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There are competing narratives in Tehran for its post-war recovery.

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Protests over refugee seats turn deadly, forcing staggered elections under internet blackout and calls for a boycott.

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Three people were killed in a Russian strike on a petrol station in Ukraine's Dnipropetrovsk Oblast on the afternoon of 3 August.

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The US tech industry’s increasingly hawkish attitude towards China has caused alarm among some observers who warn it could cause greater mistrust between the two countries. Silicon Valley has become much more politicised in recent years, with leading figures such as Elon Musk donating vast sums to political campaigns, including Donald Trump’s 2024 presidential bid. The US government has placed technological competition at the centre of its rivalry with Beijing. Meanwhile, tech lobbyists are...

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Rebecca Walser of Walser Wealth Management joins Vonnie Quinn on "Bloomberg Brief" to discuss the implications of Fed Chair Kevin Warsh mulling changes to the frequency and timing of the Fed's policy meetings. (Source: Bloomberg)

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Four of the injured, among them two children, are in serious condition

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Russia’s ballistic missile attacks on Ukraine pose an urgent question for NATO leaders.

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Iran denies talks with US as Trump halts strikes at the last minute Submitted by Alex MacDonald on Mon, 08/03/2026 - 10:55 Iranian officials say their only current talks are with Oman over reopening the Strait of Hormuz Iranians walk past an anti-US billboard at Enghelab Square in Tehran on 3 August (AFP/Atta Kenare) Off Iran has denied any talks are ongoing with the US despite a claim from Donald Trump, who called off strikes on the country on Saturday. Trump had announced that negotiations with Iran would begin on Monday after he decided to hold off on new strikes against the Islamic Republic in order to pursue a deal. "Obviously, they don't want to be attacked," Trump told reporters on Sunday on board Air Force One. "Now what we're doing is we're talking to them in the form of a negotiation. It begins tomorrow afternoon. " However, Iran's foreign ministry has said there were currently no negotiations with the US but that talks were taking place with Oman over the Strait of Hormuz. The Foreign Ministry spokesperson, Esmaeil Baghaei, said discussions with Oman were "constructive" and aimed at reaching an agreement on a new route. "We are not currently negotiating with the United States. Our negotiations are with Oman to secure passage through the Strait of Hormuz," Baghaei said during a press briefing. "We hope that both regional and extra-regional actors will appreciate this responsible move by Iran and adopt a constructive approach. " He added that as long as a US naval blockade on Iranian ports continues "the situation in the Strait of Hormuz will remain unchanged". Oil prices fall Despite the conflicting statements, oil prices fell sharply on Monday following Trump's statement. At around 09.15 GMT the price of a barrel of North Sea Brent crude for October delivery – trading as the benchmark contract for the first time – was down 4.59 percent at $83.89. On Sunday, Saudi Arabia 's state media said Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman had spoken to Trump over the phone on developments in the region. The crown prince reportedly stressed "the necessity of prioritising dialogue to de-escalate tensions and the importance of exerting all possible efforts to achieve a truce, which paves the way for diplomatic solutions". Why are Kurdish groups in Iraq being attacked amid the US-Iran flare-up? Read More » He also said diplomatic solutions should "yield positive results for preserving the security and stability of the region and prevent it from being drawn into a wider conflict". The conversation came after Saudi Arabia expressed concern over Trump's plans to strike Iran. The conflict between the US- Israel and Iran, which began in February, has left thousands of people dead and caused massive economic damage particularly in the Gulf states, which have faced repeated attacks from Iran. The closure of the Strait of Hormuz has been particularly disruptive to the region's economy, and the long-term reopening of the waterway has been a primary goal. A spokesperson for Iran’s parliamentary National Security Committee, Hassan Qashqavi, said on Monday that Tehran was close to reaching an agreement with Oman over the strait. He also confirmed that the country's mediators were seeking to revive the Memorandum of Understanding with Washington. War on Iran News Post Date Override 0 Update Date Mon, 05/04/2020 - 21:19 Update Date Override 0

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Experiments involving 3D printing and launching missiles from uncrewed vessels were expected to take place among high-end warfighting training.

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Ukraine has struck another warehouse belonging to Russian e-commerce giant Wildberries in a long-range drone attack.

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New Zealand sailing team combine racing with campaigning for environmental and social impact “Sailing on the Solent was awesome, but our racing … not quite perfect,” says Blair Tuke, co-chief executive of the Black Foils, New Zealand’s SailGP team, after finishing fifth at last month’s Great Britain Sail Grand Prix. It was only the team’s second competitive outing of the season after the boat had to be “pretty much rebuilt” following a big crash in Auckland in February, which forced them to miss four races. But the team’s work off the water hasn’t stopped in the boatyard. Before the race in Portsmouth, which coincided with the beginning of National Marine Week in the UK, the Black Foils were awarded the Better Planet award in SailGP’s Impact League that rewards teams for environmental and social impact alongside racing. Continue reading...

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Six people were injured in a strike on Odesa Oblast on 3 August, with some hospitalised. Efforts to deal with the aftermath are ongoing.

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Nickolay Mladenov emphasized that both sides, Israel and the radical Palestinian movement Hamas, are responsible for fulfilling the terms of the peace agreement

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'We will rise again': A new generation of Tunisians prepare for Ennahda's return Submitted by Faisal Edroos on Mon, 08/03/2026 - 09:35 President Kais Saied's crackdown was meant to bury Tunisia's largest Islamist movement. Five years later, the movement's youth wing insists their comeback is near Ennahda supporters take to the streets on 13 September 2019 in the run up to the country's presidential election (Faisal Edroos/MEE) Off They've watched their leaders jailed, their offices closed and their movement repeatedly attacked. But five years after President Kais Saied seized sweeping powers and dismantled Tunisia 's democratic institutions, supporters of Ennahda insist the country's largest Islamist movement is preparing to rise from the ashes. Rather than seeing the past five years as the movement's final chapter, many of the group's younger members describe the crackdown as another episode in a history marked by imprisonment, exile and political persecution. They say it has forced Ennahda to confront its mistakes, renew its leadership and prepare for a future beyond Saied's rule. "The idea that Ennahda has been defeated and that Tunisians no longer want Islamic parties is simply not true," said Ahmed, a 23-year-old resident of Ettadhamen, a working-class suburb of Tunis with a long history of support for Islamist movements. "More and more young people want a movement that is rooted in Islam, a movement that speaks to our identity and will stand up for Muslims being oppressed across the world. " "We are witnessing a resurgence and we will rise again. " 'We haven't left the political scene and are still here' - Mohamed, small business owner Ahmed's optimism stands in stark contrast to the movement's current predicament. Since Saied suspended parliament on 25 July 2021, Ennahda leader Rached Ghannouchi and dozens of senior opposition figures have been imprisoned, while much of the movement's leadership has been prosecuted or pushed into exile. Once the dominant force in Tunisia's democratic transition, Ennahda is today weaker than at any point since the rule of former strongman Zine El Abidine Ben Ali. Inside the movement, however, few believe its story has ended. 'Muslim democracy' Founded in the early 1980s, Ennahda emerged as Tunisia's principal Islamist opposition movement under Ben Ali, with thousands of its members imprisoned, tortured or forced into exile. When the Arab Spring toppled his decades-long rule, the movement returned to public life and won Tunisia's first democratic elections, presenting itself as a model of what its leaders called "Muslim democracy". Unlike many Islamist movements elsewhere in the region, Ennahda argued that Islam and democracy were complementary rather than contradictory. Over time it moved away from the idea of an Islamist party towards what Ghannouchi described as a party of "Muslim democrats", committed to pluralism, constitutional rule and peaceful transfers of power. At its landmark 2016 congress, the movement formally separated its political and religious activities, arguing that mosques should not become arenas for party politics. The night Tunisia changed: How the Arab Spring's only democracy was destroyed Read More » Rather than advocating the imposition of Islamic law, Ennahda said religion should provide society with moral guidance while democratic institutions, competitive elections and an independent judiciary remained the basis of government. Its manifesto committed the movement to civil liberties, equal citizenship and political pluralism, positions that distinguished it from many other Islamist parties across the region. That evolution won cautious support from Western governments eager to see Tunisia succeed where much of the Arab Spring had faltered. Following Ennahda's election victory in 2011, the US State Department said it looked forward to working with Tunisia's newly elected leaders as they built "a democratic future". Britain's Foreign Office likewise welcomed the country's free and fair elections and pledged its support for Tunisia's democratic transition. For Ennahda's leaders, Tunisia offered an opportunity to demonstrate that political Islam and democratic governance could coexist. That vision, however, was soon tested by the realities of governing. Although Ennahda governed alongside successive secular coalition partners and never held power alone, Tunisia's economy stagnated, unemployment remained high and governments struggled to deliver the economic improvements many Tunisians had expected after the revolution. Increasingly, the movement became the public face of the frustrations that accompanied the democratic transition, allowing Saied to cast himself as the outsider who would sweep away the old political class. His power grab in July 2021 transformed Tunisia's political landscape almost overnight. Democracy abandoned Ennahda's supporters argue the movement's greatest mistake was not ideological, but strategic. They say that years spent trying to build consensus with secular rivals and reassure critics ultimately failed to protect the democratic system the party had worked to establish after the 2011 revolution. In the 2019 presidential run-off, Ennahda also refused to back media magnate Nabil Karoui, instead throwing its support behind Saied after its own candidate was eliminated. At the time, many within the party viewed Saied as the safer choice, seeing Karoui, a polarising businessman often dubbed Tunisia's "Berlusconi", as too closely associated with the old political establishment. Ahmed Gaaloul, a senior Ennahda official, believes the movement underestimated both the determination of its opponents, both local and regional, and the willingness of Tunisia's international partners to accept the dismantling of its democratic institutions. "We believed that no one would dare overthrow a democratic system that Tunisians had sacrificed so much to build," he said. "We misread the moment. " He said that while regional powers hostile to the Arab Spring sought to undermine Tunisia's democratic transition, Europe and the US also failed to defend it. "The fragmentation and weakness was mainly in Europe," he said. "They did not defend our democracy. " Instead, Gaaloul said, Western governments increasingly accepted the argument that Tunisia's democratic experiment had failed, while overlooking what he described as an authoritarian rollback. 'We spent years trying to appease everyone at the expense of our own party' - Hatim, Ennahda member "The whole democracy that survived for 10 years after the revolution was being let down," he said. For many younger members, that experience has prompted a broader reassessment of the movement's own approach to power. The arrests of much of Ennahda's senior leadership have accelerated an internal debate over whether the consensual politics that defined Tunisia's democratic transition ultimately left the movement vulnerable. "Many of us respect what Ennahda achieved after the revolution, but we also think it compromised too much," said Hatim, a 28-year-old engineer and member of the group. "We spent years trying to appease everyone at the expense of our own party. Now, the younger generation, including myself, want leaders who are confident enough to pursue their programme instead of always making concessions. "We don't want endless consensus if it means abandoning our Islamic values. " That view is increasingly common among younger activists, many of whom believe Ennahda spent too much energy trying to prove to its opponents that political Islam could coexist with democracy, only to see those same democratic institutions dismantled. Former Ennahda MP Maher Madhioub says the movement has spent the past five years reflecting on those failures. "Ennahda was not born in a government or one of the state's institutions, but out of the huge sacrifices of its members over more than four decades," he said. "It was born as a civil, public and universal movement. It won some elections and lost others, but it has always stood with the Tunisian people's aspirations for liberty, dignity and justice. Governing was always a means to an end, not an end in itself. ” A different movement If Tunisia eventually returns to democratic politics, Madhioub believes Ennahda will emerge a different movement. "There is no doubt that it has learned a lot from what happened," he said. "It will be more confident in itself, its choices and its competent members, and it will take all its responsibilities. " Whether that opportunity comes soon remains uncertain. Saied continues to enjoy the backing of neighbouring Algeria, whose President Abdelmadjid Tebboune recently described Tunisia's security as inseparable from Algiers' own and pledged to defend it against "any threat". His remarks, made days after the fifth anniversary of Saied's power grab, underscored Algiers' continued support for the Tunisian president despite mounting criticism of his authoritarian rule. In the cradle of Tunisia's revolution, anger gave way to apathy. Then Gaza happened Read More » Inside Ennahda, however, there is little expectation of an imminent return to power. Members say their priority is preserving the movement's organisational networks, supporting imprisoned colleagues and preparing for the day Tunisia's political space eventually reopens. "We haven't left the political scene and are still here," said Mohamed, a 31-year-old small business owner. "But in the future we expect the movement to speak more forcefully about what is happening beyond our borders. "Whether it's Palestine, Sudan or other crises affecting Muslims, Ennahda should have a stronger voice and stand up for people facing oppression," he said. "We want a leadership that will challenge others that are harming Muslims. We will not accept silence for the sake of diplomacy," he added. Despite years of repression, Radwan Masmoudi, president of the Center for the Study of Islam and Democracy, believes the movement remains too deeply rooted in Tunisian society to disappear. "Ennahda specifically, and moderate Islamist parties in general, are here to stay," he said. "Any real democracy in Tunisia or in the Arab world cannot exclude such an important and critical part of society. I do think there will be a place for Ennahda in a new democratic Tunisia, just like there will be a place for all other Islamic and secular political movements. " For supporters, the movement's future will ultimately depend not on whether it returns to government, but whether Tunisia returns to democracy. "People thought we had disappeared before," Madhioub said. "If Ennahda wins the first democratic elections held after the end of this terrible coup, it will be because it learned from what happened. " Inside Tunisia Tunis News Post Date Override 1 Update Date Mon, 05/04/2020 - 21:19 Update Date Override 0

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Israel escalates Gaza attacks and pushes hardline demands, threatening the US-backed peace roadmap.

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Thailand has issued a full-throated rebuttal of comments by a UN human rights specialist whose visit last week to Cambodia found 20,000 people remain displaced by the border war, as the neighbouring nations engage in a battle for international opinion over their deadly territorial dispute. Thailand and Cambodia fought a brief but bloody border war in July and December last year that killed scores and displaced roughly a million people across both sides of the disputed frontier. A December 2025...

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Governor Sergey Aksyonov offered his condolences to the family and friends of the deceased

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A $506 million bet on thousands of New York rent-stabilized apartments has already soured for bond investors. Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s rent freeze threatens to make it worse.

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'We will rise again': A new generation of Tunisians prepare for Ennahda's return Submitted by Faisal Edroos on Mon, 08/03/2026 - 09:35 President Kais Saied's crackdown was meant to bury Tunisia's largest Islamist movement. Five years later, the movement's youth wing insists their comeback is near Ennahda supporters take to the streets on 13 September 2019 in the run up to the country's presidential election (Faisal Edroos/MEE) Off They've watched their leaders jailed, their offices closed and their movement repeatedly attacked. But five years after President Kais Saied seized sweeping powers and dismantled Tunisia 's democratic institutions, supporters of Ennahda insist the country's largest Islamist movement is preparing to rise from the ashes. Rather than seeing the past five years as the movement's final chapter, many of the group's younger members describe the crackdown as another episode in a history marked by imprisonment, exile and political persecution. They say it has forced Ennahda to confront its mistakes, renew its leadership and prepare for a future beyond Saied's rule. "The idea that Ennahda has been defeated and that Tunisians no longer want Islamic parties is simply not true," said Ahmed, a 23-year-old resident of Ettadhamen, a working-class suburb of Tunis with a long history of support for Islamist movements. "More and more young people want a movement that is rooted in Islam, a movement that speaks to our identity and will stand up for Muslims being oppressed across the world. " "We are witnessing a resurgence and we will rise again. " 'We haven't left the political scene and are still here' - Mohamed, small business owner Ahmed's optimism stands in stark contrast to the movement's current predicament. Since Saied suspended parliament on 25 July 2021, Ennahda leader Rached Ghannouchi and dozens of senior opposition figures have been imprisoned, while much of the movement's leadership has been prosecuted or pushed into exile. Once the dominant force in Tunisia's democratic transition, Ennahda is today weaker than at any point since the rule of former strongman Zine El Abidine Ben Ali. Inside the movement, however, few believe its story has ended. 'Muslim democracy' Founded in the early 1980s, Ennahda emerged as Tunisia's principal Islamist opposition movement under Ben Ali, with thousands of its members imprisoned, tortured or forced into exile. When the Arab Spring toppled his decades-long rule, the movement returned to public life and won Tunisia's first democratic elections, presenting itself as a model of what its leaders called "Muslim democracy". Unlike many Islamist movements elsewhere in the region, Ennahda argued that Islam and democracy were complementary rather than contradictory. Over time it moved away from the idea of an Islamist party towards what Ghannouchi described as a party of "Muslim democrats", committed to pluralism, constitutional rule and peaceful transfers of power. At its landmark 2016 congress, the movement formally separated its political and religious activities, arguing that mosques should not become arenas for party politics. The night Tunisia changed: How the Arab Spring's only democracy was destroyed Read More » Rather than advocating the imposition of Islamic law, Ennahda said religion should provide society with moral guidance while democratic institutions, competitive elections and an independent judiciary remained the basis of government. Its manifesto committed the movement to civil liberties, equal citizenship and political pluralism, positions that distinguished it from many other Islamist parties across the region. That evolution won cautious support from Western governments eager to see Tunisia succeed where much of the Arab Spring had faltered. Following Ennahda's election victory in 2011, the US State Department said it looked forward to working with Tunisia's newly elected leaders as they built "a democratic future". Britain's Foreign Office likewise welcomed the country's free and fair elections and pledged its support for Tunisia's democratic transition. For Ennahda's leaders, Tunisia offered an opportunity to demonstrate that political Islam and democratic governance could coexist. That vision, however, was soon tested by the realities of governing. Although Ennahda governed alongside successive secular coalition partners and never held power alone, Tunisia's economy stagnated, unemployment remained high and governments struggled to deliver the economic improvements many Tunisians had expected after the revolution. Increasingly, the movement became the public face of the frustrations that accompanied the democratic transition, allowing Saied to cast himself as the outsider who would sweep away the old political class. His power grab in July 2021 transformed Tunisia's political landscape almost overnight. Democracy abandoned Ennahda's supporters argue the movement's greatest mistake was not ideological, but strategic. They say that years spent trying to build consensus with secular rivals and reassure critics ultimately failed to protect the democratic system the party had worked to establish after the 2011 revolution. In the 2019 presidential run-off, Ennahda also refused to back media magnate Nabil Karoui, instead throwing its support behind Saied after its own candidate was eliminated. At the time, many within the party viewed Saied as the safer choice, seeing Karoui, a polarising businessman often dubbed Tunisia's "Berlusconi", as too closely associated with the old political establishment. Ahmed Gaaloul, a senior Ennahda official, believes the movement underestimated both the determination of its opponents, both local and regional, and the willingness of Tunisia's international partners to accept the dismantling of its democratic institutions. "We believed that no one would dare overthrow a democratic system that Tunisians had sacrificed so much to build," he said. "We misread the moment. " He said that while regional powers hostile to the Arab Spring sought to undermine Tunisia's democratic transition, Europe and the US also failed to defend it. "The fragmentation and weakness was mainly in Europe," he said. "They did not defend our democracy. " Instead, Gaaloul said, Western governments increasingly accepted the argument that Tunisia's democratic experiment had failed, while overlooking what he described as an authoritarian rollback. 'We spent years trying to appease everyone at the expense of our own party' - Hatim, Ennahda member "The whole democracy that survived for 10 years after the revolution was being let down," he said. For many younger members, that experience has prompted a broader reassessment of the movement's own approach to power. The arrests of much of Ennahda's senior leadership have accelerated an internal debate over whether the consensual politics that defined Tunisia's democratic transition ultimately left the movement vulnerable. "Many of us respect what Ennahda achieved after the revolution, but we also think it compromised too much," said Hatim, a 28-year-old engineer and member of the group. "We spent years trying to appease everyone at the expense of our own party. Now, the younger generation, including myself, want leaders who are confident enough to pursue their programme instead of always making concessions. "We don't want endless consensus if it means abandoning our Islamic values. " That view is increasingly common among younger activists, many of whom believe Ennahda spent too much energy trying to prove to its opponents that political Islam could coexist with democracy, only to see those same democratic institutions dismantled. Former Ennahda MP Maher Madhioub says the movement has spent the past five years reflecting on those failures. "Ennahda was not born in a government or one of the state's institutions, but out of the huge sacrifices of its members over more than four decades," he said. "It was born as a civil, public and universal movement. It won some elections and lost others, but it has always stood with the Tunisian people's aspirations for liberty, dignity and justice. Governing was always a means to an end, not an end in itself. ” A different movement If Tunisia eventually returns to democratic politics, Madhioub believes Ennahda will emerge a different movement. "There is no doubt that it has learned a lot from what happened," he said. "It will be more confident in itself, its choices and its competent members, and it will take all its responsibilities. " Whether that opportunity comes soon remains uncertain. Saied continues to enjoy the backing of neighbouring Algeria, whose President Abdelmadjid Tebboune recently described Tunisia's security as inseparable from Algiers' own and pledged to defend it against "any threat". His remarks, made days after the fifth anniversary of Saied's power grab, underscored Algiers' continued support for the Tunisian president despite mounting criticism of his authoritarian rule. In the cradle of Tunisia's revolution, anger gave way to apathy. Then Gaza happened Read More » Inside Ennahda, however, there is little expectation of an imminent return to power. Members say their priority is preserving the movement's organisational networks, supporting imprisoned colleagues and preparing for the day Tunisia's political space eventually reopens. "We haven't left the political scene and are still here," said Mohamed, a 31-year-old small business owner. "But in the future we expect the movement to speak more forcefully about what is happening beyond our borders. "Whether it's Palestine, Sudan or other crises affecting Muslims, Ennahda should have a stronger voice and stand up for people facing oppression," he said. "We want a leadership that will challenge others that are harming Muslims. We will not accept silence for the sake of diplomacy," he added. Despite years of repression, Radwan Masmoudi, president of the Center for the Study of Islam and Democracy, believes the movement remains too deeply rooted in Tunisian society to disappear. "Ennahda specifically, and moderate Islamist parties in general, are here to stay," he said. "Any real democracy in Tunisia or in the Arab world cannot exclude such an important and critical part of society. I do think there will be a place for Ennahda in a new democratic Tunisia, just like there will be a place for all other Islamic and secular political movements. " For supporters, the movement's future will ultimately depend not on whether it returns to government, but whether Tunisia returns to democracy. "People thought we had disappeared before," Madhioub said. "If Ennahda wins the first democratic elections held after the end of this terrible coup, it will be because it learned from what happened. " Inside Tunisia Tunis News Post Date Override 0 Update Date Mon, 05/04/2020 - 21:19 Update Date Override 0

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The Consulate General of Ukraine in Wrocław has reacted to an attack on Ukrainians in Kozuchów; the circumstances and motives are being investigated.

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Ukraine's Consulate General in Wrocław has condemned an incident in which a Polish woman sustained serious injuries and a Ukrainian man was detained by police on suspicion of involvement in the attack.

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Three people were injured after a Russian drone struck a petrol station in Zaporizhzhia on 3 August.

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One of them sustained multiple shrapnel wounds, the regional emergency response center said

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Yûki Igarashi’s adaptation of Osamu Tezuka’s influential manga is a conservative (if impressively animated) reimagining that dulls the source material’s pioneering elements First-time director Yûki Igarashi should hit the jackpot here: the first big-screen adaptation for decades of Princess Knight, a seminal postwar manga series from Astro Boy genius Osamu Tezuka. But this very loose reworking is an anticlimax: conservative in solely concentrating on the girlishly feminine side of its protagonist, Sapphire (voiced by Saya), where the gender-flipping original was heralded by many as pioneering; and bland in its vanilla characterisation and dull adherence to battle-anime norms. The owner of the most prominent hair bow since Minnie Mouse, Sapphire is a princess forced into exile when a Nergal – a kind of gargantuan flying earwig – lays waste to her home kingdom of Silverland. Wandering with her lady-in-waiting Zirco (Mayumi Shintani), she takes refuge in neighbouring Goldland and, in need of cash, bags a job working in the mines that supply crystals to placate the Nergal. When another one attacks, she falls into a crystal pool that activates her head ribbon and transforms her into Princess Knight, who is capable of trouncing the interdimensional critters. Local noble Velvet (Seiran Kobayashi), keen to slip free of the Nergal yoke himself, is paying close attention. Continue reading...

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Pop and rock legend tells Sunday Times of drinking problem and ill health after final Genesis tour in 2021 Phil Collins has said that he suffered life-threatening alcoholism in recent years. Speaking to the Sunday Times, the pop and rock legend, 75, said that his drinking began after he stopped taking Antabuse, a drug that causes illness if alcohol is consumed, which he had been using since an earlier period of alcoholism. Continue reading...

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Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has launched his re-election bid in Brazil. The eighty-year-old veteran told crowds in São Paulo on August 2nd he's in "great shape" as he pursues a fourth and final term in office. His main election rival is Flavio Bolsonaro, eldest son of far-right former president Jair Bolsonaro. The 45-year-old senator stepped into the role after his father was convicted of plotting a coup to prevent Lula from taking power in 2023.

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Iran says currently no negotiations with US Iran's foreign ministry has said there are currently no negotiations with the US but talks are taking place with Oman on managing of the Strait of Hormuz. "We are not currently negotiating with the United States. Our negotiations are with Oman to secure passage through the Strait of Hormuz, Esmaeil Baghaei, the ministry spokesperson, said during a press briefing. Baghaei said discussions with Oman were "constructive", adding that they were aimed at reaching an agreement on a new route. "We hope that both regional and extra-regional actors will appreciate this responsible move by Iran and adopt a constructive approach," he said. He added that as long as a US naval blockade on Iranian ports continues, "the situation in the Strait of Hormuz will remain unchanged".

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Small commercial sea drones that have shown they can monitor PLA warships in the South China Sea have emerged as a new potential challenge for Beijing in the disputed waters. Last week, Seasats, a California-based autonomous vessel maker, released footage – which has been verified by Reuters – showing its Lightfish drone operating near a Chinese Type 052D guided-missile destroyer on June 16. The latest encounter reportedly took place 105km (65 miles) northwest of Luzon, the largest Philippine...

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Ukraine's defence forces struck Russian logistics depots, a repair base, drone facilities and a communications hub in occupied Crimea and Russia on the night of 2-3 August.

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Europe's warming climate intensifies fires in France and Spain, scorching forests and threatening more communities.