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Cuba has reached a breaking point that even its crisis-hardened leadership cannot ignore. It is running out of fuel amid US pressure, having last received oil on January 9 from Mexico. This has prompted airlines such as Air Canada to cancel all flights to Cuba, hitting the tourism lifeline that accounts for most of the island’s foreign currency. Massive power outages  are now routine, and the UN has warned of a possible " humanitarian collapse " if Cuba’s oil needs go unmet. For the first time in decades, Cuba’s 67-year-old regime faces a crisis where its traditional survival tools – external bailouts, mass emigration and austerity – may no longer be enough. Hostility between the US and Cuba  dates back to 1960, when the newly socialist Cuban state nationalised American assets. Havana’s subsequent cold war alignment with Moscow then prompted an embargo in 1962  that prohibited almost all trade between the US and Cuba. Since then, Washington...

MILAN, Italy (AFP)  — Delta Air Lines CEO Ed Bastian sought to reassure international travelers Wednesday that the United States remains a welcoming destination ahead of the upcoming 2026 World Cup. “Hopefully, the World Cup will bring a lot of Europeans, a lot of international visitors into the United States (US) market,” Bastian told AFP. The United States, along with Canada and Mexico, will be hosting the biennial football competition from June 11 through July 20. But the US crackdown on immigration by Donald Trump’s presidential administration has raised worries that some international travelers may avoid it this year. “Yes, the US has a focus on immigration. This is not immigration. This is tourism,” Bastian said in an interview in parallel with the Winter Olympic Games. “And as long as people are coming with the proper credentials, they’re not having any issues,” Bastian said. Delta, which is sponsoring Team USA in Milan, has projected revenue growth of between fi...

Feb 13 (Reuters) - The U.S. is sending a second aircraft carrier to the Middle East amid tensions with Iran, U.S. media outlets reported late on Thursday. The aircraft carrier USS Gerald R. Ford and its escort ships will be sent to the Middle East from the Caribbean, the New York Times, which first reported the news, said, citing U.S. officials. Earlier this week, President Donald Trump had said he was considering sending a second aircraft carrier to the Middle East if a deal is not reached with Iran. The first aircraft carrier, the USS Abraham Lincoln and several guided-missile destroyers arrived in the Middle East in January. Trump said on Thursday the United States has to make a deal with Iran and suggested an agreement could be struck over the next month. "We have to make a deal, otherwise it's going to be very traumatic, very traumatic," Trump told reporters. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday  said he hoped that Trump was creating the ...

TikTok keeps track of everything you do on its app – no surprises there. What's less obvious is how the company follows you around other parts of the internet that have nothing to do with TikTok.  In fact, TikTok collects sensitive and potentially embarrassing information about you even if you've never used the app. Over the past week, I've watched websites sending TikTok data about cancer diagnoses, fertility and even mental health crises. It's part of a tracking empire that extends far beyond the social media platform. Now, thanks to a new set of features, TikTok is poised to expand its network and see even more details about your life. The change comes just weeks after the sale of TikTok's US operations  to a group of companies with ties to US President Donald Trump. The deal has led to fresh privacy concerns   from some human rights experts   and users , though TikTok says it has transparent guidelines  on how it res...

Russia has said it will abide by limits on its nuclear weapons as set out in a lapsed arms control  with the United States, as long as Washington continues to do the same. The New START agreement expired earlier this month,  leaving the world’s two biggest nuclear-armed powers with no binding constraints on their strategic arsenals for the first time in more than half a century and sparking fears of a new global arms race. In an address to parliament on Wednesday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said that Moscow was in no rush to start developing and deploying more weapons – backtracking on comments made by his ministry last week that said Russia considered itself no longer bound by the treaty’s terms. “We proceed from the fact that this moratorium, which was announced by our president, remains in effect, but only while the United States does not exceed the outlined limits,” said Lavrov. "We have reason to believe that the United States is in no hurry t...

The Dangote Petroleum Refinery has recorded a historic milestone, becoming the first refinery in the world to attain and sustain full 650,000 barrels per day capacity on its Crude Distillation Unit (CDU) and Motor Spirit (MS) Block. The refinery announced that both units are now operating at optimal performance following a scheduled maintenance exercise, marking what it described as a landmark achievement in global refining operations. As part of the post-maintenance process, the refinery commenced an intensive 72-hour performance test run in collaboration with its licensor, UOP, to validate operational efficiency and confirm that all critical parameters meet international standards. Chief Executive Officer, David Bird, said the milestone demonstrates the strength of the refinery’s engineering design and operational capacity. “Our teams have demonstrated exceptional precision and expertise in stabilising both the CDU and MS Block. This milestone underscores the strength, re...

~ news.sky.com

BEIJING, Feb 10 (Reuters) - China's foreign ministry on Tuesday said there had been no reports of its citizens being stranded in Cuba due to airlines suspending flights to the country because of a jet fuel shortage, following the U.S. blocking of shipments from Venezuela. "China firmly supports Cuba in safeguarding its national sovereignty and security, and opposes foreign interference," Lin Jian, a foreign ministry spokesperson, told a regular news conference. "We will always provide support and help to the Cuban side to the best of our ability."

BBC Verify  is a service introduced by the British Broadcasting Corporation  (BBC) in 2023. According to the BBC "BBC Verify is a specialist team of journalists using open-source intelligence (OSINT), satellite imagery, data analysis and forensic techniques. They fact-check information, verify video, counter disinformation, and analyse data to separate fact from fake, and to bring clarity on complex issues." BBC Verify says that it "pulls back the curtain" to show not only news, but to verify how it has come to be known. The original BBC Verify Web site has individual entries for many stories. In 2025  BBC Verify Live  was added, a single page on the BBC News home page and on the BBC app for a day with verification of many of the day's news stories added cumulatively as available.  ~ en.wikipedia.org

French President Emmanuel Macron has urged Europe to assert itself on the world stage, saying it is time to start acting like a "power". In the face of growing threats from China, Russia and now the US, he told a group of European newspapers that the continent faced a "wake-up call". "Are we ready to become a power? This is the question in the field of economy and finance, in defence and security, and in our democratic systems. "In another era we might have said it is the moment to 'assume our majority'," he said ahead of an EU summit in Brussels later this week. Macron repeated his call for EU-wide mutualised loans in order to raise hundreds of billions of euros needed for industrial investment. "The time has come to launch a shared debt capacity to fund our future expense - eurobonds for the future. We need big European programmes to finance the best projects," he said. Similar calls in the past have met scepticism from...

China is quietly accelerating its pullback from U.S. Treasuries, pushing state-linked banks to slash exposure amid rising volatility and geopolitical risk. The shift, paired with aggressive gold accumulation, adds weight to de-dollarization trends and strengthens Bitcoin’s appeal as a neutral hedge. Crypto markets see the move less as a short-term shock and more as a long-term tailwind in a world drifting toward multipolar finance. China’s de-dollarization push  is gaining momentum in early 2026. Reports of faster U.S. Treasury sales by state-linked Chinese banks, alongside a renewed pivot toward gold, the yuan (renminbi), and alternative financial systems, suggest Beijing is becoming increasingly cautious about how much of its financial future remains tied to the U.S. dollar. The move has already rippled through global markets. U.S. Treasury prices slipped, yields climbed, and the benchmark 10-year yield rose toward the 4.24–4.25% range shortly after the news surfaced....

The United States and Armenia have struck an agreement on civil nuclear cooperation, amid a push by Washington to strengthen ties with the West Asian country that was once a close ally of Moscow. Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and US Vice President JD ⁠Vance, who is on a two-day visit to the country, signed the multibillion-dollar nuclear energy deal on Monday. The deal, known as a 123 Agreement, sees the US entering a sector previously dominated by Russia, which had supplied the technology for the only nuclear power plant in the republic. “This agreement will open a new chapter in the deepening energy partnership between Armenia and the United States,” Pashinyan said at a joint news conference with Vance. Vance said the agreement, which allows the US to legally license nuclear technology and equipment to other countries, would enable up to $5bn in initial US exports to Armenia, plus an additional $4bn in longer-term fuel and maintenance contracts. The deal related...

NEW YORK, Feb 9 (Reuters) - Oil prices settled more than 1% higher on Monday after the U.S. Department of Transportation issued an advisory to U.S.-flagged vessels to stay as far as possible from Iranian territory while passing through the Strait of Hormuz and Gulf of Oman. Brent crude oil futures settled up 99 cents, or 1.5%, at $69.04 a barrel. U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude rose 81 cents, or 1.3%, to settle at $64.36. The U.S. DOT's Maritime Administration on Monday noted that vessels going through the Strait of Hormuz and Gulf of Oman have historically faced the risk of being boarded by Iranian forces, including as recently as February 3. The agency advised U.S.-flagged ships  to stay close to Oman while eastbound in the Strait of Hormuz. The move renewed concerns that tensions between the U.S. and Iran could lead to oil supply disruptions. About a fifth of the oil consumed globally passes through the Strait of Hormuz between Oman and Iran. "This week's...

KYIV, Feb 8 (Reuters) - Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Sunday that he was imposing sanctions on some foreign manufacturers of components for Russian drones and missiles used against Ukraine. "Producing this weaponry would be impossible without critical foreign components, which the Russians continue to obtain by circumventing sanctions," Zelenskiy said on X. We are introducing new sanctions precisely against such companies – component suppliers, as well as missile and drone manufacturers. I have signed the relevant decisions." According to two decrees published by the Ukrainian presidency, targets of the sanctions include several Chinese companies as well as companies from the former Soviet Union, the United Arab Emirates and Panama. Despite negotiations to end  the four-year war , Russia has sharply increased the scale and number of missile and drone strikes on Ukraine in recent months, focusing its attacks on the energy and logistics se...

Bad Bunny's Super Bowl half-time show was one big love letter to his native Puerto Rico ,  culminating in a message of pride in his home and the Americas, and an appeal for unity with the US. The 14-minute set included guest performances from Lady Gaga and Ricky Martin, along with cameos from the likes of Pedro Pascal, Cardi B, Karol G and Jessica Alba, who could be seen dancing on the porch of his famous casita, a staple of his shows designed to look like a traditional Puerto Rican home. The 31-year-old, who was the world's most-played artist in 2025 according to Spotify , made history by becoming the first musician to perform entirely in Spanish at a Super Bowl, which is normally the most-watched event on US TV. He did choose to say one line in English, "God bless America", before listing nations of Central, South and North America as dancers carried their flags. Behind them, a billboard message read "The only thing more powerful than hate is love...