Reuters/Ipsos survey suggests Americans are increasingly unhappy with Trump’s handling of the economy.

A new poll suggests that the number of people in the United States who approve of the job Donald Trump is doing as president has dropped to 39 percent as concerns grow over the state of the economy.

The poll released by Reuters/Ipsos on Tuesday indicated Trump’s approval rating is down about 2 points from 41 percent earlier this month, a decline driven partly by growing economic dissatisfaction among members of Trump’s own Republican Party.

Just 33 percent of respondents expressed approval of Trump’s handling of economic issues, the lowest level since he took office for a second time in January.

Growing affordability woes could be a serious political liability for Trump and his allies, who campaigned in 2024 on a promise to address inflation and concerns around the cost of living.

A recent Politico poll found high levels of anxiety in the US over expenses such as healthcare, groceries and housing with 55 percent of respondents assigning Trump’s policies some responsibility for increasing food prices.

The Reuters/Ipsos poll also suggested Trump’s approval rating on cost-of-living issues dropped to 27 percent from 31 percent earlier in December. Among Republicans, approval of his handling of the economy dropped to 72 percent from 78 percent.

‘Golden age’

Trump has denied rising prices are squeezing Americans, calling concerns over affordability a “hoax” being perpetrated by hostile media coverage and Democratic rivals and insisting that the US economy is in a “golden age”. In remarks last week, Trump said he was “crushing” inflation and “prices are coming down tremendously.”

Some Democrats have relished watching Trump reprise the arguments of his Democratic predecessor Joe Biden, who was criticised for insisting during his 2021-2025 presidency that Americans’ frustrations over inflation and the cost of living were being exaggerated.

While Trump’s approval rating has declined from a high of 47 percent when he first returned to the White House, his rating has remained relatively stable over the past several months with slight increases and decreases between the high 30s and low 40s.

A rebel leader in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo says his fighters will withdraw from a key city at the request of the US.

Corneille Nangaa’s statement came days after US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the capture of Uvira by rebel forces violated a peace deal, and the US would “take action to ensure promises made to the President [Donald Trump] are kept”.

Nangaa said that rebel forces would pull out of the city as a “trust-building measure”.

The US accuses Rwanda of backing the rebels. Rwanda denies the allegation, but its President, Paul Kagame, signed a peace accord on 4 December with his DR Congo counterpart, Felix Tshisekedi, at a ceremony in Washington hosted by Trump.

The US president hailed the deal as “historic” and “a great day for Africa”.

The rebels were not signatories to it – and have been taking part in a parallel peace process led by Qatar, a US ally that has strong ties with Rwanda.

Nangaa is the coordinator of the Alliance Fleuve Congo (AFC), a coalition of rebel groups. It includes the M23, the most powerful force that European countries, along with the US, say is backed by Rwanda.

DR Congo’s army is supported by troops from neighbouring Burundi.

The M23’s capture of Uvira was a major blow to them, as the city is only 27km (17 miles) from Burundi’s economic capital, Bujumbura, on the northern tip of Lake Tanganyika.

“AFC/M23 will unilaterally withdraw its forces from the city of Uvira as requested by the United States mediation,” Nangaa said in a statement, adding that this was being done to give the Qatar-brokered peace process the “maximum chance to succeed”.

He did not indicate when the withdrawal would take place, but called for the deployment of a “neutral force” to monitor a ceasefire and to prevent DR Congo’s army from regaining control of territory it had lost.

About 200,000 people have fled their homes in eastern DR Congo since the latest round of fighting started early this month, the UN says.

At least 74 people, mostly civilians, had been killed, and 83 others had been admitted to hospital with wounds, it added.

Eastern DR Congo has been wracked by conflict for more than 30 years, with numerous peace initiatives aimed at ending the fighting having failed.

The Trump administration hopes that its peace initiative will work and pave the way for US companies to boost their investments in the resource-rich region.

The US State Department said in 2023 that DR Congo had an estimated $25tn (£21.2tn) in mineral reserves.

This included cobalt, copper, lithium, manganese and tantalum – needed to make the electronic components used in computers, electric vehicles, mobile phones, wind turbines and military hardware.

The rebels began a major advance earlier this year when they captured Goma, the capital of North Kivu province, on the border with Rwanda.

At the time, South African troops were deployed to help DR Congo’s army, but they were forced to withdraw after the M23 seized the city in January.

Shortly afterwards the rebels captured the next big city in eastern DR Congo, Bukavu, capital of South Kivu province.

The move on Uvira – the government’s last major foothold in South Kivu – came after the rebels broke the defence lines of the DR Congo army, militias allied with it and Burundian troops.

The offensive started a few days before Kagame and Tshisekedi flew to Washington to ratify the agreement first hammered out in June.

Paris Saint-Germain ordered to pay superstar forward now at Real Madrid unpaid salary and bonuses.

A Paris labour court has ordered Paris Saint-Germain to pay Kylian Mbappe 60 million euros ($70.6m) in unpaid salary and bonuses, bringing a partial end to one of the most acrimonious disputes in French football.

The ruling on Tuesday followed months of legal wrangling after the France striker took PSG to court over earnings he said were withheld for April, May and June 2024, shortly before he left the Ligue 1 club to join Real Madrid on a free transfer.

“We are satisfied with the ruling. This is what you could expect when salaries went unpaid,” Mbappe’s lawyer Frederique Cassereau told reporters.

The court found PSG had failed to pay three months of Mbappe’s salary, an ethics bonus and a signing bonus due under his employment contract.

Those sums were recognised as due by two decisions of the French Professional Football League in September and October 2024, and the judges said PSG had not produced any written agreement showing Mbappe had waived his entitlement.

The judges rejected PSG’s arguments that Mbappe should forfeit his unpaid wages entirely but also dismissed several of the player’s additional claims, including allegations of concealed work, moral harassment and breach of the employer’s duty of safety.

The court did not view Mbappe’s fixed-term contract as a permanent one, a decision that limited the scale of potential compensation related to dismissal and notice pay.

‘Labour law applies to everyone’

“This judgment confirms that commitments entered into must be honoured. It restores a simple truth: even in the professional football industry, labour law applies to everyone,” Mbappe’s legal team said in a statement.

“Mr. Mbappe, for his part, scrupulously respected his sporting and contractual obligations for seven years, right up to the final day.”

PSG had argued that Mbappe acted disloyally by concealing for nearly a year his intention not to renew his contract, preventing the club from securing a transfer fee similar to the 180 million euros ($212m) they paid to sign him from AS Monaco in 2017.

Mbappe’s representatives said the dispute concerned the strict application of French labour law and unpaid remuneration rather than transfer policy.