The Guardian

Latest news, sport, business, comment, analysis and reviews from the Guardian, the world's leading liberal voice

Antonio Tejero obituary

Military officer who led an armed assault on the Spanish parliament in an attempted coup in 1981

Lt Col Antonio Tejero, who has died aged 93, terrorised much of Spain on 23 February 1981 when he led an armed assault on the Spanish parliament, the Cortes, in Madrid.

At 6.23pm, some 250 civil guards burst into the semi-circular chamber of the lower house during the investiture of Leopoldo Calvo-Sotelo as the new prime minister. For 18 hours the entire parliament was held hostage until a negotiated surrender the following morning; the Communist party leader Santiago Carrillo said he had expected to be shot.

Continue reading...

Iran is becoming more defiant in face of US-Israeli onslaught

Tehran spurns Trump envoy Steve Witkoff and insists on guarantees it will not be attacked again

Iran has spurned two messages from Donald Trump’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff, seeking a ceasefire as its leaders sense it is not losing the war and the US president is at the minimum feeling the political pressure.

The foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, has further said a unilateral declaration from Trump that the US had won the war would not bring an end to the conflict. The implication is that even if the US announced a willingness to end its attacks, Iran might be willing to continue the conflict in some form, or keep its chokehold on shipping seeking to navigate the strait of Hormuz.

Continue reading...

Familiar tale for Slot after Lemina gives Galatasaray edge over Liverpool

The good news for Liverpool is that the situation is salvageable, when it really might not have been. The bad news is that they were distinctly second best for the first three quarters of the first leg of their Champions League last-16 tie.

Nobody who saw their second half collapse away to Juventus in the play-off round could be confident Galatasaray are a team capable of squeezing the life out of the second leg. There is a nervousness about them at the back, a persistent sense of misfortune about to strike, but going forward they are breezy, quick and fun. Their only regret will be that, having taken an early lead through the former Wolves midfielder Mario Lemina, they did not add a second goal to give them more to defend at Anfield.

Continue reading...

Alabama governor spares death row inmate set for nitrogen gas execution

Kay Ivey commutes sentence of Charles ‘Sonny’ Burton, saying death penalty would be unfair as he did not fire the fatal shot

The governor of Alabama commuted the death sentence of a 75-year-old inmate who was set to be executed this week, even though he was not in the building when the victim of the murder he was sentenced for was killed.

Kay Ivey, the Republican governor of the state, reduced Charles “Sonny” Burton’s sentence to life in prison without possibility of parole this week. The move marks the second time the governor has granted clemency of a death row inmate since she took office in 2017.

Burton was sentenced to death for the 1991 shooting death of a customer, Doug Battle, during a store robbery. However, another man, Derrick DeBruce, shot Battle after Burton had left the store.

DeBruce’s death sentence was reduced on appeal to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Ivey said in a statement that she could not fairly administer the death penalty to Burton when the man who actually killed Battle was allowed to live.

“I firmly believe that the death penalty is just punishment for society’s most heinous offenders, as shown by the 25 executions I have presided over as governor. In order to ensure the continued viability of the death penalty, however, I also believe that a government’s most consequential action must be administered fairly and proportionately,” she said.

Continue reading...

Haiti president’s assassination driven by greed and power, US prosecutors say

Opening statements begin in Miami trial of four men accused in the 2021 killing of Jovenel Moïse

Greed, arrogance and power were the driving forces behind four men charged in the US for the 2021 assassination of Haiti’s last elected president, Jovenel Moïse , prosecutors told a court on Tuesday during opening statements.

Federal prosecutors and defense attorneys began presenting opening statements in the trial in Miami for Arcangel Pretel Ortíz, Antonio Intriago, Walter Veintemilla and James Solages. They are charged with conspiring in South Florida to kidnap or kill Haiti’s former leader. Moïse’s assassination led to unprecedented turmoil in the Caribbean nation, where gang leaders have grown increasingly violent and empowered.

Continue reading...

De Speld

Uw vaste prik voor betrouwbaar nieuws.

Jerno (21) vermoedt dat die dronken appjes van zaterdagnacht ‘ook verstuurd zijn door Russische hackers’

​“Moet je zien joh, heel ziek dit”, zegt Jerno (21) uit Culemborg uit het niets in de groepschat met zijn vrienden. Hij stuurt een link door naar een NOS-artikel over het nieuws dat Russische hackers de WhatsApp- en Signal-accounts van ambtenaren zijn binnengedrongen. “Volgens mij hebben ze mij ook te grazen genomen hoor, zaterdagnacht, toen jullie dachten dat ik al die dronken appjes stuurde. En ik ben niet eens een ambtenaar, kun je nagaan.”

Jerno wijst op de grote hoeveelheid berichten die hij in de nacht van zaterdag op zondag naar zijn vrienden stuurde. Daarin schreef hij onder meer in een lang bericht vol spelfouten dat hij bang is dat hij nooit meer liefde vindt en dat hij denkt dat Fenna het met hem heeft uitgemaakt omdat hij niet mannelijk genoeg is. Daarna stuurde hij een audiobericht waarin hij het lied ‘Altijd vrijgezel’ van Gerard Joling meezong. “Zo zie je maar hoe ver Rusland al is met AI”, concludeert Jerno nu. Hij leest de berichten nog eens terug, en ziet een hele reeks verwijderde appjes. “Nou ja, dat is dan wel weer netjes van die Russen.”

Jerno stuurt vandaag ook een bericht naar zijn ex Fenna, die hij al maanden niet had gesproken, totdat hij haar zaterdagnacht uit het niets meerdere Suzan & Freek-nummers doorstuurde met als begeleidende tekst ‘wij????’ Daarna volgde nog een lange reeks appjes. Hij legt haar uit dat “de Russen hem te pakken hebben genomen.”

“Volgens mij hebben ze ook nog m’n Instagram-account gehackt, anders snap ik niet hoe ze kunnen weten dat je nieuwe vriend Davey heet. Motherfuckers. Ik hoop dat het niet vaker voorkomt, maar ik kan niks garanderen, want dit is al de derde keer deze maand. Eikels.”

​​​

&''


Sargasso

Hopeloos Genuanceerd

Closing Time | Stratocumulus Evergaol

Supervage, progessieve, experimentele space opera met invloeden van jazz, death en psychedelische metal. En ja joh, tuurlijk een nummer (Stratocumulus Evergaol) van een half uur, want waarom ook niet? Supervette cover art trouwens, past er uitstekend bij. Cryptic Shift, mensen, vette shit!

Slashdot

News for nerds, stuff that matters

OpenAI Is Walking Away From Expanding Its Stargate Data Center With Oracle

OpenAI is reportedly backing away from expanding its AI data center partnership with Oracle because newer generations of Nvidia GPUs may arrive before the facility is even operational. CNBC reports: Artificial intelligence chips are getting upgraded more quickly than data centers can be built, a market reality that exposes a key risk to the AI trade and Oracle's debt-fueled expansion. OpenAI is no longer planning to expand its partnership with Oracle in Abilene, Texas, home to the Stargate data center, because it wants clusters with newer generations of Nvidia graphics processing units, according to a person familiar with the matter.

The current Abilene site is expected to use Nvidia's Blackwell processors, and the power isn't projected to come online for a year. By then, OpenAI is hoping to have expanded access to Nvidia's next-generation chips in bigger clusters elsewhere, said the person, who asked not to be named due to confidentiality. In a post on X, Oracle called the reports "false and incorrect." However, it only said existing projects are on track and didn't address expansion plans.

CNBC notes: "Oracle secured the site, ordered the hardware, and spent billions of dollars on construction and staff, with the expectation of going bigger."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The Register

Biting the hand that feeds IT — Enterprise Technology News and Analysis

Amazon insists AI coding isn't source of outages

E-souk disputes report linking 'Gen-AI assisted changes' to recent high-impact incidents

Amazon's weekly operations meeting today reportedly focused on recent service outages and on the role that code changes attributed to generative AI may have played. However, the company is downplaying the possibility of problems with AI.…

Rijnmond - Nieuws

Het laatste nieuws van vandaag over Rotterdam, Feyenoord, het verkeer en het weer in de regio Rijnmond

Veel oud-Hollandse namen en een ellenlange kieslijst: zeven opvallende feitjes over de verkiezingen

De verkiezingen van de gemeenteraad staan weer voor de deur. Rijnmond legde al kieslijsten in onze regio naast elkaar en selecteerde zeven opvallende weetjes.