EL PAÍS English

House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, center, Wednesday on Capitol Hill.J. Scott Applewhite (AP)

House of Representatives approves Biden and McCarthy’s debt ceiling deal

The most radical Republican and Democratic Congress members vote against the agreement, but do not succeed in stopping it

A new weapon in the Ukrainian war: Light drones capable of striking Moscow

Javier G. Cuesta|Moscow

Tuesday’s attack, which targeted an area near the official residence of Vladimir Putin and has been attributed to Kyiv by the Kremlin, has raised questions about Russian air defenses

Biden approves a new $300 million military aid package for Ukraine

A gold rush in space

Moisés Naím

In Silicon Valley, there’s a growing sense that there are enormous fortunes to be made in the cosmos

Seven of the nine thresholds that allow for human life on earth have already been crossed

Miguel Ángel Criado

A new report quantifies the climatic, natural and pollutant limits that ensure the safe and orderly maintenance of civilization

Undercover, persecuted or in exile: How journalists are resisting in Central America

El País|Nicaragua / San Salvador / Ohio

Three journalists from Nicaragua, El Salvador and Guatemala provide a first-person account of what it’s like to continue reporting on reality despite the authoritarian onslaught

A torched vehicle in Agua Amarga, in the Coatepec Harinas municipality. Locals set it on fire to denounce the kidnapping of a community representative, on May 18, 2023.

In Mexico, clashes between La Familia Michoacana and the Jalisco Cartel are taking a toll

Zedryk Raziel|Mexico

General Pedro Sánchez, with a group of indigenous people who have joined the search for the missing children, on May 21.

Head of the search for the four minors in the Colombian Amazon: ‘If they were dead, we would have found them by now’

Juan Diego Quesada|Bogotá

NATO soldiers install barbed wire to secure an area near Zvečan, in northern Kosovo on Tuesday.

Belgrade’s policies take a toll once again on Kosovo

Tamara Djermanovic

Why do Kosovo-Serbia tensions persist?

Nicolás Maduro and Lula da Silva in Brasília on Monday.

Summit of South American leaders faces divisions on Venezuela: ‘The human rights situation is not a narrative construction’

Naiara Galarraga Gortázar|Brasília

Former Vice President Mike Pence speaks to local residents during a meet and greet, on May 23, 2023, in Des Moines, Iowa.

Mike Pence to launch campaign for president in Iowa on June 7

The former vice president’s team sees early-voting Iowa as critical to his potential path to victory and advisers say he plans to campaign aggressively for the state’s conservative, Evangelical Christian voters

Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie planning to launch GOP presidential campaign next week

US job openings hit 10.1 million, as labor market remains strong despite Fed efforts to combat inflation

Layoffs fell in April, but the number of people quitting their jobs — a sign of confidence that they can find better pay or working conditions elsewhere — slid

In this courtroom sketch, prosecuting attorney Eric G. Olshan questions witness Rabbi Jeffrey Myers, in the federal trial for 2018 synagogue massacre suspect Robert Bowers, on May 30, 2023, in Pittsburgh.

Worshippers describe fear during gunman’s deadly attack on Pittsburgh synagogue: ‘My mind was clouded with panic’

Testimony resumed on Wednesday in the trial of a suburban truck driver charged with carrying out the deadliest antisemitic attack in U.S. history

Three more GOP governors sending National Guard troops to US-Mexico border

Virginia’s Glenn Youngkin announced Wednesday he’s deploying 100 National Guard soldiers. At least eight Republican-led states have made similar deployments in the weeks since Texas Gov. Greg Abbott appealed for help at the border

Students sit on the lawn near Royce Hall at UCLA in the Westwood section of Los Angeles on April 25, 2019.

As Supreme Court considers affirmative action, colleges see few other ways to achieve a diverse student body

The court took up affirmative action in response to challenges at Harvard and the University of North Carolina. Lower courts upheld admission systems at both, rejecting claims that the schools discriminated against white and Asian-American applicants

Mummies found in the Peruvian archaeological zone of Cahuachi, in the department of Ica (Peru).

Ayahuasca in hair and psychotropic trade routes: How drugs were used in pre-Incan civilization

Andrea J. Arratibel|Mexico

Analysis of mummies found at the archaeological site of Cahuachi in Peru has revealed the relationship that the Nazca culture had with narcotics

Women with disabilities forcibly sterilized: ‘They operated on me with no explanation’

Laura Llach / Lucía Riera

The European Parliament debates illegalizing a practice that is only prohibited in nine EU countries, including Spain

An unexpected plot twist and the impromptu embrace of three actors earned the episode a nearly perfect score—9.9 out of 10—from viewers.

All the episodes of ‘Succession’ ranked from worst to best: Five constants that define the series

Héctor Llanos Martínez|Madrid

Thousands of IMDb users have rated the 39 episodes of the HBO show. Along with each installment’s score, we highlight recurring themes: water as a liberating element, asocial social gatherings, betrayal, Shakespeare and an excellent script that validates the current screenwriters’ strike

50-year-old men are hooked on a video game: Behind the appeal of the new ‘Zelda’

Enrique Alpañés

‘The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom’ has transcended the world of gamers to become a social phenomenon with sales in the millions, among other things because it attracts its most important player: the one who was already here 40 years ago

The work of the French painter Edgar Degas titled for decades 'Russian Dancers' and which the National Gallery in London has re-catalogued as 'Ukrainian Dancers'.

Moscow loses a cultural battle as Degas’ ‘Russian dancers’ recognized as Ukrainian

Óscar Gutiérrez|Madrid

Museums such as the National Gallery and the Metropolitan have agreed to retitle works described in their catalogs as Russian amid an offensive against the Russification of Ukrainian history

The Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, as seen on the far side of the Dnipro River from Ostriv, has been under Moscow's control since March 2022.

STAGE SIX

Life under the shadow of Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia

Residents lining up for humanitarian aid in Konstantynivka.

STAGE FIVE

Zoom classes between bombardments at the gates of Bakhmut

Members of the 1st company of the 63rd Infantry Brigade on the Liman front in the Donetsk region.

STAGE FOUR

Video games, tea and drones on the front lines

Serhii and Olga Portianov's house in the village of Kamianka was occupied by Russian troops for months.

STAGE THREE

A wedding anniversary on the highway of horror

A couple walk past a bombed-out house in Kupiansk.

STAGE TWO

Ukrainians track Russian missiles on Telegram between beers and snacks

STAGE ONE

Ukraine: A journey to the front that has the world on edge

NASA Administrator Bill Nelson before the interview.Álvaro García

Bill Nelson, head of NASA: ‘We want to protect the water on the Moon to prevent China from taking it over’

Nuño Domínguez

Pictured, a crab is trapped in a plastic cup in the sea in the Verde Island Passage in the Philippines in March 2019.

Can a plastic bottle made of 65% recycled material be considered green?

Jose Sanz Sainz|Madrid

Environmentalists are criticizing the European Commission’s attempt to lessen the requirements for labeling plastic containers sustainable

Eduardo Bruera, oncologist and head of the Department of Palliative, Rehabilitation and Integrative Medicine of the MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston.

Eduardo Bruera, palliative care expert: ‘Suffering can always be relieved, but not eliminated’

Jessica Mouzo

In this May 28, 2023, image courtesy of the Nova Scotia Government in Canada, smoke rises from a wildfire near Barrington Lake in Nova Scotia's Shelburne County.

Wildfire on Canada’s Atlantic coast forces evacuation of 16,000 people

A recreation of the species 'Jakapil kaniukura.'

Robots that feel what they touch

J. A. Aunión

The odyssey of restoring the most famous Roman mosaic in the world: Seven tons, two million pieces and a 2,000-year-old mortar

Guillermo Altares|Naples

The mosaic represents Alexander the Great’s battle with Darius III. It was found in Pompeii’s House of the Faun and is conserved in Naples’ Archaeological Museum.

A man buys groceries at the Walmart Supercenter in North Bergen, New Jersey, on February 9, 2023.

Consumer confidence declines again in May, particularly for older Americans

It’s the fourth time in five months that overall U.S. consumer confidence has declined, as Americans become more pessimistic about the labor market, on top of elevated anxiety over inflation