Speaking with Donald Trump, Volodymyr Zelensky, Ukraine’s president, agreed to a partial ceasefire—halting attacks on energy infrastructure—with Russia. Trump administration officials said that the American president proposed taking over Ukrainian energy facilities, including nuclear plants, for “protection”. Meanwhile military leaders from a coalition of Ukraine’s allies were set to meet in London to discuss plans to deploy a peacekeeping operation to the country.
At least 85 people were killed in Israeli air strikes on Gaza, according to health officials in the enclave. The strikes followed Israel’s resumption of ground operations in Gaza, particularly around the Netzarim corridor, which separates the north and south of the territory. On Wednesday Israel Katz, Israel’s defence minister, warned of “total destruction and ruin” unless Israeli hostages are released by Hamas.
Authorities in Turkey arrested nearly 40 people for social-media posts in support of Ekrem Imamoglu, Istanbul’s mayor, who was arrested on Wednesday. The government said it was searching for more than 200 others suspected of making similar posts. Mr Imamoglu was set to be named as the main opposition candidate to Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the authoritarian president.
The Bank of England held its benchmark interest rate at 4.5%, warning that trade tensions caused by Donald Trump’s tariff policies were causing “a lot of economic uncertainty”. The bank lowered interest rates from 4.75% at its last meeting on February 6th. The annual rate of inflation, which was 3% in January, remains above the bank’s target of 2%.
Softbank said it had agreed to buy Ampere Computing for $6.5bn. Ampere makes processors for cloud servers based on a design by Arm, a British chipmaker that Softbank acquired in 2016. The deal will help the Japanese technology fund with its foray into artificial intelligence. Arm plans to start manufacturing its own chips for AI, rather than just designing them.
A jury in North Dakota ordered Greenpeace to pay at least $660m in damages for protesting against an oil pipeline in the state. Energy Transfer, a Texas-based oil company, sued the environmental NGO for inciting more than 100,000 people to join a protest by the Sioux Standing Rock Tribe against the pipeline’s construction in 2016. Greenpeace argued it played only a minor role in the action.
Malaysia’s government revived the search for MH370, a Malaysian Airlines plane that went missing in 2014 while carrying 239 people from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. Under a new agreement Ocean Infinity, an American firm, will search 15,000 square km (5,791 square miles) of the southern Indian Ocean. Malaysia will award the company $70m if the wreckage is recovered.
Figure of the day: $38trn, the amount held by American households and non-profit organisations in shares of listed firms. Read the full story here.
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