देश-विदेश

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky accused Moscow of deploying North Korean ballistic missiles during a series of overnight attacks across Ukraine that left at least seven people dead in Zaporizhzhia. Local officials in Zaporizhzhia reported that the strikes hit the city’s Zaporizhstal metallurgical plant with guided bombs and missiles, killing seven employees, injuring 24 others, and forcing the facility to suspend operations. The barrage was part of a broader aerial offensive involving 120 Russian drones and multiple missile launches that disrupted power supplies in Kharkiv and Kherson while damaging civilian infrastructure in Kyiv and Sumy. In response, Ukrainian forces launched retaliatory deep-space strikes targeting critical Russian supply and industrial assets. Ukrainian drones struck facilities belonging to online retailer Wildberries in the Voronezh region, as well as a petrochemical plant in western Siberia. The long-range campaign follows a strike on the Tanevo oil refinery in Tatarstan, located over 680 miles inside Russian territory, which killed 13 people and injured dozens. Zelensky warned that Moscow’s growing reliance on North Korean weaponry and troops presents a expanding international security threat. Western military intelligence previously noted that thousands of North Korean soldiers had been deployed to support Russian units in the Kursk region, where allied forces suffered heavy casualties during autumn combat.

Canadian airline WestJet has agreed to pay 4.5 million Canadian dollars to settle a decade-long class-action lawsuit brought by thousands of female flight attendants over workplace harassment. A British Columbia Supreme Court judge approved the final agreement on Monday, concluding negotiations that began in June. The settlement funds will be distributed among 3,452 current and former flight attendants after deducting legal fees and administrative costs. The lawsuit was initially filed in 2016 by former flight attendant Mandalena Lewis, who alleged that a pilot sexually assaulted her during a 2010 layover in Hawaii and that the company failed to take appropriate investigative action after she reported the incident. Lewis criticized the final terms, stating that the agreement failed to deliver complete justice for the victims. The settlement contains no admission of guilt by WestJet, nor does it mandate compulsory anti-harassment training for flight crews. However, the carrier agreed to commission an independent inquiry to review its reporting procedures, workplace culture, and underreporting issues, affirming its commitment to strengthening employee safety measures.

Jury selection began this week at the Regional Justice Centre in Las Vegas for the long-delayed trial of Duane “Keffe D” Davis, who is accused of orchestrating the 1996 drive-by shooting that killed hip-hop icon Tupac Shakur. Davis, 63, faces a charge of murder with a deadly weapon with a gang enhancement, carrying a potential sentence of life in prison without parole if convicted. Prosecutors allege that Davis, a former shot-caller for the South Side Compton Crips, supplied the firearm and directed the attack in retaliation for an assault on his nephew, Orlando Anderson, by Shakur and Death Row Records associates following a boxing match at the MGM Grand. The case relies heavily on self-incriminating accounts provided by Davis, including statements made to police in 2008 and details published in his 2019 co-authored memoir, Compton Street Legend. While prosecutors maintain that Davis breached non-prosecution conditions through his public commentary, defence attorneys argue that the book was ghostwritten and heavily embellished for financial gain, maintaining that Davis was not present in Las Vegas on the night of the shooting. Jury selection is expected to continue through the end of the week to establish a final panel of 12 jurors and four alternates. Opening arguments are scheduled to commence today, on 17 August, in a trial projected to span roughly four weeks.

Four prominent non-governmental organizations filed a joint federal lawsuit contesting executive sanctions imposed by the Trump administration on the International Criminal Court, arguing the penalties unlawfully disrupt global war crimes prosecutions. The legal challenge, brought by Human Rights Watch, the Center for Constitutional Rights, the Open Society Institute, and the American Friends Service Committee, targets an executive order enacted in February 2025. The presidential directive established financial sanctions and travel bans against ICC officials, judges, and affiliated advocacy groups involved in investigating alleged war crimes in Palestinian territory, including cases involving senior Israeli officials. Attorneys representing the civil rights organizations contend that the broad scope of the sanctions violates First Amendment protections regarding free speech and association. The suit asserts that the threat of severe civil and criminal penalties has effectively forced US-based legal advocates to suspend representation of victims before the tribunal, while halting formal collaborations with sanctioned international rights groups. The filing marks the latest in a series of legal challenges against the administration’s broader push to limit the jurisdiction of the Hague-based court. Representatives for the US Department of State and Department of Justice did not immediately issue formal statements regarding the lawsuit.

The United States Department of Justice has arrested leading far-right extremism expert Heidi Beirich, charging her with financial crimes in an expansion of the federal government’s criminal case against the Southern Poverty Law Centre (SPLC). A superseding indictment returned in Alabama federal court charges Beirich, the former chief financial officer and Intelligence Project director for the SPLC, with conspiracy to commit wire fraud, conspiracy to make false statements to a bank, and conspiracy to commit money laundering. The charges stem from an April indictment against the civil rights organization over a discontinued intelligence programme that paid informants to infiltrate white supremacist groups. Federal prosecutors allege the SPLC secretly funneled donor funds through shell companies and fictitious entities to hide payments made to field sources. The government claims Beirich engaged in a romantic relationship with one informant and oversaw the transfer of $140,000 in donor funds into a shared bank account. Beirich, who currently serves as chief strategy officer and co-founder of the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism, denied the allegations through her legal counsel. Defense attorney Michael Proctor characterized the prosecution as politically motivated retaliation against an expert who dedicated decades to dismantling white supremacist movements. A federal judge in Alabama permitted the broader case against the SPLC to proceed last week after rejecting arguments requesting a dismissal on grounds of vindictive prosecution.

At least 44 people have died after an severely overcrowded passenger ferry capsized on Lake Kariba in Zimbabwe, according to updated statements from national police authorities. The vessel, which had a maximum rated capacity of 90 individuals, was carrying at least 114 adult passengers, five crew members, and an unrecorded number of children under ticketing age when it encountered severe waves. A surviving crew member reported that up to 153 passengers may have been aboard when the boat began taking on water roughly 30 minutes after departing the port town of Kariba. Zimbabwe’s Civil Protection Unit deployed a specialized aquatic rescue team and helicopters to locate dozens of individuals who remain unaccounted for. While initial emergency reports placed the confirmed death toll at 15, police retrieved additional bodies from the water throughout Wednesday afternoon, raising the official fatality count significantly. Lake Kariba, the world’s largest man-made lake by volume, serves as a crucial transit route for rural communities traveling between mainland settlements, fishing camps, and islands. Local officials and disaster management agencies have recommended that the incident be formally declared a national disaster as search and recovery operations continue.

A Mexican judge has ruled that prosecutors presented sufficient evidence to formally charge Ángel Aguirre, the former governor of Guerrero state, with forced disappearance and obstruction of justice in connection with the 2014 vanishing of 43 students. Aguirre, who was arrested following new testimony gathered by a federal investigative unit, is accused of ordering the destruction of surveillance camera recordings that could have clarified the events surrounding the abduction of students from the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Teachers’ College in Iguala. Defence counsel denied all allegations, asserting that Aguirre was attending a high-level meeting at the time the recordings were allegedly transferred to him. The judge ordered that Aguirre remain held in a maximum-security prison pending trial. The indictment represents one of the most prominent legal developments in the case since the 2022 arrest of former federal Attorney General Jesús Murillo Karam. Of the 43 trainees abducted on 26 September 2014 after commandeering buses for a protest, the remains of only three have been positively identified.