Mount Rainier National Park, Washington — Two crew members who were missing following the crash of a fighter jet in mountainous terrain in Washington during a routine training flight have been declared dead, the U.S. Navy said Sunday.

The EA-18G Growler jet from the Electronic Attack Squadron crashed east of Mount Rainier on Tuesday afternoon, according to Whidbey Island Naval Air Station. Search teams, including a U.S. Navy MH-60S helicopter, immediately launched from NAS Whidbey Island to try to find the crew and crash site.

Army Special Forces soldiers trained in mountaineering, high-angle rescue and technical communications were brought in to reach the wreckage, which was located Wednesday by an aerial crew resting at about 1,828 meters (6,000 feet) in a remote, steep and heavily wooded area east of Mount Rainier, officials said.

Locating the missing crew members “as quickly and as safely as possible” had been their priority, Capt. David Ganci, commander, Electronic Attack Wing, U.S. Pacific Fleet, said Thursday.

The aviators’ names won’t be released until a day after their next of kin have been notified, the Navy wrote in a press release Sunday, adding that search and rescue efforts have shifted into a long-term salvage and recovery operation as the cause of the crash is still being investigated.

“It is with a heavy heart that we share the loss of two beloved Zappers,” said Cmdr. Timothy Warburton, commanding officer of the aviators’ Electronic Attack Squadron, in the press release.

“Our priority right now is taking care of the families of our fallen aviators. … We are grateful for the ongoing teamwork to safely recover the deceased.” Ganci said they could not identify the missing crew until 24 hours after their families had been notified of their status.

The crash remains under investigation.

The EA-18G Growler is similar to the F/A-18F Super Hornet and includes sophisticated electronic warfare devices. Most of the Growler squadrons are based at Whidbey Island. One squadron is based at Marine Corps Air Station Iwakuni, Japan.

The “Zappers” were recently deployed on the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower.

The search took place near Mount Rainier, a towering active volcano that is blanketed in snowfields and glaciers year-round.

The first production of the Growler was delivered to Whidbey Island in 2008. In the past 15 years, the Growler has operated around the globe supporting major actions, the Navy said. The plane seats a pilot in front and an electronics operator behind them.

“The EA-18G Growler aircraft we fly represents the most advanced technology in airborne Electronic Attack and stands as the Navy’s first line of defense in hostile environments,” the Navy said on its website. Each aircraft costs about $67 million.

Military aircraft training exercises and travel can be dangerous and sometimes result in crashes, injuries and deaths.

In May, an F-35 fighter jet on its way from Texas to Edwards Air Force Base near Los Angeles crashed after the pilot stopped to refuel in New Mexico. The pilot was the only person on board in that case and was taken to a hospital with serious injuries.

Last year, eight U.S. Air Force special Operations Command service members were killed when a CV-22B Osprey aircraft they were flying in crashed off the coast of Japan.
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BELGRADE — European Union candidate Serbia will continue to refuse to impose sanctions against Russia over its invasion of Ukraine despite Western pressure, Serbia’s leader said after his telephone conversation with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Sunday.

Populist Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said on Instagram that he believes the call, what he said was his first in more than two years with the Russian president, will help “further development of relations and trust between Russia and Serbia.”

“We talked as people who have known each other for a long time, as friends, and the ten-minute conversation was marked by a personal note, and we also talked about those who are weak [pro-Western] leaders,” Vucic said.

He did not say whether he would accept an earlier invitation by Putin to attend a BRICS summit of emerging economies, led by Russia and China, in Kazan later this week.

Although formally seeking E.U. membership, traditional Russian Slavic ally Serbia has refused to join Western sanctions against Russia over the war in Ukraine though it has reluctantly condemned Moscow’s aggression. Vucic has said that imposing the sanctions wasn’t in Serbia’s national interest.

He said Sunday he expects criticism from the West of his conversation with Putin, but stated that “Serbia is a sovereign country which makes its own decisions.”

He also thanked Russia “for providing sufficient quantities of gas for Serbia at favorable prices.” Serbia was almost completely dependent on the Russian gas but has recently agreed to start to diversify its supplies.

Serbia, which was never part of the Soviet bloc, on Sunday marked the 80th anniversary of the liberation of its capital Belgrade from the Nazi World War II occupation, which was accomplished mostly thanks to former Yugoslavia’s communist partisans, but also the Soviet Red Army.

Belgrade’s nationalist authorities marked the liberation date with a display of the pro-Russian sentiment, with thousands marching through Belgrade waving Russian flags and chanting slogans.

At a meeting marking the anniversary, Vucic delivered a speech in the Russian language, which he said is a sign of respect for the Red Army, without which “there would not have been the liberation of Belgrade.”
…

Tehran — Iran summoned the ambassador of Hungary, whose country holds the rotating European Union presidency, to protest a joint E.U.-Gulf Cooperation Council statement on islands controlled by Iran but claimed by the UAE, state media reported Sunday. 

The statement, published after the first summit between the two regional blocs on Wednesday, said, “We call on Iran to end its occupation of the three islands of the United Arab Emirates, Greater Tunb, Lesser Tunb and Abu Musa, which constitutes a violation of the sovereignty of the UAE and the principles of the Charter of the U.N.” 

The islands located near the Strait of Hormuz, a globally vital shipping lane, have been disputed between the United Arab Emirates and Iran for decades.  

Tehran has controlled the islands since 1971 at the end of British imperial rule over them. 

“The Hungarian ambassador was summoned to the Iranian foreign ministry to protest against the repetition of certain baseless claims in the joint declaration from the leaders of the EU and the GCC,” the official IRNA news agency reported.   

The foreign ministry called the EU’s stance “thoughtless, irresponsible and void of any legal basis,” IRNA added.  

On Monday, the European Union accused Tehran of supplying missiles and drones to Russia for use in its war against Ukraine and imposed fresh sanctions on the country. 

In April 2023, Iran appointed an ambassador to the UAE for the first time in nearly eight years as part of improving diplomatic relations with Gulf Arab states. 
…

WARSAW, Poland — The prominent American journalist and historian Anne Applebaum urged continued support for Ukraine as she accepted a prestigious German prize Sunday, arguing that pacifism in the face of aggression is often nothing more than appeasement.

Applebaum made her appeal to an audience in Frankfurt, where she was awarded the Peace Prize of the German Book Trade. She was joined by her husband, Polish Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski, who like his wife is a strong voice on the international stage for supporting Ukraine as it defends itself against Russia’s brutal invasion.

“If there is even a small chance that military defeat could help end this horrific cult of violence in Russia, just as military defeat once brought an end to the cult of violence in Germany, we should take it,” Applebaum said.

Many Germans have embraced an ethos of pacifism because of their nation’s aggression under Adolf Hitler during World War II. And many have misgivings now about supplying weapons to Kyiv, fearing Russia and worried that it could cause the war to spread beyond Ukraine’s borders to the rest of Europe.

“Some even call for peace by referring solemnly to the ‘lessons of German history,” Applebaum noted, according to a transcript of her speech published by the prize organization.

“As I am here today accepting a peace prize, this seems the right moment to point out that ‘I want peace’ is not always a moral argument,” Applebaum said. “This is also the right moment to say that the lesson of German history is not that Germans should be pacifists.”

“On the contrary, we have known for nearly a century that a demand for pacifism in the face of an aggressive, advancing dictatorship can simply represent the appeasement and acceptance of that dictatorship.”

She argued that the “real lesson” from German history should be that Germans “have a special responsibility to stand up for freedom and to take risks in doing so.”

The prize, which is endowed with $27,185, was awarded in St. Paul’s Church in Frankfurt — which is considered the birthplace of German parliamentary democracy — at the end of the Frankfurt Book Fair.

The prize has been awarded since 1950. It honors individuals who have contributed to turning the idea of peace into reality through literature, science or art. Last year’s prize was awarded to British-Indian writer Salman Rushdie for his perseverance despite enduring decades of threats and violence.

The German news agency dpa reported that Applebaum’s strong support for continuing to arm Ukraine triggered some criticism, citing Karin Schmidt-Friderichs, the head of the German Publishers and Booksellers Association, which awards the prize.

Nonetheless she received strong applause for her speech, dpa reported from Frankfurt.

Following pacifism to its logical conclusion, Applebaum argued, would “mean that we should acquiesce to the military conquest of Ukraine, to the cultural destruction of Ukraine, to the construction of concentration camps in Ukraine, to the kidnapping of children in Ukraine.”

Applebaum writes for The Atlantic magazine. She has written books that focus on totalitarianism in Eastern Europe, including “The Gulag,” and “The Iron Curtain” and “Red Famine,” about dictator Joseph Stalin’s war on Ukraine. She recently published “Autocracy, Inc. The Dictators Who Want to Run the World.” In 2004, she was awarded the prestigious Pulitzer Prize.

The prize jury said Applebaum’s analyses of communist and post-communist systems in the Soviet Union and Russia reveal “the mechanisms by which authoritarians grab hold of power and maintain their control.”

The laudation for Applebaum was delivered by the Russian historian Irina Scherbakova, a founding member of the human rights organization Memorial, which is now banned in Russia and was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2022.
…

New York — Manhattan’s famed luxury store row Fifth Avenue is in line for a major makeover.

New York City officials unveiled a plan last week to transform a central portion of the thoroughfare between Bryant Park and Central Park into a more pedestrian-centered boulevard.

They propose doubling the size of sidewalks, reducing traffic lanes from five to three, as well as adding seating areas and hundreds of trees and planters, among other improvements.

The vision is to emulate iconic strolling and shopping boulevards such as the Champs-Élysées in Paris.

“As we celebrate the 200th anniversary of one of the most famous streets in the world, New Yorkers can look forward to a brand-new Fifth Avenue that will return the street to its former glory as a pedestrian boulevard,” Madelyn Wils, interim president of the Fifth Avenue Association, which runs the local business improvement district, said in a statement. “Reversing the century-old trend of putting cars first, this visionary design will transform our overcrowded avenue into a spacious and green corridor for shoppers and workers, visitors and New Yorkers, and everyone on Fifth.”

The plan would cost more than $350 million and be paid through a mix of public and private financing, according to Mayor Eric Adams’ administration and the Future of Fifth Partnership.

Officials said the project represents the avenue’s first major redesign and could pay for itself in less than five years through increased property and sales tax revenue.

But some transit advocates have voiced concerns, saying the plan does not give enough consideration to the needs of the public bus system or the city’s many cyclists.

A public meeting will be held later this month on the plan, and construction could begin in 2028.

Officials say Fifth Avenue is roughly 100 feet wide, with just two 23-foot sidewalks, even though pedestrians make up 70% of all traffic on the corridor.

Some 5,500 pedestrians traverse its blocks on average each hour, a number that swells to 23,000 people an hour during the holidays, officials said.

“People across the globe identify Fifth Avenue as a premier destination for strolling and shopping,” Meera Joshi, the city’s deputy mayor for operations, said in a statement. “But its larger-than-life reputation means that its sidewalks have reached their capacity, hosting more people per hour in peak seasons than Madison Square Garden.”

The Fifth Avenue plan was among other ambitious plans for roadways city officials revealed [last] week.

They also proposed capping stretches of the Cross Bronx Expressway, a major highway that cuts through the borough of the Bronx.

City officials said the proposals would build parks and greenspaces atop the covered highway, helping restore urban neighborhoods hollowed out by the expansion of the national highway system and the development of suburbs.

“This is a historic opportunity to right the wrongs of the past and reconnect communities once again,” Joshi said. 
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miami, florida — Hurricane Oscar made landfall early Sunday in the southeastern Bahamas and was heading toward Cuba, an island recently beleaguered by a massive power outage.  

The National Hurricane Center in Miami said the storm’s center arrived on Great Inagua island. It is expected to produce a dangerous storm surge that could produce significant coastal flooding there and in other areas of the southeastern Bahamas. Two to four inches of rainfall are expected, with isolated amounts of up to six inches.  

Forecasters said five to 10 inches of rain, and even isolated amounts of up to 15 inches, are expected across eastern Cuba through Tuesday.  

Oscar formed Saturday off the coast of the Bahamas and brushed past the Turks and Caicos islands to the south.  

The National Hurricane Center earlier characterized the storm as “tiny,” but hurricane warnings were in place Sunday for southeastern Bahamas and portions of Cuba.  

The storm’s maximum sustained winds were clocked at 80 mph (130 kph) with higher gusts. Its center was located about 150 miles (240 kilometers) east-northeast of Guantanamo, Cuba. The storm was heading west at 12 mph (19 kph) and was expected to reach Guantanamo or Holguin, Cuba, on Sunday afternoon at hurricane strength.  

The hurricane’s approach comes as Cuba tries to recover from its worst blackout in at least two years, which left millions without power for two days last week. Some electrical service was restored Saturday.  

Philippe Papin of the National Hurricane Center said it was somewhat unexpected that Oscar became a hurricane Saturday.  

“Unfortunately the system kind of snuck up a little bit on us,” Papin said.  

Hours earlier Tropical Storm Nadine formed off Mexico’s southern Caribbean coast. It degenerated into a tropical depression as it moved over land. 
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Berlin — A Libyan suspected of planning an attack on the Israeli embassy in Berlin and links to the Islamic State group will appear before a judge on Sunday, German prosecutors said. 

The suspect, identified only as Omar A., was arrested on Saturday evening at his home in Bernau, just outside the German capital, the federal prosecutors’ office said. 

Omar A. was accused of planning a “high-profile attack with firearms” on the Israeli Embassy in Berlin, they said. 

As part of his preparations, Omar A. was suspected of having “exchanges with a member of IS in a messenger chat,” said the prosecutors, who described him as a supporter of the group’s ideology. 

In a message on X, Israel’s ambassador to Berlin said, “Muslim anti-Semitism is no longer just hate rhetoric. It leads to and encourages terrorist activities worldwide.” 

Israeli embassies were “on the front line of the diplomatic battlefield,” ambassador Ron Prosor said. 

Interior Minister Nancy Faeser said protecting Jewish and Israeli institutions in Germany was “of the utmost importance to us.” 

Law enforcement were acting with the “utmost vigilance” to prevent any suspected “Islamist, antisemitic and anti-Israel violence,” Faeser said.   

Foreign tipoff   

Prosecutors said Omar A. would appear on Sunday before a judge who would decide if he should be remanded in custody. 

Authorities said they searched the 28-year-old’s home in Bernau on Saturday. 

They also searched the property near Bonn of another person “not suspected” of involvement in the alleged plan. 

German daily Bild said the flat in the town of Sankt Augustin near Bonn belonged to the suspect’s uncle, who was being treated as a witness. 

German authorities arrested Omar A. after a tipoff from a foreign intelligence agency, Bild said, adding that he had not been on any militant watchlist in Germany. 

Bild said the Libyan man was thought to have entered Germany in November 2022 and to have made a request for asylum the following January, which was rejected in September 2023. 

Since the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, and Israel’s retaliatory onslaught on Gaza, German authorities have increased vigilance about possible Islamist threats and antisemitism. 

In early September, Munich police shot dead a young Austrian man known for his links to radical Islamism after he opened fire at the Israeli Consulate and on police. 

In early October, there were explosions near the Israeli Embassy in Denmark and gunfire near its mission in Sweden. 
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KYIV — Russian air defenses shot down more than 100 Ukrainian drones Sunday over Russia’s western regions, Moscow officials said, while 17 people were injured in the Ukrainian city of Kryvyi Rih in a ballistic missile attack. 

The Russian Defense Ministry said 110 drones were destroyed in the overnight barrage against seven Russian regions. Many targeted Russia’s border region of Kursk, where 43 drones were reportedly shot down. 

Social media footage appeared to show air defenses at work over the city of Dzerzhinsk in the Nizhny Novgorod region, close to a factory producing explosives. 

Local Gov. Gleb Nikitin wrote on social media Sunday that four fire fighters had been injured repelling a drone attack over Dzerzhinsk’s industrial zone, but did not give further details. 

Such large-scale aerial attacks are still relatively rare over Russia 2½  years after Moscow launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. 

A similar attack at the end of September saw Russia’s Ministry of Defense report the destruction of 125 drones across seven regions. 

Meanwhile, 17 people were injured in Ukraine’s Kryvyi Rih after the city was hit with two Russian ballistic missiles, officials said Sunday. 

The attack late Saturday evening damaged homes and businesses, said local administration head Oleksandr Vilkul. 

The Ukrainian air force said that Russia launched 49 drones and two Iskander-M ballistic missiles in total overnight. It said 31 of the drones were shot down over 12 regions, including the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, while another 13 disappeared from radar — suggesting they were knocked out by electronic defenses. 

In a statement on social media, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that Russia had launched some 800 guided aerial bombs and more than 500 attack drones over Ukraine in the past week alone. 

“Every day, Russia strikes our cities and communities. It is deliberate terror from the enemy against our people,” he said, renewing calls for continued air support from the country’s allies. 

“United in defense, the world can stand against this targeted terror.” 
…

MILWAUKEE — Whooping cough is at its highest level in a decade for this time of year, U.S. health officials reported Thursday.

There have been 18,506 cases of whooping cough reported so far, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said. That’s the most at this point in the year since 2014, when cases topped 21,800.

The increase is not unexpected — whooping cough peaks every three to five years, health experts said. And the numbers indicate a return to levels before the coronavirus pandemic, when whooping cough and other contagious illnesses plummeted.

Still, the tally has some state health officials concerned, including those in Wisconsin, where there have been about 1,000 cases so far this year, compared to a total of 51 last year.

Nationwide, CDC has reported that kindergarten vaccination rates dipped last year and vaccine exemptions are at an all-time high. Thursday, it released state figures, showing that about 86% of kindergartners in Wisconsin got the whooping cough vaccine, compared to more than 92% nationally.

Whooping cough, also called pertussis, usually starts out like a cold, with a runny nose and other common symptoms, before turning into a prolonged cough. It is treated with antibiotics. Whooping cough used to be very common until a vaccine was introduced in the 1950s, which is now part of routine childhood vaccinations. It is in a shot along with tetanus and diphtheria vaccines. The combo shot is recommended for adults every 10 years.

“They used to call it the 100-day cough because it literally lasts for 100 days,” said Joyce Knestrick, a family nurse practitioner in Wheeling, West Virginia.

Whooping cough is usually seen mostly in infants and young children, who can develop serious complications. That’s why the vaccine is recommended during pregnancy, to pass along protection to the newborn, and for those who spend a lot of time with infants.

But public health workers say outbreaks this year are hitting older kids and teens. In Pennsylvania, most outbreaks have been in middle school, high school and college settings, an official said. Nearly all the cases in Douglas County, Nebraska, are schoolkids and teens, said Justin Frederick, deputy director of the health department.

That includes his own teenage daughter.

“It’s a horrible disease. She still wakes up — after being treated with her antibiotics — in a panic because she’s coughing so much she can’t breathe,” he said.

It’s important to get tested and treated with antibiotics early, said Dr. Kris Bryant, who specializes in pediatric infectious diseases at Norton Children’s in Louisville, Kentucky. People exposed to the bacteria can also take antibiotics to stop the spread.

“Pertussis is worth preventing,” Bryant said. “The good news is that we have safe and effective vaccines.”
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Tens of thousands of students in the Southeast are dealing with school disruptions after Hurricane Helene wreaked havoc so severe — on homes, campuses and municipal power and water systems — that some districts have no idea when they will reopen.

While virtual learning helped during the COVID-19 school closures, that has not been an option for this crisis because internet and cellphone service has remained spotty since the storm struck in late September.

In hard-hit western North Carolina, some districts warn students will miss up to a month of school, and others say they can’t yet determine a timeline for returning to classrooms.

“I feel like a month is a lot, but it’s not something that can’t be overcome,” said Marissa Coleman, who has sent her four children to stay with grandparents in Texas because their home in North Carolina’s Buncombe County has no running water. “But if we get further into Thanksgiving and Christmas, it’s like, how are they actually going to make this up?”

In mountainous Buncombe County, Helene swept away homes, cut power and destroyed crucial parts of the water system for Asheville, a city of about 94,000 people. The storm decimated remote towns and killed at least 246 people throughout the Appalachians, where massive cleanup efforts have been complicated by washed-out bridges and roads. It was the deadliest hurricane to hit the U.S. mainland since Katrina in 2005.

The Buncombe County School system, which serves over 22,000 students, told families Tuesday on the district’s Facebook page no decision has been made “with regards to start date or length of day” because of a need to repair buildings, restore phone and security systems and redraw bus routes.

Even when schools reopen, educators worry the disruption could have profound effects on students’ learning and emotional well-being.

Children who experience natural disasters are more prone to acute illness and symptoms of depression and anxiety, research shows. The physical and mental health impacts put them at greater risk of learning loss: Absences can undermine achievement, as can the effects of trauma on brain function.

The challenges come amid growing concerns about the impacts of climate change on students. Wildfires have swept through communities, displacing families. Many school systems with inadequate heating or air conditioning have closed during extreme weather or forced students and educators to endure sweltering or frigid temperatures. According to the World Bank, 400 million children lost school days because of “climate-related closures” in 2022.

Days after Helene made landfall, Hurricane Milton roared ashore last week farther south along the same Florida coast as a Category 3 storm. While about half the state’s districts were closed, all of them were planning to reopen by the end of this week.

Schools affected by Helene are trying to provide stability. The Buncombe district has suggested parents trade books with neighbors and friends for their kids. “Have them write, maybe about something they’re looking forward to when school starts again,” the district told parents on social media. “Turn everyday experiences into math problems.”

Cécile Wight, a mother of two in Asheville, said she has been grateful for concern shown by schools including surveys checking on families’ well-being and an elementary school bus driver who took his own car to visit each child on his route.

“That has been huge, just having the emotional support from the school system and from the people we know at the school,” she said.

But uncertainty remains. Wight said her family is able to stay at their home because they have well water, but many other families have yet to return since evacuating. Most of Buncombe’s 45 schools still lacked running water as of Tuesday, meaning they’re unable to meet basic safety and hygiene standards.

Schools have begun exploring whether it would be possible to open without running water, relying on portable bathroom trailers. In a letter to families, Asheville Superintendent Maggie Furman said the district is considering drilling wells at each school so they don’t have to rely on city water.

Coleman said her kids are eager for some kind of normalcy.

“I understand the schools are going to have to take some time to find a way to open safely, and I support that 100%. But I definitely am not in the camp of ‘We need to wait until we get water back, until everything’s normal again to open.’ I just think that’s going to be too long,” Coleman said.

The Tennessee Department of Education is still trying to determine how many schools remain closed since Hurricane Helene and how many took too much damage to reopen.

Echoing the COVID-19 pandemic, several schools in Tennessee have postponed traditions like homecoming games, parades and dances. Many colleges are also granting extensions on application deadlines, officials say, to reduce high school seniors’ stress.

In storm-drenched areas elsewhere, some early education providers may never reopen.

Private child care and preschool centers are particularly vulnerable in the aftermath of a natural disaster, said Militza Mezquita, senior adviser for education in emergencies at Save the Children. Many already operate on thin margins, meaning a temporary closure can easily turn permanent. As for-profit companies, they are also ineligible for many types of disaster aid. A natural disaster can wipe out 10% to 20% of providers, Mezquita said.

“Child care recovery is very critical to the whole recovery ecosystem,” Mezquita said, noting the people essential to recovery — road workers, cleanup crews, doctors and nurses — often have young children that need to be looked after. “If they are not able to adequately get their children in care, they can’t go to work.”

Despite the instability, educators like Heather Smith, who was named North Carolina’s Teacher of the Year in the spring, encourage families to see the lessons storms can provide. Smith brought along her two children, ages 8 and 4, to serve meals at her church.

“Our kids are learning so much every day, whether it’s about adversity, whether it’s about helping a community,” said Smith, who rode out the storm at her home in Waynesville.

Similarly, Wight has been taking her children to volunteer for relief efforts at a school. She said it has helped them feel active and involved in the community.

“If COVID taught us something, it’s that we can make things work. The kids are resilient,” Wight said. “They will eventually catch up on the academic side of things.”
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NEW YORK — Cher, Mary J. Blige and Ozzy Osbourne were among this year’s Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees, an elite group formally introduced into the music pantheon Saturday at a star-studded concert gala.

Kool & the Gang, Dave Matthews Band, Foreigner, A Tribe Called Quest, and Peter Frampton round out the 2024 class of honorees, artists honored at the ceremony held in Cleveland, Ohio, home of the prestigious hall.

Big Mama Thornton, Alexis Korner and John Mayall received special honors for “musical influence,” as Jimmy Buffett, MC5, Dionne Warwick and Norman Whitfield received awards for “musical excellence.”

Suzanne de Passe, a trailblazer for women executives in the music business, who was big in Motown, won the night’s award for nonperforming industry professionals.

Dua Lipa kicked off the evening with a performance of Believe, with Cher joining the pop star onstage to finish her 1998 smash hit, which was credited as the first song to use auto-tune technology as an instrument.

“I changed the sound of music forever,” she said in her acceptance speech, less than a year after railing against the hall for not having yet added her to the ballot.

“It was easier getting divorced from two men than it was getting in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame,” she quipped Saturday night.

Performers included Kelly Clarkson, Sammy Hagar, Slash and Demi Lovato, who all appeared for Foreigner.

A group of artists including Queen Latifah, De La Soul and Busta Rhymes also performed with the surviving members of the eclectic, pioneering hip hop group A Tribe Called Quest — Q-Tip, Ali Shaheed Muhammad and Jarobi White. 
…

PARIS — Women and men demonstrated together Saturday in Paris and other French cities in support of Gisèle Pélicot and against sexual violence highlighted by the harrowing trial of her ex-husband and dozens of other men accused of rapes while she was drugged and unconscious.

The demonstrations outside Paris’ criminal court, in the southeastern city of Lyon and elsewhere underscored how Pélicot’s courage in speaking out about her ordeal is inspiring people in France and beyond, even as they’ve been horrified by the scale and brutality of the abuse she suffered over the course of a decade.

Since the September 2 beginning of the extraordinary trial, during which Pélicot has faced 51 of her alleged rapists, she has been praised for her composure and decision to keep the hearings public — after the court initially suggested that they be held behind closed doors.

“She has decided to make this an emblematic trial,” said Elsa Labouret, one of the Paris demonstrators and a spokesperson for the women’s group “Osez le féminisme!” (Dare to be feminist!)

“Victims don’t have to do what she did. They have a right to have their anonymity protected. It’s not necessarily a duty of any victim. But what she decided to do is very, very important because now we cannot ignore the violence that some men can resort to,” she said.

Demonstrators denounced what they said is laxity from the French justice system toward sexual violence and fears of being raped and assaulted that they said stalk women day-in, day-out.

Placards they held up read: “Shame must change sides,” “Stop the denial,” “Not your punching ball” and “We are all Gisele. Are you all Dominique???”

Dominique Pélicot admitted during the trial that for nearly a decade, he repeatedly drugged his unwitting wife and invited dozens of men to rape her while she lay unconscious in their bed.

He told the court that he also raped Gisèle and that the 50 other men also standing trial understood exactly what they were doing. She has divorced him since his arrest. The trial is expected to run until December.

The defendants range in age from 26 to 74. Many of them deny having raped Gisèle Pélicot, saying her then-husband manipulated them or that they believed she was consenting.

“You can never know who is a rapist or who is a monster. Like, it could be your neighbor, it could be anyone,” said Paris demonstrator Khalil Ndiaye, a student.

“It’s really disgusting somehow to think that it could be people that you know, people that you hang out with every day and, like, they could do things like that.”

He said he regards Gisèle Pélicot as an icon.

“Because in her pain, she decided not to give up and not to just lie down,” he said. “She decided to fight. And we’re all here today because she’s fighting and she’s inspiring us to fight, too.”
…

Britain’s six-time Olympic track cycling champion Chris Hoy has revealed he has “two to four years” to live after he was diagnosed with terminal prostate cancer which metastasized to his bones.

The announcement comes after the 48-year-old Scot said in February he was feeling “optimistic and positive” as he was undergoing treatment for an unspecified cancer diagnosed last year.

However, the sprinter, who worked as a pundit with the BBC at last summer’s Paris Games, has now revealed he has known for more than a year that his cancer is incurable.

Despite his illness, Hoy says he remains positive and appreciating life.

“Hand on heart, I’m pretty positive most of the time and I have genuine happiness,” Hoy told The Times.

“This is bigger than the Olympics. It’s bigger than anything. This is about appreciating life and finding joy.”

“As unnatural as it feels, this is nature. You know, we were all born and we all die, and this is just part of the process.”

Hoy wrote a memoir about his life over the past year in which he describes how doctors discovered his cancer after initially finding a tumor in his shoulder.

The father of two also said he had an allergic reaction to his chemotherapy treatment, feeling “completely devastated at the end of it.”

On top of his own treatment, Hoy was dealt another blow when his wife Sarra Kemp was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in November.

“But you remind yourself, aren’t I lucky that there is medicine I can take that will fend this off for as long as possible,” an optimistic Hoy said.

“I’m not just saying these words. I’ve learnt to live in the moment, and I have days of genuine joy and happiness.”

“It’s absolutely not denial or self-delusion. It’s about trying to recognize, what do we have control over?

“The fear and anxiety, it all comes from trying to predict the future. But the future is this abstract concept in our minds. None of us know what’s going to happen. The one thing we know is we’ve got a finite time on the planet.”

Hoy was at the vanguard of Britain’s era of domination in track cycling, winning gold medals at the Athens, Beijing and London Olympics. He also claimed 11 world titles during a glittering career.

Until 2021 Hoy was the most successful British Olympian and the most successful Olympic cyclist of all time before being overtaken by fellow Briton Jason Kenny who claimed his seventh Olympic gold at the Tokyo Games.
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WASHINGTON — The U.S. is investigating an unauthorized release of classified documents that assess Israel’s plans to attack Iran, three U.S. officials told The Associated Press. A fourth U.S. official said the documents appear to be legitimate.

The documents are attributed to the U.S. Geospatial Intelligence Agency and National Security Agency and note that Israel continues to move military assets in place to conduct a military strike in response to Iran’s blistering ballistic missile attack on October 1. They were sharable within the “Five Eyes,” which are the U.S., Great Britain, Canada, New Zealand and Australia.

The documents, which are marked top secret, were posted online to Telegram and first reported by CNN and Axios news outlets. The officials spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter publicly.

The investigation is also examining how the documents were obtained — including whether it was an intentional leak by a member of the U.S. intelligence community or obtained by another method, such as a hack — and whether any other intelligence information was compromised, one of the officials said. As part of that investigation, officials are working to determine who had access to the documents before they were posted, the official said.

The documents emerged as the U.S. has urged Israel to take advantage of its elimination of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar and press for a cease-fire in Gaza, and has likewise urgently cautioned Israel not to further expand military operations in the north in Lebanon and risk a wider regional war. However, Israel’s leadership has repeatedly stressed it will not let Iran’s missile attack go unanswered.

Hamas and Hezbollah, in Lebanon, have been designated terrorist organizations by the United States, United Kingdom, European Union and others.

In a statement, the Pentagon said it was aware of the reports of the documents but did not have further comment.

The Hamas attack on Israel a year ago killed 1,200 people and led to the capture of about 250 hostages. Israel’s counteroffensive in Gaza has killed more than 42,400 Palestinians, with more than half of them women and children, according to Gaza health officials. The Israeli military says the death toll includes thousands of Hamas fighters. 
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German police have arrested a Libyan suspected of belonging to the Islamic State group and of having planned an attack on the Israeli embassy, federal prosecutors told Agence France-Presse on Saturday. 

“There is some suggestion he had planned an attack on the Israeli embassy in Berlin,” said a spokesman for the prosecutor’s office, adding that the suspect was also thought to be affiliated with the Islamic State group. 

Bild daily reported that police commandoes had stormed a flat in Bernau, north of Berlin, in the evening and arrested the 28-year-old man. 

The newspaper said German authorities had acted on a tip-off from a foreign intelligence agency. 

Israel’s ambassador to Berlin, Ron Prosor, thanked German authorities for “ensuring the security of our embassy” in a message on the social media platform X. 

Since the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, which triggered the war in the Gaza Strip, German authorities have increased their vigilance against Islamist militant threats and the resurgence of anti-Semitism, like in many countries around the world. 

In early September, Munich police shot dead a young Austrian man known for his links to radical Islamism after he opened fire at the Israeli consulate. 
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Ukraine’s military deployed air-defense systems late Saturday to repel an aerial assault on Kyiv, according to the capital’s top elected official. 

“Stay in shelters!” Mayor Vitali Klitschko warned on the Telegram messaging app, according to Reuters, which was unable to independently confirm the scope of the aerial assault. 

Hours later, Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin used the same messaging app to say Russian defense forces had destroyed at least one drone flying towards the capital city.   

According to Reuters, preliminary information indicated reports of damage or casualties where debris fell in the Ramensky district of the Moscow region. 

Reuters was unable to independently confirm the scope of the aerial assault on Kyiv.   

Saturday’s attack on Kyiv follows a visit to the city by French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot, who said a Ukrainian defeat would mean “chaos” for the international order. 

According to Agence France-Presse, Barrot’s speech came hours after Russian forces issued a statement claiming that they’d captured another village in the country’s east. 

Barrot’s visit, aimed at underlining Paris’ unflinching support for Ukraine, comes at the end of a week in which Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy unveiled his “victory plan” to defeat Russia, again calling for beefed-up Western backing. 

“A Russian victory would consecrate the law of the strongest and precipitate the international order towards chaos,” said Barrot, who also warned that recent reports of North Korean regular troops supporting Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, if verified, would constitute a serious escalation of the war.

France’s top diplomat also said Paris was open to the idea of an immediate invitation for Ukraine to join NATO, but that talks would continue on the subject with allies. 

Barrot’s stop in Kyiv coincided with the G7 defense ministerial meeting in Naples, Italy, which saw a pledge of “unwavering” support for Ukraine, including vows of military aid, according to a final statement.   

“We underscore our intent to continue to provide assistance to Ukraine, including military assistance in the short and long term,” read the group’s final statement following the one-day summit. 

Information in this report is from Reuters and Agence France-Presse. 
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Some 200,000 mail carriers have reached a tentative contract deal with the U.S. Postal Service that includes backdated pay raises and a promise to provide workers with air-conditioned trucks. 

The new agreement, which still needs to be ratified by union members, runs through November 2026. Letter deliverers have been working without a contract since May 2023. 

Both the union and the Postal Service welcomed the agreement, which was announced Friday. 

“Both sides didn’t get everything they wanted. But by bargaining in good faith, we ended with an agreement that meets our goals and rewards our members,” Brian Renfroe, the president of the National Association of Letter Carriers, told The Associated Press. “To make that happen, the Postal Service had to recognize the contributions of members to the Postal Service and the American people.” 

Among other improvements, the deal increases the top pay and reduces the amount of time it takes new workers to reach that level, Renfroe said. He credited Postmaster General Louis DeJoy and his deputy for bargaining in good faith throughout the arduous process. 

The Postal Service said the agreement supported its 10-year ‘Delivering for America’ mission to modernize operations and adapt to changing customer needs. 

“This is a fair and responsible agreement that serves the best interest of our employees, our customers and the future of the Postal Service,” said Doug Tulino, the deputy postmaster general and chief human resources officer. 

As part of the agreement, all city carriers will get three annual pay increases of 1.3% each by 2025, some of which will be paid retroactively from November 2023. Workers will also receive retroactive and future cost-of-living

There is also a commitment from the Postal Service to “make every effort” to provide mail trucks with air-conditioning. 

The Postal Service in summer began rolling out its new electric delivery vehicles, which come equipped with air-conditioning. While the trucks won’t win any beauty contests, they did get rave reviews from letter carriers accustomed to older vehicles that lack modern safety features and are prone to breaking down — and even catching fire. 

Within a few years, the new delivery fleet will have expanded to 60,000, most of them electric models, serving as the Postal Service’s primary delivery truck from Maine to Hawaii. 

Under the tentative contract agreement, the Postal Service must discuss with the union any plans to buy new mail trucks that don’t have air-conditioning. 

This is the second contract negotiated since DeJoy was appointed postmaster general in 2020. It is expected to take several weeks for union members to ratify the contract. Rural mail deliverers aren’t covered by the contract because they are represented by a different union. 
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miami, florida — Hurricane Oscar formed Saturday off the coast of the Bahamas, according to the National Hurricane Center in Miami, Florida. It characterized the storm as “tiny.” 

The government of the Bahamas has issued a hurricane warning for the Turks and Caicos Islands and the southeastern Bahamas. The government of Cuba has issued a hurricane watch for the provinces of Guantanamo, Holguin, and Las Tunas. 

Locally heavy rainfall is expected across the Turks and Caicos Islands and the southeastern Bahamas later Saturday, according to the latest advisory. Heavy rain is expected to spread to eastern Cuba on Sunday. 

The storm’s maximum sustained winds were clocked at 80 miles per hour (130 kilometers per hour) with higher gusts. Its center was located about 165 miles (260 kilometers) east-southeast of the southeastern Bahamas and about 470 miles (755 kilometers) east of Camaguey, Cuba. 

Hours earlier, Tropical Storm Nadine formed off Mexico’s southern Caribbean coast and was moving inland across Belize. Heavy rain and tropical storm conditions were occurring over parts of Belize and the Yucatan peninsula. 

A tropical storm warning is in effect for Belize City and from Belize to Cancun, Mexico, including the popular tourist destination, Cozumel. 

The hurricane center said Nadine was located about 20 miles (35 kilometers) east of Belize City, with winds of 13 mph (20 kph). Its maximum sustained winds were at 50 mph (85 kph). 

Nadine was expected to move across Belize, northern Guatemala, and southern Mexico through Sunday, the center added. 
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kyiv, ukraine — A video purporting to show dozens of North Korean recruits lining up to collect Russian military fatigues and gear aims to intimidate Ukrainian forces and marks a new chapter in the 2 1/2-year war with the introduction of another country into the battlefield, Ukrainian officials said. 

The video, which was obtained by Ukraine’s Center for Strategic Communications and Information Security, which operates under the Culture and Information Ministry, is said to show North Korean soldiers standing in line to pick up bags, clothes and other apparel from Russian servicemen. The Associated Press could not verify the video independently. 

“We received this video from our own sources. We cannot provide additional verification from the sources who provided it to us due to security concerns,” said Ihor Solovey, head of the center. 

“The video clearly shows North Korean citizens being given Russian uniforms under the direction of the Russian military,” he said. “For Ukraine, this video is important because it is the first video evidence that shows North Korea participating in the war on the side of Russia. Now not only with weapons and shells but also with personnel.” 

The center claims the footage was shot by a Russian soldier in recent days. The location is unknown. 

It comes after the head of Ukrainian military intelligence, Kyrylo Budanov, said in local media reports that about 11,000 North Korean infantrymen were currently training in eastern Russia. He predicted they would be ready to join the fighting by November. At least 2,600 would be sent to Russia’s Kursk region, where Ukraine launched an incursion in August, he was quoted as saying. 

“The emergence of any number of new soldiers is a problem because we will simply need new, additional weapons to destroy them all,” Solovey told AP. “The dissemination of this video is important as a signal to the world community that with two countries officially at war against Ukraine, we will need more support to repel this aggression.” 

The presence of North Korean soldiers in Ukraine, if true, would be another proof of intensified military ties between Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. Last summer, they signed a strategic partnership treaty that commits both countries to provide military assistance. North Korean weapons have already been used in the Ukraine war. 
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ANCHORAGE, ALASKA — On a desolate slab of island tundra in western Alaska, a resident of Adak will again become the last American to cast an in-person ballot for president, continuing a 12-year tradition for the nation’s westernmost community.

The honor of having the last voter in the nation fell to Adak when they did away with absentee-only voting for the 2012 election and added in-person voting.

“People have a little bit of fun on that day because, I mean, realistically everybody knows the election’s decided way before we’re closed,” said city manager Layton Lockett. “But, you know, it’s still fun.”

When polls close in Adak, it will be 1 a.m. on the East Coast.

Adak Island, midway in the Aleutian Island chain and bordered by the Bering Sea to the north and the North Pacific Ocean to the south, is closer to Russia than mainland Alaska. The island best known as a former World War II military base and later naval station is 1,931 kilometers (1,200 miles) southwest of Anchorage and farther west than Hawaii, where polls close an hour earlier.

Mary Nelson said Republican Mitt Romney was likely conceding the 2012 race to President Barack Obama on election night when she became Adak’s first last voter in a presidential election, although she didn’t know Obama had been reelected until the next morning when she turned on her computer to read election results.

Nelson, who now lives in Washington state, recalled to The Associated Press by telephone that she was a poll worker in Adak at the time and had forgotten to vote until just before the 8 p.m. poll closing time.

“When I opened the [voting booth’s] curtain to come back out, the city manager took my picture and announced that I was the last person in Adak to vote,” she said.

That was also the end of the celebration since they still had work to do.

“We had votes to count, and they were waiting for us in Nome to call with our vote count,” she said.

There are U.S. territories farther west than Alaska, but there’s no process in the Electoral College to allow residents in Guam, the northern Mariana Islands, American Samoa and the U.S. Minor Outlying Islands to vote for president, according to the National Archives.

“I’ve been tickled pink and told people about it,” said Nelson, now 73. “I have the story I printed out about it and show some people who I think would think it’s a big deal, like my family,” she said.

Adak Island has historical significance for its role in World War II. The U.S. built facilities on the island after Japanese forces took islands farther west in the Aleutian chain.

Troops landed in August 1942, to begin building an Army base, and enemy planes dropped nine bombs on the island two months later, but in undeveloped areas, and riddled the landscape with machine gun fire. The Navy began building facilities in January 1943.

In May 1943, about 27,000 combat troops gathered on Adak as a staging point to retake nearby Attu Island from the Japanese.

Among famous Americans stationed at Adak were writers Dashiell Hammett and Gore Vidal. The island also played host to President Franklin Roosevelt, boxing champion Joe Lewis and several Hollywood stars, according to the Adak Historical Society.

In a lighter note, the Army attempted to start a forest on Adak Island between 1943 and 1945. A sign placed by residents in the 1960s outside the area of 33 trees noted: “You are now Entering and Leaving the Adak National Forest.”

After the war, the island was transferred to the Air Force and then the Navy in 1950. Nearly 32,000 hectares (80,000 acres) of the 73,000-hectare (180,000-acre) island were set aside for Navy use, and the rest of the island remained part of what eventually became the Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Refuge.

The base closed in 1997. The Navy retains about 2,300 hectares (5,600 acres) with the remainder either owned by the Aleut Corporation, the Alaska Native regional corporation for the area; the city of Adak; or the refuge.

Lockett said the city is facing tough times with a dwindling population and lack of an economic driver. The town’s fish processing plant has closed numerous times over the years.

When the base was active, there were about 6,000 residents on Adak Island. The 2020 Census counted 171 residents. Lockett says that’s probably now down to below 50 full-time residents.

In Alaska, a school must have 10 students to remain open. Mike Hanley, the Aleutian Region School District superintendent, said in an email that the school closed in 2023 after it started the year with six students. That shrank to one by November, and then that student left.

Hanley said by the time he notified the state education department, “there were literally no children on the island, not even younger pre-K students.”

When it comes to politics, Lockett said it’s pretty easy in a small town to know where your neighbors fall politically, but there seems to be one goal that unites everyone.

Whoever is in office, are they going to try to “encourage the military to come back to Adak in some way, shape or form?” he said.

“We’re kind of in that great midst of, what’s next for Adak, because we’re struggling,” he said.

For now, with the presidential election coming up, the city can focus on its unique place in America.

“I’m not sure who the last voter will be this year,” said Adak City Clerk Jana Lekanoff. “Maybe it’ll be a bit of a competition?”
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WASHINGTON — Over the past four years, judges at Washington’s federal courthouse have punished hundreds of rioters who stormed the U.S. Capitol in an unprecedented assault on the nation’s democracy. On the cusp of the next presidential election, some of those judges fear another burst of political violence could be coming.

Before recently sentencing a rioter to prison, U.S. District Judge Reggie Walton said he prays Americans accept the outcome of next month’s election. But the veteran judge expressed concern that Donald Trump and his allies are spreading the same sort of conspiracy theories that fueled the mob’s January 6, 2021, riot.

“That sore loser is saying the same things he said before,” Walton said earlier this month without mentioning the Republican presidential nominee by name. “He’s riling up the troops again, so if he doesn’t get what he wants, it’s not inconceivable that we will experience that same situation again. And who knows? It could be worse.”

‘It scares me’

Walton, a nominee of President George W. Bush, is not alone. Other judges have said the political climate is ripe for another attack like the one that injured more than 100 police officers at the Capitol. As Election Day nears, judges are frequently stressing the need to send a message beyond their courtrooms that political violence can’t be tolerated.

“It scares me to think about what will happen if anyone on either side is not happy with the results of the election,” Judge Jia Cobb, a nominee of President Joe Biden, said during a sentencing hearing last month for four Capitol rioters.

Judge Rudolph Contreras lamented the potential for more politically motivated violence as he sentenced a Colorado man, Jeffrey Sabol, who helped other rioters drag a police officer into the mob. Sabol later told FBI agents that a “call to battle was announced” and that he had “answered the call because he was a patriot warrior.”

“It doesn’t take much imagination to imagine a similar call coming out in the coming months, and the court would be concerned that Mr. Sabol would answer that call in the same way,” Contreras, a President Barack Obama nominee, said in March before sentencing Sabol to more than five years in prison.

Trump’s distortion of the January 6 attack has been a cornerstone of his bid to reclaim the White House. The former president has denied any responsibility for the crimes of supporters who smashed windows, assaulted police officers and sent lawmakers running into hiding as they met to certify Biden’s 2020 victory.

‘Patriots’ and ‘hostages’

Trump has vowed to pardon rioters, whom he calls “patriots” and “hostages,” if he wins in November. And he said he would accept the results of the upcoming election only if it’s “free and fair,” casting doubts reminiscent of his baseless claims in 2020.

Judges have repeatedly used their platform on the bench to denounce those efforts to downplay the violence on January 6 and cast the rioters as political prisoners. And some have raised concerns about what such rhetoric means for the future of the country and its democracy.

“We’re in a real difficult time in our country, and I hope we can survive it,” Walton said this month while sentencing a Tennessee nurse who used a pair of medical scissors to smash a glass door at the Capitol.

“I’ve got a young daughter, I’ve got a young grandson, and I would like for America to be available to them and be as good to them as it has been to me,” he said. “But I don’t know if we survive with the mentality that took place that day.”

More than 1,500 people have been charged with federal crimes related to the January 6 siege, which disrupted the peaceful transfer of presidential power for the first time in the nation’s history. Over 1,000 rioters have been convicted and sentenced. Roughly 650 of them received prison time ranging from a few days to 22 years.

Justice Department prosecutors have argued in many cases that a prison sentence is necessary to deter convicted Capitol rioters from engaging in more politically motivated violence.

“With the 2024 presidential election approaching and many loud voices in the media and online continuing to sow discord and distrust, the potential for a repeat of January 6 looms ominously,” prosecutors have repeatedly warned in court filings.

‘I’d do it all over again’

Prosecutors argue that defendants who have shown little or no remorse for their actions on January 6 could break the law again. Some rioters even seem to be proud of their crimes.

The first rioter to enter the Capitol texted his mother, “I’ll go again given the opportunity.”

A man from Washington state who stormed the Capitol with fellow Proud Boys extremist group members told a judge, “You can give me 100 years, and I’d do it all over again.” A Kentucky nurse who joined the riot told a television interviewer that she would “do it again tomorrow.”

A Colorado woman known to her social media followers as the “J6 praying grandma” avoided a prison sentence in August when a magistrate judge sentenced her for disorderly conduct and trespassing on Capitol grounds. Rebecca Lavrenz told the judge that God, not Trump, led her to Washington on January 6.

“And she has all but promised to do it all over again,” said prosecutor Terence Parker.

Prosecutors had sought 10 months behind bars. After her April trial conviction, Lavrenz went on a “media blitz” to defend the mob, spread misinformation, undermine confidence in the courts and boost her celebrity in a community that believes January 6 “was a good day for this country,” Parker said.

Magistrate Zia Faruqui sentenced Lavrenz to six months of home confinement and fined her $103,000, stressing the need to “lower the volume” before the next election.

“These outside influences, the people that are tearing our country apart, they’re not going to help you,” Faruqui told her.
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Naval drills hosted by Iran with the participation of Russia and Oman and observed by nine other countries began in the Indian Ocean on Saturday, Iran’s state TV said.

The exercises, dubbed “IMEX 2024,” are aimed at boosting “collective security in the region, expand multilateral cooperation and display the goodwill and capabilities to safeguard peace, friendship and maritime security,” the English-language Press TV said.

Participants would practice tactics to ensure international maritime trade security, protect maritime routes, enhance humanitarian measures and exchange information on rescue and relief operations, it said.

The exercises coincide with heightened tensions in the region as Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza rages and Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels retaliate by launching attacks on ships in the Red Sea.

In response to regional tensions with the United States, Iran has increased its military cooperation with Russia and China.

In March, Iran, China and Russia held their fifth joint naval drills in the Gulf of Oman. Countries observing the current drills include Saudi Arabia, Qatar, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Thailand.
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