Trump says a deal with Iran and opening of Strait of Hormuz are 'largely negotiated'
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (AP) — President Donald Trump said Saturday that a deal with Iran on the war, including opening the Strait of Hormuz, has been “largely negotiated” after calls with Israel and other allies in the region.
“Final aspects and details of the Deal are currently being discussed, and will be announced shortly,” Trump said on social media, with no details. He said he had spoken with leaders from Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Pakistan, Turkey, Egypt, Jordan and Bahrain, and separately with Israel.
He described it as a “Memorandum of Understanding pertaining to PEACE" that still must be finalized by the United States, Iran and the other countries that participated in the calls. It capped a week in which the U.S. weighed a new round of attacks on the Islamic Republic that would break a fragile ceasefire.
There was no mention of Iran's nuclear program and highly enriched uranium, which Iran has sought to discuss later. There was no immediate comment from Iran or Israel. Trump said speaking with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who had pressed the U.S. to go to war, went “very well.”
Earlier on Saturday, a regional official with direct knowledge of the Pakistan-led mediation efforts said the U.S. and Iran were closing in on a deal to end the war.
40,000 people under evacuation orders for a chemical tank leak in Southern California
Authorities in Southern California on Friday were racing to figure out how to prevent the explosion of a storage tank that has been leaking a hazardous chemical used to make plastic parts, as some 40,000 people were under evacuation orders in the area.
A storage tank holding between 6,000 and 7,000 gallons (22,700 and 26,500 liters) of methyl methacrylate overheated Thursday and began venting vapors into the air at an aerospace plastics facility in Garden Grove, a city in Orange County, the local fire authority said.
The tank could fail and crack, releasing the chemical onto the ground, or it could explode, Orange County Fire Authority Division Chief Craig Covey said Friday.
“This thing is going to fail, and we don’t know when,” Covey said. “We’re doing our best to figure out when or how we can prevent it.”
Officials ordered residents in Garden Grove to leave and expanded evacuation orders Friday to some residents of five other Orange County cities — Cypress, Stanton, Anaheim, Buena Park and Westminster — after being unable to stop the leak overnight on the tank at GKN Aerospace, which makes parts for commercial and military aircraft.
Trump's Justice Department scrubs its website of news releases about Jan. 6 defendants
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Department of Justice is acknowledging it has removed from its website news releases about criminal cases related to the Jan. 6, 2021, riot, calling the information about the prosecutions “partisan propaganda.”
The purge of news releases documenting criminal charges, convictions and sentencings is the latest step by the Trump administration to dramatically rewrite the history of the assault on the Capitol, when hundreds of supporters of Republican President Donald Trump stormed the building in an effort to halt the congressional certification of his 2020 election loss to Democrat Joe Biden.
Trump, on his first day back in office in January 2025, pardoned, commuted the prison sentences or vowed to dismiss the cases of all of the 1,500-plus people charged with crimes during the Capitol assault, including those convicted of attacking officers with makeshift weapons such as flagpoles, a hockey stick and crutch.
On Monday, the Justice Department announced the creation of a $1.776 billion fund meant to compensate Trump allies who feel they were unjustly investigated and prosecuted. Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche has not ruled out that rioters convicted of violence will be eligible for payouts, prompting bipartisan anger in Congress.
After a journalist on Friday observed on the social media platform X that the Justice Department was “quietly” removing news releases on its website that were related to the Jan. 6 attack, including about a Texas man who pleaded guilty to assault and also faced separate state charges of soliciting a minor, the department responded through its “rapid response” account that there was “nothing ‘quiet’ about it.”
Ukrainian drone attack triggers fire at a Russian oil terminal
A Ukrainian drone attack caused a fire at another Russian oil terminal overnight, local officials in Russia’s Krasnodar region said Saturday, in what appeared to be the latest attack on Moscow’s vital oil industry.
Authorities in the city of Novorossiysk said falling drone debris sparked a fire at an oil terminal, injuring two people. Russia’s Astra news outlet said Ukrainian drones struck the Sheskharis oil terminal and depot, the terminus for Russian state-controlled pipeline company Transneft’s main oil pipelines in the region. Images posted by Astra appeared to show smoke rising above the oil terminal, but they could not be verified.
On Saturday afternoon, Ukraine's General Staff said its forces had struck the Sheskharis oil terminal overnight.
“The facility provides shipment of oil and oil products for export and is involved in meeting the needs of the Russian army,” the General Staff wrote on Telegram, adding that Ukrainian forces had also hit a tanker in the Black Sea belonging to Russia’s so-called “shadow fleet.”
Ukraine has expanded its mid- and long-range strike capabilities, deploying drone and missile technology that it has developed domestically to battle Russia’s 4-year-old invasion. Attacks on Russian oil assets that play a key part in funding the invasion have become almost daily occurrences.
Iran's soccer federation says team's World Cup base camp has been moved to Mexico from the US
PHOENIX (AP) — The president of the governing body of Iranian soccer said Saturday the nation's World Cup training base has been moved to Mexico from the United States after getting approval from FIFA.
Mehdi Taj, president of the Iran Football Federation, announced the decision Saturday in a statement issued by the federation's media relations official. FIFA has not confirmed the move.
Iran had been scheduled to train in Tucson, Arizona, but a move has been a possibility because of uncertainty surrounding the war in the Middle East and security concerns. Officials at Tucson's Kino Sports Complex had no comment.
The federation says the team will now be based in Tijuana, Mexico, just south of San Diego. This year's World Cup runs from June 11 to July 19 and will be co-hosted by the U.S., Canada and Mexico.
“All team base camps for the countries participating in the World Cup must be approved FIFA," Taj said in his statement. "Fortunately, following the requests we submitted and the meetings we held with FIFA and World Cup officials in Istanbul, as well as the webinar meeting we had yesterday in the Tehran with the respected FIFA secretary general, our request to change the team's base from the United States to Mexico was approved.”
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Gunmen open fire in 2 separate attacks in Honduras, killing at least 25 people
TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras (AP) — Gunmen opened fire in two separate attacks Thursday on the Honduran coast, killing at least 25 people, including six police officers, authorities said.
The first incident took place at a plantation in the municipality of Trujillo in northern Honduras, where at least 19 workers were shot and killed, according to Public Prosecutor’s Office spokesperson Yuri Mora.
The resource-rich region has been the site of a decades-long agrarian conflict.
The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights has previously issued precautionary measures to some activists in the region who have been threatened, surveilled and intimidated for their work defending the environment and land rights.
The 2024 killing of environmental leader Juan López highlighted the dangers of defending natural resources in this highly militarized area of Honduras. The Central American nation regularly ranks as one of the most dangerous for environmentalists, with five killed in 2024 and 18 the year before, according to nongovernmental organization Global Witness.
Norway-set drama about political polarization ‘Fjord’ wins Palme d’Or at Cannes
Cristian Mungiu’s Norway-set drama about political polarization, “Fjord,” has won the Palme d’Or, handing the Cannes Film Festival ’s top honor for the second time to Mungiu, the Romanian director of “4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days.”
At a 79th Cannes Film Festival that saw few films cause a stir, “Fjord” found wide admiration for its engrossing tale of what Mungiu called “left-wing fundamentalism.” It stars Sebastian Stan and Renate Reinsve as Romanian Evangelicals who move to Norway, but soon after have their children taken from them by child services for spanking them.
“Today the society is split. It’s divided. It’s radicalized,” said Mungiu. “This film is a pledge against any type of fundamentalism. It's a pledge for these things we quote very often, like trauma and inclusion and empathy. These are lovely words but we need to apply them more often.”
Mungiu becomes just the 10th filmmaker to win the Palme d’Or twice. His “4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days,” a Romanian abortion drama, won the award in 2007.
The win for “Fjord” extends one of the movies’ most extraordinary streaks. Neon, the specialty label, has now taken seven Palme d’Or winners in a row. “Fjord” adds to its unparalleled run, including last year’s champion, Jafar Panahi’s “It Was Just an Accident,” and the 2024 winner, “Anora.” The latter went on to win best picture at the Oscars.
Progressives land a big win in a Philadelphia House primary and hope it means more are on the way
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — It looked like progressive Chris Rabb had a mountain to climb to win the Democratic nomination for a congressional district in Philadelphia.
The mayor and the city's Democratic Party had endorsed another candidate in this week's primary. So had members of Pennsylvania's delegation in the U.S. House. One Rabb rival was backed by millions of dollars. A second benefited from a get-out-the-vote operation run by the influential local building trades unions.
But Rabb finished 15 percentage points ahead of his closest competitor in Tuesday's election, and the state representative is likely on his way to Washington because no Republican sought the GOP nomination.
Rabb was propelled by a constellation of progressive groups, charting a path to victory partly by assailing his own party as listening more to donors than voters. He credited a grassroots movement inspired by New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, alarmed by Republican President Donald Trump and hungry for a government responsive to their needs.
“That was at the heart of why I was running and that is what I built my campaign around and that, I believe, is a chord we struck in this electorate that showed up and came out like gangbusters,” Rabb said in an interview with The Associated Press.
Kyle Busch died after severe pneumonia progressed into sepsis, his family says
CONCORD, N.C. (AP) — Kyle Busch died after severe pneumonia progressed into sepsis, resulting in rapid and overwhelming complications, according to a statement released by his family.
Dakota Hunter, vice president of Kyle Busch Companies, said in a news release the family received the medical evaluation on Saturday.
Busch, a two-time NASCAR champion, died at 41 on Thursday, a day after passing out in a Chevrolet simulator.
Sepsis is considered a life-threatening medical emergency that occurs when the body has an extreme, overactive response to an infection, causing the immune system to damage its own tissues and organs, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Typically the immune system releases chemicals to fight off pathogens like bacteria, viruses or fungi, but with sepsis the response goes into overdrive. The results can cause widespread inflammation, form microscopic blood clots and make blood vessels leak.
Deadliest coal mine explosion in China in years kills at least 82 people, local officials say
BEIJING (AP) — A gas explosion at a coal mine in China’s northern Shanxi province killed at least 82 people, local officials said Saturday, in what was the country’s deadliest mining accident in recent years.
The official Xinhua News Agency said the accident at Changzhi city’s Liushenyu coal mine happened on Friday evening.
At a news conference late Saturday, local authorities said 82 were dead and that more than 120 people were hospitalized. Two were still missing. The death toll was a revised, lower number from earlier reports by state broadcaster CCTV that said 90 had died.
The scene at the coal mine was “chaotic” in the immediate aftermath of the accident, they said, and figures provided at the time were initial and not definite.
The explosion was under investigation, local officials said, adding there were “serious violations” of the law by the mine’s operator. They did not elaborate on any specific violations.

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