81 m. ago 618 dead in Sri Lanka landslides as rains batter South, Southeast Asia

Sri Lankan authorities issued fresh landslide warnings on Sunday, with rains lashing areas already devastated by a powerful cyclone as the death toll rose to 618. A chain of tropical storms and monsoonal rains has battered Southeast and South Asia, setting off landslides, flooding vast tracts and cutting off communities, from the rainforests of Sumatra to Sri Lanka’s highland plantations. At least 1,812 people have been killed in the natural disasters rolling across Sri Lanka, Indonesia,...

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3 h. ago Hegseth defends killing boat survivors, likens drug gangs to al

Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth doubled down on deadly US air strikes against alleged drug-running boats off the Venezuelan coast, saying he would have made the same call as the admiral who ordered survivors to be killed. The nearly two dozen strikes on boats in the Caribbean and Pacific have come under bipartisan scrutiny, but recent reports that a September strike included a second one to kill two survivors clinging to wreckage at sea have prompted accusations of possible war crimes. “From what...

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4 h. ago Kevin O'Leary, Jensen Huang Warn US Falling Behind China In Data Center Construction: 'Need To Cut The Red Tape'

Kevin O'Leary, Jensen Huang Warn US Falling Behind China In Data Center Construction: 'Need To Cut The Red Tape'  Benzinga

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5 h. ago Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang Warns China Could Beat America In AI: 'They Can Build A Hospital In A Weekend' While US Takes Years

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang Warns China Could Beat America In AI: 'They Can Build A Hospital In A Weekend' While US Takes Years  Benzinga

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7 h. ago Maduro Shocks Trump With Direct NATO Access After Russia, China Backing For Venezuela? Big Reveal

Maduro Shocks Trump With Direct NATO Access After Russia, China Backing For Venezuela? Big Reveal  Times of India

Politics

17 h. ago Ukraine’s Zelensky holds ‘very substantive’ call with Trump envoys

President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Saturday that he and his negotiators who are discussing a US-led plan for Ukraine had a “very substantive and constructive” call with US envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner. “Ukraine is committed to continuing to work honestly with the American side to bring about real peace,” Zelensky said on Telegram as the third day of the talks were to be held in Florida. “We agreed on the next steps and the format of the talks with America,” he added. Zelensky, who...

Politics

18 h. ago Venezuela’s Machado defies warning, vows to attend Nobel Peace Prize ceremony

Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado has vowed to go to Norway to pick up her Nobel Peace Prize, defying a warning from Caracas that she would be a fugitive if she did so. The head of the Nobel Institute, Kristian Berg Harpviken, on Saturday said that Machado – who lives in hiding in her country – promised him she would make the ceremony, set to take place in Oslo on Wednesday. “I was in contact with Machado last night [Friday] and she confirms that she will be in Oslo for the...

Events

20 h. ago ‘Don’t say we didn’t warn you’: Beijing summons journalists in Hong Kong after fire

‘Don’t say we didn’t warn you’: Beijing summons journalists in Hong Kong after fire  The Guardian

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20 h. ago ‘Don’t say we didn’t warn you’: Hong Kong foreign media told not to cause trouble after fire

‘Don’t say we didn’t warn you’: Hong Kong foreign media told not to cause trouble after fire  The Guardian

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20 h. ago The great slowdown: Germany at a standstill as ‘China shock’ hits

It is not unusual for Berlin to be cloaked in a blanket of grey on the brink of winter. What hangs over the city this year, however, feels heavier. This new shade of gloom cuts through conversations about everything. Germany’s coalition government is just six months old, but already some are wondering how long it can last. The economy is no larger now than it was five years ago and is being pummelled by a heady brew of structural problems and external threats. The German foreign minister warned...

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21 h. ago Beijing warns foreign media in Hong Kong over crossing ‘red lines’ during meeting

Beijing’s national security office in Hong Kong has met representatives from foreign media outlets in the city and warned them against crossing “red lines”, following reports it said smeared the government’s fire relief efforts and attacked the Legislative Council election. According to sources, foreign media outlets that were requested to attend the meeting included Agence France-Presse, the Financial Times, The New York Times and Associated Press. Bloomberg News reported it also attended. The...

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21 h. ago Gaza truce incomplete without ‘full withdrawal’ by Israel: Qatar PM

The nearly two-month-old ceasefire in the Gaza Strip will not be complete until Israeli troops withdraw from the Palestinian territory under a peace plan backed by Washington and the United Nations, mediator Qatar’s prime minister has said. “Now we are at the critical moment ... A ceasefire cannot be completed unless there is a full withdrawal of the Israeli forces, [and] there is stability back in Gaza,” Qatari prime minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani said on Saturday. Sheikh...

Politics

25 h. ago Probe links Philippines flood corruption to Pogo crypto schemes

Funds siphoned off from the Philippines’ flood control projects and converted into cryptocurrency may be linked to online scam syndicates run by offshore gaming operators, an official from the country’s cybercrime unit has revealed. Renato Paraiso, acting executive director of the Cybercrime Investigation and Coordinating Centre, told This Week in Asia that investigators had uncovered a “definite link” between digital assets tied to the multibillion-peso flood control scandal and cryptocurrency...

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26 h. ago Jakarta vs the internet: Indonesia’s gamble with digital freedom

What happens when a democracy begins to fear its own internet? In Indonesia, that question is no longer hypothetical, as the government threatens to pull the plug on major online platforms many of its people rely upon. When Jakarta warned last month that it could block major platforms like Cloudflare and Wikipedia, the move was justified as a crackdown on online gambling – a vice officially outlawed in the world’s largest Muslim-majority nation. But for tech industry players and free-speech...

Politics

28 h. ago ‘We all knew’: is your job safe from the AI you are helping train?

For Malaysian tech worker Sam, there were three short steps to being replaced by robots at a global social media company’s Kuala Lumpur office. First came weeks spent training the company’s artificial intelligence systems. Then came the ominous warnings of “restructuring”. Finally, the inevitable: redundancy. “One day, out of nowhere, we had to attend a town hall,” said the 29-year-old, who asked to use a pseudonym to protect his job prospects. “They never explicitly said it was due to AI, but...

Politics

28 h. ago ‘We all knew’: is your job safe from the AI you are helping to train?

For Malaysian tech worker Sam, there were three short steps to being replaced by robots at a global social media company’s Kuala Lumpur office. First came weeks spent training the company’s artificial intelligence systems. Then came the ominous warnings of “restructuring”. Finally, the inevitable: redundancy. “One day, out of nowhere, we had to attend a town hall,” said the 29-year-old, who asked to use a pseudonym to protect his job prospects. “They never explicitly said it was due to AI, but...

Politics

29 h. ago Fire risks persist on construction sites despite deadly Hong Kong blaze: watchdog

Fire safety risks still persist on construction sites across Hong Kong following the deadly blaze in Tai Po, the industry watchdog has warned, after a scaffolding worker in a major subsidised estate was sacked for smoking. Thomas Ho On-sing, chairman of the Construction Industry Council, on Saturday criticised the industry for failing to “learn a lesson” from the Tai Po tragedy. “I have been inspecting construction sites recently and found that many still have styrofoam boards and volatile...

Events

29 h. ago Lessons not learned, Hong Kong construction council says after site checks

Fire safety risks persist at building sites across Hong Kong following the deadly blaze in Tai Po last week, the Construction Industry Council has warned, after a scaffolding worker at a major subsidised estate was sacked for smoking. Council chairman Thomas Ho On-sing on Saturday criticised companies for failing to have “learned a lesson” from the tragedy. “I have been inspecting construction sites recently and found that many still have styrofoam boards and volatile paint. They also continue...

Politics

29 h. ago India and Russia agree to boost trade to US$100 billion by 2030

Russian President Vladimir Putin held talks with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday at an annual summit and agreed to diversify mutual economic ties, as the United States presses India to revise its decades-old partnership with Russia. The 23rd Russia-India Summit comes at a pivotal moment as the US pushes for a Ukraine peace deal while seeking global cooperation. It will test New Delhi’s efforts to balance relations with Moscow and Washington as the nearly four-year war in Ukraine...

Economics

29 h. ago Chinese industry bodies issue RWA tokenisation warning amid Beijing’s crackdown

Mainland Chinese industry associations have issued a joint warning to real-world asset (RWA) tokenisation providers after Beijing turned on the screws, dashing hopes that Beijing might ease restrictions on digital-asset activities amid competition with the US. Tokenising real-world assets involves multiple risks such as fake assets, business failure and speculative trading, and Chinese authorities had not approved any such activities, seven industry bodies, including the National Internet...

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