NASA has delayed the first US manned mission to the Moon in more than half a century until September 2026 "to work through the challenges" on developing and integrating the spacecraft systems in the Artemis program, US space agency administrator Bill Nelson told reporters on Tuesday.

"To give [the] Artemis teams more time to work through the challenges with first time developments, we are going to give more time on Artemis II and Artemis III," Nelson told a teleconference. " We are adjusting our schedule to target Artemis II for September of 2025 and September of 2026 for Artemis III which will send humans for the first time to the lunar south pole."

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❗️ Ecuadorian President Daniel Noboa on Tuesday ordered the army to "neutralize" criminal groups operating in the country with tens of thousands of members following the declaration of a state of internal armed conflict in Ecuador.

"To recognize the presence of the internal armed conflict... To order the armed forces to carry out military operations in accordance with international humanitarian law and respect for human rights to neutralize the groups that are listed in Article 4 of this decree," the text of the president's decree read.

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Ecuadorian police have released footage showing detained participants of the attack on the TV channel.

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US forces in Iraq and Syria have been attacked nine times since January 4, Pentagon Press Secretary Pat Ryder stated on Tuesday.

"Since January 4, there have been nine attacks," Ryder said during a press briefing, when asked about recent attacks on US forces in Iraq and Syria.

There have been 127 total recent attacks on forces in Iraq and Syria, Ryder clarified.

52 of the attacks occurred in Iraq and 75 in Syria, Ryder said.

The attacks come amid heightened tensions in the Middle East, including the Palestine-Israel conflict and attacks on vessels in the Red Sea by Houthi militants in Yemen.

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🇨🇳🚙 China on verge of grabbing world's largest car exporter noscript in 2024

Chinese car exports are surging, heading for the 5 million mark in international sales. Automobile deliveries climbed by 58 percent, accounting for a whopping 4.4 million units in 11 months of 2023, beating Japan's 3.99 million units in 2022. Global finance firm UBS predicts that by 2030, one-third of cars worldwide could be Chinese.

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🇮🇱🇱🇧 A senior commander of Lebanese Shia movement Hezbollah responsible for dozens of drone attacks across northern Israel in recent months has been killed in southern Lebanon as a result of an Israeli airstrike, The Times of Israel newspaper reported on Tuesday.

The individual killed was the commander of Hezbollah's aerial forces in southern Lebanon, Ali Hussein Barji. He was reportedly struck while driving in the town of Kherbet Selem just before the funeral of another senior Hezbollah commander, Wissam al-Tawil.

Later in the day, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) confirmed Barji's death.

"Today [Tuesday], an IAF aircraft eliminated Ali Hussein Barji, the Commander of the Southern Lebanon Region of Hezbollah's Aerial Unit. Ali led dozens of terror activities against Israel using explosive UAVs and surveillance UAVs against Israel and IDF soldiers. Ali also led the attack against the headquarters of the IDF Northern Command earlier today," the IDF said in a statement.

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Newly published video shows the moment that hostages were released from Ecuador's TV studio.

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The shell that had hit a shelter of Doctors Without Borders is believed to have been fired by a tank of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), the organization said on Tuesday.

MSF stated on Monday that its shelter in the southern Gaza Strip, housing over 100 staff and their families, had been attacked. Four people had been injured in the incident, including a 5-year-old daughter of an MSF staff, the organization then said and later confirmed the death of the girl.

"Prior to the incident, MSF notified Israeli forces that the shelter near Gaza European Hospital was housing MSF staff and their families. Furthermore, no evacuation orders were issued before the strike. While MSF is not able to confirm the origin of the shell, it appears to be similar to those used by Israeli tanks. MSF has contacted Israeli authorities and is seeking further explanation," MSF said in a statement on the website.

The organization also condemned the attack on its shelter "in the strongest possible terms."

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❗️ Peru reinforces border security with police special forces amid an "internal armed conflict" in Ecuador, the Peruvian Interior Ministry said.

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The Peruvian Interior Ministry said Tuesday that police special forces are being deployed to the border with neighboring Ecuador after Ecuadorian President Daniel Noboa declared a state of internal armed conflict in the country and ordered Ecuador's army to "neutralize" criminal groups operating in the country.

"Interior Minister Victor Torres Falcon has ordered that a contingent of the Directorate of Special Operations (Diroes) of national police be immediately deployed to the borderline with Ecuador to reinforce security measures," the ministry said on X (formerly Twitter).

La Republica newspaper reported earlier on Tuesday that Peruvian President Dina Boluarte had called an emergency meeting of the council of ministers to "take urgent measures to prevent thugs who escaped from [Ecuador's] prisons from entering Peru."

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🇺🇸🇮🇶 US won’t leave Iraq unless it’s squeezed out

“The US will drag its feet. The US will be reluctant to leave Iraq for many reasons. First, America is afraid of increased cooperation between Iraq and Iran. It sees its presence in Iraq as the best strategy of preventing such a future. Second, it uses its Iraqi presence to obstruct an unimpeded highway between Iran and Syria, which in turn is important to Israel,” Dr. Hossein Askari, a professor emeritus at George Washington University specializing in Middle Eastern affairs, told Sputnik.

💬 “Iraqi politicians have to be united and demand US withdrawal and much more publicly. The US must be embarrassed in the eyes of the world as an occupying power before it leaves,” Askari said.

Last week, Baghdad announced plans to speak to Washington about the removal of US troops after a US airstrike killed a senior Iraqi militia leader. A Pentagon spokesman told reporters Monday that he was “not aware of any plans” by the US to leave.

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🇪🇨 Fabricio Colon Pico, the leader of Ecuador's second-largest criminal gang, Los Lobos, has escaped from prison as a result of riots, the country's National Service for Comprehensive Assistance to Adult Persons Deprived of Liberty and Teenage Offenders of Ecuador (SNAI) said Tuesday.

"On the morning of January 9, clashes broke out between inmates, the national police and prison staff at Chimborazo Prison No. 1. Following the incident, Colon P., who was deprived of liberty and was in the prison, escaped from custody with other inmates," SNAI said in a statement on X (formerly Twitter).

SNAI also said that inmates of five Ecuadorian prisons in the provinces of Azuay, Canar, Napo, Tungurahua and Cotopaxi had taken 125 prison security personnel and 14 administrative staff hostage. SNAI added that security forces' operations at prisons in the provinces of Chimborazo and Napo have allowed the release of 11 hostages since the riots began.

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🇪🇺 Only 14% of Ukrainian refugees in Europe hope to return soon, surveys conducted by the UN refugee agency UNHCR have found

"The majority, of course, hope to return one day to Ukraine but just 14% of them plan to do so in the near future. That's because of the security concerns along with the access to the basic services, housing and livelihoods," UNHCR spokesperson Matthew Saltmarsh told a news briefing of the United Nations Information Service in Geneva.

Europe is hosting some 5.9 million Ukrainians displaced by the nearly two-year conflict, 62% of them women and girls and 36% children. Another 2 million have fled to Russia.

"The majority of refugees plan to remain where they are but they will require continued support from the host governments and the international community to meet their basic needs and to access key services and build their self-reliance," Saltmarsh added.

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