Global Pulse

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  • Pogacar may face fine for running red light in Flanders win

    Pogacar may face fine for running red light in Flanders win

    One of the most dramatic editions of the Tour of Flanders delivered both a historic cycling milestone and an ongoing disciplinary controversy on Sunday, as defending champion Tadej Pogacar secured a record-equalling third title in the men’s race while facing a potential official probe over a red light violation at a railway crossing.

    The incident, which occurred with more than 200km remaining in the 278km contest, saw as many as 20 riders, including Pogacar and race favorite Remco Evenepoel, cross the level crossing after warning lights had activated. Officials had signaled the peloton to halt ahead of an oncoming train, but the front group slipped through the crossing while chasing early breakaway riders. The East Flanders public prosecutor’s office confirmed to BBC Sport that it has launched an official investigation into the event.

    Pogacar, the 27-year-old Slovenian cycling star, defended the group’s actions, arguing that race officials failed to give competitors sufficient advance warning to come to a complete stop. “Suddenly three guys jump in the middle of the road and start waving to stop,” he explained to reporters after the finish. “How can you stop in one second? I think they could prevent this by stopping us before, not 10 metres before the crossing. I was thinking, maybe it’s like some protesters or something crazy is going on.”

    Local Belgian media reports indicate that if found responsible, the riders could face penalties ranging from fines of 320 euros to 4,000 euros, as well as an eight-day driving ban. The outcome of the investigation remains pending as of press time.

    Regardless of the disciplinary outcome, Sunday’s result cemented Pogacar’s place in cycling history. The win marks his third Tour of Flanders title, drawing him level with Mathieu Van der Poel and six other all-time greats at the Belgian Monument. More importantly, it pushed his total number of Monument victories – the five most prestigious one-day events in men’s road cycling – to 12, putting him clear of Roger de Vlaeminck (11 wins between 1970 and 1979) to claim outright second place on the all-time list. Only Belgian legend Eddy Merckx, who holds 19 Monument titles, sits ahead of Pogacar now.

    The race itself was a showcase of elite cycling skill, with the decisive move coming 57km from the finish line, when Pogacar, Van der Poel and Evenepoel dropped the rest of the elite field with a blistering acceleration on the second ascent of the iconic Oude Kwaremont climb. Evenepoel, making his Tour of Flanders debut, could not match the pace on the subsequent Paterberg climb and drifted back from the leading pair, eventually finishing third behind the two front-runners. The Slovenian and Dutch champion worked together for nearly 40km before Pogacar launched his race-winning attack on the final ascent of the Oude Kwaremont. He crested the climb with a six-second advantage and held on to finish 34 seconds clear of Van der Poel, denying the Dutch star a record fourth Tour of Flanders title. Evenepoel, the double Olympic champion, held off Belgium’s Wout van Aert to round out the podium in his first appearance at the race.

    Pogacar’s incredible 2026 season continues without a loss: he has now won all three races he has entered this year, including Milan-San Remo last month, giving him two Monument wins in two starts this season. Next weekend, he will line up at Paris-Roubaix aiming to make more history: a victory there would make him only the fourth male rider ever to win all five Monument races, following the Belgian legends Eddy Merckx, Rik van Looy, and Roger de Vlaeminck. “It was a really crazy race today. I don’t know what to say – super-hard from I don’t know which kilometre,” Pogacar told Belgian television after the finish. “I don’t race too much, so when I race there is pressure to win. So far everything went perfect for me, so I can be more than happy. Coming next week to Roubaix, I can go motivated, but I try to enjoy the cobbles.”

    In the accompanying Women’s Tour of Flanders, European champion Demi Vollering claimed her third career Monument title with a dominant solo victory. The 29-year-old Dutch rider mirrored Pogacar’s winning strategy, dropping her challengers on the Oude Kwaremont climb to open a 19-second gap over her closest pursuers, France’s Pauline Ferrand-Prevot and Dutch rising star Puck Pieterse. She extended her advantage all the way to the finish, crossing the line 45 seconds clear of Ferrand-Prevot, who beat Pieterse in a sprint for second place. Three-time winner Lotte Kopecky of Belgium finished fourth, 1 minute 4 seconds off Vollering’s winning time.

  • War in the Middle East: latest developments

    War in the Middle East: latest developments

    The fragile stability of the Middle East has crumbled further in the past 48 hours, with a cascade of military strikes, conflicting claims over a high-stakes rescue mission, and shifting energy policy roiling the already volatile region. What began as long-simmering cross-border clashes has erupted into broader confrontations that threaten to draw global powers into open conflict, with multiple interconnected developments unfolding across Iran, Israel, Lebanon and the Persian Gulf.

    One of the most high-profile rifts opened between the United States and Iran, centered on control of the Strait of Hormuz — the world’s most critical chokepoint for global oil shipments. Former President Donald Trump, in a profanity-laced social media post, issued an extreme threat to Tehran, promising “hell” and pledging targeted strikes on Iranian bridges and power plants if Iran did not reopen the strategic waterway by his self-imposed Monday deadline. Speaking to Fox News shortly after the post, Trump softened his tone slightly, saying he believed a negotiated deal with Iran remained achievable, but added that he was prepared to “blow everything up and take over the oil” if no agreement was reached.

    Parallel to the Hormuz standoff, a contentious cross-border rescue operation deep inside Iranian territory has deepened mistrust between Washington and Tehran. The U.S. says a rescue mission conducted by American commandos recovered a missing airman whose F-15 fighter jet had crashed in Iranian territory, with Trump hailing the operation as “daring” and “miraculous”. Trump added that dozens of U.S. aircraft participated in the mission, and that the recovered airman had been seriously wounded. Iranian military officials have issued a starkly contradictory account, claiming the entire U.S. operation was “completely foiled”. Iranian military spokesperson Ebrahim Zolfaghari claimed two U.S. C-130 transport planes and two helicopters were destroyed during the incursion. U.S. mainstream outlets including The New York Times and CBS later corroborated parts of the Iranian account, reporting that two U.S. aircraft that became stranded at an abandoned airport in Iran’s southern Isfahan province were destroyed by American forces to prevent them from falling into Iranian custody.

    Military strikes have targeted key infrastructure across multiple countries in the region. A joint U.S.-Israeli airstrike hit the Qasem Soleimani International Airport in southwestern Iran, according to Iranian state media. Across the border in Lebanon, the Israel Defense Forces launched a new wave of strikes on the capital Beirut and its southern suburbs, targeting what it described as key infrastructure sites belonging to the Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah. Lebanese official data confirms the strikes killed at least four people and wounded 39 more. Further south in Lebanon, an Israeli airstrike on the town of Kfar Hatta — which Israeli officials previously ordered residents to evacuate — killed seven people, including an entire family of six who were waiting on the street for a relative to pick them up, Lebanese civil defense sources told Agence France-Presse. Following an Iranian attack on energy and civilian infrastructure across the Gulf, damage has been reported in three Gulf states: the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Kuwait. Kuwait’s state petroleum company reported “severe” damage to the country’s oil and petrochemical facilities caused by Iranian drones, while Abu Dhabi officials confirmed they were working to extinguish fires at a petrochemical plant sparked by falling drone debris.

    On the energy front, the OPEC+ alliance of major oil-producing nations announced a policy shift, agreeing to raise collective production quotas by 206,000 barrels per day starting in May. The cartel issued a stark warning alongside the quota hike, noting that repairing energy infrastructure damaged by recent regional attacks is both extremely costly and time-consuming, meaning disruptions to global oil supplies could persist for months or even years. OPEC+ also emphasized the “critical importance” of keeping global maritime trade routes open to ensure the uninterrupted flow of global energy supplies. Even as military tensions climb, limited diplomatic outreach continues: Oman’s state news agency confirmed that Omani and Iranian officials held talks focused on easing shipping restrictions through the Strait of Hormuz, with technical experts from both sides putting forward a range of proposals to de-escalate the standoff over the waterway.

    International voices have begun calling for de-escalation, with Pope Leo XIV issuing a urgent plea for peace in his first Easter blessing as pontiff, addressing thousands gathered in St. Peter’s Square. The pope condemned growing global indifference to the violence, saying “We are growing accustomed to violence, resigning ourselves to it, and becoming indifferent. Indifferent to the deaths of thousands of people.” He called directly on leaders with the power to authorize military action to “choose peace” over conflict. The shadow of war has even fallen over one of Christianity’s holiest sites: Israeli security forces imposed new access restrictions on the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in annexed East Jerusalem, the site where Christian tradition holds Jesus was crucified, buried and resurrected. On what is normally one of the busiest days of the year for the Old City, the usually crowded alleyways were silent on Easter Sunday, the holiday overshadowed by ongoing regional conflict.

  • Artemis’s stunning Moon pictures – science or holiday photos?

    Artemis’s stunning Moon pictures – science or holiday photos?

    More than five decades after the final Apollo mission carried humans farther from Earth than any expedition in history, NASA’s Artemis II mission is making new headlines for a cascade of breathtaking high-definition imagery of the Moon and our home planet captured by its four-person crew. Shared widely across social media platforms, where the photos have racked up millions of likes, the shots showcase both celestial bodies from rarely seen vantage points, bringing the awe of deep space exploration directly to the public. But the striking visuals have sparked a key debate: do these images offer groundbreaking new scientific insight, or are they simply the space equivalent of scenic holiday snapshots?

    To build public buy-in for the ambitious program, NASA has leaned into transparency and accessibility throughout the 10-day mission. The entire journey is live-streamed for global audiences, and the four astronauts deliver regular video updates, narrating their progress with palpable excitement. The crew has been so eager to observe the passing Moon and Earth that the viewing window of the Orion spacecraft even became smudged, forcing mission control to send step-by-step instructions for the astronauts to clean it mid-flight.

    This mission marks the first time consumer digital cameras have been deployed this deep into space. The Orion capsule is outfitted with 32 imaging devices total: 15 mounted to the craft’s exterior and 17 held by the crew for handheld shooting. Contrary to assumptions that NASA would rely on cutting-edge custom hardware, most of the equipment consists of off-the-shelf models more than a decade old, including Nikon D5 DSLRs, GoPro action cameras, and standard smartphones. NASA even publishes photo metadata on its Flickr photostream that explicitly notes which device captured each publicly released shot.

    The first major set of images from the mission dropped last Friday. The iconic shot “Hello, World” was captured by Commander Reid Wiseman when the capsule was positioned nearly equidistant between Earth and the Moon: 142,000 miles from our home planet and 132,000 miles from lunar surface. The image captures a rare double aurora during an Earth eclipse of the Sun, with the planet Venus glowing brightly at the frame’s bottom. Earth appears upside down in the composition, with the Sahara Desert and Iberian Peninsula visible on the left, and eastern South America on the right. While widely praised as a visually stunning shot, astronomers note it holds little new scientific data; NASA’s own Deep Space Climate Observatory, which launched in 2015 with the Earth Polychromatic Imaging Camera (Epic), regularly captures imagery of Earth from nearly one million miles away, far farther than Artemis II’s current position.

    A day later, NASA released a second historic image, tagged “history in the making”, that captures the Orientale basin: a massive impact crater located on the Moon’s little-seen far side, a region defined by a thicker crust and a far higher density of impact craters than the near side that always faces Earth. The image was released in advance of the mission’s Monday lunar flyby, when the crew will circle the far side and pass within just 4,600 miles of the lunar surface. NASA says the shot marks the first time the entire Orientale basin has been observed directly by human eyes; even Apollo mission astronauts never got a full view of the crater, limited by their orbital paths and illumination conditions during their flights.

    NASA has emphasized that the unique contribution of this mission lies in human observation, rather than data collected by robotic explorers. The agency notes that the human eye and brain are far more sensitive to subtle variations in color, texture, and lunar surface characteristics than automated instruments, a capability that could lead to unexpected new discoveries and a deeper, more nuanced understanding of the Moon’s geologic features.

    But not all experts agree. Chris Lintott, an astrophysics professor at the University of Oxford and co-host of the BBC’s long-running astronomy series *The Sky at Night*, argues that the primary value of the Artemis II images is aesthetic and cultural, not scientific. Lintott explains that ever since the Apollo program of the 1960s and 1970s, robotic missions have comprehensively mapped the Moon’s far side. In 2023, India’s Chandrayaan-3 probe captured highly detailed imagery of the same Orientale basin terrain, and in 2024, China’s Chang’e-6 mission collected the first ever surface samples from the far side, following up China’s 2019 milestone as the first nation to land a robotic probe on the region.

    “Unless something very unusual happens, there will be nothing for the [Artemis] astronauts to discover,” Lintott explained. While he acknowledges that the crew could potentially spot an impact flash if a large meteoroid strikes the far side’s dark surface, any systematic survey of such events would be far better conducted with automated video cameras than human observers scanning from a capsule window. Still, Lintott stresses that the lack of new scientific discovery does not make the mission meaningless. “The [images] we already have back are beautiful, stunning and iconic – taken by astronauts not by robots. This is a voyage of exploration, not lunar science and that’s fine!” he said.

    While NASA frames the mission and its imagery around scientific progress, a closer look reveals broader political and institutional context that shapes the program. The United States is currently locked in a new 21st century space race with other global powers, most notably China, with both nations competing to be the first to return humans to the lunar surface. A successful Artemis II mission would signal that the U.S. has taken a decisive early lead in this competition for now.

    The mission also comes at a critical moment for NASA’s institutional standing. Current U.S. policy has cut funding for many federal scientific institutions, putting increased pressure on NASA to demonstrate its public value at a time when private space companies like SpaceX are rapidly advancing their own human spaceflight capabilities and raising expectations for accessible deep space travel. As history shows, scientific progress is driven by inquiry and evidence, but it is never isolated from political and institutional priorities.

    This is not the first time a NASA lunar mission has produced culturally transformative imagery. In 1968, Apollo 8 astronaut Bill Anders captured the iconic “Earthrise” photograph from lunar orbit, which showed our blue planet rising above the gray lunar surface. The image highlighted Earth’s fragility at the height of Cold War global tension, reminding audiences across the world that all humans share a single home planet. It proved that a single powerful image could reshape public understanding of our place in the universe, and NASA is hoping Artemis II will deliver a similarly resonant cultural moment for a new generation. For now, audiences across the world can only sit back, enjoy the journey, and marvel at the stunning new views of space captured by the Artemis II crew.

  • Iran says 2 US C-130 Hercules planes, 2 Black Hawk helicopters destroyed in central airspace

    Iran says 2 US C-130 Hercules planes, 2 Black Hawk helicopters destroyed in central airspace

    TEHRAN – Amid rapidly escalating military tensions between Iran, the United States, and Israel, Iran’s top unified military command Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters announced Sunday that it has destroyed four U.S. military aircraft in the country’s central airspace during a purported American rescue mission.

    According to Iranian state news agency IRNA, spokesperson Ebrahim Zolfaghari confirmed that the destroyed assets include two U.S. Air Force C-130 Hercules transport planes and two Black Hawk utility helicopters. The aircraft were intercepted and taken out during a coordinated joint operation conducted by Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC), regular army, voluntary Basij militia, and national law enforcement forces operating south of Isfahan province in central Iran, Zolfaghari added.

    The Iranian military spokesperson framed the U.S. incursion as a covert deceptive operation disguised as a pilot rescue mission. Zolfaghari explained that the U.S. action was launched under the false pretense of retrieving a pilot from a previously downed American aircraft at an abandoned airfield south of Isfahan, and that the operation ended in total defeat thanks to the rapid, coordinated response of Iranian armed forces.

    He further accused sitting U.S. President Donald Trump of deliberately spreading misinformation to confuse global public opinion in an attempt to downplay and justify what he called the U.S. military’s “bitter defeat.”

    The latest exchange of claims comes two days after the IRGC announced it had shot down an American F-35 stealth fighter jet in central Iranian airspace, adding at the time that the fate of the jet’s crew remained unconfirmed. Shortly after that announcement, U.S. officials stated that one pilot from the downed aircraft had already been recovered, with search operations ongoing for the second.

    On Sunday morning, President Trump took to his social media platform Truth Social to issue a counterclaim, hailing what he called “one of the most daring search and rescue operations in U.S. history.” He added that the second downed pilot had been successfully rescued and was unharmed.

    This new escalation comes just over a month after a major regional attack that upended Middle East security. On February 28, the United States and Israel launched a joint airstrike campaign targeting Tehran and multiple other Iranian urban centers, which killed Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei alongside multiple senior military commanders and civilian bystanders. In response, Iran launched a massive retaliatory campaign of missile and drone strikes targeting Israeli territory as well as U.S. military bases and assets positioned across the Middle East, pushing the region to the brink of full-scale open war.

  • Trump threatens ‘hell’ for Iran over Strait of Hormuz

    Trump threatens ‘hell’ for Iran over Strait of Hormuz

    Escalating tensions across the Middle East have reached a new boiling point, after former U.S. President Donald Trump issued fiery, explicit threats against Iran over its blockade of the strategically critical Strait of Hormuz, paired with revelations of a high-stakes U.S. search and rescue mission that extracted a wounded American airman from inside Iranian territory.

    In a incendiary post shared on his Truth Social platform Sunday, Trump demanded Iran immediately reopen the key oil and gas shipping lane, which Tehran has effectively closed amid the ongoing regional conflict that began with joint U.S.-Israeli strikes on Iran in late February. “Open the Fuckin’ Strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll be living in Hell,” Trump wrote. He went on to warn that Tuesday would bring coordinated U.S. strikes on Iranian power plants and bridges, declaring “There will be nothing like it!!!” In a subsequent interview with Fox News, however, Trump softened his tone slightly, noting he saw a “good chance” Iran would agree to a diplomatic resolution on the Hormuz issue by Monday.

    The threats came just after Trump announced what he called one of the most daring rescue operations in U.S. history: the extraction of a seriously wounded U.S. airman from deep inside Iran’s mountainous interior. Multiple U.S. media outlets have since shed light on the risky mission, revealing the airman, a weapons systems officer, was equipped with a sidearm, location beacon and encrypted communications device to coordinate with rescue teams. According to reports from The New York Times and CBS, two aircraft intended to extract the airman and his rescuers became stuck at a remote Iranian base, forcing U.S. forces to destroy the planes to prevent sensitive technology from falling into Iranian hands. Three additional transport planes were ultimately used to successfully pull the team out of the country.

    Iran’s account of the operation differs sharply from the U.S. narrative. Tehran says it foiled the mission, which it claims made use of an abandoned airport in Iran’s southern Isfahan province, and released footage showing charred, smoking aircraft wreckage scattered across a desert area. Iranian state media reports five people were killed in strikes connected to the operation, and the Iranian military claims it destroyed four U.S. aircraft involved in the mission. Tehran has not explicitly denied that U.S. forces successfully extracted the airman, however. Trump also confirmed the operation marked the second successful rescue of an American service member in as many days, noting the first mission was kept secret to avoid endangering the second.

    Conflicting reports also surround the downing of the American fighter jet the airman ejected from. Iran says its forces shot the plane down, a claim U.S. media has repeated, though the Trump administration has not publicly confirmed the detail.

    The harsh exchange over the rescue operation comes as the broader regional war, which entered its third month after launching February 28, continues to expand and disrupt global markets. After opening the conflict with joint strikes, Iran responded by blocking the Strait of Hormuz — a passage through which roughly a fifth of the world’s oil supplies pass — and launching retaliatory strikes against Israel and its Gulf allies. On Sunday alone, Iran targeted critical infrastructure across the Gulf, damaging civilian facilities in the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Kuwait. Pro-Iran armed groups also launched two separate attacks on U.S. diplomatic sites in Baghdad overnight, the U.S. embassy confirmed.

    Diplomatic efforts to de-escalate tensions over the Strait of Hormuz are already underway, however. Reports indicate Omani and Iranian deputy foreign ministers have held recent talks focused on reopening the shipping lane to commercial traffic.

    For many ordinary Iranians, though, Trump’s stark threats have so far failed to disrupt daily life. In interviews with AFP on the ground in Tehran, residents appeared largely indifferent to the rhetoric. In a large western park, young Iranians gathered for picnics, played frisbee to techno music, and flew kites near the city’s iconic Milad Tower, going about their weekend routines as usual.

    The conflict has spread steadily to neighboring Lebanon, where the Iran-backed Hezbollah movement has traded near-daily strikes with Israel since the war began. Israel has responded with counter-strikes and deployed ground forces into southern Lebanon. An Israeli strike on the southern Lebanese village of Kfar Hatta Sunday killed a family of six who were waiting to evacuate, alongside a relative who had arrived to pick them up, a Lebanese civil defense source told AFP. A second Israeli strike on southern Beirut killed at least four people, Lebanon’s health ministry confirmed.

    The ongoing violence has also upended religious celebrations across the region. For Christian minorities marking Easter Sunday, the conflict cast a dark shadow over traditional observances. In Jerusalem’s Old City, normally bustling with pilgrims this time of year, silence reigned Sunday. Israeli security restrictions have limited access to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, one of Christianity’s holiest sites, leaving many faithful unable to carry out their traditional Easter rites. “It’s very hard for all of us because it’s our holiday… It’s really hard to want to pray but to come here and find nothing. Everything is closed,” said 44-year-old pilgrim Christina Toderas, visiting from Romania. In his annual Easter blessing from the Vatican, the newly inaugurated Pope Leo XIV addressed the conflict directly, urging leaders with the power to end hostilities to “choose peace” and decrying global indifference to the “deaths of thousands of people” in the region.

    Tensions also spiked Saturday after a strike near Iran’s Bushehr nuclear plant killed a security guard. Russia, which helped construct the facility and continues to support its operations, condemned the strike as an “evil deed” and announced it would evacuate 198 Russian personnel from the site. Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi issued a stark warning that continued strikes on the coastal plant could trigger catastrophic radioactive fallout that would threaten Gulf Cooperation Council capitals far more than Tehran, noting Bushehr sits much closer to Kuwait, Bahrain and Qatar than it does to the Iranian capital.

    Domestically, the Iranian government continues to crack down on dissent weeks after crushing a large wave of anti-government protests. Iran’s judiciary announced Sunday it had executed two men convicted of collaborating with the U.S. and Israel. Nationwide internet restrictions, implemented amid the unrest, have now stretched into the longest full-country blackout in Iran’s history, internet monitoring group NetBlocks confirmed Sunday.

  • 3 killed as high winds topple a tree on an Easter egg hunt in Germany

    3 killed as high winds topple a tree on an Easter egg hunt in Germany

    A devastating sudden accident has shaken northern Germany, where a massive tree uprooted by severe wind gusts crashed into a crowd of Easter egg hunt attendees on Sunday, leaving three people dead — among them an infant just 10 months old — and one person critically injured, local law enforcement confirmed.

    The tragedy unfolded around 11 a.m. in a wooded area outside the small town of Satrupholm, where roughly 50 people had gathered for the community event. All attendees were affiliated with a nearby residential institution that supports vulnerable pregnant people, new mothers and children, according to the facility’s public information. When the 30-meter (nearly 100-foot) tall tree fell, it landed directly on a small group of attendees, trapping four people beneath its heavy trunk and branches.

    First responders rushed to the scene to extract the trapped victims. A 21-year-old woman and a 16-year-old girl suffered fatal injuries and could not be saved, passing away at the site of the incident. The 21-year-old’s 10-month-old daughter was also badly hurt; despite emergency medical efforts, the infant died shortly after arriving at a local hospital. An 18-year-old woman sustained severe life-threatening injuries and was airlifted to a medical center via rescue helicopter for urgent treatment.

    The residential facility at the center of the event operates as part of Schleswig-Holstein’s state-funded child welfare network, designed to give critical support to expecting and new mothers facing challenging circumstances that require external assistance. In the wake of the crash, specialized grief counselors were immediately deployed to the site to support surviving attendees, first responders and facility staff who witnessed the traumatic event.

    Photographs of the aftermath published by German outlet Bild show scattered, colorful Easter eggs still lying across the forest floor, with two of the deceased victims covered in white sheets, marking the scope of the sudden loss. In a grim precursor to the disaster, the German national weather service had already issued an official high wind warning for the region ahead of the event, alerting residents to dangerous gust conditions.

    Regional government leaders for Schleswig-Holstein, where Satrupholm is located, have publicly expressed their shock and sorrow over the fatal incident. In a joint statement shared by Germany’s dpa news agency, Governor Daniel Günther, Interior Minister Magdalena Finke, and Youth and Families Minister Aminata Touré said, “Our thoughts are with the family members of the dead, with the injured, and with everyone who had to experience this terrible occurrence.” The statement added that the entire region is deeply shaken by the unforeseen tragedy.

  • Easter Rising commemorations take place in Dublin and Belfast

    Easter Rising commemorations take place in Dublin and Belfast

    Across the entire island of Ireland, communities and political leaders gathered this week to mark the 110th anniversary of the 1916 Easter Rising, a defining moment in Ireland’s long push for sovereign independence that continues to shape modern political discourse around unification.

    The Easter Rising, a coordinated rebellion launched to end centuries of British rule in Ireland, remains one of the most consequential events in Irish history. On Easter Monday 1916, rebel leader Pádraig Pearse stood on the steps of Dublin’s General Post Office (GPO) — the rebellion’s central headquarters — and read a proclamation declaring an independent Irish republic. What followed was six days of urban fighting concentrated in Dublin, which ultimately ended with the rebels’ surrender to British forces. More than 450 people lost their lives in the conflict, and 16 rebel leaders were executed in the weeks after the surrender. Though the rising itself was militarily defeated, historians widely credit the harsh British response, particularly the executions, with shifting Irish public opinion from initial hostility to widespread sympathy for the republican cause, ultimately laying the groundwork for the creation of the Irish Free State and later the fully independent Republic of Ireland.

    This year’s commemorative events centered on the GPO in Dublin, the symbolic heart of the 1916 rising. Irish presidential official Catherine Connolly opened the proceedings by laying a ceremonial wreath at the site, a tradition that honors all those who lost their lives in the rebellion. Dignitaries from across the island joined the event, including Northern Ireland First Minister Michelle O’Neill, Irish Taoiseach Micheál Martin, Tánaiste Simon Harris, Defence Minister Helen McEntee, Dublin Lord Mayor Ray McAdam, and Sinn Féin leader Mary Lou McDonald. More than 200 personnel from the Irish Defence Forces took part in the ceremonial proceedings, and Captain Eva Houlihan delivered a reading of the original 1916 proclamation, exactly 110 years after Pearse’s historic reading from the same location.

    Later in the day, speakers addressed crowds at Arbour Hill Cemetery, where 14 of the executed 1916 leaders are buried. McDonald, who serves as leader of the Irish opposition in the Dáil, used the anniversary to frame the next phase of Irish political history, tying the legacy of the Easter Rising to the contemporary push for Irish unification. With the 30th anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement approaching — the 1998 peace deal that ended decades of sectarian conflict in Northern Ireland and formalized provisions for unification via public vote — McDonald argued that the time has come for tangible progress toward a united Ireland. “We have secured the peace. Now is the time to write the next chapter of our national story — the reunification of Ireland,” she said. “This is the decade when Irish unity can be won — decided by people north and south in referendums. The conversation is underway, but conversation alone is not enough. We need vision, determination, and leadership. We need action.”

    In Northern Ireland, thousands of people turned out for a major commemorative parade along the Falls Road in west Belfast, ending at Milltown Cemetery, a key site for republican remembrance. Deirdre Hargey, Sinn Féin’s South Belfast Member of the Legislative Assembly (MLA), addressed the assembled crowds, echoing McDonald’s call for progress toward unity. “While we must never forget, we must also look forward with confidence and hope in building a new and united Ireland,” she said. Hargey also drew a connection between the 1916 fight for Irish self-determination and modern global struggles for sovereignty, noting that “as we continue working towards this, we must reflect on those countries whose own sovereignty and self-determination is being threatened throughout the world.” She added that upcoming 2027 regional and local elections are expected to energize the growing campaign for Irish unification.

    The anniversary commemorations come at a moment of shifting political dynamics across Ireland. Opinion polling in recent years has shown growing support for unification in both Northern Ireland and the Republic, and the 30th anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement next year is expected to bring renewed focus to the issue. For republicans across the island, the 110th anniversary of the Easter Rising serves not just as a time to honor the sacrifice of the 1916 rebels, but as a catalyst to advance the goal of completing the Irish independence project that Pearse and his fellow rebels first proclaimed a century ago.

  • ‘Choose peace’: Pope marks first Easter under cloud of Mideast war

    ‘Choose peace’: Pope marks first Easter under cloud of Mideast war

    In his inaugural Easter Sunday address as the supreme leader of the global Catholic Church, Pope Leo XIV delivered a urgent, impassioned call for global actors to prioritize peace amid the raging, region-spanning war that has reshaped life across the Middle East just months after his election to the papacy. Speaking to thousands of worshippers and pilgrims gathered in Vatican City’s St. Peter’s Square, the pontiff, who was chosen to succeed the late Pope Francis in May 2025, called out the growing global complacency toward violence that has settled over communities worldwide.

    “We are growing accustomed to violence, resigning ourselves to it, and becoming indifferent. Indifferent to the deaths of thousands of people,” Pope Leo told the assembled crowd. The conflict, which erupted on February 28 following joint U.S.-Israeli military strikes against Iran, has since escalated to draw in actors across the entire Middle East, sending shockwaves through global energy and commodity markets and severely disrupting economic activity worldwide. This year’s Easter celebrations, one of the holiest observances on the Christian calendar for the world’s 1.4 billion Catholics, have been overshadowed by the conflict from the Vatican to the Holy Land.

    Pope Leo, who has already established himself as one of the most prominent global voices calling for an immediate de-escalation of the conflict, revealed plans Sunday for a special prayer vigil to be held at the Vatican on April 11 focused on peace in the region. He also used the holiday address to pay tribute to his predecessor, Pope Francis, who made his final public appearance exactly one year prior on Easter Sunday, passing away just hours later. In a move that amplified his diplomatic pressure, the pontiff confirmed this week he had personally reached out to U.S. President Donald Trump to urge the administration to seek a diplomatic off-ramp to end the hostilities. Reflecting on the moral weight of the ongoing conflict, he added, “We live in a world ravaged by wars and marked by a hatred and indifference that make us feel powerless in the face of evil.”

    Thousands of kilometers away in Jerusalem, the heart of Christian worship, the holiday unfolded against a backdrop of eerie emptiness. The narrow, usually bustling alleyways of Jerusalem’s Old City stood silent, the area all but abandoned amid the expanding regional conflict that follows months of fighting in Gaza. Israeli security authorities have implemented harsh new restrictions on access to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, the site where Christian tradition holds Jesus Christ was crucified and resurrected, citing ongoing security concerns. Only a small fraction of the usual number of worshippers were permitted to approach the sacred site, with police checkpoints deployed along all access routes to screen visitors. Every shop and business in the surrounding area shuttered for the holiday, deepening the pervasive sense of loss and disruption.

    For pilgrims who traveled thousands of miles to mark the holiday at the holy site, the restrictions have been devastating. “It’s very hard for all of us because it’s our holiday… It’s really hard to want to pray but to come here and find nothing. Everything is closed,” 44-year-old Romanian pilgrim Christina Toderas told reporters. Otmar Wassermann, a 65-year-old visitor who was turned away from the church, shared that he left the site feeling deeply frustrated by the disruption to the centuries-old tradition of open Easter worship.

    Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa, the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, addressed the grim reality in his Easter Vigil homily delivered at the restricted site. “The doors are still closed,” he stated, referencing an incident just one week prior when Israeli police blocked him from holding a scheduled mass at the church, a move that sparked widespread international condemnation. In published excerpts of his sermon released by his office, he added, “The silence is almost absolute, broken perhaps by the distant sound of what war continues to sow in this holy and torn land.”

    The conflict has upended Easter celebrations across every corner of the Middle East, home to some of the world’s oldest and most vulnerable Christian communities. In southern Lebanon, majority-Christian towns along the border with Israel are trapped between ongoing crossfire between Israeli forces and the Iran-backed Hezbollah movement. In the small border village of Debel, residents marked the holiday to the constant roar of artillery bombardment surrounding their community. The village is now almost completely cut off from basic services, with residents relying entirely on humanitarian aid deliveries to survive. “The situation is tragic,” local community leader Joseph Attieh told AFP via phone. “People are terrified, and the sound of shelling and gunfire has not stopped for a moment since last night. We haven’t been able to sleep. We are putting our trust in God, because this is the only glimmer of hope we will not give up on.”

    Further afield, the security risks of the conflict have forced Christian leaders to cancel or scale back traditional Easter observances. In Dubai, all public Easter masses have been suspended indefinitely as a security precaution. In Damascus, the capital of Syria, Catholic officials confirmed Easter celebrations would be limited to small, private masses following a recent deadly attack on a majority-Christian town in central Syria, leaving communities reeling.

  • Congo to receive third-country deportees from the US under new deal

    Congo to receive third-country deportees from the US under new deal

    KINSHASA, Democratic Republic of Congo – The Congolese government announced Sunday it has agreed to accept deported migrants from the United States under the Trump administration’s controversial third-country deportation program, making it the latest African nation to sign on to the controversial policy framework. According to an official statement released by the Congolese Ministry of Communications, the first group of deportees is scheduled to arrive in the country before the end of this month. The government did not release additional details, including an exact arrival date or the total number of migrants that will be transferred to Congolese territory.

    Congo’s government framed the arrangement as a temporary commitment, emphasizing that the agreement aligns with the country’s stated dedication to upholding human dignity and advancing international solidarity. The statement also clarified that the deal will impose no financial burden on Congolese public finances, with the U.S. government covering all logistical costs associated with the migrant transfers.

    This new agreement puts Congo among at least eight African nations that have now reached similar third-country deportation deals with the U.S. Many of these participating nations have already been heavily impacted by other Trump administration policies, including sweeping restrictions on trade, foreign aid and legal migration pathways. Recent data from a report compiled by Democratic staff of the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee shows the Trump administration has allocated at least $40 million in public funding to deport roughly 300 migrants to third-party countries outside the migrants’ native nations.

    Human rights lawyers and migration activists have raised widespread concerns over the structure and ethics of these deals with African partner states. Multiple nations that have already agreed to the pacts are led by notoriously repressive regimes with documented poor human rights records, including Eswatini, South Sudan and Equatorial Guinea.

    A central point of controversy is that many of the migrants being transferred via these programs already hold formal protection orders from U.S. immigration judges, which bar the U.S. from deporting them back to their home countries due to extreme safety risks including violence, persecution, and threats to their lives. Unlike some previous agreements that have allowed for blanket transfers, the Congolese government has confirmed it will not implement automatic, mass transfers of incoming deportees. Instead, officials noted every migrant’s case will undergo individual review, with assessments conducted in alignment with Congolese national law and domestic national security requirements.

  • Pope Leo calls for global leaders to choose peace in his first Easter Mass

    Pope Leo calls for global leaders to choose peace in his first Easter Mass

    On Easter Sunday, thousands of devout worshippers packed Vatican City’s St. Peter’s Square to witness a historic moment: the first ever Easter Mass and address delivered by Pope Leo XIV, the first pontiff born in the United States.

    Framed by elegant arrangements of white roses on the central balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica, the new pontiff opened his message with a urgent plea directed at global power holders. Standing against a backdrop of vibrant spring decor—rows of sunny daffodils interspersed with thousands of purple, red, and white blooms arranged for the holiest day on the Christian liturgical calendar—Leo called for an end to the violence tearing through communities across the globe.

    “On this day of celebration, let us abandon every desire for conflict, domination and power, and implore the Lord to grant his peace to a world ravaged by wars,” he told the gathered crowd. Expanding on his critique of global inaction in the face of bloodshed, the pontiff highlighted a dangerous cultural shift taking root across the world: “We are growing accustomed to violence, resigning ourselves to it, and becoming indifferent, indifferent to the deaths of thousands of people.”

    He doubled down on his core appeal, stating clearly: “Let those who have weapons lay them down. Let those who have the power to unleash wars choose peace.” In a departure from recent papal tradition, Leo chose not to name specific nations or ongoing conflicts in his main Easter address, though his track record of public criticism makes his priorities clear: he has emerged as a prominent vocal opponent of the ongoing war between the United States and Iran, and has used every recent public platform to denounce global armed conflict and push for immediate de-escalation. Earlier this week, he made an uncommon direct appeal to U.S. President Donald Trump, urging him to pursue a diplomatic “off-ramp” to end the Iran conflict.

    Before closing his address, Leo paid respectful tribute to his predecessor, Pope Francis, who delivered his final Easter address exactly one year prior, only hours before his death. Drawing a connection between the core Easter narrative of Jesus Christ’s resurrection after crucifixion and modern calls for peace, Leo emphasized that Christ remained entirely nonviolent even in the face of unjust suffering.

    Following his address, the pontiff delivered the traditional “Urbi et Orbi” blessing—Latin for “to the city [of Rome] and the world”—to the crowd below, waving to thousands of gathered faithful before concluding the service. As Vatican bells rang out across the city-state and the assembled worshippers erupted in applause, Leo closed the event by offering Easter greetings in multiple languages, including Latin, Arabic, and Chinese.

    Consistent with his sustained push for peace advocacy, the pope also announced he would return to St. Peter’s Basilica on April 11 to lead a special prayer vigil dedicated to global peace. This public event marks the next step in a weeks-long campaign by Pope Leo to draw attention to the human cost of war: during Holy Week leading up to Easter, he delivered a series of addresses warning against growing public apathy toward suffering caused by armed conflict. During his sermon at the Easter Vigil held Saturday night, he urged Christian believers across the world not to grow numb to the scale of global violence, but to actively work toward reconciliation between divided groups.