A dangerous winter storm has swept across the US, leaving at least seven people dead and cutting power to hundreds of thousands of homes.

Schools and roads across the country have been closed and flights have been cancelled as “life threatening” conditions stretched from Texas to New England, according to the National Weather Service (NWS).

At least two people died of hypothermia in Louisiana, and other deaths linked to the storm have been reported in Texas, Tennessee and Kansas.

As of Sunday afternoon, more than 800,000 households had lost power, according to poweroutage.us. Meanwhile, more than 11,000 flights were cancelled, FlightAware reported.

Widespread heavy snow, sleet and freezing rain, which is a dangerous phenomenon where cooled rain droplets freeze instantly on surfaces, could last for days, as the storm could affect around 180 million Americans – more than half the population.

“The snow and the ice will be very, very slow to melt and won’t be going away anytime soon, and that’s going to hinder any recovery efforts,” Allison Santorelli, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service, told the BBC’s US media partner CBS News.

Louisiana’s Department of Health confirmed on Sunday that two men had died of hypothermia.

The mayor of Austin, Texas, said there had been an “exposure-related” death.

Officials in Kansas said a woman, whose body was found on Sunday afternoon covered in snow, “may have succumbed to hypothermia”.

Weather-related deaths of three people have also been reported in Tennessee.

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani wrote in a post on X that at least five people in the city had died on Saturday but added their cause of death was yet to be determined.

He said, however, “It is a reminder that every year New Yorkers succumb to the cold”.

New York state Governor Kathy Hochul warned residents to stay inside and off roads.

“This is certainly the coldest weather we’ve seen, the coldest winter storm we’ve seen in years,” she said on Sunday.

“A sort of an arctic siege has taken over our state and many other states across the nation.”

Hochul said the “brutal” conditions were expected to bring the longest cold stretch and highest snow falls in years.

“It is bone chilling and it is dangerous,” she said.

Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear said on Sunday that the state was seeing more ice and less snow than was originally predicted.

“That is not good news for Kentucky,” he said.

Weather experts have warned that one of the biggest dangers of the storm is ice, which has the potential to damage trees, down power lines and make roads unsafe.

In Virginia and Kentucky, authorities have responded to hundreds of crashes on roads.

Canadians have also been hit with heavy snow and hundreds of cancelled flights.

Officials estimate that there will be 15-30cm (5-11in) of snowfall in the province of Ontario.

U.S. immigration agents shot and killed a U.S. citizen in Minneapolis on Saturday, officials said, sparking fierce protests and condemnations from local leaders in the second such incident this month.
Officials with the Department of Homeland Security said a Border Patrol agent fired in defense after a man who had a handgun resisted their attempts to disarm him.

Local leaders questioned that account, which Reuters could not verify and which videos circulated online appeared to contradict.

The man killed has been identified in media reports and on social media as Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old nurse who worked at the Veterans Affairs hospital in Minneapolis.
In bystander videos verified by Reuters, Pretti can be seen standing in the street and filming agents with his cellphone.
The videos show one of the agents apparently deploying pepper spray at Pretti and other protesters. While Pretti attempts to block the spray and help other protesters, several agents wrestle him to the ground and begin striking him with blows to the head and body.
As they hold Pretti on the ground, one of the agents draws his weapon and multiple shots are fired. Pretti’s body can be seen in the street.

The shooting drew hundreds of protesters to the neighborhood to confront the armed and masked agents, who deployed tear gas and flashbang grenades.
State officials were already at odds with President Donald Trump’s administration over the shooting of another U.S. citizen by federal immigration agents. Trump officials have said an immigration agent was acting in self-defense when he shot 37-year-old Renee Good on January 7. They have refused to allow local officials to participate in their investigation of the incident.

POLICE SAY MAN WAS LAWFUL GUN OWNER

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem told reporters the man killed on Saturday had attacked agents on an immigration raid, though she did not say whether he pulled out his weapon.
“He wasn’t there to peacefully protest. He was there to perpetuate violence,” Noem said at a news conference.

Among local leaders who sharply questioned that account was Minnesota Governor Tim Walz.
“I’ve seen the video from several angles and it’s sickening,” Walz said. “The federal government cannot be trusted to lead this investigation – the state will handle it.”

The head of the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, Drew Evans, told reporters that federal agents blocked his team’s attempts to begin an investigation on Saturday.
Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O’Hara said the man who was killed was a lawful gun owner with no criminal record other than traffic violations.
As people protested the shooting, city police and state troopers arrived to manage the crowd. The situation appeared to have calmed after federal agents left the area, though protesters remained on the streets for hours afterward.
Local officials pleaded for restraint. “Please do not destroy our city,” O’Hara said.
Minneapolis officials, in a statement, said National Guard members would support local police at the scene of the shooting at the request of local officials to the governor.
The nearby Minneapolis Institute of Art said it had closed for the day due to safety concerns, and the National Basketball Association postponed a Minnesota Timberwolves game.

MAYOR, GOVERNOR CALL FOR OPERATION TO END

Walz and other local and state officials called for an immediate end to the Trump administration’s local immigration enforcement operations.
“How many more residents, how many more Americans need to die or get badly hurt for this operation to end?” Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey said at a press conference.
Trump accused local elected officials of stirring up opposition.
“The Mayor and the Governor are inciting Insurrection, with their pompous, dangerous, and arrogant rhetoric,” the Republican president wrote on social media.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/world/us/minnesota-governor-says-federal-agents-involved-shooting-minneapolis-2026-01-24/

Russia launched another vast attack on Ukraine’s energy system, rocking Kyiv with explosions overnight and into Saturday morning, leaving 1.2 million properties without power countrywide during sub-zero winter cold.
Deputy Prime Minister Oleksiy Kuleba said more than 3,200 buildings in the capital remained without heating in the late evening, down from 6,000 in the morning. Night-time temperatures were hovering around -10 degrees Celsius (14 F).

More than 160 emergency crews were operating in the capital to restore heating, he said. Crews were also at work in other affected areas, mainly in western and southern Ukraine.
Energy Minister Denys Shmyhal, writing on Telegram after the daily meeting of officials devoted to energy, said more than 800,000 Kyiv households were still without power as were a further 400,000 in Chernihiv region, north of the capital.
“As for power, constant enemy attacks unfortunately keep the situation from being stabilised,” he wrote.
Many residents’ apartments were already freezing cold from disruption to Kyiv’s centralised heat distribution system following previous attacks.

Moscow carried out the strikes as trilateral, U.S.-brokered talks between Russia and Ukraine continued into a second day in the United Arab Emirates, later adjourning with no sign of compromise. More talks were due to take place next weekend.
Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko said Russia targeted the capital and four regions in the country’s north and east.
“We are quickly restoring damaged power generation facilities, increasing imports as much as possible, and introducing new alternative capacity,” she said.
Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said one person was killed in the capital city and four were injured, three of them requiring hospitalisation, while over 30 people including a child were injured in Ukraine’s second city, Kharkiv.

Klitschko visited Kyiv’s worst-affected district, the northeastern suburb of Troyeshchyna, where 600 buildings were without power, water and heat.

He said vulnerable residents were being given hot food and medicine, and that the city was rolling out extra, heated shelters which would be operating around the clock in the area.
Kyiv recently loosened its wartime military curfew to allow people in freezing apartments to go to heated tents or public buildings at night.
Russia, which has pummelled Ukraine’s power grid since November 2022, nine months into its full-scale invasion, is conducting its heaviest bombardment campaign on energy facilities this winter. People across Ukraine have been left with only a few hours of electricity a day, some without heat or water.
Ukraine’s air force said Russia had unleashed 375 drones and 21 missiles, including two of its rarely deployed Tsirkon ballistic missiles, in its overnight attack.
The sky over Kyiv was lit up by regular orange flashes as air defences fired on missiles and drones descending on the capital. Loud booms echoed around the city’s tall buildings.
Tymur Tkachenko, head of Kyiv’s military administration, reported strikes in at least four districts. A medical facility was among the buildings damaged.
Before Saturday, Kyiv had already endured two mass overnight attacks since the New Year that have knocked out power and heating to hundreds of residential buildings.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/world/ukrainian-capital-under-russian-attack-air-defences-operation-2026-01-24/

There’s a reason they say what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas.

Nevada just hit the jackpot in a new survey crowning it America’s most deceitful state — after experts tallied up fraud cases, romance swindles, identity theft, bogus doctor’s notes, fake IDs and even Google searches for notorious cheating site Ashley Madison.

Almost 1 in 5 Nevada residents admits to frequent fibbing, according to researchers at online tarot reading site Tarotoo, who found the Silver State also has the second-highest rate of romance scams.

In February, the feds nabbed a serial Vegas vixen in a scheme the FBI described as a “romance scam on steroids,” in which Aurora Phelps, 43, was accused of using dating apps to seduce, incapacitate, steal the identities and empty the bank accounts of men in their 60s and 70s.

The three-year spree was linked to three deaths, authorities said.

While falsehoods flew in Nevada, other states took the cake in individual categories.

Florida topped the charts for fraud, with 2,179 reports per 100,000 people, and identity theft, with 528 per 100,000.

In July, a Florida woman was swindled out of $15,000 of her retirement savings after scammers used artificial intelligence to clone her daughter’s voice in a telephone scam to convince the victim her loved one was in trouble.

Source : https://nypost.com/2026/01/24/us-news/nevada-most-deceitful-state-in-us-new-study-finds/

A car plowed into a terminal at the Detroit Metro Airport in Michigan Friday night – and the driver bellowed nonsense as he was dragged away from the scene, according to shocking footage and reports.

Wild footage captured the black sedan sitting in the middle of the McNamara Terminal, where startled Delta Airlines employees were working as it smashed through the glass doors of the Romulus, Mich. around 7:30 p.m., according to WXYZ.

The driver immediately exited the vehicle with his hands raised and speaking in a daze as security and airport officials rushed to the debris-ridden area.

“The response was so quick thank God with the cops and TSA and everybody,” stunned traveler Ali Khalifa told the outlet.

“That all happened in seconds.”

Gov. Tim Walz is akin to the leader of a “drug cartel,” according to a Minnesota state lawmaker who filed articles of impeachment against the embattled Democrat — and warns other pols in the scandal state could be next.

Republican state Rep. Mike Wiener drafted the paperwork to boot lefty Walz in November and filed the docs on Jan. 12, alleging the former vice presidential candidate failed in his fiduciary responsibility to taxpayers as a $9 billion Somali social services scandal unfolded under his nose.

“This is almost like a drug cartel. You’ve got various levels that are all taking a cut of this money that comes from the federal government,” Wiener told The Post.

Walz, he said, was “ultimately in charge of the cartel.” He “maybe didn’t know every detail that’s going on, but [he is] overseeing what’s taking place.

“He is responsible when whistleblowers come forth. It is his responsibility to make sure that changes are made. We have a fiduciary responsibility, which is in the articles of impeachment,” Wiener continued.

“Whistleblowers had brought things forth, but were told not to pursue it because it could be viewed as racist,” he continued.

Other impeachment targets could include the head of Minnesota’s Management Budget Office Erin Campbell and Attorney General Keith Ellison, Wiener said.

Ellison should have been the person to prosecute the $250 million, pandemic-era Feeding Our Futures welfare fraud scandal, but instead turned a blind eye and allowed federal authorities to prosecute the case, Wiener said.

Campbell’s office was negligent in doling out federal funds without adequate oversight, the lawmaker said.

At a contentious oversight hearing on Wednesday, Campbell claimed her office “did not have a tool” to hold agencies accountable for their funding decisions, the Pine Journal reported.

Campbell’s office did not return a request for comment.

Aimee Bock, the convicted ringleader of the Feeding Our Futures scam, claimed on Wednesday that Walz and other state leaders were aware of the fraud.

“I have to believe that the governor’s office and Keith Ellison’s office were aware of this,” Bock told Fox News.

Ellison denied the allegations. “She is a liar, a fraudster, and manipulator of the highest order who has never acknowledged or accepted her guilt,” a rep for Ellison told the outlet.

Source : https://nypost.com/2026/01/24/us-news/articles-of-impeachment-filed-against-cartel-boss-tim-walz-could-expand-to-other-state-officials/

THREE people have been found dead in New York City amid Winter Storm Fern – with the 2,000 “ice zone” smashing temperature records.

Over 230 million Americans are bracing for impact as the blistering weather lashes multiple states with heavy snow, sleet, and freezing rain.

The monster storm is already breaking records as it sends temperatures falling as low as -43 degrees with extreme cold warnings rolled out across the country.

As of Saturday afternoon, three people have been found dead on the streets in NYC as a result of the biting cold.

A 67-year-old man was found on a Manhattan sidewalk, before two other bodies – a man in his 30s and a woman in her 60s – were discovered in Brooklyn.

At least 18 states have put themselves into a state of emergency to bolster any response efforts as officials expect damage like that seen from a hurricane.

Officials have said they expect Storm Fern to be a ‘once-in-a-generation’ event as it brings the worst cold weather front in over two decades.

Thousands of flights across the U.S. were canceled as a Storm Fern started to wreak havoc on Saturday across much of the country.

Power was knocked out and major roadways were snarled with dangerous ice.

As crews in some southern states began working to restore downed power lines, officials in some eastern states issued final warnings to residents.

Forecasters say the damage, especially in areas pounded by ice, could rival that of a hurricane.

Around 120,000 power outages were reported in the path of the winter storm, including about 50,000 each in Texas and Louisiana, according to poweroutage.us.

In Shelby County, Texas, near the Louisiana border, ice weighed down on pine trees and caused branches to snap, downing power lines.

About a third of the county’s 16,000 residents lost power on Saturday.

Bodies of three people found in NYC as temperatures plummet

Storm Fern has turned deadly with the first fatalities being reported from New York City.

The bodies of three people have been found on the streets of New York City.

A 67-year-old man was found on a sidewalk round 7:45 am on 3rd Avenue in Manhattan, cops said.

Meanwhile two other bodies, a man in his 30s and a woman in her 60s were found separately in Brooklyn almost two hours later.

All three died as a result of “weather-related circumstances” sources familiar with the matter told NBC New York as temperatures went below freezing.

New Mexico declares emergency

Governor Michelle Lujan-Grisham has declared a state of emergency in New Mexico ahead of freezing temperature and heavy snowfall.

Up to $200,000 have been put aside for emergency funds.

The executive order said the severe weather “will likely be of such magnitude as to be beyond local control and requires the resources of the State of New Mexico to minimize economic and physical harm”.

Up to one foot of snow is expected to fall in some areas of New Mexico – with power outages and shut down roads also anticipated.

Three cities bracing for the most snow

Boston, New York City and Oklahoma City are expected t be hit worst by Winter Storm Fern over the weekend.

Each city could see as much as 18 inches of snow.

Blankets of snow are already falling in Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, Missouri, and Minnesota as of Saturday afternoon.

Kentucky to see power outages and 15 inches of snow

Governor Andy Beshear says parts of Kentucky could see up to 15 inches of snow and power outages.

He said: “Kentucky, we’re looking at 36 straight hours of snow, sleet, freezing rain and dangerous temperatures across the state.

“This storm is going to have a major impact on roadways, utilities and daily lives.”

The Governor added that his state had 43 warming centres prepared to house people from the cold, and that about 800 Kentucky Guard personnel were on standby.

Warming shelters open in Carolinas

North and South Carolina have opened warming shelters ahead of the winter storm.

Separate shelters for men and women have opened across several counties including Mecklenburg, Alexander, Anson, Ashe and Catawba.

AT least one person has been killed and 14 injured in a gas explosion at a New York City apartment block.

The explosion triggered a four-alarm blaze at the top of the high-rise building in the Bronx in the early hours of Saturday morning.

Just after midnight, firefighters arrived at the building to tackle the blaze on the 16th floor of the 19-storey block with over 150 homes evacuated as a result.

One civilian was pronounced dead at the scene and 14 people were taken to hospital.

At least one of those people is said to be critical, FDNY Chief Kathleen Knuth said.

One of the wounded is a firefighter who was attending the blaze, authorities told Bronx News 12.

Firefighters were called to the Eastchester building just after midnight following calls of a strong smell of gas.

Just fifteen minutes later, as the FDNY carried out its investigation of the leak, the explosion took place.

Shocking photos from the fire show one resident hanging out of a window on the top floor waving a bed sheet.

Over 230 first responders attended the blaze with 75 units arriving at the building as temperatures across the city plummeted.

“It was a very, very difficult night, on a very cold night, which caused even more difficulty,” FDNY Commissioner Lillian Bonsignore told reporters.

Source : https://www.the-sun.com/news/15833773/new-york-city-bronx-gas-explosion-fire/

IT’S the 9am rush hour in one of America’s biggest cities.

But instead of commuters, the train carriage is packed with zombie-like drug addicts.

Welcome to Chicago, Illinois – the new US capital for ‘tranq’.

‘Tranq’ or ‘Zombie Dope’ is the street name for Xylazine, a powerful animal tranquiliser – so dangerous it’s never been used on humans – which earned its nickname for its ability to rot skin and cause users to fall into a deep sedation or a zombie-like stupor.

Now, it’s being increasingly mixed with the deadly synthetic opioid fentanyl, which is 50 times stronger than heroin and is responsible for more than 200 overdose deaths each day across America.

Chillingly, each death drives more addicts to the dealer of the deadly dose – as users seek ever more potent cocktails.

Used more often in liquid form, but also sold as a powder online from Chinese suppliers for just $6 a kilo, three tenths of a cubic centimetre – the size of a dried pea – can sedate a human and cause death.

But it’s no wonder it’s so rampant when a $5 bag – around £3.70 in the UK – costs less than a takeaway coffee.

Within 30 seconds on the metro, our reporter witnessed a man slumped onto a carriage seat with his eyes closed, apparently high on the lethal mix.

Scattered around him was drug paraphernalia including baggies, condoms full of white powder and old needles.

He was only one of dozens The Sun saw taking over the trains as a way to escape the freezing conditions of the ‘Windy City’ and in turn coming face-to-face with law-abiding residents.

Others swigged from vodka bottles and could barely move in a zombie-like trance commonly associated with taking fentanyl.

One carriage, which had eight seats, was packed with druggies riding to the end of the train line and back again, scaring locals with occasional outbursts and brandishing metal bars as weapons.

Commuter Ashley Woodfork, 33, said: “I’ve lived here for 11 years and the metro has become one of the most dangerous parts of the city.

“Drug users have taken it over.

“You used to just see them on the streets under tunnels and certain areas but now it’s become so prolific you are being almost assaulted with it as you try to go to work.”

The drug has been famously associated with the city of Philadelphia – widely considered ground zero for the tranq crisis in the US – but it has now hit Chicago.

‘Deadliest drug threat’

The Drug Enforcement Agency said last year in a warning: “Xylazine is making the deadliest drug threat our country has ever faced, fentanyl, even deadlier.”

Professionals say that’s because xylazine doesn’t respond to naloxone, most commonly known as narcan, a spray used to reverse the effects of opioids on fentanyl users.

Dr Wilnise Jasmin, medical director of Behavioral Health at the Chicago Department of Public Health, explained “Xylazine is not an opioid so it cancels out the medicine and its effects cannot be reversed.”

“You don’t remember taking it

After leaving the train, our reporter was confronted with homeless encampments lining the streets – just yards from affluent neighbourhoods and businesses – as users brazenly take the drug in daylight.

Shockingly, one man, whose face was covered in sores, collapsed against a wall as he lit a pipe filled with tranq, in Baltic temperatures of minus one degrees.

He smoked it three times in a minute before struggling to stand and adopting the “fentanyl fold” – a rigid stance, bending over at the waist and unresponsive, which makes users look like zombies.

It’s the physical signal that the central nervous system is suppressed and often happens just hours before an overdose.

His pal – across the road – told us: “Tranq is the only drug you can get here now.

“It’s ruining the city.

“The high doesn’t last for long so you need more and more.

“It is killing us but we don’t care as we want to die.

“Even in the freezing cold we will still be on the streets doing it.”

“Tranq is the only drug you can get here now. It’s ruining the city

We spoke to several tranq users who explained it was “the only drug available” in Chicago and costs half the price of pure fentanyl, at just $5 for a bag which can last up to three days.

Drug dealers, our reporter was told, almost exclusively mix fentanyl with xylazine because it’s cheaper for them to make and is more addictive for users with a high that lasts longer.

‘Zombie dope’

Fentanyl addict Brett Bradley, 44, who agreed to speak to us, said: “I started using dope in 2010 and I’ve been in prison four times since then for short-changing cash registers because of drugs.

“I lost my best friend to it.

“He was sleeping on my living room floor and I woke up to him dead.

“There’s no heroin around here, it’s all fentanyl mixed with xylazine, called “zombie dope”.

“That’s all you can get.

“You can boil it, smoke it, put it in pipes, and inject it but mainly you smoke it.

“It comes in a powder or liquid.

“People are scared of dying but once they have that habit they can’t stop it.

“You have a chain on your leg – you aren’t going far as you have zero control over it.

“It’s a fixed fight as you can’t win. More and more people are taking it.

“It’s $5 a bag which will last you for three days.”

Fellow addict Gardner Springfield, who is from Chicago, 54, added: “There weren’t as many overdoses in the past.

“It’s got so much worse.

“It’s cheaper which is why tranq is so popular and a high more potent than just fentanyl although it still doesn’t last long enough.

“When you come to you are already in withdrawal and need another fix

“When you come to you are already in withdrawal and need another fix – it’s that addictive.

“It’s the cheapest drug in Chicago at the moment and the cheapest place to buy it in the US because there are so many addicts in this city so there’s a lot of competition.”

‘Rotting flesh’

Another user, who called himself Lonzo, explained: “It’s real scary. It’s suicidal to take this drug.

“You don’t feel anything. It’s as if you’re not there.

“I have to ask myself why do I take it? I have nearly died lots of times.”

He told our reporter that if we were to take it we would “die instantly” as it’s so dangerous.

Fentanyl is present in over 90 percent of opioid overdose deaths in Cook County, the largest county in Illinois which contains Chicago.

Source : https://www.the-sun.com/news/15834406/zombie-dope-us-capital-walking-dead-metal/

Now hailing the role of British soldiers in Afghanistan, Trump called them “among the greatest of all warriors” in a post on Truth Social.

From claiming that troops from the UK and other NATO allies “stayed a little back” from the frontlines during the “war on terror” in Afghanistan after 9/11, US President Donald Trump on Saturday went straight for an olive branch as UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer had termed his remark “appalling”.

Now hailing the role of British soldiers in Afghanistan, Trump called them “among the greatest of all warriors” in a post on Truth Social.

It was during an interview with Fox News earlier this week that Trump said troops from NATO allies “avoided” the frontline in Afghanistan, even though 457 British soldiers were killed in the post-9/11 conflict.

In his post now, Trump wrote: “The GREAT and very BRAVE soldiers of the United Kingdom will always be with the United States of America!”

“In Afghanistan, 457 died, many were badly injured, and they were among the greatest of all warriors. It’s a bond too strong to ever be broken,” he added.

He called the UK military “second to none (except for the U.S.A.!)”, finishing with: “We love you all, and always will!”

What Trump said before u-turn

His claim about troops “staying a little back” was only his latest barb at European allies. “They’ll say they sent some troops to Afghanistan,” Trump had said, referring to NATO allies, “And they did; they stayed a little back, a little off the frontlines.”

Following the 9/11 attacks, the UK and other allies joined the US from 2001 in Afghanistan after it invoked NATO’s collective security clause.

Trump had questioned whether NATO would be there if the US ever needed them. “We have never really asked anything of them.” he’d said.

This sparked outrage in Britain, with several ministers criticising Trump.

“The President was wrong to diminish the role of NATO troops, including British forces, in Afghanistan following the 9/11 attacks on the US,” PM Starmer’s spokesperson said. “We are incredibly proud of our armed forces and their service and sacrifice will never be forgotten,” he reportedly said.

Defence Minister John Healey highlighted that NATO’s Article 5 has only been triggered once — at the call of the US. The troops who died were “heroes who gave their lives in service of our nation”, he added.

NATO’s Article 5 states that an armed attack against one NATO member shall be considered an attack against them all.

Source : https://www.hindustantimes.com/world-news/after-afghan-frontlines-taunt-at-nato-allies-trump-takes-a-love-you-turn-for-british-soldiers-101769275160523.html

Zhang, 75, and Liu, 61, are the vice-chairman and member of the Central Military Commission (CMC) respectively.

China said on Saturday (Jan 24) that the vice-chairman of its powerful Central Military Commission (CMC) and another high-ranking official have been placed under investigation over suspected “serious violations of discipline and law”, a common euphemism for corruption.

“Following a review… it has been decided to initiate an investigation into Zhang Youxia and Liu Zhenli,” the defence ministry said in a statement.

Zhang, 75, is one of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s longest-serving allies in the armed forces.

A career army officer and war veteran, Zhang oversees military operations, training and weapons procurement within the People’s Liberation Army (PLA). His ties with Xi reportedly run deep, with their fathers being revolutionary comrades.

Liu, 61, is a member of the CMC, and its Joint Staff Department chief, responsible for overseeing the PLA’s joint operations, training and combat readiness.

Zhang and Liu were last seen in public on Dec 22, when they attended a CMC ceremony conferring the rank of general on two senior officers.

Xi – who is also CMC chairman – was present at the event, and Zhang read out the promotion orders signed by Xi, according to state broadcaster CCTV.

Aside from the two newly promoted generals, CCTV footage showed four full generals in attendance: Zhang Youxia and Zhang Shengmin – who was named CMC vice-chair last October, replacing the disgraced He Weidong – Liu and Defence Minister Dong Jun.

Saturday’s announcement came after about a week of speculation, largely confined to overseas Chinese-language and Taiwan-based media, that Zhang Youxia could be in trouble.

The reports highlighted Zhang Youxia’s absence on Jan 20 from a high-level study session on the fourth plenum that was attended by senior party and military leaders.

In footage of the event broadcast by CCTV, Zhang Shengmin appeared seated in the front row alongside other Politburo members. Zhang Youxia, a Politburo member, was not seen.

The reports also highlighted Liu as another notable absentee from the Jan 20 event. Others singled out included He Lifeng, who was attending the World Economic Forum in Davos, as well as Politburo members Shi Taifeng, head of the Organisation Department of the Communist Party’s Central Committee, and Ma Xingrui, former party secretary of Xinjiang.

Ma’s absence has stirred talk over his fate, with reports highlighting that he has been missing from public view for the last few months. No reasons have been floated for Shi’s no-show.

ANTI-CORRUPTION CRACKDOWN

The military was one of the main targets of a broad corruption crackdown ordered by Xi in 2012. That drive reached the upper levels of the military in 2023 when the Rocket Force was targeted.

Eight top generals were expelled from the ruling Communist Party on graft charges in October 2025, including the country’s number two general, He Weidong. He had served under Xi and alongside Zhang on the CMC,

He, along with ex-CMC Political Work Department chief Miao Hua, were expelled from both the military and the party, Reuters reported.

The former was succeeded by Zhang Shengmin, a general in Beijing’s secretive Rocket Force and who is not related to Zhang Youxia.

The 67-year-old Zhang Shengmin is a veteran political officer who has been secretary of the CMC’s Discipline Inspection Commission since 2017, serving as a key enforcer of Xi’s sweeping military clean-up.

Also among the fallen top brass were He Hongjun, Wang Xiubin, Lin Xiangyang, Qin Shutong, Yuan Huazhi and Wang Chunning.

Source : https://www.channelnewsasia.com/east-asia/china-military-zhang-youxia-liu-zhenli-probe-serious-violations-discipline-5880556

The plan focuses on strengthening public artificial intelligence research capabilities, says the Ministry of Digital Development and Information.

Singapore is investing more than S$1 billion (US$786 million) in its National AI Research and Development Plan (NAIRD) to strengthen public artificial intelligence research capabilities over five years from 2025 to 2030, the Ministry of Digital Development and Information (MDDI) said on Saturday (Jan 24).

The plan, announced by Minister for Digital Development and Information Josephine Teo at the Singapore AI Research Week 2026 gala dinner, supports Singapore’s broader AI ambitions under its updated National AI Strategy (NAIS) 2.0.

It builds on ongoing AI research efforts in research, innovation and enterprise, MDDI said.

Singapore launched its first National AI Strategy in 2019, which saw the country embark on national AI projects in education, healthcare, logistics, security and municipal services.

The updated NAIS 2.0, announced by then-Deputy Prime Minister Lawrence Wong in 2023, aimed to more than triple the number of AI practitioners to 15,000, and help Singapore become a place where the world’s top AI creators gather.

The latest S$1 billion investment taps on the National Research Foundation (NRF) investment of S$37 billion in research, innovation and enterprise, announced in December last year, and the previous tranche of S$28 billion.

The S$37 billion investment will address various needs, including growing and enhancing Singapore’s talent pool, and leveraging AI as a transformative force over the next five years, NRF then said.

KEY FOCUS AREAS

NAIRD focuses on three key areas: fundamental AI research, applied AI research and talent.

Despite breakthroughs, there are “fundamental limitations” in AI development, Mrs Teo said.

“For example, AI training and inference remain extremely resource-intensive. Their draw on energy and water cannot be ignored,” she said, adding that Singapore already has one of the region’s densest concentrations of data centre capacity.

Under the plan, Singapore will establish AI research centres of excellence that house local and international researchers.

The research centres of excellence, hosted in public research institutions, will focus on “long-term, difficult questions”, Mrs Teo said.

They will advance research and development efforts in areas such as responsible AI, which safeguards against AI risks and protects AI systems from being exploited.

These research centres will also look into reducing AI’s reliance on data, emerging AI methodologies and general-purpose AI, such as developing AI that can perform multiple tasks across different domains.

In terms of applied research, the plan will build capabilities to support the adoption and application of AI in industry and initiatives driven by research, innovation and enterprise domains.

Mrs Teo said the updated plan aims to nurture “bilingual research talents” who are proficient in AI and have domain expertise.

“We aim also to build core AI engineering capabilities for the translation of theory to systems and applications,” she added.

To build a talent pipeline, the plan will continue to support initiatives to develop interest in AI research among youths. For instance, the National Olympiad in AI in Singapore prepares pre-university students to participate at the international level.

At the tertiary level, the plan aims to provide students with exposure to top AI research institutions both locally and abroad, by continuing to scale up national programmes such as the AI Singapore PhD Fellowship Programme and the AI Accelerated Masters Programme.

Singapore has also established schemes to support and develop faculty, through the AI Visiting Professorship, which facilitates collaboration between local and international researchers. To date, the scheme has supported eight awardees.

Mrs Teo said the AI research centres of excellence will also be “significant platforms” for talent development.

“In parallel, we will continue to attract top-tier AI startups and tech companies to base their research and innovation teams in Singapore,” she said.

GROWING AI RESEARCH

Research is a key driver in AI efforts to ensure that Singapore remains at the forefront of AI innovation, MDDI said.

In 2025, Singapore ranked third in AI research in The Observer’s Global AI Index, behind the United States and China. The index ranks countries on their level of investment, innovation and implementation of AI.

More companies have also set up corporate research labs in Singapore, such as Microsoft Research Asia and Google DeepMind, which opened an AI research lab in November last year.

Source : https://www.channelnewsasia.com/singapore/singapore-invest-over-1-billion-in-national-ai-research-plan-5875861

The landslide, triggered by heavy rainfall, struck a village in the region of West Bandung.

Indonesia: A landslide killed at least eight people and more than 80 are missing on Indonesia’s main island of Java on Saturday (Jan 24), a disaster official said.

Triggered by heavy rainfall, it struck two villages in Java’s West Bandung region at about 2.30am (3.30am, Singapore time) and buried residential areas.

Abdul Muhari, a spokesman for the national disaster agency, or BNPB, confirmed that eight people were killed.

“As of Saturday 10.30am, dozens of residents were reported safe, and 82 people were still being searched for,” he said in a statement.

The disaster follows flooding and landslides late last year that killed about 1,200 people and displaced more than 240,000 in Indonesia’s Sumatra island, according to official figures.

Environmentalists and experts have pointed to the role forest loss played in the flooding and landslides that washed torrents of mud into villages.

West Bandung’s mayor Jeje Ritchie Ismail told reporters that the military, police and volunteers were assisting in the search for the missing.

However, he warned that the terrain was extremely difficult and that the ground remained unstable.

The local search and rescue agency said it was conducting manual excavation, spraying the soil with water pumps and using drones to search for the victims.

FOREST LOSS

Floods and landslides are common in Indonesia during the rainy season, which typically runs from October to March.

Tropical storms and intense monsoon rains pummelled parts of South and Southeast Asia late last year, triggering deadly landslides and floods from the rainforests of Sumatra to highland plantations in Sri Lanka.

Forests help absorb rainfall and stabilise the ground held by their roots, and their absence makes areas more prone to flash flooding and landslides, David Gaveau, founder of conservation start-up The TreeMap, told AFP in December.

More than 240,000 ha of primary forest were lost in 2024, according to analysis by The TreeMap’s Nusantara Atlas project.

Source : https://www.channelnewsasia.com/asia/indonesia-village-landslide-killed-missing-heavy-rainfall-west-bandung-5880411

Steep terrain has turned elevation into a fact of everyday life in Chongqing. Beyond the viral images of its dizzying cityscape, CNA traces a quieter human story of adaptation, loss and resilience across generations.

Getting to Chen Hao’s apartment is an exercise in navigation and elevation.

The path winds through Gangfeng village, one of the last remaining old residential communities in Jiangbei district.

Laundry hangs between balconies. Potted plants crowd the window ledges. Elderly neighbours gather for baba – the local custom of drinking tea outdoors – often at street corners or in small open squares.

Then comes the stairwell, its steps worn smooth by decades of use.

Chen Hao lives on the third floor of a building that has never had an elevator, even though multiple flights of stairs separate each floor. The 63-year-old retiree has been making this climb for decades, since his family moved there in the 1980s.

Standing on the balcony, he gestures toward the wall of high-rises that fills the horizon. None of these buildings existed decades ago, Chen Hao pointed out.

“The view was extremely open. Originally, we could see the mountains, see Jialing River – even Shamo Stone far away,” he said, referring to landmarks that once defined his skyline.

He pauses. “Now we can’t see any of that.”

Chen Hao’s lived experience is a small window into life in Chongqing, a city of around 32 million people, where steep, uneven terrain has turned elevation into a fact of everyday life.

The sprawling metropolis in southwest China is dubbed an “8D city” – an exaggeration of 3D – for its maze-like streets and viral visuals of roads stacked atop buildings.

Mountains account for 76 per cent of Chongqing’s land areas, followed by hills at 22 per cent, and flat land at just 2 per cent, according to academic reports.

Unlike many other Chinese cities, bicycles and e-scooters are rare in Chongqing as the streets are simply too steep.

“What’s most distinctive about Chongqing is something everyone talks about,” Li Weitao, an architect who has spent more than a decade designing buildings in the city, told CNA.

“When you enter a building from the street, you realise you’re on the 14th floor. Then you walk down 14 floors, get to what you think is the first floor, walk out, and you’re still on the street.”

In a place without absolute ground, a generation that built the city’s vertical neighbourhoods watches familiar landscapes and memories disappear, even as new ones rise in their place. At the same time, younger residents are coming of age in those same layered quarters.

Through the lives of residents across generations, CNA traces stories of adaptation, loss and resilience in a city shaped as much by elevation as by time.

SHOULDERING THE CITY

Before the escalators came, before the malls and the modernisation, Chongqing moved on human backs.

Xu came to the city’s urban core from rural Dianjiang county – about 120km to the northeast – more than 30 years ago.

Aged 63, he is among Chongqing’s dwindling ranks of porters, known locally as “bang bang jun”. The term comes from the bamboo poles used by these porters, primarily men, to carry goods across their shoulders.

At their peak in the 1990s, as rural migrants flooded the city, the ranks of “bang bang jun” were estimated at between 300,000 and 500,000.

Today, their numbers have dwindled to just a few thousand, according to various reports – a decline driven by better roads, delivery apps and the simple fact that few young people want the work.

Xu did not start out as a porter. “At the beginning, I was shining shoes, together with fellow villagers,” he told CNA.

The earlier roads were unpaved, thick with mud.

“The roads were terrible back then. That’s why the shoe-shining business was good at the time. Shoes got dirty easily.”

Later, as wholesale markets grew and shops couldn’t deliver fast enough, he switched to carrying goods.

The city he entered was unrecognisable from today. Major malls like Grand Ronghui and Shengming had not been built.

Liangjiang, now a sprawling state-backed development zone, was not yet on the map.

As a porter, this meant long days of backbreaking work, he recalled.

“There were very steep slopes. Carrying loads uphill was ‘nao huo de hen’ (extremely brutal),” he said.

“In the past, even big loads were carried by ‘bang bang’. Roads weren’t connected and transport wasn’t convenient – everything relied on human labour.”

While the loads have become less punishing, Xu’s work endures.

Now, he wakes before dawn, arrives at the wholesale market by 6.30am and hauls goods until it closes at 2pm. On good days, he earns between 100 yuan (US$14) and 200 yuan – meaning even a full month of such takings would barely match Chongqing’s minimum monthly wage of around 2,300 yuan.

“Hard manual labour never makes much money. It’s just to scrape by. Barely enough to live,” Xu said.

Yet in his view, the labour remains indispensable.

“Without ‘bang bang’, how do goods get moved out? Doesn’t it still require human labour?”

LIFE BETWEEN LEVELS

The work of carrying goods may be fading, but vertical movement remains woven into daily life – especially for the young.

At 7.45pm, the stairs beside Kaixuan Road Elevator rise steeply into the evening haze. The lift – China’s first urban passenger elevator – links the upper and lower halves of Chongqing, and spans 11 storeys.

At this hour, students from nearby Fudan Secondary School are making their way up. The elevator ride only costs 1 yuan, but some have chosen the stairs.

Bao, 14, sometimes takes the lift, but not that particular evening.

“There are too many people – the elevator down there is super crowded,” said Bao, who identified herself only by her surname. “And because you get squeezed going up – squeezed really badly.”

During exams, when time is tight, Bao doesn’t bother waiting for the elevator. “I just run up and down directly.”

Shen Xiwang, 13, has a different reason for taking the stairs.

“My family’s (financial) situation isn’t very good … so I use less money,” he told CNA.

“Originally, (my friends) were also going to take the elevator, but I told them to come and keep climbing with me.”

None of the students CNA spoke to was fazed by the climb.

“In Chongqing – everywhere you go, you’re climbing stairs,” said another 14-year-old student, surnamed Wu.

“Mountain city. That’s the characteristic of this city.”

For those who grew up elsewhere, the adjustment to Chongqing’s vertical rhythms can be jarring.

Gong Yupeng arrived from Qingdao 18 months ago, following his girlfriend – a nurse at a children’s hospital – across 1,800km by car. He calls himself a “Shandong man becoming a Chongqing son-in-law”.

Gong, a business consultant in the design industry, learned quickly that Chongqing has its own directional logic.

“People here don’t say east, south, west, north – they only say up and down,” he said.

“Here, buildings face every direction, so it’s easy to lose your sense of direction.”

Gong also quipped that navigation apps cannot be trusted.

“You turn on navigation and it feels really close, just a few steps, maybe a few hundred metres. But once you actually walk, you realise you have to make a huge detour down.”

When he loses his bearings, Gong calls a taxi.

“I put a lot of faith in the ‘yellow Ferraris’,” he said, using a local nickname for Chongqing’s yellow cabs. “They can take me out of there without relying on navigation.”

But despite some pains, Gong has come to love the climb.

“I think stairs are okay for me, because I like exercising. Going up and down – I think it’s kind of fun. It’s like walking through a maze: after you go down a small path or go up a flight of stairs, it’s a completely different scene. I think that’s a little surprise Chongqing gives me,” he said.

THE ARCHITECTURE OF ALTITUDE

What sometimes feels like improvisation is, in fact, built into the city itself.

Li, the architect whose firm has worked on several renewal projects across Chongqing, says the city’s verticality is most extreme in Yuzhong district – a peninsula wedged between two rivers where an entire mountain is wrapped in buildings.

“The entire spatial structure is much more three-dimensional,” he explained. “Every single project encounters very complicated site conditions and height-difference relationships.”

At first, this was about passively solving problems. Over time, it evolved into actively using the terrain.

“If I have multiple ground floors,” Li said, “then the architectural space becomes much more interesting.”

A striking example is Baixiangju, a 24-storey residential complex completed in 1993. It has no elevators.

The project comprises six towers, with more than 500 households stacked into the mountainside.

From higher levels, stairways lead into other stairways, paths and actual roads that are narrow and winding. Although clearly within a residential complex, the setting feels unexpectedly precipitous.

Mid-level aerial corridors connect the blocks, forming a web of passages lined with beverage stalls, cafes and lamb soup restaurants.

Inside, residents go about their lives in a simple, unhurried rhythm.

The building was designed to exploit a loophole, Li noted.

“Back then, buildings over 10 storeys were required to have elevators,” he said, adding that Baixiangju avoided crossing that threshold by working with the terrain.

Three exits – on the 1st, 10th, and 15th floors – each lead to different streets, different neighbourhoods.

“No matter which entrance you use, you’re never actually above 10 storeys, so they didn’t install elevators.”

By creating entrances at three different levels, Baixiangju’s developers ensured no single access point exceeded that limit – a cost-saving workaround. This would be impossible under current building codes, which mandate elevators for structures with at least four floors.

One detail captures the strangeness: along the corridors, shops that appear side by side display different floor numbers.

A lamb soup restaurant might be marked as on the 11th floor; a drinks shop a few metres away, the 12th.

They belong to different blocks, each starting from a different ground level.

But not everyone is enamoured by Chongqing’s verticality. For those who maintain its infrastructure, the extraordinary has long since become ordinary.

Pang, 27, repairs elevators for a living. Asked whether Chongqing’s terrain creates special problems, he shrugged.

“Elevators are basically all the same; the systems are pretty similar,” he said.

“Other places have a lot (of elevators) too – it’s just that Chongqing has a bit more.”

Is the work hard? “Every job is tough,” he said. “It depends on the level of hardship and the kind of hardship.”

THE COST OF GOING UP

In Gangfeng village, the afternoon light falls across the open square where neighbours have gathered for their customary tea drinking.

“Every day the baba is full of people,” observed Chen Shijin, 92, the father of retiree Chen Hao. The elder Chen himself occasionally participates.

Chen Shijin entered Chongqing’s Third Steel Plant – one of several steel plants that once anchored the city’s industrial base – in 1954. He retired in 1985.

The factory site was once located on the land below their family home.

“When we were children, going down from here meant walking down a slope to the river,” Chen Hao said.

“Look at the roads now – they’ve changed completely.”

Development has redrawn the city’s features, but also its social fabric.

The junior Chen worries that the community spirit he grew up with is being eroded elsewhere as neighbourhoods like his give way to high-rises.

Source : https://www.channelnewsasia.com/east-asia/chongqing-8d-city-vertical-living-china-5848256

Donald Trump has praised UK soldiers who fought in Afghanistan after his claim that allied forces avoided the front lines prompted criticism from veterans and politicians.

Earlier this week Trump angered US allies by downplaying the role of Nato troops in the war and doubted whether the military alliance would be there for the US “if we ever needed them”.

Trump’s words drew condemnation from international allies, while Sir Keir Starmer called them “insulting and frankly appalling”.

The UK prime minister spoke to Trump on Saturday, after which the US president used his Truth Social platform to praise UK troops as being “among the greatest of all warriors”.

Trump was criticised for remarks he made during an interview with Fox News on Thursday in which the president said of Nato troops: “We’ve never needed them. We have never really asked anything of them.

“They’ll say they sent some troops to Afghanistan… and they did, they stayed a little back, a little off the front lines.”

That triggered a huge backlash from the families of soldiers who served in Afghanistan, as well as veterans and politicians from across the Westminster and international spectrum who called for Trump to apologise.

Prince Harry said the sacrifices of troops needed to be respected as he pointed out Nato’s collective security clause had been invoked once – following the 9/11 attacks.

In October 2001 the US invaded Afghanistan to oust the Taliban, whom they said were harbouring Osama Bin Laden and other al-Qaeda figures linked to the 9/11 attacks the previous month. Nato nations contributed troops and military equipment to the US-led war.

More than 3,500 coalition soldiers died, about two-thirds of them Americans, as of 2021 when the US withdrew from the country. The UK suffered the second-highest number of military deaths in the conflict behind the US, which suffered 2,461 fatalities.

On Saturday, Downing Street said the prime minister and US president spoke about the UK’s involvement alongside US and Nato forces in the conflict.

A spokesperson said: “The prime minister raised the brave and heroic British and American soldiers who fought side by side in Afghanistan, many of whom never returned home. We must never forget their sacrifice”.

Shortly after the conversation, Trump posted fresh comments on his Truth Social platform – appearing to step back from his critical comments but stopping short of directly apologising for the words he used in Thursday’s interview.

He wrote: “The great and very brave soldiers of the United Kingdom will always be with the United States of America.

“In Afghanistan, 457 died, many were badly injured, and they were among the greatest of all warriors.

“It’s a bond too strong to ever be broken. The UK military, with tremendous heart and soul, is second to none (except for the USA). We love you all, and always will!”

Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch said she was pleased Trump had acknowledged the UK’s role in fighting alongside the US and Nato allies in Afghanistan.

“It should never have been questioned in the first place,” she said.

On Friday, the Duke of Sussex released a statement in which he praised the contributions of Nato troops who were in Afghanistan.

“I served there. I made lifelong friends there. And I lost friends there,” the prince said.

“In 2001, Nato invoked Article 5 for the first – and only – time in history. It meant that every allied nation was obliged to stand with the United States in Afghanistan, in pursuit of our shared security. Allies answered that call.

“Thousands of lives were changed forever. Mothers and fathers buried sons and daughters. Children were left without a parent. Families are left carrying the cost.

“Those sacrifices deserve to be spoken about truthfully and with respect, as we all remain united and loyal to the defence of diplomacy and peace.”

Most of the 457 British troops who died serving in Afghanistan over a period of nearly 20 years were killed in Helmand – the scene of the heaviest fighting.

Hundreds more suffered injuries and lost limbs – including Cpl Andy Reid who lost both his legs and his right arm after stepping on an improvised explosive device (IED) in Afghanistan.

“Not a day goes by when we’re not in some kind of pain, physically or mentally reflecting on that conflict,” he told BBC Breakfast on Friday.

Reid recalled working with American soldiers, adding: “If they were on the front line and I was stood next to them, clearly we were on the front line as well.”

Badenoch, Sir Ed Davey and Nigel Farage were among the Westminster leaders to call out the US president for his comments; while outside the UK, ministers from foreign governments also criticised Trump’s remarks.

Canada’s Minister of National Defence David J McGuinty said Canadian “men and women were on the ground from the beginning, not because we had to, but because it was the right thing to do.”

American political and military figures have also expressed their anger and frustration over Trump’s Nato comments.

“I think it’s insulting to those who were fighting alongside of us,” former national security adviser Herbery Raymond McMaster told the BBC.

Source : https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c3edwx37pd9o

“Jersey Shore” staple Nicole “Snooki” Polizzi received terrifying news during a recent doctor’s visit.

The reality TV personality took to TikTok on Wednesday to reveal she’s been dealing with abnormal pap smear results and precancerous cells for about four years, leading her to undergo an “uncomfortable” colposcopy and biopsy.

“Results come back. Doctor calls me and he’s like, ‘Not looking great.’ He found cancerous cells on the top of my cervix,” she said, adding that she’ll now need a cone biopsy under anesthesia for further testing.

@snooki
Ladies we are in this together 🙏🏽 #colposcopy #conebiopsy #cervicalcancer

♬ original sound – Snooki

“I’m terrified. It’s scary, but we have to get it done because cervical cancer is nothing to joke about,” the 38-year-old continued.

A teary-eyed Polizzi explained that if her second biopsy results come back abnormal she may need a hysterectomy.

“Obviously I’m done having kids but, as a woman, the thought of getting a hysterectomy is just sad and scary,” she said.

“Getting the hysterectomy and then not being able to have kids, I think that’s what’s killing me.”

“But whatever to keep me healthy and safe to be here for my kids that I have now,” she added, referring to the three children she shares with husband Jionni LaValle — Lorenzo, 13, Giovanna, 11, and Angelo, 6.

Polizzi further said she’s “scared and freaking out,” but hoping her video will help her connect with other women who have gone through similar situations.

She also admitted that she delayed her routine exams out of fear and doesn’t want others to make the same mistake.

“The reason why my doctor’s on my ass all the time is because I waited. I waited on my damn appointments because I knew I might not get great results but also because I didn’t want to feel the pain. I didn’t want to deal with the stress of having to deal with all of this,” she said.

Source : https://pagesix.com/2026/01/24/celebrity-news/nicole-snooki-polizzi-cries-reveals-scary-cancer-news/

Iran’s crackdown on protests has reportedly resulted in over 5,000 deaths, according to activists, with the real toll potentially higher due to a significant internet blackout. The US has increased naval forces in the region amid escalating tensions, with President Trump warning against mass executions of protesters.

Iran’s Foreign Minister Seyed Abbas Araghchi on Friday said that the death toll in the unrest stood at 3,117 in the country, as Iran simultaneously faces mounting international scrutiny over a deadly nationwide crackdown on protests. He said that 2,427 of those killed were civilians and security personnel, while 690 were identified as “terrorists”, according to Iranian authorities.

The statement comes amid sharply contrasting accounts from rights groups and activists, who say Iran’s broader crackdown on nationwide protests has claimed far more lives. Activists said at least 5,002 people have been killed in the government’s response to unrest across the country, even as Iran remains under a sweeping internet blackout.

The developments come as United States President Donald Trump described an approaching American carrier group as an “armada,” raising concerns of possible military escalation even as Washington and Tehran trade sharp rhetoric.

Freezing rain fell in parts of Texas on Friday as a huge, dayslong winter storm began a trek that threatened to bring snow, sleet, ice, bone-chilling temperatures and extensive power outages to about half the U.S. population. Forecasters warned that catastrophic damage, especially in areas pounded by ice, could rival that of a hurricane.

Schools in Chicago and other Midwestern cities called off classes, airlines canceled thousands of weekend flights, churches moved Sunday services online and the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tennessee, decided to hold its Saturday night radio performance without fans. Carnival parades in Louisiana were canceled or rescheduled.

At least 182 million people were under watches or warnings for ice and snow, and more than 210 million were under cold weather advisories or warnings. In many places those overlapped.

Utility companies braced for power outages because ice-coated trees and power lines can keep falling long after a storm has passed.

“It’s going to be a big storm,” Maricela Resendiz said as she picked up chicken, eggs and pizzas at a Dallas store to get her, her 5-year-old son and her boyfriend through the weekend. Her plans: “Staying in, just being out of the way.”

72-hour snowfall forecast

Freezing rain slickened roads in Lubbock, Texas, in the afternoon as temperatures dropped.

After sliding into the South, the storm was expected to move into the Northeast, dumping about a foot (30 centimeters) of snow from Washington through New York and Boston, the National Weather Service predicted.

Arctic air was the first piece to fall in place

Frigid air that spilled down from Canada prompted the cancellations of classes at schools throughout the Midwest. Wind chills as low as minus 40 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 40 Celsius) meant that frostbite could set in within 10 minutes, making it too dangerous to walk to school or wait for the bus.

In Bismarck, North Dakota, where the wind chill was minus 41 (minus 41 Celsius), Colin Cross cleaned out an empty unit for the apartment complex where he works.

“I’ve been here awhile and my brain stopped working,” said Cross, bundled up in long johns, two long-sleeve shirts, a jacket, hat, hood, gloves and boots.

Despite the bitter cold, a protest over an immigration crackdown went on as planned in Minnesota, with thousands demonstrating in downtown Minneapolis.

Nationwide, nearly 5,000 flights were delayed or canceled Friday, many of them in Dallas and Chicago, according to the flight tracking website FlightAware. About 2,800 were called off for Saturday.

In Oklahoma, Department of Transportation workers treated roads with salt brine, the Highway Patrol canceled troopers’ days off and National Guard units were activated to help stranded drivers.

The federal government put nearly 30 search and rescue teams on standby. Officials had more than 7 million meals, 600,000 blankets and 300 generators placed throughout the area the storm was expected to cross, according to the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

President Donald Trump said via social media that his administration was coordinating with state and local officials and “FEMA is fully prepared to respond.”

Ice could take down power line

s, and pipes could freeze

After the storm passes, it will take a while to thaw out. Ice can add hundreds of pounds to power lines and branches and make them more susceptible to snapping, especially if it’s windy.

In at least 11 Southern states from Texas to Virginia, a majority of homes are heated by electricity, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

Campaigning began Thursday for Bangladesh’s first national elections since the 2024 uprising that ousted longtime Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.

The major political parties held campaign rallies in the capital, Dhaka, and elsewhere ahead of Feb. 12 election, which is seen as the most consequential in Bangladesh’s history as it follows Hasina’s ouster and is being held under an interim government with voters also deciding on proposed political reforms.

The interim government led by Nobel Peace Prize laureate Muhammad Yunus has pledged to hold a free and fair election, but questions were raised after his administration banned Hasina’s former ruling Awami League party. The Awami League and the Bangladesh Nationalist Party have historically dominated the country’s electorate.

There are also concerns about the country’s law and order situation, but the government says they will keep the voting peaceful.

Yunus assumed office three days after Hasina left the country for India on Aug. 5, 2024, following the deaths of hundreds of protesters and others in a violent crackdown.

With the Awami League excluded from the election, a 10-party alliance led by Jamaat-e-Islami, an Islamist party, is seeking to expand its influence. Jamaat-e-Islami has long faced criticism from secular groups who say its positions challenge Bangladesh’s secular foundations. A new party formed by student leaders of the uprising, the National Citizen Party, or NCP, is also part of the alliance.

Tarique Rahman, BNP chairman and the son of former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia, is widely seen as a leading contender for prime minister. His party has drawn strong support rooted in the political legacy of his mother, who died last month. Rahman returned to Bangladesh last month after 17 years in exile in the United Kingdom.

Rahman launched his campaign in the northeastern city of Sylhet with an address to thousands of supporters at a rally Thursday. He is scheduled to visit several other districts in the coming days.

In Sylhet, Rahman criticized the Jamaat-e-Islami party for using religious sentiment to get votes. He said that if elected, he would uphold national sovereignty and work for women and young people.

“Now we must establish the right to vote, rebuild the nation, and make it economically self-reliant,” he said.

Jamaat-e-Islami and the NCP began their campaigns in the capital, Dhaka.

“There are terrorism (crimes), extortion, corruption and forcible possession, (our fight) is against them to establish a just Bangladesh, and alongside to build a safe Dhaka for women and children,” said Nasiruddin Patwari, a leader of the National Citizen Party.

The election will also include a referendum on a national charter, with the interim government seeking voter support for what it describes as a new political course built on reforms. The charter was signed last year by 25 of the country’s 52 registered political parties. The Awami League opposed the idea and several other parties declined to sign the document.

Rahman’s return has reenergized his supporters.

“Under his leadership, in the coming time we want to see a self-reliant Bangladesh and organizing this country through a democratic process,” said Ali Akbar Rajan, a BNP supporter, at Rahman’s rally in Sylhet. “He will emerge as a successful statesman, that is what we hope for,”

The July National Charter, named after the uprising that began in July 2024 and led to the fall of Hasina, is currently nonbinding. Supporters of the charter say a referendum is needed to make it legally binding and a part of the constitution. Only Parliament can change the constitution in Bangladesh.

Source : https://apnews.com/article/bangladesh-election-campaign-hasina-yunus-tarique-b71a45ce5046ceb3577dad8854f7f176

New York City’s animal shelter system put out an urgent call for help housing their bigger dogs ahead of the impending snowstorm — and was inundated with big-hearted pooch lovers wanting to lend a hand.

The Animal Care Center of New York took to social media, pleading with New Yorkers to foster a “blizzard buddy” during the upcoming winter storm that is set to wallop the city over the weekend — dumping a foot or more of snow — noting that supplies and travel from the shelter would be covered.

After putting out the call, the ACC was overwhelmed with requests to help — receiving over 1,500 emails in less than 24 hours from people wanting to enjoy the snowfall with a furry friend.

The “blizzard buddy” program is part of a greater “straycation” initiative offered by the ACC throughout the year, where dog lovers can foster a pup for a weekend, giving shelter dogs a break from the kennel and a chance to enjoy time in a real home environment.

“Straycations” for shelter dogs help the four-legged pals recharge, shine, and get one step closer to finding their forever homes, according to the ACC.

Source : https://nypost.com/2026/01/23/us-news/nyc-shelters-seeking-blizzard-buddies-for-their-dogs-ahead-of-snowstorm/

More than half of the US is preparing for the winter storm, which is reportedly spreading from the Rocky Mountains to the Great Lakes.

Most parts of the US are bracing for what is expected to be a monster winter storm that could delay flights and trigger power outages amid the biting cold across the country. Parts of Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas reportedly witnessed fresh snow on Friday (local time) in what was seen as a prelude to the winter storm expected to converge with bitter Arctic cold and engulf places.

More than half of the US is preparing for the winter storm, which is reportedly spreading from the Rocky Mountains to the Great Lakes.

According to news agency Reuters, at least 14 states and the District of Columbia have declared weather emergencies.

Besides, experts have warned of power outages, which could last several days in some places. Airlines have also issued advisories, urging passengers to prepare for cancellations, delays or changes to their flight schedules.

German Chancellor Merz said the current form of US President Trump’s “Board of Peace” prevented Germany from joining for “constitutional reasons.” But Merz said he was open to “new formats” of cooperation with the US.

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said he is open to new dialogue with the United States, but added that he would not join US President Donald Trump’s so-called Board of Peace as it currently stands.

“We are, of course, ready to explore other forms, new forms of cooperation with the United States of America,” he said at a press conference in Rome on Friday.

Merz had previously expressed his willingness to participate in such a body to Trump weeks ago, but he added that what it has now become cannot be accepted by Germany in its current structure “on constitutional grounds.”

Germany ready for more cooperation with US

The rejection adds Germany to the list of traditional US allies that said they would not join the board, including France, the UK and Spain.

Saudi Arabia, Hungary and Qatar have confirmed their spots on the US board, which some observers see as a way to circumvent the United Nations.

Source : https://www.dw.com/en/merz-says-germany-wont-join-trumps-board-of-peace/a-75633920

After identifying a suspected agent, Germany has expelled a Russian embassy employee and summoned the Russian ambassador.

The incident is emblematic of the threats that the West, Germany and other EU countries see coming from Russia. Above all, it highlights how close potential Russian agents can get to politicians in Germany.

In a press photo released by the Ukrainian government, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is sitting next to German Chancellor Friedrich Merz during an economic event in Berlin in December. Just two rows behind Zelenskyy and Merz sits the woman who has now been exposed as a possible spy for Russia.

At the time, the German government had gathered numerous European heads of state in the German capital to discuss a possible end to Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine.

On Wednesday of this week (January 21, 2026), German-Ukrainian Ilona W.* was arrested in Berlin. She is alleged to have been in contact with an employee of the Russian embassy since at least November 2023: “On various occasions, the accused provided him with information relating to the war between the Russian Federation and Ukraine, among other things,” the Federal Prosecutor’s Office said.

Purporting to promote international understanding

The authorities also explained what this could mean in concrete terms: Ilona W. is alleged to have collected information about participants in “high-profile political events.” And she is said to have passed on information to her contact about the locations of the German arms industry, drone tests and planned deliveries of drones to Ukraine. The woman was acting as a kind of lobbyist in political circles in Berlin, was known to be very energetic and had access to many high-level events — as the picture from December shows.

According to information from, among others, the Berlin studio of broadcaster ARD, Ilona W. was chairwoman of a “federal organization” based in Berlin. According to its own statements, the organization is an umbrella association for “binational associations” promoting international understanding. A former lawmaker of the center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD) is also said to sit on the board of trustees.

Investigations are also being conducted against two former members of the German Armed Forces, the Bundeswehr, who knew the alleged spy personally. They are suspected of having given her official information. However, it is still unclear whether they knew that the information was apparently going to the Russian secret service. According to the Federal Ministry of Defense, one of them is a former senior officer who recently retired, and the other is a senior civil servant who left the Bundeswehr more than 15 years ago.

Germany expels Russian embassy employee

The German Foreign Office summoned Russian Ambassador Sergey Nechayev. Nechayev was informed that one of the embassy’s diplomatically accredited employees had been spying and had to leave the country. The man, who according to the news agency dpa is believed to be the deputy military attaché, may therefore have been Ilona W.’s contact.

The Foreign Office stated: “The ambassador was informed in no uncertain terms on behalf of the Foreign Minister that espionage activities in Germany will not be tolerated by the Federal Republic of Germany and will have consequences.” And Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul himself added during a trip to Africa: “We are watching very closely what Russia is doing, and we are taking action against it.”

Russian Embassy: ‘A ridiculous provocation’

The Russian embassy’s response was not long in coming. The statement described the accusations as a “ridiculous, hastily cobbled together provocation.” The embassy told AFP news that the accusations were apparently intended to discredit the Russian diplomatic mission as part of the “spy hysteria actively cultivated in Germany.” It went on to say, “We have made it clear that Berlin’s unfriendly actions will not go unanswered.”

Russian intelligence activities are being monitored more and more frequently in Germany. Bundeswehr barracks have been under surveillance, and weapons transport routes supporting Ukraine have been spied on. Experts believe that Russia’s espionage activities in Germany have long since reached the same level as during the Cold War prior to the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989.

In May of last year, Germany’s domestic intelligence agency conducted an investigation into Russian activities in Germany: “As Russia has become less hesitant to take action against Germany, the increase in incidents in Europe, including those that attract public attention, also demonstrates that Russia regards the use of force as a legitimate means,” the agency wrote in its report.

Source : https://www.dw.com/en/germany-investigates-russian-espionage-case/a-75631642

The Duke of Sussex has called for the sacrifices of Nato troops to be “spoken about truthfully and with respect”, after the US president claimed allies stayed “a little back” from the front lines in Afghanistan.

“I served there. I made lifelong friends there. And I lost friends there,” Prince Harry, who was twice deployed to the country, said on Friday as he paid tribute to Nato troops killed in the conflict, including 457 UK service personnel.

The prince was reacting to controversial comments made by Donald Trump in an interview on Thursday.

Trump’s words have drawn condemnation from international allies, with Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer calling them “insulting and frankly appalling” .

The UK and other nations joined the US in Afghanistan after Nato’s collective security clause was invoked following the 9/11 attacks.

Prince Harry said: “In 2001, Nato invoked Article 5 for the first – and only – time in history. It meant that every allied nation was obliged to stand with the United States in Afghanistan, in pursuit of our shared security. Allies answered that call.”

He added: “Thousands of lives were changed forever. Mothers and fathers buried sons and daughters. Children were left without a parent. Families are left carrying the cost.

“Those sacrifices deserve to be spoken about truthfully and with respect, as we all remain united and loyal to the defence of diplomacy and peace.”

The duke’s comments follow Trump’s Fox News interview in which he said: “We’ve never needed them. We have never really asked anything of them.

“They’ll say they sent some troops to Afghanistan… and they did, they stayed a little back, a little off the front lines.”

The president also said he was “not sure” the military alliance would be there for the US “if we ever needed them”.

In the UK, Trump’s remarks were condemned across the UK’s political divide.

Shortly before the prince’s statement, Sir Keir gave his own reaction saying if he himself had “misspoken in that way” he would “certainly apologise”.

Sir Keir said: “I will never forget their courage, their bravery and the sacrifice they made for their country.

“There were many also who were injured, some with life-changing injuries.

“I consider President Trump’s remarks to be insulting and frankly appalling and I am not surprised they have caused such hurt to the loved ones of those who were killed or injured and, in fact, across the country.”

Outside the UK, ministers from foreign governments also criticised Trump’s remarks.

Poland’s foreign minister Radoslaw Sikorski, who was among 33,000 Polish troops who served on the frontline in Afghanistan, said: “No one has the right to mock the service of our soldiers”.

Canada’s Minister of National Defence David J McGuinty said that Canadian “men and women were on the ground from the beginning, not because we had to, but because it was the right thing to do.”

He said 158 of their troops “paid the ultimate price” for leading allied efforts in the Kandahar Province.

Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, former secretary general of Nato during the Afghanistan War, told the BBC World Service: “No American president should have the liberty to belittle their legacy and to insult the ones who are still grieving the fact that they didn’t come back alive from Afghanistan.

“What I would expect is a sincere apology from the president of the United States.”

In October 2001 the US invaded Afghanistan to oust the Taliban, whom they said were harbouring Osama Bin Laden and other al-Qaeda figures linked to the 9/11 attacks. Nato nations contributed troops and military equipment to the US-led war.

More than 3,500 coalition soldiers had died, about two-thirds of them Americans, as of 2021 when the US withdrew from the country. The UK suffered the second-highest number of military deaths in the conflict behind the US, which saw 2,461 fatalities.

Most of the 457 British troops who died serving in Afghanistan over a period of nearly 20 years were killed in Helmand – the scene of the heaviest fighting.

Hundreds more suffered injuries and lost limbs – including Cpl Andy Reid who lost both his legs and his right arm after stepping on an improvised explosive device (IED) in Afghanistan.

“Not a day goes by when we’re not in some kind of pain, physically or mentally reflecting on that conflict,” he told BBC Breakfast.

Reid recalled working with American soldiers during his time in Afghanistan, adding: “If they were on the front line and I was stood next to them, clearly we were on the front line as well.”

Diane Dernie, whose son Ben Parkinson suffered severe injuries when an Army Land Rover hit a mine near Musa Qala in 2006, said Trump’s words were “so insulting” and hard to hear.

The 41-year-old is currently recuperating after another operation, but Dernie told the BBC that Trump’s comments showed “a childish man trying to deflect from his own actions”.

Dernie called on Starmer to “stand up for his own armed forces” and call out the US president.

Her comments were put to the prime minister who replied: “I’ve made my position clear, and what I say to Diane is, if I had misspoken in that way or said those words, I would certainly apologise and I’d apologise to her.”

Giving a second interview to the BBC moments after Starmer’s statement, Dernie said the prime minister’s words were strong enough – but said he should go further.

“His words were exactly what we wanted to hear, but we need those words to be addressed directly to the president,” Dernie said. “I appreciate what Starmer has said, but they need to be said to Donald Trump.”

Throughout Friday, the leaders of the main Westminster political parties gave their reaction to Trump’s comments.

Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch said: “I spoke to parents of young men who have lost their lives. It is a disgrace to denigrate their memory like that.

“There is too much careless talk from President Trump. He clearly doesn’t know the history of what happened. We must not have these sorts of throwaway remarks.”

Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ed Davey criticised the US president’s remarks and said: “Trump avoided military service five times. How dare he question their sacrifice.”

Trump received five deferments from a military draft during the Vietnam War – four for academic reasons and one for bone spurs, a calcium build-up in the heels.

Reform UK leader Nigel Farage said: “Donald Trump is wrong. For 20 years our armed forces fought bravely alongside America’s in Afghanistan.”

American political and military figures have also expressed their anger and frustration over Trump’s Nato comments.

Former national security adviser Herbert Raymond McMaster, who served as senior US officer in Afghanistan, said British forces were engaged in counter-insurgency operations every day.

“I think it’s insulting to those who were fighting alongside of us,” McMaster told the BBC.

“What I would like him to say is to make amends by affirming our gratitude for our allies who fought alongside us, and especially those who made the ultimate sacrifice in a war that I think was important, obviously, to the future of all humanity.”

During his second term in office, Trump has repeatedly criticised Nato, often accusing its member states of not spending enough on defence.

In the last few weeks, Trump has made comments about acquiring Greenland – a semi-autonomous territory of fellow Nato ally Denmark.

Trump’s repeated remarks over ownership, threats of military action and tariffs against traditional European allies have rattled the transatlantic treaty.

The White House has remained pretty quiet on the outrage being expressed in Britain – partly because the story has not played big in the US, and because Trump has been otherwise occupied, not making his usual appearances in front of cameras to have questions thrown at him.

Source : https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/clym2l7d75eo

Canada’s Arctic is a massive, treacherous, and largely inhospitable place, stretched out over nearly 4 million square kilometres of territory – but with a small population roughly equal to Blackburn in England or Syracuse, New York.

“You can take a map of continental Europe, put it on the Canadian Arctic, and there’s room to spare,” Pierre Leblanc, the former commander of the Canadian Forces Northern Area told the BBC. “And that environment is extremely dangerous.”

Standing at the defence of that massive landmass is an aging string of early warning radars, eight staffed military bases and about 100 full-time Coast Guard personnel covering 162,000km of coast, about 60% of Canada’s total oceanfront.

The Arctic region is the scene of intense geopolitical competition, bordered by Russia and the US on either side of the North Pole – and increasingly attractive to China, which has declared itself a “near Arctic state” and vastly expanded its fleet of naval vessels and icebreakers.

Standing in the middle is Canada, whose population is a small fraction of the larger Arctic players.

Nearly four years after Arctic security was thrust into the headlines following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the defence of Canada’s far north has again been brought to the forefront of public consciousness by Donald Trump’s designs on Greenland, a self-governing part of the Kingdom of Denmark that the White House says is vital to safeguarding the US from would-be enemies abroad.

Canada’s Arctic has not gone unnoticed by the Trump administration, which has reportedly become increasingly concerned by perceived vulnerabilities to US adversaries, and in April signed an executive order underscoring American “commitment to ensuring both freedom of navigation and American domination in the Arctic waterways.”

The Canadian government, for its part, has sought to reassure the US and Nato allies that it is doing its part to protect the region.

Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Prime Minister Mark Carney said that Canada is working to secure “our shared objectives of security and prosperity in the Arctic” through “unprecedented” investments in radar systems, submarines, aircraft and “boots on the ground” in the region.

Col Leblanc, who spent a total of nine years in the Canadian Arctic, said those investments have marked a “major shift” in Arctic security, noting that increases in Canadian defence expenditure – from 2% to 5% of GDP by 2035 – have meant “real action” in terms of additional over-the-horizon radar and aircraft dedicated to the Arctic.

Much of this focus, he added, has been prompted by the Trump administration’s renewed focus on the Arctic and Greenland.

“[That] certainly helps the Canadian government move in the right direction,” Leblanc added.

Still, challenges persist, including limited port facilities and difficulties resupplying far-flung bases that are sometimes thousands of cold, empty miles apart.

While Canada and other US Nato allies have opposed the Trump’s administration bid to “take over” Greenland to protect the Arctic, several experts who spoke to the BBC agreed with the administration’s broad assessment that the need for additional defences in the region are urgently needed.

Troy Bouffard, the director of the Fairbanks, Alaska-based Center for Arctic Security and Resilience, said that while on-the-ground cooperation between the US and Canada in the Arctic “remains the envy of the world”, much of the existing defence infrastructure was designed to combat Cold War-era threats, rather than existing ones.

In particular, he warned of the prospect of hypersonic missiles that travel at least five times the speed of sound, making them much harder to detect and intercept than traditional ballistic missiles, which would follow predictable arcs over the North Pole.

Such a threat is no longer theoretical.

Russia has used hypersonic missiles in combat in Ukraine, including a January strike that saw the first operational use of the nuclear-capable “Oreshnik” missile that carries multiple warheads at approximately 10 times the speed of sound.

“That technology has changed everything for us. We have to relook at the entire North American defence system and re-do it,” he said. “What exists right now cannot defend against hypersonic cruise missiles, at all. Like 0%.”

Traditional ground-based radar systems, he added, “are not going to work” against these emerging technologies. Space-based satellites must also contend with coverage gaps in high latitudes, prompting a renewed focus and investments in over-the-horizon radar.

Notably, over-the-horizon technology – along with space-based sensors – form a key part of the Trump administration’s planned Golden Dome missile defence system for North America.

For now, it is unclear what role Canada will play in the Golden Dome, a project Trump said at Davos Canada should “be thankful for”.

On Friday, Trump posted on Truth Social that Canada was opposed to having the Golden Dome over Greenland “even though The Golden Dome would protect Canada. Instead, they voted in favor of doing business with China, who will ‘eat them up’ within the first year!”.

The BBC has contacted Carney’s office for comment.

Those negotiations have been strained by the often antagonistic relationship between the US and Canada, with Trump in May posting that Canada could pay $61bn to join the programme or become the 51st US state and join for free.

Trump’s remarks prompted Canada’s ambassador to the UN, Bob Rae, to compare it to a “protection racket”.

Despite tensions, Michael Byers, an expert in Arctic security at the University of British Columbia, said that American concerns over Arctic security, and their threats of tariffs, have helped prompt Canada’s government to re-focus on the Arctic.

“Whether or not American concerns are justified, there is a feeling in Ottawa that we have to satisfy [them],” he said. “No one takes the 51st state issue seriously, but what we do take seriously are the economic pressures that the US is able to impose.”

“The Canadian government is very aware of that possibility,” he added.

Source : https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c9vx0p77pn8o

Nicola Peltz and Victoria Beckham had issues with each other prior to the wedding drama cited by Brooklyn in his recent social media rant.

“They can’t stand each other and don’t talk,” a source close to the family told Page Six in August 2022, noting that trouble was already “brewing” prior to their April 2022 Florida nuptials.

“The build-up to the wedding was horrendous,” they added.

The source further claimed that Peltz, 31, didn’t want Victoria “to be any part of the planning, and she wouldn’t clue Victoria in on anything. Communication was minimal.”

The insider claimed there had been “non-stop petty drama” that was coming between the aspiring chef, 26, and his parents David, 50, and Victoria Beckham, 51.

At the time, the source claimed the former soccer star and fashion designer hadn’t “spoken to [Brooklyn] for months.”

Adding fuel to the fire, Brooklyn also shared a sultry cover of British magazine Tatler — dubbing his model wife “The New Mrs. Beckham” for their August 2022 issue.

The insiders hinted that perhaps the “Bates Motel” actress experienced jealousy over the former Spice Girl’s various successes, especially as she attempted to emerge from her shadow for her own nuptials.

Reps for Victoria, Brooklyn and Nicola Peltz did not immediately return Page Six’s request for comment on Friday.

The Beckham family feud came to a head on Monday, when the aspiring chef took to Instagram Stories with a six-page rant directed at David and Victoria.

Among their offenses, he claimed, were cancelling “making Nicola’s [wedding] dress in the eleventh hour despite how excited she was to wear her design, forcing her to urgently find a new dress,” and controlling “narratives in the press about our family.”

Brooklyn also accused his mother of “hijacking” his first dance with Peltz before dancing “very inappropriately on me in front of everyone.”

He added, “I’ve never felt more uncomfortable or humiliated in my entire life.”

A guest at the soirée previously told Page Six that after Marc Anthony, who performed at the wedding, invited “the most beautiful woman in the room” to the stage, Victoria “got up on stage and wrapped her arms around Brooklyn” and “nuzzled into his neck.”

“She was dancing with him very inappropriately,” they told us, adding, “She took that moment from Nicola, that is the God’s truth.”

However, a butler who also attended the nuptials told the Sun on Friday that Nicola — who reportedly was enraged that Victoria was called up as the “most beautiful woman in the room” for the first dance — issued an ultimatum to her new husband.

Source : https://pagesix.com/2026/01/23/celebrity-news/victoria-beckham-and-nicola-peltz-couldnt-stand-each-other-long-before-wedding-drama/

US President Donald Trump has sharply criticised Canada over its reported opposition to his proposed “Golden Dome” missile defence system in Greenland, accusing Ottawa of undermining its own security while deepening ties with China.

In a post on Truth Social, Trump claimed the expansive missile shield would help protect Canada, despite what he described as Canadian resistance to the project.

“Canada is against the Golden Dome being built over Greenland, even though the Golden Dome would protect Canada,” Trump wrote. “Instead, they voted in favour of doing business with China, who will ‘eat them up’ within the first year.”

The remarks mark the latest escalation in Trump’s increasingly combative rhetoric toward America’s northern neighbour, folding defence policy, trade tensions and long-standing political grievances into a single attack.

Trump’s comments followed Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney’s recent visit to Beijing, aimed at resetting economic ties with China, Canada’s second-largest trading partner after the United States.

Source : https://www.news18.com/world/china-will-eat-them-up-trump-slams-canada-over-opposition-to-greenland-golden-dome-9852853.html

Mette Frederiksen said she was visiting to show “strong support” to the people of Greenland. Her visit comes amid a turbulent week in which President Trump backed down on his bid to forcibly annex the Arctic island.

Denmark’s prime minister, Mette Frederiksen, arrived in Greenland on Friday in a show of solidarity for the Arctic island that US President Donald Trump still has his sights firmly set on.

It’s been a turbulent week that has seen Trump back down from threats to seize the Arctic island and agree to negotiationswhile also putting relations with European allies to the test.

Trump has repeatedly stated that the US “needs” Greenland for its “national security,” pointing to his claims — without providing evidence — that the island is “covered with Chinese and Russian ships all over the place.”

Frederiksen welcomed by Greenland’s PM
Frederiksen touched down in Greenland’s capital, Nuuk, and was welcomed on the tarmac by Greenlandic Prime Minister Jens-Frederik Nielsen, with the two embracing, before continuing inside for talks.

Earlier in the day, Fredriksen spoke with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte in Brussels on how security could be boosted in the region.

“We are preparing the next steps,” ‌Frederiksen told reporters ⁠while walking alongside Nielsen in central Nuuk. “I’m first and foremost here to show our strong support for Greenland’s people as a difficult time.”

Trump seeking ‘total access’ to Greenland
Trump on Thursday said that details of his bid to gain “total access” to the semi-autonomous Danish territory were being worked out.

Trump and Rutte agreed on what the US leader called a “framework,” although the details of what this involves have yet to be disclosed.

Danish Foreign Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen said as much on Friday, pointing out that no detailed plan had been hammered out between Trump and Rutte, but rather there was a “framework for a future agreement.”

He said, “Instead of those drastic ideas about needing to own Greenland… (Trump) now wishes to negotiate a solution.”

Source : https://www.dw.com/en/denmarks-pm-visits-greenland-to-show-support/a-75633439

The Mexican government is reviewing whether to keep sending oil to Cuba amid growing fears within President Claudia Sheinbaum’s administration that Mexico could face reprisals from the United States over the policy, which is a vital lifeline for the Communist-run Caribbean island, according to three sources familiar with the discussions.

A U.S. blockade of oil tankers in Venezuela in December and the dramatic capture of President Nicolas Maduro this month have halted Venezuelan oil shipments to Cuba, leaving Mexico as the single-largest supplier to the island that suffers from energy shortages and mass blackouts.

Mexico’s pivotal role in sending oil to Cuba has also put the U.S.’ southern neighbor in Washington’s crosshairs. President Donald Trump has stressed Cuba is “ready to fall” and said in a January 11 Truth Social post: “THERE WILL BE NO MORE OIL OR MONEY GOING TO CUBA – ZERO!”

Publicly, Sheinbaum has said Mexico will continue oil shipments to Cuba, saying they are based on longterm contracts and considered international aid. But the senior Mexican government sources said the policy is under internal review as anxiety grows within Sheinbaum’s cabinet that the shipments could antagonize Trump.

Mexico is trying to negotiate a review of the USMCA North American trade pact, while also persuading Washington it is doing enough to combat drug cartels and that U.S. military action against the groups on Mexican territory is neither welcome nor needed.

The government review of Cuban oil shipments has not been previously reported, and the sources requested anonymity to discuss the sensitive matter. It remains unclear what ultimate decision the Mexican government might take, with sources saying a complete halt, a reduction, and a continuation in full are all still on the table.

The Mexican presidency told Reuters the country “has always been in solidarity with the people of Cuba” and added that shipping oil to Cuba and a separate agreement to pay for the services of Cuban doctors “are sovereign decisions.” The Cuban government did not respond to a request for comment.

A White House official said: “As the President stated, Cuba is now failing on its own volition … there will be no more oil or money going to Cuba from Venezuela, and he strongly suggests Cuba makes a deal before it is too late.”

LAND ATTACKS ON CARTELS
In recent weeks, Trump has ratcheted up pressure on Mexico, saying the country is run by the cartels and that ground attacks against them could be imminent. Sheinbaum has repeatedly stressed that any unilateral U.S. military action in Mexican territory would be a grave breach of the country’s sovereignty.

“There is a growing fear that the United States could take unilateral action on our territory,” one of the sources added.

During a phone call last week, Trump questioned Sheinbaum about crude and fuel shipments to Cuba and the presence of thousands of Cuban doctors in Mexico, two of the sources said. Sheinbaum responded that the shipments are “humanitarian aid” and that the doctors deal “is in full compliance” with Mexican law, the sources familiar with the call said. They added Trump did not directly urge Mexico to halt the oil deliveries.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/mexico-weighs-stopping-oil-shipments-cuba-amid-concerns-trump-retaliation-2026-01-23

Earlier ‌in ‌the day, Trump met ‍Zelenskyy on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Switzerland.

President Donald Trump ‌said ⁠on Thursday ‌both Russian President Vladimir Putin and ​Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy have ‌said ‌they would like to make ⁠a deal to end the ⁠nearly ⁠four-year-old war.

Source : https://www.deccanherald.com/world/trump-says-putin-zelenskyy-want-to-make-a-deal-to-end-the-war-3871820

The Big Apple’s gonna be buried!

A fast-approaching deadly winter storm is expected to dump up to 18 inches of snow on the New York City area early Sunday — bringing a bone-chilling temps and a travel nightmare across the tri-state.

“The roads are going to be horrendous from Sunday on,” said AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Tom Kines.

“There’s no travel that will be safe, it’s going to be a disaster.”

The snow is expect to start between midnight and 8 a.m. Sunday and continue into Monday — snarling roads and grounding airplane flights, Kines said.

Forecasters are predicting up to 16 inches for New York City and up to 18 inches for the Hudson Valley — potentially the most snowfall there since the Blizzard of 1996.

Don’t expect to go anywhere or get anything done Sunday, and possibly Monday, Kines said.

“If there’s a foot or more, the city is going to be at a standstill. Travel by land will be slow at best if not impossible and airports will be shut down,” he said.

Snowfall in other parts of the US such as Dallas and Charlotte will likely cause flight delays in New York City and all over the country, Kines said.

“There’ll be a huge domino effect on airport this weekend,” he said. “I’m sure there’s gonna be many, many cancelations and delays.”

Nationally, the historic winter storm is set to bring “considerable disruption” to millions of people in roughly 35 states, with areas east of the Rockies hardest hit, forecasters said.

The snowfall — which comes as the city shivers through frigid temperatures in the teens — is forecast to stop by around noon Monday at the latest, Kines said.

And it’s going to stick around, too. Temps will dip to 11 degrees Friday and aren’t expected to rise above freezing until Wednesday, Feb. 4.

“It’s going to be a dry, fluffy snow, which is good for those who have to shovel, so that’s one bright spot,” he said.

If the Big Apple gets at least a foot of snow, it would be the most in the city since February 2021, when 16.8 inches fell in Central Park over a two-day period.

The more likely scenario, Kines said the storm could move north and blanket the city with 4 to 8 inches.

Overall, 8 to 12 inches will fall around the tri-state region — including in the Hudson Valley, nearly all of New Jersey and Connecticut, according to meteorologists.

Still, despite the warnings, Mayor Zohran Mamdani said the jury is still out on just how badly the city will be hit.

“We are expecting precipitation to begin late Saturday or early Sunday and to possibly last into Monday. The forecast is predicting anywhere from 3 to 12 inches of snow,” Mamdani said at a press conference Thursday.

“It is entirely possible that we get less than three inches — and it is just as possible that we get over a foot,” he said. “New Yorkers know that forecasts do not always get it right.”

He said the city will begin a “pre-snow treatment” on Friday to prepare for the storm.

“What that means is that we will brine all highways, major streets, and bike lanes to mitigate snow and ice accumulation, and we are also going to accelerate cleanup once the storm has passed,” he said.

He added that “roughly 2,000 sanitation workers” will work 12-hour shifts Saturday to “remove snow around the clock.”

“ As we speak, our sanitation fleet is being transformed into a snow-clearing fleet,” he said.

New Yorkers on Thursday scrambled to buy shovels and sidewalk salt to prepare for the storm as some Manhattan shops were nearly sold out.

“They’re out of Icemelt, so it’s a little bit of a panic,” said one Manhattan building super, who settled for a 12-pound jar of another brand. “That’s all they had. This is enough for now.”

An employee at Home Depot on West 23rd Street near Fifth Avenue in Manhattan said the store was low on rock salt because there was a big demand for it in other parts of the country.

Source : https://nypost.com/2026/01/22/us-news/monster-storm-could-dump-up-to-16-inches-of-snow-on-nyc/

Three people have been killed and another injured after a shooting in a small town in New South Wales (NSW), Australia.

Emergency services were called to a residential area in Lake Cargelligo at about 16:40 local time (05:40 GMT) on Thursday.

Police are searching for Julian Ingram, 37, in connection with the killings.

A man and woman were found shot dead in a vehicle, and a second shooting soon afterwards killed a woman and left a man in a “critical condition” in hospital, police said.

Australian newspaper The Sydney Morning Herald reported that the incident was a suspected domestic violence attack and that one of the victims is believed to be Ingram’s former partner.

Andrew Holland, NSW police assistant commissioner, declined to comment on the relationship between the gunman and the victims.

The public was urged to remain indoors and multiple crime scenes have been established, he told reporters.

NSW police later released a photograph of Ingram and urged the public to get in contact with any information on his whereabouts.

“Any death in a small country town is confronting, but again, a scene where you have people shot by firearms is obviously going to make people very, very tense and very concerned,” Holland said.

Source : https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c4g00mv29j5o

Hollywood has revealed the nominations for this year’s Oscars, which will honour the film industry’s finest stars and movies from the past 12 months.

Sinners leads the way with a record 16 nominations, breaking the record for the most Oscar nominations, which was previously held by All About Eve (1950), Titanic (1997) and La La Land (2016).

One Battle After Another is next with 13 nominations, while Marty Supreme, Frankenstein and Sentimental Value are next with nine, and Hamnet has eight.

The awards will take place on 15 March, hosted by US comedian Conan O’Brien.

Best picture

• Bugonia
• Frankenstein
• F1
• Hamnet
• Marty Supreme
• One Battle After Another
• The Secret Agent
• Sentimental Value
• Sinners
• Train Dreams

Best actor

• Timothée Chalamet – Marty Supreme
• Leonardo DiCaprio – One Battle After Another
• Ethan Hawke – Blue Moon
• Michael B Jordan – Sinners
• Wagner Moura – The Secret Agent

Best actress

• Jessie Buckley – Hamnet
• Rose Byrne – If I Had Legs I’d Kick You
• Kate Hudson – Song Sung Blue
• Renate Reinsve – Sentimental Value
• Emma Stone – Bugonia

Best supporting actress

• Elle Fanning – Sentimental Value
• Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas – Sentimental Value
• Amy Madigan – Weapons
• Wunmi Mosaku – Sinners
• Teyana Taylor – One Battle After Another

Best supporting actor

• Benicio del Toro – One Battle After Another
• Jacob Elordi – Frankenstein
• Delroy Lindo – Sinners
• Sean Penn – One Battle After Another
• Stellan Skarsgård – Sentimental Value

Best director

• Paul Thomas Anderson – One Battle After Another
• Ryan Coogler – Sinners
• Josh Safdie – Marty Supreme
• Joachim Trier – Sentimental Value
• Chloé Zhao – Hamnet

Best adapted screenplay

• Bugonia
• Frankenstein
• Hamnet
• One Battle After Another
• Train Dreams

Best original screenplay

• Blue Moon
• It Was Just an Accident
• Marty Supreme
• Sentimental Value
• Sinners

Best original song

• Dear Me – Diane Warren: Relentless
• Golden – KPop Demon Hunters
• I Lied to You – Sinners
• Sweet Dreams of Joy – Viva Verdi!
• Train Dreams – Train Dreams

Best original score

• Bugonia
• Frankenstein
• Hamnet
• One Battle After Another
• Sinners

Best international feature

• It Was Just an Accident
• Sentimental Value
• Sirât
• The Secret Agent
• The Voice of Hind Rajab

Best animated feature

• Arco
• Elio
• KPop Demon Hunters
• Little Amélie or the Character of Rain
• Zootopia 2

Best documentary feature

• Come See Me in the Good Light
• Cutting Through the Rocks
• Mr. Nobody Against Putin
• The Alabama Solution
• The Perfect Neighbor

Best costume design

• Avatar: Fire and Ash
• Frankenstein
• Hamnet
• Marty Supreme
• Sinners

Best make-up and hairstyling

• Frankenstein
• Kokuho
• Sinners
• The Smashing Machine
• The Ugly Stepsister

Best production design

• Frankenstein
• Hamnet
• Marty Supreme
• One Battle After Another
• Sinners

Best sound

• Frankenstein
• F1
• One Battle After Another
• Sinners
• Sirât

Best film editing

• F1
• Marty Supreme
• One Battle After Another
• Sentimental Value
• Sinners

Best cinematography

• Frankenstein
• Marty Supreme
• One Battle After Another
• Sinners
• Train Dreams

Best visual effects

• Avatar: Fire and Ash
• F1
• Jurassic World Rebirth
• Sinners
• The Lost Bus

Best live action short

• A Friend of Dorothy
• Butcher’s Stain
• Jane Austen’s Period Drama
• The Singers
• Two People Exchanging Saliva

Best animated short

• Butterfly
• Forevergreen
• Retirement Plan
• The Girl Who Cried Pearls
• The Three Sisters

Source : https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/ckgyyqkn0yvo

Chancellor Friedrich Merz and Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni are showing closer ties than their countries have in years. Meloni is no longer seen as a right-wing outsider, taking on a role as mediator with Donald Trump.

Bilateral relations between Germany and Italy are better than they have been in a long time. “Merz and Meloni – is a new duo emerging in the EU?” asked the German daily Handelsblatt this week.

The latest escalation between the European Union and the United States over US President Donald Trump’s demand for Greenland has added significance to Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s visit to Italy this week.

For German politicians, France has long been the closest partner in Europe. When Giorgia Meloni became leader of a right-wing coalition in Rome in 2022, she was met with skepticism by Germany’s center-left government at the time.

The first woman to head an Italian government is the leader of Fratelli d’Italia party (Brothers of Italy), which is sometimes described as right-wing extremist, sometimes as post-fascist, and at the very least as right-wing nationalist. The party is — or was — regarded by German centrist politicians as roughly equivalent to the far-right populist Alternative for Germany (AfD): a party they want nothing to do with.

Meloni maintains contacts with Trump and the EU

Meloni, who has openly expressed admiration for Italy’s dictator Benito Mussolini, initially confirmed this impression. Her slogan “God, Fatherland, and Family” is the motto of Meloni’s party, reflecting its traditionalist stance based on Christian identity, national pride and traditional family structures, and opposition to globalism. Meloni was initially critical of the EU and forged close relations with US President Donald Trump. Pictures of the two of them, smiling broadly, demonstrating how well they get along, further cemented Meloni’s outsider position in the EU.

Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orban, another of Trump’s favorites, is also an outsider in the EU. But there are crucial differences. Unlike Orban, Meloni supports Ukraine in its war of defense against the Russian invasion and has spoken out in favor of making Ukraine a candidate for EU membership. Italy’s economic weight — it is the third-largest economy in the eurozone after Germany and France — also means that other EU governments can not afford to ignore her.

Meanwhile Meloni, who previously wanted to lead Italy out of the EU, has become increasingly pragmatic and constructive at the European level. This has also been recognized by Germany’s conservative-led government, for example, when Meloni recently secured the necessary majority of votes for the free trade agreement between the EU and the South American Mercosur countries. Germany’s longtime close partner, France, opposed the agreement, but was outvoted.

Merz and Meloni attempt to de-escalate

Over the years, Meloni has established a strong position that is recognized by Trump, Merz and other European heads of government. Last spring, she attempted to mediate in the customs dispute between the US and the EU.

Most recently Trump threatened punitive tariffs on anyone opposed to his acquisition of the Danish island of Greenland, although he backtracked again at the World Economic Forum in Davos. While the threat was still in the air and other European politicians, including German ones, were brandishing the cudgel of counter-tariffs, both Merz and Meloni warned against a total rift with Trump.

Both fear that a trade war would cause serious economic damage to their battered, heavily indebted economies. They worry even more about losing the US as a protective power.

There is clearly a “communication problem” between Trump and the Europeans, Meloni said a few days ago. That was putting mildly what was probably the biggest crisis in transatlantic relations since the end of World War II. Now, according to Meloni, it is necessary to “resume dialogue and avoid escalation.” Merz has said much the same thing.

Germany was affected by Trump’s tariff threats, Italy was not

In the heated atmosphere, Italy had offered to mediate. German government spokesman Stefan Kornelius welcomed the offer. “The Italian prime minister has also spoken to the US president on the phone. That is always very helpful,” he said.

Unlike Germany, Italy had not contributed any soldiers to the reconnaissance mission to Greenland sent by several NATO countries. As a result, it was not affected by the US tariff threat.

The governments in Berlin and Rome both want to work together to promote competitiveness and reduce bureaucracy within the EU. In a position paper, they warn that the European Union risks falling behind the US and China if swift action is not taken.

In his speech in Davos on Thursday, Merz said that the joint German-Italian proposals would be presented at a special EU summit that he initiated, due to take place in February.

Source : https://www.dw.com/en/merz-and-meloni-reshape-germany-italy-relations/a-75607617

Police in India have arrested a woman who accused a man of sexual misconduct on a bus on social media, who then took his own life soon after. His family accused the woman of engagement farming with a spurious claim.

The case has evoked strong responses on both sides and a debate on the dangers of so-called “trial by social media” or by media more generally.

Local police launched a case on Monday investigating possible abetment of suicide. The Kerala state Human Rights Commission also ordered a police probe into the incident.

Claim and counter-claim

The 35-year-old woman posted a video online, which attracted more than 2 million views before she removed it from public availability, in which she said the man “deliberately touched me without my consent” on a public bus. She accused him of touching her breast with his elbow.

“This was not an accident or a misunderstanding. It was a clear violation of my sexual boundaries,” she said in the video.

In a country where sexual misconduct is widespread, the post attracted considerable attention and, in some cases, led to severe criticism of the man.

Two days after the video was published, the 42-year-old’s parents found him hanging in their house. His mother said he had been deeply affected by the public attention and had not eaten for two days and that he died by suicide the day after his birthday. She filed a criminal complaint, alleging that the claims against her son were baseless and designed to gain social media attention.

His accuser later posted another video defending her actions, but subsequently also made that private. Her more recent public posts on Instagram received an array of sometimes highly critical comments, including some repeatedly calling for “justice.”

Source : https://www.dw.com/en/india-woman-arrested-over-suicide-of-man-she-accused/a-75610488

EU wants to revive trade ties with the US, but warned the bloc will stand up for its interests. It also announced after an emergency summit that it will double its investment in Greenland.

European Council President Antonio Costa has said that the EU leaders believe “it’s very important to preserve and cherish our transatlantic partnership.”

He made the comments after chairing an emergency summit in Brussels late on Thursday.

The evening meeting was called to reassess ties with United States over President Donald Trump’s treats to annex the semi-autonomous Danish territory of Greenland and impose tariffs on select EU nations.

But on the eve of the summit, while attending the World Economic Forum in Davos, Trump suspended his tariff threats and said he wouldn’t use force to take the Arctic island.

EU leaders to turn focus on implementing trade deal with US

The summit didn’t make any decision. But Costa said the priority now must be to implement the EU-US trade deal agreed in July, 2025.

The US is the EU’s biggest trading partner. “The goal remains the effective stability of the trade relations,” Costa told reporters.

At the same time, Costa warned that the EU “will continue to stand up for its interests and will defend itself, its member states, its citizens and its companies against any form of coercion.”

EU aims to double financial support to Greenland

Speaking after the summit, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has admitted that Europe has invested “too little in the Arctic and the security of the Arctic.”

In the next EU budget from 2028, the Commission also wants to double financial support for Greenland, she said.

She said her team “will soon put forward a comprehensive package of investments,” in Greenland without elaborating what these could be.

Merz ‘grateful’ for sudden climbdown in Davos

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz welcomed Trump’s apparent U-turn.

“I am very grateful that President Trump has distanced himself from his original plans to take over Greenland, and I am also grateful that he has refrained from imposing additional tariffs on February 1,” Merz told reporters ahead of the summit.

Merz also said that the EU countries “will have to strengthen the resilience and robustness of the European Union” going forward.

Denmark calls for permanent NATO presence in Arctic region

Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen repeated her country’s call for an intensified NATO military presence in the Arctic region and the semi-autonomous territory of Greenland, in response to Trump’s claims of US control being necessary to fix perceived security shortfalls.

“We need a permanent presence from NATO in the Arctic region, including around Greenland,” Frederiksen told reporters. Like leaders in Greenland, she reiterated that sovereignty was a red line, but indicated a willingness to discuss further cooperation with the US.

“It’s clear for everybody that we are a sovereign state ‍and we cannot negotiate about that. But of ​course we can discuss with the US how we ⁠can ​strengthen our common cooperation on security in ‌the ‌arctic region,” she said.

The US already has extensive rights to military access and construction in Greenland dating back the better part of a century. Trump has touted a “total access” deal in which the US will get “everything we wanted” at no cost, but has not gone into detail or explained how this differs from the status quo.

NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte told the Reuters news agency that Western allies would step up their presence in the region under the deal, but did not flesh out how.

Relief tempered with caution

EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said that despite Trump’s change of tack, there was plenty for European leaders to discuss.

“I think everybody’s relieved by the recent announcements,” she said. “We have also seen that in this one-year period, we are ready for a lot of unpredictability.”

“We need to still discuss our plans for different scenarios because everything could change,” she added, pointing out that neither EU members nor the United States benefited from unpredictability in transatlantic relations. “Every kind of disagreement that allies have, like Europe and America, is just benefiting our adversaries who are looking and enjoying the view.”

Johnny Depp is the latest celebrity to be dragged into the drama surrounding the Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni legal drama.

Documents obtained by TMZ on Thursday revealed the name-drop in an August 2024 text exchange between Lively’s husband, Ryan Reynolds, and his talent agent Warren Zavala, in which they discussed the ongoing case.

“It’s this guy’s incredible ego,” Zavala allegedly wrote of Baldoni. “It feels like he’s laying a trap if her truth surfaces, while promoting a narrative digitally.”

“Yeah. But honestly, someone is just gonna tell a journalist the real deal and it’s gonna blow up in his face,” the “Free Guy” star replied.

“One would think,” Zavala then responded, noting that “the truth does become muddled sometimes.”

“That’s why I’m concerned if he’s laying a trap,” the talent agent continued. “I hope this fraud s–t weasel is exposed. I just want to protect our downside. The movie working is everything. Let’s see if the noise subsides.”

Along with a link to media coverage over the “It Ends With Us” stars battling over a final cut to the movie, Zavala wrote, “This is all spin. I think we let it burn.”

Reynolds then responded, “How’d that work out for Depp??” referencing the “Pirates of the Caribbean” star’s infamous defamation court battle with Amber Heard.

Zavala wrote that the case “Cratered both of them ultimately” before reportedly slamming Baldoni as an “egotistical s–t weasel with a god complex” and Reynolds labeling the director a “human rounding error.”

Depp and Heard’s case — in which the “Edward Scissorhands” star sued his ex-wife for defamation — ended in 2022 with Depp being awarded $10.35 million in punitive damages, and Heard awarded $2 million in damages in her counterclaim.

The “Aquaman” star has since relocated to Madrid, Spain, where she’s raising her three children, and Depp has continued to forge ahead with appearances at the Cannes and San Sebastian film festivals in recent years.

Reps for Depp, Reynolds, Lively, Baldoni, and Zavala did not immediately return Page Six’s requests for comment.

Depp’s is the most recent celebrity name to show up in recently unsealed documents related to the Lively and Baldoni case.

Jameela Jamil called the “Gossip Girl” alum a “suicide bomber” and a “villain” in 2024 texts to a publicist obtained via court docs by the Daily Mail on Thursday — and a source close to the matter subsequently told Page Six that “The Good Place” star’s comments were “disappointing.”

Page Six also obtained texts between Lively and Taylor Swift — also from 2024 — that revealed the “Opalite” hitmaker star felt distanced from Lively as the legal battle intensified.

Source : https://pagesix.com/2026/01/22/celebrity-news/ryan-reynolds-cites-johnny-depp-in-texts-about-blake-lively-justin-baldoni-drama/

President Donald Trump said on Thursday he had secured total and permanent U.S. access to Greenland in a deal with NATO, whose head said allies would have to step up their commitment to Arctic security to ward off threats from Russia and China.
News of a framework deal came as Trump backed off tariff threats against Europe and ruled out taking Greenland by force, bringing a degree of respite in what was brewing to be the biggest rupture in transatlantic ties in decades.

Trump’s U-turn triggered a rebound in European markets and a return toward record highs for Wall Street’s main indexes, but also raised questions about how much damage had already been done to transatlantic ties and business confidence.
Details of any agreement were unclear and Denmark insisted its sovereignty over the island was not up for discussion. EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said the bloc’s U.S. relations had “taken a big blow” in the past week, as EU leaders met for an emergency summit.
Greenland’s Prime Minister Jens-Frederik Nielsen welcomed Trump’s comments but said he was still in the dark on many aspects.

“I don’t know what there is in the agreement, or the deal, about my country,” he told reporters in the capital Nuuk.
“We are ready to discuss a lot of things and we are ready to negotiate a better partnership and so on. But sovereignty is a red line,” he said, when asked about reports that Trump was seeking control of areas around U.S. military bases in Greenland as part of a wider deal.
“We cannot cross the red lines. We have to respect our territorial integrity. We have to respect international law and sovereignty.”
Speaking to reporters aboard Air Force One on his return from the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Trump said a new deal was being negotiated that would be “much more generous to the United States, so much more generous.”
He skirted questions on sovereignty, but said: “We have to have the ability to do exactly what we want to do.”

Earlier Trump told Fox Business Network the deal would essentially bring “total access” for the United States.
“There’s no end, there’s no time limit.”
A source familiar with the matter said NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte and Trump had agreed in Davos on further talks between the U.S., Denmark and Greenland on updating a 1951 agreement that governs U.S. military access and presence on the Arctic island.
The framework they discussed also calls for prohibiting Chinese and Russian investments in Greenland, the person said.
Another source familiar with the matter said what had been agreed was “a frame on which to build,” adding that “anything being reported on specific details is speculative.”
Rutte told Reuters in Davos it was now up to NATO’s senior commanders to work through the details of extra security requirements.
“I have no doubt we can do this quite fast. Certainly, I would hope for 2026, I hope even early in 2026,” he said.

DENMARK SAYS SITUATION REMAINS DIFFICULT

Trump’s ambition to wrest sovereignty over Greenland from fellow NATO member Denmark has threatened to blow apart the alliance that has underpinned Western security since the end of World War Two and reignite a trade war with Europe.
Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said no negotiations had been held with NATO regarding the sovereignty of Greenland, a semi-autonomous territory of Denmark.

“It is still a difficult and serious situation, but progress has also been made in the sense that we have now got things where they need to be. Namely that we can discuss how we promote common security in the Arctic region,” she said.
Speaking later ahead of the emergency summit of EU leaders, Frederiksen called for a “permanent presence of NATO in the Arctic region, including around Greenland.”
Kallas said “disagreements that allies have between them, like Europe and America, are just benefiting our adversaries who are looking and enjoying the view.”
Finnish President Alexander Stubb said he hoped allies could put together a plan to boost Arctic security by a NATO summit in Ankara in July.
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer told Rutte on Thursday that the UK stood ready to play its full part in ensuring security in the Arctic, a spokesperson said.

MILITARY AND MINERALS

After meeting with Rutte, Trump said there could be a deal that satisfies his desire for a “Golden Dome” missile-defence system and access to critical minerals while blocking what he says are Russia and China’s ambitions in the Arctic.
Rutte said minerals exploitation was not discussed in his meeting with Trump. Specific negotiations over the Arctic island would continue between the United States, Denmark and Greenland itself, he said.
The 1951 agreement established the U.S. right to construct military bases in Greenland and move around freely in Greenlandic territory. This is still the case as long as Denmark and Greenland are informed of its actions. Washington has a base at Pituffik in northern Greenland.
“It is important to clarify that the U.S. had 17 bases during the Cold War and much greater activity. So that is already possible now under the current agreement,” said Marc Jacobsen, a professor at the Royal Danish Defence College.
“I think there will be concrete discussions about Golden Dome, and I think there will be concrete discussions about Russia and China not being welcome in Greenland.”
China’s Foreign Ministry told Reuters on Friday that claims China is a threat are “baseless”, when asked to respond to the Arctic comments.
China opposes other countries using it as “an excuse” to push their own agenda, the ministry said.
China has repeatedly said its scientific expeditions in the Arctic and commercial shipping operations in the region followed international treaties and laws, accusing the West of distorting facts and hyping up its activities as clues to military intent.
Last week, the state-backed Global Times newspaper said in an editorial that it ” firmly opposed attempts by the United States and Europe to label China with terms such as ‘military threat,’ ‘resource grabber’ or ‘rule breaker’ in Arctic affairs.”

Source : https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/trumps-greenland-climbdown-triggers-relief-way-forward-unclear-2026-01-22/

The United States on Thursday announced plans for a “New Gaza” rebuilt from scratch to include residential towers, data centres and seaside resorts, part of President Donald Trump’s push to advance an Israel-Hamas ceasefire shaken by repeated violations.
In the Gaza Strip, health officials said Israeli airstrikes on Thursday had killed five people in the enclave. There was no immediate Israeli comment on the violence, the latest to fray the October truce accord.

Trump has parlayed the ceasefire into a broader “Board of Peace” initiative aimed at resolving conflicts globally.
After hosting a signing ceremony for the board in Davos, Switzerland, on Thursday, Trump invited his son-in-law Jared Kushner to present development plans for Gaza, its densely populated cities and towns now in ruins from two years of war.
“In the beginning, we were toying with (building) a free zone, and then (having) a Hamas zone,” Kushner told an audience in Davos of Trump’s early plans to rebuild Gaza, where nearly the entire 2 million population is internally displaced.
“And then we said, you know what? Let’s just plan for catastrophic success.”

‘MASTER PLAN’

Kushner presented the audience with a slideshow depicting a “master plan” for what he termed a “New Gaza”, displayed on a colour-coded map with areas reserved for residential development, data centres and industrial parks.
The slides included an image of a Mediterranean coastline packed with glittering towers akin to those in Dubai or Singapore. They suggested redevelopment would begin in Rafah in the south, an area under complete Israeli military control.
But they did not address key issues such as property rights or compensation for Palestinians who lost their homes, businesses and livelihoods during the war. Nor did they address where displaced Palestinians might live during the rebuilding.
Kushner did not say who would fund the redevelopment, which would first require clearing an estimated 68 million tons of rubble and war debris.

A conference will be held in Washington in the coming weeks “where we’ll announce a lot of the contributions that will be made … from the private sector,” Kushner said, without elaborating.
The slides shown by Kushner were nearly identical to slides leaked to the Wall Street Journal in December. The newspaper reported then that the U.S. had offered to “anchor” 20% of the redevelopment project, without going into detail.
Trump has floated the idea of transforming long-impoverished and dilapidated Gaza into the “Riviera of the Middle East”, an idea that has drawn criticism from Palestinians.

RAFAH CROSSING

Kushner’s presentation in Davos followed remarks by Ali Shaath, the Palestinian technocrat leader backed by Washington to administer the enclave under Trump’s 20-point plan for Gaza.
A key unfulfilled element of the ceasefire has been the reopening of Gaza’s key Rafah border crossing with Egypt for the entry and exit of Palestinians. Shaath, speaking by video link, announced the Rafah crossing would open next week.
“Opening Rafah signals that Gaza is no longer closed to the future and to the war,” Shaath said.
Israel, which controls the Gaza side of the crossing, has rejected reopening it until Hamas fulfills its ceasefire obligation of returning the remains of the last hostage held in the territory.
After Shaath’s announcement, an Israeli political source said a special effort was being made to return Ran Gvili’s remains and that Israel would discuss reopening the crossing starting next week.

PERSISTENT VIOLENCE

The next phase of Trump’s Gaza plan would see Hamas disarm and international peacekeepers deploy in the crowded, coastal enclave as Israeli troops withdraw further. The first phase left Israel in control of well over half of Gaza, with Hamas holding a sliver of territory along the coast.
Israel has continued to carry out air and artillery strikes in Gaza, often accusing Hamas militants of preparing attacks on its troops or encroaching into areas it controls.
Health officials at Al Shifa Hospital, Gaza’s largest, said four Palestinians were killed on Thursday by Israeli tank shelling in the Zeitoun suburb of eastern Gaza City. A fifth person was killed by Israeli fire in Khan Younis in the south, health officials said.
Israel’s military did not immediately provide comment.
A day earlier, Israeli fire killed 11 people including two boys and three journalists, health officials said. On Thursday, Palestinians in Gaza held funerals for the three journalists, who press advocates said had been using a drone to film tents housing displaced people.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/us-pitches-new-gaza-development-plan-israeli-fire-kills-five-palestinians-2026-01-22/

President Donald Trump sued banking giant JPMorgan Chase and its CEO Jamie Dimon for $5 billion on Thursday over allegations that JPMorgan stopped providing banking services to him and his businesses for political reasons after he left office in January 2021.

The lawsuit, filed in Miami-Dade County court in Florida, alleges that JPMorgan abruptly closed multiple accounts in February 2021 with just 60 days notice and no explanation. By doing so, Trump claims JPMorgan and Dimon cut the president and his businesses off from millions of dollars, disrupted their operations and forced Trump and the businesses to urgently open bank accounts elsewhere.

“JPMC debanked (Trump and his businesses) because it believed that the political tide at the moment favored doing so,” the lawsuit alleges.

In the lawsuit, Trump alleges he tried to raise the issue personally with Dimon after the bank started to close his accounts, and that Dimon assured Trump he would figure out what was happening. The lawsuit alleges Dimon failed to follow up with Trump. Further, Trump’s lawyers allege that JPMorgan placed the president and his companies on a reputational “blacklist” that both JPMorgan and other banks use to keep clients from opening accounts with them in the future.

In a statement, JPMorgan said it believes the suit has no merit.

Trump threatened to sue JPMorgan Chase last week at a time of heightened tensions between the White House and Wall Street. The president said he wanted to cap interest rates on credit cards at 10% to help lower costs for consumers. Chase is one of the largest issuers of credit cards in the country and a bank official told reporters that it would fight any effort by the White House or Congress to implement a rate cap on credit cards. Bank industry executives have also bristled at Trump’s attacks on the independence of the Federal Reserve.

Debanking occurs when a bank closes the accounts of a customer or refuses to do business with a customer in the form of loans or other services. Once a relatively obscure issue in finance, debanking has become a politically charged issue in recent years, with conservative politicians arguing that banks have discriminated against them and their affiliated interests.

Debanking first became a national issue when conservatives accused the Obama administration of pressuring banks to stop extending services to gun stores and payday lenders under “Operation Choke Point.”

Trump and other conservative figures have alleged that banks cut them off from their accounts under the umbrella term of “reputational risk” after the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. Since Trump came back into office, the president’s banking regulators have moved to stop any banks from using “reputational risk” as a reason for denying service to customers.

“JPMC’s conduct … is a key indicator of a systemic, subversive industry practice that aims to coerce the public to shift and re-align their political views,” Trumps lawyers wrote in the lawsuit.

Source: https://apnews.com/article/trump-jpmorgan-debanking-jamie-dimon-a976813384a942e5152f17659fdebd16

The Kurdish people are one of the largest ethnic groups in the world without their own country. Many are native to the region where four countries — Iran, Iraq, Syria and Turkey — meet and share languages and culture.

Syrian transitional government troops and Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) had been fighting for weeks in northern Syria. On Tuesday evening, the announcement of a four-day ceasefire restored a measure of calm.

SDF fighters were close allies of the international coalition battling the extremist “Islamic State,” or IS, group in Syria and managed to take control of strategically important areas in Syria during 14 years of civil war. Recent clashes with Syrian government troops has pushed them out of these areas.

The Syrian government accuses the SDF of disregarding a March 2025 agreement which required all Kurdish civilian and military institutions to be merged into the administration of the Syrian state and army by the end of 2025 — a plan that was never implemented. The Kurdish leadership, in turn, accuses the Syrian government of ignoring the rights of ethnic and religious minorities as it reorganizes the country after civil war.

These latest developments turn the global spotlight back onto a centuries-old issue: The fate of the Kurds, a community of over 30 million people without an independent state of their own, in one of the world’s most volatile regions.

A people without a homeland
Some 30 to 35 million Kurds live around the world. But they are not a homogenous group. Different dialects are spoken in Kurdish regions. Religiously the Kurds also vary. While the majority belong to Sunni Islam, significant Alevi, Yazidi, Shiite and Christian communities also exist.

Historically, the Kurds lived in the area between Mesopotamia’s Euphrates and Tigris rivers. Yet after the fall of the Ottoman Empire and the end the World War I, France and Britain split up what would have been a Kurdish homeland. The 1923 Treaty of Lausanne divided the area into four states: today’s Turkey, Iraq, Syria and Iran — thereby shattering the dream of an independent Kurdish state, as promised in the earlier Treaty of Sevres.

Today Europe is home to the largest Kurdish diaspora outside the Middle East, with Germany hosting the most Kurds.

Syria: Language bans, statelessness
After the partition of their homeland, many Kurdish tribes occupied areas in Syria along the Turkish border, until the Syrian government launched an Arabization campaign in the 1960s.

A 1962 census led to around 120,000 Kurds losing their Syrian citizenship. They were declared stateless and deprived of their right to property and ownership. Thousands were deported to the desert, with Arab tribes deliberately resettled in their ancestral homelands.

In the decades that followed, the Kurds experienced even further oppression, with bans on their languages, books and Kurdish names.

Today around 2.5 million Kurds live in Syria, making up around 10% of the total population.

During the Syrian civil war and the rise of the IS group in 2014 and 2015, a Kurdish paramilitary, the Syrian Democratic Forces, or SDF, became a US ally in the fight against the IS group. It was during this period that the SDF created a self-run region in northeast Syria. The SDF maintains close ties to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK.

Turkey: Repression, armed struggle
Some 15 to 18 million Kurds live in Turkey. Yet for many decades, the country did not recognize them as a distinct ethnic group and minority. Until a few years ago the use of Kurdish language and Kurdish first names were banned.

In 1984, the PKK— designated a terrorist group by Turkey, the United States and the European Union — began an armed struggle against the Turkish state. Its initial aim was the creation of an independent Kurdish state although the PKK eventually pivoted to demanding Kurdish rights instead. In May 2025, the PKK announced its dissolution following a public appeal by its leader Abdullah Ocalan, who has been imprisoned in Turkey since 1999 after being convicted of treason.

Although a fresh attempt was made to start a peace process in Turkey, with the PKK signaling its willingness to disarm, talks have come to a standstill.

The Kurds want the release of imprisoned Kurdish politicians, an end to the Turkish administration of Kurdish cities, and a review of PKK founder Ocalan’s prison conditions.

The Turkish government has been accused of supporting fighters in Syria who deliberately target Syria’s Kurdish areas.

Iraq: Persecution and autonomy
The history of the 7 to 8 million Kurds in Iraq is one marked by suffering. But they are also the Kurds who have come closest to a homeland.

Under Saddam Hussein, the Kurds were subject to brutality. In March 1988 Hussein attacked the Kurdish city of Halabja with chemical weapons, killing at least 5,000 people, mostly civilians.

After the second Gulf War, the victorious US-led coalition enforced a no-fly zone over Iraq, allowing the Kurds to set up their own government in what would become a semi-autonomous region.

Since 2005, the Iraqi constitution has officially recognized this region. Politics in Iraqi Kurdistan are dominated by two families, the Barzanis and Talabanis and their respective political parties.

Source: https://www.dw.com/en/kurds-in-the-middle-east-struggle-for-a-homeland/a-75612377

The dollar was higher, gold softer and stocks on the rebound on Thursday after U.S. President Donald Trump dropped tariff threats and ruled out seizing Greenland from an ally by force.
Trump’s theatrics and consequent tensions have kept markets on edge this week, prompting investors to take the latest developments with a pinch of salt even as relief was palpable.

“I won’t do that,” the U.S. President said at Davos of an attack to secure Greenland.

“Okay? Now everyone’s saying ‘oh, good’ that’s probably the biggest statement I made because people thought I would use force. I don’t have to use force, I don’t want to use force, I won’t use force.”
He added on his Truth Social platform that the U.S. and NATO had a framework for a deal and that he would not impose tariffs.
European futures were 1.2% higher in the Asia afternoon and FTSE futures rose 0.75%. On Wall Street the S&P 500 (.SPX), had notched a 1.16% rise, its largest in two months, and futures were 0.3% higher through Asian trade.
A bouncing dollar has pushed the euro back under $1.17, to $1.1686, and gold has dropped about $100 an ounce to $4,790 from a record high of $4,887.

MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan (.MIAPJ0000PUS), rose around 1% and chipmaker gains in Seoul carried the KOSPI (.KS11), above 5,000 points for the first time.
“The TACO, as they call it, is certainly real,” said Damian Rooney, director of institutional sales at Argonaut, a resources-focused broker in Perth, referring to a Wall Street acronym for “Trump Always Chickens Out”.

NATO DEAL

Trump said after meeting with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte that Western Arctic allies could forge a new deal over Greenland that would satisfy his desire for a missile defence system and access to critical minerals.
There were no details. Rutte later told Fox News the issue of whether Greenland will remain with Denmark did not come up in his conversation with Trump, unsurprising since Rutte is not in charge of either Denmark or Greenland.

And investors were wary of completely unwinding some of the haven bets made this week.
“Our mood here is it’s been fabulous fun being a gold bull for the last year and a half,” said Argonaut’s Rooney, “and with gold you never throw the baby out with the bathwater because (Trump) can’t help himself doing or saying some crazy things, whether he’s going to carry through or not.”
The VIX index (.VIX), nicknamed Wall Street’s fear gauge, sharply fell back towards baseline levels and U.S. Treasuries, which had been sold through the week, caught a bid.
“The market has largely removed the tail risk of a U.S. confrontation with its NATO partners – not that conflict was ever truly priced into the distribution, but some would have hedged against the risk,” said Pepperstone analyst Chris Weston.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/world/china/global-markets-wrapup-1-pix-2026-01-22/

U.S. President Donald Trump abruptly stepped back on Wednesday from threats to impose tariffs as leverage to seize Greenland, ruled out the use of force and suggested a deal was in sight to end a dispute over the Danish territory that risked the deepest rupture in transatlantic relations in decades.
Traveling in Davos, Switzerland, Trump backed down, for now, from weeks of rhetoric that shook the NATO alliance and risked a new global trade war. Trump had threatened at the weekend to impose rising tariffs on eight European countries’ U.S.-bound exports.

But after meeting with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte at the Swiss Alpine resort, Trump said Western Arctic allies could forge a new deal over the strategic island territory of 57,000 people that satisfies his desire for a “Golden Dome” missile‑defense system and access to critical minerals while blocking Russia and China’s ambitions in the Arctic.
“It’s a deal that everybody’s very happy with,” Trump told reporters. “It’s a long-term deal. It’s the ultimate long-term deal. It puts everybody in a really good position, especially as it pertains to security and to minerals.”
“It’s a deal that’s forever,” he added

Rutte later said the issue of whether Greenland will remain with Denmark did not come up in his talks with Trump.
“That issue did not come up anymore in my conversations tonight with the president,” Rutte said in an interview on Fox News’ “Special Report with Bret Baier” show.
“He (Trump) is very much focused on what do we need to do to make sure that that huge Arctic region – where change is taking place at the moment, where the Chinese and the Russians are more and more active – how we can protect it.”

SCOLDING, DISMISSIVE THREATS

Trump earlier in the day had delivered more than an hour of scolding and dismissive threats aimed at countries already unnerved by his push to seize territory from a longtime U.S. NATO ally.
European diplomats said the president’s sudden shift in tone doesn’t resolve the dispute but helps defuse an open rift between allies as they work to sort out their differences in private.

It remained unclear what kind of agreement could meet Trump’s demands for outright “ownership” of a territory that its residents and leaders have said is not for sale.
“Negotiations between Denmark, Greenland, and the United States will go forward aimed at ensuring that Russia and China never gain a foothold – economically or militarily – in Greenland,” a NATO spokesperson said.
No date or venue was provided for such negotiations. Trump said he had tasked Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and envoy Steve Witkoff to take part in further discussions.
“What happens in Greenland is of absolutely no consequence to us,” said Russian President Vladimir Putin, quoted by Russian news agencies speaking to the country’s National Security Council.

Trump said on his Truth Social platform that the U.S. and NATO had “formed the framework of a future deal with respect to Greenland and, in fact, the entire Arctic Region,” and that “based upon this understanding, I will not be imposing the Tariffs that were scheduled to go into effect on February 1st.”
It was the latest in a series of reversals of major policies or threats by Trump ahead of deadlines he has imposed during his second term in office.
Denmark said the issue should be handled through private diplomacy rather than on social media.

“What is crucial for us is that we get to end this with respect for the integrity and sovereignty of the kingdom (of Denmark) and the right of the Greenlandic people to self-determination,” Denmark’s Foreign Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen told public broadcaster DR.
Rasmussen said he had spoken with Rutte but declined to provide details on what had been agreed.
Greenland’s government did not reply to a request for comment.
Earlier in the day, the Republican U.S. president acknowledged financial markets’ discomfort with his threats and ruled out force in a speech to global elites at the World Economic Forum annual meeting.
“People thought I would use force, but I don’t have to use force,” Trump said. “I don’t want to use force. I won’t use force.”
The change in posture sparked buying on Wall Street. The S&P 500 (.SPX), index posted its biggest one-day percentage gain in two months, adding 1.16% for the day. Trump’s more hawkish comments on Greenland on Tuesday helped deliver the sharpest equities selloff in three months.

TRUMP DOMINATES DAVOS AGENDA

Trump’s Greenland comments dominated a whirlwind trip to Davos. Emboldened after a year in office that saw major institutions and allies bend to his will, Trump chastised Europeans on their soil on issues ranging from wind power and the environment to immigration and geopolitics.

He cast himself as a defender of Western values. “We want strong allies, not seriously weakened ones,” Trump said. “I love Europe and I want to see Europe go good, but it’s not heading in the right direction.”

While he took the threat of force off the table for Greenland, Trump bragged about U.S. military might, citing recent operations such as the shock ousting of Venezuela’s Nicolas Maduro earlier this month.

Calling Denmark “ungrateful,” the Republican U.S. president played down the territorial dispute as a “small ask” over a “piece of ice” and said an acquisition would be no threat to the NATO alliance, which includes Denmark and the United States.

“No nation or group of nations is in any position to be able to secure Greenland other than the United States,” said Trump, who four times during the speech mistakenly referred to Greenland as Iceland, another NATO member state.

“You can say yes, and we will be very appreciative, or you can say no, and we will remember.”

Trump also used his speech to settle scores on other grievances. He rounded on Britain over extracting insufficient oil from the North Sea, Switzerland over its trade surplus in goods with the U.S., France over its pharmaceutical policy, Canada for what he saw as its ingratitude and NATO for its unwillingness to conform to U.S. interests.

His remarks drew uncomfortable looks and light laughter from the audience in Davos, but most were silent.

His speech did notably less to address Trump’s top domestic political challenge, the low marks voters give his handling of cost-of-living issues.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/business/davos/determined-seize-greenland-trump-faces-tough-reception-davos-2026-01-21/

US President Donald Trump raised eyebrows after claiming at Davos that the US effectively controlled Greenland during World War II and was “stupid” to return it to Denmark, calling Denmark “ungrateful.” He argued that only the US can defend the island.

President Donald Trump used his address at the World Economic Forum (WEF) 2026 in Davos, Switzerland, to revive his long-running push for the United States to acquire Greenland from Denmark, invoking World War II history to justify his claims. During the speech, Trump argued that the US had effectively controlled Greenland during the Second World War and was “stupid” to return it afterward.

“After the war, we gave Greenland back to Denmark. How stupid were we to do that? But we did it. But we gave it back. But how ungrateful are they now?” he said.

Trump sharply criticised Denmark, branding it “ungrateful” and claiming it was unable to defend either itself or Greenland during WWII. He pointed out that Denmark fell to Nazi Germany within six hours and argued that US intervention was decisive for Europe’s survival.

“Without us, you’d be speaking German and Japanese perhaps,” he told the audience.

He also claimed the US had effectively “already had” Greenland as a trustee after defeating the Axis powers, stating that American forces defended the island and prevented enemies from taking it.

“We literally set up bases in Greenland for Denmark, we were fighting for Denmark, but we saved Greenland and prevented our enemies from getting it,” Trump said, calling Greenland “a vast, almost uninhabited piece of ice” in a “key, strategic location between the US, China, and Russia.”

Cruz Beckham “liked” a video poking fun of Victoria’s alleged “inappropriate” dancing at brother Brooklyn’s wedding.

Page Six can confirm that Cruz, 20, gave the throwback video — which features Victoria seductively dancing onstage to her 2001 track “I’m Not Such An Innocent Girl” — a “thumbs up” after gossip social media site Culture Enquirer reposted it on Tuesday.

In the video, Victoria’s energetic choreography included swinging her hips, shimmying, and caressing her thighs and backside while belting out the lyrics to the suggestive track.

She donned a black leather halter top and matching low-rise pants for the performance, which included a bevy of similarly clad backup dancers.

The reposted meme included the caption, “the wedding video in question” — referencing Brooklyn’s recent public accusation that his mother “hijacked” his first dance with wife Nicola and “danced very inappropriately” on him.

“In front of our 500 wedding guests, Marc Anthony called me to the stage, where in the schedule was planned to be my romantic dance with my wife but instead my mum was waiting to dance with me,” he wrote in a lengthy social media statement on his family on Monday — confirming Page Six’s previous reporting on the alleged “jaw-dropping” moment.

Brooklyn, 26, added in his statement, “She danced very inappropriately on me in front of everyone. I’ve never felt more uncomfortable or humiliated in my entire life.”

Two sources confirmed the existence of video footage of “Victoria dancing inappropriately with Brooklyn at his wedding” to Page Six on Tuesday, though Brooklyn and Peltz own and reportedly do not plan to release it.

Reps for Cruz, Brooklyn, and Victoria Beckham did not immediately return Page Six’s request for comment.

In any case, fans in the comments thread immediately picked up on the “like” from David and Victoria Beckham’s youngest son.

“@cruzbeckham liked this?” one person wrote, while another added, “GUYS CRUZ LIKED IT ”

Others expressed their amusement. “I would love for her to dance at my wedding!” one person gushed, while another joked, “Was it that inappropriate @brooklynpeltzbeckham ? ”

From the outside, the vacant shop on the corner of a busy avenue in central Sydney looks abandoned. Plastic sheeting is taped across all the windows and there’s a large padlock hanging on the door handle.

Step inside, though, and you’re greeted by cuddly toys, candles, trinkets and messages of hope scribbled on large sheets.

All of them come from a makeshift memorial that was created after the 14 December attack at Bondi Beach that killed 15 people.

So when the Sydney Jewish Museum and the Australian Jewish Historical Society heard that the memorial would be removed by the local council, they sprang into action to ensure everything contained within it could live on.

Many of the items now live in neat squares made out of masking tape on the shop floor.

One says “bees” – within it are dozens of knitted and cuddly insects – a nod to 10-year-old Matilda Bee, the youngest victim of the attack.

Another has a heap of deflated foil balloons – again, mostly bees.

There’s also a box of stones – Jewish mourners traditionally place a stone on a grave instead of flowers – as well as flags, books, Christmas decorations and even a Barbie cracker.

Some families who were unable to go to any of the vigils in Bondi have also paid a visit to the spaces housing the tributes.

“It was too overwhelming to be in Bondi, but in this space it was very quiet. And I think to see everything laid out and the amount, they found it really moving and meaningful,” said Shannon Biederman, the senior curator at the Sydney Jewish Museum.

Families also came to the flower space and were given flower pressing to do, while artists and community members joined in too.

For Shannon, memorialising the items is a deeply personal task.

Her family were regular attendees of Chanukah by the Sea – the festival targeted by the alleged gunmen. They had bought tickets to go but at the last minute, they changed their mind.

They also knew the family of Rabbi Eli Schlanger, one of the 15 victims.

“I do work in a Holocaust museum, so the murder of Jews isn’t something that I’m not used to, and I’ve learned to compartmentalise,” she says.

“But it’s different because I’m used to working with history and this is now, and we are a museum of memory, but we’re still very much live in [this].

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese was among the first to lay a bouquet in front of the Bondi Pavilion the morning after the attack. Over the course of a week, the tributes spread like a wave across the forecourt.

The massacre at Bondi was Australia’s worst mass shooting in nearly three decades and left the country reeling. It also saw people pointing the blame at the government for letting something like this happen to a community that had been repeatedly warning authorities about a rise in antisemitism in recent years.

But the conversation is now trying to focus on bringing people together – a sentiment the community wants to see continued in a permanent memorial to the dead.

On Thursday, landmarks across the country will also be lit up and a minute’s silence held in honour of the victims. Australians are also being asked to perform a mitzvah – an everyday act of kindness such as checking in on a neighbour or a donation – a Jewish tradition and a way to bring people together after last month’s attack.

How the memorial will live on is still unclear – several artists have come forward, keen to work with some of the material but a committee will make the final decisions.

Seven countries including Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Egypt say they will join US president Donald Trump’s Board of Peace, according to a joint statement.

They will join Israel, which also publicly confirmed its participation earlier.

On Wednesday evening Trump said Vladimir Putin had also agreed to join – but the Russian president said his country was still studying the invitation.

The board was originally thought to be aimed at helping end the two-year war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza and oversee reconstruction. But its proposed charter does not mention the Palestinian territory and appears to be designed to supplant functions of the UN.

However Saudi Arabia said that the group of Muslim-majority countries – Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Egypt, Jordan, Indonesia, Pakistan and Qatar – endorsed the aim of consolidating a permanent ceasefire in Gaza, supporting reconstruction and advancing what they described as a “just and lasting peace”.

At the World Economic Forum in Switzerland, Trump told reporters that Putin had accepted his invitation to join. “He was invited, he’s accepted. Many people have accepted,” Trump said.

Putin responded quickly, saying the invitation was under consideration, Reuters reported. He said Russia was prepared to provide $1bn from frozen Russian assets and that he viewed the board as primarily relevant to the Middle East.

It is not clear how many countries have been invited to join Trump’s new body – Canada and the UK are among them, but have not yet publicly responded. The UAE, Bahrain, Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Hungary, Kazakhstan, Morocco and Vietnam have already signed up.

On Wednesday the Vatican also confirmed Pope Leo has received an invitation. Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, the Vatican’s Secretary of State, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, said the Pope would need time to consider whether to take part.

However Slovenia’s Prime Minister Robert Golob said he had declined the invitation because the body “dangerously interferes with the broader international order”.

A leaked document says the Board of Peace’s charter will enter into force once three states formally agree to be bound by it, with member states given renewable three-year terms and permanent seats available to those contributing $1bn (£740m), it said.

The charter declared the body as an international organisation mandated to carry out peace-building functions under international law, with Trump serving as chairman – and separately as the US representative – and holding authority to appoint executive board members and create or dissolve subsidiary bodies.

Last Friday, the White House named seven members of the founding Executive Board, including US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff, Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner and former UK prime minister Tony Blair.

Former UN Middle East envoy Nickolay Mladenov was appointed as the board’s representative in Gaza during a second phase of the plan, which includes reconstruction and demilitarisation, with the board authorised by a UN Security Council resolution running until the end of 2027.

On Saturday, Netanyahu’s office said the Gaza Executive Board’s composition “was not coordinated with Israel and runs contrary to its policy”.

Israeli media said the decision to include representatives of Turkey and Qatar – which both helped broker the ceasefire that took effect in October, along with Egypt and the US – had happened “over Israel’s head”.

Under phase one of the peace plan, Hamas and Israel agreed to the ceasefire, an exchange of living and dead Israeli hostages in Gaza for Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails, a partial Israeli withdrawal, and a surge in deliveries of humanitarian aid.

Israel has said it can only move into the second phase after Hamas hands over the body of the last dead hostage.

Phase two faces major challenges, with Hamas having previously refused to give up its weapons without the creation of an independent Palestinian state, and Israel having not committed to fully withdrawing from Gaza.

Source : https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cn8jek4vv8ko

US President Donald Trump called off looming tariffs on European countries over Greenland after he said he reached a “framework of a future deal” over the island during a meeting with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte.

Closing summary: Trump backs down from imposing tariffs, and other key points

President Donald Trump delivered remarks to government officials and business elite at the World Economic Forum in Davos on Wednesday.

He made headlines when he said he would not use military force to acquire Greenland but laid out an argument to have the US have control over the Danish territory, saying US ownership would “strengthen” the NATO alliance.

Europe later said it was going to suspend the approval of a trade deal reached with Trump last year in July.

Hours after that, Trump said he was scrapping tariffs he threatened to impose on eight European countries, including Denmark and Germany, over their support for Greenland’s status to continue to be a part of the Danish Kingdom.

Trump said he was backing down after having a conversation with NATO Secretary- General Mark Rutte and that the pair had “formed the framework of a future deal” with respect to Greenland.

European leaders have reacted to the news of an emergent deal over the future of Greenland, but there’s sure to be more on the EU-US trade deal later this morning.

The US thanked Iraq for its cooperation to transfer up to 7,000 prisoners out of Syria, after the Kurdish-led SDF lost control over the territory where the prisoner camps were held.

Islamic State (IS) detainees who were being held in northeastern Syria will be transferred to secure facilities in Iraq, the US army said on Wednesday.

The US Central Command said in a statement that the operation to transfer the detainees had begun, with 150 IS fighters already on their way to Iraq.

“We are closely coordinating with regional partners, including the Iraqi government, and we sincerely appreciate their role in ensuring the enduring defeat of ISIS,” said CENTCOM commander Admiral Brad Cooper.

“Facilitating the orderly and secure transfer of ISIS detainees is critical to preventing a breakout that would pose a direct threat to the United States and regional security,” he added.

The CENTCOM statement said that up to 7,000 prisoners could be transferred to Iraq.

Syria’s Foreign Ministry said the transfer of the detainees represented “an important step to strengthen security and stability.”

Why are they being transferred?

Syrian government forces entered areas of northeastern Syria over the weekend, in a move to expand its territorial control over the country, driving away Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) fighters who held the territory.

IS fighters and their families were being held in prisoner camps overseen by the SDF, but as the Syrian army advance, the SDF said it had to abandon their post at northeastern al-Hol camp, holding mostly women and children, and al-Aqtan prison for IS fighters.

At al-Hol, some 24,000 were still being held when the SDF retreated.

Who are the prisoners?

The IS group was defeated in Iraq in 2017 and two years later, it was defeated in Syria. The threat was not eliminated entirely; the group’s sleeper cells still carry out deadly attacks in both countries.

According to an Iraqi intelligence general, speaking to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity, the IS members who will be transferred to Iraq are of different nationalities.

He added that they included fighters from Tunisia, Tajikistan and Kazakhstan and some Syrians, among others.

The general told AP that the fighters are expected to be interrogated and then put on trial in Iraq.

Source : https://www.dw.com/en/us-begins-transfer-of-is-fighters-from-syria-to-iraq/a-75598783

Rock climber Alex Honnold plans to scale the facade of what was once the world’s tallest building — live on Netflix. But not all are impressed by the idea.

“It should be within my comfort zone,” Alex Honnold said in on a recent edition of The Jay Shetty podcast. “So it’s not so much about ‘what if I die?'”

The 40-year-old American is one of the world’s best climbers, specifically rock and vertical climbing. Weather permitting, Honnold will be venturing onto unfamiliar terrain in Taiwan on Saturday morning (January 24), local time. He intends to climb the facade of the Taipei 101 skyscraper “free solo,” meaning alone and without any safety equipment.

Netflix, the world’s largest streaming service with more than 300 million subscribers, is planning to broadcast Honnold’s ascent live. In the trailer for the broadcast, Netflix plays on the life-threatening nature of the event.

“I think I’ve gotten used to fear over the years. It’s an ever-present part of climbing,” Honnold says in the trailer.

“No matter how much you prepare, occasionally things just happen. If you fall, you’re gonna die.”

Warning about possible copycats

The event is not without its critics, including Claudia Paganini, philosopher and theologian who lectures at the University of Innsbruck. One of her main areas of research is media ethics.

Paganini told DW that Netflix would be crossing a line with the broadcast, because of “the very concept and voyeuristic dynamics” that it promotes.

“I consider the live broadcast of a high-risk, potentially fatal event problematic because the media are no longer just documenting, commenting on, and contextualizing it, but are actively co-producing the event as a spectacle,” Paganini said.

She added that the risk is being deliberately used to increase attention and reach – and financial gain. Therefore, the responsibility “no longer lies primarily with the athlete, but with the media disseminating the information.”

Furthermore, Paganini warns that the live broadcast of Honnold’s ascent is “likely to normalize risky behavior and encourage imitation, even if one emphasizes that an exceptional athlete is involved.

“Therefore, the planned project must also be viewed very critically from the perspective of child and youth protection.”

Oscar for climbing documentary

Throughout his climbing career, Honnold has frequently walked a tightrope between life and death.

In 2017, he became the first person to climb the 900-meter-high granite wall of the legendary El Capitan in Yosemite National Park in the United States, without a rope. He completed the extremely challenging “Freerider” route in just four hours. The route had been first climbed in 1995 by Germany’s Alexander Huber.

The documentary “Free Solo” about Honnold’s ascent won an Oscar in 2019 and reached millions of viewers in cinemas and later via streaming services.

The film thrived on the thrill that the spectacular images from the wall triggered in viewers. But unlike the upcoming live broadcast from Taiwan, those viewers already knew that the climb had ended well.

‘Not relevant for climbers’

The climbing community appears not to be as excited about the event as one might think.

“The ascent of Taipei 101 won’t provide any new insights into climbing, so from that perspective, the stunt isn’t relevant for us as climbers,” Alexander Huber told DW.

“But of course, it will reach a very wide audience via Netflix, and Alex is certainly entitled to do it.”

Since his 2017 feat on El Capitan, Honnold has been among the top earners in the climbing world. The climber puts a third of his earnings into his own foundation. The Honnold Foundation supports private solar energy initiatives worldwide. How much Netflix is ​​paying the climber for his latest project has not been disclosed.

Eight overhanging blocks

Taipei 101 – the number indicates the number of floors – was completed in 2004 and, at 508 meters, was then the tallest building in the world. Three years later, it was surpassed by the 828-meter-tall Burj Khalifa in Dubai.

The landmark of Taiwan’s capital city is reminiscent of a Chinese pagoda in its shape. Eight identically shaped blocks rise above a trapezoidal first section, overhanging upwards. The uppermost, narrower section of the building is crowned by an antenna array. The facade is made primarily of glass and aluminum.

‘He’ll do it very easily’

It’s not the first time someone has climbed the building. French free climber Alain Robert did it on Christmas Day 2004. Contrary to his usual practice, the “French Spiderman,” as he calls himself, was secured with a rope from above during his climb.

The Taiwanese government had hired him for this stunt to promote the then-new skyscraper. Over his career, Robert has scaled around 200 buildings worldwide via their facades, mostly free solo. While the Tapei climb was government approved, most were not and by his own account, Robert has been arrested more than 170 times for climbing buildings.

“The most important thing about Taipei 101 is not to lose concentration,” the now 63-year-old told Climbing magazine.

“What makes it complicated is to repeat the same move over and over again. But otherwise, you just take it one move at a time.”

After each of the eight blocks, Honnold can rest on a wide ledge before continuing his climb, Robert said.

“I’m sure he’ll do it very easily.”

Source : https://www.dw.com/en/free-solo-climb-on-netflix-if-you-fall-youre-gonna-die/a-75580558

A friend of Barron Trump told a UK court he saved her life when he dialed police after seeing her being attacked by her ex-boyfriend on a FaceTime call.

The woman reached out to Trump in the midst of a violent dust-up with her former beau Matvei Rumianstev, 22, who allegedly started battering her because he was jealous of her friendship with the president’s son, Metro UK reports.

Trump, 19, who was in the US at the time, quickly called for help, telling emergency operators, “I just got a call from a girl I know. She’s getting beaten up.”

After giving her address, he urged them to hurry to the scene.

A landslide smashed into a campsite in rain-swept northern New Zealand on Thursday (Jan 22), leaving multiple people missing, police and rescuers said.

Mud had buried and crushed a shower block at the campsite, which lies at the foot of extinct volcano Mount Maunganui, video and photo images on local media showed.

Voices had been heard from beneath the rubble, emergency officials said.

“Whilst the land’s still moving there, they’re in a rescue mission,” Assistant Police Commissioner Tim Anderson told reporters at the scene.

“I can’t be drawn on numbers. What I can say is that it is single figures.”

The landslip hit several campervans and the shower block at the camp, which lies on the North Island in an area lashed by heavy overnight rain.

“I turned around, and I could see the land coming down onto some structures,” Nix Jaques, who was about to walk up the mountain, told public radio RNZ.

“There were some vehicles that were moved. It came down on an ablutions block. I believe there were some people in the showers. And it shifted a campervan,” she said.

The woman reportedly spoke to a couple who were missing a child in the disaster.

“PEOPLE SCREAMING”

People at the campsite had instantly tried to dig into the rubble and heard voices, Fire and Emergency commander William Pike told reporters.

“Our initial fire crew arrived and were able to hear the same,” he said.

But rescuers soon withdrew everyone from the site because of the risk of dangerous earth movements, the fire commander said.

Asked if voices had been heard since then, he said: “Not that I know of, no.”

Hiker Mark Tangney saw people fleeing the camp and ran to help, the New Zealand Herald reported.

Source : https://www.channelnewsasia.com/world/new-zealand-landslide-mount-maunganui-heavy-rain-bay-plenty-5875191

Handprints on cave walls in a largely unexplored area of Indonesia may be the oldest rock art studied so far, dating back to at least 67,800 years ago.

The tan-colored prints analysed by Indonesian and Australian researchers on the island of Sulawesi were made by blowing pigment over hands placed against the cave walls, leaving an outline. Some of the fingertips were also tweaked to look more pointed.

This prehistoric art form suggests the Indonesian island was home to a flourishing artistic culture. To figure out how old the paintings were, researchers dated mineral crusts that had formed on top of the art.

Upon seeing the new study, independent paleoanthropologist Genevieve von Petzinger said she “let out a little squeal of joy”.

As one-person households rise across China, more young adults are finding freedom in living alone – and confronting the emotional costs that come with it.

Tian Yuan has lived alone for eight years – long enough to know that silence can sometimes feel impossible to ignore.

One night, she returned home to her three-bedroom apartment in Guangzhou, a space she shares only with her cat, Dobby, a blue golden shaded British longhair.

At first, the solitude felt familiar, Tian said: the television murmuring in the background, the freedom to wander.

Then something shifted.

“I suddenly felt devastated,” recalled the 30-year-old advertising director.

“I felt like the only person in the universe.”

She sank onto the sofa and began to cry. Her cat jumped up and licked her face, its rough tongue brushing against her skin.

When Xiang asks young people why they no longer date, he often hears the same response.

“Too tiring. The emotional cost is too high,” they tell him.

Many describe agonising over small interactions, he said, like how to order food without imposing preferences, how to protect personal space while respecting someone else’s.

“All these very small things become emotionally complicated,” Xiang said.

Increasingly, some opt out altogether. The Chinese term is ai wu neng – the incapability of love.

To Xiang, this reflects a deeper shift.

“Love sounds romantic but for most of human history, love was very practical,” he noted.

Previous generations married first and hoped affection would follow.

That arrangement is now unacceptable to the younger generations, who believe love must be cherished for its own sake – not as a byproduct of household logistics.

The paradox, Xiang said, is that “they find it very difficult to put affection or love into practice”.

ALONE BUT ALWAYS MOVING

THE Razzies 2026 nominations have been unveiled and stars including Rihanna and Natalie Portman have made it to the list of worst actors of the year.

The iconic parody ceremony, officially called The Golden Raspberry Awards, recognizes the worst cinematic failures of each year.

This year’s 46th edition sees a whole host of big names nominated in various categories but this is one award none of them will want to take home.

Natalie Portman has landed a nomination for Worst Actress for her role in action adventure film Fountain Of Youth.

She’s up against Rebel Wilson in Bride Hard, Michelle Yeoh for Star Trek: Section 31, Ariana DeBose in Love Hurts and Milla Jovovich for In The Lost Lands.

Meanwhile, the Worst Actor nominees include Jared Leto for Tron: Ares, The Weeknd in Hurry Up Tomorrow, Ice Cube in War of the Worlds, Dave Bautista for his portrayal in In The Lost Lands and Scott Eastwood in Alarum.

Rihanna has found herself in the mix for Worst Screen Combo alongside James Corden for their partnership in Smurfs.

They’ll be going up against the seven dwarfs in Snow White, The Weeknd and his “colossal ego”, Ice Cube and his Zoom Camera and Robert DeNiro and Robert DeNiro for his dual role as Frank and Vito in The Alto Knights.

Five films have been nominated for Worst Picture, with Millie Bobby Brown and Chris Pratt’s The Electric State facing off with Disney’s Snow White, Star Trek: Section 31, Hurry Up Tomorrow and War of the Worlds.

Both Snow White and Ice Cube’s War of the Worlds have bagged the most nominations, with six nods apiece.

The winners of the 46th annual Razzies will be unveiled at there ceremony in Los Angeles on March 14.

The live-action remake of Snow White opened up to mixed reviews when it released in back in March last year.

Critics praised Rachel’s portrayal of the iconic Disney princess but called out the film’s stylistic choices.

It completely bombed at the box office, earning $206 million worldwide, against a huge budget of $240 to $270 million, with it being one of the most expensive Disney films ever.

Source : https://www.the-sun.com/entertainment/15819276/rihanna-natalie-portman-nominated-worst-actors-razzies-2026/

DONALD Trump has vowed Iran will be “wiped off the face of the Earth” if the regime follows through on assassination threats.

The explosive statement came as the US leader hit back at taunts from Tehran.

Speaking to NewsNation on Tuesday, Trump addressed deadly protests sweeping Iran that have reportedly left thousands dead.

Asked how he would respond to threats on his life, the president said: “I’ve left notification, if anything ever happens… the whole country’s going to get blown up. I would absolutely hit them so hard.

“I have very firm instructions, anything happens, they’re going to wipe them off the face of this Earth.”

The warning comes after Iranian state TV aired a menacing broadcast last week showing footage of the assassination attempt Trump survived as a presidential candidate in 2024.

The clip was captioned in Farsi with the words: “This time, the bullet won’t miss.”

Trump later hinted that there would have been a nuclear response if Ayatollah Ali Khamenei had started hanging Iranians in an interview with CNBC at the World Economic Forum in Davos.

Behind the scenes, the White House is already drawing up attack plans after Trump demanded “decisive” military options that could collapse the Islamist regime.

According to reports, the president has been pressing the Pentagon for strike packages ranging from punishing hits on the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps to full-scale action designed to smash the mullahs’ grip on power.

Trump has repeatedly insisted any response must be “decisive”, and warned that continued threats on his life would end with Iran getting “blown up”.

The sabre-rattling comes as Iran descends deeper into chaos, with anti-regime protests raging for weeks and blood running in the streets.

US-based human rights monitors say more than 4,500 people have already been killed, including hundreds of security forces, with a further 26,000 arrested.

Thousands more deaths are still being investigated, fuelling fears the true toll could be far higher.

Other activists warn the slaughter could be far worse, with horrified witnesses claiming the dead may number up to 20,000 after machine-gun fire ripped through crowds and bodies piled up in makeshift morgues.

Footage leaked from inside Iran appears to show body bags stacked in trucks and warehouses, while families have reportedly been forced to pay “bullet money” to retrieve the corpses of loved ones, or sign documents blaming protesters for their own deaths.

Amnesty International has raised the alarm over reports of mass graves being dug at Tehran’s vast Behesht-e Zahra cemetery, with authorities accused of secretly burying victims to hide the scale of the killings.

Security forces are also said to be going door-to-door hunting wounded protesters, dragging them from homes and hospitals amid an internet blackout now stretching hundreds of hours.

Trump has openly backed the uprising, urging Iranians to rise up and promising protesters that “help is on the way”, while warning Tehran not to execute detainees.

At the same time, the regime has doubled down on its threats against the US president.

Iranian state TV last week aired chilling footage of the 2024 assassination attempt on Trump, overlaid with the message: “This time, the bullet won’t miss.”

Similar threats have appeared at pro-regime rallies in Tehran, with demonstrators holding signs warning that “the arrow doesn’t always miss”.

Senior Revolutionary Guards commanders have also issued open threats, vowing to “set their world on fire” if the US strikes Iran’s leadership.

The Islamic Republic has accused Washington of stirring unrest and warned it would retaliate against US bases and allies if attacked.

Source : https://www.the-sun.com/news/15819485/trump-iran-wiped-off-earth-ayatollahs-threat/

If curiosity did in fact kill the cat, at least the feline had a great memory beforehand. Decades of research reveal curiosity doesn’t just make one crave new experiences and learning, it also changes how the brain processes and stores information. Put another way, curiosity helps memory.

A major research review published in the Annual Review of Psychology analyzed decades of studies on how motivation affects memory. This process led to the finding that when someone is genuinely curious about something, their brain doesn’t just remember the answer better. It also remembers completely random information encountered at the same time, even if it wasn’t being focused on.

The study was conducted by showing people trivia questions, some boring and some genuinely interesting. While people waited for the answers to the interesting questions, researchers flashed random photos of faces on the screen. Later, people remembered those faces way better when they’d seen them during a state of high curiosity, even though the faces had nothing to do with the trivia questions.

Brain scans revealed what was happening. When curiosity kicked in, a region called the ventral tegmental area lit up. This is the same reward center that activates when someone is about to get paid or eat their favorite food. The region then formed stronger connections with the hippocampus, the part of the brain that files away memories.

Curiosity is akin to putting the brain into “sponge mode.” It doesn’t solely absorb the thing we’re curious about; it soaks up everything around at that moment. Researchers call this an “interrogative state.” That is, the brain is primed to ask questions, make connections, and actually understand how ideas fit together.

Why Cramming for Tests Makes You Forget Everything

A different pattern emerges when someone is stressed about learning something.

When someone is cramming for a high-stakes exam or learning something because they are afraid of failing, the brain switches into a completely different mode. Stress response kicks in, flooding the brain with a chemical called noradrenaline. This heightens focus, but in a very specific, narrow way.

Instead of making connections between ideas, the stressed brain laser-focuses on individual facts and details. It will remember exactly what that threatening thing looked like (useful when running from bears), but will struggle to understand how it relates to anything else.

Researchers tested this by having people learn information in two different ways: one group learned things to earn money, another group learned things to avoid getting shocked (tiny static shocks, nothing dangerous). The shock-avoidance group actually remembered individual facts better, but they were less likely to remember how those facts connected to each other.

Brain scans showed why: Stress activates the amygdala, the brain’s alarm system, with less help from the hippocampus, the relationship-builder. This leads to a bunch of isolated facts rattling around in one’s head.

This explains why many people can ace a multiple-choice test on Tuesday and completely forget everything by Friday. They memorized the facts in isolation, under stress, so they never connected to anything meaningful. Their brains filed the information away in the “urgent but temporary” folder instead of the “actually understand this” folder.

A boring lecture activates neither curiosity nor stress response. The brain is just sitting there thinking, “Is this important? Should I care?” And with no strong signal either way, most of that information doesn’t stick.

How to Hack Your Brain’s Learning Modes

The good news? We’re not stuck with whatever learning mode The brain defaults to. We can actually train ourselves to shift between different mental states.

Researchers have proven this works. In one study, they taught people to consciously activate their brain’s reward system using mental imagery while watching their brain activity in real-time on a scanner. People practiced imagining rewarding scenarios until they could reliably turn on their reward centers just by thinking about them. Months later, they reported still using these mental tricks to motivate themselves through difficult tasks.

Different learning goals need different brain states. When someone is first learning something completely new, like medical terminology or a foreign language alphabet, they actually need that focused, detail-oriented mode to nail down the basics. The stress isn’t ideal, but the narrow focus helps.

But once those foundations have been established, the brain needs to switch modes. That’s when curiosity becomes essential for building understanding. One needs their brain in that open, connective state where it’s asking “How does this relate to that?” and “What happens if I combine these ideas?”

So What Does This Look Like in Practice?

Instead of telling yourself “I have to memorize this for the test” (which triggers your stress response), try reframing it: “I wonder how this actually works in real life?” That simple shift can engage your curiosity system instead of your threat system.

When something seems boring, actively generate questions about it. Don’t just read passively, ask yourself: “Why does this matter?” or “How is this different from what I already know?” Your brain treats questions as puzzles worth solving.

For big exams, try mentally reframing the stakes. Instead of “This test determines my future,” think of it as “This is practice to see what I know.” Sounds simple, but studies show this kind of reframing shifts which brain systems activate during learning.

Alternate study approaches is another option: Spend some time doing focused, detail-oriented review (that narrow imperative mode), then switch to exploratory connection-building where you’re making diagrams, explaining concepts to friends, or applying ideas to real scenarios (that open interrogative mode).

Source : https://studyfinds.org/curiosity-rewires-brain-better-memory/

Several European countries are considering whether to stop sending personnel to a U.S. military-led coordination centre for Gaza, saying it has failed to increase aid flows to the war-shattered enclave or achieve political change, diplomats said.
The Civil-Military Coordination Centre was established in southern Israel in October under President Donald Trump’s plan to end the war in Gaza. It was tasked with monitoring the Israel-Hamas ceasefire, facilitating the entry of aid and developing post-war policies for the Palestinian territory.

Dozens of countries, including Germany, France, Britain, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates, sent personnel including military planners and intelligence officials to the centre as they sought to influence discussions on Gaza’s future.
But eight foreign diplomats told Reuters that officials from some European countries had not returned to the CMCC, located near the Gaza border, since the Christmas and New Year holidays. Several nations were questioning the purpose of the centre, with one Western diplomat describing it as “directionless”.
“Everybody thinks it’s a disaster, but there is no alternative,” said another Western diplomat.

The European rethink, which has not been previously reported, is the latest sign of unease among Washington’s allies as Trump pursues unorthodox foreign policies towards Gaza, Greenland and Venezuela.
Some European governments were now considering whether to reduce their CMCC presence or even to stop sending personnel altogether, the diplomats said. The diplomats declined to say which governments were reassessing their position.
The White House and U.S. State Department did not respond to requests for comment on this story.

‘BOARD OF PEACE’

The CMCC is run by a U.S. general and also hosts both American and Israeli military personnel. Its establishment was a key element of the first phase of Trump’s ceasefire plan, which has been shaken by repeated Israeli airstrikes in Gaza against what Israel says have been Hamas attempts to carry out attacks.

As Trump pursues the next phase of his plan, including by setting up a “Board of Peace” to supervise Gaza policy, it is unclear whether the CMCC will retain any influence over policy formation or aid distribution.
The diplomats said it was also not known how the CMCC would work with the Board of Peace’s Gaza-focused bodies, including its committee of Palestinian technocrats.
Washington last week announced Trump’s plan had moved to the second phase, which would include demilitarisation and reconstruction. But there was no mention of further Israeli military withdrawals, beyond a partial pullback that has left 53% of Gaza still in Israeli hands.
In November, Reuters reported U.S. partners were concerned that Gaza could be effectively partitioned as efforts to advance Trump’s plan beyond the ceasefire stalled.

There was also no mention in Trump’s second phase announcement of the expected deployment of a multinational stabilisation force into the enclave.
Gaza’s border with Egypt has yet to reopen, although this was supposed to have happened during the plan’s first phase that took effect in October, amid repeated Israeli objections.
The diplomats said there had been no significant increase in humanitarian aid entering Gaza since the truce took hold, contradicting White House assertions, despite widespread homelessness and malnutrition.
Many trucks entering Gaza were in fact carrying commercial goods, they said, and Israel remained effectively in control of Gaza’s aid policy, despite the U.S.-led CMCC being tasked with helping boost relief supplies into the enclave.
Israel bans or restricts supplies from entering Gaza on the grounds they are “dual-use”, or could be repurposed for military as well as humanitarian purposes. The diplomats said Israel has so far made no concessions on dual-use items, which include metal poles for tents to house the largely displaced population.

ISRAEL DEFENDS POLICY ON ACCESS TO GAZA

An official at COGAT, the Israeli government agency that coordinates civilian policy in Gaza, said that 45% of all trucks that have entered Gaza since the October ceasefire were commercial vehicles transporting food and other everyday goods.
The official said humanitarian trucks were prioritised, and that commercial shipments supplemented the aid effort. If additional humanitarian trucks were available, they would be allowed to enter Gaza, the official said.
The COGAT official acknowledged that Israel continues to restrict dual-use items, but said alternatives are being sourced, such as tent poles made of wood.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/some-european-states-rethink-presence-us-backed-gaza-base-diplomats-say-2026-01-20/

European leaders, rattled by Donald Trump’s latest global gambit, are looking to present a united front in Davos, as CEOs warned against an emotional response to the U.S. president’s ambition to take over Greenland.
French President Emmanuel Macron said the European Union should not bend to “the law of the strongest”, adding that it was “crazy” that the bloc was having to contemplate using its “anti-coercion instrument” against the United States.

“We do believe that we need more growth, we need more stability in this world, but we do prefer respect to bullies,” Macron told the World Economic Forum’s annual meeting, the day before Trump’s arrival in Switzerland.
Without referring directly to Trump, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen highlighted a need to respond to seismic shifts in the world and said the speed and scale of change had driven a consensus in Europe on independence.
“It is time to seize this opportunity and build a new independent Europe,” she said in a speech.
Belgium’s Prime Minister Bart De Wever said the 27-member bloc was “at a crossroads” where it must decide on how to get out of a “very bad position” after trying to appease Trump to get his support for the Ukraine war.

“So we should unite and we should say to Donald Trump … ‘You’re crossing red lines here.’ We either stand together or we will stand divided,” De Wever said on a panel discussion.
Swedish Deputy Prime Minister Ebba Busch told Reuters that attempts to win over Trump with flattery, as some European leaders have tried in the past, would not work.
“Stroking the cat along the line of its fur is not going to do the trick this time. The EU needs to toughen up and hold the line,” she said, adding that the bloc needed to keep options for trade retaliation “locked and loaded”.

EUROPEANS AT ODDS OVER HOW TO RESPOND TO TRUMP

Trump announced tariffs on Saturday on imports from European allies that oppose the U.S. acquiring Greenland, an autonomous territory of Denmark.
European governments, which are facing growing challenges from populist, nationalist parties, have been at odds over how to respond to the tariff threat while maintaining U.S. support for Ukraine.

Macron said Europe should not accept a world where might makes right and called for bold moves to defend European industries.
“Let’s not be shy. Let’s not be divided. Let’s not accept a global order, which will be divided by those who claim to have the bigger voice,” Macron said.
Macron also appeared to see an opportunity for Europe in Trump’s chaotic policies.
“We have a place where the rule of law and predictability is still the rule of the game, and my guess is that it is under-priced by the market,” he said in his speech.
However, some senior bankers and executives in Davos, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said they saw the response from European leaders to Trump’s moves as emotional rather than pragmatic. Two suggested the continent needed to look beyond the way the U.S. president delivers his message and have a negotiation.

“But they won’t even want to have that conversation, because they’re so offended by the style. And so what you have in Europe is a very, very, delicate balance of a continent that cannot move together,” one senior banker told Reuters.
European countries say Trump’s threat of new tariffs would violate a trade deal reached with the U.S. last year, and EU leaders are set to discuss possible retaliation at an emergency summit in Brussels on Thursday.
U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, however, voiced confidence that the United States and European countries would find a solution and avoid what some have warned could become a prolonged trade war.
“Why are we jumping there? Why are you taking it to the worst case? … Calm down the hysteria. Take a deep breath,” he said.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/business/davos/europes-leaders-stand-firm-davos-ceos-warn-emotions-2026-01-20/

Thousands of U.S. workers and students marched through cities and university campuses on Tuesday in opposition to the immigration policies of President Donald Trump.
On the first anniversary of Trump’s second term, protests sprang up across the country against his aggressive immigration crackdown that prompted outrage after federal agents dragged a U.S. citizen from her car and shot dead 37-year-old mother Renee Good in Minneapolis in past weeks.

Hundreds of protesters gathered in Washington and smaller cities like Asheville, North Carolina, where demonstrators marched through the downtown shouting “No ICE, no KKK, no fascist USA,” according to online videos.

The Trump administration says it has a mandate from voters to deport millions of immigrants in the country illegally. Recent polls show most Americans disapprove of the use of force by officers with Immigration and Customs Enforcement and other federal agencies.
University students demonstrated in Cleveland, Ohio, chanting “No hate, no fear, refugees are welcome here” while high schoolers in Santa Fe, New Mexico, left class to attend a “Stop ICE Terror” rally at the state capitol, according to protest organizers and school officials.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/world/us/thousands-protest-against-trump-immigration-policies-2026-01-20/

All ​three major Wall Street indexes ended Tuesday with their biggest one-day drops in three months, in a broad selloff triggered by concerns ‌that fresh tariff threats from President Donald Trump against Europe could signal renewed market volatility.
The risk-off trade was pervasive, helping vault gold to fresh record highs, and pushing up debt costs with U.S. Treasuries wobbling under renewed selling pressure. Bitcoin, which can find favor when traditional markets waver, fell more than 3%.

All three U.S. equity benchmarks registered their worst one-day performance since October 10, with both the S&P 500 (.SPX), and Nasdaq Composite (.IXIC), slipping below their 50-day moving averages.
The S&P 500 (.SPX), lost 143.15 points, or 2.06%, to ‌end at 6,796.86 points, while the Nasdaq Composite (.IXIC), gave up 561.07 points, or 2.39%, to 22,954.32. The Dow Jones Industrial ​Average (.DJI), fell 870.74 points, or 1.76%, to 48,488.59.

UNCERTAINTY RISES

Tuesday was the first opportunity for U.S. investors to act on Trump’s weekend comments, given the market holiday for Martin Luther King, Jr. Day.
This included Trump saying additional 10% import tariffs would take effect on February 1 on goods from Denmark, Norway, Sweden, France, Germany, ‍the Netherlands, Finland and Great Britain — all already subject to U.S. tariffs.

The tariffs would increase to 25% on June 1 and continue until a deal was reached for the U.S. to purchase Greenland, Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social. Leaders of Greenland, an autonomous territory of Denmark, and Denmark have insisted the island is not for sale.
The reinjection of ⁠tariff threats into global markets harkens back to April’s “Liberation Day,” when Trump’s levies on global trade partners pushed the S&P 500 to near bear market territory.
The ‍CBOE Volatility Index (.VIX), also known as Wall Street’s fear gauge, spiked to 20.09 points, its highest close since November 24.

Trading volumes were also higher: around 20.6 billion shares changed ‌hands on ‌U.S. exchanges on Tuesday, up from the 17.01 billion average for the last 20 trading days.
While investor sentiment was frayed on Tuesday, the question being asked is whether Greenland represents a knee-jerk selloff, or something that will have longer-term implications for markets.

Jamie Cox, managing partner at Harris Financial Group, said he was not seeing indications investors were fleeing.
“I’m not at the point yet where I’m willing to say what is happening with Greenland, and the resurgence of the tariff threat back ⁠and forth, is going to precipitate a ⁠correction in the equities markets,” he ​said, adding he would be surprised if there was a 3% to 5% drop this week.

BOND MARKETS SPILLOVER

A potentially more significant action, in Cox’s eyes, would be whether Japanese authorities intervene in financial markets.
Japanese government bonds plunged on Tuesday, sending yields to record highs, while Tokyo stocks and the yen also fell after Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s call for a ‍snap election shook confidence in the country’s fiscal health.
The moves helped push the cost of longer-term European government bonds higher, while a selloff in U.S. Treasuries was more pronounced on the long end of the curve.
Despite tariff talk, and notable bond movements, the U.S. economy remains in a strong position.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/business/sp-nasdaq-futures-slide-one-month-lows-greenland-concerns-2026-01-20/

Australia’s Prime Minister Anthony Albanese on Wednesday welcomed Parliament’s passing of anti-hate speech and gun laws in response to two shooters killing 15 people at a Jewish festival in Sydney last month. Authorities say the attack was inspired by the Islamic State group.

“At Bondi, the terrorists had hate in their hearts, but they had guns in their hands,” Albanese told reporters, referring to the father and son gunmen accused of attacking Jewish worshippers during Hanukkah celebrations at Bondi Beach on Dec. 14.

“We said we wanted to deal with that with urgency and with unity and we acted to deliver both,” Albanese added.

The government had initially planned a single bill, but separated the issues of hate speech and gun laws into two bills introduced to the House of Representatives on Tuesday.

The bills passed through the Senate late Tuesday with the minor Greens party supporting gun reform and the conservative opposition Liberal Party backing anti-hate speech laws.

Albanese’s center-left Labor Party holds a majority in the House, but no party has a majority in the upper chamber.

Albanese said he was would have preferred stronger laws against hate speech, but the Senate would not compromise.

“If you can’t get laws passed in the wake of a massacre, then it’s difficult to see people changing their minds,” Albanese said.

The gun laws create new restrictions on gun ownership and create a government-funded buyback program to compensate people forced to hand in their firearms.

Anti-hate speech laws enable groups that don’t fit Australia’s definition of a terrorist organization, such as the Islamist group Hizb ut-Tahrir, to be outlawed as it is by some other countries.

Earlier Tuesday, Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke told Parliament that alleged gunmen Sajid Akram, 50, and his 24-year-old son Naveed Akram wouldn’t have been allowed to possess guns under the proposed laws.

The father, who was shot dead by police during the attack, legally owned the guns used.

His son, who was wounded, has been charged with dozens of offenses, including 15 counts of murder and one of committing a terrorist act over the attack.

Burke said that the Indian-born father would have been barred from gun ownership under the proposed laws because he wasn’t an Australian citizen. The Australian-born son would also been banned, because he had come under surveillance in 2019 from the Australian Security Intelligence Organization, or ASIO, over his association with suspected extremists.

ASIO also has a role under the new anti-hate speech laws in deciding which hate groups should be outlawed. Neo-Nazi group National Socialist Network has announced plans to disband rather than have its members targeted under the laws.

The opposition Nationals party had broken away from its Liberal Party partners by opposing the anti-hate speech legislation, arguing it could impinge on free speech.

“The legislation needs amendments to guarantee greater protections against unintended consequences that limit the rights and freedom of speech of everyday Australians and the Jewish community,” Nationals leader David Littleproud said late Tuesday.

Source : https://apnews.com/article/australia-gun-laws-hate-speech-parliament-2cf0b2e74634027945a6e10b6398c3ae

Scientists have uncovered the mummified remains of cheetahs from caves in northern Saudi Arabia.

The remains range from 130 years old to over 1,800 years old. Researchers excavated seven mummies along with the bones of 54 other cheetahs from a site near the city of Arar.

Mummification prevents decay by preserving dead bodies. Egypt’s mummies are the most well-known, but the process can also happen naturally in places like glacier ice, desert sands and bog sludge.

The new large cat mummies have cloudy eyes and shriveled limbs, resembling dried-out husks.

“It’s something that I’ve never seen before,” said Joan Madurell-Malapeira with the University of Florence in Italy, who was not involved with the discovery.

Researchers aren’t sure how exactly these new cats got mummified, but the caves’ dry conditions and stable temperature could have played a role, according to the new study published Thursday in the journal Communications Earth and Environment.

They also don’t know why so many cheetahs were in the caves. It could have been a denning site where mothers birthed and raised their young.

Scientists have uncovered the rare mummified remains of other felines, including a saber-toothed cat cub in Russia.

It’s uncommon for large mammals to be preserved to this degree. Besides being in the right environment, the carcasses also have to avoid becoming a snack for hungry scavengers like birds and hyenas.

To find such intact evidence of cheetahs that lived long ago in this part of the world is “entirely without precedent,” study author Ahmed Boug with the National Center for Wildlife in Saudi Arabia said in an email.

Source : https://apnews.com/article/cheetah-mummy-saudi-arabia-caves-f4a42d5842eb3ff1a97a151c2b502255

A TOP lawyer working for Goldman Sachs is being quietly ushered out of the company after her disturbing relationship with Jeffrey Epstein came to light, a bombshell report has claimed.

Kathryn Ruemmler, who served as a counselor to President Barack Obama, previously admitted to dealing with the disgraced financier, but sources say newly unearthed documents have put her under fire.

Executives at the cash cow financial firm are said to be drafting a “contingency plan” to remove Ruemmler from her post as chief legal officer and general counsel, according to insiders who spoke with The Wall Street Journal.

They’re still planning a “graceful” exit for the ultra-rich lawyer, despite Goldman CEO David Solomon publicly defending her and denying the report, the Journal reported.

The move comes after Ruemmler’s name surfaced in newly released documents and emails that were obtained by a congressional committee.

Ruemmler hasn’t been accused of any crimes or wrongdoing, and she’s defended mentions of her name in a response to the Journal, while also showing remorse over the association.

“As I have said, I regret ever knowing him, and I have enormous sympathy for the victims of Epstein’s crimes,” she said in a response.

She had informed her employer that she had done business with Epstein in the past with the law firm Latham & Watkins, but the leaked evidence appears to show their relationship was also personal.

Documents released by the committee show that Ruemmler held dozens of meetings with Epstein – who was standing accused of sex trafficking girls when he died by suicide in 2019.

According to the cache of evidence, the disgraced financier helped her with apartment hunting and even knew her “sushi order.”

He also appeared to help plan trips for her to visit his infamous private island, but she denies ever actually going.

According to the Journal, executives grew especially concerned when Ruemmler was listed as Epstein’s backup executor, who is the person elected to carry out the orders in someone’s will.

Ruemmler insisted that she had nothing to do with Epstein’s estate following his death.

Though Epstein was known to write people’s names in documents without their consent, the discovery “set off fresh alarms,” the outlet reported.

Ruemmler was also said to have caused a stir within the company when she was caught calling Trump “so gross” in email correspondence with Epstein, who responded that the president was “worse in real life and upclose.”

The day that email was released, Solomon was set to attend a White House dinner with the president.

Other correspondence appears to poke holes in Ruemmler’s claim that she never represented Epstein.

Emails sent from 2014 to 2019 show she was included in hundreds of threads that discussed legal strategy and compliance with a nonprosecution agreement.

One exchange from February 2018 had the subject line, “Re: this email trail was discovered today !. brad saying the girls got paid for services.”

Controversy surrounding Ruemmler is made even more glaring as she sits on Goldman’s Reputational Risk Committee, where she helps to vet potential clients for ethical concerns.

According to insiders who spoke with the Journal, other executives, especially female bosses, are questioning whether her dealings with Epstein make her a poor fit for the role.

Solomon has also defended Ruemmler in internal conversations about the matter, at one point telling other senior women he was dumbfounded people were questioning her rank, sources claimed.

Source : https://www.the-sun.com/news/15812463/goldman-sachs-humilated-hiring-obama-insider-lawyer-tied-jeffrey-epstein/

USHA Vance is pregnant.

The second lady made history after announcing that she and Vice President JD Vance will welcome their fourth child this summer.

In a statement, the couple said, “We’re very excited to share the news that Usha is pregnant with our fourth child, a boy.

“Usha and the baby are doing well, and we are all looking forward to welcoming him in late July.

“During this exciting and hectic time, we are particularly grateful for the military doctors who take excellent care of our family and the staff members who do so much to ensure that we can serve the country while enjoying a wonderful life with our children.”

Usha is set to be the first second lady in US history to give birth while serving in the White House.

Only one first lady has given birth and raised her newborn in the White House – Frances Cleveland in 1893.

After welcoming John F Kennedy Jr. in 1960 following the election, Jackie Kennedy also gave birth to Patrick Kennedy while in office in 1963, but he only lived two days.

Usha now joins Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt as the second White House lady who is set to welcome a child while serving under Donald Trump.

Usha and JD already have three young children: Ewan, 8, Vivek, 5, and Mirabel, 4.

The kids are being raised in an interfaith household, as JD is a Catholic convert while Usha was raised Hindu.

Before entering public service, the second lady worked as a trial lawyer until she quit in July 2024 to dedicate more time to the political campaign.

JD has made it clear that he wants “more babies” in the US, and is working to make parenthood more affordable, he said in his first speech as vice president.

Despite his desires for more children, he’s made it clear that raising children under the scrutiny of a global stage is anything but easy.

Speaking on The Katie Miller podcast, he described Usha as “the gentle parent” while he takes a more no-nonsense approach.

He said if one of the children is having a meltdown, he will “immediately grab them, take them to the bathroom, and say, ‘You got to cut this s**t out.’”

Source : https://www.the-sun.com/news/15812793/jd-usha-vance-reveal-gender-fourth-child/

THE city’s new mayor sparked eyebrows on daytime TV after describing a budding “bromance” with President Donald Trump, even as he blasted “inhumane” ICE raids in Minneapolis.

Mayor Zohran Mamdani made his first appearance on ABC’s The View since he was sworn in as mayor of New York.

During the segment, The View host Joy Behar praised Mamdani for going on the “charm offensive” after he met Trump in Washington, DC, following his victory, saying the president appeared charmed, unlike Governor Gavin Newsom, who has “gone on the attack.”

Behar then pressed Mamdani about his “bromance” with Trump, and Mamdani replied: “I think my intention is about being honest and direct with the president.

And I think there are many disagreements the two of us have. There’s no shortage of them. One thing that we do have in common is that we both love New York City. We’re both New Yorkers.”

Behar also asked Mamdani why he’s been exchanging texts with Trump.

After he called it “incredible” to be building “a city government that moves as fast as New Yorkers do.”

Behar jumped in: “What’s interesting is you called him a ‘fascist’ to his face, a dream I’ve always had, and then we saw you talking to him that day, and he seemed to be madly in love with you.”

The conversation then turned to Minneapolis, where Mamdani said ICE raids are “cruel,” “inhumane,” and “leave a sense of fear.”

Asked about Renee Good, he said he “doesn’t know how to describe the murder,” adding: “it’s terrifying.”

Pressed on whether the federal agents could target New York, Mamdani said “we are being asked to not believe our own eyes,” claiming he told Trump the raids “are cruel, they’re inhumane, they do nothing to deliver on public safety.”

He insisted “my job is to stand up for every New Yorker,” and said “our values and laws are not bargaining chips.”

Asked if he would cooperate with ICE in New York, Mamdani said: “I’m not willing to have a negotiation with New Yorker’s lives.”

He also noted that Sanctuary city policies were at one point defended by Republicans and Democrats alike.

FOES TO BROS

Last year, after their first White House meeting in November, the two shared positive feelings afterwards and said they bonded over wanting New York City to thrive.

Mamdani told reporters they were clear about their differences but still had a productive chat, until one question brought up him previously calling Trump a fascist.

Trump abruptly cut in, raising his arm and saying, “That’s OK you can just say yes,” as the room burst into laughter and Mamdani smiled before going quiet.

After the meeting, Trump called it “great” and “very productive,” congratulated Mamdani on his campaign, and said, “I think you’re gonna have, hopefully, a really great mayor.”

Last year in October, Mamdani appeared on Fox News, and at that time, he addressed Trump “directly,” saying he was ready to work with him, but on his own terms.

He also added he would not be “a mayor like Mayor Adams who will call you to stay out of jail,” nor “a disgraced governor like Andrew Cuomo who will call you to ask how to win this election.”

He stressed he is “ready to speak at any time” about lowering the cost of living for New Yorkers, adding:

Source : https://www.the-sun.com/news/15811296/new-york-mayor-zohran-mamdani-trump-bromance-the-view/

Blake Lively and Taylor Swift’s texts blasting Justin Baldoni as a “clown” and “a bitch” have been revealed in new court docs.

Lively called Baldoni — her director and co-star in “It Ends With Us” — the “doofus director of my movie” in text messages to Swift according to court docs obtained by Page Six.

The actress allegedly asked the pop star to endorse her revision of the “It Ends With Us” script without even reading it back in April 2023 and Swift was supportive, Baldoni’s lawyers claim in the docs.

“Swift agreed to do Lively’s bidding, texting Lively, ‘I’ll do anything for you!!,” per the court docs.

The docs note that after Swift endorsed Lively’s revised script in a meeting with Baldoni at Lively’s apartment, Lively texted Swift, “You were so epically heroic today. I recapped every moment to Ryan [Reynolds]. I kept remembering stuff. You making s–t up about me and lenses. And referring to yourself as my doll. This clown falling for all of it. But also resisting it. You are the worlds absolute greatest friend ever.”

More correspondence with Swift include the singer suggesting Baldoni was not “strategic” in using her song “My Tears Ricochet With Us” in “It Ends With Us.”

“In April 26, 2024 messages, Lively and Swift discussed a plan to use Swift’s song in the film’s trailer,” the court docs state. “Swift wrote: ‘If Justin was strategic he would be like no Taylor swift in the trailer because that gives you more power over the film, that’s your ally not his.’”

“Lively responded: “You are so right…He should’ve run from your music…How stupid. This was his only shot at having the appearance of an upper hand,’” the docs continue.

In December 2024, Swift texted Lively ahead of the bombshell New York Times article that claimed Baldoni waged a smear campaign against the “Gossip Girl” alum.

“I think this bitch knows something is coming because he’s gotten out his tiny violin,” Swift texted Lively, according to the docs.

In Lively’s response, which is included in the court docs, she denies she and Swift discussed the New York Times article beforehand, and also denies she asked Swift to endorse her script revisions without reading it.

“And I sent Taylor the script on her way to my apartment because Justin was still there, and I asked her to read them,” Lively states. “I told her she didn’t have to, I didn’t want her to feel pressured to do that, but I hoped that she would.”

Later in the lengthy docs, Baldoni’s lawyers also allege Lively insulted Baldoni to her other famous friends, including Ben Affleck and Matt Damon. Lively allegedly told them she “rewrote the script” and “directed every actor.”

“She also did not hesitate to disparage Baldoni among her Hollywood crowd, describing him to Ben Affleck, for example, as a ‘chaotic clown,’” per the docs.

Reps for Lively, Swift and Baldoni didn’t immediately respond to Page Six’s request for comment.

Swift was first dragged into Lively and Baldoni’s feud in January 2025 when the former “Man Enough” podcast host filed his countersuit against Lively.

Baldoni’s filing included text messages referencing a moment when he allegedly felt “pressured” by Reynolds and Swift, whom the actress called her protective “dragons,” to respond positively to a scene Lively rewrote.

Source : https://pagesix.com/2026/01/20/celebrity-news/taylor-swift-calls-justin-baldoni-a-bitch-with-a-tiny-violin-in-bombshell-text-to-blake-lively/

Danish MEP Anders Vistisen created a stir in the European Parliament by bluntly telling US President Donald Trump to “f**k off” in response to Trump’s suggestion that the US should take over Greenland for national security reasons.

Danish Member of European Parliament (MEP) Anders Vistisen grabbed everyone’s attention during a House session telling United States President to ‘F**K Off’, hitting out the Donald Trump over his claims of taking over Greenland.

Vistisen rejected recent claims being made by Trump suggesting that American should take over Greenland in view of its national security.

Speaking in the European Parliament, Vistisen said, “Let me put this in words you might understand: Mr. President, f*ck off.”

However, Vistisen was pulled up for using the cuss words against the US President. The House Speaker told him that he was sorry to interrupt him, but this is against their rules. “As much as you might feel or the room might feel into this, we have clear rules about cuss words, language that is inappropriate in this room. I’m sorry to interrupt you, but this is unacceptable even if you might have strong political influence about it.”

The room welcomed the quick interruption of Vistisen by the Speaker, who immediately asked and advised the member not to use these cuss words, saying they have clear language rules.

The remarks by Danish MEP have come after Donald Trump earlier today shared AI generated map of Greenland showing it as part of United States in yet another pressure tactics that he is trying over European allies.

Trump claims his intervention averted “nuclear” war between India and Pakistan after Operation Sindoor in May 2025, suggesting he deserved a Nobel Prize for ending eight wars.

US President Donald Trump has again claimed that his intervention helped avert a possible war between India and Pakistan in May 2025, when tensions sharply escalated following Operation Sindoor.

Speaking to reporters at the White House on Tuesday, Trump claimed that during the first 10 months of his second term, he had brought an end to eight long-running conflicts, singling out tensions between India and Pakistan, who “were going to go nuclear.”

He said the two nuclear-armed neighbours were on the brink of a major confrontation, alleging that eight aircraft had been downed and warning that the situation could have spiralled into a nuclear exchange. Recounting a recent meeting, Trump said Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif had credited him with saving millions of lives.

“I ended eight unendable wars in 10 months…Pakistan and India. They were really going at it. Eight planes were shot down. They were going to go nuclear, in my opinion. The Prime Minister of Pakistan was here and he said, President Trump saved 10 million people and maybe much more than that,” Trump said while addressing the media to mark the first anniversary of the start of his second term.

The US President had made the same remarks just days earlier at an event commemorating the renaming of Southern Boulevard as Donald J Trump Boulevard.

Trump Says He Deserved Nobel Prize For Ending 8 Wars

Trump went on to suggest that he deserved a Nobel Peace Prize for each conflict he claimed to have resolved. “I should have gotten the Nobel Prize for each war. But I don’t say that. I saved millions and millions of people,” he said, adding pointed remarks about the Nobel Committee.

Referring to Norway, Trump implied that decisions on the prize were politically influenced. He also mentioned Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado, praising her for handing over her peace prize medal to him and saying she believed he was more deserving.

“Don’t let anyone tell you that Norway doesn’t control the shots, okay? It’s in Norway. Norway controls the shots…That’s why I have such respect for Maria, doing what she did. She said, I don’t deserve the Nobel Prize. He does,” Trump.

Trump’s Repeated Claims Of Ending India-Pakistan Conflict

Since May 2025, Trump has repeatedly maintained that his administration played a decisive role in defusing tensions between India and Pakistan, arguing that US diplomatic pressure and the threat of tariffs forced both sides to step back from the brink during a military standoff. These statements have aligned with Trump’s broader public campaign highlighting his credentials for the Nobel Peace Prize—an honour he ultimately did not receive.

India has firmly dismissed Trump’s claims, consistently stating that no external mediation was involved in the ceasefire. New Delhi has asserted that the truce was the result of direct communication between the two neighbours after India carried out Operation Sindoor, which targeted terrorist infrastructure in Pakistan in retaliation for the April 2025 Pahalgam attack in Jammu and Kashmir that killed 26 people, most of them tourists.

Source : https://www.news18.com/world/they-were-going-to-go-nuclear-trump-again-takes-credit-for-india-pakistan-ceasefire-ws-l-9845397.html

“They’re shooting at me. Please come get me. I’m scared.”

When filmmaker Kaouther Ben Hania first heard the emergency phone call recording of Hind Rajab, a frightened six-year-old Palestinian girl begging for help while under siege in Gaza City in 2024, on social media, she says she immediately knew what she had to do.

Hitting pause on the movie she was about to make, the Tunisian two-time Oscar-nominee called her producer and they agreed to shift focus to telling the story of the girl, who was killed – likely by Israeli fire, according to a number of media investigations – along with her aunt, uncle and cousins, and two paramedics sent to save her.

“It haunted me,” Ben Hania tells BBC News about the voice recording, which is the centrepiece of her Oscar-shortlisted docudrama, released in UK cinemas last Friday.

“I was really angry, I was sad, I felt helpless, and I hate it when I feel helpless.

“I asked myself this basic question, what can I do? I’m a filmmaker, so I can do movies.”

She adds: “We started working on The Voice of Hind Rajab that way to not feel helpless, to not accept, to bear witness.

“Because not doing it, for me, was being complicit in a way.”

Hind Rajab’s car was hit by suspected Israeli fire as she and her family tried to flee bombing during the two-year war in Gaza.

Several family members were killed, but Hind managed to answer a callback from the helpers at the Palestinian Red Crescent Society.

The ambulance trying to reach her was also shelled, and Hind, her family, and the ambulance crew all died.

The Israel Defence Force initially stated none of its troops had been in the area where Hind and the others were killed.

But that suggestion was questioned following independent investigations by research agency Forensic Architecture, in colloboration with NGO (Non-Governmental Organisation) Earshot and journalists from Al Jazeera, which concluded that damage to both the car and the ambulance was consistent with Israeli tank fire.

The IDF later said it had “conducted raids on terror targets” with forces operating in neighbourhoods in Gaza City, including Tel al Hawa, from where Hind had made her emergency call.

The UN cited her case in a commission of inquiry accusing Israel of war crimes, which it denies.

An IDF spokesperson told the BBC it is still being reviewed by Israel’s Fact-Finding Assessment Mechanism (FFAM).

US president Donald Trump has doubled down on his threats to take control of Greenland, saying on social media that there is “no going back” and that “Greenland is imperative”.

During a news conference at the White House, Trump was asked how far he was willing to go to acquire Greenland and replied, “You’ll find out”.

Meanwhile, French president Emmanuel Macron warned at a meeting at the World Economic Forum meeting in Switzerland of a “shift towards a world without rules”, while Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said the “old order is not coming back”.

Trump is due to arrive in Davos on Wednesday, where he has said there are “a lot of meetings scheduled on Greenland”.

During the lengthy press briefing, Trump also told reporters that “things are going to work out pretty well” in Greenland.

Asked by the BBC whether the possible break up of the Nato alliance was a price the president was willing to pay for Greenland, he responded, “Nobody has done more for Nato than I have, in every way,” and said “Nato is going to be happy and we are going to be happy,” adding, “We need it for world security.”

But he earlier questioned whether Nato would come to aid of the US, should it be required.

“I know we’ll come to (Nato’s) rescue, but I just really do question whether or not they’ll come to ours,” he told reporters.

Nato – the North Atlantic Treaty Organization – currently has 32 member states, with the US one of the 12 founding countries.

Designed to safeguard freedom and security through a collective defence, one of the core principles of the Nato alliance is outlined in Article 5, which says that an armed attack against one or more members will be considered an attack against all.

Trump has not ruled out using military force to acquire Greenland; when NBC News asked yesterday whether he would use force to seize the territory, the president replied “no comment”.

In an interview with BBC Newsnight on Tuesday evening, Greenland’s Minister of Industry and Natural Resources, Naaja Nathanielsen, said that Greenlanders were “bewildered” by the president’s demands.

“We do not want to be Americans, and we have been quite clear about that,” Nathanielsen said.

“What value do you put on our culture and our right to decide what happens with us in the future?”

Ahead of the forum in Davos, Trump shared screenshots that he says showed text messages sent to him by Macron and Nato Secretary General Mark Rutte.

In them, Rutte said he was committed to finding a way forward on Greenland, while Macron said he “does not understand what you are doing”, but offered to organise a meeting with other leaders in Paris.

The President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, addressed the matter directly in a speech to attendees on Tuesday, which was the first day of the forum, emphasising that Europe is “fully committed” when it comes to the security of the Arctic.

However, she said that this could only be achieved together, and called Trump’s proposed additional tariffs “a mistake”.

The US president has said he will add a 10% tariff to “any and all goods” imported from eight European countries from 1 February if they opposed his proposed takeover of Greenland.

In her speech, Von der Leyen added that the European Union stands in “full solidarity” with Greenland and the Kingdom of Denmark – adding that their sovereignty is “non-negotiable”.

Her words were echoed by Canada’s Mark Carney, who said that his country’s commitment to Nato’s Article 5 – which states an armed attack against one or more members is considered an attack against all – is “unwavering”.

“We stand firmly with Greenland and Denmark and fully support their unique right to determine Greenland’s future,” Carney said.

In Macron’s remarks, he said he preferred “respect to bullies” and the “rule of law to brutality”.

Earlier on Tuesday, Trump threatened a 200% tariff on French wine and champagne after Macron reportedly declined an invitation to join the Gaza “Board of Peace”.

Source : https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cvgr19m642zo

Israel banned the UN agency for Palestinian refugees last year, claiming it had been infiltrated by militants, a charge the United Nations strongly denies.

Israeli crews began demolishing the headquarters of the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) in occupied East Jerusalem on Tuesday.

They bulldozed several buildings in the compound, which once housed dozens of agency staff.

UNRWA head Philippe Lazzarini condemned the move, describing it as a “new level of open and deliberate defiance of international law, including of the privileges and immunities of the United Nations, by the State of Israel.”

UNRWA has not used the building since early last year, after Israel ordered the agency to vacate all its premises and halt its operations. On Tuesday, Israeli forces confiscated devices and forced out the private security hired to guard the facility.

An Israeli flag now flies over the demolished site.

Israel accuses UNRWA of bias

Israel said the move enforces a law banning UNRWA, claiming some agency staff have ties to militant groups such as Hamas.

The United Nations has denied that UNRWA has an anti-Israel bias and said it acted quickly to purge any suspected militants among its staff.

“This is a historic day, a day of celebration and a very important day for governance in Jerusalem,” Israel’s National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir said.

He posted a video of himself at the site as the demolition work began.

Israel’s Foreign Ministry defended the demolitions, saying the state owns the compound.

“The compound does not enjoy any immunity and the seizure of this compound by Israeli authorities was carried out in accordance with both Israeli and international law,” it said.

Roland Friedrich, UNRWA’s director in the West Bank, rejected the Israeli claim and insisted that the compound “remains United Nations property and is protected by the privileges and immunities of the UN, regardless of whether it is currently in use”.

Palestinian Authority and Saudi Arabia condemn Israeli operation

United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres called on Israel to halt the ⁠demolition ‍restore it and other ‌UNRWA premises to ‌the ⁠world body “without delay,” deputy UN spokesperson Farhan ‌Haq ‌told reporters.

The Palestinian Authority condemned the Israeli actions too.

“The ministry warns of the gravity of this deliberate escalation against UNRWA, which comes within the framework of a systematic targeting of its role and UN mandate, and an attempt to undermine the international protection system for Palestinian refugees,” the Foreign Ministry in Ramallah said in a statement.

Source : https://www.dw.com/en/israel-demolishes-structures-inside-unrwa-compound/a-75583759

In a recent survey, some 60% of Germans said buying a Tesla was “completely out of the question,” Meanwhile, the German military has filled its ranks to the highest levels in over a decade.

Donald Trump is expected to meet global business leaders in Davos on Wednesday, sources familiar with the matter said, as the U.S. President’s presence looms large over the annual gathering of the global elite in Switzerland.
Business leaders, including CEOs in financial services, crypto and consulting, were invited to a reception after Trump’s address to the World Economic Forum’s annual meeting, the sources told Reuters on Monday. The agenda was unclear.

One CEO simply had “a reception in honour of President Donald J Trump” scheduled in their diary, while another said their understanding was that global CEOs had been invited, not just those from the United States. One of the sources said the invitations had come from the White House.
Anthony Scaramucci, an investor who briefly served as Trump’s communications director during his first term, said he knew the meeting was happening.
“I’m not going. I’m not sure I’m invited, but even if I were, I wouldn’t want to be a side show,” Scaramucci said.
Trump is expected to arrive on Wednesday in the Swiss mountain resort, where he is due to deliver a special address.

Several top U.S. officials, including Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, are also accompanying Trump.
China, meanwhile, is being represented in Davos by Vice Premier He Lifeng who is due to deliver a special address on Tuesday. He will also host a reception with CEOs and founders of global companies, a source told Reuters.
China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs did not immediately respond to a request for comment outside of business hours.

‘EVERYONE SHOULD TAKE THE PRESIDENT AT HIS WORD’

The WEF agenda has to some extent been overtaken by the U.S. president’s dramatic policy moves, including his demand in recent days that the United States take over Greenland.

WEF organisers have said that over 3,000 delegates from more than 130 countries will attend this year, including 64 heads of state and government, particularly from emerging economies.
The list also includes several heads of G7 nations, with changes in U.S. policy under Trump in focus.

Russian President Vladimir Putin’s special envoy Kirill Dmitriev will also travel to Davos and hold meetings with members of the U.S. delegation, two sources with knowledge of the visit told Reuters on condition of anonymity.
Meanwhile, national security advisers from a number of countries are due to meet on the sidelines of the event on Monday, with Greenland among the subjects on the agenda, diplomatic sources said.
One European diplomat, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said Greenland had been added to the agenda of the previously scheduled meeting after Trump on Saturday to impose extra tariffs on eight European countries until the U.S. is allowed to buy the Arctic island.
Bessent said European governments should not retaliate against any measures taken by the U.S. in their dispute.
“I think it would be very unwise,” Bessent told reporters when asked about retaliatory trade measures on the sidelines of the WEF meeting, adding that Europe should not doubt Trump’s intentions over Greenland.
“I’ve been travelling, so I haven’t been in touch (with European officials), but I spoke to President Trump and evidently there are a lot of inbounds, and I think everyone should take the president at his word,” Bessent said.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/business/davos/trump-meet-global-ceos-davos-with-us-policy-focus-2026-01-19/

It was a mix of carmine and scarlet, with a hint of orange – a new hue, inspired by an elderly woman at Barcelona’s opera house, whose elegance struck a young Valentino Garavani.
The colour, introduced to the fashion world several years later, in 1959, with a strapless cocktail dress of draped tulle, has carried his name – “Valentino red” – ever since, doubling as the eponymous Italian fashion group’s signature.

“I think a woman dressed in red is always wonderful, she is the perfect image of a heroine,” Valentino wrote in the book “Rosso” (Red), released in 2022. He would include at least one red dress in every one of his collections.
Valentino, the Italian fashion designer who built one of the country’s most celebrated luxury houses and was known in the industry as “the emperor”, died on Monday at his home in Rome, his foundation said. He was 93.
The cause of death was not immediately known.

‘I LOVE BEAUTY’

Valentino ranked alongside Giorgio Armani and Karl Lagerfeld as the last of a leading generation of designers, from an era before fashion became a highly commercial industry run as much by financiers and marketing executives as by couturiers.

Scaling the heights of high fashion, he was the first Italian to feature on the exclusive Paris haute couture catwalks.
Passionate about film, he dreamed as a young man of dressing the “beautiful ladies of the silverscreen”, as he called them, among them 1950s Hollywood stars Lana Turner and Judy Garland.
Valentino would eventually design Elizabeth Taylor’s wedding gown, and was the first choice for numerous Oscar winners, including Sharon Stone and Penelope Cruz.
His romantic designs, simple at first glance, were full of intricate detail. “I love beauty,” Valentino said. “It is not my fault. And I know what women want: they want to be beautiful.”
The designer, who also dressed Jackie Kennedy, created a business empire under his own name before selling it off ahead of his retirement, in 2008.

‘YOU NEED A LOT OF PATIENCE’

Valentino was an only child, born into a well-to-do family in Voghera, south of Milan, where his father ran an electrical supplies company.

Having started drawing and appreciating high-end clothes from a young age, he studied couture in Milan and Paris, where he then worked as an apprentice for designer Jean Dessès. He returned home in 1960, opening his own fashion house in the heart of Rome.
That year, Elizabeth Taylor chose a white Valentino gown for the premiere of blockbuster “Spartacus”.
Also in 1960, he met Giancarlo Giammetti in a Roman cafe. Giammetti would go on to be his partner in business and in life.
“To share life with a person for your whole existence – every moment, joy, pain, enthusiasm, disappointment – is something that cannot be defined,” Valentino said of him.
Giammetti took on the managerial part of the business, leaving creative matters to the designer.
“To be with Valentino as a friend, as a lover and as an employee is a bit the same: you need a lot of patience,” Giammetti said in “Valentino: The Last Emperor”, a documentary that followed the designer in the last two years of his career.
Valentino’s georgette fabrics, chiffon ruffles and ornate embellishments, including the exclusive budellini technique – where long strips of sheep’s wool are hand rolled into tubes, wrapped in silk and stitched together – won him a multitude of awards, including France’s highest civilian distinction in 2006.
“Fame and fortune didn’t change him,” Giammetti said at the time. “He is still the little guy I met 45 years ago.”
Superstitious and introverted, Valentino loved chocolate, skiing and his pugs. He told Corriere in 2017 that he was afraid of death.

‘THE PERFECT MOMENT TO SAY ADIEU’

In 2007 he wowed Rome with lavish celebrations to celebrate his decades in fashion – a three-day event that included dinners, parties and exhibitions with thousands of guests flying in from around the world.
Months later he announced that he would stop designing for his company, which he no longer controlled after selling the firm almost a decade earlier for some $300 million.
“I have decided that this is the perfect moment to say adieu to the world of fashion,” he said. “As the English say, I would like to leave the party when it is still full.”
His last catwalk show was held in January 2008 in Paris, a city he called his second home and which he said had taught him to love fashion and life.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/valentino-italian-haute-couture-emperor-who-painted-fashion-red-dies-93-2026-01-19/

Three U.S. Catholic archbishops on Monday decried the direction of American foreign policy, saying the country’s “moral role in confronting evil around the world” was in question and that military action must only be used as an extreme last resort.
“In 2026, the United States has entered into the most profound and searing debate about the moral foundation for America’s actions in the world since the end of the Cold War,” the three highest-ranking U.S. Catholic archbishops said in a rare joint statement.

The statement by Cardinals Blase Cupich of Chicago, Robert McElroy of Washington and Joseph Tobin of Newark, echoes Pope Leo’s fiery Vatican speech earlier this month denouncing the world’s “zeal for war”.
Leo, the first U.S. pope, has previously criticized some of U.S. President Donald Trump’s policies, in particular on immigration.
Citing recent developments in Venezuela, Russia’s war in Ukraine and the threats against Greenland by the Trump administration, the archbishops said rights of nations to self-determination appeared “fragile”.
“The events in Venezuela, Ukraine and Greenland have raised basic questions about the use of military force and the meaning of peace,” the clerics said.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/world/us/top-us-catholic-cardinals-question-morality-american-foreign-policy-2026-01-19/

U.S. President Donald Trump has linked his drive to take control of Greenland to his failure to win the Nobel Peace Prize, saying he no longer thought “purely of Peace” as the row over the island threatened to reignite a trade war with Europe.
Trump declined to tell NBC News in an interview whether he would use force to seize Greenland. He did reiterate his threat to hit European nations with tariffs if a deal is not reached.

Trump has intensified his push to wrest sovereignty over Greenland from fellow NATO member Denmark, prompting the European Union to weigh hitting back with its own measures.
The dispute threatens to upend the NATO alliance that has underpinned Western security for decades and which was already under strain over the war in Ukraine and Trump’s refusal to protect allies unless they increase defence spending.
Trump’s threat has rattled European industry and sent shockwaves through financial markets. Investors fear a return to the volatility of 2025’s trade war, which only eased when the sides reached tariff deals in the middle of the year.

In a text message on Sunday to Norway’s Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Stoere, Trump said: “Considering your Country decided not to give me the Nobel Peace Prize for having stopped 8 Wars PLUS, I no longer feel an obligation to think purely of Peace, although it will always be predominant, but can now think about what is good and proper for the United States of America.”
Norway’s government released the messages on Monday.
Stoere had sent an initial message with Finnish President Alexander Stubb calling for a de-escalation of tensions, eliciting a response from Trump less than half an hour later.

NOBEL COMMITTEE GAVE 2025 PEACE PRIZE TO MACHADO, NOT TRUMP

The Norwegian Nobel Committee annoyed Trump by awarding the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize not to him but to Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado.
In his message, Trump also repeated his assertion that Denmark cannot protect Greenland from Russia or China.

“… And why do they have a ‘right of ownership’ anyway?” he wrote, adding: “The World is not secure unless we have Complete and Total Control of Greenland.”
Trump vowed on Saturday to implement a wave of increasing tariffs from February 1 on EU members Denmark, Sweden, France, Germany, the Netherlands and Finland, along with Britain and Norway, until the U.S. is allowed to buy Greenland, home to only 57,000 people.
“We are living in 2026, you can trade with people, but you don’t trade people,” Denmark’s Foreign Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen said during a visit to London on Monday.
In a post on Facebook, Greenland Prime Minister Jens-Frederik Nielsen said the territory should be allowed to decide its own fate.
“We will not let ourselves be pressured. We stand firm on dialogue, on respect and on international law,” he said.

Denmark’s military told Reuters that Danish soldiers would land in Kangerlussuaq, western Greenland, on Monday, as part of the Arctic Endurance military exercise.
Trump dismissed the arrival of NATO allies in Greenland.
“That wasn’t a military,” Trump told reporters on Monday in Florida before he boarded a flight back to Washington, DC.
“They sent a few people, and they say they sent them not for me, but to guard against Russia. But you know, NATO has been warning Denmark for about 20 years now, longer than that, 25 years, they’ve been warning Denmark about the Russian threat, and it’s not only Russia, it’s also China.”

TALKS WITH TRUMP IN DAVOS?

Norway’s Stoere said he would change his schedule to attend the World Economic Forum in Davos on Wednesday and Thursday, overlapping with Trump’s planned appearance at the annual gathering of the global political and business elite. The country will not change its stance on Greenland, the country’s foreign minister Espen Barth Eide said.
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said he too would try to meet Trump on Wednesday, adding that a trade dispute was not wanted. “But if we are confronted with tariffs that we consider unreasonable, then we are capable of responding,” Merz said.
Asked by reporters on Monday what he planned to say to European leaders in Davos about his Greenland plan, Trump said: “I don’t think they’re going to push back too much. Look, we have to have it.”
“They have to have this done. They can’t protect it. Denmark, they’re wonderful people, and I know the leaders – they’re are very good people, but they don’t even go there.”
U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said it would be “very unwise” for European governments to retaliate.
“I think it’s a complete canard that the president will be doing this because of the Nobel prize. The president is looking at Greenland as a strategic asset for the United States,” he told reporters in Davos.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/trump-tells-norway-he-no-longer-feels-obligation-think-only-peace-2026-01-19/

“Intimidation,” “threats” and “blackmail” are just some of the terms being used by European Union leaders to describe U.S. President Donald Trump’s warning that he will slap new tariffs on nations opposing American control of Greenland.

European language has hardened since Trump returned to the White House 12 months ago. Now it’s in reaction to the previously unthinkable idea that NATO’s most powerful member would threaten to seize the territory of another ally. Trade retaliation is likely should Trump make good on his tariff announcement.

A year into Trump 2.0, Europe’s faith in the strength of the trans-Atlantic bond is fading fast. For some, it’s already disappeared. The flattery of past months has not worked and tactics are evolving as the Europeans try to manage threats from an old ally just as they confront the threat of an increasingly hostile Russia.

Trump’s first term brought NATO to the brink of collapse. “I feared that NATO was about to stop functioning,” former Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg wrote in his recent memoir, after the U.S. president had threatened to walk out of a 2018 summit.

Now, Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen is warning that should he try to annex Greenland, a semiautonomous part of Denmark, “then everything stops … including our NATO.”

“We are at the very early stage of a rather deep political-military crisis,” said Maria Martisiute, a European Policy Centre analyst. “There is a greater realization, even though political leaders will not like to admit it, that America has abandoned NATO.”

Reading the riot act

In January 2025, U.S. allies at NATO were waiting to hear Trump’s plans for Ukraine.

Europe’s biggest land war in decades was about to enter its fourth year. The Europeans believed that President Vladimir Putin would pose an existential threat to their territory should Russia win.

Few thought that Biden administration policies would continue. But within weeks, any lingering hopes for the U.S. commitment to Ukraine dissolved. American arms supplies and funds began to dry up. Europe would have to fill the gap and pay for U.S. help.

In a speech at NATO headquarters in February, U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth read the riot act to European allies and Canada. The United States had priorities elsewhere and Europe must handle security in its own backyard.

Ukraine would not join the alliance. Its territory seized by Russia would not be returned. The Europeans could pull together a force to help Ukraine if they wanted, but they wouldn’t get U.S. help if they went into the country and got attacked.

Trump has since blamed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy for the invasion, notwithstanding visits with royalty in the U.K. and the Netherlands meant to mollify him.

Days later that February, in Munich, Vice President JD Vance met the leader of a far-right party during election campaigning in Germany. He claimed that Europe’s main threat was internal, not Russia. Free speech is “in retreat” across the continent, Vance warned.

But after winning the poll, Chancellor Friedrich Merz, said that “in view of the increasing threat situation,” Germany and Europe “must now very quickly make very big efforts, very quickly,” to strengthen their defense capabilities.

Europe’s security independence

Over the course of last year, European leaders and Zelenskyy flew to Washington to try to keep Trump onside. A 28-point plan to end the war that he floated would acquiesce to many Russian demands.

The plan was reworked. Talks continue, but without Putin. Few expect him to accept. Trump mostly blames Zelenskyy for the stalemate.

Meanwhile, Europe pressed ahead with new defense measures, even as Trump waged a global tariff war, including against U.S. allies, roiling their economies.

The EU created a multibillion-euro fund to buy arms and ammunition, with the emphasis on sourcing them from European companies and weaning nations off U.S. suppliers.

Debt rules were eased for security spending. Money was funneled into Ukraine’s defense industry. In December, European leaders agreed to pay for most of its military and economic needs for the next two years as Kyiv teeters on the brink of bankruptcy.

A new U.S. national security strategy further soured trans-Atlantic relations. It paints European allies as weak, offers tacit support to far-right political parties, and criticizes European free speech and migration policy.

European Council President Antonio Costa warned the U.S. against interfering in Europe’s affairs. Merz said that the U.S. strategy underscores the need for Europe to become “much more independent” from the United States.

Work has since begun on Europe’s own security strategy. It aims to respond to “the geopolitical changes in our world and to give an appropriate answer to that,” European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said.

Part of it is to make Europe even more autonomous.

As France, Germany, the U.K., Norway, Sweden and the Netherlands sent troops to Greenland last week — small in number but highly symbolic in the message of resolve sent to the White House — French President Emmanuel Macron said that it’s important “to stand at the side of a sovereign state to protect its territory.”

Source : https://apnews.com/article/trump-europe-nato-greenland-security-8d31b28bb7076f534fba25b80aa3a59f

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has fired his vice premier and railed against “incompetent” officials in a rare and very public broadside against apparatchiks at the opening of a critical factory, state media said Tuesday (Jan 20).

Vice Premier Yang Sung Ho was sacked “on the spot”, the state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said, in a speech in which Kim attacked “irresponsible, rude and incompetent leading officials”.

“Please, Comrade Vice Premier, resign by yourself when you can do it on your own before it is too late,” Kim reportedly said.

Nuclear-armed North Korea, which is under multiple sets of sanctions over its weapons programmes, has long struggled with its moribund state-managed economy and chronic food shortages.

Kim has been quick to scold lazy officials for alleged mismanagement of economic policy, but such a public dismissal is very rare.

Touring the opening of an industrial machinery complex on Monday, Kim blasted cadres who for “too long been accustomed to defeatism, irresponsibility and passiveness”.

Yang was “unfit to be entrusted with heavy duties”, Kim said, according to KCNA.

“Put simply, it was like hitching a cart to a goat – an accidental mistake in our cadre appointment process,” the North Korean leader explained.

“After all, it is an ox that pulls a cart, not a goat.”

And he urged a quick turnaround in the “centuries-old backwardness of the economy and build a modernised and advanced one capable of firmly guaranteeing the future of our state”.

Images released by Pyongyang showed a stern-looking Kim delivering a speech at the venue in Hamgyong Province in the country’s frigid northeast, with workers in attendance wearing green uniforms and matching grey hats.

LAZY OFFICIALS

The impoverished North has long prioritised its military and banned nuclear weapons programmes over providing for its people.

It is highly vulnerable to natural disasters, including floods and drought, due to a chronic lack of infrastructure, deforestation and decades of state mismanagement.

The new machine complex makes up part of a large machinery-manufacturing belt linking the northeast to Wonsan further south, “accounting for about 16 per cent of North Korea’s total machinery output”, according to Yang Moo-jin of the University of North Korean Studies.

Kim’s public dismissal of Yang mirrors past cases such as Jang Song Thaek, Kim’s uncle, who was executed in 2013 after being accused of plotting to overthrow his nephew, Yang said.

The North Korean leader is “using public accountability as a shock tactic to warn party officials”, he told AFP.

Pyongyang is gearing up for its first congress of its ruling party in five years, with analysts expecting it in the coming weeks.

Source : https://www.channelnewsasia.com/east-asia/kim-jong-un-north-korea-sacks-official-incompetence-5869446

From hormonal fluctuations to cortisol spikes, experts explain what’s causing post-adolescence breakouts.

You’d think pimples were something you left behind with teenage angst and exam stress – but dermatologists say it’s common to develop acne in your 20s to 40s and beyond, even if your teenage skin was clear.

“Many adults come to me saying, ‘I thought I left pimples behind in my teenage years – why is this happening now?’” said Dr Angeline Yong, founder of Angeline Yong Dermatology and Sskins Medispa. “That sense of frustration can be as hard to manage as the acne itself.”

Unlike teenage breakouts, which are mainly driven by hormonal fluctuation, the causes of adult acne are more complex and “still not as well understood”, added Dr Sarah Too, medical director of Astria Medical Aesthetics. “Adult acne is also seen to be more cyclical compared to the consistent breakouts in teens.”

“The good news is that with tailored treatments and the right skincare, it can be effectively managed – even in adulthood,” said Dr Yong.

1. HORMONAL AND MEDICAL FACTORS

“Teenage acne is largely driven by puberty-related hormone surges, particularly androgens, which stimulate excess oil production and make the skin more prone to clogged pores,” explained Dr Yong.

“In adults, fluctuations related to the menstrual cycle such as oestrogen dominance, pregnancy, post-partum shifts, or perimenopause can all spark new breakouts. Conditions like polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) may also surface later in adulthood and contribute to acne,” she continued.

Men with high testosterone levels are also prone to “deeper, cystic, nodular breakouts”, noted Dr Too. Once hormone levels stabilise after adolescence, flare-ups usually ease, which is why adult acne is more common among women.

Certain medications can also aggravate the skin. “Steroids, anti-seizure drugs, or even supplements like high-dose vitamin B12 may cause or worsen acne,” said Dr Yong.

2. STRESS

“When we’re under pressure, the level of cortisol (the stress hormone) increases, stimulating oil glands and fuelling inflammation,” explained Dr Yong. This makes pores more likely to clog, and existing breakouts become more persistent.

Her advice: Treat stress as seriously as skincare. “Good sleep, rest, meditation and self-care really help the skin respond better to treatment.”

3. LIFESTYLE HABITS

From your diet to phone hygiene, small daily habits can make a big difference.

“High-glycaemic foods like char kway teow or chicken rice can spike blood sugar and increase insulin and Insulin-like Growth Factor 1 (IGF-1), which stimulate excess oil and clog pores,” said Dr Too. “Dairy and sugary drinks like milk coffee and bubble tea also boost oil production and inflammation.”

While blue light from screens hasn’t been proven to cause acne, it may worsen inflammation and accelerate premature ageing. The bigger issue, says Dr Too, is constant phone-to-cheek contact: “It can trigger localised breakouts through friction, pressure and bacteria transfer.” To minimise flare-ups, try to keep your phone away from your face as much as possible, and clean it regularly.

In a wide-ranging speech as he opened the fifth session of the 15th Parliament, the king alluded to topics that have generated controversy in recent months and slammed corruption in the military and public service.

National interests must take precedence over state rights, and any education system that seeks recognition in Malaysia must accept the use of the Malay language and Malaysia’s history, king Sultan Ibrahim Sultan Iskandar told parliamentarians on Monday (Jan 19).

In a wide-ranging speech at the opening of the fifth session of the 15th Parliament, the king alluded to topics that have generated controversy in recent months and slammed corruption in the military and public service.

He called on members of parliament to avoid inciting tensions among different regions in the country, stressing that differences in opinion should be resolved maturely and not through hatred or suspicion.

On the “collective interests of Malaysians”, he said Malaysia should return to the original intent of the 1963 Malaysia Agreement (MA63) – which forms the basis of the Federation of Malaysia – emphasising unity, mutual respect and close cooperation between the states and the federal government.

“State rights must always be respected. However, the interests of Malaysia as a whole must always be prioritised,” Sultan Ibrahim said.

His remarks come amid a push by the East Malaysian states of Sabah and Sarawak for greater autonomy.

Last year, the Kota Kinabalu High Court ruled that the Malaysian federal government had acted unlawfully by failing to fulfil Sabah’s right to 40 per cent of federal revenue derived from the state for nearly 50 years.

The court also ordered an agreement be reached on Sabah’s 40 per cent share of federal revenue for each financial year from 1974 to 2021, with the process to be completed within 180 days.

Sarawak, meanwhile, is in a dispute with national energy company Petronas over more control of its oil and gas assets. Petronas filed an application at the Federal Court earlier this month, to seek a determination on the legal position of its operations in Sarawak.

Sultan Ibrahim also called for an “all-out” fight against corruption, stressing that efforts must not only focus on bribe-takers, but also related parties including those offering bribes or acting in collusion.

“I have said before that I came to Kuala Lumpur to hunt down corrupt individuals, and it seems I have now found them,” he said. “I am deeply disappointed that corruption cases have occurred within the Malaysian Armed Forces, extending to the highest levels.”

“Perhaps after this, I should appoint only a sergeant as the Chief of the Defence Force,” Sultan Ibrahim added.

Former army chief Muhammad Hafizuddeain Jantan is among those arrested following investigations into alleged irregularities in military procurement tenders.

Anti-graft investigators have seized and frozen over RM52 million (US$12.82 million) in cash, gold, luxury goods and funds from more than 80 bank accounts in two separate cases linked to alleged corruption in army procurement contracts.

Sultan Ibrahim said he is confident there are more corrupt individuals out there, including in customs, the police and other agencies. “This is just the tip of the iceberg … I will continue to hunt you down,” he said.

The government must provide experienced judges and special court channels so that corruption trials can be expedited, he added.

On the education front, the king said “any proposal to recognise any other education system must accept Bahasa Melayu and Malaysia’s history”.

“If there are those who do not accept the Malay language, it is better not to live in Malaysia,” he added.

After its poor showing in the Sabah state election on Nov 29, the Democratic Action Party (DAP) has made a renewed push for the Unified Examination Certificate adopted by Chinese-medium independent high schools to be recognised by the government for entry into public universities or the civil service. The UEC is generally considered equivalent to the A levels.

As the 13th Malaysia Plan begins this year, the government must focus on the well-being of the people, especially in fields of education, housing, health and public transport, said the king.

Source : https://www.channelnewsasia.com/asia/malaysia-parliament-king-sultan-ibrahim-speech-corruption-national-interests-5868126

Brooklyn Beckham reached a point of no return in his feud with his famous parents, David and Victoria Beckham.

“There has been a massive breakdown in trust,” an insider tells Page Six of the breaking point, which happened “last week” — just days before the chef released a bombshell statement directed at his family.

“From Brooklyn and [wife] Nicola [Peltz’s] perspective they have tried everything they can to repair the relationship privately with David and Victoria, they’ve tried to talk it out, have tried to have meetings with them, but ultimately in the end they just didn’t trust them anymore.”

Brooklyn and Peltz had also allegedly reached a point of frustration with reading things that “weren’t true.”

“They’d had enough,” the source explains, noting that as the drama has escalated in recent months, “This ultimately has become a huge power struggle between two powerful families.”

“The couple just doesn’t want to deal with it anymore,” the insider adds. “They’ve had it and just want to move on in their lives. Last week was the last straw, they just couldn’t handle it anymore.”

The eldest child of the pro athlete and fashion designer took to social media on Monday amid escalating tension with his parents.

“I do not want to reconcile with my family,” the chef, 26, wrote via Instagram Stories. “I’m not being controlled, I’m standing up for myself for the first time in my life. For my entire life, my parents have controlled narratives in the press about our family.”

Brooklyn continued, accusing his parents David, 50, and Victoria, 51, of “performative social media posts, family events, and inauthentic relationships,” among other grievances.

“Recently, I have seen with my own eyes the lengths that they’ll go through to place countless lies in the media, mostly at the expense of innocent people, to preserve their own facade,” Brooklyn wrote.

He also alleged his parents “have been trying endlessly to ruin [his] relationship” with his wife, 31, whom he married in a lavish Florida ceremony in 2022.

Brooklyn further claimed the former Spice Girl “cancelled making Nicola’s [wedding] dress in the eleventh hour despite how excited she was to wear her design, forcing her to urgently find a new dress.”

Prior to the wedding, Brooklyn accused his parents of “repeatedly” pressuring and attempting “to bribe” him into “signing away the rights to” his name.

He wrote that his “holdout affected the payday” and claimed that his mother and father “have never treated me the same since.”

Brooklyn divulged that Victoria hijacked the couples’ first dance — which Page Six reported last May — “in front of our 500 wedding guests.”

“She danced very inappropriately on me in front of everybody,” Brooklyn alleged, adding, “I’ve never felt more uncomfortable or humiliated in my entire life.”

Brooklyn and his model wife subsequently renewed their vows in August 2025 in an effort to reclaim the moment and “create new memories of our wedding day that bring us joy and happiness, not anxiety and embarrassment.”

Without directly mentioning his brothers Romeo, 23, Cruz, 20, and sister Harper, 14, Brooklyn accused his family of valuing “public promotion and endorsements above all else” and claimed to have shown up for “every fashion show, every party and every press activity to show ‘our perfect family’”

In his lengthy screed, Brooklyn also lashed out at the “completely backwards” narrative that “my wife controls me.”

Instead, he claimed he has “been controlled by [his] parents for most of [his] life,” and suffered from “overwhelming anxiety” as he grew up.

“For the first time in my life, since stepping away from my family, that anxiety has disappeared,” he concluded the statement, adding that he has “found peace and relief.”

“My wife and I do not want a life shaped by image, press, or manipulation. All we want is peace, privacy and happiness for us and our future family.”

Reps for David and Victoria did not immediately respond to Page Six’s requests for comment on Monday.

Source : https://pagesix.com/2026/01/19/celebrity-news/why-brooklyn-beckham-finally-lost-it-the-breaking-point-in-his-explosive-feud-with-victoria-and-david-revealed/

Explosion occurs in downtown Shahr-e-Naw neighbourhood, ⁠thought to be one of the most secure areas ‌of Kabul.

The restaurant hit by the blast on Monday is in the commercial ​Shahr-e-Naw neighbourhood of Kabul that includes office buildings, shopping complexes ‍and embassies, police spokesperson Khalid Zadran said. The district is considered one of the safest in the city.

The Chinese noodle restaurant was jointly run ‍by a ⁠Chinese Muslim, Abdul Majid, his wife, and an Afghan partner, Abdul Jabbar Mahmood, and served the Chinese Muslim community, Zadran said.

One Chinese national, identified as Ayub, and six Afghans were killed in the blast, which occurred near the kitchen, while several others were injured, Zadran added.

The Afghan branch of ISIL (ISIS) later claimed responsibility for Monday’s attack, saying in a statement that it was carried out by a suicide bomber.

ISIL’s Amaq news agency said the group had put Chinese citizens on its list of targets, citing “growing crimes by the Chinese government against Uighurs”.

Rights groups accuse Beijing of widespread abuses of Uighurs, a mainly Muslim ethnic minority group of about 10 million people who live in China’s far western Xinjiang region. Beijing denies any ​abuse and has accused Western countries of interference and peddling ‌lies.

Several people die in blast in Kabul

Videos shared on ​social media showed debris scattered on the street ‌outside and smoke spewing from a large hole torn into the front of the restaurant building.

The Italian NGO Emergency said a medical facility it oversees in Kabul had received 20 people from the blast, seven of whom were dead when they arrived. The organisation said the casualty figures were “still provisional”.

“Twenty people have been received at EMERGENCY’s Surgical Centre in Kabul following an explosion this afternoon in the Shahr-e-Naw area, near the hospital. Among those received were seven people dead on arrival,” the NGO said in a statement.

Source : https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/1/19/several-killed-in-kabul-blast-afghan-taliban-interior-ministry-says

Canada will allow a capped number of Chinese electric vehicles into its market and cut tariffs in exchange for lower Chinese duties on key farm exports, PM Mark Carney has said.

Canada will allow a limited number of Chinese electric vehicles into its domestic market and actively court Chinese joint-venture investments in its auto sector, Prime Minister Mark Carney announced, signalling a significant recalibration of Ottawa’s trade and industrial strategy amid strained relations with the United States.

In a post on X, Carney said his government was taking concrete steps to position Canada as a global hub for electric vehicle manufacturing.

“To make Canada a leader in electric vehicle manufacturing, we’re working to attract significant new joint-venture Chinese investments,” he wrote.

As part of the transition, he added that Canada would permit a capped number of Chinese EVs into the country.

“And as our domestic sector builds up, we’ll allow a limited number of EVs from China into the Canadian market — less than 50,000 next year — providing more affordable, energy-efficient options for Canadians.”

The policy shift follows a trade understanding reached during Carney’s visit to China, where Canada agreed to slash its 100 per cent tariff on Chinese electric vehicles to 6.1 per cent and introduce an initial annual cap of 49,000 vehicles.

According to Carney, the quota is expected to expand gradually, reaching roughly 70,000 vehicles over the next five years.

In return, China will reduce tariffs on major Canadian agricultural exports, including canola seeds, which Carney said will see duties fall from 84 per cent to about 15 per cent.

Tariffs on other products such as canola meal and certain seafood will also be eased, a move the Prime Minister said last week would unlock nearly $3 billion in export orders for Canadian farmers, fish harvesters and processors.

“Our relationship has progressed in recent months with China. It is more predictable, and you see results coming from that,” Carney had told reporters after meetings with Chinese leaders.

The move represents a clear break from US policy, which continues to impose steep tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles.

While some members of the US administration have warned that Canada’s decision could be problematic in the long term, US President Donald Trump publicly welcomed the agreement.

“That’s what he should be doing, and it’s a good thing for him to sign a trade deal. If you can get a deal with China, you should do that,” Trump said.

Carney acknowledged concerns from Canadian automakers and labour groups but argued that the limited quota was designed to allow a “smooth transition” while the domestic EV sector scales up.

He said the initial cap would account for only about 3 per cent of the roughly 1.8 million vehicles sold annually in Canada, and stressed that China is expected to begin investing in Canada’s auto industry within three years.

“We’re building a new part of our car industry, building cars of the future in partnership, bringing affordable autos for Canadians at a time when affordability is top of mind,” he said, adding that the strategy aligns with Canada’s long-term goal of moving toward a net-zero emissions future.

During the visit, Carney also met Chinese President Xi Jinping, with both leaders pledging to stabilise and improve bilateral ties after years of tension.

Source : https://www.news18.com/world/canada-allows-lower-tariffs-chinese-electric-cars-chinese-ev-canadian-farm-products-tariff-cut-mark-carney-ws-l-9842923.html