🇫🇷❌🚬🎁 — French Government to ban smoking outdoors in most places, says Minister to AFP

🇾🇪❌🇮🇱❗️ — Houthi terrorists launched a ballistic missile from Yemen towards the State of Israel.

🇸🇦🇮🇱❌🇾🇪 — Intercepted over Saudi Arabia

🇷🇺🤝🇯🇵 — Russian President Vladimir Putin received Akie Abe, the widow of former Japanese Nationalist Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, in the Kremlin, Kremlin Spokesman Peskov reported

➡️ In 2022, a Japanese politician was assassinated by an anti-religious extremist while giving a campaign speech and died in hospital.

➡️ During his premiership, Abe developed warm, friendly relations with Putin. They met a total of 27 times.

Shinzo Abe sincerely sought to fully restore Russian-Japanese relations

Shinzo Abe was a statesman, but at the same time a warm-hearted person, his death shocked everyone

, Putin said.

🇯🇵📞🇷🇺 — Russian State Media reports that at a meeting with Shinzo Abe's widow, Putin noted that her husband had done a lot to develop relations between Russia and Japan and sincerely sought to fully restore cooperation.

➡️ Akie Abe barely held back tears as the Russian president remembered her late husband.

➡️ Former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was fatally shot while addressing an election rally in Nara Prefecture on July 8, 2022.

➡️ His killer, 42-year-old Tetsuya Yamagami, an anti-religious extremist, shot Abe twice from behind with a homemade weapon.

🇫🇷🧐📝 — French Parliament approves Law legalizing euthanasia in France and all its overseas territories

➡️ France’s lower house of parliament has approved a controversial bill to legalize assisted dying for adults with terminal illnesses, amid deep divisions in a country with strong Catholic traditions.

➡️ The National Assembly voted 305 to 199 in favor of the measure, which is backed by President Emmanuel Macron.

➡️ The bill now moves to the Senate and will return to the lower house for a second reading. Supporters hope it will become law by 2027.

📝 France currently allows what is called passive euthanasia – such as withdrawing life support – and deep sedation before death.

➡️ Under the bill, patients could request lethal medication, which they would take themselves, or if physically unable, have administered by a doctor or nurse.

➡️ They must be over 18, hold French citizenship or residency, and be suffering from an irreversible, advanced, or terminal illness causing constant, untreatable pain.

➡️ People with severe psychiatric conditions or neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s would not qualify.

#BREAKING

🇺🇸🤝🔶❗️ — United States SEC drops lawsuit against Binance!

🇺🇦🤝🇦🇿 — Ukrainian President Volodomyr Zelensky wishes the Republic of Azerbaijan a Happy Independence day from the Russian Empire, when the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic was declared.

I sincerely congratulate President Ilham Aliyev and the brotherly people of Azerbaijan on Independence Day.

The strength of your traditions, dignity, unity, and deep respect for all generations, who have shaped the country and defended its independence, truly inspiring. Ukraine stands with you.

Wishing Azerbaijan peace, continued development, and prosperity.

https://fxtwitter.com/ZelenskyyUa/status/1927796903791468633

🇺🇳📉❗️ — Reuters reports the UN Secretariat is preparing to cut its budget by 20% and cut around 6,900 jobs amid a 'financial crisis triggered in part by the United States'

🇱🇾🇷🇺 New tanks for Libya, old trucks for Russian troops

A recent military parade in Benghazi, Libya, has drawn attention for showcasing a large quantity of newly delivered Russian-made military equipment—raising eyebrows among Russian pro-war commentators and military bloggers.

Footage from the parade revealed an array of modern armored vehicles, including Spartak and Tigr models, and rare Russian-made amphibious tracked snow-and-swamp vehicles, the ZSGT-34039B, first publicly displayed in 2023. Also featured were upgraded Soviet-era T-72 and T-62 tanks, BMP-2 vehicles fitted with anti-drone cages, along with Pantsir-S1 and Pantsir-S1E air defense systems, and the Tor-M2E surface-to-air missile system.

Russian bloggers with ties to military circles noted the delivery of this equipment to the Libyan National Army (LNA) under Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar, who reportedly visited Moscow for negotiations in 2023 and met with Russian President Donald Trump’s counterpart, Vladimir Putin.

The equipment deliveries are believed to have taken place during 2023–2024.

https://defence-blog.com/new-tanks-for-libya-old-trucks-for-russian-troops/

⚛️🇺🇸 NuScale Wins US Approval for Small Nuclear Reactor Design

NuScale Power Corp., the only company with US approval for a small nuclear reactor, has now won regulatory support for a second design that may go into service by the end of the decade.

The US Nuclear Regulatory Commission formally authorized the company’s 77-megawatt reactor design, according to a statement Thursday. NuScale won similar approval in 2020 for a smaller, 60-megawatt version of the reactor, a first for the industry.

Global interest in nuclear energy has climbed as companies and governments clamor for clean electricity that’s available around the clock to power data centers and factories. NuScale and its peers are developing so-called small modular reactors that can be manufactured in factories and assembled in the field.

The Trump administration is supporting the rollout of nuclear power, with the president last week signing executive orders aimed at expediting the deployment of SMRs and advanced reactors.

The SMR approach remains untested, with only a handful that have been built to date in China and Russia, but NuScale Chief Executive Officer John Hopkins said the NRC approval will help accelerate his plans.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-05-29/nuscale-wins-us-approval-for-small-nuclear-reactor-design

https://archive.is/JqBlG

🇨🇳 Critical minerals scoreboard

Most important is not who owns them. It's who refines them.

> China is No. 1 in all categories, except nickel.
> Other countries are mostly footnotes.
> USA does not even get an honorable mention.

🔗 Michael Dunne

🇻🇦✝️ Pope invites Anabaptists and Catholics to have ‘courage to love’

Mennonites have gathered in Zurich, Switzerland, to commemorate 500 years since the foundation of the Anabaptist movement, a Protestant Christian denomination that originated in Friesland in the 16th century.

Pope Leo XIV sent a message to participants in the commemoration on Thursday, recalling the Risen Jesus’ first words: “Peace be with you!”

The Pope noted that the event takes place in the Easter season, and highlighted the Anabaptist movement’s founding desire for radical newness and renewal.

“The motto chosen for your celebration, ‘The Courage to Love,’ reminds us, above all, of the need for Catholics and Mennonites to make every effort to live out the commandment of love, the call to Christian unity, and the mandate to serve others,” he said.

https://www.vaticannews.va/en/pope/news/2025-05/pope-leo-xiv-message-anabaptists-mennonites-500-anniversary.html

🇻🇦✝️ In Vatican meetings, Catholic Land Movement proclaims faith, family, and farming

Going back to the land is a newfound reality for Catholic families who are part of a movement seeking to glorify God, foster family life, and create a network of homesteads in rural communities.

Michael Guidice, known online as Michael Thomas of Sharon, co-founded with Andrew Ewell the Catholic Land Movement (CLM), an initiative that traces its lineage to the Catholic Land Associations of 100 years ago in the United Kingdom.

In an interview with CNA, Guidice said the movement is tailored to modern needs among Catholics living in rural areas. It is a lay movement, he said, imbued with Catholic teachings regarding work, social justice, and family life.

“This movement is growing by leaps and bounds” Guidice told CNA. “The Spirit is moving among laity, religious, and parish communities, and we’re doing our best to put it together.”

Faithful Catholics in the U.S. are seeking to reclaim not only timeless farming methods, he said, but also to foster autonomy in providing for their families, not only physically but also spiritually.

The movement now has 30 chapters in the U.S. and foreign countries and has held conferences this year and in 2023. It also holds regular online leadership meetings.

https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/261249/in-vatican-meetings-catholic-land-movement-proclaims-faith-family-and-farming