Scientists in South Korea have announced a new world record for the length of time they sustained temperatures of 100 million degrees Celsius — seven times hotter than the sun’s core — during a nuclear fusion experiment, in what they say is an important step forward for this futuristic energy technology.

Nuclear fusion seeks to replicate the reaction that makes the sun and other stars shine, by fusing together two atoms to unleash huge amounts of energy. Often referred to as the holy grail of climate solutions clean energy, fusion has the potential to provide limitless energy without planet-warming carbon pollution. But mastering the process on Earth is extremely challenging.

The most common way of achieving fusion energy involves a donut shaped reactor called a tokamak in which hydrogen variants are heated to extraordinarily high temperatures to create a plasma.

High temperature and high density plasmas, in which reactions can occur for long durations, are vital for the future of nuclear fusion reactors, said Si-Woo Yoon, director of the KSTAR Research Center at the Korean Institute of Fusion Energy (KFE), which achieved the new record.

KSTAR, KFE’s fusion research device which it refers to as an “artificial sun,” managed to sustain plasma with temperatures of 100 million degrees for 48 seconds during tests between December 2023 and February 2024, beating the previous record of 30 seconds set in 2021.

The KFE scientists said they managed to extend the time by tweaking the process, including using tungsten instead of carbon in the “diverters,” which extract heat and impurities produced by the fusion reaction.

The ultimate aim is for KSTAR to be able to sustain plasma temperatures of 100 million degrees for 300 seconds by 2026, a “a critical point” to be able to scale up fusion operations, Si-Woo Yoon said.

What the scientists are doing in South Korea will feed into the development of the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor in southern France, known as ITER, the world’s biggest tokamak which aims to prove the feasibility of fusion.

KSTAR’s work “will be of great help to secure the predicted performance in ITER operation in time and to advance the commercialization of fusion energy,” Si-Woo Yoon said.

This announcement adds to a number of other nuclear fusion breakthroughs.

In 2022, scientists at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory’s National Ignition Facility in the United States, made history by successfully completing a nuclear fusion reaction which produced more energy than used to power the experiment.

This February, scientists near the English city of Oxford announced they had set a record for producing more energy than ever before in a fusion reaction. They produced 69 megajoules of fusion energy for five seconds, roughly enough to power 12,000 homes for the same amount of time.

But commercializing nuclear fusion still remains a long way off as scientists work to solve fiendish engineering and scientific difficulties.

Nuclear fusion “is not ready yet and therefore it can’t help us with the climate crisis now,” said Aneeqa Khan, research fellow in nuclear fusion at the University of Manchester in the UK.

However, she added, if progress continues, fusion “has the potential to be part of a green energy mix in the latter half of the century.”

Crowds gathered in Germany overnight to celebrate the legalization of cannabis starting from Monday.

There was music and dancing at the Brandenburg Gate in central Berlin, where attendees waved placards and blew clouds of smoke into the air.

One person could be seen cycling through the crowd dragging an artwork of a giant cannabis leaf on a trailer behind their bike, while another ceremoniously rolled a joint in front of television cameras.

Last month, Germany’s lower house of parliament voted to legalize cannabis for limited recreational use following a controversial national debate about the pros and cons of allowing easier access to the drug.

Health minister Karl Lauterbach hailed the move in a post on X on Monday.

“Cannabis use already existed yesterday, but it’s increasing. Now it’s exiting the taboo zone,” he wrote.

“This is better for real addiction help, prevention for children and young people and for combating the black market, for which there will soon be an alternative.”

The new rules mean adults can possess small amounts for personal use but the drug remains banned for under 18s.

Under the new legislation, put forward by Germany’s ruling coalition party, adults can cultivate up to three plants for private consumption and be allowed to possess 50g at one time at home, and 25g in public, starting from April 1.

From July 1, cannabis will be available in licensed not-for-profit clubs with no more than 500 members – all of whom would have to be adults. Only club members would be allowed to consume their output.

The German government said that cannabis would remain illegal for minors and highly restricted for young adults, adding that consuming the drug near schools and playgrounds would be illegal.

The move makes Germany the third country in Europe – after Malta and Luxembourg – to legalize the drug for recreational use, removing cannabis from the official list of banned substances.

The Netherlands bans possession of drugs but some municipalities permit them to be sold in coffee shops under its so-called policy of toleration.

In other countries, like Australia and the US, rules vary in different localities.

Dogs can understand that certain words refer to specific objects, according to a recent study, suggesting that they may understand words in a similar way to humans.

It offers the first evidence of brain activity for this comprehension in a non-human animal, researchers said, though the study’s conclusion has faced scrutiny from other experts in the field.

It has long been known that dogs can learn commands like “sit,” “stay,” or “fetch” and can respond to these words with learned behaviors, often with the help of a treat or two, but untangling their understanding of nouns has proven more difficult.

To understand dogs’ language skills, Lilla Magyari, an associate professor at Stavanger University in Norway and researcher at Eötvös Loránd University in Hungary, and Marianna Boros, a postdoctoral researcher at Eötvös Loránd University, were inspired by studies investigating the comprehension of infants before they can speak. They decided to mimic these experiments with dogs, they said.

As the study’s lead authors, they devised an experiment in which 18 dog owners said words for objects their dogs already knew. Then, the owners held up either the matching object or a different one while small metal discs harmlessly attached to the dogs’ heads measured brain activity in a process known as electroencephalography (EEG).

In this way, scientists observed that brain activity in 14 of the 18 dogs was different when they were shown an object that matched with the word, compared to one that mismatched. They said that the resulting brain activity was the same as those produced by humans in similar experiments.

“Our claim is to say that a dog understands a word, it means in the absence of the object, the dog activates a so-called mental representation,” Boros said. “We can imagine it as the memory for that object.

“When the owner shows the object which is not matching that mental representation, then there is a very typical brain response we observed in the dog’s brain that in humans is widely accepted as an index of… semantic understanding.”

There was a two-second gap between owners saying the word of an object and showing it, a condition favoring the interpretation that dogs understood the words rather than simply associated them with the object, the researchers argued in the study.

Words that dogs knew better – as determined by their owners – also produced a bigger mismatch effect when the wrong object was shown, which researchers said strengthened their hypothesis.

Previous experiments testing dogs’ understanding of nouns had involved them fetching specific objects when asked, according to a statement released by the Eötvös Loránd University.

This method suggested that dogs only fetched the correct object at a rate expected by chance though, as Magyari noted, dogs can perhaps be unmotivated or distracted during studies.

By using EEG, there was no need for this behavioral response and researchers were able to test the dogs’ “passive understanding because maybe they can reveal more than they are able to exhibit or show,” she added.

But the true extent of the dogs’ comprehension is still unknown, even by the study’s authors, since the dogs were responding to their own toys and objects that the owners brought to the lab.

“In this study, we only know that when they heard the words they were expecting their (own) objects,” Magyari said.

“So we don’t know how much (understanding)… they have about the relationship between the word and the object, whether it also reflects categorical knowledge, which means whether they think the ball refers to many ball-like things not only to their own ball. This is something further studies need to look into.”

He said the time delay in the experiment “was neither here nor there, if it’s conditioning there can be a gap of some seconds” and that only familiar words would elicit a response explaining the greater mismatch effect.

He said that dogs lacked the two areas of the brain crucial for human understanding of language therefore the EEG pattern highlighted by the researchers was not shared by humans.

“If we’re making a claim that the pattern of the brainwave shows you that it must be an understanding of words, you need it to be the same pattern,” he said.

The study was published in the journal Current Biology on March 22.

Israeli military forces have withdrawn from Gaza’s largest hospital, Al-Shifa, after a 14-day siege that witnesses and Gazan authorities say left the medical facility largely destroyed.

“The situation is very bad,” said Mahmoud Bassal, a spokesperson for Gaza’s Civil Defense, on Monday. Al-Shifa is “completely destroyed and burned down. Many of its buildings are totally destroyed or charred,” he said.

“Injured and dead bodies fill the hospital grounds,” he added. “There are bodies buried in the hospital yards.”

Images from the area showed widespread destruction with charred and pockmarked buildings inside the complex.

More than 30 wounded people were transported from Al-Shifa to the Al-Ahli Baptist Hospital east of Gaza City, Bassal said.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) confirmed their withdrawal in a statement on Monday, saying they had completed “precise operational activity” in the area.

The Ministry of Health in Gaza said about 3,000 people were inside Al-Shifa when the IDF began its raid on March 18, and that those attempting to leave were being targeted by snipers and fire from helicopters. Hamas previously accused Israel of striking targets “without regard” to the patients or medical staff inside – a claim echoed by people at the complex.

Targeting hospitals in wartime is prohibited under international law, but those standards change if enemy combatants are using the facility to attack an enemy.

The IDF said that during the raid, its troops “killed terrorists in close-quarters encounters, located numerous weapons and intelligence documents throughout the hospital, while preventing harm to civilians, patients, and medical teams.”

It has also said that civilians, patients, and medical teams were evacuated during the operation — though Palestinians inside and around Al-Shifa reported civilian casualties and arrests. Eyewitnesses have said medical personnel and other civilians were detained by Israeli troops.

Israel has for years said that Hamas fighters are sheltering in mosques, hospitals and other civilian places to avoid Israeli attacks. Hamas has repeatedly denied the claims.

‘Like a horror movie’

“Bulldozers crushed bodies of people everywhere around and in the yard of the hospital,” said Al-Za’anoun.

After the withdrawal, people began arriving at the destroyed complex to search for missing family members, he said, adding: “We found entire families dead and their bodies are decomposed in houses around the hospital.”

Those still alive in the complex are malnourished, with some survivors saying they had to share one bottle of water among six people each day, Al-Za’anoun said.

Second raid

This raid was the second of its kind at the hospital, with the IDF first raiding Al-Shifa in November. By January, the IDF said it had completed dismantling Hamas’ command structure in northern Gaza.

Israel’s closest ally, the United States, has repeatedly backed Israeli assessments that Hamas and other Gaza militants used Al-Shifa’s medical complex as a command hub, and to hold hostages and store weapons.

Asked about the attack on Al-Shifa, US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said on March 18 that “Hamas came back into Shifa” after Israel had cleared the hospital of the militant group.

Meanwhile, the siege has been condemned by international organizations, with World Health Organization (WHO) Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus saying in March, “Hospitals should never be battlegrounds.”

WHO and other humanitarian groups had been warning of an ever-nearing famine in northern Gaza. By late March, 70% of the population was suffering with catastrophic levels of hunger, according to a UN-backed report.

All 2.2 million people in Gaza do not have enough food to eat, with half of the population on the brink of starvation and famine projected to arrive in the north “anytime between mid-March and May 2024,” according to the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC).

At a school in Japan’s snowy northern mountains, reminders of distinguished alumni are everywhere. Banners herald Los Angeles Dodgers megastar Shohei Ohtani and Toronto Blue Jays pitcher Yusei Kikuchi, their faces greeting every visitor.

But now, Hanamaki Higashi High School celebrates a new prodigy in its midst – one whose high-school records beat even those of Ohtani and Kikuchi.

Raised in the sleepy town of Hanamaki, Iwate prefecture, Rintaro Sasaki doesn’t know a life without baseball, having grown up playing catch with both his sister and his father, who is a coach.

Once he joined a school known for its elite baseball team, he shared dormitories with teammates and was immersed in the sport – as well as in his predecessors’ towering achievements.

Now aged 18, he has already etched his name into the annals of baseball history with an astounding 140 home runs during his high school career, a feat which surpasses the legends he admires. He was the projected number-one pick for Japan’s professional baseball league.

But unlike his predecessors, Sasaki is charting a different course. Eschewing an immediate professional career, he is instead choosing education: from this autumn, he’ll attend Stanford University in California, with a view to top-level baseball after that.

“I think it could be a place where I can challenge myself in new ways. And I don’t just want to practice baseball, but also study to prepare for my second career when I eventually retire,” he said, drawn to Stanford by the expansive campus that felt like a slice of home and a coaching staff that promised a familial support system.

Sasaki said this pivot to academia was inspired by his father, Hiroshi, who doubles as his coach and the guiding force behind Hanamaki Higashi’s baseball program.

Hiroshi, who mentored Ohtani and Kikuchi before his son, sees in America a land where Rintaro’s unique talents can flourish.

Under his father’s tutelage, Sasaki has grown into a formidable talent. But for his son to stand shoulder to shoulder with Ohtani and Kikuchi, the coach said he needs far more practice.

Ohtani, who during the offseason signed baseball’s richest contract with World Series favorites the Dodgers, has won the American League MVP award twice over the past three seasons as a pitcher and designated hitter with the Los Angeles Angels.

“I had never seen such a level of athleticism before [Ohtani and Kikuchi]. I knew from the moment they entered the team that they would be tremendous athletes if they could build on their muscular strength,” Sasaki said, sitting in the same gym where the two athletes trained under his watch. He doesn’t take much credit for raising the two stars, saying they would’ve excelled anywhere.

Now, with the emergence of three baseball stars from Hanamaki Higashi, Sasaki’s teammates swell with pride at the honor of walking the same corridors.

Despite its status as a public school with a modest baseball budget, Hanamaki Higashi has impressively produced three outstanding athletes. When asked the secret behind this success, Coach Sasaki says it’s not something mystical in the water—rather, a potent mix of rigorous practice and formidable mental strength.

“I think the most important thing is not to blame others and not to make excuses…The other thing I do is set firm goals,” he said.

As the younger Sasaki prepares for this next chapter, he carries with him the ethos of Hanamaki Higashi, a testament to the school’s remarkable legacy of nurturing baseball talent.

“One day, I want to be playing on the same field as Ohtani and Kikuchi,” he said. “That’s what’s driving me.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is in “excellent” health following surgery to treat a hernia, according to a statement released Sunday by Hadassah Hospital Ein Kerem in Jerusalem.

The procedure “ended successfully” and Netanyahu is “awake, he is talking to his family, and his situation is perfect,” Alon Pikarsky, the hospital’s director of general surgery, said in an early morning video statement.

Netanyahu, 74, was diagnosed with a hernia during a routine examination on Saturday, his office previously said in a statement. He was placed under anesthesia for the procedure, his office said.

The surgery meant Israel’s leader was temporarily out of action with the nation at war with Hamas in Gaza following the October 7 attacks. Israel’s deputy prime minister and justice minister, Yariv Levin, stepped in for Netanyahu while he was incapacitated.

In a news conference Sunday in Jerusalem ahead of the surgery, Netanyahu said he was optimistic about the results of the procedure and that he will return to work “very quickly.”

“I assure you that I will get through this treatment successfully and return to action very quickly,” Netanyahu said.

The operation took place amid renewed talks between Israel and Hamas in Cairo, according to a report in Egyptian media.

The negotiations to secure the release of the remaining Israeli hostages held by the militant group in exchange for a ceasefire in the conflict that has seen more than 32,000 Gazans killed had reached an impasse last week.

This is Netanyahu’s second surgery since returning to the premiership in late 2022. A health scare last summer ended with the Israeli leader being fitted for a pacemaker to fix a transient heart block.

Netanyahu previously had a hernia in 2013 that also required surgery.

A hernia is a gap in the abdominal muscular wall that allows something inside the abdomen to protrude outward, according to Johns Hopkins Medicine.

King Charles III has made his most significant outing since his cancer diagnosis last month, attending the traditional Easter Mattins church service in Windsor on Sunday.

Charles, 75, appeared to be in good spirits as he arrived by car to St. George’s Chapel, a 14th-century building on the grounds of Windsor Castle, around an hour’s drive from London. He was accompanied by his wife, Queen Camilla, for the event – a staple in the royal calendar.

Typically, the extended royal family gathers for Easter at Windsor Castle before heading to church together. Their arrivals are usually watched by staff living at Windsor, either from a nearby grassy bank or from their doorsteps.

The royal couple waved delightedly to a crowd of well-wishers before making their way into the chapel through the Galilee Porch.

One member of the public called out “Happy Easter” to the British monarch, to which he responded, saying: “And to you.”

“He looked wonderful. He smiled at me and had a little laugh, loved the Welsh flag,” she added.

This year’s celebration is a quieter affair with fewer royals in attendance to minimize the King’s contact with others during his treatment.

The King and Queen sat apart from the rest of the main congregation for the one-hour service.

Similarly, the late Queen Elizabeth II sat separately to her loved ones when she attended the funeral of her husband, Prince Philip, which took place amid strict pandemic regulations in 2021.

The King’s siblings were the first family members to arrive. Prince Edward and Sophie – the Duke and Duchess of Edinburgh – were accompanied by their son, James, Earl of Wessex. They were followed by the King’s sister, Princess Anne – who gave a quick wave to the crowd – and her husband, Tim Laurence, as well as Prince Andrew and Sarah Ferguson, Duchess of York.

Following the service, Camilla was presented with a bouquet of white and yellow flowers by a young boy as the royal couple departed the chapel.

With more cries of “Happy Easter,” Charles thrilled well-wishers by unexpectedly making his way over to them, sparking applause from the public. During the surprise walkabout he appeared at ease, stopping to chat at various points and shaking hands.

It was unclear if Charles would attend the usual post-service family lunch. In the days ahead, he and Camilla will reportedly take a break for Easter.

The King’s presence will be an encouraging sight for many royal-watchers after he temporarily paused public-facing engagements on the advice of his doctors.

He has, however, kept a steady hand on the tiller, seeing to state business and official paperwork with his daily red boxes from the UK government while maintaining a diary of private audiences as well as his regular weekly meeting with Prime Minister Rishi Sunak.

In recent days, he greeted the new ambassadors of Moldova and Burundi at Buckingham Palace, met with secretary-general of the Climate Vulnerable Forum, as well as sat down with a group of community and faith leaders from around the UK.

Charles sought to reassure the nation he has been handling constitutional matters behind the scenes in a personal message ahead of Easter weekend.

In a recorded audio address for the annual Royal Maundy service on Thursday, he reiterated his coronation pledge “not to be served but to serve” with “my whole heart.”

He also shared his “great sadness” that he wasn’t able to join the congregation, saying the service “has a very special place in my heart.”

The Queen deputized for her husband, distributing the traditional Maundy money – specially-minted coins – to people in recognition of their service to the church and local community.

A notable absence from Sunday’s Easter festivities were the Prince and Princess of Wales and their three children. The Waleses attended last year with Prince Louis making his debut at the family outing to the delight of royal-watchers.

The family of five have been laying low since Catherine disclosed a little over a week ago that she had started chemotherapy for cancer found in post-operation tests after a planned abdominal surgery in January.

The Waleses are spending the Easter holidays together as they continue to adjust to Kate’s diagnosis.

A Kensington Palace spokesperson said last Saturday that the prince and princess had been “extremely moved by the public’s warmth and support” and were “grateful for the understanding of their request for privacy at this time.”

Kate has not been seen in an official capacity since Christmas Day. Easter had initially been suggested by Kensington Palace as the period when she would resume duties following her operation. However, her return has been postponed until cleared to do so by her medical team.

Prince William is expected to resume public engagements in mid-April once Prince George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis have restarted school.

The threat of ISIS, also known as Islamic State, might have seemed to be waning as headlines turned to Ukraine, Gaza and the next US election. But last week’s attack on a Moscow concert hall reminded the world of the enduring danger of Islamist terrorism and the ambitions of what is known as IS Khorasan (ISIS-K) far beyond its camps in the mountains of Afghanistan.

Analysts believe the group has a growing focus on Europe – and point to events such as this year’s Paris Olympics as potential targets.

ISIS claimed responsibility for the Moscow attack. The fact that Tajik nationals were allegedly involved indicates ISIS-K was responsible; the group draws many members from central Asia and has a record of previous plots in Russia. US officials have also said there is evidence ISIS-K carried out the attack.

ISIS-K was created nine years ago as an autonomous ‘province’ of the Islamic State, and despite many enemies has survived and proved itself capable of launching attacks in Pakistan, Iran and central Asia. Before the Crocus City attack, it had planned others in Europe and Russia. The commander of US Central Command, Gen. Erik Kurilla, assessed recently that ISIS-K “retains the capability and the will to attack US and Western interests abroad in as little as six months with little to no warning.”

UN experts and others – including the Russian security services – estimate the strength of ISIS-K at between 4,000 and 6,000 fighters. Sanaullah Ghafari became the group’s leader in 2020 and, despite occasional reports of his demise, terrorism analysts believe he remains an effective leader.

Both the Taliban and the United States have sought – though not in concert – to expunge ISIS-K from its safe havens in eastern Afghanistan. But a recent analysis in Sentinel, the journal of the Combating Terrorism Center at West Point, said it “remains a resilient organization, capable of adapting to changing dynamics and evolving to survive difficult circumstances.”

Endurance and expansion

ISIS-K’s most infamous attack until now was the suicide bombing at Kabul airport in 2021 that killed nearly 200 people, including 13 US soldiers guarding the airport.

It has continued a campaign of suicide bombings and assassinations against the Taliban, which it regards as insufficiently radical and beholden to outside powers. Just last week, an ISIS-K suicide bomber detonated his explosive belt among Taliban militia in the Afghan city of Kandahar, inflicting dozens of casualties, according to local accounts.

But ISIS-K has also expanded its orbit. Amira Jadoon, who has written a book about the group, said that over the last three years ISIS-K “has grown more ambitious and aggressive in its efforts to gain notoriety and relevance across South and Central Asia, launching its most aggressive multilingual propaganda campaign and expanding the types of attacks it conducts.”

Last year the group executed a devastating bombing against an election rally in Baujur, Pakistan, in which more than 60 people were killed. It has also established a foothold in the restive Pakistani province of Baluchistan bordering Iran.

In January, ISIS claimed responsibility for twin suicide bombings in the Iranian city of Kerman, killing 90 people and injured more than 200. Jadoon, an associate professor at Clemson University, said that given its “proximity to the attacks, its highly sectarian attack strategy, and its diverse membership base, it is highly likely that ISK [as the group is also called] played a role in the Kerman attack.”

The threat to Europe

ISIS-K has ambitions far beyond south Asia, aiming to target Russia, western Europe and even the United States. European security agencies are paying heightened attention to the threat, even if ISIS-K’s capabilities are yet to match its ambitions.

Hans-Jakob Schindler, senior director of the Counter Extremism Project, notes that in July last year seven men were arrested in Germany suspected of planning high-profile attacks and being in contact with ISIS-K planners. All the suspects were from central Asia.

This month, two Afghan citizens were detained in Germany, accused of making “concrete preparations” to attack Sweden’s parliament in retaliation for a spate of Koran burnings in the country. One had joined ISIS-K last year, prosecutors asserted, and their plans were made “in close consultation with” ISIS-K operatives.

Christine Abizaid, director of the US National Counterterrorism Center, told Congress last autumn that so far “ISIS-Khorasan has relied primarily on inexperienced operatives in Europe to try to advance attacks in its name.”

Fitton-Brown – former coordinator of UN sanctions and threat assessment regarding ISIS, al Qaeda and the Taliban – agreed that so far the threat in Europe has been “naïve and embryonic” but warned that ISIS-K “has plugged into the central Asian diaspora, primarily in Russia and Turkey and to some extent in Germany.”

He regards the Moscow attack as a “breakthrough success” for the group, demonstrating a level of planning not previously seen beyond south Asia. ISIS claimed that the Crocus City Hall had been intensively reconnoitered.

A leaked US Defense Department assessment last year noted that “ISIS has been developing a cost-effective model for external operations that relies on resources from outside Afghanistan, operatives in target countries, and extensive facilitation networks.”

Following the Moscow attack, France – which hosts the Olympics this year – raised the terrorist threat level to the maximum. Prime Minister Gabriel Attal said thousands more soldiers were ready to boost its counter-terrorism force, adding: “The Islamist threat is real…We are constantly preparing for all scenarios.”

Jadoon said the risk of ISIS-K’s “brand resonating with individual sympathizers in Western countries cannot be overlooked.” She explained that as militants see it as “an inspirational and growing force, it may attract individuals from Western nations who are drawn to its ideology. This could lead to attempts by individuals to travel to conflict zones to join its ranks or carry out attacks in their home countries on behalf of the group.”

Hating Putin and the ‘Eastern Crusader’

Russia may be particularly vulnerable to ISIS-K. Ten years ago, then ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi denounced “the crusaders, their allies, and with them the rest of the nations and religions of kufr (infidel), all being led by America and Russia.”

A year later, ISIS’ franchise in Sinai claimed responsibility for the bomb that brought down a Russian charter jet flying from Sharm el-Sheikh to St. Petersburg, killing all 224 people onboard.

ISIS’ loathing of Vladimir Putin stems from the Russian role in Syria in support of the Assad regime and the brutal Chechen wars in the early years of the century. Russia’s support for authoritarian regimes in central Asia – which ISIS-K has described as Russia’s “puppets” – has deepened the animus.

ISIS-K has also derided the Taliban for “befriending Russians, the murderers of Chechen Muslims.” In 2022, an ISIS-K suicide bomber attacked the Russian embassy in Kabul, killing two employees.

Now it’s clear that the group is trying to establish itself inside Russia. Earlier this month, the Russian security service – the FSB – said it had that killed two ISIS-K operatives in the region of Kaluga who were planning an attack on a Moscow synagogue.

Fitton-Brown regards Russia as extremely vulnerable to further attacks, with its security services preoccupied by Ukraine and a vast pool of migrant workers from central Asia, at least some of whom have likely been radicalized. All those arrested since the Crocus City attack are Tajik.

Several previous ISIS-inspired or claimed attacks in Russia have involved Tajik, Uzbek or Kyrgyz nationals. In 2017 an Uzbek national carried out a suicide bombing on the St Petersburg metro, killing 15.

The attitude of the Russian government, both pre- and post- the Moscow attack, may not help it confront the threat. After the US warned in early March of the possibility of terror attacks at “large gatherings in Moscow, to include concerts,” Putin lambasted “provocative statements by a number of official Western structures…All this resembles blatant blackmail and an intention to sow fear and destabilize our society.”

Schindler at the Counter Extremism Project said that even if the FSB were aware of such plots, protective deployment of security forces at concerts would have smacked of contradicting the Kremlin – and would therefore have been unwise.

After the attack, Putin said it was carried out “by the hands of radical Islamists,” but was sponsored elsewhere, suggesting Ukraine had been involved, something strenuously denied by Kyiv and Washington. And according to the director of the FSB, Alexander Bortnikov, three countries were behind the terrorist attack: the US, UK and Ukraine.

The narrative from Moscow is that even if ISIS-K or individuals inspired by it step up their campaign in Russia, they’ll be seen as puppets of darker forces. That may distort intelligence-gathering.

For ISIS-K, the Moscow attack is a coup. Rita Katz, executive director of SITE Intelligence, said: “ISIS’ global support rests in no small part on its image as a capable organization, and this devastating massacre in Russia will only feed into that image.”

In another world, Ukraine would be voting today. In a year where billions get the chance to cast a ballot, people here would be giving their verdict on the presidency of Volodymyr Zelensky.

Five years ago, the man whose talents as an actor, comedian and producer had made him a household name in Ukraine was propelled into office. But with Russian forces still inside the country and millions of Ukrainians displaced from their homes, fighting on the frontlines, or living overseas, there is no election in sight.

Some US Republicans have sought to make the upcoming expiration of Zelensky’s term, which happens in May, another reason why military aid should be withheld.

Zelensky himself has said he was open to the idea but in recent months has made it clear it is not something he believes the country can or should do. Although Sunday is the day the constitution says Ukraine should be voting, it also does not allow it during wartime. The alternative would be to suspend martial law for the period of an election.

On Kyiv’s Maidan square on a Friday afternoon, it is chilly. Skies are overcast and there is a hailstorm on the way.

This large open space, through which cuts one of the city’s main thoroughfares, was the cradle of what Ukrainians call the Revolution of Dignity – the uprising ten years ago that pushed out the country’s pro-Putin leader, Viktor Yanukovych, and shifted Ukraine’s focus towards Europe and the United States.

Mykola Lyapin, a 21-year-old student, is having a smoke before the rain comes. He would have voted for Zelensky five years ago if he had had the chance and would vote for him now.  He has no fear that when the time comes the president will move on.

“Our people are free, and we proved it in 2014, when we were dissatisfied with President Yanukovych. We came here to the Maidan, some even lost their lives, but we achieved what we wanted. It is in our genes to defend our position. If the people really believe Zelensky has been running the country for too long a time, we will solve it, even if the war is ongoing.”

Just up the hill, in a bookshop selling Jamie Oliver cookbooks, among other titles, 42-year-old psychologist Kateryna Bilokon is talking with a friend in the small café at the front of the shop. She voted for Zelensky in 2019 and is happy with his performance. She is dissuaded from supporting an election due to the cost.

“It would be a drain on the state budget; it would be better to redirect funds to arm our military,” she says, adding, “There is no one who could replace Zelensky at the moment.”

‘Not the right time,’ says Zelensky

Opinion polls suggest there is little appetite among Ukrainians for a vote – just 15% of respondents told the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology last month the country should hold an election.

Last August, President Zelensky was asked for his position in an interview on Ukrainian television and sounded sympathetic to holding a poll.

“There is a logic to it. If you are defending democracy, then you must think about this defense, even in a time of war. Elections are one of those defenses,” he said, at the same acknowledging that a vote could well prove a divisive distraction from the main goal of defeating Russia.

For a leader sensitive to accusations of wanting to hang on to power, and whose appeal in 2019 came in part from a pledge of greater openness and democratic transparency, shutting down talk of elections is a risk. All the same, in subsequent comments, the president has been less equivocal. “Now is not the right time for elections,” he said last November, and his position has not changed since then.

Oleksiy Koshel, of the Committee of Voters of Ukraine, a pressure group which seeks to uphold democratic rights, sees clear-eyed political calculation at work. He believes Zelensky’s team initially wanted to hold elections because the president’s support was so high. But as his ratings started to slip towards the end of the year so  the leadership went cold on the idea.

Recent months have been tough on the battlefield for Ukraine. As the United States Congress continues to dither over new military aid, elections in Ukraine became folded into the debate by some Republicans. Vivek Ramaswamy, who ran for the Republican Party nomination for president, accused of Kyiv of “threaten[ing] to cancel elections … unless the US forks out more money.”

South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham, despite being a strong supporter of aid for Ukraine, also took an unequivocal stance, telling a press conference in Kyiv last year, “I want to see this country have free and fair elections, even while it is under assault. The American people need to know that Ukraine is different. This has been a very corrupt country in the past.”

Strikingly, on his latest visit to Ukraine earlier this month Graham had moderated his position considerably, saying he now shared the consensus position among Ukrainians.

“Everyone I spoke with said you need to get this war in a better place before you have elections. That makes sense to me, having been on the ground,” he said.

More sensitively, perhaps, are the people living in what Ukraine refers to as the temporarily occupied territories. This is the roughly 20% of the country that is under Russian control.

The impracticalities of facilitating voting there are clear, but the optics of going ahead with a national poll regardless would also be deeply troubling to many. While some Ukrainians might quietly suspect that those who have stayed behind in the occupied territories have done so because they have pro-Russian sympathies, the appearance, nevertheless, would be one of abandonment, of Kyiv willingly disenfranchising those it is seeking to liberate. It is not hard to see how the Kremlin could exploit that.

The other group of people whose participation in the election would provide a challenge are those in the armed forces, especially those in combat positions on the front line.

“It would be unfair to deprive the right to vote in the elections for soldiers who are defending the independence of our country at the cost of their lives and health,” Stefanchuk said.

Soldiers warn against ‘power vacuum’

“The military is afraid that someone may decide to hold elections, either for internal reasons, or under pressure from Western countries […] A power vacuum during the transition period may pose a threat to the management of the military and the functioning of the state,” Oleksandr Voitko, serving with a drone unit, said.

Another soldier, serving with the 47th Brigade near Avdiivka, who preferred to remain anonymous, agreed.

Eventually, though, Ukrainians will return to the polls. Zelensky’s numbers may be off their highs, but he remains popular; 64% of Ukrainians say they trust him as leader.

Even so, Oleksiy Koshel, the voting rights campaigner, believes two years into the war, people are starting to move beyond a natural inclination in times of crisis to place trust in those in power. He expects politicians who emerge from the military such as former Commander in Chief Valerii Zaluzhnyi or lesser-known figures to get record results when elections are eventually held.

Anecdotally, too, it is not difficult to find people in Kyiv who believe there should eventually be a reckoning for the full-scale invasion for the current political leadership. A young businessman out with his wife and children, who were visiting him briefly from Italy where they were seeing out the fighting, was scathing about the president.

He had failed to heed the warnings about Russia, the man said, preferring not to give his name.

The result, he said, was that his own children, and those of his friends, were growing up speaking Italian or Czech because the war had driven them abroad to seek safety.

“These children should be speaking Ukrainian,” he said with a mixture of anger and ruefulness.

Maria Kostenko and Victoria Butenko contributed to this report

Armed police raided Peru’s government palace and the private home of President Dina Boluarte in search of Rolexes and other luxury watches as part of a preliminary corruption inquiry.

Police broke down the door to her property late Friday after officials apparently ignored orders to open up, Reuters reported.

The probe was prompted by Peruvian news outlet La Encerrona’s investigation into Boluarte’s watches. After reviewing thousands of photographs of the President, La Encerrona determined that Boluarte owned at least 14 luxury watches.

Peruvian media have since dubbed the incident the “Rolex case.”

Boularte had denied any wrongdoing before the raid, saying anything she owned was a result of her hard work.

“I came to the presidential palace with my hands clean and I will leave with my hands clean as I have promised the Peruvian people,” she said.

Boularte’s office said in a statement early Saturday that the searches were completed “without incident.” Her lawyer, Mateo Castaneda, told Peruvian broadcaster RPP that the police presence was excessive and designed to “make a show.” He added that police had taken photos of approximately 10 watches but he could not confirm what brands.

Castaneda said that Boularte is scheduled to testify at the prosecutor’s office next month.

The president’s political allies were also quick to come to her defense and malign the raid as excessive.

Prime Minister Gustavo Adrianzen said in an interview with RPP that the raid, conducted late at night on a bank holiday, was an attack on the president’s dignity, while Justice Minister Eduardo Arana told reporters that the searches were unconstitutional.

Peru has in recent years been rattled by political instability, with president after president brought down by allegations of corruption or political malfeasance.

Boluarte succeeded Pedro Castillo, a former teacher and union leader from rural Peru, in December 2022. Castillo was impeached and removed from office after attempting to dissolve Congress and install an emergency government – a tactic that lawmakers slammed as an attempted coup.

He was then accused of rebellion and conspiracy, charges he denies.

Castillo’s election followed a string of emergency and interim leaders after the downfall of former President Martin Vizcarra, who was impeached over allegations of corruption in November 2020. Vizcarra’s predecessor, Pedro Pablo Kuczynski, resigned in 2018 due to a corruption scandal involving the massive Brazilian conglomerate Odebrech. And the president before Kuczynski, Ollanta Humala, is currently facing trial on charges of money laundering. Humala has pleaded not guilty.