Jammu: Police arrested two cross-border drug traffickers in connection with drone-delivered drug modules in Pakistan and seized around 150 grams of heroin from their possession in Kathua district of J&K. Kathua police registered a case and booked the two persons under the NDPS Act.The police received information about a drone drop incident at the J&K-Punjab border near Kathua Nagri district and launched an investigation. The first accused, Jatin from Kotmanwar, Pathan, was arrested with the help of technical analysis and CCTV footage. Police said further investigation led them to Danish Dogra, a resident of Jahbal, Kathua.Police said preliminary investigations revealed that the accused contacted a Pakistani smuggler via Internet phone calls and received heroin, which was to be sold to vulnerable youths for monetary gain. Further investigations are underway to identify the entire smuggling network and forward links.Police are asking citizens to come forward with any information and cooperate with authorities in the fight against drugs.
Pakistan continues to ignore Indian warnings as drones return to valley, third incident in five days
A shooting in a South Carolina State University dormitory left two men dead and another injured, just four months after a fatal shooting occurred on the university’s campus.
This video-produced image shows a shooting at a residential complex on the campus of South Carolina State University in Orangeburg, South Carolina, early Friday, Feb. 13, 2026. (Associated Press)
Henry L. Crittington, 19, died at the scene and Terrell Thomas, 18, died at the hospital following a shooting Thursday night at the Hugine Suites complex, authorities said. The condition of the third man in the hospital was unclear and his name has not been released.
The eight-hour lockdown on campus was lifted on Friday morning. No arrests have been announced, but authorities said there was no longer a threat.
Thursday night’s shooting occurred more than four months after two shootings occurred during homecoming celebrations on Oct. 4. One occurred near the same residential complex and resulted in the death of a 19-year-old woman. A man was injured in another shooting. School officials later announced new safety measures.
Kaya Mack had just finished delivering food on campus when she heard gunshots and saw many police officers coming in through the gate.
She said she wasn’t sure where the gunfire came from.
“Their loud sirens shocked me,” she told WLTX-TV. “We looked around, me and everyone else on campus, we all looked around and asked ‘What’s going on?'”
The university canceled classes for Friday and made counselors available to students.
Several people have been arrested on gun-related charges related to the October shooting.
After the October shooting, University President Alexander Conyers announced the addition of new fencing around campus and increased security patrols to better control pedestrian access, according to a news release at the time. Crews are also working to repair damaged perimeter barriers.
Lawmakers need to look at laws that would allow students and others to carry guns on college campuses if they are locked in a car, one lawmaker said. Democratic state Rep. Hamilton Grant said in a statement that they could quickly and easily obtain weapons if the situation escalates.
“We are grieving during Homecoming and this community is grieving again,” said Grant, a 2011 graduate of the university.
Founded in 1896, the school is South Carolina’s only historically black public university and has more than 2,900 current students, according to its website.
The university community recently commemorated the 58th anniversary of what became known as the Orangeburg Massacre. They remember February 8, 1968, when police opened fire on a group of black students who had gathered on campus after protesting segregation at a local bowling alley, killing three young men.
Nikhil Gupta, an Indian man, has pleaded guilty to conspiring to kill Gurpatwant Pannun in the United States.
Nikhil Gupta, a 54-year-old Indian man, pleaded guilty to conspiring to kill Khalistan separatist leader Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, a U.S. citizen. Gupta pleaded guilty to three counts of murder-for-hire, conspiracy to commit murder-for-hire and conspiracy to commit money laundering. His sentencing will take place in May 2026. In 2023, Gupta worked with others, including Vikas Yadav, in a plot to kill Pannun, who U.S. court documents identified as an outspoken critic of the Indian government. “The victim has publicly called for part or all of Punjab to secede from India and establish a sovereign Sikh state called Khalistan, and the Indian government has banned the victim and his separatist group from entering India,” the department said. The department said Nikhil, also known as Nick, described himself as an international drug and weapons trafficker and communicated electronically with Yadav, who U.S. authorities identified as a former employee of the Indian government. They said Yadav recruited Gupta to plot Pannu’s murder but was later foiled. Gupta contacted a hitman, but he was an undercover agent. Yadav agreed to pay $100,000 to murder the victim. Authorities said Gupta obtained Pannon’s personal information, home address, phone number, daily activities and more. The plot was uncovered and Gupta was arrested in the Czech Republic and extradited to the United States.
Away from America and our people: U.S. attorney
U.S. Attorney Jay Clayton said Nikhil Gupta was wrong to believe he could kill people on U.S. soil from abroad without consequences. “He believed he could kill people outside this country without consequences just to exercise his American right to free speech,” Clayton said. “But he was wrong, and he will face justice. Our message to all nefarious foreign actors should be clear: Stay away from America and our people.”
BENGALURU: Bengaluru-based space startup GalaxEye has signed a channel partnership agreement with Space PSU NewSpace India Limited (Nsil), marking the first time the state-owned company has partnered with a domestic private player to distribute satellite data.Under the agreement, Nsil will resell high-resolution OptoSAR data generated by GalaxEye’s own satellites. GalaxEye’s upcoming spacecraft will be incorporated into what the founders describe as a “virtual constellation,” allowing Nsil to fill data gaps in its current offerings.“Nsil will resell our data. From now on, whatever satellite we launch, Nsil will be the reseller of this data,” GalaxEye co-founder and CEO Suyash Singh told TOI.“Drishti”, the first satellite in GalaxEye’s planned 10-satellite constellation, is scheduled to be launched on February 25. The company plans to deploy all 10 spacecraft within the next four years. The current agreement covers the entire planned constellation, meaning Nsil can distribute data from each satellite as it comes online.In effect, Nsil will act as an extended sales arm for the startup. It will be able to sell raw data as well as downstream products built by GalaxEye. The arrangement also allows Nsil to sell satellite data directly to its own customer base, which includes government agencies and commercial customers.Drishti, expected to be launched on a SpaceX mission, will weigh 160 kilograms and is expected to become India’s largest privately built commercial satellite. While GalaxEye procured the satellite bus through contracts with Ananth Technologies and XDLINX, the company said the spacecraft will carry its proprietary “SyncFused OptoSAR” technology that combines optical and synthetic aperture radar data on a single platform.Measuring approximately 1 cubic meter and equipped with a 3.5-meter deployable antenna, Drishti will provide 1.5-meter resolution imagery with a global revisit time of 7 to 10 days. The data is intended for defence, border surveillance, disaster response, infrastructure monitoring, agriculture and financial risk assessment.GalaxEye has completed around 500 airborne test flights and had earlier flown a payload on Isro’s PSLV mission. The structural model was recently tested at ISRO’s UR Rao Satellite Centre.The startup is in discussions with the Indian Ministry of Defense and Agriculture and has signed letters of intent with partners in over 20 countries. It plans to expand the size of its future satellites, targeting a resolution of 0.5 meters for future versions.“With the recent increase in geopolitical events, we look forward to providing unparalleled imagery intelligence. We have already attracted interest from defense and security agencies, utilities, agriculture and financial companies and we are very excited about the potential of this technology to transform decision-making and operational efficiency across industries,” Singh earlier told TOI.
The head of the World Trade Organization on Friday urged China to change its growth model, arguing that its soaring trade surplus is ultimately unsustainable and risks triggering new trade barriers.
WTO chief urges China to reverse trade surplus
WTO Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala told the Munich Security Conference that Beijing said it wanted to support the multilateral trading system “because it has benefited so much from it”.
However, “the export-led growth model that has driven China’s growth in the past 40 years cannot drive China’s growth in the next 40 years,” Okonjo-Iweala said.
“A trade surplus of $1.2 trillion is unsustainable. Because the rest of the world cannot absorb it,” she added.
“If China doesn’t take action, we’re going to see more obstacles.”
China’s trade surplus hit a record $1.2 trillion last year. Trade with the U.S. has fallen sharply, despite the resumption of a bitter trade war between the world’s two largest economies with President Donald Trump’s return to the White House.
Other trading partners filled the gap, with China’s exports overall growing by 5.5% in 2025, while imports in dollar terms remained unchanged.
China’s economy will grow 5% by 2025, one of the slowest growth rates in decades, Beijing said on Monday, as the world’s second-largest economy grapples with persistently sluggish consumer spending and a debt crisis in the real estate sector.
In October, Trump reached a truce with Chinese President Xi Jinping. But in January, he announced he would impose tariffs on countries that trade with Iran. China, which is at the forefront of these countries, has warned that it will defend its interests.
Other major markets for Chinese products, such as the European Union, are alarmed by the imbalance in the trade balance with China.
Europeans, concerned that their markets will become an outlet for China’s overproduction, have urged China to stimulate domestic consumption that has been sluggish for years.
The WTO will hold its main biennial ministerial meeting in Cameroon in late March.
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A Jet2 flight (LS896) from Antalya, Turkey to Manchester, England, had to make an emergency landing in Belgium after two passengers started punching and kicking each other, while other passengers screamed. Jet2 called their actions “appalling” and said the two passengers would be banned from flying for life.It all started when a passenger made a racist comment loud enough for the passenger sitting next to him to hear it. The man was drunk on the plane, but witnesses said he was not drunk and gibbering; He knew exactly what he was talking about. Initially, everyone ignored it. But the passenger later became aggressive because he was unable to buy cigarettes from the crew. He then targeted nearby Pakistani passengers, The Sun reported. Soon it became a battlefield, with some reports saying passengers saw blood on the seats and teeth on the floor. The pilot had to make an emergency landing in Brussels and the two passengers disembarked. The pilot told everyone on board that he had 30 years of flying experience but had never seen anything like this. “I just got home from a bad flight and am still in shock, like so many other passengers. What was supposed to be an easy journey turned into one of the most traumatic experiences we have ever had. From the very beginning of the flight, a passenger sitting behind us started making racist remarks, quietly enough for others to not hear, but loud enough Big enough for us to hear. We chose to ignore it at first but it didn’t escalate. Even though he was drinking on the plane he was fully aware of what he was saying and we were thousands of feet in the air and the situation escalated,” one passenger said on social media.
Jammu: In the J&K Assembly, members of the BJP are not missing any opportunity to push the party into a corner. Omar Abdullah Government deals with a range of issues. Outside the House, however, some party MPs generously praised the First Minister on Friday for his allocation of the annual budget. Amarnath pilgrimage.“Our chief minister’s move to allocate Rs 180 crore for the Amarnath Yatra is a positive step,” Pawan Gupta, a BJP MP from Udhampur west, said, adding that it “reflects the changing times in Jammu and Kashmir”.Linking the government’s moves to wider political and social transformation in the region, Gupta said: “Ultimately what we want is that Kashmir should join the mainstream, and that is slowly happening. In this Parliament, you heard legislators today saying they are proud Indians.” Earlier, we mostly heard about special status. “The MLA said although the BJP remained critical of the government on several issues, the good and constructive decisions should be recognized.In his budget speech last week, Omar said his government was committed to ensuring the safety, comfort and spiritual experience of pilgrims visiting the sacred cave shrine. He proposed to “further modernize pilgrimage infrastructure with an investment of Rs 180 crore during 2026-27 in partnership with the Border Roads Organization to improve road connectivity, emergency response systems and logistical support.” He announced that this initiative would ensure that pilgrims’ pilgrimage becomes safer, smoother and more dignified.Gupta said the chief minister’s current stance on the Amarnath pilgrimage marks a significant shift from the past. “Earlier, Omar Abdullah had a different view on Haj but now his views have changed. As an Indian, it is my duty to appreciate this change,” he said.Bharatiya Janata Party MP Balwant Singh Mankotia also appreciated the change in approach by the chief minister, recalling how Omar had opposed such measures during the 2008 riots when he said “not an inch of land would be given”.Vikram Randhawa, another party MLA representing Bahu constituency, who had created a stir in the House earlier in the day by accusing Kashmiris of illegal settlement on land belonging to the Jammu Development Authority, praised the chief minister for the budgetary allocation for the Amarnath Yatra.
RICHMOND, Va. — An au pair who conspired with her employer-turned-lover to kill his wife and another man was sentenced to 10 years in prison Friday.
Brazilian au pair sentenced to 10 years in prison for plotting to kill lover’s wife and another man
Prosecutors recommended the immediate release of Juliana Perez Magalhaes in exchange for her guilty plea to a downgraded manslaughter charge in the February 2023 killing of Joseph Ryan. She testified that she shot Ryan as Brendan Banfield stabbed Ryan’s wife, Christine, to death in the couple’s bedroom.
Instead, the judge sentenced the Brazilian woman to the harshest possible sentence.
“I know that my remorse cannot bring you peace,” Magalhães told the families of the victims. “I lost myself in a relationship and abandoned my morals and values.”
Fairfax Chief Circuit Judge Penney S. Azcarate showed no mercy.
“Let us be clear: You deserve nothing but jail time and reflection on what you did to your victims and their families. May this weigh heavily on your soul,” the judge said.
Magalhães remained silent for months before agreeing to cooperate with prosecutors in the case against them Brendan Banfield, convicted This month a jury indicted him on aggravated murder charges in the deaths of his wife and Ryan. Prosecutors said their romance continued months after the killings.
At trial, Magalhães testified that she and IRS agent Banfield created an account on the social media platform for people interested in sexual fetishes in the name of his wife, a pediatric critical care nurse. Ryan contacted the account and agreed to a sexual encounter involving a knife.
Magalhães said she and Brendan Banfield took the couple’s 4-year-old child to the basement and into the bedroom, where Brendan Banfield shot Ryan and stabbed his wife in the neck. Magalhães said when she saw Ryan move, she fired a second shot, killing him.
As part of her plea deal, her attorneys and prosecutors agreed to end her prison sentence. sentencing hearing. Chief Judge Penny Azcarat could still reject the deal. In Virginia, manslaughter is punishable by up to 10 years in prison.
This article was generated from automated news agency feeds without modifications to the text.
New Delhi: Coal and Mines Minister G Kishan Reddy on Thursday launched the second round of exploration license auction covering 11 critical and deep mineral blocks in eight states. The licenses will allow exploration for rare earth minerals in Telangana, Rajasthan and Odisha, and diamonds, vanadium, titanium and other minerals in other states.The minister said the second phase, which builds on the strong response to the first round, will deepen private sector participation under the new exploration regime and promote technologically advanced exploration practices. He also launched Geological Survey of India’s next-generation portal – a cloud platform that integrates data collection, analysis, visualization and dissemination.Reddy said that as global competition for critical minerals intensifies, resilient supply chains are critical for strategic security and highlighted the country’s efforts to reduce import dependence and achieve mineral self-reliance under the ‘Viksit Bharat’ vision.“India is working towards reducing import dependence and becoming mineral self-reliant in line with the Viksit Bharat vision,” the minister said, highlighting the reforms in the mining sector aimed at building a strong exploration ecosystem.He also cited the expansion of the scope of the National Mineral Exploration and Development Trust Fund and a “whole-of-government” approach to enhance exploration, data integration, data-driven decision-making and systematic identification of mineral prospects.
Union Budget 2026: Odisha, Kerala, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu to build dedicated rare earth corridor
Why Greenland looks bigger than Africa on the map, even though that’s not the case
Maps sit quietly in classrooms, on news websites and on mobile phone screens. They look solid and precise, but the world they represent is always slightly distorted. Because the Earth is round, any flat world map has to stretch or compress something. Over time, certain projections have become familiar, especially the Mercator projection. Critics have long argued that such repeated exposure could alter how people imagine the size of continents and countries. A large international study, “The impact of map projections on people’s global perception of maps: a global study”Published in MDPI , set out to examine this issue in a measurable way. The researchers collected responses from more than 130,000 participants and compared their size estimates to different map projections and true Earth scale. These findings add weight to ongoing debates in cartography and cognitive science.
Mercator projection Greenland appear larger than Africa on the map
On a globe, the difference is obvious. Africa’s landmass stretches across the equator and into both hemispheres. Greenland lies further north, occupying a small portion of the space. Africa is approximately fourteen times the size of Greenland. This is not a marginal difference. It reflects basic geographical measurements. It was only when the curved Earth was flattened for display that the chaos began. Visual imbalance is closely related to the Mercator projection, created in the sixteenth century for navigation. The design preserves angles, which helps sailors chart straight courses. It does not preserve area.As latitude increases, the land appears to be stretched vertically and horizontally. Greenland is located near the Arctic Circle, so it expands dramatically on this projection. Most of Africa lies near the equator, still closer to its true size. The results feel convincing because the distortion is systemic. It affects all high latitudes, not just Greenland.
Flat maps cannot display a round earth without distortion
Any flat world map has to compromise. Some projections protect the area. Other protective shapes or orientations. No one can maintain all properties at the same time. Equal-area projections reduce the Greenland effect, although they change the shape in other ways. Digital earth-based maps have become increasingly common, but familiar flat world maps are still widely used in media and education. The problem is not deception. This is geometry.
Size bias affects perception more than projection
What really stands out is a familiar psychological pattern. Small countries are often overrated. The larger ones are underrated. This relationship is evident in reference cases such as Japan, South Africa and the United States.The researchers noted that this bias is consistent with established psychophysical principles. Human judgment does not scale evenly with physical dimensions. This trend seems to be more influential than exposure to specific map styles.
Familiarity with forecasts suggests limited impact
Participants were also asked which projection they knew best, including Robinson and Gall-Peters. Familiarity did not translate into more distorted estimates.The broader picture suggests that global cognitive maps are shaped by hybrid experiences rather than by one dominant cartographic image. These distortions remain on paper. Internally, they softened.
