Category: World

For just the third time in more than two decades, less than half of Americans say they are “very satisfied” with the way things are going in their personal lives. The 47% of U.S. adults expressing high satisfaction with their lives has edged down three percentage points over the past year and is only one point higher than the 2011 record low for the trend.

The previous low points in Americans’ personal satisfaction have occurred at times of economic uncertainty. The 46% reading in 2011 came when the country was still recovering from the 2007-2009 recession, and the other sub-50% reading (47%) was in December 2008 during the global economic crisis.

In addition to the 47% of U.S. adults who are currently very satisfied, 31% are somewhat satisfied, 11% are somewhat dissatisfied and 9% are very dissatisfied. The current data are from Gallup’s Jan. 2-22, 2024, Mood of the Nation poll that also finds Americans’ views of the national economy are largely negative. Gallup has asked Americans whether they are satisfied or dissatisfied with their personal lives since 1979. Gallup added the question measuring degrees of satisfaction in 2001.

The combined 78% of U.S. adults who are now satisfied (very or somewhat) with their lives is well below the trend average of 84% since 1979 and is also the lowest since 2011. It is down five points over the past year and comes just four years after hitting a record high of 90% in January 2020, when economic confidence was at a 20-year high shortly before the COVID-19 pandemic forced widespread closures that resulted in an economic collapse in the U.S.

Life Satisfaction Highest Among Upper-Income, Married, Religious Adults
Majorities of Americans across all key demographic subgroups are at least somewhat satisfied with their lives, but only a few groups have majorities saying they are very satisfied. This includes those with annual household incomes of $100,000 or more, married adults, those who attend religious services regularly, college graduates, Democrats and those aged 55 and older.

Source: https://news.gallup.com/poll/610133/less-half-americans-satisfied-own-lives.aspx

Helicopter was on its way to San Diego from Creech Air Force Base in Nevada

Five U.S. Marines aboard a helicopter that went down in California Wednesday have been confirmed dead, the military said.

Civil authorities found the helicopter Wednesday morning in Pine Valley, roughly 40 miles east of San Diego, after it had gone missing on a routine training flight a day earlier.

It had taken off from Creech Air Force Base outside Las Vegas Tuesday and was reported missing when it didn’t land at the Miramar air station in San Diego on schedule later that day.

The Marine Corps launched a search effort along with the San Diego County sheriff’s department and the Civil Air Patrol, the civilian auxiliary of the U.S. Air Force.

Source: https://www.wsj.com/politics/national-security/marines-confirmed-dead-helicopter-crash-california-af94775b?st=wf24v7cqxuijfg4

In his latest message, the UN Chief has slammed the Jewish state for its offensive in Rafah, which is the last refuge city of Gazans.

As the Israel-Hamas war rages on, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has condemned Israel for its continued offensive in the war-torn strip. In his latest message, the UN Chief has slammed the Jewish state for its offensive in Rafah, which is the last refuge city of Gazans.

Taking to social media platform X, the UN Chief stated that Israel’s operations in Rafah will create an “exponentially increase what is already a humanitarian nightmare with untold regional consequences”.

Guterres added that he was alarmed by the reports which shared that the “Israeli military’s next focus is on Rafah”.

“Half of Gaza’s population is now crammed into Rafah with nowhere to go…Such an action would exponentially increase what is already a humanitarian nightmare with untold regional consequences,” stated the UN Chief on X.

Source: https://www.timesnownews.com/world/un-chief-slams-israel-for-rafah-attacks-warns-of-humanitarian-nightmare-article-107539662

Why have one cover star when you can have 40?

Edward Enninful said goodbye to his job as editor-in-chief of British Vogue after seven years with one star-studded cover featuring supermodels, pop stars, movie stars and more.

Mother-daughter duos including Kate and Lila Moss and Cindy Crawford and Kaia Gerber front the March 2024 mag alongside pop stars like Dua Lipa and Miley Cyrus.

But it’s supermodels who take up most of the real estate; Linda Evangelista, Gigi Hadid, Iman, Amber Valletta, Irina Shayk, Cara Delevingne, Karlie Kloss, Naomi Campbell and Christy Turlington are among the many major faces represented.

Jane Fonda, Oprah, Salma Hayek, Selma Blair, Victoria Beckham, Ariana DeBose, Anya Taylor-Joy, Laverne Cox and Serena Williams are among the other A-list participants.

Enninful — who announced in June 2023 that he would be stepping away from as EIC — tapped famed photographer Steven Meisel for the shoot, which saw all 40 in-demand women actually gather together in the same room. Pat McGrath oversaw the makeup for the entire endeavor.

“When it came to my last issue, I knew the cover would be dedicated to women. Of course! Women have shaped British Vogue for close to 108 years now, and have certainly informed every moment of my six and a half year tenure here, to say nothing of leading and guiding me through my entire life,” Enninful wrote, in part, for his last editor’s letter.

The government abandoned the principles that brought about the economic liberalisation. There was economic mismanagement and financial indiscipline, and there was widespread corruption, the Centre has said.

New Delhi: The UPA government had “inherited a healthy economy but made it non-performing in 10 years,” the Centre said in its comparative White Paper on the 10 years of the UPA and the decade under Prime Minister Narendra Modi. In an all-out attack on the Congress ahead of the Lok Sabha elections, the Centre accused the UPA government, which went out of office in 2014, of leaving behind “an unenviable legacy of a structurally weaker economy and a pervasive atmosphere of despondency”.

Calling it a “lost decade”, the White Paper tabled by Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in parliament this evening, said the UPA had left a trail of economic mismanagement and “short-sighted handling of the public finances… and undermining the macroeconomic foundations”.

The government abandoned the principles that brought about the economic liberalisation. There was economic mismanagement and financial indiscipline, and there was widespread corruption, the Centre has said, slamming the Manmohan Singh government on a day he finishes his Rajya Sabha tenure.

“In 2004, when the UPA government began its term, the economy was growing at 8 per cent (with industry and services sector growth above 7 per cent each and a resuscitating agriculture sector growth above 9 per cent in FY04) amidst a benign world economic environment,” read the 50-page White Paper.

But instead of taking the reforms further and consolidating the gains, the UPA only “took credit” for the high growth brought about by the “lagged effects of the reforms of the NDA government and favourable global conditions”.

The White Paper said the average annual inflation rate between 2004 and 2014 was around 8.2% and accused the UPA of doing nothing to contain the high inflation.

After pursuing policies that created a huge fiscal deficit, the UPA government borrowed heavily from outside but used the funds in an unproductive manner. Infrastructure was neglected, development programnmes were mis-managed. Even the social sector schemes – which the UPA prided itself on — were laden with unspent funds, the Centre said on an issue that’s likely to draw a strong reaction from the Congress.

“Across the 14 major social and rural sector ministries, a cumulative ₹ 94,060 crore of budgeted expenditure was left unspent” over the 10 years. This, the Centre said, amounted to 6.4 per cent of the cumulative budget, compared to the 1 per cent left unspent by the NDA government over the last decade.

The UPA government, it added, had also ignored defence preparedness and health expenditure, leaving it a “pain point” for Indian households.

A chunk of the White Paper was devoted to the mismanagement and scams that plagued the defence sector.  “By 2012, shortage of combat-ready equipment and ammunition was a chronic issue plaguing our forces. One would also recall the long-drawn process of procurement of fighter aircraft that never reached any conclusion. Even the decision to provide bullet-proof jackets and night vision goggles to Indian Army soldiers was kept hanging for years,” the White Paper read.

The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) won the 2024 elections by an absolute landslide, Imran Khan’s party declared on Friday as the independent candidates linked to the jailed former prime minister’s party were outperforming expectations in the polls.

This comes as Khan’s PTI was barred from contesting Thursday’s election as a bloc, but unofficial tallies by local TV channels showed independent candidates, including dozens anointed by his party, leading in most constituencies. Amid a delay in official results, PTI cautioned against manipulation, asserting it would only lead to chaos and instability.

‘OVER 150 SEATS’
By 6 am (local time) the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) had announced just eight National Assembly results, with three seats going to PTI-linked candidates. “PTI won the Elections 2024 by an absolute landslide. The world witnessed it. Manipulation of results now will not achieve anything other than absolute chaos & instability. The people have decided! Honor their decision,” the PTI wrote on X early Friday morning.

“Copies of these forms have been collected by PTI candidates’ polling agents, which show them winning by a large majority. According to independent reports, PTI has won well over 150 National Assembly seats & is in a solid position to form government in Federal, Punjab & KP, with a clear majority. However, manipulation of the results in the late hours of the night is an utter disgrace & a brazen theft of the nation’s mandate. The people of Pakistan vehemently reject the rigged results,” the party added.

‘INTERNET PROBLEMS’
The ECP earlier blamed “internet problems” for the delay. TV stations were basing their projections on counting done at the local constituency level. Earlier, before the first results were announced, PTI chief organiser Omar Ayub Khan said he was confident the party had done enough. “Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf-backed independent candidates have the ability to form the next federal government with a two-thirds majority,” he said in a video statement released to media.

Source: https://www.news18.com/world/imran-khan-linked-candidates-outperform-in-pakistan-elections-pti-warns-of-absolute-chaos-if-8772059.html

Russian leader’s comments came in interview with former Fox News star Tucker Carlson

Russian leader Vladimir Putin said a prisoner exchange would probably lead to the release of Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, but he declined to give a time frame for the deal and said Gershkovich was caught committing espionage in Russia.

Gershkovich has been detained since March 2023 on an espionage charge that he, the Journal and the U.S. government vehemently deny. In a two-hour interview with Tucker Carlson, Putin said a prisoner swap was being discussed between U.S. and Russian special services. Such talks have led to swaps in the past “and probably this is going to be crowned with success as well,” Putin said. “But we have to come to an agreement.”

Putin didn’t say who, specifically, Moscow was demanding in return for Gershkovich or other U.S. citizens now detained in Russia. But he made clear reference to Russian operative Vadim Krasikov, now serving a life sentence in Germany for gunning down a Chechen émigré in a Berlin park in 2019. Putin called Krasikov, whom he did not refer to by name, a Russian patriot.

When he was detained, Gershkovich was accredited by Russia’s Foreign Ministry to work as a journalist in Russia. The U.S. has designated Gershkovich as wrongfully detained, a status that commits it to working to secure his release. The U.S. has said Gershkovich isn’t a spy and has never worked for the government.

“We’re encouraged to see Russia’s desire for a deal that brings Evan home, and we hope this will lead to his rapid release and return to his family and our newsroom,” The Wall Street Journal said in a statement.

“Evan is a journalist, and journalism is not a crime. Any portrayal to the contrary is total fiction,” WSJ added. “Evan was unjustly arrested and has been wrongfully detained by Russia for nearly a year for doing his job, and we continue to demand his immediate release.”

Source: https://www.wsj.com/world/russia/putin-tucker-carlson-interview-wsj-prisoner-exchange-evan-gershkovich-75eb7b14?st=nn0hvvufjppmouu

President Volodymyr Zelenskiy replaced Ukraine’s popular army chief with his ground forces commander on Thursday, a huge gamble at a time when Russian forces are gaining the upper hand nearly two years into their war.
The shakeup ushering in a new military leadership follows months of speculation about a rift between Zelenskiy and army chief General Valeriy Zaluzhnyi, who many Ukrainians see as a national hero.

“As of today, a new management team takes over the leadership of the Armed Forces of Ukraine,” Zelenskiy said in a statement.
He promoted ground forces chief Colonel General Oleksandr Syrskyi, 58, to be the new head of the Armed Forces, citing his role in overseeing the defence of Kyiv in 2022 and the lightning Kharkiv counteroffensive later that year.
Syrskyi, who goes by the call sign “snow leopard”, takes the helm amid deep uncertainty as Kyiv awaits vital military aid from the United States that has been delayed by Republicans in the U.S. Congress for months.

The U.S. State Department said the move to replace Zaluzhnyi was a “sovereign decision”.
The Pentagon said Washington “will work effectively with General Syrskyi, we already have”.
With Ukraine struggling to overhaul how it mobilises civilians into the army, the sacking of Zaluzhnyi could deal a blow to troop morale on a 1,000-kilometre (621-mile) front. It could also backfire politically, hurting Zelenskiy’s ratings.

Zelenskiy said he was grateful to Zaluzhnyi for his time as army chief and posted a photograph of the two men shaking hands and smiling, with Zaluzhnyi flashing the peace sign.
MESSAGES OF GRATITUDE
Messages of gratitude for Zaluzhnyi, known widely as the “Iron General”, flooded social media following the announcement. Some Ukrainians posted images of the top general alongside images of hearts.
Passers-by in central Kyiv openly questioned the move.

“This is a very odd decision. We know our enemy and it is not Zaluzhnyi,” said Svitlana Kalinina, a consultant.
“I am very upset. I don’t know about others but I am very upset. This is a signal that worries me,” said Olena, a doctor.
Late last year a poll put the public’s trust in Zaluzhnyi at over 90%, significantly higher than Zelenskiy’s 77%.
Under Zaluzhnyi’s command, Ukrainian forces rebuffed Russia’s initial assault on Kyiv and reclaimed swathes of territory in 2022. But the battlefield momentum turned against Ukraine last year as a much-vaunted counteroffensive proved unable to break through heavily defended Russian lines.
Russia has since ramped up offensive pressure on the eastern front, trying to cut off and encircle the town of Avdiivka.
Zelenskiy indicated it was last year’s setback that underpinned his decision to replace Zaluzhnyi.
“In the second year of this war, we won the Black Sea. We won the winter. We proved that we can regain control over the Ukrainian sky. But, unfortunately, we could not achieve the goals of our state on the ground.”
The military shakeup unfolded over a series of statements in which Zelenskiy said he had met Zaluzhnyi to discuss changes to the military leadership, adding that he had asked the general to remain “on his team.”

Source: https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/ukraines-zelenskiy-says-time-has-come-changes-top-military-2024-02-08/

As the S&P 500 continues to hit fresh milestones with a first-ever break above the 5,000 level, its valuation is reaching new heights as well.
The S&P 500’s (.SPX), opens new tab forward price-to-earnings ratio — a commonly used metric to value stocks — this week rose to 20.4 times, a level last reached in February 2022, according to LSEG Datastream. That puts it far above the index’s historic average of 15.7.

It isn’t unusual for valuations to climb along with stock prices, and equities can stay expensive for a long time before returning to more moderate levels. Still, some investors believe the index’s growing multiple has made buying into the broad market a less enticing proposition. The S&P 500 has surged 21% since late October, making new record highs along the way.
It briefly crossed the 5,000 level at the end of Thursday’s session, before closing just below the mark.

“There is nothing screaming from the rooftops that at 20 times you have to sell,” said Mark Hackett, chief of investment research at Nationwide. “It’s just you’d obviously rather buy at 15 times.”
Stock valuations have risen even as Treasury yields have rebounded this year, following a rethink of how soon the U.S. Federal Reserve will begin cutting interest rates
Higher yields tend to pressure equity valuations as it means bonds are offering more investment competition to stocks and that future company cash flows are valued less highly. That means stock valuations could rise further if the Fed delivers its widely expected cuts and yields fall. The 10-year Treasury yield was last around 4.16%.

Source: https://www.reuters.com/markets/us/sp-500-breaches-5000-its-valuation-hits-lofty-levels-well-2024-02-08/

Justices hear oral arguments on whether 14th Amendment’s disqualification clause bars him from returning to the White House

The Supreme Court appeared likely to reject an attempt to remove Donald Trump from the 2024 presidential ballot, with justices across the ideological spectrum suggesting Thursday that Congress and not individual states must set the standards before a presidential candidate can be disqualified for engaging in insurrection.

Colorado’s Supreme Court, invoking a constitutional provision enacted after the Civil War, barred Trump in December from the state’s presidential ballot after finding he engaged in insurrection by inciting his followers to attack the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, to stop certification of President Biden’s victory in the November 2020 election. Trump appealed, and the U.S. Supreme Court expedited its proceedings ahead of Colorado’s March 5 primary election.

“If Colorado’s position is upheld, surely there will be disqualification proceedings on the other side,” said Chief Justice John Roberts, suggesting a cycle of partisan retaliation by states across the country. “A goodly number of states will say, whoever the Democratic candidate is, you’re off the ballot. And others for the Republican candidate, you’re off the ballot.”

Jason Murray, representing six Republican and independent voters from Colorado who filed suit to disqualify Trump, dismissed such fears. The disqualification provision “has been dormant for 150 years. And it’s because we haven’t seen anything like Jan. 6th since Reconstruction,” he said. “Insurrection against the Constitution is something extraordinary.”

Source: https://www.wsj.com/us-news/law/supreme-court-takes-up-donald-trumps-ballot-eligibility-725f2fa0?reflink=integratedwebview_share

Russian President Vladimir Putin said in an interview that aired on Thursday that Russia will fight for its interests “to the end” but has no interest in expanding its war in Ukraine to other countries such as Poland and Latvia.
In his first interview with an American journalist since before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine nearly two years ago, Putin said Western leaders had come to realize it was impossible inflict a strategic defeat on Russia and were wondering what to do next.

“We are ready for this dialogue,” he said.
Putin also said he believed it was possible to reach an agreement to free U.S. journalist Evan Gershkovich of the Wall Street Journal, who has been detained in Russia for nearly a year and is awaiting trial on spying charges.
Putin made the comments in a more than two-hour interview with conservative talk-show host Tucker Carlson that was conducted in Moscow on Tuesday and aired on tuckercarlson.com.

President Joe Biden will not be charged over his retention of government documents, Special Counsel Robert Hur announced on Thursday. In doing so, Hur stated that if Biden were charged, the president could present to a jury “as a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory.”

Attorney General Merrick Garland appointed Hur as Special Counsel last year after lawyers for Biden informed the government that the president was in possession of classified documents from his days as a senator and vice president. Hur concluded that Biden “willfully retained” the classified material.

Hur’s report describes Biden’s memory in damning terms, at one point stating that it “appeared to have significant limitations.” The report recounts a recorded 2017 conversation with Mark Zwonitzer – who helped Biden write two memoirs – in unflattering terms:

Source: https://www.mediaite.com/biden/elderly-man-with-a-poor-memory-devastating-doj-report-says-biden-did-not-remember-when-he-was-vice-president-and-when-his-son-died/

A majority of senators have now declared support for the legislation, Employment Minister Tony Burke from the ruling centre-left Labor party said

Australia will introduce laws giving workers the right to ignore unreasonable calls and messages from their bosses outside of work hours without penalty, with potential fines for employers that breach the rule.

The “right to disconnect” is part of a raft of changes to industrial relations laws proposed by the federal government under a parliamentary bill, which it says would protect workers’ rights and help restore work-life balance.

Similar laws giving employees a right to switch off their devices are already in place in France, Spain and other countries in the European Union.

A majority of senators have now declared support for the legislation, Employment Minister Tony Burke from the ruling centre-left Labor party said in a statement on Wednesday.

The provision stops employees from working unpaid overtime through a right to disconnect from unreasonable contact out of hours, Mr. Burke said.

“What we are simply saying is that someone who isn’t being paid 24 hours a day shouldn’t be penalised if they’re not online and available 24 hours a day,” Prime Minister Anthony Albanese told reporters earlier on February 7.

The bill is expected to be introduced in parliament later this week.

The bill also includes other provisions like a clearer pathway from temporary to permanent work and minimum standards for temporary workers and truck driver.

Some politicians, employer groups and corporate leaders warned the right to disconnect provision was an overreach and would undermine the move towards flexible working and impact competitiveness.

The left-wing Greens, which supports the rule and was the first to propose it last year, said it was a big win for the party. A deal had been reached between Labor, smaller parties and independents to support this bill, Greens leader Adam Bandt said on Twitter.

Source : https://www.thehindu.com/news/international/australia-to-allow-workers-to-ignore-after-hours-calls-from-bosses/article67820917.ece

Security groups warn China could strike US infrastructure in the event of a conflict

Chinese hacking groups maintained access to U.S. infrastructure systems for “at least five years” before they were discovered recently, according to a new report from U.S. security groups.

The Joint Cybersecurity Advisery issued its findings on Wednesday, saying that Chinese hackers had access but remained dormant inside U.S. systems. The hackers have infiltrated “Communications, Energy, Transportation Systems, and Waste and Wastewater Systems Sectors — in the continental and non-continental United States and its territories.”

The advisory is made up of U.S. law enforcement groups as well as security groups from the allied nations of Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the U.K.

The report states that the cyber operation’s goal was not intelligence gathering, but instead to gain access to and control critical infrastructure across the U.S. The report adds that the hackers could wreak havoc on U.S. systems in the event of a major conflict between the U.S. and China.

The hackers’ “choice of targets and pattern of behavior is not consistent with traditional cyber espionage or intelligence gathering operations,” the report reads. “The U.S. authoring agencies are concerned about the potential for these actors to use their network access for disruptive effects in the event of potential geopolitical tensions and/or military conflicts.”

The report echoes concerns raised by FBI Director Christopher Wray in a congressional hearing last week.

“There has been far too little public focus on the fact that PRC [People’s Republic of China] hackers are targeting our critical infrastructure — our water treatment plants, our electrical grid, our oil and natural gas pipelines, our transportation systems. And the risk that poses to every American requires our attention now,” Wray told lawmakers.

“China’s hackers are positioning on American infrastructure in preparation to wreak havoc and cause real-world harm to American citizens and communities, if or when China decides the time has come to strike,” Wray said.

Source : https://www.foxnews.com/us/chinese-hackers-access-us-infrastructure-least-5-years-discovery

North Korea’s Supreme People’s Assembly has voted to scrap all agreements with South Korea on promoting economic cooperation, the North’s official KCNA news agency reported on Thursday, as the two Koreas’ ties continue to deteriorate.

The assembly, which takes formal steps to adopt policy decisions of the ruling Workers’ Party, also voted to abolish laws governing economic ties with Seoul, including the special law on the operation of the Mount Kumgang tourism project.

The tours to the scenic mountain just north of the eastern border were a symbol of economic cooperation that began during a period of engagement between the two Koreas in early 2000s, drawing nearly 2 million South Korean visitors.

The project was suspended in 2008 after a South Korean tourist who strayed into a restricted zone was shot and killed by North Korean guards.

Hyundai Asan, an affiliate of the Hyundai Group conglomerate which invested more than 750 billion won ($564 million) in developing the Kumgang project, declined to comment on the report.

South Korea’s Unification Ministry, which handles ties with Pyongyang, said the North’s action was not surprising and would only deepen its isolation. Seoul does not recognise the unilateral move, an official added.

The KCNA report did not mention the North’s special law governing another major joint economic project, the Kaesong industrial zone, which at its peak housed the factories of 125 South Korean companies employing 55,000 North Korean workers.

The companies pulled out and the factory zone shuttered in 2016 when Seoul suspended the project after the North’s fifth nuclear test and long-range ballistic missile launches.

In January, South Korea closed a state-run foundation that supported the development and operation of the Kaesong industrial zone, which at the time was considered a sign that Seoul viewed the project was unlikely to be revived.

‘NOT RATIONAL’

North Korea has said it considers the South as an enemy at war and last year scrapped a military pact signed in 2018 aimed at de-escalating tensions near the military border drawn up under a truce ending the 1950-53 Korean War.

In a pre-recorded interview with state TV KBS aired late on Wednesday, South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol called the shift in North Korea’s inter-Korea policy “an extraordinary change” but said it was hard to understand the thinking behind the move.

“What hasn’t changed is that the North has tried for more than 70 years to turn us into Communists, and while doing that, it realized its conventional weapons were insufficient so they went onto nuclear development to threaten us,” he said.

Yoon, who has taken a hard line against Pyongyang, said he remains open to engaging the North, even by holding a summit meeting with Kim, and provide aid if it would help its economy, but said the North Korean leadership is “not a rational group.”

Since taking power in 2011, Kim has pushed the North to develop nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles even as its economy languished.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/north-korea-scraps-all-economic-cooperation-deals-with-south-korea-kcna-2024-02-07

Employees at a mining company had been waiting to return home when a landslide struck their vehicles – it is the latest incident in the Philippines following a long spell of extreme weather.

At least seven people have been killed and 48 others are missing after a landslide buried two buses carrying passengers in the southern Philippines.

The incident on Tuesday happened close to a gold mining site in the mountain area of Masara, situated in the town of Maco in Davao de Oro province.

Among the missing were 27 miners who had been waiting in two buses to begin their journey home when the landslide buried both vehicles, Davao de Oro provincial spokesperson Edward Macapili said.

Officials said workers were being collected in four 60-seater buses along with a jeep, which had a capacity for 36 passengers.

The vehicles had been picking up employees of Apex Mining – one bus had already left the scene to begin its journey at the time of the disaster, they added.

Several miners jumped out of bus windows to escape the landslide.

The search for survivors resumed on Wednesday after it was suspended overnight due to fears of more landslides, officials said.

More than 750 families have been moved to evacuation centres.

The recent extreme conditions had started to ease in the days before the latest landslide, said Mr Macapili.

He added: “It happened so fast. They suddenly saw the landslide cascading directly toward them.”

Army troops, police and volunteers rescued 31 residents who were injured.

Torrential rains have saturated the region in recent weeks.

Source : https://news.sky.com/story/seven-people-killed-as-landslide-buries-two-buses-in-philippines-mining-village-13066129

Rescuers were battling heavy snow Wednesday to reach a Marine Corps helicopter carrying five troops that went down in the mountains outside San Diego.

The CH-53E Super Stallion helicopter — the largest helicopter in the military, designed to fly in harsh conditions — had gone missing as an historic storm dumped heavy snow and record rain over California.

Civilian authorities searching on ground and by air located the aircraft just after 9 a.m. Wednesday near the mountain community of Pine Valley, about a 45-mile (72-kilometer) drive from San Diego, but snowy conditions were making it challenging to gain access on the ground, officials said. The fate of those aboard wasn’t immediately known.

The Marines were flying from Creech Air Force Base, northwest of Las Vegas, where they had been doing unit-level training and were returning home to Marine Corps Air Station Miramar in San Diego, defense officials said.

It was not immediately known what time the helicopter left Creech nor what time they were due to arrive. Waves of heavy downpours hit the area throughout the night and heavy snow fell in the mountains in Southern California.

The last known contact with the helicopter was at about 11:30 p.m. Tuesday, Cal Fire’s spokesperson Mike Cornette told CBS 8 news. That location was based on a “ping” reported to a Cal Fire dispatch center. The agency sent several engines and an ambulance to the area overnight.

Cal Fire officials said the military helicopter was reported missing in an area north of Interstate 8 and Kitchen Creek Road, located southeast of Pine Valley, which is at about 3,700 feet (1,127 meters) in elevation in the Cuyamaca Mountains.

Pine Valley was experiencing light rain and wind between about 11 p.m. and 1 a.m., said Casey Oswant, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service, San Diego. Weather data from the region is relatively sparse, she said.

Snow likely began around 6 a.m., with 6 to 8 inches (15 to 20 centimeters) accumulating within a matter of hours, according to another nearby weather station.

Source: https://apnews.com/article/marine-helicopter-san-diego-a1498c3de5cc4d3bd6f59a97f10a4c74

A man who bills himself as “The Official Pro-Life Spider-Man” scaled the exterior of the massive Sphere venue in Las Vegas on Wednesday to raise funds for a pregnant woman, according to a post on his social media site. He was arrested.

Las Vegas police said they began receiving calls about a person climbing the 366-foot-tall (112-meter-tall) spherical structure near the Strip after 10 a.m. The police department confirmed in an email about an hour later that 24-year-old Maison Des Champs had been detained.

His arrest came just days before Las Vegas hosts its first-ever Super Bowl, which is expected to bring more than 330,000 visitors this week.

Des Champs is a local rock climber who has scaled skyscrapers before in Las Vegas and beyond. He posted a short cellphone video Wednesday morning on his Instagram account. The video shows him against a blue but cloudy sky with a GoPro camera strapped to his head.

“Hey guys, I’m here on top of the Sphere,” he says in the video, wind whipping in the background as he explains that his latest stunt was meant to bring attention to his anti-abortion cause while helping raise funds for a pregnant woman who is experiencing homelessness. He said later in a separate post that the money raised will help the woman “cancel her abortion appointment.”

Des Champs has been charged with one count of felony destruction of personal property and conspiracy to destroy property, a gross misdemeanor.

Some of the deaths this year include the murder of Vivek Saini, the suicide of Sameer Kamath, and the deaths of Neel Acharya and and Akul Dhawan

The Indian community in the US is reeling from the recent string of sudden deaths among Indian students across American universities this month. The circumstances surrounding these tragic events vary, with one student losing his life in a shocking murder, another succumbing to suicide, and several deaths remaining unexplained. Numerous questions linger, leaving the community grappling with uncertainty and seeking answers.

Some of the deaths this year include the brutal murder of Vivek Saini, the suicide of Sameer Kamath, the mysterious demise of Neel Acharya, and Akul Dhawan’s death due to hypothermia.

‘You always have to be situationally aware’
In the aftermath of the recent deaths, Indian students studying in the US spoke with Hindustan Times about their concerns.

Kajari Saha, 28, from the University of California, Santa Barbara, said she felt a “sense of alienation” after learning about the incidents. “You always have to be situationally aware and surround yourself with people who feel safe to you,” she said. “I live in California, a very liberal state compared to others. However, there is a bit of racial profiling, no matter where you go.”

“Although I am mostly surrounded by friends, I can imagine how threatening it must feel for someone who lives by themselves and in the vicinity of where these incidents happened,” she added.

‘There were occasions when I felt scared to travel alone’
Vivek Saini, an MBA student in Georgia’s Lithonia, was brutally attacked and killed by a homeless man named Julian Faulkner. The gut-wrenching incident was caught on camera.

Faulkner reportedly hit Saini about 50 times on the head with a hammer. The incident took place at the Chevron Food Mart at Snapfinger and Cleveland Road.

“I first came across the news on X and it shook me to the core. I think over the past year, there has been a growing number of crimes, including some hate crimes, among different communities and unfortunately sometimes students are on the receiving end of it,” Anukta Datta, 28, also from the University of California, Santa Barbara, said.

On being asked whether Indian students in the US have reasons to feel threatened, she added, “Having lived in Michigan and California over the last six years, I think this is very subjective. Although Ann Arbor is a very buzzing and rather safe college town in the Midwest, there were still occasions when I felt scared to travel alone. These incidents can be very worrying for Indian students, mostly based on where they live and their surrounding community.”

Source: https://www.hindustantimes.com/world-news/us-news/exclusive-indian-students-in-us-universities-living-in-fear-after-2-deaths-in-a-week-scared-to-travel-alone-101707375660882.html

Sky News’ Alex Crawford reports from the scene and says there is “great tension” and a “great deal of anger towards America” following the strike.

A US drone strike in Baghdad has killed three members of the powerful Kata’ib Hezbollah militia, including a high-ranking commander, according to US officials.

The drone strike hit a car in the Iraqi capital – and was in response to a drone strike that killed three US troops in Jordan towards the end of January.

Sky News’ Alex Crawford arrived at the scene shortly after the blast and said there was “great tension” and a “great deal of anger towards America”.

“There has been a furious response about the killing,” she said.

“The locals round here are demanding an investigation by the Iraqi government, demanding that there is revenge.

“There is a great deal of anger, a great deal of tension here.”

Crowds gathered as emergency response teams picked through the wreckage.

The US has blamed the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, a broad coalition of Iran-backed militias, for the attack in Jordan on its forces, and officials have said they suspect Kata’ib Hezbollah, in particular, of leading it.

The strike on Wednesday night hit a main road in the Mashtal neighbourhood in eastern Baghdad.

A US official said that a senior Kata’ib Hezbollah commander was targeted in the strike.

Two officials with Iran-backed militias in Iraq said that one of the three killed was Wissam Mohammed “Abu Bakr” al Saadi, the commander in charge of Kata’ib Hezbollah’s operations in Syria.

The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorised to speak to journalists.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/us-drone-strike-in-baghdad-kills-iran-backed-militia-commander-us-officials-say-13066463

Taylor Swift has sold one of her private jets for $40 million, according to a new report.

The pop sensation sold her Dassault Falcon 900LX on January 30 to Missouri-based car insurance company Car Shield, according to documents obtained by Daily Mail.

Swift reportedly purchased the jet for $40 million in 2011, but the plane is now estimated to be worth around $7million second-hand, the Daily Mail reported. She still owns the larger Dassault Falcon 7X, which is worth around $54million brand new and has been her primary mode of transportation during the international leg of her Eras Tour.

The 34-year-old singer-songwriter has been under pressure to cut down on her carbon emissions for years, especially as she travels around the world between tour shows and appearances to support boyfriend and Kansas City Chiefs tight-end Travis Kelce at his NFL games. In 2022, Swift topped the list of the worst celebrity private jet CO2 emission offenders, according to Yard, a sustainability marketing agency that prides itself on “cutting-edge data and analysis.”

Swift is expected to travel from her concert in Tokyo and back to the U.S. on Sunday to watch her boyfriend Travis Kelce in the Superbowl.

The move to sell comes on the heels of news that Swift lawyers sent a letter to Jack Sweeney, a junior at the University of Central Florida, who tracked her flights and locations, to demand that he stop, the Daily Mail reported.

In addition to Swift, Sweeney also tracks the flight paths of planes and helicopters owned by celebrities, billionaires, politicians and other public figures using publicly available data provided by the Federal Aviation Administration to share the estimates of their cost and emissions.

“I think it’s important to note that nowhere do I intend for harm. I actually think Swift has some good songs,” Sweeney told Daily Mail. “I believe in transparency and public information.”

Swift’s attorneys sent a cease-and-desist letter to Sweeney in December, blaming his automated tracking of her private jet for tipping off stalkers about her location, stating that “the timing of stalkers” suggests a connection to Sweeney’s flight-tracking sites, according to The Washington Post. Sweeney is also accused of “disregarding the personal safety of others”; “willful and repeated harassment”; and “intentional, offensive, and outrageous conduct and consistent violations of our client’s privacy.”

The letter from her lawyers states that there is “no legitimate interest in or public need for this information, other than to stalk, harass, and exert dominion and control.”

Swift recently flew from Sao Paulo, Brazil to Kansas City marking her biggest trip to date, using 4,151 gallons of fuel and costing an estimated $23,250, according to Daily Mail. A spokesperson for Swift said the star was working to travel less frequently than she has in the past.

“Before the tour kicked off in March of 2023, Taylor purchased more than double the carbon credits needed to offset all tour travel,” the spokesperson told the outlet.

Sweeney was suspended from Twitter, now X, in 2022 by Elon Musk, who said the sharing of real-time location information violated the platform’s terms of service and was dangerous for himself and members of his family. Sweeney’s account has since been restored.

“Sweeney is an awful human being,” Musk posted to Twitter Tuesday. “Taylor Swift is right to be concerned.”

Source: https://www.foxnews.com/media/taylor-swift-sells-off-one-her-40m-private-jets-but-threatens-sue-college-student-who-tracks

Spy camera footage of South Korea’s first lady accepting a luxury bag gift was leaked as a “political manoeuvre”, President Yoon Suk Yeol said.

Mr Yoon said the act was “regrettable” but stopped short of apologising.

He has been under pressure to address the issue, which has roiled his ruling party ahead of key elections in April.

His first comments on what local media has called the “Dior bag scandal” disappointed citizens and angered the opposition.

Late last year, left-wing YouTube channel Voice of Seoul published a video that purportedly showed first lady Kim Keon Hee accepting a 3m won ($2,200; £1,800) Dior bag from a pastor, who filmed the exchange in September 2022 using a camera concealed in his watch.

“The video [was made public] at a time when the general election is drawing near, a year after the issue happened, so we can see this as a political manoeuvre.” Mr Yoon told broadcaster KBS.

“The fact that she was unable to cold-heartedly reject him was the problem, if one can call it a problem, and it is a little regrettable,” Mr Yoon said.

Some analysts have said the scandal threatens the prospects of Mr Yoon’s conservative People Power Party in April’s legislative elections. The video was released as his approval ratings were beginning to recover.

The opposition Democratic Party said Mr Yoon fell short of the public’s expectations of a sincere apology.

“The president’s shameless attitude is hopeless,” the party’s spokesman Kwon Chil-seung said.

“It’s hard to say how long we will continue to watch the self-righteousness of a president who refuses to admit fault and apologise to the people,” Mr Kwon said.

Some expressed disappointment on X, formerly Twitter.

“There was no apology for the Dior bag the whole country was waiting for,” according to one comment.

Another X user questioned the significance of Mr Yoon’s apology at this time: “Even if you receive an apology from such a shameless and unwilling authority, what is the meaning of that apology, which you were forced to accept like squeezing apple juice for several months?”

Several conservative newspapers, such as Joongang Ilbo and Chosun Ilbo, pointed out that Mr Yoon did not comment on the appropriateness of Ms Kim’s actions.

Local publications have reported that the presidential office confirmed receipt of the bag and said that it was “being managed and stored as a property of the government”.

Source: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-68236424

As heir to the throne, William will be the leading member of the Royal Family at official events across the country for some time as the King continues his treatment for cancer.

The Prince of Wales has returned to royal duties following his wife’s abdominal operation and the King’s cancer diagnosis – while his brother Prince Harry is heading back to the US after visiting his father.

The Duke of Sussex was at Heathrow ready for his return to his family in California after earlier flying into the UK to see the King.

He is said to have spent about 45 minutes with his father, who has started treatment for cancer.

It comes as William, as heir to the throne, hosted his first engagement as the leading member of the Royal Family at official events across the country in the absence of his father.

He has been hosting an investiture ceremony at Windsor Castle, awarding honours like CBEs, OBEs and MBEs to recipients.

Later on Wednesday, he will attend a gala fundraising dinner for London’s Air Ambulance Charity.

The King’s cancer treatment as an outpatient started earlier this week, and he returned, with the Queen, to his Sandringham home in Norfolk on Tuesday after seeing Harry.

The King has postponed all public-facing duties, although he is continuing with work on his red boxes of state papers.

Meanwhile, Downing Street has said the prime minister will have his weekly audience with the King over the phone.

Kate left hospital last Monday and returned to Adelaide Cottage in Windsor to be reunited with her three children after undergoing planned abdominal surgery on 16 January at the London Clinic.

William last carried out a major royal event more than three weeks ago, when he travelled to Leeds to make former Leeds Rhinos team-mates Rob Burrow and Kevin Sinfield each a CBE for raising funds and awareness for motor neurone disease.

After taking time off work, William had planned to return once Kate’s recovery had settled – the 42-year-old future queen is not expected to take on official duties until after Easter.

At the same private hospital that cared for Kate, the King received treatment for an enlarged prostate and was discharged the same day as his daughter-in-law.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/prince-william-hosts-first-engagement-since-kings-cancer-diagnosis-and-kates-surgery-13066010

Same story, same result.

For the third time this week, President Biden told an audience that he discussed the Jan, 6, 2021, riot at the US Capitol with European leaders who were actually dead at the time.

On Wednesday, Biden told Democratic donors in New York that he spoke about the riot with former German Chancellor Helmut Kohl, whose death pre-dates the event by nearly half a decade.

The shocking gaffe comes just days after the 81-year-old president confused French President Emmanuel Macron with the country’s ex-leader Francois Mitterrand — who died in 1996.

Biden made the blunder Wednesday in front of audiences at two separate fundraisers as he regaled donors with an anecdote about his first international trip as president – to the 2021 G-7 summit in Great Britain – after his 2020 election win over former President Donald Trump.

“I showed up … and I sat down and said, ‘America’s back,’ and [French President Emmanuel] Macron looked at me and said, ‘For how long?’ How long? Not a joke,” Biden recalled, according to a pool report of the president’s stop at the home of Maureen White, whose husband Steven Rattner manages billionaire former Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s fortune.

“Helmut Kohl said, ‘Joe, what would you think if you picked up the phone and picked up the paper tomorrow and learned in the London Times, on the front page, that 1,000 people stormed the Parliament, broke down the doors of the House of Commons and killed 2 bobbies in the process … trying to stop the election of a prime minister?’” he added.

Kohl, who served as the chancellor of Germany from 1982 to1998, died in 2017 – nearly four years before the 2021 G7 summit.

Angela Merkel was the chancellor of Germany at the time of the gathering of world leaders Biden was referring to.

About 50 guests, including actor Robert De Niro, were witness to the gaffe.

Biden also referenced “Helmut Kohl of Germany” during the telling of a nearly identical anecdote during a stop at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel near Columbus Circle, for an event hosted by Dr. Ramon Tallaj, chairman of the nonprofit SOMOS Community Care and a member of Mayor Eric Adams’s COVID-19 recovery task force.

The president stumbled through the same story on Sunday in Las Vegas, with one of the only differences being that he recalled Mitterrand, rather than Kohl, presenting him with the hypothetical.

“It was in the south of England. And I sat down and I said, ‘America is back,’ and Mitterrand from Germany, I mean from France, looked at me and said – said, ‘you know what — why — how long you back for?’” Biden said in the campaign speech.

Mitterrand served two terms as president between 1981 and 1995. He died on January 8, 1996 at the age of 79.

Biden’s latest gaffe is one of many verbal blunders he’s committed since taking office, which have sparked concerns over his mental acuity as he seeks a second term in office.

In one of his most infamous verbal misfires, Biden sought out Indiana Rep. Jackie Walorski at a White House event held eight weeks after her high-profile death.

“Representative Jackie — are you here? Where’s Jackie?” the president asked from the podium during the October 2022 function. “I think she was going to be here.”

Source: https://nypost.com/2024/02/08/news/biden-says-he-discussed-jan-6-capitol-riot-with-former-german-chancellor-helmut-kohl-who-died-in-2017/

Pakistan has suspended mobile calls and data services as millions head to the polls to vote in a new government.

An interior ministry spokesman said the measure was warranted, citing recent incidents of terror in the country.

The election comes almost two years since the previous prime minister, cricketer-turned-politician Imran Khan, was ousted in a no-confidence vote.

Three-time PM Nawaz Sharif is now on the ballot in what many analysts say is Pakistan’s least credible election yet.

Khan was jailed on corruption charges last year and is barred from standing.

Both calls and data services have been suspended, though wifi networks still appear to be working.

One voter told the BBC they were shocked at the decision, saying “voters should be facilitated instead of [having to be met with] such hurdles”.

Another said she was expecting a blanket shutdown.

Many voters in the city of Lahore told the BBC that the internet blackout meant it was not possible to book taxis to go and vote, while others said they couldn’t chat to other family members to co-ordinate when to head to polling stations.

Justifying the move, an Interior Ministry spokesman said: “As a result of the recent incidents of terrorism in the country, precious lives have been lost. Security measures are essential to maintain law and order situation and to deal with potential threats.”

Two bomb blasts killed 28 people in Balochistan province on Wednesday.

The shutdown was also criticised by Bilawal Bhutto Zadari, son of murdered ex-Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, who called for services to be restored “immediately”. Mr Bhutto, who is also running for the top job, said his Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) had approached the election commission and the courts to get services restored.

The country is on high alert, with a heavy security presence at polling stations across the country. One station in Lahore the BBC visited had armed guards at the entrance and army officers roaming around the area.

Border crossings with Afghanistan and Iran have been closed for both cargo and pedestrians to “ensure full security” during polling, a spokesman from Pakistan’s foreign ministry said.

The country has in the past cut internet services to control the flow of information – though a shutdown of this extent is unprecedented, especially during an election.

Absolutely fair election: Nawaz Sharif
Mr Sharif and his daughter Maryam voted in Icchra, Lahore on Thursday afternoon. Security was tight, with officers forming a ring around them and a jeep covered in antennas to jam phone signals.

Black cars lined the area as the pair entered the station.

When asked if he thought the election was free and fair, Mr Sharif said they were “absolutely fair”.

Speaking to the BBC outside the polling station after having cast his vote, he said he had “never had any problems with the military”.

Mr Sharif spoke of the “lack of civility, the arrogance, and this culture of disrupting and destroying the country”, in an apparent reference to Pakistan under Mr Khan.

He said he and his family had gone to jail, “made sacrifices and now we are here witnessing this day”. If his party wins, “people’s lives will become easier, inflation will go down – this is what people want, this is their wish – and their wishes should come true”, he added.

Voting ends at 1700 local time (1200 GMT). Strict rules around election coverage – including what can be said about candidates, campaigning and opinion polls – remain in place until 23:59 local time on Thursday. Its unclear how soon results will be announced but they must be released within two weeks of the vote.

Outside one polling station in the city of Multan in Punjab, some female polling agents told the BBC they were not allowed to enter polling booths – and therefore could not observe the polling process.

Typically, female polling agents are given a seat inside booths.

In Lahore, dozens of voters crammed into the small corridors of a school in Naseerabad, with some saying they had been waiting for more than two hours to vote.

Rising violence and economic struggles
As many as 128 million people are registered to cast their votes, almost half of whom are under the age of 35. More than 5,000 candidates – of whom just 313 are women – are contesting the 266 directly-elected seats in the 336-member National Assembly.

The Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) (PML-N) and the PPP are considered the two major parties going into the vote.

However, picking out candidates from Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party is more difficult, after it was banned from using the cricket bat symbol under which all its candidates run.

The move has forced PTI-backed candidates, who are running as independents, to use other symbols instead, including calculators, electric heaters and dice. Electoral symbols play a key role in a country where more than 40% are unable to read.

Source: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-68226228

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday rejected Hamas’ latest offer for a ceasefire and return of hostages held in the Gaza Strip, but U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said there was still room for negotiation toward an agreement.
Hamas, the Palestinian militant group that rules Gaza, proposed a ceasefire of 4-1/2 months, during which all hostages would go free, Israel would withdraw its troops from Gaza and an agreement would be reached on an end to the war.

The Hamas offer, which was first reported by Reuters, was a response to an earlier proposal drawn up by U.S. and Israeli spy chiefs and delivered to Hamas last week by Qatari and Egyptian mediators.
Calling Hamas’ position “delusional,” Netanyahu renewed a pledge to destroy the Islamist movement, saying there was no alternative for Israel but to bring about its collapse.
“The day after is the day after Hamas. All of Hamas,” he told a press conference, insisting that total victory against Hamas was the only solution to the four-month-old Gaza war.

“Continued military pressure is a necessary condition for the release of the hostages,” Netanyahu said.
But Blinken’s comments, following a meeting with Netanyahu, suggested forging a truce agreement was not a lost cause.
“There are clearly nonstarters in what (Hamas has) put forward,” Blinken said at a late-night press conference in a Tel Aviv hotel, without specifying what the nonstarters were.
“But we also see space in what came back to pursue negotiations, to see if we can get to an agreement. That’s what we intend to do.”

Blinken met the leaders of Qatar and Egypt on Tuesday and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in Ramallah on Wednesday.
A senior Hamas official, Sami Abu Zuhri, described Netanyahu’s remarks as “political bravado” that showed the Israeli leader’s intention to further pursue conflict in the region.
Another Hamas official, Osama Hamdan, said a Hamas delegation led by senior Hamas official Khalil Al-Hayya would travel on Thursday to Cairo for ceasefire talks with mediators Egypt and Qatar. Hamdan urged Palestinian armed factions to go on fighting.
Israel began its military offensive after Hamas militants from Gaza killed 1,200 people and took 253 hostages in southern Israel on Oct. 7. Gaza’s health ministry says at least 27,585 Palestinians have been confirmed killed, with thousands more feared buried under rubble. There has been one truce to date, lasting a week at the end of November.
HAMAS PROPOSES THREE-PHASE TRUCE

Israel had previously said it would not pull its troops out of Gaza or end the war until Hamas was wiped out.
But sources close to the negotiations described Hamas as taking a new, three-phase approach to its longstanding demand to end the war, proposing this as an issue to be resolved in future talks rather than a condition for the truce.
According to the offer document seen by Reuters and confirmed by sources:
* During the first 45-day phase all Israeli women hostages, males under 19 and the old and sick would be freed, in exchange for Palestinian women and children held in Israeli jails. Israel would withdraw troops from Gaza’s populated areas.
* Implementation of the second phase would not begin until the sides conclude indirect talks over the requirements for ending mutual military operations and restoring complete calm.
* The second phase would include the release of remaining male hostages and full Israeli withdrawal from all of Gaza. The remains of the dead would be exchanged during the third phase.
Washington has cast the hostage and truce deal as part of plans for a wider resolution of the Middle East conflict, ultimately leading to reconciliation between Israel and Arab neighbours and creation of a Palestinian state.
Netanyahu rejects a Palestinian state, which Saudi Arabia says is a requirement for the kingdom to normalise relations with Israel.
Israel has sought to capture Khan Younis, the main city in Gaza’s south. Last week, Israel said it plans to storm Rafah, a move U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said on Wednesday would “exponentially increase what is already a humanitarian nightmare with untold regional consequences.”
The Israeli military said it had killed dozens of militants in fighting over the last 24 hours. It has made similar claims throughout the fighting in Khan Younis which could not be independently verified.
In Rafah, on Gaza’s southern edge where half of the enclave’s 2.3 million people are penned against the border with Egypt, the bodies of 10 people killed by Israeli strikes overnight were laid out in a hospital morgue. At least two of the shrouded bundles were the size of small children. Relatives wept beside the dead.

Source:  https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/gaza-mediators-search-final-formula-israel-hamas-ceasefire-2024-02-07/

Nikki Haley said that India has played smart in the current global situation and stayed close with Russia.

Republican presidential aspirant Nikki Haley on Wednesday said that India wants to be a partner with the US, but as of now they don’t trust Americans to lead. The Indian-American presidential aspirant also said that India has played smart in the current global situation and stayed close with Russia.

Nikki Haley, in an interview with Fox Business News, said that, as of now, India sees the United States as weak, reported news agency PTI.

“I have got to say, I have dealt with India too. I have talked with Modi. India wants to be a partner with us. They don’t want to be a partner with Russia. The problem is, India doesn’t trust us to win. They don’t trust us to lead. They see right now that we’re weak. India has always played it smart. They have played it smart, and they have stayed close with Russia, because that’s where they get a lot of their military equipment,” she said.

“When we start to lead again, when we start to get the weakness out and stop putting our head in the sand, that’s when our friends, India, Australia, New Zealand, all of them will — and Israel, Japan, South Korea — all of them want to do that…,” Haley said.

Source: https://www.indiatoday.in/world/story/india-sees-us-as-weak-played-smart-by-staying-close-to-russia-nikki-haley-2499025-2024-02-08

The company was manipulated through a multi-person video conference, where every participant, except the victim, was created using deepfake.

A multinational company in Hong Kong fell victim to a staggering $25.6 million (over ₹ 200 crore) scam orchestrated using sophisticated deepfake technology, a report said. Hong Kong police said that employees at the company were manipulated through a multi-person video conference, where every participant, except the victim, was created using deepfake.
A deepfake is a type of synthetic media that uses artificial intelligence to manipulate or generate visual and audio content, often with a malicious motive, to appear authentic.

According to the report, the perpetrators used deepfake technology to transform publicly available video and audio footage into lifelike versions of the company’s staff members, including a digitally cloned chief financial officer.

The victim, a finance department employee, received a phishing message in mid-January, purportedly from the company’s UK-based CFO, instructing them to conduct a secret transaction.

Despite an initial “moment of doubt,” the employee succumbed to the ruse after participating in a group video conference. During the call, the deepfake representations of company employees appeared authentic, leading the victim to follow instructions and make 15 transfers totaling $25 million to five different Hong Kong bank accounts.

Source: https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/cfo-cloned-200-crores-stolen-hong-kong-company-falls-victim-to-deepfake-5003629

In a dramatic setback, House Republicans failed Tuesday to impeach Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, forced to shelve a high-profile priority — for now — after a few GOP lawmakers refused to go along with the party’s plan.

The stunning roll call fell just a single vote short of impeaching Mayorkas, stalling the Republicans’ drive to punish the Biden administration over its handling of the U.S-Mexico border. With Democrats united against the charges, the Republicans needed almost every vote from their slim majority to approve the articles of impeachment.

A noisy, rowdy scene erupted on the House floor as the vote was tied for several tense minutes, 215-215. Several Republican lawmakers — led by the impeachment’s chief sponsor, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia — surrounded one of the holdouts, Wisconsin Republican Mike Gallagher, who refused to change his vote.

With the tally stuck, Democrats shouted for the gavel to close out the vote.

“Frustrated,” said Rep. Mark Green, R-Tenn., the chairman of the Homeland Security Committee, “but we’ll see it back again.”

House Speaker Mike Johnson’s spokesman Raj Shah said they “fully intend” to reconsider the articles of impeachment against Mayorkas “when we have the votes for passage.”

But next steps are uncertain. In the end, three Republicans opposed the impeachment, and a fourth Republican switched his vote so the measure could be revisited. The final tally was 214-216.

The outcome was another dismal result for the House Republicans who have repeatedly been unable to use their majority power to accomplish political goals, or even to keep up with the basics of governing.

Johnson, who could afford only a few defections from his ranks, had said earlier he had personally spoken to Gallagher and another GOP holdout, acknowledging the “heavy, heavy” vote as he sought their support.

“It’s an extreme measure,” said Johnson, R-La. “But extreme times call for extreme measures.”

Not since 1876 has a Cabinet secretary faced impeachment charges and it’s the first time a sitting secretary is being impeached — 148 years ago, Secretary of War William Belknap resigned just before the vote.

The impeachment charges against Mayorkas come as border security is fast becoming a top political issue in the 2024 election, a particularly potent line of attack being leveled at President Joe Biden by Republicans, led by the party’s front-runner for the presidential nomination, Donald Trump.

Source: https://apnews.com/article/house-republicans-impeach-homeland-security-secretary-mayorkas-8209736501ed4fe12e4b164443d6a8a9

Taylor Swift’s attorneys have threatened legal action against Jack Sweeney, a college student who has attracted the ire of celebrities and billionaires over his social media accounts that share publicly available information about private jet landings and takeoffs.

An attorney for Swift sent a cease-and-desist letter to Sweeney, a University of Central Florida junior, in December, according to The Washington Post. The letter, which Sweeney shared with the Post, says that his social media accounts cause “direct and irreparable harm, as well as emotional and physical distress.” It says that unless Sweeney stops the “stalking and harassing behavior,” the artist would “have no choice but to pursue any and all legal remedies.”

“I think it’s important to note that no where do I intend for harm. I actually think Swift has some good songs. I believe in transparency and public information,” Sweeney wrote in an email to The Verge.

The accounts share information that’s already publicly available through the Federal Aviation Administration and signals that private jets broadcast, which Sweeney has made easier to access by posting on social media.

Along with data on private jet landing and takeoff patterns, Sweeney also posts estimates of the associated fuel use and greenhouse gas emissions of the flights. “Flight shame” really took off in 2018 after an environmental campaign in Sweden urged people to find less polluting ways to travel. Swedish activist Greta Thunberg then made waves for taking a two week by sea journey to attend a climate conference in New York the following year.

A report in 2022 on celebrities with the biggest carbon footprints from flying placed Swift at the top of the list. “Taylor’s jet is loaned out regularly to other individuals. To attribute most or all of these trips to her is blatantly incorrect,” Swift’s representatives responded at the time.

Source: https://www.theverge.com/2024/2/6/24063220/taylor-swift-jet-public-data-social-media

The billionaire businessman governed Chile for two terms, the second of which was marked by violent protests

Sebastián Piñera, a wealthy entrepreneur turned two-time president of Chile, died Tuesday when the helicopter he was piloting crashed in a lake in a rural area of southern Chile, government officials and people close to the former president said.

Piñera and three passengers were traveling in his small helicopter when it splashed down during a vacation in the town of Lake Ranco, some 460 miles south of Santiago, the capital, said the former president’s longtime aide, Jaime Bellolio.

Authorities said the helicopter had just taken off in the rain following the president’s visit to the home of a friend, José Cox, when it descended for as-yet unexplained reasons into the lake, also called Lake Ranco. Piñera had been en route to his summer home nearby.

“Three people were able to unlock their belts and swim to shore,” said Bellolio. “But the president wasn’t able to do that.”

Source: https://www.wsj.com/world/americas/former-chilean-president-sebastian-pinera-dies-in-helicopter-crash-450c3102

Prince of Wales to act as the face of the monarchy in public events while his father undergoes treatment for unspecified cancer

Prince William, the youngest and most high-profile member of the working royals, is now tasked with being the public face of the British monarchy after his father King Charles III’s cancer diagnosis.

Polls show that the Prince of Wales, 41, is already the most popular member of the royal family. Over the years, the prince has built up a reputation of being a steady pair of hands who rarely causes controversy and is an adept practitioner of the House of Windsor’s well-tested formula of polite neutrality.

U.K. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said Tuesday that the monarch’s cancer had been caught early, raising hopes that the king would make a complete recovery and return to public duties in the coming months. Meanwhile, Prince William—who is the king’s immediate heir—will gain experience at being the House of Windsor’s public face, even if his role is symbolic and his father remains head of state.

The 75-year-old king’s diagnosis came less than a year after he was crowned and 17 months after his mother Queen Elizabeth II died, making Charles the oldest British monarch to accede to the throne after a record seven decades in waiting as heir. He has proved surprisingly popular as monarch, developing himself into a grandfather-of-the-nation figure while quietly pushing issues he cares about such as the environment.

Source: https://www.wsj.com/world/uk/king-charless-cancer-diagnosis-puts-spotlight-on-his-son-william-5e5b2037?st=clizrt6g6a4kaft

We’re pausing our live coverage
That’s all our coverage for now, but we’ll be back soon with regular updates and analysis of the war in Ukraine.

Before we go, here is a quick recap of the key moments from this morning and afternoon.

Putin interview: Former Fox News host Tucker Carlson has confirmed he is interviewing Vladimir Putin, confirming rumours.

Infant killed: A Russian attack on a hotel in the Kharkiv region killed a two-month-old boy and injured his mother, the regional governor said.

Spec ops explosion: Special forces blew up a Russian drilling platform in the Black Sea used as a drone site, Ukraine claimed.

Clandestine bombs: Georgia’s acting prime minister accused Ukraine of trying to spread the war to his country after authorities seized what they said was a truck loaded with explosives bound for Russia.

Nuclear concerns: Security at Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant remained fragile amid staff cuts enacted by Russian authorities occupying the facility, the UN’s nuclear watchdog chief said ahead of a visit tomorrow.

Partitioning Ukraine: The Kremlin was attempting to normalise the idea of partitioning Ukraine at the borders of the Lviv region, analysts at the Institute for the Study of War said.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/ukraine-russia-war-latest-putin-tucker-carlson-sky-news-live-news-12541713

Ms Crumbley had a duty to prevent her son from harming others, prosecutors said, but failed to secure a gun and ammunition at her home and failed to get help for her son’s mental health issues.

The mother of a school shooter who killed four students at a school in the US has been convicted in a landmark case.

Jennifer Crumbley, 45, was found guilty of four counts of involuntary manslaughter and faces 15 years in prison for each charge.

Her son Ethan was 15 when he opened fire at Oxford High School, in Michigan in November 2021, killing 14-year-old Hana St Juliana, 16-year-old Tate Myre, 17-year-old Madisyn Baldwin, and 17-year-old Justin Shilling and injuring seven other people.

The first-of-its-kind case against Jennifer Crumbley was brought by prosecutors who said she had a duty to prevent her son from harming others.

She was, they said, grossly negligent and could have foreseen the violence.

Ms Crumbley was also accused of failing to secure a gun and ammunition at her home and failing to get help for her son’s mental health issues.

James Crumbley, 47, bought their son the gun, a 9mm handgun, he used in the shooting, prosecutors said, even though he was too young to own his own gun under state law.

The weapon was purchased four days earlier – apparently as a Christmas present – and was “freely available” to the teenager.

He brought the weapon to school on the day of the shooting, though no one checked his rucksack.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/michigan-school-shooters-mother-convicted-in-landmark-case-13065596

The United States accused Russia on Tuesday of firing at least nine North Korean-supplied missiles at Ukraine, while Moscow labeled Washington a “direct accomplice” in the downing of a Russian military transport plane last month.
Russia’s U.N. Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia and deputy U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Robert Wood traded the accusations at a U.N. Security Council meeting on Ukraine, requested by Moscow. Russia invaded neighboring Ukraine nearly two years ago.

California storms kill three people as 38 MILLION remain under flood alerts and Beverly Hills roads turn to rivers of mud

• The Pineapple Express weather system has killed three Californians and 38 million people remain under flood alerts
• The National Weather Service forecasts the storm could bring up to an additional six inches of rain into Tuesday
• Multi-million-dollar homes of Tinsel Town’s elite have been trashed by flooding

At least three people have died in the historic flooding battering California, as multi-million-dollar mansions are trashed by rivers of flowing mud and boulders – while forecasters predict more rain is still to come.

The Pineapple Express, a weather system lingering over much of the Golden State, is causing chaos over several regions including the star-studded Beverly Hills, Malibu and Montecito neighborhoods.

The severe weather system has killed three Californians so far and 38 million people remain under flood alerts, as the National Weather Service forecasts additional rainfall of up to six inches into Tuesday.

Forecasters estimate a slow-moving and narrow axis of anomalous moisture will continue to focus across Southern California over the next 12 to 24 hours, maintaining a significant threat for life-threatening flash flooding.

Chad Ensey, 41, died in his home in Sacramento County on Sunday when a fell on him during the storm, reported NBC News.

Source: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13049011/California-storms-kill-three-people-millions-remain-flood-alert.html

Queen Elizabeth II liked to say that she needed to be seen to be believed. Now it falls to her son King Charles III to test that principle, after a cancer diagnosis that will force him out of the public eye for the foreseeable future.

For a family that has cultivated its public image through thousands of appearances a year — ribbon-cuttings, ship launchings, gala benefits, investiture ceremonies, and so on — the sidelining of Charles may finally force the royals to rethink how they project themselves in a social-media age.

The king’s illness is the latest blow to the British royal family, which has seen its ranks depleted by death (Elizabeth and her husband, Prince Philip), scandal (Prince Andrew), self-exile (Prince Harry and his wife, Meghan), and other health woes (Catherine, the wife of Prince William).

Charles, who is 75, took part in 425 royal engagements in 2023, his first full year on the throne, according to a count by The Daily Telegraph. That made him the second hardest-working royal after his younger sister, Princess Anne, who did 457. Both were busier than in the previous year, when Elizabeth, though in the twilight of her life, still appeared in public sporadically.

While Anne, 73, shows little sign of slowing down and William plans to return to public duties while his wife convalesces at home from abdominal surgery, even a temporary absence of the king from the public stage would put heavy pressure on the family’s skeleton crew of working royals.

“There aren’t that many of them,” said Peter Hunt, a former royal correspondent for the BBC. “There are only two of them who are under 50. They’ve got to decide whether to continue to deliver on the queen’s mantra. What is the core minimum of engagements they need to do to do that?”

The answer to that riddle, royal watchers argue, may lie in technology and social media. During the coronavirus pandemic, when Elizabeth was sequestered at Windsor Castle, she conducted meetings via Zoom calls, becoming comfortable enough with it that she cracked jokes with the pixelated faces on her computer screen.

Buckingham Palace’s use of social media can also amplify the in-person exposure of family members. The royal family’s Instagram account claims more than 13 million followers and its account on X well over five million.

For young people, who spend hours a day online and follow their favorite celebrities on social media, a royal turning up to dedicate a new primary school or neighborhood health clinic may not matter as much as it did to their parents or grandparents.

The greatest burden of the king’s illness is likely to fall on his 41-year-old heir, William. He has worked to carve out a role on issues from climate change to homelessness. How much time he will be able to devote to those causes while he is also functioning as an understudy for his father is not clear.

Ed Owens, a royal historian who recently published “After Elizabeth: Can the Monarchy Save Itself?,” argues that the royals should step back from these charitable pursuits in any event, because they interfere with the proper role of the government in society.

“The culture of royal philanthropy,” Mr. Owens wrote, “has too often capitalized on the gaps left exposed in a broken welfare state.”

William has also jealously guarded his family’s privacy: Kensington Palace, where he has his office, offered few details about the condition of Catherine. There were no photographs of the couple’s three young children — George, Charlotte, and Louis — visiting their mother in the hospital.

That approach stood in contrast to his father, who approved the disclosure of an unusual amount of detail about his prostate treatment, and more recent cancer diagnosis. The scrutiny of William will inevitably increase, experts said, as he occupies a more central place in the Windsor family hierarchy.

Another question looms, over the role of Prince Harry, the king’s younger son, who fell out bitterly with his father and brother after he and Meghan withdrew from royal duties and moved to California in 2020.

Harry arrived in London on Tuesday to visit his father, leading royal watchers to muse that the crisis could prompt a reconciliation between him and his family. But Harry did not bring his own family and it was not even clear where he would stay; the king evicted him from his residence, Frogmore Cottage, last year.

While Charles will cede the public stage for now, the palace has taken pains to emphasize that he remains a fully vested constitutional sovereign. He will continue to meet weekly with Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and see other visitors. He will continue to plow through official documents, delivered to him daily in a traditional red box.

There are no current plans to name counselors of state, who could perform some of the king’s duties if he were he incapacitated by illness. Among those on the roster for that role are Queen Camilla and William.

There are some rituals only a sitting monarch can perform. Charles must grant a request from the prime minister to dissolve the Parliament before a general election. He must also ask the leader of the party holding a majority to form a government.

Source: https://dnyuz.com/2024/02/06/charles-iiis-cancer-diagnosis-could-reshape-how-the-monarchy-works/

Number has been used in hostage negotiations between Israel and Hamas

DUBAI—As many as 50 of the hostages taken from Israel by Hamas on Oct. 7 could be dead, a figure that is considerably higher than the 29 deaths Israel has publicly acknowledged, according to an Israeli assessment shared with U.S. and Egyptian officials.

The estimate was presented by Israel during hostage negotiations in Cairo in recent weeks, according to Egyptian officials, and has played a key role in negotiations for the release of hostages—alive and dead—still being held in Gaza.

If the latest Israeli estimate is correct, it would mean that around 80 of the 132 hostages believed held by Hamas or other militant groups are still alive and that militants are keeping dozens of bodies of people they kidnapped. None of the dead have been returned so far.

Hamas militants and others from Gaza seized more than 240 hostages during their Oct. 7 assault on southern Israel, which included terrorist attacks on a music festival and agricultural communities and left 1,200 people dead, according to authorities.

Source: https://www.wsj.com/world/middle-east/israel-privately-estimates-as-many-as-50-hostages-could-be-dead-a98a7feb?reflink=integratedwebview_share

The Ukraine-born winner of the Miss Japan beauty pageant has given up her crown after a tabloid report revealed her affair with a married man.

Karolina Shiino, 26, was crowned Miss Japan two weeks ago but her win sparked public debate due to her heritage.

While some welcomed the naturalised citizen’s crowning, others said she didn’t represent traditional Japanese beauty ideals.

Amid the furore, a local magazine published an expose alleging an affair.

The article in the Shukan Bunshun reported that Ms Shiino had engaged in a relationship with a married influencer and doctor. The man has not provided any public comment.

In its initial response to the report last week, the pageant organisers defended Ms Shiino, saying she hadn’t known the man was married.

However on Monday, organisers said she had confessed to knowing about the man’s marriage and family.

She had apologised for being misleading and organisers had accepted her title resignation, the Miss Japan Association said.

Ms Shiino also apologised to her fans and the general public in a statement on Monday, where she said she had acted out of fear and panic in response to the report.

“I am truly sorry for the huge trouble I have caused and for betraying those who supported me,” she said.

The Miss Japan title will now remain vacant for the rest of the year, although there were several runners-up.

Source: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-68213223

Actor Gina Carano sued Disney and Lucasfilm on Tuesday for firing her from “The Mandalorian” in 2021, over a social media post in which she compared being a Republican to being Jewish during the Holocaust.

The suit, filed in California federal court, alleges wrongful termination and discrimination, as well as a demand that the court should force Lucasfilm to recast her and pay at least $75,000 in punitive damages.

Elon Musk is funding the suit, following his promise to pay for legal actions taken by people claiming discrimination from posts to Twitter/X. However, the posts in question originated on Carano’s Instagram Stories.

“As a sign of X Corp.’s commitment to free speech, we’re proud to provide financial support for Gina Carano’s lawsuit, empowering her to seek vindication of her free speech rights on X and the ability to work without bullying, harassment, or discrimination,” said Joe Benarroch, head of business operations at X, in a statement.

Carano played Cara Dune, a Rebel soldier turned mercenary, for the first two seasons of “The Mandalorian,” which streams on Disney+. But she came under immediate criticism when she shared a post from a different Instagram account in February 2021.

“Jews were beaten in the streets, not by Nazi soldiers but by their neighbors…even by children. Because history is edited, most people today don’t realize that to get to the point where Nazi soldiers could easily round up thousands of Jews, the government first made their own neighbors hate them simply for being Jews. How is that any different from hating someone for their political views,” the post read.

The same day as the post, Lucasfilm and UTA, Carano’s agency at the time, dropped her. UTA, however, is not named as a defendant in the suit. The case alleges that Disney is at fault for Carano’s former agency dropping the actor.

Source: https://variety.com/2024/tv/news/gina-carano-disney-lawsuit-mandalorian-lucasfilm-1235899939/

During the polls, Pakistanis will be voting for their next Prime Minister as well as the governments of the four provinces – Punjab, Sindh, Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. The election process will begin on February 8, 2024, and will take place across 90,582 polling stations all over the country.

After months of delay, Pakistan is all set to vote for its next government tomorrow – February 8, 2024. Around 128 million Pakistanis have registered to vote and will head to the polls to elect their next Prime Minister.

During the polls, Pakistanis will be voting for their next Prime Minister as well as the governments of the four provinces – Punjab, Sindh, Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

Pakistan Elections 2024 – Voters, Candidates and Other Details 

Around 128 million have registered to vote in the elections scheduled for tomorrow. Out of this, around 69.2 million are male votes and 59.3 million are female voters.

The 2024 elections would also be youth-oriented with 44 percent of the eligible voters being under the age of 35 years. 22 percent of the voters are in the age group of 36 and 45 years.

Source: https://www.timesnownews.com/world/pakistan-elections-2024-amid-economic-crisis-128-million-voters-to-choose-next-pakistan-pm-tomorrow-article-107472428

Lufthansa Airlines, the German flag carrier, is set to go on a strike on Wednesday. Some 25,000 staff will take part in the walkout over pay.

The Verdi union announced that ground staff at Lufthansa Airlines, the German flag carrier, is set to go on a strike on Wednesday, adding to the recent wave of labour unrest in the country’s transportation sector as employees push for higher wages.

According to the union’s statement, the strike is scheduled to commence at 4am and conclude at 7:10am on Thursday lasting 27 hours.

Lufthansa has cautioned that up to 90 per cent of its flight schedule will face cancellation, AFP reported. The strike will affect around 100,000 passengers, as per Bloomberg.

The industrial action will affect airports in Frankfurt, Munich, Hamburg, Berlin, and Dusseldorf.

Germany, Europe’s largest economy, has experienced a series of nationwide strikes impacting air travel, railways, and public transportation.

A spokesperson for Lufthansa mentioned that it is too early to determine the exact number of flight cancellations. The airline devised an emergency timetable to assess the potential impact on its 3,000 daily flights, Reuters reported.

In a warning to passengers, Lufthansa said as per AFP, “Due to the strike, we currently assume that around 10 to 20 per cent of the Lufthansa airline programme will be possible.”

It also said, “Please only come to the airport if your flight has not been cancelled,” adding that rebooking counters will be closed too.

Ground services represent one of the various sectors within Lufthansa presently engaged in collective bargaining discussions.

In negotiations concerning contracts for ground staff, Verdi is pressing for a wage hike of 12.5 per cent for 25,000 employees, or a minimum increase of 500 euros ($544.30) monthly over a span of 12 months, coupled with a one-time payment of 3,000 euros to counteract inflation.

The airline said it has put forward a proposal offering workers raises amounting to over 13 per cent within the next three years, along with the immediate disbursement of substantial inflation bonuses AFP reported. However, the union has dismissed the offer as “completely unacceptable”.

Source: https://www.hindustantimes.com/world-news/lufthansa-airlines-strike-passengers-affected-details-101707267478319.html

King Charles has been pictured for the first time since his cancer diagnosis was made public, after the Duke of Sussex arrived in the UK to visit him.

The King and Queen were pictured in a car leaving Clarence House in London, and are now at Sandringham in Norfolk.

Prince Harry arrived in London after an overnight flight from the US.

Buckingham Palace announced on Monday that the King, 75, had been diagnosed with a form of cancer and would step back from public duties for treatment.

The Palace has disclosed few details about the King’s diagnosis, other than to confirm it was discovered during a recent procedure to treat an enlarged prostate.

Both of his sons were informed about his diagnosis before the announcement.

The King and the Queen smiled and waved as they left Clarence House, their home in London, on Tuesday.

Charles and Prince Harry met for around 45 minutes before the King left for his flight to Sandringham.

The Duchess of Sussex is expected to remain in the US, where the couple live with their two young children.

There are no plans for Prince Harry to meet his brother, the Prince of Wales, during his visit to London, the BBC understands.

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak earlier told BBC Radio 5 Live the King’s cancer had been “caught early” and said he was still in “regular contact” with the monarch.

He said their weekly audiences would continue to take place during the King’s treatment.

The speed with which Prince Harry has hurried from California to visit his father in the UK appears significant.

There had already been signs of the family getting closer, such as when the duke, 39, spoke to the King by phone for the monarch’s birthday last autumn.

But there were no signs of Prince Harry or Meghan heading over for Christmas or for any other family get-togethers. Until now they had stayed an ocean apart from the rest of the Royal Family.

Tensions in the Royal Family – as reported in Prince Harry’s memoir Spare – seemed not so much between him and the King, but rather with his brother the Prince of Wales and fuelled by the excesses of the tabloid press.

To that end, Prince Harry’s recent trips to the UK have been more about law courts than the royal courts.

But even before this latest health news, Prince Harry and Meghan – who live in the exclusive Californian community of Montecito – seemed to be planning more projects and travel.

They travelled to Jamaica for a film premiere and had said they would be in Canada later this month, in an event related to their Invictus Games. That trip is still expected to go ahead.

Source: https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-68214982

Warner Bros. Discovery is preparing to launch a streaming service in partnership with ESPN / Disney and Fox Sports, as reported earlier by CNBC and Sports Business Journal. All three companies have agreed in principle to launch an as-yet-unnamed standalone app, of which they all share one-third ownership, this fall that streams a range of leagues and sports.

It is poised to have sports networks including ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNU, SECN, ACCN, ESPNews, ABC, FOX, FS1, FS2, BTN, TNT, TBS, and truTV. The new service will air games from the National Football League (NFL), Major League Baseball (MLB), the National Basketball Association (NBA), and the National Hockey League (NHL), along with NASCAR, PGA Tour Golf, Grand Slam Tennis, and more. Disney Plus, Hulu, and Max users will also get the option to bundle the new service.

The Verge reached out to the three companies with a request for more information but didn’t immediately hear back.

“The launch of this new streaming sports service is a significant moment for Disney and ESPN, a major win for sports fans, and an important step forward for the media business,” Disney CEO Bob Iger said in a statement. “This means the full suite of ESPN channels will be available to consumers alongside the sports programming of other industry leaders as part of a differentiated sports-centric service.”

Sports streaming has become increasingly fractured as some leagues opt to continue airing games on traditional cable networks, while others have struck deals with streaming services. Last year, Warner Bros. Discovery’s Max streaming service launched a live sports add-on for an extra $9.99 per month.

Meanwhile, Amazon Prime Video has a deal to stream live Thursday Night Football games, and Apple TV Plus offers subscribers a Major League Soccer season pass. Paramount Plus and NBC’s Peacock also offer select live sports streams. Local blackouts due to regional sports streamers are another issue the combined app will have to deal with.

The Disney-owned ESPN is also expected to launch a streaming-only version of its sports network. Iger said last year that the company expects to launch a direct-to-consumer version of ESPN in 2025 as viewers turn away from cable. The company was also rumored to be shopping for a partner for ESPN after declining ad revenue from the once-lucrative cable market. ESPN and Disney spoke to the NFL and NBA about such a partnership, according to CNBC last year, but it seems the company found a new path by teaming up with one of its largest competitors (Fox) and one of its parent company’s largest competitors (Warner Bros. Discovery).

Source: https://www.theverge.com/2024/2/6/24064007/espn-fox-warner-bros-sports-streaming-partnership

The flight left Portland, Oregon, on Jan. 5 bound for Ontario International Airport in San Bernardino County, California, when the door plug blew off.

The door panel on an Alaska Airlines Boeing 737 that fell off midair had no bolts installed on the door plug, according to preliminary findings released Tuesday by the National Transportation Safety Board.

A picture of the plane in a factory in Renton, Washington, revealed the lack of bolts, the NTSB said.

“Photo documentation obtained from Boeing shows evidence of the left-hand MED plug closed with no retention hardware (bolts) in the three visible locations,” the report said, using an acronym for the middle exit door.

However, it was not clear at what stage in the manufacturing process the plane was in when the photo was taken.

The faulty plug was manufactured by Spirit AeroSystems Malaysia on March 24, 2023, and was received at Spirit AeroSystems Wichita on May 10, 2023, the report said. The plug was then installed and rigged on the Spirit AeroSystems Fuselage Line 8789 before it was shipped to Boeing on Aug. 20, 2023. The fuselage arrived at Boeing’s Renton facility on Aug. 31, 2023, according to the report.

In a statement Tuesday, Boeing said it appreciates the NTSB’s work and will review the findings “expeditiously” while continuing to cooperate with investigations by the NTSB and Federal Aviation Administration.

“Whatever final conclusions are reached, Boeing is accountable for what happened,” Boeing President and CEO Dave Calhoun said in the statement. “An event like this must not happen on an airplane that leaves our factory. We simply must do better for our customers and their passengers. We are implementing a comprehensive plan to strengthen quality and the confidence of our stakeholders. It will take significant, demonstrated action and transparency at every turn — and that is where we are squarely focused.”

The flight, carrying 177 people, left Portland, Oregon, on Jan. 5 bound for Ontario International Airport in San Bernardino County, California, when the door plug blew off, leaving a gaping hole in the side of the aircraft. Many passengers described hearing a “loud bang” shortly after takeoff. A photo from one passenger showed a panel missing from the side of the fuselage. The plane was forced to make an emergency landing in Portland, Oregon.

The FAA grounded all 171 Boeing 737 Max 9 airplanes operating in the U.S. amid the NTSB’s investigation. The FAA also said it was increasing its oversight of Boeing production and manufacturing.

In his testimony to the House Transportation and Infrastructure Aviation Subcommittee on Tuesday, FAA Administrator Mike Whitaker offered more details on the increased scrutiny now underway at Boeing.

“We’re proposing to expand the oversight approach to include both audits and inspection which is why we’re moving inspectors into the facilities,” Whitaker said. “We know what we need to do next, which is to have more on-the-ground presence to verify what’s going on.”

Whitaker added the Jan. 5 incident has prompted the FAA to determine if there are any issues with production at Boeing.

“There have been issues in the past and they don’t seem to be getting resolved so we feel we need a heightened sense of oversight to get after that,” he said. “I think we’re gonna need more boots on the ground, we’re gonna need more inspectors. We don’t have many inspectors on the aircraft certification side of the house.”

Earlier this month, Alaska Airlines and United Airlines confirmed plans to return their fleet of Boeing 737 Max 9 planes to service. Alaska said in an earning report that it was preparing to complete inspections of its fleet and that each aircraft would be returned to service after passing inspection.

Source: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/faulty-door-panel-alaska-airlines-flight-no-bolts-installed-ntsb-says-rcna136416

Donald Trump does not have presidential immunity and can be prosecuted in an election interference case, a US appeals court has ruled.

The court in Washington ruled that there was no basis for Mr Trump to assert that former presidents have blanket immunity from prosecution for any acts committed as president.

The ruling means he can be prosecuted for actions he took while in the White House from January 2017 and in the run-up to 6 January 2021, when a mob of his supporters stormed the Capitol.

It is the second time in as many months that judges have rejected his claims to be exempt from prosecution.

Writing on his Truth Social platform, Mr Trump described the court’s ruling as “nation-destroying” and said it “cannot be allowed to stand”.

“If not overturned, as it should be, this decision would terribly injure not only the Presidency, but the Life, Breath, and Success of our Country,” he added.

“A President will be afraid to act for fear of the opposite Party’s Vicious Retribution after leaving Office. I know from personal experience because I am going through it right now. It will become a Political Weapon used for Election Interference. Even our Elections will be corrupted and under siege.

“So bad, and so dangerous for our Nation. SAVE PRESIDENTIAL IMMUNITY!”

The Republican, who is the overwhelming favourite to be nominated to run again in November, is expected to appeal and the case may ultimately be decided in the US Supreme Court.

The judges wrote in their decision: “We conclude that the interest in criminal accountability, held by both the public and the executive branch, outweighs the potential risks of chilling presidential action and permitting vexatious litigation.”

They did not set a date for a trial, which was originally set for next month, before being postponed last week.

The date is politically significant, as Mr Trump would prefer to delay it until after the US general election in November.

If his nomination is confirmed and he defeats Democrat president Joe Biden, he could presumably try to use his position as head of the executive branch to order a new attorney general to dismiss the federal cases or he could potentially seek a pardon for himself.

Last month, the Supreme Court turned down a chance to get involved, by rejecting a request from special counsel Jack Smith to take up the matter quickly and issue a speedy ruling.

The court has previously decided presidents are immune from civil liability for official acts, and Mr Trump’s lawyers have for months argued that that protection should be extended to criminal prosecution as well.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/donald-trump-does-not-have-presidential-immunity-and-can-be-prosecuted-in-election-interference-case-us-appeals-court-rules-13065365

Former President Donald Trump, who has refused to debate any of his rivals for the Republican nomination, on Monday said he wanted to debate U.S. President Joe Biden immediately.
“I’d like to debate him now because we should debate. We should debate for the good of the country,” Trump said on a radio show hosted by conservative commentator Dan Bongino.
When asked by reporters during a trip to Las Vegas on Monday about Trump calling for a debate, Biden, a Democrat, said: “If I were him, I would want to debate me too. He’s got nothing to do.”

Although the overwhelming frontrunner in the Republican race to challenge Biden in the Nov. 5 election, Trump has yet to sew up the nomination and has turned down Republican rival Nikki Haley’s request that he debate her.
In response to Trump’s comments, Haley’s campaign said in a statement that he was “too chicken” to debate her.
“Now it’s time for Trump to man up and agree to debate Nikki Haley. Nikki is ready to put her conservative record and vision for a strong and proud America up against Trump’s campaign of chaos and vendettas,” Haley campaign spokesperson Olivia Perez-Cubas said.

Source: https://www.reuters.com/world/us/trump-seeks-debate-with-biden-2024-presidential-race-2024-02-05/

The landslide re-election of El Salvador President Nayib Bukele was cheered by supporters of his gang crackdown, but has worried opponents who fear the country is sliding into a de facto one-party state.
The tallying of the vote was still ongoing on Monday but Bukele had appeared to deliver a crushing victory, with the backing of around 83% of voters. The president said his New Ideas party was on course to bag 58 posts in the 60-seat congress, although only 5% of the vote had been counted.

The result grants Bukele unprecedented control of the assembly, where last term he used his party’s supermajority to reshape institutions and pack the courts. One such tribunal let him seek re-election despite a constitutional ban on consecutive terms.
In his victory speech on Sunday night, Bukele said the opposition had been “pulverized” on the back of his popular anti-gang crackdown and emphasized that his victory was the result of a free vote.

“Democracy means the power of the people,” he said, lashing out at foreign governments, journalists and rights groups who have warned of an authoritarian drift and railing against the U.S. for its role in the country’s brutal 1979-1992 civil war.
El Salvador had “made history” for electing a single party “in a fully democratic system,” he said.
But rights groups said they are worried about where the country is headed and forecast further curbs on civil rights.

Source: https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/bukele-landslide-shifts-el-salvador-one-party-state-amplifies-democracy-fears-2024-02-05/

The US military struck dozens of targets in Syria and Iraq overnight on Friday into Saturday, in retaliation for a January 28 drone attack on a base in Jordan that killed three US soldiers.

Russia and China accused the United States during a UN Security Council meeting on Monday of stoking already high tensions in the Middle East with its recent retaliatory strikes on Iran-backed groups in Iraq and Syria.
The US military struck dozens of targets in Syria and Iraq overnight on Friday into Saturday, in retaliation for a January 28 drone attack on a base in Jordan that killed three US soldiers.

The strikes, which targeted elite Iranian units and pro-Iranian militant groups, have led to fears that the ongoing Israel-Hamas war in Gaza could spiral into a regional conflict.

“It’s clear that American airstrikes are specifically, deliberately aimed to stoke the conflict,” said Russian ambassador Vasily Nebenzia, whose country had called for the emergency meeting.

China’s ambassador Jun Zhang similarly claimed that the “US actions will certainly exacerbate the vicious cycle of tit-for-tat violence in the Middle East.”

Anger over Israel’s devastating campaign in Gaza — which began after an unprecedented Hamas attack on October 7 — has grown across the Middle East, stoking violence involving Iran-backed groups in Lebanon, Iraq, Syria and Yemen.

A UN official called for “all parties to step back from the brink and to consider the unbearable human and economic cost of a potential regional conflict.”

“I appeal to the Council to continue to actively engage all concerned parties to prevent further escalation and the worsening of tensions that undermine regional peace and security,” said Rosemary DiCarlo, under-secretary-general for political and peacebuilding affairs.

The American strikes have drawn criticism from the governments of Iraq and Syria, and also from Iran, which denies any role in last month’s drone attack.

“Any attempt to attribute these actions to Iran or its armed forces is misleading, baseless and unacceptable,” Iranian ambassador Amir Saeid Iravani told the Council on Monday.

He pledged that if Iran faces “any threat, attack or aggression affecting its security,” it would “not hesitate to exercise its inherent rights… to respond firmly.”

Source: https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/russia-china-accuse-us-of-deliberately-escalating-middle-east-tensions-5002569

Pakistan goes to the polls this week in an election that rights observers have dubbed deeply flawed, with the country’s most charismatic politician languishing in jail, barred from taking part.

The nuclear-armed nation of 240 million people presents itself as the world’s fifth largest democracy, but judicial hounding of former prime minister Imran Khan has some questioning that claim. In the past week Khan, a former international cricketer who led Pakistan to victory in the World Cup in 1992, has been sentenced to lengthy jail terms for treason, graft, and an illegal marriage.

Analysts say the character assassination shows how worried the military-led establishment is that his Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party could still prove a decisive factor in Thursday’s vote. “I am sure they are worried about it, and the military doesn’t have the capacity to put in a fix at national level,” said analyst Shuja Nawaz, author of “The Battle for Pakistan”, a book examining Islamabad’s relations with Washington. “PTI can squeak in with a sizeable number and still be a player,” he told AFP.

Shuja said while Western nations were avoiding making any comment on the political chaos gripping Pakistan, they were still watching events closely, worried about the risk of insecurity. “In a broad sense, an election in Pakistan is a mere blip on the radar, given all the crises proliferating around the world,” said Michael Kugelman, director of the South Asia Institute at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington. “But let’s be clear: Pakistan’s polls do matter.”

The country has been run by the military for much of its history since partition from India in 1947, and occupies a strategic space neighbouring also Afghanistan, Iran and China. It has been at the centre of the so-called “war on terror”, with Al-Qaeda founder Osama bin Laden finding shelter in the country until he was killed in a Navy Seal commando raid in 2011.

The architect of the 9/11 attacks on the United States, Khalid Sheik Mohammed, is a Pakistani, now incarcerated at Guantanamo Bay. The strategic importance is highlighted by the fact that Beijing made the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) the centrepiece of its trillion dollar Belt and Road initiative, giving the world’s most populous nation access to the Arabian Sea and beyond via an “all-weather friend”.

The country itself, however, appears permanently in crisis. Deeply in debt, the economy has for decades been propped up by successive bailouts from the International Monetary Fund and loans from wealthy gulf Arab nations who use Pakistanis as cheap labour.

Inflation is galloping at nearly 30 percent, the rupee has been in freefall for three years — losing nearly 50 percent of its value since 2021 — and a balance of payments deficit has frozen imports, severely hampering industrial growth. The Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) is expected to win the most seats in Thursday’s vote, giving its 74-year-old founder Nawaz Sharif a fourth shot at running the country.

Source: https://www.news18.com/world/jailed-imran-khan-looms-large-over-flawed-pakistan-feb-8-election-8766971.html

It’s been a bleak midwinter for the Royal Family. Prince William, Prince Harry and their royal relations will now face private anxieties and public pressures after the King’s worrying health news.

It all began three weeks ago, entirely out of the blue on an icy cold January afternoon, with a message that the Princess of Wales had had an operation serious enough to require months of recovery.

Barely had the TV cameras scrambled to her hospital in London, when it was also announced that the King was going to have a procedure for an enlarged prostate.

It was an entirely unexpected double royal health blow that was then compounded by Sarah Ferguson, Duchess of York, revealing she had skin cancer.

Now we learn that the King has a form of cancer. All the questions that get asked by families everywhere on getting such troubling news – Where? How far? What type? What next? – remain unanswered.

Royal information may be put out by palaces on social media these days, rather than anything more ceremonial. But however it arrives, it’s been a torrent of bad news for the royals. The Royal Family is still a family after all.

And it looks a much more fragile group of people than it did in the summery celebrations of last year’s Coronation.

But such emergencies can pull people together.

Without any equivocation or complication, Prince Harry is coming to visit his father, travelling over from the US alone in the next few days.

It will be seen as building bridges but that was already in process, with the prince calling his father for his 75th birthday in the autumn. The tension always seemed to be more with his brother and the tabloid press, rather than his father.

Prince William, who was already due to return to official duties after his wife’s operation, will now be expected to play a bigger role in terms of public appearances and covering for official duties. But he faces both his wife and father as being ill at the same time.

But Prince William is the heir, the next in line, and will be expected to step up, in the way that not that long ago, King Charles was stepping up to help his own mother. Attention will turn to him when he appears publicly later this week.

He will be worrying about his wife’s health problems. But the palaces will also miss Catherine, as one of their most reliable figures in troubled moments, and now out of action for months.

Source: https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-68211941

Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley has applied for Secret Service protection because of increasing threats she has received on the campaign trail, Haley’s team confirmed to Fox News on Monday.

The former two-term South Carolina governor who later served as U.N. ambassador in former President Donald Trump’s administration is Trump’s last remaining major rival for the 2024 GOP nomination.

Haley discussed the request for protection in an interview Monday afternoon with The Wall Street Journal.

“We’ve had multiple issues,” the former South Carolina governor and United Nations ambassador said after a campaign event in Aiken, South Carolina. “It’s not going to stop me from doing what I need to do.”

Haley was asked at a news conference in Columbia, S.C. late last week about increased levels of security at her events.

“When you do something like this, you get threats,” she told reporters. “It’s just the reality.”

Haley mentioned the need to “put a few more bodies around us,” but that it hadn’t affected her campaigning.

“At the end of the day, we’re going to go out there and touch every hand, we’re going to answer every question, we’re going to make sure that we are there and doing everything that we need to,” she added.

Hours after Haley spoke to reporters, a heckler was removed from her campaign event in Hilton Head, South Carolina.

Once a very long shot for the nomination, Haley enjoyed momentum in the polls in the late summer and autumn, thanks in part to well-received performances in the first three GOP presidential primary debates.

Source: https://www.foxnews.com/politics/nikki-haley-asks-secret-service-protection-after-increase-threats

President Biden told a crowd in Las Vegas on Sunday that he recently met with Francois Mitterrand, the French president who has been dead for nearly 30 years.

The comments came while Biden was warning of the dangers of a potential second Trump presidency, as he aimed to shore up enthusiasm ahead of Tuesday’s Democratic primary in Nevada.

Biden recounted a story he has told many times during his presidency, about a meeting he had with French President Emmanuel Macron during a G7 meeting in England, some months after Biden had taken over the White House.

“I sat down and I said, ‘America’s back,’” Biden recalled. “And Mitterrand from Germany – I mean from France – looked at me and said…”

Biden appeared to trail off before collecting his thoughts to finish the sentence: “Well, how long are you back for?”

The president continued, saying the “Chancellor of Germany” asked him how he – and by extension, the U.S. – would respond if, hypothetically, thousands of people stormed Britain’s House of Commons and killed two “bobbies,” or British police officers, to stop the election of a Prime Minister.

François Mitterrand was France’s president between 1981 and 1995. He died in 1996.

In Tuesday’s Nevada Democratic presidential primary, Biden faces only token opposition from author Marianne Williamson and a few relatively unknown challengers. He won Nevada in November 2020 by fewer than 3 percentage points. But he came to Nevada to rouse voters for the fall campaign as well.

Source: https://www.foxnews.com/politics/biden-tells-crowd-he-recently-met-mitterand-former-french-president-who-died-1996

Viewers of Sunday night’s 60 Minutes were likely left gobsmacked by footage showing “large groups” of undocumented migrants from China sneaking through the US border with Mexico.

The segment was filed by correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi, who opened the piece by reporting:

The number of migrants arriving at the southern border is unprecedented. Last year, U.S. Customs and Border Protection recorded two-and-a-half million instances of detaining or turning away people attempting to cross into the United States from Mexico.

So what’s the fastest growing group among them? Chinese migrants. Yes, you heard that right…Chinese. We saw large groups, including many from the middle class, come through a 4-foot gap at the end of a border fence 60 miles east of San Diego.

The illegal entryway is a new route for those hoping to live in America.

A steady flow of what appears to be mostly Chinese nationals are shown walking through a clear gap in the border wall, with useless barbed wire fencing haven being pushed aside. At one point, cameras capture an armed Border Patrol agent standing just 25 feet away who did nothing to deter the illegal entry.

Source: https://www.mediaite.com/tv/60-minutes-bonkers-border-segment-shows-steady-flow-of-chinese-migrants-flooding-california/

A storm of historic proportions dumped a record amount of rain over parts of Los Angeles on Monday, sending mud and boulders down hillsides dotted with multimillion-dollar homes while people living in homeless encampments in many parts of the city scrambled for safety.

About 710,000 people statewide were without power Monday evening.

The storm was the second one fueled by an atmospheric river to hit the state over the span of days.

Virtually all of Southern California was under flash flood advisories and watches, including the Los Angeles area, where between 5 and 10 inches (12.7 to 25.4 centimeters) of rain had fallen and more was expected, according to the National Weather Service. At the downtown measuring station, 6.7 inches of rain had fallen by Monday afternoon, nearly half the yearly average of 14.25 inches. It was already the third-wettest two-day period since 1877, the service said.

So far officials have attributed three deaths to the storm that first hit Northern California. Crews rescued people from swift-moving water in various parts of Southern California on Monday, including 16 people and five cats in Los Angeles County alone, authorities said.

Also rescued were two homeless people who spent the night on a small island in the Santa Ana River in San Bernardino, about 55 miles (88.51 kilometers) east of Los Angeles, authorities said.

“They were cold and exhausted from a night out stranded on this little patch of dirt that was in the middle of the river,” said Capt. Nathan Lopez of the San Bernardino County Fire Department. A dog and two cats were also saved.

At a news conference, authorities said rain would taper off in intensity on Tuesday, but the threat of flooding remained high.

“The ground is extremely saturated, supersaturated,” said Ariel Cohen, meteorologist in charge of the National Weather Service bureau in Los Angeles. “It’s not able to hold any additional water before sliding. It’s not going to take much rain for additional landslides, mudslides, rockslides and other debris flows to occur.”

Near the Hollywood Hills, floodwaters carried mud, rocks and household objects downhill through Studio City, damaging at least two homes, city officials said. Sixteen people were evacuated.

“It looks like a river that’s been here for years,” said Keki Mingus, whose neighbors’ homes were damaged. “I’ve never seen anything like it.”

The Los Angeles Fire Department said 1,000 firefighters were contending with 49 debris flows, 130 reports of flooding, half a dozen structure fires and several rescues of motorists stranded in vehicles.

Drake Livingston who lives in the Beverly Crest neighborhood, was watching a movie around midnight when a friend alerted him to flooding.

“We looked outside and there’s a foot-and-a-half of running water, and it starts seeping through the doors,” said Livingston, whose car was found submerged in several feet of mud in the morning.

Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass urged residents to avoid driving, warning of fallen trees and electrical lines on flooded roadways.

Shelters were adding beds for the city’s homeless population of nearly 75,000 people.

Tony Sanz spent the night in a city park before seeking higher ground around dawn as floodwaters were rising around his tent.

“Boy did it rain last night,” he said Monday afternoon hunkered down in a tent layered with tarps on a sidewalk outside a supermarket. He spied the cloudy skies during a break in the downpours and wondered, “Is that it? I hope that’s it.”

Not yet, according to forecasters.

The weather service predicts up to 8 inches (20 centimeters) of rainfall across Southern California’s coastal and valley areas, with 14 inches (35 centimeters) possible in the foothills and mountains over the next two days.

Authorities also reported several spills Monday, including the discharge of about 5 million gallons of raw sewage in the Rancho Dominguez area surrounding Compton. Most of the untreated sewage went into a channel leading to the Pacific Ocean and the city closed a 7-mile (11.27-kilometers) stretch of Long Beach to recreational swimming,

Earlier in the day, commuters stepped through several inches of floodwater as they rushed to catch trains at Union Station in downtown Los Angeles.

Most Los Angeles public schools remained open, but some districts were closed. The weather also prompted the closure of Knott’s Berry Farm, Six Flags Magic Mountain and SeaWorld San Diego theme parks and a rare early closure of Disneyland.

Over the weekend, the storm inundated streets and brought down trees and prompted water rescues in the San Francisco Bay area.

Source: https://apnews.com/article/california-storms-atmospheric-river-pineapple-express-18997dd8bac897c4115d0f453d0bc058

In an exclusive interview with a Canadian daily, The Globe and Mail, which broke the story of Canada taking a stand against India well in advance, Sanjay Kumar Verma has taken the position that India is not going to aid the Canadian authorities in their probe unless ‘specific evidence’ is provided. The top diplomat’s interview came in the aftermath of Canada’s National Security Advisor Jody Thomas softening his earlier stance on the alleged Indian involvement.

The killing of pro-Khalistan separatist Hardeep Singh Nijjar sparked a massive row between Canada and India. The Indian High Commissioner in Canada has now revealed that his office is to yet to receive any information from the Canadian authorities on the slaying that happened in June last year.

In an exclusive interview with a Canadian daily, The Globe and Mail, which broke the story of Canada taking a stand against India well in advance, Sanjay Kumar Verma has taken the position that India is not going to aid the Canadian authorities in their probe unless ‘specific evidence’ is provided. The top diplomat’s interview came in the aftermath of Canada’s National Security Advisor Jody Thomas swaying away from a hardliner view that Ottawa earlier took.

“We need relevant and specific evidence for us to help the Canadian authorities,” High Commissioner Verma told The Globe. He further went on to say that “unless we see something relevant and specific, it would be extremely difficult for us to do anything to help the Canadian authorities.”

Source: https://www.timesnownews.com/world/india-to-not-aid-in-nijjars-killing-probe-high-commissioner-verma-cites-lack-of-evidence-from-canada-article-107441416

The top U.S. diplomat met Saudi Arabia’s de-facto ruler on Monday during a Middle East visit Palestinians hope will clinch a truce before a threatened Israeli assault on Rafah, a border city where about half the Gaza Strip population is sheltering.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrived in Riyadh at the start of his first trip to the region since Washington brokered an offer, with Israeli input, for the first extended ceasefire of the war.

Blinken’s meeting with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman lasted about two hours.
State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said Blinken and the crown prince had discussed regional coordination to achieve “an enduring end” to the crisis. “The Secretary underscored the importance of addressing humanitarian needs in Gaza and preventing further spread of the conflict,” Miller said in a statement.

Blinken did not answer reporters’ questions as he returned to his hotel.
The ceasefire offer, delivered to Hamas last week by Qatari and Egyptian mediators, awaits a reply from militants who say they want more guarantees it will bring an end to the four-month-old war.
“Impossible to say if we’ll get a breakthrough, when we’ll get a breakthrough,” a senior U.S. official told reporters during the flight to the Saudi capital. “The ball right now is in Hamas’ court.”

Blinken also aims to win backing for U.S. plans for what would follow a truce: rebuilding and running Gaza, and ultimately for a Palestinian state – which Israel now rejects – and for Arab countries to normalize ties with Israel.
Washington also seeks to prevent further escalation elsewhere in the Middle East, after days of U.S. airstrikes against pro-Iranian armed groups across the region.
Miller said Blinken and the crown prince had discussed the urgent need to reduce regional tensions.
In London, British defence minister Grant Shapps told parliament that the air strikes had depleted the ability of Yemen’s Houthis to target Red Sea shipping but the threat was “not fully diminished.”
‘TOTAL VICTORY’
Israel threatened a new ground assault on Rafah, a small city on the southern border with Egypt where over half of Gaza’s 2.3 million people are now living, mostly in makeshift tents.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, visiting troops on Monday, said Israeli forces had killed or wounded more than half of Hamas’ fighting forces and would carry on until “total victory”.
Senior Hamas official Sami Abu Zuhri dismissed Netanyahu as “playing the game of making delusional victories” in the face of continued resistance.
The ceasefire proposal, as described by sources close to the talks, envisions a truce of at least 40 days when militants would free civilians among remaining hostages they are holding, followed by later phases to hand over soldiers and bodies.
The only truce so far lasted a week in November.
“We want the war to end and we want to go back home, this is all that we want at this stage,” said Yamen Hamad, 35, a father of four reached by messaging app at a U.N. school in Deir al-Balah in central Gaza. The area is one of the few where Israeli tanks have yet to advance, and is jammed with tens of thousands of displaced families.
“All we do is listen to the news through small radios and view the internet looking for hope. We hope that Blinken will tell Netanyahu enough is enough, and we hope our factions decide in the best interest of our people.”
FIGHTING IN KHAN YOUNIS, GAZA CITY
Israeli tanks have been advancing for two weeks in Khan Younis. Fighting has also resurged in Gaza City in the north of the strip, in areas Israel said it subdued in the war’s first two months.
The Israeli military said on Monday its forces had killed dozens of Palestinian fighters in northern, central and southern Gaza over the last 24 hours.
As night fell, Khan Younis residents said Israeli tanks had stepped up shelling around Nasser Hospital, the largest functioning medical facility in the south, setting some houses ablaze.
The Palestinian Red Crescent Society said some 8,000 displaced people had been evacuated from its headquarters in Khan Younis and Al-Amal hospital after two weeks surrounded by Israeli troops.

Source: https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/palestinians-hope-blinken-visit-can-deliver-gaza-truce-before-rafah-assault-2024-02-05/

Heavy rains from atmospheric river cause mudslides, while 100 mph winds hit some northern areas

Torrential rains hammered Southern California, flooding freeways, triggering mudslides that engulfed hillside homes and forcing authorities to rescue people trapped in raging waters.

The deluge battered communities from Santa Barbara to San Diego, with up to 10 inches of rain falling in some places since Sunday, shattering rainfall records across the region, according to the National Weather Service. About 4.1 inches of rain poured onto downtown Los Angeles on Sunday, breaking the daily record of 2.55 inches of rain set in 1927, according to the NWS. It was the third wettest day on record for February, with the high of 4.8 inches set in 1913.

The storm also broke rainfall records at Los Angeles International Airport, Long Beach Airport and Santa Barbara Airport, the weather service said.

The Los Angeles Fire Department said evacuations had been enforced in several areas after homes were hit by mudslides and debris flows. The weather service on Monday warned residents in the Hollywood Hills and around the Santa Monica Mountains to avoid traveling as those areas could get hit with life-threatening landslides and flash floods.

A total of 49 mudslides were reported across Los Angeles, including ones that struck two homes in the Studio City neighborhood and resulted in the evacuation of 16 people from those and neighboring properties, Fire Chief Kristin Crowley said in a Monday morning press update.

Her agency reported “significant damage” to about five homes in the Hollywood Hills on Monday which left an additional 10 people displaced. Just downhill, Scott and Deborah Windus on Monday used shovels to clear another small mudslide blocking a drain and threatening to flood the road.

“We don’t know when it happened,” said Deborah, 72. “It’s for safety’s sake, we want to make sure the drains are going.”

Nearby, other residents tried to clear some of the debris with shovels, in order to pull out cars. An excavator was also trying to dig through the debris pile, trying to dislodge at least two cars stuck in the mud. Nearby a family with young children was leaving a house with packed bags in a car.

Source: https://www.wsj.com/us-news/climate-environment/california-atmospheric-river-rain-flash-floods-power-outages-380907e4?reflink=integratedwebview_share

India has vastly expanded infrastructure under Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his bid to lure global capital and supply lines away from Beijing.

Investors are pulling billions of dollars from China and heading to India with Wall Street giants such as Goldman Sachs Group and Morgan Stanley endorsing the South Asian nation as the prime investment destination for the next decade.

The $62 billion hedge fund Marshall Wace has positioned India as its biggest net long bet after the US in its flagship hedge fund. An arm of Zurich-based Vontobel Holding AG has made the country its top emerging-market holding and Janus Henderson Group Plc is exploring fund-house acquisitions. Even Japan’s traditionally conservative retail investors are embracing India and paring exposure to China, according to a Bloomberg report.

“People are interested in India for several reasons — one is simply it’s not China,” Vikas Pershad, Asian equities portfolio manager at M&G Investments in Singapore told the agency.
“There’s a genuine long-term growth story here.”

Aniket Shah, global head of environment, social and governance practice at Jefferies Group LLC., said a recent investor call about India was one of the firm’s best-attended.

“People are really trying to figure out what’s going on in India,” he said.

India has vastly expanded infrastructure under Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his bid to lure global capital and supply lines away from Beijing.

In the US exchange-traded fund market, the main fund buying Indian stocks received record inflows in the final quarter of 2023, while the four largest China funds combined saw outflows of almost $800 million. Active bond funds have put 50 cents to work in India for every dollar they pulled from China since 2022, according to EPFR data.

Source: https://www.businesstoday.in/markets/global-markets/story/wall-street-giants-are-dumping-china-for-india-in-historic-market-shift-416301-2024-02-06

King Charles III has been diagnosed with cancer less than 15 months after ascending to the throne, Buckingham Palace announced Monday.

“During The King’s recent hospital procedure for benign prostate enlargement, a separate issue of concern was noted,” the palace said in a statement. “Subsequent diagnostic tests have identified a form of cancer.

“His Majesty has today commenced a schedule of regular treatments, during which time he has been advised by doctors to postpone public-facing duties.

“Throughout this period, His Majesty will continue to undertake State business and official paperwork as usual,” the palace added.

The shocking development comes just a week after the 75-year-old king was discharged from the hospital following the treatment for an enlarged prostate.

Officials did not disclose with which specific form of cancer Charles was diagnosed, but Buckingham Palace clarified it is not prostate cancer, according to the BBC.

“The King is grateful to his medical team for their swift intervention, which was made possible thanks to his recent hospital procedure,” the statement from the palace continued.

“He remains wholly positive about his treatment and looks forward to returning to full public duty as soon as possible.

“His Majesty has chosen to share his diagnosis to prevent speculation and in the hope it may assist public understanding for all those around the world who are affected by cancer.”

Kensington Palace did not specify when the king would be expected to return to his royal duties, as all of his public engagements have been put on pause.

President Joe Biden on Sunday ticked through a list of reasons he says a second Donald Trump presidency would be a “nightmare” for the country as he urged Nevada Democrats to vote for him in the state’s presidential primary this week and for his party at large in November.

Biden opened a campaign swing with a fundraiser where he focused on Trump’s ample history of provocative statements — his description of Jan. 6 rioters as “hostages,” his musing about a former top military officer deserving execution, his branding of fallen soldiers as “suckers” and “losers,” his wish to be a Day One “dictator,” his vow to supporters that “I am your retribution,” and more.

Then it was on to a community center in a predominantly Black section of Las Vegas, where he told his crowd of several hundred that “you’re the reason we’ll make Donald Trump a loser again.”

Biden said the stakes were huge when he took on Trump in 2020 — “what made America America, I thought, was at risk’ — and they are even larger now as a likely rematch looms.

He told donors at the private home in Henderson, Nevada, that if they came to Washington, he’d show them the White House dining room table where Trump, according to ex-aides, sat transfixed for hours in front of the TV as the rioters he’d fired up with his rhetoric stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

“We have to keep the White House,” he said., “We must keep the Senate” and win back the House.

Accomplish that, he said, and “we can say we saved American democracy.”

He was equally blunt in talking up his record at his subsequent rally where he implored voters to “imagine the nightmare of Donald Trump.”

Trump campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung responded in kind, saying Biden “has been a nightmare for this country in just three short years in the White House, and no amount of gaslighting will make Americans forget about all the misery and destruction he has brought.”

In Tuesday’s Nevada Democratic presidential primary, Biden faces only token opposition from author Marianne Williamson and a few relatively unknown challengers. He won Nevada in November 2020 by fewer than 3 percentage points. But he came to Nevada to rouse voters for the fall campaign as well.

The state known largely for its casino and hospitality industries is synonymous with split-ticket, hard-to-predict results. It has a transient, working-class population and large Latino, Filipino and Chinese American and Black communities . Nevada has a stark rural-urban divide, with more than 88% of active registered voters — and much of its political power — in the two most populous counties, which include the Las Vegas and Reno metro areas.

In 2022, Democrats successfully defended their Senate seat and lost the governor’s office. The six constitutional officers elected statewide are split evenly among Democrats and Republicans.

The narrow victory of Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto helped Democrats party keep control of the Senate for the remainder of Biden’s current term.

Working in Biden’s favor this year is the vast Democratic operation built by the late Sen. Harry Reid. The “Reid Machine” has for years trained operatives and retained organizers and is partially why, despite Nevada’s status as a purple state, Democrats have won every presidential election here since 2008.

But early signs show Biden could have more ground to make up than in past races. Voters are largely dissatisfied with the likely Biden-Trump rematch. A New York Times/Siena poll from November put Biden’s approval rating at 36% in Nevada.

“I know from my reelection, the issues that matter to Nevadans are still those kitchen table issues,” Cortez Masto said in an interview.

Biden has built his reelection campaign around the theme that Trump presents a dire threat to U.S. democracy and its founding values. The president also has championed the defense of abortion rights, recently holding his first big campaign rally, in Virginia, where the issue energized Democrats who won control of the state’s House of Delegates.

Source: https://apnews.com/article/biden-nevada-primary-trump-2024-presidential-election-a7900c2fdb926e50c8bea31b4dadd210

Researchers at the world’s biggest particle accelerator in Switzerland have submitted proposals for a new, much larger, supercollider.

Its aim is to discover new particles that would revolutionise physics and lead to a more complete understanding of how the Universe works.

If approved, it will be three times larger than the current giant machine.

But its £12bn price tag has raised some eyebrows, with one critic describing the expenditure as “reckless”.

That money – which is only the initial construction cost – would come from member nations of the European Organization for Nuclear Research (Cern) including the UK, and some experts have questioned whether it makes economic sense.

The biggest achievement of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) was the detection of a new particle called the Higgs Boson in 2012. But since then its ambition to track down two holy grails of physics – dark matter and dark energy – have proved elusive and some researchers believe there are cheaper options.

The new machine is called the Future Circular Collider (FCC). Cern’s director general, Prof Fabiola Gianotti, told BBC News that, if approved, it will be a “beautiful machine”.

“It is a tool that will allow humanity to make enormous steps forwards in answering questions in fundamental physics about our knowledge of the Universe. And to do that we need a more powerful instrument to address these questions,” she said.

Inside the atom-smasher

Pallab Ghosh and Kate Stephens go inside the biggest particle accelerator in the world to find out why scientists want an even larger one.

Available now on BBC iPlayer

Cern is located on the border of Switzerland and France, near Geneva.

The LHC consists of an underground circular tunnel 27km in circumference. It accelerates the inside of atoms (hadrons) both clockwise and anticlockwise to speeds close to the speed of light and at certain points crashes them together harder than any other atom-smasher in the world can.

The smaller, sub-atomic particles left over from the collisions help scientists work out what atoms are made of and how they interact with each other.

Building on a revolutionary discovery
The supercollider’s detection of the Higgs Boson particle more than 10 years ago was ground-breaking.

The existence of a building block that gives all other particles in the Universe their form was predicted in 1964 by the British physicist, Peter Higgs, but was only discovered at the LHC in 2012. It was the final piece of the jigsaw of the current theory of sub-atomic physics, which is called the Standard Model.

The proposal is for the larger FCC to be built in two stages. The first will begin operating in the mid 2040s and will collide electrons together. It is hoped the increased energy will produce large numbers of Higgs particles for scientists to study in detail.

The second phase will begin in the 2070s and require more powerful magnets, so advanced that they have not yet been invented. Instead of electrons, heavier protons will be used in the search for brand new particles.

The FCC will be nearly three times the circumference of the LHC, a whopping 91km and twice as deep.

So why do they need an even larger hadron collider?

It is because the LHC, which cost £3.75 billion to build, and started operating in 2008, has not yet been able to find particles that will help to explain 95% of the cosmos.

Scientists are still searching for two big unknowns – a force called dark energy which acts like the opposite to gravity, and drives objects in the Universe such as galaxies apart. The other is dark matter, which can’t be detected but its presence is felt through gravity.

“We are missing something big,” Prof Gianotti tells us.

She says the FCC is needed because the discovery of these dark particles would lead to a new more complete theory of how the Universe works.

Source: https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-68172162

Few experiences are as luxurious as a cruise. From oceans to lakes and even rivers, the world’s best cruise liners aim to wow their guests with entertainment, hospitality, libation, and delicious food. Because of this, StudyFinds has compiled a list of the best cruise lines most recommended for leisure and travel.

World travel is a popular form of vacationing for many Americans. Dreaming of the next stop on your bucket list? On average, Americans plan to visit four different destinations in 2024. Three in 10 individuals aim to become “experienced travelers” next year, focusing on learning and guided tours, according to a new survey of 2,000 Americans. Conducted by OnePoll on behalf of YMT Vacations, the survey revealed that 51 percent of respondents seek relaxed vacations, 43 percent prioritize cultural exploration, and 38 percent look forward to visiting historical sites.

How much are you willing to spend when it comes to going on vacation? When planning a getaway, the average American sets their vacation budget limit at $2,743. However, 16 percent of those polled won’t even spend over $1,000 on a vacation, according to a survey of 2,000 Americans who travel. Whatever the budget, American travelers are determined to go on some sort of vacation this year. Almost half of American travelers (48%) would rather take on additional work this year than not be able to afford one.

When it’s time for a vacation, a cruise is an appealing option for many travelers. With so many cruise liners available, it can be important to get some additional information before deciding. Our ten experts shared their findings regarding the best cruise liners. Let us know your favorite cruise liners in the comments below!

The List: Best Cruise Lines, According To Experts

1. Norwegian Cruise Line

Norwegian Cruise Line is a well-respected industry leader. They have been recognized as the best of the best by many of our experts. The cruise liner is home to 17 ships that sail to over 120 destinations worldwide. Norwegian Cruise Line goes from the warm waters of the Caribbean, through history-laden Europe, to the wild terrains of Alaska.

The cruise line’s “Freestyle Cruising” is popular among passengers since it allows for flexible dining, entertainment and onboard experiences. Norwegian Cruise Lines also offers the “Free at Sea” promotion, which allows guests to select added-value options such as free drinks or shore excursions. And people don’t need to worry if they’re on a budget thanks to their range of cabin options.

Norwegian Cruise Line is also popular for its solo staterooms for those who don’t want to share cabins with family or friends. The best part: they don’t have to pay twice the fare by doing so. However, the solo staterooms are located in the ship’s interior, so they usually don’t have windows or balconies.

2. Virgin Voyages
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Virgin Voyages has made a name for itself as a quality service-provider. Its fleet and services are top-rated, giving guests the best bang for their buck. The average base fare per night includes free gratuities and complimentary Wi-Fi. Also, all 20 eateries onboard are included, so passengers don’t need to spend more money on specialty dining services.

The cruise-line is adults-only, so you don’t need to worry about kids running around. It’s also ranked as the best cruise lines for the money, making it stand out from the competition. If you’re looking for one of the best experiences of your life, experts highly recommend Virgin Voyages.

One of the best parts about Virgin Voyages — they have frequent sales and promotions, including 50 percent off a second sailer’s fee and no single supplements for solo sailors.

3. Disney Cruise Line

Disney Cruise Line is a top contender when it comes to outstanding food and hospitality, making it one of the top family cruise lines in the world. Their fleet of four ocean liners offers many family-friendly options, bringing the fun and pizazz of the Disney Parks experience to the sea.

Just like their parks, Disney’s premium price holds true on their cruise line as well. There’s many programs for both adults and children on the Disney Cruise Line.

Disney Cruise Line offers meet-and-greets with its popular characters, Disney-themed shows, and substantial kiddie fun zones. This is the place for you if you’re a huge Disney fan.

4. Hurtigruten Cruises

Hurtigruten Cruises are well-reviewed for their routes across impressive vistas. They also offer remote and mysterious voyages that are less luxurious in favor of more adventure. The Norwegian fleet takes passengers throughout Northern Europe — even as far as the North Pole! Guests are able to take in breathtaking views of the Norwegian coast and Northern Lights.

Hurtigruten Cruises sails across 34 different ports along the Norwegian coastline. Despite not being a luxury ship, they’re able to get to minor ports and communities larger ships can’t.

The cruise liner emphasizes sustainability and environmental responsibility. Hurtigruten Cruises offers a number of expeditions beyond the polar regions, including the Norwegian fjords, Iceland, and Greenland.

5. Viking Ocean Cruises

Viking Ocean Cruises offer a unique experience. Their fleet vessels are generally smaller and have no children on board, accommodating around 1,000 guests. The cruise line caters to adults who want to escape reality and relax without children around.

Viking Ocean Cruises is one of the best ways to visit multiple countries in a single trip without having to step on an airplane. That means you don’t have to worry about repacking or lugging your luggage anywhere!

Its European river cruise itineraries include complimentary dining and free onshore excursions. Passengers can make the most out of their stops in Budapest, Lyon, Amsterdam and Prague.

6. Windstar Cruises
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Ocean sailing offers a different travel experience as compared to non-wind powered ships. Because they have only three vessels, Windstar Cruises has an air of exclusivity. Windstar Cruises mainly travels to “out-of-the-way” ports that larger ships can’t get to.

Windstar’s ships have retractable marinas on its decks for activities like water skiing, sailing, kayaking, and snorkeling. The cruise liner also gives passengers the chance to recreate the experience of sailing aboard a cruise ship.

Windstar’s six vessels carry 148 to 342 passengers, making it very intimate for romantic types. Windstar also offers James Beard-themed cruises, including market tours and cooking demonstrations from a James Beard Award-winning chef.

Source: https://studyfinds.org/7-best-cruise-lines/

Considered the ‘first rugby superstar’, he played club rugby for Llanelli and Cardiff, as well as winning 25 international caps for Wales.

Barry John, the Welsh rugby legend, has died aged 79.

He died peacefully in hospital on Sunday.

A family statement read: “Barry John died peacefully today at the University Hospital of Wales surrounded by his loving wife and four children.

“He was a loving Dadcu [grandfather] to his 11 grandchildren and much-loved brother.”

The rugby union fly-half won three Five Nations titles, a Grand Slam and two Triple Crowns – while also playing five Tests for the British and Irish Lions on their 1968 and 1971 tours.

Nicknamed The King by New Zealand journalists after he inspired the Lions’ famous 1971 Test series victory over the All Blacks, John won 25 Wales caps between 1966 and 1972.

He played his club rugby for Llanelli and then Cardiff, where he struck up a half-back partnership with Gareth Edwards that went on to flourish for Wales and the Lions.

John was partnered by Edwards in 23 of his Wales international appearances, plus all five Lions Tests – one against South Africa and four against New Zealand.

He announced his shock retirement at the age of 27, citing pressures of fame and expectation.

Considered one of rugby’s first superstars, Edwards wrote in his autobiography that John “had this marvellous easiness in the mind, reducing problems to their simplest form, backing his own talent all the time.

“One success on the field bred another and soon he gave off a cool superiority which spread to others in the side.”

Another revered Wales and Lions colleague, Gerald Davies, said: “Whilst the hustle and bustle went on around him, he could divorce himself from it all.

“He kept his emotions in check and a careful rein on the surrounding action. The game would go according to his will and no one else’s.”

‘One of the greatest’

The rugby world paid tribute to John after news of his death was announced.

The British and Irish Lions said in a post on X that John was “truly one of the greatest”.

“Barry inspired so many and will forever be remembered for how much he gave to the sport. All our thoughts are with his family and friends.”

Jonathan Davies, one of the most renowned Welsh players of the 1980s and 1990s, paid tribute to John, writing on X: “RIP Barry – another one of my heroes sadly gone. #BarryJohnTheKing.”

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/wales-and-british-and-irish-lions-legend-barry-john-dies-aged-79-13064259

Essex Police said the force was “working with experts” to establish the breed of the dogs and urged the public not to speculate as the daughter of the victim said they were XL bullies . It comes just days after an XL bully ban came into force.

A woman has died after being mauled by two dogs reported to be XL bullies.

Essex Police said officers were called to a house in Hillman Avenue, Jaywick, where they found victim Esther Martin seriously injured.

The 68-year-old, who was visiting her 11-year-old grandson at the time, was pronounced dead at the scene shortly after 4pm on Saturday.

A 39-year-old man from Jaywick, who was known to the victim, was arrested on suspicion of dangerous dog offences and remains in custody.

Ms Martin’s daughter Sonia Martin said the dogs were of the XL bully breed – which was banned at the start of this month – with a total of six puppies and two adult dogs in the property.

She told the BBC: “There were adult XL bully dogs in the property, and my mum had raised concerns to the owners about them being dangerous and quite aggressive.”

Ms Martin said she had been told the puppies started fighting and her mother was told by the dogs’ owner to “put a broom in among them, to distract them”.

“That’s when she was attacked,” she added.

Ms Martin added that her mother, from Woodford Green in London, had been “getting her life back together” following the death of another daughter two years ago.

She added: “It’s killed our mum and it’s killed our children’s grandmother. I’m getting married in a couple of years and my mum won’t be at that.”

‘Unflinching bravery’

Essex Police said earlier on Sunday that the force was “working with experts” to establish the breed of the dogs and urged the public “not to speculate”.

Chief Superintendent Glen Pavelin said both of the animals were “destroyed inside the house” after officers arrived at the scene.

He told reporters: “Their unflinching bravery and professionalism ensured that there is no ongoing threat to the people of Essex as a result of this incident.”

The force also revealed that members of the public tried to save Esther as the attack unfolded.

Chief Supt Pavelin said: “I would also like to thank local people who tried to get into the house to help Esther Martin. You should be proud.”

He added: “Our thoughts remain with everyone affected by what’s happened.

“I’ve seen the flowers laid down for Esther, as have my officers. I would like to thank all those that have come together to pay tribute to her.”

Chief Supt Pavelin said the man arrested is thought to be a relative of Esther.

‘Barking and screaming’

Lucy Shaw, 38, who lives nearby, told the PA news agency she heard screaming for around 10 minutes.

She said: “We went out into the garden and it was all quiet and then we heard dogs barking, and then we heard someone screaming.

“It seemed like the screaming of a child. That went on for about 10 minutes. We went back in after a while because it sounded horrific.”

Fellow neighbour Mike Coleman, 74, said he saw a man come down the road to the property and start shouting.

He said: “He is really shouting and hollering, he was really, really loud. Then he starts whacking at the windows. He appeared panicked.

“He said ‘phone the police’. My wife phoned them but they said they had someone else on the phone. Minutes later the police came – two cars, then three then five, and then they blocked the road off.

“I heard the shots of them being destroyed, then that was it.”

His wife Julie Coleman, 67, described the man as “very stressed, very agitated, very verbal and quite concerned”.

She added: “He was shouting ‘they’re XL bullies’, but I just don’t know [what breed they were].”

Breed yet to be established

Although the breed involved is yet to be established, the attack comes just days after a ban on XL bully-type dogs came into force, meaning it is now a criminal offence to own one of the animals in England and Wales without an exemption certificate.

Unregistered pets can be seized and owners fined and prosecuted.

Around 40,000 of the large bulldog-type American breed are believed to have been registered before Wednesday’s deadline, but there may be thousands more without certificates.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/woman-dies-after-being-attacked-by-two-dogs-in-essex-13063798

Iran has issued a warning to the U.S. over potentially targeting two cargo ships in the Mideast long suspected of serving as forwarding operating base for Iranian commandos

Iran issued a warning on Sunday to the U.S. over potentially targeting two cargo ships in West Asia long suspected of serving as forwarding operating base for Iranian commandos, just after America and the United Kingdom launched a massive airstrike campaign against Yemen’s Houthi rebels.

The statement from Iran on the Behshad and Saviz ships appeared to signal Tehran’s growing unease over the U.S. strikes in recent days in Iraq, Syria and Yemen targeting militias backed by the Islamic Republic.

Those attacks, themselves a retaliatory campaign for the killing of three U.S. soldiers and wounding of dozens of others in Jordan, all stem back to Israel’s war on Hamas in the Gaza Strip, which has escalated tensions across the wider Middle East and raised fears about a regional conflict breaking out.

The Yemen strikes overnight on Sunday struck across six provinces of Yemen held by the Houthi rebels, including in Sanaa, the capital. The Houthis gave no assessment of the damage but the U.S. described hitting underground missile arsenals, launch sites and helicopters used by the rebels.

“These attacks will not discourage Yemeni forces and the nation from maintaining their support for Palestinians in the face of the Zionist occupation and crimes,” Houthi military spokesman Brig. Gen. Yahya Saree said. “The aggressors’ airstrikes will not go unanswered.”

U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin warned the Houthis after the strikes that “they will continue to bear further consequences if they do not end their illegal attacks on international shipping and naval vessels.” That message was echoed by British Foreign Secretary David Cameron, who said: “The Houthi attacks must stop.”

The Behshad and Saviz are registered as commercial cargo ships with a Tehran-based company the U.S. Treasury has sanctioned as a front for the state-run Islamic Republic of Iran Shipping Lines. The Saviz, then later the Behshad, have loitered for years in the Red Sea off Yemen, suspected of serving as spy positions for Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard.

In 2017, Saudi Arabia described the Saviz as a maritime base and weapons transshipment point for the Guard, staffed by men in military fatigues. Footage aired by Saudi-owned television channels showed the vessel armed with what appeared to be a covered machine gun bolted to the ship’s deck.

In the video statement on Sunday by Iran’s regular Army, a narrator for the first time describes the vessels as “floating armories.” The narrator describes the Behshad as aiding an Iranian mission to “counteract piracy in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden.” However, Iran is not publicly known to have taken part in any of the recent campaigns against rising Somali piracy in the region off the back of the Houthi attacks.

Source: https://www.thehindu.com/news/international/after-new-us-strikes-hitting-yemen-iran-issues-a-warning-about-suspected-spy-ships-in-the-mideast/article67811220.ece

California deluge begins as residents are told to evacuate over life-threatening ‘bomb cyclone’ that is set to bring hurricane-force winds and dump 8 TRILLION gallons of rain with 37 MILLION residents under flood warnings

• The latest in a series of atmospheric river storms is expected to bring heavy flooding to much of the state
• Residents in Santa Barbara and Ventura Counties were urged to evacuate their homes
• The term ‘bomb cyclone’ denotes a storm that rapidly worsens over 24 hours.

The first images have emerged showing California pummeled by potentially deadly rain and wind as about 37 million residents remain under flood alerts.

San Francisco Public Works crews tended to a downed acacia tree in the neighborhood of West Portal, equipped with a chainsaw, as rain pounded the city.

Videos from San Jose showed trees swaying and buckling under the gusts. And in Santa Cruz, water ponded on residential streets and poured out of drainpipes.

Atmospheric rivers began hitting the state last week, toppling trees and dousing roads. With the ground already soaked from the first storm, officials expressed concern about mudslides and flooding.

Weather researcher Ryan Maue said the ‘bomb cyclone’ – a term denoting a storm that rapidly intensifies over 24 hours – could dump more than 8 trillion gallons of precipitation on the state.

He likened the amount to the volume of Lake Mead – 8.5 trillion gallons.

The Weather Prediction Center issued a Level 4 risk for excessive rainfall in Santa Barbara and Oxnard – an exceedingly rare advisory issued on fewer than 4 percent of days on average.

A Level 3 risk was instated for much of the California coast, including San Francisco down through Los Angeles.

Speaking at a news conference Saturday, Nancy Ward, director of the Governor’s Office of Emergency Services, said more than 8,500 members of public safety organizations had been mobilized in anticipation of the storm.

The threat of extreme weather was great enough that Governor Gavin Newsom activated the state’s emergency operation center, which would run 24 hours a day, Ward added.

Officials in Santa Barbara County heightened evacuation advisories to orders on Saturday.

The same day, the Ventura County Sheriff’s Office issued evacuation orders for some communities, in place from 5pm local time Saturday to 5pm Sunday.

Source: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13043713/California-bomb-cyclone-Pineapple-Express-rain.html?ito=native_share_article-top

The assault comes just days before Pakistan votes in a general election that has already seen dozens of attacks on candidates and party supporters.

Karachi: Dozens of militants attacked a police station in northern Pakistan early Monday, killing at least 10 officers, a senior commander said. The assault comes just days before Pakistan votes in a general election that has already seen dozens of attacks on candidates and party supporters.
“More than 30 terrorists launched an attack from three directions. There was an exchange of fire for over two-and-a-half hours,” Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provincial police chief Akhtar Hayat Gandapur told AFP.

He said 10 officers were killed and four wounded in the attack on Chaudhwan police station in Dera Ismail Khan district.

The border regions of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa have for years seen Pakistan Taliban, Islamic State and other groups attacking government and security targets, as well as targeting civilians.

Gandapur told AFP the attackers briefly seized control of the police station during the assault in the early hours of Monday.

At least 24 militants were killed last week when ethnic Baloch separatists launched raids on a compound of government facilities in a remote part of Pakistan’s southwest, the military said.

Four security personnel and two civilians were killed during the attack and subsequent search operations.

The Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA), a banned Baloch separatist group, claimed responsibility for that attack in a statement on social media.

Source: https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/10-cops-killed-after-militants-attack-police-station-in-pakistan-4996491

Bukele had been expected to secure second term amid soaring approval ratings and virtually no competition.

Bukele on Sunday claimed to have won more than 85 percent of the vote despite electoral authorities not releasing the official results of the poll.

“According to our numbers, we have won the presidential election with more than 85 percent of the votes and a minimum of 58 of 60 deputies in the Assembly,” Bukele said on X before official results were announced, describing the outcome as a “record in the entire democratic history of the world”.

Mexican Foreign Minister Alicia Barcena congratulated Bukele, although the official results had not been announced.

China’s Embassy in the capital San Salvador also congratulated Bukele and his party for the “historic victory”.

With soaring approval ratings and virtually no competition, gang-busting Bukele had been widely expected to comfortably secure a second term.

For the first time since civil war ended in 1992, the Central American country held the election under a state of emergency imposed for Bukele’s crackdown on criminal gangs, which slashed homicide rates but drew criticism for human rights violations.

Source: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/2/4/el-salvador-votes-with-nayib-bukele-poised-for-second-presidential-term

Australia said Monday it was appalled at China’s suspended death sentence for writer and democracy blogger Yang Hengjun.

Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong said in a statement it was “harrowing news for Dr Yang, his family and all who have supported him.”

Yang has been detained in China since Jan. 19, 2019, when he arrived in Guangzhou from New York with his wife and teenage stepdaughter.

He received a closed-door trial on an espionage charge in Beijing in May 2021 and was awaiting a verdict. The details of his case have not been disclosed.

Yang has denied he has worked as a spy for Australia or the United States.

The Chinese court did not immediately announce the sentence. In China, suspended sentences are generally commuted to life sentences after a certain length of time.

Yang was born in China and was a diplomat and state security agent before moving to the private sector in Hong Kong and later to Australia. He became an Australian citizen in 2002. China does not recognize dual nationalities.

In Australia, he became known as a writer of spy novels, blogger and political commentator. In January 2019, he was detained by Chinese authorities upon landing in the southern metropolis of Guangzhou.

He was initially held under a form of detention known as “residential surveillance at a designated location,” during which he was denied access to his family and lawyers. Yang was later moved to a Beijing detention center.

In a letter to his sons in August last year, Yang said he hadn’t experienced direct sunlight in more than four years. He told his family he feared he would die in detention after being diagnosed with a kidney cyst, prompting supporters to demand his release for medical treatment.

Wong said Australia “will be communicating our response in the strongest terms” and will continue to press for Dr Yang’s interests and wellbeing, including appropriate medical care.

Source: https://apnews.com/article/china-australia-yang-hengjun-sentence-b20bd2b0a5704b10fcff16cdfdd699ed

The Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) on Monday boycotted President Mohamed Muizzu’s inaugural address to the Parliament. Another opposition party, The Democrats, also joined MDP, saying the three cabinet members whom the Parliament rejected last week had been invited to the sitting.

The MDP, which holds a majority in the Parliament, said its decision to boycott Muizzu’s address is meant to diminish the Parliament’s honour, the Maldivian outlet SunOnline International reported. Local media reported that the President of the island nation is required by the Constitution to address Parliament at the first session of the first term of the year. Amid largely empty seats, Muizzu began his address in the morning.

On Sunday, the MDP said that another reason it decided to boycott the address is because top government officials were involved in rioting outside the Parliament on the day of the cabinet approval vote. The opposition party accused the Muizzu government of making no effort to stop the protestors as they threatened and physically assaulted lawmakers. The party further said this decision was a form of peaceful protest “in condemnation of the actions of the government that is far removed from democracy.”

Two main opposition parties last month had expressed grave concern about the government’s anti-India stance, stressing the importance of New Delhi as a key long-standing ally. The MDP and The Democrats had said that alienating any development partner, especially the country’s most long-standing ally would be “extremely detrimental” to the long-term development of the country. The two opposition parties said, “Consecutive governments of the country must be able to work with all development partners for the benefit of the people of the Maldives, as the Maldives has traditionally done.”

Source: https://www.news18.com/world/maldives-opposition-who-slammed-muizzus-anti-india-stance-to-boycott-his-inaugural-speech-8766412.html

Former Trump official Mike Gill, who was shot by a carjacker Monday in Washington D.C., died from his wounds on Saturday, Fox 5 DC reported.

“It is with profound sadness that I wish to inform the community of the passing of my husband, Mike Gill,” his wife, Kristina Gill, said in a statement.

“His sudden departure has left a void in our lives that can never be filled.”

Gill had served as Trump’s chief operating officer of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission.

Drew Maloney, President and CEO of the American Investment Council and Gill’s friend for 15 years, said he was “grateful” for their friendship.

“Mike was not just a close friend; he was an extended member of our family. Our daughters’ friendship blossomed into a beautiful bond, and it was a testament to Mike’s warmth and kindness that he welcomed us into his life with open arms,” Maloney told Fox 5 DC.

Former CFTF Chairman J. Christopher Giancarlo remembered Gill as “one of the most wonderful, honest, earnest, and open-hearted persons on this earth.”

“Words cannot express the tragedy of the loss of this fine man, colleague, and cherished friend,” Giancarlo added. “He will be sorely missed and long remembered.”

The father of three was picking his wife up from work when 28-year-old Artell Cunningham got inside his parked car outside of an office building on K street and shot him in the head around 5:45 p.m., according to police.

After the shooting, Cunningham fled on foot. He tried to steal another vehicle around 7 p.m. on 3rd Street. About 10 minutes later, he fatally shot 35-year-old Alberto Vazquez, Jr. and drove off in his car.

He stole two more cars before he allegedly opened fire at a D.C. police officer along I-295 and a Maryland State Police trooper who was assisting a disabled vehicle along I-95 in Laurel, Maryland around 2:30 a.m. the next day.

No officers were injured.

Source: https://nypost.com/2024/02/03/news/former-trump-official-mike-gill-dead-days-after-washington-dc-carjacking-report/

Geingob died at Lady Pohamba Hospital in Windhoek, where he was receiving treatment from his medical team, the presidency said.

Namibia’s President Hage Geingob, 82, died in hospital early on Sunday, the presidency said, weeks after he was diagnosed with cancer.

The post on social media platform X did not give a cause of death, but late last month the presidency said he would travel to the United States for treatment after being diagnosed with cancer following a regular medical check-up.

Geingob died at Lady Pohamba Hospital in Windhoek, where he was receiving treatment from his medical team, the presidency said.

Source: https://www.hindustantimes.com/world-news/namibia-president-hage-geingob-passes-away-after-cancer-diagnosis-101707018683973.html

The European Broadcasting Union (EBU) says the Eurovision Song Contest isn’t political, and argues that Russia’s ban in 2022 was “fundamentally different”.

Pressure is mounting on European broadcasters to boycott Israel’s participation in the Eurovision Song Contest because of the war in Gaza.

More than 27,000 people have been killed in Israeli military action, and over 66,000 have been injured since the conflict began, according to Gaza’s Hamas-led health ministry. Israel retaliated after Hamas fighters killed more than 1,000 Israelis and took hundreds of hostages in attacks on 7 October last year.

It’s the second time politics has dominated Eurovision, after Russia was expelled from the 2022 contest over its invasion of Ukraine. Ukraine went on to win the competition.

Iceland is among the countries considering whether to participate this year. It has said it will decide whether or not to take part only once its representative is chosen, with the process kicking off tonight.

The Icelandic Broadcasting Authority, RUV, shared a message on its website, saying: “No decision will be made regarding Iceland’s participation in Eurovision until after the contest, and after consultation with the winner.

“The reason is the criticism that has arisen regarding Israel’s participation in the contest, despite the war in Gaza.”

Iceland’s televised selection process, featuring 10 songs and artists, takes one month, with the results announced on 2 March. One of the contestants, Bashar Murad, is Palestinian.

Meanwhile, in Sweden more than 1,000 musicians – including Dancing On My Own singer Robyn – have written an open letter to the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) which organises Eurovision and SVT, which is the country’s host broadcaster, accusing them of “double standards”.

Flagging Russia’s earlier exclusion from the competition, the Swedish musicians said it was their “duty” as cultural practitioners to “bring about change and counter artwashing”.

The letter concluded: “Allowing Israel’s participation undermines not only the spirit of the competition but the entire public service mission. It also sends the signal that governments can commit war crimes without consequences. Therefore, we appeal to the EBU: Exclude Israel from the Eurovision Song Contest 2024.”

Over 1,500 artists in Finland have also urged their public broadcaster, Yle, to join the calls on the EBU to exclude Israel, calling it “a country that commits war crimes”.

The Finnish artists added that a country which “continues a military occupation” should not get “a public stage to polish its image in the name of music”.

Irish broadcaster RTE has also received a petition signed by more than 500 people setting out similar demands.

In Norway last month, semi-naked protesters knelt in the snow in front of the country’s public broadcaster NRK to also demand Israel’s exclusion from Eurovision.

And in Spain, the leader of the left-wing party Podemos, Ione Belarra, has called on the Spanish Congress to debate the removal of Israel from the competition as part of “a pressure tactic to halt the genocide against Palestinian people”.

She has registered a non-legal proposal to request the debate, which if approved would urge the Spanish government to “position itself clearly against Israel’s participation in the Eurovision Song Contest”.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/eurovision-song-contest-calls-to-ban-israel-grow-piling-pressure-on-european-broadcasters-13062984

False eyelashes and wigs valued at more than $165 million were exported from North Korea and then sold to the West as “made in China” last year.

False eyelashes – known colloquially as “falsies” – and wigs made up 60% of North Korea’s declared exports to China in 2023, bringing in $167 million of foreign cash into the Hermit Kingdom.

The country exported more than 1,600 tons of falsies alone, a Reuters investigation found.

The discovery raised eyebrows in the West, which imposes harsh sanctions against North Korea due to its nuclear program, resulting in bans on trading coal, textiles and oil, among other items.

The U.S. State Department estimates that the totalitarian government seizes up to 90% of its citizens’ income garnered from foreign exports, leaving many to live in poverty.

The eyelash and hair trade is assumed to generate millions each month for Kim Jong Un’s regime, although the exact total is unknown, according to sanctions lawyer Shin Tong-chan and other international trade experts.

The hair trade, which includes eyelashes, is not sanctioned, meaning North Korea can freely trade the products with China without breaking international law, three sanctions experts told the outlet.

China imports semi-finished North Korean eyelashes and then slaps a “made in China” label on them after it completes and packages the products, said the report, citing 15 sources in the eyelash industry.

Afterward, the products are shipped to the West, Japan and South Korea, eight people directly involved with the trade told the outlet.

North Korean exports to China nearly doubled in 2023 after the hard years of the pandemic, when the DPRK tightly shut its borders. In 2019, right before the pandemic, the country made less off eyelashes and other hair products, only bringing in $31.1 million.

The two Asian countries maintain their trade is legal and any suggestion that it violates UN sanctions is “completely without foundation.”

A spokesperson for the Chinese Foreign Ministry said Beijing and Pyongyang “are friendly neighbors” and that “normal cooperation between the two countries that is lawful and compliant should not be exaggerated.”

However, the US has further sanctions against North Korea, including sanctioning any company whose sales fund Kim’s regime.

The US does face troubles enforcing those sanctions unilaterally on foreign businesses whose primary clients are not American, two international sanctions lawyers told Reuters.

A US Treasury spokesperson said it “actively enforces the range of our broad North Korea sanctions authorities against both US and foreign firms” and would “continue to aggressively target any revenue generation efforts” by Pyongyang.

In 2019, the Treasury Department sued e.l.f. Cosmetics for nearly $1 million over allegations it was inadvertently selling false eyelashes that contained materials from North Korea.

Source: https://nypost.com/2024/02/03/news/167m-of-north-korean-false-eyelashes-wigs-exported-to-west-via-china/amp/

With a unanimous vote by the Board of Supervisors, San Mateo County has become the first county in America to recognize loneliness as a public health emergency.

“We have 45% of the people who find themselves being lonely. Who suffer from loneliness,” said Supervisor David Canepa.

Canepa introduced the resolution he hopes will spur further action.

He says since the pandemic, county statistics have shown loneliness explode among the local population.

A trend the country’s surgeon general, says is also being seen nationwide.

“This is a problem that has been building for decades in our country. COVID certainly worsened it and poured fuel on the fire. But that fire was burning before,” said Dr. Vivek Murthy.

In addition to the county-wide resolution, Canepa is also sending a letter to Gov. Gavin Newsom.

In it, he asks the governor create a new minister of loneliness position for the state.

Canepa says while San Mateo County is taking the charge to tackle loneliness here in the U.S., other places like Japan and the U.K. have already taken steps to address the epidemic in their own countries.

If approved, the minister of loneliness would work to enact policies to help improve not just loneliness, but also mental health in general among the public at large.

Source: https://abc7news.com/san-mateo-declares-loneliness-state-of-emergency-first-in-us-mental-health-depression/14373042/

Russian police on Saturday detained a group of around 20 journalists, including an AFP reporter, covering a protest in Moscow by the wives of men mobilised to fight in Ukraine.

The women have staged rare protests outside the Kremlin walls for weeks, in an uncomfortable movement for the authorities that has so far not been put down.

A detained AFP video journalist said Russian and foreign reporters — all men — were detained and transported in a van to a police station.

The group of journalists was arrested as they covered and filmed the women — who are demanding their partners be brought home from Ukraine — outside Red Square.

Video footage showed police bringing reporters wearing yellow press vests to police vans.

The wives of mobilised men have been staging protests outside the Kremlin walls every weekend for weeks, symbolically bringing red flowers to a tomb of an unknown soldier.

While Moscow has orchestrated a huge crackdown on dissent at home, the women’s movement has so far gone unpunished.

The detained AFP journalist said around 40 people took part in the protest.

An online live stream posted by the women’s group showed participants walking together through central Moscow.

“We are here as the women who need their husbands,” said one of the women in the live stream.

Source: https://www.france24.com/en/europe/20240203-russian-police-detain-reporters-covering-moscow-protest-by-soldiers-wives

A knife attack early on Saturday in the Gare de Lyon rail station in Paris left three people wounded, police said, ruling out terrorism at this stage.
Police arrested the suspected attacker, who showed signs of mental disorders, Paris police chief Laurent Nunes told reporters. “We found medicine on him which suggests he was undergoing treatment.”

Two of the victims suffered light wounds while the third was more seriously hurt but was not in a life-threatening situation, police said.

Source: https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/knife-attack-leaves-three-people-wounded-paris-police-say-2024-02-03/

About 1,100 homes have been destroyed and officials fear the current death toll of 46 will rise as rescuers reach the worst affected areas.

At least 46 people have been killed by forest fires in central Chile that have destroyed about 1,100 homes.

The death toll could rise further as rescue teams reach the most heavily affected areas, President Gabriel Boric said.

Chile’s interior minister Carolina Toha said there were 92 forest fires burning in the centre and south of the country, affecting 43,000 hectares.

She said authorities’ biggest concern was that some of the fires were developing very close to densely populated areas, “with the very high potential to affect people, homes and facilities”.

Wildfires are not uncommon in Chile over summer. Fires during last year’s record heatwave left 27 people dead and more than 400,000 hectares burnt.

“The area with fires today is much smaller than last year [but] at this time the number of hectares affected is multiplying very rapidly,” Ms Toha said.

One of the fires was threatening the coastal resort town of Vina del Mar, she said, where some areas have already been badly affected.

In Villa Independencia, a hillside neighbourhood in the east of the town, several blocks of homes and businesses were completely destroyed. Burnt-out cars with broken windows lined the streets, which were covered in ashes.

“I’ve been here 32 years, and never imagined this would happen” Rolando Fernandez, who lost his home, told the Associated Press news agency.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/forest-fires-kill-at-least-19-people-in-chile-with-fears-they-will-spread-in-densely-populated-areas-13063543

Speaking to Sky News, Michelle O’Neill, the first nationalist to occupy the first minister office at Stormont, also said her appointment marks “a historic day, truly representing a new dawn”.

Northern Ireland’s new first minister has told Sky News she “absolutely contests” the UK government’s claim that a referendum on Irish unity is decades away.

Sinn Fein’s Michelle O’Neill, the first nationalist to occupy the office, described her elevation at Stormont as “a historic day, truly representing a new dawn”.

In a document, outlining the basis of the DUP’s return to power-sharing, the UK government said it saw “no realistic prospect of a border poll”.

But Ms O’Neill said: “I would absolutely contest what the British government have said in that document, in so far as my election to the post of first minister demonstrates the change that’s happening on this island.

“That’s a good thing. It’s a healthy thing because this change I think can benefit us all.

“I believe that we’re in the decade of opportunity and I believe, also equally, that we can do two things at once.

“We can have power-sharing, we can make it stable, we can work together every day in terms of public services, and whilst we also pursue our equally legitimate aspirations.

“There are so many things that are changing. All the old norms, the nature of this state, the fact that a nationalist republican was never supposed to be first minister. That all speaks to the change,” she added.

Ms O’Neill grew up in the “murder triangle” in County Tyrone. Her father was an IRA prisoner and her cousin was shot dead by the SAS.

But having pledged to be a “first minister for all”, she broke with republican tradition by using the term “Northern Ireland” in her acceptance speech.

“I’m somebody who wants to be a unifier. I’m somebody that wants to bring people together.

“We’ve had a difficult past, a turbulent past. A lot of harm was caused in the past and I think it’s so, so important that here in 2024, and we’ve just celebrated the anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement last year, that we very much look towards the future.

“I hope I can represent the future. I believe I can represent the future, as somebody who wants to work with all communities.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/northern-irelands-new-first-minister-michelle-oneill-contests-claim-irish-unity-is-decades-away-13063691

Polls show a criminal conviction could torpedo Donald Trump’s chances in 2024 — and some of his close advisers are telling him to take it seriously

IN THE MIDDLE of last year, several of Donald Trump’s closest advisers, including some of his 2024 campaign’s senior staff, started noticing an ominous trend in independent polling and in internal Republican survey data: A significant share of swing voters in key states — even some Republicans — say they would not want to vote for a freshly-convicted criminal.

The trend spooked them enough that, in recent months, some of these officials and political allies have directly warned Trump of possible looming catastrophe ahead for his 2024 presidential bid, two people with direct knowledge of the matter tell Rolling Stone.

For the most part, Trump has shrugged off such warnings, as he and his campaign brass publicly lean on bravado and their messaging that President Joe Biden’s reelection prospects are unequivocally doomed in November. Still, Trump and his legal team are working diligently to delay his criminal trials, in hopes that he can secure the presidency once again — and the power to quash the cases — before any potential convictions come down.

They’ve had at least some success: On Friday, the judge in Trump’s Washington, D.C. election subversion case declared that the trial will not take place on March 4, as it was originally scheduled, and will be rescheduled at a later date.

Republicans close to the former president and current 2024 GOP frontrunner have been carefully tracking poll results — especially in a handful of battleground states that will decide the expected Biden-Trump rematch — of likely swing voters who say they are open to pulling the lever for Trump, with a major caveat. Many of these survey respondents, including in the crucial bloc of self-identifying independents, keep saying that they would not vote for Trump, if prior to the election, a jury handed down a guilty verdict in one of the criminal cases against him.

In a number of national and state polls, this variable — whether Trump is criminally convicted — puts what has been a moderate Trump lead in peril. For several months, this trend has continued to appear in a variety of high-quality polls, both public and private, including as recently as this week.

But even as the MAGA elite publicly insist that Biden is historically vulnerable as an incumbent, the polling trend has grown increasingly difficult for Trump’s lieutenants to just brush off, according to interviews with seven knowledgeable sources such as conservative activists close to Trump 2024, officials working on the ex-president’s campaign, longtime GOP operatives, and Trump allies in right-wing media.

“[Late last year], I mentioned to him how the polls were saying a conviction would hammer him with some of the voters he needs to keep in his column to win,” says a source who has spoken to Trump about 2024 many times. “I said it was something to take very seriously, but not necessarily a death blow … But in my own thoughts, I kept thinking, ‘It’d be a fucking disaster.’ But we’ll find out, I guess. Hopefully, people are lying to the pollsters.”

Within the upper echelons of Team Trump, there is a range of opinion on what these numbers mean exactly. Some say it’s too early and that it’s all theoretical, and therefore possibly a polling mirage. Others are concerned, but they’re not setting their hair on fire. Some are privately saying that a criminal conviction could be fatal to Trump’s chances at reconquering the White House.

Another close Trump ally tells Rolling Stone that, though there are many variables and Biden’s own polling is uniquely terrible, they can’t shake the feeling that one day they’ll look back on this polling trend as a bright-red warning sign — one that is comparable to the foreboding signs that Trump’s 2016 opponent saw for months before her defeat.

As this Trump ally points out, 2016 Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton’s campaign was derailed in part by an investigation by former FBI Director James Comey. The ally notes that Clinton “had [FBI director James] Comey hanging over her for the 2016 campaign. It was not the only thing that brought her down, but it was a significant thing… hacking at her campaign for months. Is a criminal conviction going to be our Hillary-Comey moment, if there ends up being [a guilty verdict] before the election? It’s a question that sort of haunts me, and I’ve discussed it with some of President Trump’s campaign people and people who the [former] president listens to.”

Steven Cheung, a Trump spokesperson, tells Rolling Stone: “These Crooked Joe Biden-directed Witch Hunts, assisted by fake news mainstream media, are just desperate attempts at election interference meant to try and disenfranchise voters because President Trump is dominating in the polls. This is all vile politics by President Trump’s enemies because they will do everything in their power, including weaponizing lawfare, to stop the presumptive Republican nominee for president and next president of the United States.”

Throughout the 2024 GOP presidential primary, Trump’s looming criminal liability has, if anything, proven to be more of a boon than problem, as his rivals proved eager to echo Trump’s allegations that he’s being unfairly persecuted. Throughout the cases, Trump’s most devoted fans have also stuck by him. The former president’s best fundraising hauls have all followed his arrests and arraignments in the various trials against him, with the largest following his booking and mugshot in the Fulton County, Georgia election conspiracy case.

But outside his core of fervent supporters, polls suggest Trump would face trouble maintaining support among the outer periphery of Republicans in the event he’s convicted in one of his trials.

“It always seemed that Democrats found the perfect tool to gain the upper hand in the 2024 election. The prosecutions of Trump clearly boosted him in the primary, but data has consistently shown that it is likely to be deadly to him among the swing voters he needs to win in a general election, especially if there’s a conviction,” says Matt Wolking, an ex-Trump 2020 campaign official who formerly served as a senior official at Never Back Down, a super PAC backing Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ failed presidential campaign.

The data has varied over time and across polling firms, but the message remains the same: Conviction could cause a significant number of Republicans to rethink their support. In the immediate aftermath of Trump’s arrest in the special counsel’s election conspiracy case, nearly half of Republicans surveyed by Reuters/Ipsos said they wouldn’t vote for him in the event of a conviction. Similar polling following Special Counsel Jack Smith’s election case charges found that most voters believed the charges against Trump were “serious” and that he should go to prison if found guilty.

The percentage of Republicans who said they wouldn’t vote for Trump in the event of a conviction declined to 31 percent in a Reuters/Ipsos poll taken in December, but it still represents a serious threat to the Trump 2024 campaign.

The impact of a conviction may be even more pronounced among voters in the key swing states that Trump needs to win in order to defeat Biden. According to polling by Bloomberg News and Morning Consult released on Wednesday, more than half of voters in seven key battleground states say a conviction would prevent them from casting a ballot for Trump. Among the voters who hold negative views of both candidates, that number rises to 79 percent.

Of course, not everyone in Trump’s orbit is a doomsayer on this.

“If anything, the criminal prosecutions of Donald Trump have only strengthened him in this election,” says Dallas megachurch pastor Robert Jeffress, who has been a faith adviser to Trump for years. “How many times did we hear predictions that indictments were going to destroy his campaign?”

Source: https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/polling-disaster-terrify-team-trump-criminal-1234959962/

FORMER Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan and his wife have been sentenced to seven years in prison over their illegal marriage.

It is the third ruling in just a week to hit the former leader, who was sentenced to 10 years for leaking state secrets and 14 with his wife for illegally selling state gifts.

A court on Saturday ruled that their 2018 marriage broke the law and fined them along with the seven year sentencing.

The pair apparently violated a law which says a woman has to wait three months before remarrying and both will spend seven years each behind bars.

His wife Bushra Bibi, 49, was married to a man who claims they divorced in November 2017. She married Khan in January 2018.

The former playboy ex-cricket star, 71, was ousted from Pakistani government through a no-confidence vote in April 2022 after being elected into office in 2018.

Khan is currently serving a three-year prison sentence over corruption allegations.

And an Islamabad court found him guilty of illegally selling state gifts last August – a charge the politician denied.

He was sentenced just days ago to a decade in prison for leaking official secrets alongside one of his party deputies.

And the very next day Khan and his wife were accused of keeping and selling on state gifts during his time in power.

They were sentenced to 14 years as a result.

The sentences come ahead of the February 8 parliamentary elections in Pakistan.

He is barred from participating in the national elections on Thursday.

Khan’s party previously said it would challenge the ruling on leaking of official secrets and called it a “sham case”.

Although Khan will not be on the ballot for the February election, he remains a potent political force because of his grassroots following and anti-establishment rhetoric.

He claims the legal cases against him are plots to sideline him ahead of the vote.

Pakistan has seen violent demonstrations since after Khan’s arrest in Mat 2023.

Authorities have cracked down on his supporters and party since then.

In May last year, footage showed Khan being arrested and bundled into a truck by riot cops.

He was detained by agents from Pakistan’s anti-corruption body, and dragged out of his wheelchair by a huge crowd of cops in riot gear.

After the politician was whisked away, a scuffle broke out between the former premier’s supporters and police.

His lawyer was left injured, as were several cops and members of the public.

Khan’s furious followers then attacked government and military property across the country.

Khan – who captained the Pakistan national cricket team through the 1980s and early 1990s – again denied wrongdoing and was released on bail within days.

The embattled former PM previously accused Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif of orchestrating a plot to assassinate him after he was shot at a rally.

Source: https://www.the-sun.com/news/10277159/pakistan-prime-minister-imran-khan-wife-sentenced-marriage/

The strikes follow American air assaults in Iraq and Syria on Friday that targeted other Iranian-backed militias and the Iranian Revolutionary Guard.

The US and Britain have launched a fresh wave of strikes against 36 Houthi targets in Yemen.

The further wave of assaults on 13 locations are designed to further disable Iran-backed groups that have attacked American and international interests in the wake of the Israel-Hamas war, according to US officials.

Launched by ships and fighter jets, the Saturday night strikes on Yemen follow a US air assault on targets in Iraq and Syria on Friday.

That assault targeted other Tehran-backed militias and the Iranian Revolutionary Guard in retaliation for the drone strike on Jordan that killed three US troops last weekend.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/us-and-uk-launch-fresh-strikes-against-houthi-targets-in-yemen-13063728

President Joe Biden easily won South Carolina’s Democratic primary on Saturday, clinching a state he pushed to lead off his party’s nominating process after it revived his then-struggling White House bid four years ago.

Biden defeated the other long-shot Democrats on South Carolina’s ballot, including Minnesota Rep. Dean Phillips and author Marianne Williamson. His reelection campaign invested heavily in driving up turnout in what it saw as a test drive of its efforts to mobilize Black voters, a key Democratic bloc central to Biden’s chances in a likely November rematch against former President Donald Trump.

“In 2020, it was the voters of South Carolina who proved the pundits wrong, breathed new life into our campaign, and set us on the path to winning the presidency,” Biden said in a statement. “Now in 2024, the people of South Carolina have spoken again and I have no doubt that you have set us on the path to winning the Presidency again — and making Donald Trump a loser — again.”

The Associated Press declared Biden the winner at 7:23 p.m. based on an analysis of initial vote results showing him with a decisive lead in key locations throughout the state. He won all 55 of the state’s Democratic delegates.

The victory comes following the president leading a Democratic National Committee effort to have South Carolina go first in the party’s primary, citing the state’s more racially diverse population compared to the traditional first-in-the-nation states of Iowa and New Hampshire, which are overwhelmingly white.

South Carolina is reliably Republican, but 26% of its residents are Black. In the 2020 general election, Black voters made up 11% of the national electorate, and 9 in 10 of them supported Biden, according to AP VoteCast, an expansive survey of that election’s voters.

Biden pushed for a revamped primary calendar that will see Nevada go second, holding its primary on Tuesday. The new order also moves the Democratic primary in Michigan, a large and diverse swing state, to Feb. 27, before the expansive field of states voting on March 5, known as Super Tuesday.

New Hampshire rejected the DNC’s plan and held a leadoff primary last month anyway. Biden didn’t campaign and his name wasn’t on the ballot, but still won by a sizable margin after supporters mounted a write-in campaign on his behalf.

South Carolina, where Biden has long held deep relationships with supporters and donors, also played a pivotal role in his 2020 campaign, where a big win revived a flagging effort in other early-voting states and propelled him to the nomination.

Biden was aided by longtime South Carolina Rep. Jim Clyburn whose 2020 endorsement served as a long-awaited signal to the state’s Black voters that Biden would be the right candidate to advocate for their interests. Clyburn remains a close Biden ally and said Saturday night that he believed New Hampshire’s delegates should be seated at the party’s convention this summer and that Democrats should avoid any further infighting.

Both Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, the first Black woman and Asian American to serve in the role, have consistently thanked South Carolina’s Democrats for their support. Biden was traveling this weekend in California and Nevada but called into a series of Black radio stations across South Carolina and told WWDM in Sumter, “The only reason I’m talking to you today as president of the United States of America is because of South Carolina. That is not hyperbole. That’s a fact.”

Campaigning in the state last week, the president said South Carolina was “the reason Donald Trump is a loser. And you’re the reason we’re going to win and beat him again,” framing the likely general election matchup with the GOP’s current front-runner.

Earlier in the day, Democratic National Committee Chairman Jaime Harrison said, “We all know that we, because of the color of this, we, our great grandparents, our grandparents, could not always vote here.” Harrison is a South Carolina native who is Black.

Source: https://apnews.com/article/biden-south-carolina-democratic-primary-2024-554e75d9d2014e28bdb4dfc1fae5d4e4

IRAQ has slammed US airstrikes following Friday’s attack – warning that the “aggressive strike” puts the region “on the brink of the abyss”.

America launched missiles against more than 85 targets in Iraq and Syria on Friday, including Iranian-backed militias, killing 34 people in both countries.

The White House said Iraq was warned ahead of the blitz – which targeted militia “command and control headquarters” and ammo stores.

America also aimed at targets in the countries linked to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard’s Quds Force and associated groups.

Iran has repeatedly been tied to the ongoing conflict exploding in the Middle East, and are believed to finance and provide weapons to groups like Hamas, Hezbollah and the Houthis.

The US bombed 85 targets in seven different locations on Friday, hitting four points in Syria and three in Iraq.

Leaked documents suggested the American blitz was coming after three American troops were killed in Jordan by an Iranian-made drone piloted from Iraq.

But Iraq on Saturday said the US was “misleading public opinion” by claiming they had given an explicit warning.

Iraqi officials said 16 people, including civilians, were killed and 25 others were wounded.

They raged: “This aggressive strike will put security in Iraq and the region on the brink of the abyss, and it also contradicts efforts to establish the required stability.

“Iraq reiterates its refusal to let its lands be an arena for settling scores, and all parties must realize this.

“Our country’s land and sovereignty are not the appropriate place to send messages and show force between opponents.

“The Iraqi government will make every effort required by moral, national, and constitutional responsibility to protect our land, our cities, and the lives of our children in all types of armed forces.”

Syrian media also said cities in the east of the country were hit.

Officials said the strikes had “fuelled the conflict in the Middle East in a very dangerous way”.

And the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said 18 people were killed in the strikes on their soil.

While Iran-linked targets were hit – Iran itself was not.

Iran’s foreign ministry spokesperson Nasser Kanani warned that the US had made a mistake which will intensify “tension and instability”.

US Central Command revealed that the strikes used more than 125 munitions, delivered by numerous aircraft, including long-range bombers.

US President Joe Biden said on Friday: “Let all those who might seek to do us harm know this: If you harm an American, we will respond.”

Britain expressed support on Saturday and said the US had a “right to respond” to the attacks on American troops.

A Government spokesperson said: “The UK and US are steadfast allies.

“We wouldn’t comment on their operations, but we support their right to respond to attacks.

“We have long condemned Iran’s destabilising activity throughout the region, including its political, financial and military support to a number of militant groups.”

It came after Biden and his wife Jill joined the grieving families of the American soldiers who died in the Middle East to see their remains returned home.

They were killed in a drone attack on the Tower 22 base, in Jordan, last Sunday.

They were Sgt William Rivers, 46, Specialist Kennedy Sanders, 24, and Specialist Breonna Moffett, 23.

More than 40 servicemen and women were also injured. The outpost was hit by an Iranian-made drone piloted from Iraq, just six miles away.

The Islamic Resistance, an umbrella group of Iran-backed militias in the region, claimed responsibility.

It said it came in response to the US’ support for Israel – the same motivation used by groups like the Houthis and Hezbollah in their attacks on Western troops or ships in the region.

Official sources earlier this week revealed plans for retaliatory strikes and said they would involve a blitz on Iranian people and facilities.

The bombshell scheme was leaked as US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin decried the barrage of drone and rocket attacks recently carried out by Iran-backed militias on US forces in the Middle East.

He said on Thursday afternoon: “The president will not tolerate attacks on American troops and neither will I.

“Our teammates were killed by radical militants backed by Iran, operating in Syria and Iraq.”

Mr Austin added that Iran-backed rebels had “tried to create even more turmoil” ever since terror group Hamas unleashed its terror on Israel on October 7, killing 1,200 people and taking 240 hostage.

He declared: “This is a dangerous moment in the Middle East.

“We will take all necessary actions to defend the United States, our interests, and our people.

Source: https://www.the-sun.com/news/10277033/iraq-iran-middle-east-strikes-america-ww3/

North Korea tested its cruise missiles as well as new land-to-air missiles off its west coast on Feb. 2, state media reported on Saturday, confirming a barrage of launches for weapons it said are aimed at enhancing defense capabilities.
The launch on Friday marked the fourth time in just over a week that Pyongyang has launched such missiles.
“These tests are part of the normal activities of the General Directorate and the Agency for Defense Development under its jurisdiction to advance the technology of new weapon systems in various aspects such as their function, performance, and operation, and are unrelated to the regional situation,” the KCNA said.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/north-korea-tested-firing-cruise-missiles-feb-2-kcna-2024-02-02

Climate activist Greta Thunberg has been cleared of breaking the law when she refused to follow police orders to leave a protest at a London oil conference last year.

There was applause in court as the judge acquitted her and her four co-defendants, saying there was not enough evidence against them and the order to disperse was unclear. The Swedish environmentalist has been arrested several times in the last year.

Source : https://www.channel4.com/news/greta-thunberg-found-not-guilty-of-public-order-charge-as-judge-finds-no-evidence-against-her

At this week’s all-hands meeting, Sundar Pichai faced the music. Plus: ByteDance’s ‘urgency’ push and a big week for Meta.

Happy Friday. I’m coming to you with fresh reporting from inside Google, where I obtained audio of CEO Sundar Pichai addressing employee concerns about layoffs, the company’s AI strategy, and more.

All of that below, plus more on the “urgency” push by ByteDance’s CEO and my notes on Meta’s big week.

Source : https://www.theverge.com/2024/2/2/24059902/google-sundar-pichai-layoffs-tgif-employee-morale

WARNING, DISTRESSING CONTENT: A US city has become so cold that everything in sight is becoming frozen or covered in snow with locals claiming it’s all ‘too much’

A US city has seen temperatures plunge so sharply that fuel is thickening, roofs are collapsing and its homeless have been left frozen solid.

A big chill has swept across Alaska, with its state capital experiencing some of its coldest spells in years. Anchorage has been plagued by a cold snap, chilling its population just shy of 300,000 to the core, leaving residents claiming it’s “too much” to bare.

Anchorage has been setting new records, with snowfall in parts of the city surpassing 100-inches this week – the quickest it has ever reached that milestone in a calendar year. Temperatures have plummeted to lows surpassing minus 40C this year already.

From snow storms to heatwaves, catch the latest weather news here.

Homeless people in the state are facing a crisis and if they can’t locate a warming centre, Anchorage is simply uninhabitable. Kevin Dahlgren, founder of Truth on the Streets, visited the city and came across a harrowing sight.

“There is a person under there,” he wrote on X/Twitter on Tuesday, claiming that a homeless person had died due to the bitter conditions. “The blanket was near frozen solid. A block away was a coroner picking up a body. We must do better.”

Source : https://www.dailystar.co.uk/news/us-news/homeless-frozen-solid-city-after-32030589

Carl Weathers, who rose to fame as Apollo Creed in the “Rocky” film franchise, has died. He was 76 years old.

Weathers died Thursday, his manager Matt Luber said. His family said the actor-turned-director died in his sleep.

“Carl was an exceptional human being who lived an extraordinary life. Through his contributions to film, television, the arts and sports, he has left an indelible mark and is recognized worldwide and across generations,” the family said in a statement.

The Louisiana-born film star was a successful football player before setting his sights on acting. He played college football at San Diego State University and signed with the Oakland Raiders in 1970 after going undrafted. He spent parts of two seasons in the NFL before playing with the B.C. Lions of the Canadian Football League.

Weathers retired from football in 1974 to pursue an acting career.

He became a household name for his role in the first “Rocky” film in 1976, when he played a cocky world heavyweight champion boxer determined to make headlines by giving Rocky Balboa, a washed-up underdog played by Sylvester Stallone, a shot at the title.

Source : https://www.wsj.com/arts-culture/film/carl-weathers-dead-9861429b?reflink=integratedwebview_share

Health experts suggest sufficient rest, warm beverages and steam baths to tackle respiratory illness

As persistent cold weather and smog grip the country, a health crisis has been battering the country’s largest province with thousands of cases of pneumonia along with hundreds of fatalities.

Punjab has been witnessing dry winters, leaving children at risk of contracting pneumonia, has reported over 8,000 pneumonia cases and 300 deaths in the month of January alone.

Despite the provincial government’s measures such as the extension of school holidays, clipped classroom hours and mandated face masks, the number of cases of respiratory disease continues to surge with the Children’s Hospital in Lahore admitting hundreds of cases every day.

Despite offering free vaccination for respiratory disease at six, 10 and 14 weeks of age, the country has long grappled with the challenge of increasing vaccine uptake in a nation where misinformation is rife with some even declaring it un-Islamic.

Director of the Expanded Programme on Immunisation (EPI) Dr Mukhtar Ahmed Awan has urged parents to ensure the administration of the complete course of vaccines to children under the age of two.

However, Awan said that the available vaccines were not quite effective in the prevailing viral pneumonia. Detailing the available stocks, Dr Mukhtar clarified that there is a sufficient stock of pneumonia immunisation vaccines that could be administered to both children and adults.

“Pneumonia vaccines are not available in the local market, whereas, no one can import these vaccines in Pakistan without the prior permission of the government. The government imports immunisation vaccines from foreign countries only for children,” the EPI director said.

Premature births and stunting caused by malnutrition are also prevalent, weakening children who are then easy prey for pneumonia.

Source : https://www.thenews.com.pk/latest/1153954-pneumonia-grips-pakistan-as-hundreds-succumb-to-respiratory-ilness

The United Nations’ highest court on Friday ruled that it will hear a case in which Kyiv has asked it to declare it did not commit genocide in eastern Ukraine, as Russia claimed as a pretext for attacking its smaller neighbour.

Ukraine brought the case to the International Court of Justice (ICJ), also known as the World Court, days after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

On Friday, judges found the court had jurisdiction to hear just a small part of the original case. The judges threw out a request by Ukraine to rule on whether or not the Russian invasion violated the 1948 Genocide Convention.

Instead the panel of 16 judges said they will rule at a later stage on whether or not Ukraine committed genocide in the Donetsk and Luhansk areas of eastern Ukraine now occupied by Russia.

“It is important that the court will decide on the issue that Ukraine is not responsible for some mythical genocide which the Russian Federation falsely alleged that Ukraine has committed,” Ukraine’s representative Anton Korynevych told journalists at the ICJ.

He added that it was also important that the emergency order by the court in March 2022 — that Russia immediately halt its military operations in Ukraine — still stands.

While the court’s rulings are final and legally binding, it has no way to enforce them and some states, like Russia, have ignored them.

In hearings in September last year, lawyers for Moscow urged judges to throw out the entire case, saying Kyiv’s legal arguments were flawed and the court had no jurisdiction.

On Friday, the judges granted some of Russia’s objections but allowed Ukraine’s request for the court to rule that there was no “credible evidence that Ukraine is committing genocide in violation of the Genocide Convention” in eastern Ukraine.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/world-court-rule-jurisdiction-russia-ukraine-genocide-case-2024-02-02

The Georgia prosecutor trying former President Donald Trump for seeking to overturn his 2020 election defeat acknowledged on Friday having a personal relationship with another lawyer on the criminal case but denied it tainted the prosecution.
Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis in a court filing said claims that threatened to upend her office’s historic prosecution had “no merit.”
Trump and two co-defendants are seeking to disqualify Willis and dismiss the charges, alleging Willis benefited financially from an “improper, clandestine personal relationship” with Nathan Wade, a lawyer she hired to help lead the investigation.

“While the allegations raised in the various motions are salacious and garnered the media attention they were designed to obtain, none provide this Court with any basis upon which to order the relief they seek,” Willis said in the filing.
The case is one of four criminal prosecutions Trump faces as he closes in on the Republican nomination to challenge Democratic President Joe Biden in November’s election. Trump has launched multiple challenges that could delay the start of any trial by weeks or months.

As he has before, Trump lashed out at Willis in a post on his Truth Social platform on Friday, saying, “THIS SCAM IS TOTALLY DISCREDITED & OVER!”
Steven Sadow, Trump’s lead defense lawyer in the case, said Willis’ filing “asks the court to turn a blind eye to her alleged personal and financial misconduct.”
Willis said her relationship with Wade did not give either prosecutor a personal or financial stake in the criminal case and said claims of a conflict of interest were based on “fantastical theories and rank speculation,” the filing said.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/world/us/trump-georgia-prosecutor-fani-willis-responds-misconduct-claims-2024-02-02

Biden warns retaliation for drone attack that killed three soldiers will CONTINUE after long-range bombers and drones hit Middle East

• Pentagon launched devastating military operation in the Middle East on Friday
• Two bombers flew from the U.S. to hit sites linked to Iran’s Revolutionary Guard
• Strikes began after Biden attended dignified transfer for the three troops killed.

The U.S. has launched a devastating wave of airstrikes on Iran’s Revolutionary Guard and militants in Iraq and Syria in retaliation for the drone strike that killed three U.S. troops.

Multiple long-range bombers and drones hit 85 targets with 125 bombs over 30 minutes in the widespread military operation on Friday night ordered by President Joe Biden.

As explosions rang out across the Middle East the president said the payback strikes will continue ‘at times and places of our choosing’ and warned militias: ‘If you harm an American, we will respond’.

Two B-1- bombers flew from the U.S. for the mission hitting seven facilities – three and Iraq and four in Syria – linked to the IRGC and Iran-backed militias.

The targets included command and intelligence centers and warehouses where missiles and drones were stored.

Shocking footage from Al-Qaim, an Iraqi border town, showed rockets flying from a munitions factory believed to have been hit by American bombers at midnight local time.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor said at least 18 pro-Iranian fighters were killed in eastern Syria and Iraq called the strikes a ‘violation of sovereignty’.

The huge operation is the first from the U.S. striking back after Iran-backed militias’ deadly strike on the Tower 22 base near Jordan’s border with Syria and Iraq last Sunday.

Sgt. William Jerome Rivers, 46, Specialist Kennedy Ladon Sanders, 24, and Specialist Breonna Moffett, 23, were killed and more than 40 troops were injured in the attack that sparked further tensions in the Middle East.

Source : https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13039553/US-begins-airstrikes-Syria-response-drone-strike-killed-three-American-soldiers-Jordan.html

An activist lawyer lodged a petition on Thursday seeking to dissolve Thailand’s Move Forward Party over its plan to amend a law protecting the monarchy from criticism, in a setback for a party that won an election on a bold agenda of liberal reform.
The petition was filed with the election commission a day after the Constitutional Court ruled the opposition Move Forward had undermined the powerful crown and national security, ordering it to cease its pursuit of changing a law that forbids insulting the monarchy.

Violations of the law are punishable by jail of up to 15 years for each perceived insult of the royal family, making it one of the world’s strictest lese majeste laws. The constitution states the king is enshrined to be held in a position of “revered worship”.
The petition was filed by Ruangkrai Leekitwattana, a lawyer and former senator with a track record of successfully pursuing legal campaigns to ban top bureaucrats and politicians, one of which led to the downfall of a prime minister in 2008.

The election commission will weigh the merits of the complaint and whether to send it to the Constitutional Court to decide on party dissolution, which could see its executives banned from politics for a decade.
Its predecessor, Future Forward, had championed similar policies and was disbanded in 2020 for violating campaign funding rules.
“The election commission must take into account (yesterday’s) case … the commission must carry out its duties and cannot remain idle,” Ruangkrai told reporters.

Source: https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/new-blow-thai-election-winners-lawyer-launches-dissolution-bid-2024-02-01/

he first time Tim Cook experienced the Apple Vision Pro, it wasn’t called the Apple Vision Pro. It was years ago; maybe six, seven, or even eight. Before the company built Apple Park, where we’re sitting right now, at a bleached oak table in this incredible circular edifice of a building clad in miles of curved glass. It’s been raining, and the clouds are clearing over the pine trees and the rows of citrus and maple trees, and the sun is reflecting off the pond in the meadow, and it’s kind of mesmerizing. And Cook’s telling me about that time, all those years ago, in his dulcet Robertsdale, Alabama, accent, when he first saw it.

It was at Mariani 1, a nondescript low-rise building on the edge of the old Infinite Loop campus with blacked-out windows. This place is so secret, it’s known as one of Apple’s “black ops” facilities. Nearly all of the thousands of employees who work at Apple have never set foot inside one. There are multiple layers of doors that lock behind and in front of you. But Cook is the CEO and can go anywhere. So he strolls past restricted rooms where foldable iPhones and MacBooks with retractable keyboards or transparent televisions were dreamed up. Where these devices, almost all of which will never leave this building, are stored in locked Pelican cases inside locked cupboards.

This building, after all, is folklore to Apple. It’s where the iPod and the iPhone were invented. This same building, where Cook finds the industrial design team working on this thing virtually no one else knows exists. Mike Rockwell, vice president of Apple’s Vision Products Group, is there when Cook enters and sees it. It’s like a “monster,” Cook tells me. “An apparatus.” Cook’s told to take a seat, and this massive, monstrous machine is placed around his face. It’s crude, like a giant box, and it’s got screens in it, half a dozen of them layered on top of each other, and cameras sticking out like whiskers. “You weren’t really wearing it at that time,” he tells me. “It wasn’t wearable by any means of the imagination.” And it’s whirring, with big fans—a steady, deep humming sound—on both sides of his face. And this apparatus has these wires coming out of it that sinuate all over the floor and stretch into another room, where they’re connected to a supercomputer, and then buttons are pressed and lights go on and the CPU and GPU start pulsating at billions of cycles per second and…Tim Cook is on the moon!

Source: https://www.vanityfair.com/news/tim-cook-apple-vision-pro

THE Royal Navy is due to test fire a nuclear weapon within days.

Officials issued a warning to shipping as nuclear submarine HMS Vanguard sailed into the Atlantic this week.

It is the first time the UK has test fired a missile since a botched launch in 2016.

And it follows a drumbeat of warnings that the world is careering to World War Three.

The Sun understands the £4bn sub is scheduled to test fire an unarmed missile after completing a seven year refit in Plymouth.

The tests are the final hurdle for HMS Vanguard to re-enter service as part of the UK’s nuclear deterrent fleet.

The 30-year-old submarine was pictured sailing from Port Canavarel in Florida on Tuesday morning.

The Navy hailed the doomsday vessel as a 491ft “colossus” that can patrol undetected for months at a time.

She can carry up to 16 Trident 2 D5 missiles, each armed with multiple British-made warheads that are each more than 20 times more powerful than the weapons dropped in World War Two on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan.

The sub is expected to launch a single unarmed missile from 90km off the US east coast.

The US National Geospatial Intelligence Agency issued a warning to shipping that plotted the missile’s expected course to an impact in the mid-Atlantic.

The missile is due travel some 6,000 km before ditching into the sea between Brazil and West Africa.

The “hazardous operations” warning also plots areas much closer to the launch site where debris is expected to fall as parts of the 60-tonne missile are burnt out and discarded.

The US-made 44ft Trident missiles are designed to blast to the edge of space and track their position against the stars before re-entering the atmosphere and plummeting to earth.

Their maximum range is some 12,000km.

A Royal Navy source said its nuclear-armed submarines can each carry more explosive power than was dropped in the whole of the Second World War.

Officials routinely refuse to comment on nuclear and submarine missions.

However, the US warning remains in force from 9pm on January 30 to 4am on February 4.

HMS Vanguard left Plymouth last year after a £500 million overhaul that took three years longer than planned.

The Sun revealed that contractors who repairing HMS Vanguard bodged repairs in the reactor chamber by gluing broken bolts back together.

But the faults were detected in pre-mission checks.

In 2016 her sister sub HMS Vengeance had a Trident missile misfire after a similar refurb.

The intercontinental ballistic missile was due to fly 9,000km from near the coast of Florida to a target south east of Ascension Island.
But it veered dangerously of course and automatically self-destructed.

Former PM Theresa May was accused of covering up the malfunction ahead of a vote in parliament on renewing the UK’s nuclear deterrent.

It was only the fifth time a Trident 2 missile had been fired this century.

Previous tests — in 2000, 2005, 2009 and 2012 — were widely publicised by the Ministry of Defence and Lockheed Martin, the weapon’s US manufacturer, as proof of the weapon’s reliability.

Defence Secretary Grant Shapps and First Sea Lord Admiral Ben Key visited Washington D.C. this week for talks with their US counterparts.

Source: https://www.the-sun.com/news/10257553/britain-test-fire-nuke-missile-trident/

Forget barhopping or even dinner out—more early professionals prefer turning in early

So much for parties, clubs and bars. When the late hours strike on a Saturday night, the place to be for more young adults is asleep in bed.

Today’s 18-to-35-year-olds say they understand the link between sleep and health better than people once did, with many seeing the long- and short-term benefits of more shut-eye. Younger people also say they take comfort in seizing control over their bedtime routines, finding solace in saying no to even a late-night dinner.

Businesses have adjusted in turn, with bars adding matinee dance parties and other daytime events.

In 2022, those in their 20s reported getting an average of nine hours and 28 minutes of sleep, according to an analysis of American Time Use Survey data by RentCafe. That’s an 8% increase from the eight hours and 47 minutes they said they slept in 2010. Those in their 30s and 40s saw smaller increases.

Bedtimes are also creeping earlier. An analysis of over two million total Sleep Number smart bed customers found that those between 18 and 34 went to bed at 10:06 p.m. on average in January, compared with 10:18 p.m. last January.

Emma Kraft, a 19-year-old junior at the University of California Berkeley, spent her sophomore year living in a sorority house with 65 other women and still managed to clock her nine-hour minimum of shut-eye.

“For me, nothing good happens after 9 p.m.,” says Kraft, who tries to be asleep by around 9:30 every night. Far from feeling like an outsider, Kraft says she’s been bombarded with requests from friends for help shifting their own bedtimes earlier.

“All of a sudden it’s so much cooler and way more accepted to sleep early, and everyone has just adapted,” Kraft says.

Party, but make it daylight

Madelyn Sugg, 25, adopted a loose 9 p.m. bedtime after moving to Tulsa, Okla., in November. Instead of barhopping into the wee hours like she often had on weekends, Sugg says she now sees a jazz show with one group of friends at 6 p.m. every Monday and grabs drinks with another group at 5 p.m. on Thursdays.

“I was afraid of that feeling of FOMO or of feeling like I’m not succeeding at building a community, but it’s actually turned out to be an improvement in all these areas,” says Sugg, a financial operations analyst.

She says the shift is saving her hundreds of dollars a month on late-night food and drinks.

Businesses used to welcoming night owls are reporting this change of behavior, too.

Seatings between 4 p.m. and 6 p.m. now make up 31% of Yelp reservations, up from 19% in 2017. The proportion of reservations between 6 p.m. and midnight have declined in tandem.

In New York City, bars are experimenting with early dance parties for those who want to get down during daylight hours. Joyface in the East Village has hosted four “matinees” since Halloween that start at 5 p.m. On New Year’s Eve, revelers counted down to 2024 at 8 p.m. The wait list that night was 200 people long, owner Jennifer Shorr says.

“We order pizza for everyone, it peaks at 8 p.m., then everyone can still be in bed by 11,” she says.

John Winkelman says he’s seen sleep swing from a long-snubbed facet of medicine to an occasionally overhyped cure-all in his 30 years in the field. The chief of the sleep disorders clinical research program at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston says he’s happy to see more people taking their sleep seriously, but says there is such a thing as too seriously.

“People are getting a little bit neurotic about it,” he says.

He doesn’t see any intrinsic benefit to turning in earlier “unless you have to wake up at 3 a.m.,” but touts the benefits of a consistent bedtime and getting somewhere between seven and nine hours.

Work-from-home effect

Will and Kelsey Tjernlund say they laugh and sometimes decline if friends invite them out to an 8 p.m. dinner on a Friday.

“We’re like, ‘Oh my gosh, that’s so late,’ ” says 33-year-old Will, who runs an e-commerce consulting business from the couple’s home in Austin, Texas, and is usually in bed by 8:30.

It’s a big departure from their lifestyle before the pandemic, when 30-year-old Kelsey worked in an office downtown and got home around 7. Now, the Tjernlunds work out during their lunch breaks and fold laundry and prep dinner in the afternoons.

Source: https://www.wsj.com/health/wellness/early-sleep-bedtime-6ecd1d67?reflink=integratedwebview_share

There were an estimated 20 million new cancer cases in 2022, with more than 35 million new cases predicted by 2050.

A survey conducted by the WHO’s International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) cited tobacco, alcohol, obesity and air pollution as key factors in the predicted rise.

“Over 35 million new cancer cases are predicted in 2050,” the IARC said in a statement, a 77 percent increase from the some 20 million cases diagnosed in 2022.

“Certainly the new estimates highlight the scale of cancer today and indeed the growing burden of cancer that is predicted over the next years and decades,” Freddie Bray, head of cancer surveillance at the IARC, told Al Jazeera on Thursday.

There were an estimated 9.7 million cancer deaths in 2022, the IARC said in the statement alongside its biannual report based on data from 185 countries and 36 cancers.

Around one in five people develop cancer in their lifetimes, with one in nine men and one in 12 women dying from the disease, it added.

“The rapidly-growing global cancer burden reflects both population ageing and growth, as well as changes to people’s exposure to risk factors, several of which are associated with socioeconomic development. Tobacco, alcohol and obesity are key factors behind the increasing incidence of cancer, with air pollution still a key driver of environmental risk factors,” the IARC said.

Lower-income burden

The IARC also highlighted that the threat of cancer varies depending on where a patient lives.

The most-developed countries are expected to record the greatest increases in case numbers, with an additional 4.8 million new cases predicted in 2050 compared with 2022 estimates, the agency said.

But in terms of percentages, countries on the low end of the Human Development Index (HDI) – used by the United Nations as a marker of societal and economic development – will see the greatest proportional increase, up 142 percent.

Source: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/2/1/new-cancer-cases-to-soar-77-percent-by-2050-who-predicts