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Poland prime minister floats migration referendum with grim video

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 21:02:42 GMT

Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki proposed holding a referendum asking citizens whether they support the arrival of “thousands of illegal migrants coming from the Middle East and Africa” under the European Union’s relocation policy.In a video posted on social networks on Sunday, Morawiecki floated the idea of holding a poll, to be conducted along with the parliamentary election scheduled for October 15. Morawiecki’s ruling Law and Justice Party is well-known for its extremely restrictive position on immigration from Muslim and African countries — while being accepting of refugees from European countries such as Ukraine. Morawiecki’s video paints a grim scenario in case more migrants were allowed into Poland, showing images of burning cars, street violence and a black man licking a knife. The full question Morawiecki said Poles should answer in the proposed referendum is: “Do you support the admission of thousands of illegal immigrants from the Middle E...

Russia fires warning shots at cargo ship in Black Sea

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 21:02:42 GMT

A Russian warship fired warning shots at a merchant ship moving across the southwestern Black Sea on Sunday, according to the Ministry of Defense in Moscow.Around 6:40 a.m. Moscow time on Sunday, the Russian patrol boat Vasily Bykov fired a warning with “automatic small arms” on the Palau-flagged cargo vessel Sukru Okan due to the ship’s failure to reply to a request to carry out an inspection, according to a statement published on ministry’s website. The ministry said that the ship was heading toward the port of Izmail in Ukraine. The ship stopped and allowed for a Russian “inspection team” to board and carry out checks, before proceeding to its destination, the ministry said. According to shipping data platform Vessel Finder, the Sukru Okan is currently en route for the Romanian port of Sulina.The incident comes weeks after Russia pulled out of the U.N.-backed grain deal that allowed Ukraine to export wheat and other produce via the Black Sea. S...

Don’t expect quick fixes in ‘red-teaming’ of AI models. Security was an afterthought

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 21:02:42 GMT

BOSTON (AP) — White House officials concerned by AI chatbots’ potential for societal harm and the Silicon Valley powerhouses rushing them to market are heavily invested in a three-day competition ending Sunday at the DefCon hacker convention in Las Vegas.Some 3,500 competitors have tapped on laptops seeking to expose flaws in eight leading large-language models representative of technology’s next big thing. But don’t expect quick results from this first-ever independent “red-teaming” of multiple models.Findings won’t be made public until about February. And even then, fixing flaws in these digital constructs — whose inner workings are neither wholly trustworthy nor fully fathomed even by their creators — will take time and millions of dollars.Current AI models are simply too unwieldy, brittle and malleable, academic and corporate research shows. Security was an afterthought in their training as data scientists amassed breathtaki...

San Diego man charged for obtaining $4M in alleged COVID loan fraud

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 21:02:42 GMT

SAN DIEGO -- A San Diego man accused of defrauding investors in his companies now faces additional charges after he allegedly obtained $4 million in COVID-related loans illegally, U.S. Attorney Andrew Haden's office announced.Denny Bhakta, 41, was arraigned in federal court on Friday for the new charges relating to Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loan fraud. Bhakta pleaded not guilty to the charges, according to court documents.According to the Haden's office, Bhakta was first indicted in Dec. 2021 for allegedly running a fraud scheme through companies he managed that took $28 million from investors since 2016, including Fusion Hotel Management, LLC and Fusion Hospitality Corporation. California man linked to fourth ‘sex worker’ death in Tijuana, prosecutor says Bhakta allegedly told investors that Fusion routinely acquired discounted blocks of hotel rooms from Hilton, according to the original indictment, which the company then sold to United Airlines at a higher price for a s...

As death toll from Maui wildfire reaches 93, effort to find and identify the dead is just beginning

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 21:02:42 GMT

LAHAINA, Hawaii (AP) — As the death toll from a wildfire that razed a historic Maui town climbed to 93, authorities warned that the effort to find and identify the dead was still in its early stages. The blaze is already the deadliest U.S. wildfire in more than a century.Crews with cadaver dogs have covered just 3% of the search area, Maui Police Chief John Pelletier said Saturday.“We’ve got an area that we have to contain that is at least 5 square miles, and it is full of our loved ones,” he said, noting that the number of dead is likely to grow and “none of us really know the size of it yet.”He spoke as federal emergency workers picked through the ashen moonscape left by the fire that razed the centuries-old town of Lahaina. Teams marked the ruins of homes with a bright orange “X” to indicate an initial search, and “HR” when they found human remains.Pelletier said identifying the dead is challenging because “we pick up the remains and they fall apart.” The remains have been ...

Migrants from dozens of boats reach tiny Italian isles; charity ship rescues hundreds of people

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 21:02:42 GMT

ROME (AP) — Migrants who set out in dozens of flimsy boats launched by smugglers on Tunisian shores have disembarked on three tiny Italian islands in a span of two days, officials said. Separately, a charity vessel carried out 15 rescue operations and the Italian Coast Guard on Sunday recovered a body off the western coast of Sicily from a shipwreck.Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni has repeatedly encouraged Tunisia to put an end to the near daily launching of multiple vessels from its ports. But in the last 10 days there has been a spate of boats capsized, shipwrecked or otherwise in distress. Tens of thousands of migrants have set out this year from northern African shores to try reach Europe. Last week, a merchant ship took aboard four survivors who were adrift in a smugglers’ engineless boat, They recounted how they had been tossed into the sea when towering waves knocked over their vessel and that 41 fellow passengers didn’t survive, a tragedy Pope Francis spoke of whe...

Younger Canadians favour changing ‘O Canada’ lyrics: poll

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 21:02:42 GMT

A new poll finds younger Canadians are in favour of additional changes to the lyrics to “O Canada”.The Research Co. poll shows 55 per cent of English-speaking Canadians between the ages of 18 and 34 agree with changing the first line of the national anthem from “Our home and native land” to “Our home on native land” while only 28 per cent of those over the age of 55 would approve of the change. Overall, only 41 per cent would approve of the change while 44 per cent disagree with the proposed modification of the lyrics. Last month, market research firm Leger found 33 per cent of those polled supported changing the anthem, with 48 per cent opposed. Again, support for the change was higher among younger Canadians (42 per cent).That poll was in response to a proposed resolution put forward by Mississauga Mayor Bonnie Crombie that would see the lyric changed to “O Canada! Our home on native land.” Juno-winning R&B singer Jully Black sparked the de...

Economists expect rise in inflation as price-growth fight enters new phase

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 21:02:42 GMT

OTTAWA — Forecasters anticipate this week’s consumer price index report to show inflation rose last month, signalling a reversal in progress after a year of steady declines in inflation. Canada’s annual inflation rate fell back to the country’s target range in June for the first time since March 2021, tumbling to 2.8 per cent.But economists expected the victory against high inflation to be short-lived, as underlying price pressures suggest it will take some time for inflation to return to the two per cent target.“I think (the report) is going to be a bit of a dash of reality for everyone, including the Bank of Canada, that basically the easy phase is over and now the hard work begins,” said Douglas Porter, BMO’s chief economist.Both BMO and CIBC expect inflation to come in at 3.1 per cent in July, largely due to higher gasoline prices.The U.S. experienced a similar uptick in inflation last month, as its annual rate rose to 3.2 per cent, up from 3....

‘The saving grace for agriculture’: Farmers look to irrigation amid climate woes

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 21:02:42 GMT

CALGARY — Sean Stanford’s wheat farm just south of Lethbridge, Alta. falls within the far left corner of Palliser’s Triangle — an expanse of prairie grassland encompassingmuch of southeast Alberta, a swath of southern Saskatchewan, and the southwest corner of Manitoba.The area is named for explorer Capt. John Palliser, who in 1857, famously declared the entire region a wasteland — so hot and arid that no crops would ever grow. More than 160 years later, with parts of the prairie provinces suffering through another summer of drought conditions, Stanford’s farm is certainly dry.“I think we’ve had three inches of rain since we started seeding. It’s been pretty dismal, honestly,” he said in an interview in July.But Stanford is growing crops, thanks to a series of small sprinklers, attached to a large pipe and powered by an electric motor that disperse water from a nearby irrigation canal over some of his fields.“Hopefully this fall I’m going to ...

What is the difference between 'sell by' and 'best-by' dates on food?

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 21:02:42 GMT

(WHTM) – Grocery stores package foods in many different ways, but they also have many ways to indicate when foods may be past their prime. While some say "use by" a specific date, others say "sell by" the posted date. But what is the difference?According to the University of Connecticut (UConn), food dating is not required by federal law. The only exception to this is infant formula and some baby food. For all other foods, except for dairy products in some states, dating is up to the manufacturer. Stores are also not legally obligated to remove outdated products from their shelves, UConn reports. This means that consumers should always check the packaging to make sure what they are buying is the freshest. Dunkin’ is releasing a line of spiked coffee and tea There are a few terms that consumers should be aware of when it comes to food dating, some of which can be confusing. Here are some common terms you may see while shopping for food. Expiration date: Food should be thrown awa...