New York (AFP) – 19-year-old French talent Victor Wembanyama is a lock to be chosen by the San Antonio Spurs in Thursday’s NBA Draft in New York, widely viewed as a once-in-a-generation talent capable of transforming a franchise.
Paris (AFP) – One person is still missing under the rubble of a central Paris building that housed a private fashion school, the day after a powerful explosion of undetermined origin left at least six people seriously injured.
Los Angeles (AFP) – Titanic exhibition producer Tom Zaller, who made the trip to the ship’s wreckage in a Mir vessel in 2000, shares his experience of the expedition while search and rescue work for a missing submersible with five people onboard near the wreck of the Titanic is still ongoing.
Seoul (AFP) – Fans queue outside a Playstation pop-up store in Seoul to buy the new Final Fantasy XVI video game on the day of release. With its innovative plotlines and steampunk airships, the franchise has delighted fans and critics for 35 years and has become one of the top-selling games with more than 173 million copies sold worldwide.
Stepanakert (Azerbaijan) (AFP) – Nagorno-Karabakh, an Armenian-populated region that broke away from Azerbaijan, is battling a humanitarian crisis complete with shortages of food and fuel.
Nakhon Pathom (Thailand) (AFP) – Rachanikorn Srikong is part of a small but growing community of cheesemakers attracting attention from top chefs in Michelin-starred restaurants in Bangkok.
Boston (AFP) – British billionaire Hamish Harding, Pakistani tycoon Shahzada Dawood and Dawood’s son Suleman, French submarine operator Paul-Henri Nargeolet, and OceanGate Expeditions CEO Stockton Rush are on board a missing submersible near the wreck of the Titanic which is at the heart of a rescue mission by the US Coast Guard.
Moscow (AFP) – Russian president Vladimir Putin says that “oddly enough, at the moment we are seeing a certain calm” on the frontline in Ukraine. Speaking at a ceremony for graduates of higher military schools, Putin vows that Russia will keep developing its nuclear arsenal, given “the new challenges and the invaluable experience” of Moscow’s offensive against Kyiv.
The World Health Organization’s Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus says about “two-thirds of health facilities” in areas affected by the conflict in Sudan are “out of service.” He adds that the WHO has “verified 46 attacks on healthcare since the start of the fighting.”
Ghanaian ex-football player Daniel Tagoe teaches the game to children at a club he set up in the Kyrgyz village of Leninskoye, near the capital, Bishkek. He says that he dreams “to have them play in English premiership, in Spain, in Russia”, an ambitious goal in a country not known for its footballing prowess.
