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Samad Rubber Works Pvt Ltd has clarified that the recent boiler blast in Faisalabad did not occur at any of its facilities, terming any reports linking the company to the incident as incorrect. “We are deeply saddened to hear about the tragic boiler blast in Faisalabad and extend our deepest condolences to the families affected,” read a statement. The glue-maker clarified that the incident did not occur at Samad Bond Factory or any of its facilities. “Our manufacturing units are only present in Lahore, and this incident has no connection to our company. All claims or reports suggesting otherwise are…

Xiaomi has open-sourced a new foundation model that integrates autonomous driving and embodied artificial intelligence, as the Chinese smartphone and electric-vehicle (EV) manufacturer seeks to enhance its AI capabilities.MiMo-Embodied, which comes after Xiaomi’s first large language model MiMo launched in April, was described as the “first open-source vision-language model” that combined autonomous driving and embodied AI tasks. Technical reports and project files are available on platforms such as Hugging Face and GitHub.The cross-embodied model achieved state-of-the-art performance in both domains, according to Xiaomi It demonstrated “superior” results in task planning, affordance prediction and spatial understanding for embodied AI, while excelling…

With ex-leader Sheikh Hasina sentenced to death in absentia for crimes against humanity, Bangladesh is turning its focus towards a referendum aimed at reforming its political system and rebuilding its democratic institutions.Interim leader Muhammad Yunus, the Nobel laureate who assumed office after last year’s uprising, earlier this month pledged to hold a national vote on the blueprint for change, timed to coincide with February’s planned parliamentary election.But analysts have cast doubt on whether the “July Charter” at the centre of the proposed reforms – named for the month that Hasina’s regime was toppled – can be successfully implemented in the…

ROME (AP) — Pope Leo XIV on Saturday accepted the resignation of an ailing Spanish bishop who is under church investigation for allegedly sexually abusing a young seminarian in the 1990s, the first known time the new pontiff removed a bishop accused of abuse.A one-line statement from the Vatican said Leo had accepted the resignation of Cádiz Bishop Rafael Zornoza, 76. It didn’t say why, but Zornoza submitted his resignation to the pope last year when he turned 75, the normal retirement age for bishops.It hadn’t been accepted though until the El País newspaper reported earlier this month that Zornoza…

LONDON (AP) — The publisher of Britain’s Daily Mail has entered exclusive talks to buy Telegraph Media Group in a deal that would link two news groups that have traditionally supported the right-leaning Conservative Party.Daily Mail and General Trust plc said on Saturday that the talks were designed to finalize the terms of a 500 million-pound ($654-million) deal to buy the Telegraph from an Abu Dhabi-backed venture known as Redbird IMI.The proposed transaction comes after concerns about foreign ownership of British news organizations stalled Redbird IMI’s efforts to take control of the Daily Telegraph and its sister Sunday publication two…

More than 103,000 people have signed an online petition demanding that K-pop girl group Aespa be banned from taking part in a New Year music event in Japan over an image posted by one of its singers that protesters claim depicts the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.The petition, on Change.org, points out that the singer posted a picture of an “atomic bomb model light” on a social media site with the message, “I bought a cute light! What do you think?”Even though the post was in May 2022, the petition says it is inappropriate for Aespa to be invited…

Pakistan reaffirmed its commitment to the European Union (EU) Generalised Scheme of Preferences Plus (GSP+) scheme during talks with the Netherlands, while simultaneously flagging key trade grievances that continue to challenge market access. During a meeting between Federal Minister for Commerce and Secretary Commerce with Ambassador of the Netherlands, H.E. Robert-Jan Siegert’s on Saturday, Pakistan raised concerns over the withdrawal of ethanol concessions and the ongoing dispute over the geographical indication (GI) of Basmati rice with India, read a statement. Secretary of Commerce Jawad Paul explained that the EU has just one scheme of interaction with Pakistan, that is GSP+.…

Chinese investment is still being actively welcomed in Ireland, the head of a major business organisation said, even as the wider European Union adopts a more cautious attitude and Dublin walks a tightrope to maintain ties with both the US and China amid a wide-ranging rivalry between the world’s two largest economies.“We’re firmly open for business within the EU rules, that is an unambiguous position,” Mary Rose Burke, CEO of the Dublin Chamber of Commerce, told the Post in an interview last week.“When we already have successful investors into Ireland, when we have Irish businesses investing in China, I don’t…

China’s ambassador to the United Nations has doubled down on his criticism of Japan, calling Japanese leader Sanae Takaichi’s earlier comments on Taiwan “highly dangerous” and damaging to the post-war international order.According to state broadcaster CCTV, Fu Cong said in a letter to UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres on Friday that Japan was “unrepentant” for the “blatantly provocative” remarks of its prime minister.He said Takaichi’s comments marked the first time a Japanese leader had “expressed its ambition for armed intervention on the Taiwan issue and the first time [Japan] has issued a military threat against China, openly challenging China’s core…

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — European leaders were set to meet in South Africa on Saturday to hash out alternatives to a U.S. plan to halt Russia’s war in Ukraine seen as favoring Moscow, nearly four years after it invaded its neighbor. The 28-point blueprint to end the Kremlin’s aggression sparked alarm in Kyiv and European capitals, with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy saying Friday that his country could face a stark choice between standing up for its sovereign rights and preserving the American support it needs. European countries see their own future at stake in Ukraine’s fight to beat back Russia,…