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Trump Reportedly Commits to Pursuing Russia-Ukraine Peace

US President Donald Trump reacts as he and the President of Poland Karol Nawrocki (not pictured) meet in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington, D.C., US, September 3, 2025. REUTERS/Brian Snyder
US President Donald Trump reacts as he and the President of Poland Karol Nawrocki (not pictured) meet in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington, D.C., US, September 3, 2025. REUTERS/Brian Snyder
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Trump Reportedly Commits to Pursuing Russia-Ukraine Peace

US President Donald Trump reacts as he and the President of Poland Karol Nawrocki (not pictured) meet in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington, D.C., US, September 3, 2025. REUTERS/Brian Snyder
US President Donald Trump reacts as he and the President of Poland Karol Nawrocki (not pictured) meet in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington, D.C., US, September 3, 2025. REUTERS/Brian Snyder

US President Donald Trump said he remains committed to pursuing a peace agreement between Russia and Ukraine despite uncertainty over the prospect of face-to-face talks between Russia's Vladimir Putin and Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelenskiy, CBS News said in a report published on Thursday.

"I've been watching it, I've been seeing it, and I've been talking about it with President Putin and President Zelenskiy," Trump said in a phone interview with CBS News on Wednesday. "Something is going to happen, but they are not ready yet. But something is going to happen. We are going to get it done."

Trump earlier on Wednesday said he plans to hold talks about the war in Ukraine in coming days after his Alaska summit with Putin in August failed to achieve a breakthrough. A White House official said Trump is expected to speak on the phone on Thursday with Zelenskiy.

Putin also said on Wednesday he is ready to meet with Zelenskiy if the Ukrainian president came to Moscow but that any such meeting had to be well prepared and lead to tangible results. Ukraine's foreign minister dismissed the suggestion of Moscow as a venue for such a meeting.

Trump told CBS News he is unhappy with the carnage between Russia and Ukraine but will keep pushing for a peace agreement.

"I think we're going to get it all straightened out. Frankly, the Russia one, I thought, would have been on the easier side of the ones I've stopped, but it seems to be something that's a little bit more difficult than some of the others," he said.

Trump has been frustrated at his inability to get a halt to the fighting, which began with Russia's invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, after he initially predicted he would be able to end the war swiftly when he took office in January.

Trump said on Wednesday that he watched China's "beautiful ceremony" marking the end of World War Two, where Putin was seen alongside Chinese President Xi Jinping and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

"I understand the reason they were doing it, and they were hoping I was watching, and I was watching," Trump told CBS News. "My relationship with all of them is very good. We're going to find out how good it is over the next week or two."

Trump said on Tuesday he was "very disappointed" with Putin, and suggested in a post on Truth Social that Xi, Putin and Kim were conspiring against the United States.

According to Reuters, the Kremlin said Putin was not conspiring against the US and suggested Trump was being ironic in his remarks.

Putin said that all countries with which Russia held talks in China supported the Russia-US summit in Alaska and had expressed hopes that the talks could help end the war in Ukraine.

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Pakistan Says 11 Citizens, 20 Iranian Nationals Being Repatriated from Vessels Seized by US

Vessels in the Strait of Hormuz, Musandam, Oman, May 15, 2026. (Reuters)
Vessels in the Strait of Hormuz, Musandam, Oman, May 15, 2026. (Reuters)
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Pakistan Says 11 Citizens, 20 Iranian Nationals Being Repatriated from Vessels Seized by US

Vessels in the Strait of Hormuz, Musandam, Oman, May 15, 2026. (Reuters)
Vessels in the Strait of Hormuz, Musandam, Oman, May 15, 2026. (Reuters)

Pakistan is repatriating 11 of its nationals and 20 Iranians from vessels seized in the high seas by the US, Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar said on Friday.

They were repatriated through Singapore to ‌Bangkok en ‌route to Pakistan's capital Islamabad ‌on ⁠Friday night, Dar ⁠added in an X post, with the Iranians due to continue to their homeland.

"All individuals are in good health and high spirits," the Pakistani minister ⁠said.

It was not immediately ‌clear which ‌vessels they had been on.

The US-Israeli ‌war on Iran, which began ‌in February, was suspended last month after a fragile ceasefire but Washington and Tehran have engaged in naval ‌confrontations and seizures of each other's vessels as they struggle ⁠to ⁠reach a peace pact.

Pakistan has been mediating between the US and Iran.

Iran effectively shut the Strait of Hormuz, which normally handles about one-fifth of the world's seaborne oil and gas supply, to most shipping after the war began.

World

FBI Offers $200,000 Reward to Catch Ex-Air Force Specialist Wanted on Espionage Charges in Iran

An FBI seal is displayed on a podium before a news conference at the field office in Portland, Ore., Jan. 16, 2025. (AP)
An FBI seal is displayed on a podium before a news conference at the field office in Portland, Ore., Jan. 16, 2025. (AP)
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FBI Offers $200,000 Reward to Catch Ex-Air Force Specialist Wanted on Espionage Charges in Iran

An FBI seal is displayed on a podium before a news conference at the field office in Portland, Ore., Jan. 16, 2025. (AP)
An FBI seal is displayed on a podium before a news conference at the field office in Portland, Ore., Jan. 16, 2025. (AP)

The FBI is offering a $200,000 reward for information leading to capture and prosecution of a former US Air Force counterintelligence specialist who defected to Iran in 2013 and was later charged with revealing classified information to the Tehran government.

Monica Elfriede Witt, 47, was indicted by a federal grand jury in February 2019 on charges of espionage, including transmitting national defense information to the government of Iran. She remains at large.

Witt “allegedly betrayed her oath to the Constitution more than a decade ago by defecting to Iran and providing the Iranian regime National Defense Information and likely continues to support their nefarious activities,” Daniel Wierzbicki, special agent in charge of the FBI Washington Field Office’s Counterintelligence and Cyber Division, said in a news release Wednesday.

“The FBI has not forgotten and believes that during this critical moment in Iran’s history, there is someone who knows something about her whereabouts.”

It wasn't immediately known why the FBI was bringing attention to Witt's case. The United States and Iran have been at war since Feb. 28.

Witt served in the Air Force between 1997 and 2008, where she was trained in the Farsi language and was deployed overseas on classified counterintelligence missions, including to the Middle East. She later found work as a Defense Department contractor.

The Texas native defected to Iran in 2013 after being invited to two all-expense-paid conferences in the country that the Justice Department says promoted anti-Western propaganda and condemned American moral standards.

Before that, Witt had been warned by the FBI about her activities, but told agents that she would not provide sensitive information about her work if she returned to Iran, prosecutors said.

According to the indictment, Witt placed at risk "sensitive and classified US national defense information and programs,” the news release said.

“Witt allegedly intentionally provided information endangering US personnel and their families stationed abroad. She also allegedly conducted research on behalf of the Iranian regime to allow them to target her former colleagues in the US government,” it said.

World

South Korea to Investigate Ship Debris from Hormuz Attack

This undated handout photograph released by South Korea's Foreign Ministry on May 10, 2026, shows a damaged part of the South Korean cargo ship HMM Namu docked at a port in Dubai. (Handout / South Korean Foreign Ministry / AFP)
This undated handout photograph released by South Korea's Foreign Ministry on May 10, 2026, shows a damaged part of the South Korean cargo ship HMM Namu docked at a port in Dubai. (Handout / South Korean Foreign Ministry / AFP)
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South Korea to Investigate Ship Debris from Hormuz Attack

This undated handout photograph released by South Korea's Foreign Ministry on May 10, 2026, shows a damaged part of the South Korean cargo ship HMM Namu docked at a port in Dubai. (Handout / South Korean Foreign Ministry / AFP)
This undated handout photograph released by South Korea's Foreign Ministry on May 10, 2026, shows a damaged part of the South Korean cargo ship HMM Namu docked at a port in Dubai. (Handout / South Korean Foreign Ministry / AFP)

Debris from a fire-damaged cargo ship said to have been attacked by unidentified aircraft in the Strait of Hormuz arrived in South Korea on Friday for investigation, the foreign ministry said.

Iran has largely blocked shipping through the vital strait since conflict broke out with the United States and Israel on February 28 and Washington blockaded Tehran's ports.

HMM Namu was struck by "two unidentified aircraft" on May 4, hitting the outer plate of the vessel's port-side ballast tank near the stern and causing a fire in the engine room, Seoul, a US ally, said at a press briefing on Sunday.

The Panama-flagged cargo vessel, operated by South Korean shipping firm HMM Co., had arrived in Dubai last week for investigation.

Its debris "arrived in South Korea by air following consultations with the UAE government" on Friday, Seoul's foreign ministry said in a statement.

The vessel debris is "scheduled to undergo detailed analysis by a specialized institution", it added without providing further detail.

Seoul said the aircraft involved in the attack "were captured on CCTV footage, but there are limitations in identifying the exact type, launch origin and physical size of the objects".

A senior government official told local media this week that the "likelihood that the (attacking) entity was someone other than Iran is low."

Tehran has denied responsibility, with its embassy in Seoul posting a statement on its website in the days following the attack, saying it "firmly rejects and categorically denies any allegations regarding the involvement" of its forces.

Seoul strongly condemned the attack and said it hopes to identify those behind it through a thorough investigation.

South Korea, Asia's fourth-largest economy, relies heavily on Middle Eastern fuel imports, most of which transited through the Strait of Hormuz during peacetime.

As a major petrochemicals producer and refiner, the closure has forced South Korea to impose a fuel price cap for the first time in nearly 30 years.