In recent years, one of the predominant policy initiatives of the progressive left has been raising the minimum wage in locales around the country. At the same time, left-leaning politicians have sought the elimination of what's known as the tip credit, which allows employers to pay restaurant servers and other tipped employees a lower hourly base wage that they then bolster with gratuities.
Just a few years into this experiment, however, policymakers are showing signs of an about-face on the tip credit's abolition as they grapple with the unfortunate, and predictable, economic results.
In 2022, Washington, D.C., made news headlines when voters passed Initiative 82. As originally designed, it would have repealed the tip credit and required servers to be paid the District's full statutory minimum wage by 2027. (D.C.'s minimum wage was $16.10 per hour in 2022, but has since risen to $18.40 due to inflation indexation.) Prior to Initiative 82, D.C. servers could be paid a $5.35 tipped wage, so long as they earned enough tips to make up the difference between the lower tipped wage and the higher traditional minimum wage.
D.C.'s Initiative 82 was just the beginning. One Fair Wage, a progressive group that lobbies against subminimum wages, quarterbacked an all-out push to eliminate the tip credit in jurisdictions across America. Chicago became the second prominent city to follow suit. States like New York, Connecticut, and Illinois also quickly saw legislation introduced to eliminate the tip credit at a statewide level. (Apart from this recent wave, a small handful of American states—including California, Oregon, and Alaska—have long operated without a tip credit).
But just when it seemed like momentum against the tip credit had reached its apex, progressive politicians started to see the writing on the wall. In the aftermath of the tip credit's repeal, D.C. saw a close to 5 percent decline in full-service restaurant jobs. Tipped worker earnings also dropped by just under $12 million—likely a result, at least in part, of restaurants reducing hours for staff in the face of higher labor costs. At the same time, many D.C. restaurants began implementing service fees or so-called auto-gratuity policies that added mandatory 10-20 percent charges onto customers' bills.
Mugged by this economic reality, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser called for the full repeal of Initiative 82. Ultimately, the D.C. Council settled for a partial repeal in 2025, maintaining at least some semblance of a tipped wage that sits below the traditional minimum wage into the years ahead (although the tipped wage eventually rises to 75 percent of the traditional wage by 2034). This was a familiar story: The council had previously repealed Initiative 77, a near-identical attempt to abolish the tipped wage that voters passed in 2018.
After Chicago moved to eliminate the tip credit, the Illinois Restaurant Association found that 89 percent of Windy City restaurants raised menu prices; another 79 percent responded by reducing worker hours. Again bowing to economic reality, the progressive Chicago City Council voted to freeze the tip credit's planned elimination, only to see the effort vetoed by Mayor Brandon Johnson. Eventually, a compromise was brokered to at least pause the tip credit at its current level for two years—which punts the issue until after Johnson stands for election again, allowing a potential successor to endorse a more lasting reversal.
In Michigan, a 2024 state supreme court ruling set the tip credit on the path toward elimination by 2030. But state lawmakers intervened last year, deciding to maintain a 50 percent tip credit in perpetuity after 2031. Notably, Michigan is currently governed by a Democratic trifecta in the governorship and both houses of the Legislature. The tip credit's revival garnered key support from Republican lawmakers to pass in a bipartisan fashion, before being signed into law by Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer.
While progressive efforts to eliminate the tip credit may be motivated by an earnest desire to ensure waiters are paid more, the math isn't that simple. Requiring a server to be paid a $16 traditional minimum wage—up from a $5 tipped wage—might appear to raise their pay on paper. But this fails to consider several important factors.
Under our "No Taxes on Tips" new normal, raising the minimum wage for servers could lead to a partial reduction in tips, which under certain scenarios can result in less take-home pay for waiters once the taxman takes his cut. If more server earnings come in the form of "auto-gratuity" policies—which are treated as taxed wages under the law—then the tax repercussions may grow even grimmer.
But more broadly, these laws attempt to subvert basic economics. As of 2025, Bureau of Labor Statistics data show that D.C. restaurants shed over 1,600 jobs in aftermath of Initiative 82; meanwhile, between 2022 and 2025, restaurant job growth in the District declined by more than 8 percent. This is just one example. The fallout is the inevitable result of restaurants responding to labor costs that suddenly skyrocket, forcing establishments to cut worker hours and sometimes transition to quick-service models that require less hourly staff. And that's to say nothing of the diners who bear the cost with higher prices and new service fees.
"We're watching a beloved bar back, a beloved busser, a dishwasher have their jobs taken away," D.C. restaurant worker Valerie Graham told Reason in 2024. "Not because our owner-operator is an evil billionaire but because they're an independent business owner who had to make some business decisions and there's a callousness with which our industry is talked about."
To be sure, the tip credit has only survived in modified and reduced form in D.C., Chicago, and Michigan—and in the case of Chicago, the about-face is only temporary. But the partial reversals show the tip credit's elimination is not a foregone conclusion. Economic reality continues to rear its head.
The post Some Progressives Tried To Abolish the Tipped Minimum Wage. Now They're Backtracking. appeared first on Reason Magazine.
Three panels of a Renaissance altarpiece, separated for almost 200 years, have been reunited in Italy for an exhibition opening on Saturday, 17th October, offering visitors a rare opportunity to see a work by Andrea Previtali in its original arrangement.
The painting, created around 1515 for the Church of the Annunciation in Serina, near Bergamo, has been reconstructed through cooperation between the Diocese of Bergamo and the Museo Villa Bassi Rathgeb in Abano Terme, close to Padua. One panel, depicting a bishop saint, belongs to the museum’s permanent collection, while the remaining two have been brought together for the exhibition.
The reunion was confirmed on 16 October by Italy’s Ministry of Culture heritage authority. It forms the central attraction of Andrea Previtali: Disciple of Giovanni Bellini, which runs until 7th February 2027 and examines the career of a painter who worked between two important artistic centres of Renaissance Italy.
The three panels originally formed a triptych, a type of religious painting consisting of a central image flanked by two wings. Such works were commissioned for churches and private chapels, where they served as devotional objects and demonstrations of the artistic ambitions of their patrons.
Over succeeding centuries, many Renaissance altarpieces were dismantled, removed from their original settings or dispersed among private collections and museums. Their individual panels could subsequently be displayed as independent works, losing much of the relationship between the images originally intended by the artist.
The Previtali triptych provides an example of how those connections can be recovered.
The Museo Villa Bassi Rathgeb holds the panel depicting a bishop saint as part of the collection assembled by Roberto Bassi Rathgeb, an art historian and collector who contributed to renewed scholarly interest in Previtali.
His collection, donated to the municipality of Abano Terme between 1972 and 1980, contains important examples of painting from the Bergamo and Brescia schools.
The collaboration with the Diocese of Bergamo has now made it possible to display the bishop saint alongside the two surviving companion panels from the original altarpiece. Their reunion allows the work to be studied as a complete composition rather than as three separate paintings.
It also offers an opportunity to reassess Previtali’s decisions concerning the relationship between figures, religious symbolism and the architectural arrangement of devotional paintings.
Andrea Previtali was born around 1480 in Valle Imagna, in the territory of Bergamo, before moving to Venice, where he entered the workshop of Giovanni Bellini.
Bellini was among the most influential painters of the Venetian Renaissance, known for his treatment of colour, light and religious subjects. His workshop trained artists who would help establish the distinctive visual language of sixteenth-century Venetian painting.
Previtali’s connection to his master is documented in an inscription on his 1502 painting Madonna and Child with Donor, now held by the Musei Civici di Padova.
The artist described himself as a pupil of Giovanni Bellini, a declaration that has become an important piece of evidence for reconstructing his early career.
The new exhibition explores that relationship by displaying works by Previtali alongside paintings associated with the artistic environment in which he trained.
Among the loans is Bellini’s Saint Justina, from the Museo Bagatti Valsecchi in Milan. Although painted before Previtali’s mature career, it demonstrates the treatment of sacred figures, colour and composition that influenced succeeding generations.
The exhibition also includes works connected with Francesco Bissolo, Girolamo da Santacroce, Palma il Vecchio and Giovanni Busi, known as Cariani.
Together, they illustrate the movement of artistic ideas between Venice, Bergamo and Brescia during a period in which painters increasingly travelled between workshops, cities and patrons.
Previtali’s career developed at a time when the artistic traditions of northern Italy were undergoing considerable change.
The Venetian school placed particular emphasis on colour and atmosphere, while painters working in Lombardy drew on different approaches to portraiture, religious narrative and landscape.
Previtali’s paintings reflect both traditions. His subjects included Madonnas, religious gatherings, portraits and landscapes, often combining carefully observed human figures with detailed natural backgrounds.
After returning to Bergamo, he encountered the work of Lorenzo Lotto, whose approach to portraiture and religious painting introduced further stylistic developments.
The exhibition therefore examines Previtali not simply as a follower of Bellini, but as an artist whose work developed through exchanges between different regional schools.
It also includes Renaissance portraits, among them a painting on loan from the Accademia dei Concordi in Rovigo.
A separate section examines the practical techniques employed in Renaissance workshops, using physical and digital displays to explain how artists prepared, constructed and completed their paintings.
Such research has become increasingly important in the study and preservation of Europe’s Old Master paintings, allowing historians to reconstruct relationships between works that have survived in different institutions.
The restoration and presentation of historic collections also forms part of the wider debate about protecting Europe’s cultural heritage.
The Previtali exhibition has been organised by the municipality of Abano Terme in cooperation with the University of Padua and the Italian heritage authorities. It is curated by Raffaele Campion and Barbara Maria Savy.
Visitors will be able to see the reunited triptych at the Museo Villa Bassi Rathgeb from 17th October until 7th February 2027. The exhibition provides a rare chance to examine the three panels together and to understand how a religious commission created more than five centuries ago fitted into the artistic culture of Renaissance northern Italy.
Scientific examination of a painting by Belgian surrealist Paul Delvaux has revealed significant changes to its original composition, including figures and other details concealed beneath layers of paint. The findings are being presented in a new exhibition opening on 16 October at Musée L in Louvain-la-Neuve.
The exhibition, La Ville lunaire II: The Hidden Side of Paul Delvaux’s Painting, examines a work completed in 1956 and held in the museum’s permanent collection. Through X-ray imaging, infrared reflectography and ultraviolet examination, researchers have been able to investigate the artist’s working methods and compare the finished painting with an original preparatory drawing.
The exhibition, which runs until 7 February 2027, follows the acquisition of the drawing by the King Baudouin Foundation in 2024. Its subsequent deposit at Musée L has made it possible to examine the two works together and reconstruct the development of a composition that underwent substantial alterations.
Completed in June 1956, La Ville lunaire II depicts a mysterious nocturnal landscape, with a long avenue, buildings, streetlamps and figures arranged within an unsettling architectural setting.
The painting measures approximately 89 by 139 centimetres and was executed in oil on a fibreboard panel. It entered the museum’s collection in 1990 through a bequest from Dr Charles Delsemme.
Its carefully constructed perspective and unusual treatment of space reflect Delvaux’s interest in creating scenes that appear familiar while remaining detached from ordinary reality.
The museum’s collection records describe the work as a strange nocturnal landscape, with wooden barriers and a sequence of streetlamps establishing its distinctive spatial arrangement.
Yet the painting visible today differs considerably from the composition Delvaux originally envisaged.
Earlier technical examinations had already established that important details were covered during the painting process. The new exhibition brings those findings into direct comparison with the preparatory drawing, enabling visitors to see how the artist’s intentions changed.
An auction catalogue published in 2024 identified several elements present in the drawing and concealed in the painting, including a moon in the right-hand sky, a seated figure on the right and two figures wearing robes near the centre.
These changes are significant because they suggest that Delvaux did more than adjust minor details. He altered the population and lighting of the scene, potentially changing how the composition would be experienced by the viewer.
The reasons for those decisions remain uncertain.
Modern conservation techniques allow researchers to examine works of art without removing the paint that covers earlier stages of their creation.
Infrared reflectography can reveal underdrawings and certain changes concealed beneath surface paint, depending on the materials used by the artist. X-ray imaging can detect differences in the composition of pigments and structures below the visible surface.
Ultraviolet examination provides further information about surface materials and alterations, including some later interventions.
When combined with documentary evidence, these methods help researchers distinguish between an artist’s initial design, revisions made during painting and changes introduced after completion.
The Musée L exhibition uses these techniques to investigate what art historians call pentimenti — visible or detectable alterations that record an artist changing their mind during the creative process.
The preparatory drawing, measuring approximately 28 by 45 centimetres, provides an additional reference point. Executed in ink and pencil, it contains elements that were subsequently revised or painted over in the final composition.
Displayed alongside the finished work, it allows visitors to follow the artist’s decisions from the preliminary design to the version that eventually entered the museum’s collection.
The technical findings also demonstrate the importance of preserving preparatory studies, which can contain information absent from completed paintings.
Born in Antheit in 1897, Paul Delvaux became one of Belgium’s best-known twentieth-century painters, developing a distinctive artistic language associated with surrealism.
His paintings frequently depict classical buildings, railway stations, deserted streets and solitary figures, often arranged in environments where architectural precision contrasts with an atmosphere of uncertainty.
He was influenced by the Italian painter Giorgio de Chirico, whose deserted urban spaces and dramatic perspectives helped establish the visual language of metaphysical painting.
Delvaux’s relationship with de Chirico has been examined extensively by art historians, including Joël Roucloux, whose study of La Ville lunaire II analysed its architectural perspective, shadows and the psychological effect of its composition.
The painting’s apparently moonlit setting is particularly interesting in light of the concealed moon identified by technical examination.
The absence of that celestial body from the final visible composition changes the relationship between the painting’s title and its visual content, leaving the viewer to interpret the source of its unusual illumination.
This approach distinguishes Delvaux from other Belgian surrealists, including René Magritte, whose work frequently relied on recognisable objects placed in logically contradictory situations.
For Delvaux, architecture, perspective and the arrangement of human figures were equally important in constructing a world that appears coherent but resists conventional interpretation.
The exhibition forms part of Musée L’s programme devoted to research into its permanent collections, rather than a conventional retrospective of the artist’s career.
Its central purpose is to explain how a single painting developed, from its first drawn composition through successive revisions to its completed form.
The research has been supported by the Jacqueline Delcourt-Nonkels Fund, managed by the King Baudouin Foundation.
For visitors, the opportunity is to examine not only a painting by one of Belgium’s leading surrealists, but also the evidence of the artistic decisions that shaped it.
The exhibition is open at Musée L in Louvain-la-Neuve from 16 October 2026 to 7 February 2027. By presenting the original drawing, technical images and finished painting together, the museum offers a detailed examination of Delvaux’s methods and the changes he made to one of his most carefully constructed nocturnal scenes.
Archaeologists working near Venice have identified what they believe to be the remains of a 1,600-year-old cathedral and an adjoining episcopal palace, resolving a longstanding question about the location of one of the region’s earliest Christian centres.
The discovery was announced on 15 October by Ca’ Foscari University of Venice, following excavations at Altinum, an important Roman settlement on the mainland near the Venetian lagoon. The foundations of a substantial religious complex have emerged from an area where ancient written accounts had long indicated the existence of a cathedral, although its precise location had remained unknown.
The findings suggest that the church was constructed between the late fourth and early fifth centuries AD, making it the earliest Christian church so far identified archaeologically in the Venetian territory. The researchers believe the complex provides physical evidence of the period when Christianity was becoming an important political and administrative force in the declining Roman Empire.
The newly identified church was a rectangular structure approximately 30 metres long and 20 metres wide, without an apse and orientated towards the east. Its layout differs from the surrounding Roman street grid, reflecting the religious requirements of the early Christian community.
The architectural arrangement resembles early churches in the northern Adriatic region, particularly those associated with Aquileia, which was an important centre of Christianity during late antiquity.
An adjoining building, distinguished by its substantial foundations and a complex arrangement of internal rooms, has been provisionally identified as the bishop’s palace. Archaeologists believe it may have stood two storeys high, with residential accommodation for senior clergy above rooms potentially associated with privileged burials.
Among the most revealing discoveries is the extensive reuse of stone paving blocks taken from the Roman streets. These materials were incorporated into the foundations of the ecclesiastical buildings, providing evidence of how the city was being physically reorganised during the transition from Roman to Christian administration.
The university’s researchers suggest that the removal of public paving materials may also indicate the authority exercised by the bishop over urban infrastructure. This interpretation would place the emerging Church at the centre of the city’s political transformation.
The existence of an early Christian cathedral at Altinum had been documented in letters written by Saint Jerome, one of the most influential Christian scholars of the late Roman period.
Writing in AD 396, Jerome referred to the religious activities of Nepotian, a priest associated with Heliodorus, the first bishop of Altinum. His descriptions included the maintenance of church furnishings, walls, floors and sacred vessels, suggesting an established and relatively prosperous Christian institution.
Until now, however, archaeologists had struggled to connect those accounts to a particular building.
The latest excavations, combining evidence collected during the 2025 and 2026 campaigns, have provided what researchers consider a convincing identification of the ecclesiastical complex.
The excavation is directed by Diego Calaon of Ca’ Foscari University and co-directed by Elisa Possenti of the University of Trento. Their work has brought together earlier archaeological records and newly examined foundations, including sections exposed during investigations in previous decades.
Researchers have also identified a burial area dating from the sixth and seventh centuries. Many graves were disturbed when construction materials were removed from the abandoned complex, but surviving human remains offer opportunities for further scientific investigation.
Radiocarbon dating, anthropological examinations and additional geophysical surveys are planned to establish a more detailed chronology and search for other elements of the religious complex, including its baptistery.
The historical importance of Altinum extends beyond the cathedral itself.
The ancient settlement was an important Roman commercial centre with connections to the waterways of the northern Adriatic. As political, environmental and demographic conditions changed during late antiquity, its population and institutions gradually shifted towards settlements within the lagoon.
One of the most important destinations was Torcello, which later became an early centre of Venetian civilisation.
Traditional accounts have often portrayed the creation of lagoon settlements as a response to barbarian invasions, with mainland inhabitants fleeing to isolated islands for protection.
The latest archaeological findings support a more complicated process.
Research at Altinum and Torcello indicates that the movement of people, religious institutions and construction materials was gradual and organised rather than the consequence of a single catastrophic event.
The cathedral appears to have been systematically dismantled during the first half of the seventh century, with substantial quantities of its stone and brick transferred to developing lagoon communities.
A surviving inscription records the establishment of Torcello’s cathedral in AD 639, providing an important chronological reference for the movement of ecclesiastical authority.
The findings add to the wider study of Europe’s surviving archaeological and architectural heritage, particularly the transformation of Roman settlements into medieval urban centres.
They also demonstrate how archaeological evidence can challenge historical narratives constructed centuries after the events they describe.
Much of the late-antique landscape at Altinum disappeared because of centuries of agricultural activity and the systematic removal of reusable building materials. In many cases, the excavators are studying trenches left by the extraction of foundations rather than surviving walls.
Further investigations may determine the complete extent of the episcopal complex and clarify the chronology of its abandonment.
For the first time, however, researchers can locate the religious buildings associated with Altinum’s earliest Christian bishops and trace their connection to the communities from which medieval Venice eventually emerged.
Archaeologists have identified a previously unknown coal-mining tunnel stretching at least 130 metres beneath woodland near Sprockhövel in western Germany. The remains provide evidence of coordinated underground construction at a time when the Ruhr’s mining industry was still developing, long before the region became synonymous with heavy industry.
The discovery was announced on 15 October by the Westphalia-Lippe Regional Association (LWL), whose archaeologists are working alongside the German Mining Museum in Bochum and GeoPark Ruhrgebiet. The team says its findings shed light on tunnelling techniques used before the eighteenth century, although the newly identified passage has not yet been given a precise scientific date.
At Haßlinghausen, a forest floor conceals old shafts, spoil heaps and depressions left by abandoned mining operations. Researchers did not enter an intact underground gallery. Instead, they identified the location of a collapsed passage by excavating at two former shaft sites and drilling into the surrounding spoil. Subsidence created by the collapse left a recognisable trace above ground.
The evidence suggests a more complex operation than miners simply following exposed seams into the earth. Construction shafts were sunk at intervals along the proposed tunnel. Workers descended through them and excavated separate stretches underground, later joining those sections into a continuous passage.
This method allowed several groups to work simultaneously rather than advancing from a single entrance. It also demanded planning and considerable labour. The filled-in shafts and disturbed soil are still visible in the excavated sections, enabling specialists to reconstruct the miners’ methods even though much of the original tunnel has collapsed.
Till Kasielke of GeoPark Ruhrgebiet explained that the construction shafts were located beside the underground route and then filled after the gallery was completed. Jennifer Garner, an archaeologist at the German Mining Museum, said the excavations would provide material for scientific dating and a better understanding of the effort required to build the structures.
The latest work follows a 2025 investigation of a separate, approximately 70-metre tunnel nearby. That earlier feature reached a coal seam some ten metres below ground. Researchers suspected it might predate the seventeenth century because it appeared to have been overlooked during later mining activity. The newly identified 130-metre passage is a distinct discovery.
The chronology matters because horizontal tunnels changed the possibilities of coal extraction. Early miners could reach seams by digging pits or inclined shafts, but groundwater increasingly obstructed work at depth. Drainage galleries allowed water to escape, making deeper workings more practical and potentially extending the life of individual mining sites.
The Ruhr is usually associated with the vast collieries, factories and transport infrastructure that drove Germany’s expansion in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Yet coal was extracted locally during the Middle Ages. The transition from small workings to organised subterranean networks remains poorly documented, partly because written records from the earliest periods are scarce.
The archaeological research programme, which began with related investigations in 2024, is intended to address that gap. The team has excavated soil layers associated with old shafts, and the recovered material may help establish when specific construction techniques were introduced. For now, it would be premature to assign the new passage a medieval date.
At Essen, the UNESCO-listed Zollverein Coal Mine Industrial Complex preserves the architecture and machinery of the Ruhr’s later industrial era. The remains at Sprockhövel represent a different historical record: temporary shafts, collapsed passages and waste deposits left by miners whose operations preceded industrial-scale coal production.
Across Europe, such landscapes have become an important part of cultural heritage. EU Today has previously reported on the preservation of Belgium’s Bois du Cazier colliery, where 262 people died in the 1956 mining disaster. In Sprockhövel, the focus is on a much earlier workforce, whose organisation and technical knowledge must be reconstructed from the ground itself.
Further dating and analysis will determine whether the newly identified tunnel pushes back the known chronology of organised drainage and gallery construction in the Ruhr. The excavations have already established that a substantial underground project once operated beneath a forest whose surface retains remarkably little indication of the work carried out there.
The fifth Rapid Damage and Needs Assessment put direct war damage at $195.1 billion (€173.4 billion) as of the end of 2025. Recovery and reconstruction needs over the next ten years are estimated at $587.7 billion (€522.3 billion), almost three times Ukraine’s nominal GDP for 2025.
Compensation goes to those whose damage has been documented, properly filed, and accepted by an international mechanism. One person working on this problem is Andriy Yermak, Chair of the UNBA Committee for the Protection of Victims of Armed Aggression against Ukraine, Compensation Mechanisms and European Integration Legal Support for Recovery. He is also the initiator of “Advokat+”, a nationwide legal support initiative for Ukrainian service members and their families. His position rests on a simple premise: an unproven right doesn’t pay, and proving it takes lawyers.
Individuals and companies follow roughly the same process. The claimant must attach proof of ownership and confirmation of value, gather photo and video evidence of the damage, and prove that the military aggression specifically caused it. The required documents depend on the claim category, and, as Andriy Yermak points out from his professional experience, this is where people most often make mistakes. In such matters, a lawyer’s help is often more than necessary.
Businesses face the same questions on a larger scale. Kyiv’s first McDonald’s, opened in 1997, has been damaged by Russian strikes, and the Coca-Cola plant near Kyiv, in operation since 1998, was recently hit by a Russian drone. A company in this position must decide what was lost, how to prove it, and which mechanism to use: the international register, a national program, or a court.
The international and national Ukrainian compensation system has several components.
The Register of Damage for Ukraine (RD4U). It has accepted claims since April 2024 and operates under the Council of Europe, headquartered in The Hague. As of 30 September 2026, all 43 claim categories are open: 21 for individuals, 11 for legal entities and 11 for the State of Ukraine. By early September, the register had received almost 190,000 claims: about 58,000 were recorded, while the rest were under review. Claims can be submitted through the Diia portal. Yermak stresses that the register records damage but does not pay compensation.
The International Claims Commission. About 40 states and the EU signed the convention establishing it in The Hague in December 2025, and ten have ratified it. Twenty-five ratifications are needed for the commission to begin work. The Verkhovna Rada ratified the convention on 30 April 2026. The commission will review the claims from the register on their merits and determine the amount of compensation in each case.
National programs. Individuals have eRecovery (єВідновлення), which covers owners of homes damaged or destroyed in hostilities after 24 February 2022. Owners of damaged homes get money for repairs, minor or major. Owners of destroyed homes get a housing certificate to buy a new one. Applications go through Diia, an administrative services centre, or a notary, and a commission decides within 30 calendar days. As of 10 October 2026, 273,169 families had received UAH 160.9 billion in total, according to the Ministry for Communities and Territories Development.
Businesses have had a war risk insurance program since 1 January 2026. It rests on Government Resolution No. 1541 and is run by the Export Credit Agency (ECA), whose mandate has already been expanded to cover insurance for domestic investments against war risks. Enterprises in high-risk regions can receive direct compensation for destroyed or damaged assets, such as buildings and equipment, up to UAH 10 million at launch. Businesses that buy war risk policies in Ukraine get part of their premiums back, up to UAH 1 million a year. Only property already enrolled in the program on the date of damage qualifies.
The courts. The Supreme Court has established a practice that allows Ukrainian courts to hear individual claims against Russia for damage caused by armed aggression, without applying state immunity. However, enforcing such judgments is difficult, so victims often turn to state and international mechanisms.
Yermak says:
Independence plays an important role here: in compensation cases, individuals or companies face official bodies. The lawyer’s role is to challenge a decision without fearing for their own position. In Yermak’s view, this requires upholding legal privilege and adherence to credible professional standards.
The register contains around 190,000 claims, each with supporting documents. Andriy Yermak notes that at this scale, legal practice can be transformed by modern technology. AI, which is now spreading into almost every area of life, can reshape legal analysis and the review of large volumes of data. Today’s lawyers are expected to work properly with data summaries, protect their clients’ confidential information, and keep professional judgment in their own hands. Looking ahead, Yermak believes this raises questions about training the next generation of lawyers: for them, professional standards will cover this practice in both compensation cases and other areas of legal work.
The “Advokat+” initiative, created by Yermak, shows that the profession can scale up quickly. Ukrainian attorneys, often pro bono, help service members and their families with procedures, applications, and complaints. Yermak is convinced that if the profession could organize mass assistance for service members, it can do the same for those affected by destruction. All it needs is training and clear rules.
In the lawyer’s view, several steps are worth taking in this direction:
Create training programs for lawyers on working with international compensation mechanisms, including filing claims with the register and working with the future commission.The result would be a system in which the scale of damage has been measured, the register accepts claims, and the commission is created. But between an entry in the register and an actual payout lies a path every claimant must walk. Without a trained, independent, and protected profession, the right to compensation will remain formal.
Filming a drone strike and posting it online may be quietly teaching Russia’s drones to aim better. Russia is collecting footage of its Geran attack drones striking Ukraine, probably to check how its optical target-recognition and guidance algorithms perform in combat, presidential defense-technology adviser Serhii “Flash” Beskrestnov says.
Russia has fitted its jet-powered Geran drones with machine vision that lets them recognize and track targets on their own in the final seconds of flight, a capability Ukraine’s electronic warfare cannot easily defeat. Now, Moscow is paying people inside Ukraine to film where those drones land, which Flash says is no coincidence after four years of not asking.
“Across many Telegram channels, the enemy is asking traitors to film videos of ‘Geran’ impacts and transmit information for a reward. For four years they didn’t ask, and suddenly it has become so crucial,” Beskrestnov notes.
The reason, he believes, lies in those optical guidance systems. Russian forces need impact footage to see how its algorithms are performing in real combat conditions, according to the expert.
His takeaway for them is blunt: stop posting the videos of Russian assaults. He stresses the serious danger of publishing footage of impact sites and urges people not to film or share it.
“This serves as a signal to everyone: do not film and do not publish videos of ‘Shahed’ hits. You see how vital and necessary this is to Russia,” Beskrestnov adds.
Earlier, Ukrenergo board chairman Vitaly Zaichenko said that a Russian drone severed a unique power transmission tower at the Dnipro River crossing in Kyiv, and it cannot be restored. He added that the company was developing new technical solutions "on the fly, and very fast."
It would start the procedures for those solutions from 15 October. Russia’s use of drones able to sever metal towers is a new and serious challenge for Ukraine’s power engineers.
A Nissan amplia as opções da sua marca global Value Advantage no mercado brasileiro com o lançamento das palhetas Flat Blade. O novo produto é voltado para veículos fora da garantia como Kicks Play, Versa, Sentra, March e Frontier e conta com homologação da engenharia de pós-venda da Nissan.
Desenvolvidas para atender às condições climáticas brasileiras, as novas palhetas combinam materiais de alta qualidade, durabilidade e eficiência na limpeza do para-brisa, contribuindo para uma condução mais segura e confortável. Com design aerodinâmico do tipo flat blade e spoiler integrado, melhora o contato com o vidro e ajuda a reduzir vibrações durante o funcionamento. A proteção em grafite também proporciona um deslizamento mais suave e silencioso, aumentando o conforto ao dirigir.
As palhetas foram desenvolvidas para atender modelos como Kicks da primeira geração e o Kicks Play (2016 a 2025), Versa e Versa V-Drive (2011 a 2020), novo Versa (a partir de 2021), March (2011 a 2017), Sentra (2014 a 2023 em diante) e picape Frontier (a partir de 2017).
Lançada no Brasil no primeiro semestre de 2026, a linha Value Advantage faz parte da estratégia da Nissan de oferecer produtos e peças com preços competitivos e desempenho confiável. As novas palhetas estão disponíveis na rede de concessionárias Nissan.
A Nissan continuará ampliando a linha Value Advantage no Brasil com novos itens voltados à manutenção e reposição, oferecendo mais opções para proprietários de veículos fora da garantia, rede de concessionárias, oficinas e reparadores independentes. Em breve, mais novidades serão anunciadas.
Principais diferenciais das palhetas Flat Blade Value Advantage
Qualidade homologada pela Engenharia Nissan
Borracha sintética de alta resistência ao desgaste
Limpeza eficiente do para-brisa para maior visibilidade
Funcionamento silencioso graças à proteção em grafite
Spoiler integrado para melhor estabilidade e menor vibração
Encaixe no padrão original Nissan
Garantia de fábrica de 3 meses
The post Nissan lança palhetas Flat Blade para modelos da marca fora da garantia appeared first on Diário da Manhã - O Jornal do leitor Inteligente.
Debris from a Russian drone damaged Cosmogony, a painting that set a national record in Ukraine, the Korsaks Museum of Contemporary Ukrainian Art in Lutsk, where the artwork was exhibited, reported on 14 October. A fire destroyed part of the painting’s final section, titled The Future, according to the statement.
Russian drones continue to attack Ukraine. Overnight into 15 October alone, Ukrainian air defense forces downed or suppressed 536 Russian unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). In recent days, Lutsk, a city in northwestern Ukraine, has been among the cities damaged by Russian attacks. Russian UAV attacks set fire to an oil depot, a wholesale warehouse, and a shopping center. At the museum, located on the shopping center’s premises, the fire damaged Ukraine’s largest painting, which covers a canvas of more than 2,000 square meters.
A fire broke out at the Adrenalin City shopping and entertainment complex, where the museum is located, Suspilne Lutsk reported. The blaze damaged the last of the painting’s six sections, according to the report.
“By destroying art and culture, they are also trying to destroy Ukrainians,” Tetiana Repnytska, director of the Museum of Contemporary Ukrainian Art in Lutsk, told Suspilne Lutsk.
Museum staff also had to evacuate more than 300 works by Ukrainian artist Emma Andiievska, which were exhibited alongside Cosmogony, Oles Tomakh, the museum’s chief curator, told Suspilne Lutsk. Some works could not be removed in time, resulting in shattered glass. However, the museum’s other exhibition halls were unaffected, the chief curator said.
The museum is weighing whether to fully restore the damaged fragment or keep the fire’s traces as a reminder of the war, and will decide after consulting the artist, Petro Antyp, and restoration specialists, it said. Repnytska told Suspilne Lutsk that the painting’s authors could also create a new section.
“Despite the shelling, we will continue to develop contemporary Ukrainian art and preserve it,” the museum director said.
Artist Petro Antyp began working on the painting in November 2022, Suspilne Lutsk reported, and it took almost two years to complete, according to the museum’s website. The painting covers an area of 2,086 square meters.
In September 2024, the project set a national record as Ukraine’s largest painting.
The artwork explores the evolution of the universe, Earth, nature, humanity, society, culture, and science. Its six sections combine myths, legends, scientific theories, and symbols from different cultures, according to the museum’s website.
The project extends beyond the canvas, as the museum presents a multimedia performance that combines light, sound, and art.
Around noon on 14 October, a Russian jet-powered Shahed drone attacked Lutsk. Drone debris damaged a wholesale goods warehouse and a residential building, Roman Romaniuk, acting head of the Volyn Regional Military Administration, told Suspilne.
Falling drone debris sparked a large fire at the Yevrohurt wholesale warehouse. A nine-story residential building on Sobornosti Avenue was also damaged, Romaniuk later reported on social media.
Six people were killed in the strike on the warehouse: five were found at the scene, and another person died in the hospital. Eleven more people were injured, Romaniuk said.
Two other people, including a child, were injured in the residential building. Twelve people remained hospitalized, one of whom was in serious condition, according to the report.
The first criminal trial arising from the destruction of the Nord Stream gas pipelines has opened in Hamburg, confronting German judges with allegations against a former Ukrainian military officer and a dispute over whether Russian energy infrastructure constituted a legitimate wartime target.
Serhii Kuznietsov, 50, is accused of organising an operation that destroyed three of the four Nord Stream pipeline strands in the Baltic Sea in September 2022. German prosecutors have charged him with offences involving explosives, damage to infrastructure and participation in a war crime.
At the opening hearing on 14 October, Kuznietsov’s lawyers sought to have the proceedings dismissed, challenging both the evidence against their client and the prosecution’s classification of the pipelines as protected civilian infrastructure.
According to the account of the opening proceedings, the defence argued that the installations served Russia’s strategic interests and had been used to exert economic and political pressure on European countries.
Kuznietsov denies involvement in the explosions. His lawyers maintain that the prosecution has not established that he participated in, let alone directed, the operation.
The explosions occurred on 26 September 2022, approximately seven months after Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Underwater detonations near the Danish island of Bornholm ruptured sections of Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2, releasing large quantities of natural gas into the Baltic Sea.
German investigators allege that a group of Ukrainians used a rented sailing yacht, the Andromeda, to transport divers, explosives and equipment to the pipelines.
According to the prosecution, the operation involved military-grade explosive devices and was organised with the knowledge or direction of Ukrainian state authorities.
These allegations remain to be tested in court. Ukrainian officials have denied state involvement, and no German judicial finding has established responsibility on the part of Kyiv’s political or military leadership.
The defendant was arrested in Italy in August 2025 and subsequently extradited to Germany following lengthy legal proceedings.
As EU Today reported following the Italian Supreme Court’s ruling, Kuznietsov’s defence had challenged the legality of his transfer and questioned the evidence underpinning the German investigation.
His appearance in Hamburg now moves the case from extradition disputes to direct examination of the prosecution’s allegations.
The central legal controversy concerns whether the Nord Stream infrastructure was entitled to protection as a civilian installation during an international armed conflict.
Under international humanitarian law, civilian objects are generally protected against attack unless their nature, location, purpose or use makes an effective contribution to military action and their destruction offers a definite military advantage.
Kuznietsov’s defence argues that Nord Stream had served Russian strategic interests by generating energy revenue and providing Moscow with leverage over European governments.
Defence lawyer Nicola Canestrini has described the pipelines as an instrument of Russian economic coercion rather than infrastructure serving an exclusively civilian purpose.
German prosecutors reject the proposition that those circumstances automatically justified their destruction. They maintain that the operation involved attacks against civilian infrastructure and therefore constituted a war crime.
The legal assessment is more complicated than determining who owned the pipelines.
Financial benefits to a belligerent state do not necessarily make every commercial installation a military objective. Equally, civilian ownership or use does not automatically exclude infrastructure from becoming a military target if the conditions established under the laws of armed conflict are satisfied.
The operational circumstances in September 2022 could become important. Nord Stream 1 had already ceased delivering gas, while Nord Stream 2 had never received German certification to begin commercial operations.
The court will therefore have to consider both the pipelines’ strategic significance and their actual contribution to Russia’s military operations at the time of the explosions.
Kuznietsov’s lawyers have also argued that his military status restricts his ability to discuss information that could be covered by Ukrainian state secrecy obligations.
According to the opening-day court reporting, the defence contends that these restrictions undermine his ability to challenge the prosecution’s case.
The proceedings also raise questions concerning the legality of his extradition from Italy and the precise offences for which his transfer was authorised.
These are separate from the underlying question of responsibility for the explosions. A procedural objection could affect the conduct of the trial without resolving the factual allegations.
The case has implications for relations between Germany and Ukraine, although criminal responsibility must be determined independently of diplomatic considerations.
Germany remains a major supplier of military and financial assistance to Kyiv. At the same time, German prosecutors are pursuing allegations that Ukrainian personnel damaged infrastructure in which German companies had invested heavily.
The pipelines themselves remain politically contentious. As EU Today previously examined, the owner of Nord Stream 2 has separately challenged the EU’s plans to eliminate Russian gas imports, demonstrating that the commercial and legal consequences of Europe’s former energy relationship with Moscow remain unresolved.
The Hamburg trial will not determine the legality of Russia’s invasion, nor will it establish Ukrainian government responsibility merely because a former officer stands accused.
It will examine the evidence against Kuznietsov and the circumstances in which the destruction of infrastructure connected to an aggressor state can constitute a criminal offence.
Further hearings are scheduled, with the evidentiary proceedings expected to begin on 27 October. The outcome will depend on whether prosecutors can establish the defendant’s alleged role and overcome the legal challenges raised by his defence.
No doubt Ed Davey lovingly cares for his disabled son, says Joanna Gray. But he's not his "carer"; he's his father. It's a distinction Britain is fast losing sight of, to the detriment of us all.
The post No Ed Davey, You’re a Father, Not a “Carer” appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.
A parliamentary inquiry by Alternative for Germany (AfD) lawmakers in the German state of Baden-Württemberg has brought to light official data showing that authorities have recorded 358 so-called child marriages since April 2012, with courts formally annulling only eight of them between 2018 and 2024.
The figures, released in early October 2026 in response to questions from state parliament members Nikolaos Boutakoglou and Emely Knorr, have drawn sharp attention to the prevalence of underage marriages — overwhelmingly involving people from migrant backgrounds — and the limited number of legal interventions.
Among the annulled cases was the 2020 marriage of an 11-year-old Iraqi girl to a 17-year-old Iraqi boy. In 2018, authorities annulled the marriage of a 14-year-old Afghan girl to a 30-year-old Afghan man. Two further annulments occurred in 2024: one involving a 16-year-old German girl and a 25-year-old Pakistani man, and another between a 16-year-old Syrian girl and a 27-year-old Syrian man, according to Welt newspaper.
The other annulled marriages involved individuals from Afghanistan, Romania, Moldova, Croatia, Serbia, and elsewhere. The state Interior Ministry stated that no court proceedings for annulment were pending at the time of its reply.
The remaining approximately 350 cases, documented by the government of Tübingen were closed under the category of “other resolutions.” Possible reasons cited by the government include the death of a partner, a decision to forgo annulment, or a subsequent marriage abroad.
These files still include striking examples of very young brides. In 2020, a 12-year-old Afghan girl was recorded as married to an 18-year-old man. In 2022, a 12-year-old Syrian girl was married to a 28-year-old Syrian man, and in 2023 a 12-year-old Afghan girl to a 21-year-old Afghan man. Multiple cases involving 13- and 14-year-old girls also appear in the data, and some reports note nine marriages in which the girl was under the age of 14 at the time of the union.
The demographic pattern is pronounced. Men from Syria accounted for 132 of the recorded cases, nearly 40 percent, followed by nationals of Bulgaria, Turkey, Afghanistan, and Iraq.
Child marriages between two German citizens made up only about 0.3 percent of the total. It is also unclear if these German citizens have a migration background, but given the pattern seen among foreigners, it is very probable.
Most of the 358 cases date from 2015 onward when the migration crisis truly began to grow in Germany. Boutakoglou highlighted the figures on social media, stating: “Almost without exception, every child marriage in Baden-Württemberg since 2017 can be traced back to mass migration! Nearly 40% of the child marriages were contracted between Syrians, while child marriages between two Germans account for only 0.3%.”
Fast ausnahmslos jede Kinderehe in Baden-Württemberg seit 2017 ist auf die Massenmigration zurückzuführen! Das ergab meine Kleine Anfrage an die Landesregierung. Fast 40 % der Kinderehen wurden zwischen Syrern geschlossen, Kinderehen unter zwei Deutschen machen nur 0,3 % aus! https://t.co/BeJ4wS3CJL
— Nikolaos Boutakoglou (@Nik_Boutakoglou) October 5, 2026
Emely Knorr, co-author of the government inquiry, wrote: “Child marriages are incompatible with our values. Children have a right to safety, education, and a self-determined future. That is why we need effective protection, early intervention, and decisive action against forced marriages.”
Germany raised the minimum marriage age to 18 in 2017 and generally does not recognize foreign marriages involving minors under certain conditions. The Tübingen authority deals exclusively with marriages contracted abroad that come to the attention of German registry offices.
The AfD inquiry was prompted in part by a Terre des Femmes leaflet warning of the risk of forced marriage during school holidays, but the state government said it had no financial involvement in the leaflet.
As Remix News has reported in the past, the issue is not just child marriages. Mass migration has brought new backward cultural norms to Europe that are completely incompatible with European human rights. For example, already in 2020, the German government admitted that there were at least 68,000 female genital mutilation victims in the country, rising 44 percent since 2017.
According to then German Minister for Family Affairs Franziska Giffey, mainly migration is to blame for the massive increase as many migrants coming to Germany commonly practice FGM in their own home countries. The practice, which is a human rights violation, involves the ritual cutting off some or all of the external female genitalia.
Germany is far from the only country dealing with this trend. Remix News reported this year that a female genital mutilation crisis had hit Paris, with over 140,000 such cases seen across the country.
The post Germany: 358 recorded child marriages since 2012, including an 11-year-old Iraqi girl appeared first on Remix News.
Angela Rayner's department funnelled taxpayers' cash into Left-wing propaganda seeking to prevent a Reform or Tory government in the wake of the Southport murders.
The post Rayner Funnelled Taxpayer Cash into Anti-Right-Wing Propaganda appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.
Oxford University has told staff not to use common phrases such as "learn the ropes" or "find your feet" over fears they confuse foreign students, sparking concern at the new scheme of language policing.
The post Oxford Tells Staff Not to Use Common Phrases Like “Learn the Ropes” for Fear of Confusing Foreign Students appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.
Login