World

A deadly Easter weekend crossing in the central Mediterranean left two migrants dead and dozens more feared missing after a boat traveling from Libya toward Europe ran into trouble near the Italian coast. Two merchant vessels recovered the bodies of two migrants and rescued 32 survivors, according to rescue charities Mediterranea Saving Humans and Sea-Watch. Citing accounts from those pulled from the water, the groups said 71 other people were lost at sea. The victims were transferred to an Italian coast guard patrol boat…

On 16 February 1992, Sheikh Abbas al-Musawi was heading to Beirut in a black Mercedes with his wife and five-year-old son when the journey turned deadly. The Iran-backed Hezbollah secretary-general was travelling with two Range Rovers carrying armed bodyguards. He was returning from a ceremony commemorating the anniversary of the killing of one of Hezbollah's founders. Trailing the convoy were Israeli Apache AH-64 helicopters, which fired missiles and killed the Hezbollah leader along with his family. A month later, a…

The Moon was looming larger outside NASA’s Orion capsule on Saturday as the crew of Artemis II entered the third day of a mission billed as a crucial step toward putting humans back on the lunar surface later this decade. NASA said the four-member Artemis crew has now crossed the halfway mark between Earth and the Moon as Orion presses on toward its scheduled lunar flyby. "We're halfway there," the space agency posted on social media. NASA also published the first images captured from inside Orion, among them a striking…

A Russian drone strike tore through a market in the frontline Ukrainian city of Nikopol this morning, killing five people and wounding 19 others, according to Ukraine's prosecutor general's office. "This is yet another war crime committed by the Russian Federation," the prosecutor's office said on Telegram. Regional governor Oleksandr Ganja said in a Telegram post that the dead included three women and two men. He also said a 14-year-old girl was among the 19 injured and remained in "critical condition". At the same time, a…

Nearly half a century has passed since Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi climbed aboard his royal jet at Tehran airport and departed Iran for the last time. His exit, in January 1979, was officially framed as a holiday — a claim few took seriously. After 14 months of unrest, the Associated Press captured the moment by calling him "a weeping king driven from his kingdom". Within hours, statues of the Shah were pulled down and his image disappeared from banknotes. Another 26 days would pass before the monarchy finally gave way, and…

A high-stakes American rescue mission deep inside Iran has recovered an airman from behind enemy lines after Tehran shot down a fighter jet, officials said today, easing an immediate political and military test for US President Donald Trump as he considers widening a war now in its sixth week. The rescued airman, whom Mr Trump identified as a colonel, was the weapons-systems officer aboard the downed F-15, a US official said. "Over the past several hours, the United States military pulled off one of the most daring search…

U.S. Revamps Strategy for Global Medical Supply Distribution The United States is transforming its approach to delivering critical medical supplies to economically disadvantaged countries, a change that experts caution might affect millions reliant on treatments for HIV and malaria. For nearly ten years, the U.S. depended on the Global Health Supply Chain Program, managed by contractor Chemonics, to distribute essential medications and preventive measures across developing regions. From 2016 to 2024, this initiative…

For Europe, the week brought back an unwelcome memory: the kind of creeping economic dread last seen when Covid-19 tore through the continent and pushed its economies to the brink in 2020 and 2021. "If this war escalates into a major regional conflict," Chancellor Friedrich Merz said at a Berlin news conference on Monday, "it could burden Germany and Europe even more than we experienced most recently during the Covid-19 pandemic or at the beginning of the war in Ukraine." Those two crises still loom large in EU capitals,…

Easter Sunday will carry unusual weight at the Vatican this year, as Pope Leo XIV prepares to mark the holiest day in the Christian calendar for the first time as pontiff while war in the Middle East darkens the celebration. The US-born pope, who has become one of the conflict’s most prominent critics, is due to celebrate mass in St Peter's Square from 9.30am Irish time before thousands of worshippers. The head of the world’s 1.4 billion Catholics will then deliver the traditional blessing at 11am Irish time, a moment likely…

Southern Lebanon is facing a grave humanitarian emergency under Israeli military occupation, Lebanese MP Najat Saliba has said, warning that thousands of civilians remain trapped in their homes as violence intensifies. In an interview with RTÉ’s Morning Ireland, Ms Saliba said about 10,000 people were cut off in the country’s south. "Israel is invading, and when they come to a village, they actually destroy all houses, and they burn the land. "At the same time, we have almost 10,000 people, or probably a little more, who are…