MUMBAI (ANP/AFP) - De Franse president Emmanuel Macron is aangekomen in India voor een driedaags bezoek. De landen hopen een deal te sluiten over de aankoop door India van een honderdtal Dassault Rafale-gevechtsvliegtuigen.

Dinsdag ontmoet Macron eerst premier Narendra Modi, voordat hij afreist naar New Delhi voor de AI Impact Summit. Deze conferentie rond kunstmatige intelligentie trekt naar verwachting meer dan 250.000 bezoekers.

Frankrijk en India hebben de afgelopen jaren nauwe economische en militaire banden opgebouwd. India zet die contacten in toenemende mate in om voor zijn defensie minder afhankelijk te worden van Rusland. Met de Rafale-deal is mogelijk 30 miljard euro gemoeid.

De grote Japanse zakenbank MUFG concentreert haar Europese activiteiten in Amsterdam. De ceo hier is een Nederlander, Harm Bots. „Als ik met het hoofdkantoor of onze klanten praat, is Europa wel vaak complex en ingewikkeld.”

Waarom hebben zoveel single vrouwen een kat, vroeg een lezer aan Japke-d. Bouma. „Omdat katten warm zijn, zichzelf kunnen redden, onderhoudsvrij, gracieus, schoon, niet met je in discussie gaan, en het voelt of ze er altijd voor je zijn.”

Ireland has announced what it says is the world's first permanent basic income program for artists, a scheme that will pay 2,000 selected artists $385 per week for three years, funded by an $21.66 million allocation from Budget 2026. The program follows a 2022 pilot -- the Irish government's first large-scale randomized control trial -- that found participants had greater professional autonomy, less anxiety, and higher life satisfaction.

An external cost-benefit analysis of the pilot calculated a return of $1.65 to society for every $1.2 invested. The new scheme will operate in three-year cycles, and artists who receive the payment in one cycle cannot reapply until the cycle after next. A three-month tapering-off period will follow each cycle. The government plans to publish eligibility guidelines in April and open applications in May, and payments to selected artists are expected to begin before the end of 2026.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Experts say the detention centres were a breeding ground for extremism and a new generation of IS members

Humanitarians warned for years that the camps in north-east Syria holding tens of thousands of family members of suspected Islamic State (IS) fighters would have to be dealt with. Calling them a “ticking time bomb”, relief groups said the women and children could not just be left to rot in squalid desert camps indefinitely, because eventually they would come home.

Despite the warnings, most states ignored the problem, refusing to repatriate their citizens. At least 8,000 women and children from more than 40 countries have been stranded in the camps of north-east Syria since 2019.

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⚽ FA Cup fourth-round news from the 7.30pm GMT kick-off
⚽ Live scores | FA Cup fifth round draw | And mail Xaymaca

Macclesfield: Dearnley, Fensome, Dawson, Buckley-Ricketts, Mellor, Duffy, Heathcote, Lacey, Osborne, Edmondson, Borthwick-Jackson

Subs: Matheson, Menayese, Griffiths, Dos Santos, Gale, Johnson, Whitehead, Pasiek, Stone.

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⚽ FA Cup draw news, due to begin from after 6.30pm GMT
⚽ Live scores | FA Cup review | And you can email Niall

TNT have kicked off with a walk-and-talk around a packed Macclesfield dressing room, the only problem being that the camera lens keeps steaming up. Let’s get on with it, shall we?

Three minutes until the draw, according to an on-screen countdown that will inevitably prove to be inaccurate. I think the fifth round is my personal favourite round of the Cup; close enough to Wembley but still with plenty of room for surprises.

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Bij een flat aan de Lissabonweg in Vlaardingen zijn maandagmiddag vier personen aangehouden, nadat zij op heterdaad betrapt werden bij een inbraak. Het is niet bekend of de verdachten al buit hadden gemaakt.