SEOUL, Aug 19 (Reuters) - South Korean Foreign Minister Cho Hyun said on Wednesday that U.S. President Donald Trump's order to curb joint military drills appeared aimed in part at pressuring Seoul to support U.S. efforts in the Iran war, alongside other unresolved issues such as investment.

"I think President Trump's message includes pressure over several pending issues concerning the South Korean government, as well as a message to North Korea and an intention by the United States to break a stalemate in the Iran war," Cho said.

By Emma Farge

GENEVA, Aug 19 (Reuters) - A record number of humanitarian workers were attacked last year, driven partly by increased use of armed drones, the United Nations said on Wednesday, calling the trend "appalling".

Some 907 aid workers were killed, injured or kidnapped in 2025 versus 833 the year before, according to the Aid Worker Security Database, a platform funded by Canada and Australia that compiles major security incidents affecting aid workers.

Of those, 350 were killed, down slightly from a record 387 in 2024.

SINGAPORE, Aug 19 (Reuters) - Shipping through the Strait of Hormuz slowed, data showed on Wednesday, as most shipowners avoided the key waterway because of a lack of clear signalling on its reopening from a blockade during the Iran war.

Six commodity vessels crossed the strait on Tuesday, Kpler data showed by 0258 GMT, down from nine a day earlier and below the 10-day daily average of 11.

By Kanishka Singh

WASHINGTON, Aug 18 (Reuters) - A former Department of Justice attorney has said the Trump administration's probes of U.S. universities over accusations of antisemitism lacked evidence and had predetermined outcomes.

A Palestinian-America

By Nidal al-Mughrabi

CAIRO, Aug 18 (Reuters) - An Israeli airstrike killed at least six Palestinians in the Gaza Strip on Tuesday, health officials said, a day after Donald Trump's envoy Jared Kushner ended a trip to the region that failed to push forward the U.S. president's plan to end the war in Gaza.

Israel's military said it had carried out an airstrike on Hamas commanders and several other militants. It said one of those targeted had taken part in the Hamas-led October 7, 2023, attack on Israel that triggered the war.

Mark Perlmutter has treated patients hit by natural disaster and conflicts across 30 countries, including in his native United States. Yet, nothing prepared him for the horrors he would witness under Israeli bombardment.

"Just our first week in Gaza was worse than all of my experiences combined, " the orthopedic surgeon told AFP of deployments that included the aftermath of the September 11 attacks in New York, Hurricane Katrina in Louisiana, and the 2010 Haiti earthquake. 

By Simon Lewis, Ryan Patrick Jones and Ismail Shakil

WASHINGTON, Aug 18 (Reuters) - The U.S. imposed sanctions on Tuesday on the International Criminal Court's president and a senior trial lawyer at the court, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said.

The move is the latest escalation in the Trump administration's campaign against The Hague-based court, which was established in 2002 by the international community to prosecute war crimes, genocide and crimes against humanity. The U.S. is not a member of the court.

By Feras Dalatey and Tuvan Gumrukcu

DAMASCUS/ANKARA, Aug 18 (Reuters) - Israel bombed an airbase in Syria on Tuesday, Syrian state media said, drawing condemnation from Turkey and criticism from a U.S. envoy who called it an "unnecessary escalation".

Syria's state-run Ekhbariya television, citing a military source, said Israel carried out eight airstrikes on the runway and storage facilities at the Abu al-Duhur base near Aleppo in northwest Syria. A separate military source and a civilian who lives near the base said there were no casualties.

PARIS, Aug 18 (Reuters) - France will expel two Iranian diplomats in the coming days in response to an incident in July involving two staff of the French embassy in Tehran.

"I had announced that this intolerable act would have consequences. And so it has. Two Iranian diplomats in France will be expelled in the very near future," Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot said in a post on X.

Last month, the French ministry said the two French embassy staff had been detained and physically intimidated by Iranian security services in Tehran.