The Hon. Owen Darrell, JP, MP, Minister of Tourism, Transport, Culture, and Sport, announces the appointments of William ‘Billy’ Griffith and Shannah Butterfield to the Bermuda Tourism Authority (BTA) Board.
Minister Darrell stated, “I am pleased to announce the appointment of Mr. William ‘Billy’ Griffith as Chairman of the BTA. Mr Griffith has served as Acting Chairman since 2025. His appointment reflects his dedication to guiding the Board and supporting BTA leadership.
“Ms. Butterfield will serve for three years as a Board member. She has a Master’s Degree in Human Resource Management and is a Certified Senior Human Resource Professional with over 20 years of experience in both the public and private sectors. She also serves on several other Boards leveraging her expertise.
“William “Billy” Griffith is a regionally respected tourism executive with more than four decades of leadership across hospitality, destination marketing, and tourism development. An Honours graduate in Hotel Management from the University of the West Indies, he began his career at Sandy Lane Hotel in Barbados. In Bermuda, Griffith served as General Manager and Executive Director of leading hotels, earning the Hotelier of the Year award. He later served as Bermuda’s Director of Tourism and as Chief Executive Officer of Barbados Tourism Marketing Inc., where his leadership delivered record visitor growth and strengthened international competitiveness. He currently serves on the Caribbean Tourism Organisation Executive Committee and is Founder and Managing Director of WCG Consulting Ltd., advising clients and destinations worldwide.”
Minister Darrell added, “I am pleased that Mr. Griffith and Ms. Butterfield have accepted the invitations to serve. I am confident their professional backgrounds and passion for the industry will add valuable perspective to the Board. They will join the current five directors, a team of corporate and tourism professionals dedicated to promoting Bermuda and driving economic growth.”
Shannah Butterfield stated, I am very honoured to serve on this Board and to work alongside fellow Board members to support the growth of Bermuda’s tourism economy. I look forward to us developing effective strategies that will strengthen the BTA and further lead towards sustainable talent development in the tourism sector.”
William Griffith stated, “I am deeply honoured to continue serving as Chairman of the Bermuda Tourism Authority and to work closely with my fellow Board members in delivering our strategic objectives for 2026. This year represents an important reset—focused on stabilising governance, strengthening culture and trust, appointing high-impact executive leadership, and sharpening performance and accountability. Together, we will guide the development of Bermuda’s next National Tourism Plan, ensuring it is sustainable, evidence-based, and aligned with our priorities, while positioning Bermuda’s tourism industry for long-term resilience, growth, and shared prosperity.”
Merz, speaking at a time of increased transatlantic tensions as U.S. President Donald Trump upends traditional alliances, said the talks were only at an initial stage and no decision was imminent
International News via Reuters:
European nations are starting to discuss ideas around a shared nuclear umbrella to complement existing security arrangements with the U.S., German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said, amid growing talk in Germany of developing its own nuclear defences.
Merz, speaking at a time of increased transatlantic tensions as U.S. President Donald Trump upends traditional alliances, said the talks were only at an initial stage and no decision was imminent.
“We know that we have to reach a number of strategic and military policy decisions, but at the moment, the time is not ripe,” he told reporters on Thursday.
Germany is currently banned from developing a nuclear weapon of its own under the so-called Four Plus Two agreement that opened the way for the country’s reunification in 1990 as well as under a landmark nuclear non-proliferation treaty that Germany signed in 1969.
Merz said Germany’s treaty obligations did not prevent it from discussing joint solutions with partners, including Britain and France, the only European powers which have a nuclear arsenal.
“These talks are taking place. They are also not in conflict with nuclear-sharing with the United States of America,” he said.
European nations have long relied heavily on the United States, including its large nuclear arsenal, for their defence but have been increasing military spending, partly in response to sharp criticism from the Trump administration.
Trump has rattled Washington’s European allies with his talk of acquiring Greenland from Denmark, a NATO ally, and his threat, later rescinded, to impose tariffs on countries that stood in his way.
He has also suggested in the past that the U.S. would not help protect countries that failed to spend enough on their own defence.
Merz’s comments were echoed by the head of the parliamentary defence committee, Thomas Roewekamp, who said Germany had the technical capacity which could be used in developing a European nuclear weapon.
“We do not have missiles or warheads, but we do have a significant technological advantage that we could contribute to a joint European initiative,” Roewekamp, from Merz’s centre-right Christian Democratic Union party, told Germany’s Welt TV.
Reporting by Andreas Rinke, writing by James MackenzieEditing by Gareth Jones
Cipollone said the digital euro scheme, together with another two projects the ECB is working on for wholesale payments, will give the euro zone the tools it needs “to keep its house in order.”
International News via Reuters:
The euro zone needs to be self-sufficient in handling payments and the digital euro will provide the necessary infrastructure for retail transactions, European Central Bank Executive Board Member Piero Cipollone said on Thursday.
Speaking remotely at a conference in Italy, Cipollone said the digital euro scheme, together with another two projects the ECB is working on for wholesale payments, will give the euro zone the tools it needs “to keep its house in order.”
“That can give it more strength,” he said when asked if the digital euro could boost Europe’s position vis-a-vis the United States.
Ghana is among the countries that had already made significant progress reducing malaria mortality by scaling up interventions
International News via Reuters:
New vaccines are helping Ghana approach a long-sought goal of ending child deaths from malaria, demonstrating the potential of the shots to drive back a disease that kills nearly half a million young children every year in Africa, according to the international vaccine aid group Gavi and the country’s health service.
But aid cutbacks by the Trump administration and other wealthy governments could mean fewer children benefit on the continent where malaria hits hardest, Gavi told Reuters.
Ghana is among the countries that had already made significant progress reducing malaria mortality by scaling up interventions such as the distribution of bed nets treated with insecticides and improving access to both preventive drugs and prompt treatment.
Two new vaccines – one developed by British drugmaker GSK (GSK.L), the other by Oxford University and the Serum Institute of India – are helping close the remaining gap, said Dr Selorm Kutsoati, who heads Ghana’s immunisation programme.
“For me, the malaria vaccine is a gamechanger,” she told Reuters.
Gavi is currently the only organisation purchasing malaria shots for African nations. It anticipates it will be able to spend just over $800 million on the programme over the next five years – 28% less than the expected need – after falling $2.9 billion short of its overall funding goal for the period, according to internal estimates prepared for its board of directors in December, seen by Reuters.
An additional 19,000 lives could be lost as a result due to lower vaccination rates, the documents say. The estimate, which has not previously been reported, is based on modelling of the vaccines’ impact by researchers at Imperial College London and the Swiss Tropical and Public Health Institute.
“It is the gap between the promise and the need for the vaccine, and the resources we have to provide that,” Scott Gordon, who heads Gavi’s malaria program, told Reuters.
U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy announced in June that Washington would no longer support Gavi, part of sweeping cuts to foreign aid that President Donald Trump says do not align with his “America First” agenda. The United States was previously one of the group’s top donors, contributing some $1.3 billion between 2020 and 2024.
The U.S. “remains committed to working with global partners to combat malaria,” a Department of Health and Human Services official told Reuters.
But the Trump administration will not disburse funds to Gavi unless it starts phasing out vaccines containing the mercury-based preservative thimerosal from its portfolio, the official said. Anti-vaccine groups have linked thimerosal to autism and other neurodevelopmental disorders, despite multiple studies showing no related safety issues.
Gavi confirmed the request and said the group remained in contact with the U.S. government on the subject. Any decision related to its portfolio would be “guided by scientific consensus,” it said.
Other donors have also been scaling back support. Britain, Gavi’s biggest donor, has pledged 1.25 billion pounds ($1.72 billion) over the next five years, more than 20% less than for 2020-25.
Britain’s international development minister, Jenny Chapman, said the country remains committed to supporting Gavi’s work because it saves lives.
A MOTHER DECIDES: ‘I HAVE TO GO FOR THE VACCINE’
Some major global organisations initially doubted the potential of the two vaccines now being rolled out in 24 African countries with help from Gavi.
Based on clinical trials, the World Health Organization (WHO) estimates they reduce malaria cases by over 50% during the first year after three shots are administered, an efficacy rate lower than many commonly used childhood shots. A fourth dose is required before a child turns 2 to maintain protection.
Supporters of the vaccines point to the success in Ghana, saying even a partially effective shot has translated into many lives saved.
“In real-world settings, we’re seeing significant impact,” Gavi’s Gordon said.
Confirmed deaths among children under the age of 5 have dropped nearly 86% in Ghana, from 245 in 2018, the year before GSK’s vaccine was introduced in select districts, to 35 in 2024, according to government figures. A decade ago, nearly 1,000 children in that age group died each year, Kutsoati said.
Malaria infections have also declined, from roughly 6.7 million in 2018 to 5.3 million in 2024, around a fifth of which were among children under 5, Ghana’s figures show.
The actual numbers are likely to be higher, as many malaria cases do not get diagnosed, and deaths that occur at home often go unreported, said Dorothy Achu, the WHO’s team lead for malaria in Africa. There can also be inconsistent reporting by some health facilities.
But Achu agreed the combination of strategies used in Ghana resulted in a “significant reduction in malaria deaths”, adding the WHO is using the country’s figures to update its estimates.
Esther Kolan, a 31-year-old clothing trader, did not need much persuading to get her 1-year-old son Phenehas Gyngyi Jr. vaccinated last summer at the Mother and Child Hospital in the southern town of Kasoa.
Her brother died of malaria just before his 15th birthday. A daughter was hospitalised twice with the disease before she turned 3.
“I told myself, no matter the condition, I have to go for the vaccine,” Kolan said, adding her family also sleeps under bed nets.
Phenehas has had three doses and has never been hospitalised with malaria.
“This has really helped me a lot,” said Kolan, who plans to get him a booster shot soon. “I was not scared for my child.”
Malaria deaths were already declining in their district when vaccines became available in 2023, according to Stanley Yaidoo, the municipal health services director. But the number of cases still put pressure on hospitals, exhausting staff and taking up beds that could be used to treat other dangerous diseases, he told Reuters.
“The vaccine implementation was the master stroke that we needed to support the already existing interventions,” Yaidoo said.
PROGRESS AGAINST A KILLER DISEASE
Some regions managed to eliminate malaria without a vaccine, but countries in sub-Saharan Africa face particular challenges, disease experts say.
Many are among the world’s poorest, with poorly-resourced health systems. The prevailing strain is particularly deadly, and there is growing resistance to preventive and curative drugs. Control efforts have been disrupted by conflicts and natural disasters.
The first countries to use the vaccines – Kenya, Malawi and Ghana – were part of a WHO-led pilot programme that began in 2019 with GSK’s shot. The WHO approved this vaccine for wider use in 2021, but the rollout faced hurdles, including a vast supply shortfall.
Access improved when WHO recommended the Oxford shot in 2023.
In many countries, it is too early to assess the vaccines’ impact. But there are anecdotal reports of reductions in cases, hospitalisations and deaths among young children, according to the Gavi documents and interviews with health officials in four countries.
Take-up of the vaccines has varied, the documents show. In the first six months of 2025, coverage rates across 11 countries for three doses ranged from over 70% in Ghana and Burkina Faso, to 45% in Liberia and 35% in conflict-hit South Sudan.
Introducing a new vaccine that requires multiple doses has presented logistical challenges, especially in rural areas where transportation and storage options are limited.
In Ghana, there was also resistance from a number of traditional and religious leaders, and politicians skeptical about the benefits, Yaidoo told Reuters.
But results talk, he said.
“Those who have had the vaccination, they give their testimonies on how their children are protected from severe malaria. So many of them are actually our ambassadors.”
Cases of severe malaria among vaccinated children were 58% lower than among unvaccinated children in the year after they received the third dose across the countries that participated in the pilot, a study published in The Lancet medical journal in January found.
Health officials in Kenya and Malawi did not respond to Reuters’ questions about their vaccination programmes.
At least four more countries plan to introduce malaria vaccines before 2028, Gavi said.
Until this year, Gavi could subsidise 85% of the assessed need for shots in areas of medium and high malaria transmission, with governments contributing as little as $0.20 per dose.
It has now reduced its spending cap to 70% for areas that will be ordering shots for the first time, the documents show. It will also be asking all but the poorest governments to increase their contributions, which vary depending on the strength of their economies.
Details of how these changes will affect individual countries are being worked out, Gavi said.
Price cuts for the vaccines could help mitigate the aid cuts. GSK and its partner, India’s Bharat Biotech, said in June they would reduce the price of their shot to under $5 a dose by 2028, roughly half what it costs now. In November, Gavi and the U.N. children’s agency announced a deal to pay 25% less for Serum’s vaccine, currently priced at around $4 per dose, within roughly a year.
GSK said the real-world data was encouraging, and it was working with Gavi on how to make the roll-out as effective as possible. It did not elaborate. The other companies did not respond to requests for comment.
At least three countries – Burkina Faso, Ivory Coast and Togo – have committed to covering some malaria vaccine needs themselves, Gordon said.
But Tanzania is struggling to plug funding gaps and will have to delay the start of its vaccination campaign, said Dr Samwel Lazaro, acting head of its malaria programme.
“Currently, the government is focused on ensuring the implementation of the most essential and life-saving services, such as the use of medicated bed nets,” Lazaro said.
($1 = 0.7255 pounds)
Jennifer Rigby reported from London and Emmanuel Bruce from Accra; Additional reporting by Nuzulack Dausen in Dar Es Salaam and Alice Lawson in Lome; Editing by Michele Gershberg and Alexandra Zavis
Goal is for students to better understand how nutrition, lifestyle and biology influence health outcomes
(Hamilton, Bermuda, January 29) A new initiative at Bermuda College is giving healthcare students hands-on experience in medical nutrition, diagnostics and wellness assessment.
The programme, which combines classroom learning with real-world laboratory testing and community-based health interventions, forms part of a Medical Nutrition course within the college’s Nursing and Allied Health curriculum.
It is designed to move students beyond theory into applied learning and through supervised assessments and structured interventions, students will work directly with volunteer participants to better understand how nutrition, lifestyle and biology influence health outcomes.
For the first time, the initiative is being supported by on-campus laboratory facilities operated by Carigenetics, enabling students to incorporate professional blood analysis and genetic wellness screening into their coursework.
The collaboration creates a unique learning environment where academic instruction is integrated with live diagnostic processes.
The course is led by Dr Andrew Dhanoo, Biology Lecturer at Bermuda College, who introduced the practical project to strengthen students’ clinical and patient engagement skills.
As part of the programme, students conduct physical assessments such as height, weight and blood pressure measurements, alongside biochemical testing including cholesterol and blood glucose analysis.
“This approach allows students to properly assess individuals and develop tailored nutrition interventions, rather than applying generic advice,” said Dr Dhanoo.
“By reassessing participants after the intervention period, students can see which strategies actually work and gain meaningful insight into preventive healthcare.”
Using the data collected, students design personalised nutrition and lifestyle plans, supported by nutrition professionals from the Bermuda Diabetes Association.
Over a two-month period, participants follow the interventions before returning for reassessment, enabling students to measure outcomes and refine their understanding of culturally appropriate healthcare strategies.
For Dr Carika Weldon, founder of Carigenetics and an adjunct lecturer at Bermuda College, the initiative reflects a deliberate commitment to education, collaboration and healthcare innovation.
Both the company’s research and clinical laboratories are based on campus to provide students with early exposure to professional laboratory environments.
“From the outset, our goal was to create real opportunities for students to gain hands-on experience in a clinical lab setting,” said Dr Weldon.
“By integrating genetics and diagnostics into teaching, we’re helping students build confidence, stand out professionally and better prepare for careers in healthcare.”
Beyond education, the project also supports the development of local diagnostic capacity and more affordable access to testing.
As a growing clinical laboratory, Carigenetics is using the programme to validate testing processes while helping address gaps in care for uninsured and underserved populations.
The pilot launches this semester, with student presentations and outcome reviews scheduled for April.
Organisers hope the model will be expanded across additional health and science courses, demonstrating the value of collaboration between education, industry and health organisations in strengthening Bermuda’s healthcare system.
Hackers could target the computers running the LLMs and direct them to carry out spam operations, phishing content creation or disinformation campaigns, evading platform security protocols, the researchers said
International News via Reuters:
Hackers and other criminals can easily commandeer computers operating open-source large language models outside the guardrails and constraints of the major artificial-intelligence platforms, creating security risks and vulnerabilities, researchers said on Thursday.
Hackers could target the computers running the LLMs and direct them to carry out spam operations, phishing content creation or disinformation campaigns, evading platform security protocols, the researchers said.
The research, carried out jointly by cybersecurity companies SentinelOne and Censys over the course of 293 days and shared exclusively with Reuters, offers a new window into the scale of potentially illicit use cases for thousands of open-source LLM deployments. These include hacking, hate speech and harassment, violent or gore content, personal data theft, scams or fraud, and in some cases child sexual abuse material, the researchers said.
While thousands of open-source LLM variants exist, a significant portion of the LLMs on the internet-accessible hosts are variants of Meta’s Llama, Google DeepMind’s Gemma, and others, according to the researchers. While some of the open-source models include guardrails, the researchers identified hundreds of instances where guardrails were explicitly removed.
AI industry conversations about security controls are “ignoring this kind of surplus capacity that is clearly being utilized for all kinds of different stuff, some of it legitimate, some obviously criminal,” said Juan Andres Guerrero-Saade, executive director for intelligence and security research at SentinelOne. Guerrero-Saade likened the situation to an “iceberg” that is not being properly accounted for across the industry and open-source community.
The research analyzed publicly accessible deployments of open-source LLMs deployed through Ollama, a tool that allows people and organizations to run their own versions of various large-language models.
The researchers were able to see system prompts, which are the instructions that dictate how the model behaves, in roughly a quarter of the LLMs they observed. Of those, they determined that 7.5% could potentially enable harmful activity.
Roughly 30% of the hosts observed by the researchers are operating out of China, and about 20% in the U.S.
Rachel Adams, the CEO and founder of the Global Center on AI Governance, said in an email that once open models are released, responsibility for what happens next becomes shared across the ecosystem, including the originating labs.
“Labs are not responsible for every downstream misuse (which are hard to anticipate), but they retain an important duty of care to anticipate foreseeable harms, document risks, and provide mitigation tooling and guidance, particularly given uneven global enforcement capacity,” Adams said.
A spokesperson for Meta declined to respond to questions about developers’ responsibilities for addressing concerns around downstream abuse of open-source models and how concerns might be reported, but noted the company’s Llama Protection tools for Llama developers, and the company’s Meta Llama Responsible Use Guide.
Microsoft AI Red Team Lead Ram Shankar Siva Kumar said in an email that Microsoft believes open-source models “play an important role” in a variety of areas, but, “at the same time, we are clear‑eyed that open models, like all transformative technologies, can be misused by adversaries if released without appropriate safeguards.”
Microsoft performs pre-release evaluations, including processes to assess “risks for internet-exposed, self-hosted, and tool-calling scenarios, where misuse can be high,” he said. The company also monitors for emerging threats and misuse patterns. “Ultimately, responsible open innovation requires shared commitment across creators, deployers, researchers, and security teams.”
Ollama did not respond to a request for comment. Alphabet’s Google and Anthropic did not respond to questions.
Reporting by AJ Vicens in Detroit; Editing by Matthew Lewis
At its intra-day peak, Brent traded as high as $70.35 a barrel, its highest since late-September
International News via Reuters:
Brent oil futures prices jumped on Thursday, hitting a four-month high on rising concerns of the potential impact a possible U.S. military attack on Iran, OPEC’s fourth-largest producer, with output of 3.2 million barrels per day.
“The immediate (market) concern … is the collateral damage done if Iran takes a swing at its neighbours or possibly even more tellingly, it closes the Strait of Hormuz to the 20 million barrels per day of oil that navigates it,” said PVM analyst John Evans.
Brent crude futures rose $1.39, or 2.03%, to $69.79 a barrel by 1011 GMT. At its intra-day peak, Brent traded as high as $70.35 a barrel, its highest since late-September.
U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude was up $1.37, or 2.17%, to $64.58 a barrel at 1011 GMT. WTI futures topped $65 a barrel on Thursday, also reaching a four-month high.
U.S. President Donald Trump has increased pressure on Tehran to end its nuclear programme, with threats of military strikes and the arrival of a U.S. naval group in the region.
Trump is considering options that include targeted strikes on security forces and leaders to inspire protesters to potentially topple Iran’s rulers, Reuters reported on Thursday, citing U.S. sources familiar with the discussions.
Some analysts are forecasting higher prices because of the Iranian concerns.
“The potential for Iran getting hit has escalated the geopolitical premium of oil prices by potentially $3 to $4 (per barrel),” analysts at Citi said in a note on Wednesday.
They added that further geopolitical escalation could push prices to as high as $72 a barrel for Brent over the next three months.
Elsewhere, the huge Tengiz oilfield in Kazakhstan is being restarted in stages after electrical fires cut output last week, with the aim to reach full production in a week.
In the U.S., the world’s biggest oil producer and largest liquefied natural gas exporter, crude and gas producers were bringing wells back online after disruption from severe cold from Winter Storm Fern over the weekend.
“The main driver of oil prices remains geopolitical risk premium surrounding Iran and the Middle East, though unplanned outages in Kazakhstan and U.S. (Winter Storm Fern) have had temporary impact as well,” DBS Bank’s energy sector team lead Suvro Sarkar said in an email.
Reporting by Robert Harvey in London, Sam Li and Trixie Yap in Singapore; Editing by Christian Schmollinger, Jamie Freed and Alexander Smith
Thailand, Singapore, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Indonesia and Vietnam have also tightened screening at airports
International News via Reuters:
Authorities in Pakistan have ordered enhanced screening of people entering the country for signs of infections of the deadly Nipah virus after India confirmed two cases, adding to the number of Asian countries stepping up controls.
Thailand, Singapore, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Indonesia and Vietnam have also tightened screening at airports. But an Indian official said there were no plans to introduce screening at the country’s airports and said there was no sign of any outbreak.
The Nipah virus can cause fever and brain inflammation and has a high mortality rate. There is also no vaccine. But transmission from person to person is not easy and typically requires prolonged contact with an infected individual.
PAKISTAN SEEKS TRANSIT HISTORY
“It has become imperative to strengthen preventative and surveillance measures at Pakistan’s borders,” the Border Health Services department said in a statement.
“All travelers shall undergo thermal screening and clinical assessment at the Point of Entry,” which includes seaports, land borders and airports, the department added.
The agency said travellers would need to provide transit history for the preceding 21-day period to check whether they had been through “Nipah-affected or high-risk regions”.
There are no direct flights between Pakistan and India and travel between them is extremely limited, particularly since their worst fighting in decades erupted last May.
In Hanoi, the Vietnamese capital’s health department on Wednesday also ordered the screening of incoming passengers at Noi Bai airport, particularly those arriving from India and the eastern state of West Bengal, where the two health workers were confirmed to have the virus in late December.
Passengers will be checked with body temperature scanners.
“This allows for timely isolation, epidemiological investigation,” the department said in a statement.
That follows measures by authorities in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam’s largest city, who said they had tightened health controls at international border crossings.
NO OUTBREAK, NO WORRY, SAYS INDIA
India’s health ministry said this week that authorities have identified and traced 196 contacts linked to the two cases with none showing symptoms and all testing negative for the virus.
The two infected people are health workers, with the male patient doing well and likely to be discharged from hospital soon, while the female patient remains critical and under treatment, the chief district medical officer in the eastern Indian state of West Bengal told Reuters on Thursday.
Indian health authorities have repeatedly sought to reassure people that the infection has been contained and that there is no reason to fear an outbreak. Federal health authorities also said there was no need to screen passengers at Indian airports.
“There is no outbreak, there were just two cases in one district in (West) Bengal and there is no spread,” a federal health ministry official told Reuters, speaking on condition of anonymity. “There is no consideration for screening at airports in India because there appears to be no need for it.”
Asked about Indian passengers being screened at airports across Asia, the official said it was the sovereign right of countries to do what they think is best.
HIGH FATALITY RATE
Nipah is a rare viral infection that spreads largely from infected animals, mainly fruit bats, to humans. It can be asymptomatic but it is often very dangerous, with a case fatality rate of 40% to 75%, depending on the local healthcare system’s capacity for detection and management, according to the World Health Organization.
The virus was first identified just over 25 years ago during an outbreak among pig farmers in Malaysia and Singapore, although scientists believe it has circulated in flying foxes, or fruit bats, for thousands of years.
The WHO classifies Nipah as a priority pathogen. India regularly reports sporadic infections, particularly in the southern state of Kerala, regarded as one of the world’s highest-risk regions for Nipah.
As of December 2025, there have been 750 confirmed Nipah infections globally, with 415 deaths, according to the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations, which is funding a vaccine trial to help stop Nipah.
Reporting by Francesco Guarascio in Hanoi, Mubasher Bukhari in Lahore, Ananda Teresia in Jakarta, Rishika Sadam and Abhijith Ganapavaram in Hyderabad, and Jatindra Dash in Bhubaneswar; Editing by Edwina Gibbs, YP Rajesh and Gareth Jones
British citizens will be allowed to visit China without a visa if they are travelling for under 30 days, Starmer said following his talks with President Xi Jinping, in what he cast as a win for business
International News via Reuters:
China agreed to relax rules to allow some visa-free travel for British citizens on Thursday during a visit by Prime Minister Keir Starmer to Beijing, as part of a partnership deal which London hopes will help expand its service sector.
British citizens will be allowed to visit China without a visa if they are travelling for under 30 days, Starmer said following his talks with President Xi Jinping, in what he cast as a win for business.
Companies had been “crying out for ways to grow their footprints in China”, a statement from Starmer said, adding that visa-free travel would help facilitate expansion in that market, boosting jobs at home.
Injecting growth into Britain’s relatively sluggish economy is one of the main aims of his four-day trip.
As part of what Britain called a “new partnership”, the two countries also agreed to conduct a feasibility study which could pave the way towards a bilateral services agreement, which would further help British firms doing business in China.
Britain’s economy is underpinned by its huge services sector and the partnership will aim to grow links in the healthcare, financial and professional services, legal services, education and skills sectors, the statement said.
Britain exports 13 billion pounds worth of services to China annually, it added, and demand from China is growing.
Reporting by Andrew MacAskill and Muvija M, writing by Sarah Young, editing by Catarina Demony and William James
The announcement marks the biggest deal so far during the trip, as Britain seeks to strengthen ties with Beijing at a time of strained relations with Washington
International News via Reuters:
UK drugmaker AstraZeneca will invest $15 billion in China through 2030 to expand medicines manufacturing and research and development, it said on Thursday as British Prime Minister Keir Starmer visited Beijing.
The announcement marks the biggest deal so far during the trip, as Britain seeks to strengthen ties with Beijing at a time of strained relations with Washington.
Starmer cast the drugmaker’s investment as a boost for Britain. “AstraZeneca’s expansion and leadership in China will help the British manufacturer continue to grow – supporting thousands of UK jobs,” he said in a statement.
Even as AstraZeneca invests heavily in the United States, led by a $50 billion manufacturing deal last year, it continues to build its business in the second-biggest market after scandals including the arrest of its China president in 2024.
BIGGEST INVESTMENT IN CHINA YET
AstraZeneca CEO Pascal Soriot said it was the company’s largest investment in China, where it has operated for more than 30 years and is the biggest foreign drugmaker. China accounts for about 12% of its revenue.
AstraZeneca has invested billions of dollars in the country during Soriot’s tenure as CEO since 2012, including $2.5 billion in a Beijing research and development hub in March last year, its second after a Shanghai site opened in 2024.
The centres work with more than 500 hospitals across China and have helped run global clinical trials.
The drugmaker said the new deal would bolster its capabilities in new therapeutic approaches like cell therapy and radioconjugates, where it said China was a recognised leader.
Building on its 2024 acquisition of Gracell Biotechnologies, AstraZeneca said it would become the first global biopharmaceutical company with end-to-end cell therapy capabilities in China.
The investment would also help develop treatments for cancer, blood disorders and autoimmune diseases, the company said, and expand manufacturing sites in Wuxi, Taizhou, Qingdao and Beijing, which it said supply medicines in China and to 70 markets worldwide.
It will lift its China workforce to more than 20,000.
ASTRAZENECA PARTNERS CHINA’S BOOMING BIOTECH INDUSTRY
China’s growing role as a source of new drug assets has become a focus for the industry, executives said at the JPMorgan Healthcare conference earlier this month.
AstraZeneca has signed more than a dozen deals with Chinese biotech firms developing early-stage experimental drug candidates, including partnerships with AbelZeta, CSPC, Harbour BioMed, Jacobio and Syneron Bio.
AstraZeneca’s Chief Financial Officer Aradhana Sarin said in November that growth in China has been “strong throughout the year”.
Some rival drugmakers have sold off Chinese assets following supply chain disruptions, economic slowdown, and strong competition in the country’s centralised drug procurement programme.
Reporting by Andrew MacAskill in Beijing and Maggie Fick in LondonAdditional reporting by Andrew Silver in ShanghaiEditing by Paul Sandle, Kirsten Donovan
The ministers are also expected to reach a political agreement to include Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps on the bloc’s list of terrorist organisations
International News via Reuters:
European Union foreign ministers adopted new sanctions on Iran on Thursday targeting individuals and entities involved in a violent crackdown on protesters and in the country’s support to Russia, EU diplomats said on Thursday.
The ministers are also expected to reach a political agreement to include Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps on the bloc’s list of terrorist organisations, putting the IRGC in a category similar to that of Islamic State and al Qaeda and marking a symbolic shift in Europe’s approach to Iran’s leadership.
Some EU members, led by France, have long been reluctant to add the IRGC to that list, but Paris said on Wednesday it would support the move, paving the way for an approval, even though such a decision needs unanimity among the bloc’s 27 members.
The IRGC, set up after Iran’s 1979 Islamic Revolution to protect the Shi’ite clerical ruling system, has great sway in the country, controlling swathes of the economy and armed forces, and it was also put in charge of Iran’s ballistic missile and nuclear programmes.
Reporting by Lili Bayer, editing by Inti Landauro, Benoit Van Overstraeten and Hugh Lawson
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The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
Statistics
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes.The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
Marketing
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.
