Former US President Donald Trump has announced plans to launch a new social media network, called TRUTH Social. He said the platform would “stand up to the tyranny of big tech”, accusing them of silencing opposing voices in the US. Social media played a pivotal role in Mr Trump’s bid for the White House and was his favourite means of communication as president. But Mr Trump was banned from Twitter and suspended from Facebook after his supporters stormed the US Capitol. Social media firms were under pressure throughout Mr Trump’s presidency to ban him, with his posts criticised as insulting, inflammatory or peddling outright falsehoods. Last year Twitter and Facebook began deleting some of his posts or labelling them as misleading, such as one in which he said Covid was “less lethal” than the flu.(BBC)…[+]

US surgeons say they have successfully given a pig’s kidney to a person in a transplant breakthrough they hope could ultimately solve donor organ shortages. The recipient was brain-dead, meaning they were already on artificial life support with no prospect of recovering. The kidney came from a pig that had been genetically modified to stop the organ being recognised by the body as “foreign” and being rejected. The work has not yet been peer-reviewed or published. Experts say it is the most advanced experiment in the field so far. Similar tests have been done in non-human primates, but not people, until now. Using pigs for transplants is not a new idea though. Pig heart valves are already widely used in humans.(BBC)…[+]

Vikings had a settlement in North America exactly one thousand years ago, centuries before Christopher Columbus arrived on the continent, a study says. Scientists say a new dating technique analysing tree rings has provided evidence that Vikings occupied a site in Newfoundland, Canada, in 1021AD. It has long been known that Europeans reached the Americas before Columbus’s arrival in the New World in 1492. But this is the first time researchers have suggested an exact date. Writing in the journal Nature, scientists said they had analysed the tree rings of three pieces of wood cut for the Norse settlement at L’Anse aux Meadows. They said that using an atmospheric radiocarbon signal produced by a dated solar storm as a reference, they were able to pin the “exact felling year of the tree” to 1021.(BBC)…[+]

The US assistant secretary for health has been sworn in as the first transgender four-star officer in the country’s history. Dr Rachel Levine, 63, is now an admiral of the US Public Health Service Commissioned Corps. Dr Levine, appointed by President Joe Biden, is already the highest-ranking openly transgender official in the US.  She described the occasion as “momentous” and “historic” during a swearing-in speech on Tuesday. “May this appointment today be the first of many more to come, as we create a diverse and more inclusive future,” she said in a speech that paid tribute to other LGBTQ individuals who came before her. Dr Levine is a graduate of Harvard College and Tulane University School of Medicine and previously worked as a paediatrician. The US Public Health Service Commissioned Corps has about 6,000 uniformed officers and is tasked with responding to health crises like the coronavirus pandemic and natural disasters.(BBC)…[+]

Brazil’s president should be accused of a series of crimes over his handling of the country’s Covid-19 pandemic, a draft of a major inquiry report says. The report is the culmination of a six-month inquiry that has revealed scandals and corruption in government. President Bolsonaro has been accused of failing to control the virus that has killed more than 600,000 Brazilians. Excerpts leaked to the media indicate that the panel wants Mr Bolsonaro to face nine charges. Initial drafts of the report had recommended the president be charged with homicide and genocide against indigenous groups. But these recommendations have now apparently been dropped from the 1,200 page report, which urges charges of crimes against humanity, forging documents and incitement to crime.(BBC)…[+]

Two former German soldiers have been arrested on suspicion of trying to form a terrorist mercenary force to fight in Yemen’s civil war, prosecutors say. Arend-Adolf G and Achim A face terrorism charges after police raids in southern Germany on Wednesday. They allegedly planned to recruit up to 150 men for a private army made up of former police officers and soldiers. They wanted to offer their services to Saudi Arabia’s government for illegal missions in Yemen, prosecutors said.Yemen has been racked by a civil war between the Saudi Arabia-backed internationally recognised government and the armed Houthi movement since 2014. Saudi Arabia entered the civil war in 2015 shortly after the capture of the capital, Sanaa, by the Houthis, who are supported by Iran.(BBC)…[+]

An amateur diver exploring shallow waters off northern Israel has found a sword thought to have belonged to a crusader knight 900 years ago. The one-metre (3.3ft) blade was discovered by Shlomi Katzin in shallow waters off Haifa. It is thought the sword, heavily encrusted with marine organisms, resurfaced after the shifting of sands. The Israel Antiques Authority (IAA) said that once cleaned and analysed it would be put on public display. The Crusades, which began in 1095 and lasted for centuries, saw European Christians travel to the Middle East to try and seize control of Jerusalem and other parts of the Holy Land from Muslims. Kobi Sharvit, who heads the IAA’s Marine Archaeology Unit, said the Carmel coast, where the blade was found, provided shelter for ships during storms throughout centuries of shipping activity along the coast.(BBC)…[+]

Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis has called on the head of the president’s office to resign immediately over alleged impropriety in exercising the powers of ailing President Milos Zeman. Police are investigating allegations of “criminal acts against the republic”. President Zeman is currently in intensive care in hospital. He was admitted a day after elections in which the centre-right opposition effectively ended Mr Babis’s chances of remaining in power. Now Czech politics have been thrown into turmoil by bombshell revelations by Senate Chairman Milos Vystrcil. For over a week, the president’s office has insisted Mr Zeman’s undisclosed illness does not prevent him from fulfilling his constitutional obligations. However, the head of the senate says he has received official confirmation from the director of Prague’s Central Military Hospital that the president is “incapable of fulfilling any of his working responsibilities” – in other words unable to carry out his duties.(BBC)…[+]

Canada Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has met indigenous leaders two weeks after he took a seaside holiday on a day meant to honour residential schools survivors and victims. His decision to skip formal events on the first National Day for Truth and Reconciliation was widely criticised. The day honours the indigenous children who were forced to assimilate in state-backed residential schools. On Monday, Mr Trudeau visited the Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc nation. “I am here today to say I wish I was here a few weeks ago, and I deeply regret it,” Mr Trudeau said in his prepared remarks. The Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc Nation – located near the site of the former Kamloops residential school in British Columbia, where the unmarked graves of 215 children were discovered in May – had written twice to invite Mr Trudeau to mark the 30 September date.(BBC)…[+]

Facebook is planning to hire 10,000 people in the European Union to develop a so-called metaverse. A metaverse is an online world where people can game, work and communicate in a virtual environment, often using VR headsets. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has been a leading voice on the concept. The announcement comes as Facebook deals with the fallout of a damaging scandal and faces increased calls for regulation to curb its influence. “The metaverse has the potential to help unlock access to new creative, social, and economic opportunities. And Europeans will be shaping it right from the start,” Facebook said in a blog post. The new jobs being created over the next five years will include “highly specialised engineers”. Investing in the EU offered many advantages, including access to a large consumer market, first-class universities and high-quality talent, Facebook said. Facebook has made building the metaverse one of its big priorities. Despite its history of buying up rivals, Facebook claims the metaverse “won’t be built overnight by a single company” and has promised to collaborate. It recently invested $50m (£36.3m) in funding non-profit groups to help “build the metaverse responsibly”. But it thinks the true metaverse idea will take another 10 to 15 years.(BBC)…[+]