Author: DW

Tens of thousands of people in Hungary protested in the capital, Budapest on Friday amid a continuing fallout from a scandal that has rocked Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s government. President Katalin Novak and former Justice Minister Judit Varga both resigned last weekend for supporting a decision to grant a pardon to a man implicated in a child sex abuse scandal in April 2023. The deputy director of a state-run orphanage who had been imprisoned for covering up a string of child sexual abuses was pardoned last year, but it only became known early this month.  Both ministers were close allies of Orban, whose party…

For the self-styled “King of New York”, the crown has slipped – and how.Donald Trump made his money and reputation in the New York real estate business, propelling him to celebrity and to the White House in 2016. As his property portfolio towered high, so did Donald Trump – the brand.It, and he, look more than a tad tawdry today.This civil fraud trial exposed a scam in which Trump exaggerated his wealth by more than $3bn (£2.38bn). The Trump organisation displayed a routine disregard for the law as it sought to build the empire and it continues beyond this judgment.To…

OpenAI, the US company behind the ChatGPT chatbot and Dall-e image generator, on Thursday unveiled an AI application that can produce short realistic videos. The application, called Sora, can create high-quality videos of up to a minute in length using a short text command called a prompt, OpenAI said. The application can also turn a photo into a video or extend a short video. The tool isn’t yet publicly available. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman on X, formerly known as Twitter, said the company was “offering access to a limited number of creators” in a testing phase. He also invited users…

Members of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) are apparently not taking a vacation to mark the Chinese New Year, which began on February 10. Taiwan’s Ministry of Defense has counted at least 43 Chinese fighter jets and 29 warships maneuvering near the island in the first six days of the new Year of the Dragon. Beijing considers Taiwan, which has been self-governing since 1949, to be Chinese territory that one day will be “reunited” with the mainland. China has carried out more and more regular “combat readiness patrols” in recent years, with fighter jets flying over the center line of the Taiwan Strait, an unofficial…

Lord Cameron has reacted after a US congresswoman’s outburst, in which she said the foreign secretary should “kiss my ass”.He laughed off the comments by prominent right-wing Republican Marjorie Taylor Greene, which came following his call for US legislators to pass a bill committing more funding for Ukraine. Lord Cameron addressed the comments – made to Sky News – during a speech at the Munich Security Conference on Friday.”We met,” he told the audience in Germany.”I went to the Republican study group lunch, talking about exactly this issue.” “We didn’t get anatomical at that stage, it was very early in…

Interest in obtaining Russian citizenship has fallen sharply since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. According to the Russian Interior Ministry, some 63,600 people applied for a Russian passport in 2023 — almost half the number in 2022, and a quarter of that in 2015. Denis (not his real name) was born in the Latvian city of Liepaja on the Baltic coast. He lived there until 1994 before moving to Veliky Novgorod in Russia with his family and obtaining Russian citizenship. But in 2012, he had to decide between his Latvian and Russian passport, after Latvia decided to accept dual…

A US judge on Friday ordered Donald Trump to pay nearly $355 million (€329.4 million) for fraud. He also banned Trump from operating businesses in the state of New York for three years. “The Court hereby enjoins Donald Trump… from serving as an officer or director of any New York corporation or other legal entity in New York for a period of three years,” Judge Arthur Engoron wrote in his ruling. He said that Trump and other defendants in the case “are incapable of admitting the error of their ways” and showed a “lack of contrition and remorse.” Trump’s adult sons,…

US President Joe Biden has said he is “contemplating” steps to punish Moscow after he blamed Vladimir Putin and his “thugs” for the death of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny.Mr Biden said he was “outraged” but “not surprised” by the death of the prominent Putin critic as he joined other world leaders in saying the Kremlin should be held accountable.UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak described Mr Navalny as the “fiercest advocate for Russian democracy”, while Canadian leader Justin Trudeau said his passing is a reminder of “exactly what a monster Putin is”.Mr Navalny had been serving a 19-year sentence on…

Skip next section Zelenskyy signs security pact with Macron in Paris02/16/2024February 16, 2024Zelenskyy signs security pact with Macron in ParisUkrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has signed a security deal with France. He traveled to Paris on Friday evening after signing a separate deal with Germany. “It’s an ambitious, very substantive security agreement … We can’t talk openly about all the details,” Zelenskyy told reporters at a joint press conference with French President Emmanuel Macron. “Each of the agreements strengthens Ukraine in its own way,” he said, comparing the deals reached with France and Germany. The agreement, which is set to last…

The war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza is increasingly influencing Saudi Arabia’s foreign and domestic policies. “The situation has become a delicate balancing act for Saudi Arabia,” Sebastian Sons, senior researcher for the German think tank CARPO, told DW. “The current war offers a possibility to correct years of relatively little Saudi commitment on behalf of the Palestinians, while at the same time, Saudi Arabia, the guardian of two holy sites in Islam, continues to pursue its normalization efforts with Israel,” Sons said. For months, the process of normalizing Saudi-Israeli ties, one promoted by the US, was seen by Saudi Arabia and Israel as offering…