English-language Prague and Czech political, civic and cultural news.
Chronological file / page 22
A Guardian profile portrays 2026 as a defining year for OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, as the company chases huge data-center buildouts, navigates competition and tries to keep regulators and investors onside.
↗State and local health departments were thrown into uncertainty after the Trump administration temporarily paused a major CDC-administered public health infrastructure grant program before reversing course, leaving agencies unclear about next steps.
↗A fast-moving winter system dubbed “Winter Storm Fern” is disrupting travel and daily life across wide stretches of the United States, triggering emergency actions and thousands of flight cancellations as snow, ice and dangerous cold spread from the Plains toward the Northeast.
↗European far-right parties that once celebrated their ideological proximity to Trump are now criticizing his Greenland ambitions, highlighting a growing split in a movement built around nationalism and sovereignty.
↗President Trump and First Lady Melania Trump hosted a private screening of an Amazon MGM documentary as Democrats criticized the optics, coming just hours after a fatal Minneapolis shooting by a federal agent intensified political fallout and shutdown fears.
↗Micron said it will acquire a semiconductor manufacturing facility in Taiwan for $1.8 billion, a deal aimed at expanding capacity as demand for memory products rises alongside AI data center growth. The transaction, expected to close in 2026 pending approvals, highlights the strategic importance of semiconductor supply chains in an era of tight capacity and rising prices.
↗In Davos, President Donald Trump formally ratified the charter of a new ‘Board of Peace,’ describing it as an international mechanism meant to guide demilitarization, governance changes and large-scale rebuilding in Gaza. The announcement came during the World Economic Forum and immediately drew intense global scrutiny over how the initiative would be implemented and enforced.
↗Investors headed into the new week weighing President Donald Trump’s threat of steep tariffs on Canadian imports alongside a busy slate of corporate earnings. The mix of trade uncertainty, Washington budget risk and major tech results has pushed market watchers to expect another bout of volatility.
↗The Pittsburgh Steelers have reached a verbal agreement with Mike McCarthy to become their next head coach, marking a major shift for a franchise that has valued continuity for decades. McCarthy, a Pittsburgh native with a Super Bowl win on his résumé, steps into a job defined by expectations and immediate pressure to end a long playoff-win drought.
↗A sprawling late-January winter storm pushed across the central and eastern United States, snarling travel, triggering power outages and prompting officials to warn of life-threatening road conditions. Airlines faced cancellations and delays while forecasters tracked a corridor of snow, sleet and freezing rain stretching from the South into the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast.
↗The FDA published details of a recall involving grated Pecorino Romano cheese sold under several brand names after testing found potential contamination with Listeria monocytogenes. Officials say consumers should not eat affected products and should return or discard items with specific date codes and expiration ranges.
↗Senate Democrats say they will oppose a sweeping government funding package if it includes Homeland Security money, citing anger over immigration enforcement and a fatal Minneapolis shooting involving federal agents. The standoff comes as the government faces a late-January funding deadline and lawmakers debate whether to split DHS funding from the broader package.
↗