Briefly

UNITED KINGDOM

Nurses begin their unprecedented walkout

Nurses on Thursday begin an unprecedented strike as a "last resort" in their fight for better wages and working conditions, despite warnings it could put patients at risk. Up to 100,000 members of the Royal College of Nursing in England, Wales and Northern Ireland were holding a one-day stoppage from 8 am to 8 pm after rejecting a government pay offer. The strike is the first in the Royal College of Nursing union's 106-year history. The country is currently grappling with a cost-of-living crisis as spiraling inflation outstrips wage growth.

UNITED STATES

Account tracking Musk's jet suspended by Twitter

Twitter suspended an account tracking its owner Elon Musk's private jet in real time, with the billionaire threatening legal action against the account's operator after saying his son had been mistakenly followed by a "crazy stalker". The suspension comes just a month after Musk, who bought Twitter for $44 billion in October, said his commitment to free speech extended to not banning the account. ElonJet, operated by 20-year-old university student Jack Sweeney, had tracked the movements of Musk's private jet using data available in the public domain before the suspension.

SOUTH KOREA

US military creates space unit to watch others

The US military formally launched a space force unit in South Korea on Wednesday, its first such facility on foreign territory that will likely enable Washington to better monitor countries in the region. The unit belongs to the US Space Force, which was launched in December 2019 under then-president Donald Trump as the first new US military service in more than 70 years. The US Space Forces Korea is a subordinate of a bigger US Space Force unit established within the Indo-Pacific command in Hawaii last month.

Agencies Via Xinhua