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Give us 5 minutes, and we'll give you the world. Around the clock, Voice of America keeps you in touch with the latest news. We bring you reports from our correspondents and interviews with newsmakers from across the world.

Give us 5 minutes, and we'll give you the world. Around the clock, Voice of America keeps you in touch with the latest news. We bring you reports from our correspondents and interviews with newsmakers from across the world.

TOKYO — Japan and the United States should avoid confrontation about the steel industry and work together amid competition from China, the world's top steelmaker, leading prime ministerial candidate Shinjiro Koizumi said Saturday. Sources told Reuters Friday that a powerful U.S. national security panel reviewing Nippon Steel's $14.9 billion bid for U.S. Steel faces a September 23 deadline to recommend whether the White House should block the deal. Koizumi, Japan's former environment minister, said at a debate Saturday that Japan and the U.S. should not confront each other when it comes to the steel industry but to face together the “shared challenge” coming from China's steel industry. "If China, producing cheap steel without renewable or clean energy, floods the global market, it will most adversely affect us, the democratic countries playing by fair market rules," Koizumi said. Nippon Steel's key negotiator on the deal, Vice Chairman Takahiro Mori, said last month that his company and other Japanese steelmakers were urging Tokyo to consider curbing cheap steel imports coming from China to protect the local market. On Sunday, Nippon Steel and U.S. Steel sent a letter to U.S. President Joe Biden about their deal, as Biden, Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris and Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump have all opposed the merger. "We are also in the midst of elections, just like the U.S., and during elections, various ideas may arise. Overreacting to each of these would, in my view, call into question diplomatic judgment," Koizumi said when asked about the deal. Sanae Takaichi, Japan's minister in charge of economic security and another prime ministerial candidate, also defended the deal during the same debate attended by eight other Liberal Democratic Party's, or LDP, leadership contenders Saturday. "It appears they are using CFIUS to frame this as an economic security issue," she said,  referring to the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States. "However, Japan and the U.S. are allies, and the steel industry is about strengthening our combined resilience." The 43-year-old son of former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, the junior Koizumi, is seen as a leading contender in the September 27 race to pick the LDP's new leader, who will become the next prime minister due to the party's control of parliament. Koizumi said Saturday that he would seek a dialog with the North Korean leadership to resolve the issue over the abduction of Japanese citizens kidnapped by North Korean agents in the 1970s and 1980s. The purported primary goal was to train North Korean agents to impersonate Japanese people. "We want to explore new opportunities for dialog between people of the same generation, without being bound by conventional approaches, and without preconditions," Koizumi said. After admitting in 2002 that it had abducted 13 Japanese, North Korea apologized and allowed five to return home. It said eight others had died and denied that an additional four entered its territory. It promised to reinvestigate but has never announced the results. Japan says North Korea has refused to send the others home because of concern that they might reveal inconvenient information about the country.

WARSAW, Poland — Thousands of people attended an antigovernment rally organized by Poland's nationalist conservative opposition party to boost support before next year's presidential election. Law and Justice leader Jaroslaw Kaczynski called on supporters to be active at social and political levels and to back the party’s candidate in next year’s presidential election. He hasn't yet named the candidate. Kaczynski also accused the pro-European Union government of acting against the nation’s interests and violating its laws and cited recently opened investigations into allegations of mismanagement and corruption of the Law and Justice government. Up to 4,000 people with national white-and-red flags gathered for the rally held in windy weather outside the Justice Ministry in Warsaw, which has become a symbol of years of deep rifts between the backers of Kaczynski and Donald Tusk, now the prime minister and leader of the center-right Civic Platform party. Law and Justice, which governed Poland for from 2015 until 2023, drew criticism from Brussels and Tusk alike for making changes to Poland’s judicial system that were deemed undemocratic. Many in the nation of 38 million people were also tired of the aggressive and divisive language that Kaczynski, who dictated the government's policies from the sidelines, used to energize support. The party lost power in the 2023 election, but is still exerting control through President Andrzej Duda, who is allied with Law and Justice. Duda, whose second and last term runs out in August, has been blocking many of the government's draft laws.

Port Sudan, Sudan — Heavy fighting on Saturday shook a Sudanese city besieged by paramilitaries, witnesses told AFP, as U.S. researchers reported unprecedented and escalating combat in the North Darfur state capital. El-Fasher is one of five state capitals in Sudan's western Darfur region and the only one not in the hands of the Rapid Support Forces, or RSF, who have been battling the regular army since April 2023. The United Nations says the war across much of Sudan has created the world's largest displacement crisis, with millions uprooted, and has led to famine at a displacement camp near El-Fasher. Darfur has seen some of the war's worst atrocities, and the RSF has besieged El-Fasher since May. "Neighborhoods are completely deserted and all you can hear are explosions and missiles," Ibrahim Ishaq, 52, told AFP. "The central market area has become unlivable because of the intensity of the explosions," said Ishaq, who fled westward from the city on Friday. Witnesses reported army bombardment south and east of the city on Saturday and said they heard air-defense batteries firing. The Yale School of Public Health's Humanitarian Research Lab said in a report Friday that its analysis confirmed "unprecedented large-scale combat operations" in El-Fasher within the previous 10 days, "with significant escalation in the past 36 hours" involving the army and the paramilitaries. It cited reports that describe "a major multidirectional RSF attack from the northern, eastern, and southern directions" on Thursday. Reduced to rubble Darfur Governor Mini Minawi had on Thursday said on social media platform X that the army had repelled "a large attack" by the RSF. The paramilitaries, however, said they seized military sites in El-Fasher. Using satellite imagery and other data, the Yale researchers said they found munition impacts "likely related to high-tempo aerial bombardment" from the regular army, but they said other structural damage resulted from "RSF bombardment" and combat activity by both sides. Whatever the battle's ultimate outcome, current levels of fighting "are likely to effectively reduce what is left of El-Fasher to rubble," the Yale study said. The United States special envoy for Sudan, Tom Perriello, on Saturday said on social media platform X: "We are extremely concerned about the RSF's renewed attacks." He urged the RSF "to stop its assault." It was not immediately possible to determine the number of victims. Sudan's war has already killed tens of thousands of people, with some estimates as high as 150,000, according to Perriello. Strikes near Khartoum In the capital, Khartoum, on Saturday, about 800 kilometers from El-Fasher, witnesses reported heavy explosions and strikes to the city's south. Independent United Nations experts earlier this month appealed for deployment of an "impartial force" to be urgently deployed in Sudan for civilian protection. Sudan's foreign ministry, loyal to the army, rejected the idea.

FORT LAUDERDALE, Florida — Ballet dancer Michaela Mabinty DePrince, who came to the United States from an orphanage in war-ravaged Sierra Leone and performed on some of the world's biggest stages, has died, her family said in a statement. She was 29. “Michaela touched so many lives across the world, including ours. She was an unforgettable inspiration to everyone who knew her or heard her story,” her family said in a statement posted Friday on DePrince's social media accounts. “From her early life in war-torn Africa, to stages and screens across the world, she achieved her dreams and so much more.” A cause of death was not provided. DePrince was adopted by an American couple and by age 17 she had been featured in a documentary film and had performed on the TV show “Dancing with the Stars.” After graduating from high school and the American Ballet Theatre’s Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis School, she became a principal dancer with the Dance Theatre of Harlem. She then went to the Netherlands, where she danced with the Dutch National Ballet. She later returned to the U.S. and joined the Boston Ballet in 2021. “We’re sending our love and support to the family of Michaela Mabinty DePrince at this time of loss,” the Boston Ballet said in a statement to The Associated Press on Saturday. “We were so fortunate to know her; she was a beautiful person, a wonderful dancer, and she will be greatly missed by us all.” In her memoir, Taking Flight: From War Orphan to Star Ballerina, she shared her journey from the orphanage to the stage. She also wrote a children's book, Ballerina Dreams. DePrince suffered from a skin pigmentation disorder that had her labeled “the devil’s child” at the orphanage. “I lost both my parents, so I was there [the orphanage] for about a year, and I wasn’t treated very well because I had vitiligo,” DePrince told the AP in a 2012 interview. “We were ranked as numbers, and number 27 was the least favorite and that was my number, so I got the least amount of food, the least amount of clothes and whatnot.” She added that she remembered seeing a photo of an American ballet dancer on a magazine page that had blown against the gate of the orphanage during Sierra Leone's civil war. “All I remember is she looked really, really happy,” DePrince told the AP, adding that she wished “to become this exact person.” She said she saw hope in that photo, “and I ripped the page out and I stuck it in my underwear because I didn’t have any place to put it,” she said. Her passion helped inspire young Black dancers to pursue their dreams, her family said. “We will miss her and her gorgeous smile forever and we know you will, too,” their statement said. Her sister, Mia Mabinty DePrince, recalled in the statement that they slept on a shared mat in the orphanage and used to make up their own musical theater plays and ballets. “When we got adopted, our parents quickly poured into our dreams and arose the beautiful, gracefully strong ballerina that so many of you knew her as today. She was an inspiration,” Mia DePrince wrote. “Whether she was leaping across the stage or getting on a plane and flying to third-world countries to provide orphans and children with dance classes, she was determined to conquer all her dreams in the arts and dance.”

BEIRUT — Syrian President Bashar Assad issued a decree Saturday in which he named former Communications Minister Mohammed Ghazi Jalali as the head of the new government following July’s parliamentary election, state media reported. Jalali, 55, has been under European Union sanctions since October 2014 over the government crackdown during Syria’s conflict that has left nearly half a million people dead since 2011. As a government minister, he was “collectively responsible for the regime’s violent repression against the civilian population,” the EU said at the time of announcing the sanctions. Jalali was communications minister for nearly two years starting in August 2014, according to the state news agency SANA. Syria’s outgoing government has been in a caretaker capacity since the mid-July parliamentary election. It's not clear how long it will take Jalali to form a new Cabinet. The EU first started imposing sanctions on Syria in 2011. The measures also include a ban on oil imports, investment restrictions, a freeze on central bank assets held in the EU, and export limits on equipment and technology that could be used to crack down on civilians or to monitor their phones and internet.

Give us 5 minutes, and we'll give you the world. Around the clock, Voice of America keeps you in touch with the latest news. We bring you reports from our correspondents and interviews with newsmakers from across the world.

DUBAI — Iran's foreign minister said that Tehran was open to diplomacy to solve disputes but not "threats and pressure," state media reported on Saturday, after the U.S. and three European powers imposed sanctions against the country's aviation sector. Abbas Araqchi's comments come a day after the European Union's chief diplomat said the bloc is considering new sanctions targeting Iran's aviation sector, in reaction to reports Tehran supplied Russia with ballistic missiles in its war against Ukraine. "Iran continues on its own path with strength, although we have always been open to talks to resolve disputes ... but dialogue should be based on mutual respect, not on threats and pressure," Araqchi said, according to the official news agency IRNA. Araqchi said on Wednesday that Tehran had not delivered any ballistic missiles to Russia and that sanctions imposed on Iran by the United States and three European powers would not solve any problems between them. The United States, Germany, Britain and France on Tuesday imposed new sanctions on Iran, including measures against its national airline, Iran Air.

ALGIERS, Algeria — Algeria's constitutional court on Saturday certified the landslide victory of President Abdelmadjid Tebboune in last weekend's election after retabulating vote counts that he and his two opponents had called into question. The court said that it had reviewed local voting data to settle questions about irregularities that Tebboune’s opponents had alleged in two appeals Monday. “After verification of the minutes of the regions and correction of the errors noted in the counting of the votes," it had lowered Tebboune's vote share and determined that his two opponents had won hundreds of thousands more votes than previously reported, said Omar Belhadj, the constitutional court's president. The court's decision makes Tebboune the official winner of the September 7 election. His government will next decide when to inaugurate him for a second term. The court's retabulated figures showed Tebboune leading Islamist challenger Abdellali Hassan Cherif by around 75 percentage points. With 7.7 million votes, the first-term president won 84.3% of the vote, surpassing the 2019 win by millions of votes and a double-digit margin. Cherif, running with the Movement of Society for Peace, won nearly 950,000 votes, or roughly 9.6%. The Socialist Forces Front's Youcef Aouchiche won more than 580,000 votes, or roughly 6.1%. Notably, both challengers surpassed the threshold required to receive reimbursement for campaign expenses. Under its election laws, Algeria pays for political campaigns that receive more than a 5% vote share. The results announced by the election authority last week showed Cherif and Aouchiche with 3.2% and 2.2% of the vote, respectively. Both were criticized for participating in an election that government critics denounced as a way for Algeria's political elite to make a show of democracy amid broader political repression. Throughout the campaign, each of the three campaigns emphasized participation, calling on voters and youth to participate and defy calls to boycott the ballot. The court announced nationwide turnout was 46.1%, surpassing the 2019 presidential election, when 39.9% of the electorate participated.

KYIV, Ukraine — U.S. historian and author Timothy Snyder led a charity run in Kyiv Saturday to raise awareness of the conditions under which Ukrainian prisoners of war are held in Russia as the conflict approaches a third winter. The race came following a recent escalation in Russian missile and drone attacks, largely aimed at Ukraine's electricity infrastructure. People clapped and cheered after Snyder, a 55-year-old Yale University professor who has written extensively on eastern Europe and the global resurgence of authoritarian regimes and is much admired in Ukraine, addressed the nearly thousand runners. He then joined a workout and participated in the run. “Thousands of Ukrainian civilians and soldiers are illegally held in captivity during an illegal war,” Snyder told The Associated Press just ahead of the run. “This race is about reminding everyone of that and expressing solidarity with Ukrainians and giving Ukrainians a chance to do something together.” The 5K and 10-kilometer runs took place around a sprawling park in the Ukrainian capital created out of a renovated Soviet-era exhibition center. The runners included members of the public, service people and veterans, as well as wives of the POWs. Among them was 27-year-old Anastasia Ofyl, whose husband Oleksandr was captured by the Russians. “We have to fight for him,” she said. “That’s why I’m running.” Ukrainian soldiers often give harrowing accounts of their conditions in Russian captivity when they return home as part of regular prisoner exchanges. In a report issued in July, a United Nations human rights agency said it “continued to document the widespread use of torture and ill-treatment, including sexual violence, against civilians and Ukrainian prisoners of war held by the Russian Federation.” Snyder, who has organized fundraisers as part of the country’s war-relief effort, enjoys near-celebrity status in Ukraine. On Tuesday, he visited President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who thanked him for his charity work. The Ukrainian head of state also received former U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson, former U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, and the American actor Michael Douglas this week. After Saturday’s race, Snyder was surrounded by admirers, many of whom waited in line for autographs and selfies. Some asked the historian to sign translated copies of his widely read books on Ukraine, “Bloodlands: Europe between Hitler and Stalin” and “The Road to Unfreedom: Russia, Europe, America.” Saturday’s race was organized by the Kyiv School of Economics’ charity foundation which, according to its website, has been raising funds for charitable assistance for Ukrainians since the start of the Russian invasion.

Give us 5 minutes, and we'll give you the world. Around the clock, Voice of America keeps you in touch with the latest news. We bring you reports from our correspondents and interviews with newsmakers from across the world.

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — A new attempt has begun to try to salvage an oil tanker burning in the Red Sea after attacks by Yemen’s Houthi rebels, a European Union naval mission said Saturday. The EU’s Operation Aspides published images dated Saturday of its vessels escorting three ships heading to the Greek-flagged oil tanker Sounion. The mission has “been actively involved in this complex endeavor, by creating a secure environment, which is necessary for the tugboats to conduct the towing operation,” the EU said. A phone number for the mission rang unanswered Saturday. However, satellite images taken Saturday morning by Planet Labs PBC and later analyzed by The Associated Press showed what appeared to be the three salvage vessels close to the Sounion. A warship could be seen nearby. The Sounion came under attack from the Houthis beginning Aug. 21. The vessel had been staffed by a crew of 25 Filipinos and Russians, as well as four private security personnel, who were taken by a French destroyer to nearby Djibouti. The Houthis later planted explosives aboard the ship and detonated them. That’s led to fears the ship’s 1 million barrels of crude oil could spill into the Red Sea. The Houthis have targeted more than 80 vessels with missiles and drones since the war in Gaza started in October. They seized one vessel and sank two in the campaign that also killed four sailors. One of the sunken vessels, the Tutor, went down after the Houthis planted explosives aboard it and after its crew abandoned it due to an earlier attack, the rebel group later acknowledged. Other missiles and drones have either been intercepted by a U.S.-led coalition in the Red Sea or failed to reach their targets. The rebels maintain that they target ships linked to Israel, the U.S. or the U.K. to force an end to Israel’s campaign against Hamas in Gaza. However, many of the ships attacked have little or no connection to the conflict, including some bound for Iran.

BUCHAREST, Romania — Five people in eastern Romania were found dead after torrential rainstorms dumped unprecedented rain, leaving hundreds stranded in flooded areas, emergency authorities said Saturday. Rescue services scrambled to save people in the hard-hit eastern counties of Galati and Vaslui. The bodies of three elderly women and two men were found in the localities of Pechea, Draguseni, Costache Negri and Corod, the Department for Emergency Situations said. Authorities later added that one of the victims had been dead for two days and “did not die due to the effects of the weather” but from other causes. Emergency authorities released video footage showing teams of rescuers evacuating people using small lifeboats through muddy waters and carrying some elderly people to safety. Some of the most significant flood damage was concentrated in Galati, where 5,000 households were affected. A Black Hawk helicopter was also deployed there to help with the search and rescue. The storms battered 19 localities in eight counties in Romania, with strong winds downing dozens of trees that damaged cars and blocked roads and traffic. Authorities sent text message alerts to residents to warn them of adverse weather as emergency services rushed to remove floodwaters from homes. By 1 p.m. Saturday, more than 250 people had been evacuated with the help of 700 Interior Ministry personnel deployed to affected communities, authorities said. Romania’s environment minister, Mircea Fechet, told The Associated Press that in some of the badly flooded areas, more than 160 liters of rain fell per one square meter, which he said is a rare occurrence. “What we are trying to do right now is save as many lives as possible,” said the minister, who was on his way to Galati to assess the situation. Romanian President Klaus Iohannis offered his condolences to the victims' families, writing on Facebook: "We must continue to strengthen our capacity to anticipate extreme weather phenomena. “Severe floods that have affected a large part of the country have led to loss of lives and significant damage,” Iohannis said. “We are again dealing with the effects of climate change, which are increasingly present throughout the European continent, with dramatic consequences on people.” Central Europe braces for intense flooding The stormy weather comes as several central European nations anticipate severe flooding to hit the Czech Republic, Poland, Austria, Germany, Slovakia and Hungary over the weekend. In the Czech Republic, river waters reached dangerous levels in dozens of areas across the country Saturday morning, flooding houses and roads in several towns and villages. Heavy rain and high winds left more than 63,000 households without power, the Czech power company CEZ said. A hospital in the country's second-largest city of Brno was forced to evacuate as dozens of citizens moved to safer grounds. Fallen trees and floodwaters caused a dozen railways across the country to also shutter. In neighboring Austria, authorities declared 24 villages in the northeast Lower Austria province disaster zones Saturday afternoon and began evacuating residents from those areas. “The coming hours will be the hours of truth for flood protection, for our emergency forces and numerous compatriots,” State Governor Johanna Mikl-Leitner said, adding that in one area, “we expect challenges of historical dimensions.” The torrential downpours have also caused a sharp rise in water levels on the Danube River in Austria's capital, Vienna, where special flood relief channels were built in the 1970s and ’80s and are likely to be tested over the weekend. The River Kamp, a tributary of the Danube, is also swelling due to the unprecedented weather. Heavy rain also hit Moldova on Saturday, where emergency workers pumped floodwater from dozens of peoples’ homes in several localities, authorities said. Meteorologists say a low-pressure system from northern Italy was predicted to dump much rain in most parts of the Czech Republic, including the capital and border regions with Austria and Germany in the south, and Poland in the north. “We have to be ready for worst-case scenarios,” Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala said after the government’s central crisis committee met. “A tough weekend is ahead of us.” In Poland, dozens of people were evacuated as a precautionary measure Saturday from two villages near the town of Nysa, in the Nysa River basin, after meteorologists warned of unprecedented rainfall, and water levels on some rivers in the area sharply rose, according to Interior Minister Tomasz Siemoniak. “The worst is yet to come,” he warned. Polish authorities appealed to residents Friday to stock up on food and to prepare for power outages by charging power banks. The weather change arrived following a hot start to September in the region. Scientists have documented Earth’s hottest summer, breaking a record set just one year ago. A hotter atmosphere, driven by human-caused climate change, can lead to more intense rainfall.

Give us 5 minutes, and we'll give you the world. Around the clock, Voice of America keeps you in touch with the latest news. We bring you reports from our correspondents and interviews with newsmakers from across the world.

When Kamala Harris and Donald Trump faced each other on the debate stage less than two months before Election Day, the two candidates were at odds on issues ranging from the economy to tariffs and Ukraine. But on immigration, their positions were especially different. VOA immigration reporter Aline Barros brings us the story.

LONDON — Prince Harry was always something different. From the moment he first appeared in public, snuggled in Princess Diana’s arms outside the London hospital where he was born in 1984, Harry was the ginger-haired scamp who stuck his tongue out at photographers. He grew to be a boisterous adolescent who was roundly criticized for wearing a Nazi uniform to a costume party, and then a young man who gave up the trappings of royal life and moved to Southern California with his American wife. Through it all, there was a sense that Harry was rebelling against an accident of birth that made him, in the harsh calculus of the House of Windsor, just “the spare.” As the second son of the man who is now King Charles III, he was raised as a prince but wouldn’t inherit the throne unless brother William came to harm. Now the angry young man is turning 40, the halfway point in many lives, providing a chance to either dwell on the past or look forward to what might still be achieved. For the past four years, Harry has focused mainly on the past, making millions of dollars by airing his grievances in a wildly successful memoir and a Netflix docu-series. But he faces the likelihood that the royal aura so critical to his image may be fading, said Sally Bedell Smith, author of “Charles: The Passions and Paradoxes of an Improbable Life.” “He is at a sort of crossroads,’’ Smith told The Associated Press. “And he appears to be struggling with how he wants to proceed.’’ How did we get here? It wasn’t always this way. Six years ago, Harry and his wife were among the most popular royals, a glamorous young couple who reflected the multicultural face of modern Britain and were expected to help revitalize the monarchy. Their wedding on May 19, 2018, united a grandson of Queen Elizabeth II with the former Meghan Markle, a biracial American actress who had starred for seven years in the U.S. television drama “Suits.” George Clooney, Serena Williams and Elton John attended their wedding at Windsor Castle, after which the couple were formally known as the Duke and Duchess of Sussex. But the optimism quickly faded amid allegations that Britain’s tabloid media and even members of the royal household treated Meghan unfairly because of racism. By January 2020, the pressures of life in the gilded cage had become too much, and the couple announced they were giving up royal duties and moving to America, where they hoped to become “financially independent.” They signed lucrative deals with Netflix and Spotify as they settled into the wealthy enclave of Montecito, near Santa Barbara, California. Since then, Harry has missed few opportunities to bare his soul, most famously in his memoir, aptly titled “Spare.” In the ghostwritten book, Harry recounted his grief at the death of Princess Diana, a fight with Prince William and his unease with life in the royal shadow of his elder brother. From accounts of cocaine use and losing his virginity to raw family rifts, the book was rife with damning allegations about the royal family. Among the most toxic was Harry’s description of how some family members leaked unflattering information about other royals in exchange for positive coverage of themselves. The prince singled out his father’s second wife, Queen Camilla, accusing her of feeding private conversations to the media as she sought to rehabilitate an image tarnished by her role in the breakup of Charles’ marriage to Diana. The allegations were so venomous that there is little chance of a return to public duty, Smith said. “He criticized the royal family in such a powerful and damaging way. You can’t un-say those things,” she said. “And you can’t unsee things like Meghan in that Netflix series doing a mock curtsey. It’s such a demeaning gesture to the queen.’’ Harry, who agreed not to use the honorific HRH, or “his royal highness,” after he stepped away from front-line royal duties, is now fifth in line to the British throne, behind his brother and William’s three children. While he grew up in a palace and is said to be in line to inherit millions of dollars on his 40th birthday from a trust set up by his great-grandmother, applied developmental psychologist Deborah Heiser thinks that, in many ways, Harry is just like the rest of us. Like anyone turning 40, he is likely to have learned a few lessons and has a good idea of who his real friends are, and that will help him chart the next phase of his life, said Heiser, who writes a blog called “The Right Side of 40” for Psychology Today. “He has had a very public display of what a lot of people have gone through,” Heiser said. “I mean, most people are not princes, but … they have all kinds of issues within their families. He’s not alone. That’s why he’s so relatable.’’ Harry's next chapter Of course, Harry’s story isn’t just about the drama within the House of Windsor. If he wants to write a new chapter, Harry can build on his 10 years of service in the British Army. Before retiring as a captain in 2015, the prince earned his wings as a helicopter pilot, served two tours in Afghanistan and shed the hard-partying reputation of his youth. Harry also won accolades for establishing the Invictus Games in 2014, a Paralympic-style competition to inspire and aid in the rehabilitation of sick and wounded servicemembers and veterans. Harry and Meghan made headlines this year with their two international trips to promote mental health and internet safety. While some in British media criticized them for accepting royal treatment in Nigeria and Colombia, the couple said they visited at the invitation of local officials. Will Charles see the grandkids? The prospects of reconciliation are unclear, although Harry did race home to see his father after Charles' cancer diagnosis. And in what may be seen as a tentative olive branch, the paperback edition of “Spare” slated for October has no additions — so nothing new to stir the pot. But plainly at this point, Harry is thinking about his family in California. He told the BBC about the importance of his two young children, Archie and Lilibet. “Being a dad is one of life’s greatest joys and has only made me more driven and more committed to making this world a better place,” the prince said in a statement released by his spokesperson.

KYIV, UKRAINE — Russia and Ukraine conducted a major exchange of prisoners Saturday, 206 in all, in their second such swap in two days, following negotiations mediated by the United Arab Emirates, officials said. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that all 103 Ukrainians returned were from the military — 82 soldiers and privates and 21 officers. The Russian Defense Ministry said that the 103 Russian soldiers exchanged had been taken prisoner in the Kursk border region where Ukrainian forces launched a surprise incursion in August. "Our people are home," Zelenskyy said on the Telegram messaging app. "We have successfully brought back another 103 warriors from Russian captivity to Ukraine." Zelenskyy posted pictures of servicemen wrapped in the national blue and yellow flag, hugging each other, talking on mobile phones and posing for group photographs at an undisclosed location. The exchange was mediated by the UAE, Emirati state news agency WAM said. It was the country's eighth such mediation since the start of 2024, it said. Kyiv and Moscow have frequently exchanged prisoners since Russia's full-scale invasion in February 2022, and Saturday's swap was the third since Ukraine began its incursion into the Kursk region. Ukrainian officials have previously said its troops had captured at least 600 Russian soldiers during the incursion, and that this would help it secure the return of captured Ukrainians. Dmytro Lubinets, Ukraine's ombudsman, said most of the freed Ukrainians had been in Russian captivity since the early days of the invasion. He posted a short video on the Telegram messaging app showing the servicemen standing in front of a bus and shouting "Glory to Ukraine." Lubinets said that Kyiv had so far secured the return of 3,672 Ukrainians in 57 exchanges.