Author: Starvision News Desk

Seoul, July 13 (IANS) North Korea on Thursday confirmed that it test-fired a Hwasong-18 solid-fuel intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) the previous day, with its leader Kim Jong-un vowing to take “stronger” military offensive until the US abandons its hostile policy against Pyongyang.Guided by Kim, the North launched a new type of the Hwasong-18 missile in a test aimed at reconfirming the technical creditability and operational reliability of the country’s core weapon system, according to Pyongyang’s official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).It marked the North’s second solid-propellant ICBM launch following its first test-firing on April 13,reports Yonhap News Agency.A solid-fuel ICBM…

Rome, July 13 (IANS) A blistering and deadly heat wave, which the Italian Meteorological Society has named Cerberus after the three-headed monster that features in Dante’s ‘Inferno’ as a guard to the gates of hell, is sweeping across parts of southern Europe.“The earth has a high fever and Italy is feeling it firsthand,” Luca Mercalli, head of the Italian Meteorological Society, told CNN on Wednesday.As a result of the heat wave, temperatures are expected to surpass 40 degrees Celsius in parts of Spain, France, Germany, Greece, Croatia and Turkey, reports the BBC.In Italy, temperatures could reach as high as 48.8…

Washington, July 13 (IANS) Ray Epps, a former US Marine who became the focus of right-wing conspiracy theories after the 2021 Capitol riot, has filed a defamation suit against Fox News for suggesting that he was an undercover agent who helped provoke the insurrection.The lawsuit, filed in a Delaware court on Wednesday, accuses Fox News of telling a “fantastical story” suggesting that Epps was a federal agent to make him a “scapegoat” for the raid on Congress, the BBC reported.Epps, a supporter for former President Donald Trump, was filmed encouraging people to enter the Capitol complex in January 2021, but…

San Francisco, July 12 (IANS) Tech billionaire Elon Musk on Wednesday launched a new artificial intelligence (AI) company called xAI that aims to to “understand the true nature of the universe”.“Announcing formation of @xAI to understand reality,” Musk tweeted.According to its website, the goal is to understand the true nature of the universe.The team is headed up by Musk and includes team members that have worked at other big names in AI, including OpenAI, Google Research, Microsoft Research, and Google’s DeepMind.The website lists Igor Babuschkin, Manuel Kroiss, Yuhuai (Tony) Wu, Christian Szegedy, Jimmy Ba, Toby Pohlen, Ross Nordeen, Kyle Kosic,…

London, July 12 (IANS) Several UK health groups on Wednesday accused big pharmaceutical companies of extracting about 11.9-12.6 billion pounds of excess profits from the NHS England for its 10 super-expensive drugs used for cancer, arthritis and blood clots. As per latest figures, NHS England has spent 13 billion pounds on just 10 super-expensive medicines in the 10 years leading up to 2022.A report by health campaign groups Global Justice Now, STOPAIDS, and Just Treatment shows that the NHS is being charged sky-high prices for key drugs, even after accounting for reasonable levels of profit.This includes an estimated mark-up of 23,000…

London, July 12 (IANS) Researchers have discovered a link between the levels of certain bacteria living in the gut and coronary atherosclerotic plaques — which are formed by the build-up of fatty and cholesterol deposits, constitute a major cause of heart attacks. Researchers at Uppsala and Lund University in Sweden analysed gut bacteria and cardiac imaging among 8,973 participants aged 50 to 65 from without previously known heart disease. The findings, published in the scientific journal Circulation, revealed that oral bacteria, especially species from the Streptococcus genus, are associated with increased occurrence of atherosclerotic plaques in the small arteries of the…

New York, July 12 (IANS) An Indian-origin tech executive from Singapore has filed a lawsuit with the California’s Civil Rights Department accusing Meta of racial discrimination that cost her promotions and work opportunities. Vaishnavi Jayakumar, 36, who joined Meta in January 2020 after stints at Disney, Google and Twitter, said she was punished for asking how to move up the ranks at Meta, left out of opportunities, and layered under less experienced colleagues.”I’ve never felt more keenly that as an Asian woman, I’m destined to be a worker, I’m not destined to be a leader,” Jayakumar wrote in a recent LinkedIn…

Wellington, July 12 (IANS) New Zealand saw a net migration loss of 13,400 people to Australia in 2022, compared with a net migration loss of 5,400 in 2021, according to estimates released by the national statistics department on Wednesday.”The net migration loss to Australia in 2022 is the largest for a calendar year since 2013, but well below the largest net loss of 43,700 in the March 2012 year,” Stats NZ’s population indicators manager Tehseen Islam said.Traditionally, there has been a net migration loss from New Zealand to Australia, reports Xinhua news agency citing Stats NZ. This averaged about 30,000…

Madrid, July 12 (IANS) Temperatures in Spain will increase to more than 44 degrees Celsius as a second heat wave will continue in the country until Thursday, according to the State Meteorological Agency (AEMET).Due to a ridge of hot air coming from the Sahara, the Iberian Peninsula is experiencing one of the hottest weeks of this year, prompting the AEMET to put several parts of the country on red alert, reports Xinhua news agency.In the south, the provinces of Cordoba and Jaen are among the hottest, with maximum temperatures reaching 45 degrees Celsius, while in the southeastern city of Murcia,…

Baghdad, July 12 (IANS) The Iraqi Ministry of Planning said the country’s population has reached 43.32 million, with an annual growth rate of 2.5 per cent.A Ministry statement said that about 50.5 per cent of the total Iraqi population are men and about 49.5 per cent women, reports Xinhua news agency.It showed that the working-age group between 15 and 64 constitutes the highest percentage, reaching 57 per cent of the total population, followed by the youth group under 15 years at 40 per cent.The statement also said 70 per cent of the population is estimated to live in urban areas…