The French probe could deepen a rift between Washington and European capitals

International News via Reuters:

Elon Musk’s social media platform X on Monday accused French prosecutors of launching a “politically-motivated criminal investigation” that threatens its users’ free speech, denying all allegations and saying it would not comply with the probe.

Earlier this month, Paris prosecutors stepped up a preliminary probe into X for suspected algorithmic bias and fraudulent data extraction, enlisting police to investigate alleged wrongdoing by the company or its executives.

“Based on what we know so far, X believes that this investigation is distorting French law in order to serve a political agenda and, ultimately, restrict free speech,” the social network posted on its Global Government Affairs account.

“For these reasons, X has not acceded to the French authorities’ demands, as we have a legal right to do.”

In the blistering attack, X also said the probe had been instigated by Eric Bothorel, a French lawmaker, who had accused “X of manipulating its algorithm for ‘foreign interference’ purposes, an allegation which is completely false”.

The Paris prosecutors’ office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Neither did Bothorel.

Musk, a former ally of U.S. President Donald Trump, has accused European governments of attacking free speech and has voiced support for some of the region’s far-right parties.

The French probe could deepen a rift between Washington and European capitals over what sort of discourse is permitted online, with senior officials from Trump’s administration alleging the censoring of right-wing voices around the world.

X said Paris prosecutors had requested it hand over “recommendation algorithm and real-time data about all user posts on the platform”, for analysis by researchers David Chavalarias and Maziyar Panahi, who it said had both exhibited “open hostility towards X”, calling into question the impartiality of the investigation.

Neither Chavalarias nor Panahi immediately responded to a request for comment.

X also chafed at the fact that it was being investigated under organised crime charges, which it said would grant the police measures including wiretapping its employees’ personal devices.

Pavel Durov, the Russian-born founder of the Telegram messaging app, is also under judicial supervision in France after being arrested last year and placed under formal investigation for alleged organised crime on the app. He denies guilt.

Early in July, Musk responded “true” to a post on X in which Durov said the French “bureaucrats” investigating X were “waging a crusade against free speech and tech progress”.

Reporting by Gursimran Kaur in Bengaluru and Dominique Vidalon in ParisWriting by Gabriel StargardterEditing by Sharon Singleton, Kirsten Donovan

The EU sanctions followed U.S. President Donald Trump’s threats last week to impose sanctions on buyers of Russian exports

International News via Reuters:

Oil prices dipped slightly on Monday, with the latest European sanctions on Russian oil expected to have minimal impact on supplies while U.S. tariffs ensure demand concerns remain.

Brent crude futures dropped 38 cents, or 0.55%, to $68.90 a barrel by 0925 GMT after settling 0.35% down on Friday. U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude declined 30 cents, or 0.45%, to $67.04 after a 0.3% decline in the previous session.

The European Union on Friday approved the 18th package of sanctions against Russia over the war in Ukraine, which also targeted India’s Nayara Energy, an exporter of oil products refined from Russian crude.

“The latest round of EU sanctions aren’t necessarily going to change the oil balance. That’s why the market is not reacting much,” said Harry Tchiliguirian at Onyx Capital Group. “Russians have been very good at circumventing these kinds of sanctions.”

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said on Friday that Russia had built up a certain immunity to Western sanctions.

The EU sanctions followed U.S. President Donald Trump’s threats last week to impose sanctions on buyers of Russian exports unless Russia agrees to a peace deal within 50 days.

ING analysts said the part of the package likely to have an impact is the EU import ban on refined oil products processed from Russian oil in third countries, though it said it could prove difficult to monitor and enforce.

Iran, another sanctioned oil producer, is due to hold nuclear talks with Britain, France and Germany in Istanbul on Friday, an Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson said on Monday. That follows warnings by the three European countries that a failure to resume negotiations would lead to international sanctions being reimposed on Iran.

In the U.S., the number of operating oil rigs fell by two to 422 last week, the lowest total since September 2021, Baker Hughes said on Friday.

U.S. tariffs on European Union imports are set to kick in on August 1, though U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said on Sunday that he was confident the United States could secure a trade deal with the bloc.

“Tariff concerns will continue to weigh in the lead up to the August 1 deadline, while some support may come from oil inventory data if it shows tight supply,” said IG market analyst Tony Sycamore.

“It feels very much like a $64-$70 range in play for the week ahead.”

Brent crude futures have traded between a low of $66.34 a barrel and a high of $71.53 after a ceasefire deal on June 24 halted the 12-day Israel-Iran war.

Reporting by Anna Hirtenstein in LondonAdditional reporting by Florence Tan in Singapore and Sam Li in BeijingEditing by David Goodman

The meeting comes as global trade frictions heat up

International News via Reuters:

China confirmed on Monday it will hold a top-level summit with the European Union in Beijing this week marking 50 years of diplomatic ties as both sides seek to navigate trade disputes amid broader global trade uncertainties.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and European Council President Antonio Costa will visit China on Thursday and meet Chinese President Xi Jinping, the Chinese foreign ministry said on Monday.

China’s Premier Li Qiang will be co-chairing the 25th China-EU summit with the EU leaders the same day.

The meeting comes as global trade frictions heat up, with Beijing seeking to secure closer economic and political ties with the bloc to hedge against uncertainties in its relations with the United States.

EU-China relations deteriorated sharply in 2021 when Brussels sanctioned Chinese officials over alleged human rights abuses in the Xinjiang region, a move that saw swift retaliatory sanctions from Beijing, halting much of bilateral exchanges.

Relations have also been marred by various trade disputes in recent years, including those over Chinese-made electric vehicles, European brandy and pork, government purchases of medical devices, and rare earths.

The summit comes at a key time for these relations, Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun told reporters at a regular press briefing.

China looked forward to the bloc working together, Guo said.

“China has always believed that after 50 years of development, China-EU relations…can cope with the changing difficulties and challenges,” he said, characterising ties between the pair as mature and stable but facing issues.

In a recent speech, von der Leyen praised China’s economic progress but said the country had flooded global markets with its overcapacity, limited access to its market, and de-facto enabled Russia’s war economy.

The bloc, which calls China “a partner for cooperation, an economic competitor and a systemic rival,” has also said it saw the need to thaw ties amid global trade uncertainties.

After U.S. President Donald Trump announced sweeping tariffs in April, von der Leyen told China’s Premier Li in a phone call that it was EU and China’s responsibility “to support a strong reformed trading system, free, fair and founded on a level playing field.”

Reporting by Liz Lee, Xiuhao Chen and Shanghai newsroom; Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman and Raju Gopalakrishnan

The vessel capsized on Saturday afternoon carrying 48 tourists and five crew members

International News via Reuters:

The death toll from a tourist boat accident in Vietnam’s Halong Bay climbed to at least 38 with several people still missing, the government said, as rescuers continued to search for survivors while bracing for the approach of Typhoon Wipha.

The vessel capsized on Saturday afternoon carrying 48 tourists and five crew members in one of the worst boating accidents in recent years in the popular tourist area.

“At least 38 of those on board have been confirmed dead and 10 rescued,” the government said in a statement.

The official Vietnam News Agency reported that all the tourists were Vietnamese, including several children.

Dozens of rescuers, including border guards, navy personnel, police and professional divers, have been deployed. Although the sea had calmed, weather conditions limited visibility, making rescue operations difficult.

Rescuers managed to retrieve the sunken boat, the government said.

The accident took place around 2 p.m. local time (0700 GMT) on Saturday, soon after Typhoon Wipha entered the South China Sea.

Authorities reported strong winds, heavy rainfall and lightning in the area at the time of the incident, adding that these conditions were not yet influenced by the approaching typhoon but were due to wind patterns over the northern region.

Halong Bay, about 200 km (125 miles) northeast of Hanoi, attracts tens of thousands of visitors every year. Boat tours are particularly popular.

In 2011, the sinking of a tour boat in Halong Bay killed 12 people, including foreign tourists.

Typhoon Wipha, the third to hit the South China Sea this year, is projected to make landfall along Vietnam’s northern coast early next week.

Reporting by Phuong Nguyen; Editing by Edmund Klamann

Millions of people who were promised clean drinking water and reliable sanitation facilities have been left to fend for themselves

International News via Reuters:

The Trump administration’s decision to slash nearly all U.S. foreign aid has left dozens of water and sanitation projects half-finished across the globe, creating new hazards for some of the people they were designed to benefit, Reuters has found.

Reuters has identified 21 unfinished projects in 16 countries after speaking to 17 sources familiar with the infrastructure plans. Most of these projects have not previously been reported. 

With hundreds of millions of dollars in funding cancelled since January, workers have put down their shovels and left holes half dug and building supplies unguarded, according to interviews with U.S. and local officials and internal documents seen by Reuters.

As a result, millions of people who were promised clean drinking water and reliable sanitation facilities by the United States have been left to fend for themselves.

Water towers intended to serve schools and health clinics in Mali have been abandoned, according to two U.S. officials who spoke on condition of anonymity. In Nepal, construction was halted on more than 100 drinking water systems, leaving plumbing supplies and 6,500 bags of cement in local communities. The Himalayan nation will use its own funds to finish the job, according to the country’s water minister Pradeep Yadav.

In Lebanon, a project to provide cheap solar power to water utilities was scrapped, costing some 70 people their jobs and halting plans to improve regional services. The utilities are now relying on diesel and other sources to power their services, said Suzy Hoayek, an adviser to Lebanon’s energy ministry.

In Kenya, residents of Taita Taveta County say they are now more vulnerable to flooding than they had been before, as half-finished irrigation canals could collapse and sweep away crops. Community leaders say it will cost $2,000 to lower the risk – twice the average annual income in the area.

“I have no protection from the flooding that the canal will now cause, the floods will definitely get worse,” said farmer Mary Kibachia, 74.

BIPARTISAN SUPPORT

Trump’s dismantling of the U.S. Agency for International Development has left life-saving food and medical aid rotting in warehouses and thrown humanitarian efforts around the world into turmoil. The cuts may cause an additional 14 million deaths by 2030, according to research published in The Lancet medical journal.

The Trump administration and its supporters argue that the United States should spend its money to benefit Americans at home rather than sending it abroad, and say USAID had strayed from its original mission by funding projects like LGBT rights in Serbia.

With an annual budget of $450 million, the U.S. water projects accounted for a small fraction of the $61 billion in foreign aid distributed by the United States last year.  

Before Trump’s reelection in November, the water projects had not been controversial in Washington. A 2014 law that doubled funding passed both chambers of Congress unanimously.   

Advocates say the United States has over the years improved the lives of tens of millions of people by building pumps, irrigation canals, toilets and other water and sanitation projects. That means children are less likely to die of water-borne diseases like diarrhea, girls are more likely to stay in school, and young men are less likely to be recruited by extremist groups, said John Oldfield, a consultant and lobbyist for water infrastructure projects.

“Do we want girls carrying water on their heads for their families? Or do you want them carrying school books?” he said.

The U.S. State Department, which has taken over foreign aid from USAID, did not respond to a request for comment about the impact of halting the water projects.

The agency has restored some funding for life-saving projects, but Secretary of State Marco Rubio has said American assistance will be more limited going forward.

At least one water project has been restarted. Funding for a $6 billion desalination plant in Jordan was restored after a diplomatic push by King Abdullah.

But funding has not resumed for projects in other countries including Ethiopia, Tanzania, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, say people familiar with those programs who spoke on condition of anonymity.

That means women in those areas will have to walk for hours to collect unsafe water, children will face increased disease risk and health facilities will be shuttered, said Tjada D’Oyen McKenna, CEO of Mercy Corps, a nonprofit that worked with USAID on water projects in Congo, Nigeria and Afghanistan that were intended to benefit 1.7 million people.

“This isn’t just the loss of aid — it’s the unraveling of progress, stability, and human dignity,” she said.

THE PERILS OF FETCHING WATER

In eastern Congo, where fighting between Congolese forces and M23 rebels has claimed thousands of lives, defunct USAID water kiosks now serve as play areas for children.

Evelyne Mbaswa, 38, told Reuters her 16-year-old son went to fetch water in June and never came home – a familiar reality to families in the violence-wracked region.

“When we send young girls, they are raped, young boys are kidnapped…. All this is because of the lack of water,” the mother of nine said.

A spokesperson for the Congolese government did not respond to requests for comment.

In Kenya, USAID was in the midst of a five-year, $100 million project that aimed to provide drinking water and irrigation systems for 150,000 people when contractors and staffers were told in January to stop their work, according to internal documents seen by Reuters. Only 15% of the work had been completed at that point, according to a May 15 memo by DAI Global LLC, the contractor on the project.

That has left open trenches and deep holes that pose acute risks for children and livestock and left $100,000 worth of pipes, fencing and other materials exposed at construction sites, where they could degrade or be looted, according to other correspondence seen by Reuters. USAID signage at those sites makes clear who is responsible for the half-finished work, several memos say.

That could hurt the United States’ reputation and potentially give a boost to extremist groups seeking fresh recruits in the region, according to a draft memo from the U.S. embassy in Nairobi to the State Department seen by Reuters.

The al Qaeda-linked al Shabaab group based in Somalia has been responsible for a string of high-profile attacks in Kenya, including an assault on a university in 2015 that killed at least 147 people.

“The reputational risk of not finishing these projects could turn into a security risk,” the memo said. 

DAMAGING FLOODS

In Kenya’s Taita Taveta, a largely rural county that has endured cyclical drought and flooding, workers had only managed to build brick walls along 220 metres of the 3.1-kilometre (1.9 mile) irrigation canal when they were ordered to stop, community leaders said. And those walls have not been plastered, leaving them vulnerable to erosion.

“Without plaster, the walls will collapse in heavy rain, and the flow of water will lead to the destruction of farms,” said Juma Kubo, a community leader.

The community has asked the Kenyan government and international donors to help finish the job, at a projected cost of 68 million shillings ($526,000). 

In the meantime, they plan to sell the cement and steel cables left on site, Kubo said, to raise money to plaster and backfill the canal.

The county government needs to find “funds to at least finish the project to the degree we can with the materials we have, if not complete it fully,” said Stephen Kiteto Mwagoti, an irrigation officer working for the county.

The Kenyan government did not respond to a request for comment.

For Kibachia, who has lived with flooding for years, help cannot come soon enough.

Three months after work stopped on the project, her mud hut was flooded with thigh-deep water.

“It was really bad this time. I had to use soil to level the floor of my house and to patch up holes in the wall because of damage caused by the floods,” she said.

“Where can I go? This is home.”

Reporting by Ammu Kannampilly in Nairobi and Taveta, Kenya and Andy Sullivan in Washington; additional reporting by Sabiti Djaffar in Mugunga, Democratic Republic of Congo, Gopal Sharma in Kathmandu and Maya Gebeily, Joelle Kozaily and Ahmad al-Kerdi in Beirut; Editing by Don Durfee and Deepa Babington