Rebellion tamed: why Iran is turning rap into a controlled industry

Negar Mojtahedi 

Iran International: Rap has moved from the margins to the spotlight in Iran, where it is being promoted on streaming platforms, entertainment shows and Instagram feeds tied to state interests and seen by millions.

To many viewers it looks like a cultural opening: a genre long associated with underground resistance now visible on mainstream screens.

But researcher and artist Siavash Rokni, a postdoctoral fellow at McGill University in Montreal who studies Iranian youth culture, pop music and the communication dynamics of social movements, argues that that the reality is more complicated.

“It is a public relations performance,” he said. “It is fooling a lot of people, and we need to stop being fooled by it.”

Rokni has followed the evolution of Iran’s rap scene across five generations. He sees the new appetite for rap not as legalization but domestication, turning underground culture into something profitable and controllable.

Entertainment shows and “normal” rappers

One of the most watched programs in this space is BaZia, hosted by a former Iranian state television personality now living in Turkey. According to Rokni, the show’s guest selection and narratives suggest an ongoing connection with Iran.

“Technically speaking, he is no longer connected to the system,” Rokni said. “But the way he chooses his guests shows there is a connection.”

The rappers appearing on BaZia help normalize a particular type of rap that is not inclusive of all aspects of this cultural practice. Many of the same rappers featured on BaZia are now set to appear in a new rap-themed program hosted by him called GANG. Rokni says it shows how this was part of a larger plan to create momentum for the new show while normalizing a particular narrative of regime approved rap.

The narrative, Rokni said, “comes very slowly” through a sequence of interviews. Artists describe performing abroad but wanting to return. Producers talk about the economic advantage of bringing rap back while being able to control the content.

Much of Iran’s music economy is in the hands of a profit-minded clique, Rokni said.

“The people who are running this oligarchical capitalism are connected to the Islamic Republic,” he said. “They just want to make cash.”

He stressed that the motivation is not necessarily ideological. Many simply benefit from the system’s structures.

The appearance of rap on screens has been accompanied by pressure and arrests behind the scenes. In early October at least five rappers and a composer were detained in Tehran and Shiraz, according to the Center for Human Rights in Iran.

Security forces raided homes, seized phones and recording equipment and transferred the men to detention.

Within days videos appeared on their Instagram accounts with shaved heads and visible tattoos, apologizing on camera. Lawyers told CHRI the accounts had been taken over by cyber police.

One of the most high profile cases remains Toomaj Salehi, whose lyrics became an anthem of the Women Life Freedom movement.

He was arrested, abused in detention, sentenced to death, released on bail and then rearrested after publicly describing his treatment. Supporters say he is targeted because he refuses to leave Iran or be silent.

Female rappers face even greater constraints. Iran bans solo female singers from performing publicly or releasing their own vocals, forcing artists into exile or underground spaces. Studios refused to record them and venues were raided for illegal performances.

Why normalize rap at all?

Rokni traces the logic back to then Iranian president Mohammad Khatami era when the government offered small cultural openings to create a sense of possibility.

“You free some cultural restrictions and reconcile with the people,” he said. “You give hope. And that can be taken away very easily.”

He called this strategy dishonest. Licensing and televised satire, he said, do not signal reform. They are tools for narrative management.

Oppression, he argued, is often brief.

“They put a lid on it,” he said. “But the program starts after that.”

The backlash against licensed rappers, especially those connected to the Woman, Life, Freedom movement, has been emotional. Some consider state approved albums a betrayal. Others see economic survival.

Rokni believes the solution is parallel economies, enabling musicians to make money without going through state linked producers or licensing offices.

“Do it yourself,” he said. He pointed to artists who built audiences through Instagram and streaming platforms.

In today’s Iran rap carries two meanings. One version is polished, licensed and safe. The other remains underground created by musicians who refuse to compromise.

Both exist at once but only one is protected.

Child bride spared execution in Iran after blood money is paid

By Sarah Johnson

The Guardian: A child bride who was due to be executed this month in Iran over the death of her husband has had her life spared by his parents, who were paid the equivalent of £70,000 in exchange for their forgiveness.

Goli Kouhkan, 25, has been on death row in Gorgan central prison in northern Iran for the past seven years. At the age of 18 she was arrested over allegedly participating in the killing of her abusive husband, Alireza Abil, in May 2018, and sentenced to qisas – retribution-in-kind.

Mai Sato, UN special rapporteur on the situation for human rights in Iran, said: “It’s great that Kouhkan won’t be executed – one life has been saved … but it doesn’t really solve the issue of the qisas law, which is in violation of many international standards.” Sato, along with three other UN experts, said earlier this month that the case “exemplifies the systemic gender bias faced by women victims of child marriage and domestic violence within Iran’s criminal justice system”.

In November, the Guardian was the first international publication to reveal that Kouhkan, an undocumented member of Iran’s Baluch minority, would face execution by hanging unless she could raise 10bn tomans (about £80,000) to pay off the victim’s family. Under Iranian law, a victim’s family can pardon someone in return for blood money – compensation payable in cases of murder or bodily harm.

In a statement issued last month, Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam, director of Iran Human Rights, said: “The blood-money amount set for her case is several times the official rate, an impossible sum for a young, undocumented Baluch woman from a deprived background who has also been rejected by her family.”

Forced to marry her cousin at 12, Kouhkan became pregnant at 13 and gave birth to a son. She suffered physical and emotional abuse for years. On the day her husband was killed, Kouhkan found him beating their son, then aged five. She called her husband’s cousin, Mohammad Abil, for help. When he arrived a fight broke out which resulted in the death of her husband. According to Iran Human Rights, Abil remains on death row.

Kouhkan’s lawyer confirmed in a post on Instagram on 9 December that the original sum of 10bn tomans had been reduced to 8bn tomans and that amount had been raised through donations. In a video published by Mizan News Agency, Kouhkan’s parents-in-law are seen signing documents.

Kouhkan hopes to be reunited with her son when she is released, according to Mehdi Ghatei, founder of Qasim Child Foundation, a charity registered in Australia, who had started a fundraiser for Kouhkan. In accordance with Iranian law, Kouhkan’s son is entitled to 2bn tomans of the total blood money, which is “a good sum for establishing a new life”, he said.

Ghatei said he had been contacted by organisations and individuals all over the world after the Guardian’s story about Kouhkan and that international pressure had played a part in saving her life. “The Iranian regime tries to keep people silent,” he said. “When people start raising awareness [of cases such as Kouhkan’s] there is sometimes huge pressure from international bodies, which increases the chances of halting executions. The role of the mainstream media is huge in this case, unbelievable.”

At least 241 women were executed in Iran between 2010 and 2024, 114 of whom were sentenced to qisas for homicide. The majority of women executed for homicide in the documented cases had killed their husband or intimate partner. Many of these women were victims of domestic violence or child marriage, or acted in self-defence.

Iran executes the highest number of women in the world, according to available data. Amnesty International said that at least 30 women were executed in the country last year. At least 42 women have been executed in 2025 so far – 18 for murdering their husbands, including two child brides, according to Iran Human Rights.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights at 77: A reminder for our lost world

By Janet Marugg, Columnist

FāVS News: It was 77 years ago — a lifetime of yesterdays still recent enough to remember in a beating heart. The year of our Lord, 1948, was a flurry of fixing broken things brick by brick and healing broken bodies bone by bone.

It was also a year for building new things that cannot break, things that will last until the last of us. It was a time of revolutionary declarations woven into the fabric of humanity and worn like a uniform of human skin.

Before this day, Dec. 10, 1948, people suffered atrocities and violations that bruised the human genome forever. Back in the day they didn’t know that the effects of human trauma are hereditary, making the future prone to suffer anxiety, addiction and mental illnesses.

They didn’t know that malnutrition in one generation undermines the health of grandchildren. They were just tired of recording the horrors of dehumanization of the world at war. So they decided to give us human rights.

Today we have the same divine rights of kings and priests because the nations on earth came together and declared it so. The people of the world declared inherent human dignity and worth. They promised to give each other better standards of life and to ensure individual, human freedoms. On Dec. 10, 1948, they signed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

In a nutshell, humans have the right to live in safety and peace. The freedom from slavery (of course). The right to justice and equality free from torture or degradation (dehumanization). We have the right to food, clothing, shelter, healthcare and education. We have a right to marry, procreate, and form relationships and to assemble. To worship in our individual conscience.

We have a right to freedom of expression, thoughts and privacy. We have a right to work and to move freely. We have a right to leisure. And we have a right to vote, participate in our governance and a right to participate in a cultural life.

This Universal Declaration of Human Rights supports human life, the reduction of human harm and the maximizing of human well-being today and for generations to come. But it also serves to define crimes against humanity. It reveals dictators, authoritarians and fascists. It sets precedent to prosecute and gives the world a moral compass.

Personally, I think the world is a little lost. We’re both dealing with past human traumas and the responsibility for the generational trauma we genetically pass to the future. But every year, on Dec.10, we are invited by the internationally recognized Human Rights Day to reset to the compass.

Humanists of all stripes (theists, atheists and agnostic) follow a creed of beliefs or aims that guide our actions toward realizing measurable benefits for human beings. As we are all dual citizens of our country and of the world, the Humanist Ten Commitments do a pretty good job reflecting the aspirations of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

And because we contain multitudes of humanity’s past and future, we recognize the International Human Rights Day as a day of renewal — a perfect fit for the season of births.

What the US national security strategy tells us about how Trump views the world

Andrew Gawthorpe
Lecturer in History and International Studies, Leiden University

The Conversation: The White House has released its national security strategy, a document put out by every US presidential administration in order to spell out its foreign policy priorities. These documents are legally required to be released by Congress and are typically written by a committee. Still, they bear the president’s signature and usually serve as a distillation of how the current commander in chief views the world.

This latest document is no exception. But perhaps even more so than any previous national security strategy, it reflects a focus on the views and activities of the current president. It touts supposed achievements of the Trump administration in a way that would be more appropriate in a campaign speech. And at numerous points, it lavishes praise on Donald Trump for upending conventional wisdom and setting US foreign policy on a new course.

So what can we learn from this document about how Trump views the world? Three themes stand out. The first is that, contrary to some claims, Trump is not an isolationist. He doesn’t want to pull the US back from foreign entanglements completely. If he did, it would hardly make sense to boast of having brokered eight peace deals or of having damaged Iran’s nuclear programme.

Like more traditional national security strategy documents, the latest one still portrays the US as having a responsibility for global peace and prosperity. But within that broad remit, it has a new set of priorities.

The most striking is the focus on the western hemisphere. Whereas recent administrations have identified the containment of China as their key priority, Trump vows he will “restore American preeminence in the western hemisphere”. Yet the only concrete “threats” the document identifies as originating in the region are drug cartels and flows of irregular migrants.

Viewed from the standpoint of previous administrations, this makes little sense. US foreign policy has usually been concerned mainly with grave security threats, particularly from Russia and China. Drugs and migrants were less important than nuclear weapons and aircraft carriers.

Trump views things differently. From his perspective, dangerous narcotics and migrants who he has previously said are “poisoning the blood” of the US are much more direct threats to the American people. Putting “America First”, to use Trump’s favourite phrase for describing his own foreign policy, means focusing on them.

But this does not mean Trump is isolationist. Protecting the American people, even in the way Trump understands it, means having an active foreign policy.

The second key theme of the document is its attitude towards “civilisation”. In it, Trump has returned to a central aspect of his political rhetoric – that “western civilisation” is under attack from a combination of hostile migrants, spineless liberals and cultural degeneracy. Just as Trump appears to see himself as leading the fightback against these forces in the US, he wants others to do the same.

In passages that have sent shockwaves through Europe’s political establishment, the national security strategy lambasts European governments for allegedly welcoming too many migrants, persecuting far-right political parties and betraying the west’s civilisational heritage.

Again, these are not the words of an isolationist. They are the words of someone who, as I have concluded in my own research, views themselves as the protector of a racially and culturally defined civilisation that covers both the US and Europe.

The particularism here is striking. Whereas past US national security strategies spelled out a desire for Washington to spread liberal democracy throughout the world, Trump’s document says this is an unachievable goal. Instead, he seems to be interested primarily in the destiny of white Europeans – and in shaping their democracy and values to conform with his own.

The national security strategy warned that several countries risk becoming “non-European” due to migration, adding that if “present trends continue, the continent will be unrecognisable in 20 years or less”. This is a stance that some observers say echoes the racist “great replacement theory”, a comparison the White House has branded as “total nonsense”.

The third and final theme that stands out from the document is its intensely economic focus. The most detailed parts of the document relate to economic statecraft – how to reshore industries to the US, reshape the global trading system and enlist US allies in the mission of containing the economic rise of China.

Regional security matters, by contrast, receive much less attention. Russia’s ambitions in Europe are barely mentioned as a problem for the US, and Taiwan merits only a paragraph. Indeed, the Kremlin has said the new strategy is “largely consistent” with its vision.

Rarely has a US national security strategy been so transactional. In its discussion of why the US will support Taiwan, the document only invokes the island’s semiconductor industry and strategic position as reasons. Not a word is said about the intrinsic worth of Taiwanese democracy or the principle of non-aggression in international law.

The impression this leaves is that, in foreign policy, Trump prioritises economics over values. He views leaders such as China’s Xi Jinping and Russia’s Vladimir Putin not as implacable dictators hell-bent on regional domination, but as possible business partners. He seems to believe the focus of foreign policy ought to be to maximise profits.

For US allies in Europe and Asia, this raises an uncomfortable question: what if the profitable thing to do turns out to be to abandon them and strike a grand bargain with Russia or China? Based on this document, they have little reason to think Trump will do anything else.

Trump lambasts ‘weak’ and ‘decaying’ Europe and hints at walking away from Ukraine

Peter Beaumont

The Guardian: Donald Trump has hinted he could walk away from supporting Ukraine as he doubled down on his administration’s recent criticism of Europe, describing it as “weak” and “decaying” and claiming it was “destroying itself” through immigration.

In a rambling and sometimes incoherent interview with Politico, a transcript of which was released on Tuesday, the US president struggled to name any other Ukrainian cities except for Kyiv, misrepresented elements of the trajectory of the conflict, and recycled far-right tropes about European immigration that echoed the “great replacement” conspiracy theory.

Trump called for Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, to accept his proposal to cede territory to Russia, arguing that Moscow retained the “upper hand” and that Zelenskyy’s government must “play ball”.

In his often halting remarks, Trump swerved from subject to subject while rehearsing familiar grudges and conspiracies. He also declined repeatedly to rule out sending American troops into Venezuela as part of his effort to bring down President Nicolás Maduro.

“I don’t want to rule in or out. I don’t talk about it,” Trump said, adding he did not want to talk about military strategy.

The US president returned repeatedly describing what he said were Europe’s problems in entirely racial terms, calling some unnamed European leaders “real stupid”.

“If it keeps going the way it’s going, Europe will not be … in my opinion … many of those countries will not be viable countries any longer. Their immigration policy is a disaster. What they’re doing with immigration is a disaster. We had a disaster coming, but I was able to stop it.”

The interview followed the release last week of a new US national security strategy that claimed Europe faced “civilisational erasure” because of mass migration and offered tacit support for far-right parties.

On Monda,y António Costa, the president of the European Council, said the signal that Washington would back Europe’s nationalist parties was unacceptable, adding: “What we cannot accept is the threat to interfere in European politics.”

Commenting on changes he said were occurring in big European cities such as London and Paris, Trump made clear that the problem as he viewed it was that they were becoming less white. He again singled out for criticism Sadiq Khan, London’s first Muslim mayor.

“And Europe is … if you take a look at Paris, it’s a much different place. I loved Paris. It’s a much different place than it was. If you take a look at London, you have a mayor named Khan.

“He’s a horrible mayor. He’s an incompetent mayor, but he’s a horrible, vicious, disgusting mayor. I think he’s done a terrible job. London’s a different place. I love London. I love London. And I hate to see it happen. You know, my roots are in Europe, as you know.“

[In] Europe, they’re coming in from all parts of the world. Not just the Middle East, they’re coming in from the Congo, tremendous numbers of people coming from the Congo. And even worse, they’re coming from prisons of the Congo and many other countries.”

Asked if the trajectory of European countries meant they would no longer be US allies, Trump replied: “Or they’ll be … well, it depends. You know, it depends. They’ll change their ideology, obviously, because the people coming in have a totally different ideology. But it’s gonna make them much weaker. They’ll be a much ... they’ll be much weaker, and they’ll be much different.”

While he denied he had a specific vision for Europe, Trump agreed he had “endorsed people that a lot of Europeans don’t like”, including Hungary’s Viktor Orbán.

“I have no vision for Europe. All I want to see is a strong Europe. Look, I have a vision for the United States of America first. It’s “Make America Great Again,” he said, adding: “I’m supposed to be a very smart person, I can … I have eyes. I have ears. I have knowledge. I have vast knowledge. I see what’s happening. I get reports that you will never see. And I think it’s horrible what’s happening to Europe.”

Russia praises US security strategy shift heralded by ‘strong’ Trump

BY JOE STANLEY-SMITH

POLITICO: Vladimir Putin’s press secretary on Sunday praised U.S. President Donald Trump’s controversial new National Security Strategy as largely in line with Russia’s view of the world.

Moscow's public acknowledgement of the alignment between the former Cold War enemies underlines how much cozier their relationship has become since Trump returned to office earlier this year.

"The adjustments we are seeing, I would say, are largely consistent with our vision, and perhaps we can hope that this could be a modest guarantee that we will be able to constructively continue our joint work on finding a peaceful settlement in Ukraine, at the very least," said Dmitriy Peskov per local media.

In an interview, Peskov said Trump’s administration differs fundamentally from previous U.S. governments and that the president is able to change the country's foreign policy orientation because he is "strong".

Trump's strategic roadmap, released Dec. 4, announced no less than a realignment of the geopolitical order and echoed the themes of the racist "Great Replacement Theory" to claim that Europe faces ‘civilizational erasure’, including from migration.

The U.S., which has been an interventionist power globally since the end of the Second World War, is shifting its focus to the Western hemisphere, according to the document — which Peskov noted does not refer to Russia as an adversary, unlike previous iterations.

The document also casts doubt on whether some European nations are reliable long-term members of NATO. The alliance was forged between the U.S. and European nations to counter an expansionist Soviet Union at the end of the 1940s.

Critics of NATO often point to the alliance’s post-Cold War eastward enlargement as a provocation to Moscow. Whether Kyiv, too, should be able to join NATO after the end of Russia’s war on Ukraine remains a key point of disagreement in ceasefire negotiations.

The alliance — which Trump has publicly undermined on numerous occasions — has struggled for influence in U.S.-brokered peace talks between Russia and Ukraine.

The NSS document outlined Washington's intention to focus on “ending the perception, and preventing the reality, of NATO as a perpetually expanding alliance."

Peskov cautiously welcomed this aspect of the plan, calling it “gratifying on the one hand.”

"But on the other hand, we know that sometimes, while everything is conceptually beautifully written, what they call the deep state does things differently. That happens, too," he added.

The so-called deep state, a rhetorical punching bag for Trump and his allies, as well as others including in European countries, can refer to anything from a slow-moving bureaucracy that prevents elected politicians from enacting change, to conspiracy theories about elites that allegedly control governments from the shadows.

France's Valerie Hayer, head of the European Parliament's centrist Renew grouping, called the NSS document "unacceptable and dangerous" while German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul said that Europe does not need "outside advice" — but called the U.S. "our most important ally in the [NATO] alliance."

Second grup of Iranian nationals deported from US

Reuters: Fifty-five Iranians deported from the United States will return to their home country in the coming days, Iran’s foreign ministry said on Sunday, in the second such deportation under President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown.

In September, officials said the US had identified about 400 Iranians to be deported, with a first flight carrying 120 people making its way to Tehran via Qatar’s capital.

“In the coming days, about 55 nationals will return to Iran...This is the second group being returned to Iran in the latest months,” Iranian foreign ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei said, adding that US deportations were based on “political grounds and anti-migrant policies that are against international law.”

The transfers mark an unusual moment of coordination between two nations at loggerheads over Iran’s nuclear program, which Tehran says is purely civilian but Washington asserts is aimed at building a nuclear bomb.

The two countries do not have a direct line of communication, Baghaei said, adding that they communicated through their respective interest protection offices or via intermediaries.

Baghaei also criticized Washington for not facilitating visas for all of Iran’s soccer delegation for the World Cup draw held on Friday in Washington.

“We have expressed our protest against the US’s decision not to give visas for our team dispatched to the World Cup draw,” Baghaei said.

While Iran had applied for nine visas for its delegation, Iranian soccer federation spokesman Amir Mehdi Alavi was quoted as saying that the US had granted only four visas, including for coach Ardeshir Amir Ghalenoei. The United States has long-standing strict visa restrictions on Iranians.

Smog Sends 210,000 Iranians to Emergency Rooms in Just 10 Days

STEVEN GANOT

The Medialine: Gray skies over Iran’s biggest cities sent more than 210,000 people with heart and breathing problems rushing to emergency rooms between Nov. 22 and Dec. 1, according to new government data that paint a stark picture of the country’s pollution crisis. The state-run IRNA news agency said patients flooded hospitals in several provinces as dirty air settled over Tehran and other urban centers.

The heaviest burden fell on Tehran, Khorasan Razavi, Khuzestan, and Alborz, where emergency wards saw surging numbers of people with chest pain, asthma attacks, and other complications. Jafar Miadfar, head of Iran’s Emergency Medical Services Organization, called the spike “a serious alarm for vulnerable groups and the public’s overall health,” warning that the trend will worsen if the smog persists. Older adults, children, and people with chronic conditions are considered most at risk.

To contain the damage, authorities have intermittently shut down schools and universities, shifted offices to remote work, and tightened traffic rules in the most polluted districts. Air quality index readings above 150—levels considered unhealthy for everyone—have been recorded repeatedly in recent days.

Iran’s smog problem is not new. Each winter, cold, still air locks pollutants over sprawling cities built around car traffic, refineries, and factories. Aging vehicles that burn low-quality fuel and decades of underinvestment in public transport feed the haze, while US sanctions have made it harder for Tehran to upgrade its energy and industrial infrastructure.

Health experts say repeated exposure to such conditions can shorten lives and drive up long-term rates of cancer, stroke, and cardiovascular disease. The latest emergency figures suggest that for many Iranians, the cost of stepping outside is no longer abstract—it is paid in hospital visits and labored breaths.

Leave me alone, AI 

Pilita Clark

Financial Times: I can’t remember exactly when it started but some time in the last couple of months, AI went from being a topic of largely theoretical interest to an actively intrusive pest.

It began when a bluish purple circle appeared unbidden on my WhatsApp screen. I ignored it at first, thinking I had mistakenly swiped on something that had made it materialise and hoping that with luck it would go away. 

But one day, in a rush to message someone, I mistakenly tapped on the circle and discovered it was “Meta AI”, a chatbot eager to help me find a restaurant or a recipe or other things I never want to find on WhatsApp. 

Thankfully, it described itself as an “optional service” from Meta, the Mark Zuckerberg company that owns WhatsApp, Facebook and Instagram. Phew, I thought. I’ll get rid of it, since it’s optional and the last thing I need to be doing is handing over yet more personal data to help make Zuckerberg’s $200bn-plus fortune even larger.

But no. When I asked Meta AI how to delete Meta AI, I was told: “You can’t disable Meta AI, but engaging with it on WhatsApp is completely optional.” 

Jolted by this breathtaking piece of guff, I realised something else: any time I tried to send an email, write a document or do virtually any other type of online work, AI barged in and tried to do it for me. 

Composing a work email provoked the suggestion that I use Google’s Gemini AI to “help me write”, a tip that leaves me feeling the neurons shrivel as I read it.  

If I opened an online document, there was Gemini again, bleating at me to “summarise this file” or “catch me up” on developments that might have occurred — but almost never had — since I last looked at the thing.

Meanwhile, logging into my favourite online transcription service to read an interview has become more AI-infested by the week. 

I have grown accustomed to being urged to “ask AI anything about this conversation” each time I try to read a transcript, a task I am — oddly enough — quite able to do by myself.

This week, before I could even look at the transcript, I had to deal with a large pop-up informing me there was not one but two AI chat modes to choose from: express, which was “balanced for accuracy and speed”, and advanced, which was “enhanced for in-depth analysis”.

Since I only wanted to skim through a hopefully accurate transcript as quickly as possible, I had zero interest in either.

None of this would be so bad if AI were capable of doing something seriously useful, like whittling down my thousands of unread emails into a manageable list and, better yet, answering the most critical ones pronto. 

I have been enthused about the profusion of AI tools that now claim to be able to conquer inbox chaos, but every review I read about them makes me doubt their utility.

Of course they may improve and I admit some AI innovations are not bad, like the story summaries that several news groups, including the FT, have started to offer. 

I can also imagine times it might be helpful to be able to rip through all the transcripts of, say, one’s last five executive meetings to check what one’s boss said about the latest revenue targets. 

And I have to concede I may be in a minority. Meta AI has more than 1bn monthly users across all its apps, I discovered, when I messaged Meta to ask if it thought it was deceptive to call an undeletable chatbot optional. Unsurprisingly, it did not, pointing out that Meta AI was no different to other new WhatsApp features, such as camera effects, that people could take or leave — but not erase.

Also, a spokesman told me, none of the conversations people have with the chatbot on WhatsApp are used to train Meta’s AI models.

And although these interactions can be used to “personalise experiences” on platforms such as Facebook from mid-December, it will require people to add their WhatsApp account to a Meta accounts centre that includes Facebook.

Considering how fast changing this stuff is, I live in hope that today’s tedious intrusions will soon fade as people adapt to it. In the meantime I would be thrilled if AI would do one thing: go away and let me get on with whatever I was doing before it interrupted.

Colombia’s president warns Trump: ‘Do not wake the jaguar’ with threats of military strikes

Tiago Rogero, South America correspondent

The Guardian: Colombia’s president has warned Donald Trump that he risked “waking the jaguar” after the US leader suggested that any country he believed was making illegal drugs destined for the US was liable to a military attack.

During a cabinet meeting on Tuesday, the US president said that military strikes on land targets inside Venezuela would “start very soon”. Trump also warned that any country producing narcotics was a potential target, singling out Colombia, which has long been a close ally in Washington’s “war on drugs”.

Shortly afterwards, Colombia’s president, Gustavo Petro, hit back in a social media post, saying: “To threaten our sovereignty is to declare war; do not damage two centuries of diplomatic relations.”

Petro also invited Trump to visit Colombia – the world’s largest producer of cocaine – to see his government’s efforts to destroy drug-producing labs. “Come with me, and I’ll show you how they are destroyed, one lab every 40 minutes,” he wrote.

Since August, the Trump administration has escalated tensions in Latin America to levels unseen since the 1989 invasion of Panama, under the pretext of anti-narcotics operations. The Pentagon has deployed a sizable naval force with nearly 15,000 troops on Venezuela’s doorstep in the Caribbean and killing more than 80 people in strikes on small boats alleged to be carrying drugs.

“We’re going to start doing those strikes on land, too,” said Trump on Tuesday.

“You know, the land is much easier, much easier. And we know the routes they take. We know everything about them. We know where they live. We know where the bad ones live, and we’re going to start that very soon too.

When asked whether the efforts would be limited to Venezuela, the US president said they would not.

“I hear Colombia, the country of Colombia, is making cocaine. They have cocaine manufacturing plants, OK? And then they sell us their cocaine. We appreciate that very much. But yeah, anybody that’s doing that and selling it into our country is subject to attack,” he said.

Longtime allies in the “war on drugs”, the US and Colombia have found their relationship fractured almost from the moment Trump took office for his second term.

Their first clash came as early as January, when Petro – a former guerrilla and Colombia’s first leftwing president – refused entry to American planes carrying deported Colombians, insisting that they be treated with dignity.

He later reversed that decision, but relations further deteriorated in September, when, after attending the United Nations general assembly, Petro joined a pro-Palestine protest in New York and urged US soldiers to disobey Trump’s orders to “attack humanity”. He has also been a fierce critic of the airstrikes on the alleged drug boats.