The edition of
Friday 15 August 2025
13 stories, section by section, the most important first.
International
Russian president Vladimir Putin travels to Alaska to meet with United States president Donald Trump to discuss pathways to bring an end to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy was not invited to the summit.
Puntland Defense Forces take full control of the strategic Wangable Well in the northern Qandala district, Bari region, Puntland from ISIS, which had served as a base for the group’s senior leaders, militants, and their families.
Guinea-Bissau expels representatives of Portuguese news agency Lusa and public broadcaster RTP from the country. Portugal summons the Guinea-Bissauan ambassador over the move.
Politics
South Korean president Lee Jae Myung holds a "de facto" inauguration ceremony, known as the "People's Mandate Ceremony", coinciding with the 80th anniversary of Korea's liberation from Japan at Gwanghwamun Square in Seoul, where he receives letters of appointment from 80 selected individuals. Lee took office on June 4 after winning the 21st presidential election without an official inauguration ceremony.
The Law
Science
The leaders of Belize, Guatemala, and Mexico announce the establishment of a tri-national nature reserve to preserve the Maya Forest. It will be the second-largest nature reserve in Latin America behind the Amazon rainforest.
Environment
At least 189 people are killed, dozens are injured, dozens are reported missing, and structures are damaged and destroyed in flooding across Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
Eleven people are killed and 130 others are injured in an explosion and fire at a gunpowder plant in Shilovsky District, Ryazan Oblast, Russia.
Five people are killed when a Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Government Mil Mi-17 helicopter crashes in bad weather while carrying relief goods to rain-affected areas of Bajaur District in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan.
One person is killed and 27 others are injured, including two airlifted, when a train collides with a slurry tanker on a level crossing and derails between Tinglev and Sønderborg in the Region of Southern Denmark.
The first hurricane of the 2025 season, Hurricane Erin, forms near the Leeward Islands.
Eighteen people are killed and nine others are injured when a bus plunges into a valley in Algiers, Algeria.
A bus collides with a stationary truck in Bardhaman, West Bengal, India, killing ten people and injuring 35 others.
Stories adapted from Wikipedia’s Current events portal for 15 August 2025, by Wikipedia contributors, CC BY-SA 4.0.