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President Volodymyr Zelensky said Ukraine and Russia have agreed to carry out a large‑scale prisoner exchange involving 1,000 detainees on each side, marking a major humanitarian step amid the ongoing war.

The agreement was reached through US‑mediated negotiations, with preparations for the exchange already underway, Zelensky said on Friday in a post on Telegram.

“Ukraine is consistently working to return its people from Russian captivity,” Zelensky said, emphasizing that humanitarian considerations remain central to Ukraine’s position.

The exchange is expected to coincide with a temporary ceasefire from May 9 to May 11, days that align with Russia’s Victory Day celebrations.

Zelensky said Ukraine’s decisions regarding security and military posture are guided by a principle of reciprocity, but that the return of prisoners takes precedence.

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Frustrated by Iran, Trump at last seizes enriched uranium
Donald Trump has succeeded in removing a country’s stash of highly enriched uranium – although that country is not Iran.

On Friday, the US Department of Energy announced that “thanks to President Trump’s decisive leadership” 13.5kg (about 30 pounds) of uranium had been removed from a legacy research reactor in Venezuela.

The department called the joint operation, involving the UK, the US and Venezuela, “a win for America, Venezuela, and the world”.

“The safe removal of all enriched uranium from Venezuela sends another signal to the world of a restored and renewed Venezuela,” Brandon Williams, the administrator of the department’s National Nuclear Security Administration, said.

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A federal judge ruled on Thursday that the terminations of hundreds of humanities grants last year by the Trump administration’s so-called “department of government efficiency” (Doge) were unconstitutional and involved “blatant” discrimination. In April last year, Donald Trump’s administration terminated more than 1,400 grants, representing more than $100m in congressionally appropriated funds awarded to scholars, writers, research institutions and other humanities organizations.

The terminations were part of a cost-cutting drive that billionaire Elon Musk was leading at Doge.

“The Government engaged in blatant viewpoint discrimination,” the US district judge Colleen McMahon said in condemning what the Trump administration cast as a crackdown on diversity practices.

The judge said the terminations violated the US constitution’s first amendment, which provides free speech rights, and its fifth amendment’s equal protection component. The ruling also said Doge did not have the legal authority to terminate the grants.

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The US military on Friday said it struck a vessel in the eastern Pacific, killing two people and leaving one survivor in the latest attack on boats suspected of transporting narcotics. This brings the death toll from strikes on such vessels in the Caribbean and Pacific to more than 190 people since September.

A video posted by the US Southern Command shows the vessel traveling through the water being hit by what appears to be a missile. The screen momentarily goes black and then shows the boat engulfed in flames.

The Southern Command said, “the vessel was transiting along known narco-trafficking routes” and “was engaged in narco-trafficking operations”. It said the two people killed were men and that it notified the US Coast Guard to start a search and rescue for the sole survivor. No further details were divulged.

The military has attacked multiple alleged drug-running boats in the eastern Pacific in recent weeks, including a strike on Tuesday that killed three people. According to a tally by the Intercept, there have now been 58 such boat strikes since September amounting to a death toll of 193 people with four survivors.

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A Federal Bureau of Investigation agent interviewed a high-ranking Wisconsin state election official in recent days about the 2020 presidential election, according to sources with knowledge of the conversation.

The agent sat down with Wisconsin Elections Commission deputy administrator Robert Kehoe earlier this week and discussed with Kehoe how elections are carried out in Wisconsin and various election theories. Kehoe debunked false claims and clarified how elections work, according to the sources.

One of the sources called the conversation "a professional interview by a career FBI agent."

A spokeswoman for the FBI did not immediately respond to questions. A spokeswoman for the state Elections Commission declined to comment.

The interview comes at a time when Wisconsin and Milwaukee election officials are bracing for potential action from federal authorities over their administration of the 2020 election, which President Donald Trump falsely claims he won.

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Mysterious videos of darting black objects, renderings of flying ships, and eyewitness reports of unexplained lights are among the previously unseen files released by the Department of Defense, and President Donald Trump said some are “related to Alien and Extraterrestrial Life.”

The files published online Friday of unidentified anomalous phenomena (UAPs), previously known as UFOs, are to be released on a rolling basis “in the interest of total transparency,” the Pentagon said.

The release allows the general public to “make up their own minds about the information contained in these files,” the Pentagon said.

The files include government documents dating back to the 1940s, images taken from moon landings, astronaut transcripts, copies of eyewitness reports and news clips, as well as video and renderings of unexplained moving objects. Most of the files are dated before this year, though one video showing unidentified aircraft flying in an undisclosed location was listed as taken in January.

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A little over a year after President Donald Trump scolded him during a nationally televised Oval Office meeting, insisting he held “no cards,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is proving he holds a few after all.

Setbacks for Trump ally and Russian dictator Vladimir Putin and the world’s newfound appreciation for Ukraine’s drone-focused defense industry have given Zelenskyy a remarkable reversal of fortune and a much stronger position than Trump could have predicted 14 months ago.

In Moscow on Saturday, Putin, who expected to take control of Ukraine within days of his 2022 invasion, will instead oversee a Victory Day parade that is drastically scaled down out of fear of Ukrainian long-range drones and missiles. Russian airports were closed in the preceding days and cell service periodically shut off as security measures. Putin himself has cut back on public appearances over fears of assassination attempts or even a coup.

On the same day, 1,000 miles to the southwest, Putin’s biggest defender in Europe, Hungarian autocrat Viktor Orbán, will officially hand over power to a new prime minister, Peter Magyar, whose election last month has already opened the door to more European Union and NATO help for Ukraine.

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Virginia Democrats on Friday asked the state Supreme Court for a stay on its ruling that threw out last month’s referendum on redistricting in the commonwealth, signaling plans to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.

The state, Virginia’s House of Delegates Speaker Don Scott (D) and others filed a joint motion asking the state Supreme Court to “delay issuing its mandate” on the referendum, according to a copy obtained by The Hill. It also stated that they plan to file an emergency petition to the nation’s highest court.

“Today’s action is an imperative step in the process we promised to pursue to explore every available option to restore the will of the voters. We will continue moving through that process deliberately, responsibly, and with full respect for the voters who made their voices heard,” said Rae Pickett, spokesperson for Virginia Attorney General Jay Jones (D), in a statement shared with The Hill.

The Virginia court on Friday had issued a ruling that quashed a new map, narrowly approved by voters in a referendum last month, that would have given Democrats as many as four new pickup opportunities ahead of the midterms.

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