Investigators have raided the headquarters of Spain’s governing Socialist party as part of a probe into the alleged misuse of party funds, in the latest in a “blizzard of corruption scandals” to hit the leadership of Pedro Sánchez, said Politico. “Scandal after scandal” involving the prime minister’s political allies and relatives have left him “on the ropes”.

What are the allegations? 
An investigating judge has accused Socialist former PM José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero of leading a criminal network that used his influence to arrange a €53 million Covid-era government bailout for the airline Spanish Plus Ultra. He is accused of receiving a total of €2.6 million from the network, and has been charged with criminal organisation, influence peddling and falsifying documents. Zapatero, a close ally of Sánchez (pictured above), denies the charges.

In a separate case last autumn, the attorney general, Álvaro García Ortiz, a government selection, was found guilty of revealing secrets. And a party operative, Leire Díez, has been accused of being paid to “carry out a campaign of misinformation” with the intention of “impeding” the legal cases connected to the party, said the BBC. She has also denied any wrongdoing.

What about Sánchez’s family?
Last month, his wife, Begoña Gómez, was charged with embezzlement, influence peddling, corruption in business dealings and misappropriation of funds. She denies the charges, and Sánchez has described the case as an “obscene farce”.

In an unrelated case, the PM’s brother, David, is on trial along with 10 other defendants over his appointment to a musical director post in 2017. He denies charges of influence peddling and misuse of public office.

What does this mean for Spain?
Sánchez came to power in 2018 on an anti-corruption ticket, after a corruption scandal brought down the conservative government of Mariano Rajoy. Although Sánchez has not been directly implicated in any of the investigations, questions over whether he knew about, tolerated, or benefited politically from the alleged actions of those around him are damaging his standing.

Crucially, it is “increasingly awkward” for Sánchez’s allies to “stick with him” as the “scale” of the alleged corruption “comes into focus”, said Politico. Although Spain does not have to hold elections until next August, he “may be forced to move earlier”. 

Nvidia has unveiled a new superchip for personal computers, marking the US tech giant’s first entry into the lucrative consumer market. “This reinvention of the computer is as big a deal as the reinvention of the phone into what we now know as the smartphone,” said chief executive Jensen Huang (pictured above) as he announced the RTX Spark chip at the Computex show in Taiwan.

‘Warning shot’
Selling artificial intelligence chips used in enormous data centres has helped Nvidia become the world’s most valuable company, with a market valuation of more than $5 trillion (£3.7 trillion). “Now, it’s looking to put its technology in people’s homes,” said The New York Times tech reporter Tripp Mickle.

Expected to be released in the autumn, the new chip will power laptop and desktop computers from makers including Dell, HP, Microsoft and Lenovo and is designed to run local AI systems that can sort files and quickly perform tasks. The “game-changer” move into personal computing fires a “warning shot across the bow” of historic industry leaders such as AMD, Apple and Intel, said TechRadar.

With the RTX Spark, the company will be hoping to conquer the growing market for AI computers. “Apple more or less owns this market today,” Max Weinbach, a technology analyst at research firm Creative Strategies, told The New York Times. “Nvidia wants to build a laptop ecosystem for Windows that’s an alternative.”

AI supercomputer in every home
The new superchip “lies at the heart of Nvidia’s push to embed AI directly into end-user devices”, said Aqsa Qaddus Tahir on The News International. The goal is “to transform PCs into personal assistants which perform various tasks such as searching email, fixing coding bugs and accelerating generative AI features in software including Adobe Photoshop”.

The Nvidia-Microsoft partnership has “quietly built the hardware layer that makes AI run locally, privately, instantly, no cloud needed”, digital creator Shohag Hossain said on X. With this chip, your laptop “becomes an AI agent that works offline”, which means “no more sending your data to some server farm”.

Nvidia boss Huang told the conference in Taiwan that the RTX Spark could be the first step towards AI supercomputers becoming a common home appliance. 

Hindus ascend the active Mount Bromo volcano in Indonesia to present offerings as part of the Yadnya Kasada festival. During the annual celebration, members of East Java’s indigenous Tengger community throw food, livestock and other gifts into the crater in tribute to the gods. 

Juni Kriswanto / AFP / Getty Images

“It wasn’t long ago that chilling red wine was the sort of niche sommelier activity everyone laughed at,” said Will Lyons in The Times. “How times change.” Chilled red wines are popping up in trendy bars and on supermarket shelves. Aldi recently launched its first “chill-to-reveal” red, in a bottle with a “clever” thermodynamic label that turns blue when the wine is at the perfect temperature for drinking.

Cooling down lighter reds with a dunk in an ice bucket brings out their “vibrant, fruity notes and makes them all the more refreshing”. And although it’s more traditional to chill beaujolais or cinsault, “adventurous” wine merchants are introducing a wide variety of other grape varieties to the “chilled-reds lexicon”, including frappato and nerello mascalese from Sicily.

You can’t go wrong with Domaine de Vavril Cuvée de l’Ecluse 2024, said Victoria Moore in The Telegraph. This “silky” beaujolais “smells of redcurrants” and has a “very seductive ease and brightness”. Or if you want to try chilling a “slightly heavier” red, said Lyons in The Times, I’d recommend Araldica Barbera d’Asti 2022. Packed with vivid notes of black fruit, spice and a “smidge of oak”, it’s “gloriously drinkable” and pairs well with “robust salads, cold sausages or pizza”.

Whichever you pick, avoid serving it “ice cold, as you might a sauvignon blanc”, said Lyons. Chilled reds only need “an hour or two in the fridge door, or half that lying down at the back”. The bottle should just “feel cool to the touch”. 

AI is devoid of meaning and humanity. That’s why its vapid voice suits this political moment
Nesrine Malik in The Guardian
When you use AI writing tools, you “draw on the chorus of styles that already exist”, writes Nesrine Malik. “You can only derive, never create”, which “severs the connection between feeling and expression”. This “cauterisation of the self” is depressingly “well suited” to our politics, in which actual ideas are obscured by the “froth of disinformation” or “numbing drone” of slogans. You may think I’m “a luddite”, but “our commitment to strive” and “trust each other” is at stake.

You can’t blame it all on misogyny, Nicola
Kathleen Stock in The Times
When a ruling party’s CEO spends party funds on “fancy tableware” and gadgets, people tend to “wonder why the party leader didn’t notice”, writes Kathleen Stock. “Especially when they were married and shared a kitchen.” But to Nicola Sturgeon, such reactions are “more evidence” that “the cards are stacked against her” by men. The “misogyny defence” has served her well, but this time, “the emotive cues aren’t working”. Probably because of “all those photos of her in close proximity to high-end coffee machines”.

Parents at my son’s school pay their kids for good grades – here’s why I won’t
Polly Hudson in The i Paper
I’ve heard rumours that parents at my son’s school are “offering readies” to their children for getting good marks, writes Polly Hudson. There’s “absolutely no way I would”. I’ve “congratulated our 11-year-old for a school report” by “taking him out for a treat”, but “there’s something about cold hard cash that feels unbelievably mercenary”. Besides, he “has to want to do well at school for himself. It’s his life, his future he’s shaping.” And “he’s my son, not my employee”.