• US State Department endorsed on April 4, 2026, a Kenyan-led multinational force of 2,500 troops to deploy to Haiti within 60 days to combat gang control in Port-au-Prince.
• Gangs control 85% of the capital, with 4,000 homicides reported in 2025; US provides $150 million in logistics and training support.
• The mission addresses a humanitarian crisis displacing 700,000 Haitians, as highlighted by UN envoy William O'Neill: 'State collapse is imminent without intervention.'
Riccione’s leftwing mayor, Daniela Angelini, says public purchase is victory for town and ‘act of love and vision’An Italian council has bought a villa where Benito Mussolini spent his summer holidays, partly to avoid the property falling into the hands of “fascist nostalgics”.Daniela Angelini, the leftwing mayor of Riccione, a town close to Rimini along Italy’s Adriatic coast, said the acquisition of Villa Mussolini through an auction was “an act of love and vision” and that bringing it back into public hands was a victory for the entire town. Continue reading...
‘Ukraine has expertise concerning sea waterways, and the defence and reopening of maritime traffic,’ says president. What we know on day 1,500Volodymyr Zelenskyy offered on Thursday to provide Ukraine’s expertise in dealing with freedom of navigation in the Black Sea to those countries considering how to keep the strait of Hormuz open amid the conflict in the Middle East. The Ukraine president, speaking in his nightly video address, said the foreign minister, Andrii Sybiha, had taken part in a virtual meeting devoted to reopening the strait of Hormuz, attended by about 40 countries. “Ukraine has relevant expertise concerning sea waterways, and the defence and reopening of maritime traffic,” he said. “If [our] partners are ready to act, we will consider how we can strengthen them, how we can apply our expertise, knowledge and technological potential.”Russia’s army recorded no territorial gains on the frontline in Ukraine in March, for the first time in two and half years, AFP analysis of data from the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) showed. The Russian army’s advances have been slowing since late 2025 due to Kyiv’s localised breakthroughs in the south-east, and losing ground in March and February on the southern section of the frontline, between the Donetsk and Dnipropetrovsk regions, the analysis showed. Across the entire frontline, Ukrainian forces managed to recapture 9 sq km in March.North Korea’s leader, Kim Jong-un, gave “field guidance” at the Memorial Museum of Combat Feats at the Overseas Military Operations, which is under construction , state media KCNA said. The museum in Pyongyang will be a place to commemorate the fallen soldiers sent to support the Russian army in the war in Ukraine. The construction of the museum is almost complete and Kim said the opening ceremony would be held in mid-April, marking the first anniversary of the deployment of the North Korean soldiers.Six Ukrainian children will be returned from Russia to their families in Ukraine, the White House said on Thursday, citing efforts by Melania Trump to expedite their return. A seventh Ukrainian child will also be returned to their family later this month, the first lady’s office said in a statement. Ukraine says almost 20,000 children have been illegally sent to Russia and Belarus, where they are sometimes subject to military training and forced to fight against their own country’s troops.Russian strikes across Ukraine on Thursday killed at least two people and wounded dozens, officials said, as Moscow stepped up its attacks amid stalled peace talks. In the south-eastern Kherson region, Russia attacked “with artillery, mortars and UAVs”, the regional prosecutor’s office said on social media. A 42-year-old man was killed when a drone hit a civilian car, and 16 others – including a teenage boy and three police officers – were wounded in air attacks and artillery shelling, it added. In the Chernihiv region, north of the capital Kyiv, Russia attacked with a ballistic missile, the head of Chernihiv’s military administration, Dmytro Bryzhynsky, said on Telegram.Russian forces maintained a daylong barrage of drone strikes on Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second largest city, on Thursday, injuring at least two people, local officials said. Kharkiv’s mayor, Ihor Terekhov, posted reports on Telegram throughout the day and well into the evening, noting strikes in four city districts. One city official said there had been at least 20 drone strikes. He said some had triggered fires and two people had been injured in an evening attack, including an eight-year-old girl.Russian forces carried out 129 attacks on Ukrainian gas and heating facilities during the recent 151-day heating season, the state oil and gas firm Naftogaz said on Thursday. “The Russians hit pipelines, gas production, underground storage facilities, heating systems – everything that Ukrainians depend on for heat and gas,” it said in a statement. Continue reading...
Government keen to avoid panic as oil price surges, but perhaps households need advice on reducing consumptionLabour ministers sent out in recent days to respond to the looming energy crisis sparked by the Iran war have essentially stuck to that reassuring wartime slogan: keep calm and carry on.“I think people should go about their lives as normal, knowing that the government is taking action to bring energy bills down,” James Murray, the chief secretary to the Treasury, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme on Tuesday. Continue reading...
The factories, which buy cheap crude and turn it into fuel, are struggling as higher oil prices threaten their razor-sharp margins The towns that are the bulwark of China’s energy security can, at a moment of global crisis, appear deceptively quiet. Trucks carrying oil trundle along wide-open highways that have little traffic, while a few boarded-up shops in crumbling low-rise buildings hint at a long-forgotten local buzz.A ramshackle noodle shop serving hand-pulled ribbons of dough was empty at lunchtime, save for a few construction workers and a teacher watching videos on Douyin, the social media platform, with his meal. Continue reading...
Fossil-fuel burning at Ohio facility could burn longer, leaving Middletown residents to face environmental risksSign up for the Breaking News US email to get newsletter alerts in your inboxIt was just a few months after moving from Louisville to Middletown, Ohio, four years ago that Vivian Adams’s six-year-old daughter’s asthma problem worsened.“My daughter was born prematurely so she already had lung issues,” she says, “[but] it’s gotten worse. She stays sick and coughing and can’t breathe. She’s had to go on everyday medication for her asthma, plus she has a rescue inhaler.” Continue reading...
Mohammed bin Salman said to consider war a ‘historic opportunity’ to remake Middle East. Plus, Senate passes funding package for Homeland Security that excludes ICEGood morning.Saudi Arabia has urged Washington to intensify attacks on Iran, a Saudi intelligence source has confirmed, while it considers whether to join the war directly.Have there been reports of active Saudi military involvement? Not so far. But a Saudi analyst said the kingdom was likely to intervene if peace efforts led by Pakistan failed. Mohammed Alhamed said: “If [Iran] rejects the conditions and continues its attacks, the threshold for Saudi action will be crossed.”What is the latest on the strait of Hormuz? On Tuesday, Tehran said it would permit “non-hostile vessels” to pass: here is a visual guide.For the latest updates, follow our live blog.Why has there been no DHS funding? Democrats have blocked it as they demand changes to its immigration crackdown, particularly after agents in Minneapolis killed the US citizens Renee Good and Alex Pretti. Continue reading...
Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman said to view US-Israeli war as ‘historic opportunity’ to remake Middle EastMiddle East crisis – live updatesSaudi Arabia has urged the US to ramp up attacks on Iran, a Saudi intelligence source has confirmed, while it is weighing a decision on whether to join the fight directly.The Saudi source confirmed reporting in the New York Times, which said the kingdom’s de facto leader, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, has urged Donald Trump not to cut short his war against Iran, and that the US-Israeli campaign represented a “historic opportunity” to remake the Middle East. Continue reading...
• Elon Musk stated Tesla and SpaceX AI will continue large Nvidia chip purchases even as Tesla advances its AI5 chip, optimized for edge compute in Optimus and Robotaxi.
• Tesla's Terafab AI chip manufacturing facility is set to launch within seven days from March 14, potentially by March 21.
• Musk praised Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, noting AI5's efficiency in half-reticle format could halve fab needs, with AI6 potentially matching dual AI5.
Banking lobby group says lenders are holding off changes as there is no widespread consumer demand for nowExplainer: What will happen when the £100 limit is scrapped?Shoppers will not be able to splash unlimited amounts on contactless cards despite the lifting of a £100 cap on payments as Britain’s banks held off on making changes.The official limit on individual contactless transactions on credit and debit cards has been scrapped but the UK’s biggest high street and challenger banks have kept the £100 ceiling in place. Continue reading...
Beijing seeks to decipher effect of Iran war on US midterms and best way to apply pressure when Trump meets XiThe White House said on Wednesday that China had agreed to postpone Donald Trump’s visit to Beijing, as war in the Middle East rages on, complicating the US president’s position at home and abroad.China has not yet commented on the delay to the highly anticipated trip, in which Trump and the Chinese president, Xi Jinping, will meet in person for the first time since October. Trump previously said he hoped to delay the trip, originally scheduled to run from 31 March to 2 April, for “five or six weeks”. Continue reading...
Head of world’s energy watchdog says it will take time for markets to recover from ongoing crisis in strait of HormuzThe world’s energy watchdog will consider releasing further emergency crude stocks into the global market to cool rising oil prices after warning that it will take time for markets to recover from the ongoing crisis in the strait of Hormuz.Fatih Birol, the head of the International Energy Agency, said its members continued to hold large reserves of emergency oil stocks even after agreeing to the biggest release of government crude in the history of the market, meaning more emergency oil reserves could still be released “as and if needed”. Continue reading...
US president urges nations to deploy vessels to keep key oil shipping route open amid conflict with IranDonald Trump has said the UK should send warships to help keep the strait of Hormuz open.In a post on his Truth Social platform on Saturday, the US president urged the UK and other countries to deploy vessels to the strait amid the conflict with Iran. Continue reading...
