PARIJS (ANP/BLOOMBERG) - De Franse economie zou in het vierde kwartaal van dit jaar licht moeten groeien, maar er is wel "ongewoon" grote onzekerheid rond die voorspelling na de gewelddadige rellen van de afgelopen tijd en door de politieke onrust in het land. Dat meldt de Franse centrale bank.

In het derde kwartaal van dit jaar kromp de Franse economie nog onverwacht met 0,1 procent in vergelijking met de voorgaande periode. Dit jaar heeft de tweede economie van de eurozone daarmee nog geen groei laten zien. De centrale bank denkt dat in het lopende kwartaal er "bescheiden" groei kan zijn. Volgens de bank nam de activiteit in het bedrijfsleven vorige maand toe en wordt ook voor november op verdere vooruitgang gerekend.

Maar bedrijfsleiders zeggen zich wel steeds meer zorgen te maken over de sociale, fiscale en politieke situatie. Zo is er ook grote onrust over de hoge Franse staatsschuld en het hoge begrotingstekort. "Het economische klimaat is zeer fragiel en onzeker", aldus de centrale bank.

De Franse centralebankpresident Emmanuel Moulin zei vorige week dat door de zwakke economische cijfers van de afgelopen tijd de groeiverwachting voor dit jaar waarschijnlijk verlaagd zal moeten worden. Vooralsnog staat die verwachting nog op een groei van 0,4 procent.

BRUSSEL (ANP) - Op Malta na willen alle EU-lidstaten instemmen om meer en nieuwe tabaksproducten onder EU-richtlijnen voor accijnzen te laten vallen. Dat zei de Ierse minister van Financiën Simon Harris na afloop van overleg met EU-collega's in Brussel.

Voor een belastingherziening is instemming van alle 27 lidstaten nodig. "Het is jammer dat Malta nog niet zover is, maar ik hoop oprecht dat we - na wat reflectie en overleg - in december wel tot een akkoord kunnen komen", zei Harris. Malta is met name tegen het verhogen van de minimumaccijns.

Met de herziening moeten nieuwe tabaksproducten zoals vapes ook onder EU-richtlijnen vallen. Maar ook bijvoorbeeld nicotinezakjes, die populair zijn in de Scandinavische EU-lidstaten.

Zweden en Finland lijken nu ook overtuigd, maar er zou nog geen belastingtarief voor de zakjes zijn vastgesteld. Ze stemmen vooral in met "het principe" om het tabaksproduct onder de richtlijn te brengen, aldus Harris. Hij noemt dat alsnog "een stap voorwaarts".

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The New York Times: Investigators at the Commerce Department were deep into a monthslong investigation of a Singaporean company that they suspected of smuggling Nvidia's artificial intelligence chips into China when their work came to a sudden halt late last year. The investigation centered on Megaspeed, a data center company led by an executive who U.S. officials now believe to be a Chinese spy who had a relationship with Nvidia's chief executive, Jensen Huang. But the case was abruptly transferred to the Justice Department last year. The shift came after Commerce Department investigators working on the case received an email from Nvidia's general counsel seeking information about the inquiry into Megaspeed.

It is not necessarily unusual for Commerce Department agents working on a case to speak with a company's representatives about issues involving their firm. But what was unusual was the content of the message. Tim Teter, Nvidia's general counsel, said that Jeff Kessler, a top official at the department, had given Nvidia permission to reach out about the case. The agents were alarmed that Nvidia had invoked the name of Mr. Kessler, their superior, who was nominated to his role by President Trump. Some viewed Mr. Kessler's interaction with Nvidia as violating government procedure and potentially tainting the case, according to current and former government officials and others familiar with the incident.

It is not clear what led to Mr. Teter's outreach to the department, but the recent revelations about Mr. Huang's acknowledged affair with a Megaspeed executive have only intensified scrutiny of Nvidia's role in influencing policy on chip sales to China. [...] The incident raised questions about what Mr. Kessler, who reports directly to Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, had discussed with Nvidia. It also raised the possibility that those discussions could become their own subject of inquiry. Perhaps inadvertently, some officials said, Mr. Kessler had opened himself to accusations of undue influence and potentially jeopardized his department's work on Megaspeed. The case was quickly transferred to the Justice Department in an effort to avoid any potential compromise of the government's investigation of Megaspeed, these people said. The Justice Department is conducting a criminal inquiry into Megaspeed, according to people familiar with the matter.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The most intense shoe salesman you’ll ever meet, a CBS News report by Charles Kuralt from 1983 about a “champion” shoe salesman.

Pokémon released its Mega Evolution Delta Region cards this week and one man in Charleston, South Carolina wanted them so badly that he left his 6-year-old daughter in line at Target at 1 am with a pillow and a blanket. 

According to the incident report obtained by 404 Media, the person next to the little girl in line heard the father ask if his daughter “had the gun” before he left her alone at Target for more than an hour. Later, the father told detectives he left his daughter behind so “he could maintain his place in line and avoid missing the opportunity to purchase the cards.”

Pokémon cards are big business and people will wait to go to wild lengths to secure them. Waiting in line outside of a store for days before a new release is routine. John-Michael Dooley was waiting in line outside of a Target in Charleston, South Carolina with his 6-year-old daughter on the morning of November 6 when he decided to run home. He didn’t want to lose his place in line so he left his daughter behind “sleeping on the concrete,” according to a record of 911 calls obtained by 404 Media.

Other people waiting for Pokémon cards watched Dooley drive away and called the cops when he didn’t return. One guy on the scene started a timer on his phone when Dooley left and called the cops once it hit 45 minutes. “[He] advised later that he continued the timer on his phone, and the point in which the father returned to target showed 1 hour and 6 minutes,” according to an incident report obtained by 404 Media.

The person in line next to the 6-year-old “recalled the father waking his daughter up before he left and advised her he was ‘taking the dogs home,’” the report said. “Following this, [he] recalled hearing the father ask the daughter if ‘she had the gun’ before leaving.’ All parties on scene advised that the offender did not ask anyone to care or look after his daughter, and all stated the offender simply left her there by herself.”

The cops woke the girl up and she told them “she was at Target in line to get Pokémon cards with her father when the store opened,” according to the incident report. The police didn’t find a gun. “The only items the juvenile had in her possession when she was located was a pillow and a green blanket.”

Dooley returned to the line to find police talking to his daughter. “The juvenile still was unsure to the whereabouts of her father at this time,” the report said. “Several minutes after this, I could hear and see a dark colored SUV driving in the parking lot of Target in our direction. As the vehicle got closer, the [person who called 911] yelled out ‘That`s him.’”

Dooley got out of his car and police arrested him. “The offender was brought back to my patrol vehicle at which point he continued to say that he had only left to bring his dogs home,” the report said. “The offender reiterated this several times while also confirming that he left his 6-year-old daughter unattended for a period of time.” Dooley has been charged with unlawful conduct toward a child.

Pokémon card collecting has been at the center of a few strange crimes over the past few years. Fights broke out in multiple Target parking lots earlier this year when a 30th anniversary set dropped.

Massachusetts judge rejects bid by Clancy’s attorneys to have the case against her dismissed

A Massachusetts judge cleared the way on Monday for Lindsay Clancy to be tried again on ⁠murder charges for killing her three young children at her home in 2023, saying a retrial would not unconstitutionally subject her to a ⁠double prosecution for the same ⁠crime.

Judge William ​Sullivan in Plymouth rejected a bid by Clancy’s attorneys to have the case against her dismissed. The judge on 4 September declared ⁠a mistrial after the jury reported that a holdout juror was preventing it from reaching a unanimous verdict.

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Jensen Huang’s close relationship with president means Nvidia CEO’s affair with woman alleged to be working for Beijing is a big deal

A hand on the back, a kiss on the cheek; the footage of Alice Huang’s interaction with Jensen Huang in a Taipei venue last year does not seem particularly remarkable at first glance.

But the Nvidia chief executive’s revelation on Sunday that he had an affair with Ms Huang has given it new significance.

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• Arsenal defender was jeered during draw with Uruguay

• ‘Everyone can do whatever they want,’ says White

Ben White has said he has no complaints at being booed by England fans when he ended his international exile during the 1-1 draw with ­Uruguay this year.

The Arsenal defender, who has returned to Thomas Tuchel’s squad after missing last month’s camp because of injury, became unpopular with some supporters after leaving the 2022 World Cup in Qatar early for personal reasons. White made himself unavailable for the rest of Gareth Southgate’s time in charge and was given a frosty reception from the Wembley crowd when he came off the bench to make his first England appearance in almost four years during the friendly with Uruguay last March.

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Former builder got his big break after restoring the home of a producer who was working on a precursor to the show

Tommy Walsh, the building and DIY expert who appeared on television shows including Ground Force, has died aged 69 after a long illness.

Walsh started his career as a professional builder before rising to fame alongside Alan Titchmarsh and Charlie Dimmock on the popular BBC garden makeover show from 1997 to 2005.

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Caucus had 100 members in the last Congress, and six of the nine candidates it endorsed won, flipping seats

House progressives, long dismissed as the Democratic party’s leftwing outliers, are heading into the next Congress in larger numbers than ever and vowing to push the new Democratic majority to the left.

The Congressional Progressive caucus said on Sunday it will welcome more than 25 new members, including a record number who won in red districts, expanding its ranks to more than 105 lawmakers.

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Al twintig jaar reist Victor van Bronckhorst, de vader van Feyenoord-trainer Giovanni, op en neer tussen Krimpen aan den IJssel en de Molukken. Daar helpt hij kinderen al jaren met voetballen en schoolspullen. "Ik geef de persoonlijke aandacht die ze nodig hebben", vertelt hij over zijn werk daar.

Er is voorzichtig optimisme over de herstart van het project The Post aan de Coolsingel in Rotterdam. De bouwwerkzaamheden liggen al een jaar stil, waardoor 305 kopers van appartementen nog steeds niet weten waar ze aan toe zijn. Een kort geding brengt alle partijen nu mogelijk in beweging.

Buffel bust sees volunteers clear more than 100 square metres in Alice Springs. An art exhibition in Alice Springs shines a spotlight on the native plants driven out of Central Australia by the invasive weed, buffel grass.

` Toshio ' has added a photo to the pool:

The Imperial Palace and bridge reflections in Tokyo, Japan.

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Vorige week kwam er een nieuw nummer uit van Heartworms, artiestennaam van Jojo Orme. Het is zeker niet slecht, maar ik plaats hier toch iets ouders. Vooral vanwege die geweldige gitaarriff, die misschien wel iets te lang is om nog een riff te mogen heten. Waarmee ik absoluut niet bedoel dat het verder een middelmatig nummer is.

De muzikale sfeer doet denken aan de vleermuizen van de jaren ’80, al is de muziek van Heartworms zeker geen kopie van de new wave uit die tijd. Jojo Orme maakt haar muziek namelijk met eenentwintigste-eeuwse middelen. Elektronica dus, die wordt gecombineerd met gitaar, bas en drums.

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Stoptober is dood, leve rookvember! Een nieuwe strijder in de oorlog tegen betutteling meldt zich aan het front: Hogeschool Windesheim te Zwolle. Ze zijn daar van oudsher gewend om lekker buiten de lijntjes te kleuren (uit het archief: lekker losjes met tentamens, lekker creatief met boekhouden) en werpen daarom de eerste RookVrij-tegel naar het oeverloze gezeikstraal over de ROOKVRIJE GENERATIE. Je kunt de nicotinezucht wel uit de student halen... Of nee wacht, dat kan dus niet. Je kunt de zwartlongen hooguit verbannen naar een treurig achterafhoekje net buiten het terrein. Sinds kort staan op de Windesheim-campus heuse rookhokken, tot ontsteltenis van gemeente-ambtenaren, antirooklobbyisten en andere types die niet leuk zijn op feestjes. Ook zijn een paar fietsers boos dat er een hok in een fietsenstalling is geplaatst, maar eerder stonden alle rokers op een kluitje voor de uitgang van die fietsenstalling te paffen en moesten de fietsers hun gezonde vervoersgewoonte dus alsnog verpesten met het bij aankomst en vertrek doorklieven van een dikke kankerwolk. Je kunt niet alles hebben. Van leven ga je dood en wat je kunt oplopen door mee te roken is niet half zo erg als wat je overhoudt aan een opleiding van Hogeschool Windesheim. De overheid is uw moeder niet en hogescholen hoeven de studentjes evenmin te leren hoe ze gezond moeten leven, dingen leren kan immers niet zijn waar het hbo voor bedoeld is. Holadijee rookhok!

Tattooed with verdant foliage, the central figure in Kelly Sinnapah Mary’s portraits is both a product of and subsumed by the plant life that surrounds her. Born in the French Caribbean territory of Guadeloupe, the artist conjures the mythic stories of her home through surreal scenes in which humans, flora, and fauna find a sort of hybrid harmony.

Sinnapah Mary’s recurring figure is named Sanbras, which the artist derived from a derogatory children’s book popular in the 19th and 20th centuries. Through uncanny compositions that rely heavily on saturated color and delicate, organic textures, Sanbras appears as a subversive figure who morphs across various bodies of work and nods to the artist’s enduring questions: how relationships between all living beings manifest and the ways political forces—European colonialism and anthropocentrism, in particular—shape such connections.

Melding various forms of knowledge and cultural symbols is a central part of Sinnapah Mary’s work, which emerges from her own evolving understanding of her family history. “As a child, the artist identified as Afro-Caribbean but later discovered that she is a descendant of indentured workers from the South Indian state Tamil Nadu, who were brought to the Caribbean following the abolition of slavery to replace enslaved labor,” her gallery, Noor Cohan, writes in a statement.

How a familial history informs one’s understanding of place and identity appears in the tender portraits of The Book of Violette, which is named after artist’s grandmother. Often centering on lone protagonists, this series unfolds through folklore and references to the ways ancestral memory is passed through generations.

Sinnapah Mary has described her grandmother’s magical garden of medicinal plants, for example, which appears as luscious flowers with human heads sprout from a plaid coverlet in “Violette’s Garden: My Father’s Shoes.” Holding a book with gilded pages and smoking a pipe, the schoolgirl stares at the viewer with a third eye, a symbol of wisdom and spiritual connection in Hinduism. “When I paint, I am channeling both my family mythology—the stories that have been told to me, the memories I have—and broader histories and cosmologies to imagine a new world,” the artist says.

Save the date for Sinnapah Mary’s Between earth and sea opening in February at The Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum in Ridgefield, Connecticut. Until then, find more on Instagram.

Do stories and artists like this matter to you? Become a Colossal Member today and support independent arts publishing for as little as $7 per month. The article Caribbean Surrealism and Ancestral Memory Merge in Kelly Sinnapah Mary’s Lush Portraits appeared first on Colossal.

Unknown attackers used compromised identity and access management (IAM) credentials associated with Qubole's AWS account to access customer AWS environments, stealing secrets and other sensitive data from S3 buckets. Qubole is a cloud data processing platform that uses cross-account IAM roles to manage compute and access storage in customers' AWS environments without requiring customers to provide long-lived AWS access keys. The supply-chain attack abused this third-party, cross-account trust relationship. Google’s cloud-security shop Wiz declined to tell us how many organizations were affected, but called it a “broad, opportunistic supply chain campaign” that hit “multiple” customer environments. “Because many organizations left trust policies active even after deprecating the platform, the attacker was able to successfully assume integration roles, enumerate cloud resources, harvest secrets, and siphon data,” the researchers told The Register in an emailed response to questions. Neither AWS nor Qubole responded to The Register's inquiries. Wiz, working with Google's Mandiant incident responders after AI data security company Sentra flagged suspicious activity, traced the malicious activity back to October 14, when credentials associated with Qubole's AWS account were used to call the sts:AssumeRole API to obtain temporary credentials for customer-managed integration roles. The calls originated from Qubole AWS account 805246085872, and used IAM user ID AIDA3W7DIFLYOLTK63SFS, Wiz analysts Zack Morrow, Sean Johnstone, and Benjamin Read said in a Monday blog about the supply chain attack. “Across the affected environments, Wiz CIRT has not observed this IAM user in any activity other than that associated with this threat actor,” the trio wrote. This activity continued on October 15, and on October 18, the digital intruders began using a second IAM user from the same account. Once inside customers’ environments, the crooks began probing a ton of AWS services and stealing credentials, keys, and other secrets stored across Lambda, Secrets Manager, and SSM Parameter Store. The miscreants also used TruffleHog to test AWS credentials belonging to victim organizations, discover their Microsoft Entra ID secrets, and request OAuth tokens using Okta client credentials also uncovered while snooping around the AWS environments. Abusing the integration roles also allowed the criminals to steal data from customers’ S3 storage, although it seems they were largely opportunistic attackers, in some cases downloading entire buckets, as opposed to state-sponsored spies looking for specific data. The threat hunters haven’t attributed the supply chain attack to any particular group, and say they don’t have any insight into how the miscreants are using the stolen data. While investigating this incident, Wiz spotted a separate campaign between October 8 and October 11 that also used customer-owned AWS access keys for Qubole integrations. While a “small number” of these also resulted in the intruders compromising victim organizations’ AWS environments, Wiz said it can’t definitively connect the two sets of malicious activity. Organizations that have integrated with Qubole should rotate credentials - although rotating a credential does not end temporary sessions that were already issued. Customers should also review CloudTrail from October 1 onward, looking for AssumeRole events where userIdentity.accountId matches Qubole's AWS account ID, 805246085872, particularly those originating from non-AWS IP addresses. “For every role session you find, review all subsequent activity from that session, especially Secrets Manager, SSM Parameter Store, Lambda and S3,” the researchers wrote. “If the threat actor assumed an integration role, rotate every secret, parameter and Lambda environment variable the role could read, and revoke active sessions for the role.”®

Thomas Hawk posted a photo:

handwritten on slide, “June 1959, Silverbrook" date stamped on slide January 1960

Thomas Hawk posted a photo: