn centers as he recovered post-crash.

“It started off with short walks and then that turned into short runs everyday. I felt this sense of calmness and a rush of dopamine every time I ran,” he continued. “I’ve kept this up for years now, and I always start my day with it. I even run three miles every day before my shows when I’m on tour.”

Barker has since credited Kardashian, whom he married in 2022, for encouraging him to fly again after the tragedy.

Source: https://pagesix.com/2024/07/07/entertainment/travis-barker-packs-on-pda-with-kourtney-kardashian-at-run-travis-run-praises-her-for-running-5k-after-birth/

The US rapper says she’s been warned of “protests in the area” and has to make “sound decisions” to ensure she gets home to see her son.

Nicki Minaj has cancelled a festival appearance in Romania over “safety concerns”.

The US rapper had been due to perform at Saga Festival in Bucharest on Sunday evening.

But she was warned about “protests in the area”, she said, and needed to make “sound decisions” so that she made it home to her son and her team to their families.

She acted out of concern for the “well-being of our team and myself”, she said.

She is still hoping to perform at the Wireless Festival in London on Friday, she added.

In a post on X, Minaj said: “Out of concern for the well-being of our team and myself, I have been advised by my security detail not to travel to Romania’s festival tonight due to safety concerns regarding protests in the area.

“I look forward to seeing you all at another time.”

The 41-year-old added: “As a mom, I have to make sure I’m making sound decisions for me to make it home to my son and for my team to make it home to their families. To not heed the advice of security at this time is simply not what I think I should be doing.

“I love you and thank you for your understanding and support. I am very excited to see my fans this Friday in London for another very special headlining show at Wireless Festival.”

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/nicki-minaj-cancels-festival-appearance-in-romania-over-safety-concerns-13174884

Leeds Rhinos scrum-half Rob Burrow became as known for his fundraising and campaigning off the pitch as his performances on it. He died last month after a four-year battle with motor neurone disease.

Thousands of people have lined the streets to pay their final respects to former Leeds Rhinos star Rob Burrow.

The funeral procession took place on Sunday, with one final trip across his native Yorkshire.

More than 160 people then attended a private ceremony in Pontefract.

The 41-year-old died last month, four years after he was first diagnosed with motor neurone disease (MND).

Sunday’s service – on 7 July – came as a nod to Burrow’s number seven shirt worn during his rugby league career.

Members of the public lined the route wearing their Leeds Rhinos shirts, as the funeral cortege made its way through to the crematorium.

The cortege set off at 1pm, and on its route passed by where Mr Burrow started off playing rugby.

Speaking to Sky News ahead of the funeral, Gary Hetherington, chief executive at Leeds Rhinos, said: “Rob was a remarkable player and a remarkable person.

“Him and all his family have been a credit to rugby league and the MND community.

“Today is an outpouring of emotion and support for him and his family and what he’s done.

“It’s brought the whole rugby league community together… and other sports as well.”

Burrow was a successful rugby player, winning eight league titles, but he became better known for his campaigning to raise awareness for MND.

His trademark determination saw him help raise millions of pounds for charity to help research the rare, degenerative brain and nerve condition.

MND eventually took Burrow’s voice and confined him to a wheelchair before he died.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/rob-burrow-funeral-takes-place-as-hundreds-of-fans-line-route-with-some-wearing-leeds-rhinos-shirts-13174652

England triumphed over Switzerland in a penalty shootout on Saturday to book a place in the Euros semi-final against the Netherlands after the heroics of Arsenal winger Bukayo Saka kept them in the game.

England goalkeeper Jordan Pickford had a not-so-secret weapon in the Three Lions’ penalty shootout victory over Switzerland.

On Saturday, Gareth Southgate’s men managed another victory to continue their unbeaten progression through the Euros to the semi-final.

In a tense penalty shootout against Switzerland, Pickford pulled out a vital save that allowed his teammates to win it.

The Everton goalkeeper saved Switzerland’s first penalty, taken by Man City defender Manuel Akanji, correctly diving to his left.

It turns out Pickford had a little help in the form of a penalty cheat-sheet taped to his water bottle.

The tactic is a common one in the modern game, but a picture snapped after the match showed how it helped the Three Lions’ to victory.

On the paper it read “Switzerland Penalty Taker List” – and listed all the players who may be taking one.

In the next column it listed instructions on what the English shot stopper should do.

Instructions like “fake right – dive left”, “set – react” and more are written down by corresponding names.

Next to Akanji’s name is “dive left”, which is what Pickford did to save his spot kick.

England’s penalty takers went on to score all five in the shootout to win the game, with Liverpool’s Trent Alexander-Arnold scoring the final deciding penalty.

But it was only thanks to the heroics of man-of-the-match Bukayo Saka that England even made it to the shootout after the Arsenal winger scored an equalising goal before the end of normal time.

He buried his own penalty despite pressure following the racist abuse aimed at him when he missed one at the previous tournament.

The result not only establishes Southgate as one of England’s most successful managers in terms of going deep into tournaments, but it puts the country within touching distance of a trophy.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/england-keeper-jordan-pickfords-not-so-secret-weapon-during-euro-2024-penalty-shootout-victory-over-switzerland-13174555

CHINA is on course to deploy killer robots into battle within two years, it has been claimed.

The warning came as the Communist state revealed it had developed robotic dogs equipped with machine guns.

Defence analyst Francis Tusa said China was not hindered by fears over AI, which would see them come up with “new ship designs, new submarine designs, new fighter aircraft designs, at a rate which is dizzying.

“They are moving four or five times faster than the States.”

He said: “We’re at the start of a race in truly autonomous systems. I would be surprised if we don’t see autonomous machines coming out of China in two years.”

The robotic gun dog, made by Chinese firm Unitree Robotics, was unveiled last month during a military exercise with the Cambodian military.

Mr Tusa said being ahead of the West will appeal to the country’s leader Xi Jinping — and embolden Vladimir Putin.

He said: “For the Chinese, it’s the issue of have we beaten the Americans and the UK in getting a fully autonomous fighter aircraft

“There’s huge prestige. I think they’ll go all out on autonomy and harnessing AI and I think Russia will follow suit.”

The UK’s Ministry of Defence is also spending millions on developing AI-based weapons systems.

But it told declassifieduk.org that it “does not possess fully autonomous weapons and has no intention of developing them”.

Source: https://www.the-sun.com/tech/11842726/china-killer-robots/

Two pistols owned by the French emperor Napoleon Bonaparte, with which he once intended to kill himself, have been sold at auction for €1.69m (£1.4m).
The weapons, which were created by the Paris gunmaker Louis-Marin Gosset, had been expected to fetch between €1.2m and €1.5m.
They were sold at the Osenat auction house on Sunday – next to the Fontainebleau palace where Napoleon tried to take his own life following his abdication in 1814.
The pistols’ sale comes after France’s culture ministry recently classified them as national treasures and banned their export.

This means the French government now has 30 months to make a purchase offer to the new owner, who has not been named. It also means the pistols can only leave France temporarily.

The guns are inlaid with gold and silver, and feature an engraved image of Napoleon himself in profile.

He was said to have wanted to use them to kill himself on the night of 12 April, 1814 after the defeat of his army by foreign forces meant he had to give up power.

However, his grand squire Armand de Caulaincourt removed the powder from the guns and Napoleon instead took poison but survived.

He later gave the pistols to Caulaincourt, who in turn passed them to his descendants.

Also included in the sale were the pistols’ original box and various accessories including a powder horn and various powder tamping rods.

Source: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c4ng49dg35vo

The powerful sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un called South Korea’s recent front-line live-fire drills “suicidal hysteria” as she threatened unspecified military steps Monday if further provoked.

The warning by Kim Yo Jong came after South Korea resumed firing exercises near its tense land and sea borders with North Korea in the past two weeks. The exercises were the first of their kind since South Korea suspended a 2018 agreement with the North aimed at easing front-line military tensions in June.

“The question is why the enemy kicked off such war drills near the border, suicidal hysteria, for which they will have to sustain terrible disaster,” Kim Yo Jong said in a statement carried by state media.

She accused South Korea’s conservative government of deliberately escalating tensions as a way to escape a domestic political crisis. She said the riskiness of the South Korean drills is clear to everyone as they happened amid “a touch-and-go situation” established after the U.S., South Korea and Japan recently held a new trilateral military exercise that North Korea views as a security threat.

“In case it is judged according to our criteria that they violated the sovereignty of (North Korea) and committed an act tantamount to a declaration of war, our armed forces will immediately carry out its mission and duty assigned by the (North Korean) constitution,” she said, without elaborating.

Later Monday, Koo Byoungsam, a spokesperson at South Korea’s Unification Ministry, described Kim’s statement as an attempt to trigger an internal divide in South Korea, saying that North Korea must first look at its own human rights violations and the international isolation caused by its nuclear program.

South Korea’s Defense Ministry separately said it will continue its live-fire drills as scheduled but didn’t say when and where new exercises are planned.

Source: https://apnews.com/article/north-korea-kim-sister-firing-drills-f7a30c34f81229d4126190023d62260b

Ukraine’s best high jumper captured a world record on Sunday to go with her world championship, and now she has a good reason to think she might bring home an Olympic gold medal to her war-torn country.

Yaroslava Mahuchikh erased a mark that had stood for 37 years at a Diamond League meet in Paris, jumping 2.10 meters (6.88 feet) in one of the last big tuneups leading into the Olympics.

The previous record of 2.09 was set by Bulgaria’s Stefka Kostadinova in Rome in 1987.

“Coming into this competition, I had feelings that I could jump 2.07 meters and maybe 2.10 meters,” Mahuchikh said. “Finally I signed Ukraine to the history of world athletics.”

The 22-year-old Mahuchikh and world indoor champion Nicola Olyaslagers both cleared 2.01 meters on their second attempt. After Olyslagers failed three times at 2.03, Mahuchikh cleared that height to secure victory.

She then cleared 2.07 meters to set a Ukrainian record and had the bar raised to 2.10, which she cleared on her first try.

Mahuchikh left her hometown of Dnipro shortly after the war with Russia began. Like virtually all elite athletes in her country, she has been training in foreign countries while keeping tabs on the war back home. She has been outspoken about the role Ukrainian sports can play to give signs of hope to those fighting for Ukraine’s survival.

Source: https://apnews.com/article/womens-high-jump-mahuchikh-world-record-0195091009764c0ce03c851f750d0481

It was an attack that sent shockwaves through a country long considered a pioneer in LGBTQ rights. In the early hours of May 6, four lesbian women were set on fire in Argentina. Only one of them survived.

It happened at a boarding house in the Barracas neighborhood of Buenos Aires, where Pamela Fabiana Cobas, Mercedes Roxana Figueroa, Andrea Amarante and Sofía Castro Riglo were sharing a room. Witnesses say a man broke in and threw an incendiary device that set the women on fire.

Pamela died soon after. Her partner Roxana died days later of organ failure. Andrea died on May 12 in a hospital.

Andrea’s partner Sofía was the sole survivor. She spent weeks recovering in hospital and is alive today only because Andrea threw herself on top of her to shield her from the flames, Sofia’s attorney Gabriela Conder told CNN. “Her partner saved her,” Conder said.

Local LGBTQ rights advocates condemned the attack as a hate crime and lesbicide, saying the women were targeted because of their sexual identity. Police have arrested a 62-year-old man who lived in the building but, according to Conder, aren’t currently treating the incident as a hate crime as they say the motive is still unclear.

For Argentina’s LGBTQ groups – many of whom are planning to commemorate the four women with a rally this weekend – the attack represents an extreme manifestation of what they consider a growing wave of hostility against them. Those they blame most for this rising intolerance are the people in power. Chief among them, they say, is the country’s new far-right leader Javier Milei.

“Things changed with the new government of Javier Milei,” said Maria Rachid, head of the Institute Against Discrimination of the Ombudsman’s Office in Buenos Aires, and a board member and founder of the Argentine LGBT Federation (FALGBT).

“Since the beginning of the new government, there are national government officials expressing themselves in a discriminatory manner and those hate speeches before our communities from places with so much power, of course, what they do is generate – actually legitimize – and endorse these discriminatory positions that are then expressed with violence and discrimination in everyday life,” Rachid said.

Milei under fire
When Milei ran for president in 2023, he and his party were accused of making offensive remarks against LGBTQ communities which were deemed hate speech by multiple groups, including Argentina’s National Observatory of LGBTQ Hate Crimes.

In a YouTube interview ahead of the November election, Milei insisted that he does not oppose same-sex marriage, but in that same interview, he went on to compare homosexuality to having sex with animals.

“What do I care what your sexual preference is? If you want to be with an elephant, and you have the consent of that elephant, that’s a problem between you and the elephant,” he said, angering LGBTQ communities, who called the comments dehumanizing.

In late October, then-congresswoman-elect Diana Mondino, who would later become Milei’s foreign minister, told an interviewer that she supports marriage equality in theory, but at the same time, compared it to having lice.

“As a liberal, I’m in favor of each person’s life project. It is much broader than marriage equality. Let me exaggerate: If you prefer not to bathe and be full of lice and it is your choice, that’s it. Don’t complain later if there is someone who doesn’t like that you have lice,” she said.

After taking office in December, Milei took steps that critics say weakened protections for LGBTQ groups. He banned the use of gender-inclusive language in government; replaced the Ministry of Women, Gender and Diversity with a less powerful undersecretariat within the Ministry of Human Capital; and effectively closed the national anti-discrimination agency, saying the Ministry of Justice would absorb its functions.

Milei’s administration argued that some of those moves were part of his plan to cut public spending in response to the country’s economic hardships. But critics say his actions have normalized a culture of discrimination toward LGBTQ groups, and in the most extreme cases, have led to violent attacks such as the deadly May 6 arson.

“When hate speech is enabled by those in power, these sectors start to feel legitimized to attack,” Esteban Paulón, a former FALGBT president who was elected to Congress last year, told CNN in a phone interview. “And obviously, behind the verbal attacks come physical attacks.”

“(Attacks) always happened. That’s the reality. But they increased more in this current government due to the hate speeches constantly maintained on television, including hate speeches that our president Javier Milei exerts,” said Jesi Hernández, a lesbian and communication member of Lesbianxs Autoconvocadxs por la masacre de Barracas (Self-convened Lesbians for the Barracas massacre).

“Today it was Pamela, Roxana, Andrea and Sofía. And tomorrow it can be me.”

CNN has repeatedly reached out to the presidency for comment on these allegations but has not received a response.

Rise in hate crimes
In 2023, an annual report by the National Observatory of LGBTQ Hate Crimes recorded 133 crimes in which the victims’ sexual orientation, identity and/or gender expression were used as a pretext for the attacks. Those numbers rose from 2022 and 2021, when 129 and 120 crimes were recorded, respectively.

Rachid points out that the observatory’s numbers only represent attacks that have been officially recorded, and that the real figures are likely much higher.

Hernández, meanwhile, notes that daily life for many people has been impacted in ways not shown by statistics alone. Some now fear they could be targeted next.

“The truth is that now, sleeping peacefully in your bed is a privilege,” Hernández said, referencing the May 6 attack, “because you don’t know if you have a neighbor who will throw something at you or come in. Sleeping is now a privilege for us.”

Despite calls from LGBTQ activists, the arson is currently being investigated as an aggravated homicide rather than a hate crime, according to Conder, Sofia’s attorney. Sofia is set to testify at the end of the month, Conder said. CNN has reached out to the criminal court investigating the case but has not received a response.

Shortly after the May 6 killings, the presidential spokesperson Manuel Adorni condemned the attack but dismissed the notion that it was motivated by hatred toward the sexual orientation of the victims.

“I don’t like to define it as an attack on a certain group,” Adorni said at a press conference. “There are many women and men who are suffering violence and these are things that cannot continue to happen.”

Progressives condemned his remarks, insisting that the government should regard lesbicide as a hate crime.

Adorni responded on social media with a picture of a Spanish dictionary that said lesbicide is not a registered word.

Source: https://edition.cnn.com/2024/07/06/americas/argentina-lgbtq-milei-fire-deaths-intl-latam/index.html

In new research, physicists have wielded the power of chess to design a group of intricate mazes, which could ultimately be used to tackle some of the world’s most pressing challenges.

Their unique labyrinthine creations, inspired by the Knight’s movements on a chessboard, might help unravel other notoriously difficult problems, including simplifying industrial processes from carbon capture to fertilizer production.

Lead author Dr. Felix Flicker, Senior Lecturer in Physics at the University of Bristol, said: “When we looked at the shapes of the lines we constructed, we noticed they formed incredibly intricate mazes. The sizes of subsequent mazes grow exponentially – and there are an infinite number of them.”

In a Knight’s tour, the chess piece (which jumps two squares forwards and one to the right) visits every square of the chessboard just once before returning to its starting square. This is an example of a ‘Hamiltonian cycle’ – a loop through a map visiting all stopping points only once.

The theoretical physicists, led by the University of Bristol, constructed an infinity of ever-larger Hamiltonian cycles in irregular structures which describe exotic matter known as quasicrystals.

The atoms in quasicrystals are arranged differently to those in crystals such as salt or quartz. Whereas the atoms in crystals repeat at regular intervals, like the squares of a chessboard, quasicrystal atoms do not. Instead, they do something rather more mysterious: quasicrystals can be described mathematically as slices through crystals that live in six dimensions, as opposed to the three of our familiar universe.

Only three natural quasicrystals have ever been found, all in the same Siberian meteorite. The first artificial quasicrystal was created accidentally in the 1945 Trinity Test, the atomic bomb explosion dramatized in the film Oppenheimer.

The group’s Hamiltonian cycles visit every atom on the surface of certain quasicrystals precisely once. The resulting paths form uniquely complex mazes, described by mathematical objects called ‘fractals.’

These paths have the special property that an atomically sharp pencil could draw straight lines connecting all neighboring atoms without the pencil lifting or the line crossing itself. This has applications in a process known as ‘scanning tunneling microscopy,’ where the pencil is an atomically sharp microscope tip capable of imaging individual atoms. The Hamiltonian cycles form the fastest possible routes for the microscope to follow. This is helpful, as a state-of-the-art scanning tunneling microscopy image can take a month to produce.

The problem of finding Hamiltonian cycles in general settings is so hard that its solution would automatically solve many important problems yet to be overcome in the mathematical sciences.

Source: https://studyfinds.org/amazingly-difficult-maze/

Researchers at the University of California-San Francisco have uncovered a startling link between inflammation in young adulthood and cognitive decline during middle age. This discovery could reshape our understanding of brain health and dementia prevention, suggesting that the choices we make in our youth may have far-reaching consequences for our mental acuity decades later.

Imagine your brain as a high-performance engine. Just as a car engine requires proper maintenance from the start to ensure peak performance over time, our brains may need similar care beginning in young adulthood. This study, published in the journal Neurology, suggests that allowing inflammation to persist in our younger years could be akin to neglecting regular oil changes – the damage might not be immediately apparent, but it could lead to significant problems down the road.

“We know from long-term studies that brain changes leading to Alzheimer’s disease and other dementias may take decades to develop,” says first author Amber Bahorik, PhD, of the UCSF Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences and the Weill Institute for Neurosciences, in a media release. “We wanted to see if health and lifestyle habits in early adulthood may play a part in cognitive skills in midlife, which in turn may influence the likelihood of dementia in later life.”

Methodology

The researchers tapped into the CARDIA study, a long-term project designed to identify factors in young adulthood that lead to cardiovascular disease later in life. Here’s how they approached their investigation:

Election results show French voters have chosen to give a broad leftist coalition the most parliamentary seats in pivotal legislative elections, keeping the far right away from power. Yet no party won an outright majority, putting France in an uncertain, unprecedented situation.

President Emmanuel Macron ’s centrist alliance arrived in second position and the far right in third — still drastically increasing the number of seats it holds in the National Assembly, France’s lower house of parliament.

No clear figure has emerged as a possible future prime minister. Macron says he will wait to decide his next steps, and heads to Washington this week for a NATO summit. The new legislators can start work in Parliament on Monday, and their first new session starts July 18.

A hung parliament?
Three major political blocs emerged from the elections — yet none of them is close to the majority of at least 289 seats out of 577.

The National Assembly is the most important of France’s two houses of parliament. It has the final say in the law-making process over the Senate, which is dominated by conservatives.

While not uncommon in other European countries, modern France has never experienced a parliament with no dominant party.

Such a situation requires lawmakers to build consensus across parties to agree on government positions and legislation. France’s fractious politics and deep divisions over taxes, immigration and Mideast policy make that especially challenging.

This means Macron’s centrist allies won’t be able to implement their pro-business policies, including a promise to overhaul unemployment benefits. It could also make passing a budget more difficult.

Can Macron make a deal with the left ?
Macron may seek a deal with the moderate left to create a joint government. Such negotiations, if they happen, are expected to be very difficult because France has no tradition of this kind of arrangement.

The deal could take the form of a loose, informal alliance that would likely be fragile.

Macron has said he would not work with the hard-left France Unbowed party, but he could possibly stretch out a hand to the Socialists and the Greens. They may refuse to take it, however.

His government last week suspended a decree that would have diminished worker’s rights to unemployment benefits, which has been interpretated as gesture toward the left.

If he can’t make a political deal, Macron could name a government of experts unaffiliated with political parties. Such a government would likely deal mostly with day-to-day affairs of keeping France running.

Complicating matters: Any of those options would require parliamentary approval.

Is the left divided?
The left has been torn by divisions in the past months, especially after the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas on Israel.

France Unbowed has been sharply criticized by other more moderate leftists for its stance on the conflict. Hard-left leaders have staunchly condemned the conduct of Israel’s war with Hamas and accused it of pursuing genocide against Palestinians. They have faced accusations of antisemitism, which they strongly deny.

The Socialists ran independently for the European Union elections last month, winning about 14% of the votes, when France Unbowed got less than 10% and the Greens 5.5%.

Yet Macron’s move to call snap legislative elections pushed leftist leaders to quickly agree on forming a new coalition, the New Popular Front.

Their joint platform promises to raise the minimum salary from 1,400 to 1,600 euros, to pull back Macron’s pension reform that increased the retirement age from 62 to 64 and to freeze prices of essential food products and energy. All that has financial markets worried.

Is an interim government needed?
Prime Minister Gabriel Attal said he will resign Monday. He also said he is ready to remain in the post during the upcoming Paris Olympics and for as long as needed. An interim government would handle current affairs pending further political negotiations.

Macron’s office says he will “wait for the new National Assembly to organize itself” before making any decisions on the new government.

There is no firm timeline for when Macron must name a prime minister, and no firm rule that he has to name a prime minister from the largest party in parliament.

Source: https://apnews.com/article/france-election-left-far-right-macron-7c61d22e610c8ceef133e26bd8c847ee

The newly appointed Dutch defence and foreign affairs ministers have said the Netherlands’ support for Ukraine is “rock solid”.
The Netherlands has been a key ally to Ukraine since Russia’s invasion in February 2022, but a far-right election victory last year cast doubt on its commitment.
On their first visit to Kyiv, Defence Minister Ruben Brekelmans and Foreign Minister Caspar Veldkamp held meetings with President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and other senior Ukrainian officials.

Indonesia’s President-elect Prabowo Subianto wants to give school children free meals, but the plan and his pledge to be ‘daring’ on spending have the country’s debt and currency markets on edge.
Prabowo and his team have tried to distance themselves from any suggestions of fiscal profligacy, and to assure market participants the incoming government respects the legal debt limits that cap its budget deficit at 3% of economic output.