World, US, Culture, Market, and Sci-Tech News Aggregation from MSM and Independent News
PARIS — France’s far-right leader Marine Le Pen said she won’t run for president next year if a Paris appeals court orders her to wear an electronic bracelet over alleged misuse of European Union funds.
Le Pen said she hopes the appeals court clears her in key verdict set for July 7 — a ruling that may derail her presidential ambitions.
“I know very well that the decision regarding this candidacy isn’t mine to make,” she said Wednesday evening on news broadcaster BFM TV.
Le Pen, 57, is challenging a March 2025 verdict that found her and other members of her National Rally party guilty of misusing EU Parliament funds in the hiring of aides from 2004 to 2016 who allegedly worked for the party instead of doing parliamentary tasks.
The crude oil shipment destined for MOL Group is already being loaded at the state-owned Janaf’s Omišalj terminal, the Croatian oil company announced on Wednesday, per a report from HVG. According to the statement, this will not be the only shipment, as seven more tankers will arrive by the beginning of April.
Janaf emphasized in its statement that it is not Russian crude oil that is being supplied to Hungarians, and yet, the company is ready to meet the entire annual demand of refineries in both Slovakia and Hungary.
In the age of AI, the scarcest resource in headquarters is no longer time. It is, rather, the willingness to say no.
Artificial intelligence is moving rapidly into military planning staffs because it compresses routine cognitive labor. AI excels at absorbing guidance, reorganizing complex material, and producing clear strategic language at speed. This feels like a qualitative advance, creating the impression that planning itself has become easier. But this impression misleads. The risk of AI-enabled planning is that it will produce plausible constructs that obscure where judgment is required, creating the illusion that analytic completeness can substitute for prioritization.
AI is seen as “raising the floor” by making it easier to produce adequate products. That is true. Yet AI also “collapses the median” by increasing the relative cost of real insight. As AI-enabled planning begin to inform real-world operations, the temptation is to treat complete answers as sufficient, without interrogating whether they represent the right answers to the hard questions of what to resource, what to defer, and what risk to accept.
The AI firm says a Chinese official’s activity on the chatbot pointed to wider “cyber special operations” to intimidate both domestic and foreign critics.
from www.channelnewsasia.com
from news.google.com
TRUMP AND ZELENSKY SPEAK: A day after President Donald Trump publicly ignored the fourth anniversary of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, and barely mentioned the war in his State of the Union address, the president resumed his pressure campaign to convince Volodymyr Zelensky he has little choice but to make a quick deal to end the war before things get worse.
“I just spoke with @POTUS Donald Trump,” Zelensky posted on X yesterday after a phone call with Trump, Steve Witkoff, and Jared Kushner. “I thanked them for all their work and for their active involvement in the negotiations and the efforts to end the war.”
In the 30-minute call, Trump told Zelensky he wants to see an end to the war “as soon as possible,” Axios reported, citing “a Ukrainian official and two other sources with knowledge of the call.”
The Justice Department announced Wednesday that a former U.S. Air Force major and longtime fighter pilot has been arrested on charges that he trained Chinese military pilots without authorization.
Gerald Eddie Brown Jr., 65, was taken into custody in Jeffersonville, Indiana, and is expected to appear in federal court on Thursday. Prosecutors allege that beginning around August 2023, Brown worked to arrange combat aircraft training for members of China’s People’s Liberation Army Air Force and traveled to China in December 2023 to carry it out.
Federal officials were blunt.
“The United States Air Force trained Major Brown to be an elite fighter pilot and entrusted him with the defense of our Nation. He now stands charged with training Chinese military pilots.”
Russian President Vladimir Putin issued a ruthless attack order in the face of peace efforts(Image: POOL/AFP via Getty Images)
Russia launched a mass overnight onslaught of almost 500 bombs on Ukraine injuring at least 26 people – as the Kremlin dampened peace talk hopes.
At least 420 deadly drones and dozens of missiles were used in the attack, plus anti-ship , ballistic and cruise weapons , many of which were aimed at Kyiv and seven other regions.
While Iran engages in fake negotiations to stall, deceive, and lie to the Trump Administration, they announce that they will be buying anti-ship missiles from China. President Trump must stop these asinine negotiations with Iran. Iran’s butchers will never honor an agreement with the U.S, most especially when President Trump leaves office in January 2029. History will not be kind to President Trump if he signs a bad nuke deal with Iran.
Related – ‘Complete game-changer’: Iran close to buying supersonic anti‑ship missiles from China
PRESIDENT TRUMP on IRAN: My preference is to solve this problem through diplomacy, but one thing is certain: I will NEVER allow the world’s number one sponsor of terror to have a nuclear weapon.
We have to be strong. It’s called peace through strength. pic.twitter.com/0CPKHtvQDt
— Department of State (@StateDept) February 25, 2026
Trump said that for 47 years the Iranian regime and its proxies “have spread terrorism and hate,” killing thousands of people in the region, including American soldiers and at least 32,000 civilians during protests that erupted last December.
Trump said the Iranian regime has… https://t.co/2T5GODAGZW
Washington — President Trump has grown increasingly frustrated with what aides describe as the limits of military leverage against Iran, according to multiple sources familiar with the matter who spoke to CBS News under condition of anonymity to discuss national security issues.
Unlike previous targeted operations, including the recent one removing Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro from power, Mr. Trump has been told that any strike on Tehran’s assets would almost certainly not be a singular, decisive blow. Instead, limited strikes could open the door to a wider confrontation — one that risks drawing the United States into a protracted conflict in the Middle East.
Hardly a week goes by now that we don’t get a cautionary tale coming out of Britain, where the political elite are determined either to destroy the nation’s ethnic majority through the mass importation of third-world migrants, or to pretend that there is no ethnic majority to destroy in the first place.
Among the pretenders is none other than Nigel Farage, whose right populist party Reform UK is poised to win an outright parliamentary majority in the next general election. Farage has been a fixture in British politics for a quarter-century now and has always presented himself as counter-establishment. Yet he is also a man who likes to be liked, which means he will not speak candidly about Britain’s migrant crisis and what must be done to save the country.
The tech firm’s safety team has been called to Ottawa to explain why it failed to alert police about an account linked to a mass shooter
Canadian officials have summoned senior OpenAI representatives to Ottawa to answer questions about the tech company’s safety protocols after it confirmed it did not alert police about an account linked to mass shooter Jesse Van Rutselaar.
Artificial Intelligence Minister Evan Solomon said on Monday that OpenAI’s senior safety officials will come to Ottawa on Tuesday to outline how the company decides when to notify law enforcement.
SYDNEY: Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said on Wednesday (Feb 25) that he did not take his security for granted, after he was evacuated from his residence for several hours following an alleged bomb threat.
Albanese was evacuated from his residence in Canberra late on Tuesday following a security threat, and returned a few hours later after nothing suspicious was found.
Police said there was no ongoing threat.
“I think it’s just a reminder, take every opportunity to tell people, turn the heat down for goodness sake,” Albanese said at an event in Melbourne on Wednesday.
Most observers predicted the recent Supreme Court (SCOTUS) ruling striking down President Trump’s International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) tariffs; however, the decision raises new doubts and questions about trade with the United States for exporters from countries like South Korea. This explainer discusses what the recent ruling means for trade between South Korea and the United States and how South Korea may respond to relations with the U.S. in the coming days.
Israeli settlers vandalized a mosque in the Israeli-occupied West Bank early Monday, spray-painting offensive phrases and setting a fire, according to the Palestinian Authority’s Ministry of Religious Affairs.
Worshippers arriving for the day’s first prayers found the damage and a smoldering fire that spewed black smoke across the entrance of the Abu Bakr Al-Siddiq Mosque in the town of Tell, near Nablus, and stained the ornate doorway.
“I was shocked when I opened the door,” said Munir Ramdan, who lives nearby. “The fire had been burning here in the area, the glass was broken here and the door was broken.”
Agentic AI is quickly moving from demo to deployment inside the Department of Defense. But what does it actually mean to give AI “agency” — and what does it take to make those systems work on real military networks?
In this episode, Ryan sits down with Ben Van Roo, co-founder and CEO of Legion Intelligence, Jags Kandasamy, co-founder and CEO of Latent AI, and Aaron Brown, co-founder and CEO of Lumbra AI, to discuss why the real challenge is not just building smart models but getting AI agents to run on military networks and inside operational workflows. They cover deploying agents in denied environments, compressing models for the edge, orchestrating them across stovepiped systems, and the Pentagon’s struggle to scale and buy these tools fast enough to matter.
China’s First Nuclear-Powered Aircraft Carrier Will Challenge US Sea Power Newsweek
from news.google.com
Trump Should Take the U.S. Military’s Warning on Iran Seriously Council on Foreign Relations
from news.google.com
(LifeSiteNews) – Regular readers of LifeSiteNews, and in fact those who read most independent media, most likely are already aware that the People’s Republic of China, through its Communist Chinese Party’s (CCP) many arms, has been meddling in Canada’s elections, as well as democracy in general, for years.
What may not be as well known is that in Canada’s smallest province, the picturesque Prince Edward Island (PEI), the CCP has been accused of using Buddhist monasteries as money laundering fronts to the tune of half a billion dollars.
Indeed, a report from late last year noted how Buddhist monks and nuns from a group called Bliss and Wisdom showed recent tax filings with about $500 million in assets.
Afghan and Pakistani forces engaged in new clashes along their troubled border region, days after deadly air strikes on Afghanistan by Pakistan sent tensions soaring.
The two countries gave competing accounts of the violence on Tuesday, each accusing the other of triggering it.
Iranian university students for the last two days have engaged in a new wave of anti-government demonstrations across the country, marking the first major rallies since a violent state crackdown in January.
The protests have reportedly taken place on at least seven campuses as students demand increased political freedom, leading to confrontations with government loyalists, according to various news reports, citing videos of the incidents.
The protests “come as Iran’s clerical leaders struggle to manage uprisings at home and a looming risk of war with Washington,” the New York Times reported.
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum says that calm is being restored and that improvised cartel roadblocks are being removed.
Violence and shelter-in-place orders are rippling out across Mexico after the military killed a cartel leader commonly known as ‘El Mencho.’ Andrew Chang explains how Jalisco New Generation, arguably Mexico’s most dangerous cartel, has been building a criminal empire for several years.
Islamabad said it carried out strikes along the border with Afghanistan early Sunday, targeting what it called hideouts of Pakistani militants it blamed for recent attacks inside Pakistan. The Afghan Red Crescent Society said more than a dozen people were killed.
Pakistan didn’t specify the locations targeted, but the Afghan defense ministry said in a statement “various civilian areas” in the provinces of Nangarhar and Paktika in eastern Afghanistan were hit, including a religious madrassa and multiple civilian homes.
The statement called the strikes a violation of Afghanistan’s airspace and sovereignty.
‘I was kidnapped and raped by Asian grooming gang – then told not to mention their race’ Express.co.uk
from news.google.com
WASHINGTON — One of the most dangerous places for Christians worldwide is Nigeria. More than a decade of deadly violence has drawn international scrutiny, prompted U.S. military action, and fueled debate over whether Africa’s most populous nation is facing genocide.
In an exclusive interview with CBN News, Nigeria’s First Lady, Oluremi Tinubu, pushed back on claims that Christians are being systematically exterminated.
“I don’t think so,” Tinubu offered repeatedly when asked whether genocide is taking place. Instead, she described the violence as rooted in long-standing regional conflicts, poverty, terrorism, and political instability — particularly as the country approaches an election year in 2027.
President Donald Trump’s new tariffs have come into effect today at a rate of 10%, after the US supreme court blocked many of his import taxes on Friday.
The president signed an executive order last Friday authorising the 10% tariffs just hours after the supreme court ruling. He later threatened to raise the rate to 15%, but did not officially do so by Tuesday 12.01am time in Washington, when the 10% levy came into effect.
However, Bloomberg is reporting that officials in the White House are working on a formal order that will increase the rate to 15%.
It comes after Trump declared this week that he can use tariffs in a “much more powerful and obnoxious way”.
Netanyahu announces ‘Hexagon of Alliances’ with India, Greece, Cyprus amid regional tensions myind.net
from news.google.com
Former British Ambassador to the U.S. Peter Mandelson is led away from his home by a police officer as he is arrested on suspicion of misconduct in public office, following revelations over his ties to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, in London, Britain, Feb. 23, 2026, in this screen capture from video.
Police in London released Peter Mandelson, Britain’s former ambassador to the United States, on bail Tuesday local time, hours after his arrest earlier.
Mandelson has been under investigation for his relationship with notorious sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
Metropolitan Police in London said that Lord Mandelson, 72, was arrested Monday on suspicion of misconduct in public office, the same grounds on which other police in Britain last week arrested and briefly detained Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, the former prince and longtime friend of Epstein.