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Middle East crisis live: Trump says US will blockade the strait of Hormuz

Trump also told Fox News that “numerous countries are going to be helping us” with the strait of Hormuz. He said the UK is among those that were sending minesweepers to remove mines that may have been placed in the water. Downing Street has not publicly confirmed this yet, although the UK has been working to figure out a “practical” plan to reopen the strait. “We have minesweepers there. Now we have highly sophisticated underwater minesweepers, which are the latest and the greatest, but we’re also bringing in more traditional minesweepers,” Trump said in an interview with Maria Bartiromo on Fox News’ Sunday Morning Futures with Maria Bartiromo. “And so I understand is the UK and a couple of other countries are sending mine sweepers,” he added.

Australia should set immigration targets to achieve a ‘stable temporary population’, report says

Australia should set immigration targets to achieve a “stable temporary population” to address the ballooning number of nonpermanent residents that has stretched the country’s public services and housing, a new report argues. Temporary migrants as a share of the total population has more than doubled over the past 15 years, from 2.7% in 2010, to more than 6%. In a new paper, Alan Gamlen, the director of the Australian National University’s migration hub, and emeritus professor Peter McDonald argue our preoccupation with net overseas migration figures has distracted from a more meaningful discussion on the “scale of temporariness”. This failure to manage the stock of temporary migrants over recent decades has contributed to growing concerns around social cohesion, “mass migration”, and the role migration has played in adding to intense pressures on infrastructure and housing, Gamlen said. A rebound in overseas migration after the end of pandemic border closures has triggered debates across a number of advanced economies about the capacity to accommodate the rapid increase in populations. Canada in late 2024 began a radical migration reset, including a cap on the number of temporary arrivals into the country as part of a strategy to lower the share of temporary migrants from 7.6% to 5% of the population. Sign up for the Breaking News Australia email Canada’s population is now shrinking for the first time since the 1940s, and experts say that there is evidence that the policy has reduced pressure on housing costs. Gamlen said there was an opportunity to learn from this experience, but that Australia should not take the same kneejerk response. “Canada was right to focus on the stock [of temporary migrants] rather than net migration. That is the right policy target because there are levers to control that, and it’s the target that relates directly to the concerns that people actually have.” But Gamlen argued the Canadians did two things wrong: the 5% target was arbitrary; and “they’ve cut so fast that they’ve caused themselves economic harm”. Gamlen and McDonald in their paper said Australia should also pursue a set number of temporary migrants, and manage long-term population by moving more or fewer temporary visa holders into the permanent program. “That means that the number of people you’re accepting into the temporary program is linked to Australia’s capacity to support permanent settlement through the development of infrastructure, and you don’t have this kind of metastasised population of guest workers who are having all sorts of unintended consequences,” Gamlen said. “Our argument is not that migration should simply be cut, it is that Australia needs a better way to govern ‘temporariness’. Our goal is a stable temporary population. “The question is not what Nom [net overseas migration] number sounds politically attractive. The question is what scale of temporariness Australia is willing and able to sustain.”

Planeloads of negotiators and too little time: US and Iran’s 21 hours of talks

It was if the two delegations in the Iran-US peace talks in Islamabad hoped that the sheer number of negotiators flown into Pakistan could overcome the handicap of having only a finite number of hours in which to settle a 20-year dispute over Iran’s nuclear ambitions, now overlaid by complex new issues such as future control of the strait of Hormuz and US compensation for its attack on Iran. Iran sent two planeloads of negotiators, including many members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) present to ensure that no gains made in the field were relinquished at the diplomatic table. Diplomats fanned out across political, legal, security, economic and military files. One Iranian-drafted technical explanation on nuclear facility safety ran to more than 100 pages. The US, often accused of leaving talks to the “noteless” special envoy Steve Witkoff, sent not just the vice-president, JD Vance, but nearly 300 other officials. It was if it finally realised that the Iranian negotiating team, including figures such as Ali Bagheri Kani, the deputy secretary of the supreme national security council and the chief negotiator in previous nuclear talks, and Abbas Araghchi, the chief negotiator in 2015 and now the foreign minister, might be on top of their brief. Vance spoke to Donald Trump at least a dozen times during the talks, and even once to Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu, a conversation Araghchi was quick to claim led to a hardening of the US position. But it was probably unrealistic to expect issues that took up two years of negotiations in Vienna between 2013 and 2015 over the nuclear deal to be resolved in one marathon session. Robert Malley, a veteran of nuclear talks with Iran under Joe Biden, noted pithily: “Twenty-one hours was 20 hours too many if the goal was to reiterate a demand Iran had already rejected. It was many hours too few if the goal was to negotiate.” Another US state department veteran, Aaron David Miller, noted if the administration believed that after only 21 hours of negotiations Iran would give up enrichment – which is what Vance implied – it totally misread the moment and the Iranian delegation. In that context, it was unfortunate that Vance spoke in terms of coming to Islamabad to see “if we could get to a situation where the Iranians were willing to accept our terms”. The former Iranian foreign minister Javad Zarif, a brave advocate of talks with the US even in wartime, was not the only Iranian to claim this sentence revealed an unchanging US take-it-or-leave-it arrogance.“No negotiations at least with Iran will succeed based on our/your terms,” he said. “The US must learn: you cannot dictate terms to Iran. It’s not too late to learn. Yet.” But that raises questions of whether the talks process is now complete or continuing, and what the two sides were trying to achieve in a weekend in Islamabad. On the first question, Pakistan, the host for the talks and mediator, is pleading with both sides not to close the door on diplomacy and resume fighting. Israel’s energy minister, Eli Cohen, by contrast is claiming the lack of an agreement means it is possible to attack the Islamic republic. Vance was more nuanced. “We leave here with a very simple proposal, a method of understanding that is our best and final offer. We’ll see if the Iranians accept it,” he said, implying a continuing conversation. Trump’s stated plan in the interim is to mount a blockade of the strait of Hormuz, trying to grab hold of Iran’s best negotiating card, to prevent Iranian oil being exported. Such a move, as many Iranian diplomats point out, may only add upwards pressure on the price of oil. As to what were the two sides trying to achieve in 21 hours of diplomacy, at one level they turned up to test one another’s resolve after close to 40 days of fighting. Prior to the talks, Iran buckled a little in that it did not secure the full ceasefire in Lebanon it had demanded, nor receive the release of its frozen assets, before meeting Vance. Netanyahu has instead agreed to hold direct talks with Lebanon on Tuesday, for the first time in 30 years. The Iranian aim was to draft a memorandum of understanding before finalising a peace agreement over a period lasting longer than two weeks, implying that the fortnight-long ceasefire would be extended. The Iranian foreign ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei admitted the timeframe in Islamabad meant no outline agreement had been likely to be reached, and spoke of two or three issues that remained outstanding. These issues are not technical but fundamental: Israel ending its offensive in Lebanon; a protocol for the future governance of shipping in the strait of Hormuz; and the future of Iran’s highly enriched uranium stockpile, including whether it would be sufficient for Iran to downblend the uranium under the tight supervision of the UN nuclear inspectorate inside Iran, or instead that it has to be exported to a third country such as Russia. On the subject of Iran’s right to enrich uranium domestically, Vance said: “The simple fact is that we need an affirmative commitment that they will not seek a nuclear weapon and they will not seek the tools that will enable them quickly to achieve a nuclear weapon.” The qualifying adverb “quickly” may be significant since under one interpretation enrichment at 3.67% purity – the maximum purity level set in Barack Obama’s 2015 nuclear deal – leaves Iran a long way from nuclear weapon-grade purity. Iran’s practical capacity to enrich uranium is currently zero due to previous US attacks on its nuclear sites, so the debate about the right to enrich is largely theoretical and one of national sovereignty. What is less theoretical is the immediate future of the strait of Hormuz, the poison pill handed to the world by the Trump team’s inability to imagine Iran’s response to an attack that it said would last a few days. At the moment, Iran is picking and choosing the nationality of the ships going through the strait. On Saturday, according to Tanker Tracker, 2m barrels of Iraqi oil and 4m barrels of Saudi oil went through the strait. Ad hoc permissions, on a grace-and-favour basis, may give Iran a new economic and diplomatic weapon but it is not a sustainable basis to conduct global trade. For one thing, Iran simply does not have the administrative apparatus to impose selective tariffs or police the strait, something it would have to do in conjunction with Oman, on the other side of the strait. But it is hard for Iran to give up its new weapon since it has been the source of its salvation in this war. Mohammad Taghi Naghdali, a member of the Iranian parliament, said: “The strait of Hormuz is something beyond the atomic bomb for us, an atomic bomb that operates continuously on a global level and demonstrates the strategic depth of the Islamic republic.” He said the options were a return to war or keeping the bone stuck in the throat of the world. Iran’s deep problems have not evaporated. Inflation is heading for three figures. A way has to be found to lift the internet blackout or businesses will fold and civil society will lose patience. The country remains cut off and its leadership under threat of assassination at any point. Surviving for Iran so far is a stunning achievement, but survival, like patriotism, may not be enough.

Irish police clear Dublin blockade staged by fuel price protesters

Police have cleared a blockade of central Dublin by farmers and hauliers who were protesting about fuel prices, signalling a possible end to six days of protests that have rocked Ireland. Mounted units and hundreds of officers regained control of O’Connell Street in a peaceful operation that emptied the thoroughfare of trucks and tractors on Sunday morning. Other police units sealed off a section of the city of Galway in an attempt to end a blockade of a fuel depot, the latest in a series of coordinated actions that began on Saturday when gardaí removed protesters from outside the Whitegate oil refinery in County Cork, prompting scuffles and the use of pepper spray. Protesters outside a fuel terminal in Foynes, County Limerick said they would lift the blockade at 1pm on Sunday. An emergency cabinet meeting was expected to approve measures to reduce fuel costs and resolve a political crisis that has rattled and divided the government, with some leaders favouring a tough response against what they termed “economic sabotage”, and others favouring accommodation. It was unclear whether the police actions and proposed financial alleviation, a carrot-and-stick strategy, would fully quell protests that have shown effective coordination despite having no central leadership or organisation. The protesting farmers, hauliers and other groups caused traffic chaos and severely disrupted fuel distribution in response to a 20% jump in fuel prices since last month, a knock-on effect from the conflict in the Middle East that has put pressure on governments around the world to cap fuel prices. Despite hundreds of forecourts running dry, 56% of voters supported the protesters, according to a poll in the Sunday Independent, a solidarity that some analysts attributed to the wider cost of living crisis. Roads and motorways that had been blocked flowed freely, and protesters who had spent successive nights sleeping in their vehicles appeared relieved to go home, but others expressed resentment at police actions and said protests would continue until demands were met. “Nobody in the city of Dublin or the country could say our assembly was anything but peaceful,” said Christopher Duffy, a spokesperson. The police threat to tow tractors and trucks compelled their withdrawal because the vehicles would be damaged if dragged without the engine on, he said. “We have no choice. Financially, we have to move the vehicles,” he said, and urged independent and rural lawmakers to withdraw support for the centre-right coalition government of Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil. Asked if the overall protests were over, he replied: “I don’t think so.” James Geoghegan, another spokesperson, said protesters would not back down until demands were met. “This protest does not end until the cost of living is dropped to a level that we can stay in business,” he told RTÉ. “Lads can go home and regroup. A lot of lads want to go home and take maybe a day’s rest and come back out because until the issues are solved, the protest doesn’t end.” The cabinet meeting later on Sunday was expected to approve measures to help agriculture, transport, fishing and other sectors most affected by fuel prices. The government said it would publicise the measures, which have been described as targeted and temporary, only after protests ended.

Peruvians go to polls hoping to break cycle of instability

Peruvians go to the polls on Sunday hoping to break a cycle of instability that has produced nine presidents in a decade as well as surging violent crime, corruption scandals and overwhelming distrust in institutions and politicians. About 27 million people who are eligible to vote must choose between a record 35 presidential candidates as well as contenders for the bicameral congress – all from a ballot sheet measuring nearly half a metre, the longest in the country’s history. The fight against crime tops voter concerns amid record homicide and extortion rates but political corruption comes a close second. Four former presidents are in jail, most of them linked to bribery cases involving the Brazilian construction company Odebrecht. Keiko Fujimori, a three-time presidential candidate and the daughter of the late president Alberto Fujimori, holds a narrow lead in opinion polls. She is closely followed by the comedian Carlos Álvarez and two former mayors of Lima, the ultra-conservative Rafael López Aliaga and the media mogul Ricardo Belmont. None of the candidates is polling above 15%, making a runoff on 7 June almost certain, according to Urpi Torrado, of the polling company Datum Internacional. “This is one of the most unpredictable elections on record,” said Torrado. “There could be surprises this Sunday because we don’t know who will make it through to the second round.” Fujimori, 50, is making her fourth bid for the presidency, having reached the runoff in the last three elections (2021, 2016 and 2011) and losing by extremely narrow margins each time. The rightwinger served as first lady in the autocratic 1990s government of her late father, who was convicted over corruption and human rights abuses and spent 16 years in prison. Ricardo Belmont, who was Lima’s mayor from 1990 to 1995, has risen in most opinion polls, winning the younger vote with his upbeat messaging and the slogan “hugs not bullets”, borrowed from the former Mexican leader Andrés Manuel López Obrador. Gonzalo Banda, a Peruvian political analyst and doctoral researcher at University College of London’s Institute of the Americas, called Belmont an “anti-establishment candidate catching votes from the right, the left and the centre”. The 80-year-old is also known for making xenophobic and sexist remarks. López Aliaga, who was Lima’s mayor until a few months ago, has run a hard-right campaign littered with disinformation, hate speech and threats against journalists and opponents. But the 65-year-old rail magnate, who has opposed same-sex marriage and pledged to refuse abortion to underage rape victims, has slipped in the polls. The surprise entry is Álvarez, one of Peru’s best-known comedians, who has been imitating presidents for the last three decades. However, his proposals are far from lighthearted. He describes himself as an admirer of Donald Trump and El Salvador’s leader, Nayib Bukele, and his tough-on-crime campaign has focused on megaprisons and the death penalty. “It is ironically poetic that due to this cycle of [political] decay in Peru, we could end up with a comedy performer who imitates politicians as president,” said Banda. Other candidates include Roberto Sánchez, who has been endorsed by the ousted former populist leader Pedro Castillo and wears the same style of wide-brimmed sombrero. Centrist candidates include a former defence minister, Jorge Nieto, and a former university rector, Alfonso López Chau. Torrado said: “No political leader has emerged who can generate a sense of hope, a feeling that this person could change the country’s political course or solve its problems. Peruvians feel that in recent years, politicians have turned their backs on the people.”

‘Never been closer’: UFO watchers buoyed by Trump and Vance’s alien ‘obsession’

Like most politicians, Donald Trump did not campaign on the issue of space aliens. But 15 months into his second term, UFO enthusiasts have been buoyed by the Trump administration’s apparent fascination with extraterrestrials, with one expert claiming the human race has “never been closer” to being presented with hard evidence of aliens. After a largely alien-free first 12 months, the president has committed himself to UFO disclosure in 2026. In February, Trump directed various departments to release “government files related to alien and extraterrestrial life”, and the White House took the unusual step of registering domain “aliens.gov” in March, setting pulses racing among believers online. UFO watchers have been further buoyed because the president is surrounded by extraterrestrial believers in his professional and personal life. JD Vance has said he is “obsessed” with UFOs. The vice-president, an enthusiastic Christian, believes they are “demons” rather than aliens – while Donald Trump Jr, the president’s adult son, declared last year that there is “evidence of non-human intelligence out there engaging with our planet”. With an alien-curious government seemingly in place, some in the UFO-watching community believe the groundwork has been laid for disclosure. The Department of Defense said it plans to release “never-before-seen UAP [unidentified unidentified anomalous phenomenon] information”, and the issue is gaining momentum in Congress too: last week, Tim Burchett, a Republican congressman from Tennessee, used an interview to proclaim “we are not alone”. The developments come after a series of remarkable UFO hearings have been held in Washington in recent years. In 2023, David Grusch, a former intelligence official, testified to Congress that the US had operated a “multi-decade” program which collected, and attempted to reverse-engineer, crashed UFOs. The government said it had not done this. “We’ve never been closer to disclosure,” said Stephen Bassett, one of the most prominent voices in the UFO world and the founder of Paradigm Research Group, an organization which lobbies the government to release information about aliens. “The president of the United States is now in a position where he could do this tomorrow, he could set up for a quick press conference out of the Oval Office and confirm in a few minutes that we’re not alone.” Bassett, who has previously claimed the Vatican has information on aliens, said there had been an “unprecedented” amount of UFO chatter from the administration, with Tulsi Gabbard, the director of national intelligence, also telling an interviewer last year that she believes in the possibility of extraterrestrials. He believes that the open discussion of UFOs has normalized the topic, creating a “ripe” situation for Trump to announce aliens exist. He said Trump’s ego, coupled with the Jeffrey Epstein saga, could contribute to the president declaring aliens to be real. “It would be a huge legacy. It would guarantee him, probably, a Pulitzer Prize. He would go down in history – no matter what else happens during his presidency – that will be forgotten well before people stop talking about the fact that he was the head of state and made the most profound announcement in human history,” Bassett said. The White House did not respond to a request for comment. Trump has given no indication that he intends to announce aliens exist. Others in the UFO world are more circumspect than Bassett, but excitement is undoubtedly growing – including among members of Congress. Last week, Burchett, the Tennessee congressman, said he had had a recent classified UFO briefing which “would set the Earth on fire” were he to share the details, while Anna Paulina Luna, also a Republican, wrote to the department of defense demanding it release 46 videos of UFO sightings. Earlier this year Luna, from Florida, said the government was going to release “a lot of cool stuff” pertaining to aliens. An official from the defense department, who asked to be referred to as a “war department official”, said: “The Department of War’s All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) is working in close coordination with the White House and across federal agencies to consolidate existing UAP records collections and facilitate the expeditious release of never-before-seen UAP information.” Jordan Flowers, executive director of the Disclosure Foundation, which works to expand transparency about UAPs, seemed hopeful about what the administration might release, although he did not go as far as Bassett. “This administration certainly seems to have a greater sense of will and interest and determination than what we have than what we have seen previously,” Flowers said. “We are cautiously optimistic that there can be incremental information released that would help us understand what is happening here.” Flowers said a short-term win would be the government agreeing to Luna’s request to release the 46 videos. The Disclosure Foundation is hosting an event on UAPs with Mike Rounds, the Republican senator from South Dakota, in Washington in June, which Flowers said could prompt “a dramatic sea change in being able to discuss this topic credibly on Capitol Hill”. In the meantime, people who believe in aliens – and want the government to confirm their existence – will have to put their faith in a government that has shown a rare interest in what has traditionally been a taboo topic. Vance, seen as the potential Republican presidential candidate in 2028, certainly seems like he won’t let the issue die. “I have not been able to spend enough time on this, but I am going to,” he told a rightwing podcast last month. “Trust me, I’m obsessed with this.”

‘We waited 12 years’: escapees from Syria’s camps face an uncertain future

For weeks he hovered near Turkey’s border with Syria hoping for good news. In early February, Xhetan Ndregjoni got word of what he was waiting for – his niece Eva was on her way after escaping the squalid desert camp in Syria where she had been held without charge since she was a child. “I don’t have the words to describe that moment,” Ndregjoni said of their reunion. The family’s ordeal had stretched back more than a decade, when Eva Dumani, then nine, and her younger brother, seven, were kidnapped from their home in Albania and taken to Syria by her father, who was later killed fighting for Islamic State. Dumani’s release was a rare moment of joy amid what has been described as an unfolding catastrophe in northern Syria. The gradual emptying of al-Hawl camp – where thousands of women and children from more than 40 countries with alleged ties to IS have been arbitrarily detained for years – has left many abandoned in a post-conflict zone, vulnerable to exploitation and raising fresh security fears. The camp’s collapse, along with the uncertainty over the future of the smaller al-Roj facility, where many western European and Australian citizens are being kept – including Shamima Begum, who travelled to Syria from the UK aged 15 – has led to renewed calls for governments to repatriate citizens held for years without charge or trial. “People are going to come back whether you want them to or not, specifically if they’ve escaped,” said Devorah Margolin, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. About 6,000 foreign nationals from countries including Serbia, Bosnia and Albania were detained at al-Hawl after the fall of IS in 2019, many of them women and children. Most have languished for years in what Human Rights Watch described as “inhuman, degrading, and life-threatening” conditions, marked by chronic shortages of food and medicine as well as violence by women still loyal to the IS. Margolin said the camp’s emptying exposed how governments that had hesitated or refused to repatriate citizens could no longer turn a blind eye. “People will get back into Europe. And so to have a proactive plan in which you can focus on trauma-informed care, reintegration, disengagement as well as security monitoring is a much better security practice than allowing people to sneak in and not addressing it at all,” she said. “That’s asking for something bad to happen.” Alongside Dumani, Belgian authorities said a woman charged in absentia for IS membership had also returned in February and was arrested on arrival. A source also told the Guardian of another woman from western Europe who had managed to smuggle herself from al-Hawl to Lebanon, where she turned up at her country’s embassy and requested assistance with repatriation. At al-Roj more than 30 Australians recently attempted to leave the camp on their own and return home, only to be turned back at the last minute. In a recent interview in al-Roj, Elona Shuli – the eldest of three sisters brought to Syria as children and married to an IS fighter at 13 – said she hoped to be repatriated by Albania. Clutching her two children, she spoke while glancing at an Albanian woman standing nearby. A relative later said more extremist Albanian women act as “enforcers” towards Shuli and her two younger sisters, attempting to keep them aligned with IS ideology. The Albanian government have told Shuli’s family that it cannot repatriate her as it cannot locate her exact location in al Roj camp. The Guardian located Shuli within minutes, after giving the camp administration her name and being led to her tent. Across Europe there has been little public acknowledgment of the shifting situation in Syria, despite long-running concerns about IS-linked individuals returning. The collapse of al-Hawl, and uncertainty over al-Roj, means women and children risk being left to navigate a conflict zone alone, said Beatrice Eriksson of the rights organisation Repatriate the Children. She said many women had contacted their governments for help, often without response. Eriksson said these children and their mothers were facing an “immediate threat”. “Responsible countries need to step in now and assist their citizens to get home, there’s no more time to waste. There are non-state groups in Syria who have an interest in recruiting, coercing and exploiting these children and their mothers,” she added. Research by Human Rights Watch found many repatriated children were able to reintegrate successfully, despite being held in conditions so dire the organisation warned their cumulative psychological impact may “amount to torture”. While Eriksson welcomed Dumani’s return to Albania, she said it was “disturbing” that it had been left to her family to bring her to safety. “Eva’s uncle is a true hero,” she said. Dumani’s grandmother had previously travelled to Syria to bring her grandchildren home but was detained and died after six years without charge. Dumani was left alone after her brother was repatriated in 2020. After escaping al-Hawl earlier this year, Dumani walked for four hours to reach a main road, where she had arranged for smugglers to meet her and take her to Turkey, her uncle told the Guardian. Albanian officials said they helped her to travel from Turkey to Albania. Once home, she could finally hug her family. “We had been waiting for this moment for 12 years,” Ndregjoni said. “It was incredibly emotional when she saw her brother and mother.” He said Dumani, now 20, was adjusting well to life at home. She has started high school, eager to make up for the education she had missed while detained. Now his concern has shifted to the 25 or so Albanians still trapped in northern Syria. “We ask the government to bring back home the other children who are in this situation, it’s really important for them to have their kids at home too,” he said.

At least 30 killed in crush at historic fortress in Haiti

At least 30 people, many of them young, have died and dozens more are reported to have been injured after a crush at a mountaintop fortress in northern Haiti that is a popular tourist spot. Jean Henri Petit, the head of civil protection for the country’s Nord department, said the incident took place on Saturday at Citadelle Henry, also known as Citadelle Laferrière, a large 19th-century fortress built shortly after the Caribbean country’s independence from France. He told the local newspaper Le Nouvelliste that the death toll could rise due to the large number of people reported missing. Several dozen people were taken to hospital, the outlet reported. Initial reports said visitors were crammed against a single entrance and a scuffle broke out between those trying to leave and enter the site. Other local media reports said a gathering took place after being advertised on TikTok. There were also reports of rumours that police at the site used too much teargas to break up a fight near the citadel, which caused people to panic and triggered a crush. The country’s culture minister, Emmanuel Menard, confirmed that 30 people had died. He said: “The injured are currently receiving the necessary medical care, and a rescue team is searching for any missing persons.” Menard said the fortress, which was listed as a Unesco world heritage site in 1982, would remain closed to visitors until further notice. Haiti’s prime minister’s office expressed “deep sadness”, in a government statement posted on Facebook, and said the crush occurred during “a tourist activity bringing together many young people”. The government urged citizens to “be calm and cautious” while it investigated. “All competent authorities are fully mobilised and placed on maximum alert to provide, without delay, the necessary assistance, care and support,” it added in its statement. The crush comes as Haiti continues to grapple with widespread violence by gangs that have massacred civilians, as well as an increasingly deadly crackdown by security forces. Haiti, the poorest country in the western hemisphere, has also been badly hit by rising oil prices caused by the conflict in Iran. On 2 April, the government announced a 37% increase in the cost of diesel and a 29% increase in the cost of gasoline. The surge in oil prices has disrupted critical supply chains, doubled transportation costs and forced millions of undernourished people to cut back on already scarce meals. The country has experienced various disasters in recent years, including a 2024 fuel tank explosion that killed two dozen people, another fuel tank blast in 2021 that killed 90 people, and an earthquake that left about 2,000 people dead that same year. Reuters, Associated Press and Agence France-Presse contributed to this report