CharlieH

Reported video removed.

OK, enough on that. CLOSED

The staff at the bank follow procedures, do not flex, and tick boxes. The procedure stops them in their tracks. When I had an issue, I insisted that my wife talk with the branch manager, not any of the staff. The manager has the power to use his or her discretion and tell the staff to do what is needed. That said, it seems you need a new card issued; you are NOT their to sign the paperwork, signature verification ID check etc so I dont see how they are going to bypass that critical step in the procedure. What you may be able to ask, just a suggestion, is the number of that new card issued and the branch to hold the actual card until you return in person. That would give you the details you need for the online aspect.Its doubtful, but worth a try as a work-around. Good luck, do tell us how it went.

@swissie If you want to start a topic, it can then be "pinned" at the head of this finance section and if there is sufficient interest and participation that could then be split off later into its own sub-forum. So, yes it can be done, step by step.

Not a forum Support issue, moved to Visa forum

Pornhub has released its global yearly report, revealing the most-searched fetishes of 2023. Users were particularly interested in 'mature' content, with searches like 'sexy granny', 'MILF', 'DILF' and 'cougar' all making the top spots. The adult website sifted through data from billions of visits to see what content defined the year's tastes, finding the top category was 'The Golden Age.' IN general, 2023 was a breakout year for artificial intelligence, and Pornhub's results show that this also extended to pornography, with searches for 'android' porn also popular. Dr. Laurie Betito of the Sexual Wellness Center said: 'It is human nature to be curious about the extraordinary. When it comes to sex, it is no different. 'We are all voyeurs to some degree, and we want to see the extremes—what we generally don't have access to in real life.' After elderly porn, the second most popular category was 'Super Size.' Source

Looks like a mix of fermino,ogy here. O-A visa issued outside the country. Non O , extention of stay based on ....xxxxx

If you have regular monthly income exceeding 40k per month, check with your office on the combination method. 400k + income totalling 800k.If they accept that then you don't need to change anything. Or if your income is in excess of 65k per month is another alternative to changing. As mentioned, better to wait until AFTER your next renewal.

The EU has agreed to open membership talks with Ukraine. European Council President Charles Michel said on Thursday: “The European Council has decided to open accession negotiations with Ukraine & Moldova.” Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelensky declared the move a victory “for Ukraine and all of Europe”. The announcement came after Vladimir Putin inadvertently admitted that more than 300,000 Russian soldiers have died or been heavily wounded in the ongoing war. The figures are in stark contrast to the last death toll offered by the Kremlin, which suggested less than 6,000 troops in Ukraine had been killed. During his first news conference since the full-scale invasion, he suggested that 244,000 Russians had been mobilised, before adding that 486,000 had volunteered to fight. He then proceeded to say that 617,000 Russians were fighting in Ukraine. This figure roughly aligns with US estimates that were declassified earlier this week, which suggested that Russia had suffered 315,000 dead and injured troops in Ukraine. But the last time the Kremlin offered an estimate of the death toll was September 2022, in which they said only 5,937 soldiers had been killed. FULL STORY

Special Report: One little girl desperately wanted to be a YouTube star. Her brother adored football and his favourite player, Cristiano Ronaldo. Their cousin was a teenage electronics wiz. Since the start of Israel’s offensive in Gaza, more than 7,000 children have been killed in airstrikes, artillery and mortar fire. Often entire families disappeared in an instant. Here are the stories of nine Palestinian children who’ve been killed in the war. Before the war began, Gaza’s streets teemed with children. Roughly half of the two million people who call the narrow strip of land home are under 18. At the weekend, and when school was out, the beaches, parks and playgrounds were full of the sounds of children laughing and playing. But Gaza’s children have had to endure so much in their short lives. A 15-year-old will have lived through five wars in their lifetime, including the current conflict. Many have been displaced several times because their homes were destroyed by bombing. Even so, they had never experienced destruction like this. Since the start of Israel’s offensive in Gaza, more than 7,000 children have been killed in airstrikes, artillery and mortar fire. That number only accounts for those who have been identified, and many more likely lie beneath the rubble. Thousands have been injured. The United Nations has described Gaza as “a graveyard for thousands of children,” and “the most dangerous place in the world to be a child.” Lost in those unfathomable numbers are the faces, the names, the lives, and the moments of joy those children brought. Here are some of their stories. The confident athlete: Siwar Almadhoun, 13 Siwar was tall for her age, and she put it to good use. Basketball was her passion. She played whenever she could – at school, in her own time, in the summer – and she won trophies. There’s a video of her, taken after winning a basketball tournament, showing her dancing on a big stage in front of a crowd while confetti sprays around her and music blares. The whole team jumps up and down with their medals. She used to wear an old basketball jersey from a Florida high school all the time because it had a hoop and a ball on the front. She loved volleyball, too – another sport where her height gave her an advantage. Siwar was much more independent than most girls her age. “She didn’t care. She would go out and run errands on her own, she would go to the beach and swim. She was always doing things, she wasn’t shy at all,” says her uncle, Hani Almadhoun. She was the most outgoing of all of her siblings; despite only being 13, she brimmed with confidence. Hani remembers her always wanting to help her parents. Siwar loved to picnic. If she had a dollar in her hand she would go to a nearby restaurant with her girlfriends where they would order the same meal every time: a shawarma sandwich, pickles, a corn salad and fries. It came in a clamshell contained. FULL REPORT

Scientists now have good numbers to describe the true scale of the world's biggest iceberg, A23a. Satellite measurements show the frozen block has a total average thickness of just over 280m (920ft). Combined with its known area of 3,900 sq km (1,500 sq miles), this gives a volume of roughly 1,100 cubic km and a mass just below a trillion tonnes. The iceberg, which calved from the Antarctic coast in 1986, is about to drift beyond the White Continent. It has reached a critical point in its journey, researchers say, with the next few weeks likely to decide its future trajectory through the Southern Ocean. Attenborough ship encounters mammoth iceberg World's biggest iceberg on the move after 30 years Shackleton's lost ship found after 107 years FULL STORY

The Dow Jones Industrial Average hit an all-time high Wednesday, surpassing 37,000 for the first time, after the Federal Reserve opted to hold interest rates steady once again and signaled the possibility of rate cuts next year. The Dow closed at 37,090, up 1.4 percent, as the central bank indicated that its nearly two-year campaign of rate hikes may be coming to an end. The Fed kept its baseline interest rate at a range of 5.25 to 5.5 percent for a third consecutive meeting Wednesday, as inflation has continued to show steady improvement since hitting a 40-year high last summer. “Inflation has eased from its highs, and this has come without a significant increase in unemployment,” Fed Chair Jerome Powell said at a press conference following the central bank’s announcement. “That’s very good news. But inflation is still too high.” Powell and Fed officials are hoping to bring inflation back down to 2 percent. The latest data released by the Labor Department on Tuesday showed consumer prices up 3.1 percent annually in November. The U.S. economy has remained surprisingly resilient in the face of the Fed’s aggressive rate hike campaign, with the unemployment rate remaining below 4 percent and widespread predictions of a recession failing to materialize so far. While the central bank has said little about its plans for 2024, all but three members of its Federal Open Market Committee — the panel responsible for monetary policy decisions — expect at least two rate cuts next year. FULL STORY

Former Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), who headed the Republican House majority during former President Trump’s first two years in office, says that Trump is not conservative but instead an authoritarian narcissist whose guiding principle is to aggrandize himself. Ryan defended former Republican Reps. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) and Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.) for standing up to Trump and said many Republican lawmakers probably now regret not voting for impeachment charges and missing their chance to remove him from the political stage. “Trump’s not a conservative, he’s an authoritarian narcissist. So I think they basically called him out for that,” Ryan told Teneo Political Risk Advisory Co-President Kevin Kajiwara during a video conference interview when asked about Cheney and Kinzinger. Ryan said Trump is “a populist authoritarian narcissist.” “Historically speaking, all of his tendencies are basically where narcissism takes him, which is whatever makes him popular, makes him feel good in any given moment,” he added. “He doesn’t think in classical liberal conservative terms. He thinks in an authoritarian way and he’s been able to get a big chunk of the Republican base to follow him because he’s the culture warrior.” Ryan said Cheney and Kinzinger “stepped out of the flow” of many other Republicans falling into lockstep with Trump “and called it out.” He said they “paid for it with [their] careers” but made the right move. “There has to be some line, some principle that is so important to you that you’re not going to cross so that when you’re brushing in the morning and look at yourself in the mirror, you like what you see. I think Adam and Liz are brushing their teeth, liking what they see,” he said. FULL STORY

(NEXSTAR) – Netflix knows what you like, it even offers a percentage chance that you’ll enjoy a new show or movie, but what about the streaming habits of others? For the first time, Netflix released a trove of viewer engagement data Tuesday that reveals which titles people spent the most – and least – time streaming. If you were a fan of FBI thriller “The Night Agent: Season 1,” you’re not alone. Netflix viewers spent 812,100,000 hours – the most of any title – watching FBI agent Peter Sutherland navigate a deadly conspiracy with ties to the White House. The second-most viewed title was “Ginny & Georgia: Season 2,” the dramedy by Sarah Lampert that follows free-spirited young mom Georgia, played by Brianne Howey, as she and her children, Ginny and Austin, try to make a new life in New England. “What We Watched: A Netflix Engagement Report” measures the total hours that viewers spent between January and June of 2023 watching Netflix by the individual show or movie title. The report, which Netflix plans to release twice a year, also notes whether or not the title was globally available and when it came out. The release date is important to keep in mind, because some of the titles might have drawn massive audiences during a period before the Jan. 1, 2023 start of the data. See the top 10 Netflix titles below: Title Available Globally? Release Date 1. The Night Agent: Season 1 Yes 2023-03-23 2. Ginny & Georgia: Season 2 Yes 2023-01-05 3. The Glory: Season 1 // 더 글로리: 시즌 1 Yes 2022-12-30 4. Wednesday: Season 1 Yes 2022-11-23 5. Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story Yes 2023-05-04 6. You: Season 4 Yes 2023-02-09 7. La Reina del Sur: Season 3 No 2022-12-30 8. Outer Banks: Season 3 Yes 2023-02-23 9. Ginny & Georgia: Season 1 Yes 2021-02-24 10. FUBAR: Season 1 Yes 2023-05-25 (Netflix) Netflix said that more than 60% of the titles released during the time frame of the report appeared on the company’s weekly Top 10 lists. The report contains data from Netflix’s extensive library, covering 18,000 titles and nearly 100 billion hours of combined viewing time (numbers were rounded to the nearest 100,000). The list represented 99% of Netflix’s titles, but any show or movie that wasn’t watched for at least 50,000 hours was left off. SOURCE

Tesla is recalling more than two million cars after the US regulator found its driver assistance system, Autopilot, was partly defective. It follows a two-year investigation into crashes which occurred when the tech was in use. The recall applies to almost every Tesla sold in the US since the Autopilot feature was launched in 2015. Tesla, owned by billionaire Elon Musk, said it would send a software update "over the air" to fix the issue. The update happens automatically and does not require a visit to a dealership or garage, but is still referred to by the US regulator as a recall. The UK Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency said it was not aware of any safety issues involving Teslas in the UK, noting that cars sold in the UK are not equipped with all of the same features as cars in the US. "Teslas sold in the UK market are not self-driving and are not approved to do so," a spokesperson said, adding that the agency would continue to monitor the situation. Autopilot is meant to help with steering, acceleration and braking - but, despite the name, the car still requires driver input. Tesla's software is supposed to make sure that drivers are paying attention and that the feature is only in use in appropriate conditions, such as driving on highways. But the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) said a two-year investigation of 956 Tesla crashes found that "the prominence and scope of the feature's controls may not be sufficient to prevent driver misuse". "Automated technology holds great promise for improving safety but only when it is deployed responsibly", the NHTSA wrote, adding it would continue to monitor the software once it was updated. Tesla did not respond to a request for comment. According to the recall notice, the company did not concur with the agency's analysis but agreed to add new features to resolve the concerns, including additional checks on turning on the self-driving features. The recall comes a week after a former Tesla employee told the BBC he believed the technology was not safe. Lukasz Krupski, speaking after winning the Blueprint Prize which recognises whistleblowers, told the BBC: "I don't think the hardware is ready and the software is ready". "It affects all of us because we are essentially experiments in public roads", he claimed. Reacting to the news of the recall Mr Krupski told the BBC it was "a step in the right direction" but pointed out it was not just a problem in the US. "The hardware is the same in all the Teslas in the US, China etc.", he said FULL STORY

The US House of Representatives has voted to formalise its impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden. Lawmakers voted along party lines to back a resolution that Republicans say will give them more power to gather evidence and enforce legal demands. Three Republican-led House committees allege bribery and corruption during Mr Biden's tenure as vice-president. But they have yet to present evidence of wrongdoing, and Mr Biden says his opponents are "attacking me with lies". The lower chamber of Congress, which Republicans control by a slim eight-seat margin, approved the inquiry on Wednesday afternoon by a vote of 221 to 212. Voting to authorise an inquiry is not the same as voting for impeachment, but it advances the likelihood that the House will eventually seek to impeach Mr Biden. In a statement, House Speaker Mike Johnson said the chamber "will not prejudge the investigation's outcome" but "the evidentiary record is impossible to ignore". A formal impeachment investigation, that leads to a House vote and a Senate trial, could represent a major headache for the president in the midst of an election year. But, even if the House ultimately opts to impeach the president, the Democrat-controlled Senate is all but certain to acquit him. Impeachment probe could be major headache for Biden What we know about the Biden impeachment inquiry "The American people need their leaders in Congress to take action on important priorities for the nation and world," Mr Biden said in a statement following the vote. FULL STORY

Since the war in Gaza began, Israel's military operations in the occupied West Bank have become more frequent, and more forceful. The northern city of Jenin - the epicentre of these raids before the Hamas attacks - is now a weekly battleground. The Palestinian teenagers I met who were running from the army there on Tuesday had the sceptical dismissive attitudes of much older men - mocking the Palestinian president and his appeals to the world for protection against Israel's occupation. Behind them, Israel's armoured bulldozers and military jeeps moved around the entrance to Jenin refugee camp, explosions and gunfire from across the city echoing along the deserted, shuttered streets. The walls of this city are covered with the pictures of young men killed by Israeli forces - some of them members of armed groups like Hamas, proscribed as a terrorist organisation by the UK and others. The posters and the faces are refreshed, year after year. Six men were killed in the operation here on Tuesday; four of them in a drone strike, witnesses said. Israel says its operations in the West Bank are targeting members of armed groups, often those with Israeli blood on their hands. But the director of Jenin's hospital, Wissam Bakr, said a chronically ill 13-year-old child also died after being blocked from reaching medical care. "The persistence of the incursions into Jenin, and the killing of young people - this will make the people more and more angry, because every day we lose one of our friends," he said. "This will not bring peace for Israel - this will bring more and more resistance." On 7 October, Hamas gunmen from Gaza attacked southern Israel, killing 1,200 people and taking 240 others hostage. More than 18,400 people are said to have been killed in Gaza during the war that followed. Here in the West Bank, 271 Palestinians, including 69 children, have been killed since the attacks - more than half the total number for the year. Almost all of them have been killed by Israeli forces, according to the United Nations. Since the Hamas attacks, support for armed resistance has risen in many parts of the West Bank - in places like Nablus and Jenin. FULL STORY

Reported post and responses removed

Clearly we are not going to list every network, basically "mainstream" recognised news/media.Moderators may use their discretion as per rule 18. Members can draw their own conclusions as to bias credibility or whatever of mainstream media.

Public Notice There have been a number of issues recently concerning the posting of Social Media videos. We would like to make a few points clear, let's start with the basic forum rule. 18. Social media content is acceptable in most forums. However in factual areas such as but not limited to news, current affairs and health topics, social media cannot be used unless it is from a credible news media source or a government agency, and must include a link to the original source. In some circumstances a moderator may relax this rule and this will be determined on a case by case basis. If this rule is relaxed a moderator will post a public notice explaining the limit and scope of the relaxation. to qualify the above, "credible" means mainstream source(BBC,CNN etc), not just anyone or any obscure media outlet with "news" tagged to its name. The video also needs to be in English.Foreign languages even with subtitles are not permitted. Hope this helps to eliminate any confusion or the need for further removals going forward. Admin

One of Turkey's top football officials may quit the game after he was physically attacked on the pitch by the president of an Ankara club and its fans. The violent attack on elite referee Halil Umut Meler has left Turkish football in a full-blown crisis and magnified concerns about Turkey's institutions. The referee was treated in hospital after he was punched in the face by MKE Ankaragucu president Faruk Koca, after the Ankara-based team conceded a late equaliser in the Turkish capital against Super Lig rivals Caykur Rizespor. While the referee lay injured, furious fans then stormed on to the pitch and kicked him. Ankaragucu's club president has since resigned and been placed in pre-trial detention with two others. The dramatic events after the final whistle underscore the intense emotions surrounding football in Turkey. The sport is massively popular in the country of 85 million people and is a platform that links Turkish politics, business and culture. The attack has prompted the 37-year old referee on Uefa's elite list to contemplate quitting, according to Ali Kunak, former general secretary of the Turkish Football Federation's central arbitration board, who spoke to Meler and local media on Tuesday. The violence has also led to an indefinite suspension of Turkish Super Lig games. The Turkish Football Federation, in a post on X, said it condemned the "inhumane, despicable attack", which it blamed in part on "irresponsible statements of club presidents, managers, coaches, and TV commentators targeting referees". Violence has long been associated with Turkish football, where it is common to see a heavy police presence at matches across the country. FULL STORY

Myanmar is now the world's largest producer of opium, overtaking Afghanistan, a UN report says. Its opium production this year is estimated to rise by 36% to 1,080 tonnes, far ahead of the 330 tonnes Afghanistan reportedly produced. Poppy cultivation in Afghanistan dropped by 95% after a drug ban by the ruling Taliban last year. Meanwhile, cultivation has expanded in Myanmar, where a brutal civil war, has made it a lucrative source of income. "The economic, security and governance disruptions that followed the military takeover of February 2021 continue to drive farmers in remote areas towards opium to make a living," says Jeremy Douglas, regional representative of the United Nations Office for Drugs and Crime (UNODC), which authored the report. Opium, the key ingredient for the hard drug heroin., has been cultivated in Myanmar for decades, where it has funded insurgent groups fighting the government. But in the past year alone, as the civil war triggered by the 2021 coup raged on, cultivation has increased by an estimated 18% - it has also become "increasingly sophisticated", the report says, and more productive, because of the use of densely organised plots, irrigation systems and sometimes fertilisers. Rising prices for the crop have also drawn more people into growing it. The pandemic and the dire state of Myanmar's economy has also made opium cultivation a more reliable and attractive form of employment. A dismal new report by the World Bank says it expects "little growth" in the country. Shan State, which has seen fierce fighting between an alliance of three ethnic armed groups and the military, has always been Myanmar's largest producer of opium. An escalation in the conflict in Shan has even brought down powerful mafia families whose wealth was built from gambling, scam centres and narcotics. But the insurgent groups still rely on the sale of opium to fund their operations. The Chinese mafia's downfall in a lawless casino town A turning point in Myanmar as army suffers big losses Mr Douglas said that the intensification of the conflict in Shan and other border areas is only expected to lead to an increase in opium production. FULL STORY

German prosecutors have charged 27 suspected far-right extremists with planning a violent coup. The suspects are accused of membership of the fringe Reichsbürger - or Citizens of the Reich - movement. "The members of the group strongly rejected state institutions and the free democratic constitutional order," according to the indictment. They are mostly associates of Heinrich XIII Prince Reuss, a Reichsbürger figurehead from an aristocratic family. Prosecutors have charged the 27 people with planning to overthrow Germany's democratic political system. Concrete preparations were made for a coup beginning in summer 2021. The plan was to seize power by invading the Bundestag, Germany's parliament, with a small group of armed personnel. The assault would be launched after receiving a signal, such as the death of Queen Elizabeth II. Inside the self-proclaimed Kingdom of Germany The alleged plotters had already determined how their new state would function after the coup. Prince Reuss was planned to be head of state. On taking office, he would negotiate a peace treaty with the Allied powers which won World War II. Prince Reuss tried to meet representatives of the Russian government to gain support for the coup, according to prosecutors. Birgit Malsack-Winkemann, then a member of the Bundestag for the far-right Alternative for Germany party, would have been made justice minister. Prosecutors said she granted access to parliamentary buildings to other co-conspirators. FULL STORY

US President Joe Biden has said Israel is starting to lose global support over its "indiscriminate bombing" of Gaza. His comments, made to donors at a fundraising event on Tuesday, marked his strongest criticism yet of Israel's leadership. Mr Biden has offered unwavering public support to the country since Hamas launched its attacks on 7 October. And while he reiterated that Israel could count on US backing, he issued a direct warning to its government. "Israel's security can rest on the United States, but right now it has more than the United States. It has the European Union, it has Europe, it has most of the world," he told donors to his 2024 re-election campaign in Washington. "But they're starting to lose that support by indiscriminate bombing that takes place," he said. Mr Biden, however, added that there was "no question about the need to take on Hamas" and Israel had "every right" to do so. The US leader has faced growing pressure, including from within his own Democratic Party, to rein in Israel's military campaign. Washington recently urged its ally to "put a premium on human life" and give clearer instructions to allow people to avoid the conflict in Gaza. Senior US officials have also displayed increasing discontent at Israel's response. The Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza said on Tuesday that more than 18,400 people had been killed by Israeli bombing since 7 October, when Hamas broke through Israel's heavily guarded perimeter and killed 1,200 people. In a statement, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel had received the "full backing" of the US for its ground war and its goal of destroying Hamas and recovering hostages. He added that Washington had blocked "international pressure to stop the war". "Yes, there is disagreement about 'the day after Hamas' and I hope that we will reach [an] agreement here as well," he said. FULL STORY

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