Online marketplace paid just $18m in corporation tax, leading campaigners to call for government action
The Chinese online marketplace Temu’s EU operations more than doubled pre-tax profits last year to just below $120m (£90m) despite employing just eight people, accounts show.
They rose 171% in the 12 months to December 2024 compared with the $44.1m the year before, as shoppers snapped up its low-cost goods, which are widely promoted on social media.
Continue reading...Blazing debris on road amid rain and wind, with one person on ground hurt and no known survivors found on plane
A small plane crashed along a major highway in south-eastern Massachusetts early on Monday amid rain and strong winds, killing both people on board and wounding another person on the ground, authorities said.
In videos taken by people in passing vehicles, smoke could be seen billowing up above Interstate 195 from scattered, blazing debris. The highway was closed in both directions near the crash site in Dartmouth, a town about 50 miles (80km) miles south of Boston, the state department of transportation said.
Continue reading...Lindsey Graham says closure won’t push him to meet Democrats’ demands on Obama-era healthcare subsidies
Republican and Democratic senators Lindsey Graham and Mark Kelly have dug their heels in over the government shutdown – which is now approaching two weeks, with the former saying that the closure won’t push him to meet Democrats’ demands for a restoration of Obama-era healthcare subsidies.
Graham said on NBC News’s Meet the Press on Sunday that he was in favor of the Senate voting to reopen the government and prepared to “have a rational discussion” with Democrats – but not with the government shut down.
Continue reading...Washington DC-based institution says it’ll temporarily close museums and research centers in response to shutdown
Smithsonian museums and the National Zoo closed their doors on Sunday in response to the ongoing government shutdown.
In a statement over the weekend, the Washington DC-based Smithsonian Institution announced that it was temporarily closing its museums, research centers and its zoo due to the government shutdown which has now entered the third week.
Continue reading...French president says opposition has not ‘risen to the moment’ after reappointment of Sébastien Lecornu as PM
The French president, Emmanuel Macron, has accused rival political parties of fuelling instability as he brushed aside calls by the opposition for him to resign amid France’s worst political crisis in decades.
“Many of those who have fuelled division and speculation have not risen to the moment,” Macron said of French opposition parties, as he arrived in Egypt on Monday to attend a summit on Gaza. He said rival “political forces” were “solely responsible for this chaos” after they “instigated the destabilisation” of the prime minister, Sébastien Lecornu.
Continue reading...Andry Rajoelina does not announce resignation in speech broadcast on social media after military rebellion
Madagascar’s president, Andry Rajoelina, said he had fled the country in fear for his life after a military rebellion but did not announce his resignation in a speech broadcast on social media late on Monday from an undisclosed location.
The 51-year-old has faced weeks of gen Z-led anti-government protests, which reached a pivotal point on Saturday when an elite military unit joined the protests and called for the president and other ministers to step down. That prompted Rajoelina to say that an illegal attempt to seize power was under way in the Indian Ocean island and to leave the country.
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