Politics

South Korea Recalls Its Ambassador to Ukraine in Row Over North Korean POWs: October 8, 2026

SEOUL, South Korea — South Korea said Thursday it will recall its ambassador to Ukraine, escalating a diplomatic dispute over President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s public disclosure that Kyiv had transferred two captured North Korean soldiers to Seoul, the Associated Press and BBC News reported.

The Foreign Ministry did not say when Ambassador Park Hee-chang would return home, the AP said. In a statement, the ministry said it would “continue consultations with the Ukrainian side” and expected that “various outstanding issues” would be resolved smoothly. Seoul says Ukraine broke an agreement to keep the transfer secret; Zelenskyy’s office says no non-disclosure agreement existed.

Zelenskyy revealed the transfer in his U.N. General Assembly speech on Sept. 23. South Korean President Lee Jae Myung called it “greatly disappointing” and a “highly sensitive issue” affecting national security, and had threatened unspecified punitive steps if Ukraine did not apologize. Foreign Minister Cho Hyun said this week that he had received an apology from his Ukrainian counterpart that fell short of expectations, but Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Heorhii Tykhyi said Wednesday that Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha had not apologized, the BBC reported.

The two soldiers were among thousands of North Korean troops sent to support Russia’s war and were captured in early 2025; they had said they wanted to resettle in South Korea. Seoul says secrecy was meant partly to protect their families in the North. South Korea has given Ukraine $445 million in humanitarian aid since 2022 and pledged $100 million more in July, but refuses to supply lethal weapons.

Sources: Associated Press (via NPR), BBC News, DW

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Ethiopian Drones Strike Eritrean Troops Inside Tigray as Fears of a Regional War Grow: October 8, 2026

Ethiopian drones struck Eritrean forces who had crossed into northern Ethiopia’s Tigray region, a conflict monitor and witnesses said Thursday, raising fears that Ethiopia’s renewed internal war could become a conflict between the two neighbors, AFP and the Associated Press reported.

The conflict monitor ACLED said Eritrean troops crossed the border at Zelambesa on Wednesday and came under drone attack at Guada as they traveled toward Idaga Hamus, attributing the strikes to Ethiopia’s military. It also said “Eritrean troops and ammunition” in the Adigrat area were hit by “multiple drone strikes” overnight. “There were many, many drone strikes yesterday. Some Eritrean lorries have been destroyed. They are no longer in the streets,” one witness in Adigrat told AFP; another said Eritrean troops appeared to be retreating north. The AP said it could not independently verify the accounts.

Neither government responded to AFP’s questions about the fighting. Eritrean Information Minister Yemane Gebremeskel did not explicitly confirm or deny that troops had crossed, but accused Ethiopia of jeopardizing regional peace through its pursuit of “sovereign access to the sea,” the AP reported. Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed reiterated Monday that his landlocked country must have access to the Red Sea.

Fighting resumed in recent weeks between Ethiopian federal forces and an opposition alliance that includes the Tigray People’s Liberation Front, undermining the 2022 peace deal. Government-allied fighters entered the regional capital, Mekelle, on Sunday after the TPLF withdrew, and residents of Shire told the AP that TPLF forces had pulled out of that town on Wednesday. Earlier this month Ethiopia expelled 10 Eritrean diplomats and closed its embassy in Asmara, and Eritrea said it was severing diplomatic ties. The two countries fought a border war from 1998 to 2000.

Sources: AFP (via Al Arabiya), Associated Press

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Italy’s Parliament Passes Meloni’s Electoral Overhaul With a Bonus-Seat Prize for the Winner: October 8, 2026

ROME — Italy’s parliament on Thursday approved a fiercely contested overhaul of the country’s electoral system championed by Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, ahead of national elections due by next year, BBC News reported.

Lawmakers voted 227 to 164 in a secret ballot to replace the current hybrid system, in which about a third of seats are filled by first-past-the-post contests, with a fully proportional one. A party or coalition that tops 42 percent will receive bonus seats — up to 70 in the 400-seat Chamber of Deputies and 35 in the Senate — which could turn a narrow win into a comfortable majority. Coalitions must also name their joint candidate for prime minister and publish their program before the vote.

Meloni had warned she could resign and trigger an early election if the reform failed. Opponents say it is designed to keep her right-wing coalition in power. “Go ahead and change the electoral law, we will win in any case under any voting system,” Democratic Party leader Elly Schlein said during the debate. Riccardo Magi of the More Europe party, who went on a hunger strike against the bill, called it an “anti-democratic law,” Al Jazeera reported.

“To those who hoped to see the centre-right divided, today we respond with facts: we are united, cohesive, and determined to carry forward the commitments made to citizens,” Meloni wrote on social media after the vote, according to the BBC. Her government recently became Italy’s longest-serving since World War II. Her term ends in October 2027, and the next general election must be held by Dec. 22, 2027, though it could be brought forward to the spring.

Sources: BBC News, Al Jazeera

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Sri Lanka Arrests Former First Lady Shiranthi Rajapaksa Over Children’s Hospital Charity Funds: October 7, 2026

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka — Sri Lankan anti-corruption authorities on Wednesday arrested former first lady Shiranthi Rajapaksa, wife of ex-President Mahinda Rajapaksa, over allegations that a charity linked to her misused donations raised for a children’s hospital, BBC News and AFP reported.

Investigators arrested the 73-year-old at the couple’s Colombo home. They are questioning her over 10 million rupees, about $30,300, collected by the Siriliya Saviya charity for a specialized scanner for Colombo’s Lady Ridgeway Children’s Hospital. Officials say such a scanner had already been donated by the Chinese government.

Rajapaksa denies wrongdoing and says the money was not misappropriated. Her husband’s spokesman, Manoj Gamage, said the funds are safe in Siriliya’s accounts. She returned Monday from medical treatment in Singapore and had petitioned a court to block her arrest, but the hearing was set for Oct. 12, the BBC reported.

Mahinda Rajapaksa was president from 2005 to 2015 and was hailed by supporters for ending the civil war with the Tamil Tigers in 2009. The family’s grip on politics collapsed in 2022, when an economic crisis toppled his brother Gotabaya. President Anura Kumara Dissanayake’s government has revived corruption probes into the family; the couple’s sons Namal and Yoshitha were both arrested earlier this year.

Sources: BBC News, AFP

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Israel Marks Three Years Since the October 7 Hamas Attack as Gaza Remains in Ruins: October 7, 2026

REIM, Israel — Israelis gathered Wednesday to mark three years since the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack that killed 1,200 people, saw 251 taken hostage and set off a war that has left much of Gaza in ruins, the Associated Press reported via NPR. It is the first anniversary since all the hostages, living and dead, were returned.

At the Nova music festival site near Reim, where more than 350 people were killed, relatives hugged at 6:29 a.m., the minute the first rockets were launched three years ago, as explosions boomed in nearby Gaza. “I have a video of him dancing here that ends at 6:29 in the morning, it’s in front of my eyes all the time,” said Anya Davitashili, whose 25-year-old son, Sean, was killed. Elkana Bohbot, freed after 738 days in captivity, marked the day in Israel for the first time.

At Kibbutz Nir Oz, a mile from the Gaza border, 41 residents and foreign workers were killed and 76 people were taken to Gaza, BBC News reported. “That’s one out of four of us: murdered or kidnapped,” resident Dalit Ram Aharon said. The anniversary comes as Israelis absorb reports in Israeli and U.S. media that regional allies warned Israel beforehand; a senior Egyptian official told NPR that Egypt’s then-intelligence chief had relayed a warning that Gaza was on the verge of an “explosion.”

For Palestinians, the day brought no relief. Most of Gaza’s roughly 2 million people live in tent camps, more than half the territory remains under Israeli military control, and Israeli strikes continue almost daily despite a ceasefire reached nearly a year ago, AP reported. Hamas praised the attack in a statement. “We witnessed death, destruction, and bombardment that we had never known before,” said Gaza City resident Walid Akram.

Sources: Associated Press (via NPR), BBC News, NPR

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Mali’s Army Retakes Kidal From Tuareg Rebels With Russian Help: October 7, 2026

BAMAKO, Mali — Malian forces backed by Russia’s Africa Corps paramilitary group have retaken the northern town of Kidal from Tuareg separatists, the country’s military-led government said Tuesday, the Associated Press, Al Jazeera and DW reported.

The Azawad Liberation Front (FLA), a coalition of Tuareg and northern separatist factions, said it had carried out a “controlled withdrawal” from the town after sustained air strikes by Malian troops and their Russian allies, calling it a temporary operational measure. Government spokesman Brig. Gen. Issa Ousmane Coulibaly said on state television that the operation was carried out by air and ground forces with Africa Corps assistance. An FLA spokesman, Mohamed Elmaouloud Ramadane, said the army entered Kidal without a fight, AP reported.

The FLA and the al-Qaida-linked group Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM) seized Kidal in a wave of attacks in April that also killed Mali’s defense minister. Malian troops and Wagner fighters had first retaken the town in November 2023, the most concrete gain of their partnership, before losing it this year.

Analysts cautioned against reading too much into the advance. Retaking the town “affirms the military-led government’s authority and boosts the army’s morale,” Beverly Ochieng of Control Risks told Reuters, according to DW, but she called it largely “symbolic” and not “decisive.” Mali’s junta, which took power in coups in 2020 and 2021, expelled French forces and U.N. peacekeepers and turned to Russian paramilitaries; rights groups have accused the army and its Russian partners of abuses during military operations.

Sources: Associated Press, Al Jazeera, DW

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U.S. Official Says Iran-Linked Plot Aimed to Kill American Troops at England’s RAF Fairford: October 7, 2026

LONDON — A U.S.-run air base in western England faced Iranian-related threats, and the Trump administration believed the aim was to kill as many American troops and destroy as many U.S. planes as possible, a U.S. official told the Associated Press, after the Pentagon pulled all of its bombers from the base.

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, could not describe the nature of the potential attack. RAF Fairford, about 100 miles west of London, has been used by American B-1 and B-52 bombers to strike Iran during this year’s war. The U.S. moved its B-1s out on Sunday, and the Pentagon said all American bombers there had returned to their home bases in the United States.

“We had a threat, and if we’re going to be threatened, we would just move them, and that sort of alleviates that,” President Donald Trump told reporters Monday, saying those behind the threat “would be linked to Iran.” British Prime Minister Andy Burnham has said there were “strong indications” Iran played a part in a Sept. 27 incident near the base, when police were alerted to three “suspicious vehicles,” BBC News reported. Tehran has strongly denied involvement.

On Tuesday, Counter Terrorism Policing arrested a 22-year-old British man in the Westminster area of London on suspicion of preparation of terrorist acts, AP reported. It is the seventh arrest in the suspected plot; six other men have been released on bail. Whitehall officials told the BBC that “there is an ongoing high tempo of threat from Iran to the UK.”

Sources: Associated Press, BBC News

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Flávio Bolsonaro Wins Key Endorsements for Brazil Runoff and Talks of Changing the Constitution: October 7, 2026

GOIÂNIA, Brazil — Right-wing presidential candidate Flávio Bolsonaro collected a string of endorsements on Tuesday for Brazil’s Oct. 25 runoff against President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and said he wants to use a newly strengthened conservative Congress to change the country’s Constitution, El País, Valor International and G1 reported.

Former Goiás governor Ronaldo Caiado, who finished fifth in Sunday’s first round with 2.18 percent of the vote, formally backed Bolsonaro at an event in Goiânia. “I am here to defeat the PT,” Caiado said, referring to Lula’s Workers’ Party, according to El País. The União Brasil–Progressistas federation, which stayed neutral in the first round, also announced its support after a unanimous decision by its party leaders, Sen. Tereza Cristina said. Former Minas Gerais governor Romeu Zema of the Novo party declared his vote for Bolsonaro on Monday.

Bolsonaro, a senator and the eldest son of former President Jair Bolsonaro, who is serving a sentence for coup plotting, won 47.03 percent of first-round votes to Lula’s 45.16 percent, according to G1. Speaking in Goiânia, he said voters had given him a Congress “much further to the right,” with majorities to choose the leaders of both chambers, “so that we can change the Constitution, so that we can redemocratize this country,” Valor International reported. He did not say which changes he has in mind.

G1 noted that the Constitution can be amended through proposed constitutional amendments that require large majorities in both houses, while some core clauses cannot be abolished. The Social Democratic Party (PSD) remains officially neutral, and Bolsonaro is also courting the Republicanos party of São Paulo Gov. Tarcísio de Freitas, who attended the Goiânia event, UOL reported.

Sources: El País, Valor International, G1

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Albanese Warns of Extreme Australian Summer as Pacific Leaders Tour Tuvalu Ahead of COP31: October 6, 2026

FUNAFUTI, Tuvalu — Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese warned Tuesday that Australia faces a summer of floods, cyclones and extreme heat as he joined Pacific leaders at a preparatory meeting for the U.N. COP31 climate summit, where representatives of 30 nations toured land-reclamation works on low-lying Tuvalu, The Guardian and Reuters reported.

“Climate change is not a problem for the future. It is here right now, and we know that sea levels here in the western Pacific are rising at more than twice the global average,” Albanese said. “In Australia, we are expecting a summer of floods, of cyclones, of extreme heat.” He told the visitors in Tuvalu: “Here in Tuvalu, we are seeing what action can look like. It’s about people.” The pre-COP gathering is being hosted by Fiji and Tuvalu ahead of COP31 in Türkiye next month; Australia is leading this year’s negotiations.

Delegates watched sand dredged from the Funafuti lagoon being used to reclaim about six hectares of land, part of roughly $50 million in donor-funded work that has also built sea walls and barriers. Project manager Alan Resture said the effort, the third in a series, will soon have added about 21 hectares to Tuvalu’s main island. Tuvalu’s roughly 10,000 people live on land averaging about two meters above sea level. “You are standing on front-line soil,” Foreign Minister Paulson Panapa told the leaders. “Promises will not hold back rising tides.”

Pacific leaders pressed for faster money and deeper emissions cuts. “Why should countries like Tuvalu take on more debt to protect ourselves from a climate crisis we did so little to cause?” Tuvalu Prime Minister Feleti Teo asked. Fiji’s prime minister, Sitiveni Rabuka, said the commitment to transition away from fossil fuels “was agreed to by all of us in Dubai” in 2023. “It is not a new ask, and it is not open for renegotiation.” Tuvalu’s climate change director, Jamie Ovia, said flood and storm-surge damage could cost $63 million a year by 2100, more than the country’s GDP.

Attendance fell short of Canberra’s hopes: 11 of the 14 presidents and prime ministers on the Australian government’s list came from Pacific island states, with the rest from Australia, Mauritius and East Timor, Reuters reported. Australia, which is bankrolling the meeting, has drawn criticism as a major coal and gas exporter that continues to approve fossil fuel projects.

Sources: The Guardian, Reuters

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Indian Police Detain Rahul Gandhi and Opposition MPs Marching on Election Commission: October 6, 2026

NEW DELHI — Police in India’s capital on Tuesday detained opposition lawmakers, including opposition leader Rahul Gandhi and his sister Priyanka, as they marched from Parliament toward the Election Commission headquarters to demand the resignation of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar over a disputed revision of voter rolls, BBC News and Al Jazeera reported.

The lawmakers were forced onto police buses and taken to police stations but were released shortly afterward, when they resumed the march and began a sit-in near the commission’s offices. Police did not say how many were held; the opposition said 237 MPs from a range of parties took part. “The election commission is a puppet in the hands of the government,” Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge told reporters, listing three “non-negotiable” demands: Kumar’s resignation, cancellation of the revision and a return to paper ballots.

At the center of the row is the Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls, which began in Bihar in June 2025 and has since expanded to most states. More than 130 million names have been removed from draft voter lists nationwide. The commission says the exercise removes duplicate, deceased and ineligible entries; critics say its document requirements risk excluding millions of eligible voters, and commission data shows rolls in some regions could shrink by as much as 30 percent.

The campaign against Kumar intensified after the Indian Express reported that the commission’s two other members had formally objected at least 14 times to decisions issued in the commission’s name without their knowledge. The commission says differing views are part of its functioning and decisions were ultimately unanimous. India’s Supreme Court has asked the government and commission to respond to a petition on the issue but declined to suspend Kumar for now.

The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party condemned the march. BJP spokesperson Sambit Patra said Congress leaders had “decided to establish anarchy in the country and attack institutions.” The youth-led “Cockroach” movement, which staged protests in Mumbai and Delhi last week, has called another round of demonstrations for Oct. 10.

Sources: BBC News, Al Jazeera

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