Eamonn Holmes and new partner Katie Alexander, 43, are said to be ‘under strain’Credit: Simon JonesThe couple went public with their romance last yearCredit: instagram/@katster32
And it appears things are still rocky, with a source telling the Mail that they’re spending an increasing amount of time apart.
The insider said: “He’s grumpier than ever and his health problems really aren’t helping, but instead of moving closer to Katie and settling, he’s spending more time with his family in Belfast, often without her.”
The couple, who first began speaking as friends on social media platform X in 2015, became romantic last year – just months after Eamonn’s split from wife Ruth Langsford was made public.
To make matters worse, Eamonn is no longer represented by InterTalent Rights Group and his manager Jonathan Shalit, who has overseen his career since 2022.
Prior to that, Eamonn had enjoyed a fruitful relationship with YMU, who continue to represent his ex-wife Ruth Langsford.
Relations between Eamonn and YMU soured in 2021 when the GBNews star allegedly felt his telly rival Phillip Schofield was receiving preferential treatment.
This was prior to Schofield being axed from ITV for lying about a relationship with a younger male member of staff.
At the time, Eamonn was livid that he and Ruth had been let go from their Friday slot on the show after 14 years of service. They were replaced by Alison Hammond and Dermot O’Leary.
Now, Eamonn has lost another longstanding gig.
Virgin radio host Ryan Tubridy has replaced him as host of The Irish Post Awards in London – a role Eamonn has held since 2013.
A difficult performance last year, in which Eamonn struggled with mobility issues amid chronic health problems, reportedly prompted bosses to look for an alternative.
A source said: “The truth is that Eamonn is an Irish legend but things didn’t really go well last time – and it’s felt that it’s time he moved over for the more appropriate talent waiting in the wings.
“This time around, it just felt foolhardy to stick with him even though he’s been such a big part of things for so long.”
The Sun has contacted an InterTalent representative for comment.
Despite the reports of low mood, Eamonn isn’t resting on his laurels.
ROMEO Beckham has confirmed that he is back with his ex Kim Turnbull after rekindling their romance.
The pair were seen in Paris this weekend, holding hands and looking loved up, just six months after the strain of the Beckham family feud led to them splitting up.
Sign up for the Showbiz newsletter
Thank you!
Romeo Beckham has confirmed he’s back together with Kim Turnbull after the pair held hands in publicCredit: The Mega AgencyThe pair were seen on two occasions in Paris this weekendCredit: Splash
The announced of their split came around the same time that the Beckham family feud kicked off.
A source told The Mail at the time: “Romeo and Kim are both young and they had a lovely time together but at that age things don’t always last forever and they decided to split up.
“They have been friendly since and have even been at the same venues.
“It’s a huge shame, particularly as David and Victoria really adored her and thought she made Romeo happy but it wasn’t to be.
In the global trade storm unleashed since US President Donald Trump’s return to power, Italian pasta producers are feeling very much alone — while their case is a special one.
On 4 September, the US Department of Commerce announced preliminary tariffs of 91.74% on 13 pasta brands.
If upheld, the tariffs would take effect in January 2026, delivering a significant blow to Italy, which exported nearly €700 million worth of pasta to the United States in 2024.
Admittedly, the case is not new. It originated in 1996, when US pasta producers accused Italian manufacturers of dumping — selling their products in the American market at prices lower than those in Italy.
Since then, Italian producers have been regularly subject to tariffs, but never of the magnitude now decided by the Trump administration.
“It’s unfair, it’s a protectionist action of the US against Italian pasta,” Margherita Mastromauro, president of Unione Italiana Food, the largest association of food producers in Italy, told Euronews.
“We need help, because a large part of our companies are involved. With a duty so high, it means that all these companies will not export until the new review will be done.”
The investigation concerned the period between 1 July 2023 and 30 June 2024, Italian producers hope the review of the year 2025 will bring them some relief. But for now, the future remains uncertain.
Can the fight become political?
The companies have been scrambling to get these tariffs lifted since September.
Two of them, Garofalo and La Molisana, have taken legal action against the decision.
The Italian government and the European Commission have begun to get involved. However, room for manoeuvre remains limited in what is, according to the president of Unione Italiana Food, more a “legal” than a “political” matter.
The Italian Foreign Ministry has said the duties were “disproportionate” and has joined the case as an “interested party” to weigh in favour of this key sector of Italy’s economy.
On its side, the Commission told Euronews that the issue could be raised within the framework of the new dialogue initiated with the Trump administration on tariffs, since the agreement reached in July ended weeks of discord between the two sides of the Atlantic.
But an EU official also conceded that, unlike the unilateral tariffs imposed on other European products — which violate rules of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) — the US anti-dumping action against pasta appears to be done traditionally, as a trade defence mechanism allowed by the WTO, which regulates international trade between its member countries.
“We are closely monitoring the case, and if there are flaws in the investigation, we will question it and we will raise the issue with the WTO,” the official told Euronews.
If that were the case, it could lead to retaliatory measures from the EU.
Socialist Italian MEP Brando Benifei, who leads the parliamentary delegation for relations with the US, condemned the US action that he considers “clearly discriminatory”.
“This has to be solved and we urge the Commission to act through,” Benifei told Euronews.
That’s why after they fielded the congratulatory phone calls and text messages, made a celebratory champagne toast and smiled while rewatching game footage for the first time this season, UCLA players and coaches eagerly resumed the pursuit of something more.
“We don’t want to be one-hit wonders,” interim coach Tim Skipper said Monday, “that’s the whole key to this thing — do not be a one-hit wonder, get back to work.”
While beating Michigan State on Saturday at Spartan Stadium wouldn’t generate the same recognition that came with the previously winless Bruins’ recent victory over then-No. 7 Penn State, it would erase any lingering doubts that things just fell into place one wonderful weekend.
UCLA (1-4 overall, 1-1 Big Ten) hopes it discovered a winning formula beyond Jerry Neuheisel’s playcalling, quarterback Nico Iamaleava’s heroics and Skipper’s putting everything together. After seeing his team look listless the previous week against Northwestern, particularly in the game’s early going, Skipper adopted the word “strain” as a rallying cry going into the game against the Nittany Lions.
“It’s just draining your tank and doing everything possible that you can possibly do on every single play for us to achieve success,” Skipper said. “So, strain was mentioned every single day, it was mentioned after the game, and I think that was the major difference. Our guys strained, from the opening kickoff to the very end of the game. We had to strain on every play to get the game to be a positive outcome for us.”
It was favorable for everyone on the team, including position groups that had previously struggled.
Not long after the Bruins held off the Nittany Lions for an epic 42-37 triumph, UCLA offensive line coach Andy Kwon gathered his players for a group photo in the end zone. Kwon posted the photo on the social media platform X, adding a one-word caption: “STRAIN!”
UCLA quarterback Nico Iamaleava passes against Penn State on Saturday.
(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)
The word also was uttered twice during a short video in which athletic director Martin Jarmond delivered the game ball to Skipper.
Two days later, there was some further basking in UCLA’s first victory over a top-10 team since toppling Oregon in 2007. Skipper was named the Dodd Trophy coach of the week, Iamaleava the Associated Press national player of the week and Neuheisel the CBS Sports coordinator of the week.
More important, it was fun to be back in the football practice facility again.
“Smiling. Laughing. Talking,” Skipper said of the scene compared to previous weeks. “When you’re sore after a game, it actually feels pretty good, you know what I mean? Like, a lot of things, just the flow. People laugh at bad jokes now and stuff, you know? Just, man, just joy.”
Meanwhile, Penn State’s falling out of the national rankings was a reminder of how quickly a college football season can change.
The Bruins finally hope to have some stability going into the game against the Spartans (3-2, 0-2) after having installed a new defense one week and a new offense the next in the wake of multiple coaching changes. Skipper said Neuheisel’s ability to explain why he wanted to run plays in certain situations to counter what the defense was doing led to an offense that rolled up a season-high 435 yards of offense, including a season-high 269 on the ground.
“He explained it in a way that he was totally confident in what he was saying,” Skipper said. “And I think everybody felt that and believed in that, and it just carried over into the game.”
Those who fear UCLA’s offense might not be as effective now that there’s footage of what Neuheisel likes to do may not need to worry. Skipper said the playbook would be specifically tailored to each opponent because the team did not have spring practice or fall training camp to install its offense.
“We’re going to watch our opponents in all phases,” Skipper said, “and then we’re going to game plan for them, and then the things that work that we’ve done previously, we’re going to do, and the new things we have to do to establish the game plan the way we want it to go, we’re going to add that to the game plan. So we’re just a work in progress, man.”
1 of 5 | Patients sick with the flu are hospitalized at a makeshift ward at Camp Funston in Kansas in 1918. On October 5, 2005, scientists announced that for the first time they were able to genetically sequence the strain of avian flu that was behind the 1918 pandemic that killed up to 50 million people worldwide. File Photo courtesy of the U.S. Army
Oct. 5 (UPI) — On this date in history:
In 1918, Germany’s Hindenburg Line was broken as World War I neared an end.
In 1921, the World Series is broadcast on the radio for the first time.
In 2001, Barry Bonds hit his 71st home run, most by a player in one season, breaking Mark McGwire’s 1998 Major League Baseball record. The San Francisco Giants slugger finished the season with 73 homers.
File Photo by Terry Schmitt/UPI
In 2005, scientists announced that for the first time they were able to genetically sequence the strain of avian flu that was behind the 1918 pandemic that killed up to 50 million people worldwide.
In 2010, Faisal Shahzad, who left an explosives-laden vehicle in New York’s Times Square, planning to detonate it on a busy night, was sentenced to life in prison.
In 2023, a Russian strike on a supermarket in the village of Hroza, in the Kharkiv region of Ukraine, killed dozens of people.
I don’t know how I managed to beat COVID-19 for so long, even as family, friends and colleagues got hit with the coronavirus. Although I took precautions from the beginning, with masking and vaccinations, I was also out in public a lot for work and travel.
But my luck has finally run out, and it must have been the air travel that did me in. I returned from a cross-country trip with a razor blade sore throat and a stubborn headache, followed by aches and pains.
The first test was positive.
I figured it had to be wrong, given my super-immunity track record.
The second test was even more positive.
So I’ve been quarantined in a corner of the house, reaching alternately for Tylenol and the thermometer. Everything is a little fuzzy, making it hard to distinguish between the real and the imagined.
For instance, how can it be true that just as I get COVID for the first time, the news is suddenly dominated by COVID-related stories?
It has to be a fever-induced hallucination. There’s no other way to explain why, as COVID surges yet again with another bugger of a strain, the best tool against the virus — vaccine — is under full assault by the leaders of the nation.
They are making it harder, rather than easier, to get medicine recommended by the overwhelming majority of the legitimate, non-crackpot wing of the medical community.
Under the new vaccine policies, prices are up. Permission from doctors is needed. Depending on your age or your home state, you could be out of luck.
Meanwhile, President Trump fired Susan Monarez, the head of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, essentially for putting her own professional integrity and commitment to public service above crackpot directives from a cabal of vaccine skeptics.
My eyes are red and burning, but can COVID be entirely to blame?
I got a booster before my travels, even though I knew it might not stand up to the new strain of COVID. It’s possible I have a milder case than I might have had without the vaccine. But on that question and many others, as new waves keep coming our way, wouldn’t the smart move be more research rather than less?
Trump downplayed the virus when it first surfaced in 2019 and 2020. Then he blamed it on China. He resisted masking, and lemmings by the thousands got sick and died. Then he got COVID himself. At one point, he recommended that people get the vaccine.
Now he’s putting on the brakes?
My headache is coming back, my eyes are still burning, and unless my Tylenol is laced with LSD, I think I just saw a clip in which Kennedy and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth attempted 50 pull-ups and 100 push-ups in 10 minutes.
I appreciate the health and fitness plug, and because Kennedy and I are the same age — 71 — it’s impressive to see him in the gym.
But there’s something that has to be said about the Kennedy-Hegseth workout tape:
They’re cheating.
Take a look for yourself, and don’t be fooled by the tight T-shirts worn by these two homecoming kings.
Those were not full chin-ups or push-ups.
Not even close.
Cutting corners is the wrong message to send to the nation’s children, or to any age group. And how is anyone going to make it to the gym if they come down with COVID because they couldn’t get vaccinated?
Honestly, the whole thing has to be a fever dream I’m having, because in the middle of the workout, Kennedy said, and I quote, “It was President Trump who inspired us to do this.”
He is many things, President Trump. Fitness role model is not one of them, no matter how many times he blasts out of sand traps on company time.
Getting back to cutting corners, Kennedy said in slashing mRNA research that “we have studied the science,” with a news release link to a 181-page document purportedly supporting his claim that the vaccines “fail to protect effectively.”
That document was roundly eviscerated by hordes of scientists who were aghast at the distortions and misinterpretations by Kennedy.
“It’s either staggering incompetence or willful misrepresentation,” said Jake Scott, an infectious-disease physician and Stanford University professor, writing for the media company STAT. “Kennedy is using evidence that refutes his own position to justify dismantling tools we’ll desperately need when the next pandemic arrives.”
I lost my sense of smell a few days ago, but even I can tell you that stinks.
SAO PAULO — President Trump has made clear who his new Latin America priority is: former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, a personal and political ally.
In doing so, he has damaged one of the Western hemisphere’s most important and long-standing relationships, by levying 50% tariffs that begin to take effect Wednesday on the largest Latin America economy, sanctioning its main justice and bringing relations between the two countries to the lowest point in decades.
The White House has appeared to embrace a narrative pushed by Bolsonaro allies in the U.S., that the former Brazilian president’s prosecution for attempting to overturn his 2022 election loss is part of a “deliberate breakdown in the rule of law,” with the government engaging in “politically motivated intimidation” and committing “human rights abuses,” according to Trump’s statement announcing the tariffs.
The message was clear earlier, when Trump described Bolsonaro’s prosecution by Brazil’s Supreme Court as a “witch hunt” — using the same phrase he has employed for the numerous investigations he has faced since his first term. Bolsonaro faces charges of orchestrating a coup attempt to stay in power after losing the 2022 election to President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. A conviction could come in the next few months.
The U.S. has a long history of meddling with the affairs of Latin American governments, but Trump’s latest moves are unprecedented, said Steven Levitsky, a political scientist at Harvard University.
“This is a personalistic government that is adopting policies according to Trump’s whims,” Levitsky said.
Bolsonaro’s sons, he noted, have close connections to Trump’s inner circle. The argument has been bolstered by parallels between Bolsonaro’s prosecution and the attempted prosecution of Trump for trying to overturn his 2020 election loss, which ended when he won his second term last November.
“He’s been convinced Bolsonaro is a kindred spirit suffering a similar witch hunt,” Levitsky said.
Brazil’s institutions hold firm against political pressure
After Bolsonaro’s defeat in 2022, Trump and his supporters echoed his baseless election fraud claims, treating him as a conservative icon and hosting him at the Conservative Political Action Conference. Steve Bannon, the former Trump adviser, recently told Brazil’s news website UOL that the U.S. would lift tariffs if Bolsonaro’s prosecution were dropped.
Meeting that demand, however, is impossible for several reasons.
Brazilian officials have consistently emphasized that the judiciary is independent. The executive branch, which manages foreign relations, has no control over Supreme Court justices, who in turn have stated they won’t yield to political pressure.
On Monday, the court ordered that Bolsonaro be placed under house arrest for violating court orders by spreading messages on social media through his sons’ accounts.
Justice Alexandre de Moraes, who oversees the case against Bolsonaro, was sanctioned under the U.S. Magnitsky Act, which is supposed to target serious human rights offenders. De Moraes has argued that defendants were granted full due process and said he would ignore the sanctions and continue his work.
“The ask for Lula was undoable,” said Bruna Santos of the Inter-American Dialogue in Washington, D.C., about dropping the charges against Bolsonaro. “In the long run, you are leaving a scar on the relationship between the two largest democracies in the hemisphere.”
Magnitsky sanctions ‘twist the law’
Three key factors explain the souring of U.S.-Brazil ties in recent months, said Oliver Stuenkel, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace: growing alignment between the far-right in both countries; Brazil’s refusal to cave to tariff threats; and the country’s lack of lobbying in Washington.
Lawmaker Eduardo Bolsonaro, Jair Bolsonaro’s third son, has been a central figure linking Brazil’s far-right with Trump’s MAGA movement.
He took a leave from Brazil’s Congress and moved to the U.S. in March, but he has long cultivated ties in Trump’s orbit. Eduardo openly called for Magnitsky sanctions against de Moraes and publicly thanked Trump after the 50% tariffs were announced in early July.
Democratic Massachusetts Rep. Jim McGovern, author of the Magnitsky Act, which allows the U.S. to sanction individual foreign officials who violate human rights, called the administration’s actions “horrible.”
“They make things up to protect someone who says nice things about Donald Trump,” McGovern told The Associated Press.
Bolsonaro’s son helps connect far right in U.S. and Brazil
Eduardo Bolsonaro’s international campaign began immediately after his father’s 2022 loss. Just days after the elections, he met with Trump at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida.
As investigations against Bolsonaro and his allies deepened, the Brazilian far right adopted a narrative of judicial persecution and censorship, an echo of Trump and his allies who have claimed the U.S. justice system was weaponized against him.
Brazil’s Supreme Court and Electoral Court are among the world’s strictest regulators of online discourse: they can order social media takedowns and arrests for spreading misinformation or other content it rules “anti-democratic.”
But until recently, few believed Eduardo’s efforts to punish Brazil’s justices would succeed.
That began to change last year when billionaire Elon Musk clashed with de Moraes over censorship on X and threatened to defy court orders by pulling its legal representative from Brazil. In response, de Moraes suspended the social media platform from operating in the country for a month and threatened operations of another Musk company, Starlink. In the end, Musk blinked.
Fábio de Sá e Silva, a professor of international and Brazilian studies at the University of Oklahoma, said Eduardo’s influence became evident in May 2024, when he and other right-wing allies secured a hearing before the U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee.
“It revealed clear coordination between Bolsonaro supporters and sectors of the U.S. Republican Party,” he said. “It’s a strategy to pressure Brazilian democracy from the outside.”
A last-minute tariff push yields some wins
Brazil has a diplomatic tradition of maintaining a low-key presence in Washington, Stuenkel said. That vacuum created an opportunity for Eduardo Bolsonaro to promote a distorted narrative about Brazil among Republicans and those closest to Trump.
“Now Brazil is paying the price,” he said.
After Trump announced sweeping tariffs in April, Brazil began negotiations. President Lula and Vice President Geraldo Alckmin — Brazil’s lead trade negotiator — said they have held numerous meetings with U.S. trade officials since then.
Lula and Trump have never spoken, and the Brazilian president has repeatedly said Washington ignored Brazil’s efforts to negotiate ahead of the tariffs’ implementation.
Privately, diplomats say they felt the decisions were made inside the White House, within Trump’s inner circle — a group they had no access to.
A delegation of Brazilian senators traveled to Washington in the final week of July in a last-ditch effort to defuse tensions. The group, led by Senator Nelsinho Trad, met with business leaders with ties to Brazil and nine U.S. senators — only one of them Republican, Thom Tillis of North Carolina.
“We found views on Brazil were ideologically charged,” Trad told The AP. “But we made an effort to present economic arguments.”
While the delegation was in Washington, Trump signed the order imposing the 50% tariff. But there was relief: not all Brazilian imports would be hit. Exemptions included civil aircraft and parts, aluminum, tin, wood pulp, energy products and fertilizers.
Trad believes Brazil’s outreach may have helped soften the final terms.
“I think the path has to remain one of dialogue and reason so we can make progress on other fronts,” he said.
Pessoa and Riccardi write for the Associated Press. AP writer Mauricio Savarese in Sao Paulo contributed to this report.
Seoul, South Korea – When Sideny Sim had a chance to visit the United States on business several years ago, it was the fulfilment of a lifelong dream.
Like many South Koreans, Sim had long admired the US as a cultural juggernaut and positive force in the world.
These days, Sim, a 38-year-old engineer living near Seoul, feels no such love towards the country.
As US President Donald Trump threatens to impose a 25 percent tariff on South Korea from August 1, Sim cannot help but feel betrayed.
“If they used to be a country that was known to be a leader in culture, the economy and the perception of being ‘good,’ I feel like the US is now a threat to geopolitical balance,” Sim told Al Jazeera.
South Korea and the US share deep and enduring ties.
South Korea is one of Washington’s closest allies in Asia, hosting about 28,000 US troops as a bulwark against North Korea.
The US is home to a larger South Korean diaspora than any other country.
But with the return of Trump’s “America First” agenda to Washington, DC, those ties are coming under strain.
In a Pew Research Center survey released earlier this month, 61 percent of South Koreans expressed a favourable view of the US, down from 77 percent in 2024.
Like dozens of other US trading partners, South Korea is facing severe economic disruption if it cannot reach a trade deal with the Trump administration by the August deadline.
The Asian country, which is a major producer of electronics, ships and cars, generates more than 40 percent of its gross domestic product (GDP) from exports.
In addition to sending a letter to South Korean President Lee Jae-Myung outlining his tariff threats, Trump earlier this month also claimed that Seoul pays “very little” to support the presence of US Forces Korea (USFK).
Trump’s comments reinforced speculation that he could demand that the South Korean government increase its national defence spending or contributions to the costs of the USFK.
After Trump last week told reporters that South Korea “wants to make a deal right now,” Seoul’s top trade envoy said that an “in-principle” agreement was possible by the deadline.
With the clock ticking on a deal, the uncertainty created by Trump’s trade policies has stirred resentment among many South Koreans.
Kim Hyunju, a customer service agent working in Seoul, said that although her company would not be directly affected by the tariffs, Trump’s trade salvoes did not seem fair.
“It would only be fair if they are OK with us raising our tariffs to the same level as well,” Kim told Al Jazeera, adding that the Trump administration’s actions had caused her to feel animosity towards the US.
“I can’t help but see the US as a powerful nation which fulfils its interests with money and sheer power plays,” Kim said.
“I’ve always thought of the US as a friendly ally that is special to us, especially in terms of national defence. I know it is good for us to maintain this friendly status, but I sort of lost faith when Trump also demanded a larger amount of money for the US military presence in our country.”
Kim Hyun-ju says Trump’s policies have made her feel animosity towards the US [Courtesy of Kim Hyun-ju]
Kim Chang-chul, an investment strategist in Seoul, expressed a more sanguine view of Trump’s trade policies, even while acknowledging the harm they could do to South Korean businesses.
“The US tariff policy is a burden for our government and businesses, but the move really shows the depth of US decision-making and strategy,” Kim told Al Jazeera.
“Trump wants South Korea to be more involved in the US’s energy ambitions in Alaska. It’s part of the US pushing for geopolitical realignment and economic rebalancing.”
Earlier this year, the US held talks with South Korean officials about boosting US exports of liquefied natural gas (LNG) to South Korea, a major LNG importer.
Keum Hye-yoon, a researcher at the Korea Institute for International Economic Policy (KIEP), said it has been difficult for a US ally like South Korea to make sense of Trump’s comments and actions.
“When Trump cites ‘fairness’ in his tariff policy, it’s based on unilateral expectations of improving the US trade balance or restoring economic strength to certain industries,” Keum told Al Jazeera.
“As allies like South Korea share supply chains with the US and work closely with its companies, disregarding these structures and imposing high taxes will likely create burdens on US businesses and consumers as well.”
While Trump’s most severe tariffs have yet to come into effect, South Korean manufacturers have already reported some disruption.
South Korea’s exports dropped 2.2 percent in the first 20 days of July compared with a year earlier, according to preliminary data released by Korea Customs Service on Monday.
Kim Sung-hyeok, the head of research at the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions (KCTU) Labour Institute, said exporters in the auto, steel, semiconductor and pharmaceutical sectors had been especially affected.
“As exports in these fields decreased considerably since the tariff announcements, production orders in domestic factories have declined,” Kim told Al Jazeera.
“Some automotive and steel production lines have closed temporarily, while other manufacturing sites have closed altogether. Voluntary resignations and redeployments have become rampant in some of these workplaces.”
Kim said small companies may face the brunt of the tariffs as they are not capable of “moving their manufacturing plants to the US”, or “diversifying their trade avenues outside of the US”.
“And as major companies face a general decline in exports, these small companies will consequently face a shortage in product delivery volume that will cause employment disputes,” he said.
Vehicles for export at a port in Pyeongtaek, southwest of Seoul, on July 8, 2025 [Anthony Wallace/AFP]
The Korea Development Institute estimated in May that the number of employed South Koreans would increase by just 90,000 this year, in part due to the economic uncertainties, compared with a rise of 160,000 last year.
Even before Trump’s arrival on the political scene, US-South Korea relations had gone through difficult periods in the past.
In 2002, two South Korean middle-school girls were killed when they were struck by a US Army armoured vehicle.
After the American soldiers involved in the incident were found not guilty of negligent homicide by a US military court, the country saw an explosion in anti-US sentiment and nationwide protests.
In 2008, nationwide protests took place after the South Korean government decided to continue importing US beef despite concerns about the risk of Mad Cow Disease.
More recently, President Lee, who was elected in June, has emphasised the importance of maintaining positive relations with China, Washington’s biggest strategic rival and competitor.
The KIEP’s Keum said the US-South Korea relationship has evolved into a partnership where the US has become a “conditional ally”, where “economic interests take precedence over traditional alliance”.
“The US is increasingly demanding South Korea to cooperate in its containment strategy of China among its other socioeconomic policies,” she said.
Keum said that South Korea will need to seek out alternative markets and diversify its exports to mitigate the fallout of Trump’s agenda.
“South Korea also doesn’t need to act alone. The country can seek joint action with countries such as EU members, Japan and Canada to come up with joint responses to the current predicament,” she said.
It’s been just 18 days since Inter Milan played its last game, losing to Paris Saint-Germain in the UEFA Champions League final. But a lot has happened since then.
The team parted ways with manager Simone Inzaghi, who led it to two European finals in three seasons, and replaced him with Cristian Chivu. It temporarily lost the services of forward Mehdi Taremi, who had returned to his native Iran earlier this month and became stranded there when Israeli attacks closed the airspace over much of the Mideast.
Then the rest of the second-best club in Europe traveled 6,000 miles from Milan to Los Angeles, where it opened the FIFA Club World Cup on Tuesday in a 1-1 draw with Mexican club Monterrey before an announced crowd of 40,311 at the Rose Bowl.
“We’re trying to focus. And it’s not easy every day, I’m not going to lie,” said forward Marcus Thuram, whose 18 goals in all competition was second on the team this season. “But it’s part of what we do, we love what we do and we’ll continue doing what we do.”
Only doing what they do has become far more complicated and exhausting in recent years as the competition schedule for both club and country has expanded.
Thuram’s father, Lilian, was widely regarded as one of the best defenders of his era during an 18-year career that saw him win two Serie A titles, a European championship and play in two World Cup finals, winning one. But he appeared in 46 or more club matches in a season just four times before retiring in 2008.
His 27-year-old son has done that in each of the past two seasons. And if Inter makes it to the final of the Club World Cup, he’ll wind up playing 55 games in 11 months. That doesn’t count his 10 appearances for the French national team since last June.
Inter Milan’s Marcus Thuram stands on the field during a loss to Paris Saint-Germain in the UEFA Champions League final on May 31.
(Luca Bruno / Associated Press)
“We were prepared for that at the beginning of the season. It’s not like they announced that at the end of the season,” Thuram, who came off the bench early in the second half Tuesday, said of the Club World Cup. “We knew it was going to be a long season.”
But how long is too long? In their ravenous quest for revenue, soccer clubs, leagues and governing bodies have crowded the calendar with invented competitions that have drained both fans’ bank accounts and players’ energy levels.
The Club World Cup is a perfect example. Although the tournament has been around since 2000, before this summer it never had more than eight teams and was held at one site during a 10-day break in the European season. This year it’s expanded into a 32-team, monthlong competition that will be played in 11 cities spread across a continent.
“The goal is to tell the American public who we are and what values have always guided us. It’s not about proving how good we are.”
— Giuseppe Marotta, CEO of Inter Milan, on the team’s participation in the Club World Cup
If Inter Milan makes it to next month’s final, its players will have just a couple of weeks off before reporting to training camp for the next Serie A season, which opens Aug. 23. With the World Cup also expanding next summer, national team players such as Thuram could play more than 70 games in 44 weeks and more than 120 games over two seasons.
That’s clearly unsustainable.
“A serious dialogue is needed between FIFA, UEFA, leagues, clubs and players to redesign an international calendar that protects the health of players and maintains the quality of games,” said Giuseppe Marotta, chairman and chief executive officer of Inter Milan. “With the introduction of the new Champions League format and the new Club World Cup, the workload on teams and players has clearly increased significantly.”
Yet clubs such as Inter Milan, Paris Saint-Germain (which played 58 games this season) and Manchester City (57 games) are drawn to the extra competitions for the same reason as the organizers who put them on: the money. The Club World Cup, now the largest and most ambitious global club tournament in history, is also the most lucrative, with a prize-money purse of $1 billion. The winner could take home $125 million, more than PSG got for winning the Champions League.
But it was forced into a gap in the schedule that really didn’t exist before.
“It’s undeniable that this event, positioned between two different seasons, is forcing us to do extra work and rethink what the traditional summer periods looks like for a football club,” Marotta said. “However these competitions also represent a huge opportunity in terms of visibility and revenue, often exceeding that of traditional competitions.”
The Club World Cup allows teams to face rivals from other continents, expanding their international following and generating additional revenue streams by planting the team’s flag in new markets and introducing its players to new fans.
“The goal is to tell the American public who we are and what values have always guided us,” Marotta said.
“It’s not about proving how good we are,” he added of the tournament. “It’s about contributing to the development of global football.”
To accommodate it, Marotta said, changes will have to be made. For example Italy’s Serie A could compact from 20 to 18 teams, the same as in the German Bundesliga and France’s Ligue 1. That would mean four fewer league games per year; not a dramatic reduction, but a start.
Inter Milan’s Lautaro Martinez, left, and Monterrey’s Victor Guzman battle for control of the ball during Tuesday’s FIFA Club World Cup match at the Rose Bowl.
(Gregory Bull / Associated Press)
Until that happens, Thuram said the players will continue doing what they do for as long as they can do it.
“It’s about doing everything every day to prepare your body for these extreme games and extreme competition. Because soccer at the highest level is extreme for the body. It’s tough,” he said. “But we have a lot of coaches, we have chefs, we have everything that is set up for us perfectly.”
As for the game, Milan dominated statistically, controlling the ball for more than 55 of the 90 minutes and outshooting Monterrey 15-9. But it couldn’t make that advantage count.
All the scoring came in a 20-minute span of the first half with the ageless Sergio Ramos putting Monterrey in front with a header in the 25th minute and Lautaro Martinez pulling that back for Milan three minutes before the intermission.
INDIANAPOLIS — Indiana Fever star Caitlin Clark will be out at least two weeks with a left quad strain, the team announced Monday.
The Fever did not say when Clark suffered the injury. The team said further updates will be provided after she gets another evaluation.
Clark played 37:52 and had 18 points and 10 assists in a 90-88 loss to the New York Liberty on Saturday.
The Fever are 2-2 this season and could be without Clark for at least the next four games against the Mystics (twice), Sun and Sky. All the opponents sit below the Fever in the Eastern Conference.
Clark is averaging 19.0 points, 9.3 assists and 6.0 rebounds this season.
