AFP - Squid Business

Chine: fin des “Deux Sessions”, le principal rendez-vous politique de l’année

Pékin dit espérer une “solution juste et durable” pour la guerre en Ukraine

South Korea’s Kia denies responsibility for anti-Musk ad

South Korean automaker Kia told AFP on Tuesday it had not approved an advertising campaign that featured one of its electric vehicles with a bumper sticker denigrating rival Tesla owner Elon Musk.The advertisement, posted last month on the social media accounts of Kia Norway, features the company’s entry-level electric car, the EV3, with a bumper sticker saying: “I bought this after Elon went crazy.”The sticker appears to riff on a viral trend of Tesla owners, unhappy with the world’s richest person’s recent foray into politics, slapping bumper stickers on their vehicles claiming they had purchased them “before Musk went crazy”.The advertisement was removed on Tuesday after AFP asked the South Korean company about the image.”Kia Corporation is aware of a social media post by Kia Norway, which has since been removed,” a company spokesperson said in a statement provided to AFP.”The post was an entirely independent local initiative that does not reflect the position of Kia Europe or Kia Corporation,” it said.Musk responded with apparent incredulity as users on the social media site X, which he owns, shared images of the Kia advertisement.”They really did that?” he asked, in response to a post calling out Kia Norway for running the promotion.Kia is an affiliate of South Korea’s Hyundai, and combined they are the world’s third-largest automaker by volume as of 2024, selling more than 7.2 million cars combined.It has rolled out a range of EVs in recent years, from the EV3 — Britain’s 2025 car of the year — to the large SUV EV9.Billionaire Musk, the boss of SpaceX and Tesla, has become a key backer of and adviser to US President Donald Trump.Musk has recently become the target of protests against the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) that he leads, including vandalisation of Tesla facilities and an apparent cyberattack on X.While Musk enjoys Trump’s confidence, polling shows he is deeply unpopular among ordinary Americans, and his cuts have sparked angry confrontations between Republicans and their constituents at town halls.Tesla has seen its sales drop across Europe in recent weeks following Musk’s controversial support for far-right groups, including Germany’s AfD during the country’s recent election campaign.Tesla sales in Germany — Europe’s biggest auto market — plunged more than 76 percent year-on-year in February, official data showed. Overall sales in the European Union almost halved year-on-year in January.Investors are concerned about the potential for boycotts and buyer backlash over Musk’s divisive behaviour as an adviser to the US president.Tesla has lost more than one-third of its market value since mid-December as Musk deepens his association with the polarising US leader.

Arrestation de Duterte: Pékin appelle la CPI à éviter les “deux poids, deux mesures”

La Russie visée par 337 drones ukrainiens, Moscou au coeur de l’attaque

La Russie a été visée dans la nuit de lundi à mardi par 337 drones ukrainiens dans l’attaque la plus importante depuis le début de son offensive en Ukraine, qui a ciblé la région de Moscou où elle fait un mort et neuf blessés.Cet envoi massif de drones intervient à quelques heures de pourparlers en Arabie Saoudite entre représentants ukrainiens et américains, qui visent à chercher un règlement du conflit en Ukraine au moment où l’administration de Donald Trump prône sa fin au plus vite.”Au cours de la nuit passée, les systèmes de défense antiaérienne ont intercepté et détruit 337 drones aériens ukrainiens, dont 91 au-dessus de la région de Moscou et 126 au-dessus de la région de Koursk”, frontalière de l’Ukraine, a indiqué le ministère russe de la Défense dans un communiqué.Parmi les autres régions visées figurent celles de Briansk et de Belgorod, frontalières de l’Ukraine, ainsi que celles de Riazan, de Kalouga, de Voronej et de Nijni Novgorod, selon la même source.”La plus grande attaque des drones ennemis contre Moscou a été repoussée, et des centaines de drones militaires ont été abattus aux frontières” du pays, s’est félicité le maire de la capitale russe Sergueï Sobianine sur Telegram.”Les spécialistes des services de secours travaillent sur les lieux de chute de débris”, a-t-il assuré.- un mort, neuf blessés -Pour sa part, le gouverneur de la région de Moscou, Andreï Vorobiov, a fait état d’un mort et neuf blessés dans l’attaque, parmi lesquels un enfant: dans la ville de Vidnoïe, le village de Sapronovo, la ville de Domodedovo et la ville de Ramenskoïe — quatre localités situées dans la grande banlieue sud de la capitale.Selon M. Vorobiov, la personne tuée est un gardien de 38 ans. Cet homme travaillait pour le centre de distribution de la compagnie agro-industrielle Miratorg, dont plusieurs locaux ont été endommagés dans l’attaque à Domodedovo, selon un communiqué publié sur son site.Face à ces “attaques massives” contre la région moscovite, une enquête pour “attentat” a été ouverte, a annoncé le Comité d’enquête russe, chargé des principales investigations dans le pays.Selon des journalistes de l’AFP, dans le village de Sapronovo, à environ 10 km de Moscou, un drone a visé le 21e étage d’un immeuble de 25 étages, plusieurs fenêtres y étant brisées et un balcon partiellement détruit.Dans la ville de Ramenskoïe, à 40 km au sud-est de Moscou, un immeuble de standing de 22 étages a été touché. Au moins deux appartements y ont été détruits, des éclats de verre étant dispersés sur des dizaines de mètres et des fragments du toit visibles sur le trottoir, selon un vidéaste de l’AFP. Dans la région de Vladimir, à quelque 200 km à l’est de Moscou, deux drones ont été abattus et un village d’environ 800 habitants a été évacué, selon les autorités locales.- visite de l’OSCE -L’attaque intervient également à quelques heures d’une visite à Moscou du secrétaire général de l’Organisation pour la sécurité et la coopération en Europe (OSCE), Feridun Hadi Sinirlioğlu, qui doit s’entretenir mardi avec le chef de la diplomatie russe Sergueï Lavrov.”Ce n’est pas la première visite à Moscou d’une délégation internationale de haut niveau qui est accompagnée par une attaque de drones des forces ukrainiennes”, a écrit sur Telegram, la porte-parole de diplomatie russe, Maria Zakharova, en estimant que de tels actes privent l’OSCE de son “sens initial, celui d’assurer la sécurité et la coopération en Europe”.L’aéroport international de Vnoukovo a interrompu son trafic tandis que les trois autres aéroports qui desservent Moscou, Domodedovo, Joukovski et Cheremetievo, ont “mis en place des restrictions temporaires”, a indiqué Rosaviatsia, l’agence fédérale russe de l’aviation.Si l’Ukraine et la Russie envoient quotidiennement des dizaines de drones vers leurs territoires respectifs, la capitale russe est elle-même rarement touchée.Fin décembre, une attaque massive de drones ukrainiens avait endommagé des immeubles et forcé des évacuations dans la ville de Kazan, dans le centre de la Russie.L’Ukraine va exposer mardi aux Etats-Unis, lors d’une réunion en Arabie saoudite, un plan pour un cessez-le-feu partiel avec la Russie, dans l’espoir de retrouver le soutien de Washington après le récent cataclysme dans leurs relations.Ces discussions à Jeddah seront les premières à ce niveau entre responsables ukrainiens et américains depuis la visite désastreuse du président ukrainien Volodymyr Zelensky à la Maison Blanche fin février.Pour avancer, l’Ukraine arrive à Jeddah avec une proposition, a indiqué lundi à l’AFP un haut responsable ukrainien sous couvert de l’anonymat: une “trêve dans les airs” et “en mer” avec Moscou.

La Russie visée par 337 drones ukrainiens, Moscou au coeur de l’attaque

Indian Wells: Monfils cède après un marathon contre Dimitrov, Alcaraz et Sabalenka faciles

Search ends for missing crew member after North Sea collision

The UK coastguard ended the search for a missing crew member after a cargo ship ran into a US-military chartered tanker carrying jet fuel in the North Sea on Monday.HM Coastguard rescued 36 crew members from the Stena Immaculate tanker and Solong container vessel, with one taken to hospital.”One crew member of the Solong remains unaccounted for, after an extensive search for the missing crew member sadly they have not been found and the search has ended,” said Matthew Atkinson, Divisional Commander for HM Coastguard.Images showed a huge plume of thick, black smoke and flames rising from the scene about 10 miles (16 kilometres) off the east England coast, sparking concerns of “multiple toxic hazards”.The Stena Immaculate tanker was “anchored off the North Sea coast near Hull… (and) was struck by the container ship Solong”, the Stena’s US-based operators Crowley said in a statement.The Stena was on a short-term US military charter with Military Sealift Command, according to Jillian Morris, the spokesperson for the command that operates civilian-crewed ships providing ocean transport for the US Defense Department.Crowley said the impact of the collision “ruptured” the tanker “containing A1-jet fuel” and triggered a fire, with fuel “reported released”.It was carrying around 220,000 barrels of jet fuel while the Solong was carrying 15 containers of sodium cyanide, according to the Lloyd’s List information service, but it is not known if any of the flammable compound had leaked.The two vessels were still on fire 12 hours after the collision, said the coastguard.A spokesperson for UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer called the situation “extremely concerning”. All crew members aboard the Stena Immaculate were confirmed to be alive, a spokeswoman for the tanker’s Swedish owner, Stena Bulk, told AFP.- ‘Toxic hazards’ -A spokesman for the government’s Marine Accident Investigation Branch spokesperson said “Our team of inspectors and support staff are gathering evidence and undertaking a preliminary assessment of the accident to determine our next steps”.Ivor Vince, founder of ASK Consultants, an environmental risk advisory group, told AFP that “the good news is it’s not persistent, it’s not like a crude oil spill”. “Most of it will evaporate quite quickly and what doesn’t evaporate will be degraded by microorganisms quite quickly”, he added, though warning that “it will kill fish and other creatures”.Paul Johnston, a senior scientist at the Greenpeace Research Laboratories at Exeter University, said “we are extremely concerned about the multiple toxic hazards these chemicals could pose to marine life.”The jet fuel entered the water close to a breeding ground for harbour porpoises, sodium cyanide is “a highly toxic chemical that could cause serious harm”, he added.- Humber traffic suspended -All vessel movements were “suspended” in the Humber estuary that flows into the North Sea, according to Associated British Ports (ABP), which operates in the Ports of Hull and Immingham in the region. The German Central Command for Maritime Emergencies said it was also dispatching a vessel capable of fire fighting and oil recovery.The alarm about the crash near the port city of Hull in East Yorkshire was raised at 0948 GMT.A coastguard helicopter, a plane, lifeboats from four towns and other nearby vessels were part of the large rescue operation, UK Coastguard said.Grimsby native Paul Lancaster, a former seaman, told AFP that “I don’t understand how two ships that big could collide”. “There must have been a massive engineering problem,” he said outside a pub in Grimsby.- Collisions rare -Collisions remain rare in the busy North Sea.In October 2023, two cargo ships, the Verity and the Polesie, collided near Germany’s Heligoland islands in the North Sea.Three people were killed and two others are still missing and considered dead.In October 2015, the Flinterstar freighter, carrying 125 tonnes of diesel and 427 tonnes of fuel oil, sank after colliding with the Al Oraiq tanker eight kilometres (five miles) off the Belgian coast.

‘Really suffocating’: Pakistan emerges from record smog season

Tens of millions of Pakistanis spent at least four months breathing toxic air pollution 20 times above safe levels, in the worst winter smog season for several years, according to data analysed by AFP.Pakistan regularly ranks among the world’s most polluted countries, with Lahore often the most polluted megacity between November and February.AFP’s analysis of data recorded since 2018 by independent air monitoring project AQICN shows the 2024-2025 winter smog season started a month earlier in October and persisted at higher levels, including in cities normally less affected by pollution.Lahore’s 14 million residents spent six months breathing concentrations of PM2.5 — tiny particles that can penetrate the lungs and bloodstream — at levels 20 times or more than recommended by the World Health Organization.Those in Karachi, Pakistan’s biggest city, and the capital Islamabad were subjected to 120 days of the same choking pollution levels.”The smog is just getting worse every year,” admitted a factory owner in Lahore, who wished to remain anonymous after openly criticising government policies.”If I was rich, my first decision would be to leave Pakistan for Dubai, to protect my children and raise them in a smog-free environment,” he told AFP.- Legal action -Experts say the pollution is primarily caused by factory and traffic emissions. It worsens in winter as farmers burn crop stubble and cooler temperatures and slow-moving winds trap the deadly pollutants.This year, winter rains that typically bring relief did not arrive until late February, as climate change renders Pakistan’s weather patterns increasingly unpredictable.The smog was so thick it could be seen from space and prompted authorities to close schools serving millions of students across the largest province Punjab, including its capital Lahore. Young climate activist Risha Rashid said Islamabad is fast becoming “another Lahore” and has launched legal action against the government.”It’s really suffocating,” the 21-year-old, who has asthma, told AFP.”I cannot go out, even if I have exams. It’s not just affecting our physical health but our mental health as well.”An Ipsos poll in November found four out of five Pakistanis said they were affected by the smog.It can cause sore throats, stinging eyes and respiratory illnesses, while prolonged exposure can trigger strokes, heart disease and lung cancer.Its effects are worse for children, who breathe more rapidly and have weaker immune systems.- ‘At war’ -This smog season, Punjab’s provincial government declared a “war on smog”, increasing public air quality monitoring devices tenfold to around 30 and offering farmers subsidised rentals of machinery to clear crop stubble and avoid burning. It also pledged to increasingly enforce emissions regulations on tens of thousands of factories and more than 8,000 brick kilns, a major source of black carbon emissions. But environmentalists and experts say action has been piecemeal and sometimes counterproductive, including restrictions on private air quality monitoring devices that the government claims give “misleading results that spread panic.”And anti-smog machines, including a tower in Lahore shut down two months after installation, are effectively useless, experts say.”It is like putting an air conditioner out in the open,” said one who spoke on condition of anonymity.- Pledges for clean air -Efforts that tackle pollution’s effects, rather than its source, miss the point, said Ahmad Ali Gul at Lahore’s University of Management and Technology.”It’s like when you have a bathtub and it’s overflowing and it’s creating a huge mess, do you first grab a towel or you first close the tap?” he said. “First, we need to focus on reducing the emissions and then we talk about how to protect ourselves from smog.”The government has blamed rival India, which borders Punjab province, for pollution blowing over into Lahore.But Pakistan has limited vehicle emissions standards, and officials admit 83 percent of Lahore’s carbon emissions are from transport. “Switching to a cleaner fuel would give immediate results, we’ve seen it in other countries,” said Frank Hammes, the global CEO of the Switzerland-based AQI air quality project.But that “needs a pretty strong central effort to push down sometimes the painful changes that need to be made in order to reduce air pollution,” he added.Pakistan’s government wants electric vehicles (EVs) to account for a third of new sales by 2030. Cheaper Chinese models launched in Pakistan in 2024, but currently make up just a fraction of overallcar sales in a country where 40 percent of the 240 million population lives in poverty, according to the World Bank. Pakistan had a taste of clean air during the pandemic, when a lockdown forced vhicles off the streets and factories to close in March 2020, but it was short-lived as the economic impact was too great for many to bear.”Air quality improved so much that we could even see the stars in Lahore in the evening,” saidOmar Masud a director of Urban Unit, which analyses pollution data for the government.While climate change can make air pollution worse, few Pakistanis worry about global warming, explained Abdul Sattar Babar, Ipsos director for Pakistan.”Most Pakistanis are overwhelmed by the economic challenges that they are facing,” he said.”When you can barely survive, climate issues are obviously not your primary concern”.