TOKYO – Fresh government data released Wednesday by Japan’s Finance Ministry reveals that the world’s fourth-largest trading economy has logged its first monthly trade deficit in four months for May, as soaring demand for AI-related technology pushed up imports enough to offset double-digit growth in outbound shipments. Preliminary calculations show that Japan’s total exports climbed 17% year-on-year to 9.51 trillion yen, equivalent to roughly $59.4 billion, while total imports jumped 12.5% over the same period to 9.89 trillion yen ($61.8 billion). The gap between inbound and outbound trade left the country with a 378.6 billion yen ($2.4 billion) trade deficit.
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Sudan’s young women return to international soccer as war and taboos linger
Against a backdrop of devastating civil war, deep-rooted cultural conservatism, and overwhelming systemic challenges, Sudan’s under-17 women’s national soccer team made history last week in Casablanca, Morocco, marking the first appearance of any Sudanese women’s soccer side on the international stage since conflict ripped through the northeast African nation in 2023.
Walking onto the turf of Larbi Zaouli Stadium, the team’s bright red jerseys cut a striking figure against the lush green pitch. Most of the squad members are teenage schoolgirls; several fled their homes to escape ongoing fighting, and many had never competed in an organized league or stepped onto a professional stadium before this qualifying tournament for the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics.
For 17-year-old captain Nura Mohamed, the opportunity to represent her country outweighed any pressure of competition. “My goal is to lift up soccer in my country,” Mohamed told the Associated Press in an on-site interview. “It’s a beautiful, unique feeling because, at the end of the day, I just love playing.”
The road to Casablanca was anything but smooth. When Sudan’s national soccer federation needed to field a squad to avoid forfeiting its spot in the Olympic qualifiers, it could not assemble a full senior women’s team amid the chaos of war. Instead, officials turned to this young, inexperienced group, which only began formal training just weeks before the qualifying matches. The outcome on the scoreboard was lopsided: the squad conceded 30 goals across two matches against Comoros, ending with an 18-0 defeat after a 17-0 opening loss. Many players wept after the final whistle, even as a small crowd of loyal fans cheered them off the pitch.
Veteran coach Burhan Tia, who oversees all of Sudan’s women’s national teams, acknowledged the massive gap between his side and more established competitors after the first match. “The difference between us and the others is huge. We cannot yet compete at the highest level,” Tia said. “Comoros has many players competing in Europe, our team is mainly made up of schoolgirls.”
Despite the heavy losses, federation leaders frame the team’s debut as a pivotal victory for women’s soccer in Sudan, which collapsed entirely when civil war broke out between the Sudanese Armed Forces and the Rapid Support Forces in April 2023. For organizers, just getting the young squad to Casablanca represents a critical step in keeping the fragile women’s program alive through the conflict. “Some traveled long distances just to attend training. Many are separated from their families, yet they continue to work hard and pursue their dream,” said Manal Ali Bushra, a businesswoman who leads the federation’s women’s soccer committee. To build long-term stability for the program, Ali Bushra added, the federation is developing new infrastructure projects, including a planned dedicated sports city and stadium renovations in relatively safe regions of Sudan, though she declined to share details of the program’s budget.
Building the team from scratch required extraordinary effort from Tia, who stepped into the role knowing the magnitude of the challenge he faced. “First, I had to find girls who played soccer. Then, once I found girls who played, I had to make sure they were the right age,” he explained. “Then I needed to convince their parents to let them miss classes for training.” With the domestic women’s league suspended indefinitely due to the war, Tia conducted scouting trips across Sudan and into neighboring Egypt, where hundreds of thousands of Sudanese families have sought refuge from the fighting. He ultimately recruited 10 players from Cairo-based soccer academies and teams, with the remaining members coming from safer cities across Sudan. Tia had hoped to recruit young talent from conflict-battered regions like Darfur and Kordofan, an area long known for producing Sudan’s top athletes, but widespread displacement and the loss of official identification documents made it impossible to verify player ages for international eligibility. The war has also destroyed much of Sudan’s transportation network, turning once-short intercity trips into days-long journeys marked by constant danger.
On the pitch, the team’s lack of high-level competitive experience was clear: several players struggled with basic tactical positioning, struggled to maintain a consistent offside line, and repeatedly turned to the sideline for coaching guidance throughout both matches. But their presence alone carries enormous political and social weight in a country where women’s participation in public sports has faced decades of pushback.
The ongoing conflict, which the United Nations has labeled the world’s worst current humanitarian crisis, has killed more than 40,000 people and displaced more than 14 million since it broke out in 2023, with famine and infectious disease spreading rapidly across contested regions. Before the war, women’s soccer in Sudan only just began to emerge: the first official women’s league was established after the 2019 revolution that ousted long-time Islamist president Omar al-Bashir, whose three-decade rule enforced strict public order laws that severely restricted women’s public freedoms. Even after the revolution, conservative religious leaders have condemned women’s soccer: prominent preacher Abdulhay Yousif has claimed the creation of a women’s league is an effort to undermine traditional Islamic values.
Liv Tønnessen, a political scientist specializing in Sudanese gender politics, explained that for the Bashir regime, women competing in sports was framed as a source of fitna — a term understood in Sudan’s conservative context as moral or sexual chaos. “The idea of women running, jumping, sweating, and even something as simple as their bodies being visible in motion, was seen by Bashir’s Islamist regime as producing fitna,” Tønnessen, a former guest researcher at a women-only university in Sudan, told the AP. “So when women step onto a soccer pitch, they are directly confronting that entire logic. They are not just present in a male-dominated sports arena, they are moving freely in it, on their own terms.”
Off the pitch, players have also faced widespread harassment: on the team’s official social media accounts, dozens of commenters have mocked the squad for their lopsided defeats, with many posting misogynistic messages telling the players to “go back to the kitchen” in multiple languages.
The team’s participation in the qualifiers has also sparked political debate. While the military government led by Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Burhan has approved the team’s international trip, the United Nations has documented widespread sexual and gender-based violence committed by Burhan’s Sudanese Armed Forces. Tønnessen argues the military’s public support for the team is a calculated move to boost its international legitimacy, framing the state as functional and aligned with the progressive goals of the 2019 revolution.
But prominent Sudanese women’s rights activist Hala Al-Karib pushes back on claims that the team is being exploited for political gain. Instead, she argues the core issue remains long-standing underinvestment in women’s soccer across Sudan, calling for sweeping reform of the national soccer federation. For Al-Karib, the team’s right to compete matters more than political posturing.
Back on the Casablanca pitch, all the politics, conflict, and public debate faded into the background. For a few hours, there was only a group of young women, united by their love of the game, chasing a dream on the international stage.
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A chilling Romanian exhibition replays videotaped secret police interrogations from 1989
Thirty-four years after the collapse of Nicolae Ceaușescu’s brutal communist regime in Romania, a groundbreaking new exhibition in the capital Bucharest has pulled back the curtain on the systematic repression and psychological violence carried out by the country’s feared secret police force, the Securitate.
Titled “A.REST 1989,” the exhibition is hosted at the National History Museum of Romania and runs through mid-September. A collaborative project between the museum, Romania’s National Council for Studying the Securitate Archives (CNSAS), and the Ministry of Culture, the exhibit leverages rare, never-before-displayed video footage to reconstruct the grim reality of detentions and interrogations that defined the Securitate’s sprawling network of surveillance and control.
At the heart of the exhibition are 26 original 1989 videotapes, held by CNSAS, that capture the live interrogations of four detainees. These recordings, preserved accidentally amid the chaotic, violent collapse of the socialist regime at the end of that year, are displayed on grainy, wall-mounted screens in the museum’s central hall. A full-scale reconstruction of a sparse detention cell, fitted with only a narrow bed, an empty metal bowl and a chipped cup, anchors the space, offering visitors a visceral sense of the isolation and dehumanization endured by detainees.
Many of the recordings lay bare the coercive, intimidating tactics Securitate interrogators used to break suspects. Intense psychological pressure, repeated threats of violence, and intimidation targeting detainees’ family members feature heavily in the footage, with questioning often veering into absurdity that leaves detainees exhausted and disoriented. In one exchange, a woman whose husband was accused of defection tells her interrogator, “I no longer have the strength to fight. I need logical arguments, not this nonsense.”
Alongside the raw video recordings, the exhibition also displays rare artifacts connected to dissident activity and repression. These include a clandestine printing press owned by journalist Petre Mihai Băcanu, which the Securitate seized in early 1989 after Băcanu and his associates used it to publish an anti-Ceaușescu, anti-government newspaper. Băcanu’s own question to interrogators — “How could we, after 45 years of socialism, still be afraid of people’s opinions, even of their thoughts?” — is featured prominently as a testament to the regime’s fear of dissent. Another chilling artifact on display is a pair of modified glasses designed to blindfold detainees during transport, preventing them from identifying locations or other political prisoners.
Exhibition curator Oana Demetriade, a historian at CNSAS, explained that the project evolved from an initial plan to create a student documentary. After reviewing the unedited tapes, she partnered with architects and designers to build the immersive exhibition, noting that the archive offers an unprecedented unfiltered look at Securitate operations. “That’s what this whole archive brings new,” she said. “How it gets here and how people, those who are arrested, in the end, are repeatedly threatened, yelled at, threatened with beatings, threatened with the family suffering, and so on.”
Mihai Demetriade, also a CNSAS historian and co-curator of the exhibition, outlined the two parallel systems of illegal detention the Securitate operated. “Preventative detention” was deployed for political cases alleging crimes against the state, while “operational detention” functioned as a state-sponsored kidnapping system: dissidents were locked away to silence them during sensitive political events, such as party congresses or visits from foreign leaders. Unlike post-regime victim testimonies or redacted official documents, the Demetriade noted, the live recordings are irrefutable evidence of the regime’s brutality, impossible for historical revisionists to dismiss. “This space is important because it proves how rapacious, tough, aggressive the communist dictatorship remained even in the last moments of the communist system,” he added.
Organizers frame the exhibition as a belated memorial to victims of Securitate repression. “In the world of Securitate ‘justice,’ detainees or those under arrest were merely prisoners, captives in the operational labyrinth of manufactured guilt,” the organizing team says. With this display, “the victims, thus, gain a voice and a place.”
The exhibition arrives at a critical moment for Romanian collective memory: as nationalism has grown in the country in recent years, so has nostalgic revisionism about the Ceaușescu era, particularly among young Romanians who have no direct personal experience of life before the 1989 revolution. Cornel Constantin Ilie, manager of the National History Museum of Romania, said the exhibition is designed to cut through this misremembering by confronting visitors with unvarnished facts. “It is an exhibition that puts you in front of facts that cannot be ignored,” he said. “It’s very important because we must not forget and we must not repeat. … What we see in this exhibition is an ugly face of history, it is a story in which human freedom, human dignity were suppressed.”
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Extraordinary Messi makes more history in masterclass for the ages
The 2026 FIFA World Cup opening matchday delivered a historic spectacle that will be etched into football lore forever, as 38-year-old Lionel Messi turned Kansas City Stadium into his personal stage, producing a breathtaking hat-trick that cemented his place among the sport’s all-time greats. The iconic Argentine forward delivered a performance for the ages, capping a 3-0 victory over Algeria by equaling Miroslav Klose’s record 16 career World Cup goals, a milestone that came on the 20th anniversary of his 2006 World Cup debut, and just one day after he became the first player in history to compete at six editions of the tournament. The day had already seen other global superstars shine: Kylian Mbappe and Erling Haaland both netted braces in their own opening fixtures, but as the sun set over the Kansas City skyline, it was clear the main event belonged to Messi.
Even before his record-breaking hat-trick, the evening felt scripted for magic. Just four minutes into the match, Messi raced past Algeria’s defense to slot past goalkeeper Luca Zidane (son of French legend Zinedine Zidane), only for an offside flag to rule out the early goal. The packed stands of Argentina fans still erupted as if they had lifted the trophy itself; journalists in the press box knew it was not a question of if Messi would score, but when.
That moment arrived in the 18th minute. From 25 yards out, Messi shifted onto his favored left foot and curled a blistering strike toward the top-right corner. Zidane got both hands to the effort, but the power of the shot carried it into the net, sending the stadium into delirium. It was Messi’s 14th World Cup goal, and the start of a historic night. Former Everton midfielder Leon Osman summed up the moment: “Messi is celebrating like it’s his first World Cup goal. With the ability he has, he never seems to age. It’s a brilliant ball into his feet and, as you’d expect, he finishes it superbly.”
At 38, Messi continues to defy the conventional limits of age for a professional footballer. This marked his 27th World Cup match, more appearances than any player in tournament history, and across 90 minutes he remained sharp, constantly scanning for space, anticipating his teammates’ runs, and looking every bit as fast and dangerous as he did a decade ago. By the 60th minute, he had doubled his tally: a costly unforced error from Zidane left the ball rolling straight into Messi’s path, and he converted with characteristic cool composure. The goal made him the oldest player ever to score twice in a single World Cup match, and put him just one strike away from equaling Klose’s all-time scoring record.
The milestone third goal came in the 76th minute, when substitute Nico Gonzalez played a perfectly weighted pass into Messi’s path. He made no mistake, slotting home to complete his first ever World Cup hat-trick. As thousands of Argentina fans chanted his name, Messi lifted his arms to the sky, taking in the moment that 20 years of work had built to. When he was substituted late in the match, he left the pitch to a standing ovation that echoed long after he reached the touchline.
Speaking after the match, Messi called the moment deeply meaningful: “To enjoy this with my family, with my team-mates, the ones who are always there, is a really beautiful moment. The squad, it’s a very united, very strong group. I feel good; we were lucky enough to win a tough match. It’s important to start off with a win in the first game. I’m grateful to the fans, because once again they’ve shown that Argentina is crazy about this – we packed the stadium again. Everything I’m experiencing now is a bonus. I’ve been fortunate enough to achieve all my dreams — or even more than I ever dreamed of achieving — both professionally and personally.”
Argentina head coach Lionel Scaloni said he struggled to put Messi’s legacy into words: “I don’t have the words to describe Messi. For 20 years, he’s had us used to seeing things like this and he inspires everyone who watches him play.”
Even after the final whistle, thousands of fans stayed in the stands to celebrate, filling the stadium with the blue and white of the Argentine flag and chants of Messi’s name that carried into the Kansas City night. For supporters, who wore his name on their backs and displayed tattoos of his likeness, Messi is far more than a footballer: words like “hero”, “idol”, and “our everything” were common descriptors among the crowd. Even Patrick Mahomes, the Kansas City Chiefs star quarterback who usually commands headlines in this very stadium, watched on from the stands, captivated by Messi’s magic.
Having led Argentina to World Cup glory in 2022, few would now bet against the ageless superstar leading his nation to another title run. On an opening day filled with the world’s biggest football talents, there was no question who stood above the rest: 20 years after his first World Cup appearance, Lionel Messi is still the main event.
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Tunisia’s Hervé Renard embraces challenge against Japan in World Cup debut
Hours after touching down in Monterrey, Mexico, veteran French football manager Hervé Renard stepped onto the training pitch Tuesday to lead his new Tunisia national squad for the first time. The 57-year-old’s appointment comes on the heels of Tunisia’s humiliating 5-1 opening defeat to Sweden, which prompted the immediate firing of former boss Sabri Lamouchi.
Renard now faces an extremely tight turnaround: just four days to integrate himself into the squad, assess player form, and devise a game plan for Tunisia’s must-win second Group F fixture against Japan this Saturday. A man familiar with last-minute coaching overhauls, this is not the first time Renard has stepped into the role Lamouchi vacated. Back in 2014, the two-time Africa Cup of Nations-winning manager took over as Ivory Coast’s head coach following the team’s early group stage exit from that year’s World Cup, a parallel that makes his latest appointment a striking moment in his managerial career.
Renard brings a resume packed with high-profile World Cup upsets that make him an intriguing pick for Tunisia’s uphill battle. Most famously, he led Saudi Arabia to a stunning 2-1 victory over eventual tournament champion Argentina at the 2022 Qatar World Cup, one of the biggest upsets in modern World Cup history. Four years prior, at the 2018 Russia World Cup, his Moroccan national side held powerhouse Spain to a surprising draw, even if the team ultimately fell short of qualifying for the knockout round.
For Renard, the draw of the World Cup’s unique energy was enough to convince him to take on the high-pressure role with little preparation time. “It’s a World Cup. I know the passion around this event. That’s what motivated me to come and it’s a challenge which isn’t easy,” he told reporters on the training ground Tuesday. He added that he has emphasized team focus to his new players, telling the squad, “At the moment we need to be focused on ourselves. We still have a few days to be ready.” He also encouraged the side to stay resilient in the face of their opening defeat, telling players they must keep their heads up as they represent their nation on the global stage.
The task Renard faces is steep. Tunisia has never advanced past the group stage in its six previous World Cup appearances, and the path to the knockout round looks narrow after the heavy opening loss. The Carthage Eagles now need positive results against both Japan and group-leading Netherlands to secure a spot in the next stage, a feat that would go down as one of Renard’s most impressive career achievements if he pulls it off.
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Trump to wrap G7 summit facing skepticism at home and jitters overseas over his plan to end Iran war
EVIAN-LES-BAINS, France — On Wednesday, U.S. President Donald Trump concluded formal working sessions of the Group of Seven summit at the scenic Alpine lakeside resort, capping off days of diplomatic talks dominated by his push to win global backing for a still-unseen tentative nuclear agreement with Iran. Even as allied leaders and domestic stakeholders openly question the pact’s lack of detail, Trump has framed the unsigned deal as a historic breakthrough that will permanently block Iran from developing or acquiring a nuclear weapon.
The G7 gathering of the world’s leading industrialized nations wrapped up its formal agenda with focused discussions on two pressing global priorities: the long-term governance of artificial intelligence and strategies to stimulate sustained inclusive economic growth across major economies. Before departing for Washington D.C., Trump is set to attend a lavish one-on-one dinner hosted by French President Emmanuel Macron at the Palace of Versailles outside Paris, an honor marking the upcoming 250th anniversary of American independence that Trump has openly welcomed.
The core controversy overshadowing Trump’s final summit day remains the Iran deal. Neither the White House nor Iranian officials have publicly released the full text of the agreement, which is scheduled for a formal signing ceremony this Friday at a luxury resort on Switzerland’s Lake Lucerne. Despite the lack of transparency, Trump lauded the still-unpublished memorandum to reporters, saying “It’s a great document. Here’s what it says: Iran will never have a nuclear weapon. It won’t have one to buy, to develop — it will not have a nuclear weapon. And I would say that’s about 99.9% of what I wanted.”
Skepticism runs deep on multiple fronts. Key U.S. ally Israel has openly expressed unease over the terms of the agreement, while Republican lawmakers in Trump’s own party have raised doubts that the deal goes far enough to curb Iran’s nuclear ambitions. The international community is also waiting for concrete proof that the pact will deliver on a critical secondary promise: reopening and permanently securing the Strait of Hormuz, the vital maritime chokepoint that Iran has effectively closed to commercial oil traffic since the outbreak of the recent conflict. Before the war, roughly 20% of the world’s traded oil and natural gas passed through the strait.
Complicating the agreement further, U.S. and Iranian officials have publicly offered conflicting interpretations of the deal’s terms. Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has stated that Israel’s ongoing military presence in southern Lebanon, where Israeli forces have been targeting Iran-backed Hezbollah militants, would count as a violation of the pact. “Without the withdrawal of Israeli forces from the territories they occupied during this war, the war has not fully come to an end,” Araghchi said. For his part, Trump acknowledged Tuesday that an Israeli strike on Hezbollah would not automatically derail the deal, but criticized Israel’s prolonged military campaign, noting “Israel’s fighting Hezbollah too long, and too many people are being killed.” Israeli strikes in Lebanon have killed nearly 4,000 people, hundreds of whom are civilians, and forced more than 1 million people to flee their homes since March 2.
Beyond the Iran nuclear debate, Trump scheduled a series of key bilateral meetings on his final G7 day, including a sit-down with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi that comes at a fraught moment for U.S.-India ties. Tensions have risen in recent weeks after three Indian sailors were killed in a U.S. military strike on a commercial tanker in the Gulf of Oman, carried out as part of Washington’s blockade of Iranian oil shipments. New Delhi has formally protested the incident, and relations have already been complicated by Trump’s back-and-forth tariffs on Indian goods over India’s continued purchases of discounted Russian oil, as well as Indian concerns that Trump’s recent trade truce negotiations with China could weaken India’s position as a rival manufacturing hub. The two leaders enjoyed a close relationship during Trump’s first term in office, but the dynamic has shifted significantly since his return to the White House.
Trump also planned to hold one-on-one talks with Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi, one of three Middle Eastern leaders invited to the summit by host Macron. On Tuesday, G7 leaders held a working lunch with el-Sissi, Qatar’s ruling emir, and the president of the United Arab Emirates focused on developing alternative energy supply routes that bypass the Strait of Hormuz. French Foreign Ministry spokesperson Pascal Confavreux explained that discussions centered on planning and financing overland infrastructure to redirect Gulf energy exports away from the closed chokepoint.
For Trump, the high-profile Versailles dinner is a particularly anticipated stop. The U.S. president openly shared his excitement for the event, saying that the opulent historic venue, the former royal residence of French kings from Louis XIV to Louis XVI, was enough to convince him to extend his post-summit stay in France. “I’m a fan of beautiful places, and I was leaving in the afternoon, and then the French president who happens to be a very nice man, invited me to dinner at Versailles,” Trump said. “And Versailles is not gold leaf — Versailles is the real deal. And I said I’d like to do it.”
The reporting was contributed by AP correspondents based in Evian-les-Bains, Geneva and Washington, with original reporting from Madhani in Geneva.
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Germany and Poland to sign a new defense deal as balance of power in Europe shifts
Against a backdrop of rising Russian aggression on Europe’s eastern frontier and growing global uncertainty over long-term United States military commitment to the continent, Germany and Poland are preparing to sign a landmark bilateral defense agreement on Wednesday, marking a new era of pragmatic security cooperation between two neighbors with a long and fraught shared history.
Shifting regional dynamics have reshaped the relationship between Berlin and Warsaw in recent years. After Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, and Poland’s liberal-led government took office in 2023 replacing the nationalist Law and Justice administration, bilateral ties have moved beyond historical friction to focus on shared security priorities. With Washington weighing a partial drawdown of its troop presence in Europe, Poland has pushed for leading European powers to take greater responsibility for defending NATO’s eastern flank. For its part, Germany is working to revitalize the Bundeswehr, its long-neglected military, with the explicit goal of building the most powerful conventional land force on NATO’s European side, positioning Berlin as a central backbone of European defense in the coming decade.
Poland’s strategic importance has grown exponentially since the start of the war in Ukraine: the country has emerged as a critical logistics and supply hub for Kyiv, while its rapidly expanding economy and massive increases in defense spending have made it an indispensable partner for Germany and other core European allies. “We Germans need a strong Poland as an equal partner,” German Chancellor Friedrich Merz stated following a December meeting with Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk in Berlin, adding that this partnership is a fundamental German national interest.
The upcoming defense agreement will outline concrete cooperative frameworks across multiple key security domains, including joint protection infrastructure for the Baltic Sea region, coordinated military mobility and cross-border infrastructure projects, cyber defense collaboration, and joint development of new defense technologies. Justyna Gotkowska, deputy director of the Warsaw-based Center for Eastern Studies think tank, noted that NATO’s collective defense plans permanently bind Germany to the security of Central and Eastern Europe, assigning Berlin a core role in defending the Baltic region alongside Poland and other neighboring states. “Germany is largely responsible for the defense of the Baltic states, and without cooperation with Poland, that will not happen,” Gotkowska explained. Military analysts widely view the Baltic states as the most probable target for a Russian attack on NATO territory in any future conflict.
While the agreement will reaffirm both nations’ existing mutual defense obligations under NATO and EU treaties, it differs from recent bilateral defense pacts each country has signed with France and the United Kingdom. Instead of including formal political mutual defense declarations, the German-Polish deal is an inter-ministerial agreement focused exclusively on practical military coordination. This structure was chosen to overcome lingering domestic political obstacles in Poland: when asked in June why Poland would not sign a full political treaty with Germany, Polish Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski explained that Polish President Karol Nawrocki, who was elevated to office with support from the nationalist Law and Justice party, would never approve such an agreement. Sikorski noted “hell would break loose here” if a full political treaty moved forward.
Historical tensions remain a persistent stumbling block. During its time in government, Law and Justice demanded $1.3 trillion in World War II reparations from Germany for Nazi Germany’s occupation of Poland, a claim Berlin has repeatedly rejected. The reparations issue is expected to reemerge as a polarizing political topic ahead of Poland’s 2025 general election, forcing Tusk to walk a fine line: the prime minister has already demanded Germany speed up compensation payments for surviving occupation victims, and he cannot afford to be seen by Polish voters as soft on Germany or aligned with Berlin’s interests at Poland’s expense.
Even as security cooperation deepens, questions remain about Poland’s place in Europe’s core security decision-making. To date, Germany has prioritized closed-door negotiations on Ukraine policy and other major security issues with its traditional Western European partners France and the United Kingdom, often excluding Warsaw from key talks. After the June 2024 London summit that brought Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy together with leaders from Germany, France, and the UK to discuss potential future peace negotiations with Russia, Tusk publicly confirmed he had complained to Merz about Poland’s exclusion. “Any arrangements made without our participation will not be respected or binding for us,” Tusk told reporters in Warsaw.
Still, many foreign policy analysts agree the shifting balance of power in Europe demands a new approach to the bilateral relationship. Rolf Nikel, former German ambassador to Poland and vice president of the German Council on Foreign Relations, argued that Poland’s role and influence within Europe and NATO have grown dramatically in recent years. “So Poland must be taken more seriously today, and, above all, must be respected more than we have seen in the past,” Nikel said. Gotkowska added that Germany must acknowledge the changing economic and military landscape: while Germany’s economy has stagnated in recent years, Poland’s economy and military capacity have expanded rapidly. “The balance of power has changed in Europe in recent years,” Gotkowska said.
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US refused to share Iran deal text with Israel: Report
Rising diplomatic friction has emerged between long-time allies the United States and Israel after Washington turned down Jerusalem’s formal request to obtain the full text of a newly signed bilateral agreement between the US and Iran, multiple US and Israeli media outlets have confirmed.
ABC News reported Tuesday that while senior Israeli officials have received a general verbal briefing on the contents of the 60-day ceasefire memorandum of understanding (MOU), the full written document has not been shared with Israeli authorities. The MOU, which was signed digitally by representatives of both Tehran and Washington this past Sunday, mandates a 60-day extension of a fragile ceasefire between the two nations and secures the reopening of the strategic Strait of Hormuz, a critical chokepoint for global oil shipments. To date, the full fine print of the agreement remains undisclosed to the public and many key regional stakeholders.
Top US officials, including Vice President JD Vance, have already appeared on major broadcast networks to defend the new diplomatic deal. During his televised remarks, Vance emphasized that the most promising outcome of this new diplomatic outreach is the reestablishment of direct bilateral dialogue between Washington and Tehran after years of frozen communications.
This new MOU comes nearly a decade after the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), the landmark nuclear deal negotiated between Iran and the US under then-President Barack Obama following months of intensive high-level negotiations. That framework collapsed in 2018, when then-President Donald Trump — who currently holds the Oval Office again — ordered a unilateral US withdrawal from the agreement and rolled out a harsh “maximum pressure” campaign that imposed crippling economic sanctions on Iran.
Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of the G-7 Summit in France on Tuesday, Trump announced plans to transmit the full text of the new MOU to Congress for review and release it publicly. A formal in-person signing ceremony for the agreement is currently scheduled to take place in Geneva, Switzerland this coming Friday.
“I never thought about sending it… but I will. I will send it to Congress,” Trump told assembled journalists. He added that he plans to share every detail of the document with the public, saying: “I will probably have a press conference and read it to you word by word so that the press covers it accurately.”
Despite the president’s promise of transparency, the fact that Israel has been denied full access to the text has reinforced deep existing concerns across the Middle East that the agreement disproportionately benefits Iran and fails to deliver on core war goals shared by both the US and Israel. Leading Israeli outlet Yediot Aharonot already labeled the MOU a “Bad Deal” in its coverage this week.
Avigdor Liberman, a prominent right-wing Israeli political figure and former defense minister, criticized the agreement during an interview with Israel’s 103FM radio. “This agreement definitely turns Iran into a nuclear power,” Liberman argued. Even so, he acknowledged that Israel has no leverage to reject any deal the US negotiates, noting: “We need to live with this. I have no complaints against the Americans. There are people here who expect the US to act according to Israeli interests, but no. I thank the US for what they have done.”
Trump has pushed back forcefully against any criticism of the deal from Israeli leaders. During his appearance at the G-7 conference, seated alongside the ruler of Qatar, Trump issued a sharp rebuke: “If it weren’t for the United States of America…Israel would not exist right now. Israel would have been blown off the face of the earth.”
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Colombia leans on James Rodríguez’s World Cup magic as it opens vs. Uzbekistan
For Colombia’s James Rodríguez, the yellow national team jersey has always brought out the best in his decades-long football career, and the 34-year-old veteran midfielder is poised to conjure up his trademark magic on one of the sport’s biggest stages: the 2026 FIFA World Cup.
Rodríguez and Los Cafeteros will kick off their 2026 World Cup campaign on Wednesday against Uzbekistan at Mexico’s iconic Estadio Azteca. Though Rodríguez has had a low-profile stint so far with Major League Soccer’s Minnesota United this season, his national team’s coaching staff and young teammates are unanimous that the veteran remains a game-changing difference-maker for the Colombian side.
“James is in good shape, he has been improving physically and of course his talent and his attributes also make him a player who, sometimes without running as much as others, defines things and brings clarity to the game,” Colombia head coach Néstor Lorenzo told reporters ahead of the opening match.
This tournament marks Rodríguez’s third World Cup appearance, tying the all-time Colombian record previously set by national football legends Carlos Valderrama and Freddy Rincón. For young first-time World Cup players like 23-year-old forward Carlos Gómez, sharing a squad with the veteran icon is a surreal, exciting opportunity.
“He’s very important for us debutants because he’s played in every World Cup; he’s a global icon,” Gómez said. “He has quality and a lot of experience. I watched him from home in 2014 and celebrated his goals; it’s very exciting for me to be with him.”
A pattern has long defined Rodríguez’s career: while he often fills a rotational role at the club level, he transforms into an unmissable star when he pulls on Colombia’s national jersey. Heading into the 2026 tournament, he arrives surprisingly fresh, having logged only 284 minutes across eight appearances for Minnesota in the first half of the 2026 MLS season. A lack of club minutes has never held him back on the international stage, however, as Rodríguez has consistently proven to be a talisman for Colombia in short-format knockout tournaments.
Most recently, Rodríguez led Colombia to a surprise run to the 2024 Copa América final, earning tournament MVP honors for his standout play. His legendary international breakthrough came 12 years earlier at the 2014 World Cup in Brazil, where he claimed the Golden Boot with six tournament goals and pushed Colombia to a historic quarterfinal finish — still the best World Cup result in the nation’s history. That breakout performance earned him a high-profile transfer to La Liga powerhouse Real Madrid, where he won two domestic titles over four seasons before launching a globe-trotting club career that has taken him to Bayern Munich, Everton, Al-Rayyan, Olympiacos, São Paulo, Rayo Vallecano, Club León and ultimately Minnesota United.
Teammates say Rodríguez’s ability to elevate his play for the national side is unmatched. “James, ever since we’ve seen him, or I since I was little, representing the country, it’s like he transforms when he puts on the jersey,” Colombian striker Luis Suárez said. “He’s a source of pride as an athlete and a teammate, not only for me but for many others. It’s a dream to be sharing the locker room with him.”
For Colombia as a whole, the 2026 World Cup carries extra meaning: the nation missed out on qualification for the 2022 Qatar tournament, and is returning to football’s grandest stage hungry for redemption. The side’s last World Cup appearance came in 2018 in Russia, where it advanced to the knockout round before falling to England in a tense penalty shootout.
“The message is to enjoy it, to be grateful, and to give their all for the Colombian jersey,” Lorenzo said. “Thank God we’re back at this tournament after eight years. We’re excited and eager to do things right.”
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Messi has his first World Cup hat trick as defending champion Argentina beats Algeria 3-0 in opener
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — On a picture-perfect evening at Arrowhead Stadium, soccer icon Lionel Messi etched his name deeper into World Cup history Tuesday, securing his first-ever tournament hat trick and drawing level with the competition’s all-time career scoring record to power defending champion Argentina to a commanding 3-0 win over Algeria in their opening Group J match.
Messi, who is set to turn 39 next week and is competing in a record sixth World Cup, opened the scoring just minutes into the contest, finishing a crisp, well-timed pass from his Inter Miami and Argentina teammate Rodrigo De Paul. The second goal came early in the second half, as Messi pounced on a loose rebound in the penalty area. Shortly after, he slotted home his third from the top of the 18-yard box before being substituted to a thunderous standing ovation from a crowd heavily dominated by pro-Argentina supporters.
The three goals pushed Messi’s career World Cup tally to 16, tying the long-standing record set by Germany’s Miroslav Klose. The milestone also makes him just the second men’s player in history, alongside Portugal’s Cristiano Ronaldo, to score in five separate World Cup tournaments. What makes the feat even more notable: it came exactly 20 years to the day after Messi’s World Cup debut, where he also found the back of the net against Serbia and Montenegro in 2004.
Algeria head coach Vladimir Petkovic acknowledged his side’s costly errors that cleared Messi’s path to the historic hat trick. “Unfortunately we afforded him the opportunity with the first and second goal, and we actually made it easier for him,” Petkovic said. “But Messi, with his clear thinking in crucial stages of the game, is able to do things that much more easily.”
Algeria star Riyad Mahrez echoed that sentiment, noting the irreplaceable impact of Messi on any match. “Argentina have a special player who can change a game on his own,” Mahrez said.
The strong opening result is a stark reversal of Argentina’s rocky start to the 2022 Qatar World Cup, where the defending champions stumbled to a shocking opening defeat to Saudi Arabia before rallying to claim their third World Cup title. Argentina head coach Lionel Scaloni emphasized the importance of a strong start this time around. “We had stumbled in the last World Cup and we needed to have a good debut today,” Scaloni said.
Messi showed no lingering effects from the mild hamstring injury that sparked concern among fans and analysts in the weeks leading up to the tournament. He nearly added two more goals to his tally: one finish was ruled out by the narrowest of offside calls, and a second long-range strike skimmed just over the crossbar. Beyond his offensive dominance, Messi also contributed to Argentina’s solid defensive shape, helping the side shut down an overmatched Algeria attack.
Algeria’s only clear goalscoring opportunity came minutes before Messi’s opener, when a Fares Chaibi strike was overturned by VAR review for offside. From that point, the match belonged entirely to Argentina and its captain.
Messi, who says he has carried a passion for the game since childhood, remained focused on the bigger picture after the historic win. “The first matches at the World Cup are always tough, and we’re seeing that nobody’s giving anything away,” Messi said. “When I’m in good shape, I give it my all.”
Tuesday’s match at Arrowhead Stadium fulfilled a decades-long dream held by late sports pioneer Lamar Hunt, who founded the NFL’s Kansas City Chiefs and was a foundational figure in growing soccer in the U.S. from the 1960s through the early 2000s. Hunt was instrumental in bringing the 1994 World Cup to the U.S., and his sons Clark and Dan have continued that work for this year’s tournament. Among the celebrity spectators in attendance was Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes, who attended alongside his wife Brittany, trading his game-day football uniform for casual Argentina-themed attire.
Looking ahead, Argentina will continue group play next with a match against Austria in Arlington, Texas on Monday, before closing out the group stage against Jordan on June 27. Algeria will face Jordan Monday in Santa Clara, California, before wrapping up Group J play against Austria back in Kansas City on June 27. De Paul summed up Argentina’s ambitions for the tournament, saying: “The goal is always to arrive on the first day and leave on the last.”