US-Iran War Diplomacy, Turkey Crackdown, Ukraine Drone Campaign

The US-Iran war and the diplomacy around it framed the day worldwide. A group of rival Middle Eastern states -- Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar and Pakistan -- coalesced behind a provisional peace deal with Iran and urged the Trump administration to accept it despite fierce Israeli opposition, an agreement that followed visits to Iran by Pakistani and Qatari officials. President Trump, marking Memorial Day at the White House as his administration weighed resuming airstrikes, wrote on Truth Social that any deal would have to be "great and meaningful" and "the exact opposite" of the 2015 nuclear accord or there would be none. Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said Iran would not accept "excessive demands," while Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Washington would consider alternatives if talks fail. Israel signaled it would not be bound by any agreement, reserving the right to strike regional threats including in Lebanon, and -- in a plan reported by Middle East Eye and said to be championed by Jared Kushner and Ambassador Mike Huckabee -- the US and Israel are working to end Jordan's custodianship of the Al-Aqsa Mosque.

The war's economic footprint was visible in the Gulf and across Asian markets. Traffic through the Strait of Hormuz remains down about 95 percent since the conflict began on February 28, with roughly six vessels a day crossing against about 100 before the war and only 532 ships transiting between February 28 and May 17. Oil prices fell about 5 percent in early Asian trading on hopes of a ceasefire, and the Idemitsu Maru became the first Japanese-owned tanker to transit the strait since the war began.

In Turkey, Erdoğan's crackdown on the opposition escalated sharply. Riot police fired tear gas and forced their way into the Ankara headquarters of the Republican People's Party (CHP) on Sunday, evicting ousted leader Özgür Özel, after a May 21 appeals court annulled the party's 2023 congress and reinstalled former leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu. The pro-Kurdish DEM party condemned the move, which followed the detention since 2024 of hundreds of CHP figures including Istanbul mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu, whose arrest set off Turkey's largest protests since 2013. Under separate pressure, Erdoğan reversed his Friday closure of Istanbul Bilgi University after students and lecturers demonstrated.

On the eastern front of Europe, Ukraine's long-range drone campaign cut Russia's national fuel output by about a fifth, forcing central refineries to halt and striking the Yaroslavl refinery a record 15th time on Friday, the campaign's peak being the overnight May 16-17 raid that sent more than 350 drones over greater Moscow. Kyiv, meanwhile, was still recovering from Russia's May 23-24 missile-and-drone barrage that damaged around 300 sites; its security service detained an 18-year-old accused of coordinating the strike, which killed two and injured 91. Along the front, Ukraine's General Staff counted 65 clashes by mid-afternoon, and Russian FAB-250 bombs killed two civilians in Kramatorsk.

Western unity over Ukraine showed fresh strain. The UK, France, Spain, Italy and Canada blocked NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte's proposal to require members to spend 0.25 percent of GDP a year on military aid for Kyiv, a plan Rutte conceded lacked unanimous support, even as Germany's foreign minister Johann Wadephul pushed allies to add 30 to 40 billion euros in bilateral funding atop the EU's 90-billion-euro credit. The friction fit a broader pattern of European governments quietly distancing themselves from transatlantic commitments amid doubts about US reliability under Trump.

In the Asia-Pacific, China launched the Shenzhou 23 spacecraft carrying three astronauts to its space station, with one set to remain in orbit for a year to study long-duration spaceflight. In Tokyo, about 20 people were injured at the Ginza Six complex after a man sprayed an unidentified substance near an ATM, and in the Philippines the death toll from a building collapse in Angeles rose to four with 17 still missing. Rubio's stop in India came ahead of a Quad meeting with counterparts from India, Australia and Japan, and Cambodia's leader pardoned the opposition figure Kem Sokha.

In Africa, Sudan's civil war, now in its third year, has hardened into a regional proxy conflict in which foreign powers arm both sides largely with drones -- a campaign that killed at least 880 civilians between January and April 2026, with the United Arab Emirates the most prominent backer of the Rapid Support Forces.

Climate and weather pressed on the agenda too. A record early heatwave gripped western Europe, with Météo-France logging 31.9C in Paris and more than 20 French towns recording their highest-ever May temperatures, triggering the first May heat alerts since the warning system began in 2004 and contributing to the death of a runner in the capital. Ahead of the G7 summit, the national science academies of the G7 nations jointly warned that Arctic summer sea ice has shrunk by half since the 1970s, with cascading effects on sea levels and extreme weather.