The Hamas leadership says it has accepted the terms of a ceasefire deal in Gaza.

In a statement, the group says it has informed Qatari and Egyptian mediators of its decision.

The finer details are yet to be announced, including how long it will last and what this means for hostages being held in Gaza.

Stay tuned for live updates from us here in London, and analysis from our colleagues in Jerusalem.


WOW!

comment by Sat Nav (U18243)
posted 35 minutes ago
comment by Sydney Sweeney (U11781)
posted 1 hour, 49 minutes ago
Japan's population

2016: 127 million

2023: 123.9 million

Do the Japanese hate seeex??
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Birth rate global ranking as per 2020:
US 141st
UK 160th
Japan 192nd
Italy 190th (!)
China 198th


Plenty of countries need to be playing a lot more Kenny G in front of the fireplace
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What about population growth?

What we need is redistribution of population.

And wealth too, while we're at it.

comment by Sydney Sweeney (U11781)
posted 8 minutes ago
The Hamas leadership says it has accepted the terms of a ceasefire deal in Gaza.

In a statement, the group says it has informed Qatari and Egyptian mediators of its decision.

The finer details are yet to be announced, including how long it will last and what this means for hostages being held in Gaza.

Stay tuned for live updates from us here in London, and analysis from our colleagues in Jerusalem.


WOW!
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Fingers crossed.

Israelis aren’t saying anything yet so far though

An Israeli source tells @SuleimanMas1 that "for now, we are not taking Hamas' answer seriously. This is a response to a unilateral Egyptian proposal. First we will receive Hamas' answer and study it."

Watching Al Jazeera and the streets of Gaza are absolutely overjoyed, so many kids jumping around

Can someone tell us what the fooooking proposal is

comment by Irishred (U2539)
posted 2 hours, 12 minutes ago
https://www.rte.ie/news/dublin/2024/0506/1447623-anti-immigration-march-dublin/

More of this happening over here unfortunately
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No one seems to be interested in this link, I wonder why?

I remember now, the fawners on here don't think they need to comment on articles like this because we should take it for granted they disagree with what is happening, which I find strange because when it happens in England they're right on it.

Sometime last week when the Irish were banging on about deporting illegals back to the UK, Mamba refused to criticise the Irish government, instead, he choose to have a pop at the Tories instead

What's a "fawner"?

comment by Hector (U3606)
posted 4 minutes ago
What's a "fawner"?
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Sumbody from outsighed ur country

comment by #4zA (U22472)
posted 6 minutes ago
comment by Hector (U3606)
posted 4 minutes ago
What's a "fawner"?
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Sumbody from outsighed ur country
----------------------------------------------------------------------

comment by clapfreesince2003 (U22207)
posted 40 minutes ago
comment by Irishred (U2539)
posted 2 hours, 12 minutes ago
https://www.rte.ie/news/dublin/2024/0506/1447623-anti-immigration-march-dublin/

More of this happening over here unfortunately
----------------------------------------------------------------------
No one seems to be interested in this link, I wonder why?

I remember now, the fawners on here don't think they need to comment on articles like this because we should take it for granted they disagree with what is happening, which I find strange because when it happens in England they're right on it.

Sometime last week when the Irish were banging on about deporting illegals back to the UK, Mamba refused to criticise the Irish government, instead, he choose to have a pop at the Tories instead




----------------------------------------------------------------------
Nothing like that even came close to happening. What a mess of a post.

We've got problems when society is producing people who think like Clappy.

BREAKING: Sky News reports that China has hacked the UK Ministry of Defence

We’re getting invaded

comment by Sydney Sweeney (U11781)
posted 16 minutes ago
BREAKING: Sky News reports that China has hacked the UK Ministry of Defence

We’re getting invaded
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Palace beating United 4-0 was the secret message, or they misunderstood message from the Palace.

comment by Irishred (U2539)
posted about 2 hours ago
comment by #4zA (U22472)
posted 6 minutes ago
comment by Hector (U3606)
posted 4 minutes ago
What's a "fawner"?
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Sumbody from outsighed ur country
----------------------------------------------------------------------

----------------------------------------------------------------------

BREAKING:

Incoming reports of an assassination attempt against Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

Several bodyguards were allegedly killed

Over 20 African countries in danger of defaulting on loans. Like many other economies in the global south, they have debts in US dollars. When the Federal Reserve raises interest rates, their obligations grow larger because they must spend more local currency to acquire an appreciating dollar and then use it to repay loans. The risk of these countries defaulting on their bonds is thus elevated, resulting in a flow of cash away from the frontier and emerging economies and toward developed countries instead.

Ugandan president Yoweri Museveni called on African leaders to audit the intentions of the World Bank and IMF loans to ensure that they were for prosperity rather than profiteering The long-serving Ugandan leader questioned why the two institutions funded seminars under the guise of capacity-building.

Kenya's president William Ruto called for a re-examination of the IMF's multilateral financial architecture, which he said was detrimental to African nations. Their debts grew by over £200m(20%) in less than a year thanks mainly to the dollar.

Kenya will be the main revenue stream from lending for the IMF and World Bank in the first half of 2024 paying over 25% of the two institutions' income on it's own. On average, African nations can pay 8 times more than Western nations when borrowing from the Bretton Woods institutions.

While no single entity is solely responsible for Africa’s dire situation, it is fair to say that the continent’s sustained engagement with the Bretton Woods institutions has narrowed African countries’ economic policymaking capacity to the management of balance-of-payments crises. Africa’s international partners have done nothing to promote industrialization on the continent.

Worse, many wealthy countries have made use of subsidies to bolster their domestic industries and competitiveness, adding to the burden on African entrepreneurs and business leaders, who are already contending with the high costs of financial repression and a chronic infrastructure deficit. This misalignment of development priorities became even more important after the World Bank, at the height of the Washington Consensus, shifted to offering balance-of-payments support.

As a result, Africa has been confronting crises with increasing frequency. In addition to security, energy, debt, and migration crises, the continent is currently experiencing the devastating effects of climate change: water stress, food insecurity, extreme weather events, and violent conflict, all of which ultimately lead to lower economic growth. And yet, Africa’s share of global climate financing is currently just 5.5%.

In their rush to promote free markets and trade liberalization, the Bretton Woods institutions failed to consider African countries’ individual circumstances and their positions on the economic-development ladder when prescribing austerity measures. Realizing Africa’s potential requires overcoming a series of challenges. Chief among them is the dysfunctional and unfair global financial system that denies many African countries the debt relief and concessional financing they need.

Asia, unlike Africa, benefited from access to affordable and patient capital, which helped it close its yawning gaps in human and physical capital and led to economic diversification and successful demographic transitions. This has yielded significant dividends in knowledge production, for example, with Asia accounting for 66.8% of the world’s patent applications in 2018 (only 0.5% came from Africa).

Bolstered by sustained investment catalyzing export diversification and effective integration into the global economy, Asia entered a long and virtuous cycle of robust economic growth, whereas more than four-fifths of African countries remain dependent on commodity exports and therefore highly vulnerable to global volatility and terms-of-trade deterioration.

To the extent that Africa faces the perpetual threat of debt overhang, owing to the twin problems of financial repression and a chronic technological deficit, reforming this “dysfunctional and unfair” system requires channeling affordable and patient capital toward the continent.

Similar to the postwar Marshall Plan for rebuilding Europe, this financing would accelerate the structural transformation of African countries and the and the implementation of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA). Such an approach could reduce the unhealthy correlation between growth and commodity-price cycles and, eventually, mitigate correlation risks (one of the main drivers of perception premiums), which would help to leverage more private capital.

In other parts of the world, trade integration has spurred structural transformation and the development of new products, suggesting that, under the right conditions, the AfCFTA would accelerate the diversification of the sources of growth required to boost both extra- and intra-African trade and sustain robust economic growth. Preliminary estimates show that intra-African exports would almost immediately increase by 109%, led by manufactured goods

Good morning/afternoon/evening/night wherever you may be.

comment by Onana what's my name? (U14210)
posted about 5 hours ago
BREAKING:

Incoming reports of an assassination attempt against Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

Several bodyguards were allegedly killed
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Some people now tryna say this is fake news?

A totally baseless claim about an assassination attempt on Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman is going viral on X after being shared by fake osint accounts and well-known misinformation spreaders seeking engagement.

There's zero evidence for the claim

Very strange that Rachel Reeves adenoidal voice never gets any better, if I was Starmer I'd get her some elocution lessons sorted.

Anyway in a desperate attempt to be down with the kids this mornings speech informed us that when it comes to the economy the Tories are gaslighting the public.

Two things spring to mind.

1. Most folk over 60 (maybe younger) haven't got a clue what it means.

2. Those who do get it are being patronised. I'm sure folk can work out whether the Government's assurances about the improving state of families finances stack up in their households.

Considering they are so far ahead Labour seem to be very worried about what the Tories say?

Cry more.

One of Pawl's worst efforts today.

Bit misogynist, telling a man to sort out a woman's voice.

I doubt they're worried Pawl, they're just fed up of the Tories constantly lying and telling us the "the plan is working" when every single one of us can see that's not the case.