Defense secretary spoke to reporters in first press briefing since Trump announced ceasefire deal after 40 days of warAfter 40 days and 40 nights of war, Pete Hegseth, the US defense secretary, on Wednesday pointed to divine providence while telling reporters that Iran’s weapons factories had been reduced to rubble, its military rendered ineffective for years and its supreme leader left wounded and disfigured, all for a temporary ceasefire.“Iran begged for this ceasefire, and we all know it,” Hegseth said at the Pentagon’s first press briefing since Donald Trump announced a two-week pause in hostilities Tuesday night. “Operation Epic Fury decimated Iran’s military and rendered it combat ineffective for years to come.” Continue reading...
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Hegseth claims Iran ‘begged’ for ceasefire after US and Tehran agree to two-week pause
The Guardian World
April 08, 2026
14:58 GMT
Defense secretary spoke to reporters in first press briefing since Trump announced ceasefire deal after 40 days of war After 40 days and 40 nights of war, Pete Hegseth, the US defense secretary, on Wednesday pointed to divine providence while telling reporters that Iran’s weapons factories had been reduced to rubble, its military rendered ineffective for years and its supreme leader left wounded and disfigured, all for a temporary ceasefire. “Iran begged for this ceasefire, and we all know it,” Hegseth said at the Pentagon’s first press briefing since Donald Trump announced a two-week pause in hostilities Tuesday night. “Operation Epic Fury decimated Iran’s military and rendered it combat ineffective for years to come.” Continue reading...
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Starmer warns ‘lot of work to do’ to make ceasefire permanent at start of talks in Gulf - UK politics live
PM will meet leaders in the region to discuss diplomatic efforts to support the ceasefire agreed between the US and Iran OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, is proposing the extension of the four-day working week, as a response to AI taking over some of the work done by humans. But for the Conservative party the four-day working week, at least in the public sector, is viewed as a menace. Officially, that’s a value-for-money position, but it also overlaps with their opposition to civil servants working from home, which has some of the traits of a culture war obsession. Today the Conservatives have announced that, if they were in government, they would ban councils from letting staff work a four-day working week on full pay. Explaining why, the Tories say in a news release: The four-day working week, as introduced by Liberal Democrat-run South Cambridgeshire district council, has left residents with more council tax for less public service. Bin collectors and social housing officials receive 100 per cent of their pay for around 80 per cent of their originally contracted hours. The Labour government have failed to act. As communities secretary, Angela Rayner scrapped [Whitehall opposition to the South Cambridgeshire policy]. Labour are refusing to legislate against a four-day week, giving councils an effective green light to get away with charging more for less work. Consequentially, Labour-run Cambridge City Council has become the second council to sign up to the four-day week. Those areas which saw a statistically significant improvement include: the percentage of calls answered by the contact centre; the average number of days taken to update housing benefit and council tax support claims; the average number of weeks for householder planning applications to be decided; the percentage of planning applications (both large and small) decided within target or agreed timescales; the percentage of council house repairs complete within 24 hours; [and] the percentage of complaints responded to on time. If performance variations caused by Covid are discounted, every single service monitored either got better or stayed the same. Continue reading...
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