At least 71 people were killed in the deadly Israeli attack on Evin Prison in Tehran, including children and women. Just one day prior to the end of the 12-day fighting, an Israeli-initiated ceasefire struck the prison, which is known for houseing political prisoners.
According to local authorities and media reports, firefighters are fighting wildfires for the second day in Izmir, in Turkiye’s western province.
Forestry Minister Ibrahim Yumakli reported on Monday that the fire in the Kuyucak and Doganbey areas of Izmir was sparked by overnight winds of 40 to 50 kilometers per hour (25 to 30 kilometers per hour). Four villages and two neighbourhoods were evacuated as a result.
He told Izmir’s reporters that more than 1, 000 people were attempting to extinguish the fires with helicopters, fire-extinguishing aircraft, and other vehicles.
From Monday through Thursday, the once-in-a-decade event will focus on pressing global issues like hunger, poverty, climate change, healthcare, and peace.
In Seville, world leaders including Kenyan President William Ruto, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, and UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres.
The event’s fourth edition features more than 4, 000 business, civil society, and financial institution representatives.
However, the US, the group’s principal player, is stifling the discussions as a result of President Donald Trump’s decision to reduce funding shortly after taking office in January.
More than 80% of all USAID programs were cancelled, according to US State Secretary Marco Rubio in March.
Additionally, Trump is imposing higher defense spending on NATO members against the wishes of Germany, the UK, and France.
However, the string of developmental aid cuts is concerning, according to Oxfam International, a global organization for advocacy, which claim to have been the biggest since 1960.
The UN also estimates $4 trillion as the size of the growing funding gap for development.
The 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) were approved at the previous meeting in 2015, and are expected to be accomplished by 2030, according to the conference organizers.
The SDGs, which include eradicating poverty and hunger, seem unlikely to be realized in five years due to the shrinking development aid.
A common declaration, which was put forth earlier in June in New York, pledges to support the UN’s development goals of improving gender equality and reforming international financial institutions.
Chola Milambo, Zambia’s permanent representative to the UN, claimed the document demonstrated that multilateralism can still be effective in achieving the development goals and that the world can overcome the financial obstacles that face them.
Japanese tea is prepared with precision at a minimalist matcha bar in Los Angeles, United States, despite a global shortage brought on by the bright green beverage’s popularity on social media.
All but four of the 25 different matcha options on the Kettl Tea menu, which opened on Hollywood Boulevard this year, were gone, according to Zach Mangan, the shop’s founder.
Telling customers that we don’t have what they want is one of the things we struggle with, he said.
The popularity of matcha “has grown just exponentially over the last ten years, but much more so in the last two to three years,” the 40-year-old explained. It has a deep grassy aroma, intense color, and pick-me-up effects.
It is now “a cultural touchpoint in the Western world,” and it can be found everywhere, from Starbucks to ice-cream flavor boards.
According to Mangan, this has resulted in a nearly doubled matcha’s market over the past year.
There is simply not more to buy, the statement continues.
Demand is exasperating in the Japanese city of Sayama, northwest of Tokyo, where Masahiro Okutomi, the 15th generation who runs his family’s tea production company, works.
He said, “We are not accepting any more matcha orders,” and that I had to state on our website.
The “tencha” leaves are shaded for several weeks before harvest in order to concentrate the flavors and nutrients. This is a labor-intensive process.
After being carefully deveined by a machine, they are then machine-dried and finely ground.
To properly make matcha, Okutomi said, “It takes years of training.” It requires “equipment, labor, and investment over the long term.”
“We just can’t keep up,” he said, “but in the short run, it’s almost a threat.”
Online influencers like Andie Ella, who has over 600,000 YouTube subscribers and established her own matcha product line, have helped to fuel the matcha boom.
Numerous fans were eagerly awaiting a photo with the 23-year-old Frenchwoman at her pastel-pink pop-up shop in Tokyo’s hip Harajuku district or to purchase her cans of strawberry or white chocolate matcha.
Ella praised Matcha for her visual appeal.
133, 000 cans of her matcha brand, which was produced in the rural Mie region of Japan, have been sold so far. It was established in November 2023 and now employs eight people.
She continued, “Demand has not stopped growing.”
Matcha accounted for twice as much of the 8,798 tonnes of green tea exported from Japan as of last year, according to data from the Japanese Agriculture Ministry.
Given the rising demand, Tokyo’s tea shop Jugetsudo, located in the touristy former fish market area of Tsukiji, is trying to keep its stock levels at a minimum.
Although we don’t strictly impose purchase restrictions, store manager Shigehito Nishikida said, “We occasionally refuse to sell large quantities to customers suspected of reselling.”
The craze has grown in intensity over the past two or three years. Customers now prefer to create their own matcha, as they do on social media, he continued.
The US President’s tariffs on Japanese products, which are currently 10%, are expected to increase to 24 percent, but the global matcha market is estimated to be worth billions of dollars.
We must raise prices because of tariffs and shortages. Even though it has not yet slowed down demand, Mangan said at Kettl Tea.
“I want matcha before it runs out,” customers say.
To reduce costs, Japan’s government is encouraging tea growers to scale up their farms.
But that runs the risk of sacrificing quality, according to grower Okutomi, who said it is “almost impossible” in “small rural areas.”
As farmers age and struggle to find successors, he added, the number of tea plantations in Japan has decreased by a quarter from what it was 20 years ago.
According to local authorities, Turkiye has evicted four villages and two neighborhoods in its western province of Izmir as a result of wildfirefights.
The blaze was reportedly sparked overnight by winds of 40-50kph (25-30mph) in the Izmir regions of Kuyucak and Doganbey, according to Forest Minister Ibrahim Yumakli on Monday.
More than 1, 000 people were attempting to extinguish the fires, Yumakli told reporters in Izmir, along with helicopters, fire-extinguishing aircraft, and other vehicles.
According to Turkish media, the fire caused operations at the Izmir Adnan Menderes airport to be suspended.
As smoke billowed over hills covered in charred trees, teams were seen using water trailers, helicopters, and tractors to transport water.
Two water-bombing aircraft and a sizable ground crew were forced to battle the flames by earlier strong winds that had previously grounded the helicopters.
According to Governor Suleyman Elban, the first fire broke out on Sunday between Seferihisar and Menderes in Izmir, spreading quickly due to winds ranging from 117k to 75 mph.
According to the governor, five Seferihisar neighborhoods have been evacuated as the fire moves toward residential areas.
According to a witness who spoke to the AFP news agency over the phone, residents of the village of Urkmez were forced to cut trees to build firebreaks and protect their homes.
A separate blaze threatening the Otokent industrial zone, which is home to numerous car dealerships, spread to nearby woodland and exploded at a landfill in Gaziemir, 13 kilometers (8 miles) from central Izmir.
In footage that the Turkish channel NTV aired, one dealership was captured on fire.
According to scientists, climate change has caused wildfires in Turkiye’s coastal regions in recent years because the summers have become hotter and dryer. A significant wildfire also destroyed the same area of Izmir last year.
As people sought shelter from the gruesome temperatures of a heatwave that will start to worsen in the coming days, firefighters were also mobilized throughout Southern Europe.
In the southwest of France, where temperatures topped 40C (104F), wildfires broke out, forcing the evacuation of a campsite and abbey as a precaution.
Greek firefighters had to battle a forest fire south of Athens last week, which caused some evacuations.
The Portuguese Institute for Sea and Atmosphere reported that a number of areas in Portugal’s southern region, including Lisbon, were also being issued a red warning until Monday night.
Two firefighters were killed by gunfire while responding to a brush fire in Coeur d’Alene, a lakeside town in the northwestern US state of Idaho.
The local sheriff’s office reported that a shelter-in-place order was lifted on Sunday night after a tactical team found the body of a man with a firearm nearby. The dead man is believed to be the suspect.
Officials did not disclose his identity or specify the type of weapon recovered.
Officials said crews responded to a fire at Canfield Mountain in the city at about 1:22pm (20:22 GMT), and gunshots were reported about a half hour later at 2pm (21:00 GMT).
Kootenai County Sheriff Robert Norris said the shooter used high-powered sporting rifles to open rapid fire on first responders.
Two firefighters were killed and, according to authorities, a third one came out of surgery and is in a stable condition but “fighting for his life”.
Norris told reporters on Sunday that authorities believe the suspect intentionally started the fire as “an ambush”.
“We do believe he started it and it was totally intentional what he did,” he added.
However, officials have not spelled out any possible motives for why the suspect might have wanted to ambush the firefighters.
According to reports, more than 300 law enforcement officers and FBI agents responded to the emergency, while police snipers searched the area from helicopters.
Video footage from the area showed smoke rising from forested hillsides, with multiple ambulances and emergency vehicles seen arriving at a local hospital.
Multiple heroic firefighters were attacked today while responding to a fire in North Idaho. This is a heinous direct assault on our brave firefighters. I ask all Idahoans to pray for them and their families as we wait to learn more. Teresa and I are heartbroken.
As this…
The Canfield Mountain area is on the eastern outskirts of Coeur d’Alene. It is a popular 24‑acre (10-hectare) natural space featuring hiking and mountain‑biking trails.
Coeur d’Alene, a city of about 55,000 people, is located roughly 260 miles (420 km) east of Seattle.
The mountain is densely covered with trees and thick brush, and its network of trails extends into a national forest.
Based on preliminary evidence, the Kootenai County Sheriff’s Office believes there was only one shooter involved in the attack. Initially, authorities had suspected there might be as many as four.
Authorities located the suspect after detecting mobile phone activity in the area and tracing the signal.
There, they discovered a man who appeared to be deceased with a weapon found nearby. They did not say how the man died, or what firearm was discovered. Norris said that authorities believe the dead man was the shooter. However, the police have not yet revealed his identity.
Police said a man called 911 to report the fire but said that it was unclear if the caller was the gunman.
Update: pic.twitter.com/S60CnpFsyX
Kootenai County officials said they would not release the names of the two firefighters who died.
“Their families will need support,” Sheriff Norris said.
“This is a heinous direct assault on our brave firefighters,” Idaho Governor Brad Little wrote on Facebook.
Officials said the bodies would be transported in a procession to nearby Spokane, Washington, accompanied by a convoy of official vehicles. One of the firefighters was working with the Coeur d’Alene Fire Department; the other served with Kootenai County Fire and Rescue.
The shelter-in-place notice was lifted at 03:50 GMT on Monday.
The wildfire on Canfield Mountain scorched approximately 20 acres (81 hectares), Norris said on Sunday, but no structures were lost in the fire, authorities confirmed.