Light News (LN)

  The relationship between Trump and Meloni was typified by warm handshakes and even warmer words until the US leader did something considered by most Italians to be unthinkable: he criticised the pope. US President Donald Trump has turned on Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, calling her "unacceptable" and claiming she lacks "courage" to back the US intervention in Iran after she condemned his attacks on Pope Leo XIV. The unexpected public rift between the two leaders, who cultivated one of the closest transatlantic relationships over the past year, erupted after Trump criticised the pontiff for his anti-war stance on Iran. "I thought she had courage, but I was wrong," Trump told Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera on Tuesday. Trump previously called Meloni "one of the real leaders of the world" and "full of energy, fantastic", while Meloni said she was able to speak to him "frankly even when we disagree". It all seemed...

  One of  President Donald Trump’s  greatest political talents is bending the rest of his party to his will. After the 2024 election, he went into overdrive on that front, claiming his “landslide” victory gave him an “unprecedented and powerful mandate.” The results  don’t indicate that, but the GOP swallowed it whole. Some lawmakers even argued they  should relegate themselves to vassals  for Trump’s agenda. (“Whatever that is, we need to embrace it,” Rep. Troy Nehls of Texas said. “All of it. Every single word.”) But that might not have been the wisest strategy for Republicans hoping to keep their seats in the 2026 midterm elections. Trump has used that wide latitude to say seemingly whatever he pleases and to pursue policies that the American people decidedly dislike, most recently with the Iran war. It’s almost as if he doesn’t care that what he’s doing could torpedo the GOP’s hopes in less than seven months — because Congress doesn’t matter much to his...

  Lavrov made the remarks after a bilateral meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping on Tuesday in Beijing. Russia's foreign minister Sergey Lavrov said that Iran has an "inalienable" right to enrich uranium for civilian purposes during a state visit to China on Wednesday, according to the Times of Israel. "The right to enrich uranium for civilian purposes is an inalienable right of the Islamic Republic of Iran," Lavrov said during a Tuesday press conference following a bilateral meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping,  according to the Times of Israel. Access to said uranium has been a hard line for U.S. President  Donald Trump  in ongoing peace negotiations with Iran. "There will be no enrichment of Uranium," Trump wrote in an April 8 post on Truth Social, adding that the U.S. would be working with Iran to dig up all remaining nuclear materials in the country to ensure the Islamic Republic would not have access to any uranium. Vice President  JD ...