Author: News Desk

London, UK: UK regulators have granted permission to proceed with the controversial Rosebank field development in the North Sea. Situated 80 miles west of Shetland, Rosebank is the UK’s largest untapped oil field, holding an estimated 500 million barrels of oil. Owners Equinor and Ithaca Energy have secured approval for development and production, following their reassurances regarding environmental concerns. The plan has been widely criticised for its impact on climate change. In the past month, 50 MPs and peers from various parties expressed worry that the oil field might generate 200 million metric tonnes of carbon dioxide. They wrote a…

United States: The United States space agency NASA has stated that scientists found “black dust and debris” from the space capsule that recently returned to Earth. The OSIRIS-REx science canister landed on Earth with the largest asteroid sample ever brought back from space. NASA announced that researchers discovered “dust and debris on the avionics deck of the science canister when the initial lid was removed today.” The space agency did not specify whether the materials discovered definitely belonged to the asteroid. NASA said on social media that “scientists gasped as the lid was lifted from the OSIRIS-REx asteroid sample return…

United States: A New York judge has ruled that Mr. Donald Trump consistently provided false information about his wealth to banks and insurers, exaggerating it by hundreds of millions of dollars. This ruling settles the main allegation brought forward by New York’s attorney general Ms. Letitia James in her civil case against the former US President. “The documents here clearly contain fraudulent valuations that defendants used in business,” the judge wrote. An attorney representing Mr. Trump criticised the judge’s decision as “an unfair judgment.” Last September, Attorney General Ms. James filed a lawsuit against Mr. Trump. It was alleged that…

Canada: Canada’s Parliament Speaker Mr. Anthony Rota has resigned following a controversy over honouring a man who served in Nazi World War II. Mr. Rota invited Mr. Yaroslav Hunka and recognised the 98-year-old as a “Ukrainian hero” during Ukrainian President Mr. Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s visit to a parliamentary session of the House of Commons. The Canadian Speaker commented that he was resigning “with a heavy heart” while addressing lawmakers in Ottawa. “This House is above any of us. Therefore, I must step down as your speaker,” Mr. Rota added. Mr. Hunka received standing ovations in the House of Commons, including from…

Canada: Canadian Sikhs have protested outside the Indian High Commission in Ottawa. It comes after Canadian Prime Minister Mr. Justin Trudeau said that there may be a connection between New Delhi and the killing of a Sikh separatist advocate in British Columbia. A week ago, Mr. Trudeau stated in parliament that Canadian intelligence agencies were actively investigating credible claims linking agents from New Delhi to the shooting of Canadian citizen Mr. Hardeep Singh Nijjar in June 2023. Approximately 100 protesters burned an Indian flag and hit a cardboard cutout of Indian Prime Minister Mr. Narendra Modi with a shoe. Additionally,…

United Kingdom: South Korean President Mr. Yoon Suk Yeol will visit the United Kingdom in November after receiving an invitation from King Charles III. The King and Queen Camilla will welcome the South Korean President and his wife Ms. Kim Keon Hee at Buckingham Palace. It will be the second incoming state visit during the King’s reign, following South Africa’s President Mr. Cyril Ramaphosa in November 2022. The King and Queen have just returned from a three-day state visit to France. The details of Mr. Yoon’s UK state visit have not been released. However, the trip will most probably follow…

Thailand: A Thai court has jailed one of the top figures in the kingdom’s youth-led pro-democracy protest movement for four years on royal insult charges. Thailand has extremely strict laws against defaming the royal family, particularly King Maha Vajiralongkorn and his close relatives. Critics argue that these laws have been used to silence opposition and suppress criticism. Mr. Anon Numpa, a 39-year-old activist and human rights lawyer, was found guilty in Bangkok Criminal Court for a speech he delivered during the 2020 protests. The protests attracted tens of thousands of people, some demanding significant changes to the monarchy and the…

United States: A new survey from the US National Center for Health Statistics has found that ‘long COVID’ may have affected almost 962,000 children and 17.9 million adults. According to the analysis, 1.3 percent of children and 6.9 percent of adults had ever had long COVID in 2022. Only 0.5 percent of children and 3.4 percent of adults said they had long COVID at the time of the survey. The data for the latest study comes from the National Health Interview Survey, a nationally representative household survey of the US civilian noninstitutionalized population that has been done continuously throughout 2022.…

Antarctica: The US data center has reportedly suggested that the sea ice around Antarctica has likely reached the lowest annual maximum amount of sea ice around the continent. The US National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) stated that Antarctic sea ice reached its maximum size in September this year, measuring 16.96 million square kilometers, as the southern hemisphere transitioned into spring. The ice pack usually reaches its biggest size in the colder winter months, so it’s likely that the measurement will be this year’s maximum. “This is the lowest sea ice maximum in the 1979–2023 sea ice record by…

South Korea: South Korea has welcomed senior diplomats from China and Japan for a trilateral meeting. The move is widely considered an attempt to ease China’s concerns about Seoul and Tokyo’s security ties with the United States as well as restart a long-suspended trilateral leaders’ summit. South Korea has been trying to deepen ties with the US and Japan amid North Korea’s regular tests of banned weapons and closer relationships with countries such as Russia. In August 2023, South Korea, Japan, and the US hailed a “new milestone” in cooperation at a historic summit in Washington, DC. The close allies…