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SAN FRANCISCO — Google allowed social media network Parler back into its Play Store on Friday, more than a year after banning the platform popular with conservatives in the wake of the insurrection at the US Capitol.

Google pulled the Parler app from its online marketplace just days after the deadly attack on the seat of US government on January 6, 2021, saying it had allowed "egregious content" that could incite more violence.

Parler had become a haven for far-right personalities who say they have been censored by other social media platforms such as Twitter. 

The attack on the Capitol, incited in part by online misinformation and violent rhetoric on sites such as Parler, was carried out by far-right supporters of former president Donald Trump, who sought to overturn the results of the 2020 election which he lost to Joe Biden.

Parler was allowed back in the Play Store after meeting requirements regarding removing abusive posts and blocking users who break the app's rules, according to Google.

"All apps on Google Play that feature user generated content are required to implement robust moderation practices that prohibit objectionable content," a Google spokesperson said in response to an AFP inquiry.

"Apps are able to appear on Google Play provided they comply with Play's developer policies."

Parler agreed to abide by Play Store rules and modified its app for Android-powered mobile devices to comply with its policies, according to Google.

Versions of the Parler app tailored for iPhones or iPads were also banned at Apple's App Store after the insurrection.

But they were put back on its virtual shelves last year after updates aimed at curbing incitements to violence, Apple said at the time.

Parler claimed to have more than 20 million users before being pulled from the Apple and Google online marketplaces.

Conservatives backing Trump's bid to overturn his election loss sparked a migration to alternative social media sites whose lax moderation policies have allowed misinformation to flourish.

MOSCOW — Russia has halted gas deliveries to Germany via a key pipeline an indefinite period after saying on Friday it had found problems in a key piece of equipment, a development that will worsen Europe's energy crisis.

Russian gas giant Gazprom said on Friday that the Nord Stream pipeline due to reopen at the weekend would remain shut until a turbine is repaired.

In a statement, Gazprom indicated it had discovered "oil leaks" in a turbine during a planned three-day maintenance operation.

Gazprom added that "until it is repaired... the transport of gas via Nord Stream is completely suspended".

Resumption of deliveries via the pipeline which runs from near St Petersburg to Germany under the Baltic Sea, had been due to resume on Saturday. 

Gazprom said it had discovered the problems while carrying out maintenance with representatives of Siemens, which manufactured the turbine in a compressor station that pushes gas through the pipeline.

On its Telegram page it published a picture of cables covered in a brown liquid.

Earlier in the day, the Kremlin warned the future operation of the Nord Stream pipeline, one of Gazprom's major supply routes, was at risk due to a lack of spare parts.

"There are no technical reserves, only one turbine is working," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters.

"So the reliability of the operation, of the whole system, is at risk," he said, adding that it was "not through the fault" of Russian energy giant Gazprom.

Following the imposition of economic sanctions over the Kremlin's invasion of Ukraine, Russia has reduced or halted supplies to different European nations, causing energy prices to soar.

The Kremlin has blamed the reduction of supplies via Nord Stream on European sanctions which it says have blocked the return of a Siemens turbine that had been undergoing repairs in Canada.

Germany, which is where the turbine is located now, has said Moscow is blocking the return of the critical piece of equipment.

Berlin has previously accused Moscow of using energy as a weapon.

The announcement by Gazprom comes the same day as the G-7 nations said they would work to quickly implement a price cap on Russian oil exports, a move which would starve the Kremlin of critical revenue for its war effort.

Gazprom also announced the suspension of gas supplies to France's main provider Engie from Thursday after it failed to pay for all deliveries made in July.

'Much better position' 

As winter approaches, European nations have been seeking to completely fill their gas reserves, secure alternative supplies, and put into place plans to reduce consumption. 

A long-term halt to Russian gas supplies would complicate efforts by some nations to avoid shortages and rationing, however.

Germany said on Friday its gas supplies were secure despite the halt to deliveries via Nord Stream.

"The situation on the gas market is tense, but security of supply is guaranteed," a spokeswoman for the economy ministry said in a statement. 

The spokeswoman did not comment on the "substance" of Gazprom's announcement earlier on Friday but said Germany had "already seen Russia's unreliability in the past few weeks".

German officials have in recent times struck a more positive tone about the coming winter.

Before the latest shutdown, Chancellor Olaf Scholz said Germany was now "in a much better position" in terms of energy security, having achieved its gas storage targets far sooner than expected.

Europe as a whole has also been pushing ahead with filling its gas storage tanks, while fears over throttled supplies have driven companies to slash their energy usage.

Germany's industry consumed 21.3 per cent less gas in July than the average for the month from 2018 to 2021, said the Federal Network Agency.

Agency chief Klaus Mueller has said such pre-emptive action "could save Germany from a gas emergency this winter".

Europe as a bloc meanwhile has been preparing to take emergency action to reform the electricity market in order to bring galloping prices under control. 

Fear of shortages of natural gas has driven futures contracts for electricity in France and Germany to record levels.

European consumers are also bracing for huge power bills as utilities pass on their higher energy costs.

LONDON — Global stock markets sank on Thursday, propelled by rampant inflation and growing recession fears.

Frankfurt, London and Paris equities each slid about 1.5 per cent, while oil prices tumbled on demand worries.

That followed losses across Asia as investors braced for more interest rate hikes, which seek to quell runaway inflation yet could derail economic activity.

Europe's stocks also fell Wednesday as record-high eurozone inflation fuelled fears that borrowing costs are set to climb even higher, as the region faces rocketing winter energy costs due to Russia's war on Ukraine.

The European Central Bank will announce its latest monetary policy decision next week, after delivering its first rate hike in a decade in July.

"Markets remain unable to snap their recent losing streak, with investors still positioning for tougher times ahead," said Interactive Investor analyst Richard Hunter.

"Central to current concerns are recessionary fears in the US and a beleaguered China. 

"With the world's two largest economies under pressure, the immediate outlook is poor."

Asian equities weakened further on Thursday as traders continued to digest shrinking factory activity in powerhouse economy China.

Shanghai also dropped after news that the Chinese city of Chengdu would effectively lock down around 16 million people in a bid to contain a COVID-19 outbreak, likely dealing another blow to a stuttering economy.

Wall Street slid on Wednesday as Treasury yields — a key gauge of future interest rates — rose further, as a broadly healthy report on US private jobs showed there was room for the Federal Reserve (Fed) to continue tightening monetary policy.

Another top Fed official signalled the bank was determined to keep lifting borrowing costs, mirroring recent comments by the US central bank's head Jerome Powell that there would be no let-up in the fight against inflation.

US interest rates are currently at 2.25-2.5 per cent, and there is a growing expectation they will be hiked by a bumper 75 basis points for a third successive meeting later this month.

A government jobs report due Friday will be closely watched by traders hoping for an idea about the next move by the bank.

The prospect of more US rate hikes continued to push the dollar higher, with 140 yen within reach for the first time since 1998.

The greenback was also at its strongest level against the pound since the height of the pandemic in 2020, with sterling buying less than $1.16.

MILAN — Italy said on Wednesday it chose a bid by US investment fund Certares, in partnership with Delta Airlines and Air France-KLM, for exclusive talks to take over national carrier ITA Airways.

The decision came as a surprise, as Swiss-Italian shipping group MSC and its ally, German airline Lufthansa, had appeared frontrunners in the race to buy Alitalia's successor.

The offer by Certares and its partners "was deemed to be the most in line with the objectives set" by the state, which owns 100 per cent of the company, the Italian economy ministry said in a statement, without disclosing the amount on the table.

"At the end of the exclusive negotiations, binding agreements will only be signed if their content is fully satisfactory for the public shareholder," the ministry said.

According to the Italian daily Il Messaggero, the Certares fund, which specialises in tourism, has proposed to buy nearly 56 per cent of ITA for around 600 million euros ($599 million).

The Italian state would retain a 44 per cent stake and have two of the five seats on the future ITA board.

MSC and Lufthansa had proposed at the end of August to pay 850 million euros for 80 per cent of ITA, a lower offer than a previous one of 1.3 billion to 1.4 billion euros made in January, due to the expected decline of the airline market after the summer.

Soaring energy prices, the war in Ukraine, a lack of staff and the resurgence of coronavirus all contribute to a hazy outlook.

Lufthansa said: "From our point of view, our joint offer with MSC was the better solution for ITA."

"Evidently, a path is now being chosen that allows more state influence and does not envisage the complete privatisation of ITA.

"Even without a cooperation with ITA, the Lufthansa Group remains excellently positioned in Italy."

The travel agency network controlled by Certares will enable ITA to expand its presence in the United States.

French-Dutch airline Air France-KLM has previously set its sights on Alitalia — in 2009, it acquired a 25 per cent stake in the Italian company before gradually withdrawing from it from 2013.

Its hands are tied by EU conditions set in return for state aid it received during the coronavirus pandemic.

It was prevented from taking a stake of more than 10 per cent in another company in the sector.

The Italian government gave the green light in February to the privatisation of the state-owned airline, which took to the skies in October last year.

ITA Airways replaced the loss-making national carrier Alitalia, which was put under state administration in 2017, after years of fruitless attempts to find a buyer.

The Italian state has spent more than 13 billion euros trying to get the national airline back on its feet.

NEW YORK — Elon Musk made a fresh filing to terminate his Twitter deal, citing new revelations from the platform's former security boss about major security gaps and misleading account data, a document made public on Tuesday showed.

In their filing to the Securities and Exchange Commission, Musk's lawyers said the information recently provided by whistleblower Peiter Zatko illustrated "far-reaching misconduct at Twitter... that is likely to have severe consequences for Twitter's business".

Musk, who has sought repeatedly to pull out of the $44 billion agreement to purchase the social media giant, has formally subpoenaed Zatko to have him share information about spam accounts and data protection shortcomings at Twitter.

The Tesla boss hopes allegations made by Zatko will bolster his case. According to court documents released on  Monday, Zatko was ordered to answer questions on the record for Musk lawyers on September 9.

The claims by Zatko have been sent to two US regulators as well as the Department of Justice.

Zatko claims Twitter misled users and regulators about "extreme, egregious" security gaps.

In a letter to Twitter's general counsel included in the SEC filing, Musk lawyer Mike Ringler wrote that allegations about certain facts known to Twitter prior to July 8 but undisclosed to Musk "have since come to light that provide additional and distinct bases to terminate the Merger Agreement".

Ringler added that the new elements are not necessary to justify a termination of the deal, but constitute additional arguments "in the event that the July 8 Termination Notice is determined to be invalid for any reason".

In early July, Musk announced he was breaking the buyout agreement with Twitter's board of directors, accusing the company of not living up to its commitments by not disclosing the exact number of inauthentic and spam accounts.

The move prompted Twitter to sue the billionaire entrepreneur to force him to honor the terms of the agreement.

A trial, which is scheduled to last five days, will begin on October 17 in a special court in Delaware.

Musk's attempt to back out of buying Twitter has struggled for momentum in court.

Twitter won some early battles in the case, including a fast-track trial date, and its stock had risen as analysts predicted the platform would prevail over the mercurial Musk.

But a US judge last week told Twitter to surrender more data to Musk on the key issue of fake accounts, and the billionaire hopes Zatko's whistleblower complaint could further turn the tide in its favor.

According to Dan Ives of Wedbush Securities, Zatko's accusations, just weeks away from trial, are "a huge potential win for Musk which could complicate the Twitter case".

PARIS — The cost-of-living crisis pushing millions of people towards poverty in Europe is driven by fossil fuels, according to a leading Earth systems scientist, who has warned that global heating risks causing runaway climate change.

Johan Rockstrom, director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and co-author of the new book Earth For All, said that spiralling inflation was in large measure a result of decades of government failures to decarbonise their economies.

"I find it very disturbing that our political leaders in Europe are unable to communicate that high living costs right now are caused by higher prices on fossil fuels," he told AFP at the book's launch on Tuesday.

"So this is fossil fuel-driven, supply-driven inflation. If 20 years ago you invested in solar [panels] or had a share in a wind farm, you're not affected today."

"The only reason why we have this crisis now is that we've had 30 years of underinvestment in preparing towards this turbulent phase which we knew would be coming," said Rockstrom.

"We've been saying since 1990 that we need to phase out the fossil fuel-driven economy towards a renewable-driven economy. And now here we are — we're now hitting the wall."

European energy prices soared to new records last week ahead of what many analysts expect to be a challenging winter as Russia's invasion of Ukraine continues to disrupt oil and gas supplies.

The year-ahead contract for German electricity reached 995 euros ($995) per megawatt hour, while the French equivalent surged past 1,100 euros — a more than tenfold increase in both countries from last year.

In Britain, energy regulator Ofgem said it would increase the electricity and gas price cap almost twofold from October 1 to an average £3,549 ($4,197) per year.

Rockstrom, who helped pioneer the concept of planetary boundaries — thresholds of pollution or warming within which humanity can thrive — said he hoped the current energy price crisis would be "communicated as another nail in the coffin" for oil, gas and coal.

"This should accelerate our transition towards renewable energy systems," he said.

'Giant changes required' 

Rockstrom has spent two years working on Earth For All — a guide to help humans survive climate change — with several of the authors of The Limits to Growth.

Written 50 years ago, that groundbreaking work warned that the development of civilisation could not go on indefinitely with no limit to resource consumption.

The new book outlines two growth trajectories this century.

The first — "Too Little, Too Late" — sees the economic orthodoxy of the last 40 years endure, leading to ever starker inequality as the Earth's average temperature rises by 2.5ºC  by 2100.

The second — the "Great Leap" scenario — sees unprecedented mobilisation of resources to produce five changes: Eradicate poverty and inequality, empower women, transform the global food system towards more plant-based diets and rapidly de-carbonise energy.

In particular, the book says the International Monetary Fund must provide $1 trillion annually to poorer nations to create green jobs, and rich governments to cancel debt to low-income creditors while giving their own citizens a "universal basic dividend" to help share corporate windfalls.

Rockstrom said the tools are already available to make the Great Leap possible.

"[It] is to do with the current knowledge on all the current existing technologies and practices and policies. If we could put in place all the five turnarounds and scale them up very fast, that's the best outcome we can have."

'Urgency point' 

The project comes after another record-breaking summer that has seen unprecedented heatwaves and drought in Europe and China and devastating floods in Pakistan.

Rockstrom said the world had reached an "urgency point" as climate-linked disasters occur more frequently than predicted in climate models.

"Here we are — at 1.1ºC [of warming now], the things that we thought would happen perhaps at 2ºC are happening much earlier and are hitting harder," he said.

Rockstrom was recently involved in a paper studying the "climate endgame" — scenarios such as the complete melting of the Greenland ice sheet or heating "feedback loops", which are deemed by scientists to be extremely unlikely and, he believes, therefore understudied.

He explained the possibility of "self-amplified warming", which is when the Earth itself is triggered into producing emissions from carbon stored in forests and methane in permafrost.

"There is a risk of rolling towards a worst-case scenario, not because we are ploughing in more carbon dioxide and greenhouse gasses from [manmade] sourcing but that the Earth system itself starts emitting these greenhouse gasses."

Rockstrom said scientists needed to "open up a much broader palette of scenarios" in climate models that could incorporate the kind of low-probability, high-impact events that could lead to runaway warming.

As to whether governments were finally ready to take the kind of system-changing action needed to avoid climate meltdown, Rockstrom said that he was "actually quite pessimistic".

"If you asked me three years ago, I would have said I was optimistic — we saw a post-Paris momentum and more policies coming into play and businesses stepping on board," he said.

"Now with the post-COVID meltdown in public trust and the rise of populism... I cannot see that we are really ready to implement all these giant leaps.

"That's why timing is really important. We need to bring back the debate and we have to have a conversation about the urgency of action. But is it a challenge? Definitely."

NEW YORK — The world's top automakers — motivated either by governmental regulations or pure profit — have made a sharp turn away from fossil fuel vehicles. But there are plenty of obstacles on the road to a future full of eco-friendly cars.

Will there be enough lithium and other vital raw materials to make electric car batteries? Will there be sufficient charging stations? How will carmakers ensure that their offerings are affordable for the average driver?

Following the success of Elon Musk's Tesla, built solely on electric vehicles, most of the biggest names in the sector are planning to invest tens of billions of dollars to reorient their businesses towards clean energy.

Stellantis, the world's fifth-largest automaker, plans to sell only electric cars in Europe by 2030. Toyota expects to release about 30 electric models in that same timeframe. General Motors (GM) hopes to stop making cars with combustion engines by 2035.

These corporate ambitions have dovetailed with efforts by national and local governments to go green.

On Thursday, California announced that from 2035, all new cars sold in the Golden State — the most populous in America — must be zero-emission.

The European Union also has taken steps to ban the sale of gas- or diesel-fueled cars — and even hybrids — by 2035, while China wants at least half of all new cars to be electric, plug-in hybrid or hydrogen-powered by that time.

Built-in demand 

Automakers are on notice that "they are going to have to figure out how to put cars on the market," said Jessica Caldwell, executive director of insights for the automotive research firm Edmunds.

"We used to say that the challenges for electric vehicles would be consumer acceptance and price," she added.

With car buyers increasingly attuned to the environment and the woes of climate change, selling the concept of electric vehicles is no longer an issue.

In the United States, General Motors says it has more than 150,000 pre-orders for the electric version of its Silverado pickup truck, which will be available next year. The wait time for a Tesla these days is several months.

For Caldwell, the bigger issue now is whether automakers "can get the raw materials" they need to make the cars.

Scarce raw materials 

Karl Brauer, an executive analyst for used car search engine iseecars.com, agrees, saying that no matter what government incentives are offered for would-be buyers of electric vehicles, the rare elements needed may simply be unavailable.

"Right now, we have a lack of palladium, and nickel, and lithium. Everything you need to build an electric car is harder to get than it was six or 12 months ago," he said.

The supply issue is linked partly to Russia's invasion of Ukraine six months ago.

But Brauer said that "nobody, a year ago, would have predicted the kind of price escalation for those raw materials, and the difficulty of getting them".

The situation "can change drastically" at any given moment, he added.

Automakers are determined to leave as little as possible to chance.

They are building their own factories to produce car batteries, setting up joint ventures with specialised parts makers and sealing partnerships with mining firms.

German auto manufacturers Volkswagen and Mercedes-Benz on Monday signed memorandums of understanding with the Canadian government to ensure their access to rare metals such as lithium, nickel and cobalt.

But, as with oil, the market for these raw materials is a global one, and the normal rules of economics apply, noted Brauer.

"If there is a certain amount of global demand for raw materials, if there is a certain amount of global supply for them, someone will always pay the price," he said.

For Brauer, shifting production lines to accommodate electric vehicle components is, by comparison, quite easy, as the automakers "have control over that".

Help, but with conditions 

Local regulations could make things more complicated for automakers.

In the United States, new legislation championed by the administration of President Joe Biden allots up to $7,500 in tax credits to every American who buys an electric vehicle.

But there are conditions: for example, final assembly of those cars must take place within US borders.

The Alliance for Automotive Innovation, a US lobbying group, estimates that about 70 per cent of the 72 electric, plug-in hybrid or hydrogen-powered cars now on the market would not qualify for the tax credit.

For Garrett Nelson, an analyst for the CFRA research firm, the new law will clearly give Tesla, GM and Ford an advantage in the United States over their European and Asian rivals.

Following California's announcement, the Alliance for Automotive Innovation said it would be "extremely challenging" to meet the sales requirements due to external factors such as inflation, supply chains and charging infrastructure.

The ongoing semiconductor shortage will also play a role, it said in a statement.

"These are complex, intertwined and global issues well beyond the control of authorities in California or the auto industry," it warned.

CAIRO — An economic crisis spurred by the Ukraine war is casting darkness upon Egypt's streets, as the government dims lights to free up energy for export and bolster hard currency reserves.

Russia's invasion of Ukraine had an immediate impact on Egypt, the world's biggest wheat importer which has relied on the ex-Soviet states for over 80 per cent of its grain.

Egypt, which turned to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for a loan after the war erupted, is pumping more natural gas abroad to increase its foreign currency reserves — a move that has come in for criticism.

While the government announced electricity rationing this month, signs of wastage elicit scorn.

"I see streetlights still working during daylight hours... and we're suffering from high electricity bills," said a disgruntled Cairo resident in his 30s who spoke on condition of anonymity.

The country's vital tourism sector has also been hit by the Ukraine conflict, cutting the flow of holidaymakers to a country still hurting from the 2011 revolution and COVID-19 pandemic.

Economic growth slowed to 3.2 per cent in the fourth quarter of 2021-22 against 7.7 per cent last year, although annual expansion was 6.6 per cent.

Despite the better-than-expected annual figure, the government said growth had tapered off in the wake of "global political and economic developments".

Egypt's monetary policy has been caught between a rock and a hard place since Russia invaded Ukraine in February.

Inflation hit a three-year high of 14.6 per cent in July after Egypt devalued the pound, pushing up the price of imports and depleting forex reserves by $7.8 billion since February to $33.1 billion in July.

Capital flight 

Egypt is negotiating an IMF loan to help mitigate fallout from the Ukraine war on the country, where 30 per cent of the 103 million population lives in poverty.

But the talks have stretched out for six months, raising eyebrows among analysts.

"The fact that talks with the IMF have dragged is probably a sign that some officials are reluctant to follow through on the Fund's demands and would prefer to rely on support from the oil-flush Gulf economies," London's Capital Economics said.

"We need to speed up negotiations with the IMF," said Hany Genena, an economist and lecturer at American University in Cairo.

"Since last week, there has been a severe shortage of dollars provided to importers by banks in various sectors."

Cairo had previously secured a $12 billion IMF loan in 2016 that required it to slash subsidies and devalue the pound.

In 2020, Egypt received two more loans, including $5.4 billion tied to reforms and $2.8 billion to tackle COVID.

Genena said Egypt needed to undertake more "drastic" reforms to restore its forex reserves, including a full float of the pound.

Last week, as the currency plunged to a near all-time low of 19.1 to the dollar, central bank Governor Tarek Amer resigned.

It was unclear why Amer quit, but Egyptian media suggested it was because of his reluctance to implement a full float.

James Swanston of Capital Economics said the currency needed to depreciate to 25 pounds to the dollar by the end of 2024 "to avoid external imbalances rebuilding".

But $14.6 billion worth of investments has flown out of the country in the first quarter of 2022, reflecting concerns over the Ukraine war.

Capital Economics said, however, that investment pledges worth $22 billion from Gulf countries will "go some way to alleviating external financing concerns".

Gas lifeline 

Among Egypt's slate of measures to preserve foreign currency was a decision to let the pound slip 17 per cent against the greenback in March.

The government said electricity rationing seeks to achieve "an additional surplus — at an average of 15 per cent of the natural gas pumped to power stations — that can be exported and bring in hard currency".

Among the measures to conserve energy were "reducing lighting in streets and public squares".

Since 2018, Egypt has been ramping up its natural gas capacity, now setting its sights on an energy-hungry Europe, which is eager to decrease reliance on Russian gas.

The government announced this month "exceptional aid to nine million families at a cost of $52 million per month", but for many, the soaring cost of living had already done enough damage. 

Mahmoud Al Saeedy, a fruit salesman in Cairo, has depleted his savings trying to keep up with rising prices.

"I return to my village in the south every 40 or 50 days, with only 600 pounds [$31.3] to give to my family," he said.

"What can they do with it?"