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EPM Briefing: Kuwait's AI defence deal, the Fed sanctions Amex, world trade hits a record

EPM Briefing: Kuwait's AI defence deal, the Fed sanctions Amex, world trade hits a record

The five verified stories of Sunday: Kuwait buys British AI air defences, the Fed sanctions American Express, London launches a flood-and-drought plan, the UN…

Defence of the future, accountability and trade that grows without being shared: here are today's five verified stories. 1. United Kingdom: The United Kingdom signed a £370 million contract with MARSS Systems Limited, an EOS company, to supply Kuwait with an air defence system combining jammers, radars and interceptors, integrated through NiDAR, the AI-enabled command-and-control platform. The deal will create 100 jobs in engineering and manufacturing, with production in Bristol, sits within Taskforce Sabre and follows Iran's missile and drone attacks in the region. 2. United States: The Federal Reserve Board announced Thursday an enforcement action against American Express Company for failing to sufficiently detect and report suspicious activity tied to money laundering, citing significant deficiencies in its anti-money-laundering programme, especially at its subsidiary national bank. The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency issued a separate action against the bank. 3. United Kingdom: The British government is launching this week a Flood and Drought Resilience Taskforce, meeting for the first time on 14 October with minister Emma Hardy and more than 50 organisations. The plan backs the largest flood defence programme in English history, with at least £10.5 billion through 2036. 4. International: The UN warned that livestreaming an execution in the United States would breach the prohibition of torture, after Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth vowed to publicly execute Nidal Malik Hasan. The office recalled that public executions are cruel and inhuman treatment and cited the 2025 report: 1,518 executions in 15 countries in 2024, a 32 per cent increase from 2023. It also urged Tennessee not to retry the execution of Christa Pike after the botched attempt on 6 October. 5. International: UNCTAD reported on 9 October that world trade hit a record $35 trillion in 2025, even as developing countries fell behind amid new technological and policy barriers. Value is concentrating in semiconductors, AI, clean energy and advanced computing, while China-US trade has dropped more than 20 per cent since 2024. Asia will contribute 60 per cent of global growth this year. 📌 Editor's note: five stories setting the pulse of the week, from defence to trade.
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