23: At least 23 people were killed on Friday in an airstrike on a Buddhist monastery in northern Myanmar. The attack is believed to have been carried out by the country’s ruling military junta. Since seizing power in a 2021 coup, the junta has been locked in brutal civil war with several powerful rebel groups.
15%: The US State Department is about to lay off 15% of its 18,000 US-based staff, as part of an efficiency drive. Secretary of State Marco Rubio says the move will make Washington’s foreign policy more agile, while critics say it will downsize America’s diplomatic capabilities at a critical moment.
$4 trillion: The AI chipmaker Nvidia has become the world’s first company valued at more than $4 trillion. Its remarkable rise in value is one of the fastest in Wall Street history, leaving its main domestic rivals Apple and Microsoft feeling.. Nvious indeed.
$20 million: Former Columbia University student and Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil filed a $20-million claim Thursday against the US government for damages incurred during his Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention. The lawsuit accuses ICE of false arrest and imprisonment, malicious prosecution, abuse of process, and intentional infliction of emotional distress. The Department of Homeland Security dismissed Khalil’s claims as “absurd.”
5,000: Gang violence has killed nearly 5,000 people in Haiti since last October alone, according to a new UN report. The Caribbean country has been mired in a deepening political, economic, and humanitarian crisis since the 2021 assassination of president Jovenel Moïse. An international police force sent to the island last year has failed to dislodge the gangs, which control large swathes of the capital, Port-au-Prince.
