Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto said Wednesday that his country will offer temporary shelter to Palestinian medical evacuees and children orphaned by the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza. “We are ready to evacuate those who are injured or traumatized, and orphans, if they want to be evacuated to Indonesia, and we are ready to send planes to transport them,” Subianto said, adding that he has instructed his foreign affairs minister to discuss evacuation plans with the Palestinian authorities at once. He said Indonesia is ready to evacuate a first batch of around 1,000 victims, who will stay in the country until they have fully recovered from their injuries and Gaza is safe enough to return to. Subianto said the move was not for permanent resettlement. Subianto spoke before getting on a flight to Abu Dhabi, the first stop in a weeklong tour of the Middle East that also includes stops in Turkey, Egypt, Qatar and Jordan. He said he would consult on the planned evacuations with those countries, some of which have also accepted Palestinians for humanitarian reasons. He added that other countries have called on Indonesia to increase its role in seeking a resolution to the conflict in Gaza. The world’s most populous Muslim-majority nation has long been a strong supporter of the Palestinians. “This is something complicated; it’s not easy, but I think it encourages the Indonesian government to play a more active role,” Subianto said.

“There’s got to be an investigation,” Keir Starmer told British lawmakers. LONDON — British Prime Minister Keir Starmer has called for a probe into the killing of 15 emergency workers in Gaza after a video appeared to contradict Israel's account of the incident and it walked back its version of events. “There’s got to be an investigation,” Starmer told the United Kingdom's lawmakers Tuesday. “And we have to be absolutely clear that we’re not just talking about that isolated incident.” The United Nations and the Palestine Red Crescent Society have also condemned the March 23 incident, when the emergency workers were shot dead and buried in shallow graves. The Israel Defense Forces initially said it opened fire after unmarked vehicles approached in the dark, but changed its account after video showed clearly marked ambulances and fire trucks with their lights on coming under fire. Starmer also criticized Israel’s “resumption of hostilities” in the Gaza Strip after two months of relative calm in the war-torn enclave came to an end and talks to extend the truce stalled. “We need to get back to a ceasefire,” he said. He also echoed warnings from the U.N. that there “hasn’t been enough aid” getting into the Palestinian enclave after Israel halted all entry of humanitarian aid and goods into the Gaza Strip last month. His comments came as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu became the first world leader to visit President Donald Trump at the White House after the U.S. introduced sweeping new tariffs on some of America’s biggest trading partners, including China and the European Union, as well as Israel. At a news conference Tuesday, Trump said he sympathized with the Israeli hostages still held in the enclave. He also made another pitch for his plan for the U.S. to “own” Gaza and remove its Palestinian population. He made no mention of the Israeli military's killing of 15 paramedics and emergency workers in Gaza. The IDF initially said soldiers had opened fire on the vehicles as they approached its position “suspiciously,” without headlights or emergency signals. It said nine Hamas and Islamic Jihad militants had been killed. But video recovered from the phone of one of the dead paramedics and reviewed by NBC News, showed an ambulance with its lights on and emergency lights flashing. The vehicle was clearly marked with the Palestinian Red Crescent Society's insignia. Lights on two other vehicles could also be seen flashing in the footage. On Monday, the IDF said a preliminary inquiry found that Israeli soldiers launched their attack “due to a perceived threat following a previous encounter in the area.” It did not expand on why a threat was perceived, but said “six of the individuals killed in the incident were identified as Hamas terrorists.” It did not provide evidence of this and said the inquiry was ongoing. In an earlier news briefing Saturday, an IDF spokesperson had said the “individual who gave the initial account” appeared to have been “mistaken.” The spokesperson said the IDF was looking into whether an error was made. Troops were not trying to hide anything by covering the bodies, but wanted to protect them from wild animals, the spokesperson said, adding that it was “common procedure” to cover vehicles. The IDF notified the U.N. of the incident on the day it happened, the spokesperson said. A spokesperson for the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said Wednesday that they could not confirm that. Asked for clarification, the spokesperson did not immediately respond. Throughout the war in Gaza, members of Britain's Parliament have raised concerns about the country's arms exports to Israel, warning that they could be used to violate international humanitarian law. After taking office in July 2024, Starmer’s government announced the suspension of around 30 licenses, out of about 350, to Israel, after the government had concluded there was a “clear risk” they “might be used to commit or facilitate a serious violation of international humanitarian law.” Included in the suspension were licenses for equipment including components for military aircraft, “as well as items which facilitate ground targeting,” British Foreign Secretary David Lammy said in September. The U.K.'s foreign office declined to say what had prompted it to suspend the licenses after NBC News submitted a Freedom of Information request in September. Such a disclosure “would be likely to prejudice the U.K.’s international relations,” it said. The U.S. continues to be Israel‘s biggest arms supplier, with Washington spending at least $17.9 billion on military aid for Israel in the first year of the country’s offensive in Gaza, according to a November report from Brown University’s Costs of War project.

China’s official Xinhua news agency said Wednesday the fire started at 9 p.m. local time (9 a.m. ET) Tuesday in Chengde city in Hebei province. Six hours later, 20 people were confirmed dead. State broadcaster CCTV said 19 others, who were uninjured, have been transferred to a hospital for observation. Officials are investigating the cause of the fire. State media said a “relevant” person in charge of the facility has been taken in by police, without giving any details.In January, a fire at a food market in the Hebei city of Zhangjiakou killed eight people and injured 15 others.

Global drugmakers’ stocks dropped across the board after U.S. President Donald Trump reiterated plans for a “major” tariff on pharmaceutical imports, threatening an interwoven global supply chain, and as his country-specific reciprocal tariffs took effect, leading to more pain in global markets. Pharmaceutical imports were initially exempt from Trump’s first set of reciprocal tariffs last week — but his administration has since indicated that levies on the sector, which in the past has been excluded from such actions, are coming. The U.S. president has said the tariffs will incentivize drug companies to move operations to the United States. However, analysts and companies have raised concerns about the difficulty in setting up manufacturing in the country. Shares of major U.S. drugmakers Amgen, AbbVie, Pfizer, Merck and Eli Lilly fell between 3% and 6% in premarket trading. In Europe, a basket of healthcare stocks fell 5% to its lowest since October 2022, leading losses among sectoral indexes on the region-wide STOXX 600, which was down 3.3% at 1013 GMT. The index was heading for its biggest one-day drop since March 2020. Trump had also threatened the duties on Friday after his first set of “reciprocal” tariffs exempted pharma products. Trump has not said when and by how much he plans to raise levies on pharma imports. “While the details are scant, we are strongly opposed to tariffs on any pharmaceuticals — these will likely do little to shift manufacturing back to the U.S.,” said BMO Capital Markets analyst Evan Seigerman. “Given the complexity of the pharma supply chain, we do not expect the industry to make any major changes. These current tariffs are being pursued under emergency powers, which at worse will last until the end of the current administration and could end sooner with an act of Congress.” Seigerman also pointed to concerns over recent layoffs at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, saying the worries were now compounded by the “real talk” of pharma tariffs. Europe and the U.S. have interconnected supply chains for medicines. The United States depends on medicines partly produced in Europe that bring in hundreds of billions of dollars in revenue. Bernstein analyst Courtney Breen wrote in a note that her worst-case scenario assumes tariffs could be steep, leading to about $53 billion in additional costs paid for pharmaceutical imports. If companies did choose to bring new manufacturing to the United States, Breen expects additional spend of $2 billion for each new “green field” site and a five-year runway to production. EU medical and pharmaceutical product exports to the U.S. totaled about 90 billion euros ($97 billion) in 2023, according to latest Eurostat data. Shares of AstraZeneca, GSK, Roche , Sanofi and Novartis fell between 5% and 6.5% in Europe. Meanwhile, Indian pharmaceutical stocks .NIPHARM closed nearly 2% lower, dragging down the benchmark Nifty 50 by 0.6%. IPCA Laboratories, Glenmark Pharma and Biocon were the top losers by percentage on the pharma index in Mumbai, ending the trading session between 4% and 5.5% lower. India’s pharma exports to the U.S. mostly comprise generics, or cheaper versions of popular drugs. The United States accounts for a third of India’s overall pharma exports.

President Donald Trump’s unprecedented tariffs on global imports into the United States took effect Wednesday, reshuffling a global economic order that has largely stood for generations and prompting new retaliations from China and Europe. Now, consumers and investors alike will begin to gauge the actual impact on the U.S. economy as the cost of the import taxes starts to flow through supply chains and into businesses and household budgets. The most immediate response from investors came in the market for government bonds. Contrary to the goals of the Trump administration, U.S. borrowing costs began to climb immediately after the tariffs came into effect overnight — an unexpected move that, combined with falling stock prices, caused some analysts to raise the prospect of broader financial instability. In a post on X, former Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers said development represented a "highly unusual pattern" that suggests "a generalized aversion to US assets in global financial markets. "We are being treated by global financial markets like a problematic emerging market," he wrote. Meanwhile, Walmart and Delta Air Lines both withdrew earnings guidance Wednesday morning based on the uncertainty Trump's scheme has generated, while JPMorgan Chase CEO said an interview that a recession in the U.S. was now likely. The average tariff faced by the dozens of nations Trump targeted is 29%, with many as high as 40%. The White House has posted the full list on its website. Chinese imports will carry a cumulative rate of as much as 104% because of new tariffs Trump imposed this year, on top of levies he had already enacted during his first term. In response, China announced Wednesday morning it was raising retaliatory duties on imports from the U.S. from 34% to 84%, while the EU agreed to slap duties of as much as 25% on U.S. imports starting next week.

President Donald Trump said Wednesday he was pausing higher targeted tariffs for 90 days for most countries, a stunning reversal in his trade war that has sent markets reeling. Trump wrote on social media just before 1:30 p.m. that he came to the decision because more than 75 trading partners didn’t retaliate and have reached out to the United States to “discuss” some of the issues he had raised. The pause didn’t apply to China, which has retaliated — with 84% hikes. Trump instead raised duties for it to 125%, effective immediately. “Based on the lack of respect that China has shown to the World’s Markets, I am hereby raising the Tariff charged to China by the United States of America to 125%, effective immediately,” he wrote. “At some point, hopefully in the near future, China will realize that the days of ripping off the U.S.A., and other Countries, is no longer sustainable or acceptable.” But the trade war isn’t exactly over, and the pause didn’t return the world to the time before Trump touched off the global instability; a 10% across-the-board duty will remain. For Canada and Mexico, goods covered by the U.S., Canada and Mexico trade agreement will continue to have no tariffs, while products that aren't exempt under the trade deal will have a 25% tariff. Canadian energy and fertilizer products will have a 10% tariff. It wasn’t immediately clear which countries the pause would cover; the White House wouldn’t say. Earlier Wednesday, the European Union voted to impose fresh retaliatory duties, but they aren’t set to take effect until next week. And separate tariffs on imported autos, steel and aluminum will remain, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said later — while planned tariffs on items like lumber and pharmaceuticals are still on. It’s not clear what prompted Trump to change his mind — he appeared to dig in just hours earlier, telling Americans “BE COOL” in a Truth Social post, and he suggested not that long ago that the tariffs could be permanent. “I did a 90-day pause for the people that didn’t retaliate, because I told them, ‘If you retaliate, we’re going to double it,’” Trump said Wednesday. “And that’s what I did with China, because they did retaliate. So we’ll see how it all works out. I think it’s going to work out amazing.” But markets have been in stunning turmoil — major stock indexes shed trillions of dollars in value, while alarming signals from the bond market set Wall Street on edge. When a false-at-the-time headline suggesting Trump would take a 90-day pause shot around the internet Monday, markets briefly surged. And a growing chorus of business leaders and Trump’s allies have come out publicly against the tariffs, including Tesla CEO Elon Musk. Markets soared on the surprising news Wednesday, with the S&P 500 climbing more than 9%, the tech-heavy Nasdaq closing up more than 12% and the Dow Jones Industrial Average ending nearly 3,000 points higher. Among the big gainers: Tesla stock was up 22%. Despite the gains, all three indexes were down from where they were a month ago and at the start of the year, and some investors questioned what the recent volatility could mean for the U.S. stock market longer-term. "My portfolio of defensive stocks is green so I don’t begrudge today’s market. But I ask you, would you want to own highly volatile US stocks whose price depends on whether POTUS had a good night’s sleep and woke up the next morning to reverse yesterday’s policies?" billionaire investor Bill Gross said on X. Goldman Sachs lowered its odds of a recession but said it is still forecasting minimal economic growth and a 45% probability of a recession given the remaining tariffs.

HONG KONG — The increasingly vicious trade war between Washington and Beijing took another turn Wednesday when China imposed an additional 50% tariff on imports from the U.S., hiking its levies on American imports to 84%. The tit-for-tat escalation came hours after President Donald Trump’s 104% tariffs on Chinese imports went into effect, including 50% Trump added Monday. Later Wednesday, Trump increased the overall U.S. tariff on Chinese goods to 125%, even as he paused higher targeted tariffs on other countries for 90 days while keeping a 10% baseline tariff in place for all countries. Trump’s 50% tariff is a “mistake upon another mistake,” China’s Customs Tariff Commission said in a statement earlier Wednesday, adding that the world’s two biggest economies should “resolve differences through equal dialogue based on mutual respect.” The effect of China’s 84% tariff may be somewhat limited because China imports only about $160 billion a year in U.S. goods compared with the more than $400 billion in goods it exports to the U.S. “I don’t think they can match in the economic realm, because the relationship is so unbalanced,” said Rick Waters, the Singapore-based director of the Carnegie China think tank. “So what they tend to do is move into adjacent realms to exact a price.” Here's a look at some of the other measures China might take. U.S. agricultural products and poultry China could greatly increase tariffs on U.S. agricultural products, or even stop importing them completely. “I think there’s a very high chance that China will stop agricultural imports from the U.S. altogether,” said Tianchen Xu, a Beijing-based economist at the Economist Intelligence Unit, a financial forecasting service. “It’s a weapon targeting Trump’s supporter base,” he added. Soybeans, which are crushed to make protein-rich animal feed ingredients and vegetable oils, have been at the heart of the U.S.-China trade dispute for some time. U.S. exports of soybeans to China fell 75% after China imposed a retaliatory 25% tariff on them in 2018, during Trump’s first-term trade war with Beijing. The Trump administration announced $12 billion in subsidies for farmers to offset the impact, and it has again promised to step in if the latest round of tariffs hurts the industry further. China could also put further restrictions on American poultry products, having announced an import ban on two U.S. companies last week. China, which frequently trades places with North America as the world’s largest box office, is a crucial market for Hollywood films. Though China has an annual quota for the number of foreign movies that can appear in its theaters, it could ban Hollywood films altogether. American movies have already been declining in popularity in recent years as U.S.-China trade tensions have escalated. There were no Hollywood films among China’s 10 highest-grossing movies in 2023, in stark contrast to 2012, when seven of the top 10 highest-grossing movies were U.S.-made, according to Maoyan, a Chinese movie-ticketing and data platform. U.S. services sector and intellectual property The U.S. has a large trade deficit with China in goods, but it comes out ahead when it comes to services such as finance, consulting and law. U.S. data lists China as its fifth-largest export market for services, according to a report by China’s State Council released Wednesday. China could target the U.S. services sector, for example, by excluding American companies from government procurement processes or restricting their cooperation with Chinese firms. The U.S. has long accused China of stealing its intellectual property. But Beijing also has its own growing intellectual property interests, and it could investigate U.S. companies in China in an effort to protect them. Fentanyl cooperation China and the U.S. have made progress on stemming the international flow of precursor ingredients for fentanyl, some of which originate in China and are then processed into the deadly opioid in countries such as Mexico before being smuggled into the U.S. But China could bring that cooperation to a halt in response to Trump’s tariffs. “Out of humanitarian considerations, China has provided various forms of assistance to the U.S.,” Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said last month. “The U.S. should not repay goodwill with hostility.” Waters said it would be “counterproductive” for China to suspend cooperation on fentanyl. “It’s just going to cement narratives in the U.S. that they’re weaponizing drugs against us,” he said.

Congolese authorities seek to sign a minerals deal with the U.S. in exchange for security support to fight rebels in the country’s conflict-hit east. The three Americans convicted of participating in a botched coup attempt in Congo last year have been repatriated to the United States, days after their death sentences were commuted to life imprisonment, Congo’s presidency said Tuesday. The three will serve out their sentences in the U.S. following the repatriation done in collaboration with the U.S. Embassy, Congolese presidential spokesperson Tina Salama said. The presidency said the Americans left Congo Tuesday morning. The State Department said it was aware of their transfer into U.S. custody and referred questions to the Department of Justice. A DOJ spokesperson said they did not immediately have information to share. The conditions of the prisoner transfer agreement were not immediately clear. But international law experts said it’s unlikely the U.S. will shorten their sentences. Among the three Americans was 21-year-old Marcel Malanga, son of opposition figure Christian Malanga, who led the foiled coup attempt that targeted the presidential palace in Kinshasa. The elder Malanga, who live-streamed from the palace during the attempt, was later killed while resisting arrest, Congolese authorities said. Marcel Malanga has said his father forced him to take part.Also repatriated were Tyler Thompson Jr., 21, a friend of the younger Malanga who flew to Africa from Utah for what his family believed was a free vacation, and Benjamin Reuben Zalman-Polun, 36, who is reported to have known Christian Malanga through a gold mining company. The repatriation came amid efforts by Congolese authorities to sign a minerals deal with the U.S. in exchange for security support that will help the capital city of Kinshasa fight rebels in the country’s conflict-hit east. U.S. President Donald Trump’s senior adviser for Africa last week confirmed the countries were in talks on the issue and said it could involve “multibillion-dollar investments.” The U.S. has estimated Congo has trillions of dollars in mineral wealth, much of it untapped. “This decision is part of a dynamic of strengthening judicial diplomacy and international cooperation in matters of justice and human rights between the two countries,” Congo’s presidency said Tuesday of the repatriation. The news of their return brought joy to their families. Thompson’s stepmother, Miranda Thompson, told the AP that they didn’t have all the details “but we’re so excited to have him on American soil again.” The Thompsons said they were grateful for all the support they received from the U.S. government, family and friends. Thompson’s lawyer Skye Lazaro said Tuesday that she had limited information on what his status will be once he lands stateside. She said she plans to pursue all available legal avenues relating to his detention in the U.S. When the U.S. assumes custody of prisoners convicted abroad, it typically agrees to carry out a sentence of imprisonment designated by that country. Lawyers for the repatriated Americans could try to get their sentences reduced by arguing they signed their consents to the prisoner transfer treaty under duress, said Jared Genser, a U.S.-based international human rights attorney. “But it would be very hard to prevail in such a case as there would be enormous implications for other potential transfers in the future if the U.S. failed to abide by such agreements,” Genser said. Dozens of others were convicted after the coup attempt, a majority of them Congolese but also including a Briton, a Belgian and a Canadian. Charges included terrorism, murder, criminal association and illegal possession of weapons. The fate of the others was not immediately clear. Congo had reinstated the death penalty last year, lifting a more than 2-decade-old moratorium, as authorities struggle to curb violence and militant attacks. Family members last year said the Americans slept on the floor at a high-security military prison in Kinshasa, struggling with health issues and having to pay for food and hygiene products.

SEOUL, South Korea — South Korea’s military fired warning shots after North Korean soldiers crossed the rivals’ tense border on Tuesday, South Korean officials said. South Korea’s military said in a statement that about 10 North Korean soldiers returned to the North after South Korea made warning broadcasts and fired warning shots. It said the North Korean soldiers violated the military demarcation line at the eastern section of the border at 5 p.m. local time (4 a.m. ET). South Korea’s military said it is closely monitoring North Korean activities. Bloodshed and violent confrontations have occasionally occurred at the Koreas’ heavily fortified border, called the Demilitarized Zone. But when North Korean troops briefly violated the border in June last year and prompted South Korea to fire warning shots, it did not escalate into a major source of tensions. South Korean officials assessed that the soldiers did not deliberately commit the border intrusion and the site was a wooded area and military demarcation line signs there were not clearly visible. South Korea said the North Koreans were carrying construction tools. The motive for Tuesday’s border crossing by North Korean soldiers was not immediately clear. The 155-mile-long, 2.5-mile-wide DMZ is the world’s most heavily armed border. An estimated 2 million mines are peppered inside and near the border, which is also guarded by barbed wire fences, tank traps and combat troops on both sides. It’s a legacy of the 1950-53 Korean War, which ended with an armistice, not a peace treaty. Animosities between the Koreas are running high now as North Korean leader Kim Jong Un continues to flaunt his military nuclear capabilities and align with Russia over President Vladimir Putin’s war on Ukraine. Kim is also ignoring calls by Seoul and Washington to resume denuclearization negotiations. Since his Jan. 20 inauguration, President Donald Trump has said he would reach out to Kim again to revive diplomacy. North Korea has not responded to Trump’s remarks and says U.S. hostilities against it have deepened since Trump’s inauguration. South Korea, meanwhile, is experiencing a leadership vacuum after the ouster of President Yoon Suk Yeol last week over his ill-fated imposition of martial law.

victory in his campaign to “take back” the Panama Canal from China could be on the rocks amid pushback from Beijing. The $23 billion sale involving two ports run by CK Hutchison, a private company based in the Chinese territory of Hong Kong, to a consortium led by the U.S. investment firm BlackRock had been scheduled to be signed last week. But an agreement between the two has been delayed under pressure from China, whose market regulator launched a review of the deal as state-run newspapers attacked it as undermining China’s national interests. NBC News takes a look at the sale and what it may mean politically and economically for the United States and China, the world’s two biggest economies. Why is it important? In his inaugural speech in January, Trump claimed without providing evidence that China controlled the 50-mile canal and vowed that the United States will take back the waterway, which he said was “vital” to national security. The Panamanian government has administered the U.S.-built canal since the United States relinquished it to the Central American country in 1999. Trump did not rule out military action, and he has directed the Defense Department to draw up plans to send more troops to Panama to “reclaim” the canal, through which 40% of U.S. trade passes.