US Business

NFL star Tom Brady and Brazilian supermodel Gisele Bundchen announced Friday they were divorcing after 13 years of marriage.

Brady and Bundchen posted similar statements on Instagram saying they had reached an amicable agreement over the terms of their split.

“In recent days my wife and I finalized our divorce from one another after 13 years of marriage,” seven-time Super Bowl champion Brady wrote.

“We arrived at this decision amicably and with gratitude for the time we spent together,” Brady added, describing the decision to proceed with the divorce as “painful and difficult.”

“We wish only the best for each other as we pursue whatever new chapters in our lives that are yet to be written,” he said, making an appeal for privacy.

The wording was echoed by Bundchen, who said in her post, “The decision to end a marriage is never easy but we have grown apart.”

Both emphasized they would continue to co-parent their children and prioritize their wellbeing. 

Entertainment news website TMZ.com had broken the news of the split early Friday, adding that Bundchen formally filed for divorce in Florida.

Brady and Bundchen, who married in 2009, have two children together, Benjamin, 12, and daughter Vivian Lake, nine. Brady also has a 15-year-old son, John Edward, with ex-girlfriend Bridget Moynahan.

The couple have a reported net worth of around $650 million, with Bundchen estimated to have contributed $400 million of the fortune.

The divorce comes after months of tabloid speculation concerning the couple’s marriage, which reportedly came under strain when Brady reversed a decision to retire from American football.

Brady and Bundchen have been one of the most prominent celebrity power couples on the US pop culture scene, straddling sport, fashion and entertainment.

– Retirement tensions –

The 45-year-old Brady is a leading athlete in the United States, with a stellar grid-iron career that has spanned more than two decades.

Bundchen, 42, is one of the world’s most recognizable models and has been the face of countless campaigns for luxury labels such as Versace, Dolce & Gabbana and Ralph Lauren.

The quarterback had announced his retirement from the NFL in February only to “unretire” the following month.

Bundchen, who over the years has repeatedly voiced concern for Brady’s long-term health by his continued presence in the sport, is reported to have moved out of the family home during the pre-season.

Brady took a mysterious extended 10-day leave from the Tampa Bay Buccaneers training camp in early August, a move which was never properly explained by the player or his team.

The former New England Patriots quarterback later hinted at problems in his personal life.

“You just have to try and figure out life the best you can,” Brady said at the time. “It’s a continuous process.”

In a September interview with Elle magazine, Bundchen once again reiterated her misgivings about her husband’s decision to carry on playing — but said she wanted him to “follow his joy.”

“Obviously, I have my concerns — this is a very violent sport, and I have my children and I would like him to be more present,” she told Elle. 

“I have definitely had those conversations with him over and over again. But ultimately, I feel that everybody has to make a decision that works for (them). He needs to follow his joy, too.”

Brady for his part admitted on his “Let’s Go!” podcast in September that juggling personal commitments with his NFL career was an ongoing struggle.

“You wrestle with different things as you get older and I’d say the only thing that changes over time is you have different priorities when you get older,” Brady said.

Russia said Friday that 300,000 reservists have been called up, with Moscow fighting to turn the tide after defeats in Ukraine have left the key southern city of Kherson in Kyiv’s sights.

The announcement of the draft’s completion came as Moscow’s proxies said they had finished a pull-out of civilians from Kherson, which Ukrainian forces were pushing to recapture as winter closes in.

The city, which had a population of around 288,000 people before the fighting, was one of the first to fall to Moscow’s troops in the early days of the February offensive and retaking it would mark a major milestone for Kyiv. 

Faced with military losses, President Vladimir Putin announced a military call-up of reservists in September, seeking to mobilise 300,000 people amid fighting in Ukraine.

Russia’s Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu told Putin on Friday in a televised meeting that the call-up — which saw Russian men dashing for the borders to avoid the fighting — had hit its target.

According to Shoigu, 82,000 recruits were already in Ukraine with 41,000 of them deployed to military units.

After making major gains in Ukraine’s east and south, Kyiv’s forces were preparing for a fierce battle to retake the  main city in the southern Kherson region.

– Kherson ‘evacuation’ complete –

Since mid-October the occupation authorities have urged Kherson residents to cross to the left bank of the Dnipro River, deeper into Moscow-controlled territory and closer to regions of southern Russia. 

By Friday, the movement of residents — which Kyiv has compared to Soviet-like “deportations” — was complete. 

“The work to organise residents leaving to the left bank of the Dnipro (river) to safe regions of Russia is completed,” Sergei Aksyonov, the Moscow-appointed head of Crimea, a peninsula Moscow annexed from Ukraine in 2014, said on social media late on Thursday.

“The crossing (of the Dnipro) is empty!” Aksyonov said after he visited the region with the Kremlin’s domestic chief Sergei Kiriyenko.

He posted photos of himself and other officials, including Kiriyenko, on a riverbank.

A Russian-installed official in Kherson, Vladimir Saldo, has said that at least 70,000 people have left their homes in the region in the space of a week. 

Kyiv’s army, meanwhile, said Friday Moscow’s “so-called evacuation” is continuing.

It claimed that the Russian command in Kherson was trying to “hide the real losses of servicemen” in order to “avoid panic”.

In a sign of Moscow suffering heavy losses, Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov said late on Thursday that 23 of his fighters were killed in battles around Kherson this week with dozens more wounded. 

“At the beginning of this week, one of the Chechen units was shelled in the Kherson region,” Kadyrov, who has sent his militia to fight alongside the Kremlin’s forces, said on Telegram.  

The Kremlin ally rarely reveals defeats but admitted that losses were “big on that day”. 

– IAEA to probe ‘dirty bomb’ claims –

Russian forces have for weeks pummelled Ukraine with air strikes especially targeting energy infrastructure, destroying at least a third of the country’s power facilities ahead of winter. 

On Friday, a group of Iranians living in Ukraine held a rally in central Kyiv against the alleged use of Iranian-made drones by Russian forces to carry out the strikes. 

“The country where we were born and the regime currently in power sends drones to kill us and our friends,” 34-year-old Iranian architect Maziar Mian told AFP. 

Iran has rejected these claims and Moscow accused the West of using these accusations to put “pressure” on Tehran.

Aksyonov also said that he and Kiriyenko visited the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant — Europe’s largest atomic facility — further north on the Dnipro River in Russian-occupied territory. 

Russia and Ukraine have accused each other of shelling the plant, sparking fears of a nuclear disaster. 

Ukraine has accused Moscow’s forces of “kidnapping” the plant’s staff and said last week that around 50 employees are held in “captivity”. 

Putin on Thursday called on the UN’s atomic agency to inspect Ukraine’s nuclear site “as soon as possible” over Moscow’s allegations that Kyiv is preparing a “dirty bomb” attack. 

A dirty bomb is a conventional bomb laced with radioactive, biological or chemical materials which are dispersed in an explosion.

Kyiv has dismissed these claims as “dangerous” lies and suspects Russia might itself use a dirty bomb in a “false flag” attack.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said Thursday it will conduct an “independent verification” of Russian allegations concerning the production of so-called dirty bombs at two sites in Ukraine.

NFL star Tom Brady and Brazilian supermodel Gisele Bundchen announced Friday they were divorcing after 13 years of marriage.

Brady and Bundchen posted similar statements on Instagram saying they had reached an amicable agreement over the terms of their divorce.

“In recent days my wife and I finalized our divorce from one another after 13 years of marriage,” seven-time Super Bowl champion Brady wrote.

“We arrived at this decision amicably and with gratitude for the time we spent together,” Brady added, describing the decision to proceed with the divorce as “painful and difficult.”

“We wish only the best for each other as we pursue whatever new chapters in our lives that are yet to be written,” he said, making an appeal for privacy.

The wording was echoed by Bundchen, who said in her post, “The decision to end a marriage is never easy but we have grown apart.”

Both emphasized they would continue to co-parent their children together and prioritize their wellbeing. 

Entertainment news website TMZ.com had broken the news of the split early Friday, adding that Bundchen formally filed for divorce in Florida.

Brady and Bundchen, who married in 2009, have two children together, Benjamin 12, and daughter Vivian Lake, nine. Brady also has a 15-year-old son, John Edward, with ex-girlfriend Bridget Moynahan.

The divorce comes after months of tabloid speculation concerning the couple’s marriage, which reportedly came under strain when Brady reversed a decision to retire from American football.

Brady and Bundchen have been one of the most prominent celebrity power couples on the US pop culture scene, straddling sport, fashion and entertainment.

The 45-year-old Brady is one of the most prominent athletes in the United States, a record seven-time Super Bowl champion during a grid-iron career that has spanned more than two decades.

Bundchen, 42, is one of the world’s most recognizable models and has been the face of countless campaigns for luxury labels such as Versace, Dolce & Gabbana and Ralph Lauren.

An intruder attacked the husband of the US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi after breaking into their home in San Francisco on Friday, her office said, leaving him needing hospital treatment.

It was not immediately clear if the attack was politically motivated. The speaker, who is second in line to the presidency, was in Washington at the time.

“Early this morning, an assailant broke into the Pelosi residence in San Francisco and violently assaulted Mr. Pelosi,” the Democratic leader’s spokesman Drew Hammill said in a statement.

“The assailant is in custody and the motivation for the attack is under investigation. Mr. Pelosi was taken to the hospital, where he is receiving excellent medical care and is expected to make a full recovery.”

The White House said President Joe Biden had called Pelosi, 82, to express his support over the “horrible attack” and was praying for her husband.

“He is… very glad that a full recovery is expected. The president continues to condemn all violence, and asks that the family’s desire for privacy be respected,” White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said in a statement.

The attack comes during a tumultuous year for Pelosi’s 82-year-old venture capitalist husband, who was convicted of drink driving after an accident in May and sentenced to five days in jail.

With less than two weeks to go before the crucial US midterm elections, members of both parties have sounded the alarm about the possibility of political violence.

According to the Capitol Police, threats against lawmakers have more than doubled since 2017.

When scientists caught the aye-aye on video using its strangely thin, eight-centimetre-long middle finger to deeply pick its nose, it pointed towards a larger mystery: why exactly do some animals eat their own snot?

The footage resulted in research which names the aye-aye, a peculiar nocturnal lemur with big ears found only in Madagascar, as the 12th primate who picks their nose. 

It joins an illustrious group that includes gorillas, chimpanzees, macaques — and of course humans.

Anne-Claire Fabre, an assistant professor at Switzerland’s University of Bern and lead author of a study published in the journal Zoology this week, told AFP that the researchers stumbled on the discovery “by chance”.

She said they were “surprised” by the behaviour of a female aye-aye named Kali, who was being filmed at the Duke Lemur Center in North Carolina in 2015.

In the video, “the aye-aye inserts the entire length of its extra-long, skinny and highly mobile middle finger into the nasal passages and then licks the nasal mucus collected”, the peer-reviewed study said.

“This video brings the number of species known to pick their nose to twelve,” it said, adding that they all have “fine manipulative skills”.

The middle fingers of aye-ayes are not only long and thin, but also have a unique ball and socket joint they use to knock on wood to locate grubs.

After seeing the video, “the first thing I was wondered is where this finger is going”, said Fabre, who is also an associate scientist at London’s Natural History Museum.

So the researchers used a CT scan of an aye-aye’s skull to reconstruct the finger’s journey, finding it probably went down the throat.

“There is no other possibility. Otherwise it would have gone into the brain and then they die,” Fabre said.

The researchers compared the finger’s probing to a very deep Covid test.

– ‘Gross’ – 

But finding out exactly why aye-ayes — or other primates — pick their noses proved a more difficult task.

The scientists reviewed the existing literature and found that “most of it was jokes”, Fabre said.

They did find one study which suggested that nose-picking could spread bacteria in a harmful manner. 

Another said that eating snot could stop bacteria from sticking to teeth, so it might be good for oral health.

So why is there so little research on nose picking?

“I think it’s just something that people didn’t think about because it’s considered to be gross,” Fabre said. However she added that lots of research has been done about coprophagia — animals eating their own excrement — which could also be considered gross.

The aye-aye, the world’s largest nocturnal primate, is highly endangered — in part because it is seen as a bad omen in its native Madagascar, she said.

After six years without releasing a solo song Rihanna on Friday dropped “Lift Me Up,” the lead track off the Marvel sequel “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever.”

The 34-year-old — who’s spent her time away from the recording studio launching high-fashion collections, a lingerie line, a makeup brand, becoming a billionaire and having a baby — warmly delivers the lullaby-esque ballad over soft strings and murmurs of a choir.

Her label said the song is a tribute to Chadwick Boseman, who played the title character in the first “Black Panther” film and died of cancer last year.

The film’s soundtrack is set for release November 4, with the movie slated to hit theaters on November 11.

It’s the first solo new music from the hitmaker behind “Diamonds” and “Umbrella” since 2016’s album “Anti.”

Rihanna’s fierce fan base has been clamoring for her ninth album, which she has said will be “reggae-infused” and has hinted since 2019 is nearly finished.

Rumors have swirled that it might be inching towards release since the NFL announced the Barbadian-born artist would be headlining the coveted Super Bowl halftime show in February, a long-awaited return to the stage for the pop phenom.

Rihanna for years has focused on other ventures, including becoming the first Black woman to head a fashion house for the French powerhouse LVMH, which owns legacy brands including Fendi and Givenchy.

She welcomed her first child with rapper A$AP Rocky in May.

The pair stepped out in public this week at the “Black Panther” sequel premiere in Los Angeles, strutting the red carpet in coordinated Rick Owens outfits.

The British government was on Friday expected to call the second election this year in Northern Ireland after UK and regional lawmakers failed to resolve a standoff over post-Brexit trade rules.

A deadline to resume devolved government at the Stormont assembly passed at midnight, prompting Northern Ireland minister Chris Heaton-Harris to tweet that he was “extremely disappointed”.

“Today Stormont could be taking decisions to ease the challenges people face. Instead, the legal duty to act falls to me as secretary of state… I will be providing an update on this,” he tweeted.

British environment minister Therese Coffey meanwhile said the failure to end the stalemate meant an election would now “definitely happen”.

Jeffrey Donaldson, leader of the pro-UK Democratic Unionist Party, defended his party’s blocking of the restoration of power-sharing, part of its protest against the so-called Northern Ireland Protocol governing post-Brexit trade rules.

He said his party could not “nominate ministers to an executive that is required to impose a protocol that harms our economy, harms our people and prevents us getting access to medicines and other vital supplies from the rest of the United Kingdom”.

Donaldson added he stood “ready to form an executive as soon as that solution is found” but that his party had been waiting for nearly three years. 

“We need a solution,” he stressed.

The expiry of the legal cut-off point for the creation of a joint executive between pro-Ireland nationalists and pro-UK unionists came after the province’s parties made a last-ditch attempt to restart the devolved assembly. 

In an argumentative session on Thursday, lawmakers briefly reconvened for the first time in months for a special sitting but failed to elect a speaker, so no new government could be created.

The DUP has boycotted the assembly since February, calling for the protocol to be overhauled or scrapped entirely.

– ‘Perpetual standoff’ –

New British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak had implored the parties to “get back to Stormont”, arguing that people in Northern Ireland “deserve a fully functioning and locally elected executive”, his official spokesman said Thursday.

Heaton-Harris, an arch-Eurosceptic only appointed to his role on September 6, has insisted that if the UK government deadline expired Friday he would not hesitate to call an election, with December 15 the expected date for the new poll.

Northern Ireland has now been without a functioning government for nine months, with pro-Irish party Sinn Fein winning a historic first election in May which is seen as further complicating the political situation.

Sinn Fein leader Michelle O’Neill — who was set to become first minister if the executive was restarted — condemned the DUP’s “perpetual standoff with the public, the majority of whom they do not speak for or indeed represent”.

The DUP insists the protocol — agreed by London and Brussels as part of Britain’s 2019 Brexit deal — must be addressed first.

It claims the pact, which effectively keeps Northern Ireland in the European Union’s single market and customs union, weakens the province’s place within the United Kingdom.

Many unionists also argue it is threatening the delicate balance of peace between the pro-Irish nationalist community and those in favour of continued union with Britain.

The protocol was agreed to avoid the return of a hard land border with the Republic of Ireland, which remains an EU member.

Eliminating that hard border was a key strand of the 1998 Good Friday Agreement, which ended three decades of sectarian violence in Northern Ireland.

Britain’s Conservative government, which has had three prime ministers in two months, has urged Brussels to agree to wholesale revisions of the protocol. London is also in the midst of passing contentious legislation to override it unilaterally.

That has sparked fears of a trade war and worsening relations with Europe when the economic landscape is already gloomy.