Category: World

The head of a major lefty video agency who shot digital video ads for Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s successful campaign made an outrageous false claim about the unhinged attacker who terrorized Jewish New Yorkers during Shabbat services at a Manhattan synagogue, The Post has learned.

“Apparently this guy was an orthodox jew who was lashing out at jews. I wouldn’t call that an ‘antisemitic attack,’” Debbie Saslaw claimed on X, linking to a Post story on the arrest with a headline calling it an “antisemitic attack.”

As it turns out, the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office charged the accused attacker, Larry Montes with two counts of assault as a hate crime, two counts of aggravated harassment and one count of criminal mischief as a hate crime for his Friday night rampage at the Central Synagogue on the Upper East Side.

The firm Saslaw co-founded, Melted Solids, prominently features its work for the Mamdani campaign.

The agency has also worked on the campaigns of Vermont Sen. and presidential candidate Bernie Sanders, House Democratic nominees Brad Lander and Claire Valdez and former Congressman Jamaal Bowman, among others.

Saslaw, who was a “senior producer” for the campaign, said she is no longer associated with Mamdani or his campaign.

Montes, a Bronx resident, allegedly admitted to cops that his actions were religiously motivated, and called those worshiping inside the synagogue “swine” and “fake Jews,” Assistant District Attorney Ali Fazal said in court Saturday night.

The 46-year-old assailant “intentionally struck a 63-year-old worshipper’s face, causing her to sustain the laceration on her lip and fall to the ground,” Fazal said.

Prosecutors said Montes then “grabbed and threw two religious candles and candle holders, causing them to break,” valued at around $10,000 each.

“In addition to having animus towards Jewish individuals, the defendant admitted to having racial animus towards black people,” the ADA said during Montes’ arraignment.

“Before exiting the building, the defendant turned his attention away from the worshippers onto the security guard… a 65-year-old African American man,” the ADA added.

He also allegedly yelled “f–k the Jews,” sources said.

Saslaw deleted her statement from X, but not before someone screengrabbed it — and she later acknowledged it was a hate crime.

“Sadly it’s a hate crime and i was obviously panicked when i heard early reports but saw nothing on twitter for 4 hours or so,” Saslaw said in a reply on her X account.

Someone responding to her post said he thought Montes might be a “Jews for Jesus” adherent.

Source : https://nypost.com/2026/08/16/us-news/ex-mamdani-campaign-staffer-makes-outrageous-claim-about-hateful-nyc-synagogue-attack-where-attacker-yelled-f-k-the-jews/

Hayden Panettiere, the actress who shot to fame as the indestructible cheerleader Claire Bennet on NBC’s “Heroes” before starring as country singer Juliette Barnes on “Nashville,” has died.

She was 36.

Panettiere’s father confirmed her death to ABC News on Sunday.

“It is with profound sadness that we share the tragic passing of our beloved Hayden,” Skip Panettiere said in a statement.

“She was an incredible light and a force of nature who brought immeasurable love and joy to all who knew her — and to the millions who watched her onscreen,” the statement continued.

No cause of death or details about the circumstances surrounding her death were immediately provided. The Post has reached out to Panettiere’s rep.

Panettiere’s shocking death came just three months after she published her deeply candid memoir, “This Is Me: A Reckoning,” in which the former child star opened up about her harrowing battles with alcohol and opioid addiction, postpartum depression, domestic abuse and the pressures of growing up in Hollywood.

The Palisades, NY, native had been working since she was a baby, appearing in commercials at just 11 months old before landing roles on the soaps “One Life to Live” and “Guiding Light.” She was homeschooled after middle school to balance her education with her grueling acting schedule.

She became one of the youngest actors to be nominated for a Grammy Award for voicing Princess Dot in the 1998 movie “A Bug’s Life” at 9 years old.

She later appeared in movies including “Remember the Titans” at 10 years old, before becoming a household name as Claire Bennet on “Heroes,” which premiered in 2006.

She also starred in several coming-of-age films and teen rom-coms in the early 2000s, including Disney’s “Ice Princess,” “Racing Stripes,” and “Bring It On: All or Nothing,” and “I Love You, Beth Cooper.”

Her performance as troubled country star Juliette Barnes on “Nashville” earned Panettiere two Golden Globe nominations for best supporting actress in 2013 and 2014, respectively.

But as her career flourished, Panettiere was privately battling addiction — a struggle she would later detail publicly.

She said her drinking began to spiral after she moved to Tennessee to film “Nashville” in 2012 and worsened following the 2014 birth of her daughter, Kaya, when she also battled postpartum depression. Kaya lives with her father, former pro boxer Wladimir Klitschko, in his native Ukraine after Panettiere relinquished custody during her struggles with addiction and postpartum depression.

An old neck injury later led her to take prescription opioids, Panettiere said, and her tolerance quickly grew into a dependency.

She first checked herself into rehab in 2015, saying she felt as though she was “drowning.”

Panettiere later returned to drinking, which she said became a crutch for dealing with anxiety and life in the public eye.

By the time she turned 30, the abuse had taken a frightening physical toll.

“My face was swollen. I had jaundice. My eyes were yellow. I had to go to a liver specialist,” Panettiere told Women’s Health.

“I was holding on to weight that wasn’t normally there. My hair was thin and coming out in clumps.”

In her memoir, the mom of one revealed that a doctor had warned her that if she continued drinking, she could be dead within five years.

She eventually underwent an eight-month stint in treatment, describing severe withdrawal symptoms that included shaking, insomnia, headaches and an episode of auditory hallucinations.

After treatment, Panettiere described sobriety as bringing her a newfound sense of calm, happiness and clarity.

The star had also spoken publicly about the domestic abuse she suffered at the hands of her former boyfriend Brian Hickerson.

Hickerson pleaded no contest in 2021 to two felony counts of injuring a spouse or girlfriend and was sentenced to 45 days in county jail and four years of formal probation.

Source : https://nypost.com/2026/08/16/us-news/actress-hayden-panettiere-dead-at-36-report/

INCREDIBLE unseen footage of Michael Jackson has been unearthed, offering an intimate window into the King of Pop’s world just months before his life fell apart.

In one clip, the superstar tours his childhood home in Gary, Indiana, pointing to where he and his brothers used to sleep in bunk beds and joking: “Take all the dirty pictures out!”

The extensive footage was captured between 2000 and 2003 by Jackson’s close friend and producer Marc Schaffel, who was filming a three-part reality series with the star.

It sees Jackson reminisce about his career, prank his inner circle by dousing himself in expensive perfume, and receive a starstruck phone call from a young Beyoncé.

Schaffel told The Sun on Sunday: “The material was originally shot to be a reality show I was making about Michael. It is the last material from Michael in the later part of his life.

“My long personal friendship with Michael had made filming this series possible. He fully trusted me. I own and have shot and paid for the footage and production.

“The first episode is entitled ‘Going back to Indiana’. This show is a 24 hour window into the life of the world’s most famous person on a pilgrimage back to his hometown, for the first time since his childhood.”

Schaffel’s fly-on-the-wall series was ultimately shelved when Jackson’s Neverland Ranch was raided in November 2003, leading to his arrest on child molestation charges.

Following the raid, the TV network Schaffel was working with lost interest in the series, leaving Schaffel with a mountain of unused footage.

Though Jackson was acquitted two years later in 2005 – after which he fled the US for Bahrain – the documentary remained unreleased.

Now Schaffel wants his film to see a wider audience, capitalising on Jackson’s posthumous renaissance following the massive success of the biopic Michael, which grossed over $1 billion (£740m) and spawned a sequel currently in production.

Schaffel said: “This footage is a perfect real-life account of his life.”

“I’ve made a rough sample cut from the footage but I’m open to collaborating on how to put the material together.”

The footage captures a rare, sentimental moment as Jackson tours the modest house where the Jackson 5 phenomenon was born, pointing out the small rooms where the bunk beds were kept and the living room where he and his brothers rehearsed every day.

He tells the camera crew: “In the living room that’s where we rehearsed every day. Just move the furniture.”

The home shows extraordinary clutter on view – which producer Marc Schaffel explains was because an older relative was living there at the time and had been given little notice before the camera crew arrived.

In another clip, filmed in the back of a luxury limousine, Jackson displays his trademark eccentric humor.

Testing out different fragrances with his team, Jackson – whose nickname for cologne was “smells” – asks for his favorite fragrance.

After his cousin, who was acting as his assistant on the trip, hands over the bottle to instigate the prank, Jackson repeatedly spritzes his own crotch.

Jackson jokes with his crew: “It’s burning…Take me to the hospital. Imagine how it feels down there?”

Schaffel said of the strange scene: “Michael being the consummate prankster with the people closest to him would love to overdo the cologne and perfume he liked.

“In this case he liked this very expensive perfume at the time and when getting ready to go out in public would put it on.

“His cousin brought out the perfumes and started overspraying as a prank, but unfortunately, all of us in the limo with him, it was so strong we couldn’t breathe.”

Separately, Jackson reminisces about his past while flicking through a photo album.

He recalled: “Every country we went to we would dress in their attire. I wanted to do it in India the most and I couldn’t.

“I would get all the little Indian children dressed in their attire. I wanted to wear one of those young, Richie hats… the turban.”

“We didn’t get to do anything,” he grumbled.

In another video from 2001, recorded during production for the charity single What More Can I Give, a 19-year-old Beyoncé Knowles is seen breathlessly speaking to Jackson over the phone from the recording studio.

The star-studded 9/11 benefit anthem brought together icons including Celine Dion, Mariah Carey, Usher, and Justin Timberlake – but its release was ultimately scrapped amid growing disputes between Jackson and his record label, Sony Music.

Shaking with excitement, a young Beyoncé whispers: “I’m going to pass out.”

She tells Jackson: “I’m very honoured. Thank you very much for giving me this opportunity.”

The future megastar confesses that when she first heard her first line of the track she “literally screamed” – and Jackson warmly wraps up the call by telling her he loves her.

Having settled out-of-court following child abuse allegations in 1993 and 1994, Jackson spent the early 2000s attempting a major artistic comeback.

However, behind the scenes, the legal and public net was rapidly tightening around the superstar once again.

By late 2002 and early 2003, Jackson allowed journalist Martin Bashir behind closed doors for the infamous documentary Living with Michael Jackson, which aired in February 2003.

Source : https://www.the-sun.com/entertainment/16848050/michael-jackson-spraying-crotch-perfume-joking-dirty-pictures/

HOTELS have been evacuated after a 5.0-magnitude earthquake rocked Spain overnight, leaving a trail of destruction behind.

A state of emergency has been declared in the southern city of Granada after buildings collapsed and rocks crushed cars – sending terrified locals and tourists running from their homes and rented accommodation.

Panic broke out as the horror tremor struck, and was then followed by 12 others.

Jaw-dropping footage on social media showed chaos unfolding at around 1am local time, including tourists rushing to the street clutching suitcases.

Homes and cars were heavily damaged – with some roads seen split in half by cracks caused by the powerful jolt.

Andalusian ‌emergency services have rescued a ‌number of people from damaged buildings.

The temblor was felt across Andalusia and as far as Madrid, with locals reporting shakes in Malaga, Sevilla, Cordoba, Jaen and Almeria.

Antonio Sanz Cabello, vice-president of the Andalusian government, said that authorities had declared an emergency.

“If you are in Granada, you have felt the earthquake, you are okay, and your home shows no damage, stay calm and avoid entering and exiting buildings unnecessarily,” he wrote on X.

“On the street, stay away from facades, cornices, balconies, walls, and other elements that could fall.”

Regional authorities reported that emergency services received around 200 calls, but no casualties have been reported so far.

Callers reported falling objects, shaking furniture and rattling doors and windows.

The earthquake caused structural damage across the area, with residents reporting cracks in structures, collapses – including entire walls – and damage to several buildings.

One witness said: “We really felt the shaking, it was so strong that it woke us up.”

The local said she saw “quite a lot of places with damaged door fronts” and that pals had shared photos of items that had fallen from shelves.

Another Granada local told The Olive Press: “I could see water sloshing around in my swimming pool, like waves in the sea.

“Everything was shaking. It was quite strong and quite long. It seemed to go on for about 10 seconds.

“It was scary, really. It makes you feel powerless.”

Some hotels were also evacuated amid fears over the stability of buildings, but people were later allowed to return.

Source : https://www.the-sun.com/news/16846262/earthquake-hits-spain-cars-crushed-buildings-damaged/

Moroccan authorities have intercepted dozens of migrants seeking to cross into the Spanish North African exclave of Ceuta, reports say.

More than 100 people were blocked trying to make their way to the border on the outskirts of the town of Fnideq, according to Moroccan security sources cited by Spanish media and news agency Reuters.

It comes a fortnight after roughly 78,000 migrants arrived in the exclave by sea in a matter of hours – 100 of whom died, according to the city’s mayor, who also said the vast majority of arrivals had returned to Morocco.

Security had been stepped up in the area after the influx and amid suggestions on social media of a second mass crossing attempt this weekend.

The security sources said 111 people had been detained in or around Fnideq – known in Spanish as Castillejos – about 3km (1.8 miles) from the border, the majority of whom were from sub-Saharan Africa.

Moroccan police – including some in riot gear – reportedly used tear gas to disperse groups of migrants gathered on nearby hills.

Earlier this week, Morocco’s government said it was monitoring “the circulation of social media posts and messages of unknown origin” calling for a mass crossing on Saturday, and warned that it would prosecute organisers and participants.

Security at the breakwater entrance was “10 times stronger than the previous day”, Spanish newspaper El País reported.

Morocco had dispatched army officers, navy speedboats and drones to the border on Saturday, it said.

Meanwhile, Madrid deployed more than 1,500 security officers to patrol the area.

Spain has also installed a metal fence and a floating barrier following last month’s influx.

The crisis had calmed since breaking out in late July, but it has sparked tensions between EU nations that share open borders as well as criticism of the Spanish government.

Italy suspended the 29-member Schengen arrangement of free movement with Spain and introduced border checks on arrivals from Spain.

Italy was backed by Finland and Denmark, while the Czech Republic called for Spain’s membership to be temporarily suspended.

Source : https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/ckg44x2ey1ro

Iran has called for the release of three pilots it said were captured by Qatar after two of its fighter jets were hit by air defences during a military operation at the start of the US-Iran war.

In a letter to the head of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), Iran’s Brig Gen Mohammad Bagherzadeh claimed the pilots – Javad Salehi, Abdul Majid Dashtian and Imran Behroshian – had been held captive for six months.

He said the body of a fourth pilot, Majid Kazemi, had been returned after he was killed in the same operation on 2 March 2026 – the third day of the war.

Qatar “categorically denied” Iran’s claims and said it was “surprised by these misleading statements”.

Bagherzadeh said the three pilots had been captured by Qatar after they ejected from their jets during a combat mission targeting a Qatari military base.

In the letter to ICRC chief Mirjana Spoljaric, published by Iranian media, he accused Qatar of violating “the inalienable rights of these prisoners, contrary to all international laws and regulations”.

The letter also claimed the three pilots had not been allowed to meet or contact their families.

Qatar’s foreign affairs spokesperson Majed Mohammed Al Ansari said contact had been made with the pilots “after they violated Qatari airspace”, but that it had not received a response.

“The necessary measures were taken to defend our territory in accordance with international law,” he added in a statement on X.

Source : https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cj4kk8kz271o

Joshua Báez, the star prospect whom St. Louis called up Friday, made history during his MLB debut Saturday, launching home runs in his first three at-bats in the Cardinals’ 8-4 win over the Cubs on Saturday afternoon at Wrigley Field.

Báez became the first player in league history to hit three homers during his debut, according to MLB’s Sarah Langs, and he provided the boost the Cardinals expected when they brought up the outfielder — ranked as the organization’s No. 3 prospect, according to MLB Pipeline — for the regular season’s stretch run.

“It’s just unreal,” the 23-year-old Báez said. “To not only get a hit, but three home runs? It’s crazy.”

His afternoon started by taking the first pitch he ever saw in the majors — a four-seam fastball from Chicago starter Matthew Boyd — 449 feet to center field.

Then, in his second at-bat, Báez waited, getting to a full count to lead off the fourth frame before sending a 77 mph changeup over the left-field fence.

That second homer already put him in the conversation for a historical debut, as he became the ninth player in MLB history to collect two homers in his debut, according to Langs.

But Báez, the Cardinals’ second-round pick in 2021 out of Dexter School in Massachusetts, kept going and took his third homer off Boyd opposite field — just tucking the homer over the fence at Wrigley Field to drive in Alec Burleson and extend St. Louis’ lead to 6-3.

“There was a calmness and a smile, like, ‘I’m here,’” Cardinals manager Oliver Marmol said. “It’s rare for me to pick my head up to enjoy parts of it. He didn’t exactly give us an option but to actually take a step back and enjoy the heck out of what was going on there.”

With a chance at a fourth homer in the eighth, Báez lined out to left field.

Báez, just 23 years old, led Triple-A with 34 homers across 103 games with Memphis before getting called up, and he became the second player in MLB history to hit his first three homers in the same game — joining the Tigers’ Seby Zavala in July 2021.

Source : https://nypost.com/2026/08/15/sports/cardinals-joshua-baez-makes-mlb-history-with-three-homers-in-debut/

Nations like Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Bahrain are reconsidering the value of hosting US military bases, driven by a perceived diminishing trust in Washington’s effectiveness

Frustration with Washington is growing among US allies in the Persian Gulf, with governments increasingly concerned that President Donald Trump is struggling to manage the diplomacy needed to end the conflict with Iran, officials say. Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Kuwait and Bahrain are increasingly united in their frustration with the Trump administration, according to three Gulf officials and a former US diplomat who spoke to The Washington Post.

Some governments have begun discussing whether it remains useful to host large US military installations, although analysts say the changes are unlikely to significantly reshape the region in the short term.

One Gulf official said the anger towards Washington was at its highest level since the US and Israel launched attacks on Iran in February. “Trump started this war,” the official said, “and we are paying the price.”

The Gulf states remain heavily dependent on the US for security and military equipment. Qatar and Bahrain host major US military bases. But the conflict has prompted some countries to consider whether they should diversify their security partnerships.

A mutual defence agreement signed by Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Pakistan last week was “a signal to the US,” a senior European official told The Post.

The agreement showed that the three powerful Sunni Muslim states “are trying to diversify their security and defense partnerships,” the official said. “In their mind, the US is not enough.”

However, a White House official said Trump “has extraordinary relationships with all of our Gulf partners”. “The United States has been in regular contact with all of our regional allies since before Operation Epic Fury,” the official said. “Iran is more isolated than ever before as a result of its terrorist actions.”

Iran on Saturday claimed that three of its fighter jet pilots were captured by Qatar during their attacks in March this year when they were targeting a US base.

Iran has accused Qatar of capturing three of its military pilots during the early days of the US-Israeli war with Iran, a claim Qatar has publicly denied.

Gen Seyed Mohammad Bagherzadeh, commander of Iran’s armed forces’ missing persons search committee, made the allegation in a letter to the International Committee of the Red Cross, which was published by Iranian media.

He said the three men were flying Su-24 fighter jets on 2 March, days after the war began, when their aircraft were hit by “enemy defenses” and the pilots ejected. According to Gen Bagherzadeh, the pilots survived but were subsequently captured by Qatari authorities.

Majed al-Ansari, a spokesman for the Qatari foreign ministry, said Doha had not detained any Iranian pilots. “We categorically deny the claims circulating regarding the detention of Iranian pilots & are surprised by these misleading statements at this particular time, amid the ongoing diplomatic efforts & initiatives aimed at de-escalating tensions in the region,” al-Ansari wrote on social media on Saturday evening.

Iranian officials emphasise that mapping shipping routes does not mean the narrow waterway will immediately reopen to unrestricted global traffic

Iran and Oman have reached a crucial agreement establishing designated shipping routes through the Strait of Hormuz, marking the first major breakthrough in restoring order to the world’s most vital maritime oil passage.

While technical talks remain ongoing and a joint formal statement is pending, the two coastal states have mapped out defined entry and exit corridors aimed at protecting national sovereignty while allowing safe commercial transit.

The Breakthrough Map

Under the negotiated framework, Iran will oversee inbound commercial traffic while Oman manages outbound vessels, establishing dedicated shipping lanes designed to prevent collisions and security incidents. Negotiated independently by Tehran and Muscat, the arrangement seeks to resolve months of maritime disruption without compromising the territorial rights of either nation.

The technical teams are currently fine-tuning operational protocols, communication channels, and environmental safeguards before issuing an official joint declaration.

Reopening Depends on US Actions

Despite the structural progress, Iranian officials emphasise that mapping shipping routes does not mean the narrow waterway will immediately reopen to unrestricted global traffic. Tehran maintains that restoring full commercial navigation remains contingent on broader geopolitical conditions, specifically demanding an end to US naval blockades, military threats, and economic sanctions.

Until these external conditions are met, the newly designated corridors will operate under strict monitoring.

Source : https://www.news18.com/world/iran-and-oman-strike-landmark-deal-to-secure-strait-of-hormuz-but-full-reopening-still-hinges-on-us-actions-10275676.html

Although Cami Clark does not officially work for Anthropic, she operates as an influential shadow adviser for them and is also spotted sitting in the front row when Dario Amodei talks at big events, such as Davos.

Cami Clark, the wife and key adviser of Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, attempted to secure investments from disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein for what she called a “revolutionary porn company” that catered to women, according to a report by The Wall Street Journal and emails in the Epstein files.

Clark was introduced to Epstein in March 2011 by literary agent John Brockman. Epstein was already convicted in 2008 as a sex offender and of soliciting prostitution.

Brockman suggested that they connect for dinner. The emails in the Epstein files showed Brockman telling Epstein that he “should connect for dinner” with Clark and her business partner Michell Capocefalo.

“A Little NSFW”

“We would love to have dinner with you this evening,” Cami then replied to the email that introduced her. The next day, she sent an email with the company’s funding requirements and said, “It was FANTASTIC meeting you last night!”

A few days later she sent the script and treatment of the first few films of her company and said that he “might enjoy” the content with “the ladies”.

“In an email, she wrote, “Jeffrey! We thought you and the ladies might enjoy the script/treatment for our first 4 films, American Girl in Paris. A little nsfw… C”

A year later in March, she asked Epstein if he would be interested in investing in her and a colleague’s businesses. However, there is no indication that the funding was ever provided. In fact, in another separate email, Epstein had responded, “Can’t do TV sex.”

In July 2012, she had also invited Epstein to a house-warming party, but emails do not indicate that the two met again in person.

Who Is Cami Clark?

Clark has been described as a “sounding board and strategic adviser” for Amodei and his company, and the report raises questions about her influence over both of them.

Although she does not officially work for the company, she operates as an influential shadow adviser for them and is also spotted sitting in the front row when her husband talks at big events, such as Davos. She also chats with investors at important gatherings such as the Allen & Co. conference in Sun Valley.

Even at his recent visit to India, at the AI Impact Summit in New Delhi this year, which allowed each executive to bring along an additional person, Amodei brought his wife. Most of the executives brought colleagues with them.

Clark was born in Nevada, United States, in 1979. After dating the former Google chief Eric Schmidt for three years in 2014, she married Amodei in 2022.

Source : https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/anthropic-ceos-wife-asked-epstein-to-invest-in-her-luxury-porn-company-report-11915346?pfrom=home-ndtv_topscroll

Spain cricket team secured their 21st consecutive international win, breaking Australia’s record and boosting their T20 World Cup 2028 qualification hopes.

Spain aren’t just good at football, which is evident from their recent FIFA World Cup 2026 triumph, but seem to be on a roll in cricket too. While the country is still a few years away from being considered a cricketing powerhouse, their incredible run on the 22-yard strip is making heads turn. The European nation secured its 21st consecutive victory on Friday, beating Finland by 8 wickets to boost their T20 World Cup 2028 qualification hopes. In the process, Spain’s incredible victorious run in international cricket helped them break a world record held by Australia.

Spain took on Finland in the Europe Sub-regional Qualifier C match, securing a whopping 132-run victory. Ranked 28th by ICC in T20 cricket, Spain haven’t suffered a single defeat in T20 internationals over the last three years. This incredible run began with their win over Isle of Man.

Over the course of this period, Spain have beaten Jersey, Croatia, Czech Republic, Greece and Finland. With their 21st victory, Spain have bettered the record once set by the Ricky Ponting-led Australian team.

Under Ponting, Australia went unbeaten in 17 ODIs, including a victory over India in the ODI World Cup final in 2003. The Aussies then won three successive Test matches against the West Indies, taking their overall tally of consecutive wins in international cricket to 20.

Most consecutive wins in International Cricket:

🇪🇸 21* – Spain (2023 – 2026)
🇦🇺 20 – Australia (2003)
🇺🇬 17 – Uganda (2024 – 2025)
🇦🇺 16 – Australia (2000 – 2001)
🇦🇺 16 – Australia (2006 – 2007)
🇵🇰 14 – Pakistan (1990)
🇵🇰 14 – Pakistan (2011 – 2012)
🇯🇵 14 – Japan (2024 – 2025)… pic.twitter.com/Z0uiwpk9bQ

— CricketGully (@thecricketgully) August 15, 2026

Source : https://sports.ndtv.com/cricket/spain-break-australias-all-time-record-go-unbeaten-in-21-games-11915837 

As Anthropic prepares for what could be one of the biggest IPOs on record, Wall Street is looking further into the future than it commonly does to put a price on ​the AI company, valuing it based on how much revenue it could generate two years from now.
Anthropic is projecting 2028 revenue of roughly $190 billion to $200 billion, according to ‌two people familiar with the company’s financials, a figure that has not previously been reported. The projection dwarfs the $47 billion revenue “run rate,” reflecting the firm’s current pace of business, that the company publicized as recently as May, and shows the scale of growth investors are being asked to underwrite.

Bankers and investors are using enterprise value-to-revenue multiples based on forecasts, four sources said.
Using revenue multiples is common for high-growth software companies that have yet to establish a mature profit profile.
But looking ​two years ahead is less typical, reflecting the speed at which Anthropic’s business is expanding and the challenges of setting benchmarks for a company still spending heavily to build out its ​AI infrastructure, the people said.
The pace of spending on AI investment has been responsible for pullbacks in many of the most popular tech stocks in ⁠recent months, including some of the firms viewed as comparable to Anthropic.

There have been precedents among some of the fastest-growing companies that hit the market recently. Backers of Cerebras Systems (CBRS.O), cited 2028 revenue expectations in ​the runup to the firm’s IPO this year, and SpaceX (SPCX.O), projections extended as far as 2029 before the company went public at a record valuation in June, the people said.
The approach reflects the difficulty of valuing ​an AI company whose margins are still being pressured by enormous spending on computing power, model training and hiring. Investors are betting that as Anthropic grows, revenue will rise faster than the costs required to support that growth, allowing margins to expand.
Anthropic did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

SEARCHING FOR COMPS

Cloud infrastructure company Cloudflare (NET.N), enterprise software company Palantir (PLTR.O), and Elon Musk’s SpaceX are among the public companies being considered as reference points for Anthropic’s valuation ahead of ​the company’s analyst day, the people said.

Public-market comparables are a crucial part of the IPO valuation process, giving investors a benchmark for how companies seen as having similar growth profiles and business models ​are valued. The peer group can also help determine which revenue or earnings multiples should be applied to a company’s financial forecasts.
Palantir is valued at 53 times this year’s expected revenue, making it one of Wall Street’s priciest ‌stocks. SpaceX ⁠and Cloudflare both trade at 41.6 times expected 2026 revenue, LSEG data show.
Each of the companies offers a different lens on Anthropic. Palantir has become a reference point for investors valuing businesses with rapid growth and exposure to AI. Cloudflare provides a comparison with a high-growth software and infrastructure company, while SpaceX offers an example of a company valued in part on expectations for its future scale rather than its current financial profile.

LOOKING PAST CURRENT EARNINGS

Established companies are typically valued more heavily on earnings, or EBITDA, which gives investors a sense of the economics of the business.
For Anthropic, however, current EBITDA does not fully capture ​the economics investors expect the company to achieve ​at scale. Anthropic is spending enormous amounts on ⁠GPUs and other computing capacity, model training, inference and hiring. Those expenses are necessary to support its rapid expansion but could become a smaller percentage of revenue as the business grows.
The company’s financial trajectory already shows how quickly that equation is changing. Anthropic’s revenue run rate was about $9 billion at the end ​of 2025, according to the company, before rising to more than $47 billion by May. Anthropic has projected revenue of at least $10.9 billion for the ​second quarter of 2026, more ⁠than double the previous quarter, on track for its first quarterly operating profit of $559 million.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/business/anthropic-ipo-valuation-hinges-190-200-billion-2028-revenue-forecast-sources-say-2026-08-15/

The Taliban marked five years in power on Saturday, seeking to portray their government as ​in control even as aid and rights groups warned of escalating crises.
Outside the former U.S. embassy in Kabul, armoured Taliban vehicles took part in a parade, ‌displaying flags and banners, and celebrating what the government described as “victory day” from Western domination.

Sirajuddin Haqqani, the Taliban’s interior minister, said in a video address that their return to power was the result of “morale, courage” and “divine assistance.”

But he also made a rare acknowledgement of “issues and problems that may still exist.”
International organisations and the U.N. say the Taliban have struggled to address the natural and humanitarian crises Afghanistan has faced over the past ​five years, in part because Afghan women are under severe restrictions.
The Taliban have also faced a string of assassinations of key regional officials in the country’s northeast in ​recent weeks.
In late July, the Taliban’s information director in Badakhshan province was killed in an attack later claimed by Islamic State. The mayor of ⁠the province’s capital also died in an attack on Thursday, local media reported.

Taliban officials did not immediately confirm the reports.

DIPLOMATIC INROADS

When the Taliban returned to power in 2021 amid the withdrawal ​of the U.S. and its allies, they promised to govern more liberally than they had in the late 1990s and early 2000s — a period marked by public executions, the sheltering of Osama ​bin Laden and the destruction of the Bamiyan Buddhas.
But those assurances quickly faltered, human rights groups say. The Taliban have imposed sweeping restrictions on women and girls since 2021, barring 2.5 million of them from secondary schools and universities, according to UNESCO, and limiting their freedom of movement.
Half of Afghan women now leave their homes only once or twice a month, according to data released by U.N. Women on Wednesday.
The Taliban say they respect ​women’s rights in accordance with Islamic sharia law.

Five years on, their government remains internationally unrecognised, with Russia the only country to have formally recognised it.

Relations between the Taliban and Pakistan — ​initially their most important partner — are tense, as Islamabad accuses Kabul of supporting Pakistani insurgents.
Many former embassies in Kabul have remained empty since the Taliban’s return to power, including the U.S. embassy that was the ‌backdrop of ⁠Taliban celebrations on Saturday.
But the Taliban have made quiet diplomatic inroads, analysts say, as some countries weigh the limits of their influence in Afghanistan and the need to engage with the government.
The Taliban are increasingly pushing for arrangements with European nations that have been seeking ways to deport more Afghans. The government in Kabul is also using its geographical location at the crossroads of South and Central Asia and the Middle East to strike economic deals.
Zia Ahmad Takal, a deputy spokesman for the Taliban’s foreign ministry, told Reuters that ceremonies marking the government’s fifth anniversary were ​expected to be held in the capitals ​of Pakistan, China, Uzbekistan, Iran, Turkey and ⁠Malaysia.
“My hope for the future of Afghanistan is that we will move toward development, God willing,” Najibullah Ghorzang, a 28-year-old shop owner who attended Saturday’s ceremonies in Kabul, said.
“We defeated a great empire, and we will defeat them again,” he said of the U.S. and its allies.

EXISTENTIAL ​WORRIES

The International Rescue Committee warned on Friday that Afghanistan’s humanitarian needs had reached a record level, driven by droughts, the fallout from ​deadly earthquakes and the deportation ⁠of Afghans from neighbouring Iran and Pakistan.
While foreign aid budgets have shrunk, the number of Afghans in need of humanitarian assistance has risen by 3.5 million people since 2021, it said.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/world/china/taliban-mark-five-years-power-aid-groups-warn-crisis-2026-08-15/

The Democratic National Committee on Saturday officially selected South Carolina as the first state to vote in the ​party’s 2028 primaries.
The vote at the DNC’s summer meeting ‌in Austin, Texas, codified a July vote by the organization’s Rules & Bylaws Committee. Following South Carolina will be Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, Michigan and Virginia, the ​DNC said in a news release.

The first state to vote ​in a presidential nominating contest often helps to shape ⁠the field of candidates, drawing campaign spending and media attention.

The calendar ​adopted on Saturday will allow Democrats “to battle-test candidates while maintaining an ​open, affordable field,” the committee said.
“The DNC has delivered a 2028 nominating calendar that truly represents our party and our values, and will help us retake the ​White House in 2028,” DNC Chair Ken Martin said in ​a statement.
Some Democrats often mentioned as potential presidential contenders have visited South Carolina over the ‌past ⁠several months, including Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear, U.S. Senator Mark Kelly of Arizona, and California Governor Gavin Newsom.
South Carolina and Nevada had tussled in July over which state should claim the top spot in ​a competition that ​became a ⁠proxy battle between the party’s Black and Latino bases.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/world/us/democrats-pick-south-carolina-first-2028-primary-state-2026-08-15/

Iran called on the U.S. to ​accept defeat on Saturday, while President Donald Trump blasted Tehran as “very evil” and told Americans to prepare for continued high fuel prices as a result of the war.
Progress towards ‌peace talks and oil tanker traffic through the strategic Strait of Hormuz remained halted, with no sign the warring parties were moving toward ending the conflict that the U.S. and Israel launched on February 28.

“This strait will be opened and closed only under Iran’s command, and so long as you do not accept the reality of defeat and stop indulging in fantasies, Iran will continue to enforce the blockade,” Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister Kazem Gharibabadi posted on X.

U.S. GASOLINE UP 29% ​ON YEAR, IRAN ALSO FEELS IMPACT

Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi said Iran had not decided to resume talks with the U.S. He told Iranian news outlet Shahrara News in an interview published on ​Saturday that Washington must meet conditions on the strait in order for shipping to resume in the waterway that handled one-fifth of the world’s oil ⁠before the war.
Trump urged Americans to accept slightly higher gasoline prices while the conflict continues.

He told a political rally in Garden City, New York, on Friday that paying “a tiny little bit more for your gasoline” is ​worth the cost of ensuring “a very evil country” could not have a nuclear weapon, one of his stated rationales for the war.
“After we finish defeating Iran … pretty soon I’ll be declaring the Hormuz Strait a ​territory of the United States,” said Trump.
Throughout the conflict, the president has alternated between threats of escalation and assertions that a peace deal is imminent.
In a trend that has sparked inflation and disappointed voters, the average U.S. price of a gallon of gasoline was about $4.08 on Friday, up 29% from a year earlier, according to the American Automobile Association.
Trump, a Republican, campaigned for reelection on a promise to lower energy costs, and Democrats are seeking to make the war’s fallout ​an issue in November congressional elections.

Crude oil futures rose $1 a barrel on Friday. Benchmark Brent futures were on track for a weekly rise of 6.0% and West Texas Intermediate 5.4%.
Tehran, too, has stepped up ​its rhetoric in recent days as attempts to bring a permanent end to the war appear deadlocked.

“The Strait of Hormuz cannot be seized by a tweet or an aircraft carrier, by issuing an order or by delivering an ‌election speech,” Gharibabadi ⁠said.
Despite Iran’s defiant tone, though, there were also signs of an economic toll there.
President Masoud Pezeshkian, in remarks on state television, blamed high inflation on a U.S. blockade of Iranian ports and sanctions on Iran’s oil exports.

NO CRUDE OIL VESSELS TRANSITING STRAIT

Trump and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent each pledged to inflict more financial damage on Iran. Bessent told Newsmax’s “Rob Schmitt Tonight” program on Thursday that announcements of more measures against Iran were coming next week.
Tehran calls its enforcement of strait traffic a blockade – the term Washington uses for its threat against Iranian vessels leaving their ports.
“What we’re doing is a great service for the world, not ​only for ourselves … and we’re really doing a great ​job,” Trump said.
Only two vessels passed through the ⁠Strait of Hormuz on Friday with no crude oil shipments visible, according to analysis from ship-tracking firm Kpler. Some ships may cross the strait undetected with their transponders off, but the figures are nowhere near the more than 130 ships that traversed it daily before the war.
Vessels that dare navigate the strait ​without Iranian permission risk missile or drone strikes.
The UAE accused Iran of attacking a third vessel operated by Abu Dhabi National Oil Company that was transiting the ​strait on Friday, the Emirati ⁠state news agency WAM reported, after blaming it for two other incidents involving ADNOC vessels in the strait on Thursday evening.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/world/us/trump-urges-americans-accept-higher-gas-prices-he-escalates-iran-rhetoric-2026-08-14/

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un reaffirmed the deepening of ties with Russia in a message to President Vladimir ​Putin as Pyongyang marked the anniversary of independence from Japan’s ‌colonial rule, KCNA state news agency said on Sunday.
Kim was replying to a message of congratulations from Putin marking Saturday’s 81st anniversary of Tokyo’s surrender in World War ​Two. The Russian leader said the bond was forged as ​Soviet soldiers fought against Japan and that cooperation would continue “in ⁠all the sectors”.

The North Korean leader expressed hope for the future of ​ties that had “carried forward the history of common struggle for justice and ​precious traditions of friendship”.
Pyongyang and Moscow have grown closer since the reclusive state began deploying troops and weapons to support Russia’s war against Ukraine in what has been Pyongyang’s most ​significant involvement in a war since the 1950s.
The Russian ship Pallada ​arrived at Wonsan port for a goodwill visit on Saturday tied to the liberation ‌anniversary, and ⁠was greeted by North Korean provincial officials and Russian embassy staff, KCNA said.

Also on Saturday, South Korean President Lee Jae Myung called for talks with the rival North aimed at peaceful coexistence, telling Seoul’s Liberation Day ceremony ​that the two ​Koreas need safeguards ⁠to prevent conflict and should work to replace their armistice with a “peace regime”.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/world/china/north-koreas-kim-russias-putin-reaffirm-ties-korean-liberation-day-2026-08-16/

At least 47 people were killed after a magnitude 7.7 earthquake and dozens of aftershocks struck off ​eastern Indonesia on Saturday, the National Disaster Mitigation Agency (BNPB) said in its latest statement.
Rescue teams have yet to reach Nagekeo, the region ‌closest to the epicentre, after landslides blocked roads and disrupted communications, officials said.

“The quake was massive, the shock was so strong,” said Nona, a 51-year-old resident of Talibura, a village in East Nusa Tenggara. “There were 13 of us inside the house and we all ran to save ourselves.”

Tsunami waves of less than 1 metre (3 feet) were recorded in several areas of the ​Southeast Asian nation after the early-morning quake. Authorities lifted a tsunami warning about three hours later.
Earlier, rescuers in the port town of Maumere found ​20 dead, six injured and two people trapped under rubble, said Fathur Rahman, head of the city’s rescue agency. Maumere ⁠is the main town in Sikka Regency on Flores Island in eastern Indonesia.
Suharyanto, head of the BNPB, earlier said residents remained trapped in several buildings across the ​affected area, while there were reports of landslides blocking a number of roads.

Teams have yet to reach Nagekeo and mobile communications in the region were affected, Fathur ​told Reuters earlier. Attempts to reach the area by road were thwarted by landslides, while another team was trying to reach it by ferry, he said.
About 2,000 residents in Nagekeo evacuated, and damage was reported to homes, warehouses and government buildings, the BNPB said. Authorities also reported power outages and traffic congestion in parts of the regency.
East Nusa Tenggara Governor Emanuel Melkiades ​Laka Lena told a press conference that at least five people were killed when buildings collapsed as they slept.

‘WE DON’T DARE TO GO HOME’

Preliminary BNPB data ​showed 157 homes were heavily damaged, 41 moderately damaged and 148 lightly damaged. Damage was also reported at 87 schools, 18 health facilities, five places of worship and six office ‌buildings, along ⁠with other infrastructure.

Parts of a building collapsed into dust and rubble as people screamed and ran in the street, according to a Facebook video, verified by Reuters as being filmed at a port in Maumere.
Rescuers were searching for survivors beneath a partially collapsed port building.
Siti Sulfia Bira, 37, who lives with her family near the port in Maumere, said she rushed to higher ground when the tremors started.
“At the moment we don’t dare to go home just yet because the situation isn’t ​stable, we still worry that there might ​be more tremors coming,” she told ⁠Reuters.
Strong shaking was felt across East Nusa Tenggara, West Nusa Tenggara and parts of South Sulawesi, the BNPB said, with residents in several areas reporting tremors lasting about a minute.
“Most of the people felt the shock and scattered out of their ​homes,” the agency said.
A hospital in Ende district in East Nusa Tenggara was moving patients outside, Kompas TV footage ​showed, while Kompas.com reported ⁠at least one landslide.
Indonesian geophysics agency BMKG recorded the first quake at 4.58 a.m. (2158 GMT) at a depth of 15 km (9 miles), followed by several aftershocks.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/business/environment/magnitude-69-earthquake-strikes-off-coast-indonesia-emsc-says-2026-08-14/

When the judge asked Luigi Mangione whether he understood that he could spend the rest of his life in prison, he answered, “Yes”.

Luigi Mangione admitted on Friday that he shot UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in a crime that shook the country, after he appeared in US federal court to change his plea to guilty.

“On the morning of December 4, I shot Mr Thompson in Manhattan, and he died,” Mangione told a federal judge.

When the judge asked him whether he understood that he could spend the rest of his life in prison, he answered, “Yes”.

28-year-old Mangione also said that he stalked the executive to an investor conference in 2024 before shooting him. He claimed that he used a ruse to gather information about the event and contacted the health insurance company ahead of time under the guise of being an investor at the firm.

Mangione said that he pursued Thompson “after years of enduring severe pain from a broken back and navigating the obstacles of the health insurance system”.

In order to avoid the New York state murder charges, Mangione entered federal court and pleaded guilty to stalking. His defence team plans to argue the New York State murder trial should be dismissed on double jeopardy grounds, which means someone shouldn’t be prosecuted twice for the same underlying conduct.

“Mr Mangione has accepted full responsibility for the death of Brian Thompson,” defence lawyer Karen Friedman said outside court, arguing that her client shouldn’t face two prosecutions over a “single tragic event”.

Source : https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/i-shot-him-he-died-luigi-mangione-admits-he-shot-unitedhealthcare-ceo-brian-thompson-11911396?pfrom=home-ndtv_topscroll

President Donald Trump on Friday said he would “soon” declare the Strait of Hormuz waterway part of US territory after defeating Iran.

President Donald Trump on Friday said he would “soon” declare the Strait of Hormuz waterway part of US territory after defeating Iran.

“After we finish defeating Iran, which is being very badly defeated — pretty soon I’ll be declaring the Hormuz Strait a territory of the United States,” he said with a chuckle during a political rally at a police academy in New York state.

“It’s true,” he added.

Trump, together with Israel, launched a war against Iran on February 28 with the stated aims of ending the country’s controversial nuclear program and sparking a popular uprising.

However, Iran struck back by establishing de facto control over much of the Strait of Hormuz, a vital passageway for large amounts of global energy and other commodity shipping.

Source : https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/donald-trump-says-will-soon-declare-strait-of-hormuz-us-territory-11912131?pfrom=home-ndtv_topscroll

Workers at Ukrainian steel giant Zaporizhstal have kept the sprawling complex running in the face of years of Russian drones, missiles and bombs.
Now, the nearly century-old mill at the heart of Ukraine’s southeastern steel industry faces a ​new threat to its survival: import quotas and carbon tariffs from the European Union.

Steel products have long been a pillar of Ukraine’s economy, accounting for 15% of its total ‌exports. The EU is its top customer, receiving around four-fifths of that output.

The bloc’s suspension of import duties after Moscow’s 2022 invasion was critical to keeping production steady at Zaporizhstal — a top steelmaker — and other mills, said Oleksandr Myronenko, COO of parent company Metinvest Group.
“Now … we see the story changing fundamentally,” he told Reuters in a recent interview. “Instead of support from the European Union, we face restrictions.”
Under new EU rules, which took effect on July 1, the bloc cut its annual tariff-free import ​quotas by nearly half, while a wide array of imported steel faces an out-of-quota duty of 50%.
Myronenko described the new measures as part of a raft of mounting challenges squeezing his industry, ​including the closure of Black Sea shipping routes and higher domestic rail costs.

In the latest Russian attack on Zaporizhstal, a strike on Tuesday killed seven workers and ⁠forced the temporary closure of the plant.
The new EU quotas for Ukraine of around 1 million metric tons represent a 60% reduction from 2025 trade volumes, according to Kyiv-based consultancy GMK Center.

MOUNTING CHALLENGES

The new measures ​are part of a pile-up of challenges facing Ukraine’s steel industry, as Kyiv and Moscow spiral towards a new escalation of the air war in the fifth year of fighting.
Russian attacks on Ukraine’s Black Sea corridor have ​cut off the primary route for its steel exports and imports of raw materials, driving up logistics costs for already financially strained firms.
Frequent strikes on the plants themselves, such as Tuesday’s ballistic-missile strike at Zaporizhstal, force costly cycles of production suspensions and restarts.

From this month, producers must also contend with a 30% increase in domestic freight tariffs to help cover the state railway’s budget, hit by its own higher electricity and maintenance costs.
Oleksandr Kalenkov, president of industry association Ukrmetallurgprom, said the country’s ​once-formidable steel sector and the government must urgently seek exemptions both at home and abroad.
“For us to survive until the end of the year, a lot of different things need to happen,” he said, referring ​to Ukraine’s steel industry.
Ukraine’s Federation of Employers said the EU trade restrictions could cost the country $1.2 billion in foreign earnings and lead to a 0.6% drop in GDP.
It called on Kyiv to push Brussels for an exclusion and a ‌joint steel import ⁠regime.

UNUSED CAPACITY

Inside Zaporizhstal, a hulking crane loads smoldering, multi-ton slabs of steel onto a conveyor where they are pounded into thin, nearly kilometre-long sheets and rolled into coils.

Large parts of such assembly lines may soon need to be powered down as the plant refocuses on making more pig iron, a semi-finished product not covered by EU quotas, Myronenko said.
But moving away from higher value-added steel products would mean around 50% of plant capacity would go unused, leading to a scramble to reassign workers, he added.
The EU says quotas are needed to protect domestic producers, while the carbon tariffs — which took effect on January 1 and charge producers according to ​their emissions — are aimed at cutting carbon leakage ​and promoting cleaner production.
With the Black Sea shipping route ⁠effectively closed, the plant faces extra costs of $30 to $40 per metric ton to import the coking coal needed for production through other European ports, Myronenko said.
The result is less efficient Ukrainian steelmakers being squeezed out of a competitive market by Turkish, Chinese and European firms.
“Everyone understands the situation in Ukraine,” he said. “But everyone still ​has their own business, their own people, and they are responsible for them, and so they behave quite aggressively on the market.”

Source : https://www.reuters.com/business/ukraines-war-hit-steel-industry-faces-new-obstacle-eu-rules-2026-08-14/

President Donald Trump’s administration asked the U.S. Supreme Court on Friday to allow it to continue construction of his $400 ‌million White House ballroom after an appeals court ruled the project lacked the necessary approval from Congress.
The Trump administration asked the justices to keep the ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit on hold while it prepares a full appeal to ​the Supreme Court.

Justice Department lawyers, in their filing, echoed Trump’s contention that the ballroom project is a security necessity. Citing ​numerous assassination attempts against Trump, the lawyers described the project as “vitally required by national security.”
“This ⁠case involves an extraordinary and unlawful injunction that will halt the ongoing construction of the integrated military complex, including a ​totally secure ballroom space, at the East Wing of the White House, which is vitally required by national security,” they wrote.
The ​D.C. Circuit in a 2-1 ruling on August 7 upheld a lower-court judge’s order directing the administration to halt above-ground construction.

“Whether or not a massive ballroom should be constructed is for Congress to decide and is not a matter for Executive self-help,” the panel wrote.
The appeals court had paused ​its order from taking effect for 14 days to allow the Trump administration to challenge it at the Supreme Court.
The ​National Trust for Historic Preservation brought the case last year after the administration tore down the East Wing and began building a 90,000-square-foot (8,360-square-meter) ‌ballroom without ⁠seeking authorization from Congress.
The National Trust in a statement on Friday urged the Supreme Court to turn down the administration’s appeal.
“The Administration brazenly asserted to the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals that even if Ballroom construction were unlawful, not even the Supreme Court had authority to stop it,” the National Trust said. “The Administration’s transparent efforts to evade the rule of law, frustrate judicial ​review, and limit the availability ​of meaningful relief in ⁠the courts must stop here.”

Source : https://www.reuters.com/world/trump-asks-us-supreme-court-allow-white-house-ballroom-construction-continue-2026-08-14/

As Anthropic prepares for what could be one of the biggest IPOs on record, Wall Street is looking further into the future than it commonly does to put a price on ​the AI company, valuing it based on how much revenue it could generate two years from now.
Anthropic is projecting 2028 revenue of roughly $190 billion to $200 billion, according to ‌two people familiar with the company’s financials, a figure that has not previously been reported. The projection dwarfs the $47 billion revenue “run rate,” reflecting the firm’s current pace of business, that the company publicized as recently as May, and shows the scale of growth investors are being asked to underwrite.

Bankers and investors are using enterprise value-to-revenue multiples based on forecasts, four sources said.
Using revenue multiples is common for high-growth software companies that have yet to establish a mature profit profile.
But looking ​two years ahead is less typical, reflecting the speed at which Anthropic’s business is expanding and the challenges of setting benchmarks for a company still spending heavily to build out its ​AI infrastructure, the people said.
The pace of spending on AI investment has been responsible for pullbacks in many of the most popular tech stocks in ⁠recent months, including some of the firms viewed as comparable to Anthropic.

There have been precedents among some of the fastest-growing companies that hit the market recently. Backers of Cerebras Systems (CBRS.O), cited 2028 revenue expectations in ​the runup to the firm’s IPO this year, and SpaceX (SPCX.O), projections extended as far as 2029 before the company went public at a record valuation in June, the people said.
The approach reflects the difficulty of valuing ​an AI company whose margins are still being pressured by enormous spending on computing power, model training and hiring. Investors are betting that as Anthropic grows, revenue will rise faster than the costs required to support that growth, allowing margins to expand.
Anthropic did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

SEARCHING FOR COMPS

Cloud infrastructure company Cloudflare (NET.N), enterprise software company Palantir (PLTR.O), and Elon Musk’s SpaceX are among the public companies being considered as reference points for Anthropic’s valuation ahead of ​the company’s analyst day, the people said.

Public-market comparables are a crucial part of the IPO valuation process, giving investors a benchmark for how companies seen as having similar growth profiles and business models ​are valued. The peer group can also help determine which revenue or earnings multiples should be applied to a company’s financial forecasts.
Palantir is valued at 53 times this year’s expected revenue, making it one of Wall Street’s priciest ‌stocks. SpaceX ⁠and Cloudflare both trade at 41.6 times expected 2026 revenue, LSEG data show.
Each of the companies offers a different lens on Anthropic. Palantir has become a reference point for investors valuing businesses with rapid growth and exposure to AI. Cloudflare provides a comparison with a high-growth software and infrastructure company, while SpaceX offers an example of a company valued in part on expectations for its future scale rather than its current financial profile.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/business/anthropic-ipo-valuation-hinges-190-200-billion-2028-revenue-forecast-sources-say-2026-08-15/

At least 20 people died after an earthquake of magnitude 7.7 and dozens of aftershocks struck off ‌eastern Indonesia on Saturday, a rescue agency said.
Tsunami waves of less than 1 metre (3 feet) were recorded in several areas of the Southeast Asian nation after the early morning tremor. The tsunami warning was lifted about three hours after the quake.

Rescuers around the port town of Maumere found 20 dead, six ​injured and two trapped under the rubble, said Fathur Rahman, head of the city’s rescue agency. Maumere is the main ​town in Sikka Regency on Flores Island in the east of Indonesia’s vast archipelago.

Teams have yet to ⁠reach Nagekeo, the region closest to the epicentre, and communications signals there had been affected, Fathur told Reuters. Attempts to reach ​Nagekeo by car were blocked by landslides, while another team was attempting to go by ferry, he said.
About 2,000 residents in Nagekeo evacuated, ​and damage was reported to a number of houses, warehouses and government facilities, national disaster mitigation agency BNPB said. Authorities also reported traffic congestion and power outages affecting parts of the regency, it said.
The governor of East Nusa Tenggara Province, Emanuel Melkiades Laka Lena, told a press conference at least five ​people died from collapsing rubble as they slept.

The BNPB, which put the quake’s toll at one dead and four injured, said it ​was still gathering data.

Earthquake near Ende, Indonesia

Parts of a building collapsed into dust and rubble as people screamed and ran in the street, a video on Facebook, ‌verified by ⁠Reuters as being at a port in Maumere, showed.
“The quake was massive, the shock was so strong, we were resting at home with family,” said Nona, a 51-year-old resident of Talibura, a village in East Nusa Tenggara. “There were 13 of us inside the house and we all ran to save ourselves.”
Strong shaking was felt across East Nusa Tenggara, West Nusa Tenggara and parts of South Sulawesi, and residents ​in several areas reported shaking ​lasting about one minute, BNPB ⁠said in a statement.
“Most of the people felt the shock and scattered out of their homes,” it said.
A hospital in the district of Ende in East Nusa Tenggara Province was moving patients outside, ​Kompas TV footage showed, and Kompas.com reported at least one landslide.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/business/environment/magnitude-69-earthquake-strikes-off-coast-indonesia-emsc-says-2026-08-14/

Iran called on the U.S. to accept defeat ​while President Donald Trump blasted Tehran as “very evil” and told Americans to brace for continued high fuel prices as a result of the war.
Progress toward peace talks ‌and oil tanker traffic through the strategic Strait of Hormuz waterway remained halted, with no sign the warring parties were moving toward ending the conflict that the U.S. and Israel launched on February 28.

“This strait will be opened and closed only under Iran’s command, and so long as you do not accept the reality of defeat and stop indulging in fantasies, Iran will continue to enforce the blockade,” Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister Kazem Gharibabadi posted ​on X early on Saturday.

U.S. GASOLINE UP 29% ON YEAR, IRAN ALSO FEELS IMPACT

Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi said Iran had not decided to resume talks with the U.S. ​He told Iranian news outlet Shahrara News in an interview published on Saturday that Washington must meet conditions on the strait in order for ⁠shipping to resume in the waterway that handled one-fifth of the world’s oil before the war.

Trump urged Americans to accept slightly higher gasoline prices while the conflict with Iran continues.
He told a ​political rally in Garden City, New York, on Friday that paying “a tiny little bit more for your gasoline” is worth the cost of ensuring “a very evil country” could not have a nuclear weapon, ​one of the president’s stated rationales for the war.
In a trend that has sparked inflation and disappointed voters, the average U.S. price of a gallon of gasoline was about $4.08 on Friday, up 29% from a year earlier, according to the American Automobile Association.
Trump, a Republican, campaigned for reelection on a promise to lower energy costs, and Democrats are seeking to make the war’s fallout an issue in November congressional elections.
Crude oil futures rose $1 ​a barrel on Friday. Benchmark Brent futures were on track for a weekly rise of 6.0% and West Texas Intermediate 5.4%.

“The Strait of Hormuz cannot be seized by a tweet or ​an aircraft carrier, by issuing an order or by delivering an election speech,” Gharibabadi said.

Despite Iran’s defiant tone, though, there were signs of an economic toll there too.
President Masoud Pezeshkian, in remarks on state television, ‌blamed high inflation ⁠on a U.S. blockade of Iranian ports and sanctions on Iran’s oil exports.

NO CRUDE OIL VESSELS TRANSITING STRAIT

Trump and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent each pledged to inflict more financial damage on Iran. Bessent told Newsmax’s “Rob Schmitt Tonight” program on Thursday that announcements of more measures against Iran were coming next week.
Tehran calls its enforcement of strait traffic a blockade – the term Washington uses for its threat against Iranian vessels leaving their ports.
“What we’re doing is a great service for the world, not only for ourselves … and we’re really doing a great job,” Trump said, adding that a ​260-day deployment by a U.S. aircraft carrier supporting ​the war effort was “not nearly long enough.”
Only ⁠two vessels passed through the Strait of Hormuz on Friday with no crude oil shipments visible, according to analysis from ship-tracking firm Kpler. Some ships may cross the strait undetected with their transponders off, but the figures are nowhere near the more than 130 ships that traversed it ​daily before the war.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/world/us/trump-urges-americans-accept-higher-gas-prices-he-escalates-iran-rhetoric-2026-08-14/

Rubio credited the personal relationship between US President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Narendra Modi with helping strengthen bilateral ties.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has extended warm greetings to the people of India on the country’s 80th Independence Day, saying the relationship between the two nations is “stronger than ever”.

In a statement issued on Friday, Rubio credited the personal relationship between US President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Narendra Modi with helping strengthen bilateral ties.

“On behalf of the United States of America, I extend warm congratulations to the people of India on their Independence Day,” Rubio said.

“Thanks to the personal relationship between President Trump and Prime Minister Modi, the U.S.-India relationship continues to grow and is stronger than ever,” he added.

Defence, AI And Space Cooperation

Rubio highlighted growing cooperation between Washington and New Delhi in defence, energy security, critical minerals, artificial intelligence, space and commerce.

He said the partnership was making the two countries, as well as the wider Indian Ocean region, “safer, stronger, and more prosperous”.

“The deep ties of friendship and family between our two peoples form the foundation of a partnership that is innovative, resilient, and forward-looking,” Rubio said.

“The United States looks forward to the future our two countries will build together,” he added.

India and the US have in recent years expanded cooperation across defence, technology, trade and strategic sectors, with both sides seeking to deepen their partnership.

Source : https://www.news18.com/world/rubio-greets-india-on-i-day-says-pm-modi-trump-bond-made-us-india-ties-stronger-than-ever-ws-l-10274289.html

COPS seize £15million of cocaine in parcels featuring the image of Norway and Man City’s Erling Haaland.

They stopped a flat-bed truck after a tip-off and found a false floor containing 370 packages weighing nearly half a ton.

The packages were wrapped in green plastic and all featured the Norwegian striker in a snap taken in the World Cup

A woman identified only as María R was arrested.

The vehicle was stopped on Wednesday on Ecuador’s Pan-American Highway near the border city of Tulcan.

The city is 153 miles north of the capital of Quito and just a few hundred yards from Colombia.

The South American country is where up to 80 per cent of the world’s cocaine is produced.

Cartels often use public figures to identify shipments so drug couriers know who they belong to and who the buyer is.

Source : https://www.the-sun.com/news/16841719/cops-seize-cocaine-erling-haaland-parcels-truck/

Omar Abdullah criticised Pakistan for claiming rights over regional water resources, stating that the country cannot selectively express sympathy for Kashmiris.

Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah on Friday launched an attack on Islamabad for staking a claim over waters originating from the region, asserting that the neighbouring country cannot be selective in its sympathy for Kashmiris. Accusing Pakistan of “sucking blood” by denying J&K the right to use its river resources, Abdullah maintained that the people have historically borne the brunt of the water-sharing framework. His remarks came in response to the remarks by Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif regarding the Indus Waters Treaty (IWT).

“We have always been saying that our blood has been sucked – these are our rivers. We had the first right on this. Pakistanis say they are great sympathisers of Kashmiris. But when it comes to water, their sympathy disappears. Where was their sympathy when we were denied permission to use our rivers?” Abdullah told reporters.

VIDEO | Srinagar: Jammu and Kashmir CM Omar Abdullah on Pakistan PM Shehbaz Sharif’s remarks on Indus Waters Treaty, says, “Yes, this is our blood. We have always said that our blood has been drained. This water is ours… these are our rivers, and we had a rightful claim to… pic.twitter.com/zDYHBS1RJt

— Press Trust of India (@PTI_News) August 14, 2026

Luigi Mangione has admitted to killing UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson after pleading guilty to federal charges of interstate stalking resulting in death.

“I shot Mr Thompson in Manhattan and he died,” the 28-year-old admitted in Manhattan federal court on Friday.

Thompson, a 50-year-old father of two, was shot from behind on 4 December, 2024 as he walked into a hotel in midtown Manhattan. Following the plea hearing, his family issued a statement calling it “an important step toward justice for Brian and for our family”.

Mangione faces a maximum sentence of life in prison. He also faces state charges, although his lawyers are seeking to get those dismissed following his guilty plea.

Mangione had initially pleaded not guilty in both the federal and state cases against him for the shooting death of Thompson.

At a hearing in Manhattan federal court on Friday, Mangione’s lawyers announced that he intended to plead guilty to the two federal charges against him.

Wearing a beige prison outfit, Mangione appeared solemn and serious throughout the hearing.

Reading a statement aloud to the court, he admitted to planning the attack ahead of time, crossing state lines with the intent to kill and using a gun he printed on a 3-D-printer and equipped with a silencer and magazine.

He told the court he was driven to kill Thompson because of his experience with the healthcare system “after years of enduring severe pains from a broken back”.

Mangione stated that he had learned UnitedHealthcare would hold an annual investor conference in Manhattan in December 2024.

He then travelled to New York for the event, he told the court.

He also said he emailed UnitedHealthcare prior to the conference “posing as an investor” and asking questions about the event.

“I emailed UnitedHealthcare with the intent to shoot Brian Thompson,” Mangione said in his statement. “On the morning of Dec. 4, 2024 I shot Mr. Thompson in Manhattan in his back.”

The sentencing for the federal charges is scheduled for 18 December.

Thompson’s family said in a statement that they will continue to seek justice in both New York state and Pennsylvania, where Mangione was arrested.

“While nothing will ease the pain of losing him, we are grateful that the federal justice system has held the person responsible for this heinous act accountable.

“Now we look to the court to ensure that sentencing reflects the severity of this crime,” the family added.

Prosecutors have recommended Mangione serve between 24-30 years in prison. But Judge Margaret Garnett said in court that she ultimately decides his sentence.

Garnett explained to Mangione that the recommendation is not binding and that the maximum sentence is life in prison along with financial penalties. There is no parole in the federal system.

Mangione’s guilty plea could now throw a wrench into his New York state case.

With the trial slated to begin in September, he faces eight state charges including second degree murder, possession of a forged instrument (for alleged fake driver’s license), and six counts of criminal possession of a weapon.

Source : https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cwy0nlq1l2wo

Ryan de Nino’s ex-wife, Jessica Castro, mourned the death of the “Married at First Sight” star in a statement following news of his death.

“I have not had contact with Ryan in years so I have/had no idea what his life entailed,” she exclusively told Page Six Friday evening.

“However, I do send my sincerest condolences to his family during this very difficult time,” she continued. “I can not imagine what they are going through. May he rest peacefully.”

De Nino died at the age of 40, TMZ reported Friday afternoon, with a family member telling the outlet that he died “suddenly” in New Jersey “earlier this week.”

At this time, the family will not be releasing further details about de Nino’s death, the outlet reported.

The reality star’s sister, Melissa DeNino, took to social media with a heartfelt tribute to her brother, along with throwback photos.

“He was fiercely loyal to those he loved,” she wrote. “He had a huge heart, always. I can’t explain what it’s like to lose a sibling.”

“Someone who’s been there from the beginning and shares the same memories,” Melissa concluded.

“No matter what we were going through, I loved him immensely. Life as I know it will never be the same.”

Castro and de Nino rose to fame on the hit reality series’ second season. The duo exchanged vows and, after a trial period, opted to remain together.

But shortly after the season aired, de Nino and Castro divorced.

In June 2015, de Nino took to social media with a cropped photo of a restraining order filed by Castro, noting that it “disgusted” him.

Source : https://pagesix.com/2026/08/14/entertainment/mafs-star-jessica-castro-reacts-to-ex-husband-ryan-de-ninos-sudden-death/

Luigi Mangione may never be convicted of murder following his bombshell decision to plead guilty to federal stalking charges Friday — thanks to “creative lawyering” that leaves his state case hanging in the balance, experts told The Post.

Just hours after the healthcare-hating pretty boy copped to charges in Manhattan federal court, which could land him life behind bars, his bulldog legal team filed papers asking to have his separate state murder case tossed out over double jeopardy.

It’s a technical move that could cost Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg a marquee conviction in one of the biggest cases of his career.

“It’s very creative lawyering by his lawyers to do this,” said Mark Bederow, a veteran Big Apple attorney and former Manhattan DA prosecutor. “The loser here is the Manhattan DA.”

Mangione’s attorneys Marc Agnifilo and wife Karen Friedman Agnifilo argue that trying the 28-year-old killer on a state case — on charges of second-degree murder and various firearms counts — would constitute double jeopardy. Double jeopardy laws protect people from being prosecuted twice for the same crime.

They say that although the charges Mangione faced in the state and federal cases were different, they stemmed from the same crime — the cold-blooded 2024 killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson.

Former prosecutor Neama Rahmani explained the Empire State has a special law that “says that there cannot be a second or subsequent prosecution in New York State Court arising from the same transaction or occurrence as a previous case.

“So that’s the magic language, the same transaction or occurrence,” he said.

Both lawyers said it’s likely that Mangione will see the state murder charges thrown out.

“It is essentially the same facts,” Bederow said of the state and federal cases. “I mean, the only real difference is the federal charges include the stalking component. But ultimately, it’s shooting and killing Brian Thompson.”

The only move that Bragg’s office has is to argue the circumstances of the murder charges are different from those in the stalking charges, the lawyers said.

“They’re gonna have to argue that the [stalking and murder] statutes are designed to protect against different evils, [that] there’s different facts that weren’t covered in the federal plea and charges,” Bederow explained.

Rahmani said the feds “botched” their case and in turn “sabotaged and torpedoed” Bragg’s case.

Federal prosecutors lost their bid to seek the death penalty against Mangione and the murder and firearms charges they mounted were also struck down — all of which should have prompted the feds to dismiss the leftover stalking charges, Rahmani explained.

“The case was completely gutted,” the lawyer said. “They should have dismissed the case and let the state [case] proceed.”

“There’s a very good chance that the state murder charges are going to be dismissed,” Rahmani said. “If I was the DA, I would be pissed that the feds completely sabotaged and torpedoed my case.”

In Mangione’s Friday motion to dismiss, he claimed he’s been a “pawn” for both prosecutors’ offices — “which have sensationalized this case and misapplied statutes in an effort to overcharge him.”

“By explicitly coordinating and planning the order of prosecutions against Mr. Mangione so as to maximize his punishment and increase each government’s chances to convict him, the facts here do not allow the District Attorney’s Office to continue to prosecute Mr. Mangione under the Fifth Amendment,” Mangione’s lawyers wrote.

Either way, the Sept. 8 trial in the state case is unlikely to proceed on time, if it goes forward at all, with the double jeopardy arguments likely to be fought all the way up in New York’s top court, Bederow said.

Source : https://nypost.com/2026/08/14/us-news/why-luigi-mangione-may-never-be-convicted-of-murder-as-his-state-case-hangs-by-a-thread/

Playboy founder Hugh Hefner repeatedly called the FBI to report Jeffrey Epstein for sexual abuse in 2005, after a Playboy Playmate told him she was raped and trafficked by the disgraced financier, according to new details in a lawsuit.

Audra Lynn Christiansen — Miss October 2003 — turned to Hef for help when she was 23 and living at his Beverly Hills mansion, prompting the late magazine publisher to call the agency “multiple times” for assistance, according to the suit, filed by 32 Epstein victims against the United States.

In addition to the rape allegations, Christiansen said she confided in Hefner that she also was trafficked to one of his rich friends — Macau casino billionaire Stanley Ho, China’s “Godfather of gambling” who died in 2020, according to the filing.

She asked Hefner to call on her behalf in 2005, because she felt he had law enforcement connections and the “clout” to her allegations were taken seriously.

“Mr. Hefner called the FBI multiple times on behalf of Ms. Christiansen to report Jeffrey Epstein,” the complaint states.

The revelations are part of an amended complaint filed in May in the US District Court for the Southern District of Florida by Epstein victims who charge the FBI failed to act on multiple reports about his sexual abuse as early as 1996.

“The fact that the FBI is trying to utilize procedural technicalities to try to avert accountability and responsibility for its failures to properly investigate Jeffrey Epstein for over 20 years should be deeply concerning to all,” Jordan Merson, lawyer for the victims, told The Post. “How can you learn from errors if you do not acknowledge them?”

Christiansen, 46, who was part of the reality television series “The Girls Next Door,” was only contacted by the FBI in October 2020, after Epstein’s death, to follow up on the information provided 15 years earlier, according to the lawsuit.

She told the FBI that her agents introduced her to Epstein, who wanted to meet her after the Playboy shoot came out, according to the 2020 FBI report of the call included in the court filing.

The Minnesota-born former model wrote in the 2003 “Playmate data sheet” that accompanied her nude centerfold that her turn-on was “a secure older man who makes me laugh” and her turnoffs included “being taken for granted.”

Source : https://nypost.com/2026/08/14/us-news/hugh-hefner-tipped-fbi-about-epstein-after-playmate-trafficked/

A British sociologist who resigned last week from the University of Cambridge following weeks of public accusations of plagiarism and media scrutiny was found dead Friday.

Jason Arday, who was 37 when he became Cambridge’s youngest Black professor in 2023, resigned after he came under intense media pressure, with weeks of allegations about plagiarism in his academic work and questions surrounding claims about his athletic and fundraising accomplishments.

The Times and Telegraph newspapers, along with the BBC and Sky News, reported that Arday, 41, was found “unresponsive” inside a home in Battersea, south London, on Friday afternoon.

News of his death comes the same week as the release of his memoir, “Great and Unfortunate Things,” a highly anticipated work that Simon & Schuster had decided to release despite the doubts about his credibility. In a statement issued through his publisher, Arday’s family said that they were “in shock to have lost this amazing father, partner, brother, uncle and son.”

“The campaign of misinformation was too much for Jason, who was a gentle man and who always wanted to see the best in everyone,” the family said, adding that for three years Arday was “subjected to a campaign of sustained abuse … by those who would leave no stone unturned in their quest to undermine him.”

The Metropolitan Police said only that a 41-year-old man was pronounced dead in Battersea, without naming the man, in accordance with its policy.

“At this time his death is being treated as unexpected, but is not believed to be suspicious,” the police statement said.

Cambridge Vice-chancellor Deborah Prentice, who earlier announced that the university will investigate the circumstances around Arday’s employment, said she was “desperately saddened” by the news.

“Our heartfelt sympathies go to Jason Arday’s family and friends at this incredibly difficult time,” she said.

In resigning as professor of sociology of education, Arday wrote in a statement that “the relentless accusations, speculation and public commentary have taken a profound toll on me and on those I love.”

He said his stepping down should not “be mistaken for an acceptance of the narratives that have surrounded me.” He has denied plagiarism, but admitted to some mistakes when working on his doctorate.

Supporters, including more than two dozen academics and politicians, had described the plagiarism allegations as a “smear campaign” designed to undermine Arday and other Black people who hold “positions of influence.”

Arday’s appointment at Cambridge highlighted his personal story of overcoming dyslexia, developmental delays and autism that he said left him non-verbal until the age of 11 and illiterate until his late teens.

Cambridge has opened investigation into plagiarism accusations

In his memoir, Arday wrote of himself as born to achieve and born to struggle. He remembered a family “legend” that the 1980s hit “Everybody Wants to Rule the World” was on the radio at the time of his birth. He described how a midwife noted his long fingers and told his mother that it was a sign he was meant for greatness. In his early 20s, he recalled, he was on a relief mission in Brazil when an aid worker placed a hand on his arm and also predicted an extraordinary life.

“But I also believe you’re destined for very sad and difficult things as well,” she warned him.

Questions about Arday’s qualifications were raised publicly last month by Nathan Cofnas, a one-time Cambridge philosophy researcher who left the university after his critique of diversity, equity and inclusion programs sparked widespread protests.

On July 24, the Times of London published an analysis of Arday’s 2015 Ph.D. thesis highlighting what it said were multiple examples of passages that were “identical or near-identical” to an earlier paper written by another researcher.

British media also raised questions about Arday’s claims that he had raised 5.5 million pounds ($7.4 million) for charity through feats such as running 30 marathons in 35 days and 600 miles in six days.

Source : https://apnews.com/article/jason-arday-cambridge-professor-london-dead-reports-9036e2b405f5849415534e80bb1b9cb1

Atlanta Falcons edge rusher James Pearce Jr. will be suspended for the first eight games of the season for violating the league’s personal conduct policy, the league announced Friday.

Pearce was arrested in February following a domestic dispute with his ex-girlfriend, WNBA player Rickea Jackson. The incident took place in Doral, Florida.

Pearce’s charges of aggravated battery with a deadly weapon, fleeing police and resisting arrest, and misdemeanor stalking could be dropped if he cooperates in a pretrial intervention program requiring random drug tests, distance from Jackson and staying out of legal trouble for one year.

Pearce will be available to participate in preseason games and all team activities until the suspension takes effect on Aug. 30.

The second-year defensive end can be reinstated on Nov. 2, following Atlanta’s Week 8 game at Tampa Bay. The Falcons will travel to Madrid to play the Cincinnati Bengals the following week.

The Falcons’ pass rush has taken a hit recently following Jalon Walker’s season-ending ACL tear. The group is left with Christian Harris, JD Bertrand, Samson Ebukam, Kendal Daniels and Bralen Trice. The Falcons also added Cameron Sample after Walker’s injury.

Atlanta traded back to the No. 26 pick in the first round of the 2025 draft to select Pearce. The former Tennessee Volunteer has played a substantial role in transforming the Falcons’ pass rush, leading the team with 10 1/2 sacks during his rookie season.

Other suspensions

Pearce was one players suspended on Friday.

The NFL also suspended Washington Commanders edge rusher Dorance Armstrong, Tennessee Titans safety Nazeeh Johnson and Buffalo Bills defensive tackle Phidarian Mathis.

Armstrong was suspended one game for violating the NFL’s personal conduct policy. He will miss the Commanders’ season opener against Philadelphia on Sept. 13.

Armstrong opened training camp on the physically unable to perform list, but has since been activated. He was limited to playing seven games last season before tearing a knee ligament.

He’s entering his ninth NFL season and third with Washington.

Johnson was suspended six games for violating the league’s policy on performance-enhancers. Mathis was issued a three-game suspension for violating the league’s substances of abuse policy.

Source : https://apnews.com/article/nfl-atlanta-falcons-b5eb71e5108fd4e5002b686a63427f84

About a dozen Palestinian households in a village in the occupied West Bank were told to leave their properties during an Israeli military operation to remove Israeli settlers.

The settlers had besieged residents in three homes in the area since Sunday, cutting off their power and water supplies.

Qusra Mayor, Abdel Azim Wadi, told the BBC that his village had been declared a closed military zone – and Israeli forces were using some of the vacated Palestinian houses as barracks. The Israeli military said the aim was “to protect the residents”.

An Israeli spokesman told the BBC the settlers’ action was “deplorable” and “unacceptable” and the government would investigate and arrest those responsible.

“The Israeli army is acting against it, and we are investigating it and we will arrest those responsible and we will prosecute them,” David Mencer said.

Settlers have been emboldened by the rapid expansion of settlements under the current Israeli government – leading to a dramatic rise in settler violence as they try to drive Palestinians off their land.

All settlements are illegal under international law.

Of the besieged families’ three homes in Qusra, which are made up of the Abu Ridi and Hassan families, the residents of two were told to leave on Thursday, they told the BBC. They said those told to leave had since moved into the third house.

Elsewhere in the village, the residents of 11 other houses had also been told to leave by the army.

Earlier, videos shared from Qusra overnight into Thursday showed a dozen Israeli security vehicles – including a bulldozer.

In later footage – filmed in the daylight – there was a long line of Israeli security forces on the road to the Palestinian village.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said they had “dismantled two illegal outposts”.

It added that it had detained one Israeli and confiscated equipment on the outskirts of the Qusra and Jalud areas, near Nablus.

One of those asked to leave their home was Qaher Odeh, who said more than 20 soldiers had entered his house on Thursday morning.

“I was asleep in the morning, my brother and I. They came in and broke down the door, shouting open up, open the door. Even now I still can’t process what I saw in front of me. There was more than 20 of them, maybe 30,” he said.

“We left and kept walking down towards the lower part of the neighbourhood. Shortly afterwards, they sealed off the entire area.

“There were people being forced out of their homes. A lot of people,” Odeh added.

After around 10 hours some families were allowed to return to their homes but found them upturned. One man told us the soldiers had thrown all the food out the fridge and stolen $1,500 in cash (£1,112).

The IDF did not address the allegations when asked by the BBC.

“The soldiers were instructed that the Qusra residents will remain in their homes,” the IDF said.

It added that soldiers would not operate inside the Palestinian home that had been subject to the settler’s siege.

The IDF stressed that Israeli “liaison officers are in ongoing contact with Qusra’s local leadership and are working to avoid disruption to the daily lives of the residents in the area”.

Qusay Abu Ridi, one of the trapped Palestinian family members, told the BBC that the house had been attacked again overnight and that a few settlers had remained in the area, hiding from the army.

His brother – who owns the property – is a Palestinian-American businessman who had complained to the US embassy.

The US Ambassador Mike Huckabee – a longstanding supporter of settlements – called the settler intimidation of the Qusra families “a horrific act of terror.

“Actions by those who carried out this horrific act of terror meant to intimidate and harass this family are disgusting. No excuse for such thuggish behavior,” he posted on X.

The situation in Qusra first began on Sunday when settlers blocked the road to the Palestinian families’ gates and cut off their power and water supplies. The first Israeli soldiers who came to the site prayed with the settlers – an act for which the Israel military later said they would be disciplined.

The Abu Ridi and Hassan families made appeals for help on social media after their water and power supplies were cut off on Sunday.

On Wednesday an attempt by Israeli security forces to dislodge the settlers led to confrontations with a bigger group.

Palestinian security camera video shared with the BBC showed confrontations between Israeli soldiers and border police and a large crowd of settlers. The security forces used tear gas and stun grenades.

In other footage, the Israeli forces appear to have confiscated the canopy under which the settlers were sheltering, while leaving their other equipment.

It is not clear exactly what the settlers in Qusra want. In the past, settlers have forced Palestinians out of their homes and seized their properties.

The stated aim of the settlers is to empty the area of its Palestinian residents.

Settlements are illegal under international law, but the Israeli government has promoted their recent rapid expansion.

The case is the latest to draw attention to the relative impunity of settlers and how Israeli forces are struggling to deal with rising settler violence.

Qusra’s mayor had earlier told the BBC that local residents had seen “a clear and sustained pattern of targeting Qusra”. Last month a newly completed mosque was set on fire with graffiti in Hebrew sprayed nearby.

That settler attack was one of many that followed on from an incident in the Palestinian village of Tal. After Israeli settlers attacked Tal, it triggered an escalation in which six people were killed – four Palestinians and two Israeli soldiers – one of whom acted as a security coordinator for a nearby Israeli settlement.

In July, settlers also surrounded a Palestinian home in the village of Jalud, near Qusra, for more than two weeks. Afterwards, the owners fled and settlers took over the property where they remain until now.

Source : https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cj4kppdk2qwo

FROM escaping the horrors of Nazi-occupied Europe to rubbing shoulders with tech titans, presidents, supermodels and sports royalty, the Kushners have pulled off a staggering three-generation rise.

What began with Holocaust survivors Joseph and Rae Kushner building modest homes in New Jersey has become a dynasty spanning Manhattan skyscrapers, Silicon Valley, Middle Eastern sovereign wealth and one of the NBA’s most famous teams.

And in New York and Miami today, grandsons Jared and Josh Kushner sit atop fortunes worth an estimated $1 billion and $5.2 billion respectively, according to Forbes.

But while the brothers were born into serious money, each took the family’s original real-estate fortune in a dramatically different direction.

Jared pushed into splashy Manhattan property before building an investment firm backed by billions from the Middle East.

Josh turned away from the traditional family business and made bets on companies including Instagram, Spotify and OpenAI before joining an ownership group buying the Los Angeles Lakers for more than $12 billion.

SURVIVORS TO BUILDERS

The foundation was laid decades before either brother was born, after their grandparents survived the Holocaust in Europe.

Rae Kushner grew up in Novogrudok, then part of Poland, before the Nazis forced the town’s remaining Jewish population into a ghetto.

Her mother and older sister were killed, and Rae was among prisoners who spent months secretly digging a 600-foot tunnel to escape.

Only 170 of roughly 250 people who fled through the tunnel survived, according to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.

After hiding in the woods, Rae and surviving members of her family were taken in by the Bielski partisans, where she stood guard and helped cook meals.

It was there that she reconnected with Joseph Kushner, whom she had known before the war.

The pair married after the Bielski camp was liberated and eventually made it to the US, with Rae moving to New York in 1949.

Joseph began doing modest property deals in New Jersey alongside other Holocaust survivors, including the Wilf family.

The Kushners first rented an apartment in Elizabeth before moving into a small brick house Joseph build himself, while Rae kept the books from the kitchen table.

By the late 1950s, Joseph was building dozens of similar homes, and by 1963 his company was constructing hundreds of garden apartments across New Jersey.

It was an extraordinary climb for a couple who had arrived after surviving a destroyed community, years of displacement and life in refugee camps.

Their son Charles took the operation to another level.

He formed Kushner Companies in 1985, the same year Joseph died, and ultimately pushed the family’s holdings beyond New Jersey and into New York.

By the late 1990s, the business had become a billion-dollar operation with apartment holdings stretching into cities across the East Coast and Midwest.

But the family’s rise was rocked by a bitter feud between Charles and his brother Murray.

Charles was later sentenced to two years in prison after pleading guilty to tax evasion, witness tampering and illegal campaign donations.

It was during that turmoil that his eldest son increasingly stepped into the spotlight.

JARED’S BIG BETS

Jared was still in his 20s when he began emerging as the public face of the family empire, eventually serving as Kushner Companies’ chief executive from 2008 until 2017.

He also bought the New York Observer while studying for his law and business degrees, giving the young heir a foothold in Manhattan’s media and power scene.

Then came the deal that would define his real-estate career.

Kushner Companies paid $1.8 billion for 666 Fifth Avenue in 2007, at the time the highest price ever paid for a single US office building.

But the timing proved brutal.

The financial crisis struck soon afterwards, leaving the property weighed down by enormous debt and forcing the Kushners to bring in outside investors while fighting to hang onto their trophy asset.

Jared later pursued an ambitious redevelopment of the tower and held talks with Chinese insurance giant Anbang, negotiations that drew intense scrutiny as he prepared to enter the White House under his father-in-law Donald Trump.

He ultimately left Kushner Companies to serve as a senior adviser during Trump’s first term, becoming heavily involved in Middle East policy.

After leaving Washington in 2021, Jared launched Miami-based Affinity Partners, and quickly found some of his biggest financial backers in the region where he had spent years cultivating diplomatic relationships.

Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund committed $2 billion to Affinity despite an investment panel raising concerns about Jared’s lack of private-equity experience and the firm’s track record.

The panel members attending the meeting said they did not favor the proposal, according to minutes obtained by The New York Times, but the PIF board led by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman approved it days later.

Affinity later pulled in more capital from the Gulf, including Qatar’s sovereign wealth fund and Abu Dhabi-based Lunate.

Forbes says Affinity was managing more than $5.4 billion by September 2025, while listing Jared’s personal fortune at $1 billion as of August 13, 2026.

And his reach has only grown.

Earlier this month, Electronic Arts confirmed the completion of its $55 billion takeover by a consortium of Saudi Arabia’s PIF, private-equity giant Silver Lake and Jared’s Affinity Partners.

JOSH’S TECH EMPIRE

Josh, meanwhile, took a very different from the property business that had shaped his father and older brother.

While Jared was expected to take over the family operation, Josh became fascinated by technology, startups, and music and the internet.

He founded venture-capital firm Thrive Capital in 2010 while still in his 20s.

One of its breakthrough bets came when Thrive put $12 million into Instagram just 72 hours before Facebook agreed to acquire the photo-sharing app at twice the valuation used for Thrive’s investment.

Another early wager saw Thrive invest $6 million in Spotify, while its portfolio eventually expanded to names including Twitch, Stripe, GitHub, Slack, Robinhood and OpenAI.

Josh co-founded Oscar Health after a broken ankle landed him with a confusing medical bill and helpe spark his interest in shaking up health insurance.

He and co-founder Mario Schlosser later pored over the Affordable Care Act and launched the tech-focused insurer, which eventually went public in 2021.

But one of Thrive’s most important bets came in artificial intelligence.

The firm became involved with OpenAI in 2022 and submitted a $130 million term sheet at a $29 billion valuation after Josh and his team were shown technology preceding ChatGPT, according to a profile published by Colossus.

Forbes now estimates Josh owns about 66 percent of Thrive, which was valued at $5.3 billion in a 2023 funding round and manages approximately $25 billion.

Those investments helped make him the richer of the two brothers, with Forbes putting his fortune at $5.2 billion.

Josh has suggested some of that drive runs through generations of the family.

“We are capable of figuring shit out,” he said when discussing whether Thrive was connected to his family’s extraordinary journey from Europe to America.

Source : https://www.the-sun.com/news/16839525/jared-and-josh-kushner-billionair-empire/

A MYSTERIOUS NASA image of Mars has been circulating on social media, leaving some wondering if there was a jellyfish-like figure moving around.

The figure has continued to raise questions and speculations since it was captured by NASA‘s Curiosity rover on August 20, 2023.

The Curiosity rover, which has been investigating whether Mars could have supported small forms of life for over a decade, took several snapshots on August 20, 2023 around 6:27pm ET, showing a dusty landscape with rocky hills.

In a panoramic shot, a small figure could be seen in the left corner, which appeared to have a body with two small legs poking out.

Images taken less than a minute before showed no signs of the mysterious creature.

Speculation about the figure was fueled on Wednesday after a social media user shared it on X.

“Surfer on Mars??” one X user said.

“Not sure what it is, but it is something interesting for sure,” another user wrote.

“First image of a jelly-fish UFO [on] Mars. Great,” said another.

“Looks like a scarecrow to me! Really, what is it? Doesn’t look like a dust devil!” another chimed in.

While many were left puzzled about what the figure could be, one pointed out that it “looks like dead pixels.”

Jean Ward, an independent Mars researcher, also shared the image, writing on X, “Jellyfish-shaped UFO/UAP Spotted on Mars.”

“This one seems to be interacting with the surface. It also reminds me of a tripod-like object.”

There were no other pictures captured on August 20, 2023 of the figure, so it remains unclear if it kept moving, or if it was just a glitch with the camera.

Source : https://www.the-sun.com/news/16839866/nasa-photos-mars-jellyfish-figure/

Ukrainian anti-ship missiles and drones blitzed a major Russian naval base on the Black Sea coast in a “unique” nighttime operation, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Wednesday.

Cutting-edge drones developed by Kyiv since Moscow’s full-scale invasion over four years ago have repeatedly targeted Russian ships in the Black Sea, including warships and oil tankers.

Ukraine’s air and sea drones have succeeded in limiting the movements of Russia’s once-dominant Black Sea navy, Kyiv officials say, in one of the country’s biggest accomplishments of the war.

But Ukrainian officials believe Russian President Vladimir Putin is bent on pressing ahead with the war, despite his bigger army’s slow and costly progress on the battlefield and U.S. diplomatic efforts to find a settlement.

Putin is planning “an additional rapid mobilization of several hundred thousand Russians by the end of the year,” Zelenskyy said Tuesday night on social media, citing Ukrainian intelligence reports.

Those reports have said recently that Russia is expanding production of ballistic missiles and jet-powered drones, both of which are hard for Ukrainian air defenses to counter.

Ukraine also is trying to scale up its weapons manufacturing through agreements with partner countries.

Russia shows no sign of a new mobilization

Neither Putin nor other senior Russian officials have hinted at a possible major call-up of forces to fight in Ukraine. Some officials have accused Kyiv of trying to rattle the Russian public with talk of a mobilization.

Russian lawmaker Andrei Gurulyov brushed off reports of a possible autumn mobilization. “It is the enemy deliberately spreading rumors about mobilization in order to destabilize the situation inside Russia,” he was quoted as saying by pro-Kremlin online outlet Tsargrad in comments published Monday.

After the widely unpopular partial mobilization of some 300,000 men four years ago, Russia has relied on volunteers attracted by relatively high pay. However, the decree declaring the partial mobilization that Putin signed in September 2022 is open-ended, allowing authorities to resume it if needed.

Ukraine says it hit Black Sea port infrastructure

The Ukrainian military “carried out a unique operation targeting the naval base in Novorossiysk — the last major stronghold of the Russian fleet in the Black Sea,” Zelenskyy said in a social media post Wednesday. The attack struck air defenses, piers and other port infrastructure, he added.

Russia relocated most of its naval ships to Novorossiysk after Ukrainian strikes on the main Black Sea base at Sevastopol on the Crimean Peninsula earlier in the war.

Hundreds of Ukrainian drones attacked Novorossiysk, Anapa and Gelendzhik and the Temryuk district of the Krasnodar region overnight, said Gov. Veniamin Kondratyev.

An 8-year-old child was one of three people killed in the attack on the region, Kondratyev said. He added that 24 others in the region were wounded. Dozens of residential buildings were damaged, Kondratyev said, and debris from downed drones fell on the grounds of four industrial plants.

The strikes damaged two of Novorossiysk’s three grain terminals, with one of them halting operations, the Russian business daily Vedomosti reported.

Russia’s Defense Ministry said its air defenses downed more than 500 Ukrainian drones.

Struck Russian port is also a key oil hub

Novorossiysk also is home to the Grushovaya oil terminal, one of the largest international hubs in southern Russia for petroleum products. No reports indicated it had been hit.

In February, the U.S. State Department expressed its displeasure about Ukraine’s attacks on Novorossiysk, saying they affected U.S. oil interests in ⁠Kazakhstan.

The Caspian Pipeline Consortium operates a pipeline from the Caspian coast in northwestern Kazakhstan to Novorossiysk. The pipeline handles much of the crude exports from three major Kazakh fields in which major U.S. energy companies, Chevron and ExxonMobil, have stakes.

With the militaries of European countries boarding and detaining sanctioned Russian oil tankers at sea, hurting the country’s trade and heaping economic pressure on Moscow, Putin on Wednesday threatened retaliation for what he termed “piracy.”

Speaking on a visit to a Russian warship taking part in a naval exercise in the Pacific, Putin said Western countries are breaking international maritime law by seizing ships they say are part of Moscow’s “ shadow fleet ” of sanctions-dodging merchant vessels.

“It’s nothing but piracy and robbery,” Putin said. “If this is done, we will be forced to respond in kind.”

On the Crimean Peninsula, which was illegally annexed by Moscow in 2014, air defenses downed 115 Ukrainian drones over Sevastopol overnight, said Mikhail Razvozhayev, the city’s Russian-installed head. He added that 10 apartment buildings and 25 private houses were damaged.

Source : https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-black-sea-attack-9eadff0d7590923e3d98c99e2b61150b

The Sultan of Brunei stripped one of his daughters-in-law of all of her royal titles after she allegedly disrespected him with behavior “unbecoming” of the royal family.

Pengiran Raabi’atul Adawiyyah, 33, was accused of showing a lack of respect to Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah, 80, the world’s longest-reigning living monarch, according to national broadcaster RTB News.

The announcement did not specify what exactly Pengiran did to offend the sultan, nor did it provide any additional information about the incident.

The Office of the Grand Chamberlain, which made the announcement, said the matter was a royal command issued by the sultan himself.

The revocation was carried out following conduct by Pengiran Raabi’atul Adawiyyah that was deemed unbecoming of a spouse of a member of the royal family,

Pengiran married Prince Abdul Malik in 2015, with the couple enjoying a lavish, 10-day ceremony in the royal palace.

The couple has four children, Princess Muthee’ah, 10, Princess Fathiyyah, eight, Princess Khaalishah, six, and Princess Nabeelah, 16 months.

Source : https://nypost.com/2026/08/13/world-news/sultan-of-brunei-strips-daughter-in-law-of-royal-titles-over-unbecoming-behavior/

Lindsay Clancy’s final text messages with her then-husband on the day she allegedly killed their three young children were revealed in court Thursday.

The unnervingly mundane exchange between the now 36-year-old mom and Patrick Clancy began just over an hour before she allegedly strangled Cora, 5, Dawson, 3, and 8-month-old Callan inside their Duxbury, Massachusetts, home while Patrick was running errands.

“Any chance you want to do take out from ThreeV,” Clancy texted Patrick about a local restaurant at 4:53 p.m. on Jan. 24, 2023. “I didn’t cook anything. It’s been a long day.”

“Yeah,” Patrick replied.

“Okie doke,” Clancy said. “Check the menu when you can.”

“What are you getting?” Patrick asked Clancy about her takeout order.

He went on to ask her if their baby boy, Callan, had woken up, and she responded, “It was just a short nap.”

“Oh, okay,” Patrick replied.

Just minutes later, Clancy texted him her food order and he responded with his.

“Mediterranean Power bowl,” Clancy wrote at 5:07 p.m.

“Okay, I’ll do scallops and pork belly risotto,” he quickly replied at 5:08 p.m.

Patrick went to a nearby CVS to get medicine for their daughter before stopping by the food joint to pick up the order, returning home just after 6 p.m. to a horrifying scene — finding a lifeless Cora and Dawson, and Callan barely clinging to life.

But first, Patrick saw Clancy lying on her back in their backyard after she tried to kill herself by jumping out of the window of their second-story bedroom. She slit her wrists and neck before partially paralyzing herself in the fall, according to testimony.

The text messages were read during the testimony of State Trooper Timothy Chiappini, who analyzed Clancy’s cellphone.

Clancy and Patrick also texted earlier that day when Clancy was filling him in on how Cora’s physical appointment went that morning.

“Her urine looked good so nothing going wrong with her kidneys, phew,” Clancy texted Patrick some time after 8:42 a.m.

“Oh wow. You’re a good momma,” he gushed in response.

Clancy’s lawyer, Kevin Reddington, wants the jury to find her not guilty by reason of insanity based on the claim that she was in the throes of severe postpartum psychosis and heard voices telling her to carry out the horrific acts.

But prosecutors claim Clancy carefully planned the murders because she wanted a break from raising the kids.

Source : https://nypost.com/2026/08/13/us-news/lindsay-clancys-final-texts-to-husband-before-strangling-their-3-children-exposed-in-court/

Bangladesh government has directed shops, markets and shopping malls to shut shop by 8 pm amid ongoing power crisis in country.

Bangladesh is facing one of its worst power crisis in years as a severe shortage of natural gas has hit electricity generation in the country, prompting the government to direct closure of shops, markets and shopping malls as early as 8pm.

Bangladesh has now turned to India for help.

New govt order forces commercial establishments to shut shop early

Under a government directive that took effect on Thursday, shops, markets and shopping malls have been directed to shut shop by 8pm, according to a Reuters report. Commercial establishments are now permitted to operate only between 11am and 8pm while hospitals, pharmacies and food-related businesses have been exempted.

B’desh turns to India for help

The worsening crisis has also prompted Bangladesh to seek additional diesel supplies from India to help manage the shortages of power and gas.

Indian high commissioner Dinesh Trivedi met Bangladesh’s Power, Energy and Mineral Resources Minister Iqbal Hassan Mahmood to discuss cooperation in the power and energy sectors, three days ago.

“High Commissioner Trivedi paid a courtesy call on Power, Energy and Mineral Resources Minister Iqbal Hassan Mahmood,” the Indian High Commission said in a post on X.

High Commissioner Dinesh Trivedi paid a courtesy call on Hon’ble Prime Minister of Bangladesh, H.E. Tarique Rahman on 10 August 2026.

High Commissioner conveyed greetings from Hon’ble Prime Minister of India and the intent to work together with the Government and the people of… pic.twitter.com/hkTmUYb1Bs

— India in Bangladesh (@ihcdhaka) August 10, 2026

They “exchanged views on further strengthening India–Bangladesh cooperation in the power and energy sectors,” it said.

Speaking to reporters after the meeting, Mahmood said the diesel shortage had directly affected gas-fired power generation, triggering widespread load-shedding.

“We have a pipeline with India through which diesel is supplied. We have asked them to provide more,” he told reporters, according to PTI.

Source : https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/bangladesh-power-crisis-gas-shortage-turns-to-india-for-diesel-forces-8-pm-shutdown-for-malls-shops-energy-us-iran-war-101786630000162.html

A massive wildfire has engulfed parts of Omiš, Croatia, burning homes, cars and buildings and forcing residents and tourists to flee by road and sea.

A massive wildfire has spread through Omis in Split-Dalmatia County, Croatia, forcing residents and tourists to flee as flames engulf homes, buildings and cars. Dramatic footage from the holiday destination shows the fire spreading rapidly through areas around the town.

The blaze broke out in Lokva Rogoznica and spread overnight toward Omis, affecting areas above the town. Strong winds have hampered firefighting efforts, causing the flames to spread quickly and change direction. Numerous houses and buildings have been endangered, while some homes have burned down. Footage from the area shows extensive material damage, including burned cars and buildings.

The Trump administration has launched a new Birth Tourism Prevention Task Force as the US State Department steps up action against foreign nationals accused of travelling to America primarily to give birth.

The Trump administration has created a new Birth Tourism Prevention Task Force to identify foreign nationals suspected of travelling to the United States primarily to give birth, with the US State Department saying it has already revoked more than 600 visas as part of the crackdown. The department said the task force will review visa-holder activity worldwide, examine travel histories and coordinate information with agencies including the Department of Homeland Security.

The move is part of President Donald Trump’s broader immigration crackdown and comes amid renewed efforts to prevent what the administration describes as the misuse of US immigration and citizenship rules. Officials say the focus will be on people who deliberately conceal the purpose of their travel and networks that facilitate such trips.

American citizenship is not for sale.

But elaborate birth tourism rings are profiting off the exploitation of America’s laws- coaching foreigners to defraud the U.S. visa system, arranging travel and housing, and even forging documents, all to enable foreign nationals to obtain…

— Secretary Marco Rubio (@SecRubio) August 12, 2026

Microsoft once regarded the idea of quitting China as unthinkable.
The year was 2010 and Google was about to exit due to concerns over censorship and cyberattacks. That decision was lauded by democracy activists, but not Bill Gates and Microsoft’s then-CEO Steve Ballmer, who suggested Google ​was overreacting.

In the past five years, however, at least 15 Microsoft branch offices and joint ventures in China have been shut, corporate filings show, and Microsoft is pursuing what five company sources described as a strategy of retreat.

The firm considered quitting the market in ‌2023 because some executives felt it took on too much geopolitical risk for too little economic return, one of them said, while stressing Microsoft has no current plans to exit. China accounted for just 1.5% of global revenue, Microsoft said in 2024.
Microsoft took a major hit from the erosion of trust between Washington and Beijing, the five people said. China has since 2017 pushed the use of domestic software, which Beijing sees as more secure and whose quality is increasingly competitive with Windows and Office. U.S. restrictions, including export controls on advanced technology, have meanwhile hindered efforts to scale Microsoft’s lucrative AI and cloud businesses in China.

Details of Microsoft’s internal deliberations about its future in China have not previously been reported.
Other U.S. tech giants with large China ​businesses are also reconsidering their exposure amid geopolitical tensions. Apple plans to manufacture in India most iPhones sold to Americans by the end of 2026, while Elon Musk last month denied reports that Tesla is debating separating its China business.
Microsoft ultimately decided to remain because it had carved out a profitable ​business servicing Chinese companies like TikTok owner ByteDance, which need Western technology to manage overseas operations, according to three people familiar with the matter. The company also believed that it needed a presence to maintain access to China’s world-class ⁠engineering talent, two of them said.
Microsoft had also cultivated a relationship with the government that is among the deepest of any tech company, its former China head Alain Crozier told Reuters. “Because of the geopolitics … some days it’s a little bit harder, but we never had a crisis,” he said.

A Microsoft spokesperson did not ​address questions about the firm’s deliberations on its China business but said it operates in a regulatory “environment that applies to every international supplier” and that it remains committed to the Chinese market.
The state of Microsoft’s China business reflects market competition, regulatory demands and technological trends, the company said.
ByteDance did not respond to questions about its ​relationship with Microsoft.

CHINA BLUES

Microsoft’s engagement with the highest levels of China’s government dates back to the early 1990s. Gates made the first of his many visits in 1994 and was received by President Jiang Zemin, who advised the Microsoft co-founder to study Chinese history.
The company has since made various efforts to build a relationship with the ruling Communist Party. Microsoft co-invested in startup incubators with the government and complied with censorship requirements that Google — now part of Alphabet — could not countenance.
By the mid-2010s, however, China had become increasingly suspicious of Western technology after revelations that U.S. firms had helped Washington spy on foreign governments. That was problematic for Microsoft as China’s largest companies are either state-owned or maintain close government ties.
Microsoft’s response was Windows 10 China ​Government Edition, whose release was personally negotiated between chief executive Satya Nadella and finance ministry officials, according to a person familiar with the matter.
The product was adopted by several government agencies, but did not take off as Microsoft hoped, said Crozier, who ran China operations through 2021.
At around the time of the Windows ​announcement in 2017, the Chinese government introduced new procurement guidelines that it billed as a framework for purchasing “safe and reliable” services. No foreign operating system, including Windows, has been regarded by the government as compliant with those policies, Microsoft said.

Non-compliance did not mean products were banned but it subjected tech administrators who used such services to scrutiny, including having ‌to run more security ⁠checks and seek additional approval, said Paul Triolo, a Washington-based China tech policy expert at DGA-Albright Stonebridge Group.
Reuters reviewed six Chinese government computer-system procurement guides published between December 2023 and May 2026. Five did not recommend Microsoft. The sixth included Windows 10 China Government Edition but said its usage was subject to “additional management requirements,” without elaborating.
The Chinese tech and finance ministries did not respond to questions about the effect of regulations on Microsoft’s business.
U.S. businesses operating in China, which have long complained about an uneven playing field, have had their confidence further dented by deteriorating Sino-American ties. Just 52% of respondents to the American Chamber of Commerce in China’s latest business climate survey said China was a top global investment priority, down from 62% in 2019.
While its efforts to become the Chinese state’s tech vendor of choice did not pay off, Microsoft found a second wind with the private sector.
Firms like ByteDance and ultra-fast-fashion retailer Shein have key businesses serving Western customers and rely on ​Microsoft’s Azure cloud to manage data in compliance with foreign regulations, two company ​sources said. Microsoft also offers Chinese enterprise clients exclusive access via Azure ⁠to Western AI models from providers like OpenAI, which do not serve China.
By the mid-2020s, helping Chinese firms go global had become Microsoft’s largest China-linked business, three people said. Two of them stressed that sales remained small by the firm’s global standards.
Analysts have additionally questioned the sustainability of that AI business, which relies on third-party suppliers like OpenAI. Chinese businesses also do not need Azure if they use domestic AI models like Kimi, which are increasingly competitive with Western alternatives while being far ​cheaper.
OpenAI and Shein did not respond to questions.

HUMAN CAPITAL

Microsoft has since the 1990s played a central role in building China’s tech talent base.
Alongside hiring commercially focused engineers, it also established Microsoft Research China, which concentrates on advanced ​technologies. The lab’s alumni include senior leaders at ⁠AI pioneers SenseTime and DeepSeek.
But the recent political pressures have affected Microsoft’s ability to retain talent.
U.S. export controls on chips and AI models have restricted the access of Microsoft’s China-based engineers to cutting-edge technology. The firm doesn’t conduct research on quantum computing and other sensitive technologies in China, Microsoft president Brad Smith told U.S. lawmakers in 2023.
Microsoft considered shutting the lab down but ultimately decided to relocate some top talent, according to two people familiar with the matter. Since the U.S. began restricting AI exports, Microsoft Research China — now known as Microsoft Research Asia — has opened labs in Vancouver, Singapore and Tokyo.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/world/china/microsoft-retreats-china-ai-boom-helps-it-keep-window-open-2026-08-13/

The U.S. has received several warnings from Israel over the past year that Iran intended to assassinate President Donald Trump, ​including before a secret Air Force One ruse in Turkey, that U.S. intelligence officials could not independently verify, according to a current U.S. official and two former officials.
The warnings, passed to ‌U.S. intelligence agencies and in some cases relayed directly by Israeli officials to senior White House officials, included possible plots to shoot Trump with a sniper or recruit someone to attack him with a knife at a large public event, the sources said. The tips began in the lead-up to the 12-day war in June 2025 and intensified prior to the U.S. decision to go to war in Iran in February, the sources said.

The most detailed warning came ahead of the NATO summit in Ankara in July, the ​U.S. official and the other person familiar with the matter said. Israeli officials briefed the White House about intelligence that indicated Iran may try to kill Trump, potentially with a shoulder-launched missile, while he ​traveled on Air Force One for the summit, the officials said.
The U.S. intelligence community has long assessed that Iran wants to retaliate for Trump’s killing of Iranian ⁠military commander Qassem Soleimani in 2020. But the Central Intelligence Agency has not been able to corroborate some of the specific threats against Trump’s life shared by Israeli intelligence since early last year, the officials said.

In the ​case of the NATO episode, a Turkish official said the country’s intelligence agencies also did not have any evidence to corroborate the Israeli claim about the threat to Trump’s life, an assessment the host country shared with ​Americans.
Despite the lack of verification, White House officials and the Secret Service have taken steps to mitigate the threats out of an abundance of caution, including an extraordinary deception operation during the Turkey trip that involved moving Trump from Air Force One to a different aircraft for his flight out of the country.
That episode underscores how Israeli intelligence is influencing the Trump administration’s decision-making about Iran at a time of heightened tensions with Tehran — and broader disagreement between U.S. and Israeli intelligence assessments on Iran’s ​threat overall.

Earlier this year, American intelligence agencies assessed that Iran was not actively building a nuclear weapon, even as Israel argued Tehran posed an urgent threat. Despite the reports from the U.S. intelligence community, Trump moved forward ​with strikes in Iran in February. Trump also took into consideration intelligence shared by Israel that Tehran had tried to assassinate him before launching the military campaign, Reuters previously reported.
A spokesperson for the Israeli embassy disputed that Israel was using ‌its intelligence to ⁠influence U.S. policy on Iran.
“The same people who claim that Israel is trying to influence U.S. policy through alleged intelligence sharing would just as soon accuse Israel of concealing critical information if it benefited their own agenda,” the spokesperson said.

The White House and CIA both declined comment.
Secret Service spokesman Anthony Guglielmi declined to discuss specific intelligence matters but said the agency remains focused on Trump’s security amid recent assassination attempts and an increase in threats against the president.
“The U.S. Secret Service continuously analyzes a wide range of information to guide our protective operations in real time and across every location we secure,” he said.

CLOSE ALLIANCE

The U.S. has long relied heavily on Israeli ​intelligence on Middle East matters, particularly as they relate ​to Iran.
The current and former officials said Israeli ⁠intelligence on Iran typically flows to the CIA or the National Security Agency through formal channels and is subsequently analyzed, two former U.S. officials said.
The U.S. intelligence agencies often cannot verify Israeli intelligence but will use other forms of information to make judgment calls on its authenticity and accuracy, the officials said.
In several instances over ​the course of the two U.S. military offensives in Iran, the CIA assessed it had “low confidence” in the Israeli intelligence about the threats posed by Iran, ​including any plans to assassinate Trump, ⁠according to one former official and another person familiar with the matter.
It is unclear how widely those assessments have been circulated inside the administration.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/us-could-not-verify-israeli-warnings-iran-plots-against-trump-sources-say-2026-08-13/

The United States on Thursday said that it could maintain a naval blockade ​of Iran indefinitely and would ratchet up economic pressure on Tehran as ceasefire talks have floundered, global oil supply is dropping and regional tensions are rising.
Defense ‌Secretary Pete Hegseth told reporters that the U.S. military has the capability to maintain a naval presence in the region to enforce its blockade of Iran, which has inflicted severe economic damage on the country.

“Indefinitely the United States Navy can maintain a blockade like that because we’ll rotate ships in and out, as we have, and we’ll continue to,” Hegseth told reporters during a trip to Panama.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on Thursday ​that the United States planned to inflict more financial damage on Iran.
“Watch this space for more announcements coming next week because we are going to apply measures like ​have never been seen in the history of economic isolation on a country,” he said in an interview on Newsmax’s “Rob Schmitt Tonight” program.
With a ⁠tentative June deal to end the war in tatters, Iran has sought to exert leverage on Washington in return by controlling the Strait of Hormuz.

It has attacked some vessels trying to ​transit the strategic waterway, through which a fifth of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas traveled before the war began in February.
Two vessels from the state-owned Abu Dhabi National Oil Company ​were attacked transiting the strait on Thursday evening, UAE state news agency WAM reported. The United Arab Emirates government condemned it as an Iranian attack.
U.S. President Donald Trump is under pressure at home to end a war that is deeply unpopular, with high fuel prices dragging down his approval ratings and potentially eroding his party’s control of Congress in midterm elections in November.
Trump has repeatedly asserted that the U.S. has “total control” over ​the strait, prompting Iranian denials. Tehran has said it will not allow the waterway to reopen until its conditions are met. These include removing economic sanctions and releasing frozen Iranian assets.

Shipping ​traffic through the Strait of Hormuz fell to eight vessels on Tuesday, compared with a 10-day average of about 12 vessels, and 130 to 140 ships before the war.
The U.S. lifted its blockade of ‌Iran’s shipping and ⁠ports for a month in mid-June but has since reimposed it, cutting off Tehran’s primary source of hard currency and compounding earlier losses from wartime strikes on its energy infrastructure.
Washington previously said it would lift the Iranian blockade once Iran and Oman, which sit on either side of the strait, reach an agreement to restore commercial shipping.

SHRINKING OIL SUPPLY

Trump has also repeatedly threatened to escalate military strikes and “hit Iran hard,” although he has thus far resisted deploying ground troops or seizing strategic islands and bombing desalination plants. Earlier this week, Trump suggested he would rely on economic ​means, rather than military action.

The U.S. has tightened ​economic sanctions against Iran and other individuals ⁠and entities that it says are helping it procure weapons, but the pressure campaign has failed to bring Tehran back to the negotiating table.
Stress is mounting on the global economy. The International Energy Agency on Wednesday forecast that global oil supply would fall by 4.3 million barrels per ​day, or around 4%, this year.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/us-eyes-indefinite-iran-naval-blockade-oil-supply-shortfall-deepens-2026-08-13/

Private equity firm Silver ‌Lake is in talks to acquire Workday (WDAY.O), in a deal that would rank among the largest software buyouts in history, according to people familiar with the matter.
News of the talks sent Workday shares nearly 18% higher on Thursday.

Silver Lake and the human-resources and financial management software company have held discussions about a ​potential deal in recent months, the people said. The talks are ongoing and there is no guarantee a deal will ​materialize, said the sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the discussions are confidential.

The Pleasanton, California-based ⁠company had a market value of around $43 billion before Reuters reported on the talks, which caused its shares to surge. The stock ​closed at $206.45 on Thursday, giving Workday a market value of around $51.1 billion.
Silver Lake could bring in additional investors to finance the deal, one ​of the people said. The private equity firm teamed with Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund and Affinity Partners for its roughly $55 billion take-private deal for videogame maker Electronic Arts last year.
Neither Silver Lake nor Workday immediately responded to requests for comment.

Prior to Thursday’s news, Workday shares had fallen about 15% this year, as ​investors questioned the durability of traditional software in an era of rapidly advancing artificial intelligence. The stock was down more than 40% ​from its 2024 peak.

AI CONCERNS SLOW BUYOUT ACTIVITY

Private equity firms have largely stayed on the sidelines of large software buyouts this year as concerns over ‌artificial intelligence ⁠have made it harder to assess the future growth and value of traditional software companies.
That has contributed to a dearth of large software take-private deals this year. Hg Capital agreed in January to take financial software maker OneStream private for about $6.4 billion — one of the larger software buyouts announced this year.
A potential acquisition of Workday would be significantly larger, making it one of the biggest tests yet of private ​equity appetite for traditional software businesses ​as AI reshapes the industry.

The ⁠deal would also follow Thoma Bravo’s agreement to acquire payroll software provider Dayforce in a transaction valued at about $12.3 billion.
Silver Lake has a history of investing in technology and software companies, including computer maker ​Dell Technologies, cloud software company VMware, and experience-management software maker Qualtrics.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/world/silver-lake-talks-buy-workday-sources-say-2026-08-13/

Singer and actor Selena Gomez was sued on Thursday by investors who ​say the “Only Murders in the Building” star committed ‌fraud by failing to fulfill duties to build and promote her mental health start-up.
The plaintiffs invested nearly $1.2 million in ​Wondermind Global, which was launched in 2021 to ​help users strengthen their “mental fitness,” according to the ⁠lawsuit filed in federal court in Delaware.

Investors said ​they were told Gomez, one of the biggest celebrities ​on social media with more than 500 million followers, would be actively involved in building the company as head of marketing. ​They argue that Gomez and other company leaders ​failed to deliver on promises including creating a mobile app.
“Gomez purported ‌to ⁠sign a contract obligating her to perform and then ignored it,” the lawsuit said.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/business/media-telecom/investors-sue-selena-gomez-alleged-fraud-over-mental-health-start-up-2026-08-13/

Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s plan to give officers gloves that deliver painful electric shocks faced criticism Wednesday from Democratic elected officials and civil rights advocates, who called it unnecessary and cruel.

ICE plans to spend between $10 million and $20 million to outfit officers and agents with “conductive distraction and de-escalation devices,” according to a notice published Monday and revealed first by The Associated Press.

The devices known as the G.L.O.V.E., which stands for Generated Low Output Voltage Emitter, are normal patrol gloves until an officer presses a button to activate its electrical mode. They must be applied directly to someone’s skin to produce a voltage that causes pain, which is intended to gain compliance from people who are resisting. Unlike Tasers, they do not leave burn or contact marks.

New York AG says she is ‘outraged’ by plan

The size of the purchase suggests ICE plans to give the device to most or all of its officers. The gloves have been used by local departments more often in jails than in the streets, where ICE officers have increasingly used force to extract people from cars and faced protests over their actions carrying out President Donald Trump’s crackdown on illegal immigration.

“We are outraged,” New York Attorney General Letitia James said at a news conference Wednesday, where she warned that ICE officers who misuse the gloves in her state could face criminal and civil consequences.

The Department of Homeland Security, ICE’s parent agency, issued a statement that did not mention the product specifically or explain why it had been chosen.

“ICE is constantly assessing the needs of our officers in the field to ensure they have the tools and equipment necessary to safely arrest and remove criminal illegal aliens from our country,” the statement said. “Every decision is made with careful consideration and appropriately reviewed to ensure that any technology ICE utilizes is consistent with all applicable law enforcement policies and standards.”

Lawsuit alleges shocks from gloves contributed to man’s death

While the devices are marketed as nonlethal and safe for the heart, a pending lawsuit alleges a 43-year-old man died in 2024 after he was shocked 27 times with the gloves and 13 more times by a Taser at a jail in Richmond, Kentucky. An internal investigation found two of the glove shocks lasted 45 and 99 seconds apiece — far more than the manufacturer’s recommended 15-second limit.

“These actions not only inflicted unnecessary pain but also heightened the risk of serious health complications,” the investigation by the Madison County Detention Center found, according to court documents.

An Associated Press review found two other lawsuits alleging injuries from the gloves, including a man with heart problems who was shocked at a Las Vegas trade show and a defendant who said he was laughed at after he was unnecessarily shocked in court. Both cases have been dismissed.

Several Democrats in Congress, including Reps. Pramila Jayapal, Maxwell Frost and Delia Ramirez, said on social media that ICE did not need another weapon.

“This won’t make anyone safer and in fact just gives ICE another dangerous tool to target citizens and immigrants alike,” Jayapal wrote on X.

Source : https://apnews.com/article/ice-electric-shock-gloves-016e15e31c5dac5cc253d32b4734dd2a

Major League Baseball ‘s growth goals have taken the game from a military base in North Carolina to a racetrack in Tennessee, with numerous stops for photo ops around the globe in between.

But there’s nothing quite like turning the bright lights on an Iowa cornfield, where home runs disappear into a sea of green stalks and ghosts of old ballplayers just might still be whispering. After playing in 2021 and 2022 at a temporary facility next to the “Field of Dreams” movie site, MLB has returned to stage another regular-season game in what is now a permanent ballpark.

The Minnesota Twins host the Philadelphia Phillies on Thursday in the small town of Dyersville, where mystique and nostalgia will hop into the pennant races for a night and the pace of the big-city beat can quickly fade into the endless rolling hills.

“It’s going to be really cool, having been able to see the movie when I was growing up,” Phillies All-Star Kyle Schwarber said. “I’ve never been out there before, so I’m excited to see the corn.”

Schwarber and his teammates sure won’t be disappointed.

“It looks awesome this year,” said Keith Rahe, the executive director of Dyersville Events, which owns and operates the complex that now stretches beyond the farmhouse and ballfield that set the 1989 film and hosts a full calendar of youth tournaments as well as high school, college, minor league and senior-level competitions.

Rahe’s nephews grew up there and have carefully cared for the corn for more than a decade. Their five-person crew has worked particularly hard on those 67 acres this summer, fertilizing, transplanting and watering so their state’s signature crop looks as lush as can be for Netflix’s worldwide streaming audience.

“It’s a big garden,” Rahe said. “It takes a lot of time and energy.”

They built it, and MLB came back

After the 2020 game originally scheduled between the St. Louis Cardinals and Chicago White Sox was pre-empted by the pandemic, the White Sox played the New York Yankees in 2021 with a Fox telecast that was the most-watched regular-season game in 23 years. The Chicago Cubs then faced the Cincinnati Reds in 2022.

Rave reviews of the broadcast presentation and on-site experience weren’t enough to guarantee the Field of Dreams an annual place on the MLB schedule, however, like the Little League World Series site in Williamsport, Pennsylvania. Building a temporary ballpark from scratch was an unsustainable task.

So the people in Dyersville — 2020 census population: 4,477 — and the business community in northeast Iowa went to work on planning and funding a permanent venue that could continue to attract visitors to the area. With a state tourism grant from federal pandemic relief money and a few big contributions from local donors, construction began two years ago on a 3,000-seat ballpark that finished in time for a series of showcase events this summer.

“We have some real plumbing that we don’t need to bring in, which is a real positive,” said MLB senior vice president of global operations and events Jeremiah Yolkut.

With temporary bleachers added for the major league crowd, there will be seating for about 8,000 people on Thursday. Fans will again enter the complex through the quaint ballfield where the movie was filmed and walk through the corn toward the new ballpark. There will be more amenities than before, but still a vibe of simplicity. More than 25 members of the Hall of Fame are scheduled to be present.

“I think it’s the perfect blend of being in the movie, on a farm, watching the baseball game, but having some of the creature comforts that people seek out when they’re coming to big events, and that’s a unique thing for us to be able to do,” Yolkut said. “I’m sure down the road if we’re able to come back to Field of Dreams we’ll learn things this year about having a permanent structure around the ballfield, but everything else remains the same.”

Connecting through a game of catch

Kevin Costner’s character Ray Kinsella welcomed the ghosts of Shoeless Joe Jackson and friends to his farmland ballfield in the fantasy film that received a best picture nomination, with a powerful closing scene during which he reconnects with his baseball-playing late father: “Hey, dad, you want to have a catch?”

Source : https://apnews.com/article/mlb-field-of-dreams-phillies-twins-13e2902508d7a490e37f7ab0331e9b7d

Lindsay Clancy’s chilling messages to a nurse practitioner in the weeks before she strangled her three young kids and tried to kill herself were revealed this week during her murder trial.

Clancy, then 32, sent nurse practitioner Rebecca Jollotta a string of messages in early December, describing that she was overwhelmed by intrusive thoughts, concerned she could be addicted to an anxiety medication, and disturbed that she was “completely numb.”

“I feel like I’m going to die and I don’t care,” the Massachusetts mother of three messaged Jollotta, who works at South Shore Hospital’s Perinatal Behavioral Clinic, on MyChart on Dec. 2, 2022.

“I have never felt anything like this before,” Clancy added, the Daily Mail reported.

Jollotta responded, telling Clancy that intrusive thoughts were “quite common” in women suffering from postpartum depression.

“They mean nothing about you as a mother,” Jollotta maintained.

Just over a month later, on Jan. 24, 2023, Clancy murdered her kids Cora, 5, Dawson, 3, and Callan, who was 8 months old, with exercise bands before she slit her wrists and throat and threw herself from the second story of her Duxbury, Mass., home, leaving her partially paralyzed.

Jollotta treated Clancy from Nov. 29, 2022 to Dec. 13, 2022, after a colleague left the clinic and transferred her to her care. During that time, Jollotta prescribed her a slew of powerful psychiatric medications.

A day after starting treatment with Jollotta, on Nov. 30, Clancy messaged the healthcare provider stating, “What I’m really feeling is I cannot go on this way,” the outlet reported.

Later that day, Clancy asked Jollotta if they could call, but the nurse practitioner testified at her murder trial that she was too busy seeing other patients and had a more junior member of her staff call her instead.

Over the next two days, Clancy, a former labor and delivery nurse, started describing her intrusive thoughts and concerns about her overall treatment plan and medications.

“It’s just a very scary stressful time for me, and starting new meds with side effects is very scary to me,” she wrote.

Clancy continued on Dec. 2, writing, “I took the Remeron,” referring to an antidepressant used for insomnia.

“I woke up at 12:15 and had intrusive thoughts – of wanting it all to be over.”

Clancy then pressed Jollotta about whether she could be addicted to the anxiety drug Ativan — stating she did not feel she was “being heard that that is a possibility.”

“I really need to explore the option that I am addicted to Ativan,” Clancy said. “I feel addicted to it, and I feel like I’m not being heard that that is a possibility,” she wrote, per the outlet.

“I feel like we are throwing all these different meds at my insomnia when the root cause is Ativan dependence. I don’t feel any of the anxious thoughts I had before.”

“I feel completely numb,” she said. “I feel like I’m going to die, and I don’t care. What do I do about this?”

Jollotta testified in court that she did not believe the mom was addicted to the medications and that the string of comments showed she was experiencing suicidal ideation.

Clancy, now 36, called Jollotta on Dec. 15, 2022, with her then-husband, Patrick Clancy, to report she was having such dark thoughts and that they would likely go to the emergency department of Mass General Hospital — with the pair referring to it as the “worst day for Lindsay.”

She was having “persistent and intrusive thoughts of suicide,” but she had “no active plan” to harm herself, Jollotta said, reading from her notes about the phone call.

Clancy did go to the emergency room that day and ended up opting out of checking into mental institution McLean Hospital, deciding instead to join an outpatient program at Women and Infants Hospital in Rhode Island, Jollotta said.

The nurse practitioner had “strongly, strongly” recommended that Clancy check into Women and Infants in a Dec. 12, 2022 MyChart message to the struggling postpartum mom, the jury learned.

But when Clancy went to the Rhode Island facility on Dec. 20, 2022, they turned her away because they thought she might have been taking too many prescription medications, according to Clancy’s lawyer, Kevin Reddington.

Source : https://nypost.com/2026/08/12/us-news/lindsay-clancys-haunting-messages-to-nurse-revealed-weeks-before-she-killed-her-3-kids/

Allison Janney doesn’t regret never having kids.

The actress, 66, spoke about never being married or having children on the “Reclaiming With Monica Lewinsky” podcast episode that dropped Tuesday. Janney admitted she’s thought about marriage, and revealed she went to a fertility specialist in her 40s.

“I always thought I would get married, just because at the time I was growing up, that’s what you did,” she noted.

But when she moved to New York to pursue her acting career, she said she had long-term boyfriends who, like her, didn’t want to have kids. However, when she was in a four-year relationship in her mid-30s, she said she thought it was the time to have children.

“And then it was apparent to me that this was not the man I wanted to have kids with,” she shared. “So I was like, ‘OK, well, I guess that didn’t happen.’”

But Janney said she was relieved.

“The way you feel in a relationship that you know is probably not the one and you’re kind of in it and you don’t know how to get out of it — that’s the most lonely feeling in the world to be with someone and feel alone,” she reflected. “Oh my God, that’s awful. So, it didn’t happen for me.’”

“I knew I never wanted to have kids,” she continued. “That’s just something that I’ve always known.”

Still, she said that in her 40s she felt that she should “just try” and visited a fertility doctor, and was bluntly told that her chances of getting pregnant weren’t great.

“The first I heard that I wouldn’t be able to have a kid at 40-something was in this fertility doctor’s office. She was like, “The odds are not in your favor,’” she recalled, admitting that she thought women could easily have kids in their 50s.

“And she said, ‘Also, where is your partner?’ And the guy that I was with, he didn’t even come with me and I was like, ‘I guess that is a sign, isn’t it?’”

Janney said that her “true love” in her life besides her friends and family are her dogs.

“Animals, especially dogs, are my heart,” she said. “I could not love dogs more.”

Source : https://pagesix.com/2026/08/12/celebrity-news/allison-janney-66-makes-frank-confession-about-never-getting-married-or-having-kids/

Israeli settlers have been besieging two Palestinian families in their homes in the occupied West Bank since Sunday, with the families saying their supplies were running out and rights groups urging the authorities to step in.

On Wednesday Israeli security forces were reported to have withdrawn from the Jewish settler outpost in the village of Qusra near Nablus, following clashes with a crowd of extremist settlers. About a dozen settlers are said to remain at the site.

After the Palestinian homeowners made their initial report to the Israeli army, the first soldiers who arrived at the scene were filmed praying with the settlers.

The Abu Ridi and Hassan families have been posting on social media appealing for help after their water and power supplies were cut off and their food stocks ran low.

It is not clear exactly what the settlers in Qusra want. In the past, settlers have forced Palestinians out of their homes and seized their properties.

The stated aim of the settlers is to empty the area of its Palestinian residents.

The latest developments come as a top UN official told the Security Council in New York on Tuesday that “the West Bank is at breaking point”.

All settlements are illegal under international law. Outposts are set up without official Israeli authorisation.

Palestinian security camera footage shows settlers tearing down a wall outside the Abu Ridi family’s home on Sunday evening and using the stones to block the road.

This left seven people – including two young girls – unable to leave their homes while other Palestinians could not reach them. They live in what is known as Area B, part of the West Bank under Palestinian administrative control and Israeli security control.

Posting on Facebook, Qusay Abu Ridi said the situation was critical, “especially as we are completely isolated”.

He wrote: “We are living in our own home, on our own land, and we are asking for nothing more than the right to live safely and with dignity.”

Aysha Hassan told Reuters the settlers had “tried to break the gate” to the house and “started throwing stones at us, cursing and insulting us”.

She said her family was “dying of fear, extremely terrified”.

On Monday, Israeli settlers blocked Israeli journalists from the left-leaning Haaretz newspaper from trying to reach the Palestinian properties. The reporters said Israeli soldiers at the scene refused to help them when their car was blocked for two hours. They were told the area was a closed military zone, however the order was not enforced on the settlers.

A day later the Israeli human rights group Yesh Din urgently appealed to the head of the Israeli military’s Central Command for the army to protect the besieged residents, evacuate the settlers’ outpost and hold the settlers accountable.

Late on Tuesday, a Palestinian ambulance was finally allowed to reach the families, delivering food and taking one child away for medical treatment.

At about the same time, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) put out a statement condemning the establishment of the new outpost. It said that entering and seizing Palestinian homes was “illegal, reprehensible, and unacceptable activity”.

When the head of its Central Command, Maj Gen Avi Bluth and other senior officers arrived at the scene early on Wednesday they are said to have met residents and voiced their “grave concern”.

Afterwards, Palestinian security camera video shared with the BBC showed confrontations between Israeli soldiers and border police and a large crowd of settlers. The security forces used tear gas and stun grenades.

In other footage, the Israeli forces appear to have confiscated the canopy under which the settlers were sheltering, while leaving their other equipment.

“Border Police forces evacuated the tent and are working to evacuate the civilians who were staying there. The incident is still ongoing,” the IDF stated.

It said it was decided that “disciplinary action would be taken against the security personnel involved, who were documented at the site several days ago”.

The Palestinian village mayor, Abdel Azim Wadi, told the BBC that local residents had seen “a clear and sustained pattern of targeting Qusra”. Last month a newly completed mosque was set on fire with graffiti in Hebrew sprayed nearby.

That settler attack was one of many that followed on from an incident in the Palestinian village of Tal. After Israeli settlers attacked Tal, it triggered an escalation in which six people were killed – four Palestinians and two Israeli soldiers – one of whom acted as a security coordinator for a nearby Israeli settlement.

In July, settlers also surrounded a Palestinian home in the village of Jalud, near Qusra, for more than two weeks. Afterwards, the owners fled and settlers took over the property where they remain until now.

“Settler violence has reached unprecedented levels,” the UN’s Deputy Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process, Ramiz Alakbarov, told the Security Council in a briefing on Tuesday.

He gave what he described as “the sobering human toll” and mentioned that the Nablus Governorate in particular had been hit hard recently by violence.

According to the UN’s figures, 76 Palestinians – including 18 children – have been killed in the West Bank this year, by Israeli forces or settlers. At the same time, three Israelis – including one civilian – were killed in confrontations with Palestinians and in an alleged ramming attack by a Palestinian in the West Bank.

Source : https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cn0npjkqrleo

A “massive” Ukrainian drone and missile strike on Russia’s port of Novorossiysk has damaged two major grain export terminals and hit the last big Russian naval base on the Black Sea, reports say.

Three people, including an eight-year-old child, were killed and another 24 injured in the overnight attack, local officials said.

Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky said Kyiv had launched rockets, jet and naval drones in a “unique operation” to strike the Russian base, although he did not mention grain terminals being hit.

Ukraine’s military later said four Russian warships, including two frigates, were hit. Russia has not commented on the issue.

“The occupying fleet and all the infrastructure that supports it will not be safe as long as Russian aggression continues,” Zelensky said in a post on social media.

Most of Russia’s Black Sea fleet is docked in Novorossiysk – one of the largest ports in Russia – after it was forced to vacate its former home base of Sevastopol, in the Russia-occupied Crimean peninsula, which was too exposed to Ukrainian attacks.

The attack follows an uptick in the exchange of strikes in the Black Sea this summer, after a period of relative calm.

In an interview with CNN, Zelensky said that Ukraine needs a tenth of the current US stockpile of interceptor missiles to stop all Russian ballistic missile attacks.

He added that 5% of the stockpile would get Ukraine through winter.

“This year we have two and a half times less interceptors than we had in 2025,” the Ukrainian president said.

“Russia has two times more ballistic missiles per month than they had before.”

A major grain trading company confirmed to Russia’s TASS news agency that its terminal had been hit in the attack on Wednesday, while another told Reuters and Russian outlet RBK the same.

The Russian agriculture ministry announced on Wednesday that it was working to redirect cargo flows to ports in the Baltic and Caspian Seas as well as land routes. It did not make any reference to Ukraine’s attacks but said it was “taking into account current logistical constraints”.

Repeated explosions reportedly rang out over Novorossiysk throughout the night as air defences shot down aerial objects.

An emergency situation was declared in the city on Wednesday, after the barrage of drones struck areas around the port and damaged pipelines, suspending water supply for the city.

Elsewhere in the region a man was killed by drone debris, regional Governor Veniamin Kondratyev said. Several locations in the surrounding Krasnodar region were also struck by “several hundred drones” overnight, Kondratyev added, with dozens of buildings damaged, including homes.

For its part, Moscow launched aerial overnight strikes which killed at least 11 civilians in Ukraine between Tuesday and Wednesday.

The majority were killed when Russia hit the southern city of Zaporizhzhia with ballistic missiles and glide bombs.

Russian President Vladimir Putin launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

The last remaining sea route out of Ukraine has been badly affected by several deadly Russian strikes on cargo ships and the port of Odesa, through which Moscow seeks to put off foreign companies from trading with Ukraine. In July, the Ukrainian Agribusiness Club (UCAB) reported a 23% decrease in exports.

Meanwhile, Ukraine has grown increasingly adept at carrying out long-range strikes on Russian territory. Its recent attacks on vessels in the eastern Black Sea have disrupted Russia’s grain shipments, too.

Russia is the world’s largest wheat exporter – but according to a Moscow-based analytics company, exports for August could fall by more than half compared to the same month over the last five years due to the disruption in the Black and Azov seas.

On Wednesday, Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova accused Ukraine of carrying out strikes on Russian grain and agricultural infrastructure, resulting in a hike in global food prices and growing grain shortages.

Source : https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c5y49xp2wrno

THREE people are dead at a daycare center after a man killed his partner and child before taking his own life in front of six other children.

Police responded to the horrifying attack after a parent witnessed it unfold while dropping off a child to the home.

The violence erupted around 9 am Wednesday at Brown Bear Childcare in Hopkins, Minnesota, just outside Minneapolis.

Three people, a man, a woman and a child, were found dead at the home.

Officers swarmed the residential neighborhood Wednesday morning as an active investigation got underway.

Police believe the man killed the woman and child before taking his own life.

Hopkins Police Chief Brent Johnson said the adults were believed to own the daycare.

“It’s believed to be the daycare owners,” Johnson said.

Authorities have not yet released their names or ages.

Investigators also have not revealed how the two victims were killed or what weapon was used.

When a reporter asked Johnson whether a stabbing was involved, he said, “We are still trying to determine weapons involved.”

There were six other children present in the daycare at the time of the incident, FOX affiliate KMSP-TV reported.

Johnson said no other children were injured. Officers were able to get the children out and reunite them with their families.

Another parent arriving at Brown Bear Childcare witnessed the attack and immediately called the police, Johnson said.

“There’s no worse scenario than this, where you drop off your child somewhere you think is safe, and you get that phone call,” the chief said.

Early reports described a heavy police presence around the home as authorities secured the scene.

Police quickly stressed that there was no continuing danger to the surrounding community.

Johnson said investigators were still working to piece together exactly what happened inside the home.

Source : https://www.the-sun.com/news/16831695/brown-bear-daycare-hopkins/

Police alleged that Aravind, a student at Acton-Boxborough Regional High School, fatally assaulted his mother and brother inside their home on Tuesday before fleeing the scene on his mother’s Honda Accord.

An Indian-origin teenager has been charged with the murder of his mother and younger brother in their suburban home in Massachusetts, United States. Arjun Aravind, 17, a resident of Acton, was arrested after an overnight manhunt that ended early Wednesday morning.

He is accused of killing his mother, 45-year-old Sudha Venkatesan, and his brother, 14-year-old Siddarth Aravind, and has been charged with two counts of murder, two counts of assault and battery on a household or family member, two counts of assault and battery, use of a vehicle without authority, and theft of a motor vehicle, according to officials.

The Crime

Police alleged that Aravind, a student at Acton-Boxborough Regional High School, fatally assaulted his mother and brother inside their home on Tuesday before fleeing the scene on his mother’s Honda Accord.

Middlesex District Attorney Marian Ryan and Acton Police Chief Douglas Sturniolo said the deaths occurred on Tuesday inside the family’s Martha Lane home in Acton, about 48 km from Boston.

The crime was discovered when a tutor arrived at the family’s home just after 6:30 pm on Tuesday for an expected appointment. When she could not get in the house, she contacted Aravind’s father, who tried but failed to reach his family. He then contacted the Acton Police Department, asking them to conduct a well-being check, Ryan said.

Aravind’s father had last seen his wife early that morning before he left for work, while his younger son Siddharth was last seen around noon.

According to the Middlesex District Attorney, when officers arrived at the scene, they found Venkatesan and Siddarth dead. Venkatesan’s body was found lying in the house’s basement, while her son was found on the first floor of the home.

Both victims were found with “obvious trauma,” but the Chief Medical Examiner is yet to release information on the exact cause and manner of death. The type of weapon used in the killings is also still under investigation.

Missing Suspect

Aravind, along with his mother’s Honda Accord, was found missing, Ryan said.

Investigators tried to locate Aravind but were initially unsuccessful and alerted law enforcement agencies and the public to be on the lookout for him. Early on Wednesday morning, police in Wayland, Massachusetts, responding to an unrelated alarm at a parking lot, found the vehicle with Aravind inside. He was taken into custody without incident.

Source : https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/indian-origin-teen-arjun-aravind-murders-mother-brother-in-us-home-chatgpted-fantasies-about-killing-family-11902759?pfrom=home-ndtv_topscroll

According to a Washington Post report, the threat was real, but the Central Intelligence Agency deemed it”not compelling enough.”

US President Donald Trump recently switched out planes during a summit in Turkey due to a “threat”. Trump had reportedly been seen switching between three aircraft, which the Republican leader confirmed later.

While he did not specify the threats, Trump stated he simply followed the advice he got from the Secret Service and the military.

Trump switched from the Qatar-gifted Boeing 747-8 to an older Air Force One, and then again made a secret switch to a smaller C-32A aircraft, reported The Washington Post.

Amid the buzz of Trump’s plane switch, it was widely reported that the US President was prompted to switch planes due to “a credible threat from Iranian proxies.”

Iran threat intel “not compelling”

According to a Washington Post report, the threat was real, but the Central Intelligence Agency deemed it”not compelling enough.”

Citing former officials familiar with the matter, the Washington Post added that it was Israel that relayed the threat to Trump’s life and called for the president to secretly fly out of the plane.

One of the officials added that while Israel had relayed its fear of an assassination attempt, CIA officials did not have much confidence in it.

The reports of an Iranian threat were seen as “Israel-derived, not US-generated and viewed as low confidence,” said an official, adding that this view was also relayed to Trump’s team.

Despite the low confidence in the threat level, another US official said, referring to Trump’s previous assassination attempts, that the Secret Service did not want to take a chance.

“The Secret Service has had three near misses with this president, so they’re not taking any chances. They did what they had to do,” the official told Washington Post.

Source : https://www.hindustantimes.com/world-news/iranian-threat-to-trump-not-compelling-enough-for-cia-before-plane-switch-in-turkey-low-confidence-israel-intel-war-101786588880541.html

During the closing hours of the NATO Leaders’ Summit in Ankara in July, U.S. President Donald Trump posted on Truth Social that he would not be flying home aboard the new presidential plane that had brought him to the Turkish capital after Qatar gifted it to the administration last year.

Instead, Trump said, he had ​sent the aircraft ahead to Mildenhall Air Force Base in England so servicemembers could tour it. He wrote, without making clear how he would ultimately get home to ‌Washington, that he would fly to Mildenhall aboard an older Air Force One.

As part of the press pool traveling with Trump, I was along for the ride.
The itinerary change was confusing, and Trump’s explanation seemed implausible. Reporters’ questions to one another turned to whether Iran had hatched a concrete plot to assassinate the president. At first, our precise itinerary also remained a mystery, though we assumed we were still heading back to Washington as initially planned after the stop in the United ​Kingdom.
If our initial hunch regarding a security concern proved accurate, the Qatari-provided plane – which is known to lack certain safety features – might not be up to snuff. That could explain why the White ​House would want to switch out the planes, and it would mean that we were in for a much more dangerous flight than usual.

Trump had inadvertently ⁠stoked speculation about potential threats during the final day of the summit on July 8. As he met with various world leaders, from Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa to Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelenskiy, ​he repeatedly brought up Iran’s longstanding attempts to kill him in comments to reporters.
After a press conference shortly before leaving Turkey in which Trump largely deflected questions about the plane swap, the sense that something ​was out of the ordinary only grew.
As we boarded what we believed was the aircraft carrying the president, White House staff directed journalists to close our window shades. When we pressed for an explanation, we were told it was a request from the Secret Service.
Having traveled on the presidential plane before, I knew this demand was atypical. Was it, perhaps, an attempt to obscure some sort of classified defense technology?

Only weeks later would we find out ​that the instruction was designed to help hide a covert operation in which Trump left the aircraft via a catering truck and boarded a different government jet due to a security concern.
On ​Air Force One itself, answers can be surprisingly hard to come by. For security reasons, reporters have no access to WiFi. Access to White House staff, meanwhile, is usually limited to a logistical staffer known as ‌a “wrangler,” who often ⁠lacks access to or authority to distribute sensitive information.
The flight from Ankara to Mildenhall was uneventful, though it was hard to relax. We believed, falsely, that the president could appear at any moment and the circumstances surrounding our flight remained a mystery.
While Trump did not “gaggle” with journalists for reasons that are now obvious, I thought little of his absence as he often forgoes speaking to journalists on Air Force One.

But when we landed in England in the late evening, the trip took another unusual turn.
As we walked off the plane, we saw Trump descend from another section of the aircraft, an elaborate ​part of the ruse in hindsight.
White House staff then ​asked us to follow Trump on foot ⁠as he walked to the Qatari-provided Air Force One, which was parked several hundred yards in front of the aircraft we had just exited. Secret Service agents flanked the president, and a black government SUV to our right rolled slowly forward.
The maneuver – which resembled nothing I had seen before ​on the White House beat – immediately struck me as notably performative and cinematic, particularly as I was unsure of its purpose.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/if-i-go-you-go-right-traveling-presidential-plane-without-trump-2026-08-12/

President Donald Trump’s order directing Americans to receive separate ​measles, mumps and rubella vaccines faces an immediate obstacle: none of the individual shots are licensed in the United States ‌and experts say it could take years before any become available, if they ever do.
Two manufacturers – Merck & Co (MRK.N), and GSK (GSK.L), – are licensed to make combined measles, mumps and rubella shots for patients in the United States. Single disease shots for these diseases have not been available in the U.S. since Merck stopped making them in 2008. They are ​not routinely used in most other countries.

Merck and GSK said in statements there is no published scientific evidence supporting the separation of ​the vaccines and decades of evidence supporting the safety of their combined shots.
“Even under current expedited review pathways, it ⁠could take years – potentially as many as 10 – to meet the safety and efficacy requirements to obtain FDA approval and then begin manufacturing and commercialization” ​of single disease shots, Merck said.
Trump signed the executive order on Monday calling for fewer childhood vaccinations, which he said would give U.S. children “gold-standard” protection. ​According to the order, “the combined measles, mumps, rubella (MMR) vaccine should be administered in three separate single-disease shots once such products are domestically available.”

At a press conference on Monday, Trump suggested that vaccines cause autism, despite a lack of scientific evidence that there is a link. Some public health experts said the order could increase vaccine hesitancy, exposing more ​children to vaccine preventable illnesses.
The CDC and many major medical groups have long recommended the combined vaccine because it reduces the number of injections ​and lowers the risk that children will miss protection against one of the three diseases.
Dr. Andrew Racine, president of the American Academy of Pediatrics, said although it’s possible ‌to separate ⁠out the MMR vaccine into its constituent components, each of those different components would have to be manufactured and have to be tested.
“They wouldn’t be able to do that probably for another 10 years, and there’s no indication that they have any interest in doing that.”

Establishing and receiving regulatory approval for just the manufacturing processes for the separate shots could be a timely and costly process, said Jesse Goodman, former Chief Scientist at the FDA.
“They’d be ​making three times as many vials ​or vaccines and filling three ⁠times as many,” Goodman said. “It’s not like they have facilities sitting around idle – so they might need to either change current facilities or even create additional capacity for them.”
Still, a White House official said on Monday the administration ​would work with the private sector to make the option of separate vaccines available for parents, relying on ​market-based solutions.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/legal/litigation/trumps-goal-split-mmr-vaccine-could-take-decade-experts-say-2026-08-12/

Taiwan ​detected AI-assisted cyberattacks on government agencies last month coming from overseas but the affected bodies successfully “handled” the incident, the ‌Ministry of Digital Affairs said on Thursday.
Taiwan has in recent years complained about what it sees as China’s “hybrid warfare” — from daily military drills near the island to disinformation campaigns and cyberattacks — as Beijing ramps up military and political pressure on the democratically governed island to force Taipei to accept its claims of sovereignty.

Chinese cyberattacks on Taiwan’s ​key infrastructure from hospitals to banks rose 6% in 2025 from the previous year to an average of 2.63 million attacks ​a day, the island’s National Security Bureau said in January, adding some of the hacks were synchronised with military ⁠drills in “hybrid threats” to paralyse the island.
In a statement, the Ministry of Digital Affairs said its cybersecurity monitoring units detected the “abnormal attack” targeting ​government agencies in July, and beginning July 20, its National Institute of Cyber Security issued a series of warning alerts while it investigated.

The investigation ​results showed the attacks displayed clear characteristics of an “overseas source”, with hackers employing a hybrid approach that combined manual operations with AI agent-assisted attacks, such as Open Claw, it said.
“The relevant attack sources, methods, and scope of impact have all been fully investigated, and the affected units have successively completed their handling,” the ministry added.
In ​response to this new type of AI-derived cybersecurity threat, the government has established protective guidelines and strengthened system monitoring across agencies to block ​attacks early, it said.
The statement did not mention China, and China’s Taiwan Affairs Office did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the attack.

ISRAELI FIRM’S ‌REPORT

Taiwan’s ⁠statement came a day after the Israeli cybersecurity company Dream said in a blog post that it had uncovered an AI-driven hacking campaign that stole credentials and other data from an unnamed government in Asia.

Dream said a team of AI agents worked together to extract scores of passwords from unidentified officials, steal personnel records from Taiwan’s justice ministry, and scan its nuclear safety agency for vulnerabilities over the course of four days.
Dream, which ​said it was able to reconstruct ​the hacking campaign after recovering ⁠the agents’ “complete operational workspace,” declined to share the data or name the government when approached by Reuters, but the Financial Times, which was the first media outlet briefed on Dream’s findings, identified the target agencies as ​Taiwanese.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/world/china/taiwan-says-it-was-targeted-last-month-ai-driven-hacking-campaign-2026-08-13/

Senator Flavio Bolsonaro’s presidential campaign is preparing a new fiscal ​framework to replace Brazil’s current budget rules, imposing tighter spending caps as debt rises that could ‌reduce real spending growth to zero, two sources familiar with the matter told Reuters.
The senator, who is the eldest son of far-right former President Jair Bolsonaro, is the leading right-wing challenger to leftist President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva in the October election.

Brazil’s gross public ​debt climbed to 81.9% of gross domestic product in June, compared to 71.4% when Lula took office in ​January 2023, leading many economists to flag the need for a painful fiscal adjustment by ⁠the next government.
Under Bolsonaro’s draft proposal, spending growth would remain below revenue growth, while varying according to public ​debt levels. The higher the debt burden, the tighter the cap on spending growth, said the sources on condition of ​anonymity.
Depending on the final design, the rule could effectively freeze federal spending in real terms in the next administration. The exact parameters of the proposal are still being drafted, the sources said.

The proposal, floated by Bolsonaro advisers in private meetings with investors, could be ​sent to Congress as a constitutional amendment during a potential government transition later this year, sources said.
The framework would ​replace Lula’s fiscal rules, which currently cap real spending growth at between 0.6% and 2.5% annually and limit it to no more ‌than ⁠70% of revenue growth.
In response to a Reuters request for comment, the Bolsonaro campaign said its government platform would be released by August 15, the deadline set by electoral law, and would detail its economic proposals.
His proposals will aim to strengthen fiscal discipline, improve public-sector efficiency and create conditions for stronger economic growth, the campaign added.
One source said the ​proposal, still under discussion, could ​freeze federal spending in ⁠real terms whenever gross government debt exceeds 80% of GDP, a threshold that has already been breached. Spending growth would be limited to 50% of revenue growth when debt ​stands between 75% and 80% of GDP, rising to 70% of revenue growth when ​debt falls below ⁠75% of GDP, the source added.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/bolsonaro-campaign-drafts-debt-linked-fiscal-rule-replace-brazil-framework-2026-08-11/

Russia freed on Tuesday a former American Marine jailed there since 2022, U.S. President Donald Trump said, as the man returned to the ​United States to be greeted with hamburgers and milkshakes.
Russia agreed to release Robert Gilman, 32, for humanitarian reasons after discussions with President Vladimir Putin, Trump ‌said on social media.

A State Department plane carrying Gilman arrived at Dulles airport on the outskirts of Washington late on Tuesday.

“He can now fully return to his family and receive the medical care he needs,” said U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff, who helped negotiate the release and greeted him at Dulles with hamburgers and milkshakes.
The White House and the State Department had urged Moscow to release Gilman so he could ​receive medical treatment in the United States. U.S. officials said Putin approved a pardon for him.
On social media, Witkoff thanked Putin for the pardon “and for his personal ​engagement throughout this process.”
U.S. officials said Russia sought no concessions in return for the release. Trump has maintained relations with Putin despite ⁠tensions over the war in Ukraine.

Gilman had been held in a prison in Voronezh, about 340 miles (550 km) south of Moscow. The exact circumstances of his health are unclear.
But Eric ​Lebson, chief strategy officer of Global Reach, an advocacy group representing Gilman’s family, told Reuters last week that Gilman was moved in late June from the prison hospital to the ​psychiatric ward of a civilian emergency hospital in a catatonic-like state assessed as a “dissociative stupor.”
A U.S. official who spoke to Gilman said he was walking and talking.
“All things considered, he seems to be in good shape,” the official said.
Trump’s post featured a photo of a gaunt-looking man on a plane surrounded by a group of smiling people carrying an American flag. The president said he had spoken to Gilman, ​who requested a cheeseburger upon landing.

“I will take care of that!” Trump said.
Gilman was to have been evaluated on the flight by four doctors, said the U.S. officials, who spoke ​on condition of anonymity.
After his Dulles stop, Gilman was on his way to a rehabilitation center in San Antonio, Texas, for medical treatment, one official said.

ARRESTED OVER POLICE OFFICER INCIDENT

Gilman, who served in ‌the U.S. ⁠Marines from August 2019 until August 2020, was traveling by train when he was arrested in January 2022 in Voronezh, Lebson said.
He was detained for allegedly kicking a police officer while drunk, according to Russian state media.
However, his father, Vladimir Gilman, who emigrated to Massachusetts from Russia, wrote in an October 2024 Boston Globe op-ed that the charges were false.
His son, he said, had fallen ill when the incident occurred and accidentally kicked the officer. The officer was uninjured, dropped the charges, and did not present evidence at Gilman’s trial, he wrote.

Robert ​Gilman was sentenced to 4-1/2 years in ​jail. He was one of at least ⁠10 Americans known to be imprisoned in Russia.
The U.S. officials said a Russian senior official, Yuri Ushakov, informed Trump aides last week that Putin had agreed to sign a decree pardoning Gilman for humanitarian purposes, given Putin’s friendship with the president.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/world/russia-frees-ailing-ex-us-marine-robert-gilman-detention-2026-08-11/

North Korea fired a ballistic missile on Wednesday toward the sea off the ‌Korean Peninsula’s east coast, South Korean and Japanese authorities said, days ahead of major joint military exercises by Seoul and Washington long denounced by Pyongyang.
The missile was launched from the Wonsan area on North Korea’s east coast at around 6 a.m. (2100 GMT Tuesday), South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said, six days after North Korea fired another ballistic missile from ​the same area.

The launch comes ahead of South Korean and U.S. military drills, dubbed Ulchi Freedom Shield, scheduled for August 17 to 27, ​aimed at countering Pyongyang’s evolving nuclear and weapons capabilities.
Hong Min, a senior researcher at the Korea Institute for National Unification ⁠in Seoul, said the launch was likely part of North Korea’s existing weapons development schedule, but the timing could also have been selected to send ​a message ahead of the U.S.-South Korean exercises.
“Even if it was a test of a weapon under development, choosing when to conduct it requires a ​political decision,” Hong said.

South Korean authorities said North Korea also fired a ballistic missile from Wonsan on August 6, but Pyongyang did not report that launch in state media. Hong said that test may have failed to achieve its intended objective.
North Korea has conducted a series of tests this year, including short-range ballistic missiles, artillery rockets and other tactical ​weapons.
Wednesday’s launch was its 11th suspected ballistic missile test in 2026, according to South Korean assessments.
South Korean and Japanese defence authorities said the missile flew ​around 700 km (435 miles). The Joint Chiefs of Staff did not identify Wednesday’s weapon as a short-range ballistic missile, saying authorities were conducting a detailed analysis of its ‌specifications.
The omission ⁠leaves open the question of what type of missile it was, analysts said. Ballistic missiles with ranges of 300 km to 1,000 km are generally classified as short-range.

Hong said the range, trajectory and launch site suggested it may have been a type of hypersonic missile, though a submarine-launched missile was also possible.
There was no immediate statement from Pyongyang on the launch.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/north-korea-fires-unidentified-projectile-media-says-2026-08-11/

The Saudi-Pak-Turkey agreement gives Saudi Arabia a shield. But for Pakistan, it could quickly become a strategic nightmare

A very strange pact has now been sealed and signed, and is now presumably to be implemented. The Makkah Al-Mukarramah Summit for Joint Defence became one of the most significant events of the year last week, with every country looking out for the coming changes. Certainly, the statement seemed to point to a collective defence framework, without any accompanying references to a possible structure. The actual text of the agreement remains classified, so this could still evolve down the road. But the problem is its implementation on the ground, particularly where Pakistan is concerned. It is all very intriguing and needs some careful examination.

Collective Defence And Nuclear Deterrence

First, the statement itself. Once you sift through the very many respectful references to the titles held by each signatory, and the usual language of ‘commitment to stability’ and so on, what remains is one paragraph that says that the agreement is “intended to strengthen collective deterrence against any act of aggression, and stipulates that any armed attack against one of the three States shall be regarded as an attack against them all”. That’s collective defence, plain and simple. But the text quietly skips a definite “deterrence” commitment, which is only to be “strengthened”. That’s Pakistan, the only nuclear-weapon state in the triad, being extremely cautious. At least that’s what is in the public version.

Trump’s assertions about voter fraud have been consistently challenged, with no evidence supporting widespread irregularities

US President Donald Trump has left open the possibility of declaring a national security emergency around elections in order to impose new voting requirements without approval from Congress. The suggestion was raised during an interview with Trump on Monday by Wayne Allyn Root, host of Real America’s Voice.

Root urged the President to declare a national security emergency to bypass Congress and introduce requirements including proof of US citizenship, voter identification and restrictions on mail-in-ballot voting before the November midterm elections.

“Let me just say that stranger things have happened, Ok. I’ll leave it at that,” Trump replied.

The President did not elaborate on the comment.

Root had told him: “Let me put an idea in your head OK.”

“You have the right to declare a national security emergency for elections,” he said. “[Congress] can’t challenge it; it can only be overturned by a two-thirds vote of both houses of Congress. So if you do this in the next month, we will get photo ID, proof of citizenship and a limit to mail-in ballots.”

However, the President does not have an established legal authority to unilaterally change the rules governing federal elections.

A March 2026 analysis by the Center for American Progress said no federal executive branch official had the authority to alter rules for federal elections. Under the US Constitution, Congress has the power to alter how federal elections are administered.

Trump has repeatedly claimed, without providing evidence, that US elections can be “rigged” through fake ballots, voter fraud and other forms of interference. There is no evidence that widespread voter fraud has changed the outcome of a US election.

The President and his allies have pushed for several changes to voting rules, including requiring voters to prove their US citizenship, requiring identification to vote and restricting some forms of voting by mail.

Several of those efforts have faced legal challenges.

A federal judge has blocked the enforcement of an executive order signed by Mr Trump last year that directed states to create a list of eligible citizens to help determine voter eligibility. Only US citizens are permitted to vote in federal elections, while research indicates that non-citizen voting is extremely rare.

Courts have also blocked an executive order seeking to restrict voting by mail.

Source : https://www.timesnownews.com/world/us/us-news/us-president-donald-trump-midterms-election-emergency-response-watch-video-article-155595962

The wedding took place at the Portuguese coastal resort of Cascais, near Lisbon, with the couple’s five children in attendance.

Football superstar Cristiano Ronaldo and his longtime partner Georgina Rodriguez have married, ending weeks of speculation over whether they had already tied the knot or were about to do so.

Ronaldo, 41, and Rodriguez, 32, shared the news on Instagram on Wednesday, posting a photograph of their hands showing their wedding bands. The picture was captioned simply: “C ❤️ G”.

No other photographs from the ceremony were shared.

The wedding took place at the Portuguese coastal resort of Cascais, near Lisbon. The Brunswick Group, which manages Ronaldo’s public relations, said their five children attended the “private and intimate” ceremony.

The marriage came exactly a year after Rodriguez announced their engagement on Instagram in August 2025, sharing a photograph of her engagement ring.

About the couple

Ronaldo first met Rodriguez in 2016 while she was working at a Gucci store in Madrid. The pair made their first public appearance together at the Best FIFA Football Awards in Zurich in January 2017.

Their relationship has since grown into one of football’s best-known celebrity romances.

Ronaldo previously spoke about his relationship with Rodriguez in her Netflix series ‘I Am Georgina’, saying he had not expected their relationship to become so serious.

“I didn’t think at the beginning that this would be this strong, that I would fall in love with her,” he said. “I didn’t expect it, honestly. But after a while, I felt that she was the woman of my life.”

Ronaldo and Rodriguez have two daughters together, Alana and Bella. They also raise Ronaldo’s eldest son, Cristiano Jr., and twins Eva Maria and Mateo. The family suffered a devastating loss in 2022 when Bella’s twin brother, Angel, died shortly after birth.

Source : https://www.news18.com/world/i-do-at-last-cristiano-ronaldo-marries-longtime-partner-georgina-rodriguez-in-portugal-ws-l-10267502.html

Fallout from the Blake Lively vs. Justin Baldoni legal saga has produced yet another lawsuit.

Showbiz reporter James Vituscka is suing his former employer, the Daily Mail, claiming they terminated him after he became embroiled in the Lively-Baldoni drama.

According to court docs obtained by Page Six Tuesday, Vituscka was named in the high-profile litigation after discussing the “It Ends With Us” fallout with both Lively’s longtime publicist and Baldoni’s representatives.

After his texts were used in court papers, Vituscka wanted to hire his own legal representation to defend himself, but alleges that the Daily Mail discouraged him from doing so. Instead, he claims, per the court docs, that the outlet “pressured” him to sign a declaration with language he was not comfortable with, like stating he “regretted” the actions that led to his involvement.

The Mail is “categorically” denying the allegations and Vituscka’s account of what transpired. In a statement to Page Six, the news outlet blasted his lawsuit as “an inaccurate account of the circumstances surrounding the declaration he signed in connection with the Lively-Baldoni litigation.”

Vituscka’s suit, filed Monday in Manhattan Supreme Court, alleges whistleblower retaliation, sex and disability discrimination, sexual harassment, interference with protected rights and wrongful termination. He is seeking damages, including lost wages, emotional-distress damages and punitive damages.

Per the court docs, Vituscka was covering the “It Ends With Us” drama as a senior US entertainment reporter when he alleges that the Mail tried to control him.

According to his lawsuit, Lively’s longtime publicist, Leslie Sloane, allegedly told him in August 2024 that Baldoni was the source of tension on the set — but never told him that Baldoni had sexually harassed or assaulted Lively.

After Lively filed a sexual-harassment complaint against Baldoni in December 2024, Vituscka alleges that he texted Baldoni’s PR crisis manager, Melissa Nathan, about the apparent discrepancy.

In the exchange, Vituscka accidentally used the phrase “sexually assaulted” rather than “sexually harassed,” but says he subsequently made clear that Sloane had never told him anything about sexual harassment.

Those texts later became part of Baldoni’s legal filings, thrusting Vituscka into the middle of the increasingly bitter litigation. Vituscka claims his words were selectively quoted and stripped of context, and he was subsequently subpoenaed to provide documents and testimony. The subpoena then set off a dispute with the Daily Mail over how he should respond, the lawsuit claims.

He alleges the Mail retaliated against him, changing the way his work was supervised before firing him in June 2025. The complaint had not yet been reviewed by the County Clerk at publication time.

“At no point did Daily Mail pressure James to sign a declaration he believed to be untrue,” the outlet told us in a statement.

“In fact, the declaration he signed was consistent with what he had already told senior management after the Baldoni complaint first came to our attention. As a trusted news organization, we expect our journalists to act with honesty and integrity, and we rely upon that important expectation.”

The Daily Mail concluded the statement by alleging that Vituscka’s “claims that he is a ‘whistleblower’ who suffered ‘retaliation,’ ‘harassment,’ ‘discrimination’ or other unlawful treatment are entirely meritless and unsupported by the facts, and we are confident they will be soundly dismissed.”

Source : https://pagesix.com/2026/08/11/celebrity-news/blake-lively-vs-justin-baldoni-legal-battle-sparks-another-bitter-lawsuit/

Speculation is swirling over whether Democrat darling Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has quietly split with her longtime beau Riley Roberts — following her public announcement this week that she was freezing her eggs to feel “more in control of my life.”

The “Squad” star, 36 — who got engaged to Roberts in April 2022 — has been spotted in recent months without her engagement ring and it was noticeably absent in May when the pair was photographed together at a Manhattan burger joint.

She also carefully chose her words when asked this week by a reporter about her choice to freeze her eggs and whether her “fiancé was supportive of it.”

“All of my loved ones have been very supportive,” she said.

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., on her fiancé’s reaction to her decision to freeze her eggs and go public with the process on Instagram. AOC announced the news of her engagement in 2022. pic.twitter.com/66ZXZZUuhG

— Nicholas A Ballasy (@NicholasBallasy) August 10, 2026

Breakup rumors have spread among the Democrat party, with one insider speculating that they split because of her ambitions to seek higher office.

Ocasio-Cortez has been considered a frontrunner for the Democratic 2028 presidential nomination or US Senate — whichever she picks.

Other Dem sources pointed out that Ocasio-Cortez hasn’t worn a ring for some time and that Roberts hasn’t been in the congresswoman’s House financial disclosures for years, having last been listed for an August 2022 trip to Italy.

The Bronx and Queens rep referred to him as a “spouse” for that junket so the two could have some food and lodging expenses covered as gifts.

They also appeared together at the coveted Met Gala — where she sported her infamous “Tax the Rich” dress, which garnered significant scrutiny from the House Ethics Committee in a report issued last year. Roberts scored a free ticket to the $35,000-per-person Big Apple event because he was considered her “spouse.”

“The Committee ‘takes very seriously its obligation to provide sound and dispassionate advice to the Members of this House’’ and would have informed Representative Ocasio-Cortez and her counsel that Mr. Roberts did not fit the definition of a ‘spouse’ for purposes of the Charitable Events Exception,” the report stated.

Ethics investigators noted that even as Roberts was claimed as a “spouse” to accept gifts and privately sponsored travel, the fiancé was not forced to disclose his financial interests to the House “as is required of Members who are legally married.”

Ocasio-Cortez and Roberts were together in 2018 when she stunningly beat out incumbent Joseph Crowley to become the youngest person ever elected to Congress and throughout her rapid ascent in the House.

The famously private duo had gotten engaged during a jaunt to her family’s hometown in Puerto Rico, yet had refrained from tying the knot for years.

The diehard environmentalist congresswoman had proudly sported her modest “zero-emission” engagement ring that she claimed was constructed from “recycled gold.”

Some conservative critics speculated that Ocasio-Cortez was holding off on a wedding to avoid scrutiny over Roberts’ finances, as it would be subject to House disclosures after marriage.

Neither Ocasio-Cortez nor Roberts returned multiple messages seeking comment.

Roberts doesn’t appear in any recent postings on the progressive princess’ very active social media accounts, though he was featured in a 2021 Christmas post and another one a few months later.

On Monday, she was posting about hitting a “strength training” session at her DC gym before taking the train back to New York to get an ultrasound — with zero mention of her longtime partner.

The pair had dated in college and briefly broke it off before reconnecting around 2015, according to the Daily Mail. Roberts even had an official House email address to access her calendar.

Source : https://nypost.com/2026/08/11/us-news/aoc-fuels-split-rumors-with-longtime-beau-riley-roberts/

Yemeni authorities said six people were killed by Iran-backed Houthi rebels attacking a vessel in the Bab el-Mandeb strait, while U.S. forces fired on a ship they said was trying to break a blockade of Iran’s ports.

Here’s a look at the latest developments in the Iran war and the wider Middle East. Full coverage can be found here.

4 crew members and 2 allied fighters killed, Yemen says

Six people were killed Tuesday by Houthis firing missiles on a vessel in the Bab el-Mandeb strait, Yemeni authorities said.

Yemen’s coast guard said the dead included four crew members and two members of the government-allied National Resistance Forces. Houthis fired three ballistic missiles at the Yemeni commercial vessel, according to the Transportation Ministry of Yemen’s internationally recognized government.

They are the first known deaths from Houthi attacks on shipping off Yemen in the latest bout of fighting in the Arab country.

With the Strait of Hormuz effectively shut down by Iran, there has been a renewed focus on the Red Sea and Bab el-Mandeb strait at Yemen’s southern tip, which is an alternate route for Saudi Arabia to ship its oil.

The deadly vessel strike came amid Houthi attacks on the government-held port city of Mokha on the Red Sea and other areas of the country. Dozens of government troops and civilians have been killed in attacks since last week, according to the Yemeni military.

The strikes are part of an escalation by the Houthis against government forces in Yemen and oil facilities in neighboring Saudi Arabia, which supports the Yemeni government, and the kingdom’s shipping in the Red Sea.

The Houthi attacks could reignite Yemen’s civil war following a 2022 truce, and open a new front in the Middle East war.

Mohammed Abdul-Salam, the Houthis’ chief negotiator and spokesperson, accused Saudi Arabia in a social media post of exploiting the ceasefire to tighten an air and sea blockade it imposed in 2015.

He said the Houthis are open for negotiations but any settlement must include lifting the blockade.

US fires on ship it said was trying to break blockade of Iran

The U.S. military said Tuesday that its forces fired on a Panamanian-flagged ship in the Gulf of Oman that tried to evade the American blockade on Iranian ports. The move came as U.S. President Donald Trump tries to keep economic pressure on the Islamic Republic.

U.S. Central Command said the vessel had ignored warnings to stop, prompting an American helicopter to fire missiles into the engine room of the M/V Vela Nova, disabling the ship. The statement did not say whether the ship’s crew suffered any casualties.

Trump on Tuesday night insisted that the U.S. military has “total control” over the Strait of Hormuz, despite the fact that Iran has kept up its attacks on ships in the waterway, largely impeding traffic there.

“Iran is going fine, going just absolutely fine,” he told reporters after a trip to Ohio. “We totally control the Strait of Hormuz. We have control over it. Nobody else. Only us,” Trump said.

Central Command said it has redirected 55 commercial vessels attempting to run the blockade, disabled three noncompliant vessels and boarded two. The U.S. Navy currently has more than 15 warships, including two aircraft carriers and an amphibious assault ship, stationed in the waters of the Arabian Sea.

Iran has refused to back down on demands that the U.S. end its blockade of Iranian ports, lift sanctions on the Islamic Republic and fulfill other conditions.

Iran effectively closed the strait after Israel and the U.S. attacked the country on Feb. 28. Attacks on the key waterway — through which roughly one-fifth of the world’s traded oil supplies passed before the war — and uncertainty around its future have kept energy prices a major focus of U.S. politics ahead of November’s midterm elections.

Pakistani official returns to Iran hoping to ease tensions with US

Pakistani Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi traveled Tuesday to Tehran for meetings with Iran’s foreign minister and other officials.

Naqvi’s visit aimed to encourage Iran to resume negotiations with the United States under an interim peace deal brokered by Pakistan in June, two officials said. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi posted photos from his meeting with Naqvi on his private Telegram channel.

It is Naqvi’s sixth trip to Iran as part of Pakistan’s diplomatic efforts to ease tensions between Iran and the U.S.

—Munir Ahmed in Islamabad

Source : https://apnews.com/article/iran-us-strait-hormuz-august-11-2026-91e4efdfe1ac035b2065127550377289

Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers may soon be outfitted with gloves that can deliver painful electric shocks intended to gain compliance from combative individuals.

ICE plans to spend up to $20 million to purchase thousands of “conductive distraction and de-escalation devices” for officers and agents by March, according to a notice published Monday by the Department of Homeland Security.

The devices are known as the G.L.O.V.E., which stands for Generated Low Output Voltage Emitter, and are manufactured by Compliant Technologies LLC of Lexington, Kentucky. They have been used in recent years by some jails and police departments.

DHS said Tuesday that it was working on a response to an Associated Press inquiry and offered no immediate comment. Jeff Niklaus, the founder and CEO of Compliant Technologies, wrote in an email, “Unfortunately, we are unable to speak on this subject.”

The notice said the solicitation for a no-bid contract could be published as early as Friday.

Civil rights advocates expressed alarm at the plan, saying ICE officers already face criticism for their use of force with little oversight or accountability while enforcing President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown.

Compliant Technologies says the devices function as a normal pair of patrol gloves until officers press a switch to activate their electrical mode. The gloves must be applied directly to someone’s skin to deliver a pain stimulus that typically helps an officer gain compliance within seconds, according to the company.

“It’s immediate and sharp, and it will distract you. I call it like a bee sting,” said John Peters, president of the Institute for the Prevention of In-Custody Deaths, who is studying how the device has been used. “If the officer is getting any type of resistance from the person, this is certainly an effective tool.”

Peters said he believed ICE’s planned purchase would likely be the largest from the company to date. He said he could envision ICE officers using the gloves to help remove uncooperative subjects from cars and houses and in and out of detention facilities.

“For smaller officers or weaker officers or older officers, I think it has a great advantage” because it can produce faster takedowns and shorten confrontations, he said.

The manufacturer warns the device should not be used as punishment, against people merely exhibiting “verbal defiance or belligerence” or on high-risk populations such as children, pregnant women or elderly or disabled people.

Jenn Rolnick Borchetta, deputy project director on policing at the American Civil Liberties Union, said the public should have no confidence that ICE officers will use the devices appropriately. She questioned why the devices would be necessary for civil immigration enforcement and noted those getting shocked might have no advance warning.

Source : https://apnews.com/article/ice-electric-shock-gloves-85ff746d3e0ee5f39e7a9a3f1f576252

Rescue workers in Colombia are working against the clock to free survivors trapped in buildings and under rubble following Monday’s powerful earthquake.

More than 180 people have been confirmed dead – most in the cities of Cali and Pereira.

The magnitude 7.4 quake struck at 07:34 (12:34 GMT) on Monday and was felt across an enormous area, stretching for hundreds of miles across western Colombia – with fresh aftershocks still being felt on Tuesday.

While the official death toll remains at 181, an aggregated figure gathered from local officials puts it higher – potentially at more than 240. A state of emergency has been declared by President Abelardo de la Espriella.

Giving an update on Tuesday from Pereira, one of the worst hit cities, President Espriella said as well as those killed, almost 2,600 had been injured, and almost 200 people remain missing.

He also reported that more than 1,100 homes had been destroyed, and more than 8,000 had been damaged.

Overnight on Monday into Tuesday, several people spent the night outdoors in cities like Pereira and Cali – either due to their homes being destroyed, or fear of further collapses.

Across the country, dozens of larger buildings have also collapsed.

In Cali, a city of 2.2 million people where there have been 95 deaths, a unified command post has been set up to co-ordinate the rescue effort.

On Tuesday, Cali Mayor Alejandro Eder said that 239 people remained trapped, with 949 injured and 45 buildings which have either completely or partially collapsed.

Several of the upper floors of one of the city’s hospitals, some dedicated to paediatric care, collapsed, leaving some patients trapped.

In Calima, a neighbourhood in the north of Cali, four children died after a section of the Gimnasio Calima school collapsed.

The mayor of the municipality, Antonio Cadavid, stated that other children ended up with serious injuries, with a total of 30 children referred to care centres.

To combat threats of looting, he has also ordered a curfew, coming into effect at 20:00 local time, and lasting until 06:00 on Wednesday morning.

Further tremors were felt in Cali on Tuesday – part of a pattern of aftershocks across the country, with more than 70 having taken place since Monday’s earthquake, according to Colombia’s geological service.

According to the agency, two earthquakes of magnitude 3.6 occurred early on Tuesday. The first was in San José del Palmar and the second in Santander.

In Pereira, 79 people have died according to the city’s fire department.

The city has implemented a car-free day to allow the search to go ahead, with citizens urged to comply.

Footage from the city has shown the massive scale of the rescue effort, with hundreds of volunteers working to remove rubble and free trapped survivors.

Hours after the earthquake hit Pereira, a resident of the Parque Industrial neighborhood, near the city’s airport, told BBC Mundo about the shock being experienced in the area.

“It’s impossible to get around the city center. In Bolívar Square (the city’s main square), at least one building collapsed. Furthermore, there are structures where buses and trucks are trapped, and people are afraid those structures will collapse as well,” he said.

“We’re all in shock. It was really awful.”

Jorge Eduardo Rojas, mayor of Manizales, said five people had been killed in the city.

Source : https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c20dqd9qwq4o

US President Donald Trump has signed an order that calls for fewer childhood vaccines and also recommends splitting the mumps, measles and rubella (MMR) shots.

“Decades ago, children received only a small fraction of the vaccines required today,” Trump said. “In those times, people were much healthier and of course the high rates of autism now observed did not exist.”

The president has long cast doubt on the safety of MMR vaccines, but multiple studies have found no connection between the shots and autism.

Medical experts have criticised the new order and said it could reduce vaccination rates and expose children to harmful diseases.

The order also recommends that the number of childhood vaccines drop to 11 from the existing 18 recommended by the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP).

Trump’s order serves as guidance, not a mandate, since shots required for school attendance are set at the state level, rather than by the federal government.

The immunisations recommended for all children under the order are for measles, mumps, rubella, diphtheria, tetanus, pertussis, polio, Haemophilus influenzae type B, pneumococcal disease, human papillomavirus, and varicella or chicken pox.

“We’re reducing them,” Trump said. “It’s not only that you’re doing fewer vaccines, or jabs, as they say, but you’re doing them in a series of visits to the doctor.”

The president suggested the MMR vaccine could be “quite lethal” if given at once. He compared it to pouring a bottle of soda into a child’s body. According to the FDA, a single dose of MMR is 0.5ml.

When a reporter asked for evidence of the “lethal” claim, Trump said: “What I’ve heard is that there are some people that say it is that way.”

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the MMR vaccine carries a very small risk of febrile seizures for young children. Those with health issues, including severe allegeric reactions or weakened immune systems, are advised to consult with healthcare providers before taking the shots.

The agency says “most people who get MMR vaccine do not have any serious problems with it”, and that getting the vaccine “is much safer than getting measles, mumps, or rubella”.

According to the CDC, there is “no published scientific evidence that shows any benefit in separating the combination MMR vaccine into three individual shots”.

Experts say that allowing time between jabs means children are more likely to contract diseases in the interim or that they are more likely to miss appointments if there are multiple shots.

Dr William Schaffner of the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine in Nashville told the BBC the increased number of visits would be harder for parents and providers to track and would add to the expense without any scientific benefit.

Since taking office in 2025, Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) Robert F Kennedy Jr has sought to change and loosen vaccine regulations.

During a tense 20-minute interview on CNN last week, Kennedy insisted he had “never questioned the efficacy of the MMR vaccine”.

He said the proposed changes were meant to give parents choice, not prohibit access to childhood vaccines.

Trump administration officials have said the order means children in the US would receive much less than the 72 shots recommended under the previous vaccine schedule, a figure that assumes annual flu and Covid-19 doses.

Dr Andrew Racine, president of the American Academy of Pediatrics, said Trump’s executive order was “dangerous” and not based on “gold-standard science”.

“Delaying or skipping shots is risky, especially as measles continues to spread and children go back to school,” Racine said.

Republican Senator Bill Cassidy, who was the deciding vote in the Senate to confirm Kennedy as health secretary, also admonished Trump’s executive order on Monday, labelling it “wrong”.

“The President does not have the expertise to make these changes,” Cassidy, a physician, wrote on X. “Vaccines are overwhelmingly safe. Vaccines are effective. Vaccines DO NOT cause autism.”

Experts fear that if parents refrain from getting their children vaccinated as a result of the discredited idea that childhood vaccines are linked to autism, it risks the re-emergence of diseases like measles.

Multiple studies have found no link between the MMR vaccine and autism. A recent high-quality study from Denmark in 2019 looked at 657,461 children and concluded that the data did not support the MMR vaccine causing or triggering autism.

On its website, the CDC recommends that two doses of the combined MMR vaccine be given to children, starting with the first dose at 12-15 months and the second between the ages of four and six.

Source : https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/ce3q5vl581wo

THE judge in Lindsay Clancy’s murder trial has slammed her lawyer’s attempt at adding someone to the witness list last minute, but there is still a chance the TikToker could be called.

Lindsay, 36, is on trial after she strangled her three children with exercise bands in the basement of their Duxbury, Massachusetts home on January 24, 2023.

If you or someone you know needs help or support for their mental health, text “STRENGTH” to the Crisis Text Line at 741-741 to be connected with a certified crisis counselor.

The former labor and delivery nurse has since pleaded not guilty to three murder charges in connection to the deaths of her children: five-year-old Cora, three-year-old Dawson and eight-month-old Callan.

Lindsay has admitted to the killings, but her lawyer plans to argue she is not criminally responsible for murder because she was suffering from undiagnosed postpartum psychosis.

On the night of January 24, 2023, Lindsay also crushed up pills, cut her wrists and neck with a knife from her kitchen and jumped out of her second-story bedroom window, leaving her paralyzed from the waist down after strangling her kids.

Her trial kicked off on July 20, and since then there has been testimony from her then-husband Patrick Clancy, first responders who responded to her home on the fateful night, medical staff who treated Lindsay and her children afterward, friends and family.

Medical professionals who treated Lindsay in the months before her kids’ deaths have also taken the stand.

One of which was a psychiatrist at McLean Hospital, where Lindsay checked herself in for inpatient stay on December 31, 2022.

Lindsay’s stay was also brought up during Patrick’s testimony, where Lindsay’s defense attorney Kevin Reddington said “the prosecutor made it out on direct exam that McLean is some kind of a five-star institution.”

Now Reddington wants to call a woman who has shared several TikToks about what it was like working at McLean Hospital.

Reddington wants Emily Thorndike, who worked at the hospital for seven years as a mental health specialist but left one year before Lindsay was admitted, to testify about hospital staffing around the holidays.

Thorndike, now an independent clinical social worker, is “available, ready, willing and able to testify about an employee’s opinion as to what a woeful environment McLean offers, especially on holidays … nobody was there,” Reddington told Judge William Sullivan.

Lindsay checked into the hospital in Belmont, Massachusetts on New Year’s Eve in 2022, and checked out on January 5.

“[Jurors] are left with the impression that McLean was this wonderful place and [Lindsay] didn’t have any interest in utilizing what was available to her,” Reddington said in court on Tuesday.

Prosecutor Shanan Buckingham argued against adding Thorndike as a witness, noting how she didn’t work at the hospital while Lindsay was a patient and because she’s been following the case online.

Buckingham also called out the late notice and how Thorndike thinks the case is “an abomination.”

“I can’t imagine that witness would be allowed to give her review of McLean,” Judge Sullivan said.

“This is not TripAdvisor. I wouldn’t allow that.”

“It seems to me it would be a very simple solution to get the staffing records or somebody at McLean who can testify to this,” Sullivan said.

Sullivan took the matter under advisement, and said he might allow some questioning of Thorndike about what staffing was like on holidays without the jury present to see if she would be allowed to testify.

In his motion, Reddington wrote that Thorndike was “incensed” over Patrick’s cross-examination, where the prosecutor “intimated that McLean Hospital was one of the best hospitals in the country and that Lindsay Clancy was offered a number of therapeutic and counselling type interventions while at McLean …”

Reddington said Thorndike wants to testify about the facts of staffing and “the repeated use of clay, coloring books and purported group therapy sessions, supervised by unqualified individuals who have no psychiatric or social work experience.”

Thorndike wanted to “talk about the prosecution lies” in a TikTok post on July 29.

She claimed there are around 23 patients at the facility at a time, and there is usually one doctor assigned to three to four patients, but on holidays, one doctor tends to all of the patients.

The prosecutor asked Patrick if he was aware one-on-one therapy was offered at the hospital’s unit, which Thorndike claims is not true.

Thorndike claimed these meetings were “check-ins” where workers would ask patients how they were doing, what they ate that day, if they talked to their family and what their treatment plan is.

She also shut down the prosecution’s claims that Lindsay saw her doctor every day she was there, claiming Lindsay wouldn’t have seen “her” doctor at the facility until the Tuesday that she was there because she came in on a weekend and that Monday was a holiday.

“McLean Hospital is committed to providing high-quality mental health care for individuals and families across the lifespan through inpatient, residential, and outpatient services,” a hospital spokesperson said in a statement to The U.S. Sun.

Source : https://www.the-sun.com/news/16826847/lindsay-clancy-trial-emily-thorndike-tiktok-witness-mclean-hospital/

Jackie, the bald eagle who became an internet sensation and a symbol of the species’ recovery in California, died Monday after being treated for an illness at a veterinary facility, her caretakers announced.

For more than a decade, nature lovers watched via an online video feed as Jackie and her partner Shadow tended to their nest each year atop trees near Big Bear Lake in the San Bernardino Mountains east of Los Angeles.

The nonprofit Friends of Big Bear Valley installed the nest camera in 2015 and documented the successes and failures of each breeding season. In 2024, Jackie diligently sat on her eggs for more than two and a half days straight after a winter storm blanketed the nest with snow.

The Los Angeles County Department of Parks and Recreation’s San Dimas Raptor Rescue team found Jackie on July 17 following reports that the bird had been involved in a fight with two other eagles and was found to be ill.

Jackie had been receiving medical treatment for three weeks at the Ojai Raptor Center, where she was treated for a variety of ailments including anemia. Despite undergoing a blood transfusion and oxygen therapy, her condition worsened and the center announced the animal’s death Monday.

“We know this news will be deeply felt by the many thousands of people around the world who have followed her journey, hoped alongside us, prayed for her, and supported the people caring for her,” the center’s statement said. “Our team is heartbroken. It has been an extraordinary privilege to care for her.”

The California Department of Fish and Wildlife is caring for the remains.

Among those who enjoyed monitoring Jackie’s nests from afar was biologist Kelly Sorenson, executive director of the Ventana Wildlife Society in central California. While his group was not involved with the Big Bear eagles, he sees their breeding as emblematic of the comeback the species has made in the state over the past decades.

American bald eagles teetered on the brink of extinction until the pesticide DDT was banned in the 1970s and other protections were established, leading the species to rebound and be removed from the federal endangered list.

Source : https://apnews.com/article/jackie-california-bald-eagle-dies-cdb769385bcf0501db7c78ded8fb7f2c

NEW YORK (AP) — The president’s media company posted a massive loss in the second quarter and announced plans to ditch new business lines and refocus as a forum for users to post their views.

Trump Media & Technology, the company behind the Truth Social platform, said Monday that it lost $238 million in the three months through June as it branched into businesses unrelated to media, including crypto. That was more than 10 times the loss from a year earlier. The per-share loss widened to 86 cents from 8 cents.

In a conference call after the earnings release, the new chief executive, Kevin McGurn, said a yearlong effort to expand by branching into several new industries including online betting and crypto would now be largely abandoned as he refocuses the business on its social media mission.

“We made the disciplined choice to pivot in order to invest more time and resources in our most important initiatives,” McGurn said. “We will say no to things or change course as warranted.”

Trump Media stock fell slightly in after-hours trading following the earnings report. The stock had fallen 8% in regular trading.

Key to McGurn’s plan is a service called Truth API that offers early access to Wall Street trading firms to top posters on the Truth Social platform. That includes the user with most followers, President Donald Trump, who often moves markets by breaking major U.S policy shifts on the site.

Source : https://apnews.com/article/truth-social-media-trump-djt-crypto-e86747f01cc12dbee0146c5f0e79012b

Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s wife Rama Duwaji is heading to Syria and Lebanon next month – and expects to bring along cops assigned to the first couple’s taxpayer-funded NYPD detail, The Post has learned.

Duwaji will be jetting to the Middle East for a trip beginning Sept. 20 to the countries on the State Department’s “Do Not Travel” list for Americans because of dangerous conditions, a source said.

The source familiar with the security detail said the first lady, who’s been described by the mayor as a “private person,” requested NYPD security – after traveling overseas last month without police protection.

Mamdani’s office confirmed the trip and that an NYPD security detail will accompany the mayor’s wife.

“Upon the strong recommendation of the NYPD, the First Lady’s security detail will be joining her when she travels to visit family in Syria and Lebanon,” said mayoral spokesperson Dora Pekec.

Confusingly, the NYPD later denied it, saying such a trip would never be approved.

“The NYPD does not send officers to countries with level four travel advisories for discretionary reasons not linked to investigative work,” an NYPD spokesperson insisted early Tuesday.

“This is not an investigative trip, and therefore, NYPD personnel will not be traveling there for it.”

The mayor’s office offered no further comment on the trip’s details or whether the purpose was solely to visit family.

The source with knowledge of the trip told The Post, “It’s not official business. It’s not doing anything for the city.”

Source : https://nypost.com/2026/08/10/us-news/nyc-first-lady-rama-duwaji-traveling-to-syria-lebanon-with-nypd-detail-sources

It’s been three decades filled with mystery, conspiracies – and anger.

The drive-by shooting that killed rap superstar Tupac Shakur on 7 September 1996 changed the trajectory of hip-hop and elevated the rapper from the face of the genre to a cultural icon.

His killing became one of popular culture’s great mysteries, with countless theories but no arrests until 2023, when Duane “Keffe D” Davis was unexpectedly charged with murdering the famous rapper.

The 63-year-old former gang boss is due to stand trial in Las Vegas, where he is accused of murder with a deadly weapon with the intent to promote, further or assist a criminal gang. He’s pleaded not guilty. If convicted, he faces life in prison without parole.

The trial is likely to unravel the intricacies of the bitter and deadly East Coast vs West Coast rap rivalries and turf wars between the Bloods and the Crips street gangs that were immortalised in rap lyrics and news reports in the 1990s.

It could also include several celebrity witnesses – including Suge Knight, the former CEO of Death Row Records, who has been thought of as the last surviving witness to Shakur’s death.

But the complicated case hinges almost exclusively on one key piece of evidence: a book co-authored by Davis that he has argued is partially a piece of fiction.

Jury selection in the case began on Monday, with opening arguments due to start on 17 August.

To understand how the case became so mythologised, you have to go back to rivalries that grew larger than the men at its centre.

In the Los Angeles gang landscape of the 1990s, there was a vicious turf war between the Bloods, often represented by the colour red, and Crips, who often wore blue.

But that territorial dispute spread through the airwaves as part of a bigger national rivalry – East Coast v West Coast rap. The genre dispute was represented by two rival record companies that defined 1990s hip-hop: Knight’s Death Row Records and Sean “Diddy” Combs’ Bad Boy Records.

“The funny thing about it is Tupac is actually an East Coast rapper,” said Jeff Pearlman, author of Only God Can Judge Me: The Many Lives of Tupac Shakur.

Born in New York City, Tupac moved to northern California as a teenager. He became known as a southern California rapper after signing with Death Row Records, which included acts like Snoop Dogg and Dr Dre.

Santi Elijah Holley, author of An Amerikan Family: The Shakurs and the Nation They Created, says the Death Row persona never told the whole story.

Tupac’s mother Afeni was a Black Panther and he grew up around the black liberation movement. Holley says his music became his politics: “His activism was his art, his lyrics.”

He acted in a number of Hollywood movies, and released hip-hop’s first double album, All Eyez on Me, which sold over 5,000,000 copies.

That album, which debuted months before his death, cemented his place in the cannon of gangsta rap, a genre that celebrated the violent life of street criminals and drug dealers.

After he was shot in Las Vegas on 7 September 1996, he became immortalised as a kind of martyr for the lifestyle he helped make famous.

That fatal night began when Tupac and Knight attended a boxing match between Mike Tyson and Bruce Seldon at the MGM Grand.

Source : https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cgmkl1j3dwvo

The cancellation of a flight in Canada after a child refused to wear a seat belt has reignited a debate about the etiquette and safety procedures relating to children travelling on planes.

The Porter Airlines flight, which was preparing to depart from Victoria to Toronto on 6 August had to return to the terminal as a “young child was standing in their seat and would not secure their seat belt”, the airline said.

The delay meant the flight could not depart before the runway closed after midnight so passengers had to be rebooked on a flight the following day.

The incident has split opinion about how children should be treated in such situations and how airlines should respond.

Regarding the child’s behaviour, Porter Airlines said “attempts by the accompanying parent and crew to address this were unsuccessful”.

“The aircraft could not take off in this unsafe condition, so the crew elected to return to the terminal and have the two passengers disembark,” it added.

Child aviation safety expert Lia Tuso told the BBC the Porter crew were protecting the safety of the passengers on the flight with their decision to stop the flight, as well as the child.

“Unrestrained children can become projectiles,” Tuso said, similar to unrestrained items of luggage, which can fly into passengers in the event of turbulence, especially during takeoff and landing.

The incident has led to a debate online over how tolerant airlines should be to travelling families, and how strictly parents should enforce airline rules.

Some have said it was an example of what happens when parents are too “gentle” on their children. The Fox News morning programme debated it, with co-host Charles Hurt saying he supported physical discipline.

“We’ve all been those parents,” he said. “But this is beyond the pale.”

Other people have pointed out that sometimes children are afraid of flying and are not trying to be disruptive.

One passenger on the Porter Airlines plane, Aryeh Kozuch, told CBC News the child had not been unruly but had seemed scared.

“They just kept hiding under their seat. If they got forced into [being] strapped in, they just kind of slid out underneath.”

Many have questioned why the whole flight had to be disrupted for one child and said the family should have been removed.

Source : https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cj6307x3wdgo

TRUE crime sleuths have sparked outrage by filming drive-by videos of the former home where Lindsay Clancy killed her three children — just days after jurors were given a rare tour of the property.

Clancy is accused of murdering five-year-old daughter Cora, three-year-old son Dawson and eight-month-old son Callan at their Duxbury, Massachusetts, home in January 2023.

Prosecutors allege Clancy strangled the children with exercise bands and left them in the basement of the home, while her husband, Patrick, was out picking up dinner.

She then allegedly attempted to take her own life by jumping from a second-floor window.

The former labor and delivery nurse survived the fall and has been left paralyzed from the waist down.

Clancy, 35, has pleaded not guilty to murder and other charges, with her defense arguing that she was suffering from postpartum psychosis at the time and had been prescribed a cocktail of medications.

Jurors were taken to the home to see the layout for themselves and better understand the physical evidence and competing accounts of what happened inside on the night of the killings.

Following the tragedy, Patrick sold the residence in January 2024 for $675,000.

Social media footage obtained by The U.S. Sun shows content creators filming the home while driving past and later sharing the videos on Instagram and TikTok.

One user, named Jamies Just Jammin, wrote, “I debated whether or not I should post this here as this is not what my page is about, but where the entire nation is obsessed with this case I thought some may be interested.

Source : https://www.the-sun.com/news/16820538/creators-slammed-visiting-duxbury-lindsay-clancy-murder-home

A “BRAVE” 16-year-old British cheerleader has died after a horror boat accident while holidaying with her family.

Teen Abbie Lainton, from Swindon, died “in a terrible accident” off the coast of a Caribbean island that also left her two siblings injured.

Abbie died after she was badly burnt when a tourist boat carrying around 35 people suddenly ignited and blew up off the coast of the Dominican Republic.

She was rushed to intensive care but died three days later.

Her siblings remain in hospital.

Authorities said 24 people were injured with 11 taken to hospital for treatment for burns.

Gisell Segovia and her husband Navin Torres, 35, were on the boat when it blew up and saw Abbie badly injured after the explosion.

Navin told The Sun how he was with the Brit teen as she fought for her life, calling Abbie “a warrior” who “did not go out without a fight”.

He and his wife had come on holiday to celebrate Navin’s birthday, but ended up burnt and traumatised in the horror accident.

The boat was returning tourists from a trip to the popular Saona Island, a tropical idyll that forms part of the Cotubanamá National Park.

Source : https://www.the-sun.com/news/16820487/brave-brit-girl-killed-boat-explosion

Critics argue that enhanced screening measures infringe on free speech and privacy rights

The US State Department on Monday said it has revoked more than 175,000 visas from foreign nationals under President Donald Trump’s administration, as the government continues its sweeping immigration crackdown.

The department said the visas were revoked from people who had “violated the terms of their visas, committed crimes, called for violence against US citizens, defrauded Americans, abused our immigration system, or endangered national security”.

Most of the visa revocations followed what the department described as “law enforcement encounters”.

It said assault, driving under the influence, theft and drug crimes were the leading causes. Other cases involved reckless driving, sexual assault, child abuse, fraud and embezzlement.

The State Department cited several cases as examples. They included “a foreign national who was charged with felony rape and sexual battery – including of a victim who was mentally disabled” and “a foreign national charged with felony kidnapping, human trafficking, and sexual exploitation of a minor”.

The department also said a person facing more than a dozen counts of possessing child sexual abuse material had their visa revoked.

In another case, a US embassy in North Africa revoked more than 100 visas from “birth tourist” parents who, the department said, had travelled to the US primarily to give birth so their children would receive US citizenship.

The department also said it had revoked the visas of several foreign nationals who “celebrated” the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk. One of those people was described as having said he “died too late”.

The State Department said in January that it had revoked more than 100,000 visas, which was a record at the time.

The latest figures come as the Trump administration continues to tighten immigration and visa policies. The administration has deported large numbers of migrants, including some who held valid visas, while also introducing stricter requirements for those seeking to enter the US.

These measures include tighter social media vetting and expanded screening of visa applicants. Rights advocates and human rights experts have criticised the social media screening, saying it threatens free speech and amounts to surveillance and the singling out of immigrants.

Source : https://www.timesnownews.com/world/us/us-news/trump-state-department-visa-revocations-birth-tourism-charlie-kirk-death-article-155533526

Days after the three countries signed the Mecca Joint Defence Agreement, Pakistan’s military media wing released a seven-minute music video celebrating what it presented as a powerful new alliance.

Pakistan’s latest attempt to put a patriotic spin on its new defence alliance with Saudi Arabia and Turkey has become an unlikely source of online amusement.

Days after the three countries signed the Mecca Joint Defence Agreement, Pakistan’s military media wing released a seven-minute music video celebrating what it presented as a powerful new alliance. Instead of simply underlining military cooperation, however, the cinematic production quickly became the subject of memes, parody videos and criticism across social media.

Titled “ONE SHIELD – Pakistan – Saudi Arabia – Turkiye”, the anthem carries the subtitle “The Great Alliance of Islam” and is also referred to as “We Are All One”. It was released on August 7 by the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), in collaboration with Pakistan Studio HD.

پاکستان نے سعودی عرب اور ترکیہ کے ساتھ مشترکہ دفاعی معاہدے پر دستخط کے بعد ہم سب ایک ہیں کے عنوان سے خصوصی نغمہ جاری کردیا@OfficialDGISPR #News #RadioPakistan https://t.co/JWmxgyyCUS pic.twitter.com/tawv2nyGmM

— ریڈیوپاکستان (@PBCofficialNews) August 9, 2026

Orchestral music is mixed with Arabic percussion and Urdu-Arabic vocals, while the central refrain repeatedly invokes shared religious identity, “One God, One Prophet, One Holy Quran, One Qibla, Three Flags, One Heart.”

Meanwhile, the military hardware of the countries gets plenty of screen time. Pakistani JF-17 Thunder fighter jets, Turkish drones, Saudi fighter aircraft and naval vessels feature prominently in the video.

The political and military leadership of the three countries also appear, including Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Even Pakistan Army chief Field Marshal Asim Munir is heavily featured in the video, reflecting his central role in the new defence arrangement.

Why The Anthem Became A Target

The Mecca Joint Defence Agreement is a serious security arrangement, with a collective defence provision under which an armed attack on one member is to be treated as an attack on all three. Pakistan has presented the clause as a step towards stronger collective deterrence.

Against that backdrop, critics questioned why such a major defence agreement was being promoted through what looked more like a military blockbuster soundtrack than conventional diplomatic messaging.

The response on X, YouTube and Instagram ranged from criticism to outright parody, with users turning clips from the anthem into memes and mocking its grandiose presentation.

You probably won’t believe this 🤣

While Türkiye, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan were signing the agreement, Pakistan’s DG ISPR was apparently busy making a SONG about it. 🎶🫣🤭

Our DG ISPR got writers, singers and a full music department ready to drop a new anthem for every… pic.twitter.com/WuQOTf9Qz5

— برهان الدین ‏| Burhan uddin (@burhan_uddin_0) August 8, 2026

One user wrote, “#DGISPR hai ya nautanki HR department” (Is #DGISPR an HR department or a drama troupe?). Another

The backlash was also tied to Pakistan’s difficult economic circumstances.

The country continues to rely on assistance from the International Monetary Fund and financial backing from friendly nations while grappling with inflation, fiscal strain and energy problems.

That created an awkward contrast for some viewers. A lavish, military-heavy production celebrating Pakistan’s strategic strength on one side and the country’s persistent economic troubles on the other.

A user on X wrote, “Different food, Different homes, Different medical facility, Different standard of living. Same same but different.”

Some social media users accused the campaign of projecting an image of military might that did not match the realities facing ordinary Pakistanis.

Source : https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/3-flags-1-heart-pakistan-anthem-for-saudi-turkey-defence-pact-sparks-ridicule-11891172?pfrom=home-ndtv_topstories

More than 100 people were killed after a powerful earthquake struck western Colombia on Monday, toppling buildings, damaging hospitals and infrastructure and trapping people beneath the rubble in the country’s strongest earthquake this century.
The quake struck just ​days after Abelardo De La Espriella was sworn in as president, thrusting the new administration into its first major crisis, with memories still fresh of devastating twin earthquakes in neighboring Venezuela in June.

“The ‌national government has all of its capabilities deployed to protect lives, assist affected communities and deliver aid wherever it is needed,” he said in a national address around 1 p.m. local time, upon declaring a national state of emergency and giving a death toll of 111. “The first priority is rescuing the people trapped under the rubble.”
De La Espriella visited Quibdo, the capital of coastal Choco province, where he promised rent subsidies for those who have lost homes, and then traveled to Cali, western Colombia’s largest city.
Though he had ​been expected to give an updated national death toll on Monday evening, De La Espriella offered only figures for Valle del Cauca province, where Cali is located, saying 35 people had died there, while ​700 had been injured. Some local media have cited a national total of 132 deaths, though the origin of the figure is unclear.

The U.S. Geological Survey said the ⁠7.4-magnitude quake struck at a depth of 107 km (66 miles). Colombia’s Geological Service said it was the strongest earthquake recorded in the country in the 21st century.

As night fell, rescue workers and volunteers with headlamps hurried to ​find people still trapped under rubble.
Authorities in Cali, Armenia and Manizales announced curfews, with Cali’s mayor saying threats of looting had forced him to deploy police and military personnel to the streets. De La Espriella promised 1,000 additional ​security personnel for the city.
Cali authorities said the Petronio Alvarez festival, an annual celebration of Pacific music which was due to start on Wednesday, has been postponed.
Video broadcast by Caracol Television showed a group of people pulling a small baby covered in dust from under a pile of rubble. Caracol reported the six-month-old girl and her mother were rescued from under a five-story building in Cali.

BUILDINGS CRUMBLE, AIRPORTS CLOSED

In the hard-hit ​city of Pereira, rescue workers told local television they were in contact with a young boy trapped under a bakery, and crane operators were working to remove badly damaged parts of buildings.

A four-story building crumbled in Pereira during ​the quake, according to Reuters-verified video, while footage from Manizales showed one of the side towers of the city’s landmark neo-Gothic cathedral collapsing and scattering debris onto nearby streets.
Reuters video showed rescue workers, police and volunteers shoveling debris by hand and ‌loading rubble into ⁠trucks as they searched for survivors trapped beneath collapsed buildings. Other footage showed damage to residential towers and emergency-service facilities, with debris crashing onto ambulances parked below.
Mauricio Andrade, a firefighter in Cali, said his team had rescued two adult women and two children from a collapsed building. As he spoke to Reuters, his team was preparing to rescue more people from the rubble.
“They are alive,” he said. “We are making space so we can free them and get them out.”
Carmen Yasmin Garcia, 43, a Cali resident and rescue volunteer, said her group had helped seven people out of a fallen building but there were still four people and a dog trapped underneath.
“A moment ago there was scratching ​but now we can’t hear anything, we still have ​faith that the dog is alive and we ⁠can get these people out,” she said. “The more people lending a hand the better.”
Saul Paz, 69, a resident of a Cali residential complex that partially collapsed, told Reuters he had been in the dining room with his son and wife when the shaking began.
“I think if it had lasted five seconds more there would be nothing left,” ​he said. “There are people who went to bed last night with a house and a car and today they won’t have anything.”
Colombia’s civil aviation authority suspended operations ​at several airports in the ⁠region, including Pereira, Manizales, Quibdo, Armenia, Cartago and Buenaventura, while engineers carried out structural inspections.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/world/earthquake-pacific-coast-shakes-colombian-capital-2026-08-10/

 

U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Monday calling for fewer childhood ​vaccinations by limiting the inoculation schedule to 11 immunizations, which he said would give U.S. children “gold-standard” protection and align the country with peer nations that recommend fewer shots.
The ‌order advances a long-standing goal of Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., an anti-vaccine activist who has promoted a link between vaccines and autism that scientists have repeatedly debunked.

“Effective immediately, my administration is recognizing gold-standard childhood vaccine recommendations for only 11 core vaccinations against the most serious and dangerous diseases, along with the MMR, which hopefully will be split up,” Trump said during a White House signing ceremony where he repeatedly cited a growing number of U.S. autism diagnoses.
“There are ​some groups that have virtually no problem with autism,” Trump said. “They’re groups that aren’t big into the world of vaccines, so there is something wrong.”
Physicians roundly rejected the action, saying no ​new science warranted a change, and that the U.S. schedule reflects decades of evidence and the specific health needs of Americans, rejecting the comparison to other ⁠countries. Fewer recommended shots will leave more children exposed to preventable diseases, they said.

The order also recommends splitting the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine into three shots taken at separate visits.
Kennedy in January ​cut the U.S. immunization schedule to remove shots against six out of 17 diseases, a move halted by a federal court ruling. The executive order says it reaffirms Kennedy’s overhaul despite the ongoing litigation.
Existing coverage under ​the Vaccines for Children program relied on by many families will continue, a senior administration official said. The government-funded program provides vaccines for those who may not be able to afford them.
The order directs the Justice Department to challenge state vaccination laws, escalating a federal fight over school immunization requirements set by states. It instructs the attorney general to sue over state laws the administration says conflict with parental authority, religious freedom, disability accommodations and equal protection, including rules ​on religious and medical exemptions from immunization mandates.

HEALTH EXPERTS REJECT CHANGES

Medical associations, public health experts, and vaccine makers also criticized the order.
The main outcome would be “confusion for parents,” said Dr. Aaron Milstone of the ​American Academy of Pediatrics Committee on Infectious Diseases. Conflicting messages, he added, would likely lead parents to delay vaccination.

Merck said there is no published scientific evidence showing any benefit to splitting the MMR shot into three, and that ‌using the individual ⁠components increases injections and can lead to delayed or missed immunizations.
Dr. Elizabeth Mack, a pediatric critical care physician in Charleston, South Carolina, said no licensed single-antigen measles, mumps or rubella vaccines were available in the United States, making the recommendation unfeasible as written.
“We don’t have a system that supports this,” she said, questioning whether extra visits would be required and if they would be reimbursed by insurers.
Mike Ybarra, chief medical officer of pharmaceutical lobby group PhRMA, said the schedule was built on decades of rigorous research and any changes “should be driven by the same high standard of evidence.”
The order was also criticized by Republican Senator ​Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, a physician who chairs ​the Senate health committee and shepherded Trump’s health ⁠agency nominees through, casting the decisive vote to confirm Kennedy.
“I’m a doctor. This executive order is wrong. The president does not have the expertise to make these changes,” Cassidy, who lost his Republican primary to a Trump-endorsed challenger and will leave office in January, said in a statement.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/trump-sign-order-seeking-more-vaccine-flexibility-white-house-says-2026-08-10/

A U.S. judge on Monday ​dismissed criminal charges against Indian billionaire Gautam Adani, but said the Justice Department’s decision to abandon the fraud and bribery case was concerning.
Brooklyn-based U.S. ‌District Judge Nicholas Garaufis’ decision to grant federal prosecutors’ rare bid to toss the case came after he inquired into their reasons for doing so, including whether Adani’s November 2024 promise to invest $10 billion in the United States was a factor in the decision to drop the charges.

The Justice Department’s decision marked the latest instance in which federal prosecutors had sought to drop a high-profile white-collar criminal ​prosecution during Republican President Donald Trump’s second term in the White House.
In dismissing the charges against Adani, Garaufis said he was satisfied that the investment pledge ​did not factor into the Justice Department’s decision, and acknowledged that judges’ role in reviewing federal prosecutors’ decisions to drop charges was ⁠limited.
But he criticized Principal Associate Deputy Attorney General Trent McCotter for collaborating with Adani’s defense lawyers in deciding to dismiss the charges without input from the prosecutors or ​agents who investigated the case.

“The irregularities in the decision to dismiss the indictment are concerning,” Garaufis wrote. “McCotter appears to have eschewed the professional opinions of innumerable officials from various ​federal offices and replaced them with his singular judgment.”
A Justice Department spokesperson pointed to a July 4 filing in which McCotter said he decided to drop the charges after meeting with defense lawyers and other Justice Department lawyers and conducting his own research and analysis.
In a statement posted on X, Gautam Adani said, “I welcome the U.S. Court’s decision with humility and deep respect for the ​judicial process.”
The judge wrote that his dismissal of the case should not be interpreted as his agreement with the Justice Department’s decision to drop the charges or an ​opinion about the merits of the case. He asked the Justice Department to submit more information to help him decide whether to dismiss charges against additional defendants.

JUSTICE DEPARTMENT SAYS CASE IS ‌PRIMARILY FOREIGN

Adani was ⁠charged in 2024 with agreeing to bribe Indian government officials so a subsidiary of his Adani Group could win approval to develop a solar energy plant, then misleading U.S. investors by providing reassuring information about his company’s anti-corruption practices. Adani Group has consistently denied wrongdoing.
Adani himself has not appeared in U.S. court to respond to the charges.
In the July 4 court filing, McCotter said the case was primarily foreign, hard to prove and inconsistent with the agency’s current priorities.
In a separate resolution to civil charges brought ​by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, ​Gautam Adani agreed to pay $6 million and ⁠his nephew, Sagar Adani, agreed to pay $12 million.
Adani Enterprises Limited (ADEL.NS), has separately agreed to pay $275 million to the U.S. Treasury Department to settle alleged violations of Iran sanctions.

Source : https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/us-judge-dismisses-criminal-case-against-indian-billionaire-adani-2026-08-10/

Indian inspectors have seized around 18,000 boxes of Diageo (DGE.L), opens new tab liquor bottles for allegedly lacking markings to show ‌they were made using safe recycled plastic, government sources said, in the latest blow to the world’s largest spirits group.
Diageo India confirmed the regulatory action, saying some of its bottles “have been quarantined by authorities until further direction”. It said they were sourced from a recycler approved by the Food ​Safety and Standards Authority of India and mandatory tests were conducted by the suppliers.

“Our products are completely safe for ​consumption … We are engaging with FSSAI for further direction on this matter,” Diageo India unit United Spirits ⁠told Reuters in a statement.
FSSAI officials visited United Spirits’ (UNSP.NS), factory in Bengaluru last week where they were told that the ​Diageo India unit used recycled plastic bottles. But they found required markings were missing, a government memo said.
“This raised serious food safety, ​misleading and misbranding compliance concerns regarding the safety of finished alcoholic beverages for consumers,” the memo said. The seizure was in the interests of public health, the document added.

The FSSAI did not respond to queries about the seizure of thousands of Diageo bottles, which Reuters is reporting for the ​first time.
The food standards regulator is taking an increasingly hard line against liquor firms, energy drink makers including PepsiCo (PEP.O), and food manufacturers ​over labelling and compliance.

SOME SMIRNOFF, WHISKY BOTTLES CHECKED

During their checks, inspectors found Diageo’s bottles only had markings showing they were made from polyethylene ‌terephthalate (PET), but ⁠should have carried a government-mandated recycled PET symbol that also indicates they are food-grade, a second government memo said.
While most large bottles of Diageo drinks are made of glass, the action focused on plastic bottles used to retail the product in smaller quantities of typically 180 millilitres.
Products worth some $1.6 million as well as plastic material were seized during the inspection in the southern city, which ​impacted more than half a ​dozen brands, including DSP Black ⁠Deluxe Whisky, Smirnoff Zesty Lime Triple Distilled Flavoured Vodka and VAT 69 blended scotch whisky, the memos showed.

Diageo, which has dubbed India its “consumer market of the decade”, has said it complies with the ​law.
Diageo recorded revenue of $3 billion in India in the year to March 2026, making it ​one of the ⁠two dominant foreign players in the market alongside France’s Pernod Ricard (PERP.PA).

Source : https://www.reuters.com/legal/litigation/india-seizes-thousands-diageo-whisky-vodka-bottles-food-safety-crackdown-2026-08-10/

Thousands of Cristiano Ronaldo fans reportedly surrounded a Madeira wedding after mistaking the bride and groom for Ronaldo and Georgina Rodriguez

A wedding in Portugal’s Madeira took an unexpected turn when thousands of Cristiano Ronaldo fans reportedly gathered outside a cathedral, convinced the football superstar was getting married to his longtime partner Georgina Rodriguez.

The bizarre incident unfolded outside Funchal Cathedral, a historic 15th-century church, where Portuguese couple Fabio Ramos and Fatima Nicole Cunha Teixeira were due to get married.
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The couple, who hail from Madeira but currently live in France, found themselves at the centre of a massive crowd after rumours spread that Ronaldo and Georgina were set to tie the knot at that very venue.

Around 2,000 fans reportedly turned up outside the cathedral, many wearing Portugal’s iconic No. 7 jersey associated with Ronaldo. The unexpected gathering created chaos as the couple’s friends and family struggled to make their way into the church for the ceremony.

Fatima was reportedly forced to push through the crowd to reach the venue, with the huge turnout threatening to overshadow what was supposed to be a private and special day for the couple.

One wedding guest described the surreal situation, saying, “This is crazy. Why does everyone think Fabio is Cristiano Ronaldo? The bride has been very upset, worrying that all the commotion will ruin her wedding day.”

The confusion appears to have been fuelled by speculation that Ronaldo and Georgina had chosen Madeira for their wedding. Fans reportedly believed the couple could have booked the cathedral under a different name, further adding to the confusion.

However, the priest at Funchal Cathedral, Marcos Goncalves, clarified that there was no secret Ronaldo wedding taking place. He confirmed that the ceremony scheduled for the day was the one involving Fabio and Fatima.

The footballer himself later reacted to a viral social media post about the mix-up, responding with laughing emojis. His reaction quickly added another layer to the already amusing episode and drew attention to the incident online.

Source : https://www.news18.com/viral/cristiano-ronaldos-reaction-goes-viral-after-2000-fans-gatecrash-wrong-couples-wedding-in-portugal-ws-l-10262747.html

Iran has issued demands regarding the Strait of Hormuz’s reopening while stating it won’t directly negotiate with the US

A vessel has been reported on fire off Oman’s Musandam Peninsula near the Strait of Hormuz amid reports that it was struck by an Iranian cruise missile, according to Iran’s Mehr News Agency. Footage circulating online appears to show a vessel burning in the waters off Oman. However, the identity and flag of the vessel and whether anyone was injured remain unknown.

Iranian state news agency Mehr reported that “some sources have reported a fire on a vessel on the Musandam Peninsula [off the coast of Oman] near the Strait of Hormuz”.

Other Iranian state media outlets have also reported the incident. There has been no official confirmation from Iran that it launched an attack on the vessel. Open-source researcher and regional observers said vessels using the Omani route had faced near-daily attacks for 10 days without a US military response.

Another researcher highlighted the timing of the reported incident, which came about 30 minutes before oil trading was due to open, writing: “I see Iran has learned the game.”

Source : https://www.timesnownews.com/world/middle-east/us-iran-war-latest-updates-strait-of-hormuz-attack-oman-musandam-coast-irgc-oil-tanker-article-155448833

Trump’s statement signalled the US’ decision to refrain from more military strikes while Iran poses tough conditions to open the strait.

US President Donald Trump on Sunday said Iran’s economy was in a “very bad shape” and his administration was just going to watch the economic pressure mount amid ongoing talks to open up the Strait of Hormuz.

Trump’s statement signalled the US’ decision to refrain from more military strikes while Iran poses tough conditions to open the strait. “We are low-keying it. We are only semi-negotiating with them. We are just watching Iran with its huge inflation and the fact they have no money,” news outlet Axios quoted him as saying.

It will work out. Like a chess game: Trump

Trump, who was making threats only a week ago, displayed unusual composure as he said, “It will work out. It always works out. It’s like a chess game.”

The US president observed that America’s naval blockade has worsened the Iranian regime’s economic crisis. Tehran has demanded that the US first end its blockade of Iranian ports and lift oil sanctions.

According to the report, Trump did not show any signs of exasperation as Iran’s latest demands lead to further delay in the opening of the key waterway. The Strait of Hormuz, through which one-fifth of the world’s oil and natural gas pass, has been shut since US and Israel launched a war on Iran on February 28.

Trump indicated that adopting this wait-and-watch policy was made easier as oil prices were falling and the American consumers were feeling “less pain from the war”.

Source : https://www.hindustantimes.com/world-news/us-low-keying-talks-with-iran-trump-tehran-conditions-hormuz-deal-chess-game-west-asia-war-101786323870254.html

The Strait of Hormuz is, by some accounts, named for a Zoroastrian deity destined to emerge victorious after a 9,000-year standoff with an adversary.

Iran’s leaders feel their own victory is at hand and won’t require the same epic patience.

They are betting that military pressure will ultimately force the United States to accept their control over the crucial waterway for global energy — and that time is on their side.

They know about the diminishing stockpiles of key U.S. weapons such as advanced missile interceptors. They know the war is deeply unpopular with Americans. They know that as long as the strait is largely closed, the price of gas and other goods will stay high ahead of U.S. congressional elections in November. They know that trying to open it by force would be costly and may require American ground troops. They know their Houthi allies in Yemen could widen the war and disrupt another major trade route.

By that logic, U.S. President Donald Trump has no choice but to capitulate.

But Iran’s strategy carries risks.

Trump points to strikes that have decimated Iran’s top leadership, navy and air force. He alternates between threatening escalation and saying talks are going well. Iran’s own economy has been battered, in part because of a U.S. blockade. Iranians rose up in mass protests just months ago and could do so again.

And Iran’s leaders need only look to how Trump’s “short-term excursion” to the Middle East has bogged down to be reminded that wars rarely turn out as expected.

An evolving deal could give Iran a major win

Iran says it is close to reaching a deal with Oman to manage the strait, which runs between the countries. But on Saturday, Tehran said the strait will not open until the U.S. “corrects its behavior,” saying it must permanently end the war, lift its naval blockade of Iranian ports and withdraw its military from the area. It also must “completely compensate” Iran for war damage, lift sanctions and “unconditionally” release frozen assets.

Source : https://apnews.com/article/iran-us-war-strait-hormuz-goals-diplomacy-77d91b276db6d749711619b0aa1c5c3f

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy denounced Russia’s latest deadly attacks on Kyiv on Saturday as he visited Serbia, one of the few European countries that has maintained friendly relations with Moscow throughout its invasion of Ukraine.

Four people, including a child, were killed in the overnight strikes on Kyiv and the surrounding region. Ukrainian forces hit Russian oil facilities.

Zelenskyy arrived in Belgrade on Friday for his first official visit to Serbia.

Speaking at a news conference in Belgrade with Zelenskyy, Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic described Ukraine as a “friendly nation” and said he was honored to welcome the Ukrainian leader — the first visit by a Ukrainian president in eight years.

The two leaders discussed their countries’ efforts toward joining the European Union, bilateral ties and ways to expand cooperation.

Kyiv’s residents face regular drone and missile barrages that Ukraine’s depleted air defenses are struggling to counter amid Moscow’s 4-year-old full-scale invasion, while repeated Ukrainian strikes on oil facilities have caused fuel shortages and rattled Russians.

Paperwork holds up missile production licenses

Vucic, who has maintained close ties with Moscow and refused to sanction Russia over the invasion — drawing pressure from the EU to change course — reiterated that Serbia respects Ukraine’s territorial integrity and said that position would not change.

“The situation in Ukraine is difficult,” Zelenskyy said at the press conference. “There was another missile strike last night — ballistic missiles targeting our infrastructure. There were also attack drones.”

Source : https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-war-missiles-patriot-zelenskyy-492d334e26b5485dbf74d7ae9c9d33ce

The “most valuable pistol on Earth” — a reputed $42 million Luger that belonged to Adolf Hitler — is at the center of a sensational court battle involving an appliance repair man and a cop in Argentina.

The weapon — described as the “Holy Grail of firearms’’ — was allegedly swiped during a SWAT-style raid by masked officers at repair man Juan Pablo Ruppel’s home in rural Buenos Aires province in 2016.

“It’s a one of a kind piece, and there is no question that it is the most valuable semiautomatic handgun in the world,’’ the 48-year-old dad of four told The Post in his first interview since a recent court ruling in the case.

Ruppel — who inherited the haunting historic “ghost of the Third Reich’’ from his German great-uncle and former Hitler bodyguard, Hans Ruppel — had been accused of stealing minor items such as plates, glasses and cutlery at the time of the raid, his suit says.

He was never charged over the allegations — but that didn’t stop a crooked cop from swiping the alleged legendary Luger from his home, according to the lawsuit.

The make of the gun, a Luger Parabellum .45 calibre No.5, is one of only five 1907 prototypes forged by the late famed Georg Luger — and already so legendary that it was mentioned by Michael Douglas’ character Gordon Gekko in the hit 1987 flick “Wall Street” as “the rarest pistol in the world.’’

But it’s the Hitler provenance that makes it an invaluable — even if chilling — piece of history, experts said.

“To understand the stakes here, you have to understand that this isn’t just a beautiful firearm; it is a ghost of the Third Reich, the most valuable pistol on Earth,” said British investigative journalist Laurence de Mello who is leading the family’s independent investigation into the missing gun as they continue to search for it.

The gun’s 1979 firearms owner license listed in Argentina’s national registry has a Buenos Aires address — where heinous Nazi “Angel of Death’’ Josef Mengele lived for more than two years before fleeing the Argentine capital.

The Luger No. 5 also is described in an Interpol notice as having the inscription “Adolf Hitler” on it.

Source : https://nypost.com/2026/08/09/world-news/adolf-hitlers-42m-luger-the-most-valuable-pistol-on-earth-at-center-of-sensational-court-battle