Morning Briefing — May 31, 2026

World News

Israeli troops cross Litani River and advance on Nabatieh in southern Lebanon — Israeli forces have advanced beyond Lebanon's Litani River for the first time since 2006, pushing north toward Nabatieh, southern Lebanon's biggest city. The incursion marks Israel's deepest move into Lebanon in over 25 years, breaching a ceasefire in place since April 17. Al Jazeera

Hegseth uses Shangri-La Dialogue to outline US posture on China, Iran and Taiwan — US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth used the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore to address relations with China, Iran, NATO and Taiwan. His remarks come amid the ongoing US-Israel war on Iran, which has rattled markets and depleted critical US munitions stocks including THAAD interceptors. Al Jazeera

US disables Gambian-flagged ship trying to breach Iran blockade — US Central Command said it disabled the M/V Lian Star with a missile strike to the engine room in the Gulf of Oman after more than 20 warnings. It is the sixth vessel US forces have stopped attempting to reach Iranian ports under the ongoing blockade. CNN

Colombians head to polls in polarising presidential election — Millions of Colombians vote Sunday in a high-stakes presidential contest expected to head to a June 21 runoff, with no candidate likely to clear 50% in the first round. The race has narrowed to leftist Senator Iván Cepeda, Trump-style right-winger Abelardo de la Espriella, and Uribe-backed Senator Paloma Valencia. CBS News

Five killed as bus crashes into vehicles on I-95 in Virginia — A New York-to-Charlotte E&P Travel bus failed to slow for traffic and struck six vehicles in a work zone in Stafford County, Virginia. Four people in an Acura that caught fire, plus one person in a Chevy Suburban, were killed, and nearly four dozen others were injured. CBS News

Bennett and Lapid demand 'powerful response' to Hezbollah barrages on northern Israel — Former PM Naftali Bennett and opposition leader Yair Lapid sharply criticised Netanyahu after Hezbollah fired repeated rocket and drone salvos that triggered air-raid sirens every 20 minutes across northern Israel over Shabbat. Bennett accused the government of 'normalising an intolerable situation' and called for strikes on Beirut's Dahiyeh suburb. Times of Israel

Rescuers free four villagers trapped 10 days in flooded Laos cave — Rescuers in Laos safely evacuated four villagers who had been trapped in a flooded cave for ten days, a day after another survivor was released. The successful operation ended a multi-day rescue effort drawing international attention. CBC News

Germany and Norway intensify joint bid for Canada's submarine contract — Berlin and Oslo are pitching the Type 212CD submarine as part of a shared NATO fleet to win Canada's procurement deal, even surrendering production slots to accelerate delivery. The pitch is aimed at countering South Korea's lead in the competition. CBC News

Business

Canada slips into technical recession as Q1 GDP contracts — Statistics Canada reported real GDP fell 0.1% annualised in Q1 2026 after a downwardly revised 1% contraction in Q4 2025, meeting the definition of a technical recession on that basis. Business capital investment fell 0.7%, its fifth consecutive quarterly decline, though household spending on financial services and food remained a bright spot. CBC News

Carney pitches 'Fortress North America' to New York business leaders — Speaking to the Economic Club of New York, Prime Minister Mark Carney argued the US depends on Canadian oil, gas, electricity, aluminium, potash, nickel and copper and proposed deeper sectoral cooperation. He framed the partnership as 'Canada Strong will help make America great again' amid difficult CUSMA renegotiations. CBC News

US-Mexico open first round of bilateral CUSMA review talks — The United States and Mexico formally began bilateral negotiations Friday to review the Canada-US-Mexico Agreement. The opening round comes as the trilateral pact faces its most consequential test, with Canadian officials planning their own Washington trip soon. BNN Bloomberg

Landmark Canada-Germany LNG deal nears announcement — Sources say a German utility will buy roughly one million tonnes of LNG per year from the Ksi Lisims project in British Columbia, bolstering the investment case for the proposed export terminal. The deal would mark a major step in Canada's pivot toward European energy customers during the ongoing Iran war. CBC News

US-UK regulatory rollback could free $2.9 trillion in bank balance sheet capacity — Research from Alvarez & Marsal covered by the FT finds that regulatory reforms in the US and UK will allow large banks to expand balance sheets by $2.9 trillion, with $1.3 trillion already added in the last two quarters. The shift highlights a widening gap with EU and Swiss banks operating under tighter rules. Financial Times (via BPI)

ECB summons banks over Anthropic Mythos AI cyber risks — The European Central Bank met with banks to underline cyber risks posed by Anthropic's Mythos model and similar advanced AI systems, urging accelerated defences. Vice chair of the ECB supervisory board Frank Elderson said it was 'unfortunate' that European banks lacked access to Mythos and hoped US banks would share testing lessons. Financial Times (via BPI)

Citi's Jane Fraser tops Fortune's Most Powerful Women in Business 2026 — Citigroup CEO Jane Fraser ranked number one on Fortune's 2026 Most Powerful Women in Business list, joined by Santander's Ana Botín, US Bank's Gunjan Kedia, JPMorganChase's Marianne Lake, and Goldman Sachs leaders Kim Posnett and Meena Flynn. The list reflects continued prominence of women running global banks. Bank Policy Institute

AI boom mints 19 new billionaires as Samsung bonus fights erupt — Bloomberg's billionaire list added 19 new entrants this year built on AI infrastructure, including founders at Cerebras, Replit and Vercel. In South Korea, oversized AI-related payouts at Samsung have sparked internal disputes over how the windfall from the boom should be shared. Bloomberg

Technology

DuckDuckGo installs jump 30% as users reject Google's AI Search overhaul — DuckDuckGo said US app installs rose 18.1% on average week-over-week from May 20-25, peaking at 30.5% on May 25, after Google replaced traditional blue links with AI-driven answers at I/O 2026. Traffic to the company's AI-free page noai.duckduckgo.com grew 22.7% on average, as CEO Gabriel Weinberg accused Google of 'force-feeding AI with no way to opt out.' TechCrunch

Google I/O 2026 unveils Gemini 3.5 Flash and Universal Commerce Protocol — At I/O 2026 Google launched Gemini 3.5 Flash on its new agent-first Antigravity platform, claiming it rivals flagship models on benchmarks like Terminal-Bench 2.1 and MCP Atlas. The company also introduced the Universal Commerce Protocol for in-Google checkout and Gemini Spark, a 24/7 personal AI agent that runs autonomously across devices. Google Blog

Anthropic's Project Glasswing uncovers 10,000+ critical software vulnerabilities — In its first progress update, Anthropic said Claude Mythos Preview and roughly 50 partner organisations identified more than 10,000 high or critical severity vulnerabilities across systemically important software in about 30 days. Of those, 1,094 were confirmed as high or critical severity, signalling a new offensive-cyber capability for frontier AI. Build Fast With AI

SpaceX wins $4.16 billion Space Force contract for Golden Dome satellites — The US Space Force awarded SpaceX a $4.16 billion contract to build threat-detection satellites as part of the Golden Dome missile-tracking architecture. It is SpaceX's second Golden Dome award, bringing total Pentagon space contracts to roughly $6 billion ahead of the company's anticipated IPO. Reuters (via Techmeme)

Delhi High Court fines Google ₹30 lakh in Hindware trademark case — The Delhi High Court ruled against Google in a trademark dispute brought by Indian sanitaryware brand Hindware, barring the company from auctioning the trademark as a keyword in Google Ads and denying safe-harbour protection. Analysts say the ruling could reshape India's roughly ₹1 lakh crore digital advertising market. Reuters (via Techmeme)

Anthropic opens Seoul office to deepen Korean AI partnerships — Anthropic formalised its presence in South Korea with a new Seoul office, building on existing deployments with SK Telecom, Samsung, LG, Hyundai and Kakao, and law firms like Law&Company. The move is also intended to accelerate Korean partner access to Claude Mythos Preview under Project Glasswing. Build Fast With AI

Kentucky school district wins ~$27M settlement from Meta, Snap, TikTok and YouTube — A Kentucky school district secured roughly $27 million in settlements from social media companies over claims that their platforms fuelled harm to students. Meta paid the largest share at $9 million, in one of the biggest payouts to date in social media harms litigation. Bloomberg (via Techmeme)

Blue Origin's New Glenn explosion threatens NASA lunar timeline — Blue Origin is assessing the impact of Thursday's New Glenn explosion on the launch pad in Florida, raising fresh concerns about delays to NASA's moon program. Despite the setback, NASA pushed ahead by awarding lunar rover contracts to Blue Origin, Astrolab, Lunar Outpost and Firefly Aerospace. CBS News

Renewable Energy

Japan researchers hit 25.14% efficiency record for perovskite-CIGS tandem solar cell — Researchers in Japan achieved a new world record efficiency of 25.14% for a perovskite-CIGS tandem solar cell structure. Separately, India-based Fujiyama Power announced plans for a 1.2 GW TOPCon solar cell manufacturing facility, and China deployed what was described as the world's largest single-unit floating wind turbine in deep-water testing. ECAICO

Germany allocates 2.3 GW of new solar in latest tender with bids near €0.039/kWh — Germany awarded around 2.3 GW of new ground-mounted solar capacity in its latest photovoltaic tender, with some winning bids around €0.039/kWh. The low clearing prices continue to strengthen the economics of large-scale solar across European markets. ECAICO

Wind and solar saved UK £1.7bn in gas imports since the Iran war began — Carbon Brief analysis found that record monthly wind and solar generation — reaching 11 TWh in March 2026 — has avoided roughly £1.7bn of gas imports since the Iran war began. The figures underscore renewables' role as an energy-security backstop during the current European energy crisis. Carbon Brief

Renewable energy overtakes coal globally for first time since 1919 — Thinktank Ember's annual review shows fossil-fuel generation fell 0.2% in 2025 as wind and solar met 99% of new electricity demand, pushing renewables ahead of coal for the first time in over a century. Solar generation alone grew a record 636 TWh, up 30% year-on-year. Carbon Brief

Nordex launches Turkish wind blade factory in Izmir — German turbine maker Nordex SE has opened production at a new blade factory in Izmir, Turkey, primarily to serve domestic demand. The plant is intended to localise supply for one of Europe's fastest-growing wind markets. Renewables Now

Leaked BHP files reveal mining giant quietly delaying climate action — Internal documents leaked to the Guardian and ABC's Four Corners show BHP has shelved or delayed projects, including an iron ore processing plant that could have avoided 1.7 million tonnes of emissions a year. The company also continued buying diesel haulage trucks — including a $500m order at Jimblebar — despite a public plan to electrify its fleet from 2027-28. Guardian

Lyten emerges as largest acquirer of bankrupt Northvolt's European assets — US battery firm Lyten has snapped up manufacturing facilities in Poland, Sweden and Germany from bankrupt Swedish battery maker Northvolt. The deals give Lyten a rapidly assembled vertically integrated production platform across Europe. Renewables Now

California overhauls carbon market amid affordability backlash — California is restructuring its cap-and-trade carbon market to address concerns that the program is pushing up consumer energy costs. The reform comes as US voters increasingly cite electricity prices as a key election issue for the first time in midterm races. Bloomberg

Alberta wildfires break out in Lac la Biche oil sands region — New wildfires have ignited in Alberta's Lac la Biche oil sands region, threatening operations in one of Canada's most important hydrocarbon production zones. The blazes add to a worsening early-season fire outlook across western Canada. Bloomberg

Soil Science

EU InBestSoil project shows restoring soil pays for farmers and ecosystems — Researchers in the EU-funded InBestSoil project — active across nine sites including Spain, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Lithuania and Croatia — find that reduced tillage and grazing-based restoration increase soil carbon, microbial diversity and nutrients without cutting yields. The team is also building a web calculator to value non-market benefits of healthy soils, with more than half of Europe's soils currently classed as degraded. Phys.org

AI could transform soil science, new Frontiers in Science paper finds — A new paper led by Professor Budiman Minasny at the University of Sydney argues that multi-agent AI systems can accelerate soil research by handling complex data, generating hypotheses and simulating peer review. The authors say AI-driven 'digital soil twins' could help land managers detect nutrient loss, water stress, compaction and erosion earlier to support climate adaptation. Phys.org

FAO warns Hormuz closure risks deepening global food crisis through soil and fertiliser shocks — At Rome Nutrition Week 2026, FAO Director-General QU Dongyu warned that the Strait of Hormuz disruption is squeezing supplies of oil, LNG, sulfur and fertilisers, driving up production costs across global agrifood systems. Qu cautioned that 'when soils are degraded due to lack of inputs,' fruits and vegetables become scarcer and more expensive, and urged governments to avoid fertiliser export bans. Fresh Fruit Portal / FAO

FAO projects global fertiliser prices 15-20% higher in first half of 2026 — FAO Chief Economist Máximo Torero warned that the Hormuz disruption has collapsed tanker traffic by more than 90%, with Middle East granular urea prices already up 19% in early March and Egyptian urea up 28%. The agency projects fertiliser prices could average 15-20% higher in H1 2026, threatening yields of nitrogen-intensive crops like wheat, rice and maize. FAO

Fiber-optic 'agroseismology' shows heavy tillage destroys soil's natural plumbing — A study in Science led by Dr Shi Qibin at the Chinese Academy of Sciences uses fiber-optic sensors to 'listen' to rainwater moving through soil, revealing that deep plowing and heavy machinery disrupt the natural pore network plants depend on. The technique, dubbed agroseismology, could enable real-time diagnosis of soil hydrodynamics on working farms. Phys.org / Science

UC Riverside robot maps soil moisture tree-by-tree for precision irrigation — A new system from Elia Scudiero's group at UC Riverside pairs a robot measuring soil electrical conductivity with buried moisture sensors to predict water content across entire orchards. The result is a tree-by-tree map that lets growers irrigate only where needed — a critical tool as drought tightens water supplies. UCR News

Soil science reframed: from farmland to forensic and extraterrestrial frontiers — A perspective in Pedosphere by Prof. Gan-Lin Zhang argues that soil science must expand beyond agriculture to cover forensic investigations, urban ecosystems, cultural heritage preservation and extraterrestrial soils for space agriculture. The authors call for new hydraulic standards, forensic matching models and microbial risk indicators for these emerging applications. EurekAlert / Pedosphere

Senegal study shows healthier soils dramatically cut locust crop damage — Scientists working with farmers in Senegal found that enriching soil with organic amendments significantly reduces locust damage to crops. The finding offers a new agroecological tool for protecting Sahel food supplies from devastating swarms. Science Daily

Cover photo by Claudio Schwarz on Unsplash.