Author: Elizabeth Jenrola Oso

Melania Trump has demanded that Hunter Biden retract comments linking her to the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, threatening legal action if he fails to do so. Biden, the son of former US President Joe Biden, claimed in an interview earlier this month that Epstein had introduced the  First Lady to Donald Trump. In a letter to Biden, Melania Trump’s lawyer, Alejandro Brito, described the remarks as false, defamatory and “extremely salacious”. He said the comments had been widely circulated on social media and reported internationally, causing her “overwhelming financial and reputational harm”. The disputed statements were made during a…

Donald Trump is moving to relax environmental regulations for private space companies, signing an executive order on Wednesday aimed at accelerating the number of rocket launches. The order, titled Enabling competition in the commercial space industry, declares it “imperative” to national security that the private rocket industry increase launches “substantially” by 2030. Under the measure, companies could be allowed to bypass environmental reviews currently required under the US National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). At present, private space firms must obtain launch permits from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), a process that includes an environmental review under NEPA. Sean Duffy, the…

Lithuanian schoolchildren will be taught how to build and operate drones under a new national programme aimed at strengthening the Baltic state’s resilience against potential future threats from Russia. In a joint initiative announced on Tuesday by the defence and education ministries, more than 22,000 people, including 7,000 children, will learn drone skills as part of a wider effort to “expand civil resistance training”. The scheme will be tailored to different age groups. Pupils aged eight to ten will learn to construct and pilot basic unmanned aerospace vehicles, while secondary school students will be trained in designing and manufacturing drone…

Authorities in Alaska’s capital, Juneau, are urging residents to evacuate as record floodwaters are expected to surge downstream from a basin dammed by the Mendenhall Glacier. Officials warn the event, driven by climate change and glacial retreat, could be the most severe on record. The annual summer flooding, known as a glacial lake outburst flood (GLOF), occurs when water trapped by the glacier’s ice dam escapes. This year’s event is fuelled by a combination of rainfall and snowmelt, threatening large parts of the city. The Mendenhall River is forecast to crest at over 16ft on Wednesday morning, according to the…

Elon Musk has threatened to sue Apple on behalf of his artificial intelligence start-up, xAI, accusing the iPhone maker of favouring OpenAI and breaching antitrust regulations in the way it manages rankings in its App Store. The remarks prompted a barbed response from Sam Altman, the OpenAI chief executive, sparking a public spat between the two former business partners on X. “Apple is behaving in a manner that makes it impossible for any AI company besides OpenAI to reach number one in the App Store, which is an unequivocal antitrust violation. xAI will take immediate legal action,” Musk posted on…

Stricter US border controls are discouraging European tourists from visiting the country, according to Europe’s largest package holiday operator. Tui’s chief executive, Sebastian Ebel, said there had been a “significant decline” in travel to the United States, citing “the atmosphere, what you hear from border control” among the reasons for the drop. He noted that many European travellers were instead choosing Canada or other long-haul destinations such as Africa and Asia. The comments follow multiple reports of foreign nationals, including Europeans with valid US visas, facing interrogation, detention and deportation. Recent incidents have involved a British tourist, three Germans, a…

Football superstar Cristiano Ronaldo has proposed to his long-term partner, Georgina Rodríguez, following nearly ten years together. Rodríguez, 31, revealed the engagement on Instagram, sharing a photograph of an enormous diamond ring alongside a caption in Spanish that read: “Yes I do. In this and in all my lives.” Ronaldo, the most-followed person on the platform, has yet to make a public statement. The couple first met in 2016 at a Gucci store in Madrid, where Rodríguez was working at the time, while the Portuguese captian was playing for Real Madrid. Since then, they have built a family together, raising…

The Spanish authorities confirmed the arrival of the seven children, marking the latest in a growing wave of attempts by migrants to enter Ceuta.

Nigeria is one of more than 60 countries facing increased tariffs after US President Donald Trump launched a reciprocal-tariff programme targeting individual products and countries with varying rates.

President Donald Trump has once again delayed the implementation of sweeping tariffs on China, signing an executive order on Monday to extend the deadline for higher tariffs until 10 November. The announcement came just hours before the existing agreement between the world’s two largest economies was set to expire. The move extends a temporary truce between the two nations, which had been due to end on Monday. The Chinese commerce ministry later confirmed that China would suspend additional tariffs on US goods for another 90 days, maintaining its 10% tariffs on US products for the time being. The statement from…