President António José Seguro is arriving in the Azores later this morning, for the Portugal Day celebrations that will this year take place on Terceira island – the home of
The post President launches Portugal Day celebrations in Azores appeared first on Portugal Resident.
Russia's Federal Tax Service has pushed regional governments to consider higher taxes on residents and businesses as local budgets sink to record deficits, The Moscow Times reported. The move follows President Vladimir Putin's drive to shrink regional shortfalls, and it shows the financial strain Russia's war against Ukraine is placing on its provinces. Independent analysts expect the squeeze to deepen as the economy slows.
The Federal Tax Service (FNS) instructed regional authorities to work out where they could raise taxes, The Moscow Times reported, citing RBC. The recommendations answered Putin's directive to cut regional deficits, and governors had to submit their proposals in early June.
The advice told regions to:
To collect more, regions were also told to inventory real estate and to look for land used off-purpose, where the tax can rise several times over.
Last year, Russia's regions closed with a combined deficit of 1.538 trillion rubles ($20.8 billion). The gap grew fivefold from 2024 and almost eightfold from 2023. Four regions ran deficits above 30% of their own revenue — Kemerovo, Vologda, Arkhangelsk, and Tyumen oblasts — and six more topped 25%.
Profit-tax revenue fell in 55 regions. It collapsed by half in the Komi Republic, dropped 40% in Orenburg Oblast, and fell 39% in Yamalo-Nenets. Overall, regions collected 9% less profit tax than in 2024 and 13% less than in 2023, according to the rating agency ACRA. The pattern fits a war economy that has turned predatory toward once-wealthy provinces.
To cover the shortfalls, regional governments spent every third ruble of their bank reserves — 1 trillion of 2.9 trillion rubles ($13.9 billion of $40 billion). They financed the rest with borrowing that pushed combined regional debt to 3.5 trillion rubles ($48.6 billion), ACRA reported — the highest in 15 years by Expert RA's earlier count. Expert RA projected the slowdown will continue this year, dragging revenues lower and lifting both the deficit and the debt burden.
Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov earlier projected the regional gap could widen to 1.9 trillion rubles ($26.4 billion) in 2026. The crunch mirrors a federal budget that has run far ahead of plan as Ukrainian strikes cut into Russian refineries and oil income.
Moscow raised VAT in January and prepared a windfall levy on big business, both breaking Putin's 2024 pledge of no tax changes before 2030. Smaller firms have been squeezed first even as the Kremlin's own spending keeps climbing
Plane on way to pick up Yadier Molina and his family crashed in Dominican Republic, killing pilot and co-pilot
A pilot and co-pilot from the United States have died in a fiery plane crash as they attempted an emergency landing in the Dominican Republic, authorities said.
Former major league baseball all-star catcher Yadier Molina said on social media that the plane was bound for Texas to pick him up, along with family and friends.
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© Photograph: Houston Astros/Getty Images
© Photograph: Houston Astros/Getty Images
© Photograph: Houston Astros/Getty Images
President António José Seguro, has said today that Portugal is now a modern country “that wants its people back”. The president was speaking at an event with the Portuguese community
The post President, PM call on emigrés, and offspring, to “come back to Portugal!” appeared first on Portugal Resident.
President Seguro has called out the spiralling costs of old people’s homes in a country where old people already vastly outnumber the young. Just in the last 12 months, monthly
The post President calls out spiralling costs of old people’s homes appeared first on Portugal Resident.
Legendary Greek vocalist Maria Farantouri has teased a groundbreaking upcoming performance, revealing that she will be singing passages from Plato’s Republic set to techno music.
Speaking to the camera on the morning show Buongiorno, Farantouri shared details about her highly anticipated concert alongside electronic music pioneer Lena Platonos, scheduled for June 19 at the historic Odeon of Herodes Atticus.
The ambitious program will feature three major works that bridge ancient text, contemporary composition, and electronic soundscapes. Farantouri noted that the performance will seamlessly blend modern musical elements guaranteed to thrill younger audiences.
“Lena Platonos and I are preparing a truly historic concert,” Farantouri said. “It connects the past with the present using very modern, electronic rhythms. I will also be singing Plato’s Republic. Lena has taken the myth of the Three Fates and set it to music—and it’s going to be techno! Young people will literally be dancing to it. It’s absolutely thrilling.”
Written around 375 BC, Plato’s Republic is arguably the most influential work of philosophy and political theory in Western history. Structured as a Socratic dialogue, it explores the definition of justice, the character of the just city-state, and the nature of the human soul. It is the very text that gave the world the famous “Allegory of the Cave”—Plato’s metaphor for how humanity mistakes the shadows of illusion for reality and how the pursuit of truth requires breaking free from those chains.
What makes Platonos and Farantouri’s techno adaptation so brilliantly ironic is Plato’s own complicated relationship with music. In the Republic, Plato devoted significant time to discussing the role of the arts in society, famously arguing that certain musical scales and rhythms should be banned because they could corrupt the soul or incite chaotic emotion.
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