Ranked among the kings of Italian cheese, with its cows fed on hay and grass, Parmesan is facing slowing sales at home as the country's population declines

Indonesia on Tuesday announced fuel rationing and mandated work from home for civil servants as it seeks to conserve energy stocks amid global price hikes due to the Middle East war.

"To ensure fuel distribution, the government will regulate purchases... with a reasonable limit of 50 litres per vehicle" per day for private consumers, said Airlangga Hartarto, the coordinating minister of economic affairs.

Speaking at a virtual news conference from Seoul, he said civil servants will work from home every Friday, official vehicle use will be cut in half and work trips for government officials reduced by as much as 70 percent.

The measures do not apply to government workers in sectors deemed essential, including health care, security, energy, and water and food supply.

The government estimates the measures, which enter into force Wednesday and are to be reviewed every two months, would save between 121 and 130 trillion rupiah ($7.1-7.6 billion), Airlangga said.

Since the Middle East war began on February 28, some of Indonesia's neighbours have already announced fuel-saving steps including work-from-home measures, official travel cuts and online schooling.

Some have also raised fuel prices, but Jakarta said on Tuesday it would not do so in the near future.

Southeast Asia's largest economy, where fuel is heavily subsidised, is an oil producer but nevertheless a net importer.

The government has doggedly defended its subsidy, which at $12.3 billion represents about five percent of the total annual budget for 2026.

Observers say Jakarta's hand may eventually be forced given that the government is required by law to keep fiscal deficit under three percent of gross domestic product.

The 2026 fuel subsidy calculation was premised on a global oil price of $70 per barrel, but prices have since topped $100.

- 'No price adjustment' -

Airlangga however said that "the national economic condition remains stable with strong fundamentals. National fuel stocks are safe and fiscal stability is maintained."

Bahlil Lahadalia, the energy minister, encouraged Indonesians to use public transport or electric vehicles instead of gasoline-powered cars.

"We need the support and cooperation of the public. We need to purchase fuel reasonably and wisely."

On Sunday, the government announced a one-day-per-week reduction in its free school meals programme, though not for areas with high malnutrition rates.

The government said that in-person schooling will be maintained, and work-from-home measures for the private sector may be considered at a later stage.

Unlike some of its neighbours, Indonesia has not seen long fuel queues as global oil prices have soared due to Iran's de facto closure of the strategic Strait of Hormuz.

A fifth of the world's crude supplies and a substantial amount of gas normally run through the waterway, but traffic has effectively halted during the war, which began with US-Israeli strikes on Iran.

A statement from the Indonesian government sent to AFP said there would be no increase "for subsidised or non-subsidised" fuel from April 1.

It warned against "misinformation" about a pending price hike, quoting presidential spokesman Prasetyo Hadi as saying "we guarantee the availability of fuel... and there is no price adjustment."

Previous fuel price hikes in Indonesia have resulted in mass protests.

President Prabowo Subianto seeks to raise the economic growth rate from 5.1 percent last year to eight percent by 2029, powered by high public spending.

mrc/mlr/ami

US President Donald Trump said Tuesday the countries that have not joined the Middle East war but are struggling with fuel shortages should "go get your own oil" in the Strait of Hormuz. 

In a Truth Social post, Trump said countries "that refused to get involved" should "build up some delayed courage, go to the Strait, and just TAKE IT," adding that the United States would not help them.  

"The U.S.A. won't be there to help you anymore, just like you weren't there for us. Iran has been, essentially, decimated. The hard part is done. Go get your own oil!"

US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth echoed that message during a news conference on Tuesday.

"This is an international waterway that we use less than most, in fact dramatically less than most," Hegseth said.

"It's not just our problem set, going forward, even though we have done the lion's share of preparation to ensure that that strait will be open," he said.

Hegseth also said that the next days of the Iran war will be "decisive," while refusing to rule out US ground forces playing a role in the conflict.

"The upcoming days will be decisive. Iran knows that, and there's almost nothing they can militarily do about it," Hegseth said.

Asked about concerns among some of President Donald Trump's base about the possible use of ground troops in Iran, Hegseth declined to tip his hand.

- Iran talks 'gaining strength' -

"You can't fight and win a war if you tell your adversary what you are willing to do, or what you are not willing to do, to include boots on the ground," he said.

"If we needed to, we could execute those options on behalf of the president of the United States and this department. Or maybe we don't have to use them at all -- maybe negotiations work," Hegseth said.

The Pentagon chief said talks on ending the war were making progress even as the more than month-long US-Israeli military campaign against the Islamic republic continued.

"They are very real. They are ongoing, they are active, and I think, gaining strength," Hegseth said of the negotiations.

He also said he had made an unannounced trip to visit US troops taking part in operations against Iran.

"We were on the ground in CENTCOM on Saturday for about half the day. For reasons of operational security, so those troops are not targeted, the places and bases will not be named," Hegseth said, referring to the US command responsible for the region.

"Suffice it to say, the trip was an honor. I had a chance to bear witness, and I witnessed the best of America," he said.

General Dan Caine -- the top US military officer -- spoke alongside Hegseth, saying that US forces have struck more than 11,000 targets so far.

The United States "continues to destroy Iran's ballistic missile and (drone) capabilities. We remain focused on interdicting and destroying the logistical and supply chains that feed these programs," he said.

bur-wd/ksb

Pentagon chief Pete Hegseth said Tuesday that the next days of the Iran war will be "decisive" while refusing to rule out US ground forces playing a role in the conflict.

Hegseth also revealed during a news conference -- his first in nearly two weeks -- that he had visited US troops in the Middle East over the weekend, and said that talks on ending the conflict were "gaining strength."

"The upcoming days will be decisive. Iran knows that, and there's almost nothing they can militarily do about it," Hegseth said.

Asked about concerns among some of President Donald Trump's base about the possible use of ground troops in Iran, Hegseth declined to tip his hand.

"You can't fight and win a war if you tell your adversary what you are willing to do, or what you are not willing to do, to include boots on the ground," he said.

"If we needed to, we could execute those options on behalf of the president of the United States and this department. Or maybe we don't have to use them at all -- maybe negotiations work," Hegseth said.

The Pentagon chief said talks on ending the war were making progress even as the more than month-long US-Israeli military campaign against the Islamic republic continued.

"They are very real. They are ongoing, they are active, and I think, gaining strength," Hegseth said of the negotiations.

He also said he had made an unannounced trip to visit US troops taking part in operations against Iran.

"We were on the ground in CENTCOM on Saturday for about half the day. For reasons of operational security, so those troops are not targeted, the places and bases will not be named," Hegseth said, referring to the US command responsible for the region.

"Suffice it to say, the trip was an honor. I had a chance to bear witness, and I witnessed the best of America," he said.

General Dan Caine -- the top US military officer -- spoke alongside Hegseth, saying that US forces have struck more than 11,000 targets so far.

The United States "continues to destroy Iran's ballistic missile and (drone) capabilities. We remain focused on interdicting and destroying the logistical and supply chains that feed these programs," he said.

And "we continue to assert dominance over the Iranian navy. We remain focused on targeting their mine laying capability, their naval assets," Caine added.

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(The Center Square) – Not all the money spent by U.S. senators’ office expense accounts goes out the door. Millions of dollars circle right back – through checks payable to the senators themselves and some of their top staffers, an in-depth review of Congressional spending by The Center Square found.

Records showing what justified the payments is a closely-guarded Senate secret, with Congress itself blocking public access.

The Center Square found more than a dozen senators and staffers received payments to themselves topping $100,000 between 2021 and 2025. Four of them – three Democrats, one Republican – received $200,000 or more. The combined payments to eight senators and six high-ranking aides topped $2.2 million, spread out over more than 3,100 individual checks issued by the Senate.

The self reimbursements generated by those offices increased 60% across three years of full spending data examined, from $345,700 in 2022 to $554,000 in 2024.

Informed of the reimbursements, David Williams, president of the Taxpayers Protection Alliance, said checks going straight to senators "should be outlawed immediately. 

"This is very problematic, and it's not something that I knew about," he added. "And there is less of a paper trail. There is less transparency. And there's so much temptation to inflate the numbers and to give yourself a little extra more when you're writing that check."

The senator who spent the most on self-payments in that period: Patty Murray, Washington Democrat and ranking member of the Senate Appropriations Committee. Senate records show her office issued 184 payments to Murray totaling $235,115.

Second-most was U.S. Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, who received 191 checks totaling $223,627. In third place, Senate Majority Whip John Barrasso, R-Wyoming, who received 242 checks totaling $202,039.

These weren’t paychecks, but expense reimbursements. That’s according to short descriptions listed among thousands of pages of Secretary of the Senate spending reports examined by The Center Square.

Senators don’t have to be paid this way. They could use government-issued travel cards, but these senators chose to pay travel expenses out of pocket, then be reimbursed.

And any Freedom of Information Act request attempting to obtain receipts, invoices, credit card statements or vouchers will be summarily rejected, Financial Clerk of the Senate Ted Ruckner explained. Congressional offices have discretion to release their own expense records, but The Center Square found only one sitting senator, James Risch, R-Idaho, willing to even discuss the payments or specific charges.

Payments in Risch’s name totaled nearly $177,000 over five years, ranking him sixth on the list among payees. But combined with payments to his chief of staff, Ryan White, his Senate office had the highest total amount in self-payments, with $313,627.

"The government does pay my expenses," Risch said. "The vast, vast, vast majority of that is my airfare back and forth to Boise every week."

High-priced commutes

Based on the Senate reports, the majority of the senators' and staffers' expenses were travel-related, with repeating labels such as "Senator Transportation," "Staff Transportation," "Per Diem" and "Incidentals."

Travel reimbursements are common in the corporate world, and workers at all levels of federal, state and local government often hand in receipts to be paid back.

But TPA president Williams said there’s a huge problem with U.S. senators being reimbursed that way: Congress exempted itself from the Freedom of Information Act when the law passed in 1966, so the public can’t determine if any senators or their aides may be abusing privileges.

There's no way to know if anyone flew first class, paid to fly family members, rented fancy limousines, spent nights at luxury hotels, or dined at gourmet restaurants. There’s also no way to know if senators use personal credit cards that come with cash-back rewards or other incentives, allowing them to reap financial benefits from tens of thousands of dollars per year in credit card charges run up at taxpayers' expense.

And while the U.S. House provides expense disclosures in electronic form, the U.S. Senate only releases the information in PDF files, which makes the expenses difficult to analyze. Williams said that's by design.

"This is what they have chosen," he said. "They're not changing this because they don't want people to know. They don't want their constituents to know. They don't want taxpayers to know. They don't want the media to know what they're spending money on."

Risch, though, described stringent internal controls by the Senate Disbursing Office.

"My people tell me the Senate drives them crazy with sending stuff back, saying, ‘Hey, where is the receipt for this or where is the receipt for that,’ or that sort of thing," the Idaho senior senator said.

With the exception of Risch, attempts to learn more about senators' expenses were met with denials or silence. The Center Square asked seven offices that spent the most on direct payments to produce backup records for a small sample of expenses.

Patty Murray’s office was asked for records on eight of her 184 checks, including two separate payments for $4,022 each, issued July and August. Descriptions for both say "Senator Transportation" and describe round trips from her home on Whidbey Island to Washington, D.C., by way of Seattle–Tacoma International Airport.

A round-trip Delta flight from Seattle to Washington, with Uber rides both ways from Whidbey Island to the airport, costs about half that. But without backup records, it's impossible to know exactly why she was reimbursed $4,022.

Murray declined an interview request through her communications director, Amir Avin, who said in an email, "Respectfully, we are not going to dedicate staff time redacting and preparing receipts for the Center Square’s review."

He described the charges as standard reimbursements, and said Murray makes an effort to fly home each weekend to hear from constituents.

Disputing that the senator’s overall travel costs are higher than her colleagues' travel, Avin said Murray uses her own card to be more efficient. 

"The travel cards cannot be used for any other expenses that may arise while the Senators are on official travel," he said in an email. "Murray just does the reimbursement process because it’s a little more streamlined."

Not sharing anything

The second-highest spender in self-payments has even longer flights home. In one commute, Schatz, the senior senator from Hawaii, spent $10,000 over the Christmas holidays in 2024, described in records as "Senator Transportation / Washington DC to Honolulu and Return." 

That's at least five times what round-trip flights cost, but it's not clear if other expenses were included. His office didn't respond to inquiries. Approached by a reporter from The Center Square as he walked through the underground tunnel to the capitol, Schatz said, "If it’s ten thousand dollars, it’s ten thousand dollars."

Asked if he travels alone, he said yes.

"I’m not really comfortable, for security reasons, disclosing how I travel," he added.

Barrasso’s office likewise did not respond to a request for an interview and backup records for eight of his 242 checks.

The office of Ted Cruz, Republican from Texas, wouldn’t produce anything on the nearly $214,000 paid in 385 checks to Chief of Staff Carl Mica and former Chief of Staff Aaron Reitz, most of it labeled as transportation and per diem costs.

Sen. Tim Scott, R-South Carolina, and his office wouldn’t address spending by his regional director, Alfred Jenkins, who received 201 checks topping $186,000. Payment descriptions say it was "Staff Transportation" between North Charleston and other cities throughout the state.

The Center Square asked a spokeswoman for Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Kansas, for records on eight payments to the senator and eight to his chief of staff, Brent Robertson. Between the two, they received a combined 488 checks for a total $289,170. And both have taken heat from the news media for allegedly superfluous travel. 

In the senator’s case, in 2024 The Wichita Eagle reported Marshall spent taxpayer funds on flights and other travel expenses visiting a vacation home in Sarasota, Florida, near his grandchildren. The reimbursements reviewed by The Center Square show at least $9,100 in expenses for trips that included Sarasota. All were prior to the Eagle's stories

Last year, Politico questioned why a chief of staff for a Kansas senator charges taxpayers for commuting to Lynchburg, Va., where he lives. Records reviewed by The Center Square show more than $25,000 went to Robertson for travel involving Lynchburg. Again, those payments stopped before Politico posted the story.

"Sorry, our office is unable to give out those records," Marshall’s communications director, Payton Fuller, wrote in an email to The Center Square.

One senator answered questions

Risch said before The Center Square asked about it, he wasn’t aware he received direct checks. He said his staff puts the payments directly back into his credit card that pays for flights. He said the only perks he’s aware of are airline miles on his card and the government’s contracted rates with airlines.

"I can understand where I’d be at the top, because I do go home every weekend," he said. "I think Boise’s probably one of the most expensive places to get to."

His office wouldn’t provide any backup records either, though, saying that would take too much time to compile. He instead provided details about his largest single reimbursement – a $4,337 payment from September 2022, described as "Staff Transportation" in a Senate report.

In an email, Press Secretary Janessa Tolman said that paid for multiple flights and a car rental with fuel and tolls. There was a flight with a connector from Washington to Boise; a flight to McCall, Idaho; flights with connectors to and from Orlando to meet with NASA officials in Titusville, Florida,; and a flight with a connector from Boise to Washington.

The senator said he flies coach. The government won’t reimburse for a first-class ticket, though he said he does get complimentary upgrades sometimes from airline miles. 

Risch, a former Idaho governor, said he’s never seen any government agency as strict about reimbursements as the United States Senate.

"If you’re going to slip something past the rules of the senate, it would be a heavy, heavy lift," he said. "You have to give them receipts, and they will call back and say, 'Well, we don’t like this, we don’t like that.' And you’ve got to explain it to them. This is not something that’s cavalier."

Indonesia on Tuesday announced fuel rations and mandated work from home for civil servants, as it seeks to conserve energy stocks amid global price hikes due to the Middle East war.

"To ensure fuel distribution, the government will regulate purchases... with a reasonable limit of 50 litres per vehicle" per day for private consumers, said Airlangga Hartarto, the coordinating minister of economic affairs.

Speaking at a virtual news conference from Seoul, he also said that civil servants will work from home every Friday, part of the government's efforts to save energy.

The government said earlier Tuesday it would not increase the price of fuel, which is heavily subsidised in Indonesia.

The Southeast Asian archipelago is an oil producer but nevertheless a net importer.

The government has doggedly defended the subsidy, which at $12.3 billion represents about five percent of the total annual budget for 2026.

Observers say the government's hand may eventually be forced given that Indonesia is required by law to keep its fiscal deficit under three percent of gross domestic product.

The 2026 fuel subsidy calculation was premised on a global oil price of $70 per barrel, but prices have since topped $100.

Airlangga said that "the national economic condition remain stable with strong fundamentals. National fuel stocks are safe and fiscal stability is maintained."

Bahlil Lahadalia, the energy minister, said: "We need the support and cooperation of the public. We need to purchase fuel reasonably and wisely."

- 'No price adjustment' -

A government statement sent to AFP earlier said there would be no increase "for subsidised or non-subsidised" fuel from April 1.

It warned against "misinformation" about a pending price hike, quoting presidential spokesman Prasetyo Hadi as saying "we guarantee the availability of fuel... And there is no price adjustment."

Previous fuel price hikes in Indonesia have resulted in mass protests.

Unlike some of its neighbours, Southeast Asia's biggest economy has not seen long fuel queues as global oil prices have soared due to Iran's de facto closure of the strategic Strait of Hormuz.

A fifth of the world's crude supplies and a substantial amount of gas normally run through the waterway, but traffic has effectively halted during the war, which began with US-Israeli strikes on Iran on February 28.

Earlier this month, the Indonesian presidency spokesman Prasetyo said the government was looking to set aside up to 80 trillion rupiah (about $4.7 billion) to shield the economy from the fallout.

On Sunday, the government announced a one-day-per-week reduction in its free school meals programme, though not for areas with high malnutrition rates.

President Prabowo Subianto seeks to raise the economic growth rate from 5.1 percent last year to eight percent by 2029, powered by high public spending.

mlr/mrc/ami

Iran's closure of the Strait of Hormuz trade route in the Middle East war is driving up the costs of shipping fuel and goods around the world, industry data shows.

Prices have risen because of falling capacity, with ships staying put in the Gulf for fear of attack if they set sail. Other ships are taking long, costly alternative routes to avoid the strait -- while the reduction of oil flows has raised the price of boats' fuel.

"We've had to stop bookings... from and to the upper Gulf region because we can't get the ships in nor out," said Rolf Habben Jansen, chief executive of major container shipping line Hapag-Lloyd last week, estimating the war had driven up costs by "$40, 50 million per week".

"A big chunk of that is bunker fuel prices but also in categories like insurance or container storage and inland transportation we have seen costs go up, and we have six ships that we cannot use today, which reduces the available capacity," he told a news conference.

Here are five data indicators of how the crisis is driving up shipping costs.

- Tanker charters -

The cost of chartering an oil tanker multiplied after US and Israeli forces started striking Iran on February 28, prompting retaliatory strikes across the region.

For a big Suezmax-class crude carrier, the average "earnings" -- a standard indirect indicator of charter costs -- has more than tripled since February 26 to over $330,000 a day, according to maritime research group Clarksons.

For liquefied natural gas carriers on a reference US to Japan route, the measure also tripled in that period to $90,000 a day.

- Oil shipping -

The overall cost of shipping oil shot up after the war broke out, said freight pricing specialist Peter Norfolk at Platts, part of S&P Global Energy.

From $46 per metric tonne at the end of February, the cost of shipping crude from the Gulf to China on a giant VLCC-class tanker nearly tripled in a few days, then eased to stand at around $64 at the end of March, he told AFP on Monday.

"Of course, in reality there is hardly any loading happening at the moment," he noted.

Around a fifth of global crude oil and liquefied natural gas passes through the strait in peacetime.

- Container costs -

The spot reference price to ship a 40-foot container has risen by 20 to 25 percent on the main routes from the Far East to Europe and the US West Coast, according to consultancy Maritime Services International.

The price has reached between $2,200 and $2,700 for a 40-foot container on that Europe route, it said.

"War surcharges have caused rates from the Far East to the Middle East Gulf and Red Sea to spike by nearly 200 percent" from February 20 to March 20, it said in a report.

"Traffic through the SoH (Strait of Hormuz) has been severely constrained, with carriers suspending bookings, rerouting vessels, and discharging cargo at alternative safe regional hubs."

- Ship fuel surge -

The price of the bunker fuel that powers ships nearly doubled after the war broke out, peaking at $1,053 per metric tonne on March 20.

It stood at more than $936 on March 31 -- up from around $540 on the eve of the war, according to market data from financial platform Factset.

- Insurance premiums -

War-risk insurance could run into tens of millions of dollars for a single trip through the Hormuz Strait, with ships and cargoes worth hundreds of millions.

David Smith, head of the marine arm at specialist insurance broker McGill, estimated last week that premiums were swinging "between three and-a-half and 10 percent" of a vessel's value.

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(The Center Square) – The U.S. doubled down on calls to allied countries for help defending the Strait of Hormuz and did not rule out boots on the ground in Iran, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Tuesday. 

Hegseth spoke to reporters at a news conference Tuesday morning. He reiterated calls from President Donald Trump to allied countries for help securing access to the Strait. Trump criticized France and the United Kingdom on Tuesday morning. He said the U.K. should step up to defend the Strait in order to lower oil prices

"You’ll have to start learning how to fight for yourself, the U.S.A. won’t be there to help you anymore, just like you weren’t there for us." Trump wrote on social media.

The Secretary of War agreed.

"There are countries around the world who ought to be prepared to step up on this critical waterway as well, it's not just the United States Navy," Hegseth said. "Last time I checked, there was supposed to be a big, bad Royal Navy that could be prepared to do things like that as well." 

Hegseth and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Dan Caine repeatedly refused to rule out putting U.S. soldiers on the ground in Iran. 

"Our adversary right now thinks there are 15 different ways we can come at them with boots on the ground," Hegseth said. "Guess what? There are."

Caine said U.S. boots on the ground are ready if called on and would pose a "pressure point" for Iran. He said Iran should keep that in mind as it negotiates with the U.S.

"Iran should note that they're out there, and a pressure point," Caine said. 

Throughout the news conference Hegseth pointed to the belief that Iranian leaders are hiding underground. He noted that last 24 hours saw the lowest number of enemy missiles and drones fired by Iran. 

"In only one month we set the terms, the upcoming days will be decisive," Hegseth said. "Iran knows that, and there's almost nothing they can militarily do about it."

He called on Iran to cut a deal with the United States and said the terms of the deal are known to Iranian leaders. 

"If Iran is not willing, the United States War Department will continue with even more intensity," Hegseth said. 

Asian nations are facing a major energy crisis as a result of the Iran war, with a sharp fall in crude shipments and few alternatives, global maritime analytics firm Kpler told AFP on Tuesday.

"We think Asia will, for now, be the ones suffering the most," Kpler president Jean Maynier told AFP in an interview at the company's offices in Singapore.

The war, which began with US-Israeli strikes on Iran on February 28, saw Tehran effectively halt traffic through Strait of Hormuz, through which a fifth of the world's crude supplies and a substantial amount of gas normally run.

This has sent shockwaves across global energy markets, leading to price hikes for consumers worldwide.

Maynier said Asia did not have enough energy resources of its own to fill the gap "in China... in big countries like the Philippines or Indonesia. So it's a real energy crisis."

The impact of the de facto closure of the Strait of Hormuz has already led governments to take exceptional measures, like the Philippines which has declared a national energy emergency, Maynier noted.

"It's really bad for Asia and we are not optimistic if the event continues," he said.

- 'No crude' -

"There is almost no crude oil arriving" in Asia currently, and no viable alternatives to energy imports from the Middle East while "inventories are being depleted", Maynier said.

He said that while the attack on Iran had been anticipated, its timing and the duration of the war that has ensued were surprising.

"What is surprising is the length of this event and, especially in Asia, the crisis that we have now with energy."

Brussels-based Kpler, which was founded in 2014 and owns the MarineTraffic website, is considered one of the foremost data analytics and ship-tracking agencies in the world.

It has been keeping a close eye on the Strait of Hormuz since the attack on Iran.

Iranian military officials have claimed to control the waterway and attack vessels from "hostile" nations, but Kpler said some are risking the trip.

Seventeen commodities vessels crossed the the strait over the weekend, 12 of them on Saturday, making it one of the busiest days for crossings since March 1, according to Kpler.

As of 1700 GMT on Monday, commodities vessels had made just 196 crossings of the waterway this month, a huge decrease from before the war.

Of those, 120 were by oil tankers and gas carriers and most were travelling east out of the strait.

- 'Dark vessels' -

Kpler, which provides real-time data for close to 1,000 companies, uses satellites, drones and other tools to track ships, said Maynier.

"All of this combined, and the selection of data sets that we collect from different partnerships help us to really understand what's happening" including when ships "go dark", he added.

A "dark" vessel -- usually a tanker or cargo carrier -- deliberately disables or manipulates transponders in a bid to go undetected by public tracking systems like Kpler's MarineTraffic.

"Dark vessels try to switch off their (tracking) device and try to escape monitoring, usually because they are involved in smuggling or trying to export sanctioned cargoes," Maynier said.

Using satellite images, shore-based antennae, data and other sources, Kpler aims to reconstruct the trajectory of a vessel that has "gone dark," he added.

"It's always hard to be 100 percent, but we can detect more than 90 percent of what's happening in real time."

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Chinese tech giant Huawei's revenue growth slowed last year, its annual report showed Tuesday, as sales of the company's consumer devices plateaued against a backdrop of sluggish domestic consumption.

Huawei's revenue came in at 880.9 billion yuan ($126 billion) in 2025, up 2.2 percent from the previous year's 862 billion yuan, the company said. 

But the figure was a fraction of the 22 percent jump in revenue reported in 2024, reflecting in large part the slowing growth of the company's consumer business.

While Huawei regained its position as the top seller of smartphones in China last year, the overall domestic market shrank in 2025, according to the US-based International Data Corporation.

Huawei reported 344.5 billion yuan revenue from its consumer business in 2025, up only 1.6 percent from the year before compared to the 38.3 percent jump reported in 2024.

"Our consumer business worked to overcome formidable challenges," rotating chairwoman Meng Wanzhou said in Tuesday's report, noting also that Huawei was "moving toward a future that is full of uncertainty".

Revenue growth from telecommunications infrastructure sales also slowed in 2025, rising 2.6 percent on-year compared to 4.9 percent in 2024.

The company attributed this to "the impact of industry investment cycles". 

Huawei has in recent years been at the centre of a standoff between China and the United States after Washington warned its equipment could be used for espionage by the Chinese government, an allegation Huawei denies.

Sanctions since 2019 have cut the firm's access to US-made components and technologies, forcing it to diversify its growth strategy.

Huawei's research and development expenditure rose in 2025 to 192.3 billion yuan -- 21.8 percent of its total revenue -- as the company poured resources into building computing products intended for AI use.

Net profit for 2025 was 68 billion yuan, up 8.7 percent from 2024's 62.6 billion yuan.

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Thousands of Germans have taken to the streets in recent days in support of a TV personality who has had fake sexualised images of her spread online, spurring a new "#MeToo" moment around online abuse.

Headlines in Germany have been dominated by the case of Collien Fernandes, 44, after she went public about faked pornographic images of her circulating on the internet. 

The case has sparked demonstrations across the country in Berlin, Hamburg, Frankfurt and elsewhere, with one of the key organisers being an activist collective called Vulver which says there are "glaring gaps" in legal protections for women online.

The government had already been planning to develop measures to deal with AI-generated deepfakes targeting women, but in the wake of the Fernandes case the justice ministry has promised legislation will be brought forward "very soon".

In an article in Der Spiegel magazine earlier this month, Fernandes said she suspected her ex-husband, 50-year-old actor and TV presenter Christian Ulmen, of using fake social media accounts in her name in order to spread fake sexualised images of her.

Ulmen denies any wrongdoing.

Some German media have said the case is the digital equivalent of that of Gisele Pelicot.

Pelicot became a global symbol in the fight against sexual violence after she waived her right to anonymity during the 2024 trial of her ex-husband and dozens of strangers who raped her while she was unconscious.

- 'Offenders' paradise' -

Fernandes said she has been suffering online harassment for years because of the material spread about her online but initially had no suspicions as to who might be behind it.

She filed a complaint against persons unknown in 2024, but the resulting investigation was shelved last June.

On Friday prosecutors announced they were opening a probe into Ulmen after evaluating Spiegel's reporting.

Fernandes has also filed a complaint in Spain, where she and Ulmen lived and which has stricter laws concerning violence against women.

She has been vocal about what she says are the weaker protections for victims in Germany, calling it an "offenders' paradise".

The justice ministry has admitted that German law is "lagging behind technological developments in this area" and that this would be addressed in its upcoming proposals.

The head of the German judges' union, Sven Rebehn, told the Rheinische Post newspaper that a "glaring lack of personnel" was also hindering more prosecutions.

- Digital violence -

On Thursday Fernandes addressed a rally in Hamburg which drew around 17,000 people demanding tougher action from the government.

She spoke to the crowd wearing a bullet-proof vest due to death threats.

"Some men -- and it's only men -- want to kill me," she said, close to tears.

On Sunday in Munich thousands braved the rain at another demonstration against deepfakes and sexual violence.

As well as supporting Fernandes, the protesters wanted to "stand with all other victims who don't have a voice", said Luna Sahling from the Young Greens, which organised the gathering.

"We want to show very clearly that we need real laws to protect women in particular from digital violence," she told AFP.

When asked by MPs about the issue of violence against women last week, Chancellor Friedrich Merz said that "a considerable part of this violence comes from migrant communities".

"A shameless populist lie," said Lydia Dietrich, director of a women's aid organisation in Munich who was also at Sunday's demonstration.

She accused Merz of "pandering to resentments" and of letting down those who are trying to effect real change on the issue.

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