TODAY

A mother who killed her baby daughter by burning her with a hairdryer has been jailed for six years.

Courtney Gartshore, 28, used the appliance to subject three-month-old Dahlia-Rose to “significant and sustained heat” on her head and body.

Emergency services were called to the scene at a property in Peterhead, Aberdeenshire, in September 2023, but the child had died.

Gartshore was convicted of culpable homicide – the closest equivalent to manslaughter in Scots Law – following a trial at the High Court in Aberdeen in July.

Sentencing Gartshore at the High Court in Edinburgh, judge Simon Collins KC described the case as “uniquely disturbing and distressing”.

He said it was “tragic as well as terrible”.

Gartshore appeared via videolink at the 25-minute hearing, during which she sobbed and wiped away tears.

The judge said Gartshore would have to live for the rest of her life knowing she was responsible for her daughter’s death.

“This was a gross breach of the most basic duty as a parent,” he added.

Judge Collins said her likely cause of death was hyperthermia and heat stroke.

Oceania have offered support to Gianni Infantino, but New Zealand have gone against their own confederation in FIFA row.

New Zealand has become the latest nation to withdraw its support for FIFA President Gianni Infantino’s re-election bid over his aborted commercial rights stake sale plan, while Oceania’s confederation cautiously backed the ⁠governing body’s leadership.

Infantino has faced open revolt after three confederations – Europe’s UEFA, the Asian Football Confederation and CONCACAF (North and Central America and Caribbean) – called for a review of his leadership and attacked his conduct over the plan to bring private investment into FIFA competitions.

Infantino will seek re-election for a fourth term in ⁠charge of the global governing body at the FIFA Congress next year, with the African and South American confederations declaring their continued support.

New Zealand, the only Oceania Football Confederation (OFC) nation to qualify for this year’s World Cup, said on Friday it had withdrawn support for Infantino and that the review of the stake sale proposal should be independent due to a loss of confidence and trust in FIFA’s leadership.

“We’ve called for an independent review specifically because what we don’t ‌want to see is a sort of in-house quick washover of this,” New Zealand Football (NZF) Chief Executive Andrew Pragnell told the Reuters news agency.

“An independent review is something else that has been called for by other confederations that will help restore some of the trust.”

The OFC said in a statement that it welcomed FIFA’s decision to withdraw the proposal and that football in the Oceania region had grown under the current FIFA leadership.

“OFC recognises the progress achieved over the last decade in advancing football development in Oceania under FIFA’s leadership and encourages FIFA to use the review as an opportunity to identify and implement any changes that may be necessary,” it added.

What allies does Infantino have?

Swiss Infantino had proposed carving off ⁠the commercial rights to the World Cup and selling 20 percent to private investors to raise about $4.2bn before ⁠a U-turn following the furore.

The proposal came with a $20m grant for member associations for the next funding cycle, an amount that could have been doubled if they signed the deal.

Following a crisis meeting in Morocco last week, FIFA apologised to its 211 member associations for mistakes in the handling of the proposal and said its leadership had ⁠full support for Infantino.

Despite the opposition of the three confederations, which represent 136 of the 211 member associations who will vote in the FIFA presidential election in March, Infantino still has plenty of allies in the game.

Six ⁠heads of Arab national football associations, including Qatar and 2030 World Cup cohost Morocco, firmly ⁠backed him on Thursday, saying they appreciated his “sustained efforts to advance football globally”.

The Confederation of African Football’s executive committee also unanimously confirmed its support for Infantino, though, there is no guarantee of a bloc vote from all 54 members.

Pragnell said an independent review into the scrapped FIFA Forward Enterprise proposal needed to shed light on decision-making and oversight at FIFA.

It should ‌also identify who was involved in the plan for Thrive Capital, a firm with close familial links to US President Donald Trump, to play a leading role in the venture.

“I think the scope needs to be considered really carefully, but what’s most important is that all confederations should agree ‌on ‌the scope, and it needs to get under way with urgency,” Pragnell told Reuters.

AFC member Australia has also called for an independent review alongside the Asian bloc, without publicly expressing a position on Infantino’s leadership.

“Based on what we’ve seen, including [Australia’s] commitment to the AFC statement, we’re strongly aligned,” Pragnell said.

With one-way attack drones playing an ever larger role in American military operations, U.S. Central Command announced it is creating what it calls “the first multinational attack drone task force.” The move comes as combat between the U.S. and Iran has paused, but tensions in the region remain high, including ongoing attacks on shipping by the Iranian-aligned Houthi rebels of Yemen. The task force is also being launched amid growing concerns about the U.S. magazine depth of high-end standoff weapons — a class of weapon one-way-attack drones aim to take pressure off of.

Dubbed Task Force Falcon Strike (TFFS), the command said it will “employ one-way attack drones consisting of unmanned systems from above, on, and below the sea operated by military support staff from the United States and regional partners.”

The CENTCOM announcement offered no further information about which nations will participate, what systems will be used, and whether those joining Task Force Falcon Strike will bring their own equipment. The command declined to provide further details when we asked.

The war against Iran saw the command follow global trends in warfare by deploying air and sea drones in combat for the first time. Other militaries in the Middle East have or are working on acquiring similar capabilities. Israel largely wrote the book on one-way attack munitions, for instance.

The establishment of TFFS follows the creation in December of Task Force Scorpion Strike (TFSS). As we were one of the first to report, this was the U.S. military’s first dedicated one-way attack drone squadron and the first operational unit armed with Low-Cost Uncrewed Combat Attack System (LUCAS) kamikaze drones, a design reverse-engineered from the Iranian-designed Shahed-136, in the Middle East.

Initially, TFSS was created to send a warning to Iran, a U.S. official told us at the time. As we noted earlier in this story, after the launch of Epic Fury on Feb. 28, TFSS marked several operational firsts for America’s use of drones in war.

The first major milestone came on the opening day of the war, when LUCAS drones were used for the first time. The second came in June, when a Saronic Corsair uncrewed surface vessel (USV) rescued the crew of a U.S. Army AH-64 Apache that crashed in the Gulf of Oman after it was downed by Iran. That was the first known instance of a drone boat being used to recover personnel as part of a search and rescue mission.

The third large step forward for U.S. drone warfare came in July, when three Corsairs “hit the port at Bandar Abbas Naval Base” and “successfully struck a submarine and ship maintenance facility in Iran,” the command stated on X that day. It was the first U.S. use of a USV as an attack weapon.

You can see those attacks in the following video produced by CENTCOM.

As we have frequently reported, Ukraine has used USVs to devastating effect on the Russian Black Sea Fleet. The Magura line of drones, among others, has played a key role in this campaign.

Notably, the command also said the new task force will also use uncrewed underwater vehicles (UUVs) as attack weapons. If they have been used in combat by the U.S., that has not been publicly acknowledged. The command did announce in April that it was using UUVs to assist in demining the Strait of Hormuz.

In December, Ukraine’s state security service (SBU) said it carried out the first-ever UUV attack on a Russian vessel. The strike was on a Project 636 Varshavyanka class, or Improved Kilo class diesel-electric submarine, in the Black Sea naval stronghold of Novorossiysk.

That attack can be seen in the video below.

North Korea has intensified its criticism of Japan’s military expansion and its growing security cooperation with the United States and South Korea, portraying the developments as a threat to regional stability.

More than a dozen North Korean state media attacks since early July have focused on Japan’s defence buildup, including its acquisition of long range weapons, rising military spending and closer security ties with Washington and Seoul.

The campaign has also coincided with unusual silence from Pyongyang over its own recent missile launches, raising questions about what North Korea is trying to achieve with its latest messaging.

Why Is North Korea Targeting Japan?

North Korean statements have focused heavily on Japan’s acquisition of counter strike capabilities, its testing of U.S. made Tomahawk cruise missiles, increased defence spending and its annual defence white paper.

Kim Yo Jong, the influential sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, warned last week of “additional military options” in response to what she described as Japan’s transformation into a military power.

North Korea’s KCNA later described Japan’s 2026 defence white paper as a document aimed at justifying military expansion and preparing for what it called a “re invasion.”

Pyongyang has also criticised the annual U.S. South Korean Ulchi Freedom Shield military exercises, accusing Washington, Seoul and Tokyo of developing what it called a “nuclear alliance.”

The United States and South Korea maintain that the exercises are defensive.

How Has Japan Changed Its Defence Policy?

Japan announced in 2022 that it planned to double defence spending to 2% of gross domestic product in response to growing security concerns involving China, Russia and North Korea.

A major part of that expansion has involved acquiring long range missile capabilities, including U.S. made Tomahawk cruise missiles capable of striking targets more than 1,000 km away.

Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s government is expected to revise Japan’s national security strategy this year, potentially leading to further increases in defence spending and investment in drones and domestic weapons production.

For Pyongyang, these developments represent a significant change in Japan’s traditional defence posture and provide another basis for portraying the regional security environment as increasingly hostile.

Is North Korea’s Campaign Really About Japan?

Analysts say Japan is only one part of a broader strategic message.

Park Won-gon of Ewha Womans University said North Korea is attempting to frame Northeast Asia as a confrontation between two opposing camps.

The objective, he said, is to create a U.S. South Korea Japan versus North Korea China Russia framework.

Such a narrative could serve several purposes for Pyongyang. It can strengthen North Korea’s argument that its nuclear weapons are necessary for self defence, while also encouraging closer political and military support from China and Russia.

South Korea’s Unification Ministry has expressed a similar assessment, saying North Korea appears to view Japan’s changing security posture, South Korea’s plans for nuclear powered submarines and trilateral military cooperation as part of a broader shift in the regional balance of power.

Why Is North Korea Silent About Its Missile Tests?

One of the more unusual aspects of the latest campaign is that North Korean state media has remained silent about recent missile launches.

North Korea conducted ballistic missile tests last week and again this week, but state media has not reported them, despite the launches being condemned by South Korea, Japan and the United States.

That differs from Pyongyang’s usual practice of publicising missile tests shortly after they take place.

Analysts believe the launches may have involved improvements to existing missile systems rather than entirely new weapons, making them less valuable as domestic propaganda.

Shin Jong-woo of the Korea Defense and Security Forum suggested that some tests could involve upgraded short range ballistic missiles developed with Russian technical assistance and potentially intended for Russia.

Another possibility is that North Korea does not want to publicise launches that could be connected to prospective military exports.

What Role Does Russia Play?

North Korea’s expanding military relationship with Russia is increasingly important to understanding its weapons development.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has repeatedly accused Russia of using North Korean missiles in Ukraine and Pyongyang of supplying Moscow with missiles, ammunition and troops.

Analysts say cooperation with Russia may also be helping North Korea improve the performance and accuracy of its missile systems through battlefield experience and technical assistance.

Recent launches could therefore represent tests of upgraded variants before they are deployed by North Korea or potentially supplied to Russia.

Analysis: What Is Pyongyang Trying to Achieve?

North Korea’s intensified criticism of Japan appears to be part of a broader attempt to reshape the strategic narrative around the Korean Peninsula.

By portraying the United States, South Korea and Japan as an increasingly integrated military and nuclear bloc, Pyongyang can present its own weapons development as a defensive response rather than an independent escalation.

The strategy also fits North Korea’s growing alignment with China and Russia. As security cooperation between Washington, Seoul and Tokyo deepens, Pyongyang has an incentive to emphasise the emergence of rival blocs and strengthen its position within the opposing camp.

Japan’s military expansion therefore provides North Korea with a useful political target. The immediate issue may be Japanese defence policy, but the larger objective is regional positioning.

If Japan continues expanding its military capabilities while U.S. South Korean and Japanese security cooperation deepens, Pyongyang is likely to use those developments to justify further weapons development and closer cooperation with Beijing and Moscow. The result could be a reinforcing cycle in which each side’s security measures become evidence for the other side that greater military preparedness is necessary.

With information from Reuters.

Pyongyang has accused the US of pushing the world ‘to the brink of nuclear war’.

North Korea has denounced major United States-South Korea military drills set to start next week as a provocation that heightens tensions on the Korean Peninsula.

The US-Japan-South Korea military cooperation is turning into a nuclear alliance, and North Korea will respond to a new level of threat with a new level of deterrent, a spokesperson for North Korea’s Foreign Ministry said on Friday, according to Pyongyang’s Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).

Pyongyang routinely denounces military drills in the south as a provocation that heightens tensions.

The drills – named “Ulchi Freedom Shield” – are due to start on August 17 and will last until August 27. They will incorporate exercises to counter drones, GPS disruption, and cyberattacks as the US and its allies adapt to North Korea’s evolving capabilities.

“The US announced that the forthcoming exercises are quite different from the ones of the past five years and intended to master the ability of fighting a war on the basis of the new aspects of modern warfare,” the North Korean Foreign Ministry spokesperson said in the statement.

“It is our consistent principle of ensuring security to respond to a new level of a threat with a new level of a deterrent,” the statement, published by KCNA, added.

Lessons learned in Russia-Ukraine

North Korea sent an estimated 12,000-15,000 soldiers to fight for Russia in its war against Ukraine, and the country is now thought to be preparing the deployment of another 10,000.

Thousands died, but the deal provided North Korea with valuable battlefield experience, as well as payment in arms, energy and direct financial support, according to reports.

Colonel Ryan Donald, spokesperson for the US and South Korean Combined Forces Command, said this week that North Korea’s deployment to the European war had changed the threat his soldiers may face on the Korean Peninsula.

“They’ve taken those lessons they learned there and brought them back to North Korea,” he told reporters. “Our training accounts for that threat.”

Pyongyang’s Foreign Ministry statement said the US-South Korea drills are being staged “at a time when military and political situation is becoming more serious with each passing day in Europe, the Middle East and other parts of the world”.

North Korea also said on Friday that it would further strengthen its nuclear deterrence, accusing the US of lowering its threshold for nuclear weapons usage and pushing the world “to the brink of nuclear war”.

On Wednesday, North Korea fired a ballistic missile towards the sea off the Korean Peninsula’s east coast, just six days after firing another missile.

The Ulchi Freedom Shield drills will include 18,000 South Korean soldiers and counterparts from the 28,500-strong US contingent in the country.

The White House said in a report on Thursday that more than 40 countries have helped China sidestep US tariffs by routing exports through nations that face lower American import duties.

The countries named include Canada, India, Mexico, Japan and South Korea, which the White House said had helped China evade tens of billions of dollars in tariffs.

White House trade adviser Peter Navarro said it had cost “American jobs and billions in revenue”.

A spokesperson for the Chinese embassy in Washington said in response to BBC queries that “trade wars have no winners” and that it opposes the US’ tariff measures and the use of state power to target China’s companies.

The spokesperson added that “any unilateral actions or agreements concerning transshipped goods must not target or harm the interests of third parties.”

The BBC has contacted the US embassies of Canada, India, Mexico, Japan, South Korea and other trading partners listed in the report for comment.

The report follows a wave of sanctions between the US and China and comes weeks before President Donald Trump will meet Chinese leader Xi Jinping in Washington.

According to government and private sector estimates quoted by the White House, between $30bn (£22.2bn) and roughly $300bn in goods have been moved from countries with higher tariff through those with lower rates.

The process is known as transshipping, which refers to the practice of transferring cargo through another country while en route to a final destination.

The US accused China of “taking advantage” of the practice by moving goods through nations that have lower duties.

China has used third countries as a stopover and has repackaged goods to hide their real origin to obtain lower tariffs, said the White House in its report, describing the process as “fraud cloaked in paperwork”.

“What has changed in today’s Great Transshipment Scam is not merely the speed and scale of this modern form of smuggling, but the breadth, depth, and sophistication of the global Shadow Transshipment Network through which China’s tariff evasion now moves,” the White House wrote.

The US has deployed artificial intelligence (AI) tools to catch transshipment efforts, it added.

The report is expected to add to key sticking points between the sides as Trump and Xi prepare to meet in the US in September.

Despite a pause in most tariffs following talks in May 2025, Washington and Beijing have continued to exchange sanctions, including restrictions on humanoid robots shipped to the US and tighter Chinese curbs on drone exports.

In April 2025, Trump unveiled sweeping levies on dozens of US trading partners based on a long-held belief that tariffs will help boost American jobs and the economy.

Those sanctions have since been struck down by the US Supreme Court, but Trump has repeatedly introduced new tariffs using alternative legal levers to continue his signature policy.

The United Nations human rights agency and the Palestinian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates have condemned a days-long Israeli settler siege of Palestinian homes in the occupied West Bank village of Qusra.

The two statements were issued on Thursday, as dozens of Israeli settlers continue to besiege three Palestinian families in the Ras al-Ain area in western Qusra for a fifth night.

“These criminal actions by the settlers, supported or acquiesced to by Israel, the Occupying Power, are making life unbearable for these Palestinian families and are clearly aimed at forcing them to leave their homes and their land,” the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights said.

The three families – comprising 15 people, including two children – have been confined to their homes with their water and power cut off since Sunday, the agency said.

“Time is running out for these three families before they are forcibly displaced,” it warned.

Meanwhile, the Palestinian Foreign Ministry issued a statement condemning the settlers for carrying out “systematic assaults that can only be described as terroristic”.

It also accused Israel of using the settlers as an “unchecked tool to implement its criminal policies” of forced displacement and annexation of the occupied West Bank.

Earlier on Thursday, US ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee also referred to the settlers’ actions as acts of “terror”.

‘This is all a charade’

Al Jazeera’s Nida Ibrahim, reporting from the scene of the siege on Thursday, said Israeli soldiers initially tried to move the trapped families out of their homes while settlers remained camped outside.

The families refused, not trusting that the Israeli soldiers would allow them back into their homes, and were eventually grouped together in one home. Residents have watched settlers push families out and then take over their properties in the past, she reported.

Qusra has faced settler attacks for decades, Ibrahim explained, and residents tie the rise in violence to the spread of illegal settlements and the lack of accountability for attackers.

On Thursday, the Israeli military said its troops dismantled “two illegal outposts” in Qusra and a nearby village, and detained one Israeli. It said more soldiers were sent to “carry out defensive missions and patrols”.

However, Ibrahim said most Palestinians believe the Israeli army is staging its response to the settler siege for the cameras, and they expect the settlers will eventually return.

Abdel Azim Wadi, the mayor of Qusra, told Al Jazeera that the Israeli army has been protecting and helping the settlers. “We saw them praying together, barbecuing together and dancing together,” he said. “They are not very interested in helping the besieged families.”

Qusra resident Abdul Kareem Hassan told Al Jazeera that he had been sleeping in his car for seven months in order to protect his home.

“This is all a charade,” he said. “If they [the Israeli army] were serious, the whole operation would not take them one hour. We’re talking about 20 settlers. If they would treat them the same way they treat Palestinians, they could finish in less than an hour.”

Another day without respite

Elsewhere in the occupied West Bank on Thursday, Israeli settlers and soldiers continued their elevated campaign of violence against Palestinians, the Palestinian news agency Wafa reported.

Israeli forces issued demolition notices for homes in Kafr Sur, the Jalazone camp and farmers’ shelters in al-Jiftlik.

In Qalqilya, soldiers detained seven relatives of a Palestinian fighter killed in a 2024 strike. Soldiers also detained three Palestinians amid a settler incursion in Burqa, east of Ramallah.

Settler attacks took place across several towns and villages, including an incident in which three Palestinians, including a child, were pepper-sprayed in their car.

Settlers also re-established a settlement near Jenin and erected a new outpost on land belonging to a town near Tulkarem.

A striking photo of homes ablaze under the headline “Houses burn and train derails on hottest day” dominates the front of the Times. Perhaps unusually, it is a headline that encompasses three separate stories from Thursday – the fires that raged across the West Midlands, the rail accident near Lewes that left two people seriously injured, and the ongoing heatwave that saw the UK record its hottest day of 2026.

The Royal Australian Air Force’s (RAAF) recently delivered and extremely capable MC-55A Peregrine airborne intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance, and electronic warfare (AISREW) aircraft has begun its first overseas deployment. Publicly available flight tracking data shows that the aircraft has been operating out of Clark Air Base in the Philippines, from where it has ventured out into the highly strategic and tense South China Sea on several occasions.

Flight tracking data from Flightradar24 indicates that MC-55 serial A51-004 flew from its home base at RAAF Base Edinburgh in South Australia to Clark, close to the Philippine capital Manila, on July 28. Data compiled by Australian Defense Magazine reveals seven missions flown out of Clark between July 30 and August 7.

With missions typically lasting between four and nine hours, the MC-55 primarily flew in or close to Philippine airspace near Mindoro and Palawan islands. However, on four occasions, according to available data, it flew further west into the South China Sea. For those parts of the mission, its transponder was switched off for periods of between three and four hours.

The Australian Defense Forces (ADF) told Australian Defense Magazine that the deployment is part of its longstanding engagements in the Indo-Pacific region but provided no further operational details.

Based on the length of time that the MC-55 ‘went dark’ on flight tracking aggregators, its areas of interest could have included various disputed reefs and other features in the South China Sea, including the Spratly Islands and Scarborough Shoal.

China, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan, and Vietnam all claim the Spratly Islands, which are largely uninhabited but may have significant reserves of natural resources around them. The Spratly Islands are home to a significant Chinese military presence, most notably in the form of artificial islands featuring long runways and aircraft hangars, among other infrastructure. They are also heavily defended with missiles, radar stations, and more.

Both China and the Philippines also lay claim to the Scarborough Shoal (known as Huangyan Island in China), which is little more than 100 miles from the Philippines and 500 miles from China.

Overall, China’s sovereignty claims over the South China Sea, including islands, other features and adjacent waters, are the most sweeping and have led to high tensions with competing claimants.

China routinely backs up its expansive claims with naval patrols, in the air and at sea.

Meanwhile, the United States says it does not take sides in these disputes but sends warships and military aircraft close to the disputed islands as part of its ‘freedom of navigation’ operations.

The same kinds of operations are also conducted by the ADF, with the RAAF responsible for missions into the South China Sea. These have previously been flown from Clark Air Base, as well as from Butterworth in Malaysia and out of Singapore. The RAAF uses the P-8A Poseidon maritime patrol aircraft for these missions, and previously also the AP-3C (EW) Orion.

The specially equipped AP-3C (EW), the secretive electronic warfare version of the RAAF Orion, was formerly flown by No. 10 Squadron, which is now responsible for the MC-55 fleet at RAAF Edinburgh.

Since we reported on the arrival of the first MC-55 at Edinburgh in January of this year, a second and third aircraft have been delivered to Australia, arriving at the same base in March and in June. The fourth aircraft is still to be delivered.

As we have described in depth previously, the MC-55 — based on a highly modified version of the Gulfstream G550 business jet — is equipped with a variety of sensors to combine electronic warfare (EW), signals intelligence (SIGINT), and intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) missions in a single airframe. These capabilities would be in extreme need during any kind of crisis in the Indo-Pacific region.

The aircraft can also serve as a networking relay and data-fusion platform, linking together other aircraft as well as surface combatants and ground forces. TWZ has previously confirmed that the MC-55 incorporates technology ported directly over from the RC-135 Rivet Joint, as you can read about here. In the past, we have also speculated that the jet is likely outfitted with active electronically scanned arrays (AESA), which would be used for standoff electronic attacks, as well as intelligence-gathering. 

In the context of missions in the South China Sea, the MC-55 is a highly capable passive intelligence-collection platform, bringing a major boost to the ADF as it seeks to keep tabs on the growing Chinese military threat in the Indo-Pacific region.

The aircraft’s ISR capabilities mean it will be well-suited to surveilling Chinese military expansion and monitoring Beijing’s activities, which have already seen a number of incidents involving the ADF and Chinese military assets. As well as operating from the Philippines, and potentially from Malaysia and Singapore, the RAAF plans to deploy the MC-55 to the Cocos Islands, deep in the Indian Ocean, approximately midway between Australia and Sri Lanka.

With the first appearance of the MC-55 at Clark Air Base, Australia appears to be moving from relying primarily on the P-8A for South China Sea maritime surveillance toward having a dedicated, highly specialised airborne SIGINT/EW capability operating alongside it. This will give the ADF and its partners a much better picture of Chinese radar, communications, air defense and naval activity.

The first overseas deployment of the MC-55 — among the most advanced surveillance and electronic attack platforms in the world — marks a significant expansion of Australia’s ability to monitor and understand Chinese military activity in the South China Sea, strengthening the ADF’s intelligence and electronic warfare reach across the Indo-Pacific.

Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com

The ability to counter individual drones and complex swarms is becoming increasingly critical on the battlefield of today and will be even more so on those of the future. In response to such threats, Lockheed Martin recently unveiled the MORFIUS X-Rotor. TWZ’s Jamie Hunter spoke with Jason Reynolds, Lockheed Martin’s Vice President of Integrated Air & Missile Defense, at the Space and Missile Defense Symposium in Huntsville, Alabama, about MORFIUS in detail.

This counter-UAS system features a High Power Microwave (HPM) payload that can reportedly neutralize more than 50 adversary drones during a single sortie. The cross-wing configuration allows MORFIUS to take off and land vertically, and it is designed specifically for field recovery and rapid reuse. After launch, the drone uses proprietary algorithms to hunt and kill enemy drones using an active radio-frequency seeker onboard. The big advantage is that MORFIUS X-Rotor can kill a lot of drones and be reused to kill more over and over. Many interceptor drones in use today are self sacrificing in order to do their job.

Lockheed Martin says it has completed live-fire testing and is accelerating production to meet demand.

“Counter-UAS is a hot topic around the world. We took MORFIUS to the Farnborough Airshow; every single person was interested in understanding the technology, the availability, the production rates. This system is going to be proliferated because we need to basically protect against drones that are single or swarming and protect our critical assets, critical sites, and defend what matters most,” Reynolds told us.

Watch the video below and subscribe to our channel on YouTube here.

Meet MORFIUS: The Drone Designed To Zap Other Drones

What Five Years of Directives Add Up To

On August 10, 2026, Reporters Without Borders marked five years of Taliban rule with an assessment that Afghanistan has become, in the organization’s words, a prison for information. The report catalogs more than twenty national directives and a long list of provincial decrees, most delivered verbally rather than published, that have progressively stripped Afghan journalism of independence. The starkest new detail is legal rather than administrative. A Code of Criminal Procedure quietly enacted in January 2026 now punishes insulting the country’s supreme leader with thirty nine lashes and a year in prison, and insulting the wider leadership with twenty lashes and six months. Afghanistan sits at one hundred seventy fifth of one hundred eighty countries in RSF’s 2026 World Press Freedom Index, alongside North Korea, Eritrea and China, as global press freedom overall falls to its lowest point in twenty five years.

From Verbal Orders to Written Law

The Taliban’s approach to media control has moved through recognizable phases since retaking Kabul in August 2021. Eleven rules issued that September gave authorities broad power over what could be published. Restrictions escalated from there: a November 2021 ban on interviewing regime critics, a March 2022 prohibition on rebroadcasting Voice of America and Radio Free Europe, and a July 2022 declaration by supreme leader Haibatullah Akhundzada that criticizing officials contradicts Islamic law, which recast basic accountability as religious transgression. Afghanistan’s 2015 Press Law, the last formal legal protection for journalists, was repealed in April 2024. What followed was an acceleration rather than a pause. September 2024 rules banned live political programming and limited on air guests to Taliban approved voices. A July 2024 law prohibiting broadcast images of living beings has since spread to more than twenty provinces. Women have been pushed out of the profession in stages, from mandatory face covering for television presenters in 2021 to a March 2025 Kandahar order banning women’s voices from radio entirely.

The Shift From Deniable Pressure to Permanent Law

What separates the January 2026 Code of Criminal Procedure from everything that preceded it is durability. Verbal orders and provincial decrees can be denied, reversed or applied unevenly, and much of what RSF documents over the past five years was communicated exactly that way, through unpublished instructions passed down from de facto ministries rather than through any formal legislative process. A criminal code cannot be waved away the same way. The document only became public because it was leaked; the Taliban never announced it. RSF notes the code does not mention journalists specifically, but it offers them no exemption either, meaning ordinary reporting on Taliban governance now falls under the same provisions that criminalize insulting the leadership. A separate article requires citizens to report any contact with government opponents, extending the incentive to inform beyond state security services into the population at large. Legal researchers reviewing the code have also flagged provisions dividing defendants into social categories, with punishment calibrated to status rather than offense, a structure that undercuts equal treatment under law well beyond the press freedom question alone.

The scale of the resulting collapse is difficult to overstate. RSF’s country data shows forty three percent of Afghan outlets disappeared within three months of the takeover, more than two thirds of the roughly twelve thousand journalists working in the country in 2021 have left the profession, and eight in ten women journalists have stopped working entirely. Behind each of those figures sits a newsroom that no longer exists or a byline that no longer appears, the practical result of a five year campaign that RSF’s South Asia desk head has described as turning criticism itself into a legal offense.

None of this makes Afghanistan an isolated case, which is what gives the story weight beyond South Asia. RSF’s own 2026 index places Afghanistan’s collapse inside a broader global pattern: more than half the world’s countries now rate as difficult or very serious environments for journalism, the worst showing the index has recorded in a quarter century. The organization has also pointed to a specific mechanism spreading well beyond authoritarian states, in which national security and counterterrorism justifications, first normalized after the September 11 attacks, are increasingly invoked to restrict reporting on matters of public interest, a pattern RSF says now appears in established democracies as well as in regimes like Afghanistan’s. Afghanistan represents the extreme endpoint of that continuum rather than an exception to it, which is precisely why treating it as a uniquely Afghan problem understates the lesson.

The crackdown has also produced a measurable outflow with consequences well beyond Afghanistan’s borders. RSF data shows the number of countries journalists have been forced to flee from worldwide has doubled over five years, from nineteen to forty, with Afghanistan topping the list. Those journalists do not disappear once they cross a border. Pakistan and Iran, the two most common host states, have each carried out mass deportations of Afghan refugees through 2026, and independent reporting from RSF and Human Rights Watch has documented Afghan journalists, including some holding valid visas, among those detained and forcibly returned toward the same authorities they fled. Resettlement pipelines to Europe and North America have slowed at the same time, leaving exiled journalists in prolonged legal limbo in third countries with limited protection. For policymakers well outside the region, that combination turns a domestic censorship story into a live test of asylum and non return commitments.

Three Paths From Here

The most likely trajectory is continued institutionalization rather than reversal. The Taliban leadership has shown no interest in press freedom as a bargaining chip for international recognition, and the shift from verbal directive to codified criminal law suggests an intent to make current restrictions permanent rather than negotiable. This path is highly likely through the remainder of 2026 and into 2027, with enforcement of the new code expanding province by province and further directives layered on top of an already dense regulatory web.

A second, less likely path involves narrow, tactical loosening tied to international engagement. If the Taliban pursues formal recognition or unlocked aid financing, cosmetic concessions on foreign broadcasters or select outlets are possible, mirroring past patterns of selective accommodation when the leadership has wanted to project moderation to specific foreign audiences. This outcome is possible but not likely to alter the underlying legal architecture, since Akhundzada’s own framing of criticism as a religious offense forecloses any structural reform led from within the leadership itself.

A third path, already underway, is a deepening exile crisis that draws in host and resettlement states more directly than the domestic censorship story alone ever could. Continued deportations from Pakistan and Iran, combined with stalled resettlement processing in Europe and North America, raise the probability of a high profile forced return case drawing sustained international attention, potentially forcing governments to clarify protection commitments to Afghan media workers in ways they have so far avoided through case by case handling. This path is likely to intensify over the next twelve months regardless of what happens inside Afghanistan itself, since it depends as much on Pakistani and Iranian deportation policy as on any Taliban decision.

Why a Domestic Censorship Story Is Not a Domestic Story

Afghanistan’s press freedom collapse will keep being read as an isolated horror story unless it is placed against the trend line RSF itself is now drawing, in which national security framing, once confined to the world’s most repressive states, is migrating into ordinary governance practice elsewhere. The clearest near term indicator to track is enforcement, not legislation. The Code of Criminal Procedure has existed on paper since January 2026 without a confirmed public prosecution under its press relevant articles. The first documented case brought under Article 19 or Article 23 against a journalist or commentator will mark the moment Taliban media law moves from threat to precedent, and from precedent to template.

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Since records began, only four days have been hotter than today in the UK.

The highest temperature ever recorded was on 19 July 2022 when temperatures at Coningsby, Lincolnshire, reached 40.3C. That marked the first and only day that readings above 40C have been seen in the UK.

Before that, the record was 38.7C at Cambridge Botanic Gardens on 25 July 2019.

Faversham in Kent reached 38.5C on 10 August 2003, while on 18 July 2022 a temperature of 38.2C occurred at Pitsford, Northamptonshire.

Amber warnings for “extreme heat” are in place for a swathe of England from London to Sheffield, parts of Cheshire and Greater Manchester, into Gloucestershire and Wiltshire in the South West and Shropshire and Herefordshire in the west.

Temperatures were also forecast reach 35C in Wales, where a drought has been declared across the whole country.

Meanwhile, a yellow thunderstorm warning is in place for Northern Ireland until 06:00 on Friday, while rain is forecast for much of Scotland.

In England, the extreme heat in this heatwave is now believed to have peaked, with cooler temperatures of 30-34C expected for the Midlands, East Anglia and much of southern England by Friday, ceding to 26C by Sunday.

More than 27 million people are facing water use restrictions, including hosepipe bans.

Ebola outbreak has killed 2,128 people out of around 4,566 recorded cases in the DRC, according to government figures.

The latest Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo has spread to a sixth province after a death was recorded in previously unaffected Bas-Uele, said the head of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention.

Jean Kaseya said on Thursday that the man died in Buta, the capital of Bas-Uele province, after travelling from Haut-Uele province.

“If we do not stop this outbreak, it will last more than a year and will be the largest in the world,” Kaseya warned. That would also increase the risk of the outbreak spreading to other countries, he added.

The World Health Organization (WHO) says it is spreading faster than any previous one.

The latest outbreak began in the northeastern Ituri province and infections have also been recorded in North Kivu, South Kivu, Haut-Uele and Tshopo provinces.

It has killed 2,128 people out of 4,566 cases recorded, according to government figures. There are no approved vaccines or treatments for the rare Bundibugyo strain of the virus responsible for this outbreak.

WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Wednesday that “at its current pace”, the outbreak was on track to surpass the deadliest on record, which started over a decade ago and killed more than 11,000 people.

The current outbreak was formally declared on May 15 but the virus had begun circulating in February, health officials said this week.

The WHO hopes to reverse the spread of the virus within three months, but warned that the outbreak would not end by then.

Ebola is rare but highly contagious and can be contracted from bodily fluids and contaminated surfaces and materials, such as bedding and clothing. The disease it causes is severe and often fatal.

Clinical trials of two possible treatments for this type of Ebola began last month in Ituri.

Two vaccines developed specifically for the Bundibugyo virus are being tested in people for the first time, the WHO said on Wednesday.

The UN health agency also plans to test whether an existing Ebola vaccine could protect people against the latest virus after studies in animals showed promising results.