Category: International

But it was also evident in the meat of the conversations. Investors talked about opportunities outside the U.S., particularly in Asia and Europe. Climate focused executives waffled about how much of a presence they wanted to have at this year’s iteration of New York Climate Week, usually an important moment on the climate calendar each September. And British officials emphasized their ability to serve as a global hub for sustainable finance. “As investors look around the world and they look for places to put capital, I think we sit in a very good position because of what’s happening geopolitically,” says Chris Hayward, policy chairman of City of London, the historic center of London, now best known as a financial hub.

To get from event to event in London required dashing around the city in the quickest fashion: typically the tube subway system, consistently overheated given the unseasonably hot London temperatures. But the geographic center of the week was undeniably the City of London, the one square mile that hosts the country’s premier banking and financial institutions. There’s a reason for that: organizers in London see an economic opportunity in supporting the energy transition. 

Who is Raúl Castro?

The organizers of the Gaza flotilla intercepted by Israeli forces on Monday said Tuesday that at least five of its boats “sustained shots” fired by the intervening soldiers.

In two videos datemarked Tuesday of what appears to be the same incident, posted on the Global Sumud Flotilla’s (GSF) Telegram channel, activists on a vessel called the Girolama can be heard shouting “don’t shoot” as metallic pings are heard. 

A video posted by the group on X includes the caption: “With hands in the air, participants implored ‘do not shoot’. This is an attack on humanity. This is what apartheid looks like: when those trying to save lives are met with bullets.”

“Shots fired very clearly at Girolama boat,” wrote the GSF with two other videos posted on their Telegram page. The group said four other boats, named as the Munki, Elengi, Alcione and Zefiro, were also fired at.

Neither the Israeli military nor the foreign ministry immediately responded to CBS News’ request for comment on the GSF’s claims, and it was not clear from the video if live ammunition was used by the Israeli forces.

One video posted by the group shows an Israeli soldier appearing to fire a weapon, but it is not clear what type of rounds were used.

Of the original 70 vessels that left Turkey as part of the flotilla, only five were still navigating toward the Palestinian enclave on Tuesday, according to a tracker on the GSF website, having seemingly avoided Israeli interception. 

Gaza has been under an Israeli naval blockade since 2007.

Israeli forces have stopped several previous GSF flotillas from reaching Gaza’s coast, arresting and deporting more than 470 people, including Swedish activist Greta Thunberg. 

GSF said Tuesday that as far as it knows, “no-one has been seriously hurt.”

WARNING: This article may affect those who have experienced​ ​​​sexual violence or know someone affected by it. 

Former Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein is scheduled to go back to court Tuesday, in his third New York trial regarding various allegations of rape and sexual assault. 

Alongside his brother Bob Weinstein, Harvey Weinstein ran the production company Miramax for two and a half decades, earning a reputation as an awards season tastemaker and ruthless taskmaster. But following 2017’s #MeToo movement, numerous women came forward with accusations of criminal sexual misconduct against him. 

Weinstein was fired from his Weinstein Company as allegations were made public in the New York Times and New Yorker articles, was expelled from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences shortly after and then criminally charged in 2018.

He was first convicted in 2020 and has been imprisoned since. He has repeatedly and consistently denied any illegal behaviour and stated all interactions were consensual — though he has not personally testified at any of his trials.  

In the time since his first conviction, a series of appeals and retrials have led to a series of court appearances — leading to Tuesday’s proceedings. His first conviction in 2020 was for third-degree rape and a first-degree criminal sexual act in connection with hairstylist and actor Jessica Mann and production assistant and producer Miriam Haley, respectively. He was acquitted on three other counts, including predatory sexual assault. Both Mann and Haley agreed to be named publicly.

He was sentenced to 23 years in prison, which he began serving at Rikers Island that year — while simultaneously facing rape and sexual assault charges in Los Angeles. 

He was found guilty of those Los Angeles charges in 2022, receiving a 16-year sentence the following year. That sentence is scheduled to be carried out after he has finished serving his time in New York. 

But in 2024, a New York appeals court overturned his 2020 convictions citing “egregious errors” in how the trial judge allowed testimony from complainants who were not directly connected to the charges he was facing. 

“No person accused of illegality may be judged on proof of uncharged crimes that serve only to establish the accused’s propensity for criminal behaviour,” they wrote in their findings, referencing New York’s “Molineux Rule,” which was a fundamental point of contention from the trial’s beginning.

At the subsequent 2025 retrial, charges related to Haley were upheld, but the charge of third-degree rape related to Mann resulted in a hung jury. For that charge, the judge declared a mistrial after the jury foreperson refused to return to more deliberations, claiming another juror bullied and intimidated them.

New, old accusers

Mann has testified that she had a consensual, on-and-off relationship with the then-married Weinstein. But when he cornered her in a Manhattan hotel room where she was staying on a weekend getaway in 2013, she protested, “I don’t want to do this,” she told jurors. 

She said he kept making advances and demands until she “just gave up.”

A third accuser — model turned psychotherapist Kaja Sokola, who agreed to be named publicly — was added to the 2025 trial and also alleged sexual assault. Weinstein was acquitted of that charge.

When opening statements begin on Tuesday, it will mark the third time that Mann’s accusations against Weinstein will be tried. Weinstein is appealing the Los Angeles verdict and is expected to appeal the New York conviction involving Haley. It carries the potential for up to 25 years in prison; no sentencing date has been set. The retrial is expected to last over a month.

Jury selection for the upcoming retrial began April 14. Questioned about the length of the proceeding and whether they could be fair and impartial about the much-publicized case, more than 80 people asked to be excused during the initial screening.

In a surprise move before jury selection began, prosecutors said they had a new piece of evidence — a remark that Weinstein allegedly made to a court officer six years ago.

According to Manhattan Assistant District Attorney Candace White, the officer told prosecutors the week prior that he was present during Weinstein’s February 2020 sexual assault conviction and heard Weinstein say: “If you had seen these girls, you would have done the exact same thing.”

Weinstein’s lawyers urged Judge Curtis Farber to keep any mention of the supposed remark out of the upcoming retrial.

“This sounds far-fetched,” defence attorney Marc Agnifilo said, also arguing that it emerged too late.

Agnifilo and his partners took on the case in February, when longtime Weinstein lawyer Arthur Aidala stepped aside from the retrial to focus on the former studio boss’ appeals and civil matters. 

In this case, the rape charge is a lower-level felony punishable by up to four years behind bars. Weinstein, 73, has already served longer than that.

Weinstein has various health problems and uses a wheelchair. Since his 2020 conviction, he has spent time in Bellevue Hospital, been diagnosed with cancer and received emergency heart surgery. 

He told the judge in January that his “mental state is collapsing” in New York’s notorious Rikers Island jail.

If you’re in immediate danger or fear for your safety or that of others around you, please call 911. For support in your area, you can look for crisis lines and local services via the Ending Violence Association of Canada database.

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A SICKO who sexually abused both a pit bull and children reportedly had his repulsive offending exposed when a social media app flagged his account.

Brandon C. Kilpatrick, 25, pleaded guilty to numerous child sexual abuse charges, bestiality and sexual extortion in Arkansas at the Pope County Circuit Court.

The vile man was sentenced to spend 96 years in prison over his depraved offending on Monday.

In a victim impact statement read to the court via Zoom, his victim said “You are disgusting. There is no saving you”.

Investigators said the slimy deviant was busted when instant messaging app Kik reported videos of child sexual abuse material linked to his account.

Kik uses unique usernames instead of phone numbers, increasing a user’s ability to remain anonymous.

Authorities later found he possessed and shared a horrifying 187 clips, the Arkansas Democrat Gazette reported.

Kilpatrick was formally charged in October last year with sexual extortion, three counts of bestiality involving the performance of a sex act on a pit bull, and 96 counts of electronic facilitation of child sexual abuse, according to court records.

His offending occurred between May and September in 2024, prosecutors told the court.

Under the agreed plea deal, Judge James Dunham came down hard on Kilpatrick.

Dunham locked up the dirt bag abuser for 18 years on the sexual extortion charge, one year for the bestiality and multiple prison terms for the child sexual abuse charges.

One of the victims told investigators that Kilpatrick had contacted her via Instagram.

Heather Patton, chief deputy prosecuting attorney for the 5th Judicial District, said that after he got his grubby hands on her private photos, he threatened to release them unless she sent more,

In her victim impact statement, the girl revealed the emotional toll her abuser’s actions had left her with.

“I trusted you more than anyone else in my whole life,” she said, sobbing.

“Had they not caught you, you would have been my end.”

In a powerful statement, she said she was determined to remain “unscathed by [his] filth.”

Kilpatrick was ordered to register as a sex offender, banned from contacting the victim, and has also been prohibited from contact with anyone under 21 or owning animals.

The sick creep listened in the proceedings on a jail phone and was streamed into the courtroom on a large TV during the hearing.

He showed no visible reaction as the victim spoke, the local outlet reported.

The emotional court hearing ended with the young woman telling Kilpatrick: “You will never understand what freedom feels like.”

Dorinda Edmisten – the executive director of the Ozark Rape Crisis Centre – was in court to offer support to the victim.

She said bestiality was not as uncommon as people think.

“No, it’s not the most uncommon thing we’ve heard,” she said.

Jeff Phillips, prosecuting attorney for the 5th Judicial District, said similar cases were difficult, even for experienced law enforcement personnel and prosecutors.

He explained that through each case, evidence had to be gathered and reviewed, including viewing the photos and videos of abuse to determine how an offender should be charged.

“We can’t unsee these things,” he said.

“We take these cases home.”

A spokesperson from the Pope County Detention Centre told The New York Post that Kilpatrick was being held there until he was transferred to a yet-to-be-determined prison.

Moscow:

Russia is trying to produce more pro-war influencers through content creation camps, training teenagers to spread the Kremlin’s hardline, anti-West narrative to the next generation.

Since invading Ukraine in 2022, Moscow has ramped up control of the domestic information space, outlawing criticism of the offensive through strict military censorship laws, throttling foreign media outlets and pushing its agenda across society.

Schools and young people have been targeted — curricula and textbooks changed to include Russia’s justification for its invasion and soldiers dispatched to whip up pro-war enthusiasm in the classroom.

At one content creation camp in early April, more than 120 teenagers, clad in green sweaters and red berets, gathered in Moscow for lectures from soldiers and state media reporters on how to produce videos, use artificial intelligence and build audiences.

“We have created a huge team of kids, who understand how to broadcast government values and our organisation’s values,” Vladislav Golovin, a former soldier and chief of the general staff of Russia’s Young Army cadets movement, said in a statement released by the group.

In a promotional video from the event, children were shown cheering a cadet racing against Golovin to see who could reload a sniper rifle the fastest.

Another organisation, the Movement of the First, runs competitions offering rewards for teenagers with the best blogs and biggest followings.

‘Easy To Radicalise’

The training camps are part of what Keir Giles, director of the UK-based Conflict Studies Research Centre, calls a “concentrated campaign to restore the prestige of the Russian military.”

“These 14–16-year-olds have grown up in an environment where they have never known anything other than Putinism. This is their reality, and so we should not be surprised if these new efforts to spread information reflect that reality,” he told AFP.

The drive to instil young Russians with Kremlin-approved values comes from the very top.

In 2023, Russian President Vladimir Putin quoted Otto Van Bismarck to summarise his approach.

“Wars are not won by generals, but by schoolteachers and parish priests,” Putin said in a televised press conference.

“Educating young people in the spirit of patriotism is crucial,” he added.

The revival of Soviet-era youth organisations, like the Young Army, Yunarmiya in Russian, and Movement of the First — which says it has 14 million online members and 1,100 regional initiatives — has been integral to those efforts.

In their beige military uniforms with red berets, the rows of teenage cadets often resemble a bright poppy field at set-piece state events, like grand military parades dedicated to Soviet victory in World War II.

As Russia has clamped down on media and the internet since ordering troops into Ukraine, the campaign has moved online.

AI and disinformation expert at the Technological University of Berlin, Veronika Solopova, said social media algorithms are ripe for the Kremlin to spread its narrative, delivering individually tailored content to evoke an emotional response.

“Young people are famously easy to radicalise, easy to jump to conclusions on the nature of injustices, which, for Russia, is then all conveniently converted into army enrolments,” she added.

‘Behind The Camera’

More than half of Russians aged 18-24 say social media is their main source of news, polling by the independent Levada Centre found in March.

Young people’s “shorter attention spans, combined with the effortless shareability of clips and reels, make digital content an exceptionally powerful tool,” said Giorgi Revishvili, a former Senior Advisor to the National Security Council of Georgia.

Social media content can be “direct and radical” or “very subtle, aimed not at generating support for Russia, but at decreasing solidarity with Ukraine,” said Dietmar Pichler, a disinformation and propaganda analyst at INVED.

At the training camp in Moscow, the Young Army cadets were quick to grasp the power of their new skills.

“When you are the one behind the camera filming the entire process, making audiences happy, you realise … you are the one who has aroused these emotions in people,” a girl said in a promotional clip published by the organisers.

“The truth lies in a frame, and we are operating the camera.”

(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

HAVANA — Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel said Thursday that while Cuba does not want military aggression from the United States, his country is prepared to fight should it happen.

Díaz-Canel spoke during a rally that drew hundreds of people to commemorate the 65th anniversary of the declaration of the Cuban Revolution’s socialist essence.

“The moment is extremely challenging and calls upon us once again, as on April 16, 1961, to be ready to confront serious threats, including military aggression. We do not want it, but it is our duty to prepare to avoid it and, if it becomes inevitable, to defeat it,” Díaz-Canel said.

He spoke as tensions remain high between the two countries, with Cuba’s crises deepening as a result of a U.S. energy blockade.

Earlier this week, Trump said his administration could focus on Cuba after the war in Iran ends.

“We may stop by Cuba after we finish with this,” he said.

He described it as a “failing nation” and asserted that it’s “been a terribly run country for a long time.”

Trump previously has threated to intervene in Cuba, like he did in early January when the U.S. military attacked Venezuela and halted key oil shipments from the South American country.

Weeks later, Trump threatened tariffs on any country that sells or provides oil to Cuba.

Both Trump and U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio — whose parents emigrated from Cuba in the 1950s before the revolution — described the island’s government as ineffective and abusive.

Díaz-Canel accused them of trying to construct a “narrative” that has no justification.

“Cuba is not a failed state. Cuba is a besieged state. Cuba is a state facing multidimensional aggression: economic warfare, an intensified blockade and an energy blockade,” said Díaz-Canel, the main speaker at Thursday’s rally.

“Cuba is a threatened state that does not surrender. And despite everything. And thanks to socialism. Cuba is a state that resists, creates, and make no mistake, a state that will prevail,” Díaz-Canel added.

Both Cuba and the U.S. have acknowledged talks to resolve the tension, but no details have been disclosed.

The Cuban president recalled the achievements made possible by the revolution and its social welfare system, which allows for free education that has trained thousands of professionals, many of whom have now been forced to emigrate due to the crisis.

The oil embargo imposed by Trump worsened the already harsh conditions brought on by an economic crisis that has lasted for five years and was triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic and a tightening of U.S. sanctions aimed at pressuring for a change in the island’s political model.

Experts have warned of a humanitarian crisis.

Measures to prevent the island from acquiring oil from its Venezuelan, Mexican and Russian suppliers are exacerbating the already poor living conditions of the population, including prolonged blackouts and fuel shortages.

The rally commemorated the 65th anniversary of a historic speech by the late leader, Fidel Castro, during a crisis with the United States. That moment marked the ideological course the Caribbean nation would take and its opposition to Washington’s continental hegemony.

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