Le Monde: In the age of AI, Chinese universities overhaul their curricula
Le Monde describes how Chinese universities are overhauling their degree programmes to align with artificial intelligence, which has been made the top priority of China’s 15th Five-Year Plan (2026–2030) — the government wants to embed the technology in as many sectors of the real economy as possible. According to Ministry of Education data, between 2021 and 2025 some 12,200 undergraduate programmes were eliminated or suspended and 10,200 new ones created — in all, nearly one-third of the country’s university course offerings has been rewritten. The shift comes as unemployment among 16–24-year-olds runs at about 16%, and graduates fear that AI tools are already taking over the entry-level work at finance and e-commerce firms.
Al Jazeera: Who profits from Africa’s gold?
Al Jazeera explains why Africa, which holds about 40% of the world’s gold reserves, still captures only a small share of the industry’s profits. Most of the gold mined is exported unrefined — chiefly to the United Kingdom, where it is refined, traded and priced — so the most profitable stages remain off the continent. A growing number of African governments are trying to change that, treating gold as a strategic financial asset that bolsters reserves and economic sovereignty.
LRT: Number of bookstores in Lithuania falls nearly 40% in a decade
The number of bookstores in Lithuania has fallen by nearly 40% over the past decade, most sharply in small towns and the regions, where people increasingly buy books online or at large retail chains. To survive, some municipally owned bookstores now sell handbags, scarves and household goods alongside books, yet many have run at a loss for years. About a third of Lithuania’s municipalities no longer have a single bookstore.
LSM: Cēsis cemetery added to the list of Europe’s significant cemeteries
The Cēsis town cemetery has been admitted to the network of the Association of Significant Cemeteries in Europe (ASCE), placing it alongside more than 200 notable European cemeteries, including Père-Lachaise in Paris and Brompton in London. Project lead Gundars Kalniņš says the recognition is the result of five years of systematic work — inventorying every monument, researching the biographies of those buried there, and restoring monuments smashed during the Soviet occupation. Founded in 1773, the cemetery was for more than two centuries one of the most important burial places for the people of Cēsis.
Meduza: «Это не закончится завтра. Это не закончится через неделю»
Meduza sent a freelance correspondent into Crimea for a few days. After Ukraine’s defence minister vowed to soon cut Crimea off from Russia and turn the peninsula into an “island”, Ukrainian strikes have proved painful for Moscow: there is almost no petrol in Crimea, the power supply is failing, and the tourist season has collapsed. On 26 June a state of emergency was declared on the peninsula.
Mexico News Daily: Everything you need to know about Mexican hand gestures
The author takes a light-hearted look at Mexican hand gestures and what they mean — for instance, that pointing at a person with your finger is considered rude in Mexico. She runs through the gestures she uses most in everyday life and notes that some of them are mostly used by men.
Financial Times: How the DeepMind mafia brought the AI boom to London
The Financial Times describes how London’s King’s Cross has become Europe’s AI hub, a resurgence largely traced to one person — DeepMind co-founder Demis Hassabis, who stayed in London rather than move to America’s West Coast after the company’s 2014 sale to Google. His former staff have formed a “DeepMind mafia” pulling billions of dollars into start-ups, yet none of them is building a homegrown British large language model the country could rely on. The debate over “AI sovereignty” sharpened when, with just 90 minutes’ notice, the US ordered Anthropic to bar foreign nationals from its latest models, Fable and Mythos.
PBS NewsHour: Tens of thousands march in the first Budapest Pride since Viktor Orbán was voted out
Tens of thousands of people took part in Budapest’s first Pride since former Prime Minister Viktor Orbán was defeated in April’s election. The march through the city centre took place in record heat (almost 38°C), and participants said the mood this time was more relaxed. A year earlier, Orbán’s nationalist-populist government had passed a law and a constitutional amendment to outlaw the event.
Meduza: Europeans, Japanese and Australians have discovered you must always tip in the US — and a lot!
For many football fans who came to the US for the World Cup, it has come as a real surprise how much you are expected to tip in America: unlike in Europe or Australia, the tip is not included in the bill yet is expected — and a large one, around 20%. Europeans, Japanese and Australians interviewed by the BBC say eating out in the US is expensive even without a tip, and excessively so with one.