Town Hall News

(Reuters) – Here are some of the events in Belarus leading up to the trial of Nobel Peace Prize winner Ales Bialiatski and his sentencing on Friday to 10 years in prison. Bialiatski denied the charges against him, and he and some human rights groups say the case against him was politically motivated. 2020 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION Belarus holds a presidential election on Aug. 9, 2020, in which veteran leader Alexander […]

By Paul Sandle LONDON (Reuters) -Arm, the chip designer owned by Japan’s SoftBank, said on Friday it would pursue a U.S.-only listing this year, dashing the British government’s hopes that the tech giant would return to the London stock market. The company did not completely rule out an eventual London listing, saying it intended to consider a subsequent IPO there in due course, without providing further details. But the decision […]

PARIS (Reuters) – Paris Saint Germain player Achraf Hakimi is facing a criminal investigation in France after an allegation of rape was made against him, said an official from the Nanterre prosecution office close to Paris on Friday. Hakimi, a Morocco international, could not immediately be reached for comment. PSG did not immediately reply to a Reuters request for comment. Hakimi has been placed under police monitoring and was banned […]

By Milana Vinn NEW YORK (Reuters) -OneSpan Inc, a U.S. cybersecurity tools vendor that has become the target of activist hedge funds such as Legion Partners Asset Management, is exploring options that include a sale of the company, people familiar with the matter said. OneSpan is working with investment bank Evercore Inc on a sale process that could attract interest from other companies and private equity firms, the sources said, […]

By Timothy Gardner WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The Biden administration said on Thursday it is offering $1.2 billion in aid to extend the life of distressed nuclear power plants which, for the first time, could offer funding to a plant that has recently closed. President Joe Biden’s climate team believes nuclear power is a crucial source of virtually carbon-free electricity needed to be maintained and expanded to reach his pledge of […]

By Akash Sriram (Reuters) – Apple Inc has blocked an update to email app BlueMail, which uses a customized version of OpenAI’s GPT-3 language model, the co-founder of the app developer told Reuters on Thursday. “Apple has blocked the BlueMail update and continues to treat BlueMail unfairly and to discriminate against us,” Blix’s Ben Volach said. “Other GPT-powered apps seem not to be restricted,” he added. Apple, which rejected the […]

By Suzanne Smalley (Reuters) – The White House on Thursday announced a new cybersecurity strategy in the latest effort by the U.S. government to bolster its cyber defenses amid a steady increase in hacking and digital crimes targeting the country. The strategy, which is intended to guide future policy, urges tighter regulation of existing cybersecurity practices across industries and improved collaboration between the government and private sector. It comes after […]

By Foo Yun Chee BRUSSELS (Reuters) – The metaverse, shared virtual worlds accessible via the Internet, is the next digital market to attract regulatory scrutiny, EU antitrust chief Margrethe Vestager said on Thursday. The metaverse has come into sharper focus since Facebook changed its name to Meta Platforms two years ago to reflect its bet on the new sector as the successor to the mobile internet. That move has in […]

By Kanishka Singh WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The U.S. Federal Trade Commission’s lone Republican commissioner, Christine Wilson, will step down from her role at the end of March, she said in a letter to President Joe Biden on Thursday, in which she criticized FTC Chair Lina Khan. In addition, Holly Vedova, head of the agency’s bureau of competition, said she would retire after decades at the agency but did not give a […]