Ukraine has struck a major blow to Russia’s digital infrastructure. Since last Thursday, Ukrainian drones have carried out a series of attacks that destroyed three large data centers belonging to Yandex — known as “the Kremlin’s Google”— on the outskirts of Moscow. The Yandex Taxi ride-hailing app and the group’s payments service, Yandex Pay, have been temporarily taken offline. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy even said the bombings disabled Russian bots.
© Vahid Salemi (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
“What plague?” an Irkutsk resident exclaims when the epidemiological crisis that has put this small Siberian city near Mongolia on the front pages over the past week is mentioned. “Do you see me wearing a mask?” the annoyed clerk at a pharmacy retorts when asked whether she has noticed any concern over reports of quarantines and the death of a laboratory worker. “Whatever the authorities say, we’ll obey. We all obey the authorities,” say two elderly women, carefree as they sit on swings in a park in Shelekhov, the suburb that their own governor advised people not to visit due to “a particularly dangerous infection.”
At least 280,000 people are missing due to the war between Russia and Ukraine, according to the vast list maintained by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). It includes Ukrainians and Russians, without distinction, and the true figure is likely higher because the list contains only requests registered with the organization. The vast majority are soldiers. Although many have probably died, some parents and wives still set a meal at an empty chair and leave their rooms unchanged in case the person suddenly returns home. They carry a pain psychologists call ambiguous loss.
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As the controversy over AI safety grows, another debate is emerging. Bill Gates, the founder of Microsoft, has said that artificial intelligence should pay taxes to compensate for the jobs that will be destroyed by the deployment of this technology.
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The first hearing of the Supreme Court’s new term on Monday addressed one of the most consequential cases for the U.S. energy sector: The City of Boulder v. Suncor Energy, a lawsuit regarded as one of the major battles over liability for climate change. Framed by many as a David-and-Goliath dispute, the City of Boulder, Colorado, sued two oil companies seeking accountability for climate change. Justices heard the parties’ arguments for roughly two hours and questioned lawyers on technical and jurisdictional matters. These are the key points in one of the most important court battles expected in the coming months.
© Kevin Wolf (AP Photo/Kevin Wolf)
Kaliningrad, the militarized Russian exclave wedged between NATO and EU members Poland and Lithuania and a constant flashpoint between the Kremlin and the Atlantic Alliance, has become the center of Vladimir Putin’s nuclear threat against Europeans. Last week Moscow accused NATO of seeking to block Kaliningrad and threatened to use nuclear weapons if the military organization moves forward with that alleged plan. For the Kremlin, the exclave, which gives it a strategic outlet to the Baltic Sea (it is the only port it can use year-round) and is a key node in its hybrid war against Europe, is an advanced bastion. For NATO, it is a piece on the board that shapes any crisis in the Baltic because it could hinder allied military movements.
The Russian invasion of Ukraine is approaching its fifth year. Since February 24, 2022, Europe and the United States have rolled out a battery of sanctions intended to strangle the Russian economy to the point where regime change would be the only viable outcome for the Kremlin. The wave of restrictions, however, has several loopholes — some deliberately left by the West to preserve certain exchanges, such as a limited purchase of hydrocarbons.
© Vyacheslav Prokofyev (Vyacheslav Prokofyev/Pool Sputni)
The U.S. Treasury bond market is scorching hot and this should worry you because of the consequences for your bottom line. Your mortgage rate, car loan, credit card interest or business loan rates could rise driven by the state of government debt securities.
© ANGELA WEISS (AFP)
Six Flags Magic Mountain, located in California, announced on Tuesday the permanent closure of the X2 roller coaster. Considered one of the park’s main attractions for two decades, the ride’s safety was called into question after CNN published an investigation reporting that more than a dozen people suffered serious brain injuries after riding it.
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Water service failed in at least 300,000 Atlanta households on July 27. Taps ran, but only a trickle came out. After receiving several consumer alerts, the water company found that a pumping station had stopped functioning, affecting that city and others in the state. The loss of pressure led authorities to advise boiling water before drinking it to reduce the risk of contamination, sparking some panic among the population. It was not a technical fault: everything points to it having been orchestrated from a computer almost 7,000 miles away, in Iran.
© Rebecca Cook (REUTERS)
“I made a fortune with Trump’s memecoin, but I lost it all the following month,” a user on X admits. “It’s a perfect Ponzi scheme,” says another. “It’s a scam, a fraud.” On other social platforms there are thousands of comments like these, ranging from investors asking “What did you expect?” to others who watched their savings vanish after chasing the promise of quick gains.
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The year 2023 was pivotal for understanding the effects of abortion restrictions in the United States. A year earlier, in June 2022, the U.S. Supreme Court issued the decision known as Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization (JWHO), which overturned the abortion-rights protection established by a previous ruling from 1973: Roe v. Wade. Since then, thousands of American women have ended pregnancies with help from Mexican feminist collectives. Several recent studies put a face to those seeking abortions: a large share come from states such as Texas, where abortion is banned, and live in neighborhoods with high levels of poverty.
© J. Scott Applewhite (AP)
Donald Trump’s Swiss Army knife is national security. He uses it for everything. If judges block his plan to remodel the East Wing of the White House to build a ballroom that dwarfs the presidential residence, he cites national security to keep the work going. When obstacles arise to building a gigantic triumphal arch in Washington to honor himself, he says national security reasons justify it. If a judge questions him about deploying the National Guard in American cities, it’s for national security. Sued for banning certain media outlets, the answer is the same. And if he can’t find other grounds to impose tariffs, he invokes national security.
© Julia Demaree Nikhinson (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)
The Kremlin has turned the parliament produced by last Sunday’s Russian legislative elections into an echo chamber for the war. Authorities barred the only party that had called for a truce, Yabloko, as well as candidates who were critical of the government — from independent Boris Nadezhdin to members of parties nominally loyal to the Kremlin such as the Communist Party and A Just Russia. In addition, the military are gradually displacing party bureaucrats in Russian politics.
© Alexander Ermochenko (REUTERS)
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