Comment on Syria, Russia pound rebel-held Aleppo but advances halt

Russian forces have seized at least nine villages amid a new push in northeastern Ukraine that began on Friday, the most square miles taken per day since the start of the full-scale invasion in February 2022. On Friday, Russian troops pushed deeper into territory in two border areas of Vovchansk and Lyptsi in Kharkiv region.

A DJ is lighting up both night clubs—and monasteries. Dressed as a monk, sporting a shaved head and gray robe, DJ NewJeansNim has become all the rage in recent weeks as he produces EDM featuring Buddhist messages. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] “Put your hands up,” he said in a clip of his DJ set last month in Taiwan, as he pressed his palms together in prayer position and jumped along to the beat.

MELBOURNE, Australia — An Australian judge Monday lifted a ban on the social media platform X showing Australians a video of a bishop being stabbed in a Sydney church. The temporary ban was put in place April 22, but the judge rejected the application from Australia’s eSafety Commission to extend the court order that would have expired Monday. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] Australian Federal Court Justice Geoffrey Kennett said he would publish his reasons for imposing and lifting the order later. The decision was a win for the company rebranded by billionaire Elon Musk when he bought Twitter last year.

When Lawrence Gasman was looking for a PhD topic back in the 1970s, computing labs were already abuzz with smart people proposing clever studies in artificial intelligence. “But the problem was we had nothing to run them on,” he says. “The processors needed just didn’t exist.” It took half a century for computing power to catch up with AI’s potential.

PADANG, Indonesia — Heavy rains and torrents of cold lava and mud flowing down a volcano’s slopes on Indonesia’s Sumatra island triggered flash floods that killed at least 37 people and more than a dozen others were missing, officials said Sunday. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] Monsoon rains and a major mudslide from a cold lava flow on Mount Marapi caused a river to breach its banks and tear through mountainside villages in four districts in West Sumatra province just before midnight on Saturday.

Vladimir Putin replaced his long-serving defense minister with a trained economist in an unexpected change of guard that signals the focus on growing the Russian war economy more than two years after the invasion of Ukraine. Putin put forward his former economy aide and First Deputy Prime Minister Andrey Belousov, 65, to take over from Sergei Shoigu, 68, who was given a gentle demotion and put in charge of the security council.