Support for Ukraine and securing peace in the Middle East priorities at G7 Leaders Summit. UK provides package of up to £242m funding for immediate humanitarian, energy and stabilisation needs in Ukraine. Leaders seek to leverage billions from immobilised Russian assets to support Ukraine. The Prime Minister will be clear that the UK will lead from the front on supporting international peace and security as he attends the G7 Leaders Summit in Italy against a backdrop of heightened volatility. At the Summit, the Prime Minister will announce up to £242 million in bilateral assistance to Ukraine, to support immediate…
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Since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the United States, with allies and partners, has rallied support for Ukraine’s defense and imposed sanctions and export controls on an unprecedented scale. Today, in line with the commitments President Biden and Group of Seven (G7) Leaders made as they prepare to meet this week in Italy, the Departments of State and the Treasury are imposing further costs on Russia by designating more than 300 individuals and entities for enabling Russia’s prosecution of its illegal war. The Department of State is imposing sanctions on more than 100 targets across multiple sectors…
Astronomers, maybe more than anyone, appreciate what an island of perfection our Earth is. Our orbit may put us at a perfect distance from the sun for life to flourish, but it is too small to easily help astronomers determine how big the universe is. Late Renaissance scholar Nicolaus Copernicus suggested that the Earth orbits the sun in 1543, but it took 300 years to prove it. In 1838, a nearby star appeared to wobble because our viewpoint on Earth was moving due to our planet being in orbit around the sun. Such apparent motion is called “parallax.” We can…
Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s attacks on Italy’s cultural heritage – from libel suits against intellectuals to her government’s censorship of texts critical of Mussolini – have made headlines across Europe. Less attention, however, has been granted to the agricultural minister’s blows on the country’s natural heritage. Francesco Lollobrigida, who has held this position since October 2022, is a lawyer who cut his teeth on politics at the neo-fascist party Italian Social Movement before joining Fratelli d’Italia in 2012. Italy’s “war” on wild boars On May 5, Lollobrigida passed a law intended to fight African swine fever, a disease spread from…
Today, the winners of the EU 2024 Prize for Citizen Science were announced. Citizen science – the general public engagement in scientific research activities – contributes to a vibrant civil society and is getting increasingly popular with Europeans.Out of the 288 applications, three citizen science initiatives received the main prizes and 27 were recognised with honorary mentions. The winners are:The ‘Grand Prize’, worth €60,000, goes to the EU-funded INCREASE project for its outstanding achievements in advancing knowledge on seed preservation through the empowerment of civil society and citizens, in particular from rural areas.The Digital Communities prize, worth €20,000, is given to the Horizon 2020…
EAST ST. LOUIS, IL – The U.S. Department of Labor has filed a complaint in federal court against two Illinois restaurants — operating as IHOP franchises in O’Fallon and Alton — and their owner after its investigation identified numerous violations, including management telling servers to surrender their tips to a shared tip pool when, in fact, the owner was keeping the tips for the restaurant or sharing them with back-of-the-house employees not eligible to participate in a mandatory tip pool. In addition to violating tip pool regulations, the department’s Wage and Hour Division also learned the restaurants and owner, Khalid Ramadan skirted…
The court on Wednesday convicted six of the nine men on various charges after a grinding three-year trial. It did not hand down a life sentence to the three main suspects, instead sentencing two of them to 28 years in prison and the other to 26 years. A seventh man was also sentenced to just four weeks in prison for drug possession. Two others were acquitted. The court said it could not be proved that de Vries was killed because of his involvement in the murder trial and dismissed the prosecutor’s claim that two men who filmed and posted the…
Still, most disapprove of how Biden has dealt with the Israel-Hamas war This Pew Research Center analysis focuses on public opinion of the United States, President Joe Biden and other world leaders. It also explores what people think about Biden’s handling of international issues and their perceptions of American democracy. The study includes publics in 34 countries across the Asia-Pacific region, Europe, Latin America, the Middle East, North America and sub-Saharan Africa. This analysis draws on nationally representative surveys of 40,566 adults conducted from Jan. 5 to May 21, 2024. All surveys were conducted over the phone with adults in…
Overall, views of the U.S. are more positive than negative across the 34 countries surveyed. A median of 54% hold a favorable opinion of the U.S., while a median of 31% have an unfavorable opinion. Poles are most likely to evaluate the U.S. positively: 86% hold a favorable view, though this share has declined 7 percentage points since last year. Half or more express a positive view in Hungary, Italy and the UK. In the other European countries surveyed, views of the U.S. are roughly split. In the Asia-Pacific region, 70% or more rate the U.S. positively in Japan, the…
A median of 43% across 34 countries surveyed have confidence in Biden to do the right thing regarding world affairs. A similar share say they do not have confidence in him. In Europe, seven-in-ten Poles trust Biden when it comes to world affairs, and majorities in Germany, the Netherlands and Sweden agree. But most adults in the other European countries surveyed do not have confidence in the U.S. president, ranging from 56% no confidence in France to 72% in Hungary. Views are also varied in the Asia-Pacific region. Large shares in the Philippines and Thailand trust Biden’s handling of international…