News

Hard Numbers: Sri Lanka’s long road to recovery, Ukraine’s homeless, Spain’s body-positive misstep, India’s cheetah resettlement

Sri Lanka’s long road to recovery, Ukraine’s homeless, Spain’s body-positive misstep, India’s cheetah resettlement
A man walks past an almost empty vegetable stall at a market in Colombo amid Sri Lanka's economic crisis.
REUTERS/Dinuka Liyanawatte

25: Sri Lanka’s new President Ranil Wickremesinghe will reveal a 25-year road map that he says will cut public debt and bring his country back from the economic brink. Wickremesinghe will present the plan to the International Monetary Fund as Sri Lanka tries to renegotiate some of the $51 billion in foreign debt it owes.

140,000: At least 140,000 homes and residential buildings have been destroyed in Ukraine since Russia’s invasion began on Feb. 24, according to Ukraine’s Defense Ministry. Kyiv now estimates that around 3.5 million Ukrainians have been left homeless as it braces for more evacuations from the east as Russia’s onslaught continues.

3: The Spanish government's attempt at body-positive summer messaging has …. not gone well. Three British women say their images were used in the campaign – which focuses on encouraging women of different shapes and sizes to strip down at the beach – without their consent. Spain’s government said that “at no point was it aware that the women in the images were actual real people.” Okay.

16: In a journey meticulously planned by conservationists, 16 cheetahs will be flown from South Africa to India in a bid to reintroduce the species in the South Asian country more than 50 years after they became extinct there. Critics say the relocation is risky for the big cats, but conservationists say it is crucial to expanding the global cheetah population.

More For You

People gather outside the Tom Bradley International Terminal at Los Angeles International Airport to decry President Trump's travel ban on 19 countries which went into effect this morning.

5: US President Donald Trump added five new countries – Burkina Faso, Mali, Niger, South Sudan, and Syria – to the list of nations banned from traveling to the US.

US President Donald Trump, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, French President Emmanuel Macron, UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, Finland's President Alexander Stubb, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen pose for a family photo amid negotiations to end the Russian war in Ukraine, at the White House in Washington, D.C., USA, on August 18, 2025.
REUTERS/Alexander Drago

With the release of its National Security Strategy, the Trump administration has telegraphed how the US intends to engage with allies, and what it expects from them.