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The Wanted's Max George in hospital and could remain there for Christmas after shock diagnosisFor a politician whose career has been remarkably scandal-free, Education Minister Ben Carroll has found himself facing unexpected pressure lately, with this year’s VCE exams marred by scandal with questions released weeks before student sat their tests. Carroll, who is also deputy premier, was forced to admit that 56 tests – nearly half of the total number of 116 VCE exams – had been hit by the breach where questions were inadvertently published online. “It went from disappointment to anger, [just] the scale of it,” Carroll told The Age . Education Minister and Deputy Premier Ben Carroll. Credit: Eddie Jim “You can’t upload cover sheets with embedded questions in them. It is simply unacceptable.” In the fallout, the chief executive of the Victorian Curriculum and Assessment Authority resigned. Carroll has also ordered a full root-and-branch review, which he says will look at every part of the authority, including the culture, following other exam bungles across three separate years. Unusually for a politician, he also took accountability for the blunder. As for whether he has confidence in the authority? “It is a good question,” Carroll says at a cafe in Aberfeldie, in what was meant to be a broad-ranging interview with the state’s deputy premier. “You always lose a bit of confidence when something like this happens ... this should not have occurred.” Such candour from a minister is rare in a political crisis. But Carroll isn’t one to shy away from issues facing the state government. A year after the departure of Daniel Andrews from the top job, Labor’s primary vote has tumbled. It has coincided with a series of government backflips, including a retreat from raising the age of criminal responsibility to 14 and its promise to set up a second supervised drug injecting room . Pill testing will be trialled this summer , in contrast to their longstanding position under Andrews, and forced health mergers, which were recommended by an expert panel, were abandoned. Deputy Premier Ben Carroll with wife Fiona and daughter Madeleine. “We’ve made some tough decisions over the past 12 months. Next year you’ll see really important delivery,” Carroll said when asked about the government’s slide in support. “I think you’ll see a turnaround, and that will require lots of hard work, and we are committed to doing that.” In a political climate where the government, and premier, are on the nose, the role of deputy can be a tricky one. Media and MPs have been on high alert for any tensions between Jacinta Allan and her deputy, who are factional foes, particularly after Carroll’s bold and somewhat surprising push for the leadership job last year. Considered a political cleanskin, Carroll surprised colleagues when he marched into the Labor Party room in September 2023, with MPs from the Right faction in tow, to mount a bid for the top job following Andrews’ departure. Incensed the Left was seeking to hold both positions, Carroll’s move is still described by colleagues as either brave, treacherous or both. “This opportunity came up, I thought it was time to make a stand, and I made a stand on that day,” Carroll says. “I would not change one minute at that meeting, or one minute of that day. I knew my true north, and I was committed to getting the right outcome.” While Carroll stands by his move, it angered Andrews who scolded his minster, and he eventually withdrew his candidacy and accepted the deputy premier position, avoiding a messy vote. “I’d been thinking about it for a long time. I [had previously] supported Jacinta to be the deputy leader ... I have always been a team player,” Carroll insists. Ben Carroll surprised many in his party when he made a push for the leadership. Credit: Eddie Jim While most of his colleagues have now agreed to let bygones be bygones, the move publicly signalled Carroll’s determination and displayed rare courage that saw him stand up to Andrews. Former premier Steve Bracks, who gave Carroll one of his first jobs in politics when he employed him as a junior staffer in his office, told The Age Carroll’s leadership bid should not be interpreted as disloyal. “He put his hand up in order to become deputy, and it was the mechanism to achieve the job he’s got,” Bracks said. “From your deputy, you want loyalty, you want someone who will always back up the leader, and someone who can take the heavy lifting, that’s what Ben has done.” Friend and former colleague Wade Noonan, who resigned from the ministry in 2017 for family reasons, believes Carroll had learnt that “leadership is rarely gifted” and said his friend was not one to miss an opportunity. “Politics is not a place for retreaters. Ben will stand up for the things that matter, in life, and in politics,” Noonan said. “There is courage in his approach. His ambition should not be confused – he is all about creating opportunity for Victorians, rather than seeking power for the sake of it.” Carroll, 49, was born in Coburg in July 1975, the first of three children. Borrowing a line from the Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, who has repeatedly said he was raised with three great faiths – the Catholic Church, the Labor Party and South Sydney Football Club, – Carroll says his parents raised him with three great passions: the Catholic Church, the Labor Party and the North Melbourne Football Club. That year, 1975, was a big year for North Melbourne, with the team winning its first VFL/AFL premiership. It was also a defining year for the ALP with the dismissal of Gough Whitlam. “Politics has always been in the house,” Carroll said. “Dad was always about the underdog.” Carroll’s father Greg was an electrician and ran his own business which went under during the 1990s recession. “I learned a lot from dad – despite losing his business in the Keating recession, he, to this day, says Paul Keating was our greatest prime minister,” he said. Ben Carroll grew up with a love for football. “We saw the recession very closely in our family, but he was always thinking about those who were less fortunate.” Carroll’s mum, Kay, was born in Fort Worth Texas before immigrating to Australia in her early teens. Carroll says his mother’s US links also spurned his love of politics, including an admiration for former president Bill Clinton. After graduating with an arts degree, Carroll spent a few years working in insurance before Bracks’ unexpected victory in 1999 saw him take the first step in his political career. By 2012, Carroll was working in Canberra for senator Stephen Conroy, when he was preselected to stand in Niddrie, edging out his current cabinet colleague , Attorney-General Jaclyn Symes. “When a seat comes up ... where you went to kinder, where you went to primary, where you went to secondary, where you got your first job, where your family have been part of the community ... you have a crack.” He lives in his electorate with wife Fiona, a lawyer, and their daughter Madeleine. Carroll says he seeks political counsel from his wife, but it was parents at his daughter’s school gate that inspired him to make another bold call as education minister – mandating that public schools introduce structured phonics as part of an explicit teaching approach. “I was on the WhatsApps with mothers and parents and fathers being stopped in the street ...[asking] are we teaching phonics?” he said. The move was particularly controversial for a Labor MP, with the Australian Education Union’s primary and secondary councils uniting to criticise the government’s decision to roll out a systematic synthetic phonics approach for all prep to grade 2 students. “I went outside the department and did my own research. I think there’s no more fundamental reform than how we teach kids to read. “I’m happy to make a stance,” he said. “That is what should drive me as minister.” Start the day with a summary of the day’s most important and interesting stories, analysis and insights. 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Insurgents reach gates of Syria’s capital, threatening to upend decades of Assad rule BEIRUT (AP) — A Syrian opposition war monitor and a pro-government media outlet say government forces have withdrawn from much of the central city of Homs. The pro-government Sham FM reported that government forces took positions outside Syria’s third-largest city, without elaborating. Rami Abdurrahman who heads the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said Syrian troops and members of different security agencies have withdrawn from the city, adding that rebels have entered parts of it. Losing Homs is a potentially crippling blow for Syria’s embattled leader, Bashar Assad. An archbishop's knock formally restores Notre Dame to life as winds howl and heads of state look on PARIS (AP) — France’s iconic Notre Dame Cathedral has formally reopened its doors for the first time since a devastating fire nearly destroyed the 861-year-old landmark in 2019. The five-year restoration is widely seen as a boost for French President Emmanuel Macron, who championed the ambitious timeline, and brings a welcome respite from his domestic political woes. World leaders, dignitaries, and worshippers gathered on Saturday evening for the celebrations under the cathedral's soaring arches. The celebration was attended by 1,500 dignitaries, including President-elect Donald Trump, Britain’s Prince William, and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. For Catholics, Notre Dame’s rector said the cathedral “carries the enveloping presence of the Virgin Mary, a maternal and embracing presence.′′ Trump is welcomed by Macron to Paris with presidential pomp and joined by Zelenskyy for their talks PARIS (AP) — French President Emmanuel Macron has welcomed Donald Trump to Paris with a full dose of presidential pomp. And they held a hastily arranged meeting with Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelenskyy on a day that's mixing pageantry with attention to pressing global problems. The president-elect's visit to France is part of a global a celebration of the reopening of Notre Dame Cathedral five years after a devastating fire. Macron and other European leaders are trying to win Trump’s favor and persuade him to maintain support for Ukraine in its defense against Russia’s invasion. Trump isn't back in office but he's already pushing his agenda and negotiating with world leaders NEW YORK (AP) — Donald Trump is making threats, traveling abroad, and negotiating with world leaders. He has more than a month-and-a-half to go before he’s sworn in for a second term. But the president-elect is already moving aggressively to not only fill his Cabinet and outline policy goals, but also to try to achieve his priorities. In recent days, Trump has threatened to impose a 25% tariff on goods from Canada and Mexico, two of the country’s largest trading partners. That led to emergency calls and a visit. And he's warned of “ALL HELL TO PAY” if Hamas doesn't release the hostages still being held captive in Gaza. South Korea's president avoids an impeachment attempt over short-lived martial law SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — South Korea’s embattled President Yoon Suk Yeol has avoided an opposition-led attempt to impeach him over his short-lived imposition of martial law. Most of Yoon's ruling party lawmakers boycotted a parliamentary vote Saturday to deny a two-thirds majority needed to suspend his presidential powers. The scrapping of the motion is expected to intensify protests calling for Yoon’s ouster and deepen political chaos in South Korea. A survey suggests a majority of South Koreans support the president’s impeachment. Yoon’s martial law declaration drew criticism from his own ruling conservative People Power Party. But the party also apparently fears losing the presidency to liberals. Days after gunman killed UnitedHealthcare's CEO, police push to ID him and FBI offers reward NEW YORK (AP) — Nearly four days after the shooting of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, police still do not know the gunman’s name or whereabouts or have a motive for the killing. But they have made some progress in their investigation into Wednesday's killing of the leader of the largest U.S. health insurer, including that the gunman likely left New York City on a bus soon after fleeing the scene. The also found that the gunman left something behind: a backpack that was discovered in Central Park. Police are working with the FBI, which on Friday night announced a $50,000 reward for information leading to an arrest and conviction. UnitedHealthcare CEO's shooting opens a door for many to vent frustrations over insurance The fatal shooting of UnitedHealthcare's CEO has opened the door for many people to vent their frustrations and anger over the insurance industry. The feelings of exasperation, anger, resentment, and helplessness toward insurers aren’t new. But the shooting and the headlines around it have unleashed a new wave of patients sharing such sentiments and personal stories of interactions with insurance companies. Conversations at dinner tables, office water coolers, social gatherings and on social media have pivoted to the topic. Many say they hope the new amplified voices can bring about change for companies often accused of valuing profits over people. 2 Pearl Harbor survivors, ages 104 and 102, return to Hawaii to honor those killed in 1941 attack PEARL HARBOR, Hawaii (AP) — The bombing of Pearl Harbor 83 years ago launched the United States into World War II. Two survivors have returned to the Hawaii military base for a remembrance ceremony on the attack's anniversary. Both are over 100 years old. They joined active-duty troops, veterans and members of the public for an observance hosted by the Navy and the National Park Service. A third survivor was planning to join them but had to cancel due to health issues. The bombing killed more than 2,300 U.S. servicemen. An explosion destroys an apartment block in a Dutch city, killing at least 3 and injuring others THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — An explosion and fire has rocked a neighborhood in the Dutch city of The Hague, killing three people and injuring other people and destroying several apartments. The cause of the disaster is unclear. Emergency authorities said four people were rescued from the rubble and taken to the hospital. The mayor said rescuers were no longer looking for survivors but for eventual bodies, but could not specify how many people might still be unaccounted for. Residents of the northeastern neighborhood of Mariahoeve in The Hague heard a huge bang and screams before dawn. Dutch authorities have deployed a specialized urban search and rescue team to find victims. How 'Mufasa' rose with Aaron Pierre and Blue Ivy's voices along with new Lin-Manuel Miranda music SAN DIEGO (AP) — When Aaron Pierre was cast as Mufasa, the weight of following in the late James Earl Jones’ legendary footsteps was enough to rattle any actor. But instead of letting the pressure roar too loudly, he harnessed his nerves to breathe fresh life into his young lion character. Pierre found parallels between himself and his character while filming his leading role in “Mufasa: The Lion King,” which opens in theaters Dec. 20. He took the reigns as the new voice of Mufasa after Jones played the iconic King Mufasa in both the 1994 and 2019 versions of Disney’s “The Lion King.” The prequel offers a fresh exploration into Mufasa’s origin story.

MLB NOTESCommunity Services (MoJCS) has launched its new sector strategy to strengthen the justice system, improve community access to justice, and boost service delivery across Vanuatu. The Justice and Community Services Sector Strategy (JCSSS) 2024–2030 sets out the sector’s strategic priorities and helps guide the 13 justice agencies in business planning and addressing systemic challenges. Building on previous strategies, developing the new framework draws on extensive consultations with sector leaders and representatives. This strategy is a vital step forward for the MoJCS’ commitment to delivering justice and community services that are accessible, equitable, timely, and of the highest quality for all people in Vanuatu. It reflects the sector’s collective vision and dedication to building a just, inclusive, and resilient society. The justice sector relies on collaboration across government agencies, communities, and international partners. One such partner is Australia, which has a long history of support with MoJCS. Joining the Director General (DG) of the MoJCS, Mr. Arthur Faerua, and the Heads of the Justice Agencies at the launch, Political Counsellor Mrs. Laura Frech Cardenas reaffirmed Australia’s commitment to Vanuatu’s justice sector. “Australia welcomes the launch of these important new strategies. As partners with the Government of Vanuatu, we share a mission of promoting justice, providing fair services, and protecting human rights,” stated Mrs. Cardenas. “This launch is a testament to the sector’s dedication to sustainable progress and the new framework will allow us to continue our efforts to strengthen the justice system, improve access to justice, and provide quality services for Vanuatu’s most vulnerable communities.” The JCSSS, aligned with the Vanuatu 2030 plan, is a roadmap for justice sector development. It focuses on improving community safety, advancing law reforms, and strengthening leadership and governance. Key strategic themes include climate adaptation, transparency, and rehabilitation, supported by actions like better infrastructure, data management, and inclusive services. As part of the launch, the MoJCS also introduced its Capacity Development (CD) Strategy 2024–2030, which is embedded within the JCSSS. The CD Strategy focuses on developing leadership and professional skills within justice institutions. DG Faerua highlighted the importance of capacity development to the sector. “We can strengthen the foundations of our institutions by investing in the development of justice professionals and leaders. By building these capabilities, we ensure that justice services are resilient, inclusive, and effective in the face of future challenges,” he said. The MoJCS acknowledges the invaluable contributions of its Heads of Agencies, development partners, and stakeholders in crafting the transformative strategies. Together, the JCSSS and CD Strategy represent a unified vision for a just, inclusive, and resilient Vanuatu. As implementation begins, the MoJCS remains committed to furthering collaboration, driving impactful reforms, and delivering justice services that meet the needs of all communities.

SUNRISE, Fla. (AP) — Spencer Knight made 20 saves, Mackie Samoskevich scored with less than a second left in the second period, and the Florida Panthers got four goals in the third to beat the Carolina Hurricanes 6-0 on Saturday and complete a two-day sweep. Aleksander Barkov, Sam Bennett, Aaron Ekblad, Evan Rodrigues and Adam Boqvist also scored for Florida, which won 6-3 at Carolina on Friday. The Panthers have won three straight — that streak following a stretch of six losses in seven games for the Stanley Cup champions. It was Knight's fourth career shutout, his first since Nov. 9, 2022 — also at home against Carolina. Spencer Martin made 23 saves on 28 shots for the Hurricanes, who have dropped four of their last six games (2-3-1). It was Martin's fourth consecutive start for Carolina. Takeaways Hurricanes: This was the first time all season that the Hurricanes failed to get a point in the game immediately following a loss. Carolina was 4-0-1 after a defeat entering Saturday. Panthers: A big day for Samoskevich — his alma mater on Saturday, that game ending just before the Florida-Carolina game started. The Panthers are 5-0-0 when he scores this season. Sam Reinhart had each of the four most recent Florida goals at 19:59, before Samoskevich got his Saturday. Key moment The Panthers scored two goals 11 seconds apart in the third to make it 5-0, and Yaniv Perets replaced Martin in the Hurricanes' net with 8:12 remaining. It was the second NHL appearance for Perets, who came on once in relief for Carolina last season. Key stat Ekblad's goal was his first in a span of 1,045 regular-season shifts since Feb. 20. Up next Carolina starts a two-game homestand Tuesday against Seattle. Florida goes to Pittsburgh to start a two-game trip on Tuesday. ___ AP NHL: Tim Reynolds, The Associated PressKinickerless mum caught on CCTV dropping bag of cocaine in Monkwearmouth’s Grange Park Primary School

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L ong before he started making guns with a 3D printer, Viljam Nyman was a kid who was bullied. In a document police later found on his computer, titled “The life story of how I became a far-right extremist”, Nyman described his childhood in Lahti, a city in southern Finland, being picked on by other kids and feeling abandoned by the adults around him. He wrote that this experience taught him something: “‘Be yourself’ or ‘don’t care’ were really bad pieces of advice. Violence and power, or the threat of using it, were actually the things that mattered. Equality and accepting difference were just words on paper, naive and idealistic fantasies. Human nature, in reality, was discriminatory and racist.” In 2005, when Nyman was 11, violent protests broke out in a number of European countries after a Danish newspaper published 12 cartoons of the prophet Muhammad in response to a debate about Islam and self-censorship. Why was it, Nyman wondered, that he was mocked for being different and no one did anything about it, but criticising a religion from faraway countries was off limits? He wrote in the document that “all of this” reinforced his belief that something was wrong with society and no one was on his side. Nyman became obsessed with Hitler and Nazi Germany. He began with the notion that bullies could be classified as subhuman and sent to camps, but became fascinated by the discipline and order of the Third Reich. As he got older, he immersed himself in online message boards that shared antisemitic theories. Until this point, Nyman had spent a lot of time playing video games. Now, he thought, he needed to do more so that he would not be a disgrace to the white race. He started to feel something he had not felt before: a sense of purpose. In 2020, when Nyman wrote the document, he was 26. He was still living in Lahti and he still did not have many friends. He was often lonely and resented not being in a relationship. Most of his social life was conducted over the internet; he regularly posted virulent racial hatred about black people, Muslims and Jews on far-right messaging platforms. He also attended far-right music events, which take place regularly around Finland, meeting like-minded people scattered across the country with whom he kept in touch online. On the encrypted messaging app Telegram, he regularly chatted with three friends in particular who shared his views. The police suspect they connected at far-right events. They were Niko Petteri Suikki and Tuukka Karinkanta, both in their 20s, and Jyrki Niemi, who was in his 60s. One of the things the men discussed was their shared belief in “accelerationism”, the idea that violence is a necessary means to hasten social collapse and introduce new power structures – ideally ethno-nationalist and authoritarian. One accelerationist tactic is to attempt to trigger a race war by carrying out attacks on ethnic minority groups in the hope of provoking retaliation. Rightwing accelerationists also emphasise the importance of stockpiling weapons in order to be prepared when society collapses. In different messaging threads and groups – including one named “Seize Finland by any means necessary” – the men shared thoughts about the coming race war. Sometimes this was couched in the ironic humour often seen in the far-right scene (“If this discussion is read by a government actor, I want to underline that I am in this chat by accident. Maybe someone else added me, I don’t know why I’m here,” Nyman wrote in December 2021). But frequently it was shockingly racist and violent. “The pleasure of shooting black gangs might take precedence over the annoyance of a prison sentence,” Nyman wrote to the group in August 2022. “At this rate, we will soon be a minority in our own country if we do not oppose those who enable the import of blacks,” Karinkanta wrote in a message to Suikki the same month, adding, “Many of them wouldn’t be ready when the race war starts.” Suikki responded with a joke about “shooting a negro”. To carry out shootings and stockpile weapons, you need guns. Nyman did not have a gun licence and was unlikely to get one. In November 2021, he bought his first 3D printer and immediately started printing gun parts. N yman was working from a blueprint, easily available online, for a model called the FGC-9, which revolutionised the world of 3D-printed weapons when it was published in March 2020. FGC stands for “fuck gun control” and 9 refers to the 9mm bullets it uses. The slogan reflects the ideological leaning of many involved in the development of 3D-printed guns. In an anonymised interview given after the manual was published, the creator of the FGC-9, who posted under the name JStark1809, said, “We fucked gun control for good ... Gun control is dead, and we killed it.” JStark1809 has since been revealed to be Jacob Duygu, a German man of Kurdish origin. In the FGC-9 manifesto, he called on people “to defend yourself and not be a victim to unjust firearm legislation any longer”. Elsewhere, he had posted about being an “incel”. In 2021, he was arrested by the German police. Two days later, he was found dead in a car parked outside his parents’ home in Hanover. He was 28. The German magazine Der Spiegel reported that an autopsy had been unable to determine the cause of death, but foul play and suicide had been ruled out. His mysterious death is the subject of many online conspiracy theories in the 3D-printed gun world. The 110-page FGC-9 manual takes readers through the process of making a weapon in meticulous detail, with step-by-step diagrams akin to those that accompany flat-pack furniture. Although 3D-printed weapons have been around since 2013, earlier models were rudimentary, requiring off-the-shelf parts manufactured by gun companies along with the 3D-printed parts, and usually firing just one or two shots before they disintegrated. In 2019, the white nationalist Stephan Balliet livestreamed a horrifying attack on a synagogue in the German town of Halle, carried out on Yom Kippur. Before the attack, he posted a manifesto online saying that one of his goals was to prove the viability of homemade weapons, including some that were 3D-printed. But on the live stream, his guns frequently jammed and he is heard cursing himself as a failure. (He did shoot and kill two people, and is serving a life sentence in prison.) The FGC-9 changed everything. Unlike those early models, the FGC-9 includes no regulated components: it can be made using just a 3D printer and parts available from a hardware store; it requires only some metalworking skills. Today, 3D printers are available for a couple of hundred pounds, while strong plastic polymers to print with are relatively inexpensive. The upper and lower receivers of the FGC-9 (the barrel assembly and trigger sections) are fully 3D-printed from plastic, as are the pistol grip and stock. The magazine can also be printed. Unlike previous 3D-printed gun models, it is a semi-automatic weapon. “It was revolutionary,” says Dr Rajan Basra, a researcher from King’s College London who studies 3D-printed weapons. The FGC-9 is now thought to be the most popular 3D-printed weapon in the world. It is particularly difficult to police, given that it doesn’t involve illegal parts. As Basra says, “You can’t regulate a steel tube or a spring.” The open-source manual was initially shared among niche gun manufacturing forums but quickly spread across the internet, and the guns have been manufactured around the world. “The guide is incredibly detailed,” Basra says. “There are videos online showing the entire process and the blueprints are shockingly easy to find – you can Google and get them in under five minutes.” The rise of these weapons is a particular concern in the UK, where 3D printing can circumvent extremely strict gun control laws. Since the FGC-9 manual was published four years ago, there have been at least 12 UK criminal cases involving these weapons. In October, 20-year-old Jack Robinson from Portsmouth was sentenced to six and a half years in prison for attempting to construct an FGC-9 and possessing documents that could be used for preparing an act of terrorism. Robinson, who was just 18 at the time of his arrest, had posted online with the username “kill Jews” and had a large amount of neo-Nazi material on his computer. Three men in Yorkshire accused of manufacturing FGC-9s to attack an Islamic centre are due to stand trial in 2025. This year, Abdiwahid Abdulkadir Mohamed, a 32-year-old Londoner, became the first known case of someone with jihadist sympathies being sentenced for possessing the FGC-9 manual and instructions for other homemade firearms (the crime was possessing documents likely to be useful for preparing an act of terrorism). But generally, around the world, 3D-printed guns have proved most attractive to organised criminals and people on the far right. “There are ideological reasons for this, such as the far-right emphasis on race war and stockpiling weapons, but it’s also a practical issue about who is sharing the blueprints online,” Basra says. “The extreme rightwing space overlaps with the hyperlibertarian idea that any gun control is a form of tyranny.” R ueben Dass is a researcher at the S Rajaratnam School of International Studies in Singapore who has compiled a database of arrests related to 3D-printed guns worldwide. “If you look at the numbers, 95% of the plots have been failures in the sense that people have been arrested before they actually shot the guns – for manufacture, possession, trafficking,” he explains. “But it’s a serious, growing risk because the technologies are becoming cheaper and more advanced and accessible.” Making a 3D-printed gun involves significantly more than simply downloading a blueprint and clicking print. To construct an FGC-9, you need drills, metalworking equipment and commitment. “You essentially turn yourself into a gunsmith. It involves frustration and trial and error and setbacks,” Basra says. “But many have followed these step-by-step instructions to make one.” The UK’s National Crime Agency says that although the weapon accounts for a small proportion of firearms cases overall, illicit interest is increasing. This is a serious concern for the authorities. While 3D-printed guns were considered to be illegal anyway by virtue of being a firearm, in November 2022 the UK government updated legislation to specifically outlaw possessing, buying or producing component parts for a 3D-printed gun. The NCA has urged the government to go further and outlaw having the blueprint at all, and there are currently two bills on this going through parliament. N yman started printing parts for his first FGC-9 in November 2021 and worked on it for months, acquiring a stick welder and an angle grinder to craft the metal sections of the gun. He frequently messaged the other three men about his progress, and sometimes they swapped ideas about how to avoid detection when buying parts, not all of which were easily available in Finland. “Did you explain that the parts were for a bicycle suspension?” Suikki asked Nyman in one exchange. “Yes,” he replied. “I said they were parts for a suspension fork; I didn’t have much more information, just that a friend asked me to make them, but my own equipment wasn’t good enough.” “I hope you’re paying in cash,” Suikki said. In another message, Nyman asked, “Any ideas for a believable story about what this part is for and what it locks, etc?” Suikki responded, “Say you’re building a safe for a school project, and since you’re an automation guy, you have to cut corners on the mechanical parts.” On 13 April, Nyman completed his first FGC-9. Niemi, the older man in the group, got hold of some 9mm bullets for it. (If you have a gun licence in Finland, it is not difficult to purchase bullets.) A few weeks later, Suikki took a train to Lahti from his home in Hyvinkää, around an hour away, to meet Nyman. They went into the forest to practise shooting and were elated to find the gun worked. Around the same time, Suikki borrowed it from Nyman and took it to his home town where he filmed himself shooting an immigrant family’s mailbox. Nyman soon started work on making more guns. In June, he rented out a warehouse to scale up his gun production. Within a few months, he would have four functioning FGC-9s. The men discussed plans to produce 15 weapons in total. Some would be hidden in case they were needed when the race war came. Others would be sold for between €1,000 and €3,000 each. (The 3D-printers cost around €250 each – by this stage, Nyman had three of them – while the other parts added up to a further €200-300 a gun.) In May, soon after Nyman finished constructing the first gun and ascertained that it could actually fire shots, he and Niemi discussed the possibility of carrying out attacks. “Now is not the time for small skirmishes; the attacks need to be of such calibre and so well-planned that they make headlines,” Niemi wrote on Telegram. In another message, he said, “That doesn’t mean we’ll be running around Helsinki with guns next week; it requires extensive planning, funding, and various preparations.” In August, Nyman messaged, “I’m leaning towards wearing an FGC-9 under a coat and going to East Helsinki or wherever those ‘roadman’ [street gang] blacks hang out.” In other messages, the men discussed the possibility of attacking critical infrastructure, including power stations, water supply systems and transportation hubs, with the aim of destabilising society and precipitating race war. “We need to hit them where it hurts. Multiple locations at once – make them scramble,” Nyman wrote in August 2022. Suikki replied, “If we time it right, the police won’t know what’s happening until it’s too late.” “The goal is to cause maximum confusion and fear,” Niemi said. “They need to feel like they’ve lost control.” Sign up to Inside Saturday The only way to get a look behind the scenes of the Saturday magazine. Sign up to get the inside story from our top writers as well as all the must-read articles and columns, delivered to your inbox every weekend. after newsletter promotion That same month, Suikki decided to toughen himself up for the coming race war. He took his cat to Niemi’s house, where he borrowed a gun and shot the cat three times. In a Telegram message to Karinkanta, he wrote that people who thought this was harsh were “probably ready to take it from a black man because they’re too scared to kill”. As Nyman pressed on with producing more FGC-9s, he did not know that police were on to him. Tuomas Kuure is a detective chief inspector in the Päijät-Häme region, of which Lahti is the main city. He is a polite, softly spoken man who has been a police officer for 20 years, mostly specialising in narcotics and organised crime. In early 2022, he got some surprising police intelligence: someone in Lahti was manufacturing guns using a 3D printer. The idea of 3D-printed guns wasn’t totally new to Kuure – there had been a couple of reported arrests for their manufacture in Finland – but it was the first time he’d ever worked on this crime himself, which made it exciting and nerve-racking. As he and his team started to investigate, they knew they had to think carefully about it. “We usually only did narcotics, and this was quite different,” Kuure tells me on a video call. “It’s easy for us to say, ‘OK, there’s some cocaine, let’s go through the normal process.’ But with this, we had to figure everything out from scratch. What do we need to show? And how can we show it?” As Nyman built his guns, Kuure, along with a team of five investigators and four officers on surveillance, were gathering information and biding their time. Kuure knew it was essential to wait for the right moment to make the arrests. If police acted too soon, before they knew for sure that the guns were capable of firing shots, it would be much harder to obtain a conviction for an aggravated firearms offence. “If the guns hadn’t been working, it would have been easy for them to say, ‘We’re not making guns, we’re just making prototypes or collectors’ items,’” Kuure says. But wait too long and the consequences could be much worse. I n late August 2022, Karinkanta took a train from his home in Oulu, a city in central Finland, to visit Nyman in Lahti to practise shooting the FGC-9s. Suikki was invited, too, but couldn’t make it. Nyman collected Karinkanta from the train station and they drove to a Lidl supermarket where they bought a watermelon. They drew a Star of David on the melon with a marker pen and drove to some woodland nearby where they filmed themselves firing shots at it. After this, they returned to the car and drove back to the warehouse Nyman had rented. “We sat in the car and smoked cigarettes,” Nyman later told interrogators. “I threw the weapons in the blue box inside the warehouse, then we drove back to my apartment.” When they got there, police officers were waiting to arrest them. “Nyman’s been taken,” Suikki messaged the Telegram group the next day. “Get out, scatter, we’ll regroup soon if we can,” Niemi replied. Kuure is used to investigating organised crime, where suspects usually answer “no comment” to every question. This was different. “These guys were more open,” he tells me. “None of them said they had terrorist motives, but about the guns they were clear: ‘I’ve shot these guns, I had them in my possession.’ Our main suspect quickly said he believes there will be confrontation between different ethnic groups. I think they might even be a bit proud because of their ideology – they think they are doing the right thing.” In his interrogation, though, Nyman insisted he did not make the guns with violent intent. Instead, he said he was worried about the energy crisis caused by the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and the idea that Russia might invade Finland next. “I decided I should make a gun, so people wouldn’t just shoot me here,” he told police. “I’m such a survivalist that there were hundreds of jars of canned goods, nuts and so on in my apartment, and I had more dry food in storage downstairs ... I’m also prepared to defend my property and myself. The FGC-9s were not to initiate any kind of violence, they were mainly for self-defence.” It’s true that when police searched Nyman’s computer they found survivalist manuals, with tips for what to store and how to carry out rudimentary medical procedures at home in the event of injury. But there was also a huge amount of neo-Nazi and accelerationist material. And the messages Nyman had exchanged with the three other men told a very different story. Soon after Nyman and Karinkanta’s arrests, Niemi and Suikki were arrested, too. Police searched all their homes and devices, uncovering a significant arsenal of weaponry, mostly at Nyman’s apartment and the warehouse he had rented. Nyman had made four FGC-9s, with plans to produce more. He had also made a 3D-printed pen-pistol. Police found a large quantity of ammunition – about 1,400 9mm cartridges – and explosives. All the men had a considerable volume of extremist material on their devices. They had mistakenly believed deleting Telegram chats would remove them, but police were able to recover significant portions of their conversations, revealing the extent to which they had discussed manufacturing the weapons and potential attacks and targets. Just a few days before his arrest, Nyman had shared a link to a news article about Sanna Marin, then prime minister, giving a speech in Lahti; he asked, “Should I go with an FGC in a hoodie?” Perhaps most worryingly, when police searched Niemi’s house, they found a list of addresses of leftwing activists and politicians. But police struggled to find evidence of plans for a specific attack – and that made it hard to prove intent. “Our suspects didn’t have any particular or detailed plans, not that we had knowledge of, but they frequently discussed what type of things should be done and whom they would target with their actions,” Kuure says. The men were released on bail while police, along with investigators from Finland’s National Bureau of Investigation, continued to build their case. “We had functioning guns; from the device searches we had videos of the guns being used, we had parts, tools, printers,” Kuure says. This was clear evidence for firearms offences, but they wanted to pursue terrorism charges, too – and astonishingly, Finland had never seen anyone convicted for far-right terrorism. During this period, most of the men kept their heads down. Nyman did not. In December 2022, the mailbox shooting video was published online, to an account believed to be run by Nyman. Police already had a copy, as it had been discovered in the device search, but until this point it had not been made public. “We believe it was the main suspect that made those publications – maybe he wanted to show like-minded persons that this is possible,” Kuure says. In this period, out on bail, Nyman also posted his own modification of the FGC-9 blueprint online, explaining that he was frustrated that not all the parts were easily available in Finland and had updated the design to address this. “I found this constant ordering and waiting for packages frustrating and also a factor that increases the risk of getting caught,” he wrote. He bought himself a new 3D printer. Soon after this flurry of activity, he was arrested again. The trial began in September 2023. Nyman and Suikki were charged with aggravated firearms offences with terrorist intent; Karinkanta was charged with aiding and abetting this; Niemi was charged with firearms offences but not terrorism, due to insufficient evidence. Journalists filled the courtroom as prosecutors presented damning evidence from the Telegram message exchanges. The defendants argued that the guns weren’t that effective and the messages were pure fantasy. “It’s daydreaming that has no basis in reality,” Nyman’s lawyer said. Kuure followed news of the trial nervously. “I knew we had a lot of materials, but I didn’t know what it would take to get that terrorism conviction,” he says. For the last two days of the trial, he slipped into the courtroom to watch proceedings first-hand. As he heard the final cases presented, he began to feel more confident. The men were all found guilty. The verdicts against Nyman, Suikki and Karinkanta marked the first time in Finnish criminal history that anyone had been convicted for far-right terrorism. Nyman was sentenced to three years and four months in prison for the firearms offences and training to commit a terrorist act. Suikki was sentenced to one year and nine months, Karinkanta was handed a seven-month suspended sentence and Niemi was sentenced to one year and two months. The court judgment stated that Nyman “produced weapons primarily for the purpose of using them in violence aimed at promoting his adopted ideology”. Around the world, authorities are grappling with how to tackle this growing threat; some countries, including the UK, are looking at making it illegal to access or download blueprints, while others continue to rely on existing firearms laws and intelligence. “Law enforcement take 3D-printed guns very seriously, but the political system we’re in is reactive,” Basra says. “If there’s a completed attack, where someone is killed, the threat will seem much more urgent and will receive more resources and attention. It’s pretty sad that we’d have to wait for that point.” In Finland, Kuure remains concerned about what might come next. “This technology makes guns available to everyone. If you have a few hundred euros, some spare time and craftiness, then you have a gun.”Police deny sitting on evidence as Netflix doc brings renewed attention to JonBenet Ramsey's killing

FDA Accepts Ascendis Pharma's Supplemental Biologics License Application for TransConTM hGH for the Treatment of Adults with Growth Hormone DeficiencyPolice deny sitting on evidence as Netflix doc brings renewed attention to JonBenet Ramsey's killing(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({}); KEY POINTS of THIS STORY Operation Destabilise Success : The UK’s NCA led an international effort that dismantled two major Russian-speaking criminal networks laundering millions of dollars. Criminal Activities : The networks funded ransomware attacks, drug trafficking, and Russian espionage, laundering over $2.3 million in ransomware payments. Global Reach: These networks operated in 30 countries, using cryptocurrency and cash-for-crypto methods to fund illicit activities . Arrests and Seizures : Authorities arrested 84 individuals, seized £20 million in cash and crypto, and imposed US sanctions on key figures. Blockchain Analysis : The operation highlighted the critical role of blockchain tracing in combating cyber and traditional organized crime. A joint international effort led by the UK’s National Crime Agency (NCA) has successfully disrupted two large-scale Russian-speaking criminal networks involved in laundering millions of dollars in illegal funds. Dubbed Operation Destabilise, the investigation exposed a network of financial transactions that supported various criminal activities, including ransomware attacks, drug trafficking, and Russian espionage. Two networks, identified as “Smart” (led by Ekaterina Zhdanova) and “TGR” (led by Rossi, Chirkinyan, and Bradens), were instrumental in facilitating the movement of illegal funds across borders, often using cryptocurrency as a primary tool. Authorities found that between 2022 and 2023, these networks laundered over $2.3 million (£20 million) in ransomware payments made to the Ryuk ransomware group , provided financial support to notorious criminal organizations like the Kinahan crime syndicate known for drug and arms trafficking, and facilitated funding of Russian espionage operations, helping to bypass financial sanctions imposed on Russia. According to the NCA’s press release , the network had a global reach, with operations spanning across 30 countries, including the UK, Russia, the Middle East, and South America. (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({}); Further probing revealed the techniques employed to hide the origin of ill-gotten funds, often involving cash-for-crypto transactions. Criminal gangs used cryptocurrency to reinvest in their illegal business, buying more drugs and firearms without transferring physical money across borders. This financial service allowed these groups to continue their violent activity. The operation resulted in the arrest of 84 individuals and the seizure of over £20 million in cash and cryptocurrency. Additionally, the US Department of Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) has imposed sanctions on four entities and five individuals associated with the TGR network. These sanctions target key figures involved in laundering money for Russian elites and cyber criminals. The operation was a collaborative effort involving multiple international law enforcement agencies, including the UK Metropolitan Police Service, French police, the US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA), and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). “While these organisations have sought to exploit emerging technologies such as cryptocurrency to obscure their activities, the inherent traceability of blockchain has proven invaluable in unravelling their activities that operated on a truly global scale, moving billions of dollars for a range of different threat actors,” the NCA’s head of cyber intelligence, Will Lyne, stated. (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({}); This operation has significantly disrupted the activities of various criminal organizations, including ransomware groups, drug traffickers, and Russian intelligence services. It has also exposed the complex ways in which cybercrime and traditional organized crime intersect. RELATED TOPICS Russian Court Jails Four REvil Ransomware Gang Members Leading French IT firm Sopra Steria hit by Ryuk ransomware Russian Man Extradited to US over Phobos Ransomware Attacks Dark Web Hydra Market Mastermind Sentenced to Life by Russia Hacker Wanted by FBI in Ransomware Attacks Arrested in Russia

MLB NOTESTo lure Juan Soto, Mets created a video of his statue outside Citi Field next to Tom Seaver's NEW YORK (AP) — The New York Mets wanted Juan Soto to know his future with them could be set in stone. When the free agent outfielder traveled to owner Steve Cohen’s house in Beverly Hills, California, for a presentation last month, the team showed a video that included an image of a future Soto statue outside Citi Field, next to the one erected of franchise great Tom Seaver. Soto put on a New York Mets jersey and cap for the first time Thursday after his record $765 million, 15-year contract was finalized and talked about what made the difference in his decision. Bill Belichick 'always wanted' to give college coaching a try. Now he will at North Carolina New North Carolina football coach Bill Belichick said he had long been interested in coaching in the college ranks. But it had never worked out until now, as he takes over the Tar Heels program. Belichick led the New England Patriots to six Super Bowl titles during a 24-year run there that ended last year. Belichick's five-year deal pays him $10 million in base and supplemental salary per year. It is guaranteed only for the first three years, including for buyout purposes. There is also up to $3.5 million in annual bonuses. Wander Franco's sex abuse trial has been postponed 5 months PUERTO PLATA, Dominican Republic (AP) — The trial against Tampa Bay Rays shortstop Wander Franco, who has been charged with sexually abusing a minor, sexual and commercial exploitation against a minor, and human trafficking, has been postponed until June 2, 2025. Dominican judge Yacaira Veras postponed the hearing Thursday at the request of prosecutors because of the absence of several key witnesses in the case. Franco’s lawyers asked the court to reconsider the postponement, arguing Franco must report to spring training in mid-February. The judge replied that Franco is obligated to continue with the trial schedule and his conditional release from detainment. LeBron James ruled out of Lakers' game at Minnesota on Friday with foot soreness LOS ANGELES (AP) — LeBron James has been ruled out of the Los Angeles Lakers’ game at Minnesota on Friday night due to soreness in his left foot. James will miss his second straight game when the Lakers return from a four-day break to face the Timberwolves. The top scorer in NBA history was away from the team this week with an excused absence attributed to “personal reasons,” coach JJ Redick said Wednesday. It’s unclear whether James will even make the quick round trip to Minnesota before the Lakers’ next game at home against Memphis on Sunday. Rape investigation that Swedish media say focused on Kylian Mbappé has been closed STOCKHOLM (AP) — Swedish prosecutors say they have dropped a rape investigation that was launched in connection with soccer star Kylian Mbappé’s visit to Stockholm in October. In a statement, lead investigator Marina Chirakova says there is not enough evidence to continue the investigation into the allegation at a hotel. Prosecutors never publicly named the suspect in the investigation but some Swedish media reported it was Mbappé. The Real Madrid striker visited Stockholm in October during a break in the Spanish league. At the time, Mbappé’s legal team dismissed those reports as false. Travis Hunter, the 2-way standout for Colorado, is the AP college football player of the year BOULDER, Colo. (AP) — Colorado two-way standout Travis Hunter is The Associated Press college football player of the year. Hunter received 26 of the 43 votes from a panel of AP Top 25 voters. Boise State tailback Ashton Jeanty finished second with 16 votes, and Arizona State running back Cameron Skattebo received one vote. A throwback player who rarely left the field, Hunter had 92 catches for 1,152 yards and 14 touchdowns as a receiver. He had four interceptions and 11 passes defensed as a shutdown corner. Hunter helped the the 20th-ranked Buffaloes to a 9-3 record and an appearance in the Alamo Bowl against BYU. 2034 World Cup visitors will live in 'a bubble' and not see real life, Saudi rights activist says LONDON (AP) — A Saudi human rights activist says soccer fans visiting Saudi Arabia for the 2034 World Cup will live in a “bubble” that doesn't reflect real life there. Lina al-Hathloul is a London-based activist whose sister was jailed in Saudi Arabia then banned from travel after campaigning to end a ban on women driving. When FIFA confirmed the kingdom as the 2034 tournament host on Wednesday its president Gianni Infantino acknowledged “the world will be watching” for positive social change. Al-Hathloul says western people “will be very safe” at the World Cup but "will see a bubble of what Saudi Arabia is.” Team claims NASCAR rescinded approval to buy new charter unless federal antitrust suit is dropped CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) — A new court filing says NASCAR rejected Front Row Motorsports’ agreement to purchase a charter from Stewart-Haas Racing unless the team and 23XI Racing dropped their federal antitrust lawsuit against the stock car series. Front Row and 23XI rejected NASCAR's new revenue sharing agreement and have gone to court. NASCAR now says it will move forward in 2025 with 32 chartered teams and eight open spots, with offers on charters for Front Row and 23XI rescinded and the SHR charters in limbo. Indian teen Gukesh Dommaraju becomes the youngest chess world champion after beating Chinese rival NEW DELHI (AP) — Indian teenager Gukesh Dommaraju has become the youngest chess world champion after beating the defending champion Ding Liren of China. Dommaraju, 18, secured 7.5 points against 6.5 of his Chinese rival in Thursday's game which was played in Singapore. He has surpassed the achievement of Russia’s Garry Kasparov who won the title at the age of 22. Dommaraju is now also the second Indian to win the title after five-time world chess champion Viswanathan Anand. The Indian teen prodigy has long been considered a rising star in the chess world after he became a chess grandmaster at 12. He had entered the match as the youngest-ever challenger to the world crown after winning the Candidates tournament earlier this year. Hojlund scores twice for Man United to beat Viktoria Plzen 2-1 in Europa League, Tottenham held 1-1 Rasmus Hojlund scored twice after coming off the bench and Manchester United rallied to beat Viktoria Plzen 2-1 in the Europa League. The Denmark striker netted in the 88th minute after collecting Bruno Fernandes’ pass off a free kick to seal the victory. Hojlund came on in the 56th and scored an equalizer six minutes later. Totenham was held 1-1 at Rangers and Lazio tops the standings after a 3-1 win at Ajax. In the Conference League a youthful Chelsea lineup made the most of a long trip to Kazakhstan by beating Astana 3-1 to stay perfect in the third-tier competition.

NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. stocks rose to records Friday after data suggested the job market remains solid enough to keep the economy going, but not so strong that it raises immediate worries about inflation . The S&P 500 climbed 0.2%, just enough top the all-time high set on Wednesday, as it closed a third straight winning week in what looks to be one of its best years since the 2000 dot-com bust. The Dow Jones Industrial Average dipped 123.19 points, or 0.3%, while the Nasdaq composite rose 0.8% to set its own record. The quiet trading came after the latest jobs report came in mixed enough to strengthen traders’ expectations that the Federal Reserve will cut interest rates again at its next meeting in two weeks. The report showed U.S. employers hired more workers than expected last month, but it also said the unemployment rate unexpectedly ticked up to 4.2% from 4.1%. “This print doesn’t kill the holiday spirit and the Fed remains on track to deliver a cut in December,” according to Lindsay Rosner, head of multi-sector investing within Goldman Sachs Asset Management. The Fed has been easing its main interest rate from a two-decade high since September to offer more help for the slowing job market, after bringing inflation nearly all the way down to its 2% target. Lower interest rates can ease the brakes off the economy, but they can also offer more fuel for inflation. Expectations for a series of cuts from the Fed have been a major reason the S&P 500 has set an all-time high 57 times so far this year. And the Fed is part of a global surge: 62 central banks have lowered rates in the past three months, the most since 2020, according to Michael Hartnett and other strategists at Bank of America. Still, the jobs report may have included some notes of caution for Fed officials underneath the surface. Scott Wren, senior global market strategist at Wells Fargo Investment Institute, pointed to average wages for workers last month, which were a touch stronger than economists expected. While that’s good news for workers who would always like to make more, it could keep upward pressure on inflation. “This report tells the Fed that they still need to be careful as sticky housing/shelter/wage data shows that it won’t be easy to engineer meaningfully lower inflation from here in the nearer term,” Wren said. So, while traders are betting on an 85% probability the Fed will ease its main rate in two weeks, they’re much less certain about how many more cuts it will deliver next year, according to data from CME Group. For now, the hope is that the job market can help U.S. shoppers continue to spend and keep the U.S. economy out of a recession that had earlier seemed inevitable after the Fed began hiking interest rates swiftly to crush inflation. Several retailers offered encouragement after delivering better-than-expected results for the latest quarter. Ulta Beauty rallied 9% after topping expectations for both profit and revenue. The opening of new stores helped boost its revenue, and it raised the bottom end of its forecasted range for sales over this full year. Lululemon stretched 15.9% higher following its own profit report. It said stronger sales outside the United States helped it in particular, and its earnings topped analysts’ expectations. Retailers overall have been offering mixed signals on how resilient U.S. shoppers can remain amid the slowing job market and still-high prices. Target gave a dour forecast for the holiday shopping season, for example, while Walmart gave a much more encouraging outlook. A report on Friday suggested sentiment among U.S. consumers may be improving more than economists expected. The preliminary reading from the University of Michigan’s survey hit its highest level in seven months. The survey found a surge in buying for some products as consumers tried to get ahead of possible increases in price due to higher tariffs that President-elect Donald Trump has threatened. In tech, Hewlett Packard Enterprise jumped 10.6% for one of the S&P 500’s larger gains after reporting stronger profit and revenue than expected. Tech stocks were some of the market’s strongest this week, as Salesforce and other big companies talked up how much of a boost they’re getting from the artificial-intelligence boom. All told, the S&P 500 rose 15.16 points to 6,090.27. The Dow dipped 123.19 to 44,642.52, and the Nasdaq composite climbed 159.05 to 19,859.77. In the bond market, the yield on the 10-year Treasury yield slipped to 4.15% from 4.18% late Thursday. In stock markets abroad, France’s CAC 40 rose 1.3% after French President Emmanuel Macron announced plans to stay in office until the end of his term and to name a new prime minister within days. Earlier this week, far-right and left-wing lawmakers approved a no-confidence motion due to budget disputes, forcing Prime Minister Michel Barnier and his cabinet to resign. In Asia, stock indexes were mixed. They rallied 1.6% in Hong Kong and 1% in Shanghai ahead of an annual economic policy meeting scheduled for next week. South Korea’s Kospi dropped 0.6% as South Korea’s ruling party chief showed support for suspending the constitutional powers of President Yoon Suk Yeol after he declared martial law and then revoked that earlier this week. Yoon is facing calls to resign and may be impeached. Bitcoin was sitting near $101,500 after briefly bursting above $103,000 to a record the day before. AP Writers Matt Ott and Zimo Zhong contributed. Copyright 2024 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. Get local news delivered to your inbox!Ralph Lauren Corp. Cl A stock underperforms Friday when compared to competitorsOn a Sunday NBA slate that includes 12 compelling contests, the Houston Rockets versus the Los Angeles Clippers is one to see in particular. If you are searching for live coverage of today’s NBA play, we’ve got you covered. Check out the links below. Sign up for NBA League Pass to get access to games, live and on-demand, and more for the entire season and offseason. Watch ESPN originals, The Last Dance and more NBA content on ESPN+. Use our link to sign up for ESPN+ or the Disney bundle. Not all offers available in all states, please visit BetMGM for the latest promotions for your area. Must be 21+ to gamble, please wager responsibly. If you or someone you know has a gambling problem, contact 1-800-GAMBLER .When Willy Adames hit a three-run home run on his 29th birthday, Milwaukee Brewers manager Pat Murphy got real after the game. “He’s going to get paid a lot of money,” Murphy said. The obvious is now a reality. Adames agreed to a 7-year, $182 million deal with the San Francisco Giants on Saturday, according to a league source. The handsome payday is fitting for Adames, who entered this winter as the clear-cut top shortstop in free agency. Adames was worth 4.8 fWAR last season after setting career highs in home runs (32) and stolen bases (21). Adames was a leader who earned respect for his clutch performances and has quietly emerged as one of the game’s top players over the past three seasons. Since 2022, Adames ranks 29th among all MLB players and sixth among shortstops with 12.6 fWAR. Source confirms: Willy Adames to Giants, seven years, $182M, pending physical. Biggest contract in Giants history, surpassing Posey’s $167M deal. — Ken Rosenthal (@Ken_Rosenthal) December 7, 2024 Originally signed by the Tigers as an international amateur, Adames was traded to the Tampa Bay Rays as part of the deal that sent David Price to Detroit. Adames spent parts of four seasons with the Rays before his trade to Milwaukee in May of 2021. Although he can be prone to whiffs and strikeouts (his 29.5 percent whiff rate last season ranked in the 21st percentile among MLB players), Adames has solidified himself as one of the game’s top offensive producers at shortstop. If there is a concern going forward, it may revolve around his defense. Advertisement Considered a plus defender in the past, Adames’ defensive metrics tumbled mightily this past season. He was worth -16 defensive runs saved and 0 outs above average in 2024. His 20 errors were the fourth most among all players, and some evaluators believe Adames may eventually be better suited moving to third base. Nonetheless, the Giants just acquired an impact infielder still in his prime years. After finishing 10th in National League MVP voting during his contract season, Adames now has a chance to emerge as an even bigger star. GO DEEPER San Francisco Giants free-agent profile: Willy Adames, SS (Photo: John Fisher / Getty Images)