German Chancellor Friedrich Merz has said there appears to be “clearly no joint plan” to bring the US and Israeli war on Iran to a swift end, warning of a dangerous escalation as the conflict continues to widen across the region.
As the United States-Israel war on Iran continues to dominate international headlines, below is a roundup of some of the stories you may have missed on Tuesday.
A former Syrian colonel living in the United Kingdom has appeared before a London court to face crimes against humanity charges linked to his alleged role in repressing demonstrations in 2011.
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Salem Michel al-Salem appeared virtually at a hearing at London’s Westminster Magistrates’ Court on Tuesday. He did not speak or enter any plea, but could be seen with a breathing tube over his mouth.
The 58-year-old has been charged with three counts of murder as a crime against humanity, relating to killings in April and July 2011 “as part of a widespread or systematic attack against a civilian population with knowledge of the attack”.
The case is the first prosecution of its kind in the UK, according to police.
Syria’s Defence Ministry has announced that Sipan Hamo, a commander in the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG), has been appointed deputy defence minister for the country’s eastern territories.
The move on Tuesday is part of the implementation of a US-brokered agreement reached in late January to end weeks of deadly clashes between Kurdish forces and the Syrian army.
The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), the Kurdish-led group that signed the reintegration deal, said in a statement that Hamo’s appointment “confirms the commitment of all Syrian parties to supporting security and stability in the region”.
Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa, who took power after the fall of longtime leader Bashar al-Assad in December 2024, has been seeking to reintegrate Kurdish forces into the country’s state institutions.
In a mid-January interview with the Reuters news agency, Hamo said the Kurds were not seeking secession and emphasised that they saw their future within Syria.
Human Rights Watch (HRW) has accused authorities in Zimbabwe of intensifying a crackdown on critics of the ruling party’s attempt to advance a constitutional amendment that would extend President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s term in office.
The global rights group said the amendment proposed by the Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF) party would extend both the president’s and parliament’s terms from five to seven years. That would effectively postpone the country’s 2028 elections until 2030.
HRW said on Tuesday that police and unidentified armed men in recent months have “threatened, harassed, and beat up several people” who are opposed to the move, including members of the opposition National Constitutional Assembly political party.
“Zimbabwe’s leaders should demonstrate their commitment to the rule of law by respecting the country’s constitution and international human rights obligations for freedom of expression and assembly,” Idriss Ali Nassah, a senior Africa researcher at HRW, said in a statement.
“Civil society, legal experts, and ordinary people should be allowed to peacefully express their views without fear.”
Italy has purchased a rare portrait by Baroque master Caravaggio for nearly $35m, one of the largest sums the state has ever paid for a single artwork, the country’s Culture Ministry announced.
The portrait of Monsignor Maffeo Barberini, an influential cleric who later became Pope Urban VIII, was painted by Caravaggio around 1598.
“This is a work of exceptional importance,” Italian Culture Minister Alessandro Giuli said in a statement.
The painting had been held in a private Florence collection and was attributed to Caravaggio in 1963. It was shown in public for the first time in 2024 at Rome’s Palazzo Barberini and will now enter the permanent collection in the palace’s art gallery.
The acquisition comes a month after the Italian Culture Ministry bought Antonello da Messina’s “Ecce Homo” for $14.9m, securing the rare work by the 15th‑century Renaissance master just as it was due to be auctioned in New York.
The United Nations Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) has said it will keep its peacekeeping force in Akobo despite an order by the country’s military to leave the opposition-held town.
In a statement on Monday, UNMISS warned that any military operations in and around Akobo – a town in the country’s northeast, near the border with Ethiopia – could “gravely endanger the safety and security of civilians”.
The South Sudan People’s Defence Forces had on March 6 ordered civilians to leave Akobo and neighbouring villages ahead of a planned offensive, UNMISS said, while peacekeepers were given 72 hours to leave.
“For its part, UNMISS reaffirms that its peacekeepers will remain in Akobo, providing a protective presence for civilians. The Mission reiterates that the safety and security of its personnel, premises, and assets must be fully respected at all times,” it said.
Andreas Krieg says the US is lacking a clear narrative for what victory in the war with Iran looks like.
Ukrainian and Russian officials have claimed battlefield successes in the more than four-year war, as Russian air attacks on Ukraine continue.
At least four people were killed in Russian attacks on the Ukrainian town of Sloviansk, regional authorities said on Tuesday.
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The governor of Sloviansk, Vadym Filashkin, confirmed the death toll on Tuesday and said 16 others were wounded, including a 14-year-old girl. He said Russian forces dropped three guided bombs on the city.
There was no immediate comment from Moscow on the attack.
Overnight drone strikes on three other Ukrainian cities wounded at least 17 people, including two children, emergency services said.
Ukraine’s air force said that it shot down 122 out of 137 drones that Russia launched during the night.
Ukrainian forces have recently retaken nearly all the territory of the southeastern Dnipropetrovsk industrial region during a counteroffensive, driving Russian troops out of more than 400 square kilometres (150sq miles), Major-General Oleksandr Komarenko said in an interview published Tuesday by local media outlet RBC-Ukraine.
He described the overall situation on the front line as difficult but under control, with the heaviest fighting continuing near Pokrovsk in eastern Ukraine and Oleksandrivka in the south, where he said Russian forces have concentrated their main effort.
There was no independent verification of his description of the military situation.
The Institute for the Study of War, a Washington-based think tank, said late Monday that recent Ukrainian counterattacks “are generating tactical, operational and strategic effects that may disrupt Russia’s spring-summer 2026 offensive campaign plan”.
Meanwhile, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that Russian forces have extended their gains in Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region, whose capture Moscow has made one of the goals of its invasion. Ukraine controlled about 25 percent of the Donbas six months ago, but it now holds just 15-17 percent, Putin said.
In Russia, the governor of the border region Bryansk, said a Ukrainian missile strike on Bryansk city had killed at least six people and wounded 37 others.
Alexander Bogomaz said those killed were civilians and that the wounded were admitted to the Bryansk Regional Hospital.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said the attack hit a Russian missile plant.
At the same time, a United Nations investigation found that the deportation and transfer of Ukrainian children since Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022 had amounted to “crimes against humanity”.
The International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for President Vladimir Putin and five other Russian officials in 2023 over the alleged illegal deportation of children, which Moscow denies and said it has been evacuating people voluntarily from a warzone.
United States special envoy Steve Witkoff told the CNBC news outlet on Tuesday that the next round of trilateral talks between Ukraine, Russia and the US would likely be “sometime next week”.
Trilateral talks were first held in January in the United Arab Emirates; a second meeting was held in February in Geneva, Switzerland. Last year, Russia and Ukraine also held three rounds of talks in Turkiye, yet so far the two countries remain no closer to a deal as key issues, including Russia’s control of Ukrainian territory, are yet to be resolved.
Moscow has repeatedly said it would only agree to a deal that allows it to retain the territories it has seized, while Ukraine has said its territory must be returned in any deal.
Israel has released video it says shows the moment a missile fired by Hezbollah struck a satellite and radar station near Beit Shemesh, causing extensive damage. The strike occurred in an area where warning sirens had reportedly failed to go off.
Energy Secretary Chris Wright has posted, then deleted, a claim that the United States military provided protection for an oil tanker travelling through the Strait of Hormuz, a critical waterway for the global energy trade.
The White House later addressed the post in a news briefing, affirming that it was false.
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The flip-flop happened early on Tuesday afternoon, when Wright posted on social media around 1:02pm US Eastern time (17:00 GMT) a message he then deleted within about a half hour.
Shortly afterwards, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt denied that a military escort had occurred, walking back the post entirely.
“I can confirm that the US Navy has not escorted a tanker or a vessel at this time,” she said. “Though, of course, that’s an option the president has said he will absolutely utilise if and when necessary at the appropriate time.”
More than 20 percent of the world’s oil travels through the strait, a narrow maritime passage between Iran, Oman and the United Arab Emirates.
But since the US and Israel launched a war against Israel on February 28, trade through Hormuz has come to a standstill amid fears of Iranian strikes.
Initially, Wright had erroneously reported that a tanker had passed through the strait with the help of the US military, and he praised the administration of US President Donald Trump for the alleged intervention.
“President Trump is maintaining stability of global energy during the military operations against Iran,” Wright wrote.
“The U.S. Navy successfully escorted an oil tanker through the Strait of Hormuz to ensure oil remains flowing to global markets.”
But the post was swiftly deleted with no explanation. Leavitt noted that the post had been “taken down pretty quickly” and that she had not yet “had a chance to talk to the energy secretary about it directly”.
The Iranian government, meanwhile, suggested that the deleted post was a misinformation effort, designed to rally global oil markets.
“U.S. officials are posting fake news to manipulate markets. It won’t protect them from inflationary tsunami they’ve imposed on Americans,” Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi wrote on social media.
“Markets are facing biggest shortfall in HISTORY: bigger than Arab Oil Embargo, Iran’s Islamic Revolution and the Kuwait invasion COMBINED.”
Free travel through the Strait of Hormuz has been a point of concern for the Trump administration, which pledged US assistance for the global shipping operations that have been affected.
On March 3, four days into the war, Trump posted on his platform Truth Social that the US Development Finance Corporation, a federal agency, would offer “political risk insurance and guarantees” for vessels travelling through Hormuz at a “very reasonable price”.
He added that military support may also be available.
“If necessary, the United States Navy will begin escorting tankers through the Strait of Hormuz, as soon as possible,” Trump wrote. “No matter what, the United States will ensure the FREE FLOW of ENERGY to the WORLD.”
But it is unclear how effective his administration would be in protecting vessels passing through the strait, given the waterway’s proximity to Iran and Tehran’s pledge to shut down the waterway.
General Dan Caine, the head of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, also signalled on Tuesday that the military had yet to begin any operations to protect oil tankers in the strait, appearing to contradict Wright’s now-deleted post.
“If tasked to escort, we’ll look at the range of options to set the military conditions to be able to do that,” Caine said in a statement.
The inability to move oil through the Strait of Hormuz has been credited with causing oil prices to skyrocket, heightening public backlash across the globe.
On Tuesday, the American Automobile Association, known as AAA, found that the average price of oil in the US had jumped to $3.54 per gallon (94 cents per litre), up nearly 43 cents from the previous week.
The war with Iran is seen as widely unpopular in the US, with poll after poll indicating it has one of the lowest initial rates of support of any foreign conflict the US has entered in recent history.