Russia trains teenage influencers to churn out pro-war content

The PGA Tour is planning to abandon the traditional season-opening swing in Hawaii from 2027, it said Monday.

The Sentry tournament on Maui has been scrapped, said a PGA Tour statement, which added that talks were taking place to transform the Sony Open tournament into part of the PGA Tour Champions circuit for veteran golfers.

The Sentry has been held every year from 1999 to 2025 at The Plantation Course at Kapalua but was cancelled this season because of water restrictions on the drought-stricken island.

The Sony Open has been held at Waialae Country Club in Honolulu since 1971 and was the PGA Tour's opening event in 2026, won by Chris Gotterup.

"We are grateful to The Plantation Course at Kapalua, Kapalua Resort, Maui County and the state of Hawaii for their longtime support of our season-opening PGA Tour event, as well as the fans, partners and volunteers across Maui who have supported the event throughout the years," the Tour said.

The move away from Hawaii had been widely rumored and PGA Tour chief executive Brian Rolapp last month signalled the American-based circuit's desire to look at other venues to launch the season.

He wanted the tour to start, he said, with a "marquee event at an iconic venue in the west."

The tour will announce its full 2027 schedule at a later date.

rcw/dh

Amazon on Monday said it pumped another $5 billion into Anthropic as it ramps up its collaboration with the startup behind Claude artificial intelligence.

The e-commerce and cloud computing colossus noted that the investment builds on $8 billion it had already invested in Anthropic, according to the companies.

Amazon added that it could invest $20 billion more in Anthropic, provided the startup meets certain performance goals.

For its part, San Francisco-based Anthropic said it has committed to spending more than $100 billion on Amazon Web Services (AWS) technology to power AI in the coming decade.

"We need to build the infrastructure to keep pace with rapidly growing demand," Anthropic chief executive Dario Amodei said in a release.

"Our collaboration with Amazon will allow us to continue advancing AI research while delivering Claude to our customers."

Anthropic said in early April that it had tripled its annualized revenues quarter-on-quarter to over $30 billion -- outpacing OpenAI for the first time.

Amodei visited US officials last week at the White House, where they struck a different tone from the dispute that erupted in February, when the AI startup infuriated Pentagon chief Pete Hegseth by insisting its technology should not be used for mass surveillance or fully autonomous weapons systems.

"We discussed opportunities for collaboration, as well as shared approaches and protocols to address the challenges associated with scaling this technology," a White House spokesperson told AFP.

The rhetoric marks a departure from months earlier, when President Donald Trump instructed the US government to "immediately cease" using Anthropic's technology after the company refused to allow the Pentagon unconditional use of its Claude AI models.

Anthropic has challenged the Trump administration in court, as well as Hegseth's move to add the company to a list of firms that pose a "supply chain risk."

Earlier this month, Anthropic announced its newest AI model Mythos, withholding it from public release due to its potential cybersecurity risks.

gc/sla

Formula One chiefs unanimously agreed on Monday to make rule changes following severe criticism of new regulations introduced this season which led to doubts over Max Verstappen continuing in the sport.

The new rules made cars a combination of combustion and electrical power, meaning drivers had to carefully manage their battery, effectively slowing down on a qualifying lap, while the cars had boost buttons to allow them to overtake.

Four-time world champion Verstappen called the new style of racing "a joke" after the Chinese Grand Prix and hinted he would take a break from F1 in 2027 unless changes were made.

Other drivers had criticised the new rules and fans said the changes had detracted from the experience of spectators.

Following an online meeting between F1, its governing body FIA, and the sport's team principals, tweaks to the rules have been finalised and are set to come in for the Miami Grand Prix on May 3.

That race will end the season's enforced five-week break following the cancellation of the Bahrain and Saudi Arabia races due to the conflict in the Middle East.

Among the changes, energy harvesting -- which helps the driver charge the battery -- will be reduced from eight megajoules to seven and the hybrid power unit will be increased from 250kw to 350kw. 

The changes are designed to allow the drivers to go at full speed for longer in qualifying.

Another change has been made to the boost button, after British driver Ollie Bearman's high-speed crash at the last round in Japan, which was attributed partly to the difference in closing speeds.

The boost button will now be capped at 150kw, "limiting sudden performance differentials", the FIA said in a statement.

Further talks are set to take place after the Miami Grand Prix.

Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff cautioned against sweeping changes to the rulebook, after his drivers Kimi Antonelli and George Russell made a fast start to the season. Antonelli leads Russell by nine points in the standings after the first three races.

Speaking before the meeting, Wolff said: "The discussions that have been taking place between the drivers, the FIA, Formula One, and the teams have been constructive. And we all share the same objectives.

"It's how can we improve the product, make it out-and-out racing, and look at what can improve in terms of safety, but act with a scalpel and not with a baseball bat.

"We are going to ratify, in order to evolve, because there has only been three races. We need to learn from the past, where decisions were sometimes made in an erratic way, and then we overshot and realised it wasn't good.

"We are custodians of the sport and we have many hundreds of thousands of fans that love F1. In order to protect this huge opportunity that the sport gives us, we shouldn't badmouth in public our own sport."

gj/nf

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed "harsh action" on Monday against a soldier caught on camera vandalising a statue of Jesus Christ in southern Lebanon.

The photo, which the military determined was authentic after it spread online, shows an Israeli soldier using a sledgehammer to strike the head of a statue of a crucified Jesus that had fallen off a cross.

The sculpture was located in the Christian village of Debl in south Lebanon, near the border with Israel, the local municipality told AFP, but officials could not say whether it had been damaged. 

AFP geolocated the image to confirm it was taken in Debl, but is currently unable to access the village.

"I was stunned and saddened to learn that an IDF soldier damaged a Catholic religious icon in southern Lebanon," Netanyahu wrote on X.

"I condemn the act in the strongest terms. Military authorities are conducting a criminal probe of the matter and will take appropriately harsh disciplinary action against the offender," he added.

Israel has conducted airstrikes across Lebanon and invaded the country's south after Hezbollah entered the Middle East war in support of its backer Iran on March 2. 

The fighting killed nearly 2,300 people and displaced more than a million before a ceasefire came into effect last week. Israel has lost 15 soldiers in the war.

- 'Profound indignation -

The military said it had determined after an investigation that the image circulating on social media was genuine and showed an Israeli soldier operating in southern Lebanon.

Checks carried out by AFP using detection tools suggested the image was likely genuine, though there were other manipulated photos circulating on social media.

The Israeli military said in a post on its official X account that it viewed the incident with "great severity", adding that the "soldier's conduct is wholly inconsistent with the values expected of its troops".

The military said "appropriate measures will be taken against those involved" but did not go into further detail.

It said it is working with the community to "restore the statue to its place".

The Assembly of Catholic Ordinaries of the Holy Land in a statement published by the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem expressed "its profound indignation and unreserved condemnation".

"This act constitutes a grave affront to the Christian faith and adds to other reported incidents of desecration of Christian symbols by IDF soldiers in southern Lebanon," the statement said.

"The Assembly calls for immediate and decisive disciplinary action, a credible process of accountability, and clear assurances that such conduct will neither be tolerated nor repeated."

"For this reason, the Assembly renews, with urgency, its call to bring to an end the war that has tormented this region for far too long."

Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar condemned the conduct as "shameful and disgraceful".

"I am confident that necessary severe measures will be taken against whoever committed this ugly act," he wrote on X.

"We apologise for this incident and to every Christian whose feelings were hurt."

Israeli troops remain in southern Lebanon despite the ceasefire.

Netanyahu last month was drawn into a row around religion and forced to defend himself after he said that Jesus had "no advantage" over Mongolian conqueror Genghis Khan.

ha-lba-jd/lba/dcp

Two decades after "The Devil Wears Prada" became a modern US classic, its stars reunited in New York on Monday for the long-awaited sequel's world premiere.

Meryl Streep, who returns as tyrannical magazine editor Miranda Priestly, was joined on the red carpet by fellow A-listers Anne Hathaway, Emily Blunt and Stanley Tucci.

"It was like, why did it take so long?" Streep told Disney Plus when asked about stepping back into her fearsome character's shoes. 

Tucci agreed: "Yes, exactly. It was like riding a bicycle."

"The Devil Wears Prada 2" sees a now well established Andy Sachs (Hathaway) back at Runway Magazine, where Miranda Priestly (Streep) is navigating the decline of print media.

The veteran editor is forced to go head-to-head with her former, frantic assistant Emily Charlton (Blunt) -- now a high-powered executive who controls the advertising revenue that Priestly needs. 

Kenneth Branagh joins the cast as Miranda's newest husband, along with newcomers like Simone Ashley and Lucy Liu. 

Naturally, fashion was front and center at Monday's premiere, where three-time Oscar winner Streep wore a red Givenchy outfit. 

She said in an interview that all the clothes, jewelry, bags and shoes featured in "The Devil Wears Prada 2" are to be auctioned for the Committee to Protect Journalists. 

Co-stars Hathaway and Blunt, who wore Louis Vuitton and Schiaparelli respectively, credited fans for making the sequel happen. 

"We're literally here because of you, because you took us into your hearts and kept us there for 20 years and said 'we want more.' That's why this whole dream has continued for us," Hathaway told Disney Plus. 

Other red carpet celebrities included Anna Wintour, the former Vogue editor, who is considered the inspiration for Streep's character. 

"The Devil Wears Prada 2" opens in theaters on May 1. 

Its 2006 precursor is widely seen as a definitive satire of the US fashion industry, capturing the allure of power and ambition. 

bjt/sla

San Antonio Spurs star Victor Wembanyama was named the NBA's defensive player of the year on Monday, becoming the first unanimous winner in the award's 43-year history.

France international Wembanyama, a generational talent who has helped transform San Antonio into title contenders, earned a perfect 100 votes in the media ballot.

Oklahoma City's Chet Holmgren came in second in the voting, with Detroit's Ausar Thompson ranked third.

The win marked another milestone in the meteoric rise of Wembanyama, who at 22 is the youngest player in history to win the honor.

"I'm super, super happy to win this award and actually super proud to be the first-ever unanimous," Wembanyama told NBC Sports Network following the award.

The 7ft 4in (2.24m) Frenchman has been billed as the future face of the NBA ever since he landed in the league after being chosen by San Antonio with the top overall pick in the 2023 Draft.

Mixing prodigious defense with a potent offense, Wembanyama has excelled again this season and is regarded as one of the front-runners for the NBA's Most Valuable Player award.

Wembanyama led the league in blocks per game (3.08) for a third straight season and helped lead the Spurs to the No.3 ranking in defensive ratings.

On Sunday, Wembanyama lit up the playoffs in his first postseason game, scoring 35 points to go with five rebounds and two blocks as San Antonio defeated the Portland Trail Blazers.

German basketball legend Dirk Nowitzki told AFP in an interview on Monday ahead of his induction to the FIBA Hall of Fame that Wembanyama was "changing the game as we speak."

"I've never seen anything like it," the 2007 NBA MVP told AFP when asked about Wembanyama.

"His defense is so good that he changes the game just by being on the court and taking away some of the layups and twos that other teams would usually take."

Wembanyama insisted on Monday that he owed his success to the work of his teammates and the Spurs coaching staff.

"We often overlook the team aspect," Wembanyama said. 

"I'm sitting here. I happen to be the guy who's put in the spotlight, but I am part of a system, and I couldn't get this award, and I couldn't do what I do if it wasn't for my teammates ... and my coaching staff."

rcw/des

(The Center Square) – The U.S. Department of Education has proposed new rules aimed at holding colleges and universities accountable for programs that leave students with low-earning jobs as the federal student loan debt nears $1.7 trillion.

The proposal, outlined in a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, would establish an accountability framework designed to address concerns that many students are financially worse off than if they had not attended college. 

The plan is backed by the Working Families Tax Cuts Act, which is a part of President Donald Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which aims to cut taxes, according to the department.

Under the proposal, programs that fail to meet earnings benchmarks in two out of three consecutive years could lose access to federal student loans. If failing programs account for at least half of an institution’s federal financial aid recipients or funding, they could also lose eligibility for Pell Grants.

“The Trump Administration’s proposed accountability framework is grounded in common sense: if postsecondary education programs do not leave graduates better off, taxpayers should not subsidize them,” Nicholas Kent, the under secretary of education, said in a statement.

The department said it would use census data to measure graduates’ earnings four years after leaving school. Undergraduate program graduates would be required to earn more than the median income of working adults ages 25 to 34 who hold only a high school diploma and are not enrolled in higher education.

Student debt levels continue to rise across the states. 

The Center Square previously reported that Mississippi has the highest student debt burden relative to income, with borrowers owing an amount equal to 56% of the state’s median income. Residents there hold a combined $17 billion in student loan debt, along with the 14th-highest default rate, according to a personal finance report.

In California, residents owe about $151.5 billion in student debt, though the state also offers numerous grant and loan forgiveness programs.

Over 70% of college graduates have not found jobs in their field, raising concerns about the return on investment in higher education.

“I think that that is definitely going to make colleges rethink what sorts of programs they should prioritize in offering to students because if they end up offering programs and majors that don't have that return on investment, they're going to find that their revenue streams are going to be affected by it,” Lance Izumi, senior director of education studies at Pasadena-based Pacific Research Institute, told The Center Square.

Izumi highlighted that young people are not getting a return on investment.

They are not making the expected income and are burdened with student loan debt, which puts them in a weaker position to repay those loans because they are unable to find work in their field, Izumi said Monday.

The Career Education Colleges and Universities declined to comment. The Center Square also reached out to the University of California for comment, but did not receive a response.

(The Center Square) – Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass has proposed a $14.85 billion budget for Fiscal Year 2026-2027.

Speaking at a press conference on Monday, Bass said the balanced budget predicts increased revenues from property, business, sales and utility taxes. According to the mayor, the budget also promotes greater efficiency in city services.

"I will absolutely not go back to the broken systems of the past," said the mayor.

Bass, who's a Democrat, added that she remains focused on reducing homelessness, building more housing, investing in city services and hiring more police officers.

“Today, as many of you know, street homelessness is down almost 18% in the city of Los Angeles while it increased 18% in the nation,” said Bass. “We're building more housing, accelerating 42,000 units through my executive directive.”

Approximately 6,000 of those 42,000 units are under construction. 

“After years and years, we are finally now hiring more officers, and homicides are at a 60-year low because we are also preventing crime as well as holding people accountable,” said Bass. “That is what the budget I'm releasing today is organized around: continuing to change LA, and move it forward."

Bass made similar comments in a video for her State of the City address.

Her budget also calls for increased funding for street and sidewalk repairs, as well as street sweeping. Illegal dumping will also be enforced throughout the city.

“This has been an issue that we've been working on for the last couple of years,” said Bass.

The mayor applauded her staff, saying the budget “reflects the urgency that Angelenos expect” as well as the accountability that the people of Los Angeles deserve.

The mayor’s budget will now go to the Los Angeles City Council for consideration.

“We are investing in what works, fixing what doesn't, and making smarter decisions with every dollar so that results are achieved in every neighborhood,” said Bass, a former U.S. representative, California Assembly speaker and physician assistant. “Because the work is not finished, we are moving with purpose, delivering real results, and building a city that is safer, more affordable and more resilient for decades to come.”

Around 490 alleged members of the powerful Central American gang Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13), including several alleged leaders, went on trial collectively in El Salvador on Monday, accused of thousands of murders.

The Attorney General's office and courts announced the start of the trial, part of iron-fisted President Nayib Bukele's anti-gang crackdown.

El Salvador is conducting mass trials of thousands of suspected gang members, many of which have spent years in prison without charge or visiting rights.

The Attorney General's office said 486 suspected MS-13 members were on trial for 47,000 crimes committed between 2012 and 2022, including 29,000 homicides.

The country's court system said that the trial included "members of the national leadership, street-level leaders, program coordinators from across the country, and founders of" MS-13.

Salvadoran authorities accuse the brutal group of a range of crimes, including the killing of 87 people in a single weekend in March 2022.

In the wake of those killings, President Nayib Bukele, a close ally of US President Donald Trump, declared a "war" on gangs, which he said controlled 80 percent of Salvadoran territory.

MS-13 is charged with the crime of rebellion "because they sought to...establish a parallel state," the Attorney General's office said.

Bukele in 2022 imposed a state of emergency, which has been used to arrest over 91,000 suspected gang members, including thousands of people who were later declared innocent.

The campaign, which made Bukele hugely popular, has resulted in a dramatic decrease in crime, turning El Salvador from one of Latin America's most dangerous countries to one of its safest.

However rights groups have denounced gross human rights abuses, including a complete lack of due process for the detainees, reports of torture and more than 500 deaths in prison.

- One conviction for all -

The fates of the detainees are now being decided in mass trials, with anonymous judges handing down one-size-fit-all punishments to large groups of defendants following the proceedings via video-link from prison.

MS-13 and the rival Barrio 18 gang operate drug trafficking rings and extortion rackets across Central America.

The Trump administration has declared the two groups -- among others -- as terrorist organizations, designations it has used in part to justify deadly military strikes on alleged drug-running boats.

The two gangs were born among Salvadoran youth on the streets of Los Angeles and then spread back to El Salvador, where they terrorized the population for more than three decades.

Bukele has accused them of murdering 200,000 people over three decades, of whom around 80,000 disappeared without trace.

State prosecutors said they had "ample evidence to request the maximum sentences" against the defendants, without specifying whether that mean life imprisonment.

At the opening of the trial, the judge stated that armed groups had disturbed "the peace of the Salvadoran population and the security of the state" for decades, and would be tried "with the full force of the law."

New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) and regional NGO Cristosal have criticized the mass trials, warning of the risk of innocent people being made to pay for the crimes of the guilty.

bur/mis/cb

(The Center Square) – The general leading President Donald Trump's ambitious Golden Dome missile shield said a key part of the program, with uncertain costs, could be scrapped in favor of lower-cost options as lawmakers turn their focus to the president's proposed $1.5 trillion Pentagon budget for 2027.

A recent hearing revealed the Golden Dome project's costs remain deeply uncertain over time. The administration's fiscal year budget seeks $17.5 billion for Golden Dome, but $17.1 billion of that hinges on a reconciliation package that may never pass, leaving the program's funding on shaky ground. About $398 million would come from the Pentagon's budget, while the White House is asking Republicans to pass the rest through the party-line reconciliation process.

Space Force Gen. Michael Guetlein said the missile shield's proposed space-based interceptors could be ditched if they aren't affordable. He said building and using armed satellites to shoot down enemy missiles early in flight may never be affordable.

"What we do not know today is 'Can I do it at scale and can I do it affordably?' That’s going to be the huge challenge for boost-phase intercept," he told the House Armed Services Strategic Forces subcommittee. "I will tell you because we are so focused on affordability. If we cannot do it affordably, we will not go into production."

Guetlein said it hasn't been well understood in the past.

"So if boost phase intercept from space is not affordable and scalable, we will not produce it because we have other options to get after it."

Subcommittee Chairman Rep. Scott DesJarlais, R-Tenn., noted nearly all of the Golden Dome funding depends on the reconciliation bill passing.

"Funding for both of these critical initiatives, interceptor procurement and Golden Dome, is part of the department's $350 billion mandatory spending request, which depends on the outcome of a broader political process that is less predictable," he noted

The missile shield will cost taxpayers billions of dollars. To date, the government appropriated about $22.9 billion for the project. Guetlein said the total cost of the Golden Dome through delivery in 2035 is estimated at about $185 billion. However, other estimates have put the costs much higher.

In May 2025, the Congressional Budget Office estimated costs could range from $161 billion to $542 billion, with lower launch costs, though original estimates put the upper range as high as $831 billion. Todd Harrison, of the American Enterprise Institute, noted the challenges in estimating, but concluded that a "system that protects against the full range of aerial threats posed by peer and near-peer adversaries could cost $3.6 trillion, and even then, it would fall short of the '100 percent' effectiveness" in a September 2025 working paper.

U.S. Rep. Salud Carbajal, D-Calif., asked Guetlein about those studies.

"When we start talking about the different cost estimates, the first thing I always say is they're not estimating what I'm building. They are estimating the modernization or the continuation of the legacy systems that we already have, and they just take the cost of a legacy system, multiply it out, and they get these really large numbers," he said. "That's not what Golden Dome is doing. Golden Dome is doing business differently."

He added, "We are laser-focused on affordability. So the difference in the architectures is that they are just not estimating what I am building."

Guetlein said the project will be operational enough to protect the U.S. by the summer of 2028, before the end of Trump's second term in office.

Guetlein is the director of Golden Dome, reporting directly to the Deputy Secretary of War.

U.S. Rep. Seth Moulton, D-Mass., raised questions about the feasibility of Trump's Golden Dome project.

"Mr. Trump's version of the Golden Dome is just not the truth," he said. "Experts from both sides of the aisle have admitted this, both from a technical and fiscal perspective. It's impossible to defend all of the United States from any kind of threat that could be launched at us."

While Moulton said he didn't like the Golden Dome, he insisted on the need for missile defense.

"I will certainly be an advocate for more missile defense on the homeland than we have today," he added.

Debate over the program's costs continues. On Tuesday morning, the Pentagon will hold a budget briefing, where the Department of War's acting comptroller and senior budget officials are expected to address questions about the fiscal 2027 spending request, with Golden Dome's funding in the spotlight. Additional briefings for the Army, Navy and Air Force are scheduled throughout the day.