News

Hard Numbers: Twitter welcomes back Trump, Obiang “re-elected,” Turks strike Kurds, LatAm to lose panda, WC rainbow armbands banned

Twitter logo displayed on a smartphone with multiple colorful faces of Donald Trump in the background.
Twitter logo displayed on a smartphone with multiple colorful faces of Donald Trump in the background.
Filip Radwanski/SOPA Images/Si via Reuters Connect

51.8: Twitter CEO Elon Musk reinstated Donald Trump's account after 51.8% of some 15 million Twitter users voted in favor of it. But will the @realDonaldTrump actually return? The former US president is committed to his own Truth Social startup but might seek a carve-out as he's running again in 2024.

43: The world's longest-serving president, Teodoro Obiang Nguema of Equatorial Guinea, is all but assured to stay in office after holding a sham election on Sunday. Obiang, 80, has ruled the oil-rich yet super corrupt West African nation with an iron fist for 43 years.

65: At least 65 people were killed Sunday in Turkish air strikes against Kurdish militants across northern Iraq and Syria. The offensive is a response to the deadly blast in downtown Istanbul a week ago, which the Turks blamed on the Kurdistan Workers' Party, classified as a terrorist group by Ankara and its NATO allies.

1 million: Mexico — and the whole of Latin America — is set to lose its last panda. Famously frugal President Andrés Manuel López Obrador is unlikely to cough up the estimated $1 million to buy another one from China, a cost Mexico has avoided for decades under an old deal that allowed it to breed pandas locally without supervision from Beijing.

0: That's how many minutes refs will wait before issuing yellow cards to players wearing rainbow-colored armbands at the soccer World Cup. Some European stars like England captain Harry Kane wanted to show support for LGBTQ rights in Qatar, which bans all same-sex relationships. But FIFA clarified: don't you dare if you don't want to get sent off.

More For You

Russian President Vladimir Putin meets with journalists to comment on new U.S. sanctions targeting two major Russia's oil producers, as well as other international issues, in Moscow, Russia, October 23, 2025.
Sputnik/Alexander Shcherbak/Pool via REUTERS

The US has paused Russian oil sanctions in a bid to stabilize energy markets rocked by the war with Iran. Administration officials stress that it’s a “tailored” measure, applying only to oil already loaded onto tankers, but it’s still a gift to Russia, which has already been clocking an extra $150 million daily in oil revenues since the war began.

A Boeing C-135 Stratotanker / Stratolifter military aircraft known as KC-135 of the United States Air Force USAF configured as Air Tanker Transport for aerial refueling, powered by 4x CFMI jet engines and tail number 63-8003. The military plane spotted flying over the Netherlands in the blue sky from Mainland USA to Tel Aviv TLV to support the Israel USA - Iran war known as Operation Epic Fury by the US Department of Defense. Venlo, the Netherlands on March 2, 2026
Photo by Nicolas Economou/NurPhoto

4: The number of crew members aboard a US refuelling plane – out of six total – who died after the aircraft crashed in neighboring Iraq on Thursday, US Central Command said this morning.