A plane carrying more than 170 Venezuelan migrants who were held in Guantanamo Bay after being deported from the US arrived in Venezuela on Thursday.

The 177 were initially flown to Honduras for transfer to Venezuela, according to US Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

The flight appeared to have nearly emptied out the naval base of migrants sent there as part of President Donald Trump’s sweeping crackdown on migration.

Questions have swirled over the legality of sending migrants to the base on Cuba – notorious for holding prisoners of the US-led “war on terror.”

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has alleged that Venezuelan migrants sent to Guantanamo Bay have ties to the Tren de Aragua gang, a criminal network that started in a Venezuelan prison.

The Venezuelan government said in a statement that it had requested the repatriation of Venezuelan nationals who were “unjustly taken to the Guantanamo naval base.”

President Nicholas Maduro said the group that arrived Thursday “are not criminals, they are not bad people, they were people who emigrated as a result of the [US] sanctions… in Venezuela we welcome them as a productive force, with a loving embrace.”

Senior Trump officials have said that Guantanamo Bay is reserved for the “worst of the worst,” but new court filings reveal that not all those who are being sent to the facility are considered to pose a “high threat.”

According to newly filed court declarations, 127 were considered high threat and being held in the base’s maximum-security prison, while 51 were low-to-medium threat and are being held at a migrant operations center. All were from Venezuela.

On Wednesday a group of Venezuelans shielded from deportation under a form of humanitarian relief filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration over its decision to revoke those protections.

Earlier this month, the DHS ended what’s known as Temporary Protected Status (TPS) in a string of moves to strip temporary protections for certain migrants.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem decided not to grant an extension of TPS, reversing a decision made by Biden’s DHS and leaving some 600,000 people in limbo.

Protections for approximately 350,000 Venezuelans are set to expire in April, opening them up for deportation. Around 250,000 Venezuelans are expected to lose them in September.

Fighting fish, thirsty camels and hairy shrimp are all featured among the winning images of the 2025 Underwater Photographer of the Year competition.

Spanish photographer Alvaro Herrero was named overall winner for his image showing the relationship between a humpback whale and her newborn calf, according to a statement from organizers on Friday.

Herrero took the photograph, which is named “Radiant Bond,” in French Polynesia.

“The mother is accompanying her calf to the surface, because the baby is still so small and clumsy,” said Herrero in the statement.

“The calf is releasing a few bubbles underwater showing it is still learning to hold its breath properly. For me, this photo really shows a mother’s love and communicates the beauty and fragility of life in our ocean.”

The image triumphed over 6,750 entries in this year’s competition.

“This delicate yet powerful study of a mother and calf’s bond says all that is great and good about our world,” said contest judge Peter Rowlands in the statement.

“We face our challenges, but the increasing populations of humpback whales worldwide shows what can be achieved,” he added.

Other category winning images include a shot of two male Asian sheepshead wrasse jousting by Japanese photographer Shunsuke Nakano, and a photograph of camels drinking in the desert taken from below the water by Kuwaiti photographer Abdulaziz Al Saleh.

The competition first ran in 1965 and this year attracted entries across 13 categories.

In 2024, Alex Dawson was named overall winner for his image of minke whale bones in shallow waters off eastern Greenland.

And in 2023, US photographer Kat Zhou’s photo of a river dolphin, or “boto,” seemingly posing for the camera at dusk, with the tip of its nose above the water and the sun setting behind it, was named the competition’s overall winner.

Two-year-old Evans was brought to the Nyumbani Children’s Home in Nairobi, Kenya a year ago, suffering from HIV and tuberculosis. With no family to care for him, Evans was referred to the orphanage by a health center after he stopped responding to medical treatment.

Nyumbani Children’s Home is the reason Evans is still alive. But political decisions made thousands of miles (kilometers) away might spell the end of his short life. Nyumbani provides him and around 100 other children with antiretroviral medication, which they have been receiving from the US Agency for International Development (USAID) through the Kenyan government.

US President Donald Trump’s recent executive order to freeze USAID’s funding means Nyumbani’s access to life-saving antiretroviral drugs, which stop the HIV virus from replicating in the body, may end soon.

Trump’s order seeks to review almost all US foreign aid for 90 days and his administration has moved to shut down USAID. The effects are beginning to set it in, with thousands of people losing their jobs globally and humanitarian programs around the world disrupted.

A life and death situation

For children at Nyumbani Children’s Home, it’s a life and death situation. As he plays with other preschoolers, Evans is oblivious to his uncertain future, despite the worry on his caregivers’ faces.

The tiny graves at one end of the orphanage compound are a bleak reminder of what a future without USAID looks like for the children. It’s a scenario Sister Tresa Palakudy — who has been looking after children here for 28 years — is well familiar with having worked at the orphanage before USAID started helping.

“When we started caring for them, they didn’t look like they had life in them,” she said. “One after another, they died. It was so painful, and I don’t want to see that happen again.”

When Nyumbani, which means “Home” in Swahili, was started in 1992 by Christian missionaries, antiretroviral medication had not been introduced. Back then, it operated as a rescue center for orphaned and abandoned children living with HIV, offering largely palliative care.

The 2003 inception of the US President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, or PEPFAR, provided new hope for children living with HIV around the continent, including the orphans at Nyumbani. PEPFAR’s humanitarian aid to combat HIV in Kenya was funded largely by USAID.

“USAID started bringing ARVs free of charge,” said Palakudy. “We put all our children on ARVs and their lives changed. They became healthy and were able to go to school and live like other children.”

Over the last two decades, the US government, through PEPFAR, has spent more than $8 billion on HIV/AIDS treatment for close to 1.3 million people in Kenya.

USAID and PEPFAR have been critical to operating Nyumbani, having donated more than $16 million to the home between 1999 and 2023. This has enabled the home to reach up to 50,000 children through the rescue center, as well as its two outreach programs Lea Toto and Nyumbani Village. The aid included direct funds to the home, which was used to run the two outreach programs.

Controversies

Direct funding from USAID was discontinued in 2023, about the same time the orphanage came under scrutiny over allegations of sexual abuse of children by volunteers and staff members.

According to a Washington Post report, six former residents claimed that administrators at the home covered up allegations of sexual abuse. The home disputed the claims of a cover up, insisting that all allegations were handled according to protocols including reporting to local authorities and providing counseling to affected residents.

Executive Director Judith Wamboye said investigations by the Kenyan police were inconclusive. The discontinuation of the funds was not related to the investigations and was in line with a change in USAID policy to channel aid through the government rather than directly to organizations.

The policy change affected all organizations receiving funding. Rather than giving money directly to non-governmental organizations, funding would be channeled through government programs that catered to similar needs. As a result, Nyumbani scaled down its outreach programs and referred beneficiaries to government institutions.

Running out of stock

With the discontinuation of direct funding from USAID, the two outreach programs under Nyumbani were scaled down and children in the program were referred to other centers. However, Nyumbani has still been reliant on USAID to supply the lifesaving PEPFAR HIV treatment drugs for free.

“The future is uncertain,” said Wamboye. “The Kenyan government announced that they only have ARV stocks to last six months.”

According to data from amfAR, the Foundation for AIDS Research, about 1.3 million people are on HIV/AIDS treatment in Kenya, and 1,602 orphans and vulnerable children in Kenya are dependent on PEPFAR. amfAR warns that President Trump’s freeze on foreign aid could sever their access to critical medical care.

One such child is Mercy, who has been under the care of Nyumbani for the last 12 years. The ARVs saved her life. “I had a very weak immune system,” she said. “This led me to contracting many serious illnesses like tuberculosis and skin diseases.”

Mercy was placed on HIV treatment, giving her a lifeline, but recent news on the freeze order has her scared for her life.

“I am very afraid that previous illnesses that I experienced when I was young will reoccur. And now that I have finished high school and am ready to join college, I am scared it will ruin everything,” she said.

On average, the children’s home requires $1,139 per child annually for HIV treatment. In addition to antiretrovirals, the home needs reagents to enable regular testing of the viral load in the children, as well as medicines to treat opportunistic illnesses, which are common among HIV patients.

Wamboye said that should PEPFAR be discontinued permanently, the cost of ARVs could go up and become unaffordable, which will mean children living with HIV will die.

“This is a life-saving situation and we cannot sit and wait and bargain on human life. So for us, it’s about human life, the lives that we need to save. Something needs to be done urgently,” she said.

Swedish police said on Friday they were investigating a suspected case of sabotage of an undersea telecoms cable in the Baltic Sea, and the country’s coast guard deployed a vessel to the area where multiple seabed cables have been damaged in recent months.

The Baltic Sea region is on alert and the NATO alliance has boosted its presence after a series of power cable, telecom and gas pipeline outages since Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022. Most have been caused by civilian ships dragging their anchors.

Finnish telecom operator Cinia said on Friday that it had detected minor damage on its C-Lion1 undersea fibre-optic link connecting Finland and Germany but that there was no impact on the cable’s functionality.

Swedish police were investigating the matter because the breach had occurred in Sweden’s economic zone, police spokesperson Mathias Rutegard told Reuters.

“The preliminary investigation relates to suspected sabotage,” Rutegard said.

It is the third time in recent months that Cinia’s C-Lion1 cable was damaged, after it was completely severed in November and December last year.

The Swedish coastguard said it had sent a vessel to help investigate the incident off the island of Gotland.

Sweden’s prosecution authority said it was not involved in the investigation of the cable breach.

Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson said the government was being briefed and that damage to any undersea infrastructure was particularly concerning amid the current security situation.

In the crowded room, a local spiritual leader chanted verses in the Isan dialect of northeast Thailand while attendees knelt on woven mats.

Between their clasped hands ran a single white string as they performed a ceremony to welcome and protect the man who sat among them: Surasak Rumnao, who had been held hostage in Gaza for more than a year.

Dressed in a white shirt with closely cropped hair, Surasak sat beside his friend Pongsak Thaenna, who was also abducted near the Gaza border during Hamas’ deadly attack on October 7, 2023.

The two men had kept each other going throughout their 15 months in captivity; now, they smiled as family and friends took turns tying sacred white threads around their wrists to bestow blessings and ward off evil.

Of the 251 people taken hostage by Hamas militants on October 7, many were migrant workers from poor rural parts of Asia, who had gone to work in Israel’s agricultural, construction and health care sectors to send money back home. Among them were Surasak and Pongsak – two of the five Thai workers freed in January under a ceasefire deal between Hamas and Israel.

Like both men, many of the Thai abductees and victims were from Udon Thani, one of the country’s poorest provinces where jobs are hard to come by – pushing young people to overseas destinations or large cities like Bangkok for work.

At Surasak’s return party, the room was filled with elderly community members; most of their working-age children had left the small town.

After the ceremony, partygoers dug into a home-cooked feast of beef soup, fermented fish, sticky rice and minced meats, before celebrating late into the night with Thai liquors. But concerns also lingered for the remaining hostages in Gaza, including one Thai national.

“I want those who have been captured to be released quickly. We are trying to pray that they will be released, not just the Israelis but also the remaining Thai,” Surasak said.

“Having been in that situation, we understand the feeling of waiting for someone to come and help us.”

15 months in captivity

Like so many men and women from Thailand’s rural Isan region, Surasak, now 32, has been working away from home since he was a teenager – job-hunting in Bangkok after high school, then doing a stint at a factory in Taiwan.

Before the abduction, he had spent five years growing tomatoes, eggplants, figs and apples on Israeli farms.

The pay was much better than what he could earn back home, he said – to the point where he could fund his siblings’ education, give his mother money for daily spending, and support the family’s rice farm.

The impact of foreign wages is clear in Surasak’s village of Ban Dung, where new houses have popped up on dirt roads and cracked asphalt streets. His home, painted an eye-catching blue and turquoise, is one of the brightest, and has been expanded and renovated several times over the years.

But that steady flow of income and improvement came to a shuddering halt on October 7 as Hamas militants poured across the Gaza border and began their murder and kidnap spree across southern Israel.

After hearing word of the attacks, Surasak was trying to rush back to his employer’s farm when he was abducted. He and the other captured workers were tied up, put in the back of a pickup truck and told not to look around as the vehicle drove off.

The hostages were split up after they reached Gaza but Surasak and Pongsak stayed together, sleeping and eating side-by-side throughout the 15 months in captivity. Surasak said they weren’t mistreated, and were fed pita bread and cheese, with a portion of meat once a week.

Back in Ban Dung, his mother, Kammee, was anxiously contacting various Thai government agencies, who eventually confirmed that her son was one of the hostages and was still alive.

At first, Surasak would ask his captors when he would be released – and they would assure him, “Tomorrow, the day after tomorrow, in three days, next month,” he said. “After asking frequently, I stopped asking because I didn’t want to have expectations from them anymore.”

Instead, he tried to “have conversations and show them my sincerity, that I am not a soldier and have no involvement with them,” he said. He joked with his captors, even playing cards with them, using hand-drawn decks when no others were available, and sketching games of checkers.

Throughout it all, he kept track of the days by looking at the date on the guards’ wristwatches – though he had no other news about what was happening on the outside.

He and Pongsak would “encourage each other by saying that they wouldn’t do anything to us. They would release us eventually as negotiations were underway,” he said. “We trusted both the Israeli side and our Thai side, along with all the agencies that were doing their best to help us. We had to have faith in them.”

When the Hamas guards finally told Surasak in January that he would be released, he didn’t believe them, he said.

But before he knew it, they were in a car, then on a plane – then reuniting with tearful families at Bangkok airport in front of journalists and Thai officials.

Joyous return

Surasak’s return home was met with joy and relief, with the ceremony on Saturday meant to “call back” his spirit – a common practice after somebody has endured a hardship.

The community believes the loss of a person’s spirit or life force from their body can cause poor health or wellbeing – so on Saturday they offered gifts to entice the spirit back and restore Surasak’s happiness.

“Come back, good spirit,” the attendees chanted together. “Come back already!”

His mother said she had waited a long time for that day.

“I’m so happy and proud that my child has returned to be in our embrace once again,” she said. “My child is like the pillar of the family, and I wouldn’t just let that go. Seeing my child come back gives me so much hope, and I’m truly delighted.”

As he adjusts to being back home, Surasak says he has no plans to return to Israel. His family also wants him to stay in Thailand.

“I think I have enough. I will use the knowledge I’ve gained to improve life in our own hometown,” he said. “I want to live a life farming and cultivating the land of my ancestors.”

But his thoughts aren’t far from the remaining hostages in Gaza, and whether the ceasefire deal will hold long enough to get them all out.

In the last round, the deal looked on shaky ground after Hamas accused Israel of violating its commitments and said it would postpone the hostage releases – though it eventually went ahead after talks with mediators in Egypt and Qatar. Six Israeli hostages are scheduled to be released next on February 22; it’s not clear when the remaining Thai hostage will be freed.

“I hope that those who are still inside remain strong. They will eventually be able to get out,” Surasak said. “Sometimes the exchanges take time… We just have to wait.”