Global Pulse

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  • Taylor Swift files to trademark her voice amid AI clone boom

    Taylor Swift files to trademark her voice amid AI clone boom

    As artificial intelligence cloning technology grows more accessible and unregulated, global pop superstar Taylor Swift has taken official steps to shield her distinctive voice from unauthorized exploitation, joining a small but growing group of high-profile creators fighting to protect their intellectual property in the AI age.

    Swift has filed two trademark applications with the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) centered on her voice, according to filings first uncovered by intellectual property attorney Josh Gerben. The submissions include two separate sound recordings that each open with the singer’s recognizable greeting “Hey, it’s Taylor” before promoting her recently released October album *The Life of a Showgirl*. A third filing submitted Friday includes an official promotional photograph of Swift performing on stage. No additional details about the scope of the requested trademark protections have been made public in the filings, and Swift’s publicist did not immediately provide comment when reached by Agence France-Presse.

    Swift’s move mirrors a similar step taken by Academy Award-winning actor Matthew McConaughey in recent years, who filed his own USPTO application to protect his voice from unauthorized AI replication. McConaughey’s filings include audio of two of his most iconic lines: the oft-quoted “Alright, alright, alright!” from his 1993 breakout role in *Dazed and Confused*, as well as his personal mantra “Just keep livin’, right?” alongside a collection of other short signature phrases.

    The growing push for voice protection from A-list creators comes as rapid advances in generative AI have drastically lowered the barrier to creating convincing deepfake vocal clones. Where replicating a person’s voice once required hours of source recordings and days of processing, modern AI models can generate a nearly indistinguishable synthetic voice from a 30-second clip in mere seconds.

    This technological leap has sparked widespread anxiety among performers and creators, who warn that unregulated AI can duplicate their voice and likeness for unauthorized commercial use, scams, or deepfake content without any compensation or consent. In response, a handful of U.S. state legislatures have begun updating privacy and intellectual property laws to address the gap. Most existing state laws only ban malicious or for-profit unauthorized use, but a small number of regions have adopted broader protections — most notably Tennessee’s 2024 ELVIS Act, named for music icon Elvis Presley, which extends sweeping intellectual property protections to creators’ likenesses and voices.

    To date, legal action by performers against unauthorized AI cloning remains relatively rare. The highest-profile case came in 2023, when A-list actor Scarlett Johansson filed a lawsuit against the developer of the Lisa AI app. Johansson alleged the app created an unauthorized AI avatar matching her likeness to use in a commercial advertisement without her permission or compensation.

  • Man Utd beat Brentford to close on Champions League berth

    Man Utd beat Brentford to close on Champions League berth

    Manchester United has brought Champions League qualification firmly within their reach after a hard-fought 2-1 victory over Brentford at Old Trafford on Monday, with veteran midfielder Casemiro and striker Benjamin Sesko notching the decisive goals to cement the club’s grip on a top-four spot.

    The match got off to a electric start for the hosts, with Kobbie Mainoo carving open Brentford’s defensive line with a blistering 2nd-minute run, only for Amad Diallo to waste the opening chance when his close-range effort was cleared off the goal line by Sepp van den Berg. Moments later, returning from suspension, Harry Maguire came agonizingly close to scoring, his powerful looping header clawed away from the line by Brentford goalkeeper Caoimhin Kelleher.

    United’s sustained pressure finally paid off in the 11th minute, when a well-drilled corner routine ended with Casemiro finding the back of the net. Bruno Fernandes delivered the set piece to Maguire, whose header skipped past a cluster of Brentford defenders at the far post, leaving the Brazilian veteran to rise above the defense and nod home from a tight acute angle. The goal marked Casemiro’s fourth strike in his last six appearances, a reminder of the enduring quality he brings to a side that will see him depart at the end of the season when his contract expires. The 32-year-old celebrated by kissing the United club badge on his jersey, as the packed Old Trafford crowd chanted for him to extend his stay with “one more year”.

    Brentford had their chances to level before the break, though. Michael Kayode’s header forced United keeper Senne Lammens into a full-stretch save to keep the hosts ahead, while Brazilian forward Igor Thiago, who proved a constant physical threat throughout the first half, failed to convert two clear openings: he scuffed a first effort under pressure from Diogo Dalot, then saw a close-range shot stopped by Kelleher. A last-ditch challenge from United teenager Ayden Heaven on Thiago nearly resulted in an own goal, but Lammens pulled off another fine save to keep Brentford off the scoresheet.

    United capitalized on those missed opportunities to double their lead just two minutes before halftime. The counter-attack began when Diallo won a tough tackle deep in United’s own half, before Fernandes drove into the Brentford penalty area and slipped a perfectly weighted pass to Sesko, who lashed a clinical finish past Kelleher from 10 yards out. The assist pushed Fernandes’ season total to 19, leaving him one short of the all-time Premier League single-season record of 20 set jointly by Thierry Henry and Kevin De Bruyne.

    The second half saw United cede much of their territorial dominance, and Brentford finally got their goal in the 87th minute, when Mathias Jensen curled a stunning 20-yard strike past Lammens to set up a tense closing period. Carrick’s side wobbled under late pressure, but held on to secure three points: in stoppage time, Lammens comfortably clutched a Mikkel Damsgaard header to confirm the win.

    The result leaves United firmly in third place in the Premier League table, 11 points clear of sixth-placed Brighton, with the top five set to qualify for next season’s Champions League. Interim manager Michael Carrick, who took over in January after Ruben Amorim was sacked, needs just two points from United’s remaining four matches to lock in a return to Europe’s elite club competition for the first time since the 2023-24 season.

    Up next, United host bitter rivals Liverpool, who sit three points behind them in fourth, in a crunch clash that could go a long way to deciding the final top-four standings. Since stepping into the role, Carrick has stabilized the club after Amorim’s turbulent reign, putting in a strong case to be given the manager’s job on a permanent basis. Co-owner Jim Ratcliffe is currently weighing up his options for the role, and securing Champions League qualification would be a major boost to Carrick’s claim.

    The win comes on the back of a 1-0 away victory over Chelsea, which reinvigorated United’s push for a top-five spot after a dip in form that included a home defeat to Leeds and a draw at Bournemouth. For Brentford, the result extends their long barren run at Old Trafford – the London club has not won a away match at United since 1937, and their latest visit ended in disappointment after a slow opening cost them any chance of a shock result.

  • Trains collide near Jakarta, killing seven, injuring dozens

    Trains collide near Jakarta, killing seven, injuring dozens

    Rescue teams have launched an urgent search and evacuation operation after a fatal overnight collision between two trains on the outskirts of Indonesia’s capital Jakarta, which has already claimed seven lives and left more than 80 others injured, with multiple passengers still trapped inside mangled carriages.

    State-owned rail operator Kereta Api Indonesia (KAI) spokesperson Anna Purba confirmed the initial casualty count to local media early Tuesday: seven fatalities and 81 injured people, with two trapped individuals confirmed alive in the wreckage as rescue work continued.

    Survivors have described the sudden, terrifying chaos of the incident, which occurred when a long-distance intercity train struck a stationary commuter train that had been halted on the tracks near Bekasi Timur Station, roughly 25 kilometers from central Jakarta. Sausan Sarifah, a 29-year-old commuter who was admitted to RSUD Bekasi hospital with a broken arm and deep thigh laceration, recalled the harrowing moments immediately after impact. She had been traveling home from work when her train stopped at the station, and passengers had already received announcements to prepare to disembark when the collision occurred. “It all happened so fast, in a split second,” Sarifah said from her hospital bed. “There was no time to get out, and everyone ended up piled up inside the train, crushed on top of one another. I thought I was going to die. Thank God I was on top, so I could be evacuated quickly.”

    According to KAI spokesperson Franoto Wibowo, the chain of events that led to the collision began when a taxi clipped the commuter train at a nearby level crossing, forcing the train to stop abruptly on the active main line where it was subsequently hit by the oncoming long-distance service. Jakarta police chief Asep Edi Suheri added that the long-distance train collided directly with the last carriage of the commuter train, which was designated as a women-only car. All confirmed fatalities and injuries are from the commuter train; all roughly 240 passengers aboard the long-distance train were evacuated without major harm, Purba confirmed.

    Witnesses at the crash site described chaotic scenes in the immediate aftermath of the incident: rescue personnel shouted urgently for emergency equipment such as oxygen tanks, ambulances formed a long, flashing queue along the access road, and stretchers carrying injured survivors were carried out of the wreckage as hundreds of shocked onlookers gathered. The Jakarta search and rescue agency noted in an official statement that the high-force impact caused “significant damage to several train carriages”, leaving multiple passengers pinned inside the twisted metal. Rescuers from the military, local fire department, national search and rescue agency, and Indonesian Red Cross have all been deployed to the site, using specialized extrication equipment to extract trapped survivors.

    As of Tuesday morning, evacuation work was still ongoing, and officials warned that the death toll could climb. Deputy house speaker Sufmi Dasco Ahmad, who was at the crash site, told reporters: “Judging from the evacuation process that is still under way, it is possible that the number of victims may continue to rise.”

    Local hospitals are also operating at a rush to treat the influx of injured patients, with medical teams conducting triage to prioritize the most severe cases. Eva Chairista, a 39-year-old woman who traveled to RSUD Bekasi after learning her 27-year-old sister-in-law Fira was injured, described a frenzied scene as families waited for updates on their loved ones. “The doctor told us to be patient, there are many whose condition is worse than my sister-in-law’s,” she said.

    This collision is the latest serious transport accident in Indonesia, a vast archipelagic nation where chronic underinvestment and poor maintenance have left much of the public transport fleet, including trains, buses and passenger aircraft, aged and unsafe. The previous major train crash in Indonesia, which occurred in West Java province in January 2024, killed four crew members and injured roughly two dozen people. One of the deadliest level crossing accidents in the country’s recent history occurred in Jakarta in 2015, when a commuter train collided with a minibus, killing 16 people.

  • Political violence jolts the US once again – with a familiar response

    Political violence jolts the US once again – with a familiar response

    On a Saturday night at the annual White House Correspondents’ Association dinner, a gathering of journalists, politicians, and public figures at the Washington Hilton was upended by sudden gunfire, turning what is normally a lighthearted annual tradition into a scene of chaos and fear that echoed the all-too-familiar trauma of political violence that has gripped modern America.

    For many attendees, the moment of panic carried deeply personal echoes of past attacks. Erika Kirk, the widow of conservative activist Charlie Kirk who was killed in a shooting just seven months prior, was left sobbing amid the evacuation. House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, who survived a near-fatal shooting at a 2017 Republican congressional baseball practice, was immediately escorted out by security personnel. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who lost both his father and uncle to political assassinations, was also removed from the venue for his safety. Even many of the journalists present had covered or witnessed the 2024 rally shooting in Butler, Pennsylvania, where an attacker shot former President and then-candidate Donald Trump, grazing his ear before being killed by a Secret Service sniper.

    Saturday’s shooting marks the third direct assassination attempt targeting Trump, who is now serving as U.S. president. The first occurred at the Butler rally, the second at his Palm Beach golf resort in 2024, and a separate incident last year saw the Secret Service kill an armed man attempting to breach Trump’s Mar-a-Lago property while the president was out of state. For the United States, the incident has cemented a grim reality: political violence has become a persistent, omnipresent threat that can strike any gathering, no matter how high-profile or protected, at any time.

    In the immediate aftermath of the shooting, the familiar cycle of response to political violence played out rapidly. Speaking from the scene Saturday night, Trump called for national unity and a toning down of divisive political rhetoric, a moment that even some of his critics acknowledged struck the right tone. A Wall Street Journal editorial noted that Trump’s post-shooting comments hit the right notes of gratitude and mutual respect. But by Sunday evening, that call for unity quickly dissolved into familiar partisan friction during a primetime interview on CBS’s *60 Minutes*. In the sit-down, Trump blamed Democrats for cultivating a cultural atmosphere that he claimed enabled the attack, and went on to deride interviewer Norah O’Donnell as “a disgrace” and “horrible” after she pressed him on the alleged gunman’s published manifesto. On the left, unfounded conspiracy theories quickly circulated online claiming the attack had been staged to boost Trump’s political standing, fueled by fears of coming crackdowns on political activism and free speech.

    Within days, the Trump administration and its congressional Republican allies had moved to tie the shooting directly to one of the president’s long-standing policy priorities: constructing a large, fortified new ballroom on the site of the White House’s former East Wing. In a social media post Sunday, Trump explicitly framed Saturday’s attack as direct justification for the project, writing that the incident was “exactly the reason” the new ballroom was needed. In a formal letter to the historic preservation group that has filed a lawsuit blocking the project, Assistant Attorney General Brett Shumate argued that the current venue arrangements put the president, his family, and his staff at grave risk, writing that the preservation group’s legal challenge directly endangers those lives. Top congressional Republicans have already pledged to introduce new legislation that would explicitly authorize the construction, with House Speaker Mike Johnson telling Fox News Monday that the fortified ballroom would provide a safe, secure venue for events like the White House Correspondents’ Dinner itself.

    But experts and observers note that a new, fortified White House ballroom alone cannot resolve the core security gaps exposed by Saturday’s shooting. Key unanswered questions remain: how was the suspected gunman able to bring weapons into a venue hosting the sitting president and dozens of top government officials? Was the Secret Service’s established security perimeter sufficient for the event? Should all guests in all areas of the hotel, not just the dinner ballroom, have been screened for weapons ahead of time? In response to these open questions, White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles has scheduled an early-week meeting with top Secret Service officials to review existing protocols and security practices for all major presidential events, including the upcoming 250th U.S. centennial celebrations scheduled for this summer.

    The shooting has also reshaped Trump’s approach to public campaigning ahead of the looming midterm elections. Following the 2024 Butler rally shooting, Trump drastically scaled back his large outdoor public rallies, a signature staple of his political career. Since taking office, he has favored small, closed-door events at secure military bases and smaller indoor venues, moving all large public appearances to enclosed arenas that allow the Secret Service to more rigorously screen all attendees. But with midterms approaching, political strategists note that Trump will face mounting pressure to return to the campaign trail to energize his base, which historically sees lower turnout in non-presidential election years when Trump is not on the ballot. While a more cautious, closed-off approach to public appearances may reduce the president’s personal security risk, it could carry a significant political cost for his party in the upcoming elections.

  • King to defend ‘democratic values’ as US state visit begins

    King to defend ‘democratic values’ as US state visit begins

    More than 19 years have passed since the last British state visit to the United States, and on Monday, King Charles III and Queen Camilla touched down at Maryland’s Andrews Air Force Base to kick off a four-day diplomatic mission focused on mending strained transatlantic relations and reinforcing shared democratic values.

    The royal couple was greeted on the tarmac by senior U.S. protocol official Monica Crowley, British Ambassador to the U.S. Sir Christian Turner, and other high-ranking dignitaries. Two local children presented the pair with bouquets, before a military band performed both the British and American national anthems to mark the formal start of the visit. From the airbase, the delegation traveled directly to the White House, where President Donald Trump and First Lady Melania Trump welcomed the royals on the building’s iconic South Portico, where ongoing renovation work is currently underway.

    Following the formal welcome, the visitors joined the Trumps for tea in the White House Green Room, before touring the grounds to view a newly expanded beehive shaped like a miniature White House. The customized installation was a deliberate nod to King Charles’ longstanding public advocacy for bee conservation and sustainable beekeeping, a small personal touch woven into official diplomatic programming.

    This state visit, organized at the request of the UK government, comes as the United States prepares to mark its 250th anniversary of independence, and is framed as a deliberate soft power push to strengthen bilateral ties that have been tested in recent months. Tensions have flared between the Trump administration and UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s government over the UK’s refusal to deepen military involvement in the ongoing Iran conflict, creating a rocky backdrop for the diplomatic talks.

    In a nod to shared transatlantic history, Queen Camilla wore a historic union jack-stars and stripes brooch originally gifted to Queen Elizabeth II by the Mayor of New York during a 1957 state visit. That 1957 trip was itself a mission to rebuild UK-U.S. relations after the 1956 Suez Crisis split the two allies over Middle East policy, making the brooch a quiet symbolic reference to past diplomatic reconciliations.

    After their White House stop, the royal couple traveled to the British Embassy in Washington D.C. for a garden party hosting more than 600 guests with cross-Atlantic ties, drawn from political, scientific, charitable and military circles. Even the menu carried diplomatic weight: the beef served in traditional tea sandwiches came from the first batch of tariff-free British beef imported to the U.S. under a recently finalized bilateral trade agreement. Attendees included former U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Senator Ted Cruz, and UK Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper.

    Queen Camilla dedicated a significant portion of her time at the garden party to meeting with women’s advocacy leaders working to combat domestic abuse. Sandra Jackson, a representative of U.S.-based support organization House of Ruth, which aids survivors of domestic violence, spoke after the meeting about the Queen’s longstanding commitment to the cause. “It’s very important to have such advocates and it’s a cause very close to her heart,” Jackson said, adding that she respected the royal household’s decision not to arrange a meeting with survivors of Jeffrey Epstein, a choice made to avoid interfering with ongoing legal proceedings related to the case. Michelle DeLaune, another anti-domestic abuse campaigner in attendance, noted that high-profile royal engagement on the issue marked meaningful progress in elevating public awareness of the crisis.

    Heading into the second day of the visit on Tuesday, King Charles is set to become the first British monarch to address a joint session of the U.S. Congress since Queen Elizabeth II spoke to lawmakers in 1991. The address comes just days after a shooting at a Washington D.C. event attended by President Trump, and royal sources confirm the King will open his remarks by expressing sympathy for the victims of the attack. Heavy security remains in place across the city following the Saturday incident.

    In his prepared remarks, the King is expected to acknowledge current policy disagreements between the U.S. and UK, while emphasizing that the two allies have a long history of overcoming differences to work together. He will call for reconciliation and renewal of the bilateral partnership, and urge joint action to defend shared values of tolerance, liberty and equality. Royal sources say the King will frame the transatlantic alliance as rooted in a commitment to compassion, peace, interfaith understanding, and mutual respect, and will reaffirm British commitment to NATO collective defense and support for Ukraine in its war against Russian invasion.

    After the congressional address, the visit will continue with a formal ceremonial military welcome at the White House, followed by a state dinner hosted by President Trump that will bring together political leaders and public figures from both nations.

  • Man pleads guilty to murder 2 decades after death of Run DMC’s Jam Master Jay

    Man pleads guilty to murder 2 decades after death of Run DMC’s Jam Master Jay

    It has been 21 years since one of hip-hop’s most iconic pioneers was gunned down in a Queens recording studio, and the long-running legal saga over his killing has taken a major turn. On Monday, 52-year-old Jay Bryant entered a guilty plea to a murder charge in connection with the 2002 ambush shooting of Jason “Jam Master Jay” Mizell, the legendary DJ of groundbreaking rap group Run-DMC.

    Bryant’s plea reversal marks a major development in a case that stumped investigators for nearly two decades. According to court proceedings, Bryant admitted to federal magistrates in New York that he aided the two co-defendants who planned the killing by helping them sneak into the studio building undetected. Prosecutors allege Bryant unlocked a back fire door to let the gunmen enter, avoiding the standard studio buzz-in system that would have alerted Mizell to their arrival. Crucially, Bryant acknowledged he knew the pair intended to use a gun to kill the 37-year-old rapper that day, and he issued an apology in court, per US media reports. He stopped short of naming any additional co-conspirators in the killing.

    DNA evidence linked Bryant to the crime scene: investigators found his genetic profile on a hat left inside the recording studio shortly after the shooting. Bryant originally pleaded not guilty when he was formally indicted in 2023, and court documents filed late last week were the first public signal that he planned to reverse his plea as part of an ongoing negotiation deal with federal prosecutors.

    The killing of Jam Master Jay has a tangled procedural history. In 2002, Mizell was shot in the head inside his Queens recording studio, a killing that sent immediate shockwaves through the global music industry. As a founding member of Run-DMC — the genre-shaping group that produced 1980s hits including *It’s Tricky*, *It’s Like That*, and the genre-bending Aerosmith collaboration *Walk This Way* that brought hip-hop to mainstream American audiences — Mizell’s death cut short a transformative career and pushed the iconic group to disband. The case went cold for nearly 20 years, before federal prosecutors finally brought charges against three men: Bryant, Mizell’s godson Karl Jordan Jr., and Mizell’s childhood friend Ronald Washington.

    In 2024, both Jordan and Washington were convicted of murder by a jury. Prosecutors argued the pair planned the “execution-style” killing as an act of revenge, after Mizell cut them out of a nearly $200,000 drug deal, framing the murder as driven by greed and vengeance. Both men have always denied any involvement in the killing. Last year, a judge threw out Jordan’s conviction, ruling that prosecutors had failed to sufficiently prove the alleged motive that was central to their case. Washington has also filed a legal challenge to overturn his own conviction.

    Bryant, who was accused of acting solely as an accomplice to Jordan and Washington, now faces a sentence of 15 to 20 years in prison. This sentence accounts for both the murder charge and separate, unrelated weapons and drug offenses he is also charged with. Hip-hop communities and music industry observers have continued to follow the case closely for decades, as the slow unraveling of the 20-year-old mystery brings the closest thing to closure for Mizell’s legacy, 21 years after his sudden death.

  • Bahrain revokes citizenship of 69 people in connection with Iran war

    Bahrain revokes citizenship of 69 people in connection with Iran war

    In a sweeping move that has drawn sharp condemnation from global human rights advocates, Bahrain’s King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa has issued a royal directive stripping 69 people of their Bahraini citizenship over accusations of sympathizing with Iran and collaborating with hostile foreign entities. The decision, legalized under a provision of Bahraini nationality law that permits citizenship revocation for individuals found to harm the kingdom’s interests or violate their duty of loyalty to the state, includes not only the accused individuals but also their dependent family members.

    According to the official text of the directive, all 69 people affected are categorized as “of non-Bahraini origin.” Campaigners speaking to Middle East Eye confirm that the majority of those targeted belong to the Ajami community, long-standing ethnic populations across Gulf Arab states whose ancestry traces back to southern Iran. This mass revocation marks the first large-scale action of its kind in Bahrain in more than seven years, per records from the Bahrain Institute for Rights and Democracy (BIRD), a London-based human rights organization.

    Citizenship revocation is far from a new tactic in Bahrain, BIRD’s data shows. Between 2012 and 2019, the Bahraini government stripped citizenship from at least 990 citizens, leaving most legally stateless under international human rights standards. Many of those previously disenfranchised were prominent human rights defenders, independent journalists, and respected religious scholars. In a 2019 gesture, King Hamad reinstated citizenship to 551 of those affected, but hundreds remain without formal nationality to this day.

    Bahraini-Danish human rights activist Maryam al-Khawaja, a prominent critic of the Al Khalifa ruling family, called the latest decision a blatant act of political oppression. “This is a tool the Al Khalifa ruling family has used for decades to target dissidents, as well as the wider Shia population in the country,” al-Khawaja told Middle East Eye. She emphasized that the entire process proceeded without any form of due process, leaving dozens of people and their families stateless while residing within Bahrain’s borders. Without citizenship, those affected are barred from accessing core public services, including government-funded primary education, public healthcare, and formal state housing support.

    Sayed Ahmed Alwadaei, a senior representative of BIRD, added that many of the people named in the royal directive have never been arrested or interrogated over the alleged offenses. There is also no formal legal pathway for those affected to challenge or appeal the ruling, a flaw that Alwadaei says leaves targeted populations extremely vulnerable to abuse and often forces the separation of family members.

    The mass revocation comes in the wake of two key regional and domestic developments. First, it was announced just days after King Hamad chaired a high-level emergency meeting with senior government officials to discuss new crackdown measures targeting individuals accused of “betraying the nation.” It also followed a diplomatic meeting between King Hamad and Kuwait’s foreign minister. Kuwait has been carrying out its own widespread campaign of citizenship revocation in recent months, a move that rights groups warn could impact hundreds of thousands of Kuwaiti residents, and the process has accelerated sharply since the outbreak of the Israel-U.S. war on Iran two months ago.

    Al-Khawaja notes that Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) regimes have exploited the ongoing regional conflict to escalate internal repression against perceived opposition groups. “Unfortunately, since the beginning of the war on Iran, the GCC regimes have taken this as an opportunity to crack down even harder,” she said.

    The regional context of the decision is unambiguous: In retaliation for the two-month-old U.S.-Israeli war on Iran, Iran launched a large-scale barrage of missiles and drones targeting GCC states, including Bahrain. The attacks left at least three Bahrainis dead and dozens more wounded, with damage reported across the island kingdom from direct impacts and falling debris from intercepted anti-missile projectiles.

    Since the outbreak of the conflict, Bahraini authorities have already ramped up domestic arrests. BIRD has documented over 200 arrests since the war began, though the organization notes the true number is likely higher due to a pattern of enforced disappearances. Arrests have targeted people who participated in anti-government protests, as well as ordinary social media users who shared footage of Iranian attacks on their personal accounts.

    One high-profile incident that has already sparked public outrage is the death of 32-year-old Mohamed al-Mosawi in government custody last month. Al-Mosawi was forcibly disappeared alongside several friends amid the post-war crackdown linked to Iran. Photographs and video evidence reviewed by Middle East Eye show extensive bruising and trauma across al-Mosawi’s face and body, leading protesters to accuse authorities of torturing him to death. In response to public anger, Bahraini investigators recently charged one intelligence officer with assault in connection with the interrogation that led to al-Mosawi’s death.

  • Nations have chance to break ‘fossil fuel mindset’: Mary Robinson

    Nations have chance to break ‘fossil fuel mindset’: Mary Robinson

    As a former Irish president who has witnessed decades of global political and environmental shifts, Mary Robinson is positioning the upcoming high-level fossil fuel phaseout conference in Santa Marta, Colombia, as an unprecedented turning point in the global fight against climate change. Speaking to Agence France-Presse ahead of the April 28-29 gathering, the veteran climate advocate says the summit comes at a uniquely opportune moment: amid ongoing global energy market chaos sparked by the Iran conflict, the meeting is throwing a stark spotlight on the steep dangers of continued reliance on coal, oil, and gas — a burden that falls heaviest on the low-income communities Robinson has spent her career championing.

    Robinson, a member of The Elders, a collective of former global leaders founded by Nelson Mandela, served as the United Nations Special Envoy for Climate Change when the landmark Paris Agreement was signed in 2015. When asked whether the Santa Marta gathering, which emerged from widespread frustration with slow progress in the UN-led climate negotiation process, undermines the role of the annual Conference of the Parties (COP), Robinson pushed back on that framing. She emphasized that the COP process remains irreplaceable for global climate coordination, noting that the Colombia conference was never intended to replace UN talks — instead, it is designed to complement and accelerate the multilateral process.

    She pointed to the failed outcome of COP30 in Belém, where fossil fuel lobbying blocked any official agreement to include explicit language referencing a phaseout of fossil fuels, as the core catalyst for organizing the Santa Marta summit. What was not foreseen when the conference was planned, Robinson noted, was the eruption of one of the most severe global oil and gas crises in modern history. This unexpected timing has only amplified the meeting’s urgency, she argued, making it the ideal moment to break through decades of entrenched “fossil fuel mindset” and accelerate the global transition to renewable, clean energy systems. “It’s the way we have to go, it’s the way we are going, but we need to go far much faster,” she said.

    Unlike formal UN climate talks, the Santa Marta conference is not structured around binding, text-by-text negotiations, Robinson explained, which gives participants unprecedented space to collaborate on actionable action. Stakeholders from across sectors — national governments, sub-national governing bodies, private industry, civil society groups, and grassroots activists gathering for the concurrent People’s Summit — are attending ready to share concrete commitments they are prepared to implement, rather than haggling over negotiating language. This open, action-oriented dynamic, Robinson said, makes it likely the summit will spawn new coalitions of actors committed to moving rapidly away from fossil fuels, creating a new, results-first momentum that has been missing from global climate talks to date.

    When addressing concerns that hundreds of millions of people around the world still depend on fossil fuels for basic energy access, Robinson tied that reliance directly to the current energy crisis: the ongoing conflict has cut off roughly 20 percent of global oil and gas supplies, sending prices soaring and leaving the world’s poorest communities facing the steepest costs. Farmers have been hit particularly hard by skyrocketing fertilizer prices tied to fossil fuel markets, highlighting that continued reliance on dirty energy offers no long-term path to energy security or stable livelihoods. This reality, she argued, makes the Santa Marta conference a uniquely critical moment to build momentum for change.

    Robinson also addressed the growing pressure many governments face to expand fossil fuel production in response to the current energy crisis, arguing that far too many policy decisions around energy security are not grounded in the urgent warnings climate scientists have issued for decades. Drawing a parallel to the COVID-19 pandemic, where most nations relied on top chief medical officers to guide policy, Robinson called on all governments to appoint chief planetary scientists to provide authoritative, science-based guidance for climate and energy policy. “During COVID, lots of countries had chief medical officers, and we listened because we were scared. They had a lot of authority,” she noted. “We’re in the same position. We haven’t thought it through yet, but we are.”

    While the latest climate science paints a deeply alarming picture, with the planet approaching irreversible tipping points faster than many researchers predicted, Robinson says she retains cautious optimism for the future. That optimism was crystallized during a scientific expedition to Greenland, where she had a transformative experience listening to a glacier calve — the process where large chunks of ice break off into the ocean as temperatures rise. She described hearing sounds like thunder as a large section of ice split off, followed by smaller cracks that echoed like rifle shots, and found herself crying as the reality of human-caused climate change hit home. That moment, she said, underscored both the urgency of the crisis and the need to seize every available opportunity to act. With the open, action-focused space provided by the Santa Marta conference, the global community finally has a chance to build the momentum needed to accelerate the transition away from fossil fuels, she argued, and leaders must not waste this opening.

  • Terror trial to begin for man accused of plotting attack on Taylor Swift concert

    Terror trial to begin for man accused of plotting attack on Taylor Swift concert

    A high-stakes terror trial targeting one of the world’s biggest entertainment events has opened in Austria, after a last-minute tip from U.S. intelligence agencies prevented what Taylor Swift has described as an imminent large-scale massacre at her 2024 Vienna Eras Tour concerts.

    Two 21-year-old Austrian men are standing before a court in Wiener Neustadt, a city just south of the Austrian capital Vienna, in connection with the foiled attack. The lead defendant, identified only as Beran A. under Austrian privacy rules, faces a slate of serious charges including membership in a designated terrorist organization, planning a mass terrorist attack at the concerts, spreading jihadist propaganda, pledging allegiance to the Islamic State (IS) terror group, illegally manufacturing explosive materials, and attempting to acquire banned weapons. Prosecutors allege that Beran A. obtained online instructions to build a shrapnel bomb using triacetone triperoxide, or TATP — an explosive commonly used in high-profile IS attacks — and received hands-on explosives training from other IS operatives. He also made repeated attempts to purchase illegal firearms and a hand grenade from underground dealers for the planned attack, according to official charging documents.

    The second defendant, Arda K., is accused of being a co-conspirator in Beran A.’s IS-aligned terror cell. Prosecutors confirm the pair not only plotted the concert attack but also planned additional assaults in three major international destinations: Mecca, Istanbul, and Dubai. If convicted on all charges, both men — who were teenagers when the plot was first developed — could face up to 20 years behind bars. A third co-defendant, a teenage Syrian national identified as Mohammed A., was already sentenced to an 18-month suspended prison term in Germany last year for assisting the plot: he translated bomb-making instructions from Arabic for Beran A. and connected him to an active IS member. The current trial in Austria is scheduled to run through late May 2026.

    The plot was derailed only by a timely tip-off from the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, which alerted Austrian authorities to the plan just 24 hours before the first scheduled concert on August 7, 2024. Beran A. was taken into custody that same day, and law enforcement ultimately arrested three total suspects linked to the conspiracy ahead of the shows. In the wake of the arrests, Austrian officials and Swift’s team made the decision to cancel all three sold-out performances at Vienna’s Ernst Happel Stadium, which were expected to draw a total audience of more than 195,000 fans from across Europe. The cancellation left thousands of disappointed Swift fans gathering in central Vienna, where they sang the singer’s hits and traded the Taylor Swift-themed friendship bracelets that have become a staple of the Eras Tour experience.

    Details of the close call were revealed in Swift’s new Disney+ documentary about her record-breaking Eras Tour, with the pop superstar sharing her first-hand account of the moment she learned of the plot. Speaking to reporters including the BBC at the documentary’s New York premiere, Swift said the tour narrowly “dodged a massacre situation” thanks to the intervention of intelligence and law enforcement. After two decades of performing, she noted, fearing for the safety of her audience was an unprecedented experience. In a social media post shared immediately after the 2024 cancellation, she reflected on the mixed emotions of the moment: “Having our Vienna shows cancelled was devastating. But I was also so grateful to the authorities because thanks to them, we were grieving concerts and not lives.”

    The Eras Tour, which wrapped its 149-show global run in December 2024 after launching in March 2023, made history as the first concert tour to surpass $1 billion in total ticket sales, drawing more than 10.1 million attendees across five continents.

  • ‘Hands and feet tied up’: Indonesia police probe alleged abuse at childcare centre

    ‘Hands and feet tied up’: Indonesia police probe alleged abuse at childcare centre

    For thousands of Indonesian parents, childcare centres are a trusted solution for balancing work and childcare, promising safe, nurturing environments for vulnerable young children. But a shocking police raid last week on a popular daycare in the city of Yogyakarta has torn back the curtain on a years-long pattern of alleged abuse and neglect that has rocked the nation and ignited urgent calls for sweeping oversight reform.

    The case centers on Little Aresha, a childcare facility marketed to local families as a premium center boasting well-equipped classrooms and a wide range of developmental play activities. For years, families like that of civil servant Noorman placed their full trust in the center. Noorman first enrolled his daughter there in 2022, drawn by the center’s polished branding, air-conditioned facilities, and the warm, approachable demeanor of the foundation’s leader. When his son was born, he enrolled the three-month-old infant at Little Aresha in 2024, never suspecting the harm that could be occurring behind closed doors.

    Small red flags appeared in hindsight: Noorman noticed unexplained cuts on his daughter’s chin and bruises on her hands, but center staff dismissed the injuries as accidents that happened at home. Another parent, Budiyanto, who enrolled his 18-month-old daughter at Little Aresha, also observed regular unexplained bruising, which staff blamed on bites from other children — an explanation he accepted as normal for group toddler care. Noorman also noticed his children consistently came home ravenous, even after he packed full lunches for them, and his infant son failed to gain weight as expected; the child was recently diagnosed with pneumonia.

    The nightmare came to light last Friday, when Noorman received an urgent panicked phone call from a friend: police were raiding Little Aresha, and he needed to collect his children immediately. When he arrived, investigators showed him graphic footage from the raid: young children with bound hands and feet, naked except for their diapers. These disturbing accounts have been corroborated by police, who confirmed the raid was launched after a whistleblower former employee filed an official report documenting inhumane treatment of children at the facility.

    Rizki Adrian, head of Yogyakarta Police’s criminal investigation unit, told reporters that investigators recovered clear physical evidence of mistreatment, including bound children and visible injuries on multiple toddlers. The facility was structured in a way that defied basic safety regulations: tiny 3-meter-wide rooms were crammed with as many as 20 children at a time. Of the 103 children officially enrolled at Little Aresha, authorities confirm at least 53 are confirmed victims of physical abuse and neglect, the vast majority under two years old.

    One viral TikTok posted by parent Erika Rismay, which has amassed more than 300,000 views, has put a human face on the alleged abuse. In the video, Rismay’s young daughter recounts how staff tied her hands and feet and covered her mouth to stop her from crying. “So I wouldn’t cry. So Mummy wouldn’t hear me crying,” the girl told her mother, who responded in the caption with devastating guilt: “Oh Allah, my child, forgive me. No wonder every day when you left for school you always cried hysterically, and when you came home you were silent and spaced out, like you had been hypnotised.”

    Following the raid, police questioned 30 center staff and officials, ultimately arresting 13 people — including the center’s principal, the head of the Little Aresha Foundation, and multiple caregivers — on child protection charges. Investigators have confirmed Little Aresha never held a valid operating license, a common issue across Indonesia’s childcare sector. The center has remained closed since the raid and has not issued any public response to the allegations.

    Local authorities have moved quickly to support affected families: Yogyakarta’s government has ordered comprehensive physical and psychological evaluations for all alleged child victims, and trauma support services will also be provided to grieving parents. Noorman, like many families, is calling for a full, transparent investigation and harsh punishment for anyone found responsible. “It’s inhumane. We’ve been entrusting him to the centre,” he said. “Not only my own child, but there were dozens of toddlers who were treated in such inhumane ways.”

    The scandal has reignited long-simmering public anger over child safety in Indonesian childcare, and prompted renewed calls for stricter industry regulation. This is not the first high-profile case of abuse at an Indonesian daycare: in 2024, a facility in Depok, south of Jakarta, faced national scrutiny after viral security camera footage captured two toddlers being mistreated by staff. A subsequent investigation by the Indonesian Child Protection Commission (KPAI) found that fewer than 20% of the more than 100 daycare centers in Depok held valid operating licenses. Nationwide, KPAI estimates there are roughly 3,000 childcare centers across the country, the majority of which operate without formal approval, just like Little Aresha.

    Yogyakarta Mayor Hasto Wardoyo has already pledged to inspect every childcare facility in the city and launch a public education campaign to help families identify licensed, verified providers. A local lawmaker has called for a full, independent probe into the Little Aresha case, describing the allegations as “truly unforgivable”. Public reaction on social media has been fierce, with many users calling for mandatory real-time security camera access for parents, and criticizing staff who mistreated vulnerable children. “If you can’t handle how kids naturally act, then don’t work there,” one Facebook user wrote.