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President Vladimir Putin made his first visit to the Kuril Islands, the Pacific chain Russia seized in 1945 and Japan still claims, prompting a formal protest from Tokyo.

It comes as Taiwan reported that an AI-built hacking tool breached its government agencies, and as NATO jets shot down a drone over Latvia.

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1️⃣ 🇱🇻🇷🇺 NATO jets shoot down a drone over Latvia: Latvia's armed forces said the drone had entered the country's airspace as a result of Russian electromagnetic warfare and was intercepted over the Balvi region in the east, and that additional air defence units have been sent to the eastern border. NATO allies met on Wednesday over a series of recent incursions along the alliance's eastern flank, saying Russia bore full responsibility for the airspace violations.

2️⃣ 🇺🇸 Alarm over a carrier at sea for 250 days: Senator Richard Blumenthal wrote to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth listing shortages of basic supplies, water contamination, plumbing problems and deteriorating mental health among the roughly 5,000 people aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln, which left California in November on a deployment originally due to end in May. Hegseth called the reports "completely misrepresented", and the Navy is preparing to replace the carrier.

3️⃣ 🇺🇦 Zelenskyy asks for a slice of America's Patriot stockpile: Zelenskyy told CNN that Ukraine needs at least 5% of the US stock of Patriot interceptors to get through winter, as Russian strikes set port infrastructure alight at Izmail and a drone destroyed a passenger train locomotive in the Odesa region carrying 340 people, killing two crew. The UN said at least 437 civilians were killed in Ukraine in July, the highest monthly toll since May 2022.

4️⃣ 🇹🇼🇨🇳 Taiwan hit by an AI-built hacking tool: Taiwan's Ministry of Digital Affairs said the attack on government agencies began on 20 July, and the Israeli company Dream, which detected it, told the Financial Times the attackers had used open-source AI agents to build an autonomous hacking tool that behaved like a coordinated team. Dream said the use of Simplified Chinese internally meant the operator was probably linked to China, though Taipei made no accusation.

5️⃣ 🇺🇸 Trump lets private firms launch cyber-attacks: The national security presidential memorandum directs the administration to "leverage the capability and innovation of the private sector" against what it calls transnational criminal organisations, authorising "limited cyber operations at the direction of the US government". Vetted firms would conduct surveillance and "cyber effects operations", including the disruption or destruction of networks, and must hold a bond of at least $1m.

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Major Story

🇷🇺🇯🇵 Putin visits the Kurils and Japan protests:

President Vladimir Putin has paid his first-ever visit to the Kuril Islands, the Pacific chain administered by Russia and claimed by Japan, meeting the regional governor and touring a fish-processing plant, a hospital and a school on Iturup.

Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi called the visit "absolutely unacceptable" and said it "offends the sentiments of the Japanese people", while Foreign Minister Toshimitsu Motegi summoned the Russian ambassador to protest.

Japan claims the four southernmost islands, which it calls the Northern Territories, as "an inherent part of Japan's territory both historically and under international law" in Motegi's words.

The islands were seized by the Soviet Union in 1945 and their Japanese population of about 17,000 deported, and roughly 20,000 Russian citizens live there now.

Putin, who travelled from Sakhalin where the Russian navy was holding drills, called Japan's sanctions "unprovoked" and said "we are not threatening Japan", adding that "on the contrary, it has territorial claims against our country".

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1️⃣ 🇲🇱 Mali separatists free 82 soldiers: The Malian armed forces said the freed soldiers were safe, and Azawad Liberation Front spokesperson Mohamed Elmaouloud Ramadane said they had been released on humanitarian grounds, with some held since 2023 and around 118 still captive. The release came the same day Mali's president pardoned a French national sentenced to 20 years over an alleged plot to destabilise the country.

2️⃣ 🇰🇵🇰🇷 North Korea threatens a new deterrent over US drills: A North Korean foreign ministry spokesperson said US, Japanese and South Korean military cooperation was turning into a nuclear alliance, and that Pyongyang would answer "a new level of a threat with a new level of a deterrent". The Ulchi Freedom Shield exercises run from 17 to 27 August with 18,000 South Korean troops, and will include drills against drones, GPS disruption and cyberattacks.

3️⃣ 🌍 El Niño on course to be the strongest on record: NOAA now puts the odds at nearly 70% that this will exceed the 1982-83 event, with sea surface temperature anomalies passing 2.5C above average over a three-month period, in records dating to 1950. Climate scientist Daniel Swain called it "a genuinely remarkable event", and forecasters say it is virtually certain that 2027 will be the hottest year on record.

4️⃣ 🇪🇺🇪🇸 EU sends experts to Ceuta as another crossing is feared: A European Commission spokesperson said the mission was to understand needs on the ground, but declined to say whether it covered preparations for a fresh influx, adding that "for us it's not about a specific date". Around 80,000 people crossed into the enclave in the last two days of July, and the digital intelligence firm Golden Owl said calls for a 15 August crossing had largely disappeared from Facebook.

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