ROTTERDAM (ANP) - De Koninklijke Vereniging van Nederlandse Reders (KVNR) maakt zich zorgen over de tientallen schepen onder Nederlandse vlag en van Nederlandse reders die op dit moment in de Perzische Golf zijn. Volgens KVNR-directeur Annet Koster kunnen de schepen na de aanvallen op Iran en vergeldingsacties van dat land nu niet of heel moeilijk weg uit het gebied.
"Op dit moment is de situatie in het gebied erg onvoorspelbaar waardoor de veiligheid van de schepen en hun bemanning minutenkoersen zijn", laat Koster zondag weten. De KVNR houdt nauw contact met de schepen in de regio en volgt de ontwikkelingen op de voet.
"Iran claimt de Straat van Hormuz te hebben afgesloten, wat een vertrek van schepen uit de Perzische Golf complex maakt", legt Koster verder uit. "Daarnaast zijn er ook schepen in het gebied die, als de Straat van Hormuz open zou zijn, niet zelfstandig havens in de Perzische Golf kunnen verlaten. Bijvoorbeeld werkschepen, die met een sleepboot verplaatst moeten worden."
HEERENVEEN (ANP) - Schaatsster Gioya Lancee heeft haar leidende positie op het NK allround verstevigd door de 1500 meter te winnen. Ze was in een persoonlijk record van 1.55,83 de snelste. Jade Groenewoud werd tweede in 1.57,60, voor Meike Veen (1.57,88).
In het klassement na drie van de vier afstanden gaat Lancee ruim aan de leiding. Groenewoud staat tweede en moet op de afsluitende 5000 meter, die omstreeks 12.20 uur start, ruim zeventien seconden goedmaken. Melissa Wijfje staat derde op bijna 25 seconden achter plek 1.
De Amerikaans-Israëlische aanvallen op Iran en het regime zijn een "oorlogsverklaring aan het adres van moslims". Dat zegt president Masoud Pezeshkian op de Iraanse staatstelevisie. Bij die aanvallen werd onder meer de hoogste leider in het land, Ali Khamenei, gedood. Israël claimde zondag voor die precisieaanval verantwoordelijk te zijn.
"Iran beschouwt het als zijn legitieme verplichting en recht wraak te nemen op de daders en bedenkers van deze historische misdaad", aldus Pezeshkian.
Wederzijdse aanvallen gaan ook zondag nog door, onder meer rond Amerikaanse bases in naburige landen, zoals bij het Saudische Riyad.
PARIJS (ANP) - De Franse president Emmanuel Macron heeft online beelden gedeeld van het enteren van een olietanker op de Noordzee. "Een zware klap voor de schaduwvloot", oordeelde hij op X, doelend op de schepen die worden gebruikt om sancties te ontduiken.
Belgische troepen waren 's nachts aan boord gegaan van het vaartuig. Franse marinehelikopters speelden daarbij een ondersteunende rol, schreef Macron. Op de beelden is te zien hoe militairen zich aan touwen uit helikopters op het dek laten zakken.
De Belgische omroep VRT schrijft dat het geënterde schip Ethera heet en op de sanctielijst van de EU staat. Het zou de eerste keer zijn dat België een schip entert dat vermoedelijk tot de Russische schaduwvloot behoort.
De actie zou 's nachts door ministers zijn gecoördineerd vanuit een commandopost. De tanker is vervolgens overgebracht naar Zeebrugge. Premier Bart De Wever heeft zijn strijdkrachten gecomplimenteerd met "hun professioneel en doortastend optreden".
If you’re living or working in the region and have been impacted by the US-Israel conflict with Iran, we would like to hear from you
In a statement posted to social media, the Israel Defense Forces says it is now striking “targets” of the Iranian “regime in the heart of Tehran”.
Iran has launched a new round of missile and drone attacks targeting Israel and several Gulf cities, after vowing retaliation for the killing of supreme leader Ali Khamenei, who had ruled the country since 1989.
Continue reading...The mutual resentments that have fueled tensions between the US and Iran have simmered for nearly half a century
For millions of younger Americans, the sudden explosion of Iran onto the national political stage and consciousness may seem like a bolt from the blue.
Yet for older generations and those with deeper historical awareness, Donald Trump’s announcement on Saturday of strikes against a distant foe is more like the outcome of a collision long foretold.
Continue reading...Sales beat wider retail sector last year thanks to customers inspired by websites such as Vinted, industry body says
Young people inspired by secondhand fashion websites such as Vinted and Depop are helping charity shops thrive despite rising energy and employment costs.
Save the Children’s retail sales rose 3% last year, helped by a surge in December when the charity rang up 11% more than the same month a year before, raising more than £1m for its causes.
Continue reading...In her teens, the Mercury prize-winning musician was stuck on tour buses when she should have been on the dancefloor. Now she is throwing herself into club culture – and living on her own terms
Until only a few years ago, Arlo Parks had never been clubbing. The lack of a party phase makes sense when you consider that while most of her friends were decamping to university at 18, Parks was busy bagging a record deal, releasing her debut album, Collapsed in Sunbeams, a few months after her 20th birthday. “It’s something that I almost didn’t have time to think about,” she says, speaking from LA, where she has lived since 2022, and where she feels very much at home. (This morning has already consisted of gymming and a walk in 28-degree sunshine that’s as bright as her neon-red hair.) “But I definitely did come to the conclusion that I had missed out – I hadn’t really had the time to be silly and have crazy, deep conversations in the smoking area. To be in an anonymous space and feel like you’re part of this whole.”
Now 25, she has very much made up for lost time with her third album, Ambiguous Desire – a paean to the night-time, which fuses elements of house, techno, UK garage and more with Parks’s celestial, feather-light vocals. While she hasn’t ditched the guitars altogether, it’s a long way from where we were when we first met Parks, born Anaïs Marinho, back in 2018. Fresh out of sixth form, where she had honed her craft via GarageBand, hers was a confessional, clear-eyed strain of alt-pop, with influences that ranged from Nick Cave to Erykah Badu. Before long, she had signed with an agent and nabbed that aforementioned record deal with Transgressive, fuelled by youthful chutzpah rather than any nepo connections. While her songs were often laced with perfectly curated cultural callbacks (“You do your eyes like Robert Smith,” she cooed on Black Dog), she didn’t shy away from singing about mental health, romantic rejection or drug abuse. One of the top comments on the YouTube video for her early single Eugene reads: “It’s so undignified for a 51-year-old bloke to be crying on a train about a song but here I am.”
Continue reading...Exclusive: Labour’s Rushanara Ali plans to intervene in elections bill amid warnings of foreign interference
A former Labour minister has added her voice to those of a growing list of experts and senior MPs calling for a ban on political donations in cryptocurrency as concerns grow over foreign interference in British elections.
Rushanara Ali, the Labour MP who helped draft the elections bill when she was a minister in the communities department, called for the government to strengthen the legislation with an outright ban on donations in digital currencies.
Continue reading...A halt on trade flows through the strait of Hormuz could spell trouble for many developed economies
The US-Israeli war on Iran has ignited fears that escalating military aggression in the Middle East could send oil prices soaring, push up prices at the pump and drive a global economic downturn.
The US began “major combat operations” in Iran on Saturday morning, shortly after Israel launched a strike against Tehran. Within hours of the US-Israeli strikes, tankers in the strait of Hormuz were reportedly warned by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard that no ship would be allowed to pass through the world’s most critical oil trade route.
Continue reading...
The rise in popularity suggests that Anthropic is benefiting from its presence in news headlines, stemming from its refusal to have its models used for mass domestic surveillance or for fully autonomous weapons... OpenAI's ChatGPT sat at No. 1 on the App Store rankings on Saturday, while Google's Gemini was at No. 3... On Jan. 30, [Claude] was ranked No. 131 in the U.S., and it bounced between the top 20 and the top 50 for much of February, according to data from analytics company Sensor Tower... [And Friday night, for 85.3 million followers] pop singer Katy Perry posted a screenshot of Anthropic's Pro subscription for consumers, with a heart superimposed over it.
Friday Anthropic posted "We are deeply grateful to our users, and to the industry peers, policymakers, veterans, and members of the public who have voiced their support in recent days. Thank you. "
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peaceful-jp-scenery posted a photo:
Mt.Bandai(1,816m) from Mt.Nishiazuma (2,035m)
西吾妻山からの磐梯山
I also took a wide-angle shot with my iPhone. Lake Inawashiro appears hazy to the left of Mt. Bandai. In the foreground is Urabandai, from left to right, you can see Lake Akimoto, Lake Onogawa, and Lake Hibara.
iPhoneで広角も撮影していました。磐梯山の左は霞んでいますが、猪苗代湖になります。磐梯山の手前は左から秋元湖、小野川湖、桧原湖と、裏磐梯の展望が広がっています。
Kita-shiobaramura, Fukushima pref, Japan