Author: BLMS MEDIA
April 25, 2025JAKARTA – President Prabowo Subianto has authorized rice exports to countries in need, reversing an earlier statement by Agriculture Minister Andi Amran Sulaiman, who had insisted on prioritizing domestic reserves.Speaking during a visit to South Sumatra on Wednesday, Prabowo said the country could share its rice surplus with others without seeking high profits, in the spirit of “humanity,” as long as the basic production, logistics and administrative costs were covered.“I have received reports from the agriculture minister and the coordinating food minister that several countries have requested rice imports from Indonesia. I approved it. I ordered that rice…
April 25, 2025TOKYO – Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, who also serves as the president of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party, held debates with opposition leaders for the first time during the current Diet session on Wednesday.While the LDP and opposition parties, including the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan, the Japan Innovation Party and the Democratic Party for the People, debated such issues as U.S. tariffs, it was conspicuous that the opposition camp did not go on the offensive against Ishiba.The tariff issue seems to have created a kind of temporary truce to political maneuvering in Japan.Tribute diplomacy“We made thorough preparations…
ISLAMABAD – NSC warns any Indian attempt to stop or divert flow of water under Indus Waters Treaty would be “act of war”.Pakistan on Thursday announced the suspension of trade and the closure of airspaces with India, among other moves, as it retaliated to New Delhi’s slew of aggressive measures against the country in the wake of a deadly attack in India-held Kashmir.The attack took place in Pahalgam, a tourist hotspot in India-occupied Kashmir that draws thousands of visitors every summer. Gunmen opened fire on visitors, killing at least 26 people — all men from across India except one from…
April 25, 2025SEOUL – South Korea and China reaffirmed their differing positions on the contentious issue of Chinese-built structures in their jointly administered West Sea zone during interagency maritime talks, with Seoul requesting that all three structures be relocated outside the zone, the Foreign Ministry said Thursday.Despite the friction, the two sides launched a working group to address the issue during the 12-hour maritime cooperation dialogue in Seoul — a platform for broad discussions on a wide range of maritime issues, according to the ministry.“Both sides shared the understanding that the issue should not become an obstruction to the current…
April 25, 2025SINGAPORE – The fashion industry has been rocked by a wave of Chinese TikToks “exposing” luxury brands in recent weeks.A response to United States President Donald Trump’s tariffs of 145 per cent against China, these viral videos are fronted by supposed factory workers, brand owners and sourcing agents who claim to be the Chinese manufacturers behind Europe’s most prestigious luxury brands.Others have gamely revealed the names and addresses of factories in China responsible for supplying to Lululemon, Birkenstock, Zara and other high-street brands.A video from the now-removed account Sen Bags racked up millions of views before it was…
Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei published an essay Thursday highlighting how little researchers understand about the inner workings of the world’s leading AI models. To address that, Amodei set an ambitious goal for Anthropic to reliably detect most AI model problems by 2027. Amodei acknowledges the challenge ahead. In “The Urgency of Interpretability,” the CEO says Anthropic has made early breakthroughs in tracing how models arrive at their answers — but emphasizes that far more research is needed to decode these systems as they grow more powerful. “I am very concerned about deploying such systems without a better handle on interpretability,” Amodei wrote…
OpenAI is bringing a new “lightweight” version of its ChatGPT deep research tool, which scours the web to compile research reports on a topic, to ChatGPT Plus, Team, and Pro users, the company announced Thursday. The new lightweight deep research, which will also come to free ChatGPT users starting today, is powered by a version of OpenAI’s o4-mini model, OpenAI says. It’s not quite as capable as the “full” deep research, but OpenAI claims it’s cheaper to serve and thus enables the company to up usage limits. “Responses will typically be shorter while maintaining the depth and quality you’ve come…
Perplexity doesn’t just want to compete with Google, it apparently wants to be Google. CEO Aravind Srinivas said this week on the TBPN podcast that one reason Perplexity is building its own browser is to collect data on everything users do outside of its own app. This so it can sell premium ads. “That’s kind of one of the other reasons we wanted to build a browser, is we want to get data even outside the app to better understand you,” Srinivas said. “Because some of the prompts that people do in these AIs is purely work-related. It’s not like…
Individuals, industry groups, and local governments submitted over 10,000 comments to the White House about its work-in-progress national AI policy, also known as the AI Action Plan. The White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) on Thursday published the text of the submissions in a PDF spanning 18,480 pages. The comments, which touch on topics ranging from copyright to the environmental harms of AI data centers, come as President Donald Trump and allies rejigger the U.S. government’s AI priorities. In January, President Trump repealed former President Joe Biden’s AI Executive Order, which had instructed the National Institute of…
Rory McIlroy and Shane Lowry finished in a share of 12th place in their defence of the Zurich Classic of New Orleans as Andrew Novak and Ben Griffin triumphed at TPC Louisiana.McIlroy and Lowry were aiming to become the first duo to go back-to-back since the Zurich Classic became a two-man team event in 2017 and began the final day on 22-under-par, five shots adrift of 54-hole leaders Novak and Griffin. They finished their fourth round six shots behind Novak and Griffin after an-even par 72 during Sunday’s foursomes, looking solid on the front nine with two birdies but then…