Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards Corps has said it targeted US military assets in the Persian Gulf region in retaliation for American attacks. US Central Command said its forces intercepted multiple Iranian ballistic missiles and drones and carried out “self-defense strikes” on Qeshm Island.

The incident began after a US warplane fired a Hellfire missile at an Iranian-linked tanker near the Strait of Hormuz late on Tuesday, damaging its engine room. Washington said the Botswana-flagged M/T Lexie was heading toward Kharg Island in breach of its unilaterally imposed blockade.

In response, the IRGC said it targeted an alleged US-affiliated vessel named Panaya with naval missiles.

US forces then apparently proceeded with a strike on an IRGC telecom tower, in what CENTCOM later called “self-defense strikes on an Iranian military ground control station on Qeshm Island.”

The IRGC then escalated with ballistic missile strikes on a “US air and helicopter base in a regional country,” as well as “the Fifth Fleet’s command center” in Bahrain.

The US Department of War said Iran had launched several ballistic missiles toward regional states, but claimed that all failed to hit their targets. Two missiles fired at Kuwait fell short or broke apart en route, while three missiles launched at Bahrain were intercepted by US and Bahraini air defense forces, the command said.

The Kuwaiti army confirmed it was responding to missile and drone attacks, with alarm sirens sounding in the country at least twice overnight. Bahrain’s Interior Ministry also urged the public to “remain calm and head to the nearest safe place” amid an air alert.

Iran restricted traffic through the key energy chokepoint after the US-Israeli attack in February, while Washington enforced a naval blockade on Iranian ports.

The IRGC warned that any violation of ceasefire would bring a “harsh price” for the US military. CENTCOM meanwhile said its forces “remain vigilant and ready to defend against unwarranted Iranian aggression during the ongoing ceasefire.”

A man has barricaded himself inside a JPMorgan Chase bank in Bakersfield, California, with an unknown number of people inside, police have said. Officers responded to the downtown branch after a bomb threat was reported at around 1pm on Tuesday.

The incident took place at the Chase Bank building near Chester Avenue and 17th Street, according to the local ABC affiliate. Police said the situation involved an active bomb threat and a hostage report, the outlet reported.

Around a dozen police vehicles, a tactical vehicle, and emergency responders were seen at the scene. Several nearby city buildings were placed on lockdown, including City Hall North, City Hall South, the Development Services Building, and Bakersfield Police Headquarters, AP said.

PUBLIC SAFETY NOTICE: We are on scene at the Chase Bank Building on Chester Avenue and 17th Street for a confirmed bomb threat.

Please stay out of the downtown area. Road closures are in effect and will remain in effect until further notice.

Updates to follow. pic.twitter.com/eKkEMr1iCj

— Bakersfield Police Department (@bakersfieldpd) June 2, 2026

“What I can guarantee to the community right now is that every single resource is at this this site’s disposal – SWAT team, bomb squad, K9 team, gang unit, drone team. Every single asset we have to bring this to the safest conclusion is out here right now, not just ‘cause that’s what the community needs, but that’s what you guys deserve,” said Sergeant Eric Celedon of the Bakersfield Police Department.

CHASE BANK

🚨Breaking - Police negotiate in hostage situation at Chase Bank amid bomb threat in downtown

🚨Bakersfield Police Address Bomb Treat at Downtown Bank

June 2, 2026

Evacuations are underway and streets are closed in downtown Bakersfield due to a hostage situation… pic.twitter.com/aV9cUX1DRj

— Sid (@Trending_Sid) June 2, 2026

Police have not publicly identified the man or said how many people are inside the bank. No injuries had been reported in the initial police updates.

JPMorgan Chase spokesperson Peter Kelley said the bank was working with law enforcement, adding: “Our focus is on the safety of everyone involved.”

DETAILS TO FOLLOW

The remains of missing Los Alamos National Laboratory employee Melissa Casias have been found in Carson National Forest, New Mexico State Police has said. A handgun was located alongside the remains, but the exact cause and manner of death have yet to be determined.

A hiker discovered human remains in the McGaffey Ridge area and notified authorities on May 28. The Office of the Medical Investigator has since positively identified the remains as Casias.

Casias worked as an administrative assistant at the key US nuclear research facility. She was reported missing on June 26, 2025, after she failed to arrive at work and did not return home after visiting her daughter, while her purse, identification, and cell phones were found left behind.

Another LANL employee, Anthony Chavez, 78, went missing in May 2025 and has not yet been found. Steven Garcia, 48, a government contractor at the Kansas City National Security Campus, which produces more than 80% of non-nuclear components for US nuclear weapons, similarly vanished from his Albuquerque home in August 2025, leaving behind his phone, wallet, and keys and taking only a handgun.

NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory materials official Monica Reza was reported missing in 2023, while two other JPL workers, Frank Maiwald and Michael Hicks, have died since 2023, with no cause of death made public and no foul play alleged. Retired Air Force Major General William McCasland went missing this February.

The House Oversight Committee requested briefings from the Department of Energy, the Department of War, the FBI, and NASA about scientists and other personnel connected to US nuclear secrets or rocket technology.

President Donald Trump called the matter “pretty serious stuff,” but the authorities have so far not established any confirmed link among the cases.

The militant group Hezbollah has released a video showing its kamikaze drones attacking Israeli soldiers in the immediate vicinity of Beaufort Castle in southern Lebanon.

The 900-year-old medieval fortress was seized by the Israeli military over the weekend, with West Jerusalem hailing it as a major achievement and vowing to push deeper into the country. The castle, a key vantage point in the area, housed an Israeli military base for two decades during the occupation of southern Lebanon, which ended in 2000.

The group released footage of its FPV drones operating in the area on Monday, a day after Israel captured the castle. According to media reports, there was no Hezbollah presence at the fortress, and no military equipment or weaponry was found at the site by the IDF.

The video features two FPV drones, one of which hits a building where Israeli servicemen were sheltering, while another UAV hits an IDF Humvee, parked tightly alongside two other soft military vehicles.

The latest round of hostilities between the IDF and Hezbollah, prompted by the US-Israeli attack on Iran, has been marked by a sharp increase in the latter’s use of FPV drones.

The FPV drone threat has apparently become a major challenge for the Israeli military, with only rudimentary measures against UAVs implemented thus far. Some armored vehicles used in the invasion have been spotted featuring sub-par anti-drone nettings and cages, while stationary nets have been observed in certain locations occupied by Israeli forces supposed to protect parked vehicles.  

On Tuesday, Israeli media reported, citing sources, that the IDF command had decided to scale down heavy vehicle presence in southern Lebanon and investigate nighttime FPV drone attacks.

Western countries have been quick to point the finger at Moscow over a recent drone incident in Romania while demonstrating little interest in a comprehensive investigation into it, Russia’s permanent representative to the UN Vassily Nebenzia has said.
Multiple similar aerial incursions in the past, which were hastily assigned to Russia at first, eventually proved to be of Ukrainian origin, he noted.

Last Friday, an explosives-laden UAV crashed into an apartment block in the Romanian city of Galati near the Ukrainian border, injuring two people. Bucharest promptly claimed the drone originated from Russia and attempted to trigger NATO's article 4.

Speaking on Monday at an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council, the Russian envoy suggested that Romania’s haste in convening it had been dictated by the West’s desire to create “yet another anti-Russian information wave.”
Nebenzia pointed to several inconsistencies in Bucharest’s version of events, noting that the Russian Geran 2 kamikaze drone, which, according to the Romanian authorities, hit the residential building, typically carries a payload of around 50 kilograms. A blast consistent with this amount of explosives would have inflicted far greater damage on the building than what was documented by the Romanian media.

The Russian representative also said that officials had initially alleged that the incident was a targeted attack, only for Romanian President Nicusor Dan to state a few hours later that the UAV had strayed from its intended route because of Ukrainian air defenses.

Alternative versions, including a potential provocation by Kiev, are not even being considered, the Russian diplomat stated, despite multiple Ukrainian UAVs having crashed in Latvia, Lithuania and Finland in recent months.

Nebenzia recounted a tragic incident in November 2022, which saw a missile kill two people in Poland. The West initially blamed Russia, only to acknowledge later that it was a Ukrainian S-300 air defense missile.

Moscow is ready to engage in an “objective and depoliticized” investigation with any relevant materials shared with Russia, Nebenzia said, echoing earlier remarks by President Vladimir Putin.

A Taiwanese institute has unveiled a new model of armed “robot dog” designed for coastal patrols, reconnaissance, and high-risk military missions. The machines were presented during an event in Taipei on Tuesday.

National Chung-Shan Institute of Science and Technology (NCSIST) demonstrated three weaponized quadruped robots walking, crouching, and navigating uneven terrain. The machines are said to be based on the Vision 60 platform developed by US firm Ghost Robotics.

The models include reconnaissance, combat, and LiDAR-equipped variants, and can be used for patrols, perimeter security, and target tracking in all-weather conditions. The robots weigh around 52kg and have a top speed of 2.5 meters per second.

Jen Kuo-Kuang, the deputy director of NCSIST’s Missile and Rocket Research Division, said the institute has already had preliminary contact with the Taiwanese military, which he said sees an urgent need for the robots in coastal surveillance, maritime patrols, and base perimeter security. 

Taipei has recently approved a special defense budget allocation of about $280 million for US arms purchases amid perennial tension with Beijing.

China considers Taiwan part of its sovereign territory – a position shared by the vast majority of countries, including Russia. Chinese President Xi Jinping has repeatedly warned that while Beijing seeks peaceful reunification with Taiwan, it would not rule out the use of force to reclaim the island if provoked.

Chinese authorities have repeatedly condemned Taipei’s ties with Washington and continued US arms sales and military cooperation with the self-governing island, describing it as interference in China’s internal affairs.

US President Donald Trump recently described arms deliveries to Taiwan as “a very good negotiating chip” with China, while also saying he supports maintaining the status quo across the Taiwan Strait.

“I believe Europe should approach China not with fear and suspicion but with confidence and a serious, open-eyed willingness to cooperate,” Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić wrote in an opinion piece for the South China Morning Post, published on the first day of his late-May state visit to Beijing – a visit he described it as the most important trip of his political career.

At a time when many Western countries frame relations with Beijing through the lens of strategic rivalry, Belgrade has chosen a different path – one based on pragmatic engagement and mutual benefit.

During the visit, which took place from May 24 to 28, Chinese President Xi Jinping awarded Vučić the Order of Friendship, the highest honor China bestows on foreign nationals. The two countries adopted two joint political statements, while 23 intergovernmental agreements and 10 additional documents involving ministries, agencies, and companies were signed. The agreements reveal a focus shifting from infrastructure financing and heavy industry toward technological integration, industrial modernization, and long-term strategic cooperation.

With almost €1 billion in newly announced investments, Serbia and China are laying the foundations for a partnership increasingly centered on innovation rather than simply construction.

Serbia 2030 and the search for a new development model

For Belgrade, the visit was fundamentally about accelerating economic development and implementing Serbia 2030, a step-by-step national modernization strategy Vučić had unveiled in March. Over the past decade, China has played a central role in Serbia’s economic transformation through investments in transport infrastructure, energy, mining, and manufacturing.

Projects such as the acquisition and revitalization of the Smederevo steel plant and the Bor mining complex demonstrated how Chinese capital could rescue strategically important sectors while preserving jobs and industrial capacity. Investments in highways, railways, bridges and energy facilities will further strengthen Serbia’s economic foundations.

Vučić has repeatedly argued that Serbia must move beyond an economic model based primarily on low-cost labor and foreign direct investment. Instead, the country aims to develop domestic technological capabilities, higher-value production, and greater economic resilience. China is uniquely positioned to support that transition.

Unlike many Western financing mechanisms, which are often slower and accompanied by extensive political and regulatory conditionality, Chinese investment offers speed, flexibility, and a willingness to engage in large-scale strategic projects – just what a country pursuing rapid modernization needs.

The visit therefore marked not merely a continuation of existing cooperation but a qualitative shift toward sectors expected to define global competitiveness in the coming decades: artificial intelligence, advanced manufacturing, robotics, green energy, digital infrastructure, and high technology.

Building Europe’s next technology hub

Perhaps the most intriguing aspect of the new partnership is Serbia’s ambition to become a regional center for advanced technology and innovation.

One of the most high-profile projects currently under discussion involves cooperation with Chinese technology firms in the field of humanoid robotics. Earlier this year, Vučić revealed negotiations with the Chinese company AGIBOT regarding what could become Europe’s first service-robot manufacturing facility. The proposed investment would reportedly include not only a robotics factory but also data centers supporting artificial intelligence development and machine-learning training.

Such a project would align closely with Serbia’s broader ambition to establish itself as a hub for AI and supercomputing in Southeast Europe.

The government plans to double national data-center capacity to one gigawatt by 2035, expand state-operated digital infrastructure, and develop a Serbian-language artificial intelligence model. Chinese expertise, financing, and technology transfer could significantly accelerate these objectives.

At the same time, Serbia’s geographic position offers advantages for Chinese investors. Through its network of trade agreements, preferential access to European markets, relatively competitive production costs, and willingness to engage pragmatically with international partners, Serbia is emerging as a potential gateway through which Chinese capital, technology, and manufacturing can reach broader European markets.

Trade, energy, and the new industrial partnership

Economic ties between the two countries continue to deepen. The Serbia-China Free Trade Agreement, which entered into force in 2024, has become a crucial institutional mechanism for expanding bilateral commerce. By lowering tariffs and facilitating market access, it has encouraged greater economic exchange and opened opportunities for Serbian exports.

Nevertheless, Belgrade is aware that trade growth alone is insufficient. Serbia continues to run a significant trade deficit with China, reflecting a broader challenge facing many developing and middle-income economies. Serbian policymakers increasingly recognize the need to move beyond exporting raw materials and importing finished manufactured products.

That is one reason Chinese foreign direct investment, although still highly important, has become more selective. Following years of rapid expansion, Chinese investment flows into Serbia declined in 2025 – not because their partnership has weakened, but because Belgrade is now prioritizing investments in technology-intensive sectors instead of concentrating primarily on mining and heavy industry.

Energy represents another area where Chinese cooperation could prove decisive.

Chinese nuclear companies have already expressed an interest in the Serbian market, particularly regarding small modular reactors, a technology increasingly viewed worldwide as a practical path toward reliable low-carbon electricity generation. Discussions involving the China National Nuclear Corporation have reportedly explored possible future cooperation in this field.

If realized, such projects would represent one of the most significant technological leaps in modern Serbian history.

Defense partnership

Security and defense cooperation also featured prominently in the broader context of the visit. Serbia’s policy of military neutrality requires the diversification of partnerships and procurement sources, making China an increasingly important defense partner.

In recent years, Serbia became the first European country to operate several major Chinese defense systems, including HQ-22 medium-range air-defense missiles, HQ-17 short-range air-defense systems, and CH-92A and CH-95 unmanned aerial vehicles. Additional interest reportedly exists in the long-range HQ-9B surface-to-air missile system.

Defense cooperation extends beyond procurement. Serbian and Chinese engineers have already cooperated on the development of Serbia’s own Pegaz drone, demonstrating the potential for joint technological development rather than simple buyer-seller relationships. As Belgrade seeks to digitalize its armed forces and security institutions, opportunities for cooperation in artificial intelligence, unmanned systems, cybersecurity, surveillance technologies, and data analytics are likely to expand.

Critics often portray cooperation between China and smaller European states as a source of geopolitical tension.

For Belgrade, however, engagement with Beijing is not about replacing partnerships with Europe or other international actors. Serbian officials consistently emphasize that Chinese projects complement rather than substitute for cooperation with Western partners.

Serbia needs infrastructure, technology, energy security, industrial upgrading, and strategic investment. China possesses the capital, expertise, manufacturing capacity, and long-term planning horizon to help deliver them.

The results of Vučić’s May visit indicate that both sides recognize this convergence of interests.

The “ironclad friendship” frequently invoked by Chinese and Serbian leaders is often dismissed abroad as diplomatic rhetoric. Increasingly, however, it reflects a tangible reality. From artificial intelligence laboratories and robotics factories to satellites, nuclear energy, and advanced defense technologies, the partnership is moving into areas that will define economic and strategic power in the twenty-first century.

For Serbia, the objective is rapid modernization, economic resilience, and long-term stability. China sees Serbia as a trusted European partner, willing to pursue cooperation which is grounded in mutual respect and shared development.

In a world increasingly shaped by fragmentation and geopolitical suspicion, that may be the most important message emerging from Belgrade and Beijing: nations do not have to choose between sovereignty and cooperation. Mutual interests and tangible results can turn strategic partnerships into powerful instruments of modernization and long-term stability.

EU lawmakers and state representatives have agreed in principle on new rules aimed at speeding up the deportation of rejected asylum seekers amid growing pressure across the bloc to curb illegal migration.

The agreement reached on Monday would allow EU countries to transfer rejected asylum seekers to third countries if they cannot be returned to their countries of origin. The regulation also introduces stricter rules for dealing with illegal migrants, especially those considered a security risk.

These include the possibility of home searches, welfare cuts, document confiscation, and extended detention periods which would be extended from six months to two and a half years. Entry bans would also be increased from five to ten years in most cases, with lifetime bans possible.

“For years, Europe sent the worst possible message: even if you had no right to stay, chances were high that nothing would happen. That era is ending. If you have no right to stay in Europe, you will have to leave,” French MEP Francois-Xavier Bellamy, who represented the European People’s Party in the negotiations, told Politico.

The deal still requires formal approval by EU governments and the European Parliament before it can enter into force.

The proposal was initially made by the European Commission last year in response to growing discontent with a decade-long influx of illegal migrants, which has remained one of Europe’s most divisive political issues since 2015 when roughly a million people entered the EU.

Despite Brussels and countries like Germany and Sweden initially embracing an open-door approach toward would-be asylum seekers, a number of EU states, including Austria, Denmark, the Netherlands, and Greece, have since moved to tighten asylum rules and have been pushing for return hubs to be established outside the bloc.

Rights groups and left-wing lawmakers have criticized the new EU rules, warning that they could expand detention, increase raids and expose rejected asylum seekers to unsafe conditions outside EU territory.

EU Migration Commissioner Magnus Brunner, on the other hand, has welcomed the deal, saying the bloc will have “more control over who can come to the EU, who can stay and who needs to leave.”

US President Donald Trump has tapped housing finance chief Bill Pulte to serve as acting Director of National Intelligence (DNI) in the wake of Tulsi Gabbard’s resignation.

Trump announced Pulte’s appointment in a post on his Truth Social platform on Tuesday, describing Pulte as someone with “deep experience managing the most sensitive matters in America.”

As acting DNI, Pulte will coordinate the work of the US federal government’s 18 intelligence agencies, and will be responsible for producing Trump’s daily intelligence briefing. Pulte, however, has no national security experience, having sat on the board of his family’s residential construction firm before being appointed by Trump to head the Federal Housing Finance Agency and chair mortgage groups Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac last year.

Pulte will continue to work in these roles while serving as acting DNI, Trump stated.

Gabbard, a vocal opponent of war with Iran, handed in her resignation amid speculation that she had been sidelined by Trump and his closest officials – among them Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Secretary of War Pete Hegseth – while plans were drawn up to abduct Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro in January and attack Iran in February.

Less than two weeks before her resignation, Gabbard told the New York Post that she was investigating more than 120 US-funded biological laboratories worldwide, including more than 40 in Ukraine. Gabbard said that her probe would focus on whether these biolabs were conducting “dangerous gain-of-function research” to turn naturally occurring viruses into potential bioweapons – as the Russian military has claimed since 2022.

Little is known about Pulte’s views on the Russia/Ukraine conflict, or on the US’ war on Iran. He is considered a Trump loyalist, however, having led mortgage fraud investigations into New York Attorney General Letitia James, California Representative Eric Swalwell and Senator Adam Schiff, and Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, all Democrats whom Trump has accused of unfairly targeting him with legal proceedings.

Pulte also referred Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook to the Department of Justice over alleged mortgage fraud last year, as Trump clashed with the Fed’s then-chairman, Jerome Powell, over his refusal to introduce steep interest rate cuts.

Protectionism is pushing the EU toward economic decline, Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic has told Bloomberg, arguing that barriers to investment between Europe, China and the US are hurting growth.

Vucic made the remarks on Tuesday shortly after returning from Beijing, where he secured more than $1 billion in Chinese investment pledges for his country.

Protectionism is “killing, in the end, Europe,” and there are “too many obstacles” complicating investment flows, the Serbian president said in an interview with Bloomberg.

Vucic also warned that Europe has become complacent in the face of growing global competition. “We all live nicely. We don’t see what’s happening around us,” he said, adding that productivity would be “the toughest and the biggest issue” facing the continent.

Vucic’s remarks come amid trade rows between the EU and both China and the US, including disputes with Beijing over electric vehicle tariffs and subsidies, and with the US over tariffs, market access and industrial policy.

Under Vucic, Serbia has become one of China’s closest partners in Europe. Chinese President Xi Jinping has described bilateral ties as an “ironclad friendship,” while a free trade agreement between the two countries entered into force in 2024. The partnership has helped strengthen Serbia’s economy, one of Europe’s faster-growing in recent years, according to the IMF and World Bank.

Belgrade has also maintained ties with Russia, rejecting EU pressure to impose sanctions on Moscow and support Ukraine. Roughly 80% of Serbia’s natural gas imports come from Russia.

Unlike Serbia, the EU has sought to phase out Russian fossil fuel imports and replace them with alternative suppliers following the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in 2022, which contributed to an overall economic downturn.

Brussels has criticized Vucic’s close ties with both Beijing and Moscow, urging Serbia to make a “strategic choice” of direction.

Vucic has insisted, however, that joining the EU remains Belgrade’s long-term objective.

British police have released bodycam footage showing officers ignoring the dying pleas of an 18-year-old stabbing victim, after his attacker falsely claimed that he had been the victim of a racist attack.

Released on Monday, the footage shows officers handcuffing student Henry Nowak as he lay dying after being stabbed multiple times by 23-year-old Vickrum Digwa in Southampton last year.

Nowak told the officers five times that he had been stabbed, to which one officer replied “I don’t think you have, mate.” Nowak was handcuffed and dragged across gravel, as Digwa remained uncuffed, telling officers that Nowak had torn off his turban in a racially-motivated attack.

The officers ignored Nowak’s pleas to call an ambulance and informed him that he was under arrest for assault, as he lost consciousness and drowned in his own blood.

Digwa was found guilty of murder last week and sentenced on Monday to 21 years in prison. The court heard that he attacked Nowak with no provocation, with prosecutors calling his claim of racism “a wicked lie.” Digwa’s mother was also found guilty of assisting an offender by hiding the knife that Digwa used to kill Nowak.

Speaking after the sentence was handed down, Nowak’s father told reporters that his son “did not die with dignity. He did not die with the care he deserved. He lost consciousness before anyone believed him.”

“The way he was treated was inhumane and degrading,” he continued. “His murderer, however, was afforded decency. He was believed. He was not handcuffed when arrested… police even took him to the kitchen so he could choose his food. The contrast is unbearable.”

Reform UK leader Nigel Farage called on the British people to respond with “pure, cold rage.” In a statement on Tuesday, Farage described the case as “proof, if ever there was any, that we’re living in a two-tier culture in this country where the rights and privileges of white people matter less than those of ethnic minorities.”

We are living in two-tier Britain where the rights and privileges of white people matter less than those of ethnic minorities. pic.twitter.com/e7EpE1kQrm

— Reform UK (@reformparty_uk) June 2, 2026

Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s office described the case as “shocking and harrowing,” but insisted that “there’s no such thing as two-tier policing.”

The government’s Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) is currently investigating the actions of the officers.

Israel has a clear interest in prolonging US hostilities with Iran and has been successfully sabotaging efforts to reach a peace agreement, Tehran-based Professor Seyed Mohammad Marandi has told RT.

The political analyst was commenting on the latest escalation of Israeli military operations against Lebanon, including strikes on Beirut, which have triggered a new surge in tensions between Washington and Tehran and could bring negotiations to a permanent halt.

Tehran has said that continued Israeli violence effectively voids the fragile ceasefire with the US, which was announced in early April. US President Donald Trump later pushed Israel to declare a similar halt to hostilities in Lebanon.

According to Axios, Trump lashed out at Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during their most recent call for undermining his attempt to find an off-ramp from the conflict.

“Netanyahu is the boss. And not Netanyahu as an individual, but Netanyahu and the Zionists who support him, whether in Washington or in the Israeli regime,” Marandi said, describing how Tehran views the power balance between Iran’s two adversaries.

“Every time the negotiations seem to be getting somewhere, we see the Israeli regime and the Zionist lobby in the United States pushing back and forcing Trump to change his position and to flip-flop,” he added.

In addition to the escalation in Lebanon, the US-Iranian truce was also undermined by sporadic military operations by both sides, most of them related to American attempts to lift the Iranian blockade of the Strait of Hormuz. Iranian officials have threatened to expand the disruption of traffic to the Bab al-Mandab Strait, another strategic waterway that could be threatened by Houthi forces in Yemen.

Watch the entire interview.

The UK must prepare for the possibility of “taking the human out of the loop” using highly automated weapons systems, according to Al Carns, the parliamentary under-secretary of state for the armed forces.

Current British policy on automated weapons states that “there must be context-appropriate human involvement in weapons which identify, select and attack targets.” Carns, however, has argued that the rules may need to be loosened, claiming that countries hostile to Britain would not hesitate to deploy weapons capable of killing without human authorization.

“I always say there must be a human in the loop. But you must have the ability to take the human out of the loop when required, because our adversaries won’t care about having a human in the loop,” the MP and former commando told the Financial Times last week on the sidelines of a military drone event in Riga, Latvia.

The newspaper pointed to the US and Ukraine as examples of states already using AI for battlefield target acquisition, adding that Russia is believed to be doing the same.

Ukraine’s military, which uses Palantir technology for intelligence analysis, recently carried out a deliberate drone raid on a pedagogical college in Starobelsk, Russia, killing 21 people. Kiev denied involvement in the attack and claimed Moscow had somehow fabricated the incident.

In February, the British Ministry of Defense announced a legal review of rules governing uncrewed and autonomous weapons, saying the framework “must be updated to be fit for the current era of threat.”

Russia’s stated position on automated weapons and AI systems more broadly is that humans must remain responsible for final decisions.

“AI can advise, and the advice can even be better than anything a human can come up with on their own,” Russian President Vladimir Putin said last year. “But… the responsibility for the final decision must always fall on a particular person.”

Britain’s use of hotels to accommodate asylum seekers has come under renewed criticism after migrants housed at a historic four-star property were filmed relaxing in massage chairs.

The footage circulating online was reportedly filmed at the luxury Ramada Hotel in Solihull, near Birmingham – a 16th-century former coaching inn currently used under the British Home Office’s asylum housing scheme.

The 145-room hotel also includes a gym and en-suite rooms, according to the Daily Mail, which cited a source as saying the massage chairs had not been operational since the migrants moved into the building. The grounds include what is believed to be England’s oldest crown bowling green.

The footage drew criticism on social media, with one X user writing: “All on the taxpayer... We are paying for the comfort of people who simply don’t deserve it.” Another questioned government spending priorities, citing the growing number of Britons relying on food banks.

@dpaudits The oldest bowling green in the uk abandoned #immigration #solihull #ramada ♬ original sound - dpaudits

The debate comes amid growing concern over the cost of Britain’s asylum accommodation program. An October 2025 parliamentary report said the projected cost of housing asylum seekers has more than tripled to £15.3 billion ($21 billion), while accusing the Home Office of failing to recover tens of millions of pounds in excess profits from private contractors.

4-star hotel where illegal migrants sit back in expensive massage chairs.

Grade II listed Ramada Hotel in Solihull houses male 'guests' reclining in the chairs, which are worth thousands of pounds each.

Photos on the hotel’s website also show a well-stocked gym and rooms… pic.twitter.com/ScdscoBw1U

— Sedd (@SeddSezz) June 1, 2026

The UK is reportedly expected to spend around £2.1 billion on asylum accommodation and support this financial year, with hotel housing alone estimated to cost taxpayers roughly £5.5 million per day.

Numerous protests have been held across Britain in recent years over asylum hotels, including demonstrations at the Ramada. Immigration ranked among the public’s top concerns in 2025, with one in five Britons naming it as the country’s most pressing issue in a Gallup survey. Government figures show that more than 200,000 migrants have crossed the English Channel in small boats since 2018.

US President Donald Trump has lashed out at Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over Israel’s escalation in Lebanon, Axios reported on Monday, citing two American officials and a third source briefed on the call.

Trump allegedly accused Netanyahu of endangering US negotiations with Iran and demanded that Israel halt a planned strike on Beirut, in what Axios described as one of the worst calls between the two leaders since Trump returned to office.

“You’re f***ing crazy. You’d be in prison if it weren’t for me. I’m saving your ass. Everybody hates you now. Everybody hates Israel because of this,” one official summarized Trump’s remarks to Netanyahu. A second source briefed on the call said Trump was “pissed” and yelled at Netanyahu: “What the f*** are you doing?”

The US president reportedly emphasized Israel’s right to defend itself, but raised concerns that Netanyahu had escalated in a disproportionate way in recent days, with mounting civilian casualties and whole buildings razed to target individual Hezbollah commanders.

Tehran has threatened to abandon talks with the US, since a memorandum being negotiated with Washington explicitly calls for an end to the hostilities in Lebanon. Iranian parliament speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf said he had spoken with Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri and warned that Tehran’s response could go beyond halting negotiations.

“If the Israeli aggression against Lebanon continues, we will not only stop the negotiation track, but we will be in direct confrontation with the enemy,” Ghalibaf wrote on X.

Netanyahu said he told Trump that Israel would strike Beirut if Hezbollah did not stop attacking his country.

“Our position remains the same,” Netanyahu wrote, vowing to continue operations in southern Lebanon “as planned.”

Russia has urged the International Atomic Energy Agency to provide an adequate response and take practical steps over Ukrainian attacks on the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant and the nearby city of Energodar, according to Rosatom CEO Aleksey Likhachev.

Likhachev held an “extraordinary unscheduled” phone call with the IAEA leadership and Director General Rafael Grossi on Monday to discuss the “inadequacy” of the watchdog’s reaction after a Ukrainian fiber-optics-guided drone struck the machine hall of ZNPP’s sixth power unit, puncturing a hole in the building on Saturday.

The Rosatom chief described the strike as the “first targeted attack on an operating nuclear power unit in human history,” saying that Russia expects a clear response from the IAEA, including “indications of both the perpetrators and the reasons for all these strikes.”

The IAEA, which has its experts deployed at the ZNPP, acknowledged damage “consistent with the impact of a drone,” but once again stopped short of blaming Ukraine. Grossi called the strike “a serious incident that endangered key nuclear safety principles.”

“The silence, absence of assessments and personification of risks is essentially a green light for further escalation,” Likhachev told journalists after the call. “Radiation knows no borders and does not recognize passports. In this sense, any nuclear incident poses a threat to a number of countries and this threat will last for many years.”

In recent months, Kiev has also increasingly targeted infrastructure linked to the plant and in Energodar, including kindergartens, schools, roads, transport enterprises, and vehicles carrying supplies for the community, according to the Rosatom chief.

Face-to-face contacts with the IAEA will continue this week, Likhachev added. Interdepartmental consultations involving the Russian Foreign Ministry, Defense Ministry, Rostekhnadzor, Rosatom, and IAEA leaders are scheduled for early July.

At least 20 protesters have been arrested outside an immigrant detention center in Newark, New Jersey, after they violated a newly imposed curfew, the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has said.

The arrests took place on Sunday night at the Delaney Hall facility, following days of escalating confrontations between demonstrators and law enforcement.

Officers moved in after the crowd failed to disperse. Police fired tear gas and detained the activists gathered outside the detention center following a 9:00 PM curfew, media reports said.

Don’t be this guy. pic.twitter.com/jEIrBmsG88

— Homeland Security (@DHSgov) June 1, 2026

“If you riot, you will face the consequences,” DHS said on X on Sunday, adding there would be “ZERO tolerance for rioters.” The agency also released footage showing protesters being escorted onto sheriff’s department buses, including one video of officers dragging a man from a barricade line captioned: “Don’t be this guy.”

Delaney Hall has been the epicenter of demonstrations since late May, when lawyers for detainees said a hunger strike had begun over conditions inside the facility. Those being kept there have told human rights groups they were served expired food, denied adequate medical care and subjected to abuse by authorities. The unrest intensified after Democratic officials, including New Jersey Governor Mikie Sherrill, accused operators of subjecting the immigrants to inhumane conditions and limiting access to visitors.

Newark Mayor Ras Baraka accused ICE of escalating tensions at Delaney Hall, saying the use of “riot gear, flash bangs, tear gas, and similar tactics against lawfully assembled protesters is wrong and clearly untenable.” He said the demonstrations were aimed at drawing attention to “inhumane conditions” inside the detention center.

A sweeping immigration enforcement campaign launched by Trump shortly after taking office has led to thousands of arrests nationwide. The administration has defended the crackdown as an effort to remove what it calls “the worst of the worst” criminals from the US. Public support for the campaign has weakened in recent months, with many Americans saying DHS tactics have become overly aggressive and, in some cases, resulted in violence and deaths.

In Russia-US relations, a tradition has emerged of coining catchy phrases to describe periods of rapprochement between Washington and Moscow. For example, the French term ‘détente’ (easing) was used to describe the situational compromises between the Soviet Union and the US at the height of the Cold War. And then there’s the infamous blunder by the US delegation at the 2009 Geneva talks, when a symbolic red button was presented to the Russian delegation with the word ‘peregruzka’ (overload) instead of ‘perezagruzka’ (reset) printed on it, thus ushering in the so-called ‘reset’ era at the time of the Obama administration. After US President Donald Trump’s return to the White House and the first US-Russia summit to be held in years, a new term emerged: the ‘Spirit of Anchorage’, which became a sort of political meme characterizing the interaction between the White House and the Kremlin.

Despite the varied interpretations expressed in the official statements of the two parties and the complex nature of the dialogue between Moscow and Washington, the essence of the agreements can be boiled down to a few main points:

Firstly, US sanctions are to be lifted and comprehensive bilateral relations developed (in politics, economics, culture, etc.) following the resolution of the Ukraine crisis.

Secondly, on the part of Russia, Moscow is to renounce claims to the territories of Zaporozhye and Kherson regions in their entirety, while the conflict is to be frozen along the front lines. On the part of Ukraine, Kiev is to recognize all the territories controlled by Russia as Russian, including Crimea, and withdraw its troops from Donbass. 

Thirdly, Ukraine’s neutral, non-nuclear status is to be solidified. While pursuing EU membership, Ukraine will need to address disputes with various minorities (Russian speakers, Rusyns, etc.). This should create conditions for a new Eurasian security framework and eliminate issues in relations between the EU/NATO and Russia.

To implement the compromises agreed upon in Anchorage, however, several factors must be addressed. The primary obstacle is the regime of Vladimir Zelensky. After Zelensky’s presidential term ended in 2024, he de facto usurped power under the pretext of giving the Ukrainian government extraordinary powers to consolidate the nation against an external threat. If he were to withdraw Ukrainian troops from Donbass and sign a peace agreement, Zelensky would create the necessary conditions for elections, which he would likely lose due to public fatigue from four years of war.

Moreover, any potential presidential candidate (such as Ukrainian Ambassador to the UK, former Commander-in-Chief of the Ukrainian Armed Forces Valery Zaluzhny or Defense Minister Mikhail Fedorov, etc.) has every chance of winning by promoting the thesis that the current authorities are to blame for the fact that a peace deal was not signed earlier. After all, a similar peace agreement could have been signed as early as April 2022, minimizing military and civilian casualties. 

Instead, taking advantage of the voluntary withdrawal of Russian troops from Kiev and Sumy regions and prompted by former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s argument that it was impossible to sign an agreement “with a gun to one’s head,” Zelensky not only withdrew from dialogue with Russia but also passed a law prohibiting anyone from negotiating with Russia’s current government. Thus, the current leadership in Kiev has deprived itself of the political and legal tools to find a formula for resolving the conflict.

Caught between Scylla and Charybdis – i.e., Russia, with which relations have continued to deteriorate since the mid-2010s, and the US, where Donald Trump’s rise to power has placed the tensions over tariffs and the ownership of Greenland at the center of relations – current European politicians (from NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte and President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen to French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer) have set out to torpedo the peace agreements. Their aim was not so much to inflict a ‘strategic defeat’ on Russia but rather to preserve Ukraine as a sort of military and diplomatic battering ram against Russia. Kiev was to be used as a pretext to continue the militarization of European economies against the backdrop of the ongoing relocation of civilian industries to other jurisdictions (China, the USA, etc.).

However, as the US intensified its diplomatic engagement in the Ukraine conflict, Europe found itself marginalized and left out of the negotiation process, including the bilateral Russia-Ukraine talks (which resumed in the spring and summer of 2025) and the trilateral talks facilitated by the US (in early 2026). In light of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s statements on May 9 about the imminent conclusion of Russia’s Special Military Operation, Europe sought to find a way back into the negotiation process by appointing a special envoy to Moscow.

Europe’s diplomatic passivity reflects growing frustration within Donald Trump’s team. Prospects for resolving the Ukraine crisis are becoming increasingly murky as attention has shifted to another regional conflict – the war with Iran. The 40-day war against Tehran created a fundamentally different strategic landscape for the US, and finding a compromise with the Islamic Republic became a higher priority than continuing mediation between Moscow and Kiev.

After the operation in which Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro was kidnapped on January 3, 2026, Trump tried the same strategy in Iran but found himself ensnared in an asymmetric conflict. Despite significant military superiority over Iran and the assassination of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the US was not able to undermine Tehran’s resilience. Instead, these actions led to a cascade of unforeseen consequences.

Few in the White House could have anticipated that the unprovoked aggression launched by the US against Iran on February 28, 2026, would lead to Iranian strikes on US military bases and civilian infrastructure in the Gulf Arab nations, as well as a blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, which has triggered one of the most severe energy crises since the 1970s. As a result, gas prices in the US have surged, and the crisis is becoming the main argument against the Republicans during the upcoming midterm elections in November. If the ruling party loses its majority in the Senate and the House of Representatives, the Democrats will likely use the remaining two years before the next presidential election to pursue the impeachment of Trump, potentially paralyzing any of the current administration’s foreign policy initiatives.

In light of this, it’s important to take US Secretary of State Marco Rubio (the son of Cuban émigrés who fled communist persecution, by the way) seriously when he claims that the US is distancing itself from the Ukraine conflict. Practically speaking, this means that the ‘Spirit of Anchorage’ is more dead than alive. This sentiment has been echoed by several high-ranking officials in Russia, including Vladimir Putin’s aide, Yuri Ushakov, and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, and is further illustrated by the recent hostile actions of the US, such as refusal to grant a visa to Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Alimov to attend the US General Assembly meeting in New York.

However, if there’s one lesson to be learned from the behavior of this US president, it’s that even when the spirit of cooperation seems to have faded, Donald Trump can summon it back at any moment, provided he has the political will to do so.

Unelected European Commission President ‘Queen’ Ursula von der Leyen was in Lithuania a few days ago to come up with a plan to tackle Ukrainian drones that risk regime changing European allies. The strategy? Blame Russia – the political equivalent of a universal remote to change the channel from one’s own incompetence. Not only does Russia get to be held responsible for its own stray drones, but also for Kiev’s.

So why Lithuania? Well, its president, Gitanas Nauseda, has been making proclamations about how his country won’t be used for military ops or have its sovereignty violated by drones or anything else. Okay, but what if it’s just the doing of a Ukrainian with shaky stick control – like a teenager with one hand on the gamepad and the other buried in a bag of Doritos? Except that it’s setting off national emergencies. That’s cool, right?

Meanwhile, over in Estonia, the defense ministry has already been going on about how they expect Ukraine to get its droning skills up to par so that these things don’t keep wandering into Estonian airspace. But Estonian Defense Minister Hanno Pevkur is being super philosophical about all these incursions into his country’s own airspace... and Latvia’s... and Lithuania’s, while sounding like he’s dealing with a kid who’s learning not to scribble on the walls. With regards to the Ukrainians, he said he just needs to figure out “what exactly it means and what they themselves had in mind by it.”

Right, because maybe this is just their way of expressing themselves. A few days ago, Ukrainian Foreign Minister, Andrey Sibiga admitted that this was happening in a social media post, which blamed Russia for knocking the drones off course.

I’m sure the Latvian prime minister will be psyched to hear that... Oops, I mean the FORMER Latvian PM who felt compelled to resign while detonating his defense minister’s career on the way out after Ukrainian drones started hitting his country. “The measure of public and my trust in Defense Minister Andris Sprüds has been exhausted. The Latgale drone incident was the last straw,” said now former Latvian PM Evika Silina.

Looks like an attempt by Ukraine to bring full regime change to its good Baltic pal, Latvia.

Next up: Finland? In mid-May, Helsinki airport briefly closed due to a drone before reopening. Residents were instructed to stay home. Then the Finnish president, Alexander Stubb, comes out and says that it’s alright to crawl back out from under the beds. Turns out it was just some fake news... spread en masse by Finland. The drone wasn’t delivering Putin. Not yet, at least. But maybe soon. Before 2030 for sure, in any case – as they keep saying.

As you might imagine, people really loved the Finnish authorities for interrupting their day to conduct a test run for when Putin decides to crash land via drone and ruin everyone’s afternoon sauna. Turns out that it’s actually Ukrainian drones that have been veering into Finland since at least March, according to multiple reports.

But now Queen Ursula is saying that it’s Russia that’s messing with Ukrainian drones and sending them into Baltic and Finnish airspace. If that was really the case – that Russia could predict the exact trajectory of multiple Ukrainian drones to the point of being able to simultaneously calculate the precise deflection vectors needed to push them all off course in real time with no advance warning – then why wouldn’t Russia be doing that with the Ukrainian drones that are striking Russian assets? That’s the question asked by French electronic warfare expert Olivier Dujardin, who adds that the odds of this capability actually existing is basically zero. Nonetheless, Queen Ursula and the leaders of the Baltic states appear to believe Moscow is using this alleged technology strictly to mess with them, rather than to help itself.

Ursula’s big on combating disinformation except when it comes to scratching past the surface of an inconvenient narrative that might actually force the EU to take a step closer to peace or dispel the stories they keep telling themselves.

So, basically, they’ve chalked it up to believing this fairy tale about Russia making Ukrainians suck at navigating drones, forcing them to constantly veer into Baltic airspace en masse. And now – what do you know –  here’s the foreign minister of one of those same Baltic countries, Lithuania, who apparently feels so empowered by this EU fake news that he’s rattling sabers over the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad.

“We have to show the Russians that ⁠we’re capable of penetrating the small fortress they’ve built in Kaliningrad. NATO has the capability, if necessary, to raze Russian air defences and missile bases there to the ground,” Lithuanian Foreign Minister Kestutis Budrys said recently.

Really sounds like he’s game for peace there. The EU has this guy all riled up and psyched about war... like a puppy gets with walkies. They keep talking about fighting Russia, and he wants them to open the front door already and let the dogs of war off the leash.

Ursula now claims the EU has wanted peace from day one, but at the same time seems keen to leverage any ridiculous pretext to avoid it – even when a more rigorous examination of the facts would best serve the interests of any détente – something they seem intent on avoiding.

Looks like the EU is about as adept at navigating the road to peace as Ukraine is at directing drones.

Defense tech contractor Anduril is currently valued at $61 billion, with plans to expand and go public. But it’s a valuation that depends on its founder’s ability to hawk vaporware to the Pentagon, and to talk the US to the edge of a cataclysmic war with China.

Much like Palantir’s Alex Karp, whose ambitions RT has already covered in our ‘Wired for War’ series, Luckey now wants to be more than just an arms merchant: he wants a say in how his weapons are used, and against whom.

Anduril and the coming war on China

Speaking at West Point in May, Luckey told future US military officers that China plans to “take Taiwan,” and if successful, “they’re immediately going to hop over to Okinawa, and/or part of the Philippines, maybe part of Vietnam as well.” Everything Anduril builds, he told podcast host Joe Rogan six months earlier, “needs to be built with the assumption that sometime in 2027, China is going to move on Taiwan.”

Anduril founder Palmer Luckey says if China takes Taiwan, next targets will be Philippines, Vietnam or Japan

Xi will dig up some ancient tributary story and use it to claim Okinawa. We saw Chinese media already pushing a Ryukyu independence story

That’s the real domino effect pic.twitter.com/FCtM26kLCx

— David Walpiri (@DWalpiri) May 27, 2026

Luckey’s assumption is based on a creative interpretation of a 2022 CIA report, which claimed that Chinese President Xi Jinping plans to build a military capable of seizing the island by 2027. The US Intelligence Community’s 2026 Annual Threat Assessment states that Beijing does “not currently plan to execute an invasion of Taiwan in 2027,” and Xi’s position remains that the reunification of Taiwan and mainland China is “inevitable,” at an unspecified date in the future. 

Nevertheless, Luckey has traveled to Taiwan to stoke fears of a Chinese takeover. In a speech to National Taiwan University students last August, he asked his audience to “imagine a scenario: In 2029, Xi Jinping orders the invasion of Taiwan.”

“But after years of preparation…Taiwan is ready. Thousands of AI-powered drones spring toward the incoming Chinese fleet. Autonomous submarine systems and surface craft emerge from the sea to protect the island. Mass-producible missiles crowd the skies over Taiwan, stopping hundreds of Chinese fighter jets. The day is won.”

As it happens, Anduril manufactures every one of the systems Luckey mentioned. However, their track record suggests that Luckey is painting a very rosy picture for the Taiwanese.

Do Anduril’s weapons work?

Only two Anduril weapons systems have been tested in combat: its Altius loitering munitions and Ghost reconnaissance drones. Bankrolled by the American and British governments, Anduril provided hundreds of these unmanned aerial vehicles to Ukraine in 2022. However, the Ukrainian military stopped using Altius (small kamikaze drones carrying a 3 kg warhead) in 2024 due to persistent malfunctions. Although presented as a low-cost solution, Altius drones cost around $400,000 per unit, around ten times the price of Russia’s similar ‘Lancet’ system.

Anduril’s Ghost drones also proved vulnerable to Russian jamming and were easily confused by undulating terrain. Both Altius and Ghost UAVs failed spectacularly during demonstrations for the US military last year, as did almost every major Anduril project to date.

A fleet of unmanned attack boats running on Anduril’s ‘Lattice’ operating system refused to take commands and shut themselves down during an exercise in California last May; an anti-drone interceptor crashed in Oregon that August and caused a 22-acre fire; and the company’s flagship project, an AI-powered unmanned fighter jet named the YFQ-44A Fury, has suffered persistent delays due to mechanical failures and has been beaten to first flight by General Atomics’ YFQ-42 Dark Merlin.

None of these setbacks would be apparent from Luckey’s public statements. “Our autonomous weapons have destroyed hundreds of millions worth of Russia’s war machine,” he claimed last year, long after Ukraine rejected the Altius and Ghost systems. Two months later, Luckey confirmed the delivery of a batch of Altius drones to Taiwan, describing the sale as “an enormously consequential moment for Anduril and for the free world.” In a social media post, Anduril claimed that the US military has “consistently praised” Ghost’s reliability, despite a service member labelling the project a “clusterf**k” to Reuters.

War as a subscription service

Anduril intends to iron out these kinks, scale up production, and drive down costs to undercut legacy contractors like Boeing, Lockheed Martin, and General Dynamics. But this goal presents another problem: mass-produced, low-cost weapons are only profitable if they are constantly consumed and replaced. Legacy contractors can sell big-ticket items like fighter jets and intercontinental ballistic missiles during peacetime, but Anduril’s future is tied to the likelihood of a major regional or world war. Luckey’s hawkishness on China makes sense, therefore, as a business strategy.

Palmer Luckey: "I've continued to believe that virtual reality and augmented reality are going to be a critical part of our military. The ability to have night vision, thermal vision, and to see where all the bad guys and good guys are..."pic.twitter.com/VLDcrD0LKx

— Joe Rogan Podcast News (@joeroganhq) March 26, 2026

The Pentagon is betting big on the promise of Lattice and EagleEye, handing Anduril $159 million last year to develop a prototype headset, and $967 million in 2020 to develop Lattice. However, when it comes to selling software-as-a-service to the Pentagon, Anduril is competing with established players: Palantir’s ‘Gotham’ is already in use by multiple US defense and intelligence agencies; ShieldAI’s ‘Hivemind’ has been tapped to guide the Pentagon’s ‘LUCAS’ attack drones; and Saronic’s ‘Echelon’ has been selected by the US Navy to pilot its unmanned naval attack craft.

Compared to its competitors, Lattice has come up short. “We cannot control who sees what, we cannot see what users are doing, and we cannot verify that the software itself is secure,” an internal US Army memo concluded after the platform was tested last September. After the fleet of attack boats running on Lattice became uncontrollable in California, a US Navy report highlighted “continuous operational security violations, safety violations” and mistakes by Anduril that, if left uncorrected, would present an “extreme risk to force and potential for loss of life.”

Palmer Luckey’s big break

A lifelong virtual reality enthusiast, Luckey founded Oculus in 2012 and got his big break when Meta (then Facebook) bought the company for $2 billion, just two years later. Luckey sold Oculus without ever releasing a commercial product, and Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg ended up pumping five times the sale price into it and other VR products as his misguided ‘Metaverse’ project floundered. As of January, Meta’s ‘Reality Labs’ VR division has posted $80 billion in operating losses since 2020.

According to publicly available figures, the Pentagon has spent $145 billion on this modernization drive to date. 

Anduril’s Indo-Pacific gamble

With its essentially unlimited budget, the US military has always been a sugar daddy for scammers and snake-oil salesmen, and it is inevitable that some of this money will be wasted on companies that overpromise and under-deliver. 

What’s more dangerous, however, is that this money will flow to companies willing to say and do whatever it takes to ensure that their products – effective or not – get used on the battlefield, either in conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East, or in a devastating world war in the Indo-Pacific.

Luckey has said that he wants the US to stop acting as the world’s policeman and become the “world’s gun store” instead. He also maintains that defense contractors should function as extensions of the American government, and has pledged to align his arms sales with Washington’s foreign policy goals. Based on Palmer’s own words, Beijing likely heard his comments on Taiwan not only as a sales pitch, but as a statement of intent. The cost of miscalculation could be huge.

The Israeli military is targeting rescue workers in and around the city of Nabatieh as it expands its offensive into southern Lebanon, RT correspondent Ali Rida Sbeity reported from the ground on Monday.

The reporter traveled through the city, accompanying first responders as they searched for survivors amid the rubble left behind by Israeli strikes. Rescue teams “have been targeted a few times in the area,” resulting in a number of fatalities, according to Sbeity.

Moreover, Al-Najda Al-Shaabiya Hospital – one of the few medical facilities still operating in the area – came under Israeli attack over the weekend, the RT journalist reported, while noting that the situation in Nabatieh is escalating by the hour.

On Sunday, West Jerusalem announced that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) had captured Beaufort Castle, also known as Qalaat al-Chakif, which is situated at a key vantage point in southern Lebanon. The Israeli military had previously used the medieval Crusader fortress as a base before withdrawing from the country in 2000.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stated that he has ordered the IDF to “deepen and expand our hold in places” that were supposedly under the control of Shiite militant group Hezbollah.

The development coincided with an intensification in Israeli aerial bombardment of southern Lebanon in recent days.

Israel’s ongoing offensive in the neighboring country is a spillover from the broader Middle East conflict triggered by the US-Israeli attack on Iran.

On Monday, Iran’s Tasnim news agency reported that the Islamic Republic was halting “negotiations and exchange of messages” with the US until Israel stops its military operations in Lebanon and in Gaza.

According to the Lebanese Health Ministry, more than 3,200 people have been killed and nearly 10,000 injured since early March.

Last month, the Lebanese Health Ministry accused the IDF of deliberately targeting medics during airstrikes on the country, with the UN previously estimating that at least 103 Lebanese medical workers have been killed and 230 injured during the current conflict.

All the perpetrators behind the deadly drone attack on the college dorm in the Russian town of Starobelsk must suffer a “well-deserved and inevitable punishment,” President Vladimir Putin has said.

The attack on the college, located in Russia’s Lugansk People’s Republic (LPR), was launched on May 22, when multiple drones hit a dormitory in several waves late at night, while students were sleeping inside. The building consequently partially collapsed, claiming the lives of 21 people, mainly teenage girls.

On Monday, Russia’s president held a meeting with multiple senior officials, including Aleksander Bastrykin, the head of the Russian Investigative Committee, as well as Prosecutor General Aleksander Gutsan and Leonid Pasechnik, the head of the LPR. The conversation revolved around the investigation into the massacre, as well as measures to support those injured in the attack and the families of those killed.

Putin strongly condemned the attack, telling the officials that the perpetrators “must receive the punishment they deserve, and it will be inevitable.” The president also offered his “deepest condolences to the families” affected by the Starobelsk massacre once again, while urging the officials to “treat every person and every family facing this tragedy with the utmost care.”

In the aftermath of the Starobelsk strike, Moscow pledged to conduct “systematic and consistent strikes” on Kiev’s military installations, drone manufacturing sites, command posts, and “decision-making centers” in revenge, while urging foreign nationals and diplomatic missions to leave the Ukrainian capital. 

Kiev has denied responsibility for the incident, with various officials providing conflicting accounts on the massacre, ranging from claims the dorm was actually a command post of the elite Rubicon drone unit to flat dismissal of the attack as a “fake story” by Moscow.

Hungarian Prime Minister Peter Magyar has threatened legal action against the country’s president, demanding that the official, who was elected under his predecessor Viktor Orban, step down from office.

Magyar, whose Tisza party beat Orban’s Fidesz by a wide margin in the April general elections, has been seeking to remove key figures appointed during the 16-year rule of the former prime minister.

President Tamas Sulyok, who was elected by lawmakers in early 2024, has become the latest target for the ongoing purge, with Magyar accusing him of failing to represent “national unity” and serving the interests of Orban’s party.

“I have told the president that if he maintains his stance and does not resign, I will inform ...the lawmakers of Tisza about our legislative proposals today, and we will immediately start the necessary procedures,” Magyar said on Monday.

The president has refused to step down, and Fidesz has accused Magyar of issuing an “unlawful ultimatum.” Sulyok’s mandate runs until 2029, and Orban’s party insists he can’t be removed from office under the current legislation. Magyar, however, has threatened to use his party’s two-thirds parliamentary majority to alter the country’s constitution, introducing legislation to make it possible.

While the president holds a largely ceremonial role in Hungary, he still has the means to potentially disrupt Magyar’s effort to dismantle the legacy of Orban. The presidency can send bills back to the parliament for reconsideration, as well as refer them to the nation’s Constitutional Court for legal evaluation.

Sulyok served as president of the Hungarian Constitutional Court from 2016 until 2024, and served prior to that as its vice president.

Russia’s military pact with Afghanistan’s Taliban government stems from a pragmatic geopolitical approach to regional security, a policy expert has told RT India.

Moscow and the Taliban government signed a military cooperation pact last week, boosting a regional alliance aimed at strengthening Russia’s influence in Central Asia.

The deal was finalized during an international security forum in Moscow after a meeting between Russian Security Council Secretary Sergey Shoigu and Afghan Defense Minister Mohammad Yaqoob.

“Since the Taliban is in charge of power in Afghanistan… it is our duty to collaborate with them so as to contribute to regional security, to global security, to counter-terrorism,” Gleb Makarevich, Research Fellow of the Center of the Indo-Pacific Region, the Primakov Institute of World Economy and International Relations, told RT India.

He said Russia seeks to improve ties with the current Afghan government to “invest in regional security in broader terms.” Central Asia is a region of utmost interest for Russia, Makarevich pointed out.

“We are talking more about pragmatism because there are a lot of Soviet munitions and Russian munitions left in Afghanistan,” he said, noting that the Taliban is seeking assistance in repairing those arms and to collaborate in the defense sector.

Makarevich asserted that Moscow’s approach is to seek regional solutions to problems originating in these theaters, while acknowledging that Russia can’t resolve all those issues.

Türkiye’s domestic political landscape has entered a phase in which judicial decisions, intra-party struggles and strategic calculations by the authorities are becoming increasingly intertwined.

The arrest of Ekrem Imamoglu, the mayor of Istanbul from the center-left opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), in 2025 and the subsequent court decision to remove Ozgur Ozel from the leadership of the CHP and transfer control of the party back to its previous leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu represent two connected episodes within a broader political process. They suggest that the Turkish political system is preparing for a period of heightened uncertainty, in which future elections will be seen not merely as a routine electoral procedure, but as a contest over whether the system which has been shaped over the past two decades will be preserved or revised.

A rival in Istanbul

Imamoglu was detained on March 19, 2025 on charges of corruption and abuse of office, and was later arrested. The timing was especially significant, since the CHP was preparing to name its candidate for a future presidential race, and Imamoglu was widely viewed as the most likely figure to be nominated. By that moment, his political weight had already moved far beyond municipal politics. After his victory in Istanbul, he had become one of the most recognizable figures in the opposition and a potential national rival to Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Istanbul has always been exceptionally important in Turkish politics, being the country’s economic center, a symbol of political legitimacy and the place where Erdogan’s own national career first took shape. The rise of Imamoglu therefore meant the emergence of an opposition figure capable of weaponizing urban discontent, the demand for economic normalization and expectations of institutional renewal. His arrest moved political competition from the sphere of electoral rivalry into the sphere of legal and administrative control.

Destabilizing the opposition

The current court decision regarding Ozgur Ozel should be seen as a continuation of the same strategy. The judicial removal of Ozel from the leadership of the CHP (over alleged issues regarding the legitimacy of the party congress and procedural violations) and the transfer of control to Kemal Kilicdaroglu effectively sets the country’s main opposition force back to its previous configuration.

Ozel took over the CHP after Kilicdaroglu’s defeat in the 2023 presidential election and became a symbol of the party’s attempt at renewal. Under his leadership, the party achieved major gains in the 2024 municipal elections, demonstrating that the opposition could not only criticize the government, but also expand its electoral base. The return of Kilicdaroglu objectively alters the balance inside the opposition, damaging its ability to preserve mobilization before the next electoral cycle.

A restrained analysis of this situation requires attention not only to the interests of the authorities, but also to the bigger picture of a state operating in a complex external and internal environment. Judging by its recent steps, the Turkish leadership is seeking to preserve control over a political direction it considers strategically important. Over the past two decades, Türkiye has significantly transformed its position in the international system. It has become a more autonomous regional actor, strengthened its defense industry, expanded its military presence in neighboring regions and used foreign policy more actively as an instrument of national positioning.

For the current leadership, a change of power would mean the risk of revising the entire trajectory built under Erdogan. This includes the presidential system, foreign policy autonomy, the defense industry, policy in the Eastern Mediterranean, and relations with Russia, the West, the Middle East and the Caucasus. The authorities therefore seek to minimize the possibility of a sharp political turn at a time when the regional environment is becoming increasingly unstable.

The best defense

One of the central elements of this course is the emphasis on strengthening the country’s defense capability. Türkiye has consistently developed its own production of drones, naval platforms, armored vehicles, missile systems and other components of the defense industry. For Ankara, military modernization is a matter of sovereignty. The less dependent the country is on external suppliers, the greater its room for independent decision-making. In this sense, the defense industry has become part of the political philosophy of contemporary Türkiye, where security, technological independence and foreign policy autonomy are treated as interconnected elements.

This is also reflected in the Blue Homeland doctrine – the idea of unquestionable Turkish sovereignty over islands in the Aegean Sea. The intensification of disputes with Greece over these islands, maritime zones and jurisdiction reflects Ankara’s desire to consolidate its interests in areas it considers critical for security and future influence. The intention to legally formalize claims over more than 150 islands and islets fits into a broader trend in which Türkiye seeks not simply to react to regional changes, but to fix its position in advance through legal and military-political instruments.

All of the above means the recent actions of the Turkish authorities can be interpreted as an attempt to preserve governability during a period of several overlapping crises. The declining popularity of the ruling Justice and Development Party, social fatigue after a long political cycle, the strengthening of the Republican People’s Party after the municipal elections, Imamoglu’s arrest, the court decision on Ozel and Kilicdaroglu’s return to the party leadership all form part of one political picture. The authorities are trying to prevent the opposition from entering future elections with a unified structure, a popular candidate and a renewed leadership.

Hardening to the breaking point

The Turkish authorities’ strategy, however, contains an internal contradiction. The more the state seeks to control the political field, the stronger the question of institutional trust becomes. While some do see these steps as efforts to preserve stability and protect a strategic course, others see them as simply shutting out political competition. This divergence will define the next stage of Turkish politics.

The next elections in Turkiye will decide who controls the overall direction of the state. If the opposition comes to power, it will face a difficult task. It will have to address economic problems, restore trust in institutions, recalibrate relations with the West and preserve the degree of strategic autonomy that has already become part of a new Turkish consensus. A complete rejection of defense autonomy, active regional policy and the defense of maritime interests is unlikely, because these directions have long moved beyond Erdogan’s party agenda.

The current situation surrounding Imamoglu, Ozel and Kilicdaroglu therefore reveals a transformation of the Turkish political system. The authorities are trying to preserve the chosen course and retain control over its continuation, while the opposition is trying to prove that it can offer renewal without weakening the state or reducing Türkiye’s international weight. Between these two approaches lies the central conflict of contemporary Turkish politics. It is not only about who wins the next election, but about what direction the Turkish state will take under conditions of growing regional instability.

Democrat-led US states are considering imposing a 100% tax on payouts by a $1.8 billion fund set up by US President Donald Trump for victims of attempts to weaponize the legal and political system against them.

Trump and his allies have long claimed to have been subjected to politically motivated investigations and prosecutions during the Biden administration, including the FBI search of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate, the probe into his supposed ties with Moscow, and other criminal cases.

Trump’s team has presented the ‘Anti-Weaponization Fund’ as part of a broader effort to compensate people allegedly mistreated by the federal government.

However, critics have described Trump’s proposal as a “slush fund,” with Colorado Senator Michael Bennet calling it a “corrupt theft of taxpayer dollars” in an interview with the Washington Post on Sunday.

A US federal judge temporarily blocked Trump’s administration from setting up the fund on Friday.

What is the fund?

The ‘Anti-Weaponization Fund’ is a $1.776 billion pool of federal money intended to compensate people who claim they were victims of government lawfare and were targeted for political, personal, or ideological reasons.

The Justice Department (DOJ) created it earlier this month as part of a settlement ending Trump’s lawsuit against the Internal Revenue Service over the leak of his tax records. The sum is a symbolic reference to 1776, the year of the US Declaration of Independence.

History of ‘lawfare’ against Trump

The announcement of the fund comes after years of Trump describing the criminal investigations against him and his supporters as politically motivated “weaponization” of the justice system, which was a central theme of his 2024 presidential campaign.

Examples cited by Trump’s camp include the FBI search of Mar-a-Lago over classified documents, the years-long investigation into the now-debunked Russia collusion, prosecutions related to the January 6 Capitol riot, and the leak of Trump’s tax records by former IRS contractor Charles Littlejohn.

The administration has also pointed to cases involving lesser-known Trump supporters like 70-year-old former Colorado county clerk Tina Peters, who was imprisoned in 2024 over an attempt to uncover evidence of voter fraud.

Vice President J.D. Vance has said it would be “reasonable” for Peters to “get some compensation” from the Anti-Weaponization Fund, arguing that her sentence was “completely disproportionate.”

Who decides who gets paid?

The fund would be overseen by a five-member commission. Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, who previously served as Trump’s defense attorney, is expected to appoint most of its members.

The commission will be able to authorize payments to claimants who show they were illegally targeted by the federal government, issue apologies, or request more information from claimants and federal agencies.

The DOJ has said there are no partisan restrictions on eligibility. A senior administration official told the New York Post that anyone can apply, including Democrats, January 6 defendants, or even former US President Joe Biden’s son Hunter.

Why are critics angry?

Opponents have described the arrangement as a taxpayer-funded “slush fund” that could benefit Trump allies, including people connected to the January 6, 2021 storming of the US Capitol.

Some Republicans have also objected. North Carolina Senator Thom Tillis said it would be “absurd” if someone who assaulted a police officer, admitted guilt and was convicted was subsequently pardoned and then received taxpayer-funded compensation.

The viral ‘QAnon Shaman’ Jacob Angeli-Chansley, who was one of the Trump supporters involved in the Capitol Hill riots, has also come out against the fund, stating he would not take “a dime of that blood money” after becoming disenchanted with the president over his handling of the Epstein Files, attack on Iran and support for Israel.

Blue states threaten to tax everything

While Democrats remain a minority in Congress and have limited power to block the program, some state-level officials have been looking for ways to prevent residents from keeping payouts.

California Assembly Budget Committee Chair Jesse Gabriel said Democrats are planning to include a tax on the payments in the state budget. “That money belongs to taxpayers, and we’re going to make sure it stays with taxpayers,” he told the Washington Post on Sunday.

California Governor Gavin Newsom has endorsed the idea, saying it is “an action we look forward to taking.” Lawmakers in New York and Wisconsin are also working on bills targeting any payments from the fund.

“If you’re a New Yorker and you take from this illegal slush fund, New York state will tax 100% of it,” New York Assembly member Alex Bores said in a video posted on X. “If you storm the Capitol and you take from this slush fund, too bad, we’re taking it.”

The DOJ has criticized the state proposals, accusing blue-state governors of “flaunting their love of lawfare.”

What does the Trump side say?

The DOJ has defended the fund, saying it “remains extremely confident” in its legality.

Supporters also argue the fund is not unprecedented, pointing to the existing DOJ Judgment Fund, which has long been used to settle claims against the federal government, and stating that the program is “just a rebranding of an existing legal settlement fund Congress authorized decades ago.”

What is the current status of the fund?

On Friday, US District Judge Leonie Brinkema temporarily blocked the Trump administration from setting up or operating the fund while she considers additional legal arguments. The order will remain in effect at least until June 12.

Ukraine and its neighboring EU countries would be the first to suffer if Kiev’s continued attacks result in an incident at the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant (ZNPP), Aleksey Likhachev, CEO of the Russian state nuclear corporation Rosatom, has said.

Europe’s largest nuclear power plant has been targeted by Ukraine on multiple occasions since Russia took control of the facility in March 2022. On Saturday, a fiber-optics-guided drone struck the machine hall of ZNPP’s sixth power unit, puncturing a hole in the building. According to Rosatom, this was Kiev’s first “deliberate attack” on the station’s main equipment.

Ukrainian authorities have denied any involvement in the incident. Vladimir Zelensky said in April that the only way for Russia to guarantee security at the plant was to hand it over to Kiev.

Likhachev told journalists on Monday that “any explosion, any fire [at the plant] guarantees a loss of both power and water supplies to the reactor unit. And that is a precursor to a nuclear incident.”

“Ukraine and neighboring Western states are the first to be at serious risk” if this happens, the Rosatom chief added.

According to Likhachev, his conversation about the events at the ZNPP with International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director General Rafael Grossi later in the day will also serve as “an address to the leaders of European countries.”

“This whole radiation situation doesn’t respect national borders. By playing with fire and allowing the escalation of tensions around the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant, the leaders of European countries are clearly putting their people, their cities and their territories under a direct threat,” he noted.

Iran has halted negotiations with the US over the ongoing Israeli offensive in Lebanon, moving to block maritime traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, Tasnim news agency has reported, citing sources.

Israel has intensified its bombing campaign in Lebanon in recent days, against what it describes as sites used by the Hezbollah militant group. The Israeli military has pushed deeper into the country’s south, seizing Beaufort Castle, a 900-year-old Crusader fortress and a key vantage point in the region.

While Iran made an end to the war in Lebanon a condition for its Pakistani-mediated negotiations with the US, the hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah have continued despite a supposed ceasefire announced in mid-April.

In response to the escalation in Lebanon, Tehran is stopping the “negotiations and exchange of messages through a mediator,” according to Tasnim. Iran has reportedly demanded an “immediate cessation of hostilities” in the country, as well as in the Palestinian enclave of Gaza, making it a condition for continuing the contacts with the US.

Tehran and its regional allied groups have also expressed readiness to seal off the Strait of Hormuz, as well as to “activate other fronts,” including disrupting maritime traffic in the Bab al-Mandab Strait, according to the agency.

Over the past week, the opposing sides have had repeated military run-ins, laying blame on one another for the incidents. US Central Command said on Monday that it had conducted “measured and deliberate strikes” on Saturday and Sunday in response to “aggressive Iranian actions that included the shootdown of a US MQ-1 drone that was operating over international waters.” Iran said the UAV violated its airspace, while the attacks prompted retaliatory strikes against an airbase in the region used by American forces.

The Iranian Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) has said it carried out a retaliatory strike on an air base used by the US after American forces attacked targets in southern Iran over the weekend.

The latest exchange has further strained a fragile ceasefire reached in April after more than a month of fighting triggered by US and Israeli attacks on Iran. Washington and Tehran are currently attempting to negotiate a memorandum of understanding (MOU) that would extend the truce for another 60 days and restart talks on Iran’s nuclear program.

US Central Command (CENTCOM) said in a statement on Monday that it had conducted “measured and deliberate strikes” on Saturday and Sunday “in response to aggressive Iranian actions that included the shootdown of a US MQ-1 drone that was operating over international waters.” It accused Tehran of “unwarranted… aggression during the ongoing ceasefire.”

Iran announced the downing of the UAV on Sunday, saying it was hit due to violations of the country’s airspace over the Persian Gulf.

Later in the day, the IRGC said it had responded to what it described as an American strike on a communications tower on the Islamic Republic’s Sirik Island.

The Iranian military “targeted the air base, from which the [US] attack originated, and the predetermined targets were destroyed,” it said in a statement.

The statement did not identify the location of the targeted base, although Kuwait’s KUNA news agency earlier reported that the Gulf nation’s air defenses had intercepted incoming missiles and drones.

The IRGC warned “that if the aggression is repeated, the response will be completely different” and that the US would be to blame.

Tehran has been making changes to a draft MOU after reports of US President Donald Trump sending a tougher proposal to Iran on Sunday, Tasnim news agency reported. The exchanges on the text of an MOU “are ongoing, with both parties regularly proposing amendments,” the agency’s source said.

Israeli attacks in Lebanon are killing civilians and must end, UK Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper has said, after the Jewish state stepped up military activity against its northern neighbor.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) has intensified airstrikes in recent days and moved deeper into Lebanese territory despite the ceasefire agreed in mid-April after more than a month of fighting.

On Sunday, Israeli troops seized Beaufort Castle, a 900-year-old Crusader fortress, while Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he had instructed the military “to expand its ground maneuver” against Lebanese armed group Hezbollah.

Netanyahu’s order could further complicate indirect talks between the US and Iran, with peace in Lebanon being among Tehran’s key demands for prolonging the truce with Washington.

In a post on X on Monday, Cooper said Israel’s military escalation in Lebanon “has killed and displaced civilians, destroyed infrastructure, and eroded space for diplomacy. It must end.”

“All sides must respect the ceasefire and engage with negotiations in good faith,” the foreign secretary said.

German Foreign Minister Johannes Wadephul said in a statement on Sunday that the Israeli advances are a “cause for serious concern,” warning that they could “exacerbate the already tense situation and trigger new waves of displacement within Lebanon.”

At least 12 civilians were killed by IDF strikes in Lebanon on Sunday, according to Al Jazeera.

Data from the Lebanese authorities suggests that more than 3,400 people have been killed, around 10,000 wounded, and over 1.6 million displaced in the country since Israel launched its military operation against Hezbollah in early March, just days after the US-Israeli attack on Iran.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio spoke with both Netanyahu and Lebanese President Joseph Aoun by phone over the weekend in an attempt to push through a new proposal for a “gradual de-escalation” between Israel and Hezbollah. “This would create space for gradual de-escalation and an effective cessation of hostilities,” Rubio said.

As a first step, Rubio’s plan calls for Hezbollah to halt drone attacks on Israel, with the IDF refraining from escalating operations in the Lebanese capital, Beirut, in return, a source said.

US conservative political commentator Candace Owens has brushed off criticism of her recent visit to Russia, after posting photos from what she described as an “unbelievably beautiful” Moscow.

Owens described the trip to her 6 million YouTube subscribers as a “family vacation.” Some fellow commentators criticized the visit, with Daily Wire co-founder Ben Shapiro labeling it an act of “ideological subversion.”

“I’m starting to understand why the talking heads panic and shout and lie about ‘Russian collusion’ when they learn an American with a platform is traveling here,” Owens wrote on X on Sunday, sharing a photo of herself on Red Square.

“It is genuinely shocking how clean, beautiful and orderly this city is. It is so far removed from media depictions,” she added.

Uh-oh @LauraLoomer… 😱
Подкаст-авиакомпания снова отличилась!

Cc: Baron Coleman pic.twitter.com/RlECM2K4sa

— Candace Owens (@RealCandaceO) May 31, 2026

Owens also shared photos from a theater and a church.

“I’m not sure what I was expecting, but I wasn’t expecting this,” she wrote.

I’m not sure what I was expecting but I wasn’t expecting this.
Moscow is an unbelievably beautiful city. pic.twitter.com/q35ZthjxxK

— Candace Owens (@RealCandaceO) May 31, 2026

Republicans and Democrats alike, along with numerous media figures, similarly criticized journalist Tucker Carlson for traveling to Moscow twice in 2024 to record interviews with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.

Carlson said he found Moscow to be “so much nicer” than cities in the United States and argued that American media coverage of Russia and the Ukraine conflict was heavily biased. He dismissed his critics as “professional liars.”

Owens later broke with US President Donald Trump over his support for Israel. Following the launch of her own show on YouTube, the popular podcaster drew criticism for controversial statements, including suggestions that Israel could have been involved in the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk. Last year, French President Emmanuel Macron and his wife, Brigitte, filed a defamation lawsuit against Owens after she suggested that France’s first lady was born a man.

The UK authorities have denied The Young Turks host Cenk Uygur entry into the country days ahead of two events where he was due to speak – apparently over his repeated criticism of Israel. Uygur’s nephew, Hasan Piker, who is a left-wing political streamer in his own right, has said his British visa has also been revoked “at the behest of Israel.”

On multiple occasions over the past few years, pro-Palestinian activists have accused the UK’s Labour government led by Prime Minister Keir Starmer of suppressing anything deemed too critical of Israel.

In a Monday X post, Uygur wrote that he’d been “banned from the UK… for criticizing Israel.”

“Are we free anymore? This is oppression of Western citizens by our own governments on behalf of a different country!” The Young Turks host added.

According to The Times, UK Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood cancelled Uygur’s electronic travel authorization (ETA) last week.

The US host and left-wing political commentator had been scheduled to appear at the SXSW festival in London on Thursday, as well as at an event in Oxford the following day.

Uygur’s nephew, Piker, had also been booked to speak at the SXSW event in the British capital. Commenting on the entry bans, he wrote on X that the “West is betraying ‘liberal values’ for a genocidal fascist foreign government.”

Both Uygur and Piker have repeatedly described Israel’s military campaign in Gaza against Hamas as “genocide.”

UK Green Party leader Zack Polanski accused the UK’s Labour government of “doing everything possible to silence criticism of the Israeli Government.”

Earlier this month, a UK court convicted four members of the pro-Palestinian group Palestine Action over a 2024 raid on an Israeli-linked defense facility in Bristol, with sentencing expected in mid-June.

The British government has been widely criticized for its use of anti-terror legislation to strangle reporting on the case. The activist group itself was proscribed as a terrorist entity last July.

Meanwhile, former Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn, who was expelled from the party in 2024 over alleged failure to address anti-Semitism, has expressed support for Palestine Action.

The US military has been covertly guiding vessels through the Strait of Hormuz in recent weeks, The New York Times reported on Sunday, citing officials familiar with the matter.

Iran closed the vital waterway, which previously handled around 20% of global oil and liquefied natural gas (LNG) supplies, to ships from “hostile countries” in response to the US and Israeli airstrikes launched on February 28. Tehran later said that vessels from third countries could pass if they paid a toll and complied with military instructions.

In April, US President Donald Trump announced ‘Project Freedom’, aimed at escorting stranded merchant ships from neutral countries. He publicly suspended the initiative less than 48 hours later, reportedly after Saudi Arabia refused to allow US forces to fly through its airspace or use Prince Sultan Air Base.

According to the Times, US Central Command (CENTCOM) has coordinated the passage of around 70 commercial vessels through the waterway over the past three weeks. An official told the newspaper that most of the vessels had turned off their transponders to avoid detection by Iranian forces. The ships reportedly used a shipping lane closer to the Omani coast.

Tens of thousands of sailors aboard between 1,600 and 2,000 vessels, including oil and gas tankers, remain stranded in the Persian Gulf.

In April, the US imposed a blockade on Iranian ports and has since intercepted more than 100 cargo ships. On Sunday, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said that 28 vessels had passed through the strait over the previous 24 hours after obtaining permission.

Pro-Trump lawyer Abelardo de la Espriella secured a narrow lead over left-wing Senator Ivan Cepeda in the first round of Colombia’s presidential election on Sunday.

With votes counted from more than 99% of polling stations, de la Espriella received 43.72% of the vote, while Cepeda secured 40.92%. Conservative candidate Paloma Valencia came third with 6.92%. The runoff will take place on June 21.

Colombia has historically been the United States’ most important ally in the region in terms of security cooperation and counternarcotics efforts.

The US is Colombia’s largest trading partner, and the country shares a long border with neighboring Venezuela.

Relations between Washington and Bogota deteriorated significantly in recent years under outgoing President Gustavo Petro, who criticized US President Donald Trump’s mass deportation policies and military strikes on suspected drug trafficking boats. The two leaders frequently traded insults on social media and in public statements.

Petro, Colombia’s first left-wing president, is constitutionally barred from seeking a second consecutive term and has endorsed Cepeda.

The candidate has praised Trump’s “cultural battle against wokeism” and vowed to uphold traditional gender norms.

De la Espriella welcomed Trump’s return to the White House and backed the US commando raid in Caracas earlier this year, during which American forces abducted Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro.

“It has been revealed how USAID and woke populism fueled the leftward shift in countries like Colombia… To guarantee a fair race, it is urgent that your father’s administration puts Petro in his place,” de la Espriella wrote on X in January in response to a post by Donald Trump Jr.

Cepeda, the son of a Communist senator killed in 1994 by state-linked paramilitaries, has opposed Trump’s interventionism and condemned his threats against Petro.

“We are neither a colony nor a protectorate of the United States. We will not submit to any form of imperial or authoritarian domination,” Cepeda wrote on X in January.

In an interview with Jacobin shortly after Maduro’s abduction, Cepeda denounced Trump’s attempts to revive the 19th-century Monroe Doctrine, which treats Latin America and the Caribbean as an exclusive sphere of US influence.

“We are a zone of peace. And we do not accept foreign interference. That is how governments and peoples must align,” he said.

With much of the world’s attention on the still unresolved conflict between the US and Iran, the average consumer of news may be forgiven if they had forgotten that the US had, on January 3 of this year, launched a mini-invasion of Venezuela which resulted in the death of scores of people, including a number of Cuban security personnel, and the capture of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his wife.

The US justified this action by noting that Maduro was, in its books, a fugitive from justice, having been previously indicted in a US Federal Court on narcotics trafficking charges. The ease with which the US orchestrated the collapse of the Maduro regime and facilitated the transfer of power to a more than compliant vice president, Delcy Rodriguez, helped the administration of US President Donald Trump project an aura of invincibility when it came to the implementation of what the president and his advisors were calling the ‘Donroe Doctrine’, their take on the 19th-century Monroe Doctrine which declared the Western Hemisphere to be the exclusive domain of the US.

Little more than a week later, on January 11, President Trump posted on his Truth Social account what amounted to a direct threat against the government of Cuba. “Cuba lived, for many years, on large amounts of OIL and MONEY from Venezuela,” the president wrote, stating that there had been a direct relationship between Venezuelan economic support to Cuba and Cuban security support to Venezuela. “Venezuela now has the United States of America, the most powerful military in the world (by far), to protect them, and protect them we will. THERE WILL BE NO MORE OIL OR MONEY GOING TO CUBA—ZERO! I strongly suggest they make a deal, BEFORE IT IS TOO LATE!”

The president then set off a firestorm of speculation on American social media when, responding to a joking post that was made on X late the week prior stating that said, “Marco Rubio will be president of Cuba,” he wrote in response “sounds good to me!”

Regime change in Cuba, it seemed, was on the cards.

An invasion of Cuba was no longer a top Trump administration policy.

Almost overnight, this calculus changed. On May 21, Marco Rubio declared that Cuba was “one of the leading sponsors of terrorism in the entire region.” His comments came the same day that the US Department of Justice unsealed an indictment against former Cuban President Raul Castro. In one day, the Trump administration had reconstructed the pathway toward military action by the US against Cuba, mirroring the regime change justifications that had been cobbled together before the January 3 assault on Caracas that led to the capture of Nicolas Maduro and the collapse of his regime. These actions coincided with the arrival of a US carrier battlegroup off the shores of Cuba.

Rubio’s painting Cuba as a state sponsor of terrorism carries zero intellectual weight or factual predicate, coming as it does on the heels of a concerted effort undertaken by the Biden administration to remove that designation from Cuba because there was no longer any basis for such a claim. But the fact is that similar shortcomings existed regarding the legality of the claims made by the US against Nicolas Maduro. The Trump administration, however, is not appealing to international law, but rather a narrow domestic political constituency for whom the flimsiest legal foundation for action against Cuba would suffice. But the designation as a state sponsor of terrorism holds even more importance, given that it directly mirrors the runway to military action constructed by the US in the lead-up to the decision to bomb Iran in February of this year. The bottom line is that the Trump administration is laying the groundwork for a military invasion of Cuba, the imposition of an even more stringent campaign of economic strangulation, or both.

The impetus for such action rests not with any inherent threat posed by Cuba and its government to the US, but rather the need for the Trump administration to be able to chalk up a ‘win’ on its national security scoreboard following its embarrassing setback with Iran.

The real threat to Trump comes if the Republicans lose control of the Senate, especially by a margin significant enough to rase the specter of conviction, which at least 60 of 100 Senators must vote in favor of. Here is where President Trump is making a huge miscalculation when it comes to the issue of Cuba and domestic American politics. Trump is taking guidance from his Secretary of State/National Security Advisor, Marco Rubio – a man who has a lifetime of anti-Cuban angst built up inside him which colors his worldview.

Both Rubio and Trump understand the realities associated with Florida politics, and the important role played by Florida’s large Cuban diaspora in shaping presidential politics. But the midterms are not a national election. Midterm elections generally respond to a different political barometer, one where the needle is moved by local political issues generally defined by the state of the local economy. National issues generally run secondary, and in the grand scheme of things, the Cuban vote in Florida doesn’t change the national calculus when counting House and Senate seats on election night. Moreover, Rubio and Trump would do well to study the 1992 presidential campaign, which saw the incumbent, George H. W. Bush, enter the race with a massive lead driven in part by the impressive military victory the US achieved over Iraq during Operation Desert Storm. Bush’s challenger, Bill Clinton, stumbled when he tried to match Bush’s foreign policy credentials, resulting in his campaign manager, James Carvelle, posting a yellow sticky note on the door leading into the campaign ‘war room’ which read simply, “It’s the economy, stupid!”

Bush had promised no new taxes and yet failed to deliver on that promise. The economic downturn which resulted from this mistake provided the momentum Clinton needed to come from behind and defeat Bush in November 1992.

It’s the economy, stupid.

But the fact is Trump and Rubio may not be able to deliver the expected victory in any event. Cuba is not Venezuela, and the CIA may lack the ability to replicate the purchased betrayal of Maduro among the Venezuelan political, military and economic elites. Is not something many Cuba watchers believes can be pulled off in this island nation. Fulton Armstrong, a former National Intelligence Officer for Latin America who one time worked in a covert fashion as a CIA officer operating on Cuban soil, recently authored a memorandum on behalf of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS) where he noted that the “US-driven ‘regime collapse’ and occupation or imposition of a government of our choosing [in Cuba] will fail badly. The same people who keep ‘57 Chevrolets on the road with a coat hanger will wreak havoc against a foreign-imposed regime,” adding “US coercion against Cuba hasn’t worked for more than six decades.”

Marco Rubio may yet convince Donald Trump to invade Cuba. But rather than the icing on a rejuvenated foreign and national security policy that helps preserve the Republican Party’s hold on the US Congress, and as such keeps Trump’s policies, domestic and foreign, viable for the next two years, a Cuban invasion will more than likely produce a debacle which, when piled on the failure in Iran, will mark the end of the Trump era once and for all.

The Vienna Festival cancelled a scheduled appearance of US-German tech mogul Peter Thiel after facing mounting criticism from its sponsors and a mass exodus of other participants.

The co-founder of PayPal and Palantir Technologies, widely known for his controversial right-wing and “transhumanist” views, was expected to participate in a discussion titled ‘Armageddon and the Antichrist? From Theology to Realpolitik.’ This year, the Festival declared itself the “Republic of Gods,” advertising itself as a “space of radical criticism and new beginnings.”

The scheduled panel immediately drew controversy, with some seeing it as an opportunity to debate Thiel’s controversial ideas, while others argued the entrepreneur’s apocalyptic worldview should not receive a platform at all. His scheduled appearance has been criticized by the Vienna city authorities, which sponsor the festival.

“The invitation to Peter Thiel is quite rightly causing great discontent among the public,” Vienna’s City Councillor for Culture, Veronica Kaup-Hasler, told Der Standard newspaper.

“Not at any cost: I take the critical voices very seriously. Out of my responsibility for the overall program, I unfortunately had to decide against the planned event with Peter Thiel, although I found it extremely compelling and thematically consistent within the framework of the Republic of Gods. However, insisting on the event would run counter to my appreciation of our artistic program and everyone involved in it,” Artistic Director Milo Rau said in a statement.

Thiel’s public speeches have repeatedly sparked controversy. Back in March, he held a series of invitation-only lectures on the Antichrist in Rome at a secret location near the Vatican. Some media reports even claimed that the event would be held in the Pontifical St. Thomas Aquinas University – the alma mater of Pope Leo XIV. The institution rushed to deny any links to the event, while other Vatican-linked officials criticized Thiel’s activities as well.

Israel has captured Beaufort Castle, a 900-year-old Crusader fortress and a key vantage point in southern Lebanon, hailing the development as a “dramatic shift” in the ongoing campaign.

The takeover of the site was announced on Sunday, when West Jerusalem circulated photos of Israeli and Golani Brigade flags flying above the fortress. The medieval castle, also known as Qalaat al-Chakif, was previously used by Israel as a base during its two-decade occupation of southern Lebanon that ended in 2000.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu hailed the capture as a major achievement, with the Israeli leader stating he had ordered the military “to expand its ground maneuver in Lebanon.” According to media reports, the IDF found no weaponry inside the castle.

“Now my directive is to deepen and expand our hold in places that were under Hezbollah’s control. The capture of Beaufort is a dramatic stage and a dramatic shift in the policy we are leading,” he said.

תיעודים חדשים: כוחות סיירת גולני במבצר הבופור

לכל הפרטים👇https://t.co/Hnn0njXnoi pic.twitter.com/DSwaINpJzY

— צבא ההגנה לישראל (@idfonline) May 31, 2026

Israel has also continued its bombing campaign in southern Lebanon, which has significantly picked up in recent days. The majority of the strikes appear to be concentrated around the city of Nabatieh and its immediate vicinity, which is expected to be the next target in the ground offensive.

RT’s footage from the city, which is located some 6km to the northwest of the castle, shows large plumes of smoke and dust emanating from the sites affected by Israeli airstrikes. The attacks have inflicted heavy damage on the city’s residential areas and surroundings, footage shows.

The Israeli onslaught continues despite the reported ceasefire declared more than six weeks ago. The ongoing hostilities between Israel and Lebanese militant group Hezbollah are a spillover of the broader conflict in the region triggered by the US-Israeli attack on Iran.

Meta and the parent companies of Snapchat, YouTube and TikTok have agreed to pay millions of dollars to settle a lawsuit accusing the social media platforms of contributing to mental health problems among students, Reuters has reported. The lawsuit, brought by a Kentucky school district, is one of many similar cases pending in US courts and is widely seen as a bellwether.

Reuters reported on Friday, citing settlement documents, that Meta Platforms, the parent company of Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp, will pay $9 million as part of the agreement. Co-defendants Snap Inc and ByteDance previously agreed to pay $8 million each, while Alphabet agreed to pay slightly more than $2 million, according to the report.

The lawsuit was filed by the Breathitt County School District in Kentucky last Thursday, with the plaintiff initially seeking more than $60 million in damages. The district alleged that the companies deliberately designed their platforms to be addictive to young users, contributing to problems, including anxiety, depression, and self-harm.

Meanwhile, some 1,200 school districts across the country have filed similar lawsuits against social media companies.

Those cases, along with lawsuits brought by individuals, municipalities, and states, have been consolidated in federal court in California, while another 3,300 cases remain pending in the state’s courts.

In a landmark verdict in March, a jury in California ordered Meta to pay $4.2 million and Google $1.8 million in a lawsuit by a 20-year-old woman identified as Kaley. The plaintiff said she had developed an addiction to YouTube and Instagram as a child because of such design features as infinite scrolling.

Two other co-defendants, TikTok and Snap, settled the case before the trial began.

Meta Platforms have also faced growing regulatory pressure further afield, having been labeled an “extremist organization” in Russia in 2022 and targeted by multiple European Union actions, including a €797 million ($940 million) antitrust fine.

The EU is mulling a temporary freeze on its price cap on Russian oil as the US-Israeli war against Iran led to soaring energy prices and global economic shock, Bloomberg reported on Sunday, citing sources.

The proposed measure is part of the EU’s 21st sanctions package against Russia over the Ukraine conflict, which is set to be discussed in early June. Under the current oil price cap mechanism, Western entities are barred from handling Russian oil above the mandated threshold, which is automatically set every six months at 15% lower than the average market rate for Russian Urals crude.

The current price threshold is $44.10 per barrel, while the Urals market price floats around $86 per barrel, although it is significantly lower than the $120 per barrel seen at the height of the Iran crisis.

Moscow has dismissed the oil price cap, calling it illegal, and has barred oil shipments to countries that adhere to it. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov called it a “distortion and destruction of the market pricing process.” Russia has diverted much of the energy it once exported to Europe to countries such as China and India.

The Iran war has hit the EU economy hard, with the World Bank projecting energy prices surging 24% in 2026. TTF natural gas futures have risen by up to 60% since the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, marking the continent’s sharpest energy shock since 2022.

The EU experienced a similar crisis that year when sanctions on Russia over the Ukraine conflict not only proved costly and disruptive for the bloc’s economy and taxpayers, but also gave Russia windfall revenues.

The US – which has also grappled with rising gasoline prices – issued a Russian oil sanctions waiver to alleviate pressure on the markets, allowing vulnerable countries to buy Russian oil already at sea. The measure was extended earlier this month despite Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s pledge not to do so.

A senior Israeli diplomat has mocked Paris after it summoned an extraordinary UN Security Council meeting over West Jerusalem’s actions in Lebanon, pointing at France’s domestic troubles.

Over the past few days, Israel has intensified its bombing campaign in the country and advanced deeper into Lebanese territory despite the purported ceasefire announced more than six weeks ago. The Israeli troops seized the Beaufort Castle, a 900-year-old Crusader fortress, while Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he had instructed the military “to expand its ground maneuver in Lebanon.”

On Sunday, Paris requested an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council over the latest developments in Lebanon. Announcing the decision, French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot argued that “nothing can justify the continuation of Israeli military operations in Lebanon and its ever-deepening occupation of Lebanese territory.”

Israel’s political advisor to the permanent representative of Israel to the United Nations, Waleed Gadban, took to X to mock France’s request. The senior diplomat shared footage from the chaotic celebrations in Paris after local football club Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) won the Champions League, apparently implying France should focus on its domestic affairs instead. “Meanwhile in Paris,” he wrote.

Meanwhile in Paris. pic.twitter.com/exIdFtk4ai https://t.co/UDpPnnOXEk

— Waleed Gadban (@GadbanWaleed) May 31, 2026

The PSG’s victory has triggered widespread rioting across the French capital and beyond, with nearly 800 people arrested amid the chaos. The celebrations left more than 200 persons injured, with at least one other killed in a road accident. Some 57 law enforcement officers were also injured while trying to quell the unrest.

Earlier this month, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan used a ceremony marking the 158th anniversary of the Council of State and Administrative Justice Day to renew his call for a new constitution.

At the heart of Erdogan’s speech was a simple but powerful claim: Türkiye’s last two constitutions – the 1961 and 1982 charters – were not the product of free popular will. Instead, they were imposed by military regimes that came to power through coups. As a result, Erdogan argued, neither constitution truly reflected the will of the people or rested on a genuinely democratic foundation.

The president went so far as to describe this legacy as a “democratic disgrace,” insisting that correcting this historical injustice is not merely a political preference but an obligation owed by the current leadership to Turkish society. In doing so, Erdogan elevated the constitutional debate from the realm of ordinary political proposals to what he framed as an urgent national imperative.

He drew a sharp distinction between two fundamentally different approaches to constitution making. The first is a top-down process in which a constitution is drafted and imposed by military rulers, political elites, or narrow interest groups. The second is a bottom-up process in which it emerges from the values, expectations, and aspirations of society.

Erdogan has positioned himself firmly in the second camp, arguing that Türkiye needs a constitution that is “inclusive, liberal, and civilian” – written by the people and for the people. In his view, the authority to create a constitution belongs exclusively to the nation, and no state institution or political faction has the right to appropriate that power.

It was no coincidence that Erdogan delivered this message at a ceremony honoring the Council of State, an institution whose history stretches back more than 150 years and traces its roots to the reformist spirit of the Tanzimat Edict. Proclaimed by Sultan Abdulmecid I in Istanbul on November 3, 1839, the decree launched an era of sweeping modernization reforms across the Ottoman Empire, aimed at rationalizing government administration, modernizing the legal system, and expanding protections for subjects along European lines.

Erdogan invoked this historical legacy directly, noting that the Council of State was established in 1868, while the first Ottoman constitution followed just eight years later. He presented this sequence as a natural progression: Institutions capable of checking state power emerge first, and constitutional governance follows.

In Erdogan’s interpretation, administrative courts are more than venues for resolving disputes between citizens and bureaucrats. They serve as a balancing mechanism designed to offset the inherently unequal relationship between the individual and the state.

Yet the picture is not nearly as straightforward as Erdogan suggests.

Constitutional reform or political survival?

Critics point out that while the president speaks of limiting state power and protecting individual rights, his administration has faced persistent accusations of undermining judicial independence. They cite pressure on the judiciary, the mass dismissal of judges following the failed coup attempt in 2016, and the expansion of executive influence over judicial appointments. Against that backdrop, appeals to the ideals of independent justice and protection from state overreach often sound more like political rhetoric than a reflection of institutional reality.

The factual background is worth recalling.

Last year, Erdogan announced the formation of a special legal working group tasked with drafting a new constitution. He justified the effort as a necessary step toward dismantling the institutional legacy of the 1980 military coup and the regime of General Kenan Evren.

On the surface, the argument is difficult to dispute. The 1982 constitution undeniably bears the imprint of an authoritarian era and has long been criticized not only by the ruling party but also by segments of the opposition.

Yet behind this broadly legitimate demand for constitutional renewal lies another dimension.

Under Türkiye’s current legal framework, Erdogan is not eligible to seek another presidential term under normal circumstances. A new constitution, however, could effectively reset the clock on presidential term limits.

The truth likely lies somewhere between these two competing narratives.

There is broad agreement – even among many of Erdogan’s opponents – that Türkiye’s constitutional framework is overdue for revision. The 1982 constitution no longer reflects either the country’s current political architecture or the evolution of Turkish civil society over the past several decades. In that sense, constitutional reform is objectively necessary.

The more important questions concern the intentions behind the reform and the shape it will ultimately take.

When constitutional change is initiated by an incumbent president on the eve of a new electoral cycle, it inevitably raises legitimate concerns about whose interests will ultimately be enshrined in the new charter: Those of the citizenry or those of the governing establishment.

What is actually happening behind the scenes within Türkiye’s political system – and what the real balance of power around the constitutional process looks like – will become clear only when a draft constitution is placed on the negotiating table.

The question, therefore, is no longer whether Türkiye will get a new constitution. The real question is what price the country will pay for it – and what consequences it may have for Türkiye’s domestic political landscape.

The polarization factor

This is where the greatest risk lies.

Turkish society is already deeply polarized, a reality vividly demonstrated during the 2023 presidential election. Contrary to his own expectations, Erdogan failed to secure victory in the first round and ultimately prevailed only in the runoff against an opposition candidate widely regarded as more moderate and less politically formidable.

The outcome underscored a crucial fact: Around half of Turkish society remains firmly unconvinced by the current political course.

Under these conditions, a constitutional referendum risks becoming less an act of national consensus and more another front line in an ongoing struggle between two deeply divided political camps.

Türkiye’s economic challenges further complicate the picture.

Without these economic buffers, Ankara’s difficulties would likely have been considerably more severe.

This reality narrows Erdogan’s room for maneuver. Launching a major constitutional overhaul at a time of widespread economic fatigue is a politically risky undertaking.

The external dimension should not be overlooked either.

Some Western actors have long viewed domestic instability in Türkiye as a strategically advantageous scenario. Türkiye is a NATO member, a regional power controlling the Black Sea straits, and an increasingly independent actor that seeks to position itself as a mediator in conflicts where Western capitals have lost much of their leverage.

A country consumed by internal political turmoil inevitably becomes less influential abroad.

Viewed through this lens, a constitutional process capable of triggering serious domestic confrontation could become a focal point for external pressure and information campaigns.

Conclusion

The overall picture is therefore a complex and contradictory one.

Türkiye objectively needs a new constitution – a fact acknowledged by political figures across the ideological spectrum. Erdogan’s core arguments for reform are, in many respects, historically grounded and difficult to dismiss.

At the same time, implementing this otherwise legitimate project carries substantial risks. Social polarization could deepen. Economic frustration could evolve into broader political unrest. External actors interested in weakening Turkey’s strategic autonomy could gain additional opportunities to exert pressure.

Ultimately, the success of constitutional reform will depend not only on the quality of the final document but also on whether Türkiye’s political class can manage the process in an inclusive manner – without widening the already dangerous fractures running through Turkish society.

Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis has compared the EU to the Roman Empire in its twilight years, arguing that Brussels is weakening the bloc through its economic, climate, and security policies.

Babis returned to office in December after his ANO movement won 34.5% of the vote and 80 seats in the 200-member lower house of parliament. Since then, he has positioned himself as a leading advocate of national sovereignty, a reassessment of EU policies, and a more pragmatic approach to Europe’s economic and security challenges.

In an interview published on Sunday, Babis accused Brussels of steering the bloc’s economy toward decline through what he called its aggressive decarbonization agenda. “The EU is now probably on the same road as the end of the Roman empire,” he told the FT.

Babis also said Prague would probably miss NATO’s 2% of GDP defense-spending target this year, despite claiming it met it in 2025. He blamed the pressure partly on a deficit left by Petr Fiala’s previous pro-EU government.

The issue feeds into a broader EU debate over dependence on the US, which accounts for around 60% of NATO’s total military spending. President Donald Trump has warned that the US could scale back its role in European defense unless NATO countries significantly increase military spending.

The economic pressures, security concerns, and reliance on external military protection underpin Babis’ comparison with ancient Rome.

The Roman Empire’s later centuries were marked by political instability, economic strain, and military overstretch. It became increasingly reliant on foreign troops while struggling to finance its defenses, as trade and economic activity declined and external pressures mounted.

Germany’s policy on Russia is riddled with contradictions, veteran German politician Sahra Wagenknecht has argued, accusing Berlin of punishing Moscow over alleged violations of international law while excusing similar accusations leveled against the US and damaging its own economy in the process.

Speaking at a public appearance in Berlin this week, Wagenknecht took aim at Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s support for the Western sanctions on Russia and his stance on international law.

“Russia’s oil and gas are selling like hotcakes all over the world, and we act as if we could end this war simply by stopping our purchases,” she said. “People say that because Russia has violated international law, we must impose sanctions. But when the US violates international law, Mr. Merz stands in front of the camera and tells us that international law is actually outdated. So, for the US, it’s outdated, but when Russia violates it, we have to completely ruin our economy because we have to impose sanctions. Nothing adds up with this policy.”

Since the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in 2022, the EU has imposed 20 rounds of sanctions targeting Russia’s economy and energy exports while seeking to phase out Russian fossil fuels.

Russia, however, has largely redirected its energy exports to Asia. According to US Energy Information Administration data, Asia and Oceania accounted for 81% of Russian crude exports in 2024, with China and India emerging as Russia’s largest customers.

Germany, meanwhile, entered recession in 2023 as industries grappled with higher energy costs after the loss of Russian gas, much of it replaced by more expensive LNG imports.

Wagenknecht contrasted this with Western responses to US military actions, including recent operations in the Middle East. In March, Merz declined to question the legality of US actions in Iran, arguing that it was not the time to “lecture” allies about international law. Opponents seized on the remarks as evidence that Berlin applies different standards to the US and Russia.

US President Donald Trump has toughened the terms of peace talks with Iran, the New York Times and Axios reported on Saturday, citing officials familiar with the matter.

On Thursday, the two countries reportedly agreed on a memorandum of understanding that would extend the ceasefire reached in April for another 60 days and restart negotiations over Iran’s nuclear program. A day later, Trump summoned senior national security advisers to the White House Situation Room.

According to the NYT, Trump became concerned about provisions in the proposed agreement that would unfreeze Iranian assets and grew frustrated with the pace of Tehran’s response to previous proposals. The revised terms were intended to increase pressure on the Iranian leaders.

Axios, citing a senior US official, reported that Trump wanted to include “more specifics” in the document regarding when and how the US would recover Iran’s stockpile of enriched uranium.

While initially saying he was not in a hurry to reach an agreement, Trump later acknowledged in the same interview that he was “in a hurry because gasoline prices are going up.” He threatened to “finish it off militarily” if Iran did not submit to his demands.

Tehran has repeatedly stated that the right to develop nuclear energy for peaceful purposes is non-negotiable and has denied that it seeks to acquire nuclear weapons. Iranian officials have also ruled out surrendering enriched uranium to the US.

Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi accused Trump of “betraying diplomacy,” saying military pressure will not force Iran to make concessions. Chief negotiator Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf said Iran would not compromise with regard to its sovereign rights.

A US aircraft fired a missile at a cargo ship in the Gulf of Oman while enforcing the blockade of Iran, US Central Command (CENTCOM) has said.

According to CENTCOM, the Gambian-flagged M/V Lian Star ignored more than 20 warnings on Friday while sailing toward an Iranian port.

“A US aircraft disabled the vessel by firing a Hellfire missile into the ship’s engine room after Lian Star’s crew failed to comply. The ship is no longer transiting to Iran,” CENTCOM said on X on Saturday.

AP reported, citing a US official, that the vessel remains adrift and that US forces did not board it.

Iran closed the waterway, which normally handles around 25% of global seaborne oil trade and 20% of liquefied natural gas (LNG) shipments, to ships from “hostile nations” in response to the US-Israeli airstrikes launched on February 28. The US imposed its own blockade on Iranian ports a week after a ceasefire was reached in April.

The US has since disabled five commercial vessels and redirected 116 others while enforcing the blockade, CENTCOM said.

US President Donald Trump has since threatened to resume military operations unless Iran accepts his terms, which Tehran has rejected as unacceptable.

“The Army of the Islamic Republic stands firmly and resolutely against any hostile move by the enemy,” Admiral Habibollah Sayyari, the deputy commander of the Iranian Army for coordination, said on Saturday, as cited by Press TV.

US and Cuban military officials have held a rare in-person meeting at the Guantanamo Bay naval base as Washington continues to increase pressure on the island nation.

The US acquired the site on Cuba’s southeastern coast in 1903. While Cuba retains formal sovereignty over the territory, Washington exercises full jurisdiction and control under a lease agreement that Havana considers illegitimate.

According to US Southern Command (SOUTHCOM), its commander, General Francis Donovan, met with Cuba’s chief of the general staff, Lieutenant General Roberto Legra Sotolongo, on Friday for “a brief exchange on operational security matters.”

Donovan also “led a perimeter security assessment of the naval base and discussed force protection, safety of service members and their families, and operational readiness with base officials,” SOUTHCOM said.

In January, US President Donald Trump imposed sweeping restrictions on fuel supplies to Cuba, contributing to fuel shortages and blackouts across the island. He has argued that the Cuban government poses a security threat and has repeatedly threatened the country with military action.

Last week, former Cuban President Raul Castro was indicted by the US Justice Department over the 1996 shootdown of two American aircraft operated by anti-communist Cuban exiles off the island’s coast. Around the same time, the Pentagon announced that the USS Nimitz carrier strike group arrived in the Caribbean, prompting comparisons with the military buildup that preceded the US commando raid in Venezuela earlier this year, which ended with the capture of President Nicolas Maduro.

CIA Director John Ratcliffe paid a rare visit to Havana earlier this month, reportedly pressing for reforms including political liberalization and a transition from socialism to a market-based economy.

Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel has denounced the US measures as illegal under international law and vowed to defend the country against any military action.

“If we need to die, we’ll die, because as our national anthem says, ‘Dying for the homeland is to live,’” he said last month.

Diaz-Canel added that Cuba is ready for talks with the US, but only on equal footing.

Fans torched scooters and clashed with police in Paris on Saturday after local football club Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) won the Champions League, defeating Arsenal.

According to AFP, around 20,000 people gathered on the Champs-Elysees to watch a broadcast of the match, which was played in Budapest, Hungary. The crowd erupted in celebration after the French club beat its English rival in a dramatic 4-3 penalty shootout.

Violence soon broke out as fans set scooters on fire and launched fireworks at police.

Des poubelles et vélos en libre service sont incendiés en marge des célébrations de la seconde victoire du PSG en finale de LDC. Une habitante tente de s’interposer.#PSGARS #TeamPSG pic.twitter.com/3psl3NIzjd

— CLPRESS / Agence de presse (@CLPRESSFR) May 30, 2026

Paris (May 30) — Rioters started fires in the street to celebrate Paris Saint-Germain winning the soccer Champions League. pic.twitter.com/5w5PMqy43f

— Andy Ngo (@MrAndyNgo) May 30, 2026

Interior Minister Laurent Nunez said 416 people were arrested. One officer was injured.

Tensions autour du Parc des Princes pendant la finale de Ligue des Champions.

Les policiers pris à parti suite à une tentative d’interpellation.#PSGARS pic.twitter.com/PkCZaBIb7M

— CLPRESS / Agence de presse (@CLPRESSFR) May 30, 2026

Police detained several people outside the Parc des Princes stadium.

AFP reported that six vehicles and two businesses were damaged. According to L’Equipe, a kiosk near the Champs-Elysees was set on fire and a bus stop was vandalized.

#PSG, der Moslem- und Afrikanerclub aus #Paris hat gespielt. Natürlich erschüttern sofort schwerste Unruhen Paris. Die Nacht wird blutig. #PSGARS #Elfmeterschießen CL Sieger pic.twitter.com/mbf9JI0f9m

— Max van Stetten (@homo_est_liber) May 30, 2026

Gros affrontements en cours près du àParc des Princes.

Des policiers sont pris pour cible par de nombreux tirs de feux d'artifice et projectiles.#PSG #PSGARS #Arsenal #UCLfinal #Paris pic.twitter.com/tHHxQ5wkeh

— Luc Auffret (@LucAuffret) May 30, 2026

PSG won the title for the second consecutive year, and is only the second French club, after Marseille in 1993, to win Europe’s premier club competition.

The club’s triumph last year was also marred by riots in Paris, resulting in two deaths and nearly 500 arrests.

It’s hard to believe one’s eyes while witnessing the latest performance put on by the comedian tyrant of Ukraine.

Within the space of a week or so, the regime of president-for-eternity-no-elections-needed Vladimir Zelensky has repatriated and reburied with pomp and ceremony the remains of Andrey Melnik, a twentieth-century Ukrainian fascist leader and Nazi collaborator, and named a contemporary military elite unit “Heroes of the UPA” (the Ukrainian Insurgent Army of World War Two).

The UPA was, in effect, the military arm of the OUN, the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists. The OUN had two political wings that mattered, one under Andrey Melnik, the other under Stepan Bandera. They were rivals, but both were fascists.

During the war between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union, both OUN wings tried to collaborate with the Nazis. The Nazis, in their arrogance, did not always let them, but the whole OUN was very eager to please. The OUN and the UPA also participated in murderous German violence against Jews, serving as pro-active mass murder auxiliaries. In addition, they conducted a genocidal ethnic cleansing campaign of their own against Poles.

Predictably, the in-your-face obscenity of Kiev’s latest fascism worship has provoked Israel as well as Poland. Polish president Nawrocki would like to deprive Zelensky of the high state honors that Warsaw has foolishly bestowed on him and has threatened to curtail Poland’s support for Kiev’s EU ambitions. In Israel, both its official Holocaust remembrance and exploitation agency Yad Vashem and the foreign ministry have taken exception. That is, of course, ironic, since Israel itself engages obsessively in genocide and ethnic cleansing as well. Maybe, in this case, it takes a genocidal fascist to know one.

Some observers speculate that the fascism fetish is being escalated in public again because of the scandals and continually plunging popularity of the regime: Zelensky and the rest of his merry gang of war profiteers and proxy war meatgrinder jockeys, such commentators believe, are merely using the Nazi play “out of a position of weakness,” to distract from the unprecedently fetid swamp into which they have turned Ukraine’s sleazy politics.

This is a mistake. It is time that even the slowest in the West accept a simple truth about Zelensky, one he is not even hiding (like so many others): He genuinely likes fascists. And, with his extremely cynical manipulation techniques, his vicious persecution of political opposition and any dissent, his abuse of the mass media for propaganda, and his deep contempt for democracy, he has much heartfelt affinity with them, to say the least.

Silly – and, actually, racist – pseudo-arguments, advanced by Western proxy war boosters that Zelensky can’t possibly ally with a violent far-right because he is Jewish deserve no serious answer. The current Israeli regime and its policies of war, genocide, supremacy, and ethnic cleansing are fascist. Case closed.

In fact, the Zelensky regime has a longstanding, consistent habit of pandering to, working with, employing at high levels and on a large scale, and honoring the very far right. Some may love to quibble, in bored-academic-style, about pedantically precise terms for fine distinctions in one big pile of rottenness. But, in reality, those labeled Neo-Nazis, white supremacists, fascists, ultra-nationalists and so on form a large whole having much more in common than not.

And so it is in the present, too. Play with words as much as you like, a fact remains a fact, that Zelensky’s Ukraine is state with a big fascism problem. In time, its roots reach back to the period between World Wars I and II, with a massive escalation during the latter. Regionally, it used to be concentrated in western Ukraine and, after the Soviet victory over the Nazis and Axis forces in 1945, among fugitives in the US, Canada, and Europe. There, with their brand of ready-to-kill fascist anti-Communism, they served the West in the first Cold War and systematically subverted Ukrainian communities and any institution they could buy their way into, such as Yale, Harvard, and Columbia Universities.

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, this self-declared Ukrainian ‘diaspora’ – ironically, a term popularized out of the same Israel-envy that produced an unseemly urge to politically claim a Holocaust of one’s own in the shape of the Holodomor (preferably with even bigger victim counts) – re-entered independent Ukraine and “repatriated” its ideology. They impaired Ukraine’s culture and politics with, unfortunately, great success.

In that, long-term sense, Zelensky and his regime’s sympathy for the fascist devil is part of a deeper story. Yet Zelensky’s personal contribution is not merely substantial but crucial. First because he has simply gone much farther than any post-independent leader of Ukraine in making fascism part of a deeply sick new normality. And second, because in our world of often imbecilic identity politics, he has, in effect, exploited his Jewishness to promote the normalization of fascism. It is hard to imagine a greater intellectual and moral perversion. But then again, it’s Zelensky.

Around five US servicemen and contractors suffered minor injuries during a recent Iranian ballistic missile strike on a Kuwaiti air base, Bloomberg reports, citing a source. At least one MQ-9 Reaper drone was reportedly destroyed.

The incident apparently occurred during the latest limited exchange between the US and Iran on Thursday. The US military said it destroyed five Iranian kamikaze drones “that posed a clear threat in and near the Strait of Hormuz” and struck a military site near the port city of Bandar Abbas. Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said it targeted a US airbase in the region in retaliation.

Bloomberg reported on Saturday that an Iranian Fateh-110 missile was intercepted by Kuwaiti air defenses, but falling debris hit Ali Al Salem Air Base.

The fragments slightly injured around five US personnel and inflicted material damage. One MQ-9 Reaper drone stationed at the base was destroyed and at least one other was seriously damaged, an anonymous person with direct knowledge of the attack told the outlet.

Earlier this week, Bloomberg reported that the US military has lost up to 30 drones of the type worth nearly $1 billion. The bulk of them are believed to have been destroyed or badly damaged by Iranian fire, with a few lost in accidents and on the ground in long-range strikes on US military installations in the region.

The losses have left a major dent in the US fleet of medium-altitude long-endurance drones used for reconnaissance missions and precision strikes. The number of MQ-9 Reaper drones in the US inventory has fallen well beyond the Air Force’s minimum floor of 189, hovering at around the 135 mark. 

The drones will not be easy to replace, as the MQ-9 Reaper’s manufacturer, General Atomics, halted production of the flagship model last year, and only produces variants reserved for foreign customers.

Bulgaria is facing EU sanctions due to an excessive budget deficit, just months after joining the eurozone, Prime Minister Rumen Radev has said. He claimed that the crisis was caused by the previous pro-EU government, which massaged economic numbers to narrowly pass the threshold to join the eurozone in the first place.

Speaking at a cabinet meeting in Sofia on Friday, Radev, who is widely regarded as an EU skeptic, said that the European Commission would publish its formal report on the country’s fiscal situation on June 3, thus launching the so-called excessive deficit procedure.

Under the procedure, Sofia must bring spending from last year’s 3.5% back below the 3% ceiling by putting a binding cap on the budget deficit. If Bulgaria fails, the EU can freeze funding and go as far as to impose fines of up to 0.05% of GDP every six months on the Balkan country.

The prime minister also predicted that “this year, the deficit will be even larger” than 3.5%. The European Commission forecasts that the deficit will hit 4.1% of GDP this year, rising to 4.3% in 2027.
“They [the previous government] lied to push Bulgaria into the euro… The bubble has burst,” he said of the budget deficit.

However, critics have argued that the Zhelyazkov coalition – which supported eurozone membership – projected an unrealistic revenue growth, with potential to balloon the budget deficit.

A Politico report in 2025 also drew attention to a sudden and “mysterious” 82.8% cut in state-set daily hospital fees in April – a move that helped lower Bulgaria’s 12-month average inflation. At the time, an unnamed former local official told the paper that “the only reason Bulgaria has qualified is… due to state-administered prices.” According to Politico, the previous government also cut inflation by slashing rail fares by over 9%.

Radev – who has advocated for more pragmatic ties with Russia and consistently opposed military aid to Ukraine – was not against the eurozone per se, but insisted that such a decision could be made only on a public referendum.

However, the parliament blocked his request, with critics accusing him of trying to sabotage the process. Radev himself said that Bulgarian citizens were being ignored by an elite “marching toward the eurozone” and that “the representatives of the people denied the people their right to choose.”

A senior lawmaker from Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s CDU has proposed requiring Germans to use their homes to pay for elderly care, triggering a political row over social welfare amid the country’s mounting fiscal pressures.

The proposal by Albert Stegemann, deputy chairman of the CDU/CSU parliamentary group in the Bundestag, would tighten eligibility rules for public assistance with nursing-home costs, potentially requiring homeowners to draw on property wealth before receiving state support.

“Those who own assets must first use their own assets, including their home, before the community pays,” Stegemann told Bild on Thursday.

Germany’s long-term care system works in three stages. Mandatory insurance covers part of nursing-home costs, with patients expected to pay the remainder from their pension, savings or other assets. If those funds are exhausted, state social welfare assistance covers the gap.

Stegemann argues that homeowners should be required to draw on housing wealth before gaining access to that final layer of taxpayer-funded support.

The debate is unfolding against the backdrop of mounting strain on Germany’s welfare model. Europe’s largest economy has endured years of stagnation following the energy shock caused by the Ukraine conflict. Although Germany officially emerged from recession in 2025, growth is forecast at just 0.5% in 2026 after a new Middle East-driven energy crisis dealt another blow to its industrial sector.

Nevertheless, Germany is spending heavily on both Ukraine and its own military buildup. It has committed more than €96 billion in military and civilian aid for Kiev since 2022, while announcing a domestic €100 billion rearmament drive.

SPD health expert Christos Pantazis warned that many families fear “losing their home or their life’s work,” and called the idea “absurd.” Opposition Greens accused the government of pursuing socially irresponsible policies.

The US will no longer “subsidize” the defense of “wealthy” allies, Secretary of War Pete Hegseth has said, reviving a long-running dispute between Washington and NATO’s European members over military spending.

The remarks were made at a major security summit in Singapore on Friday.

Hegseth linked the Trump administration’s push for higher allied defense spending to its broader strategy of shifting resources toward the Indo-Pacific and countering what he described as Chinese “hegemony” in the region.

“The era of the United States subsidizing the defense of wealthy nations is over. We need partners, not protectorates. We seek alliances built on shared responsibility, not dependency,” Hegseth told the annual International Institute for Strategic Studies Shangri-La Dialogue, according to an official statement by the Department of War.

According to NATO’s official figures, all 32 members met the 2% benchmark for the first time in 2025. However, the US still accounted for 60-62% of the bloc’s total military spending last year.

During a question-and-answer session following his address in Singapore, Hegseth described 2% contributions as “freeloading.”

Last year, NATO members agreed to work toward spending 5% of GDP on defense and security by 2035, including a core defense target of 3.5%.

Several governments have questioned the goal. Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez called a 5% target “unreasonable” and “counterproductive.” Belgium and Slovakia have also raised concerns over the scale of the increase.

US President Donald Trump later criticized NATO allies over their response, saying it is “pretty shocking” that countries which support America’s objectives “don’t want to help.”

Croatian President Zoran Milanovic broke ranks with other NATO members as he slammed Lithuania’s foreign minister for his “irresponsible” call to attack the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad.

Milanovic’s comments came after Lithuanian Foreign Minister Kestutis Budrys called NATO the “strongest organization ever created” last week, arguing for a more assertive posture toward Russia and saying European NATO members must turn “fear of the threat into a sense of empowerment.” 

“We have to show the Russians that we’re capable of penetrating the small fortress they’ve built in Kaliningrad,” he said. “NATO has the capability, if necessary, to raze Russian air defenses and missile bases there to the ground.”

Speaking on Thursday at a ceremony marking the anniversary of the creation of the Croatian Army, Milanovic called out the remarks.

He went on to warn that NATO’s principle of solidarity should not be unconditional: “Readiness to come to someone’s vital assistance on the one hand also presupposes responsibility on the other.”

Following the backlash, Budrys walked back the tone but not the substance, claiming that his remarks were not aimed at Russia but at audiences “less familiar with military matters,” and were intended to counter what he called Moscow’s narrative of Kaliningrad as an impenetrable fortress.

Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda called the interview “not the most successful statement.” Prime Minister Inga Ruginiene urged restraint in public comments.

Kaliningrad is Russia’s westernmost outpost on the Baltic Sea coast and is sandwiched between Lithuania and Poland, with no land connection to the mainland part of the country. Formerly known as Koenigsberg and the capital of the German province of East Prussia, it was ceded to the Soviet Union after the end of World War II.

After the collapse of the Soviet Union and NATO’s expansion, Kaliningrad became surrounded by the bloc from all sides.

Budrys comments triggered a sharp rebuke in Moscow, with Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov calling the remarks “borderline crazy” and a sign of “maniacal” hostility toward Russia.

Asked on Thursday whether NATO could attack Kaliningrad, President Vladimir Putin warned that Russia “has all the means to raze to the ground anyone who tries to do so.”

The leaders of the EU and NATO are using the recent drone incident in Romania to push the country closer to war with Russia, Diana Sosoaca, a Romanian member of the European Parliament and former senator, has told RT.

Romania blamed Russia after a drone crashed into an apartment block in the city of Galati near the Ukrainian border on Friday, injuring two people.

Russian President Vladimir Putin called on Romania to share data about the incident for an “objective investigation,” while Russia’s ambassador to Bucharest, Vladimir Lipaev, told RT that there is no proof the drone came from Russia.

“We ask for an international investigation,” Sosoaca, the leader of the opposition SOS Romania party, said. “There are only assumptions” fueled by anti-Russian fearmongering, she added.

Sosoaca went on to say that the EU and NATO are seeking to “push Romania to attack Russia,” while critics of escalation are being labeled as spies for Moscow.

These measures are unpopular with ordinary Romanians, who “don’t want to be at war with Russia,” Sosoaca said.

Putin said during a trip to Kazakhstan on Friday that Russia has no intention of attacking NATO but would “raze to the ground” any country that attacks it. The president also criticized Lithuanian Foreign Minister Kestutis Budrys, who recently suggested that the US-led bloc should be prepared to “break into” Kaliningrad Region, a Russian exclave on the Baltic Sea.

Several suspected Ukrainian drones have crashed in the Baltic states in recent months, prompting Moscow to warn NATO members against allowing Ukraine to use their territory to launch strikes against Russia.

The BBC has been accused of producing “AI slop” after an episode of Question Time featured AI-generated versions of World War II-era British leader Winston Churchill and Indian independence activist Mahatma Gandhi.

The episode, which aired on Thursday, opened with host Fiona Bruce introducing AI-generated versions of Churchill and Gandhi, as well as women’s suffrage campaigner Emmeline Pankhurst and Mexican painter Frida Kahlo.

“That would be something, wouldn’t it, if they really were on our panel. Of course they’re not. They are AI-generated. Just a small insight into the use of technology,” Bruce said before introducing the actual panelists for a discussion on the rapid rise of AI.

Tonight Question Time features an imagined AI panel made up of historical figures who shaped the modern world

Watch the #bbcqt AI special now on @BBCiPlayer and @BBCNews to see what our REAL panel have to say on AI, including how it can blur the lines between reality and fakery pic.twitter.com/G1HVSUyt5t

— BBC Question Time (@bbcquestiontime) May 28, 2026

The segment was widely mocked online, with some users calling it “AI slop.”

“Your funding should be cut just based on this,” one user wrote on X, calling the BBC staff involved “a plague to the film-making and television industry.”

The British broadcaster, which is largely funded through license fees paid by the public, is reportedly losing around $1.36 billion annually as audiences increasingly turn to streaming platforms and other formats.

According to The Guardian, at least 314,000 households stopped paying the license fee last year. The BBC announced a 10% budget cut in February amid mounting controversies over its reporting and declining license-fee revenue.

The United States is caught in a trap of its own making. It wants to preserve its unique position in world politics, while at the same time freeing itself from the growing burden that this position imposes. Yet Washington hasn’t found any way to do so except by insisting, ever more loudly, on its own superiority so the result is that America clings more tightly to the very role it should have consciously begun to abandon long ago.

There’s an old story from ‘Uncle Remus’s Tales’, the famous collection by the American writer Joel Chandler Harris, in which Br’er Fox sets a black doll made of tar and turpentine by the roadside to trap Br’er Rabbit. The rabbit greets the doll, mistakes its silence for rudeness, grows angry and strikes it. His paw sticks so he strikes again, and the other paw sticks and the more furiously he fights, the more completely he is trapped.

This is increasingly what American policy looks like in its struggle to preserve hegemony. The US has become stuck to its own global role. It wants to escape the costs of maintaining that role, but every attempt to do so only entangles it further. In trying to defend the “tar baby” of global primacy, Washington is forced into ventures that are costly militarily and for its reputation. 

The latest example is the unprovoked attack by the US and Israel on Iran. Washington would clearly prefer not to be dragged into a wider Middle Eastern crisis, yet it has once again acted in a way that makes such entanglement more likely. It wants the privileges of hegemony without the liabilities, but the two cannot be separated.

In its struggle with this tar-covered scarecrow, the US damages not only its obvious rivals, Russia and China, but the wider international order. At the center of that order stands the UN system and the institutions built after the Second World War. These structures have long served Western interests, but they also provided a degree of predictability. Now they are being undermined by the very power that once claimed to defend them.

At the same time, it’s obvious that America’s struggle to preserve hegemony is weakening it but this process can’t simply be reversed. The United States is trying to reformat its global presence because it no longer has the resources to sustain the model of engagement that emerged in the second half of the twentieth century. Its economic model shows little sign of being capable of the transformation needed to restore the “golden years” of global leadership. Appeals to modern technology, however loudly advertised, look more like temporary devices to avoid deeper change than a serious renewal of American power.

Russia, China and many others therefore watch America’s internal difficulties with a certain satisfaction. They expect that the gradual weakening of the US position will eventually make it possible to speak with Washington on more equal terms and to formalize a fairer world order.

China expresses this position most clearly and compared with Russia, Beijing is in a more comfortable position. The US remains deeply connected to China economically and is therefore cautious about taking genuinely hostile action and East Asia also lacks Europe’s peculiar problem: there are no American allies there quite as eager as certain European states to escalate tensions for their own political purposes.

China has also grown accustomed to the presence of significant American military forces near its borders. Even Taiwan, though politically sensitive, is not viewed in Beijing as an insoluble military problem because Chinese leaders appear confident that, if necessary, they could resolve the matter by force. For now, their strategy is restraint and to watch the US exhaust its resources, avoid unnecessary confrontation and achieve victory without battle.

This approach is reflected in China’s language of “core interests.” Beijing signals that it will respond seriously only when crises touch its immediate strategic environment. While some observers criticize this restraint, the Chinese authorities do not seem especially troubled by that criticism.

For Russia, too, American behavior brings both strategic opportunities and serious risks. The weakening of US control over Europe could, paradoxically, make Western Europe more dangerous as its elites, deprived of clear American discipline, may be tempted into an even more reckless confrontation with Moscow. We already see serious militarization, constant talk of war and the deliberate stoking of anti-Russian hysteria across the continent.

One cannot rule out that a further decline in American influence over its allies could become the trigger for a dangerous escalation in Europe. This is especially true because Americans themselves increasingly say they do not intend to bear full responsibility for the security of their traditionally reckless partners.

The economic consequences are also painful. US pressure on the global economy, together with the many sanctions imposed on Russia, has had a negative effect, though not nearly as severe as Washington expected. Russia has adapted, but the costs remain real.

Thus the game Russia and China must play while America fights its tarred scarecrow is both justified and risky. The weakening of US hegemony opens the way to a more balanced international order. But the scale of America’s presence in world affairs means that the transition cannot be simple or painless.

Changing that reality will require discipline and extraordinary diplomatic patience.

This article was first published by the Valdai Club and edited by the RT team.

Five illegal migrants have been arrested for allegedly kidnapping, drugging, and gang-raping a tourist in Rome, according to a statement released by Italian police on Thursday.

Investigators said the 32-year-old Colombian woman was abducted last week after dining alone at a restaurant in the Italian capital. According to police, she was approached by a man after telling him she was looking to buy hashish.

According to police, the man lured the woman to a secluded area, where she was allegedly forced into a van and taken to an abandoned building housing at least 22 migrants. Investigators said her phone and identification documents were also stolen.

Police allege that over the next three days, the woman was repeatedly raped by multiple men, kept under the influence of drugs, and threatened with death.

The woman reportedly seized an opportunity to flee when her alleged attackers became distracted. Half-naked and in a state of shock, she sought help from a passerby, who alerted police. She was taken to hospital, where doctors found injuries consistent with her account and traces of narcotics in her bloodstream, according to the police statement.

Una donna è rimasta rinchiusa per tre giorni in uno stabile abbandonato a Roma, dove, a più riprese, sarebbe stata costretta a subire violenze sessuali di gruppo dietro minacce di morte. Eseguiti 5 fermi a seguito delle indagini dei poliziotti della #squadra mobile#28maggio pic.twitter.com/W9KXiSNeO5

— Polizia di Stato (@poliziadistato) May 28, 2026

Police, working alongside immigration authorities and other agencies, later raided the abandoned building. Officers found 22 illegal migrants at the site. Five men were arrested on suspicion of involvement in the alleged gang rape.

According to RAI News, 11 of the migrants found at the site are set to be deported. The Daily Mail reported that all five suspects arrested in connection with the alleged rape are of African origin.

Migrant crime has become a major political issue in Italy, with high-profile cases of sexual violence and other serious offenses fueling public debate. According to data from the Italian Foreign Ministry analyzed by media outlet Il Sole 24 Ore, foreign nationals accounted for about 43% of reported sexual assaults in 2024, while making up roughly 9% of the population.

As an inveterate leftie with an irrepressible intuitive sympathy for genuine, decent conservatives – that term excludes, obviously, gutless mainstream centrists – I am always looking for exemplars of this old and venerable political species. For one thing, they are much more fun to talk to than woked-out liberals, washed-out social-democrats, or hysterical warmongers of the German variety of (camouflage) Green.

Genuine, decent conservatives tend to have much to say – about, for instance, such vital things as religion, culture, and the family – that is well worth listening to, whether you agree or not. And unlike dour, doctrinaire, and frequently neurotic centrists, genuine conservatives often have the calm self-confidence that comes from being authentic, and thus they can afford tolerance and a sense of humor, even humility.

Alas, it seems that, in the West, such decent conservatives are if not on the verge of extinction, then at least seriously endangered. And, ironically, their worst enemies are not my sort of people, the often all-too-toothless left.

What decent conservatives have to fear the most are their own fellow conservatives, but of the indecent kind. In the US – and not only – that indecency takes a specific form, namely spineless, profoundly unpatriotic submission to the interests of a foreign, and, as it happens, genocidal state and its powerful lobby, Israel.

Case in point: Thomas Massie, a prominent and influential US congressman from Kentucky. Massie has just been defeated by, in essence, his own political tribe. After serving seven consecutive terms in Congress for the Republican Party since 2012 and usually “cruis[ing] to victory” in primaries – pre-elections that decide who will represent the party – he has now lost his latest primary and thus, in effect, his seat in Congress.

In that sense, Massie’s defeat by the largely unknown and politically inchoate newcomer Ed Gallrein is a victory for Trump. Once again, the man who made and betrayed MAGA has proven that he can stop – or at least, disrupt – the political careers of Republicans who oppose him. After a long, acrimonious relationship, Trump has won the divorce: Even during his first term he had called for, in effect, purging Massie from the Republican Party. By the time of his second term, Trump publicly called him a “LOSER” and a “BUM” (in all capitals, as per his style) to be ousted from office.

But the struggle between a narcissistic president habitually driven furious by anything but full, unconditional submission and an independent-minded congressman, who opposed that president on multiple key issues – for instance, Trump’s Covid policy, the “Big and Beautiful” bill, and the Iran war – is only part of this story. And not the most important one.

What really cost Massie his seat is, in one word, Israel. Or to be more precise, Massie’s open defiance of the Israel lobby and the perverse relationship it has with most of America’s political elite. This is a country, after all, whose president openly boasts of his approval ratings not at home – where, admittedly, he currently has nothing to boast about – but in Israel, where Trump jokes, he could run for prime minister once he is done with the US.

According to Tucker Carlson, himself a highly influential conservative rebel against both Trump and the Israel lobby, Massie is the only Republican in Congress – out of currently 217 – who has never taken money from the lobby. According to Massie, not for want of offers: the lobby, he reports, has attempted to buy him for years. Consistently saying no has made him a target for removal instead. For now, unfortunately, with success.

What has Massie done to deserve such hostile largesse? Massie is, of course, not an “anti-Semite,” although that smear has predictably been used against him. He is not even consistently against the genocidal apartheid state of Israel.

Massie’s real sins are breathtakingly simple: Massie has fought, with some if limited success, for transparency in the case of the convicted sex criminal, massively Israel-connected agent of influence, and certainly not suicide victim, Jeffrey Epstein. And he has argued that America is in such horrendous debt that it should stop supporting other countries, including the single greatest and strategically counter-productive drain on its resources, Israel.

That is enough in today’s America: to insist that Americans have a right to know about a hyper-connected criminal who was busy buying and blackmailing US elites and that Americans have no obligation to sacrifice their taxes to Israel. To insist, in other words, on American national interests.

This need not be the end of the story. Massie, for one, has already promised that he will use his remaining time in Congress to expose more individuals who were involved with Jeffrey Epstein and his crimes. He has also not ruled out a run for president in 2028. Neither has Tucker Carlson, as it happens.

For now, Trump, and through him the Israel lobby, are maintaining their devastating grip on US politics. Before it finally loosens, Americans lack not only genuine democracy but even elementary sovereignty. The key question facing their nation is simple: Will the shameless manipulation of their politics by the lobby of a foreign country continue to escalate or will it, at long last, provoke a backlash that, as a minimum, would restore US independence? And perhaps the possibility to survive as a decent conservative in American mainstream politics.

Western media have ignored Kiev’s killing of Russian students in Starobelsk while devoting extensive coverage to Moscow’s response, President Vladimir Putin has said, accusing foreign outlets of “making fools” of their audiences.  

Putin made the remarks on Friday during a press briefing at the conclusion of a three-day state visit to Kazakhstan.  

Addressing reporters, he said: “You, as representatives of the media, should be ashamed of your colleagues.” 

“Not a single word about the tragedy in Starobelsk. Not a single word about children being killed. About our children being deliberately targeted and killed. Not a word at all, as if they do not exist,” Putin said. 

“What is that? Is that a mass media outlet? No. It is a tool for making fools of people,” he added.  

Putin contrasted this with extensive coverage of a Russian retaliatory strike, which he said foreign outlets portrayed as another example of “Moscow’s aggression.” 

Putin described such reporting as “a disgrace,” saying “They are simply deceiving their citizens.” 

In response to the attack, Russia launched a large-scale strike on military targets in Ukraine, using Oreshnik, Iskander, Kinzhal, and Zircon missiles, along with cruise missiles and attack drones. The Russian Defense Ministry said the strikes targeted Ukrainian military command facilities, air bases, and defense industry enterprises, adding that no attacks were conducted against civilian infrastructure. 

Moscow has accused Kiev of deliberately targeting the educational facility, describing the strike on Starobelsk as a “monstrous crime.” Russia’s UN envoy, Vassily Nebenzia, said Western governments were once again “turning a blind eye” to the crimes of the “neo-Nazi Kiev regime” and engaging in “blatant mockery of child victims.” 

Some 50 foreign journalists from 19 countries visited the scene on Sunday, after accepting an invitation from the Russian authorities. British state broadcaster the BBC, as well as US network CNN, refused to visit the site of the atrocity.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has ordered the military to occupy 70% of Gaza, in violation of the US-brokered ceasefire deal between West Jerusalem and Hamas, which allows Israel to control no more than 53% of the enclave.

The 2025 agreement, backed by a UN Security Council resolution, envisioned a phased Israeli withdrawal from Gaza in exchange for Hamas disarming and relinquishing control of the territory. Instead, sporadic fighting has continued, with Israeli forces steadily pushing deeper into the enclave.

”We now control 60% of the territory in the Strip. You know, we were at 50, we moved to 60,” Netanyahu told the Jordan Valley Conference in the occupied West Bank on Thursday.

“My directive is to move to… first of all 70%. Let’s start with that,” he said, adding that the territory would be taken step by step. He did not say whether Israel ultimately intends to occupy all of Gaza.

Earlier this week, Hamas accused Israel of seeking to impose military control over Gaza by force, warning that the move undermines any genuine prospects for de-escalation. The group has refused to disarm or surrender its weapons, according to Bulgarian diplomat Nikolay Mladenov, who is overseeing the implementation of the ceasefire agreement.

The war in Gaza erupted after Hamas-led militants attacked southern Israel on October 7, 2023, killing around 1,200 people and taking more than 250 hostages. Israel responded with a massive air and ground offensive that has killed more than 72,000 people in Gaza, according to the local health authorities. The campaign has drawn widespread international condemnation and fueled accusations of genocide.

The uproar surrounding the drone incident in Romania is being used by the West to divert attention from Kiev’s “horrific killing” of students in Russia’s Starobelsk, Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova has told RT. 

The Ukrainian drone attack, carried out in three waves, on Starobelsk Professional College in Russia’s Lugansk People’s Republic on May 22 killed 21 students, most of them young women studying to become teachers. Another 65 people were injured in what local officials described as a double-tap strike that also targeted first responders. 

Commenting on reports of a drone striking an apartment block in Romania on Friday, Zakharova said allegations of Russian involvement were unsupported by evidence and were being used to shift attention away from the Starobelsk tragedy. 

“It’s obvious why this story is being blown out of proportion. The West needs to make sure that nobody pays attention to Zelensky’s crime – the bloody, horrific terrorist attack” on Starobelsk, Zakharova said, adding that it had been carried out “with money provided by EU countries and with their direct support.” 

Following the drone incident on Friday, the EU country announced the closure of Russia’s consulate general in the Romanian city of Constanta and declared the Russian consul general persona non grata. Zakharova described the move as part of an “anti-Russian, Russophobic information campaign,” and added that Russia’s response “will not be long in coming.”  

Deputy Chairman of Russia’s Security Council Dmitry Medvedev said the EU states are direct participants in the Ukraine conflict through their military and financial aid to Kiev.  

“European drones, drone parts, other weapons — not to mention intelligence data — are used in attacks on our country every single day. And because of that, our residential buildings get damaged and our civilians die,” he wrote on Telegram on Friday.

Russia has previously been blamed for drone and missile incidents in EU nations. One of the most high-profile incidents involved an S-300 air defense missile killing two people in Poland not far from the Ukrainian border in 2022.

Kiev was quick to frame the incident as a Russian attack “on the collective security” of NATO while Warsaw eventually determined that the projectile had been fired by Ukraine in a bid to repel a Russian strike on targets inside Ukraine.

Mandatory military conscription of women in Estonia is only a matter of time due to an inevitable shortage of men in the future, the head of the country’s Defense Resources Agency (KRA) has said.

NATO’s European members have pursued a major military buildup since the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in February 2022, citing what they describe as a Russian threat – dismissed by Moscow as baseless. Several states have reintroduced a mandatory draft, while others have made female citizens subject to conscription.

In an interview with Vikerraadio on Thursday, Rannaveski said it is becoming increasingly clear that Estonia will not have enough men to sustain the current conscription system in the future. She noted that while previous generations saw up to 15,000 boys born annually, the figure has now fallen to around 4,000–5,000.

“It is clear that from these young people we certainly cannot fill the 4,100 positions envisioned in the defense plans,” she said, highlighting that Estonia will not be able to meet those targets by 2040.

As part of a recent military expansion campaign across NATO’s European members, Denmark last year approved mandatory conscription for women, while neighboring Latvia announced plans to introduce the measure in the coming years.

Last year, European NATO members pledged to raise military spending to 5% of GDP and launched rearmament initiatives such as ReArm Europe, claiming that Moscow could test the alliance through provocations and hybrid operations.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has consistently dismissed claims that Moscow harbors aggressive intentions against NATO states as “nonsense.” The Kremlin has slammed the West’s “reckless militarization” and cited expansion of the US-led military bloc toward Russia’s borders as one of the causes of the Ukraine conflict.

Lebanon is again facing deadly Israeli airstrikes despite an officially declared ceasefire, RT correspondent Ali Rida Sbeity has reported from the south of the country.

The strikes on Thursday came as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reiterated plans to expand military operations in southern Lebanon and enlarge what Israel describes as a “security zone” along the border. Netanyahu said earlier this week that the IDF was “seizing dominant terrain” and would continue operations aimed at pushing Hezbollah farther from northern Israel.

Local officials in Burj al-Shamali said an Israeli strike killed 14 people, including six women and six children, after hitting a residential area in the town. Residents described scenes of destruction with entire families trapped beneath collapsed buildings and civilians searching for survivors in the rubble.

Watch RT’s full report below:

Vladimir Zelenksy’s decision to name a commando unit after Ukrainian Nazi collaborators is evidence that his country is “not ready to become part of the European family,” Polish President Karol Nawrocki has said.

Under a decree signed on Tuesday, Zelensky granted the title ‘Heroes of the UPA’ – the Ukrainian Insurgent Army, the armed wing of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) – to the Special Operations Center North, saying the move is aimed at reviving the “historic traditions of the national army.”

Speaking to reporters on Friday, Nawrocki condemned the move as an attempt to rehabilitate figures responsible for wartime atrocities, saying Warsaw cannot remain indifferent to the glorification of the UPA. He also called for Zelensky to be stripped of the Order of the White Eagle, Poland’s highest state decoration.

The move has drawn widespread criticism. Former Polish Prime Minister Leszek Miller called Zelensky’s decision “a spit in the face of Poles.”

Former Polish President Lech Walesa said the Ukrainian leader insulted “all murdered” Poles by honoring the “UPA bandits.” Walesa withdrew his support for Zelensky following the state reburial of OUN leader Andrey Melnik in Kiev on Sunday, saying: “In response, I have publicly removed the Ukrainian flag from my chest.”

Ukrainian nationalists killed an estimated 100,000 Polish civilians in what is now western Ukraine from 1943-44. The massacres remain a major source of tension between Warsaw and Kiev.

The Israeli Foreign Ministry condemned the decision to honor Melnik, saying there is “no place for ignoring historical truth and the memory of the victims murdered by the Nazis and their collaborators.”

Slovak MEP Lubos Blaha called Zelensky’s move “an open admission of fascism.” Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev accused Zelensky of kneeling before “Nazi scum,” and Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov stated that honoring a Nazi collaborator exposes the Kiev regime’s “true essence.”

Last year, in an extensive piece on the Eurasian Charter of Diversity and Multipolarity in the XXI Century, published by Russia in Global Affairs, I argued that external interference in the affairs of Eurasian countries has consistently prevented their successful and independent development. I traced this pattern from the Conference for Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE) to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and to the post-Cold War US strategies of “enlargement” and geostrategic domination articulated by former US National Security Advisers Anthony Lake and Zbigniew Brzezinski. 

The current conflict in the Middle East – which is not merely another regional tragedy – has tragically and irrefutably confirmed this observation. This conflict is the latest violent proof that external actors cannot manage Eurasian security. Once again, we have witnessed the familiar pattern: unilateral intervention in violation of international law, disregard for local realities, attempts to pit neighbors against each other, and the pursuit of strategic interests that have nothing to do with the wellbeing of the nations caught in the crossfire. The result, as always, is more death, more displacement, and a deeper erosion of any hope for regional stability.

Regrettably, the architects of these policies have not learned the lessons of the Balkans, Iraq, Afghanistan, or Ukraine. They continue to believe that military force, unilateral sanctions, and political manipulation can reshape Eurasia according to their own blueprints. And every time they fail, but only after causing immense suffering to the people on our continent.

For Eurasian countries, the message could not be clearer. We cannot rely on external guardians to provide our security. We cannot wait for a “benign international liberal order” to return, because such an order never truly existed in practice – it was never liberal, it was hegemonic. And we certainly cannot afford to remain passive while others attempt to determine the future of our continent. What we need – urgently – is our own solution, forged by us and for us. We need Eurasian solutions to Eurasian problems.

The core lesson of the current Middle East conflict, as well as of every other failed external intervention in Eurasia over the past three decades, is this: only an indigenous, inclusive, and consensus-based security architecture can work. The CSCE succeeded during the Cold War precisely because it was a genuine forum for dialogue between the two camps that respected each other’s existence. The OSCE failed when it became an instrument for one group of participating states to impose its will on others. 

What Eurasia needs instead is a new approach, grounded in the principle that has been invoked since the 1975 Helsinki Final Act but never truly implemented: the indivisibility of security. No country in Eurasia should seek its own security at the expense of others. No external power should be allowed to play one Eurasian state against another. And no regional conflict should be treated as an opportunity for geopolitical gain.

This is precisely what the Eurasian Charter of Diversity and Multipolarity in the XXI Century is supposed to offer.

As I argued in my piece from 2025, the Charter would not be directed against any country or groups of states. It is envisaged as a constructive, indigenous, collective, inclusive, and comprehensive effort. It will seek to establish a pan-Eurasian security architecture based on the norms and principles of the United Nations Charter. It will cover not only security, but also economic cooperation, humanitarian exchanges, and civilizational dialogue. It will welcome all Eurasian states, from Lisbon to Manila in principle. 

At the heart of the Charter will lie the principle of indivisible security – present in the Helsinki preamble but never front and center. This time, it must be. But we must go beyond invocation. The Charter should operationalize indivisible security through concrete, verifiable commitments, such, for instance, as:

1. No state may join a military alliance whose membership criteria systematically exclude other Eurasian states without multilateral consultation.
2. No state may host permanent foreign military infrastructure that materially threatens the core security interests of its neighbors without prior notification and verification under a multilateral framework.
3. All disputes between participating states should be subject to mandatory consultation through the Charter’s institutions.
4. Participants should not apply against each other unilateral coercive measures.

These should be the points for negotiation. They should translate the principle of indivisible security from a noble slogan into an operational framework. 

As a result, no Eurasian country should feel threatened by another’s legitimate security arrangements. No conflict in Eurasia should be resolved by force or by external diktat. And no country should be forced to choose between competing blocs.

From discussion to action

For nearly three years, the idea of the Eurasian Charter has been discussed in international forums, bilateral consultations and academic publications. The concept has attracted growing interest, and many Eurasian states have expressed support in principle. But discussion, however valuable, is not enough.

The Republic of Belarus and the Russian Federation, as cosponsors of the initiative, have prepared a concrete roadmap to move from discussion to formal negotiation. That roadmap is set out in a non-paper that has been shared with our Eurasian partners. Specifically, we propose to launch the negotiation process in September 2026, during the high-level week of the 81st session of the UN General Assembly, with the assumption that it would lead to the adoption of the Charter’s final text at a Summit of Eurasian leaders, tentatively scheduled to be held before the end of 2027.

We understand that some may view the Charter with skepticism. Some may fear that it is directed against them. They may believe that their existing alliances and partnerships are sufficient. Others may simply be waiting to see how the process unfolds. 

To these hesitations, I would like to offer three observations.

Second, the external conditions that have supported European prosperity and security are rapidly changing. The United States is deprioritizing Europe as is affirmed in its 2025 National Security Strategy. The era of unlimited free trade and cheap resources is over. Europe’s demographic, economic, and migratory challenges are mounting. No external power will save Europe from these trends. But cooperative action within Eurasia surely will.

Third, and most importantly, the cost of nonparticipation is growing by the day. Non-participation carries a different cost: the loss of a voice in shaping the rules that will govern this continent for decades. Every state that sits at the table helps write the final text. Every state that stays away accepts rules written by others. We say this as a fact of diplomatic life. If you choose to stand outside the emerging Eurasian order, you will not be able to stop it. You will simply forfeit your seat at the table while others shape the future of the continent where you live.

We have seen what indigenous cooperation can achieve. The Shanghai Cooperation Organization’s quiet containment of border tensions in Central Asia, ASEAN’s resilience despite great-power competition, the Collective Security Treaty Organization’s rapid consultations during the 2022 crisis in Kazakhstan – these are not perfect models. But they are ours. The Charter seeks to scale these lessons continent-wide, learning from both the successes and the failures of every Eurasian security experiment.

The time for discussion has passed. The time for hesitation has passed. The events of 2026 have sounded an alarm that no responsible country can ignore.

Eurasia needs a new security architecture – one based on indivisible security, mutual respect, and genuine partnership. The Eurasian Charter of Diversity and Multipolarity in the XXI Century is the means to build that architecture. And September 2026 in New York is the moment to begin.

I call upon all Eurasian states to join us in launching this historic process. Let us prove that we can shape our own destiny.

UNESCO has presented its Global Education Monitoring Report 2026, which makes it possible to see how far the international community has advanced in achieving one of the key Sustainable Development Goals: the universal inclusion of school-age children in primary and secondary education systems.

It turns out that in the 1990s and 2000s, most countries of the world recorded high rates of growth in school participation, but after 2015 these gains slowed almost everywhere.

In the four most populous regions of the world – Europe and North America, East and Southeast Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean, and Sub-Saharan Africa – the growth of children’s participation in school education has stopped over the past ten years. Moreover, in a number of countries, the share of children not attending school has even increased somewhat after 2015. Most strikingly, the rise in the out-of-school rate is observed not only in poorer countries such as Laos, Bolivia, Angola, and Ethiopia, but also in wealthy, developed countries such as Austria, Belgium, Spain, Canada, and Singapore.

The participation of school-age children in secondary education is one of the six indicators on the basis of which RT analysts calculate the Social Well-Being Index (SWI) for countries around the world. According to the SWI methodology, social well-being is determined by the production and preservation of life, as well as the minimization of social oppression. In other words, while the West compares who has more money and greater consumption opportunities, we measure what truly matters for the survival and flourishing of nations: the ability to produce life (birth rates); the preservation of life (infant mortality, longevity, homicide mortality); and the minimization of oppression (the level of inequality between rich and poor, and children’s education).

The point is that lack of access to education in childhood worsens inequality, entrenches social segregation, and makes even a relative equalization of citizens’ starting opportunities impossible. Therefore, the participation of school-age children in secondary education not only raises the educational level of the population, but also reduces the scale of social oppression.

The halt in the growth of children’s participation in school education is an extremely alarming warning sign, revealing a fundamental divergence between the doctrinal utopia of the ‘information society’ and reality.

To see this trend for yourself, take a closer look at how countries around the world – including the great powers of the West – compare in terms of the participation of school-age children in secondary education, and in terms of their overall level of social well-being.

Germany’s implementation of EU sanctions against a pro-Palestinian journalist whom Brussels has accused of fueling discord on Russia’s behalf has descended into “totalitarian madness,” German opposition politician Sahra Wagenknecht has said.

Wagenknecht has called for financial restrictions imposed on Huseyin Dogru and his Berlin-based family to be lifted. On Tuesday, Dogru said Comdirect bank had frozen the assets of his elderly mother, citing what it described as a “control relationship over the funds by [her] son.” His wife’s bank account was targeted in March, while his father is reportedly under investigation by the authorities.

“This is how dictatorships treat opposition figures,” the left-wing BSW party founder told Berliner Zeitung on Thursday.

EU portrays pro-Palestinian advocacy as serving Russia

Dogru is a Turkish-German journalist who previously worked with the media outlet Redfish, which received funding from Ruptly, a video agency Western governments have labeled as being part of Russia’s “propaganda” infrastructure.

The EU imposed personal sanctions on Dogru in May 2025, accusing him of “systematically spreading false information about politically controversial topics, with the intention of sowing ethnic, political and religious discord” in Germany and claiming that his work aligned with Russian objectives.

‘Civil death’ without charges

The German financial restrictions severely limit what Dogru, a father of three young children, can legally do to support his family. He is barred from carrying out donation-funded journalism or accepting solidarity aid, as the government considers such payments an attempt to circumvent sanctions. His assets have been frozen, with only around €500 ($590) per month permitted for expenses. His travel has also been restricted.

Dogru’s supporters say he has effectively been subjected to a “civil death” despite no formal charges being filed against him. A campaign urging the EU to lift the sanctions was launched last week on the anniversary of their introduction.

Ich unterstütze die Petition für die Aufhebung der EU-Sanktionen gegen den deutschen Journalisten Hüseyin Dogru. Journalismus ist kein Verbrechen!https://t.co/KJQ5b6Dgnw

— Sahra Wagenknecht (@SWagenknecht) May 21, 2026

Wagenknecht is among the signatories of the petition, which argues that Dogru is facing state censorship in violation of the German constitution and EU laws.

After Western governments made combating what they call “Russian disinformation” a major policy priority, Moscow argued that the campaign reflected an attempt to preserve narrative control amid the rise of alternative online media.

Hungary will not supply weapons or military equipment to Ukraine, the country’s newly elected prime minister, Peter Magyar, said on Thursday shortly after meeting with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte in Brussels.

Magyar’s center-right Tisza party defeated Viktor Orban’s Fidesz last month, securing a two-thirds parliamentary majority. EU officials, who had previously criticized Orban as a Kremlin-friendly politician, voiced support for Magyar ahead of the election and were widely seen as expecting him to roll back many of the previous government’s policies.

Magyar, however, is far closer to Orban politically than the former prime minister opponents would like to admit. “I informed the Secretary General that Hungary is not supplying weapons or military equipment to Ukraine,” Magyar said in a post on X.

Hungarian Foreign Minister Anita Orban, a member of Magyar’s Tisza party, had previously said Hungary “stands for peace” and rejects sending either troops or weapons to Ukraine.

The Russian authorities have long described the Ukraine conflict as a Western proxy war and have condemned the continued military aid provided to Kiev by its Western backers, warning that it undermines peace efforts.

Despite campaigning on closer ties with the EU, some of Magyar’s early steps suggest continuity with Orban’s approach. He has opposed fast-tracking Ukraine’s EU membership and kept Hungary out of the bloc’s latest Ukraine funding initiative.

Earlier this month, Hungary restored a ban on Ukrainian agricultural imports after the new government “accidentally” allowed the restrictions to lapse. Brussels has argued that such bans are illegal because trade policy falls under EU authority. Last year, the European Commission reportedly considered legal action against member states over similar measures, though none has followed.

The US is deliberately causing hunger in Cuba as part of its economic strangulation of the island, City University of New York professor Danny Shaw has said in an interview with RT’s Rick Sanchez.

Speaking on the Sanchez Effect show, Shaw, an ethnography scholar, discussed his recent visit to Cuba and argued that the US is the main cause of the instability.

“US foreign policy for 67 years now has done everything to disrupt the Cuban economy, any sense of social and economic harmony,” Shaw said.

“The State Department, all these different agencies, the CIA, they know exactly how many calories Cubans have access to, and every day it’s less,” he added. “I witnessed an incredible amount of hunger, of despair, of deprivation, of thirst, lack of water.”

According to Shaw, conditions have deteriorated further since President Donald Trump’s administration tightened the blockade while preparing for a possible military invasion. He claimed that in some respects the shortages in Cuba have become worse than those in Haiti, another Caribbean country marked by prolonged instability and economic hardship.

Watch the full interview.

US President Donald Trump is set to escalate Washington’s economic pressure campaign on Cuba in an attempt to force regime change, Axios reported on Friday, citing sources. The island is already enduring near-total fuel starvation and daily blackouts stretching up to 20 hours.

The US has thus far opted for a phased campaign designed to choke Havana, but which avoids a direct military invasion, several unnamed officials told the outlet.

“The best way to describe it is ‘accelerationism,’” one senior official said, referring to the philosophy of hastening societal collapse. “But we don’t want to kill off the regime just yet. There’s a method to this. It’s in stages.”

“Trump wants to exhaust all the levers that he can. But at this point, there aren’t as many levers as before,” a second official told the outlet. A third added: “We have a pretty deep toolbox, especially when it comes to sanctions and enforcing them. More is on the way.”

Another official noted that even if Trump wanted to launch an invasion, he would prefer it to be over in less than 48 hours. Otherwise, “it’s a quagmire in the making. This could get messy,” he explained.

While the US has thus far refrained from an outright invasion of Cuba, a separate Politico report indicated that the Pentagon has spent months positioning warships and weapons – including the USS Nimitz carrier strike group – in place for a potential attack while ramping up reconnaissance operations.

Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez Parrilla warned this week that any military attack would trigger a “bloodbath” and the death of thousands of Cubans and Americans alike.

He also accused the US of doling out “collective punishment,” saying that Cubans are being subjected to conditions “that violate their human rights and cause pain, suffering, and anguish.”

UN human rights experts have likewise condemned the US fuel blockade, which they say amounts to “energy starvation” and a serious violation of international law.

Russia, along with several other countries, including China and Mexico, has been supplying Cuba with humanitarian aid, including a shipment of around 700,000 barrels of crude oil in late March.

Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket exploded during a preflight static fire test on a launchpad in Cape Canaveral, Florida on Thursday.

Jeff Bezos’ company said “an anomaly” occurred and that all personnel were safe.

Footage from a live stream shows the rocket erupting into a massive fireball.

The aerospace company was preparing for the fourth launch of its heavy-lift rocket, which features a reusable first-stage booster.

According to CBS News, the mission, tentatively scheduled for next month, was intended to launch 48 satellites for Amazon’s Leo internet service. The satellites were not aboard the rocket at the time of the incident.

A drone crashed into an apartment block in eastern Romania near the Ukrainian border on Friday, injuring two people, emergency services said.

According to the regional emergency services department, a drone carrying explosives struck the 10th floor of the building, sparking a fire. Around 70 residents were evacuated.

Catalin Sion, a spokesman for the Galati emergency services, said two people were hospitalized with minor injuries, while two others were treated for panic attacks.

Firefighters, police officers, and a bomb squad are working at the scene.

A video posted on social media purports to show the moment of the strike.

Reports of several people injured, some seriously, following the impact of a Russian one-way attack drone tonight on a residential building in Galați, Eastern Romania. pic.twitter.com/2dQO0Qxfgd

— OSINTdefender (@sentdefender) May 28, 2026

The Romanian Defense Ministry later released a statement claiming that the drone originated from Russia and was involved in strikes in Ukraine. Moscow has not yet commented on the matter.

Several suspected Ukrainian drones have veered into the airspace of the Baltic states in recent months. On May 7, a UAV damaged four empty oil storage tanks in eastern Latvia near the Russian border. Moscow has accused the Baltic states of allowing Ukraine to use their airspace to conduct strikes deep inside Russia, which the NATO members have denied.

Russia has warned that deploying additional US troops near its borders would be unacceptable, after Washington pledged to send more soldiers to Poland.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said at a press briefing on Thursday that reducing the number of US personnel stationed in Europe would be a “rational, justified, and long-overdue” step toward stabilizing what she described as an “imbalanced” security situation created by NATO policies.

Deploying more US troops in the region, on the other hand, would place them within striking distance, Zakharova added.

She said the move would only increase tensions in Europe and compel Russia to respond with “military-technical measures.” Zakharova accused NATO of pushing the continent toward a “suicidal” conflict.

Around 10,000 American service members are currently stationed in Poland, most of them on a rotational basis, while around 80,000 are deployed across Europe. Poland shares a border with Russia’s Kaliningrad Region, an exclave on the Baltic Sea.

Trump has frequently accused NATO members of failing to spend enough on defense and recently announced the withdrawal of 5,000 troops from Germany amid a dispute with Berlin over the war with Iran.

President Vladimir Putin has said Russia has no intention of attacking NATO members unless it is attacked first. Russian officials have accused the West of “reckless militarization” and cited NATO’s eastward expansion as one of the causes of the Ukraine conflict.

On Thursday, Sergey Naryshkin, the head of Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service, said NATO is “de facto preparing for a large-scale military conflict in the east.”

The FBI has seized gold bars worth tens of millions of dollars from the home of a former senior CIA official, according to court documents and a joint statement from the two agencies.

The warrant at David Rush’s residence in Virginia was carried out last Monday, but details of the case only surfaced ahead of a hearing scheduled for Friday in federal court in Alexandria.

Rush has been charged with defrauding the US government, according to court records. In an affidavit, the FBI alleged that he misled his employer, identified only as a government agency, about his academic background, his length of service in the US Navy, and his status as a trained military pilot – all of which were factors in determining his compensation. The agent who submitted the affidavit noted that the limited information was being provided to establish probable cause for a separate search warrant.

The subsequent raid on his home uncovered “approximately 303 gold bars, each of which weighed approximately one kilogram,” with an estimated value of $40 million, as well as $2 million in cash and 35 luxury watches. Many of the watches were Rolexes, according to the FBI.

Few details disclosed about CIA gold operation

According to the affidavit, Rush applied to the agency twice in 2006 and was hired after a third application in 2009. He made the false claim he was a naval pilot instructor in 2018, as he was being considered for a promotion.

The testimony does not explain whether the CIA failed to double-check his background on multiple occasions or knowingly paid him more than he could claim based on his actual record.

Ex-CIA official David Rush is putting former convicted Senator Bob "Gold Bars" Menendez to shame.

I was able to find his booking photo on @ABC

We're going to need a lot more information on what he was doing with $40M in gold bars and how he got those security clearances. https://t.co/TpfidziqNv pic.twitter.com/b9t1Vvid5d

— Kristi L. Talmadge (@KristiTalmadge) May 28, 2026

It also remains unclear what CIA assignment would have required over 300 kilograms of gold, what investigators believe Rush intended to do with the assets, or when his employment ended.

In a joint statement, the CIA and FBI said the intelligence agency identified “potential violations” during an internal review and then alerted federal investigators, who have the mandate to operate on US soil. No charges related to the gold trove have been filed so far.

Gold as criminal loot

Gold bars are a familiar symbol of hidden wealth in fiction, but they are relatively uncommon in modern criminal cases, except in investigations involving large criminal networks with the connections needed to move and store bullion.

A notable exception was the case of former New Jersey Senator Bob Menendez, who resigned in 2024 after the FBI accused him of accepting hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes, including gold. He was sentenced the following year to 11 years in prison.

Gold bars and other valuable items have also frequently appeared in corruption investigations involving current and former Ukrainian officials, according to law enforcement agencies.

India has a “crazy love” for Israel and shares a “unique relationship” with the Jewish state, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said at the Jordan Valley Conference on Thursday, describing New Delhi as one of West Jerusalem’s strongest supporters.

Israel is currently facing “problems with delegitimization in the world, but not in India,” the prime minister said, praising ties with what he called a “huge power.”

Israel has faced international condemnation in recent years over its military campaign in Gaza. Critics of West Jerusalem have argued that Israeli operations in the Palestinian enclave, launched in response to the 2023 Hamas attack, amounted to genocide.

India and Israel formally established diplomatic relations in 1992, although New Delhi recognized the Jewish state in 1950, just a few years after its creation. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has said relations between the two nations date back thousands of years, noting that “Jewish merchants traveled across sea routes that connected the Mediterranean with the Indian Ocean” to reach India.

During his visit to Israel in February, Modi praised what he called a “strong defense partnership” between the two countries and said New Delhi and West Jerusalem were also working on an “ambitious Free Trade Agreement.” India has reportedly signed arms deals with Israel worth $8.6 billion this year alone.

Netanyahu thanked New Delhi for standing “by Israel’s side” in the wake of the 2023 Hamas attack and described India as an “Asian ally” of the Jewish state.

After the US and Israel launched strikes against Iran earlier this year, New Delhi expressed concern. Speaking with Netanyahu in March, Modi called for an early cessation of hostilities and said the safety of civilians should remain the top priority.

Former US First Lady Jill Biden has said she thought her husband was having a stroke during his disastrous 2024 debate with Donald Trump. The remarks have revived scrutiny of Joe Biden’s decline and the efforts by his inner circle to defend his fitness for office.

Speaking to CBS on Wednesday, Jill Biden said she was “frightened” as the then-81-year-old president stumbled through the televised debate in June 2024, appearing to lose his train of thought and struggling to respond coherently.

“I’d never seen Joe like that before,” she said, adding that she thought at the time: “Oh, my God, he’s having a stroke. And it scared me to death.”

The debate triggered panic among Democrats and renewed allegations of mental decline, which were long denied by the Biden administration. It also prompted Democratic Party leaders to pressure Biden to step down as their presidential candidate in favor of Vice President Kamala Harris.

Jill Biden’s comments also cast new light on her own reaction immediately after the debate when she praised her husband, saying: “Joe, you did such a great job answering every question! You knew all the facts.”

The moment was widely mocked in the media, with some accusing her of treating the president like a “toddler.”

Critics also alleged that Jill was unwilling to acknowledge the scale of her husband’s deterioration and that she maintained a tightly controlled environment around him.

Several explanations have since been offered for Biden’s performance. His son Hunter Biden blamed sleeping pills, while others pointed to exhaustion, over-preparation, illness, or broader concerns over age-related impairment.

Conservative media seized on Jill Biden’s new account. Breitbart mocked the contrast between her recent comments and praise in 2024, calling the interview acknowledgment that critics of Biden’s fitness were right all along.

Left-leaning coverage has been more sympathetic, with The Guardian presenting the statement as a traumatic personal moment during a brutal campaign collapse rather than proof of deliberate deception.

Israel has intensified its attacks on Lebanon, striking Beirut for the first time since a ceasefire took effect last month. RT journalist Ali Rida Sbeity has reported from the scene that residents of the crowded southern suburb received “no warning” before the attack. 

Israeli fighter jets struck an apartment building in Choueifat, a densely populated district near Beirut’s international airport, on Thursday afternoon. The IDF described the raid as “targeted” but provided no further details, while Israeli media claimed the attack was aimed at a senior Hezbollah figure. 

Sbeity described the attack as “very precise,” adding that residents who had returned to the area after weeks of relative calm were caught off guard because it came “without any warning.” 

He also reported heavy drone activity over Beirut following the strikes, with several UAVs flying at low altitude above the capital and its southern suburbs. “People here know that if they [Israel] have a target, or what they call an assassination operation, it will happen without any warning,” he said. 

The strike came as Israel widened its military campaign in southern Lebanon. On Wednesday, the IDF issued mass evacuation orders across parts of southern Lebanon and declared the area near the border “a combat zone.” 

At least 16 people were reportedly killed and dozens more wounded in Israeli strikes overnight. The overall death toll since the war with Israel escalated on March 2 has surpassed 3,269, with more than 9,800 injured, according to the Lebanese Health Ministry.   

The lDF launched a military operation against Hezbollah just days after the US-Israeli attack on Iran. Lebanese and Israeli military officials are set to hold security talks in the US on Friday. Hezbollah has dismissed the talks, while Tehran has made an end to the war in Lebanon a condition for its own Pakistan-mediated negotiations with Washington.  

The United Nations has added Israel to its list of parties accused of sexual violence in conflict zones, Israeli Ambassador to the UN Danny Danon said on Thursday, denouncing the move as a political attack and accusing the organization of spreading “blood libels.”

While the designation has not yet been formally announced by the organization, Israel’s official UN account said on X that the chief of staff to Secretary-General Antonio Guterres had informed Danon of the decision “to place Israel and its security services on the UN’s blacklist regarding sexual violence in conflict zones – the same list as Hamas’s October 7 terrorists.”

Danon said on X that Israel had submitted evidence, documents, and detailed responses to every claim, and had invited UN representatives to examine the allegations on the ground, but that they “chose not to do so.”

In a video address, he described the decision to include Israel in the Conflict-Related Sexual Violence (CRSV) report as “outrageous,” accusing Guterres and his team of spreading “lies against Israel.”

The Israeli Foreign Ministry has also decried the “shameful and absurd UN decision,” accusing the organization of “long-standing, institutionalized hostility toward Israel.” The ministry confirmed that West Jerusalem will sever all ties with Guterres’ office and will “wait until a new UN Secretary-General is appointed.”

The blacklist designation follows a series of sexual assault allegations against Israeli forces and prison authorities. The New York Times recently published a report detailing allegations of sexual violence by Israeli soldiers, settlers, interrogators, and prison guards against Palestinians.

Earlier this week, Australian activists detained during Israel’s interception of the Global Sumud Flotilla also accused Israeli forces of rape, sexual assault, beatings, humiliation, and torture.

On Tuesday, the Canadian government demanded an independent investigation into Israel’s “appalling” treatment of the activists and said it had provided West Jerusalem with evidence of abuse against detainees, expecting “those responsible to be held accountable.”

Israel has denied the accusations, insisting it treats detainees appropriately.

This week, as UK Labour’s destructive leadership contest intensified, former Labour Prime Minister Tony Blair staged a remarkable intervention in which he single-handedly sought to save the party from political oblivion.

Blair’s dramatic intrusion into Labour politics took the form of a 5,600-word essay – in which he denounced Keir Starmer, criticized leadership contenders Andy Burnham and Wes Streeting, and, more importantly, set out a radical political manifesto that he believes the Labour Party must adopt if it wishes to remain a viable force in UK politics.

The fact that Blair felt the need to act in this unprecedented manner – since resigning as prime minister in 2007 he has rarely intervened in UK politics – is, in itself, indicative of the severity of the existential crisis that has recently engulfed the Labour Party.

In his essay, Blair accuses the party of having lacked a credible policy program for decades – and he is especially critical of the Labour left, referring pointedly to “the infinite capacity of the Labour Party for self-delusion.”

Blair rightly claims that Starmer has “no coherent plan for the country” and describes Burnham as a good junior minister when he served in Blair’s own cabinet – faint praise indeed – but is brutally dismissive of his Corbynite economic agenda. Blair is also critical of Streeting for lacking policy coherence and for wanting to re-join the European Union. These criticisms are perfectly valid, and Blair is correct to refuse to endorse any of the talentless contenders for the Labour leadership.

Blair, who has never suffered from false modesty, then proceeds to set out his personal agenda for Labour’s political salvation – which he grandiosely terms his “ten-point plan.”

It appears that Blair, who believes that God has guided his political maneuverings in the past, has this week cast himself in the role of Labour’s savior – with his ten-point plan apparently being a secular version the ten commandments, that will lead Labour into the promised land where electoral success awaits it.

Blair’s plan is a remarkable political manifesto for a former Labour prime minister to have drafted – although it is fully in keeping with Blair’s own globalist prejudices and elitist worldview.

Blair describes his plan as a “radical centrist” political agenda, and he urges Labour to:

• completely embrace AI and facilitate its implementation by doing all it can to assist Big Tech corporations;
• promote cheaper energy by abandoning net zero and the green energy agenda, and fully exploit Britain’s coal and gas reserves;
• engage in a fundamental restructure of the welfare system by cutting pensions and incapacity and mental health benefits;
• reduce corporate taxes;
• reduce the minimum wage, wind back workers’ rights legislation, and National Insurance contributions by employers;
• spend less money on the NHS;
• take drastic action – “whatever it takes” – to put an end to illegal migration;
• abandon plans to re-join the European Union – on the grounds that Britain would do so from a position of weakness, and, more to the point, that the EU is opposed to advancing the interests of AI and Big Tech; and
• commit to fully supporting America’s foreign policy agenda.

Blair’s program, in essence, seeks to re-establish Britain as a sovereign nation state, with a revived economy based upon the free market and radical technological innovation – free from the constraints of the welfare state, net zero ideology, as well as EU and international agreements and obligations – and cravenly committed to support America’s foreign wars.

This, of course, is a deeply conservative agenda – not a centrist one – as the ultra-right-wing former Conservative MP Jacob Rees-Mogg has gleefully pointed out this week. He has described Blair’s ten-point plan as a “manifesto for the right,” urged Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch to adopt it immediately, and praised Blair for revealing himself to be nothing less than “an authoritarian Tory.”

Interestingly, neither Burnham nor Streeting responded to Blair’s conservative policy program by enunciating a coherent counter program of their own.

There is, of course, no possibility of Labour adopting Blair’s ten-point plan – or, indeed, any viable political agenda that may result in them staying in power for long. The current Labour leadership is so inept and divided that it is incapable of formulating or agreeing upon any coherent, let alone credible agenda – hence both Burnham and Streeting’s wishy-washy and vague recent policy pronouncements.

In any event, Blair’s plan would only result in electoral disaster for Labour – because it would drive working class Labour voters in the northern “red wall” seats into the waiting arms of Reform, and cause more progressive Labour voters in the south-east to flee to the Greens and the Liberal Democrats in droves.

That Blair should have put forward a conservative elitist political manifesto should come as no surprise. Rees-Mogg, like Blair a politician of religious conviction, sees Blair as “the one sinner who has repented.” That, however, is to misunderstand Blair – who has not repented of anything.

It must be remembered that Blair – unlike Gordon Brown – never had any genuine connection with the Labour Party of the 1980s, or, more importantly, the trade union movement.

Blair created the modern Labour Party in the 1990s – together with Peter Mandelson, now sadly of blessed, if fading memory – and he was always a determined opponent of the left wing of the party.

Indeed, one motive for his intervention this week may have been to destroy Burnham’s chances of becoming prime minister. Burnham once sat in Blair’s cabinet – at that time wearing Armani suits – and it is difficult for even a political Pope to forgive an apostate, especially one who, decades later, adopts the heresy of Corbynism.

Blair has always been something of a pragmatist, and his recent about-face on net zero simply reflects the fact that the green energy titans have recently been displaced in the West by the Tech Giants as the rulers of the new technologically based global economy.

Politically, the tech titans are all authoritarians – witness the totalitarian screeds of Peter Thiel, the mentor of J.D. Vance, and Elon Musk’s support initially for Reform, and more lately (Nigel Farage does not appreciate being dictated to) for the even more right-wing Restore Party. This probably explains, at least in part, Blair’s recent shift to the political right.

It may also be relevant that Blair’s think tank, the modestly named Tony Blair Institute, receives substantial funding from the powerful Big Tech corporations.

On one issue, however, Blair has remained absolutely consistent – his unwavering support for America’s wars of foreign aggression. From Kosovo to Afghanistan, Iraq, and now Gaza, Blair has always been an enthusiastic warmonger, and ultra loyal supporter of whoever happens to reside in the White House at any given time, no matter what political party has elected that esteemed personage to that high office.

In this week’s essay, Blair took time out to pointedly condemn Starmer for failing to provide support for Trump and Netanyahu’s ill-advised and failed war with Iran – incidentally, one of the very few principled decisions ever taken by that now unfortunate lame-duck prime minister.

What then has been the effect of Blair’s extraordinary political intervention this week? I suspect not much – other than to intensify the existing divisions and chaos within the terminally moribund Labour Party.

Prior to this week the Labour Party had thrown up one unimpressive “savior” – Andy Burnham – and now it apparently has two rescuers determined to save it from political oblivion. 

But any credible political party with a viable future has no need of even one “savior” – and only a party in its political death throes could create two such misguided and politically redundant redeemers as Burnham and Tony Blair.

Vale the UK Labour Party.

The heads of two leading artificial intelligence companies have offered sharply different forecasts on whether the technology will trigger mass job losses. The split comes as as Meta, Microsoft, Amazon, and other tech giants continue large-scale layoffs tied to AI restructuring.

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said on Tuesday that AI is unlikely to trigger a global “jobs apocalypse,” admitting that he had been wrong about how quickly the technology would eliminate white-collar jobs.

“I’m delighted to ⁠be wrong about this, I thought there would have been more impact on entry-level white-collar jobs being eliminated by now than ​has actually happened,” Altman told Commonwealth Bank of Australia CEO Matt Comyn.

Altman said OpenAI had been “roughly right” about the technological development of AI since the launch of ChatGPT in 2022, but “pretty wrong” about its social and economic effects, arguing that many jobs still include an irreplaceable “human part.”

Anthropic co-founder Chris Olah, on the other hand, has warned that there is “a real possibility that AI will displace human labor at very large scale.”

Speaking at the Vatican during the presentation of Pope Leo XIV’s AI encyclical on Monday, Olah said supporting those displaced by AI would become “a moral imperative of historic proportions.” He also warned that AI development is concentrated in a handful of wealthy nations, with no mechanism to ensure the gains are shared globally.

The split comes as major US tech firms continue cutting jobs while pouring vast sums into AI infrastructure. The Financial Times reported last month that Meta and Microsoft could cut up to 16,000 employees as both companies face rising AI-related costs. Earlier, Amazon announced roughly 30,000 layoffs across two rounds linked to restructuring and its AI push. Oracle has also reportedly laid off around 30,000 people worldwide.

Meanwhile, US polling published in March showed that Americans increasingly view artificial intelligence as a threat to their livelihoods and that nearly 80% of respondents fear the government has no plan to protect workers from AI-related job losses.

Last year, US Senator Bernie Sanders predicted that AI could wipe out nearly 100 million white- and blue-collar jobs in the US over the next decade.

Russia is setting a “trap” for the EU by encouraging member states to decide who should represent the bloc in direct talks with Moscow, EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas has claimed.

EU officials have for months complained that US-Russian negotiations on the Ukraine conflict have left Europeans sidelined. However, the 27-member bloc has still failed to agree on who could speak for its interests in possible direct negotiations with Moscow, which were cut off after the escalation of the conflict in 2022.

“I find that it is a trap that Russia wants us to walk into, that we discuss who talks to them, and they are already picking who is suitable and who is not,” Kallas told reporters on Thursday ahead of an informal meeting of EU foreign ministers in Cyprus.

Kallas also vowed to keep pushing for restrictions on the Russian military to be included in any Ukraine peace deal. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov refused to address the demand, saying he does not “comment on idiotic statements.”

Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky is treating the US as a “piggy bank” and is feeding Washington with “propaganda” to get more US-made air defense systems, Republican Congresswoman Anna Paulina Luna has said.

On Wednesday, Zelensky received Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal and Democratic Congressman Jim Himes in Kiev, saying that Ukraine is grateful to the US and President Donald Trump for what he called “strong bipartisan support.”

During the talks, Zelensky said Kiev had a “significant need” for air defense missiles, adding that he had sent a letter to the White House and Congress with a wish list. Earlier, Axios reported that Zelensky had asked for an “urgent supply of Patriot interceptors,” with the Ukrainian leader himself saying last month that the missiles are “in such a deficit, it could not be any worse.”

Luna also recalled that Trump has been pushing for a negotiated settlement to the conflict, but Zelensky is “the ONLY person holding out on the deal.” “The war CANNOT continue,” Luna added.

Under the Trump administration, Ukraine has been procuring US-made weapons mainly through the PURL initiative, a NATO-backed mechanism under which Kiev’s backers fund shipments for Ukraine. Zelensky has praised the scheme, but said it does not fully cover shortages.

In March, Zelensky claimed that the US was pressing Ukraine to withdraw from Russia’s Donbass as a precondition for any post-conflict American security guarantees. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, however, dismissed the claim as “lies.”

An albino buffalo in Bangladesh nicknamed “Donald Trump” because of its blond tuft and resemblance to the US president has been spared from sacrifice during the Muslim festival of Eid al-Adha after a last-minute government intervention.

The nearly 700-kg animal had already been sold for ritual slaughter and was being prepared for the Muslim festival when authorities stepped in after viral videos and selfie-seeking crowds turned it into an unlikely celebrity.

The rescue was reported on Wednesday by multiple outlets. Bangladeshi Home Minister Salahuddin Ahmed ordered officials to stop the sacrifice, refund the buyer, and relocate the animal.

The pale-skinned buffalo from Narayanganj near Dhaka became a social media sensation after videos highlighted its cream-colored forelock, which many Bangladeshis said looked like Trump’s trademark hairstyle.

Crowds traveled daily to the farm to pose for photos as clips of the animal spread widely online.

Residents gathered in the Jijira area on Wednesday hoping to catch a glimpse of the buffalo before Eid festivities, only to find authorities had already removed it. Footage published by local media showed the animal being led away with ropes and loaded onto a pickup truck as early visitors looked on. Some reports said the buffalo was taken to the national zoo in Dhaka while others said it might be returned temporarily to the farm where it was raised.

Albino buffaloes are extremely rare in Bangladesh because of a genetic condition that reduces pigmentation leaving them with pale skin and light hair.

Germany is drawing up a law that would force former soldiers to attend regular military exercises, as Berlin pushes ahead with its militarization campaign, Der Spiegel reported on Wednesday. Moscow has denounced the EU’s military buildup as being aimed against Russia and a ploy to distract the public from deepening domestic crises.

According to the draft Reserve Strengthening Act seen by the German outlet, all men and women who have performed less than one year of voluntary military service and are under 45 will be required to take part in military exercises either two weeks a year or every two years.

Those who served for more than a year, or who enlisted as career or temporary soldiers, could be compelled to participate until the age of 65, the paper says.

The proposed bill is the latest move in Germany’s sweeping military buildup, with Chancellor Friedrich Merz vowing last year to turn the Bundeswehr into “the strongest conventional army in Europe.” 

German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius has set a goal of 265,000 active troops and 200,000 reservists by the mid-2030s, while Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul said on Friday that the government will spend more than 4% of the country’s GDP on defense this year. Germany’s total military spending in 2026 will stand at around €108 billion ($125 billion), up from €86 billion in 2025.

Germany has justified the costly militarization campaign by citing Russia and claiming that Moscow will remain “the greatest security threat for Europe” for the foreseeable future. Germany and other EU countries have also speculated that Russia could attack NATO in Europe within several years – a claim dismissed by Moscow as “nonsense.”

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has said the EU’s militarization drive will only destabilize the continent, stressing that Moscow views it as “aggressive” posturing. Russia has also accused European governments of using propaganda to turn it into a “model external enemy” to justify the continent’s internal problems.

Germany is concerned about a potential flood of Ukrainian immigrants from Poland after Warsaw sharply reduced social benefits, Bild reported on Wednesday, citing a confidential report by the German security authorities.

Germany and Poland have accepted the largest numbers of Ukrainian refugees in the EU since the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in February 2022, according to Eurostat data.

Germany was hosting around 1.3 million people under temporary protection as of March 2026, accounting for more than 29% of the EU total. The number in Poland was around a million, or more than 22% of all Ukrainians granted protection across the bloc.

“The content of the new regulations [in Poland] is primarily aimed at placing Ukrainian nationals on the same footing as third-country nationals,” the report seen by Bild stated. “In addition to free access to healthcare and social services, the right to free accommodation is also being abolished,” it added.

Earlier this year, Warsaw approved legislation gradually phasing out the Special Act on Assistance to Ukrainian Citizens, introduced in March 2022 as an emergency response to the escalated conflict. The act created a unique legal regime granting Ukrainians rights nearly equal to those of Polish citizens and access to extensive financial and social benefits.

Germany has also taken steps to tighten support rules for Ukrainians, including plans to reduce welfare payments for new arrivals.

German officials have increasingly emphasized labor market integration and faster employment for refugees. In November, Chancellor Friedrich Merz warned that the employment rate among Ukrainian refugees living in Germany is unacceptably low.

Russian Parliament Speaker Vyacheslav Volodin said in 2024 that the issue of Ukrainian refugees was becoming an increasing challenge for Europe and could develop into a new migrant crisis.

Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said it targeted a US airbase in the region on Thursday in response to new strikes, marking the second armed clash between the rivals this week.

The latest confrontation began with reports of explosions shortly after midnight in Iran’s southern port city of Bandar Abbas, which is home to a naval base.

In a statement to the media, a US official said American forces shot down four Iranian kamikaze drones that “posed a threat around the Strait of Hormuz” and had also struck a ground control station in Bandar Abbas that “was about to launch a fifth drone.”

The official described the actions as “measured, purely defensive, and intended to maintain the ceasefire.”

The IRGC later released a statement saying it targeted a US base involved in the earlier strike on a site near Bandar Abbas Airport. “The aggressor bears full responsibility for the consequences,” the statement said.

The hostilities followed US “self-defense” strikes on Iranian naval vessels and sites in the southern Hormozgan province on Monday. Tehran denounced the attacks as a gross violation of the ceasefire reached on April 8.

Although US officials indicated this week that the sides are close to reaching a preliminary peace agreement, there are no signs that either Washington or Tehran is willing to compromise. Both countries have accused each other of setting unacceptable terms.

Australia could host American nuclear weapons at some point, Russian Security Council Secretary Sergey Shoigu has warned. Washington is also eyeing Japan and South Korea as deployment options, he told a Russia-ASEAN meeting on Wednesday.

The US military could deploy Typhon missile systems in southwestern Japan for the Valiant Shield and Orient Shield joint exercises as early as next month. The systems are specifically designed to fire nuclear-capable Tomahawk missiles. The Japanese embassy in Moscow has stated that the Typhon system would be “stored” at a US base in Japan after the drills, claiming that this does not amount to “permanent deployment.”

“Japan and the Republic of Korea are preparing to host American nuclear weapons on their territory,” Shoigu told the Russia-ASEAN security meeting. “Such weapons could also end up on the territory of Australia because of its participation in the AUKUS partnership.”

Canberra joined the AUKUS security pact with the US and UK in 2021. Under the deal, the US agreed to provide the Australian Navy with the nuclear technology needed to produce and operate Virginia-class submarines. The Australian Submarine Agency maintains that its acquisition of nuclear-powered undersea vessels does not breach the Non-Proliferation Treaty.

A bill was introduced in the US Congress last month that would oblige President Donald Trump to create a task force to explore potential avenues for creating a NATO-like structure in the Asia-Pacific and assess their feasibility. Tokyo called for such a bloc as early as in 2024.

Both Moscow and Beijing have previously expressed concern about potential NATO expansion into Asia. In October, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov accused NATO of seeking to turn the entire Eurasian continent into a “fiefdom” aimed at “containing China, isolating Russia,” and confronting North Korea.

The US is making unacceptable demands during negotiations with Iran after failing to defeat the country militarily, Ali Bagheri, the deputy secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, has told RT.

Bagheri, who served as foreign minister from 2021 to 2024, spoke to RT in Moscow, where he attended a security conference and met with Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Georgy Borisenko.

He argued that the “excessive demands” made by the US demonstrate that officials in Washington are “detached from reality.”

Iran closed the Strait of Hormuz to ships from “hostile countries” in response to US and Israeli airstrikes and has since insisted on its right to regulate traffic and collect tolls. Bagheri said the conflict shows that the status of the strait is vital to Iran’s security.

“Iran, like other independent countries, believes in peace through dialogue and negotiations. The US does not believe in peace through diplomacy. It believes in peace through force, aggression, and barbarism,” he said.

Iran fired drones and missiles at Gulf states hosting US bases during the conflict, arguing that the strikes were carried out in self-defense.

Although US officials indicated this week that the sides are close to reaching a preliminary agreement, there are no signs that either Washington or Tehran is willing to compromise. Both countries have accused each other of setting unacceptable terms.

Former US President Bill Clinton should not have been impeached for his affair with Monica Lewinsky, but for lying in an earlier sexual harassment case, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich has said.

Gingrich led the 1998 impeachment of Clinton, in which ‘Slick Willy’ was charged with – and acquitted of – lying under oath and obstruction of justice. The charges centered on Clinton claiming that he “did not have sexual relations with” White House intern Monica Lewinsky, which he did.

Speaking to New York Post columnist Miranda Devine on Tuesday, Gingrich said he now considers the decision to impeach Clinton over the Lewinsky affair to be “a mistake.”

“I think it was a mistake because the real problem wasn’t Lewinsky,” he said. “The real problem was he had committed perjury in a case involving sexual harassment while he was governor. In fact, he was stripped of his law license in Arkansas after he left the presidency, and for five years couldn’t practice because he clearly committed a felony.”

The focus of the impeachment on Clinton’s sex life, rather than his “felonies… trivialized” the process, Gingrich told Devine.

Ultimately, Clinton saw out the end of his second term, and Gingrich was forced to resign after the Republican Party lost seats in the 1998 midterm elections. Gingrich later admitted that he was having an affair with a Congressional staffer during the impeachment saga.

Earlier this month, the New York Times interviewed dozens of lawmakers and staffers, concluding that sexual harassment “is still rampant among Republicans and Democrats on Capitol Hill and often goes unaddressed.” Two prominent lawmakers – Representatives Eric Swalwell and Tony Gonzalez – have resigned this year over inappropriate relationships with staffers.

President Donald Trump has suggested that the US would attack its ally Oman if it attempts to seize control of the Strait of Hormuz, which has effectively been closed since the US and Israel launched attacks against Iran in February.

According to Reuters, Trump made the remarks after Iranian state TV reported that it obtained an unofficial draft agreement that would reopen the vital waterway, with Iran and Oman jointly managing maritime traffic.

“No, the strait is going to be open to everybody,” Trump told journalists during a cabinet meeting on Wednesday. “We’ll watch over it, but nobody’s going to control it. That’s part of the negotiation that we have.”

Oman, a key US ally, mediated talks on Iran’s nuclear program until they were suspended by the conflict.

Iran and Oman lie on opposite sides of the narrowest part of the Strait of Hormuz, which normally handles around 25% of global seaborne oil trade and 20% of liquefied natural gas (LNG) shipments.

Iran closed the route to ships from “hostile nations” following the US-Israeli airstrikes, while the US declared its own blockade of Iranian ports in April. Tehran has since insisted on its “sovereign right” to manage traffic through the strait and collect tolls.

Iran’s peace terms reportedly include demands for reparations, the withdrawal of US troops from the region, and an end to Israel’s wars in Lebanon and Gaza. The US has demanded that Iran completely dismantle its nuclear program, which Tehran insists is entirely peaceful.

Dan Greaney, the Simpsons writer who foresaw Donald Trump winning the White House decades in advance, has announced his own 2028 bid for presidency.

The Simpsons’ longtime writer and producer wrote the ‘Bart to the Future’ episode, broadcast in March of 2000, in which an adult Lisa Simpson appears as “America’s first straight female president,” who inherits a “budget crunch from President Trump.”

In a video on social media on Tuesday, Greaney, dressed as a prophet in a loose robe and large fake beard, accuses Trump, Vice President J.D. Vance, and “billionaires, careerists and cowards in both parties” of turning their backs on America’s founding principle “that all men are created equal.”

“The government is supposed to work for everyone. Democracy for all, accountability for all, prosperity for all. We must restore this,” he says.

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“Wait, I am a lawyer,” he says, announcing that he would run for president of the United States on the platform “America for All.”

According to his campaign website, the self-styled “progressive Republican” supports fighting influence-buying, improving transparency in US politics, making housing more readily available, and expanding universal health care.

Students are being taught that black people cannot be racist towards white people as part of an educational initiative aimed at, yes, countering racism.

According to teaching materials adopted by a group of Sheffield schools and introduced by Notre Dame High School, teenagers are explicitly taught: “Black people can be racially prejudiced towards a white person which is wrong and totally unacceptable. However, this is not racism. Racism is racial prejudice plus power. In the UK, white people hold the cultural power.”

In a lesson plan on “being anti-racist in our actions” for children aged seven to 11, a portion of the curriculum is devoted to “empathy building” including “privilege”.

It says: “In Britain, white people are likely to be privileged by the colour of their skin. This privilege arises because they are much less likely to be affected by racist behaviour, including bias, discrimination and verbal and physical abuse.

“Privileged people have a responsibility to reduce racism by: being aware of it; improving their own language and behaviour; challenging their friends’ language and behaviour; reporting incidents of racism; providing support to those who have been harmed by discrimination.”

The initiative pushes the idea that all white people enjoy “white privilege,” despite the fact that this is glaringly untrue. There are large segments of the white population that are impoverished and discriminated against on a daily basis. At the same time, many white people are the target of violence largely due to the color of their skin. In short, the term is highly divisive and unjustly generalizes and alienates disadvantaged white communities.

In a question-and-answer section that seems to accept that all of this is the consequence of racism, students are asked: “What is happening? Why is this an example of racism? If race isn’t real, how do you explain this? Has the concept of race led some people to believe that some groups of people are different to others?

“Are certain racial groups being treated differently? Are there other possible explanations for this?”

But is this treatment of black people simply the result of racism and skin color? Or is it more due to the realities on the ground which show that, per capita, black people are more prone to commit crimes than white people? Could it be that it is the black crime rate that largely causes racism against black people? This is not to suggest that racism doesn’t exist, or that there are no police officers who unfairly target black citizens, but crime statistics don’t lie.

In order to resolve the problem, society needs to get to the root causes of black crime, which include economic inequality that black people disproportionately suffer from. Until we reach that day, reckless school lessons like the ones being introduced in the UK risk inciting violence against white people, and thankfully there are British politicians who are able to see the inherent dangers of teaching materials like these.

She said: “It is deeply alarming that children as young as seven are being exposed to divisive identity politics in schools under the banner of ‘anti-racism education.’

“These materials teach children that black prejudice against white people cannot be described as racism, present contested concepts like ‘white privilege’ as unquestionable fact and encourage pupils to see themselves primarily through the lens of race.

“It is hugely damaging and exactly the kind of Left-wing ideological nonsense that should be nowhere near our classrooms.

“Labelling children by race and teaching them to focus on what divides them will only foster resentment and deepen division.”

Parents in the United Kingdom are beginning to push back against an educational system that seems more interested in indoctrinating students with critical race theory than providing a solid education. Children should not be spending their childhood thinking about their peers’ skin color or whether racism against white people exits. In reality, when left to their own devices, children do not place any importance on other children’s skin color and play happily together. It is only when meddling ideologues intervene that children begin to believe there is a problem.

Israel carried out heavy strikes across southern Lebanon after declaring the entire area a “combat zone.” RT witnessed the evacuations ahead of the bombardment.

Wednesday’s escalation came after Israel Defense Forces (IDF) issued evacuation orders for several areas ahead of what it described as strikes on Hezbollah targets. Maps published by the IDF earlier in the day marked large sections of the Lebanese Tyre region for evacuation, and military spokesman Avichay Adraee warned that all areas south of the Zahrani River were considered a “combat zone.”

Reporting from Lebanon’s Tyre District, RT journalist Ali Rida Sbeity said residents had begun fleeing the city, noting that many had “stayed throughout the war, even at its peak and after the ceasefire, but now they are taking this road toward Saida and Beirut, seeking safer areas.”

In a statement posted hours later on X, the IDF claimed that it had struck military buildings, command centers, and launch sites allegedly used by Hezbollah in the Bekaa Valley and southern Lebanon. The military claimed that around 550 Hezbollah-linked targets had been hit since the beginning of the week, adding that operations around Tyre were ongoing.

צה"ל תקף מבנים צבאיים, מפקדות ואתרי שיגור בבקעא: מתחילת השבוע הותקפו כ-550 מטרות של ארגון הטרור חיזבאללה בלבנון

לאורך היום, צה"ל תקף בבקעא ובמספר מרחבים בדרום לבנון מבנים צבאיים, מפקדות ואתרי שיגור בשימוש ארגון הטרור חיזבאללה.

תקיפת המפקדות בצור נמשכות גם ברגעים אלו pic.twitter.com/E0qkGQ3Knt

— צבא ההגנה לישראל (@idfonline) May 27, 2026

Lebanese media reported strikes on several southern towns, including Deir Amas, Braiqaa, Srifa, and Toura. The Lebanese army said one of its soldiers had been killed near a military position in the Bekaa region.

The intensified bombing comes amid indirect talks between the US and Iran, with Tehran asserting that Israel must bring a halt to its military operations against Hezbollah if the ceasefire with Washington is to be extended. US President Donald Trump has previously said that Israel should only engage in “surgical” military strikes in Lebanon.

According to Lebanon’s Health Ministry, at least 3,213 people have been killed and 9,737 wounded since Israel launched its military operation against Hezbollah following the US-Israeli attack on Iran in late February.

Senior figures within Germany’s Christian Democratic Union (CDU) are allegedly discussing the possible ousting of Chancellor Friedrich Merz due to his record-low approval ratings, according to German media reports.

According to Bild, talks about potentially “swapping” Merz for another chancellor are reportedly taking place within the party’s top ranks, including among regional leaders such as Hendrik Wust of North Rhine-Westphalia, Boris Rhein of Hesse, and Michael Kretschmer of Saxony.

Wust, who leads Germany’s most populous state, has also been floated by Bild, Focus, and Die Welt as a potential replacement for Merz. Several outlets have described him as Germany’s third most popular politician and the highest-rated CDU figure, while Merz was recently named the world’s most unpopular political leader in a public opinion survey.

Eckart Lohse, head of the parliamentary editorial office at FAZ, wrote on Wednesday that even CDU members who don’t openly oppose Merz now “consider the chancellor weak” and speak of “a palpable feeling of unease.”

Other outlets, including Bild and Focus, have described the reported talks about removing the chancellor as “rumors,” stressing that no concrete plans have emerged so far.

Since taking office in May of 2025, Merz has stepped up support for Ukraine and accelerated Germany’s rearmament drive. He has pledged to make the Bundeswehr Europe’s “strongest” conventional army, citing what he describes as a growing Russian threat.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly dismissed claims that Moscow plans to attack NATO countries as “nonsense,” accusing European leaders of using the narrative to distract their citizens from domestic problems.

Merz has also urged Germans to work more, describing the country’s welfare model as outdated and unsustainable. By mid-April, his disapproval rating had climbed to 76%, with just 19% of Germans satisfied with his performance.

“Significant fractions” of Pope Leo XIV’s recent encyclical on the dangers of artificial intelligence were actually written by artificial intelligence, analyst Linch Zhang claims.

In the 42,000-word ‘Magnifica Humanitas’ (Magnificent Humanity), the pontiff warned of the growing, state-like power of Silicon Valley, the immorality of autonomous weapons, and the dangers of allowing AI to “construct a new Tower of Babel” and reduce human beings to “a resource to be used and exploited.”

Despite its appeal for AI to be regulated and “disarmed,” large portions of ‘Magnifica Humanitas’ show some telltale signs of being written by AI, Zhang claimed in a blog post on Tuesday.

Running the text through AI detector Pangram, Zhang found that some paragraphs were “essentially 0% AI,” but others were between 40% and 100% AI-written. All four of Francis’ encyclicals registered as entirely human-written, as did writings by Popes Benedict XVI and John Paul II. Pangram also flagged the Italian version of the encyclical for AI, suggesting that artificial intelligence was not just used to translate the document.

When Zhang’s experiment was repeated by The Verge, roughly 46% of the encyclical was determined to be written by AI.

The specific LLM (large language model) used to craft the text was likely Anthropic’s Claude, Zhang claimed, citing his own familiarity with Claude and its overuse of certain words such as “genuinely.”

The fact that certain paragraphs appear completely free of AI suggests that “some senior Vatican officials heavily used AI assistance for this encyclical and many (probably including Pope Leo himself) didn’t,” Zhang wrote.

“My tentative hypothesis is that Pope Leo does not approve of the AI usage in encyclicals, and plausibly was not even aware of significant AI usage in his own encyclical,” Zhang concluded.

The Vatican has not commented on Zhang’s claims. Nor has Anthropic, whose co-founder, Christopher Olah, delivered an address alongside the Pope on Monday.

The EU could temporarily deny future member states’ veto rights in order to prevent them from interfering with the bloc’s foreign policy, the Guardian reported on Tuesday, citing EU sources.

The idea is reportedly being discussed as Brussels seeks to bring new members in before the end of the decade, while avoiding the kind of internal roadblocks that the likes of Hungary and Slovakia have put up to impede EU military and financial support for Ukraine.

According to the newspaper, the European Commission is now considering a plan under which new entrants would not automatically receive the power to block foreign policy decisions or other matters requiring unanimity, such as taxation. The measure could apply for several years after accession, four EU sources told the outlet.

The proposal to restrict veto rights was reportedly brought up during treaty negotiations with Montenegro, which has been negotiating accession for 14 years and is hoping to become the EU’s 28th member by 2028. It is currently considered the frontrunner among the bloc’s nine official candidate countries.

If the ban is ultimately included, Montenegro’s treaty could later serve as a template for other candidates, the Guardian claimed, noting that the measure is “legally borderline” and would have to be time-limited to avoid creating second-class EU members.

A number of EU officials have since called for abandoning the bloc’s unanimity principles, with German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul stressing that an EU with over 33 members could not continue operating under rules designed for a smaller bloc.

Former EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell has similarly argued that unanimity has made the bloc irrelevant in international politics, calling for a smaller core group of members to be established that would make decisions on EU policy.

However, critics of this push have accused Brussels of using the Ukraine conflict and enlargement debate to centralize power at the expense of national sovereignty. Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico has warned that abolishing veto rights on fundamental EU issues would be “the beginning of the end” for the bloc.

Spanish police have searched the headquarters of the country’s ruling Socialist Workers’ Party (PSOE) in a graft probe involving alleged influence-peddling and irregular party financing.

According to local media, investigators from the Civil Guard’s elite Central Operative Unit (UCO) entered the party’s Madrid offices on Wednesday to obtain evidence of suspected illegal financing. 

The case is reportedly centered on former PSOE member Leire Diez; several former party officials and businessmen are also said to be under scrutiny. Diez is accused of attempting to influence graft investigations and discredit members of Spain’s anti-corruption police unit, allegations she denies.

PSOE, which is led by Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, said it would cooperate fully with investigators and hand over any requested information but has denied any attempt to conceal evidence.

Sanchez, who is in Rome for talks with Pope Leo XIV, told reporters there had been “a lot of fake news” and insisted the party “will act decisively, as we always have.” He also warned against politicizing judicial investigations and rejected opposition calls for snap elections, saying he could not call a vote for “partisan interests” but only “for the general interest of the citizens.”

Sanchez, who has led Spain since 2018, has emerged as one of the EU’s most vocal critics of Israel’s war in Gaza and the US-Israeli military escalation with Iran. He has pushed for limits on arms sales to Israel and refused to allow American forces to use Spanish bases for operations linked to strikes on Iran, saying Madrid would not be “complicit” in the conflict – moves that have heightened tensions with Washington and West Jerusalem.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has slammed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over the destruction of Gaza, warning that Muslims may soon teach him a “lesson.”

Erdogan made the remarks during Eid al-Adha celebrations in his hometown of Rize, where he called for Muslim unity and putting pressure on Israel.

“What is happening in Palestine, in Gaza, gives us a special stance, a special vigil this Eid. God willing, this tyrant Netanyahu will soon learn the lesson he deserves from the Muslims of the world,” he said, according to Anadolu news agency.

The comments came days after Israel detained hundreds of activists from a Gaza-bound flotilla, which had departed from Türkiye carrying humanitarian aid and pro-Palestinian campaigners seeking to challenge Israel’s blockade of the enclave.

Erdogan branded the interception “piracy and banditry.”

Erdogan has been among the most vocal critics of Israel’s military campaign in Gaza since it began in 2023, accusing Israel of “genocide” and “state terrorism” against Palestinians, while comparing the Israeli government to Nazis at times.

In July of 2024, ten months into the conflict, Erdogan said Türkiye could act against Israel “just like” it did in Libya and Nagorno-Karabakh, which was widely interpreted by Israeli media and officials as a threat of military intervention.

Israeli officials have increasingly portrayed Türkiye as a regional threat. Following Erdogan’s 2024 remarks, Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz compared the Turkish leader to Iraq’s Saddam Hussein, warning him to “remember what happened there and how it ended.”

Earlier this year, former Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett said Turkey could become Israel’s leading regional adversary, making it the “next Iran.”

Has also pointed to the economic links between the two countries, noting that Türkiye provides transit for Azerbaijani oil to Israel, which reportedly meets up 60% of the Jewish state’s crude oil needs.

North Korea has tested newly-developed missile launch and tactical cruise missile systems equipped with precision AI guidance, KCNA state news agency reported on Wednesday.

The drills, carried out on Tuesday, assessed the power of a tactical ballistic missile’s specialized warhead and the reliability of an AI-guided 240mm artillery rocket, as well as the accuracy of a new AI-guided tactical cruise missile, the agency said.

The new North Korean cruise missile’s “tactical cruising shell” has a combination of autonomous navigation and TERCOM (terrain contour matching) navigation systems, as well as “an AI terminal guidance function” that could allow Pyongyang to precisely hit targets at a distance of up to 100 km, KCNA said. With systems like these, artificial intelligence steers the munition towards its target in the final stages of flight.

The firing control and automation systems on the three tested launch vehicles have been updated for the “conditions of modern warfare,” North Korean leader Kim Jong-un said at the test, according to KCNA.

The main task of Pyongyang’s armed forces and defense science sector is to defend North Korea’s sovereignty and guarantee its economic and political development “with powerful war deterrence,” he said.

Various countries, including the US and Russia, have been increasingly focused on integrating AI into their military systems.

AI is also being integrated into Russia’s administrative and defense sectors, Russian President Vladimir Putin said last month. Putin instructed the government to develop a national plan to deploy its own “fully sovereign” AI solutions in all areas, including security and national defense.

After February 28, 2026, relations between the United Arab Emirates and Iran entered a new phase of escalation, one in which the old formula of cautious pragmatism effectively stopped working.

Formally, Abu Dhabi declared its neutrality in the war which the US and Israel launched against Iran, and emphasized that it was not providing its territory, airspace, or its waters for strikes against Iran. However, the course of the war quickly showed that Tehran no longer believed such statements. The UAE remains a key US partner in the Persian Gulf, a participant in the Abraham Accords with Israel, and an important financial and logistical hub within the Western infrastructure in the region. For that reason, in Iran’s perception, the Emirates increasingly look like a participant in an anti-Iranian coalition.

The central symbol of the dispute remains the issue of Abu Musa, Greater Tunb, and Lesser Tunb, the three islands located near the entrance to the Strait of Hormuz. Iran established control over them in 1971, shortly before the creation of the UAE. The Emirates have since regarded the islands as occupied territory and have demanded that the dispute be resolved through negotiations or international arbitration. For Iran, the matter is closed, since Tehran considers the islands part of its own territory. For the UAE, it is an unhealed wound from the birth of the federation and a constant reminder of its strategic vulnerability before a larger neighbor. Today’s discussions about a possible military scenario around the islands are perceived as a direct return to the most painful issue in Emirati-Iranian relations.

A veneer of neutrality

Before the current war, Abu Dhabi tried to be on good terms with everyone. It needed to preserve trade with Iran, ensure security through the US, develop technological and defense cooperation with Israel, and, in its public rhetoric, avoid direct involvement in the conflict. But after the US and Israel attacked Iran, that balance began to collapse. Media reports appeared about secret contacts between Israeli officials and the UAE leadership at the height of the war. CBS News reported that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had made a secret visit to the UAE and met with the country’s president, Mohammed bin Zayed.

According to the channel, the meeting took place in late March, after the current military escalation had already begun. The Israeli side treated the visit as a fact, while the UAE publicly denied the reports. That discrepancy itself became an important political episode, damaging the image of Emirati neutrality and giving Iran another argument for accusing Abu Dhabi of hidden coordination with West Jerusalem.

Israeli military assistance

Axios, citing Israeli and American officials, reported that Israel had sent the UAE an Iron Dome air defense system and military personnel to operate it – later confirmed by US Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee. For the UAE, this cooperation can be explained as a defensive necessity, since the country found itself under the threat of missile and drone strikes. For Iran, however, the logic looks different. Tehran perceives this as the integration of the UAE into Israel’s military infrastructure in the Gulf.

Officially, Abu Dhabi can argue that the matter concerns only the protection of civilian infrastructure. But war erases the boundary between defense and participation. Every air-defense system, every group of foreign military specialists, every exchange of intelligence, and every closed meeting with Israeli leaders can be seen as part of a single front. It shows that UAE-Israel ties after the Abraham Accords are no longer limited to diplomacy, trade, and technology. Under wartime conditions, those ties acquire direct military-strategic significance.

American presence

Iranian representatives claimed that the CIA and US military structures were operating from UAE territory or using Emirati infrastructure in operations against Iran. It’s difficult to verify the truth of these statements, but in wartime the statements themselves become part of the conflict. Tehran uses them to justify pressure on the UAE and to portray it as a platform for US and Israeli activity. Abu Dhabi, for its part, has found itself in a difficult position. If it openly acknowledges deep coordination with Washington and West Jerusalem, it becomes a direct target for Iranian retaliation. If it denies everything while remaining part of the US security system and receiving defense assistance from Israel, its neutrality looks increasingly unconvincing.

The financial factor

For decades, Dubai has remained one of the most important external hubs for Iranian business, including trading companies, exchange houses, intermediary structures, and payment channels through which Tehran partially circumvented sanctions. Amid the war, unconfirmed reports appeared that the UAE, either shortly before the current escalation or already during the conflict, had restricted Iranian financial channels, frozen Iran-linked assets, or participated in closed arrangements involving the movement of billions of dollars. The most reliable open-source evidence points to a broader pattern of intensified pressure. The US imposed new sanctions on the Iranian exchange house Amin Exchange and a network of related entities, including companies in the UAE, Turkey, China, and Hong Kong, which Washington said helped Iranian banks conduct transactions in ways that circumvented restrictions.

For Iran, this is yet another front in the war. Even if the UAE explains tighter financial controls as a requirement of the sanctions regime and as a way to protect its own banking system, the political timing turns such steps into part of the pressure on Tehran. In peacetime, Abu Dhabi could play the role of an intermediary between the reality of sanctions and the realities of living next to Iran. In wartime, that gray zone quickly becomes a field of accusations. If the Emirates close financial channels, Iran sees it as participation in economic warfare. If they leave the channels open, the US increases pressure on Abu Dhabi and demands greater discipline in sanctions enforcement.

The situation was further complicated by allegations that US officials were encouraging the Emirates to become more actively involved in the campaign and to consider the possibility of seizing one of the Iranian islands in the Persian Gulf. True or not, the very fact that such reports appeared shows that the island dispute may once again be used not only as a historical Emirati grievance, but also as an instrument in the US and Israeli military strategy against Iran.

This is where the UAE may find itself under pressure from both sides. On the one hand, the US and Israel badly need regional actors to join their campaign against Iran. Without the participation of Gulf states, the war remains an external operation by Washington and West Jerusalem that causes discomfort even among Arab states that fear Iran. If regional actors take part in the pressure on Tehran, however, it creates the appearance of a broader coalition and reduces the political cost for the US and Israel. The UAE specifically has a modern military, ports, intelligence infrastructure, financial leverage, ties with Israel, and its own territorial dispute with Iran, making it especially important for this strategy.

On the other hand, Iran views any deepening of Emirati involvement as grounds for retaliation. Strikes on infrastructure, threats to shipping, accusations that Emirati territory is being used, drone attacks, and pressure through allied networks in the region show that Tehran is prepared to transfer the cost of war onto its neighbors if it considers them part of a hostile framework. The UAE said drones had struck near the Barakah nuclear power plant and pointed to their origin from Iraqi territory, immediately linking the incident to the wider network of pro-Iranian forces in the region. For the Emirates, this is an extremely dangerous situation. Their cities, ports, airports, energy infrastructure, financial system, and reputation as a safe haven all depend on stability. Even limited involvement in the war could strike at the very foundation of the Emirati development model.

A slippery slope

As a result, UAE neutrality is becoming an increasingly unstable construct. Abu Dhabi does not want to enter the war openly, yet it also cannot fully distance itself from the US and Israel, because those ties provide missile defense, military support, and strategic insurance against Iran. This duality makes the UAE from a potential arbiter of the crisis into one of its most vulnerable participants.

The main danger for Abu Dhabi is that it could be dragged into the conflict not by one abrupt decision, but through a series of gradual steps. Financial discipline against Iranian networks, then deeper US-Israeli defense coordination, then visits and closed consultations with Israeli officials, then participation in securing the Strait of Hormuz, then discussion of the disputed islands as a possible lever of pressure against Iran. Each individual step can be presented as defensive, technical, or forced. But taken together, they may lead to a situation in which the UAE is no longer merely near the war, but inside it.