Global Pulse

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  • Musk’s SpaceX buys AI coding start-up for $60bn days after IPO

    Musk’s SpaceX buys AI coding start-up for $60bn days after IPO

    In a blockbuster deal that underscores the booming demand for generative artificial intelligence tools across tech and aerospace industries, Elon Musk’s SpaceX has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire AI coding startup Anysphere – creator of the popular AI coding agent Cursor – for $60 billion, just four trading days after the rocket firm closed its historic initial public offering.

    The acquisition, which is set to close by the end of the third quarter of 2026, was pre-negotiated under a partnership deal first struck between the two companies in April 2025. Under that earlier agreement, SpaceX secured an option to either purchase the startup outright for $60 billion or pay $10 billion for the joint development work the teams had completed together. Cursor shareholders will receive the full purchase price in newly issued SpaceX public stock, under the terms of the deal.

    The move comes on the heels of SpaceX’s landmark listing on the New York Nasdaq stock exchange, which went down as the largest initial public offering in global history. The IPO valued the company at more than $2 trillion, and raised a staggering $85.7 billion in fresh capital for the firm. Since its debut, SpaceX shares have surged nearly 50% from the $135 per share IPO offer price, pushing up the net worth of majority owner Elon Musk past the $1 trillion mark, making him the first person ever to reach that personal wealth milestone.

    Cursor has emerged as one of the fastest-growing players in the red-hot AI coding space, a segment where firms like OpenAI and Anthropic have also built popular tools that automate core parts of the software development workflow. The startup’s product is already in use at major technology firms including Stripe, Adobe and Nvidia, where Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang has publicly hailed Cursor as his “favourite enterprise AI service”.

    For SpaceX, the acquisition is a strategic move to accelerate the growth of its in-house artificial intelligence division, xAI – the firm behind the controversial chatbot Grok, which Musk brought into SpaceX following an acquisition earlier this year. When the partnership was first announced in April 2025, SpaceX framed the combination of Cursor’s strengths and its own computing infrastructure as a path to building industry-leading AI models. “The combination of Cursor’s leading product and distribution to expert software engineers with SpaceX’s million H100 equivalent Colossus training supercomputer will allow us to build the world’s most useful models,” the company said in its original April statement.

    But the blockbuster deal and SpaceX’s record valuation have also sparked ongoing debate about market exuberance and wealth inequality. Unlike mature public companies, SpaceX’s $2 trillion valuation is almost entirely tied to investor optimism about its future earnings potential, rather than proven consistent profitability. Financial filings show SpaceX has remained unprofitable, racking up more than $9 billion in operating losses across 2025 and the first half of 2026, driven by massive capital outlays for AI infrastructure and rocket development programs.

    Founded as a commercial rocket firm focused on developing reusable launch vehicles, SpaceX has expanded its footprint over the past decade to include the Starlink satellite internet constellation, which now serves millions of customers globally. Its entry into the artificial intelligence race via the xAI acquisition, followed by the Cursor purchase, marks the company’s most aggressive push yet to diversify beyond its core aerospace operations and compete with top AI players that have commanded sky-high valuations in public markets.

  • US-Iran accord may crumble faster than the ink can dry

    US-Iran accord may crumble faster than the ink can dry

    On June 14, 2026, Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, who acted as the lead mediator between Washington and Tehran, announced that the two long-warring adversaries had reached a tentative agreement to end open hostilities, with a formal signing ceremony scheduled for June 19 in Switzerland. US President Donald Trump quickly hailed the deal as a major diplomatic and national security triumph on his Truth Social platform, highlighting that the Strait of Hormuz—one of the world’s most critical global oil chokepoints—would reopen to all commercial traffic, the crippling US blockade on Iranian oil exports would be lifted, and global energy markets would see a resumption of Iranian crude flows. What Trump omitted from his celebratory announcement was any mention of Iran’s nuclear program and the size of its enriched uranium stockpile—the core casus belli cited by the US to launch the war in the first place. All of these contentious issues, along with other longstanding points of contention including Iran’s ballistic missile program and its regional allied proxies, have been pushed to future negotiations scheduled to unfold over a 60-day window. As an expert in international and nuclear security, I argue that this agreement delivers no meaningful resolution to the issues that sparked the war, and has left the United States with significantly eroded credibility as a reliable negotiating partner on the global stage.

    To understand why the nuclear dispute remains the most intractable barrier to a lasting peace, we can turn to James Fearon’s foundational 1995 rationalist theory of war, which outlines three core barriers that push nations to armed conflict even when both sides would prefer a negotiated settlement: incomplete information about each side’s willingness to commit force and absorb damage, the inability to deliver credible, binding commitments to uphold a deal, and the “indivisibility problem” — when the disputed issue cannot be split or compromised to create a mutually acceptable middle ground.

    This recent war has resolved only the first of these three barriers. Both sides have now seen the full scope of each other’s capabilities: how much military force the US was willing to deploy, and how much damage Iran could endure while remaining in active conflict. What even months of war could not fix is the long-running problem of broken commitments between the two nations, a rift that dates back decades.

    Iran strictly abided by the terms of the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), the landmark international nuclear deal that placed strict limits on Tehran’s nuclear activities. The International Atomic Energy Agency repeatedly verified that Iran held its uranium enrichment level to 3.67% — a purity suitable only for civilian power reactor use, far below the threshold required for a nuclear weapon — and kept its total enriched uranium stockpile below 300 kilograms, in full compliance with the agreement. Yet in 2018, the Trump administration unilaterally withdrew from the JCPOA, dismissing the pact as “the worst deal ever negotiated” over its sunset provisions and its failure to address Iran’s ballistic missile program from the start.

    When Iran returned to the negotiating table in 2025, the US and Israel launched airstrikes against Iranian targets while talks were still ongoing. Then, in February 2026, as negotiators were closing in on a tentative agreement, another joint US-Israeli strike killed Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and lead nuclear negotiator Ali Larijani mid-negotiation. This pattern of reneging on diplomatic commitments and breaking off talks with military force is why Iran now demands concrete, enforceable guarantees and immediate sanctions relief before it will sign any final deal, rather than relying on unfulfilled promises of good faith. A nation that honored its nuclear commitments for years only to be attacked has little reason to trust future American promises of concessions. For that reason, the 60-day delay is best understood as a window for Tehran to observe whether the US and Israel will uphold the ceasefire across all regional fronts, including Lebanon.

    The indivisibility problem is what makes the nuclear dispute fundamentally unresolvable in the short term. Most international diplomatic disputes can be split into incremental compromises: sanctions can be lifted in phases, for example. Even nuclear programs can be partially restricted, as the JCPOA proved: the deal counted operational centrifuges, capped enrichment levels, and strictly monitored stockpile sizes. What cannot be split is the core disagreement at hand: the US demands that Iran eliminate all uranium enrichment entirely, while Tehran insists uranium enrichment for civilian purposes is an inalienable sovereign right that it will not surrender.

    The 2015 JCPOA centered entirely on the nuclear question, arranging for strict, verified limits in exchange for sanctions relief. But during 2025 and early 2026 talks, the US reversed its JCPOA position entirely. Instead of placing limits on an existing program, Washington demanded the full, permanent elimination of Iran’s entire nuclear enrichment infrastructure. US envoy Steve Witkoff insisted on zero enrichment and the permanent dismantling of Iran’s three core nuclear sites: Natanz, Fordow, and Isfahan. Iran rejected the demand outright, reaffirming that enrichment is a non-negotiable sovereign right. Both rounds of talks ended in US-Israeli airstrikes.

    The upcoming June 19 agreement does not place any cap on Iran’s enrichment activities, nor does it require the elimination of Iran’s nuclear program. It only ends active fighting, reopens the Strait of Hormuz, and pushes all core disputes including enrichment, stockpiles, ballistic missiles, and regional proxies to 60 days of follow-up talks. In a recent interview with The New York Times, Trump claimed he faced no rush to remove Iran’s near-weapons-grade fuel stockpiles stored in facilities damaged by bombing, and asserted that Iran would voluntarily suspend enrichment for 15 to 20 years and only enrich for civilian purposes. This stands in stark contrast to the JCPOA, negotiated under the Obama administration, which physically removed 97% of Iran’s existing enriched stockpile from the country and enforced verified, binding limits on enrichment. Because it fails to address any of the core nuclear issues that sparked the war, the Trump-brokered deal is nothing more than a ceasefire, not a lasting nuclear agreement.

    Returning to the rationalist theory of war, we see that the conflict resolved only the information problem, revealing what each side was willing to endure. The commitment problem remains entirely unsolved. Neither side can yet deliver a promise that the other will trust, particularly Iran after its lead negotiators and top leadership were killed mid-negotiation. Worse, the indivisibility problem has only grown more intractable since the war began. The standoff between zero enrichment and Iranian sovereign rights remains as uncompromising as ever, and the 60-day delay is not a step toward resolution—it is just the same unsolved problem with a deadline attached.

    The only potential path forward relies on American restraint. If Washington can rein in Israeli strikes against Iran and Hezbollah in Lebanon, it can slowly begin to rebuild the credibility it lost through two rounds of broken negotiations and unprovoked attacks. This is an enormous test for the second Trump administration. Even as the current ceasefire deal was being finalized, Israel launched a strike on Beirut, an attack that could easily derail the upcoming talks. In my view, the 60-day window is not a path to a lasting settlement, but just a temporary pause before the next round of negotiations fails. I argued back in April that this conflict would never end in a clean, final settlement, and would instead unfold as a series of fragile, contested pauses. The June 19 deal is just the first of these pauses.

    Iran has emerged from the war with its nuclear enrichment expertise fully intact, its existing stockpile secured, and a strengthened belief that only a fully operational nuclear weapon would deter future US-Israeli attacks. At the same time, Iran proved it could hold its ground against a superior military force, successfully strike US bases and regional allies, and discovered new strategic leverage it did not fully appreciate before the war: control over the Strait of Hormuz has proven to be a far more effective deterrent than a nuclear program ever could be.

    Today, the strait is open, oil is flowing, and the core question that the war was fought to resolve remains exactly where it started. Thousands of lives were lost only to bring both sides back to square one. No one has won a meaningful victory, even though both sides will inevitably claim triumph.

  • German president says Europe is worried over tensions in the disputed South China Sea

    German president says Europe is worried over tensions in the disputed South China Sea

    During an official state visit to the Philippines on Tuesday, German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier has publicly articulated Europe’s deep anxiety over rising frictions in the disputed South China Sea, warning that a major escalation in the critical waterway could threaten global freedom of navigation, echoing disruptive disruptions seen in the Strait of Hormuz.

    Speaking alongside Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. at a joint press briefing in Manila, Steinmeier drew a parallel between the South China Sea situation and past blockades of the Strait of Hormuz amid the Iran conflict, noting that European leaders are particularly focused on ongoing territorial standoffs between Manila and Beijing. He emphasized that the Indo-Pacific, and Southeast Asia in particular, stands as one of the most economically dynamic regions on the planet, making any instability here a pressing concern for European economies and security.

    “If any disruptive incident occurs in that part of the world, it will trigger profound alarm across Europe,” Steinmeier stated, speaking through a professional interpreter. “Breaches of international maritime law endanger unimpeded navigation, a lesson the recent Hormuz blockade drove home to us in the most dramatic way possible.”

    The closed-door bilateral meeting between the two leaders covered multiple topics of mutual concern, including the fallout of potential Strait of Hormuz disruptions, which have previously driven sharp global spikes in fuel and fertilizer prices.

    While Steinmeier stopped short of directly naming any single party as responsible for the ongoing South China Sea tensions, Germany’s long-held position reaffirms that China’s activities in the disputed waters violate the sovereign and economic rights of coastal states including the Philippines, while jeopardizing open navigation for all countries. This stance aligns with comments made by then-German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock during her 2024 visit to Manila, when she highlighted that high-risk maneuvers by Chinese vessels that have led to minor collisions with Philippine craft threaten the economic development prospects of the Philippines and other regional coastal states. Baerbock also explicitly stated that China’s expansive territorial claims in the South China Sea have no basis under international law, and called for a peaceful negotiated resolution to the disputes. During that 2024 visit, Baerbock toured the Philippine Coast Guard headquarters and inspected a German-donated surveillance drone aboard a Philippine patrol vessel.

    On his visit, Steinmeier doubled down on Germany’s commitment to supporting the Philippine Coast Guard, which has operated as Manila’s front-line agency safeguarding the country’s territorial claims and has been involved in multiple direct encounters with Chinese maritime forces in the disputed waters.

    In his response, Marcos expressed his gratitude to Germany for its consistent public backing of the Philippines’ efforts to uphold the rule of law in the South China Sea, including its repeated calls for all parties to honor the 2016 binding South China Sea Arbitral Award. The 2016 ruling, issued under the framework of the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, formally invalidated China’s sweeping historic claims to nearly the entire South China Sea. Beijing refused to participate in the arbitration process initiated by Manila, has rejected the ruling outright, and continues to disregard its provisions.

    The South China Sea dispute involves multiple claimant parties beyond China and the Philippines: Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei, and Taiwan also hold overlapping territorial and maritime claims in the region. The United States, which maintains no territorial claims of its own in the waterway, has repeatedly reaffirmed its mutual defense treaty obligation to the Philippines — its longest-standing Asian ally — stating it will come to the Philippines’ defense if Philippine forces, vessels, or aircraft come under armed attack. China has consistently issued warnings opposing any U.S. intervention in the regional disputes.

  • Authorities say at least 9 dead, 25 hurt after a train and bus collide in Zimbabwe

    Authorities say at least 9 dead, 25 hurt after a train and bus collide in Zimbabwe

    A devastating collision between a freight train and a passenger bus at an unguarded level crossing in southern Zimbabwe has left at least nine people dead, among them two children, and left more than two dozen others injured, according to official statements from Zimbabwean police and national railway officials.

    The fatal crash unfolded on Tuesday in Triangle, a small agrarian town best known as the heart of Zimbabwe’s sugar production industry. National Railways of Zimbabwe spokesperson Andrew Kanambura confirmed in an official briefing that the collision was entirely preventable, caused by clear human error. The bus driver failed to follow mandatory railway safety protocols, he said, neglecting to come to a full stop and scan for oncoming trains before attempting to cross the active tracks.

    Emergency response teams rushed to the crash site immediately after the incident, extricating survivors from the mangled wreckage and transporting all 25 injured victims to local medical facilities for urgent care. Visual documentation of the scene published by local Zimbabwean media outlets underscores the violence of the impact: the bus is left crumpled alongside the rail line, its entire side sheared away by the force of the train. Twisted metal shards, broken glass and personal debris are scattered across the ground surrounding the site, leaving a clear picture of the tragedy.

    This latest fatal transportation disaster comes amid a disturbing string of deadly incidents across Zimbabwe in recent weeks. Less than seven days before this collision, a minibus carrying schoolchildren caught fire in the central region of the country, killing seven students. Just one month prior, a head-on collision between a passenger bus and a heavy haulage truck claimed 10 lives.

    Deadly road and level crossing accidents are not an isolated problem in Zimbabwe: data from the country’s own road safety agency shows that a traffic collision occurs every 15 minutes on average across the nation. That pace translates to a daily toll of five deaths and 38 injuries, with officials confirming that 94% of all road-related accidents in the southern African nation stem from human error, including noncompliance with traffic and rail crossing safety rules.

    The crisis extends far beyond Zimbabwe’s borders, too. Data from the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa shows that the African continent holds the unenviable title of the highest road traffic fatality rate in the world, even though the region is home to just 3% of the world’s total registered motor vehicles. The UN body’s analysis also notes that buses and other public transit vehicles are disproportionately represented in fatal mass casualty crashes across the region.

  • Cuba tourism collapses as US pressure campaign bites

    Cuba tourism collapses as US pressure campaign bites

    In the first five months of 2026, Cuba has faced an unprecedented collapse in its core tourism industry and a deepening humanitarian crisis, driven by sweeping new sanctions imposed by the Trump administration against the Caribbean island’s communist government.

    New data published by Cuba’s National Office of Statistics and Information (Onei) confirms that international visitor arrivals have dropped by a staggering 58.4% year-over-year, falling to fewer than 360,000 for the January-to-May period. This sharp decline is no accident: the Trump administration has deliberately targeted Cuba’s tourism sector, the largest source of critical foreign revenue for the island’s cash-strapped government, as a central pillar of its pressure campaign against Havana’s leadership.

    The sanctions have triggered a cascading exodus of international businesses from the island. Multiple major foreign airlines and global hospitality operators have suspended all operations in Cuba, creating a vicious cycle that pushes visitor numbers even lower. Most recently, Canada’s flag carrier Air Canada announced an indefinite suspension of all Cuban routes earlier this month, a decision that deals an outsized blow to the local tourism industry. Canada has long been the top source of tourists for Cuba, according to Onei’s 2026 data, and Air Canada had already paused service in February due to acute shortages of aviation fuel on the island. The airline explicitly cited ongoing political and economic uncertainty on the island as the core reason for making the suspension permanent.

    Leading Spanish hospitality groups Meliá and Iberostar have also pulled out of dozens of Cuban hotel properties, complying with a June 5 US deadline that requires all foreign companies to end all business ties with Grupo de Administración Empresarial S.A. (Gaesa), the Cuban state-run conglomerate controlled by the country’s armed forces. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has publicly labeled Gaesa a “state within a state,” claiming in a Spanish-language address directed at the Cuban people that the group hoards business profits for a small ruling elite and brutally represses any Cubans who voice dissent against the government.

    Beyond the collapse of tourism, the combination of sweeping US sanctions and a de facto oil blockade has dramatically worsened long-running shortages of basic goods across Cuba, including fuel, prescription medications, and staple food supplies. On Monday, Cuban state news outlet Cubadebate reported a devastating drop in pediatric cancer survival rates: since January, when President Donald Trump threatened to impose secondary sanctions on any nation or company that supplies oil to Cuba, the survival rate for children with cancer has fallen from 85% to just 65%.

    Widespread fuel scarcity has paralyzed critical sectors of the domestic economy, including municipal waste management. Piles of uncollected garbage now line the streets of Cuban cities, creating public health risks. Frequent, prolonged, and island-wide power outages have also sparked rare public protests across the country, where public dissent has historically been punished with lengthy prison sentences.

    Even basic religious activities have been disrupted by the growing crisis. Agence France-Presse reported Sunday that communion wafers, a core sacramental item for Catholic Mass, have joined the growing list of scarce goods on the island. Multiple Catholic priests told AFP that church leaders have been forced to ration distribution of the wafers to worshippers. The wafers are traditionally produced at a Havana monastery, where nuns now face daily power outages that restrict electricity access to just two hours a day, making it impossible to maintain normal production levels of the unleavened bread. Photos from the island already show far fewer vehicles on Havana’s streets than before sanctions were tightened, a visible indicator of how deeply the fuel crisis has reshaped daily life for ordinary Cubans.

  • Russian artist and Putin critic shot dead in Poland

    Russian artist and Putin critic shot dead in Poland

    A chilling execution-style killing has rocked eastern Poland, where a 44-year-old Russian artist and outspoken critic of Vladimir Putin’s Kremlin regime was gunned down in broad daylight just hundreds of meters from a Belarusian diplomatic mission. Local law enforcement officials have launched a wide-ranging investigation into the murder, which has sent shockwaves across European security circles given the victim’s high-profile public opposition to authoritarian leaders in Moscow and Minsk.

    The victim, Robert Kuzovkov, who publicly worked under the pseudonym Semyon Skrepetsky, was killed on a Monday morning in a public car park in Biała Podlaska, a Polish city roughly 25 miles from the Belarusian border and just 600 meters from the local Belarusian consulate. According to official statements from Marcin Kozak, spokesperson for the District Prosecutor’s Office in Lublin, an unidentified attacker approached Skrepetsky and opened fire, striking the artist twice before moving closer once he fell to the ground to fire three additional lethal shots.

    “When the victim fell to the ground, the perpetrator approached, fired three more shots and then quickly fled the scene. Robert K died at the scene,” Kozak confirmed to reporters. Forensic teams responding to the attack recovered five 9mm shell casings and one Geco 9mm Luger bullet from the car park crime scene, and a formal autopsy to confirm cause of death and gather additional forensic evidence is scheduled for Wednesday.

    Skrepetsky built a public reputation for his sharp satirical caricatures that targeted authoritarian leaders across the former Soviet bloc, including Russian President Vladimir Putin, Belarusian strongman Alexander Lukashenko, and Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov. Kozak noted that the artist had been open about his condemnation of the Kremlin’s current political agenda, a stance that put him in the crosshairs of critics of the Russian government even before he relocated to Poland.

    Public records show Skrepetsky moved to Biała Podlaska from Russia in 2021, as political crackdowns on anti-Kremlin critics intensified inside the country. Just days before his killing, the artist appeared at an anti-Kremlin protest marking Russia Day outside the Russian embassy in Berlin on June 12. Video footage posted to social media from the event shows Skrepetsky carrying a satirical painting caricaturing both Putin and former Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, with a Russian flag tied to his trousers that dragged along the pavement as he marched.

    In the immediate aftermath of the shooting, Polish law enforcement detained two Belarusian men, aged 33 and 37, near the Belarusian consulate in Biała Podlaska. Investigators have not yet confirmed what connection the two men may have to the killing, and Kozak said their possible roles in the incident remain under active investigation. Police have not yet named or publicly identified the suspected gunman, who remains at large after fleeing the scene of the shooting.

  • Williams sisters receive Wimbledon doubles wildcard

    Williams sisters receive Wimbledon doubles wildcard

    One of the most iconic sibling pairs in tennis history is set to return to the sport’s most famous grass court, as Venus and Serena Williams have received a wildcard entry to compete in the 2025 Wimbledon women’s doubles draw. The surprise announcement has sent ripples of excitement through the global tennis community, marking Serena Williams’ first Grand Slam appearance since her widely assumed retirement after the 2022 US Open.

    Now 44 years old, Serena, a 23-time Grand Slam singles champion with seven Wimbledon singles titles to her name, launched her competitive comeback last week at the Queen’s Club Championship, and is currently competing in doubles in Berlin alongside top-ranked Karolina Muchova. Her reunion with older sister Venus at the All England Club will be the pair’s first Grand Slam appearance together since that 2022 US Open run.

    At 45, five-time Wimbledon singles champion Venus Williams has maintained limited competitive play in recent seasons. Though she has dropped all seven of her singles matches in 2025, she notched a doubles win at the Madrid Open in April alongside Britain’s Katie Boulter, and previously made history in 2024 as the second-oldest woman to claim a WTA Tour-level singles match win at the Washington Open. Speaking ahead of Serena’s comeback, Venus expressed nothing but confidence in her sister’s form, telling reporters: “The quality of her stroke is obviously there. She is a natural — she is very tenacious.”

    The Williams sisters’ legacy at Wimbledon is unmatched by any active pair. Between them, they have claimed 12 Wimbledon singles titles, and partnered together to take home six women’s doubles crowns at the tournament — their first coming in 2000, and their most recent in 2016. Three decades after they first burst onto the professional tennis scene as teenage prodigies, revolutionizing the women’s game with their power, athleticism and aggressive style, their return has become one of the most anticipated storylines of the 2025 grass court season.

    Notably, neither sister was selected for a singles wildcard, though one women’s singles spot remains unassigned. The wildcard announcement also brought disappointment for several high-profile players heading into the tournament, which kicks off on June 29.

    Former British number one Dan Evans, who announced that 2025 will be the final season of his professional career, was not awarded a wildcard into the men’s singles main draw. Unless he claims one of the two remaining wildcard spots to be allocated over the next two weeks, he will need to navigate the qualifying draw to secure a spot in his final Wimbledon singles appearance. The 36-year-old, who helped Britain claim its first Davis Cup title in 79 years in 2015 and has reached the Wimbledon third round three times, voiced his frustration after being overlooked for a Queen’s Club wildcard earlier this month, saying he feels he has not been taken seriously as a competitor. He did receive a consolation doubles wildcard, however, paired with 2023 Wimbledon boys’ champion Henry Searle for that draw.

    In contrast, three-time Grand Slam champion Stan Wawrinka, who is also retiring at the end of the 2025 season, received a men’s singles wildcard, alongside Bulgaria’s Grigor Dimitrov, a 2014 Wimbledon semi-finalist who was forced to retire from a 2024 fourth-round match against eventual champion Jannik Sinner while holding a two-set lead.

    Other notable players who missed out on men’s singles wildcards include 2021 runner-up Matteo Berrettini, 2022 finalist Nick Kyrgios, and retiring French veteran Gael Monfils. Berrettini is heavily favored to claim a main draw spot as the first alternate if a player withdraws before the tournament, while Kyrgios did receive a doubles wildcard, paired with Kazakhstan’s Alexander Bublik.

    In the women’s singles draw, recently crowned French Open runner-up Maja Chwalinska earned a wildcard following her breakthrough run at Roland Garros, alongside six British players who received wildcard entries. Six British players, including 2021 US Open champion Emma Raducanu, earned direct entry to the singles draws based on their ranking, alongside four British men who received wildcard entries on Tuesday. Wildcards for the tournament are selected at the discretion of the Wimbledon committee, which notes selections are typically based “on the basis of past performance at Wimbledon or to increase British interest.”

  • ‘Daylight robbery but worth it’ – what fans are spending on World Cup

    ‘Daylight robbery but worth it’ – what fans are spending on World Cup

    Five days into the historic 2026 FIFA World Cup, the first tournament co-hosted by the United States, Mexico and Canada, fans from across the globe have opened up to the BBC about the eye-watering total costs of chasing their football dreams at the global sporting event. For countless supporters, a World Cup experience is framed as a priceless, once-in-a-lifetime opportunity – but those who have travelled to matches across the three host nations have encountered price tags that stretch well beyond typical sporting event budgets, with even casual attendance running into thousands of dollars for just one or two fixtures.

    Morten Oftedal, a Norwegian football fan based in Atlanta, Georgia, did not hesitate to pull out all the stops when Norway qualified for the tournament for the first time in 28 years. He knew this summer would likely be the only chance his 82-year-old father – who sparked Oftedal’s lifelong love of the sport – would ever get to see his home nation compete on the World Cup stage. “I’ve been a huge soccer fan my whole life, and it’s mostly due to dad,” Oftedal explained. “I can’t be like, ‘no, let’s do it next time, or somewhere else’. So, we’re very excited.”

    That excitement, however, came with a shocking bill. Oftedal paid $380 per person for three tickets to Norway’s group stage match against Iraq in Massachusetts. He redeemed 180,000 frequent flyer points for three round-trip flights from Atlanta to Boston, and calculated round-trip stadium transport would add another $80 per person. When adding up all associated costs, the total value of cash and redeemed points for just one match for himself, his father and his wife hit roughly $3,600 – a figure Oftedal calls “insane”. Reflecting on the pricing structure of the 2026 tournament, he argued that “it’s not really for individuals, I feel like it’s for corporate America”.

    Oftedal is far from the only fan paying four-figure sums to attend matches. Multiple supporters who spoke to the BBC reported total attendance costs falling in the low thousands of dollars, but most said their lifelong passion for football and the chance to make irreplaceable memories softened the blow of the high prices.

    Iain Bagwell, a 58-year-old British expat living in Atlanta, is taking his son on a road trip to Dallas to watch England face Croatia, and paid roughly $1,200 per Category 2 ticket. “At the time I thought it was like daylight robbery,” he said. “But looking at the way it’s going, and the way that Fifa handled it, it probably wasn’t such a bad deal.” To cut down on overall accommodation costs, the pair are camping along their route, a choice that adds adventure as well as savings. After the England match, they will drive on to Kansas City to catch the Tunisia-Netherlands group stage fixture, for which they paid $235 per ticket.

    While many American sports fans have grown accustomed to exorbitant ticket prices for top-tier domestic events, such as the recent NBA Finals where the cheapest tickets for New York Knicks games at Madison Square Garden started around $3,500, the 2026 World Cup’s price points have come as a major shock to international travelling fans.

    Admir and Alisa Maric, travelling from Bosnia and Herzegovina to Toronto to watch their national team face Canada, admitted their trip was far more expensive than they expected, but said the experience was irreplaceable. “It’s an amazing feeling, I never thought I was going to a World Cup game,” Admir said. “I always wanted to experience it.” The pair secured last-minute third-row tickets for CAD$1,250 (US$890) per seat, on top of $600 per night for accommodation and $1,150 per person for flights, bringing their total trip cost to roughly CAD$5,400.

    Fellow Bosnia and Herzegovina supporters Aida and Emina Tucic, who live just outside Toronto in Hamilton, knew they would attend the match the second their nation qualified. But they too were caught off guard by soaring pricing. “We were a little trepidatious just because the tickets prices started to become, like, crazy,” Aida explained. After monitoring resale platforms for weeks, they purchased tickets three days before kickoff for CAD$1,200 per seat. When asked if the price was fair, Aida said “probably not”, noting that “football should be accessible to the fans” – but added that the experience itself was “priceless for me”. Emina echoed the sentiment, saying: “It’s once-in-a-lifetime. Both the countries you love, one where you were raised, one where you were born – getting to see them both play on the world stage, it’s amazing.”

    In Mexico, the pricing barrier is even starker for local fans, with roughly 30% of the country’s population living below the poverty line. For many ordinary Mexicans, the closest they can get to World Cup action is watching impromptu street pickup matches in popular districts like Mexico City’s Zona Rosa. Ticket prices for the tournament’s opening match at Mexico City’s iconic Azteca Stadium were far out of reach for most locals: few fans paid less than the equivalent of $1,500 USD per ticket, and some resale tickets hit $4,000 or more, with only a small handful of fans receiving free complimentary tickets through employers or gifts.

    Aaron Vieyra, a member of Mexican supporters’ group Furia Azteca, paid 30,000 pesos ($1,750 USD) per ticket for himself and his girlfriend, purchasing the pair through a personal contact. He noted that a single ticket at that price equals roughly three months’ rent for the average Mexico City resident. Having attended previous World Cups in Brazil and Russia, Vieyra said he spent more on this single match in his home country than he paid for all his match tickets combined at the two prior tournaments. “The game itself was historic and we were so happy to be in the Azteca for that moment, I still get goosebumps,” he said. But when asked if the ticket was good value, he hesitated: “It was worth it, but only just. It worked out for us because I didn’t have to pay for flights or hotels. If we’d have had to pay for those costs on top, then there is no way I’d have spent that kind of money on a ticket.”

    Beyond match tickets, ancillary costs inside and outside stadiums also vary widely across host venues, with some seeing extreme markup. Concession pricing inside venues largely aligns with what fans expect at top-tier U.S. arenas, but there are wide gaps between locations: an investigation by The Athletic found that a 16oz American beer costs $16 at New York New Jersey Stadium, the venue set to host the 2026 World Cup final, with a 20oz bottle of water priced at $5. By comparison, at Atlanta’s Mercedes-Benz Stadium, a 12oz domestic beer costs just $5, a 20oz beer is $9, and a 20oz water is only $3.

    Local transit costs have also drawn criticism for extreme markup: a single train ticket from New York City’s Penn Station to NYNJ Stadium for World Cup matches costs $98, a massive jump from the usual $12.90 fare. New Jersey Governor Mikie Sherrill defended the price hike, explaining that the increase is intended to stop local residents from shouldering the $48 million cost of expanded World Cup transit service, and added that FIFA is not contributing any funding to the project.

    In response to widespread outcry over inflated pricing, local officials across the three host nations have pushed back against FIFA to secure more affordable options for ordinary fans. New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani negotiated with FIFA to reserve 1,000 $50 match tickets for local residents, distributed via a public lottery. The Canadian province of Ontario passed the Putting Fans First Act to cap exorbitant resale ticket markups, and Dallas has introduced complimentary public transit to and from its host stadium for all match attendees.

    Despite the widespread sticker shock and criticism of the tournament’s pricing structure, nearly all of the fans who spoke to the BBC said they still view the experience as worth the cost, with the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity and irreplaceable memories outweighing the financial strain. For Oftedal, the chance to share the tournament with his father trumps any budget concern: “creating memories with my father would be the most important thing, and the worry about money goes away after a while.”

  • Mixed emotions ahead of Haiti vs. Brazil for dually aligned fans headed to the World Cup game

    Mixed emotions ahead of Haiti vs. Brazil for dually aligned fans headed to the World Cup game

    The 2026 FIFA World Cup, the first iteration of the tournament co-hosted by three nations — the United States, Canada, and Mexico — and the first held on U.S. soil since 1994, is set to deliver one of its most emotionally charged group stage matchups: Haiti versus five-time world champion Brazil. For Haitian fans at home and across the global diaspora, this pairing is far more than a simple David-versus-Goliath contest. It is a lifetime dream come true, pitting a beleaguered underdog national team against a soccer powerhouse that Haitians have adored for generations.

    Peguy Joseph, a Haitian living in Florida who has cheered for Brazil his entire life, will get to attend the June 19 match in Philadelphia — on his birthday, no less — marking the first time he will ever not root for the Brazilian side. “It’s a double joy,” Joseph explained. “I’ll be happy if Haiti win — but if Haiti lose, I won’t be sad, because it’s Brazil! It’s the fanaticism. When you love it, you love it.” He is far from alone in this conflicted excitement: thousands of dual-aligned Haitian fans across the U.S. and beyond are grappling with a one-of-a-kind mix of national pride and lifelong fandom ahead of the historic game.

    Even Brazilian fans are embracing the friendly energy of the matchup. Rafael Saldanha, a Brazilian resident of New York City who scored a ticket to the game, called the pairing a happy coincidence. “I was happy actually, when I learned that Brazil’s going to play Haiti, because I know these are two very friendly nations to each other,” he said. “Both are nations that have their own internal struggles. But at the same time, these are two countries whose populations manage to be extremely happy … regardless, or in spite, of the challenges posed on them every day.”

    Haiti’s journey to this World Cup match is a story of against-all-odds resilience. The Western Hemisphere’s poorest nation has not qualified for the World Cup since 1974, and this cycle it faced extraordinary barriers to qualification: armed gangs control most of Port-au-Prince, where the national team’s home stadium is located, forcing the Grenadiers, as the squad is nicknamed, to play all their home qualifying matches on the Caribbean island of Curaçao, without the cheers of their local fanbase. Still, the team fought past higher-ranked rivals to book its place in Group C alongside Morocco, Scotland, and the beloved Brazilian powerhouse. Currently ranked 84th in the world against Brazil’s 6th place standing, Haiti enters the matchup as a 30-to-1 underdog, but fans and analysts alike are pointing to soccer’s long history of stunning upsets.

    Haiti’s deep affection for Brazil’s national team stretches back more than 40 years, rooted in cultural connection and shared history. As the first Black-led republic in the world, many Haitians see themselves in Brazil’s storied legacy of Black superstars, from Pelé to Romario, Ronaldo Nazario, and Neymar — icons whose faces were painted on the bright tap-tap minibuses that crisscross Port-au-Prince for generations. It was at the 1982 World Cup that millions of Haitians first fell in love with Brazil’s iconic jogo bonito, the beautiful game, led by the legendary captain Sócrates. Subsequent decades cemented that loyalty: fans celebrated Brazil’s 1994 and 2002 World Cup titles as if they were their own, and the bond deepened in 2004 when Brazil led a United Nations peacekeeping mission to Haiti, organizing an exhibition match in Port-au-Prince that drew thousands of cheering fans lining the route from the airport to the stadium to greet Brazilian greats including Ronaldo and Roberto Carlos. Even after Haiti lost 6-0 that day, fans waved Brazilian flags in celebration of the historic visit.

    In the years since, migration has only strengthened the connection between the two nations: thousands of Haitians relocated to Brazil after the devastating 2010 earthquake, and more have settled there in recent years fleeing ongoing gang violence and political unrest back home. For Haitian diaspora communities in the U.S., who have faced years of uncertainty over immigration policy, this World Cup run has become a unifying moment of pride that puts daily struggles on hold.

    Joel Jean-Baptiste, a Haitian-American who grew up in Haiti and has supported Brazil his whole life, canceled a planned family vacation to Europe just to buy a ticket to the June 19 match. “For us, and for all Haitian kids, Brazil was number one,” he said. “Playing them in the World Cup would be — IS — the dream, a lifetime dream and has every Haitian national excited to see what’s going to happen this summer.”

    Rachelle Leger, a Haitian-American community leader in Philadelphia, summed up the prevailing mood. “It’s almost like David and Goliath — we’re going up against a giant, a huge soccer giant,” she said. “We’re not looking at it like a rival; we’re looking at it as a moment in time. We’re just savoring it, we’re really proud of Haiti making it, we’re really proud to be there to support the team, even though (Haitians) support both teams.”

    For those holding out hope for a historic upset, soccer scholar Kirk Bowman, a Georgia Tech professor who teaches courses on soccer and global politics and has written extensively on the sport’s globalization, notes that a Haitian underdog already made soccer history at the 1950 World Cup held in Brazil. That tournament, a hastily assembled U.S. team of part-time amateur players pulled off one of the biggest upsets in soccer history, beating a top-ranked England side 1-0. The game-winning goal was scored by Joe Gaetjens, a Haitian working as a dishwasher and semi-pro player in New York City. After the win, jubilant Brazilian spectators — who saw England as the main threat to their own title bid — carried Gaetjens off the field. Though Gaetjens was later killed under Haiti’s brutal Duvalier regime, his place in soccer lore endures.

    “Haiti can believe in another Haitian ‘miracle on grass,’” Bowman said. “A Haitian already had one.”

  • UN-backed court opens trial of former Central African Republic president Bozizé

    UN-backed court opens trial of former Central African Republic president Bozizé

    BANGUI, Central African Republic — A landmark trial for one of the Central African Republic’s (CAR) most divisive former leaders has gotten underway this week, as a United Nations-supported tribunal opens proceedings against ex-President François Bozizé on charges of crimes against humanity. The accusations stem from widespread atrocities carried out by state security forces between 2009 and 2013, the final years of Bozizé’s decade-long rule.

    The proceeding is the sixth trial conducted by the Special Criminal Court, a hybrid tribunal established in 2015 with UN backing to address the mass atrocities committed during decades of internal conflict in the CAR. Unlike international courts that operate outside national judicial frameworks, the tribunal is integrated into CAR’s domestic legal system, designed to build long-term accountability capacity in the country.

    Prosecutors have centered their case on systematic abuses that occurred at two high-security facilities: a prison and a military training camp in Bossembélé, a town located roughly 150 kilometers northwest of the CAR capital Bangui. As head of state and supreme commander of the country’s armed forces, Bozizé is held legally responsible for atrocities committed by his presidential guard and other loyal security units. The charges against him include a roster of grave offenses: murder, enforced disappearance, torture, sexual violence, and other crimes against humanity.

    At 79 years old, Bozizé is being tried in absentia. Since 2023, the former leader has lived in exile in Guinea-Bissau, which has repeatedly rejected the tribunal’s 2024 international arrest warrant and refused to extradite him to face judgment in his home country. Three of Bozizé’s former close military associates — Eugène Barret Ngaïkosset, Vianney Semndiro, and Firmin Junior Danboy — are also named as co-defendants in the case and are scheduled to appear in person for the duration of the trial.
    Bozizé first rose to power in 2003, when he seized control of the country via a military coup. He remained in office until 2013, when his government was toppled by the Seleka, a mostly Muslim rebel coalition. His ouster set off a wave of sectarian bloodshed that has convulsed the country for more than a decade: fighting between Seleka fighters and predominantly Christian Anti-balaka militias killed thousands of civilians and displaced millions more.
    While a formal peace agreement was reached between the government and major armed factions in 2019, more than a third of the groups that signed the deal have since withdrawn their support. Low-intensity violence between state forces, allied militias, and rebel factions continues to destabilize large swathes of the country to this day.

    For survivors of the Bossembélé abuses, the absence of the former president has cast a shadow over the historic proceeding. Maximin Lin Crozon Cazin, who was detained and tortured at the Bossembélé site during Bozizé’s rule, spoke to reporters about his disappointment that the ex-leader would not appear to answer for the alleged crimes. “It is unfortunate that François Bozizé does not have the courage to face justice in his own country,” Cazin said. “I expect this trial to establish the truth and provide reparations” for victims and their families, he added.

    Marie Edith Douzima-Lawson, the lead defense lawyer for Bozizé, declined to give detailed comments on the case ahead of opening arguments, noting only that the defense team has prepared “solid arguments” to rebut the prosecution’s claims.

    Beyond the legal and political implications of the trial, the proceedings shine a renewed spotlight on the long-running crises facing the CAR. One of the poorest nations on Earth, the country holds vast untapped mineral reserves including gold, yet nearly one in three Central African citizens lives on less than $2 USD per day. The CAR also has been a key early hub for the Russian mercenary network Wagner, which currently provides security support to current President Faustin-Archange Touadéra and leads counter-rebel operations across large parts of the country.