A Foreign Affairs analysis published Friday warns Iran's late-February closure of the 21-nautical-mile Strait of Hormuz has set a "cheap, fast, and devastating" template for the Strait of Malacca (40% of global trade), the Taiwan Strait (Bloomberg: a blockade could erase 5.3% of global GDP) and the Luzon and Lombok straits. The same day, German broadcasters WDR/NDR revealed Russia's secret "Skythen" programme to station nuclear-armed Skif missiles on the seabed; Ukraine documented 695 Russian torture methods and 406 POW deaths in custody; US economic confidence fell to -45 as Iran-war petrol prices pushed the gallon to $4.55; Pakistan's Field Marshal Munir landed in Tehran to finalise a US-Iran letter of intent.

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Gallup economic confidence falls to -45, worst since 2022, as Iran-war petrol prices push US gallon to $4.55

US economic confidence fell to -45 in Gallup's latest Economic Confidence Index, the worst reading since the 2022 cost-of-living crisis, with only 16 percent of Americans rating the economy as good or excellent and 76 percent saying conditions are getting worse. The poll, released Friday, ties the slide to inflation and a petrol-price surge to $4.55 per gallon — up from below $3 before the US-Israeli war on Iran began in late February — driven by Iran's closure of the Strait of Hormuz and Washington's naval siege of Iranian ports. The reading lands as a separate New York Times/Siena poll this week showed only 31 percent approve of President Donald Trump's handling of the war, even as Trump has said the economic fallout does not factor into his approach to Iran.

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Ukraine documents 695 Russian torture methods, 406 POW deaths, and 2,112 sham convictions in 'Made in Russia. Delivered to Captivity' project

Ukrainian Parliament Commissioner for Human Rights Dmytro Lubinets unveiled the "Made in Russia. Delivered to Captivity" project on Thursday, formally documenting 695 distinct torture methods used by Russia against Ukrainian prisoners of war and confirming that 406 Ukrainian POWs and civilian hostages with captured status verified by the ICRC or other sources have died from torture in Russian custody, most often from broken ribs and internal organ damage. He further reported 860 logged cases of improper detention conditions, 2,112 Ukrainians sentenced by Russian courts in what he called "a separate crime" of illegal rulings of 20-25 years or life, and a network of 186 verified holding sites across Russia, occupied territories and Siberia. Lubinets publicly criticised the International Committee of the Red Cross for declining his separate invitation to attend, citing the unanswered 2022 Olenivka massacre of 53 ICRC-verified POWs as evidence that "there is no international human rights protection system" functioning against Russia.

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WDR and NDR reveal Russia's secret 'Skythen' programme to station nuclear-armed Skif missiles on the seabed

German broadcasters WDR and NDR, after a months-long investigation citing Western intelligence sources, reported on May 21 that Russia is developing a secret programme codenamed "Skythen" to station nuclear-armed ballistic missiles on the seabed at depths of several hundred metres, where they would be hidden from NATO detection and remotely activated in wartime. The system pairs the 96-metre Severodvinsk-based vessel "Zvezdochka" — and possibly the special submarine "Sarov" — with a modified "Skif" missile derived from the submarine-launched "Sineva", with a reported range of several thousand kilometres and first tests said to have taken place "several years ago." The Pentagon studied an analogous concept codenamed "Orca" in 1980 before abandoning it, and the 1971 Seabed Treaty bars such emplacement in international waters but exempts a state's own coastal regions — the broadcasters said Russia would place Skythen in its own waters.

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UK April public-sector borrowing hits £24.3bn, highest since 2020 Covid, as debt-interest sets April record £10.3bn and motor-fuel sales plunge 10.2%

UK public-sector borrowing reached £24.3 billion in April, the highest April figure since the Covid pandemic in 2020 and £4.9 billion above the year-earlier total, with debt-interest payments hitting a record £10.3 billion for the month and inflation-linked social benefits adding £2.7 billion to net spending, the Office for National Statistics said on Thursday. Separately released retail figures showed sales volumes falling 1.3 percent over the same month — the steepest monthly drop in nearly a year — dragged down by a 10.2 percent collapse in motor-fuel sales, the largest since November 2020, as petrol prices spiked on the Iran war. Pantheon Macroeconomics' Rob Wood estimated that debt-interest costs in 2026/27 will now run about £15 billion above the Spring Statement assumption if gilt yields stay where they are, threatening Chancellor Rachel Reeves' £23.6 billion headroom against her own fiscal rule.

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