The Know Daily - Thursday 13 June 2024

_{Read in 5m 43s ∙ Listening to Lady Parts∙}

🌍 The G7 agenda | 💕 Craving connection | 💰 Election bet 

In a “life-changing” move to make opera more accessible to vision-impaired fans, New Zealand Opera has become the first in the world to offer braille surtitles. The new technology will send surtitles (the dialogue that’s projected above the stages of live performances) direct to a user’s personal braille-reading machine, allowing them to follow lyrics and scripts without the interference of audio descriptions.

🌍 The G7 agenda

The G7 summit kicks off today, with AI and additional funding for Ukraine top of the agenda. 

What’s the G7?
The G7 is an organisation of the world’s seven largest “advanced” economies - Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the UK and the US. They gather annually to discuss pressing transnational issues and develop joint responses to them - and while the G7 can’t pass laws, it does have global influence. For instance, the G7 played an important role in creating a global fund to tackle malaria and Aids in 2002, said the BBC.

This year, Italian PM Giorgia Meloni will host the three-day conference in the southern region of Puglia.

What are the main topics on the agenda?
Support for Ukraine will feature heavily, with the G7 and the EU expected to announce a $50bn loan to the country, made up of profits from frozen Russian assets. The war in Gaza will also feature, with leaders likely to restate past positions, from calling on Hamas to accept President Joe Biden’s ceasefire deal to reiterating the need for a two-state solution, reported Al Jazeera. 

The Italian government has also expressed a desire to create “mutually beneficial partnerships”.  Namely, PM Meloni is expected to push the Mattei Plan, through which Italy will give €5.5bn of grants and loans to several African countries to develop their economies. However, many experts point out that it may be a cover to curb immigration to Europe.

Anything else to look out for? 
For the first time in the summit’s history, a pope will be in attendance. Pope Francis is set to make an “historic intervention” in a session about AI, in an effort to ensure the technology serves humanity, said CNN.