Politics
The Justice Department's newly released Epstein files implicated numerous prominent figures, naming Bill Gates and prompting Melinda French Gates to demand answers while police opened a probe into Peter Mandelson.
The White House confirmed the United States and Iran would hold direct talks in Oman on Friday after days of conflicting reports about timing, location and format.
Ukrainian, Russian and U.S. negotiators held trilateral talks in Abu Dhabi on Wednesday that Ukraine called productive, while the Kremlin said it would continue fighting until Kyiv conceded.
Tom Homan, the Trump administration’s border czar, announced the immediate withdrawal of 700 ICE and CBP agents from Minneapolis after two fatal shootings by federal officers and nationwide outcry.
More than three million files linked to Jeffrey Epstein were released, and President Donald Trump refused to discuss them, insulting a journalist who asked about the documents.
The New START nuclear-arms treaty between the United States and Russia expired today, eliminating the last bilateral limits on their strategic arsenals and prompting warnings of a renewed arms race.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said about 55,000 Ukrainian soldiers had been killed fighting Russia, a figure Kyiv presented as its official estimate.
Chinese President Xi Jinping pressed U.S. President Donald Trump on Taiwan and warned against arms sales during a phone call that also covered Iran and trade, officials said.
Israeli strikes killed at least 18 Palestinians in Gaza and halted patient transfers at Rafah, Palestinian officials said, after Israel said a gunman shot and wounded an Israeli soldier.
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Pressure grew on Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s chief of staff, Morgan McSweeney, over Peter Mandelson’s proposed ambassadorial appointment after Commons revelations about Mandelson’s links to Jeffrey Epstein unsettled MPs.
DOJ said it removed ICE lawyer Julie T. Le after she told a Minnesota federal judge "this job sucks" and said immigration agencies hadn't complied with court orders.
EU member states agreed terms for a €90 billion loan to Ukraine, setting strict eligibility for military purchases and offering British firms access if the UK helps cover borrowing costs.
French prosecutors raided X's Paris offices and summoned owner Elon Musk to answer questions in a probe of the platform, a search X called "abusive."
Spain's prime minister Pedro Sánchez announced a plan to bar under-16s from social media and to increase platform liability, prompting criticism from Elon Musk and Telegram founder Pavel Durov.
The U.S. Supreme Court cleared California's new congressional map, allowing a plan that could give Democrats as many as five additional House seats after Republicans sought intervention.
Telegram founder Pavel Durov accused Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez’s proposed social-media law of threatening internet freedoms and sparking a public clash with Moncloa.
Ryan Routh was sentenced to life in prison for attempting to assassinate President Donald Trump at his West Palm Beach golf course in 2024.
President Donald Trump verbally attacked CNN reporter Kaitlan Collins at the White House when she questioned him about Jeffrey Epstein's victims, trading insults in the Oval Office.
Russian and Ukrainian negotiators, mediated by the United States, held talks in Abu Dhabi while Russian drone and missile attacks continued to strike Ukraine, overshadowing the diplomacy.
The U.S. shot down an Iranian drone near a U.S. aircraft carrier, which Washington called self‑defense, while Iran said planned talks in Oman would still take place Friday.
The European Parliament resumed consideration of a US-EU trade agreement in Strasbourg after President Trump retreated on Greenland, and lawmakers demanded guarantees Washington would not threaten European sovereignty.
Human Rights Watch said in its 2026 global report that Donald Trump had undermined core U.S. democratic pillars, likening the country to Russia and China and urging a democratic coalition.
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz traveled to Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates to seek a strategic partnership with Gulf states, including talks on arms and energy.
In Washington, Gustavo Petro handed Donald Trump a list of suspected drug kingpins abroad, while Claudia Sheinbaum rejected Trump’s claim that cartels controlled Mexico.
Tom Homan, the administration's border czar, said he withdrew 700 federal immigration agents from Minnesota, citing increased cooperation from state corrections authorities.
President Donald Trump planned to install a restored Christopher Columbus statue on the White House grounds, reviving a monument toppled in 2020 and drawing criticism from historians and conservationists.
France arrested four suspected Chinese agents in Gironde after they built a satellite dish at a rented holiday home to intercept and transmit sensitive military data to China.
Thuringia’s AfD leader Björn Höcke failed in a constructive no-confidence vote to unseat CDU Minister-President Mario Voigt in the Landtag, though Höcke picked up one extra vote beyond his faction.
Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi said ICE agents sent to the 2026 Milan‑Cortina Winter Olympics would have no operational policing role, limited to analysis and information‑sharing.
Venezuelan security forces and the FBI detained Alex Saab, a Colombian‑Venezuelan businessman and former Maduro minister, in Caracas for extradition to the United States.
Volkswagen and Stellantis urged EU policymakers in Brussels to create a “Made in Europe” label for electric cars to protect jobs, boost innovation and preserve continental production.
Renée Good's brothers testified to a U.S. congressional forum that ICE agents fatally shot their sister during an operation in Minneapolis and urged lawmakers to act.
Saif al-Islam Gaddafi, son of Libya's late dictator Muammar Gaddafi, was shot dead by masked assailants at his residence near Zintan, southwest of Tripoli.
Kari Nessa Nordtun instructed the Norwegian Education Directorate to reject several new private schools despite Stortinget's support, prompting critics to say she exceeded her authority.
Former Rep. Lee H. Hamilton of Indiana died at 94 after a 34‑year House career in which he led the Foreign Affairs and Intelligence committees and the Sept. 11 commission.
Die Bundeswehr reduzierte ihre Truppenpräsenz im Nordirak und zog Soldaten aus Erbil ab, weil die Spannungen zwischen den USA und dem Iran gestiegen waren.
A judge at Spain's Audiencia Nacional released Francisco de Borbón on €50,000 bail, barred him from leaving Spain and confiscated his passport pending an investigation into alleged money‑laundering.
France's public prosecutor asked an appeals court to impose five years' ineligibility on National Rally leader Marine Le Pen in her appeal trial, potentially blocking a 2027 presidential bid.
The Italian government presented a security decree to the Council of Ministers today that extended self‑defense rights to citizens, granted legal protections for police, and authorized preventive detentions.
In Modena, former general Paolo Vannacci, at his first public appearance after quitting the League to form Futuro Nazionale, accused Matteo Salvini of being "the traitor."
Elly Schlein launched a Pescara campaign against the government's Nordio security reform, calling it "liberticidal," while Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi urged preventive detention in the Senate.
Former general Luca Vannacci launched a new party in Italy after leaving the League, drawing supporters and prompting concern among right‑wing allies about electoral impact.
Italian officials said they repelled Russian-linked cyberattacks that targeted Milano‑Cortina Olympic websites, hotels in Cortina and several embassies or consulates abroad.
Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi in Japan called a snap parliamentary election for Sunday, giving rivals three weeks to rally for her majority in a high-stakes gamble over her future.
AfD state parliament member Jörg Dornau was arrested inside the Saxony Landtag after prosecutors accused him of evading EU sanctions and concealing income from a Belarus onion farm.
Carabinieri's ROS said investigators found a dossier on MEP Ilaria Salis while jailed in Hungary, alleging an IT consultant obtained her criminal record and passed it to Vincenzo De Marzio.
Italy's interior minister Matteo Piantedosi said ICE agents would attend the Milan–Cortina Winter Olympics but would have no operational authority and Italian police would retain responsibility for security.
Germany streamlined housing subsidies into two KfW programs to speed construction, while U.S. lawmakers advanced bipartisan measures aimed at rewarding new building and cutting red tape.
Two men were arrested over alleged sabotage of German Navy ships in Hamburg, and Greek authorities held a 55-year-old Greek in Komotini pending extradition under a European arrest warrant.
Italy’s Carabinieri NAS said its 2025 review found widespread intramoenia and billing fraud, carrying out 45,762 inspections, issuing 6,255 criminal sanctions and 148 arrests.
General Vannacci’s Futuro Nazionale polled between 2% and 4.5% in Italy and was unlikely to enter a governing majority, polls showed.
President Trump pursued buying Greenland, prompting renewed scrutiny of U.S.–Danish control arrangements and, according to Swiss paper Tages-Anzeiger, a spike in Swiss imports of Greenlandic gold.
Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin held a videoconference Wednesday and hailed their deepening economic, diplomatic and military ties as a stabilizing factor amid global turbulence.
