Joe Galvin

YouTube video by BBC News Sudanese survivors of el-Fasher siege tell the BBC about RSF brutality | BBC News

A horrific mass murder is unfolding in Sudan, where no one can see it. The RSF are murdering civilians in El Fasher, having finally defeated the Sudanese army forces holding out in the city. The BBC has managed to speak to some who escaped

www.youtube.com/watch?v=i7fC...

cc @lauratmurphy.bsky.social @irishuyghurca.bsky.social

Better Cotton Initiative Supplier List - Better Cotton Initiative This is a public list of all companies/units that are on the BCI Platform from merchants to end product manufacturers. It may not be exhaustive as some companies may choose to be excluded from this li...

The Better Cotton Initiative has removed Aksu Lianfa Textiles, a supplier that RTÉ Investigates found had taken in Uyghurs under a state-backed forced labour programme, from its supplier list. Aksu Lianfa's parent remains, despite its use of forced labour cotton. bettercotton.org/documents/be...

„The China Trap: How Germany made itself dependent on China out of convenience and myopia“.

Cover page of Germany‘s main business paper.

A collective German elite failure on a gigantic scale. Time for a reckoning. And most of all: finally time for serious action to reduce our dependencies.

Fascinating new details on Intellexa, the Israeli spyware firm that used Ireland as a financial headquarters for a number of years, including its registration of a Chinese-Hong Kong subsidiary. The Irish subsidiary has been largely dormant since I reported on its activities in 2022/2023.

"AI-related spending now contributes more to the nation’s GDP growth than all consumer spending combined, and by another calculation, those AI expenditures accounted for 92 percent of GDP growth during the first half of 2025."

🚨🇸🇩 The Blood is Visible From Space Peter Rothpletz on the genocide in Sudan, Trump’s latest weaponization of the DOJ, and 'journalists' from The Free Press wreaking havoc on both sides of the Atlantic.

"The sand in and around the city of approximately 400,000 is so caked with blood that you can see evidence of the RSF’s war crimes via satellite imagery, according to Yale’s Humanitarian Research Lab (HRL)."

Zeteo's Peter Rothpletz in today's First Draft morning newsletter, on Sudan:

Exclusive: British newspaper spoke to the wrong DeBlasio, not an ‘imposter’ How a Long Island vintner, with the help of ChatGPT, prompted a transatlantic journalistic debacle.

“'I never once said I was the mayor. He never addressed me as the mayor,' DeBlasio told Semafor Wednesday evening. 'So I just gave him my opinion.'"

www.semafor.com/article/10/2...

He is, instead, a 59-year-old Long Island wine importer named Bill DeBlasio, who merely responded to an email from a journalist seeking his views on Democrat Zohran Mamdani’s policies. “I’m Bill DeBlasio. I’ve always been Bill DeBlasio,” DeBlasio said in an interview conducted Wednesday evening through his Ring doorbell in Huntington Station, Long Island, from his current location in Florida. “I never once said I was the mayor. He never addressed me as the mayor,” DeBlasio told Semafor Wednesday evening. “So I just gave him my opinion.”

I’m crying

www.semafor.com/article/10/2...

Three people familiar with the situation told Semafor that Hurley reached out to an email address the reporter believed belonged to the former mayor of New York. It's unclear where he got the address, or who it actually belongs to. In a state nent shared with outlets including Semafor, a News UK spokesperson blamed the debacle on whoever that email address belongs to, saying the paper had "apologised to Bill de Biasio and removed the article immediately after discovering that our reporter had been misled by an individual falsely claiming to be the former New York mayor."

Part of the push came from the top. As the New York mayor's race approaches, The Times of London has accelerated its push for more, and largely hostile, coverage of Mamdani. That campaign has been driven internally by Margi Conklin, a New York Post veteran who was most recently managing editor at The Free Press, and who assigned the de Blasio piece, per two people with knowledge of the situation.

This colossal Times of London/de Blasio screwup gets more amazing at every turn.

Scoop via @maxtani.bsky.social

www.semafor.com/article/10/2...

China Pushes to Silence Victims of African Mining Disaster Toxic waste from a Chinese mine in Zambia washed through homes and fields. Compensation offers are tied to nondisclosure.

Such an important story by my colleague Nicholas Bariyo. Locals accuse Chinese officials of deception, while Zambian President Hichilema is accused of kowtowing to Sino Metals while negotiating relief from a $6 billion debt to China.

www.wsj.com/world/asia/c...

The market in three headlines.

Ed Luce watching democracy die in the United States of America

NEW: A director at L3 Harris Trenchant, a company that sells zero-day vulnerabilities, has been charged with stealing secrets to sell in Russia. Story is on the Bloomberg Terminal now, will be live on the web imminently.

Exclusive | Trump Pardons Convicted Binance Founder The pardon follows months of efforts by Changpeng Zhao to boost Trump crypto company

Story here
www.wsj.com/finance/curr...

The Times' self-regard will always override everything else. This was a good opportunity for the Times to show us and tell us that it knows better. They're too busy with all those REAL stories.

The @nytimes.com coverage today was terrible. Late to start. Badly framed. And just…some weird mix of lazy and too-cool-for-school? This prophylactic squib was especially annoying. Since they didn’t focus on either! www.nytimes.com/2025/05/01/i...

Lawyers ask ICC to investigate 122 European officials for crimes against humanity in Mediterranean Human rights lawyers accused 122 European officials of committing crimes against migrants in the Mediterranean Sea.

Big development: Human rights lawyers have made a new filing to the International Criminal Court. It includes the names of 122 European individuals accused of committing crimes against humanity against people trying to cross the Mediterranean Sea. apnews.com/article/liby...

They have also played several English teams, live, on Irish television.

Opinion | Europe Failed Israel It is still unclear whether Donald Trump will succeed in ending the war in Gaza two years after Oct. 7, 2023. What is clear, however, is that when it really mattered, Europe and large parts of the fre...

There is near unanimity now that Israel committed genocide in Gaza (most genocide scholars, the UN, Amnesty, HRW, B'Tselem, MSF etc). This genocide was committed with the support of the US, EU and the UK. Europe's most powerful media exec see things differently. www.politico.com/news/magazin...

𝐖𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐢𝐬 𝐬𝐩𝐲𝐰𝐚𝐫𝐞 – 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐰𝐡𝐲 𝐢𝐬 𝐢𝐭 𝐚𝐩𝐩𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐦𝐨𝐫𝐞 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐦𝐨𝐫𝐞 𝐢𝐧 𝐄𝐔 𝐡𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐬?

In our latest podcast, journalists and Emma du Chatinier talk with spyware expert Vas Panagiotopoulos about how EU money fuels firms behind illegal surveillance and repression.

🎧 Listen here: www.ftm.eu/articles/eur...

China’s export controls may end the era of ‘de-risking from China’ with Chinese technology Beijing’s battery export controls threaten the West’s push for clean energy independence

China's export controls may end the era of trying to de-risk from China using Chinese technology

Excellent piece on the fraught position of Europe's battery industry, much of which is still reliant on China, by @hjesanderson

A social dumping disaster? EU’s ‘ 28th Regime’ plans could help corporations bypass member state rules | Corporate Europe Observatory In the name of competitiveness, corporate lobby groups are promoting a radical plan to create an EU-level ‘28th regime’ of parallel, weaker rules. This could help corporations to avoid stricter member...

🚫 Lately, Allied for Startups has lobbied for the so-called '28th regime', a set of weaker EU rules on taxation and labour rights - a social dumping disaster in the making.

EU policy-makers should close the door to Big Tech’s shady lobbying tactics

www.corporateeurope.org/en/2025/09/s...

NEW: Since October 2023, the IDF Spokesperson's Unit has released dozens of 3D animations illustrating alleged Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iranian sites

The style is now unmistakable: satellite zoom-ins, black & white wireframes, and red-textured houses - a new visual language of war

First Conviction - RTÉ Podcasts An investigation into the case of a couple imprisoned for a crime against their child - that never happened...

This new podcast from RTÉ Investigates and the Doc on One team, about a shocking miscarriage of justice, is a must listen, not just for the story of the case itself but for its wider implications for the Irish justice system. www.rte.ie/radio/podcas...

This is genuinely a sentience check for basic reporting. How does this get built? Who builds it? Who buys the GPUs? Who pays for the data centers? Where do they get built? That’s now 26GW of capacity OpenAI has “committed to,” how long will it take to build? When are the chips paid for?

If anyone works at CBS News and would like to leak to me about whats unfolding over there, my Signal is ParkerMolloy.86

An economic disaster waiting to happen.

Uyghur woman in Ireland details Chinese pressure and harassment Around 200 Uyghurs live in Ireland, part of a minority of 12 million in China's Xinjiang region. The UN says they face possible crimes against humanity — and one woman says Beijing's repression has fo...

Very concerned by the reported harassment of Uyghur WHRD Nuria Zyden in Dublin & intimidation of her family members in Xinjiang in apparent retaliation for her work on Uyghur rights. I urge the Irish authorities to ensure she receives adequate protection.
www.rte.ie/news/investi...

Israel accused of detaining Greta Thunberg in infested cell and making her hold flags Activist tells Swedish officials she has been subjected to harsh treatment, including insufficient food and water

““They dragged little Greta [Thunberg] by her hair before our eyes, beat her, and forced her to kiss the Israeli flag. They did everything imaginable to her, as a warning to others,” the Turkish activist ErsinÇelik, a participant in the Sumud flotilla, told Anadolu news agency.”+