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UK economy escapes summer contraction, just about

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:35:00 GMT

The U.K. economy stagnated in the third quarter as the Bank of England’s interest rate increases hit the property market hard. Gross domestic product, which measures the total value of goods and services produced by the economy, was flat in the three months through September from the second quarter, the Office for National Statistics said on Friday. That was a slowdown from growth of 0.2 percent in the spring quarter but marginally better than market expectations for a 0.1 percent decline.The figures were dominated by a 1.6 drop in activity related to the property market, as mortgage lending retreated to pandemic-era levels in response to the highest interest rates in 15 years.Somewhat surprisingly, in the light of recent developments, there were no revisions to figures for the previous two quarters. As such, GDP at the end of September was 0.6 percent higher than a year earlier.The Bank’s latest forecasts for the U.K. economy, published last week, indicate that growth w...

AI ‘Tom Cruise’ joins fake news barrage targeting Olympics

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:35:00 GMT

In a dramatic voiceover interspersed with footage of International Olympic Committee chief Thomas Bach, Hollywood A-lister Tom Cruise warns that “corrupt officials” are “slowly and painfully destroying the Olympic sports that have existed for thousands of years.”The bizarre revelation comes as part of a purported four-part Netflix documentary series, “Olympics Has Fallen,” alleging corruption at the heart of the International Olympic Committee (IOC).Just one big problem: The entire thing is fake.No such Netflix documentary series exists, and Cruise’s voice has been generated using artificial intelligence. The slickly edited nine-minute episodes are part of what the IOC on Thursday called an “organised disinformation campaign” against it.“The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has recently been faced with a number of fake news posts targeting the IOC,” the Olympic body’s statement reads, including “an entire documentary produced with defamatory content, a fake narrative and false ...

Au menu élyséen, l’IA sous cloche

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:35:00 GMT

Notre newsletter quotidienne sur les enjeux de lobbying et de transparence en France.Par AURORE GORIUSAvec OCÉANE HERRERO, ALEXANDRE LÉCHENET 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— Emmanuel Macron apôtre d’une gouvernance de l’IA.— Arnaud Lagardère va diriger la bibliothèque Hachette.— Un député oublie de déclarer ses voyage au Qatar.Chères lectrices, chers lecteurs fidèles, votre infolettre Paris Influ est en accès libre tout au long du mois de novembre. Si vous aimez nous lire, n’hésitez pas à partager ce lien où, à l’aide d’une simple adresse mail, il est possible de recevoir nos infos quotidiennes pendant une semaine — soit cinq newsletters et au moins autant d’exclus. Et, bien sûr, <3 sur vous.TECHROBOT SOUS CLOCHE. Emmanuel Macron veut se faire une place dans la discussion sur la gouvernance mondiale de l’intelligence a...

Week 10 recap: Chicago Bears hold off the Carolina Panthers 16-13 behind Tyson Bagent and D’Onta Foreman

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:35:00 GMT

Chicago Bears quarterback Tyson Bagent threw for 162 yards and running back D’Onta Foreman rushed for 80 yards to lead the Bears to their third victory of the season, a 16-13 win against the Carolina Panthers at Soldier Field on Thursday night.Five days after he committed four turnovers in a loss to the New Orleans Saints, Bagent didn’t give the ball away and completed 20 of 33 passes to get his second win as a starter in place of injured quarterback Justin Fields.Panthers rookie quarterback Bryce Young had a chance to lead a winning or tying drive in the final minutes. Young got the Panthers to the Bears 41-yard line, running for 2 yards on fourth-and-1 and completing a 13-yard pass to Miles Sanders on fourth-and-2 later in the drive.But after Young threw three straight incompletions, Panthers kicker Eddy Pineiro, a former Bear, missed a 59-yard field-goal attempt short.Young completed 21 of 38 passes for 185 yards, no touchdowns and no turnovers. The Bears sacked him t...

Israeli strikes hit near several hospitals as the military pushes deeper into Gaza City

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:35:00 GMT

KHAN YOUNIS, Gaza Strip (AP) — Israeli strikes hit near several hospitals in Gaza City early Friday as the military pushed deeper into dense urban neighborhoods in its battle with Hamas militants, prompting increasing numbers of civilians to flee toward the south of the besieged territory.Israel has accused Hamas fighters of hiding in hospitals and using the Shifa Hospital complex as its main command center, which the militant group and hospital staff deny, saying Israel is creating a pretext to strike it. Growing numbers of people have been living in and around Shifa Hospital, Gaza’s largest, hoping it will be safer than their homes or United Nations shelters in the north, several of which have been hit repeatedly. Israeli troops were around 3 kilometers (2 miles) from the hospital, according to its director.Early Friday, Israel struck the Shifa courtyard and the obstetrics department, according to the head of the Hamas-run media office in Gaza, Salama Maarouf. A video at the...

Putin and top military leaders visit southern military headquarters to assess his war in Ukraine

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:35:00 GMT

Russian President Vladimir Putin visited the Southern Military District headquarters in Rostov-on-Don as he assessed the state of his country’s forces in Ukraine as the war drags on toward winter. It was his second public visit to the headquarters in less than a month.Video shared by a Russian state news agency showed Putin being greeted late Thursday by Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu and Valery Gerasimov, chief of the General Staff.Almost 21 months of war have significantly eroded both Russia’s and Ukraine’s military resources. As winter comes, the fighting is likely to further settle into attritional warfare and analysts expect little change to the more than 1,000-kilometer (600-mile) front line. In Rostov-on-Don, less than 100 kilometers (60 miles) from Ukraine’s southeastern border, Putin was “introduced to new types of military equipment” and was informed about the progress of the war, his spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said, according to Russian state news agency...

Live updates | Israeli strikes hit near Gaza City hospitals as more Palestinians flee south

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:35:00 GMT

Israeli strikes hit near hospitals in Gaza City as the military pushed deeper into dense urban neighborhoods in its battle with Hamas militants.The fighting is prompting increasing numbers of civilians to flee south, and growing numbers of people have been living in and around hospitals, hoping it will be safer than their homes or United Nations shelters in the north, several of which have been hit repeatedly. Gaza’s largest city is the focus of Israel’s campaign to crush Hamas following its deadly Oct. 7 incursion in southern Israel that set off the war, now in its second month.The number of Palestinians killed in the war has risen to over 10,800, including more than 4,400 children, the Hamas-run Health Ministry in Gaza said. In the occupied West Bank, more than 160 Palestinians have been killed in the violence and Israeli raids. More than 1,400 people in Israel have been killed, most of them in the Hamas attack, and about 240 hostages were taken from Israel into Gaza by the milita...

British economy flatlines in third quarter of the year, update shows ahead of budget statement

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:35:00 GMT

LONDON (AP) — The British economy flatlined in the third quarter of the year, official figures showed Friday ahead of a budget statement from the government later this month that it hopes will bolster growth in the run-up to national elections.The Office for National Statistics said growth in the July-to-September period was zero compared to the previous three-months. All sectors, such as manufacturing and construction, broadly showed the same subdued picture.Despite the uninspiring headline figure, the quarterly outcome was slightly ahead of analysts’ expectations for a modest decline in output.The British economy, like many others particularly in the world, is facing headwinds in the form of higher interest rates, which are aimed at taming inflation.Last week, the Bank of England kept its main interest rate unchanged at the 15-year high of 5.25% and indicated that borrowing costs will likely remain at these elevated levels for a while to get inflation back to its target of 2...

Chill in the air Friday-Saturday, but a string of 60° temps starts Monday. With El Niño in progress, NASA warns of extra coastal flooding on the western coasts of the Americas.

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:35:00 GMT

Starts warming up a little in the afternoon Sunday, but by Monday, a string of 60° temperatures start that could include some mid-60s by the middle of next week toward Wednesday and ThursdayNovember's off to a milder than normal start averaging 3.5° above normal. Despite that surplus, the month is running 5.2° cooler than the opening 9 days of November a year ago.  The official high temp hit 70 on this date a year ago.Northwest winds through the atmosphere are circulating chillier air into the Midwest and the Chicago area.  Temps Thursday night dip into the upper 20s in normally cooler locations away from the city and Lake Michigan and to the 36 in the city proper. Coolest days so far this autumn to hit Friday-SaturdayBoth Friday and Saturday (Veteran's Day) are to see temps hard pressed to make 50-degrees —making them the coolest days here since the spell of chilly weather which produced the Halloween snow squalls more than a week ago.BUT THE PATTERN SHIFTS BACK TO A...

EU services production: Up by 0.3% in August

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 19:35:00 GMT

In August 2023, the production of services (excluding financial and public services) increased by 0.3% in the EU and by 0.5% in the eurozone compared with July 2023. Compared with August 2022, services production increased by 2.4% in the EU and by 2.9% in the eurozone.This information comes from data on services production published by Eurostat. For more details on the production of the different services industries, consult the Statistics Explained article on the services production index.Source dataset: sts_sepr_mThe index of services production (ISP) is a business indicator which measures the monthly changes of the production volume of the services industries (excluding financial and public services).More information Statistics Explained article on services production (volume) index overview Thematic section on short-term business statistics Database on short-term business statisticsIf you have any queries, please visit the contact page.