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Authorities say seven people are still missing after deadly explosions at a facility storing pyrotechnic material.

Two explosions at a military facility in the Bolivian city of Viacha have killed at least 10 people and injured dozens of others, authorities said.

The blasts occurred on Friday in an area used to store pyrotechnic material, about 30km (18 miles) from the administrative capital, La Paz, Bolivia’s Ministry of Defence said.

Viacha health director Rita Nebraska told a local television station that between 10 and 15 people were believed to have been killed and 62 others were injured.

She said 14 of the wounded were transferred to hospitals in La Paz, including a girl with third-degree burns.

Fireworks were stored at the military facility, but the cause of the explosions remains under investigation, police spokesman Roger Roca said. He added that seven people were still missing.

Firefighters warned that a heat source remained at the site, Nebraska said, urging residents to stay at least 150 metres away because of the risk of another explosion.

Police said dozens of nearby homes were damaged and that many civilians were injured by shattered glass.

About 50 civilians and six military personnel injured in the explosions “have been treated … by the different medical centres of Viacha”, Deputy Minister of Defence Ernesto Justiniano Urenda said in a statement.

An investigation is under way to determine the cause of the explosions, how the pyrotechnic material was stored and whether anyone was responsible, he added.

Footage posted on social media showed one of the explosions shattering windows in nearby buildings and sending debris into the air as thick black smoke rose from the facility.

A former ABC News employee is asking a court to drop CBS News chief correspondent Matt Gutman from her wrongful termination lawsuit, which claimed she was sexually harassed by him when they were colleagues.

Samira Said, a field producer for ABC News for four years, included the claims related to Gutman in a wrongful termination lawsuit filed Aug. 14 in Los Angeles County Superior Court against her former employer and its parent The Walt Disney Co.

Said’s lawyers filed a request with the court Friday to drop Gutman, who was named as a defendant. Lawyers for Said did not respond to an email asking why the request was made. ABC and Disney remain defendants in the suit.

The suit cited two incidents where Said claimed Gutman created a hostile work environment by making inappropriate sexual comments while on the job.

Gutman declined comment on the matter through a CBS News representative.

Said alleges she was wrongfully terminated from ABC News in 2025 after dealing with mental health issues. The suit accuses the company of violating California’s Fair Employment and Housing Act by not making accommodations for her. She is seeking compensatory and punitive damages along with her attorneys’ fees.

Gutman, 48, was the first high-profile talent hire by CBS News Editor-in-Chief Bari Weiss, who took charge of the division in October. He recently filled in as anchor of the “CBS Evening News” and scored higher ratings than Tony Dokoupil, the program’s regular anchor.

Gutman spent 17 years at ABC News, where he mostly reported from Los Angeles.

Caracas, September 4, 2026 (venezuelanalysis.com) – Dozens of campesino families in Bolívar State, southeastern Venezuela, are calling for support from the acting Delcy Rodríguez government after their land title was arbitrarily revoked.

“This should not happen. We have worked the land which we fought for and secured legally,” campesino spokeswoman Zurima Carvajal told Venezuelanalysis.

Carvajal belongs to the “Ojo de Agua Las 3 Raíces” campesino council, which brings together 41 families in a 470-hectare land estate with the same name located in the Padre Pedro Chien municipality of Bolívar state.

The rural organization denounced that their collective land title was arbitrarily revoked in 2024 but local authorities did not give any notice for more than two years. In recent weeks, the campesino families have denounced intimidation and attempts at eviction.

“A few days ago there were shots fired against my house,” Carvajal stated. “Local police came and wrote a report, but then nothing happened.” 

The campesino leader denounced that a local family who claims to own the land has ties to military officials, National Assembly legislators, and Bolívar State Governor Yulisbeth García. Carvajal added that she has received recurring threats and that a group of men hired to intimidate the campesino council destroyed a fence, causing the families to lose five heads of cattle which ran into nearby fields.

“We urge national authorities, from Acting President Delcy Rodríguez to Agriculture Minister Vladimir Padrino, as well as the Land Institute (INTI), to investigate this case and restore our land deed,” Carvajal concluded. “There has to be a mechanism to protect those who work the land.”

The Ojo de Agua campesino council began its struggle in 2016, reporting to authorities that vast tracts of land were abandoned in the Padre Pedro Chien municipality. Shielded by Venezuela’s Land Law, which protects rural collectives who occupy and produce in idle estates, the campesino families began to settle in the area in 2018.

Carvajal recalled that the organization immediately faced intimidation and violence from would-be landowners who could not produce any property deeds after the INTI opened an investigation. However, they repeatedly destroyed the campesinos’ crops, while bringing legal charges that led to the jailing of several activists.

The Ojo de Agua organization had a decisive breakthrough after joining the 2018 Admirable Campesino March that saw hundreds of rural activists march for hundreds of kilometers to demand that the Nicolás Maduro government address agrarian issues, including landowner violence and the judicial persecution of local organizers.

With support from other campesino organizations, Ojo de Agua received its land title from the Maduro government in 2020. Carvajal affirmed that the land has been permanently productive, with a variety of crops including corn, sugar cane, beans, and vegetables, as well as a small herd of cattle.

Land struggles have recently intensified in rural Venezuela, with a growing number of rural collectives denouncing the arbitrary revocation of titles. Opposition party Vamos Vamos Venezuela, backed by agroindustrial and cattle rancher lobbies, has campaigned for the repeal of the landmark 2001 Land Law, approved by former President Hugo Chávez, in order to turn Venezuela into “a country of property owners.”

Campesino movements have vowed to fight to defend the popular gains in the countryside.

The Venezuelan acting government and parliament have yet to comment on a potential reform to the Land Law. However, the National Assembly preliminarily approved a law to “protect cattle rearing activities,” with legislature President Jorge Rodríguez publicly criticizing the nationalization of large land estates under Chávez.

In parallel with land issues, Venezuelan rural organizations have also denounced that national production is at risk due to unrestrained imports of foodstuffs such as corn, rice, and sugar. Small-scale producers have pointed the finger at agribusiness corporations for resorting to imports during harvest season in order to drive down crop prices.

The US is the second largest source of agricultural imports to Venezuela by volume, totaling $758 million in 2025. Researcher Felipe Pacheco reported that corn imports from the US more than quadrupled in the first five months of 2026, compared to the average of the prior five years.

Edited by Lucas Koerner in Philadelphia, USA.

Fans had travelled from across the UK and the world to see the rapper, including Prince Dean Sithole, who hailed Jay-Z as one of his role models.

“I think he’s very impacting, especially for us black people because we don’t get a lot of recognition,” the 19-year-old from Leeds told BBC Newsbeat.

“Seeing him today shows that dreams are possible and you can be that person that you want to be.”

Jay-Z, real name Shawn Carter, broke through with his 1996 debut album, but it was his third record, Vol. 2: Hard Knock Life, in 1998 which landed him the top spot in the US charts for the first time and a best rap album Grammy.

He went on to establish himself as one of the most influential figures in hip-hop, releasing 13 solo studio albums and several collaboration records, which have secured him 25 Grammy Awards.

He was also the first rapper inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2017, as well being inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2021.

Over the years, he has also become one of the most prominent music mogul’s in the world, with his company Roc Nation representing a host of top talent and, in recent years, it has been behind the Super Bowl half-time show.

In 2019, he was declared hip hop’s first billionaire by Forbes, having built an empire based on music, property, fashion and investments alongside his wife Beyoncé.

The power couple have three children, daughter Blue Ivy, 14, and 9-year-old twins, Rumi and Sir.

Welcome to Bunker Talk. This is a weekend open discussion post for the best commenting crew on the net, in which we can chat about all the stuff that went on this week that we didn’t cover. We can also talk about the stuff we did or whatever else grabs your interest. In other words, it’s an off-topic thread.

This week’s caption reads:

U.S. Marine Corps Lance Cpl. Vincenzo Morrison, right, a metal worker, and Chief Warrant Officer 4 Daniel Opper II, an engineer equipment officer, both with 1st Maintenance Battalion, 1st Combat Readiness Regiment, 1st Marine Logistics Group, utilize an underground bunker to repair a drone’s flight controller during a field exercise on Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton, California, Aug. 19, 2026. The FEX focused on increasing proficiency in tactical communication networks, analog processes, field intermediate maintenance and supply operations, as well as refining Marine combat skills in an expeditionary environment in order to prepare for Exercise Steel Knight 27 at the end of the year. (U.S. Marine Corps photo by Cpl. Desiree Ruiz) 

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• Finally, as always, report offenders, please. This doesn’t mean reporting people who don’t share your political views, but we really need your help in this regard.

The Eastern Economic Forum (EEF) has been described as a successful solid platform since its creation. It increasingly attracts guests from widely different countries, especially leaders of China, India, Malaysia, Mongolia, and Myanmar. The leaders of Vietnam, Kazakhstan, Laos, and Thailand have visited it in various capacities. The business segment of the forum has long gone far beyond the geographical boundaries of Eurasia. Its frequent unprecedented large number of guests includes businesspeople from South America, Africa, and the Middle East. That, however, it remains open for entrepreneurial contacts with everyone whose natural interests are primarily in the trade, economic, and social spheres. This cross-platform cooperation between the structures is developing, growing deeper and creating a new agenda. The most essential feature is that the platform is guided by the principles of equality, mutual benefit, and honest dialogue, which are entirely different from those of Western-oriented structures. 

The EEF, which opened on 1st-4th September, in Russia’s Far Eastern city of Vladivostok, has become a solid platform for open and constructive dialogue among business leaders, government officials, and members of the expert community. It has also become a unique venue for discussing the strategic development of the Russian Far East and the country as a whole, while fostering and strengthening potential partnerships with counterparts, particularly from the Asia-Pacific region, in food production, infrastructure, logistics, industry, energy, and many other sectors of the economy. While recognizing the huge untapped economic potential of the region, it is also understandable that the development of the Far East largely depends on human capital, entrepreneurial efforts, and the ability of regions to create the necessary conditions for realizing the practical expectations.

On 2nd September, as part of the business program, the “Towards a Common Future: Inclusion as a Development Resource for the Far East” discussion was held with a strong focus on how to create an equal opportunity environment, develop human capital, and engage diverse groups in economic and social life. The following day, the majority of the participants in the “Inspiring Investments: A Development Strategy for Growth and Scaling” session touched on funding mechanisms for creative projects, opportunities to enter foreign markets, and collaboration between businesses, investors, development institutions, and government agencies. The key point focused on the development of the creative economy and international cooperation with Asia-Pacific countries, industry investments, the export of intellectual property and creative products, the media’s role in the development and positioning of regions in the Far East, new content formats, and training personnel for the economy of the future.

As part of the discussions at the forum, Russia and the United States continued their business dialogue, headed by Robert Agee, president and CEO of the American Chamber of Commerce in Russia (AmCham Russia), and with the participation of US representatives. It was spearheaded by the Roscongress Foundation in Russia.  Anton Kobyakov, Adviser to the President of the Russian Federation, noted, however, that there is a strong appetite on both sides for direct professional engagement. What matters most is to sustain the momentum and possibly broaden the agenda to include bilateral entrepreneurial partnership. 

“There is the need to facilitate more networking to identify specific strategic areas for cooperation,” said Robert Agee, president and CEO of the American Chamber of Commerce in Russia, and unreservedly agreed to continue their work on developing business ties and prepare for the participation of American representatives in the Russian Federation.

With many Asian and Pacific participants, explored opportunities for developing small and medium-sized enterprises. This is becoming increasingly important amid structural changes in the economy, as businesses look for new avenues for growth. The EEF made it possible not only to exchange experience but also to find concrete solutions that will help entrepreneurs adapt to changing conditions and unlock new opportunities for growth.

Developing trade, strengthening of interstate ties, and the creation of a common space for interaction among Asia-Pacific countries have assumed a new trend with Russia. The argument was logically based on Russia’s historical experience of cooperation with East Asian countries. It was further underlined that Russia and the Asia-Pacific attract politicians and entrepreneurs from around the world. In these current geopolitical circumstances, Russia needs to seek out new opportunities for development, particularly from the Asia-Pacific region, and with reference to the emerging new multipolar world. At the heart of the forum program was the search for new sources of growth and resilience for SMEs amid structural changes in the economy, from raising productivity and adopting new technologies to managing risks and adapting business models. One section of the program focused on the role of automation and artificial intelligence, changes in business processes, employees’ readiness to work with new technologies, and ways of improving productivity. 

In addition to the above, a special session was devoted to analysis where experts outlined the key economic trends across the Asia-Pacific region. As monitored, this session was set out in the analytical review entitled “Asia Trends 2026: The AI Boom, Industrial Relocation, and Geopolitical Fragmentation,” prepared ahead of the opening of the Eastern Economic Forum on 1st September. The review clearly noted, among other things, that Asia accounts for around 60% of global GDP growth and is becoming the world’s new center of trade, industry, technology, finance, and military power. Within the region, however, economic growth is highly uneven, while technology and capital are concentrated in a small group of states, making consolidation difficult. The ASEAN countries, meanwhile, face competition from Chinese manufacturers while also coming under growing geopolitical pressure from Washington. More broadly, the Asia-Pacific region is more exposed than any other to the effects of the energy crisis and to climate risks such as a super El Niño. 

According to the International Monetary Fund, Asian GDP grew by 5% in 2025, significantly ahead of global growth of 3.5%. Within the region, however, countries face a range of specific challenges, from high labor costs and insufficient industrial capacity to balance-of-payments difficulties and currency instability. These factors are driving increasingly divergent development paths among Asian economies. The region’s advanced economies, such as Japan and South Korea, posted lower growth rates, at 1.2% and 1%, respectively, in 2025. Asia’s emerging economies grew by 5.5% overall over the same period, with performance ranging from a 2% contraction in GDP in Myanmar to an 8% surge in Vietnam. 

Countries with the strongest growth prospects are attracting investment, leaving others with fewer opportunities to draw in capital. According to the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, developing countries in Asia attracted US$644 billion in foreign direct investment in 2025. That is around 40% of the global total and more than 70% of all investment in developing countries. Capital flows are unevenly distributed: eight of the ten largest recipients of foreign direct investment among developing countries are in Asia, and together they account for around 60% of all inflows to developing economies and more than 80% of inflows to the region. 

Capital is becoming increasingly concentrated not only in a small number of countries but also in a narrow range of sectors, particularly artificial intelligence, clean energy, semiconductors, and critical minerals. In the longer term, this could deepen inequality and worsen the position of countries without a strong presence in these fields. Asia is one of the principal beneficiaries of the global AI boom. The investment cycle associated with its development has driven up demand for semiconductors, memory, servers, network equipment, and related electronics. The region occupies a central position in the global supply chain for these products. Technology exports will remain a powerful engine of economic growth in Asia, although the benefits will be distributed unevenly depending on each country’s position in the value chain.

South-East Asia’s role as an industrial center is growing as production capacity relocates there from China, which is no longer a low-cost manufacturing base. Chinese companies have begun redirecting production to Vietnam and Indonesia in particular in order to mitigate the impact of US tariffs. At the same time, China has increased its exports of industrial components and capital goods, supplying the equipment and parts needed by manufacturing centers in other countries. Exports of intermediate goods, including memory chips, other semiconductors, and industrial components, rose by 9% in 2025. Part of this represented an indirect offset to reduced shipments to the United States, as components, particularly in electronics, were used by manufacturers in other countries to produce goods that were subsequently exported to the US. A fall of roughly US$15 billion in smartphone exports, for example, was matched by a comparable increase in shipments of components, notably to India. 

In many other cases, however, the growth in exports of components and equipment was not linked to replacing sales China had lost in the US. Instead, it supported the expansion of production in third markets, especially developing ones, reinforcing China’s role as a supplier of production inputs rather than an exporter of finished goods. The result is an integrated supply chain taking shape across the region, encompassing research and development and the manufacture of high-technology components in China, assembly and packaging in an ASEAN country such as Malaysia or Vietnam, and the subsequent shipment of products to markets within the region and beyond. 

Amid the fragmentation of the global economy and trade, the development of the Eurasian space calls for resilient regional supply chains and logistical connectivity between states. Russia’s Far Eastern Federal District can play a strategically important role here. Thanks to its location, the district can serve as a resource and logistics gateway within the transport corridors linking European Russia with Asia. For a long time, infrastructure constraints held back the expansion of ties between Russia and Asian states, but the situation has begun to change with the development of the Eastern Operating Domain, which comprises the Baikal–Amur Mainline and the Trans-Siberian Railway. 

A program to modernize the Eastern Operating Domain has been under way since 2013, aimed at eliminating bottlenecks on the railways of Siberia and the Far East. Over that period, its carrying capacity has increased by 84%, reaching 180 million tonnes in 2025. The modernization is expected to raise that figure to 210 million tonnes by the end of 2030 and 270 million tonnes by the end of 2032. The development of the rail network and port infrastructure will largely determine the prospects for Eurasia and for the Asia-Pacific region in particular, as the world’s economic, financial, and trade center shifts towards the region. 

Emerging trends are reshaping the world; South-South economic partnership is seemingly becoming both the political and economic architecture. Logically, developing collaboration with Asian partners, anchoring discussions on technological leadership, and making breakthroughs in scientific fields and adopting innovative technologies are increasingly reshaping the world. Today, the role of academic institutions is to build a solid scientific and technological foundation that addresses applied industrial challenges while enhancing business efficiency, eco-friendliness, and sustainability. It is only through this synergy between science and the real economic sectors that can bring true multifaceted sovereignty. In conclusion, Asia-Pacific and Russia have to create a new model of economic and business and trade relations in the Global South.

As monitored from official reports, Russia is creating practically a new model of development of the Far East with maximally comfortable conditions for enterprises, as well as legal innovations for the investment climate in the region. Therefore, potential Asia-Pacific investors have to work on new ideas and new strategies for developing trade, agro-processing, industry, and other economic sectors in the Far Eastern region. The Eastern Economic Forum was held from September 1 to 4 on the campus of the Far Eastern Federal University. This year’s theme: “The Far East: Development for the Benefit of People.” It was the 11th EEF and organized by the Roscongress Foundation.

Costa Rican President Laura Fernandez has suggested that United States military operations in the country’s territory could bring national security benefits.

But she added caveats. In an interview published on Friday, Fernandez emphasised to the news service Reuters that such measures would require approval from the national legislature.

She also added there were no plans in the works for US forces to operate in the country.

“It would obviously be very good for national security if it were about pursuing a common objective against transnational crime, transnational drug trafficking, transnational terrorism,” said Fernandez, a right-wing populist who took office in May.

Fernandez succeeded her mentor, former President Rodrigo Chaves, after a February election in which concerns about security and rising violence in the Central American country played a prominent role.

Though she ran on a tough-on-crime platform, Fernandez has said that she is not currently considering a state of emergency to address the problem.

Such emergency declarations typically suspend key constitutional rights, in favour of giving police or the military added powers to crack down on violence.

That model has been popularised under the right-wing president of El Salvador, Nayib Bukele.

But critics point out that the states of emergency are meant to be short-term measures, not permanent ones. El Salvador has been under an emergency declaration since 2022, with the government extending it dozens of times.

Crime has become a top voter concern in Costa Rica. The Central American country’s homicide rate has doubled in the last decade, reaching 17.2 per 100,000 inhabitants in 2023.

That figure still places the country’s average well below many others in the region, but the change, partly attributed to increased drug trafficking activity, has startled many residents.

Fernandez’s remarks also reflect growing pressure from the US to reduce crime across the Western Hemisphere.

Since returning to office for a second term, US President Donald Trump has pushed to expand his country’s influence across Latin America, notably through military engagements.

Earlier this year, he launched the “Shield of the Americas”, also known as the Americas Counter Cartel Coalition (ACCC), to bring together right-wing leaders across the region to address drug trafficking.

Trump used the inaugural meeting to encourage Latin American governments to embrace a military-driven approach to crime, despite concerns about human rights.

He has also carried out and threatened military operations in sovereign countries, on the premise of combatting crime.

Some countries, such as Mexico, have baulked at the prospect of US military forces carrying out operations on their territory. Critics point to Washington’s long record of interventions and rights abuses in the region.

But other countries have been more receptive. US forces, for instance, have recently carried out military operations with the right-wing government of Ecuador, in an effort to lower crime rates.

Ecuador’s armed forces, however, have been accused of crimes such as torture and enforced disappearance, abuses that experts warn could be worsened by support from the US.

A July report from Human Rights Watch warns that the military collaboration between Ecuador and the US has already had dire consequences.

Ecuadorian fishermen have reported facing attacks at sea, and in one case, Ecuadorian soldiers allegedly detained and tortured four Colombian farm workers, using methods such as mock executions, beatings and electric shocks.

That incident reportedly took place during a raid near the border carried out with US support.

“The two countries’ security relationship is deepening at a moment when both governments have engaged in serious human rights violations fueled by their insistence on framing their confrontations with organised crime groups as a kind of war,” the report says.

Those raids come after Ecuadorian voters rejected a referendum last year that would have allowed foreign countries to set up military bases in the country.

Israeli forces bar Israeli and Palestinian activists from delivering food and medicine to homes besieged by settlers.

Israeli police have killed a Palestinian man in Jerusalem and the Israeli army has blocked humanitarian assistance from reaching an occupied West Bank village besieged by settlers for weeks.

Officers opened fire on a 33-year-old Palestinian near Damascus gate in Jerusalem on Friday. Israeli police said its border guard “neutralised” the man, claiming he was attempting to stab one of them.

The Palestinian Wafa news agency identified the man as Ibrahim al-Hendi from East Jerusalem’s Beit Hanina neighbourhood. He was pronounced dead at the scene.

Following the incident, Israeli forces deployed around Damascus Gate and the surrounding area of Jerusalem’s Old City, Palestinian sources told Al Jazeera.

Separately, the Israeli army said that it arrested Palestinians in the town of Qabatiya in the West Bank, alleging they were “planning to carry out an attack” against Israelis and security forces.

Ten other Palestinians were arrested during a 48-hour Israeli army operation in Nablus in the West Bank. The Israeli army said it seized more than “30 weapon production machines used to manufacture weapons” during the operation.

Meanwhile, Israeli settlers and soldiers carried out attacks across the occupied West Bank on Friday, Wafa reported. Settlers stormed the Khirbet al-Hamra community in the northern Jordan Valley and assaulted one resident.

Israeli settlers, accompanied by soldiers, also attacked Khalet a-Nahlah in southern Bethlehem. Israeli forces also fired tear gas and concussion grenades at a crowd of Palestinians who gathered to resist the attacks.

Blocking access to Qusra

As violence and harassment of Palestinians continues across the occupied territory, the Israeli army on Friday also prevented around 100 peace activists from delivering food and medicine to Palestinians who have been under siege in the town of Qusra for 28 days.

Since August 9, Israeli settlers have besieged three Palestinian homes in the northern occupied West Bank village, while the Israeli army has also prevented the families from entering or leaving them, claiming the area is a “closed military zone”.

“Day 28 of the blockade on Qusra. About 100 activists arrived to deliver supplies to the besieged families,” the Israeli Peace Now movement said in a post on X.

“The army blocked us at first, claiming Qusra was a ‘closed military zone.’ Then let us in but on the way back detained us for ‘violating a closed military zone’,” it added.

Qusra Mayor Abdel Azim Wadi also told the state-run Turkish Anadolu news agency that the Israeli army has been “preventing the delivery of basic necessities to three families trapped on Mount Ras al-Ain”.

US ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee told Israeli public broadcaster Kan on Friday that settler violence against Palestinians is “damaging the image of Israel as a nation and a people, warning that Israel “needs all the friends it can get” and “doesn’t need more enemies”.

Around 750,000 Israeli settlers live in 156 illegal settlements and 360 settlement outposts in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and carry out attacks aimed at forcibly displacing Palestinians, according to Palestinian figures.

World number one Aryna Sabalenka’s straight-sets US Open win against Kamilla Rakhimova stopped by smell of cannabis.

World number one Aryna Sabalenka had an unusual interruption during ⁠her US Open third-round ⁠match, stopping play to alert the umpire to a strong smell of cannabis drifting onto the Louis Armstrong Stadium court.

Sabalenka, who ⁠had made a fast start to go 3-0 ahead before securing a straight-sets win against Uzbekistan’s Kamilla Rakhimova, raised the issue during her second service game on Friday, pointing ⁠out the smell before play resumed.

“Someone is smoking weed,” top seed Sabalenka told umpire Eva Asderaki-Moore as she was serving 30-0 up. “Would you mind to… because it’s so strong.”

Sabalenka later told reporters she was not objecting to anyone enjoying themselves, but asked for the smoking ‌to be kept away from the court.

“I was like, Guys, you can do whatever, you can smoke whatever, you can relax as much as you can, but please to not do it around the tennis courts,” a smiling Sabalenka said. “It’s a bit tricky to handle that smell while you’re trying to compete at your best.”

The odour of cannabis has become a familiar — if unwelcome — feature at ⁠Flushing Meadows, with players complaining about the distraction in the ⁠past.

While smoking is not permitted inside the grounds, recreational cannabis is legal for adults 21 and older in New York, and smoke from people in the surrounding Flushing Meadows-Corona Park can drift into the tennis ⁠complex and onto the courts.

Sabalenka said she had smelled cannabis before during the tournament but never so strongly during a ⁠match, with Friday’s wind apparently carrying the odour into ⁠the stadium.

“That strong, yeah. Also, because it was a bit windy,” she said. “I don’t know if it was coming from the crowd or was from the outside because the wind blows it into the stadium.

“I ‌just hope they are a bit more aware of that stuff,” she added, before laughing when the questions returned to the subject. “Come on, guys. I think there is ‌nothing ‌else to say about weed. I’m just asking people not to smoke it next to the tennis court.”

Israeli attacks against villages and towns across southern Lebanon continue despite truce agreements and diplomacy.

An Israeli air strike targeting a motorcycle has killed two people in the Lebanese town of Kfar Reman, the Ministry of Public Health has said, as Israeli forces intensify attacks on southern Lebanon.

Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency (NNA) reported on Friday that the strike hit in Nabatieh near the strategic Ali al-Taher ridge, which the Israeli army said it had captured, though Hezbollah did not confirm losing it.

Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz on Friday claimed the military had cleared Hezbollah fighters embedded in tunnels under the strategic ridge, which overlooks a wide area that has become one of the most hotly contested.

Israeli raids and artillery shelling also targeted seven towns in the Tyre and Nabatieh districts, causing no casualties.

NNA said the attacks hit al-Mansouri, Majdal Zoun, Buyout al-Sayyad, Beit Lif and Srebbine in the Tyre district, as well as Zawtar al-Sharqiyah and Mayfadoun in Nabatieh.

The attacks come amid continued Israeli escalation against villages and towns across southern Lebanon despite two truce agreements – on June 4 and 26 – mediated by United States President Donald Trump’s administration.

The June 4 ceasefire was contingent on a “complete cessation” of Hezbollah fire and the evacuation of its fighters from the area south of the Litani River.

The June 26 framework agreement did not specifically call for the withdrawal of the Israeli forces and instead tied it to the disarmament of Hezbollah.

Since March 2, when the latest Israeli escalation in its war on Lebanon began, Israeli attacks have killed more than 4,000 people and injured at least 12,000 others, while forcing more than one million people from their homes, according to Lebanese authorities.

Israel has expanded its military presence across swaths of southern Lebanon since launching its new campaign against Hezbollah, which fired rockets into Israel in retaliation for US-Israeli air strikes that killed Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

On Friday, Israeli authorities separately released four Lebanese people who had been held in Israeli prisons after being detained in southern Lebanon.

They were transferred to Lebanese authorities via the International Committee of the Red Cross, a day after one Lebanese man was released as part of an agreement between the two countries.

Germany, Austria, ⁠Greece, Denmark and the Netherlands did not outline where the centres would be located.

Five European nations have agreed on concrete steps towards a deal with an unspecified non-European Union country to host migrant return facilities, senior officials said, in a sign of mounting determination to counter immigration.

Germany, Austria, ⁠Greece, Denmark and the Netherlands, known as the Group of Five, aim to sign deals this year to send migrants without legal residency to countries outside the European Union. The nations expected to host return centres have not been named.

“Around New Year, we expect to have a common understanding with a partner country outside of the European Union,” Danish Immigration and Integration Minister Morten Bodskov told reporters on Friday at a news conference in Copenhagen, without elaborating.

“It’s a new chance to have a life in a partner country,” he said, adding ‌that the five nations would be in dialogue with the International Organization for Migration and the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) on their next steps.

A spokesperson for UNHCR said the agency had not been approached with ‌details ‌of the proposal and therefore could not comment.

The Group of Five is set to reconvene in Munich, Germany, at the end of September to advance the plan.

German Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt confirmed that the group wants “to reach an agreement with ‌third countries this year that will enable the establishment of return hubs”.

The European Parliament in June approved an overhaul of migration policy aimed at speeding up deportations and allowing member states to set up centres abroad, in what some critics of the policy say could weaken safeguards for asylum seekers.

The Council of ⁠Europe, a non-EU body that promotes human rights, democracy and the rule of ⁠law, said in July that the proposed return hubs posed “considerable human rights risks”.

Danish Refugee Council Secretary-General Charlotte Slente said a better policy would be to implement the EU Pact on Migration and Asylum, which focuses ⁠on stricter border screening, faster return procedures and expanded digital systems for managing asylum claims.

“Return hubs focus on a small number of returns; they ⁠will not stop people from taking even more dangerous routes, and ⁠they could violate basic human rights,” she said.

It’s the dead of night when the buzz of the engines of a series of Shahed-136 one-way attack drones breaks the silence. Carrying their lethal payloads the drones slip into the darkness with a distant supply base as their target. Tracking, identifying, and then destroying this swarm of drones is no easy task.

The unmanned aircraft system (UAS) threat environment is changing rapidly with an increasing variety of killer drones that demand differing methods of tracking and identification to engage and defeat them. Operational users are learning from rapidly-evolving- conflicts, and modern air defense methods increasingly rely on scalable, layered, and persistent sensing teams that can detect and track small, fast, low-altitude, and even swarming, aerial threats in all kinds of complex situations, on land or at sea.

Ray Bischoff served active-duty with the U.S. Army for nearly 25 years, and he’s now the senior director of business development at Leonardo DRS, specialising in evaluating tactical formations and defensive requirements at all operational levels throughout the Department of War and allied nations. He is particularly focused on emerging threats from drones..

Bischoff spoke at length with TWZ’s Jamie Hunter about the use of tactical radar systems as part of a layered counter-drone system that is sufficiently versatile to tackle the toughest drone problems now, and what may come in the near future.

JH: Can you set the scene with regards to how you see the counter-UAS mission right now from a sensing perspective.

RB: The counter-UAS environment is changing and advancing very quickly. At the top level, we need to employ a variety of sensor systems – in this particular case we’re talking about tactical radars – but there are many other types of sensors, and at the highest end of the threat level it’s about connecting these together into a networked architecture.

Layering different systems in depth is vital, both from a communications architecture perspective and physically layering them in different places to protect different routes or avenues of approach, or sensitive facilities.

Look at the Strait of Hormuz, for instance, which is a vast area, with a layered and networked system to maximize the depth of coverage. The primary reason for this is that the biggest enemy in many situations like these is time. That networked architecture and having sensors in depth really gains you time, which gives you opportunities to make a better decision, time to reposition, to better evaluate. You need time to evaluate what different things in space are doing, where they’re going or where they’re coming from.

JH: When you say layered, are you talking about different systems that can look in different ways over different distances and systems in different positions that help you with that time element? What does layered actually mean?

RB: You can layer different types of sensors. Think of baseball. If all your players are home-run hitters, you probably aren’t going to do very well. You need to have different skills across your team to succeed, and it’s the same thing here. Layering of radar sensing bands, different types of technology such as electro-optic and infra-red that “see” in long, short and midwave, acoustic sensors, electronic warfare sensors to look for signals and other types of energy. It’s also about physically layering them in space, or depth.

We often see large exquisite sensors that have a lot of range and cover a large area. But this makes them susceptible to being targeted and destroyed. Layering sensors gives you redundancy, retaining the ability to defend. So, this is layering both in physical location, and in different types of technology.

This way, if one of your sensors is taken down by any means – for example by electronic countermeasures – your other systems can theoretically continue to operate. Just think how you can see, smell, touch, taste – it’s the same concept with layering different types of technologies, which is exactly what we at Leonardo DRS do and we integrate them so we can interact and share information to maximize the benefits of this layered approach. A team ultimately makes the sensors more effective across networks and architectures.

JH: Presumably you get good indicators on developments from the current operations in Ukraine. You already mentioned the Strait of Hormuz as well. What are the big lessons that you’re getting here about different types and sizes of drones?

RB: Without going into the details of combat operations, the bottom line is you have to advance your technologies at the rate or as close to the rate of the advancement of the weapons systems that are being utilized. We’re seeing a mixture of things when it comes to the UASs; that’s larger craft that are getting faster and can carry heavier payloads, or smaller ones with longer ranges that can move through areas almost undetected. 

There’s been so much investment in UAS technology, and they are becoming cheaper and easier to manufacture. People can 3D-print these things in their houses now. So, looking at this from a sensing perspective, that layering is becoming increasingly important.

We are looking to do things to counter these developments, such as maybe elevate the sensors to “see” across the top of the trees or place a sensor down in a valley – so that adds layering in altitude or elevation to remove blind spots. Just like the military, if you’re setting-up a defensive position, you have to cover what we called “dead space” where you can’t see with eyes or sensors from ground level.

JH: Can we dig further into the role of tactical radars in counter-UAS, specifically Leonardo DRS’ 202 Expeditionary Skid, which I believe is based on your Extended Multi-Mission Hemispheric Radar [exMHR].

RB: Radars “see” things that are physically present in space and time, and that’s why they are such great tools in the counter-UAS kit bag of sensors. That said, some radars are affected by weather and other factors, some work better in particular environments.

The 202 Expeditionary Skid is a new system from Leonardo DRS that uses our long-range exMHR, which is a software-defined AESA [Active Electronically Scanned Array] pulse-Doppler radar. It operates in the S-Band and that’s a very reliable band for all weather conditions including strong performance in dust storms and rain. When you get into K, Ku, and X-bands, they typically have smaller beams and therefore greater accuracy, but they suffer in poor weather and can become extremely degraded. S-band radar suffers significantly less degradation in that environment.

The 202 Expeditionary Skid, also known as U-KIT-0091, has a single radar panel that has a search area of 90 degrees by 90 degrees, so we often mount them in groups of four to provide full 360-degree coverage. Each panel has a really fast scan rate, much faster than a traditional spinning radar set. Plus, having multiple radar faces to make up a complete system is much more survivable. They can also overlap their field of regard without impairing each other.

We have sought to provide a solution that marries an appropriate level of range, accuracy, capability, and performance, that can still be very flexible in its ability to relocate or change mission sets. This is designed to be extremely versatile, meaning that it operates in different environments quickly. U-KIT-0091 has been purposefully designed to be mobile in a compact system that can either be used by itself or networked and fused together with other systems. Back to the baseball analogy, this is the kind of guy you really want on your team because you can use them wherever you need them.

The radar or set of radars sit on a small skid system that can slide into the back of a pickup truck, into the back of a tactical vehicle, onto a trailer, you can set it just about anywhere and it occupies a four-by-four-feet position. It has its own power generation, its own positional information that works in denied environments, basically it’s capable of working by itself from the get-go. The best part is that it’s truly mobile – the operator doesn’t have to stop the vehicle to make it work. You can turn it on and set-off. It’s working. If you come to a stop, it’s still working. It can be mounted on a ship, it can be taken airborne by an aircraft, so it’s got land, sea, and air applications. We’ve installed these on all types of ground platforms, water-based platforms, on top of a building or some sort of structure and it’s already in service, but I can’t specify where. It tracks drones very well, but of course it can track just about anything that can exist in that space.

JH: So you could strategically locate several of your radars to look in different directions or be positioned to look in a certain direction if you knew the expected paths that the threats would use?

RB: The system is designed exactly for things like that. Instead of putting all of your eggs in one basket, you disperse your eggs, and focus on different avenues or approach angles so that you can then have sensors strategically located where they can pick up these things and then as long as they’re networked back into weapons systems that have the overlapping fields of fire or bubbles – coverage areas – then you can protect your area. 

Any time you can decouple a sensor from a weapon system or multiple types of sensors from each other, you stand a far greater chance of survivability and optimizing accuracy. If you put all your eggs in one basket, and if you lose that basket, you lose everything. In addition, if you separate sensors, you gain accuracy because you have different angles and you can leverage simple geometry.

JH: Could you depict what an end-to-end engagement might look like using your tactical radar.

RB: The radar sensors will typically be emitting energy as they search for objects in a particular space. If something is detected and determined to be a valid target then the data is sent from the radar to some type of a command and control system, which may well be receiving information from other complementary sensors too. It then fuses that data and passes it to an effector, whether that’s a non-kinetic or a kinetic system, for engagement.

Meanwhile, the radar continues to track and it can determine whether that object was removed or if its path changed, and so on and so forth. But you know, a lot of these radars operate in a way whereby they can be turned on or off by different sensors to avoid them having to constantly transmit energy, they’re very customizable to meet the requirements and the emissions that are needed, whether that’s air defense, counter-drone, etc.

They can operate independently too, maybe covering a small area that needs to be protected, and integrated with a localized weapon system, or, as I already explained, they can be networked into a much larger set-up, they are modular, open system architecture and easily incorporated.

Most customers tend to choose their own command and control systems, which is why the plug-and-play part of our system is so important. It really doesn’t matter what they want to partner it with, what we provide enables that very easily.

JH: To be clear, your tactical radars could be deployed to defend the entire eastern seaboard of the U.S., they could be positioned to defend an air base, or they could be used to defend a ship in the Strait of Hormuz.

RB: The architecture can scale geographically through a distributed, networked sensor approach. The specific coverage area depends on factors including sensor density, the threat environment, command-and-control integration, and the available effectors.

Customers can deploy multiple radars and feed them into a single command-and-control system, positioning sensors to optimize coverage for the operational need. For example, one radar set could cover a valley vulnerable to low-flying drone ingress, while another positioned on higher ground provides longer-range surveillance. The key is a modular capability that enables users to tailor coverage and layer sensors where they are most needed – without relying on one large radar system to see everything from a single location.

JH: I’m keen to know what you consider to be the most challenging drones to detect and track. Is the challenge the speed they’re traveling out at, maybe new low observable designs, or the fact they’re flying very low. What are the big issues you’re seeing?

RB: It’s really all of the above. The other really challenging problem is when something is flying very low to the ground. The lower they bring them in altitude, they are harder to track as an independent target.

The challenge with drone swarms isn’t detection – if you can see the drones, you can track them. The harder problem is managing those tracks, deciding which threats matter most, and assigning the right effector to each one.

If 100 drones are inbound, it’s not just about having 100 weapons available. It’s about coordinating a fast, cost-effective response across a large number of simultaneous threats.

Ultimately, pairing radars and electro-optical/infrared sensors together is the way to go, because each of those have their own strengths. One of those sensors is going to see the drone better than the other, plus you have the redundancy that at least a couple of them will “see” the threat and give you enough information in sufficient time to prosecute it. Fitting into that team, however it is constructed, is exactly how we position our 202 Expeditionary Skid U-KIT-0091 radar.

Contact the write: Jamie.Hunter@teamrecurrent.io

Ukrainian crews operating Australian-supplied M1A1 Abrams tanks say the battlefield has become so saturated with Russian drones that their tanks cannot currently be used in combat, but they reject the idea that main battle tanks have become forever obsolete.

Since receiving these tanks last year, the crews, serving with Ukraine’s 425th Separate Assault Regiment “Skala,” have used the Abrams in two combat operations in the fight for Pokrovsk, a key Ukrainian logistics hub and part of a defensive belt of towns in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region. They recounted their experiences to Hromadske, an independent media channel in Ukraine.

Чому «Скеля» їхала на Abrams у Покровськ / hromadske

Fighting around Pokrovsk

The first major deployment described by the crews took place in December of last year, when Abrams tanks were used to support assault groups entering Pokrovsk.

The crewmember with the callsign Kent described moving into the city behind a mine-clearing tank and ahead of two infantry fighting vehicles (IFVs) carrying assault troops, during a mission that was deliberately aggressive.

“Since a tank is a priority target — my task was to draw their attention, while our infantry dismounted and moved in successfully.”

The Abrams was also assigned three target points to engage along the route.

“We went right in there, poured it on, and drove back out,” he recalled.

A video showing the 425th Separate Assault Regiment in action in August 2025, soon after receiving the Abrams:

Танки Abrams в 425 ОШП “Скала” [Серпень 2025]

The second operation, on March 31, involved an attempt to enter and hold an industrial area near Pokrovsk to help block Russian movement toward Hryshyne, a contested village in the district.

The operation was prepared for more than two weeks. Ukrainian forces conducted reconnaissance flights, examined difficult sections of the planned routes, and provided crews with extensive video and imagery.

“They knew every meter of the route,” another of the unit’s commanders, with the callsign Kubik, said.

Weather was considered essential. The Ukrainians waited for fog and rain, hoping to limit the effectiveness of Russian drones.

“Without the right weather we wouldn’t have been able to pull off operations like that,” Kubik said.

The operation nevertheless resulted in the destruction of four out of five armored vehicles, some of which are seen in the video embedded below.

The commander acknowledged that the Russian side may have had advance knowledge of the operation.

“I can’t rule out the possibility that the enemy knew our plan,” he said.

His Abrams was not immediately destroyed. According to the crew, it completed its task and the assault troops dismounted before the weather changed.

“Once the fog lifted, they started working on it with an FPV drone,” the commander said.

Why use tanks at all?

The losses prompted criticism from Ukrainian military commentators, particularly after footage of the destroyed vehicles was published.

However, the crews defend the decision to use armored vehicles for the missions. According to the men of the Skala interviewed, the alternative was often to send infantry over several miles on foot while carrying weapons, ammunition, water, and other supplies.

“That takes more time,” Kubik explained. “And the enemy isn’t standing still — the enemy is moving toward them.”

The argument that infantry could simply move more stealthily on foot also has limitations.

“Every day the Mavic drones are flying, the fixed-wing drones are flying,” he said. “No fog, guys are visible.”

Combined witu IFVs, the Abrams can provide the ability to rapidly move troops while simultaneously delivering heavy direct fire against enemy positions and offering substantial protection to its crew.

The crews argue that this capability remains worthwhile even when the tank itself may eventually be lost.

One commander was asked whether deploying a roughly $5-million tank makes sense if a single sortie can result in its destruction.

“Yes, of course it makes sense to deploy it,” he replied.

“First and foremost — it saves the lives of the crew inside it.”

A tank under attack by drones

The Ukrainian crews repeatedly highlighted the Abrams’ accuracy and survivability.

“What are the biggest advantages of the Abrams?”, Kent was asked.

“Accuracy.”

Its biggest disadvantage, he said, is equally obvious on a modern battlefield: “It’s very tall — and very large — so it’s hard to conceal.”

A video showing a U.S.-supplied Abrams under attack from Russian FPV drones:

Kent described surviving an engagement in which his tank was struck repeatedly while on the move.

“More than 20 drones hit me,” he said of one operation into Pokrovsk.

He attributed the Abrams’ survival to the combination of its armor and additional anti-drone protection fitted to the vehicle.

“All of it together is effective,” he said.

He pointed to fairly basic modifications including rubber strips and a foldable wire cage mounted on the turret, as additional layers of protection against drone attacks.

“A drone doesn’t hit the actual penetrating element directly — it just can’t reach it,” he explained. “It hits the rubber, and then the blast wave travels from there.”

Even with their tanks festooned with explosive reactive armor (ERA) bricks, the crews acknowledge that such protection has limits.

Kent also noted that the Abrams was still missing the ‘hedgehog’-type protective coverings that have been seen on Russian tanks.

“They also protect very well. An effective thing,” he said.

For now, the drone threat has led the regiment to keep its Abrams out of combat, as we will return to later.

The Abrams as a machine

The crews’ assessment of the Abrams included praise for its mobility, roomy interior, gun, and fire-control system.

Kubik said he had personally driven an Abrams to 50 miles per hour cross-country.

“The engine is an absolute beast,” he added.

The tank can also rapidly perform a pivot turn, which the crews consider particularly useful when maneuvering in confined spaces. Despite its prodiguous weight, it only rarely becomes bogged down after the kind of very heavy snow-melt that effects all vehicles on the battlefield.

Its disadvantages include its demanding maintenance requirements. The running gear was described as particularly sensitive, with crews inspecting, lubricating, and replacing components after every sortie.

Fuel consumption is another major burden. The crew cited roughly 400 to 700 liters (106 to 185 gallons) per 100 kilometers (62 miles) depending on terrain and operating conditions.

“On asphalt it burns about 400 liters,” one said. In boggy terrain, consumption can reach “700 liters or more.”

The Abrams thirsty gas turbine engine and extreme logistical demands have always been a criticism of the platform.

The crews said the vehicle’s ability to operate on different fuels is useful, although diesel provides the best engine-hour performance in their experience. Prior to delivery, the gas turbine engines of the tanks were reconfigured to use diesel fuel instead of the standard JP-8 aviation kerosene, according to earlier reports.

They also praised the Abrams’ protected ammunition storage and crew space compared with Soviet-designed tanks.

The version operated by the Ukrainians is an M1A1 rather than the latest Abrams configuration, with less sophisticated electronics than newer variants. It also lacks the classified armor found on its U.S. Army counterpart.

“For me — as a tanker — this configuration, what we have right now, is more than enough,” Kubik said. “The sight is absolutely excellent. The gun is also great.”

Waiting for a solution to the drone problem

The interview ultimately presents a more complicated picture than either the declaration that tanks are obsolete on the Ukrainian battlefield.

At the time of writing, at least 25 Abrams have been confirmed visually to have been destroyed, damaged, or abandoned in Ukrainian service. This is from a total of 31 provided by the United States and 49 from Australia.

“For now, we’re not using them further — there’s no way to,” Kubik said. “The enemy has developed their drone component very heavily, and for now we don’t have the means to counter that.”

While tanks remain exceptionally powerful direct-fire and protected mobility platforms, the proliferation of inexpensive uncrewed aircraft has made operating them increasingly difficult.

M1A1 AIM Abrams tanks of the 425th Assault Regiment 🇺🇦.
The reinforced upper glacis and turret roofs are clearly visible. pic.twitter.com/Sn9h8OWZ9P

— 𝔗𝔥𝔢 𝕯𝔢𝔞𝔡 𝕯𝔦𝔰𝔱𝔯𝔦𝔠𝔱 🦩🇬🇪🇺🇦🇺🇲🇬🇷 (@TheDeadDistrict) June 21, 2026

“If someone had told me, as a tanker, back in 2022: ‘Take this — we’re giving you an Abrams, we’ll give you time to train and you’ll fight in it,’” Kubik said, “I would never have climbed out of it.”

“I’d only be saying: ‘Bring me shells. I’ll drive non-stop wherever needed, arrive and work.’”

As it stands, reconnaissance drones can find the Abrams, FPV drones can attack it, and persistent surveillance makes concealment difficult. Experience has shown that without more effective counter-drone capabilities, even a heavily protected tank can eventually be overwhelmed.

But Kubik believes that will change.

“The day will come when one of our bright minds figures out some excellent solution against drones — and we’ll start using them again.”

Asked whether the era of tanks is over, his answer was unequivocal.

“It’s not over … They’re just waiting it out for now, biding their time. Writing off tanks — in my opinion — is still too early.”

Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com

The United States economy has added 162,000 jobs in August, with large gains in local government education and food services.

The unemployment rate remained unchanged, according to the monthly jobs report released by the US Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) on Friday.

The data was well above analysts’ expectations. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast 56,000 gains, the Wall Street Journal forecast 53,000, and Bloomberg had forecast 55,000, following a loss of 23,000 in July.

Local government education, or public schools, accounted for nearly 42,000 of the jobs added as the 2026–27 school year begins across much of the US. Teachers typically fall off payrolls during the summer months when school is not in session.

Food service jobs also saw large increases, with the sector adding 59,000 jobs for the month of August compared with the month prior.

There were also gains in construction, which added 22,000 jobs, and healthcare, which added 12,000.

The information sector, which accounts for industries like data processing, web hosting, publishing, broadcasting and telecommunications, fell by 23,000, with notable layoffs at companies including Scripps TV and Zillow, which fall under the umbrella of these industries.

The financial activities sector, which accounts for industries like insurance, commercial banking and real estate, dropped by 12,000.

Mixed data

The data comes in sharp contrast to the ADP national employment report, which tracks private payrolls and found 38,000 jobs added across the US economy.

Meanwhile, the Labor Department’s Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) report released on Tuesday revealed job openings were slightly changed, with 7.3 million in July, up from 7.2 million the previous month, while total separations fell to 5.1 million in July from 5.3 million in June.

The move in job gains comes ahead of the US Federal Reserve’s policy meeting later this month, where the central bank will vote on interest rates. Amid the job gains, CME Group’s FedWatch, which tracks the likelihood of monetary policy decisions, had a 60 percent chance of a 25 basis point rate increase to 3.75–4.00 percent, up from 49 percent on Thursday.

US President Donald Trump was quick to comment on the jobs report and push for rate cuts.

“Lower the interest rates because the U.S.A. is a much stronger credit than it was a short time ago!” he said in a post on his social media platform Truth Social.

He also ramped up threats to cut off trade with nations that the US has a deficit with if the central bank does not cut rates.

Despite a strong jobs report, US markets are trending downwards. The Nasdaq is down 0.2 percent, the Dow Jones Industrial Average is down 0.5 percent, and the S&P 500 is down 0.3 percent amid Trump’s comments.

Meanwhile, Canada released its jobs report amid the ongoing trade dispute with the US. The Canadian economy lost 41,700 jobs, according to Statistics Canada, with the unemployment rate holding steady at 6.4 percent.

“We expect the economy will continue struggling to create jobs in the near term as mounting headwinds from new US-Canada tariffs, greater uncertainty from a flare-up in the trade war, and the ongoing Iran conflict and a shrinking population weigh on hiring,” Tony Stillo, director of Canada Economics at Oxford Economics, said in a note provided to Al Jazeera.

As the war drags on in Ukraine, its civilians are again suffering.

Thirty-eight people were killed in the village of Myla on August 29, when a Russian drone attack struck an ammunition depot. Another 12 were killed in attacks across the country on September 1.

Civilian deaths have sharply increased this summer as Russia is using jet-powered drones, which fly at about half the speed of a passenger jet and are more difficult to intercept than propeller-powered drones.

Jet-powered drones numbered about 2,800 in August, said Ukraine Air Force spokesman Yurii Ihnat, compared with about 1,500 in July, several times the number launched in June. Ukraine has an interception rate of more than 90 percent against propeller-powered drones, but only 60 percent against the jet-powered variant, Ihnat said.

Ukraine said Russian forces suffered 42,020 casualties last month, as Moscow’s territorial gains dropped to a fraction of last year’s rate of advance.

Ukrainian armed forces figures showed Russia’s monthly casualties were only slightly below July’s 42,860 and well above the 39,290 in June.

Al Jazeera cannot independently verify casualty estimates by either side, but if accurate, those summer figures – 25.8 percent higher than the casualties Ukraine inflicted in the spring – suggest the high Russian casualty rate is not a passing event.

Russian recruitment rates are thought to be well below those totals, estimated by Ukraine at about 32,500 a month this year.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has publicly shared intelligence suggesting that Russian leader Vladimir Putin will conscript 300,000 or more troops next month.

Zelenskyy has said that up to 80 percent of Russian casualties were inflicted in Kostiantynivka, the southernmost of Ukraine’s “fortress belt” of cities in the eastern Donetsk region, whose capture Putin has repeatedly prioritised.

Russian forces are thought to control only a portion of the city, but have infiltrated more than 70 percent of it with scattered individual troops sent to drop supplies and await reinforcements. Ukrainian drone operators have been targeting the troops as Russia replenishes them.

This week it was revealed that Ukrainian commander-in-chief, Mykhailo Drapatyi, reinforced the Donetsk front around Sloviansk and Dobropillia, north and south of Kostiantynivka, respectively, but kept the Kostiantynivka front largely unchanged. That suggests Ukraine may be adopting the tactic of fighting a prolonged rearguard in the urban landscape to inflict attritional losses, as it did in the battles of Bakhmut, Pokrovsk and Chasiv Yar.

The fight for Kostiantynivka has sapped troop strength elsewhere on the front line, where Ukraine liberated 130sq km (50 square miles) of its land in August, limiting Russia’s overall advance.

Russia seized just over 90sq km (35 square miles) in August, estimated the Institute for the Study of War, a Washington-based think tank that assesses territorial gains using open-source geolocated sources.

While still a net gain, that is less than a fifth of the land Russia seized in August last year.

During June, July and August this year, the ISW assessed that Russia gained firm control of 160sq km (60 square miles), compared with 1,440sq km in the summer months of 2025 (560 square miles) – a 90 percent decrease.

Ukraine’s response

Ukraine has turned its focus from Russian refineries to strikes against Russian air defences, radar systems and drone launch sites.

Ukraine’s Unmanned Systems Forces (SBS) destroyed 33 air defence elements in August, increasing the annual total to 263.

Ukraine also kept up some strikes on refineries, hitting 12 in August, along with two gas-processing plants and three oil transshipment terminals, according to its defence ministry.

During the past week, Ukraine struck the Yanos refinery in Yaroslavl and the Kirishi and Ust-Luga refineries near Leningrad, all 800km (500 miles) from its border.

Those strikes have caused petrol shortages, further hurting Russia’s economy.

Ukraine’s military intelligence reported that certain Russian exports had fallen by 80 percent compared with pre-war levels. Oil has been among the hardest hit, as Ukraine has struck terminals and hundreds of tankers carrying Russian oil in the Black Sea and Sea of Azov.

Russian oil exports from the Black Sea port of Novorossiysk fell from 800,000 barrels a day in July to 350,000 barrels per day in August, said Ukraine’s Foreign Intelligence Service.

“The Russian side acknowledges that its Black Sea Fleet ships are effectively blockaded in Novorossiysk due to our drone strikes and are unable to operate at sea,” said Zelenskyy.

“Since the Russian fleet is unable to provide escorts for the commercial and shadow fleet …  one of the solutions being considered is to equip civilian ships with small arms, electronic warfare (EW) equipment and military personnel,” he said. “We will prepare appropriate countermeasures.”

The strikes on the oil industry have not only reduced exports. They have reverberated across the Russian economy, creating queues at petrol stations and raising prices for motorists.

This week, Russia extended its ban on diesel exports to the end of September to keep its army and transport industry supplied and sought to import petrol.

Occupied Crimea, where petrol distribution has been restricted to government-owned vehicles, has been hard hit.

The Russian-appointed governor of the region, Sergei Aksyonov, said on September 2: “Fuel supplies to the region are currently not fully meeting the needs of the residents. Unfortunately, some residents of Crimea will, at this stage, face limited access to gasoline”.

The anti-immigration Reform UK party said two of its senior officials had stepped down on Friday, following allegations that they were secretly filmed appearing to discuss ways to circumvent UK electoral laws on foreign donations.

The far-right party, whose popularity has soared in the past two years, is already embroiled in several other funding scandals involving its leader Nigel Farage. On Friday, it announced an internal probe into the latest case, which was brought to light by a Channel 4 investigation.

Reform is currently holding its annual party conference in Birmingham, central England.

Here’s what we know about the foreign funding claims and how they could affect British politics.

What did the Channel 4 investigation show?

Channel 4, an independent broadcaster, aired footage of senior Reform officials Dan Jukes and James Orr meeting with undercover reporters who were posing as prospective Reform backers from the United States.

In one instance during the programme, which was broadcast on Thursday night, footage was shown of Jukes appearing to talk about a proposal for Reform to receive a 500,000-pound ($675,000) donation from one of the men, who was presenting himself as an American financier, through his son, who he said lives in the UK.

The “son” was actually another journalist from investigative group Verbatim, which recorded the exchange.

In separate footage, Orr appeared to discuss a plan for the US donor to fund opinion polls for Reform UK rather than donating the money directly.

He told the undercover reporter that “we just don’t have British-resident donors, British entities, that would support us”.

During the investigation, Verbatim reported that Reform officials arranged for the US donor to pay more than 30,000 pounds ($40,500) to fund three opinion polls, without disclosing the source of the funds.

Channel 4 said it had verified the findings from Verbatim, an offshoot of the Centre for Climate Reporting.

What are the UK’s rules against foreign funding for political parties?

Under UK electoral law, political parties may only accept donations from British voters or UK-registered businesses. Donations from individuals or organisations based overseas are strictly forbidden.

In a statement on Friday, a UK Electoral Commission spokesperson said political parties must report all “permissible donations” they accept exceeding 11,180 pounds ($15,120) and all “impermissible donations” exceeding 500 pounds ($676).

“Parties are responsible for ensuring their internal processes and controls are fit for purpose,” the spokesperson said. “Information about any potential attempt to evade the controls on donations is for the police to consider.”

How has Reform responded to the allegations?

Following the programme’s broadcast, Reform initially issued a statement denying any wrongdoing and claiming the allegations were a hoax.

In a later statement, however, the party said it was conducting an internal probe and that Orr and Jukes had stepped down pending its outcome.

Orr, the party’s policy head, said he had agreed to step down temporarily and would “cooperate fully” with the investigation.

Jukes, Farage’s long-term aide, denied any wrongdoing but said he had “stepped back from politics in order to clear my name”.

Farage accused the undercover journalists of “entrapment” and told broadcaster LBC, “they got a couple of our contractors to say things that perhaps should not have been said”.

“And as a result of that, you know, they have been removed this morning. And yeah, you know, I’m not happy about it,” Farage said.

“The party has broken no laws, the party has not taken any dodgy money or anything like that whatsoever,” Farage insisted.

Will Reform face legal consequences?

It remains to be seen. The UK’s ruling Labour Party has written to the police asking them to investigate possible criminal offences.

The Metropolitan Police said it was aware of the allegations in the broadcast and would assess any information provided to them.

This does not amount to the formal launch of an investigation.

Why does this matter?

The latest donation scandal is another blow for Reform, which has seen its place as the UK’s most popular party slip in opinion polls in recent months.

Last year, polling by YouGov suggested that Reform had become the most popular political party, and would likely win a UK general election if one had been held then. At that point, Labour was trailing far behind in the polls – projected to win just 27.3 percent of parliamentary seats, compared with Reform’s 41.7 percent. The former ruling Conservative Party stood at just 7 percent.

But a poll this week by YouGov showed Reform now tied with the UK’s left-wing Labour Party with 23 percent support each. The Conservatives have caught up with 20 percent.

This is not the first funding scandal Reform has grappled with, either. In July, Farage dramatically stepped down as Member of Parliament for Clacton amid allegations, also revealed in the UK media, that convicted fraudster George Cottrell, 32, recruited and paid three staff to work on Farage’s social media before the 2024 general election and has continued to allow Farage to use a five-storey Georgian townhouse he rented near Buckingham Palace.

Farage ultimately re-won his seat in Clacton at a by-election but still faces the prospect of a parliamentary inquiry into undeclared funding of 5 million pounds ($6.7m) from Thailand-based billionaire and crypto investor Christopher Harborne, who paid for Farage’s personal security before he announced his candidacy in the 2024 general election. So far, Farage denies all wrongdoing.

This week, Farage told the BBC that the parliamentary inquiry was unfair. He said there was a “wilful attempt, and it’s gone on now for months, to say that everything to do with Reform, that every individual involved with Reform is somehow a crook”.

This is evidence of “the establishment in a very coordinated way fighting back”, he claimed.

However, Justin Fisher, professor of political science at Brunel University of London, told Al Jazeera Reform’s latest donation scandal would further hurt Farage’s standing both within and outside his party, and could cost Reform votes in the next elections.

“If this was an isolated incident, then Reform would probably be able to brush it off,” said Fisher. “But it comes on top of serious questions about a donation to Nigel Farage, and a donation to Reform which allegedly had overseas links. This all contributes to a narrative which Reform is having great difficulty avoiding.”

Lebanese President Joseph Aoun praises the release and thanks US President Donald Trump for his efforts.

Four Lebanese citizens who were held in Israel have been released and handed over to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), the day after a first prisoner was freed.

In a statement on Friday, Lebanon’s President Joseph Aoun thanked the United States after the Red Cross facilitated the transfer. The US has been brokering talks between Beirut and Tel Aviv aimed at ending hostilities between the neighbouring countries.

Aoun expressed his gratitude “for all the efforts exerted, particularly by the US under the leadership of President Donald Trump and by international bodies, especially the ICRC”.

The ICRC confirmed that “at the request of the relevant parties, [it] facilitated the transfer to Lebanon of five individuals released from Israeli detention”.

Associated Press and Anadolu news agency reporters said they saw a convoy of ICRC vehicles heading towards the Naqoura border crossing on Friday morning and later returning. The convoy then entered a Lebanese army barracks in Tyre.

The release follows a pledge by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday that authorities would free five Lebanese prisoners.

The prisoner released on Thursday was identified as Malek Ghazi.

It was the first such handover since the outbreak of the latest Israel-Hezbollah war six months ago.

Other released prisoners include Hussein Ayash from the village of Harouf and Mohammed Juheir, a fisherman from the border town of Naqoura, AP reported.

Dozens of Lebanese citizens are believed to be held in Israeli detention centres, including civilians as well as Hezbollah members captured during fighting in southern Lebanon.

The ICRC called for its teams to be granted access to the remaining prisoners unjustly held by Israel, noting that it has not had access to detainees held in Israel since October 2023.

“Many families in Lebanon are still waiting for answers about the fate of loved ones who may be detained, deceased or otherwise unaccounted for,” it said.

Clashes between the Israeli army and Hezbollah began after Israel launched its genocidal war on Gaza in October 2023. That led to over a year of hostilities that escalated into a full-blown war in 2024.

Two years later, Lebanon was fully drawn into the conflict when the US and Israel launched a war on Iran. Hezbollah, a key ally of Iran, fired rockets into Israel in retaliation for the killing of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Israel responded with air strikes and a ground invasion that have killed at least 4,300 people in Lebanon.

Lebanon began direct talks with Israel in April. Aoun’s government has vowed to fulfil the terms of the US-brokered framework agreement.

He said it would pave the way for “the full restoration of Lebanese sovereignty, without giving up an inch of our land or a single one of our people”.

China is buying ninety percent of Iran’s oil exports, settling transactions in renminbi, and hiding the rest beneath layers of shell companies. This is not defiance. It is a demonstration, conducted in plain sight, of exactly how far American economic reach actually extends.

Scott Bessent promised, when he launched Operation Economic Outcast last week, that no one would be above the reach of US sanctions. China’s foreign ministry responded by saying Beijing would do everything necessary to safeguard its own rights and interests. That exchange, watched by the rest of the world, is not really about Iran. It is about whether the threat of American secondary sanctions can force a country that has already fought several trade wars with Washington to a standstill into changing its economic behaviour. The answer, which China has been demonstrating methodically for months, is no.

How China Made Itself Immune to US Secondary Sanctions

The architecture of Chinese-Iranian trade has been specifically designed to sit outside dollar-system jurisdiction. Chinese banks and companies that buy Iranian oil settle transactions in renminbi or through barter arrangements, making them effectively immune to American extraterritorial authority. The handful of Chinese entities that still touch dollar-denominated transactions do so through shell companies that can be discarded and replaced faster than Washington can identify and sanction them. The result is the regulatory whack-a-mole problem that American Treasury officials privately acknowledge, eliminate one entity, and three more appear in its place, each more obscured than the last.

Washington could escalate by sanctioning major Chinese banks and companies that have no Iran ties at all, using them as leverage to pressure Beijing to rein in those that do. That option exists on paper. In practice, it would constitute a declaration of economic war against China’s financial system at a moment when the US economy is already strained by six months of conflict with Iran, oil prices are elevated, and midterm elections are eight weeks away. The Trump administration knows this, which is why Bessent’s ultimatum came with no major Chinese institution on the sanctions list. The threat was real. The enforcement mechanism was not.

What a US Victory in Iran Would Cost Beijing

China sources roughly forty percent of its oil imports from the Gulf, with Iran accounting for ten percent of that total. If the US wins this war convincingly, meaning Iran’s government collapses or capitulates and Washington reinstalls itself as the dominant security guarantor across the Gulf, the energy architecture that China has spent two decades building becomes dependent on American goodwill. Every barrel of Gulf oil that China buys would effectively pass through a security framework Washington controls.

The regional knock-on effects compound that problem. The Mecca pact between Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Pakistan, the SCO’s deepening trade and financial architecture, the China-brokered Saudi-Iran normalisation of 2023: all of these represent years of Chinese diplomatic investment in a Middle East that is gradually reducing its security dependence on the United States. An Iranian defeat that pushes regional states back under the American umbrella undoes that investment at a stroke. From Beijing’s perspective, the cost of buying Iranian oil at a discount and absorbing American secondary sanctions is considerably lower than the cost of losing the regional influence that Iran’s survival helps sustain.

Neither Ally Nor Bystander

The SCO summit in Bishkek last week illustrated Beijing’s position with more precision than any official statement. Xi met Putin and Modi bilaterally. Iran’s President Pezeshkian attended the summit and held consultations at foreign minister level. He was not invited to Beijing. He did not get a Xi bilateral. That calibrated distance is deliberate, and it reflects a Chinese calculation that is more sophisticated than either alliance or abandonment.

Beijing does not want Iran to lose. It also does not want Iran to win so completely that Tehran’s regional hegemony destabilises the Gulf relationships China has been cultivating. The Chinese position, buying Iranian oil, refusing to arm Iran, keeping diplomatic engagement at arm’s length, is designed to keep Iran functional without making China responsible for Iranian behaviour. It is the foreign policy equivalent of keeping a fire burning without touching it.

Xi’s scheduled visit to Washington later this month, coming directly after the Bishkek summit, reinforces this reading. Beijing is simultaneously demonstrating to Iran that it has economic backing and demonstrating to Washington that it has strategic restraint. Both demonstrations serve Chinese interests. Neither requires China to choose a side.

Five Things Worth Watching

• Whether Xi’s Washington visit produces any concrete understanding on Iran-related secondary sanctions. If the two sides agree on a framework that gives China cover to quietly reduce Iranian oil purchases over time, the sanctions architecture gains traction it currently lacks. If the summit produces only standard language about constructive competition, Operation Economic Outcast’s China problem remains unresolved.
• The SCO Development Bank’s progress toward implementation. If the bank moves from agreement to operational institution in the coming months, it creates dollar-independent financing infrastructure that makes secondary sanctions significantly less effective not just for China-Iran trade but for the broader Eurasian trade network the SCO is building.
• Whether any Chinese entity on the August sanctions list is large enough that its designation produces real disruption rather than being absorbed and routed around. The signal from August’s first wave was that Washington sanctioned deliberately small targets. The size and visibility of the next wave’s targets will tell you how seriously Washington is willing to press China.
• India’s position on renminbi settlement for its own Iranian oil purchases. If Delhi follows Beijing’s approach and expands non-dollar settlement for energy trade, the secondary sanctions architecture faces a second major exemption that Washington is even less able to address given how carefully it has been courting India.
• Iran’s currency trajectory. The rial has hit record lows despite Chinese oil purchases continuing. If the currency continues to deteriorate even with Chinese demand stable, it suggests Operation Economic Outcast is landing on Iran’s non-oil economy in ways that the Chinese lifeline cannot fully offset which changes the pressure calculus regardless of whether Beijing complies.

The Bottom Line

Washington designed Operation Economic Outcast to isolate Iran. What it has demonstrated is the outer boundary of American economic jurisdiction in a world where China has spent a decade building the infrastructure to sit outside it. Renminbi settlement, dark fleet shipping, teapot refineries, shell company networks, these are not improvised workarounds. They are a parallel financial architecture, constructed precisely for this contingency, and it works well enough to keep Iranian oil flowing at volumes Washington cannot stop.

The deeper problem for the Trump administration is not that China is defying its sanctions. It is that China is proving, transaction by transaction, that the sanctions cannot be enforced against a country of sufficient size and sufficient preparation. That demonstration has an audience well beyond Beijing and Tehran. Every country currently watching whether to comply with American secondary sanctions is learning the same lesson: the reach of US economic power has a ceiling, and China has found it.