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Thousands of visitors streamed through the Grand Egyptian Museum on Tuesday as almost the entire collection of King Tutankhamun’s treasures — over 4,500 artefacts — was displayed together for the first time since the young pharaoh’s tomb was discovered in 1922.Curated and conserved over nearly two decades, the collection was unveiled to the public two days after the museum’s lavish opening ceremony on Saturday. In a vast, dimly lit main hall spanning four levels, visitors gazed at chariots, household items, jewelled ornaments and, at the centre, Tutankhamun’s iconic golden mask.The mask sits surrounded by personal belongings, gilded tools, family heirlooms and funerary statues. An adjacent room showcases two small mummified princesses — Tutankhamun’s daughters who died before birth — also on public display for the first time. Tutankhamun died aged 18 or 19 between 1323 and 1324 BC, with genetic and radiological studies suggesting malaria combined with a bone disorder as his cause of death. He was mummified and buried in Luxor’s Valley of the Kings inside three nested coffins, the smallest weighing 110kg, all placed within four gilded shrines like matryoshka dolls. While the coffins are now at the museum, the mummy remains in Luxor. Visitors can also see the Khufu Sun Boat, described as the oldest and largest wooden artefact in human history, while a second solar boat is being restored. These 4,600-year-old funerary boats, made of cedar and acacia, were intended to transport the king into the afterlife. The first, measuring 43.5 meters, was discovered in 1954 at the base of the Great Pyramid; the second will soon be displayed behind glass in a live restoration lab. The museum, a monumental structure overlooking the Giza Plateau, contrasts sharply with the colonial-era, cramped Egyptian Museum in central Cairo. Natural light filters through vast triangular windows, illuminating both colossal statues and delicate jewellery from Egypt’s ancient civilisation. President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi officially opened the $1-billion museum on Saturday in a ceremony attended by kings, queens, heads of state and other dignitaries. Egypt hopes the museum will revive tourism and bolster its economy. Egyptian Tourism Minister Sherif Fathy expects five million annual visitors, which would make it among the most visited museums in the world.So far, he said, it had welcomed 5,000–6,000 visitors each day.

LIV Golf will abandon its abbreviated 54-hole format in favor of 72-hole tournaments in 2026, officials said Tuesday.The Saudi-backed circuit, whose name is derived from the Roman numeral for ’54’, had previously touted its three-round tournaments as a core distinction from traditional golf events.However the 54-hole format prevented LIV events from earning Official Golf World Rankings points, making it harder for LIV players to qualify for golf’s majors.A statement from LIV on Tuesday said the circuit’s events will now be played over four days, with most starting on a Thursday.”As we enter our fourth season as a League, the move to 72 holes marks a pivotal new chapter for LIV Golf that strengthens our League, challenges our elite field of players,” LIV Golf chief executive Scott O’Neil said.”The most successful leagues around the world …continue to innovate and evolve their product, and as an emerging league, we are no different,” O’Neil added. “LIV Golf will always have an eye towards progress that acts in the best interest of LIV Golf and in the best interest of the sport.”The decision to adopt the 72-hole format also boosts the chances of LIV reaching an agreement with the PGA Tour over unifying golf. The two circuit’s different formats had reportedly been a key stumbling block in ongoing negotiations.The circuit’s decision was welcomed by LIV’s biggest stars, with former world number one Jon Rahm describing it as “a win for the League and the players.””We are competitors to the core and we want every opportunity to compete at the highest level and to perfect our craft,” Rahm said in a statement.Two-time major champion Bryson DeChambeau said he hoped the move would enable more LIV players to compete in majors.”Everyone wants to see the best players in the world competing against each other, especially in the majors, and for the good of the game, we need a path forward,” DeChambeau said.”By moving to 72 holes, LIV Golf is taking a proactive step to align with the historic format recognized globally.”Launched in 2022, LIV Golf divided the sport after signing a slew of golf’s biggest names to big-money deals including Rahm, DeChambeau and Dustin Johnson.The 2026 LIV Golf season tees off in Riyadh in February.

Sudan’s defence minister said on Tuesday that the army would press on with its fight against the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces after the country’s security and defence council met to discuss a US proposal for a ceasefire. “We thank the Trump administration for its efforts and proposals to achieve peace,” Hassan Kabroun said in a speech broadcast on state television, while adding that “preparations for the Sudanese people’s battle are ongoing.” “Our preparations for war are a legitimate national right,” he said following the council meeting in Khartoum.No details of the US truce proposal have been made public.White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters on Tuesday that Washington wanted “to see this conflict come to a peaceful end, just as we have with so many others, but the reality is it’s a very complicated situation on the ground right now”.She said the United States was “actively engaged” in seeking a peace deal alongside Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the UAE.The war in Sudan, which has killed tens of thousands of people and displaced millions more over the past two years, has spread to new areas in recent days, sparking fears of an even greater humanitarian catastrophe.The army-aligned authorities had rejected an earlier truce proposal from the four countries — referred to as the Quad — under which both they and the paramilitaries they are fighting would be excluded from a transitional political process.The latest discussions follow an escalation on the ground, with the paramilitary RSF appearing to prepare an assault on the central Kordofan region after capturing El-Fasher, the last army stronghold in the vast western Darfur region.People forced to flee El-Fasher have described facing intimidation and violence from the RSF.Mohamed Abdullah, 56, told AFP he was stopped by RSF fighters while leaving the city last week the day before its fall on October 26. “They demanded our phones, money, everything. They kept searching us thoroughly,” he said of the RSF. On his way to Tawila, about 70 kilometres (43 miles) to the west, he saw “a body left on the street that looked like it had been eaten by a dog”.- ‘Out of control’ -Trump’s envoy to Africa, Massad Boulos, held talks in Sudan’s neighbour Egypt on Sunday with Cairo’s Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty, and then on Monday with the Arab League.During their discussions, Abdelatty stressed “the importance of concerted efforts to reach a humanitarian truce and a ceasefire throughout Sudan, paving the way for a comprehensive political process in the country”, according to a foreign ministry statement.According to the Arab League, Boulos met the regional body’s chief Ahmed Aboul-Gheit and briefed him on recent US efforts in Sudan to “halt the war, expedite aid delivery and initiate a political process”.The Quad has been engaged in months of diplomacy aimed at securing a truce in the more than 30-month conflict in Sudan.In September, the four powers proposed a three-month humanitarian truce, followed by a permanent ceasefire and a nine-month transition to civilian rule, but the army-aligned government immediately rejected the plan at the time.In the aftermath of the RSF’s assault on El-Fasher, reports emerged of mass killings, sexual violence, attacks on aid workers, looting and abductions during the offensive.The International Criminal Court on Monday voiced “profound alarm and deepest concern” over the reports, adding that such acts “may constitute war crimes and crimes against humanity”.Speaking at a forum in Qatar, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called on the warring parties Tuesday to “come to the negotiating table, bring an end to this nightmare of violence — now”. – ‘Do not kill children’ -In Sudan’s capital Khartoum, which is under army control, children took part in an anti-paramilitary protest on Monday.One pupil held up a handwritten sign that read: “Do not kill children, do not kill women.””The militia is killing the women of El-Fasher with no mercy,” another sign said.Both sides in the war have been accused of committing atrocities.The UAE is accused by the UN of supplying arms to the RSF — allegations it has repeatedly denied. Meanwhile, the Sudanese army has received support from Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Iran, according to observers.The fall of El-Fasher gave paramilitaries control over all five state capitals in Darfur, raising fears that Sudan would effectively be partitioned along an east-west axis.The RSF now dominates Darfur and parts of the south, while the army holds the north, east and central regions along the Nile and Red Sea.

Dick Cheney, arguably the most powerful vice president in US history as George W. Bush’s number two during the September 11, 2001, attacks and ensuing wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, died Monday. He was 84.Cheney forged an influential role in the traditionally inconsequential job and was a major power behind the throne as Bush thrust the United States into the so-called “war on terror,” with a dark underbelly of renditions, torture and the Guantanamo prison site.A hated figure by many on the left, he made a remarkable pivot toward the end of his life when he opposed Donald Trump’s ultimately successful campaign to return to the White House in 2024.Cheney’s daughter Liz Cheney, a former congresswoman from Wyoming, said her deeply Republican father had voted for Trump’s Democratic opponent Kamala Harris.Cheney, also a former congressman and defense secretary, “died due to complications of pneumonia and cardiac and vascular disease,” according to a family statement.As 46th vice president, Cheney served for two terms between 2001 and 2009.The job is often frustrating for ambitious politicians, but Cheney’s Machiavellian skills gave him considerable sway.He helped usher in an aggressive notion of executive power, believing the president should be able to operate almost unfettered by lawmakers or the courts, particularly during wartime.It was an approach that saw Bush enter military quagmires in Afghanistan and Iraq, and prompt major controversy over his impact on civil liberties.Bush on Tuesday hailed his former vice president as “among the finest public servants of his generation” and “the one I needed” when in the White House.Cheney was “a patriot who brought integrity, high intelligence and seriousness of purpose to every position he held,” Bush added.White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt pointedly offered no condolences when asked Tuesday about Cheney’s death.Trump “is aware of the former vice president’s passing,” she told a briefing, noting White House flags had been lowered to half staff “in accordance with statutory law.”- Neo-con -Born in Lincoln, Nebraska, on January 30, 1941, Cheney grew up mostly in the sparsely populated western state of Wyoming.He attended Yale University but dropped out of the prestigious East Coast school and ended up earning a degree in political science back home at the University of Wyoming.He spent ten years in Congress as a representative for Wyoming before being appointed defense secretary by George H.W. Bush in 1989.Cheney presided over the Pentagon during the 1990-91 Gulf War, in which a US-led coalition evicted Iraqi troops from Kuwait.As vice president, Cheney brought his neo-conservative ideology to the White House and played a greater role in making major policy decisions than many of his predecessors in the role.Cheney was one of the driving forces behind the decision to invade Iraq following the September 11, 2001, attacks by Al-Qaeda on New York and Washington.His inaccurate claims that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction fueled the drumbeat for war ahead of the 2003 US invasion.Seen as Bush’s mentor on foreign policy, Cheney remained loyal to his former boss and a staunch defender of Bush-era policies.In a 2015 interview, Cheney said he had no regrets over the 2003 invasion of Iraq, and credited a so-called “enhanced interrogation program” for the successful hunt for Al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden, who was killed by US forces in 2011. Despite a preference for privacy, Cheney was rarely out of the headlines.He once hurled an expletive at a Democratic senator on the Senate floor and infamously accidently shot his friend Harry Whittington in the face during a hunting trip.His professional life was punctuated by a series of health scares — he suffered five heart attacks between 1978 and 2010, including one in 2000, the year he and Bush were elected to the White House.He underwent quadruple bypass surgery and had a pacemaker fitted in 2001, which was later replaced.

Dick Cheney achieved influence unrivaled for a vice president in shaping US foreign policy, ruthlessly pursuing military might and advocating pre-emptive war to reshape the world.The descent of Cheney, who died Tuesday, was also spectacular. His hawkish brand of neoconservatism, including the invasion of Iraq, began to be repudiated even before he left office, and today both major US parties largely reject his views.With America shellshocked by the September 11, 2001 attack, Cheney — his grim demeanor accentuated when he spoke from dark bunkers — advocated a doctrine of pre-emptive strikes, with the United States attacking first before threats materialize, toppling hostile regimes if needed.Cheney also led the shattering of Western norms on treatment of prisoners, indefinitely jailing terrorism suspects without charges and approving “enhanced interrogation” techniques such as waterboarding that are widely considered torture.Cheney, a veteran Washington insider with no ambition to be president himself, quickly towered over the less experienced commander-in-chief, George W. Bush.”It would be hard to argue that he was not the most influential vice president,” said Aaron Mannes, a scholar of the American vice presidency who lectures at the University of Maryland School of Public Policy.Cheney gained clout by focusing narrowly on national security and enabled Bush by “pushing an open door.””There were a lot of stories of him being a sort of secret president — the Darth Vader — running everything. I’m not sure that’s true,” Mannes said. “It was more a matter of where he put his weight.” – Iraq bloodshed -The decision to invade Iraq still reverberates across the Middle East and haunts American foreign policy.Hundreds of thousands of civilians, as well as more than 4,000 US troops, died as the United States toppled Saddam Hussein and the country descended into sectarian bloodshed.Cheney by the end of his 2001-2009 term began to lose policy debates.Bush sided with his secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, and pursued diplomatic options such as talks with North Korea defying Cheney’s motto, “We don’t negotiate with evil; we defeat it.”Democrat Barack Obama swept to power rejecting Cheney’s worldview, offering an outstretched hand to those who “unclench your fist.”Less expected, Cheney’s Republican Party shifted direction, as many veterans came home to struggling communities and drug addiction.Donald Trump last year called Cheney “the King of Endless, Nonsensical Wars, wasting Lives and Trillions of Dollars,” though as president he has been eager to exert the swagger of force himself.In another turn that would have been unthinkable when Cheney was vice president and a hate figure for Democrats, he said he voted for Democrat Kamala Harris last year over Trump.He joined his daughter, former congresswoman Liz Cheney, who unlike many Republicans has spared no words in criticizing Trump as anti-democratic.Danielle Pletka, a senior fellow at the conservative American Enterprise Institute who backed the Iraq war, nonetheless said she believed Americans still backed Dick Cheney’s idea that a “strong America is a power for good in the world.””And I don’t think Donald Trump would disagree with that characterization of his own stance,” she said.- Never prosecuted -Obama vowed on taking office that the United States “does not torture” but also decided not to prosecute anyone, hoping to turn the page.The prison for indefinite detentions on Guantanamo Bay, Cuba — which Obama wanted to close within a year — remains open a decade and a half later, although with far fewer inmates.Sarah Yager, Washington director of Human Rights Watch, which long urged an investigation against Cheney, said the US breaking of norms emboldened other nations to torture.She also pointed to allegations of mistreatment of migrants sent by Trump to El Salvador.”There is a direct line from Vice President Cheney to the torture that the US is now complicit in in El Salvador,” she said.”It’s really a shame that accountability never closed the door for the United States on torture.”

Iran has released from prison a French pair held for more than three years and sentenced to lengthy jail sentences on espionage charges their families always rejected, French President Emmanuel Macron announced on Tuesday.Cecile Kohler, 41, and Jacques Paris, 72 — she a high school teacher, he a retired teacher, both on a tourist visit to Iran when they were arrested in May 2022 — are now “on their way to the French embassy in Tehran”, Macron said on X.He welcomed this “first step” and said talks were underway to ensure their return to France as “quickly as possible”.French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot added in a separate post on X that they were now at the residence of the French ambassador and “awaiting their definitive release” from Iran. Their Paris-based legal team said in a statement to AFP that the release had “ended their arbitrary detention which lasted 1,277 days”.Their release comes at a time of acute sensitivity in dealings between Tehran and the West in the wake of Israel’s 12-day June war against the Islamic republic and the reimposition of UN sanctions in the standoff over the Iranian nuclear drive.- ‘State hostages’ -Kohler and Paris were among a number of Europeans still held by Iran in what several European governments, including France, describe as a deliberate strategy of hostage-taking by Tehran to extract concessions from the West.France has described them as “state hostages”.Kohler and Paris were the last two French citizens officially known to be held by Tehran after several other French nationals were released over the last months.Their sentences on charges of spying for France and Israel issued last month after a closed door trial amounted to 17 years in prison for Jacques Paris and 20 years for Cecile Kohler.The families insisted they are wholly innocent and were only visiting Iran as tourists.Kohler was shown in October 2022 on Iranian television in what activists described as a “forced confession”, a practice relatively common for detainees in Iran which rights groups say is equivalent to torture.France had filed a case with the Hague-based International Court of Justice over the couple’s detention, saying they were held under a policy that “targets French nationals travelling in or visiting Iran”.But in September, the ICJ suddenly dropped the case at France’s request, causing disappointment among the families but also sparking speculation that closed-door talks were underway between France and Iran for their release.Iran, which has previously carried out exchanges of Westerners for Iranians held by the West, has previously said the couple could be freed as part of a swap deal with France, which would also see the release of Iranian Mahdieh Esfandiari. Esfandiari was arrested in France in February on charges of promoting terrorism on social media, according to French authorities. She is to go on trial in Paris from January 13 but was last month released on bail by the French judicial authorities in a move welcomed by Tehran.

Cement conglomerate Lafarge went on trial in France Tuesday, accused of paying the Islamic State group and other jihadists protection money to build its business in war-torn Syria.In a similar case in the United States, the French firm pleaded guilty to conspiring to provide material support to US-designated “terrorist” organisations and agreed to pay a $778-million fine, in what was the first time a corporation had faced the charge.In the French trial, Lafarge — which has since been acquired by Swiss conglomerate Holcim — is accused of paying millions of dollars in 2013 and 2014, via its subsidiary Lafarge Cement Syria (LCS), to jihadist groups and intermediaries to keep its plant operating in northern Syria.Groups it allegedly paid include the Islamic State group (IS) and Syria’s then Al-Qaeda affiliate Jabhat al-Nusra.Defendants include Lafarge, its former chief Bruno Lafont, five ex-members of operational and security staff, and two Syrian intermediaries.One of the Syrians was not present and is subject to an international arrest warrant.The defendants were accused of “funding terrorism” and violating international sanctions at the start of the trial.Lafarge could face a fine of up to $1.2 million if found guilty of “funding terrorism” and much more if found to have breached sanctions.Holcim, which took over Lafarge in 2015, has said it had no knowledge of the Syria  dealings.- Syrian staff left behind -Lafarge finished building a $680-million factory in Jalabiya in 2010, before Syria’s civil war erupted in March the following year amid opposition to then-president Bashar al-Assad’s brutal repression of anti-government protests.Foreign groups and powers also became involved and IS jihadists gained ground from 2013. They seized large swathes of Syria and neighbouring Iraq in 2014, declaring a so-called cross-border “caliphate”.They implemented their brutal interpretation of Islamic law, carrying out public executions, cutting off the hands of thieves, and selling women from the Yazidi minority as sex slaves.While other multinational companies left Syria in 2012, Lafarge evacuated only its expatriate employees and left its Syrian staff in place until September 2014, when IS seized control of the factory.In 2013 and 2014, LCS allegedly paid intermediaries to access raw materials from IS and other groups and to allow free movement for the company’s trucks and employees.Kurdish-led Syrian fighters, backed by the air power of a US-led coalition, defeated IS and its proto-state in 2019.- Crimes against humanity? -An inquiry was opened in France in 2017 after several media reports and two legal complaints in 2016, one from the finance ministry for the alleged breaching of an economic sanction and another from non-governmental groups and 11 former LCS staff members over alleged “funding of terrorism”.The Paris trial is scheduled to last until December 16.In the US case, the Justice Department said Lafarge sought IS help to squeeze out competitors, operating an effective “revenue sharing agreement” with them.Lafont, who was chief executive from 2007 to 2015 when Lafarge merged with Holcim, at the time denounced the inquiry as “biased”.Another French investigation into Lafarge’s alleged complicity with crimes against humanity is ongoing.In the United States, around 430 Americans of Yazidi background and Nobel laureate Nadia Murad have filed a civil suit accusing the group of supporting brutal attacks on the population through a conspiracy with IS.

With replicas of missiles on display and effigies of Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu hanging from a crane, thousands of Iranians commemorated on Tuesday the 1979 storming of the US embassy in Tehran. Five months after a brief war with Israel that saw the US join in with strikes on key nuclear facilities, demonstrators chanted “Death to America, death to Israel!” and sang revolutionary songs in a particularly charged outing for the annual event. Though the commemorations are held annually, “this year, the country is under a bit of pressure” from its two arch foes, said student Mohammad Hossein, 15, standing next to a friend whose shoes bore the trademark swoosh of American apparel giant Nike. “We must be more visible this year so that the authorities, the army and others can feel at ease and know that we are behind them,” he added.Throughout the day, US and Israeli flags were burned and trampled, and participants dressed as Israeli soldiers pretended to mourn over fake coffins draped with the Star of David, mocking the country’s losses in Gaza. The swinging effigies of Trump and Netanyahu, meanwhile, called to mind the public executions sometimes carried out by Iran. “America’s hostility towards us will never end,” said Malek, 57, a labourer who declined to give his full name, adding “America’s job is to deceive”.In mid-June, Israel launched an unprecedented wave of air strikes on targets across Iran, including military sites, nuclear facilities and residential areas, killing dozens of senior officials and scientists. Over the course of the 12-day war that followed, Washington joined its ally in striking three nuclear sites, despite having been involved in ongoing talks with Tehran over its atomic programme. – Missiles and centrifuges -“Our feeling is much different (this year) because our country has been seriously attacked,” said Sareh Habibi, a 17-year-old student. “Our peers, teenagers and the youth, were martyred, and somehow it seems like a mission on our shoulders to come” to the demonstration, she added.Along the parade route, replicas of missiles — similar to the ones fired at Israeli cities during the war — were displayed bearing the slogan “We love to fight the Israeli regime”. Mock uranium centrifuges were also set out, a nod to Iran’s insistence on its right to develop a civilian nuclear programme despite Western suspicions it is seeking a bomb — an accusation Tehran denies. According to state media, similar commemorations took place in several other cities, including Mashhad in the northeast, Kerman in the south and Rasht in the north.Some participants carried portraits of Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, while others hoisted the image of Hassan Nasrallah, the longtime leader of the Iran-backed Lebanese militant group Hezbollah who was killed in an Israeli strike last year.On November 4, 1979, less than nine months after the overthrow of Iran’s monarchy and the establishment of the current Islamic republic, a group of students stormed the US embassy in Tehran, deeming it a “nest of spies”.Several dozen American diplomats were held hostage, some for 444 days, marking a break between Tehran and Washington, which were previously allies. The animosity has persisted for decades, and Khamenei ruled out on Monday any cooperation with the United States until Washington changed its policy towards the region, including its support for Israel.