Sharaa’s US visit: Syria joins alliance against Islamic State after White House talks
Sharaa, whose rebel forces ousted longtime ruler Bashar al-Assad late last year, was the first Syrian leader to visit the...
Geostrategy
No link between paracetamol and autism, major review finds
Paris, France -- There is no clear link between pregnant women taking the common painkiller paracetamol and autism in their...
Science
Geostrategy
US soliciting new bids for Moon mission amid SpaceX delays: NASA chief
The US space agency's Artemis program hopes to return humans to the Moon as China forges ahead with a rival...
- Blue Origin is the Jeff Bezos-founded rival of SpaceX. That company currently has the contract for the fifth planned mission of the multibillion-dollar Artemis program.
- US President Donald Trump's second term in the White House has seen the administration pile pressure on NASA to accelerate its progress.
Business
OpenAI big chip orders dwarf its revenues – for now
New York, United States - OpenAI is ordering hundreds of billions of dollars worth of chips in the artificial intelligence...
- In less than a month, the San Francisco startup behind ChatGPT has committed to acquiring a staggering 26 gigawatts of sophisticated data processors from Nvidia, AMD, and Broadcom
- Silicon Valley-based Nvidia has announced plans to invest up to $100 billion in OpenAI over several years to build the world's largest AI infrastructure
Geostrategy
Trump says Gaza ceasefire still in force after Israeli strikes, suggests Hamas leadership didn’t violate truce
Asked by reporters whether the truce was still in effect, Trump said: "Yeah, it is". The US president, who helped...
- The dozens of strikes Israel carried out on Hamas positions in Gaza Sunday came after it accused the militant group of targeting its troops in "a blatant violation" of the truce
- The deal established the outline for hostage and prisoner exchanges, and proposed an ambitious roadmap for Gaza's future, but it has quickly faced challenges to its implementation
Geostrategy
Cash-strapped Gazans left disappointed as first banks reopen
Deir el-Balah, Palestinian Territories -- The Palestinians trying to rebuild their lives in the ruins of Gaza are short of...
- Food is purchased with cash or through bank transfers, which are often complicated due to power and communication outages.
- Gazans have lost a lot of savings and commissions on transfers can reach 40 percent.
Geostrategy
Publishers fight back against US book bans
Frankfurt, Germany -- Escalating attempts to remove works featuring themes such as LGBTQ lifestyles and race relations from US bookshelves...
- In 2020 just under 300 titles faced "challenges" -- demands to restrict access to them or remove them entirely -- across the United States.
- That number began surging the following year, and reached over 9,000 in 2023, said the NGO, whose office for intellectual freedom has been tracking challenges since 1990.
Geostrategy
13 killed in Gaza as Hamas says Israel devising pretexts to resume attacks
Izzat Al-Rishq, a member of Hamas's political bureau, reaffirmed the group's commitment to the ceasefire and said Israel "continues to...
- Palestinian witnesses told AFP clashes erupted in the southern city of Rafah in an area still held by Israel.
- Hamas had been fighting a local Palestinian gang known as Abu Shabab but the militants were "surprised by the presence of army tanks".
Geostrategy
Protesters out in force for anti-Trump ‘No Kings’ rallies across US
Organizers said seven million people attended protests spanning New York to Los Angeles, with demonstrations popping up in small cities...
- Trump's response to Saturday's events was typically aggressive, with the US president posting a series of AI-generated videos to his Truth Social platform depicting him as a king.
- In one, he is shown wearing a crown and piloting a fighter jet that drops what appears to be feces on anti-Trump protesters.
Geostrategy
China’s power paradox: record renewables, continued coal
Bangkok, Thailand -- Call it the China power paradox: while Beijing leads the world in renewable energy expansion, its coal...
- China accounted for 93 percent of new global coal construction in 2024, the Centre for Research on Energy and Clear Air (CREA) found.
- China wants 3,600 gigawatts of wind and solar by 2035, but that may not meet future demand, risking further coal increases.
Geostrategy
Israel receives bodies of two more hostages returned by Hamas
The issue of hostage bodies still in Gaza has become a sticking point in the ceasefire implementation, with Israel linking...
- Relief agencies have called for the Rafah border crossing from Egypt to be reopened to speed the flow of food, fuel and medicines.
- Gaza rescuers, meanwhile reported fresh violence in some areas despite the truce.
Geostrategy
Iran says no longer bound by ‘restrictions’ on its nuclear programme
Iran said on Saturday that it was no longer bound by restrictions on its nuclear programme as a landmark 10-year...
- The 2015 deal -- signed in Vienna by Iran, China, Britain, France, Germany, Russia and the United States -- saw the lifting of international sanctions against the Islamic republic
- But the pact had already been in tatters after Washington unilaterally withdrew during President Donald Trump's first term, with Iran later pulling back from its commitments
Sharaa’s US visit: Syria joins alliance against Islamic State after White House talks
Sharaa, whose rebel forces ousted longtime ruler Bashar al-Assad late last year, was the first Syrian leader to visit the...
Geostrategy
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OPEC+ looks set to further hike oil output
Geostrategy
OpenAI signs $38 bn infrastructure deal with cloud giant AWS
Under the seven-year agreement, OpenAI, which is partly owned by AWS's archrival Microsoft, will gain access to computing resources including...
Business
Trump says Russia, China have secretly tested nuclear weapons
President Donald Trump alleged Sunday that countries including Russia and China have conducted underground nuclear tests unknown to the public,...
Geostrategy
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Geostrategy
Syrian leader to discuss sanctions, reconstruction in US visit: FM
Syria's president will discuss issues including lifting remaining sanctions, reconstruction and counter-terrorism when he becomes the country's first leader to...
- Ahmed al-Sharaa is expected in the US capital in early November, Syria's top diplomat Asaad al-Shaibani told a panel at the Manama Dialogue in Bahrain
- On Saturday, US envoy to Syria Tom Barrack said Sharaa was heading to Washington "hopefully" to sign an agreement to join the US-led alliance against the Islamic State
Geostrategy
Death becomes a growing business in ageing, lonely South Korea
Busan, South Korea -- Rows of coffins line a university classroom in the South Korean port city of Busan, ready...
- Single-person households now account for around 42 percent of all homes in Asia's fourth-largest economy.
- A new profession has emerged reflecting that statistic: cleaners who are called in to tidy up homes after their occupants, most of whom lived alone, have died.
Geostrategy
Hundreds in south Lebanon mourn Hezbollah members killed in Israeli attacks
Nabatieh, Lebanon -- Hundreds of people gathered in south Lebanon's Nabatiyeh on Sunday to mourn five Hezbollah members killed in...
- On Saturday, an Israeli strike killed four people in Kfar Rumman, Nabatiyeh district, the Lebanese health ministry and the Israeli military said.
- The men's coffins were draped in Hezbollah's flag while mourners threw petals and chanted "death to Israel, death to America".