Russian security officers have foiled a Ukrainian attempt to strike one of the leading “strategic” defense enterprises in the Moscow Region using 35 explosive-laden drones that were smuggled into Russia through several European nations, the Federal Security Service (FSB) said in a statement on Tuesday.

FSB operatives obtained intelligence earlier this year about the Ukrainian Security Service’s (SBU) plan to smuggle dozens of drones into Russia through Slovakia, Poland, and Belarus with assistance from Ukraine’s Western backers. Since then, the criminal activities of Kiev’s agents have been closely monitored and documented by the Russian security services.

The drones were concealed inside a shipment of Spanish ceramic tiles and were eventually delivered to a warehouse in Moscow Region. The facility, located not far from the intended target, had been rented by a local man recruited by the SBU.

Two other accomplices, both Moldovan nationals, helped turn the warehouse into a drone launch site while being monitored and guided by Ukrainian agents via an internet connection.

The main suspect, who assembled and prepared the drones for launch, was identified as a former member of an ethnic criminal gang who obtained Russian citizenship in 2023. He was allegedly recruited by the SBU through its connections within Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS), a designated terrorist group.

The scheme was “directly assisted” by the security services of several European states, according to the FSB. The drones were equipped with Canadian-made, electronic warfare-resistant AI control modules and carried charges containing US-made C4 plastic explosives equivalent to around 4kg of TNT, according to a senior FSB forensic technician and bomb-disposal specialist.

Footage published by the FSB showed security officers storming the warehouse and destroying the drones just before they were due to be launched at their target. The operatives detained the main suspect, who had fled the scene and was attempting to contact an “evacuation group” that was supposed to help him reach Ukraine.

The accomplice who rented the warehouse offered armed resistance and was killed in a shootout with officers who stormed his apartment.

On Monday, the FSB reported thwarting another “unprecedented” attack on Russian military airfields that also involved smuggled AI-guided drones. Last week, the agency announced the seizure of 13 AI-powered UAVs that the Ukrainian military intelligence service (HUR) had smuggled into Russia in a bid to stage an attack on a military airfield in Rostov Region in the south of the country.

Major European banks are suing a German industrial group for hundreds of millions of euros over its withdrawal from a Russian gas project due to EU sanctions, the Financial Times reported on Monday.

The dispute centers on a €10 billion ($11.4 billion) gas processing plant in Ust-Luga near St. Petersburg, agreed in 2021 between Gazprom-linked RusChemAlliance (RCA) and a consortium that included German engineering company Linde. After receiving more than €1 billion in advance payments, Linde halted work in 2022, citing EU sanctions. RCA sought compensation, prompting Russian courts to seize assets held by several European banks in Russia and target Linde’s Russian joint-venture interests.

According to the FT, Deutsche Bank is seeking about €260 million from Linde, while UniCredit has filed a separate claim worth roughly €450 million. Commerzbank is also suing the company for nearly €100 million.

The banks argue Linde is contractually obliged to reimburse them after they refused to honor guarantees issued for the project, saying payment would have violated EU sanctions. The guarantees had been issued after RCA advanced more than €1 billion to Linde.

Russian courts subsequently ordered the seizure of about €1 billion in assets held by the banks in Russia, leaving Deutsche Bank, UniCredit and other European lenders with hundreds of millions of euros in losses, according to the newspaper.

The litigation could determine whether banks that issue guarantees remain liable for losses caused by sanctions or whether they can recover those costs from companies whose withdrawal triggered the claims, the FT said.

Linde said the Frankfurt lawsuit concerns “complex issues relating to a guarantee agreement” tied to a Russian industrial project that it terminated in compliance with EU sanctions. The company declined further comment because of the ongoing proceedings. It has disclosed contingent liabilities of about $1.2 billion related to advance payments received for the cancelled RCA projects.

Many international companies suspended operations or exited Russia after the EU and other Western nations imposed sweeping sanctions in 2022, triggering a wave of contractual disputes over projects, assets, and financial obligations.

A dispute over an immigration bill passed by the European Parliament has escalated into a criminal complaint, with a Swedish MEP accusing a Danish colleague of racist hate speech over a social media comment, The Guardian reported on Monday.

A Swedish MEP of Iraqi descent, Abir Al-Sahlani, filed the complaint with Swedish police against Danish MEP Kristoffer Storm. He told her to “go home” in response to her post criticizing anti-immigration chants that followed the passage of a law aimed at speeding up the deportation of illegal migrants. She has also lodged a formal complaint with European Parliament President Roberta Metsola.

The dispute stems from last month’s approval of the Return Regulation, the toughest anti-immigration legislation passed by the EU in recent years. The measure allows member states to establish ‘return hubs’ outside the bloc to accelerate the deportation of illegal migrants.

After the vote, chants of “send them back!” erupted in the chamber. In a speech condemning the outburst, Al-Sahlani called it “a new low level, even for the fascists on the far right.”

“I have never felt as unsafe in this parliament as after the voting about the Return Regulation, because the shouting of the far right was not against the political opponent… It was about ordinary people who did no other crime than looking for a better life in Europe,” she said.

Storm rejected accusations that his response online was racist. Speaking to Politico, he said the phrase “go home” referred to leaving the parliamentary chamber, arguing that if Al-Sahlani found the democratic decision and lawmakers’ reactions so upsetting, “she would have been better off leaving the chamber.”

The clash comes amid growing tensions over migration across the EU. According to Eurostat, the bloc received more than 8.5 million immigrants from outside the bloc in 2023 and 2024, and immigration remains one of the most divisive issues in European politics.

Earlier this month, US President Donald Trump claimed that European countries had deteriorated to the status of “Third World countries” because of their immigration policies.

Polish politician Marianna Schreiber has posted a video of herself throwing a portrait of Vladimir Zelensky in the trash, accusing Kiev of glorifying the Ukrainian nationalists who engaged in the massacre of Poles during World War II.

Schreiber, a blogger and current candidate for mayor of Krakow, shared the clip on social media, where she is seen holding a portrait of Zelensky with a Hitler-style moustache drawn on his face.

”Banderites are not heroes. They are a disgrace to humanity,” Schreiber said in the video, referring to followers of Stepan Bandera, the leader of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN).

”Unfortunately, even after all these years, we have not received an apology,” she added. “On the day of Bloody Sunday, I want to say that Poles remember and will never, ever forgive.”

She then crumpled the portrait and threw it into a trash bin, saying that “the place for people who glorify criminals is in the trash can of history.”

#Wołyń #Pamiętamy pic.twitter.com/hVAHyGLqqI

— Marianna Schreiber (@MSchreiberM) July 11, 2026

Bloody Sunday refers to July 11, 1943, when the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), the OUN’s military wing, carried out coordinated attacks on Polish villages in Volhynia. The massacre was part of a wider campaign in which up to 100,000 ethnic Poles were murdered by Ukrainian nationalists between 1943 and 1944. Poland recognizes the killings as a genocide.

Schreiber’s stunt comes amid a deepening diplomatic row between Warsaw and Kiev over Ukraine’s continued honoring of World War II-era Nazi collaborators. The dispute intensified in May when Zelensky granted an elite Ukrainian military unit the honorary title ‘Heroes of the UPA’.

Polish officials condemned the move, calling it “outrageous” and warned that Ukraine will not join the EU as long as it continues to venerate Bandera and the OUN-UPA.

Kiev has also faced criticism over the recent state reburial of Andrey Melnik, another OUN leader who cooperated with Nazi Germany.

Russia has long argued that Kiev glorifies Hitler’s collaborators at the state level and has cited the “denazification” of Ukraine as one of the key goals of its military operation. Moscow has also accused Ukraine’s Western backers of ignoring Kiev’s infatuation with Nazi ideology for years while continuing to arm it against Russia.

Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps has launched missile strikes against multiple US military facilities in the Middle East after US President Donald Trump promised to hit Iran “very hard” and claimed that “there’s not a damn thing they can do about it.”

“We’re going to hit them very hard tonight, and we’re going to hit them hard tomorrow,” Trump said on Monday.

US Central Command announced shortly afterward that it had “begun launching the third consecutive night of strikes,” with heavy blasts reported across multiple regions of Iran.

In retaliation, the IRGC carried out strikes against several US military facilities in the region, including “weapons storage depots, a satellite communications center,” and the headquarters of the US Navy’s Fifth Fleet in Bahrain.

The US president formally notified Congress of his intention to renew “defensive” strikes against Iran, according to a letter dated Friday and obtained by the New York Times, Politico, and other outlets. The White House argued that the move gives the administration a fresh 60-day timeline before it must seek congressional approval.

Trump also claimed that Washington is “taking over” the Strait of Hormuz, a key global energy supply bottleneck, and would charge vessels “20% on all cargo shipped” in exchange for protection. Washington would also reinstate its blockade of Iranian ports and bar passage to vessels belonging to Iran or its customers, he added.

Follow our live coverage below for continuous updates.

US President Donald Trump has formally told Congress that Washington has resumed what he described as “limited defensive strikes” against Iran, Politico and the New York Times reported on Monday.

The US House of Representatives previously attempted to limit Trump’s war powers, arguing that he lacked congressional approval for the February 28 US-Israeli attack on Iran. Under the War Powers Resolution of 1973, the president must withdraw American forces after 60 days unless Congress authorizes the war.

In a letter dated Friday and obtained by the outlets, Trump reportedly argued that the renewed US strikes on the Islamic Republic represent his “responsibility to protect Americans and the United States’ interests both at home and abroad.”

LIVE UPDATES: Iran strikes back after Trump restarts war (PHOTOS, VIDEOS)

The White House reportedly argued that the move gives the Trump administration a fresh 60-day timeline to continue military operations against Iran.

.@NewsHour obtained the letter from President Trump sent to Sen Chuck Grassley (president pro tempore in Senate) notifying congress that military action in Iran has resumed. It’s dated July 10, last Friday. pic.twitter.com/FuPd2Uanle

— Liz Landers (@ElizLanders) July 13, 2026

In May, Trump notified Congress that the initial conflict, dubbed Operation Epic Fury, had been “terminated” after a ceasefire between the US and Iran was reached on April 7.

However, the armistice and the memorandum of understanding signed by the US and Iran on June 17 collapsed after strikes resumed last week, with both sides accusing each other of breaking the agreement.

On Monday, Trump claimed that Washington is “taking over” the Strait of Hormuz, the key energy supply bottleneck that has served as a point of contention since the US and Israel launched the conflict.

The US would control the waterway and charge ships “20% on all cargo shipped,” the president said on Truth Social. Washington would also reinstate its blockade of Iranian ports and bar passage for vessels belonging to Iran or its customers, he added.

Iran has launched renewed strikes on American military facilities in Jordan, Bahrain, Kuwait, and Oman overnight, with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) saying it hit at least six bases in statements on Monday. The large-scale operation is a response to continued US strikes on targets across the Islamic Republic, according to Tehran.

The US has bombed Iran for four consecutive nights. It follows continued disagreement on the interpretation of the memorandum of understanding (MoU) signed by Washington and Tehran in mid-June, with both sides accusing each other of violations.

Targets of Iranian strikes

The Iranian military targeted Prince Hassan Air Base in Jordan, where a number of large missile depots and fuel storage tanks were “set ablaze,” according to the IRGC.

Sheikh Isa Airbase in Bahrain was the second target, where the Iranian Air Force struck a US drone command and control center and destroyed “key helicopter maintenance and repair facilities” and “the hangar housing a P-8 electronic warfare aircraft,” the Guard said.

The Iranian military also said it hit two American bases in Kuwait over the weekend and on Monday. At the Ali al-Salem Airbase, a Patriot air defense system was claimed destroyed, as well as some fuel storage tanks. At the Ahmad al-Jaber Airbase, a “strategic” radar system was reportedly taken out.

“Two HIMARS missile launchers and ammunition bunkers filled with missiles” were “completely” destroyed in a separate attack on another US facility in the Gulf nation, the IRGC added.

In the final phase of the operation, the Iranian Navy targeted a US base in Bahrain’s Juffair district located south of the capital Manama, where several surveillance radars were claimed destroyed.

An IRGC statement also maintained that “the Strait of Hormuz is our territory” and the only way for it to stay open is for the US to cease what it called “illegal… military interventions” in the area.

What’s been the US response?

The US military has not commented on the IRGC’s claims.

The latest statement from US Central Command (CENTCOM), issued on Sunday, said American forces had “completed a new wave of offensive strikes against Iran,” hitting “dozens of targets at multiple locations.” According to CENTCOM, the operation targeted air defense systems, coastal radar sites, missile and drone capabilities, and small boats, but did not specify the locations.

CENTCOM also said sea attack drones had been used for the first time against Iran. It further insisted that Iran “does not control” the Strait of Hormuz and said US forces in the region were prepared to ensure “freedom of navigation.”

On Monday, US President Donald Trump said America would be “taking over” the Strait of Hormuz from Iran and expected to “get paid” for providing security in the strategic waterway.

What’s the latest?

Iranian forces reportedly opened fire on two ships attempting to transit the strait on Monday morning.

Explosions were also reported near the southern Iranian city of Bandar Abbas and on Qeshm Island, according to Al Jazeera. The Iranian military said it had shot down a “hostile” drone near Bandar Abbas.

Elsewhere, at least two people were reportedly killed and three others injured in US strikes on several locations in the western Iranian city of Abadan.

Bahrain’s military said it had intercepted several Iranian missiles and drones. Attacks were also reported in the United Arab Emirates and Qatar, where three people, including a child, were reportedly injured by falling debris.

What led to the latest escalation

The current exchange of fire follows months of fluctuating hostilities between Washington and Tehran. The conflict began with a joint US-Israeli attack on Iran on February 28, prompting the latter to retaliate with strikes on American military bases across the Middle East.

Washington and West Jerusalem initially framed the campaign as an effort to topple Iran’s leadership and halt its nuclear program. The focus later shifted to the Strait of Hormuz after Tehran closed the strategic waterway in response.

A ceasefire in April halted regular shooting and was followed by months of Pakistan-mediated negotiations, culminating in the signing of a memorandum of understanding on June 17. Fighting resumed last week after Washington and Tehran clashed over the status of the Strait of Hormuz.

The US has demanded that Iran fully reopen the waterway and has been escorting commercial vessels along a route closer to the Omani coast, a move the IRGC has denounced as “illegal.”

A comprehensive new study of the global workforce finds that ‘anxiety’ is the best definition for how most workers feel about their career, their future, and the AI tsunami that threatens to wash it all away.

These days, everyone from doctors to lawyers and accountants to clerks are pondering the same question: will some machine eventually take over my job and what can I do to prepare for what appears to be an inevitability?

Just 22% of workers worldwide strongly agreed that their job was safe from elimination, according to a new report from ADP Research released this month. The results come from one of the largest workforce sentiment surveys ever conducted – more than 39,000 workers across 36 countries were polled.​

Meanwhile, a poll conducted by Ipsos in partnership with Epoch AI found that half of American adults used AI in the past week, either for personal or work use, with 20% of full-time workers saying that AI has taken over parts of their job.

Thus, it should surprise exactly nobody that the introduction of AI technology into all sectors of the economy is the leading cause of employee apprehension. Workers from Singapore to Spokane are fighting to understand what the technological upheaval means for their future – and they’re not comforted by what they are witnessing.​ The corporate world has failed to convince their workforce to welcome artificial intelligence with open arms.

“Despite three years of historically low global unemployment and steady economic growth, our data reveals widespread job insecurity expressed by workers worldwide,” Nela Richardson, chief economist, told reporters in a briefing on the survey results in New York City.

The ADP Research Today at Work 2026 report, based on survey responses collected in late summer 2025, “paints a portrait of a global workforce caught in the crosscurrents of technological disruption, demographic upheaval, and deep uncertainty,” writes Nick Lichtenberg in Fortune magazine. “The anxiety cuts across borders and industries, but ADP found that it hits hardest at the bottom of the organizational ladder.”​

According to the report, of the workers who make up the majority of most companies, only 18% said their job was safe. Managers did only marginally better at 21%. Predictably, confidence increased with seniority and status: Middle managers were listed at 23%, upper managers at 31%, and C-suite executives (an organization’s highest-ranking senior executives) at 35%. The data reveals that the higher up a worker is on the corporate ladder, the less afraid they are of taking a spill.​ Nevertheless, just a little more than a third of top executives feel like they have job security, according to the data, Fortune reported.

National divides were also painfully obvious. In Japan, a country famous for its intense commitment to corporate culture, only 5% of workers felt their jobs were secure, the lowest finding of any country in the survey. Meanwhile, Nigeria tallied the most confident workforce, with 38% of workers expressing job security. In America, the figure was only 28%.​

Globally, young workers ages 18 to 26 reported the highest level of optimism, with 29% saying they had the necessary skills to get ahead. But more senior workers ages 55 to 64 painted a drearier picture: Only 18% felt similarly prepared, and just 12% believed their company was investing in their talents. At the same time, just 20% of young workers strongly agreed AI would positively affect their jobs in the next year. That figure plummeted to just 10% among workers ages 55 to 64.​

ADP researchers are of the opinion that the current state of tension hitting the workforce is avoidable. What it boils down to is a failure of leadership. Employees who feel their supervisors are investing in their abilities were 5.3 times as likely to feel a high degree of job security.

“Younger workers are definitely more optimistic about their skill set,” Richardson told reporters. “Older workers are also, you know, more likely to say that they’re financially unprepared. Which is interesting. They make more money, but they feel more stretched financially. They’re more likely to say that they’re less productive and less engaged than younger workers. Youth and optimism go hand in hand.”

The survey also exposes a disturbing engagement crisis. Just 19% of workers globally were fully engaged on the job last year, a figure that is unchanged from 2024. That means about 80% of the workforce is not giving it their all on the job. Among those employees who strongly agreed their employer was investing in them, 53% were fully engaged. The figure sunk to just 12% for those who did not feel the investment. Meanwhile, employees who find meaning in their jobs are 12.5 times as likely to be fully engaged as those who don’t.​

“Upskilling isn’t just a strategy,” Richardson continued. “It’s a reassurance. It’s a trust pact between the employer and the worker.”

Currently, it is clear that the level of trust between worker and employer is greatly lacking inside of the corporation as the introduction of AI technologies can come at any time and with little prior notice. Such an environment leads to a general feeling of unnecessary worry and malaise inside of the workplace. Workers need assurances that they are receiving the same level of investment as AI technology is currently receiving to the tune of billions of dollars per year. That will make facing an AI future a less unsettling prospect for everyone.

Iraq may gradually be turned into a platform for the US to exert pressure on Iran. This doesn’t mean that Baghdad will be directly involved in the conflict; rather, Iraq may be used as a political, intelligence, logistical, and border corridor as part of a broader anti-Iran strategy currently being developed by the US and Israel.

The latest events in Baghdad point to the likelihood of this scenario. In late June, Iraqi security forces blocked the entrances to the ‘Green Zone’ – a fortified area in Baghdad where key government institutions and foreign diplomatic missions are located – and carried out a series of raids. Several political figures were detained, some of whom, according to media reports, are associated with the bloc of former Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani.

Officially, this is being presented as an anti-corruption campaign. But in Iraq – and generally, in the Middle East – anti-corruption cases are rarely just about corruption. Very often, they are driven by a power struggle, external influence, control over security forces, and an attempt to alter the balance within the elites.

Notably, this is happening after a shift in the political configuration of Iraq. Iraqi Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi, a businessman and political newcomer, was presented as a compromise figure after a protracted crisis within the Coordination Framework (a council of major Shiite parties). His emergence on the political scene was the result of complex bargaining between domestic and foreign players.

Western and regional media directly reported that his candidacy was backed by Washington. Therefore, what is happening in Iraq may be viewed as more than just an internal fight against corruption. According to another theory, this may be an attempt to reform the Iraqi elite, weaken pro-Iranian groups, limit the influence of armed groups linked to Tehran, and make Baghdad more manageable in the event of renewed pressure on Iran.

Herein lies the main question: Is Iraq being prepared for war against Iran? Probably not. Iraq is viewed as a platform for pressuring Iran, not as an independent participant in the war. These are fundamentally different things. Iraqi territory may be used for intelligence operations, pressure, logistics, special operations, work with the Kurdish factor, and control over border areas. However, this does not mean that the US will decide to launch a full-scale ground invasion of Iran. Currently, this option appears too risky and costly.

Nevertheless, Iraq is a very sensitive direction for Tehran. Factors like the shared border, US infrastructure, the weakness of certain state institutions, the autonomous Kurdistan region, competition between the elites, and the presence of armed groups make Iraq a convenient space for applying hybrid pressure. Instead of a direct strike via the Persian Gulf, the US may employ a more gradual approach, for example, by creating new flashpoints around Iran without declaring a major war. 

We may particularly note the incident that occurred last week near the city of Piranshahr in Iran’s West Azerbaijan Province. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) announced the elimination of five terrorists who infiltrated the country through the mountainous border regions to commit acts of sabotage. 

Geography plays a key role in this matter. Piranshahr is located very close to the border with Iraq. Nearby is the Tamarchin Border Terminal, through which cargo flows from Iraq to Iran and further along regional routes. This is more than just a trading hub. It’s a sensitive area where border issues, logistics, the ethnical factor, and security issues converge.

This area is home to a large Kurdish population on both sides of the border. Moreover, in Iran’s West Azerbaijan Province, domestic and intercommunal tensions periodically arise between Iranian Kurds and Iranian Azerbaijanis, though Tehran tries not to draw public attention to this matter. These border areas are particularly attractive for external players: Here, it’s much easier to create tension, stage provocations, test the response of the security forces, and burden the state with additional problems.

In this situation, the Kurdish factor could become one of the key tools used against Iran. Firstly, it is a well-known fact that the Kurds are used by the US and Israel. Moreover, the border zone between Iran and Iraq has long been home to armed groups, historical contradictions, a complex ethnopolitical situation, and external influence. This is precisely why the clashes near Piranshahr cannot be viewed separately from the political processes in Baghdad. On the one hand, Iraq is witnessing a purge of political figures associated with previous pro-Iranian forces. On the other hand, the Kurdish border is becoming more active. Together, this creates a feeling that a network of pressure is being formed around Iran; Iraq, Kurdistan, the Persian Gulf, intelligence agencies, sanctions, infrastructure threats, and internal destabilization efforts are all part of it. 

At the same time, a full-scale ground invasion of Iran remains unrealistic. Iran cannot be quickly suppressed by means of a ground invasion because of its vast territory, difficult terrain, powerful security apparatus, significant mobilization resources, missile potential, and a network of allied structures in the region. Any attempt to use Iraq as a staging ground for a direct invasion would almost inevitably lead to retaliatory strikes against US military facilities in Iraq, the energy infrastructure of the Gulf states, and the logistics of US allies.

That is why the Gulf monarchies, despite their ties to Washington, are unlikely to openly engage in a full-scale war against Iran. They may provide infrastructure, intelligence and logistics support, airspace, or political cover. But direct involvement comes with much greater risk. Tehran’s response could be painful, and would target the ports, oil facilities, air bases, financial centers, and transportation corridors of the Gulf states. 

In other words, Iraq looks less like an independent participant in a future war and more like a convenient platform for pressuring Iran; it could be used for political reorientation, intelligence and logistics, work with the Kurdish forces and armed groups, and limited operations against Tehran.

This scenario appears more likely as of today. The US may hesitate to launch a full-scale ground war against Iran, but it could very well use Iraq as a territory for gradually weakening Iranian influence. The events in Baghdad and Piranshahr demonstrate that preparations for a new war against Iran are proceeding quietly and systematically.

A deadly blaze swept through a bar in Bangkok, Thailand, late on Sunday, leaving at least 28 people dead and dozens more critically injured, the authorities have reported.

According to eyewitness accounts the fire originated near the bar’s music stage and quickly spread, with many customers getting lost in the smoke and becoming trapped in the bathrooms in the ensuing panic.

At least 71 people were injured, with 25 remaining in critical condition, the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration reported on Monday.

“When the power went out – for instance, at the restroom entrance – visibility dropped to zero. Everyone tried to exit, but the restroom had no windows; it was a dead end,” Thai national police chief Kittharath Punpetch said in a press briefing on Monday.

“Once inside, escape was impossible because smoke had already filled the area, and facing it meant confronting the danger.”

Thai police have begun focusing their forensic investigation on the area above the venue’s music stage as they work to determine what caused the deadly fire, he added.

The police will investigate the owners for negligence amid reports that the emergency exits were blocked, he said.

Terrifying video from the night of the incident shows a plume of fire shooting out of the bar’s front entrance, as customers run out surrounded by the flames.

Harrowing footage from inside the bar shows people choking on smoke as they run out of the darkened venue.

The Chatuchak District Office has issued an order closing the establishment for 30 days while the investigation takes place.

The bodies of 15 tourists who drowned in a speedboat accident in Vietnam on Saturday afternoon have been returned to India.

The vessel was ferrying 32 Indian tourists and four Vietnamese crew members when it capsized, shortly after departing Hon May Rut Ngoai island, authorities said.

The bodies were flown from Ho Chi Minh City to Mumbai on Monday, the Indian embassy in Vietnam posted on X. The embassy said earlier that 16 survivors had been discharged from a local hospital and were returning to India. All the deceased were from the south of the country.

The mortal remains of the 15 Indian nationals have departed from Ho Chi Minh City to Mumbai by Vietnam Airlines flight VN 979 and will arrive at 2130 hours local time.

The State Governments of Andhra Pradesh, Kerala and Tamil Nadu will coordinate transportation of mortal remains…

— India in Vietnam (@AmbHanoi) July 13, 2026

The boat overturned within minutes of departure when a large wave hit it, AP reported. The boat swerved in rough waters before it capsized. Rescue teams arrived within five minutes and pulled survivors from the water.

One survivor, who is in critical condition, has been transferred to Cho Ray Hospital in Ho Chi Minh City for specialized treatment.

The tourist group was on a trip organized by a smartphone manufacturer for its employees, distributors, and retail partners.

The accident occurred about 6 miles south of Phu Quoc, Vietnam’s largest island and one of its most popular beach destinations, which attracts millions of domestic and foreign tourists each year.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has warned that any Ukrainian strikes on Russian territory will be met with significantly stronger retaliation. 

Putin made the remarks on Monday while addressing the ‘All for Victory!’ forum organized by the All-Russian People’s Front, where he discussed the Ukraine conflict and Moscow’s response to Western backing for Kiev. 

“Our response will always mirror any strike on Russian territory. We will respond in kind – only several times more powerfully,” Putin said. “The enemy will feel it. They already do, I hope. And they will feel it even more in the future.” 

Russia’s strength lies in its ability to overcome “every difficulty and every challenge,” while the “Russophobic” part of the collective West continues to wage a campaign against the country, Putin said. 

Despite the pressure, Russia is “developing its economy, strengthening its financial system, modernizing its Armed Forces and expanding its defense industry,” he said, adding that these efforts are already changing “the situation on the battlefield.” 

“Our fighters are advancing,” Putin said. “That is why there is no doubt we will achieve victory.” 

Ukraine has intensified drone attacks on Russian energy infrastructure and residential areas in recent months amid continued setbacks on the battlefield, launching several hundred UAVs a day on average. FPV drones, including AI-assisted models, have increasingly targeted passenger buses and private vehicles. 

In late June, Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky announced a 40-day pressure campaign, combining long-range strikes and clandestine operations aimed at inflicting economic damage on Russia. 

Moscow has condemned the attacks as indiscriminate acts of terrorism intended to distract from Ukraine’s battlefield setbacks, responding with an expanded campaign of long-range strikes. 

Most Russian strikes in recent weeks have focused on the Ukrainian capital, Kiev, targeting military-industrial facilities, drone assembly and storage sites, and weapons depots.

India’s private sector players are increasingly taking up hardware and equipment manufacturing as the country ramps up defense production, seeking to reduce its reliance on costly imports, RT India reports.

India’s annual defense production surged to an all-time high of $18.64 billion in the financial year (FY) 2025-26. This is a 15.6% increase on the previous financial year’s $16.13 billion, and a 110% surge since FY 2020-21, when the figure was $8.86 billion.

The private sector’s share of this ramp-up is noteworthy, considering defense production has traditionally been a preserve of India’s public sector. The private sector contributed nearly a fourth, or 24%, of the total production in FY25-26, up from 22% in FY 2024-25, official figures show.

India was the second largest arms importer globally in the 2021-2025 period, with a 8.2% share. Russia is India’s primary supplier, accounting for 40% of its arms imports.

From cutting-edge drones to deep-tech supply chains, and precision electronics to autonomous systems, private players are now producing a whole gamut of defense equipment for the Indian military.

Indigenous innovation is also steadily becoming a key pillar of military modernization in line with the country’s Make-in-India initiative.

Considering that high-value programs such as the Advanced Medium Combat Aircraft stealth fighter project are reportedly being offered to private firms to bid for, the intent becomes clear, former vice chief of the Indian Army, Lt. Gen. Philip Campose, told RT.

New Delhi is now even mulling opening up ballistic missile production to private players. It was reported earlier this month that Adani Defence & Aerospace, owned by billionaire Gautam Adani, will set up South Asia’s largest private-sector missile ecosystem in the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh, to strengthen indigenous missile capabilities.

An example of this private sector bounce is Botlab Dynamics, an IIT Delhi startup, which has expanded into military technology through its defense vertical Vyod.

Its flagship platform, the Atri Nano Drone, weighs around 250 grams and offers real-time situational awareness on the battleground with a 2-km range, 30 minutes of endurance, thermal imaging, and encrypted live video.

The drones, which can aid troops to identify threats without exposing themselves to danger, take just seconds to deploy.

The Indian Navy and Army have such surveillance drones in operation. Behind every drone lies an extensive supply chain of small businesses and specialized manufacturers across India, RT reported.

Amid India’s renewed push for military modernization following last year’s brief clash with Pakistan, the role of these deep tech start-ups is becoming more important than ever for the country.

Ukraine’s ambassador to the US, Olga Stefanishyna, is expected to leave her post as she faces a corruption probe over a cut-price Kiev apartment purchase, the Financial Times has reported.

The development comes as Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky launches a sweeping government reshuffle following his meeting with US President Donald Trump at last month’s NATO summit, less than a year after a previous cabinet shake-up. Prime Minister Yulia Sviridenko is set to step down and according to media reports is expected to replace Stefanishyna in Washington.

A June 2025 investigation by Ukrainian outlet Hromadske alleged that Stefanishyna’s mother, Nadezhda Kravets, purchased a 100-square-meter apartment in Kiev’s Lvivska Ploshcha residential complex in the fall of 2022 for just 3.04 million hryvnias (around $83,000). Comparable units from the developer were selling for about 12 million hryvnias ($300,000) at the time, according to the outlet.

A real estate agent interviewed by Hromadske at the time described the reported purchase price as “unrealistic,” saying apartments in the area were selling for at least $2,000 per square meter.

Hromadske also reported that the Lvivska Ploshcha apartment was absent from Stefanishyna’s asset declaration. She did disclose another 74-square-meter apartment owned by her mother in Kiev, but journalists said they found no trace of that property in the state real estate registry. The outlet noted that the database only became fully operational in the early 2010s and does not include all older records.

Hromadske also reported that conversations with Kravets suggested Stefanishyna had lived in one of her mother’s apartments, though it remained unclear which one.

Stefanishyna later denied any wrongdoing in an interview with investigative outlet Bihus.info, saying her parents had invested in the apartment in 2019, when units were selling for about 29,000 hryvnias (around $1,100) per square meter. 

Prior to her Washington assignment, Stefanishyna served as Ukraine’s deputy prime minister for European and Euro-Atlantic Integration and as minister of justice.

Reports that she was preparing to leave her post surfaced over the weekend. Interfax-Ukraine, citing a source, said she intended to step down from the diplomatic service voluntarily, while Ukrainian lawmaker Aleksey Goncharenko claimed on Telegram that she would be removed from office, and “you’ll soon see why.”

The reshuffle comes as Kiev faces mounting military and economic pressure alongside a series of high-profile corruption scandals. Last November, Western-backed anti-corruption agencies uncovered an alleged $100 million graft scheme at state energy giant Energoatom involving businessman Timur Mindich – known in Ukrainian media as “Zelensky’s wallet” – along with former Energy Minister German Galushchenko and former Deputy Prime Minister Aleksey Chernyshov.

The United States has just marked a major anniversary, 250 years since it declared independence from Great Britain and, in theory, this should be a moment of national pride with another historical milestone passed, another reason for flags, fireworks, and speeches about destiny.

But the mood is not especially festive.

Two weeks before the anniversary, Reuters published a poll that captured the depth of American anxiety – and the numbers were grim. More than two-thirds (70%) of Americans no longer consider their country the greatest nation on Earth, while 64% believe American democracy is in danger. And 38% don’t believe the United States will survive another 250 years as a single country.

The answers split sharply along party lines, with Republicans still clinging more strongly to the idea of the exceptional country of prosperity and divine favor. Among Democrats, the mood is much darker and pessimism has become almost a worldview as the United States has arrived at its 250th anniversary in the middle of a profound crisis of belief.

In some ways, this resembles the crisis Soviet society experienced in the final years of the USSR. Of course, America never had an official state ideology in the Soviet sense and nobody in Washington promised to build communism at breakneck speed, but the US did have its own coherent vision of the future which it called the American Dream.

That dream promised prosperity through hard work and freedom. Work hard, play by the rules, take responsibility for yourself, and life will improve, your children will live better than you did and your country will remain a model for the world, but in the 21st century, that promise began to fall apart.

The first serious cracks appeared among millennials, the generation born between 1981 and 1996. Their parents got rich, bought homes, built savings, and traveled abroad, but they inherited student debt, unaffordable housing, unstable work, and the strange feeling that no matter how hard they run, the finish line keeps moving further away.

Older Americans told them the answer was simply to work as hard as they did, but younger Americans could see the numbers and how with comparable effort, earlier generations ended up far wealthier. 

So the old formula no longer worked and that undermined the idea of labor as an absolute virtue. If hard work no longer guarantees a decent life, then what remains? Freedom?

Americans are formally free in that they elect presidents and congressmen. Yet Congress is filled with elderly politicians who seem determined to change nothing and who often leave public life only when nature finally intervenes. Presidents speak beautifully on campaign trails, but once inside the White House, they usually follow the same old path so while the faces change, the machine remains and freedom, too, begins to look hollow.

For younger Americans, the American Dream is becoming what the bright communist future became for late Soviet citizens as an official promise repeated so often that almost nobody believes it anymore. Once a society loses its vision of the future, disorientation follows and almost everyone can feel that the system is not working properly. But what should replace it and where should the country go?

Well, American society has developed two sharply different answers. The conservative right believes America can be saved by a return to pragmatism with a freer market, support for major entrepreneurs, ruthless efficiency in public spending, and a foreign policy less constrained by old ideological sermons about democracy and human rights. In this view, America must stop trying to lecture the world and start taking care of itself.

The progressive left believes the opposite, that the pillars of liberal democracy mustn’t be abandoned, but that the economy needs radical restructuring. National wealth, they say, must be distributed more fairly and big business, especially in the technology sector, is viewed with deep suspicion. The new villains are “tech feudal lords,” billionaires whose power appears to rival that of the state itself.

Both camps agree on one thing, that the current order is exhausted, but they simply disagree on what should come next.

Donald Trump was supposed to test the right-wing answer in practice and his supporters expected a revolution in a break with the old elite, a new economic nationalism, a government that would stop apologizing and start acting because he promised all of that.

But Trump’s presidency has shown the limits of his movement in that there’s not much of a system and Trump doesn’t think in historical categories, but in terms of Trump. If it were up to him, Washington would be filled not with a new national doctrine, but with golden ballrooms and monuments to his own greatness.

His approach to America’s 250th anniversary has even disappointed some of his admirers. Many expected a serious program, or at least a symbolic reflection on the country’s path, but instead, Trump keeps speaking about his own achievements. At times, it is hard to tell whether America is celebrating 250 years of independence or continuing the festivities for its president’s 80th birthday.

So now disillusioned by the right, America is glancing left, although the country doesn’t yet trust the left nationally. But locally, especially in big cities, voters are increasingly willing to experiment, with Zohran Mamdani, the openly socialist mayor of New York, an obvious example. This is no accident as the largest cities are where the contradictions of modern America are most visible in terms of housing costs, inequality, migration, crime, decaying infrastructure, and anger at remote elites.

If socialist policies succeed at city level, their supporters will soon claim they are ready for higher office.

And what will their opponents do then? They could accept defeat or they may decide that their America can no longer live under the same roof as the other America, which is the real question behind the anniversary. Not whether the United States has had a remarkable 250 years, because it has, but the question is whether it still has a common future.

Perhaps America will find a new compromise and perhaps it will reinvent itself again, as it has done before, but perhaps its two political tribes have already begun traveling in different historical directions.

If, over the next 250 years, US history follows that road toward a civilized or uncivilized split, it won’t be because Americans lacked flags or speeches, it will be because the country’s old promise stopped convincing its own people.

This article was first published by the online newspaper Gazeta.ru and was translated and edited by the RT team

Germany will fund the purchase of 50,000 attack drones for the Ukrainian military, Reuters has reported, citing informed sources.

Ukraine has intensified its drone attacks on energy infrastructure and residential areas inside Russia in recent months amid continued setbacks on the front line, targeting the country with several hundred UAVs per day on average. Among other things, there has been an increase in incidents where FPV drones, including AI-guided models, have hit passenger buses and private vehicles.

On Wednesday, at least 11 civilians were killed and a dozen others wounded in drone strikes across Russia, according to local authorities. Moscow has responded to these attacks by launching large-scale missile and UAV raids against military-related targets in Ukraine.

The drone order made by the German government involves low-cost Shrike first-person-view UAVs, Reuters said in an article on Sunday.

The quadcopters in question are produced by Ukrainian manufacturer SkyFall and rely on software from US firm Auterion. They are designed to autonomously track and engage moving targets in the final phase of the flight, it explained.

Auterion CEO Lorenz Meier told the agency that the contract for the Shrike drones was worth about €90 million ($103 million) and that it had been bankrolled by “a European country.” Some of the UAVs have already been supplied to Kiev, and the rest are expected by the end of 2026, he said.

According to Meier, Auterion is providing software to at least 100,000 drones from various manufacturers this year, which are paid for by several Western governments and intended to be delivered to Ukraine. This includes a $50 million Pentagon contract for 33,000 UAVs that have already been supplied to Kiev, he added.

SkyFall confirmed Germany’s involvement in the deal when contacted by Reuters, but refrained from providing any further details. The defense ministries in Berlin and Kiev declined to comment.

Germany has been the biggest supporter of Ukraine in the EU since the escalation between Moscow and Kiev in February 2022, with the amount of military aid provided by Berlin amounting to some €55.5 billion ($63.4 billion), according to government data.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said last week that “it is high time Berlin put an end to the aggressive war [it is waging against Russia] by proxy of the Kiev regime.”

Moscow’s top diplomat, Sergey Lavrov, previously argued that the support for the “Nazi regime” in Kiev and the continued mobilization of Germany were signs of it “ transforming into a Fourth Reich.”

Slovakia was not the only NATO state that refused to participate in the bloc’s latest military aid package for Ukraine, the country’s president, Peter Pellegrini, has said.

During the summit in Ankara, Türkiye last week, NATO members pledged to provide Kiev with €70 billion ($80 billion) in military equipment, training, and other assistance this year and to sustain at least the same level of financial support in 2027.

In an interview with broadcaster TA3 on Sunday, Pellegrini rejected claims that Bratislava was alone in declining to contribute to the package during the gathering in the Turkish capital.

“That is simply not the case. The Hungarian Prime Minister [Peter Magyar] spoke clearly on this matter, stating that Hungary would not provide any military or financial aid to Ukraine. The Czech Prime Minister [Andrej Babis] expressed the exact same position right at the negotiating table and there were other prime ministers, who also will not participate in those 70 billion,” he said.

“Slovakia was not alone in this attitude. Our position is that we will not help with weapons or financially participate in the further arming of Ukraine,” the president stressed.

Overall, Pellegrini described the NATO summit as “constructive,” but expressed regret that it focused on boosting military aid to Kiev and strengthening its air defenses and the ability to hit targets deep inside Russia, while “very little, if any, time has been devoted to when and how to start diplomatic negotiations.” 

“There is no purely military solution to this conflict. If this continues, it will be a war of attrition for several years, in which thousands of innocent people and tens of thousands of soldiers will be dying every month,” Pellegrini said.

After Robert Fico returned as Slovak prime minister in October 2023, Bratislava halted military supplies to Kiev. It also consistently criticized EU sanctions against Russia and called for a diplomatic solution to the Ukraine conflict.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova last week described the NATO summit as “humiliating” for Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky.

“He once again rolled out his usual wish list, begging for missile and air defense systems… while touting Ukrainian military’s terrorist capabilities. NATO members offered no meaningful response to these appeals,” Zakharova argued.

Moscow has repeatedly warned against Western military and financial support for Ukraine, arguing that it only serves to prolong the conflict without altering its outcome, while also increasing the risk of a direct clash between Russia and NATO.

US President Donald Trump has claimed that America is “taking over” the Strait of Hormuz from Iran, and will act as the “guardian angel” of the key waterway “and get paid for it.” Tehran has earlier declared the strait closed, blaming “hostile actions” by US forces.

Speaking by phone to ‘Fox & Friends’ on Monday, Trump said Iran was getting its “ass kicked” in the war against the US, asserting that the country’s navy, air force and missile capabilities had been “virtually annihilated” and listing senior Iranian leaders he said had been killed. 

He added that US troops were continuing to carry out strikes against Iranian targets after he declared a ceasefire with Tehran to be “over” this past weekend.

“We’re taking over the strait. They’ve got nothing,” Trump said, arguing that Washington should have dealt with what he called the Iran threat “47 years ago.” He accused successive US presidents of having been “tapped along” by Tehran without taking decisive action.

Control of the Strait of Hormuz – a vital route for global oil and liquefied natural gas shipments – has emerged as a major flashpoint in the Middle East conflict, which was triggered by a surprise joint US Israeli attack on Iran on February 28 which cost the life of the late Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and several members of his immediate family.

1/
Due to recent hostile actions by the US forces, passage through the #Strait_of_Hormuz is currently unfeasible. As soon as stability and calm are restored, all applications will be reviewed in accordance with the scheduled timeline, and the permitting process will resume.

— PGSA | نهاد مدیریت آبراه خلیج فارس (@PGSA_IRAN) July 13, 2026

Tehran has formally declared the strait closed, blaming “hostile actions” by US forces in a post on X on Monday by Iran’s Persian Gulf Strait Authority, which said passage would only resume once “stability and calm” are restored.

Regular exchanges of strikes stopped after a ceasefire in April, which led to the signing of a memorandum of understanding (MoU) on June 17. Hostilities have since resumed as the sides clashed over the interpretation of the MoU and the status of the strait. The US continued striking targets in Iran early on Monday, marking the fourth consecutive night of bombardment. Iran responded by firing missiles and drones at US military sites in Jordan, Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain, and Oman.

“We’ve had ten deals with these people, and so we’re just going to hit them very hard,” Trump claimed, adding that the US is going to “guard” Hormuz and going to get paid “a lot of money.” 

Under the MoU, Iran pledged to use “its best efforts for the safe passage of commercial vessels with no charge” during the 60 day period and to negotiate with Oman over “the future administration and maritime services” in the strait. Tehran has maintained that it has the right to regulate traffic, collect tolls and require ships to use a designated route. 

Washington has demanded that Iran declare the strait fully open and has been guiding vessels along a route closer to the Omani coast, which Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) has denounced as “illegal.”

South African police have arrested a British citizen wanted in the UK over the alleged murders of his wife and two young daughters, saying he was found with an illegal firearm in Johannesburg.

The 45-year-old suspect, Ndodana Mkhanyisi Tshuma, who is of Zimbabwean origin, was due to make his first appearance at the Johannesburg Magistrate’s Court on Monday, according to South African Police Service (SAPS) national spokesperson Brigadier Athlenda Mathe. She said Tshuma would appear before the court on two separate matters: extradition proceedings to the UK and a charge of possessing an illegal firearm in South Africa.

Mathe confirmed that South Africa had received a provisional extradition request from Interpol Manchester through Interpol Pretoria, outlining the allegations against Tshuma relating to the deaths of his wife and two daughters. ”We will be awaiting a full extradition request within 40 days that will include the UK case docket, as well as supporting evidence,” Mathe said, adding that the second matter before the court relates to the illegal firearm allegedly found in Tshuma’s possession.

”We are tracing the suspects responsible for selling him this unlicensed firearm,” she said. Explaining the extradition process, Mathe said the provisional request includes the arrest warrant issued by UK authorities. ”We will be awaiting the full extradition request within 40 days that will include the entire UK case docket, as well as supporting evidence. It will then be up to the court to determine when he will be extradited back to the UK,” she noted.

Mathe stressed SAPS had worked closely with UK authorities through Interpol throughout the investigation. ”We are all Interpol member countries. We share intelligence, we share information, and we assist each other with cross-border and international investigations,” she said.

Asked whether Tshuma had been harboured or assisted while in South Africa, Mathe said investigators had found no evidence to suggest that he had been protected. ”Absolutely not. He was not harboured. We worked closely with different stakeholders, including his family, to apprehend him,” she said.

Tshuma was arrested in Kensington, Johannesburg, on Friday during a coordinated operation involving the SAPS Interpol National Central Bureau, Crime Intelligence and the Organised Crime Investigation Unit. UK authorities are seeking his extradition in connection with the deaths of his wife, 42-year-old Nothabo Zandile Tshuma, and their daughters, Natalie, 15, and Nala, 5.

The three victims were found at the family’s home in Great Denham, near Bedford, after police forced entry on Monday following concerns that they had not been seen for several days.

Acting National Commissioner Lt Gen Puleng Dimpane praised the officers involved in the operation, describing the arrest as an example of effective cooperation between specialised SAPS units and international law enforcement partners.

According to Sky News, Tshuma left the UK on Saturday, two days before the bodies were discovered, flying from London Heathrow Airport to Zimbabwe on a British passport. Police later released CCTV images of him at the airport as part of efforts to trace his whereabouts. ITV News reported that Tshuma owns and operates a property business, Nexus Trove Holdings, from his home in Great Denham. The company’s latest filings show it held assets of just over £1 million (about R24 million) at the end of 2024.

First published by IOL

Russia has no intention of providing proof to the Baltic states over claims that they allowed Ukrainian drones to use their airspace for attacks on Russian territory, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has said.

Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia last week issued a joint demarche after Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Galuzin said Moscow had “verified data” showing that Baltic states had provided air corridors for Ukrainian drones attacking Russian civilian infrastructure.

The three countries said the accusations were “completely unfounded” and denied opening their airspace for the strikes.

Responding to the demarche on Monday, Peskov stated that Russia’s military and special services “see where things fly from and how they fly.”

“This is well known to everyone, and we are not going to prove anything to anyone here,” he said, adding that Moscow is closely tracking the sources of threats to Russian border areas and regions deeper inside the country.

Russia has repeatedly noted that Ukrainian drones have crossed or crashed in Baltic airspace while targeting Russian territory. Moscow has argued that such routes would require either the consent of the countries involved or a failure of their air defenses.

In recent months, Ukrainian drones have been reported in Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia amid intensified strikes on northwestern Russia, including Leningrad Region and areas around St. Petersburg.

Estonian Foreign Minister Margus Tsahkna said in June that Tallinn was “not happy” about Ukrainian drones entering its airspace, but added that Estonia was not telling Kiev to stop because the incidents were part of the conflict with Russia.

Moscow has accused the Baltic states of playing with fire by allowing their territory to be used for hostile actions. Russian officials have warned that if neighboring countries knowingly help facilitate Ukrainian drone strikes, Moscow would consider them complicit in the attacks and would have the right to self-defense under the UN Charter.

Nigerian security forces have rescued dozens of schoolchildren and teachers abducted nearly two months ago, when gunmen attacked three schools in the southwestern state of Oyo, the West African nation’s authorities have confirmed.

The military, police, and intelligence agencies completed the operation on Friday, during which eight suspected militants were arrested and an unspecified number were killed, according to Nigerian President Bola Tinubu.

“This successful military operation has ended the siege and standoff of over 50 days and has brought relief to the entire nation and the affected families in particular,” Tinubu said in a statement.

In a separate statement, the Nigerian Army said 44 students and teachers had been freed following an intelligence-led operation in the Old Oyo National Park and other parts of the country.

The military said multiple arrests disrupted the kidnappers’ leadership, informant network, hideouts, and supply routes, forcing the group to release the hostages unconditionally. It added that security personnel suffered casualties during the operation, but did not provide details.

Officials previously said 39 children and seven teachers were abducted from schools in the Ahoro-Esiele and Yawota communities of Oriire Local Government Area on May 15. One teacher was later reported killed in captivity.

The gunmen reportedly entered the communities wearing military-style uniforms and took the captives into the Old Oyo National Park, a vast forest reserve extending toward neighboring Kwara State. The federal government later deployed a special rescue team and approved the recruitment of 1,000 forest guards in Oyo.

On Friday, President Tinubu vowed to “get justice for these children and their teachers and for the family of Mr. Oyedokun, who the terrorists gruesomely murdered.”

Africa’s most populous nation has experienced a surge in deadly attacks on military bases, churches, and schools in recent months, prompting the government to declare a state of emergency. The authorities have blamed jihadist groups affiliated with Boko Haram and its splinter faction, Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP), for the violence across the northeast, northwest, and central regions.

In Borno State alone, at least 76 students were abducted by armed groups in Askira-Uba Local Government Area between mid-May and June. Last month, suspected ISWAP militants kidnapped at least 36 students and a staff member from Government Day Secondary School in Lassa. On May 15, armed assailants also seized more than 40 students from the Primary and Junior Government Day Secondary School in the Mussa-Biri community, according to officials.

Russian and Chinese warships have conducted live-fire drills in the Yellow Sea as part of the annual Joint Sea naval exercises, the Russian Pacific Fleet announced on Monday.

The sea phase of the drills involved vessels from Russia’s Pacific Fleet and the Chinese People’s Liberation Army Navy. The crews practiced countering modern threats, including simulated attacks by drones and unmanned boats.

Over several days, ships from the joint detachment, which included guided missile cruisers, submarines, destroyers, and rescue vessels, used naval artillery and shipboard machine guns to repel a mock attack by unmanned aerial and surface systems. Electronic warfare systems were also used to suppress a simulated mass attack.

The crews also practiced joint maneuvering, anti-submarine warfare, engaging simulated enemy surface vessels, and search-and-rescue operations, according to the Pacific Fleet.

The Joint Sea-2026 exercises began on July 6. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov previously stated that the drills are not directed against any country, and that military cooperation between Moscow and Beijing contributes to regional security.

China’s Defense Ministry described the exercise as part of the annual cooperation plan between the two militaries. It said the drills are aimed at jointly addressing security challenges and maintaining regional peace and stability.

Russia and China have expanded military cooperation alongside closer political and economic ties in recent years. Moscow and Beijing have described their relationship as a comprehensive strategic partnership, while repeatedly stressing that it is not directed against third countries.

An Indian sailor is missing after an attack on a commercial shipping vessel in the Strait of Hormuz area on Saturday.

The Cyprus-flagged GFS Galaxy was attacked off Oman’s northern coast while transiting the Strait of Hormuz as the shaky ceasefire between Iran and the US unravelled. Search operations are continuing for the missing sailor, while 23 crew members were rescued and given medical aid.

“Of the 11 Indian nationals on board, ten have been rescued so far, while one Indian National is reportedly missing,” India’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement. New Delhi condemned the attack, saying the targeting of civilian shipping and infrastructure in the region must end.

In June, three Indian sailors died when US forces enforcing a naval blockade of Iran fired on their vessel, the MT Settebello.

The deaths led to domestic pressure on the Modi government to raise the issue with the Trump administration, with India twice summoning US Chargé d’Affaires Jason Meeks to the Foreign Ministry in New Delhi.

Our statement on the attack on a commercial vessel off the coast of Oman ⬇️

🔗 https://t.co/JtqdfO6iJ0 pic.twitter.com/V6jD6zJOtx

— Randhir Jaiswal (@MEAIndia) July 12, 2026

The GFS Galaxy, a container ship, issued a distress call after it was hit, which reportedly happened about 44 nautical miles off Musandam Governorate, Oman’s Maritime Security Center said in a social media post on Sunday.

The UK Maritime Trade Operation had earlier reported a fire on board a container ship. Authorities later said the crew abandoned the vessel and evacuated into a lifeboat.

India’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson termed the continued attacks on commercial shipping in the region “worrisome.” The ministry said New Delhi is coordinating with Omani authorities on the search and rescue operation.

The US on Sunday said it carried out fresh waves of attacks on Iranian targets in retaliation for Tehran’s strikes on a commercial ship in the Strait of Hormuz.

Iran responded with a barrage of airstrikes targeting several countries in the Middle East, including Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, Oman, and Jordan.

The first time I saw Boris Johnson, he was dangling in mid-air in a safety helmet, Union Jack flags fluttering above him and his polished shoes tucked awkwardly beneath him. He looked like Mr. Bean after being accidentally ejected from an aircraft.

I couldn’t believe that this was the new prime minister of Britain, so I checked other photographs, assuming it might be Photoshop. But it wasn’t, and there he was, sitting in the same office once occupied by Winston Churchill and Margaret Thatcher.

That image has stayed with me because it captured something larger and made me ask what’s happened to Britain’s political elite, and to Western Europe’s more broadly?

Britain has changed prime minister repeatedly in recent years, and each new arrival has seemed more insubstantial than the last and compared with the major figures of the past, many of today’s leaders look lightweight and strangely unprepared for the seriousness of the offices they hold.

Elsewhere in Western Europe, the picture is no better, such as Emmanuel Macron who looks the part in a well-cut suit, but appearances only go so far. The photographs from his youth, the theatrical poses and the carefully managed presidential image all speak to a politics increasingly dominated by presentation, while even scenes from his marriage, such as the now-famous footage of Brigitte Macron appearing to strike him on a government aircraft, would have been almost unimaginable in the eras of François Mitterrand or Valéry Giscard d’Estaing.

In Western Europe’s smaller states, the decline is often more pronounced as political leaders increasingly resemble overexcited adolescents, eager to display their ideological credentials and fashionable causes. Their language is grandiose, their judgement frequently poor, and their sense of responsibility minimal.

Russia Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s contempt for them is therefore understandable given he’s a career diplomat formed in a different political culture, one in which statecraft was supposed to involve discipline and a sense of consequence. Faced with Western Europe’s current political class, he sometimes sounds like a man struggling not to say what he really thinks.

The problem is that these leaders may be transient, but the consequences of their decisions are not and while governments change, the submarines, cruise missiles, armies, tanks and aircraft remain and so do the strategic commitments, sanctions regimes, broken relationships and accumulated risks created by politicians who may be gone within a few years.

So why has the quality of Western Europe’s political leadership declined so sharply? One major reason is economic as over the past three decades, the business world has become far more attractive to ambitious and capable young people than public service. A vice president responsible for government relations at a large corporation can earn €1.5 million a year, often with bonuses, stock options and a generous severance package and politics can’t compete with that.

An English friend once told me that a former schoolmate of his might one day become prime minister and this wasn’t fantasy. The man had attended an elite school, had been politically active from a young age and was moving through the expected stages of a serious political career.

Then business intervened as he was offered a position so lucrative that the uncertain prospect of becoming prime minister no longer seemed especially attractive and, thus, his political career faded, not because he lacked ability, but because the private sector valued that ability more highly.

Henry Kissinger spoke harshly about the decline of Western political leadership when he insisted that modern politicians lacked competence and any real understanding of the tasks before them and he was largely correct.

Yet Kissinger didn’t fully address another part of the problem, which is the American role in selecting and shaping much of Europe’s political class.

A notable number of European leaders have studied in the United States, attended American-funded programs or received support from US-linked foundations early in their careers and these institutions don’t simply identify talented young people, but they help shape their worldview.

This isn’t necessarily a matter of direct recruitment by intelligence services, because that’s a more difficult and unreliable process. The method is subtler, as young politicians are introduced to networks and encouraged to adopt a particular understanding of international affairs.

The result is a loyalty filter and independent-minded people rarely flourish in such systems. Those who advance are often the most adaptable and the most willing to repeat the approved language. In other words, the process doesn’t necessarily select the strongest candidates, but it selects the easiest to shape.

There are occasional mistakes, particularly in Poland where American institutions sometimes underestimate the ability of Polish politicians to imitate the language expected of them while retaining deeply nationalist instincts. Washington is wary of genuine Polish independence, but its candidate pool is limited, so compromises are made.

The American domestic system works differently, where young politicians often enter party networks already equipped with a good education and a carefully managed personal life and if they need money, party-connected business interests help them.

Republicans have traditionally relied on industrial and corporate networks, while Democrats have been supported by finance, arts, law, and media. A promising politician may spend several years in business, earn enough to become financially secure, and then return to public life with a house, and investments, but in Europe, the mechanism is almost the reverse.

Public pressure is constantly applied to reduce politicians’ salaries and privileges as the argument is always that they should cost less and appear more ordinary. Meanwhile, corporations offer increasingly extraordinary rewards to anyone with intelligence and connections so the predictable result is reverse selection.

The most capable people leave, while the ambitious ones move into business, consulting, finance, or lobbying and those who remain are often ideologues, careerists, eccentrics, or mediocrities with nowhere more attractive to go.

This process is now difficult to stop and the prestige of political office has fallen too far, while the rewards available in the corporate world have become too large and too obvious.

Much of Europe is therefore left with leaders who often lack competence and historical perspective and while they occupy powerful offices, many seem unable to understand the scale of the responsibilities they have inherited.

The danger isn’t merely that they look ridiculous, it’s is that they govern states possessing vast economic and military power and when weak people inherit powerful machinery, the consequences can be anything but trivial.

This article was first published by the online newspaper Gazeta.ru and was translated and edited by the RT team

Algeria and Mali have announced the restoration of diplomatic relations after a yearlong rift that erupted when Algiers shot down a Malian military drone near their shared border.

Malian government spokesperson Issa Ousmane Coulibaly said on Friday that the West African nation would allow its ambassador to return to Algiers as part of measures aimed at the “renewal of relations of cooperation and friendship” with Algeria.

Bamako has also decided to reopen its national airspace to all civilian and military aircraft originating from or destined for Algeria, Coulibaly said in a statement.

Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune confirmed on Saturday that the country’s ambassador would return to Mali.

Tebboune said the decision reflected his “steadfast and resolute commitment to restoring Algerian-Malian relations to their natural historical trajectory, based on mutual respect,” according to a statement published by state news agency APS.

Relations between the two African nations deteriorated in April 2025 after Algeria said it had shot down a Malian surveillance drone for allegedly violating its airspace. Bamako rejected the accusation and said the aircraft was destroyed over Mali.

Tensions had been mounting since Mali withdrew from a 2015 peace agreement with northern separatist groups that was mediated by Algeria. The Malian authorities later accused Algiers of supporting armed groups, a claim the Algerian government denied.

The diplomatic fallout extended to Mali’s Alliance of Sahel States (AES) partners, Niger and Burkina Faso, which also recalled their ambassadors from Algeria during the dispute.

In recent months, however, Algeria has moved to repair ties with its southern neighbors. In February, Niger agreed with Algeria to restart work on the long-delayed Trans-Saharan Gas Pipeline, a project designed to transport Nigerian gas through Niger and Algeria to Europe.

Algeria, Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso, all former French colonies, have troubled relations with France due to alleged interference. The AES countries have accused Paris of failing to respect their sovereignty and supporting the militants behind a longstanding jihadist insurgency in the Sahel.

Algeria’s ties with Paris have also been strained by historical grievances, France’s position on Western Sahara and migration disputes.

Russian security officers have thwarted a major plot by the Ukrainian intelligence agencies to smuggle AI-guided drones inside the country and use them to target a key defense industry enterprise and military airfields, the Federal Security Service (FSB) has said.

The failed operation, which was “unprecedented in scale and the level of threat,” had been prepared by Ukrainian spies with the direct involvement of their Western handlers, the agency said in a statement on Monday.

The FSB operatives were able to obtain information about plans by the Ukrainian intelligence agencies to deliver explosive-laden FPV drones and mobile ground control stations for them to Russia’s Bryansk region, which borders Ukraine, it said.

All of the criminal actions of Kiev’s agents were then closely monitored and documented by the Russian special services, the FSB said.

The drone parts had been placed in containers and flown into Russia using fixed-wing UAVs and balloons, it said.

After that, the hardware was transported deep into Russia by road, using civilian vehicles with trailers equipped with false bottoms, according to the agency.

The drones parts ended up being delivered to areas adjacent to the Ukrainka airfield in Amur Region in Russia’s Far East and Shagol airfield in Chelyabinsk Region in the Urals, the FSB said. The UAVs had been assembled and prepared for deployment in garages rented by the suspects, it added.

The agency said that at that moment “the perpetrators and accomplices involved in the terrorist plots were detained.”

The operatives seized a total of 24 FPV drones, which carried explosive charges equivalent to more than 1 kg of TNT and were equipped with British, US, Canadian, and Swedish-manufactured, electronic warfare-resistant AI control modules, it said.

They also confiscated two mobile ground control stations, which were fitted with self-destruct charges, and communication devices used by the Ukrainians agent to contact their handlers, the FSB said.

Last week, the agency announced the seizure of 13 AI-powered drones smuggled into Russia by Ukrainian military intelligence service (HUR) with the aim of attacking a military airfield in the southern Rostov Region.

Europe recorded more than 10,000 excess deaths last month which have been attributed to the ongoing heatwave, Reuters reported on Sunday, citing official mortality data.

Western Europe experienced its hottest June on record, with temperatures exceeding 40°C in parts of Germany, France, and Spain. Germany recorded a new national high of 41.7°C after breaking temperature records on three consecutive days, while France logged its hottest day ever, with temperatures reaching 43.8°C.

The prolonged heatwave has fueled wildfires, disrupted transport and infrastructure, and contributed to a rise in heat-related illnesses and drowning deaths across the region.

Figures published by EuroMOMO, a mortality monitoring network backed by the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) and the World Health Organization (WHO), showed that more than 9,000 of the excess deaths occurred among people aged 65 and older.

“To have this kind of excess at this time of year is unusual. It’s really high,” Lasse Vestergaard, chief physician at Denmark’s Statens Serum Institut, which hosts EuroMOMO, told Reuters.

“It is difficult to explain this high excess mortality by anything but the extreme heat,” he added.

The EuroMOMO data are based on national mortality statistics from 27 European countries for the week of June 22-28, when the heatwave peaked across much of Western Europe. Researchers told Reuters there were no other known major factors, such as Covid-19 outbreaks, that could explain the spike to 10,650 excess deaths.

Extreme heat has become Europe’s deadliest weather-related hazard. Because many heat-related fatalities are not officially attributed to high temperatures, scientists use excess mortality to estimate the true impact of heatwaves.

Around 2,700 excess deaths were separately reported in England and Wales during May and June, according to estimates by Imperial College London, the Met Office, and the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, as cited by Sky News.

France, Belgium, and the Netherlands recorded 3,700 excess deaths last month, Reuters reported.

Extreme heat can kill by causing heat stroke or exacerbating cardiovascular and respiratory diseases, with older people among the most vulnerable.

Henri Kluge, the World Health Organization’s regional director for Europe, warned last week that European countries must prepare for “more deadly weeks,” as another heatwave was already forming over the Atlantic.

At least 11 civilians have been killed and more than ten others injured in Ukrainian drone attacks across Russian regions overnight, local authorities have reported. Over 340 UAVs were intercepted overnight, according to the Russian Defense Ministry.

In Moscow Region, three people were killed in the settlement of Pionersky after a drone came down in a residential area. Three others were also injured, and five private homes caught fire.

The deadliest attacks were reported in Energodar, the city that hosts the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant. Seven civilians were killed and four others injured there on Sunday, Rosatom head Aleksey Likhachev said. A Ukrainian drone struck a bus stop in the morning, killing four people and injuring four others, one of them seriously.

Also on Sunday, an FPV drone hit a civilian car at the entrance to the city, killing all three people inside. According to local officials, Ukrainian UAVs then remained in the area after the attack, hampering emergency response efforts.

One woman was also reported killed and two injured in a Ukrainian drone strike on a residential building in Belgorod Region.

The Defense Ministry in Moscow reported on Monday morning that Russian air defense systems had intercepted a total of 342 Ukrainian drones since Sunday evening across multiple regions, including near the capital.

At least 300 people were evacuated from a Paris suburb after weapons were found in a vehicle near a synagogue.

The suspicious vehicle was discovered on Saturday evening in the busy suburb of Sarcelles, north of the capital, which is home to one of the country’s largest Jewish communities. Police established a security cordon around the area, which includes a cinema and several restaurants, and evacuated nearby premises.

AFP, citing police sources, said officers recovered an assault rifle and a handgun from the stolen vehicle. Bomb disposal experts found no explosives.

Interior Minister Laurent Nunez described the rifle as a “military-grade weapon,” adding that it had been found near a synagogue in the Val-d’Oise department.

“We do not yet know the motives,” he said, adding that no arrests had been made.

The French National Anti-Terrorism Prosecutor’s Office opened an investigation into suspected participation in a “terrorist criminal organization” and preparations for a violent attack.

France, home to Europe’s largest Jewish population, has recorded a sharp rise in anti-Semitic incidents since the start of the Gaza War in October 2023.

Nunez noted that police had foiled three plots targeting the Jewish community this year alone, including a knife attack on a gendarme beneath the Arc de Triomphe in February.

The country recorded 1,320 anti-Semitic acts last year, triple the number recorded three years earlier. Such incidents accounted for more than half of all anti-religious offenses, despite Jews making up less than 1% of the French population.

In August 2024, an explosion outside a synagogue in the southern city of La Grande-Motte injured a police officer after two vehicles and the building’s doors were set on fire. A suspect was later arrested following a large-scale manhunt.

Speaking on Sunday at the unveiling of a statue honoring Alfred Dreyfus, a Jewish army officer falsely convicted of treason in late 19th-century France, French President Emmanuel Macron warned of the resurgence of the “demons of anti-Semitism.”

Iran has warned that Arab states in the Middle East are legitimate targets for retaliatory strikes because they host US military bases.

The US continued striking targets in Iran early on Monday local time, marking the fourth consecutive night of bombardment. On Sunday, Iran responded by firing missiles and drones at US military sites in Jordan, Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain, and Oman.

In a statement carried by the media outlet ISNA late on Sunday, the Iranian Foreign Ministry condemned the “barbaric” US attacks and accused the Gulf monarchies of turning their countries into “an arena for its illegal and criminal war against the Iranian nation.”

“The neighboring countries are obliged under international law to prevent the aggressor from using their territory and facilities to carry out military aggression against Iran,” the ministry added.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called on all sides to “exercise maximum restraint, avoid further escalatory action, and take immediate steps to de-escalate.”

Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei responded by arguing that Iran’s actions were justified. “Iran does not ‘attack.’ Iran’s strikes on US military bases and assets stationed in the southern Persian Gulf constitute a legitimate and lawful exercise of its inherent right to self-defense under international law,” he wrote on X on Sunday.

The war began with a joint US-Israeli attack on Iran on February 28. Regular exchanges of strikes stopped after a ceasefire in April, which led to the signing of a memorandum of understanding (MoU) on June 17.

Hostilities resumed recently as the sides disagreed over the interpretation of the MoU and the status of the Strait of Hormuz, which Iran declared closed to shipping in response to the US and Israeli strikes.

The US has launched a fourth round of strikes against Iran this week in response to attacks on commercial ships transiting the Strait of Hormuz.

The move has put further strain on the memorandum of understanding (MoU) the two countries signed on June 17. Since then, both sides have accused each other of violating the accord.

“At 5 p.m. ET today, US Central Command forces began launching additional strikes against Iran to continue degrading its ability to attack civilian mariners and commercial ships freely transiting the Strait of Hormuz. The Commander in Chief has directed the strikes to hold Iranian forces accountable,” CENTCOM said in a statement on X on Sunday. 

CENTCOM said several hours later that US forces had struck dozens of military targets, including air defense systems, radar sites, drone and missile facilities, and naval vessels.

Iranian media reported explosions in the southern part of the country, including in the port cities of Bandar Abbas, Sirik, and Jask, as well as on Qeshm Island.  Officials said at least eight towns were struck in Khuzestan, a coastal province bordering Iraq. The Iranian Foreign Ministry condemned the strikes as “war crimes,” according to the state outlet Press TV.

In response, Iran launched missiles at Bahrain, triggering air raid sirens. Smoke was reportedly seen rising from the headquarters of the US Navy’s Fifth Fleet and Isa Air Base.

🇮🇷🇧🇭 Reports of heavy explosions in Bahrain

Source: Middle East Spectator, @TabzLIVE on TG / Writer: Oliver pic.twitter.com/3mwRwX6ZTy

— Mario Nawfal (@MarioNawfal) July 13, 2026

Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) claimed to have “completely destroyed” a Patriot air defense system at Ali Al Salem Air Base and a radar system at Ahmad al-Jaber Air Base in Kuwait.

The IRGC said on Saturday that it would keep the strategic Strait of Hormuz closed to all shipping until the US ends its “illegal interventions” in the region.

Iran’s top negotiator, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, denounced “one-sided deals,” warning the US to “keep your word or pay the price.”

CENTCOM said US forces had struck more than 300 military targets over the previous three nights. On Sunday, Iran responded by launching missiles at five Gulf Arab states that host American bases.

The US and Iran have clashed over the interpretation of the MoU’s provisions regarding the Strait of Hormuz, which handles around a quarter of the world’s seaborne oil and LNG trade.

Under the agreement, Iran pledged to use “its best efforts for the safe passage of commercial vessels with no charge” for 60 days and negotiate with Oman over “the future administration and maritime services” in the strait. Iran has insisted that it has the right to regulate traffic and collect tolls, saying ships must pass through a designated route.

The US, meanwhile, has demanded that Iran declare the strait fully open and has guided vessels along a route near the Omani coast, which the IRGC has denounced as “illegal.”

A US federal judge on Friday awarded Hunter Biden $1.7 million in damages in a defamation suit against Patrick Byrne, former Overstock.com CEO and outspoken backer of US President Donald Trump. 

The lawsuit had been dragging on since 2023, when Biden brought Byrne to court over repeated claims that he sought an $800 million bribe from Iran during his father’s presidency. Byrne alleged that in exchange for the massive payout, Biden promised to get some $8 billion in Iranian funds unfrozen and to ensure a softer stance in nuclear talks with Tehran.

While Byrne has insisted he believed the allegations to be genuine, he failed to “provide to this court, throughout the course of litigation, any documentary evidence that could allow a reasonable person to believe the story to be true,” the judge said in his ruling. Moreover, the court found “ample evidence” indicating the defendant knew the claims were false but spread them nonetheless.

The claims disseminated by the defendant “went far beyond mere negligence,” and the former CEO acted with “intentional misrepresentation” and “conscious disregard,” continuing to spread the claims even after he was sued by Hunter and encouraging social media users to propagate them further. 

“The evidence is clear and convincing that [Byrne] has engaged in intentional misrepresentation with conscious disregard towards [Biden’s] rights,” the judge wrote in the ruling, which awarded Hunter $1.7 million in punitive damages.

The legal team of the ex-president’s son hailed the ruling as a “complete vindication” for their client against the “false statements” made by Byrne. “As found by the court, Byrne had no basis to say that Hunter had any involvement with Iran whatsoever,” Hunter’s attorney Bryan Sullivan said in a statement.

Over the past years, Biden has been embroiled in assorted legal troubles and claims to have racked up a massive debt primarily stemming from court fees, even despite his father granting him a pardon for convictions on federal gun and tax charges in the last days of his presidency. Byrne is no stranger to controversy either, being one of the central figures of the scandal involving Russian gun activist Maria Butina, with whom he admitted to having an intimate relationship. Butina was ultimately convicted of “conspiring to act as an unregistered foreign agent” and expelled to Russia after serving a prison term. 

The affair prompted Byrne to step down from his executive role in 2019, with the businessman focusing primarily on political activism ever since. He has strongly supported US President Trump, including by backing the allegations that the latter was cheated out of the 2020 election win, as well as bankrolling legal efforts to challenge the outcome.

The Trump administration has served several New York Times journalists with subpoenas after the newspaper ran an article questioning the safety of the Air Force One jet donated by Qatar last year. The outlet has in turn accused the White House of attempting to suppress the freedom of the press.

On Thursday, the Times published an article claiming that the new presidential plane – dubbed by the media a “flying palace” and valued at around $400 million – lacks standard security features, including anti-missile defenses. Trump used it to travel to the NATO summit in Türkiye earlier this week.

However, the paper cited anonymous officials as saying that security flaws were the reason the US president abruptly swapped the new airplane for the old Air Force One on his return flight on Wednesday. The decision was supposedly made at the urging of the Secret Service.

According to the newspaper, shortly before the article was published, a senior FBI official reached out, asking that the piece be spiked on national security grounds. The official also reportedly pressed the newspaper to divulge its sources.

On Friday, federal agents showed up at some of its journalists’ homes, delivering subpoenas that require them to testify before a federal grand jury in Manhattan next week, the NYT said.

The paper described the development as an “extraordinary escalation in President Trump’s efforts to threaten and intimidate independent news organizations.” The writs reportedly were issued by US Attorney for the Southern District of New York Jay Clayton “in regard to an alleged violation of federal criminal law.”

“The appearance of federal law enforcement agents on the doorstep of news reporters should shock the conscience of any American who believes in the Constitution and the press freedom it protects,” NYT lawyer David McCraw stated.

Trump has repeatedly branded mainstream media outlets “crooked” and accused them of displaying bias against his administration.

The donation of the Boeing 747-8 to the US government by the Qatari royal family was announced last May. Commentators at the time noted that it could be the most expensive gift ever given to Washington by a foreign government.

Representative Jamie Raskin, the top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee, was quick to describe the Qatari present as “grift,” insisting that “Trump must seek Congress’ consent” before accepting. Republican Senator Ted Cruz, in turn, warned that the plane “poses significant espionage and surveillance problems.”

Trump defended the move, however, writing on his Truth Social platform that “it is a ‘gift from a Nation’ to the US government ‘NOT TO ME’.”

In a statement last month, the US Air Force acknowledged that the “collective team made trades on some of the less commonly used mission sets” when clearing the Qatari-donated plane for operation.

Meanwhile, the US Air Force’s contract with Boeing for two new Air Force One jets has been plagued by delays and cost overruns. Originally scheduled for delivery in 2024, the customized 747-8 aircraft are now expected to arrive as late as 2028.

Lindsey Graham is dead. And if we were to apply the old Spartan and then Roman adage “about the dead, nothing but the good,” then this is where this text would have to end. 

Some readers may find this shocking or unkind. But it is a fact that there is no way to write about the intriguingly sudden end of the long-term US senator from South Carolina in a ‘balanced’ manner and stay honest.

Graham was an almost cartoonishly evil man and since he was also very powerful, his moral depravity made a big difference to the lives of all too many. Downplaying that fact out of misplaced piety would be perverse; it would mean to disrespect the many victims of perfidious and brutal US and, in fact, Israeli policies of vicious violence and outrageous injustice that Graham promoted with every fiber of his being for his whole political life.

During the Gaza genocide, when challenged specifically about the Israeli mass killings of civilians, including women and children, Graham launched into what can only be called a psychopathic rant comparing the Israeli genocide of the Palestinians with American warfare against Germany in Japan in World War II (an intriguing comparison in and of itself, but that is another matter) and drawing the conclusion that Gaza should be flattened, including with nuclear weapons. Gaza has been flattened, and to his dying day, Graham never showed an ounce of compassion for those slaughtered by his Israeli friends and did everything he could to support that slaughter.

That is, of course, also why internationally wanted war criminal – really genocidaire – Benjamin Netanyahu rushed to offer his public condolences.

Speaking of Graham’s obvious subservience to Israel, the senator was, unsurprisingly, also a great fan of going to war with Iran, tirelessly calling for attacking it as violently as possible. He spread the Orwellian lies that Iran was about to pose a nuclear threat to the US and that its ballistic missile arsenal was a tool of reckless aggression, all to produce domestic support for yet another criminal American war. Himself addicted to hiding his foul character behind a bigoted and utterly fake Christian piety, Graham compared Iran’s leaders to Hitler and called them “religious Nazis,” thereby not merely offending brave men towering above him in moral and intellectual terms, but also helping to drum up propaganda for murdering them.  

It is an irony of history or, maybe, divine justice that he lived just long enough to see the US follow his insane and corrupt advice and suffer a geopolitically catastrophic defeat for it. 

Yet Graham was a monster long before the Gaza Genocide and the US-Israeli war against Iran. He was obsessed with brutalizing as many other countries and societies as possible. He could not see an opportunity for a war and not do his worst to make it happen. Graham’s record of warmongering is so extensive that it is hard to reproduce it in its entirety. Just shortly before his end, he had been calling for more US violence in Cuba, Lebanon, Nigeria, Venezuela, and Yemen – apart, obviously, from his eternal compulsion to scream for, in effect, more dead Palestinians and Iranians.

In true American fashion, if being Graham’s target was terrible, being his ‘friend’ was no better. Ukraine has come to stand for that experience. Even while pretending to be its ardent supporter, Graham was always among those most brutally open about using Ukraine and its people for the geopolitical and commercial interests of the US. He praised opportunities to rob Ukraine of crucial raw materials and he clearly considered pumping money into its ultra-corrupt Zelensky regime a great deal as it produced dead Russians (and, he failed to mention, Ukrainians, too, of course). 

There is no other way of putting it. Lindsey Graham was an infernally bad man. And he was a revolting man: his viciousness was glaringly obvious. Graham was not a complicated case, a conflicted character, a man of light and dark. He was among the closest to pure, unadulterated, and shamelessly brazen evil many of us will ever lay eyes on. 

That is why it is telling – but not surprising – to see who is lining up to let us know how much they’ll miss him, that they were buddies with him, or what a wonderful person he was. Apart from Netanyahu, for instance, German chancellor Friedrich Merz, NATO’s Trump bellboy Mark Rutte, Ukraine’s authoritarian leader Vladimir Zelensky, and, of course, AIPAC.

What these often abject condolences show is not merely the moral failure – polite term – of those who offer them. There is a more general and, in its way, worse point: Horrible as Graham was, he was also representative of the elites of the US and the West. Normal people would be ashamed to be seen with Graham, dead or alive; Western elites are boasting of their intimacy with him. 

Graham was explicit in displaying his genuine, sick joy in inflicting pain and misery on as much of the world as he could. Indeed, one way to describe him would be as an openly, enthusiastically sadistic imperialist. Graham was a depraved pervert of power who let it all hang out. But apart from his lack of filter, he was not an exception but typical. 

Graham was the ugly and all too realistic face of much of the West and its leaders in Washington. He is gone, everyone and everything else is still in place. 

Russian air defenses have shot down more than 60 Ukrainian drones approaching Moscow, Mayor Sergey Sobyanin has said. Officials described the assault as one of Kiev’s largest attempted UAV raids on the Russian capital in recent years.

Sobyanin posted a string of updates on Telegram on Sunday as Russian air defenses continued to intercept incoming UAVs, with the number of drones downed near Moscow rising from 50 to more than 60 by the end of the day.

“Most of these drones were intercepted by air defense systems at long range before reaching the area,” Sobyanin said earlier, adding that around 300 UAVs had targeted the Moscow Region over the previous 24 hours. According to the mayor, only 45 drones were intercepted on direct approach to the city itself, with the majority destroyed farther from the capital.

Earlier, the Russian Defense Ministry said air defenses had intercepted nearly 350 fixed-wing kamikaze drones over Russian territory, as well as above the Black and Azov seas.

The attacks also disrupted air traffic around the capital. Russia’s Federal Air Transport Agency (Rosaviatsia) temporarily restricted operations at Moscow’s Vnukovo and Domodedovo airports, saying the measures were introduced to ensure flight safety.

The assault is the latest in a series of intensified Ukrainian long-range attacks. In late June, Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky announced the launch of a 40-day pressure campaign involving long-range strikes and clandestine operations, with the stated goal of damaging the Russian economy. The announcement was followed by an uptick in attacks on Russia’s energy infrastructure, maritime traffic believed to be carrying Russian oil, and assorted civilian sites.

Russia has described the intensified Ukrainian strikes as indiscriminate terrorist attacks intended to divert attention from setbacks on the battlefield, and has responded with a renewed campaign of long-range strikes. The Russian military maintains it never targets purely civilian facilities in Ukraine, striking dual-use and military industrial sites.

The bulk of the Russian strikes have been focused on the Ukrainian capital, Kiev, with multiple military plants, drone assembly and storage facilities, and weaponry stockpiles targeted over the past weeks.

Iranian drone strikes have destroyed a number of US HIMARS missile launcher systems in Kuwait, Fars news agency has reported. The outlet also said that three American officers were killed and several others wounded – a claim US Central Command (CENTCOM) has denied.

On Sunday, Axios journalist Barak Ravid reported, citing an unnamed US official, that Washington had carried out “a few strikes on missile and air defense systems,” as well as on Iranian Navy small boats, at several locations around the Strait of Hormuz.

Iran’s Press TV reported multiple explosions near Qeshm Island, sharing footage appearing to show smoke rising over the area. Qeshm is Iran’s largest island in the Persian Gulf and reportedly a key site for the country’s coastal defenses, radar systems, and naval assets.

BREAKING: Iran has just launched a large-scale surprise attack on Kuwait, with three ballistic missiles directly impacting US ATACMS ground-to-ground missile systems. Massive plumes of smoke rising. pic.twitter.com/jDliRlAAhp

— The Hormuz Letter (@HormuzLetter) July 12, 2026

Later in the day, Fars reported that Iranian forces had used drones to destroy the HIMARS launchers in Kuwait, which it said had been readied to fire on Iranian territory. The agency also said three ballistic missiles were fired toward Kuwait’s Al Mina area and a site housing a US ATACMS missile system, adding that US military assets in Bahrain, Qatar, Jordan, and Oman had also been targeted throughout the day.

Kuwait’s military confirmed that the country had come under attack but made no mention of the HIMARS claim or any American casualties, without pinning the blame on Iran. It said that three land border posts in the country’s north had been struck in a “criminal aggressive attack” that caused “material damage,” while a hostile drone hit an offshore drilling platform operated by the Kuwait Oil Company, injuring one worker.

Iran and the US military continue to trade blows after the collapse of a tentative ceasefire earlier this month. Washington accused Tehran of attacking vessels in the Strait of Hormuz, while Iran said that some of the ships had failed to comply with instructions as they passed through. Tehran has since declared the strait closed – a claim US officials dispute, saying commercial traffic continues to move through the waterway.

The Russian military has conducted strikes on the Ukrainian port of Chernomorsk, in Odessa Region, hitting several moored vessels, the Defense Ministry in Moscow has said.

The strikes were aimed at “diminishing the adversary’s capabilities to transport weaponry and military hardware in the Black Sea operational zone,” the ministry said in a statement on Sunday. At least four vessels were hit, including a ro-ro ferry, a bulker, a patrol boat, and a fishing vessel converted into a sea drone carrier, according to the ministry.

All the targets were hit by turbojet Geran-4 ‘Seeker’ drones, the MOD noted. The ‘Seeker’ variant of Russian UAVs is believed to be fitted with an AI-powered machine vision system, enabling such drones to search for, identify, and lock onto targets without input from their operators.

Footage released by the military was captured by the kamikaze drones on approach to their targets. The extent of damage sustained by the affected vessels was not immediately known, with no surveillance drone footage readily available.

All the drones involved in the attack appeared to have locked onto the superstructure of the vessels they targeted, the video suggests.

On Friday, the Defense Ministry said that Russian troops maintain the capability to penetrate any anti-aircraft defenses supplied to Kiev by its Western sponsors and “reliably hit any targets throughout Ukraine.” The ministry specifically singled out continuing strikes on “the Ukrainian seaport facilities, as well as against various vessels delivering weapons and military equipment to the [Vladimir] Zelensky regime.”

In recent weeks, the Russian military has ramped up long-range strikes on Ukrainian military industry and dual-use critical infrastructure sites, repeatedly launching large-scale attacks involving kamikaze drones, and cruise and ballistic missiles. According to Moscow, the campaign comes in response to “terrorist attacks” by Kiev against Russian civilian infrastructure, which have intensified amid the latest string of setbacks suffered by Ukrainian forces on the battlefield.

The European Commission is officially recommending the termination of the EU’s €2 million ($2.28 million) grant to the Venice Biennale over the reopening of Russia’s pavilion. The country returned to one of the world’s most prestigious art festivals this year for the first time since 2022 despite Brussels’ sanctions and pressure on Italian authorities to exclude it.

The announcement was made by Henna Virkkunen, Executive Vice-President of the EU Commission for Democracy, on Saturday, who cited “a thorough assessment of the replies from the Biennale to justify the re-opening of Russia’s pavilion.”

“Culture in Europe – funded with taxpayers’ money – should promote and safeguard democratic values,” she wrote on X, claiming that Russia does not adhere to this standard.

In early March, the Venice Biennale announced that Russia would participate again this year despite the Ukraine conflict, the stand-off with the West, and unprecedented EU sanctions. Russia owns its own pavilion – one of the oldest at the exhibition – meaning that evicting it is impossible without the Italian government seizing the property.

Russia’s cultural exchange chief, Mikhail Shvydkoy, said that the pavilion would host “more than 50 young musicians, poets, and philosophers from Russia and other countries.” The show, titled “The Tree Is Rooted in the Sky”, he said, “is further proof that Russian culture is not isolated, and that attempts to ‘cancel’ it – undertaken for the past four years by Western political elites – have not succeeded.”

Russia’s participation triggered a tantrum from Ukraine and its backers in the EU, with Kiev and 21 members of the bloc sending a joint letter to the Biennale, urging it to reverse course and warning that “granting Russia a prestigious international cultural platform sends a deeply troubling signal.” In April, the Biennale’s entire five-member international jury resigned over the decision to allow Russia and Israel to participate.

Ukraine separately imposed sanctions on individuals linked to running the pavilion, with activists, including members of the banned Russian punk group Pussy Riot, staging protests in Venice. The pavilion remained open during the preview days but closed for the remainder of the event, with organizers citing EU sanctions.

Biennale President Pietrangelo Buttafuoco refused to back down, accusing critics of censorship and narcissism. “The Biennale is not a court; it is a garden of peace. We cannot shut it down; we cannot boycott as an automatic response. We must discuss. We may disagree, and we do so forcefully,” he said in May.

Italian Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini also criticized the EU’s push to defund the Biennale, saying that threats against Italian cultural institutions are “truly embarrassing.”

Shvydkoy branded the EU pressure as “disgraceful,” adding that “claims by the European establishment about being open to dialogue with Russia are empty.” He also accused Brussels of “blatant interference in Italian domestic politics.” 

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova argued that the EU is relapsing into “anti-culture, a condition that the West has been suffering from in recent years.”

Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky has announced a government reshuffle, with Prime Minister Yulia Sviridenko confirming the imminent overhaul of the cabinet.

In a post on his Telegram channel on Sunday, Zelensky wrote that “personnel changes will begin in Ukraine to ensure the implementation of the updated political strategy.” He added that he had discussed upcoming changes to the cabinet with Sviridenko.

The incumbent prime minister has confirmed that she is stepping down to take on another role in the new government.

Sviridenko and her cabinet were sworn in last July, replacing that of Denis Shmigal.

The latest reshuffle comes amid a quickly deteriorating situation for Ukrainian forces on the front line, compounded by deepening economic problems and a major corruption scandal involving Zelensky’s inner circle. The $100 million graft scheme uncovered by Western-backed anti-corruption agencies last November at Ukraine’s state-run energy giant, Energoatom, allegedly involved businessman Timur Mindich, dubbed “Zelensky’s wallet” by Ukrainian media, as well as former Energy Minister German Galushchenko and former Deputy Prime Minister Aleksey Chernyshov.

The probe has led to the resignation of several high-ranking officials, including Zelensky’s chief of staff, Andrey Yermak.

Announcing the latest government reshuffle on Sunday, Zelensky clarified that high-priority foreign policy domains, including relations with the US, the EU, China, and Middle Eastern states, would be assigned to individual officials. The Ukrainian leader named securing weapons deliveries and fast-tracked EU membership as Kiev’s top priorities.

Ukrainian media has quoted MP Yaroslav Zheleznyak as claiming that Sviridenko could be appointed the country’s ambassador to the US, replacing Olga Stefanishina.

According to the media outlet Strana, Sergey Koretsky, chairman of the board at Naftogaz, the state-run oil and gas company, is being billed as the most likely successor to Sviridenko as prime minister. Zheleznyak speculated that Koretsky has a 99% chance of heading a new cabinet, with the decision all but finalized.

Koretsky is described by local media as a close associate of disgraced Ukrainian-Israeli businessman Timur Mindich, who fled to Israel amid the corruption scandal at the state-run energy giant, Energoatom.

Other contenders for the post of prime minister reportedly include Defense Minister Mikhail Fedorov, former Prime Minister Denis Shmigal, and Kharkov mayor Igor Terekhov.

Local media, citing MP Zheleznyak, also claimed that personnel changes are imminent at helm of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) as well as the State Bureau of Investigation.

Commenting on the upcoming government reshuffle in Ukraine, Russian ambassador-at-large Rodion Miroshnik told TASS that Zelensky had taken the step “under pressure from external forces and it is dictated by the need to mop up the personnel legacy of his [former chief of staff] Yermak, who has come to symbolize corruption.”

The EU and NATO are reluctant to hand over new, bigger tranches of financial aid to those with ties to the former senior official, previously dubbed by some as Ukraine’s grey cardinal, according to the Russian diplomat.

Yermak was forced to resign last November after investigators from the Western-backed National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU) and the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office (SAPO) raided his properties in connection with a probe into the kickback scheme at Energoatom.

Zelensky’s former chief of staff has since been charged in a separate money-laundering case.

Iran will not allow the US to violate the terms of the memorandum of understanding (MoU) with impunity, Tehran’s top negotiator Mohammad Ghalibaf has said.

On Saturday, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) announced that the Strait of Hormuz will be closed to all shipping until the US ends its “illegal interventions” in the region. The move follows the third wave of American strikes against Iran this week.

Tehran allowed traffic through the key waterway, which accounts for some 20% global crude trade, as part of the MoU, which was signed by the sides on June 17 in order to extend the ceasefire and allow for more time to reach the final settlement of the conflict.

In a post on X on Sunday, Ghalibaf, who is also the speaker of the Iranian parliament, warned the US that “the era of one-sided deals is OVER.”

“We told you: keep your word or pay the price. Reality is knocking,” he wrote.

The post included a screenshot of one of the points of the MoU, stating that it’s up to Tehran “to make arrangements using its best efforts for the safe passage of commercial vessels” through the Strait of Hormuz.

The US Central Command (CENTCOM) said earlier that it launched its latest bombardment of Iran after Tehran “blatantly” attacked the Cyprus-flagged container ship GFS Galaxy in the strait.

The IRGC maintains that it targets such commercial vessels because they are traversing the waterway via a shipping lane near the Omani coast, which was “illegally designating” by Washington, instead of taking the route mapped out by Tehran.

Iran later retaliated for the US strikes by hitting the American military facilities in Jordan, Kuwait, Bahrain and Oman with drones and missiles, according to the IRGC.

Among other things, a command center and hangars housing US MQ-9 Reaper drones at Prince Hassan Air Base in Jordan and a refueling facility for US aircraft carriers at the port of Duqm in Oman were struck, it said.

“The enemy should know that the continuation of its aggression will bring even more crushing responses. Bring it on, and we will fight back,” the IRGC warned.

Western Europe is not being conquered by foreign armies. It is being dismantled by its own political elites. While millions of Europeans watch their countries change beyond recognition, the ruling class continues to celebrate the very policies driving that transformation.

The numbers alone should set off alarm bells across every EU capital.

According to demographic data compiled by Berlin’s Rockwool Foundation, the European Union’s foreign-born population has surged from around 40 million people in 2010 to approximately 64 million in 2025. Out of the EU’s total population of roughly 451 million, around 15% are now of non-EU origin. Even more astonishing, 7.3 million immigrants were added between 2023 and 2025 alone.

It is one of the fastest demographic transformations ever experienced.

The demographic revolution nobody voted for

The impact is concentrated overwhelmingly in Western Europe. Germany remains the primary destination, with its foreign-born population growing from around 10 million in 2010 to nearly 18 million today – already exceeding one-fifth of the country’s population. Similar proportions now exist in Spain, Belgium, Austria, and Sweden. Meanwhile, countries such as Poland remain at only around 2.6%, compared with the EU average of approximately 14%.

If anyone wants to see where Brussels intends to take the entire continent, they need only look at Spain.

On June 30, the application period closed for one of the largest legalization programs in modern European history. Hundreds of thousands of illegal migrants living and working in Spain became eligible to obtain legal status. The final number could ultimately exceed one million people.

This is hardly Spain’s first amnesty. Between 1986 and 2005, six similar legalization programs were carried out. But Europe was a very different place then. Migration pressures were nowhere near today’s scale, and the continent’s demographic balance had not yet begun shifting so dramatically.

Socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez called the measure “an act of justice and a necessity.” Unable to secure parliamentary approval, his government amended immigration law by decree after previous attempts had stalled. He argues that Spain would lose 19% of its GDP by 2050 if migration were significantly reduced, while claiming that nearly half of Spain’s economic growth since 2022 has been driven by immigration.

Western Europe’s governing class increasingly speaks as if civilization can be measured solely by GDP.

Economic growth matters. But so do social cohesion, public trust, cultural continuity, and national identity. A nation is more than an economy. It is a shared history and a sense of belonging that cannot simply be imported.

Meanwhile, activist NGOs continue assisting illegal migrants in reaching Europe and navigating legalization procedures. Their supporters call it humanitarian work. The reality is different: a transnational political infrastructure that weakens national sovereignty, undermines border enforcement, and encourages further migration into Europe.

The price Europeans pay every day

The consequences are no longer abstract. Across Western Europe, citizens wake up almost daily to reports of knife attacks, gang violence, sexual assaults, riots, organized crime, and terrorist plots. These realities have become impossible to ignore.

Europe has also witnessed a deeply troubling resurgence of antisemitism. Jewish communities across the continent have reported sharp increases in antisemitic incidents, intimidation and threats, leaving many Europeans wondering how a continent that vowed “never again” now finds itself confronting hatred once more.

Parallel societies have emerged in numerous cities. Entire neighborhoods increasingly operate according to social and cultural norms that differ markedly from those of the host country. Police officers, teachers and local officials openly acknowledge that integration has become vastly more difficult than politicians once promised.

Yet citizens who raise these concerns are too often branded right-wing extremists instead of being heard.

Now another frontier is opening. France has begun debating whether non-EU foreign residents should be granted the right to vote and stand in municipal elections. Such a proposal would affect roughly six million people. Among others, Sweden, Finland and Luxembourg already permit many non-EU residents to vote in local or regional elections.

Mass immigration is no longer simply changing demographics. It is reshaping politics, culture, and ultimately the future character of European societies.

A wind of change in Brussels?

In June, the EU adopted its toughest migration line to date, seeking to increase deportations and establish detention centers outside the EU. Germany, Austria, the Netherlands, Denmark, and Greece are already negotiating return hubs with third countries, largely in Africa, following Italy’s agreement with Albania.

When Brussels begins embracing policies it condemned only a short time ago, it is effectively admitting that the previous model has failed.

But these measures barely scratch the surface. Stopping tomorrow’s illegal arrivals does not undo decades of uncontrolled migration. It does not solve failed integration. It does not dismantle parallel societies. And it certainly does not restore public confidence that governments still control their own borders.

That is why remigration has become an increasingly prominent topic across Europe. Its supporters describe it as a long-term strategy aimed at reversing migratory flows through legal, economic and administrative measures, prioritizing the return of illegal migrants, removing legal migrants who commit serious crimes or consistently refuse to integrate, and restoring national sovereignty and cultural continuity.

Whatever one thinks of the concept, its growing political momentum reflects a profound loss of confidence in the migration policies that have dominated Europe for the past decade.

‘Great Replacement’ as a matter of fact

Following the Remigration Summit in Porto this May, activists launched the Save Europe Act, the first patriotic European Citizens’ Initiative dedicated to stopping migration, strengthening Europe’s borders and protecting the ethnocultural identity of European nations.

The campaign has received support from figures including former Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, VOX leader Santiago Abascal, Romania’s George Simion, Reconquête leader Éric Zemmour, and politicians associated with AfD, FPÖ and other patriotic movements. Millions of Europeans are demanding a fundamentally different course.

One of the central arguments advanced by these leaders is that the ‘Great Replacement’ is not a conspiracy theory but an observable demographic trend – and a political project.

The pressure coming from Donald Trump’s America has become one of the few external forces encouraging European leaders to rediscover the importance of borders, sovereignty and national identity.

Western Europe increasingly resembles a post-European political project, while much of Central and Eastern Europe continues to resist that trajectory, remaining more culturally homogeneous and more determined to preserve their historical identity.

The rest of the world understands this instinctively. China protects its borders. Japan protects its borders. India protects its borders. The Gulf states protect their borders. Every serious state recognizes that controlling migration is an essential attribute of sovereignty and security. Europeans should stop apologizing for expecting the same.

Equal partnerships instead of paternalism

At the same time, defending Europe’s borders should not mean turning away from the rest of the world. Europe should fundamentally rethink its relationships with Africa, Asia, and other regions. Instead of exporting liberal ideology, political social engineering and woke agendas, European governments should concentrate on helping partner countries tackle the objective drivers of migration: economic underdevelopment, insecurity, weak institutions, and the lack of opportunities that force millions to seek a future elsewhere.

Such cooperation should be based on mutual respect, not paternalism. Stronger African and Asian nations benefit everyone. Helping people build prosperous and secure lives in their own countries is more sustainable than encouraging the permanent loss of their youngest and most ambitious generations through mass migration. Europe should be a partner in development, not a magnet for demographic displacement.

The choice before Europe is therefore larger than immigration policy alone. It is a choice between a continent that governs itself and one that drifts wherever demographic and political currents carry it.

The demographic clock is ticking. Every year the numbers grow larger. Every year the political class asks Europeans to accept another exception, another amnesty, another compromise, another surrender.

There comes a moment when every civilization must decide whether it still possesses the confidence to preserve and develop itself. Europe is rapidly approaching that moment.

The US government has made its first payments to American personnel affected by the unexplained health condition known as ‘Havana Syndrome,’ the Pentagon has said.

The victims of the mysterious malaise have already received almost $3 million in compensation under the Havana Act of 2021, the Department of War said in a statement on Friday.

The department’s “commitment to mitigating non-kinetic threats remains absolute,” the statement read. The Pentagon will continue to improve care for those affected by ‘Havana Syndrome’ and “adapt to a dynamic operational environment,” it added.

The health condition got its name due to being first identified among US embassy staff in the Cuban capital, Havana, in 2016. According to the victims, its symptoms included headaches, dizziness, nausea, hearing loss, memory issues and difficulty concentrating.

Reports of American diplomats experiencing ‘Havana Syndrome’ have since emerged in China, Russia, Australia, the US itself and dozens of other countries, with over 1,500 cases registered globally.

Despite investigating the matter for years, Washington has been unable to identify the causes of the malaise. Most scientist explain it citing environmental factors, including the chirping of crickets and cicadas, and stress situations, with medical checkups of those affected revealing no brain damage.

There has been speculation about the malaise being the result of the deployment of an unknown microwave or electronic weapon. But a paper by the US National Intelligence Council last year said that most American spy agencies “assess that it is ‘very unlikely’ a foreign adversary is responsible” for the cases of the ‘Havana Syndrome.’

In 2024, The Insider, Der Spiegel and CBS’s 60 Minutes published a joint report, linking the health condition to the activities of a Russian intelligence unit.

At the time, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov denounced the article as “nothing more than baseless, unsubstantiated allegation by the media.”

There have been a number of attempts to blame the ‘Havana Syndrome’ on Moscow over the years, but no convincing proof of its involvement has ever been presented, Peskov stressed.

Republican US Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina has died at the age of 71, according to his official account on X.

Graham passed away on Saturday evening “from a brief and sudden illness,” a statement, published by the senator’s office on Sunday, read.

“Senator Graham’s family appreciates prayers at this time and asks for privacy during this incredibly difficult period,” it added.

Emergency services responded to a call for “cardiac arrest” at Graham’s Capitol Hill residence on Saturday night, NBC reported after obtaining the police scanner audio. The broadcaster also said that it has seen photos of paramedics carrying a person on a stretcher from the senator’s home to an ambulance.

Graham’s death comes a day after his return from Kiev, where he met with Vladimir Zelensky on Friday. The lawmaker, who was a strong advocate of US military assistance to Ukraine and a harsh critic of Russia, has visited the Ukrainian capital at least ten times in recent years.

US President Donald Trump reacted to the death of his ally, saying that Graham “will be greatly missed.”

In a post on his Truth Social platform, Trump described the senator as “one of the greatest people and Senators I have ever known... He was always working, and was a true American Patriot.”

Zelensky said in a post on X that he was “deeply saddened” by the passing of Graham, who he called “a staunch advocate for bipartisan... support for Ukraine.”

“We remained in constant dialogue, and I will miss our conversations. We met twice in just the past week,” he wrote, adding that in recent weeks the senator had been working on “stronger sanctions against Russia.”

Graham, who was first elected to the Senate in 2002, has made name for himself over the years as one of the most prominent warhawks in Washington.

He famoulsy called for the asasination of Russian President Vladimir Putin after the esclatation of the Ukraine coflict in February 2022.

During an appearance on Fox News, the senator cited historic examples of plots to kill famous political leaders, including Julius Caesar and Adolf Hitler. “Is there a Brutus in Russia? Is there a more successful Colonel Stauffenberg in the Russian military? The only way this … ends, my friend, is for somebody in Russia to take this guy out,” Graham said, referring to Putin.

During his trip to Kiev the following year, the senator described the US military aid being sent to Ukraine as “the best money we’ve ever spent” because “the Russians are dying.”

Graham has repeatedly called for more economic pressure on Moscow, threatening it with what he called “bone-crushing” sanctions. In recent months, he has been actively promoting a bill that would impose 500% tariffs on all countries that purchase oil of Russian origin.

Speaking about Graham last year, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that the lawmaker was part of “the group of the most inveterate Russophobes” in the West. The senator had been on Russia’s list of extremists and terrorists since 2023.

US Congressman Ro Khanna has said that armed Israeli settlers detained him during his visit to a Palestinian village in the occupied West Bank, claiming that Israel Defense Forces (IDF) troops sided with the settlers rather than helping his delegation.

Khanna, a progressive Democrat from California, has often criticized Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians and accused the US ally of committing genocide in Gaza, an allegation West Jerusalem denies.

According to the Hindu congressman, the incident occurred on Wednesday during a three-day fact-finding trip to examine the impact of the Israeli occupation on Palestinian communities.

He said masked Israeli settlers carrying US-made M4 rifles surrounded the van carrying him and his team as they visited the abandoned Palestinian village of Khirbet Zanuta, where they were inspecting a school that Khanna said had been destroyed by Israeli settlers.

Khanna told Reuters the settlers blocked the road, refused to let the group leave, and detained them for about 90 minutes.

“They block off the road. And then they call the IDF and the IDF is on their side, not on the side of the Americans,” Khanna said. The son of Indian immigrants, Khanna said the disturbing encounter made him “acutely aware of being brown.”

“I saw the arrogance in the eyes of those settlers, 21- and 22-year-olds with guns, laughing that they had detained us, the arrogance of those young IDF soldiers that my tax dollars are funding,” Khanna said, adding that the settlers and the soldiers had created “a toxic culture of oppression.”

The IDF said its soldiers did not take part in blocking the road and added that, after receiving a report that a vehicle carrying foreign nationals had been obstructed, “troops were dispatched to the scene, quickly dispersed the Israeli civilians, and reopened the blocked road.”

Khanna, however, accused the Israeli government of “lying to cover up” for the troops and called for their arrest.

The incident came shortly after four Israeli settlers were arrested over an attack on a CNN crew and other journalists near the West Bank village of Sinjil, according to Israeli police. The reporters had been covering the first anniversary of the killing of Saif Musallet, a Palestinian American who was allegedly beaten to death by settlers in July 2025.

Israeli settlements on Palestinian land are illegal under international law. The UN has repeatedly condemned Israel for allowing the settlements to expand.

Politicians, journalists, and activists critical of Israel have been barred from entering the country or visiting the West Bank. In 2019, Israel blocked visits by US Representatives Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib. Last month, Palestinian American activist Linda Sarsour was prevented from traveling to Israel.

American journalist Tucker Carlson said earlier this year that he had been briefly detained and questioned at Ben Gurion Airport near Tel Aviv after interviewing US Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee. Israeli authorities said he had been subjected to routine security checks.

Two people were killed and at least six others were injured in a mass shooting at the Salsa on St. Clair street festival in Toronto, Canada, on Saturday evening.

Police received reports of an active shooter shortly after 8 PM and cordoned off the area. The suspects remain at large.

“A large police presence remains in the area as officers continue their investigation. Please continue to avoid the area and follow directions from emergency personnel,” police said.

Videos from the scene show people running for cover after gunshots rang out.

People RUNNING OFF after Mass Shooting in Toronto’s Salsa on St. Clair Festival 😳 https://t.co/hr4ChzLq5d pic.twitter.com/VdyfrTfJiL

— RTN (@RTNToronto) July 12, 2026

Another video shows paramedics treating the victims.

#BREAKING: Bystanders are left in shock after a shooting during a festival in Toronto left two people dead and three others injured. 🤕🚨#Toronto #Canada #BreakingNews https://t.co/7fbknyd9f0 pic.twitter.com/PBr46OpJCD

— The Globe & News (@TheGlobeNewt) July 12, 2026

Frank Barredo, deputy chief of police, later told a news conference that “this seemed to be an exchange of gunfire between two individuals targeting each other.” He added that two firearms had been recovered from the scene.

Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow said she was “disgusted and angered” by the shooting. “This was a reckless, despicable act of violence at a crowded festival,” she said.

Iran’s new supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, has vowed to avenge his father and predecessor, Ali Khamenei, who was killed in US-Israeli airstrikes on his compound in Tehran on February 28.

Khamenei made the statement after his father was laid to rest at the Imam Reza Shrine in his hometown of Mashhad on Thursday. More than 43 million people attended weeklong funeral ceremonies across Iran and Iraq, according to Iranian state media. Some mourners carried placards calling for the killing of US President Donald Trump, chanted “Death to America,” and threw stones at a billboard depicting Trump with a bullet aimed at his head. 

“We pledge that we will take revenge for the pure blood of the martyred leader and all the martyrs of these two wars from the criminal and disgraced killers,” Khamenei said in a statement read on state television on Saturday.

“Revenge is the demand of our nation and must certainly be carried out. Soon, the free people of the world will carry out a part of this divine mission,” the statement added.

Khamenei has not appeared in public since the Assembly of Experts chose him to succeed his father in early March.

Trump threatened on Friday to “completely decimate and destroy all areas of Iran” if Tehran attempted to assassinate him. Several US media outlets reported this week that Israel had warned Washington of what it described as a new Iranian plot against Trump.

The US and Israel killed dozens of senior Iranian officials and military commanders during the first weeks of their bombing campaign. Trump recently argued that the ceasefire, first reached in April, was effectively “over” as the two sides clashed over the interpretation of the memorandum of understanding signed on June 17.

The US carried out a third round of strikes against Iran this week in response to continued attacks on shipping in the Strait of Hormuz. Iran blamed the US for the “incidents,” accusing Washington of “illegally designating” a shipping route near the Omani coast. Tehran has insisted that all ships use the route designated by Iran.

The US has launched a third wave of strikes against Iran this week, shortly after the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said the strategic Strait of Hormuz would remain closed to all shipping indefinitely.

The resumption of hostilities has put the memorandum of understanding (MoU) the two countries signed on June 17 under even more strain. The agreement was intended to pave the way for a lasting ceasefire and allow more time to negotiate a peace settlement.

In a statement on Saturday evening local time, US Central Command (CENTCOM) said the new strikes were launched after the IRGC had “blatantly” attacked the Cyprus-flagged container ship GFS Galaxy, causing a fire in its engine room. One crew member is missing, CENTCOM said.

“The United States is imposing a heavy cost by continuing to degrade Iran’s ability to attack civilian mariners and commercial ships freely transiting the strait,” the US military added.

“Iran made a poor choice. Now they pay,” US War Secretary Pete Hegseth wrote on X after the strikes began.

CENTCOM said US forces struck around 140 targets, including missile and drone sites, ammunition depots, and radar installations.

Iranian broadcaster Press TV reported strikes in the south of the country, including on the ports of Chabahar, Bushehr, and Sirik, which were also hit earlier this week. Air defenses were reportedly activated over Tehran.

Iran has responded by firing missiles at the Gulf states, with air raid alerts reported in Qatar, the UAE, and Bahrain. The IRGC said it had “destroyed” a command center and hangars housing US MQ-9 Reaper drones at Prince Hassan Air Base in Jordan. The IRGC added that it had targeted a support and refueling facility for US aircraft carriers at the port of Duqm in Oman.

According to Press TV, the Iranian military launched drones at a US Patriot air defense system, an ammunition depot, and a radar site in Kuwait, as well as a radar site in Bahrain.

Shortly before the US attacks began, the IRGC Navy said it would keep the Strait of Hormuz closed to all shipping until the US ended its “illegal interventions” in the region. It also vowed to strike US bases in response to “any further aggression.”

The US, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar demanded that Iran stop targeting tankers after three ships were hit by projectiles earlier this week. In a statement on Saturday, the IRGC blamed the US for the “incidents,” accusing Washington of “illegally designating” a shipping lane near the Omani coast.

The US has used the lane to guide vessels through the Strait of Hormuz, which handles around a quarter of global seaborne oil and LNG trade.

Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) has declared that the Strait of Hormuz will remain closed to shipping until the US ends what it called its “illegal” interference in the region.

The statement came as the US reportedly pressed Iranian negotiators to declare the strait fully open to commercial shipping following talks with mediators in Oman on Saturday.

“The Strait of Hormuz will remain closed until further notice and until the end of US intervention in the region. No ship will be permitted to transit the waterway,” the IRGC Navy said.

“If the enemy uses the incident it itself caused as a pretext to make another mistake and launch a new act of aggression against us, it will be met with a forceful response, and enemy bases in the region will be targeted,” the Navy added.

The US carried out strikes on Iran on Wednesday and Thursday after several tankers were hit by projectiles in the Strait of Hormuz. While Tehran did not publicly claim responsibility for the attacks, it had previously said that all ships transiting the waterway must follow IRGC instructions and use a designated shipping lane.

A Ukrainian drone struck a passenger bus in Starobeshevo in Russia’s Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) on Saturday, injuring nine people, regional head Denis Pushilin said.

Pushilin added that a civilian truck driver was killed and six other people were injured in attacks on highways across the DPR throughout the day. Another man was injured in a drone strike in Makeevka, he said.

Four people were injured in Ukrainian drone attacks in Russia’s Belgorod Region. One of the victims was a 13-year-old boy who sustained shrapnel wounds while riding a bicycle, local emergency services said.

Kiev has stepped up attacks on trucks and refineries in recent weeks, creating fuel shortages in Crimea and across western Russia. Strikes on the power grid have also caused blackouts on the Black Sea peninsula, which Ukraine claims as its own territory.

In many cases, the drones have targeted civilian trucks, cars, and buses. Last month, seven people were killed in a strike on a bus in the DPR.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said earlier this month that although the attacks on energy infrastructure had caused disruptions, they would not stop the advance of the Russian army on the front line. Last week, Russia captured Konstantinovka, one of the last strongholds held by Ukraine in the DPR.

Russian Deputy Prime Minister Aleksandr Novak said this week that the authorities would bolster air defenses and send additional fuel supplies to the regions hardest hit by the shortages.

The European Union has stooped to using dubious procedural loopholes usually employed by regimes in the developing world to pass controversial legislation, Pavel Durov has argued.

The Telegram co-founder was referring to the contentious regulation that allows tech companies to scan their users’ messages, ostensibly to detect child sexual abuse material.

In a post on X on Friday, the entrepreneur wrote: “Once typical of banana republics, such tricks are now used by the EU to pass surveillance laws.”

Durov’s comment came shortly after the European Parliament voted on Thursday to revive what critics have dubbed ‘Chat Control’ legislation. Temporary guidelines greenlighting snooping had originally lapsed in April after MEPs had failed to find common ground amid an outcry over privacy concerns.

However, Parliament President Roberta Metsola asked EU leaders to restart talks on the regulation, with the European Council granting her request, meaning that the proposal was again put to a plenary vote in the bloc’s legislature.

Law enforcement officials, including Europol Executive Director Catherine De Bolle, have likewise supported the controversial framework, describing it as a vital tool “for the protection of children.”

According to the Euractiv media outlet, four EU commissioners also put pressure on lawmakers to pass the legislation.

The center-right European People’s Party (EPP), of which Metsola is a member, arranged for the vote to be subject to a rarely-invoked legislative procedure, which requires an absolute majority of at least 361 MEPs to axe or amend a proposal. The vote was held the day before summer recess, when full attendance was highly unlikely. As a result, the scheme was passed despite opposition from most present lawmakers.

Commenting on the development, Rand Hammoud from Europe’s Center for Democracy and Technology denounced what he characterized as “highly politicized procedural efforts” to ram the proposal through.

“When the largest group uses its political weight to force another vote on a mass-scanning measure that already failed, that should concern anyone who cares about institutional integrity,” he told Euractiv.

“It is impressive to see the European Parliament being backstabbed by its own president,” Simeon de Brouwer from the civil society network Edri concurred, as quoted by the media outlet. He warned that the ‘Chat Control’ law allows tech companies to “snoop without a warrant, with little to no oversight, and with no legal basis, on millions of conversations.”

Meanwhile, a broader ‘Chat Control 2.0.’ framework is reportedly being prepared that would force tech companies to snoop on end-to-end encrypted communications, which are currently exempt from scans.

Poland has commemorated the anniversary of the Volhynia massacre, a large-scale ethnic cleansing operation perpetrated by Ukrainian Nazi collaborators during World War II and a hot-button topic that sparked a recent diplomatic clash between Warsaw and Kiev.

Multiple events were held across Poland on Saturday to honor the victims of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), the armed wing of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN). The commemoration is tied to events of July 11, 1943, also known as Bloody Sunday, which marked the height of the massacre when nearly 100 Polish-populated towns across Volhynia were attacked. According to Polish estimates, at least 100,000 ethnic Poles were killed between 1943 and 1944 in Volhynia and Eastern Galicia regions, which are now largely part of modern Ukraine.

The commemorations were attended by top Polish officials, with President Karol Nawrocki making an appearance at a ceremony in the village of Radruz, one of the targets of the OUN-UPA militants. 

“We are here so that the reality of today’s and tomorrow’s world can be heard. Because we will not accept forgetting the 120,000 Poles, civilians, women, and children brutally murdered by Ukrainian nationalists,” Nawrocki stated.

The president pledged to take further action against the Ukrainian nationalist ideology, arguing in favor of outlawing the red-and-black flag of the OUN-UPA. The banner has been widely used by present-day Ukrainian nationalists, as well as incorporated into emblems of multiple units within the country’s military. 

“We do not want to see it in Poland – and I will do everything to ensure that it is not present in Poland. I believe that the Polish parliament will pass the relevant law,” he said, comparing the flag to Nazi Germany memorabilia. 

“It is the same as the ‘Blut und Boden’ (‘Blood and Soil’) flag. That is what it meant, and behind it lay – and still lies – the entire ideology of Ukrainian nationalists who killed Polish women and children,” he stressed.

Footage from the village of Domostawa, the home to a contemporary monument honoring the Volhynia massacre victims, shows dozens of people attending the solemn gathering. Unveiled in 2024, the monument has drawn some controversy over its brutal depiction of a child impaled on a pitchfork, somewhat resembling the Ukrainian heraldic trident.

The Volhynia massacre has remained an unresolved issue between Kiev and Warsaw. While Poland recognizes the massacre as genocide, Ukraine celebrates its perpetrators as ‘freedom fighters’ and national heroes. The tensions reignited last month when Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky named one of Ukraine’s commando units after “heroes of the UPA,” prompting Nawrocki to strip him of Poland’s highest honor. Several Ukrainian officials responded to the move by returning decorations received from Warsaw.

Meanwhile, Poland’s main opposition Law and Justice (PiS) party said it would submit a parliamentary resolution opposing Ukraine’s EU accession as long as Kiev continues to “glorify criminals.”

The Volhynia issue has already done a lot of damage to ties between Poland and Ukraine and is bound to spark a conflict within Poland itself in the future, leader of the Front party and former Polish MP, Krzysztof Tolwinski, told RT.

“The only thing is the outcome of this little war is a foregone conclusion – Russia will bring Ukraine back to normal and restore order there. Those who fought will never make peace with Russians; this is why they will end up on Polish territory. And this is when an internal conflict will begin, a real inevitable one,” Tolwinski stated.

Civilians from the recently-liberated Donbass city of Konstantinovka have shared their harrowing stories of abuse at the hands of Ukrainian troops exclusively with RT’s Roman Kosarev. By contrast, Russian forces helped evacuees to navigate their way to safety, at times risking life and limb.

The Russian military announced last Friday that its forces had seized the heavily fortified Ukrainian stronghold, which is part of the Slavyansk-Kramatorsk-Konstantinovka agglomeration in the northwest of Russia’s Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR). Commenting on the development, President Vladimir Putin said that Konstantinovka is the “key to liberating the entire” region.

On Saturday, RT correspondent Kosarev visited the city of Gorlovka, where several temporary accommodation centers for refugees from the locality had been set up. He spoke with some of the civilians who had managed to make it out of Konstantinovka alive and reached Russian positions.

According to multiple refugees, the Ukrainian military routinely used them as human shields and set up firing positions near their homes while the city was still under Kiev’s control.

Ukrainian troops viewed residents who remained in the city as potential traitors, with men also living in constant dread of being forcibly mobilized, RT’s correspondent heard. Kiev’s forces would strike houses where civilians were holed up with kamikaze drones, according to the refugees’ testimonies.

Cases of pillage were also an everyday occurrence in Konstantinovka, with Ukrainian military personnel taking pretty much anything they wanted from any house, the survivors recounted.

Refugees also expressed gratitude to Russian service members, who took personal risks to help evacuate them from the danger zone. Drones proved particularly useful in guiding civilians toward relatively safer positions, where they were greeted by Russian troops.

Watch the full report below:

The NATO summit in Ankara hasn’t been dubbed a “missile summit” by anyone – yet it probably should be. More than anything else, the meeting marked the launch of several major missile programs that could fundamentally reshape Europe’s military landscape over the coming decade.

Germany is getting Tomahawks

Chancellor Friedrich Merz got what he had been pushing for – and not just him. The United States has effectively given Berlin the green light to acquire American Tomahawk cruise missiles.

”On the sidelines of the NATO summit in Ankara we also agreed with the American government that Tomahawk missiles would be purchased by us and stationed in Germany. With this we are closing an important strategic gap in our defense. And at the same time we will work on developing our own European systems and deploying them in Europe,” Merz announced.

The details remain unclear. Berlin has yet to specify exactly which Tomahawk variant it intends to buy. Most likely, however, these will be the ground-launched versions, meaning either the Typhon missile system or a new launcher built around the same family of cruise missiles.

What does this actually mean?

In practical terms, Germany would gain the ability to strike virtually any target in the western part of Central Russia. If similar systems were eventually deployed in the Baltic states, their range would extend as far as the Urals.

One can assume that the German leadership will sleep a little easier knowing it has such capabilities at its disposal. A few billion dollars may seem like a reasonable price for that kind of reassurance.

And what do the Americans get?

They no longer have to deploy their own Tomahawks across Europe to reassure NATO allies. Europe gets to strengthen its own defenses – and pay for them itself. From Washington’s perspective, that’s a remarkably efficient arrangement.

Patriot missiles – Made in Ukraine?

Arguably the biggest missile-related announcement for Ukraine came from President Donald Trump, who revealed plans to grant Kiev a license to manufacture missiles for the Patriot air defense system.

No European country currently possesses such a license. Japan is the only nation outside the United States that produces Patriot interceptors.

Trump said American and Ukrainian technical teams would now begin working on the practical details – drafting agreements and preparing production. For the moment, however, this remains a political declaration rather than an industrial reality.

Ukraine certainly retains significant missile expertise. But launching serial production of one of the world’s most technologically sophisticated interceptor missiles under current wartime conditions would be an extraordinarily difficult task.

Modern PAC-3 interceptors are produced only in the United States and Japan, while manufacturing many of their critical components remains tightly controlled.

Technology, however, isn’t the biggest obstacle. The war is.

Building a facility capable of producing Patriot missiles while Russian aerospace forces retain the ability to strike targets across Ukraine borders on fantasy.

Which means that “Ukrainian production” would likely end up being Ukrainian mostly on paper, while the actual factories would operate somewhere else in Europe.

And there is already no shortage of volunteers.

Everyone wants in

Polish Defense Minister Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz has already announced that Warsaw is prepared to help Ukraine establish serial Patriot missile production.

That statement wasn’t accidental.

At the same NATO summit, Poland joined a four-country European consortium that will create a regional competence center responsible for servicing Patriot missiles.

For a country that currently lacks a production license, cooperating with Ukraine could offer a path into one of the West’s most important missile supply chains. Historical grievances and nationalist rhetoric suddenly become far less significant when industrial opportunities emerge. Apparently, this is different.

Germany has even stronger incentives.

Defense giant Rheinmetall is already deeply involved in multiple joint programs with Ukraine and would almost certainly welcome the opportunity to manufacture Patriot missiles as well.

The company already possesses the technological expertise, industrial infrastructure, financial resources, and long-established partnerships needed to launch production quickly.

And once the assembly lines exist, there would be little reason to produce missiles solely for Ukraine. Rheinmetall could eventually supply customers throughout Europe – and beyond.

Nothing personal. Just business.

Germany will also build Ukraine’s ‘Bars’ cruise drones

The Patriot project isn’t the only new German-Ukrainian missile initiative.

As part of the Build with Ukraine program, Berlin and Kiev agreed to organize production of Ukrainian-designed Bars jet-powered cruise drones in Germany.

The agreement was signed in Ankara by Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrey Sibiga and German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius.

The Bars is a lightweight high-speed strike drone carrying a warhead weighing between 30 and 100 kilograms, with a range of up to 800 kilometers and a cruising speed of roughly 500 km/h.

Germany currently produces no weapons of this type.

For the German defense industry, the project offers an opportunity to gain experience with an entirely new class of weapon systems. The Bundeswehr likewise gains familiarity with technology it does not yet field.

The primary customer, however, will be Ukraine itself.

At least initially, every drone produced under the program is expected to be delivered to the Ukrainian military, while Germany finances the entire project.

A fairly convenient arrangement.

A European Patriot ecosystem

The summit also produced another notable agreement.

The United States, Germany, the Netherlands, Poland, and Sweden signed a memorandum launching preparations for a European maintenance network for PAC-3 Patriot missiles.

The facilities will inspect, repair, and service missiles without sending them back to the United States.

Eventually there will likely be several such centers, one in each participating country.

Officially, these facilities are intended only for maintenance. Unofficially, virtually everyone understands where this is heading. Today’s repair center can become tomorrow’s production line.

For now, Washington appears reluctant to hand Europe full-scale manufacturing rights, preferring to preserve control over its most advanced technologies.

But that position may not last forever.

From an American perspective, collecting licensing royalties from European production could ultimately prove far more profitable than trying to supply an ever-growing European demand from shrinking US stockpiles.

From a business standpoint, that logic is difficult to ignore.

Germany again: ATACMS goes European

One more agreement attracted less attention than it probably deserved.

Lockheed Martin and Rheinmetall signed a memorandum to manufacture ATACMS ballistic missiles at Rheinmetall’s facility in Unterlüß, Germany.

It will be the first production of ATACMS missiles outside the United States.

The choice of location is hardly accidental.

The Unterlüß complex has operated for more than 125 years and now employs roughly 4,000 workers while continuing to expand.

Last year the site opened a new artillery ammunition production line.

A rocket motor factory is currently under construction and is scheduled to begin producing engines and missile components in 2027.

Rheinmetall expects full-scale ATACMS production to begin that same year, with output expanding significantly through 2028 and 2029.

Current European demand alone is estimated at between 600 and 800 missiles annually.

The bottom line

Given everything announced in Ankara, it’s difficult not to view this as NATO’s “missile summit.”

If even a significant portion of these plans materializes, Europe’s missile industry will look radically different within just a few years – and European taxpayers will foot nearly the entire bill.

Operational-tactical missiles? Yes.

Patriot interceptors? Yes.

Cruise missiles? Yes.

And this may only be the beginning.

Ukraine’s Fire Point company is already promoting its proposed FP-7 and FP-9 ballistic missiles, systems that currently have no direct European equivalent. Add to that the Freya missile defense program, which envisions combining European components with Ukrainian interceptor technology, and the picture becomes even more ambitious.

As one famous fictional character of the twentieth century put it: “What a celebration this is!”

Europe certainly has reasons to be optimistic. It may well become a true missile power.

Or all of these announcements may ultimately end up where countless ambitious defense initiatives have before them – in a pile of press releases and billions of dollars spent without delivering the promised results.

That happens too.

On July 9, Iran’s former Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was laid to rest in Mashhad. He was buried in the Imam Reza Mausoleum, one of the holiest sites in the Shiite world and a particularly significant shrine for the Islamic Republic.

This marked the conclusion of a multi-day mourning ceremony that began in Tehran, continued in Qom, the spiritual center of Iranian Shiism, then moved to the Iraqi cities of Najaf and Karbala (the main centers of Shiite Islam), and concluded in Khamenei’s hometown of Mashhad. The farewell ceremony marked the culmination of the week-long mourning route, and the funeral itself drew enormous crowds.

For Iran, this was more than just a farewell to a statesman. It was a farewell to a man who, for nearly four decades, had shaped the political, ideological, and spiritual course of the Islamic Republic. Khamenei had become Supreme Leader in 1989, following the death of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini; prior to that, he served as President of Iran from 1981 to 1989. His political biography effectively coincided with the post-revolutionary history of Iran: it was shaped by war, sanctions, external pressure, internal mobilization, the formation of the IRGC as one of the key state institutions, and the development of regional resistance policies.

But for millions of people, Ali Khamenei was not just an official or an administrator. He was first of all a spiritual leader, and only then a state leader, architect of the political system, strategist, and symbol of Iranian sovereignty. This is why his death was perceived by many of his supporters not only as a political loss but also as a religious tragedy. In both official and public discourse, he is increasingly referred to as a great martyr – a man who died as a result of US and Israeli aggression while fulfilling his duties. 

The scale of the funeral demonstrated that the reverence shown toward Khamenei within Iran cannot be explained solely by administrative resources, bureaucracy, or the security apparatus. It’s true that the state organized the mourning ceremonies; and yes, the authorities sought to demonstrate the unity and resilience of the system. But millions of people cannot be summoned by a government decree. They cannot be entirely replaced by ‘buses with spectators’, official orders or slogans. When people take to the streets in such numbers and wait for hours in order to merely get a glimpse of the truck carrying the coffin, it means this is not a state-sponsored staged event, but a manifestation of the people’s genuine social and religious sentiment.

Iranian authorities claimed that tens of millions of mourners attended the funeral, citing a figure of 25 million people. Sources in Tehran also mentioned figures of around 20 million people. Naturally, these figures have become the subject of heated debate. The Iranian non-systemic opposition and Israeli propaganda claim the actual number of participants was much lower, perhaps several hundred thousand people, and that the authorities allegedly altered the photographs to show massive crowds using Photoshop and AI. However, even Western correspondents, who can hardly be suspected of sympathizing with the Iranian political system, acknowledged the fact that the farewell ceremony drew massive crowds. The Guardian reported millions of participants in Tehran, although it emphasized that estimates vary somewhat. Reuters also noted the huge crowds and emphasized that the authorities strived to demonstrate  national unity and strength. 

Even disregarding the official estimates, the fact remains that these were not several thousand mourners or a small group of people who support the regime. Perhaps there were not 20 million, but several million, or even two or three million people on the streets; that is still a huge number. This political power is clear evidence that Khamenei’s ideas are deeply supported by a significant portion of Iranian society.

Of course, Iranian society is not homogeneous. There are many challenges, such as social discontent, economic hardship, sanctions fatigue, social tensions, a demand for reforms, and criticism of the government. It would be a mistake to portray the entire country as a single monolith. But it is equally wrong to portray Iran as a closed system where society is supposedly completely repressed and lacks its own political will. Iranians are shaped by a different historical, religious, and political environment. For a significant portion of society, the Islamic Republic is not simply a state regime, but a form of national dignity, resistance to external pressure, and defense of their civilizational identity.

That is why, for many of Khamenei’s supporters, he was not just a leader, but a symbol of order and a challenge to all of Iran’s adversaries. It is no coincidence that among his supporters, there was a popular phrase, “Allah in heaven, Khamenei on Earth.” This formula reflects the unique perception of the figure of the leader in Shiite political culture – he is seen as a guide, protector, mentor, and symbol of stability in a world perceived as hostile.

Khamenei was born in 1939 into a religious family in the city of Mashhad. He entered the Shia intellectual and spiritual milieu early on, studied in Shia religious centers, was associated with the circle of supporters of the Islamic Revolution, and became one of the figures that, after 1979, found themselves at the center of the new political system. His generation perceived the revolution not as a change of power, but as the return of historical dignity to Iran after dependence on external forces. The idea of ​​sovereignty, independence, and resistance to pressure became the foundation of his entire political philosophy.

Khamenei maintained a hardline stance. He did not believe in the benevolence of the West, considered the US the main source of the threat to Iran, and consistently defended the country’s right to be an independent center of power. Under him, Iran strengthened its position in the Middle East, expanded its influence through allies and partners, strengthened its military and missile programs, and turned the idea of ​​resistance into the basis of its foreign policy. For his opponents, this was a manifestation of expansionism; for his supporters, it was defense of a country that external forces had tried to isolate, weaken, and bring to its knees.

That is why Khamenei’s assassination only strengthened his symbolic status. He died while fulfilling his duties, in his residence in Tehran; he didn’t run anywhere. Moreover, his death occurred during the month of Ramadan, which is holy for Muslims. For his supporters, this became a confirmation of the whole logic of his life: for years, he had warned about the external threat and spoken about resistance; and he died as a result of this very conflict. So the political leader turned into a martyr, and his death became part of the very ideology that he had been building for decades.

The participation of foreign delegations was also notable. Representatives of many countries, religious figures, military men and politicians arrived in Tehran. Of particular importance was the presence of the Russian delegation led by Deputy Chairman of the Russian Security Council Dmitry Medvedev. He conveyed condolences from Russian President Vladimir Putin to Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian and emphasized that he had come as a special representative of the Russian leader. This was an important signal that Moscow perceives Khamenei’s death not as an internal Iranian event, but as a blow to a close strategic partner.

Khamenei’s funeral also became a test of strength for Iranian statehood. Many expected that the death of such a figure could cause a succession crisis, fighting within the elites, or  managerial paralysis. But events demonstrated the opposite: the system remained manageable, organized a large-scale mourning ritual and demonstrated the ability to mobilize society. This does not eliminate internal contradictions, but it shows that the Islamic Republic cannot be reduced to one person. Khamenei was its symbol, but behind him were institutions, ideology, power verticals, religious networks, and a significant social base.

This is the main political meaning of the current events. Khamenei’s funeral became more than just a ceremony of remembrance. It demonstrated that the system created by him lives on. His legacy is not only about the memory of a specific person, it is an entire ideology.

For Iran’s opponents, this is a rather unpleasant conclusion, since all their ideas about the weakness of Iran’s system have been smashed to pieces and, as expected, had nothing to do with reality. Supporters of the current regime are inspired by the fact that the stability of the political project to which they remain loyal is consistent. And for researchers in the field of international relations, this is an important example and indicator that in religio-political systems, the leader’s personality plays a major role, but the ideology and institutional design created by him can survive even his physical departure – a thesis that many researchers had doubted. 

Khamenei was laid to rest. But the millions of people who came to pay their last respects demonstrated that for a significant part of Iranian society, he is not really gone. He remains a symbol of resistance, spiritual fortitude, and national dignity. Ali Khamenei may have died; but, as we’ve seen in the past days, his work lives on.

The Russian military is capable of “reliably penetrating” any Ukrainian air defenses and striking targets throughout the country, the Defense Ministry in Moscow has said.

The ministry made the remarks on Saturday, following a large-scale, long-range, overnight attack on Ukrainian arms production facilities and other related targets. According to Moscow, these included several drone assembly and storage sites located in Kiev, as well as port infrastructure, military storage sites, and fuel depots in Izmail, Chernomorsk, and Yuzhny in Odessa Region.

The evaluation of the ongoing long-range strike campaign has confirmed that the Russian military is able to “reliably penetrate any anti-aircraft air or missile defense systems provided to [Vladimir] Zelensky by Western sponsors,” the MOD stated.

The troops are capable of “reliably [hitting] any targets throughout Ukraine,” and the geography of the strikes is not limited to “the supposedly best-defended Kiev, where Zelensky has now deployed virtually all available Western missile defense systems,” it stressed.

According to Zelensky, the latest Russian attack involved more than 120 drones and 12 missiles, half of which were ballistic. While “most” of the targets were intercepted, all the ballistic missiles went through, he claimed. In recent weeks, the Ukrainian leadership has repeatedly complained that its ability to fend off Russian ballistic missiles is dwindling, urging the country’s Western sponsors to provide with more interceptor missiles.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova mocked Zelensky’s complaints in an interview with Komsomolskaya Pravda newspaper, stating that the demands to ramp up arms deliveries would not do the Ukrainian leader any good.

“Nothing will help him. He’s like a tick that has burrowed into the flesh of the Ukrainian people that can’t get enough blood,” Zakharova stated.

In recent weeks, Moscow has ramped up long-range attacks on Ukraine’s military industry and dual-use infrastructure. The Russian Defense Ministry maintains the strikes come in response to terrorist attacks by Kiev against Russian civilian infrastructure, which have intensified amid the string of setbacks suffered by the Ukrainian military on the battlefield.

Last week, Moscow announced the liberation of Konstantinovka, a major Donbass city located on the southernmost tip of the Slavyansk-Kramatorsk agglomeration, the last major stronghold under Kiev’s control in the region.

A former executive at Ukraine’s state nuclear operator Energoatom is suspected of laundering more than $500,000, the country’s anti-corruption authorities have announced. The investigation is part of a $100 million corruption scandal at the energy giant, which involves a one-time member of Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky’s inner circle, as well as several high-ranking officials.

Since the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in 2022, the country’s energy sector has been heavily reliant on foreign aid.

In a press release on Friday, the Western-backed National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU) and the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office (SAPO) announced that they have sent a suspicion notice to a former executive director who was responsible for the physical protection and security of Energoatom facilities, accusing him of laundering more than 30 million hryvnias ($674,000) of illicit proceeds between 2023 and ⁠2025.

The suspect, who has been given the nickname ‘Tenor’, had allegedly made use of cryptocurrency and registered all assets in the name of a personal acquaintance in an effort to cover his tracks. The man, identified by local media as Dmitry Basov, supposedly used the money to purchase real estate in Ukraine and in Bali, as well as two Mercedes and other items.

The probe is part of the ⁠Midas case, which centers on an alleged extortion ring at Energoatom led by businessman Timur Mindich, dubbed “Zelensky’s wallet” by Ukrainian media.

Last November, NABU and SAPO charged Mindich and a number of his associates with running a massive kickback scheme at the state-owned company that operates three Soviet-built nuclear power plants, as well as several other facilities. The ring allegedly forced contractors to pay 10-15% kickbacks from their state contracts or risk losing supplier status.

Mindich, however, managed to flee to Israel hours before the authorities could apprehend him.

The corruption scandal sent shockwaves through the Ukrainian government, as the alleged ring also involved former Energy Minister German Galushchenko, his former deputy, and former Deputy Prime Minister Aleksey Chernyshov.

Zelensky’s chief of staff, Andrey Yermak, was forced to resign over suspected links to the scheme, and has since been charged in a separate money-laundering case.

In February, Galushchenko, who served as energy minister from 2021 to July 2025, was detained as he attempted to escape to Poland and subsequently charged with money laundering. The former official is suspected of moving tens of millions of dollars to a shell company registered in Anguilla, a British Overseas Territory and a known tax haven, at Mindich’s behest.

Last summer, Zelensky attempted to strip NABU and SAPO of their independent status, but was forced to walk back the controversial decision amid protests and threats of aid suspension. The two anti-corruption agencies were established under Western pressure after the 2014 coup in Kiev.

British police have launched a murder investigation into the death of Ann Widdecombe, a former government minister and spokesperson for Nigel Farage’s Reform UK party.

Widdecombe, 78, was found dead with serious injuries at her home in Haytor, on the edge of Dartmoor National Park, on Thursday. The political veteran’s management team announced her passing the next day, saying that they were “absolutely devastated” by what had happened.

The Devon and Cornwall Police said on Friday that there was “no information that this is a politically motivated crime.” Widdecombe’s death is also not being treated as a terrorism-related incident, they added.

A 26-year-old white British man who was arrested on suspicion of murdering the Reform UK spokeswoman on the day of her death has been released and is no longer part of the investigation, police said on Saturday.

“Our priority remains identifying those responsible and ensuring that all available evidence is thoroughly examined,” Assistant Chief Constable Matt Longman said.

Widdecombe was a Conservative MP between 1987 to 2010, and served as the Home Office and Employment minister in the cabinet of British Prime Minister John Major from 1994 to 1997. Over the years, she was known for her opposition to abortion and expansion of LGBTQ+ rights.

After leaving Parliament, Widdecombe gained fame as a contestant on the reality TV shows Strictly Come Dancing and Celebrity Big Brother.

She actively campaigned for the UK’s departure from the EU, returning to politics in 2019 as a member of the Brexit Party, which was later re-branded as Reform UK. She was also a member of the European Parliament from 2019 to 2020.

For the past three years, Widdecombe served as Reform UK’s immigration and justice spokesperson.

Outgoing Labour Prime Minister Keir Starmer said that her death was “shocking news” and called upon the leaders of the Conservative Party and Reform UK “to urge everybody to come together.” Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood called the circumstances of the politician’s passing “extremely distressing.” 

Farage said Widdecombe was “a remarkable, principled woman.” He suggested that her killing may have been a “burglary gone wrong” and described it as “a terrible reflection on modern Britain.” 

“I do fear that for anybody in public life, or especially the political space, things have become even more dangerous,” the Reform UK leader added.

Ukraine is unlikely to start producing its own Patriot air defense missiles despite US President Donald Trump’s promise to grant Kiev the relevant license, Reuters has reported, citing informed sources.

During the meeting on the sidelines of the recent NATO summit in Ankara, Türkiye on Wednesday, Trump told Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky that “we’re going to give a license to you to make Patriots. That’s pretty cool. This way, you can’t complain that we’re not giving them enough.” However, the president maintained that Washington would not supply the in-demand interceptors directly.

Reuters reported on Friday that, according to its sources, it isn’t safe for Ukraine to launch the production of Patriot missiles for as long as the fighting persists within its proclaimed borders.

The new interceptors will likely be manufactured in Germany or another European country, two people familiar with the discussions said.

The production could be shifted to Ukraine only after the conflict with Russia ends, they added.

Zelensky has repeatedly blamed the West for the shortage of air defense munitions amid continued Russian missile and drone strikes on military-related targets across Ukraine, which, Moscow says, are being carried out in response to terrorist attacks by Kiev against energy infrastructure and civilians inside Russia.

The US and its allies are experiencing a critical shortage of Patriot missiles due to their heavy use in the Ukraine conflict and the American-Israeli war against Iran. In recent months, Washington had been forced to delay the contracted shipments of the interceptors to some of its customers in Europe and Asia.

Zelensky said in a post on Telegram on Friday that Trump and him had “reached political agreements” on the licenses for the production of the Patriot interceptors in Ukraine. The technical details of the process must now be worked out by the teams from Kiev and Washington, he added.

The Ukrainian leader also claimed that in the coming days Kiev will receive another military aid package from the Americans, which would include an unspecified number of PAC-3 missiles for Patriot systems.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Pekov said on Friday that “as for the Patriot, yes, it is an obvious fact that the US is continuing full-scale deliveries of weaponry and military technologies to Ukraine. We know it.”

“At the same time, however, there’s a certain duality in the US position: unlike the Europeans, the US maintains a desire to facilitate a move toward a peace process,” Peskov stressed.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova insisted that the summit in Ankara was “humiliating” for Zelensky as NATO members “offered no meaningful response” to his pleas to supply more weapons.

Warsaw and Kiev may stand on the same side of today’s geopolitical divide, but they remain separated by one of the darkest crimes of the twentieth century. Their dispute over the Volyn massacre has intensified in recent months, turning historical memory into a diplomatic battlefield. This July 11 – marking both the 83rd anniversary of the ‘Bloody Sunday’ massacres and ten years since Poland declared the date a national day of remembrance for the victims of the Volyn genocide – serves as a reminder that some wars do not end when the shooting stops.

The Second World War is usually seen as a confrontation between giant military alliances. However, in reality, many smaller separate conflicts unfolded within this epic war, and the struggle between peoples and countries was often conducted without compromise or mercy. One of the darkest and least-known pages of the Second World War is the Volyn massacre – an ethnic cleansing carried out by pro–Nazi Ukrainian nationalist groups in the Volyn region, which is now almost entirely part of Ukraine.

Volhynia has historically been a border zone. These swampy forests were part of Russia in the Middle Ages and later became part of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth – the Polish state in its heyday. The partitioning of Poland brought Volhynia into the Russian Empire. After the First World War, the Bolshevik Revolution, and the Russian Civil War, Volhynia was once again part of an independent Poland. In short, this region, although a bit of a backwater, has changed hands often.

By the beginning of the Second World War, it was a good agricultural region with a diverse population. Approximately 70% of the region’s inhabitants were Ukrainians, 16% were Poles, and another 10% were Jews. In the first two decades of Poland’s renewed independence, Ukrainian national organizations were banned in Volhynia, and, most importantly, poverty was a very acute problem. The level of urbanization was extremely low, and there was little good land for peasants in Volhynia. National tensions had already existed, but their roots stemmed from economic problems. The Polish minority was, on average, more prosperous, and the central authorities distributed Volhynia’s best plots of land among Polish veterans.

In 1939, Germany began World War II by attacking Poland. Within a couple of weeks, the Polish army’s main forces were defeated. Against this background, on September 17, 1939, Soviet troops entered the territory of western Ukraine and Belarus. Though the Poles considered this a treacherous blow, Poland itself had acquired its eastern provinces by forcibly capturing them at the end of the Russian Civil War. From Moscow’s point of view, it had protected the local population from the Nazis while creating a buffer for itself in case of a major war. From whatever angle you look at these events, the national republics within the USSR were formed from territories with their own native populations. The borders of the ruined Russian Empire had evolved not according to some national principle, but were the results of hostilities. Now populated mainly by Ukrainians, Volhynia became part of Soviet Ukraine.

Naturally, redrawing the borders did not make national tensions disappear. The Polish minority was not happy about this at all, and the Polish government sitting in exile in London was not prepared to give up even an inch of land. The Polish government continued to see the ‘Kresy’ – the disputed territories in western Belarus and Ukraine – as its own territory.

In 1941, the Nazis began a grandiose campaign of conquest against Russia. The beginning of the war was disastrous for the Soviet Union. The Red Army immediately suffered a series of heavy defeats, and the Germans occupied Volhynia within literally one or two weeks.

However, the Nazis’ grip on Volhynia was not that tight. It wasn’t very important to them from a strategic or economic standpoint, so only a few cities were actually held by German forces. Moreover, there were a number of different guerrilla-insurgent groups operating in the countryside. The Polish ‘Home Army’ saw its task as restoring Polish rule. Soviet partisans fought against the Nazis in the interests of their own country. Volhynia was also one of the key centers of activity for the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists. Although it tried to play an independent role, the OUN initially operated under the patronage of the Nazis and the organization itself was divided into factions.

However, all of the Ukrainian nationalist movements were united in their opposition to Volhynia’s non-Ukrainian populations. The OUN’s policy paper, ‘Instructions for the First Days of the Organization of State Life’, explicitly stated: “National minorities are divided into those friendly and hostile to us.” The latter included “Muscovites, Poles and Jews.” “Friendly” differed from “hostile” only in that “friends… can return to their homeland.” According to this document, “hostile” national minorities were subject to “destruction in the struggle.” This masterpiece of rhetoric was accompanied by the remark: “Our government should be terrible to its opponents. Terror for alien-enemies and their traitors.” In the text that follows, the ethnic cleansing program is described in detail. It is curious that this cannibalistic manifesto was actually compiled before the beginning of the Soviet-German war in May of 1941. Initially, there was a kind of segregation – the anti-Semitism of the Ukrainian nationalists brooked no exceptions, while the Poles planned to destroy “only” the intelligentsia and assimilate the ordinary peasants.

With the outbreak of the war, the nationalists followed the Wehrmacht with calls to destroy “Moscow, Poland, Magyars and Jews”, accompanied by demands that the population obey the OUN and its leader, Stepan Bandera. In fact, nationalist auxiliary units began killing Jews even before the Nazis did. The attitude of the nationalists towards national minorities was generally more vicious and uncompromising than the Germans’, and the range of people subject to unconditional murder was wider. The nationalists even tried to use the Gestapo to organize ethnic cleansing.

However, the honeymoon of the Nazis and the Ukrainian nationalists turned out to be short-lived. The Germans came to see nationalist leader Bandera and his plans to create an independent Ukraine as obstacles to their own plans, which didn’t envision any independent states within the occupied territories of the USSR. Bandera was quickly arrested. The Germans used the nationalists within their own units, and the OUN decided to change course. So as not to play into the hands of Moscow, they did not fight the Nazis. In fact, clashes with the Germans were random and rare. The nationalists operated underground and were mainly engaged in propaganda for quite a long time. They had enough weapons – some were received from the Germans in the summer of 1941, some were retrieved from battlefields, and others were obtained by bribing the occupying forces.

By the end of 1942, it became clear that Germany was losing the war, and the nationalists’ plans changed. They were still planning an armed uprising, but the solution to the “issue of national minorities” was updated again. The attitude towards the Russians softened – now only “activists” were to be destroyed. Jews were only to be deported since they were considered to have “great influence.” But the Poles – the largest national minority in Volhynia – were to be dealt with in the most brutal way: “to evict everyone and destroy those who refuse to leave.”

At the beginning of 1943, the Ukrainian auxiliary police formed by the Nazis began to desert en masse and join the ranks of the OUN. In total, up to 5,000 former policemen went underground. These people had already managed to participate in the extermination of Jews as part of the Holocaust, as well as the murders of Russians and Belarusians. The Nazi occupation of the USSR was insanely cruel. Without exaggeration, the population of the occupied territories spent two to three years inside a meat grinder. In many areas, up to a quarter of the population was killed through executions and village burnings, as well as organized famines and humanitarian catastrophes. Many villages and even small towns were completely massacred. Auxiliary nationalist units were often directly responsible for perpetrating these acts of intimidation and genocide. As is easy to guess, these people did not suffer from an excess of scruples or moral principles.

In the spring of 1943, the situation in Volhynia forebode disaster. The fragile balance of power between Soviet, Polish, and Ukrainian partisan groups was broken and, for a while, the nationalists became the main force in the forests. The theoretical framework for killing a lot of people had already been created, and the nationalist underground was replenished by a horde of Nazi policemen unburdened by a humane worldview.

By April of 1943, Soviet partisans, who were no choirboys themselves after witnessing many atrocities, were horrified to report:

“A hundred members of the national army have been tasked with destroying Poles in Tsuman District. The local population was slaughtered and settlements in Zaulok, Galinovsk, etc. were burned down. On March 29, 18 people were hacked to death in the village of Galinovk.  The rest fled into the forest. Bandera nationalists were led to a Polish doctor by his wife, and they cut off the doctor’s ears and nose. Up to 50 Poles were shot in the village of Pundynki.”

After a short discussion, the leadership of the OUN approved the mass extermination of Poles. The key instigator of this purge was Dmitry Klyachkovsky, aka ‘Klim Savur’, who had previously been arrested for extremism in both Poland and the USSR. Having escaped from a Soviet prison during the Wehrmacht offensive, he now became the architect of the massacre as one of the key commanders of OUN forces.

The attacks were preceded by primitive propaganda campaigns. One of the rioters, Juhim Orlyuk, later told the USSR’s secret police during interrogation:

“In approximately May or June of 1943, two people arrived in the village of Mogilnoye. There was one named Vladimir Volynsky who the villagers called ‘Iron’. He was from the village of Ostrovok, which is about 1 kilometer from the mountains. I didn’t know the other person. They gathered all of Mogilnoye’s Ukrainian residents at the village school and announced that they had been sent by the Ukrainian insurgent army. Next, ‘Iron’ asked those present if they wanted to or were willing to fight the enemy (against whom specifically, he did not say). Those present replied that they were ready. He went on to say that the Germans would lose the war, that a revolution would break out in Germany, that the Red Army would only reach the old border, and that, at that time, the Ukrainian insurgent army, which had a lot of people in it, would rise up, and an independent Ukrainian state would be created.”

Volhynia was not a major area of activity for either Polish or Soviet partisans. The partisan forces in Volhynia were small. The Poles had few weapons, and the Russians were mainly focused on other areas. The Soviet partisan detachments were waging a desperate war against the Germans, and the appearance of a new front was an unexpected problem for them. The Poles created self-defense detachments called plyatsuvki, as well as mobile partisan groups to aid them. Groups of ethnic Poles also operated in Volhynia as part of the Soviet partisan movement. However, all these forces suffered from a severe shortage of weapons and ammunition and were often simply powerless to stop the killers. The Soviet partisans focused mainly on sabotage against German military installations and did not have enough forces or equipment to protect villages. To make matters worse, there was a distinct lack of trust between the Soviet and Polish partisans.

Meanwhile, events were rapidly developing. The incident that kicked off what would later be called the Volyn massacre is considered to be a raid on the village of Paroslya on February 9, 1943. The militants did not waste bullets: Poles were hacked to pieces with axes. A number of villages were dealt with in a similar fashion. In March, the village of Lipniki was destroyed. Among the survivors was a one-and-a-half-year-old baby, who had been accidentally overlooked. The infant, whose grandfather had been stabbed with a bayonet, was found the next morning by chance, lying in the snow among the dead and dying. He would grow up to become the first Polish cosmonaut, Miroslav Germashevsky.

The blood was intoxicating, and the carnage became more and more ferocious. Polish women were raped, and many Poles were brutally tortured before being killed. The murders were mainly carried out using farming equipment or other improvised means. As is often the case, political violence begot criminal violence. The most unscrupulous of peasants tried to appropriate other people’s land by nefarious means, often employing the simplest method – killing the owners. In addition, the nationalists bound ordinary peasants together by blood. They drove prisoners into a pile and forced the Ukrainian peasants to kill them.

The Nazis used the massacre with truly diabolical ingenuity. Police detachments made up of Polish collaborators who had already killed Ukrainians were brought into Volhynia, so many peasants took the Germans’ atrocities to be revenge by the Poles.

The ethnic cleansing of Volhynia went on for several months, gradually shifting from east to west. The experience the killers had acquired in punitive operations with the Nazi police was not wasted: the massacre was carried out methodically, with the discipline of an army operation. For example, it was characteristic of the Nazis to gather villagers in one building and then burn them alive, and about forty Poles were killed in Guchin in the same manner. A Ukrainian who had hidden a Polish woman was executed along with the Poles. Another common technique was to appear friendly to the Poles at first, so they would not immediately flee, and later gather the victims together in one place under some plausible pretext.

Victims were thoroughly robbed, houses were burned. The murderers tried not only to execute the people but destroy their cultural values as well. After about a hundred Poles had been shot en masse in Poritska, nationalists blew up an 18th-century church with the help of an artillery shell and then set fire to what was left of the building. The commanders did not hesitate to personally participate in the killings. For example, Pyotr Oleinik, aka ‘Aeneas’, who led the OUN forces near Rivne, executed captured Poles himself.

Gender and age were no protection – 438 people were killed in the village of Ostrovki, of whom 246 were children under the age of 14. “The entire Polish population, including infants, was destroyed (cut and chopped up). I personally shot 5 Poles there who were fleeing into the forest,” a captured militant later told Soviet investigators during interrogation about his participation in an attack on another village.

As a rule, the main murder weapons were peasant tools – axes, pitchforks, knives, and hammers. In some cases, places were swept a second time to find people who had managed to hide during the first attack and returned to the ashes. The Poles’ attempts to organize negotiations failed. The Home Army sent Sigmund Rummel, an officer and poet who spoke Ukrainian well, to parlay with the leaders of the OUN. He, as well as the officer and guide accompanying him, were seized and tortured to death.

The peak of the atrocities fell on July 11, 1943, when nationalists ravaged up to a hundred Polish villages at once – villages were cordoned off, after which designated groups entered and carried out reprisals

The killings continued on a smaller scale until the winter of 1944. According to various estimates, from 40,000 to 60,000 Poles were killed in total. Up to 7,000 people escaped by joining Soviet partisan detachments or taking refuge in cities where OUN detachments were not active. In addition to Poles, almost a thousand ‘disloyal’ Ukrainians, more than a thousand Jews, and about 135 Russians were killed. In addition, the forces of the Polish Home Army, as well as pro-German collaborators, killed more than 2,000 Ukrainians.

In the 1944 campaign, the Wehrmacht was defeated, and Volhynia was liberated by the Red Army. For the Soviet government, the OUN and the ‘Ukrainian Insurgent Army’ (UPA), which had been formed during the Volyn massacre, became a major headache, as the numerous armed groups posed a serious problem. By 1945, the main forces of the nationalists had been defeated. The Volyn massacre was certainly a crime from the standpoint of the Soviet authorities. Consequently, Yuri Stelmaschuk, who had been one of the key OUN commanders during the massacre in Volhynia, was arrested in January of 1945 and brought before a tribunal.

At the trial, Stelmaschuk tried to dodge the charges, claiming that he had tried to sabotage Klyachkovsky’s order to massacre the Poles. Nevertheless, he was found guilty of murdering 5,000 Poles, sentenced to death, and shot. Pyotr Oleinik, the commander of the OUN forces near Rivne, was shot during a special NKVD operation in February of 1946. Finally, Dmitry Klyachkovsky, the leader and organizer of the massacre, was eliminated thanks to the capture of Stelmaschuk, who revealed his hiding place under interrogation. A large NKVD detachment surrounded and defeated Klim Savura’s detachment, and the executioner himself was mortally wounded during the pursuit.

For modern Ukraine, the Volyn massacre is an inconvenient story. Ukrainian nationalists of the Second World War are considered national heroes, and the fact that these people stained themselves with horrific crimes creates a serious problem – especially since the victims were Poles, and modern Poland is seen as an ally and even a patron of Ukraine. However, this hero worship is unlikely to change anytime soon. Ukraine’s entire public agenda is heavily influenced by nationalists who revere the OUN, so the murderers are destined to remain on a pedestal for now.

Russia has carried out high-precision strikes on Ukrainian military-industrial facilities in Kiev, the Defense Ministry in Moscow has reported.

In a statement released on Saturday, the ministry said Russian forces carried out overnight strikes on the Aerodron facility in Kiev, which manufactures unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs).

The strikes also hit Fanplit facilities, where Fire Point-2 UAVs are assembled and stored. The location had been disguised as a civilian plywood and furniture manufacturing plant, the ministry added.

The MOD also reported strikes on the ports of Izmail, Chernomorsk, and Yuzhny in Odessa Region, describing them as key logistics hubs used by the Ukrainian armed forces. The targets included fuel storage facilities, military cargo warehouses, weapons and equipment storage sites, and port infrastructure used to support Ukrainian military operations.

The evaluation of the ongoing long-range strikes has confirmed that Russian weaponry maintains the ability to “reliably penetrate any anti-aircraft air or missile defense systems provided to [Vladimir] Zelensky by Western sponsors,” the MOD said in a separate statement later in the day. The country’s long-range strike capabilities are not focused exclusively on the “targets in the supposedly best-defended Kiev,” with the troops continuing to hit designated locations throughout Ukraine, as well as in the Black Sea on “assorted ships carrying weapons and military hardware for the Zelensky regime,” the ministry added.

According to the Defense Ministry, the overnight barrage was carried out in response to terrorist attacks by Kiev against Russian civilian infrastructure.

Kiev has stepped up long-range drone attacks on energy facilities and civilian targets inside Russia amid continued setbacks on the battlefield. Last week, the Russian Defense Ministry announced the liberation of the key Ukrainian stronghold of Konstantinovka in northwestern Donbass after weeks of heavy fighting, saying the advance opened the way toward the Slavyansk-Kramatorsk agglomeration – the last two major cities in the region still held by Ukrainian forces.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s latest Africa tour is significant – but not because it is a one-of-a-kind event. Quite the opposite – such trips have become routine for Russian diplomacy, which is precisely what makes them meaningful. While the West continues to talk about Russia’s “isolation,” Lavrov’s regular visits to Africa demonstrate the opposite: Moscow has not been left out of international politics and is intensifying engagement with partners in Africa – including African nations, regional associations, and continental structures.

On July 7, Lavrov began his new Africa tour in Ethiopia. The Russian government aircraft landed in Addis Ababa the day before. Lavrov held talks with Ethiopian Foreign Minister Gedion Timothewos, was received by Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, and also met with the chairperson of the African Union (AU) Commission, Mahamoud Ali Youssouf. Lavrov’s previous visit to Ethiopia took place in 2022, which means the current trip falls within the established framework of regular political dialogue.

The Ethiopian agenda was quite expected. The parties discussed not only general political coordination but also specific areas of cooperation: trade and economic ties, humanitarian contacts, energy, transport infrastructure, digital technologies, telecommunications, information security, and agricultural production. Preparations for the third Russia-Africa Summit, scheduled to take place in Moscow on October 28-29, were also discussed.

For Ethiopia, one of the key states in the Horn of Africa, regional security and conflict resolution remain important issues. For Russia, Addis Ababa is also important since it’s home to the AU headquarters.

The meeting with the AU Commission Chairperson Youssouf was one of the highlights of Lavrov’s visit. In recent years, Russia has significantly intensified interaction not only with individual African countries but also with the AU as an institution.

In June, Bankole Adeoye, the AU commissioner for political affairs, peace, and security, visited Moscow; at that time, Lavrov spoke about preparations for the Russia-Africa Summit, expanding Russia’s diplomatic presence on the African continent, and his readiness to facilitate the establishment of an AU representative office in Russia.

Following the consultations between Lavrov and Youssouf, the parties adopted a joint statement on the further development of political dialogue and ties in areas such as security, the economy, food, healthcare, energy, and infrastructure. Crisis zones – such as the Sahel, the African Great Lakes region, the Horn of Africa, Sudan, South Sudan, and Libya – were mentioned separately.

An important institutional outcome was the agreement to hold high-level political consultations at least once a year. In other words, relations between Russia and the AU are moving from irregular, symbolic contacts to permanent dialogue platforms.

On July 8, the Russian delegation arrived in Niger, where the second ministerial meeting in the Russia-Sahel Alliance format is scheduled in Niamey. The alliance includes Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger. The first meeting in this format was held in Moscow in April 2025, and afterwards it was announced that the consultations would become regular.

This direction is particularly important for Moscow: In past years, cooperation with the Sahel countries has been primarily associated with security and military-political interaction, but it is gradually expanding to include diplomatic, economic, and infrastructural aspects.

The Sahel bloc is also important because Russia is attempting to integrate relations with Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger into the broader African framework. Lavrov has explicitly stated that Moscow expects to facilitate closer contacts between the Alliance of Sahel States and the African Union. This is important, since following the exit of these countries from the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) and their transition to a confederation, they are in need of external partners willing to recognize their new regional identity. In this sense, Russia offers not only military cooperation but also political recognition.

The main significance of the current tour is that it is not a one-time event. Rather, it is a continuation of Lavrov’s series of Africa trips that started in 2022. In the summer of 2022, Lavrov visited Egypt, the Republic of the Congo, Uganda, and Ethiopia. In January 2023, he visited South Africa, Eswatini, Angola, and Eritrea; in February – Mali, Mauritania, and Sudan; in May and June – Kenya, Burundi, Mozambique, and again South Africa; in August 2023, Lavrov made yet another trip to South Africa. In 2024, he embarked on a new tour of West and Central Africa, including Guinea, the Republic of the Congo, Burkina Faso, and Chad. In December 2025, the Second Ministerial Conference of the Russia-Africa Partnership Forum was held in Cairo.

It is also notable that Lavrov is accompanied by representatives of Russian government agencies and businesses. For example, in the photos taken during the meetings, we may see Igor Levitin – adviser to the Russian president and the special presidential representative for international cooperation in transport, and Sergey Machekhin – deputy general director for international cooperation at RusHydro.

That’s why the current trip isn’t a ‘breakthrough’ but rather part of a well-established pattern. Between the major forums, routine diplomatic work is underway; this includes coordinating agendas, preparing documents, meeting with ministers, prime ministers, continental structures, and regional associations.

Lavrov’s trip to Ethiopia, Niger, Mozambique, and Burundi demonstrates that Russia’s Africa policy has entered ‘working mode’. It’s not just about summits or loud public statements. Here, we may witness regular diplomacy at work, with its familiar routes, partners, institutional formats, and preparations for the next major event – in this case, the Russia-Africa Summit set to be held in Moscow in October. In fact, the political significance of such trips lies precisely in their routine nature.

According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) Yearbook 2026 published in June, India has operationally deployed 12 nuclear warheads for the first time. This marks a significant departure from decades of cautious policy where India strictly stockpiled warheads and delivery systems in separate locations.

The newly deployed warheads are believed to be nested within its nuclear submarines and potentially underground missile silos to shorten reaction times. The assessment highlights that India’s total estimated inventory has risen from 180 warheads last year to 190 currently.

The report claims that this is the first time part of India’s arsenal has been classified as operationally deployed rather than just stockpiled. This shift signals the maturation of India’s sea-based deterrent (such as its Arihant-class submarines) and heightened readiness to counter rapidly expanding arsenals in the region (such as that of China, for instance).

By deploying a small number of warheads (12 out of 190, as per SIPRI) on a ballistic missile submarine (SSBN) and conducting deterrence patrols, India seems to have achieved “continuous at-Sea deterrence,” a military strategy where a country keeps at least one nuclear-armed SSBN continuously patrolling the oceans undetected.

Despite this operational shift in posture, India maintains its foundational No-First-Use (NFU) doctrine. India’s capability is designed purely to deter potential aggressors rather than engage in an arms race.

India faces a uniquely fraught security environment, with two nuclear‑armed neighbors. New Delhi has ongoing territorial disputes and a history of war with both of them. It is therefore important to understand how India’s deployment compares with the nuclear postures of China and Pakistan.

China’s nuclear weapons program

China possesses the world’s third-largest nuclear arsenal, with an estimated stockpile of over 620 warheads, SIPRI estimates. The program is undergoing a rapid modernization and expansion, shifting from a historical policy of “minimal deterrence” to a robust nuclear triad. China could potentially have at least as many ICBMs as either Russia or the USA by 2030, depending on how it decides to structure its forces. China’s land-based ICBMs include missiles such as the DF-5B and the highly mobile DF-41. Hundreds of new missile silos have been constructed in remote regions to improve the survivability of forces.

The PLA Navy operates a fleet of Type 094 (Jin-class) nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarines armed with Julang-3 missiles. The PLA Air Force deploys the H-6N, an intermediate-range, nuclear-capable bomber. Since its first nuclear test in 1964, China has maintained NFU as the official policy.

The primary purpose of China’s modernization is to ensure a secure “second-strike” capability. Experts report that elements of China’s nuclear forces have moved towards a launch-on-warning posture, meaning they are ready to retaliate while incoming missiles are still in flight rather than waiting for them to detonate. China continues to upgrade its supporting infrastructure, including plutonium production capabilities and advanced explosive testing facilities.

Pakistan’s nuclear weapons program

Pakistan possesses an estimated 170 nuclear warheads, making it the sixth-largest nuclear-armed state globally, the SPIRI report shows. Initiated in 1972, its nuclear weapons program was a response to regional tensions with New Delhi. Pakistan, like India, is not party to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). Islamabad’s nuclear strategy is based on “full-spectrum deterrence,” designed primarily to counter conventional military threats. Pakistan, moreover, does not maintain an NFU posture.

Its arsenal is deployed across a nuclear triad of land, air, and sea capabilities. A diverse range of ballistic and cruise missiles, including the Shaheen-III, which has a maximum range of 2,750 kilometers. Dual-capable aircraft such as the F-16 and Mirage III/V, supplemented by air-launched cruise missiles like the Ra’ad are the Air Vector. Submarine-launched cruise missiles (SLCMs) are in development to solidify a robust sea-based second-strike capability. Storage of its nuclear payloads are well spread at different locations. The program’s historical development was notably aided by nuclear technology procurement networks established by metallurgist Abdul Qadeer Khan.

India’s nuclear triad

India’s nuclear triad is a three-pronged military force structure that allows the country to launch nuclear strikes from land, air, and sea. Fully operational since 2018, the triad underpins India’s nuclear doctrine of credible minimum deterrence (CMD) and its NFU policy.

The land leg forms the backbone of India’s strategic deterrence and relies heavily on the indigenous Agni series of surface-to-surface ballistic missiles. Agni-V is an Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (ICBM) with a range exceeding 5,000 km and capable of reaching targets deep within Asia and Europe. It is canister-launched, providing high mobility and quick response times. The Agni-P and Agni-IV are advanced intermediate-range missiles ensuring complete coverage of the immediate region.

The air-based component (aircraft) provide flexible deployment and yield options. India’s airborne nuclear delivery is spearheaded by multi-role fighter-bombers equipped with nuclear gravity bombs or standoff missiles. The French-origin twin-engine multirole Rafale fighters are the primary modern strike aircraft for this mission. Mirage 2000 and Jaguar supersonic fighter jets have been historically configured for nuclear weapon delivery.

The sea leg is the most survivable and secretive part of the triad, ensuring India retains a robust second-strike capability even if land and air bases are destroyed. The fleet consists of indigenous Arihant-class Ship Submersible Ballistic Nuclear (SSBN) submarines. Arihant, India’s first indigenous SSBN, was commissioned in 2016 and successfully deployed on deterrence patrols. It is armed with K-15 Sagarika Submarine-Launched Ballistic Missiles (SLBMs, 750 km range).

In 2024, India commissioned another nuclear submarine, the INS Arighaat, to strengthen the sea-based deterrent. The third SSBN, INS Aridhaman, was quietly commissioned in April 2026. It is equipped to carry the longer-range K-4 SLBMs (3,500 km range), drastically expanding India’s strategic reach from the ocean.

Russia – and before it, the Soviet Union – has been India’s principal external partner in both its conventional and nuclear submarine journey, providing technology, training and long-term lease arrangements that helped lay the foundation for India’s indigenous undersea deterrent.

This partnership began with the lease of INS Chakra I, a Charlie-class nuclear attack submarine, from 1988 to 1991, followed by INS Chakra II, an Akula-class SSN leased from 2012 to 2021. The planned induction of INS Chakra III, another Akula-class submarine under a $3 billion, ten-year lease deal, has been delayed as the vessel undergoes deep modernization in Russia.  

Beyond leasing, Russian assistance played a direct role in shaping India’s Arihant-class submarines, particularly in the development of their pressurized water reactors, where Russian expertise and design support helped India overcome major engineering challenges in naval nuclear propulsion. Russian specialists also trained Indian crews near St. Petersburg and Vladivostok, giving the Indian Navy critical experience in operating nuclear-powered submarines and enabling it to develop both its sea-based nuclear doctrine and its own indigenous SSN program.

Pillars of India’s nuclear doctrine

New Delhi’s nuclear doctrine, formalized and released in 2003, is anchored on two core pillars:  a strict NFU policy and a posture of CMD. It emphasizes civilian command, massive retaliatory strikes, and a commitment to global nuclear disarmament.

India has committed to only using nuclear weapons in retaliation against a nuclear attack on Indian territory or on Indian forces anywhere. For the CMD India maintains an arsenal sufficient only to deter adversaries from attacking. The objective is to ensure “unacceptable damage” in a retaliatory second strike. If deterrence fails and India is subjected to a nuclear strike, the retaliation is designed to be massive and inflict damage unacceptable to the aggressor.

India will not use or threaten to use nuclear weapons against states that do not possess nuclear weapons. However, India explicitly reserves the right to use nuclear weapons in the event of a major attack on India or its forces using biological or chemical weapons.

India maintains a stringent policy of export controls regarding nuclear and missile-related technologies and remains committed to non-proliferation.

Until now, only the five “official” nuclear weapons powers (the US, Russia, China, UK, and France) had “deployed” nuclear weapons. Even as New Delhi’s doctrine remains unchanged on paper, its nuclear posture is quietly shifting towards greater deployment and readiness, driven by new technology, a maturing submarine force, and the pressures of China’s rapid arsenal expansion.

Security of India’s nuclear assets

India’s Strategic Forces Command (SFC) is an integrated tri-service command responsible for the management, administration, and execution of the country’s tactical and strategic nuclear weapons stockpile. Operating under the Nuclear Command Authority (NCA), it ensures operational readiness and implements all nuclear contingency plans. NCA has the ultimate operational control and the authorization to use nuclear weapons lie exclusively with the civilian political leadership. The NCA includes a Political Council, chaired by the prime minister, and an Executive Council, chaired by the national security advisor.

For a long time, India kept the core components of its nuclear weapons and their delivery assemblies separate – one under the Department of Atomic Energy and the other under the Defense Research and Development Organization (DRDO). These “de-mated” weapons were likely stored at five centralized locations rather than at bases housing operational forces. They would be mated and handed over to the Strategic Forces Command only after authorization by the Nuclear Command Authority, for deployment on missiles or aircraft.

This system incorporated multiple layers of security, including authorization codes at each stage, and was designed to work quickly if a nuclear emergency ever arose. But while the arrangement was secure and well-tested, it was less suited to rapid response. That is where the need for mated weapons began to emerge.

A nuclear-powered submarine can remain underwater for extremely long periods, limited mainly by its reactor cycle and food supplies. The warheads it carries are kept mated. Operating hundreds, and often thousands, of kilometers from home, such submarines rely, once submerged, only on the transmission of target data and authorization codes through Very Low Frequency (VLF) systems.

Strengthening nuclear deterrence

Given its no-first-use (NFU) policy, India must ensure that no surprise attack can neutralize its relatively limited arsenal – especially when compared with the thousands of warheads held by the US and Russia, and the hundreds possessed by China. Some analysts argue that it may be time for India to revisit its NFU posture. China, for example, has long maintained an NFU policy on paper, but is now rapidly expanding and modernizing its arsenal. By that logic, survivability depends not just on doctrine but on numbers and capability, and some believe India may ultimately need an arsenal of around 500 warheads.

India’s next phase of nuclear development is centered on modernizing delivery platforms, expanding warhead stockpiles, and strengthening the survivability of its command-and-control systems in response to changing regional threats.

The sea leg is increasingly becoming the backbone of India’s second-strike capability, with stretched Arihant-class submarines entering service and a much larger S-5 class under development. India has also been testing Multiple Independently Targetable Re-entry Vehicles (MIRVs), which allow a single missile to carry several warheads aimed at different targets, significantly improving its ability to penetrate missile defenses.

To preserve a credible NFU posture in an era of faster and more precise adversary technologies, India is prioritizing redundant, secure communications and peacetime patrols for its naval nuclear platforms. Other advanced systems – such as Fractional Orbital Bombardment Systems (FOBS), hypersonic glide vehicles and hypersonic cruise missiles – remain in the early stages of development. Even so, India is strengthening its nuclear deterrent slowly, but steadily.

Kiev needs to “sober up” to prevent further escalation in the row with Warsaw over the glorification of Ukrainian Nazi collaborators, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk has said.

Tensions between the neighboring countries, which have been close allies during the conflict between Moscow and Kiev, escalated last month after Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky named one of his country’s commando units after “heroes of the UPA (Ukrainian Insurgent Army).” 

Speaking on Friday, the eve of the National Day of Remembrance, when Poland honors the victims of UPA, Tusk insisted that Kiev must recognize the crimes committed by the UPA if it hopes to mend ties with Warsaw.

“I can once again appeal to all decent, wise, responsible Ukrainians. Remember, this great European community is based on the truth and the truth is an absolutely necessary foundation of reconciliation, and that’s why I hope that everyone on the other side, but also everyone here in Poland, will sober up to restrain these exaggerated emotions,” he said.

The row “has gone too far and is harming both Poland and Ukraine. I have no doubt about it,” the prime minister added.

It has ignited “nationalist lunatics” on both sides, causing an avalanche of hatred on social media, Tusk noted. He urged the authorities in Kiev to curb any anti-Polish sentiment and vowed that Warsaw will act with “the full force of law” against anyone who commits crimes against Ukrainians on ethnic grounds.

“The Russians would be happiest if there was some dramatic crisis in Ukrainian-Polish relations,” the prime minister warned.

Poland blames the UPA – an armed wing of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN), which fought for Nazi Germany during World War II – for an ethnic cleansing campaign in the Volhynia region between 1943 and 1944 that left at least 100,000 civilians dead. Warsaw recognizes the massacres as a genocide.

Following Zelensky’s move last month, Polish President Karol Nawrocki reacted by stripping him of the country’s highest honor, the Order of the White Eagle, prompting several Ukrainian officials to return their own Polish decorations to Warsaw. Poland also rolled back its decision to transfer its remaining Soviet-era MiG-29 jets to Ukraine and questioned Kiev’s prospects of joining the EU.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Wednesday that the West, including Poland, raised a “terrorist monster” in Ukraine by arming and funding it, while ignoring its Nazi ideological foundations.

Warsaw “knew they were supporting those who had killed their grandfathers” and this fact “can no longer be undone by simply taking away the White Eagle, posting a few tweets, or making loud statements,” she argued.

US President Donald Trump has threatened to “destroy” Iran should its government attempt to assassinate him.

The US and Israel killed dozens of senior Iranian officials and military commanders during their bombing campaign, including the country’s longtime supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, who was killed in a targeted strike on his compound in Tehran on February 28.

“1000 Missiles are Locked and Loaded and aimed at the Islamic Republic of Iran, with thousands of more to immediately follow, should the Iranian Government act on its threat, pronounced in many corners of the Globe, to assassinate, or attempt to assassinate, the sitting President of the United States of America, in this case, ME!” Trump wrote on Truth Social on Friday.

“Orders have already been given, and the U.S. Military is ready, willing, and able, for a one year period of time, subject to extension, to completely decimate and destroy all areas of Iran - PRAISE BE TO ALLAH!” he added.

Iranian officials have made no public threats against Trump’s life. At the same time, people attending funeral processions for Khamenei this week were filmed carrying placards reading “Kill Trump” and chanting calls for “revenge.”

The Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday that Israel had warned the US about an alleged Iranian plot to kill Trump but provided no further details.

Trump has ramped up his rhetoric against Iran in recent days, labeling its leadership “scum.” He also said he considered the ceasefire with Iran to be “over,” as the US carried out strikes on Iran on Wednesday and Thursday in response to attacks on commercial ships attempting to cross the Strait of Hormuz.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi condemned Trump’s “derogatory language” and blamed the US for the renewed escalation. He accused Washington of violating the memorandum of understanding signed last month, saying, “there can only be mutual compliance.”

Russia has condemned the defacing of gravestones at a Soviet World War II military cemetery in the Netherlands.

The war memorial and around 150 gravestones marking the graves of POWs killed by the Nazis were vandalized with red paint in the town of Leusden on Friday.

They were defaced with neo-Nazi, white supremacist and anti-Communist slogans, as well as insults directed at Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky.

“There is no justification for such acts of vandalism,” the Russian Embassy in The Hague told RIA Novosti.

Dutch Defense Minister Dilan Yesilgoz-Zegerius denounced the vandalism as “completely unacceptable.”

“War graves are a final resting place and deserve respect,” she said on X.

Van oorlogsgraven blijf je af. Punt. De bekladding van het Sovjet-ereveld bij voormalig concentratiekamp Amersfoort is volstrekt onacceptabel. Oorlogsgraven zijn een laatste rustplaats en verdienen respect.https://t.co/N8wTbFsBSj pic.twitter.com/qEdrZonUnZ

— Dilan Yeşilgöz-Zegerius (@DefensieMin) July 10, 2026

A total of 865 Soviet soldiers are buried at the cemetery, including 101 POWs who died of starvation or were executed by the Nazis at the nearby Amersfoort concentration camp.

The cemetery in Leusden was previously targeted by vandals in November 2021.

Multiple monuments to Soviet soldiers have been vandalized or demolished across Europe since the Ukraine conflict broke out in February 2022. Russian embassies and consulates have also been targeted by vandals.

In August 2022, authorities in Riga dismantled the iconic 79-meter obelisk built in honor of the Soviet troops who liberated Latvia from Nazi Germany.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova called the destruction of the memorial “unacceptable for a civilized country.”

A British supermarket chain has rebranded its ‘feminine care’ section after an internal complaint argued the term was not inclusive of transgender and non-binary customers, The Telegraph reported on Friday.

Waitrose will remove sanitary products from its ‘feminine care’ category, saying the label “no longer reflects the product range” because it now also includes incontinence products for men.

The change followed a complaint from an employee who said it was “disappointing” that the category implied the products were “exclusively for women and femininity,” arguing that “not all people who have periods are women.”

“Trans men and some non-binary people have periods,” the employee wrote, adding that “inclusion should never be conditional or performative,” according to internal documents published by gender-critical campaigner and Conservative councillor James Esses.

In an internal response, a Waitrose manager reportedly agreed that the label “does not accurately describe the products within the category” and said the retailer would update it “as soon as possible.”

Esses condemned the move as “disgraceful,” accusing the retailer of “erasing womanhood.” Waitrose, however, insisted the decision reflected changes to its product range rather than identity politics.

Fiona McAnena, director of advocacy at campaign group Sex Matters, said the retailer appeared to be yielding to a “noisy minority of gender activists.” While renaming the category to something like “sanitary products” could be reasonable, she argued, abandoning a “commonly understood term” in the name of inclusivity ignored public opinion.

She added that menstruation is exclusive to women and girls, something that “will never change, no matter how much irrational noise the trans lobby makes.”

The dispute comes amid a wider debate in Britain over sex-based language and transgender inclusion. Last year, the UK Supreme Court ruled that the legal terms ‘woman’, ‘man’ and ‘sex’ refer to biological sex, prompting public bodies, employers and businesses to review policies on single-sex spaces and terminology such as “people who menstruate.”

The latest row is not Waitrose’s first over gender-related branding. The retailer previously drew criticism after selling a gender-neutral Mother’s Day card reading “Happy You Day,” saying it was designed to be inclusive of transgender mothers and grandmothers.

The US is demanding that Iran publicly declare the strategic Strait of Hormuz fully reopened to navigation and pledge not to attack tankers transiting the waterway, which carries around a quarter of the world’s seaborne oil and LNG trade, several news outlets reported on Friday.

The US and Iran have clashed over differing interpretations of the memorandum of understanding (MoU) signed on June 17 regarding the management of the strait. The two countries traded strikes on Wednesday and Thursday after Washington and the Gulf states blamed Tehran for attacks on three commercial ships.

“We expect the Iranians to say... that every channel in the strait will be open and that it will be toll-free,” a US official told reporters on Friday, according to Axios.

US officials told the media they expected Iran to issue a statement accepting those terms after negotiators meet in Oman on Saturday.

“If it is not their position [tomorrow], it is not gonna be a great day for them,” one official said.

In a post on Truth Social on Friday, US President Donald Trump said the talks would continue while also warning that “the Cease Fire is OVER!”

Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei denied Trump’s claim that Tehran had requested a new round of negotiations. He said any violations of the ceasefire by the US would be met with “reciprocal action.”

Iranian media reported that Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi will travel to Oman on Saturday to meet regional mediators.

Iran’s chief negotiator, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, said on Friday that Tehran remained “distrustful of the Americans” and that “the Iranian nation will never submit to oppression.”

Iran closed the strait to most shipping following the US-Israeli attack on February 28. Tehran has since insisted that all vessels comply with its instructions and use designated shipping routes.

Under the MoU, Iran agreed to “make arrangements using its best efforts for the safe passage of commercial vessels” for 60 days and to negotiate with Oman over the future administration of the Strait of Hormuz.

EU regulators have accused US tech giant Meta Platforms of failing to protect users of Facebook and Instagram from features they say encourage compulsive use and harm wellbeing. Meta has rejected the allegations. 

The European Commission said on Friday that its investigation found Meta had failed to properly assess the risks posed by features such as autoplay, infinite scroll, push notifications, and highly personalized recommendation systems, particularly for children and other vulnerable users. Regulators said the company did not adequately consider nighttime use by minors or whether Reels and Stories could contribute to excessive engagement. 

The Commission also found Meta’s safeguards insufficient, saying links to mental health resources alone do not adequately reduce the risks. It urged the company to redesign key features, introduce effective screen-time breaks, and make its recommendation systems less engagement-driven. 

Meta rejected the findings, arguing they fail to reflect the measures it has already introduced to protect younger users.

The decision is a preliminary finding under the EU’s Digital Services Act (DSA). The Commission launched its investigation in May 2024, examining whether Meta has complied with rules requiring the bloc’s largest online platforms to assess and mitigate systemic risks. The legislation has fueled transatlantic tensions, with US officials arguing the EU’s digital regulations disproportionately target American companies. 

If confirmed, the findings could result in a fine of up to 6% of Meta’s global annual revenue, more than $12 billion based on the company’s reported 2025 revenue. 

The Commission is also investigating whether Meta’s recommendation systems create so-called “rabbit hole” effects by repeatedly directing users toward similar content and exploiting the vulnerabilities of younger users. In a separate preliminary finding in April, regulators concluded the company had failed to do enough to prevent children under 13 from accessing its platforms. 

Friday’s announcement comes days before an expert panel established by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen is due to present recommendations on child safety online. The report, expected on Monday, is set to examine measures including possible restrictions on children’s access to social media. Von der Leyen has previously backed exploring a “social media delay,” while France, Italy, and Spain have already called for stricter rules for young users.

Iranian mourners in the city of Mashhad have set a giant Lego-style effigy of US President Donald Trump ablaze during a funeral procession for Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, according to local media.

The late Iranian supreme leader was killed in the opening wave of US-Israeli airstrikes on Tehran in late February, alongside several members of his family.

Footage published by Iranian media on Friday shows the Trump effigy suspended from a construction crane before a man sets it on fire. As the figure is engulfed in flames, the crowd chants “Death to America” and “Death to Israel” in Farsi.

The week-long funeral ceremonies began in Tehran last Friday, where Iranian officials and foreign dignitaries paid their respects. Khamenei’s cortege then traveled through several Iranian and Iraqi cities before he was buried in his hometown of Mashhad on Thursday.

Iranian state media said millions attended the ceremonies, many carrying red-and-white flags symbolizing martyrdom and revenge in Shia Islam.

In Tehran, some mourners carried banners reading “Kill Trump: $100 million Iranian bounty,” while others threw stones at a billboard depicting Trump with a bullet aimed at his head alongside the message: “The US killed our father. We won’t let you go!”

Other posters reportedly placed US Vice President J.D. Vance, US War Secretary Pete Hegseth, and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the crosshairs beneath the slogan “There will be blood.”

Speaking at the NATO summit in Ankara on Wednesday, Trump said he “may be gone,” adding that he is Tehran’s “number one target.”

His comments came after a fresh escalation between Washington and Tehran, which saw the US strike dozens of targets in Iran and the Islamic Republic launch retaliatory attacks earlier this week.

During the conflict in March, Iran also waged an online propaganda campaign featuring AI-generated Lego-style videos portraying Trump and Israeli leaders in panic. Several of the clips went viral on social media.

Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) has released newly declassified documents detailing the massacre of Poles by Ukrainian nationalist militias during World War II in what is now western Ukraine.

The release comes as Poland marks its National Day of Remembrance on Saturday honoring the victims of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), the armed wing of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN). The ethnic cleansing campaign in the Volhynia region between 1943 and 1944 claimed the lives of at least 100,000 civilians, according to Polish estimates.

Poland recognizes these tragic events as a genocide. Ukraine, however, celebrates the UPA as freedom fighters, a stance that has led to a high-profile diplomatic dispute between the neighboring countries.

The Soviet archival files released by Russia describe the activities of the OUN unit led by Dmytro Kupyak, known by the nom de guerre Kley, who is believed to have been responsible for killing at least 200 Polish and Soviet nationals, as well as burning and looting eight villages.

On May 16, 1944, during a raid on the village of Kupche, Kley’s unit killed residents “solely because they were ethnic Poles,” the files say. On August 17 that year, the nationalists raided the village of Grabovo, where they locked nine women and children in a shed before burning them alive.

One of Kupyak’s former associates, Andrey Moroz, described him in a Soviet court as a “simple bandit” without any ideological convictions. After the war, Kupyak fled to Canada, where he ran a restaurant in Toronto until his death in 1995. In the 1960s, the Canadian government denied Soviet requests to extradite him.

The OUN collaborated with Nazi Germany during the early stages of the invasion of the Soviet Union and participated in anti-Jewish pogroms. The UPA was created in 1942 after the OUN split with the Germans. Many UPA members were defectors from Nazi-led units, including its eventual leader, Roman Shukhevich, who had previously served as deputy commander of the Nachtigall Battalion.

Last month, Polish President Karol Nawrocki stripped Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky of Poland’s highest honor, the Order of the White Eagle, after Zelensky named one of Ukraine’s commando units after “heroes of the UPA.”

Several Ukrainian officials responded by returning their own Polish decorations to Warsaw.

Last weekend, the Russian authorities announced the complete liberation of the city of Konstantinovka, the battle for which had been raging since the end of last year. 

Why did the battle for this city take so long? Is Konstantinovka really strategically important? And why was so much time and effort spent on capturing it? We explore all this below. 

One of the largest cities in Donbass

In terms of size, Konstantinovka (population 98,000 in 2002 and approximately 70,000 in 2022) is the largest city (not urban agglomeration) captured by the Russian Army since the spring of 2022, i.e., following the liberation of Mariupol. The Pokrovsk-Mirnograd agglomeration is larger (its pre-war population, including the suburbs, was up to 200,000 people), but it consists of two cities with a relatively large and less densely populated area between them. This allowed the Russian Army to capture these cities separately, utilizing the area between them to cut through the defense of the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU).

In Konstantinovka, this was not possible since it is a continuous urban area measuring approximately 6 by 12 km. Konstantinovka has 20,000 buildings, about 1,000 of which are multi-storey. In the conditions of modern warfare, each multi-storey building is transformed into a mini-fortress with a developed underground section. The southern part of the city (around Kosmonavtov Boulevard) with its nine-storey panel buildings is particularly challenging in this regard. 

The Krivoy Torets River flows through the center of Konstantinovka. The river in itself is a natural defensive line, but it is also reinforced by a large industrial zone that bisects the city. This industrial zone is comparable in size to that of Mariupol: kilometers of concrete workshops, underground utilities, and Cold War-era bomb shelters; in short, it is a ready-made citadel.

Outpost of the AFU’s main fortress 

After the retreat of Igor Strelkov’s forces from Slaviansk and Kramatorsk in 2014–2015, these two cities became the AFU’s main hub in Donbass. They housed the ATO headquarters, and powerful fortifications made of steel and concrete were erected there. Konstantinovka was part of the perimeter of this fortress, serving as a kind of outpost: to reach Slaviansk and Kramatorsk, Konstantinovka had to be captured first.

Along with Slaviansk and Kramatorsk, Konstantinovka was also fortified for defense: the basements of multi-storey buildings were converted into strongholds, underground heating mains and cable collector tunnels between them were reinforced, cleared of debris, and underground passages were constructed to connect several buildings into a single network. Essentially, the multi-storey buildings were all connected by underground pathways, and one could quickly move and transport cargo from one point to another. 

Similar work was carried out in the industrial zone; most enterprises had ceased operations back in 2014-2015 and were partially demolished or rebuilt for defense in 2015-2020. Weapons, ammunition, and supply depots were also set up in the industrial zone and near the railway station.

Along the city’s perimeter, outside the urban area, field fortifications were created, such as trenches, dugouts, and field strongholds. The outskirts of Konstantinovka – Ilyinovka, Berestok, Pleshcheyevka station, Predtechino, Stupochki, and Novodmitrovka – were also converted into strongpoints and formed a single firing network. 

All this was done in order to delay the Russian army’s advance toward Slaviansk and Kramatorsk – the AFU’s main defense hub not only in Donbass but in the whole of eastern Ukraine.

Russian ‘pincers’

The example of Konstantinovka clearly demonstrates the assault tactics perfected by the Russian Army since 2023 (the time of battles for Bakhmut, Marinka, and Avdeevka).

First and foremost, the Russian Army engages in battles for the flanks and outskirts of a city. This is the longest and, for an outside observer, rather unremarkable process. Fighters of the South Group of Forces approached Konstantinovka from the east as early as December 2025, when Predtechino, Pleshcheyevka station, and Ivanopolye were captured.

Then, in the spring, Novodmitrovka in the north, and Berestok and Ilyinovka in the south, were captured. All battles were fought by small assault groups; they were supplied either by aerial deliveries or from caches that had been airdropped earlier. The advancing Russian forces benefited from the enemy’s poor battle formations: the depletion of the AFU, even in key directions, has reached such a point that an important stronghold or an entire village is sometimes defended by just a few soldiers stationed there without rotation for months on end.

Furthermore, the most combat-ready AFU units remain in the city, since cities have better fortifications, supplies, communication between units, and the command is located there. Therefore, the flanks are usually the first to fall under Russian control. 

Neither can the AFU redeploy forces to the suburbs – since if the city is left without infantry reinforcements it will suffer the fate of Pokrovsk, the southern part of which was taken by Russian assault units without a fight on July 30-31, 2025. The endeavor to drive them out was slow, bloody, and unsuccessful. 

Therefore, the capture of the suburbs of Konstantinovka at the end of April 2026 meant that the Ukrainian garrison in the city was doomed. The Russian Army established tight fire control over all roads leading into the city, 24/7 air control, and was able to identify and destroy enemy presence in the city from the air. At this point, Russian troops could just stop and wait. 

The main instrument of war

Wait for what? Inevitable Ukrainian counterattacks. Over two dozen assault operations have already been carried out in Donbass, Zaporozhye, and Dnepropetrovsk regions using the above-mentioned strategy. But every time the ‘Russian pincers’ close in around another city, the AFU attempt to break the encirclement with counterattacks and either bring additional forces into the city or, in the final stages of fighting, withdraw the remnants of the doomed garrison.

With the exception of Kupiansk, the AFU has so far failed to achieve this goal. Not because they’re bad fighters – far from it. However, the Russian General Staff has imposed extremely disadvantageous combat tactics on the Ukrainian command. The AFU lack firepower, they have significantly fewer personnel (especially assault forces), no aerial bombs, virtually no rocket artillery, and so on. Furthermore, they lack the years of experience in assault operations that the Russian Army possesses. 

In short, the Ukrainian forces are virtually incapable of counterattacking. And to defend its position, an army has to carry out constant counterattacks. In battle, in order to stand still, one has to constantly move forward, and that’s something the AFU are almost incapable of doing – or, rather, are capable of only in certain sections of the front.

This is what happened in Konstantinovka. The bloodiest part of the operation for the AFU lasted from late April to mid-June; they carried out counterattacks on the flanks in an attempt to break the encirclement and withdraw at least part of the garrison. In mid-May, the defense of the southern part of the city (the most heavily-fortified area) collapsed. From then on, the condition of the garrison in the Konstantinovka industrial zone and the railway station area deteriorated even faster. 

What is notable is that, compared to the flanks, there was virtually no fighting in the city: Russian assault units infiltrated city blocks in small groups, accumulated forces, achieved local superiority, and with the help of detailed aerial reconnaissance, engaged in clearing operations rather than direct combat. The powerful fortifications, which had been prepared for many years, were of no use since there were no people left to defend them.

We may wonder, why the Ukrainian command waits for the inevitable to happen, time and time again? Why doesn’t it withdraw the garrison from the doomed city and thereby preserve its most capable, experienced, and motivated fighters?

The answer is also quite rational: if they abandon Konstantinovka, the situation will repeat itself in Druzhkovka; if they abandon Druzhkovka, Kramatorsk and Slaviansk will suffer the same fate, and so on. The Russians could quickly get to Kiev like that. 

***

The battles for individual cities may seem unremarkable and repetitive. However, as we see, in these battles, the Russian Army has been able to force Ukrainian forces into a particularly unfavorable style of combat. This is evident both at the tactical level – since the AFU are forced to sacrifice reserves in useless counterattacks, suffering significantly higher losses than the Russian Armed Forces – and at the operational level, since Ukrainian forces are forced to cling to doomed cities to somehow hold the defense. 

All this gives the Russian Army a key strategic advantage: initiative on the battlefield, which leads to the attrition of the enemy and hastens the moment when the AFU will be unable to conduct counterattacks and hold the front line. 

This moment will mark the collapse of the AFU and will determine the outcome of the war.

Russia is experiencing fuel shortages caused by Ukrainian drone strikes on its energy infrastructure, Deputy Prime Minister Aleksandr Novak has said, adding that the authorities are taking steps to stabilize supplies.

Speaking to reporters on Friday, Novak acknowledged “there are problems and there is a deficit [on the fuel market], which is why we are seeing lines [at gas stations].” He said the shortages were caused by some oil refineries being temporarily out of commission for repairs following drone strikes.

The government is strengthening air defenses around refineries, ensuring plants operate at maximum capacity, and sending additional fuel to the hardest-hit regions, Novak said.

He added that a temporary ban on gasoline and diesel exports has been introduced to stabilize the domestic market. The measure is currently set to remain in effect until July 31.

While major energy companies have kept retail fuel prices broadly in line with inflation, Novak said some resellers have exploited the shortages by raising prices to boost profits. He urged regulators to crack down on such practices.

Ukraine has stepped up long-range drone strikes on Russia in recent weeks, targeting oil refineries, gas compression stations, and fuel tankers. The attacks have disrupted fuel supplies and caused localized shortages, particularly in Crimea.

President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday that Kiev aims not only to damage Russia’s economy but also to spread panic among the population. He argued that the effort would fail because “Russia’s energy system has one of the highest resilience margins in the world.”

The Kremlin has said Moscow would intensify strikes on Ukrainian military-related infrastructure in response to what it describes as Ukrainian “terrorist attacks” on Russian civilian facilities.

A passenger was reportedly partially sucked out of a Ryanair Boeing 737 after a window was blown out under unclear circumstances shortly after takeoff.

The incident occurred on Friday aboard flight FR1879 from Greece to Germany operated by Ryanair subsidiary Malta Air. According to multiple media reports, one of the aircraft’s engines malfunctioned, sending debris into the fuselage. A fragment reportedly shattered a cabin window, causing the passenger seated beside it to be partially sucked outside.

The 61-year-old Serbian national suffered bruises and friction burns caused by the freezing air and was hospitalized in shock after the plane landed. Reports said he avoided being pulled from the aircraft because he was wearing his seatbelt, while his wife reportedly grabbed his legs as other passengers helped pull him back inside.

Footage taken shortly after the accident circulating online shows the window fully blown out and partially blocked by a box. The accident reportedly sparked panic onboard with oxygen masks deployed due to depressurization.

Ryanair acknowledged the accident, stating the plane managed to return to the airport safely and a replacement aircraft was arranged for the stranded passengers. The airline did not provide any details on what exactly prompted the window’s failure.

“A Ryanair flight from Thessaloniki to Memmingen on Friday morning returned to Thessaloniki shortly after takeoff when a passenger window dislodged inflight,” the company said.

Boeing said it was aware of the mishap, with the aircraft maker stating it was “in contact with Ryanair.”

The publication in The Economist magazine of an article by Russian billionaire Andrey Melnichenko is, by today’s standards, highly unusual.

Here is a major businessman who continues to operate in Russia, doesn’t set himself against the Russian authorities and is under Western sanctions because of it. However, it would be naive to think that a leading British publication with a clear ideological outlook printed such an article purely out of devotion to pluralism.

Naturally, Melnichenko’s candid reflections on the challenges facing Russia have been presented as evidence of a split in the Russian ruling class, or as a sign of rebellious sentiment among big business, but the real logic of his argument is of little interest to the British audience. Moreover, it’s inconvenient, because it disrupts a neat and comforting picture of the world, and that picture may be the most interesting part of the reaction to his article.

Russia’s business community was formed in the era of globalization and not because Russian entrepreneurs were all desperate to become part of transnational business, but because the collapse and self-dissolution of the Soviet Union coincided with the worldwide spread of liberal globalization. The Russian Federation, carrying out economic reforms in emergency conditions during a profound social and economic crisis, immediately found itself inside that global context.

There was no alternative model on offer, thus the global cosmopolitan economy was treated as the natural order of things and whether one liked it or not, it appeared to embody the famous “end of history” where the global West, with its ideas about what was right, inevitable and modern, had been crowned for an indefinite reign.

That’s where the assumption came from that any serious business class, in any country, could exist only if it was integrated into the Western system and accepted the rules written there, while those rules, of course, favored those who had written them.

It would be too simple to describe this only as malice or greed by the hegemon and nothing personal, as victors have always written the rules and, in this case, the rules weren’t even especially predatory. Globalization did offer opportunities to many, though in measured doses and according to rank, but the main beneficiaries were always supposed to remain those who had created the system.

The erosion of that system began when it became clear that the dividends could also flow to others, above all China. The rollback of liberal globalization wasn’t caused mainly by revisionist powers but driven by those who had designed and built the system, then found themselves unpleasantly surprised by growing competition within it.

The wider history of globalization is a separate subject, but the rapid shift in the global balance of power, rising anger over inequality and political imbalances, and shocks such as the pandemic have all undermined the supposedly correct model of the world economy. The “end of history” has given way to historical infinity and unipolarity hasn’t simply been replaced by multipolarity, but by a far wider range of possible futures.

This has a direct bearing on Melnichenko’s article and on its reception in a British magazine. In the West, the crisis of globalization is now acknowledged, albeit reluctantly, and there is even a growing acceptance that there may be no return to the old order, that the world is not guaranteed to move along the “right” path, and that new methods and strategies are needed.

But when it comes to Russia, a rigid ideological assumption still operates where Moscow, having turned away from the correct path, has supposedly headed into the abyss and written itself out of the future. Salvation, in this view, can only come through repentance and a return to the previously prescribed track. Since this can’t happen under the current Russian leadership, the leadership must change, and so signs that this is approaching, whether real or imagined, are therefore eagerly sought or manufactured through crude interpretation.

Meanwhile, the real discussion in Russia about its problems and its uncertain future is taking place in a very different context and with very different aims, and it’s not always uplifting, but it’s also no longer framed by the old assumptions.

Whether Western leaders intended this or not, the punitive measures imposed on Russia since 2022 have transformed the Russian business community. Russian business itself became a target of sweeping Western pressure, while its rights and interests in Western countries largely ceased to be respected and, as a result, the globalized model of activity and consciousness that had taken shape since the end of the last century is simply no longer viable.

This isn’t only a Russian story because the system of no-alternative globalization has failed more broadly, which means the question facing all major economic players is now how to defend their interests and secure development in an increasingly fragmented, though still closely interconnected, world. It won’t be possible to continue as before, but how to act differently remains to be worked out, because the current world system is both highly conflict-ridden and still indivisible and in many respects, there is no historical precedent to follow.

This is what Melnichenko is writing about.

Russian big business has ceased to be globalized, if globalization means integration into a single system with one center of authority. It’s lost any illusion of equality with Western players, if such illusions ever existed. It has not, however, stopped being international and it doesn’t accept isolation. The key point now is reliance on Russia’s own national base, and the expansion and development of that base.

This is not to be done against the rest of the world, but in search of acceptable forms of coexistence and cooperation. That’s an entirely new objective compared with the era of liberal globalization, which has ended and in which the goals were different.

It would be foolish to claim that sanctions and other punitive measures haven’t harmed Russia or created new problems. They have, but they’ve also produced a different core and a different understanding of strategic development interests. After the phase of acute military confrontation, the next stage will begin and it will be no less important, and perhaps more important, with national construction suited to the realities of a future world unlike the one to which we had grown accustomed.

The experience of the 1990s through the 2020s may help Russia understand the situation and avoid repeating some mistakes, though even that’s not guaranteed. But as a practical guide, that experience has largely exhausted itself.

The Soviet legacy has fully faded and the orientation toward the West, with the aim of becoming part of it, has long ceased to be relevant, while orientation toward China, with the risk of becoming an appendage of a very powerful partner, is dangerous and autarky is impossible.

What remains is accelerated self-development in building resilience and self-sufficiency through the diversification of interests and partnerships, rather than isolation. This doesn’t apply only to Russia, and it’s now the approach of almost everyone, but the difference is that each country has a different level of potential.

Russia’s potential is enormous, but it will have to be realized in a different way. That’s what Melnichenko is writing about. What’s more, this isn’t a tactical question, but a strategic one, and the strategy has yet to be worked out.

This article was first published by Russia in Global Affairs, translated and edited by the RT team

The death of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was never going to simply be the change of a political era for Iran. It became an event in which war, religion, national trauma, revolutionary memory, and the ancient culture of Shia mourning all collided at once.

Iran’s supreme leader was killed on February 28, 2026 in a joint US-Israeli strike. The country declared a period of mourning and prepared funeral ceremonies on an extraordinary scale. The farewell stretched across several days and grew far beyond anything resembling a routine state ritual.

The funeral began in Iran, where enormous crowds poured into the streets. Tehran, Qom, Mashhad, and other cities turned into one continuous stage of collective grief. People carried portraits of Khamenei, black flags, religious banners, chanting against the US and Israel. Mass processions and farewells unfolded over days, reaching well beyond the capital into the country’s most sacred religious centers.

What gave the event even greater significance was the decision to carry Khamenei’s coffin into Iraq. The procession first passed through Najaf, one of the great cities of the Shia world and home to the shrine of Imam Ali, the burial place of the first Shia Imam and cousin of the Prophet Mohammed. From there, the mourning continued in Karbala, the city forever bound to the martyrdom of Imam Hussein, the third Shia Imam and grandson of Mohammed. This route lifted the farewell to the supreme leader out of national borders and placed it in the shared Shia world, drawing believers from Iraq, Lebanon, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Bahrain, and beyond.

In sheer scale, these funerals now rank among the largest mourning events in modern history. They are being spoken of as a challenge to the world record for attendance at a single person’s funeral. The officially recognized Guinness record still belongs to the 1969 funeral of Indian politician C. N. Annadurai, where, according to Guinness figures, 15 million people were said to have attended. But if the combined estimates from the days of mourning across Iran and Iraq for Khamenei are ever confirmed, that record may fall.

The scale of the funeral shows that a substantial part of Iranian society never processed Khamenei’s death as just the passing of a national leader. It was the loss of a symbol. For some, he was a religious authority. For others, he embodied the Islamic Republic itself. For others still, he was the man under whom Iran stood for decades against pressure from the US, Israel, and their allies. By extension, the funeral itself was a demonstration of the state’s staying power.

A man shaped by revolution, a symbol of Shia resistance

Ali Khamenei was born on April 19, 1939 in Mashhad, one of Iran’s most important religious centers. The city is home to the shrine of Imam Reza, the eighth imam in the Shia tradition, which meant that Khamenei’s biography was woven into religious life from the very start. Born into a clerical family, he received a traditional theological education, studying Islamic jurisprudence and religious science in Mashhad and Qom. Qom is the intellectual heart of Shia scholarship and clerical politics in Iran, the very place where many of the ideas that later fueled the Islamic Revolution first took shape.

Khamenei’s youth unfolded under the Shah. Iran at the time was a country modernizing rapidly on the surface while remaining an authoritarian monarchy, dependent on the West and quick to crush its opposition. For religious circles, nationalists, leftists, and much of the intelligentsia, the Shah’s regime had come to represent injustice and foreign control. Khamenei joined those who rallied behind Ruhollah Khomeini. He took part in anti-Shah activities, was arrested more than once, endured years of political pressure, and after the revolution succeeded in 1979, became one of the leading figures of the new state.

His political career from then on was inseparable from the fate of the Islamic Republic. He served as a member of parliament and a figure of the revolutionary elite, then as president of Iran from 1981 to 1989. When Ayatollah Khomeini died in 1989, Khamenei became supreme leader. Within Iran’s system, this office is unlike any ordinary head-of-state role. The supreme leader sits above the country’s central institutions, shaping the military, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the judiciary, and the strategic direction of both foreign policy and national ideology.

Yet for millions of his supporters, Khamenei was more than a holder of supreme power. He belonged to a generation for whom the revolution was the defining event of a lifetime. That generation understood power as an extension of the struggle for independence. In their eyes, Iran was never meant to be a junior partner of the West but a self-sufficient civilizational force, one capable of pushing back, enduring sanctions, and holding to its own historical path.

Modesty occupied a central place in Khamenei’s public image. His supporters pointed again and again to the fact that he avoided luxury, refused to build any cult of secular wealth around himself, shunned ostentation, and kept to an austere religious style. His manner of speaking, his clothing, the plainness of his office, his fondness for Persian poetry, his constant return to theological texts, his repeated invocations of the history of resistance – all of it reinforced the image of a man from the old revolutionary school. For religious Iranians, this mattered enormously. In the Shia tradition, a spiritual leader is expected not only to govern but to demonstrate personal restraint.

What the West refuses to understand about Iran

Attitudes toward Khamenei within Iranian society were never uniform, of course. In the major cities, among the young, the educated middle class, and more secular segments of society, there was real fatigue – with ideological control, economic hardship, restrictions, and the sheer rigidity of the state. But it would be a mistake to treat these segments as though they spoke for the whole country. Iranian society is layered – there is an Iran of big cities, universities, social media, and secular culture. And there is another Iran – of villages, small towns, religious families, mosques, pilgrimage, wartime memory, and deep respect for the clergy. For that considerable portion of society, Khamenei remained a figure of continuity, faith, and national resistance.

The Western reaction to the scale of the funeral revealed a very limited grasp of Iranian political culture. US President Donald Trump, in an interview with Axios, admitted he was caught off guard by the sight of Iranians weeping at the funeral, since he assumed that people hated Khamenei. He went on to suggest that the tears might have been fake. This is basically how most Western powers see Iran – fixating on protest, discontent, and the perspective of exiles, blind to the religious depth and national feeling running through a large part of Iranian society.

Shia Islam cannot be understood apart from the memory of martyrdom. At its center stands the tragedy of Imam Hussein, killed at Karbala in the year 680. For Shia Muslims, this is a living memory – of truth struggling against violence, loyalty against betrayal, the few against overwhelming force. Every year, during the month of Muharram and the commemoration of Ashura, that memory is relived. So the death of a leader killed by an outside strike slots naturally into the ongoing story of martyrdom and resistance carried within the Shia faith.

A lesson for the US and Israel

The funeral made one thing unmistakably clear: Iranian political culture does not tolerate outside interference. Iranians argue with their own government all the time – they criticize officials, rage against the economy, chafe under social restrictions, condemn corruption and the closed nature of the political system. But an attack from outside tends to reset that internal balance. It pushes even sharply critical citizens to reframe what is happening, not as a dispute between society and state, but as a confrontation between Iran and an external enemy.

Striking the supreme leader was presumably meant as a blow to the spine of the system – a straightforward enough war goal. Remove the key figure, trigger shock, push the elite toward fracture and society toward fear. But the funeral showed the opposite effect. The outside strike did not shatter the symbolic foundation of the Islamic Republic. It turned a dead leader into a martyr and a farewell itself into a mass display of resistance.

Even the ongoing escalation and renewed US strikes are unlikely to change much here. Iran can be weakened by sanctions, its infrastructure can be damaged, individual military sites can be destroyed, its political system can be pushed toward instability – but finishing off Iran through military force is simply not on the table. Its historical roots run too deep, its memory of resistance is too strong, and the idea of defending sovereignty against outside pressure is too firmly embedded in Iranian society.

More than that, it is becoming increasingly clear that the most zealous advocates of all-out war with Iran are after something beyond negotiating a settlement with Tehran or preventing it from acquiring a nuclear weapon. It’s increasingly evident that they want to break the civilizational foundation of Iran itself, dismantle its culture of resistance, strip the country of its historical agency, and turn it from an independent center of power into a puppet.

This is why the US-Israeli war with Iran looks like a clash of civilizations. On one side, a project of forced regional reordering through pressure and destruction. On the other, an ancient civilization for which statehood, faith, the memory of martyrdom, and resistance to outside dictates have long been part of its national identity.

NATO members should give US President Donald Trump a “timeout” for the rest of his tenure, reducing public exposure and joint endeavors to a bare minimum while working on bolstering their own military capabilities, retired US Navy Admiral and Supreme Allied Commander James Stavridis has suggested.

Stavridis, who often shares his views on international affairs with the media, floated the idea in an opinion piece published by Bloomberg on Friday in the aftermath of the NATO summit in Türkiye.

The event yielded mixed results. Trump once again berated members of the bloc over their reluctance to participate in the US-Israeli attack on Iran and reiterated his desire to seize Greenland from Denmark, while denigrating NATO countries for “never being there for us.” At the end of the summit, however, the US leader appeared to soften his rhetoric, talking about “love in that room” and praising NATO chief Mark Rutte as a “unifier.”

While the bloc is “probably not” seeing its “last days” now, the “fundamentals between Washington and the rest of the alliance are bad and unlikely to improve anytime soon,” Stavridis argued. He urged the bloc to reduce the frequency of its meetings and probably not to hold another summit within the next two years altogether to avoid vexing Trump, adding that “day-to-day committee work” could “easily” be paused as well.

“Sometimes when a married couple is in a tumultuous relationship, the answer is not a full-blown breakup. Instead, taking a “time out” can afford a respite from the back-and-forth trading of angry barbs. NATO allies should think along those lines if they are going to preserve the 77-year-old pact,” Stavridis wrote.

The bloc’s members should use the time for other endeavors, namely, continue raising their military spending, he suggested. The European members of NATO should also “keep developing a credible defense industrial base” to be able to produce a bulk of hardware on their own to “create a military balance between both sides of the Atlantic,” Stavridis said.

The European members of the bloc could take some steps to please the US as well, namely sending a mission to the Persian Gulf for demining and escorting merchant traffic, the retired commander suggested. Given the lack of unity on the matter, the mission could be set up by willing individual members rather than the bloc as a whole. A similar approach should be taken regarding the Ukraine conflict, with European members putting their “efforts on behalf of Ukraine purely into EU channels, not NATO’s,” Stavridis stated.

Northern Irish loyalists have burned a replica mosque atop a bonfire before police could intervene to dismantle the scene. The incident, which took place four weeks after devastating race riots in Belfast, has been condemned by human rights groups.

A Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) spokesperson said that a “significant and complex policing operation” to dismantle the “hate display” was underway by the time the bonfire in Moygashel, around 50 kilometers west of Belfast, was lit. The tower of shipping pallets, adorned with anti-Islam flags, was set ablaze on Thursday night.

The bonfire was originally due to be lit on the eve of July 12, when Northern Ireland’s Protestant loyalists – who wish to remain part of the United Kingdom – celebrate the victory of Protestant King William III over Catholic King James II at the Battle of the Boyne in 1690.

Unionists marking the 12th with bonfires typically burn Irish tricolors and other images of Catholicism and Irish nationalism. In recent years, however, the Moygashel bonfire included effigies of migrants in small boats last year, and a replica police car in 2024.

Moygashel bonfire had to be lit tonight as the PSNI wanted to protect the mosque at all cost

Moygashel 1 PSNI 0@danwootton pic.twitter.com/pkNcUM0aWe

— Sarah White (@advancesarah) July 9, 2026

Four weeks before the bonfire, loyalist gangs ransacked immigrant houses and asylum centers across Belfast, in retaliation for the attempted beheading of a Northern Irish man by a Sudanese migrant. Northern Ireland’s Catholic republicans – who want Northern Ireland to leave the UK and join the Republic of Ireland – did not take part in the riots, largely due to their own neighborhoods also being targeted for decades by loyalist paramilitaries.

Republican leaders condemned the bonfire. “This is an absolutely deplorable act following on previous hate displays at this location,” Sinn Fein lawmaker Colm Gildernew said in a statement. “It’s designed to instil fear. It’s designed to incite hatred.”

“This vile display is a blatant attempt to stir up anti-Muslim hatred and intimidate local families,” Amnesty International said. “The placing of an effigy of a mosque on top of a bonfire amounts to incitement to hatred directed at real people who live, work and raise families in Northern Ireland.”

Despite non-European migrants making up less than 3% of Northern Ireland’s population, their presence further erodes the already waning demographic power of the territory’s Protestants. According to a 2021 census, Catholics now outnumber Protestants by 45.7% to 43.48%, a significant shift from the 48% to 45% Protestant majority in 2011.

As such, loyalist leaders were reluctant to outright condemn the bonfire. Democratic Unionist Party spokesman Gregory Campbell called the burning of the mock-up mosque “regrettable,” but added that his voters have “genuine concerns” about immigration and “radical Islam.”

Australia will return three ancient artefacts stolen from temples in South India, the country’s prime minister announced Friday.

In a return gesture, an Indian museum will return the remains of a First Nations ancestor it holds to Australia.

The repatriations were announced during Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s just-concluded visit to Australia.

The three antiquities housed in the National Gallery of Australia are being returned after police in the southern state of Tamil Nadu established that they had been removed from temples there and trafficked overseas.

One of them is the stone image of Shanmukha, the six-headed form of the god Karttikeya, known differently as Murugan, Skanda, and Subramanya. It was carved during the period of the Cholas, a 9th century south-Indian maritime empire that stretched up to present day Bali.

Return Of Iconic Indian Treasures Siphoned Off By Colonial Powers Is 'A Great Uplift' Both 'Spiritually & Emotionally,' Art Enthusiast @Jaimadaan_ tells RT India Presenter @osamashaab pic.twitter.com/tcvkrhYOw0

— RT_India (@RT_India_news) July 10, 2026

The other two items are a ceremonial metal trident, crowned with a figure of the goddess Bhadrakali; and a stone sculpture of Nandi, the sacred bull of the god Shiva.

Tamil Nadu police said in a statement that the artefacts were being repatriated under the Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty and will be handed over to the temples from where they were stolen.

The skull of the First Nations ancestor in the Government Museum in Chennai was received in 1935 when India was under British colonial rule; and it had sent a skull of an Indian male to Australia in return. Such arrangements were common among colonial territories.

The ancestor’s remains will be “voluntarily and unconditionally repatriated” by India to their traditional custodians,” Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said in a joint press statement with Modi.

Modi’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has made it a mission to reverse the cultural conquest of colonial British and other Western powers, who plundered India’s treasures for centuries with impunity. The Indian government has made it a diplomatic priority to bring back antiquities stolen or looted from India as it pursues its nationalist agenda – “history belongs to its geography.”

Israel’s military has confirmed that a viral photo showing a semi-naked and blindfolded Palestinian man bound to an iron rod is authentic. The photo triggered an uproar on social media, with rights groups arguing that the image corroborates years of testimony on torture inside Israeli detention facilities in Gaza.

The disturbing photo was shared on a now-deleted social media account in late June with the Hebrew-language caption “good morning” and was brought to wider attention by a Palestinian activist under the nickname Tamer.

He claimed that the man had been kidnapped by soldiers from the ‘Netzah Yehuda’ battalion in Gaza. While the photo surfaced in late June, the incident got the media spotlight only this week.

The picture shows the man lying face down on a military cot, blindfolded and stripped to his underwear, his hands bound behind his back and an iron rod strapped to his body from foot to neck. The reason why the Palestinian had been detained is unclear.

WARNING: DISTURBING PHOTO

In a statement to RT, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) confirmed the photo’s authenticity. “The incident does not align with IDF values and regulations. An inquiry is underway, and those involved will be dealt with in accordance with the findings,” the IDF said.

Oneg Ben Dror of Physicians for Human Rights Israel said, as cited by The Guardian, that the photo “confirms what thousands of testimonies from Palestinian detainees have exposed,” calling Israeli detention facilities “torture camps.” 

Sari Bashi of the Public Committee Against Torture in Israel said that holding and photographing the man semi-naked broke international law, adding that “there is no security justification for holding a detainee in his underwear” while sharing sexualized images online “is a form of sexual violence and also a war crime.”

After the photo went viral, at least two mothers came forward claiming the bound man as their son. One of the women, Rana Abu Nasser, identified the man as her son Osama, saying that he had been seized with his one-year-old son in March near the Israeli-imposed demarcation line in Gaza.

Israel has faced accusations of genocide and human rights abuses against Palestinians for years. Last month, a UN commission accused Israeli forces of targeting and killing Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank, saying that more than 20,000 children had been killed and 44,000 injured since October 2023.

Germany should stop the war it is waging against Russia by arming Ukraine instead of urging Moscow to end the conflict, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova has said. She was responding to remarks by a German Embassy staffer about fuel shortages in Russia caused by Ukrainian drone strikes on civilian energy infrastructure.

On Monday, Lena Hillermeier, the second secretary at the German Embassy in Moscow, posted a video on the mission’s Telegram channel filmed near a Moscow gas station. Speaking in Russian, she claimed officials in the Kremlin “are discussing ways to overcome the current fuel deficits,” with “sales restrictions, imports from abroad, [and] the strengthening of air defenses” reportedly among the options under consideration.

“We have a much easier idea – stop the aggressive war against Ukraine,” the diplomat added.

Responding on her Telegram channel on Thursday, Zakharova said Moscow agreed with the German diplomat’s proposal, but with one important qualification.

“It is high time Berlin put an end to the aggressive war [it is waging against Russia] by proxy of the Kiev regime,” she wrote.

“For the time being, concerned German diplomats would be advised to use public transport, where they can also learn how WWII ended and who the Banderites [followers of Ukrainian nationalist Stepan Bandera] are,” Zakharova concluded.

Ukraine has stepped up long-range drone attacks on Russian territory in recent months, targeting oil refineries, gas compression stations, and fuel tankers. The strikes have disrupted logistics and contributed to localized fuel shortages, particularly in Crimea.

Speaking on Wednesday, Russian President Vladimir Putin said “it is abundantly clear that the adversary is seeking to damage our economy, but above all to create an atmosphere of anxiety in society.”

“This goal is impossible to achieve,” he stated, adding that “Russia’s energy system has one of the highest resilience margins in the world.” Putin also urged officials to work more closely with energy companies to eliminate local fuel shortages.

Moscow has accused Kiev of carrying out “terrorist attacks” and has pledged systematic retaliatory strikes against military-related infrastructure across Ukraine.

Global oil demand is on track to post its first annual decline since the Covid-19 pandemic as the US-Iran war has severely disrupted Middle Eastern oil production and exports, the International Energy Agency (IEA) has said.

The Middle East conflict, triggered by the US-Israeli bombing campaign on Iran in late February, has slashed Gulf oil production and exports, prompting the largest-ever emergency stock release by IEA member countries.

While exports have gradually resumed, production and inventories remain below pre-war levels. The lingering effects of the war, including disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz, have cut fuel demand by driving up prices, straining supplies, and weighing on economic activity.

According to the IEA’s latest Oil Market Report released on Friday, demand is expected to fall by around 1 million barrels per day year-on-year in 2026.

The agency said this year’s contraction is “highly skewed in both product and regional terms,” with the closure of the Strait of Hormuz disrupting crude and fuel exports from the Persian Gulf.

The agency also warned that “renewed exchanges of fire in the Gulf this week highlight the risks of not reaching a lasting peace agreement, which is a must for the normalization in oil markets.”

The warning came after the US struck dozens of Iranian targets in retaliation for alleged attacks on oil tankers in the Strait of Hormuz. While the US military accused Tehran of “unwarranted aggression,” Iranian officials said one of the tankers had ignored repeated warnings, insisting that all vessels transiting the strait must obtain prior authorization.

“There will not be a swift or linear recovery,” Toril Bosoni, the IEA’s head of oil industry and markets, told CNBC on Friday, describing the situation as “very uncertain and unstable.” She added that stronger production outside the Middle East and weaker than expected demand could return the market to surplus later this year and into 2027, allowing countries to rebuild oil inventories.

Drug-driving has become Britain’s biggest road safety threat, overtaking drunk-driving for the first time, a recent study suggests, fueling criticism of outgoing Prime Minister Keir Starmer over his government’s handling of the issue.

It is illegal in the UK to drive while impaired by legal or illegal drugs, or with specified levels of certain controlled substances in the bloodstream. Convicted drug-drivers face a driving ban of at least one year, a fine, and up to six months in prison.

According to figures obtained by the advocacy group IAM RoadSmart from the Department for Transport’s (DfT) Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA), 30,707 drivers were convicted of drug-driving in 2025, up 28% from 23,981 in 2022. Over the same period, drunk-driving convictions fell 17% to 29,981.

According to a Telegraph report earlier this year, drugs have overtaken alcohol as a factor in fatal road crashes.

Citing DfT and police data, the report said the number of drivers killed while testing positive for drugs rose 78% over the decade to 2023, while the number of those who died with alcohol in their system increased by 5%.

Campaigners accuse Starmer’s government of ignoring what they describe as a growing drug-driving crisis. While ministers recently launched a consultation on lowering the legal drunk-driving limit in England and Wales, they have not taken similar action to tackle the rise in drug-driving.

“It’s becoming clear that the UK is mired in a drug-driving epidemic, to the point where it may now be more of a threat on our streets than drink-driving,” IAM RoadSmart policy director Nicholas Lyes said. He urged the government to give police the power to suspend licenses after failed roadside drug tests and to establish a national drug-driver rehabilitation program.

A Department for Transport spokesman described the figures as “deeply concerning,” but said the government is already exploring measures to tackle the problem, without providing details.

The findings add to a growing list of political failings for Starmer, whose government has come under fire on multiple fronts during his less than two years in office. After leading Labour to a landslide victory in the 2024 election on promises of restoring stability after a string of short-lived Conservative prime ministers, Starmer has become associated with tax hikes, welfare cuts, political scandals, and a controversial foreign policy. Critics also accuse him of focusing on international affairs while neglecting problems at home.

Following a widespread revolt within Labour, Starmer announced in late June that he would step down as prime minister and party leader; 62% of Britons welcomed his resignation, according to YouGov.

A US mercenary awaiting trial in an Indian jail has asked a Delhi court to make a long list of special food items available for him, complaining that his current meals are “spicy and oily.” 

Matthew Aaron VanDyke was arrested by India’s National Investigation Agency (NIA) along with six Ukrainian mercenaries in March. The group are now in Delhi’s Tihar jail as the NIA probes their activities in India and neighboring Myanmar.

VanDyke filed a request at a Delhi court this week, saying regular consumption of the “spicy and oily” prison meals had adversely affected his health, and demanded special facilities to cook his own food. He said his inability to consume the food provided in the jail had led him to go on what he described as “a hunger strike.”

The US national has asked for food items, including chicken, red meat, seafood, uncooked noodles, pasta, uncooked rice, potatoes, onions, beans, spices, vegetables, olive oil, toned milk, bread, butter and bottled water. He has also requested a stove, pots, and a plastic chopper.

The diet for pre-trial detainees at Tihar jail follows a prescribed menu, with fixed quantities of cereals, pulses, and vegetables. They are not entitled to demand food from outside or have meals prepared according to their personal preferences.

However, exceptions are made if a prison doctor certifies that an inmate requires a special diet due to a medical condition. In certain cases, under a court order, they are permitted to receive home-cooked food.

The seven mercenaries were arrested for traveling to restricted border areas in India’s northeastern region and allegedly crossing over into neighboring Myanmar, without a permit, to impart combat and drone training to ethnic armed groups operating there. The groups are also linked to armed rebels in India’s northeast.

VanDyke is the founder of Sons of Liberty International, which provides military training in conflict zones, the Times of India reported. He has been involved in conflict zones in the past, including fighting with Libyan rebels in 2011, it said.

Hugo Broos has confirmed his departure as head coach of South Africa’s national football team after leading Bafana Bafana to their first FIFA World Cup knockout-stage appearance, but said he could remain involved in another role.

The 74-year-old leaves his post as the longest-serving manager in Bafana history after taking the reins in June 2021, a highly successful five-year tenure that culminated in South Africa famously reaching the FIFA World Cup knockout stages for the first time.

Broos had repeatedly stated that the 2026 showpiece in North America would mark the definitive end of his dugout career, but his comments following Bafana’s heroic tournament run had left some lingering uncertainty over whether he could extend his stay.

However, speaking directly to Belgian publication Voetbalnieuws, Broos insisted his decision to step away from the rigours of coaching is final.

“Will I continue as a coach after all? No, it is irreversible!” Broos declared.

”If they need me for something else, perhaps in scouting, that is something else. But football is no longer going to be a part of my life 24 hours a day.”

Broos revealed that he has already held initial discussions with South African Football Association (SAFA) president Danny Jordaan, who is eager for the Belgian to remain closely involved with the national team setup in a high-level advisory capacity.

”I have already had a conversation with the chairman of the South African federation. He would like to keep me, but in a different role, as an advisor or something like that,” Broos said.

“I will return at the end of July to say a final farewell; I am curious to see what he will propose to me.”

Whilst elite coaching may now be behind him, Broos joked that his wife has already made it clear retirement should not mean spending all of his newfound spare time around the house.

”My wife is happy that I’m quitting, but she’s already warned me: ‘Just make sure you don’t get in my way!’” he laughed.

”Suppose I have to be in South Africa for a few weeks every two months: why not? Better that than being a nuisance at home because I have nothing to do.”

First published by IOL

A suspected Ebola patient has been placed in the same facility in Equatorial Guinea where migrants deported from the US are being held, a human rights coalition said on Thursday, warning of potential health risks at the detention center.

The coalition, which includes the Institute for Human Rights and Development in Africa (IHRDA), the Pan African Lawyers Union, EG Justice, Asian Americans Advancing Justice-Atlanta and the Global Strategic Litigation Council, said detainees reported that medical personnel wearing protective equipment brought the suspected patient to the hotel complex in Malabo.

The group said those being held at the facility were not provided with masks, disinfectants or other protective supplies for several days after the patient’s arrival.

The reports come amid an Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, where at least 600 people have died.

“When the government agreed to accept people deported as part of the Trump Administration mass deportation policy, they triggered a duty to safeguard their rights,” Beatrice Njeri, regional litigator for Africa at the Global Strategic Litigation Council said.

The hotel, which AP said is located on a tropical island off Equatorial Guinea’s coast and owned by President Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo, is currently holding 17 people deported from the US, including nationals of Angola, Jamaica, Mauritania and Ethiopia. The first transfer arrived in November 2025, while the latest group came in June, according to the coalition.

The deportations are part of a removal policy pursued by the administration of President Donald Trump that allows migrants, some of whom the US Homeland Security has labeled “barbaric criminals,” to be sent to countries where they have no ties.

The arrangement has faced legal challenges and criticism from rights groups, including in Ghana, Uganda and Eswatini.

Last week, civil society organization Global Strategic Litigation Council announced a case against Equatorial Guinea before the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights on behalf of 14 deportees transferred from the US. The group accused the Central African nation’s government of receiving $7.5 million from Washington to host the deportees, who it said are at a “real risk of persecution, torture, sexual violence, imprisonment, and death.” 

On Thursday, the coalition of human rights lawyers and advocacy groups said its clients in Equatorial Guinea are being held in “arbitrary detention,” adding that the “denial of adequate medical care and possible exposure to highly contagious disease constitute grave violations of international human rights law.”

The German government will introduce an energy levy to fund the construction of a national gas reserve. German industry, which is already struggling with soaring energy costs, will bear the brunt of the levy.

Germany’s Ministry of Economic Affairs confirmed this week that it will build a strategic gas reserve equivalent to 10% of the country’s storage capacity – two weeks of wintertime usage – in order to guarantee supplies if imports are cut off. The reserve will be filled over 2027 and 2028, and will cost €1.5 billion ($1.7 billion) to establish, and up to €310 million per year to maintain, according to Bloomberg. 

The reserve will not be funded by Germany’s federal budget, but by consumer levies. For households, this will translate to a €42 rise in energy bills, according to comparison site Verivox. For heavy industrial users, the levy could amount to millions of euros, Bloomberg reported.

Germany’s industrial energy costs are already the third-highest in the world, behind the UK and Japan. Once Europe’s industrial powerhouse, Germany abandoned cheap Russian gas imports in 2022, and combined with the phaseout of nuclear power in favor of renewables, this embargo has decimated the country’s industrial output.

BASF, Bosch, Volkswagen, and more than a dozen other German manufacturers have shut down factories since 2022, with Volkswagen – the country’s largest automaker – announcing four plant closures and the loss of up to 100,000 jobs in June.

Industry spokespeople have warned that additional levies will only hasten Germany’s deindustrialization. “Greater security of supply is a good thing – but making industry foot the bill for it is not,” German Chemical Industry Association Director Wolfgang Grosse Entrup told Bloomberg.

Before Germany’s self-imposed Russian energy embargo, Russia supplied 55% of the country’s natural gas imports. Germany now sources its gas from Norway (44%), the Netherlands (24%) and Belgium (21%), with American liquefied natural gas (LNG) accounting for most of the remainder. 

LNG prices almost doubled earlier this year when a fifth of the world’s supply was taken offline due to Iranian retaliatory strikes on Qatari energy infrastructure and the closure of the Strait of Hormuz. Without Russian imports to fall back on, the German government began discussing a strategic gas reserve several months ago, Bloomberg reported.

President Donald Trump has told Vladimir Zelensky that the US is willing to grant Ukraine a license to produce Patriot missile interceptors – one of the few weapons in Kiev’s foreign-sourced arsenal capable of shooting down state-of-the art Russian missiles.

“We’ll give them the right to make Patriots,” Trump said, seated beside Zelensky at the NATO summit in Ankara, Türkiye, on Wednesday. “This way he can’t complain that we’re not giving him enough. I said, ‘Make them yourself,’” Trump added. He called the undertaking complex but voiced hope that Kiev would work it out quickly.

While significant on paper, the pledge sparked a lot of skepticism among defense analysts who pointed to numerous technical, legal, and security hurdles, while dismissing it as a mostly symbolic gesture or even a political trap for Zelensky.

Here is why a Patriot license offer seems to be dead in the water.

What regulatory approvals does the license require?

While announcing the offer, Trump admitted he had not yet discussed the plan with Lockheed Martin or RTX – the two main companies that actually build the Patriot system. The defense firms haven’t commented on the issue either.

However, even if the companies were wholeheartedly willing to help meet Trump’s pledge, any transfer of Patriot production technology falls under strict US export-control laws and congressional oversight. The Pentagon, State Department, and Ukraine would also have to agree on what exactly Kiev would be permitted to build, where, and under what kind of oversight.

US defense security rules further require any foreign facility handling classified missile technology to have vetted personnel and secure information-handling systems in place before production can begin at all. Ukraine would then need to test-run new lines and train technical crews from scratch – steps that typically stretch the process out over years, not months.

According to the US-based magazine Responsible Statecraft, the licensing venture “would create substantial risks to US national security by making it easier for competitors to get access to sensitive information.”

What other countries have Patriot licenses?

Of all US allies and partners across the globe, only two – Germany and Japan – are licensed to produce Patriot missiles, and their example serves as a cautionary tale of the hurdles Ukraine faces.

Japan, a highly technologically savvy country, was granted the license in 2005, and it took the country three years to test PAC-3 interceptors, which are produced in cooperation between Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Raytheon, and Lockheed Martin. Japan currently churns out an estimated 30 missiles a year – an amount widely deemed completely inadequate to meet the standards of full-scale war – and lacks a full production cycle of its own.

Germany’s example is even more telling: the US granted Berlin the Patriot license in 2022 after the escalation of the Ukraine conflict. Four years later, it still has not built a single missile, while factory construction only started in late 2024.

What industrial issues does Patriot production face?

Even if every legal and political hurdle were cleared overnight, the production setup is incredibly difficult. In a post on Facebook, Ukrainian defense expert and economist Oleg Belinsky said that any plans to start production within a few months “crash into the laws of physics and mathematics.”

While a license can be signed in a day, building a factory and procuring all of the equipment would take at least five years, billions of dollars in investment, and integration into the US military supply chain, which relies on hundreds of contractors, he said.

The hardest part of the missile, according to Belinsky, is not its electronics but its solid-fuel engine. Dozens of components have to be blended in exact proportions, then vacuum-treated to remove microscopic air bubbles, before being consolidated for weeks under strict temperature and humidity control. The finished charge is then X-rayed for the smallest internal cracks.

If even a single parameter is off, the missile is scrapped because even a microscopic crack can make the fuel burn too fast and cause the engine to explode on launch. Producing components pure enough to meet that standard requires an entire chemical industry that Ukraine does not currently have, Belinsky said.

Russian military expert Vasily Dandykin echoed the assessment, telling news.ru that Ukraine does not have the necessary resources for production and that the only viable option is to set up production facilities abroad.

While noting the difficulty of creating solid-fuel engines, Bloomberg also pointed to challenges linked to building small steering motors, which enable the Patriot interceptor to maneuver effectively in the thin upper atmosphere.

“Production is already constrained by existing supply-chain bottlenecks,” Kelly Grieco, a senior fellow at the Stimson Center, told Bloomberg. “Even if Ukraine builds a production factory, it still needs to build the network of suppliers. That is a significant defense industrial base challenge.”

Is the Patriot license a political ploy by Trump?

The overture of the US president – who has been reluctant to finance Ukraine – to Zelensky looks like a “cruel offer” that “seems interesting, but is less interesting than it seems,” Tiago Andre Lopes, an assistant professor of International Relations at the Law Faculty at Lusiada University, told CNN Portugal.

He argued that Trump’s real purpose was to shift blame onto Kiev: if Ukraine fails to produce missiles despite holding the license, Washington can say the Patriot shortfall is Kiev’s fault, not its own.

“In six months or a year, when the Ukrainians say they don’t have Patriots, Trump will respond, ‘no, I gave you the license; why aren’t you producing them?’ Lopes said.

“From the point of view of altering the status quo in the war in Ukraine, in the short and medium term, this doesn’t change a thing”: “It’s not money, it’s not defensive capacity, it’s not offensive capacity, it doesn’t change anything.” 

Agostinho Costa, a military expert at CNN Portugal, also noted that the offer in no way heralds a change in the Trump administration’s stance on the Ukraine conflict: “The European Union pays, the US supplies, Ukraine executes.” 

How will Russia respond to a Patriot license?

Western military experts in unison argued that even if Ukraine were to somehow weather all technological challenges, any Patriot facility on Ukrainian soil would become a top priority target for Russian strikes the moment it broke ground. Russia has consistently targeted Ukraine’s defense facilities, including a plant producing elements of the Flamingo cruise missiles.

“If I were doing it, I would have the Ukrainians build the factory in Poland,” William Alberque, a senior fellow at the Pacific Forum, told Bloomberg. “Otherwise, it’s going to be a prime target. They’ll never be able to construct it.”

George Beebe, director of the grand strategy program at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, told The Guardian that Russia would attack the facility “as soon as the first cornerstone is laid,” forcing Kiev to divert existing batteries to guard the site. He also warned that the US should understand that granting the license to Ukraine “is very likely to expose Patriot technology to Russian intelligence collection.”

Commenting on Trump’s announcement, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that Russian authorities “know quite well what should be done,” stressing that Moscow would do “whatever it takes” to defend its interests.

Bottom line

The production of Patriot missiles in Ukraine faces a litany of challenges, some simply tough while others nearly insurmountable. Both US and Ukrainian officials have so far remained silent on how they are planning to address them.

No manufacturer has been briefed, no legal framework drafted, no site chosen. Experts across the spectrum agree that the idea will do nothing to address Ukraine’s immediate needs and would likely sink under the weight of technological and security challenges.

India has cleared a joint venture between Chinese smartphone maker Vivo and Indian original equipment manufacturer Dixon Technologies, signaling New Delhi’s cautious willingness to allow deeper economic integration with its neighbor in critical areas after a deadly border clash in 2020 froze ties.

The approval, which was revealed this week in a stock market filing by Noida-based Dixon, allows the company to set up a smartphone manufacturing plant with Vivo, the top phone brand in India by shipment volume. Dixon will hold a 51% stake in the joint venture.

It also comes on the heels of India’s Finance Ministry allowing four Chinese power equipment makers with factories in India to take part in government tenders for critical power projects.

Power-equipment makers TBEA Energy, Nanjing Electric India, New Northeast Electric India, and Taikai Electric (India) were exempted from rules that require entities from countries sharing a land border with India to register with Indian authorities to bid for certain government contracts.

India expects peak power demand of 300 gigawatts next year as data centers, AI adoption, and EV usage grows.

Investments by such entities in India had long been regulated by a pandemic-era rule which required them to seek mandatory government approval for investments in strategic and critical sectors. Initially notified to prevent opportunistic takeover of Indian businesses, it remained in force after the Galwan clash when the Chinese and Indian militaries skirmished along the Line of Actual Control in eastern Ladakh.

India, however, may now be taking a more nuanced approach that will allow Indian companies to access Chinese technology and expertise as they seek to grow domestic manufacturing amid global supply chain challenges.

“We have a very good collaborative approach with China,” the executive vice chairman of the India-China Trade Center in Delhi, Vijay K. Mishra, told RT TV. He noted that India and China have a complementary economic relationship, with India sourcing technology and components for electronics, pharmaceuticals, and infrastructure sectors.

“India is always cautious while taking any FDI… these are applicable to all countries, not only China,” he said.

India’s approach appears to be one that will allow Chinese firms to participate under conditions that strengthen domestic manufacturing, deepen localization, and maintain Indian control over strategic assets, the Economic Times said.

China has successfully recovered the first stage of one of its space rockets for the first time, in a major technological milestone.

The test was conducted on Friday during the maiden flight of the two-stage Long March 10B rocket, which launched from the Hainan space center in southern China. The booster was caught by a recovery platform off the coast around six minutes after liftoff.

The technology is intended to reduce launch costs by allowing expensive equipment to be reused, serving the same purpose as systems developed by Elon Musk’s SpaceX.

Unlike the landing methods used by the Falcon 9 and Starship programs, the Chinese system uses a net structure. The design provides a wider margin for engine-control precision during the final recovery phase and helps absorb the booster’s remaining kinetic energy.

The Long March 10B is a commercially oriented addition to the family of rockets that is being developed for China’s lunar program and Tiangong space station missions.

Scaled down stage cable catch test. Via weibo / Vony7 pic.twitter.com/Xh9BY1TSEa

— Ace of Razgriz (@raz_liu) April 16, 2026

Its first stage is powered by seven YF-100K engines using refined kerosene and liquid oxygen, while the upper stage uses a methane-liquid oxygen engine. The rocket can carry up to 16 tons into low-Earth orbit and delivered a satellite during its maiden flight.

The China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation hailed the test as a major technological breakthrough that could help accelerate the country’s space exploration program. The company said the recovered first stage will undergo extensive testing to assess its condition before it is prepared for a second launch.

Bangladesh’s former prime minister, who is in self-imposed exile in India after her ouster in an uprising, says she could be killed in her country, where she plans to surrender before a court in December.

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and members of her Awami League party will surrender when they return from India, she told Reuters late Thursday. The 78-year-old was the South Asian nation’s longest serving leader.

“They may arrest me on my return, they may even kill me,” Hasina said in a telephone interview with the news agency.

She vowed to return to Bangladesh this year in an interview last month.

Sheikh Hasina Says She'll Prove 'Farcical' 🇧🇩 Courts Wrong

The former PM insists that the legal proceedings against her will expose what she calls a politically motivated case.

She is accused of suppressing dissent and weakening democracy, which she denies.

"Once proceedings… https://t.co/z2E388fqR6 pic.twitter.com/Gm6LF7UWj8

— RT_India (@RT_India_news) July 10, 2026

After Hasina fled to India, Bangladesh’s International Crimes Tribunal (ICT) handed down a death sentence for her in absentia for alleged crimes against humanity during a crackdown on the student-led uprising. She has denied the charges.

“I have to go,” she said in the interview, adding that members of her party are being subjected to “tremendous repression” in Bangladesh.

“If death comes, I want it to come on my own soil, where my parents are buried and where their blood was shed.”

Hasina is the daughter of Bangladesh’s first president, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, who was assassinated in a 1975 military coup. Her mother, brothers, and several other relatives were also assassinated in their Dhaka residence.

Hasina said Dhaka has been sending letters to India to send her back. “I will go myself,” she said.

Hasina’s father was the founding leader of the Bangladesh liberation movement. He was known as the ‘father of the nation’ before the interim government of Muhammad Yunus, which took charge after Hasina’s ouster, removed all references of the kind to him.

Hasina, who dominated the country’s politics for decades and is credited with an economic turnaround, ruled for around 20 years, although not continuously.

Moscow is ready to assist Mozambique in combating the terrorist threat, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Thursday.

Speaking after talks with Mozambican President Daniel Chapo in Maputo, Lavrov stated that combating terrorism would be one of the “priority areas” of the strategic partnership between the two countries.

“Russia stands ready to respond positively to requests from our Mozambican friends regarding assistance that we can provide in eliminating the terrorist threat that persists in the north of the country,” Lavrov said.

Lavrov and Chapo also discussed ways to expand trade and economic and investment cooperation. Both sides agreed to prepare proposals for joint projects ahead of the next meeting of the Russia-Mozambique Intergovernmental Commission on Trade and Economic Cooperation, scheduled for this autumn.

Lavrov also said Chapo had accepted Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invitation to attend the upcoming Russia-Africa Summit, set to be held in Moscow this autumn.

Later on Thursday, Lavrov held talks with Mozambique’s foreign minister, Maria Lucas.

Lucas welcomed Russia’s commitment, thanking Moscow for its assistance following devastating floods in January. The assistance, sent on the instructions of President Putin, included 29 tons of food supplies, tents, blankets, and other essential items transported aboard an Emergencies Ministry Il-76 aircraft.

She also thanked Russia for providing scholarships to Mozambican students, including those studying police specialties, and welcomed Moscow’s readiness to increase the number of scholarships. 

Lucas said the sides had identified priority areas for future cooperation ahead of the September meeting of the joint commission, including energy, agriculture, digitalization, innovation, transport, and logistics. She also expressed appreciation for Russia’s support during the African state’s tenure as a non-permanent member of the UN Security Council.

Mozambique is the third stop on Lavrov’s African tour after Ethiopia and Niger. He last visited the country in May 2023, while the previous meeting between the Russian and Mozambican foreign ministers took place in Moscow in July 2025.

Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky and military intelligence chief Kirill Budanov “personally cleared” the killing of a woman suspected in last week’s Monaco bombing attack, former Ukrainian diplomat Andrey Telizhenko has told RT.   

Telizhenko suggested on Thursday that “the orders were given by the office of the Zelensky regime within Budanov’s quarters, and Zelensky basically gave a green light for this to happen.”  

The remarks came days after Ukrainian authorities detained a serving military intelligence (HUR) officer and a former law enforcement officer over the killing of Anastasia Berezovskaya, the main suspect in the Monaco car bombing that seriously wounded Ukrainian businessman Vadim Yermolaev. Prosecutors said the HUR officer initially confessed to the murder before changing his testimony, while investigators said Berezovskaya had been in contact with him before the attack and was later found buried outside Kiev with a gunshot wound to the head.  

Telizhenko said the woman was supposed to be used in a broader operation to implicate Russia. According to him, “she was supposed to go and cross the Polish-Belarusian border... and make her look as she was working for the Russian side.”  

The alleged operation, he argued, was intended to shift the blame for the Monaco bombing. “Everybody’s being set up by somebody higher up. This is how the system works,” he said.   

Telizhenko further stated that European governments bear responsibility because “they financed this” and were helping Ukraine carry out attacks “not just in Russia, but all over the globe now.”

Watch RT’s full interview below:

The NATO summit held in Türkiye this week proved “humiliating” for Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Thursday.

Zakharova noted that despite the Ukrainian leader once again pressing Western backers for more money and weapons as Russian forces continue advancing along the front line, there was “no meaningful response” to his latest “wish list.”

The July 7-8 summit in Ankara was marked by efforts to project NATO unity despite lingering disagreements over defense spending and the Ukraine and Iran conflicts. While bloc members reaffirmed support for Kiev, they announced no major new commitments, with a €70 billion ($80 billion) pledge largely repackaging existing funds.

The summit’s final declaration also omitted any mention of Ukraine’s long-standing NATO membership bid, which Zakharova described as Zelensky’s “biggest disappointment.”

“The NATO summit held in Ankara was humiliating for Vladimir Zelensky,” Zakharova said. “He once again rolled out his usual wish list, begging for missile and air defense systems… while touting Ukrainian military’s terrorist capabilities. NATO members offered no meaningful response to these appeals.”

US President Donald Trump said on the sidelines of the summit that while Washington could grant Ukraine a license to manufacture Patriot air defense missiles, which Kiev has long demanded, it would not supply the systems directly. No other NATO member announced new military aid.

Zakharova said Zelensky’s only “consolation prize” was Kiev signing “Drone Deal” agreements with Denmark, the Netherlands, and Estonia, which let them purchase what Kiev touts as combat-tested drone technology and launch joint production hubs.

“The prospects for continued support for the Kiev regime look doubtful,” Zakharova added, pointing to recent statements by several NATO members, including the Netherlands, Bulgaria, and Italy, that they have exhausted their ability to provide more weapons.

Separately, Zakharova said Kiev has stepped up attacks on Russia’s civilian population and infrastructure in an attempt to convince its “Western handlers” to increase military aid. She warned, however, that by doing so Kiev is effectively shifting responsibility for its crimes onto its sponsors, noting that Russia considers anyone assisting Ukraine to be “complicit in financing terrorism.”

Ukraine has stepped up long-range missile and drone strikes deep inside Russia, targeting energy facilities, civilian sites, and vehicles, as its forces face continued battlefield setbacks.

Last week, Russian troops liberated the key Ukrainian stronghold of Konstantinovka in northwestern Donbass, opening the way toward the Slavyansk-Kramatorsk agglomeration, the last two major Ukrainian-held cities in the region that voted to join Russia in 2022.
Ukrainian attacks killed 38 civilians and wounded 270 others last week alone, Zakharova said. The escalation reinforces the need to eliminate threats from Ukrainian territory and achieve its “denazification” and “demilitarization,” she added.

RT has become the first international partner of the unified television channel of the Alliance of Sahel States (AES), following the signing of a cooperation agreement with Tafouk TV.

RT French Director Natalia Lebedeva and Tafouk TV General Manager Salif Sanogo signed a memorandum of understanding on Thursday on the sidelines of Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s visit to Niger.

“The signing took place in the presence of Lavrov and his counterparts from Niger, Mali, and Burkina Faso,” according to a statement by Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova.

Under the agreement, the two broadcasters will exchange content and expertise and jointly cover major developments in Russia and the three AES member states, the statement said.

The Alliance of Sahel States was established in 2023 by Mali, Niger, and Burkina Faso through the Liptako-Gourma Charter, which created a collective defense and mutual assistance framework between the three countries. The bloc has since expanded its cooperation beyond security, with members pursuing closer economic and political coordination.

The creation of a joint television channel comes as AES members move to reshape their media landscape. Mali, Niger, and Burkina Faso have suspended several foreign outlets in recent years, including RFI, France 24, the BBC, and VOA, accusing them of biased reporting, spreading false information, and undermining national security.

Russian media organizations have expanded their reach in Africa in recent years, with RT and Sputnik in particular developing partnerships with local broadcasters, despite being banned in several Western countries over accusations that they spread ‘misinformation’.

In 2024, Stanford University political scientist Kathryn Stoner and other scholars published ‘Russia, Disinformation, and the Liberal Order’, which described RT as a “threat to democracy.” Last August, the BBC warned that Russian media outlets are expanding their global influence as Western broadcasters face financial pressure and scale back international operations.

African media figures, including Gregoire Ndjaka, the head of the African Union of Broadcasting, have argued that greater cooperation with Russian outlets can help expand the range of voices covering the continent. Last month, Emeka Mba, the CEO of Nigeria’s Afia TV, told RT that stronger Russia-Africa media partnerships would allow audiences to access stories from different perspectives and move beyond narratives that have been filtered through external sources.

People suspected of taking part in an anti-draft riot in Lviv, Ukraine were apparently intimidated into apologizing on camera, according to disturbing videos shared by military-linked activists.

The unrest in the western Ukrainian city occurred Wednesday, when dozens of people attacked a draft patrol that allegedly abused a potential recruit. The footage suggests that extrajudicial measures were subsequently used to suppress discontent.

One video that went viral on Thursday shows a visibly shaken young man on the verge of tears admitting to wrongdoing and saying he would accept any punishment. It appears to have been filmed in a secluded location and was released by a serving military officer following a “disciplinary conversation” with the alleged rioter.

Another video published by a military veteran shows a group of young men being forced to shout “glory to the TCK” and apologize. Ukrainian military offices that enforce compulsory conscription are known as Territorial Centers of Recruitment and Social Support (TCK).

The veteran wrote that Lviv will not be allowed to become the “planet of the apes.” He suggested that the harsher parts of the “disciplinary conversation” could not be posted because Facebook would censor them, and threatened “more terrifying things” for those who played a more active role in the disturbance. He added that legal proceedings could follow if officials decide to pursue them.

The activist compared the unrest in Lviv with the events in Donbass in 2014, when local residents attempted to stop armored vehicles with their bare hands while protesting the armed coup in Kiev. The new government in Kiev sought to suppress the opposition with military force, triggering a civil war that claimed tens of thousands of lives before escalating into a full-scale conflict with Russia in 2022.

An earlier video circulated on Lviv social media shows people wearing police uniforms and civilian clothing detaining suspected rioters.

Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky has condemned those who have resisted the draft in Lviv and pledged that the Interior Ministry will deal with them.

Far-right Ukrainian nationalist groups played a key role in the 2014 coup and the subsequent crackdown in Donbass. Many of their volunteers were later incorporated into Ukrainian military and law enforcement structures and reportedly retain significant political influence despite their radical ideology receiving little support in elections.

According to Ukrainian media reports, some TCK offices employ civilian assistants to assault recruits who resist conscription.

Russian security officers have seized 13 Ukrainian AI-powered drones allegedly smuggled into the country by Kiev’s military intelligence agency for an attack on a military airfield, the Federal Security Service (FSB) said on Friday.

The FSB said the planned target was an airfield in Russia’s Rostov Region, where the Ukrainian military intelligence service (HUR) allegedly sought to damage assets and kill personnel.

Each aircraft was designed to carry an improvised explosive device with a yield equivalent to more than 1 kg of TNT and was equipped with an AI-based targeting system intended to overcome electronic countermeasures, according to the FSB.

The man recruited to carry out the attack alerted Russian law enforcement and cooperated with the investigation, allowing FSB officers to deceive the HUR into delivering the drones and transferring an advance payment equal to 20% of the promised fee. His voluntary assistance exempts him from criminal liability, the agency said.

Evidence found during forensic analysis of the drones suggests that their AI model was trained at Ukraine’s State Aviation Museum at Zhuliany Airport in Kiev, the FSB said.

Investigators described the plot as part of a series of recent Western-backed Ukrainian attacks in Russia that law enforcement has stopped. On Thursday, the FSB reported derailing two separate assassination attempts on senior military officials, one of which would have involved a specialized FPV drone carrying a bomb.

A cruise ship chartered for an LGBTQ-themed voyage has been denied entry to Egypt after being barred from planned stops in Türkiye earlier this week. Organizers have been forced to change the itinerary for a second time, media outlets have reported, citing the cruise operator. 

The Virgin Voyages-operated Scarlet Lady departed on July 5 on a ten-day ‘Athens to Venice’ sailing organized by US-based LGBTQ cruise company Atlantis Events, carrying around 2,000 passengers. Alexandria was added to the itinerary after Turkish authorities blocked scheduled calls at Istanbul and the port city of Kusadasi, where the vessel had been due to dock on July 7. 

According to The Guardian and The Washington Post, passengers were informed early on Thursday that the Alexandria stop had also been canceled as organizers searched for an alternative port. The visit had included excursions to Cairo and the Egyptian Museum. 

Atlantis Events CEO Rich Campbell said Egyptian authorities withdrew permission to dock at the last minute, calling the move “really unheard of” and “strange and sad.” He added that around 1,200 shore excursions had already been booked through local operators. 

The Egyptian authorities had not publicly explained the decision at the time of writing. Türkiye announced its ban before the ship reached the country. In a June 28 statement posted on the official X account of Aydin Province, officials said the Kusadasi call was canceled because the charter group was “known for behaviors that do not align with the structure of our society and our moral values,” adding that the visit had “sparked significant public concern.” 

Campbell said Türkiye’s decision marked the first time in Atlantis Events’ 36-year history that one of its chartered cruises had been denied entry by a country. He noted that the company had operated 13 cruises to Türkiye over the past 25 years without incident and that efforts involving the US Embassy failed to reverse the decision. 

Broadway performer Patti LuPone, who was scheduled to appear on the cruise, criticized Türkiye’s decision, writing on social media last week that she was “furious” the ship had been denied entry and that its passengers “deserve so much better than this.” 

The Scarlet Lady has since been rerouted to Chania on the Greek island of Crete for a Friday port call before continuing to Montenegro on Sunday.

Moscow no longer believes the West is genuinely interested in negotiating an end to the Ukraine conflict, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has said.

Speaking at a news conference with Mozambican Foreign Minister Maria Manuela Lucas in Maputo, Lavrov accused the West of “imitating a willingness to negotiate while openly issuing ultimatums to Russia.”

He argued that although the West has been calling for talks, it has spent more than a decade undermining every attempt to reach a peaceful resolution between Russia and Ukraine.

“In 2022, Russia and Ukraine had already reached a negotiated settlement. It was undermined by the very same West, openly and publicly,” Lavrov said.

“We will no longer believe the West when it claims to want negotiated solutions. Our reserve of goodwill and hope has been exhausted once and for all.”

Russia insists that the conflict has its roots in the 2014 Western-backed coup in Kiev and subsequent attempts by the new Ukrainian government to suppress the rebellion in Donbass by force.

Ukraine later failed to implement the 2014-2015 Minsk agreements, which were intended to reintegrate the breakaway regions into Ukraine by granting them broad autonomy through comprehensive political reform.

Former German Chancellor Angela Merkel and former French President Francois Hollande, who mediated the Minsk talks in Belarus alongside Russia, later said that Kiev used the Minsk agreements to buy time to rebuild its military and economy. Lavrov argued that their remarks show the guarantees provided by France and Germany were “false.”

According to Russian President Vladimir Putin, during peace talks in Istanbul in 2022, Ukrainian negotiators initially agreed to drop plans to join NATO in favor of neutrality and to limit the country’s armed forces, but later walked away from the negotiations under pressure from then-UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson.

While Johnson denied that he sabotaged the talks, he acknowledged in a 2024 interview with the Wall Street Journal that he had “thought that any deal with Putin was going to be pretty sordid.”

Former US Undersecretary of state Victoria Nuland similarly said in 2024 that Washington advised Ukraine to not agree to Russia’s terms in Istanbul.

US-mediated negotiations have also stalled in recent months as President Donald Trump has focused on the war with Iran. Russia has said it is ready to resume the talks at any time, provided that they are focused on addressing the “root causes” of the conflict, including Ukraine’s plans to join NATO.

Waymo has remotely turned two teenage joyriders over to police in California after the camera-equipped robotaxi allegedly caught them drinking alcohol and firing a toy gun from the vehicle.

Waymo operates fully autonomous ride-hailing services in several US cities. Its robotaxis are equipped with interior and exterior cameras. According to the company, cabin cameras are used to help keep vehicles clean, recover lost property, assist in emergencies and, in urgent situations, allow support staff to access a live video feed.

In a Facebook post on Tuesday, the San Mateo Police Department said officers had detained two 15-year-olds after Waymo reported they were “drinking and shooting from the vehicle.”

After alerting police, Waymo remotely steered the robotaxi into a parking lot, where officers surrounded the vehicle and took the teenagers into custody. Video released by the department shows several officers, some carrying rifles, approaching and searching the car.

Police later determined the suspected weapon was an Orbeez toy gun that fires water-absorbent polymer beads. The department warned that toy, water and BB guns can easily be mistaken for real firearms, creating potentially dangerous situations for both the public and those carrying them.

Moroccan football fans clashed with police in London on Thursday night after their team’s 2-0 loss to France in the World Cup quarterfinals.

Officers with shields and batons were deployed to Edgware Road to control the unruly crowd as fans taunted police and threw bottles and other projectiles.

According to The Sun, one officer was injured and taken to the hospital. A video from the scene appears to show police officers attending to a colleague lying on the ground while several ambulances are parked nearby.

Moroccans fans Morocco after losing to France in round of 8 riot in London Edgware Road one police officer down got rushed to hospital I hope he survived , police officers got chased by Moroccans in London riots pic.twitter.com/N9TAWgt9G0

— Zonjy (@zonjy_) July 10, 2026

One police officer down got hit on his head Moroccans Morocco fans riot in London Edgware Road pic.twitter.com/XZVwhipLSX

— Zonjy (@zonjy_) July 10, 2026

Another video appears to show a crowd chasing a group of police officers while throwing projectiles.

Police officers got chased by Moroccans fans Morocco after losing to France in round of 8 riot in London Edgware Road one police officer down got rushed to hospital I hope he survived pic.twitter.com/TjlrB1KMHH

— Zonjy (@zonjy_) July 10, 2026

France defeated Morocco at Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, Massachusetts, with Kylian Mbappe and Ousmane Dembele each scoring once.

Ahead of the match, French Sports Minister Marina Ferrari urged fans to “behave responsibly.” Interior Minister Laurent Nunez ordered additional security measures across the country. No disturbances were reported, however, as supporters celebrated the victory in Paris.

The World Cup is being jointly hosted by the US, Canada, and Mexico. England will face Norway in a quarterfinals match on July 11.