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Top EU official wants European aircraft carrier and missile shield

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 20:57:34 GMT

BRUSSELS — Thierry Breton wants Europe to get serious about its defense — including by developing an aircraft carrier and missile defense shield.Speaking at a defense conference, EU Internal Market Commissioner Breton — whose portfolio also includes defense — said the European Commission “must present an ambitious European defense investment program” that makes sure fledgling efforts to build out production of ammunition and missiles can be sustained while also developing flagship initiatives like naval vessels and next-generation missile shield programs.A European defense industrial strategy is planned for November 8, a Commission official said, but Breton said it’s time to start discussing an aircraft carrier vessel to patrol the seas, a so-called Eurodome air defense system and a space-based “European threat detection and identification capability.”“With the return of high-intensity conflict on the European continent, we have no other choice,” he told def...

‘Resilient’ Orioles believe they can rally from ALDS deficit vs. Rangers: ‘I don’t want to go home yet’

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 20:57:34 GMT

After the Orioles lost a second straight playoff game Sunday to leave their brilliant 2023 season one defeat from ending, veteran right-hander Kyle Gibson couldn’t encyclopedically recall how Baltimore responded to each of its two-game losing streaks during the regular season. He remembered only how they responded to salvage a series split with the Tampa Bay Rays last month.But on a team bus ride later that night, Gibson went through the schedule and saw, just as they did against the Rays, he and his teammates thrived at bouncing back. He believes it can help them do the same as they trail the Texas Rangers 2-0 in the best-of-five American League Division Series. The Orioles require victories in three straight elimination games to keep their season alive, beginning with Tuesday’s Game 3.“This team,” Gibson said, “is pretty resilient.“They’re young, but they got a lot of experience this year when it comes to playing in big games. None,...

Stock market today: Hopes that interest rate hikes will abate push world shares higher

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 20:57:34 GMT

BANGKOK (AP) — Shares climbed Tuesday in Europe and Asia after Wall Street advanced on potentially encouraging news about interest rates, which have been dragging markets lower since the summer. The International Monetary Fund warned Tuesday that the world economy is losing momentum in the face of higher interest rates, the war in Ukraine and widening geopolitical rifts.Global economic growth is forecast to slow to 2.9% in 2024 from an expected 3% this year, the IMF said. The forecast for next year is down a notch from the 3% it predicted back in July.But fueled by optimism over a respite from rising interest rates, Germany’s DAX jumped 1.6% to 15,375.23 and the CAC 40 in Paris was up 1.4% to 7,117.90. Britain’s FTSE 100 gained 1.5% to 7,604.40. The futures for the S&P 500 and the Dow Jones Industrial Average edged 0.2% higher. On Monday, the S&P 500 gained 0.6%, flipping from losses to gains after two Federal Reserve officials suggested interest rates might rema...

Chinese coast guard claims to have chased away Philippine navy ship from South China Sea shoal

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 20:57:34 GMT

BEIJING (AP) — China’s coast guard claimed Tuesday to have chased a Philippine navy ship from a disputed shoal in the South China Sea as tensions between the two countries over rich fishing areas escalate.Coast guard spokesman Gan Yu said the Philippine ship had sailed into waters next to the Scarborough Shoal, which China calls Huangyan Island, and ignored “multiple calls” to turn back. “The Chinese coast guard took necessary measures to expel the Philippine ship in accordance with the law, such as following it and forcing it out and controlling its route,” Gan said. In Manila, the Philippines’ military chief of staff, Gen. Romeo Brawner Jr., said authorities were still looking into the alleged incident but think it was more likely “propaganda from the Chinese” than an actual confrontation.“If we ever have a ship there, we will not agree to be driven away (from our) exclusive economic zone,” Brawner told reporters. “It’s our right to make sure that our...

Chinese developer Country Garden says it can’t meet debt payment deadlines after sales slump

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 20:57:34 GMT

HONG KONG (AP) — Chinese property developer Country Garden warned Tuesday that it cannot repay on time a 470 million Hong Kong dollar ($60 million) loan in the latest sign of distress in the industry after Beijing clamped down on mounting debts in the industry.The company said in a filing to the Hong Kong Stock Exchange that it “expects that it will not be able to meet all of its offshore payment obligations when due or within the relevant grace periods,” including U.S. dollar notes the firm has issued.Country Garden earlier had been hailed as a model real estate company by Chinese authorities. It had avoided defaults on debt even as rivals such as China Evergrande, the world’s most heavily indebted property firm, defaulted in 2021 after the Chinese government began restricting borrowing by developers. The company’s Hong Kong-traded shares sank 10.7% on Tuesday.Its liquidity crisis suggests developers remain under pressure even after regulators lifted some controls on ho...

China touts its Belt and Road infrastructure lending as an alternative for international development

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 20:57:34 GMT

BEIJING (AP) — China is touting its 10-year-old Belt and Road Initiative as an alternative model for economic development, releasing a government report that praises the program while glossing over criticism that it has saddled poor countries with too much debt. The program championed by Chinese leader Xi Jinping has financed construction of ports, power plants, railroads and other projects around the world. “Over the past 10 years, the fruitful results of building the Belt and Road together and the growing circle of friends have fully proved that the Belt and Road does not engage in a closed and narrow circle, transcends the old mindset of geopolitical games and creates a new paradigm of international cooperation,” Li Kexin, the Foreign Ministry’s director for international economics affairs, told reporters in Beijing.Since it was launched, the Belt and Road Initiative, or BRI, has backed projects carried out mostly by Chinese construction companies, financed by loans from Ch...

Live updates | A third French citizen has died and 14 others are missing in latest Israel-Hamas war

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 20:57:34 GMT

PARIS — French lawmaker Meyer Habib said Tuesday on RTL radio that a third French person died in the weekend attack by Hamas militants on southern Israeli towns. France’s Foreign Ministry previously confirmed two French deaths in the latest war between Israel and Hamas and reported that 14 others missing. They include a 12-year-old boy who the French Foreign Ministry said has “very likely” been kidnapped. Habib said the boy appears to have been captured by Hamas militants who attacked his French-Israeli family. THE PALESTINIAN ISLAMIC JIHAD MILITANT GROUP SAYS 2 MEMBERS WERE KILLEDBEIRUT — The Palestinian Islamic Jihad militant group announced Tuesday that two of its members were killed by Israeli fire after crossing from Lebanon into Israel on Monday as part of the Hamas-led attack that started over the weekend. Funerals were set to be held in Ein el-Hilweh on Tuesday.Islamic Jihad said in a statement that seven Israeli soldiers were wounded in Monday’s cross-border operation, whil...

2 top Polish military commanders resign in a spat with the defense minister

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 20:57:34 GMT

WARSAW, Poland (AP) — Two top commanders of the Polish armed forces have tendered their resignations, the military said Tuesday. Polish media have reported on growing tensions between the two commanders — the chief of the General Staff, Gen. Rajmund Andrzejczak, and operational commander Gen. Tomasz Piotrowski — and Defense Minister Mariusz Blaszczak. Blaszczak has publicly criticised Piotrowski over the army’s reaction to a stray Russian missile that crashed in a Polish forest in December. No one was hurt.Blaszczak alleged that Piotrowski had not informed him of the incident and that the army failed to find the missile. It was later accidentally found by a civilian. According to media reports, the minister had recently kept Piotrowski out of the loop on operational decisions like stepping up defenses on the border with Belarus or the evacuation of Poles from Israel after the weekend Hamas attack. The resignations come five days before key parliamentary elections and media rep...

Cambodia records second bird flu death in a week, third this year, after no cases since 2014

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 20:57:34 GMT

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia (AP) — A 2-year-old girl is the second person in Cambodia to die of bird flu this week, and the third this year, the country’s Health Ministry has announced.Laboratory tests confirmed that the girl, who lived in the southeastern province of Prey Veng, died Monday with H5N1 avian influenza, the ministry said in a statement.The ministry had announced on Sunday that a 50-year-old man in neighboring Svay Rieng province also had died from bird flu. In February, an 11-year-old girl became the country’s first bird flu fatality since 2014. Her father was also found to be infected but survived.According to a global tally by the U.N.‘s World Health Organization, from January 2003 to July 2023, there have 878 cases of human infection with H5N1 avian influenza reported from 23 countries, 458 of them fatal. Cambodia had recorded 58 cases since 2003 of humans infected with bird flu.“Since 2003, this virus has spread in bird populations from Asia to Europe and Africa, and to t...

Losing streak continues: Powerball jackpot climbs to $1.73 billion

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 20:57:34 GMT

DES MOINES, Iowa (NEXSTAR) — The Powerball jackpot climbed to an estimated $1.73 billion after no one matched the game’s six numbers Monday and won the giant prize.The winning numbers announced were: 16, 34, 46, 55, 67 and the Powerball 14. There was a $2 million winner in Florida and $1 million winners in California, Indiana, Oregon and Virginia.There has been no winner for 35 consecutive drawings, since the last time someone won the top prize on July 19. That streak trails the record of 41 draws set in 2021 and 2022. The jackpot is now the second largest in U.S. history. The largest ever was a $2.04 billion Powerball prize hit by a player in California in November 2022.Here are the largest lottery prizes in the U.S.:$2.04 billion (Powerball): Nov. 7, 2022; California$1.73 billion (Est. Powerball): Oct. 11, 2023$1.602 billion (Mega Millions): Aug. 15, 2023; Florida$1.586 billion (Powerball): Jan. 13, 2016; California, Florida, Tennessee$1.537 billion (Mega Millions): Oct. 23, ...