Global Express | October 5, 2026: Japan Summons US Ambassador Over Okinawa Killing Case

Source: Compiled from Al Jazeera, CNBC, BBC, Xinhua and others

1. Japan Summons US Ambassador Over Marine Arrested in Okinawa Killing

Japan has summoned the United States ambassador after an American Marine was arrested on suspicion of robbing and killing a woman. US Ambassador to Japan George Glass pledged 'full cooperation' with the investigation on Sunday.

The Marine, 20-year-old Lance-Corporal Devin Jacob Ballard, has denied the charges. The victim was 39-year-old Anna Yagi. According to Japanese media, CCTV footage showed a non-Japanese man entering a hotel room with the woman in the city of Naha, then leaving alone with what appeared to be her belongings. Police said her body was found in the room and she appeared to have been strangled.

Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi called the incident 'extremely brutal and heinous' and said her government had lodged a strong protest with the US side while demanding maximum cooperation. Defence Minister Shinjiro Koizumi said incidents involving US military personnel 'must never occur'. Newly elected Okinawa Governor Genta Koja told reporters the case was 'absolutely unforgivable' for residents long forced to live next to US bases.

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2. Spain's PM Sanchez Calls Snap Election for November 29

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez announced on October 5 that he is calling an early parliamentary election for November 29, after a conservative-dominated parliament rejected two housing decrees proposed by his minority left-wing government, triggering mass protests.

Parliament voted down the two decrees on Friday: one aimed at halting evictions of vulnerable people, curbing real-estate speculation and restricting short-term leases; the other making leases renew automatically and effectively indefinitely. The right-wing Catalan separatist party Junts, the centre-right People's Party and the far-right Vox all voted against them.

Protests erupted in late September after an 87-year-old woman in Madrid was evicted from the home she had lived in for 70 years, after an international investment fund bought her building and hiked the rent. Tens of thousands rallied across Spain at the weekend; police fired rubber bullets and tear gas in Valencia and arrested three members of a far-right group in Madrid. Average rents in Spain have almost doubled in a decade, making housing a sensitive issue for young voters.

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3. Samoa PM Apologises Over Nazi Salute Video

Samoa's Prime Minister La'auli Leuatea Schmidt apologised on October 5 after previously unseen video showed him leading a Nazi salute and saying 'Heil Hitler' at a family gathering. The clip was published a day earlier by the local newspaper the Samoa Observer.

The seven-second footage was recorded at a Schmidt family reunion on the island of Savai'i in July 2007, when he was an MP and deputy speaker of parliament. In it, he holds a microphone, leads a 'hip hip' exchange, then tells those present to raise their right hands and say 'Heil Hitler'; about a dozen people appear to follow him. Radio New Zealand said it independently verified the footage through its correspondent in Samoa.

Schmidt said on Monday that the words and gesture were inappropriate regardless of intent, and apologised for any offence. 'I reject Nazism, antisemitism, racism and all forms of political extremism,' he said. Schmidt, who became prime minister in 2025, has made strong public expressions of support for Israel and pledged to open a Samoan embassy in Jerusalem before the end of 2026.

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4. Ethiopian Forces Retake Mekelle as Tigray Fighting Resumes

Ethiopian federal forces and allied Tigray Peace Force fighters have retaken Tigray's regional capital Mekelle, reviving fears of another prolonged conflict. The Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF) confirmed on Saturday that it had withdrawn from the city, saying its regional administration would operate temporarily from elsewhere.

Government forces and allied fighters entered the city on Saturday, and a pro-government militia source, a humanitarian worker and a Mekelle resident confirmed to Reuters on Sunday that they were in control. The development comes less than four years after the Pretoria agreement ended two years of devastating fighting.

The 2020-22 war killed hundreds of thousands of people by some estimates and displaced millions. In July the TPLF said the Pretoria agreement had effectively collapsed, accusing the federal government of failing to implement key provisions; the government rejected that and accused the TPLF of undermining the deal. Analysts note the renewed conflict involves a wider set of actors, has spread into Afar, and has coincided with a sharp deterioration in Ethiopia-Eritrea relations, with the two countries closing embassies and severing diplomatic ties.

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5. Middle East Oil Exports Surpass Pre-War Levels, Data Shows

Provisional data from ship-tracking firm Kpler showed crude oil exports from the Middle East rose above pre-war levels on four of the seven days in the last week of September, climbing to 19.5-22.5 million barrels per day (bpd) on September 24 and between September 27 and 29.

But senior Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps commander Ali Fadavi said in a televised interview on Sunday night that only three to four million bpd are now moving through the US-supervised route in the Strait of Hormuz, dismissing the amount as 'negligible' compared with pre-war traffic. He said that, for the first time, no US vessels were present in the Gulf, the Strait of Hormuz, the Sea of Oman or the northern Indian Ocean, and that US warships are '100 percent vulnerable' to IRGC attacks.

The data showed total crude, oil products, chemicals and non-gas liquids averaged 22.4 million bpd in the seven days to September 30, with the seven-day moving average for crude exports at 18.5 million bpd on October 1. Before the US-Israel war on Iran, exports averaged 18 million bpd between March 2025 and February 2026. LNG cargoes exiting the Strait of Hormuz also rose in September to their highest monthly level since February. Iran's parliament speaker and top negotiator, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, said on Sunday the strait would remain closed until the US accepts Tehran's seven-day plan to reopen it.

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6. Japan's Century-Old Businesses Are Disappearing at a Record Pace

Bankruptcies among Japanese businesses more than 100 years old are occurring at a record pace, reaching 112 in the first eight months of 2026, according to Teikoku Databank. Experts say a shrinking domestic market, labor shortages, rising costs and succession challenges are testing these long-established firms.

Kadoya Sesame Mills, a sesame oil maker founded in 1858, is set to go private through a tender offer backed by Japanese private equity firm Integral, more than two decades after listing in 2004. Sube Shoten, a tofu maker founded in 1877 during the Meiji era, reportedly ceased operations in May and began preparing to file for bankruptcy.

In the first half of 2026, bankruptcies linked to higher prices rose 23.8% to 556, labor-shortage bankruptcies climbed 12.4% to 227, and bankruptcies linked to a lack of successors rose 16.9% to 312 year on year. Shigeto Nagai, head of Japan economics at Oxford Economics, said these century-old companies long thrived through family ownership, deep roots in local communities and a business approach that stays within their means, but increasingly fear they cannot foresee sustained high profits.

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7. Nearly 200 Under Observation in Russia Over Suspected Plague

Nearly 200 people have been placed under medical observation in Russia's Irkutsk region in eastern Siberia over suspected exposure to plague, according to local media. The reports said 189 people were being monitored after an employee at an anti-plague research institute fell ill. Alexei Tsydenov, head of the nearby Republic of Buryatia, said the woman had died from an unspecified form of plague.

Russia's public health watchdog Rospotrebnadzor said on Sunday that the employee had been diagnosed with 'pneumonia of unknown etiology' and that the sanitary and epidemiological situation in the Irkutsk region and the cities of Irkutsk and Shelekhov remained stable; expanded testing had not detected microorganisms linked to her work.

The update followed reports that a 27-year-old employee at the institute had fallen ill with suspected pneumonic plague after returning from a work trip to Buryatia. Axios reported on Sunday, citing a Trump administration official, that the White House was monitoring the suspected case and related quarantines, saying the administration was 'aware, monitoring the outbreak, and assessing options'. Russia's and Moscow's health ministries, the World Health Organization and the US State Department did not immediately respond to CNBC's requests for comment.

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8. France Closes Up to 500 Schools as Student Protests Continue

Up to 500 schools across France will be partially or totally closed on Monday after clashes between riot police and student protesters, the French education minister said on Sunday. Lessons will be 'totally or partly suspended' in some '400 to 500' high schools because security conditions 'have not been fulfilled', Edouard Geffray said, adding that 24 schools had been 'burned or ransacked' since the protests began.

Thousands of students have been demonstrating over education standards, and the protests, which started last week, have spread from Paris to cities including Montpellier, Nantes and Marseille. Pupils have objected to a lack of teachers, overcrowded classrooms and run-down buildings. On Friday, Justice Minister Gerald Darmanin said 735 of France's 3,700 schools had been affected 'one way or another' by violent protests.

The education minister warned Monday's figure could be comparable to Friday's but promised a 'partial, progressive return to lessons'. He said 'activists - particularly from the far-left' had infiltrated and hijacked the student movement and engaged in extreme violence, and that 78 education staff had been wounded, 'something we have never seen before'. Interior Minister Laurent Nunez said 1,747 people were arrested on Friday; AFP reported more than 5,000 arrests since the movement began, around 85% of them minors.

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9. Trump Forms 'Super Intelligence Force' Working Group

US President Donald Trump announced on October 4 the creation of a 'Super Intelligence Force' (SIF), to be led by Director of National Intelligence Jay Clayton, with the heads of the Federal Trade Commission, the Pentagon and the Office of Personnel Management taking part. The group will coordinate federal artificial intelligence matters and report to Trump and White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles.

Trump said the group's task is to coordinate federal government action, maintain US leadership in AI and protect the American people, engaging consumers, public-interest groups, religious organizations, critical-infrastructure providers and AI companies. Other officials helping lead it include FTC Chairman Andrew Ferguson, Pentagon Chief Technology Officer Emil Michael and OPM Director Scott Kupor.

The move follows a September 29 White House meeting at which Trump pushed major tech executives to sign the 'White House Superintelligence Agreement', signed by the heads of Google, Anthropic, Meta, OpenAI, xAI and Nvidia, committing them to a four-layer control and audit mechanism. The same day, Trump signed an executive order requiring federal agencies to use 'superintelligence' and 'SI' instead of 'artificial intelligence' and 'AI' in official communications, websites, reports and policy documents.

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10. Yemen Government Forces Counterattack Near Bab-el-Mandeb

A Yemeni government army official said on October 5 that government forces had launched a counteroffensive that day against Houthi positions controlling high ground around the strategic Bab-el-Mandeb strait, according to Xinhua. Wadah al-Dubaisi, a military spokesman for the West Coast Joint Forces, said that under air cover government forces advanced from several directions toward the Zubab area of south-western Taiz province and were fighting Houthi fighters occupying the high ground.

Al-Dubaisi said the operation was continuing, with the Saudi-led coalition providing air cover in support of ground troops. He said government forces, backed by local tribal fighters, had retaken several positions, cut a supply line used to send Houthi reinforcements toward Bab-el-Mandeb, and captured a number of Houthi fighters.

The same day, Rashad al-Alimi, head of Yemen's Presidential Leadership Council, declared a 'Yemen Dawn' operation to restore state institutions, liberate the capital Sanaa and end the Houthi rebellion. The Houthi-run Al-Masirah TV, citing a Houthi military source, denied any government advance in the Zubab direction, calling the reports 'completely false'.

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