Unions mobilize nationwide as Congress prepares to debate sweeping overhaul of labor laws. Argentina ground to a halt on Thursday as a general strike called by unions protested labor reforms pushed by far-right President Javier Milei.

In Buenos Aires, a heavy security operation sought to prevent thousands of citizens from reaching Congress, where lawmakers are set to debate a bill that would radically change working conditions in the country.

Citizens are moving on foot as trains, flights, the subway and most bus lines are not operating. Partial disruptions have also been reported at public health institutions.

The General Confederation of Labor (CGT), Argentina’s largest labor federation, is leading the general strike, which began at midnight. The general strike includes 13 trade unions and the Argentine Workers’ Central (CTA).

“Since last night, factory workers on overnight shifts began leaving their posts,” said Jorge Sola, one of the CGT’s three secretaries.

The Milei administration threatened public employees with docking a day’s pay if they join the strike. Such retaliatory measures had not previously occurred in Argentina.

Despite threats of repression and retaliation, workers, social activists and leftist militants are protesting nationwide, while access points to the Argentine capital remain under heavy guard by the Gendarmerie.

The labor legislation reform was approved by the Senate on Feb. 12, when clashes broke out between police and demonstrators near Congress. Milei’s bill is scheduled to be debated by the Lower House starting at 2 p.m. on Thursday.

The joint exercise was launched following a IRGC drill in the Strait of Hormuz. On Thursday, the naval forces of Iran and Russia held a joint drill in the Gulf of Oman and the northern Indian Ocean, successfully carrying out a series of operations.

During the exercise, the special operation teams of the navies of Iran’s army, Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC), and Russia successfully carried out an operation to liberate a hijacked ship. The vessels and aerial units of the two countries also took part in the operation, which involved aerial reconnaissance, surface operations and the capture of pirates. This stage of the exercise featured the participation of Iran’s Alvand destroyer, missile-launching warships, helicopters, landing craft, special operation teams, and combat speed-boats and vessels, among others.

They enacted different arrangement scenarios and implemented offensive formations to improve tactical coordination, increase joint command and control capabilities, and practice rapid response in operational conditions. The involved units practiced various deployment methods and combined maneuvers.

Hassan Maqsoudlou, the drill’s spokesman, said the drill aims to improve maritime security, expand cooperation between the two countries’ navies, and improve coordination in joint operations.

The joint drill was launched following a drill by the IRGC in the Strait of Hormuz, which involved a temporary closure of the strategic waterway on Tuesday, and amid heightened tensions between Iran and the United States as well as a U.S. military buildup in the region.

Detention marks unprecedented moment for senior British royal amid years of scandal. On Thursday, the British police arrested Prince Andrew, brother of King Charles III and son of the late Queen Elizabeth II.

Pressure from the Crown for Andrew to voluntarily cooperate with police over his ties to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein led to his arrest on suspicion of misconduct in public office.

On his 66th birthday, Andrew will no longer be remembered as a hero of the Falklands War, as the royal family’s “playboy,” or as the eccentric husband of Sarah Ferguson, but rather as a sinister figure whose titles and privileges had until now shielded him.

The “Epstein Papers” scandal may prove the final nail in the coffin of his career, after he became the first senior member of the modern British royal family to be arrested.

Although he has always denied involvement in Epstein’s network of sexual abuse of minors, his mother and his brother gradually moved to sideline him from public life.

In October 2025, Andrew was stripped of his princely title by Charles III, as the steps he had taken to distance himself from the royal family, including renouncing all his honors, were deemed insufficient by the monarch.

Charles III also ordered him to leave the palace he occupied in Windsor and relocate to the Sandringham estate in Norfolk, where he was arrested by Thames Valley Police.

Despite rumors that circulated for years about alleged wrongdoing, the beginning of Andrew’s downfall dates to around 2015, when BBC revealed that accuser Virginia Giuffre had filed a complaint in a Florida court alleging she was forced to have sexual relations with him as a minor within a network of sex slaves.

The case returned to the spotlight in 2019 after the British newspaper Daily Mail published images from 2010 showing the prince at Epstein’s New York mansion, bidding farewell to a young woman leaving the residence. The photos surfaced around the time of Epstein’s imprisonment and his subsequent apparent suicide in the jail cell where he was awaiting trial.

The scandal prompted the prince to announce his withdrawal from public life on Nov. 20, 2019. Giuffre filed a civil lawsuit against him in New York in 2021, alleging that he sexually abused her when she was a minor.

In January 2022, the situation shifted after U.S. court documents revealed a confidential 2009 agreement under which Epstein paid Giuffre US$500,000 to withdraw her allegations — a document Andrew’s lawyers believed would help dismiss the case against him.

However, on Jan. 12 the court rejected that argument, and the following day his mother stripped him of all military titles and royal patronages.

In February, his lawyers announced an out-of-court settlement with Giuffre for 14 million euros, funds reportedly provided by his mother. The New York court that was set to try Andrew closed the case.

In April 2025, Giuffre was found dead at her home in Australia, where she had lived for years, in what authorities described as an apparent suicide. A month earlier, she had posted that she had been struck by a bus and had “four days to live.”

Five months later, Andrew again made headlines in the British press following the publication of an email he sent to Epstein in 2011, revealing he had remained in contact with him longer than he had acknowledged in a prime-time interview on the BBC.

In the message, the prince told Epstein they were “in this together” and promised they would stay in touch and “play some more soon,” after Epstein had pleaded guilty to soliciting sex from a minor and a day after the first photographs of Andrew with Giuffre became public.

Several USFK F-16 fighter jets took off from Osan Air Base in Pyeongtaek, about 60 kilometers south of Seoul, late Wednesday and flew above international waters in the Yellow Sea, according to the military sources.

The F-16s reportedly flew to an area between the respective air defense identification zones of South Korea and China, prompting the Chinese military to dispatch its own fighter jets to the scene, but no clash occurred.

The USFK notified the South Korea military on its plan ahead of the exercise but apparently did not elaborate on the details, including the purpose of the drills, a source said.

Both Seoul's defense ministry and the USFK did not provide further details over the incident.

"The USFK, alongside our military, maintains a powerful combined defense posture," a ministry official said, adding the ministry cannot verify military operations involving USFK assets.

The USFK said it did not have any response to provide.

The latest drills comes amid speculation that Washington will seek to redefine the role of the USFK as it pushes to focus on countering Chinese threats while urging allies to take on greater security burdens.

The U.S. National Defense Strategy released last month signaled a possible shift in U.S. force posture in South Korea, noting that the South is capable of taking "primary" responsibility to deter the North with "critical, but more limited" U.S. support -- a shift that it says is in line with America's interest in "updating" U.S. force posture on the Korean Peninsula.

USFK Commander Gen. Xavier Brunson has also mentioned the need for "flexibility" of the USFK as he introduced a map that puts the east at the top rather than standard north-up mapping.

"Forces already positioned on the Korean Peninsula are revealed not as distant assets requiring reinforcement, but as troops already positioned inside the bubble perimeter that the U.S. would need to penetrate in the event of crisis or contingency," he said, as he introduced the map on Nov. 17 last year.

Quentin D., the identity activist attacked on Thursday in Lyon, is dead; Emmanuel Macron denounces "an unprecedented wave of violence" and calls for "calm"

Very seriously injured on Thursday, the 23-year-old was hospitalized and placed in a coma. The prosecutor's office has opened an investigation for aggravated violence. The perpetrator(s) of the attack have not been identified. (note - 2 suspects have been found)

Quentin D., the 23-year-old identity activist attacked on Thursday evening on the sidelines of a conference by MEP Rima Hassan (La France Insoumise, LFI), at the Institute of Political Studies (IEP) in Lyon, has died, the prosecutor's office announced on Saturday 14 February.

Quentin D. had been placed in a coma, with a life-threatening prognosis, at the Edouard-Herriot hospital, after being taken care of "in a serious condition" early Thursday evening by the emergency services, in the5th arrondissement of Lyon. He did not survive a concussion, the result of violent blows to the head, a security source told Le Monde.

The prosecutor's office has opened an investigation for aggravated violence. The perpetrator or perpetrators of the attack have not yet been identified. "The investigation is continuing, it is now being conducted on the charge of aggravated fatal blows, in addition to the violence aggravated by three circumstances," the prosecutor's office said in a statement on Saturday.

Emmanuel Macron denounced on X "an unprecedented wave of violence", calling for "calm, restraint and respect". "To his family and loved ones, I send my thoughts and the support of the nation," he said, considering that "no cause, no ideology will ever justify killing." "Prosecuting, bringing to justice and condemning the perpetrators of this ignominy is essential. Hatred that murders has no place in our country," he concluded.

"Quentin's death is a tragedy," reacted Grégory Doucet, the mayor of Lyon, considering that "such a wave of violence in the heart of the city is unacceptable". According to the ecologist elected official, "no political disagreement can justify violence".

His family calls for "calm"

Quentin D.'s family called for "calm", while denouncing a "crime", according to their lawyer. "An ambush, methodically prepared, would seem to have been set for Quentin by organized and trained individuals, in very large numbers and armed, some with their faces masked, having carried out preliminary scouting (...) These facts, if they are confirmed by the investigation (...) constitute a crime," Fabien Rajon wrote in a statement. "Quentin's family trusts the investigators and the justice system to ensure that those responsible for his death are quickly arrested and held accountable," it added.

According to the identity group Nemesis – which claims to be feminist, and continues to wrongly attribute responsibility for sexual violence to immigrants – Quentin D. was part of the security service responsible for helping its activists during their demonstration against a conference by Rima Hassan at the Institute of Political Studies in Lyon, in the7th arrondissement.

The ultra-right group claimed, in several messages on X, that Quentin D. had been attacked by far-left activists. The Nemesis group has appointed members of the Young Guard, an anti-fascist group dissolved in June 2025 and founded by Raphaël Arnault from Lyon, elected MP in 2024 in the Vaucluse under the colors of LFI. The latter expressed "horror and disgust" after the announcement of Quentin's death, and said he hoped that "all the light would be shed".

On Friday, the Lyon prosecutor's office said that "at this stage, the context and circumstances of these facts must be determined". "Numerous hearings" took place all day on Saturday, a source close to the investigation told Agence France-Presse.

This tragedy has triggered many political reactions. The leader of the National Rally, Marine Le Pen, called on Saturday for the justice system to condemn "with the greatest rigor" the perpetrators of a "criminal act of unprecedented violence". The day before, the head of the far-right party, Jordan Bardella, had sounded the "mobilisation of the entire political class" by pointing the finger at the Young Guard and calling for its dissolution. The anti-fascist group has in fact already been dissolved in 2025 for "violent acts".

Marion Maréchal once again attacked La France Insoumise, which has been in the crosshairs since Friday: "The militia of Mélenchon and LFI has killed," she wrote on X. The president of the Republicans, Bruno Retailleau, pointed to the responsibility of the "far left", which "kills".

LFI has "condemned with the greatest firmness all physical violence," said its coordinator, Manuel Bompard. Several party offices have been the subject of damage following the political condemnations targeting the "insoumis" and the "far left", notably in "Paris, Rouen, Metz, Castres, Bordeaux, Lille, Montpellier and Toulouse", according to Manuel Bompard. The accusations against LFI are "without any foundation," the "rebellious" leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon wrote on X on Saturday, calling on his troops "to be extremely vigilant." Questioned on franceinfo tv, MP Eric Coquerel repeated that LFI condemned "all political violence" and said that the activists in charge of Rima Hassan's security "were in no way involved in what happened". He pointed to a "Lyon context" marked by the violence of "far-right groups".

Several other left-wing leaders also reacted to the death, including the first secretary of the PS, Olivier Faure, deeming the "level of violence reached" "unacceptable". "In a democracy, no one should die for their ideas (...) It is up to the police and the judicial authority to carry out a diligent investigation and to render justice," he wrote on X. "We must stop with this violence in politics that will always lead to tragedies. Let all light be shed and justice be done," called for the national secretary of the PCF, Fabien Roussel.

Laurent Nuñez on Saturday called on prefects to "strengthen vigilance around political rallies, as well as around campaign offices". In a message posted on X and in a telegram addressed to the prefects, the Minister of the Interior explains that it is a question of "avoiding any disturbance to public order and guaranteeing the safety of people and property."

In Lyon, Jean-Michel Aulas, candidate of the right and center in the municipal elections in March, has put his campaign on hold for Sunday, according to his entourage.

A rally in tribute to Quentin took place on Saturday afternoon in Angers and other calls for rallies have been launched for Sunday in Montpellier and Paris.

In a broader context, Isabelle Sommier, professor of political sociology at the University of Paris-I-Panthéon-Sorbonne, recalls that, between 1986 and 2021, the 53 deaths occurring in a framework of political violence – excluding attacks by Islamists representing 70% of political violence – are due to 90% on the extreme right and 10% on the extreme left.[36,][]37] Thus, if the death of Quentin Deranque is due to political motives, he would be the first victim of the extreme left in France since the attacks of Direct Action in the 1980s, when the extreme right has already caused 7 deaths since 2022 for ideological reasons].37] According to the Swiss historian and politician Stéfanie Prezioso, the main French media do not take into account this imbalance and present the violence of the fascist and anti-fascist groups as equivalent for about forty years, and “[put] on an equal footing the executioners and their victims”[[]38].

https://basta.media/mort-de-quentin-d-a-lyon-l-antifascisme-est-aujourd-hui-instrumentalise https://bonpote.com/90-des-meurtres-a-caractere-ideologique-sont-le-fait-de-lextreme-droite/ https://www.huffingtonpost.fr/politique/article/cette-affirmation-de-marion-marechal-sur-les-violences-de-l-extreme-droite-est-contredite-par-les-chiffres_260519.html