International

Spain is not the country in the European Union where the most people smoke. According to Eurostat data from 2023, 24% of the population over 15 years old are smokers, a percentage that coincides with the European average. Countries like Bulgaria (37%) or Greece (35%) are above the Spanish prevalence of smokers, while Sweden (8%) and the Netherlands (11%) record some of the lowest rates. However, smoking remains one of Europe’s main public health problems: the European Region – as defined by the WHO, which includes countries outside the EU – has the highest prevalence of smokers in the world, at 24.1%, above the global average (19.5%).

The United States has completed its eleventh consecutive night of attacks against Iran, in a new operation in which it struck military operations centers, drone facilities and aircraft, maritime capabilities, and military logistics.

When he returned to power a year and a half ago, Donald Trump promised that he would adopt a hands-off approach to artificial intelligence development, which would allow the United States to “unleash the full potential of AI,” in contrast to the more regulatory stance of his predecessor, Joe Biden, and that of the countries of the European Union.

Shake-up in the Ukrainian army. President Volodymyr Zelensky dismissed the commander-in-chief of the armed forces, Oleksandr Syrskyi, this Tuesday and has appointed General Mykhailo Drapatyi, who until now was in charge of leading the Joint Forces, in his place.

The goal by Ferran Torres gave a moment of euphoria to more than 2,000 Palestinians in Ramallah, in occupied West Bank; a place where collective joy is an extremely scarce commodity. Good news is fleeting in this land. Barely three minutes later, as the crowd held its breath before the imminent victory of the Spanish team, the broadcast of the match stopped.

If there is a day when it is legitimate to compare politics with football, it is today. England has not won the world championship since 1966, and it has not had a good prime minister for decades. If you ask the Conservatives, since Margaret Thatcher in the eighties. If you ask the centrist Labour, since Tony Blair in the nineties. And if you ask the left-wing Labour, you have to go much further back, to Harold Wilson, James Callaghan, or even Clement Attlee, creator of the welfare state.

Andy Burnham is now serving as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. The former mayor of Manchester, who was received on Monday morning by Charles III at Buckingham Palace, gave a speech at the doors of his new residence, 10 Downing Street, in which he pledged to restore stability to the United Kingdom and admitted the lack of quality of the current political generation in the United Kingdom.

The director of the United States Center for AI Standards and Innovation, Chris Fall, resigned just three months after being appointed to lead the federal AI testing institute at the Department of Commerce, a department spokesperson told Reuters.

The United States and Iran are heading towards the return of war on all fronts, due to the lack of solutions that resolve their fundamental disagreement: who should control the Strait of Hormuz. Washington concluded yesterday its ninth consecutive night of attacks against Iranian military and civilian infrastructure, bombings that reached the cities of Bushehr, Chabahar, Bandar Mahshahr, and Bandar Imam Jomeini. For its part, Iran attacked for the second day the Aqaba international airport, in southern Jordan, as well as military bases in Bahrain and Kuwait, and two oil tankers in Hormuz, a maritime route through which 20% of the world’s oil passed before the war.

The American-British men’s rights influencer Andrew Tate and his brother Tristan were arrested on Saturday in Miami, United States, at the request of the United Kingdom, which demands their extradition for alleged rape.