With a population of 180,000, Switzerland's third-biggest city after Zurich and Geneva straddles the River Rhine and sits right on the northern border with both France and Germany.

Basel's location played a major role in its growth and continental importance through the ages.

From May 11 to 17, it will be centre-stage in Europe again as it hosts Eurovision 2025, the pop music extravaganza that has become one of the world's biggest annual live television events and a giant international party.

The influence of the Rhine can be felt in Basel's historic centre, dominated by the twin towers of Basel Minster, where the Dutch thinker Erasmus is buried.

But Basel's modern emblems are the two Roche Towers, Switzerland's tallest buildings. Completed in the last decade, standing 205 metres and 178 metres (673 and 584 feet) high, they are the headquarters of the eponymous giant pharmaceutical firm.

The chemical and pharmaceutical industries now drive the city's economy.

- Carnival and the arts -

Basel is one of Europe's great centres of culture.

The first edition of Sebastian Brant's "Ship of Fools", one of the bestsellers of the European Renaissance, was printed in the city.

The Rhine spirit is vividly expressed every spring at the three-day Basel Carnival, which transforms the city streets into a river of painted lanterns, colourful masks and creative costumes, flowing to the sound of pipes and drums.

The world's biggest Protestant carnival features on UNESCO's intangible cultural heritage list and attracts thousands of tourists.

The city has world-renowned museums -- none more so than the Kunstmuseum, the oldest public art collection in the world dating back to 1661.

In a referendum in 1967, citizens decided to buy two paintings by Pablo Picasso, who, moved by the vote, would later donate several more works to the city.

Across the Rhine, the Museum Tinguely draws in thousands of visitors with its kinetic art sculptures, while just outside the city, the Beyeler Foundation hosts an outstanding collection of modern and contemporary artworks.

And every year, art lovers and gallery owners from around the world flock to Art Basel, one of the world's top contemporary art fairs.

In sports, Basel is home to tennis all-time great Roger Federer, while FC Basel are on the verge of winning their 21st Swiss football championship.

- Chemicals and quakes -

Besides its culture, Basel is now synonymous with the chemical and pharmaceutical industries, home to globally important groups such as Roche, Novartis, Sandoz and Syngenta.

The psychedelic drug LSD was created at the Sandoz laboratories there in 1938.

Pharma and chemicals make Basel a major player in the Swiss economy, attracting researchers and students as well as cross-border workers.

Around 35,000 people cross over from France and Germany, attracted by higher Swiss wages.

Basel is the home of the Bank for International Settlements, considered the central bank of central banks.

The city is left-leaning, perhaps due to the influence of its university, the oldest in Switzerland, founded in 1460.

It has approximately 13,000 students from 100 countries, around a quarter of whom are studying for their doctorates.

The city has also lived through major disasters: the great earthquake of 1356 and the Sandoz chemical spill 630 years later.

The biggest quake in central Europe in recorded history, and the fires it caused, destroyed a city already ravaged by the Black Death.

The 1986 fire at the Sandoz chemical plant on the outskirts of Basel also left its mark due to the ecological disaster caused by toxic chemicals leaking into the Rhine, killing wildlife as far downstream as the Netherlands.

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Their every move is scrutinized by Havana for signs of support for critics of communist rule.

Cubans who meet with the representative of the island's arch-foe, which has toughened its six-decade trade blockade since President Donald Trump returned to power, also risk the ire of the authorities.

Yet the new US chief of mission in Cuba, Mike Hammer, seems unfazed as he crisscrosses the country of 9.7 million, meeting with dissidents and splashing pictures of the encounters on social media since taking the post in November.

It's a sharp contrast to his more discreet predecessors.

Cuba, which restored ties with the United States in 2015 after half a century of hostility, has accused Hammer of an "activist" approach to his mission.

"I travel around Cuba because, as a diplomat with over 35 years' experience, I know... that it is very important to understand a country and its people," Hammer said recently in a Spanish-language video posted on the embassy's X account.

In the message he also invited Cubans to contact him to request a meeting and to suggest places he should visit.

- Church activism -

A former ambassador to Chile and the Democratic Republic of Congo, Hammer arrived in Cuba in the dying days of Joe Biden's presidency.

In the past six months, he has met dozens of dissidents, human rights activists, independent journalists, church leaders and families of jailed anti-government demonstrators, most of whom are under close surveillance.

At every turn, the affable diplomat presses for the release of political prisoners, quoting Cuban nationalist hero Jose Marti on the need for a republic "that opens its arms to all."

In February, he travelled to the eastern city of Santiago de Cuba to meet opposition leader Jose Daniel Ferrer, who had just been released from prison under an eleventh-hour deal with Biden.

Cuba agreed to free over 500 prisoners in return for Washington removing the island from a list of state sponsors of terrorism.

On his first day back in office Trump tore up the deal by putting Cuba back on the terrorism list.

Havana released the prisoners nonetheless but last month sent Ferrer and fellow longtime opposition leader Felix Navarro, whom Hammer also met, back to prison, for allegedly violating their parole conditions.

Hammer has also shown solidarity with Berta Soler, leader of the Ladies in White rights group, who has been repeatedly arrested for trying to attend mass dressed in white, which the government considers a dissident act.

On April 13, Hammer accompanied her to a Palm Sunday church service in Havana.

Soler, 61, was briefly detained afterwards, triggering condemnation from Washington of Cuba's "brutish treatment" of its people and its attempt to "intimidate US diplomats."

- Avoiding more sanctions -

Michael Shifter, senior fellow at the Inter-American Dialogue think tank in Washington, said Hammer's style signaled a change in tack under Trump's Secretary of State Marco Rubio, the son of Cuban immigrants who is fiercely critical of the island's leadership.

"Ambassador Hammer has instructions to make visits with greater frequency and visibility," Shifter said.

Cuba's deputy foreign minister Carlos Fernandez de Cossio last month lashed out at Hammer, accusing him of "being an activist that encourages Cubans to act against their country."

Another senior foreign ministry official accused Hammer of flouting the historic rapprochement deal struck by his former boss, ex-president Barack Obama with his Cuban counterpart Raul Castro.

For Cuban political scientist Arturo Lopez-Levy, professor of international relations at the University of Denver, the problem facing Cuba is how to "keep the embassy open without it becoming a platform for subversive activities."

Shifter said he expected Cuba to show restraint.

The island is struggling with its worst economic crisis in 30 years, marked by shortages of food and fuel, recurring blackouts and a critical shortage of hard currency.

As a result, Havana has "an interest in avoiding even tougher sanctions," Shifter said.

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But now Air Force One -- like many other American institutions once considered sacred -- is getting the Donald Trump treatment.

- A name, not a plane -

Technically Air Force One is the callsign for whichever US Air Force plane, no matter how small, is carrying the US president.

But most people identify it with the two heavily modified versions of the Boeing 747-200 jet liner that usually shuttle the US president around the world.

The two current models, called the VC-25A in military speak, both entered service in 1990 during the presidency of George H.W. Bush.

With its classic blue and white livery the current jumbo jet has become so famous that it even spawned a Hollywood thriller named after it, starring Harrison Ford.

Sometimes presidents use smaller planes based on Boeing 757s for shorter flights, dubbed "Baby Air Force One."

- Presidential suite -

"Big Air Force One" boasts luxury features fit for a commander-in-chief.

The president himself has a large suite that includes an office with leather chairs and a polished wooden desk -- a space Trump used for a press conference to sign a proclamation renaming the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of America.

A medical suite on board can also function as an operating room, should the worst happen.

There are special cabins for senior advisors, Secret Service members and 13 traveling press. It has two galleys that can feed 100 people at a time, all on specially branded crockery.

- Special features -

But the plane's main role is keeping the US president safe.

Inflight refueling capability means it can stay in the air almost indefinitely.

A hardened electronics system protects against electromagnetic pulses -- whether from nuclear explosions or hostile jammers -- "allowing the aircraft to function as a mobile command center in the event of an attack on the United States," the White House said.

Those communications also keep Trump constantly in touch with the ground -- and able to send social media posts in mid-air.

The jet also has top secret air defenses, according to aviation specialists.

These reportedly include countermeasures that can jam enemy radars and infrared tracking systems, plus dispensers for chaff -- metal shavings that distract radar-guided missiles -- and flares that blind heat-seeking missiles.

- Historic roles -

Inevitably, Air Force One has also played its role in history.

The first specially-designed jets were brought in by John F. Kennedy in 1962, using modified Boeing 707s. One of those jets brought Kennedy's body back to Washington after his assassination in Dallas in 1963.

Then in 2001, George W. Bush took to the skies aboard Air Force One after the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington.

- Trump obsession -

But Trump has long had something of an obsession with the presidential jets.

The Republican has consistently sought to upgrade them, agreeing a deal with Boeing in 2018 during his first term for two new models based on the newer 747-8 jet.

He also dreamed up a new color scheme -- replacing the one largely in place since Kennedy's time -- with a deep red stripe down the middle of the aircraft and a dark blue underbelly.

Trump likes the new look so much that he still has a model of it on his coffee table in the Oval Office, and showed it off at his inauguration for a second term.

But now he has repeatedly complained about delays and cost overruns.

"We're very disappointed that it's taking Boeing so long... We have an Air Force one that's 40 years old," Trump said on Monday.

"You look at some of the Arab countries and the planes they have parked alongside of the United States of America plane, it's like from a different planet."

One of those same Arab countries, Qatar, has now offered the United States a Boeing 747-8 from the royal family to use as a stopgap Air Force One.

But with ethical concerns and security worries about using a plane from a foreign power for such an ultra-sensitive purpose, it's unclear whether the scheme will ever leave the ground.

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The ambitious restoration of the derelict Argo factory has made it "one of the most beautiful buildings of Tehran", said architect Nazanin Amirian, visiting the latest exhibition there.

While the former factory with its towering chimney and cavernous cellar has been given a new life, many other historic buildings in the Iranian capital face a grimmer fate.

"We hoped restoring Argo would inspire others to preserve similar buildings," said Hamid Reza Pejman, director of the Pejman Foundation that took on the project.

But "economic conditions are tough", said Pejman, after years of crippling sanctions and with no government funding to support restoration endeavours.

Established more than a century ago, the Argo factory had produced one of Iran's oldest and biggest beer brands before falling into disuse.

It had ceased operations just a few years before the 1979 Islamic revolution, which toppled Iran's Western-backed shah and ushered in a strict ban on the production and consumption of alcoholic beverages.

The brand itself lives on alcohol-free, with rights to the Argo logo transferred to a local beverage company, Pejman said.

He said that since the factory was "out of operation" at the time, it was spared the fate of some other breweries which were set ablaze during the revolution.

Ever since the Islamic republic banned alcohol, bootleg beverages proliferated on the black market, with toxic methanol occasionally contaminating the natural ethanol and resulting in mass poisonings.

- 'Transform the city' -

Left a crumbling structure of weathered brick walls that also served as a shelter for homeless people, the Argo building was eventually purchased by the Pejman Foundation in 2016.

Its brick walls and chimney were restored, keeping their distinct industrial look, while other parts like the roof had to be entirely rebuilt.

Since 2020, the building has been open to the public as a museum, featuring local and international artists.

In a nod to its past life, the Argo arts centre offers non-alcoholic beer for sale.

The current exhibition is a collection of installation works, sculptures and paintings by Iranian multidisciplinary artist Maryam Amini.

Over the years, the building has been swallowed by Tehran's rapid urban expansion, now surrounded by high-rises, modern cafes and sprawling commercial centres in one of the city's busiest neighbourhoods.

Much like the Argo factory until 2016, some of Tehran's historic buildings including old movie theatres have been abandoned for years, largely due to economic hardship.

Others were demolished as shifting urban priorities have favoured modern developments over restoration.

Amir Ali Izadi, a 43-year-old artist visiting the factory-turned-museum, expressed his hope that similar buildings would undergo renovation.

"It would transform the city's landscape," he said.

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The US and Russian presidents' phone call on March 18 focused on Russian strikes on Ukrainian energy sites, US military aid to Kyiv, and peace negotiations.

But according to the Kremlin, Putin also brought up a subject close to his heart -- ice hockey -- and raised the possibility of matches between players of both countries.

"We've been seeing efforts by the Russians to warm up the situation with Donald Trump and vice versa... Putin is a big hockey fan," Gary Smith, a former Canadian diplomat and author of "Ice War Diplomat", told AFP.

Smith's book focuses on a series of hockey matches between Canada and the Soviet Union during the Cold War in 1972, which is considered one of the most significant events in 20th-century Canadian history.

"The advantage of sports is that it impacts foreign societies from top to bottom because there's such a mass interest in sports," he added.

"So you have an opportunity to really convey a message, a cultural message. And what it does is it helps break down cultural stereotypes.

"For instance, we didn't like the communists at all but they had a goaltender, 20 years old, named Vladislav Tretiak, and he put a human face on communism."

- 'Relationships of trust' -

Whether ice hockey can help to "humanise" modern-day Russia more than half a century later remains to be seen.

First, games would have to actually take place between the Americans and Russians and despite Trump's agreement in principle, this is not yet a done deal.

The North American NHL cut ties with its Russian counterpart, the KHL, after Moscow's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 and Russia is banned from international competitions until at least 2026.

Smith assesses the chance of the offer coming to fruition as "50-50" -- and dependent on the course of the war.

"The longer the war in Ukraine goes on, the less likely this series will happen," he said, noting that the White House read-out of the call made no mention of ice hockey.

Putin, 72, portrays himself as having a healthy and athletic lifestyle and took up ice hockey late in life, playing in high-profile gala matches every year.

Ice hockey "brings people together and helps build relationships of trust", he said during one match in 2019 when asked about possible "hockey diplomacy".

By coincidence, Russian Alex Ovechkin, who plays for NHL franchise the Washington Capitals, is closing in on the league record of 894 goals set by the player widely considered the greatest of all time, Wayne Gretzky.

Ovechkin founded "PutinTeam" to support the Russian president in the 2018 election and his Instagram profile picture shows him standing with Putin.

- Elbows up! -

In recent weeks, ice hockey has also emerged as a proxy for tensions between North American neighbours the United States and Canada.

In February, a clash on the ice between the two countries in an international tournament in Montreal was marked by three fights in the first nine seconds and a chorus of deafening boos.

Faced with Trump's repeated calls to make their country the "51st state", Canadians have adopted a rallying cry of resistance directly drawn from the vocabulary of their national sport: "Elbows up!"

New Prime Minister Mark Carney, himself a former player, also alluded to ice hockey in a speech about the trade war with Washington over tariffs.

"Canadians are always ready when someone else drops the gloves," he said, referring to ice hockey's notorious punch-ups.

"The Americans should make no mistake: in trade as in hockey, Canada will win."

The former central banker donned his national team jersey for the final of the tournament.

Despite a phone call from Trump himself to the American players before kickoff, the United States lost the final 3-2 to Canada.

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Alexander-Arnold joined the Reds 20 years ago as a six-year-old and has gone on to win a clean sweep of Premier League, Champions League, FA Cup, League Cup, UEFA Super Cup and Club World Cup titles.

His status is reflected in a mural that stands just metres from the club's Anfield stadium, emblazoned with the quote: "I'm just a normal lad from Liverpool whose dream has just come true."

However, how he will be remembered for years to come in his home city will for many be dictated by the decision he takes in the coming weeks over his future.

Alexander-Arnold's contract expires at the end of the season, meaning Madrid do not have to pay a transfer fee for a player who has smashed Premier League records when it comes to a creative output from a right-back.

Here, AFP Sport looks at the key considerations facing the 26-year-old ahead of a career-defining call.

- Madrid's compelling case -

Liverpool like to taunt their Premier League rivals with their six European Cups, making them by a distance the most successful English club in the competition's history.

Madrid though are in a league of their own with 15 European Cup or Champions League triumphs, including six in the past 11 years.

On top of the lifestyle benefits that a switch to the Spanish sunshine offers, Alexander-Arnold would be lining up each week alongside his close friend and England colleague Jude Bellingham, among a cast of stars also including Kylian Mbappe and Vinicius Junior.

The spotlight at the state-of-the-art, newly refurbished Santiago Bernabeu could also offer Alexander-Arnold the chance to fulfil his dream of becoming the first full-back to win the Ballon d'Or.

"I believe I can (win it)," Alexander-Arnold told Sky Sports earlier this season. "It's only the morning after you retire that you're able to look in the mirror and say, 'I gave it everything I got'.

"It doesn't matter how many trophies you win, or how many medals you've got. It matters what you give to the game and if you reach your full potential."

By running his contract down, Alexander-Arnold is in a strong position to make millions from a signing-on bonus in lieu of Madrid having to pay a huge transfer fee.

And he can argue there is little more to be gained by staying at Anfield.

Liverpool are 12 points clear at the top of the Premier League, meaning by the time his current deal expires, Alexander-Arnold should be a two-time English champion to go with six other major trophies.

"His legacy, I hope, is one of an outstanding homegrown footballer who's done incredibly well for this club," Steve McManaman, who himself made the move from Liverpool to Real Madrid on a free transfer back in 1999, told the BBC.

- Follow Gerrard's lead? -

McManaman won two Champions Leagues and two La Liga titles in his four years in the Spanish capital and yet is being used as the counter argument encouraging Alexander-Arnold to stay.

"It's about his legacy at Liverpool and how he is seen. Do you want to be seen like (Steven) Gerrard or McManaman?" former Liverpool defender Jamie Carragher, himself a one-club legend, said of Alexander-Arnold's choice.

"He (McManaman) went to Real Madrid and won cups but he is not adored. If (Alexander-Arnold) stays, he will be remembered as one of the best to play for the club and not far behind Gerrard."

Alexander-Arnold is already the club's vice-captain and would be the natural heir to Virgil van Dijk.

In contrast to the era of Gerrard, McManaman and Michael Owen, who swapped Liverpool for Madrid in 2004, he is part of a side regularly competing at the top of the Premier League and Champions League.

Should he stay, Alexander-Arnold could be front and centre of trophy lifts in years to come as a local lad turned legend.

But Liverpool are just the latest club to learn that the magnetism of Madrid is hard to resist.

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He makes "bisht", a long gown which for centuries has been a status symbol, worn by kings and princes -- and ordinary men -- and could take a week of meticulous work to create.

Now, with cheap Chinese-made robes taking a bite out of his business, the 60-year-old tailor is struggling to make a profit, and his only son wouldn't take over the beleaguered shop.

But Mohammed refuses to let the ancient craft die, searching for ways to hand down his knowledge.

"We've started training here at the shop and at home," he told AFP in his windowless atelier in the oasis city of Hofuf, with bishts hanging all around.

"I am teaching my grandchildren, be they girls or boys."

In Mohammed's native Al-Ahsa governorate, it was "considered shameful for a man to go to a funeral or a market, or make a visit to anyone anywhere without wearing the bisht", he said.

The bisht came to global attention in 2022 when Qatar's emir draped one over football star Lionel Messi after the World Cup final.

Although Arabs across the Gulf still sometimes wear traditional garb, especially in formal settings, factory-made clothing has replaced tailor services in the oil-rich countries of the region.

- Robe 'recession' -

At his workshop, Mohammed watched over his granddaughter Fajr, nine, and grandson Ghassan, 10, as they embroidered delicate gowns.

For the veteran craftsman, who learned to weave when he was only five, this is "my entire life".

"I came into this world... seeing only bishts around me," said Mohammed, wearing the Saudi national dress of white thobe robe and chequered red-and-white headdress.

"I was born in (my father's) tailor shop and grew up watching my mother sew. I saw my brothers and cousins work with my father in the tailor shop," he added with pride.

His wife was also a bisht seamstress, he said, skilled at collar embroidery.

But his modest shop in an artisans' market in Hofuf has fallen on hard times.

"A sort of recession has taken hold," he said.

A high-quality bisht could once have fetched up to 6,000 riyals ($1,600), but machine-made cloaks sell for just a fraction of that price, Mohammed said.

"Pieces I would make for 1,500 riyals now go for 150 riyals. It's not enough to make a living."

- 'Didn't give up' -

Mohammed refuses to let the tradition die out, and he is far from alone.

A bisht revival is taking shape in Saudi Arabia even as it opens up to the world, attracting tourists and foreign businesses.

Last year, the kingdom ordered ministers and other senior officials to wear a bisht when entering or leaving the workplace or attending formal events.

Saudi Arabia has named 2025 the Year of Handicrafts, when it will promote and support 10 crafts including bisht-weaving.

And Gulf countries are trying to include the bisht on the UNESCO list of intangible cultural heritage in a bid to preserve the craft.

Some of the bishts hanging on the walls of Mohammed's workshop are at least a century old, he said, proudly presenting a brown robe made from sheep's wool.

"Someone offered me 200,000 riyals for this, but I refused to sell it because it is as dear to me as my life. It represents my country's history," he said.

"I want to pass them down to my children and grandchildren, and I will instruct them never to sell them," he said, pointing to the pieces on the walls.

Mohammed also gives weekly bisht tailoring lessons at a nearby institute, mostly for young people.

"We didn't give up," he said, training the younger generation "to revive an old heritage that was disappearing".

"We will bring it to life once more," said Mohammed.

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Friends since childhood in Seattle, Gates and Allen founded Microsoft in 1975 with a stated goal of putting a computer in every office and home.

- Gates -

Born William Henry Gates III in 1955 in Seattle, he began writing software programs while a 13-year-old schoolboy.

Gates dropped out of Harvard in his junior year to start Microsoft with Allen.

The childhood friends created MS-DOS operating system, since renamed Windows, which went on to dominate office work.

Gates built a reputation as a formidable and sometimes ruthless leader.

Critics argue he unfairly wielded Microsoft's clout in the market, and the US pressed a winning antitrust case against the company in the late 1990s.

In 2000, Gates ceded the CEO job to Ballmer, whom he befriended while the two were students at Harvard.

Gates chose to devote himself to a charitable foundation he established with his then-wife, Melinda.

He resigned from Microsoft's board of directors in 2020 -- shortly after the firm acknowledged the existence of an "intimate" relationship with an employee in the past.

The following year, the couple divorced. Melinda Gates faulted him for his relationship with disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein, who was found guilty of sexually exploiting under-age girls.

His support of Covid-19 vaccine campaigns and agriculture programs that focus on climate change and women made Gates a favorite target of conspiracy theorists.

Baseless accusations aimed at Gates include him putting tracking chips in vaccines.

- Allen -

Paul Allen, born in 1953 in Seattle, was a schoolmate of Gates.

Allen was 10 when he started a science club at home, and would later bond with young Gates over computers.

"Microsoft would never have happened without Paul," Gates wrote in tribute to Allen, who died of cancer complications in 2018.

Gates told of Allen showing him a magazine featuring a computer running on a new chip, and warning that a tech revolution was happening without them.

Allen is credited with combining "microcomputer" and "software" to come up with "Micro-Soft".

He left Microsoft in 1983, but remained a board member until 2000. He went on to accuse Gates and Ballmer of scheming to "rip him off" by getting hold of his shares while he battled cancer.

- Ballmer -

Ballmer was seen as a devoted salesman who ramped up Microsoft revenue while neglecting innovation.

A Michigan native with a talent for mathematics, he graduated from Harvard.

Ballmer joined Microsoft in 1980 and was best man at the 1994 wedding of Bill and Melinda Gates.

Ballmer, now 69, succeeded Gates as chief executive in 2000.

His enthusiastic gestures, awkward dance moves, and voice-straining shouts made him the stuff of internet memes and company lore.

Ballmer oversaw the launch of Xbox video game consoles, Surface tablets, and Bing online search engine. Microsoft bought Skype and Nokia's mobile phone division on Ballmer's watch.

During his tenure, Microsoft was seen as clinging to PCs while lifestyles raced toward mobile devices and cloud-based software.

His product failures include Zune digital music players, Kin mobile phones, and a Vista version of Windows.

- Nadella -

Nadella took over as chief executive in early 2014 and says he learned leadership skills playing cricket as a boy growing up in India.

Nadella, who will turn 58 in August, was hired in 1992 while studying at the University of Chicago.

Early in his academic career, a drive to build things led him to pursue computer science, a focus not available during his engineering studies at Mangalore University.

Nadella's Microsoft bio shows stints in research, business, server and online services units.

For relaxation, he turns to poetry, which he likened to complex data compressed to express rich ideas in few words.

Nadella held firm that for Microsoft to succeed, it needed to adapt to a "cloud-first, mobile-first world".

Soon after becoming chief, he ordered the biggest reorganization in Microsoft's history.

He is credited with guiding Microsoft from a fading packaged software business to the booming market for cloud services.

Microsoft has been pumping billions of dollars into AI, investing in ChatGPT-maker OpenAI and infusing the technology across its products.

In a rare stumble, Nadella triggered an uproar his first year as chief by suggesting during an on-stage discussion that working women should trust "karma" when it comes to securing pay raises.

Microsoft's acquisitions under Nadella include Sweden-based Mojang, maker of the popular video game Minecraft; social network LinkedIn, and the GitHub online platform catering to software developers.

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Some companies at the Milan Furniture Fair, which opened Tuesday, compare the sudden levies to a rampaging wrecking crew. But many are also determined to keep offering their prestige output in the hope that buyers in the key US market will stick with them.

The United States is the Italian furniture industry's second-biggest market after France, accounting for 2.2 billion euros ($2.4 billion) of its 19.4 billion euros of exports in 2024, according to industry figures.

The "geopolitical" factors, such as the new tariffs, "will certainly have long-term repercussions," the fair's president Maria Porro told AFP.

About 10 percent of all Italy's exports go to the United States, and Prime Minister Georgia Meloni will go to Washington on April 17 in a bid to ease the impact of the 20-percent tariffs imposed on European Union products.

Some furniture firms say it is too early to know how much damage can be expected from the tariffs that have shaken global markets.

"We made it through Covid, we had the war in Ukraine and lost Russian clients, but we survived," said Nicola Fagetti, finance director of the Parma company La Contessina, which prides itself on producing a modern version of Italian renaissance styles.

"We are now facing tariffs, but we always find a solution," he said stoically. US sales account for 35 percent of his company's made-to-order exports.

Emmanuel Antonello, marketing director for Villari, a luxury brand whose tables can cost more than $20,000, is also refusing to panic.

"The United States accounts for 20 percent of our exports, but we can still count on our sales in the Middle East, our primary market with a 60 percent share," he said.

And he's banking on customer loyalty across the Atlantic: "Americans are fascinated by Italian design -- there's a 'Wow!' effect when they see our products; for them, they're gems."

- Absent Americans -

But there are few Americans roaming the fair this year, while they were the sixth-largest foreign contingent in 2024.

"I will lose a lot of my clients. I think the tariffs are going to be enormously awful for trade," said interior designer Allison Muir, a 48-year-old from San Francisco and a fan of the late Italian designer Gio Ponti.

"Italian design can really relax the mind and create a place to really reflect. And I think that's what a lot of my clients are looking for in the frenetic Silicon Valley," she said.

Upset with Trump's policies, she is considering leaving the United States and settling with her family in Seville, Spain.

A decline in exports to France (-3.3 percent) and Germany (-6 percent) already helped drag down the Italian furniture industry's revenues last year by more than two percent to 27.5 billion euros.

"Even though some emerging markets are growing, such as the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, they are still unable to make up for traditional markets," said Porro, the fair's president.

Turning to trends at the 63rd edition of the Salone del Mobile, she said clients are increasingly interested in sustainability and a return to nature.

"In a period of instability like the one we are experiencing now, people prefer natural, bright and warm shades," she said, adding that the border between design and art is increasingly blurred.

The giant show, open until Sunday, has 2,103 exhibitors, with more than a third from outside Italy. Last year, it attracted 370,824 visitors from around the world, a 20 percent increase on 2023.

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At 63, wearing number 10 and sporting brown-dyed hair, the grandmother of seven was far from your typical footballer when she stepped onto the field for her first international tournament.

"I feel like a superstar," Nonhlanhla grinned, revealing a missing tooth. "They call me the goal machine."

Her team, Vuka Soweto, hails from the renowned township of Soweto outside Johannesburg.

It had joined more than a dozen others from across Africa and beyond to compete this week at the Grannies International Football Tournament in the northern province of Limpopo.

The four-day "Grannies World Cup" was held in a stadium with sweeping mountain views.

The 30-minute games were played in two halves at a slow but purposeful pace, between teams from as far as the United States, France and Togo.

"It is all about active ageing. Whether we win or lose, it is all about coming here and staying fit," said 62-year-old South African Devika Ramesar, a mother of two and grandmother of five.

Until this week, the Liverpool fan had never stepped onto a football pitch.

Kenyan striker Edna Cheruiyot only had two months to learn the "long list" of football rules before Friday, when she scored her only goal.

She took selfies to remember her first ever trip abroad and send to her grandchildren.

- Unfair pressure on grannies  -

"I feel nimble. This is the lightest I have been since my first child in 1987," Cheruiyot said, adjusting the blue headwrap covering her greying hair.

At 52, she is a youngster within her team, whose oldest player -- Elizabeth Talaa -- is 87.

The idea for the tournament arose in 2007 as a way to improve the health of local women, said founder Rebecca Ntsanwisi, 57, who is fondly called Mama Beka.

It came out of her sense of personal challenge following a cancer diagnosis that once bound her to a wheelchair.

"The older women need to come together and enjoy. We are neglected," she told AFP outside the home where she lives with her ageing parents.

She hopes to host the next tournament in Kenya in 2027.

In South Africa alone, almost 40 percent of  children live in households headed by their grandparents, according to government statistics.

That is mainly due to poverty, cultural traditions and urban migration.

But grandmothers should not be saddled with the responsibility of raising their grandchildren, Ntsanwisi said.

"This is our time to enjoy and relax," she said. "I will die knowing that I did something."

Chris Matson, 67, took the advice to heart and travelled from the United States to "enjoy every second of the tournament".

"I did not play when I was little so to do it now is wonderful," said the bubbly goalkeeper for the winning American New England Breakers team, who also took the golden glove.

"I have something precious to take home," she told AFP, cradling her first ever trophy.

- Rolling back time -

The team doctors, however, earned their keep.

The aches and pains of the elderly players needed constant checking, South African team medic Diana Mawila said.

Some members of her Vakhegula Vakhegula team had to be monitored for high blood pressure before every game.

Vakhegula Vakhegula means "grandmothers grandmothers" in the local Tsonga language and is a nod to the national men's team, Bafana Bafana or "boys boys".

But the team disagreed with the medic's assessment and burst into heartfelt laughter.

"We are fit!" captain Thelma Ngobeni said, balancing on her head a packet of maize flour that players received after the games.

"It is not about winning or losing. All that matters is that we showed up, had fun and did our best," she said.

Nonhlanhla's goal was more ambitious. A dream of making it big in football was within reach, she said.

"It's never too late to achieve your childhood dreams. I don't see anything stopping me," she added, walking out of the tunnel to face France.

In a scene mirroring professional football, the vuvuzela-blowing crowd erupted in applause as teams entered the stadium hand in hand with young mascots and national anthems played.

"I'm halfway there, right?" Nonhlanhla smiled.

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© Agence France-Presse