Global Pulse

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  • Blanche withdraws Trump fund plan in writing, ahead of AG confirmation vote

    Blanche withdraws Trump fund plan in writing, ahead of AG confirmation vote

    A months-long political standoff over the permanent appointment of U.S. Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche has taken a critical turn, after Blanche formally abolished a controversial administration-proposed fund that had derailed his confirmation for weeks. The proposal, once tied to a legal settlement between President Donald Trump and the Internal Revenue Service, had sparked bipartisan backlash over fears it would open the door to compensating rioters charged in the January 6, 2021 U.S. Capitol attack.

    First unveiled earlier this year as part of a $1.8 billion “anti-weaponization” plan attached to Trump’s lawsuit against the IRS over the leak of his personal tax returns, the fund was framed by the administration as a mechanism to compensate allies who claimed they faced politically biased prosecutions under previous presidential administrations. Beyond Capitol riot defendants, the original deal also included provisions that would have shielded Trump, his family members and their private business entities from future IRS audits of past tax filings.

    The proposal faced immediate pushback from across the political spectrum. Democrats uniformly condemned the plan as a self-serving giveaway to Trump allies that would reward people convicted of violent actions during the Capitol riot. Even some Republican lawmakers raised sharp concerns, with two GOP senators — John Cornyn and Thom Tillis — blocking Blanche’s confirmation vote over verbal assurances that the fund had been scrapped. The pair argued that public statements were not enough to guarantee the plan would not be revived later, and demanded formal, written confirmation that the proposal was permanently dead, alongside changes to the IRS immunity language that narrowed its overly broad scope.

    In a series of posts to X Sunday evening, Blanche addressed both of the holdouts’ core concerns. The acting attorney general wrote that he had held multiple closed-door meetings with Senate Judiciary Committee members over recent weeks to answer outstanding questions and resolve lingering worries. Attached to one post was an official signed order stating clearly: “This Order establishes, beyond any doubt, that there is no Fund.” In a second post, Blanche confirmed he had revised the language around IRS audit protection to narrow its scope, meeting the senators’ demand for clarification.

    A spokesperson for Cornyn confirmed to CBS News, the U.S. partner of the BBC, that the senator had reached a formal agreement with the Department of Justice on the issue, clearing the path for a confirmation vote. Tillis has not yet issued an official public response to Sunday’s developments, but prior comments from the senator left little doubt about his opposition to the original fund: he previously described the proposal as a “payout pot for punks” and called the confirmation impasse “unfortunate”, noting he viewed Blanche — Trump’s former personal lawyer — as qualified for the role despite his objections to the plan.

    Trump himself had sent mixed signals about the plan and Blanche’s nomination in the days leading up to Sunday’s announcement. On Friday, he told reporters the fund was “dead”, but just days later threatened to revive the proposal if Senate Republicans failed to advance Blanche’s confirmation. He also openly floated the idea of withdrawing Blanche’s nomination entirely after weeks of stalled negotiations.

    Now, the Senate Judiciary Committee is scheduled to hold a meeting Tuesday that is expected to include a formal vote on advancing Blanche’s nomination to the full Senate for a final confirmation vote. The formal abolition of the fund removes the last major barrier to Blanche taking the role of attorney general on a permanent basis, ending a weeks-long intra-Republican standoff that had put the nomination in doubt.

  • Russian planes fire a salvo of glide bombs at a southern Ukraine city, killing 1 and wounding dozens

    Russian planes fire a salvo of glide bombs at a southern Ukraine city, killing 1 and wounding dozens

    A devastating aerial assault on residential neighborhoods in southern Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia has left one civilian dead and dozens injured, marking the latest in a years-long pattern of Russian use of largely uncountered heavy weaponry against Ukrainian population centers, regional officials confirmed Monday.

    Over a 90-minute window Sunday evening, Russian warplanes deployed eight powerful guided glide bombs across four districts of the city, Zaporizhzhia regional governor Ivan Fedorov announced. The attack killed a 71-year-old woman and left 31 people wounded, among them a 16-year-old girl. At least 22 multi-unit apartment buildings suffered significant damage in the strike, adding to the massive toll of civilian infrastructure destruction from Russia’s full-scale invasion, which entered its fifth year this year.

    Glide bombs, a weapon Russia has relied on heavily since the beginning of its invasion, are modified Soviet-era munitions fitted with modern guidance systems that give them increased accuracy. Each weapon can carry up to 3,000 kilograms of high explosive, enough to leave massive craters and level entire city blocks. Critically, Ukraine currently lacks operational defense systems capable of reliably intercepting these weapons, leaving civilian communities vulnerable to repeated devastating strikes.

    The deadly assault came on the heels of a wider wave of long-range Russian attacks across Ukraine that unfolded over the weekend and into Monday. In an overnight barrage from Sunday to Monday, Russia launched 181 long-range strike drones at targets across the country, Ukraine’s Air Force reported. While Ukrainian air defense teams managed to jam and shoot down 163 of the unmanned aerial vehicles, 18 penetrated defenses, damaging infrastructure at 13 separate locations.

    The continued onslaught of ballistic missile and glide bomb attacks has pushed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to issue another urgent appeal to Western allies for additional air defense capabilities, specifically U.S.-manufactured Patriot systems. The Patriot platform is the only weapons system currently in Ukraine’s arsenal that can reliably intercept Russian ballistic missiles, but stockpiles of Patriot interceptors have been stretched dangerously thin globally amid ongoing conflicts including tensions in the Middle East tied to the Iran war.

    “The world has Patriot missiles. What matters now is for our partners to make the political decision to provide the necessary packages,” Zelenskyy stated in a social media post Monday. “The United States knows what we need. Europe knows what we need. Anti-ballistic missiles must protect people — not sit in stockpiles.”

    The plea comes amid uncertainty over U.S. support for Ukraine’s defense industrial capacity. Last week, U.S. President Donald Trump walked back an earlier indication that he would approve a license to allow Ukraine to produce its own Patriot interceptors domestically, telling reporters Friday the issue remains under active review and no final decision has been reached.

    In response to this delay, Zelenskyy has floated an alternative proposal: that tech entrepreneur Elon Musk allow Ukraine to use his Starlink satellite internet network to enable targeting of Russian ballistic missile launch sites located inside Russian territory. As of Monday, Ukrainian officials have not publicly confirmed whether the plan is moving forward.

    Russian officials have meanwhile reported their own set of alleged strikes and Ukrainian counterattacks over the same 24-hour period. The Russian Defense Ministry claimed its forces hit four bulk cargo ships carrying military supplies for Ukraine, three of which were located in Black Sea waters and one docked in the Ukrainian port of Mykolaiv, though no independent verification of the claim has been provided.

    Russian-installed authorities in Crimea, the Ukrainian peninsula illegally annexed by Russia in 2014, said three people were killed and two wounded in an overnight Ukrainian attack on the region. No further details on the strike were released by the Kremlin-appointed head of Crimea, Sergei Aksyonov.

    Ukrainian drone strikes have also continued targeting Russian logistics infrastructure, hitting a key warehouse operated by Wildberries, Russia’s largest e-commerce retailer, in the Vladimir region, located east of Moscow. The strike sparked a large fire at the facility, the company confirmed Monday. Three people were injured in the attack, regional governor Alexander Avdeyev said. This latest incident is part of a sustained Ukrainian campaign that has hit more than a dozen Wildberries distribution hubs across Russia, causing significant disruption to the company’s national operations.

    On Monday, the Russian Defense Ministry said its air defense forces intercepted 131 Ukrainian drones overnight across multiple Russian regions, annexed Crimea, and the Black Sea, matching the scale of the largest recent cross-border drone offensives by Ukraine.

    This ongoing cycle of attack and counterattack underscores the continued intensity of fighting across the front lines and deep behind enemy lines more than four years after Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

  • Prime minister visits quake-hit southern Japan as cleanup begins in intense heat

    Prime minister visits quake-hit southern Japan as cleanup begins in intense heat

    One week after a powerful magnitude 7.1 earthquake shook Japan’s southwestern Kumamoto Prefecture on the island of Kyushu, the disaster-battered region is facing a cascading series of new crises: sweltering near-40°C heat, critical shortages of basic supplies, and growing public anger over missteps from both political leaders and a local business.

    As of Monday, prefectural officials confirmed the earthquake’s death toll has reached 38. Among those fatalities is one resident who died of apparent heat stroke while sheltering in a vehicle amid the ongoing high temperatures, and another victim whose cause of death is still undergoing official investigation. An additional 114 people across the prefecture have been confirmed injured, with infrastructure damage widespread: official data shows 700 residential properties have been completely destroyed, and more than 11,300 other buildings have sustained varying degrees of damage.

    In communities across the quake zone, residents have begun the slow first steps of recovery: stacking mounds of splintered debris, broken household furniture and water- or impact-damaged appliances on curbs for municipal collection crews. In the smaller towns of Uki and Hikawa, construction crews have broken ground on the first batches of temporary housing for residents left homeless by the disaster.

    But recovery efforts are being severely hampered by extreme weather and crippling supply shortages. The Japan Meteorological Agency forecast that temperatures would climb as high as 35°C to 40°C (104°F) across the region on Monday, and more than 46,000 households remain cut off from running water. Shortages of fuel for generators and vehicles have also been widely reported, leaving communities without reliable power for cooling. As of Monday, more than 8,500 displaced people are still staying in overcrowded emergency shelters converted from public facilities including community centers, school gymnasiums and classrooms, and the vast majority of these shelters lack working air conditioning. Other displaced residents have been forced to sleep in uncooled vehicles in public parking lots and parks, or camp outside the ruins of their damaged homes.

    Disaster experts have long warned that this combination of overcrowding, insufficient cooling, poor sanitation and limited privacy creates deadly health risks for displaced populations following major natural disasters. The death of a heat stroke victim in a shelter vehicle has already amplified fears that more lives could be lost to heat-related illness, compounding the earthquake’s initial death toll.

    On Monday, Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi made her first visit to the quake-hit region since the disaster struck. However, the trip quickly sparked public backlash: Takaichi toured one of the area’s best-resourced shelters, which offers residents cardboard beds, privacy partitions and full air conditioning. Critics on Japanese social media quickly argued that the carefully selected visit did not reflect the grim reality facing most displaced people in the prefecture, and that the prime minister’s trip amounted to performative politics that ignored the scale of the crisis.

    A separate controversy has also emerged surrounding the deaths of two employees at a local general store inside the collapsed Aeon Mall in Kashima. Officials confirmed that an explosion, believed to be caused by a gas leak that followed the initial earthquake, killed the pair after roughly 3,000 shoppers had already been evacuated to a nearby parking lot. Seven total deaths were reported at the mall, with rescuers recovering seven bodies and pulling five survivors from the rubble.

    The store’s operator, local firm Habita, has confirmed that it instructed the two employees to re-enter the damaged shopping mall after the initial quake to retrieve sales proceeds and lock them in a safe. On Sunday, two Habita executives attended the wake of 22-year-old Kurumi Otake, one of the two dead employees, to offer a formal apology to her family. “I wish someone had stopped her,” Otake’s mother told reporters through tears, after meeting with the executives. “My daughter is not coming back.”

  • Top US admiral warns against coercion, says no nation will dominate Indo-Pacific

    Top US admiral warns against coercion, says no nation will dominate Indo-Pacific

    At a regional security conference hosted in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia by U.S. Pacific Command on Monday, the leader of the U.S. military’s Indo-Pacific command delivered a stark warning that coercive behavior from Beijing and other global actors poses growing threats to Indo-Pacific stability, stressing that Washington will never permit a single power to seize control of the strategic region.

    Admiral Samuel Paparo, commander of U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, spoke via video link to the assembled delegates, arguing that some actors are leveraging manufactured claims of legitimacy to enable intimidation and pressure against neighboring states. He drew a sharp conceptual distinction for the current geopolitical moment: “That’s not the rule of law. That’s the rule by law. That distinction between law as a tool of order versus law as a weapon of raw power, is the defining fault line of our time.”

    Paparo’s comments arrive against a backdrop of sustained heightened tensions in the South China Sea, where China’s expansive territorial and maritime claims overlap with competing claims from multiple Southeast Asian coastal nations. The Philippines has emerged as the primary site of recent standoffs between Beijing and a regional claimant, with repeated confrontations between Chinese and Philippine maritime vessels centered on a contested shoal. Manila has formally accused Chinese crews of carrying out dangerous navigation maneuvers, deploying water cannons against Philippine vessels, and repeatedly attempting to block government resupply missions to Filipino personnel in the disputed area. China has outright rejected all these accusations, and continues to assert its full territorial sovereignty over the contested waterway.

    The United States has repeatedly maintained that it does not take formal sides in the overlapping sovereignty claims in the South China Sea, but affirms its unwavering support for freedom of navigation, adherence to international law, and the right of all nations to operate in accordance with their recognized legal rights. Paparo underlined that open sea access, collective maritime security, and unobstructed global commerce form the foundation of lasting regional stability. He added that peaceful negotiation of disputes and universal respect for national sovereignty are non-negotiable requirements to protect the existing rules-based order in the Indo-Pacific.

    “The United States is clear-eyed about the complex security environment in this region. Our posture and our intent are well defined. The United States is deterring China through strength, not through confrontation,” Paparo stated. “We will not let any nation dominate this region or sweep away the hard-fought sovereign rights of independent states.”

    The U.S. commander further noted that the Indo-Pacific remains the central global hub of geopolitical and economic activity, but rising instability and evolving security challenges have made closer coordination between U.S. allies and regional partners more critical than ever before.

    Opening remarks earlier in the conference came from Philippine Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro, who pledged that Manila would continue to resist and push back against what he framed as Chinese aggression in the region. Speaking to reporters after his address, Teodoro expanded on his concerns, noting that Philippine anxiety over China’s actions extends far beyond its activities in the South China Sea. He pointed to Beijing’s recent test of a ballistic missile launched into the Pacific Ocean as clear evidence of China’s expanding regional reach and growing military footprint. “China is everywhere … this is a matter of concern,” he added.

    On the sidelines of the security gathering, Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Secretary-General Kao Kim Hourn offered a more optimistic update on long-running negotiations between ASEAN member states and China over a binding code of conduct to govern interactions in the South China Sea and de-escalate long-running tensions. According to Kao, talks have advanced dramatically in recent months, with negotiators now far closer to finalizing the text than ever before. “The pace has picked up dramatically and I think we are much closer to finalizing the code of conduct,” Kao said. “I have full confidence that we will get it done within this year.”

  • Two workers told to re-enter quake-hit Japan mall before fatal blast

    Two workers told to re-enter quake-hit Japan mall before fatal blast

    A devastating magnitude 6.8 earthquake that struck Japan’s Kumamoto Prefecture on July 28 has left an even deeper tragedy in its wake: two employees of a local general goods retailer lost their lives in a subsequent explosion at the heavily damaged Aeon Mall, after being instructed by their employer to re-enter the structurally unstable building to secure store cash. The pair were among 38 total fatalities recorded from the seismic event, with seven of those deaths tied to the Aeon Mall complex.

    One of the fallen workers has been publicly identified as 22-year-old Kurumi Otake, while the second employee’s identity remains private at the request of their family. According to reporting from Japan’s Asahi Shimbun, Otake encountered a family member outside the mall immediately after the initial earthquake struck. She told the relative that her employer, Habita – a 48-year-old retail chain that operates more than 10 locations across multiple Japanese prefectures – had ordered her to return inside to move cash from the store’s registers to a locked safe. This account was confirmed by two Habita representatives, who attended Otake’s wake on Sunday to offer a formal apology to her grieving family.

    In statements to Japan’s public broadcaster NHK, Habita Sales Director Goji Yuse acknowledged that the order given to the two workers was completely inappropriate, and that the company bears full responsibility for the tragedy. “Looking back now, it was not worth a life,” Yuse told reporters at the wake, per reporting from Kyodo News. “The instructions given at the time were inappropriate, and I truly regret the loss of two precious lives,” he added, noting that the company is still evaluating next steps for accountability and support for the victims’ families.

    Otake’s family has shared that the young woman was known for her strong sense of responsibility, and had been supporting her mother financially since her father passed away three years ago. “If she hadn’t gone back inside the store at that time, Kurumi would still be with her family today,” a relative told local media. Otake’s mother echoed the grief of the loss in a statement to reporters, saying simply, “My daughter is not coming back.”

    The timeline of the tragedy reveals a devastating gap between the earthquake and the fatal explosion: while most mall patrons and staff evacuated immediately after the seismic shaking, the explosion that took the workers’ lives struck roughly an hour later, when the pair were carrying out their assigned task inside the damaged building.

  • Water bombers take to skies as Greece battles wildfires

    Water bombers take to skies as Greece battles wildfires

    After a week of relentless, life-threatening blazes that have scorched thousands of hectares of land and claimed five lives, Greece has ramped up its wildfire response, with water-bombing aircraft returning to the skies Monday as dangerous high winds finally subsided.

    Unlike neighboring France and Spain, which faced severe fire events early in the 2024 summer season, Greece escaped major wildfire activity for months. That luck ran out two weeks ago, however, and the country has now been locked in a desperate battle against multiple uncontrolled blazes for 14 straight days. The fires have consumed vast swathes of forest, coastal scrubland, and productive agricultural land west of the Greek capital Athens, as well as destroying areas on the islands of Crete and in the Peloponnese peninsula.

    As of Monday, three major active fire fronts remained the most pressing concern for crews: the areas of Psatha, Kryo Pigadi and Kandyli, all located between 45 and 70 kilometers west of central Athens. With wind speeds dropping after days of gusts reaching up to 80 kilometers per hour — conditions that had forced aerial assets to ground, severely hampering containment efforts — nine water-bombing aircraft were able to rejoin the fight early Monday. They joined nine helicopters and roughly 450 ground-based firefighters working to contain the blazes across the Attica and Boeotia regions.

    Even with the return of aerial support, Greek officials have stressed that the battle against the flames remains far from even. On Monday morning, the country’s Civil Protection agency ordered new mandatory evacuations for several small villages located near the Kandyli fire line, moving residents out of the path of advancing flames ahead of expected high temperatures through the day.

    The crisis has already left a tragic toll. Since wildfires escalated last week, five people have been killed in fire-related incidents, all of them active responders. Three firefighters died last week while battling separate blazes in Crete and the Peloponnese. On Sunday, a mid-air collision between two Bell firefighting helicopters near Psatha killed a Danish pilot and a Greek co-pilot aboard one of the aircraft; the second helicopter’s pilot, a British national, and Greek co-pilot survived with injuries and were transported to a nearby hospital for treatment.

    Following the collision, all Bell helicopters leased for the firefighting campaign have been grounded pending the outcome of a full official investigation, Greece’s public broadcaster ERT reported. The 15 Bell helicopters were leased from Australia’s McDermott Aviation, a company that has provided aerial support to Greek wildfire operations for seven years, according to the firm.

    In a development that points to a potential human cause for one of the most destructive blazes, Greek police have arrested two employees of a national electricity utility in connection with a fire that broke out Friday near Porto Germeno, a coastal village on the Gulf of Corinth approximately 60 kilometers west of Athens. Investigators currently believe the blaze was sparked by a faulty or damaged electrical cable in the area.

    Satellite data from the European Union’s Copernicus Earth observation programme, cited by Greek local media, shows that more than 12,000 hectares of forest and agricultural land have been burned since the outbreak of fires a week ago. That number is expected to rise as containment efforts continue.

    Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis has warned that the country faces “extremely difficult” days ahead, as sustained high temperatures and record-dry vegetation continue to create ideal conditions for fire ignition and spread. Civil Protection authorities have classified Attica and neighboring Boeotia — the regions currently facing the most active blazes — as level four on a five-point fire danger scale, meaning the threat of destructive fire remains “very high” as the country enters the peak of its summer tourist season. Climate scientists have long warned that the Mediterranean region will see increasingly frequent and intense wildfire seasons driven by rising global temperatures linked to anthropogenic climate change, a trend that is already evident in Greece’s ongoing crisis.

  • New polling reveals Labor maintains ‘election-winning’ lead as One Nation overtakes Coalition as main rival

    New polling reveals Labor maintains ‘election-winning’ lead as One Nation overtakes Coalition as main rival

    Australia’s upcoming federal election landscape has been upended by freshly released polling data from research firm Roy Morgan, which positions right-wing populist party One Nation as the primary opposition to incumbent Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s Labor Party, pushing the traditional center-right major opposition Coalition into third place. The data, published in mid-2024, paints a startling new picture of voter sentiment, breaking the long-standing two-party duopoly that has dominated Australian federal politics for decades. According to the poll, primary vote support for the ruling Australian Labor Party (ALP) currently stands at 27.5%, enough to deliver a parliamentary majority if an election were held today regardless of whether the ALP faced One Nation or the Coalition as its main competitor for power. One Nation, the nationalist party led by Pauline Hanson, recorded a primary support rating of 24% – a 1.5 percentage point drop from the previous survey, but still enough to place it well ahead of the Liberal Party, the largest member of the Coalition. The Liberal Party saw a 1.5 percentage point rise in support to reach 20%, while its traditional rural coalition partner, the Nationals, held steady at 3.5% aggregate support. Combined, the two Coalition parties sit at just 23.5% primary support, half a point behind One Nation. Beyond voter intention, the polling also tracks a notable dip in public confidence in the federal government, with the overall confidence index falling 1.5 points to 67.5 out of 100. A majority of Australian voters – 59.5%, up 1.5 points from the last poll – now believe the country is headed in the wrong direction, a reading that signals broad underlying voter dissatisfaction with the current political trajectory. The survey also highlighted stark divides in confidence across party bases. Unsurprisingly, ALP supporters recorded the highest confidence rating, at 137.5, far above the baseline 100 mark. Greens supporters came next with a confidence rating of 70, down 16.5 points from the previous survey, followed by Coalition supporters at 50 – up 7.5 points. One Nation supporters, who are among the most dissatisfied with the current government, recorded a confidence rating of just 6.5, a seven-point drop from the last poll. Based on the data, Roy Morgan’s analysis concludes that the next federal election will now be framed as a head-to-head contest between the ALP and One Nation, rather than the long-running ALP-Coalition battle that has defined Australian federal elections for over a century. The research firm acknowledged the fragmented nature of modern Australian politics, noting that multiple three-way and four-way contests will play out across different electorates, with battles also occurring between the ALP and the Coalition, One Nation and the Coalition, and all major parties facing challenges from the Greens, centrist Teal Independents, and smaller regional parties including Katter’s Australian Party (KAP). The shake-up in voter polling comes amid concurrent political controversy for One Nation leader Pauline Hanson, who this week banned three major Australian news outlets – The Guardian, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC), and The Age – from a public event scheduled for Monday, where the party is set to unveil eight candidates for the upcoming Victorian state election this November. The move has drawn criticism from media freedom advocates, who argue that excluding major independent outlets from public political events undermines transparency in the lead-up to state polling. This realignment in voter support marks a significant shift in Australian politics, reflecting growing voter dissatisfaction with the traditional major parties and the rising influence of right-wing populist messaging ahead of the next federal election, which is scheduled to be held by mid-2025.

  • ‘Stupidity’: Richmond coach unleashes on Luke Trainor after one-game ban for stomach punch against West Coast rival

    ‘Stupidity’: Richmond coach unleashes on Luke Trainor after one-game ban for stomach punch against West Coast rival

    Richmond Tigers have finally broken through an 11-match losing drought, securing their first win in nearly three months against West Coast Eagles on Sunday. But the moment of celebration has been overshadowed by a costly lapse in judgment from young defender Luke Trainor, who received a one-game suspension from the AFL’s Match Review Officer for a deliberate stomach punch on Eagles utility Jack Williams.

    The 20-year-old Richmond prospect’s moment of frustration boiled over in the second quarter of the upset win, after he and Williams had been trading minor, playful on-field jabs for several minutes. Trainor lashed out with a closed-fist strike to Williams’ midsection, leaving the Eagles player crumpled on the ground clutching his abdomen. Williams was able to regain his feet shortly after the incident and leave the field for the team bench.

    Following the match, the Match Review Officer classified the off-the-ball incident as intentional strike with medium impact, resulting in an automatic one-game ban. Trainor will now be forced to miss Richmond’s upcoming away clash against Adelaide this coming weekend, stripping the club of a young developing player just as they are working to build momentum after their long losing run.

    Richmond senior head coach Adem Yze opened up to media after the match, addressing the incident before the official suspension was handed down. Yze noted that he had not reviewed the incident immediately after the final siren, but confirmed the club would hold the player accountable if the strike was proven to be against league rules. The coach did praise Trainor’s overall on-field performance during the win, noting that the young defender had continued to show growth and played a key role in the club’s first victory in months.

    Even so, Yze made clear that avoidable disciplinary suspensions are unacceptable for his side, particularly as the club already deals with a growing list of injured players sidelined for matches. “When we’ve got lack of availability through injury, we don’t want to be losing players through stupidity,” Yze told reporters. The coach added that the club has already held multiple conversations with the entire playing squad about avoiding unnecessary disciplinary incidents, noting that all players have been educated on what counts as acceptable and unacceptable on-field conduct.

    The suspension comes as a disappointing gut punch for Richmond, who were hoping to build on their long-awaited win with a strong performance in Adelaide to continue climbing the AFL ladder.

  • Detained Suu Kyi meets Red Cross official in Myanmar: president office

    Detained Suu Kyi meets Red Cross official in Myanmar: president office

    Nearly three and a half years after a military coup ousted Myanmar’s democratically elected government, the detained opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi has held her first publicly confirmed meeting with an international official, according to the country’s presidency. On Monday morning, Arnaud de Baecque, the ICRC’s Resident Representative to Myanmar, held a face-to-face encounter with the 81-year-old Nobel Peace Prize laureate, the office confirmed.

    The junta-led administration released multiple images alongside the announcement: one captures Suu Kyi shaking hands with a figure that matches de Baecque’s description, while two other images show Suu Kyi cutting a birthday cake inscribed with the message “Happy Birthday Aunty Suu.” While AFP could not independently certify the images’ authenticity, artificial intelligence analysis found no evidence of digital manipulation, and no prior versions of the photos had been circulated online before Monday’s announcement. The AFP has reached out to the International Committee of the Red Cross for further comment on the meeting.

    The February 2021 military coup ended Suu Kyi’s five-year tenure as Myanmar’s state counsellor, after her National League for Democracy won a landslide re-election victory. The junta immediately detained Suu Kyi on a sprawling set of criminal charges that international human rights organizations universally dismiss as politically fabricated, designed to remove her from public life and dismantle her widely popular party. The post-coup uprising against military rule has devolved into an ongoing civil conflict that has killed more than 100,000 people, according to data from the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (ACLED).

    Earlier this year, the junta oversaw a widely boycotted and restricted general election that consolidated its control over the civilian government. In April, former junta chief Min Aung Hlaing was sworn in as the country’s new civilian president, and shortly after the inauguration, he announced he would commute the remainder of Suu Kyi’s combined 27-year prison sentence and transfer her from prison to private house detention in the capital Naypyidaw. To date, junta authorities have refused to disclose the exact location of her detention or confirm how much of her sentence remains in effect.

    For months, Suu Kyi’s family and the international community have called for independent verification that she remains alive. Her son, British national Kim Aris, has repeatedly pushed for independent access to confirm her welfare following the transfer to house arrest. This meeting marks the first time a third-party international representative has been allowed to see Suu Kyi publicly since the coup.

    A senior veteran politician from Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy, speaking to AFP on condition of anonymity, called the confirmation of her survival a small relief. “We are happy to see her photo like this if it’s really her meeting with the ICRC. We can know now that she’s alive,” the politician said, adding: “However, Aunty should be released immediately as she’s being detained unlawfully.”

    Since the 2021 coup, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) has suspended Myanmar’s junta leadership from participation in the bloc’s high-level summits, over the military’s failure to implement a peace and reconciliation roadmap agreed with the bloc. In recent months, however, neighboring Thailand has led a diplomatic push to readmit Myanmar back into ASEAN’s regional framework, both through bilateral engagement and bloc-level initiatives.

    Min Aung Hlaing has already undertaken official visits to China, India, and ASEAN member Laos since taking office as president, and he is scheduled to make a high-profile official trip to Thailand later this week. Independent Myanmar analysts and regional policy researchers say the timing of the ICRC meeting, coming just days before the Thailand trip, is no coincidence.

    “It’s the old military game plan to use Suu Kyi as a bargaining chip,” independent Myanmar analyst David Mathieson told AFP. He noted that multiple ASEAN member states have long demanded public proof of Suu Kyi’s status as a condition for normalizing diplomatic relations with the junta. “As a gesture to the international community, it’s the wildcard Min Aung Hlaing was holding close to his chest,” Mathieson added.

    Morgan Michaels, a researcher focused on Myanmar at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, said the junta stands to gain significant diplomatic ground by allowing international access to Suu Kyi. “Releasing her in particular would go a long way to facilitating Myanmar’s re-invitation at the political level,” Michaels said. Even with this latest gesture, Suu Kyi’s continued detention remains a major sticking point for the international community: ASEAN has repeatedly called for its own special envoy to be granted access to meet Suu Kyi, a request the junta has rejected repeatedly to date.

  • Australian stocks recover after US President Donald Trump cancels planned attack on Iran

    Australian stocks recover after US President Donald Trump cancels planned attack on Iran

    Australia’s benchmark share index bounced back from steep early losses to close in positive territory on Monday, after a sudden policy shift from former U.S. President Donald Trump that pulled back from planned military strikes against Iran and calmed global market jitters over energy inflation.

    Heading into the trading day, futures markets had priced in a roughly 1% opening drop for the Australian Securities Exchange, as investors braced for escalating Middle East tensions that threatened to push global oil prices sharply higher. But the market trajectory shifted dramatically mid-morning after Trump announced he had called off what he described as a major planned military strike on Iran, a strike that would have been the largest offensive against the country since World War II. The announcement eased widespread fears that conflict would disrupt global oil supplies and trigger a new spike in global inflation.

    By the closing bell, the benchmark ASX 200 had gained 42.50 points, or 0.47%, to settle at 9019.30. The broader All Ordinaries index followed suit, adding 41.40 points, or 0.45%, to reach 9178.40. The Australian dollar edged lower during Monday’s session but held above the key psychological threshold of 70 U.S. cents, closing at 70.34 U.S. cents.

    Nine out of the ASX’s 11 industry sectors finished the day in positive territory, led by strong gains in utilities, healthcare, and consumer discretionary stocks. The utilities sector posted the strongest performance of any group: Origin Energy climbed 2.88% to $11.07, AGL Energy rose 1.93% to $8.44, and Genesis Energy surged 5.85% to $2.17. Consumer discretionary stocks also posted solid gains, with retail conglomerate Wesfarmers rising 1.45% to $90.66, electronics retailer JB Hi-Fi adding 0.60 points to close at $82.42, and automotive group Eagers Automotive gaining 1.40% to $23.85.

    The only notable drag on overall market gains came from the energy sector, where falling oil prices pushed most major stocks lower. Brent crude futures fell 5.3% to settle at $83.26 a barrel, after dipping as low as $81.55 earlier in the session as tensions de-escalated. Top Australian energy producers reflected the drop: Woodside Energy shares fell 1.37% to $32.50, and Santos slumped 1.91% to $7.89. Refiner and retailer Ampol bucked the trend, posting a marginal 0.08% gain to close at $39.93.

    Speaking to reporters aboard Air Force One on Sunday, Trump explained that he had opted to pause planned strikes to open the door for diplomatic negotiations, set to launch on Monday afternoon. “Obviously, they don’t want to be attacked. They knew the extent of the attack because they saw it forming,” he said. “Now what we’re doing is we’re talking to them in the form of a negotiation. It begins tomorrow afternoon.”

    Tony Sycamore, senior market analyst for IG, noted that the sudden de-escalation removed a key layer of risk that had spooked investors in prior sessions. He added that Trump also signaled a potential deal governing shipping through the Strait of Hormuz — a critical global oil chokepoint — is within reach, with talks on Iran’s nuclear program to follow after initial negotiations. Still, Sycamore struck a cautious note on the long-term outlook for tensions: “Whether this turns into a rinse and repeat of last week — with hopes of a deal collapsing as Iran digs in its heels and continues to leverage its control over the Strait, potentially through an attack on a US base or a tanker transiting the waterway remains to be seen.”

    In individual company news, mining giant Fortescue continued a downward trend from the previous week, sliding another 3.84% to close at $17.80 — a 12-month low for the stock. The drop was driven by falling iron ore prices, with Singapore iron ore futures falling 1.90% to $94.25 a tonne. Elsewhere, Steadfast Group jumped 2.94% to $5.26 after the company issued an update to the market confirming that a KKR-led consortium reaffirmed its planned takeover offer for the business at $6 per share.