SCROLL NEWS / DISCOVERY
Search headlines
Find the stories shaping the conversation.
Results for " sanctioned " 55 found 🔀 AI-powered Shuffle
Sign in to save shuffle history.
Maryland becomes 18th state to sanction girls flag football
Maryland has sanctioned girls flag football as a varsity sport, becoming the 18th state to do so. The season begins August 12.
76ers' Jaylen Brown Picks Up Controversial Hobby This Offseason
Jaylen Brown competed in an unsanctioned boxing match. An activity that could have cost him an NBA contract.
Crossroads students begin push to make pickleball a varsity sport
Their vision has birthed the L.A. High School Pickleball League, the first of its kind in California. It's the beginning of something that could be a sanctioned sport.
Flag football approved as sanctioned sport for high school girls in New Jersey
NEW: 8 Doctors Sanctioned by the RI Department of Health
Eight licensed physicians face a sweeping array of discipline actions by the Rhode Island Department of Health.
High school dance, cheer and lacrosse could become sanctioned sports in Louisiana
Representative Roger Wilder III, R-Denham Springs, introduced a resolution that could bring high school dance, cheer and lacrosse under the Louisiana High School Athletic Association's jurisdiction. The move could bring more oversight and structure to the sports.
It's Official: Girls' Flag Football is a sanctioned sports for Maryland high schools
Maryland is adding another championship sports to high schools. The Maryland Public Secondary Schools Athletic Association (MPSSAA) officially sanctioned girls'
A warning from Pete Golding: Go after me, and I’ll expose the system
Ole Miss coach Pete Golding has told NCAA he will expose rampant tampering if he is sanctioned amid Dabo Swinney allegations.
US Sanctions Mexican Cartel CDN's Horse-Racing, Business Network
MEXICO CITY, Oct 13 (Reuters) - The US Treasury Department on Tuesday sanctioned four people and 11 entities tied to the Cartel del Noreste (CDN), targeting a business network spanning horse racing, construction, trucking and the energy sector that Washington says helped finance the Mexican ...
Two British anti-hate speech campaigners sanctioned by US state department
Imran Ahmed and Clare Melford among five Europeans hit with visa bans over claims they wish to ‘suppress American viewpoints they oppose’
Fresno Fair Expands 2026 Grandstand Entertainment With Rodeo Derby, Monster Trucks
Discover the action-packed lineup at the Big Fresno Fair, including a new Demolition Derby and returning rodeo favorites.
Scott Bessent goes after the top Mexican cartel’s new billion-dollar business: gas stations
Treasury sanctioned two men and nine firms tied to a Jalisco cartel fuel-theft ring that reportedly nets tens of millions a year across 21 Mexican states.
Girls Flag Football coming to RI high schools in 2027
Girls Flag Football has officially been sanctioned as a high school sport in Rhode Island.
New Jersey adds flag football as sanctioned sport for high school girls
Reporter's Notebook: Tlaib forces rare House procedure after Republican accuses her of defending terrorists
Rep. Max Miller was sanctioned after attacking Rep. Rashida Tlaib during a Lebanon war powers debate, triggering the rare 'words taken down' process.
Trump administration gave firm with ties to ballroom donor the green light to do business with a sanctioned Russian bank
Private equity investor Konstantin Sokolov was also appointed to run a government enterprise fund.
At last, The Bullet Heaven genre - popularised by hits like Vampire Survivors - has been sanctioned by Steam
This update has introduced a variety of new game tags for different genres, which should help categorize upcoming genres.
Russia spent extra $130 billion for goods while sanctioned: Latvia
The Latvian analysts said intelligence showed Russia's own forecasts warn it may lose another $136 billion just in trade by 2030 due to the sanctions.
Jets Celebrate as Girls Flag Football Becomes a Sanctioned Sport in New Jersey
Chairman Woody Johnson: ‘To See New Jersey Embrace Girls Flag Football Is Truly Rewarding’
Girls Flag Football is Now OHSAA’s 29th Recognized Sport
OHSAA Board of Directors voted to add girls flag football as a fully sanctioned sport
How Americans’ Financial Health Is Faring In The “K-Shaped” Economy
Hey all, Jason here. Money20/20 is still two weeks away, but I’ve already started packing (not procrastinating for once!). My calendar is already filling up with various sessions I want to catch, meetings, and of course happy hours, dinners, and other side events. If you’ll be in Vegas and want to catch up, let me know by replying to this email, and we can try to find a time amidst the chaos of the Venetian. A big if not totally unexpected piece of news dropped on Friday: the Independent Community Bankers of America, a trade group that represents smaller U.S. banks, filed a lawsuit against the OCC and Comptroller Jonathan Gould, arguing that the regulator’s move to grant trust bank charters to firms seeking to use them to conduct substantial non-fiduciary activities exceeds the authorities granted to the OCC by Congress. I haven’t had time to fully digest the legal filing or speak to folks in my network about it, but you can expect to see coverage and analysis on it in next week’s newsletter. Subscribe or Support by Upgrading The NerdCon agenda just dropped. It’s stacked. Partner content: Nubank built an AI-first bank. Chime built its own banking core. Figure and Valon are rebuilding the mortgage stack. At NerdCon, you’ll hear from the people behind those bets: what they chose, what they learned, and what they’re still figuring out. The agenda is live, with leaders from Nubank, Chime, OpenAI, Remitly, Mercury, Figure, Valon and more. Follow the mainstage conversations, bring the problem your team is wrestling with to a hands-on workshop, or pull up a chair at a roundtable. Pick your quests. Meet us in San Diego, November 18–20. Fintech Business Weekly readers save 20% with code FBW20. Explore the Agenda Things To Know & Other Good Reads Federal Reserve Board finalizes changes to enhance the transparency and public accountability of its stress test and reduce volatility in its stress test-related capital requirements (Federal Reserve Board of Governors) FDIC Announces Conclusion of Independent Monitorship (FDIC) Modernizing Financial Regulation: Initial Observations from eSLR (Fed Vice Chair for Supervision Michelle Bowman) The Data Version of Godzilla versus Kong: FRED Takes on AI (Fed Governor Christopher Waller) Financing the AI buildout (Brookings) Q3’26: Rules for Banks but Not for Crypto (Fintech Takes Banking) The Inevitability of Local Stablecoins (Lombard Notes) Delusions of AI Governance: The Human-in-the-Loop Comfort Blanket (Fintech Snark Tank) Stripe agrees to acquire Parafin to expand revenue opportunities for platforms and help small businesses grow (Stripe) Listen: Fighting Fraud in the Age of AI, with SEON’s Tamas Kadar (Fintech Business Weekly) How Americans’ Financial Health Is Faring In The “K-Shaped” Economy If there is one overarching theme across the economy and politics in the U.S. at the moment, it’s “affordability.” The term is vague enough to encompass a panoply of factors shaping Americans’ day-to-day lives: rising costs for the hallmarks of being “middle class,” including healthcare, housing, childcare, and education, inflation and rising interest rates, and a job market with the specter of AI hovering over it. At the same time, policy shifts under the Trump administration have resulted in reduced subsidies to those who get health insurance under the Affordable Care Act and new restrictions on qualifying for Medicaid and SNAP, the impacts of which have yet to be fully felt. These factors are contributing to declining consumer confidence and general dissatisfaction with the economy, despite continuing GDP growth and stock market records. This divergence is encapsulated in the idea of the “K-shaped” economy, in which a small proportion of Americans have seen their wealth balloon, while the majority of American households struggle to preserve the lifestyle they have. Perhaps the greatest determinant of which branch of the “K” a household is on is whether their wealth and income are primarily derived from employment vs. from assets. Nearly two decades of low interest rates and, more recently, elevated rates of inflation have benefited asset owners, while those whose income is primarily or solely derived from labor have largely seen real purchasing power stagnate or decline. This is reflected in recent Bureau of Labor Statistics data showing that labor share of U.S. GDP — the fraction of economic output that accrues to workers as compensation in exchange for their labor — dropped to just 52.8% in Q2 2026, the lowest since the BLS began keeping records. In 1947, approximately 2/3rds of economic output accrued to workers; even as recently as 2001, labor’s share of GDP was 64.1%. Against this backdrop, we’ve seen the rise of more credit and credit-like products: cash advance apps, “no-fee” overdraft, earned wage access, and buy now pay later, which are often used as small-dollar short-term borrowing mechanisms to meet immediate consumption needs or pay other bills (eg utilities, cell phone, other debt payments). With the markers of a middle class existence and, increasingly, basic financial stability seemingly out of reach for many, it should be no surprise there’s been an increase in “financial nihilism,” something industry peers like Alex Johnson and Frank Rotman have discussed and analyzed the roots of. The explosion of gambling and gambling-adjacent products and services — often marketed under the guise of being an “investment” — is inextricably intertwined with the rise of financial nihilism. Crypto, sports betting, and, more recently, prediction markets offer an escape or even hope of sorts, like a contemporary, digital version of a scratch-off lottery ticket, while leaving the overwhelming number of people who use such products worse off. Share of Households That Are Financially “Vulnerable” Ticks Up The Financial Health Network’s 2026 Financial Health Pulse® report adds context on how American households are faring. (I linked to this report in last week’s newsletter, but wanted to take time to further unpack the data in the report this week.) The Financial Health Network publishes the report annually, providing insight into how Americans’ financial circumstances are changing over time. The 2026 report is derived from a survey fielded in April and May 2026. The report leverages survey responses to assess indicators of financial health across spending, saving, borrowing, and planning/protecting and to determine a zero to 100 “FinHealth” score. Those with scores between 0 and 39 are considered “Financially Vulnerable,” consumers with scores ranging between 40 and 79 are defined as “Financially Coping,” and those with scores of 80 to 100 are “Financially Healthy.” The report found that moderate improvements in 2025 were reversed, with the share of respondents considered financially “vulnerable” rebounding to 17%. The longitudinal data reflect the impact of pandemic-era programs, like expanded unemployment, cash stimulus payments, and pauses of federal student loan payments. The positive impacts of those programs, as reflected in the Financial Health Pulse reports, had largely disappeared by 2023. While pandemic-era inflation — to be fair, in part caused by the various support and stimulus measures — had come down from as high as 9% in 2022, it has rebounded since the start of Trump’s second term, with tariffs and energy market disruptions owing to the war in Iran pushing prices back up. Specific indicators in the survey that deteriorated from 2025 to 2026 include the share of respondents spending less than their income over the past 12 months, the share paying all bills on time over the past 12 months, the share that have a manageable amount or no debt, the share that are “moderately” or “very” confident their insurance is adequate to cover them in an emergency, and the share that “somewhat” or “strongly” agree that their household plans ahead financially. Unsurprisingly, lower- and moderate-income households are more likely to struggle to pay their bills on time and have any funds leftover to save. The share of low-income households whose income exceeded their spending dropped from 35% in 2025 to 31% in 2026, while the share of upper-income households whose income exceeded expenses remained unchanged at 63%. Households with student loans or revolving credit card debt reported having “a bit more” or “far more” debt than was manageable at rates far higher than those not carrying these types of debts. The share of those with student loan debt indicating their debt load was too high to manage increased from 50% in 2025 to 55% in 2026, while the share of those with revolving credit card debt saying the same ticked up from 51% in 2025 to 54% in 2026. Households that had student loans were markedly more likely to be financially “coping” or “vulnerable” vs. those without student loans. In 2026, 27% of households with student loans were considered financially vulnerable, a jump of 6% points vs. 2025. Households without student loans saw just a 1% point increase (not statistically significant) in those considered financially vulnerable. Households’ perception of the affordability of categories of goods and services paints a stark picture, with less than one-fourth considering higher education affordable, about a third deeming childcare affordable, and less than half viewing healthcare as affordable. Fintech Business Weekly is made possible by the generous support of paying subscribers — bringing you independent analysis of banking, fintech, and crypto without fear or favor. You can support my work by becoming a paying subscriber if you aren’t already. Paying subscribers enjoy: access to the entire archive of nearly six years of newsletters extended versions of the weekly newsletter, with additional content and analysis and (for founding member tier) quarterly personal 1:1 fintech Q&A / strategy calls with me, tapping into my unparalleled knowledge of the intersection of banking and fintech and experience working in the sector, including helping to launch Goldman Sachs’ retail bank Marcus Support Fintech Business Weekly You can also support Fintech Business Weekly by sponsoring a newsletter or podcast, putting you in front of 93,000+ of the most influential decision makers in banking, fintech, and crypto. Learn more about sponsor opportunities or request a media kit by dropping me an email. Democratic Senate Report Highlights How Iran Uses Tether to Evade U.S. Sanctions Iran uses stablecoins, specifically Tether, to evade sanctions, fund regional proxies, and to purchase military drones, a report released last week by the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations says. The report was authored by committee ranking member Senator Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) and the minority staff. Crypto and stablecoin proponents will often push back on criticism that criminals make use of these assets by arguing that, on an absolute dollar basis, far more illicit funds flow through traditional banking systems and payment rails than via crypto and stablecoins. And while that is likely true, it elides the reality presented in news story after news story: whether state actors — Russia, Iran, North Korea — or criminal groups, those looking to engage in illicit transactions increasingly favor stablecoins and, specifically, Tether (USDT). The report from the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations released last week adds context to how Iran uses Tether has a lynchpin in its shadow banking system. The report analyzed 846 wallets that have been sanctioned or targeted for seizure, finding that 84% of them transacted exclusively or primarily in Tether. The ability to create near limitless, anonymous wallets and to move funds effectively instantaneously and irreversibly have made crypto a favored financial mechanism for bad actors. Stablecoins solved key drawbacks of bitcoin, namely, the original cryptocurrency’s highly volatile value in dollars. And while Tether (the company) has the technical ability to “freeze” or destroy funds, the company is often limited and reactive in its approach to doing so, the Senate report argues. Tether, which is nominally based in crypto-friendly El Salvador, “has stated that its compliance with OFAC sanctions is ‘voluntary’ and that it follows ‘OFAC guidelines,’” the Senate report says. Owing to these favorable attributes, Tether “became a primary cryptocurrency for Iran, Hamas, Hizballah, and the Houthis beginning in 2023 and has expanded in scale since,” according to the report. Tether’s role in Iran’s shadow banking system, the report says, is enhanced by crypto exchanges like Bybit, Kyrrex, OKX, Gate, and Binance, and through “over the counter” exchanges and hawala networks. The consequences of these financial flows aren’t hypothetical. The Senate report links Tether as a funds transfer mechanism to Iranian proxies in the region, including Hizballah, the Houthis, and Hamas. Tether has also been used to make payments to secure components necessary to manufacture drones, the report says. The report concludes by arguing that “[s]tablecoin issuers with a significant nexus to the United States, particularly those that offer dollar-denominated stablecoins, should be subject to American sanctions law rather than being allowed to hide behind foreign jurisdictions.” Stablecoin issuers like Tether must be held accountable for repeated failures to prevent illicit finance and sanctions violations by law enforcement, the Department of Justice, the Securities and Exchange Commission, and OFAC, the report argues. [Paying Subscriber Exclusive] OUSD Goes Live, Make Your Own Neobank, U.S. Sanctions Russia’s A7 Network As “Transnational Criminal Organization” OpenUSD, the stablecoin issued by the Open Standard consortium that includes Stripe, Visa, Mastercard, core providers, crypto firms, and numerous banks, went live last week. Social commerce platform Whop raised eyebrows in fintech by offering creators on its platform the ability to launch their own neobanks, which the company describes as “great businesses that are easy to run,” in just 15 minutes. And OFAC and FinCEN target Russia’s “shadow banking” A7 Network — more on these stories after the paywall.
U.S. Senate committee makes new trans athlete allegations against USA Hockey
The Senate Commerce Committee accuses USA Hockey of facilitating competitions where trans athletes compete against female players in sanctioned leagues.
Venezuela condemns ‘warmongering threats’ as Trump orders oil blockade
Trump has ordered a ‘total and complete’ blockade of sanctioned oil tankers to and from the country
Hegseth Invokes Divine Purpose to Justify Military Might
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has imbued U.S. military actions with a Christian moral underpinning that suggests they are divinely sanctioned.
Sanctions fears as Krygyzstan shutters companies suspected of aiding Russia
Crackdown on 50 firms is rooted in Bishkek's own worries of being sanctioned, say analysts.
Mental health professionals sanctioned by licensing board
The Iowa Board of Behavioral Health Professionals has sanctioned two central Iowa practitioners for alleged misconduct.
A Seized Oil Tanker Off Venezuela and the Big Business of Dark Fleet Smuggling
The U.S. seizure of a vessel off Venezuela is likely to squeeze the country’s government, but do little to counter the tankers that secretively move oil from sanctioned countries.
Mental health professionals sanctioned by licensing board
The Iowa Board of Behavioral Health Professionals has sanctioned two central Iowa practitioners for misconduct.
The Official Sonic Discord Server’s Launch Went About As Poorly As You’d Expect
The mod team is working overtime to rein in fans in its company-sanctioned forum
Travel Health Insurance Requirement Implemented
As of October 6, 2026, all travelers to Kenya must obtain travel health insurance through the government-sanctioned provider prior to entry and must present proof of coverage upon arrival. The Electronic Travel Authorisation (ETA) portal (for ETA-eligible nationals) and the eCitizen portal (for non-ETA-eligible nationals) have been updated with this requirement. The insurance costs approximately USD 44 and is valid for one year, including for repeat trips to Kenya during the insurance policy's validity period. Previously, travelers could rely on private or employer-provided health insurance and did not need to provide proof of coverage before entering the country. This change will not affect the above applicants' processing times. However, travelers should obtain the required insurance before traveling to avoid delays or bars to entry. Notably, Tanzania recently adopted a similar mandatory inbound travel insurance requirement, potentially signaling an emerging trend in the East African region.
AI hallucinations are causing headaches in Louisiana courtrooms. 'It shocked me.'
More than a dozen attorneys have been fined or sanctioned in Louisiana for using fabricated quotes or cites in their pleadings -- called hallucinations -- generated by AI tools. It's a growing problem.
They played for Celtic
The 27 year old Norwegian international Vidar Riseth was the first signing of the Jozef Venglos era at Celtic, after the club sanctioned a fee of £1.5 million to sign the player from Austrian side AS...
High school dance, cheer and lacrosse could become sanctioned sports in Louisiana
Representative Roger Wilder III, R-Denham Springs, introduced a resolution that could bring high school dance, cheer and lacrosse under the Louisiana High School Athletic Association's jurisdiction. The move could bring more oversight and structure to the sports.
US forces caught dark fleet tanker after chasing it across Atlantic
The tanker, originally called Bella 1, evaded a US naval blockade of sanctioned vessels near Venezuela last month.
Businesses Working With Iranian Airlines Risk Sanctions, Warns U.S. Treasury Secretary
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent warned that the U.S. will place sanctions on anyone conducting business with sanctioned Iranian airlines as commercial flights resume from Tehran. “Doing business with sanctioned Iranian airlines risks exposure to U.S. sanctions. Foreign governments should take all
What happens when the US decides to seize an oil ship?
Since early December the US Coast Guard and other military branches have boarded and taken control of five oil ships that had previously been sanctioned, all either accused of being in the process of transporting Venezuelan oil or on their way to take on oil that has been subject to US sanctions since President Donald Trump began a pressure campaign against the leadership of the country during his first term.
India-born US citizen drives research into light at sanctioned Chinese school
At the University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Arup Neogi’s team explores how light and sound interact.
In Thailand, Buddhism Is Twinned With Political Power
In Thailand, where it’s the state-sanctioned religion, practices have proved to be surprisingly mutable.
US says foreign financial institutions doing business with Iran may be sanctioned without notice
The US Treasury Department said on Monday it was alerting foreign financial institutions that continue to do business with Iran or its financial sector that they may be sanctioned by Washington without advance notice.
US Sanctions Cuba’s President as Trump Pushes Harder for Change
The US sanctioned Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel and members of his family, ratcheting up pressure on the communist government even further.
US seizes another sanctioned oil tanker in the Caribbean
The US has seized another sanctioned oil tanker in the Caribbean Sea, US Southern Command said on Friday.
Kennedy is funding dangerous science to validate his anti-vaccine agenda
The fact that the U.S. actually sanctioned the study is deeply troubling.
Trump orders ‘total and complete blockade’ of sanctioned oil tankers coming to and leaving Venezuela
President Donald Trump said Tuesday he was ordering a “total and complete blockade” of sanctioned oil tankers coming to and leaving from Venezuela, ratcheting up pressure against leader Nicolás Maduro’s regime and suggesting an economic motive to the US’ military campaign in the region.
It's Official: Girls' Flag Football is a sanctioned sports for Maryland high schools
Maryland is adding another championship sports to high schools. The Maryland Public Secondary Schools Athletic Association (MPSSAA) officially sanctioned girls'
Science diplomacy lessons from a North Korean volcano
Mount Paektu, a mythic, active volcano on the border between North Korea and China, is almost the epitome of a scientific challenge that crosses political lines. In 946 CE, it erupted in one of the five biggest volcanic events of the past 10,000 years, kicking up huge quantities of ash and sending destructive mud flows down river channels for hundreds of kilometres. Should this happen again, the entire region, including easternmost Russia, South Korea and even Japan could be hit. “It’s definitely got the potential to be big,” said James Hammond, a professor of geophysics at Birkbeck, University of London. An eruption on the scale of 946 would have “huge regional impact.” For the past 15 years, Hammond has helped lead a groundbreaking collaboration with North Korean scientists to study the volcano, navigating scientific sanctions, tough export controls on scientific equipment and a long, pandemic-enforced exodus from the country. Although he seems more at home on far-flung research expeditions – before speaking to Science|Business, Hammond was camping out on a Greenland ice sheet – he has also advised the European Commission on its changing science diplomacy strategy. His long experience with North Korea has made Hammond sceptical of blanket bans on science collaboration, no matter the country.This is a live question in Europe, where in the wake of Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine, institutional ties with Russian universities were almost entirely severed, although some scientists fear this could undermine our understanding of climate change’s impact on the Arctic. Here, Hammond tells the story of the Mount Paektu mission and the policy lessons he takes from it. Ominous rumblingsThe genesis of Hammond’s collaboration came in 2002, when Mount Paektu began to rumble ominously. Earthquake activity picked up and the volcano began to emit unusual gases. North Korean scientists took notice. “People felt we need to know more about this volcano,” said Hammond. In 2011, North Korean vulcanologists put out a request for international expertise to help them learn more. At the time, Hammond and his collaborator, Clive Oppenheimer, were working on a vulcanology project in another sanctioned country, Eritrea, and so decided to answer the call. Within a month, they had flown into Pyongyang. “It was pretty incredible,” recalls Hammond (left). “We were made to feel like honoured guests, and invited to official celebrations.” The scientific opportunity was huge. Paektu is unusually positioned, a thousand kilometres from where tectonic plates rub against each other in the Pacific. “It was an incredibly interesting volcano, but not much research had been done, at least not in the international community,” he said. “There was so much we felt we could do. And we had these partners that were super keen to engage.”The mission received an unusual visitor in the form of volcano-obsessed filmmaker Werner Herzog, who accompanied Hammond and Oppenheimer while directing his 2016 film Into the Inferno about volcanos across the world. Four days into the trip, the German director delivered a long speech about reunification to his North Korean hosts, recalls Hammond. “He got to the heart of the Koreans and how they felt, and how they thought, in a way that I'm not sure I ever will,” he said. UN sanctionsHowever, Hammond realised he’d been “naïve” about how difficult it would be to collaborate with North Korea, which was sanctioned far more heavily than Eritrea. “We didn’t fully appreciate the all-encompassing nature of restrictions,” he said. In 2016, as tensions escalated over Pyongyang’s nuclear tests, a United Nations resolution banned all joint scientific work with North Korea. However, the UN sanctions did allow countries to request carve outs, and the UK successfully requested an exemption for Hammond’s work. Related articlesEU pushes for joint science diplomacy, but care needed to avoid gridlock, experts sayRussia severs its last ties with German scienceAnchor Greenlanders in Arctic climate research, experts tell EU ahead of policy updateExport controls have also delayed Hammond’s work. In one case, it took 18 months to get approval from the UK government to take seismometers, which measure earthquakes, to North Korea. “It was frustrating,” he said. “But they didn’t just say no.” However, one instrument, called an induction coil, used to measure how the earth conducts electricity, was blocked entirely because it can in theory be used to detect submarines. Karaoke bondingSince the collaboration started in 2011, Hammond has visited the country around 15 times, although the pandemic closed off North Korea for more than five years. A trip last November was Hammond’s first since the outbreak. Despite this lengthy interlude, Hammond has deep bonds in the country. The North Korean scientists Hammond works with are somewhat isolated, as they struggle to access the latest research papers and travel to international conferences. That said, they are “excellent geophysicists” and are “very well trained in the field,” he said. Over karaoke and chats about their families, “we’ve made friendships, for sure,” he said. The authorities have to sign-off things like the placement of seismometers, for example, but Hammond said these requests have been approved. “Everything that we've asked for within a scientific context has been delivered.”Scientific backchannels? These kind of personal links between scientists across political lines are one purported benefit of science diplomacy. During the Cold War, some historians argue, scientific contact between the US and Soviet Union laid a groundwork of trust for other cooperation, such as on arms control. Hammond agrees that backchannel contacts to North Korean geophysicists are hardly likely to defuse a military crisis on the Korean peninsula, but the simple fact of the scientific collaboration makes contacts between diplomats that little bit easier. “It creates opportunities to understand each other a little bit better,” he said. “When maybe you have those more difficult discussions as diplomats, it's coming from a slightly better place.” Cutting tiesDrawing lessons from the Mount Paektu mission for today’s links with Russian science isn’t simple. The analogy is far from exact, Hammond said, “because one is essentially a Cold War, versus a pretty hot war in the case of Russia.” But Hammond’s broader argument is that the challenges we face, such as climate change, pandemics, biodiversity loss, pollution and so on, have globalised in an unprecedented way, making blanket shutdowns in collaboration with any country unwise.He’s somewhat critical of the UN scientific sanctions imposed on North Korea in 2016, even though they did allow for exceptions. “I think a blanket halt to some of these things, when we face big global challenges [. . .] that’s quite a risky thing to do,” he said.Institutional endorsement?European academics are still by and large free to work individually with Russian counterparts. However, official, institutional partnerships have largely ended. Shortly following the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Russian university rectors wrote a public letter endorsing the war, meaning European universities fear official collaboration could also be seen as a kind of endorsement. Hammond acknowledges there is a risk of legitimising regimes, and state-controlled universities, through scientific cooperation. “That’s the trade off you have to make,” he said. Strategic projectsWith Russia, instead of giving a green light to restart all Arctic science, a middle ground might be firing up a few carefully selected “strategic” projects, said Hammond. After all, European countries are still collaborating with Russia on the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor, an experimental nuclear fusion plant in the south of France. However, even if Europe did try to revive Arctic science with Russia, there’s no guarantee Russian scientists would play ball. A series of high-profile arrests of physicists in Russia accused of sharing their findings with the outside world has made collaboration fraught. Even before the invasion of 2022, “the Russian regime made it increasingly difficult, and this sort of discouraged people,” Dag Rune Olsen, rector of the Arctic University of Norway, told Science|Business last year.
Girls high school flag football: Students push to have growing sport sanctioned in Minnesota
Students are pushing to have high school girls flag football sanctioned by the Minnesota State High School League as the sport grows in popularity across the state and the nation.
US says foreign financial institutions doing business with Iran may be sanctioned without notice
WASHINGTON, Oct 5 (Reuters) - The US Treasury Department said on Monday it was alerting foreign financial institutions that continue to do business with Iran or its financial sector that they may be sanctioned by Washington without advance notice. DETAILS: • "Foreign financial institutions continuing to transact with sanctioned Iranian financial institutions could be targeted at any time without advance notification and should take immediate action to terminate such activity and relationship
Daytona Beach businesses brace for unsanctioned truck event
The city is establishing a 24-hour special event zone from 6 a.m. Saturday to 6 a.m. Sunday.
UK forces board sanctioned Russian oil tanker in English Channel for the first time, says Keir Starmer
Prime minister says British armed forces intercepted a Russian shadow fleet vessel in the early hours of Sunday morning
Trump administration designates three far-left groups as violent terrorist networks under new sanctions
The Treasury Department sanctioned Palestine Action, Autistici Inventati and Masar Badil, freezing U.S. assets tied to violent far-left terror networks.
Trump 'disappointed' by the selection of Mojtaba Khamenei in Iran
The U.S. sanctioned Mojtaba Khamenei for representing his father to advance his \
US says foreign financial institutions doing business with Iran may be sanctioned without notice
WASHINGTON, Oct 5 (Reuters) - The US Treasury Department said on Monday it was alerting foreign financial institutions that continue to do business with Iran or its financial sector that they may be sanctioned by Washington without advance notice.
GOP firebrand moves to dissolve Congressional Black Caucus: ‘Federally sanctioned segregation’
Nancy Mace's resolution would bar race-based House caucuses, effectively forcing dissolution of the Congressional Black Caucus and similar groups.
Politics is being 'completely redefined': Harold Ford Jr
'The Five' discusses the U.S. military seizing two sanctioned vessels in the Atlantic as Democrats tear into President Donald Trump for capturing the former Venezuelan president.