World - Tuesday, May 5, 2026

President Trump said a U.S. blockade on the Strait of Hormuz would “remain in full force.” The sudden shift came after Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said U.S. efforts to free vessels trapped in the waterway would continue.

President Donald Trump said he was halting the US military operation to escort ships through the strait of Hormuz US-Iran truce teeters on meltdown as stalemate takes toll on each side Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, is travelling to Beijing later today for talks with his Chinese counterpart “on bilateral relations and regional and international developments”, his ministry said on its Telegram account. While Beijing condemned the initial US and Israeli strikes on Iran which started the war in late February, China has largely adopted a posture of neutrality ever since and has urged for a diplomatic resolution to the conflict. Continue reading...

The operation guide ships through the Strait of Hormuz will be halted because progress has been made toward reaching a deal with Iran, the US president says.

The president made the announcement in a social media post just hours after Secretary of State Marco Rubio had affirmed the newly created mission, which bore little connection to the original justification for war.

Follow updates live Get our breaking news email , free app or daily news podcast Federal shadow treasurer says any handouts in budget could add to inflation The federal shadow treasurer, Tim Wilson , has warned that potential cash handouts in next week’s federal budget could add to inflation. Unfortunately when the government hasn’t take inflation seriously, we’ve ended up in this situation and the risk is that if you keep handing out money to households, what you’ll actually do is fuel inflation. This is a government that cuts taxes. We’ve cut taxes already and we will cut taxes again, we made that clear and we made that public. The issue is, the budget won’t be pumping a lot of extra stimulus in the economy, in fact overall we’ll be winding back spending in the budget. Continue reading...

Mamata Banerjee loses West Bengal state, throwing her party - and political future - into doubt.

Control of Congress at stake as Ohio Senate seat could tip scale for Democrats to retake chamber in November Sign up for the Breaking News US email Donald Trump has issued a fresh verbal attack against Pope Leo XIV, accusing the pontiff of “endangering a lot of Catholics” because “he thinks it’s fine for Iran to have a nuclear weapon”. The remarks come two days before Marco Rubio, the US secretary of state, meets Leo at the Vatican in an effort to ease the tensions sparked by Trump’s previous broadside against the Chicago-born pontiff over his condemnation of the US-Israeli war on Iran. Continue reading...

He was saved by a Jersey family after escaping a Nazi labour camp, but after the war he disappeared in the Soviet Union.

The Strait of Hormuz crisis is pushing Gulf states and the U.S. to develop alternative energy routes, reducing dependence on one vulnerable choke point.

At least 12 people were killed in Zaporizhzhia, one of the highest tolls from a single attack so far this year. The cities of Dnipro and Kramatorsk were also attacked.