Authorities in the southern Indian state of Telangana are racing against time to save eight construction workers trapped inside a tunnel for more than 72 hours.

Around 50 workers had been working inside the 43km (26.7-mile)-long tunnel, located in Nagarkurnool district, when a part of its roof caved in early Saturday morning.

Officials say 43 of them managed to come out safely but efforts to reach the remaining eight men have faced repeated setbacks due to loose soil, mud and slush inside the tunnel.

They have also been unable to establish contact with the trapped men, or provide them with oxygen and other essential supplies.

Jupally Krishna Rao, a state minister overseeing the rescue effort, told PTI news agency that "the chances of their survival are very remote."

On Monday an expert team of "rat-hole miners" - people trained in narrow tunnel navigation - arrived to clear the debris and get to the workers. The same team had sucessfully rescued 41 construction workers trapped in a tunnel after a landslide in the Himalayan state of Uttarakhand in 2023.

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US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth traveled Tuesday to Naval Station Guantanamo Bay (NSGB), Cuba.

"Arrived at Naval Station Guantanamo Bay on the front lines of the war against America’s southern border," said Hegseth.

The protection of the US’ sovereign territory is the Pentagon's mission and the department moved "swiftly" to implement the executive orders of President Donald Trump on border security, he added.

During his first trip to NSGB since his January confirmation, Hegseth met service members who are "directly supporting the apprehension and deportation of dangerous illegal aliens."

Last month, Trump ordered the construction of a detention camp at Guantanamo Bay to hold up to 30,000 of the "worst criminal illegal aliens threatening the American people."

The White House has since begun flying undocumented migrants -- labeled as a "high threat" and "criminals" -- to the detention center in Cuba as part of Trump’s mass deportation plan.

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A Southwest Airlines plane and a private jet that entered the runway without authorization experienced a close call at Chicago Midway International Airport on Tuesday morning, the Federal Aviation Administration said.

Southwest Flight 2504 landed safely at the Chicago airport after the flight crew had to perform a go-around to prevent a potential incident, according to Southwest.

The FAA is investigating the incident, which took place at around 8:50 a.m. local time.

The close call comes as the National Transportation Safety Board and the FAA are investigating a string of safety incidents in recent weeks, including the deadly midair collision over the Potomac River near Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, a Medevac jet crash in Philadelphia and a deadly regional airline crash off the coast of Nome, Alaska.

In the Chicago incident, the Southwest plane was arriving from Omaha, Nebraska, and the private jet, a Bombardier Challenger 350, was headed to Knoxville, Tennessee, according to FlightRadar24.

Air traffic control instructed the private jet to turn left on “Runway 4L, cross Runway 31L and hold short of Runway 31C,” according to audio from LiveATC.net.

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Elon Musk on Monday said hundreds of thousands of federal employees have “another chance” to justify their recent accomplishments or risk losing their jobs.

“Subject to the discretion of the President, they will be given another chance. Failure to respond a second time will result in termination,” he wrote on social media, referring to an email asking federal employees to list five things they accomplished last week by 11:59 p.m. Monday.

The directive appeared to contradict guidance from the Office of Personnel Management, which told federal departments and agencies responses were voluntary. Multiple federal agencies had instructed employees to disregard Musk’s initial email, at least temporarily.

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There is no word yet on how many federal workers complied with the original directive.

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Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said Tuesday that she expected to reach a “good agreement” with her U.S. counterpart Donald Trump this week to avoid being hit with tariffs.

Her remarks came a day after Trump said that his planned levies on imports from Mexico and Canada were moving forward as planned.

“We hope to be able to reach an agreement before the end of the week, at the latest on Monday,” Sheinbaum said at her morning news conference.

“I think that there will be a good agreement because until now there has not been a single issue where there is conflict, a problem that cannot be solved,” she added.

Mexican officials are in Washington for talks this week and Sheinbaum said she would speak with Trump again by phone if needed.

Shortly after taking office, Trump announced duties of up to 25 percent on Mexican imports, citing illegal immigration and the flow of deadly fentanyl.

He issued a last-minute halt to the levies for a month, until next Tuesday, after Sheinbaum agreed to deploy 10,000 more troops to the Mexican-US border.

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A federal judge in Seattle blocked President Donald Trump’s effort to halt the nation’s refugee admissions system Tuesday.

The ruling came in a lawsuit brought by major refugee aid groups, who argued that Trump’s executive order suspending the federal refugee resettlement program ran afoul of the system Congress created for moving refugees into the U.S.

Lawyers for the administration argued that Trump’s order was well within his authority to deny entry to foreigners whose admission to the U.S. “would be detrimental to the interests of the United States.”

U.S. District Judge Jamal Whitehead said in his ruling after the hearing Tuesday that the president’s actions amounted to an “effective nullification of congressional will” in setting up the nation’s refugee admissions program.

“The president has substantial discretion ... to suspend refugee admissions,” Whitehead told the parties. “But that authority is not limitless.”

Justice Department lawyer August Flentje indicated to the judge that the government would consider whether to file an emergency appeal.

The plaintiffs include the International Refugee Assistance Project on behalf of Church World Service, the Jewish refugee resettlement agency HIAS, Lutheran Community Services Northwest, and individual refugees and family members. They said their ability to provide critical services to refugees — including those already in the U.S. — has been severely inhibited by Trump’s order.

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Tánaiste Simon Harris has said the discovery that a scanner bought for over €120,000 for the National Gallery has never been used raises "serious control issues".

The scanner, which has been lying idle since it was purchased in 2017, is the latest spending controversy to arise within State-funded organisations.

There still has not been a suitable lead-lined room found for the special X-ray machine eight years on.

The National Gallery said it purchased an X-ray system valued at €124,805 in November 2017, funded by the Cultural Digitisation Scheme.

It said that some elements of the X-ray system are being stored by the gallery, while the X-ray bulb is still with the supplier.

“X-ray facilities are used by most major galleries and museums and are considered an important tool for collection research and care,” it said.

“The Gallery has been working with the relevant experts and stakeholders to bring the system into operation and has identified a preferred solution.”

Arriving for Cabinet on Tuesday, Taoiseach Micheál Martin said it was an “incomprehensible” issue, while Tanaiste Simon Harris said his reaction was “one of absolute fury”.

“It’s very difficult to explain that, why someone would embark upon the purchase of a scanner that they didn’t have a facility to locate it in,” Mr Martin said.

“It’s up to the agency to explain that.”

He praised the National Gallery as “a beautiful building” and a “prized” institution, but said it was “a difficult story to explain”.

He said: “I think it falls on the Gallery itself to explain what happened here and I believe it happened eight years ago so I believe the Minister (for Arts and Culture Patrick O’Donovan) will be bringing something to the Government today on that and I await to hear the details of it.”

Mr Harris echoed calls for the National Gallery to address the issues raised.

“It’s really important for the people who are paid to run these institutions to come out and talk to the Irish people in relation to these issues,” he said.

“Government provides money to state agencies and they do very good work, but they are also accountable for the spend of that money.

“I’m quite sure the people will want to hear from the National Gallery itself. We’ve worked very hard as a Government, as taxpayers, to increase vital funding into areas like the arts.

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Iraq and energy giant BP finalised an agreement to develop oil fields in the northern province of Kirkuk, Iraqi authorities and the British company said Tuesday.

The mega-project covers petroleum production, the rehabilitation of existing facilities, the capture and use of natural gas produced alongside crude oil, and potential exploration projects.

The agreement was signed between Iraq's state-owned North Oil Company and BP, Prime Minister Mohamed Shia al-Sudani's media office said.

The deal, which is the result of extensive negotiations and several memorandums of understanding, involves "the development of four major oil fields in Kirkuk: Bai Hassan, Kirkuk, Jambur, and Khabbaz".

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