What happened
Cuba has confirmed that CIA director John Ratcliffe has held talks with senior officials in Havana after the US renewed an offer of $100 million in aid as the island grapples with fuel shortages, blackouts and growing unrest. The discussions came as Washington maintained pressure on the Communist government through an oil blockade and fresh sanctions, leading some to speculate on whether Donald Trump intends to invade the island nation.

Who said what
Trump knows he “can’t bomb his way to victory” in Iran, said Heather Digby Parton at news site Salon. He instead appears willing to start “yet another military operation” closer to US shores. Invading Cuba seemed “less likely as the quagmire in Iran has developed”, but the US president may see pivoting back to the Western Hemisphere as a way to “distract from his failure” in the Middle East.

What next?
Senate Republicans are “cautioning” Trump against an attack on Cuba, said political site The Hill. The US should remain “focused” on “trying to get the Strait of Hormuz opened up”, Senate Majority Leader John Thune told reporters. Republican senators last month blocked a resolution forbidding military action, according to the outlet, but sentiment in the party is “shifting as a military operation against Cuba appears more likely”.

What happened
Madonna, Shakira and BTS have been announced as the performers at the inaugural half-time show of the Fifa World Cup final.

It will be the first time that the World Cup final will feature a half-time performance, with organisers calling it a “singular moment” that will be broadcast live around the world. Curated by Coldplay’s Chris Martin, the extravaganza will support Fifa’s Global Citizen Education Fund.

Who said what
The fact that there is a trio of acts performing has “raised concerns about how long half-time will be”, according to The Guardian. There was also a half-time show at last year’s Fifa Club World Cup final, also held at MetLife Stadium, “which stretched the break in excess of the regulation 15 minutes”.

But the BBC has said it understands that the show will be just 11 minutes long.

What next?
Shakira (pictured above), who yesterday also released “Dai Dai”, the official song of the 2026 World Cup, previously performed at the 2010 World Cup in South Africa.

It used to be the case that to “win Eurovision you had to ‘fly on the wings of love’, ‘take me to your heaven’ or ‘sail into infinity’”, said The Guardian. But now other languages have got their musical acts together.

This year a total of 24 languages will be sung at Eurovision as many entrants return to their native tongues.

Competing nations were required to sing in their national language until 1999, but when this rule was abolished there was a “flood of entries” performed in English, according to fan site Aussievision. Delegations assumed that the “global language” would “win more appeal with audiences”.

A study published in the Royal Society Open Science journal looked at the songs from every contest from 1956 until 2024, a total of 1,763 entries. It found that from 1999, more than 70% of songs were entirely in English or a mix of English and a native language. By 2014, more than three-quarters of the entries were sung entirely in English, surging above 80% in the three years that followed.

But more recently there’s been a “return to songs performed in national languages”, a development that’s become “very popular with fans”. Some songs are performed in a mix of languages. For instance, this year’s entry from Moldova, “Viva, Moldova!”, performed by Satoshi, includes six languages. France, Italy, Portugal and Spain have all “resisted the temptation” to use songs with English lyrics, said New Scientist.

Irving Wolther, a Eurovision historian, told The Guardian that “after Brexit, there was a sense of ‘now we are no longer being patronised by the Brits, we Europeans can express our own voice’”.