President Luiz Incio Lula da Silva of Brazil is visiting Beijing this week, and Chinas Xi Jinping will also meet top officials from other Latin American and Caribbean nations to emphasize their ties.

The proposal, which is to be considered this week by a key House panel, omits some of the furthest-reaching reductions to the health program but would leave millions without coverage or facing higher costs.

President Donald Trump speaks with reporters as he signs executive orders in the Oval Office at the White House, Feb. 10, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, file)2025-05-12T05:13:10Z DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) On his trip this week to the Middle East, U.S. President Donald Trump will visit Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, though his most pressing regional challenges concern two other countries: Israel and Iran.After ending a ceasefire two months ago, Israel is intensifying the war in the Gaza Strip, where a blockade on food, medicine and other supplies is worsening a humanitarian crisis. And Iran, an enemy of Israel and a rival of Saudi Arabia, stands on the cusp of being able to develop nuclear weapons.Yet Trump will focus his attention on three energy-rich nations home to existing or planned Trump-branded real estate projects places where he aims to leverage American economic interests to do what he personally revels in: making business deals.This is his happy place, said Jon B. Alterman, a senior vice president at the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies. His hosts will be generous and hospitable. Theyll be keen to make deals. Theyll flatter him and not criticize him. And theyll treat his family members as past and future business partners. But Trump wont be able to avoid altogether diplomacy on Gaza or Iran: The Gulf countries hosting him are also interested in easing the regional tensions that emanate from these two places.Trump can easily score a win by reassuring them of Americas strategic commitment to the region, demonstrating consistent messaging and generally rising above the fray, analysts Elizabeth Dent and Simon Henderson of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy wrote Friday. Trump doesnt plan to visit IsraelBy not scheduling a trip to Israel during his first trip to the region during his second term as president, Trump is reinforcing a feeling in Israel that its interests may not be top of mind for him.That sense intensified last week, when Trump announced that the U.S. would halt its strikes on the Houthis, an Iran-backed rebel group in Yemen that agreed to stop its attacks on American vessels in the Red Sea. The Houthis attacks on Israel did not appear to be covered by that deal, which came as a surprise to Israel, according to an Israeli official who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive diplomatic issue. Days after the deal between the U.S. and the Houthis and despite a two-day Israeli assault on Houthi targets a missile from Yemen again set off air raid sirens in Israel. Then Israels military warned Sunday that Houthi-controlled ports in Yemen could be targeted again.Trumps move to launch negotiations with Iran over its nuclear program also jarred Israel, which fears a deal that would not be strict enough to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon or rein in its support for regional militant groups.Israel had hoped that Trump might provide military assistance in any strike it carried out on the countrys nuclear facilities an action that is unrealistic so long as there are negotiations, or if they reach a deal.That has raised questions in Israel over Trumps reliability on other major issues, like a long-sought normalization deal with Saudi Arabia as part of any defense pact the administration may reach with the kingdom. Saudi Arabia has said it would only normalize ties with Israel in exchange for significant concessions for the Palestinians toward statehood, something the current Israeli government is unlikely to agree to. Israel has said it will hold off on expanding the war in Gaza until after Trumps visit, leaving the window open for a new ceasefire deal to materialize. And while Hamas and Trump announced that the last living American hostage in Gaza, Edan Alexander, will be freed as part of efforts to establish a ceasefire, it is not clear what involvement Israel had in that deal. Still, Trump has given Israel free rein in Gaza and, like Israel, blames Hamas for any civilian casualties.U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee played down any significance to Trumps decision not to visit the country, saying in interviews with Israeli media that his visit to the region was focused on economic issues. No major breakthrough in Iran nuclear talksFor Iran, much depends on the talks it is having with the U.S. over its rapidly advancing nuclear program. A reported two-month deadline to reach a deal likely has passed as U.S. officials signal America may push for Iran to give up enrichment entirely something Tehran has insisted is a red line.Although four rounds of talks mediated by Oman have not led to a major breakthrough, they have gone into the so-called expert level meaning specifics about any possible accord likely have been discussed.Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi traveled over the weekend to both Saudi Arabia and Qatar ahead of Trumps trip. Iran likely is trying to pass messages to the U.S. while signaling its interest in continuing the talks. Iranian officials increasingly threaten to pursue a nuclear weapon, while Trump and Israel have both threatened to strike Iranian nuclear sites if a deal isnt reached. The Islamic Republic is running out of options. Its economy has cratered since Trump in 2018 unilaterally pulled America out of their initial nuclear deal with world powers. And Irans self-described Axis of Resistance a group of aligned nations and militant groups, including Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon has been mauled since the Israel-Hamas war began.Iran also faces internal political pressure, including from women increasingly refusing to wear the state-mandated headscarf, or hijab.There is one thing that unites most Iranians, however pride over the Persian Gulf. Trumps consideration of having America uniformly call the body of water the Arabian Gulf instead drew fierce criticism from across the country.This gulf has always been the Persian Gulf and it will forever remain the Persian Gulf, Tehrans Friday prayer leader Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami saidTrumps 2017 trip still haunts the GulfAfter starting his trip in Saudi Arabia, Trump will then go to Qatar, which recently announced plans for a Trump-branded development there.This tight embrace of the president comes after his first trip to the Middle East in 2017 apparently sparked what became known as the Qatar crisis. That is when Bahrain, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the UAE boycotted Qatar over its support of Islamists in the region and its ties to Iran, with which it shares a massive offshore natural gas field.The dispute grew so serious that Kuwaits ruling emir at the time, Sheikh Sabah Al Ahmad Al Sabah, suggested on a visit to the White House there could have been military action.Trump initially criticized Qatar as having historically been a funder of terrorism at a very high level at the start of the boycott. Less than a year later, he praised Qatar and rolled that back. The four nations ended their boycott just before Biden took office.Then on Sunday, President Donald Trump said he was ready to accept a luxury Boeing 747-8 jumbo jet as a gift from the ruling family of Qatar during his trip to the Middle East. U.S. officials say it could be converted into a potential presidential aircraft which would amount to the president accepting an astonishingly valuable gift from a foreign government With crude oil prices trading just over $60 a barrel lows not seen since 2021 one major criticism Trump has for the Gulf states isnt there. The question is how Trump will deal with the regions multitude of crises and still-tender wounds.To avoid a repeat of the 2017 diplomatic crisis, Trump should reemphasize efforts to unite the Gulf said Dent and Henderson, of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.___Goldenberg reported from Tel Aviv, Israel. JON GAMBRELL Gambrell is the news director for the Gulf and Iran for The Associated Press. He has reported from each of the Gulf Cooperation Council countries, Iran and other locations across the world since joining the AP in 2006. twitter instagram mailto TIA GOLDENBERG Goldenberg is an Associated Press reporter and producer covering Israel and the Palestinian territories. She previously reported on East and West Africa from Nairobi. twitter mailto

Youngsters hold a photograph of the jailed leader of the rebel Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK, Abdullah Ocalan as they gather to watch live on a tv screen a Pro-Kurdish Peoples' Equality and Democracy Party, or DEM, delegation members releasing an statement from Ocalan, in Diyarbakir, Turkey, Thursday, Feb. 27, 2025. (AP Photo/Metin Yoksu, File)2025-05-12T06:17:25Z ANKARA, Turkey (AP) A Kurdish militant group announced a historic decision Monday to disband and disarm as part of a new peace initiative with Turkey, after four decades of armed conflict.The decision by the Kurdistan Workers Party, or PKK, was announced by the Firat News Agency, a media outlet close to the group. It comes days after it convened a party congress in northern Iraq.In February, PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan, who has been imprisoned on an island near Istanbul since 1999, urged his group to convene a congress and formally decide to disband, marking a pivotal step toward ending the decadeslong conflict that has claimed tens of thousands of lives since the 1980s. On March 1, the PKK announced a unilateral ceasefire, but attached conditions, including the creation of a legal framework for peace negotiations.The group has led an armed insurgency since 1984 that has left claimed tens of thousands of lives. It is listed as a terror group by Turkey and its Western allies. Firat news said the congress decided to dissolve the PKKs organizational structure and the end armed struggle, with the practical implementation of this process to be led and overseen by (Ocalan.) As a result, activities carried out under the name PKK were formally terminated.Congress assessed that the PKKs struggle had brought the Kurdish issue to the point of resolution through democratic politics, thus completing its historical mission.

A villager cleans the roof of his house damaged by Pakistani artillery shelling at RS Pura, along the International Border, India, Monday, May 12, 2025, after the two countries reported no incidents of firing overnight. (AP Photo/Channi Anand)2025-05-12T05:23:04Z NEW DELHI (AP) Indian and Pakistani authorities said on Monday that there were no reported incidents of firing overnight along the heavily militarized region between their countries, the first time in recent days that the two nations were not shooting at each other.India and Pakistan on Saturday reached an understanding to stop all military actions on land, in the air and at the sea, in a U.S.-brokered ceasefire to stop escalating hostilities between the two nuclear-armed rivals that threatened regional peace. The night remained largely peaceful across Jammu and Kashmir, and other areas along the international border, the Indian army said in a statement, adding that no incidents had been reported.Senior military officials from India and Pakistan are scheduled to speak later Monday to assess if ceasefire was holding. There were fears it would not hold after they accused each other of violations just hours after it was announced. Local government officials in Pakistan-administered Kashmir reported no incidents of cross-border firing along the Line of Control and said that civilians displaced by recent skirmishes between Pakistani and Indian forces were returning to their homes. There were celebrations in the Pakistani city of Lahore on Sunday as India and Pakistan reached a ceasefire deal after they fired volleys of missiles across their borders on Saturday. (AP Video: Jahanzaib Aurangzaib) Pakistans military spokesperson, Lt. Gen. Ahmad Sharif, said late Sunday that Pakistan remains committed to upholding the ceasefire and will not be the first to violate it.He also confirmed that senior military officials from both nations would speak on by phone on Monday. The militaries of the two countries have been engaged in one of their most serious confrontations in decades since last Wednesday, when India struck targets inside Pakistan it said were affiliated with militants responsible for the massacre of 26 tourists in Indian-controlled Kashmir. The tourists, mostly Indian Hindu men, were brutally killed in front of their families in the meadow town of Pahalgam last month. India accused Pakistan of backing the militants who carried out the massacre, a charge Islamabad denied. The incident first led to a spat of tit-for-tat diplomatic measures by both the nations, sending their bilateral ties to a near historic low.The two expelled each others diplomats, shut their airspace, land borders, and suspended a crucial water treaty.After Wednesdays strikes in Pakistan, both sides exchanged heavy fires along their de facto border in the restive Kashmir region followed by missile and drone strikes into each others territories, mainly targeting military installations and airbases. Dozens of civilians were killed on both the sides in heavy shelling, the two countries said.The Indian military on Sunday for the first time claimed its strikes into Pakistan-controlled Kashmir and Pakistan last week killed more than 100 militants, including prominent leaders.Lt. Gen. Rajiv Ghai, the director general of Indias military operations, who will be talking to his Pakistani counterpart on Monday, said Indias armed forces struck nine militant infrastructure and training facilities, including sites of the Lashkar-e-Taiba group that India blames for carrying out major militant strikes in India and the disputed region of Kashmir. Ghai said at least 35 to 40 Pakistani soldiers were killed in clashes along the Line of Control, the de facto border that divides the disputed Kashmir region between India and Pakistan. Five Indian soldiers were also killed, he said.Pakistans Information Minister Attaullah Tarar on Thursday said his countrys armed forces had killed 40 to 50 Indian soldiers along the Line of Control. Pakistani military also claimed to have shot down five Indian fighter jets and inflected heavy losses on Indian military installations by targeting 26 locations in India.The Associated Press couldnt independently verify the claims made by India and Pakistan.

Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, R-La., speaks during a news conference at the Capitol, Tuesday, May 6, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Rod Lamkey, Jr.)2025-05-12T04:36:35Z WASHINGTON (AP) House Republicans unveiled the cost-saving centerpiece of President Donald Trumps big, beautiful bill late Sunday, at least $880 billion in cuts largely to Medicaid to help cover the cost of $4.5 trillion in tax breaks.Tallying hundreds of pages, the legislation is touching off the biggest political fight over health care since Republicans tried to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare, during Trumps first term in 2017 which ended in failure. While Republicans insist they are simply rooting out waste, fraud and abuse to generate savings with new work and eligibility requirements, Democrats warn that millions of Americans will lose coverage. A preliminary estimate from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said the proposals would reduce the number of people with health care by 8.6 million over the decade. Savings like these allow us to use this bill to renew the Trump tax cuts and keep Republicans promise to hardworking middle-class families, said Rep. Brett Guthrie of Kentucky, the GOP chairman of the Energy and Commerce Committee, which handles health care spending. But Democrats said the cuts are shameful and essentially amount to another attempt to repeal Obamacare. In no uncertain terms, millions of Americans will lose their health care coverage, said Rep. Frank Pallone of New Jersey, the top Democrat on the panel. He said hospitals will close, seniors will not be able to access the care they need, and premiums will rise for millions of people if this bill passes. As Republicans race toward House Speaker Mike Johnsons Memorial Day deadline to pass Trumps big bill of tax breaks and spending cuts, they are preparing to flood the zone with round-the-clock public hearings this week on various sections before they are stitched together in what will become a massive package. The politics ahead are uncertain. More than a dozen House Republicans have told Johnson and GOP leaders they will not support cuts to the health care safety net programs that residents back home depend on. Trump himself has shied away from a repeat of his first term, vowing there will be no cuts to Medicaid.All told, 11 committees in the House have been compiling their sections of the package as Republicans seek at least $1.5 trillion in savings to help cover the cost of preserving the 2017 tax breaks, which were approved during Trumps first term and are expiring at the end of the year. But the powerful Energy and Commerce Committee has been among the most watched. The committee was instructed to come up with $880 billion in savings and reached that goal, primarily with the health care cuts, but also by rolling back Biden-era green energy programs. The preliminary CBO analysis said the committees proposals would reduce the deficit by $912 billion over the decade with at least $715 billion coming from the health provisions.Central to the savings are changes to Medicaid, which provides almost free health care to more than 70 million Americans, and the Affordable Care Act, which has expanded in the 15 years since it was first approved to cover millions more. To be eligible for Medicaid, there would be new community engagement requirements of at least 80 hours per month of work, education or service for able-bodied adults without dependents. People would also have to verify their eligibility to be in the program twice a year, rather than just once.This is likely to lead to more churn in the program and present hurdles for people to stay covered, especially if they have to drive far to a local benefits office to verify their income in person. But Republicans say itll ensure that the program is administered to those who qualify for it.Many states have expanded their Medicaid rosters thanks to federal incentives, but the legislation would cut a 5% boost that was put in place during the COVID-19 pandemic. Federal funding to the states for immigrants who have not shown proof of citizenship would be prohibited. There would be a freeze on the so-called provider tax that some states use to help pay for large portions of their Medicaid programs. The extra tax often leads to higher payments from the federal government, which critics say is a loophole that creates abuse in the system.The energy portions of the legislation run far fewer pages, but include rollbacks of climate-change strategies President Joe Biden signed into law in the Inflation Reduction Act.It proposes rescinding funds for a range of energy loans and investment programs while providing expedited permitting for natural gas development and oil pipelines.__ Associated Press writer Amanda Seitz contributed to this report.

Burkina Faso President Ibrahim Traore attends the Victory Day military parade in Moscow, Russia, Friday, May 9, 2025, during celebrations of the 80th anniversary of the Soviet Union's victory over Nazi Germany during the World War II. (Sergei Bobylev/Photo host agency RIA Novosti via AP)2025-05-12T04:22:08Z DAKAR, Senegal (AP) At least 100 civilians were killed by Burkina Faso government forces in March near the western town of Solenzo, Human Rights Watch said Monday.According to victim testimony and videos shared on social media gathered by the rights group, the attackers were Burkina Faso special forces and members of a pro-government militia, the Volunteers for the Defense of the Homeland. The victims were all ethnic Fulani, a pastoralist community that is widespread across the region, which the government has long accused of supporting Muslim militants.An earlier report from Human Rights Watch stated that the governments involvement was likely, because of video evidence on social media, although the findings were not definitive. The government issued a sharp denial when first reports surfaced, saying in a statement it condemned the propagation, on social media, of images inducing hate and community violence, and fake information aimed at undermining social cohesion in the country. The viral videos of the atrocities by pro-government militias near Solenzo sent shock waves through Africas Sahel region, but they told only part of the story, said Ilaria Allegrozzi, senior Sahel researcher at Human Rights Watch. Further research uncovered that Burkina Fasos military was responsible for these mass killings of Fulani civilians, which were followed by deadly reprisals by an Islamist armed group. The government needs to impartially investigate these deaths and prosecute all those responsible. Burkina Faso authorities did not immediately reply to a request for comment on the groups new report. The landlocked nation of 23 million people has symbolized the security crisis in the arid Sahel region south of the Sahara in recent years. It has been shaken by violence from extremist groups linked to Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State group, and the governments fighting them. The military junta, which took power in 2022, failed to provide the stability it promised. According to conservative estimates, more than 60% of the country is now outside of government control, more than 2.1 million people have lost their homes and almost 6.5 million need humanitarian aid to survive.The attack in the western Boucle du Mouhoun region, including Solenzo and other towns, began on Feb. 27 and lasted until April 2, involving hundreds of government troops and drones, according to eyewitnesses quoted in the report.The VDPs shot at us like animals, while drones were flying over our heads. Many women and children died because they could not run, said a Fulani herder, 44, from Solenzo, referring to the pro-government militias.After the attack, hundreds of Fulani residents fled across the border into neighboring Mali, the report said.Today, in the whole province, there are no more Fulani they all fled or were killed or taken hostage, said a 53-year-old man from Solenzo. But the other (ethnic) communities remain.After the government forces left, the report said that jihadist fighters from a group known as JNIM reentered the towns and carried out reprisal killings against residents, targeting the men whom it considered to be military collaborators. All the men had been executed in front of the health center, said a 60-year-old woman who witnessed JNIM abuses in Tiao village, a town to the northeast of Solenzo on April 5. I counted up to 70 bodies.According to analysts, the juntas strategy of military escalation, including mass recruitment of civilians for poorly trained militia units, has exacerbated tensions between ethnic groups. It it impossible to get an accurate picture of the situation in the country since the military leadership has installed a system of de facto censorship, rights groups said, and those daring to speak up can be openly abducted, imprisoned or forcefully drafted into the army.

The Kurdistan Workers Party, or P.K.K., said on Monday that it would lay down its arms, a decision that could reverberate across neighboring countries.

Palestinians struggle to obtain donated food at a community kitchen in Khan Younis, in the southern Gaza Strip, Friday, May 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Abdel Kareem Hana)2025-05-12T06:07:48Z An Israeli strike on a school-turned-shelter in the Gaza Strip killed at least 16 people early on Monday, mostly women and children, according to local health officials.At least five children and four women were among those killed in the strike on a school in the Jabaliya area, the Gaza Health Ministrys emergency service said. It also said that a number of people were wounded.The Israeli military says it only targets militants and blames civilian deaths on Hamas because its fighters operate in densely populated areas. There was no immediate comment on the latest strike.The attack came as U.S. President Donald Trump is heading to Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates this week. After ending a ceasefire two months ago, Israel is intensifying the war in the Gaza Strip, where its 10-week blockade on food, medicine and other supplies is worsening a humanitarian crisis. Here is the latest: Some families of hostages uneasy over the planned release of American-Israeli hostageThe relatives of Israeli hostages have welcomed the announcement that an American-Israeli hostage would be freed by Hamas as a gesture to President Trump but there is also unease.Some said Alexander was singled out for freedom because of his American citizenship and said they were worried about the fate of the other 23 living and roughly 35 dead captives who remain in Gaza.Trump is rescuing him. Who will rescue Gali and Ziv?, Maccabit Mayer, the aunt of sibling hostages Gali and Ziv Berman, told Israeli Army Radio on Monday. She said she was sorry the twin brothers dont have the right citizenship.Also, some of the relatives accuse Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of not doing enough to free their loved ones, saying his insistence on continuing the war in Gaza is politically motivated. Hamas says it will release last living American hostage in Gaza in a ceasefire effort Hamas says the last living American hostage in Gaza will be released as part of efforts to establish a ceasefire, reopen crossings into the Israeli-blockaded territory and resume aid delivery to the battered enclave. Two Hamas officials have told The Associated Press they expect the release of Edan Alexander in the next 48 hours. Trumps envoy Steve Witkoff confirmed in a message to the AP that Hamas has agreed to release Alexander as a good will gesture toward Trump.The announcement of the first hostage release since Israel shattered a ceasefire in March comes shortly before Trump visits the Middle East this week. Alexander is an Israeli-American soldier who grew up in the United States. Famine looms as Israel presses its blockade of GazaHospital patients are among the most vulnerable as Palestinians across Gaza struggle to feed themselves. Israels blockade on food and other supplies entering the territory is now in its third month and hospitals are unable to provide food. Families must bring whatever they can find to help loved ones recover and doctors say patients have lost weight in recent weeks.Aid groups say malnutrition is on the rise across Gaza. Food distributions have ended and charity kitchens are rapidly closing. Markets are empty of almost everything but canned goods and small amounts of vegetables, and prices have been rising. RSShttps://feedx.net https://feedx.site

Actors Gerard Depardieu and Catherine Deneuve are seen in Cannes, southern France, on May 11 1984. (AP Photo/Michel Lipchitz, File)2025-05-12T06:48:38Z For over half a century, Grard Depardieu stood as a towering figure in French cinema, a titan known for his commanding physical presence, instinct, sensibility and remarkable versatility.A bon vivant who overcame a speech impediment and a turbulent youth, Depardieu rose to prominence in the 1970s and became one of Frances most prolific and acclaimed actors, portraying a vast array of characters, from volatile outsiders to deeply introspective figures.In recent years, however, Depardieus illustrious career has been overshadowed by multiple allegations of misconduct. He has been accused publicly or in formal complaints by more than 20 women, but so far only a sexual assault case has proceeded to court. Some others were dropped because of a lack of evidence or the statute of limitations.In March, the Paris public prosecutor requested an 18-month suspended prison sentence over accusations that he sexually assaulted two women on a film set. A decision is expected on Tuesday. Here is a timeline of key moments in Depardieus rise and fall:Dec. 27, 1948: Born in Chteauroux, in a modest family of six children. His youth is tumultuous. Depardieu lives close to an American military base and rubs shoulders with small-time hoodlums, smuggling all kinds of goods.1960s: Depardieu arrives in Paris. He takes acting classes and discovers all the great classics of literature while undergoing therapy to correct his speech difficulties. 1967: Depardieu makes his screen debut in the short film Le Beatnik et le Minet and appears in his first stage play.1972: Features in Nathalie Granger, directed by Marguerite Duras.1974: First big hit in France with Les Valseuses, (Going Places), Bertrand Bliers classic farce about two wandering thugs.1980s: Depardieu becomes the most sought-after French actor. Maurice Pialat casts him in Loulou, the highly acclaimed Police, for which he won an acting prize at the 1985 Venice Film Festival, and Under Satans Sun, a provocative tale about a monks encounter with the devil which won Cannes Palme dOr in 1987. Depardieu stars in many hits: The Woman Next Door, Jean de Florette, The Last Metro, Danton, The Return of Martin Guerre. 1991: Depardieu receives a nomination for the best actor Oscar for his performance in Cyrano de Bergerac. But controversy ensues after Time magazine carries an affirmation by Depardieu that he took part in a rape as a 9-year-old. The movie suffers a bloody nose at the Oscars. Depardieu categorically denies saying he took part in rape. Its outrageous at 9 years old or at any age, he told the French newspaper Le Monde. Yes, one can say I had sexual experiences when I was very young, but a rape, never. I respect women too much.1990s: Depardieus career is unaffected in France. He stars in Jean-Luc Godards Hlas pour moi. Meanwhile, Depardieu reinforces his popularity with mass audiences with the Astrix & Oblix film series.1998: Depardieu crashes his motorcycle. His blood-alcohol limit is five times the legal level. He escapes with leg and face injuries. The incident was one of several encounters with the law for Depardieu, who also grabbed headlines when he urinated in the aisle of a plane before takeoff on a Paris to Dublin flight, and when he was detained for allegedly driving drunk on his scooter. 1999: Depardieu returns to the French stage for the first time in 13 years as a guilt-ravaged emperor in a murder-mystery.2000: Depardieu undergoes successful coronary bypass surgery.Oct. 13, 2008: Death of his son Guillaume Depardieu.2013: After sparring with his native country over taxes, Depardieu is granted Russian citizenship by Vladimir Putin.2014: Depardieu plays the leading role in Welcome to New York, the film inspired by the life of Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the former director of the International Monetary Fund who was accused in 2011 of sexually assaulting a hotel maid.2018: Prosecutors in Paris open a preliminary investigation after actor Charlotte Arnould accused Depardieu of raping her at his home. That case is still active, and in August 2024 prosecutors requested that it go to trial. 2023: His wax figure is removed from Paris most famous wax museum following negative reactions from visitors over allegations about his conduct with women. The decision to remove the figure from the Grevin Museum followed a TV documentary showing him repeatedly making obscene remarks and gestures during a 2018 trip to North Korea.2025: Depardieu goes on trial in Paris on charges of sexually assaulting two women on a movie set. He is accused of having groped a 54-year-old set dresser and a 34-year-old assistant during filming in 2021 of Les Volets Verts.

US Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent, left, and US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer meet the media on the second day of a bilateral meeting between the United States and China, in Geneva, Switzerland, Sunday, May 11, 2025. (Martial Trezzini/Keystone via AP)2025-05-12T08:10:50Z GENEVA (AP) U.S. and Chinese officials said Monday they had reached a deal to roll back most of their recent tariffs and call a 90-day pause to keep talking to resolve their trade disputes. Stock markets rose sharply as the globes two major economic powers took a step back from a clash that has unsettled the global economy. U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said the U.S. agreed to drop its 145% tariff rate on Chinese goods by 115 percentage points to 30%, while China agreed to lower its rate on U.S. goods by the same amount to 10%.Greer and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent announced the tariff reductions at a news conference in Geneva.The two officials struck a positive tone as they said the two sides had set up consultations to continue discussing their trade issues.Bessent said at the news briefing after two days of talks that the high tariff levels would have amounted to a complete blockage of each sides goods, an outcome neither side wants. The consensus from both delegations this weekend is neither side wants a decoupling, Bessent said. And what had occurred with these very high tariff ... was an embargo, the equivalent of an embargo. And neither side wants that. We do want trade. We want more balanced trade. And I think that both sides are committed to achieving that. Trump last month raised U.S. tariffs on China to a combined 145% and China retaliated by hitting American imports with a 125% levy. Tariffs that high essentially amount to the two countries boycotting each others products, disrupting trade that last year topped $660 billion.The announcement by the U.S. and China sent shares surging, with U.S. futures jumping more than 2%. Hong Kongs Hang Seng index surged nearly 3% and benchmarks in Germany and France were both up 0.7% JAMEY KEATEN Keaten is the chief Associated Press reporter in Geneva. He previously was posted in Paris and has reported from Afghanistan, the Middle East, North Africa and across Europe. twitter

Varda Ben Baruch holds a picture of her grandson Edan Alexander, who is held hostage in Gaza, gathers with other families to call out on loudspeakers in hopes that their loved ones will hear them, near the Gaza border in Kibbutz Nir Oz, southern Israel, April 20, 2025. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg, File)2025-05-12T07:36:30Z DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip (AP) An American-Israeli soldier taken captive and held for more than 19 months in the Gaza Strip is expected to be released on Monday, Hamas said, as part of a good will gesture for the Trump administration that could lay the groundwork for a new ceasefire between the warring sides.Edan Alexander was snatched from his military base in southern Israel during Hamas cross-border attack on Oct. 7, 2023, which set off the war in Gaza. His expected release would be the first since Israel shattered an 8-week ceasefire with Hamas in March when it unleashed fierce strikes on Gaza which have killed hundreds.Israel has also promised to intensify its offensive, including by seizing the territory and displacing much of its population again. Before the ceasefires demise, Israel blocked all imports from entering the war-ravaged Palestinian enclave, deepening a humanitarian crisis there. Israel says the steps are meant to pressure Hamas to accept a ceasefire agreement on Israels terms.Israel says that, including Alexander, 59 hostages remain in captivity, about 24 who are said to be alive and the remaining are deceased. Many of the 250 hostages taken by Hamas-led militants in the 2023 attack were freed in ceasefire deals. Trump says the expected release is hopefully a step toward ending the warAfter announcing on Sunday its intention to release Alexander, Hamas said in a statement on Monday that the handover would occur later in the day. Israeli authorities did not respond to requests for comment on the timing of the release.U.S. President Donald Trump, who is set to arrive in the Middle East on Tuesday on his first official foreign trip, said Sunday that the planned release is a step taken in good faith towards the United States and the efforts of the mediators Qatar and Egypt to put an end to this very brutal war and return ALL living hostages and remains to their loved ones. Hopefully this is the first of those final steps necessary to end this brutal conflict. I look very much forward to that day of celebration! Trump said on his social media platform Truth Social. Trump, who is travelling to Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, is not scheduled to stop in Israel.An Israeli official said that Trump envoy Steve Witkoff was expected in Israel on Monday and would meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahus security Cabinet to discuss nuclear talks with Iran and efforts to free more hostages. The official spoke on condition to of anonymity in line with regulations.Alexanders family, which is based in the U.S., was on route to Israel, according to the Hostages and Missing Families Forum, a group representing the captives families. Israel says it still plans to escalate its offensive in GazaOn Monday, a statement from Netanyahus office said Alexanders release was expected, without indicating timing, and that Israel was not granting any concessions for it. The statement said Israel did not commit to a ceasefire or to free Palestinian prisoners as part of the release and that it had only agreed to create a safe corridor to allow for Alexander to be returned.The statement said Israel would still carry on with its plans to ramp up its offensive in Gaza despite the expected hostage release. Israel says it wont launch that plan until after Trumps visit to the Middle East this week, to allow for a potential new ceasefire deal to emerge.A statement by the office on Sunday said the U.S. had told Israel that Alexanders release could lead to a new deal with Hamas to free more hostages.Netanyahu faces criticism for not freeing all the hostagesIsraels exact involvement in getting the release off the ground wasnt immediately clear. But it created a backlash against Netanyahu, with critics accusing him of having to rely on a foreign leader to help free the remaining hostages. At the opening of his trial for alleged corruption, where he is giving testimony, a woman in the courtroom asked whether he was ashamed that the president of the United States is saving his citizens and he is leaving them to die there in captivity?Critics accuse Netanyahu of not doing enough to free the hostages, saying his insistence on keeping up the war in Gaza is politically motivated. Netanyahu says he aims to achieve Israels twin war goals, freeing the hostages and dismantling Hamas-led militants killed 1,200 people and took 250 captive in the 2023 attack. Israels retaliatory offensive has killed over 52,800 Palestinians, many of them women and children, according to Gazas Health Ministry, which does not say how many of the dead were combatants or civilians. It obliterated vast swaths of Gazas urban landscape and displaced 90% of the population, often multiple times.___Magdy reported from Cairo and Goldenberg from Tel Aviv, Israel. Associated Press writer Melanie Lidman in Tel Aviv, Israel, contributed to this report. ___Follow APs war coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/israel-hamas-war SAMY MAGDY Magdy is a Middle East reporter for The Associated Press, based in Cairo. He focuses on conflict, migration and human rights abuses. twitter facebook mailto TIA GOLDENBERG Goldenberg is an Associated Press reporter and producer covering Israel and the Palestinian territories. She previously reported on East and West Africa from Nairobi. twitter mailto

Dealers walk past near the screens showing the Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI), left, and the foreign exchange rate between U.S. dollar and South Korean won at a dealing room of Hana Bank in Seoul, South Korea, Friday, May 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man)2025-05-12T03:58:45Z HONG KONG (AP) World shares and U.S. futures surged Monday after the U.S. and China announced they were suspending for 90 days most of the sharp tariff hikes each has imposed since U.S. President Donald Trump began escalating his trade war. A joint statement said that for a 90-day period, the U.S. will cut tariffs on Chinese goods to 30% from as high as 145%. China said its tariffs on U.S. goods will fall to 10% from 125%. The agreement to allow time for more talks followed weekend negotiations in Geneva, Switzerland, that the U.S. side said had made substantial progress. The full impact on the complicated tariffs and other trade penalties enacted by Washington and Beijing remains unclear. And much depends on whether they will find ways to bridge longstanding differences during the 90-day suspension. But as trade envoys from the worlds two biggest economies blinked, finding ways to pull back from potentially massive disruptions to world trade and their own markets, investors rejoiced. The future for the S&P 500 jumped 2.6% and that for the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 2%.Oil prices rallied, with U.S. benchmark crude oil gaining $1.66 to $62.68 per barrel. Brent crude, the international standard, added $1.63 to $65.55 per barrel. The U.S. dollar surged against the Japanese yen, trading at 148.18 Japanese yen, up from 146.17 yen. The euro fell to $1.1107 from $1.1209. In other stock trading, Tokyos market closed before the joint statement was issued, gaining less than 0.1% to 37,644.26. But Hong Kongs, which closes later, jumped 3% to 23,558.11. Germanys DAX gained 1% to 23,723.55 and the CAC 40 in Paris added 0.8% to 7,805.62. Britains FTSE 100 edged 0.1% higher, to 8,560.42.Investors were also watching for developments in other flashpoints including clashes between India and Pakistan, the war in Ukraine and conflict in the Middle East. The Sensex in Mumbai shot up 3.2% after India and Pakistan agreed to a truce after talks to defuse their most serious military confrontation in decades. The two armies have exchanged gunfire, artillery strikes, missiles and drones that killed dozens of people.Pakistans KSE 100 surged more than 9% and trading was halted for one hour following a spike driven by the ceasefire and an International Monetary Fund decision Friday to disburse about $1 billion of a bailout package for its battered economy.The Shanghai Composite Index picked up 0.8% to 3,369.24.Chinese EV battery maker CATL, or Contemporary Amperex Technology Co., Ltd., said in a prospectus filed with the Hong Kong Stock Exchange that it plans to raise nearly $4 billion in a share listing. Elsewhere in Asia, the Kospi in Seoul gained 1.2% to 2,607.33.Australias S&P/ASX 200 climbed less than 0.1% to 8,233.50.Taiwans Taiex gained 1%.On Friday, U.S. stocks drifted, with the S&P 500 edging 0.1% lower. Last week was the first in seven where the index at the heart of many 401(k) accounts moved by less than 1.5%, after careening on fears about President Donald Trumps trade war and hopes that hell relent on some of his tariffs.The Dow dipped 0.3%, while the Nasdaq composite edged up by less than 0.1%.Apart from trade talks and other geopolitical factors, the flow of earnings reports for the start of the year from companies is slowing but still moving markets. ELAINE KURTENBACH Based in Bangkok, Kurtenbach is the APs business editor for Asia, helping to improve and expand our coverage of regional economies, climate change and the transition toward carbon-free energy. She has been covering economic, social, environmental and political trends in China, Japan and Southeast Asia throughout her career. twitter mailto

by Tony Schick and Monica Samayoa, Oregon Public Broadcasting This article was produced for ProPublicas Local Reporting Network in partnership with Oregon Public Broadcasting. Sign up for Dispatches to get stories like this one as soon as they are published. On Feb. 17, Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek released a video assuring Oregonians that Donald Trump would not derail the progressive states efforts to combat climate change. As promised during his presidential campaign, Trump had issued executive orders during his first week in office aimed at halting new sources of wind power and freezing Biden-era funding for renewable energy. Oregon, Kotek said, had been leading the way for years on courageous state policies to fight climate change. Along with neighboring Washington state, Oregon has set an ambitious mandate for electric utilities to be carbon neutral within the next two decades.Its going to take all of us working together finding innovative solutions, no matter the obstacles, to confront the climate crisis, the governor said, and we are not turning back.But the reality is not nearly as inspiring as Kotek made it sound. For all their progressive claims, Oregon and Washington trail nearly all other states in adding new sources of renewable energy. Iowa, a Republican-led state with roughly the same population and usable volume of wind as Oregon, has built enough wind farms to generate three times as much wind power.Whats held the Northwest back is a bottleneck Oregon and Washington leaders paid little attention to when they set out to go 100% green, an investigation by ProPublica and Oregon Public Broadcasting found: The region lacks the wiring to deliver new sources of renewable energy to peoples homes, and little has been done to change that.Northwest leaders left it to a federal agency known as the Bonneville Power Administration to arrange badly needed upgrades to an electrical grid thats nearly a century old in places. Bonneville, under a setup that is unique to the Northwest, owns most of the power lines needed to carry green power from the regions sunny and windy high desert to its major population centers. Bonneville has no state or local representation within its federally appointed bureaucracy and, by statute, operates as a self-funded business. The agency decides which energy projects can hook up based on whether its infrastructure can handle the extra load, and it decides how quickly that infrastructure gets expanded. Its glacial pace has delayed wind and solar projects under Democratic and Republican presidents alike.Of the 469 large renewable projects that applied to connect to Bonnevilles grid since 2015, only one has reached approval. Those are longer odds than in any other region of the country, the news organizations found. No major grid operator is as stingy as Bonneville in its approach to financing new transmission lines and substations needed to grow the power supply, according to industry groups that represent power producers.Efforts to bypass Bonneville didnt start until this year, when Oregon and Washington legislators considered bills to create their own state bonding authorities for upgrading the regions high-voltage network.Both bills died. Washington and Oregon Trail the Nation in Renewable Growth Changes in states average annual production of power from wind, solar, hydroelectric and geothermal between the decades of 2005-2014 and 2015-2024 (Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration) The grids severe constraints are hindering the Northwest at a time when it desperately needs more electricity. Oregon and Washington lawmakers lured power-guzzling data centers with tax breaks in recent years, and the industry has helped drive electricity demand sky high. Having failed to add enough green-energy sources or any new gas-fired power, the Northwest buys electricity from elsewhere, at high prices, during extreme weather. Rates paid by customers of major Oregon utilities are now 50% higher than five years ago. The worsening energy shortage threatens millions of residents with continual rate hikes and sporadic power outages not to mention dashing the Northwests hopes of drastically reducing its contribution to climate change. The people who, technically speaking, are in charge of our transmission system are dropping the ball, said Oregon state Rep. Mark Gamba, a Democrat who sponsored this years failed legislation aimed at creating a state grid improvement authority. We are absolutely looking at rolling blackouts, and we are absolutely looking at not hitting any of our climate targets when it comes to energy production. Kotek declined an interview request. Kotek spokesperson Anca Matica said in a statement that the governor is open to innovative ideas to increase transmission capacity and labeled it key to achieving the states energy goals. She offered no direct response to questions about Oregons lack of progress in boosting renewables. While Washington and Oregon generate a lot of hydro power, their numbers have trended down over the last decade Hydroelectric generation by state and theyve added new sources of renewables, such as wind and solar, much more slowly than other states. Renewable energy net generation by state, excluding hydro (Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration) Reuven Carlyle, the former state senator who crafted Washingtons 2019 decarbonization bill, said he was deeply cognizant of the regions transmission challenges at the time but that plans to address the problem simply slipped.Its certainly nothing to be proud of that it didnt get resolved, said Carlyle, who founded a consulting firm for climate-focused investments after leaving the Legislature. And its embarrassing that Oregon and Washington, which are such good-looking states, simply cant practically build anything in terms of energy.In the final months of the Biden administration, Bonneville announced a plan to do some grid upgrades, and agency Administrator John Hairston has said the self-funded federal agency is investing in transmission as much as it can without taking on too much debt.Bonneville responded to written questions from OPB and ProPublica by citing recent improvements to its process for connecting energy projects and noting that its not the only player responsible for growing the grid. The agency added that it remains committed to its critical mission of supporting the region with affordable, reliable and secure power.But Bonnevilles latest plans for the grid are in jeopardy. In addition to suspending all new federal wind permits, the Trump White House has added Bonneville to the long list of agencies cutting federal jobs. Three Bonneville employees, requesting anonymity for fear of retribution, said the cuts will make building out the transmission system even harder.With four years of Joe Bidens climate activism in the rearview mirror, the Pacific Northwest appears to have blown its best chance to realize its ambitions for renewable power. Projects in LimboDavid Brown is a case study in the long and agonizing path to breaking ground on a Northwest solar farm. The Portland energy developer has been in the renewables business since 2003, and his firm, Obsidian Renewables, has a plan to put a vast array of solar panels on a piece of southern Oregon high desert thats the size of 3,000 football fields. Brown said its expected to produce enough energy for about 110,000 homes. Obsidian will handle everything from acquiring the land to getting permits approved, then look to sell the solar farm to an investor or utility once its ready for construction. But any power plant, whether fueled by coal, wind or sunshine, has to be wired into the electrical grid: a system of transmission lines and transformers that pools electricity and channels it to customers. While power lines crisscross the nation, power mainly gets used within the region that generates it. As in most parts of the Northwest, the nearest transmission lines Brown could plug into belong to Bonneville. He asked the agency for permission to connect his solar farm to its system in 2020. He doesnt expect approval until at least 2028.I dont know a single place in Oregon or Washington where I can connect a new solar project and get transmission. Not one, he said.One part of the holdup is that Bonneville needs to finish studying what kind of substation it will need to safely let a big new power source into the grid. Browns 400-megawatt solar farm has been through three such interconnection studies so far. The first time, Bonneville estimated Browns business would need to pay $23 million to build a substation, which Bonneville would own. The second study bumped the price to $70 million. By the third, Brown said, it was $212 million. He said the agency blamed supply chain and labor issues, in part, for the near-tripling in cost over four years. David Browns company, Obsidian Renewables, has proposed to build one of the states largest solar farms but has been waiting for five years for Bonneville Power Administrations approval. (Kristyna Wentz-Graff/Oregon Public Broadcasting) There are hundreds of projects like Browns: more than 200,000 megawatts worth of renewable energy awaiting Bonnevilles signoff, or enough to power the Northwest nearly 10 times over. One proposed wind farm has been in Bonnevilles queue for more than 16 years. Among projects 20 megawatts or bigger that were proposed in the past decade, the only one that made it through Bonnevilles waitlist was an add-on to an existing Portland General Electric wind farm that didnt require any major transmission upgrades. It won approval in 2022. The Northwest is not the only region with a backlog of projects waiting to plug in. Grid operators across the country have navigated a deluge of new wind, solar and mass-storage battery requests in recent years. Many applicants proved to be merely testing the waters, with nearly 3 in 4 ultimately pulling their plans, according to Joseph Rand, an energy researcher at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.But other regions managed to sort out problems better than the Northwest, OPB and ProPublica found. The news organizations used data from Bonneville and from a national database compiled by researchers at the Berkeley Lab to analyze how many large renewable energy projects waiting for grid connections made it to the finish line.The data showed that for large projects proposed since 2015, Bonnevilles one approval translates to a success rate of 0.2%, the lowest rate of any region. By contrast, about 10% of new applications for major projects in the Midwest and 28% in Texas made it through. Bonneville has said one reason for the slow progress is that its waitlist is jammed up with too many speculative projects more dream than financial reality. (Theres no evidence that Bonneville has it worse, though; data shows that the share of developers who back out after seeking Bonnevilles approval, 76%, is close to the national average.)Renewable advocates and energy developers say Bonneville struggles to hire and retain people to process connection requests because the agency pays less than the private sector. In January, Washington U.S. Reps. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, a Democrat, and Dan Newhouse, a Republican, introduced a bill to make Bonnevilles compensation more competitive, but it hasnt moved since.To speed things up, Bonneville has halted new requests for grid connections and changed its approach to reviewing applications. Where specialists used to review proposals one at a time, in the order received, they now plan to prioritize projects that are closest to ready. The agency said the new approach will increase the number of projects that get connected while cutting processing time in half, from an expected 15 years. Bonneville said in a statement that it is confident the interconnection reforms we adopted will prove sufficient to meet our customers needs.The changes have not yet helped Brown, who has been awaiting Bonnevilles approval to start work in southern Oregon since 2020. For now, the planned solar project remains in limbo.Its gonna take me years and a couple million dollars to get land use approval, Brown said, and why do I want to get land use approval if I dont know whether or not I have transmission?Theres No Room for Your ProjectThe predicament Brown and dozens of other wind and solar developers face is a product of the Northwests unusual history with electric power.Oregon and Washington were blessed with powerful rivers fed by abundant snow and rainfall. Beginning in the New Deal era, the federal government built dozens of hydroelectric dams and a sprawling transmission system to electrify the rural West. The regions energy supply was cheaper and emitted less carbon than the rest of the nations. Bonneville was at the helm.Even today, hydropower supplies almost 35% of Oregons electricity and more than 50% of Washingtons, according to the most recent data available. But hydroelectric dams are a finite and increasingly shaky power source. Output from existing dams dips whenever droughts sap water from the Columbia River basin. New dams are a nonstarter because dams have decimated the regions salmon populations.That leaves wind, solar and battery storage as the most promising places for the Northwest to turn as it approaches self-imposed deadlines to fully wean utilities off electricity that comes from oil, coal or gas.Bonneville has now become a barrier to accommodating the new power sources, six green energy developers told OPB and ProPublica.An agency that erected more than 4,800 miles of high-voltage transmission lines from 1960 to 1990 built fewer than 500 miles from 1990 to 2020. In the past five years, it built 1. Bonneville has the ability to borrow money, at low interest rates, for projects that would enable the grid to carry more power. Congress pushed the agency to do so in 2021, more than doubling Bonnevilles debt limit specifically to finance transmission upgrades. The chairs of the Oregon and Washington public utility commissions, in a joint 2022 letter, urged Bonneville to spend the money: The region needs BPA to be a leader in delivering a transmission system that serves the entire region. Bonneville, however, has been reluctant to take on debt. It is still paying off billions of dollars in bonds from failed nuclear plants in the 1970s. As recently as 2019, the agencys finances were so poor that some economists expected it to become insolvent. Bonnevilles transmission planners, for their part, have told OPB and ProPublica in previous interviews that they want to avoid building expensive transmission lines that no one ends up using.We cant speculate and build a transmission line to nowhere, Jeff Cook, the agencys vice president for transmission planning, said in May 2024. First image: Contractors repair a transformer box in Portland, Oregon. Second image: Solar panels on the Wheatridge farm, the only project Bonneville approved out of the hundreds that applied for a grid connection in the past decade. (Kristyna Wentz-Graff/Oregon Public Broadcasting) When Bonneville announced in the fall it would tap some of its expanded debt limit to help pay for $5 billion in transmission upgrades over a decade, renewable energy advocates characterized the work as long overdue maintenance that wouldnt provide the expansion the grid needs. Most of the work Bonneville announced was the equivalent of fixing potholes, installing some new round-abouts, doing some repaving, Spencer Gray, executive director of the Northwest & Intermountain Power Producers Coalition, said in an email.A further frustration for wind and solar developers that is unique to Bonneville: The grid operator makes them absorb an outsize share of the cost for projects that help the transmission network accommodate their electricity and it requires a big deposit up front. Thats true even if the new power lines benefit a wide network and will be around for many generations of customers.Lately, the answer to these individual developers has been, Theres no room for your project. If you want to put this project on our system, its going to cost you this many millions of dollars to help us upgrade the system, said Sarah Edmonds, president of a coalition of utilities known as the Western Power Pool.The approach, Edmonds said, has had a chilling effect on the ability of developers to get their projects online.Michelle Manary, Bonnevilles vice president of transmission marketing and sales, said requiring up-front deposits keeps existing ratepayers from getting stuck with the tab if a developer backs out and that Bonneville has begun work on a transmission upgrade. She said other regions have more control over who pays these costs because their entire distribution networks are under one operator. Bonnevilles transmission lines are more like highways, from which electric utilities serve as exit ramps that deliver power the last mile to Northwest neighborhoods. Manary denied that Bonnevilles current way of allocating costs has stifled green energy projects. But she acknowledged the agency needs to reevaluate its policy amid the flood of applications for new projects, and she said that process is underway. Texas Is Kicking Our AssThe rest of the nation has taken a different approach to bringing green power online with better outcomes.In most parts of the country, each grid has a central, independent operator, known as a regional transmission organization, typically run by a board that represents customers, electric utilities and other groups. Bonneville recently rejected joining a California-based energy market that advocates described as the Northwests best bet at accelerating the adoption of renewables.In Texas, which runs its own grid, large renewable projects applying to connect in the past decade took a median of 19 months to get the green light, or nearly two years less than the one project Bonneville approved in that time frame. California and the Midwest were also faster than Bonneville.Texas doesnt require project-by-project grid upgrades the way other grid operators do. It essentially tells developers it will connect their project, and then it figures out how to balance the added electricity after the fact. Texas and other regional grid operators spend billions more than Bonneville on transmission upgrades annually, and they spread the costs across a wider swath of customers than Bonneville does. (Bonneville says the federal agency differs so much from regional operators that theyre not a fair comparison group.) Texas brought more energy online in the past two years than any other power region. Thats helped the oil and gas powerhouse become the countrys biggest producer of wind and solar energy. Last year alone it added more than enough renewable energy to power the entire Northwest.Texas is kicking our ass, said Gamba, the Oregon state representative. Oil well pumps and wind turbines in Lamesa, Texas, in February (Julio Cortez/AP) Northwest lawmakers were told that theyd need to find effective ways of confronting their regions aging transmission system if they wished to phase out coal and natural gas.As Washington lawmakers debated a mandate for renewable power in 2019, Nicholas Garcia of the Washington Public Utility Districts Association testified that replacing coal plants with wind and solar would require more transmission, significantly more transmission.In 2021, when Oregon lawmakers debated their own mandate for carbon-free energy, Republicans also raised concerns that the states transmission lines were maxed out. It became one more GOP argument against the bill, in addition to saying more should be done to ensure green energy projects were built in Oregon. Numerous reports from the Oregon and U.S. departments of energy, for example supported the assertion that heftier transmission lines were needed. Bonneville would be key to meeting that need, with one utilities lobbyist calling Bonnevilles grid the backbone for decarbonization in testimony to Oregon lawmakers. But Oregon state Rep. Pam Marsh, who led the 2021 effort, said in a recent interview she was focused on getting utilities to cut their carbon emissions and that green energy advocates werent demanding transmission improvements at the time.I was not thinking personally about the role that Bonneville might play in this, said Marsh, a Democrat representing southern Oregon. Washingtons Legislature took some action on the need for better transmission: It required the state to study the issue. The resulting 2022 report concluded that the grid was indeed inadequate but led to little in the way of solutions. Instead, lawmakers decided to require utilities to plan out transmission needs 20 years ahead rather than 10, and they created a statewide environmental review in hopes of streamlining the states approval process for transmission. It did nothing about impediments posed by Bonneville. The Legislature was a little complacent about relying on Bonneville to upgrade the grid, said Sen. Sharon Shewmake, a freshman lawmaker in 2019 when Washington enacted its energy mandate.Shewmake and Gamba both introduced legislation this year following states like Colorado, New Mexico, North Dakota and Wyoming in creating independent authorities to finance transmission infrastructure. Gamba said he led an 80-person group of interested parties through 18 months of drafting. Democratic Washington Gov. Bob Ferguson labeled Shewmakes bill a priority.The legislation didnt make it through either states Democrat-controlled legislatures, however.Brown, the energy developer whos been awaiting Bonnevilles solar approval since 2020, said the future of the Northwests energy dreams looks dim.We dont have a prayer of meeting our heralded, flag-waving renewable energy goals, he said. The dialogue will be to blame Trump; it wont be to blame ourselves for poor planning and extremely low expectations. Ellis Simani assisted with data analysis.

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In April, Coca-Cola proudly launched a new ad campaign it called Classic, celebrating famous authors and the sugary drinks omnipresence in culture by highlighting classic literary works that mention the brand. The firm that produced the ad campaign said it used AI to scan books for mentions of Coca-Cola, and then put viewers in the point of view of the author, typing that portion of the text on a typewriter. The only issue is that the AI got some very basic facts about the authors and their work entirely wrong.One of the ads highlights the work of J.G. Ballard, the British author perhaps best known for his controversial masterpiece, Crash, and David Cronenbergs film adaptation of the novel. In the ad, we get a first person perspective of someone typing a sentence from Extreme Metaphors by J.G Ballard, which according to the ad was written in 1967. When the sentence gets to the mention of Coca-Cola, the typeface changes from the generic typewriter font to Coca-Colas iconic red logo.Before going to China with my parents, I spent six months in Canada, I went to Detroit, Buffalo, the Niagara falls. Whats more, the Shangai [sic] I knew was entirely within the sphere of American influence, says the text that appears on the page as the typewriter clack. The cars, the merchandise, Coca-Cola, air conditioning, the radio stations, the comics, the lifestyle, it was all American.When the typewriter types Coca-Colas logo we can hear the pop and fizz of a carbonated bottle opening.J.G. Ballard never wrote a book called Extreme Metaphors, and he never wrote the words that appear on the page in the ad. In reality, Extreme Metaphors, actual full title: Extreme Metaphors: Selected Interviews with J. G. Ballard 1967-2008, is a book edited by Dan OHara and Simon Sellars which collects interviews with J.G. Ballard that was published in 2012, three years after the authors death. The words in the ad were not written, but spoken by Ballard in an interview with the French Magazine Littraire in 1985. Ballard spoke in English, the magazine translated his words to French, and OHara told me he translated that printed French back to English.The sequence of words being typed out by the imagined J. G. Ballard in the ad was never written by him, only spoken, and the only person ever to type that exact sequence out in English is me, OHara told me. What most outraged my eye was the word Shangai being typed. Ballard would never have misspelled the name of the city in which he was born. Seeing the ad triggered an academic neurosis: had I? I checked my copy of Extreme Metaphors and, thank god, no: its printed as Shanghai in the original text.For the creation of Classic AI was leveraged in the initial research phase to identify books with brand mentions, a spokesperson for VML, a WPP agency behind the ad, told me in an email. After that, we conducted a manual scan of credible sources to ensure accuracy and due diligence and secured permission from all involved publishers, authors and estates.WPPs Open, an AI-powered Production Studio, collaborated on the ad. Coca-Cola also recently got some bad press about a different AI-generated ad, but this one was produced by a different agency.VML did not respond to specific questions about inaccuracies in the ad. Coca-Cola and the J.G. Ballard estate did not respond to a request for comment. At the time of writing, the ad is still up on YouTube, errors and all.A source who was familiar with the details of the deal who asked to remain anonymous told me that the Ballard estate was not aware the ad used AI in any way.If you read the text in the ad, you're not reading his prose: you're reading mine, translating his recorded words from French, OHara said. I've done my best to render his meaning, but that's all I've managed to do. My prose is a pretty poor substitute for the real thing, and I feel anyone seeing the ad and thinking there's nothing special about the writing is both right, and misled to think it's Ballard's own writing.I think I had to translate five of the interviews in the book into English, including the one used in the ad, and getting the tone and feel of a particular speaker right is an art and an endeavour in itself, OHara added. All of that is made evident by and in the book itself, and the relation between the authors and Ballard is clear. Coca-Cola's ad erases all of that. But on the other hand, I'm not going to argue with Coca-Cola describing Extreme Metaphors as a literary classic!Another clue that the people who made this ad do not really understand or care about Ballards work is that they chose to highlight it in the first place. His most famous novel, Crash, is about people who are turned on and have sex in terrible car crashes. Not exactly brand friendly. It is also, as Ballard himself said, about how technology can exploit us all, a very common complaint against generative AI.I would still like to think that Crash is the first pornographic novel based on technology, Ballard wrote in his 1995 introduction to the novel. In a sense, pornography is the most political form of fiction, dealing with how we use and exploit each other, in the most urgent and ruthless way. Needless to say, the ultimate role of Crash is cautionary, a warning against that brutal, erotic and overlit realm that beckons more and more persuasively to us from the margins of the technological landscape.

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