Global Pulse

博客

  • Tennessee halts executions after death row inmate Christa Pike survives hers

    Tennessee halts executions after death row inmate Christa Pike survives hers

    A botched lethal injection procedure that left death row inmate Christa Pike alive after two doses of the execution drug has prompted Tennessee Governor Bill Lee to order an immediate pause on all scheduled executions for the remainder of 2026. The unprecedented halt comes on the heels of a second failed execution attempt in the state this year, sparking new scrutiny of Tennessee’s capital punishment protocols.

    Pike, 50, was minutes away from becoming the first woman executed in Tennessee in more than 200 years when the procedure went wrong on Wednesday. Prison officials administered two separate lethal doses of pentobarbital, the drug mandated under the state’s existing execution rules, but the attempt failed. Pike was transferred to a local hospital for emergency care following the incident, and details on her current medical status remain undisclosed as of Friday.

    Pike was originally sentenced to death in 1996 for the brutal torture and murder of 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer, a college student. Then 18 years old, Pike carried out the killing alongside her then-boyfriend Tadaryl Shipp in a widely publicized case that captivated the state.

    Speaking to reporters at a public event Thursday morning, Lee acknowledged his frustration over the failed procedure. “I’m highly disappointed, along with Tennesseans, about what happened last night,” the governor said. He added that carrying out lawful executions stands as one of the Tennessee state government’s most solemn and serious responsibilities, and has called for a full independent third-party review to uncover exactly what went wrong during the Pike attempt. As of Thursday, Lee has not released details on which entity will lead the review, or how long the investigation is expected to take.

    The governor’s suspension of executions will put a hold on the scheduled December 3 execution of Gary Sutton, another convicted murderer on Tennessee’s death row. Legal representatives for Pike have confirmed that the inmate required urgent life-saving medical intervention after the botched procedure, and have not yet released further comment on her condition.

    The Tennessee Department of Correction, which oversaw Wednesday’s execution attempt, has defended its adherence to state protocol in an official statement. The agency confirmed that its team followed every step of the execution process formally approved by the state attorney general’s office, noting that the pentobarbital used in the protocol has repeatedly proven effective in past executions. The department added that the approved protocol does not allow for any additional procedures beyond what staff carried out during Wednesday’s attempt.

    This botched attempt marks the second time Tennessee execution teams have failed to carry out a planned lethal injection in 2026. Back in May, the scheduled execution of Tony Carruthers was called off entirely after staff were unable to locate a suitable vein to administer the lethal drug. Carruthers received a one-year reprieve following the failed procedure. The back-to-back failures have thrown the future of Tennessee’s capital punishment system into question as state officials await the results of the upcoming independent review.

  • New Middle East Eye podcast brings voices from Gaza to the world

    New Middle East Eye podcast brings voices from Gaza to the world

    Against a backdrop of unrelenting humanitarian crisis and widespread global scrutiny of Israeli military actions in Gaza, independent news outlet Middle East Eye (MEE) has announced the launch of a groundbreaking new podcast that aims to shift global narrative away from dehumanizing statistics and toward the unfiltered, firsthand experiences of Palestinians living through the conflict.

    Titled *The Gaza Podcast* and helmed by Hussam Tannera—a Gaza-based teacher, father, and direct survivor of the ongoing conflict—this new series is intentionally structured to place ordinary Palestinians at the forefront of its reporting, giving listeners an intimate, unmediated look at daily life in the enclave that goes far beyond breaking news headlines.

    Every episode of the series will feature in-depth, unscripted conversations with Palestinian residents covering the full spectrum of their lived realities: from mass displacement and the widespread destruction of homes and infrastructure to crippling shortages of life-sustaining resources including food, clean water, and medical care, as well as the quiet, ongoing fight to preserve normal family life amid constant chaos and uncertainty.

    The debut episode, now available to audiences globally, features an extended, raw conversation with Mariam Yusuf, a newly graduated medical doctor who has built a life in Gaza. Yusuf shares her harrowing experience of seeking shelter in a Gaza hospital early in the conflict, detailing her forced quarantine after contracting chickenpox, the devastating loss of close family members to starvation, and the impossible struggle of processing profound grief while surrounded by total systemic and physical collapse.

    In his remarks ahead of the launch, David Hearst, co-founder and editor-in-chief of MEE, framed the podcast as a critical intervention into a global discourse that has increasingly normalized the suffering of people in Gaza. “The genocide in Gaza has been normalised. What happens there is now openly being used as a model to try elsewhere, in the occupied West Bank and Lebanon,” Hearst explained. He added that mainstream coverage too often reduces Gaza’s civilian population to abstract numbers and casualty counts, and that *The Gaza Podcast* directly addresses that gap by giving Palestinians full agency to share their own stories on their own terms. “Hussam brings a deeply personal perspective to these conversations, making this an important and timely series for anyone who wants to understand what life is really like in the strip,” Hearst said.

    The launch of the series comes as Gaza’s 2.3 million residents continue to face catastrophic, long-running hardship. More than 80% of the enclave’s population has been internally displaced, with most families surviving in overcrowded, unsanitary makeshift shelters after Israeli military operations destroyed more than half of Gaza’s residential and public infrastructure.

    Since the outbreak of full-scale conflict in October 2023, Israeli actions in Gaza and its ongoing occupation of the West Bank and East Jerusalem have sparked widespread international diplomatic condemnation, and have led to formal legal proceedings against the Israeli state at two of the world’s highest international judicial bodies. At the International Court of Justice (ICJ), the United Nations’ highest court for state-to-state disputes, the court has already confirmed there is a plausible case that Israel’s actions in Gaza amount to genocide, with a second ongoing case examining the legality of Israel’s 58-year occupation of Palestinian territories. Separately, prosecutors at the International Criminal Court (ICC) have issued formal arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, charging both with war crimes and crimes against humanity.

    The Israeli government has consistently rejected all allegations of wrongdoing, routinely justifying strikes on civilian infrastructure—including residential towers, schools, hospitals, and United Nations aid facilities—by claiming Palestinian armed groups including Hamas operate from these sites. Human rights organizations and independent investigators have documented that these claims are rarely verified, and have largely gone unchallenged by major Western media outlets and Israel’s key Western allies, including the United States.

    As of October 7, 2025, official Palestinian health authorities record that at least 20,179 Palestinian children have been killed by Israeli operations in Gaza, including more than 1,000 infants under one year old and 420 newborns. Even after a fragile ceasefire took effect on October 10, 2025, Israeli military raids and attacks across the occupied Palestinian territories have killed at least 1,257 Palestinians and wounded more than 4,100 more, with victims including journalists, medical workers, first responders, artists, writers, and athletes among the civilian casualties.

    It is within this context of ongoing trauma and erasure of civilian experiences that *The Gaza Podcast* was built: to create a space for Palestinians to speak for themselves, beyond the dehumanizing casualty counts that dominate much mainstream coverage of the conflict.

    *The Gaza Podcast* is currently available to stream on YouTube for video viewers, and can be accessed via all major audio podcast platforms including Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

    Middle East Eye is an independent media outlet focused on original, unconflicted coverage and analysis of the Middle East, North Africa, and surrounding regions. More information about the outlet and its work is available on its official website.

  • Australia call up Maddinson after cancer recovery

    Australia call up Maddinson after cancer recovery

    In a remarkable comeback story that has captured the attention of the global cricket community, Australian batter Nic Maddinson has earned a recall to the national squad for the opening Test of Australia’s three-match series against South Africa, just months after completing treatment for testicular cancer. The 34-year-old left-hander, who last represented Australia in Test cricket back in late 2016 for three caps, was diagnosed with the disease in April 2025, when it spread to his lung and lymph nodes. After completing a rigorous course of chemotherapy in July 2025, Maddinson received medical clearance to return to competitive cricket just eight weeks after his final treatment session. While he has not appeared in first-class cricket since his diagnosis, he has worked his way back to match fitness through five appearances in last season’s Big Bash League, and turned in a standout performance of 126 runs for New South Wales against Victoria in Australia’s domestic one-day competition on Sunday to cement his case for selection. Joining Maddinson in the updated touring squad is 29-year-old Victorian wicketkeeper Sam Harper, who receives his first ever call-up to a senior Australian Test squad. Both additions come as cover for existing squad members dealing with injury: incumbent wicketkeeper Josh Inglis will miss the series opener starting 9 October in Durban after scans confirmed a fracture to his right index finger. Australia’s selection chair George Bailey explained the pair’s inclusion, noting that Harper provides immediate back-up for Inglis as the injured keeper works toward a potential return for the second Test in Gqeberha, while Maddinson offers valuable batting flexibility across the entire order. Harper earned his call-up off the back of strong recent form, having notched 128 runs for Australia A against India A in an ongoing unofficial Test in Puducherry this week, and amassed 677 runs across the 2025-26 Sheffield Shield domestic season. The series opener is not without further selection questions for Australia, however: star all-rounder Cameron Green remains a doubtful starter after picking up a lower abdominal strain while batting in the final one-day international that preceded the red-ball series. Both Maddinson and Harper are now in contention for a spot in the final starting XI for the first Test, which will get underway at Durban’s Kingsmead ground this Friday. The match marks the first stop of a grueling three-match Test tour for Australia, which will move on to Gqeberha for the second fixture and conclude with a third match at an alternate South African venue. The inclusion of Maddinson, whose off-season battle with cancer has been widely followed in Australian cricket circles, adds an emotional narrative to what is already expected to be a hotly contested series between two of the world’s top-ranked red-ball sides. As it stands, South Africa have named a 19-player preliminary squad for the series, led by captain Temba Bavuma, and featuring key fast bowlers Kagiso Rabada and Anrich Nortje, and star batters Aiden Markram and Tony de Zorzi. Australia’s full 18-man squad, now including Maddinson and Harper, is led by captain Pat Cummins, and features core players including Marnus Labuschagne, Steve Smith, Nathan Lyon and Mitchell Starc.

  • Russia targets busy bridge in central Kyiv in broad daylight

    Russia targets busy bridge in central Kyiv in broad daylight

    A new wave of coordinated Russian drone strikes has rocked Kyiv, marking a dangerous escalation of attacks on Ukrainian capital infrastructure that has disrupted daily life and raised fresh alarms over Moscow’s shifting military strategy. In the most high-profile strike of Thursday morning’s assault, two Russian unmanned aerial vehicles scored a direct hit on the Pivdennyi Bridge, a critical transport artery that connects the eastern and western halves of Kyiv across the Dnipro River.

    The attack unfolded as a metro train carrying dozens of passengers crossed the span. Mariana Mykytenko, a reporter with Ukraine’s 5 Kanal TV who was aboard the train, recalled one passenger shouting “Shahed” — the name of Russia’s widely used Iranian-designed drone — moments before the blast sent a cloud of debris and dust pouring into the carriage through ventilation vents. No injuries were reported among passengers on the train, which was able to evacuate riders to the Vydubychi station on Kyiv’s west bank before service was halted across the line entirely. Road traffic across the bridge was also suspended temporarily before authorities later allowed limited passage.

    Thursday’s strike marked the first time a major Kyiv bridge has been targeted since the full-scale invasion began, a shift that analysts say signals Russia’s intent to disrupt core urban infrastructure and break public morale. While the blast caused significant visible damage near the base of the bridge’s central stanchion, preliminary inspections by Kyiv municipal authorities have found no critical structural compromise to the span.

    The bridge attack was not the only strike on Thursday’s target list. Shortly before 9 a.m. local time, a separate Russian drone crashed into the third floor of a Kyiv school. More than 100 students were on campus at the time of the strike, but school administrators had already moved all students and staff into a fortified bomb shelter before impact. The blast partially collapsed one exterior wall of the building and destroyed an internal staircase, but no casualties were reported. Valentyna Chorna, the school’s principal, said classes resumed for students inside the shelter immediately after the attack.

    “Our shelter is built solid, so none of the children or teachers were hurt,” Chorna said in an interview. “They just continued their lessons. Russia says they don’t target civilians, but to break our nation, they know they have to go after our children.” President Volodymyr Zelensky has reiterated that Moscow must face full international accountability for these deliberate strikes on civilian infrastructure.

    The Thursday attacks follow a day of coordinated strikes on Kyiv’s energy grid that brought power cuts back to the capital for the first time since last winter. Ukrainian Prime Minister Serhii Koretskyi noted that this level of combined assault on multiple strategic targets has not been seen since the end of spring. Kyiv authorities have spent months prepping for an expected Russian winter campaign of energy attacks, installing hundreds of small-scale power generators to shore up resilience against outages.

    Analysts and Ukrainian officials say the stepped-up pace of strikes comes as Russia takes advantage of reported gaps in Ukraine’s air defense systems. Most notably, Russia has recently ramped up deployment of a new design of jet-powered attack drone, which saw its first documented operational use on Wednesday. According to Serhiy Beskrestnov, a technology adviser to President Zelensky, the new drone carries a 40-kilogram warhead and is purpose-built to destroy high-voltage electricity pylons and steel bridge infrastructure.

    Ukrainian air defense officials report that Russia launched more than 3,177 of these high-speed jet drones across Ukraine in September alone. Their greater speed compared to slower loitering munitions like the Shahed has made them far harder for Ukraine’s overstretched air defense networks to intercept, giving Russian forces a growing tactical advantage in striking deep into urban areas.

    The recent wave of strikes has also targeted Ukrainian scientific infrastructure. Overnight Wednesday, a drone attack hit Kyiv’s Institute of Nuclear Research, and earlier this week, a strike on the National Academy of Sciences killed one person. For residents of Kyiv, the repeated strikes on once-secure core infrastructure serve as a constant reminder that the capital remains firmly in Russia’s crosshairs, even months after the last large-scale ground assault on the city was repelled.

  • Russian dissident Garry Kasparov says US warned him of danger to his life

    Russian dissident Garry Kasparov says US warned him of danger to his life

    One of Russia’s most high-profile exiled opposition figures, former world chess champion Garry Kasparov, has publicly confirmed he received joint warnings from U.S. and Lithuanian security agencies about an imminent threat to his life, amid a broader federal indictment that exposes a coordinated Kremlin-linked assassination network targeting dissidents abroad.

    Kasparov, who has lived in exile in the United States since fleeing Russia in 2013, revealed that he and Ivan Tyutrin, co-founder of the opposition Free Russia Forum, were both advised to increase security precautions following the intelligence alert – advice he confirmed he has already implemented. His statement comes just weeks after the U.S. Department of Justice unsealed a criminal indictment charging five individuals with working on behalf of Russian intelligence to carry out transnational attacks and assassinations, with a specific focus on exiled Russian dissidents and defectors operating in the U.S. and other allied countries.

    In a post published to his Substack newsletter, Kasparov noted that intelligence officials did not explicitly confirm he and Tyutrin were named targets, but both received clear warnings to shore up their personal safety. Spanish newspaper El Mundo first reported the threat in recent coverage, stating that U.S. authorities had alerted both Kasparov and another exiled opposition figure, Ilya Ponomarev, to the plot over the summer. Citing anonymous sources close to Kasparov, the outlet added that the former chess grandmaster was placed under enhanced security protection this summer, marking the first time such measures have been implemented since he relocated to the U.S.

    Unbowed by the threat, Kasparov issued a defiant statement rejecting any attempt to silence his activism. “I will not stop and I will not hide, even if I thought it was possible to do so,” he wrote. “My family and I will not truly be safe as long as [Russian President Vladimir] Putin is in power in Russia – a circumstance shared by millions.”

    Kasparov stepped away from professional competitive chess in 2005 to shift into Russian politics, founding multiple opposition movements that openly challenged Putin’s rule before he was forced into exile. Since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Russian authorities have designated Kasparov a “foreign agent,” and added him to the country’s official list of terrorists and extremists in 2024 – designations Kasparov has repeatedly rejected as politically motivated.

    The second named opposition figure, Ilya Ponomarev, holds a unique place in Russian anti-Kremlin history: he was the only member of Russia’s parliament to vote against Moscow’s illegal annexation of Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula in 2014, and has lived in exile in Ukraine ever since. When contacted by The Moscow Times, Ponomarev declined to explicitly confirm or deny that he had received a warning about the alleged plot, but noted that the exposed assassination scheme represents “a new level of escalation” by the Russian government.

    The U.S. Justice Department’s indictment outlines that the network, dubbed the RIS Network, has been operating under the direction of Russian intelligence services since at least the start of 2024. Prosecutors say the group has coordinated a global campaign of conspiracies, violent attacks, and targeted assassinations against Russian dissidents and defectors across multiple continents. John A. Eisenberg, Assistant Attorney General for the U.S. Department of Justice’s National Security Division, confirmed in an official statement that the five charged individuals are accused of operating “as part of a global assassination network that reached into the United States, attempting to recruit U.S. citizens and foreigners to carry out killings at the behest of the Kremlin.”

    The five men named in the indictment are Yuri Khrameev, Kirill Khrameev, Oemis Romagoza Durruthy, Yaidel Delgado Suarez, and Angel Eduardo Castro. All five remain at large as of the latest updates, and no arrests have been reported in connection with the case. When the indictment was first unsealed earlier this month, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov declined to comment on the charges, telling reporters he would not address the claims until he had reviewed “any credible evidence” or “tangible facts” supporting the accusations.

  • Witnesses recount Christa Pike’s failed execution

    Witnesses recount Christa Pike’s failed execution

    A botched execution attempt on convicted murderer Christa Pike has drawn renewed scrutiny over capital punishment procedures, after eyewitnesses provided harrowing accounts of the prolonged, problematic procedure. According to multiple people present for the execution, Pike first began voicing discomfort, telling observers and medical staff that she felt sharp pain in her arm where execution drugs were being administered. For nearly 60 minutes after that initial complaint, witnesses recorded that Pike remained alive, with audible sounds of steady breathing and distinct snoring filling the execution chamber. The unprecedented sequence of events eventually led officials to halt the procedure and transport Pike to a nearby hospital for emergency care, leaving the execution incomplete and sparking fierce new debate over the ethics and reliability of current lethal injection protocols. The failed attempt has also put a spotlight on longstanding concerns about access to suitable execution drugs and the risk of prolonged suffering for death row inmates during capital punishment procedures.

  • ‘He’s taught us courage’: Friend on Indian pilot hailed as a hero

    ‘He’s taught us courage’: Friend on Indian pilot hailed as a hero

    When Captain Dharav Gosalia first received news of the terrifying incident that befell his long-time friend Smit Machchhar, the first sensation he felt was sheer disbelief that sent goosebumps across his skin. Their decades-long bond stretches back to when both men were 20-year-old aspiring pilots, neighbors in Mumbai’s Ghatkopar suburb, who went on to train together in New Zealand. Machchhar was Gosalia’s senior, and the pair later worked side-by-side for six years at India’s SpiceJet, where they co-piloted Boeing 737 aircraft across regional routes. When their careers diverged, Machchhar relocated to Dubai to join Flydubai in 2022, while Gosalia stayed with Air India to pilot larger Boeing 777 jets. Despite the distance, the two stayed connected, checking in regularly via WhatsApp and phone calls to swap stories about new routes, share family updates, and discuss the daily rhythms of life as commercial pilots.

  • Watch: Why are students protesting at schools in France?

    Watch: Why are students protesting at schools in France?

    A growing movement of student-led protests has swept across French schools, with young learners taking a stand against systemic failures that have undermined the quality of domestic education. The BBC’s senior correspondent Hugh Schofield has been reporting on the ground from Paris, documenting the unrest as it expands from isolated local demonstrations to a coordinated national movement. What began as small-scale discontent in a handful of overburdened schools has quickly snowballed, as students share their experiences of oversized learning environments that make focused study nearly impossible and persistent gaps in teaching staff that leave core classes unstaffed for weeks at a time. Education activists and student organizers say the protests are a direct response to months of unaddressed complaints to government education authorities, who have failed to deliver on repeated promises to fund more teaching positions and upgrade overcrowded school infrastructure. As the movement gains traction, communities across the country are joining in solidarity with the protesting students, putting increasing pressure on the French government to deliver urgent, tangible reforms to fix the country’s ailing public education system.

  • Kanye West’s Russia shows officially cancelled after weeks of uncertainty

    Kanye West’s Russia shows officially cancelled after weeks of uncertainty

    Two planned stadium concerts by Ye, the rapper legally formerly known as Kanye West, have been formally scrapped after weeks of lingering uncertainty and public backlash over the artist’s history of hateful antisemitic and pro-Nazi rhetoric. The performances were scheduled to take place October 10 and 11 at St. Petersburg’s Gazprom Arena, and would have marked the largest live show by a Western artist in Russia since Moscow launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

    Confusion over the shows began back in August, when Gazprom Arena officials publicly stated they had never signed a formal venue rental agreement with the event promoters, meaning the concerts could not go forward on their property. Local organizers Say Agency, a Moscow-based events company, initially said they were working behind the scenes to resolve the venue dispute, before ultimately confirming the full cancellation in an official statement posted to the Telegram messaging platform.

    “With sincere regret, the Ye concerts in St. Petersburg will not be able to take place on the scheduled dates,” the organization wrote. “We will issue an official statement regarding the status of the project and our plans in the near future.” In addition to the contractual deadlock, Gazprom Arena also confirmed it had received hundreds of public complaints from members of the public about hosting West, whose long record of bigoted comments has sparked global outrage in recent years.

    West has recently issued a public apology for his past hateful statements, attributing his offensive remarks to a loss of connection with reality brought on by his bipolar disorder diagnosis. But the apology did little to quell backlash in Russia, a country that suffered catastrophic loss from the 1941-1945 Nazi invasion during World War Two. Top Russian officials were among the most vocal critics of the planned shows: Maria Zakharova, spokesperson for the Russian Foreign Ministry, called the planned performances unacceptable and called out West’s well-documented glorification of Nazi leader Adolf Hitler.

    Criticism intensified after it emerged that in 2025, West began selling merchandise printed with swastikas and released a song titled *Heil Hitler*, a reference to the Nazi salute used by Hitler and his regime. Pro-Kremlin pro-war bloggers also added their opposition, arguing that Russia should not welcome an American artist at a time when the U.S. continues to send billions of dollars in military and financial aid to Ukraine to defend against the Russian invasion.

    This cancellation is far from an isolated incident for West, who returned to global touring earlier this year following a years-long pause of his live performance career. He launched his comeback with his first major U.S. concert in over five years in Los Angeles back in April, and has since held shows across Western Europe, including stops in Spain, Portugal and the Netherlands. But multiple planned performances across the globe have been scrapped due to backlash over his views. Last summer, West was set to headline London’s Wireless Festival, but he was barred from entering the United Kingdom, forcing organizers to cancel the entire event entirely. Planned shows in Poland, Italy and France have also been called off in recent months. As of Tuesday, West has not issued any public comment on the cancellation of his planned Russian performances.

  • Trump’s AI rebrand causes ‘unprecedented’ demand for Slovenian website names

    Trump’s AI rebrand causes ‘unprecedented’ demand for Slovenian website names

    A surprising ripple effect from former U.S. President Donald Trump’s proposal to rebrand artificial intelligence (AI) as “super intelligence,” abbreviated SI, has rocked Slovenia’s national domain name market, pushing monthly .si suffix registrations to unprecedented levels, according to the country’s official domain registry Register.si.

    Trump first floated the renaming idea during his September 11 address to the United Nations General Assembly in New York. Arguing that the term “artificial” creates a misleading impression that the technology is fake, he told attendees: “It’s not fake, it’s actually amazing. But we have to be careful… welcome to the new world of super intelligence.”

    Weeks later, the policy moved forward: on a Tuesday in late September, Trump gathered leading U.S. technology industry executives for what he billed as “an extraordinary gathering” of pioneers “building America’s Golden Age.” During the event, he signed an executive order mandating all U.S. federal government departments and agencies adopt “SI” and “Super Intelligence” as the official terminology for the technology, requiring the replacement of “AI” across all official government correspondence, public websites, formal reports and all other official communications.

    The spelling error on the final order quickly drew public mockery online, after observers noticed the word “United States” was misspelled directly beneath Trump’s signature on the document.

    But beyond the domestic political controversy in the U.S., the proposal triggered an unexpected boom half a world away in Slovenia, where the .si country-code top-level domain has long served as the official online identifier for Slovenian websites, matching the new SI abbreviation Trump proposed.

    Register.si spokesperson Klara Herman confirmed that total .si domain registrations hit 44,000 in September, a staggering jump from fewer than 2,000 registrations recorded in August. That marks an increase of more than 2,100% month-over-month, with activity spiking particularly in the final weeks of the month. Herman described the scale of September’s registration activity as “unprecedented” when compared to the previous 12 months of data, noting that September’s numbers stand out “very clearly” against all other months of 2026.

    The peak of the surge came on September 30 alone, when the registry processed more than 11,000 new .si domain applications. While Herman acknowledged that Trump’s renaming push is the most plausible trigger for the boom, she cautioned that it would be premature to attribute the entire increase solely to the U.S. president’s comments.

    Domain industry observers note a more established explanation for the rush: speculative domain purchasing, a practice where investors register specific domain names they expect to grow in value, with the goal of reselling them later for a substantial profit. One of the most famous examples of this practice dates back to 1997, when prominent domain investor Rick Schwartz, widely known as “The Domain King,” purchased the domain men.com for $15,000. Seven years later, he sold the asset for $1.32 million, netting a seven-figure windfall.

    For readers interested in following the latest developments in AI and global technology trends, the publication offers a regular Tech Decoded newsletter that curates top stories from around the sector.