MOSCOW — A Russian politician who openly opposed his country’s military campaign in Ukraine and attempted to run against President Vladimir Putin in last year’s presidential election has now been found guilty of displaying “extremist symbols” — a conviction that effectively shuts him out of this fall’s parliamentary race.
Boris Nadezhdin, 63, faced the charges because of a 2023 online interview in which he briefly held up a photograph of the late opposition figure Alexei Navalny. At the time of the interview, Navalny was serving a 19-year prison term on extremism charges that many observers viewed as politically motivated. Navalny would later die at an Arctic prison facility on February 16, 2024.
Nadezhdin called the case against him ridiculous, arguing that the government was simply trying to prevent him from participating in September’s vote for Russia’s parliament. A court in Dolgoprudny — a town on the northern edge of Moscow where Nadezhdin resides — found him guilty and imposed a fine of 1,000 rubles, the equivalent of about $13.
Just one week before the verdict, Russia’s Justice Ministry labeled Nadezhdin a “foreign agent” — a designation that carries heavy negative implications in Russia and subjects him to increased government oversight. That label also prohibits him from holding public office, though he had still been able to pursue his symbolic parliamentary campaign up until Friday’s ruling.
During Friday’s court proceedings, Nadezhdin reported feeling unwell, prompting the hearing to be paused so medical personnel from an ambulance team could evaluate him. He had previously indicated he was thinking about leaving Russia, but said he has been prohibited from doing so.
Back in January 2024, Nadezhdin gathered tens of thousands of signatures while publicly calling for an end to the fighting in Ukraine. However, Russia’s Supreme Court ruled that more than 9,000 of the signatures his campaign submitted were invalid — enough to disqualify him from the March 2024 presidential ballot. Putin faced only minimal opposition in that election and secured a fifth term with ease.
Since Russian forces entered Ukraine in February 2022, the government has dramatically intensified its suppression of dissent and free expression. Rights organizations, independent journalists, civil society groups, LGBTQ+ activists, and certain religious communities have all been targeted. Hundreds of individuals have been imprisoned, and thousands more have left Russia to escape the crackdown.
In a separate development on Friday, Ilya Remeslo — a blogger and pro-Kremlin activist who has more recently turned critical of Putin — was taken into custody in St. Petersburg. He faces accusations of spreading false information about the Russian military, a charge that has frequently been used to silence government critics.
Russia’s state-run Tass news agency reported that Remeslo would be transported to Moscow for a court appearance. Earlier this year in March, he had publicly criticized the military operation in Ukraine and demanded Putin step down. Shortly after making those remarks, he was placed in a psychiatric facility, where he remained for a month — something he described as retaliation for speaking out.
ISLAMABAD (AP) — Pakistani security forces conducted raids on several militant hideouts in the country’s northwestern region, killing members of the Pakistani Taliban and recovering a stockpile of weapons, according to the military and local officials.
The military announced Friday that intelligence-led operations carried out over the prior day resulted in the deaths of 24 fighters belonging to the outlawed Pakistani Taliban and Baloch separatist organizations.
According to a military statement, the raids were launched in direct response to two militant attacks that occurred on Wednesday. One involved a suicide bomber who loaded a vehicle with explosives and drove it into police officers and civilians. A lesser-known militant group also attacked a police station in Bannu, a district within Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province along the Afghan border, injuring several officers.
Pakistan’s President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif each issued separate statements Friday commending the security forces for what they called a rapid and effective response to those behind the recent Bannu attacks.
Both leaders stated that wiping out terrorism remains the government’s foremost priority and pledged to hold those responsible accountable.
The Pakistani Taliban — formally known as Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, or TTP — are a distinct but allied group to the Afghan Taliban government now ruling Afghanistan. Pakistan regularly accuses the Afghan government in Kabul of ignoring cross-border militant activity, a charge Kabul consistently denies, even as the TTP and the Baloch separatist group BLA frequently take credit for attacks inside Pakistan.
Over the past year, Pakistan has launched multiple strikes it says were aimed at TTP strongholds near the Afghan border.
The Pakistani government in Islamabad also claims these militant groups receive backing from India, an allegation the Indian government in New Delhi denies. Both the president and prime minister repeated that claim in their Friday statements.
The military added that Pakistan’s security forces plan to continue the Azm-e-Istehkam campaign — translated as “Resolve for Stability” — a nationwide counterterrorism effort approved last year under the National Action Plan, designed to dismantle militant networks throughout the country.
Federal health officials have pinpointed shredded iceberg lettuce imported from Mexico and served at Taco Bell restaurants as the origin of a large-scale outbreak of cyclospora, a parasite that causes severe diarrhea.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced late Thursday that consumers should avoid shredded iceberg lettuce at Taco Bell locations operating in Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio, and West Virginia.
An investigation by the Food and Drug Administration traced the contaminated lettuce back to a single supplier, though federal authorities have not publicly named that company.
“FDA is working with the supplier of iceberg lettuce to determine if potentially contaminated shredded iceberg lettuce remains on the market,” the CDC stated, adding that the agency is also looking into whether the lettuce may have reached additional states. The CDC further noted that “Taco Bell has committed to stop using any lettuce from the supplier identified by FDA’s traceback investigation.”
Prior to the federal government’s official confirmation, Taco Bell released a statement on Tuesday saying the chain had “voluntarily and temporarily removed limited ingredients at select restaurants as a precautionary measure,” pledging to monitor the situation and follow guidance from public health authorities.
Health agencies at both the federal and state levels have been jointly investigating this multi-state cyclospora outbreak. Infections have been reported in more than 30 states this year, and current figures already exceed the previous U.S. record of roughly 4,700 cases set in 2019.
Cyclospora is a tiny, round parasite that attacks the intestines and is known to cause watery diarrhea with, according to the CDC, “frequent and sometimes explosive bowel movements.” Outbreaks most commonly occur during late spring and summer months. The parasite spreads through feces and has historically been linked to fruits and vegetables exposed to irrigation water contaminated with fecal matter.
The illness resulting from cyclospora infection, known as cyclosporiasis, is less frequently encountered than foodborne illnesses caused by germs like salmonella or E. coli. It is not typically life-threatening and can usually be treated with antibiotics. For many years, few U.S. outbreaks were reported, but case numbers began climbing about a decade ago, with a particularly sharp increase in 2018 and 2019.
Health experts believe cyclospora infections were historically undercounted, partly because standard food poisoning tests were not designed to detect this specific parasite. Researchers point to climate change and improved detection methods as key factors driving the upward trend in reported cases.
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio is set to travel to Manila this Sunday for a series of high-level diplomatic meetings involving Asia-Pacific nations, where he is widely expected to sit down with his Chinese counterpart to help prepare a possible September summit between President Donald Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov is also anticipated to be in Manila next week, joining gatherings that will include Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi as well as top diplomats from Japan, Australia, Canada, and Britain. The meetings are organized around the 11-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations, known as ASEAN.
The diplomatic activity unfolds against a backdrop of worldwide uncertainty, with the Iran war disrupting international trade and placing economic strain on countries throughout Asia.
The U.S. State Department confirmed that Rubio will attend three major forums: the ASEAN Post-Ministerial Conference, the East Asia Summit Foreign Ministers’ Meeting, and the ASEAN Regional Forum Foreign Ministers’ Meeting. His trip is scheduled to run through next Thursday, during which he will also hold meetings with senior officials from Indo-Pacific nations.
A State Department statement outlined the purpose of the visit, saying: “The Secretary’s visit advances a clear U.S. priority: a free and open Indo-Pacific that delivers safety, security, and prosperity for the region and for the American people.” The statement added that Rubio would work to strengthen the U.S. relationship with the Philippines during the trip.
While neither the U.S. nor China has officially confirmed a bilateral meeting between Rubio and Wang Yi on the sidelines of the forum, such an encounter is broadly expected, as representatives from both countries have met in similar settings before.
Analysts say that if the two top diplomats do meet, the conversation will likely center on organizing a second Trump-Xi summit this year. The two leaders last met in May, and Trump has indicated that Xi plans to visit the United States at the end of September.
Relations between Washington and Beijing have become somewhat more stable under a temporary trade truce the two sides reached in October, but significant disagreements persist. Many analysts describe the overall relationship as caught in a new form of Cold War.
Beyond the Trump-Xi summit preparations, the forum is expected to tackle tensions in the South China Sea, where multiple regional nations dispute territorial claims. The meetings also follow ASEAN foreign ministers’ informal talks last week with Myanmar’s foreign minister — the first direct face-to-face exchange since a 2021 coup prompted ASEAN to exclude Myanmar’s leaders from its sessions.
The gatherings take place shortly after the 10th anniversary of a 2016 international ruling that struck down the legal foundation of China’s broad South China Sea territorial claims — a decision Beijing continues to reject.
Philippine Foreign Affairs spokesperson Dominic Xavier Imperial said both ASEAN and China remain committed to negotiating a “substantive and effective” code of conduct for the waterway, expressing confidence that meaningful progress could be made this year.
Harrison Pretat, a maritime security expert at Washington’s Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank, anticipates that Rubio will voice U.S. concerns about China’s conduct in the South China Sea, but in a restrained manner given the Trump administration’s broader agenda with Beijing. “He will also not want that to completely derail his talks with Wang Yi,” Pretat said, “so I would expect a calibrated approach rather than an attempt to really hammer Beijing. I think China will likewise want to state their position and move on to other things — but there is always room to be surprised.”
Another Southeast Asia expert at the same think tank, Andreyka Natalegawa, said scam operations based in Southeast Asia are also likely to come up during the meetings. The Trump administration has characterized these fraud centers as costing American citizens billions of dollars annually.
Three Chinese airlines have committed to purchasing a combined total of 95 Airbus jets in deals worth approximately $17.8 billion at list price, as carriers in China’s massive aviation market continue pushing to grow their fleets and replace older aircraft with more fuel-efficient models.
Air China, the country’s national carrier, along with its subsidiary Shenzhen Airlines, will together acquire 55 Airbus planes at a combined list price of $12.4 billion. Separately, Hainan Airlines has agreed to purchase 40 jets from the A320neo family at a list price of up to $5.4 billion. Both deals were disclosed through filings with the Shanghai Stock Exchange.
Under the agreement, Air China will take delivery of 15 A350-900 wide-body aircraft, valued at roughly $6.09 billion, with deliveries scheduled between 2030 and 2032. Shenzhen Airlines will receive 40 narrow-body A320neo-family jets, valued at approximately $6.35 billion, with deliveries expected between 2029 and 2032. Hainan Airlines’ 40 A320neo jets are set to arrive between 2028 and 2032.
Air China noted in its filing that the actual prices paid will fall below the listed figures, as Airbus is offering significant discounts — a common practice on large aircraft orders of this scale.
The purchases come as Chinese carriers work to rebuild and grow their operations following the pandemic. However, the outlook has become more difficult for some of China’s biggest airlines. Air China recently disclosed a projected net loss of as much as 2.6 billion yuan for the first half of the year, citing high fuel costs that have “drastically squeezed” its profit margins.
Other Chinese carriers have also been placing major orders with Airbus in recent months. China Eastern Airlines last month announced plans to purchase 25 A330neo jets for around $9.35 billion, following an earlier announcement in March to buy 101 A320neo aircraft for about $15.8 billion. In April, China Southern Airlines and its subsidiary Xiamen Airlines agreed to acquire 137 aircraft for $21.4 billion.
The new planes are projected to increase total capacity by around 7.1% for the Air China group and 4.3% for Shenzhen Airlines, based on their combined passenger and cargo capacity as of December 31, 2025. Some of the incoming jets will replace older aircraft being phased out of service.
The A320neo family is a direct competitor to Boeing’s 737 MAX on medium-haul routes, while the A350-900 is commonly deployed on long-haul international flights.
LONDON — Former Greater Manchester mayor Andy Burnham moved to within one step of becoming Britain’s next prime minister on Friday after being chosen to lead the ruling Labour Party.
Since his return to parliament in June, Burnham has laid out a series of policy positions that give a clearer picture of how he might lead the country as it grapples with a cost-of-living crisis, sluggish economic growth, and the challenge of winning back voters.
SHIFTING POWER AWAY FROM LONDON
Burnham has vowed to deliver what he calls “the biggest rebalancing of power our country has seen.” His primary target is Whitehall — the London hub of government departments where civil servants help ministers shape and carry out national policy — which he argues has grown too dominant at the expense of Britain’s regions.
“It is time for Whitehall to accept that growth cannot be ordered from the top down. Instead, it can only be nurtured from the bottom up,” he said during a June 29 speech.
While his initial focus is on England, home to 85% of the United Kingdom’s population, he has also called for expanded regional authority in Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland — nations that already have semi-autonomous assemblies handling most domestic matters but currently lack the ability to raise taxes or borrow money independently.
Among his pledges is granting regions greater control over economic development, housing, transportation, education, and job training. He has also proposed establishing a “Number 10 North” in Manchester — a northern counterpart to the prime minister’s official London residence and office at Number 10 Downing Street.
This northern hub would drive decentralization efforts and assist regions in reforming key utilities, rebuilding industry, and spurring regeneration to deliver what Burnham calls “good growth” across every part of the country. He has also pledged to give regions more public control over essential services including water, housing, energy, and transportation.
REBUILDING BRITISH INDUSTRY
Burnham has expressed a desire to revitalize Britain’s industrial base, pledging support for domestic manufacturing and production in critical sectors including steel, defence, energy, food, and farming.
Defence is a particular area of emphasis. He has committed to strengthening the armed forces, arguing that defence investment should serve as a vehicle for reindustrializing struggling communities across Britain, while also reducing the government’s dependence on foreign suppliers.
EDUCATION AND WORKFORCE TRAINING
Burnham has called for a shift away from the heavy emphasis on university education, instead pushing for greater recognition of technical and vocational qualifications. He has promised to build a system “based on parity between academic and technical” pathways. He has also encouraged businesses to expand apprenticeship opportunities for young people.
HOUSING
On housing, Burnham has pledged that his government would launch “the biggest council house building programme since the post-war period” following 1945, with plans to use vacant public land to keep costs down.
He described the approach as adopting “a national Housing First philosophy, as has been pioneered so successfully in Finland” — a reference to the Nordic country’s model of providing homeless individuals with stable housing rather than temporary shelter, treating a secure home as the foundation for addressing other life challenges.
TAXES AND FISCAL POLICY
Burnham has said he will honor the Labour government’s existing fiscal rules, which require day-to-day spending to be matched by revenues, and has reaffirmed the party’s commitment not to raise taxes on working people.
He has floated several potential tax reforms, including an overhaul of business rates to better support pubs and high street retailers, and has expressed backing for a land-value tax — an annual levy based on the market rental value of land itself, not the buildings on it. Such a tax could potentially lead to the elimination of stamp duty, a tax on home sales, and might also replace council tax, which households currently pay for local services.
SOCIAL CARE
Burnham has signaled that social care is in need of a significant overhaul, though he has not yet detailed specific plans.
FOREIGN POLICY
Burnham has said comparatively less about international affairs, but drew praise from the left wing of the Labour Party when he called on the government to increase pressure on Israel. He has also pledged to maintain Britain’s support for Ukraine in its defense against Russia’s ongoing war, and has committed to deepening ties with European nations, particularly in the areas of defence and security.
Netflix shares tumbled more than 10% in premarket trading on Friday after the streaming company projected another quarter of slowing revenue growth and announced plans to share less viewership information with investors, stoking fears that its era of standout growth could be coming to an end.
In what marks another step back from transparency, Netflix said it will reduce its viewing-hours reports from twice a year to just once annually beginning in 2027. That decision follows last year’s move to stop reporting subscriber counts, leaving investors with fewer tools to gauge the company’s performance as it faces mounting competition from traditional media companies and YouTube.
“Whenever you take away a data point from investors when results aren’t as good as they have been you will get punished by the market,” said Ben Barringer, head of technology research at Quilter Cheviot.
If Friday’s premarket losses carry through to the closing bell, the company could shed more than $35 billion from its market value of roughly $313 billion. The stock has already fallen 44% from its all-time high reached in June 2025, including a drop of more than 20% so far this year alone.
Netflix’s unsuccessful bid to acquire Warner Bros earlier this year has added to questions about where the company’s next wave of growth will come from. Slow uptake of its ad-supported streaming option — long promoted as a major growth engine — has only deepened those concerns.
Analysts also pointed out that after a strong content year in 2025, which featured the final season of the popular sci-fi series “Stranger Things” and the South Korean hit “Squid Games,” Netflix’s content lineup for the current year looks comparatively thin, which could further drag on growth.
Retaining subscribers remains critically important for Netflix, which has long carried a higher stock valuation than rival media companies. Those competitors have smaller streaming audiences and are dealing with ongoing declines in traditional cable TV viewership.
Netflix currently trades at nearly 20 times its projected earnings over the next year, compared to 13.5 times for Walt Disney and 6.6 times for Comcast — a reflection of the premium investors have historically been willing to pay for the streaming leader.
Despite the disappointing outlook, at least 18 analysts reduced their price targets for the stock after Netflix’s revenue and earnings forecast came in below Wall Street expectations. Even so, the median analyst price target still sits roughly 40% above where the stock closed on Thursday.
“The story lacks excitement,” said Jeffrey Wlodarczak, analyst at Pivotal Research Group.
Truist Financial posted a stronger quarterly profit Friday, with a resurgence in capital markets activity pushing investment banking earnings higher and increased market volatility keeping trading operations busy.
The broader banking industry has been riding a wave of renewed dealmaking, which has generated substantial advisory fees, while unpredictable market conditions have driven more client activity through trading desks at major financial institutions.
Here are the key highlights from Truist’s latest quarterly results:
Truist’s combined investment banking and trading revenue jumped nearly 72% for the three-month period ending June 30, compared to the same quarter a year ago.
The bank’s stock climbed 1.9% in premarket trading following the earnings announcement.
Bank executives are expressing optimism about the months ahead, pointing to strong deal pipelines and healthy backlogs for the second half of the year. That outlook is feeding expectations that the investment banking “super cycle” still has more ground to cover.
Global markets continue to experience turbulence, driven by uncertainty around interest rate direction, ongoing geopolitical tensions, and nervousness surrounding artificial intelligence developments in the tech sector — conditions that tend to keep trading activity elevated.
Truist CEO Bill Rogers offered his assessment of the quarter, stating: “We continued to deepen client relationships, grow in attractive markets, and improve operating efficiency and profitability.”
The bank’s wealth management division also saw gains, with income rising 7.8% during the second quarter.
Overall, Truist’s net income available to common shareholders came in at $1.52 billion, or $1.23 per share — a notable improvement over last year’s $1.18 billion, or 90 cents per share.
Motorists traveling northbound on Old Orchard Road are facing a lane restriction due to ongoing construction work in the area.
The closure affects the stretch of road running from Edgemoor Street to the Lewes-Georgetown Trail. Drivers are encouraged to plan ahead and allow extra travel time or consider an alternate route if possible.
The lane is expected to reopen by 5 p.m. Travelers should remain alert for construction crews and equipment in the area and follow all posted traffic control signs.
Authorities in Claymont are reaching out to the public for assistance in identifying a suspect believed to be behind a series of attempted break-ins that took place Thursday morning in the Darley Green neighborhood.
According to police, officers were dispatched around 10:05 a.m. on July 16, 2026, after receiving reports of attempted burglaries at several homes along the 3500 block of Naamans Drive, as well as a residence in the 1400 block of Historical Way.
Upon arriving at the scene, officers determined that an unknown individual had attempted to burglarize the properties. The suspect’s identity remains unknown at this time.
Anyone who may recognize the suspect or has information related to these incidents is urged to contact local law enforcement.
A northbound lane on Old Mill Bridge Road is currently closed to traffic between Millers Neck Road and Ellsworth Lane as construction crews work in the area.
The lane restriction is expected to remain in place until 5 PM. Drivers traveling through that stretch should allow extra time or consider an alternate route to avoid delays.
Motorists traveling in the area should be aware of an extended road closure affecting Gravel Hill Road in Sussex County.
According to transportation officials, Gravel Hill Road will be closed to through traffic between Lewes Georgetown Highway and Bennum Switch Road. The closure is the result of ongoing construction work in the area.
The road is expected to remain closed until 10 p.m. on July 24, 2026. Drivers are encouraged to allow extra time and seek alternate routes during the construction period.
Drivers traveling along Carsdale Court near Arundel Drive should be prepared for intermittent lane closures as construction work continues in the area.
The lane restrictions are expected to remain in place until 6 p.m. Motorists are encouraged to use caution when passing through the construction zone and to allow for additional travel time if their route takes them through the affected area.
No further details about the nature of the construction were provided. Updates on traffic conditions can be found through local traffic resources.
A ship traveling eastward through the Gulf of Aden was boarded by unauthorized individuals on Friday, according to the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations, known as UKMTO. The incident took place approximately 65 nautical miles south of Al Mukalla port in Yemen.
In a separate development, UKMTO also reported that a tanker was caught up in an incident involving military forces on Thursday. That encounter occurred roughly 100 nautical miles east of Duqm, a port city in Oman. Officials noted the tanker experienced interactions tied to ongoing military activity in the surrounding region.
A mobile trash removal crew is currently active along northbound Interstate 95 in the stretch between Newark and Wilmington, according to traffic officials.
The crew is expected to remain on the highway until 3 p.m. Drivers traveling through that corridor should remain alert and use caution as workers may be present along the roadway.
Motorists are encouraged to slow down and stay aware of any personnel or equipment near the travel lanes while the cleanup operation is underway.
Construction activity is causing intermittent lane closures on Quail Hollow Drive at Village Drive, according to traffic officials.
The lane restrictions are expected to remain in place until 6 p.m. Drivers traveling through the area should anticipate possible delays and consider alternate routes if available.
No additional details about the nature of the construction work were provided. Motorists are urged to slow down and use caution when passing through the work zone.
BEIJING — A Chinese blogger has been handed a 20-month prison sentence after being convicted of making up false claims about the safety of Xiaomi’s SU7 electric sedan, according to state media reports released Friday.
Chinese authorities have been intensifying efforts over the past year to crack down on false advertising, online misinformation, and other questionable practices within the country’s highly competitive automotive sector. Officials have expressed concern that misleading content could warp how consumers perceive vehicles and distort fair competition. Bloggers and online platforms accused of spreading false information about automakers have increasingly found themselves in legal trouble.
The blogger, identified by the surname Gao, was found guilty by the Haidian District People’s Court of damaging the reputation of goods by inventing false information and deliberately harming the image of automaker Xiaomi, the Beijing Daily reported. In addition to his prison term, Gao was ordered to pay a 100,000 yuan fine, which amounts to approximately $14,800.
The incident at the center of the case dates to August 2024, when Gao and members of his team published a crash-test video that appeared to show the doors of Xiaomi’s popular SU7 failing to open following a collision. The video also seemed to indicate that the vehicle’s emergency call feature did not activate and that its central control screen remained dark, according to Chinese media accounts.
The clip was posted to Gao’s video-sharing account, which had approximately one million followers, and quickly spread across the internet, racking up around three million views.
Investigators determined that Gao and his associates had secretly tampered with the vehicle’s auxiliary battery before filming and had incorporated footage of a battery that had been damaged by a forklift in order to deceive viewers, the Beijing Daily reported.
Back in January 2025, Xiaomi publicly stated that “a blogger and his accomplices who previously maliciously smeared Xiaomi Auto have been arrested according to law.”
Attempts to reach the Haidian District court and the blogger for comment were unsuccessful.
As the FIFA World Cup captured the attention of people across the country, photographers from NPR member stations fanned out to document how communities came together to celebrate the tournament.
From public parks and open plazas to street corners and areas outside stadium gates, fans gathered in large numbers to watch the matches and cheer on their favorite national teams. For a brief but memorable stretch of time, the World Cup became part of the rhythm of daily life in cities and towns throughout the nation.
One striking image showed a six-year-old named Nehemiah cheering loudly for Mexico during halftime at Auditorium Shores, where Austin FC hosted a FIFA World Cup watch party for the Mexico versus South Africa match on Thursday, June 11.
The photographs, taken by Patricia Lim and other NPR member station photographers, offer a vivid look at how a global sporting event can bring people of all backgrounds out into shared public spaces, united by the excitement of the game.
A chemical tanker traveling through the Gulf of Aden was seized by an armed group off the coast of Yemen on Friday, according to the British military.
The United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations Center, known as UKMTO, reported that military authorities confirmed the ship had been boarded by “unauthorized personnel” in waters south of Yemen’s al-Mukalla province.
British maritime security company Ambrey indicated that Somali pirates are believed to be responsible for the boarding. The firm noted that the tanker did not have an armed security team on board at the time of the incident.
Ambrey also reported that a Korean naval vessel was dispatched to assist the tanker after it issued a distress call while traveling in a westbound direction.
Ship tracking service Maritime Traffic showed that the vessel — a Tanzania-flagged oil and chemical tanker named Asana — had been headed toward Bosaso, Somalia at the time of the incident.
Yemen’s coast guard in Aden had not responded to requests for comment as of the time of this report.
This latest incident is part of a troubling pattern of maritime attacks in waters near Yemen, a country devastated by years of civil war and considered one of the poorest in the world.
Somali pirates have recently expanded their activity further out into the Gulf of Aden. On July 1, suspected pirates targeted a vessel located 76 nautical miles — approximately 140 kilometers — south of the southeastern Yemeni port town of Balhaf. According to UKMTO, four armed men on a small boat caused minor damage to the ship’s bridge during that attack.
In a related development on Thursday, the European Union signed an agreement with Djibouti aimed at bolstering its naval presence in the Red Sea to counter the Iran-backed Houthi rebel group, which has repeatedly threatened to attack ships passing through the region.
The EU currently operates two maritime security fleets in the Red Sea, a critical shipping corridor that connects the Mediterranean Sea — via the Suez Canal — to the Indian and Pacific oceans.
Yemen’s civil war began in 2014 and has pitted Iran-backed Houthi rebels against a Saudi-led coalition backing the country’s government. While a fragile peace between the Houthis and Saudi Arabia had largely held in recent months, tensions have flared again this week.
KAMPALA, Uganda — A school bus filled with young students returning from an educational field trip in Uganda veered off the road and flipped over Thursday night, leaving at least 20 children and one adult dead, according to police.
The crash took place in the Kapchorwa District in eastern Uganda. The students had been visiting Sipi Falls, a scenic waterfall in the region, when the bus went off the road on the way back. The Uganda Police Force shared details of the incident in a statement posted on social media.
Three adults and multiple children who survived the crash were transported to various hospitals for treatment. Police did not immediately provide a precise count of those injured.
At least nine of the children were listed in critical condition, according to Ugandan Minister of Local Government Balaam Barugahara Ateenyi, who posted about the tragedy on social media. He also noted that the adult who was killed appeared to be the founder and head of the school.
Barugahara said that residents living near the crash site stepped up as first responders, helping to get injured children to hospitals and doing what they could to assist victims in the immediate aftermath.
Police identified the bus as belonging to King David Junior School, an elementary school located in Kampala, Uganda’s capital city.
According to the preliminary police report, the driver lost control of the vehicle, which then struck a rock and overturned. Authorities stressed that the exact cause of the crash remains under investigation.
Images released by police showed the bus lying on its side with the roof completely torn away, seats twisted and mangled, and clothing and luggage scattered across the road.
Deadly road accidents are a persistent problem in Uganda, frequently attributed to poorly maintained vehicles, speeding, and deteriorating road conditions — challenges shared across much of the African continent. Earlier this month, at least 14 people lost their lives when a bus collided with a truck in a remote part of northern Uganda.
Africa holds the worst road safety record globally, with more than 300,000 people killed in road crashes each year and approximately 26 deaths per 100,000 people. By comparison, Europe — which sees far heavier road traffic — records around 20,000 road deaths annually, or about nine per 100,000 people, according to figures from the World Health Organization and the United Nations.
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Chien Le first crossed paths with the Venerable Bhikkhu Pannakara back in 2005, several years before Pannakara took his vows as a novice monk at the Fort Worth, Texas Buddhist temple where he now serves as deputy abbot.
What left an impression on Le back then — and continues to astonish him today — is Pannakara’s unwavering resolve.
“When he decides to do something, he goes all the way,” said Le, who serves as secretary of the Huong Dao Vipassana Bhavana Center in Fort Worth. “He’s never been afraid of obstacles. He always finds a way through them.”
That fierce determination was on full display during the meditative Walk for Peace that Pannakara led earlier this year. Accompanied by an international group of monks and his rescue dog, Aloka — who has become a symbol of the movement — the group covered 2,300 miles (3,700 kilometers), departing Fort Worth on October 26 and arriving in Washington, D.C., on February 14.
Along the route, Pannakara delivered talks on mindfulness and compassion in churchyards, town squares, and before the Lincoln Memorial, drawing large and diverse audiences. Millions more followed the journey from around the world via the internet.
Within weeks, the walk transformed this relatively unknown monk into a prominent voice for peace and unity at a time of deep national division. His profile has continued to rise, with some observers drawing parallels to the Dalai Lama, the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., and the late Thich Nhat Hanh — a celebrated Zen master and peace activist who, like Pannakara, had Vietnamese roots.
Pannakara, who recently visited Southern California with Aloka for a series of speaking events, said the growing attention is not something he seeks.
“There is no fame for monks,” he said. “I made a vow to walk to raise awareness of peace, loving kindness and compassion. That’s what it’s about.”
As a practitioner of Theravada Buddhism, Pannakara adheres to the “Vinaya” — a rigorous set of monastic guidelines. This means abstaining from social media, owning no personal property, never handling money, and practicing celibacy and humility.
He does not eat after noon, and according to Le, sleeps in a seated position — not a requirement for Theravada monks, but a discipline embraced by some as a way to cultivate deeper mindfulness.
Pannakara was born in 1981 in Dak Lak, Vietnam, the youngest among 10 siblings. He describes his family’s relationship with Buddhism as being Buddhist in “name only.” He came to the United States in 1997 and later earned a degree in information technology from the University of Texas at Arlington. His real introduction to Buddhist practice, he said, came through temple summer camps and youth leadership programs in the U.S.
He eventually stepped away from his engineering career to pursue monastic life, receiving full ordination in 2010 under his teacher, the Venerable Ratanaguna, whom he frequently credits as his greatest source of inspiration. He said no single moment drove him to make the change — rather, it was the accumulated weight of watching loved ones struggle and witnessing people trampling one another in pursuit of success.
“To me everything just seemed fake,” he said.
Le remembers that Pannakara’s parents were devastated by his decision.
“Even on the day he was ordained, his mother came, and she cried a lot,” Le said, adding that his family ultimately came to accept his path.
Le noted that Pannakara proved to be a fast learner at the temple, taking on numerous projects including landscaping, building a new kitchen, constructing housing for monastics, and creating a memorial hall for deceased members.
At his teacher’s urging, Pannakara traveled to Myanmar between 2018 and 2020 to deepen his study of Vipassana meditation — an ancient technique traced back to the Buddha himself as a foundation for achieving enlightenment. When the COVID-19 pandemic struck, he returned to Fort Worth and helped organize food drives, according to temple member Amanda Phan.
“(Pannakara) is a rare human being,” Phan said. “He is an embodiment of kindness, compassion, wisdom — a bodhisattva — a being whose purpose is to relieve others from their suffering.”
In late 2022, Pannakara joined roughly 100 monks on a 2,100-mile (3,380-kilometer), 112-day pilgrimage retracing the path of the Buddha — beginning at his birthplace in Lumbini, Nepal, continuing to Bodh Gaya where the Buddha achieved enlightenment, then to Sarnath where he delivered his first sermon, and finally to Kushinagar, where he passed away. The monks walked barefoot, ate one meal each day, and slept beneath the open sky.
“I had learned the Buddha’s teachings from the Tipitaka (Buddhist canon),” Pannakara said. “But with this walk, I experienced it.”
The journey also taught him something about himself — about his capacity to endure hardship and pain.
“I learned that we can do much more than we think we’re capable of,” he said.
That pilgrimage also brought Aloka into his life. The name Aloka means “light” in Pali.
“Even when he faced challenges and almost died he walked with us,” Pannakara said of his dog.
On an earlier visit to Bodh Gaya — beneath the Bodhi tree where the Buddha is said to have attained enlightenment — Pannakara said he experienced a vision to construct stone stupas to safeguard the sacred teachings for future generations. Seven years later, he shared that vision with Ratanaguna. With his teacher’s blessing, the $200-million Dhammacetiya project was set in motion — a plan to build 840 stupas inscribed with the Buddha’s teachings in 10 languages, designed to endure for 4,000 years.
During the temple’s 2022 International Vesak Ceremony, Pannakara knelt before an assembly of monastics and guests and vowed that if he cannot complete the project in his current lifetime, he would “be reborn to continue this project until its completion.” He said both the Dhammacetiya project and the peace walks — which he intends to continue — serve his deeper commitment to promoting peace and preserving Buddhist teachings.
Ajahn Nisabho, a Theravada Buddhist monk based in Seattle, said he was deeply moved by Pannakara’s sincerity and dedication.
“The story of his quilted robe that he stitched together from pieces of cloth he picked up during the walk in India — he was honoring that past and that ethos,” Nisabho said. “As a fellow monk, it was inspiring for me to see floods of people walking behind him during the peace walk.”
Bhikkhu Bodhi, a senior Theravada monk who spoke at the closing of the Walk for Peace in Washington, praised Pannakara’s decision to stay out of political discussions during the walk. However, Bodhi, 81, expressed hope that Pannakara will eventually use his platform to address pressing social concerns such as poverty, hunger, housing, and climate change.
“I just hope that as (Pannakara) becomes more established and gets accustomed to publicity, he’ll consider taking a stand on these issues that have deep moral and spiritual significance,” he said.
Nisabho, for his part, believes Pannakara made the correct call by keeping politics out of the walk. He observed that few spaces today can draw the kind of broad, diverse participation the peace walk achieved — comparing that rare ability to Dolly Parton, “who brings truckers and drag queens together.”
“The vision of a monastic is the one chance someone has, to be inspired toward awakening and find an escape from suffering,” Nisabho said. “If you bring politics into that, you cause damage by alienating half the country.”
Calls to end ageism and better safeguard elderly people from hidden abuses took center stage this week in Geneva, where United Nations negotiators began formal discussions on a new international treaty focused on the rights of older individuals.
The week of talks, which wrapped up Friday, were initiated and led by Argentina as part of a broader effort to tackle exclusion, discrimination, and neglect of the elderly. The United Nations projects that the global population of people over age 65 will double over the next 50 years, eventually making up one-fifth of all people on Earth.
“Our objective is not just to address the needs of the present, but also to prepare a system that can meet the needs of the future,” said Carlos Mario Foradori, Argentina’s ambassador to the U.N. in Geneva. “This goal is to build an instrument that strengthens the dignity, protection, and the rights of millions of older persons globally.”
In addition to Argentina, Brazil, Slovenia, the Philippines, and Gambia are among the leading supporters of the proposed treaty. Chile and South Africa also expressed backing during the week-long session.
Negotiators are expected to reconvene in Geneva this October, though it remains unclear how long the full negotiation process will take. Treaties of this nature can take many years to finalize.
While existing human rights treaties include protections against discrimination based on race and gender, no such treaty currently addresses discrimination based on age.
“There are many situations where people are not fully protected by existing law,” said Heidrun Mollenkopf, President of AGE Platform Europe, a network representing older people.
Mollenkopf told Reuters that serious abuses in nursing homes — including the use of chemical restraints to manage the behavior of people living with dementia — often go unnoticed. “It’s completely hidden what’s going on,” she said, adding that there have even been cases of homicide, though she did not point to specific incidents.
A U.N.-appointed independent expert on the human rights of older people flagged these concerns in a 2021 report, finding that ageism was widespread globally and that deeply rooted stereotypes about aging were shaping laws and public policy.
Advocates point to examples such as mandatory retirement ages, age restrictions on jury service, and reduced access to cancer screenings for people beyond a certain age as evidence of systemic discrimination.
“There are age restrictions that go completely unchallenged,” said Bridget Sleap, a senior researcher at Human Rights Watch. “The idea that people should just stop working because they have a birthday, it’s arbitrary.”
Informal U.N. discussions on the issue have been ongoing since 2011, but advocates say the disproportionately high toll COVID-19 took on elderly populations gave new urgency to the push for formal negotiations. Repeated deadly heat waves across Europe that have hit seniors especially hard have also added momentum, campaigners say.
Margaret Gillis, 67, founding President of the International Longevity Centre Canada, said she anticipates a “fight” ahead, warning that authoritarian governments could try to weaken any final agreement, while other nations may push back over concerns about rising healthcare costs.
Mollenkopf, who is 85, expressed cautious hope. “I hope a treaty will come in my lifetime,” she said. “But I’m afraid it might not.”
The head of Australia’s largest telecommunications company told a Senate inquiry on Friday that an outage last week was likely the result of an undocumented design change and a software update that was never applied to a network time-keeping device.
The disruption, which occurred the previous Wednesday, is the most recent in a series of major incidents affecting Australia’s telecommunications industry over the past several years. Thousands of customers lost phone service, wireless payment systems were knocked offline, and train operations came to a halt.
The country’s second-largest telecom provider suffered a 13-hour emergency call service outage last year, an incident that may have contributed to four deaths. That company had also been hit by a cyberattack in 2022 that exposed the personal information of millions of people, followed by a 2023 outage that left millions without phone or internet access for an entire day.
In her opening remarks to the Senate, Telstra CEO Vicki Brady explained that routine maintenance work on network timing and synchronization equipment triggered a software configuration that caused the device to reset its date back to 2006. That reset caused authentication certificates across Telstra’s network to fail, disrupting both voice and data services — including calls to the country’s Triple Zero emergency line.
Brady said the problem stemmed from an intentional design change that had been made to the device to fix an earlier fault, but that change was never properly documented. As a result, the maintenance crew had no way of knowing how the equipment would respond when it was restarted. A software update that should have been applied to the device had also been left incomplete.
“Had that software update been completed or had the design change been properly reviewed and documented post the earlier incident, and reflected in the maintenance procedure, the outage may not have occurred,” Brady told the Senate.
She added: “Our investigation will address why that design change was not documented, why the software update was not completed, and what needs to change in our controls so known risks are captured, prioritised and closed before they can affect customers.”
Brady has been with Telstra since 2016, when she joined from Singtel-owned Optus.
HORTOBAGY NATIONAL PARK, Hungary — Hungarian officials are working to save a UNESCO World Heritage site by redirecting water into its drying marshlands, as a severe drought threatens to wipe out one of Europe’s most important habitats for migratory birds.
The Hortobagy National Park, known as the “Puszta,” stretches across the plains and wetlands of eastern Hungary and draws visitors from around the world. Each year, tens of thousands of migratory birds stop here to nest and breed before making their journey to Africa as autumn approaches.
At the heart of the concern is a large marshland known as “Fekete ret,” or Black Meadow — once part of the natural floodplains of the Tisza river. The area first dried out in 2013, and during the last major drought in 2022, it went completely dry and more than 800 hectares burned.
Lajos Gal, a regional unit manager with the Hortobagy National Park Directorate who has spent more than three decades working in the marshes, described the ongoing challenge.
“Unfortunately, the groundwater level in the area has been continuously decreasing,” he said.
He noted that this year has been particularly difficult. “This is a very special year because the heat arrived very early, and we started the year with a very large water deficit. The spring was not rainy… and the swamp beds could not fill up. This year we managed to get water from the water department for ecological water replenishment.”
Gal said roughly 2 million cubic meters of water have already been directed into the marshes through the Nyugati irrigation canal, and the flow is still ongoing. He noted that without this effort, the entire area would have dried up completely by now.
The effects of climate change are also reshaping the behavior of the birds that depend on the park. Gal said migration patterns have shifted noticeably over the years.
“The spring migrations are starting earlier… Since there are no really cold winters, we don’t really have to wait for a warming after the long winter and then the spring migration begins, but the birds come back over a prolonged period, not all at once,” he explained.
He added that several species he remembered from his childhood have virtually vanished from the area. However, he pointed to one unexpected development: “Also, there are species, for example the little pygmy cormorant, which we almost never saw when I was a child, and nowadays there is a quite nice population here in the Black Meadow.”
Gal stressed that a lasting solution is needed — one that focuses on retaining as much water as possible as it flows into Hungary. He said preserving the wetlands is critical not only for wildlife, but also because they generate a local microclimate and help maintain groundwater levels in the region.
SOUTHPORT, England — Australian golfer Lucas Herbert has taken control of the British Open leaderboard Friday, reaching six under par after a breathtaking start to his second round at Royal Birkdale.
Herbert turned heads by completing the front nine in just 28 strokes, carding six birdies in favorable conditions. His strong play pushed him to the top of the standings as the second round got underway.
American Jackson Suber, who surprised the golf world by leading after Thursday’s opening round, entered Friday at five under par following a first-round 65. He added a birdie on his second hole of the day, but three consecutive bogeys threatened to derail his momentum. Suber steadied himself and climbed back to five under with four holes remaining in his round.
England’s Matt Wallace posted a second-round 67 to finish at four under par, giving him the lead among players who had already completed their rounds in the clubhouse.
Fellow American Eric Cole turned in the best single round of the tournament so far, firing a six-under 64 to make his mark on the leaderboard.
Reigning champion Scottie Scheffler, sitting at two under par, was scheduled to tee off at 1404 GMT.
A United Nations agency is warning that the movement of Ebola victims’ remains between different parts of the Democratic Republic of Congo is putting more communities at risk of infection, particularly when families transport bodies back to home villages for burial.
The International Organization for Migration reported Friday that more than 2,000 Ebola cases and at least 700 deaths have been documented in Congo and neighboring Uganda as of July 14. Notably, roughly two-thirds of those deaths occurred outside of medical facilities.
Ebola is caused by a virus that spreads through direct contact with bodily fluids from infected people or animals. Symptoms can include high fever, vomiting, and both internal and external bleeding. The current outbreak is being driven by the Bundibugyo strain of the virus. Critically, the virus remains highly contagious even after a person has died, making how bodies are handled a key factor in controlling the spread.
Andrew Mbala of the International Organization for Migration stressed the importance of proper body management and community involvement. “If we don’t really manage the dead bodies well, if we don’t engage the community … then it means there will be more spread within the community,” he said.
IOM officials identified the movement of bodies between districts within Congo as a particularly difficult challenge to address, as grieving families often wish to bury their relatives in their ancestral communities.
Mbala noted that while no bodies have been transported across international borders, movement within the country has been widespread. “There hasn’t been any crossing of dead bodies to another country, but we have seen a lot of crossings of dead bodies within the country,” he said.
The IOM cautioned that if remains are not handled safely during transport, the virus could take hold in areas that have not yet been affected by the outbreak.
Residents across dozens of American cities are waking up to hazy, orange-tinted skies as wildfire smoke continues to drift across wide stretches of the United States.
The smoky conditions have triggered poor air quality alerts in multiple cities, raising health concerns for people who spend time outdoors. Officials are urging the public to stay inside as much as possible until conditions improve.
Relief may not come quickly — forecasters say the air quality situation is unlikely to get better until the weekend arrives.
U.S. corporate earnings season is picking up steam in the days ahead, with reports from Alphabet and Intel poised to shape investor sentiment around the booming artificial intelligence trade — all while markets navigate uncertainty tied to the ongoing U.S.-Israeli war with Iran.
As of Thursday, the S&P 500 was slightly lower for the week but remained close to record territory, having climbed 10% so far in 2026 on the back of a bull run now approaching four years in length.
Rising expectations for corporate profits this year have given investors confidence to stay bullish on stocks. The second-quarter earnings season, now just getting underway, is expected to confirm that momentum, with S&P 500 earnings projected to surge 25.7% during the period, according to LSEG IBES data.
Michael Arone, chief investment strategist at State Street Investment Management, explained why markets keep climbing despite troubling news cycles. “Headlines continue to raise anxiety and leave investors scratching their heads wondering why the market continues to reach new heights,” he said. “And the reason it does is because the fundamentals have been resilient, and the earnings continue to be outstanding.”
Alphabet’s quarterly results, due Wednesday, are expected to be one of the most closely watched reports of the season. The parent company of Google ranks as the third-largest U.S. company by market value at $4.3 trillion, and as one of the so-called “Magnificent Seven” heavyweight stocks, its performance can move major market indexes.
Alphabet is also considered an AI “hyperscaler” — a company pouring billions of dollars into data centers and AI infrastructure. That kind of capital spending has been central to this year’s market rally, fueling massive gains for semiconductor companies and others benefiting from the AI buildout.
Kevin Mahn, president and chief investment officer at Hennion & Walsh Asset Management, warned that any sign of reduced AI spending could have wide consequences. “If Alphabet announces any type of pullbacks with respect to the spending that they’re forecasting around AI, you could see ripple effects across the entire AI ecosystem,” he said.
Chip company earnings from Intel and Texas Instruments are also drawing significant attention after a remarkable run in semiconductor stocks. Despite some stumbling in recent weeks, the Philadelphia SE Semiconductor index is still up roughly 68% in 2026. Intel shares have more than doubled, soaring over 160%, while Texas Instruments has gained 68%.
Recent earnings from Samsung Electronics and Taiwan Semiconductor drew muted market reactions despite strong results, underscoring just how high the bar has been set for the chip industry. Arone noted that leveraged investment products tied to semiconductors are “amplifying on both the upside and the downside,” contributing to the sector’s sharp swings.
Beyond the AI-focused names, Tesla — another member of the Magnificent Seven — is also scheduled to report results in the coming week. Additional high-profile reports are expected from American Express, Philip Morris International, and defense contractor RTX, with more than 80 S&P 500 companies set to release results.
Major U.S. banks already kicked off the season this week, posting earnings boosted by merger and acquisition advisory fees and a surge in trading revenue.
Markets remain on edge over Middle East developments following a recent escalation of the nearly five-month-old U.S.-Israeli war with Iran. While many investors believe the conflict will be relatively brief, concerns persist that renewed flare-ups could push energy prices back to the elevated levels seen when the war began — potentially stoking inflation fears.
That concern takes on added weight ahead of the Federal Reserve’s meeting scheduled for the end of July. Futures markets suggest traders expect the central bank to raise interest rates in the coming months to combat inflation that currently sits above the Fed’s 2% annual target.
Some of those worries eased this week after consumer and producer price data came in cooler than expected, reducing the likelihood of a rate hike at this month’s meeting.
Eric Kuby, chief investment officer at North Star Investment Management, offered a measured take on the economic picture. “The macro data has painted a picture of a steady economy with some improvement in inflationary pressure,” he said.
KYIV, Ukraine — At least four civilians lost their lives and 20 others were hurt in Russian overnight attacks on Ukraine, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy announced, even as his government faces a deepening political storm over the abrupt dismissal of his defense minister.
Zelenskyy carried out a sweeping government overhaul on Thursday, which included naming a new prime minister. The shake-up rattled Ukraine’s military leadership and set off a wave of public anger — a troubling development at a time when Ukraine had been making meaningful progress in its fight against Russia’s invasion, now more than four years old.
The sudden exit of Defense Minister Mykhailo Fedorov, a young and well-liked government figure, prompted thousands of Ukrainians to take to the streets in cities throughout the country on Thursday to protest his removal. More demonstrations were anticipated on Friday.
Fedorov, who is 35 years old and had served in the post for only six months, is widely credited as the key force behind Ukraine’s rapid technological advances and anti-corruption efforts within the military — developments that had renewed hope among Ukrainians in the ongoing war.
Zelenskyy explained that a breakdown in the working relationship between Fedorov and Gen. Oleksandr Syrskyi — the commander of Ukraine’s armed forces, who began his military career in the former Soviet Union — had made it impossible for Fedorov to remain in his position.
To replace him, Zelenskyy said he asked Maj. Gen. Yevhen Khmara, the acting head of the state’s security service and a highly respected special operations expert, to assume the duties of defense minister.
Zelenskyy said late Thursday that he planned to formally ask Parliament to confirm Khmara’s appointment, as Ukrainian law requires. However, the process may face delays. Ukrainian law mandates that the defense minister be a civilian, meaning any active-duty military or security service member must first leave service before being officially appointed. Adding to the complication, lawmakers are scheduled to be on summer recess through mid-August.
Khmara has led the SBU security service since January. Before that, he commanded the SBU’s elite Alpha special forces unit and is recognized as a key architect of Operation Spiderweb — one of Ukraine’s most dramatic military strikes, targeting Russian air bases last year. He joined the Alpha unit in 2011, took command of it in 2023, and was promoted to major general the following year.
Russia has responded to setbacks on the battlefield and Ukraine’s targeting of Russian oil infrastructure — which has triggered serious fuel shortages — with relentless bombing campaigns aimed at civilian areas.
In Ukraine’s southern port city of Odesa, a Russian missile strike overnight killed two people and injured 10 others, including children, according to regional military administration head Oleh Kiper. Among those killed was a woman who had been walking in a park with her children at the time of the attack; her children survived.
In the Zaporizhzhia region, two more people were killed and five others were wounded in a separate strike, Zelenskyy said. He also reported that three people were injured due to Russian shelling in the northeastern Kharkiv region.
Officials confirmed additional injuries from Russian strikes across five other regions of Ukraine.
On the other side of the conflict, Russia’s Defense Ministry reported that its air defenses shot down 243 Ukrainian drones overnight heading into Friday. Vladimir Saldo, the Moscow-installed leader of the Russian-occupied portion of Ukraine’s Kherson region, said three civilians were killed and seven others injured in Ukrainian drone attacks over the previous 24 hours.
An exceptionally early and powerful heat wave that swept across Europe this summer appears to have triggered a dramatic surge in deaths, with emerging data suggesting that well over 10,000 more people died during the peak of the heat than would normally have been expected.
Researchers track what is known as “excess mortality” — the gap between the number of deaths that would typically occur and the actual number recorded. That figure spiked sharply in late June, when portions of Europe endured record-breaking temperatures. Experts warn that the full picture takes time to develop, and that many heat-related deaths are never officially classified as such. A heart attack, for instance — which can be brought on by extreme heat, particularly in elderly individuals or those with pre-existing health conditions — may simply be recorded on a death certificate as a heart attack, with no mention of heat.
The alarming toll marks a troubling start to the summer season. Heat waves have claimed thousands of lives across Europe in recent years, though 2003 remains the deadliest on record, with roughly 70,000 deaths attributed to heat that year. Scientists note that the growing frequency and severity of heat waves are being driven by climate change, which results from the burning of fossil fuels such as coal, oil, and natural gas.
The EuroMOMO mortality monitoring network, which collects data from approximately two dozen countries, estimated 14,260 excess deaths from all causes during the week that ended June 28. More than 12,000 of those deaths were among people aged 65 and older, out of a total of 84,583 deaths recorded that week. Death figures in the weeks before and after were significantly lower.
Lasse Vestergaard of Denmark’s Statens Serum Institut, which oversees EuroMOMO, explained that “we attribute this to the heat wave affecting quite a lot of countries in Europe, and we do that because there is no other obvious explanation that could explain such a high excess mortality happening at the moment.” He described such a sharp spike in a single week as “highly unusual.” While EuroMOMO does not release country-by-country figures, it identified France, Belgium, and Germany as having the highest rates of excess deaths.
Individual countries have also released their own estimates, though the methods and timeframes used vary. Here is a look at what different nations are reporting.
Germany’s disease control agency, the Robert Koch Institute, directly linked 6,830 deaths to heat through early July, with 6,470 of those victims being 65 or older. Temperatures in Germany hit their highest recorded levels in late June, reaching a peak of 41.7 degrees Celsius (107.06 Fahrenheit) on June 28, according to the German Weather Service.
In England and Wales, the national weather agency — Britain’s Met Office — estimates that approximately 2,700 people died from heat-related causes during heat waves in May and June. Around 550 of those deaths occurred in late May, with roughly 2,200 happening in late June. The country set national heat records for both May, at 35.1 Celsius (95.18 Fahrenheit), and June, which exceeded 37 Celsius (98.6 Fahrenheit).
France’s public health authority reported at least 2,000 more deaths during the week of June 22-28 compared to the previous week, when temperatures were already on the rise. France experienced its hottest days ever on June 24 and 25, when the Meteo France weather service said its national thermal indicator — an average of daily temperatures from 30 weather stations — reached 30 Celsius (86 Fahrenheit). Over 40 percent of the country saw peak temperatures exceeding 40 Celsius (104 Fahrenheit).
In Spain, the Carlos III Health Institute, an official government monitoring agency, attributed an estimated 937 deaths in June to excess heat. The AEMET weather agency reported that last month was Spain’s second-hottest June on record, with temperatures running 3.2 Celsius (5.8 Fahrenheit) above the monthly average. A five-day heat wave pushed temperatures well above 40 Celsius (104 Fahrenheit) on a regular basis.
Belgium recorded 1,747 deaths above the expected level during the heat wave that lasted from June 18 to July 1, according to Sciensano, the country’s public health institute. The agency noted that “a certain excess mortality is expected during heat waves, as during waves of cold weather and flu epidemics,” but added that “the heatwave of June 2026 is distinguished by its exceptional breadth.” Temperatures at the height of the heat wave reached 35.5 Celsius (95.9 Fahrenheit) on June 26, according to the IRM weather institute.
The Netherlands saw approximately 480 more deaths than expected during the June heat wave, according to its public health service. The increase in deaths was most pronounced in the eastern and southern parts of the country, where temperatures climbed the highest. The Dutch weather service recorded a June temperature record of 36.8 degrees Celsius (98.24 Fahrenheit) — more than a full degree Celsius (1.8 Fahrenheit) above the previous record, which had stood since 1947.
MANILA, Philippines — The Philippine government has lodged a strong formal protest with China over what it described as the portrayal of Filipinos as monkeys in an animated video released by a Chinese state-owned media outlet, calling on Beijing to have the content removed immediately.
Manila’s Department of Foreign Affairs announced Friday that a series of opinion videos and cartoons — most notably an animated clip posted to China Daily’s Facebook page on July 10 — focused on China’s refusal to accept a 2016 international arbitration ruling that struck down Beijing’s sweeping territorial claims in the South China Sea.
The roots of the dispute go back to 2013, when the Philippines brought the arbitration case after China took control of a shoal located to the west of the Philippines following a tense standoff. China disputed the tribunal’s authority, refused to participate in the proceedings, and dismissed the resulting ruling as illegitimate.
The China Daily video on Facebook depicts a monkey gripping a piece of paper labeled “South China Sea Arbitration Award,” dressed in what appears to be a traditional Philippine shirt, a rural hat, and worn-out pants. The clip then shows two hands — each sleeve marked with “USA” and “Japan” — throwing the monkey into the sea, where it is blasted by a water cannon from what appears to be a Chinese coast guard vessel.
The video’s caption ridicules the arbitration ruling, claiming it is not a path to peace “but a source of confrontation dressed up as law.” It also accuses Philippine politicians of “clinging to external forces and stirring up trouble in the South China Sea,” saying they are “turning their country into a pawn in someone else’s geopolitical game.”
The Philippines first conveyed its “firm objection to the offensive content” directly to Chinese Ambassador Jing Quan in Manila on Thursday. Philippine Foreign Undersecretary Leo Herrera-Lim “demanded that the materials be taken down, stressing that such content is inconsistent with the mutual respect expected between states,” according to the Department of Foreign Affairs.
In its formal protest, the department stated that “China Daily went beyond legitimate political debate by resorting to demeaning, dehumanizing, and racist depictions of Filipinos.” It further argued that “disagreement over legal and political issues does not justify resorting to imagery that has no place in the public discourse of responsible states.”
The Philippine Embassy in Beijing also sent a letter directly to China Daily’s editor-in-chief, repeating Manila’s demand that the offensive material be pulled down without delay.
At a press briefing in Beijing, China’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lin Jian stated Friday that the video “does not represent the official position” and declined to comment further on it.
However, Lin went on to characterize the South China Sea arbitration as “a political farce disguised as a legal proceeding,” and maintained that “the so-called award is illegal, null and void and has no binding force.”
The Philippine government marked the anniversary of the July 12, 2016 ruling as a significant victory for the rule of law over aggression.
The United States, the United Kingdom, more than a dozen other Western and Asian nations, and the 27-member European Union have all reaffirmed the validity of the ruling.
Clashes over territory in the disputed waters have grown more frequent in recent years, particularly involving Chinese, Philippine, and Vietnamese forces and fishing fleets. The long-standing disputes over the strategically important waterway — a major artery for global trade — also involve Malaysia, Brunei, and Taiwan.
The head of the U.S. Small Business Administration, Kelly Loeffler, significantly grew her financial stake in Elon Musk’s SpaceX following her nomination to lead the agency, reaping millions of dollars when the company completed the largest initial public offering in U.S. history, according to a Reuters examination of federal financial disclosure records.
Before taking office, Loeffler reported an investment of between $1 million and $5 million — dated as of January 3, 2025 — in xAI, Musk’s artificial intelligence and social media company, which has since merged with SpaceX. That information came from a financial disclosure she was required to file prior to becoming SBA administrator.
A second financial disclosure, which Loeffler signed on May 14, 2026, and which Reuters obtained from the SBA on June 12, revealed she made an additional investment of between $1 million and $5 million in SpaceX and xAI during 2025. That second investment had not been previously reported publicly.
Two independent government ethics attorneys reviewed the disclosures and agreed with Reuters’ findings. Cabinet officials are required to report asset values in ranges and are not required to specify the exact dates of investments made before taking office.
SpaceX holds contracts with the U.S. military. Under federal law, cabinet members are barred from participating in government decisions involving companies in which they hold a financial interest. Public records do not show any financial connection between the SBA and either xAI or SpaceX, and xAI did not appear on the SBA’s publicly available list of AI tools used by agency employees in 2025.
Loeffler and her staff did not respond to repeated requests from Reuters seeking comment on her SpaceX holdings.
The payoff from those investments proved substantial. SpaceX priced its IPO on June 12 at a valuation of $1.77 trillion — the largest in U.S. history. According to Franco Granda, an analyst at data provider PitchBook, Loeffler’s first xAI investment could have been worth anywhere between $7 million and $2.6 billion on the day of the offering, depending on the exact amount invested and the timing. Her second investment would have been worth between $2.2 million and $25.4 million that same day.
Granda noted that earlier investments carried higher potential returns. xAI’s valuation climbed more than 7,000% between its first funding round and January 5, 2025, while SpaceX’s overall valuation more than doubled throughout 2025.
Loeffler’s initial stake in xAI was acquired through a private placement — an investment type typically available only to high-net-worth individuals and select institutions.
Loeffler is not the only Trump administration official with ties to Musk’s companies. At least 10 administration officials disclosed investments in SpaceX or xAI on their 2025 financial forms. None of those officials works at the Defense Department.
Musk, a billionaire and former adviser to President Trump, is the founder and chief executive of SpaceX.
Loeffler has an extensive background in finance. She founded and served as chief executive of Bakkt, a bitcoin trading platform, and spent 16 years at Intercontinental Exchange, the company that owns the New York Stock Exchange, according to her LinkedIn profile. She is married to Intercontinental Exchange CEO Jeffrey Sprecher and previously served a brief term representing Georgia in the U.S. Senate.
The SBA is a federal agency that assists entrepreneurs in starting and growing small businesses, connects business owners with lenders and funding sources, and helps communities recover from natural disasters. The Senate confirmed Loeffler as SBA administrator on February 19, 2025.
A regulatory fine levied against e-commerce giant Coupang for a data breach has escalated into a significant diplomatic flashpoint between South Korea and the United States, raising questions about Seoul’s treatment of American technology companies.
Coupang, which is South Korea’s largest online retailer despite being headquartered in Seattle, has become the center of a growing dispute that has rattled relations between the two countries. The situation became serious enough that Kang Kyung-wha, Seoul’s ambassador to the U.S., traveled back to the South Korean capital on Wednesday to consult with officials in President Lee Jae Myung’s administration.
“The (Coupang) issue is dragging on much longer than I expected,” Kang told local media when asked about U.S. criticism of the matter. She indicated the issue would be handled separately from other bilateral agreements already in place between the two nations.
The broader stakes are considerable. A $350 billion South Korean commitment to invest in the United States, Seoul’s goal of constructing nuclear-powered submarines, and ongoing coordination regarding China and North Korea are all potentially affected by the growing tensions.
Beyond the Coupang matter, South Korea has also faced criticism from the U.S. State Department over changes to its communications laws that would increase financial penalties on content publishers found to have spread misinformation online. The State Department expressed “significant concerns” that the amendments could lead to excessive content regulation and threaten free speech. Those changes would apply to both domestic platforms and global companies including Google, Meta, X, and TikTok.
South Korean lawmakers who spoke with Reuters said they worry Washington is treating the Coupang case as a litmus test for how open Seoul is to American business, rather than viewing it as a domestic privacy matter.
“This is not discrimination against an American company,” said ruling Democratic Party lawmaker Park Sun-won. “It was action over a personal data leak affecting 35 million people. It would be the same for any company.”
A fellow ruling party lawmaker, Kim Young-bae, argued that framing the Coupang dispute as evidence of anti-American bias misrepresents both the facts and the overall direction of the alliance between the two countries.
South Korea’s Foreign Ministry has similarly stated that the Coupang matter should not be connected to ongoing security negotiations, including Seoul’s submarine ambitions — a plan that U.S. President Donald Trump endorsed last December.
When asked about the dispute, a State Department spokesperson said South Korea “should not impose disproportionate burdens on U.S. companies.” The White House did not respond to a request for comment.
Coupang pointed to its prior statements, saying the company hoped to reach a constructive resolution. A source familiar with the negotiations, who asked not to be named given the sensitivity of the matter, said Coupang had spent months seeking a “constructive off-ramp” with Seoul — “literally hundreds of times over the last seven months” — including requests for what it described as a fair technical review and an appropriate penalty.
The dispute traces back to November, when Coupang disclosed a data breach affecting more than 33 million customers after a former employee in China accessed its systems. In June, South Korean regulators issued a fine of 625 billion won — approximately $422.62 million — saying the penalty was meant to protect consumers. Coupang has said it plans to contest the fine, claiming regulators failed to account for corrective actions the company had already taken.
Following the fine, a number of U.S. Republicans came out in support of Coupang and criticized the South Korean government’s actions. A report released this month by the U.S. House Judiciary Committee accused South Korea of discriminating against American-owned businesses, alleging that Seoul had weaponized its regulations against Coupang and other companies.
South Korea’s presidential office rejected those claims, saying the report unfairly reflected Coupang’s viewpoint while ignoring Seoul’s position. A House Judiciary Committee spokesperson responded by telling Reuters that Seoul’s reaction showed “South Korea is acting just like other foreign governments that have been caught targeting and harassing innovative U.S. companies.”
Lawmaker Kim Joon-hyung of the minor Rebuilding Korea Party said some in the U.S. were conflating the business complaints around Coupang and the communications law changes with accusations of election fraud — allegations that members of South Korea’s far right have made against President Lee.
In June, an opinion piece published in the Wall Street Journal by two American conservatives accused the Lee administration of undermining the U.S.-South Korea alliance, pointing to the Coupang case as an example, and also alleged the administration was pushing constitutional changes to extend its hold on power indefinitely. The piece drew sharp criticism from South Korean officials and the presidential office.
“This time the problem is more serious because it is combined with extreme claims — and it is being done organizationally,” Kim said.
JAKARTA — Indonesia is working on a major overhaul of its copyright laws that would make it the first country in Southeast Asia to formally address artificial intelligence in such legislation, according to a draft bill reviewed by Reuters.
The proposed changes would extend copyright protections to people who use AI as a tool in creating content, though fully AI-generated works with no human involvement would not qualify. The draft bill did not specify exactly how much human participation would be required to earn protection.
Hermansyah Siregar, an Indonesian law ministry official responsible for intellectual property matters, confirmed the draft was authentic and said it would mark the first time AI is explicitly recognized under Indonesia’s copyright framework.
“The development of generative AI has disrupted the copyright framework,” Siregar said. “If unregulated, it could kill human creation.”
Among the bill’s key provisions are a ban on using AI to replicate a creator’s “distinctive style,” a requirement to disclose when AI was used in producing content, and mandates that tech platforms pay compensation when they aggregate, republish, link-preview, or use news content for AI training purposes. That money would flow through state-supervised organizations to news publishers.
The rules would cover a wide range of content types, including journalism, photography, video games, computer programs, and films.
The legislation originated in parliament and was sent to the government for review. It was not immediately clear when it might become law.
Tech giant Google issued a statement last month pushing back on the proposed overhaul. The company warned that overly rigid requirements could hurt local creators and stifle innovation.
“Rigid, overbroad mandates, however, would harm local creators, slow innovation, and leave Indonesia as an international outlier, ultimately discouraging the investment needed to drive its digital future,” Google said, adding that it planned to engage with the government on the matter.
Non-compliant platforms could face serious consequences under the bill, including the loss of their local business permits in Indonesia.
IP and entertainment lawyer Ari Juliano Gema noted that the bill might raise alarms among technology companies because it appears to blur the line between commercial AI use and AI used for research purposes.
Meta and TikTok had not responded to requests for comment at the time of reporting. Meta’s Instagram and Facebook platforms are widely used in Indonesia.
Siregar pointed to an ongoing court case led by the New York Times — one of several lawsuits brought by copyright holders against tech companies over the alleged unauthorized use of their content to train AI systems — as an example of why global regulation is needed.
He also noted the draft is not finalized and that the government is still collecting input.
The proposed legislation comes as Indonesia, Southeast Asia’s largest economy, is actively pushing to expand AI adoption and weave the technology into major government programs. On Thursday, Indonesia was among 29 nations that signed an agreement in Shanghai to create an intergovernmental body that China says will promote international cooperation and governance of AI.
China’s president on Friday laid out a vision for a new global AI framework, pledging to share open-source AI tools and expertise with developing nations while calling for AI systems to remain under human oversight and for countries to develop early-warning mechanisms to manage AI-related risks.
Indonesia’s transparency requirements for AI-generated content are in line with rules taking shape in other parts of the world. The European Union’s AI Act requires clear labeling when AI is used to create or alter images, video, or audio in ways that constitute a deepfake, with some exemptions for artistic or satirical content. The United States and Singapore do not explicitly mention AI in their copyright laws, but both countries’ copyright offices have stated that human contribution is required for copyright protection.
Maritime security sources say armed individuals are believed to have seized control of a chemical tanker named the Asana after boarding the vessel in the Gulf of Aden, off Yemen’s southern coastline, on Friday.
The small tanker, which did not have a confirmed flag, had the Somali port of Bosaso listed as its next destination, according to ship tracking data.
One maritime security source indicated that early assessments suggest the incident appears to be connected to Somali piracy, not to Yemen’s Iran-aligned Houthi militia.
The British navy agency UKMTO confirmed Friday that a vessel had been boarded by unauthorized individuals while traveling eastward through the Gulf of Aden, approximately 65 nautical miles south of Yemen’s Al Mukalla port.
British maritime risk management group Vanguard noted that many details remain unknown. “Details regarding the number of assailants, the circumstances of the boarding, and the status of the vessel and crew remain unclear,” the group stated.
An official with Greek maritime security company Diaplous confirmed that a South Korean warship had been dispatched to the scene.
British maritime security group Ambrey reported that the vessel sent out a distress call at approximately 6:20 a.m. GMT on Friday. The group added that the ship had no armed security team on board when the incident took place, and that the intruders are suspected to be part of a pirate action group.
Shipping databases list the vessel’s operator as Marshall Islands-based Exon Energy, which could not be reached for comment.
In a related development, sources told Reuters on Thursday that Iran has asked Yemen’s Houthis to be prepared to shut down the Red Sea oil route if the United States were to strike Iranian power infrastructure — a move that could pose a serious new threat to global energy supplies.
Companies across the United States are facing an alarming increase in cyberattacks powered by artificial intelligence, with hackers stealing sensitive data and bringing business operations to a standstill.
The latest victim is Fairlife, LLC, a dairy company owned by Coca-Cola, which was forced to temporarily shut down its U.S. production operations after an outside party gained unauthorized access to portions of its computer systems.
Earlier this week, the White House announced it is forming a new coordination group that will bring together AI developers and operators of critical infrastructure. The goal is to share information about cybersecurity weaknesses discovered by advanced AI systems and to work together on responses.
Below is a rundown of U.S. companies that have reported or been impacted by cyber incidents so far this year:
January 26 — Nike: The ransomware group World Leaks claimed on its website to have published 1.4 terabytes of data taken from Nike. The company declined to address the specifics of its investigation or whether any ransom was paid.
January 28 — Bumble, Match Group, Crunchbase, and Panera Bread: Bloomberg News reported that cyberattacks struck Bumble, Match Group, and Crunchbase. Separately, Panera Bread disclosed a security incident involving customer contact information and notified the appropriate authorities.
February 24 — Wynn Resorts: The company confirmed that hackers obtained employee data, triggering an investigation. The attackers demanded the equivalent of roughly $1.5 million in bitcoin.
March 11 — Stryker: A hacking group with ties to Iran claimed credit for an attack on the medical device maker that disrupted order processing, manufacturing, and shipping worldwide. The attackers also wiped remote devices running the Windows operating system. However, Stryker said patient services and connected medical products were not affected.
March 12 — Crunchyroll: Hackers claimed to have taken personal data along with 8 million support ticket records from the subscription-based anime streaming service, including 6.8 million unique email addresses, according to a report by BleepingComputer.
March 28 — Hasbro: The toy company said it was looking into a cybersecurity incident involving unauthorized access to its network. Hasbro took some systems offline and warned customers that order fulfillment could be delayed for several weeks.
April 10 — OpenAI: OpenAI disclosed a security issue after a third-party developer tool called Axios caused a GitHub workflow to download and run a malicious version of Axios. The company said it found no evidence that user data, systems, or intellectual property had been compromised.
April 13 — Take-Two Interactive’s Rockstar Games: The hacking group ShinyHunters claimed it stole nearly 80 million Rockstar Games business records by taking advantage of a third-party breach involving analytics provider Anodot. Rockstar said only a small amount of non-material company information was accessed.
May 4 — West Pharmaceutical Services: The medical equipment maker said a cyberattack involving data theft and system lockdowns disrupted manufacturing and logistics operations around the world. The company took systems offline before eventually restoring operations at its manufacturing, supply chain, and commercial locations.
May 11 — Instructure/Canvas: Instructure, the company behind the widely used Canvas educational learning management system, said a hack linked to ShinyHunters disrupted access and exposed student and school data from nearly 9,000 institutions. The company later reached an agreement under which the group said the stolen data was deleted and customers would not be targeted for extortion.
May 21 — Blank Rome: The law firm said cybercriminals posing as its IT department tricked an attorney into uploading files, exposing the personal information of 57,554 current, former, and prospective clients. The incident is the subject of a proposed class action lawsuit.
May 27 — Carnival: The cruise company said a social-engineering attack compromised an employee account, exposing personal details including names, addresses, and government-issued identification numbers. The company blocked the unauthorized access and notified those affected.
June 11 — Novo Nordisk: The maker of Wegovy said unauthorized individuals copied information from its internal IT systems, including limited clinical trial patient data. The company launched an investigation and temporarily shut down certain internal systems, though it said core operations were not impacted.
June 15 — iRhythm Holdings: The medical technology firm said a threat actor obtained potentially sensitive data — including proprietary information and patient health records — through a social-engineering attack targeting third-party-hosted business applications. A payment demand was later issued, though the company said patient care, medical device systems, and operations remained unaffected.
June 15 — AdaptHealth: The company reported that a “threat actor” stole patient information and insurance billing passwords after a social-engineering attack compromised a third-party contractor’s account, giving the attackers access to cloud-based business applications and internal patient management systems.
June 17 — Fortinet: Researchers reported that a widespread hacking campaign targeting Fortinet firewall and VPN devices compromised approximately 75,000 systems globally, resulting in password theft at Fortune 500 companies and government agencies in more than 15 countries.
July 16 — Coca-Cola Co./Fairlife: The beverage giant said its dairy subsidiary Fairlife temporarily suspended U.S. production operations after unauthorized access to parts of its systems, including production-related systems. The company investigated the incident while working to restore affected operations.
Good morning, Delmarva! It’s going to be a hazy, smoky Friday across the peninsula, so keep that in mind if you’re planning any outdoor activities today. Temperatures will climb to a warm high near 90°F under partly sunny skies, with light and variable north winds staying between 0 and 5 mph. The smoke may irritate those with respiratory sensitivities, so folks with asthma or breathing conditions may want to limit time outdoors.
Tonight stays warm and muggy with that smoky haze lingering and overnight lows settling around 71°F.
Looking ahead to Saturday, more of the same smoke-filled skies are expected through the day, with highs again reaching 90°F. However, Saturday night brings a significant change — showers and thunderstorms are on the way, with lows around 75°F. Make sure you have your umbrella handy if you have Saturday evening plans!
Stay safe out there, Delmarva, and we’ll keep a close eye on those weekend storms for you. Have a great Friday!
Former President Trump used a recent public address to raise concerns about the security of voting systems across the United States, but election security experts are pushing back hard on those claims.
According to those experts, neither Trump’s speech nor a batch of unclassified documents released alongside it contain any evidence to back up the assertions that American voting systems are at risk.
In other news, dangerous floodwaters have swept through portions of Texas, creating hazardous conditions for residents in affected areas.
Think you’ve been keeping up with the week’s biggest headlines? A new news quiz is challenging readers to test their knowledge across a wide range of topics — from military policy to movies.
Among the subjects covered this week: what the Pentagon is reportedly planning to screen so-called ‘war fighters’ for, along with questions tied to the blockbuster franchise Jurassic Park, current events in United Kingdom politics, and the latest surrounding Pete Hegseth.
The quiz also ventures into the world of conspiracy theories and numismatics — the study and collection of coins and currency — rounding out a broad mix of topics from the past week in news.
Whether you’re a casual news follower or a dedicated current events enthusiast, the weekly format offers a chance to see how much of the week’s stories actually stuck.
WARSAW — Poland’s president used his veto power Friday to block two pieces of legislation that would have created formal “cohabitation contracts” for unmarried couples living together, delivering a major blow to LGBT rights advocates in a country that already offers some of the most limited protections for same-sex couples in the European Union.
Prime Minister Donald Tusk came to power in 2023 with promises to advance reforms on abortion access and LGBT rights. However, deep divisions within his broad, pro-European governing coalition — combined with the veto authority held by nationalist President Karol Nawrocki — have made progress on those fronts extremely difficult.
The two vetoed bills, formally titled the “status of the closest person in a relationship and the cohabitation agreement,” would have permitted any two adults to enter into a legally recognized agreement covering shared property rights, access to a partner’s medical records, and decisions related to burial arrangements.
The legislation had managed to win backing from across the governing coalition, including the conservative PSL party, which had previously refused to support earlier versions of similar proposals out of concern they would weaken the institution of marriage. Nawrocki, however — a political ally of the nationalist opposition party Law and Justice, known as PiS — argued the bills still went too far.
“These proposals create a new, formalised institution of family law, equipped with a broad catalogue of rights similar to those of marriage,” Nawrocki said in a recorded statement.
Citing his role as a defender of Poland’s constitution, he added: “As the guardian of the Constitution, I cannot accept a solution that would lead to the loss of the special status of marriage, defined in Article 18 of the Constitution as a union of a man and a woman under the protection and care of the Republic of Poland.”
Overriding the veto would require a three-fifths supermajority in parliament, with at least half of all lawmakers participating in the vote. With nationalist opposition parties firmly against the bills, that threshold is considered virtually unachievable.
Katarzyna Kotula, the government official responsible for equality policy, sharply criticized the decision, saying Nawrocki had “turned his back on two million people living today in informal relationships.”
Kotula noted that Poland is now required to recognize same-sex marriages registered in other countries following a ruling by the European Union’s top court. She said her focus would shift toward making sure those couples can access every benefit available to them under that recognition.
Poland’s Campaign Against Homophobia, known as KPH, also condemned the veto, pointing out that the legislation Nawrocki rejected was already a stripped-down version of earlier civil partnership proposals. “Today’s veto of the bill, however, shows that even the absolute minimum of rights the bill was intended to provide is too much for the president,” the organization said.
Regional prosecutors in Ukraine reported Friday that a Russian drone strike hit port infrastructure in the southern city of Mykolaiv, leaving three civilian foreign-flagged vessels damaged.
The attack, which took place in the early hours of Friday morning, also claimed the lives of two Ukrainian citizens who were aboard one of the foreign vessels at the time of the strike, prosecutors said.
LONDON — Andy Burnham is on the verge of becoming Britain’s next prime minister, with the Labour Party officially announcing Friday that he has won the leadership contest to replace outgoing Prime Minister Keir Starmer.
Burnham ran as the sole candidate in the race to lead the center-left governing party, collecting nominations from 379 of the 403 Labour members of Parliament in the House of Commons as of Thursday evening.
The former mayor of Greater Manchester has been widely expected to take the top job for weeks, though he has shared very little about what his policy agenda will look like. After winning a special election for a parliamentary seat about a month ago, he promised to build a politics “based on unity and hope” and an economy that distributes growth more evenly throughout the country.
Despite his imminent rise to power, Burnham has held no press conferences and granted very few interviews, meaning he will step into 10 Downing Street largely unfamiliar to voters outside of Manchester.
Known as one of Labour’s most effective communicators, Burnham is expected to bring a more easygoing leadership style compared to the more rigid Starmer. However, he inherits a long list of difficult challenges, including a slow-moving economy, a cost-of-living crisis driven by ongoing conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East, and public services stretched to their limits.
According to his office, Burnham plans to lay out some of his key priorities in his first address as Labour leader on Friday, promising he will have the “courage to fix the big things that politics has neglected.”
He is expected to emphasize economic renewal, greater public ownership of essential industries, and the creation of modern industrial jobs. He will argue that Britain took “a series of wrong turns in the 1980s” when “political power was centralized and economic power privatized” — a reference to the era of Conservative Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, whose policies of privatization, deindustrialization, and centralization fundamentally reshaped the British economy.
In a video shared on social media late Thursday, Burnham also said he would prioritize improving access to social care for people who need support due to age, illness, or disability — an urgent concern in a nation with a rapidly aging population, and one that has stumped both Labour and Conservative governments for years.
Starmer announced last month that he was stepping down after two years in office marked by missteps and poor judgment calls that damaged his reputation with both his own party and the broader public. Labour has been consistently trailing the anti-immigration party Reform UK in polls, and the party suffered devastating losses in local elections in May, creating pressure on Starmer that ultimately proved too great to withstand.
Starmer will remain in office until Monday, when he will formally submit his resignation to King Charles III. The king will then invite Burnham to form a new government.
Under Britain’s parliamentary system, a governing party can swap out its leader — and therefore the prime minister — without triggering a national election. The next scheduled general election is not required until 2029.
Burnham will be the seventh person to lead the United Kingdom since 2016, reflecting the rapid turnover at the top of British politics in recent years.
A renewed wave of U.S. military strikes against Iran has sent ordinary Iranians spiraling back into deep anxiety and uncertainty, following a brief period of relative stability during a fragile ceasefire.
Reuters reached out to Iranians through an encrypted messaging application, and those who responded described worsening economic conditions and an overwhelming sense of dread about the future.
Somayeh, a 40-year-old photographer living in Tehran, shared a photo of her weekly grocery haul to illustrate how dramatically prices have risen since before the war began — nearly doubling in many cases.
“The most important thing overall in the middle of the war is the economy. Everyday our situation is worse and more difficult,” she said.
She added: “The thing that’s the most stressful is the back and forth: one day it’s war, the next it’s peace. We don’t know what’s actually going to happen. We can’t even make plans for two days in the future.”
Like all others who spoke with Reuters, Somayeh agreed to be identified only by her first name, saying she feared retaliation from Iranian authorities if her full identity were revealed.
Amir, a 30-year-old software engineer based in Sanandaj in Iran’s western Kurdistan province, said he had just gotten married shortly before U.S.-Israeli strikes kicked off on February 28, marking the start of the conflict.
His struggles began even earlier, when Iran’s government cut off internet access during protests against the authorities in January — a move that effectively shut down his ability to work as a remote employee.
“Within a month or so when the internet was reconnected, the war began. The internet was cut off again, businesses were again severely impacted, there was a lot of trouble in my industry,” Amir said.
“I had crippling debt. There were no other pathways for me because I’m in Sanandaj and I’m a remote worker who relies on the internet. I couldn’t work at all,” he added.
Amir said he only managed to find work a few days ago — but now the fighting has intensified again. The ceasefire reached in June has given way to near-daily exchanges of attacks and counterattacks in what has now become a conflict stretching more than four months.
Nazanin, a 34-year-old psychotherapist also speaking from Sanandaj, said she once dreamed of leaving Iran to pursue a doctoral degree in psychology. But the dramatic collapse in the value of Iran’s rial currency has made that dream financially impossible.
“I could probably go to Turkey and stay for two months but I neither have the money nor the possibility to make that happen,” she said.
She also described how the fear of being separated from her family during airstrikes has changed her thinking about leaving.
“During the war, whenever I was away from my family, I would start thinking if I was hit with an airstrike, how would this affect my family?” she said. “And then I would think that if my family was killed by a bomb, what would I do? The thought of not being with them and of having the destiny of a person living alone with grief was so difficult that it impacted my idea of emigrating.”
Somayeh, the Tehran photographer, said she too once had plans to leave Iran, but the currency crisis put an end to those. Even so, she said she would choose to stay even if leaving were now possible.
“Today even if I was able to go, I don’t think I would because my life, home and family are here. Even if I was able to leave for a few months, I’d have to return and continue my life here. I don’t think I’d ever leave,” she said.
Hiwa, a resident of the city of Mahabad, said he also has no desire to leave. He views the economic suffering brought on by the war as a potential catalyst for broader social upheaval.
“The continuation of this war can activate social elements because with the continuation of the current trend of inflation, there is no conceivable alternative but street riots,” he said.
Thousands of Iranians died when the government violently suppressed the January protests. Since then, authorities have worked to prevent further unrest through arrests, executions, and a heavy security presence on the streets.
Amir described suffering from insomnia for months while he was unable to reach his father, who had been away in Iraqi Kurdistan. Yet despite everything, he said he intends to remain in Iran.
“My mom was around during the (1980-88) Iran-Iraq War and she said then that my grandfather would say that it’s ok if we died, as long as we were under our own roof,” he said.
“We don’t want to leave our home. We don’t know what it would be like to leave. Will the borders be open? Will we be let into other countries and deal with the same situation that Syrian (refugees) did?” he asked, drawing a comparison to Syrians who fled their country’s civil war, which lasted from 2011 to 2024.
PARIS — Two people have lost their lives after powerful thunderstorms tore through France overnight, bringing a deadly end to a prolonged period of extreme heat. By Friday, roughly 53,000 households were left without electricity, according to French media reports and grid operator Enedis.
In the central Haute-Vienne department, a woman died Thursday evening when a falling tree struck her in the town of Saint-Victurnien. Separately, in the eastern town of Dolomieu, a man was discovered burned to death late Thursday night inside a workshop that had caught fire after being struck by lightning, according to AFP.
Grid operator Enedis reported Friday that the power outages were concentrated primarily in two regions — the Auvergne Rhone-Alpes area in the southeast and Nouvelle Aquitaine in the southwest.
France’s national weather service, Météo-France, lifted an orange-level thunderstorm alert Friday for all southeastern departments that had previously been under the warning. Earlier, forecasters had cautioned residents about the threat of large hailstones and powerful wind gusts stretching from the Massif Central mountain range to the Alps.
Pharmaceutical company GSK announced Friday that it is pulling the plug on further development of an experimental drug designed to treat refractory chronic cough, after the medication came up short on one of its key benchmarks in a late-stage clinical trial.
Following the news, the company’s stock slid 2%, dropping to 1,916 pence per share.
The drug, known as Camlipixant, showed mixed results during the trial. At its 50 mg dose, the medication successfully met one of its primary goals — reducing how often patients coughed over a 24-hour period compared to those taking a placebo — when taken twice daily over a 12-week period. However, the drug failed to achieve statistical significance when measured against that same goal at the 24-week mark, according to GSK.
Because the drug did not consistently meet its main objectives throughout the full duration of the trial, GSK said it has decided against moving the treatment forward.
A Chinese maker of optical components used in artificial intelligence data centers is moving forward with what could become the largest stock offering in Hong Kong this year.
Zhongji Innolight announced Friday that the Hong Kong Stock Exchange’s listing committee has given the green light for the company’s listing plan. The Shenzhen-listed firm made its initial public offering documents public following that approval, a step that also signals clearance from China’s securities regulator.
According to sources who spoke in June, the company is looking to raise as much as $7 billion through the Hong Kong listing. If achieved, that figure would top the $3.1 billion share sale completed by Luxshare Precision on July 6, which currently holds the title of Hong Kong’s largest offering of the year, according to LSEG data.
Hong Kong’s IPO market has been on a record-breaking pace in 2026. Companies have collectively raised $33.8 billion through new listings so far this year — more than twice the $16.4 billion raised during the same stretch in 2025, LSEG data shows.
Danish drugmaker Novo Nordisk announced Friday that India’s national drug regulatory authority has granted approval for its popular obesity medication Wegovy to be used in treating metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis — commonly referred to as MASH — a severe form of fatty liver disease.
The Central Drugs Standard Control Organisation gave the go-ahead for Wegovy’s 2.4 mg semaglutide injection specifically for MASH treatment, according to the company.
MASH develops when excess fat accumulates in the liver, triggering inflammation and causing liver damage. The condition falls within a wider category of fatty liver diseases and can worsen into more serious liver complications when left without treatment.
Novo Nordisk pointed out that approximately two out of every three people in India live with fatty liver disease, underscoring the enormous number of potential patients in the country who could benefit from the newly approved treatment.
The company also noted that MASH is often considered a silent disease — meaning most patients experience no noticeable symptoms until the condition has already reached an advanced stage.
Wegovy, which has become one of Novo Nordisk’s most high-profile medications, uses the active ingredient semaglutide and already carries approval in India and several other markets for long-term weight management.
The company faces stiff competition in India’s rapidly expanding obesity drug market, going up against Eli Lilly’s Mounjaro as well as lower-priced generic semaglutide products introduced by homegrown pharmaceutical firms including Dr Reddy’s and Sun Pharma.
Sales data from market research firm Pharmarack show Novo Nordisk moved approximately 76,000 units of Wegovy in India during the first half of 2026.
An NPR reporter recently got a hands-on introduction to one of the Chesapeake Bay’s most cherished traditions — catching crabs.
Frank Langfitt of NPR took a turn at crabbing on the Bay, experiencing firsthand what draws so many people to the water each season. While Maryland alone issues more than 5,000 commercial crabbing licenses, the number of people who crab purely for enjoyment is far greater — reaching into the tens of thousands.
The experience shines a light on a pastime that has long been woven into the culture and way of life along the Chesapeake Bay region.
A teleprompter operator with longstanding ties to President Trump is facing accusations that he used his privileged access to the president’s scripted remarks to line his own pockets.
The individual is suspected of placing bets on the prediction market website Kalshi, reportedly using his advance knowledge of what the president was about to say to gain a financial edge.
Because teleprompter operators see a president’s prepared remarks before they are delivered publicly, the accused would have had early insight into the content of Trump’s speeches — information that could potentially be used to anticipate market or public reactions.
A father and son are sharing their memories and experiences tied to a long-standing Alaskan tradition — the blanket toss, a practice rooted in the region’s whaling heritage.
The high-flying activity, which involves launching a person into the air using a large blanket or hide held by a group of people, has been part of Alaskan indigenous culture for generations.
The two discussed what the tradition means to them and how it has been passed down through their family, offering a personal look at a cultural practice that connects them to their Alaskan roots.
A devastating flood emergency is unfolding across parts of Texas, where relentless rainfall has left at least two people dead and hundreds of others in need of rescue.
Several Texas communities have been overwhelmed by more than 20 inches of rain that has fallen since the start of the week, sending floodwaters surging through neighborhoods and trapping residents in their homes and vehicles.
Emergency responders have conducted hundreds of rescues as the floodwaters continue to pose serious dangers to those caught in the affected areas.
The Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent responsible for fatally shooting a Colombian man in Maine is facing serious scrutiny over his personal history, according to people who know him well.
The agent, who has a background as an Army veteran and former law enforcement officer, is being characterized by those closest to him as a violent individual who battles mental health issues.
His ex-wife and others in his inner circle say he should never have been permitted to carry a weapon, raising troubling questions about how the agent came to be employed in a role that requires one.
If you have been watching the World Cup this year, chances are you have heard the term VAR come up more than once — and not always in a positive way.
VAR, which stands for Video Assistant Referee, is a technology that allows officials to review key match decisions using video footage. The idea was to make the game fairer by catching mistakes that referees might miss in real time.
But at this year’s World Cup, the system has become nearly impossible to ignore — and for many fans, that is exactly the problem. What was once welcomed as a helpful tool has turned into a source of frustration and controversy throughout the tournament.
There was a time when supporters and teams actually embraced the technology. Now, however, many are calling it a disruption that is taking the joy out of watching matches.
The debate raises a bigger question: when it comes to using technology in sports, can there be too much of a good thing?
Hitachi Energy and Eve announced Friday they have entered into a formal agreement to jointly develop the power and charging infrastructure required for Eve’s electric vertical takeoff and landing vehicle — commonly referred to as a “flying car.”
The memorandum of understanding calls for Eve and Hitachi’s energy division — part of the larger Japanese conglomerate Hitachi — to collaborate on building the charging systems the aircraft will need to operate.
This agreement marks the first time Eve, which is controlled by Brazilian aircraft manufacturer Embraer, has signed a deal specifically focused on charging infrastructure for its aircraft.
Speaking to reporters at the event where the deal was announced, Luiz Mauad, Eve’s vice president of customer services, stressed the urgency of getting the power infrastructure right from the start. “The power has to be there from day one. Otherwise, we can’t fly; we can’t take off,” he said.
Glauco Freitas, Hitachi Energy’s Brazil head, explained that the company plans to adapt its existing electric vehicle fleet charging technology to meet the unique demands of eVTOL aircraft.
Eve’s aircraft are currently in the flight testing phase, with full certification anticipated in 2028. The company has already secured approximately 2,700 pre-orders from customers around the world.
British police announced Friday that a 39-year-old man has been formally charged with suspected involvement in assisting Iran’s intelligence service, marking the latest in a string of incidents tied to Tehran under the United Kingdom’s national security laws.
The suspect, identified as Vahid Aberi, is a resident of Liverpool in northern England. He was taken into custody at a police station in central England, and law enforcement conducted searches at addresses in both Birmingham and Liverpool.
UK security officials have repeatedly raised alarms about Iran’s attempts to use criminal networks as proxies to conduct hostile operations within Britain. Since the start of the U.S.-Iran war, a number of antisemitic attacks in Britain have been linked to Iran.
Earlier this week, Britain moved to ban support for Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, invoking new legal powers specifically designed to combat the use of state-sponsored proxy actors.
Investigators said they have not identified any direct threat to any specific community or individual in connection with the Aberi case, but acknowledged that authorities are stepping in more often to disrupt suspected foreign intelligence activity.
“We have seen a significant and sustained increase in the tempo of our work in national security investigations in recent years,” said Helen Flanagan, who leads counter terrorism policing in London, in an official statement.
Just last week, Britain called in Iran’s top diplomat to address the stabbing of an Iranian journalist in London — a crime for which two Romanian nationals were convicted.
Iran’s embassy in London has previously pushed back against accusations of threatening British security, dismissing such claims as “unfounded, politically motivated and hostile allegations.”
Aberi was scheduled to appear before a London court later on Friday.
HONG KONG — As an independent investigation into Hong Kong’s most deadly fire in decades drew to a close Friday, attorneys presented arguments that shoddy construction practices and deliberate deception of regulators transformed what started as a small fire into a catastrophic tragedy.
The blaze, which broke out in November, swept through seven buildings at Wang Fuk Court, an apartment complex in the suburban Tai Po district. A total of 168 people lost their lives, and thousands of residents were displaced — many of whom remain in temporary housing.
Victor Dawes, the committee’s lead attorney, told investigators that the use of scaffolding netting that lacked fire-retardant properties was very likely a major reason the flames spread so rapidly. The complex was in the middle of a large renovation project at the time of the fire. Dawes also noted that wooden planks covering staircase windows created thick smoke in the very escape routes residents needed to flee.
Dawes named Will Power Architects Company, a consultancy firm, and Prestige Construction & Engineering Co., the project’s primary contractor, as entities that cut corners on both labor and materials while actively misleading regulators and the building’s homeowners. He described a pattern of improper practices, including falsified inspection compliance records, with certain professionals signing off on documents in a manner he likened to a “rubber stamp.”
Dawes also took aim at the government’s reliance on an honor-based system to monitor the renovation project, saying relevant departments must bear some responsibility for what occurred.
“When faced with dishonest bad actors, the entire system collapsed,” he said.
Several residents broke down in tears during Friday’s hearing.
A day earlier, on Thursday, attorney Jenkin Suen, representing the government, conceded that some weaknesses existed within the system, but argued it would be unfair to characterize government departments as the ones who caused the fire. He said certain contractors and professionals exploited a mechanism meant to protect the public and violated the trust that had been placed in them.
Jeffrey Tam, an attorney representing nine Wang Fuk Court residents, acknowledged that some witnesses came forward despite the emotional toll of the tragedy. However, he noted that others seemed more focused on avoiding blame.
“But we heard some witnesses appear that they just wanted to be shirking responsibility,” Tam said. “So sometimes I also understand why they could not hold back their anger.”
He added that deflecting blame would not help the city uncover the full truth of what happened.
The investigating committee is led by High Court judge David Lok and is expected to release recommendations after examining the fire’s causes, potential systemic failures, and whether current regulations and penalties are adequate. A timeline for when those findings will be made public has not been announced.
The committee’s mandate does not extend to questions of legal liability, which will be handled separately by law enforcement authorities.
Last month, Hong Kong authorities announced charges in June against seven individuals and two companies — including Will Power and Prestige Construction & Engineering Co. — for offenses that include manslaughter and conspiracy to defraud in connection with the fire.
The families of two Australian teenagers killed by methanol-laced alcohol in Laos are speaking out against what they describe as woefully inadequate charges expected to be filed by Lao authorities.
Nineteen-year-olds Bianca Jones and Holly Morton-Bowles were among six foreign tourists who died after consuming tainted drinks at a hostel in Vang Vieng in November 2024. The other victims included an American man, a British woman, and two Danish women.
Speaking to reporters in Melbourne, the parents of Bianca Jones said Lao authorities were set to announce charges Friday against the individuals allegedly responsible for supplying the methanol-contaminated drinks. Mark Jones, Bianca’s father, said the families had been informed that those convicted could face a maximum of one year behind bars and a fine of approximately 1,600 Australian dollars — roughly $1,117 in U.S. currency.
Mark Jones called that outcome “unacceptable.”
Bianca’s mother, Michelle, expressed her heartbreak directly: “It’s like their lives didn’t even matter. We’re just really appalled by it all. You know, they were just going over to have a bit of fun and just doing the rite of passage that every, you know, child or teenager does. So for that outcome, it was just devastating.”
The two young women had been staying at the Nana Backpacker Hostel, where they reportedly drank complimentary shots of Laotian vodka before going out to other venues. When they did not check out as expected, staff found them ill in their room. They were eventually transported to hospitals across the border in Thailand, where both later died.
Shaun Bowles, the father of Holly Morton-Bowles, joined the Jones family at the news conference and called the anticipated legal outcome “mind-boggling because (Laos) is a popular tourist destination for a lot of travelers, a lot of Australian, young Australian travelers and young people from around the world.”
Bowles warned that the situation would likely cause future travelers to think twice about visiting Laos, saying the country had demonstrated “the value that they put on tourists’ lives over there and the way they’ve tried to cover this up.”
Methanol poisoning is a global public health concern, affecting not only tourists but also local populations — particularly in countries where alcohol is expensive or restricted. Data compiled by Doctors Without Borders identifies Indonesia, India, and Russia as nations with the highest number of reported cases. Methanol is sometimes added to mixed drinks at low-quality establishments as a cheaper substitute for ethanol, and it can also appear as a byproduct of improperly distilled homemade alcohol.
Laos is one of Southeast Asia’s least wealthy nations and draws many visitors, especially backpackers. The town of Vang Vieng is known as a hub for nightlife and adventure activities.
Australia’s Foreign Minister Penny Wong issued a statement Friday saying she was “deeply frustrated and bitterly disappointed” that Lao authorities were not pursuing “the most serious charges” in connection with the women’s deaths. Her office did not immediately provide details on how many people were expected to face charges, and her statement did not specify the exact counts.
Wong also confirmed that she and Australia’s Prime Minister had sent an envoy to Laos on Friday “to convey the Australian Government’s objections and reinforce our expectations for an investigation that delivers justice for Holly, Bianca and the other victims of the methanol poisoning.” Australian officials additionally summoned Laos’ ambassador to Canberra in response to the situation.
The Laos Embassy in Canberra had not responded to requests for comment at the time of publication.
NEW DELHI (AP) — India has introduced its first domestically manufactured hydrogen-powered train, taking a significant step toward greener transportation across one of the world’s largest rail systems.
The train consists of two hydrogen-powered driving cars along with eight passenger coaches and will serve routes in the northern state of Haryana. Railway officials say it can reach speeds of up to 75 kilometers per hour — about 47 miles per hour — and has a passenger capacity of roughly 2,600 people.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi officially unveiled the train, named the “NaMo Green Rail,” at Jind railway station in Haryana on Friday. The name “NaMo” is a widely recognized shorthand combining Modi’s first and last names.
“This is a very significant day in the direction of self-reliant India and sustainable development,” Modi wrote in a post on X.
The project also includes hydrogen storage and refueling infrastructure, allowing officials to evaluate how the technology could function within India’s broader rail network.
Hydrogen fuel cells work by combining hydrogen and oxygen to produce electricity, with water vapor being the only direct byproduct of the process. A number of other nations have already deployed hydrogen-powered trains as a cleaner substitute for diesel on rail lines that have not been fully electrified.
Friday’s launch connects to India’s larger environmental goals, including a national target of achieving net-zero carbon emissions by 2070. Indian Railways has been exploring hydrogen technology as a potential replacement for diesel fuel on select routes.
Detroit Lions defensive end Pat O’Connor has decided to walk away from professional football, announcing his retirement from the NFL on Thursday.
The 32-year-old appeared in eight games for Detroit last season, including three starts. He recorded 10 tackles, logging 21% of the team’s defensive snaps — 106 total — and 64% of special teams snaps, which amounted to 143 plays.
O’Connor’s NFL journey began when Detroit selected him in the seventh round of the 2017 NFL Draft out of Eastern Michigan. The Lions released him from their practice squad in September of that year, and he went on to sign with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
Over the course of his career with both Tampa Bay (2017, 2019-2024) and Detroit (2024-25), O’Connor appeared in 88 regular-season games with three starts, finishing with 52 tackles, 2.5 sacks, and seven tackles for loss.
Among the highlights of his career was being part of the Buccaneers’ Super Bowl championship team during the 2020 season. He also saw playoff action with Tampa Bay in both 2022 and 2023.
O’Connor took to Instagram to reflect on what his career meant to him. “If you had told my younger self that I’d play this long, spend my entire career with just two teams, get drafted, and win a Super Bowl, he would have called you crazy,” he wrote. “But here we are.”
BEIJING — China is demanding that the United States roll back what it describes as “discriminatory” new visa regulations, and the country says it is prepared to take matching retaliatory action if necessary.
At a press conference held in Beijing on Friday, foreign ministry spokesperson Lin Jian stated that China rejects the American policy changes outright, adding that the new rules do not serve the interests of either country.
The U.S. announced the changes on Thursday, tightening how long visas remain valid for foreign students, cultural exchange participants, and journalists. Among the changes, Chinese journalists will now be limited to visa stays of just 90 days.
Seven American aid workers who had been fighting the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo are now quarantining at an isolation facility located on a Kenyan air force base, following new U.S. travel restrictions, the head of the charity that employs them confirmed to Reuters.
These workers are the first individuals to actually use the facility, which has been the subject of significant controversy in Kenya and is currently tied up in an active court case. A judge has ordered a halt to activity at the site pending a final ruling, yet U.S. officials and satellite images reviewed by Reuters indicate that work at the location has continued regardless.
Under the new U.S. government policy, American citizens returning from the Democratic Republic of Congo — where an Ebola outbreak is ongoing — are required to spend three weeks in a third country before they are permitted to re-enter the United States.
The bio-isolation unit was constructed by the U.S. government on an air force base in central Kenya to house Americans who may have been exposed to the Ebola virus while working in Congo or Uganda. The facility has drawn sharp criticism from many Kenyans, who argue the U.S. is essentially shifting the health burden of caring for potentially exposed individuals onto their country.
Last month, Kenya’s health minister announced an immediate stop to construction at the site after being found in contempt of court for ignoring suspension orders that had been issued by a local court against the project.
Franklin Graham, president and CEO of Samaritan’s Purse, confirmed the situation to Reuters. “Samaritan’s Purse has seven American Disaster Assistance Response Team staff members there,” Graham said. “None of them have any symptoms, but they are being quarantined by the Kenyan government for 21 days.”
A U.S. State Department official also weighed in, telling Reuters that the group of Americans — who had served on the front lines of the Ebola response — had “voluntarily moved to the Kenya facility for precautionary monitoring and isolation.” The official added that “Kenyan authorities have authorized their movement into the facility under the observation of the U.S. Public Health Service clinicians,” and that the decision was made “strictly out of an abundance of caution.”
Kenyan health ministry officials did not respond to requests for comment, and a senior Kenyan foreign ministry official stated they had no information about the situation.
A source familiar with the matter, who requested anonymity, said the group arrived at the central Kenya site on Monday and are currently sleeping on army cots inside tents. Some members of the group had worked directly as medical staff treating Ebola patients at the charity’s treatment centers, while others served in non-medical roles with no direct patient contact, such as construction work.
“There is one potential high risk exposure,” the source said, noting that the health of all seven individuals is being actively monitored. Kenyan authorities are not permitting the group to leave the facility or travel elsewhere within the country, the source added.
TOKYO — Asian financial markets suffered steep losses Friday as a sweeping global selloff in technology stocks intensified, dragging equity indexes in Japan and Taiwan down by as much as 6%.
Japan’s Nikkei 225 index officially entered correction territory, having shed more than 10% of its value since reaching an all-time closing high on June 25.
Takamasa Ikeda, a senior portfolio manager at GCI Asset Management in Tokyo, pointed to the close relationship between the Nikkei and the SOX semiconductor index as a key factor. “The Nikkei is highly correlated with the SOX index. The pace of the SOX’s gain was unsustainable, and there’s been a correction in it. A correction was anticipated, but it is happening earlier than market expectations,” he said. He added that investors are growing skeptical about whether major tech companies can generate returns large enough to justify enormous investments financed through heavily leveraged loans.
Christopher Forbes, head of Asia and Middle East at CMC Markets in Singapore, noted that even solid tech earnings weren’t enough to prop up prices. “They were good (tech) earnings. But it just shows how much was baked into the price. SpaceX is a pretty good proxy for market sentiment right now, and it’s below the IPO price,” he said. Forbes also observed that rising bond yields are weighing on markets, though he hasn’t seen outright panic yet, with investors instead moving toward gold and silver.
Johan Javeus, a senior economist at SEB in Stockholm, described the selloff as likely driven by a mix of forces. “Probably a combination of factors where the selloff is partly driven by profit-taking on many AI stocks, coupled with the recurring doubts of an AI investment bubble. The fact that the SpaceX IPO has done so poorly makes many investors extra nervous,” he said.
Kei Okamura, a portfolio manager at Neuberger Berman in Tokyo, suggested that signals from the Federal Reserve may have sparked the downturn. “I think the Fed was likely a trigger. Kevin Warsh and his comments and changing views towards what appears to be quite hawkish Fed policy started a cascading effect towards taking chips off the table,” Okamura said. He noted that heavy selling began with high-profile names like SK Hynix and Samsung before spreading more broadly, calling the situation a “bloodbath” that is “across the board.”
Fabien Yip, a market analyst at IG in Sydney, said investors are now focused on financial sustainability rather than just growth numbers. “Retail investors have borrowed to trade in this really impressive AI rally, so I think the unwinding of leveraged positions will definitely exaggerate the decline as well,” he warned. Yip cautioned that if the selloff carries into the U.S. trading session, South Korean markets could face a particularly rough reopening.
Shoichi Arisawa, a fellow in the investment research department at Iwai Cosmo Securities in Tokyo, said the correction appears to be a reaction to the sharp run-up that preceded it, but expressed confidence that the underlying business outlook for AI and semiconductor companies hasn’t fundamentally changed.
Naoki Fujiwara, a senior fund manager at Shinkin Asset Management in Tokyo, raised concerns about the reliability of memory chip makers’ forecasts, suggesting demand signals may be distorted by customers ordering early ahead of anticipated price hikes. He said upcoming earnings reports from major memory chip users like Alphabet could provide a clearer picture and potentially spark a market rebound.
Wen Xunneng, CEO of Zhu Liu Asset Management in Shanghai, was more blunt in his assessment. “The global AI bubble is bursting. The A-share correction followed pull-backs in South Korean and U.S. stocks,” he said, adding that while the AI industry continues to expand, that growth doesn’t guarantee stock prices will keep climbing. He also noted that a large number of quantitative funds in China are amplifying market swings.
Shrikant Kale, a senior quantitative strategist at Jefferies in Hong Kong, said markets may be starting to price in more realistic earnings growth expectations for AI-related companies, moving away from assumptions of flawless execution and never-ending upgrades.
Zhiwei Zhang, chief economist at Pinpoint Asset Management in Hong Kong, characterized the correction as largely technical rather than rooted in fundamental changes. “It appears largely technical rather than fundamental. There doesn’t seem to be any major change in the tech capex expectations. It is more of an adjustment of crowded positions that led to a certain state of stampede,” he said.
Gary Tan, a portfolio manager at Allspring Global Investments in Singapore, agreed that the movement looks more like excess enthusiasm leaving a crowded trade than a broader market shift. “From the flows we are seeing, this looks more like froth coming out of a crowded AI trade than a knee-jerk reaction to higher yields,” he said, noting that investors appear to be locking in profits on top AI performers rather than rotating into other sectors.
The White House officially confirmed Thursday that President Donald Trump plans to attend Sunday’s World Cup final, where Spain will face defending champion Argentina.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt announced that Trump will travel to New York City on Friday to take part in a FIFA reception at Trump Tower in Manhattan. He will then head to MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey, for Sunday’s championship match.
The confirmation follows a statement made last month by FIFA president Gianni Infantino, who indicated Trump would be on hand to present the winning trophy. Speaking on “Fox & Friends” on June 23, Infantino said, “We will be together with the president, enjoying the final and handing the trophy to the winner, of course.”
World leaders have a longstanding tradition of attending World Cup finals and participating in trophy presentations, a practice seen at both the 2022 tournament in Qatar and the 2018 event in Russia.
This marks Trump’s first attendance at any match during the current World Cup, which is being co-hosted by the United States, Canada, and Mexico. Neither Trump nor Vice President JD Vance had attended any of the 102 games played prior to this announcement. Cabinet members, however, did appear at matches involving the U.S. men’s national team in California and Seattle.
“His attendance will cap what has been the most-watched, most secure and most successful World Cup in American history,” Leavitt said.
The United States previously hosted the Men’s World Cup just once before, back in 1994.
Trump has made a habit of attending major sporting events during his time in office, including the Super Bowl, the U.S. Open tennis tournament, the Ryder Cup, and the Daytona 500. In November 2024, he attended a UFC event at Madison Square Garden, and last month he was present for UFC Freedom 250 on the White House South Lawn, as well as Game 3 of the NBA Finals between the New York Knicks and San Antonio Spurs at Madison Square Garden.
Trump also has a connection to Sunday’s venue — last summer, he was at the same stadium for the Club World Cup Final, where he shared the stage as English club Chelsea lifted the trophy.
Infantino and Trump previously teamed up to announce that the World Cup draw would be held last December at the Kennedy Center in Washington. Infantino also presented Trump with the inaugural FIFA Peace Prize at that time.
The World Cup has not been without controversy involving Trump. He acknowledged reaching out to Infantino to push for a review of the red-card suspension handed to U.S. striker Folarin Balogun, who received the ban following a foul during a 2-0 win over Bosnia and Herzegovina on July 1.
Balogun was automatically ruled out of the round of 16 match against Belgium on July 6 as a result. Infantino confirmed he received Trump’s call and that Trump publicly urged for Balogun to be allowed to play, though the FIFA president maintained he did not step into the decision-making process.
On July 5, FIFA suspended the one-game ban, allowing Balogun to take the field despite the surrounding controversy. Belgium ultimately knocked the U.S. out of the tournament with a 4-1 victory.
President Donald Trump turned up the heat on his effort to place election security at the heart of the Republican Party’s midterm strategy, claiming during a prime-time White House address that China meddled in the 2020 presidential election — a claim that contradicts an official U.S. intelligence assessment.
The roughly 30-minute Thursday evening speech saw Trump revisit long-held assertions that American elections are fundamentally flawed, pointing to newly declassified documents he described as exposing “shocking vulnerabilities.” However, many of those documents appeared to fall well short of supporting his claims, and Trump offered no evidence that any votes were changed or manipulated in 2020.
Trump used the address to once again urge fellow Republicans in Congress to advance legislation that would impose stricter voter identification and citizenship verification requirements. The bill, called the SAVE America Act, has stalled in the Senate due to strong Democratic opposition, even as research consistently shows that voter fraud is extremely rare.
The speech arrived at a politically difficult time for Trump and his party. Republicans are facing the possibility of losing one or both chambers of Congress in November, with the president’s approval numbers dragged down by the unpopular Iran war and rising energy costs. Some Republican leaders have privately encouraged Trump to focus on kitchen-table concerns like the high cost of living rather than relitigating the 2020 election.
Trump briefly addressed the war, saying the United States was “winning big,” and highlighted domestic achievements including tax cuts and his immigration enforcement efforts before pivoting to election integrity.
The president announced he was releasing classified information showing that China had unlawfully obtained 220 million U.S. voter files containing names, addresses, and other personal data. He also alleged that members of the U.S. intelligence community had intentionally concealed the full scope of China’s actions.
However, a 2021 unclassified U.S. intelligence assessment found no sign that any foreign government attempted to or succeeded in altering “any technical aspect” of the 2020 presidential election — including voter registrations, ballot counts, or final results. That assessment was overseen by John Ratcliffe, who served as Trump’s director of national intelligence at the time and now leads the CIA.
The same report noted that China had been gathering data on U.S. voters, public opinion, candidates, and senior government officials since at least 2008, likely to help forecast election outcomes. Two sources with knowledge of the situation indicated that the voter data China obtained was not classified — voter files are commonly bought by political consultants — and could not be used to alter election results.
Trump’s pointed rhetoric toward China also raised concerns about damaging a relationship that had stabilized following a costly trade war the previous year. Trump is hoping to sit down with Chinese President Xi Jinping in September to discuss improving trade ties.
Before Trump’s speech began, a spokesperson for the Chinese embassy, Liu Chang, pushed back firmly, stating: “China has never and will never interfere in the presidential elections of the U.S.”
Trump has spent years sowing doubt about U.S. election outcomes, repeatedly and falsely claiming that his 2020 defeat to Democrat Joe Biden was the result of a rigged process. He has also promoted other unsubstantiated claims — that mail-in voting is riddled with fraud, that voting machines cannot be trusted, and that non-citizens are casting ballots in large numbers. Courts and election recounts across the country have found no evidence of widespread fraud in the 2020 race.
Despite the lack of evidence, Trump’s messaging has resonated with his political base. A Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted in April found that 63% of Republicans believe Trump’s assertion that the 2020 election was stolen.
During Thursday’s address, Trump claimed his administration had identified more than 275,000 non-citizens registered to vote across just four states — though he offered no evidence that any of them had actually cast a ballot. Past investigations have shown that citizenship verification systems have sometimes incorrectly flagged naturalized citizens as non-citizens, and studies consistently find that non-citizens voting is extremely rare.
Many of the newly declassified documents Trump cited also appeared to undercut rather than support his arguments. One CIA document, prepared just last month, dealt with Venezuela’s election rather than the United States’. A separate document stated that “vote tabulation systems would be difficult to manipulate on a wide enough scale to compromise election results.” A third CIA document described Chinese espionage efforts targeting Biden’s campaign, but also noted that Beijing “does not currently intend to covertly interfere to try to sway the outcome of the election.”
Democratic Senator Mark Warner of Virginia, who serves as vice chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, issued a sharp response during the speech. “Trump’s shocking ‘bombshells’ about China are totally bogus,” Warner said. “The fact is our intelligence agencies unanimously agreed that China did not even try to change a single vote in the 2020 election.”
TEL AVIV, Israel — Israel’s parliament wrapped up its work and formally dissolved early Friday, concluding a flurry of last-minute legislation pushed through by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s governing coalition.
The Knesset had been set to begin its summer recess on Friday and will not come back into session before the October 27 elections.
The dissolution arrives at a difficult moment for Netanyahu, who is fighting to maintain his grip on power as Israel approaches the third anniversary of the October 7 attack that ignited nearly three years of conflict. Recent polling shows growing momentum for opposition parties, with former Prime Minister Naftali Bennett and a well-known centrist former military commander leading the charge.
In the days leading up to the dissolution, the Knesset pushed through a series of contentious measures during lengthy legislative sessions, as Netanyahu worked to advance several of his key priorities before the parliament closed.
Among the bills passed this week were two measures that would effectively pause military conscription for ultra-Orthodox men — a move seen as an effort to secure the support of ultra-Orthodox political parties in the next coalition government.
The Knesset also approved several measures tied to Netanyahu’s broader effort to reshape the country’s judicial system, including legislation expanding government authority over broadcast media and reducing the influence of the attorney general. Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara, who has been a vocal opponent of the overhaul, has frequently been a target of criticism from Netanyahu and right-wing politicians.
Knesset Speaker Amir Ohana marked the occasion with brief remarks as he announced the dissolution. “We are completing a four-year term, we passed nine budgets and hundreds of bills, I thank you for the trust you placed in me, through which together we succeeded in maintaining a four-year term,” he said.
Finishing a full four-year term is a notable achievement in Israeli politics. The last time an Israeli government completed a full term without calling early elections was back in 1988.
Israel has no term limits for its prime minister, and Netanyahu has served more terms than any other leader in the country’s history — though even for him, completing a full four-year term is uncommon. Between 2019 and 2022, Israeli voters went to the polls five separate times. According to the Israel Democracy Institute, Israel holds elections on average every 2.4 years, ranking it second-lowest among OECD nations for the length of time between elections — a sign of ongoing political instability.
TOKYO (AP) — Japan officially put a new and contentious law on the books Friday, making it a crime to desecrate the country’s national flag. The legislation was a central goal of Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s right-wing agenda, but critics are pushing back hard, calling it a tool to intimidate citizens and muzzle dissent against her administration.
Under the new law, it is illegal to publicly damage, remove, or deface Japan’s national flag — known as the “hinomaru” — in any manner that “causes extreme discomfort or sense of disgust to others.” Even livestreaming or uploading video of someone burning or cutting a flag in a private space falls under the law’s reach.
Those found guilty could face a prison sentence of up to two years or a financial penalty of up to 200,000 yen, which is roughly $1,230.
Takaichi has long argued that Japan’s absence of a law protecting its own flag was “wrong,” pointing out that the country already had legislation on the books to prevent damage to foreign national flags — particularly those displayed at embassies and diplomatic sites — in order to prevent international incidents.
Legal scholars have largely pushed back against the new measure. Many argue the law’s wording is too vague, leaving it open to selective enforcement that could target people who criticize the government.
“Punishing national flag vandals means a prohibition of criticism against the government,” said Motohiro Hashimoto, a constitutional law professor at Chuo University, during testimony before parliament this week.
The law has sparked a wave of questions in parliament about what specific actions would actually be punishable. Takaichi’s governing Liberal Democratic Party outlined several examples of violations: pulling down and throwing away a flag displayed at a municipal building; tearing, burning, or cutting a flag in a public space; stepping on or smearing mud on a flag in public; and streaming or posting footage of oneself burning or cutting a flag even while at home.
However, certain uses of the flag are permitted. Digital or illustrated versions of the flag appearing in anime, cartoons, or AI-generated images are exempt because they are not physical objects. Flag imagery that is part of a painting is also not subject to punishment. Additionally, damaging the small decorative hinomaru flags commonly placed on children’s meals is allowed.
Opposition lawmaker Ayaka Shiomura of the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan raised questions during a parliamentary session about whether crossing out an image of the flag — noting the flag’s complicated historical meaning when used at political rallies — would be a punishable act. LDP lawmaker Akihisa Shiozaki gave a notably vague reply: “It all depends. It is difficult to categorize, standardize or make a hypothetical judgment until it happens.”
Experts note that while other nations, including the United States and countries across Europe, have laws addressing flag vandalism, those laws tend to include clearer standards and stronger safeguards for free expression.
Japan’s national flag — a red circle on a white background — is thought to have roots in ancient sun worship. It was formally recognized as the flag for Japanese commercial ships in 1870. Today, it is a common sight at sporting events, government buildings, and international gatherings. At Imperial Palace events, crowds wave miniature versions of the flag to show support for the emperor and the royal family.
A separate well-known Japanese flag, called the “kyokujitsuki,” features a red disc surrounded by 16 outward-spreading rays. That flag has repeatedly drawn sharp protests from some of Japan’s neighboring countries due to its association with Japan’s imperial navy during the period when Japan colonized the Korean Peninsula and invaded or occupied China and other parts of Asia before its defeat in World War II in 1945.
Despite the hinomaru’s widespread modern use, it did not hold official legal status as a national flag until 1999 because of lingering controversy over its wartime associations. Starting around the 1980s, the Japanese government pushed to have the flag and the national anthem “Kimigayo” — which translates to “the Emperor’s reign” — used in public schools, a move that often drew protests from teachers opposed to patriotic education.
The emotional weight of that debate was underscored in 1999, when a school principal in Hiroshima took his own life the day before a graduation ceremony, caught in the middle of a standoff between teachers protesting the flag and local education officials demanding its display.
A landslide tore through a residential area in the southwestern Chinese city of Chongqing on Friday, burying buildings and leaving an unknown number of people trapped, according to state media reports.
China’s state broadcaster CCTV reported that rescue crews managed to pull at least eight survivors from the wreckage, with search and recovery operations still actively underway.
According to CCTV, the landslide hit at approximately 9:08 a.m. local time in Chongqing’s Pengshui county.
Footage released by the broadcaster captured a portion of a mountainside giving way and crashing down onto a nearby residential neighborhood. Multiple buildings were situated close to where the collapse occurred, and emergency workers could be seen combing through the debris in search of additional survivors.
Pengshui County lies in the southeastern part of Chongqing, sharing borders with the provinces of Hubei and Guizhou.
TAIPEI — Taiwan’s Vice President Hsiao Bi-khim is sounding the alarm over what she describes as a relentless campaign by China to isolate Taiwan on the world stage, speaking out Friday after Papua New Guinea announced it would be closing Taiwan’s representative office in the Pacific nation.
“Our diplomatic situation is truly extremely difficult. China is suppressing us everywhere — suppressing our chances to survive and to expand our international space,” Hsiao told reporters in Taipei.
Despite the setback, the vice president vowed Taiwan would keep pushing forward. “For us, this is a setback, but we will still continue to strive — to strive for opportunities, whether for our overseas compatriots or to continue expanding our cooperation with the international community,” she added.
The announcement from Papua New Guinea’s Foreign Minister Justin Tkatchenko on Thursday drew swift praise from Beijing and sharp condemnation from Taipei. Like the vast majority of countries around the world, Papua New Guinea maintains official diplomatic relations with China rather than Taiwan.
The Pacific region has long been a flashpoint for rivalry between Beijing and Taipei. China considers Taiwan part of its own territory and does not recognize it as a sovereign state, a position Taiwan firmly rejects.
With this latest development, only 12 countries now formally recognize Taiwan diplomatically. Three of those nations are located in the Pacific — Palau, Tuvalu, and the Marshall Islands.
New Zealand’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade acknowledged the Papua New Guinea announcement in a statement, saying officials are aware of the decision. “We will seek further information about this decision in due course,” the statement read, offering no additional details.
Both Taiwan and Papua New Guinea hold membership in APEC, the Asia-Pacific economic forum. Port Moresby served as host of the group’s annual leaders’ summit in 2018, an event that a Taiwan government envoy attended.
Papua New Guinea briefly recognized Taiwan diplomatically back in 1999. Taiwan also continues to operate a representative office in Fiji.
Tensions in the region are not new. In 2020, a Taiwanese diplomat was hospitalized in Fiji after two Chinese diplomats forced their way into a reception in an apparent attempt to identify who was in attendance.
Families of the five crew members who died when a K2 Airways Boeing 737 cargo plane went down in the Arabian Sea off Pakistan are demanding a broader international search effort to recover the aircraft’s flight recorders and uncover the cause of the crash.
Surface debris from the freighter was collected shortly after the July 7 disaster, but the sea floor in that area sits at roughly 3,000 meters — about 9,800 feet — below the surface. Aviation experts who have experience with deepwater accidents, including the 2009 Air France 447 crash, say locating the so-called black boxes would require an expensive underwater operation that Pakistan would likely need foreign help to carry out.
Adding urgency to the situation, the locator beacons on the 27-year-old aircraft were built to transmit signals for only 30 days. Retrieving the recorders could shed light on whether a navigational system problem reported just before the crash was connected to a navigation component that family members say was swapped out prior to the flight.
Pakistan has issued no public updates on the underwater search in over a week. An industrial firm with deepwater search capabilities told Reuters it had received no inquiries from Pakistan seeking assistance from foreign companies or navies.
Yashib Rizwan, the eldest son of Captain Rizwan Idris, spoke directly to the need for continued efforts. “The search has to continue, and whatever resources can be deployed, locally and internationally, should be deployed,” he said. “For us a transparent investigation is key.”
Abdur Rafay Siddiqui, the son of engineer Muhammad Arif Siddiqui, also voiced support for bringing in international assistance if necessary. Both families have already held funeral prayers after giving up hope that the bodies would ever be found.
Pakistan’s government has not answered questions about whether it intends to seek help from other countries. K2 Airways, which lost its only aircraft in the crash, has also declined to respond to requests for comment.
What Happened in the Final Minutes
According to Pakistan’s airports authority, the pilots radioed in a navigational system problem at 9:18 p.m. local time while the plane was en route to Karachi from Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates. Ground controllers attempted to assist, but just three minutes later, radar showed the aircraft dropping rapidly and all communication was lost.
Data from Flightradar24 painted a harrowing picture: the plane fell roughly 5,000 feet in under a minute, then shot back up about 6,000 feet in 30 seconds, before entering a fatal dive from an altitude of 36,550 feet.
Ghulam Nabi, the father-in-law of co-pilot Faisal Jatoi, said the plane had spent about 10 days in Sharjah before the flight while the crew waited for a replacement part to arrive from the United States following a maintenance issue.
Yashib Rizwan, the captain’s son, confirmed that one of the plane’s two inertial reference units — devices that provide the cockpit with data on the aircraft’s position, speed, and orientation — had been replaced while the plane was in Sharjah.
John Goglia, a former member of the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board, explained the potential significance of such a malfunction. “If you have a problem with your IRU, you just can’t rely upon the instruments,” he said, noting that pilots flying at night over open water without visual cues could have serious difficulty determining the aircraft’s orientation.
Experts caution that aviation accidents almost always result from a combination of factors, and it has not been established whether the replaced component played any role in the disaster.
A similar scenario unfolded in the 2007 Adam Air crash in Indonesia, where an inertial reference system failure contributed to the accident. In that case, investigators found that the pilots became so focused on faulty instrument readings that they failed to notice the plane had banked sharply to the right, lost control, and plunged into the sea, killing all 102 people on board. Signals from the Adam Air black boxes were picked up about three weeks after the crash with help from the U.S. Navy, but pulling the recorders up from roughly 2,000 meters of water took several months and millions of dollars using a specialized remotely operated vehicle.
U.S. aviation expert Todd Curtis said on the “Flight Safety Detectives” podcast that Pakistan is unlikely to launch a comparable recovery mission, given that the K2 aircraft was an aging cargo jet rather than a modern passenger plane.
Japan’s ruling political party stepped forward Friday with serious concerns about what it describes as suspected secret cooperation between activist investors and buyout funds in transactions designed to take publicly listed companies private.
A project team focused on corporate governance within the Liberal Democratic Party outlined the issue in draft policy proposals, stating that there have been instances where activist investors are believed to have been working covertly alongside private equity funds pursuing take-private deals.
According to the group, such situations “raise concerns from the perspectives of both enhancing corporate value and legal fairness.” The proposals are expected to be finalized before the end of this month, though no specific cases of alleged collusion were identified in the document.
Observers note this represents one of the most direct expressions of concern yet from Japan’s governing party regarding the growing influence of activist investors in corporate restructuring and take-private transactions — a sign that some companies are pushing back against pressure from such investors.
The Japan Private Equity Association declined to offer any comment on the matter.
Private equity activity in Japan surged 47.8% last year, reaching $42 billion in deals according to Dealogic. That momentum has carried into the current year, highlighted by a bidding competition involving EQT against SoftBank’s LY Corp and Bain Capital for control of Kakaku.com.
Japan has grown into one of the most active markets outside the United States for activist investing, drawing in hedge funds that have pressured companies to boost returns, unwind cross-shareholding arrangements, and strengthen governance practices.
The draft proposals also flagged cases in which activist shareholders are suspected of “securing unfair gains” by channeling a portion of their sale proceeds back into acquisition vehicles set up by private equity buyers.
Among the proposed reforms are stricter standards for shareholders seeking to call special meetings or submit proposals, along with limits on shareholder proposals touching on management decisions.
The group also explored potential steps to rein in what it characterized as “speculative or abusive” arbitrage trading.
Drawing on practices used in U.S. jurisdictions including Delaware, the document suggested Japan may want to consider limiting appraisal-rights claims by investors who bought shares after a merger or acquisition was publicly announced. Appraisal rights give shareholders who oppose a buyout the ability to demand the company buy their shares at a value determined by a court.
Arbitrage trading came under scrutiny during a prolonged dispute over Toyota Motor’s buyout of Toyota Industries, during which U.S. activist fund Elliott Investment Management accumulated a significant stake in the Toyota subsidiary in an effort to push for a higher acquisition price.
FARNBOROUGH, England — Defense is set to dominate this year’s Farnborough Airshow as aerospace and arms manufacturers struggle to meet surging weapons demand, even as the commercial aviation sector works to steady a fragile production recovery.
With the war in Ukraine now entering its fifth year and a ceasefire in the Gulf falling apart, the traditional rivalry between Boeing and Airbus for commercial jet orders is expected to take a back seat at the July 20-24 event in England.
“The global security environment is arguably more complex and volatile today than we have seen in many, many decades, and we are watching security threats evolve at a breakneck pace,” said Air Chief Marshal Harv Smyth, head of the Royal Air Force, speaking at an International Air Chiefs Conference held ahead of the show.
Arms manufacturers are arriving at their once-every-two-years gathering amid the largest increase in European defense spending since the Cold War, though questions remain about exactly where and how those funds will be directed.
Some industry leaders are raising alarms that defense technology startups building drones and AI-powered targeting software could shake up the established order — much the way SpaceX disrupted the rocket launch industry. The conflicts in Ukraine and Iran have highlighted the need for faster development timelines and systems that can be produced at scale.
“The younger companies are aggressive, not risk-averse,” said Tom Enders, president of the German Council on Foreign Relations and co-chairman of German defense startup Helsing. “They spend their own money. Procurement agencies and armed forces increasingly understand this is the way for a dynamic fast-moving industry,” added Enders, the former Airbus CEO who also chairs tank maker KNDS.
Some of the new defense dollars will flow toward existing warplanes such as the Lockheed Martin F-35 and the Eurofighter — both of which are scheduled to perform at the show — but startups like Helsing and U.S.-based Anduril are pushing AI-driven concepts including uncrewed fighter systems, even after some early stumbles.
“Valuations are tilting in favour of the defence entrants but…most militaries are still spending the vast amount of their resources on manned platforms,” said Byron Callan, managing partner of research firm Capital Alpha.
Show organizers told Reuters that defense companies will account for half of a record 1,600 exhibitors this year, up from a historical share of about 40%, with notable growth in AI, deep-tech, and finance firms.
On the commercial aviation front, both Airbus and Boeing are expected to announce new orders and reveal the buyers behind previously undisclosed deals. However, with delivery slots already booked well into the next decade, the usual wave of splashy order announcements is likely to generate less buzz than in previous years. Investors are instead keeping their eyes on actual aircraft deliveries, where manufacturers earn the bulk of their profits.
Industry sources indicated that total deals at the show may have difficulty surpassing 300 aircraft — well short of some pre-show estimates of up to 800 jets. The final count could also include orders that were previously announced.
“Winning orders is not the question. It’s not the relevant measuring stick that it used to be because of production capacity constraints,” said Jerrold Lundquist, managing director of advisory firm The Lundquist Group.
The aerospace industry has been battling supply chain problems since the COVID-19 pandemic, particularly with castings and forgings — precision parts manufactured from molten or solid metal that meet strict quality standards.
Resolving those bottlenecks is critical to Airbus reaching its long-delayed goal of boosting single-aisle jet production by roughly 25% to 75 aircraft per month by 2027. Boeing, meanwhile, has signaled it is exploring production rates beyond its current targets as it works to close the gap with Airbus and stabilize its declining market share.
“The supply chain…has improved relative to where it was a year or two ago but (not) to the point where Airbus can pursue its goal of 75,” said manufacturing expert Kevin Michaels, managing director of AeroDynamic Advisory. “And as Boeing raises rates, it’s surely going to cause issues there as well,” he added.
Engine delivery delays have been among the most persistent headaches in aviation’s supply chain, creating frustration for both aircraft manufacturers and airlines. GE Aerospace, one of the world’s largest jet engine producers, said the situation is getting better but that more progress is needed.
“I do think the supply chain has really turned the corner,” GE Aerospace CEO Larry Culp told Reuters. “(There is) more work to do.”
BEIJING — A landslide hit a county in the southwestern Chinese city of Chongqing on Friday, burying an unknown number of people and causing several residential buildings in the area below to collapse, according to Chinese state media reports.
A community worker in Pengshui county first noticed rocks beginning to fall around 8 a.m. local time and immediately sounded an emergency alarm, state broadcaster CCTV reported. Authorities quickly ordered more than 60 residents to evacuate the area.
However, before the evacuation could be completed, the full landslide hit at 9:08 a.m., trapping some of those who had not yet escaped. The total number of people buried remained unclear as officials worked to confirm the figures.
The official Xinhua news agency reported that nine individuals had been rescued from the debris, and none of them were in life-threatening condition. The cause of the landslide had not been determined as of the initial reports.
Video footage broadcast by CCTV captured rocks and debris cascading down onto a group of riverside homes. People were seen running from the disaster scene as a massive cloud of dust rose behind them. A separate dashcam video, shared on social media platform X and confirmed as authentic by Reuters, showed a hillside giving way and sending wreckage across a road, forcing vehicles and a motorcycle to come to a sudden stop.
China’s Ministry of Emergency Management elevated its response to a level-two emergency and sent a 100-person rescue team to the area. An additional 206 rescue personnel and 49 vehicles from the country’s fire and rescue force were also deployed to assist in the recovery operation, according to a ministry statement.
KUALA LUMPUR — U.S. investor Balaji Srinivasan is questioning whether Malaysia remains a safe bet for global technology investment, following an immigration inspection at a “digital nomad” community he founded there that was triggered by unverified social media allegations.
The country’s Immigration Department confirmed Wednesday that its inspection of 266 foreign nationals at the Network School found that all of them possessed valid travel documents. The announcement came one day after authorities said they were looking into online claims that Israelis were present at the community in violation of Malaysian law.
Srinivasan, a former chief technology officer at Coinbase who established the Network School, took to social media late Thursday to raise a pointed question: “Should the global tech community continue investing in Malaysia?”
He noted that his experience would be relevant to “executives at Google, Amazon, Apple, and Microsoft, founders of tech unicorns like Coinbase and Solana, and investors at the world’s largest venture capital funds.”
Srinivasan stated that any additional investments he had planned for Malaysia are now on hold until he receives guarantees that a similar situation will not occur again. He also requested a meeting with the prime minister’s office. Reuters has reached out to that office for comment on his statements.
According to Srinivasan, an anonymous social media account made false accusations that the community was sheltering illegal immigrants. That post led to an official visit days later, during which he said authorities examined hundreds of passports — including those of dual-passport holders — and determined everything was in compliance.
Though he acknowledged that immigration officials conducted themselves in a courteous and professional manner, Srinivasan argued that “the process is the punishment.”
Malaysia, a Muslim-majority nation and firm supporter of the Palestinian cause, does not maintain diplomatic relations with Israel. However, the country has no specific legislation preventing Israelis from entering using passports from another country.
The timing of the controversy is notable. In 2024, Malaysia unveiled a roadmap aimed at transforming the country into a global hub for tech startups, featuring favorable visa programs for foreign investors and skilled workers, along with measures to simplify business formation and attract venture capital. That vision has gained further momentum through a surge in data center investment in Johor — the Malaysian state where the Network School operates — which has emerged as Southeast Asia’s fastest-growing data center hub.
SHANGHAI — Chinese President Xi Jinping took the stage at a major artificial intelligence conference in Shanghai on Friday, calling for countries around the world to work together on AI development and pushing back against restrictions that have cut China off from some of the most cutting-edge technology available.
Xi made clear that no single nation should hold the reins on artificial intelligence. “The development of artificial intelligence should not be a solo performance by any single country but rather a symphony of global cooperation,” he told attendees at China’s annual World Artificial Intelligence Conference. Leaders from Kazakhstan, Cambodia, and Thailand were present, along with United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres.
Xi also repeated a complaint China has raised before, targeting what he described as nations stretching the definition of national security to justify blocking others from technology. “We should together oppose the practice of overstretching the concept of national security in the field of artificial intelligence, and of placing one’s own security above that of other countries,” he said.
The remarks come as restrictions led by the United States have blocked China from obtaining some of the world’s most advanced technologies, pushing China to develop its own capabilities and deepening the technology competition between the two largest economies on the planet.
Xi announced that over the next five years, China will offer 5,000 training opportunities related to artificial intelligence for developing nations. He also said China would expand AI cooperation with several major international organizations and blocs, including the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, the League of Arab States, the African Union, the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, and the BRICS countries. Additionally, he pledged to give 30 countries access to a Chinese-developed AI weather system capable of providing early warnings for dangerous conditions.
Just one day before Xi’s speech, 29 countries — among them Pakistan, Russia, and Kazakhstan — signed an agreement with China to create a World Artificial Intelligence Cooperation Organization. According to Chinese state media, the new body will be an intergovernmental organization based in Shanghai focused on promoting global AI governance.
This year’s conference drew more than 1,100 companies and 1,400 guests, state media reported. Tech giant Huawei is using the event to show off its powerful AI computing system, known as the Atlas 950 SuperPoD.
Some analysts who follow the technology sector now believe China has moved beyond simply trying to catch up with the United States and has become a genuine innovator in artificial intelligence. China’s five-year plan through 2030 places AI among its top priorities in science and technology advancement.
Chinese open-source AI models, such as DeepSeek, have gained attention globally as attractive and often more affordable alternatives to U.S. AI models, which are typically closed-source. They have found particular appeal in developing countries.
A thick, acrid haze from wildfires spread across a wide stretch of the United States on Thursday, dimming skies from the Great Lakes region eastward to parts of the East Coast.
The heavy smoke significantly reduced visibility in affected areas, and officials cautioned that outdoor air quality had reached levels that could be harmful to breathe.
The Associated Press compiled a photo gallery documenting the dramatic scenes as the smoky skies settled over the region.
Taiwan’s president is urging the island’s parliament to get behind a new drone spending package, saying the country cannot ignore global calls to take on a greater share of collective defense responsibilities.
President Lai Ching-te made the appeal on Friday while visiting the National Chung-Shan Institute of Science and Technology, a government-affiliated arms contractor located in the central city of Taichung. He told reporters that pressure from China on Taiwan has been growing more intense.
“To demonstrate our determination to safeguard the nation, maintain stability across the Taiwan Strait, and uphold peace in the Indo-Pacific, we must respond to the international call to share the responsibility of collective defence,” Lai said.
The push comes after Taiwan’s opposition-controlled parliament voted in May to approve only two-thirds of the T$1.25 trillion — roughly $38.69 billion — in additional defense funding that Lai had originally requested. Lawmakers at the time set aside money only for purchasing U.S. weapons systems.
Now, the government has put forward a new T$210 billion spending proposal focused on surveillance drones, coastal attack drones, and small surface drones, with funding planned through the end of 2031. Opposition parties in parliament are also advancing their own drone spending proposals.
Lai pointed to the ongoing conflict between Russia and Ukraine, as well as fighting involving the United States and Iran, as evidence that drones have emerged as the “most important assets on the battlefield.”
He called on both ruling and opposition lawmakers to set aside their differences and work together on the issue. “I also call on both the ruling and opposition parties to jointly support national security and industrial development, in order to respond to the international community’s expectations regarding Taiwan’s determination to safeguard its security,” he said.
China considers Taiwan part of its territory and has never ruled out using military force to bring the island under its control. Lai and his administration reject Beijing’s claims of sovereignty over Taiwan.
The United States, which serves as Taiwan’s primary arms supplier and most significant international supporter, has expressed strong backing for Taiwan’s efforts to expand defense spending — particularly when it comes to drones. Earlier this month, the top U.S. diplomat stationed in Taiwan said the island needs a “hornet’s nest” of drones to deter potential conflict and bolster security.
The Trump administration has been pushing U.S. allies to increase their own military budgets, a call that Lai has publicly and enthusiastically embraced.
Fast-fashion powerhouse Shein has cleared a major hurdle on its path to going public, after receiving approval from the Hong Kong stock exchange’s listing committee for an initial public offering (IPO), according to three people familiar with the situation who spoke on Friday.
The development brings Shein significantly closer to a stock market debut in the Asian financial hub — one that has been closely anticipated by investors and industry watchers alike. Previous attempts by the company to list on exchanges in New York and London were derailed by regulatory scrutiny.
The sources who shared this information asked not to be identified, saying they were not authorized to speak publicly on the matter. Representatives for both Shein and the Hong Kong stock exchange did not respond to Reuters’ requests for comment regarding the outcome of the hearing process.
Reuters had reported earlier this week that the listing committee hearing was set for Thursday, during which Shein was expected to field questions from the exchange about its business operations and financial standing.
Under Hong Kong market rules, once a company receives the listing committee’s approval following its hearing, it is then permitted to move forward with investor roadshows and the process of building its order book ahead of the IPO.
Shein is aiming for a valuation in the range of $40 billion to $50 billion for its Hong Kong listing. That figure represents a significant decline from the $100 billion valuation the company reportedly received during a funding round in 2022, when it first began pursuing a listing in New York.
STOCKHOLM — Swedish defense and aerospace manufacturer Saab delivered a second-quarter earnings beat on Friday, as soaring demand across its key markets pushed both sales and new order bookings sharply higher.
The company, best known for producing the Gripen fighter jet, reported operating earnings of 2.79 billion Swedish crowns — roughly $289 million — up from 1.98 billion crowns during the same period a year ago. That result surpassed the 2.48 billion crown average estimate from an LSEG analyst survey.
Saab, whose product lineup extends well beyond fighter jets to include missiles, advanced electronics, and submarines, posted like-for-like sales growth of 29.8% compared to the previous year. Company leadership said it remains focused on expanding production capacity to keep pace with the extraordinary level of demand.
The surge comes on the heels of several consecutive years of rising orders, largely driven by a broad rearmament effort across Europe in response to Russia’s ongoing war in Ukraine. That momentum has accelerated even further in recent months, with Saab landing a series of landmark contracts.
Among the most significant deals: Saab is set to supply new Gripen E fighter jets to Ukraine, and Brazil is reportedly considering adding 20 more Gripen aircraft to its existing fleet. The company has also signed a $4.8 billion agreement with Poland to deliver three A26-type submarines.
Adding to the strong order pipeline, NATO recently announced plans to purchase up to 10 of Saab’s GlobalEye surveillance aircraft — a move that came just weeks after Canada committed to buying a fleet of the same plane, which is built on a Bombardier jet platform. Saab is also competing to supply Canada with Gripen fighters.
“With our broad offering and rapidly expanding production capacity, we are well positioned to meet this growing demand,” said Saab CEO Micael Johansson.
(Note: $1 = 9.6637 Swedish crowns at time of reporting)
For the past five years, China consistently brought in an average of 11.5 million barrels of oil every single day. But since April, that figure has collapsed to just 8 million barrels per day — and the world’s energy markets are taking notice.
By June, Chinese oil shipments had fallen to roughly 40% of what they were before the Iran war began. That dramatic pullback has helped hold global oil prices in check and made more oil available to other nations.
But energy analysts are scratching their heads trying to figure out exactly how China managed such a steep reduction — and whether the drop is here to stay.
“It’s the million-dollar question,” said Michal Meidan, head of China Energy Research at the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies. “There’s a massive level of uncertainty because we don’t fully understand what has happened.”
Part of the difficulty in answering that question lies in China’s lack of transparency. The country’s strategic oil reserves are classified information, its state oil companies share little publicly, and official data is incomplete at best.
Some energy analysts now believe China’s oil imports could end up permanently lower by 1 million to 2 million barrels per day compared to pre-war levels — a significant shift for a country that has been one of the primary engines of global oil demand growth for decades.
TRANSPORTATION FUEL USE MAY HAVE CHANGED FOR GOOD
The war has exposed the fact that China’s transportation network can operate on considerably less fuel than previously believed. This matters greatly for crude oil imports, since roughly half of what China brings in gets refined into fuel for vehicles and transport.
What remains unclear is whether the conflict will significantly speed up the adoption of electric vehicles, particularly now that gasoline prices have retreated to pre-war levels after jumping by more than 25%.
Electric and hybrid vehicles reached a record high of 62% of all new car sales in China in June. However, overall car sales are down by hundreds of thousands this year due to a sluggish Chinese economy and the fact that 87% of vehicles on the road still run on gasoline.
One area where lasting change appears more certain is diesel. The Chinese government launched a plan in June to electrify its trucking industry, targeting 80% electrification on high-traffic short-haul routes by 2030.
Energy consultancy Rystad now projects Chinese gasoline and diesel consumption will fall by 6.6% and 6.9%, respectively — significantly steeper than its pre-war projections of 3.5% and 3%.
“The crisis has acted as a trigger,” said Ye Lin, an analyst at Rystad. “It helped consumers build more confidence in electric cars and trucks.”
ECONOMIC WEAKNESS ADDS ANOTHER LAYER OF UNCERTAINTY
Beyond transportation, the broader Chinese economy poses additional risks to oil demand, according to Meidan of the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies.
China’s ongoing property market crisis has hammered the construction sector and eroded diesel demand for several years, with property values still declining. A prolonged economic slowdown could also reduce demand for plastics and other petroleum-based products, putting pressure on refiners who are already facing competition from coal-derived alternatives.
“Something we’re not thinking enough about is the broader economic story,” Meidan said. “That is a really big question that will impact Chinese oil demand and industrial activity.”
THE ROLE OF STRATEGIC OIL RESERVES
Before the war, China had been aggressively building up its strategic petroleum reserves — a move that turned out to be well-timed when the Strait of Hormuz closed. That stockpiling activity inflated import numbers in the period leading up to the conflict.
That reserve-building campaign appears to have paused since the war began, but analysts say it’s difficult to predict when China might resume it or at what scale, given how little Beijing discloses about its reserve targets and current storage levels.
Reuters reported last year that China was constructing new oil storage facilities. In May, Premier Li Qiang called for even greater storage capacity during a visit to a reserve site.
“Although there is demand destruction, there will still be incremental crude oil imports that China will use to fill its strategic petroleum reserves,” said June Goh, a senior analyst at Sparta Commodities.
Goh noted that structural shifts like electrification could bring monthly crude imports down to between 8 million and 9 million barrels per day once conditions in the Gulf stabilize — but a new stockpiling push could push that figure back up to the 9.5 million to 11 million barrel range.
During China’s stockpiling effort last year, Brent crude was trading between $58 and $83 per barrel. The current price sits at around $85. Analysts suggest China could resume stockpiling if prices drop back below $70.
FUEL EXPORT POLICY ALSO SHAPES THE PICTURE
Reaching any new normal will also depend on the resumption of stable Gulf supplies and Beijing lifting its wartime restrictions on fuel exports, analysts say. Without the ability to export surplus gasoline, diesel, and jet fuel, Chinese refiners have little motivation to increase crude purchases and ramp up production.
Beijing did lift those export restrictions for July, but analysts warn they could be reinstated for August following a resumption of fighting in the Gulf.
Over the longer term, fuel exports will play a role in determining where China’s crude imports ultimately settle. If overseas markets absorb China’s excess refined fuel and petrochemicals, refineries may need to import more oil. China manages its fuel exports through a tightly controlled quota system.
NBA commissioner Adam Silver took the conversation around WNBA star Caitlin Clark in a broader direction Thursday, saying the real issue isn’t about foul calls — it’s about how she’s been turned into a “political football” in America.
Silver made the remarks while speaking on a panel at the Game Plan Summit in New York, presented by CNBC and Boardroom. The Indiana Fever guard has been a lightning rod for controversy since entering the league in 2024, when she quickly became one of the biggest draws in women’s basketball, boosting both ticket sales and TV ratings.
The debate over physicality and officiating reached a boiling point on June 24, when Phoenix Mercury forward Alyssa Thomas struck Clark in the neck with a closed fist during a loose-ball play in the second quarter. No foul was called during the game, which Phoenix won 111-109. After the game, however, the WNBA issued Thomas a retroactive flagrant foul, a one-game suspension, and a $1,000 fine, determining she had “recklessly made contact with her fist” to Clark’s throat.
Thomas called the contact accidental, but said she and her family were subsequently subjected to death threats, harassment, and racist abuse — adding another layer to growing concerns about player safety and online conduct surrounding the league.
“Ultimately, the issues around Caitlin Clark are not largely about officiating,” Silver said at the summit. “That particular incident is not about whether a foul should have been called at the time of the game or whether that was ultimately a flagrant non-review. I’ve come to know Caitlin really well. She’s an incredible player and also an incredible person. And she wants to focus on being the best player she can. And she’s become a bit of a political football in this country, and I think it’s incredibly unfair to her.”
Silver declined to address a Sports Business Journal report suggesting he pressured WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert to suspend Thomas, saying weighing in would be unfair to both Engelbert and Clark.
“What people are trying to make a larger issue (about) is not (whether) that was a flagrant foul or not,” Silver added. He also acknowledged that WNBA officiating needs improvement, saying there is “no doubt about it.”
Clark herself addressed the situation in early July, speaking out against “the harassment, the hate.” She said, “None of that is OK. That goes for the opposing teams we play, that goes for my teammates, that goes for my coaches.”
Fever head coach Stephanie White echoed those concerns, pointing to a noticeable increase in “toxicity, racism, homophobia” and other hateful commentary directed at players, especially on social media.
Engelbert, also appearing as a panelist at Thursday’s New York event, said, “The vitriol and everything that our players receive … is unacceptable.” She highlighted league efforts to combat harassment and bolster security at team events. Engelbert also described off-season steps to improve officiating, including a committee made up of players, college coaches, general managers, and officials, as well as a task force dedicated to reviewing game film for on-court physicality concerns.
The National Weather Service office located in Mount Holly, New Jersey has issued an Air Quality Alert, effective as of 3:45 PM Eastern Time on July 16.
During periods of poor air quality, health officials generally recommend that sensitive groups — including the elderly, children, and those with respiratory or heart conditions — limit their time outdoors and reduce strenuous physical activity.
Residents are encouraged to monitor local forecasts and updates from the National Weather Service for any changes to this alert or additional advisories as conditions develop.
The National Weather Service office in Mount Holly, New Jersey has issued an Air Quality Alert, according to an official notice released on July 16 at 3:45 PM Eastern Daylight Time.
Residents in the affected area are advised to be aware of current air quality conditions, which may present health risks for certain individuals. Those who are sensitive to air pollution — including the elderly, young children, and people with respiratory or heart conditions — are urged to limit their time outdoors and reduce physical activity outside.
Authorities recommend that everyone monitor local air quality updates and follow any guidance provided by health officials. Keeping windows closed and staying in air-conditioned spaces may help reduce exposure to poor air quality conditions.
Additional details, including the specific geographic area covered by this alert and the expected duration, were included in the official notice from the National Weather Service. Residents should check the latest updates from local authorities and weather services for the most current information.
The National Weather Service office located in Mount Holly, New Jersey has issued an Air Quality Alert, effective as of 3:45 PM Eastern Daylight Time on July 16.
Authorities are urging residents to be mindful of air quality conditions during the alert period. People who are sensitive to air pollution — including those with asthma, heart conditions, or other respiratory issues — are encouraged to limit their time outdoors and reduce physical activity outside when possible.
Children, the elderly, and anyone with pre-existing lung or heart conditions are considered most at risk during periods of poor air quality. Residents should monitor local forecasts and updates from the National Weather Service for any changes to the alert status.
The European Central Bank is scheduled to gather on July 23, and oil prices have once again moved to the center of concern for the institution’s policymakers.
A brief pullback in energy costs last month temporarily eased pressure on officials to raise interest rates — but that relief did not last long. With a lasting resolution to the Iran war appearing unlikely, uncertainty continues to cloud the road ahead.
Here are five key questions surrounding the upcoming meeting:
1. What action will the ECB take on July 23?
The most likely outcome is that the ECB will hold its key interest rate steady at 2.25%. That would follow a June rate increase that made the ECB the first among the world’s largest central banks to raise rates in response to the war.
While renewed conflict has pushed oil and natural gas prices higher, oil sitting near $85 per barrel is still well below the peaks seen in March and April — meaning policymakers feel no urgent need to act immediately. Even so, financial markets are still factoring in a small probability of a rate move.
Morgan Stanley’s chief Europe economist Jens Eisenschmidt noted that the question of whether a July hike was even discussed will likely come up. “There will be questions on whether a hike in July was discussed. I’m pretty sure that a few (policymakers) might bring it up,” he said. He added that any such conversation could serve as a signal about where the ECB stands heading into September.
2. How does the renewed Iran war escalation affect the ECB’s outlook?
For now, the moderate rise in oil prices — compared to earlier, more dramatic spikes — means the situation hasn’t shifted dramatically from what policymakers anticipated in June.
Oil futures are currently trading within a range that falls between the baseline and more favorable scenarios the ECB outlined last month, which supports the argument for holding rates in July.
Additionally, euro zone inflation declined more sharply than expected in June, and that drop wasn’t driven solely by energy prices — underlying inflation, which strips out energy costs, also fell more than forecasters had predicted.
Rabobank senior macro strategist Bas van Gaffen said policymakers have reason to be patient: “Policymakers can probably wait until September for more clarity on how developments in the Middle East affect inflation and the inflation outlook.”
3. Will the ECB raise rates again before the year is out?
Most likely yes. Both traders and economists surveyed by Reuters expect another rate hike, with September being the most anticipated timing — partly because that’s when the ECB releases updated economic projections.
Even during the period when oil prices were falling, sources indicated to Reuters that the rationale for a post-July rate increase remained solid. Now that energy prices have climbed again, traders have increased their bets on an additional move after September as well — though only three out of 74 economists polled by Reuters share that view.
Ross Hutchison, head of euro zone market strategy at Zurich Insurance Group, described the ECB’s mindset this way: “It’s super clear when we listen to the vast majority of ECB speakers, they simply are more concerned about missing inflation again to the upside than they are about the risk of what they still see as a weak but resilient economic outlook.”
A fertilizer shortage stemming from the Middle East conflict, combined with a European heatwave, could push food prices higher and keep inflation elevated — even if energy costs eventually ease. That said, some analysts remain skeptical that further rate hikes are necessary at this point, noting that there are few signs of accelerating wage pressures or second-round inflation effects.
4. What would happen if the ECB raised its minimum reserve requirement?
Analysts say it would drain liquidity from the financial system at a somewhat faster pace, moving up the timeline at which money markets become more sensitive to liquidity conditions.
Reuters recently reported that the ECB is weighing a plan to double the share of cash that banks must hold in non-interest-bearing reserve accounts. That move would reduce the interest the ECB pays banks on their excess reserves — a cost that grows as rates rise.
Societe Generale expects the effect on short-term funding markets to be relatively limited. The bank estimates the measure would remove roughly 160 to 170 billion euros in excess liquidity from the system, compared to the approximately 500 billion euros per year already being withdrawn through quantitative tightening.
5. Is the digital euro gaining momentum?
It appears so. In June, the ECB received important backing from the European Parliament for the digital euro project, ending three years of disputes with banks that have worried about losing deposits and revenue.
The push to launch a digital euro has taken on added urgency since President Donald Trump’s tariffs sparked concerns that the U.S. could potentially use its dominance over American payment networks as a geopolitical tool.
The goal is to finalize legislation by the end of this year, with a pilot program launching next year and a full rollout targeted for 2029.
Morgan Stanley’s Eisenschmidt said the digital euro is a meaningful step toward reducing Europe’s reliance on foreign payment systems, but cautioned that its current design — focused primarily on retail users — may limit how much it can achieve that goal.
Just before dawn on May 24, 2000, the final columns of Israeli tanks rolled back across the border from Lebanon into Israel, ending an 18-year occupation of the south. Then-Prime Minister Ehud Barak, who gave the order to pull out, described the return of Israeli troops as sending “shivers down his spine.”
By that point, much of the Israeli public had come to see the original invasion — which was launched to drive out Palestinian militants — as a costly strategic blunder, drawing comparisons to the American military’s experience in Vietnam.
Now, 26 years later, Israel has once again taken control of a large portion of southern Lebanon. Polling shows that most Israelis currently back an extended military presence there, but voices like Barak’s — those who lived through the last occupation — are sounding alarms that Israel risks repeating the same mistakes.
“Our very presence will become the only goal,” Barak said in a recent interview, describing what he recalled thinking back in 1985, when he was serving as a general and Israel was shifting from active combat to a long-term deployment in Lebanon. “We will protect our fortresses, we will protect our convoys of supply, the logistics, the patrols, everything,” he said he warned at the time. “But we were not serving Israeli security, we were not serving the state. There was no logic to this in 1985, and there was no logic in 2000, when we pulled out.”
Israel launched a new invasion of Lebanon in March and now holds more than 600 square kilometers — roughly 230 square miles — of territory. The operation began after Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed Lebanese militant group, launched a series of drone and missile attacks in retaliation for the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran.
Last month, Israel reached a framework agreement with the Lebanese government to use at least two areas in southern Lebanon as “pilot zones” for dismantling Hezbollah weapons and infrastructure, with security then handed over to Lebanon’s military. Israeli forces would subsequently redeploy or leave those areas. Hezbollah was not included in the agreement and has pledged to fight it.
In the meantime, Israeli officials have said troops will remain inside a broader “security zone” in Lebanon for as long as Hezbollah holds onto its weapons. Following the October 7, 2023, Hamas attack that triggered the war in Gaza, Israel has also maintained smaller security zones in Gaza and Syria, citing the need to prevent future militant attacks.
“We didn’t ask anyone’s permission to enter Lebanon, and we don’t need anyone’s permission to stay in Lebanon,” Defense Minister Israel Katz said recently, describing it as Israel’s “right and our duty” to protect communities along the northern border.
Barak, who served as the military’s top commander before becoming prime minister, still regards the 2000 withdrawal as one of his greatest accomplishments. He recalls visiting soldiers stationed in Lebanon in the early 1980s, who told him, “We are fighting to remove the threat from Hezbollah so that our children will be safe and won’t have to serve here.” Yet when Barak finally ordered the pullout nearly two decades later, some of those same soldiers’ children were themselves serving in Lebanon.
Barak argued that Israel’s self-declared security zone inside Lebanon failed to deliver meaningful protection during the previous occupation, and he doubts the new zone will fare any better. Even in the 1990s, he noted, basic Katyusha rockets fired by Hezbollah could easily clear the zone and strike northern Israel.
“In order to destroy, totally destroy Hezbollah, you’d have to conquer the whole of Lebanon,” Barak said — a prospect most Israelis view as unrealistic. He also warned that Israel’s continued presence in the south, combined with widespread destruction of villages there, risks driving more Lebanese citizens toward Hezbollah. Israel says the group hides fighters and weapons in those border communities, but Israeli military operations since March have displaced approximately one million Lebanese people.
According to the Lebanese government, about 40% of those displaced have since returned to their homes. More than 4,300 people have been killed since fighting began on March 2. Close to 40 Israeli soldiers have also lost their lives, along with a defense contractor and two civilians in northern Israel.
Hezbollah was established in 1982 partly in response to the Israeli occupation, and waged a brutal guerrilla campaign that included suicide bombings, assassinations, roadside bombs, and ambushes. Israel responded with airstrikes and bombing campaigns, and also supported a local proxy militia — a mostly Christian force called the South Lebanon Army — that patrolled the region and served as a buffer between Israeli troops and Hezbollah. After the 2000 withdrawal, thousands of South Lebanon Army fighters and their families fled into Israel.
The nature of the conflict has shifted significantly since then. Israel is now operating without a local proxy force, instead relying on surveillance and strikes conducted from the air or from elevated positions along ridges and hilltops. Hezbollah, which once depended on guerrilla-style tactics, now deploys high-precision missiles and drones — including fiber-optic guided drones that are difficult to intercept and have inflicted Israeli casualties.
One significant difference from the situation in 2000 is the possibility of a diplomatic resolution, said Orna Mizrahi, a former deputy director of Israel’s National Security Council. She pointed to Lebanese President Joseph Aoun as a potential opening for Israel. Since his election last year, Aoun has publicly criticized Hezbollah and indicated a willingness to negotiate a lasting ceasefire with Israel.
“The military operation needs to complement a diplomatic process,” said Mizrahi, who now works as a senior researcher at the Institute for National Security Studies, an Israeli think tank.
While Hezbollah is unlikely to agree to disarm, Mizrahi said the group has been significantly weakened by its conflicts with Israel. She added that Hezbollah’s primary backer, Iran, is also occupied with withstanding U.S. strikes and fighting over control of the Strait of Hormuz. This has opened a window, she argued, for reshaping the balance of power inside Lebanon by building up the Lebanese government and military. Israel will never fully eliminate Hezbollah, she acknowledged, but while the group is struggling to regroup, Israel could work with international partners to help Lebanon take it on.
By the time Israel pulled out of Lebanon in 2000, the occupation had grown deeply unpopular — largely due to the deaths of more than 1,200 Israeli soldiers during the campaign. In 1997, four mothers of soldiers serving in Lebanon founded a grassroots movement pushing for withdrawal.
Brurya Sharon, now 84 years old and one of those founding members, remembers sending both of her sons to fight in Lebanon. At the time, she felt that the Israeli government and military were sustaining the occupation out of habit, without seriously examining whether it was actually working.
The group, known as the “Four Mothers” movement, has been widely credited as a major force behind Israel’s eventual withdrawal. They deliberately avoided partisan politics, Sharon said, keeping their focus on the lives of soldiers — a concern that crossed political lines.
Today, however, Sharon says the country is so fractured — particularly in the aftermath of the October 7 Hamas attack — that she sees no realistic path for a broad public movement to push for withdrawal from Lebanon. Israelis, still deeply shaken by that attack, are wary of leaving the country’s borders exposed. A recent poll by the Israel Democracy Institute found that more than seven in ten Israelis support a permanent security presence in southern Lebanon.
“I don’t see a sunbeam of hope, I don’t even see a speck of light,” Sharon said.
DHAKA, Bangladesh — For sewing machine operator Ruma Aktar, a single everyday item has changed the way she works and improved her quality of life: a pair of reading glasses.
Aktar’s job at a Bangladesh garment factory is intense, with workers expected to complete thousands of garments each day. Accuracy is critical — even minor errors can slow down an entire production line or lead to rejected pieces. Aktar says her new glasses have allowed her to thread needles much more quickly, while also eliminating the headaches and eye strain she once dealt with regularly.
“Before I got the glasses, it took me a long time to thread the needle. Now I can thread it in just a short time. I make far fewer alterations than before,” she said.
Bangladesh is home to the world’s second-largest garment industry, trailing only China. Some factory owners there are now actively working to get more glasses into the hands of their employees as a way to improve output. The nation’s garment sector accounts for roughly 11% of its gross domestic product and provides jobs for approximately 4 million people.
VisionSpring, a global nonprofit that works to make affordable eyewear available in lower-income countries, estimates that about one in three garment workers in Bangladesh need glasses but currently go without them.
The organization has been distributing pairs costing less than ten dollars each through a partnership with the Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association, a group that represents factory owners across the country.
Ella Gudwin, chief executive of VisionSpring, said the impact was felt almost immediately. Workers were better equipped to hit quality and production targets, and better eyesight helped cut down on common mistakes like skipped stitches, uneven hems, and buttons sewn in the wrong place — reducing the need to redo work.
Fahima Akhter, a director at Bangladeshi garment company Masco Group, said factory managers initially had no idea how widespread the vision problems were, largely because workers rarely spoke up about them. She said Masco Group has now screened around 5,000 employees, with approximately 30% of them receiving glasses as a result.
Akhter added that the company intends to expand the screening program to cover its remaining workforce of more than 20,000 people.
“We don’t consider it a cost. It is an investment. If the workers are working with better vision, their productivity and workplace safety will improve, and eventually this will translate into better productivity and profit for the company,” she said.
A randomized controlled research trial conducted in India, which was co-authored by Gudwin, found that sewing machine operators who were given reading glasses boosted their productivity by 6% while also making fewer errors. The study, published in April in the British Journal of Ophthalmology, calculated that every dollar spent on vision screening and glasses generated $3.37 in productivity gains over a 12-week period.
The research also estimated that rolling out similar programs across the global garment and textile industry could produce the equivalent of $27 billion in additional output each year.
Gudwin noted that vision correction has historically been overlooked in workplace settings because glasses were viewed as a luxury rather than a necessary tool. She said many factory workers begin experiencing age-related vision decline in their late 30s and early 40s, but often put off getting help because they assume eyewear is too expensive.
Bringing eye screenings directly into the factory, Gudwin said, eliminates those obstacles entirely.
Masco Group’s Akhter said she believes vision screening should become a standard benefit across Bangladesh’s entire garment sector.
“Having a clear vision is not a luxury, it is a necessity now,” she said.
WASHINGTON — Democratic members of Congress are demanding a full accounting from the Department of Homeland Security over how it screens and trains immigration enforcement officers, following a report that an ICE agent involved in a deadly Maine shooting has a troubling history of mental illness and violent conduct.
The Associated Press revealed that David Brouillette — the Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer who shot and killed a Colombian man earlier this week in Maine — is an Army veteran whose close relatives say he has struggled with serious mental health issues since early childhood.
The top Democrat on the House Homeland Security Committee, Rep. Bennie Thompson of Mississippi, said Brouillette’s background raises serious red flags about the agency’s recruitment process. “This senseless tragedy must be investigated and the officer responsible should be taken off our streets and face justice for his actions,” Thompson said in a statement to the AP.
Thompson added that Brouillette’s history of violence and mental health struggles, combined with the fatal shooting, “directly call into question the supposed vetting and training ICE does of its recruits.”
Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer — who led a government shutdown of the Department of Homeland Security earlier this year as Democrats sought to place limits on immigration enforcement — said the failure to establish proper oversight is now costing lives. “The Trump administration rushed 12,000 agents onto our streets without ensuring they were fit to carry a badge and a gun — and Republicans gave this rogue agency vast power and no accountability,” Schumer said. “They empowered ICE. Now they must work with us to prevent more killings.”
The shooting occurred Monday when Brouillette shot and killed 25-year-old Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero, a Colombian national, while Guerrero was sitting in his car near his home in the coastal Maine city of Biddeford. At least 10 people have died in encounters with immigration agents since the current administration launched its enforcement crackdown.
The revelations about Brouillette’s past come as the Department of Homeland Security has been rapidly expanding its workforce, backed by large amounts of funding from Republicans in Congress to support the administration’s mass deportation efforts. Critics say the pace of hiring raises serious questions about whether recruits are being properly screened before being sent into communities.
Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, the Republican chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, pointed back to a statement she had already issued, saying “an impartial investigation into the shooting in Biddeford needs to proceed, as the details surrounding this tragedy are important.” Collins had previously called it “extremely unfortunate” that the agent was not wearing a body camera at the time of the shooting.
Collins noted that she had secured $20 million for expanded body camera use and $2 million for de-escalation training as part of the Homeland Security funding bill Republicans passed to end the department shutdown. “The Democratic government shutdown delayed enactment and implementation of these important safety measures,” she said.
Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut called the AP’s findings alarming. “This bombshell is absolutely appalling — exactly the intolerable danger that we feared as a result of arrest quotas and inadequate training,” he said. “This agent clearly should never have had a gun — let alone one provided to him by the United States government. And now a man is dead. I’m going to continue demanding answers and accountability.”
Sen. Alex Padilla of California said the Trump administration has “encouraged ICE and CBP to enter and terrorize our communities, even if those agents are untrained, improperly vetted, or lack experience,” referring to Customs and Border Protection. “The killing of Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero was horrifying,” Padilla said, “and there must be a credible, independent, and transparent investigation so that those responsible are held accountable.”
Stock markets across Asia fell sharply on Friday, with Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 index plunging nearly 5% as investors sold off shares in computer chipmakers and companies tied to artificial intelligence technology.
Japan’s Nikkei finished the day down 5.8%, closing at 62,945.97. Taiwan’s markets also tumbled, losing more than 5% on the day. South Korean markets were not open for trading Friday. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index dropped 2%, settling at 24,514.29, while China’s Shanghai Composite fell 1.6% to 3,818.59. In Australia, the S&P/ASX 200 slipped 0.7% to 8,775.70.
AI-related stocks have been under pressure for several weeks now. Investors are growing concerned that share prices in the sector have climbed too high, and that the enormous demand for computer memory chips and processors may not hold up if artificial intelligence technology fails to deliver the profits and productivity gains that many have anticipated.
The turbulence carried over from Thursday’s session on Wall Street, where the S&P 500 dropped 0.5% despite the fact that roughly three out of four stocks in the index actually gained ground. That disconnect came as many of the nation’s largest companies reported stronger-than-expected earnings for the most recent quarter. The Dow Jones Industrial Average edged down 0.2%, and the Nasdaq composite fell 1.5%.
Chipmaker Nvidia was the biggest drag on the market, falling 2.4%. Other companies that had surged on AI enthusiasm also gave back some of their recent gains. Micron Technology dropped 5.6%, though it remains up nearly 199% for the year. SanDisk tumbled 12.6% but is still an extraordinary 494% higher than where it started the year. Western Digital fell 9.2%, yet remains up 171% for 2024.
On the energy front, oil prices surged as conflict in the Middle East intensified. Fears that the war with Iran could force oil tankers away from the Strait of Hormuz — a critical shipping lane connecting the Persian Gulf to global markets — pushed prices toward a one-month high. Brent crude, the international benchmark, rose 1.1% to $85.13 per barrel. U.S. benchmark crude climbed 1.3% to $79.95 per barrel. U.S. stock futures also slipped.
As President Donald Trump threatened sanctions against networks that refused to broadcast his address live Thursday evening, television outlets across the country faced one of their most difficult editorial decisions in recent memory: whether to air the speech at all.
Both broadcast and cable news organizations spent the hours before Trump’s address debating how to handle coverage, trying to strike a balance between informing the public and potentially amplifying what many feared could be false claims about the 2020 elections.
When the dust settled, networks had taken a range of different approaches, though most shared one common thread: fact-checking the president’s remarks in real time, even while he was still speaking.
The decision-making unfolded amid deep and growing friction between the press and a president who has made controlling media coverage a clear priority. Trump used the speech itself to go after networks that declined to carry it live, singling out “NBC and ABC fake news” and claiming they skipped it because they “don’t like the topic.” He then went further, suggesting the networks deserved to be punished for their choices.
“They and others in the media are part of a plot,” Trump said, without providing any evidence to support the claim. It should be noted that there is also no evidence of fraud in the 2020 elections.
“They want to continue this fraud for whatever reason. They want to keep it going,” he said. “Fraud like this should mean a revocation of their licenses. They use our public multibillion-dollar-in-value airwaves for absolutely no money. They pay nothing. All we want is honesty in our elections and honesty in reporting.”
The conflict between Trump and the press during his second term has played out in multiple arenas, including sanctions against White House press corps members, regulatory moves through the Federal Communications Commission, and court battles.
Many networks appeared to finalize their coverage plans at the last minute, announcing decisions just minutes before the 24-minute address began, resulting in a wide variety of approaches.
CNN anchor Kaitlan Collins hosted her regular nightly program rather than airing the speech. “We aren’t taking it live,” she explained, citing the president’s “well-documented history” of making false statements. Analysts were present to offer commentary and fact-checking. Veteran correspondent John King told viewers, “Sadly, we have no choice to be skeptical when this president talks elections.”
Fox News and Fox Broadcasting chose to carry the speech in full. ABC and NBC, however, kept their regular programming running — ABC aired “Press Your Luck” while NBC showed an animal program featuring alligators — though both were prepared to break in if events warranted and aired special reports following the address.
Despite skipping the live broadcast on their main channels, both ABC and NBC streamed the speech live on their digital platforms — NBC News NOW and ABC News Live — along with ABC News Radio. In an era when streaming continues to grow, that approach allowed both networks to effectively cover both bases.
CBS took a different path, pulling a summer rerun of “Georgie & Mandy’s First Marriage” to air a special report anchored by Tony Dokoupil. The CBS broadcast joined the speech already in progress at 9:06 p.m. and cut away before it concluded at 9:23 p.m.
MSNBC began carrying the speech live on host Jen Psaki’s program but switched to analysis and commentary after 17 minutes. Psaki briefly used a split screen, with her on the right side and a muted Trump visible on the left.
By the time the address wrapped up, Fox News was the only major network still airing it live.
Robert Thompson, director of Syracuse University’s Bleier Center for Television and Popular Culture, described the evening as unusual, noting that reporters were quoting and describing the speech while showing very little of the actual footage. Thompson argued that full coverage was the right call — especially if the speech was expected to contain inaccurate statements.
“When the president of the United States makes an announcement that there is going to be a major speech with major information, however cynical we are … I think that is, by definition, important civic news significant to the citizenry,” he said. “It’s the president making the speech, and if the president does what everybody’s worried about him doing, that is a real reason to be covering it, to bear witness on exactly what gets said.”
Earlier in the day, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt had called on networks to carry the speech live. Fox News Channel’s Sean Hannity also weighed in on his program, calling it “pretty unheard of for a primetime address for a president” that major networks would opt out of live coverage.
However, broadcast networks have passed on live primetime coverage before. They previously declined to air a 2014 immigration speech by President Barack Obama and President Joe Biden’s 2022 democracy address, “Battle for the Soul of the Nation.”
Thursday’s events took place against a backdrop of increasing tension between the media and the current administration. Broadcast networks have been under heightened scrutiny from the Trump-appointed chair of the FCC, Brendan Carr, who has initiated early reviews of licenses for some ABC-owned stations and floated the idea of stripping the popular talk show “The View” of its long-standing exemption from equal time rules.
Trump’s hostility toward news organizations that don’t align with his agenda is nothing new, but during his second term he has escalated those efforts — often using the machinery of the federal government as a tool — both in the courts and in the broader public arena.
In a speech delivered Thursday evening, President Donald Trump told the country that Americans deserve secure elections, and he stated he was exercising federal authority to stop them from being “stolen.”
However, election security experts point out that one of the most powerful protections built into the U.S. voting system is the fact that elections are not run at the federal level. Voting in America takes place across more than 10,000 separate jurisdictions, each operating under rules established by state and sometimes local governments.
That highly fragmented structure makes the American election system extraordinarily complex — but also remarkably resistant to large-scale fraud. On the rare occasions when misconduct does occur, existing security measures typically catch it.
The decentralized nature of U.S. elections traces back to the nation’s founding. The Founding Fathers deliberately placed authority over elections with the states rather than the federal government. While Congress holds the power to regulate elections — and has exercised that power through legislation such as the Voting Rights Act — the Constitution clearly establishes that states hold primary responsibility for setting the “times, places and manner” of elections.
Unlike many other countries, the United States has no national election agency overseeing the presidential race. The day-to-day responsibility of running elections falls to local officials — typically a clerk or election supervisor — supported by staff and volunteers.
Although the variety of election laws across states can be confusing, experts in election security view this structure as a feature, not a flaw. Stealing a presidential election — as Trump has falsely claimed happened to him in 2020 — would require enormous numbers of election workers in the most competitive counties across the country to be willing to face prosecution, prison sentences, and fines. It would also require officials from both political parties to look the other way, with everyone involved somehow staying silent — a scenario experts describe as highly unlikely.
Beyond the structural safeguards, there are also widely shared security practices designed to ensure only eligible voters cast ballots and that each person’s vote is counted only once.
Stories of people casting multiple ballots, voting under a deceased relative’s name, or stealing mail-in ballots are not unheard of — but when these incidents do take place, they are frequently detected and prosecuted. Voting more than once, tampering with ballots, falsely claiming residency, or submitting someone else’s ballot are all crimes that carry significant fines and potential prison time. Non-citizens who violate election laws also face deportation.
For those who might still consider cheating the system, U.S. election infrastructure is built with multiple layers of protection and transparency designed to block such attempts.
For in-person voting, most states either require or request that voters show some form of identification at the polls. Others verify voters through alternative means, such as asking them to state their name and address, sign a poll book, or complete an affidavit.
For absentee voting, every state requires a voter’s signature on the ballot. Many states go further, requiring bipartisan teams to compare signatures against those on file, mandating notarization, or requiring a witness signature. These measures mean that even if a ballot is mistakenly sent to an old address and the current resident mails it in, election workers have checks in place to flag the irregularity.
Trump has spent six years asserting that he won the 2020 presidential election — a race he lost to former President Joe Biden.
A 2021 review by The Associated Press examined every potential case of voter fraud in the six battleground states Trump contested. The investigation uncovered fewer than 475 cases — a number that would have had no impact on the outcome of the election.
Trump’s claims of massive voter fraud have been rejected by numerous judges, state election officials, and even a division of his own administration’s Homeland Security Department. In 2020, then-Attorney General William Barr — a Trump appointee — told the AP that no evidence of widespread fraud had been found. “To date, we have not seen fraud on a scale that could have effected a different outcome in the election,” Barr said at the time.
The explosive rally in artificial intelligence chipmakers is hitting a rough patch, as worries about sky-high valuations and the long-term sustainability of massive spending have prompted some investors to quietly change course — moving away from semiconductor stocks and toward the very tech giants writing the checks.
For much of the last two years, the prevailing strategy was straightforward: pour money into chip and infrastructure companies, betting that Microsoft, Amazon, Alphabet, and Meta would keep ramping up spending on data center construction at a breakneck pace.
But that era of rapid acceleration may be nearing its end. UBS estimates that the combined capital expenditures of these major tech companies will climb 76% this year to $673 billion — but then grow by only 25% the following year, and just 6% by 2028.
Some active fund managers have already trimmed their holdings in chip stocks and are instead purchasing shares of the hyperscalers themselves, which have notably underperformed the chip sector’s rally. They are also moving into software companies and industries expected to benefit as AI technology gets adopted more broadly, including financial services and healthcare.
“Once they stop increasing their capex, it will definitely be a relief for hyperscalers and a negative signal for the semi industry,” said Alexis Bossard, global equity portfolio manager at Edmond de Rothschild Asset Management. Bossard has already reduced his exposure to semiconductor stocks, which he believes have become overpriced relative to realistic expectations.
The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index — whose top holdings include Nvidia, Broadcom, Micron, ASML, and TSMC — has more than doubled over the past year, even after falling nearly 18% from its June peak. That compares with an 11% gain in the equal-weighted S&P 500 and an 8% rise in Europe’s AI-light STOXX 600.
A July fund manager survey from Bank of America found that 82% of respondents viewed semiconductors as the most crowded trade in the market, and not a single manager reported holding a short position in the sector.
The central question for investors now is how to position if AI spending remains strong but no longer grows fast enough to justify the lofty expectations already built into AI infrastructure stocks.
Bossard said he has increased exposure to Amazon and favors areas including liquid cooling, cybersecurity, and select software companies. “We have a massive underexposure to semis right now,” he said.
LFG+ZEST CIO Alberto Conca has made sharp cuts to positions in memory-chip and equipment makers while building up stakes in hyperscalers and healthcare stocks. He has also backed that view by purchasing put options on certain semiconductor names.
After initially funding AI infrastructure buildout with their own cash reserves, the major tech companies are increasingly turning to outside financing — raising questions about whether capital market pressures could eventually put a ceiling on spending growth.
The corporate bond market has absorbed billions of dollars in Big Tech debt issuance this year, and investors had been eager to buy — until recently. Apollo Chief Economist Torsten Slok noted that cover ratios, a measure of investor demand relative to bond supply, have dropped to below 2 times in July, down from nearly 5 times back in February.
In June, the Basel-based Bank for International Settlements warned that if returns disappoint, it could trigger a sudden withdrawal of financing and transform the current spending boom into a prolonged bust.
“Cash flow is starting to be almost completely drained by capex,” said Conca, who argues that hyperscalers will be forced to become more disciplined about spending growth.
Research firm Empirical Research has flagged a growing disconnect between moderating capital expenditure growth and the still-ambitious revenue expectations built into chipmaker and AI infrastructure supplier stocks — suggesting something will eventually have to give.
“Either the capex trajectory of the hyperscalers will be upgraded again, or the revenue growth pencilled in for their suppliers will have to come from elsewhere,” the firm stated.
Not everyone is turning bearish. Madeleine Ronner, senior portfolio manager at DWS, expects upcoming earnings season commentary from hyperscalers to remain supportive of continued investment. “The surprise would be if it’s not like that,” she said, adding that buy-side forecasts for 2027 spending remain well above analyst estimates.
DWS has taken some profits in semiconductor stocks following their strong run but remains overweight in the sector, and some of its funds have added exposure to industrial and electrical equipment companies after recent price declines.
Growing community opposition to data center construction in the United States could also put a brake on spending. Empirical Research estimates that roughly 70% of data center projects face some level of local pushback.
New York this week became the first U.S. state to halt construction of large new data centers, imposing a one-year moratorium amid concerns that the facilities powering the AI boom are driving up electricity costs, straining water supplies, and placing burdens on local communities.
Despite these headwinds, investor appetite for AI infrastructure remains strong overall. Data from Morningstar shows that chip-focused investment funds attracted a record $10 billion in net inflows through May.
Jurrien Timmer, Director of Global Macro at Fidelity Investments, argues that demand for computing capacity remains robust and that the recent volatility may simply be another temporary shakeout. He drew a comparison to the late-1990s internet boom, when leading technology stocks repeatedly fell 20% to 30% before eventually pushing higher.
“The AI story is well known, it’s ongoing, the earnings are still supporting the trend,” Timmer said.
Even so, Timmer believes investors should diversify their exposure, noting that companies benefiting from AI adoption — such as those in the financial sector — may increasingly matter alongside the companies building the AI infrastructure itself.
“I want to participate in the boom, but I also want to protect myself in case that boom is overdone,” he said.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards announced Friday that they carried out an attack on a U.S. special operations command center located at al-Tanf in Syria. The strike, according to Iranian state media, was described as retaliation for the killing of Iranian soldiers in the city of Iranshahr.
Reuters was unable to independently confirm the claim. As of the time of the report, neither the Syrian government nor the U.S. military had issued any statement in response.
It is worth noting that the U.S. military announced in February that it had finished withdrawing from the al-Tanf base, which sits at the point where the borders of Syria, Jordan, and Iraq meet.
Syria has been working to keep itself out of the broader regional conflict that has drawn in neighboring countries. Lebanon has seen fighting between Hezbollah and Israeli forces, while Iran-backed armed groups in Iraq have carried out drone and rocket attacks.
Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa stated in March that his country intended to remain neutral unless it was directly attacked. Speaking at an event hosted by the Chatham House think tank in London, Sharaa said: “Unless Syria is targeted by any party, Syria will remain outside any conflict.”
In addition to the strike claim, the Revolutionary Guards stated that Iran maintains full control over the Strait of Hormuz. They warned, according to state media, that no oil or gas would be allowed to pass through the waterway for as long as U.S. attacks continue.
New Zealand officials confirmed Friday that a native bird has tested positive for the deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu, just days after the country recorded its very first case of the disease.
The infected bird is a swamp harrier hawk — called a kahu in the local Maori language — that was discovered in the Wairarapa region of the North Island. Biosecurity Minister Andrew Hoggard announced the finding in an official statement.
New Zealand’s initial bird flu detection was reported on Wednesday, when a brown skua found near Wellington tested positive — the country’s first ever confirmed case of the disease.
“While it’s disappointing to find a native bird with H5 bird flu, it’s not unexpected following the confirmation earlier this week of our first case,” Hoggard said.
He also explained how the hawk likely came into contact with the virus. “This hawk can go out to the coast — especially in winter to hunt. Hawks can get bird flu by hunting, eating, or scavenging infected birds,” Hoggard said.
Officials noted that no cases of bird flu have been detected in any poultry at this time.
As a precautionary measure, health officials have begun vaccinating 300 core breeding birds from five of the nation’s most at-risk endangered species, which include the flightless takahe and kakapo.
The developments follow a similar situation in Australia, which earlier this month reported its first bird flu case in a local seabird. Prior to that, all confirmed Australian cases had involved migratory birds passing through the region.
Fox Sports capped off a historic week for soccer television ratings when Argentina’s dramatic 2-1 semifinal victory over England on Wednesday became the most-watched World Cup semifinal ever broadcast in the English language, according to Variety.
The match pulled in an average of 15.063 million viewers on Fox, easily surpassing the record set just 24 hours earlier when Spain blanked France 2-0 in Tuesday’s semifinal, which had averaged 11.462 million viewers.
The matchup in Atlanta — featuring Argentina’s global superstar Lionel Messi going head-to-head with England’s star striker Harry Kane — hit a peak audience of 22.177 million viewers between 4:45 and 5 p.m. ET on Wednesday.
To put those numbers in perspective, Fox averaged just 6.531 million viewers across the two 2022 World Cup semifinals. The previous English-language record for a World Cup semifinal was 6.595 million viewers, set during the France-Morocco match in December 2022 in Qatar.
Across the Atlantic, the numbers were equally staggering. Radio Times reported that Wednesday’s England match was the most-watched live television broadcast in the United Kingdom so far in 2026, peaking at 24 million viewers — representing 85% of all TV viewing at that moment — and averaging 22.1 million on BBC One and BBC iPlayer.
The match surpassed England’s quarterfinal win over Norway on ITV1, which peaked at 16.8 million viewers based on overnight figures. It also marked the BBC’s largest live audience since England fell to Italy in the Euro 2020 final back in 2021.
Looking ahead, defending World Cup champion Argentina will take on European champion Spain in the tournament final this Sunday in East Rutherford, N.J. England and France will square off Saturday in the third-place match in Miami Gardens, Fla.
Global markets faced fresh turbulence Friday as a widespread selloff in semiconductor stocks rolled through Asia and set the stage for a shaky opening in Europe, according to a morning markets report from Rae Wee.
Stocks in Taiwan and Japan took the heaviest hits from the ongoing chip market downturn, while South Korean markets were closed for a holiday and avoided the damage.
Even a blockbuster earnings report couldn’t rescue sentiment. TSMC, the massive Taiwanese chip manufacturer, posted earnings growth of 77% — well above expectations — yet its shares still dropped 4% as investors remained unconvinced.
The ripple effects reached Europe quickly. EUROSTOXX 50 futures dropped 0.9%, and DAX futures fell 0.6% ahead of the trading day.
After a strong run for semiconductor stocks this year, investors have started stepping back from crowded positions in the sector, with renewed worries about heavy spending on artificial intelligence coming back into focus.
Adding to the cautious mood, the Chinese memory chip company CXMT saw its $8.6 billion initial public offering draw far less investor interest than most recent Chinese IPOs, with a lower-than-expected over-subscription rate.
On the political front, U.S. President Donald Trump on Thursday declassified intelligence documents he said demonstrate that China interfered in American elections. The move revived his repeated claims about election security, even though a U.S. intelligence assessment previously found no evidence that Beijing had any impact on the 2020 election, which Trump lost.
Financial markets largely shrugged off Trump’s accusations, but analysts warned that his sharp rhetoric toward China could destabilize a relationship that had been slowly recovering after last year’s damaging trade war. Trump has expressed hope to sit down with Chinese President Xi Jinping in September to discuss improving trade ties between the two nations.
Conflict in the Middle East also continued to simmer. Iran announced Friday that it had launched new attacks against U.S. facilities in the Gulf, coming after a sixth straight night of American strikes on Iranian military sites.
In China, the country’s foreign exchange regulator announced Friday it would be issuing new investment quotas for qualified institutional investors looking to put money overseas — a move that follows a recent crackdown on illegal cross-border money transfers.
Key items to watch Friday that could move markets include U.S. import price data, industrial production figures, and housing statistics. Earnings reports are expected from Swedbank, Danske Bank, Sweco, Volvo, and Burberry Group. The United Kingdom is also reopening auctions on one-month, three-month, and six-month government debt.
Thick, foul-smelling wildfire smoke rolled across a broad stretch of the country on Thursday, stretching from the Great Lakes all the way to portions of the East Coast. The haze reduced visibility and triggered urgent warnings from officials telling people to avoid breathing outdoor air.
Across many cities, residents were told to remain indoors or wear protective masks if going outside was unavoidable. Air quality climbed to unhealthy and hazardous levels — conditions considered dangerous for everyone, not just those with pre-existing health concerns. The smoke originates primarily from wildfires burning in Canada, with additional fires in northern Minnesota also contributing. A stalled high pressure system has been pushing the smoke down toward ground level, according to Steven Freitag, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Detroit, where air quality ranked among the worst of any major city in the world.
“Sure enough, it arrived in force here and it’s really pretty extreme levels,” Freitag said, adding that visibility in certain spots had dropped to just half a mile.
Detroit resident Omar Mitchell, 50, had a mask on as he made his way to his restaurant, glancing up at the sky with concern. “It’s scary,” he said. “You don’t know necessarily what the side effects may be. That’s days or months later.”
Health experts warn that the tiny particles in wildfire smoke can penetrate deep into the lungs and enter the bloodstream, potentially causing heart and lung complications along with other serious long-term health consequences.
Sky turns yellow, air reeks across the region
The entire state of Michigan and large portions of Minnesota were placed under hazardous air quality alerts. In the Chicago metropolitan area, air quality fluctuated between very unhealthy and hazardous readings.
National Weather Service meteorologist Jake Petr cautioned that even if northwest winds help clear the air later in the week as forecast, smoky conditions could keep returning until the fires are fully extinguished — a process that could stretch on for months, possibly until snowfall arrives in Canada and northern Minnesota.
In downtown Chicago, 76-year-old Bill Ostrowski walked through streets shrouded in smoke, a mask covering his face. “It stinks. It’s not a good sign when you wake up in the morning and you can smell the air,” he said.
In St. Paul, Minnesota, Brent Williams, who heads the soil, water and climate department at the University of Minnesota, described the sky as “glowing yellow.” He said the region “could be looking at weeks to months of continued smoke and flare-ups off and on as the winds blow in different directions.”
A study released this year determined that prolonged exposure to fine particles from wildfire smoke was linked to an average of 24,100 deaths annually across the lower 48 states. Extended exposure can worsen existing medical conditions and lead to serious chronic illnesses, including respiratory disease, cardiovascular and neurological problems, and early death.
New York City hands out masks, cancels outdoor plans
Over the New York City area, a dense haze cast an orange and yellow tint across the morning sky, partially hiding Manhattan’s skyline from view.
City officials opened cooling centers, and health authorities asked New Yorkers to cut back on vigorous or lengthy outdoor activities. Schools, parks, and other city agencies moved programming indoors, postponed events, and adjusted how they operated. State officials handed out tens of thousands of face masks at transit hubs and other high-traffic locations.
Gwen Moseley, 65, was among the first to pick up a free mask at Rosedale Library in Queens. She spends much of her workday traveling as a therapist for children with autism. “Who wants to be breathing this? It’s not healthy,” she said while waiting for a young client. “When I’m out walking, I can feel the scratchiness in my throat.”
Weather service meteorologist Maureen Hastings said the smoke had eased somewhat but was expected to thicken again by late afternoon or evening, potentially lingering through the night. She indicated it might shift southward briefly on Friday before returning after dark.
The state Department of Environmental Conservation flagged the potential for temporary spikes of “very unhealthy” air quality stretching from Buffalo in the western part of the state to Rochester near Lake Ontario, then to Syracuse in the central region and down into the greater New York City area.
In Philadelphia, officials encouraged residents to avoid strenuous outdoor activity and to stay inside when possible, or wear N95 or KN95 masks if heading out. “Today is not the day to start your marathon training plan,” said Dr. Palak Raval-Nelson, the city’s public health commissioner.
Minnesota wildfires continue to spread
In Minnesota, forest rangers spent Thursday searching a remote wilderness area to locate anyone who might still be present, days after wildfires forced officials to close the region.
The Boundary Waters area along the U.S.-Canada border was shut down on Tuesday. Between 6,000 and 10,000 people were believed to be inside at the time of the closure, though Superior National Forest staff estimated by Wednesday that they had made contact with approximately 90 percent of them, according to Karen Harrison, a spokesperson for the state and federal agencies coordinating the response.
Harrison said Thursday that heavy smoke has grounded helicopters and that the fires are continuing to spread despite active firefighting efforts. “There will be fire on the landscape until fall, and some fire will be burning until snow cover,” she said.
In a separate development, the Royal Canadian Air Force successfully evacuated 11 Minnesota teenagers and four staff members on Wednesday from wildfires burning in an Ontario provincial park located roughly 175 miles north of the Minnesota border.
LONDON (AP) — Andy Burnham’s journey to the top of British politics has been defined by equal parts persistence and bold decision-making.
Ten years ago, Burnham walked away from a two-decade career climbing the Labour Party ranks in London to head north and seek the position of mayor of Greater Manchester. Just one month ago, he secured a seat in Parliament through a high-stakes special election. This Monday, he will be sworn in as Britain’s 59th prime minister.
The rapid collapse of Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s government after only two years in power has thrust the 56-year-old Burnham into the country’s highest office — without a national electoral mandate and with limited experience at that level. He will step through the door of No. 10 Downing Street carrying enormous public expectations and serious questions about whether he can meet them.
“A whole range of people across the Labour movement and in the country have projected onto Andy Burnham their hopes and their fantasies about how the country should be run and what Labour should stand for and what Andy Burnham stands for,” said Joshi Herrmann, founder of Manchester news site The Mill, who has reported on Burnham for years.
“He has got lots of people’s hopes up,” Herrmann added.
Though Burnham built his political reputation in Manchester, he was actually born in Liverpool and raised in a commuter village nestled between those two rival cities in northwest England.
His father worked as an engineer for British Telecom and his mother served as a receptionist. He grew up in a tight-knit Catholic household. Burnham has described himself as “not particularly religious,” but he has credited Catholic values and the center-left Labour Party with shaping his commitment to social justice.
Burnham and his brothers were the first in their family to attend university — and it was Cambridge, one of England’s oldest and most prestigious schools.
“He needed a lot of persuading to apply because he felt that as a working-class boy, going off to Cambridge wasn’t for him,” said Stephen Harrington, Burnham’s former English teacher at St. Aelred’s Catholic High School, in remarks to the BBC. “He didn’t believe in himself. But he did it, and the rest is history.”
Burnham has spoken openly about feeling like an outsider at Cambridge, where many of his fellow students came from wealthy backgrounds and elite private schools in southern England. He earned a degree in English and met his future wife, Dutch fellow student Marie-France Van Heel, now a marketing executive. The two wed in 2000 and have three children — a son and two daughters.
Following graduation, Burnham worked as a journalist at trade publications before transitioning into a role as a researcher and adviser to Labour politicians.
He won a seat in Parliament in 2001, representing the Manchester-area constituency of Leigh, and steadily moved up through government under Labour Prime Ministers Tony Blair and Gordon Brown. Between 2007 and 2010, he held three Cabinet positions under Brown: chief secretary to the Treasury, culture secretary, and health secretary.
A pivotal moment in his political life came in 2009, when he was heckled while attending a memorial for the 1989 Hillsborough Stadium disaster — a tragedy in which 97 Liverpool soccer fans were crushed to death. For years, bereaved families had fought to challenge a false police account that blamed unruly fans for the catastrophe.
Burnham became a fierce advocate for those families, helping push for a new inquest, a formal apology, and legislation requiring public officials to be truthful about disasters regardless of the reputational consequences.
After Labour fell from power in 2010, Burnham ran for the party’s leadership that year and again in 2015, falling short both times. In 2017, with Labour at a low point nationally, he left Parliament to pursue the Greater Manchester mayoral race.
The mayoral role suited him well. He demonstrated a talent for coalition-building, an eye for political opportunity, and a strong streak of practicality. His governing style earned the label “Manchesterism” — a form of business-friendly socialism that seeks to blend private and public investment in areas like transportation, housing, and infrastructure.
Manchester, once a cornerstone of Britain’s industrial era and widely considered the birthplace of the Industrial Revolution, had long suffered from the decline of British manufacturing. Under Burnham’s leadership, the city experienced a resurgence, with new high-rise developments rising on former industrial land. He was particularly praised for consolidating the region’s fragmented public transit system under public control and improving its performance.
He traded in formal suits for jeans and dark T-shirts, talked openly about his love of bands like Oasis, The Smiths, and New Order, and spent his free time playing soccer or competing in DJ battles spinning 1990s music.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, Burnham publicly clashed with Conservative Prime Minister Boris Johnson, accusing him of taking a “London-centric” approach that unfairly penalized cities in the north. That confrontation earned him the nickname King of the North — a nod to the television series “Game of Thrones” that reflected both his regional advocacy and his broader political ambitions.
Burnham has described his time in national government as “unfinished business,” and his opportunity came when Starmer was pressured to resign by Labour colleagues worried about the party’s declining popularity.
To re-enter Parliament, Burnham needed a seat. A sitting Labour lawmaker agreed to step down, triggering a special election in the Manchester-area district of Makerfield. Burnham won decisively against the candidate from the anti-immigration party Reform UK, reinforcing his image as an electable figure.
When the contest to choose a new Labour leader opened, Burnham ran unopposed.
He has pledged to deliver “a new politics based on unity and hope” and “an economy that works for everybody,” regardless of where people live. A central part of his agenda involves expanding the powers of regional leaders, and he has announced plans to establish a satellite prime minister’s office — a “No. 10 North” — in Manchester.
Herrmann said Burnham’s greatest assets include a gift for compelling storytelling and a sense of empathy that sets him apart from most politicians. He also credited the incoming prime minister with holding “a set of principles about trying to make the country fairer, trying to bring people out of poverty, that he really does believe in.”
Critics, however, argue that Burnham’s policy platform lacks specifics — particularly around how he intends to fund his promises. He will also inherit many of the same challenges that undermined Starmer, including a sluggish economy, strained public services, and a persistent cost-of-living crisis. His background offers little preparation for foreign policy matters, from the ongoing war in Ukraine to navigating relations with U.S. President Donald Trump.
And governing a nation of 70 million people is a vastly different undertaking than leading a region of 3 million.
Still, Sacha Lord, a Manchester music entrepreneur who served as Burnham’s adviser on the nighttime economy, pushed back on any notion that the new prime minister is too soft for the job.
“He’s not scared of locking horns with people,” Lord said. “Everybody thinks Andy’s this nice, cheeky-chappy guy. But trust me, when he wants something … he tends to get it.”
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — American airstrikes carried out Friday appear to have caused the collapse of a tower at Iran’s Chabahar port, a facility located along the Gulf of Oman that serves as a critical trade gateway for Afghanistan.
U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth posted surveillance imagery appearing to show the tower coming down. The footage had already been circulating on social media through activist channels before Hegseth shared it publicly.
Chabahar port has been struck multiple times by U.S. forces. Iranian state media confirmed that a third wave of strikes had hit the location, though officials did not immediately address reports of the tower’s collapse.
Iranian authorities characterized the tower as a structure used to monitor commercial vessel traffic entering the port. However, Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard is also known to maintain a presence at ports throughout the country.
Shares of Tech Mahindra, India’s fifth-largest IT services company, climbed 3% in early Friday trading after the firm reported revenue that exceeded analyst expectations, boosted by gains in its manufacturing division and a weaker rupee.
The company’s stock was changing hands at 1,555 rupees per share, making it the top-performing stock on the Nifty IT index, which itself was up 2% on the day.
Market analysts noted that Tech Mahindra appears positioned to record the strongest growth among major IT services firms during the first quarter of fiscal year 2027.
JERA, the largest power generation company in Japan, has quietly begun exploring whether to list its shares on a U.S. stock exchange, according to three individuals with knowledge of the matter.
The company, which is privately held and jointly owned by Tokyo Electric Power and Chubu Electric Power, has traditionally looked toward the Tokyo Stock Exchange as its most likely venue for going public. However, sources say JERA is now examining ways to connect with international investors as it pushes forward with global expansion plans.
Two of the sources, all of whom asked not to be named due to the sensitive nature of the discussions, said JERA has begun reviewing U.S. market conditions, the level of interest from potential investors, and what regulatory hurdles it would need to clear.
The review is still in its earliest stages. No decisions have been reached on when an initial public offering might take place, how it would be structured, or what the company’s market value might be, the sources indicated.
JERA has previously signaled its interest in pursuing a public offering as a way to raise capital and grow its corporate profile. One source noted that rising interest from overseas institutional investors has pushed the company to strengthen its outreach efforts internationally.
JERA declined to offer any comment on the matter. Representatives for Tokyo Electric and Chubu Electric were not available to respond.
In terms of scale, JERA is Japan’s largest buyer of liquefied natural gas and brings in annual revenue of 3 trillion yen — roughly $18.48 billion — supported by assets totaling around 10 trillion yen. Its domestic power generation capacity stands at 59 gigawatts, including projects still under development, and it accounts for approximately 30% of Japan’s total electricity supply.
Looking ahead, JERA plans to invest 5 trillion yen between fiscal year 2024 and 2035, with a target of reaching 350 billion yen in net profit by that point, up from 183.6 billion yen in fiscal 2025.
The company handles roughly 35 million metric tons of LNG each year and has been building out its supply chain through upstream investments, fuel purchasing, and trading — with recent activity concentrated in the United States. JERA has also been growing its renewable energy operations.
The Nikkei newspaper reported in June that JERA is weighing the development of large-scale natural gas power plants in the U.S. to help meet the rapidly growing electricity demand driven by data centers — highlighting how significant its overseas business has become.
A successful U.S. listing could give JERA greater financial firepower to fund major energy projects and global expansion, while also raising its visibility among international investors and giving it stock that could be used in potential merger or acquisition deals.
JERA’s exploration comes amid a broader trend of Japanese companies turning to U.S. capital markets as their operations become more global. PayPay, which is backed by SoftBank Group, listed on the Nasdaq exchange this year, and memory-chip manufacturer Kioxia is preparing to list American depositary shares. Reuters also reported last year that the Rakuten Card unit of Rakuten Group was weighing a U.S. listing.
