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India's Supreme Court on Friday granted interim bail to a top opposition leader who was arrested nearly seven weeks ago in a bribery case that opposition parties called a political move by Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government against his rivals during a national election.

Arvind Kejriwal, the leader of the Aam Aadmi Party, or Common Man’s Party, is the chief elected official in the city of New Delhi and one of the country’s most influential politicians of the past decade.

The court ordered Kejriwal's release on interim bail, enabling him to campaign in the country's national election until the voting ends on June 1, Kejriwal's attorney said.

SUPPORTERS OF INDIA'S OPPOSITION LEADER FLOCK TO CAPITAL IN PROTEST OF HIS ARREST

Opposition leaders hailed the court verdict. "It will be very helpful in the context of the current elections," said Mamta Banerjee, the top elected official of West Bengal state.

However, Manjinder Singh Sirsa, a leader of the ruling party, said the court’s decision did not mean that Kejriwal has been exonerated in the bribery case. He will have to go back to jail on June 2 as pre-trial court proceedings are still taking place.

Justices Sanjiv Khanna and Dipankar Datta said in their order on Friday that the national election was an important event. They rejected the prosecuting agency's plea that their decision would put Kejriwal in a beneficial position compared with ordinary citizens.

They did, however, imposed some conditions on Kejriwal for granting interim bail. He will not be allowed to visit his office and some decisions he makes as chief minister of New Delhi must be approved by the capital’s governor. Also, he cannot interact with any witnesses in the case, they said.

INDIA'S POLICE DETAIN DOZENS OF PROTESTERS DEMANDING RELEASE OF OPPOSITION LEADER

Kejriwal was arrested by the federal Enforcement Directorate, India’s main financial investigation agency, on March 21. The agency, controlled by Modi’s government, accused Kejriwal’s party and ministers of accepting 1 billion rupees ($12 million) in bribes from liquor contractors nearly two years ago. The arrest triggered days of protests by party activists supported by other opposition parties.

Kejriwal, who has remained New Delhi's chief minister, has denied the accusations. His party is part of a broad alliance of opposition parties called INDIA, which is the main challenger to Modi’s governing Bharatiya Janata Party in India's six-week-long general election, which began last month.

Kejriwal's case was the first time that a chief minister in India was arrested while in office. His arrest, which occurred before the start of the election, dominated headlines for weeks.

His lawyer, Abhishek Manu Singhvi, said he was a serving chief minister and not a "habitual offender" and deserved to be released to campaign. Kejriwal’s deputy, Manish Sisodia, was also arrested in the case earlier, weakening his party’s campaign in national elections.

The Enforcement Directorate opposed his bail, saying that releasing Kejriwal to campaign would indicate that there were different judicial standards for politicians and other citizens.

"The right to campaign for an election is neither a fundamental right nor a constitutional right and not even a legal right," it said, adding that Kejriwal is not a candidate in these elections.

Kejriwal's party is the main challenger to Modi’s governing BJP in the Indian capital New Delhi and Punjab state where voting will take place on May 25 and June 1 respectively.

The national elections that started on April 19 are due to conclude on June 1. Votes will be counted on June 4.

While the federal agency accused Kejriwal of being a key conspirator in the liquor bribery case, the opposition parties said the government was misusing federal investigation agencies to harass and weaken its political opponents. They pointed to a series of raids, arrests and corruption investigations of key opposition figures.

Kejriwal called his arrest a "political conspiracy" to prevent him from campaigning, and accused the Enforcement Directorate of "manipulating investigative agencies for political motives."

Modi’s party denies using law enforcement agencies to target the opposition and says the agencies act independently.

Kejriwal, a former civil servant, launched the Aam Aadmi Party in 2012. He promised to rid the Indian political system and governance of corruption and inefficiency.

The party’s symbol — a broom — and its promise to sweep the administration of graft struck a chord with Delhi residents, fed up with runaway inflation and slow economic growth.

Croatian conservative leader Andrej Plenkovic was formally appointed prime minister-designate on Friday for a third consecutive term after he forged an alliance with an extreme right party following an inconclusive election.

Plenkovic's ruling Croatian Democratic Union won the most votes at last month's parliamentary vote in the European Union nation, but not enough to stay in power on their own. The party this week agreed to form a coalition with far-right Homeland Movement for a parliamentary majority.

Lawmakers are set to approve Plenkovic's new government next week. It will have a slim majority of 78 lawmakers in the 151-member assembly, which could herald political uncertainty.

CROATIA VOTES IN A BITTER SHOWDOWN OF A PARLIAMENTARY ELECTION BETWEEN PRESIDENT AND PRIME MINISTER

"We will continue in our third mandate to work for progress," Plenkovic said on X, formerly Twitter, after he was appointed by President Zoran Milanovic.

Plenkovic's new Cabinet is likely to push Croatia further to the right ahead of next month's European election, which takes place as the continent faces a war in Ukraine, climate emergencies, migration and other problems.

The Homeland Movement, or DP, is a relatively new political party in Croatia, made up largely of radical nationalists and social conservatives who had left the center-right HDZ. The party is led by the hard-line mayor of the eastern town of Vukovar, which was destroyed during Croatia’s 1991 war for independence after it split from the former Yugoslavia.

For the first time in years, Croatia’s government will not include a party representing minority Serbs because DP opposed their inclusion. That has fueled concerns about ethnic tensions stemming from the conflict in the 1990s.

HDZ has largely held office since Croatia gained independence. The Balkan nation became an EU member in 2013, and joined Europe’s passport-free travel area and the eurozone last year.

Hundreds of volunteers have set up a makeshift dog shelter in an abandoned, roofless warehouse in the Brazilian city of Canoas, one of the hardest hit by floods since last week. They treat and feed sick, hungry or injured dogs, hoping to reunite them with their owners.

Their work was at full speed Friday morning as heavy rains are expected again in the region for the weekend.

Floods in Rio Grande do Sul have killed at least 107 people. Another 136 are reported missing and more than 230,000 have been displaced, according to state authorities. There is no official tally for the number of animals that have died or are missing, but local media estimated the number to be in the thousands.

NEW YORK FIREFIGHTER ADOPTS PUPPY HE HELPED RESCUE AFTER SHE WAS HIT BY A CAR: 'I’D LOVE TO TAKE HER'

Since Sunday, the makeshift shelter, about the size of a football pitch, has welcomed hundreds of ill and agitated canines from inundated areas. Every hour, between 20 and 30 dogs arrive, many of them injured after having been run over or nearly drowned. The shelter sends some to veterinary hospitals, but others in need of medical attention are too frail to be transported.

Hairdresser Gabriel Cardoso da Silva, 28, is one of the main organizers of the improvised facilities. He came from neighboring city of Gravatai, which was not hit by the heavy rains.

"We came here on Saturday to help rescue people. When we were about to leave, we heard the barking. I and my wife felt so moved, we just cried; we have two dogs," said Silva.

With no government coordination for the displaced animals, many were drawn to the movement following a social media campaign.

LOST DOG IS SAFELY RESCUED AFTER IT SURVIVED ALONE IN THE WOODS FOR MORE THAN 6 YEARS

"Sunday we had 10 volunteers, now we have 200. We have tons of food. Our community chose to embrace this, but days ago we felt so alone."

Whenever a dog is reunited with family, the hairdresser shouts "One less!" so other volunteers can stop and applaud throughout the shelter, which is covered in dog food, chains to stop them from fighting with each other and donations.

Cardoso's cry often mixes with loud barks of small and jittery dogs, fights between distraught homeless pets and frantic movement by desperate families trying to locate one or more of their members.

Éder Luis da Silva Camargo, a garbage collector in Canoas, found two of his six dogs at the center after searching for two days. Hunter and Preta were separated from him on Tuesday, as they boarded different boats during a rescue operation.

"They were so scared then, they ran to the side and we couldn’t run after them. Now, thank God, we found them here," Camargo said.

He and his wife Jenifer Gabriela, 21, want to find their four dogs that are still missing: Bob, Meg, Polaca and Ravena.

"This is the third place we came to look for them. This is great, but we still want to find the others," Gabriela said.

Animal protection groups and volunteers have shared images of difficult rescues and heartwarming scenes of pets reuniting with their owners on social media, which has spurred Brazilians to send donations and brought veterinarians to the region.

One video that went viral showed a man crying inside a boat, hugging his four dogs after rescuers went back to his home to save them.

The tough situation of animals in southern Brazil became national news this week after a horse nicknamed Caramelo garnered attention for spending days stranded on a rooftop in Canoas, not far from the shelter.

About 24 hours after he was first spotted and with people clamoring for his rescue, a team in Brazil’s Rio Grande do Sul state on Thursday successfully removed Caramelo, providing a dose of hope to a beleaguered region.

Carla Sassi, chairwoman of Grad, a Brazilian nonprofit that rescues animals after disasters, said she met with state government officials in Canoas to discuss emergency measures to rescue pets. So far, according to volunteers, only business leaders and local residents have acted to save pets in flooded areas.

After the coronavirus pandemic triggered once-unthinkable lockdowns, upended economies and killed millions, leaders at the World Health Organization and worldwide vowed to do better in the future. Years later, countries are still struggling to come up with an agreed-upon plan for how the world might respond to the next global outbreak.

A ninth and final round of talks involving governments, advocacy groups and others to finalize a "pandemic treaty" is scheduled to end Friday. The accord's aim: guidelines for how the WHO's 194 member countries might stop future pandemics and better share scarce resources. But experts warn there are virtually no consequences for countries that don’t comply.

WHO’s countries asked the U.N. health agency to oversee talks for a pandemic agreement in 2021. Envoys have been working long hours in recent weeks to prepare a draft ahead of a self-imposed deadline later this month: ratification of the accord at WHO's annual meeting. But deep divisions could derail it.

WHO DIRECTOR CALLS FOR WORLD PANDEMIC TREATY TO PREPARE FOR DISEASE X

U.S. Republican senators wrote a letter to the Biden administration last week critical of the draft for focusing on issues like "shredding intellectual property rights" and "supercharging the WHO." They urged Biden not to sign off.

Britain's department of health said it would only agree to an accord if it was "firmly in the U.K. national interest and respects national sovereignty."

And many developing countries say it's unfair that they might be expected to provide virus samples to help develop vaccines and treatments, but then be unable to afford them.

"This pandemic treaty is a very high-minded pursuit, but it doesn’t take political realities into account," said Sara Davies, a professor of international relations at Griffith University in Australia.

ALL GOP SENATORS PRESS BIDEN NOT TO SUPPORT EXPANDING WHO PANDEMIC AUTHORITY

For example, the accord is attempting to address the gap that occurred between COVID-19 vaccines in rich and poorer countries, which WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said amounted to "a catastrophic moral failure."

The draft says WHO should get 20% of the production of pandemic-related products like tests, treatments and vaccines and urges countries to disclose their deals with private companies.

"There’s no mechanism within WHO to make life really difficult for any countries that decide not to act in accordance with the treaty," Davies said.

Adam Kamradt-Scott, a global health expert at Harvard University, said that similar to the global climate agreements, the draft pandemic treaty would at least provide a new forum for countries to try to hold each other to account, where governments will have to explain what measures they’ve taken.

The pandemic treaty "is not about anyone telling the government of a country what it can do and what it cannot do," said Roland Driece, co-chair of WHO’s negotiating board for the agreement.

There are legally binding obligations under the International Health Regulations, including quickly reporting dangerous new outbreaks. But those have been flouted repeatedly, including by African countries during Ebola outbreaks and China in the early stages of COVID-19.

Suerie Moon, co-director of the Global Health Center at Geneva’s Graduate Institute, said it was critical to determine the expected role of WHO during a pandemic and how outbreaks might be stopped before spreading globally.

"If we fail to seize this window of opportunity which is closing … we’ll be just as vulnerable as we were in 2019," she warned.

Some countries appear to be moving on their own to ensure cooperation from others in the next pandemic. Last month, President Joe Biden’s administration said it would help 50 countries respond to new outbreaks and prevent global spread, giving the country leverage should it need critical information or materials in the future.

Yuanqiong Hu, a senior legal and policy adviser at Doctors without Borders, said it’s unclear what might be different in the next pandemic, but hoped that focusing attention on some of the glaring errors that emerged in COVID-19 might help.

"We will mostly have to rely on countries to do better," she said. "That is worrisome."

Israel continues a missile strike on the city of Rafah, Hamas' last stronghold in Gaza, after ceasefire talks with the terrorist regime once again fell apart.  

During negotiation efforts in Cairo, Egypt, Hamas reportedly demanded an initial 12-week ceasefire, double the six-week timeframe offered by the Israeli Defense Force.

Air strikes continue on Rafah as the IDF marshals manpower and military equipment outside the city limits in preparation for a ground invasion.

BIDEN VOWS TO WITHHOLD WEAPONS FROM ISRAEL IF NETANYAHU GOES FORWARD WITH RAFAH INVASION

Palestinians have fled the city en masse as the conflict comes to a boiling point, with over 100,000 internally displaced refugees setting up tent cities and temporary shanty towns outside Rafah.

The Israeli government's determination to enter Rafah is unpopular with Western powers, which have repeatedly urged the Jewish nation to avoid the operation due to the likely massive loss of civilian lives involved.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed to follow through with the eradication of Hamas — even if it loses Israel its allies.

ISRAEL URGES PALESTINIANS TO EVACUATE RAFAH AHEAD  OF EXPECTED GROUND OPERATION IN HAMAS STRONGHOLD

"If we must stand alone, we shall stand alone," Netanyahu said. "If we must, we shall fight with our fingernails. But we have much more than our fingernails, and with that strength of spirit, with God’s help, together we shall be victorious."

President Biden is vowing to withhold weapons from Israel if the Jewish State goes forward with its invasion of Rafah. 

"Civilians have been killed in Gaza as a consequence of those bombs and other ways in which they go after population centers," Biden told CNN’s Erin Burnett in an interview released Wednesday. 

"I made it clear that if they go into Rafah – they haven’t gone in Rafah yet – if they go into Rafah, I’m not supplying the weapons that have been used historically to deal with Rafah, to deal with the cities – that deal with that problem," Biden said.

Airstrikes were fired into Jabalya camp in the north of Gaza overnight. Further strikes occurred at the same time in the city of Khan Younis. A total of twelve people were killed in the bombings.

Fox News Digital's Joseph A. Wulfsohn contributed to this report.

An upcoming Ukraine peace summit, ostensibly the most ambitious bid in years by neutral Switzerland to mediate a major conflict, is instead showing how Swiss economic and security interests increasingly align with Western Europe over Russia.

This is the view of both Swiss advocates of closer cooperation with Western powers and nationalist opponents who say Switzerland is abandoning its neutral tradition and should limit the scope for foreign entanglements.

Russia has not been invited to the June 15-16 talks taking place at a lakeside resort near the central city of Lucerne, which Switzerland agreed in January to host at the behest of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy.

FAMOUSLY NEUTRAL SWITZERLAND PLEDGES $2B TO UKRAINE UNDER GLOBAL PRESSURE

Rather than ending the war, the summit is poised to work towards mitigating risks stemming from Moscow's invasion of Ukraine and trying to isolate Russia, according to Western diplomats and Swiss foreign policy experts.

"It's going to be about shoring up Ukraine rather than bridge-building for immediate peace," said Daniel Woker, a former Swiss ambassador to Australia, Singapore and Kuwait.

Responding to a request by Reuters for comment, the Swiss foreign ministry said Switzerland's neutrality is "constant" and will not be altered by the conference.

"But being neutral does not mean being indifferent," it added in the statement. "Switzerland strongly condemns Russia's aggression against Ukraine. Outside the military realm, the right to neutrality does not stand in the way of solidarity and support for Ukraine and its people."

The conference, which Switzerland says should pave the way for a "future peace process", will focus on issues of global concern such as nuclear safety, freedom of navigation, food security and humanitarian matters, the ministry said.

Switzerland says Russia must be involved in the process, but justified its lack of an invitation next month on the grounds Moscow had repeatedly said it had no interest in taking part.

The Kremlin has described Switzerland as "openly hostile" and unfit to mediate in peace-building efforts, in particular because of its adoption of EU sanctions against Moscow.

Bern has asked over 160 delegations to the summit, pressing hard to include Russian allies from the so-called Global South, notably China, which says it is considering taking part.

If the summit can craft consensus with Russian allies on areas of mutual concern it could increase pressure on Moscow to compromise, diplomats say.

European support for the summit is solidifying, with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz confirming his attendance, alongside leaders from Spain, Poland and Finland, among others.

Thomas Borer, a former Swiss ambassador to Germany, said Switzerland's business and security interests are overwhelmingly tied to Western Europe, North America and their allies, making it strategically imperative to stand with Ukraine.

Government protestations of neutrality would not change that, he added.

"Neither the Russians nor our Western allies view us as neutral," he said.

Around two-thirds of Swiss exports go to North America, the EU, Britain, Japan and Australia. Less than 1% go to Russia.

Supporters of closer Western alignment also note Switzerland is almost completely surrounded by NATO countries, which act as a buffer against potential external intrusions.

"Neutrality is a cop-out for a country that's basically getting a free ride off the security that others provide," said Franziska Roth, a lawmaker in the Swiss parliament for the center-left Social Democrats.

Since Russia invaded Ukraine, two of Europe's other historically neutral states, Sweden and Finland, have both joined NATO.

As a U.N. member, Switzerland had a duty to uphold international law, which the Russian invasion violated, Roth said. Helping Ukraine recover from that took precedence over outdated notions of neutrality, she added.

Neutrality is, however, firmly rooted in the Swiss psyche and ditching it would be akin to Britain abolishing the monarchy, regardless of the geopolitical forces pulling at the country, said former ambassador Woker.

A study published in March by the Center for Security Studies at the ETH Zurich showed 91% of Swiss felt the country should stay neutral, though 26% also backed taking "a clear stand" in favor of one side in foreign military conflicts, up 8 percentage points from 2021.

It also showed a majority in favor of Switzerland getting closer to NATO.

Woker and other critics argue neutrality is an anachronism used as a pretext for protecting Swiss economic and financial interests, and risks isolating the country.

Recognized in 1815 by European powers after Napoleon's defeat and enshrined in the 1907 Hague Convention, Swiss neutrality helped bind together the multilingual confederation during the World Wars.

The right-wing Swiss Peoples' Party (SVP), the biggest group in the Swiss lower house of parliament, argues neutrality is an integral part of Switzerland's prosperity and that Bern's support for Ukraine undermines it.

The SVP has initiated a referendum to embed neutrality in the constitution, though it is unlikely to be held before 2025.

The party's most emblematic figure, Christoph Blocher, this month criticized the peace summit, saying failure to invite Russia did not augur well for Switzerland.

"We're only bringing the Ukrainians," he said. "And we say we're neutral."

It was "unacceptable" that the U.S. decision to withhold some weapons from Israel became public while the two governments still were discussing Israel's planned offensive into the Gaza city of Rafah, the Israeli envoy to Washington said on Thursday.

The U.S. pause on some arms supplies to Israel "sends the wrong message to Hamas and to our enemies in the region," Israeli Ambassador Michael Herzog told a Carnegie Endowment for International Peace webinar a day after U.S. President Joe Biden warned Israel for the first time that Washington would withhold weapons if Israeli forces launch a major offensive into Rafah.

Biden's comments in a CNN interview were his strongest public warning to date in his effort to deter an Israeli assault on Rafah. They underscored a growing rift between the U.S. and its strongest ally in the Middle East.

NETANYAHU SAYS ISRAEL 'WILL STAND ALONE' IF NECESSARY AFTER BIDEN THREATENS TO WITHHOLD WEAPONS

Billions of dollars worth of U.S. weaponry remains in the pipeline for Israel, despite the delay of one shipment of bombs and a review of others because of U.S. concerns their use in Rafah could wreak more devastation on Palestinian civilians.

The U.S. has said it has not seen an Israeli plan to protect the estimated 1.4 million Palestinian civilians in Rafah, most of them displaced by fighting from other parts of the devastated Gaza Strip.

Herzog said Israeli officials had been discussing a Rafah operation for weeks with U.S. officials "and we told them point blank that we're not going to move automatically into the urban area without first developing a plan for the population and implementing" that plan.

"We told the administration that what we are going to do is not time based, it is conditions based and we showed them our plans," he continued.

"I think its unfortunate that before we completed this discussion...things went out in public in the sense that, you know, 'Don't do Rafah and if you do we withhold certain weapons," Herzog said. "I might say as well it is unacceptable."

Israel launched its offensive in Gaza following the Oct. 7 onslaught into Israel by Hamas fighters who killed some 1,200 people and took 252 hostages back into the seaside enclave.

Israel's assault has killed nearly 35,000 Palestinians and wounded nearly 80,000, most of them civilians, Hamas-ruled Gaza's health ministry says.

Herzog said the U.S. decision to withhold some weapons "puts us in a corner because we have to deal with Rafah one way or the other."

To achieve its goal of destroying Hamas as a military and political force and eliminate its threat, Israel must defeat four battalions of Hamas fighters deployed in Rafah, he said.

"I don't believe we can complete the job of defeating Hamas in Gaza without addressing this question," Herzog said.

A U.S. congressional committee on China has asked leading research university Georgia Institute of Technology to detail its collaboration with a Chinese university facing U.S. government restrictions due to its alleged ties to the country's military.

Georgia Tech partnered with China's northeastern Tianjin University on cutting edge technologies despite its documented ties to the People's Liberation Army (PLA), John Moolenaar, the new Republican chairman of the House of Representatives' select committee on China, wrote in a letter on Thursday to the U.S. school's president Angel Cabrera.

But the Georgia Tech scientist who led the project defended the research, saying all the results were available to the public, that it had passed extensive legal reviews, and that only a small portion of the funding came from the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI), which is heavily sponsored by the Pentagon.

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The letter noted that Tianjin University and numerous affiliates had been added in 2020 to the Commerce Department's export restrictions list for actions contrary to U.S. national security, including trade secret theft and research collaboration to advance China's military.

"While Georgia Tech is now prohibited from exporting sensitive technologies to Tianjin University due to the Entity List's prohibitions, it has collaborated with Tianjin University and at least one other PLA-linked entity on developing sensitive technologies," Moolenaar said.

The Tianjin research center is affiliated with a Chinese company with subsidiaries that supply the PLA, the letter said.

A Georgia Tech press release from January said its researchers based in Atlanta and at the Tianjin International Center for Nanoparticles and Nanosysms had created the world's first functional semiconductor made from the nanomaterial, graphene, which it said could lead to a "paradigm shift" in electronics and yield faster computing.

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The U.S. and China, in the midst of an intense geopolitical and scientific rivalry, both view semiconductors as a strategic industry with civilian and military uses, including quantum computing and advanced weapons systems.

A spokesperson from Georgia Tech said it welcomed the congressional inquiry, but that GTRI "does not have a collaboration, research partnerships, or provide any funding to Tianjin University."

"We are continuously monitoring the evolving relationships between China and the United States and have implemented additional procedures and protocols to ensure security and maintain vigilance," Abbigail Tumpey, the spokesperson told Reuters in an email.

In a published article, researchers credited financial support from GTRI, which counted the Defense Department and the U.S. military as customers for more than 90% of its research in fiscal year 2023, according to its latest annual report.  

Moolenaar said Georgia Tech's collaboration with Tianjin University raised questions about its entity list compliance, and asked Cabrera to thoroughly disclose all of its joint work.

GTRI, Tianjin International Center for Nanoparticles and Nanosystems, and China's embassy in Washington did not respond immediately to Reuters' requests for comment.

Walter de Heer, the Georgia Tech professor who directed the program, told Reuters that only one Atlanta-based student had derived funding from GTRI for "nonproprietary" research related to the collaboration, which involved reproducing samples made in Tianjin.

He said deteriorating U.S.-China relations had derailed what had been a fruitful scientific endeavor with Chinese researchers. He said the research was still about a decade away from viable implementation, but that he had been unable to obtain U.S. government or private sector funding for follow-on research despite its promise.

"Everything I'm doing is public domain and open source," De Heer said.

The letter marks one of the first actions Moolenaar has taken as head of the bipartisan committee, a post he assumed in April after former Representative Mike Gallagher left Congress. No Democrats on the committee signed the letter.

The U.S. Justice Department under the Biden administration ended a Trump-era program called the China Initiative intended to combat Chinese espionage and intellectual property theft, but which critics had said spurred racial profiling toward Asian Americans and chilled scientific research.

Still, U.S. agencies and Congress have stepped up scrutiny of China's state-sponsored influence and technology transfers at American colleges and universities, concerned that Beijing uses open and federally funded research environments in the U.S. to circumvent export controls and other national security laws.

Various congressional bodies have recommended stricter China-related measures be added to the Higher Education Act of 1965 that requires U.S. colleges and universities that receive federal funding to disclose foreign ownership, control, gifts and contracts.

Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk on Friday announced a reshuffle of his Cabinet to replace four ministers running for the European Parliament next month.

The changes are also seen as a chance to bring new energy into Tusk’s government, which took office in December and embarked on deep reforms in many areas, including justice, foreign policy and the media.

"Today comes the time of bringing order and this is one of the reasons for which we jointly decided to have these changes," Tusk said.

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He said there will be more changes in the future that would be dictated by the "interest of the state."

Tusk’s pro-European Union government has embarked on a wide reversal of the policies of its right-wing predecessors, the Law and Justice party, who between 2015 to 2023 put Poland on a collision course with the 27-member EU. Tusk's team is taking steps to free the judiciary and the state media from the political control that Law and Justice tried to impose, and bring to account those responsible for mismanagement and loss of funds by state-owned companies.

Culture Minister Bartlomiej Sienkiewicz, who spearheaded the change of management at the state TV, radio and news agency, and the minister of the interior and administration, Marcin Kierwinski, were replaced. The ministers for state assets, Borys Budka, and for development and technology, Krzysztof Hetman, were also leaving.

The new interior minister is Tomasz Siemoniak, who served as the defense minister in Tusk's previous government in 2011 to 2015. He retains his job as coordinator of special services at a time of Russia's war on Poland's neighbor Ukraine.

The culture minister is now Hanna Wroblewska, an art historian, while Jakub Jaworowski, an economist and financier, was put in charge of state assets, where auditing is currently taking place, uncovering glaring cases of mismanagement under the previous government. Krzysztof Paszyk, an experienced politician and lawmaker, is the new minister of development and technology.

They will take office after formal appointment by President Andrzej Duda on Monday.

The reshuffle came just hours before a major protest planned in Warsaw by Law and Justice, seeking to win seats in the June 9 elections to the European legislature. They were joining with farmers protesting new EU agriculture policies to cut green gas emissions, called the Green Deal.

Russian President Vladimir Putin reappointed Mikhail Mishustin as the country’s prime minister on Friday, a widely anticipated move to keep on a technocrat who has maintained a low political profile.

Mishustin and other technocrats in the Cabinet have been credited with maintaining a relatively stable economic performance despite bruising Western sanctions for Russia's role in Ukraine. Most other Cabinet members are expected to keep their jobs, though the fate of Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu appeared uncertain.

In line with Russian law, Mishustin, 58, who held the job for the past four years, submitted his Cabinet’s resignation on Tuesday when Putin began his fifth presidential term at a glittering Kremlin inauguration.

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Mishustin, the former head of Russia’s tax service, steered clear of political statements and avoided media interviews during his previous tenure.

The speaker of the parliament’s lower house, Vyacheslav Volodin, announced that Putin submitted Mishustin’s candidacy to the State Duma, which will hold a session later Friday to consider it.

Under the constitutional changes approved in 2020, the lower house approves the candidacy of the prime minister, who then submits Cabinet members for approval. The changes were ostensibly meant to grant parliament broader power, but the procedure is widely seen as pro forma given Kremlin control over the body.

Most Cabinet members are expected to keep their jobs, but it was not clear if Shoigu, the defense minister, would be among them after last month’s arrest of his top associate, Timur Ivanov.

Ivanov, who served as deputy defense minister in charge of massive military construction projects, was arrested on bribery charges and was ordered to stay in custody pending official investigation.

The arrest of Ivanov was widely interpreted as an attack on Shoigu and a possible precursor of his dismissal despite his close personal ties with Putin.

Shoigu was broadly criticized for Russian military’s setbacks in the early stage of the fighting in Ukraine. He faced scathing attacks from mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin, who marched on Moscow nearly a year ago to demand the ouster of Shoigu and the chief of the General Staff, Gen. Valery Gerasimov.

After Prigozhin’s death in a suspicious plane crash two months after the rebellion — widely seen as the Kremlin’s revenge — Shoigu appeared to shore up his position. But Ivanov’s arrest, interpreted by many as part of Kremlin’s political infighting, again exposed Shoigu’s vulnerability.

One of the suspects believed to be connected to the murders of two Australian brothers and an American, who were on a surfing trip in Mexico, allegedly admitted to his girlfriend that he killed all three, according to her. 

During a court hearing on Wednesday, the BBC reported that Ari Gisel, the girlfriend of suspected killer Jesús Gerardo Garcia Cota, allegedly showed up at her house on April 28 and told her he did something to "three gringos." Gringo is a slang term used to describe English-speaking foreigners. 

When she asked what he meant, Gisel stated that Garcia Cota said "I killed them." 

In keeping with Mexican law, prosecutors identified him by his first name, Jesús Gerardo, alias "el Kekas," a slang word that means "quesadillas," or cheese tortillas. 

MOTHER OF AUSTRALIAN SURFERS KILLED IN MEXICO DELIVERS TOUCHING EULOGY AT SAN DIEGO BEACH

After admitting to the crime, Garcia Cota reportedly took Gisel outside to show her his vehicle, which reportedly had the tires on it that were allegedly stolen from the victims' truck, Gisel explained in court. 

Mexican authorities believe the surfers were all killed because thieves wanted the tires from their truck. 

The three men, brothers Jake and Callum Robinson from Australia and American Jack Carter Rhoad, were on a camping and surfing trip along a stretch of coast south of the city of Ensenada when they went missing last weekend.

Chief state prosecutor María Elena Andrade Ramírez theorized the killers drove by and saw the foreigners' pickup truck and tents and wanted to steal their tires. But "when [the foreigners] came up and caught them, surely, they resisted."

MEXICAN AUTHORITIES REVEAL BIZARRE REASON THEY BELIEVE AUSTRALIANS, AMERICAN WERE MURDERED ON SURFING VACATION

The thieves then allegedly went to what she called "a site that is extremely hard to get to" and allegedly dumped the bodies into a familiar well. A fourth body was also found inside the well.

Ramírez said investigators were not ruling out the possibility the same suspects also dumped the first, earlier body in the well as part of previous crimes.

All three bodies had a gunshot wound to the head, Reuters reported, citing a source from the attorney general's office.

The mother of the Robinson brothers delivered a moving tribute to her sons Tuesday at a beach in San Diego.

"Our hearts are broken, and the world has become a darker place for us," Debra Robinson said, fighting back tears. "They were young men enjoying their passion of surfing together."

FOURTH BODY FOUND IN SEARCH FOR US AND AUSTRALIAN SURFERS WHO MYSTERIOUSLY VANISHED IN MEXICO

During her speech, Robinson noted that her son Jake loved surfing so much that, as a doctor, he liked to work in hospitals near the beach.

"Jake’s passion was surfing, and it was no coincidence that many of his hospitals that he worked in were close to surfing beaches," she said. "Live bigger, shine brighter, and love harder in their memory," she said.

Garcia Cota will be prosecuted for the crime of "disappearance committed by private individuals," and homicide charges are expected to be filed later, the BBC reported. 

The prosecution added that it is continuing to gather evidence in an effort to charge two other suspects, who remain in custody for alleged possession of methamphetamine.

Fox News Digital's Bradford Betz and The Associated Press contributed to this report. 

A Boeing 737-300 plane carrying 85 people caught fire and skidded off a runway at Senegal's main airport, near the capital of Dakar. Ten people were injured in the crash, including the pilot, the country's transport minister said Thursday.

Passengers were evacuated from the burning aircraft at Blaise Diagne International airport and some described "complete panic" as they scrambled for their lives.

The Air Sénégal flight operated by TransAir was headed to Bamako, in neighboring Mali, late on Wednesday with 79 passengers, two pilots and four cabin crew, when the crash happened. The airport is located about 31 miles from Dakar.

BOEING WHISTLEBLOWER FROM KANSAS IS 2ND TO DIE IN PAST 2 MONTHS

It wasn't immediately clear what caused the plane to catch fire and skid off the runway. The injured were being treated at a hospital, while the others were taken to a hotel to rest, the minister added.

Passengers jumped down the emergency slides at night while flames engulfed one side of the aircraft and screams were heard all around, recounted Malian musician Cheick Siriman Sissoko, who filmed the passengers' ordeal on his phone camera.

"I saw my life flash before my eyes," he said. "I thought about my mother, my wife, my kids," Sissoko, 39, told The Associated Press from the hotel where passengers were recovering from the shock.

"Only the slide on one side opened, so there was complete panic during the evacuation," he added.

Ibrahim Diallo, 20, a Malian citizen aboard the flight, said the plane had attempted to take off earlier that night but failed.

"The pilot told us everything was under control and that we’re going to try to take off again," he told the AP. "The second time, smoke started coming from one of the wings."

Boeing referred all request for comment to the airlines.

"Carriers operate and maintain their airplanes for upwards of 30 to 40 years," a statement said. "We refer you to each operator for questions related to their fleet operations. We will provide any requested support to our customer."

Air Sénégal did not respond to a request for comment but posted a statement on teh social media platform X, saying that flights between Dakar and Bamako were rescheduled to a later date, without providing further details.

It was the third incident involving a Boeing airplane this week. Also on Thursday, 190 people were safely evacuated from a plane in Turkey after one of its tires burst during landing at a southern airport, Turkey’s transportation ministry said.

The company has been under intense pressure since a door plug blew out of a Boeing 737 Max during an Alaska Airlines flight in January, leaving a gaping hole in the plane. The Federal Aviation Administration in February gave Boeing 90 days to come up with a plan to fix quality problems and meet safety standards for building planes after the accident.

The incident has raised scrutiny of Boeing to the highest level since two crashes of Boeing 737 Max jets in 2018 and 2019 that killed 346 people. About a dozen relatives of passengers who died in the second crash have been pushing the U.S. government to revive a criminal fraud charge against the company by determining that Boeing violated terms of a 2021 settlement.

In April, a Boeing whistleblower, Sam Salehpour, testified at a congressional hearing that the company had taken manufacturing shortcuts to turn out 787s as quickly as possible that could lead to jetliners breaking apart.

The Aviation Safety Network, which tracks airline accidents, described the plane in Senegal's crash as a Boeing 737-38J, an aircraft that was delivered in the 1990s. The network published photos on X of the damaged plane in a grassy field, surrounded by fire suppressant foam. One engine appeared to have broken apart and a wing was also damaged, according to the photos.

The network is part of the Flight Safety Foundation, a nonprofit group that aims to promote safe air travel and tracks accidents.

Argentina’s biggest trade unions mounted one of their fiercest challenges to the libertarian government of President Javier Milei, staging a mass general strike on Thursday that led to the cancellation of hundreds of flights and halted key bus, rail and subway lines.

Main avenues and streets, as well as major transportation terminals were left eerily empty. Most teachers couldn’t make it to school and parents kept their children at home. Trash collectors walked off the job — as did health workers, except for those in emergency rooms.

ARGENTINA'S NEWLY ELECTED PRESIDENT, LIBERTARIAN JAVIER MILEI, SWORN INTO OFFICE

The 24-hour strike against Milei’s painful austerity measures and contentious deregulation push threatened to bring the nation of 46 million to a standstill as banks, businesses and state agencies also closed in protest.

Thursday’s action marked the second nationwide union strike since Milei came to power last December, slashing spending, laying off government workers, and freezing all public works projects in a bid to rescue Argentina from its worst financial crisis in two decades.

He has also devalued the local currency, stabilizing the peso but also causing prices to soar. Argentina’s annual inflation rate now nears 300% — considered the highest in the world, outpacing even crisis-stricken Lebanon.

The government said transport service disruptions would prevent some 6.6 million people from making it to work. During the morning rush-hour on Thursday, few cars could be seen on streets typically snarled with traffic. Garbage was already piling up on deserted sidewalks.

Milei posted a photo on Instagram holding up a soccer jersey emblazoned with the words "I DON’T STOP."

The country’s largest union, known by its acronym CGT, said it was staging the strike alongside other labor syndicates "in defense of democracy, labor rights and a living wage."

Argentina’s powerful unions — backed by Argentina’s left-leaning Peronist parties that have dominated national politics for decades — have led the pushback to Milei’s policies on the streets and in the courts in recent months.

"We are facing a government that promotes the elimination of labor and social rights," the unions said, seeking to portray Thursday’s strike as an eruption of public outrage over Milei’s free-market policies that have disproportionately affected poor and middle classes.

The government downplayed the disruption as a cynical ploy by its left-wing political opponents.

"They want to keep Argentina on a path of servitude," said presidential spokesperson Manual Adorni of the union leaders, accusing them of "extorting Argentines to try to return to power."

Union leaders said they had no choice but to escalate their actions after Argentina’s lower house approved Milei’s state overhaul bill and tax packages last week.

Even as lawmakers scrapped the bill's most controversial articles, unions remain vehemently opposed to parts of the package that relax labor market regulations and grant Milei power to restructure and privatize public agencies. The bill is now being debated in the opposition-dominated Senate.

Rubén Sobrero, general-secretary of the Railway Union, said the unions were prepared to extend the strike if negotiations did not yield results. "If there is no response within these 24 hours, we'll do another 36," he said.

For months, most recently Monday and Tuesday this week, raucous demonstrations by leftist parties gripped Buenos Aires, the country’s capital — in sharp contrast to the silence prevailing on the streets Thursday.

Argentina’s main international airport warned travelers to check in with their airlines as flight boards in terminals displayed a stream of yellow cancellation notices. The country’s flagship carrier, Aerolíneas Argentinas, announced it had canceled nearly 200 domestic and regional flights and rescheduled over a dozen international flights, affecting 24,000 passengers and costing the airline $2 million.

Only one bus company said it would continue regular service on Thursday. Shortly after the strike began at midnight, police said protesters attacked two of the company’s buses in Buenos Aires, breaking windows but causing no casualties.

"We won’t let them (the unions) break everything we are achieving," conservative Security Minister Patricia Bullrich posted on social media with a photo of the shattered bus windows.

Experts say that both sides are politically motivated.

In using the strike to assail his rivals, Milei is compensating for worsening economic pressures, said Sebastián Mazzuca, a political science expert at Johns Hopkins University. In bringing the economy to a halt, unions that had their candidate defeated in the last presidential election are flexing their muscles.

"This conflict is sold to the public as a social conflict, but it's really a political conflict," Mazzuca said. "The outgoing government doesn't want to die. And the new government wants to stay in power."

Guyana’s government on Thursday said it gave permission for the U.S. military to fly two powerful F/A-18F Super Hornet jets over its capital to demonstrate the close military and other forms of cooperation between this oil-exporting South American nation and the United States.

The country had about three hours notice of the exercise through an American embassy announcement but most people appeared to have been surprised by the noisy and unprecedented fly over that comes in the midst of simmering tensions between Guyana and Venezuela over a large swath of Guyana’s territory.

VIDEO OF GUYANA’S PRESIDENT SNAPPING BACK AT BBC REPORTER’S CLIMATE QUIZ GOES VIRAL: ‘LET ME STOP YOU’

A Guyana government statement said the "exercise seeks to deepen the ongoing security cooperation between our two countries," but both sides stayed clear of any reference to moves by neighboring Venezuela to annex the oil and mineral-rich Essequibo region.

President Nicolás Maduro recently signed a law annexing the region. The U.S. has made it clear it supports Guyana in the ongoing dispute and had assisted with surveillance flights for Guyana late last year when Venezuela had threatened to invade the country.

The military exercise came just a day after U.S. Marine Corps Maj. Gen Julie Nethercot visited Guyana for talks pertaining to "deterring aggression, defeating threats and rapidly responding to crises," as the Florida-based U.S. Southern Command reiterated its unwavering support for Guyana.

Guyana is awaiting a World Court decision on Venezuela's claim to the region but Venezuela has said it does not recognize the court and will ignore its decision whenever it is handed down.

A shipment of two types of precision bombs to Israel remains in limbo after being paused by the U.S. in opposition to Israeli forces’ operation in Rafah.

The shipment contains 1,800 2,000-pound bombs, and 1,700 500-pound bombs the Biden administration has said may be used in Rafah.

Pentagon press secretary Maj. Gen. Patrick Ryder confirmed the shipment of bombs was paused, though the future of the shipment remains undetermined.

"We’ve not made a final determination on how to proceed with this shipment," Ryder said.

BIDEN VOWS TO WITHHOLD WEAPONS FROM ISRAEL IF NETANYAHU GOES FORWARD WITH RAFAH INVASION

A U.S. official said in a statement to Fox News Digital on Wednesday that the U.S. position has been that Israel should not launch a major ground operation in Rafah, where over a million people are currently sheltering.

"We have been engaging in a dialogue with Israel in our Strategic Consultative Group format on how they will meet the humanitarian needs of civilians in Rafah, and how to operate differently against Hamas there than they have elsewhere in Gaza," the official continued. "Those discussions are ongoing and have not fully addressed our concerns. As Israeli leaders seemed to approach a decision point on such an operation, we began to carefully review proposed transfers of particular weapons to Israel that might be used in Rafah. This began in April."

Following this review, the U.S. decided last week to pause shipment of the bombs, according to the official, who said the administration is "especially focused" on the end-use of the 2,000-pound bombs and "the impact they could have in dense urban settings as we have seen in other parts of Gaza."

MANY ISRAELIS FEEL ‘BETRAYED’ FOLLOWING BIDEN THREAT TO WITHHOLD ARMS TO DEFEAT HAMAS IN RAFAH

The official also emphasized that these shipments do not have anything to do with the Israel supplemental appropriations passed last month.

The statement from the U.S. official comes after two Israeli officials told Axios that U.S.-manufactured ammunition to Israel was paused last week for the first time since Hamas' Oct. 7 attack against the Jewish state.

On Tuesday, the Israel Defense Forces announced that it had gained operational control of the Gazan side of the Rafah Crossing after troops began a "precise counterterrorism operation" in eastern Rafah aimed at killing Hamas terrorists and dismantling "Hamas terrorist infrastructure within specific areas of eastern Rafah."

Fox News Digital's Landon Mion contributed to this report.

Chad’s military leader, Mahamat Deby Itno, was declared the winner of this week's presidential election, according to provisional results released Thursday. The results were contested by his main rival, Prime Minister Succès Masra.

The national agency that manages Chad’s election released results of Monday's vote weeks earlier than planned. The figures showed Deby Itno won with just over 61% of the vote, with the runner-up Masra falling far behind with over 18.5% of the vote. Gunfire erupted in the capital following the announcement.

Preliminary results were initially expected on May 21.

CHAD HOLDS LONG-AWAITED PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION SET TO END YEARS OF MILITARY RULE

Chad held its long delayed presidential election following three years of military rule, a vote that analysts widely expected the incumbent to win. Deby Itno, also known as Mahamat Idriss Deby, seized power after his father, who spent three decades in power, was killed fighting rebels in 2021.

The oil-exporting country of nearly 18 million people hasn’t had a free-and-fair transfer of power since it became independent in 1960 after decades of French colonial rule.

Hours ahead of Thursday’s announcement, Masra published a speech on Facebook accusing the authorities of planning to manipulate the outcome.

During the 11 minute speech, Masra appeared in a blue suit at a podium with the national flag in the background and claimed victory, saying the incumbent was planning to reverse the outcome of the vote. He called on Chad’s military, police and other security forces to stop following Deby Itno’s orders.

"These orders will lead you to side with the wrong side of Chad’s history, these orders will lead you to fight your brothers and sisters, these orders will lead you to commit the irreparable and unforgivable," he said in the speech. "Refuse to obey these unjust orders!"

There was no immediate response from the president's office.

Masra, president of The Transformers opposition party, fled Chad in October 2022. The country’s military government at the time suspended his party and six others in a clampdown on protests against Deby Itno’s decision to extend his time in power by two more years. More than 60 people were killed in the protests, which the government condemned as "an attempted coup."

An agreement between the country’s minister of reconciliation and Masra’s political party late last year allowed the exiled politician and other opposition figures to return to Chad. He was later appointed prime minister.

Chad is seen by the U.S. and France as one of the last remaining stable allies in the vast Sahel region following military coups in Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger in recent years. The ruling juntas in all three nations have expelled French forces and turned to Russia’s mercenary units for security assistance instead.

About half of Zimbabwe’s population urgently needs food and water after the country’s worst drought in four decades, the U.N. humanitarian agency said Thursday as it launched an appeal for $430 million to help those most in need.

About 7.6 million of the country's 15 million people need "lifesaving and life-sustaining" humanitarian assistance, the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said. But the agency is asking donors for the money to help the 3.1 million people in the most severely affected districts for the coming year, said Edward Matthew Kallon, U.N. resident humanitarian coordinator.

ZIMBABWE RELEASES OVER 4,000 PRISONERS UNDER AMNESTY TO REDUCE OVERCROWDING

A drought induced by the El Nino weather phenomenon is sweeping across much of southern Africa and has left both people and animals in desperate need of food and water. Zimbabwe, an agriculture reliant nation and one time exporter of food, is among the hardest hit by the drought.

Harvests for the staple corn for the 2023-24 season are estimated at about 700,000 tons, which is 70% down from last season. Zimbabwe requires 2.2 million tons annually to meet demand for humans and livestock, according to government crop assessment figures.

The U.N. appeal said that help will range from food assistance to cash transfers and construction of solar-powered boreholes that would provide drinking water for people and starving livestock such as cattle that are a key source of both food and labor.

El Nino, a naturally occurring climatic phenomenon that warms parts of the Pacific Ocean every two to seven years, has varied effects on the world’s weather. In southern Africa, it typically causes below-average rainfall, but this year has seen the worst drought in decades.

In southern Africa it has resulted in some of the hottest days in decades in some areas and floods in others, destroying livelihoods in a region where many people rely on farming to survive.

More than 60% of Zimbabwe’s population live in rural areas, growing the food they eat, and sometimes small surpluses that they sell meet expenses such as school fees. With relatively little participation in the cash economy, many of those won’t be able to buy food even when it’s available in markets.

"Immediate action is required to avert loss of life and livelihoods over the coming months," read part of the 45-page appeal document.

Children under the age 5 and pregnant and breastfeeding women are more vulnerable, while the risk of gender-based violence, sexual exploitation and abuse are heightening as a result of the drought, according to the appeal document.

In patriarchal Zimbabwe, children, particularly girls, are often tasked with trekking long distances to search for water, putting their safety at risk. Close to 2 million children, both boys and girls, could be forced to drop out of school due to the impact of the drought, the U.N agency said.

The drought also could exacerbate a cholera outbreak by leading to unsafe hygiene, such as lack of hand washing and and drinking from polluted wells.

A Brazilian horse nicknamed Caramelo by social media users garnered national attention after a television news helicopter filmed him stranded on a rooftop in southern Brazil, where massive floods have killed more than 100 people.

About 24 hours after he was first spotted and with people clamoring for his rescue, a team in Brazil’s Rio Grande do Sul state on Thursday successfully removed Caramelo, providing a dose of hope to a beleaguered region.

HORSE APPEARS TO GRIEVE HIS OWNER'S DEATH DURING FUNERAL PROCESSION IN BRAZIL

The brown horse had been balancing on two narrow strips of slippery asbestos for days in Canoas, a city in the Porto Alegre metropolitan area that is one of the hardest-hit areas in the state, much of which has been isolated by floodwaters.

"We found the animal in a debilitated state," Cap. Tiago Franco, a firefighter from Sao Paulo deployed to lead the rescue, was quoted as saying in a statement from that state’s security secretariat. "We tried to approach in a calm way."

Firefighters and veterinarians climbed onto the mostly submerged roof, sedated and immobilized the horse and then laid him on an inflatable raft — all 770 pounds of him. The operation involved four inflatable boats and four support vessels, with firefighters, soldiers and other volunteers.

The rescue was broadcast live on television networks that filmed from their helicopters. Social media influencer Felipe Neto sent out updates to his almost 17 million followers on X as the rescue was underway. Afterwards, he offered to adopt him.

"Caramelo, Brazil loves you!!! My God, what happiness," he wrote.

President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva's wife, Janja, posted a video of herself sharing the good news with the Brazilian leader, whispering into his ear at an official event. He smiled, gave a thumbs up and hugged her to him. Rio Grande do Sul's Gov. Eduardo Leite also celebrated the rescue, posting on X: "All lives matter, we stand firm!"

Caramelo is recovering at a veterinary hospital affiliated with a university.

Mariângela Allgayer, a veterinarian and professor at the institution, said Thursday afternoon on social media that he remains very dehydrated.

He is about 7 years old and, based on his characteristics, was likely used as a draft animal for a cart, Bruno Schmitz, one of the veterinarians who helped rescue and evaluate Caramelo, told television network GloboNews. He’s also very gentle, Schmitz added, which greatly helped with the administration of sedatives.

"It was a very difficult operation, well beyond the standards even for specialized teams. I think they had never been through something like this before, but thank God everything went well," he said, then showed Caramelo standing up.

The stranded horse is just one of many animals rescue workers have been striving to save in recent days. Rio Grande do Sul state agents have rescued about 10,000 animals since last week, while those in municipalities and volunteers have saved thousands more, according to the state's housing secretariat.

Animal protection groups and volunteers have been sharing images of difficult rescues and heartwarming scenes of pets reuniting with their owners on social media. One video that went viral shows a man crying inside a boat, hugging his four dogs after rescuers went back to his home to save them.

Heavy rains and flooding in Rio Grande do Sul have killed at least 107 people. Another 136 are reported missing and more than 230,000 have been displaced, according to state authorities. There is no official tally for the number of animals that have been killed or are missing, but local media have estimated the number is in the thousands.

Not far from where Caramelo was rescued, pet owners in Canoas celebrated as they waited in line to get donations at a makeshift animal shelter organized by volunteers.

"So much bad news, but this rescue does give people here some more hope," said Guilherme Santos, 23, as he sought dog food for his two puppies. "If they can rescue a horse, why not all dogs that are still missing? We can definitely do this."

Carla Sassi, chairwoman of Grad, a Brazilian nonprofit that rescues animals after disasters, said she is meeting with state government officials in Canoas to discuss emergency measures to rescue pets.

Thousands of protesters gathered Thursday in the Armenian capital, Yerevan, to demand the resignation of Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan over his government's decision to hand over control of border villages to Armenia's long-time rival Azerbaijan.

Armenia and Azerbaijan have fought two wars since the Soviet Union collapsed and Armenia said in April that it would return the villages to Azerbaijan. That decision came after Azerbaijan in September waged a lightning military campaign in Nagorno-Karabakh, a majority ethnic Armenian region inside Azerbaijan. That caused tens of thousands of people to stream into Armenia, sparking demonstrations as protesters called for the prime minister to be ousted.

Protesters led by a senior cleric in Armenia's church walked a distance of around 100 miles from villages near the border with Azerbaijan to Yerevan where they gathered Thursday in Republic Square.

ARMENIA'S PRIME MINISTER IN RUSSIA FOR TALKS AMID STRAIN IN TIES

Videos shared on social media showed thousands of people waving Armenian flags. A senior Armenian cleric said a prayer and told the protesters he gave Pashinyan one hour to resign, blaming him for the loss of Armenian territory.

Archbishop Bagrat Galstanyan told protesters they should "engage in peaceful acts of disobedience," if Pashinyan did not listen to their demands.

Pashinyan visited Moscow Wednesday and held talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin amid spiraling tensions between the estranged allies. The meeting took place a day after Putin began his fifth term at a glittering Kremlin inauguration which the Armenian leader did not attend.

Putin's spokesperson Dmitry Peskov was quoted Thursday by Russian state news agency Tass as saying the two leaders had agreed to the removal of Russian forces from some Armenian regions.

In brief remarks at the start of the talks, Putin said that bilateral trade was growing, but acknowledged "some issues concerning security in the region."

Pashinyan, who last visited Moscow in December, said that "certain issues have piled up since then."

Armenia’s ties with Russia, a longtime sponsor and ally, have grown increasingly strained after Azerbaijan waged its military campaign in September to reclaim the Karabakh region, ending three decades of ethnic Armenian separatists’ rule there.

Armenian authorities accused Russian peacekeepers who were deployed to Nagorno-Karabakh after the previous round of hostilities in 2020 of failing to stop Azerbaijan’s onslaught. Moscow, which has a military base in Armenia, has rejected the accusations, arguing that its troops didn’t have a mandate to intervene.

The Kremlin, in turn, has been angered by Pashinyan’s efforts to deepen ties with the West and distance his country from Moscow-dominated security and economic alliances.

While Pashinyan was visiting Moscow, Armenia’s foreign ministry announced that the country will stop paying fees to the Collective Security Treaty Organization, a Russia-dominated security pact. Armenia has previously suspended its participation in the grouping as Pashinyan has sought to bolster ties with the European Union and NATO.

Russia was also vexed by Armenia’s decision to join the International Criminal Court, which last year indicted Putin for alleged war crimes connected to Russia's actions in Ukraine.

Moscow, busy with the Ukrainian conflict that has dragged into a third year, has publicly voiced concern about Yerevan’s westward shift but sought to downplay the differences.

Kremlin spokesman Peskov conceded Tuesday that "there are certain problems in our bilateral relations," but added that "there is a political will to continue the dialogue."

Tensions in Tunisia ratcheted up as demonstrators seeking better rights for migrants staged a sit-in before European Union headquarters on Thursday, capping a week in which Tunisian authorities targeted migrant communities from the coast to the capital with arrests and the demolition of tent camps.

Several activists were apprehended this week, accused of financial crimes stemming from providing aid to migrants. Authorities razed encampments outside U.N. headquarters, sweeping up dozens of sub-Saharan Africans who had been living there for months.

TUNISIAN OPPOSITION DECLINES TO PARTICIPATE IN ELECTION UNLESS POLITICAL PRISONERS FREED

Fewer migrants have made the dangerous journey across the Mediterranean Sea this year compared to last year, due to weather and beefed-up border security. The 2024 figures are in line with objectives set by the EU as part of a deal worth more than 1 billion euros ($1.1 billion) that included assistance to better police the border and prevent migrants without papers from reaching Europe.

However, human rights activists say the crackdown has been damaging for the tens of thousands of migrants stuck in Tunisia as a result.

Demonstrators on Thursday blasted the security-centric approach that governments on both sides of the Mediterranean Sea have chosen to drive their migration policies. Some of the signs at the protests decried Tunisia's cooperation with Italy and Europe, while others mourned the lives of Tunisians who have died or gone missing at sea.

Bodies continue to wash ashore on the country's central coastline not far from small towns where migrants have clashed with police and farmers have grown increasingly wary of the growing presence of encampments in olive groves where they make their livings, claiming rampant theft and staging protests demanding government intervention, according to local media.

The number of migrants reaching Italy in 2024 fell by two-thirds, compared to the same point last year, according to figures from Italy’s Interior Ministry on May 8.

The U.N. refugee agency UNHCR reported that more than 24,000 migrants travelled from Tunisia to Italy in the first four months of 2023 while fewer than 8,000 had successfully made the journey over the same time period this year.

These trends relieve pressure on European officials hoping to avoid overcrowded detention centers, high numbers of asylum claims and increased concern about immigration ahead of EU parliamentary elections in June.

But in Tunisia, an opposite reality is taking shape.

In April, authorities directly thwarted 209 migration attempts and in total prevented more than 8,200 migrants from reaching Italy, the majority from sub-Saharan African countries. The Tunisian Coast Guard said it had prevented more than 21,000 migrants from reaching Italy this year.

"Tunisia is deepening the crisis and promoting the idea that there is no solution," Romdane Ben Amor of the Tunisian Forum for Economic and Social Rights, a leading NGO known by its French abbreviation FTDES, told Radio Mosaïque, the country’s largest private radio station.

President Kaïs Saïed acknowledged on Monday that migrants were being deported from coastal cities to the borderlands in "continued cooperation" with neighboring countries. He claimed that pro-migrant "traitors and agents" were being funneled millions in euros and dollars to help settle migrants without legal status in Tunisia.

He made similar remarks last year, when he said sub-Saharan African migrants were part of a plot to erase his country’s identity.

His comments followed the arrest earlier this week of Saadia Mosbah, a Black Tunisian anti-discrimination activist, and Sherifa Riahi, the former president of an asylum rights group.

Mosbah was taken into custody and her home was searched as part of an investigation into the funding for the Mnemty association she runs. She was arrested after she posted on social media condemning the racism she faced for her work from people accusing her of helping sub-Saharan African migrants, said Bassem Trifi, the president of the Tunisian League for the Defense of Human Rights.

Riahi was arrested on Wednesday under the same financial crimes law, Radio Mosaïque reported.

Last week, more than 80 migrants were arrested in Tunis after clashes with law enforcement during the clearance of encampments in the capital that the authorities said were "disturbing the peace," according to Radio Mosaïque.

Hundreds of migrants had camped near the headquarters of UNHCR and the International Organization for Migration, many of them demanding the agencies resettle them outside of Tunisia. Law enforcement used heavy machinery to raze their tents and then bused them outside of the city to "an unknown destination," said Ben Amor from FTDES.

An estimated 244 migrants — most of them from outside Tunisia — have died or disappeared along the country's Mediterranean coastline this year, including 24 whose bodies were found last week, the NGO said.

In a report based on government data released Monday, it noted that the number of migrants without papers crossing the Mediterranean had decreased as Tunisian authorities reported an increasing number of interceptions. This was the case for both migrants from Tunisia and migrants passing through the country en route to Europe.

North African and European officials have sought to curb human trafficking and to improve the policing of borders and coastlines to prevent deaths at sea. However, thousands of migrants fleeing conflict, poverty, persecution or hoping for a better life have continued to make the journey. They take boats from the coast north of Sfax, Tunisia's second-largest city, to Italian islands such as Lampedusa, about 130 kilometers (81 miles) away.

The European Union hopes to limit migration with policies including development assistance, voluntary return and repatriation for migrants and forging closer ties with neighboring governments that police their borders. The EU and member countries such as Italy have pledged billions of dollars over the past year to countries including Tunisia, Mauritania and Egypt to provide general government aid, migrant services and border patrols.