Taliban release US academic held in detention for more than a year

• Oklahoma Republican Senator Markwayne Mullin was confirmed as Homeland Security Secretary in a 54-45 Senate vote, replacing fired Kristi Noem to oversee mass immigration raids and deportations. • Republican Rand Paul voted against Mullin, calling him a 'freaking snake' during hearings, while Democrats John Fetterman and Martin Heinrich crossed lines to support him. • Confirmation occurs as DHS partial shutdown risks extending into April amid staffing shortages, with ICE agents deployed to airports to ease security lines.

• President Donald Trump stated the US is negotiating with Iran to end the three-week-old war, citing two days of 'very good and productive conversations' after Iran reportedly reached out, with talks set to continue this week. • Trump refused to name the 'top' Iranian official involved, only saying it was not new Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei, and claimed he would 'jointly control' the Strait of Hormuz with 'whoever the next Ayatollah is'. • US and Israeli airstrikes continued across Iran, targeting Tehran, Tabriz, Isfahan, Karaj, gas facilities, and a pipeline, with Iran reporting over 1,500 civilian deaths since February 28.

• President Donald Trump extended his deadline for Iran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz by five days on Monday, saying the U.S. will delay striking Iranian power plants to allow envoys to hold talks with Tehran leadership. • Trump stated his government was holding "productive talks" with Iran, but Iran denied any negotiations were occurring and fighting showed no signs of slowing. • An Iranian warhead with approximately 100 kilograms of explosives struck central Tel Aviv on Tuesday, causing significant damage, while Iranian missile attacks also hit Kurdish positions in Iraq, killing 6 Peshmerga fighters and wounding 30 others.

Tania Warner says she has documents showing she is in the US legally, but immigration agents were not swayedSign up for the Breaking News US email to get newsletter alerts in your inboxA Canadian woman who has been imprisoned with her seven-year-old daughter by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has cautioned other immigrants that they are at risk of detention, even if they follow the correct legal process – and warned them to keep out of sight for as long as Donald Trump is president.“Don’t go anywhere near a checkpoint, and if your papers are in processing, just lay low. Trump meant what he said – he is trying to get rid of everyone, whether they are good or bad,” said Tania Warner, 47, who is currently held with her autistic daughter, Ayla, at the Dilley immigration processing center in south Texas. Continue reading...

Minister tells security conference many people could have been killed in Invasion Day incident; Treasury working ‘full tilt’ on budget measures. Follow updates liveGet our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcastRadicalisation now more likely to come ‘across a browser’ than a border, home affairs minister saysTony Burke says it would be “reckless” and “ignorance in the extreme” for Australia to pretend that immigration is the solution to preventing violent extremism on our shores.It would be ignorance in the extreme for us to pretend that that is the fix. It would be reckless in the extreme for us to pretend that immigration is the solution. It is something that is one of our tools, but the only way we deliver national security is to deal with facts and risks as they present themselves, not as you might want them to be.Where we once only had to look at radicalisation potentially being something that might come across our border, it now comes across a browser. Where radicalisation used to involve – that you might have to go to a training camp in Afghanistan – it now comes to you in an algorithm.The Australia Day arrest in Perth, for a number of reasons, it didn’t receive the publicity that it really should have. But can I just say – we got so lucky. We got so lucky.This was not a stunt. The person who threw the pipe bomb into the middle of a crowd of First Nations protesters believed that – if you look at what it was – this was something where there was a reasonable expectation it would have gone off, and the number of people who then would have been killed. The fact that that didn’t happen is not through any planning. We just got lucky. Continue reading...

PM’s party forecast to win most votes, but another centrist or centre-right coalition appears likelyMette Frederiksen’s Social Democrats and Denmark’s other left-leaning parties appear to have failed to win enough votes to gain a clear mandate to form a government in an election fought amid geopolitical tensions with the US over Greenland.According to two exit polls released shortly after voting stopped on Tuesday evening, the prime minister’s party looked to have won the most votes but still performed worse than expected, with an estimated 19%-21% of the vote. Continue reading...

Diplomats say US president’s latest claimed plan probably based on now outdated framework put forward in May 2025Middle East crisis – live updatesThe 15-point framework plan for peace with Iran that Donald Trump has said is being discussed is based on a proposal put forward by his negotiating team during nuclear talks almost a year ago, diplomats with knowledge of the talks believe.That original 15-point plan was the basis for negotiations in late May 2025, shortly before the talks collapsed due to Israeli airstrikes on Iran’s nuclear programme. Continue reading...

Defence chiefs have been discussing how to unblock the conduit for about a fifth of the world’s oil suppliesThe UK has offered to host an international security summit to draw up a “viable, collective plan” to reopen the strait of Hormuz as economic fallout from the Iran conflict continues.Defence chiefs have been discussing how they could unblock the vital shipping lane, through which about 20% of global oil supplies usually pass, amid the Middle East crisis unleashed by the US and Israel. Continue reading...

Police understood to have record of Keir Starmer’s former chief of staff reporting phone stolen in OctoberPolice were “too busy” to investigate the theft of Morgan McSweeney’s phone despite the potential sensitivity of his messages and contacts, according to reports.Keir Starmer’s former chief of staff told the Metropolitan police that his phone was stolen in central London when he was returning home from a restaurant on 20 October last year, the Times reported. Continue reading...

Suella Braverman presses the FA to scrap diversity and inclusion policies, which she claims are ‘racist’Reform UK has been accused of seeking to insert “toxic politics” into football after the party pressed the Football Association in England to scrap diversity and inclusion policies.Suella Braverman wrote to the FA on Tuesday to ask for a meeting to discuss the governing body’s diversity policies, which Reform’s equalities spokesperson described as “utter woke nonsense”. Continue reading...

More than £4m spent on 39 visits abroad, with most expensive being PM and officials’ £413,000 visit to Cop30Keir Starmer’s government is spending an increasing amount on foreign trips, with almost 40 visits abroad adding up to more than £4m since he took office, the latest transparency figures have showed.The prime minister had his most costly quarter for foreign travel in the last three months of 2025, with eight trips adding up to £1.2m. Continue reading...

British investigators are circumspect, but experts and security officials say incident has hallmarks of Iranian intelligenceMiddle East crisis – live updatesFrom Golders Green, where four ambulances belonging to a Jewish charity were set alight in the early hours of Monday, a tangled trail likely leads across two continents to Tehran.British investigators are circumspect. Speaking at an event on Monday evening, Sir Mark Rowley, the head of the Metropolitan police, described a “very relevant and rolling threat” from Iran to the UK and specifically to Jewish targets but warned it was still “too early” to attribute the attack in north London to Tehran. Continue reading...