Author: NCIJ NETWNCIJ NETWORK

Tehran, Iran – Iran’s military authorities say they are prepared to resume war with the United States if negotiations again fall through, emphasising that they have adapted and recovered.Washington has signalled that an agreement over the Strait of Hormuz may be imminent, and US President Donald Trump renewed his demand for a deal, or “total surrender” this week.Recommended Stories list of 4 itemsend of listBut the Islamic Republic has said while talks are ongoing with Oman and other mediators to end the US-Israel war on Iran, work on boosting military strength has only intensified.“We have made maximum use of the…

Russia has made deep changes to its forces under pressure from the war, and many politicians and intelligence officials worry it could be ready to attack a NATO country by the end of the decade. Zaluzhnyi’s unusual rebuke underscores a growing change in the alliance’s relationship with Ukraine. The country has shifted from relying on European military support in the early years of the war to becoming one the continent’s most powerful and technologically advanced militaries — far ahead of Western forces in the mass production of drones, missiles and other key systems. “Ukraine contributes to transatlantic security,” said NATO’s…

When President Trump called Representative Max Miller, his former loyal aide, to warn him the domestic abuse allegations he was facing would make it tough for him to win re-election, Republican officials at the White House and in Ohio hoped it would be enough to get the embattled congressman to drop out.But Mr. Trump stopped short of asking Mr. Miller to step aside, and the congressman made it clear he had no intention of doing so, according to two people familiar with the call who spoke about the confidential conversation on the condition of anonymity.The president, who endorsed Mr. Miller…

Morocco’s all-powerful monarch and Europe’s most prominent leftwing leader make for uneasy bedfellows in a relationship of mutual dependence. But the migration crisis that erupted at Spain’s borders has signalled where King Mohammed VI holds leverage over Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez.Although Morocco’s economy is one-tenth the size of Spain’s, the two countries are bound by a dense web of commercial ties. Yet they diverge on big geopolitical issues. King Mohammed has cultivated close ties with Donald Trump, while Sánchez has become one of the US president’s main antagonists in Europe.The desire of many young Moroccans to leave their country, and…

The brand trip is a right of passage for influencers. It’s a mark of legitimacy that a sponsor wants to invite them on an all-expenses-paid vacation, often with luxurious freebies and activities. Trips can also spur hard feelings from uninvited influencers, trigger criticism from the public, and project a certain frivolousness.Usually it is fast fashion companies or beauty brands flying out influencers with the goal of flooding social media with sponsored content. This time, it was a major AI company.Over the weekend, several influencers began posting about OpenAI’s “first ever brand trip,” which appears to have taken place outside of…

Hyperliquid’s HYPE ETFs went 12 trading sessions without a single inflow from July 17 through Aug. 3, 2026, recording $29.8 million in reported net outflows. The drought counted nine negative sessions and three flat ones.According to Farside Investors, BHYP absorbed $22.5 million of the outflows, far more than THYP’s $5.3 million and HYPG’s $2 million. Farside’s Aug. 3, 2026 entry added a $1 million HYPG outflow; BHYP and THYP were flat.Earlier inflows across the HYPE ETFs left a deep cushion. Farside’s table through Aug. 3, 2026 showed about $283 million of cumulative reported flows across the category, with $106.3 million…

An emperor penguin colony in Antarctica had a run-in with a grounded iceberg that may have led to a disastrous breeding season. On Coulman Island, which is home to one of the largest emperor penguin colonies on the planet, surviving chick counts declined by 69 percent in 2025 compared with the previous year. This may have been due to the sneaky shape of an iceberg grounding nearby, delaying the birds’ return from their foraging grounds with food for their young, scientists report July 23 in Communications Earth & Environment. Sign up for our newsletter We summarize the week’s scientific breakthroughs…

Finned octopus species alive today are all small, deep-sea animals that mostly live in pitch-black darkness thousands of meters beneath the surface of the sea. But a new discovery by a team of researchers in Japan, published in April 2026, found that the ancient octopus relatives were likely gigantic predators that roamed the late Cretaceous seas between 100 million to 72 million years ago. Huge fossil jaws have been uncovered in Cretaceous deposits near Japan and on Vancouver Island in Canada. Though they were known to be part of the cephalopods class that includes squid, cuttlefish and octopus,…

Greece’s Asso.subsea has reported it was purchasing the inspection, maintenance and repair (IMR) vessel Viking Reach from the joint venture of Reach Subsea and Eidesvik Offshore, following the sale announcement from earlier today.Source: Asso.subsea It was reported today, August 4, that Eidesvik Reach, in which Eidesvik holds a 50.1% ownership interest and Reach Subsea 49.9%, had entered into a memorandum of agreement (MoA) with an undisclosed buyer for the sale of the 2009-built, 85-meter-long vessel. Asso.subsea is expanding its fleet with the addition of Viking Reach, which will, upon delivery, be renamed Arete, honoring Queen Arete of Greek mythology. The acquisition also includes a…

Reading Time: 5 minutes Editor’s note: This story was produced as part of the NEW (Northeast Wisconsin) News Lab, a consortium of six news outlets. Three Democratic candidates tried to convince voters that they were the best shot to unseat Republican U.S. Rep. Tony Wied in the 8th Congressional District. To a crowd of about 50 on Aug. 3 at the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay’s Christie Theatre, the candidates tried to differentiate themselves to voters heading into the Aug. 11 primary election. The winner will go against Wied in the Nov. 3 general election, vying to represent nearly 737,000 people…