Nations

Iran has mounted attacks on Gulf states and declared the Strait of Hormuz closed after the United States conducted its third round of strikes in a week, in a serious escalation as the ongoing conflict spirals.

Tehran on Sunday claimed attacks on Bahrain, Kuwait, Jordan, Qatar and Oman, calling them its response to renewed US bombings on cities along its southern coast.

The widescale US strikes came after Iran shut the Strait of Hormuz — a critical waterway and one of the biggest flashpoints in the conflict — accusing Washington of violating a memorandum of understanding (MoU) signed between the two sides last month.

So, where is the conflict headed? Here is everything we know.

Why has Iran attacked Gulf states and closed Hormuz?

Iran launched missile and drone attacks targeting US military bases and facilities in several Gulf states, while the US Central Command (CENTCOM) carried out a third round of strikes targeting radar, missile, and drone sites across southern Iran last week.

The US attacks came after Iran opened fire on commercial vessels in the Strait of Hormuz and announced the closure of the strategic waterway until further notice, with one crew member missing, according to CENTCOM.

Iran’s powerful parliament speaker and key peace negotiator, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, said on Sunday, “The era of one-sided deals is over.”

“We told you: keep your word or pay the price. Reality is knocking,” Ghalibaf posted on X with an image of Article 5 of the MoU, which relates to the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz.

On Wednesday, US President Donald Trump announced that the ceasefire with Iran was over. His statement was followed by Iran’s Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei pledging to avenge his father’s killing.

How did we reach here?

The fragile MoU reached between the US and Iran had several glaring gaps, keeping the door to escalation ajar.

The tensions spilled over into the Strait of Hormuz again last Monday, when Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) struck three commercial vessels, including a Qatari liquefied natural gas (LNG) tanker off the coast of Oman.

The next day, the US carried out strikes on Iranian military targets, and Tehran responded with missile and drone attacks on US bases across the Gulf, prompting Trump to call off the ceasefire.

The tit-for-tat attacks continued. On Saturday night, the IRGC announced the closure of the Strait of Hormuz until further notice after attacking a container ship using what it called an unapproved route. On Sunday, a second vessel on the strait was hit.

Where did the latest US strikes hit?

CENTCOM said its third round of strikes on Iran last week was “holding Iranian forces accountable” for their recent attack on a Cyprus-flagged ship in the Strait of Hormuz.

It said it hit about 140 military targets that “included Iranian missile and drone sites, naval capabilities, ammunition storage facilities, communication networks, and coastal surveillance locations”.

It added that more than 300 targets were struck over the course of three nights throughout the week “to degrade Iran’s ability to attack civilian mariners and commercial vessels freely transiting the strait”.

Iran’s state broadcaster IRIB said the US launched air attacks on the outskirts of the city of Veysian, in the western Lorestan province, while another strike hit a military base in Iran’s Khondab.

Officials from Bushehr, on Iran’s southern coast, told local media that US forces attacked five cities in the province, including Asaluyeh, Dir, Bushehr, Dashti and Tangestan.

Tehran has said the loss of lives and the extent of damage are under review.

Where did Iran hit back overnight?

Since the start of the ongoing conflict in late February, Tehran has accused the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries of actively supporting US military operations by hosting its bases and allowing it to use their airspace.

Oman

The IRGC claimed a “heavy and surprise” attack on logistics support centres and refuelling platforms used by US aircraft carriers at the port of Duqm in Oman, according to IRIB.

The IRGC’s public relations office told IRIB the sites were “destroyed” in the attack.

Qatar

The IRGC said it also targeted Qatar’s Al Udeid airbase with ballistic missiles and claimed to have destroyed a fighter plane maintenance centre, as well as a command-and-control centre at the base.

Qatar’s Ministry of Defence said it intercepted incoming Iranian fire. Three people, including a child, were wounded as a result of falling shrapnel from the interception of Iranian attacks, Qatar’s Ministry of Interior said.

Kuwait

Iran’s army said it used explosive drones to target a Patriot air defence system, an ammunition depot and a radar site belonging to the US military in Kuwait.

Bahrain

In another wave of drone attacks, Tehran targeted a US communications system and radar site in Bahrain.

Jordan

The IRGC said it targeted US military facilities at Prince Hassan airbase in Jordan with several ballistic missiles, and claimed to have destroyed a command-and-control centre at the base, as well as hangars housing MQ-9 drones.

What’s happening in the Strait of Hormuz?

Iran has closed down the strait after firing a warning shot that struck a vessel travelling on an unapproved route, and said on Sunday it had disabled a second vessel.

The strait will remain closed until “the end of US interference in this region”, the IRGC said.

Iranian officials told state media the US military has been trying to create an “illegal route” through the Strait of Hormuz, causing insecurity in the area.

The narrow-yet-vital waterway — touted as the artery of global trade, hosting 20 percent of energy flow — has been at the centre of tensions between the US and Iran since the preliminary deal was signed.

Tehran has consistently insisted that only routes approved by Iran shall be taken up during transit through the strait. It says it is open to managing the strait only with Oman, the other coastal country.

The US and the GCC countries have rejected Iran’s claim on the strait and demanded that navigation be freed of interference or any sort of fees.

On Saturday, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi landed in Oman, where the leaders discussed the shipping and management of the Strait of Hormuz, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said.

How have Gulf countries reacted?

Some countries had sirens blaring on Sunday afternoon, with governments asking residents to stay indoors.

Oman condemned Iran’s attacks and said it is taking “all necessary measures to deal with the developments to preserve the safety of the country and its residents”.

In Qatar, the Interior Ministry said the country’s security threat level is high and urged everyone to remain in safe places and avoid unnecessary movement.

The Kuwaiti army said its forces were responding to “hostile aerial targets” in the country’s airspace, adding that the sounds of explosions are the result of its defence systems intercepting the attacks.

Bahrain’s Interior Ministry said air raid sirens were activated, urging residents to remain calm.

Beard will complete a long season after the final two Wales matches against Argentina and South Africa in Durban next weekend.

The former Ospreys lock had only just linked up with the Wales squad a couple of days before the Fiji game, following a mammoth first season with French club Montpellier, which included a Challenge Cup success and losing the Top 14 final to Toulouse.

“I have personally loved it and it was probably the best decision I’ve made rugby wise so far for myself and my family,” said Beard.

“It was a tough decision at first, leaving the Ospreys after being there since I was 14.

“But it was probably something, if I didn’t join Montpellier, I might have regretted at the end of my career.”

While playing in France is a tough challenge, it is also a rewarding one said Beard.

“It’s a physical league and you’ve got to play 30 games a season,” he added.

“But just the support and passion, everything they do out in the Top 14 is a different level to what I’ve experienced before.

“So it’s been an amazing move for myself and my family.”

Argentina 9-5 Wales, Buenos Aires, 14 September 1968

Argentina 9-9, Wales, Buenos Aires, 28 September 1968

Wales 16-7 Argentina, Cardiff, 9 October, 1991

Wales 43-30 Argentina, Llanelli, 21 November, 1998

Argentina 26-36 Wales, Buenos Aires, 5 June, 1999

Argentina 16-23 Wales, Buenos Aires, 12 June, 1999

Wales 23-18 Argentina, Cardiff, 1 October, 1999

Wales 16-30 Argentina, Cardiff, 10 Nov, 2001

Argentina 50-44 Wales, Tucuman, 12 June, 2004

Argentina 20-35 Wales, Buenos Aires, 19 June, 2004

Argentina 27-25 Wales, Puerto Madryn, 11 June, 2006

Argentina 45-27 Wales, Buenos Aires, 17 June, 2006

Wales 27-20 Argentina, Cardiff, 18 August, 2007

Wales 33-16 Argentina, Cardiff, 21 November, 2009

Wales 28-13 Argentina, Cardiff, 20 August, 2011

Wales 12-26 Argentina, Cardiff, 10 November 2012

Wales 40-6 Argentina, Cardiff, 16 November 2013

Wales 24-20 Argentina, Cardiff, 12 November 2016

Argentina 10-23 Wales, San Juan, 9 June 2018

Argentina 12-30 Wales, Santa Fe, 16 June 2018

Wales 20-20 Argentina, Cardiff, 10 July 2021

Wales 11-33 Argentina, Cardiff, 17 July 2021

Wales 20-13 Argentina, Cardiff, 12 November 2022

Argentina 29-17 Wales, Marseille, 14 October 2023

Wales 28-52 Argentina, Cardiff, 9 November 2025.

The American democratic experiment stands on shaky ground. Not since the Civil War have these proverbially United States been so disunited. As the nation throws itself a grand old 250th birthday bash in Washington, the mood in much of the country is more funereal than festive.

All-out partisan warfare has sown chaos. Republican legislators, taking their lead from a president who sees half the nation as his personal enemy, have put their own party’s interests over the republic’s. Staying in office has become the only thing that matters. The values imparted to me throughout my public school education — equal opportunity, impartial justice, respect for expertise, basic honesty — have been abandoned by a new breed of politician that has turned governance itself into a blood sport.

Where can one turn for reassurance that America’s best years are still ahead? Would you believe me if I said the theater? I’m not toeing the line for my field. I’m merely calling attention to a development that’s been gaining strength since I first reported on it in 2015. A cohort of playwrights, breathtakingly diverse demographically as well as aesthetically, has been rejuvenating American theater.

These writers aren’t on a sociological mission. They’re not trafficking in grievance or appealing to a particular political base. They let their plays do the talking. And they’ve been trying to have a conversation that isn’t hijacked by the most doctrinaire voices in the room.

From an institutional perspective, the American theater is in bad shape. The triple whammy of the COVID-19 closures, inflation and technological disruption has left everyone hurting. The Mark Taper Forum had to suspend programming for more than a year, smaller companies still in operation are producing fewer shows, and producers everywhere are gravitating toward the bankably familiar.

But despite this difficult terrain, it has been a boom time for American playwriting. For more than a decade, I’ve been teaching a course at the California Institute of the Arts called American Drama Now, and each year the selection of plays has become harder to whittle down. I designed the seminar partly around theater offerings in Los Angeles to connect students to recent developments in the field and to consolidate awareness that something special is happening in the American theater.

The current generation of playwrights has revealed itself to be remarkably resilient and independent. It has had no other choice. By the time many of these rising talents were accruing debt in graduate writing programs, the dream of a sustainable career in the nonprofit theater had already gasped its last breath.

When Wendy Wasserstein, Tony Kushner, Craig Lucas and Jon Robin Baitz emerged in the late 1970s and ’80s, it was still imaginable that a chosen few playwrights could make a living via the regional theater circuit, that constellation of companies founded as an alternative to the Broadway model.

That prospect was growing dimmer a few years later when playwrights such as Suzan-Lori Parks and Lynn Nottage came into prominence. But hope was still alive in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Regional theaters such as Seattle Rep, the Guthrie, the Goodman and Baltimore Center Stage remained committed to their missions while New York nonprofit companies continued to hold the line off-Broadway.

When did the picture change? In 2009, “Outrageous Fortune: The Life and Times of the New American Play” was published by the Theatre Development Fund, and one of the key findings in this study written by Todd London with Ben Pesner and Zannie Giraud Voss is that “there is no way to view playwriting as anything but a profession without an economic base.” A chasm had opened between the network of increasingly corporate-minded nonprofit theaters and the artists this system was built to serve.

The situation has grown bleaker in the last decade and a half as commercial pressures have ramped up and media consolidation and digital shortsightedness have obliterated arts coverage. Yet there’s been an unexpected upside. Theater artists who have come of age in this period have been released from the burden of having to conform to notions of regional theater respectability.

Instead of worrying about the timid taste of subscription audiences, these dramatists have been writing for themselves and their communities, dreaming up plays that don’t have to fit into institutional slots or stay within the staid bounds of traditional proscenium house decorum. The irony is that in not trying to pass muster with more conservative theatergoers (and their fastidious institutional guardians), playwrights have been winning over not just critics but also formerly squeamish artistic directors and perennially nervous Broadway producers.

The playwrights who appear regularly on the syllabus in American Drama Now — Young Jean Lee, Tarell Alvin McCraney, Annie Baker, Branden Jacobs-Jenkins, Samuel D. Hunter, Martyna Majok, Jeremy O. Harris, Will Arbery, Jackie Sibblies Drury, Quiara Alegría Hudes, Ayad Akhtar, among them — are of different ages, sensibilities and backgrounds. What they share is an appreciation of the complexities and contradictions in being an American.

The politics of identity for them is a lived experience. And as dramatists, they’re uniquely positioned to appreciate the conflicted loyalties and communal tensions of American life in dramatic rather than dogmatic terms. Whatever agendas they may personally espouse, these writers are too alert to the messiness of history and human nature to be rigidly ideological in their work.

The ongoing war between woke and anti-woke factions is a fatuous melodrama best left to the satirists. The goal of playwrights grappling seriously with what it means to be an American today isn’t to score social media points but to shed light on the fractured reality of our collective experience.

Characters in plays by Young Jean Lee, such as “Straight White Men,” are often “trying on masks to see what might prove effective in a given situation.”

(Lawrence K. Ho / Los Angeles Times)

Identity is not a fixed fact but a raucous collision of parts. No single category can contain the Whitmanesque multitudes jockeying for position inside us. Race, religion, ethnicity, gender, age, sexuality, class, disability and geography don’t line up in perfect political harmony, and each social marker tells only a fraction of the whole story. (Money, the great unequalizer, may be the most taboo subject of all.) “We are not only but also,” the sociologist and cultural historian Todd Gitlin wrote in his 1995 book “The Twilight of Common Dreams: Why America Is Wracked by Culture Wars.” We also overlap and often even clash with ourselves.

Discussion around identity can be dangerous. How can anyone be expected to navigate the minefield? Tribalists and traditionalists have controlled the terms of the battle, one by simplifying, the other by denying, the way privilege has shaped our compound selves.

Playwrights know better. They understand the way oppression, which falls disproportionately on the marginalized, has warped all of us. History, whether acknowledged or not, is etched in our souls.

It is a long-held tenet of the theater that the most interesting characters, like the most interesting people, are defined by their schisms and paradoxes. (How else could Hamlet have maintained his centuries-long hold?) Dramatists are more cognizant than ever of the sociopolitical import of these contradictions and they’ve been chronicling the way this historically freighted baggage emerges in the drama of everyday life.

All the world is indeed a stage and all its inhabitants merely stock players, as Jaques lays out in “As You Like It.” Hegel described Shakespeare’s characters as “free artists of their own selves.” The truth where we and our contemporary stage surrogates are concerned is somewhat more constrained. Culture and representation largely determine the range of our performance possibilities.

Plays such as Branden Jacobs-Jenkins’ “Appropriate” reexamine “the canon of great American family dramas … to uncover the stories that have been suppressed.”

(Craig Schwartz)

Jacobs-Jenkins has recognized perhaps more acutely than any of his peers the way dramatic forms have locked us into set scripts about our lives. He tackles genres — adapting a Dion Boucicault melodrama in “An Octoroon,” reexamining the canon of great American family dramas in “Appropriate” — to uncover the stories that have been suppressed in the dominant white middle-class narratives that would prefer not to think of themselves as political.

Lee’s standout identity plays — “Straight White Men,” “The Shipment” and “Songs of the Dragons Flying to Heaven” — reject the illusion of stable, coherent characters propagated by psychological realism. The figures in her uncategorizable works are in experimental flux, trying on masks to see what might prove effective in a given situation. Even “Straight White Men,” which uses the old home-for-the-holidays genre as a springboard, can’t help spinning away from the drama’s droll hyper-naturalism toward something resembling performance art. (Not even straight, white men want to be confined to a box, even a relatively plush one.)

“Fairview,” by Jackie Sibblies Drury, “theatricalizes the experience of the white gaze.”

(Jeff Lorch)

In “Fairview,” Jackie Sibblies Drury theatricalizes the experience of the white gaze, ultimately reversing the comfortable position white theater audiences have traditionally held. Bess Wohl’s “Liberation,” this year’s most decorated play, reanimates the history of the 1970s feminist movement by questioning what it could be leaving out of the picture. “The Balusters,” by David Lindsay-Abaire, brings the current culture wars to the stage with unique sensitivity through the squabbles of a neighborhood association torn between protecting its town’s heritage status and coming to terms with the more pluralistic demands of the 21st century.

“Fairview,” “Liberation,” and “The Balusters” are extremely funny plays that also happen to be deadly serious. If philosophy begins in wonder, trenchant social drama seems to start in laughter.

What do theatergoers want? They don’t just want to look; they also want to be seen. Isn’t that what any of us wants when gazing into the mirror held up to nature, as Hamlet describes the theater? To be granted a more expansive view of ourselves and others?

E pluribus unum, the motto of the United States, is so fundamental that it’s printed on our currency. There’s perhaps no place where the truth of this phrase — out of many, one — is more regularly realized than at the theater, where strangers transform over the course of a show into that mysterious organism we call an audience.

Gitlin ends “The Twilight of Common Dreams” with a plea: “For too long, Americans have busied themselves digging trenches to fortify their cultural borders, lining their trenches with insulation. Enough bunkers! Enough of the perfection of differences! We ought to be building bridges.”

A coalition mindset doesn’t mean denying history or pretending that America has been a level playing field. It’s been anything but in this “melting pot where nothing melted,” to quote the rabbi whose eulogy sets Kushner’s “Angels in America” in motion. But history happens to all of us, not just a select few. And to be an American is to be embroiled in the great democratic experiment that has been defined by division from the beginning. Empathy, the nuclear fusion of playwriting, is expanded when we’re allowed to take in more of our patchwork selves. Today’s dramatists have been extending a generous invitation to their compatriots: We’ll show you our complexity, if you’ll show us yours.

Australia: Jock Campbell; Max Jorgensen, Joseph-Aukuso Suaalii, Len Ikitau, Dylan Pietsch, Carter Gordon, Ryan Lonergan; Angus Bell, Josh Nasser, Allan Alaalatoa, Jeremy Williams, Josh Canham, Rob Valetini, Fraser McReight, Harry Wilson (capt).

Replacements: Brandon Paenga-Amosa, James Slipper, Taniela Tupou, Lachlan Shaw, Tom Hooper, Tate McDermott, Ben Donaldson, Tom Wright.

Sin-bin: Shaw (76)

Ireland: Hugo Keenan; Jimmy O’Brien, Garry Ringrose, Stuart McCloskey, Jamie Osborne; Sam Prendergast, Jamison Gibson-Park; Tom O’Toole, Dan Sheehan (capt), Tadhg Furlong, Joe McCarthy, James Ryan, Cian Prendergast, Josh van der Flier, Jack Conan.

Replacements: Ronan Kelleher, Jeremy Loughman, Thomas Clarkson, Tadhg Beirne, Nick Timoney, Craig Casey, Ciaran Frawley, Bundee Aki.

Referee: Ben O’Keeffe (NZR)

Finn Russell will not feature in Scotland’s opening Nations Championship match of the summer series but could feature against South Africa, says head coach Gregor Townsend, who welcomes back Jonny Gray.

Fly-half Russell, 33, has not fully recovered from the calf injury that kept him out of the latter part of Bath’s domestic campaign and was not considered for the match at Estadio Mario Alberto Kempes in Cordoba on Saturday (20:10 BST). The Scots face the Springboks in Pretoria on 11 July then Fiji at Murrayfield on 18 July.

Tom Jordan starts at 10 in Russell’s absence, with Fergus Burke among the replacements.

Gray returns against the Pumas, having missed this year’s Six Nations, while fellow lock Scott Cummings, 29, and prop Pierre Schoeman, 32, will win their 50th caps.

“Great for [Jonny Gray] to be back in the squad,” said Townsend. “Since his move to Perpignan, he’s played very well so his form’s been rewarded with this opportunity. It’s nice obviously nice that him and Scott Cummings are playing together.

“Jonny was at Glasgow when Scott came through as an 18-year-old. It will be great to see them both back int he second row again.”

Overall, the XV in Cordoba shows eight personnel changes to the team that finished the Six Nations with defeat to Ireland in Dublin in mid-March.

Full-back Kyle Rowe, centre Rory Hutchinson, wing Jamie Dobie, fly-half Tom Jordan, hooker George Turner, prop Elliot Millar-Mills and Cummings are the players joining Gray in coming in to the side.

Kyle Steyn moves from left to right wing to accommodate Dobie. Prop Zander Fagerson and wing Darcy Graham, who started in Dublin, drop to the bench.

Gregor Hiddleston could make his Scotland debut off the bench.

“We’ll have to gel quickly,” Townsend said.

“It’s our first game since we played in Dublin. We’ve got a lot of evidence in the Six Nations and November that when we get our game in place in attack and defence, we can cause problems to any team in world rugby and do more than that, convert opportunities.

“I believe that our squad now is much deeper and we use that bench to continue what the starters are doing or actually raise the energy.”

Scotland: Rowe, Steyn, Hutchinson, Tuipulotu (capt), Dobie, Jordan, White; Schoeman, Ashman, Millar-Mills, Gray, Cummings, M Fagerson, Darge, Dempsey.

Replacements: Hiddleston, Sutherland, Z Fagerson, Samuel, Brown, Horne, Burke, Graham.

In-play, in-picture adverts will not be part of ITV’s coverage of the Nations Championship in July, but the 20-second slots, shown before a scrum, are set to return for the November Tests and next year’s Six Nations.

The abundance of opportunities in ITV’s schedule in July, with an expanded 48-team football World Cup dominating the airwaves, means advertisers’ spending has been directed elsewhere.

During their debut at this year’s Six Nations, the scrum slots, one of which was available per half, were bought up by blue-chip companies such as Samsung and Virgin Atlantic.

During the segments, audio from the stadium dipped, the screen was split in half and an advert was played in the right-hand part of the screen. Some viewers criticised the concept as intrusive.

Six Nations chief executive Tom Harrison said the adverts may be “a little bit uncomfortable” for viewers in the UK who, unlike those in the US and Australia, are only used to adverts appearing around, rather than during, play.

The Nations Championship pits the northern hemisphere teams who compete in the Six Nations – England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales, France and Italy – against southern hemisphere sides South Africa, New Zealand, Australia and Argentina, plus invited sides Fiji and Japan.

It starts on Saturday with six games, with a further six on 11 July and 18 July before concluding in November.

Cardiff loose-head prop Rhys Barratt and Dragons back-row forwards Harri Keddie and Ryan Woodman all made their international debuts in Twickenham, but miss out on the squad for the three Tests.

Wings Gabriel Hamer-Webb and Tom Rogers, centres Bryn Bradley and Joe Roberts, fly-half Jarrod Evans, scrum-half Ellis Bevan, lock or flanker Freddie Thomas and back-row forward Olly Cracknell also miss out.

Leicester open-side flanker Tommy Reffell makes the cut after being overlooked by Tandy for the autumn internationals and Six Nations.

“We have selected a squad of 33 players for the Nations Championship to mirror what will be required for the World Cup in 2027,” said the head coach, who cut 11 players and lost Jenkins.

“We are building a lot of competition among our group of players, which is what we want to have, and there were some tough calls to make.

“We have an exciting opportunity over the next three weeks in a brand-new competition and can’t wait to get our campaign started against Fiji on Saturday.”

Louis Rees-Zammit, Max Llewellyn, Tomos Williams, Rhys Carre, Nicky Smith, James and Reffell could not face the Baa-Baas because they play for English clubs, but all return for the Nations Championship fixtures.

The loss of Jenkins means that Tandy is down to three specialist locks – Ben Carter, Teddy Williams and Adam Beard, who is included fresh from playing for Montpellier in their Top 14 final defeat by Toulouse on Saturday.

The former Ospreys second-row forward, who lost his starting spot to Carter during the Six Nations, came on in the final quarter in Paris.

“He has been with us for two campaigns, is battle-hardened and is really experienced,” said Tandy about Beard.

Wales had already lost centre Louie Hennessey, tight-head prop Keiron Assiratti and hooker Liam Belcher to injury before cutting down their squad.

June 27 (UPI) — Europe may have to brace for even broken records as the historic heat wave that has roasted the continent over the last week is unlikely to let up.

Temperatures in Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands all set heat records on Friday, and events in both Spain and France were cancelled, while most of central Europe issued the latest in days of warnings about the dangerous temperatures, The BBC and The Washington Post reported.

Although some meteorologists, including those in the United Kingdom, have said that temperatures in some areas will start cooling off, forecasters in Czechia, Austria and some Balkan nations are bracing for their own broken heat records this weekend.

The heat wave, which experts at the World Meteorological Organization have called the worst in Europe since the mid-1970s, reinforces what the organization has called “the world’s most rapidly warming continent.”

“In the 50 years since the historic heatwave of 1976, Europe as a whole has warmed by around two degrees,” John Kennedy, head of climate information at WMO, said in a press release.

“It’s the fastest warming continent, and extremes of temperature have increased, too,” Kennedy said.

France this week recorded it’s hottest June temperature three days in a row, the United Kingdom and Spain set records two days in a row, and Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands all saw historic June heat records fall.

The WMO said on Friday that it expects the heatwave to keep spreading cross large swaths of Western, Central and Southern Europe during the next two weeks, with a significant focus of the heat expected to blast the Balkans.

WMO said that Portugal, Spain, France, Belgium, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Italy, Czechia, Slovakia, Hungary, Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Montenegro, Albania, North Macedonia, Greece, Bulgaria and Romania all should expect heat that is 3 degrees Celsius to 10 degrees Celsius above weekly June averages.

June 26 (UPI) — President Donald Trump on Friday threatened to impose a 100% tariff on any country that enacts a digital services tax against a U.S. company.

The new tariff would be applied to all goods shipped into the United States and be levied on top of any other tariff already in effect for that country, Trump said in a post on Truth Social.

At least a dozen nations have digital services taxes, which are meant to limit the influence of large technology companies — especially large U.S. companies such as Apple, Amazon and Meta — and are being considered by several European countries, CNBC and Politico reported.

Canada last year rescinded a digital services tax hours before it was set to go into effect in order to restart trade negotiations with the United States, which Trump held back on until the tax was canceled.

“Please let this statement serve to represent that any Country that imposes such a Tax will immediately be met with a 100% TARIFF on any and all Goods sent to the United States of America,” Trump said in the post.

“This TARIFF will supersede Trade Deals made with the Country, whether implemented, signed, or not,” Trump said. “Additionally, the 100% TARIFF will be immediately imposed, if they proceed.”

Canada’s tax was to be levied against online marketplace and advertising services companies, as well as social media companies, but Trump called it a “direct and blatant attack” on the United States and canceled talks on the tax was rescinded.

Deaths of immigrants held in US detention centres have surged during Donald Trump’s second term.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Turk, has called for an independent investigation into the severe uptick in deaths in migrant detention centres during President Donald Trump’s second term in office.

In a statement on Friday, Turk expressed concern over the lack of transparency over those deaths, at least 19 of which have occurred so far this year, according to US government statistics.

“Those responsible for violations of the law must be held to account, and the rights of the victims’ families to truth, justice and reparation and guarantees of non-recurrence must be upheld,” the UN rights chief said.

Deaths in immigrant detention centres have surged during Trump’s second term in office, a by-product of what rights groups and immigration lawyers have depicted as systematic neglect, inhumane conditions and abuses.

The Trump administration has sought to rapidly expand the network of immigrant detention centres, some operated by private contractors, as it seeks to carry out the mass deportation of immigrants in the US.

Trump stated in a social media post on Friday that his administration has the “Highest Average Daily Arrest Rate by ICE and CBP, including Total Detention, with Final Orders of Removal, than any other president, by far!”

The reported death of a Georgian man, Mamuka Artmeladze, in a detention facility in Louisiana on June 4 increased the number of fatalities so far this year to 19, compared to 33 last year and 11 in 2024.

“The mortality rate of deaths in ICE custody is at its highest level in over a decade and has more than doubled since Trump’s second term began,” the watchdog group Human Rights Watch wrote in a report on detention deaths earlier this month. “The rate is nearly four times that of the Biden administration and more than two and a half times as high as that of the first Trump administration.”

That report said the 52 people who have died in detention during Trump’s second term ranged in age from 19 to 75 and came from 20 different nationalities.

Turk wrote on Friday that there have been “concerning allegations regarding the use of force” at such facilities and that five of the deaths recorded in 2026 were classified as suicides.

He also expressed concern over the reported use of solitary confinement, which is associated with a heightened risk of suicide and considered a form of torture by the UN after a period of 15 days.

“All these factors exacerbate vulnerability and raise serious concerns as to whether some of these deaths in ICE custody could have been prevented,” he said.

As the destructive Bobcat fire sent plumes of smoke billowing from the Angeles National Forest in 2020, Ryan Huling recalled that at the time news reports claimed the blaze caused “no injuries” and that no homes had been destroyed.

That irked the Sierra Madre writer, who watched from his cabin as flames incinerated the home of bears, coyotes, pumas and squirrels. He believes countless critters were killed or maimed by flames, and points to accounts of mountain lions emerging with singed paws and bears scrambling into communities.

“Anonymity has done them no favors, in the sense that people don’t know where they live, they don’t know what landmarks are important to them, they don’t know what areas carry special significance to bears and other animals,” Huling said.

Yet through his research he discovered that rapidly advancing technology — including artificial intelligence, GPS tracking and crowdsourcing — is revealing more about animal “societies” than ever before. The revelation launched him on a worldwide tour of non-human communities, culminating in his debut book, “The Hidden Nations of Animals.”

The cover of Ryan Huling’s first book, published in June.

(Penguin Random House)

Published this month, the book’s first chapter takes readers to North America’s “beaver belt,” roughly 1,100 miles in northern Canada that are jam-packed with beaver dams. According to Huling, the sheer density of those dams only became apparent thanks to technology that allows researchers to analyze high-resolution satellite imagery and identify them from space. One analysis found 2,700 dams surrounding a town of only about 1,000 people.

Another stop took him to Zambia, where African mole-rats dig complex tunnel systems that include designated nurseries, pantries and bathrooms. Just before Huling arrived, a researcher had used radio trackers to determine that the subterranean animals operate on a biological clock that has them alternate between a few hours of activity and a few hours of napping — not a bad work schedule!

Some of Huling’s other adventures include exploring a tornado of Mexican free-tailed bats outside of San Antonio and red-crowned cranes that have found refuge in the Korean Demilitarized Zone.

But uncovering these hidden worlds isn’t just left to the experts anymore. While the expense or difficulty of tracking wild animals has resulted in knowledge voids in the past, crowdsourcing is helping to fill in the gaps.

Today, any smartphone-toting nature lover can snap a photo of a great horned owl or a ground squirrel and upload it to a citizen science app such as iNaturalist. Some platforms are specialized, for example Merlin for birds and Happywhale for marine mammals. All that data is a rich playground for scientists. According to an article published last year in BioScience, iNaturalist data in peer-reviewed research grew tenfold in the previous five years.

Now, AI is making it so humans don’t have to necessarily look at the raw material. Instead, AI can mine images, videos or sound clips for the appearance of an animal of interest — or even catalogue individual critters. Happywhale has an AI feature that identifies particular humpbacks by unique patterns and shapes on their tails.

Technology is advancing so fast that Huling said it was hard to stay current. In his prologue, he mentions a researcher showing him a prototype of a teeny solar-powered radio tag for monarch butterflies. By the time the book hit the shelves, the concept was already live — harnessed, in one instance, to study how the brilliant orange insects use overwintering groves along the California coast. Just this week on Instagram, the California Department of Fish and Wildlife highlighted a study in which rare bumblebees are tagged with minute QR codes that can be read by remote cameras.

After about a half-year of travel, Huling returned home with a heightened awareness of what he calls “inconspicuous abundance” — that the world is teeming with more life than meets the eye. He puts this new lens to the test by venturing to the storm-battered shores of San Miguel Island off the coast of Santa Barbara. Considered “uninhabited” in the traditional sense, he finds that the rarely visited corner of Channel Islands National Park is a haven for lumpy seals, glimmering fish and squawking seabirds. Sharks lurk beneath the waves.

“For them, as now for me, this distinctive island remains anything but deserted,” he writes.

On San Miguel Island, Huling saw and heard hundreds of sunbathing seals and sea lions.

(Oliver Uberti / Penguin Random House)

In other animal news

• Earlier this month, in Big Bear Lake, a memorial service was held for Sandy Steers, the late conservationist who was best known for turning two bald eagles into an international phenomenon by livestreaming their nest. It was a touching gathering, where Steers’ friends and colleagues got personal about a woman who they said was willing to go to the mat for her beloved raptors.

An illustration for “Hidden Nations” depicts author Huling at home, surrounded by the natural environment — including a black bear.

(Oliver Uberti / Penguin Random House)

• For decades, Steers battled a planned development near the nest of famed eagle couple Jackie and Shadow, and helped to negotiate an agreement in which a land trust could buy the site for $10 million. The nonprofit she led is now racing to raise the money by July 31 so it can be bought and conserved.
• In the desperately needed good-news department, endangered steelhead trout that scientists feared had perished in last year’s Palisades fire unexpectedly survived — and even had babies. It’s a big deal: they represent the last known population of steelhead in the Santa Monica Mountains.
• A civil grand jury has found that the L.A. Zoo needs new leadership, citing deterioration of its facilities and rapidly declining membership. In less than a year, membership dropped 23% and exhibits for lions, bears, sea lions and pelicans have closed because they need major renovations.
• Last summer, researchers made an astonishing discovery off the Sonoma County coast — 18 sunflower sea stars, a species decimated by disease and all but gone from California waters. SF Gate writes that the finding was only just announced, with scientists now racing to learn all they can about the survivors. As previously reported, the stars with up to 24 arms could hold the key to restoring the state’s ravaged kelp forests.

And news about the environment

This is the latest edition of Boiling Point, a newsletter about climate change and the environment in the American West. Sign up here to get it in your inbox. And listen to our Boiling Point podcast here.

For more wildlife and outdoors news, follow Lila Seidman at @lila_seidman on X and @lilaseidman.bsky.social on Bluesky.

China’s foreign minister says that emerging economies remain underrepresented in global governance institutions.

Presenting China’s new white paper on making global governance more equitable, minister Wang Yi argued that the role of the United Nations should be strengthened and developing countries should have a stronger voice in the world body.

In Beijing’s stated view, all countries should have an equal voice in global affairs, which means the Global South should have more representation.

China’s call comes as the world is engulfed in many armed conflicts and facing serious economic challenges.

But is Beijing now presenting itself as a leader of the Global South? And will it be able to garner enough support to play that role?

Presenter: Sami Zeidan

Guests:

Steve Tsang – Director of the SOAS China Institute

Cobus van Staden – Head of research at the China-Global South Project

Allen Carlson – Associate professor in the Government Department at Cornell University

The sense of anticipation felt by Ireland supporters about the start of the inaugural Nations Championship ramped up a degree or two on Wednesday when head coach Andy Farrell named his 36-man squad for the three matches his side will play in July.

Farrell’s selection for the games against Australia, Japan and New Zealand in July features three players who have yet to win their first caps, all three of those Connacht forwards.

Props Billy Bohan and Sam Illo, along with back row Sean Jansen, are part of the group which will travel to Sydney on Monday to begin their preparation for the three Test matches in the southern hemisphere.

The call-ups reflect the excellent form shown by Connacht in the latter half of the season particularly, as a run of positive results by Stuart Lancaster’s team’s moved them into eighth in the United Rugby Championship table, and thereby progressing to the end-of-season play-offs and qualify for next season’s Champions Cup.

In total, six Connacht players have been named with Darragh Murray, Cian Prendergast and Bundee Aki also having been chosen.

The inclusion of front-rowers Illo and Bohan owes much to the unavailability of injured Leinster props Andrew Porter, Jack Boyle and Paddy McCarthy, but both will be keen to make the most of the opportunity afforded to them.

With the opening fixture with the Wallabies in Sydney on 4 July, BBC Sport NI takes a closer look at the credentials of the uncapped trio in the Ireland squad.

Thousands of Bosnia fans turned Toronto blue as they marched to the chants of ‘Free Palestine’ in Toronto.

Toronto, Canada — Nadia, a Bosnia and Herzegovina supporter who did not share her surname, stood out in her deep blue shirt as a sea of red-adorned Canada fans swarmed around her outside the Toronto Stadium an hour before kickoff to their FIFA World Cup 2026 opening game.

With the blue and yellow Bosnian flag draped around her, she found herself among the minority of “away” fans on Canadian soil on Thursday, less than two weeks after her team was given a warm welcome to the World Cup cohost nation.

It reminded Nadia, an immigrant, of her arrival in Canada in the mid-1990s when her family fled the Bosnian genocide that killed about 100,000 people and displaced more than two million.

“I wish I had space for two hearts so I could properly support both my countries,” Nadia told Al Jazeera when asked about her allegiance as loud roars of the crowd spilled out of the stadium behind her.

Nadia admitted her heart was ultimately with Bosnia, but the Canada cap she sported was a nod to the country that became home when she had to flee hers.

Earlier in the day, thousands of Bosnia supporters turned Toronto into a sea of blue as they marched towards the match venue in the city’s downtown while chanting “Free Palestine” to thunderous claps.

“They [Palestinians] should be free, enough with the wars and genocide,” Nadia said as her eyes welled up with tears. She took a deep breath before adding: “There is so much suffering, especially for the children.”

Cultures blend in Toronto

Dan, a Bosnia supporter in his 40s, was the same age as his primary school-aged son when he fled the genocide in his country.

The father-and-son duo enjoyed the game and soaked in the atmosphere among the 45,000-plus fans at the stadium before heading back slightly upset with the draw.

The day Canada opened its first World Cup became an amalgamation of immigrant Bosnian fans’ identities as they shared high fives and traded jerseys with their opposing numbers.

Every shade of skin colour and a multitude of mother tongues made the stadium and a nearby fan festival a microcosm of Toronto’s reputation as a multicultural hotspot.

The fan festival boasted the full spectrum of football enthusiasts — the hardcore supporters with expert analyses, laced with expletives at missed chances, and those in attendance purely for the vibes.

Football aside, several Canadian fans abhorred the immigration policies of their neighbour to the south. They were proud to be known for their hospitality at the 48-nation tournament across North America.

Admir, a travelling Bosnian fan, was full of praise for Canadian hospitality when he arrived from New Jersey.

“Everyone from ordinary people to stadium support staff to restaurant owners have been so accommodating since we got here,” he told Al Jazeera ahead of kickoff.

Compared with the barrage of immigration nightmare stories of World Cup supporters trying to enter the US, his journey to Canada was seamless.

Despite his home state hosting eight World Cup matches, Admir chose to pay an exorbitant price for tickets to see Bosnia, who returned to the World Cup after 12 years following a fairytale qualification.

The sun had drained most fans of their energy after the match, but not Tanya, who drove seven hours from New York to Toronto on Thursday morning.

“The atmosphere at the fan festival was amazing; Toronto has been great.”

“I think our boys played pretty well,” she said of the match. “We didn’t win, but it wasn’t a loss either.”

Volker Turk, the high commissioner for human rights at the United Nations, has issued some of his harshest criticism yet of the recent sanctions the United States has imposed on Cuba.

On Monday, Turk drew a line between the increasing restrictions on the Cuban economy and reports of heightened death rates, particularly among children.

“The fuel restrictions imposed since early 2026 and recent tightening of extraterritorial sanctions, taken together, are directly harming Cubans, especially the most vulnerable,” Turk said in a statement.

“Children are dying because doctors lack access to essential medical supplies and medicines. This is unacceptable.”

Such “severe sanctions”, he added, run contrary to the “basic principles of international human rights law”. He called for them to be “lifted immediately”.

Turk’s comments are a direct response to the suite of actions taken under US President Donald Trump to tighten pressure on Cuba, a Caribbean island that has already weathered a decades-long US trade embargo.

Starting in January, the Trump administration moved to cut off Cuba’s foreign oil supply, a linchpin for its ageing energy grid.

First, it severed supplies of oil and funds from Venezuela. Then, on January 29, Trump issued an executive order declaring Cuba to be an “unusual and extraordinary threat” to US national security. As such, he said, any country that supplied it with oil would be subject to steep tariffs.

In the months since, the Trump administration has continued to layer sanctions on Cuba. In May, for instance, penalties were announced against Cuba’s Interior Ministry, its National Police and its Directorate of Intelligence.

Those were followed this month by sanctions targeting Cuba’s president, Miguel Diaz-Canel, as well as members of his family.

The sanctions are designed to penalise those “responsible for repression” in Cuba, an island whose communist government has been accused of stifling dissent, as well as imprisoning and torturing activists.

Turk on Monday acknowledged Cuba’s human rights record and called on the country to “release all those arbitrarily detained”.

But he also pointed to the mounting death toll associated with the US sanctions, which have isolated the island country from much of the world.

The sanctions freeze any US-based assets the target may have, but they also prohibit entities from conducting business with the sanctioned parties. That can result in difficulties accessing global financial systems and other international platforms.

The de facto oil blockade has also resulted in the increasing frequency of power outages, and essential services like public transportation and medical care have faced reductions. Turk pointed to those downstream effects in his remarks.

“Cuba faces increasing isolation,” he said. “Companies are leaving. Fewer airlines fly to the country. It is almost disconnected from international payment systems.”

Turk’s office has also highlighted the human costs of the sanctions. According to the statistics it cited, infant death rates have doubled, reaching 9.9 for every 1,000 births. The survival rate for childhood cancer, meanwhile, has declined from 85 to 65 percent.

In March, the Cuban government also warned of medical needs going unanswered as a result of the energy shortage. It estimated that there was a backlog of 96,387 people awaiting surgery, 11,193 of whom were minors.

It also underscored that 16,000 patients needed radiotherapy, and another 2,888 required dialysis, two treatments that depend on steady electrical supplies.

Turk’s remarks also pointed to the risks posed by the Atlantic hurricane season and other natural disasters. Within hours of his remarks, western Cuba was rattled by a powerful 6.1-magnitude earthquake. Summer heat alone could cost lives, he explained.

“Rising summer temperatures risk increasing the spread of vector borne and waterborne diseases,” Turk said.

“The hurricane season further increases exposure. This creates a perfect storm for social and economic deterioration and suffering for the Cuban people.”

Trump has repeatedly suggested that he is considering military action in Cuba to remove its leadership after the US-Israel war on Iran reaches an end.

Since January, only one Russian oil tanker has been allowed to reach the island, leaving its foreign fuel supplies largely depleted.

UCLA’s Megan Grant is just like every other college senior her age.

Sure, it might not seem like it from the outside looking in. After all, how can someone who has hit 89 home runs across her college career — one short of the Bruins’ record — and helped one of softball’s most dynamic offensive teams check off a list of new NCAA and program records relate to the other sociology majors in her classes at UCLA?

Grant disappears into her head sometimes, something she readily acknowledges. But her solution might not be as accessible to all the other “Twilight”-binging, video-game-loving UCLA students. She has coach Kelly Inouye-Perez keep her, the Division I home run queen, from getting caught up in the moment.

“She does a really great job with just keeping me neutral,” Grant said. “Sometimes I may get in a little crazy headspace, but she does a really great job helping me get out of those feelings that I’m stuck in, and she pulls me out and makes me realize, ‘Hey, as long as I can be who I am, that’s enough.’”

UCLA head coach Kelly Inouye-Perez, left, confers with associate head coach Lisa Fernandez next to infielder Jordan Woolery during NCAA reigonal game on May 15.

(Gina Ferazzi/Los Angeles Times)

Inouye-Perez and assistant coach Lisa Fernandez are some of the Bruins’ biggest keys to success as the team prepares for the start of the Women’s College World Series in Oklahoma City. The Bruins will face Texas Tech at 4 p.m. PDT Sunday in a game airing on ESPN.

UCLA closed its super regional with a single-season home run record (200) and a record for WCWS appearances (34).

Grant is no stranger to the work necessary to see that level of success. But even in her rare bad at-bats and struggles, Inouye-Perez and Fernandez allow her the space to fail. After all, there are nine places in the lineup. One person alone isn’t indicative of UCLA’s wins or losses, Inouye-Perez says.

“We really focus on succeeding and learning how to fail, so they can just get to the next pitch,” Inouye-Perez said. “We talk about the ability to slow the game down, to take deep breaths, to be able to enjoy the moment. It’s not on any one Bruin.”

That mentality doesn’t exist in a void. Inouye-Perez and Fernandez worked in tandem to create the powerhouse team, which is in the midst of one of the best offensive seasons in D1 softball history.

Inouye-Perez is in her 20th year coaching the Bruins and is the only NCAA softball player to win a championship as a player and a coach. She led the 2010 and 2019 teams to those titles. Meanwhile, Fernandez, in her 28th year coaching at UCLA and her fourth as associate coach, has taken primary responsibility for hitting — one of the Bruins’ biggest keys to success. The team leads the nation in batting average (.385), RBIs per game (10.38) and on-base percentage (.496).

“Me and her, we’re workhorses,” Grant said of Fernandez. “We work all day after practice hours together, and it just means the world. You can tell that she loves the game and her little nuggets that she teaches me.”

The Bruins’ success in the batter’s box also has helped raise the tide of a team that could’ve fallen into many pitfalls. The team has only one main pitcher, Taylor Tinsley, who’s spent the most time in the circle in the NCAA tournament with 29-1/3 innings pitched. The Bruins are also young. Of the 21 players on the roster, only eight are seniors, redshirt juniors or juniors.

Seniors Jordan Woolery and Grant are one pace to break NCAA records, but the underclassmen aren’t far behind. Redshirt freshman Aleena Garcia set a single-game RBI record (7) when she hit two three-run homers in UCLA’s 14-4 win over Central Florida in the Super Regional.

Much like Inouye-Perez, Fernandez’s best attribute is her ability to be a sounding board for Grant.

“You get her enthusiasm too,” Grant said. “If you mess up, she’s always there to have your back. She celebrates your wins as well, and she gets very ecstatic about it. It almost makes me laugh, because it makes things so much more fun. She just brings that out of people.”

Even when teams lose to UCLA and Fernandez, it’s still a positive experience for some.

UCLA associate head coach Lisa Fernandez huddles near the mound with starting pitcher Taylor Tinsley (23) during the fifth inning of a comeback win over California Baptist. The Lancers scored 10 runs in the fifth, but Tinsley bounced back from outing.

(Gina Ferazzi/Los Angeles Times)

Central Florida coach Cindy Ball-Malone considered Fernandez one of the best softball players ever, calling her the Michael Jordan of the sport. But what makes her truly impressive, Ball-Malone said, is that Fernandez is an even better coach.

“She’s just a winner,” Ball-Malone said. “I kind of just want to rub up on her or something to get that mojo because she’s got it. Her attention to detail, her belief in the smallest things, that’s why she is so good at what she does.”

It’s no wonder then why so many people, regardless of team affiliation, want to see UCLA’s coaches in person.

If you’re a part of the Bruins, you get to learn from people who have brought the school championships. And, if you’re trying to beat UCLA, there’s no better accomplishment than saying you beat Inouye-Perez and Fernandez’s record-breaking team.

“[Fernandez is] going to push you, and it might be uncomfortable, but dang it, you have no choice but to get better,” Ball-Malone said. “If you can get through her, you can get through anybody, and I’m going to learn from that so I can bring that to this program.”

The Trump administration has sought to pressure international officials who scrutinise reported abuses by Israeli forces.

The United States government has returned UN human rights expert Francesca Albanese to a list of sanctioned individuals after a judge had granted a temporary injunction against the designation.

On Wednesday, an update appeared on the US Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) website, indicating that Albanese had been added to the agency’s list of Specially Designated Nationals (SDN), without offering further details.

Albanese serves as the UN’s special rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territory, and her criticism of Israeli policies has made her a target under US President Donald Trump.

In July 2025, Secretary of State Marco Rubio issued a statement announcing sanctions against Albanese, accusing her of “lawfare” and “biased and malicious activities” against Israel.

He also cited her recommendation that the International Criminal Court (ICC) should issue arrest warrants against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Minister of Defence Yoav Gallant, which it ultimately did in November 2024.

The announcement was one in a series of actions the Trump administration has taken against critics it sees as hostile to US and Israeli interests.

The sanctions barred Albanese from entering the US and froze her assets in the country. They also prevented any US-based entity from doing business with her.

Albanese, an Italian citizen, has close ties to the US: Her daughter is a US citizen, and the family maintains a residence in the country.

In February, members of Albanese’s family filed a lawsuit on her behalf, stating that the sanctions had disrupted her life, even preventing her from accessing her bank account.

The lawsuit also accused the Trump administration of trying to intimidate those who speak out against Israeli rights abuses.

Albanese has been vocal in her assessment that Israel has committed genocide in Gaza, a view echoed by leading human rights experts around the world. More than 75,000 Palestinians have been killed in the territory since 2023, when Israel launched its genocidal war on the Strip.

Albanese is not alone in facing economic penalties for her work. Since taking office for a second term, Trump is estimated to have issued sanctions against nine ICC judges, as well as prosecutors for the court.

The judges and prosecutors were reportedly involved in probes into abuses by US and Israeli forces.

Legal experts have condemned the sanctions as an assault on international law and an effort to shield the US and its allies from scrutiny.

On May 13, US District Judge Richard Leon, an appointee of former President George W Bush, ruled in favour of the Albanese family’s lawsuit, granting a temporary injunction against the sanctions.

Leon found that the Trump administration had used the penalties to curtail Albanese’s constitutionally protected speech. He also stated that Albanese could not be blamed for the ICC’s actions.

“It is undisputed that her recommendations have no binding effect on the ICC’s actions,” Leon wrote. “They are nothing more than her opinion.”

As a result of the ruling, Albanese was removed from the sanctions list this month.

But the Trump administration appealed Leon’s order. It also said it would restore her to the sanctions list as soon as it was able, though it is unclear what prompted Wednesday’s change.

Moscow’s envoy accuses Washington of failing to honour commitments under the 1947 UN Headquarters Agreement.

Russia has slammed the United States for failing to grant a visa to Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Alimov to attend a United Nations Security Council meeting in New York, calling the decision a breach of Washington’s obligations.

Vassily Nebenzia told the Security Council on Tuesday that the country should have been represented by Alimov – “who oversees matters related to the United Nations” – at the meeting.

“However, despite all of our attempts to persuade the US side to issue a visa to him, that visa was ultimately not granted,” Nebenzia said.

The 1947 agreement that established the international body’s headquarters in New York requires the US to issue visas to foreign diplomats looking to attend UN functions “without charge and as promptly as possible”.

Nebenzia said not granting a visa to Alimov is a violation of that treaty and also a slight to Beijing, which is chairing the Security Council in May.

“We view this not just as a breach by Washington of its obligations under United Nations Headquarters Agreement, according to which access to United Nations needs to be provided for all officials and member states, barring none, but we also view this as an egregious instance of disrespect for the Chinese presidency of the Security Council,” he said.

The US Department of State did not immediately respond to Al Jazeera’s request for comment.

The visa controversy comes at a time of receding tensions between Washington and Moscow as US President Donald Trump pushes to end the war in Ukraine.

Trump has been regularly speaking with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin. But Washington has continued to enforce sanctions against Moscow over the Ukraine invasion.

Both Putin and Trump have separately visited China and met with its president, Xi Jinping, in recent weeks.

Earlier this week, Iran’s Foreign Ministry said Abbas Araghchi, the country’s top diplomat, cancelled his participation in Tuesday’s Security Council meeting due to visa issues.

During last year’s UN General Assembly, in September 2025, the US imposed strict limits on the movement of the Iranian delegation in New York.

In 2019, the US also delayed then-Iranian President Hassan Rouhani’s visa for the General Assembly but eventually granted him entry.

May 24 (UPI) — The United States on Sunday blamed the collapse of a U.N. nuclear nonproliferation conference on what it called some countries’ inability to take Iran’s threat to global nonproliferation seriously.

The nearly monthlong Review Conference of the Parties to the Treaty on the Nonproliferation of Nuclear Weapons ended Friday without consensus on an outcome document, which reviews implementation of the Cold War-era pact and sets recommendations and commitments for its 191 state parities.

Conference President Do Hung Viet of Vietnam said Friday, following weeks of work and four versions of an outcome document, that he would not put it forward for adoption as “the conference is not in a position to achieve agreement on its substantive work.”

The failure came amid mounting global insecurity, including the war in Iran, the modernization and expansion of nuclear arsenals and other geopolitical tensions, which complicated efforts to reach consensus.

The U.S. State Department on Sunday faulted on other NPT member states.

“The inability of some NPT States Parties to take Iran’s threat to global nonproliferation seriously will be addressed by the United States in our continuing engagements,” State Department spokesperson Thomas Pigott said in a statement.

He said the failure to adopt a document was made worse by what he described as Iran’s continued noncompliance with NPT-required safeguards and “its escalating nuclear activities.”

Pigott did not specify in the statement which activities he was referring to. The United States attacked Iran’s nuclear facilities in June, with President Donald Trump repeatedly claiming they were “obliterated.”

“For the NPT Review Conference to uphold its founding mandate, States Parties cannot turn a blind eye to Iran’s noncompliance, nor can violators be allowed to undermine the enforcement and accountability mechanisms at the core of the NPT,” he said.

Iran was quick to blame the United States, saying Washington’s “excessive demands” were at fault.

The United States was seeking to include language in the document concerning Iran, which accused the United States during the meeting of violating the treaty by attacking its nuclear facilities.

“The NPT Review Conference failed for the third consecutive time due to obstructionism by the United States and its allies,” Iran’s mission to the U.N. said in a social media statement.

Following the collapse of the conference, U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres expressed his “disappointment.”

“The current international environment, marked by deep tensions and an elevated risk posed by nuclear weapons, demands urgent action,” his spokesperson, Stephane Dujarric, said in a statement.

“The secretary-general appeals to all states to make full use of all available avenues of dialogue, diplomacy and negotiation to reduce tensions, lower nuclear risks and, ultimately, eliminate the nuclear threat.”

It is the 11th meeting of the treaty states parties and the third in consecutive review conference to end without an agreement.

Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association, said the failure of the conference to call for “urgently needed” concrete actions to avert a new nuclear arms race was due to the five nuclear-armed states’ use of “aggressive diplomatic intimidation tactics against non-nuclear weapons states.”

He also said U.S. leadership as “sorely lacking.”

“The foundations of the NPT, the cornerstone of global efforts to reduce and eliminate the world’s greatest danger, are cracking due to inattention, intransigence and ineptitude,” Kimball said in a statement.

May 21 (UPI) — Americans traveling back to the United States who have recently been in Democratic Republic of the Congo, Uganda or South Sudan will be required to enter the country through Washington, D.C.

Citizens and lawful permanent residents who have been in any of the countries in the last 21 days will be required to fly to Washington Dulles International Airport for enhanced health screenings before continuing on to their final destination, the U.S. Department of State announced.

The announcement follows an Air France flight bound for the United States on Wednesday afternoon being redirected to Montreal Trudeau International Airport after a passenger on board was determined to be from the DRC.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Monday already had blocked non-U.S. passport holders from entering the United States if they had been to any of the three African nations in the last 21 days.

An American doctor, one of several exposed in the DRC, was also confirmed to be infected with the Bundibugyo strain of Ebola on Tuesday and flown to Germany for treatment.

“The Dulles requirement applies to all passengers, including U.S. citizens and lawful permanent residents, who were present in those countries,” the State Department said in a travel advisory.

“Please be prepared for flight changes or cancellations,” the department said.

World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said during a press conference that there have 51 confirmed cases of Ebola among the three countries, with nearly 600 suspected cases and 139 suspected deaths.

Tedros said the scale of the epidemic is “much larger” in the DRC, and that there have been deaths reported among health care workers, which suggests health care-associated transmission.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has reported that the doctor whose case was confirmed this week, with officials flying him to Germany because of their previous experience in handling Ebola cases.

Although contacts linked to the doctor also have been moved to Germany and Czechia for observation, there have been no additional cases in Americans, the CDC said.

May 18 (UPI) — The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Monday restricted non-U.S. passport holders from entering the United States if they have been in Uganda, the Democratic Republic of the Congo or South Sudan in the past 21 days.

The agency made the announcement as there have at least 346 cases and 88 deaths in the DRC, on top of several cases that have been confirmed in nearby nations in people who been there, the CDC said over the weekend.

The CDC said that is coordinating with various agencies and companies to manage travelers who have been exposed to Ebola as it also deploys employees to support containment of the outbreak in the three nations.

“CDC assess the immediate risk to the general U.S. public as low, but we will continue to evaluate the evolving situation and may adjust public health measures as additional information becomes available,” the agency said in a situation summary.

In the last five days, the World Health Organization confirmed that the Ebola virus circulating in the three countries right now is the Bundibuyo virus, one of four known strains that have affected humans since Ebola was discovered in mid-1970s.

Although there is an approved, licensed vaccine against Ebola which has successfully been used to quell outbreaks, the vaccine — called Ervebo — only protects against acquisition of the Zaire species of Ebola virus, making it useless in the current outbreak, according to the CDC.

WHO on Saturday declared the outbreak a public health emergency of international concern.

In its update, WHO said that there are “significant uncertainties to the true number of infected persons and geographic spread associated with this event at the present time. In addition, there is limited understanding of the epidemiologic links with known or suspected cases.”

Ebola spreads from wild animals to humans and from human to human through direct contact with blood or other bodily fluids from infected individuals, and carries a case fatality rate of roughly 50%.

A number of affected Americans have reportedly been exposed to the virus during the outbreak.

The CDC has recommended that people who have traveled through the two countries in the last 21 days should immediately seek medical attention if they develop Ebola symptoms, which can include fever, weakness, vomiting, diarrhea or unexplained bleeding.

In addition to roughly 30 CDC employees dispatched to the region, and will join officials from several other global and regional health agencies, the WHO is expected to convene an emergency committee to advise the agency’s director-general on its response the outbreak.