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7: A no-deal Brexit would push the UK into recession and hit its economy seven times harder than the rest of the EU, the IMF forecast on Tuesday.

529 billion: Remittances (money sent home by immigrants) to low- and middle-income countries set a record in 2018, according to the World Bank. The total reached $529 billion, a sum greater than foreign investment in the developing world during the same period.


11: More evidence the US economy remains strong: According to official data released in March, the US economy had 7.6 million unfilled jobs at the end of January, but just 6.5 million people looking for work. That was the 11th straight month the number of US job openings topped the number of job seekers.

85: By 2050, up to 85 percent of the world's French speakers will live in Africa, according to estimates from an organization that monitors language statistics. That's up from about 44 percent of all French speakers today. The expected increase will come mainly from rising birth rates in French-speaking African countries but also higher rates of French language study in both English and Portuguese-speaking African countries.

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PA via Reuters Ukraine's Vladyslav Heraskevych, with his helmet, which features pictures of people killed in the war with Russia. Heraskevych was ruled out of the Men's Skeleton event by the International Olympic Committee just over an hour before competition began, pictured at the Cortina Sliding Centre, on day six of the Milano Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics, Italy. Picture date: Thursday February 12, 2026.

PA via Reuters Ukraine's Vladyslav Heraskevych, with his helmet, which features pictures of people killed in the war with Russia. Heraskevych was ruled out of the Men's Skeleton event by the International Olympic Committee just over an hour before competition began, pictured at the Cortina Sliding Centre, on day six of the Milano Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics, Italy. Picture date: Thursday February 12, 2026.

20: The number of fallen Ukrainian athletes and coaches depicted on a Ukrainian skeleton racer’s helmet at the Winter Olympics, which prompted the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to disqualify him on Thursday. The IOC said the helmet violated Olympic rules, which prohibit political messaging during games. Critics of the disqualification said [...]