Joe Jimbob

The head of Europe's video game rating system, PEGI, has warned against supposed "silver bullet" child protection solutions such as age verification, in an interview with AFP.

A new set of PEGI (Pan-European Game Information) age ratings, coming into force from June, will take into account factors including in-game purchases, incentives to constantly revisit games or the ability to limit in-game messages from strangers.

It had taken "a couple of years" for PEGI to work out the new classification, its director general Dirk Bosmans told AFP.

The games sector has in recent years been the subject of debate, including over allegedly addictive mechanics such as "loot boxes" -- virtual items purchasable for real money that contain a random in-game reward.

PEGI's new ratings will not apply to games released before June this year -- even the most widely played titles, such as "Fortnite" or "League of Legends".

In future, "we will have to work out a plan of attack, an approach to live service games," Bosmans said, "especially games that will continually provide new updates".

Introduced in 2003, PEGI is the only media age classification system harmonised across European countries, its chief noted -- although Germany has its own ratings.

As a self-regulatory mechanism by the games industry, its rules are applied by major console makers Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft, as well as by Google on its app store.

Apple has its own age rating system, while the dominant PC gaming platform Steam -- based in the US -- has not implemented one.

- 'Regulatory pressure' -

PEGI has updated its approach in part in response to growing "regulatory pressure" within the European Union, Bosmans said.

Even as the EU has tightened digital regulation in recent years, member states are taking their own steps -- including a draft law in France barring under-15s from social media, which the government has warned would cover some online games with social aspects, such as "Roblox".

If passed, the law will require all users to prove their age from 2027.

While automated online verification "sounds like it's going to fix everything... data protection organisations are very concerned", Bosmans said.

"We first need to have a really good conversation before we start deciding on where to apply it."

He added that companies in the sector have welcomed the updated PEGI classifications.

"They understand that by making PEGI better and stronger, they are better protected against lack of nuance, quick fixes," Bosmans said.

- Parents needed -

Bosmans also spoke out against full-on bans of games for children below a certain age -- as mooted by French President Emmanuel Macron last month ahead of an expert inquiry.

"A ban is not very nuanced. It's not very proportionate, no matter for what you apply it," he said, recalling that PEGI was created to avoid just such a scenario in the early 2000s.

What's more, in Australia -- where social media has already been banned for under-16s -- "there is now concern that kids are primarily busy with trying to circumvent the rules, sometimes with the help of their parents," Bosmans said.

"You can try all kinds of technical or legal methods to enforce PEGI ratings. If in the end parents decide, no, my 13-year-old is going to play this 16 (rated) game, it doesn't change anything," he added.

"Thinking that you can do it without the parents is the biggest mistake you can make."

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The US Supreme Court was weighing on Monday whether mail-in ballots received by electoral authorities after Election Day can be counted, in a case that could have repercussions for November's midterm elections.

The case involves a challenge by the Republican National Committee (RNC) to a law in the southern state of Mississippi that allows ballots to be counted if they arrive within five business days after Election Day.

The ballots must be postmarked by Election Day.

Fourteen US states allow mail-in ballots to be tallied after the date of the election if they bear a postmark by Election Day.

Republican President Donald Trump has been a vocal critic of mail-in ballots and has falsely claimed that they contributed to his 2020 election loss to Democrat Joe Biden.

A federal judge ruled in favor of Mississippi but was overturned by an appeals court panel which said ballots must arrive by Election Day to be counted.

Mississippi Solicitor General Scott Stewart, arguing before the top court on Monday, said "states have broad power over elections" and have been allowed to count ballots received after Election Day for "over a century."

"Congress has respected it and no one challenged it until now," Stewart said.

Democrats tend to use mail-in ballots more than Republicans and the practice became more widespread during the Covid pandemic.

The Trump administration has joined the opponents of the Mississippi law and a ruling by the conservative-dominated Supreme Court could affect the ballot-counting rules in other states.

The mail-in ballot counting case is one of a number of voting rights cases being heard by the Supreme Court this term.

The court, which includes three justices nominated by Trump, heard arguments last year over the use of race to draw congressional electoral districts.

The Supreme Court is likely to deliver its rulings in the cases by the end of June or early July, which would provide enough time for them to be applied to the November congressional elections.

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An experimental vaccine for Lyme disease is broadly effective, pharmaceutical companies Pfizer and Valneva announced Monday, however the latter firm's shares fell because the clinical trial did not reach its main goal.

There are currently no approved vaccines to treat Lyme disease -- the world's most common tick-borne illness. 

The new vaccine candidate "demonstrated more than 70 percent efficacy in preventing Lyme disease in individuals aged five years and above" during a phase 3 clinical trial, the US and French-Austrian companies said in a joint statement. 

However, because there were fewer cases of Lyme disease than expected during the study period, the trial did not meet its primary endpoint, they added.

Following the announcement, Valneva's share price plunged more than 38 percent at around noon GMT on the Paris stock exchange, which was otherwise up 0.7 percent.

Prizer said in the statement it remains "confident in the vaccine's potential and is planning submissions to regulatory authorities" in the United States and European Union.

"These results bring us a step closer to our goal of delivering a much-needed vaccine to help protect against Lyme disease," Valneva CEO Thomas Lingelbach added.

The vaccine LB6V, formerly called VLA15, creates antibodies in humans that fight off the bacteria Borrelia burgdorferi, which causes Lyme disease.

The condition is rarely fatal, but people bitten by an infected tick often get a rash and suffer flu-like symptoms including muscle and joint ache, headache, nausea and vomiting. 

In some cases, it can also cause neurological problems.

Research in 2022 estimated that more than 14 percent of the global population has had the disease, warning that transmission rates could increase as climate change brings longer, drier summers. 

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(The Center Square) — New Jersey is suing the Trump administration to block plans to convert a warehouse in a tiny Morris County town into a regional immigration detention facility. 

In a lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court on Friday, New Jersey Attorney General Jennifer Davenport and lawyers for the Town of Roxbury allege the proposed facility would mean an influx of 1,500 detainees to the community of 23,000 that "would strain beyond capacity the local water and sewage systems, threatening water availability and risking sewage overflows into land and water." 

The 50-page complaint also argues that the warehouse — which the Department of Homeland Security purchased recently for $129 million — isn't a proper location for an immigration detention center.

“The Roxbury Warehouse is a logistics center fit for Amazon Prime packages, not people — among other things, it currently has a total of four toilets, despite the planned influx of up to 1,500 detainees and hundreds more ICE employees," the plaintiffs wrote. "The construction required to further establish the site as a detention center would have major environmental impacts to boot." 

"It is thus unsurprising that DHS’s decision to establish a mass detention facility at the Roxbury Warehouse has drawn such powerful opposition across the political and ideological spectrum," they wrote. 

In February, DHS confirmed that it was planning on purchasing warehouses around the country, including one in Roxbury, to be converted into U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facilities as part of the Trump administration's mass deportation efforts. 

"These will not be warehouses – they will be very well-structured detention facilities meeting our regular detention standards," an ICE spokesperson said in a February statement. "Sites will undergo community impact studies and a rigorous due diligence process to make sure there is no hardship on local utilities or infrastructure prior to purchase."

But the proposal has drawn bipartisan pushback from state and local officials, many of whom said they were not briefed on ICE's plans and only learned about the proposed facility through news stories. . Roxbury's all-Republican town council unanimously rejected the proposal.

“This plan won’t make the community or our state safer," Democratic Gov. Mikie Sherrill said in remarks. "It doesn’t just violate common sense, it violates federal law, not to mention zoning and building codes that any other property owner would have to abide by. The administration may think it’s above the law, but it will soon find out that that is not the case.”

New Jersey already has two ICE facilities where immigrants facing deportation are held by federal authorities: Delaney Hall in Newark, holds more than 1,000 detainees, while a smaller facility in Elizabethtown has capacity for hundreds, according to Homeland Security. The agency also plans to open an ICE detention facility at the U.S. military's Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst. 

Davenport said New Jersey and Roxbury claim the proposed facility violates the Administrative Procedures Act, the National Environmental Policy Act, the Intergovernmental Cooperation Act, and the Immigration and Nationality Act. They've asked a federal judge to block the plans. 

"Federal laws require — and our state and towns deserve — that DHS and ICE consult with the state and the township on major projects in their backyard," Davenport, a Democrat, said in a statement. "Instead, DHS and ICE are ramming through a secretive purchase and rushed renovation. We will not allow these ill-considered plans to happen." 

(The Center Square) – The U.S. Supreme Court is hearing arguments in a consequential case Monday morning to determine whether mail-in ballots must be received by Election Day. 

The case, Watson v. Republican National Committee, centers around a Mississippi law that allows mail-in ballots to be counted up to five days after an election as long as they are postmarked by Election Day. The Mississippi law was enacted in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Thirteen other states have similar laws that allow domestic mail-in ballots to be received after Election Day, as long as the ballot is postmarked by the date of an election. In Illinois, mail-in ballots can be received up to 14 days after an election. 

Lawyers for the Republican National Committee argued that federal law sets the Tuesday after the first Monday in November as Election Day. 

Nineteen states and the District of Columbia filed a brief to the Supreme Court that argued states should have the ability to set rules over the receipt of ballots. The states said mail-in ballot deadlines give voters an opportunity to cast their ballots. 

"States have the constitutional authority to make individualized judgments on how best to receive and count votes in federal elections," representatives for the states wrote. 

The states argued overseas military ballots could be affected by a ruling in the case. However, election advocates said Congress’ passage of the Uniformed and Overseas Citizen Voting Act established requirements for states to send absentee ballots 45 days before a federal election.

The case will be argued throughout the morning and a decision is expected by July. 

(The Center Square) – Seniors paid higher Medicare premiums in 2025 due to billions in overpayments to private insurers, a new congressional report shows.

The Joint Economic Committee found Medicare Advantage overpayments increased Medicare Part B premiums by an average of $212 per person in 2025. That added about $13.4 billion in costs.

Most seniors pay Part B premiums out of their Social Security checks. Higher premiums mean less take-home income.

“Let’s be honest about the math, when Medicare Advantage is overpaid, that money doesn’t just disappear, it shows up in the Medicare Part B premiums seniors pay every month, including those paid by traditional Medicare beneficiaries who are not getting extra benefits,” Chairman David Schweikert said in the report.

The report said Medicare Advantage plans cost more than traditional Medicare, even though lawmakers designed the program to save money.

In 2025, the federal government paid an estimated $76 billion to $84 billion more for Medicare Advantage than it would have under traditional Medicare.

On average, Medicare Advantage costs 17% to 20% more per patient, the report said.

Since Medicare ties premiums to overall program costs, higher spending leads to higher premiums for all seniors, including those not enrolled in Medicare Advantage.

“Today, between aggressive upcoding, questionable quality bonuses, and structural overpayments in Medicare Advantage, seniors who stay in traditional Medicare are effectively subsidizing the system,” Schweikert said. “That’s not sustainable, it’s not fair, and it can be reformed.”

In the past decade, overpayments have added about $82 billion to Part B premiums, according to the report.

A group of Senate Democrats said the findings highlight broader affordability issues.

“At a time when over one-third of adults with health insurance report delaying or skipping care altogether due to cost, six of the largest for-profit health insurance companies in America reported over $71 billion in profits in 2024,” the Insurance Watchdog Coalition said in a statement.

Premiums are expected to keep rising. Part B premiums increased nearly 6% in 2025 and will rise another 10% in 2026.

The committee said higher premiums are reducing seniors’ Social Security benefits.

If trends continue, annual Part B premiums could reach about $5,000 per person by 2035.

France's local elections show the appeal of political extremes is growing in France, but Marine Le Pen's far-right party is not necessarily poised to win the presidency next year when Emmanuel Macron must step down, analysts said Monday.

Leftists held onto France's biggest cities in Sunday's polls, including Paris and Marseille, boosting hopes that the next leader of the European Union's second biggest economy, and sole nuclear power, will come from a mainstream party.

The right notched wins in several other big cities, while the far right and hard left established a stronger local footprint.

But limited gains of the far-right National Rally party and divisions on the left suggest the 2027 race is open, despite opinion polls favouring Le Pen and her allies, experts said.

"French town hall elections yielded no big breakthrough for the far right and no clear trend nationwide," Mujtaba Rahman, Europe director at risk analysis firm Eurasia Group, told AFP.

He said the election results suggested that next year's presidential election was "more open" than pollsters have suggested.

The RN secured wins in small and mid-sized towns, but failed to take any major urban centre. 

"It's a catastrophe (for them) in large cities," said Nonna Mayer, a political scientist at Sciences Po university and research centre CNRS.

RN party leader Bardella, 30, failed to secure support from the traditional right in run-off votes.

After a far-right ally won Nice, he claimed France's fifth largest city as a win for his own party.

"There is a real glass ceiling in large cities," added Blanche Leridon, director of French studies at the Paris-based Institut Montaigne.

- 'Dilemma for the left' -

The hard-left France Unbowed (LFI) of firebrand Jean-Luc Melenchon also scored some wins, taking the economically depressed town of Roubaix on the Belgian border and the working-class Paris suburb of Saint Denis.

The mainstream left has sought to distance themselves from LFI, over claims of antisemitism and the fatal beating of a far-right activist last month blamed on the hard left.

While a number of left-wing candidates allied with the hard left to strengthen their chances in the runoffs, the tactic did not pay off.

In Toulouse, Europe's aerospace hub and France's fourth-largest city, it resulted instead in a win for the right.

Analysts said that the question of strategy for both the left and right remained unresolved in the run-up to the 2027 presidential polls.

"The right is divided on what needs to be done," said Mayer.

On the left, said Leridon, the rift between those who champion a broad united front and those who advocate for a left without France Unbowed was only going to widen.

"While the Socialist Party can afford to bypass LFI at the municipal level, it will be a completely different story on a national scale," she said.

Analysts say Melenchon, 74, hopes to capitalise on his party's performance to launch a strong new run for the presidency.

Eric Maurice, an analyst at the Brussels-based European Policy Centre, said the left needs to craft a viable strategy for next year's vote that includes LFI voters.

The challenge, he said, is finding an arrangement that attracts LFI supporters without letting the hard left dominate such an alliance. 

"That's the main dilemma for the left, because Melenchon won't back down," he told AFP.

"The left cannot go divided into the first round if they want to be in the second round next year," he added. 

"But who can be the candidate? If it's Melenchon, they will probably lose," he said, adding too many people find him unpalatable.

- 'Nothing is inevitable' -

Former centrist prime minister Edouard Philippe, 55, kept his seat as mayor of the northern city of Le Havre, boosting his presidential run. 

"On the right, Philippe could emerge as the potential single candidate," said Maurice, adding Macron's former prime minister could reach a second-round run-off and ultimately win.

But analysts said it was too early to make any predictions.

"I certainly don't want to downplay the risk of a National Rally victory -- that risk is very real -- but nothing is inevitable, and nothing is decided at this point," said Leridon.

Mayer said the RN benefits from the divisions of its opponents on the right and left but still showed "many weaknesses".

The party had weak local roots, "a malfunctioning party machine" and was mired in legal troubles, she told AFP.

Bardella is expected to run next year instead of Le Pen, 57, if an appeals court bans her from office in a graft case.

"They have not yet won, even if they never have been so close to the Elysee," said Mayer.

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US President Donald Trump told AFP on Monday that "things are going very well" regarding Iran, shortly after announcing talks with Tehran and a five-day pause on targeting the Islamic republic's power plants.

Trump's abrupt shift on Iran came hours before the expiration of a two-day ultimatum under which he threatened to attack Iranian power plants if Tehran did not reopen the strategic Strait of Hormuz.

"Things are going very well," Trump said in brief comments by telephone to AFP when asked about Iran, following his earlier Truth Social post on the negotiations that immediately sent oil prices tumbling.

In his post, Trump made the surprise announcement, backed by little detail, that diplomacy was underway. This came after he earlier shunned talks with Tehran in the fourth week of the joint US-Israeli military campaign.

Trump said in the post that Tehran and Washington "have had, over the last two days, very good and productive conversations regarding a complete and total resolution of our hostilities in the Middle East."

"Based on the tenor and tone" of the talks, "which will continue throughout the week, I have instructed the Department of War to postpone any and all military strikes against Iranian power plants and energy infrastructure for a five-day period, subject to the success of the ongoing meetings and discussions," Trump wrote.

The US president did not give further details on the talks in his comments to AFP, which he made from his Mar-a-Lago residence in Palm Beach, Florida, where he spent the weekend.

- Iran denies talks -

Iranian media however said on Monday that there were no negotiations underway towards ending the war.

"There are no talks between Tehran and Washington," said Mehr news agency citing Iran's foreign ministry, adding that Trump's statements were part of a push "to reduce energy prices". 

Trump's post came just hours before Wall Street was set to open after brutal selloffs on European and Asian markets and a further climb in the price of oil.

The oil price has posed an increasing political headache for Trump as Americans complain of higher prices at the pump, ahead of crucial midterm elections in November that will determine the make-up of Congress.

On Friday, Trump had said that he was considering "winding down" the war, leaving the responsibility for keeping the strait open to so far-reluctant NATO allies.

But on Saturday Trump then issued a deadline of 2344 GMT Monday -- early Tuesday in Tehran -- for Iran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow passageway into the Gulf through which one-fifth of the world's oil transits.

Iran had partly closed the strait as part of its retaliation for US and Israeli attacks launched on February 28 that have killed top officials including the cleric-run nation's longtime supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamanei.

Iran had remained defiant and threatened that if Trump went ahead it would target vital infrastructure across the Gulf including energy sites and desalination plants critical in the parched region.

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Ukraine fired drones at a key Russian oil port near the Finnish border on Monday, both Moscow and Kyiv said, triggering a huge fire at the facility.

Satellite images showed flames and thick plumes of black smoke rising into the air from the oil terminal in the Russian town of Primorsk, which sits on the Gulf of Finland and is about 50 kilometres (30 miles) from the EU and NATO member.

Russia has been pummelling Ukraine with near-daily air strikes, repeatedly hitting its energy infrastructure and triggering blackouts that plunged millions into cold and darkness during the winter months.

Ukraine has retaliated by launching drone attacks at Russia, mainly at Moscow's energy and military facilities.

"A fuel tank was damaged in the port of Primorsk, causing a fire," said Alexander Drozdenko, governor of Russia's western Leningrad region. 

Drozdenko said Russian air defence systems had destroyed more than 70 drones over the region, which has not been a main front in Russia's war with Ukraine.

The General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine said it had "struck key fuel and energy infrastructure facilities in the Russian Federation", including at Primorsk. 

"According to preliminary information, both the tank farm and the oil loading infrastructure were hit," the General Staff said on social media on Monday.

The satellite images appeared to show fires and smoke rising from several cylindrical fuel tanks at the site.

Ukraine said Primorsk handles approximately 60 million tonnes of oil per year.

"The aggressor country uses the proceeds from oil sales to continue the war against Ukraine," it added.

The General Staff also claimed a hit on an oil refinery in the central Russian city of Ufa, around 1,400 kilometres (870 miles) from the front line.

It said the strike caused "a fire on the facility's grounds".

Ukraine's air force said on Monday that Moscow fired 251 drones at Ukraine overnight, 234 of which were shot down.

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(The Center Square) – A majority of American voters favor guardrails on K-12 political activism during school hours and say students should remain focused on academics, according to a new poll. 

The Center Square Voters’ Voice Poll found 58% of voters support limits on activism during school hours, and 39% say schools should focus strictly on academics and avoid activism altogether during the school day.

The poll, conducted by Noble Predictive Insights between March 2–5, 2026, surveyed 2,659 registered voters, including 1,177 Republicans, 1,270 Democrats and 773 Independents, of whom 330 do not lean toward either major party. It is among the most comprehensive tracking polls in the country.

The poll was weighted by party affiliation, age, region, gender, education and race/ethnicity.

The issue breaks along party lines. Among voters who supported former President Donald Trump, 71% favor clear limits on school activism, compared with 35% of voters who supported former Vice President Kamala Harris or former President Joe Biden. 

Among true independents, about 69% support some form of limits. Only 10% of all respondents support allowing full activism during school hours.

Parents with children in school were especially supportive of limits, with majorities favoring guardrails during instructional hours. Older voters were also more likely than younger voters to support stricter limits.

Mike Noble, founder of Noble Predictive Insights, said the issue shows a clear consensus among voters.

“This activism issue seems like one of those no-brainer issues,” Noble said. “Very few people support having no guardrails.”

As activism on K-12 campuses has increased, the group Defending Education has begun tracking student walkouts and protests nationwide. The organization reports 307 protests or walkouts so far in 2026, compared with 46 in 2025.

“By allowing these protests, school leaders are increasing the chance of harm befalling students and decreasing much-needed instructional time in the classroom,” Rhyen Staley, research director at Defending Education, said. “Administrators need to put an end to these acts of ‘civil disobedience’ before they lose complete control.”

The Center Square reached out to teacher unions for comment, but has not received a response.

The poll’s margin of error is +/- 1.9%.