Blinken says decisions like Iran prisoner swap are "hard" ones to make, amid concerns it encourages hostage-taking
CBSN
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken addressed concerns Wednesday that the U.S. deal to release five Iranians and agree to the release of nearly $6 billion in frozen Iranian assets — in exchange for the release of five Americans who were detained in Iran — encourages hostage-taking among hostile nations.
"These are hard decisions, hard decisions for the president to make," Blinken, who is currently in New York for the U.N. General Assembly, told "CBS Mornings."
But Blinken said over 30 Americans who were unjustly detained worldwide are now home as a result of those decisions.
France's anti-terrorism court on Friday convicted eight people of involvement in the beheading of teacher Samuel Paty outside his school near Paris four years ago, a horrific death that shocked the country.
At least two people were killed and dozens were injured after a car plowed into a busy Christmas market in Magdeburg, Germany, on Friday. Authorities said it appeared to be a deliberate attack.
Swedish police said Friday a man had been shot dead in a parking garage in the city of Norrkoping, with media identifying the victim as the rapper Gaboro, who reportedly had links to criminal gangs.
Seven inmates were killed in a prison riot in southern Mexico, when inmates resisting transfers to other jails fought police with guns and knives, authorities said late Thursday.
A 7-year-old girl was killed and at least five other students and a teacher were wounded in a knife attack at a school in the Croatian capital, Zagreb, on Friday, police said. The local hospital said the wounded teacher had suffered life-threatening injuries, Reuters reported.
Southern Gaza Strip — In a rare moment of access to the war-ravaged Palestinian territory, CBS News visited a critical aid distribution center on Wednesday just inside the Gaza Strip, near the Karem Shalom border crossing from Israel. The humanitarian crisis in Gaza after more than a year of the Israel-Hamas war remains dire.
The Guinness World Records are known for highlighting the most interesting, unique and even strange occurrences of human nature across the globe.
Moscow — Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday made a rare admission of failings by his powerful security agencies over the Ukraine-orchestrated killing of a senior general in Moscow. Lt. General Igor Kirillov, the head of the Russian military's chemical and biological weapons unit, was killed by a bomb planted in a scooter in Moscow on Tuesday, the boldest assassination claimed by Kyiv since the start of the conflict.
Two highway crashes in southeastern Afghanistan killed a combined total of 50 people and injured 76, a government spokesman said Thursday.
A judge in France on Thursday found the former husband of Gisèle Pelicot, who admitted to drugging and raping her repeatedly over the course of almost a decade and inviting dozens of other men to assault her as well, guilty of aggravated rape. He was given the maximum sentence of 20 years in prison.
Moscow — Former Royal Ballet star Sergei Polunin, famous for his tattoos of Russian President Vladimir Putin, on Wednesday announced that he plans to leave Russia. The Ukrainian-Russian dancer was one of the most prominent stars who backed Russia's unilateral 2014 annexation of Crimea and its military assault on Ukraine. He was rewarded with prestigious state posts.