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Cubans on electric tricycles decorated with Cuban flags ride past the US embassy during the anti-imperialist youth march in Havana on April 2, 2026. (AFP) Cubans on electric tricycles decorated with Cuban flags ride past the US embassy during the anti-imperialist youth march in Havana Thursday. …
British Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper prepares to speak during a virtual summit at the Foreign & Commonwealth Office in London, Thursday. (Reuters) British foreign minister Yvette Cooper stressed Thursday the “urgent need” to reopen the Strait of Hormuz and slammed Iran’s “recklessness” as she convened a meeting of some 40 countries on the vital shipping route.Cooper said Iran’s blockading of the waterway was “hitting our global economic security” as she kicked off the virtual meeting of international allies.The strait has been virtually closed since the US-Israeli war against Iran started on February 28, impacting global supplies of important commodities including oil, liquid natural gas, and fertiliser.That has led to a sharp rise in energy prices.Cooper said foreign ministers and representatives from more than 40 countries had joined the call to discuss “the urgent need to restore freedom of navigation for international shipping, and the strength of our international determination to see the Strait reopen once more”.A total of 37 countries have signed a statement, first published last month, expressing “readiness to contribute to appropriate efforts to ensure safe passage through” the shipping lane.Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the Netherlands are among those to have signed it.The US, China, and most Middle Eastern countries have not, according to a list provided by the UK government.”We have seen Iran hijack an international shipping route to hold the global economy hostage,” Cooper added in her opening remarks, broadcast before the rest of the meeting took place behind closed doors.Cooper said the discussions would focus on the “collective mobilisation of our full range of diplomatic and economic tools and pressures” to “enable a safe and sustained opening of the Strait”.A spokesperson for the French foreign ministry said securing the Strait of Hormuz could “only take place once the intense phase of the bombing is over”.French President Emmanuel Macron, speaking on a visit to South Korea, meanwhile, said a military operation to liberate the Strait of Hormuz was “unrealistic”, while lamenting Trump’s differing daily statements on the Iran war and Nato.”There are those who advocate for the liberation of the Strait of Hormuz by force through a military operation, a position sometimes expressed by the US,” Macron said.”I say sometimes because it has varied, it is never the option we have chosen and we consider it unrealistic,” he said.The virtual meeting came after Trump urged oil-importing nations to show “courage” and seize the narrow strait.”The countries of the world that… receive oil through the Hormuz Strait must take care of that passage,” Trump said in a prime-time address at the White House late Wednesday.”Just take it, protect it, use it for yourselves,” he added.Trump has said he would consider a ceasefire only when Hormuz is “free and clear”.Western officials have insisted any operation to protect seafarers using the strait could only come after a ceasefire.”We are also convening military planners to look at how we marshal our collective defensive military capabilities, including looking at issues such as de-mining or reassurance once the conflict eases,” Cooper told Thursday’s meeting.Around a fifth of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas passes through the strait in peacetime.The channel normally sees around 120 daily transits, according to shipping industry intelligence site Lloyd’s List.But since March 1, commodities carriers have made just 225 crossings, according to maritime intelligence firm Kpler, a 94-percent decrease on peacetime. Related Story Source…
Nepal’s Prime Minister Balendra Shah (centre) and Rastriya Swatantra Party President Rabi Lamichhane (second left) arrive to attend the parliament session in Kathmandu Thursday. (AFP) Nepal’s newly elected lawmakers met Thursday for the first parliamentary session since deadly anti-corruption protests toppled the government in September 2025 and left the old parliament building in flames.Lawmakers, elected in March, met within the new parliament building, with many of the politicians taking their seats for the first time.That includes the Himalayan nation’s new leader, rapper-turned-politician Prime Minister Balendra Shah, who led the Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP) to sweep the polls, winning 182 of the 275 seats, just short of a two-thirds majority.Shah, 35, was dressed all in black, including his trademark dark sunglasses that he kept on inside the hall.The prime minister has remained silent publicly since his RSP party won the election, beyond taking the oath as leader and the release of a rap song, where he said that the “strength of unity” was his “national power”.Rabi Lamichhane, president of the RSP, spoke to lawmakers Thursday.”The votes we have received are not just of support, but for change… and I can proudly say we have begun that change,” he said.”Our work, and the government’s work, will speak,” he said.Lamichhane asked the opposition to “monitor us 24 hours”, and use their experience to point out their mistakes.The new parliament is markedly younger compared to the previous government, with nearly 60 directly elected members under the age of 40.The deadly September demonstrations began over a brief social media ban but tapped into longstanding fury over corruption and economic hardship.At least 76 people were killed over two days of unrest.Three high profile arrests — including four-time ex-prime minister KP Sharma Oli — linked to the unrest have been made so far.An inquiry commission into the violence had recommended that Oli and ex-home minister Ramesh Lekhak, as well as the capital Kathmandu’s former chief district officer Chhabilal Rijal, be investigated under laws addressing deaths caused by negligence.Oli, Lekhak and Rijal have denied responsibility for the violence and no charges have been laid. …
Kuan Bi-ling speaks during a press conference in Taipei, Taiwan, Thursday. (Reuters) Taiwan will strengthen its defences of the Pratas as China steps up its activities around the islands which lie at the top end of the South China Sea, the minister in charge of Taiwan’s coastguard said Thursday.Lying roughly between southern Taiwan and Hong Kong, the Pratas are seen by some security experts as vulnerable to Chinese attack due to their distance – more than 400km (250 miles) – from mainland Taiwan.The Pratas, an atoll which is also a Taiwanese national park, are only lightly defended by Taiwan, and its coastguard has that responsibility rather than the military. China claims the Pratas, and Taiwan, as its own territory.Kuan Bi-ling, head of Taiwan’s Ocean Affairs Council, said China was gradually expanding the maritime areas in which it carries out “grey zone harassment” – referring to non-combat operations designed to put pressure on Taiwan such as coastguard patrols.Since last year, the number of Chinese government boats, which include the coastguard, has increased around the Pratas, whereas previously activity was concentrated around Taiwan itself and the Kinmen islands, which sit close to the Chinese coast, she added.”From a political and strategic perspective, we have found that for them, seizing Dongsha would carry considerable strategic significance,” Kuan said, using the name both Taiwan and China use for the Pratas.Taiwan has renovated the wharf on the main island and will regularly deploy vessels with greater operational capacity there, she added, in comments to the Taiwan Foreign Correspondents’ Club.”Dongsha is an excellent and highly important site for the development of an island defence system, and we currently have plans to develop this,” Kuan said, without giving details.China’s Taiwan Affairs Office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.In January, Taiwan said a Chinese reconnaissance drone briefly flew over the Pratas, in what Taiwan’s defence ministry called a “provocative and irresponsible” move.Kuan said China’s pressure campaign “lets down people on both sides of the Taiwan Strait”, given it drains resources from other things such as rescuing mariners in distress.In time of war, Taiwan coastguard ships would be pressed into action, including its new Anping-class corvettes, which are based on the navy’s Tuo Chiang-class warships and have space to install anti-ship missiles.Kuan said China was also giving Taiwan an opportunity to learn.”As a result, we are accelerating our efforts to strengthen our capabilities and to speed up the transition between peacetime and wartime readiness,” she said. Source link
French President Emmanuel Macron (C) and his wife Brigitte Macron (L) are welcomed upon their arrival at Seoul Air Base in Seongnam on April 2, 2026.…
Police officers look at a building of the North Sumatra’s National Sports Committee of Indonesia damaged following a severe 7.4-magnitude offshore quake in Manado, North Sulawesi,…
President Donald Trump signs an executive order, in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, DC. (Reuters/File Photo) President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Tuesday aimed at tightening mail-in voting rules nationwide, including by directing his administration to create a list of confirmed US citizens eligible to vote in each state, and said he did not see how the measure could be challenged. The order would use federal data to help state election officials verify who is eligible to vote in their jurisdictions. It would also require absentee ballots to be sent only to voters on each state’s approved mail-in ballot list and mandate secure ballot envelopes with unique tracking barcodes. Any move to force changes to state-run election systems is likely to face immediate legal challenges. Trump said only a judge could block the order and complained that there were many “rogue” and “very bad” judges. “I don’t see how they can challenge it,” he said about the executive order. The Republican president for years has held to his false claim that his 2020 election defeat was the result of widespread voter fraud and has called for a tightening of rules for voting by mail ahead of the November midterm elections, when his party will be trying to defend its narrow majorities in Congress. His vocal opposition to voting by mail did not stop Trump from casting his own vote that way in a special election in Florida last week. Asked about it, he said he cast a ballot by mail recently “because I’m president” and “I had a lot of different things” to do. Source link
Trump’s remarks came just hours after his Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth declined to reaffirm the US commitment to Nato’s collective defenceTensions between the US and Nato allies flared up as President Donald Trump said he was considering pulling the US out of the military alliance due to its European members’ refusing to send ships to unblock the Strait of Hormuz. Nato, which includes European countries, the US and Canada, was formed in 1949 with the aim of countering the risk of Soviet attack and has been the cornerstone of the West’s security ever since.Trump told Reuters yesterday that he would state in an address to the nation later in the day that he was “absolutely” considering withdrawing the US from the Nato alliance. “I’ll be discussing my disgust with Nato,” he said of the speech. Asked if he was thinking about pulling out of Nato, he said: “Oh, absolutely without question. Wouldn’t you do that if you were me?” Trump’s remarks came just hours after his Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth declined to reaffirm the US commitment to Nato’s collective defence, a concept that lies at the heart of the alliance. Experts have long warned that remarks suggesting that the US might not honour its Nato commitments could encourage Russia to test Nato members’ readiness to enforce the alliance’s Article 5, which states an armed attack against one member state is an attack on all. France was among the first European Nato members to react to similar comments by Trump to Britain’s Daily Telegraph published earlier in the day, in which Trump called Nato a “paper tiger” and said he was considering exiting the alliance after allies failed to back US military action against Iran. “Let me recall what Nato is,” French junior army minister Alice Rufo said — though without directly addressing Trump’s threat to leave Nato.“It is a military alliance concerned with the security of territories in the Euro-Atlantic area. It is not intended to carry out an operation in the Strait of Hormuz, which is not in accordance with international law.” In Poland, Defence Minister Wladyslaw Kosiniak-Kamysz called for calm. “I hope that amid the emotions surrounding the President of the US today, a moment of calm will come,” he said. “And why? Because there is no Nato without the US, and it is in our interest that this calm comes. But there is also no American power without Nato.”Nato had no immediate comment. A German government spokesperson, when asked to react to Trump’s comment, said Germany remained committed to Nato. “This isn’t the first time he’s done this, and since it’s a recurring phenomenon, you can probably judge the consequences for yourself,” the spokesperson told a regular government press conference, speaking of Trump. British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said he would act in his country’s interest, whatever the “noise”. The instability caused by the Iran war meant Britain should pivot to focus on closer economic and defence ties with Europe, he said. The Iran war has exacerbated tensions between the US and Europe that have mounted since the start of Trump’s second term in office over everything from trade to his demands for ownership of Greenland, an autonomous territory of Nato ally Denmark. Europe is also nervously watching Trump’s efforts to broker an end to the war between Russia and Ukraine, with some senior European officials concerned Trump appears to support an agreement in Moscow’s favour. Asked on Tuesday if the US was still committed to Nato’s collective defence, Hegseth said: “As far as Nato is concerned, that’s a decision that will be left to the president. But I’ll just say a lot has been laid bare.”“You don’t have much of an alliance if you have countries that are not willing to stand with you when you need them,” Hegseth said. France has refused to allow Israel to use its airspace to resupply a flight carrying American weapons being used in the war against Iran, and Italy denied permission for US military aircraft to land at the Sigonella air base in Sicily before heading to the Middle East, sources told Reuters. Both France and Italy said it was standard policy and nothing had changed.Spain, however, said publicly it had fully closed its airspace to US planes involved in attacks on Iran.Trump has also repeatedly blasted Britain for not joining the United States when it launched the war. Source link
South Korea has secured around 50 million barrels of alternative oil supplies for this month to replace supplies from the Middle East blocked due to the effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz, government officials said Thursday.The government and oil refineries are working hard to secure alternative oil supplies from different countries, Deputy Minister for Trade, Industry and Resource Security Yang Ghi-wuk said in a regular briefing on energy supply, noting that Seoul has been knocking on doors of Saudi Arabia, Oman, Kazakhstan, the United States and other countries.About 80 million barrels of oil arrive in South Korea each month when things run as usual, but around 50 million barrels have been tentatively secured at the moment for this month, with alternative supplies expected to increase in May, South Korea’s (Yonhap) news agency quoted Yang as saying.To cover the shortfall, the government is controlling the demand and working to help with supplies through a crude oil swap system with private companies, he added, noting the government will continue close monitoring of the market. Source link
The German government announced the implementation of new regulatory measures to curb frequent fuel price fluctuations by limiting the number of price increases to once per day. Price increases are permitted once at midday, whereas price decreases may be made at any time without limit.The German Parliament passed the new legislation on March 26 as part of a government package to combat sharp price spikes caused by energy market volatility following military escalation in the Middle East.The package includes legislation to regulate fuel price adjustments, alongside two amendments to competition law aimed at tightening oversight of arbitrary price hikes within the fuel sector.The German government stated that Middle East developments and the closure of the Strait of Hormuz shipping route have driven global oil prices up by approximately 30%, directly impacting domestic fuel costs.Following a recent European Council meeting, Chancellor Friedrich Merz emphasized that the government is working to mitigate the war’s economic impact. He noted that restricting fuel price increases to once per day is a key part of this strategy, along with efforts to stabilize market supply and closely monitor price trends.Before this law took effect, gas stations adjusted their prices multiple times a day. Official data showed some stations recording nearly 50 price changes in a single day, leading to significant consumer confusion. Source link