UNITED STATES: President Donald Trump said today that he will double his planned tariffs on steel and aluminum from 25 per cent to 50 per cent for Canada, escalating a trade war with the country’s northern neighbour.

President Trump posted to Truth Social that the increase of the tariffs set to take effect on Wednesday is a response to the price increases that the provincial government of Ontario put on electricity sold to the US.

The US stock market plummeted following the announcement.

SERBIA: Several hundred student protesters blocked Serbia’s public television station building in Belgrade today as tensions soar in the Balkan country, days ahead of a large rally planned for the weekend and billed as an endgame in months of anti-government demonstrations. 

The students first blocked the TV building in central Belgrade, Serbia’s capital, late on Monday and several hundred gathered again today.

PAKISTAN: Insurgents attacked a passenger train in a tunnel and claimed to take over 100 hostages today, as authorities struggled to reach the remote area.

The fate of the estimated 500 people aboard was not immediately clear.

Officials said that the attackers blew up the railroad track in the south-west Balochistan province and exchanged fire with security guards aboard the train.

SOMALIA:  A car bomb exploded today at a hotel in the central Somali city of Beledweyne in a militant attack that killed at least six people, including two prominent traditional elders, according to witnesses.

The explosion targeted the Cairo Hotel, which houses traditional elders and military officers currently involved in co-ordinating the government’s offensive against the jihadist group al-Shabab.