HELSINKI: Finnish Prime Minister Sanna Marin said on Friday she had taken a drugs test in the wake of video footage published earlier this week that showed her partying with friends, and vowed she had never used illegal drugs.
“I have today taken a drug test and the results will come within a week,” she told a news conference. “Never in my life have I used drugs.”
Marin added that her ability to perform her duties was unimpaired during the night in question and that she would have left the party had she been required to work.
Video clips of Marin partying with well-known Finnish influencers and artists began circulating in social media this week and they were soon published by several media outlets in Finland and abroad.
Marin had faced calls to do a drug test from politicians in her government coalition as well as from the opposition after the videos emerged.
Finnish PM takes drugs test after party video causes stir
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Finnish PM takes drugs test after party video causes stir
- Video clips of Marin partying with well-known Finnish influencers and artists began circulating in social media this week
Oracle says data center outage causing issues faced by US TikTok users
WASHINGTON: Oracle on Tuesday said issues faced by US users of social media app TikTok are the result of a temporary weather-related power outage at an Oracle data center, after California Governor Gavin Newsom linked the issues to what he called the suppression of content critical of President Donald Trump.
“Over the weekend, an Oracle data center experienced a temporary weather-related power outage which impacted TikTok,” Oracle spokesperson Michael Egbert said in an email.
A powerful winter storm struck much of the US over the weekend.
“The challenges US TikTok users may be experiencing are the result of technical issues that followed the power outage, which Oracle and TikTok are working to quickly resolve,” Egbert said.
On Monday, Newsom said his office was launching a review to determine if TikTok’s content moderation practices violated state law.
“Following TikTok’s sale to a Trump-aligned business group, our office has received reports — and independently confirmed instances — of suppressed content critical of President Trump,” Newsom’s office had said.
TikTok’s Chinese owner, ByteDance, last week finalized a deal to set up a majority US-owned joint venture known as TikTok USDS Joint Venture LLC that will secure US data, to avert a ban on the short video app used by more than 200 million Americans. The deal was praised by Trump.
The joint venture has denied censorship, saying “it would be inaccurate to report that this is anything but the technical issues we’ve transparently confirmed.”
Each of the joint venture’s three managing investors — cloud computing giant Oracle, private equity group Silver Lake and Abu Dhabi-based investment firm MGX — will hold a stake of 15 percent. The deal provides for American and global investors to hold 80.1 percent of the venture while ByteDance will own 19.9 percent.
The joint venture said on Tuesday it “made significant progress in recovering our US infrastructure with our US data center partner” but noted that US users may still face some technical issues, including when posting new content.
With more than 16 million followers on his personal TikTok account, Trump credited the app with helping him win the 2024 election.
Last week’s deal was a milestone for TikTok after years of battles with the US government over Washington’s concerns about risks to national security and privacy under Trump and former President Joe Biden.
