Explainer

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s salvo against Chinese students, promising to “aggressively revoke” their visas, is the latest move in heightening tensions between the world’s two largest economies.

Despite a temporary tariff truce reached between them earlier this month, divisions between Washington and Beijing remain wide, with recent ruptures over higher education, artificial intelligence (AI) chips and rare earth minerals.

Here’s all we know about how relations between China and the United States are worsening despite diplomatic efforts.

What did the US and China agree on tariffs?

A US-China trade spat escalated after Trump’s administration raised tariffs on Chinese goods to 145 percent earlier this year, with cumulative US duties on some Chinese goods reaching a staggering 245 percent. China retaliated with 125 percent tariffs of its own on US goods.

Under an agreement reached on May 12 following two days of trade talks in Geneva, tariffs on both sides were dropped by 115 percentage points for 90 days, during which time negotiators hope to secure a longer-term agreement. For now, the US has maintained a 30 percent tariff on all Chinese goods while Beijing has a 10 percent levy on US products.

In the weeks since the temporary reprieve, however, Washington and Beijing appear to have had only limited discussions.

On Thursday, US Treasury secretary Scott Bessent told Fox News that trade talks between the US and China are “a bit stalled”, and may need to be reinvigorated by a call between US President Donald Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping.

In the meantime, the Trump administration has announced new, strict visa controls on Chinese university students and told US companies to stop selling their advanced chip software used to design semiconductors to Chinese groups.

Why is the US targeting Chinese students?

On Wednesday, Rubio announced that the US will “aggressively revoke” the visas of Chinese students studying in the country. He also pledged to ramp up scrutiny of new visa applicants from China and Hong Kong.

The Trump administration’s decision to carry out deportations and to revoke student visas is part of wide-ranging efforts to fulfil its hardline immigration agenda.

China is the second-largest country of origin for international students in the US, behind India. Chinese students made up roughly a quarter of all foreign students in the US during the 2023-2024 academic year – more than 270,000 in total.

China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs criticised the decision to revoke visas, saying it “damaged” the rights of Chinese students. “The US has unreasonably cancelled Chinese students’ visas under the pretext of ideology and national rights,” Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said.

The Trump administration also banned Harvard University from enrolling any foreign students on May 22, accusing the institution of “coordinating with the Chinese Communist Party”. That move has since been blocked by a US federal judge.

Still, the largest portion of foreign students at Harvard – almost 1,300 – are Chinese, and many top officials, including the current leader Xi Jinping, have sent their children to the Ivy League school.

How is the US taking aim at Chinese semiconductors?

On May 13, just after the end of trade talks in Geneva, the US Commerce Department issued guidance warning American firms against using Huawei’s Ascend AI semiconductor chips, stating that they “were likely developed or produced in violation of US export controls”. 

The move marked the latest in a series of efforts by the Trump administration to stymie China’s ability to develop cutting-edge AI chips. The tiny semiconductors, which power AI systems, have long been a source of tension between the US and China.

China’s Commerce Ministry spokesperson fired back against the guidance last week, accusing Washington of “undermining” the consensus reached in Geneva and describing the measures as “typical unilateral bullying and protectionism”.

Then, on May 28, the US government ramped up the row by ordering US companies which make software used to design semiconductors to stop selling their goods and services to Chinese groups, The Financial Times reported.

Design automation software makers, including Cadence, Synopsys and Siemens EDA, were told via letters from the US Commerce Department to stop supplying their technology to China.

Why is the US targeting Chinese semiconductors?

The US has been tightening its export controls on semiconductors for more than a decade, contending that China has used US computer chips to improve military hardware and software.

Chinese officials and industry executives deny this and contend that the US is trying to limit China’s economic and technological development.

In his first term as president, Trump banned China’s Huawei from using advanced US circuit boards.

Huawei is seen as a competitor to Nvidia, the US semiconductor giant which produces its own-brand of “Ascend” AI chips. In April, Washington restricted the export of Nvidia’s AI chips to China.

But Nvidia’s chief executive, Jensen Huang, recently warned that attempts to hamstring China’s AI technology through export controls had largely failed.

How could China be affected by US measures?

The suspension of semiconductor sales will limit supplies for aerospace equipment needed for China’s commercial aircraft, the C919, a signature project in China’s push towards economic and transport self-reliance.

Christopher Johnson, a former CIA China analyst, told The Financial Times that this week’s new export controls underscored the “innate fragility of the tariff truce reached in Geneva”.

“With both sides wanting to retain and continue demonstrating the potency of their respective chokehold capabilities, the risk the ceasefire could unravel even within the 90-day pause is omnipresent,” he added.

Will China ease restrictions on rare earth minerals exports?

US officials had expected the Geneva talks to result in China easing its export restrictions on rare earth elements. So far, there have been few signs of that, however.

Rare earth minerals are a group of precious minerals required to manufacture a wide range of goods in the defence, healthcare and technology sectors.

Rare earth metals, which include scandium and yttrium, are also key for producing components in capacitors – electrical parts which help power AI servers and smartphones.

China processes some 90 percent of the world’s rare earth minerals and instituted export controls in April to counter Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariffs in April, triggering alarm among US companies.

Last week, for instance, Ford temporarily closed a factory in Chicago which makes utility vehicles after one of its suppliers ran out of a specialised rare earth magnet.

In most new cars, especially elevate vehicles (cars with robotic technology allowing them to “climb” over obstacles), these high-tech magnets are used in parts which operate brake and steering systems, and power seats and fuel injectors.

The restrictions on the supply of rare earth minerals provide Beijing with a strategic advantage in future negotiations, as it can limit supplies of crucial technologies for US industry.

In a one-minute video, US Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr revoked the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s recommendation that healthy children and healthy pregnant women be vaccinated for COVID-19, leaving some experts concerned and others unsure about the policy’s details.

Kennedy was joined in the video, posted on May 27 on X, by Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Marty Makary and National Institutes of Health Director Jay Bhattacharya.

Kennedy, who was tapped by President Donald Trump after a years-long embrace of vaccine conspiracy theories, did not make it clear whether he was referring to a recommendation for children or pregnant women getting vaccinated for the first time, for getting subsequent booster shots, or both. Days after the announcement, HHS’s website provided no clarity, saying, “COVID-19 vaccines are available to everyone 6 months and older. Getting vaccinated is the best way to help protect people from COVID-19.” A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention webpage dated January 7 – before Kennedy was secretary – provided a similar broad vaccine endorsement.

Some experts say the low rates of serious COVID-19 cases among children justify tightening the federal vaccine recommendation. Others say that the move will make it harder to get vaccinated and cause preventable serious illnesses.

Kennedy broke from norms by not waiting for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices to vote on vaccine guidance at a scheduled June meeting.

Recommending against vaccination for certain groups could make it harder for most children and pregnant women to get the shot, if insurers decide not to cover COVID-19 shots for those groups. Immunization rates are already low, with 13 percent of children and 14.4 percent of pregnant women up to date with the 2024-25 edition of the COVID-19 vaccine, the CDC found in late April.

We fact-checked the three federal health officials’ comments with health experts.

Kennedy said child vaccine boosters lacked clinical data

Kennedy said, “Last year, the Biden administration urged healthy children to get yet another COVID shot, despite the lack of any clinical data to support the repeat booster strategy in children.”

In recent years, the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices – a group of outside experts that advises the CDC on who should be vaccinated and how often – has recommended annual boosters for healthy children who have already received COVID-19 vaccines.

The committee made this recommendation without also recommending that every annual iteration of the vaccine undergo new rounds of clinical trials before being used, said Dr William Schaffner, professor of preventive medicine at the Vanderbilt University Medical Center. (The vaccine had been approved by the FDA for safety and efficacy early in the pandemic.) The panel concluded that the coronavirus vaccine operated in the same way as the annual flu vaccine, which has not required repeated clinical trials, said Schaffner, a former committee member and current adviser.

The American Academy of Pediatrics and the American Academy of Family Physicians also recommended COVID-19 vaccinations for children and did not urge new clinical trials.

Kids generally don’t need the vaccination, FDA chief said

Makary said, “There’s no evidence healthy kids need” the vaccine.

This is disputed. Most children will not face serious illness from COVID-19, but a small fraction will. Experts draw different lines when deciding how widespread the vaccination programme needs to be, given this scale of risk.

During the 2024-25 COVID-19 season, children and adolescents age 17 and younger comprised about 4 percent of COVID-19-associated hospitalisations. The relatively small number of serious cases among children has driven the belief among some scientists that the universal vaccination recommendation is too broad.

However, among all children, rates of COVID-19-associated hospitalisations were highest among infants less than six months old.

“With 4 million new children born every year with no exposure to COVID, young children have rates of disease similar to the disease rates in people older than 65,” Schaffner said, citing a September 2024 article on the CDC’s website.

COVID-19 was among the top 10 causes of death in children during the worst of the pandemic between 2020 and 2022, said Tara C Smith, a Kent State University epidemiologist. “Though we may no longer be at that stage … we vaccinate for influenza, so why not continue to do so for COVID?”

Some doctors are concerned about the lingering syndrome known as long COVID, about which less is known, especially among children.

The outside advisory committees and the medical academies found this level of serious disease to be sufficient to recommend continued annual vaccinations.

Makary said this policy is similar to those in other countries

Makary was accurate when he said that “most countries have stopped recommending” routine COVID-19 vaccination for children.

“Many countries will only offer the COVID vaccine to children if they have underlying health conditions or are immunocompromised,” said Brooke Nichols, a Boston University associate professor of global health.

Makary co-wrote a May 20 article that included a list of booster recommendations in Canada, Europe and Australia. It said in most countries, the recommendation was to vaccinate older people or those at high risk.

Most countries have taken this course, Schaffner said, because “by now, 95 percent of us have had experience with COVID, either through the vaccine or through illness or both. And second, the current variants are thought to be much milder than some of the earlier variants.”

The World Health Organization in 2024 recommended the COVID-19 vaccine for children with health risks who had never been vaccinated. For children and adolescents who had previously been vaccinated, it did not routinely recommend revaccination.

The European Medicines Agency recommended the BioNtech Pfizer vaccine for children over the age of five years and said the use of the vaccine for children is effective and safe. Euronews reported that the agency issued its recommendation in November 2021 and later recommended the Moderna vaccine for children ages 12 to 17.

In the United Kingdom, “only older people or those with specific diseases or illnesses making them susceptible to severe COVID were recommended to get boosters, and as a result, uptake in those groups was actually higher than in the US,” where outreach and advertising for the vaccinations focused on children as well as older people, said Babak Javid, an associate professor in the division of experimental medicine at the University of California-San Francisco.

The New York Times found that in Europe “many countries do not recommend the vaccines for healthy children under 5, but the shots are approved for everyone 6 months and older,” meaning that they can be safely used by anyone who’s at least six months old.

Doctors say the vaccine protects pregnant women

Experts disagreed with Kennedy’s recommendation against vaccinating pregnant women, saying the vaccine protects pregnant women and their infants.

Steven J Fleischman, American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists president, said, “It is very clear that COVID-19 infection during pregnancy can be catastrophic and lead to major disability, and it can cause devastating consequences for families. In fact, growing evidence shows just how much vaccination during pregnancy protects the infant after birth, with the vast majority of hospitalised infants less than six months of age – those who are not yet eligible for vaccination – born to unvaccinated mothers.”

After a vaccination, antibodies reach the fetus. The doctors’ group said there is no evidence the vaccine creates adverse effects for either mother or the fetus, although fever or pain at the injection site are possible.

The federal government in May provided conflicting information about the vaccine and pregnancy.

In Makary’s May 20 article, he and his co-author included pregnancy on the CDC’s 2025 list of underlying medical conditions that increase the risk of severe COVID-19.

“They literally contradicted themselves over the course of a couple of days,” said Dr Peter Hotez, Texas Children’s Hospital Center for Vaccine Development co-director. “It appears RFK Jr reversed his own FDA’s decision.”

Following the May 27 video announcement, Makary told NBC that the decision about vaccination should be between a pregnant woman and her doctor.

A 2024 review of 67 studies found that fully vaccinated pregnant women had a 61 percent lower likelihood of a COVID-19 infection during pregnancy.

What’s next?

In its June meeting, the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices might move towards less sweeping recommendations for vaccinating children, closer to those that Kennedy enacted.

“If you listened to the discussions in the most recent previous meeting, they very much seemed to be moving in a more targeted approach,” Schaffner said.

The question of pregnant women may be one where the advisory committees may recommend more flexibility with vaccine usage than what Kennedy’s video statement seems to suggest, Schaffner said.

Other areas where the panels could back greater flexibility could be for otherwise healthy people who serve as caregivers or who live with more vulnerable people who are advanced in age or are immunocompromised.

Billionaire and Tesla chief Elon Musk has stepped down from his role as head of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), in which he was charged with reducing federal spending, as he nears the maximum limit for his tenure as a special government adviser.

His departure comes just after his first major public disagreement with President Donald Trump over the administration’s much-touted tax-and-spending budget bill, which was passed by the Republican-controlled US House of Representatives on May 22 by a single vote.

In a post on X on Wednesday, Musk said his time with the administration had “come to an end”.

“I would like to thank President Donald Trump for the opportunity to reduce wasteful spending,” the SpaceX founder wrote.

As my scheduled time as a Special Government Employee comes to an end, I would like to thank President @realDonaldTrump for the opportunity to reduce wasteful spending.

The @DOGE mission will only strengthen over time as it becomes a way of life throughout the government.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) May 29, 2025

Musk, who was appointed by Trump to lead DOGE, has seen his tenure in the White House marred by controversy, in particular sparked by his attempt to dismantle the US Agency for International Development (USAID), an agency dedicated to distributing foreign aid.

With Musk’s departure, what will become of DOGE? And what legacy does the Tesla CEO leave behind?

How long was Musk at DOGE?

Musk’s term as a “special government employee” in the Trump administration meant he was only entitled to serve for 130 days in any 365-day period, and is barred from using government roles for any monetary gain.

Musk’s term has lasted just over four months, a few days short of the maximum legal limit.

In late April, Musk said he would soon shift his focus back to his own business enterprises and that his “time allocation” at DOGE would “drop significantly” starting in May.

However, Musk did note that he would spend “a day or two per week on government matters for as long as the President would like me to do so, as long as it is useful”.

Why does Musk disagree with Trump’s tax-and-spending bill?

In a clip from an interview with news channel CBS’s Sunday Morning programme, released on Tuesday, Musk revealed he was “disappointed to see the massive spending bill”.

According to him, the wide-ranging budget bill, also known as the “One Big Beautiful Bill”, increases the budget deficit and undermines his work at DOGE.

“I think a bill can be big or it can be beautiful. But I don’t know if it can be both. My personal opinion,” Musk told journalist David Pogue.

On Wednesday, Trump staunchly defended the bill. “We will be negotiating that bill, and I’m not happy about certain aspects of it, but I’m thrilled by other aspects of it,” Trump told reporters at the White House. “That’s the way they go.”

The budget bill spans more than a thousand pages and outlines various domestic policy goals favoured by the Trump administration.

Among its provisions are measures that extend tax cuts introduced during Trump’s first presidential term in 2017. The bill also boosts funding for Trump’s proposed “mass deportation” initiative and for security along the US-Mexico border.

The disagreement over the tax-and-spending bill was one of several challenges Musk has encountered during his time at the White House.

What else has Musk disagreed with the Trump administration about?

Musk ran afoul of several Trump officials during his stint at the White House, including the president’s chief trade adviser, Peter Navarro, whom he called a “moron” over Trump’s sweeping increase in trade tariffs across the globe. Musk has also stated publicly that he would be more in favour of “predictable tariff structures”, in addition to “free trade and lower tariffs”.

In April, the SpaceX founder expressed hopes for “a zero-tariff situation” between the US and Europe. Instead, Trump has threatened to impose a 50 percent tariff on imported goods from the European Union unless the two sides can agree to a trade deal. 

What will happen to DOGE now?

Trump established DOGE by executive order the day he was sworn into office on January 20. With Musk’s departure, it’s unclear what fate awaits the agency, as Trump has yet to appoint anyone to replace him.

Musk was given a mandate to reduce federal funding, which included downsizing the government’s workforce, terminating government contracts and attempting to close down entire agencies. In February, he and Trump both claimed they had unearthed billions of dollars worth of fraud related to diversity and climate schemes within the government. This was proved to be largely untrue or misleading.

In his post on Wednesday, Musk said: “The DOGE mission will only strengthen over time as it becomes a way of life throughout the government.”

However, Colleen Graffy, a former US diplomat and professor of law at Pepperdine University in California, said DOGE’s future was on shaky ground. “The power of DOGE came from the world’s richest man, Musk, having the ear of the world’s most powerful person, Trump,” she told Al Jazeera. “DOGE will likely struggle along for a while, but without Musk, and with pending court cases against it, its days are numbered. It would be a poisoned chalice appointment for anyone to take. Trump’s tax cuts will dwarf any savings.”

What will Musk’s DOGE legacy be?

Musk’s role in the Trump administration has sparked a large amount of controversy.

He has overseen major reductions in the number of federal employees and the dismantling of multiple government-funded programmes – moves that have drawn widespread criticism.

“Elon Musk’s DOGE was like one of his rockets exploding soon after liftoff, thereby demonstrating how not to do things,” Graffy told Al Jazeera.

“The difference is that for one, the learning experience is paid in money; for the other, the price is paid in human lives,” she added.

A major point of criticism directed at Trump and Musk centred on their decision to severely scale back USAID’s operations.

By late February, the main offices of the agency in Washington, DC, had been essentially shut down.

Following the dismissal of roughly 1,600 employees and the placement of approximately 4,700 more on leave, staff were given just 15 minutes to gather their belongings and exit the building.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio later revealed that 83 percent of all contracts managed by USAID had been closed.

In March, a federal judge in Maryland stated that DOGE had “likely violated” the US Constitution by attempting to dismantle the agency. The judge authorised a temporary injunction to stop DOGE from proceeding with USAID-related staff reductions, building closures, contract terminations, or the destruction of USAID materials.

Lisa Gilbert, co-president of Public Citizen, a consumer rights advocacy group, described DOGE as a “mantra of destruction”.

“The legacy of Elon Musk is lost livelihoods for critical government employees, hindered American education, loss of funding for scientists and the violation of Americans’ personal privacy, all in the service of corrupt tech-bro billionaire special interests,” she told Al Jazeera.

“The carnage is even more horrifying internationally, as Musk’s chainsaw will lead to the pointless and needless deaths of likely millions of people in the developing world.”

Max Yoeli, senior research fellow in the US and the Americas Programme at Chatham House, said Musk’s brief tenure has “irrevocably altered US government”.

“DOGE’s weakening of state capacity and disruption of America’s research and development ecosystem pose lasting risks to US economic prospects and resilience, even as courts still grapple with legal issues his approach raised,” Yoeli told Al Jazeera.

A United States trade court has ruled that President Donald Trump’s global reciprocal tariffs are illegal, finding that the president overstepped his authority by imposing the import levies last month. Wednesday’s ruling could throw Trump’s sweeping trade policies into disarray, experts say.

The Court of International Trade in New York ruled that an emergency law invoked by Trump during his “Liberation Day” announcement in April does not give him unilateral authority to impose certain tariffs. Instead, the court ruled, that power resides with Congress.

It also extended this ruling to previous tariffs levied earlier this year on Canada, Mexico and China over the fentanyl opioid crisis as well as security at the US border.

Trump has consistently promised Americans that his tariffs will draw manufacturing jobs back to the US, and shrink the country’s $1.2 trillion goods trade deficit with the rest of the world.

He has argued that the US’s large trade deficits with other countries amount to a national emergency, particularly regarding China, giving him the right to invoke emergency measures. But the court disputed that, arguing the US has run a trade deficit with the rest of the world for 49 years.

“The court does not pass upon the wisdom or likely effectiveness of the President’s use of tariffs as leverage,” a three-judge panel said in the decision to issue a permanent injunction on the blanket tariff orders issued by Trump since January.

“That use is impermissible not because it is unwise or ineffective, but because [federal law] does not allow it.”

On April 9, Trump imposed a 10 percent across-the-board tariff on all imports, plus higher reciprocal rates for countries with which the US has large trade deficits. He later paused or lowered those, but kept the 10 percent baseline tariff in place.

Wednesday’s ruling, if it stands, would blow a hole through Trump’s strategy to use tariffs to wring concessions from trading partners, experts say. It also creates uncertainty around trade negotiations and agreements with the European Union and China, as well as other countries.

But the Trump administration, some experts say, might explore new ways to impose tariffs even if it loses the current case.

What has the court ruled?

The three-judge panel was ruling on a lawsuit filed by the nonpartisan Liberty Justice Center on behalf of five small businesses which import goods from countries targeted by the duties. To date, at least seven lawsuits have been filed challenging Trump’s trade policies.

On Wednesday, the court invalidated all of Trump’s tariffs since January which were rooted in the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), a 1977 law meant to address “unusual and extraordinary” threats during a national emergency.

“The Worldwide and Retaliatory Tariff Orders exceed any authority granted to the President by IEEPA to regulate importation by means of tariffs,” the court ruling stated.

The judgement affects levies imposed on April 2, including the baseline 10 percent tariff and higher, so-called “reciprocal” duties on many countries, but not the sectoral tariffs that Trump had imposed earlier.

The ruling left in place any tariffs that Trump issued using his Section 232 powers from the Trade Expansion Act of 1962, including his 25 percent tax on most imported vehicles and parts, as well as on all foreign-made steel and aluminium.

The judges gave the government 10 days to carry out the necessary administrative moves to remove the affected tariffs.

How has the Trump administration responded to the ruling?

Minutes after the announcement of the ruling, the Trump administration filed a notice of appeal and questioned the authority of the court.

In a statement issued on Wednesday, White House spokesperson Kush Desai said US trade deficits with other countries constituted “a national emergency that has decimated American communities … and weakened our defence industrial base”.

“It is not for unelected judges to decide how to properly address a national emergency,” Desai added.

Stephen Miller, the White House deputy chief of staff for policy, also hit out at the ruling with a post on X claiming “the judicial coup is out of control”.

The Justice Department, which is headed by US Attorney General Pam Bondi, a Trump appointee, said the lawsuits should be dismissed because only Congress, not private businesses, can challenge a national emergency declared by the president under the IEEPA.

How have world markets responded?

Financial markets responded positively to the ruling, with the US dollar rising in value against the euro, yen and Swiss franc.

In Europe, the German Dax rallied by 0.9 percent at the start of trading on Thursday, while the UK’s FTSE 100 index of shares ticked up by 0.1 percent.

Stocks in Asia also climbed on Thursday, while the price of Brent crude – the global price benchmark for Atlantic basin crude oils – climbed 81 cents, or 1.25 percent, to $65.71 a barrel.

Most economists agree that eliminating Trump’s tariffs would improve prospects for the world’s major economies.

What steps could the Trump administration take now?

The Trump administration has 10 days to complete the process of halting tariffs, although the introduction of most reciprocal tariffs has been shelved until later in the summer anyway.

It’s not yet clear if the White House will respond by suspending its emergency powers after July 9, when the reciprocal tariffs pause is set to end.

For now, the trade court ruling will most likely be appealed at the US Court of Appeals in Washington, DC, and — if needed — after that, the US Supreme Court. It is unclear how long this process could take.

Meanwhile, Trump can still unilaterally launch import taxes of 15 percent for 150 days on nations with which the US runs large trade deficits, in line with Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974.

The White House may also begin to explore other laws to enable it to force through Trump’s trade policies.

According to Mona Paulsen, assistant professor in international economic law at the London School of Economics, “Section 338 of the Tariff Act of 1930 could be option”.

This would allow Trump to raise duties up to 50 percent above existing charges on imports from countries that “discriminate against US commerce”.

“Rather than wipe out Trump’s trade plans, I think yesterday’s ruling will see the White House use more and more ambiguous trade laws,” Paulsen told Al Jazeera.

How does the ruling affect new trade deals?

The trade deal that Trump reached with the United Kingdom on May 8 has been thrown into doubt following the trade court ruling.

That agreement, which has not yet been finalised, imposed a 10 percent tariff only on all imports from the UK.

“A lot of governments will wait and see what happens now,” said Paulsen, suggesting that trade partners may now have a stronger hand in negotiations with the US.

United States President Donald Trump commuted the federal drugs-and-extortion sentence of former Chicago gang leader, Larry Hoover, on Wednesday. Hoover has been serving multiple life sentences following both state and federal convictions over the past five decades.

For his federal conviction, Hoover is currently being held at the ADX Florence prison, a federal prison formally known as the United States Penitentiary Administrative Maximum Facility, in Florence, Colorado.

Commuting a sentence means reducing its length or severity, or ending it entirely. The US president has the power to commute federal sentences, but not state sentences.

Here is what we know.

Who is Larry Hoover and why was his sentence commuted?

Hoover, 74, is the cofounder of Gangster Disciples, one of Chicago’s most powerful gangs.

In a two-page order issued on Wednesday, the Trump administration commuted his federal sentence, considering it served “with no further fines, restitution, probation or other conditions” and ordering his immediate release, according to a copy of the document from Hoover’s legal team seen by The Chicago Tribune.

Hoover’s lawyers said the order was a vindication of their attempts to have their client’s sentence reduced.

Lawyers Jennifer Bonjean and Justin Moore said in a statement: “The Courts have demonstrated a complete unwillingness to consider Mr Hoover’s considerable growth and complete rehabilitation. Despite the Court’s unwillingness to do the right thing, Mr Hoover has been able to keep his voice alive through the incredible work of many advocates and supporters. Thankfully, Mr Hoover’s pleas were heard by President Trump who took action to deliver justice for Mr Hoover.”

Lobbying for Hoover’s pardon has mounted since Trump appointed Alice Johnson as his “pardon tsar” in February this year. Johnson was a non-violent drug offender and was sentenced to life in prison in a drug conspiracy case, but was pardoned by Trump in 2020.

What was Hoover convicted of?

Hoover has been convicted on both state charges and federal charges. A federal crime is a violation of the US Constitution, possibly spanning multiple states, while a state crime is one that breaks a state law.

He was convicted in 1973 on state charges in Illinois for the murder of 19-year-old drug dealer William “Pooky” Young and sentenced to 200 years in prison.

Online state prison records show that Hoover was an inmate at Dixon Correctional Center in western Illinois from 1974. He was accused of continuing to direct the Gangster Disciples from behind bars.

In 1997, Hoover was convicted on federal charges of extortion, federal drug conspiracy and continuing to engage in a criminal enterprise. Hoover has spent nearly three decades in solitary confinement at ADX Florence, a maximum security prison in Colorado, according to his lawyers.

What crimes has the Gangster Disciples gang been involved in?

According to court documents, Hoover was one of the leaders of the gang between 1970 and 1995. The documents state that under Hoover, the Gangster Disciples sold “great quantities of cocaine, heroin, and other drugs in Chicago”.

As of 1995, the gang was believed to have 30,000 members in Chicago and had spread to at least 35 other states, according to an article published by the US Department of Justice that year.

However, little is publicly known about the activities of the Gangster Disciples in recent years.

What are the conditions in the ADX Florence prison?

ADX Florence in Colorado is a super-max prison, or an administrative maximum (ADX) prison, a control unit prison with the highest level of security.

The prison opened in 1994. Prisoners are held in solitary confinement in 12-by-7ft (3.6-by-2 metre) cells with thick concrete walls, and cannot see each other. Inmates sleep on a thin mattress atop a concrete slab. The cells also have a sink, toilet and automated shower.

Prisoners may have access to televisions, books or arts-and-crafts materials. Human interaction is very limited in ADX prisons.

Is Larry Hoover free to leave prison now?

No, Hoover is still serving his 200-year state sentence following the 1973 Illinois murder conviction.

It is not known if or when Hoover might be moved to another prison – such as the Dixon Correctional Center, a medium-security prison in Illinois that opened in 1983 – now that his federal conviction has been commuted, to serve out his state convictions. In the past, Illinois Department of Corrections officials have suggested that Hoover complete his state sentence in federal prison, citing security concerns.

Is Hoover eligible for parole?

The online records at Dixon Correctional Center say that Hoover will not be eligible for parole until October 2062, when he will be 111 years old. It is not clear whether his parole date can be advanced.

Presidential clemency is reserved for federal crimes, and not state crimes, according to the US Congress website, so Trump cannot intervene. The power to commute state crimes rests in the hands of the governor of the state. The governor of Illinois is Democrat JB Pritzker, who has so far not spoken about Hoover, nor of any plans to grant him clemency.

What role have public figures played in this case?

Performer Ye, formerly known as Kanye West, has long advocated for the pardon of Hoover. In 2018, during Trump’s first term, Ye requested Trump pardon Hoover. On Ye’s 2021 album, Donda, a track called “Jesus Lord” features a vocal snippet from Hoover’s son, Larry Hoover Jr, thanking Ye for bringing up his father’s case in the Oval Office. “Free my father, Mr Larry Hoover Sr,” the junior Hoover is heard saying.

Rapper Drake also advocated for Hoover’s freedom. In 2021, Ye and Drake set personal tensions aside and collaborated on a “Free Hoover” concert in Los Angeles.

“WORDS CAN’T EXPRESS MY GRATITUDE FOR OUR DEVOTED ENDURING PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP FOR FREEING LARRY HOOVER,” Ye posted on X after the commutation order.

WORDS CAN’T EXPRESS MY GRATITUDE FOR OUR DEVOTED ENDURING PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP FOR FREEING LARRY HOOVER

— ye (@kanyewest) May 28, 2025

Why is Trump pardoning people now?

The exact reasoning for Hoover’s commutation is unclear. However, it comes amid a spree of commutations and pardons granted by Trump.

On Wednesday, Trump issued a pardon for former Republican Congressman Michael Grimm, who was convicted of tax fraud in 2015 and sentenced to several months in prison.

On Tuesday, the president pardoned reality television couple Todd and Julie Chrisley, who were convicted of tax evasion and defrauding banks of at least $30m in 2022. Todd Chrisley received a 12-year prison sentence, while his wife was sentenced to seven years.

Many of the world’s poorest countries are due to make record debt repayments to China in 2025 on loans extended a decade ago, at the peak of Beijing’s Belt and Road Initiative, a report by the Sydney-based Lowy Institute think tank has found.

Under the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), a state-backed infrastructure investment programme launched in 2013, Beijing lent billions of dollars to build ports, highways and railroads to connect Asia, Africa and the Americas.

But new lending is drying up. In 2025, debt repayments owed to China by developing countries will amount to $35bn. Of that, $22bn is set to be paid by 75 of the world’s poorest countries, putting health and education spending at risk, Lowy concluded.

“For the rest of this decade, China will be more debt collector than banker to the developing world,” said Riley Duke, the report’s author.

“Developing countries are grappling with a tidal wave of debt repayments and interest costs to China,” Duke said.

What did the report say?

China’s BRI, the biggest multilateral development programme ever undertaken by a single country, is one of President Xi Jinping’s hallmark foreign policy initiatives.

It focuses primarily on developing country infrastructure projects like power plants, roads and ports, which struggle to receive financial backing from Western financial institutions.

The BRI has turned China into the largest global supplier of bilateral loans, peaking at about $50bn in 2016 – more than all Western creditors combined.

According to the Lowy report, however, paying off these debts is now jeopardising public spending.

“Pressure from Chinese state lending, along with surging repayments to a range of international private creditors, is putting enormous financial strain on developing economies.”

High debt servicing costs can suffocate spending on public services like education and healthcare, and limit their ability to respond to economic and climate shocks.

The 46 least developed countries (LDCs) spent a significant share – about 20 percent – of their tax revenues on external public debt in 2023. Lowy’s report implies this will increase even more this year.

For context, Germany used 8.4 percent of its budget to repay debt in 2023.

Lowy also raised questions about whether China will use these debts for “geopolitical leverage” in the Global South, especially with Washington slashing foreign aid under President Donald Trump.

“As Beijing shifts into the role of debt collector, Western governments remain internally focused, with aid declining and multilateral support waning,” the report said.

While Chinese lending is also beginning to slow down across the developing world, the report said there were two areas that seemed to be bucking the trend.

The first was in nations such as Honduras, Burkina Faso and Solomon Islands, which received massive new loans after switching diplomatic recognition from Taiwan to China.

The other was in countries such as Indonesia and Brazil, where China has signed new loan deals to secure critical minerals and metals for electric batteries.

How has China responded?

Beijing’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said it was “not aware of the specifics” of the report but that “China’s investment and financing cooperation with developing countries abides by international conventions”.

Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said “a small number of countries” sought to blame Beijing for miring developing nations in debt but that “falsehoods cannot cover up the truth”.

For years, the BRI has been criticised by Western commentators as a way for Beijing to entrap countries with unserviceable debt.

An often-cited example is the Hambantota port – located along vital east-west international shipping routes – in southern Sri Lanka.

Unable to repay a $1.4bn loan for the port’s construction, Colombo was forced to lease the facility to a Chinese firm for 99 years in 2017.

China’s government has denied accusations it deliberately creates debt traps, and recipient nations have also pushed back, saying China was often a more reliable partner than the West and offered crucial loans when others refused.

Still, China publishes little data on its BRI scheme, and the Lowy Institute said its estimates, based on World Bank data, may underestimate the full scale of China’s lending.

In 2021, AidData – a US-based international development research lab – estimated that China was owed a “hidden debt” of about $385bn.

Does the Lowy report lack ‘context’?

Challenging the “debt-trap” narrative, the Rhodium consulting group looked at 38 Chinese debt renegotiations with 24 developing countries in 2019 and concluded that Beijing’s leverage was limited, with many of the renegotiations resolved in favour of the borrower.

According to Rhodium, developing countries had restructured roughly $50bn of Chinese loans in the decade before its 2019 study was published, with loan extensions, cheaper financing and debt forgiveness the most frequent outcomes.

Elsewhere, a 2020 study by the China Africa Research Initiative at Johns Hopkins University found that, between 2000 and 2019, China cancelled $3.4bn of debt in Africa and a further $15bn was refinanced. No assets were seized.

Meanwhile, many developing countries remain in hock to Western institutions.

In 2022, the Debt Justice Group estimated that African governments owed three times more to private financial groups than to China, charging double the interest in the process.

“Developing country debt to China is less than what is owed to both private bondholders and multilateral development banks (MDBs),” says Kevin Gallagher, director of the Boston University Global Development Policy Center.

“So, Lowy’s focus on China lacks context. The truth is, even if you remove China from the creditor picture, lots of poor countries would still be in debt distress,” Gallagher told Al Jazeera.

Following the COVID-19 pandemic and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, inflation prompted the United States Federal Reserve, as well as other leading central banks, to hike interest rates.

Attracted to higher yields in the US, investors withdrew their funds from developing country financial assets, raising yield costs and depreciating currencies. Debt repayment costs soared.

Global interest rates have since come down slightly. But according to the UN, developing country borrowing costs are, on average, two to four times higher than in the US and six to 12 times higher than in Germany.

“A crucial aspect about Chinese lending,” said Gallagher, “is that it tends to be long-term and growth enhancing. That’s precisely why a lot of it is focused on infrastructure investment. Western lenders tend to get in and out faster and charge higher rates.”

The world’s largest Bitcoin conference is taking place in Las Vegas, Nevada from May 27-29.

This year’s event includes several speakers from US President Donald Trump’s circle including Vice President JD Vance; Trump’s two eldest sons, Donald Trump Jr and Eric Trump; as well as White House crypto tsar David Sacks.

Trump’s favourable view of cryptocurrency and his family’s heavy involvement in the industry is raising concerns about the integrity of Trump’s administration and how he is using his influence as president of the United States.

How has Bitcoin performed under Trump?

Over the past week, Bitcoin reached an all-time high of $111,970, marking a 2.6 percent increase from its previous Inauguration Day peak of $109,114.

Since Donald Trump’s re-election in November 2024, Bitcoin has surged 60 percent, rising from about $69,539 at close on Election Day to its current record level.

The cryptocurrency briefly dropped below $90,000 on February 25, amid market jitters triggered by Trump’s announcement of new tariffs on multiple countries and industries worldwide, before recovering.

What were the policies during the Biden administration?

During the Biden administration, government policy on cryptocurrency was mixed, with a plethora of lawsuits brought against crypto firms by then Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) chair Gary Gensler, who has been replaced under the new Trump administration. There were also major moves to adopt cryptocurrency, with the SEC approving 11 spot Bitcoin ETFs in January 2024.

In 2022 and into 2023, the crypto market faced major drawdowns following the implosion of Bahamas-based cryptocurrency exchange FTX in 2022 and the regional banking crisis in early 2023. This led to the Federal Reserve Board releasing statements to banks on the risks of crypto assets, which it has recently withdrawn.

What are Trump’s crypto policies?

The crypto industry has emerged as a significant political player, contributing large sums to support Trump and other legislators.

Much of Biden’s crypto policies have been rescinded under the Trump administration, with the US Senate advancing key pro-crypto legislation such as the establishment of the Strategic Bitcoin Reserve and the Digital Asset Stockpile, aimed at maintaining control of Bitcoin seized as part of “criminal or civil asset forfeiture proceedings”.

Trump’s cryptocurrency policies included appointing pro-crypto figures to key regulatory roles, such as naming Paul Atkins as the new SEC chair.

The most recent rally in Bitcoin is largely prompted by investor optimism over a more crypto-friendly administration and proposed regulatory changes to reduce barriers to entry in the crypto asset markets.

Unlike fiat currencies, Bitcoin’s maximum supply is 21 million coins. Because of this, the White House has stated “there is a strategic advantage to being among the first nations to create a strategic Bitcoin reserve.”

What if Bitcoin were a country?

With Bitcoin priced at $110,000 and a circulating supply of approximately 19.87m BTC, its market capitalisation stands at roughly $2.18 trillion.

If Bitcoin were a country, it would be a major economic powerhouse, ranking roughly in the top 10 worldwide by gross domestic product (GDP) size, roughly on par with countries like Brazil ($2.17 trillion), Canada ($2.14 trillion) or Russia ($2.02 trillion).

What are the regulations and ethics on government officials’ involvement in crypto?

Just before taking office, Trump launched the $TRUMP meme coin at a Crypto Ball held in Washington, DC. Meme coins are often created as a joke and are susceptible to volatile price movements, however, Trump’s coin has allowed top investors access to him.

Last week, President Trump hosted top investors for a cryptocurrency project at his luxury golf course in Northern Virginia. It’s estimated investors spent $148m on the $TRUMP coin to secure their seats at the dinner, with the top 25 spending more than $111m, according to crypto intelligence firm Inca Digital, the Reuters news agency reported.

While the White House insisted Trump would be attending the event “in his personal time”, he spoke at the event behind a podium marked with the presidential seal.

When Trump’s meme coin launched, it first surged, then fell in value, while its creators, which include an entity linked to the Trump Organization, made hundreds of millions in trading fees.

The Trump family is now deeply invested in crypto, with ventures like First Lady Melania Trump’s coin and a stake in World Liberty Financial, a cryptocurrency firm founded in 2024.

While government officials have financial disclosure requirements, and regulatory agencies can monitor the goings-on of officials, critics have warned of conflicts of interest, as Trump backs crypto after once opposing it, potentially using policy to boost his own gains.

For a country whose government is not recognised by any nation, Afghanistan’s acting Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi has had an unusually busy calendar in recent weeks.

He has hosted his counterpart from Pakistan, spoken on the phone with India’s foreign minister, and jetted to Iran and China. In Beijing, he also met the Pakistani foreign minister again. On Wednesday, he joined trilateral talks with delegations from Pakistan and China.

This, even though the ruling Taliban have historically had tense relations with most of these countries, and currently have taut ties with Pakistan, a one-time ally with whom trust is at an all-time low.

While neither the United Nations nor any of its member states formally recognise the Taliban, analysts say that this diplomatic overdrive suggests that the movement is far from a pariah on the global stage.

So why are multiple countries in Afghanistan’s neighbourhood queueing up to engage diplomatically with the Taliban, while avoiding formal recognition?

We unpack the Taliban’s latest high-level regional engagements and look at why India, Pakistan and Iran are all trying to befriend Afghanistan’s rulers, four years after they marched on Kabul and grabbed power.

Who did Muttaqi meet or speak to in recent weeks?

A timeline of Afghanistan’s recent diplomatic engagements:

• April 19: Pakistan’s Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar travels with a high-level delegation to Kabul to meet Muttaqi and other Afghan officials. The two sides discussed an ongoing spat over Pakistan’s repatriation of Afghan refugees, bilateral trade and economic cooperation, the Afghanistan Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement.
• May 6: Dar and Muttaqi spoke again on what turned out to be the eve of India’s attack on Pakistan, leading to four days of missile and drone attacks between the two nuclear-armed neighbours. The exchange of fire took place after India accused Pakistan of being involved in the April 22 Pahalgam attack in Indian-administered Kashmir, which left 26 people dead.
• May 15: India’s External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar holds a phone conversation with Muttaqi to express his gratitude for the Taliban’s condemnation of the Pahalgam attacks.
• May 17: Muttaqi arrives in the Iranian capital Tehran to attend the Tehran Dialogue Forum, where he also holds meetings with Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi and President Massoud Pazeshkian.
• May 21: Muttaqi visits Beijing. Trilateral talks between Afghanistan, Pakistan and China take place aimed at boosting trade and security between the three countries.

Head of the Taliban’s political office in Doha, Qatar, Suhail Shaheen said the group is a “reality of today’s Afghanistan” as it “controls all territory and borders of the country”.

“The regional countries know this fact and, as such, they engage with the Islamic Emirate at various levels, which is a pragmatic and rational approach in my view,” he told Al Jazeera, referring to the name by which the Taliban refers to the current Afghan state.

“We believe it is through engagement that we can find solutions to issues,” he added, arguing that formal recognition of the Taliban government “not be delayed furthermore”.

“Our region has its own interests and goals that we should adhere to.”

Why is India warming up to the Taliban?

It’s an unlikely partnership. During the Taliban’s initial rule between 1996 and  2001, the Indian government refused to engage with the Afghan group and did not recognise their rule, which at the time was only recognised by Pakistan, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia.

India, which had supported the earlier Soviet-backed government of Mohammad Najibullah, shut down its embassy in Kabul once the Taliban came to power: It viewed the Taliban as a proxy of Pakistan’s intelligence agencies, which had supported the mujahideen against Moscow.

Instead, New Delhi supported the anti-Taliban opposition group, the Northern Alliance.

Following the United States-led ousting of the Taliban in 2001, India reopened its Kabul embassy and became a significant development partner for Afghanistan, investing more than $3bn in infrastructure, health, education and water projects, according to its Ministry of External Affairs.

But its embassy and consulates came under repeated, deadly attacks from the Taliban and its allies, including the Haqqani group.

After the Taliban’s return to power in August 2021, New Delhi evacuated its embassy and once again refused to recognise the group. However, unlike during the Taliban’s first stint in power, India built diplomatic contacts with the group – first behind closed doors, then, increasingly, publicly.

The logic was simple, say analysts: India realised that by refusing to engage with the Taliban earlier, it had ceded influence in Afghanistan to Pakistan, its regional rival.

In June 2022, less than a year after the Taliban’s return to power, India reopened its embassy in Kabul by deploying a team of “technical experts” to run it. In November 2024, the Taliban appointed an acting consul at the Afghan consulate in Mumbai.

Then, last January, Indian Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri and Muttaqi both flew to Dubai for a meeting – the highest-level face-to-face interaction between New Delhi and the Taliban to date.

Kabir Taneja, a deputy director at the New Delhi-based Observer Research Foundation, says not dealing with “whatever political reality sets in in Kabul was never an option” for India.

“No one is pleased per se that the reality is the Taliban,” Taneja told Al Jazeera. However, while India’s “decades-long” efforts to foster goodwill with the Afghan people have faced challenges since the Taliban takeover, they have not been entirely undone.

“Even the Taliban’s ideological stronghold, the Darul Uloom Deoband seminary, is in India,” he added. “These are ties with the country and its actors that cannot be vanquished, and have to be dealt with realistically and practically,” he added.

What is Pakistan’s calculus?

One of the Taliban’s foremost backers between 1996 and 2021, Pakistan has seen its relationship with the group plummet in recent years.

Since the Taliban’s takeover in 2021, Pakistan has seen a surge in violent attacks, which Islamabad attributes to armed groups, such as the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP). Pakistan insists that the TTP operates from Afghan territory and blames the ruling Taliban for allowing them sanctuary – a claim the Taliban government denies.

Emerging in 2007 amid the US-led so-called “war on terror”, the Pakistan Taliban has long challenged Islamabad’s authority through a violent rebellion. Though distinct from the Afghan Taliban, the two are seen as ideologically aligned.

Dar’s visit to Kabul and subsequent communication with Muttaqi represent a “tactical, ad hoc thaw” rather than a substantial shift in Pakistan-Afghanistan relations, says Rabia Akhtar, director at the Centre for Security, Strategy and Policy Research at the University of Lahore.

During the recent India-Pakistan crisis, Islamabad grew increasingly concerned about the possibility of Afghanistan allowing its territory to be used by New Delhi against Pakistan, she suggested. “This has increased Islamabad’s urgency to secure its western border,” Akhtar told Al Jazeera.

Meanwhile, Pakistan’s decision earlier this year to expel Afghan refugees – including many who have spent most of their lives in Pakistan – and frequent border closures disrupting trade are also sources of tension in the relationship.

The refugees question, in particular, could prove to be a key factor that will shape future relations between the two countries, Akhtar said.

“While Pakistan has pushed for repatriation of undocumented Afghans, Kabul views such deportations as punitive,” she said. “If this dialogue is an indication of a recognition on both sides that confrontation is unsustainable, especially amidst shifting regional alignments and economic pressures, then that’s a good sign.”

The Taliban’s Shaheen said while Kabul wanted good relations with Islamabad, they should be “reciprocated” and that a “blame game” is not in anyone’s interest.

“We have taken practical steps as far as it concerns us,” he said, noting that Afghanistan had started building checkpoints “along the line adjacent to Pakistan in order to prevent any one from crossing”.

“However, their internal security is the responsibility of their security forces not ours.”

China, at the trilateral talks in Beijing on Wednesday, said Kabul and Islamabad had agreed in principle to upgrade diplomatic ties and would send their respective ambassadors at the earliest.

Nevertheless, Akhtar does not expect the “core mistrust” between the two neighbours, particularly over alleged TTP sanctuaries, to “go away any time soon”.

“We should look at this shift as part of Pakistan’s broader crisis management post-India-Pak crisis rather than structural reconciliation,” Akhtar asserted.

What does Iran want from its ties with the Taliban?

Like India, Tehran refused to recognise the Taliban when it was first in power, while backing the Northern Alliance, especially after the 1998 killing of Iranian diplomats in Mazar-i-Sharif by Taliban fighters.

Iran amassed thousands of troops on its eastern border, nearly going to war with the Taliban over the incident.

Concerned about the extensive US military footprint in the region post-9/11, Iran was said to be quietly engaging with the Taliban, offering limited support in an effort to counter American influence and protect its own strategic interests.

Since the Taliban took back reins of the country nearly four years ago, Iran again showed willingness to build ties with rulers in Kabul on a number of security, humanitarian and trade-related matters, analysts say.

Shaheen, head of the Taliban’s office in Doha, said that both Iran and India previously thought the group was “under the influence of Pakistan”.

“Now they know it is not the reality. In view of this ground reality, they have adopted a new realistic and pragmatic approach, which is good for everyone,” he said.

Ibraheem Bahiss, analyst at the International Crisis Group, said the meeting between Muttaqi and Iranian President Pezeshkian doesn’t signal an “impending official recognition”. However, he said, “pragmatic considerations” have driven Iran to engage the Taliban, given its “key interests” in Afghanistan.

“Security-wise, Tehran wants allies in containing the ISIS [ISIL] local chapter. Tehran has also been seeking to expand its trade relations with Afghanistan, now being one of its major trading partners,” he told Al Jazeera.

In January 2024, twin suicide bombings in Kerman marked one of Iran’s deadliest attacks in decades, killing at least 94 people. The Islamic State Khorasan Province (ISKP), an Afghanistan-based offshoot of ISIL, claimed responsibility.

In recent years, ISKP has also emerged as a significant challenge to the Taliban’s rule, having carried out multiple high-profile attacks across Afghanistan.

Bahiss added that Tehran also needed a “willing partner” in addressing the issue of some 780,000 Afghan refugees in Iran, as well as the “transboundary water flowing from Helmand River “.

In May 2023, tensions between the two neighbours flared, leading to border clashes in which two Iranian border guards and one Taliban fighter were killed.

The violence came after former and now deceased Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi warned the Taliban not to violate a 1973 treaty by restricting the flow of water from the Helmand River to Iran’s eastern regions. Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers denied the accusation.

Two staff members from the Israeli embassy in the United States were shot and killed on Wednesday night as they left a Jewish museum in Washington, DC, prompting outrage from US and Israeli officials.

A 30-year-old man from Chicago, Illinois, named as Elias Rodriguez, has been arrested in connection with the shooting, the police said. He is the only suspect.

President Donald Trump condemned the shooting as “horrible”, stating there was no place for “hatred” in the US. Israeli President Isaac Herzog said he was “devastated” by what had unfolded in the US capital.

“This is a despicable act of hatred, of anti-Semitism, which has claimed the lives of two young employees of the Israeli embassy,” he said.

Kristi Noem, Secretary of Homeland Security, said federal authorities were investigating the attack and would bring its “depraved perpetrator” to justice.

Here is what we know so far:

What is known about the shooting?

Officers responded to multiple calls about a shooting near the Capital Jewish Museum at about 9:00pm on Wednesday (01:00 GMT Thursday).

The victims, a man and a woman, were leaving an event at the museum, which is in the area of 3rd and F streets in Northwest, Washington, DC, close to an FBI field office and the US attorney general’s office, when the suspect approached a group of four people and opened fire, Metropolitan Police Chief Pamela Smith said at a news conference.

First responders found the victims unconscious and not breathing. Despite life-saving efforts, both were pronounced dead.

According to police, the suspect entered the museum after the shooting and was detained by security personnel at the event.

“Once in handcuffs, the suspect identified where he discarded the weapon, and that weapon has been recovered, and he implied that he committed the offence,” Smith said.

What do we know about the victims?

The two were named by the Israeli embassy in Washington, DC as Yaron Lischinsky and Sarah Lynn Milgrim.

Both were members of staff. The Israeli ambassador to the US, Yechiel Leiter, told reporters the young staffers were a couple “about to be engaged”.

“The young man purchased a ring this week with the intention of proposing to his girlfriend next week in Jerusalem,” Leiter revealed.

What do we know about the suspect, Elias Rodriguez?

The suspect has been identified as 30-year-old Elias Rodriguez from Chicago, Illinois.

Reporting from close to the site of the shooting, Al Jazeera’s Heidi-Zhou Castro said the suspect was not previously on the radar of local authorities.

“He was not a known entity. There was no heightened alert prior to this happening,” she said.

What do we know about the suspect’s motive?

So far, the police have not confirmed any motive.

Speaking on Thursday, Israel’s foreign minister, Gideon Saar, blamed a “toxic anti-Semitic incitement against Israel and Jews around the world” since the Hamas-led attack on Israel in October, 2023.

When the suspect, Elias Rodriguez, was taken into custody, he began chanting: “Free, free Palestine,” Police Chief Smith said.

Mohamad Elmasry, professor of media studies at the Doha Institute for Graduate Studies, said the attacks were “awful” and were rightfully being condemned regardless of political ideology.

He said: “You have the Trump administration, Israel and some of their supporters coming out and saying that this is an act of anti-Semitism … and that could be the case, that it is just an act of naked anti-Jewish hatred, which obviously should be condemned,” Elmasry told Al Jazeera.

“But it’s also possible that Mr Rodriguez carried this act of vigilante violence out against the State of Israel, or that he’s taking out his frustrations over the genocide [in Gaza] or Israel’s apartheid policies, on these embassy staffers. That’s an important distinction, because if that’s the motive, then it requires a different course of action.”

What has been the reaction to the shooting?

“These horrible DC killings, based obviously on antisemitism, must end, NOW!” President Trump posted on social media early Thursday.

“Hatred and radicalism have no place in the USA. Condolences to the families of the victims. So sad that such things as this can happen! God bless you all!”

Israeli officials also strongly condemned the incident, describing it as a “despicable act of hatred”. Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, said after the shooting: “We are witnessing the terrible price of anti-Semitism and the wild incitement against the State of Israel.

“I have instructed to enhance security arrangements at Israeli missions around the world and to increase protection for state representatives,” Netanyahu said.

On Thursday, reactions and condolences poured in from other countries as well.

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz called the shooting a “heinous act” in a post on X, adding that at the moment “we must assume there was an anti-Semitic motive.”

Kaya Kallas, the EU foreign policy chief, said: “Shocked by the shooting of two Israeli embassy staff in Washington DC. There is and should be no place in our societies for hatred, extremism, or antisemitism. I extend my condolences to the families of the victims and the people of Israel.”

France’s foreign minister, Jean-Noel Barrot, said: “The murder of two members of the Israeli embassy near the Jewish Museum in Washington is an abhorrent act of antisemitic barbarity. Nothing can justify such violence. My thoughts go to their loved ones, their colleagues, and the State of Israel.”

In Ireland, the prime minister, Micheal Martin, said: “I strongly condemn the horrific gun attack that killed two Israeli embassy staff in Washington DC last night. My deepest sympathies go to the family and friends of the couple, and the Israeli people. There can be absolutely no place for violence or hate.”

Antonio Tajani, the Italian Foreign Minister, said: “I stand with the State of Israel for the tragic murder of two young employees of the Israeli embassy in Washington. Scenes of terror and violence to be strongly condemned. antisemitism born of hatred against Jews must be stopped, the horrors of the past can never return.”

What will happen next?

Police Chief Smith said law enforcement did not believe there was an ongoing threat to the community at present.

FBI Director Kash Patel said he and his team had been briefed on the shooting.

“While we’re working with [the Metropolitan Police Department] to respond and learn more, in the immediate, please pray for the victims and their families,” he wrote on X.

Washington, DC Mayor Muriel Bowser told reporters her administration would not tolerate “violence or hate in our city”.

“We will not tolerate any acts of terrorism, and we’re going to stand together as a community in the coming days and weeks to send a clear message that we will not tolerate anti-Semitism,” Bowser said.

The shooting comes as Israel has launched a new military campaign in Gaza to control all of the Strip, while continuing to impose an 11-week aid blockade that has been widely condemned.

Many world leaders, including allies, have demanded that Israel end the war and let aid into the war-ravaged territory or face punitive actions.

United States President Donald Trump announced on Tuesday that he has selected a $175bn design for the multilayered Golden Dome missile defence programme aimed at countering aerial threats “even if they are launched from space”.

As part of the project, the US would deploy missile interceptors in space to shield against ballistic and hypersonic threats.

Here is more about the Golden Dome project.

What did Trump announce?

Trump on Tuesday announced $25bn initial funding for the project that will cost $175bn and be completed by the end of his current term in 2029.

“Once fully constructed, the Golden Dome will be capable of intercepting missiles even if they are launched from other sides of the world, and even if they are launched from space,” Trump said.

“This is very important for the success and even survival of our country.”

Trump also announced that US Space Force General Michael Guetlein would be the lead programme manager, responsible for overseeing the project’s progress.

“I promised the American people that I would build a cutting-edge missile defence shield to protect our homeland from the threat of foreign missile attack,” said Trump.

Trump additionally announced: “Canada has called us, and they want to be a part of it. So we’ll be talking to them.”

What is the Golden Dome project?

Trump said the Golden Dome was made to take down “hypersonic missiles, ballistic missiles and advanced cruise missiles”, adding that the programme would have space-based interceptors and sensors.

Pentagon chief Pete Hegseth, speaking alongside Trump, said the system is aimed at protecting “the homeland from cruise missiles, ballistic missiles, hypersonic missiles, drones, whether they’re conventional or nuclear”.

The announcement comes just months after January 27, when Trump signed an executive order to “immediately begin the construction of a state-of-the-art Iron Dome missile defence shield, which will be able to protect Americans”.

The Iron Dome is Israel’s missile defence system which detects an incoming rocket, determines its path, and intercepts it. The development of the system was funded by a grant from the US.

Trump said existing defence capabilities will be used in the construction of the project, and predicted the total cost would be about $175bn.

The White House has not yet released further details about the project. While Trump said the system would be developed in the US, he has not named which companies will be involved.

A space-based defence system was first envisaged by Ronald Reagan, the Republican US president from 1981 to 1989. Amidst the Cold War, Reagan proposed a barrier to nuclear weapons that included space-based technology, as part of his Strategic Defense Initiative, or Star Wars project.

“We will truly be completing the job that President Reagan started 40 years ago, forever ending the missile threat to the American homeland,” Trump said on Tuesday.

Is the Golden Dome plan feasible?

Industry experts have questioned the timeline and budget of the plan.

Funding for the Golden Dome has not yet been secured. At Tuesday’s news conference, Trump confirmed that he was seeking $25bn for the system in a tax cut bill currently moving through Congress, although that sum could be cut amid ongoing negotiations.

Additionally, some variation is expected in the total cost of the project. The Associated Press quoted an unnamed government official as saying Trump had been given three versions of the plan, described as “medium,” “high”, and “extra high”. These versions correspond to the number of satellites, sensors and interceptors that will be placed in space. AP reported that Trump picked the “high” version, which has an initial cost ranging between $30bn and $100bn.

“The new data point is the $175 billion, but the question remains, over what period of time. It’s probably 10 years,” Tom Karako, a senior fellow with the Defense and Security Department at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), told the Reuters news agency.

On May 1, 42 Democratic members of the US Congress signed a letter questioning the possible involvement of Elon Musk’s SpaceX, which is among the top technology companies seeking to build key components of the Golden Dome.

“If Mr Musk were to exercise improper influence over the Golden Dome contract, it would be another example of a disturbing pattern of Mr Musk flouting conflict of interest rules,” the letter says.

How did China and Russia – the US’s biggest rivals – react?

The US sees a growing threat from China and Russia, its main adversaries.

Over the past decades, China has greatly advanced its ballistic and hypersonic missile technology, while Moscow boasts one of the most advanced intercontinental-range missile systems in the world. Russia and the US have amassed the largest arsenals of nuclear warheads worldwide.

The threat of drones has also grown amid advancements in technology.

China denounced the Golden Dome as a threat to international security and accused the US of prompting an arms race.

“The United States puts its own interests first and is obsessed with seeking its own absolute security, which violates the principle that no country’s security should come at the expense of others,” Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning said at a regular briefing.

“(The plan) heightens the risk of space becoming a battlefield, fuels an arms race, and undermines international security,” he said.

The Kremlin said the Golden Dome missile shield plan was a “sovereign matter” for the US.

“This is a sovereign matter for the United States. If the United States believes that there is a missile threat, then of course it will develop a missile defence system,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters, including AFP, on Wednesday.

“That is what all countries do,” he added.

“Of course, in the foreseeable future, the course of events will require the resumption of contacts to restore strategic stability,” he said.

South Africa’s President Cyril Ramaphosa will begin a state visit to the United States on Monday in what his government describes as an attempt to “reset” the relationship between the two countries, which many experts say has become the frostiest in decades.

The visit comes just days after the US welcomed a group of 59 white South African “refugees” who President Donald Trump claims are being persecuted in South Africa because of their race, and are facing a “genocide”. They flew to the US on a special relocation plan and will be allowed to settle there.

Ramaphosa’s government denies those allegations and says whites, who own more than 70 percent of the land despite making up just 7 percent of the population, are not discriminated against.

In a statement, Ramaphosa’s office said the two leaders would discuss “bilateral” and “global issues of interest”. The White House has not yet made a statement regarding the meeting.

This is the first time Trump will host an African leader at the White House since he took office in January. South Africa, which currently presides over the G20, will hand over leadership to the US in November.

Here’s the timeline of the anticipated meeting, as well as a breakdown of the main issues which have caused tension and are most likely to be tabled:

When is the meeting?

Ramaphosa will travel on Monday, May 19, and will meet with Trump at the White House on Wednesday, May 21.

His office did not share an agenda for the talks, but said that “the president’s visit to the US provides a platform to reset the strategic relationship between the two countries”.

The agenda is expected to include the treatment of white South Africans, aid cuts and the ongoing wars in Ukraine and Gaza.

What will Trump and Ramaphosa discuss?

The agenda is expected to include the following subjects:

Treatment of white South Africans

The issue of relations between South Africa’s historically advantaged white minority population and Ramaphosa’s Black-led government has been the most touchy one between the two governments.

White Afrikaners are descendants of mainly Dutch colonisers who, until 1990, controlled the country under an apartheid system that segregated and excluded the Black majority. Many of the most successful business leaders and farm owners in the country are still white. More than half of the Black population is categorised as poor.

Trump and his billionaire ally, South African-born Elon Musk, have severely criticised the Ramaphosa administration’s alleged poor treatment of these white people in the country, following Ramaphosa’s signing into law of an Expropriation Bill which allows the government to confiscate land, in some instances, without compensation. The law, signed in January, allows expropriation from any land owner for redistribution to marginalised groups such as women and people with disabilities.

Some Afrikaner groups say the law could allow their land to be redistributed to some of the country’s Black majority.

Trump has highlighted allegations by a group of white South Africans who fear that their land will be seized. This group also says white farmers face a disproportionate number of violent assaults, which have led to several deaths and amount to a “genocide”.

The South African government has denied that there is a genocide and says the attacks are part of a wider crime problem. Speaking at the Africa CEO forum in Abidjan in Ivory Coast on May 13, Ramaphosa said the US government “has got the wrong end of the stick”, as South Africa suffers overall from high rates of violent crime, regardless of the race of victims. Both white and Black farmers have been targeted in farm attacks, in which armed criminals have assaulted, robbed and sometimes murdered farm workers in usually remote locations.

Meanwhile, Musk, who is the founder of internet company Starlink, also blames the government for the company’s failure to launch in South Africa because of its Black empowerment laws which require that large corporations and businesses seeking government contracts be owned in part by marginalised groups such as Black people.

In a March post on his X social media platform, Musk said Starlink was not allowed to launch “because I am not black”. Officials have denied these allegations and say the country’s business laws are meant to right historical wrongs.

Tariffs and aid cuts to South Africa

Since re-entering the White House in January, Trump has implemented a triple whammy of economic policies that have hit South Africa hard.

First were the sweeping aid cuts the US announced after Trump signed an executive order pausing foreign aid to all countries for at least 90 days.

That disrupted funding for treatment and research in South Africa for deadly communicable diseases like HIV. South Africa has the largest number of people living with HIV in the world, and until then, the US provided about 18 percent of the government’s HIV budget. In 2023, the US provided $462m in HIV aid. Since January, some HIV treatment programmes have remained cut, while others have had their funding reinstated, although it’s unclear how many.

In February, Trump ordered that additional financial aid be cut specifically to South Africa over what he said was “unjust racial discrimination”, citing the alleged confiscation of white-owned land. He also cited South Africa’s filing of its genocide case against Israel over its war on Gaza at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in December 2023. Details of the further aid cuts were not made public.

Finally, South Africa has also been hit by Trump’s tariff war. The country was slapped with a 30 percent tariff on all goods in April. An additional 25 percent tariff was placed on South African-made vehicles entering the US, putting vehicle surcharges at 55 percent.

Ramaphosa described Trump’s actions as “punitive” and said the tariffs would “serve as a barrier to trade and shared prosperity”.

Although Trump paused reciprocal tariffs for most countries (including South Africa) for 90 days on April 9, South Africa’s government wants tariffs to be permanently dropped. South Africa also still faces the baseline 10 percent tariff on goods that Trump has imposed on all countries.

The US is South Africa’s second-largest bilateral trading partner after China. Under the duty-free Africa Growth Opportunity Act introduced in 2000, South Africa sells precious stones, steel products and cars to the US, and buys crude oil, electrical goods and aircraft in return.

The AGOA framework, which includes 32 African countries, is up for renewal this year, but it’s unclear if Trump’s White House will follow through with it.

Israel-Gaza ICJ case and Gaza War

The South African government filed its genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) on December 29, 2023, accusing it of “genocidal acts” during its assaults on Gaza, to the anger of Israel’s ally and major weapons supplier, the US.

The landmark case highlighted the African country’s vocal and visible support for the Palestinian cause and was the first court case against Israel in the ongoing war in Gaza. Hearings began in January 2024. In March 2024, the ICJ issued an emergency order that Israel ensure food aid deliveries into Gaza and cease its offensive in Rafah.

Both Joe Biden’s and Trump’s administrations in the US have opposed South Africa’s move, with Trump denouncing Pretoria’s “aggressiveness”. On February 7, Donald Trump signed an executive order pausing aid to the country. The order cited the ICJ case, the Afrikaner issue and South Africa’s alleged collaboration with Iran to develop nuclear weapons.

South Africa, meanwhile, has promised not to withdraw its case despite this backlash. Foreign minister Ronald Lamola told The Financial Times in February that there was “no chance” the country would back down.

“Standing by our principles sometimes has consequences, but we remain firm that this is important for the world and the rule of law,” he said.

Ukraine-Russia War

Trump and Ramaphosa are also expected to discuss peace and mediation efforts in the Ukraine-Russia war as representatives of the two countries hold talks for the first time since the war began in February 2022.

The Trump administration has taken a lead role in mediating between Russia and Ukraine. During his election campaign, Trump promised to negotiate an end to the war “within 24 hours” if elected. Much of that effort, seen by some as aggressive, has fallen flat, however. A state visit to the US by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy ended with Trump and his deputy, JD Vance, shouting at their guest in February this year.

South Africa, meanwhile, has opted to stay neutral in the conflict and has called for dialogue between the sides. The country is a historical ally of Russia because of the former Soviet Union’s support during apartheid. Both are also founding members of the growing BRICS alliance of economies, alongside India, Brazil and China, which some see as a rival to the G5 group of richest countries.

South Africa has not condemned Russia or Putin for the invasion of Ukraine, and has abstained from a United Nations resolution that did so.

At the same time, Pretoria has remained friendly with Ukraine. In April, Ramaphosa hosted Zelenskyy during a state visit during which they discussed increasing trade and the ongoing war, with the Ukrainian leader calling for more pressure on Moscow.

Hours before Zelenskyy met with Ramaphosa, the South African leader said he spoke over the phone with Trump, and they both agreed that the war needed to stop.

Poland will hold the first round of voting in its presidential election on Sunday.

This is a hotly contested race between two main candidates – one from Civic Platform, the lead party in the ruling Civic Coalition, and the other an independent backed by the main opposition party, Law and Justice (PiS).

While much of the power rests with the prime minister and parliament in Poland, the president is able to veto legislation and has influence over military and foreign policy decisions. The current president, Andrzej Duda, who is from PiS, has used his veto to block reforms to the justice system that the government has been trying to enact for some time.

Furthermore, reports of foreign election interference have recently spooked voters who are primarily concerned with issues such as the Russia-Ukraine war, immigration, abortion rights and the economy.

Here is all we know about the upcoming vote:

How does voting work?

Polish citizens aged 18 or older can vote. There are about 29 million eligible voters. On Sunday, they will select a single candidate from a list of registered presidential candidates. If a candidate wins at least 50 percent of the vote, they win the election. If all candidates fall short of the 50 percent threshold, the country will vote in a second round for the two top contenders from the first round on June 1. The winner of that contest will become president. The election is expected to go to a second round.

Presidents may serve a maximum of two five-year terms in Poland. The current president reaches the end of his second term on August 6.

What time do polls open and close in Poland?

On May 18, polls will open at 7am (05:00 GMT) and close at 9pm (19:00 GMT).

What’s at stake?

In 2023, current Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s Civic Coalition ascended to power, ending eight years of rule by the PiS party’s government.

While Tusk promised to reverse unpopular judicial reforms enacted by PiS, President Andrzej Duda, a former nationalist ally of the party, has hampered Tusk’s efforts by using his presidential power to veto legislation.

What are the key issues?

Key issues dominating this election include the Russia-Ukraine war.

When the war first broke out in February 2022, Poland threw its full support behind Ukraine, welcoming more than one million Ukrainian refugees who crossed the border without documents.

On May 10, Tusk, alongside other European leaders, visited Kyiv and gave Russian President Vladimir Putin an ultimatum to enact an unconditional 30-day ceasefire in Ukraine.

However, relations between Poland and Ukraine have grown tense. Earlier this year, Polish farmers led protests, arguing the market had been flooded with cheap agricultural products from Ukraine.

There are also emerging reports of Ukrainian refugees facing discrimination in Poland, as well as resentment about welfare provided to them.

There have been growing fears of a spillover of Russian aggression to Poland due to its proximity to Ukraine. On May 12, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Warsaw said an investigation had revealed that Moscow’s intelligence agencies had orchestrated a massive fire at a shopping centre in Warsaw in May 2024.

Several candidates for the presidential election have proposed raising the defence budget to 5 percent of GDP.

Poles also have economic concerns about taxes, housing costs and the state of public transport.

Abortion is a key issue in Poland. Poland has some of the strictest abortion laws in Europe. Women are only allowed to have abortions in cases of rape or incest or if their life or health are at risk.

In August 2024, Tusk acknowledged that he did not have enough backing from parliament to deliver on one of his key campaign promises and change the abortion law.

Opinion is also split on whether LGBTQ rights should be restricted or expanded in the country.

The country is also divided over how involved it should be with the European Union (EU), with the PiS taking the stance that the country would be better off forming an alliance with the United States than the EU.

Who is running?

A total of 13 candidates are vying for the presidency. The top four candidates are:

Rafal Trzaskowski

Trzaskowski, 53, has been the liberal mayor of Warsaw since 2018 and is an ally of Tusk, affiliated with the PM’s political alliance, Civic Coalition. He is also a senior member of the Civic Platform party (PO), which heads the Civic Coalition. Trzaskowski was narrowly defeated by Duda in the 2020 presidential election.

During his time as mayor, he was lauded for investing in Warsaw’s infrastructure and culture. He proposes to increase defence spending to 5 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) and to develop Poland’s arms and technology industry.

Trzaskowski has liberal views. He is pro-Europe and one of his campaign promises includes strengthening Poland’s position in the EU. Another one of his pledges is to relax abortion laws, however, he has been quiet on this issue during the run-up to the presidential election. He has also been supportive of the LGBTQ community and has attended pride parades. This could alienate some more conservative voters who live outside urban centres.

For this reason, right-wing voters may vote against him in the second round of voting. Trzaskowski could also lose support from centrist and progressive voters, who are frustrated by Tusk’s inability to bring reform to abortion laws.

Karol Nawrocki

Nawrocki, 42, is a conservative historian standing as an independent candidate backed by the PiS party.

His academic work has been centred around anti-communist resistance. He currently administers the Institute of National Remembrance, where his removal of Soviet memorials has angered Russia. He administered the Museum of the Second World War in northern Poland from 2017 to 2021.

His campaign promises include lowering taxes and pulling Poland out of the EU’s Migration Pact and Green Deal. He also wishes to allocate 5 percent of GDP to defence. Nawrocki is critical of giving more rights to LGBTQ couples.

Nawrocki has had a fair share of controversies in the past. In 2018, he published a book about a notorious gangster under the pseudonym “Tadeusz Batyr”. In public comments, Nawrocki and Batyr praised each other, without revealing they were the same person.

Slawomir Mentzen

Mentzen, 38, is a far-right entrepreneur who leads the New Hope party, a member of the Confederation coalition. He has degrees in economics and physics; owns a brewery in Torun; runs a tax advisory firm; and is critical of government regulation, wishing for significant tax cuts.

Mentzen has used social media platforms to connect with younger voters.

He believes that Poland should not take sides in the Russia-Ukraine war. He wants to ensure the Polish constitution overrides EU laws and wishes to withdraw from the EU Green Deal. He opposes LGBTQ rights and opposes abortion, even in cases of rape.

Ahead of the 2019 election for the European Parliament, he said: “We don’t want Jews, homosexuals, abortion, taxes or the European Union.” Since then, he has tried to distance himself from this statement.

While Poland offers free higher education, Mentzen dropped in opinion polls after he advocated for tuition fees in state schools in late March.

Szymon Holownia

Holownia, 48, is a former journalist and television personality-turned-politician. He is the speaker, or marshal, of the lower house of parliament, the Sejm.

In 2020, he founded a centrist movement called Polska 2050, which burgeoned into a party and ended up joining Tusk’s coalition.

Holownia wishes to promote regional development alongside better access to affordable housing and improving the public transport system. He says he wants to reduce bureaucracy, support Polish businesses and develop Poland’s domestic arms production capabilities.

Other candidates

Three leftist candidates are also running the election including Deputy Senate Speaker Magdalena Biejat, 43, an advocate for women’s rights, minority rights, affordable housing and abortion access; Adrian Zandberg, 45, who has made similar promises to Biejat; and academic and lawmaker Joanna Senyszyn, a former member of the Polish United Workers’ Party.

Other candidates include far-right Grzegorz Braun, who was pilloried globally for using a fire extinguisher to put out Hanukkah candles in parliament in 2023, and journalist and YouTuber Krzysztof Stanowski, 42, who does not have a political programme and wants to show Poles behind the scenes of the campaign while raising money for charity.

What do the opinion polls say?

As of May 12, Trzaskowski was in the lead with the support of 31 percent of voters, according to Politico’s polling aggregate. Nawrocki was in second place with 25 percent, while Mentzen had 13 percent and Holownia had 7 percent.

When will we know the results?

As soon as polls close, Ipsos will release an exit poll based on surveys undertaken at 500 randomly selected polling stations. While this is not the official result, it is expected to be highly indicative of which way the vote is going. Partial results may start to emerge on Sunday night or Monday.

In Poland, voting always takes place on a Sunday. In 2020, the official results for the first round of voting were confirmed on Tuesday morning.

What is the election interference controversy about?

On Wednesday, Poland said it had uncovered a possible election interference attempt via advertisements on Facebook.

“The NASK Disinformation Analysis Center has identified political ads on the Facebook platform that may be financed from abroad. The materials were displayed in Poland,” according to a statement by NASK, which is Poland’s national research institute dealing with cybersecurity. “The advertising accounts involved in the campaign spent more on political materials in the last seven days than any election committee.”

The NASK statement did not specify which countries’ financial backers of the campaign were believed to be based in. Fears of Russian election interference are high in Europe after Romania declared a do-over of its November presidential election after reports emerged of alleged Russian election interference. The first round of the repeat election took place on May 4, with the second round due to happen on May 18. This was after far-right politician Calin Georgescu, who was polling in single digits during the campaign, surprisingly emerged victorious.

A 23-year-old Mexican influencer, Valeria Marquez, was fatally shot while livestreaming on Tuesday.

Marquez, who had more than 113,000 followers on the platform, was broadcasting to her audience when the attack occurred.

According to a statement from the Jalisco state prosecutor’s office, the case is being investigated under femicide protocols, applied in instances where a woman is killed due to her gender.

What is femicide?

Femicide refers to gender-related killings against women and girls. According to the latest report from the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and UN Women, femicide is rising around the globe.

In 2023, a woman was intentionally killed every 10 minutes by a partner or family member.

Of the 85,000 women and girls killed across the world in 2023, 60 percent (51,000) were murdered by an intimate partner or a family member.

How common is femicide in Latin America and the Caribbean?

Honduras has the highest femicide rate with 7.2 women killed per 100,000 in 2023, followed by the Dominican Republic (2.4 per 100,000) and Brazil (1.4 per 100,000).

Mexico has the fourth-highest femicide rate in Latin America and the Caribbean, alongside Paraguay, Uruguay and Bolivia – all with 1.3 killings per 100,000 women in 2023.

In terms of absolute killings, Brazil saw the highest number of femicide cases with 1,463 women murdered. It was followed by Mexico, where 852 women were killed as a result of femicide in 2023. Honduras had the third-highest number, with 380 femicide cases.

Femicide is on the rise in Mexico

The rate of femicide is rising on the whole in the country, despite some fluctuations over the years.

It has become a major concern in Mexico with recorded cases rising significantly over the past decade. In 2015, femicides represented 19.8 percent of female homicides. This proportion had increased to 24.2 percent by 2024.

According to the UN Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (UNCLAC), in 2015, the rate of femicide in Mexico was 0.7 women per 100,000. In 2023, that number now stands at 1.3 per 100,000 women – though that’s down marginally from a peak of 1.6 per 100,000 in 2021. Gender-based violence against women grew globally during the COVID-19 pandemic, and Mexico was no exception.

While statistics from UNCLAC show the rate of femicide in Mexico has declined over the past three years, it remains a pronounced and often silent issue due to underreporting, say experts.

In Mexico, some 85 percent of women aged 15 and over who have experienced physical or sexual violence did not file a complaint, according to Mexico’s National Survey on the Dynamics of Household Relationships.

Where in Mexico has the worst rates of femicide?

The killing of Marquez took place just days before another woman, a mayoral candidate in the state of Veracruz, was also shot dead during a livestream alongside three other people.

According to Mexico’s National Public Security System (SNSP), the national rate of femicide was 1.18 per 100,000 in 2024.

The state of Morelos, in south-central Mexico, had the highest rate of femicide with 4.7 women per 100,000 murdered, followed by Chihuahua (2.35 per 100,000) and Tabasco (2.22 per 100,000).

In Jalisco state where Marquez was killed, the femicide rate was 0.63 per 100,000 in 2024.

Jalisco is ranked sixth out of Mexico’s 32 states, including Mexico City, for homicides, with 906 recorded there since the beginning of President Claudia Sheinbaum’s term in October 2024, according to the data consultancy TResearch.

Half a million people in the Gaza Strip, or one in five Palestinians, are facing starvation.

The entire rest of the population is suffering from high levels of acute food insecurity, according to a recent report by the UN’s Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC).

“The risk of famine in the Gaza Strip is not just possible – it is increasingly likely,” the IPC says.

For more than 73 days, Israel has blocked all food, water, and medicine from entering Gaza, creating a man-made crisis, with the IPC warning that famine could be declared any time between now and September.

What is famine and when is it reached?

Famine is the worst level of hunger, where people face severe food shortages, widespread malnutrition, and high levels of death due to starvation.

According to the UN’s criteria, famine is declared when:

• At least 20 percent (one-fifth) of households face extreme food shortages
• More than 30 percent of children suffer from acute malnutrition
• At least two out of every 10,000 people or four out of every 10,000 children die each day from starvation or hunger-related causes.

Famine is not just about hunger; it is the worst humanitarian emergency, indicating a complete collapse of access to food, water and the systems necessary for survival.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), since Israel’s complete blockade began on March 2, at least 57 children have died from the effects of malnutrition.

What does starvation do to the body?

Israel is using starvation as a weapon of war. A report released by Doctors of the World (Medecins du Monde) this week states that in just 18 months, acute malnutrition in Gaza has risen to levels similar to those found in countries enduring protracted humanitarian crises spanning several decades.

Starvation is when the human body is deprived of food for so long that it suffers and often dies.

Estimates say the body can last up to three weeks without food, but the length of time varies between individuals.

Starvation occurs over three stages. The first begins as early as when a meal is skipped, the second occurs with a prolonged period of fasting where the body uses stored fat for energy.

The third, and often fatal, stage is when all stored fats have been depleted and the body turns to bone and muscle as sources of energy.

The effect on children

Children are most vulnerable to Israel’s continued blockade of essential food items.

More than 9,000 children have been admitted to hospital for treatment for acute malnutrition since the start of the year, according to the United Nations.

The IPC projects that between now and March 2026, nearly 71,000 children under the age of five will suffer from acute malnutrition, including 14,100 children facing severe cases of malnutrition.

The effect of malnutrition on children varies, but the first 1,000 days of a child’s life, which includes the pregnancy up to two years, are critical for a child’s healthy development.

Malnutrition leads to an out-of-proportion height-to-weight ratio, stunted growth and eventually, death.

Earlier this month, at Kamal Adwan Hospital in Beit Lahiya, in northern Gaza, Dr Ahmed Abu Nasir said the situation has become worse than ever due to the blockade.

“Children are in their growing stage and badly need certain nutrients, including proteins and fats,” the paediatrician told Al Jazeera. “These are not available in the Gaza Strip, particularly in the north.”

Pregnant and breastfeeding women will also need to be treated for malnutrition, with 17,000 women facing this risk.

‘Finding a single meal has become an impossible quest’

The entire population of Gaza, about 2.1 million people that remain, are facing levels of food shortages that threaten their existence.

Earlier this month, Ahmad al-Najjar, a displaced Palestinian in Gaza City, told Al Jazeera, “Finding a single meal has become an impossible quest.”

Despite large numbers of trucks carrying vital supplies piling up on the border between Egypt and the Gaza Strip, Palestinians in Gaza have resorted to selling rubbish to afford the eye-wateringly inflated food prices.

Some 93 percent of Gaza’s population is at risk of levels of food insecurity above the crisis levels indicated by the IPC. If the situation does not change, the IPC has indicated that of those 2.1 million people:

• 470,000 people (22 percent of the population) will face catastrophic levels of food insecurity – the most severe phase, which indicates famine, leading to starvation and death.
• More than one million (54 percent) will face emergency levels of food insecurity, the second most severe phase where there is a high risk of critical malnutrition.
• 500,000 people (24 percent) will face crisis levels of food insecurity, the third most severe IPC phase where households are dealing with inconsistent food consumption to the point of resorting to extreme measures to secure food.

In essence, in as little as a month, Gaza’s entire population could be starving.

The features of malnutrition and starvation are unmistakable in Gaza, with severely underweight children and babies. In children, severe protein deficiency causes fluid retention and a swollen abdomen.

Where in Gaza is most at risk?

Food insecurity across the Gaza Strip is severely affecting all areas of the blockaded enclave.

All 25 bakeries supported by the World Food Programme (WFP) closed at the beginning of April due to the lack of supplies, and food stocks for most of the 177 hot meal kitchens are reportedly exhausted.

Certain governorates are experiencing more severe levels of hunger. According to the IPC:

• 30 percent of North Gaza is facing catastrophic levels of food insecurity, 60 percent are facing emergency levels, while 10 percent are facing crisis levels.
• 25 percent of Rafah is facing catastrophic levels of food insecurity, 60 percent are facing emergency levels and 15 percent are facing crisis levels.

The IPC says Israel’s continued blockade “would likely result in further mass displacement within and across governorates”, as items essential for people’s survival will be depleted.

Brussels is drawing up plans to use trade tariffs and capital controls to maintain financial pressure on Russia, even if Hungary decides to use its veto to block an extension of the European Union’s sanctions regime, which lapses in July of this year.

The European Commission has told ministers that a large part of the EU’s sanctions, which included freezing 200 billion euros ($224bn) of Russian assets, could be adapted to a new legal framework to bypass Budapest’s veto, according to the United Kingdom’s Financial Times newspaper.

Viktor Orban, Hungary’s prime minister, has repeatedly held up EU boycotts on Moscow as the central European country gets 85 percent of its natural gas from Russia. Orban’s nationalist government is also one of the most friendly to Moscow in all of Europe.

In any event, the EU’s recent proposals have emerged as Moscow and Kyiv hold their first direct peace talks since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

Ukrainian and Russian representatives are convening today in Istanbul, Turkiye. However, Vladimir Putin will not travel to Istanbul for face-to-face talks with Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

Last weekend, European leaders held talks in Ukraine to put pressure on Russia to agree to a 30-day ceasefire in the run-up to the Istanbul talks. Ukraine agreed to it. Russia did not.

What sanctions does the EU currently have in place against Russia?

The EU adopted its 17th sanctions package against Moscow, designed to stifle Russia’s economy and force President Vladimir Putin to end the war in Ukraine, on Wednesday. This package has been signed off by Budapest and will be formally ratified by the European Commission next week.

Brussels has progressively expanded sanctions against Moscow since 2022, introducing import bans on Russian oil, a price cap on Russian fuel and the freezing of Russian central bank assets held in European financial institutions.

Vast swaths of Russia’s economy – from media organisations to aviation and telecommunications – are now under EU restrictions, in addition to trade bans and measures targeting oligarchs and politicians.

Under the 17th package, some 200 “shadow fleet” tankers have been sanctioned. These are ships with opaque ownership and no Western ties in terms of finance or insurance, allowing them to bypass financial sanctions.

The latest sanctions will also target Chinese and Turkish entities that the EU says are helping Russia to evade embargoes. New restrictions will be imposed on 30 companies involved in the trade of dual-use goods – products with potential military applications.

“Russia has found ways to circumvent the blockage imposed by Europe and the United States, so closing the tap would grab Russia by the throat,” France’s foreign minister, Jean-Noel Barrot, told BFM TV.

How effective are sanctions?

Alongside military support for Kyiv, sanctions have been the EU’s main response to Russia’s war on Ukraine. But sanctions have so far failed to stop the war. What’s more, due to high oil prices and elevated military spending, Russia’s economy has outperformed expectations since the start of 2022.

Barrot acknowledged on Wednesday that the impact of sanctions has been insufficient. “We will need to go further because the sanctions so far have not dissuaded Vladimir Putin from continuing his war of aggression … we must prepare to expand devastating sanctions that could suffocate, once and for all, Russia’s economy,” said Barrot.

What new measures are being proposed?

While the 17th round of sanctions was only agreed on Wednesday, EU ministers are already considering what more might be done to undermine Putin’s political clout if the war in Ukraine persists.

Capital controls, which would be aimed at restricting money flowing in and out of Russia, and trade measures such as tariffs, are two options that have been mentioned by the European Commission in recent weeks. Capital controls can take a variety of forms, including restrictions on foreign investment, limiting currency exchange or imposing taxes on the movement of capital.

The commission also aims to share proposals next month that would allow Brussels to implement a ban on new Russian gas spot market contracts – deals for immediate delivery and payment – with European companies in 2025, and a total phase-out by 2027.

Despite oil export restrictions, Russia still earns billions of euros from natural gas sales into the EU through liquefied natural gas (LNG) and TurkStream (a pipeline connecting Russia to southeastern Europe via the Black Sea). Banning spot market contracts would lower Moscow’s revenue from these sources.

Brussels may also propose tariffs on enriched uranium as part of its effort to cut EU reliance on Russian fuels.

According to The Financial Times, the EU insists that these measures would not amount to sanctions and therefore would not need the unanimous backing of all 27 EU countries, which is normally required to extend sanctions.

“I think the EU cooked up these potential punishments to try and get Russia to agree to the 30-day ceasefire … it was the stick they were brandishing,” said an analyst familiar with the matter who asked not to be named.

Will the US impose more sanctions?

It may. On May 1, Senator Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican, said he had the commitment of 72 colleagues for a bill that would enact “bone-crushing” sanctions on Russia.

Graham, a close ally of President Donald Trump, is spearheading a draft bill that seeks to impose a 500 percent tariff on imports from countries that buy Russian oil and fossil fuels.

Trump himself, who seemingly welcomes the possibility of a rapprochement with Russia, said in March that he was “considering” imposing sanctions and tariffs on Russia until a peace agreement is reached with Ukraine.

Could such measures force Putin to the negotiating table?

“Most Russian people want life to return to normal and business owners are getting tired of war-related costs,” the anonymous analyst told Al Jazeera. “There is a growing sense of unease.”

She said she doubted whether the EU’s touted measures would bring Putin any closer to signing a peace agreement, however. “Only because sanctions haven’t been able to do that,” she said, “and there’s already a maze of them.”

According to Castellum.AI, a global risk platform, Russia has been slapped with 21,692 sanctions since the start of the war – the majority of them against individuals.

“On past performance, it’s hard to see how even more sanctions and additional punishments will stop the fighting,” the analyst said.

She estimated a 60 percent chance that Russia and Ukraine would still be at war by the end of this year.

The Trump administration says it has accepted an airplane worth an estimated $400 million from the state of Qatar. While Trump is president, the White House says it would be used as the new Air Force One, then it would go to Trump’s presidential library after his term ends.

The aircraft would become the most expensive gift from a foreign government ever to a US elected official, ABC News reported. But some members of Congress say accepting it would be unconstitutional.

When asked about the potential gift at a May 12 executive order signing, Trump blamed Boeing’s lack of progress in building a new Air Force One. He said he would be “stupid” to refuse a free airplane, and said he won’t use it after he leaves office. “It’s not a gift to me, it’s a gift to the Department of Defense,” he said.

What do experts say?

Legal experts told PolitiFact they believe accepting the gift would violate the US Constitution’s emoluments clause, which reads, “No Person holding any Office of Profit or Trust under them, shall, without the Consent of the Congress, accept of any present, Emolument, Office, or Title, of any kind whatever, from any King, Prince, or foreign State.”

The emoluments clause was designed “to prevent foreign nations from gaining improper influence” over US leaders, said David Forte, Cleveland State University emeritus law professor.

Experts differed on whether accepting the plane would be an impeachable offense.

Michael Gerhardt, a University of North Carolina law professor, said that if Trump accepts the gift, it could be an impeachable deed, because it would amount to “a fully corrupt act.”

Forte, however, said the gift wouldn’t necessarily amount to a bribe or an impeachable offense, but it “is a form of influence buying designed to gain the gratitude of the recipient by playing to his vanity.”

Is this the first time Trump is facing such accusations?

During Trump’s first term, Congressional Democrats, private individuals and attorneys general from Maryland and Washington, DC, filed lawsuits against Trump stemming from the emoluments clause.

However, many of the cases were dismissed on procedural grounds, and the US Supreme Court did not rule on the transactions’ underlying constitutionality.

Trump’s possible acceptance of the aircraft is different, said Frank Bowman, a University of Missouri emeritus law professor.

In his first term, Trump said payments were made to his businesses. This time, there would be no connection to Trump’s businesses. It would be a gift offered for free with no promise of payment from the president or the US Treasury, Bowman said.

NBC News, citing an anonymous senior Justice Department official, reported that Attorney General Pam Bondi approved a memo prepared by the agency’s Office of Legal Counsel that deemed it was legal for the Defense Department to accept the gift. Bondi has previously lobbied on behalf of the state of Qatar.

Trump, on his part, has thanked Qatar for the jet.

“If we can get a 747 as a contribution to our Defense Department, during a couple of years whole they’re [Boeing is] building the other one, I think that’s a very nice gesture [from Qatar],” he said on May 12.

Can the emoluments clause be enforced against Trump?

Legal experts said it’s unlikely that Congress, controlled by Republicans, will stop Trump from accepting the gift.

Meghan Faulkner, communications director for Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, DC, said that since it appears the Justice Department has signed off on receiving the gift, it “could make it harder to hold him accountable”.

Bowman said the Justice Department, according to longstanding policy, wouldn’t prosecute a sitting president.

Faulkner said Trump stands to benefit again after running out the clock on emoluments challenges during his first term. “Enforcing the Emoluments Clause in the courts would face similar challenges (in his second term), including the challenge of finding a plaintiff who has standing to challenge the violations,” she said.

What happened in Palestine in 1948?

Every year on May 15, Palestinians around the world mark the Nakba, or catastrophe, referring to the ethnic cleansing of Palestine in 1948.

Having secured the support of the British government for the creation of a Jewish state in Palestine, on May 14, 1948, as soon as the British Mandate expired, Zionist forces declared the establishment of the State of Israel, triggering the first Arab-Israeli war.

Zionist military forces expelled at least 750,000 Palestinians from their homes and lands and captured 78 percent of historic Palestine. The remaining 22 percent was divided into what are now the occupied West Bank and the besieged Gaza Strip.

The fighting continued until January 1949 when an armistice agreement between Israel and Egypt, Lebanon, Jordan and Syria was forged. The 1949 Armistice Line is also known as the Green Line and is the generally recognised boundary between Israel and the West Bank. The Green Line is also referred to as the (pre-) 1967 borders, before Israel occupied the rest of Palestine during the 1967 war.

Israel’s military occupation of Palestine remains at the core of this decades-long conflict that continues to shape every part of Palestinians’ lives.

Mapping the Palestinian villages Israel destroyed

Between 1947 and 1949, Zionist military forces attacked major Palestinian cities and destroyed some 530 villages. About 15,000 Palestinians were killed in a series of mass atrocities, including dozens of massacres.

On April 9, 1948, Zionist forces committed one of the most infamous massacres of the war in the village of Deir Yassin on the western outskirts of Jerusalem. More than 110 men, women and children were killed by members of the pre-Israeli state Irgun and Stern Gang Zionist paramilitary organisations.

Palestinian researcher Salman Abu Sitta documented detailed records of what happened to these 530 villages in his book, The Atlas of Palestine.

Where are Palestinian refugees today?

Some six million registered Palestinian refugees live in at least 58 camps located throughout Palestine and neighbouring countries.

The UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) provides assistance and operates hundreds of schools and health facilities for at least 2.3 million Palestinian refugees in Jordan, 1.5 million refugees in Gaza, 870,000 refugees in the occupied West Bank, 570,000 refugees in Syria and 480,000 refugees in Lebanon.

The largest camps in each are Baqa’a in Jordan, Jabalia in Gaza, Jenin in the occupied West Bank, Yarmouk in Syria, and Ein el-Hilweh in Lebanon.

More than 70 percent of Gaza’s residents are refugees. About 1.5 million refugees live in eight refugee camps around the Gaza Strip.

According to international law, refugees have the right to return to their homes and property from which they have been displaced. Many Palestinians still hope to return to Palestine.

The plight of Palestinian refugees is the longest unresolved refugee problem in the world.

United States President Donald Trump has announced that US sanctions on Syria will be lifted, in a huge boost to the government in Tehran, which took power after the overthrow of longtime leader Bashar al-Assad in December.

“There’s a new government that will hopefully succeed in stabilising the country and keeping peace,” Trump said in Saudi Arabia on Tuesday, the first of a three-day visit to the Middle East, including Qatar and the United Arab Emirates. “I will be ordering the cessation of sanctions against Syria in order to give them a chance at greatness.”

Trump is also expected to meet Syria’s president, Ahmed al-Sharaa, in Riyadh on Wednesday, in a further signal to the world that the international isolation of Syria should end.

In Syria, the news has been met with celebrations in the capital, Damascus, and elsewhere. There is hope the move will help turn around the country’s economy after more than a decade of war.

Let’s take a closer look.

What sanctions had been placed on Syria?

The US was just one of many countries that had placed sanctions on Syria during the former al-Assad regime, which governed the country from 1971 to 2024.

The US sanctions were wide-ranging. The US initially designated Syria a “State Sponsor of Terrorism” in 1979, which led to an arms embargo and financial restrictions, including on foreign assistance.

Further sanctions were imposed in 2004, including more arms export restrictions and limits on Syria’s economic interactions with the US.

After the war in Syria began in 2011, and al-Assad’s regime started attacking civilian antigovernment protesters, numerous other wide-ranging sanctions were imposed on Syria and regime-linked individuals. This included a freeze on Syrian government assets held abroad, a ban on US investments in Syria and restrictions on petroleum imports.

The US had also announced a $10m reward for the capture of Syria’s current leader, al-Sharaa, and listed Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, the organisation he ran before its dissolution with the fall of al-Assad, as a “Foreign Terrorist Organization”.

Why was Syria under sanctions?

The main tranche of sanctions was imposed during the early years of Syria’s war, when the US was supporting the country’s opposition and attempting to isolate the al-Assad regime, pointing to its human rights abuses, including the use of chemical weapons.

The “terrorist” designation placed on Hayat Tahrir al-Sham was a result of its former association with al-Qaeda. This was one of the reasons there has been international wariness to remove sanctions on Syria even after the fall of al-Assad.

Why are they being lifted now?

Al-Sharaa has slowly been gaining international legitimacy for his government since it came to power in December. The US had already removed the reward for his capture, and the Syrian president has been able to travel internationally and meet world leaders, including in Saudi Arabia and France.

The new Syrian government has made a concerted effort to present itself as a moderate force that could be acceptable to the international community, including by distancing itself from designated “terrorist” groups, promising to cooperate with other countries on “counterterrorism” efforts and making statements supporting minority rights. The latter has been particularly important in light of sectarian fighting involving pro-government forces and minority groups after the fall of al-Assad.

The Reuters news agency also reported this week that Syria has attempted to convince the US that it is not a threat but a potential partner, including by saying it was engaged in indirect talks with Israel to deescalate tensions with the US’s Middle eastern ally – despite Israel’s bombing of Syria and occupation of its territory. There had also been talk of US-Syria business deals, even including a Trump Tower in Damascus.

Trump on Tuesday said that his decision to end the sanctions came after discussions with Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

“Oh, what I do for the crown prince!” he said.

Speaking to Al Jazeera, Omar Rahman, a fellow at the Middle East Council on Global Affairs, said that US relationships with Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the UAE – all countries that had been pushing for an end to sanctions and support for the new Syrian government – had been an integral part of Trump’s decision.

“This wasn’t something that was too difficult for Trump to do,” Rahman said. “He didn’t need to get permission from anybody. He didn’t even need consent from Congress.”

Will investment now pour into Syria?

Because of the central role the US plays in the global financial system, the lifting of sanctions is a signal to the world that it can do business in Syria.

The sanctions had been economically debilitating for Syria, and presented a huge impediment for the new government, which is under pressure to improve living standards in a country where unemployment and poverty levels are high, and electricity blackouts are common.

Whether the US itself invests in Syria remains to be seen, but increased Arab and Turkish investment is likely.

“[The removal of sanctions] takes away a key obstacle in [Syria’s] ability to establish some kind of economic development, economic prosperity,” Rahman told Al Jazeera. “But there are plenty of other obstacles and challenges the country is facing.”

EXPLAINER

Evidence shows Jeffries’s statement that about 20 percent of veteran households rely on food stamps is mostly false.

The leader of the Democrats in the United States House of Representatives, Hakeem Jeffries, has slammed House Republicans for considering cuts to federal safety net programmes, pointing out that they would impact veterans.

“About 20 percent of households with veterans rely upon supplemental nutritional food assistance,” the representative for New York’s 8th Congressional District said on Thursday, referring to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), sometimes called food stamps.

Jeffries’s statement followed news reports that House Republicans are pushing to limit future SNAP benefit increases, add additional work requirements and shift some SNAP costs – which historically have been entirely paid by the federal government – to states.

Jeffries cited an inaccurate figure. The share of veterans relying on SNAP benefits is about 8 percent, according to an April 2 report from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a liberal think tank.

Jeffries’s office did not provide evidence to back up his statement.

The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities report cited Department of Agriculture data showing that 11 percent of veterans aged 18 to 64 nationwide experienced food insecurity from 2015 to 2019. The department defined food insecurity as “limited or uncertain access to enough food” because of a lack of economic resources. The department found that veterans were 7 percent more likely than nonveterans to experience food insecurity after controlling for a range of socioeconomic and demographic characteristics.

The centre’s report used US Census Bureau data from 2021 to 2023 to estimate the number of veterans living in households that received any SNAP benefits during the 12 months before being surveyed.

The report estimated that more than 1.2 million veterans lived in households receiving SNAP benefits, which is 8 percent of the total population of 16.2 million US veterans during that period.

Luis Nunez, a research analyst with the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities and author of its report, said the 8 percent covers all veterans whether they live alone or with others.

The highest percentage of veterans on food stamps in any state was 14 percent in Oregon, followed by 11 percent in Louisiana, New Mexico and West Virginia.

Nationally, 8% of veterans receive food stamps; no state is higher than 14%

Data from a few years earlier showed lower percentages than the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities report.

The Rand Corporation think tank studied data from 2015 to 2020 and found 4.9 percent of veterans nationwide lived in households receiving SNAP benefits at some point in the previous 12 months. A 2022 Government Accountability Office report found 6.5 percent of all veterans received SNAP benefits in 2019. And the Agriculture Department found that in 2018 and 2019, the average was 6.6 percent.

Our ruling

Jeffries said, “About 20 percent of households with veterans rely upon” the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.

An April 2 study found that 8 percent of veterans in the US rely on SNAP benefits. No state had a share higher than 14 percent.

Studies with data from a few years earlier show rates from 4.9 percent to 6.6 percent.

There’s an element of truth that veterans face food insecurity at a higher level than nonveterans. But the statement ignores critical facts that would give a different impression. So we rate the statement mostly false.