Global Pulse

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  • Russian missile strike destroys family home, 10 feared dead

    Russian missile strike destroys family home, 10 feared dead

    In one of the deadliest large-scale Russian attacks on Ukraine in recent months, a massive overnight barrage of missiles and drones launched early Thursday has killed dozens of civilians, including 10 members of a single extended Ukrainian family whose home was completely obliterated in an eastern strike.

    Ukrainian emergency service officials confirmed to Agence France-Presse that six deaths have been formally verified at the residential site outside Kryvyi Rih, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s hometown, with four additional people still missing and presumed dead amid extensive destruction. Forensic teams are still processing the blast site, where 17 body fragments have been recovered to date amid piles of splintered wood and crumbled concrete. Regional governor officials have released on-the-ground photos showing rescue workers sifting through the rubble of what was once the Voronov family home.

    Zelenskyy identified the victims in a social media statement Thursday morning: mother Olena, father Artem, their seven children, and a grandchild, noting the youngest presumed victim was just 18 months old. “It was an ordinary home, blown into smithereens,” he wrote, condemning the deliberate targeting of civilian residential property.

    Sergiy Kovtoniuk, press officer for the State Emergency Service in Dnipropetrovsk region, told AFP that the scale of devastation leaves little hope of survival for the 10 people present in the home at the time of the strike: “It can be preliminarily stated that all 10 people who were in the house have died.”

    The strike on the Voronov family home was part of a far larger coordinated assault that saw Russia launch 74 missiles and 284 drones across Ukraine overnight, the latest escalation in a four-and-a-half-year war that has seen civilian casualties spike sharply in recent weeks. Zelenskyy had issued a public warning of an impending attack late Wednesday, prompting tens of thousands of Kyiv residents to seek shelter ahead of the first blasts, which rang out shortly after midnight across the capital.

    For the first months of the full-scale invasion, Kyiv’s subway system served as a primary bomb shelter for residents, and that long-held routine reactivated quickly Thursday night. More than 56,000 people packed into station platforms, setting up tents, rolling out yoga mats and unfolding sleeping bags in a now well-rehearsed process. Galyna Doschuk, a 27-year-old photojournalist who has taken shelter in the subway repeatedly during the war, summed up the mindset of many Ukrainians amid the ongoing attacks: “I want to live… sometimes our neighbour gets in the way. But we’re fighting on.”

    By dawn Thursday, three additional civilian deaths were confirmed across Kyiv, Poltava and Lviv. A popular Kyiv flea market was destroyed in the strike, with its charred, twisted metal framework still smoldering as vendors arrived to salvage whatever belongings they could. In the western city of Lviv, which suffered extensive damage across multiple residential blocks, rescue teams pulled a 93-year-old woman alive from the rubble of a collapsed five-story apartment building, where she had been trapped alone on the top floor. AFP reporters on the ground saw stunned local residents gathering around destroyed apartment blocks, many crying and covering their faces as they surveyed the damage.

    The assault also spilled over into NATO territory, triggering new diplomatic tensions after a 10-meter-wide crater was discovered in an agricultural field in eastern Poland, roughly 80 kilometers from the Ukrainian border. Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk confirmed Thursday that debris recovered from the site matches a Russian Kh-101 cruise missile, confirming the projectile originated from the overnight Russian barrage.

    Ukrainian air force officials reported that defense systems successfully intercepted 55 of the 74 Russian missiles and 265 of the 284 drones launched in the attack. However, Ukrainian forces continue to face critical gaps in defense against advanced Russian ballistic missiles, which Moscow has increasingly deployed in recent strikes and are far harder to intercept. Zelenskyy renewed his urgent appeal to Western allies Thursday for additional air defense systems and interceptor missiles to shield civilian population centers.

    The appeal comes just two days after Zelenskyy met with U.S. President Donald Trump at the White House to discuss anti-ballistic defense cooperation. Trump previously announced plans to grant Ukraine a license to domestically produce Patriot anti-ballistic interceptors, but neither government has released further details of the agreement to date.

    April 2025 has already become the deadliest month for Ukrainian civilians since April 2022, according to casualty tallies, as Russia has dramatically scaled up the frequency and size of its missile and drone strikes across the country. Russia’s defense ministry claimed in a statement Thursday that the overnight barrage exclusively targeted Ukrainian military-industrial sites, military communications hubs and logistics centers, a claim that contradicts extensive on-the-ground reporting of civilian damage and casualties.

  • AP Exclusive: Child soldiers recount horrors of Sudan’s war and presence of Colombian mercenaries

    AP Exclusive: Child soldiers recount horrors of Sudan’s war and presence of Colombian mercenaries

    Four years into Sudan’s brutal civil conflict between the national army and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), gripping firsthand testimonies from former child soldiers have pulled back the curtain on systematic abuse, forced conscription, and the hidden role of foreign mercenaries in the capital region of Khartoum. Six former child conscripts held by the RSF spoke anonymously to The Associated Press, sharing harrowing details of their exploitation that align with broader investigations into foreign fighter involvement in the war.

    One 17-year-old survivor, who was abducted at 15 while selling cigarettes in Omdurman – Khartoum’s twin city – described being mistakenly seized by RSF fighters searching for deserters, then thrown directly into frontline combat with no prior weapons training. Chained by his hands and feet to an anti-aircraft weapon mounted on a pickup truck, he recalled being left exposed as Sudanese warplanes launched airstrikes. When enemy jets approached, Colombian mercenaries who commanded the post retreated to fortified bunkers, ordering the chained children to open fire on the aircraft. Anyone who tried to run, the teens were told, would be killed by their captors before the bombs could hit them.

    The teenager, who still bears shrapnel scars on his head and face, spent 18 months in captivity at the RSF’s Central Reserve Camp in Omdurman, where dozens of child recruits were held. He described being kept bound around the clock – even during meals, when guards poured water over the shackled boys instead of allowing them to bathe. Colombian mercenaries stationed at the base trained the children to operate heavy anti-aircraft systems and explicitly ordered that the teens be chained to the weapons to prevent escape, he said. Too terrified to aim accurately, he never hit a target, he added.

    A second 17-year-old survivor, abducted at 15, shared equally devastating accounts from his detention at the RSF’s al-Konan camp, where he said Colombian mercenaries trained him and other underage recruits to handle heavy artillery and operate drones. Locked in a cell unless he was ordered to carry out strikes, he described seeing civilian targets through drone cameras, and being beaten – sometimes unconscious with electric batons – when he refused to fire. He watched an 18-year-old friend who attempted to escape shot dead by RSF fighters, and he still suffers nightly nightmares from the trauma.

    These testimonies confirm long-suspected reports of widespread Colombian mercenary deployment alongside the RSF. Rights researchers say the foreign fighters are recruited by a United Arab Emirates (UAE) state-linked contractor and trained in Emirati military bases, supporting the RSF in its fight against the Sudanese army. A UN panel has previously tracked weapons shipments from the UAE to the RSF, though the UAE has repeatedly denied arming the paramilitary group, claiming all shipments were humanitarian aid for refugees. It did not respond to multiple AP requests for comment on the mercenary allegations.

    Colombia’s long history of internal armed conflict has created a large pool of combat veterans with specialized U.S.-backed training, many of whom turn to mercenary work abroad due to low domestic pensions and limited civilian job opportunities. While Colombia has passed legislation banning its citizens from fighting in foreign wars, recruitment networks continue to operate, veteran groups report. Human Rights Watch and the private research firm Conflict Insights Group have already documented Colombian mercenary presence in Sudan’s Darfur region, including during the RSF’s 2024 capture of El Fasher, where the paramilitary has been accused of mass civilian killings. A Colombian mercenary who fought in Darfur for six months in 2025 told the AP that hundreds of Colombian fighters were deployed on RSF front lines, and he personally encountered child recruits as young as 13.

    The accounts from Khartoum mark the first concrete on-the-ground confirmation of Colombian mercenary activity training child soldiers in the capital region. Multiple independent sources, including a defected former RSF fighter and a senior Sudanese military officer, confirmed to the AP that Colombian fighters were actively training underage recruits in Khartoum while the RSF controlled the city. The Colombian government said it has no official information confirming the child soldier training allegations, but condemned any such abuses.

    Across Sudan, an estimated tens of thousands of children as young as 8 have been forcibly conscripted by all parties to the conflict, according to Sudan’s National Council for Child Welfare. The United Nations confirms both the RSF and government-allied militias have deployed child soldiers on front lines, with thousands still held in combat roles. The RSF, which grew out of the Janjaweed militias that carried out a genocidal campaign in Darfur in the 2000s, has a well-documented pattern of repeating these abusive tactics today. International law explicitly classifies forced child recruitment as a war crime, and rights experts say the UAE’s documented support for the RSF could leave the Gulf nation complicit in widespread crimes against humanity.

    Both of the surviving teens interviewed by AP spoke from a government-run rehabilitation facility on the outskirts of Khartoum, which housed more than 200 former child soldiers recaptured when the army retook the capital over the past year. Facility staff told AP that multiple child recruits have confirmed Colombian mercenary involvement in their training across Khartoum’s camps. Many of the released children face a difficult path forward: some carry permanent disabilities from combat and torture, while others have been rejected by their families traumatized by the war. Psychologists at the facility work to reconcile families with the boys, who are struggling to process severe trauma and guilt over acts they were forced to commit.

    Since the AP’s visit to the facility in April 2025, all children held there have been released through a joint process between the Sudanese government and UNICEF. The UN children’s agency is working to expand efforts to release and reintegrate remaining child soldiers across the country, pushing for all parties to recognize conscripted children as victims rather than combatants. For the teens who survived their ordeals, the desire to rebuild is mixed with lingering trauma. “We have made mistakes,” one boy said. “We want to get out of here to rebuild Sudan.”

  • Russia blamed for missile that blasted crater in Polish field

    Russia blamed for missile that blasted crater in Polish field

    A Russian missile that likely strayed into NATO territory during a massive overnight assault on Ukraine has left a massive 10-meter crater in a rural Polish field, drawing sharp condemnation from Western alliance leaders and reigniting concerns over the spillover risks of Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

    Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk confirmed Thursday that preliminary forensic analysis of recovered debris from the explosion site points strongly to a Russian Kh-101 cruise missile as the source of the blast. The detonation, which struck a field outside the small village of Tarnawa Kolonia roughly 80 kilometers from the Polish-Ukrainian border, occurred at 4:00 a.m. local time, rattling nearby residents and shaking home windows across the community.

    Law enforcement officials confirmed that the massive blast crater and scattered missile fragments were located approximately two kilometers from the village center. While the missile violated Polish sovereignty, Tusk emphasized there is no evidence to suggest Poland was an intentional target of the strike. He did, however, confirm that two unidentified airborne objects entered Polish airspace during the Russian attack on Ukraine: one left clear physical evidence of its incursion at the crater site, while a second object registered only a brief signal near the border and caused no damage before exiting.

    This incursion marks the latest in a growing series of spillover incidents involving Russian military ordnance in NATO territory since Moscow launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Thursday’s missile strike coincided with one of Russia’s largest mass assaults on western Ukraine in recent months, targeting the Lviv region just across the border from Poland. The overnight attack saw Russia launch 74 missiles and 284 drones across Ukraine, killing at least eight civilians.

    Immediately after the incursion was detected, Tusk called an emergency meeting of his national crisis unit in Lublin, the largest city near the explosion site, alongside Polish Defence Minister Wladyslaw Kosiniak-Kamysz and Interior Minister Marcin Kierwinski. Polish military prosecutors have opened a formal investigation to confirm the missile’s origin and full circumstances of the incursion.

    NATO officials confirmed that in response to the incursion, the alliance and Polish military activated joint air and ground defense systems. A Polish F-16 fighter jet was scrambled to intercept the object after it was detected on radar, but pilots lost track of the missile before it crashed. Tusk noted that Polish air defense units were prepared to shoot down the projectile if it had altered course toward populated civilian areas.
    “NATO and alliance commanders maintain constant close coordination with Polish authorities over this violation of Polish airspace,” NATO spokesman Martin O’Donnell said in a statement confirming the alliance’s response.

    Leaders from across Europe and Ukraine have issued swift condemnation of the incident. Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andriy Sybiga wrote on social media platform X that the incursion underscores the urgent need for coordinated action against Russia, calling the country a shared historic enemy that poses a direct threat to both Ukraine and NATO members.

    French President Emmanuel Macron also issued a strong condemnation in a social media post addressed to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and Prime Minister Tusk, condemning both the deadly Russian strikes on Ukrainian civilians and the violation of Polish sovereignty. “Our support for Ukraine and our allies will not weaken,” Macron wrote.

    European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen echoed that sentiment, writing on X that “The Polish people are famously unafraid.. and our thoughts are with them. To put an end to this, we are helping Ukraine win this war in every way we can.”

    This latest incident follows a series of high-profile spillover events involving Russian military equipment in neighboring European states since 2022. In November 2022, a Ukrainian air defense missile intended to intercept Russian ordnance crashed in the Polish village of Przewodow, killing two Polish civilians. Just this past September, roughly 20 Russian drones that entered Polish airspace were either shot down or crashed inside Polish territory. Other neighboring states including Romania and Moldova have also repeatedly recorded incursions and crashes of Russian drones and missiles over the course of the war.

  • Greek police probe ‘foul play’ in death of woman found in suitcase

    Greek police probe ‘foul play’ in death of woman found in suitcase

    A shocking death investigation is underway in Athens, Greece, after the remains of a 38-year-old Scottish national, Elisabeth-Jane Ross, were discovered hidden inside a suitcase in an abandoned downtown structure. The grim find was made on July 18 by a homeless person navigating the Kypseli district, a busy central neighborhood popular with international travelers, young expats, and packed with short-term Airbnb rentals.

    Authorities have confirmed Ross arrived in Greece from Cyprus roughly two weeks before her body was located. Preliminary estimates place her time of death between five and seven days prior to the discovery, and an initial physical examination of her remains failed to pinpoint a clear cause of death or rule out criminal intervention. A Greek police spokesperson told the BBC that official investigations are currently pending results from toxicology testing, which will help investigators confirm how Ross died and whether any third-party foul play contributed to her death.

    Further details emerging from the investigation suggest suspicious activity following Ross’s death: according to The Guardian’s Athens correspondent Helena Smith, someone maintained control of Ross’s mobile phone after she passed away, sending outbound messages to mislead loved ones and authorities who were attempting to locate her. Smith also added that Ross had family based in Edinburgh, pre-existing connections to Greece, and had been staying with a friend in Athens before she went missing.

    Scottish and UK authorities have moved quickly to support Ross’s grieving family. Scotland’s First Minister John Swinney confirmed that the Scottish Government and the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office will provide full support to Ross’s next of kin. Swinney called the case deeply appalling, saying he shares profound concern over the tragic incident.

    The UK Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office confirmed Wednesday that it is providing consular assistance to the family and maintaining close coordination with Greek law enforcement. A spokesperson for Police Scotland added that the force is aware of the incident, is in regular contact with Greek investigating authorities, and has assigned officers to support Ross’s family members who remain in Scotland. Interpol has declined to issue any comment on the ongoing investigation, citing its policy against discussing open individual cases.

  • Ceuta asks Madrid to declare a national emergency as thousands cross into the Spanish territory

    Ceuta asks Madrid to declare a national emergency as thousands cross into the Spanish territory

    In the Spanish North African exclave of Ceuta, local authorities have made an urgent plea to the national government in Madrid, calling for a formal national emergency declaration and military intervention to address a sudden, massive wave of unauthorized border crossings that has overstretched local capacity. Thousands of migrants have entered the tiny territory in recent days, triggering comparisons to a major 2021 border crisis that tested Spain’s migration management systems.

    Footage captured at Ceuta’s Tarajal Beach shows large groups of people, predominantly of Moroccan origin, moving past coastal breakwaters and flooding onto local beaches and access roads. While most of the new arrivals are young adult men, the crowds also include entire families with women and young children. Some migrants were heard shouting “Viva España!” to an Associated Press freelance journalist documenting the unfolding situation on the coast.

    The sharp escalation in unauthorized entry follows a steady rise in migration attempts targeting the exclave, with many migrants attempting to reach Ceuta by swimming across the border waterway in recent weeks. The current wave of crossings mirrors the chaotic border crisis that unfolded in May 2021, when more than 8,000 migrants entered Ceuta over a 48-hour period, overwhelming local services in a matter of days.

    Juan Jesús Vivas, president of Ceuta’s regional government, has formalized the request for national action, arguing that a declaration of national emergency on national security grounds is necessary to address the crisis. Beyond the formal emergency status, Vivas has called for additional reinforcements of national police forces and the deployment of army personnel to secure the shared border with Morocco. He emphasized that extra law enforcement and military support is critical “to guarantee the inviolability of the frontier and citizen safety” for both existing residents and the new arrivals.

    Days before making this formal request, Vivas had already raised alarms about overstretched local infrastructure, warning on Wednesday that official migrant reception centers were operating far beyond capacity. Hundreds of new arrivals have been forced to sleep on public streets in Ceuta as the local government struggles to provide basic shelter and services to the growing number of migrants.

  • Malaysia begins screening 5,000 refugees for their planned return to Myanmar

    Malaysia begins screening 5,000 refugees for their planned return to Myanmar

    KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia – Malaysia has kicked off a joint repatriation program with Myanmar, starting documentation and security screening for thousands of Myanmar nationals detained across the country, Malaysia’s Home Minister Saifuddin Nasution announced Thursday. Under the terms of the bilateral agreement, Myanmar has pledged to accept up to 5,000 of its citizens currently residing in Malaysia, in addition to an unconfirmed number of Myanmar nationals based at the Cox’s Bazar refugee camp in southeastern Bangladesh. To date, Malaysian authorities have identified roughly 4,000 eligible individuals held across the country’s 19 detention facilities. These detainees will be relocated to a centralized location to complete mandatory security checks and official identity paperwork, Saifuddin told reporters. “We will certainly hit the 5,000-person target once this verification process is finalized,” he noted, adding that Malaysia’s foreign ministry will lead all subsequent coordination with Myanmar on moving the process forward. A day prior, on Wednesday, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim publicly confirmed that the repatriation cohort would consist of Rohingya refugees. “People ask why we don’t just send them back immediately. Send them to where? Myanmar refused to take them back before,” Anwar stated in comments reported by the *New Straits Times*. “Now, thanks to our improved bilateral relations with Myanmar, they have agreed to accept 5,000 from Malaysia.” Unlike the prime minister, Saifuddin did not explicitly name the Rohingya as the group being repatriated, only confirming that the program applies to Myanmar nationals holding official refugee status. Repeated attempts to reach Malaysian foreign ministry officials for additional clarification Thursday went unanswered. In Cox’s Bazar, Mohammed Mizanur Rahman, a commissioner for refugee, relief and repatriation for Bangladesh, told the Associated Press he had no knowledge of any upcoming repatriation of Rohingya from the camp, which hosts hundreds of thousands of displaced Rohingya who fled violence and persecution in Myanmar. Myanmar officials based in the national capital of Naypyitaw have pushed back against claims that the program includes Rohingya, clarifying that the effort is limited exclusively to verified Myanmar citizens held in Malaysian detention. Han Win Aung, director-general of the ASEAN department at Myanmar’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, told AP the country does not recognize the Rohingya as an official ethnic group, a longstanding policy that has been widely criticized by the international community. Myanmar officially refers to the Rohingya as “Bengalis,” framing the group as illegal migrants from Bangladesh, despite many Rohingya families having lived in Myanmar for generations. “This is not a program to bring back Bengalis. There are Myanmar nationals being held in Malaysian detention centers for a range of different reasons,” Han Win Aung explained. “Both sides are still in the coordination phase, and only individuals whose identity as legitimate Myanmar citizens has been fully verified will be repatriated.” Han Win Aung added that the current initiative builds on small-scale repatriation operations carried out in 2021 and 2022, when Myanmar accepted more than 1,100 of its citizens who were stranded in Malaysia. Final details, including the full timeline for transfers and the confirmed final number of repatriates, are still under active discussion between the two governments, he noted. Currently, Malaysia hosts approximately 215,600 refugees and asylum seekers registered with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. Around 126,000 of that total are Rohingya, making Malaysia home to one of the largest Rohingya refugee communities in Southeast Asia. Critically, Malaysia is not a signatory to the UN Refugee Convention, and the country classifies all refugees as undocumented migrants, leaving the population vulnerable to detention and deportation. This article includes reporting contributions from journalists Julhas Alam in Bangladesh and Grant Peck in Bangkok.

  • Suspected Kinahan gang leader faces extradition

    Suspected Kinahan gang leader faces extradition

    After months of legal challenges, suspected Irish transnational crime cartel leader Daniel Kinahan has lost his battle against extradition, and is now set to be returned to Ireland to face criminal charges within weeks, senior law enforcement sources have confirmed to BBC News NI.

    Kinahan was first taken into custody in Dubai this past April under an international arrest warrant issued by Irish judicial authorities, but immediately launched formal appeals to block his transfer. Those appeals have now been fully exhausted, clearing the final legal hurdle for his extradition. Irish national police, known as An Garda Síochána, anticipate that United Arab Emirates officials will imminently sign the formal extradition paperwork to officially initiate the transfer process.

    Once the extradition is approved, moving Kinahan back to Irish territory will require a large-scale coordinated security operation involving both Gardaí and the Irish Defence Forces, given the high-profile nature of the case and Kinahan’s alleged criminal connections.

    The case against Kinahan stretches back years, and has drawn international attention. In April 2022, the United States government imposed formal economic sanctions on Kinahan and his close family members after U.S. authorities formally named them as the core leadership of the Kinahan Organised Crime Cartel, a transnational network focused primarily on international drug trafficking.

    Kinahan also built high-profile connections to the global sports industry through MTK Global, his former boxing management firm that at its peak represented more than 100 professional fighters, including heavyweight champion Tyson Fury and former two-division world titleholder Carl Frampton. The company has since ceased operations.

    The long-running criminal feud between Kinahan’s network and rival Hutch crime gang has been one of the bloodiest in modern Irish criminal history, claiming 18 lives to date. The feud made global headlines in 2016, when gunmen aligned with the Hutch gang opened fire at a boxing weigh-in event at Dublin’s Regency Hotel in an attempted assassination of Kinahan. Kinahan escaped unharmed, but associate David Byrne was killed, and two other people were wounded in the attack. Byrne’s 2016 funeral is the event where the above image of Kinahan was originally captured.

    Kinahan is not the first senior figure from his organization to be extradited from the UAE to Ireland. Earlier this year, Sean McGovern, described by prosecutors as a “senior lieutenant” in the cartel, was extradited under the same bilateral agreement between the two nations. Just last month, McGovern was convicted of directing a criminal organization and sentenced to 24 years in prison.

    In an official statement provided to BBC News NI, An Garda Síochána confirmed it was aware of Kinahan’s ongoing detention in the UAE, and noted that all procedural questions related to his arrest remain under the purview of Emirati authorities at this stage. The force reaffirmed its longstanding commitment to pursuing high-level organized crime suspects regardless of where they flee. “An Garda Síochána has been steadfast in our determination that we would pursue those allegedly involved in serious organised criminal activity, wherever they go,” the statement said. “An Garda Síochána has developed many major international partnerships in our efforts to target transnational organised crime groups.”

  • French authorities say 4 people have died trying to cross the Channel

    French authorities say 4 people have died trying to cross the Channel

    PARIS – French authorities confirmed Thursday that four people have lost their lives in two distinct dangerous small-vessel journeys attempting to cross the English Channel, a route that has become one of the deadliest migration corridors in Western Europe in recent years.

    The first fatal incident unfolded early Thursday morning, after authorities received an emergency alert regarding a distressed boat approximately 6 a.m. local time. The maritime prefecture responsible for overseeing the English Channel and North Sea quickly deployed search and rescue teams to the area near the coastal city of Dunkirk. First responders successfully pulled all three people from the disabled vessel and brought them to shore, but medics could only confirm that the three had already died after reaching land.

    A second, unrelated tragedy occurred the previous evening off the coast of Hardelot, a small coastal town in France’s northwestern Pas-de-Calais region. According to local prefecture officials, the small migrant boat capsized in rough channel conditions late Wednesday. “The provisional death toll stands at one man, estimated to be between 30 and 40 years old,” the prefecture stated in an official release. Six additional people on board, including a one-year-old toddler, suffered only minor injuries and have already received medical attention from emergency response teams.

    French judicial authorities have launched formal investigations into both incidents to establish the exact cause of death and identify any individuals responsible for organizing the dangerous unauthorized crossings. The English Channel has seen a surge in irregular migration attempts over the past decade, with thousands of people risking their lives each year in often overcrowded, unseaworthy vessels organized by people-smuggling networks. This latest string of deaths brings renewed attention to the ongoing political and humanitarian challenges surrounding migration across the narrow body of water separating France and the United Kingdom.

    Associated Press has full ongoing coverage of global migration developments available on its dedicated news hub.

  • Watch: Strikes near Zelensky’s hometown as hundred of drones launched

    Watch: Strikes near Zelensky’s hometown as hundred of drones launched

    A devastating wave of Russian missile and drone strikes across Ukraine has claimed eight civilian lives, including three children, local Ukrainian authorities confirmed this week. The assault, which involved hundreds of unmanned aerial vehicles launched against targets across the country, also brought new violence close to President Volodymyr Zelensky’s central Ukrainian hometown of Kryvyi Rih, where regional officials reported strike activity in surrounding areas.

    Local emergency services responded quickly to the aftermath of the attacks, working to extinguish fires, clear rubble from damaged residential and infrastructure sites, and rescue any civilians trapped in affected buildings. The three child victims — two boys and one girl — were among those killed in the coordinated assault, a detail that has underscored the ongoing human cost of Russia’s full-scale invasion, now in its third year.

    The large-scale drone offensive is the latest in a months-long pattern of Russian strikes targeting Ukrainian population centers and critical infrastructure, particularly as Ukraine works to shore up its air defense capabilities with support from Western allies. Ukrainian officials have repeatedly warned that Russia regularly stockpiles missile and drone components to carry out mass attacks ahead of expected Ukrainian counteroffensive operations and during key seasonal periods, such as the winter energy season.

    As of the latest updates, additional details on the full scope of infrastructure damage and the number of injured civilians are still being compiled by regional authorities. The strike near Zelensky’s hometown comes amid ongoing diplomatic efforts to secure additional military aid for Ukraine from Western partners, with negotiations over long-term support packages still ongoing in the United States and European Union.

  • Missile that left crater deep inside Poland was probably Russian – Polish PM

    Missile that left crater deep inside Poland was probably Russian – Polish PM

    In an incident that has escalated cross-border tensions amid Russia’s ongoing military campaign in Ukraine, a presumed Russian missile crashed into a rural field in eastern Poland early Thursday, leaving a sizable crater deep within Polish territory, official statements confirmed.

    The crash site, located a short distance from the small village of Tarnawa Kolonia, sits roughly 100 kilometers (62 miles) from Poland’s border with Ukraine. The impact left a crater stretching 10 meters (33 feet) across, and the incident unfolded concurrently with a massive Russian air assault targeting the western Ukrainian city of Lviv.

    Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk announced preliminary findings during an emergency gathering of government officials in Lublin, noting that all available evidence points to the object being a Russian Kh-101 missile. “All the indications are that it was a Russian Kh-101 missile, but we want to be 100% certain about the type of missile and who launched it,” Tusk said, emphasizing the need for a definitive, evidence-based conclusion before formal attribution.

    Ukraine’s acting Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha had previously characterized the incident as an incursion of NATO airspace, confirming his assessment that a Russian Kh-101 cruise missile had strayed into Polish territory during Russia’s large-scale strike on Ukrainian infrastructure.

    Polish Defense Minister Wladyslaw Kosiniak-Kamysz added context to the overnight activity, revealing that around 20 airborne objects were detected near Polish airspace during the overnight hours. Specialized pyrotechnical experts are currently conducting detailed forensic analysis to confirm the exact identity and origin of the object that impacted near Tarnawa Kolonia.

    Military records show that Poland’s armed forces first detected the rogue object at approximately 03:40 local time Thursday (01:40 GMT). An F-16 fighter jet was immediately scrambled to intercept the object, but it disappeared from Polish radar systems just minutes after detection.

    Prime Minister Tusk confirmed that, despite the destructive impact, no casualties have been reported from the incident. Even so, Polish authorities are treating the incursion and crash as a high-priority serious event, given its implications for regional security and NATO’s collective defense commitments.

    The incident comes just hours after Tusk held a bilateral meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Lublin Wednesday evening, during Zelensky’s return trip to Ukraine from high-level talks with former U.S. President Donald Trump.

    This is a developing breaking news story, with official investigations still ongoing. Additional details will be released as forensic analysis is completed and more information becomes available to authorities.