prison

DENVER — Colorado Gov. Jared Polis on Friday commuted the sentence of election conspiracy theorist Tina Peters following pressure from President Trump, the latest instance of the president using his influence to reward those who echoed his baseless claims of mass fraud as the cause of his 2020 election loss.

Trump has championed the case of Peters, a 70-year-old former county clerk who was sentenced to nine years behind bars after being convicted in a scheme to make a copy of her county’s election computer system. She will be released June 1.

In April, a Colorado appeals court upheld her conviction but ordered Peters to be resentenced because it said the judge who sent her to prison wrongly punished her for speaking out about election fraud, a decision that Polis praised.

In a letter to Peters, Polis wrote that she was convicted of serious crimes and deserved to spend time in prison. “However, this is an extremely unusual and lengthy sentence for a first time offender who committed nonviolent crimes,” the governor wrote.

He added that Peters’ application “demonstrates taking responsibility for your crimes, and a commitment to follow the law going forward.”

Trump posted around the time of the announcement on his social media platform: “FREE TINA!”

Jeany Rush, 76, wears a We the People pin along with numerous Free Tina Peters stickers during the Colorado Republican State Assembly on April 11 at Massari Arena on the Colorado State University Pueblo campus in Pueblo, Colo.

(Timothy Hurst/MediaNews Group/The Denver Post via Getty Images)

‘Affront to the rule of law’

Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold criticized the decision by the governor — a fellow Democrat — saying that “it was a dark day for democracy” and that ”selling out our state’s justice system for Trump is an affront to the rule of law.”

“A clear message is being sent to those willing to break the law and attack democracy for the president — they will likely not face consequences for their actions,” Griswold said at a news conference.

Peters has been serving her sentence at a prison in Pueblo after being convicted in 2024 by jurors in Mesa County, a Republican stronghold that supported Trump.

Peters sneaked in an outside computer expert, an associate of MyPillow Chief Executive Mike Lindell — a fellow election denier — to make a copy of her county’s Dominion Voting Systems election computer server as state officials updated it in 2021. Peters joined Lindell onstage at a “cybersymposium” that promised to reveal proof of election rigging, after which video and photos of the update, including passwords, were posted online.

After the commutation announcement, Peters issued a statement through her attorney thanking Polis and apologizing.

“Five years ago I misled the Secretary of State when allowing a person to gain access to county voting equipment. That was wrong,” Peters said. “I have learned and grown during my time in prison and going forward I will make sure that my actions always follow the law, and I will avoid the mistakes of the past.”

She also condemned threats and violence against voters, county clerks and election workers.

Gubernatorial candidates weigh in

Polis is ineligible to seek reelection due to term limits, and the candidates running to succeed him weighed in on his decision.

Sen. Michael Bennet, a Democrat in the race, said that he vehemently disagreed with the commutation and that Peters knowingly broke the law, undermined elections and was convicted by a jury.

“Lawlessness only breeds more lawlessness,” Bennet said. “With President Trump continuing to attack Colorado, we must do everything we can to stand strong for our institutions and the rule of law.”

A Republican candidate, state Sen. Barbara Kirkmeyer, said she would have preferred that the trial judge revisit Peters’ sentence as ordered by the appeals court before the governor considered any commutation.

“A commutation or pardon by a governor should be reserved for truly extraordinary circumstances,” Kirkmeyer wrote in a statement. “The governor has a responsibility to apply justice fairly, consistently, and without bias.”

Trump’s influence

Peters was convicted of state, not federal, crimes, which put her beyond the reach of Trump’s pardon power, which he used to free those convicted of crimes for the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. So the president championed her cause through the media.

Trump has lambasted both Polis, calling him a “Scumbag Governor,” and the Republican district attorney who prosecuted her, Daniel Rubinstein, for keeping Peters in prison. He has referred to Peters as “elderly” and “sick.” Earlier this year, Trump uninvited Polis from a White House meeting with governors over the case.

The president had said Colorado was “suffering a big price” for refusing to release her. His administration has been choking off funds, ending federal programs and denying disaster aid. It also announced the dismantling of the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Colorado and relocated the U.S. Space Command from the state to Alabama.

Matt Crane, executive director of the Colorado County Clerks Assn., said the commutation “signals that it is open season on our election and election officials.”

“Gov. Polis is bending the knee to the same political voices and conspiracy theories that are undermining belief in our democratic institutions,” Crane said. “This is now Gov. Polis’ legacy. He will not be able to run from it.”

Peters’ health

Peters’ lawyers have said her health has declined in prison. Peters, who had part of her right lung removed in 2017, started coughing frequently after the prison’s heating system was turned on for the winter and has had trouble sleeping due to chronic pain from fibromyalgia, her lawyers said.

In January, Peters was involved in a scuffle with another inmate but was found not guilty of assault following a prison disciplinary hearing, Colorado Department of Corrections spokesperson Alondra Gonzalez-Garcia said. Peters was found guilty of being in a location without authorization.

The federal Bureau of Prisons tried but failed to get Peters moved to a federal prison. In January, Polis said he was considering granting clemency for Peters, calling her sentence “unusual and harsh“ for a first-time, nonviolent offender. In March he repeated those arguments in a lengthy post on the social media platform X.

Polis defended his decision Friday in a social media post.

“I’ll always stand for free speech and to make sure that we live in a country that no matter what your viewpoints are, you are not incarcerated longer because of them,” Polis said.

In contrast to some other Democratic governors, Polis, who portrays himself as a political iconoclast, has at times taken an accommodating stance toward Trump. Though he criticized the president’s tariff and immigration policies, the governor praised earlier moves by Trump such as creating the Department of Government Efficiency, which was run by billionaire Elon Musk, and the choice of vaccine critic Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to run the Department of Health and Human Services.

Slevin and Riccardi write for the Associated Press. AP writers Ali Swenson in New York, Jacques Billeaud in Phoenix and Audrey McAvoy in Honolulu contributed to this report.

WASHINGTON — David Venturella, a former executive at a private prison operator, will serve as the acting head of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the Trump administration says, after the agency’s current leader steps down at the end of the month.

A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security said late Tuesday that Venturella would succeed Todd Lyons, who led the agency through much of the administration’s tumultuous crackdown on immigration. ICE did not immediately respond to an email seeking additional information Wednesday.

Venturella left the Geo Group in early 2023 and has been working at ICE leading the division that oversees detention contracts, members of Congress wrote in a public letter earlier this year.

At the Geo Group, which houses around one-third of ICE detainees, Venturella served in a number of posts, including executive vice president overseeing corporate development, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission filing. He also oversaw removal operations for ICE in 2011 and 2012 after working for federal contractors, including one that specializes in security clearances and background checks.

Geo has benefited from President Trump’s mass deportation push, garnering big contracts to open three shuttered facilities. Among them was a $1-billion, 15-year deal for a detention center in New Jersey’s largest city.

“Last year was the most successful period for new business wins in our company’s history,” Geo’s CEO George Zoley said during an earnings call last week.

Geo owns and operates 23 ICE detention facilities, with about 26,000 available beds. Zoley also said that ICE’s air transportation subcontract had continued to steadily increase and that it secured a new contract last year for electronic monitoring.

Venturella will lead ICE at a time when the public mood has soured on Trump’s immigration crackdown, which sent surges of federal immigration officers into American cities to round up immigrants. Those raids sent tensions soaring and prompted clashes between protesters and law enforcement, leading to the fatal shootings of two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis earlier this year.

Trump returned to the White House on a promise of mass deportations, and ICE has been a central executor of that vision. Under Lyons’ leadership, the agency used a massive infusion of cash to expand hiring and detention capabilities, and it ramped up arrests to meet demand from the Republican administration.

Federal officials announced Lyons’ departure last month from ICE, which had gotten $75 billion from Congress to fulfill Trump’s mass deportation campaign.

Venturella’s appointment comes as Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin settles into his role atop the Cabinet agency overseeing ICE. Mullin has promised to keep his department out of the headlines and has indicated a softer tone on immigration, although he is expected to align with the president’s priorities on mass deportations.

One contentious issue confronting Homeland Security now is a plan for converting warehouses into immigrant detention centers. Conceived while Kristi Noem led the department, the effort has encountered multiple lawsuits and intense community blowback, including in Republican-led states.

The $38.3-billion plan would increase detention capacity to 92,000 beds and mean acquiring eight large-scale facilities, capable of housing 7,000 to 10,000 detainees each, and 16 smaller regional processing centers.

Those, and other sites, were supposed to be running by the end of November. But after Noem’s departure, the department paused the purchase of new warehouses as it scrutinizes all contracts signed during her tenure.

Last month a judge extended a pause on transforming a massive Maryland warehouse into a processing facility for immigrants, and there are signs that federal officials are scaling back the plans.

This could be good news for Geo. The Florida-based company has about 6,000 idle beds at six company-owned facilities, Zoley said last week.

Zoley had offered a note of skepticism about the warehouse plan during an earlier earnings call in February, noting that renovating a warehouse is “more complicated than you may think.” At that point, he said the company was “cautiously” looking at whether to bid to help operate some of them.

Hollingsworth writes for the Associated Press.

A man accused of nabbing unreleased music by Beyoncé in a vehicle break-in last summer has pleaded guilty to the theft and has been sentenced to serve time in prison.

Kelvin Evans, 41, on Tuesday entered guilty pleas in Fulton County Superior Court in Georgia to counts of entering an automobile and criminal trespass. Fulton County Superior Court Senior Judge Jane C. Barwick sentenced Evans, who was set to go on trial this week, to two years in prison and three years on probation. Evans was also warned to keep his distance from the victims and the scene of the theft.

Evans was sentenced less than a year after stealing the pop diva’s unreleased music from her choreographer’s van in Atlanta. According to police, Evans broke into the Jeep Wagoneer rented by choreographer Christopher Grant and dancer Diandre Blue when they stopped at a restaurant to eat. The artists were in town for the “Diva” singer’s four-night takeover of Atlanta’s Mercedes-Benz Stadium for her Cowboy Carter tour.

Evans damaged the trunk window and stole a pair of suitcases that contained two computers and five jump drives of unreleased music as well as footage, plans for the tour production and past and future set lists, the police report said. He also stole clothing, Apple AirPods Max headphones and designer sunglasses, police said.

Police arrested Evans in August. He was indicted in October and initially pleaded not guilty in January and even rejected the plea deal during a hearing last month.

Despite his arrest, police have not recovered the stolen items.

The chances of Beyonce releasing new music was already pretty slim heading into Evan’s scheduled trial. Speculation swirled online that the Grammy winner would drop the third act of her planned music trilogy timed to the summer. The singer’s rep Yvette Noel-Schure put a hard stop on those rumors in late April.

“This is unequivocally false!!” Noel-Schure posted on X.

Times assistant editor Christie D’Zurilla and the Associated Press contributed to this report.

Influential former prime minister released on parole after spending about eight months behind bars.

Thailand’s former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra has been released from a prison in Bangkok after spending eight months of a one-year sentence there over a corruption-related charge.

Hundreds of people, including the 76-year-old billionaire’s family and political allies, greeted him on Monday, chanting, “We love Thakisn” as he left the Klong Prem Central Prison.

Thaksin remade ⁠and dominated Thai politics for a quarter-century, but his influence has waned of late following his jailing and his once formidable Pheu Thai Party’s worst election performance on record ⁠earlier this year.

His hair closely cropped and in a simple white shirt, Thaksin walked out of prison at about 7:40am local time (00:40 GMT) and was immediately surrounded by family members, including his daughter, Paetongtarn Shinawatra, who was sacked as prime minister by ‌a court order in August last year, weeks before his imprisonment.

He smiled brightly as he walked around to greet his supporters, but left without speaking to reporters.

Thaksin had served as prime minister from 2001 until a military coup toppled him in 2006, while he was abroad.

After 15 years in self-exile, he returned to Thailand in 2023 to face an eight-year sentence for conflicts of interest and ⁠abuse of power relating to his time in office. That sentence ⁠had been commuted to one year by the king.

But he was in prison for only a few hours following his homecoming before complaining of heart trouble and chest pains. He then spent six months in the VIP ⁠wing of a hospital until he was freed on parole.

In September last year, the Supreme Court ruled that Thaksin must serve ⁠that time in prison, concluding that he and his doctors ⁠had intentionally prolonged his hospital stay with minor surgeries that were unnecessary.

A Ministry of Justice panel agreed last month to grant him parole as part of a review of more than 900 eligible prisoners’ cases, citing his good behaviour in prison, his age and the low risk that he would repeat his offence.

According to the corrections department, Thaksin will be required to wear an electronic ankle monitor for the remainder of his sentence.

In a video streamed by the Thairath news outlet on Monday, Thaksin was seen rolling down the car window to greet a small group of supporters outside his home in western Bangkok and responding to reporters’ shouted questions that “I was in hibernation; I can’t remember anything now”.

Thaksin’s Pheu Thai Party, which slipped to third place in February’s elections, joined the governing coalition of conservative Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul.

Thaksin’s nephew, Yodchanan Wongsawat, who became Pheu Thai’s standard-bearer ahead of the February election, was made minister of higher education in Anutin’s cabinet.

Thaksin’s daughter, Paetongtarn, became the country’s youngest prime minister in 2024, but was removed from office by Thailand’s Constitutional Court after a recording was released of a compromising phone call with former Cambodian leader Hun Sen.

Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes suspends use of law to reduce prison sentences, pending further review.

Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes has barred the implementation of a law that could dramatically reduce the prison sentence of former President Jair Bolsonaro for involvement in a coup plot after his loss in the 2022 election.

De Moraes ordered the law’s suspension on Saturday until the Supreme Court can convene a full hearing to consider appeals challenging its constitutionality.

Bolsonaro’s conviction for involvement in a plot to remain in office after losing to left-wing rival Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva in 2022 has become a cause celebre for the country’s political right, which has pushed for Bolsonaro’s release from prison.

The Supreme Court sentenced the former far-right president to 27 years in prison in September, but a law passed by Brazil’s conservative-majority Congress in December would apply to Bolsonaro and others convicted in the plot, paving the way for reductions in their sentences.

President Lula vetoed the bill in January, but a vote led by Bolsonaro’s allies in Congress overrode the veto in late April.

Plaintiffs have subsequently asked the Supreme Court to overturn the bill, stating it is unconstitutional.

Lawyers for those convicted must file individual requests for sentence reduction. The ruling by de Moraes essentially suspends such requests until the court has had the opportunity to decide on the law’s constitutionality.

Lawyers for the 71-year-old Bolsonaro filed a new appeal to the Supreme Court on Friday, asking it to overturn what they called a “miscarriage of justice”.

Bolsonaro’s conviction and sentencing remain a matter of controversy in Brazil, where his allies have decried it as a political witch-hunt.

Opponents have welcomed it as a necessary form of accountability, from which not even former presidents are exempt.

Seoul appeals court cuts ex-prime minister’s prison sentence from 23 years to 15.

A South Korean appeals court has reduced the sentence of former Prime Minister Han Duck-soo by eight years for crimes relating to ex-President Yoon Suk Yeol’s declaration of martial law.

The verdict was issued in the South Korean capital, Seoul, on Thursday.

Yoon’s decree in December 2024 briefly suspended civilian government and plunged South Korea into chaos, but it only lasted about six hours as opposition lawmakers moved quickly to overturn it in a vote.

A lower court had sentenced Han in January to a heavier-than-expected jail term of 23 years for engaging in the insurrection, as well as on related charges of perjury and falsifying an official document.

But the appeals court in Seoul cut that by eight years on Thursday, with the presiding judge announcing: “We sentence the defendant to 15 years in prison.”

The court still maintained most of Han’s convictions but lessened the penalties after taking into account his “more than 50 years as a public official prior to the martial law declaration”.

“The records also make it difficult to find evidence showing that the defendant participated more actively in the insurrection, such as by conspiring in advance or systematically leading the operation,” the judge said.

However, he said Han had “abandoned the grave responsibilities arising from the authority and position entrusted to him and instead sided with those participating in the acts of insurrection”.

Han, wearing a white shirt and a dark suit with no tie, listened to the verdict without showing much emotion.

The 76-year-old has been imprisoned since his original sentence in January.

Han had denied wrongdoing on all charges except perjury, saying in November that while he regretted not being able to stop Yoon from declaring martial law, he “never agreed to it or tried to help”.

Han is an experienced technocrat, who served in senior posts under five presidents.

He became the acting president after Yoon was impeached, before his own impeachment on accusations of having aided Yoon in the martial law declaration.

The Constitutional Court overturned Han’s impeachment, restoring his powers to serve as leader before he resigned from the post to run in a snap election in June.

He ended his bid for the presidency following rifts among conservatives.

Yoon, who faces eight separate trials, was handed a life sentence in February on charges of “masterminding an insurrection”.

Yoon, a former career prosecutor, denied the charges, arguing he had presidential authority to declare martial law and that his action was aimed at sounding the alarm over opposition parties’ obstruction of government.

He has apologised for the “frustration and hardship” brought upon the people by his martial law decree, but said in a statement after the sentencing that he stood behind the “sincerity and purpose” behind his actions.

Fighters attack ‘Africa’s Alcatraz’, which detains high-value prisoners, and disrupt crucial supply chains to the capital.

In a new wave of attacks in Mali, an al-Qaeda-linked group has stormed a main prison housing fighters from the armed group and set fire to trucks with food supplies heading to the capital Bamako.

Fighters from the Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM) group stormed the Kenieroba Central Prison, a recently built complex dubbed “Africa’s Alcatraz”, located about 60km (37 miles) southwest of Bamako, Al Jazeera’s Nicolas Haque reported on Wednesday.

The detention centre houses 2,500 prisoners, including at least 72 inmates considered “high value” by the Malian state, Haque said, adding that Malian armed forces were repelling the attack.

Among the prisoners are JNIM fighters and a number of people arrested following large-scale attacks last month by the group’s fighters and Tuareg separatists, the Azawad Liberation Front (FLA).

The fighters attacked several military bases across multiple cities, including areas where senior government officials live, and took control of the northern city of Kidal in a coordinated offensive on April 25 and April 26, which struck at the heart of the West African country’s military government.

One of those attacks killed Malian Defence Minister Sadio Camara and his family in their home in Kati, a garrison town near the capital. On Monday, the leader of the country’s military government, Assimi Goita, took on the role of defence minister. At least 23 others were also killed in the attacks.

Since then, “there has been a wave of arrests of former and current military officers, members of civil society, lawyers, members of the political opposition – all accused of colluding with al-Qaeda fighters,” said Haque, who has been reporting for years on and in Mali. He added that fighters linked to the armed group were also arrested.

Security sources told AFP news agency that opposition figures Mountaga Tall, Youssouf Daba Diawara, and Moussa Djire are among those “abducted”.

According to family members and security sources who spoke to the agency, Tall, a lawyer, was taken on May 2 in Bamako by hooded men on charges of plotting with opposition figures in the Senegalese capital, Dakar, to overthrow the military government. Since his arrest, Tall has been questioned at least once for “attempted destabilisation”.

The security sources said Diawara and Djire were suspected of links with, respectively, the influential imam Mahmoud Dicko and Oumar Mariko, two opposition figures in exile. At least two other civilians who are close to Mariko were also arrested following the attacks, a judicial source told AFP, without giving further details.

The military prosecutor’s office said on May 1 that it had “solid evidence” of the “complicity” of certain military personnel, accusing them of helping with the “planning, coordination and execution” of the attacks.

In a report published on Tuesday, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) said there have also been “gravely concerning reports of extrajudicial killings and abductions, allegedly carried out by members of the security forces” following the attacks.

The violence has set off fighting across Mali’s vast desert north, raising the prospect of significant gains by armed groups that have shown an increasing willingness to strike neighbouring countries.

JNIM has called on Malians to rise up against the government and transition to Islamic law. The group has also pledged to besiege Bamako, and on Friday, it had reportedly set up checkpoints around the city of four million.

Haque said the blockade has the potential to cause a humanitarian disaster.

“These are al-Qaeda fighters that have pointed 12.7mm machine guns on their motorbikes, stopping any outgoing or incoming traffic,” the correspondent said. “We have seen on social media these fighters stopping food trucks trying to enter the area. This blockade is not just affecting people living in Bamako; it’s affecting people throughout Mali.”

On May 3, the mayor of Diafarabe village, in the Mopti region, called on the authorities to act before people started dying of hunger, as the village had run out of food.

Mohammadi has lost consciousness twice and suffered a severe cardiac crisis, her foundation has announced.

Iranian human rights activist and 2023 Nobel Peace Prize laureate Narges Mohammadi has been transferred from prison to a hospital due to a sharp decline in her health.

Mohammadi had two episodes of complete loss of consciousness and a severe cardiac crisis, her foundation announced on Friday.

“This transfer was done as an unavoidable necessity after prison doctors determined her condition could not be managed on-site, despite standing medical recommendations that she be treated by her specialized team in Tehran,” the Narges Mohammadi Foundation said.

Earlier on Friday, Mohammadi had fainted twice in prison in Zanjan in northwestern Iran, according to the foundation.

She was believed to have suffered a heart attack in late March, according to her lawyers, who visited her a few days after the incident. At the time, she appeared pale, underweight and needed a nurse to help her walk.

‘Life-threatening mistreatment’

Mohammadi, 53, has been imprisoned since December 12 after she was arrested during a visit to the eastern Iranian city of Mashhad.

In February, she was sentenced to more than seven years in prison. Her lawyer said six years of that sentence was for the accusation of “gathering and collusion to commit crimes”.

Her family said in February that her health was worsening in prison, in part because of an alleged beating she had endured during her arrest in December. They said multiple men hit and kicked her in her side, head and neck.

The Nobel committee condemned the “ongoing life-threatening mistreatment” of Mohammadi in a statement in February.

The Iranian government has not commented on the alleged attack.

Prior to her arrest in December, Mohammadi had already been serving a sentence of 13 years and nine months on charges of collusion against state security and propaganda against Iran’s government, but had been released on furlough since late 2024 due to medical concerns.

The move comes as part of a larger prisoner pardon tied to a Buddhist religious holiday.

Myanmar’s ⁠former leader Aung San ⁠Suu Kyi ⁠has been moved to house ‌arrest, state media report, more than five years after the military toppled the civilian government that the Nobel laureate had led and jailed her.

President Min Aung Hlaing, who ordered the coup in 2021, said in a statement on Thursday that he “commuted the remaining sentence to be served at the designated residence”.

State media broadcast a photograph of Suu Kyi seated on a ‌wooden bench and flanked by two uniformed personnel – the first public image of the democracy campaigner in years.

Translation: Change the location where Daw Aung San Suu Kyi is serving her sentence (change her remaining sentences to continue serving at her designated residence).

Earlier on Thursday, authorities had announced her prison sentence was being reduced as part of a larger prisoner pardon tied to a Buddhist religious holiday. State media said in addition to the amnesty granted to 1,519 prisoners, including 11 foreigners, the sentences of remaining convicted prisoners were cut by a sixth.

Suu Kyi was originally sentenced to 33 years in prison in late 2022 for several offences that her supporters and rights groups described as attempts to discredit her and legitimise the army takeover that removed her from office and to prevent her return to politics.

Thursday’s amnesty, the second applied to her in recent weeks, would bring her sentence down to 18 years with more than 13 years left to serve, according to the calculation.

The decision to move the 1991 Nobel Peace Prize winner to house arrest was welcomed as a “meaningful step” towards a “credible political process”, a spokesman for United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said.

“We appreciate the commutation of Aung San Suu Kyi to a so-called house arrest in a designated residence. It is a meaningful step towards conditions conducive to a credible political process,” Stephane Dujarric told reporters.

He reiterated the UN’s call for the “swift release” of all political prisoners in Myanmar.

“It is good to hear that the house arrest has been confirmed, but we haven’t received any direct notification,” a member of Suu Kyi’s legal team told the Reuters news agency.

“We only found out about it from the news announcement.”

More amnesties for other prisoners

The amnesty is the second in two weeks after one on April 17 when more than 4,500 prisoners were granted amnesty.

The amnesties come after Min Aung Hlaing was sworn into office as president on April 10 after an election that critics said was neither free nor fair and was orchestrated to maintain the military’s tight grip on power.

In his inauguration speech, he said his government would grant amnesties aimed at promoting social reconciliation, justice and peace.

Suu Kyi, who is now 80 years old, has been serving her prison term at an undisclosed location in the capital, Naypyitaw.

Information about her condition has remained tightly controlled. Reports in 2024 and 2025 indicated declining health, including low blood pressure, dizziness and heart problems, but these claims could not be independently verified. Her legal team has not been allowed to meet her in person since December 2022.

The 2021 army takeover triggered enormous public resistance that was brutally suppressed, triggering a bloody civil war that has killed thousands of people.

According to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, a rights monitoring organisation, 22,047 people have been in detention in Myanmar since the army takeover.

Suu Kyi spent almost 15 years as a political prisoner under house arrest between 1989 and 2010. Her tough stand against military rule in Myanmar turned her into a symbol of nonviolent struggle for democracy.

President Alexandr Lukashenko is hoping to improve relations with the West once more.

Belarus has released Polish-Belarusian journalist Andrzej Poczobut from jail as part of a prisoner exchange.

Poland’s Prime Minister Donald Tusk confirmed the release on Tuesday, noting that Warsaw had been helped in a joint diplomatic push on Minsk by the United States, Romania and Moldova.

The prisoner swap with Poland saw 10 prisoners released overall, with signs that Belarusian President Alexandr Lukashenko is hoping to improve relations with the West once more. Ties have deteriorated due to his support for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Poczobut was detained by Belarusian authorities in 2021 and later sentenced to eight years in a labour camp after a trial widely criticised by rights groups and Western governments as politically motivated.

Concerns had grown in recent years about his health while in detention.

“Andrzej Poczobut is free! Welcome to your Polish home, my friend,” Tusk posted on social media.

Belarus also ⁠released Polish priest ⁠Grzegorz Gawel and a Belarusian who helped Polish ‌services, whose name was not to be revealed, ⁠the Polish leader added.

‌Russians and Moldovans were also among the prisoners swapped in a “five ⁠for ⁠five” exchange.

Joint-effort

Tusk also noted that the release followed lengthy diplomatic efforts.

“The exchange at the Polish-Belarusian border is the finale of a two-year-long intricate diplomatic game, full of dramatic twists,” he said.

“It succeeded thanks to the outstanding work of our services, diplomats and prosecutors, as well as the tremendous help from our American, Romanian and Moldovan friends.”

The announcement came hours after Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski published a photograph of a meeting with US Special Envoy to Belarus John Coale, saying the pair had discussed “important issues”.

Coale later said that the US had helped to secure the release of three Polish nationals and two Moldovans.

“We thank Poland, Moldova, and Romania for their invaluable support in this effort, as well as President Lukashenko’s willingness to pursue constructive engagement with the United States,” he said.

“Under President Trump, America shows up for its allies and delivers diplomatic victories no one else can,” he claimed.

Poczobut, who had worked as a correspondent for the Polish newspaper Gazeta Wyborcza, has been arrested numerous times in Belarus over the past decade.

In 2011, he was fined and jailed for 15 days for his participation in protests following Belarus’s 2010 presidential election. He was later detained again in 2011 and 2012 on accusations of insulting Lukashenko.

His cases drew international condemnation, with the European Parliament, Reporters Without Borders and Amnesty International among organisations calling for his release.

Earlier this year, the European Parliament awarded Poczobut and Georgian journalist Mzia Amaglobeli the Sakharov Prize.

Like the milieu in which they’re set, prison movies can be terribly constricting. Often focusing on well-worn themes of masculinity, regret and redemption, they feature (and sometimes indulge) rough-hewn portrayals of tortured characters suffering through physical and emotional tumult. Inherently compelling but also a shade predictable, the genre promises a tantalizing glimpse at a terrifyingly macho world — one that most of us are fortunate not to know firsthand.

Cal McMau’s feature directorial debut hardly reinvents the formula, but it does remind audiences what remains so sturdy about the premise of an ordinary man trying to stay alive behind bars. And thanks to the latest impressive turn from rising star David Jonsson, “Wasteman” even finds a few new notes to play within a familiar stark melody.

Jonsson is Taylor, who has been serving 13 years in a U.K. prison for a drug deal that went tragically wrong, leading to an accidental death. Soft-spoken and overly accommodating, the young man mostly wants to avoid trouble, allowing himself to be bullied by cell-block thugs Paul (Alex Hassell) and Gaz (Corin Silva) while offering to cut their hair in exchange for the pills that fuel his addiction. Taylor has learned to go along to get along, existing in a zombie-like state from the perpetual high he chases.

But Taylor’s stasis is interrupted by the news that he may be granted early parole. (The overstuffed U.K. penal system needs to shed nonviolent prisoners to make room for dangerous offenders.) Longing to reconnect with his estranged teenage son Adam (Cole Martin), Taylor can see the light at the end of the tunnel — until the arrival of Dee, his new cellmate.

Played by a snarling, coiled Tom Blyth, Dee swaggers whereas Taylor shrinks. Seeing his new home as his kingdom, Dee quickly becomes the prison’s chief supplier of whatever you need — sneakers, candy, drugs — while ferociously asserting his dominance. (Early on, Dee slashes a fellow inmate’s face, recognizing him as someone who once ran with a rival crew.) Taylor adapts to the volatile situation as he always has, serving as the unthreatening beta, eventually earning Dee’s trust and friendship. Soon, Dee takes an interest in Taylor, ordering his lackeys on the outside to give Adam gifts that they claim are from his dad.

“Wasteman” introduces this odd-couple scenario and then waits for their fragile coexistence to rupture. Accustomed to being the prison’s top dogs, Paul and Gaz don’t take kindly to Dee invading their turf, resulting in an escalation of tension that puts Taylor’s parole at risk. But if much of “Wasteman” follows an expected trajectory, the film’s conception of Taylor proves thornier than anticipated.

Although probably best known for the HBO series “Industry,” Jonsson has demonstrated a dazzling range over a short period of time, including acing romantic dramas (“Rye Lane”) and dystopian thrillers (“The Long Walk”). But what unites his diverse roles is the sense of a sensitive, intelligent actor who constantly makes us wonder what he’s thinking.

Jonsson’s silences always seem to say so much and in “Wasteman” he capitalizes on his reserved demeanor and smaller frame to create a character who is much less frightening than those around him. Unlike Dee, he’s no hardened criminal, merely a guy who made one stupid mistake to financially support his child, and “Wasteman” initially encourages viewers to sympathize with this delicate soul who’s been thrown to the wolves.

Gradually, though, Jonsson complicates our feelings about Taylor. Equally desperate to be freed and to keep getting high — essentially escaping one prison while remaining in another — he slowly reveals himself to have little in the way of principles or ethics. When Paul and Gaz confront Dee, Taylor’s response is so cowardly that it’s pathetic, suggesting a spinelessness that bedeviled him long before he wound up in jail. The film presents Taylor as a kindly spirit, which turns out to be little more than calculated self-preservation.

Within the confines of a fairly conventional prison drama, McMau dissects an anonymous nobody who discovers that, both in prison and in life, there are consequences for not taking sides. Despite Dee’s savagery, Blyth portrays Taylor’s cellmate as loyal and honest — someone who believes in a personal code of conduct. The movie’s bitterest irony is that, of the two men, it’s ultimately Dee who may be more honorable.

McMau’s attempts to amplify the story’s grim authenticity occasionally fall flat. (Inspired by footage shot by actual inmates with contraband cellphones, the first-time director incorporates stagey inserts meant to re-create these intimate, graphic images.) He’s on firmer footing exploring his two leads as they square off inside this smoldering crucible. Like Jonsson, Blyth hints at a whole universe inside his character simply by the way he quietly listens and observes. As Taylor’s parole looms, the stakes grow. By the time “Wasteman” reaches its ambiguous finale, our loyalties are far from clear-cut.

RUSSELL Brand has confessed he thinks about going to prison “every day” ahead of his rape trial and denies being a “grifter”.

The comedian and actor, 50, who now hosts a podcast is facing trial on three counts of rape, three of sexual assault and one of indecent assault against six women from 1999 to 2009.

He denies all the charges against him.

The star, who wore a crucifix around his neck, talked at length with Piers Morgan on his YouTube show Uncensored.

Asked if he thought about the reality of going to jail if he was found guilty, Brand said: “Yes… all the time, every day.”

He added: “I will be with God wherever I am. And of course, I would prefer to be with God with my wife and my kids… I’m not saying that that’s not a difficult image, you know, and a difficult thing to contemplate, of course it is.”

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Brand, who brought a Bible with him, continued: “We are going to find out the truth, and we’re going to deal with the truth.

“Because actually, I am not afraid of the truth and if the truth is I am going to prison, then I am. My job will be, do not be afraid of that truth, that is what you are going to do.”

The one-time Hollywood star claimed he would face being behind bars “with God” if he was found guilty of the charges against him.

He also strenuously defended his innocence.

Morgan put it to him that there were people who considered him “basically just a massive grifter”.

Brand immediately shot back: “No, that’s what they say about you.”

Morgan added: “You’re very eloquent, you can be very persuasive with the power of your words, but that actually when it comes to any of these issues, you don’t really have a personal principle.”

Brand said: “I do, I do.”

In an earlier interview for The Megyn Kelly Show podcast admitted he had sex with a 16-year-old when he was 30.

He said his relationships at the time were “exploitative” – but stressed his sex with the girl was legal.

Brand said: “In Europe and in the United Kingdom where I’m from, the age of consent is 16. And I did sleep with a 16-year-old when I was 30.

“But when I was 30, I was a very different person. I was a lot younger and I was an immature 30-year-old.”

Brand told host Megyn Kelly his relationships in the past were “selfish”.

He continued: “I did not apply enough consideration barely any I suppose really to how that sex was affecting other people.”

At the height of his fame, the actor starred in a number of Hollywood films, including Forgetting Sarah Marshall and Get Him to the Greek.

His trial at Southwark Crown Court is due to start on October 12.

Pope Leo XIV visited a prison in Equatorial Guinea on the last day of his Africa tour. The pontiff spoke to 600 detainees in the pouring rain about dignity and reconciliation, after criticising prison conditions.

WASHINGTON — A man who stole a purse from then-Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem while she dined at a restaurant under the protection of Secret Service agents was sentenced on Wednesday to three years in prison for a string of thefts in the nation’s capital.

Mario Bustamante Leiva did not recognize Noem when he grabbed her Gucci handbag from the floor of a restaurant where she was eating with her family in April 2025, according to the U.S. attorney’s office. Noem’s purse had credit cards and about $3,000 in cash. Police recovered it from Leiva’s motel room.

Bustamante Leiva, a 50-year-old native of Chile, is facing deportation after his sentence imposed by U.S. District Judge Trevor McFadden.

“Bustamante Leiva came to Washington illegally to prey on citizens of the district,” said Jeanine Pirro, U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, in a statement. “His pattern of theft ends here.”

Noem, who is identified only by her initials in court filings, acknowledged the incident in a statement last year that referred to Bustamante Leiva as a “a career criminal who has been in our country illegally for years.”

He pleaded guilty in November to three counts of wire fraud and one count of first-degree theft. He was charged and convicted of robbing two other people and charging fraudulent purchases to their credit cards.

Bustamante Leiva was charged along with a second suspect, Cristian Montecino-Sananza, who was sentenced in March to 13 months of incarceration for his role in one of the other thefts.

Investigators said they identified Bustamante Leiva as a suspect in the thefts after he used a stolen gift card to make a purchase.

Kunzelman writes for the Associated Press.

April 22 (UPI) — On Wednesday, a U.S. District judge sentenced the man who stole a purse from former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem to three years in prison for that theft and others in Washington, D.C.

Noem was eating with her family April 25 at a restaurant in the presence of Secret Service agents when Mario Bustamante Leiva took her Gucci purse from the floor, NBC News reported. Police later found the bag, which had credit cards and more than $3,000 in cash, in Bustamante Leiva’s room.

The U.S. attorney’s office said that Bustamante Leiva, 50, a native of Chili, did not recognize Noem when he took the purse. The theft was part of a string of similar incidents in which Bustamante Leiva stole bags that belonged to women at restaurants throughout the District of Columbia.

Police arrested Bustamante Leiva on April 26, 2025. He pleaded guilty in November to three counts of wire fraud and one count of first-degree theft. He will face deportation after his prison sentence, the U.S. attorney’s office said.

“Bustamante Leiva came to Washington illegally to prey on citizens of the district,” Jeanine Pirro, U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, said in a press release. “He methodically targeted women at restaurants, stealing their purses and monetizing the stolen cards within minutes. His pattern of theft ends here.”

Court records show that, in three cases last April, Bustamante Leiva took bags from women at district restaurants and used their cards to make purchases, including gift cards worth hundreds of dollars, soon afterward. The incidents took place April 12, 17 and 20, 2025, with the last involving Noem.

In the April 12 case, Bustamante Leiva worked with codefendant Cristian Montecino-Sanzana, the U.S. attorney’s office said. Montecino-Sanzana was sentenced March 13 to 13 months in prison and three years of supervised release. He also faces deportation after his sentence.

Magistrate hands the opposition figure five-year term, that his lawyers say will be appealed.

South African opposition politician Julius Malema has been sentenced to prison time for firing a rifle in ⁠the air at a party rally.

Malema, the leader of the far-left opposition Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF), was handed a five-year sentence on Thursday by Magistrate Twanet Olivier.

Malema, who is one of South Africa’s most prominent politicians, was convicted last year of charges, including unlawful possession of a ⁠firearm and discharging a weapon in a public place over the 2018 incident at a stadium in the Eastern Cape province.

The 45-year-old leader of the fourth-biggest party in parliament had pleaded not guilty, arguing the gun was a toy.

“It wasn’t … an impulsive act,” the magistrate said. “It was the event of the evening.”

Malema’s defence said the shots were only intended to be celebratory.

His lawyers applied for leave to appeal the magistrate’s decision within ⁠minutes of it being ⁠read out in a court in KuGompo City, formerly East London, on Thursday.

Outside the court, hundreds of Malema’s red-clad EFF supporters gathered for the sentencing in the politically charged case.

The EFF – a small but vocal party – says the case is an attempt to silence its outspoken leader, who is known for fiery speeches.

Party supporters have threatened protests should their leader be jailed.

The magistrate stressed it “is not a political party who has been convicted here … it is a person, an individual.”

The maximum time was a 15-year prison sentence. If confirmed after all appeals, the five-year sentence would bar Malema from serving as a lawmaker.

That would be a major setback to the EFF, which has strong support among young South Africans frustrated by the racial inequality that has persisted since the end of white minority rule in 1994.

Release of Mahdieh Esfandiari comes a week after Iran released two French citizens held on espionage charges.

Iranian national Mahdieh Esfandiari has returned home after being held in France for more than a year as part of what appears to be an exchange of detainees between the countries.

Iran’s state television reported on Wednesday that the “rights activist”, sentenced to one year in prison after making online comments supportive of Palestine and the 2023 Hamas attack on Israel that prompted the genocidal war on Gaza, had returned to Iran.

The University of Lyon graduate, who had been living in France since 2018, where she worked as a translator, was arrested in February last year on charges of promoting “terrorism”, and released on bail in October.

“I think it’s clear for everyone that there is no freedom of speech, at least not in France where I was. The court’s ruling was very unjust,” Esfandiari told state television in a Wednesday broadcast.

Esfandiari’s release comes a week after French citizens Cecile Kohler, 41, and Jacques Paris, 72, arrived in France after being held for more than three years in Iran.

Kohler and Paris were arrested by Iranian authorities in May 2022 but were freed in November last year, after more than three years in prison on espionage charges that their families vehemently deny.

They were taken by French diplomats to France’s mission in Tehran, where they lived under house arrest until their full release on April 7. Upon their release, they were driven from Iran to neighbouring Azerbaijan before taking a flight to Paris.

President Emmanuel Macron’s office said their release was the outcome of a “long-term effort”, but talks accelerated in recent weeks due to pressure from the US-Israel war on Iran, giving a sense of urgency to the situation.

While an exchange was not explicitly acknowledged by France, Iran’s state-run agency IRNA had previously said Tehran reached an agreement with Paris for the release of the French citizens in exchange for Esfandiari.

American YouTuber Johnny Somali, who sparked outrage in South Korea two years ago after kissing a statue symbolizing Korean victims of Japan’s wartime sexual slavery, was sentenced by a court Wednesday to six months in prison and remanded in custody.

Somali was indicted by South Korean authorities on multiple charges, including obstruction of business and violations of minor public order laws.

He is accused of uploading a video of himself kissing a “Statue of Peace” that commemorates the former sex slaves in Seoul and performing a lewd dance in front of it in October 2024. He also provoked public outrage by causing disturbances on buses, subways and an amusement park, vandalizing a convenience store in Seoul’s Mapo district and playing obscene videos in public.

The Seoul Western District Court sentenced Somali to six months in prison and 20 days of detention and barred him from employment at institutions related to children and adolescents for five years.

The court then ordered him to be taken into custody immediately.

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