20/07/2025

theSun on Sunday JULY 20, 2025

WORLD 8

Trump slaps US$10b suit on Murdoch, newspaper

Gaza students sit for high school exams Palestinian students in the Gaza Strip sat for their Tawjihi (high school matriculation) exams yesterday in an exceptional electronic session, amid Israel’s war. The third round of exams, known as the complementary session, is designated for students who failed or missed up to two subjects from the 2023 academic year. Due to extreme conditions, the Palestinian Ministry of Education launched the exams remotely, using a special digital platform. “This extraordinary step was taken in light of the genocide and devastation Gaza continues to endure,” said Education Minister Amjad Barham during a press conference in Ramallah. He said the exams were originally scheduled for Dec 12, 2023, but had been postponed due to the Israeli assault. According to ministry spokesperson Sadeq Al-Khudour, the exams are conducted in two daily sessions, 9-11am and 2-4pm, depending on whether students are sitting for one or two subjects. A pilot test was conducted on Thursday to ensure technical readiness. The ministry also announced plans for upcoming exams for students born in 2006 and 2007, with two full Tawjihi rounds expected to take place electronically once the current phase concludes. Al-Khudour said out of 78,000 high school students in Gaza, 4,000 have been killed since the start of the Israeli offensive. Another 4,000 students took their exams abroad, while 70,000 remain, most of whom are expected to sit for exams later this year and next. – Bernama Microsoft likely to sign AI protocol BRUSSELS: Microsoft will likely sign the European Union’s code of practice to help companies comply with the bloc’s landmark artificial intelligence rules, its president said on Friday, while Meta Platforms rebuffed the guidelines. Drawn up by 13 independent experts, the voluntary code of practice aims to provide legal certainty to signatories. They will have to publish summaries of the content used to train their general purpose AI models and put in place a policy to comply with EU copyright law. The code is part of the AI Act, which came into force in June last year and will apply to Google owner Alphabet, Facebook owner Meta, OpenAI, Anthropic, Mistral and thousands of companies. “I think it’s likely we will sign. We need to read the documents,” said Microsoft president Brad Smith. “Our goal is to find a way to be supportive and at the same time one of the things we really welcome is the direct engagement by the AI Office with industry,” he said, referring to the EU’s regulatory body for AI. Meta reiterated its criticism of the code. “Meta won’t be signing it. This code introduces a number of legal uncertainties for model developers, as well as measures that go far beyond the scope of the AI Act,” said Meta chief global affairs officer Joel Kaplan. The social media giant has the same concerns as a group of 45 European companies, he said. – Reuters GAZA: Around 1,500

years, and the two were photographed and videoed together at parties. The Wall Street Journa l article published on Thursday was damaging because it indicated a shared interest in sex. The Journal reported that Trump had wished Epstein a happy 50th birthday in 2003 with a “bawdy” letter, part of an album of messages from rich and well-known figures. According to the Journal , the Trump letter contained the outline of a naked woman and had the future president’s signature. It ends with “Happy Birthday – and may every day be another wonderful secret”. Trump reacted in a series of furious social media posts, saying “it’s not my language. It’s not my words.” “I never wrote a picture in my life. I don’t draw pictures of women,” he said. US media has published drawings done by Trump in the past, with several dating to the early 2000s when he used his celebrity status to donate sketches for charity. – AFP

Publisher stands by story before he could face trial supercharged the narrative.

When Trump returned to power for a second term in January, his supporters clamoured for revelations about Epstein’s supposed list of clients. But Bondi issued an official memo this month declaring there was no such list. The discontent in Trump’s “Make America Great Again” base poses a rare challenge to the Republican’s control of the political narrative in the United States. It remained unclear whether a court would authorise the unsealing of the grand jury testimony. But even if such material were made public, there is no assurance it would shed much, if any, light on the main questions raised in the conspiracy theories, particularly the existence and possible contents of an Epstein client list. Asked on Friday by reporters if he would pursue the broader release of information related to the case, Trump did not answer. Trump was close with Epstein for

WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump sued media magnate Rupert Murdoch and The Wall Street Journal for at least US$10 billion (RM42.5 billion) on Friday over publication of an article on his friendship with alleged sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein. The defamation lawsuit, filed in federal court in Miami, saw the 79-year old hitting back at a scandal threatening to cause serious political damage. The Journal reported on Thursday that in 2003, the then-real estate magnate wrote a suggestive birthday letter to Epstein, illustrated with a naked woman and alluding to a shared “secret”. The lawsuit, which also names two reporters, the Dow Jones corporation, and Murdoch’s parent company News Corp as defendants, claims that no such letter exists and that the paper intended to malign Trump. Dow Jones, the Journal’s longtime publisher, said it is standing by the story. “We have full confidence in the rigour and accuracy of our reporting, and will vigorously defend against any lawsuit,” a Dow Jones spokesperson said in a statement. In another bid to dampen outrage among his own supporters about an alleged government cover-up of Epstein’s activities and 2019 death, Trump ordered US Attorney-General Pam Bondi to seek the unsealing of grand jury testimony from the prosecution against the disgraced financier. In a filing in New York, Bondi cited “extensive public interest” for the unusual request to release what is typically secret testimony. Epstein, a longtime friend of Trump, was found hanging dead in a New York prison cell while awaiting trial on charges that he sexually exploited dozens of underage girls at his homes in New York and Florida. The case sparked conspiracy theories, especially among Trump’s far-right voters, about an alleged international cabal of wealthy paedophiles. Epstein’s death, declared a suicide,

A protester holds a sign outside the White House demanding the release of all files related to Epstein. – AFPPIC

US rejects changes to WHO pandemic response rules WASHINGTON: The United States on Friday rejected changes agreed last year to the World Health Organisation’s pandemic response, saying they violated the country’s sovereignty. privacy or personal liberties,” they said in a joint statement. Countries had until yesterday to lodge reservations about the amendments. Conservative activists and vaccine sceptics in Britain and Australia have waged public campaigns against the changes.

Rubio and Kennedy disassociated the United States from amendments to the International Health Regulations, which provide a legal framework for combating diseases, agreed last year at the World Health Assembly in Geneva. “We regret the US decision to reject the amendments,“ said WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. He stressed the amendments “are clear about member states sovereignty”, adding that WHO cannot mandate lockdowns or similar measures. The changes included a “commitment to solidarity and equity”, in which a new group would study the needs of developing countries in future emergencies.

The amendments came about when the Assembly failed at a more ambitious goal of sealing a global agreement on pandemics. Most of the world finally secured a treaty in May, but the United States did not take part as it was withdrawing from WHO. The United States took part in the May June 2024 negotiations but said it could not support a consensus as it demanded protections for intellectual property rights. Rubio and Kennedy said the changes “fail to adequately address WHO’s susceptibility to political influence and censorship during outbreaks.” – AFP

President Donald Trump on returning to office on Jan 20 immediately began his nation’s withdrawal from the UN body, but the State Department said the language from last year would still have been binding on the United States. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr said the changes “risk unwarranted interference with our national sovereign right to make health policy”. “We will put Americans first in all our actions and we will not tolerate international policies that infringe on Americans’ speech,