By Alexander Villegas SALAR DE ATACAMA, Chile Albemarle Corp hopes to expand its lithium operations in Chile's Atacama

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The Ukraine war may remain a “stalemate” throughout 2024, military experts have told The Independent, as hopes fade for a major breakthrough in this year’s counteroffensive against Russia. Delays in Western military aid handed Moscow time to build heavily fortified defences, which have largely held up against months of intense assaults – and constraints in ammunition and weaponry now mean both armies may struggle to sustain the current pace of the war, some analysts believe. With the prospect of a Middle East conflict likely to further stretch Washington – Ukraine’s largest backer – ahead of a US presidential election in November 2024, Vladimir Putin’s strategy may now be to preserve the current state of the frontline and “wait it out”, Western experts say. With just weeks likely left before seasonal weather changes dampen offensive efforts in Ukraine, Dr Patrick Bury of the University of Bath said: “There hasn’t been a breakthrough, there’s been tactical gains, low-level operational gains – but not strategic.” “What this summer has shown is that [Ukraine] can fight at company level [of around 100 soldiers] but when you go the next level up to the battalion, they just don’t really have the coordinated experience to fight with all the moving parts”, said Dr Bury, a former Nato analyst and British Army captain. While the US is due to start providing F-16 fighter jets next year, the sophistication of the Russian air force means Ukraine will still struggle to achieve air superiority, “and you need air superiority really to be able to free up the chance of large-scale manoeuvre”, he added. Therefore “unless there’s significant widespread packages of training, new weapons and equipment”, Dr Bury said, “it’s looking like 2024 is a bit of a stalemate” – with any significant shifts instead likely to take place off the battlefield. Agreeing that “we’re [already] seeing a stalemate now”, Dr Frank Ledwidge – a former military intelligence officer, now at the University of Portsmouth – questioned “whether any tactics would have worked against defenders who [Ukraine] didn’t outnumber three to one”. “In the most basic military algorithms, you need an attack ratio of three [troops] to one, and the Ukrainians don’t have anything like that,” he said. “So barring any significant change in that force ratio there’s no reason really now to assume that future operations will be any different.” Warning that there are “no game changers”, including F-16s, Dr Ledwidge likened the situation to the Western Front in 1917, adding: “Breakthroughs were made eventually in the First World War, but only when the Americans came in with two million soldiers.” He added: “Unless somebody has the moral courage to say ‘Ukraine is highly unlikely to retake all its land’, then this will go on.” James Nixey, director of the Chatham House think-tank’s Russia and Eurasia programme, said: “It does seem as though we’re heading towards a battle for Crimea.” While noting that Russia is “going all-in” by putting its economy and society “on a near at total war footing”, which may help address ammunition shortages, Mr Nixey said he agreed that significant changes to the situation in Ukraine will now likely “happen off field”. “Putin is banking almost everything on a Trump return,” he said, adding that the conflict emerging in Gaza and Israel – and threatening to become a wider Middle East conflict drawing in Hezbollah and Iran – means that “attention, resources and funding will be diverted now” from Ukraine. “While it’s true that the US army prepares for to simultaneous separate wars, the reality is that the pie is likely to be smaller – even if Ukraine funding is tagged onto an Israel assistance bid,” said Mr Nixey. US president Joe Biden, who recently suffered a setback in securing Congress’s approval for Ukraine aid, rejected that prospect this week, telling CBS News: “We’re the United States of America, for God’s sake. The most powerful nation in the history of the world. “We can take care of both of these and still maintain our overall international defence. We have the capacity to do this and we have an obligation … If we don’t, who does?” But agreeing that a second conflict has “certainly got the potential for stretching the US”, Dr Bury and Dr Ledwidge both believe a military stalemate in Ukraine is therefore “very satisfactory” to the Russian president. “Putin’s strategy is just to wait it out,” said Dr Bury. “Putin’s played a masterstroke here – he’s basically used a nuclear threat to slow down and salami-slice the aid to Ukraine. That’s the effect it’s had.” “Those threats were enough to make the Biden administration and the Germans were very wary” of supplying F-16s, tanks and long-range weaponry, he noted, adding: “We got there in the end, but it took time. “And that, it turned out, gave Russia time to build very good defensive lines and make their problem easier and the Ukrainians’ much harder.” Read More Russia to return four Ukrainian children to their families as part of Qatari-brokered deal Putin arrives in China on rare trip abroad to meet ‘dear friend’ Xi Jinping As the conflict in Israel rages on, the world must not forget about Ukraine ‘My body was burning’: Russian journalist’s horror journey in grips of suspected poisoning

A Netflix fan has shared a couple of genius hacks to improve your viewing experience immeasurably. The tech whizz, who goes by the TikTok username Matty McTech, noted that many of us resort to subtitles when watching our favourite shows because of frustratingly shoddy sound quality. However, McTech suggested that the issue isn’t the fault of the programmes themselves, but simply an easily-resolved speaker issue. Addressing his 4.8 million followers, the self-styled “PC enthusiast” said: “Have you ever been watching Netflix and you’re struggling to hear quiet voices over the background music and sound effects?” Sign up for our free Indy100 weekly newsletter Well, he continued: “It might be because Netflix thinks you have surround sound.” Displaying his screen, he directed the audience to an “other” button in the bottom right-hand corner, which brought up an audio drop-down menu. “You can see the default audio is 'English 5.1',” he pointed out. “That means that Netflix thinks you have five speakers and one subwoofer (another type of loudspeaker). “If you don’t,” he continued: “You want to select 'English Original'.” He then clicked on the option, which instantly changed the sound dynamics on the episode of ‘You’ he was watching. “Now the background music is a little quieter and I can hear him talk,” he said. @setupspawn Thos will improve your Netflix Watching Experience! #netflix #tipsandtricks #netflixseries He then offered another handy tip – directing viewers to a website called Netflix-codes.com. Here, “You can find a bunch of secret Netflix category codes that they don’t tell you about,” he revealed. Explaining how it works, he said: “Let’s say for instance I want to watch some anime horror shows, all I have to do is take this code – 10695 – then I can go to the Netflix search and type in the code. “Easy.” McTech’s advice clearly struck a chord with streaming lovers, as his video racked up a whopping 12.6 million views in just over a week. However, his hacks weren’t the only things to draw the audience’s attention. Scores of commentators swiftly fixated on his pronunciation of “anime” and on an open tab in his web browser. “Sir, what the hell is ‘A nai me’?” one asked. “The way I FLEW to the comments for how he pronounced anime,” wrote another. “Did anyone [...] catch the second tab he had pulled up… or are we looking past that? Lol” asked a third. If you pause the clip when he’s going through his Netflix-codes.com cheat, you’ll see that the tab next to the website reads: “Best place to hide a body.” Obviously, no one actually believed McTech had inadvertently revealed himself to be a murderer. Instead, they praised him for nailing social media. “Between the pronunciation of anime, the second tab, and the helpful info: you sir, have mastered TikTok,” one admirer wrote. “Well played.” Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

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Naked Attraction’s Anna Richardson has spoken about the possibility of a celebrity version of the show taking place in the future, saying that she’s already had interest from famous faces. Reports were recently denied that the series was coming to an end on Channel 4, and it looks like there could be enough people to make a celeb version viable at some point. Richardson, who has hosted the show since it first aired in 2016, spoke to OK! and revealed that she’s had interest from showbiz pals. “I’ve bumped into a couple of celebs recently who’ve gone ‘I’d do it!’,” Richardson said, saying that Blue singer and Hollyoaks star Duncan James has expressed an interest. Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter “Duncan James was like ‘I’m up for it!’, and I was like ‘oh my god!’. And the lovely Anna Whitehouse, who does the Dirty Mother Pukka podcast, said to me a couple of weeks ago that she’d do it! “This is starting to look like we’re getting five pods together…I know in the past Scott Mills from Radio 1 said, possibly as a joke, that he would do it.” As well as talking about future plans for the show, Richardson also said that she’d like to take Naked Attraction on tour. “My big dream is to do Naked Attraction live!” she said. “I’d like to do it as a theatre show. I just think there’s a few things that we could do now to move it on and Naked Attraction Mark 2. But we’ll see…..” Of course, Naked Attraction is a unique TV programme that sees contestants baring all in the hopes of being chosen by the person looking for love. It’s seen plenty of memorable moments over the years, and the new most recent 10th series was no different – with one contestant provoking somewhat of a large talking point after being labelled “dangerous”. Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

WASHINGTON Sales of new U.S. single-family homes jumped to a 13-month high in April, boosted by a persistent

Markets on Wall Street pointed lower early Friday as anxiety carried over from a day earlier when a handful of central banks around the world cranked interest rates higher in their fight against inflation