Disruption

By Pranav Baskar and Matthew Mpoke BiggMonday May 4, 2026 A brazen seizure off Yemen has renewed fears that Somali pirates are regaining their footing — and raised fresh suspicions that they may be operating alongside Iran-backed Houthi rebels amid upheaval across the Middle East. Maritime police forces from the Puntland State region of Somalia patrolling the Gulf of Aden last year.Credit...Feisal Omar/Reuters Somali pirates hijacked an oil tanker off Yemen’s coast on Saturday and steered it into Somali waters, authorities…

The global trading order is under siege, World Trade Organization director-general Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala warned as delegates convened for the WTO ministerial in Yaounde, calling the disruption the most severe the system has faced in eight decades. "The world order and the multilateral system we used to know has irrevocably changed," she said, stressing: "We cannot deny the scale of the problems confronting the world today." With 166 member states represented, the WTO meets in the Cameroonian capital amid stark divisions among…