World News

Niger's own soldiers tried to take the palace, and Russian troops stopped them →

Soldiers in Niger's army seized the capital's air base and fired near the presidential palace. A Russian paramilitary force flew drones against them, and the army government survived. It is the second Sahel government Russia has rescued this year.

US forces strike Iran over sea mines, and the Strait of Hormuz stays shut →

American forces hit two Iranian rocket launchers on Larak Island on Sunday, saying crews there were preparing to drop sea mines into the Strait of Hormuz. Iran promised a reply, and US forces in Jordan were reported under attack hours later. Six months into the war, the strait that once carried a fifth of the world's oil is still closed, and Iran's own trade is down about a third.

US companies get a fifth of Venezuela's oil, and Venezuela keeps the ownership papers →

A 25-year deal hands 65 billion barrels and 17 oil fields to American money, crews and buyers. Venezuela keeps 19 dollars of every 88-dollar barrel it sells to the United States.

The Kurds' American funding ends the day the last US troops leave Iraq →

A Pentagon deal that pays and trains Iraqi Kurdistan's 180,000-strong Peshmerga expires on 30 September, and four sources say it will not be renewed. It runs out under a programme named after Islamic State, while the force is being hit by Iran.

Britain handed Ukraine the missile plans, and Russia named Britain a target →

Moscow says it could hit British military assets after London licensed Kyiv to build Storm Shadow missiles itself. Plus twenty-four more stories from the day.

Washington calls off another Korean drill and points at Iran, as Asia starts making other plans →

The US cancelled next month's landing exercise with South Korea, saying its forces are tied up in the Iran war. Within a day Xi Jinping was planning a trip to Delhi and Japanese lawmakers were flying to Beijing.

The sanctions land today, and both sides are threatening the countries in between →

Washington announces its toughest Iran sanctions on Monday, reaching Iran's trading partners too. Tehran spent the weekend warning its neighbours that joining in makes them enemies. Neither message was aimed at the other.

Canada walks away from Washington's best offer, and says the old relationship is over →

The US taxed $20 billion of Canadian goods at 50 percent. Canada refused terms Washington called its most generous, and the reason was not the price.

Ebola outruns the response in DR Congo, with half the deaths in twenty days →

The UN says the outbreak is growing exponentially across an area bigger than France, more than 2,500 people are dead, and the money to fight it runs out within weeks. Also: six months of the Iran war, Europe's soldier shortage, and the strongest El Nino in living memory.

Haiti books an election in a capital it does not control →

The regional body for the Americas told Haiti it needs help to hold December's vote, in a country where armed groups own the roads. Across the day, one shape kept repeating: governments deciding things they cannot yet reach far enough to do.

Russia hits Kyiv again as Ukraine's sacked defence minister calls for a wartime vote →

Mykhailo Fedorov's demand for elections is the first from a major Ukrainian figure since 2022, and it landed the same week parliament confirmed his replacement by 312 votes to 2.

Russia threatens Britain over drones, while the fight it means is already burning in Estonia →

Moscow warned London of consequences for supplying attack drones to Ukraine. The retaliation it is talking about is already running: an arson attack on an Estonian weapons maker, a bomb-carrying drone at a German airport, parcels set alight in the post.

Kushner shuttles between Hamas and Netanyahu, and the Gaza plan moves nowhere →

A US-backed roadmap that Hamas accepted and eight Arab and Muslim governments back is frozen by an Israeli leader facing an October election. The US-Iran ceasefire deadline passed with no deal, and American petrol hit a record August price.

Ukraine sends 600 drones at Moscow as Russia burns a Kyiv book market →

Nineteen dead across both countries in the war's biggest night of long-range strikes, as Kyiv targets the warehouses of ordinary Russian life. Meanwhile the US-Iran truce expires, Kushner meets Hamas, and Washington scales back its Korea drills.

The US empties the Pacific of carriers in the same week it tells allies to pick a side →

Washington sent its last western-Pacific carrier to the Middle East, then drafted a letter telling three dozen countries they must choose between its technology bloc and China's.

Israel moves to hand settler policing to the police as a West Bank siege enters its sixth day →

A blockade of three Palestinian homes in Qusra pushed Israel's defence minister to order a change in who polices settlers - a step Palestinians call annexation by another name.

Venezuela's rulers and their rivals sit down to talk, each boxed in at home →

Seven months after US forces seized Maduro, Venezuela's interim chavista government and its opposition held six days of talks, agreeing to free political prisoners and reform the courts. Neither side is free to give much: each answers to a hard audience at home. The same squeeze runs through a week of trade fights, a deepening Iran blockade, and Russia's border provocations.

The truce both sides say they want, and neither can lock in →

Iran and the US both claim they would rather deal than keep fighting. A month into the war's second phase, the peace deal is going nowhere, because neither side can promise to keep it.

Russia bars its last anti-war party from the ballot, leaving critics one door out →

A Moscow court struck the only anti-war party from September's vote. With protest closed off, Russians who oppose the war are left to leave or fall silent.

Nigeria's oil economy booms for its companies and cracks for its people →

Africa's largest oil exporter posted record corporate profits this week even as over half its people fell into poverty - the clearest sign yet of the split at the heart of a petro-state, a pattern echoing from Libya to the Gulf.

Houthis strike a Saudi refinery and a Red Sea port, deepening the fight over the world's oil chokepoints →

Yemen's Houthis hit Saudi Arabia's Jazan refinery and the port of Mokha, reopening the Red Sea crisis while Iran keeps the Strait of Hormuz shut - and few countries want to pay to guard the sea lanes everyone depends on.

India's Gen Z protests dent Modi, as South Asia's youth revolts keep spreading →

A leaderless online movement forced a rare climbdown from Modi's government, and it fits a regional pattern where fear suddenly switches sides.

Lebanon and Israel pick who will watch the peace they both fear to start →

The two agree a shortlist of countries to verify Hezbollah's disarmament - a trusted referee, because neither will make the first move on trust alone.

Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Pakistan sign a defence pact as the Gulf braces for a wider war →

Three regional powers bound their armies together in Jeddah, a response to a dragging Iran war and a US security umbrella no one is sure they can count on.

China turns its supply-chain grip into a weapon as the US trade truce cracks →

Beijing answers new US sanctions and import bans by squeezing the drone parts, testing labs and tech chains that Washington runs through - a reminder that whoever sits at the chokepoint of a shared network can turn it into a lever.

The US steps back as the world's guarantor, and its allies rush to realign →

For the first time since 1949, Washington told Europe to take primary charge of its own defense - and the Gulf, Japan and Ukraine are all recalculating who they can count on.

The world arms itself around a rising China, and nobody has fired a shot →

A top US admiral warns that no single power will dominate the Indo-Pacific as Japan rearms, Washington rushes missile parts, and the fear of a shifting balance drives a global buildup.

China draws a line around the model that made it →

Beijing defended its factory-first growth model even as manufacturing slowed to a four-month low, choosing continuity over the consumer pivot the West and its own economists have long urged.

Trump threatens Iran's oil fields, then backs off as Tehran vows to hit the whole Gulf →

A US ultimatum to strike Iran's energy sites collided with Iran's threat to set the region's oil on fire. Trump blinked, cancelling the attack "subject to" a fast deal, as Gaza's ceasefire stayed on paper and Ukraine's drone war reached deeper into Russia.

A US Senate bill would slap 100% tariffs on countries that buy Russian oil →

A sweeping sanctions package named for the late Senator Lindsey Graham cleared its first hurdle in the Senate, aimed at Russia but landing hardest on India and China. Meanwhile Russia pressed its advance in eastern Ukraine and struck Kyiv, killing three.

Thousands rush Spain's Ceuta as Europe hardens its migration line →

A border enclave is overwhelmed as Europe moves toward measures that were unthinkable a few years ago - deportations to Taliban Afghanistan, an EU centre in Libya, and a call to suspend Spain from open borders. Plus a Russian missile inside Poland, a claimed Gaza disarmament deal, and a heat toll now counted in the thousands.

Canada calls off its strongest trade weapon before it fires →

Ottawa rules out choking oil exports to the US even as Trump walks away from the free-trade deal, the Gulf war grinds into a second phase, and a drought quietly starves Uganda's north.