Levels of carcinogenic chemical near Ohio derailment site far above safe limit

EPA scientists assessed a dioxin cancer risks threshold in 2010, but a federal cleanup is only triggered at far higher levels

Newly released data shows soil in the Ohio town of East Palestine – scene of a recent catastrophic train crash and chemical spill – contains dioxin levels hundreds of times greater than the exposure threshold above which Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) scientists in 2010 found poses cancer risks.

The EPA at the time proposed lowering the cleanup threshold to reflect the science around the highly toxic chemical, but the Obama administration killed the rules, and the higher federal action threshold remains in place.

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‘We are a little bit scared’: OpenAI CEO warns of risks of artificial intelligence

Sam Altman stresses need to guard against negative consequences of technology, as company releases new version GPT-4

Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, the company that developed the controversial consumer-facing artificial intelligence application ChatGPT, has warned that the technology comes with real dangers as it reshapes society.

Altman, 37, stressed that regulators and society need to be involved with the technology to guard against potentially negative consequences for humanity. “We’ve got to be careful here,” Altman told ABC News on Thursday, adding: “I think people should be happy that we are a little bit scared of this.

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Black Virginia man pinned to ground by deputies before his death, family says

Video from state mental hospital of brutal treatment of Irvo Otieno recalls death of George Floyd, lawyer says

Video from a state mental hospital shows a Black Virginia man who was handcuffed and shackled being pinned to the ground by deputies who are now facing second-degree murder charges in his death, according to relatives of the man and their attorneys who viewed the footage on Thursday.

Speaking at a news conference shortly after watching the video with a local prosecutor, the family and attorneys condemned the brutal treatment they said Irvo Otieno, 28, was subjected to, first at a local jail and then at the state hospital where authorities say he died on 6 March during the admission process.

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Silicon Valley Bank’s parent company files for bankruptcy

SVB Financial Group files for chapter 11 protection but failed Silicon Valley Bank, now under FDIC control, is not part of it

Silicon Valley Bank’s parent company filed for bankruptcy protection on Friday, a week after the tech lender was taken over by federal regulators following a 36-hour surge of depositor withdrawals that triggered the worst bank collapse since the financial crisis.

SVB Financial Group filed for chapter 11 protection on Friday in New York bankruptcy court where administrators will set about selling off assets to meet creditors claims.

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A bloody delusion: how Iraq war led to catastrophic aftermath in Middle East

The 2003 invasion’s legacy reverberates in the emboldenment of Iran, Islamic State’s violence and the disintegration of Syria

In Baghdad’s heart of power, Iraq’s prime minister arrives at work each day in a building once used by Tariq Aziz, Saddam Hussein’s close adviser and foreign minister. The ruins of a Saddam-era defence building still teeter next door, 20 years after an American bomb crashed through its roof at the start of the invasion.

Not far away, the green dome of the Republican Palace – built on the orders of King Faisal II, then used by Iraq’s dictator before being occupied by the US army – sits on top of the still-standing totem of Iraq’s history.

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The Cure’s Robert Smith convinces Ticketmaster to refund ‘unduly high’ fees after fan anger

Ticketing giant will refund $10 to fans who bought cheapest tickets on the band’s US tour, and $5 to everyone else after frontman asks for an explanation

Ticketmaster will refund some of its fees to fans buying tickets for the Cure’s US tour, after frontman Robert Smith took them to task over their “unduly high” fees that were, in some cases, adding up to more than the price of a ticket.

On Thursday, Smith told fans that he was “as sickened as you all are” and he would contact Ticketmaster after many took to social media to complain about the ticket sales behemoth’s additional fees.

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Cash-strapped banks have borrowed $300bn from the Fed this past week

The central bank has lent about half as much as it provided during the 2008 crisis as banks rush to shore up their financials

Cash-short banks have borrowed about $300bn from the Federal Reserve in the past week, the central bank announced on Thursday.

Nearly half the money – $143bn – went to holding companies for two major banks that failed over the past week, Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank, triggering widespread alarm in financial markets. The Fed did not identify the banks that received the other half of the funding or say how many of them did so.

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Biden administration sides with climate lawsuit against fossil fuel companies

DoJ brief argues Colorado case against energy giants ExxonMobil and Suncor should be heard in state court instead of federal

The US Department of Justice filed a legal brief Thursday in support of local governments in Colorado that are part of a growing wave of local and state governments pursuing climate litigation against fossil fuel companies.

In the brief, the DoJ argued that the Colorado case against the Canadian energy giant Suncor should be heard in state court, which is considered more favourable than federal court for plaintiffs who are suing oil companies over climate change. ExxonMobile is also a defendant in the case.

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Billionaire Peter Thiel claims he has $50m of his own money stuck in SVB fall

In the wake of the bank’s crisis, venture capitalists have been trading accusations over who is responsible for the collapse

Facing heat for his investment fund’s role in triggering the run on the Silicon Valley Bank last week, billionaire Peter Thiel told the Financial Times that he had $50m of his own money “stuck” in the bank when it collapsed.

Even as Thiel’s Founders Fund was advising companies to move their money from the bank, a decision that has been widely blamed for precipitating its failure, Thiel said that he kept a portion of his own $4bn personal fortune in the bank.

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Whoopi Goldberg apologizes for using Romani slur on ABC’s The View

‘I’m really, really sorry,’ the actor said, a year after she was suspended from show for saying the Holocaust ‘isn’t about race’

Whoopi Goldberg has issued an apology following her use of a racial slur during an episode of ABC’s The View.

On Wednesday, Goldberg used a derogatory term associated with Romani people while discussing former president Donald Trump, saying that his supporters are “people who still believe that he got gypped somehow in the election”.

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US banks launch $30bn rescue of First Republic to stem spiraling crisis

Bank of America, Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan agree to prop up troubled bank after its shares tumbled amid wider turmoil

Wall Street’s giants moved to end the US’s spiraling banking crisis on Thursday by agreeing to prop up troubled First Republic, a mid-sized bank whose shares have been pummeled amid a wider banking turmoil.

Bank of America, Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan and others will deposit $30bn in First Republic, which has seen customers yank their money following the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) and fears that First Republic could be next.

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Will UK follow US in demanding TikTok be sold by its Chinese owner?

TikTok will be concerned Rishi Sunak will match each upward ratchet in pressure from his allies

When asked this week whether the UK would ban TikTok on government phones, Rishi Sunak’s response signalled a change in stance: “We look at what our allies are doing.”

Previously ministers had seemed sanguine, even saying that whether or not the app stayed on someone’s phone should be a matter of “personal choice”.

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Jim Gordon, session drummer on dozens of hits such as Layla, dies aged 77

After playing with the Beach Boys, George Harrison and other mid-century stars, Gordon was convicted of killing his mother during a psychotic episode in 1983

Jim Gordon, a session drummer in the 1960s and 70s who contributed to hits by the Beach Boys, Steely Dan and dozens more, has died aged 77.

He died in a psychiatric prison in Vacaville, California. Gordon had been incarcerated since 1983, after he killed his mother during a psychotic episode. He was diagnosed as schizophrenic and sentenced to 16 years to life, but never attended parole hearings and never left prison.

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US releases footage of Russian jet crashing into American drone over Black Sea

Pentagon says video has been edited for length but shows events in sequential order

A remarkable video released by the Pentagon shows the moments before a Russian fighter crashed into a $32m US Reaper drone after spraying it with jet fuel on Tuesday morning over the Black Sea.

The declassified footage shows an Su-27 Flanker jet making two exceptionally close passes of the uncrewed drone, spraying fuel in front of it, a harassment tactic that US experts say has not been seen before.

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More than a quarter of Republicans approve of Capitol attack, poll shows

Survey also reveals more than half of Republicans think January 6 was a form of legitimate political discourse

More than a quarter of Republicans approve of the January 6 Capitol attack, according to a new poll. More than half think the deadly riot was a form of legitimate political discourse.

The Economist and YouGov survey said 27% of Republicans either strongly or somewhat approved of the riot on 6 January 2021, which Donald Trump incited in an attempt to overturn his election defeat by Joe Biden.

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First Thing: Autopsy of ‘Cop City’ activist shot by police still incomplete

Manuel Paez Terán’s family say other state agencies have also failed to release information about activist’s death. Plus, how the first Twitter-fuelled bank run played out

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Attorneys for the family of Manuel Paez Terán, known as Tortuguita, have disclosed to the Guardian that a medical examiner’s office in Georgia has still not completed an autopsy of the environmental activist nearly two months after he was shot dead by the police.

What did an independent autopsy reveal? A separate, family-ordered autopsy appeared to show that the activist was sitting cross-legged, with his hands in front of his face, when he was hit by a hail of bullets. “Manuel was looking death in the face, hands raised when killed,” the civil rights attorney Brian Spears said.

What has the impact of the flood been like? Three water systems have been identified as potentially contaminated, according to county officials. Eleven schools have had to close, and hundreds of people are being housed in shelters where beds are mostly full. County officials are bracing for more evacuations and new damage from the next big rain.

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‘Path of error and danger’: China angry and confused over Aukus deal

Deal is designed to counter perceived threat from Beijing but analysts in China say it could push region closer to conflict

When the UK, the US and Australia announced the details of their multibillion-dollar deal to provide Australia with nuclear-powered submarines on Monday, the reaction in China was both outrage and confusion.

The allies were “walking further and further down the path of error and danger”, said Wang Wenbin, China’s foreign ministry spokesperson, on Tuesday. The Chinese mission to the UN accused the three countries of fuelling an arms race.

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Family of Florida man who died while being violently restrained sues jail staff

Suit alleges that Broward county sheriff’s office used excessive force as Kevin Desir suffered mental health emergency in 2021

The family of a Florida man who died after being violently restrained by jailers is filing a civil rights suit against the officers who were involved in the incident and the jail’s healthcare provider.

According to a draft of the lawsuit shared exclusively with the Guardian, the family of 43-year-old Kevin Desir alleges that Broward county sheriff officials used excessive force against Desir while he was suffering from a severe mental health episode, violating his 14th amendment rights.

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UK ministers under pressure to tighten laws on ‘forever chemicals’ in drinking water

Vast numbers of people drinking water with levels that would be banned in the US, research shows

Pressure is building on UK ministers to tighten regulations on PFAS “forever chemicals” as research shows vast numbers of people are drinking water with levels that would be banned in the US.

On Tuesday, US president Joe Biden announced plans to drive down acceptable limits in drinking water to four nanograms per litre (4ng/l) for two types of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFOS and PFOA), and announced proposals to regulate four more – PFNA, PFHxS, PFBS and GenX Chemicals – as a mixture.

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Newark mayor signs deal with Hindu nation that does not exist

Mayor and city council agreed to partnership with Kailasa, invented by Indian fugitive Swami Nithyananda

The city of Newark, New Jersey, has confirmed that it was duped over five days in January when Mayor Ras Baraka invited what he believed to be a delegation from the Hindu nation of Kailasa to join into a sister city partnership.

A signing ceremony was held at which Baraka told a Kailasa delegate: “I pray that our relationship helps us to understand cultural, social and political development and improves the lives of everybody in both places.”

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