Global Pulse

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  • Flood rescue enters fourth day in Nepal-China border as weather hampers air operations

    Flood rescue enters fourth day in Nepal-China border as weather hampers air operations

    Four days have passed since catastrophic flash floods tore through mountainous border regions shared by Nepal and the Tibet Autonomous Region of China, leaving hundreds dead and thousands more unaccounted for, and adverse weather conditions on Saturday brought a halt to critical aerial rescue efforts that have been running nonstop since the disaster struck.

    The deadly disaster, triggered by a sudden glacier collapse that unleashed torrents of water and debris across the high Himalayan landscape on Wednesday, has already claimed an overwhelming number of lives. As of Friday, Nepal’s official disaster management authority recorded 579 fatalities, while local police later updated the confirmed death toll to 553. On the Chinese side of the border, official reports raised the confirmed death count to seven by Friday, with large-scale village evacuations underway and top political leaders leading on-the-ground relief coordination.

    Across Nepal alone, the number of people listed as missing has nearly doubled in recent days to 1,924, after registration officials added hundreds more unaccounted-for local residents to the official tally. China’s official state media has reported 554 people missing on its side of the border. Among the missing are hundreds of foreign nationals, who were in the region for work on infrastructure projects, high-altitude trekking, or religious pilgrimage to the area’s sacred mountain peaks. To date, more than 3,700 people trapped by the floodwaters have been pulled to safety across Nepal.

    Brigadier General Raja Ram Basnet, spokesperson for the Nepali Army, confirmed Saturday that all helicopter rescue operations would remain suspended until inclement weather clears enough to allow safe flight operations. Even before the pause, search and rescue teams faced extreme, overwhelming obstacles to reach trapped survivors. At the Upper Trishuli-1 Hydropower Project, a major infrastructure construction site in Nepal’s Rasuwa District, authorities believe more than 100 workers remain trapped inside a construction tunnel that has been completely filled with thick, heavy mud. Rescuers have only been able to reach a small number of people at the site using makeshift systems of baskets and ropes, but progress remains glacial: up to 1.5 meters (5 feet) of dense mud covers the entire area, and there are almost no suitable landing spots for rescue helicopters to deploy personnel and equipment.

    Search operations are ongoing across multiple high-risk sites on both sides of the border, including the flood-ravaged Gyirong border crossing, which suffered extensive damage in the initial disaster. On Saturday, Chinese state broadcaster CCTV released new on-site footage showing rescue teams reaching the damaged Gyirong Port crossing, with crews accessing remote cut-off areas on foot, via inflatable rafts, and even by being lowered from drones deployed into the disaster zone. The footage showed rescuers calling out “Anyone, anyone?” as they searched rubble and debris for any trapped survivors, with no immediate confirmation of how many people were in the border checkpoint compound when the floods hit.

    In addition to challenging terrain and bad weather, rescue teams have also faced persistent secondary risks: authorities have been on high alert for a second catastrophic flood, triggered by a new glacial lake that formed high in the Himalayas after the initial glacier collapse that sparked Wednesday’s disaster. Experts issued urgent warnings that the new lake was at risk of overflowing, which would send a second wave of floodwaters down into the already devastated valley. However, latest monitoring data from China’s Ministry of Water Resources, released late Friday, showed the lake has shrunk considerably, with water levels dropping more than 10 meters (32 feet) from their peak Thursday morning, reducing the risk of a repeat disaster. Even so, Basnet noted that rescue teams have had to temporarily relocate operations multiple times as new flood warnings are issued for at-risk areas.

    The disaster has sparked urgent international attention, with United Nations agencies warning that more than 17,000 children in affected areas are in immediate need of life-saving assistance, and families of missing foreign nationals — including dozens of relatives of missing people from the United States — have publicly called for accelerated rescue efforts to locate their loved ones. This reporting was a collaborative effort by Associated Press journalists across multiple locations in South Asia and the United States.

  • Ingham’s boss gives stark chicken price warning as H5 bird flu crisis spreads

    Ingham’s boss gives stark chicken price warning as H5 bird flu crisis spreads

    As the H5 avian influenza outbreak continues its spread across Australian wildlife, the head of the nation’s largest poultry producer has issued a clear warning that consumers will soon face higher retail prices for chicken, driven by rising industry costs tied to the growing public and animal health crisis.

    Edward Alexander, chief executive and managing director of Ingham’s Group, which supplies approximately 40% of all chicken meat consumed in Australia, outlined the mounting cost pressures facing the domestic poultry industry during a recent investor meeting. Alexander told shareholders that even without a single confirmed outbreak of the virus among the country’s commercial poultry flocks to date, the industry is already shouldering an extra $130 million in additional costs. These costs stem from a confluence of factors: enhanced biosecurity measures to prevent the virus, soaring feed prices driven by global inflation and geopolitical instability in the Middle East, and ongoing surveillance protocols.

    According to Alexander, these expanded costs will inevitably pass through to end consumers. “Retail pricing moves more with changes to the cost base … so we will see that take effect,” he stated.

    The spreading virus represents an unprecedented and serious threat to Australia’s commercial poultry sector, Alexander emphasized. In response to the growing risk, Ingham’s has already dispatched a team of senior executives to Europe, where nations have spent years navigating widespread H5 bird flu outbreaks, to gather critical insights and best practices for biosecurity management. “We take this risk extremely seriously,” Alexander said, noting that predicting the exact timing and location of a commercial outbreak remains impossible.

    Despite the grave risk, Alexander expressed confidence in Ingham’s preparedness, positioning the company as better resourced to handle an outbreak than any other competitor in the Australian market. Over the past months, the firm has poured significant resources into prevention protocols, widespread surveillance, contingency scenario planning, and rapid response frameworks to mitigate the risk of the virus reaching its operations. Its geographically diverse national production network, Alexander explained, adds an extra layer of resilience: “An outbreak in one location does not automatically translate into disruption across our broad network. We have the ability to isolate affected areas, protect other parts of the network and redirect production and supply.”

    Alexander also confirmed that so far, the spread of bird flu in Australian wildlife has not dented consumer demand for chicken products. He credited clear public communication around the fact that properly handled poultry remains safe for human consumption for the steady demand, noting “we’re not seeing any impact on demand at the moment.”

    Alexander’s warning comes on the heels of a series of alarming new developments in the spread of the H5 strain across Australia. The virus was first detected in the country in migratory wild birds, but it has quickly jumped to native bird species, including giant petrels. In recent days, it has begun spreading to wild mammals, triggering growing concern among conservation and health officials about the risk to vulnerable native species including the iconic Tasmanian devil.

    This week, a dead red fox found in the Adelaide metropolitan area tested positive for H5 avian influenza, marking the first confirmed case of an infected mammal in an Australian urban center. On the heels of that discovery, South Australian authorities confirmed that a dolphin that washed ashore on Goolwa Beach is also suspected to have died from the virus. Dr Skye Fruean, the state’s chief veterinarian, noted that authorities are still investigating how the marine mammal contracted the virus, but the most likely pathway is interaction with or consumption of an infected wild bird.

    The cross-species jump of the virus has amplified existing concerns about the threat it poses to scavenging native Australian species, particularly the endangered Tasmanian devil, which regularly feeds on carrion that may include infected bird or animal carcasses.

  • The missing in Nepal-Tibet flash floods

    The missing in Nepal-Tibet flash floods

    On Saturday, official data confirmed that catastrophic flash floods and landslides that swept across the Nepal-Tibet border region have left at least 2,478 people unaccounted for and roughly 600 others dead, with authorities warning that casualty numbers could shift further amid ongoing post-disaster chaos. The total count of missing people jumped by more than 1,000 in just 24 hours, driven by a sharp upward revision from Nepal’s disaster management agency, which raised its missing count for the Nepali side of the border to 1,924 on Friday. China’s official Xinhua News Agency reported Saturday morning that 554 people remain missing on the Tibetan side of the border, with seven confirmed fatalities there.

    Cross-border tallies show at least 777 foreigners are among the missing, including international tourists and foreign workers stationed in the popular mountain cross-border region. Nepal’s tourism authorities confirmed that 121 tourists have already been pulled to safety, but full data on the total number of rescued people, including local residents and foreign laborers, has not yet been released. On the Nepali side, the total confirmed death toll reached 586 as of Friday’s update.

    Discrepancies have emerged in some missing person counts between Nepali authorities and foreign diplomatic missions, as response teams continue to sort through incomplete and conflicting data. Nepal’s Tourism Board currently lists 622 people missing on Nepali territory: 149 are Nepali nationals traveling in the area, while the disaster agency puts the domestic missing count at 127, with hundreds of local residents still unaccounted for.

    Major nationalities of missing people on the Nepali side include 98 Indians (with 85 rescued), 65 Americans (with two rescued, no reported fatalities per U.S. officials), 61 Ukrainians, 51 Malaysians, 41 Australians, 33 British citizens, 29 Latvians, and 25 Canadians – Canada’s foreign ministry notes 30 Canadians are missing across both Nepal and Tibet. Other missing foreign nationals include nine South Koreans, nine Singaporeans, nine Russians, eight Germans, six South Africans, five Japanese, five New Zealanders, four French, three Spanish, three Hungarians, three Portuguese, three Italians, three Kazakhs, and multiple other nationalities with one or two people unaccounted for. Several citizens from these countries have already been confirmed safe.

    Chinese officials previously confirmed that 260 foreigners are missing on the Tibetan side of the border, but no breakdown of their nationalities has been published to date. Details on the nationalities of non-tourist missing people on Nepal’s side also have not been released by authorities, as search and rescue operations continue across the rugged, flood-ravaged border landscape.

  • US cuts off major Egyptian bank from global financial system

    US cuts off major Egyptian bank from global financial system

    In a sharp escalation of its economic pressure campaign against Iran, the U.S. Treasury Department announced Friday sweeping new sanctions designed to cut key regional financial actors linked to Tehran out of the global dollar system. The action, framed by the administration as part of its broader push to neutralize what it calls Iran’s financial enablers, centers on cutting off the United Arab Emirates-based branches of Egypt’s second-largest financial institution, Banque Misr, from access to U.S. financial networks.

    Under the proposed rule put forward by Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), Banque Misr UAE will lose its correspondent banking privileges that allow it to transact in U.S. dollars starting September 28. The proposal includes a 30-day public comment period, during which stakeholders can submit feedback for or against the measure, a step that could ultimately alter the final outcome of the designation. Treasury officials said the branch represents a critical access point for the Iranian regime to secure U.S. dollar holdings, justifying its removal from the global financial system.

    The new sanctions campaign, dubbed “Operation Economic Outcast,” was first unveiled by Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent earlier this week as part of Washington’s broader efforts to squeeze Iran amid ongoing heightened tensions over the Strait of Hormuz. Following the implementation of the new rule, U.S. financial institutions will be required to implement enhanced due diligence for all cross-border transactions involving foreign correspondent accounts, and take reasonable steps to block any transactions connected to Banque Misr UAE.

    Friday’s announcement also expanded sanctions to target Dubai’s local branch of Iran’s Bank Melli, one of the country’s oldest and largest commercial banks. Bank Melli functioned as Iran’s de facto central bank prior to the 1979 Islamic Revolution, and today maintains a sprawling network of branches across the Middle East and Europe. The U.S. also imposed direct sanctions on the branch’s manager, Reza Mohammad Taeedi. In its statement, Treasury noted that Bank Melli has long operated as a core financial hub for Iran’s military apparatus, including the U.S.-sanctioned Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Qods Force and the Iranian Ministry of Defense and Armed Forces Logistics.

    A third entity, Hong Kong-based Kameng Trading Limited, was also added to the U.S. sanctions roster for its alleged role in money laundering on behalf of a pre-existing sanctioned Iranian exchange house, Pedram Pirouzan Exchange House, which also operates under the alias Opal Exchange.

    The sanctions, which touch on a Hong Kong-based firm amid deepening geopolitical ties between Beijing and Tehran, have sparked questions about potential impacts on U.S.-China relations, particularly ahead of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s planned state visit to the White House next month. China currently stands as the largest importer of Iranian energy exports. When asked about potential frictions on Monday, Bessent noted that the U.S. is pursuing quiet diplomatic outreach to align expectations with all global partners, saying, “We find that the best way to engage with countries is through quiet diplomacy, and we are level setting with every country to tell them our expectations.”

  • Former Ecuadorian President Lenín Moreno sentenced to 5 years for corruption

    Former Ecuadorian President Lenín Moreno sentenced to 5 years for corruption

    QUITO, Ecuador — In a landmark ruling that marks another high-profile conviction of a former head of state in Ecuador’s long-running crackdown on systemic political corruption, an Ecuadorian court sentenced ex-president Lenín Moreno to five years of incarceration on Friday. The 73-year-old former leader was found guilty of accepting illegal bribes from a Chinese construction firm in exchange for facilitating the award of a multi-billion-dollar contract for a major hydroelectric power project.

    Moreno, who uses a wheelchair due to a permanent physical disability that prevents him from walking, was present in the courtroom for the verdict reading. Per court order, he will serve his entire sentence under house arrest rather than in a traditional prison facility, in consideration of his mobility impairment.

    The court’s conviction extends beyond Moreno himself. His wife, daughter, two brothers, and brother-in-law were all found guilty of acting as accomplices in the coordinated bribery scheme. Moreno’s wife and daughter each received 30-month prison sentences, and all five convicted co-defendants have been ordered to pay restitution equal to three times the amount of their illegal gains within a 90-day deadline.

    Prosecutors laid out that the corruption network operated between 2008 and 2018, collecting illegal bribes equal to 4% of the total contract value of the Coca Codo Sinclair hydroelectric plant, which was developed by China’s Sinohydro. The illicit funds were moved through a web of domestic and international financial transactions to bribe public officials and distribute payouts to private beneficiaries, including Moreno, who was serving as vice president under then-president Rafael Correa at the time the scheme was launched.

    Sinohydro broke ground on the roughly $2 billion Coca Codo Sinclair project in 2010 and completed construction, turning the facility over to the Ecuadorian government in 2016. In the years since its completion, the dam has been the subject of widespread public criticism over repeated reports of serious structural defects that have impacted its operation and long-term viability.

    Moreno first entered national politics in 2007, when he was selected as Correa’s running mate and took office as vice president, a post he held until 2013. He was succeeded in that role by Jorge Glas, who would later become Moreno’s own running mate when Moreno won the 2017 presidential election as the candidate of Correa’s left-wing Correísta movement. Glas has since left office and is currently serving a prison sentence for corruption convictions.

    Friday’s conviction makes Moreno the third former Ecuadorian president to be handed a prison sentence for corruption-related offenses in recent years, though the crimes for which he was convicted occurred before he took the nation’s highest office. His predecessor in the presidency, Rafael Correa, was sentenced to eight years in prison in 2020 for his role in a separate bribery scandal involving Brazilian construction conglomerate Odebrecht. Correa has lived in Belgium for years and remains outside the reach of Ecuadorian law enforcement. Before that, former president Jamil Mahuad was sentenced to 12 years in prison in 2014 for misappropriation of public funds. Another ex-president, Abdalá Bucaram, has already been convicted of organized crime charges and is currently awaiting sentencing.

  • Number of missing in Nepal, China floods soars past 2,400

    Number of missing in Nepal, China floods soars past 2,400

    Three days after a devastating tsunami-style surge of water and debris tore through cross-border Himalayan communities, rescue teams in Nepal and China’s Tibet Autonomous Region continued their frantic search for thousands of unaccounted-for people on Saturday. By Friday, official counts put the total number of missing people at more than 2,400, with rescuers having already recovered 586 fatalities — several of which washed downstream as far as northern India. The catastrophic disaster has reshaped lives across the border region, leaving survivors with nothing and forcing agonizing waits for news of loved ones.

    The high-altitude Himalayan border region is dotted with large-scale hydropower and energy infrastructure projects, and Nepal’s national disaster management authority confirmed that 933 workers from local hydropower facilities had been added to the growing missing persons list. They join hundreds of trekkers and Hindu pilgrims who were en route to Tibet’s sacred Mount Kailash, one of the region’s most popular religious destinations, when the flood struck.

    Survivors recount scenes of total destruction, with entire riverside settlements washed away in a matter of minutes. “All the settlements near the river were swept away. There is nothing left,” survivor Buddhi Ram Dangol told Agence France-Presse. For families of the missing, uncertainty has turned into days of agonizing waiting. Samjhana Thing, who has not heard from her brother since the flood hit, said, “We don’t know anything. Hopefully he is in a safe place.”

    The International Committee of the Red Cross described the scale of trauma from Wednesday’s disaster as “enormous”, estimating that as many as 93,000 people across the region have been displaced or otherwise affected. Officials warn the final death toll will almost certainly rise as search teams reach more remote cut-off areas. Widespread destruction has severed supply routes, leaving emergency teams and trapped survivors facing dwindling stockpiles of clean drinking water and food. Compounding the already dangerous search mission is the persistent threat of secondary flooding. The initial surge of ice and mud created large new natural debris dams across mountain valleys, creating unstable temporary lakes that continue to threaten response teams. On Friday, Nepali police issued an urgent order for all rescuers to evacuate high-risk zones immediately after receiving reports that a new debris dam on the Tibetan side of the border had burst. In Tibet, Chinese authorities paused rescue operations in the worst-hit Gyirong county due to the risk of new flooding, before announcing the threat had eased. State news agency Xinhua reported Saturday morning that two trapped villagers had been pulled from the debris in the area.

    On the Nepali side of the border, military teams are working to extract dozens of trapped workers from the tunnel of the Trishuli 3A hydropower project, one of the largest energy facilities in the flood zone. Army spokesman Raja Ram Basnet told AFP that two rescue helicopters have been deployed to the site, but treacherous conditions and destroyed access routes have made locating the tunnel entrance extremely challenging. So far, 350 workers and local residents have been evacuated to safety from the area, but more than 100 people remain trapped, he added.

    Workers rescued from other hydropower projects along the Trishuli Valley described a disaster that unfolded with terrifying, unexpected speed. Buddha Tamang, a dam worker who was airlifted to safety Thursday after being stranded for more than 24 hours, said he only survived because he was inside a tunnel at the time the flood hit. “The senior officers working on the other side, they were all swept away,” Tamang said.

    By Friday, Nepal’s official death toll stood at 579, with 1,924 people — including 517 foreign nationals — still unaccounted for, a near-doubling of the previous missing count of 977. Across the border in Tibet, which remains closed to most foreign journalists, state-run Xinhua reported seven confirmed deaths and 555 missing people as of Saturday. Chinese authorities have already evacuated 555 stranded tourists and 499 local residents from high-risk flood zones in Tibet. India has recovered seven bodies from rivers that originate in Nepal, all believed to be victims of the cross-border disaster.

    Dozens of international Hindu devotees are among the missing, as many were traveling along the popular pilgrimage route to Mount Kailash. Sivaranjani Muthunathan, a 46-year-old pilgrim, was traveling by bus with 56 other devotees toward the Chinese border when the group stopped, initially assuming they were caught in a routine traffic jam. “Then there was fog, smoke, something that seemed to suddenly engulf us,” Muthunathan told AFP Friday, sharing mobile footage she recorded of a raging torrent of mud and water surging toward her vehicle. One by one, vehicles around the bus were swept away or buried under falling debris. “One by one, we also climbed out through the driver’s side,” then scrambled up a nearby hillside to safety, she said.

  • Somali piracy surges as the impact of the US-Iran war ripples outwards

    Somali piracy surges as the impact of the US-Iran war ripples outwards

    A sharp resurgence of piracy off the coast of Somalia has amplified threats to global commercial shipping, a sector already strained by maritime blockades and escalating regional tensions stemming from the ongoing conflict between the United States and Iran. In just four days last week, two separate cargo vessels were seized in the Gulf of Aden, pushing the total number of recorded attacks since the start of 2026 to at least 13. This wave of hijackings marks the most significant escalation of maritime criminal activity in the region in more than a decade, reviving long-dormant fears over security for one of the world’s most critical trade corridors.

    “Piracy is always a crime of opportunity,” explained Omar Mahmood, senior Somalia analyst at the International Crisis Group (ICG). “Right now, the pirates see a clear opening to act.” That opening has been created by cascading insecurity in key waterways further north: the Strait of Hormuz remains a flashpoint for ongoing tensions between Washington and Tehran, while Iran-aligned Houthi forces in Yemen have enforced a targeted blockade of the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, the critical gateway to the Red Sea. Though the blockade was originally implemented as part of the Houthi dispute with Saudi Arabia, it has upended security for all international shipping transiting the region.

    Vice-Admiral Ignacio Villanueva Serrano, operations commander for the European Union’s naval mission tasked with protecting shipping off Somalia’s coast, noted that pirates have calculated international security resources are already stretched thin by the northern crises. “They believe that international forces will be focused on managing Hormuz and Bab el-Mandeb, rather than prioritizing counter-piracy patrols off Somalia,” he said.

    Two recent high-profile seizures underscore the growing threat. On August 17, the MV Lutuf, a Cameroon-flagged cargo vessel, was hijacked off the coast of Somalia’s semi-autonomous Puntland region. Just four days later, pirates boarded the MT Sibu 1, an Eritrean-flagged oil products tanker, in Gulf of Aden waters near the Yemeni coast.

    The hijacking of the MV Lutuf has triggered unforeseen diplomatic and security fallout. Since August 18, two drone strikes targeting alleged pirate supply networks linked to the vessel have killed 13 men. While no party has officially claimed responsibility for the attacks, local and regional officials have blamed Turkey, claiming the MV Lutuf was carrying a cargo of Turkish weapons bound for Somalia’s capital, Mogadishu.

    The BBC has confirmed that the MV Lutuf is now one of six vessels being held by pirate groups demanding multi-million dollar ransoms. Four of the seized ships are currently anchored near Bander Beyla, a coastal fishing town long recognized as a piracy hotbed. Current activity remains far below the peak of Somali piracy 15 years ago, when attacks cost the global economy billions of dollars annually: in 2011 alone, Somali pirates launched more than 200 attacks and held hundreds of crew members hostage. A coordinated international naval response, paired with the adoption of private security teams on commercial vessels, successfully drove down attacks and contained smaller flare-ups in 2023 and 2024.

    But experts warn that while pirate networks were suppressed for years, they were never dismantled. Root causes including widespread poverty and persistent weak governance and security in Somalia have never been addressed, allowing criminal networks to remain intact. Locally, the current resurgence is fueled by deep-seated anger over unregulated overfishing by foreign trawlers in Somali territorial waters, which has gutted the small-scale fishing industry that sustains coastal communities in Puntland.

    Shifting shipping patterns have also created more targets for pirates. As vessel operators divert their routes south to avoid conflict and blockades further north, more commercial ships are now passing closer to Somalia’s coastline. With global oil prices remaining elevated, hijacking a loaded oil tanker has become a far more lucrative criminal enterprise. Mahmood noted the confluence of factors working in pirates’ favor: “You have that combined effect of less naval patrolling but more commercial shipping in these waters, and that signals an opportunity. And once you’ve had a successful attack, that spurs other criminal groups to carry out copycat incidents.”

    Analysts have also floated the possibility of limited collaboration between Somali pirate networks and Yemeni criminal groups, following multiple seizures near the Yemeni coast. Mahmood, however, says any collaboration is almost certainly between criminal factions, not with Iran-backed Houthi forces—especially since the MT Sibu 1 is reportedly part of Iran’s so-called “shadow fleet” of vessels used to transport oil in violation of U.S. sanctions. “I don’t see something specifically Iran-directed,” he emphasized.

    Turkey’s role in the crisis has emerged as a major point of political tension. Unnamed Puntland security sources and a Somali federal government official have told the BBC that the MV Lutuf was carrying weapons and sensitive satellite equipment bound for a Turkish military training facility in Mogadishu, as well as a new Turkish space station being constructed north of the capital. Turkey has a long-standing defense and economic partnership with Somalia’s federal government, focused in part on strengthening Somalia’s maritime security. The sources also claim that six international warships are currently deployed near the hijacked MV Lutuf: two from Turkey, and one each from Spain, Denmark, the United States, and India. The BBC has not been able to independently verify this deployment.

    The Somali government official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, alleged that Turkey carried out the second deadly drone strike on August 24 that killed nine armed men. “The men who were killed were criminals and I don’t have sympathy for them, but taking it to that level is escalating the situation even more,” he said. Turkey’s defense ministry has confirmed that its forces are providing “necessary support” to Somali authorities within the framework of their existing security agreement, but has not directly addressed accusations it carried out the drone strikes. Somalia’s federal government has only stated publicly that it is aware of counter-piracy operations and will take appropriate steps to manage the situation.

    Puntland authorities have been far more vocal in their opposition. Deputy Puntland Security Minister Abdirahman Yusuf told BBC Somali Service that his administration has evidence linking Turkey to the drone strikes, citing observed Turkish military activity near the MV Lutuf and along the Puntland coast. The BBC has not independently verified these claims. Puntland’s security ministry issued a formal statement opposing “bombings by international warships targeting civilians” that “undermined co-operation in combatting piracy,” and demanded an immediate explanation for the strikes.

    Analysts warn that the incident has further complicated long-running political tensions between the semi-autonomous Puntland region and the federal government in Mogadishu, which has long had a close military relationship with Turkey. This political rift already undermines efforts to coordinate a unified counter-piracy response across Somalia.

    While the current wave of hijackings has not yet reached the level of a full-blown piracy resurgence, experts warn that without a de-escalation of the U.S.-Iran conflict and renewed international investment in counter-piracy deterrence, Somali piracy will continue to raise security risks in one of the world’s most economically vital maritime corridors.

  • Close race as Iceland votes on whether to restart talks on joining EU

    Close race as Iceland votes on whether to restart talks on joining EU

    On Saturday, Icelandic voters headed to polling stations across the small Nordic nation to decide a question that has split public opinion and shaped national politics for nearly 15 years: whether to restart accession negotiations with the European Union, a process first halted in 2013. With pre-vote opinion polls consistently showing a razor-thin margin between the two campaign sides, no analyst has been willing to confidently predict the final outcome, with results expected to be announced in the early hours of Sunday.

    Iceland’s current centre-left administration, led by Prime Minister Kristrún Frostadóttir, had long planned to hold this public vote, but mounting instability in global geopolitics pushed the government to schedule the referendum earlier than initially planned. Unlike many European Union accession debates that center heavily on security and international alliances, this campaign has focused far more on two core national priorities: Iceland’s iconic fishing industry and its hard-won national sovereignty.

    Voting opened at 9:00 GMT and remained open until 22:00 GMT, with more than 20% of eligible voters already casting their ballots during the early voting period, according to Iceland’s national public broadcaster RUV. For a nation of just under 400,000 people, the referendum has sparked high voter turnout, reflecting how deeply the question of EU membership divides Icelandic society. The question put directly to voters is straightforward: “Should Iceland resume accession negotiations with the European Union?”

    Already, Iceland is tightly integrated into European economic and border structures: as a member of the European Economic Area, it participates in the EU’s single market and is part of the Schengen Area, which allows free movement across most European borders. Full EU membership would bring Iceland into the EU customs union and eventually require adopting the euro as its national currency. When Iceland paused accession talks in 2013, the process was already far along: of the 35 policy chapters that must be negotiated to join, 27 had been opened and 11 had been provisionally finalized. European Commission officials have confirmed that if voters approve restarting talks, the full negotiation process could be wrapped up in as little as one to two years.

    Crucially, a Yes vote in Saturday’s referendum is not a final commitment to join the bloc. It would only greenlight the government to resume talks and negotiate a formal accession agreement. Once an agreement is reached, it would require approval from a second public referendum, the Icelandic parliament, and constitutional amendments, as well as ratification from all 27 existing EU member states. Pro-membership campaign group “Yes to See” argues that Icelanders deserve the chance to see what terms the bloc can offer before making a final, binding decision, saying that current voters lack all the information needed to reject membership outright.

    Even a No vote would not permanently close the door to future EU accession talks, leaving the possibility of revisiting the question open for future administrations. Sovereignty has emerged as the most contentious issue throughout the campaign. Iceland only gained full independence from Denmark in 1944, a milestone that remains central to the nation’s identity, and its fishing and marine industries account for nearly 40% of the country’s total exports. No campaigners warn that EU membership would force Iceland to cede control of its valuable fishing waters to the EU’s Common Fisheries Policy, requiring it to share access with other member states. While EU negotiators have indicated Iceland could secure a special exemption for its fishing sector, opponents remain deeply skeptical, and the issue remains the single largest barrier to a successful accession agreement. Many voters still reference the 1970s “Cod Wars” fishing disputes with the United Kingdom, which Iceland ultimately won, a reminder of how the country has fought to retain control of its marine resources – the same issue that has derailed Icelandic EU membership bids in the past.

    The current push for a referendum traces back to the aftermath of the 2008 global financial crisis, when Iceland’s entire banking system collapsed. In response to that economic crisis, the country first launched accession talks in 2009, only to pause the process four years later in 2013. Today, Iceland ranks as one of the most affluent nations in Europe, with the fifth-highest GDP per capita in the world. Many Icelandic voters, including Bifröst University politics professor Eirikur Bergmann, attribute the country’s strong economic performance to its independence from the EU. Still, Iceland faces pressing economic challenges: it is currently ranked as the most expensive country in the world, with inflation holding at 5.6% and stubbornly high interest rates at 8%. Pro-membership campaigners argue that joining the EU would bring greater economic stability and help bring inflation and interest rates down over time.

    While security has taken a backseat in campaign debates, it was a key factor in the government’s decision to move the referendum forward. As a founding member of NATO, Iceland has no standing military of its own, relying on a decades-old bilateral defense agreement with the United States signed in 1951 and collective security from NATO allies. No campaigners argue that Iceland’s security is already fully guaranteed by NATO and the U.S., and that EU membership is no replacement for its existing defense architecture. Growing geopolitical tension, including increased Russian maritime activity near Iceland in the wake of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine (which Iceland has strongly supported) and recent remarks from former U.S. President Donald Trump expressing interest in acquiring Greenland and confusing the island with Iceland, has sparked new concerns among some voters about small nation security. The EU and Iceland signed a new security and defense partnership earlier this year, with EU officials framing membership as an anchor in a community of shared values, prosperity, and collective security.

    Ahead of voting, the two campaign sides faced off in a nationally televised debate, led by their top figures: Prime Minister Kristrún for the Yes campaign and Guðrún Hafsteinsdóttir, chair of the opposition Independence Party, for the No side. During the debate, Kristrún emphasized that Iceland is already deeply integrated into European structures, framing a Yes vote as “one of the biggest risk-reducing steps we can take” for the nation’s future. She repeatedly stressed that a Yes vote does not guarantee membership, and that the government would honor any outcome on Saturday. For her part, Guðrún clarified that the No campaign does not oppose close cooperation with Europe, saying “We already do [work well with Europe], and we want that to continue.” Instead, she framed the vote as a choice over whether to hand over decision-making power over fisheries, agriculture, and natural resources to EU leadership in Brussels.

    Hallgrimur Oddsson, director of EU-Iceland think tank European Currents, noted that even though geopolitical instability prompted the government to call the referendum earlier, it has remained a low-priority issue for voters during the campaign. “It’s lower on the agenda than many would think,” Oddsson explained, confirming that domestic economic and sovereignty issues have dominated public discussion, as the latest pre-election poll shows the No campaign holding a narrow 51.6% lead, putting the final result too close to call.

  • Transgender former Israeli spy detained by ICE in US

    Transgender former Israeli spy detained by ICE in US

    A transgender Israeli woman with a background in elite Israeli military intelligence is set to be deported from the United States following a conviction on felony kidnapping charges, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) confirmed this week.

    ICE announced in a public statement Thursday that agents took Eliyahu Alon, identified by the agency as a “criminal illegal alien from Israel”, into custody during a targeted enforcement operation in Concord, New Hampshire. ICE referenced Alon by her previous given name, Avishay, a decision that comes amid Alon’s longstanding legal fight over gender recognition during her criminal proceedings.

    According to ICE’s public disclosure, Alon’s criminal record includes three separate felony convictions: making criminal threats with a deadly weapon, kidnapping, and unlawful possession of controlled substances. Before relocating to the United States, Alon served in Unit 81, one of the Israeli Defense Forces’ most sensitive classified divisions, which develops cutting-edge technology for special operations run by Israeli military intelligence. Following her military service, Alon transitioned gender and went on to hold senior engineering positions at major U.S. tech giants Amazon and Microsoft, court records and legal representatives confirmed to The Jerusalem Post.

    Alon’s offense stemmed from a 2024 incident: she was arrested in September that year for abducting a male acquaintance whom she suspected had spiked her water bottle with GHB, the so-called “date rape drug” linked to sexual assault. Court indictment documents show that the plan to abduct and interrogate the man originated with a friend of Alon’s, Brian Levy, who pushed Alon to confront the suspect. When law enforcement arrived at Alon’s Dover, New Hampshire, residence to investigate a report of a suspicious vehicle parked outside, they inadvertently uncovered the kidnapping: officers heard the victim screaming for help from inside the home. At the time of the raid, Alon had two loaded handguns on the property, one of which was fitted with an illegal silencer, and she had pointed one of the weapons at the victim during his detention, the indictment confirms.

    Alon was tried and sentenced as a male despite her public gender identity as a woman, receiving a prison sentence of 2 to 6 years in state custody in early July. Following her sentencing, Alon launched a legal challenge to her placement in a male correctional facility, requesting access to gender-affirming medical care and a transfer to a women’s prison. Instead of ruling on her correctional placement appeal, New Hampshire authorities transferred Alon to federal immigration custody on August 20 to begin deportation proceedings, clearing the way for her removal from the U.S. once her sentence concludes.

  • How ‘Book Queen’ Dolly Parton inspired millions of children with gift of reading

    How ‘Book Queen’ Dolly Parton inspired millions of children with gift of reading

    Following the passing of global entertainment icon Dolly Parton this week at age 80, tributes are pouring in not only for her decades-long cultural impact but for the transformative philanthropic legacy she leaves behind: the Imagination Library, the free childhood literacy programme that has put more than 300 million books into the hands of young children across the globe.

    Parton first dreamed up the initiative to honor her father, a man whose harsh upbringing in Appalachia left him unable to read or write, cutting short his life potential. “He was the smartest man I have ever known, but I know in my heart his inability to read probably kept him from fulfilling all of his dreams,” Parton once wrote in an open letter on the programme’s website. “Inspiring kids to love to read became my mission.”

    What began as a small local project in Sevier County, Tennessee – Parton’s hometown – in 1995 has grown into an international movement. After expanding across the entire United States in 2000, the programme crossed borders to launch in Canada in 2006, the United Kingdom in 2007, Australia in 2013, and Ireland in 2019. Operating through partnerships with local community organisations, Imagination Library mails one free, age-appropriate book every month to children from birth until their fifth birthday, regardless of their family’s household income. To mark its 30th anniversary in 2025, the organisation announced it had distributed more than 300 million books – a rate of one book delivered every 78 seconds, reaching more than 3 million children globally.

    For families around the world, the programme has delivered far more than free reading material – it has shaped daily routines, supported child development, and removed financial barriers that keep low-income families from building home libraries. Harriet Anscombe, a London mother of two, signed her daughter up for the programme when the girl was just three months old. Today, at four years old, the child has never known a day without regular story time. “It just blows my mind that it’s readily available for every family that lives in my borough,” Anscombe said. “If I didn’t get those books, maybe I wouldn’t have started doing bedtime stories till she was two – but because we were getting them so early, it embedded story time into our routine from when she was just a couple of months old.”

    Across the Atlantic in Denver, Colorado, Ciara Fernandez Faber enrolled her son in the programme eight years ago, and the programme quickly became a core part of their family life. For years, their favorite book was *I Am A Rainbow*, a title written by Parton herself that explores emotional awareness for young children. “It’s a book about different emotions, and so we would act out the different emotions, the different faces,” Faber explained. “At the back of the book, there’s a little excerpt by Dolly talking about how everybody has a rainbow of feelings, and we would read that – and he would always point to her picture and say, ‘There’s the Book Queen.’”

    Families consistently highlight the thoughtful curation of Imagination Library’s book list, which covers a wide range of social and emotional topics that help children navigate complex issues. Helen Cashell, a Dublin, Ireland, parent of two, said the programme’s diverse selections helped her children learn about acceptance and resilience. “Whether it was same-sex families or just different types of families, things about bravery, courage, bullying, things about different identities,” those topics were woven gently into age-appropriate stories, she said.

    The programme also elevates underrepresented authors, bringing their work to young readers who would otherwise never encounter it. Selina Brown, a children’s author whose book *My Rice Is Best* – which features a Black protagonist – was selected for distribution through the programme, saw 14,000 copies of her work sent to children across the UK. For families struggling to make ends meet, the programme eliminates the impossible choice between basic needs and children’s books: “To choose between gas, electric, food or a book, you’re going to choose a core need – but with the Dolly Parton Imagination Library, you don’t have to do that,” Brown noted.

    In many cases, the programme has delivered life-changing developmental progress for children facing learning challenges. In inner-city Sydney, Australia, first-time mother Paige Stewart enrolled her twin daughters, both of whom had speech delays and learning difficulties, when they were infants. After just two books, Stewart noticed a remarkable shift. One of the girls spoke her first clear word – “orange” – after reading a free colour book delivered by the programme. “Not only did they learn their colours from that book… it kind of set the tone for them speaking and their joy for books,” Stewart said, adding that she now advocates widely for the programme to other parents.

    For many long-time Parton fans, the programme is a deeply personal tribute that keeps the star’s legacy alive. Kristina Hadley, a grandmother from Alabama, signed her granddaughter Eillie Elaine up for Imagination Library before the child was even born. Now nearly three years old, Eillie has an entire bookshelf dedicated to the books she has received, and gets excited every time she checks the mail, calling out “Ms Dolly!” in anticipation of her next book. Hadley choked up recalling the news of Parton’s death, saying, “Imagination Library is going to keep her memory going with the younger generation, and I hope and I pray that this is something that goes on for years and years and years.”

    Geoff Blacklin, a grandparent from Manitoba, Canada, whose grandchildren participate in the programme, echoed that sentiment, noting that Parton built the legacy quietly without seeking public acclaim. “The biggest thing that I like is the fact that she didn’t do anything for recognition,” Blacklin said. “She gave families more than books. She gave children a love of reading, precious moments with loved ones, and opportunities to learn and dream.”

    Parton herself reflected on the programme’s extraordinary growth before her passing, writing on the Imagination Library website that the initiative’s success exceeded her wildest early dreams. “In the beginning, my hope was simply to inspire the children in my home county, but here we are today with a worldwide programme that gives a book a month to well over 3 million children,” she wrote, thanking the community partners who helped turn her personal tribute to her father into a global force for good. Before he died, Parton said, her father told her Imagination Library was the most important work she had ever done – a praise that meant more to her than any other accolade she earned in her six-decade career.