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US President Donald Trump has made it clear he wants the Nobel Peace Prize when it is announced next week but experts predict he has little chance against those toiling on forgotten causes outside the limelight.The prestigious prize will be announced on Friday, October 10 but before that, Trump's assault on science is likely to stir debate when the laureates for the medicine prize are revealed on Monday, followed by daily announcements for the awards for physics, chemistry, literature, and economics.Trump said this week it would be an "insult" to the United States if he did not win the Nobel Peace Prize, but experts in Oslo, where the award is based, say he has virtually no chance due to his "America First" policies and divisive style."It's completely unthinkable," Oeivind Stenersen, a historian who has conducted research and co-written a book on the prize, told AFP.Trump "is in many ways the opposite of the ideals that the Nobel Prize represents", he said."The Nobel Peace Prize is about defending multilateral cooperation, for example in the UN... and Trump breaks with that principle, he follows his own path, unilaterally," he added.The US leader claims to have resolved six or seven wars in as many months -- a figure experts say is grossly exaggerated."The Nobel Committee should assess whether there have been clear examples of success in that peacemaking effort," the head of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), Karim Haggag, told AFP.Tens of thousands of people are eligible to submit a candidate for the Nobel Peace Prize.This year, 338 individuals and organisations are known to have been nominated but their names are kept secret for 50 years. Forgotten conflicts Haggag said the prize ought to go to actors working quietly behind the scenes.The Nobel Committee should shine a light on "the work done by local mediators and local peace builders on the ground", he said."These are actors who have been forgotten in many of the world's forgotten conflicts," he said, citing Sudan, the Sahel and countries in the Horn of Africa -- Somalia, Ethiopia and Eritrea.Sudan's Emergency Response Rooms -- networks of volunteers risking their lives to feed and help people enduring war and famine -- are one such group, he noted.Media watchdogs such as the Committee to Protect Journalists and Reporters Without Borders could also be honoured after a deadly year for reporters, especially in Gaza."Never before have so many journalists been killed in a single year," Nina Grager, the head of the Peace Research Institute of Oslo, said.Yulia Navalnaya, the widow of Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny, is meanwhile among bookies' favourites.Last year, the Nobel Peace Prize went to Japan's atomic bomb survivors' group Nihon Hidankyo for its efforts to ban nuclear weapons.Switzerland's Kracht for literature? The other Nobel that generates frenzied speculation is the literature prize, to be announced on October 9.Switzerland's Christian Kracht, considered one of the greatest contemporary authors in the German-language world, is a favourite in literary circles.At this year's Gothenburg Book Fair, held annually a few weeks before the Nobel prize announcement, "many members of the Swedish Academy (which awards the literature prize) were there, sitting in the front row during his event", culture critic Bjorn Wiman at Swedish daily Dagens Nyheter told AFP."And that is usually a sure sign," he said.After the Academy gave the nod to South Korea's Han Kang last year, Wiman thinks this year "it will go to a white man from the Anglo-Saxon, German or French-language world".The Nobel season opens Monday with the medicine prize, followed by the awards for physics on Tuesday and chemistry on Wednesday.The economics prize wraps up the Nobel season on October 13.The mechanisms of innate immunity, the identification of leukaemia stem cells and the discovery of an appetite-regulating hormone are among the medical research fields that could be honoured.This year's laureates in the science disciplines could use their win to sound the alarm over Trump's billions of dollars of funding cuts for scientific research. The Nobel Prize consists of a diploma, a gold medal and a cheque for around $1.2 million.

Kia Corp. is planning to launch a hybrid compact sports utility vehicle in India within the next 18 months, aligning with a new emissions policy that encourages transitional technologies and entering a segment bypassed by its Japanese rivals.The upcoming sub-four-meter vehicle will be complemented by a second, larger hybrid SUV, according to people familiar with the matter who requested anonymity as the details are not yet public. The timeline for these rollouts is not final and may change, they added.The launches will mark the South Korean automaker’s entry into dual-powered segments — cars that can run on fossil fuels as well as batteries — in the South Asian country. The Indian units of Toyota Motor Corp. and Suzuki Motor Corp. have been the only ones so far to roll out hybrid vehicles but have stuck to larger cars in this technology. The domestic carmakers have largely prioritized their fresh investments in fully electric vehicles.Kia’s strategy underscores how automakers are broadening their lineups to meet stricter emission norms. India’s draft emissions policy last week signaled a shift from EV-centric ambitions to promoting hybrids and other alternatives as part of a multi-fuel roadmap toward cleaner mobility.A representative for Kia in India did not respond to an email seeking comments on the new hybrid launches.Practical AlternativeKia’s compact offering could also help unleash demand for hybrids in the South Asian nation, where affordability and infrastructure gaps make dual-powered vehicles a practical alternative to EVs. As global automakers recalibrate their strategies amid uneven EV adoption and tightening emission norms, compact hybrids could emerge as a new battleground in India as well as other emerging economies where small vehicles still rule the road.The absence of hybrids in the compact segment has so far curbed adoption of the technology in the country, with such vehicles making up just about 2.5% of India’s passenger vehicle market — less than half the share held by EVs, according to government registration data.That makes hybrid entry critical for Kia, which lacks a mass-market EV and relies heavily on diesel and gasoline models such as the Seltos and Sonet in India. Kia India currently sells the locally-made Carens Clavis EV and the imported EV6.The Indian unit of Kia’s parent Hyundai Motor Co. said earlier this year it will add a hybrid vehicle to its product lineup in addition to a broader plan to launch 26 models by 2030.

Australian shares advanced on Thursday in a session of broad-based gains led by miners and gold stocks, with positive sentiment bolstered by Wall Street's performance. The S&P/ASX 200 index rose as much as 0.7% to 8,906.30 points earlier in the session, its highest since September 2, and was up 0.6% by 0032 GMT. The benchmark ended 0.1% lower on Wednesday. Miners led gains on the benchmark for the day by advancing 1.9% as copper prices rose. The sub-index hit its highest level since late-December 2023. Shares of miners BHP, Rio Tinto and Fortescue rose between 0.9% and 1.4%. Gold stocks jumped to a record high, rising 2.5%, as surging bullion prices on safe-haven demand lifted the commodity. Shares of gold miners St Barbara advanced 5%, while Evolution Mining, Northern Star Resources and Genesis Minerals were up between 1.9% and 2.6%. Technology stocks rose 0.3%, tracking their overseas peers, which closed higher overnight as investors shrugged off weak private payrolls data and uncertainty around the first day of the U.S. government shutdown. Wall Street gains often lift Australian markets by boosting global investor sentiment and risk appetite. Banks added 0.6% to the benchmark's gains, with shares of the "Big Four" banks up between 0.3% and 0.5%. Healthcare stocks advanced 1.3%, while energy stocks inched 0.1% higher. Further south, New Zealand's benchmark S&P/NZX 50 index fell 0.2% to 13,400.88 points. Investors are now focused on next week's Reserve Bank of New Zealand policy decision, with ANZ analysts expecting a 25-basis-point rate cut to 2.75%, according to a note.