Global Pulse

分类： world

  • Gunmen attack airport in Niger’s capital as explosions, gunfire heard

    Gunmen attack airport in Niger’s capital as explosions, gunfire heard

    In the early hours of Thursday, heavily armed gunmen launched an assault on Diori Hamani International Airport, the primary air gateway for Niger’s capital city of Niamey, triggering intense exchanges of gunfire and powerful explosions that shook the surrounding area, according to on-the-ground witnesses and a senior national security official.

    The anonymous security official, who is not permitted to speak publicly about ongoing operational matters, confirmed that the attackers successfully breached the airport’s outer security perimeter before forces were rapidly deployed to counter the assault. At this early stage of investigations, the identity and affiliation of the assailants remain unconfirmed, with no immediate claims of responsibility emerging from any militant group.

    Following the conclusion of the initial clash, an Associated Press reporter on site observed that Nigerian soldiers had established extensive checkpoints on all major access roads leading to the airport, conducting thorough searches of every passing vehicle and pedestrian as part of post-attack security sweeps.

    Thursday’s incident marks the second high-profile attack targeting the Niamey airport facility in 2024. Back in January, the Islamic State group claimed credit for a near-identical strike that specifically targeted Niger’s unmanned aerial drone assets stationed at the airport. In the wake of that earlier assault, military authorities announced they had significantly strengthened security protocols and patrols across the airport complex.

    The airport itself holds far more than civilian aviation significance: it houses a major Nigerien Air Force base, and serves as the operational headquarters for the joint military command of the Alliance of Sahel States (AES), the regional bloc formed by Niger, Burkina Faso and Mali. All three nations are currently governed by military juntas that took power via coups in recent years, and all three have grappled with a years-long surge in deadly jihadi insurgent violence that has destabilized large swathes of the Sahel region.

    Security analysts warn that despite stepped up defensive measures, militant groups continue to pose severe, persistent threats to high-profile targets across Niger and the broader Sahel. Beverly Ochieng, a senior security analyst at global risk consulting firm Control Risks, noted that the airport’s central role as the AES headquarters makes it an especially attractive symbolic target for extremist groups seeking to undermine the regional alliance’s security operations.

    “The symbolism of the airport as headquarters for AES will drive intent by militants to target it,” Ochieng explained.

    The ongoing instability comes amid a broader shift in regional geopolitics, as the three junta-led Sahel nations have cut military cooperation with Western powers including France and the United States, and moved closer to other global powers including Russia, while still struggling to contain the expanding jihadi insurgency that has killed thousands and displaced millions across the region since 2012.

  • Moscow hit by largest Ukrainian attack since start of Russia’s full-scale war

    Moscow hit by largest Ukrainian attack since start of Russia’s full-scale war

    Nearly four and a half years after Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the largest recorded Ukrainian drone assault on the Russian capital has sent thick plumes of smoke billowing over Moscow’s skyline, marking a dramatic escalation of Kyiv’s long-range strike campaign against targets deep inside Russian territory. Close to 200 unmanned aerial vehicles targeted sites across the Moscow region in the coordinated attack, which Ukrainian officials have framed as a direct retaliation for a recent Russian strike that destroyed a major religious landmark in Kyiv.\n\nLocal Moscow region governor Andrei Vorobyov confirmed that 17 civilians sustained injuries in the assault. The Kapotnya oil refinery in southeast Moscow, a key energy infrastructure site, was hit for the third time in just one month and the second time this week, triggering large-scale fires that turned the sky black with toxic smoke. Footage circulating widely on social media — despite Russian government bans on publishing imagery of drone strike aftermath — captured an oil storage tank lid blown dozens of meters into the air by the force of the explosion. Falling drone debris also sparked a fire at a nearby shopping mall and forced evacuation of multiple residential high-rise buildings. All four of Moscow’s major commercial airports suspended operations for several hours, disrupting more than 500 incoming and outgoing flights that were either canceled or delayed.\n\nBeyond the Moscow region, the assault extended across other parts of Russia. An oil depot in the southern Rostov region was struck, killing one civilian, according to preliminary official reports. Russia’s Ministry of Defense claimed that its air defense systems intercepted and destroyed nearly 1,000 drones and four Ukrainian cruise missiles across the entire country over a 24-hour period surrounding the attack. These numbers have not been independently verified, and Ukraine has not confirmed the total volume of munitions launched in the operation.\n\nUkrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy openly claimed responsibility for the strike, referring to the assault on the Moscow region as “long-range sanctions,” Kyiv’s standard euphemism for long-distance strikes on Russian territory. He emphasized that the large-scale attack was a direct response to last week’s Russian bombardment of Kyiv that left a prominent religious landmark engulfed in flames. “We don’t want this war and have never wanted it,” Zelenskyy said in remarks following the assault. “But if Ukraine burns, your Moscow will burn too.” He added that a diplomatic end to the conflict remains Kyiv’s goal, urging Russia to take necessary steps toward negotiated peace.\n\nThe mass drone strike marks a clear milestone in the evolution of Kyiv’s long-range strike capabilities. Strikes on Moscow, located roughly 310 miles from the Ukrainian border, were rare just two years ago: Ukraine’s first successful drone attacks on the capital only began in spring 2023, and early strikes were sporadic, usually involving fewer than five drones. As Ukraine has expanded its domestic drone production and improved its long-range technology, attacks on Russian core territory have grown steadily more frequent and larger in scale. While Russia has constructed layered air defense networks around Moscow in response to the growing threat, the sheer number of drones deployed in this latest assault allowed multiple weapons to penetrate the defensive shield and hit intended targets.\n\nThe strike campaign against Moscow and other major Russian cities aligns with Zelenskyy’s stated strategy of “bringing the war home” to ordinary Russian citizens, who have largely been shielded from direct impacts of the conflict that their country launched. While the grinding war of attrition continues along the hundreds of kilometers of front line in eastern and southern Ukraine, most Russians have experienced little direct disruption to daily life — a reality that Kyiv is seeking to change with deep strikes on infrastructure and population centers.\n\nIn a tit-for-tat escalation, Kyiv confirmed that Russia launched its own large-scale overnight assault following the Moscow attack, deploying more than 200 drones and multiple ballistic missiles across Ukrainian territory. No immediate casualty figures for this retaliatory strike were released as of the latest reports.\n\nRussian President Vladimir Putin has not issued any public statement on the large-scale attack on the capital. At the time of the assault, Putin was hosting a summit of Southeast Asian leaders in the central Russian city of Kazan, hundreds of kilometers east of Moscow.\n\nUkrainian Foreign Minister Andriy Sybiha amplified Kyiv’s messaging in a post on the social platform X, directly addressing residents of Moscow. “One of the most popular questions asked by Muscovites this morning is ‘What is going on?’” Sybiha wrote. “I can answer. Your country started a war of aggression against ours. For years, it has been killing our people. Now that you know what’s going on, ask Putin when he is planning to end it.”

  • Suspected gang leader shot dead in flower bouquet ambush at airport

    Suspected gang leader shot dead in flower bouquet ambush at airport

    On a recent Wednesday in Ecuador’s largest coastal metropolis Guayaquil, a brutal midday assassination outside José Joaquín de Olmedo International Airport’s arrivals terminal has sent new shockwaves through a country already grappling with an unrelenting crisis of gang-fueled violence. The victim, identified by Ecuadorian Interior Minister John Reimberg as 39-year-old Carlos Alberto Suástegui Villanueva, was the leader of the El Triunfo faction of Los Águilas — one of the most violent criminal organizations operating in the South American nation. Security camera footage from the airport captured the chilling premeditation of the attack: two young assailants waited patiently for their target outside the terminal, concealing their weapon beneath a stuffed teddy bear alongside a bouquet of flowers to avoid raising suspicion. As Suástegui exited the arrivals area, one attacker stepped forward, drew the hidden firearm, and fired multiple shots at point-blank range, before both suspects fled the scene, with the second gunman firing a final shot at the fallen victim as they ran. The chaotic immediate aftermath of the shooting left passengers and bystanders scrambling for safety. Local newspaper El Universo reported that crowds scattered in panic when gunfire rang out; one innocent bystander suffered a non-fatal injury, and viral footage from the scene shows a traveler pulling a suitcase collapsing to the ground amid the chaos. In the wake of the attack, law enforcement authorities closed the arrivals terminal for more than two hours to allow forensic investigators and police officers to process the crime scene, and have since taken two teenagers into custody in connection with the assassination. This brazen public killing is the latest high-profile incident in a years-long surge of organized criminal violence that has remade Ecuador’s security landscape. The attack comes just 24 hours after Ecuadorian President Daniel Noboa announced a new state of emergency covering 10 of the country’s provinces, including Guayas — the administrative region where Guayaquil is located. Los Águilas, the gang Suástegui led, was formally classified as a terrorist organization by the Noboa administration in 2024, and the group has long been linked to large-scale drug trafficking and systematic extortion operations across the country. Geographic location has made Ecuador a critical transshipment hub for cocaine: the country sits between Colombia and Peru, the world’s top two producers of coca leaf, the raw material for cocaine, and criminal groups have exploited weak governance and under-resourced law enforcement to turn Ecuador into the primary corridor for smuggling cocaine to consumer markets in the United States, Europe, and other global destinations. What was once considered one of the safest countries in South America has over the past decade transformed into a regional crime hotspot, boasting one of the highest homicide rates in the entire Western Hemisphere. Guayaquil, the country’s economic and population center, has been disproportionately impacted by drug and gang-related bloodshed, but even by local standards, the assassination of a high-profile gang leader in broad daylight outside one of the country’s busiest international airports has deeply rattled local communities. President Noboa took office on a promise to crack down on rampant organized crime, and his administration has relied heavily on declarations of states of emergency to grant expanded powers to security forces, including the authority to search private residences without a warrant when officers have reasonable suspicion of illegal activity. Despite these aggressive policy measures, Ecuador’s national murder rate climbed to an all-time record high in 2025, demonstrating the stubborn persistence of the country’s security crisis.

  • Clouds of black smoke rise over Moscow after Ukrainian drones hit an oil refinery

    Clouds of black smoke rise over Moscow after Ukrainian drones hit an oil refinery

    In one of the most extensive Ukrainian drone strikes against Russian infrastructure since Moscow launched its full-scale invasion more than four years ago, Ukraine targeted a critical Moscow oil refinery for the second time in seven days and forced a temporary suspension of commercial flights at multiple capital airports, senior Russian officials confirmed Thursday.

    The coordinated attack unfolded just hours after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy announced he had completed a high-stakes coordination call with his counterparts from the United States and France, and secured firm new commitments of additional military and diplomatic backing from G7 leaders gathering for their annual summit. Later Thursday, Zelenskyy was scheduled to arrive in Brussels for urgent talks with NATO and European Union leadership, where a top agenda item will be negotiating the framework for a pan-European ballistic missile defense shield. Russia has launched relentless barrages of these hard-to-intercept missiles against Ukrainian civilian and military infrastructure for months.

    For months, Ukraine has systematically targeted Russian energy facilities as part of a deliberate strategy to erode the Kremlin’s war revenue and bring the tangible consequences of the invasion home to ordinary Russian citizens. The tactic has already led to localized fuel shortages across multiple Russian regions.

    Images and footage circulated by Russian state and independent media outlets showed intense infernos raging at the Moscow Oil Refinery, a sprawling complex located just 9 miles from the Kremlin core. The facility is one of Russia’s largest refining operations, supplying more than one-third of all fuel consumed in the Moscow region per its official public data. It suffered a previous drone strike just two days earlier on Tuesday, which sparked a smaller fire that Russian emergency services extinguished quickly.

    Russian transport and aviation authorities confirmed that all incoming and outgoing flights from four major Moscow-area airports were paused for several hours as air defense units responded to the drone incursion, disrupting travel for thousands of passengers.

    Beyond the refinery strike, in the broader Moscow region, a drone crashed into a multi-story residential building in the city of Zhukovsky, triggering a full evacuation of the structure, regional governor Andrei Vorobyov confirmed. Debris from intercepted drones damaged multiple other structures across the region, leaving 16 people injured including two young children, Vorobyov added.

    The Russian Defense Ministry reported that its air defense systems intercepted and destroyed 555 Ukrainian drones across multiple Russian regions overnight, with nearly 200 of the unmanned vehicles shot down as they approached the Moscow capital area. For context, Ukrainian air force data recorded that Russia launched roughly half that number of drones at Ukrainian targets in the same 24-hour window.

    This latest attack marks another public setback for Russian President Vladimir Putin, coming less than a month after a Ukrainian drone strike hit his hometown of St. Petersburg during a high-profile international economic forum that hosted foreign dignitaries. On the day of the Moscow attack, Putin was 430 miles east of the capital in Kazan, hosting a summit of Association of Southeast Asian Nations leaders as the Kremlin courts deeper economic and political ties with the bloc to offset Western sanctions.

    In a voice message sent to a journalist group chat, Zelenskyy framed the strike as part of Ukraine’s campaign to pressure the Kremlin into entering good-faith peace negotiations. The Ukrainian leader recently accepted an unconditional ceasefire proposal put forward by former U.S. President Donald Trump, but Putin has rejected the offer, and U.S.-led peace initiatives have since stalled. “If Putin does not want to end this war and wants to continue it, we will not sit quietly — we will respond,” Zelenskyy emphasized.

    Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha leaned into the public impact of the attack in a post on the social platform X, writing: “One of the most popular questions asked by Muscovites this morning is ‘What is going on?’ I can answer. Your country started a war of aggression against ours. For years, it has been killing our people. Now that you know what’s going on, ask Putin when he is planning to end it.”

    Western military analysts and senior officials note that, alongside the new commitments of backing from the G7, Ukraine has gained growing tactical momentum against Russia’s larger conventional military in recent weeks, driven largely by its expanding fleet of domestically produced and Western-supplied high-tech drones. Longer-range drone strikes have not only disrupted Russian domestic oil production but have also severely choked Russian supply lines in Ukrainian territories occupied by Moscow forces.

    French President Emmanuel Macron described the just-concluded G7 summit as a critical milestone for Ukraine, noting that Western backers — led by the United States — had reaffirmed their long-term commitment to supporting Kyiv’s defense, though he declined to share specific details of new aid packages. Under the second Trump administration, U.S. military assistance to Ukraine has been scaled back significantly, leaving European countries as the largest suppliers of military and financial support to Kyiv, a shift that has come amid well-documented tensions between Trump and Zelenskyy. Despite that shift, Macron stressed after leaving the G7 venue at the Palace of Versailles that “America is with us on Ukraine, that is very important.”

  • MEE correspondent Mohammed Amin, refused UK visa, wins One World Media Award

    MEE correspondent Mohammed Amin, refused UK visa, wins One World Media Award

    Award-winning Sudanese journalist Mohammed Amin has been named Journalist of the Year by One World Media, a leading global media organization, for his relentless on-the-ground reporting from conflict-torn Sudan as a freelance correspondent for Middle East Eye (MEE). Though the honor was awarded at a ceremony in London Wednesday night, Amin could not collect the prize in person after the UK Home Office rejected his travel visa application, barring his entry to the country.

    In a pre-recorded video acceptance speech played for the ceremony audience, Amin called out the discriminatory reasoning cited in his visa refusal. UK officials claimed he posed an immigration risk, alleging he would likely overstay his visit to seek asylum in Britain.

    “The Sudanese are not a heavy burden in this world. We are equal partners in humanity,” Amin asserted in his address, pushing back against the implicit bias in the Home Office’s decision.

    Amin’s award-winning work has centered the experiences of Sudanese civilians caught in the ongoing brutal civil war between the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) and the Sudanese Armed Forces, a conflict the international community has largely sidelined. He highlighted the story of his home village, al-Tekeina, which successfully mounted a community defense against the RSF — a paramilitary group widely accused of perpetrating genocide against Sudanese civilians.

    “This tells us what people can do when they have the will, and what independent media can do,” he said of the village’s resistance. Describing Sudan as “a very wounded and traumatised country,” Amin reframed the conflict not as a two-sided battle between military factions, but “between fascism and the Sudanese people.” He closed his speech with a call for global solidarity among journalists in the Global South, urging the creation of independently funded, community-centered media platforms to elevate unheard local narratives.

    The Home Office’s visa rejection came despite full sponsorship for Amin’s trip from MEE and a formal invitation from One World Media’s award organizers. UK visa rules offer no right of appeal against immigration refusals for short-term travel. Notably, this is not Amin’s first time traveling to London for a major journalism award: in 2022, when he won the Martin Adler Prize at the Rory Peck Awards for his reporting on Wagner Group massacres and the 2019 Sudanese coup, the then-Conservative UK government approved his visa without issue.

    Barriers for Sudanese applicants have skyrocketed since the outbreak of full-scale civil war in April 2023. Earlier this year, the current Labour government implemented a controversial “visa brake” policy that pauses all new student visa applications from Sudanese citizens applying from outside the UK, along with applicants from Afghanistan, Cameroon and Myanmar. Amin also has personal ties to the UK: he lived in the coastal English city of Plymouth for two years during his childhood.

    Chinwe Kalu-Uma, interim director of One World Media, expressed deep disappointment over the visa refusal in a statement to MEE. “It is deeply disappointing that Mohammed, our Journalist of the Year Award winner, who has at great risk continued to report from inside Sudan so that the world might pay attention, has been denied a visa to travel to London to receive that recognition,” she said. “His absence from our stage is itself a story about the barriers Sudanese people face, not only in their own country, but in being seen and heard beyond it.”

    Amin beat out two other high-profile finalists for the award: Ghada Abdulfattah, nominated for her New York Times reporting from Gaza, and Tony Cheng, recognized for his Al-Jazeera coverage of the aftermath of the 2025 Myanmar earthquake.

    Over the past year, Amin’s reporting has broken ground on undercovered aspects of Sudan’s war: he has investigated the bloody aftermath of the siege of el-Fasher, documented how the illicit drug captagon fuels the conflict, and exposed the targeting of the marginalized Kanabi community by all warring factions. His viral report on al-Tekeina’s resistance, which spread widely across Sudanese social media and was translated into multiple languages, prompted a landmark visit from a Sudanese government delegation led by the prime minister — the first official state visit to the village in more than 60 years — that brought promises of reconstruction aid.

    One World Media’s judging panel praised Amin’s work for filling a critical gap in global coverage. “Mohammed Amin’s work provides rare, essential insight into a conflict the international community has largely ignored. He centres voices from within his own community to reveal the human reality of the conflict, exposing not only what is happening on the ground but why it matters far beyond Sudan’s borders,” the judges wrote in their citation. “His reporting combines clarity, sensitivity, and political relevance, demonstrating the wider implications of the conflict while remaining rooted in lived experience.”

    David Hearst, co-founder and editor-in-chief of MEE, commended Amin’s extraordinary courage and commitment to ethical journalism. “Mohammed Amin has reported from Sudan with courage, precision and an unwavering commitment to the people whose lives have been shattered by this conflict,” Hearst said. “His reporting has documented not only the brutality of the war, but also the resilience of Sudanese civilians. At great personal risk, Mohammed has ensured that Sudan’s story reached a global audience. His work embodies the very best traditions of journalism: bearing witness, holding power to account, and giving voice to those who would otherwise go unheard.”

    When asked for comment on Amin’s visa refusal, a UK Home Office spokesperson only stated that all applications are reviewed on an individual basis in line with published policy, and that it is longstanding government policy not to comment on individual cases.

  • Sudanese victims ask ICC to investigate Emiratis over RSF atrocities in el-Fasher

    Sudanese victims ask ICC to investigate Emiratis over RSF atrocities in el-Fasher

    Seven Sudanese survivors of the devastating atrocities in Darfur have taken a landmark step toward accountability, filing a formal communication with the International Criminal Court (ICC) asking prosecutors to open an investigation into senior United Arab Emirates (UAE) government officials and business leaders for their alleged role in enabling war crimes and genocide committed by the Rapid Support Forces (RSF).

    Submitted to the ICC Office of the Prosecutor on Tuesday under Article 15 of the Rome Statute — the legal mechanism that allows any individual or group to submit evidence to prompt a formal inquiry — the filing names UAE Vice President Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan among those accused of maintaining close ties to the RSF, and facilitating the group’s operations through critical financing and logistical backing. The submission specifically requests prosecutors examine the potential criminal liability of third-party actors under Articles 25(3)(c) and 25(3)(d) of the Rome Statute, which cover individuals who aid, abet, or knowingly contribute to crimes carried out by a group acting with a shared criminal purpose.

    The UAE has repeatedly and publicly denied allegations that it has provided weapons, funding, or any other form of support to the RSF. However, a growing body of independent investigations published since mid-2023 has consistently linked the UAE to sustained arms and materiel flows to the RSF. Multiple inquiries have confirmed that weapons have reached the RSF via a secret airbridge operating out of Amdjarass, Chad, with the UAE named as the primary suspected supplier. In January 2024, Middle East Eye (MEE) exposed a sprawling cross-border network through which the UAE funnelled weapons to the RSF, with supply routes stretching across Libya, Chad, Uganda, and breakaway regions of Somalia. More recently, an April 2024 MEE investigation uncovered covert RSF support operations operating out of an Ethiopian military base in Asosa, Benishangul-Gumuz region, with identical military vehicles documented at the Port of Berbera in Somaliland — where the UAE maintains a permanent military base. A 2024 New York Times investigation, which is cited in the new ICC filing, further found that the UAE smuggled weapons to the RSF concealed within shipments labelled as humanitarian aid. In May 2024, Human Rights Watch reported that Colombian mercenaries hired by a UAE-based company transited through Emirati military bases before deploying to Sudan to support the RSF.

    The survivors — all now sheltering in a 26,000-person displacement camp in Sudan’s Northern State, many of whom walked more than 745 miles to escape violence — are not only seeking accountability for the RSF fighters who directly carried out atrocities. They are calling for the court to trace responsibility up the entire chain of support, investigating every individual and entity that funded, armed, or facilitated the RSF’s campaign of violence.

    The ICC already holds clear jurisdiction over crimes committed in Darfur, stemming from a 2005 United Nations Security Council referral that grants the court authority to prosecute individuals of any nationality for crimes committed in the region. Legal scholars consulted by MEE note that this jurisdiction could theoretically extend to Emirati nationals accused of aiding RSF crimes, though significant practical barriers remain. The UAE has not ratified the Rome Statute, and gathering admissible evidence and securing state cooperation would present major challenges for ICC investigators.

    The communication was brought to the court by Elise Le Gall, a Paris-based ICC counsel acting on behalf of the seven survivors. “International crimes cannot be committed without support networks,” Le Gall said in a statement accompanying the filing. She called on ICC prosecutors to closely examine private and public sector actors who may have enabled the RSF’s atrocities “through the provision of funding, logistical support, equipment, or personnel.”

    The filing centers on the catastrophic fall of El-Fasher, the capital of North Darfur, which was captured by the RSF on October 26, 2025, after a 500-day siege that trapped more than 250,000 civilians without access to food, clean water, or life-saving medicine. The United Nations Human Rights Office has confirmed that more than 6,000 civilians were killed in the first three days of the RSF’s final assault on the city. Prior to the fall of El-Fasher, satellite analysis from Yale University’s Humanitarian Research Lab identified a ring of earthen fortifications built by the RSF around the city as a deliberate “kill box” designed to block civilian escape and enable mass killing.

    The submission details systematic allegations of mass murder, torture, sexual violence, forced displacement, and deliberate attacks on hospitals and medical infrastructure. It documents a repeated pattern of violence in which RSF fighters pursued fleeing civilian populations and deliberately ran them over with armed vehicles. Mohamed Ismail Abdelrahman Hassan, a doctor from El-Fasher who treated injured civilians throughout the entire siege, stated in the filing that heavy weapons supplied to the RSF “devastated infrastructure, besieged civilian populations, and killed civilians indiscriminately.”

    The survivors’ filing draws substantial support from the findings of the UN Independent International Fact-Finding Mission for Sudan, which concluded in February 2025 that the RSF’s conduct in El-Fasher bears all the legal hallmarks of genocide, in addition to widespread crimes against humanity and war crimes. Mona Rishmawi, a member of the fact-finding mission, told MEE earlier this year that the targeted killing of El-Fasher’s Zaghawa and Fur communities left “only one reasonable inference”: that the RSF acted with explicit genocidal intent. Rishmawi called on all governments to immediately halt arms flows to the RSF, warning that any state providing backing to either side in the Sudan conflict risked being held legally complicit in acts that meet the legal threshold of genocide. The mission has already shared confidential evidentiary materials with the ICC, Rishmawi confirmed, though the court’s constrained operational capacity, weakened by long-standing United States sanctions, makes swift investigative action far more difficult.

    Earlier this year, ICC Deputy Prosecutor confirmed that the court’s office is already conducting an active investigation into the atrocities committed in El-Fasher. While the ICC has been probing alleged RSF atrocities since 2023, prosecutors have not yet requested arrest warrants for any Sudanese nationals linked to the violence.

  • UN food agencies warn acute hunger will worsen in 13 hot spots as famine risks rise

    UN food agencies warn acute hunger will worsen in 13 hot spots as famine risks rise

    In a stark joint warning released Wednesday, two leading United Nations food security agencies have sounded the alarm that catastrophic acute hunger is on track to escalate dramatically across 13 vulnerable global hotspots over the coming months. Driven by a toxic combination of persistent conflict, plummeting humanitarian funding, and climate-related extreme weather, the crisis threatens to push millions more people to the brink of famine by the end of 2026.

    The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and World Food Program (WFP) outlined the grim outlook in their latest analysis, projecting that food insecurity conditions will deteriorate sharply between June and November 2026. Currently, an estimated 266 million people across the globe already face high levels of acute hunger, a figure that stands to grow rapidly without urgent intervention.

    Four nations — Sudan, South Sudan, Yemen, and Palestine — remain the four highest-priority areas of greatest concern, according to the report. Two additional countries, Nigeria and Somalia, have been newly added to this highest-risk category amid rapidly declining conditions and soaring famine risks.

    The agencies identified conflict and widespread violence as the single largest driver of acute hunger in nearly all the identified hotspots. These catastrophic conditions are being compounded by overlapping cascading crises: crippling economic shocks, drastic cuts to global humanitarian funding, and the looming disruptive impacts of the El Niño weather pattern, which is forecast to bring severe droughts and destructive floods to already vulnerable regions.

    One of the most troubling trends highlighted in the report is the dramatic collapse in funding for life-saving food assistance and related support programs. Since 2022, global funding for these critical initiatives has plummeted by approximately 59%, even as global need for aid has surged to unprecedented levels.

    “The warnings in this report cannot be ignored,” stated Carl Skau, Acting Executive Director of the WFP. “Without action now, millions more are expected to face worsening levels of hunger in the months ahead, pushing some closer to famine.”

    The report noted that conditions in the Gaza Strip have shown modest improvement following a ceasefire implemented in October 2025, but the overall situation remains extremely fragile. Earlier this year, around 1.6 million people in Gaza — equal to roughly 77% of the territory’s analyzed population — experienced acute food insecurity and required urgent life-saving assistance. More than 500,000 of those people faced emergency-level hunger, with a smaller group already confronting catastrophic famine conditions.

    Agency officials also warned that additional emerging pressures are further worsening the bleak outlook. Spillover instability from the ongoing broader Middle East conflict and an active Ebola outbreak in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo have disrupted local food markets, destroyed livelihoods, and blocked critical aid access to vulnerable populations, exacerbating an already severe crisis.

    In closing, the FAO and WFP called for swift, coordinated international action to scale up life-saving aid, protect vulnerable local livelihoods, and stop further deterioration of food security across the affected regions. The agencies emphasized that without immediate, targeted intervention, millions more people will face catastrophic hunger in the near future.

  • Record-breaking heatwave develops across Europe

    Record-breaking heatwave develops across Europe

    A severe, record-challenging heatwave is currently gaining strength across the entire European continent, bringing unseasonably high temperatures that are on track to break long-standing local climate records. According to reporting from climate correspondent Simon King, the sweltering conditions are forecast to keep intensifying over the coming days, with France’s capital city of Paris projected to see temperatures climb as high as 40 degrees Celsius as early as Sunday.

    Meteorological agencies across the continent have already issued heat warnings for multiple regions, as high pressure systems trap warm air moving up from northern Africa. The rapidly rising temperatures are raising concerns for public health, infrastructure strain, and increased wildfire risk in affected areas, with authorities advising vulnerable populations to stay hydrated and avoid unnecessary outdoor exposure during the hottest parts of the day. What makes this event notable is its early timing in the summer season, with many areas set to exceed average peak temperature records for this time of year by several degrees.

  • Migrants clash with police at a deportation site in South Africa where thousands have gathered

    Migrants clash with police at a deportation site in South Africa where thousands have gathered

    JOHANNESBURG – Violent confrontations broke out Wednesday between police and hundreds of migrants waiting for repatriation outside a processing center in Durban, South Africa, bringing renewed attention to the simmering immigration tensions roiling the continent’s most economically developed nation.

    Footage broadcast by local South African television networks captured protesters hurling rocks, wooden sticks and fallen logs at law enforcement officers stationed near the community processing hall. In response, police deployed stun grenades and fired rubber bullets to disperse the crowd, marking one of the most visible flashpoints since a wave of anti-immigrant demonstrations and targeted attacks on foreign nationals began spreading across the country in recent weeks.

    Most of the migrants gathered at the Durban site are Malawian citizens who first arrived at the facility more than seven days ago. They had come voluntarily to board government-arranged buses returning them to their home country, after rising anti-foreign violence left many feeling unsafe in South Africa. KwaZulu-Natal Premier, the top official for the province that contains Durban, confirmed that nearly 10,000 Malawian migrants have been camped in a nearby park while waiting for the repatriation process to move forward.

    However, lengthy delays in organizing the departures prompted South Africa’s Ministry of Home Affairs to step in, setting up an on-site immigration court and launching formal deportation proceedings for the gathered migrants. Local media reports confirm the clashes were fueled by mounting frustration over the extended wait to return home, a journey many migrants began voluntarily to escape growing hostility.

    To date, South African officials have confirmed that at least 1,876 of the migrants at the center have been verified as residing in the country without valid immigration documentation, and will be processed for formal deportation. Verification for remaining migrants is still ongoing, with Durban’s mayor estimating that more than 6,000 Malawian citizens could ultimately be deported from the country.

    Malawi is not alone in arranging voluntary repatriation for its citizens in South Africa. It is one of at least five African nations that have organized trips to bring their residents home following reports of targeted threats and violent attacks on foreign nationals. Malawi has already successfully moved hundreds of its citizens back across the border via chartered buses, while Nigeria, Ghana, Mozambique and Zimbabwe have also arranged flights and buses to facilitate the exit of their citizens who wish to leave.

    The South African national government has publicly condemned the recent string of attacks on foreign nationals, which have been ignited by a sharp surge in anti-immigrant sentiment among certain domestic political and community groups. For the past two years, the country has been engaged in a widespread crackdown on unauthorized immigration: Home Affairs data shows more than 100,000 people staying in the country illegally have been deported in that period, and an additional 500,000 people were turned away at the border before they could enter South Africa illegally.

  • Killing of Russian artist in Poland has hallmarks of political assassination, prime minister says

    Killing of Russian artist in Poland has hallmarks of political assassination, prime minister says

    WARSAW, Poland — Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk has publicly stated that the fatal shooting of a Russian artist critical of the Kremlin’s leadership in eastern Poland bears all the markings of a coordinated political assassination, as international law enforcement continues a sprawling investigation into the killing.

    The victim, Robert Kuzovkov, who worked under the pseudonym Semyon Skrepetsky, was gunned down at close range near his residence in the eastern Polish city of Biala Podlaska early Monday morning, regional prosecutors confirmed in an official statement released Tuesday.

    Speaking at a press briefing in Warsaw Wednesday, Tusk laid out preliminary findings that point toward a politically motivated killing. “Everything points to this being a political murder,” Tusk told reporters. “But we must wait for concrete evidence and more definitive indications. Because if that proves to be the case — if the killing was ordered by Russia — then it is an extremely serious matter from an international perspective. It would constitute an act of state terrorism.”

    Polish law enforcement initially detained two Belarusian citizens shortly after the shooting as persons of interest, but Tusk confirmed Tuesday that both have been released, as investigators found no evidence tying them directly to the crime. Tusk emphasized that the investigation remains in its active evidence-gathering phase, noting that the complexity of the case has slowed progress. “The case is difficult. If a hired killer is involved, identifying that person is unfortunately not an easy task,” he added. In a revealing detail, the prime minister confirmed that Polish security authorities had previously offered Skrepetsky protection over concerns for his safety, an offer the artist ultimately declined.

    Polish prosecutors laid out the context for the killing in their Tuesday statement, confirming that through his artistic work, Skrepetsky consistently and publicly expressed sharp criticism of the current policies of the Russian government. The artist, who fled Russia for exile in Poland, became known for his unflattering portraits of Russian President Vladimir Putin, Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov, and other senior Russian political figures. One of his most provocative works depicts Putin being held in the arms of former Soviet dictator Josef Stalin.

    Just one day before his death, on Sunday, Skrepetsky published a new video to his YouTube channel showing a protest he carried out in Berlin on June 12 — Russia’s annual Sovereignty Day holiday — where he placed a Russian national flag into a public trash can.

    Prosecutors detailed the sequence of the attack: at approximately 9:45 a.m. Monday, an unidentified male suspect approached Skrepetsky near his home, fired two shots, then moved in to fire three additional rounds at close range before fleeing the scene. Skrepetsky died instantly from multiple gunshot wounds to the head, chest, and back.

    The killing comes amid a growing pattern of alleged targeted attacks against Russian government opponents exiled in Europe, dating back to Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. To date, Russia has been repeatedly accused of orchestrating assassination attempts against dissidents and anti-Kremlin activists across the continent, including targeted plots against exiled opponents living in France and Lithuania.

    In recent months, European security officials have uncovered multiple high-profile plots linked to Russian operatives. German authorities recently broke up planned assassination attempts targeting the head of a German weapons manufacturer that supplies arms to Ukraine, as well as a senior Ukrainian military official. Earlier this year, Polish law enforcement arrested a suspect in what authorities confirmed was a plot to assassinate Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy during a visit to the country. In 2024, a defected Russian military helicopter pilot was also killed in a targeted attack in Spain, with Russian intelligence operatives named as the primary suspects in that killing.