4: A gunman killed four people, including a police officer, at a Midtown Manhattan skyscraper in New York City on Monday. The shooter, identified as Shane Tamura, was armed with an M4 assault rifle when he entered the building, which is home to the headquarters of the National Football League (NFL) and other corporations. Tamura was carrying a note claiming that he suffered from chronic traumatic encephalopathy – a degenerative brain disease common among football players – because of the NFL.
38: At least 38 people are dead after days of heavy rains and flooding in Northern China, prompting President Xi Jinping to initiate “all-out” search and rescue efforts on Monday. The extreme weather has also led officials to evacuate 80,000 residents from Beijing, according to state broadcaster CCTV.
35: Nigerian gunmen killed at least 35 hostages despite receiving a ransom payment of 50 million naira ($32,600) for the release of 56 people that they had abducted from a village in northern Nigeria. Mass kidnappings are commonplace in Africa’s most populous country, and there has been a spate of them in the first half of 2025 (read more here).
1: In a bid to better control online information and protect “moral and ethical values”, Kyrgyzstan’s government has decreed that all internet traffic will be handled by one state monopoly. As part of the move, the small Central Asian nation has also banned online “skin flicks” (sorry for the archaic term, readers, but we’ve got spam filters to beat!)
13: After a case that lasted 13 years, a Colombian lower court judge found former President Álvaro Uribe guilty of bribery on Monday, in what was the first major criminal conviction of an ex-leader in Colombia. The conservative Uribe, who led the country from 2002 to 2010, will likely appeal the ruling, meaning the case is far from over.
