Good morning.
The G7 group of major economies will unveil further sanctions and export controls targeting Russia over its war against Ukraine, as it was announced that the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, would attend the Hiroshima summit in person.
The Russian invasion of Ukraine, now in its second year, will be high on the agenda as G7 leaders gather in Hiroshima on Friday. The US has spearheaded tough sanctions on Russian companies, banks and individuals; the forthcoming announcements are designed to reaffirm world powers’ resolve to support Ukraine and squeeze Moscow.
A US official, speaking to reporters before the gathering, said the G7’s latest efforts were aimed at disrupting Russia’s ability to get materials it needs for the battlefield, close loopholes used to evade sanctions, further reduce international reliance on Russian energy, and narrow Moscow’s access to the international financial system.
Almost 80 years since the bombing of Hiroshima, survivors of the atomic bombings are urging G7 leaders to issue a strong statement against the use of atomic weapons when they meet in Hiroshima later this month.
“Our commitment to continue tightening the screws on Russia remains as strong as it was last year,” a US official said.
What will be discussed during the summit? Japanese media said that the leaders’ communique was expected to include a call for countries to stop providing weapons to Russia to prosecute its war in Ukraine. Citing unnamed Japanese government officials, the Asahi Shimbun said discussions would focus on how G7 countries could close loopholes to strengthen sanctions against the Kremlin.
What else is on the agenda? China is expected to be discussed and disagreements on how to address China’s growing global influence could overshadow the summit, with a senior French official warning that the meeting should not turn into an “anti-Chinese G7”. On Friday, the European Council president, Charles Michel, said it was in the EU’s interest to maintain “stable and constructive” cooperation with China.
TikTok creators sue to block Montana’s ban on the platform
A group of TikTok creators have sued to block Montana’s ban of the platform, arguing that the new law violates their first amendment rights.
Greg Gianforte, Montana’s governor, on Wednesday signed into law the first US state-level ban of the increasingly embattled social media app, effective 1 January 2024. The governor argued the move was “to protect Montanans’ personal and private data from being harvested by the Chinese Communist party”.
It comes amid increasing US escalations against TikTok, which is owned by the Chinese tech company ByteDance. TikTok has come under increasing scrutiny over its ties to China due to concerns that such links could pose a national security threat.
The five users behind the Montana lawsuit seek to block the law, which makes it illegal for the Apple and Google app stores to offer the app in the state. They include a former Marine sergeant, an exercise influencer, a rancher and a small swimwear business, with millions of followers combined.
What does the lawsuit say? “Montana can no more ban its residents from viewing or posting to TikTok than it could ban the Wall Street Journal because of who owns it or the ideas it publishes,” it said.
What has Austin Knudsen, Montana’s attorney general, who is named in the lawsuit, said? Emily Flower, a spokesperson for Knudsen, said the state was ready for lawsuits. “We expected a legal challenge and are fully prepared to defend the law,” she said.
Harry and Meghan ‘demand agency hand over car chase images’
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex have reportedly demanded a celebrity photo agency hand over images taken during what the royal couple said was a “near-catastrophic” chase with “a ring of highly aggressive paparazzi”.
Backgrid, a California-based entertainment picture agency, said on Thursday it rejected the request, which was laid out in a letter from the Sussexes’ legal team, demanding it provide the images taken on Tuesday in New York City.
The episode, which recalls the death of Harry’s mother, Diana, Princess of Wales, who was killed when her car crashed while being followed by paparazzi in Paris in 1997, is said to have happened after the couple and Meghan’s mother attended an awards ceremony.
Backgrid told the BBC the letter stated: “We hereby demand that Backgrid immediately provide us with copies of all photos, videos, and/or films taken last night by the freelance photographers after the couple left their event and over the next several hours.”
How did the agency respond? The agency told the broadcaster it had replied: “In America, as I’m sure you know, property belongs to the owner of it: third parties cannot just demand it be given to them, as perhaps kings can do. Perhaps you should sit down with your client and advise them that his English rules of royal prerogative to demand that the citizenry hand over their property to the crown were rejected by this country long ago. We stand by our founding fathers.”
In other news …
The Walt Disney Company is scrapping plans to build a nearly $1bn corporate campus in Florida that would have housed 2,000 employees amid its ongoing legal battle with Florida’s governor, Ron DeSantis. Josh D’Amaro, the Disney parks chief, said in an email to employees yesterday that “changing business conditions” prompted Disney to reconsider its 2021 plan.
Spirit Airlines refused to allow a Puerto Rican family to board a flight from Los Angeles to Puerto Rico because they did not have a passport for their two-year-old child. The US airline has ‘sincerely apologized’ to Marivi Roman Torres, who was traveling with her husband, Luís, and son, Alejandro.
The man accused of fatally stabbing the Cash App founder Bob Lee has pleaded not guilty to murder. Nima Momeni, 38, was arraigned yesterday in a San Francisco courtroom on a single murder charge in Lee’s death last month. The judge ordered Momeni to remain in jail without bail.
Jane Fonda has said the late French director René Clément asked to sleep with her during the making of their 1964 thriller Joy House, saying he said he “needed to see what my orgasms were like” before she filmed a sex scene. Fonda made the allegation on the chatshow Watch What Happens Live.
Stat of the day: Gun violence is top public health concern for quarter of Americans – poll
A quarter of Americans now believe guns are the number one public health threat, according to new polling. According to the Axios/Ipsos American Health Index, 26% of Americans believe access to guns is the top threat to public health. About 25% believe opioids and fentanyl are the top concern. Concern over access to firearms is growing. In February, only 17% of Americans cited gun access as a top concern, Ipsos reported. Black Americans, Democrats and people in urban communities are most concerned about gun access. In the Axios/Ipsos survey, 49% of Black Americans, 50% of Democrats and 31% of people living in urban areas cited firearm access as their number one concern. There have been several mass shootings this year, occurring in schools, shopping malls and hospitals.
Don’t miss this: San Francisco names first drag laureate as LGBTQ+ rights under attack in US
Anti-trans legislation is roiling the nation. Bills prohibiting drag performances are cropping up in statehouses. Violence and vitriol are turning children’s drag story hour events into headline-news protests. San Francisco is fighting back by naming the nation’s first drag laureate, an ambassador-style position designed to represent the city’s famous LGBTQ+ community at a time when rights are under attack. In a city known for its support of LGBTQ+ rights, the city’s mayor, London Breed, says it was a natural step to create a position that not only embraces drag culture but puts government resources toward it. D’Arcy Drollinger, a well-known drag performer and nightclub owner, will receive a $55,000 stipend in her 18-month role as the city’s inaugural drag laureate.
Climate check: More than half of the world’s lakes have shrunk in past 30 years, study finds
More than half of the world’s large lakes and reservoirs have shrunk since the early 1990s – chiefly because of the climate crisis and human consumption – intensifying concerns about water supply for agriculture, hydropower and human consumption, a study has found. A team of international researchers reported that some of the world’s most important freshwater sources – from the Caspian Sea between Europe and Asia, to South America’s Lake Titicaca – lost water at a cumulative rate of about 22 gigatonnes a year for nearly three decades, equivalent to the total water use in the US for the entire year of 2015. Fangfang Yao, a surface hydrologist at the University of Virginia who led the study published on Thursday in the journal Science, said 56% of the decline in natural lakes was driven by global heating and human consumption, with warming “the larger share of that”.
Last Thing: First records of human kissing may date back 1,000 years earlier than estimated
Humanity’s earliest record of kissing dates back about 4,500 years in the ancient Middle East, 1,000 years earlier than previously thought, according to researchers. Scientists have highlighted evidence that suggests kissing was practised in some of the earliest Mesopotamian societies and documented in ancient texts from 2500BC that have been largely overlooked. In an article published in the journal Science, researchers also cited evidence that kissing may have contributed to the spread of orally transmitted diseases such as cold sores. Although research had suggested that friendly or familial kissing was a common behaviour between humans across time and geography, romantic-sexual kissing was not thought to be culturally universal.
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