Name: EU-Russia, Epstein photos and a slightly drier holiday
Uploaded: 2025-12-13T16:49:34.000Z
Duration: 10 min 11 s
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Sharon hi, I'm Sharon Reich Garson in New Jersey.

Today, the EU freezes 210 billion euros in Russian assets to back Ukraine.

A look behind the scenes as a photographer follows torrential floods in the Pacific Northwest.

Plus, will the US have its holiday cheer without the hangover this year?

This this is Reuters World News bringing you everything you need to know from the front lines in 10 minutes.

Seven days a week, The European Union is freezing 210 billion euros in Russian central bank assets to provide a massive loan to Ukraine for its fight against Russia.

The move ensures no member state can block the freeze.

Russia's calling the move illegal and saying it's suing Euroclear, which holds most of those funds.

I haven't seen it, but I mean, everybody knew this man.

President Donald Trump shrugging off 19 newly released photos of Jeffrey Epstein, some showing him as Democrats drop a trove of files and it's not over.

The Justice Department is set to release more next week.

Oil tanker movements in and out of Venezuela have come to a near standstill after the US seized an oil tanker and nearly 2 million barrels of crude oil near the coast this week and on Friday, Admiral Alvin Hulsey stepped down two years early as head of U.S.

Sources tell Reuters he was pushed out by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who's been driving a harder military stance in the region.

Rain has finally eased in the Pacific Northwest and Western Canada after an atmospheric river brought several days of torrential rain.

Tens of thousands of people are under evacuation orders after a warning to residents across Washington State and western Canada to brace for life threatening floods.

We spoke to photographer David Ryder on Friday from a flooded park in Burlington where National Guard crews were working on evacuations and rescues.

The waters have completely spilled over the edge of the Skagit River.

The pictures of this boat rescue, this was in Burlington, Washington.

They started to load up this inflatable raft into one of the military vehicles.

I was talking to one of the National Guard guys and even they were kind of surprised at what they were doing because you don't see a river raft going into a military vehicle like that too often.

Some of the crews were on foot and I was on foot following them kind of wading through the water.

They paddled the raft, picked up a guy and two dogs, and

then floated back over to the vehicle to give a ride to the guy and his two dogs.

The past week has been a big one for markets.

Fresh worries about an air bubble and talk of Fed rate cuts have dominated.

Host of our sister podcast Morning bid, Dara Ranasing is here to share what to watch in the week ahead.

It's actually been a really busy week, Sharon, so let's start with Oracle.

IT shares suffered the worst day since January as a company released its latest earnings.

And in that report they raised their forecast for capital expenditure.

So you had these kinds of renewed concerns about an AI AI bubble and high valuations in the sector.

So the Fed cut interest rates as expected and signaled that it's in no hurry to cut interest rates again.

So that's one the markets will be watching closely next year.

And you know, it's also just worth noting what's going on in Japan there.

We saw huge pressure in the government bond market.

Short, dated yields are at their highest since the global financial crisis, which is saying something.

The bank of Japan is meeting next week and it's expected to deliver a rating increase.

The U.S. army has unveiled plans to build portable refineries for critical minerals to cut reliance on China.

They're starting a six month trial using a mini refinery focusing on antimony trisulfide, a key ingredient for the explosive cap at a bullet's base.

Mining correspondent Ernest Scheider has more.

The problem from the commercial industry's perspective is that it's just not economical to make large volumes of antimony trisulfide when you're basically only going to have one customer, that is the U.S.

So the military realized pretty quickly that it would have to come up with its own solution.

And working with the Idaho National Laboratory, which is part of the U.S.

department of Energy, as well as Perpetua Resources, which is building an antimony and gold mine in Idaho.

The U.S. army has basically built its own mini refinery.

This produces between 7 to 10 metric tons annually of that antimony trisulfide.

That's a really small amount from commercial volumes perspectives, but

it's enough antimony trisulfide for the army to make all of the bullets it would need in peacetime.

And if there were an armed conflict to break out, the army could then basically use two or three or four or more to rapidly increase production.

If all this works out, then they're going to start to look at other critical minerals as well, including tungsten, which is used as a hardening agent for steel as well as rare earths, which has been in the headlines a lot this year because China has blocked exports at various times.

And they also might look at boron, which is used in bulletproof vests and other types of weaponries.

I was speaking with somebody at the US army who painted this really, I think stark but interesting picture.

He said, without antimony trisulfide, you can't make primers.

And an army without bullets is just a parade.

We have one more hostage deceased, Hani Gvili, a hero of Israel.

Over to Israel now, where Hamas and the International Red Cross continue searching for Israel's last hostage.

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is getting ready to turn his attention to the next phase of a U.

But for Rod Gavili's family, it's a moment filled with fear and anticipation.

Tali Gavili has been clinging to the faint hope that Ron, a 24 year old police officer, may still be alive.

His absence has left what she describes as the largest possible hole in her heart.

Posters of Ronnie, as his family and friends call him, line the streets of his hometown, metal in southern Israel.

The family say they're waiting for Gavili's return and that Israel can't begin the next phase of peace talks before he does.

Americans say they're drinking less than ever.

Mocktails, health conscious trends on social media paint a picture of a nation turning away from booze.

Reporter Emma Rumney says that the amount U.S.

adults drink each week hasn't shifted nearly as much as it seems.

Americans report that they are drinking less or even drinking at record lows.

But when it comes to data on actual consumption, this data shows that the picture is a little bit more complicated.

So while there has indeed been a drop in the the average number of drinks per adult in the US since 2021, that drop is only about one drink per person per week.

And the rate of weekly drinking has hovered between 10 and 12 drinks per week for decades.

And this drop isn't outside of that range.

One of the big concerns has been around whether young people specifically are drinking less.

And again, that comes from survey data which in recent years has suggested that they are, as well as kind of anecdotal evidence which is people knowing family members, you know, the children of friends who say they aren't drinking or aren't drinking as much as they did before.

And also there's been a kind of rise in young people prioritizing health or prioritizing wellness.

And all of this together is kind of fed into this debate around whether alcohol sales could go into decline in the long term.

Some sources point to the fact that economic pressures are really weighing on people at the moment.

People just simply do not have as much money in their wallet as they did previously.

And that's particularly acute for Gen Z, who some of them especially are in their early 20s.

They don't have have stable employment yet.

You know, they haven't sort of properly started climbing the career ladder.

And that could mean that those economic pressures affect their drinking and weigh on how much they drink, more so than for older generations.

And for today's recommendation, a collection of our pictures of the year, this time focusing on the animal kingdom.

Follow the link in the pod description for polar bears taking over an abandoned research station, fireflies lighting up the night skies in Chile, and

For more on any of the stories from today, check out Reuters.com or the Reuters app.

Don't forget to follow us on your favorite podcast player.

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EU-Russia, Epstein photos and a slightly drier holiday

critical

prioritize

ingredient

basically