The US is still willing to negotiate

Plus, how one Ukrainian soldier survived beneath the front lines.

Go beyond the headlines with Reuters on the stories shaping the day. Subscribe for $1/week. Daily Briefing Daily Briefing By Kate Turton Hello. Secretary of State Marco Rubio says the US is still willing to negotiate over the Iran crisis and Pakistan seeks a $10 billion fund from the US after mediating Iran talks. Meanwhile, separate US talks with Canada and Mexico test North America's trilateral trade pact and OpenAI says AI models went rogue during testing. Plus, how one Ukrainian soldier survived beneath the front lines. Today's Top News   Marco Rubio at the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Foreign Ministers' Meeting in Pasay, Metro Manila. BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/Pool via REUTERS War in Iran The possibility for diplomacy remains alive in the Iran conflict as US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the United States is still willing to negotiate an end to the crisis, and Iran's Interior Minister Eskandar Momeni visited mediator Pakistan and asked Islamabad to continue its efforts. Pakistan has asked the US for a $10 billion exchange stabilization facility which, if approved, could provide a lifeline for the cash-strapped South Asian economy. The request, which is being reported for the first time, follows Pakistan's role in brokering talks over the Iran war. A Houthi threat to impose a naval blockade against Saudi Arabia in the Red Sea could significantly widen the Iran war and strain a US military already focused on stopping Tehran's attacks across the region. In other news The Trump administration plans to submit to Congress a pact with Saudi Arabia to share nuclear power technology that does not ‌include safeguards the US has long said would stop materials being used in nuclear weapons programs. Correspondent Timothy Gardner has more on the Reuters World News podcast.  President Donald Trump will campaign in Georgia amid Republican concerns that his renewed focus on election fraud claims could hurt the party's chances in one of the country's most competitive Senate races. Firefighters struggled to contain Spain's largest wildfire of the year, while two firefighters were killed battling a fire in southwestern France, as an extreme heatwave continued to fuel dangerous conditions across Europe, bringing drought and forecasts of severe hailstorms. President Volodymyr Zelenskiy named a young major general, Mykhailo Drapatyi, as the commander-in-chief of Ukraine's military after days of street protests, marking the biggest shake-up in ‌the country's military leadership since its war with Russia began. Business & Markets   Separate US negotiating tracks for Canada and Mexico are testing a trilateral free trade zone that has defined North America's economy for 32 years, with the US potentially forcing concessions on Canada that Mexico agrees to in its more advanced talks. OpenAI said that an autonomous agent powered by its advanced AI models went rogue during a security test and triggered a hack that compromised the infrastructure of AI startup Hugging Face last week. Rubio has asked diplomats to push back against talk of a "kill switch" in American technology products following the White House's short-lived decision to keep foreigners from America's most advanced ‌AI models, according to a recent cable reviewed by Reuters. Biotech experts and industry executives are calling plans by the US Food and Drug Administration — hit by job cuts last year — to hire thousands of employees and update clinical-trial standards encouraging, but want assurance that politics will not interfere in the agency's drug-review process. Escalating hostilities between the United States and Iran could reignite inflation, drive interest rates higher and knock global growth back to as low as 1.3%, down from 2.9% last year, World Bank chief ‌economist Indermit Gill told Reuters. Japan's yen hits a 40-year low above 163 per dollar. Is Tokyo about to intervene? Find out on today's Reuters Morning Bid podcast. A year in a foxhole: How one Ukrainian soldier survived beneath the front lines   Serhii Krynitskyi spoke to Reuters upon returning to his unit following a 346-day stint at his frontline position. REUTERS/Alina Smutko Watch our documentary about one drafted infantryman's marathon ordeal hiding in a small, isolated dugout carved out in the heart of Ukraine's drone-infested "kill zone". Serhii Krynitskyi's video diaries chart his experience under the front lines of the war with Russia.  Read more And Finally... A multiwavelength scene of the visible part of an overlapping supernova remnant. NASA/Swift/Handout via REUTERS Unlike our sun, most of the largest stars in the cosmos are not solo acts, but rather are born together with another star in what is called a binary system, destined to spend their lives gravitationally bound in a cosmic marriage. But not even the best marriage — on Earth or in space — ‌lasts forever. Scientists now for the first time have discovered evidence of two such massive stars from a binary system that both ran out of fuel and exploded violently within a relatively short time. Read more   Sponsors are not involved in the creation of newsletters or other Reuters news content. Advertise in this newsletter or on Reuters' website   Reuters Daily Briefing is sent 5 days a week. Think your friend or colleague should know about us? Forward this newsletter to them. They can also sign up here. Want to stop receiving this email? Unsubscribe here. To manage which newsletters you're signed up for, click here. This email includes limited tracking for Reuters to understand whether you’ve engaged with its contents. For more information on how we process your personal information and your rights, please see our Privacy Statement. Terms & Conditions   © 2026 Thomson Reuters. All rights reserved. 3 Times Square, New York, NY 10036

A new front in US-Iran war

Plus, why oil prices haven't gone crazy.

Go beyond the headlines with Reuters on the stories shaping the day. Subscribe for $1/week. Daily Briefing Daily Briefing By Kate Turton Hello. The Houthis announce a Saudi naval blockade, Modi calls for a foolproof exam system in India after youth protests, and Burnham targets lower energy bills in his first move as UK prime minister. Plus, why oil prices haven't gone crazy despite months of war. Today's Top News    Boats sail near the coast of Bab el-Mandeb, Yemen April 2, 2026. REUTERS Middle East Yemen's Iran-aligned Houthis said they would impose a naval blockade on Saudi Arabia, opening a potential new front against the United States in its war with Iran and raising the threat to global energy supplies and trade beyond the Gulf. Aid agencies, U.N. officials and Palestinian health authorities warn that Gaza is facing an unprecedented collapse of its water and sanitation systems, leaving much of the population trapped between immediate thirst and a longer-term environmental crisis whose consequences could last decades. US President Donald Trump said that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will not be arrested when he visits the US, after New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani said he was still considering the move. In other news Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi called for setting up a foolproof public examination system in the country, a day after supporters of the youth-led "cockroach" movement clashed with police as ‌they marched on parliament to protest against question paper leaks. Our photographers document the protests here. Voters will go to the polls in Arizona to choose nominees for the US Congress and governor, with races ‌that will set the tone for November's midterm elections in a state known for its competitive elections. You can ask Reuters anything about the midterm elections. Our reporters will answer questions in the Politics US newsletter. Nicaragua's long-serving president Daniel Ortega said the Central American country will no longer hold elections, eliminating the possibility ‌of an electoral challenge when his term ends next year and further entrenching the rule he shares with his wife. New British Prime Minister Andy Burnham said he would cut taxes on electricity bills in his first attempt to ease a lengthy cost-of-living crisis that has angered the public and helped stoke political instability. Global hunger declined for a third consecutive year in 2025, with improvements recorded across every continent, although mounting risks from climate ‌shocks and trade disruption could threaten further progress, a United Nations report said. Business & Markets   A drone view shows containers at the Manzanillo seaport, in Manzanillo, Mexico. REUTERS/Daniel Becerril/File Photo US and Mexican trade negotiators will meet for a third round of bilateral talks to try to push forward with revising the North American trade agreement, just as Trump slaps Canada with a new set of ‌punitive duties. Brazil's Pix, one of the world's most successful instant-payment systems, has become a flashpoint between Brasília and Washington as the Trump administration aims to protect US firms from the model's growing appeal in dozens of countries. The United States and China are planning to hold talks over AI in September, five sources familiar with ‌the matter told Reuters, as the superpowers confront how to regulate the risks posed by their increasingly powerful rival frontier models. Read our exclusive. Taco Bell is facing a wave of lawsuits after contaminated lettuce left hundreds sick and more than 100 hospitalized. Legal Reporter Jenna Greene explains why, under strict liability laws, plaintiffs don't even need to prove the chain did anything wrong. Listen now. As Russia deploys growing numbers of faster jet-propelled versions of its Shahed attack drone, some defence companies are racing to develop a new generation of faster interceptors. It’s 20 years since the economist Nicholas Stern made the financial case for stopping global warming. Though temperatures have risen, green energy is cheaper. In this episode of The Big View podcast, he tells Peter Thal Larsen that needed investments can boost the economy and the planet. Why oil prices haven't gone crazy despite 5 months of US-Iran war   As the United States and Israel went to war with Iran at the end of February, analysts predicted the price of crude oil could hit $150 a barrel or even rise as far as $200, with the fifth ‌of global supply that transits the vital Strait of Hormuz suddenly cut off from world markets. But, Brent crude futures peaked around $126 — comfortably below 2008's all-time high of $147 — and averaged just $101 a barrel between the start of the conflict on February 28 and June 11 when Donald Trump called off strikes on Iran, before briefly retreating to pre-war levels of $70 in early July. Read more And Finally... Argentina's Enzo Fernandez walks off after being shown a red card, July 19. REUTERS/John Sibley Reuters was at every stadium for every game of the 2026 FIFA World Cup. Here is a selection of some of the highlights, with the best of the action on and off the pitch, and the surprise moments that caught the eye of our editors. View photos   Sponsors are not involved in the creation of newsletters or other Reuters news content. Advertise in this newsletter or on Reuters' website   Reuters Daily Briefing is sent 5 days a week. Think your friend or colleague should know about us? Forward this newsletter to them. They can also sign up here. Want to stop receiving this email? Unsubscribe here. To manage which newsletters you're signed up for, click here. This email includes limited tracking for Reuters to understand whether you’ve engaged with its contents. For more information on how we process your personal information and your rights, please see our Privacy Statement. Terms & Conditions   © 2026 Thomson Reuters. All rights reserved. 3 Times Square, New York, NY 10036