The World Health Organization on Sunday, May 17, declared an Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo a Public Health Emergency of International Concern and said there was a high risk it could spread to neighboring countries
International News via Reuters:
The United States, Mexico and Canada on Thursday announced aligned public health travel measures for people coming from African regions at the greatest risk from Ebola, they said in a joint statement, as they aim to protect citizens and visitors during the World Cup.
“The health and safety of every person in the region remains our highest priority as we welcome the world to North America,” they said in the statement, which did not detail the aligned measures.
The World Health Organization on Sunday, May 17, declared an Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo a Public Health Emergency of International Concern and said there was a high risk it could spread to neighboring countries.
The decision has prompted governments to step up travel-related containment measures.
Washington last week banned non-citizens who had traveled to the DRC, Uganda or South Sudan in recent weeks from entering the United States. On Friday, the ban was extended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to green card holders who have been in those countries in the previous 21 days.
Canada has banned residents from the DRC, Uganda and South Sudan from entering the country for 90 days, which started on Wednesday.
Canadian citizens, permanent residents and other foreign nationals who have been in affected areas in recent weeks and do not have symptoms will have to quarantine for 21 days from May 30, according to a statement from Canada’s public health agency.
Mexico’s Health Secretary David Kershenovich on Monday outlined tighter Ebola screening measures at airports, urging the public to avoid travel to DRC and asking arrivals from the country to observe a 21-day quarantine.
Reporting by Katharine Jackson; Writing by Daphne Psaledakis; editing by Michelle Nichols
Saltus students with Coral Tempest Mini-boat prior to launch on January 14, 2026.
Saltus Grammar School today launched Compass, its 2026–2031 Strategic Plan, and announced a transformational $500,000 endowment gift to expand experiential learning opportunities for students. Together, these milestones mark a defining moment for the school, pairing a clear vision for Saltus’ future with meaningful investment in the learning experiences that will bring that vision to life.
Grounded in Saltus’ mission to inspire a passion for learning and independent thinking, Compass is a strategic framework designed to help students develop the knowledge, character, competencies, and global perspective needed to thrive in a changing world. It affirms Saltus’ commitment to academic excellence while placing equal emphasis on adaptability, judgment, and purposeful engagement with the world beyond school.
Developed through extensive consultation over the past year, Compass reflects the collective voices of students, parents, faculty, staff, school leadership, and the Board of Trustees. The result is a shared direction that is ambitious, practical, and deeply rooted in the values and experiences that define a Saltus education.
Reinforcing this vision is the establishment of the Spirit of Discovery Fund: The Roderick A. Ferguson III Endowment, a transformative gift from Martha Ferguson to honor the memory of her late husband, Roderick A. Ferguson III (’65). The endowed fund will serve as a permanent source of support for experiential learning, maritime education, environmental stewardship, and innovation across the school.
“This is a powerful example of vision and action coming together,” said Julie Rousseau, Head of School at Saltus. “Compass provides a clear and inspiring direction for our future, while the Spirit of Discovery Fund creates meaningful opportunities for students to learn through authentic experiences that deepen curiosity, build confidence, and strengthen their connection to Bermuda, their community, and the wider world.”
Commenting on the creation of this endowment at Saltus, Martha Ferguson added, “Rod enjoyed his time at Saltus where he made some lifelong friends. Since one of his passions was sailing, I think he would find this fund appropriate and a huge benefit to the current students by providing them with the opportunities to explore their marine inclinations.”
The endowment directly advances one of the plan’s four strategic directions, Experiential Learning and Community Connections, by ensuring that learning extends beyond the classroom into authentic, real-world environments. Through Saltus Expeditions, students will engage in immersive, place-based learning across Bermuda and beyond, including outdoor education, environmental exploration, community-connected experiences, student exchanges, and hands-on inquiry. Maritime voyages aboard Spirit of Bermuda and STEAM (Science, Technology, Arts, and Math) experiences such as the Miniboat Project will further connect students’ learning to Bermuda’s environment, culture, and maritime heritage.
Together, these experiences will help students connect academic learning with real-world application while developing resilience, leadership, collaboration, and a strong sense of responsibility to their community and environment.
Structured as a permanent endowment, the Spirit of Discovery Fund will provide sustained support for distinctive learning experiences while also allowing the flexibility to invest in emerging opportunities connected to innovation, sustainability, environmental stewardship, and global citizenship.
Compass is organized around four strategic directions: ● Teaching and Learning Excellence ● Well-Being, Belonging, and Identity ● Experiential Learning and Community Connections ● Sustainability and Future Readiness
Together, these directions position Saltus to build on its strong foundations while continuing to evolve to meet the needs of future generations of learners.
The launch of Compass and the Spirit of Discovery Fund reflects the longstanding generosity and shared commitment of the Saltus community. Saltus is focused on the strategic and active growth of its endowment, a vital asset built on a strong history of giving. This growth is visible in the school’s established endowed financial assistance funds, including the Jeannie Beard Award, the Staunton Scholarship,the Michelle L.
Outerbridge Memorial Fund, the Alumni Endowed Scholarship Fund, and the Francis ‘Goose’ Gosling Scholarship Fund. This is further demonstrated by the recently established Green Family Financial Assistance Endowment, to ensure that vital financial assistance continues to expand. Through this momentum, Saltus continues to enhance learning opportunities while helping to ensure that a Saltus education remains accessible. In the past eight years alone, more than 300 students have benefited from financial assistance and scholarship awards, underscoring the school’s enduring commitment to opportunity, access, and educational excellence.
As Saltus looks ahead, Compass will serve as a living framework, one that continues to evolve alongside the needs of students, the community, and an ever-changing world.
Saltus invites families, alumni, and the wider community to explore Compass and learn more about the school’s 2026–2031 strategic direction at saltus.bm/compass.
The government said it is committed to making Bermuda’s correctional system safer, more secure and more focused on rehabilitation
The Government concedes that every stakeholder and the country as a whole, deserves better than what the current system has often delivered.
Wednesday’s response was triggered by an article by Shadow National Security Minister Robert King, who is appalled by the conditions at Westgate laid bare in a report commissioned by the Ministry of Justice.
The company is also planning to roll out new models that specialize in tasks such as transcription, reasoning, speech and images, the report said, citing a person with direct knowledge of the plans
International News via Reuters:
Microsoft will unveil a suite of new homegrown AI models next week at its annual “Build” conference for developers in San Francisco, including a coding model to boost the usage of its GitHub Copilot tool, the Information reported on Thursday.
The company is also planning to roll out new models that specialize in tasks such as transcription, reasoning, speech and images, the report said, citing a person with direct knowledge of the plans. Microsoft declined to comment on the report.
Here are some details:
• Microsoft shares climbed on the report, and were last up nearly 3%.
• It has been rushing to beef up its own AI products as it gears up for a future independent of its once-vital partner OpenAI — the companies have changed their partnership terms in recent months to reduce reliance on each other.
• The tech giant has primarily relied on AI models from OpenAI, Anthropic and Big Tech rival Google to power its GitHub Copilot AI tool for software developers.
• While the tool had seen encouraging uptake initially, products such as Anthropic’s Claude Code have quickly risen to the top spot in AI-assisted coding.
• Microsoft is now eyeing AI startup acquisitions, Reuters reported earlier this month, to diversify beyond its OpenAI partnership.
• The potential deals could help Microsoft beef up AI talent and deliver on its stated goal of building a cutting-edge AI model by next year, three sources had told Reuters.
• Market sentiment on Microsoft has soured this year as investors question the viability of its early lead in AI as its OpenAI partnership unravels, while rivals Google and Amazon report strong progress in their own AI efforts.
Reporting by Deborah Sophia in Bengaluru; Editing by Shilpi Majumdar
While the Chips Act focused on supply side measures, the Chips Act 2.0 will focus on the demand side, the EU document said
International News via Reuters:
The European Commission wants governments to buy chips made by EU startups as it seeks to reduce Europe’s reliance on U.S. and East Asian products, a document seen by Reuters shows.
The proposal dubbed Chips Act 2.0 supplements the original Chips Act implemented three years ago, which has so far failed to achieve its goals of attracting advanced manufacturing and doubling the bloc’s global chip market share to 20% by 2030.
EU tech chief Henna Virkkunen will on June 3 lay out details of the latest attempt to develop and control critical technologies and services, which has been driven mainly by tensions with the United States and China and their dominance in these areas. Europe makes about 10% of global semiconductors.
While the Chips Act focused on supply side measures, the Chips Act 2.0 will focus on the demand side, the EU document said.
“Through Demand Accelerators, the Chips Act 2.0 will also aim to boost the use of EU-designed and EU-made chips by linking suppliers with users via offtake agreements and a demand forum,” the document said.
“To stimulate demand and support EU-based start-ups and scale-ups, the Chips Act 2.0 will deploy public innovation procurement, as a strategic tool,” the paper said.
The Commission also proposed fast-tracking environmental approvals for chip facilities.
Reporting by Foo Yun Chee; editing by Barbara Lewis
Blair, who led Labour to victory in three British elections between 1997 and 2007, took aim at Starmer and two potential rivals this week, in a more than 5,000 word essay
International News via Reuters:
Prime Minister Keir Starmer defended his government on Thursday against criticism from Labour’s longest-serving premier, Tony Blair, saying his ministers had adopted the right policies to start stabilising Britain after a period of flux.
Blair, who led Labour to victory in three British elections between 1997 and 2007, took aim at Starmer and two potential rivals this week, in a more than 5,000 word essay calling on the governing party to focus on better policy decisions rather than personalities or knee-jerk responses to its declining fortunes.
Starmer, who is battling some of the worst popularity ratings of any leader, said while he welcomed debate on “policy and ideas”, he disagreed with Blair’s assessment of the government’s record almost two years into power.
“I don’t agree that the policy choices of this government weren’t the right policy choices, given what we inherited,” he told reporters.
“(It’s a) very different situation in 2024 to 1997; and dealing with what we had to turn around, the policy choices were vindicated by them, because those changes have happened,” Starmer said.
He listed better relations with the European Union, stabilising the economy and reducing waiting times for the country’s public health service as his government’s achievements, pressing home his oft-repeated message that he is not planning to step down despite calls from some in the party.
Blair’s comments have done little to settle emotions in Labour, with the two potential contenders to replace Starmer – Greater Manchester mayor Andy Burnham and former health minister Wes Streeting – also rejecting his critique.
On Wednesday, Burnham and Streeting both said Blair had failed to grasp how inequality in Britain was driving new voting habits, such as the rising popularity of the populist Reform UK party and the left-leaning Green Party.
Since suffering large defeats in local elections and votes to the Scottish and Welsh assemblies earlier this month, Starmer has faced the biggest challenge yet to his authority, with dozens of Labour lawmakers calling on him to step aside.
He has pledged to fight on and prove his critics wrong by delivering the “change” he promised when Labour won a landslide election victory in 2024.
Reporting by Sam Tabahriti and Elizabeth Piper; Editing by Toby Chopra
Under the European Union’s crypto rules, MiCA, crypto companies have until June 30 to get a licence to continue operating in the bloc
International News via Reuters:
France’s top markets regulator warned crypto companies they could be blacklisted and sued if they do not get an EU licence to operate by end of June, as the bloc fully rolls out tighter regulation of crypto.
Under the European Union’s crypto rules, MiCA, crypto companies have until June 30 to get a licence to continue operating in the bloc. European regulators have already warned that companies without licences need to have “orderly wind-down plans” in place.
The rules, which were agreed in 2023, bring regulatory oversight to the multi-trillion-dollar crypto industry’s operations in Europe, even as U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration has eased regulation for the crypto sector in the U.S..
“It’s becoming very, very urgent to finalise the licences applications,” Marie-Anne Barbat-Layani, president of the French markets regulator, AMF, told journalists on Thursday.
Crypto companies which have not secured licences by the EU’s deadline will be put on blacklists and will face enforcement action, including prosecution, if they continue to seek EU customers without authorisation, Barbat-Layani said.
Under MiCA, crypto companies have to apply for licences from regulators in individual EU countries, which they can use as a “passport” to operate throughout the 27-nation bloc.
Last year, some regulators became concerned about differences in how countries were applying the rules, with the speed of licence approvals in Malta drawing scrutiny from the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA).
Barbat-Layani reiterated that France would be prepared to block the passporting of licences granted by other countries if it does not agree with that country’s decision, a stance first reported by Reuters in September.
Still, she said, this would not be what the regulator would want, as it would represent a “serious collective failure”.
Reporting by Elizabeth Howcroft, editing by John O’Donnell
Alexa Lightbourne, Minister of Home Affairs, reflects on the three Town Hall presentations on pursuing CARICOM membership. Responding to questions, she says the events were about consulting with the public, not persuading them.
The consultation period, which followed the release of the Green Paper on full CARICOM membership, concludes on May 31st.
The Department of Sport and Recreation is aware that some parents experienced confusion regarding Summer Camp placement notifications issued through the registration portal. A review conducted with the Department, Digital Transformation Team, and stakeholders confirmed that the lottery process itself worked correctly and that camp placements were properly assigned. The issue relates to the wording of notification emails and the clarity of instructions presented to parents within the portal.
Minister of Tourism & Transport, Culture & Sport, the Hon. Owen Darrell, JP, MP, stated, “We understand the frustration and confusion experienced by some parents and want to assure the public that camp placements were generated correctly. Our immediate focus is on improving communication, clarifying next steps for families, and ensuring parents receive accurate and easy-to-understand information as quickly as possible.”
The Department is now working with vendors to update notification templates, clarify instructions for parents, identify any failed email deliveries, and provide additional support materials to help families navigate the portal. The team is also reviewing ways to consolidate multiple notifications for parents who applied for more than one camp or week to reduce further confusion.
Families requiring assistance may contact the support team by e-mail at Osshelp@gov.bm or by calling the technical support line at +1 (441) 907-6767.
At this time, there are no plans to rerun the lottery process. The Department continues to validate the full scope of impacted users and will provide further updates once this work is completed. Families are asked for patience while these corrective measures are finalized.
Media release supplied by the Government of Bermuda.
The unrelenting dominance of Airforce was finally broken on Race Day Seven of the Wednesday Night Sailing series, as the crew of Menace secured a spectacular victory in Hamilton Harbour.
The fleet took to the traditional course starting and finishing near the high-profile Princess Dock, facing a shifting breeze that demanded ultimate precision from the local tacticians. Airforce entered the evening carrying the heavy psychological momentum of a five-meet winning streak on corrected time. However, their bid to extend that flawless baseline was unceremoniously snapped down the final stretch.
In an unusual twist, race officials opted not to release individual elapsed or corrected times, publishing only the definitive finishing standings once the structural handicap math had been finalized. Despite the lack of concrete timing benchmarks, there was no mistaking the authority of Menace, who were cleanly declared the overall winners to shake up the summit of the series leaderboard.
The fight for the remaining podium spot was a fiercely contested affair, with the RS 21 4 REID boat showcasing excellent top-end speed to hold off the chasing pack and claim a highly commendable third-place finish.
The immense depth of the local fleet was on full display through the mid-table exchanges. The crew of Stormy bounced back from a string of tough technical outings earlier in the month to secure a brilliant fourth-place finish overall. They were followed closely across the digital line by the experienced crew of Fat Tuesday, who safely rounded out the top five boats on corrected time.
While Airforce departs the Princess Dock disappointed to see their historic streak come to an end, the high-performance mileage accumulated keeps them firmly in the hunt for the overall series crown.
Second baseman Adam Hall and his Winnipeg Goldeyes continued their sensational early-season turnaround, securing a dominant 7-1 victory over the Gary SouthShore RailCats at the U.S. Steel Yard.
The clinical triumph marks a fourth consecutive win for the Canadian outfit. Having endured a miserable 0-4 opening to their American Association campaign, the Goldeyes have re-established a fierce baseline, clicking cleanly to win five of their last six contests. Hall proved an essential cog in the offensive machine, finishing 1-for-3 from the plate while crossing the diamond to register a vital run scored.
The definitive damage was inflicted during a ruthless top of the third inning, where Winnipeg’s batting lineup systematically picked apart RailCats starter Grant Cherry. Noah Marcelo sparked the sequence with a sharp, lining double to left field to bring home T.J. Schofield-Sam. Roby Enríquez instantly doubled the misery for the Indiana faithful with a clinical two-run single up the middle, before Max Murphy capped off the four-run showcase with an RBI base hit to centre. The crucial hit leaves Murphy just one shy of matching Reggie Abercrombie’s legendary, all-time club record of 393.
While the bats laid down the baseline, the evening ultimately belonged to an exceptional pitching performance from Winnipeg starter Kevin Vaupel. The left-hander dictated the terms of engagement across seven magnificent innings, surrendering a meager three hits while fanning four batters without issuing a single walk.
The lone blemish against Vaupel’s record arrived in the fifth, when Gary SouthShore’s Nick Podkul launched a leadoff home run to left field. Winnipeg’s response was immediate and physical; in the top of the sixth, Jiandido Tromp crushed his first home run in a Goldeyes uniform—a majestic two-run shot to left that brought Adam Hall home with him. Marcelo added a late exclamation point in the ninth, tripling before scoring on Ramón Bramasco’s single to stretch his individual hitting streak to eight games and complete the comprehensive routing block.
The iconic vessel gears up to return to the Newport Bermuda Race as crews work to revive its mission for future generations
For thousands of young Bermudians, the Spirit of Bermuda is more than just a ship – it represents a rite of passage.
After financial uncertainty threatened the future of the iconic sail-training vessel last year, the crew is now preparing for a comeback, beginning with a return to the Newport Bermuda Race.
More in the below report.
The foundation is planning to soft launch summer youth programmes that would begin mid-August after they complete another planned ocean voyage – Sail Boston, a global gathering of tall ships to celebrate the 250th Anniversary of the founding of the United States.
Talks have already begun with education partners to later determine the return of school voyages.
As the foundation works to stabilise its finances and restart educational programmes, Mr Doughty says the long-term goal is not just preserving the vessel – but ensuring future generations of Bermudians can continue its legacy.
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