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BUNIA, Congo (AP) — Residents of a town at the epicenter of the Ebola outbreak in eastern Congo attacked and burned part of a health center where people are being treated for the virus, and 18 people suspected of infection left the facility, a local hospital director said Saturday. It was the second such attack in the region in a week.

Unidentified people arrived at the clinic in Mongbwalu on Friday night and set fire to a tent set up for suspected and confirmed Ebola cases by the Doctors Without Borders humanitarian group, Dr. Richard Lokudi, director of the Mongbwalu General Reference Hospital, told The Associated Press.

“We strongly condemn this act, as it caused panic among the staff of the Mongbwalu Referral Hospital and also resulted in the escape of 18 suspected cases into the community,” he said.

On Thursday, another treatment center in the town of Rwampara was burned down after family members were prohibited from retrieving the body of a local man.

The bodies of those who died of Ebola can be highly contagious and lead to further spread when people prepare them for burial and gather for funerals. The dangerous work of burying suspected victims is being managed wherever possible by authorities, which can be met by protests from families and friends.

A burial for Ebola patients in Rwampara took place on Saturday under tight security as tensions between health workers and the local community ran high, said David Basima, a team leader with the Red Cross overseeing burials.

“Arriving at the (healthcare) structure, we experienced a lot of difficulties, including resistance from young people and the community. So we were forced to alert the authorities so that they could come to our aid, just for safety,” said Basima.

Authorities in northeastern Congo on Friday banned funeral wakes and gatherings of more than 50 people in an effort to curb the spread of the virus. The World Health Organization said that the outbreak now poses a “very high” risk for Congo — up from a previous categorization of “high” — but that the risk of the disease spreading globally remains low.

WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said Friday that 82 cases and seven deaths have been confirmed in Congo, but that the outbreak is believed to be “much larger.”

There is no available vaccine for the Bundibugyo virus, a rare type of Ebola, which spread undetected for weeks in Congo’s Ituri province following the first known death while authorities tested for another, more common, Ebola virus and came up negative. There are now 750 suspected cases and 177 suspected deaths, though more are expected as surveillance expands.

Dr. Jean Kaseya, director-general of the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said a response to the outbreak must include building trust with communities.

The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies said on Saturday that three of its volunteers had died from the outbreak in Mongbwalu. The agency said it believed the three healthcare workers contracted the virus while carrying out dead body management activities on March 27 as part of a humanitarian mission unrelated to Ebola.

This would significantly push back the timeline of the outbreak from the previous first confirmed death in late April in the town of Bunia, the capital of Ituri.

The international reaction to the current outbreak has been strong with the United States

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McMakin reported from Dakar, Senegal.

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KYIV, May 23 (Reuters) – The Ukrainian military said on Saturday it had struck Russia’s Sheskharis oil terminal – one of the largest on the Black Sea – and the nearby Grushova oil depot.

The overnight attack sparked a fire at the Sheskharis terminal, Ukraine’s general staff said on the Telegram app. It also said that a tanker named Chrysalis was hit in the Black Sea.

Ukraine has sharply increased the number and scale of its strikes on Russian oil refining and transportation facilities in recent months, seeking to reduce Russia’s revenues from oil and gas exports, which the Kremlin uses to finance its war.

The commander of Ukraine’s drone forces, Robert Brovdi, said on Saturday that in the first 23 days of May, Ukrainian drones had attacked 13 major Russian oil facilities.

Earlier this week, Brovdi said that six of Russia’s 10 largest oil refineries had stopped processing crude oil following Ukrainian attacks.

Reuters could not independently verify these claims.

CHEMICAL PLANT, VESSELS UNDER ATTACK

Zelenskiy said earlier on Saturday that Ukrainian drones had attacked a large Russian chemical plant, Metafrax Chemical, in the Perm region that supplied products to Russia’s military complex.

He said the plant had stopped operating after the attack.

In a separate message on Telegram, Brovdi said that on Saturday morning Ukrainian drones attacked a Russian military frigate and a hovercraft missile boat near the Novorossiysk naval base.

“The extent of the damage is unknown,” Brovdi added.

(Reporting by Daniel Flynn and Pavel Polityuk; Editing by Tomasz Janowski)

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DUBAI, May 23 (Reuters) – Iran’s top negotiator, Parliament Speaker Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf, told Pakistani army chief Asim Munir during talks in Tehran on Saturday that the U.S. was not an honest party in negotiations to end their war and Iran would not compromise on its national rights, state television reported.

A regional mediation push led by Pakistan aims to narrow differences between Iran and the U.S. after weeks of war that have left the vital waterway of the Strait of Hormuz closed to most shipping despite a nervous ceasefire, upending global energy markets.

Iranian state media reported that Munir had also met President Masoud Pezeshkian in the presence of Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi, with whom he had two meetings, before flying out.

The talks reportedly centred on a 14-point document proposed by Iran, which it considers the main framework for the discussions, and messages exchanged between the two sides.

Qalibaf said Iran would pursue its “legitimate rights”, both on the battlefield and through diplomacy, but added that it could not trust “a party that has no honesty at all”, an allegation Iran has made several times before.

He said Iran’s armed forces had rebuilt their capabilities during the ceasefire and that, if the United States “foolishly restarts the war”, the consequences would be “more forceful and bitter” than at the start of the conflict.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Friday that the United States has seen some progress towards a deal but that more work was required, while Iran’s foreign ministry said the differences remained deep and significant.

Despite weeks of conflict, Iran has preserved its stockpile of near-weapons-grade enriched uranium as well as missile, drone and proxy capabilities that the United States and Israel say they aim to curb.

(Reporting by Jana ChoukeirEditing by Tomasz Janowski and Kevin Liffey)

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DHAKA, May 23 (Reuters) – At least 86 children have died from confirmed measles infections in Bangladesh this year, and another 426 with symptoms consistent with the disease, health officials said on Saturday, as the country battles one of its worst outbreaks in decades.

Cases have spread rapidly in recent months, overwhelming hospitals and placing severe strain on already fragile healthcare services, particularly in rural districts and densely populated low-income urban areas.

Health authorities have identified 62,507 suspected measles cases nationwide as well as 8,494 laboratory-confirmed infections between March 15 and May 23, data from the Directorate General of Health Services showed.

Children under five are most vulnerable to severe infection and death, particularly those who have not been vaccinated or have only been partially immunized, health officials have said.

The World Health Organization said last month declining routine immunisation coverage had increased the risk of a large-scale outbreak.

Since then, the government has expanded emergency measles-rubella vaccination campaigns targeting young children.

The government says it has also deployed rapid response teams, strengthened disease surveillance and increased the distribution of vitamin A to reduce complications.

Measles is one of the world’s most contagious diseases but can largely be prevented through two doses of vaccine.

(Reporting by Ruma Paul, Editing by Andrew Heavens)

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ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (AP) — The United States and Iran are close to agreeing on a memorandum of understanding aimed at ending the war, two regional officials and a diplomat said Saturday, as the United States has weighed a new round of attacks on the Islamic Republic.

Iran signaled “narrowing differences” in negotiations with the U.S. after Pakistan’s army chief held more talks in Tehran, and U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio told journalists in India that “there’s been some progress made” and “there may be news later today.”

The officials and diplomat expressed hope that a final decision on the Pakistan-prepared draft could come within 48 hours as both sides review it. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief the media.

They said Vice President JD Vance and envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner played significant roles in helping bridge remaining gaps, and that Qatar played a key role by sending a senior official to Tehran to support Pakistan’s mediation efforts.

Still, both Iran and the U.S. emphasized their key positions and have warned of the risks of resuming attacks.

Iran state TV quoted Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmail Baghaei as describing the draft as a “framework agreement” and adding: “We want this to include the main issues required for ending the imposed war and other issues of essential importance to us. Then, over a reasonable time span, between 30 to 60 days, details are discussed and ultimately a final agreement is reached.”

He said the Strait of Hormuz is among the topics discussed.

Positions have moved closer in recent days, Iran’s official IRNA news agency quoted Baghaei as saying.

“Over the past week, the trend has been toward narrowing differences,” he said. “We will have to wait and see what happens over the next three or four days.”

Baghaei said nuclear issues are not part of the current negotiations, as Tehran first seeks to end the war before discussing its nuclear program that has long been at the heart of international tensions.

“Our focus at this stage is on ending the war on all fronts, including Lebanon,” Baghaei said, adding that lifting sanctions on Tehran “has explicitly been included in the text and remains our fixed position.”

Rubio, in New Delhi, said that “even as I speak to you now there is some work being done. There is a chance that whether it’s later today, tomorrow, in a couple days we may have something to say.”

Rubio repeated the U.S. stance that Iran can never have a nuclear weapon and must turn over its highly enriched uranium, and the Strait of Hormuz must be open.

Iran has rebuilt military assets after weeks of war and then a fragile ceasefire, parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf said after the meeting with Pakistan’s Field Marshal Asim Munir, state TV reported.

Qalibaf, the lead negotiator in historic face-to-face talks with the U.S. last month, also said the result would be “more crushing and more bitter” than at the start of the war if U.S. President Donald Trump resumes attacks.

Trump earlier said he was holding off on a military strike against Iran because “serious negotiations” were underway, and at the request of allies in the Middle East. Trump has repeatedly set deadlines for Tehran and then backed off.

The U.S. and Israel sparked the war with attacks on Feb. 28, cutting short talks with Iran. Tehran retaliated by effectively closing the Strait of Hormuz, a key waterway for the region’s oil, natural gas and fertilizer, causing global economic pain.

The U.S. then blockaded Iranian ports, and the U.S. Central Command on Saturday said U.S. forces had turned away more than 100 commercial vessels and disabled four since the blockade began April 13.

On his visit to Tehran, Pakistan’s army chief also met with Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, President Masoud Pezeshkian and other senior officials, the two officials said, adding that Islamabad continues efforts to arrange a second round of direct negotiations.

It was not clear whether Munir met with Brig. Gen. Ahmad Vahidi, who heads Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard, has become a major player in formulating Iran’s tough stance in talks.

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Lee reported from Washington.

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By Andrea Shalal

WASHINGTON, May 22 (Reuters) – Twenty-seven countries have moved since the Iran war started to put in place crisis instruments that could quickly access funding from existing World Bank programs, according to an internal document viewed by Reuters.

The World Bank document did not name the countries or the total amount of funds potentially being sought. The World Bank declined to comment.

The document showed that three countries had approved new instruments since the Middle East conflict began on February 28 while the others were still completing the process.

The war and resulting disruption of global energy markets have hit global supply chains and prevented vital fertilizer shipments from reaching developing countries.

Officials in Kenya and Iraq have confirmed they are seeking rapid financial support from the World Bank to deal with the war’s fallout such as surging fuel prices hitting the African nation to a massive drop in oil revenue for Iraq.

The 27 countries are among 101 that had access to some form of pre-arranged financing instrument that they could tap in a crisis, including 54 that signed up to the Rapid Response Option, which allows countries to use up to 10% of their undisbursed financing.

World Bank President Ajay Banga last month said the bank’s crisis toolkit would allow countries to draw on pre-arranged contingent financing, existing project balances and fast-disbursing instruments to access an estimated $20 billion to $25 billion.

He said the bank could also reorient parts of its portfolio to bring the total to $60 billion over six months, with further longer-term changes possible to bring the total to around $100 billion.

At the time, the head of the International Monetary Fund, Kristalina Georgieva, said she expected up to a dozen countries to seek $20 billion to $50 billion in near-term assistance from the global lender. But few requests have been logged, according to three sources familiar with the matter.

“Countries are definitely in wait-and-see mode,” said one of the sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Kevin Gallagher, director of the Global Development Policy Center at Boston University, said countries were more willing to seek World Bank funds than negotiate with the IMF because IMF programs generally require austerity measures that could compound the social unrest already seen in countries like Kenya.

(Reporting by Andrea Shalal; Editing by Cynthia Osterman)

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DAKAR, Senegal (AP) — Senegal ’s President Bassirou Diomaye Faye has fired Prime Minister Ousmane Sonko after months of simmering tension.

The decision was announced by the secretary general of the government, Oumar Samba Ba, during a late-night broadcast on Friday.

The firing caps a period of open confrontation between the two former allies from the Patriotes Africains du Sénégal pour le Travail, l’Éthique et la Fraternité (Pastef) party, who had defeated the former ruling party in March 2024.

Ba said the sacking of the prime minister led to the resignation of all the members of the government and its dissolution.

The Pastef party had ridden into office after a fierce campaign mounted against the then-ruling party Alliance pour la République following widespread speculation that former President Macky Sall wanted to use a 2016 constitutional change to revise his term in office.

Sall, who led the country between 2012 and 2024, eventually did not contest the election after violence erupted in the West African nation. The clashes between the security forces and supporters of Ousmane Sonko, the then-opposition leader, led to at least 16 deaths and left several people injured. Sall’s party lost the election in the first round.

Sonko, who heads the Pastef party, was barred from running after a defamation conviction was upheld by Senegal’s supreme court, and the Constitutional Court dismissed his candidacy. Faye ran instead of Sonko, and Sonko was appointed Prime Minister.

“Praise be to Allah. Tonight I will sleep with a light heart in the Keur Gorgui neighborhood,” Sonko wrote in a short post on X after his dismissal.

The past few months have led to open confrontation between the pair. Earlier this month, Faye said the former prime minister would only keep his job if he did it properly after criticism from Sonko. The two disagreed on key policies, including the negotiation of a loan from the International Monetary Fund.

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Adetayo reported from Abuja, Nigeria.

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NEW DELHI (AP) — U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio arrived in India on Saturday ahead of a meeting next week with his counterparts from India, Australia, and Japan, members of the Indo-Pacific strategic alliance known as the Quad.

The visit comes as Washington seeks to stabilize relations with India after ties soured over President Donald Trump’s tariff policies, which raised duties on several Indian exports.

Much of Rubio’s four-day visit, however, will focus on a multi-city tour, along with a gala reception in New Delhi marking the 250th anniversary of U.S. independence.

“There’s a lot to work on with India, they’re a great ally and partner. We do a lot of good work with them so this is an important trip,” Rubio said ahead of his visit to India.

Rubio arrived in eastern city of Kolkata early Saturday where he is later scheduled to visit Mother House, the headquarters of the Missionaries of Charity, founded by Mother Teresa. In coming days, he will also visit northern cities of Agra and Jaipur, known for iconic monuments and palaces.

He is also scheduled to hold a bilateral meeting with India’s External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar and is expected to call on Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

On Tuesday in New Delhi, Rubio will participate in the ministerial meeting of the Quad that has repeatedly accused China of flexing its military muscles in the South China Sea and aggressively pushing its maritime territorial claims.

Beijing maintains that its military is purely defensive to protect what it says are its sovereign rights and calls the Quad an attempt to contain its economic growth and influence.

After his inauguration in January last year, Rubio’s first formal international engagement was meeting with the foreign ministers of the other Quad countries, both jointly and in separate sessions.

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KAMPALA, Uganda (AP) — Boon-dee-BOO-joh.

Before it became the somewhat easy-to-mispronounce name of a rare type of Ebola virus, Bundibugyo is a mountainous district in western Uganda that even some locals would struggle to pinpoint on a map.

It’s home to roughly 200,000 people. Many are cocoa farmers who search for whatever cultivable land they can find in the impossibly steep landscape of hills and valleys marking Uganda’s border with Congo. As an example of the classic village idyll, Bundibugyo is a beautiful place.

Yet it now trends for an unpleasant reason, making some Ugandans rue Bundibugyo’s association with the current Ebola outbreak, which has infected hundreds of people in eastern Congo. There are 160 suspected Ebola deaths in two provinces.

The Ugandan district’s connection to the Bundibugyo virus stems from an Ebola outbreak there nearly two decades ago that was flagged as a new species of Ebola, a viral disease that usually manifests as hemorrhagic fever.

The outbreak wasn’t the Sudan virus, named for the area in present-day South Sudan where that type was first identified. It also wasn’t the type known as Zaire, as present-day Congo was known when Ebola — itself the name of a Congolese river — was first discovered in 1976.

So the November 2007 outbreak in a remote part of western Uganda came to be known as Bundibugyo, one that scientists even now haven’t studied as much. That is why Ebola specialists say it is particularly dangerous. Moreover, it was spreading in Congolese villages before health authorities there identified it as the cause of sickness in a growing number of people.

The 2007 outbreak in Bundibugyo killed at least 37 people but had been contained by the end of the year. A second outbreak of the Bundibugyo virus, also relatively small, came in 2012 in Congo’s northeast.

Initial cases in those outbreaks were identified early, allowing for a quick public health response, according to Dr. Tom Ksiazek, a University of Texas Medical Branch virologist who directed the group within the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that first identified the Bundibugyo virus.

This time, while there is no Ebola in Bundibugyo, a lingering connection to the picturesque Ugandan district is hurtful, said Ugandan government spokesman Alan Kasujja, who has urged global health authorities to clarify that Uganda isn’t the epicenter of the latest outbreak.

“Bundibugyo is too beautiful to be the name of a disease,” he said on X. “We need to take back its name from this madness.”

The World Health Organization is responsible for the taxonomic descriptions. As was seen with the global mpox outbreak — the disease’s name was changed in 2022 from monkeypox — the United Nations agency is sensitive to the use of descriptors or tags that may expose whole communities to stigmatization.

With Ebola, however, the trend has been to name viruses for the places where they were first identified.

Ugandan health authorities have experience dealing with Ebola, one reason they are adamant there is “no Ebola” in this East African country and want WHO to be more specific in its updates on the toll of the outbreak now deemed to be of global concern.

Uganda has reported only two cases, both Congolese nationals who traveled to Uganda before Congo declared an outbreak on May 15. One of them, a 59-year-old man, was admitted to a hospital in Kampala, the Ugandan capital, on May 11 and died three days later.

The second person, a woman about whom local authorities have said little, is being treated at a different Kampala hospital.

This outbreak is on “the Congo side” mainly, Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni said Thursday, urging local tourism authorities to fight the perception that Ebola is spreading in Uganda.

Museveni urged Ugandans to “stop shaking hands” as part of measures to avoid infection. He also ordered the postponement of an annual religious event that attracts thousands of pilgrims, from Congo and elsewhere, who converge around a Catholic basilica just outside Kampala by June 3.

Other measures announced Thursday include the suspension of all public transportation and flights between Congo and Uganda.

The risk stemming from cross-border commerce is high, said Dr. Emmanuel Batiibwe, who led efforts to stop an Ebola outbreak in 2022 that killed at least 55 people.

Stopping the current outbreak from spreading into Uganda will require “enhanced surveillance at all points of entry,” he said.

Uganda has had multiple Ebola outbreaks, including one in 2000 that killed more than 200 people. There was an outbreak in Kampala last year.

All available vaccines and treatments for Ebola don’t work for Bundibugyo patients. Tracing contacts and isolating them is seen as especially key to stopping the spread of this virus, in addition to getting healthcare workers proper protective equipment.

A family of fruit bats is believed to be the natural hosts of the viruses that cause Ebola, according to WHO. Ebola is spread by contact with the bodily fluids of an infected person or contaminated materials.

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BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) — An Argentine who spent 448 days imprisoned in Venezuela called Friday for the international community to increase pressure on the government of interim Venezuelan President Delcy Rodríguez to release other prisoners.

The 35-year-old Nahuel Gallo was released March 1 after being detained on espionage accusations brought by the government of now-ousted President Nicolás Maduro.

“I think we’re still imprisoned until our fellow inmates are freed,” Gallo told The Associated Press.

During nearly 15 months in detention, Gallo said he endured beatings, limited medical care and constant psychological pressure inside Rodeo I.

As acting president since Maduro’s capture by U.S. forces in January, Rodríguez has promised democratic reforms and the Venezuelan government has previously denied reports of abuses in prisons. Critics, however, say hundreds remain jailed for political reasons.

For Gallo, those detentions show Venezuela’s repressive system remains intact.

On Thursday, Gallo met in Buenos Aires with U.S. Ambassador to Argentina Peter Lamelas, who said in a statement that “the Maduro regime in Venezuela used the arbitrary detention of foreign citizens as a tool of political repression.”

This week, National Assembly President Jorge Rodríguez — the interim president’s brother — announced plans to release 300 detainees, some of which rights groups consider politically based.

Gallo was arrested Dec. 8, 2024, while attempting to enter Venezuela to visit his Venezuelan partner, María Alexandra Gómez García, and their son, who was then less than 2 years old.

At an immigration checkpoint, Venezuelan authorities searched his phone and found WhatsApp conversations with his partner about Venezuela’s political and economic situation.

“You’re criticizing my president,” Gallo recalled officers telling him.

He was then transferred to the General Directorate of Military Counterintelligence, where he said he was handcuffed, beaten and kicked during interrogations.

Afterward, he was forced into a truck, where agents continued interrogating him after finding contacts linked to Argentine judicial agencies on his cellphone.

“You are a spy. You work for the government,” he recalled them saying while threatening to throw him from the vehicle, pressing a gun against his head and pointing a Taser at him.

Nearly three weeks after his arrest, then-Venezuelan Attorney General Tarek William Saab accused Gallo of participating in “terrorist actions” against Venezuela.

During the nearly 15 months he spent at Rodeo I, Gallo said he had no contact with Argentine officials and no information about whether negotiations for his release were underway.

Gallo described harsh conditions inside the prison. Medical care was limited. Detainees had only a few minutes each day to bathe, wash clothes and use the bathroom. Inmates were frequently sprayed with pepper spray.

As a foreigner, he was not allowed to receive visits. The first time he spoke with his wife came after a year in detention and only after he launched a hunger strike.

The memories that still haunt him are of guards beating prisoners in nearby cells.

“I think the greatest torture is seeing something being done to someone else and not being able to do anything,” Gallo said.

He now uses social media to denounce conditions in Venezuelan prisons and advocate for those still detained.

“The person who’s still inside is waiting for the one who got out to do something,” he said.

Gallo still remembers what fellow inmates told him as he left Rodeo I: “Gallo, don’t forget about us.”

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Follow AP’s Latin America coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/latin-america

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