Skip to content
Search

Latest Stories

What We're Watching

Elections in India, US oil exports are booming from Hormuz shutdown, Meloni shifts the focus to geopolitics

​A woman shows her ink-marked finger after casting her ballot at a polling station during the Assam Legislative Assembly election in Nagaon District, Assam, India, on April 9, 2026.

A woman shows her ink-marked finger after casting her ballot at a polling station during the Assam Legislative Assembly election in Nagaon District, Assam, India, on April 9, 2026.

Photo by Anuwar Hazarika/NurPhoto
Make us preferred on Google

Can India’s Modi make inroads in unfriendly territory?

More than 50 million voters in India’s states of Assam and Kerala, along with the federally-administered territory of Puducherry, head to the polls today in regional elections. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) will be hoping for a change of fortune in Kerala, a left-leaning southern state where it has never won. For the BJP’s opponents, the aim is to hold on to local power and continue to act as a check on Modi and his party’s dominance. These elections also mark the start of an electoral cycle, with West Bengal and Tamil Nadu – two more states that lean against the BJP – set to hold votes later this month. Results for all these contests are expected on May 4.


An armada steams towards the US

At least 68 empty oil tankers are plying their way towards the United States, according to Kpler, a shipping intelligence firm. That’s a record, and nearly triple the number of tankers making that journey before the start of the Iran war. With the Strait of Hormuz — which handles a fifth of global oil shipping and 80% of oil exports to Asia — still largely shut, consumers are looking elsewhere, particularly to the US, the world’s leading producer. US exports are projected to spike by roughly a third to over 5 million barrels per day, up from a 3.9 million in March. And are you ready for a mashup of two big stories? A significant part of those exports is actually Venezuelan crude, which came under US control after Donald Trump deposed the oil-rich country’s strongman leader Nicolás Maduro in January.

Meloni shifts the spotlight to geopolitics

Giorgia Meloni's first parliamentary appearance since her crushing referendum defeat was expected to be a reckoning. Instead, she made it about Iran. In a nearly hour-long speech today, she declared reopening the Strait of Hormuz a vital interest for Italy and the European Union, rejected Tehran's push to charge tolls on shipping, and threatened new taxes on energy speculators. Fresh off a Gulf tour to secure energy supplies, she's betting that being a wartime crisis manager beats answering awkward questions about a new tourism minister's corruption trial.

More For You

Spain's Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez walks to greet European Council President Charles Michel at Moncloa Palace in Madrid, Spain, May 30, 2024.

Spain's Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez walks to greet European Council President Charles Michel at Moncloa Palace in Madrid, Spain, May 30, 2024.

REUTERS/Susana Vera
Spain will head to the polls next monthSpain’s Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez called a snap election today for November 29, after losing a vote on Friday to pass emergency measures to quell nationwide protests over the country’s housing crisis. The Sánchez government has faced growing criticism in recent months over issues including the Ceuta [...]
People walk past near a campaign billboard featuring Milorad Dodik, Aco Stanisic, Savo Minic, Zeljka Cvijanovic and Damjan Skipina, candidates of the Alliance of Independent Social Democrats (SNSD) in Bosnia and Herzegovina's 2026 general election, in Pale, Bosnia and Herzegovina.

People walk past near a campaign billboard featuring Milorad Dodik, Aco Stanisic, Savo Minic, Zeljka Cvijanovic and Damjan Skipina, candidates of the Alliance of Independent Social Democrats (SNSD) in Bosnia and Herzegovina's 2026 general election, in Pale, Bosnia and Herzegovina, September 29, 2026.

REUTERS/Amel Emric
EU vs. Russia on the ballot in BosniaBosnians will head to the polls this weekend for elections in one of the world’s most complicated political systems. Voters will elect three national presidents representing three main ethnic groups – one Bosniak, one Croat, and one Serb. Collectively, they serve as the country’s head of state. But the biggest [...]
In this drone view an inflatable dinghy carrying migrants makes its way towards England in the English Channel, Britain.

In this drone view an inflatable dinghy carrying migrants makes its way towards England in the English Channel, Britain, August 6, 2024.

REUTERS/Chris J. Ratcliffe
One in, one out, all done: UK and France scrap migration pactLast year the two countries struck a landmark deal to reduce the number of asylum seekers crossing the English Channel from France in small boats: for each undocumented migrant that the UK returned to France, British authorities would accept an asylum applicant with known family links in [...]
A plane, carrying passengers who were on the FlyDubai aircraft bound for Israel from the United Arab Emirates, which was diverted to Saudi Arabia following an emergency signal, on the tarmac as it arrives at the Ben Gurion International Airport, in Lod, near Tel Aviv, Israel.

A plane, carrying passengers who were on the FlyDubai aircraft bound for Israel from the United Arab Emirates, which was diverted to Saudi Arabia following an emergency signal, on the tarmac as it arrives at the Ben Gurion International Airport, in Lod, near Tel Aviv, Israel, September 30, 2026.

REUTERS/Ammar Awad
Attempted hijacking suspected in Dubai-Israel flight chaos A flight from Dubai to Israel plunged nearly 20,000 feet on Wednesday during a blood-spattered fight in the cockpit. Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu said the co-pilot had tried to stab the pilot in an attempt to hijack the plane and crash it. Passengers and crew intervened to land the plane [...]