Wednesday, July 5, 2023

Six In The Morning Wednesday 5 July 2023

 

Jenin: Palestinians fear escalation after destructive West Bank assault

By Tom Bateman
BBC Middle East correspondent, Jenin

The atmosphere in Jenin refugee camp feels like one I have witnessed elsewhere - in Gaza, after wars with Israel.

But this is the occupied West Bank; where the dynamics are very different. Now it seems like a fast descent into something far more dangerous is already happening.

The destruction in the camp following the Israeli army's biggest assault there in 20 years is massive.

As hundreds of troops entered the camp on Monday morning, the army fired missiles from drones - air strikes have not been used in the West Bank for two decades - and tore up roads to clear them of what it said were militants' roadside bombs.



Tuesday was world’s hottest day on record — breaking Monday’s record

Average global temperature hits 17.18C and experts expect record to be broken again very soon

World temperature records have been broken for a second day in a row, data suggests, as experts issued a warning that this year’s warmest days are still to come – and with them the warmest days ever recorded.

The average global air temperature was 17.18C (62.9F) on Tuesday, according to data collated by the US National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP), surpassing the record 17.01C reached on Monday.

Until the start of this week, the hottest day on record was in 2016, during the last El Niño global weather event, when the global average temperature reached 16.92C.



Foreign firms in Russia continue to help fund Putin's war

A study shows that only 17% of Western firms with local Russian units prior to the invasion of Ukraine have exited Russia. Those that remain are paying Moscow billions in taxes, indirectly bankrolling the Ukraine war.


new reportby the Kyiv School of Economics (KSE) and B4Ukraine has found that multinationals in Russia continued to pay taxes there in 2022, indirectly financing the Kremlin's war

According to some estimates, sustaining its military efforts costs Russia at least $1 billion a day, a huge burden on Moscow's finances, especially with lower oil and gas prices and sanctions on Russian energy hurting the Kremlin's primary source of income.

According to the report, of 1,387 Western companies with Russian subsidiaries at the start of the full-scale invasion on February 24, 2022, only 241 (17%) have completely exited Russia. Those that have not yet left the Russian market generated $177.2 billion (€162 billion) in revenue in Russia last year, it said.


'Love letters' from death row: Singapore's pre-execution photo shoots


Death row inmate Nazeri Lajim beams at the camera, fingers raised in a "V" sign, wearing a shirt emblazoned with large motifs and showing no signs of his impending hanging. Taken days before his execution at Singapore's Changi prison, the picture is among the last mementoes Lajim's family has of the 64-year-old, who was executed on charges of drug trafficking. Rights groups have long called to abolish capital punishment, but the city-state insists it is an effective deterrent against crime.




ICJ confirms international case over Iran downing of Flight PS752


Four countries accuse Iran of failing to take all practical measures to prevent the downing of the 2020 flight and of not being transparent enough.



The International Court of Justice (ICJ) has confirmed that Canada and three allies have filed proceedings against Iran over its downing of Flight PS752 in 2020, which killed all 176 people on board.

Canada, the United Kingdom, Sweden and Ukraine, all of whom lost nationals and residents in the incident, tabled their case under the Montreal Convention, which deals with civil aviation safety, The Hague-based tribunal said on Wednesday.

The ICJ, also known as the World Court, said the applicants accuse Iran of failing to take all practical measures to prevent the destruction of the passenger plane and said it subsequently “failed to conduct an impartial, transparent and fair criminal investigation and prosecution consistent with international law”.


IAEA chief visits Fukushima before radioactive water is released

By MARI YAMAGUCHI


The United Nations nuclear chief will visit Japan's tsunami-wrecked nuclear power plant Wednesday after the agency affirmed the safety of a contentious plan to release treated radioactive water into the sea.

On his way to the Fukushima Daiichi plant, a highlight of his four-day Japan visit, International Atomic Energy Agency chief Rafael Mariano Grossi joined a meeting of government and utility officials, as well as local mayors and fishing association leaders, and stressed the continuous presence of this agency throughout the water discharge to ensure safety and address the residents' concerns.

“What is happening is not something exceptional, some strange plan that has been devised only to be applied here, and sold to you,” Grossi said in his opening remarks in Iwaki, about 40 kilometers south of the plant. “This is, as certified by the IAEA, the general practice that is agreed by and observed in many, many places all over the world.”


China detains graduate who allegedly stole data for website rating students’ attractiveness

Published 4:02 AM EDT, Wed July 5, 2023

Police in China have detained a college graduate suspected of stealing university data to create a website rating the attractiveness of his fellow students.

The 25-year-old, identified by police by his surname Ma, is a graduate of the prestigious Renmin University in Beijing, according to a police statement on Monday.

Multiple online posts over the weekend accused him of stealing the personal information of students from the university’s database while he was studying there.

The posts alleged that Ma used the data to create a website that rates the physical appearance of both undergraduate and graduate students. Screenshots of the website, which has since been shut down, show profiles of the students, with their names, student IDs, dates and places of birth listed alongside their photos – and their assigned scores.







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