Some of Hollywood’s biggest stars are set to travel to Italy for the 83rd Venice Film Festival, which opens Wednesday.

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Russian President Vladimir Putin said cooperation between Russia and China is advancing across all areas, including the economy. He cited major projects in energy, industry, space, transport and logistics, and noted that a Chinese container ship made its first regular voyage along the Northern Sea Route in mid-August.

Russia-China relationsbilateral cooperationNorthern Sea Route

NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope launched from Florida’s Kennedy Space Center on August 30. It will survey huge areas of the sky, cataloguing vast numbers of stars, planets and galaxies while helping scientists investigate exoplanets, cosmic evolution, dark matter and dark energy.

Roman Space TelescopeNASAspace explorationdark matter

NASA’s $4.3 billion Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope launched Sunday from Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Its 300-megapixel camera and refurbished spy mirror will provide a field of view 100 times wider than Hubble, probing the mysterious forces driving the Universe while complementing the James Webb Space Telescope.

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The Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope lifted off from Florida on Sunday, starting a mission to survey enormous areas of the sky and test whether the universe’s standard model remains valid.

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NASA has successfully launched its newest space telescope from Kennedy Space Center in Florida, reaching orbit 10 minutes after liftoff. Named for astronomer Nancy Grace Roman, the instrument is being hailed by scientists as a discovery machine that could illuminate the major physics mysteries of dark matter and dark energy.

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Airlink has defended a dramatic flypast by two aircraft over Cape Town’s DHL Stadium shortly before a South Africa-New Zealand rugby match. Flightradar24 said the lead plane passed less than 50 feet above the stadium. Critics questioned the risks, while the airline said the manoeuvre was carefully planned, approved and carried out by experienced crews.

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Monitoring channels reported that Ukrainian drones targeted a Wildberries warehouse in Yekaterinburg on Aug. 31. Sverdlovsk Oblast Governor Denis Pasler confirmed a strike near a logistics center, while debris damaged three apartment buildings and injured four people. The claims could not be independently verified.

Ukrainedrone strikeYekaterinburgWildberries

Russia’s Defense Ministry said air defenses intercepted and destroyed 239 Ukrainian fixed-wing drones over Russian regions and the Black Sea overnight. Drones and debris damaged residential buildings and a logistics center in Yekaterinburg, with no deaths reported. A civilian was injured in a separate drone detonation in Belgorod Region.

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A South Korean court sentenced Unification Church leader Han Hak-ja to two years in prison after finding that the church gave former first lady Kim Keon Hee two Chanel bags and a diamond necklace worth 80 million won in exchange for business and political favours. Han denied the allegations.

South KoreaUnification Churchbribery

A Seoul court has sentenced Unification Church leader Han Hak-ja to two years in prison for bribery. She was accused of giving expensive gifts to former First Lady Kim Keon Hee through an intermediary in return for political favors, but has denied wrongdoing.

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Unification Church leader Hak Ja Han was given a two-year prison term by a court in South Korea’s capital.

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The European Commission says ChatGPT, Reddit and Roblox each exceed 45 million average monthly users in the EU and must therefore comply with stricter Digital Services Act obligations. They must assess and mitigate risks involving illegal content, child protection and users’ mental health. ChatGPT is the first AI chatbot covered by the law.

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The EU has designated ChatGPT a Very Large Online Search Engine under the Digital Services Act, requiring OpenAI to address risks involving minors, user mental health, and illegal content. Reddit and Roblox received similar designations, and all three must comply with the rules by the end of December 2026.

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French forward Bradley Barcola has joined Liverpool from Paris Saint-Germain in a record-breaking Ligue 1 transfer.

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The Metropolitan Museum of Art has canceled a planned Met Gala exhibition centered on controversial fashion designer John Galliano.

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Elon Musk may allow Ukraine to use Starlink-operated drones for deep strikes inside Russia, but only with White House approval, the Financial Times reported, citing sources. The sources said Musk conveyed this position to former Ukrainian Defense Minister Mikhail Fyodorov and argued that authorizing such attacks is a political decision for the Donald Trump administration.

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Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Türkiye have named their new mutual-defence arrangement the Mecca Defence Alliance and established a strategic political and defence committee. The group will work on military interoperability, joint exercises, defence-industrial cooperation and counterterrorism, while its structure and the circumstances for invoking mutual defence remain unclear.

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Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said the Mecca Joint Defense Agreement is open to all regional countries. He said the signed pact has launched a process to build a new regional security and cooperation architecture, with an attack on one member defined as aggression against all members.

Mecca PactTurkeySaudi ArabiaPakistan

Türkiye, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan are meeting in Istanbul for the first time since signing the Mecca Defence Agreement. The pact aims to strengthen collective deterrence against aggression and treats an armed attack on any one of the three countries as an attack on all three.

TürkiyeSaudi ArabiaPakistandefence pact

Michael Saylor-led Strategy resumed bitcoin purchases last week, acquiring $370 million worth. It was the company’s first week of bitcoin buying in about two months.

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Google Maps has started displaying “Lake America” to users in the United States after an executive order by US President Donald Trump. In Canada, users still see “Lake Ontario”, the name used for more than 400 years, with results varying by login location.

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Google Maps now shows Lake Ontario as “Lake America” for users in the United States, following Donald Trump’s order to rename it and update the US Geographic Names Information System. Canadian users will still see “Lake Ontario,” although some Canadian government websites using Google data displayed the new name. Ontario Premier Doug Ford erected a sign insisting the lake remains Lake Ontario.

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Google is modifying its Maps platform so that users in the United States see Lake Ontario displayed as “Lake America.”

Google MapsLake OntarioUnited States

Ontario Premier Doug Ford mocked President Donald Trump’s order to rename Lake Ontario “Lake America,” while saying he remained optimistic that Canada and the US would eventually overcome their trade and tariff differences.

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