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Category: Europe

  • MIL-OSI Global: How the struggles of the UK hospitality sector could hit the rest of the economy

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Zoe Adjey, Senior Lecturer in Hospitality and Events, University of East London

    Across the UK, Mother’s Day represented a vital revenue opportunity for the hospitality sector. Bars, restaurants, cafés and pubs would have anticipated a boost courtesy of family groups – and some spring-like weather. Sadly though, due to some harsh financial realities including higher tax and wage bills coming into force now, many of these establishments may not survive to serve customers next Mother’s Day.

    The budget has introduced measures that are projected to directly increase the average hospitality wage bill by up to 8.5% thanks to increases in the minimum wage and employer national insurance contributions.

    The UK’s most recent GDP figures showed the country’s economy shrank by 0.1% in January. But behind this small decline there was a more concerning trend. Trade in the hospitality industry fell by 2.4% – the biggest economic contraction among the figures – after it had shown promising growth of 0.9% in December.

    It’s likely that customers saw so-called “awful April” on the horizon – bringing rises in a range of utility and consumer costs – and were beginning to curb their spending. But costs are rising for venues too. Many of those bars, cafés, restaurants and hotels that remain open will have to increase prices and cut opening hours to make the numbers add up.

    Behind each closed pub or empty restaurant lies a story that goes far beyond its four walls. I’ve worked in the sector since my teenage years – from family-run establishments on the Northern Irish coast to venues in London and overseas – and I’ve seen firsthand how business closures affect people. Now, as a lecturer in hospitality, I can see what support this unique sector needs to weather the storm.

    I have seen small seaside cafes where owners knew every customer by name, providing essential social connections for elderly visitors who may not have had another social interaction that day. When these cafes closed, the community bonds were severed overnight.

    Every shuttered hotel or bar means people losing their livelihoods, perhaps mothers working part-time to balance employment and childcare or students funding their education. The impact of these closures is immediate and profound, and extends throughout the supply chain.

    They affect the dairy farmer who supplied the milk, the baker who made fresh pastries each morning, and the technician who serviced the coffee machines. This interconnected web generated £121 billion in economic activity in 2022 across the UK.

    Weddings and wakes

    Pubs and cafes are more than just businesses. Often, they’re the beating hearts of communities. These are the spaces where neighbours stop to chat, where chance encounters bloom into lifelong friendships and romances, and where people come together for weddings and wakes. When the shutters come down, it represents a tear in the community fabric and threatens the cohesion of neighbourhoods.

    As the gathering places where communities come together, pubs and cafes simultaneously create livelihoods that support those same communities. Hospitality in the UK employs an extraordinary 3.5 million people directly (and another three million indirectly through supply chains and support industries). This makes it the UK’s third largest employer, behind only retail and healthcare.

    This dual role, as both social hub and major employer, makes these establishments uniquely valuable.

    The stark GDP figures for hospitality at the start of 2025 expose a concerning shift in consumer habits, with fewer people choosing to book a table in a restaurant, instead making do with buying in groceries for a meal at home. This harks back to the times of COVID lockdowns. Even people who still visit hospitality venues are spending less per visit, compounding the revenue challenges.

    When a family chooses to eat at home rather than visit their local restaurant, the impact extends far beyond that empty table. Farmers, delivery drivers, kitchen manufacturers and cleaning services (to name just some) all feel the pinch.

    For the small businesses in the hospitality supply chain – many of which derive more than 80% of their income from the sector – this spending shift is an existential threat. Historically, such changes in consumer behaviour have been early indicators of broader economic downturns, making this pattern particularly worrying.

    A VAT reduction offers a compelling solution for UK hospitality business. European countries like Italy and France charge 10% on “food for immediate consumption”, while in Greece it’s 13%. These are far below the UK’s 20%. A change along these lines could protect customers against price rises, improve business cash flow, and offset the wage and NI contribution increases.

    And there is precedent for this. During the 2008 recession, Chancellor Alistair Darling cut VAT from 17.5% to 15% for 13 months as part of a stimulus. The following year’s budget reported “positive early signs” of lower prices supporting consumer spending.

    But right now, this combination of rising costs and reduced consumer spending creates a perfect storm for an industry that has traditionally underpinned economic recoveries. With millions of people relying on hospitality for their livelihoods, this trajectory of decline must be corrected – or there will be profound implications for the wider pattern of economic growth across the UK.

    Zoe Adjey does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. How the struggles of the UK hospitality sector could hit the rest of the economy – https://theconversation.com/how-the-struggles-of-the-uk-hospitality-sector-could-hit-the-rest-of-the-economy-253507

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Why Donald Trump’s decision to slash USAID is hurting American soft power and making the world less safe

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Chase Johnson, PhD Candidate, University of Warwick

    The Trump administration’s foreign policy has raised alarms. It seems to have shifted America away from it traditional Nato allies, favouring instead a closer relationship with Russia. There has also been talk of plans to control Greenland, the Panama Canal – possibly even Canada. This has caused sleepless nights for political leaders, especially in Europe.

    However, in the developing world, the biggest concern is the US government’s suspension of development aid. For people in these regions, access to clean water, seeds for crops and vaccines is a matter of life or death.

    The suspension is presently the subject of a battle in the US Supreme Court, but at the end of February, the administration said it planned to cut 90% of all overseas aid contracts. With a single stroke of President Trump’s Sharpie pen, this has struck out US$60 billion (£39 billion) of US aid assistance, globally. Internal projections by the US Agency for International Development (USAID), published by the New York Times at the beginning of March, forecast dire consequences, including a massive increase in diseases such as malaria and polio as well as a rise in cases of malnutrition of up to a million children.

    USAID was founded in 1961 under John F. Kennedy’s administration. It operated with an annual budget of about US$58 billion – orders of magnitude larger than any other country’s development portfolio. It maintains a staff of diplomats, subject experts, and also employs local nationals around the world. It is a critical component of US soft power and works in close proximity to the country’s national security interests.

    USAID’s absence will be felt around the world. Perhaps the most consequential effect lies with the freezing of American food aid. Experts have already predicted that without this lifeline, Sudan could face a famine to compound the effects of the civil war that has raged there. The consequences of this will be very public, producing heartbreaking headlines and images.

    But there is another side to this that the Trump administration seems to be overlooking. USAID is one of the largest single customers of American farm products that constitute the country’s food aid packages – 1 million metric tonnes in 2024 alone.

    One of the most misunderstood concepts of foreign aid is the fact that large portions of its budget are spent domestically. A report may say that billions of dollars of food aid were given by the US to Sudan – but much of that represents payments to American farmers who are growing the food that is then donated to starving people – not just in Sudan, either.

    America’s farmers already exist on very tight margins, so an unexpected loss in revenue such as this, is likely to be a serious blow to them as well. It’s just one example of the effect this decision will have both at home and abroad.

    Pulling away the safety net

    Without USAID the world is less safe. There is a large body of research on how development assistance is a critical component of an effective national security strategy. In 2018, the then secretary of defense, Jim Mattis, who was appointed by Trump, said in an interview that his message to the world is: “Work with our diplomats because you do not want to fight the Department of Defense.”

    To illustrate Mattis’s point, consider the academic work done on the emergence of climate-driven conflicts driven by water and food shortages. One crisis simulation I use in my classrooms puts students in the role of solving a kinetic (shooting) war over water rights in the Horn of Africa. This particular crisis, while used as a game to teach national security, could very easily become a reality. It’s the sort of thing USAID helps to prevent.

    I have had the fortune to serve my country in several capacities. Before I started my doctorate in intelligence and national security, I spent four years working for the US government, both as a development worker and in the diplomatic and defence sectors. While diplomacy, defence and development work might look very different on the surface, I can attest that they are quite similar – and very closely linked.

    They operate in very different spheres – but the goal is ultimately the same: to help partner nations enhance their own safety and prosperity. Without this help they may turn to adversaries such as Russia and China to provide assistance and security. These adversaries then have an opportunity to expand their influence around the world, which can include supporting dictatorships and predatory lending, such as seen in the Chinese belt and road initiative.

    Peacekeeping through soft power

    As a US peace corps volunteer, I called on USAID funding to help the community I was assigned to. In Akhaltsikhe, Georgia I taught English and coordinated youth development programmes.

    The Akhaltsikhe region is one of the poorest in the country – and the school was in a sorry state of affairs. With a USAID grant, we were able to renovate part of the school and create an English language learning centre, which still thrives today, 12 years later. I can say first-hand that this project had a big impact on the image of the US among the Georgian people in my community.

    It should go without saying that the US has a chequered past when it comes to some of its foreign policy interventions. But the country’s wealth and resources offer it the unique position to help grow and enhance western values in parts of the world that deserve the same freedom that developed countries in the west take for granted. In my opinion, that is money well spent.

    Whatever value one might place on the US global footprint does not erase the truth of its existence. America is called upon to uphold democracy, to lift people out of poverty, and to respond to crises no matter where they are. Donald Trump, Elon Musk and his Doge staffers should have paid greater heed to USAID’s motto: “For the American people.”

    Chase Johnson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Why Donald Trump’s decision to slash USAID is hurting American soft power and making the world less safe – https://theconversation.com/why-donald-trumps-decision-to-slash-usaid-is-hurting-american-soft-power-and-making-the-world-less-safe-251062

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: American liberators of Nazi camps got ‘a lifelong vaccine against extremism’ − their wartime experiences are a warning for today

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Sara J. Brenneis, Andrew W. Mellon Professor of Spanish, Amherst College

    A staged recreation of Mauthausen’s liberation, May 6, 1945. Spanish prisoners documented the camp’s actual liberation the day prior using Nazi cameras. National Archives and Records, Cpl. Donald R. Ornitz, US Signal Corps/Administration, III-SC-206395

    When American soldiers liberated the Mauthausen Nazi concentration camp in Austria 80 years ago this May, Spanish prisoners welcomed them with a message of antifascist solidarity.

    The Spaniards hung a banner made from stolen bed sheets over one of Mauthausen’s gates. In English, Spanish and Russian, it read: “The Spanish Antifascists Greet the Liberating Forces.”

    Both American servicemen and Spanish survivors remember the camp’s liberation as a win in their shared fight against extremism, my research on the Spanish prisoners in Mauthausen finds. They all understood the authoritarian governments of Nazi Germany, Italy and Spain as fascist regimes that used extremist views rooted in intolerance and nationalism to persecute millions of people and imperil democracy across Europe.

    World War II, the Holocaust and the horrors of Nazi violence have no modern equivalent. Nevertheless, extremism is now threatening democracy in the United States in recognizable ways.

    As the Trump administration executes summary deportations, works to suppress dissent, fundamentally restructures the federal government and defies judges, experts warn that the country is turning toward authoritarianism.

    As a scholar of the Mauthausen camp, I believe that understanding how American soldiers and Spanish prisoners experienced its liberation offers a valuable lesson on the real and present dangers of extremism.

    ‘We knew then why we had to stop Hitler’

    In 1938, the Nazis established Mauthausen, a forced labor camp in Austria, with an international prisoner population. My research shows that the Nazis murdered 16,000 Jews and 66,000 non-Jewish prisoners at Mauthausen between 1938 and 1945, including 60% of the roughly 7,200 Spaniards imprisoned there.

    The Spanish prisoners were committed antifascist resistors sent there in 1940 and 1941. Known as Republicans or Loyalists, they had fought against Francisco Franco in the Spanish Civil War and Adolf Hitler in World War II.

    The young men with the 11th Armored Division of the U.S. Army who liberated Mauthausen would never forget the moment they discovered the camp. It was May 5, 1945, just days before the war ended in Europe. A platoon led by Staff Sgt. Albert J. Kosiek was repairing bridges in this tucked-away corner of Austria when a Swiss Red Cross delegate alerted them to a large Nazi concentration camp nearby.

    Mauthausen’s international survivors were among the Nazis’ last prisoners to be freed.

    George Sherman was a 19-year-old tank gunner from Brooklyn when his patrol found Mauthausen. He was Jewish and had read about the Nazi camps in Europe in the Army’s newspaper.

    American liberators rolling into the Mauthausen concentration camp on May 5, 1945, as photographed by prisoner Francesc Boix. Sgt. Harry Saunders is standing on the left fender.
    Francesc Boix/Courtesy of Collections of the Mauthausen Memorial

    Still, seeing a concentration camp with his own eyes was alarming.

    “The piles of bodies” struck him, he remembered in an oral history recorded for the University of South Florida in 2008. So did “these people walking around like God knows – skeletons and whatnot.”

    Sgt. Harry Saunders, a 23-year-old radio operator from Chicago, also remembered the moment he saw the Mauthausen survivors. They were men and women of all nationalities.

    “The live skeletons, the people that were in the camp, it was indescribable, it was such a shock,” he said in a 2002 interview for the Mauthausen Memorial’s Oral History Collection in Vienna.

    One of the Spanish prisoners at Mauthausen, Francesc Boix, had stolen a camera from the SS in the chaotic moments before the camp’s liberation. Boix photographed Sgt. Saunders rumbling into the concentration camp on an armored car.

    Saunders kept that photograph for the rest of his life. It captured a moment of clarity for him.

    “When we liberated Mauthausen, we really knew then why we had to stop Hitler and why we really went to war,” he said in the interview.

    Frank Hartzell, a technical sergeant with the 11th Armored Division, was 20 when he helped to liberate Mauthausen. He turned 100 this year. We met in mid-March 2025 and discussed his wartime experience.

    “What I saw and experienced appalled me,” Hartzell told me.

    The outrage has stayed with him for 80 years.

    ‘Starved and crippled but alive’

    The American liberators toured the gas chambers and the crematory ovens in Mauthausen.

    Maj. Franklin Lee Clark saw the dead stacked up in “piles like cord wood to the point that they had to bring in bulldozers and make mass graves,” and took photos to document it.

    The Spanish banner hanging on the Mauthausen prison gate, May 1945.
    Franklin Lee Clark/Emory University Archives, Witnesses to the Holocaust Project

    Soldiers from the 11th Armored Division directed locals to bury the men and women murdered by the Nazis. The local Austrians claimed they had not known about their town’s concentration camp. But a farmer who lived nearby had been upset about all the dead bodies visible from her property. She filed a complaint asking the Nazis either to stop “these inhuman deeds” or do them “where one does not see it.”

    The American liberators made sure that the townspeople could no longer look away from the murderous rampage carried out in their backyards.

    While Boix was taking photos of American soldiers during liberation, the soldiers were taking photos of the welcome banner the Spaniards had painted.

    On the back of one snapshot, a Signal Corps soldier typed out his impressions of their message: “I really know what that word (antifascist) means. We liberated these prisoners in the Mauthausen concentration camp near Linz, Austria. They were Poles, Hungarians and Spanish Loyalists (remember the Loyalists?). They had men and women in this camp. Starved and crippled but alive.”

    After Mauthausen was liberated, the freed Loyalists set to work documenting the Nazis’ crimes. Along with his countrymen Joan de Diego, Casimir Climent and others, Spanish survivor Joaquín López Raimundo compiled lists of Mauthausen victims and their Nazi captors. Using the Nazis’ own typewriters, they spent two weeks listing the names and personal details of Spanish victims of Mauthausen and of the SS who had killed them.

    The result was page after page of evidence they handed over to American war crimes investigators and the International Red Cross.

    Boix, meanwhile, gave the Americans hundreds of photo negatives he had rescued from the camp’s photography lab.

    Boix later testified about these images in the war crime trials at Nuremberg and Dachau. He described seeing the Nazis beat, torture and murder their victims in Mauthausen and then photograph the bodies. For 2½ years, Boix stole the photographic evidence of their crimes.

    He “could not keep those negatives because it was so dangerous,” he testified at Dachau, so he “hid them in various places until the liberation.”

    Testimony in the Nuremberg war crime trials. Francesc Boix’s testimony begins at 7:44. (U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy National Archives and Records Administration. Producer: US Signal Corps)

    A lifelong vaccine against extremism

    For the American liberators, their up-close view of the horrors of Mauthausen and their interactions with the Spanish antifascist survivors was a lifelong vaccine against extremism.

    They witnessed how a fascist leader tore the world apart. They saw with their own eyes the death and destruction of political extremism.

    When I interviewed Hartzell, he expressed concern that the United States is going down a dangerous path.

    “The USA today is not the USA I fought and came close to dying for,” Hartzell told me.

    As American Mauthausen liberator Maj. George E. King warned an interviewer in 1980:

    “This is the lesson we have to learn: It could happen here.”

    Sara J. Brenneis does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. American liberators of Nazi camps got ‘a lifelong vaccine against extremism’ − their wartime experiences are a warning for today – https://theconversation.com/american-liberators-of-nazi-camps-got-a-lifelong-vaccine-against-extremism-their-wartime-experiences-are-a-warning-for-today-248813

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: More adults are taking up gymnastics — and reaping the benefits

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Sophie Burton, Senior Lecturer in Sport and Exercise Biomechanics, Cardiff Metropolitan University

    shutterstock Alex Emanuel Koch/Shutterstock

    Gymnastics has long been seen as the domain of children and teenagers, with young athletes flipping and tumbling their way through high-energy routines before retiring in their late teens or early twenties. But in recent years, a surprising shift has emerged – more adults are taking up the sport. Whether for fitness or fun, gymnastics is no longer just for the young.

    What’s the reason for this? And what benefits can adults gain from embracing a sport known for its physical demands?

    The rise in adult gymnastics is more than just a passing fad. Participation numbers have been climbing steadily over the past few years. In the US, for example, the number of adult gymnasts has grown by over 25% in the past five years.

    In the UK, there are more than 400 gymnastics centres offering programmes specifically for over 18s. There are also adult-specific championships, with opportunities to compete in acrobatic, artistic, trampolining and tumbling gymnastics.

    Clubs once focused solely on youth gymnastics programmes are now seeing increased demand for adult classes. Club owners and coaches have noted a swing in their membership demographics, with more adults signing up to refine their skills or simply try something new.

    This is something I have seen first hand. Having competed at gymnastics as a child before retiring in my late teens, I then transitioned into coaching. As a coach, I found myself particularly drawn to adult gymnastics classes, which were starting to grow in popularity. I enjoyed the unique challenges and rewards of coaching adults, as they brought a fresh energy to the gym.

    Several factors may be driving this newfound enthusiasm for gymnastics among adults.

    One reason may be the challenge of learning new skills later in life. Mastering a cartwheel, handstand or somersault as an adult requires coordination, strength and perseverance. Many adults are drawn to gymnastics precisely because it offers a steep learning curve, providing both a physical and mental challenge.

    It’s also an opportunity to revisit childhood passions. For many people, gymnastics may have been a childhood activity they drifted away from. Now, as adults, they’re rediscovering the joy of movement – this time with the benefit of structured training and supportive coaching.

    Social media has played a role in the rise of adult gymnastics too. Platforms such as Instagram and TikTok are filled with stories of adult beginners tackling gymnastics, from learning their first handstand to mastering backflips.

    On the more elite end of the sport, there are numerous examples of gymnasts displaying longevity or of others making comebacks having retired years earlier. For example, Chellsie Memmel, the US 2008 Olympic team silver-medalist and 2005 world all-around champion, announced in 2020 that she was coming out of retirement at the age of 32.

    Meanwhile, the career of 49-year-old Uzbek gymnast Oksana Chusovitina has spanned almost four decades. Chusovitina is the only gymnast ever to compete in eight Olympic Games, and she has also competed at 16 world championships. Last month, she finished fourth in the women’s vault final at the FIG World Cup in Antalya, Turkey.

    Athletes like Memmel and Chusovitina are an inspiration to adults who may have thought they were too old to give gymnastics a go.

    Another major factor is the post-pandemic focus on health. COVID-19 led many to rethink their approach to fitness. Gymnastics, which combines strength, mobility, flexibility and endurance, offers a full-body workout which appeals to people looking to maintain an active lifestyle.

    What are the benefits?

    Physically, gymnastics improves flexibility, mobility, balance, coordination and strength. The controlled movements and stretching involved enhance the body’s range of motion and reduce stiffness.

    Learning to support one’s own body weight in movements such as handstands builds core and upper-body strength, while the emphasis on balance helps prevent falls and injuries. Strengthening muscles and joints through gymnastics can also benefit other sports and daily activities, reducing the likelihood of strains and sprains.

    Beyond the physical benefits, gymnastics offers mental and social advantages. Learning complex movements keeps the brain engaged and improves focus, providing cognitive stimulation. Mastering new skills fosters a sense of achievement and self-belief, while the sense of progress can be highly motivating.

    Many adults may also find that gymnastics provides an excellent outlet for stress relief, allowing them to disconnect from daily pressures and focus on movement. And adult gymnastics classes often create a strong sense of community, where participants can support one another, share goals and celebrate progress together.

    Any challenges?

    Despite its benefits, adult gymnastics does come with challenges. One of the biggest concerns for newcomers is the fear of injury. Gymnastics is a demanding sport and the risk of falls and strains can be a worry. But structured training, proper warm-ups and gradual progression all help to minimise these risks.

    Another common challenge is self-consciousness. Many adults may feel intimidated by the thought of practising alongside younger, more experienced gymnasts. However, the growing availability of adult-only classes has helped make the sport more inclusive and accessible.

    A more practical challenge is the limited availability of suitable classes. While the number of clubs offering adult gymnastics is growing, not all facilities cater to beginners, meaning some may need to travel further to train. Nevertheless, as demand increases, more clubs are expanding their offerings to accommodate adult learners.

    So, if you’ve ever wanted to revisit an old passion or take on a new physical challenge, gymnastics might just be worth a shot. The increasing number of adults taking up the sport shows that age is no barrier to trying something new.

    Sophie Burton does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. More adults are taking up gymnastics — and reaping the benefits – https://theconversation.com/more-adults-are-taking-up-gymnastics-and-reaping-the-benefits-252067

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Schatz: Donald Trump Is Ruining The Economy On Purpose, Everyone Will Pay More For Everything

    US Senate News:

    Source: United States Senator for Hawaii Brian Schatz

    WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Brian Schatz (D-Hawai‘i) spoke out on the Senate floor today after President Donald Trump announced a new tariff plan that will levy the largest tax hike on middle-class families in a generation and force families to pay an average of $5,000 more each year.

    “Donald Trump is ruining the economy on purpose,” said Senator Schatz. “Starting tomorrow, we’ll be paying more for everything – groceries, food, cars, homes, toys, electronics, everything that you buy. This is about the ability for people to pay for college. This is about the ability for people to retire with dignity and comfort. Trillions of dollars of wealth are being demolished. These are everyday people panicked about how much more expensive their next trip to Walmart or Costco will be, or when they’ll lose their job.”

    The full text of Senator Schatz’s remarks can be found below. Video is available here.

    Donald Trump is ruining the economy on purpose. He is ruining the economy on purpose. I’m not sure if there’s ever been an American president, let alone a chief executive of any country that has ruined the economy on purpose. The stock market had its worst day in five years yesterday, and I just checked before I delivered these remarks. Just five minutes ago, 1600 down on the Dow Jones, the S&P down 5 percent, Nasdaq 4 percent, the Russell 5 percent. What does that mean as a practical matter? It means if you spent all your life working and saving and investing, and you are on the edge of retirement, and let’s say you’ve got $312,000 plus your Social Security income, you just lost 30 grand in two days because of Donald Trump. You lost 10 percent of what you earned over a lifetime. Now, for Howard Lutnick and Elon Musk and Donald Trump and everybody that surrounds him at Mar-a-Lago, they can ride this out. They can short it, they can buy crypto. They can do all kinds of wonderful things to make sure that they can ride this out. Regular people cannot ride this out.

    The dollar hit a six-month low. Layoffs have already started. Consumers are cutting back on spending. And by the way, the data is there. But also just talk to anybody. Just talk to anybody about how they feel about spending right now. And the likelihood of a recession went up 20 percent in a day. JPMorgan now says it’s more than 60 percent likely.

    So what is this even for? Why are people so freaked out? Why is the entire world, from friends and partners to adversaries and enemies, scrambling to retaliate against the United States, the indispensable nation? It’s so that Donald Trump can raise trillions of dollars in revenue to pay for the biggest tax cuts for billionaires in the history of the planet.

    Starting tomorrow, we’ll be paying more for everything – groceries, food, cars, homes, toys, electronics, everything that you buy. Estimates have home prices ballooning by almost $20,000 per unit. Cars will cost $6,000 more. An iPhone, 250 bucks more. Clothing prices will go up by roughly 20 percent. Also, what we’re going to be a textile manufacturer? That’s our goal as a country is to make t-shirts and socks?

    Workers will be laid off, but I guess it’ll all be worth it in the end because this is paid for. What does that mean? It means that in their big budget plan, they need to cut taxes for billionaires, but they don’t have enough money to finance that. And so they’re using tariff revenue to balance out the money that they’re going to shovel to a bunch of billionaires.

    Trump is very famous for having few firm, fixed political beliefs. He’s changed his mind about just about everything, but not on tariffs. He’s a self-proclaimed “tariff man.” He’s repeatedly said that the word tariff is the most beautiful word in the English language. And for years, he’s lavished praise on the 20th century tariffs, which, by the way, helped to deepen the Great Depression. So he’s very happy about all of this. Like there should be no mistaking this is what he intends to do. And this is one of the differences between Trump 1.0 and Trump 2.0. He’s doing all the things. He’s actually going through with it. This is not mean tweets and like normal behavior. This is all of the crazy stuff he’s saying is now being effectuated as public policy, as economic policy, as fiscal policy. He’s going through with it. You can no longer be dismissive of these resistance types, these Democrats, these shrill, these partisans, these people who can’t keep their head on straight. These people who just want to punish Donald Trump for saying: “man, that guy is kind of crazy. He’s going to crash the economy.” He’s literally crashing the economy on purpose.

    The idea that other countries will just graciously pay the tariffs is a fantasy. Much like Trump’s claim that Mexico would pay for the wall. In reality, it’s American importers who pay the tariffs, and then they pass it on to consumers, which is exactly what happened the last time Trump tried to do this. Economists who studied the tariffs that Trump imposed during the first term on certain goods from China found that it was consumers. It was you that paid the price. So here’s roughly how it worked this time around. There’s going to be math involved here. If these tariffs are expected to raise $6 trillion, as Trump says, that would mean collecting something like $600 billion every year over the next ten years. Broken out by household people are looking at $5,000 a year in added costs.

    I bet you Donald Trump doesn’t know anyone personally. Maybe he’s met people, but like in terms of the people he hangs out with that he spends time with, that he likes that he works with, he probably doesn’t know anyone for whom $5,000 is an unmanageable, increased cost. But I know a lot of people like that. In fact, a lot of people in my home state are like that.

    They cannot absorb a $5,000 increase in the cost of everything. And that is before you consider the hundreds of thousands of lost jobs and the devastation of small businesses and farmers and others. One small business owner in Iowa put it this way, “Trump’s calling it Liberation Day. Maybe something like Liberation Day liberated from reality.” Farmer in Kansas agreed.

    “These tariffs are just absolutely bad news that caused the prices for everything that we buy to go up and the prices for everything that we sell to go down.” Everything that we buy is more expensive. Everything that we sell is cheaper. Does that sound like a smart economic plan?

    It’s bad news any way you cut it. But even worse, more confusing, more idiotic, more infuriating is when you look at how they arrived at these rates. These are not actually reciprocal tariffs. Reciprocal tariffs being like essentially country X assesses tariffs in the amount of 15 percent so we reciprocate. We do 15 percent back. This is how they did it.

    They used a one size fits all formula to remake the global trading system. They took our trade surplus with any given country. So the way you do it to do reciprocal tariffs is country X says 10 percent, we go back at 10 percent. What they did is say let’s take our trade surplus, which means what we export minus what we import divided by total exports. And then cut it in half. Why they didn’t cut it in a third? Why they didn’t, you know, do some coefficient other than 50 percent?  I don’t know, but it’s purely arbitrary. So we have an $18 billion trade deficit with Indonesia. We import $28 billion worth of goods from them. 17.9 divided by 28 is 64. Divide that by two and you get 34, which is surprise, surprise, exactly the rate that Trump set for Indonesia. Half of the differential between export exports and imports literally makes no sense. Like you’ve got a bunch of economists right, left and center going WTF? I cannot believe this is bad policy. But also it’s like childish, childish math.

    The White House formula is so bonkers at the same economist that pointed that it pointed to as the basis for the rationale immediately were critical: “they pulled two numbers out of thin air that perfectly cancel each other out. This type of reductionist analysis is very troubling and scares me,” said economics professor Anson Soderbery, whose paper the White House cited even their sources are saying, don’t use my name to justify this nonsense.

    Another economist said that the White House had misunderstood his research, which specifically cautioned against excessively high tariff rates like Trump’s. “Making rates higher is a bad idea for the United States. We use supercomputers to find the optimal tariffs. The Trump administration seems to have taken a bit of a shortcut here. Also, our results suggest that the EU should not be tariffs and yet they set high tariffs against them. Finally, our range of optimal tariffs are substantially lower than the ones the administration just announced.” So if you can believe it, we’re in a situation where economists are using supercomputers to find optimal tariff rates. While the president of the United States is using a formula. And I’m not exaggerating that a fifth grader could solve. Now, whether it’s the Signal chat or this formula, this administration’s incompetence is on display every day.

    It’s why we now have tariffs in places like Herd Island and McDonald Island, where there are no living human beings, only penguins. Or, as the New York Times noted, “Trump’s decision to put a 32 percent tariff on Switzerland stunned politicians and business leaders in the alpine country. Switzerland has an open trade policy and recently abolished all industrial tariffs.” It’s not reciprocal. If they’re not tariffing us. For countries like Brazil, where we have a trade surplus, they still slap 10 percent. Israel reduced their tariffs to zero, still got the 10 percent. This is not a case of a bunch of Democrats crying wolf just to warn the Republicans. The markets are speaking. They are terrified. And this isn’t about a bunch of billionaire corporations and their profitability.

    This is about the ability for people to pay for college. This is about the ability for people to retire with dignity and comfort. Trillions of dollars of wealth are being demolished. These are everyday people panicked about how much more expensive their next trip to Walmart or Costco will be, or when they’ll lose their job. People are already stockpiling supplies. Shortly after Trump’s announcement, JPMorgan described the impact of the tariffs over the next few months like this. “On a static basis, today’s announcement would raise just under 400 billion in revenue, or about 1.3 percent of GDP, which would be the largest tax increase since 1968. The resulting hit to purchasing power could take real disposable personal income growth in the second and third quarters into negative territory, and with it, the risk that real consumer spending could also contract in these quarters. This impact alone could take the economy perilously close to slipping into a recession.”

    Now countries are already responding. So it’s not like this is a static situation which can’t get worse because the retaliations are going on. And this idea that all this is just a leverage play, look, there’s 200 countries that we have some sort of trading arrangement with and Donald Trump is very unpopular so asking a leader of a country or a parliament of a country to waive their tariffs at the end, at the end of a economic gun because Trump is bullying them. It’s like not good domestic politics for them. The best domestic politics for them is to stand up to Donald Trump’s bullying. And that’s bad for all of us. We’re not going to wave our way through 194 trading partners.

    China just imposed a 34 percent reciprocal tariff for our 54 percent tariff on Chinese goods. And in a truly bizarre turn of events, we forced our allies and adversaries to try to find ways to work together. Earlier this week, for the first time in years, China, Japan and South Korea discuss possible of working together on free trade as a response to Donald John Trump.

    This is the most shocking image. This red line continuing to go down precipitously, but among the other most shocking images, there’s a picture of high leaders from Korea… first of all, Korea and Japan are in a better place now. But they are, you know, there have been some diplomatic challenges over the decades and the generations, but they’re in a reasonably good place.

    So just to see them shaking hands is a big deal. But to see them shaking hands, literally holding hands with a high official from China to indicate they’re in this together against us. So it is true that Donald Trump is uniting the world. The problem is he’s uniting the world against us.

    Look, there is a. Real objective here that we’ve been working on for the last four, eight years. And whether it’s chips or it’s cars or it’s clean energy, we’ve actually increased the amount of domestic manufacturing in the United States of America with good industrial policy and targeted trade policy. But this is mayhem. This is mayhem. John Kennedy, the current senator from Louisiana, said it exactly right. He said tariffs are like whiskey. A little bit can be refreshing, can be useful too much – I’m paraphrasing – very bad things happen. Very bad things are happening.

    In the time I took to deliver these remarks, probably some number of tens of billions of dollars of additional wealth from working people was just wiped out. And I want to make one final point, and this is the most important point Republicans can and should stop this, with an exception of maybe 3 or 4 members, almost every Republican senator hates tariffs.

    The question is whether they will stand up to Donald Trump, who has taken this decidedly protectionist, anti-market, super harmful direction. But all we need Republicans are in charge of the Senate is for them to exert their constitutionally given authority over the assessing of tariffs. There is bipartisan momentum in that space. But we are not there because what I’m reading and what I’m hearing is they’re willing to give this a couple of months and let me give you a bunch of free advice to my Republican friends.

    If you’re going to stand up to him in two months, do it now.

    Your people are suffering. People are being laid off. People are about, by the way, most of people, most of what is happening in terms of Trump’s plummeting popularity is what they are seeing on their screens. But in the next week or so, it’s not what they’re seeing in their screens. It’s what they’re seeing when they try to buy something.

    It’s what they’re seeing amongst their friends who are being laid off. This is about to get very real, and I advise you against my own political interests, but in the country’s interests, if you’re going to stand up to him in June, my God, do it now. I yield the floor.

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: New guide to research and innovation challenges for climate adaptation released

    Source: United Kingdom – Executive Government & Departments

    News story

    New guide to research and innovation challenges for climate adaptation released

    A new report identifying the research and innovation needed to support the UK to adapt effectively to climate change has been released.

    Image of a bumblebee collecting pollen from a bluebell.

    A new report identifying the research and innovation needed to support the UK to adapt effectively to climate change has been released today.  

    Developed by the Government Office for Science and the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, the Climate Adaptation Research and Innovation Framework (CARIF) outlines the research and innovation needed around climate adaptation. 

    CARIF is designed to make it easier for government, industry, and research communities to work together to tackle the challenges we face around adapting to climate change. The new framework is the first time the UK research needs across government and across sectors have been brought together in one place.   

    Environment Minister Emma Hardy said:

    We are already seeing the impact of climate change and extreme weather on people’s lives, from transport disruption to flooding in people’s homes.  

    This is why, alongside our research into climate adaptation, we are exploring how we can set out stronger objectives to drive action to increase our preparedness for the impacts of climate change up to and beyond the next National Adaptation Programme in 2028.

    Government Chief Scientific Adviser Professor Dame Angela McLean said:

    We need new research to make the UK more resilient to climate change, and innovation to improve how effectively and affordably we ready systems for change. The UK has world-leading science capabilities which we can harness to ensure we are ready for future climate impacts.  

    We have spoken with academia, industry, UK government and the financial sector to produce this first Climate Adaptation Research and Innovation Framework. It aims to drive use of our science capabilities to address the climate adaptation challenge.

    CARIF covers 11 sectors including nature, working land and seas, food security, water supply, energy, telecommunications and ICT, transport, town and cities and community preparedness/response, buildings, health, and business and finance.  

    Read the Climate Adaptation Research and Innovation Framework here.

    Updates to this page

    Published 7 April 2025

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI Russia: Vasilina Yuskovets will meet with students of the State University of Management

    Translartion. Region: Russians Fedetion –

    Source: State University of Management – Official website of the State –

    On April 9, a meeting of students with Russian actress Vasilina Yuskovets will take place at the State University of Management as part of the VI All-Russian Festival of Student Short Films “Kinosfera”.

    Vasilina Yuskovets played the leading role in the successful STS channel project “Ivanovy Ivanovy”, after which she participated in such projects as “Out of the Game”, “IP Pirogova”, “Life on Call”, etc. In 2022, Vasilina received the “Best Actress” award at the Pilot festival for the project “Alice’s Dreams”, which became the only Russian participant in the international festivals Canneserials and Berlinale Series Market Selects.

    At the end of the meeting there will be photo and autograph sessions.

    We are waiting for everyone on April 9 at 15:00 in the PA-215 auditorium.

    Let us recall that last week a meeting with director Alexander Zhigalkin took place at the State University of Management.

    Subscribe to the tg channel “Our State University” Announcement date: 04/9/2025

    Please note: This information is raw content directly from the source of the information. It is exactly what the source states and does not reflect the position of MIL-OSI or its clients.

    MIL OSI Russia News –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: Government and industry to train up ‘clean power army’

    Source: United Kingdom – Executive Government & Departments

    Press release

    Government and industry to train up ‘clean power army’

    Government and industry to train up ‘clean power army’ of apprentice engineers, welders, and technicians.

    • Clean energy sector to create thousands of new apprenticeships as part of Plan for Change
    • Energy Secretary tells industry forum that a clean power army of engineers, welders and technicians will be required to deliver clean power by 2030, and that government will work with industry to build it, with Regional Skills Pilots in Aberdeen, Cheshire, Lincolnshire, and Pembrokeshire
    • Work and Pensions Secretary says the government will “give this generation the tools they need to seize the opportunity that is the clean energy transition”

    Young people will be trained to fill thousands of clean energy jobs and apprenticeships needed to deliver clean power by 2030 as part of the government’s Plan for Change to get Britain working and unlock growth.  

    The Energy Secretary has told industry, unions and trade bodies that the government will work with them to build a clean power army to hit ambitious targets for clean power by 2030 at a forum convened with the Work and Pensions Secretary today (Monday 7 April 2025).  

    The transition to clean power will create thousands of opportunities across the sector, from renewables to upgrading the UK’s grid infrastructure.  

    National Grid alone plans to support around 55,000 more jobs by the end of the decade and SSE Transmission plans are supporting a further 37,000 jobs, 17,500 of which would be in Scotland. Scottish Power’s SP Energy Networks plans to double its transmission workforce to create around 1,400 jobs and support a further 11,000 jobs across the UK – with all 3 plans subject to approvals by the regulator.    

    The government is driving forward with Regional Skills Pilot in the clean energy sector. Aberdeen, Cheshire, Lincolnshire and Pembrokeshire have all been identified as key growth regions for clean energy. Local partners will receive funding to identify the skills support that is needed in their area to deliver clean power by 2030, which will protect households and businesses from unstable fossil fuel markets for good. 

    Funding could go towards new training centres, courses or career advisers – supporting local people into opportunities in industries such as welding, electrical engineering, and construction.    

    The government is wasting no time in investing in good jobs for British industries, including thousands of new, skilled jobs being supported in the North East of England as contracts for the first carbon capture, usage and storage were signed in December, following a £21.7 billion commitment from the government to ensure the UK’s vision for CCUS becomes a reality. The government has also invested £55 million for port of Cromarty, to transform it into a major hub for the UK’s world-leading floating offshore wind industry, creating hundreds of skilled jobs and generating growth.  

    The latest CBI Economics figures show jobs supported by net zero sectors increased by 10% last year, with the average annual wage across the sector at £43,000 – £5,600 higher than the national average.  

    The push to support more clean energy jobs comes as the government delivers the most ambitious reforms of the UK’s energy system in a generation and record investment into homegrown clean energy projects. 

    Energy Secretary Ed Miliband said:  

    The energy sector has always been a source of good, skilled, and unionised jobs for young people across the UK, providing secure, well-paid employment for life.   

    To meet our target to reach clean power by 2030, we need a clean power army of engineers, welders and technicians – giving thousands of young people the opportunity to play a vital role in tackling the climate crisis, increasing our energy security and boosting the economy to deliver our Plan for Change.

    Work and Pensions Secretary Liz Kendall said:    

    With almost a million young people neither earning nor learning it is vital that we give this generation the tools they need to seize the opportunity that is the clean energy transition.  

    Our plan to Get Britian Working will overhaul employment support, giving everyone the tools and skills they need to and build a stronger, more prosperous future for them and their families.

    The government launched its Get Britain Working white paper late last year, outlining the biggest employment reforms in a generation and boost employment including reforming Jobcentres to create a genuinely public employment service so everyone can get personalised skills and employment support, as well as a Youth Guarantee ensuring every young person has the chance to earn or learn. Alongside government work to drive up employment and opportunities, the renewable sector will also continue to turbocharge the economy.  

    The government is working closely with employers to train up Britain’s young people to seize clean energy opportunities. Trade unions will also have an essential role in building the UK’s skilled energy workforce, with the government determined to drive world-class pay, terms, and conditions in the clean energy sector. The government is already driving better access and conditions for unions in the energy sector- since July EDF Renewables UK and Ireland have signed one of the first renewables industry recognition agreements with Prospect, Unite, GMB and UNISON.   

    The government has also launched Skills England and the Office for Clean Energy Jobs to bring together key partners to meet the skills needs of the next decade across all regions.    

    Opportunities are already being created through a number of schemes and initiatives to deliver training and skills for apprentices and workers transitioning from the fossil fuel sector, including innovative schemes such as the:  

    • Skills Passport: This supports oil and gas workers to identify routes into several roles in offshore wind including construction and maintenance
    • Your Apprenticeship app: A new app designed by the government with extensive input from apprentices to provide easier access to essential tools, resources, and support to help apprentices to thrive in their qualification

    Whilst driving up employment and opportunities, the renewable sector will also continue to turbocharge the economy.  

    CBI Economics analysis commissioned by the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit shows that the net zero sector already contributes £83 billion annually to the UK economy, with further investment into projects predicted to grow this even further.  

    Government research has also revealed the extent in which apprenticeships can help drive this growth, with apprentices in England across the economy estimated to create £25 billion of economic growth over their lifetime.  

    Through investment and initiatives, the government will help build the pipeline of skilled workers needed to deliver clean power by 2030, which will unlock £40 billion of investment a year and reindustrialise Britain with thousands of good jobs across the country. This underscores the government’s commitment to deliver a jobs-rich clean energy transition, putting communities and trade unions at the heart of the UK’s clean energy future.    

    Notes to editors

    Skills is a devolved policy area, and therefore the remit of Skills England and the Your Apprenticeship App will only cover England. However, Skills England will assess skills needs across the whole of the UK and DESNZ is working closely with the devolved governments on ensuring we have the skilled workforce for the clean energy transition, including through the Regional Skills Pilots.   

    The RIIO T3 business plans for the UK’s 3 electricity transmission companies are all subject to approval by the energy regulator Ofgem.

    Updates to this page

    Published 7 April 2025

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: Moorways Sports Village set for £327,000 gym expansion

    Source: City of Derby

    The fitness suite at Moorways Sports Village is set to be expanded to more than 200 stations as part of an exciting £327,000 project.

    The centre, run by award-winning operator Everyone Active in partnership with Derby City Council, will increase the size of the gym to cover the majority of the second floor.

    Once completed, Moorways will be home to one of the largest gyms in Everyone Active’s portfolio of more than 230 centres across the country.

    Works are due to begin on Monday, April 21 and are scheduled to be completed by Friday, June 20. The improved gym will feature around 55 more stations, an increase of 38 per cent on the current set-up. It will include:

    • Brand new functional area including sled track
    • Brand new resistance and Hammer Strength plate-loaded machines
    • Booty Builder dual hip thrust bench
    • Brand new recovery area
    • Brand new additional treadmills

    It is not anticipated that the works will cause any disruption, with members able to use all facilities as normal while upgrades are ongoing.

    As part of the project, group fitness facilities will be relocated to the first floor, where the existing meeting rooms are being transformed into a brand-new multi-purpose studio.

    Everyone Active’s general manager, Myles Hickman, said: 

    This fantastic project is hugely exciting news and we cannot wait to show the local community the new and improved gym on their doorstep.

    The upgrades will enable us to accommodate more people, providing a wider range of state-of-the-art equipment which aligns with current fitness trends.

    No matter what your age, interests or ability, the gym at Moorways and our helpful colleagues will enable you to achieve your perfect workout.

    Councillor Ndukwe Onuoha, Derby City Council Cabinet Member for Streetpride, Public Safety and Leisure, said:

    It’s wonderful to see how Moorways Sport Village is thriving. This exciting project to expand the fitness suite will enhance the gym experience for members and allow even more Derby citizens to boost their health and wellbeing.

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI Europe: Switzerland participates on the NATO Science and Technology Board

    Source: Switzerland – Department of Defence, Civil Protection and Sport

    Due to its contributions in the fields of research and technology over the years as part of the Partnership for Peace, Switzerland has been invited by NATO to regularly attend the meetings of the Science and Technology Board (STB) of the NATO Science and Technology Organization (STO) from March 2025 onwards. From 7 to 9 April 2025, Switzerland will be represented by the Federal Office for Defence Procurement armasuisse at the STB meeting in Brussels, where it will present its priorities in the area of research and technology development.

    MIL OSI Europe News –

  • MIL-OSI: Notice of Annual General Meeting in Karolinska Development AB (publ)

    Source: GlobeNewswire (MIL-OSI)

    The shareholders of Karolinska Development AB (publ), reg. no. 556707-5048, (“Karolinska Development” or the “Company”) are invited to the Annual General Meeting, on Thursday May 15, 2025, at 3:00 p.m. (CEST), at Nanna Svartz väg 2, 171 65 Solna, Sweden.

    The Board of Directors has resolved that shareholders shall have the right to exercise their voting rights in advance through postal voting pursuant to item 13 in the articles of association. Therefore, shareholders may choose to exercise their voting rights at the AGM by attending in person, by postal voting or through a proxy.

    Participation in person

    A shareholder who would like to participate at the AGM in person must:

    both be entered in the register of the shareholders maintained by Euroclear Sweden AB by Wednesday May 7, 2025,

    and give notice of his or her intention to participate to the Company no later than Friday May 9, 2025, at the address Karolinska Development, “AGM”, Nanna Svartz väg 6A, 171 65, Solna, Sweden, or through email eva.montgomerie@karolinskadevelopment.com. When giving notice to participate, please provide name, personal identity number or company registration number, telephone number and number of represented shares.

    Participation by postal voting

    Shareholders who wish to participate in the AGM by postal voting must:

    both be registered in the register of shareholders maintained by Euroclear Sweden AB as per Wednesday May 7, 2025,

    and notify their intention to participate by submitting their postal vote in accordance with the instructions below, so that the postal vote is received by Karolinska Development no later than Friday May 9, 2025.

    Shareholders may exercise their voting rights at the AGM by voting in advance through postal voting pursuant to item 13 in the articles of association, referring to Chapter 7, Section 4 a of the Swedish Companies Act.

    For advance voting, a special form must be used. Forms in Swedish and English are available for download on the Company’s website, www.karolinskadevelopment.com.The advance voting form is valid as notification of participation at the AGM.

    The completed advance voting form must be received by the Company no later than Friday May 9, 2025. The completed form shall be sent to Karolinska Development by e-mail to eva.montgomerie@karolinskadevelopment.com or by regular mail to Karolinska Development, “AGM”, Nanna Svartz väg 6A, 171 65, Solna, Sweden. The shareholder may not provide special instructions or conditions in the advance voting form. If so, the vote (i.e. the advance vote in its entirety) is invalid. Further instructions and conditions are provided in the form for advance voting.

    Those who wish to withdraw a submitted postal vote and instead exercise their voting rights by participating in the AGM in person or through a proxy must give notice thereof to the AGM’s secretariat prior to the opening of the AGM.

    Participation by proxy

    If the shareholders are represented by proxy, a written proxy must be issued and submitted to the Company at the above address well in advance of the AGM. The proxy is valid during the period set forth in the proxy, however, at most five years from the issuance. If a proxy is issued by a legal entity, a copy of the legal entity’s registration certificate or similar document evidencing signatory powers must be enclosed. Proxy forms in Swedish and English are available for download on the Company’s website, www.karolinskadevelopment.com.

    Nominee registered shares

    For shareholders who have their shares nominee-registered through a bank or other nominee, the following applies in order to be entitled to participate in the meeting. In addition to giving notice of participation, such shareholder must re-register its shares in its own name so that the shareholder is registered in the share register kept by Euroclear Sweden AB as of the record date Wednesday May 7, 2025. Such re-registration may be temporary (so-called voting rights registration). Shareholders who wish to register their shares in their own names must, in accordance with the respective nominee’s routines, request that the nominee make such registration. Voting rights registration that have been requested by the shareholder at such time that the registration has been completed by the nominee no later than Friday May 9, 2025, will be taken into account in the preparation of the share register.

    Proposal for agenda

    1.    Election of chairman of the meeting
    2.    Preparation and approval of the voting list
    3.    Approval of the agenda
    4.    Election of one or two persons to verify the minutes
    5.    Determination of whether the meeting was duly convened
    6.    Presentation of the annual report and the auditor’s report and the group annual report and the auditor’s group report
    7.    Resolutions regarding
    a)   adoption of the profit and loss statement and the balance sheet, and consolidated profit and loss statement and consolidated balance sheet
    b)   appropriation of the Company’s result according to the adopted balance sheet
    c)   discharge from liability for the directors and the CEO
    8.    Resolution regarding the number of directors and auditors and deputy auditors to be appointed
    9.    Resolution in respect of the fees for the Board of Directors and for the auditors
    10.    Election of chairman of the Board of Directors, directors and auditors and deputy auditors
    11.    Principles for appointing members and instruction for the Nomination Committee
    12.    Resolution on approval of the Board of Directors’ Remuneration Report 2024
    13.    The Board of Directors’ proposal regarding authorization for the Board of Directors to resolve on transfer of own shares
    14.    The Board of Directors’ proposal regarding authorization for the Board of Directors to resolve on new issues of shares
    15.    Closing of the meeting

    Items 1 and 8–11: The Nomination Committee’s proposal regarding chairman at the meeting; number of directors, auditors and deputy auditors to be appointed; fees for the Board of Directors and auditors; election of chairman of the Board of Directors, directors, auditors and deputy auditors and principles for appointing members and instruction for the Nomination Committee

    The Nomination Committee has consisted of Yan Cheng (chairman), appointed by Worldwide International Investments Ltd; Jack Li, appointed by invoX Pharma Ltd; Jan Dworsky, appointed by Swedbank Robur Microcap fond; Hans Wigzell, appointed by Insamlingsstiftelsen för främjande och utveckling av medicinsk forskning vid KI; Peter Markborn, appointed by Styviken Invest AS.

    The Nomination Committee proposes that the Annual General Meeting resolves as follows:

    Lawyer Annika Andersson (Cirio Law Firm) is appointed to chair the Annual General Meeting.

    The number of directors will be five and no deputies will be appointed.

    The number of auditors will be one and no deputy auditor will be appointed.

    The chairman will be paid a fixed amount of SEK 400,000 to be paid out in proportion to board meetings attended. All other directors will be paid a fixed amount of SEK 200,000 to be paid out in proportion to board meetings attended. The fees to the directors remain unchanged compared to previous year.

    The auditors will be paid as per invoice.  

    Re-election of the directors Ben Toogood, Anna Lefevre Skjöldebrand, Philip Duong and Will Zeng, and election of Anders Härfstrand as director for the time until the end of the 2026 Annual General Meeting.

    Re-election of Ben Toogood as new Chairman of the Board of Directors.

    Anders Härfstrand was born 1956. He holds a M.D and Ph.D from the Karolinska Institute. His other appointments include work as founder of Härfstrand Consulting AG, Switzerland, co- founder of P4BIOS, USA and consultant to CIS Biopharma, Switzerland. Anders Härfstrand has many years of experience from the pharmaceutical industry with a global track record of success in building commercial operations, marketing and sales management, and product development. His previous assignments include member of the executive management of Pharmacia, Pfizer-Japan and Serono, CEO for various European biotech companies as well as chairman of the board and board member of public and private companies in the USA and Europe. He has also been a former board member of Karolinska Development. Anders Härfstrand holds no shares in Karolinska Development. He is independent in relation to the Company, its executive management and the Company’s major shareholders.

    The composition of the Board of Directors meets the independence requirement of the Swedish Corporate Governance Code.

    The Nomination Committee proposes that voting shall take place individually.

    Re-election of Ernst & Young Aktiebolag as auditor in accordance with the audit committee’s recommendation, currently with Oskar Wall as auditor in charge, for the time until the end of the 2026 Annual General Meeting. The audit committee has prior to the 2025 Annual General Meeting carried out a procurement process as procurement of audit in accordance with applicable legislation shall take place after the same accounting firm has been auditor for a ten-year period.  

    The Nomination Committee shall have five members. Every year, the five largest owners (voting power, as set forth in the share register kept by Euroclear Sweden AB as of the last banking day in August) shall appoint one member each. The chairman of the Board of Directors shall convene the first meeting. If a shareholder does not exercise its right to appoint a member, the shareholder next in order of voting power, who has not already appointed a member or has a right to appoint a member, shall have the right to appoint a member to the Nominating Committee. The members of the Nomination Committee shall be made public as soon as the members have been appointed, and in no case later than six months prior to the Annual General Meeting. The members shall among themselves appoint the chairman of the committee. If a member resigns or is prevented from pursuing his/her assignment, the shareholder that has appointed such member shall appoint a new member. In the event that the shareholding in the Company is materially changed, before the Nomination Committee has completed its assignment, the Nomination Committee may decide to change the composition of the Nomination Committee, as determined by the Nomination Committee (considering the principles applicable for the appointment of the Nomination Committee). Any change in the composition of the Nomination Committee shall be announced as soon as possible. No fees shall be paid to the members of the Nomination Committee. Out of pocket expenses shall be reimbursed by the Company. The mandate of the committee shall be until the members of the succeeding committee have been announced.

    The Nomination Committee is to make proposals to the Annual General Meeting regarding the election of Chair of the Annual General Meeting, number of board members, Chair of the Board and other board members and remuneration to the board members. The Nomination Committee is also to make proposals regarding the Company’s auditor, remuneration to the Company’s auditor and election of members of the Nomination Committee or principles for the selection of a Nomination Committee. The Nomination Committee shall conduct an annual evaluation of this instruction and when necessary propose to amend it to the Annual General Meeting. The Nomination Committee shall otherwise carry out the tasks that, according to the Swedish Corporate Governance Code, are the responsibility of the Nomination Committee.

    Item 7 b: Appropriation of the Company’s result according to the adopted balance sheet

    The Board of Directors and the CEO propose that the amount at disposal of the Annual General Meeting, in total SEK 1,235,972,877, shall be carried forward.

    Item 12: Resolution on approval of the Board of Directors’ Remuneration Report 2024

    The Board of Directors proposes that the AGM approve the Board of Directors’ remuneration report for 2024 in accordance with Chapter 8, Section 53 a of the Swedish Companies Act.

    Item 13: The Board of Directors’ proposal regarding authorization for the Board of Directors to resolve on transfer of own shares

    The Board of Directors proposes that the Annual General Meeting resolves to authorize the Board of Directors, for the period until the next Annual General Meeting, on one or more occasions, with or without deviation from the shareholders’ preferential rights, to resolve on transfer of all shares of series B held by the Company at any given time. The Company holds 244,285 shares of series B at the time of the publication of this notice. Transfer may take place on Nasdaq Stockholm or otherwise. Transfer on Nasdaq Stockholm shall be made at a price per share within the registered price interval at any given time, being the interval between the highest bid and lowest ask price. Otherwise, transfer shall be made on market terms. Payment for shares shall be made in cash, in kind or by set-off.

    The purpose of the authorization for transferring own shares and the reasons for potential deviation from the shareholders’ preferential rights, is to give the Board of Directors the possibility to adjust the Company’s capital structure, to use repurchased shares as payment for, or financing of, acquisitions or investments in order to create increased value for the shareholders.

    A resolution in accordance with the Board of Directors’ proposal requires support from shareholders with not less than 2/3 of votes cast as well as shares represented at the meeting.

    Item 14: The Board of Directors’ proposal regarding authorization for the Board of Directors to resolve on new issues of shares

    The Board of Directors proposes that the Annual General Meeting resolves to authorize the Board of Directors, for the period until the next Annual General Meeting to resolve, on one or more occasions, with or without deviation from the shareholders’ preferential rights, and for payment in cash, by set-off or in kind, to issue new shares of series B up to a number that, at the time of the first resolution under this authorization, corresponds to twenty (20) per cent of the total share capital; provided however that any such issue must not result in the Company’s share capital exceeding the Company’s maximum allowed share capital as set out in the articles of association.

    A resolution in accordance with the Board of Directors’ proposal requires support from shareholders with not less than 2/3 of votes cast as well as shares represented at the meeting.

    Miscellaneous

    The annual report, auditor’s report, remuneration report and other documents that are to be made available in accordance with the Swedish Companies Act, are available at the Company on Nanna Svartz väg 2, 171 65, Solna, Sweden and at the Company’s website, www.karolinskadevelopment.com, no later than three weeks before the AGM, and will be sent to shareholders who so request and provide their postal address.

    The Board of Directors and the CEO shall, if requested by any shareholder and if the Board of Directors is of the opinion that it can be done without causing material harm to the Company, provide disclosures about conditions that may impact assessment of an item of business on the agenda, about conditions that may impact assessment of the Company’s or a subsidiary’s financial situation, and about the Company’s relationship with another group company.

    As per the date of this notice, there are 270,077,594 shares, representing a total of 293,074,943 votes outstanding in the Company, distributed among 2,555,261 shares of series A (with 25,552,610 votes) and 267,522,333 shares of series B (with 267,522,333 votes). As per the date of this notice, the Company holds 244,285 treasury shares of series B.

    Processing of personal data

    For information on how your personal data is processed in connection to the Annual General Meeting see the privacy policy available on Euroclear Sweden AB’s website: https://www.euroclear.com/dam/ESw/Legal/Privacy-notice-bolagsstammor-engelska.pdf

    Solna in April 2025
    Karolinska Development AB (publ)
    The Board of Directors

    Attachment

    The MIL Network –

  • MIL-OSI: Zero Hash Further Enhances its Leading Position as the Crypto-as-a-service provider for Brokerage Firms

    Source: GlobeNewswire (MIL-OSI)

    NEW YORK, April 07, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Zero Hash, the leading infrastructure for stablecoins and crypto, today announced that it is one of the first in the industry to complete an independent assessment of its infrastructure against the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s Regulation Systems Compliance and Integrity (“Reg SCI”) requirements. While not subject to Reg SCI, Zero Hash has taken the effort to voluntarily confirm that its systems exceed the most stringent capacity, integrity, security, resiliency, and infrastructure standards in financial markets.

    This milestone reinforces Zero Hash’s unrivaled position as the go-to infrastructure provider for the explosion of digital assets adoption among broker-dealers, asset managers, and financial institutions globally. Zero Hash powers many of the leading brokerage and neo-banks including Interactive Brokers, tastytrade, Current and MoneyLion. The rigorous third-party assessment was conducted by Schellman Compliance LLC, which verified that Zero Hash exceeds Reg SCI’s high standards and maintains industry-leading, robust, secure, and resilient systems.

    “Although Zero Hash does not deal in securities, many of our customers are overseen by the SEC. This assessment further demonstrates what sets us apart – our unwavering commitment to providing the most comprehensive, scalable, and secure solutions for our customers and end users,” said Scott Minneman, Chief Information Security Officer at Zero Hash. “We are powering the future of finance. Having Reg SCI verification further secures our position as the partner of choice for the world’s largest financial institutions embracing digital assets.”

    About Zero Hash
    Zero Hash is the leading crypto and stablecoin infrastructure provider that seamlessly connects fiat, crypto, and stablecoins in one platform, enabling a better way to move and transfer money and value globally.

    Through its embeddable infrastructure, start-ups, enterprises, and Fortune 500 companies build a diverse range of use cases, including cross-border payments, commerce, trading, remittance, payroll, tokenization, wallets, and on/off-ramps.

    Zero Hash Holdings is backed by investors, including Point72 Ventures, Bain Capital Ventures, and NYCA.

    Zero Hash Trust Company LLC will be established in North Carolina and hold a non-depository trust charter issued by the North Carolina Commissioner of Banks.

    Zero Hash LLC is a FinCen-registered Money Service Business and a regulated Money Transmitter that can operate in 51 U.S. jurisdictions. Zero Hash LLC and Zero Hash Liquidity Services LLC are licensed to engage in virtual currency business activity by the New York State Department of Financial Services. In Canada, Zero Hash LLC is registered as a Money Service Business with FINTRAC.

    Zero Hash Australia Pty Ltd. is registered with AUSTRAC as a Digital Currency Exchange Provider, with DCE registered provider number DCE100804170-001. Zero Hash Australia Pty Ltd. is registered on the New Zealand register of financial service providers, with Financial Service Provider (FSP) number FSP1004503. Zero Hash Europe B.V. is registered as a Virtual Asset Services Provider (VASP) by the Dutch Central Bank (Relation number: R193684). Zero Hash Europe Sp. Zoo is registered as a VASP by the Tax Administration Chamber of Poland in Katowice (Registration number RDWW – 1212).

    Media Contacts
    Zero Hash
    Shaun O’Keeffe
    (855) 744-7333
    media@zerohash.com 

    The MIL Network –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: Inquiry into the Southport attack begins today

    Source: United Kingdom – Executive Government & Departments

    News story

    Inquiry into the Southport attack begins today

    The Home Secretary announces the first phase of the Southport Inquiry starts today and appoints Rt Hon Sir Adrian Fulford as chair.

    The Home Secretary, Yvette Cooper has announced that the first phase of the Southport Inquiry will start today.

    The Home Secretary previously announced in January 2025 that an inquiry would be launched following the conviction of the perpetrator of the 2024 Southport attack, to examine what went wrong in this horrific case and how services should respond to fixated youth violence.

    Sir Adrian Fulford has been appointed as the chair following consultation with the victims and families of those killed or affected by the attacks and plans to travel to meet them as a first priority.

    This follows the Prime Minister’s commitment to leave no stone unturned in uncovering how this attack happened and to not let any institution of the state deflect from their failure.

    Home Secretary, Yvette Cooper said:

    The brutal murder of three young girls: Bebe, Elsie and Alice in Southport was an unimaginable tragedy – we owe it to their families, and all those affected on that terrible day to quickly understand what went wrong, answer difficult questions and do everything in our power to prevent something like this from happening again.

    The Southport Inquiry will provide insights into any failings that allowed a young man with a previous history of violence, to commit this horrendous attack. 

    Sir Adrian Fulford will bring a wealth of legal and criminal justice expertise to this role, and I am pleased he has agreed to chair the inquiry.

    The inquiry will be statutory. This follows representations made by families and victims of the attack and means the Inquiry has all the necessary legal powers to receive evidence and hear witness testimony effectively.

    It will take place in 2 phases. The first will thoroughly investigate the circumstances surrounding the attack and the events leading up to it. This will include examining an overall timeline of the perpetrator’s history and interactions with various public bodies including criminal justice, education, social care, and healthcare, as well as decision-making and information-sharing by local services and agencies.

    The second is expected to examine the wider issues of children and young people being drawn into extreme violence.

    Sir Adrian Fulford will bring an impartial and extensive legal background, particularly on issues relating to policing and the criminal justice system.

    He is a retired Lord Justice of Appeal and former judge of the International Criminal Court 2003 to 2012. Previously, he was the Vice-President of the Court of Appeal (Criminal Division) in 2019 and was the first Investigatory Powers Commissioner between 2017 to 2019.

    Updates to this page

    Published 7 April 2025

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: Brandywell becomes first Peace Pitch in the League of Ireland

    Source: Northern Ireland – City of Derry

    Brandywell becomes first Peace Pitch in the League of Ireland

    7 April 2025

    The Ryan McBride Brandywell Stadium has become the first ground in the League of Ireland to receive an international designation celebrating peace and reconciliation through football.
    The Peace Field initiative will see the Lone Moor Road stadium twinned with Flanders Peace Field in Mesen, Belgium – the site of the First World War Christmas Truces of 1914 when German, British and Allied soldiers played games of football during a break in fighting.
    The Brandywell has received the designation in recognition of The Life Hack Project in the Rath Mor Centre which aims to support young people to build and develop life skills that foster good relations, build confidence and relations and make them more employable.
    A plaque to commemorate the twinning, stating that all games on the pitch will be played in the spirit of the 1914 Christmas truces, was presented to representatives from The Life Hack Project, Derry City and Strabane District Council and Derry City Football Club before the weekend’s League of Ireland Premier Division home game against Cork City.
    The plaque will be displayed in the stadium and a duplicate will be erected at the Flanders Peace Pitch in Belgium alongside 76 other Peace Fields from six different continents across the world.
    Mayor of Derry and Strabane Council, Cllr Lilian Seenoi Barr praised The Lifehack Project saying: “I am delighted the Ryan McBride Brandywell Stadium has received this international designation which pairs it with one of the most famous sports fields in world history.
    “It is just recognition for the key work The Life Hack Project do to improve the quality of life and employment prospects of our young people.
    “It also serves as a timely reminder of the reconciliatory impact sport can have by bringing people together through a shared passion for play.”
    Richie McRory, Lifehack Project Coordinator added: “Over the last three years young people from the Lifehack Project based in Creggan have engaged on a cross community and cross border basis with young people from a diverse range of backgrounds.
    “We have hosted and attended a number of football events that have encouraged inclusion, reconciliation and participation.

    “Through these events we have developed a very positive relationship with Limestone United and become involved with the International Peace Field Project.

    “We are very proud to receive the Peace Plaque on behalf of Derry City FC from our friends at Limestone UTD.

    “We look forward to continued work and participation in the Peace Field Project.”

    A spokesperson for Derry City Football Club added: “Derry City Football Club is truly honoured that the Ryan McBride Brandywell stadium has become the first in the league of Ireland to receive this international designation.

    “Ironically, the club is currently undertaking a complete review of our underage and Academy structures.

    “We absolutely share the goals of the city’s Lifehack Project and our City Council of supporting and developing the young people of the North West and beyond through sport.

    “We are delighted to associate with the Flanders Peace Field in Mesen, the site of that iconic ‘Christmas Truce’ football game in 1914. 

    “As we also celebrate the opening of the Brandywell’s new North Stand this evening, Derry City FC is fully committed to doing everything we can to support the growth of sport in the region.”

    While the Brandywell is the first League of Ireland stadium to receive Peace Pitch status, Limestone United on the North Belfast interface received the designation in 2023.
    Brian Casey, Limestone United, added: “The club were privileged to present the peace plaque to Derry City with our friends from the Lifehack project who do amazing work with young people from the Creggan area of the city.

    “Lifehack participated in the opening of the Limestone United Peace pitch at Seaview Football grounds, the home of Crusaders FC, so it’s great to see another brilliant club having a Peace Pitch and contributing to building peace in our community.” 
    Ernie Brennan, CEO of the Children’s Football Association added: “The Peace Field Project chimes with the city of human rights, it is all about the essence of play.
    “All children play without prejudice, when Allied and German soldiers stood up to shake hands, exchange gifts and play games on Christmas Day, 1914, the humanitarian act served to remind mankind that childhood is a time we all revert too, for love, peace and happiness.” 
    For more information on the Children’s Football Alliance and the Peace Field Project visit https://www.childrensfootballalliance.com/peace-field-projects/

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: Breastfeeding Friendly Sunderland

    Source: City of Sunderland

    Sunderland venues are signing up to support breastfeeding mothers and their families through the Breastfeeding Friendly Sunderland Pledge.

    Venues across the city are now proudly displaying the Breastfeeding Friendly Sunderland logo after signing up to be friendly and welcoming places for breastfeeding mothers. Cafes, restaurants, leisure centres and more have now joined this pledge, helping mothers feel comfortable and confident to breastfeed their babies when they’re out and about in the city.

    Councillor Kelly Chequer, Deputy Leader and Cabinet Member for Health, Wellbeing and Safer Communities at Sunderland City Council, said: “We’re really excited about rolling out the Breastfeeding Friendly Sunderland Pledge, which is all about creating friendly and welcoming places for breastfeeding mams and families.

    “This is a real step forward in making our city more supportive and welcoming for breastfeeding, one of the most natural things in the world with benefits for baby’s and mother’s health too.”

    “Legally, women can breastfeed in any public space and when you see the Breastfeeding Friendly Sunderland logo, you know that the venue has staff and volunteers who support breastfeeding mothers and that there will be a clean and comfortable place to breastfeed in.

    “We’re delighted that over 30 venues have already signed up to the pledge and we’re looking forward to seeing more signing up in the coming months, making it easier for breastfeeding mothers to get out and about and enjoy everything our city has to offer.”

    Breastfeeding has numerous health benefits for both babies and mothers. It provides essential nutrients, strengthens the baby’s immune system, helps women recover after birth, and can even lower the risk of some cancers. Also, it’s eco-friendly and free.

    Registered venues include Sunderland Museum and Winter Gardens, Creative City Smart Hubs, Family Hubs, University of Sunderland, Everyone Active Centres, Sunderland City Council Registrars, local restaurants, cafes and community venues. Just look for the Breastfeeding Friendly Sunderland logo to find them.

    A full list of all the venues which have signed up, can be found here: Breastfeeding Friendly Sunderland Venues | Links for Life Sunderland

    The owner of Coffee 57 Michael Johnson said: “We are more than happy to support the initiative, and hope we play a part in making it a success.”

    Tamsin Austin, Venue Director at The Fire Station, stated: “As an inclusive venue it’s important to us that we provide a safe and welcoming space for all, which includes mothers who wish to breastfeed their babies. We’re delighted to be part of Breastfeeding Friendly Sunderland to show our support for families in Sunderland and beyond.”

    Venues can find out more and sign up to the pledge here: How does my business / venue get involved? | Links for Life Sunderland

    There’s lots of support to help with breastfeeding in Sunderland.

    For more information contact:

    Health Visiting on 03000031552 or visit: Growing Healthy 0-19 Sunderland | HDFT Childrens Health Service 

    Or download the app here  Download Our App | HDFT Childrens Health Service Start for Life – Together for Children 

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI Russia: Teachers Flock into ‘Digital Flocks’: The Secret Life of Moscow’s ‘Invisible College’ Revealed

    Translartion. Region: Russians Fedetion –

    Source: State University Higher School of Economics – State University Higher School of Economics –

    Thousands of Moscow teachers are forming virtual “digital flocks” and don’t even know it. Educator and researcher Evgeny Patarakin reveals this phenomenon in his new monographs. The book was published by the Moscow State Pedagogical University. The author created it together with students of the course “Building online communities“, which takes place at the base Institute of Education HSE. They found that in the age of digital platforms, educational materials are no longer born in the offices of individuals. Now knowledge emerges thanks to the collective creativity of people who may never meet in person.

    Let’s imagine a football field where the ball is passed from player to player. Every touch is a digital trace, every pass is a connection between people. This is how modern educational platforms work: a document or lesson plan becomes the ball that unites teachers from different schools.

    “We found that 75% of teachers copying each other’s projects form a single community – a giant component,” notes Patarakin, who studied digital traces at the Moscow Electronic School (MES).

    Digital analysis has revealed a surprising picture: teachers who have never met in person form invisible but strong bonds. When a mathematician from Bibirevo downloads a presentation created by a historian from Kuzminki and then refines it, they become part of the same team without even realizing it.

    In science, such communities of experts linked by common interests rather than formal affiliation with an organization are called “invisible colleges.” The term dates back to the 17th century and refers to informal associations of scientists.

    “It’s like a complex, self-organizing system where each participant acts according to their own rules, but together they create something bigger,” Patarakin explains. In his research, he found that teachers in the digital space form “digital flocks” of sorts — groups that act in concert, although their members may not even be aware of each other’s existence.

    To understand the mechanisms of this phenomenon, the researcher developed several virtual “sandboxes” using the programming languages Scratch, Snap! and others. In these models, digital characters, following elementary algorithms, create complex structures that are strikingly reminiscent of real educational communities.

    The researcher built a virtual world with digital teachers and lesson scenarios. It turned out to be something like a computer game, where instead of fantasy heroes there are teachers, and instead of artifacts there are educational materials. In this model, it is possible to configure how accessible the materials are for different teachers: for example, whether they only see scenarios for their subject or can discover the developments of colleagues from other disciplines.

    These computer models have serious practical implications. They help create educational platforms where knowledge is shared more effectively and teachers can find and improve each other’s materials more quickly. In such a world, the collective intelligence of thousands of educators surpasses the capabilities of even the most brilliant individual experts.

    Please note: This information is raw content directly from the source of the information. It is exactly what the source states and does not reflect the position of MIL-OSI or its clients.

    MIL OSI Russia News –

  • MIL-OSI Africa: Africa’s Strategic Diplomacy Fuels Mining Sector Growth

    Source: Africa Press Organisation – English (2) – Report:

    CAPE TOWN, South Africa, April 7, 2025/APO Group/ —

    African nations are leveraging strategic partnerships to attract investment and strengthen their mining sectors. As competition between Western and Eastern powers intensifies over critical minerals, Africa has emerged as a key player in global supply chains, balancing geopolitical interests while maximizing economic benefits. With global markets racing to secure resources for the energy transition and the Fourth Industrial Revolution, the upcoming African Mining Week will facilitate collaboration between African governments and international stakeholders.

    U.S.–DRC Partnership to Unlock Mineral Wealth

    In March 2025, the U.S. State Department reaffirmed (https://apo-opa.co/43JPLr8) its interest in engaging with the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) to unlock its estimated $1.2 trillion in untapped mineral resources. Cooperation between the two countries could yield a transformative impact on the sector, with U.S. financing and technical expertise unlocking the potential of the world’s largest cobalt producer and Africa’s largest copper producer. The U.S. has already played an active role in the financing and development of the Lobito Corridor, facilitating mineral transport and trade between the DRC, Angola, Zambia and international markets.

    EU Expands Mining, Green Energy Investments

    This month, the European Union (EU) pledged €4.7 billion (https://apo-opa.co/42q3265) to South Africa to support raw material value addition, the energy transition, local vaccine manufacturing and green hydrogen production. South Africa, home to the world’s largest deposits of platinum group metals (PGMs), will leverage this funding to enhance PGM production to meet growing demand for electrolysers used in green hydrogen applications. This follows South Africa’s $1 billion green hydrogen partnership with Denmark and the Netherlands established in 2023. Neighboring Namibia has also attracted European investment, with the EU committing €25 million to Namibia Hydrogen Fund Managers in September 2024 to propel the country’s green hydrogen sector. Meanwhile, Uganda is taking steps to develop its mining sector with the support of the EU and Germany’s Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development, having launched the Sustainable Development of the Mining Sector project earlier this month. 

    China Strengthens its Position in African Mining

    China remains one of the largest investors in African mining, with both state-owned and private firms driving sector growth. In September 2024, China pledged $50 billion over three years for infrastructure and mineral development across the continent. Key projects in the DRC include CMOC’s $2.5 billion expansion of the Tenke Fungurume Mine and Sinohydro and China Railway’s $7 billion infrastructure-for-minerals deal in copper and cobalt mining. China has also invested heavily in Zimbabwe’s lithium sector and pledged $1 billion to upgrade the Tazara Railway, improving East Africa’s mineral exports.

    Growing Global Interest in Africa’s Mining Sector

    Beyond the U.S., EU and China, countries like Canada, Australia and the UAE are ramping up mining investments in Africa. Canadian firms are expanding their footprint in West Africa’s gold sector, Australian companies are backing lithium and rare earth projects in southern Africa and the UAE is securing stakes in critical mineral supply chains through strategic joint ventures. African Mining Week, taking place October 1-3 in Cape Town, will provide a platform for African nations to engage global investors, strengthen cooperation and accelerate resource development.

    MIL OSI Africa –

  • MIL-OSI Europe: EBA publishes its Peer Review on the performance of stress tests by Deposit Guarantee Schemes

    Source: European Banking Authority

    The European Banking Authority (EBA) today released the findings of its latest Peer Review on the performance of stress tests by deposit guarantee schemes (DGSs) across the European Union. This comprehensive review assessed how seven national DGSs performed stress tests against benchmarks developed for the purposes of this Peer Review. The benchmarks derive from the Deposit Guarantee Schemes Directive (DGSD) and the Revised EBA Guidelines on stress tests of deposit guarantee schemes. Stress tests of DGSs are essential for maintaining financial stability and protecting EU citizens. By rigorously assessing the performance of DGS stress tests, the EBA aims to continuously enhance the preparedness of DGS to handle bank failures and safeguard depositors’ funds. 

    The review found that all seven DGSs have effectively developed their stress testing programmes in line with the guidelines, with only minor shortcomings. All seven DGSs have also demonstrated effective cooperation with relevant authorities, with robust stress testing of these arrangements.  

    However, only five of the seven DGS could fully or largely demonstrate that they have: 

    • performed all the mandatory core stress tests, using realistic assumptions and conducting objective evaluations; 

    • increased severity and complexity of their testing scenarios to adequately stress test their ability to intervene; and 

    The Report outlines follow-up measures addressed to all EU DGSs in areas such as the prompt development of stress tests, performance of stress tests, cooperation, severity and complexity of stress tests, and identification of areas for improvement. 

    In addition to the detailed review of the seven DGSs, the Report presents an overview of the 194 stress tests conducted by all DGSs in the EU, Norway, and Liechtenstein during the 2021-2024 period.  

    ​Legal basis and next steps 

    In accordance with Article 4 of the Deposit Guarantee Schemes Directive1, based on the results of the stress tests, the EBA shall, at least every five years, conduct peer reviews pursuant to Article 30 of Regulation (EU) No 1093/2010 in order to examine the resilience of DGSs. Article 30 of the EBA Regulation requires the EBA to periodically conduct peer reviews of some or all of the activities of competent authorities within its remit, to further strengthen consistency and effectiveness in supervisory outcomes. 

    The EBA will conduct a follow-up peer review of the implementation of the measures included in the Report in two years, ensuring that the findings and recommendations are effectively addressed. 

    MIL OSI Europe News –

  • MIL-OSI Europe: President Karin Keller-Sutter to attend meeting of EU’s Economic and Financial Affairs Council

    Source: Switzerland – Department of Finance

    On 11 April 2025, Karin Keller-Sutter, President of the Swiss Confederation, will attend the informal meeting of the EU’s Economic and Financial Affairs Council (ECOFIN) in Warsaw. The purpose of the meeting is to promote European exchanges on international financial and tax issues.

    MIL OSI Europe News –

  • MIL-OSI Security: Water safety advice as warmer weather continues

    Source: United Kingdom London Metropolitan Police

    As warmer weather returns to London and more people are out enjoying the sunshine, the Met’s Marine Policing Unit (MPU) is raising awareness of the dangers of entering the capital’s waterways.

    Chief Inspector Rob Ranstead, who leads the Met’s MPU, said: “We absolutely understand the natural draw of rivers, lakes and open water across the city. However, we have sadly seen a recent rise in incidents where people have got into difficulty – and very tragically, some have lost their lives.

    “So I want to make a direct appeal to the public: please enjoy London’s waterways safely, but never underestimate the risks.

    “Open water may appear calm and inviting, but it can be dangerously deceptive. Strong currents, sudden drops, hidden hazards and cold-water shock can affect even the strongest swimmers. Once a person is in the Thames, for example, they will almost definitely struggle to keep afloat or in control. The river holds currents stronger than any person and moves at extreme speeds. The water may look calm but the tides are extremely strong and fast, able to easily drag someone a mile in just ten minutes.”

    Our key advice is simple but potentially lifesaving:

    • Do not swim in open water unless it is part of a supervised and safe environment.
    • Never enter the water under the influence of alcohol or drugs.
    • Talk to your children and young people about the risks—many incidents involve teenagers during school breaks or weekends.

    Chief Inspector Ranstead added: “Our officers patrol the River Thames and many of London’s waterways on a daily basis. We see the heartbreak and devastation these preventable tragedies cause – with families changed forever in a matter of seconds. Working with partners we are increasing our visibility and delivering water safety education, but we need the help of the public. Please respect the water, look after one another, and think twice before taking unnecessary risks.”

    On average the Met’s MPU is called to over 140 incidents each month on the River Thames. They work with partner agencies such as the RNLI, HM Coastguard, Port of London Authority, Tidal Thames Water Safety Forum and London Fire Brigade, to help keep the tidal stretch of the Thames safe for Londoners.

    + If you find yourself in the water please follow the RNLI’s ‘Float to Live’ steps:

    – If you fall into water, fight your instinct to thrash around.

    – Lean back, extend your arms and legs.

    – If you need to, gently move them around to help you float.

    – Float until you can control your breathing.

    – Only then, call for help or swim to safety.

    MIL Security OSI –

  • MIL-OSI: Resolutions of Baltic Horizon Fund repeat general meeting

    Source: GlobeNewswire (MIL-OSI)

    A repeat extraordinary General Meeting of Baltic Horizon Fund unit-holders and Swedish Depositary Receipt (hereinafter the “SDR”) holders (hereinafter together the “Investors”) took place on 7 April 2025 in Tallinn, Estonia.  

    The repeat meeting was convened as the required quorum was not reached during the initial extraordinary General Meeting on 27 March 2025. In accordance with section 10.11 of the fund rules of Baltic Horizon Fund the repeat General Meeting is permitted to adopt resolutions regardless of the number of votes represented at the meeting, unless otherwise stipulated in the fund rules.

    9 Investors were registered as attending to the meeting, holding 47,673,338 Baltic Horizon Fund units/SDRs which represent 33,2% of the total number of votes of the fund.

    The agenda of the meeting was to decide on the appointment of the new members of the supervisory board, the remuneration to be paid to them and the removal of the current supervisory board members.

    The General Meeting resolved: 

    1. To elect Andrius Smaliukas as a new member of the supervisory board of Baltic Horizon Fund as of 1 May 2025 for a period of two years;

      2. The resolution was passed, 100% of the votes represented at the meeting were in favour.

      1. To elect Milda Dargužaitė as a new member of the supervisory board of Baltic Horizon Fund as of 1 May 2025 for a period of two years;

        2. The resolution was passed, 100% of the votes represented at the meeting were in favour.

        1. To elect Antanas Anskaitis as a new member of the supervisory board of Baltic Horizon Fund as of 1 May 2025 for a period of two years;

          2. The resolution was passed, 100% of the votes represented at the meeting were in favour.

          1. To pay remuneration to the chairman of the supervisory board for fulfilling obligations of the member of the supervisory board in the amount of EUR 36,000 per calendar year;

            2. The resolution was passed, 90,1% of the votes represented at the meeting were in favour. There were no votes against the resolution, but 6 investors remained impartial.

            1. To pay remuneration to supervisory board members, other than  the chairman, for fulfilling obligations of the member of the supervisory board in the amount of EUR 11,000 per calendar year;

              2. The resolution was passed, 90,2% of the votes represented at the meeting were in favour. There were no votes against the resolution, but 5 investors remained impartial.

              1. To recall Reimo Hammerberg, Monica Hammer and David Bergendahl from the position of supervisory board member with the last date of the office being 30 April 2025.

                2. The resolution was passed, 100% of the votes represented at the meeting were in favour.

                All investors registered to participate at the meeting participated in voting.

                The meeting recording is available here.

                The minutes of the meeting will be made available within seven days via the website of the Baltic Horizon Fund.

                For additional information, please contact:

                Tarmo Karotam
                Baltic Horizon Fund manager
                E-mail tarmo.karotam@nh-cap.com
                www.baltichorizon.com

                The Fund is a registered contractual public closed-end real estate fund that is managed by Alternative Investment Fund Manager license holder Northern Horizon Capital AS. 

                Distribution: GlobeNewswire, Nasdaq Tallinn, Nasdaq Stockholm, www.baltichorizon.com

                To receive Nasdaq announcements and news from Baltic Horizon Fund about its projects, plans and more, register on www.baltichorizon.com. You can also follow Baltic Horizon Fund on www.baltichorizon.com and on LinkedIn, Facebook, X and YouTube.

    The MIL Network –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: Government to listen, learn and deliver as consultation on transformational welfare reforms begins

    Source: United Kingdom – Government Statements

    Press release

    Government to listen, learn and deliver as consultation on transformational welfare reforms begins

    Welfare reforms must be shaped by and for disabled people, the Minister for Social Security and Disability Sir Stephen Timms said today [Monday 07 April], as the official consultation on the government’s proposals begins.

    • Publication of all accessible versions set to trigger the start of official consultation into welfare reforms announced by Work and Pensions Secretary.
    • Disabled people and those with health conditions are encouraged to have their say so their views are at the heart of the new system.
    • Reforms will fix the broken welfare system by giving people genuine support to unlock work and boost living standards as part of the government’s Plan for Change.

    Welfare reforms must be shaped by and for disabled people, the Minister for Social Security and Disability Sir Stephen Timms said today [Monday 07 April], as the official consultation on the Government’s proposals begins.

    It comes as the government commits to the establishment of ‘collaboration committees’ to further develop the reforms, bringing together groups of people for specific work areas to provide discussion, challenge, and make recommendations. 

    Announced on Tuesday 18 March, the proposed reforms will ensure that sick and disabled people have the same opportunities to work as anyone else, and will unlock work, boost living standards, and help grow the economy as part of the government’s Plan for Change.

    They will also seek to overhaul the broken benefits system so it supports those who need it, while helping those who can work into jobs and delivering fairness to the taxpayer. 

    The Minister for Social Security and Disability is urging those likely to be affected by the changes – either individually or through disability charities and organisations – to have their say through the consultation, ensuring their views help shape the proposed changes.

    Minister for Social Security and Disability Sir Stephen Timms said:

    We inherited a broken welfare system, which incentivises ill-health, locks people out of work and isn’t fit for a future in which so many of us will face long-term health conditions.

    We want a system that genuinely works for disabled people and those with health conditions, as well as the country and the economy, and we want to hear their views and voices at the heart of the new system. 

    I encourage people to engage so they can have their say as we listen, learn and deliver support which will help millions into work, put welfare spending on a more sustainable path, and unlock growth as part of our Plan for Change.

    The 12-week consultation on reforms to health and disability support officially launches today with publication of all accessible versions of the Pathways to Work Green Paper. 

    The proposed reforms aim to support people into work, protect people who can never work and put the welfare system on a sustainable footing so that it can continue to support those in need now and into the future. One in three of us faces a long-term health condition, so we all need a system that can support us to stay in work or get back into work.

    The measures are the latest step in the government’s drive to build a modern welfare system that helps people get jobs rather than creating unnecessary barriers, with ministers’ proposed plans set to:

    • Provide more tailored employment support for those who can work, breaking down barriers to opportunity.
    • Simplify the system and reduce unnecessary assessments, cutting bureaucracy and making it easier to navigate.
    • Improve the way financial support is assessed and delivered, ensuring it reaches those who need it most and that people using the system have a better experience and are treated with dignity and respect.
    • Build a more flexible approach that recognises the diverse needs of disabled people and those with long-term health conditions.

    Without changes, it is forecast that the system could cost as much as £70 billion a year by the end of the decade and risk not being there for people when they need it in future.

    Issues open for consultation include:

    • Supporting people to thrive with the new support offer.
    • Supporting employers and making work more accessible.
    • Reforming the structure of the health and disability benefits system.

    These are part of the wider reforms that also include reintroducing reassessments for people on incapacity benefits who have the capability to work to ensure they have the right support and aren’t indefinitely written off, targeting Personal Independence Payments for those with higher needs, and rebalancing payment levels in Universal Credit.

    Additional Information:

    • For more information and to have your say, please see the Pathways to Work – GOV.UK consultation page.  The consultation closes on Friday 30 June 2025.
    • The Government announced the biggest shake up to welfare for a generation: Biggest shake up to welfare system in a generation to get Britain working – GOV.UK
    • Please see the Health and Disability Green Paper: Pathways to Work: Reforming Benefits and Support to Get Britain Working Green Paper – GOV.UK
    • DWP intend to run a number of accessible virtual and face-to-face events on the Green Paper to hear from stakeholders, including disabled people and their representative organisations, directly. More information on these events and registration is advertised on the consultation pages on GOV.UK. 
    • We are committing to the establishment of ‘collaboration committees’ to further develop our reforms. This means we will bring together groups of people for specific work areas who will meet to collaborate with civil servants and provide discussion, challenge, and recommendations. Each group will have a different mix of people including both those with lived experience of the policy area and other experts.

    Updates to this page

    Published 7 April 2025

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: City housing partners spring into action to help community centre

    Source: City of Wolverhampton

    Through Wolverhampton Council’s housing framework, Morro Partnerships is currently developing 2 sites in Bushbury for new council homes – ‘Magic Gardens’ off Sandmere Rise and land off Old Fallings Crescent.

    As part of its commitment to communities, members of Morro Partnerships’ new build team joined council volunteers and roped in members of D&R Contract Services Limited to redecorate the nearby Bushbury Triangle Resource Centre.

    The centre on Stanley Road offers free community services and support to residents in need, with activities including children’s gardening clubs, free breakfasts and bingo. It also provides office space for other local organisations to run services, including homelessness support.

    The building interior was showing signs of wear and tear – but has now been painted from top to bottom by the housing partners, using paint donated by Dulux.

    Steve Harris, Bushbury Triangle Chair of Trustees, said: “We are really grateful as we couldn’t do it ourselves. It has vastly transformed the building which hadn’t been decorated in 25 years.

    “Having a nicer environment will help us provide better services to the community and encourage people to use the centre.”

    City of Wolverhampton Council Deputy Leader and Cabinet Member for City Housing, Councillor Steve Evans, said: “Bushbury Triangle Resource Centre provides invaluable support and services to city residents and continues to grow in popularity.

    “Their home needed a refresh and hats off to the staff from the council housing team and everyone else for volunteering their time to help, equipment and supplies to support this invaluable asset at the heart of the Bushbury community.

    “When we select our council housing development partners, as well as demanding they deliver quality and sustainable homes for our residents, we expect them to provide wider benefits to the community.

    “We have built a thriving working relationship with Morro Partnerships and I’m delighted they are supportive of our work to maintain well connected neighbourhoods.”

    Morro Partnerships Head of Social Purpose, Abdul Mozzamdar, said: “Bushbury Triangle Resource Centre is an invaluable service for the local community, which I experienced firsthand when I visited the centre last November.

    “The commitment from the volunteering residents is highly commendable, and it is a key example of true community spirit, which I feel should be emulated across all cities, towns and villages in England.

    “Morro Partnerships has committed to supporting communities in which we work, live, and play, and this intervention highlights our commitment to make lasting changes for the community to enjoy for generations to come.

    “A big thank you goes to D&R Contract Services Limited for their support in helping the community.”

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: Council helps to deliver social change

    Source: Northern Ireland City of Armagh

    Council was delighted to support cultural diversity and inclusion awareness events across Southern Regional College (SRC). In an increasingly interconnected world, students at the college immersed themselves in the vibrant tapestry of cultures that enrich Northern Ireland.

    The events featured a dynamic mix of workshops, discussions and performances, all designed to showcase the rich diversity within local communities. Students had the opportunity to engage with key stakeholders from the Policing and Community Safety Partnership (PCSP), Armagh Banbridge and Craigavon Community Development and Good Relations Team, Victim Support NI and the Police Service for Northern Ireland (PSNI).

    Artsekta, an award-winning social enterprise dedicated to transforming communities through shared creative experiences, brought the essence of global cultures to life with captivating dance performances from Mexico, China and India. These performances were followed by insightful talks on the traditions and heritage of these countries. Student Celine Maria Corhea also spoke on her Romanian roots and gave fellow students an insight into her heritage.

    Victim Support NI and the PSNI addressed sensitive topics which included discrimination, prejudice and social challenges which continue to remain present within our communities. Discussions centred on how individuals can safely confront negativity and introduced students to various local support services available for those who witness or experience hate crime in their community.

    Lord Mayor of Armagh City, Banbridge and Craigavon Borough, Councillor Sarah Duffy, said; “ABC Council is delighted to work in partnership with SRC to support their cultural diversity and inclusion events. Communities across our borough are passionate about celebrating diversity, fostering inclusivity and working towards a shared and brighter future for all and we as a council are proud to play our part.”

    Speaking on the events, Michael Availa from Victim Support NI commented; “With hate crime rising across NI, the Hate Crime Advocacy Service wants to ensure that SRC students are keenly aware of how to identify, report and seek support for hate incidents and that the community is resilient. Having worked with SRC over the last year, it is very clear that its students are ‘ahead of the curve’ on these issues and readily embrace diversity.”

    The events at SRC’s Armagh and Lurgan campuses were funded by The Executive Office District Council’s Good Relations Action Plan and delivered in partnership with Artsekta, Victim Support, PCSP, the Community Development and Good Relations Team and SRC.

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI Russia: The II National (All-Russian) Round Table “Science in a Foreign Language – a Step into the Future of a Professional” was held at SPbGASU

    Translartion. Region: Russians Fedetion –

    Source: Saint Petersburg State University of Architecture and Civil Engineering – Saint Petersburg State University of Architecture and Civil Engineering – Participants and listeners of the section “Architecture today and tomorrow: design, innovations and trends”

    On April 3, the Department of Intercultural Communication of SPbGASU held the II National (All-Russian) Round Table “Science in a Foreign Language – a Step into the Future of a Professional”.

    This year, the round table brought together students, postgraduates and graduate students from St. Petersburg, Moscow, Nizhny Novgorod, Penza, Omsk, as well as students of the preparatory department of SPbGASU and students studying in master’s and postgraduate programs from China, Morocco, Algeria, Serbia, who presented the results of their scientific research in English and Russian as a foreign language.

    The chairperson of the organizing committee, head of the department of intercultural communication Elena Selezneva addressed the participants with a welcoming speech, expressing confidence: in the modern world, knowledge of a foreign language is no longer just an advantage, but a necessity for success in any scientific field. The ability to convey your scientific ideas, regardless of language barriers, is of decisive importance.

    The Deputy Chair of the Organizing Committee, Professor of the Department of Intercultural Communication Elena Chirkova also gave a welcoming speech. Elena Ivanovna spoke about the word cloud created last year – a visual representation of key concepts and ideas that arose during the discussions.

    The round table was organized in four areas: architecture, construction, economics and intercultural communication.

    Section “Architecture today and tomorrow: design, innovation and trends”

    The section meeting discussed a wide range of issues in the modern development of architecture and the preservation of cultural heritage, including the role of lighting, innovative approaches to design, the development of the urban environment and leisure infrastructure, and technologies for the restoration of historical buildings in Russia and abroad.

    Anastasia Nasedkina (SPbGASU) presented a report on “Landscape architecture techniques for designing public spaces in northern cities.”

    “My report was dedicated to landscape architecture techniques in designing public spaces in northern cities based on the concept of a “winter city”. I chose this topic because projects often do not take into account how the object will look or be used in winter, and this can be a very long time,” shared Anastasia.

    Tatyana Lazareva (SPbGASU) presented a report entitled “15-minute city as a solution to the urban crisis.”

    “I reviewed the model of urban development aimed at creating comfortable, accessible and environmentally friendly urban spaces. I listed the key principles of this approach, successful examples of its implementation in different countries, as well as the challenges that modern megacities face,” the student said.

    Section “Construction today and tomorrow: design, innovation and trends”

    The participants of this section raised such important issues as geological surveys to ensure safety in construction, innovative technologies and building materials and their properties for the stability of structures.

    Liu Zichi (SPbGASU) spoke about approaches to the restoration of historical buildings in China and Russia. The audience also learned about the differences in the choice of building materials between the two countries, which are influenced by the natural environment, climate conditions, cultural traditions and conditions of technological development.

    Yassin Sekuri (SPbGASU) covered the topic “Application of innovative construction technologies in cramped urban environments.”

    “The use of innovative technologies in construction in urban development conditions is a necessary step for sustainable urban development. Digitalization and modular technologies improve the quality of construction, reduce timeframes and minimize the impact on the environment. Safety at construction sites is maintained through new monitoring and automation systems,” Yassin is confident.

    Section “Economy in the era of change: challenges and prospects”

    The section’s reports were devoted to the problems of logistics and digitalization, ecology and tourism, motivation and communication in the economic sphere. It is also worth noting the participants’ interest in using artificial intelligence to solve practical problems.

    Vladislav Tikkoev (SPbGASU) introduced the audience to the prospects and difficulties of the transition to electronic executive documentation in construction.

    “In my report, I drew attention to new methods of maintaining documentation during the construction of capital construction projects. Modern EDI tools now also apply to such an important aspect of the activities of construction companies as the certification of completed works. I cited the main provisions that regulate the forms and procedure for maintaining documentation, distribute areas of responsibility between construction participants, and also provided examples from domestic and foreign practice. I spoke about the problems and prospects of using digital forms of acts in the conclusion. In further research, I will assess the impact of a systematic approach to the preparation of executive documentation on the financial stability of organizations and the feasibility of capital construction projects,” said Vladislav.

    Pavel Timofeev (SPbGASU) presented a report entitled “Problems of logistics in the implementation of the Arctic development program.”

    “My report is dedicated to the main tasks set by the Strategy for the Development of the Arctic Zone of the Russian Federation and Ensuring National Security for the Period up to 2035, as well as logistical problems that may hinder the implementation of these tasks. The report reveals why the projects specified in the strategy, which are of strategic interest to our country, may be under threat, and what decisions are being made to prevent these threats or minimize their consequences,” Pavel said.

    Jamil-Nezhar Benshaban (Saint Petersburg State Forest Engineering University named after S. M. Kirov) presented a report on “The Impact of Artificial Intelligence and Gamification on the Motivation of Company Employees”.

    “What if work felt less like work and more like a game? Imagine you’re at your desk, working on a project, and suddenly bam – you’ve earned points, unlocked a new level, and your name moves up the leaderboard. Your colleague at the next desk says ‘high five’, and your boss sends you a reward. It’s not science fiction. Companies in Algeria, Russia, and elsewhere are already using AI-powered gamification to turn routine work into exciting competitions,” Jamil-Nezhar said.

    The speaker looked at the reasons why people love games; gave examples of how this method is used in some companies; called for starting small – creating a leaderboard for a weekly team competition, conducting employee surveys using AI tools, introducing a rewards system. In his opinion, we need to think globally: “The future is not about making people stay at work: we need to make them want to stay.”

    Section “Intercultural communication, language interaction and translation practice”

    Postgraduate student Li Ruimin, participant of the section “Intercultural communication, language interaction and translation practice”

    During the work of this section, reports were heard on current issues of translation of scientific and technical texts; special attention was paid to the prospects of using artificial intelligence for translation purposes. In addition, the participants conducted a comparative analysis of the organization of the educational process in Russian and Chinese universities. Everyone agreed on the importance and necessity of studying a foreign language for future professional activity.

    Martina Kojović (SPbGASU) presented a report “Serbian and Russian. Language proximity – help or obstacle in mastering the Russian language?” According to the student, the linguistic proximity of Serbian and Russian can be both an assistant and an obstacle in learning. It is important to be aware of the similarities and differences in order to effectively master the language, avoiding traps and “false friends” (words that are similar but have different meanings), grammatical errors.

    The sections were moderated by students Anna Aleshina, Daria Nikulina, Sofia Myagkaya and Fyodor Romanchuk, who successfully completed the professional training program “Translator in the Sphere of Professional Activity” last year.

    “This was my first experience moderating a round table. From it I learned the importance of flexibility and the ability to adapt to unexpected situations, which will certainly come in handy in the future. I enjoyed interacting with an active audience and, of course, I would like to develop in this direction,” Fedor shared.

    “It was interesting to try myself in a new role and learn more about modern architectural research. I gained valuable experience – I learned how to build interaction between the speaker and the audience, and also met interesting people,” said Anna Aleshina.

    A round table in a foreign language is not only a platform for discussing the results of scientific research, but also an opportunity to improve language skills, which are a significant component of professional growth.

    This year the round table program was very rich. Participants of all sections raised topical issues that are of serious scientific interest.

    The Department of Intercultural Communication of SPbGASU expresses gratitude to all participants and invites them to discuss new scientific achievements next year.

    Please note: This information is raw content directly from the source of the information. It is exactly what the source states and does not reflect the position of MIL-OSI or its clients.

    MIL OSI Russia News –

  • MIL-OSI Security: Met officers recover £50k of stolen tools in east London

    Source: United Kingdom London Metropolitan Police

    Around £50,000 worth of stolen tools were recovered during a Metropolitan Police operation at a car boot sale in Rainham, east London.

    In response to concerns from tradespeople about a rise in tool thefts, the Met worked with Essex Police and trading standards officers to carry out a large search of the Willow Farm Car Boot Sale on Sunday, 6 April.

    By using intelligence, and with the help of a dog that can sniff out items marked with forensic water, officers identified and seized around 1,000 suspected stolen tools.

    Four men, aged between 40 and 60, from Hackney and Southend-on-Sea were arrested on suspicion of handling stolen goods.

    A number of suspected stolen bikes, as well as cash, illegal vapes and other counterfeit goods were also seized.

    Inspector Mark Connolly, from the Met’s neighbourhood policing team in east London, said:

    “We’ve heard from hard-working Londoners about the financial and personal impact of tool theft and we’re working hard across the Met to tackle it.

    “As well as working with partners to target prolific offenders in proactive and intelligence-led operations such as this, we’re also carrying out tool marking events to make it harder for criminals to sell on stolen goods.”

    Inspector Daniel Selby, from Essex Police’s Grays Neighbourhood Policing Team, said:

    “Trading stolen or counterfeit goods is illegal and inexcusable, so we are working with our partners to disrupt supply lines and arrest those who are profiting from crime.

    “Hard-working tradespeople rely on their tools to make a living and we appreciate how devastating the implications of a theft can be for victims and their families at a time when many people are struggling financially.

    “Purchasing illegitimate goods only serves to line the pockets of the criminals, creates a market that inevitably leads to more offending, and can land the buyer in serious trouble.”

    Officers will work over the coming weeks to identify the tools and trace their original owners.

    Any tradespeople or those in possession of power tools are advised to mark their property, take photographs, and record serial numbers so that, in the event of theft, officers have more chance of returning property.

    Marking tools with SelectaDNA forensic water also helps officers identify stolen goods. Met officers will be hosting a free tool marking event at the Toolstation in Ramac Way in Charlton between 07:30hrs and 14:00hrs on Tuesday, 8 April.

    We also advise reporting any thefts in a timely manner, providing as much detail as possible. Removing tools from your vehicles overnight will also help deter thieves.

    We urge the public not to buy goods you know or suspect to be stolen or counterfeit, as this feeds organised crime. If the price seems too good to be true, it could be the item is either stolen or fake. Buying goods you know or suspect to be stolen is a criminal offence.

    If you suspect anyone of selling stolen or counterfeit goods, you can report this to us online or anonymously via Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111.

    MIL Security OSI –

  • MIL-OSI: Diamond Equity Research Initiates Coverage on Almonty Industries, Inc. (TSX: AII) (ASX: AII) (FWB: ALI) (OTCQX: ALMTF)

    Source: GlobeNewswire (MIL-OSI)

    New York, NY, April 07, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Diamond Equity Research, a leading equity research firm with a focus on small capitalization public companies has initiated coverage of Almonty Industries, Inc. (TSX: AII) (ASX: AII) (FWB: ALI) (OTCQX: ALMTF). The in-depth 49-page initiation report includes detailed information on the Almonty Industries’ business model, services, industry overview, financials, valuation, management profile, and risks. 

    The full research report is available below.

    Almonty Industries Inc. Initiation of Coverage

    Highlights from the report include:

    • Sangdong Mine Potentially Set to Become the World’s Largest Non-Chinese Tungsten Source: Almonty’s flagship Sangdong Mine in South Korea is poised to transform the global tungsten landscape, with projected output exceeding 40% of non-China supply and 5% of global supply by 2027. In our view, Sangdong is not just Almonty’s crown jewel, but also a cornerstone asset for rebuilding Western tungsten supply chains, given its expected 90+ year mine life and strong by-product upside potential from molybdenum.
    • High-Grade Molybdenum Asset Adds Material Upside from Late 2026: Located just below Sangdong’s skarn horizons, the AKM Molybdenum Project adds meaningful diversification. The project has a maiden inferred resource of 21.5 Mt @ 0.26% MoS₂ and is fully permitted within the existing Sangdong mining lease. A $19/lb floor-price offtake agreement with SeAH M&S de-risks the development and ensures predictable cash flows. Production is targeted for late 2026/early 2027, with an anticipated 60-year mine life based on historical government data.
    • Strong and Visible Cash Flow Backed by Long-Term Contracts: Almonty has secured a 15-year offtake agreement with a floor price of US$235 per MTU, equating to approximately US$580 million in guaranteed revenue over the contract life. This agreement, with no price cap, provides exceptional cash flow visibility and allows Almonty to benefit fully from market upside. The contract emphasizes the credibility of Sangdong as a reliable source of high-grade tungsten and reflects deep buyer confidence in Almonty’s long-term delivery capabilities and quality of asset.
    • Resilient Tungsten and Molybdenum Outlook Driven by Structural Supply Shortages and Rising Strategic Demand: Tungsten and molybdenum markets are experiencing sustained upward pricing pressure due to structural supply constraints, geopolitical export restrictions, and robust industrial demand. Tungsten prices have rebounded strongly, with APT reaching near-decade highs. Similarly, molybdenum prices surged to historical peaks ($40/lb in early 2023) due to critically low global inventories and supply disruptions. Given limited substitution possibilities, rising applications in defense, aerospace, infrastructure, and clean energy technologies, we believe these market dynamics could support elevated tungsten and molybdenum prices, benefiting producers like Almonty.
    • Critical Material Status, Export Bans, and NATO Mandates Drive Demand Shift: Tungsten has been designated a critical raw material by the U.S., EU, Australia, Canada, and South Korea due to its high economic importance and supply risk. The U.S. Department of Defense will ban Chinese, Russian, North Korean, and Iranian tungsten for military procurement starting in 2027, while the EU has extended anti-dumping tariffs on Chinese tungsten carbide. Almonty’s Portuguese material is already commanding premiums of over 15% as Western buyers prioritize ESG-aligned sources. China’s own export controls on tungsten and molybdenum, effective February 2025, further restrict global access. In our view, these developments create a powerful structural tailwind for Western-aligned producers like Almonty.
    • Proven Operational Track Record and Industry Trust Anchor the Business Model: Almonty has a 128-year history in tungsten mining and previously sold operations for 21x earnings during the 2007 supply squeeze. Its Panasqueira Mine in Portugal has been producing for over a century, while the Los Santos Mine is scheduled to restart in 2026. Management has consistently met all development milestones, raised AUD 18.45 million in 2024, and continues to co-invest alongside shareholders. We view this track record as a major differentiator, supporting the company’s ability to win contracts, secure financing, and execute on scale.
    • Valuation: Almonty Inc. presents a unique investment opportunity, offering exposure to a portfolio of high-grade tungsten and molybdenum assets with clear near-term production visibility. Key upcoming milestones, including the commencement of production at the Sangdong tungsten and molybdenum projects, downstream processing initiatives, and the Panasqueira expansion opportunity, are expected to potentially drive meaningful growth in revenues and profitability. Furthermore, the company operates in a low-risk, transparent jurisdiction and has secured long-term offtake agreements with global partners, providing additional stability and cash flow visibility. We have applied a Net Present Value (NPV) valuation using a Discounted Cash Flow (DCF) approach, incorporating expected production volumes, life-of-mine estimates, throughput capacities, ore grades, recovery rates, and commodity price forecasts. Using an 8% discount rate, we arrive at a valuation of C$4.00 per share, contingent on successful execution by the company.

    About Almonty Industries, Inc.  

    Almonty Industries Inc. is a global leader in tungsten mining, with strategically positioned assets in geopolitically stable regions including South Korea, Portugal, and Spain. The company is set to become the largest tungsten producer outside China upon the commissioning of its flagship Sangdong Mine. 

    About Diamond Equity Research

    Diamond Equity Research is a leading equity research and corporate access firm focused on small capitalization companies. Diamond Equity Research is an approved sell-side provider on major institutional investor platforms.

    For more information, visit https://www.diamondequityresearch.com.

    Disclosures:

    Diamond Equity Research LLC is being compensated by Almonty Industries, Inc. for producing research materials regarding Almonty Industries, Inc. and its securities, which is meant to subsidize the high cost of creating the report and monitoring the security, however the views in the report reflect that of Diamond Equity Research. All payments are received upfront and are billed for research engagement. As of 04/07/25 the issuer had paid us $50,000 for our company sponsored research services, which commenced 03/07/2025 and is billed annually. Diamond Equity Research LLC may be compensated for non-research related services, including presenting at Diamond Equity Research investment conferences, press releases and other additional services. The non-research related service cost is dependent on the company, but usually do not exceed $5,000. The issuer has not paid us for non-research related services as of 04/07/2025. Issuers are not required to engage us for these additional services. Additional fees may have accrued since then. Although Diamond Equity Research company sponsored reports are based on publicly available information and although no investment recommendations are made within our company sponsored research reports, given the small capitalization nature of the companies we cover we have adopted an internal trading procedure around the public companies by whom we are engaged, with investors able to find such policy on our website public disclosures page. This report and press release do not consider individual circumstances and does not take into consideration individual investor preferences. Statements within this report may constitute forward-looking statements, these statements involve many risk factors and general uncertainties around the business, industry, and macroeconomic environment. Investors need to be aware of the high degree of risk in small capitalization equities, including the complete loss of their investment. This report does not explicitly or implicitly affirm that the information contained within this document is accurate and/or comprehensive, and as such should not be relied on in such a capacity. All information contained within this report is subject to change without any formal or other notice provided. Investors can find various risk factors in the initiation report and in the respective financial filings for Almonty Industries, Inc. Please review initiation report attached for full disclosure page.  

    Contact:
    Diamond Equity Research
    research@diamondequityresearch.com

    Attachment

    The MIL Network –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: Value for money in pre-arranged financing for disasters

    Source: United Kingdom – Executive Government & Departments

    News story

    Value for money in pre-arranged financing for disasters

    A GAD actuary has co-authored a guidance note to help countries and organisations assess value for money when using pre-arranged financing for disasters.

    Credit: Shutterstock

    Countries and organisations seek to set up financing ahead of disasters. This involves understanding which solution or product presents the best value for money (VfM).

    The report Assessing value for money in pre-arranged financing for disasters: a practical framework has been published by the Centre for Disaster Protection and co-written by a GAD actuary.

    Preparing for disasters

    This guidance note has been developed to help countries and organisations considering or using pre-arranged financing instruments through the process of assessing if a particular instrument or combination of instruments offers the best value for money.

    Pre-arranged financing (PAF) is set up before a disaster and involves committing funding and preparing response plans before disasters occur. As financing is in place before a disaster, it ensures funding is available to reach affected people once an event occurs.  

    Assessing value for money

    The report is drawn from the work of the Centre for Disaster Protection over the past 5 years, and is aimed at organisations or countries which are looking to:

    • set up new PAF instruments
    • improve the design of existing PAF instruments
    • understand the optimal combination of financial instruments needed to manage the risks they face

    The report provides an overview of VfM analysis. It shows how it is a useful tool to inform decision making and demonstrate the potential effectiveness of new financial approaches compared to existing methods of financing disaster response. The report also presents a flexible 7-step framework for approaching VfM analysis in this context, supplemented by case studies and examples.

    Credit: iStock Photo

    Who’s it for?

    The research sets out which organisations may benefit from undertaking VfM assessments in relation to PAF. They include:

    • national governments
    • donor agencies
    • humanitarian agencies and NGOs
    • risk finance providers
    • multilateral development banks / multi-donor funds

    Process and content

    GAD’s Head of Climate and Disaster Risk Georgi Bedenham co-authored the report. She said: “We developed a 7-step framework to encourage governments and organisations to consider a range of aspects of VfM. It is intended as a guide to support anyone designing, commissioning and conducting VfM assessments.

    “We have also provided a useful set of guiding questions at each stage to help the reader work their way through the process.”

    Updates to this page

    Published 7 April 2025

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: Declaration of intent between the UK, Bulgaria and Romania on organised immigration crime

    Source: United Kingdom – Executive Government & Departments

    Correspondence

    Declaration of intent between the UK, Bulgaria and Romania on organised immigration crime

    The UK, Bulgaria and Romania have signed a declaration of intent to work together to deal with organised immigration crime.

    Documents

    Declaration of intent

    HTML

    Details

    Declaration of intent between the UK, Bulgaria and Romania on tackling organised immigration crime.

    Updates to this page

    Published 7 April 2025

    Sign up for emails or print this page

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: Illicit cigarettes, tobacco and vapes seized from city store by council’s Trading Standards team

    Source: City of Wolverhampton

    Acting on complaints, the council’s Trading Standards team and officers from Bilston Police targeted a premises in the city where the goods were believed to be on sale.

    Thousands of illegal items were found in the shop itself as well as in a storeroom and a concealed staircase.

    Officers found 13,680 illicit cigarettes, 3.1kg of banned hand rolling tobacco and 1,546 illicit disposable vapes. In addition, 12 banned novelty lighters were discovered along with 16 vials of an unidentified liquid, suspected to be nicotine.

    If genuine, the retail value of the vapes seized is an estimated £15,000, the value of the cigarettes seized is around £9,918 and the value of the hand rolling tobacco would be an estimated £1,890.

    Action is set to be taken against the owner of the premises where the material was seized while further investigations will be carried out to identify their suppliers.

    Once investigations have been completed, the illegal cigarettes and tobacco will be handed over to a recycling scheme to be dealt with in an environmentally friendly way.

    The seizures, which took place during an operation on 19 March, were carried out under 2 national Trading Standards initiatives, Operation CeCe and Operation Joseph.

    Councillor Bhupinder Gakhal, cabinet member for resident services at City of Wolverhampton Council, said: “We are determined to clamp down on the availability of illicit products and are particularly concerned with illegal sales made to our younger residents.

    “This operation forms part of our wider strategy in dealing with this issue and we will continue to carry out routine test purchases alongside targeted action days.

    “I’d like to congratulate all those involved in this successful partnership operation, including our Trading Standards team and Bilston Police.”

    Lord Michael Bichard, Chair, National Trading Standards, said: “The trade in illegal tobacco harms local communities and affects honest businesses operating within the law.

    “Having removed 19 million illegal cigarettes and 5,103kg of hand rolling tobacco in 2023 to 2024, Operation CeCe (a National Trading Standards initiative in partnership with HMRC) has taken £27.2 million pounds worth of illicit tobacco off the market since the operation launched in 2021 and continues to successfully disrupt this illicit trade.”

    Officers from our Trading Standards team have issued some warning signs to look out for when buying cigarettes and tobacco or vapes.

    The telltale signs of illegal tobacco include unusual taste, cheap price, unusual packaging, spelling mistakes or incorrect logos. They may also have health warnings that may not be printed in English, might not display a picture, might not be printed on a white background and may have different sized lettering to usual.

    Residents are advised to look out for the following when buying vapes:

    • The product must have a ‘warning’ diamond of not less than 10mm x 10mm containing an exclamation mark/skull and crossbones and the words Warning/Danger clearly visible on the packaging.
    • There is a requirement for a batch number or other means to identify the specific production of the product, to permit the tracing of the product should a safety issue be raised.
    • 30% of the packaging must display the required warning “this product contains nicotine which is a highly addictive substance” on both the front and back surfaces of the unit pack.  
    • Illicit vapes are often produced in China. Many illicit vapes have packaging clearly meant for the American/Californian market.

    Anyone who thinks they may have been sold illegal goods or suspect someone is selling them, can email trading.standards@wolverhampton.gov.uk    

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –