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How to get tech right in Europe?

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:55:53 GMT

As our societies navigate challenging times and undergo widespread digital transformation, fostering growth in our homegrown tech businesses has never been more critical to achieving the wider goals of the European project.Via EUTA. Kristin Skogen Lund, president, European Tech Alliance; CEO, Schibsted The European Tech Alliance (EUTA) represents leading tech companies born and bred in Europe. We believe that with the right conditions, EU tech companies can enhance Europe’s resilience, boost our technological autonomy, protect and empower consumers, and promote European values such as transparency, the rule of law and innovation to the rest of the world.The European Commission’s ambitious targets for 2030 in the Digital Decade program represent a vision for a sustainable and more prosperous digital future. However, more is needed if we are to achieve our goals.Europe must boost its tech competitiveness over the next five years. To unlock European tech leadership both at home and bey...

Enquête sur l’Expo 2030 : rien ne vous sera caviardé !

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:55:53 GMT

Notre newsletter quotidienne sur les enjeux de lobbying et de transparence en France.Par ALEXANDRE LÉCHENETAvec AURORE GORIUS, GIORGIO LEALI et PAUL DE VILLEPINInfos, tuyaux et mini-drames à partager ? Ecrivez à Océane Herrero, Aurore Gorius, Alexandre Léchenet et Paul de Villepin | Voir dans votre navigateurLE MENU DU JOUR— Budget : les sénateurs se mobilisent contre les choix du gouvernement.— Star du ballon, caviar et jeux d’eau : plongez dans la campagne de Riyad pour l’Expo 2030.— Coup de Mistral AI pour Thierry Breton.Bonjour à toutes et à tous, pendant que vous vous reposiez, les sénateurs eux, n’ont pas chômé. La semaine dernière, ils ont voulu le faire savoir : “Alors qu’aucun débat n’a eu lieu à l’Assemblée nationale, [le Sénat] débattra, pendant trois semaines, jusqu’au 12 décembre.”De vrais marathoniens. Ils ont discuté des recettes, au risque de la répétition, tout le weekend, votant plusieurs mesures contre l’avis du gouvernement. Ils remettront le couvert dans la foul...

What London’s mayor learned when he took on the cars

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:55:53 GMT

It looked like group therapy. One late summer day, Sadiq Khan, the mayor of London, sat with a group of faith leaders and clean-air campaigners in a small circle in the near-empty hall of a suburban church.The moment was meant to be one of celebration, for Khan and for London. He was marking the creation of the largest clean air zone in the Western world through the expansion of restrictions on polluting cars to cover the entire British capital, a city of 8.9 million people. Instead, the gathering was reminiscent of a group of conspirators meeting under siege. “I’m very moved to be here,” said Rabbi Jonathan Wittenberg, brow furrowed, tone hushed. He praised Khan’s “courage.”Sitting beside the mayor was Rosamund Adoo-Kissi-Debrah, a 53-year-old teacher turned campaigner. She reflected on the tragedy that had turned her into an activist. Just over a decade ago, her daughter Ella died of severe asthma caused by the pollution from the busy road by their home. “She drowned in her ...

Live updates | Israel and Hamas prepare for fourth swap as mediators seek to extend cease-fire

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:55:53 GMT

Israel and Hamas are preparing for a fourth exchange of militant-held hostages for Palestinians imprisoned by Israel, as mediators seek to extend a cease-fire in Gaza that is set to expire after Monday.On Sunday, Hamas freed 17 more hostages — 14 Israelis and three Thais — in a third exchange under the four-day truce. In turn, Israel released 39 Palestinian prisoners.Of the roughly 240 hostages captured by Hamas in its Oct. 7 attack in southern Israel that ignited the war, 62 have been released, one was freed by Israeli forces and two were found dead inside Gaza. Israel has said it would extend the cease-fire by one day for every 10 additional hostages released. Hamas has also said it hopes to extend the truce, which was mediated by the United States, Qatar and Egypt.With the truce deal has come increased shipments of fuel and supplies into Gaza — though aid groups say it’s still barely enough to dent the needs of the 2.3 million Palestinians in Gaza who have endured weeks of ...

Representatives of European and Arab countries meet in Barcelona to discuss the Israel-Hamas war

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:55:53 GMT

BARCELONA, Spain (AP) — Delegations from the European Union member states and Middle Eastern and north African countries are meeting Monday in Barcelona, Spain, to discuss the crisis in Gaza where a fragile pause in fighting is set to expire.Forty-two delegations are scheduled to gather at the event hosted by the Union for the Mediterranean, with many represented by their foreign ministers. The meeting is chaired by the EU’s foreign policy chief Josep Borrell and Jordan’s Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi.Israel is not attending the meeting, which in past years has largely become a forum for cooperation between the EU and the Arab world. Monday’s gathering was supposed to focus on the role of the union 15 years after its founding, but the meeting has taken on new significance since the Oct. 7 militant attack on Israel and Israel’s ensuing war in the Gaza Strip.Jordan’s Safadi told The Associated Press on the eve of the event that he hopes the talks will help “bridge a gap” between Arab ...

Iran adds sophisticated warship to Caspian fleet

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:55:53 GMT

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — Iran’s navy on Monday added a destroyer capable of launching cruise missiles to its Caspian Sea fleet, state media reported.The 1,400-ton Deilaman destroyer, named for a town in north of Iran, is 95 meters (312 feet) long and 11 meters (36 feet) wide and is able to launch torpedoes while traveling at 30 knots (56 kph, 35 mph), the state-owned IRNA news agency said.Deilaman can detect more than 100 targets, including vessels, drones, helicopters, submarines and aircraft, simultaneously, the report said.During a ceremony marking the inauguration of Deilaman, Maj. Gen. Mohammad Hossein Bagheri, chief of the Armed Forces General Staff called the Caspian a “sea of peace and friendship” and said Iran’s naval power there will serve “peace, security of commercial fleets, confronting terrorists and probable incidents in the future.”This is the sixth warship Iran has commissioned in the Caspian Sea, the largest inland body of water in the world, shared by Russia, Azerbaija...

Rescuers attempt manual digging to free 41 Indian workers trapped for over two weeks in tunnel

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:55:53 GMT

NEW DELHI (AP) — Authorities in India said on Monday they were set to begin manual digging of what they hoped was the final phase of rescuing the 41 construction workers trapped in a collapsed mountain tunnel in the country’s north for over two weeks. This came a day after an attempt to drill vertically — an alternate plan to digging horizontally from the front — started, with the newly replaced drilling machine excavating about 20 meters (nearly 65 feet), according to officials.Devendra Patwal, a disaster management official who is at the accident site, said they were prepared for all kinds of challenges, but hoped they wouldn’t face stiff resistance from the mountain.“We don’t know what the drilling machine will have to cut through. It could be loose soil or rocks. But we are prepared,” he said.So far, rescuers have excavated and inserted pipes — after digging horizontally — up to 46 meters (150.9 feet), welded together to serve as a passageway from where the men would be pu...

Diplomas for sale: $465, no classes required. Inside one of Louisiana’s unapproved schools

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:55:53 GMT

SPRINGFIELD, La. (AP) — Arliya Martin accepted her high school diploma with relief and gratitude. It was her ticket to better-paying work, she felt, after getting kicked out of high school and toiling for eight years at factory jobs to support her children. “This is a new path for me to get on with my life,” she said. But Martin didn’t take any classes or pass any tests to receive her degree. She got it in July from a school where students can get a high school diploma for $465.Unlike public schools, formal homeschooling programs or traditional private schools, nearly 9,000 private schools in Louisiana don’t need state approval to grant degrees. Nearly every one of those unapproved schools was created to serve a single homeschooling family, but some have buildings, classrooms, teachers and dozens of students.While unapproved schools account for a small percentage of the state’s students, those in Louisiana’s off-the-grid school system are a rapidly growing example of the natio...

French labor minister goes on trial for alleged favoritism when he was a mayor

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:55:53 GMT

PARIS (AP) — French Labor Minister Olivier Dussopt goes on trial on Monday over charges of favoritism related to a 2009 public sector contract passed when he was a mayor.Dussopt is suspected of having favoured a private company, the Saur group, in the awarding of a water contract when he was the mayor of the small town of Annonay in the southeast of France, France’s financial prosecutor’s office said. He has denied any wrongdoing. Speaking on France 3 national television earlier this month, Dussopt said: “I’m going before the court to prove I acted in good faith.”The investigation was launched in 2020 after investigative website Mediapart revealed possible links between Dussopt and a local manager of the Saur company.Dussopt is a key member of the government of President Emmanuel Macron. Appointed labor minister in 2022, he championed the unpopular plan raising raising the retirement age from 62 to 64. The changes prompted months of mass protests at the beginning of the year. ...

A watchdog urges UN Security Council to consider all options to protect Sudan’s Darfur civilians

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:55:53 GMT

CAIRO (AP) — An international watchdog urged the United Nations Security Council on Monday to consider all options to protect civilians in Sudan’s Darfur region after the latest attacks on non-Arabs killed hundreds of civilians.The paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, which was born out of the notorious Janjaweed militias, has been at war against the Sudanese military since mid-April, when months of tension exploded into open fighting in the capital, Khartoum, and other urban areas in the African nation. The conflict wrecked the country and forced more than 6 million people out of their homes, either to safer areas inside Sudan or to neighboring countries.In the first week of November, the RSF and their allied Arab militias attacked the town of Ardamata, a few kilometers (miles) north of Geneina, the provincial capital of West Darfur, Human Rights Watch said. After taking over a military base in Ardamata, the attackers rampaged through the camp for displaced people and other nearby re...