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Middle East crisis live: US and Iran race to find missing pilot; Trump warns Tehran over strait of Hormuz

The death toll in Lebanon has reached 1,422 since the conflict with Israel began on 2 March, according to data from the Lebanese health ministry and reported by the Associated Press. In just the past 24 hours, Israeli strikes have killed 54 people and wounded 156. The ministry reports that the cumulative fatalities include 126 children and 93 women. These losses follow a period of intense aerial bombardment that began after Hezbollah launched rockets into northern Israel in a show of solidarity with Iran. Among those killed are 54 health workers, while Israeli strikes have targeted 87 emergency medical service facilities, the health ministry said.

Fugitive mafia boss wanted for murder arrested at Amalfi coast luxury villa

An Italian mafia boss, who was one of Italy’s most dangerous fugitives, has been arrested on murder charges after more than a year on the run, Italian police said on Saturday. Roberto Mazzarella was the head of the notorious Mazzarella clan of the Camorra – the Naples-based organised crime gang. Mazzarella was arrested on Friday night at a luxury €1,000-a-night villa on the Amalfi Coast, where he was with his wife and two children. He “did not resist arrest” during a raid in the town of Vietri sul Mare in Salerno, police said in a statement. Mazzarella was fourth on the interior ministry’s list of the most dangerous fugitives. The 48-year-old had been on the run since 28 January 2025 when he was due to be arrested on murder charges for the killing of Antonio Maione in 2000 in San Giovanni a Teduccio. Maione’s brother Ivan confessed to the killing of Mazzarella’s father, Salvatore, in 1995. Video released by police of the raid showed heavily armed officers in the seaside villa. The operation involved the Carabinieri investigative unit (Italy’s national military police), the Italian air force, and the Salerno coastguard patrol boat monitoring the surrounding waters. Police said they found €20,000 in cash and three luxury watches during the raid, along with mobile phones and forged identity documents. The Mazzarella family controls much of the smuggling and drug trafficking in Naples, as well as being involved in counterfeiting, and the laundering of proceeds via Milan and northern Italy. The arrest was welcomed by lawmakers. In a statement the Naples prefect, Michele di Bari, called the operation “an investigative success”. He added: “The result of tireless fieldwork and the extraordinary professionalism of the judiciary and the carabinieri, which strongly reaffirms the presence of the state in the territory. “This result brings to justice an individual of high criminal danger and restores to citizens a profound sense of security and legality.” The president of the antimafia commission, Chiara Colosimo, wrote on X: ‘‘I express enormous satisfaction for the brilliant operation carried out.’’ Pina Picierno, the vice-president of the European parliament, said it was a “great victory for the state and a clear signal in the fight against mafias”.

Search for missing US crew member of downed fighter jet enters second day

US search and rescue efforts for the missing second crew member of the downed F-15E fighter jet continued into a second day as Iran came under heavy bombing and Israel extended the war in Lebanon. A pilot had been rescued on Friday after the F-15E Strike Eagle became the first US plane to be downed over Iran during the five-week-long war, but the second of the two-strong crew has not been accounted for. The US military had not had a jet shot down by enemy fire in more than 20 years – since a warplane was downed during the 2003 invasion of Iraq, retired air force Brig Gen Houston Cantwell told the Associated Press. Iranian media released pictures of a wreckage, including a distinctive F-15 tail fin, and a used ejector seat on Friday, with state media and businesses in the country offering a bounty if the missing crew member could be captured. The US air force launched a massive search and rescue effort, using low-flying Pave Hawk helicopters and specialist C-130 Hercules transport. Military pilots said the missing F-15 crew member would be trying to hide for as long as possible from the Iranian military and potentially seeking to transmit their location relative to a known secret point in the hope that US special forces coming in via helicopter would be able to rescue them. It was not clear exactly how the F-15 was downed, though Iran said it had shot it down. The US military did not publicly comment, while the US president, Donald Trump, said on Friday the episode would not affect efforts to negotiate a peace settlement with Iran. A Pave Hawk helicopter was hit by fire from the ground during the rescue, though it was able to fly away successfully. Another combat plane, an A-10 Warthog attack aircraft, crashed near the strait of Hormuz with Iran claiming it had shot it down. Its pilot was rescued. Though Iran has been repeatedly bombed by the US and Israel, with several facilities at Mahshahr, a petrochemical complex, in Khuzestan province, targeted on Saturday, the F-15 and A-10 incidents show that Iran can still inflict damage on the US air force. A building close to Iran’s civil Bushehr nuclear power plant was struck on Saturday morning, killing a guard, Iran said. Later, the IAEA atomic energy watchdog said it had been informed by Iran of the incident, the fourth in recent weeks, and added “no increase in radiation levels was reported”. Israel also said it had conducted a wave of strikes on Tehran overnight against what it said were air defence, ballistic missile storage and weapons development facilities. Several heavy blasts were heard in the capital at about 7.30am in the morning in attacks that Iranians described as terrifying. Iran’s foreign minister also said that Tehran had not – as had been reported in the US overnight – walked away from possible peace talks in Pakistan. Abbas Araghchi, posting on social media, said that Iran’s position had been misrepresented. “We are deeply grateful to Pakistan for its efforts and have never refused to go to Islamabad. What we care about are the terms of a conclusive and lasting END to the illegal war that is imposed on us,” he wrote on X. Trump said that Iran needed to be ready to reopen the strait of Hormuz to oil tankers and merchant shipping and repeated that he had given Tehran a deadline to comply and threatened an unspecified escalation. “Remember when I gave Iran ten days to MAKE A DEAL or OPEN UP THE HORMUZ STRAIT. Time is running out – 48 hours before all Hell will reign down on them. Glory be to GOD!” he said in a social media post. The US president had originally threatened to bomb Iran’s power plants if it did not accept a peace agreements he proposed, and has periodically repeated that threat while extending the deadline. Further waves of air transports from military bases in the US to the Middle East have been monitored by aviation enthusiasts since the start of April, raising fresh speculation that Trump may order a ground deployment to seize the Kharg Island oil terminal, islands in the strait of Hormuz or Iran’s nuclear material. At least 1,900 people have been killed and 20,000 injured in Iran since the start of the war, according to estimates from the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent societies, though precise figures are scarce. Israel attacked Tyre, south Lebanon, after telling residents to leave. One missile destroyed an 11-storey building north-east of the city, a second partly destroyed a five-storey structure and a third hit the Burj al-Shamali Palestinian camp south of the city. Israeli strikes have killed more than 1,200 people in Lebanon and displaced more than 1.1 million people. Hezbollah sites in Beirut were also targeted on Friday and overnight, Israel said. Missiles continued to be fired into Israel. Four people were lightly wounded in three different cities across central Israel and Iran was accused of using cluster munitions, whose use is banned by many countries, in the attacks. One was reported to have landed in a car park near Israel’s Kirya military headquarters in Tel Aviv.

Why US and Russia are backing Viktor Orbán in Hungary election

The official announcement that JD Vance was to visit, days before Hungarians cast their ballots in a hotly contested election, was greeted by Budapest with no less than four exclamation marks and three emojis. “!!Official!!” Viktor Orbán’s political director, Balázs Orbán, wrote on social media as he confirmed the news. The White House said Vance, along with his wife Usha, will land in Hungary on Tuesday, in what is widely seen as an attempt to bolster Orbán as he trails in the polls. But the US isn’t the only country throwing its weight behind Orbán. Support has also apparently come from Hungary’s east, as Russian intelligence agencies, along with disinformation networks with links to Russia, are alleged to be working to sway the election. Questions have begun to swirl as to why the two countries appear to agree on the need to keep Orbán – who once described Hungary as a “petri dish for illiberalism” – in power. “That is somewhat ironic, isn’t it?” said Jeremy Shapiro, the research director of the European Council on Foreign Relations. “If you would have asked me five years ago: ‘Would that happen?’ I would certainly say no.” It was a glimpse of how US-Russian relations had transformed of late, he said. “On one level, the US and Russia are sort of playing their old rivalry games, but on another level, they seem to be aligning ideologically in terms of their commitment to, let’s say, a white nationalist Christian civilisational ethic.” As the central European country prepares to head to the ballot, the election in a country of about 9.5 million has taken on an outsized importance. Donald Trump has repeatedly endorsed Orbán, describing him as a “fantastic guy” and a “strong and powerful leader”. Hungary, long seen by many as pro-Russian and a “bit of a Russian mole” within the EU and Nato, had not changed, nor had Russia, said Shapiro. “It’s the US that has changed here,” Shapiro said. “The US has essentially realigned itself ideologically and redefined its relationship with Russia. Viktor Orbán is ground zero of that because he’s the clearest sort of white Christian civilisational leader in Europe, and he’s the one who has had the most ideological impact and exchange with the Trump administration.” Trump and those around him have long talked up Hungary, depicting it, in the words of one local journalist, as a sort of “Christian conservative Disneyland”. The veneration has continued, even as Hungary plunged in press freedom rankings, faced accusations of no longer being a full democracy and, according to Transparency International, became the most corrupt country in the EU. Orbán’s efforts to foster a warm relationship with the Trump administration stand in sharp contrast to his dealings with the EU, where the relationship has plunged to new lows amid clashes on migration, LGBTQ+ rights and, most recently, Orbán’s refusal to sign off on a €90bn loan to Ukraine. In February, Marco Rubio was candid about the extent to which the Trump administration was prepared to back Orbán. “I can say to you with confidence that President Trump is deeply committed to your success, because your success is our success,” the US secretary of state told Orbán at a press conference. If Orbán were to face struggles, Trump would be “very interested” in finding ways to help, Rubio added. “We want this country to do well. It’s in our national interest, especially as long as you’re the prime minister and the leader of this country.” Weeks later, reports began to emerge of the lengths that Russia also appeared to be going to in order to secure Orbán’s victory. The Washington Post reported that Russian intelligence operatives had proposed staging an assassination attempt on Orbán to bolster his chances of winning, while the Guardian found that disinformation networks with links to Russia were publishing content aimed at undermining Orbán’s main opponent. However, it may be too soon to conclude that Russia and the US are on the same side, as their motivations are distinctly different, said Dalibor Rohac, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. “For the Russians, having Orbán as the fifth column in the EU – as someone who can derail or block or slow down European decision-making or as a conduit for intelligence operations – is quite useful. He has rendered many services to the Russians over the years,” he said. A hint of this support emerged after it was alleged that Hungary’s foreign minister, Péter Szijjártó, had routinely called up his Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov, to pass on the details of confidential EU meetings. Szijjártó later acknowledged he had conferred with Lavrov, describing the conversations as “diplomacy.” For the US, however, the “infatuation” with Orbán appeared to be rooted in ideology, said Rohac. “For Russia, I think there is a real strategic imperative in trying to keep Orbán in power,” he said. “For the US, I think it’s a sort of artefact of how the Republican party has transformed under Trump.” He pointed to a 2019 letter to Trump, whose signatories included Rubio, in which the US Senate committee on foreign relations expressed concerns about Hungary’s “downward democratic trajectory” and the country’s close relationship with Moscow. “There was a time when Republicans understood what was going on in Hungary and were able to push back against this sort of uncritical infatuation with Orbán,” said Rohac. “And I presume there are still some in Congress who understand what is really going on and how Hungary is not a reliable partner. But they’re just much quieter now.” Late last month, the spotlight was on these voices after a bipartisan pair of US senators said they had introduced legislation calling for sanctions on senior Hungarian officials if the country’s leadership continued to obstruct aid to Ukraine or rely on Russian oil and gas. Jeanne Shaheen, the top Democrat on the Senate foreign relations committee, said in a statement: “When the rest of Europe is rightfully weaning off Russian energy, Hungary has doubled down.” She called on the Trump administration to hold all of its allies to the same standard. “It is beyond belief that vice-president Vance is reportedly planning on visiting Hungary to provide an electoral boost to a corrupt government that continues to help fund Russia’s war machine,” said Shaheen. Just how successful the US and Russia would ultimately be in propping up Orbán remains to be seen. As Hungarians grapple with economic stagnation, political scandals and fraying social services, most polls suggest that Orbán’s Fidesz party continues to trail behind the centre-right Tisza party, led by Péter Magyar. Beyond electoral success, however, Rohac saw a broader message in the Trump administration’s support for Orbán, one that he said Europe needed to consider carefully. “I’m almost reluctant to say it, but I think Europeans at some level have to worry about whether, in the same way that Russia interferes in European elections quite regularly, we should not expect Elon Musk with X or other US platforms to also kind of weigh in on these election campaigns,” he said. “I don’t think it was a concern that people had – that these things could be weaponised against European democracies – but I think it’s a concern that people ought to have in the age of Trump.”

Keir Starmalade, anyone? Will marmalade really have to be rebranded in UK?

The story is, in Fleet Street terminology, a marmalade dropper. The name marmalade is being dropped. But is it? What has been reported? “Starmer’s breakfast reset, or why you won’t be able to call it just marmalade any more,” shouted the Daily Mail on Saturday morning. Its online title went further asking: “What would Paddington think!” The story provided the title with an excuse to run a reader poll asking: “Did Starmer always intend to steer Britain back towards the EU?” The Times called it a “bitter end for marmalade”, while the BBC, which broke the story, was slightly more sober, reporting that “marmalades may need to be relabelled under post-Brexit food deal”. The Conservative former home secretary Priti Patel accused Labour of “attacking the great British marmalade”, saying the prime minister was “so desperate to fit in with his EU pals and unpick Brexit, he’s now looking to rename British marmalade to align with the EU”. So, what has actually happened? As part of a planned food deal with the EU, the BBC reports, the UK is considering aligning with the bloc’s naming rules that allow all conserves to be marketed as marmalades – as long as the type of fruit is specified. For example, citrus-based conserves being labelled “citrus marmalade”. Another example of EU red tape? That really depends on how far back you want to go. The UK is being asked to align with regulations in force within the bloc. That much is certainly true. It is part of the entirely standard practice of ensuring common values and norms between two entities when they agree a trade deal. But any divergence arguably only exists in the first place because of British idiosyncrasy. In the 1970s, following UK lobbying, the EU agreed to allow only the conserve made from oranges to be named marmalade. This caused a problem in some countries on the continent, where that word – or its cousins – refers to a whole range of conserves. In German, the word for jam is “marmelade”, in Italian it is “marmellata”. In 2004, the EU relaxed its rules to allow fruit-based spreads being sold in farmers’ markets in Germany and Austria to be referred to as marmalades. Following Brexit – with the need to keep the British sweet having gone – the rules were relaxed further to allow all conserves to be marketed as marmalade, as they naturally would be in many European languages. Nevertheless, we’re being banned from calling orange marmalade “orange marmalade”? No. An exemption has been drafted that would allow the citrus fruit used to make the conserve to be specified in the name. In other words, “orange marmalade” would be fine. A government source pointed out that marmalade on UK supermarket shelves is already usually labelled as “orange marmalade” or “Seville orange marmalade”, which they suggested was in compliance with the EU rules. Either way, this is all part of a Labour plot to “unpick Brexit”? As Patel might reasonably be expected to know, the rules on naming conserves were already due to come into force in the UK as part of the “Windsor agreement” struck by the Conservative government – and backed by Labour in parliament – in 2023. This proposal would simply see them extended from Northern Ireland to the rest of the country. What has the government said? A government spokesperson said: “British marmalade is not changing. There is no requirement for retailers or producers to relabel orange marmalade as ‘citrus marmalade’, and jars on UK shelves will remain exactly as they are today. “Many British manufacturers already meet international labelling standards voluntarily so their products can be sold overseas – this deal simply supports that trade by cutting unnecessary red tape with our largest market. “Crucially, the agreement supports exporters while fully preserving the UK’s ability to shape food rules in the national interest.”

‘Feels like history is being made’: will young Hungarian voters oust Orbán?

As he rushed to finish off his cigarette before heading to class, Ákos, 20, confessed that he has more at stake than most as Hungarians prepare to head to the polls in the coming days. “If things remain the same, or get even worse, I can’t see a future here,” said the aspiring teacher. “There are many people who want to try living elsewhere, and that’s totally fine, but I’m not one of them. For so long I’ve dreamed of working and teaching here.” Ákos was four years old when Hungarians voted in Viktor Orbán as prime minister in 2010, setting in motion a 16-year grip on power that has sought to transform the central European country into an “illiberal democracy” – and which has defined much of this student’s early life. Ákos is a member of Generation Orbán – the young Hungarians who came of age as the country plunged in press freedom rankings, was accused of being an “electoral autocracy”, and became the most corrupt country in the EU. Now, it is these people, many of whom will be voting for the first time in a general election on 12 April, who have become the primary and most powerful driving force for change. One recent poll suggested that 65% of voters under the age of 30 are planning to cast their vote against Orbán. “It’s been devastating at times,” said Boldi, 22, another student, citing the lack of opportunities for young people and stalled social mobility. “I think anything is better than a party that had 16 years to change things and just made it worse.” In interviews with young Hungarians on an overcast day in Budapest, the Guardian heard many voters express deep hopes that their country is on the brink of change. Most polls have suggested that Orbán is trailing in voter support as he faces off against an unprecedented challenge from Péter Magyar, a former top member of Fidesz. “With all of the marches and gatherings that are happening, it kind of feels like history is being made,” said Betti, 24, as she made her way through a leafy courtyard just off the Astoria intersection in central Budapest. The election has pitted two distinctly different versions of Hungary’s future against each other, leaving deep divisions as Fidesz works to convince voters that Ukraine is the country’s top enemy and Orbán the only safe pair of hands, while Tisza urges voters to focus on economic stagnation, fraying social services and corruption. “It’s just terrible right now,” said Betti, whose job as a cashier gives her a frontline view to the rising cost of living and, like the others who spoke to the Guardian, declined to give their surname. “It’s kind of depressing knowing that there are people around you who just don’t want things to get better or they believe the propaganda, like ‘Ukraine is coming for us’.” The shift of young voters away from Fidesz – a movement founded by pro-democracy, change-seeking youth which at one point required its members to be under the age of 35 – is one of the biggest stories of the election, said Nóra Schultz, a Budapest-based political analyst. “Even before Tisza came on to the scene, there was definitely a mood for change among youngsters. But when Péter Magyar started running his party, there was a complete shift,” she said. “Now, in the most reliable polls, Fidesz has below 10% support among people under the age of 30.” She listed a raft of reasons to explain the change, from domestic concerns over the cost of living and access to housing to a pro-EU stance that clashed with Orbán’s drift towards Russia. Social media, she added, had also played a role: independent journalists and opposition politicians had managed to carve out spaces capable of circumventing Fidesz’s tight grip on traditional media, where the party and its loyalists are estimated to control 80% of the landscape. In the run-up to the election, both candidates have also taken very different approaches to courting the youth vote, said Schultz. Magyar has made a conscious effort to call on them to help spread the word, while Orbán has highlighted initiatives such as the aid his government rolled out for first-time homebuyers or tax benefits for young mothers. “Magyar treats young people as political actors. Orbán is more like: ‘Be happy about what you’ve been getting,’ whereas Péter Magyar is: ‘Come and join me,’” she said. The impact can be plainly seen in places such as TikTok, where legions of young women have posted videos of themselves lip-syncing and dancing to Magyar’s speeches or flaunting nail designs featuring the party’s branding, said Schultz. “And you don’t see that with Fidesz at all.” On the streets of central Budapest, however, some were swift to stress that their vote was less about Magyar and more about the need for change. “It’s not like all the youngsters are Tisza activists,” said Jani, 21, who is studying to be a film director. “It’s more like everybody is against this system and Tisza is the only option we have. I don’t sympathise with Péter Magyar at all, but I have no choice so I will vote for him.” Others worried that the wave of opposition wouldn’t be high enough to dislodge Fidesz from power. Some of this was about the electoral maths, as polls suggest Fidesz continues to lead among voter aged 65 and over, as well as much of the countryside. But it was also about accusations of an electoral system that over the years has been remade to tilt heavily in Orbán’s and his party’s favour. These claims came to the fore in the last election, as the opposition alleged gerrymandering and vote-buying to explain why its momentum had failed to translate into electoral success. Other young Hungarians said they were anxious about how Orbán – the leader whose strongman approach has been touted as an inspiration to Donald Trump and far-right movements across the globe – would react if Tisza were to win. “I think they’ve already realised that it’s over for them, but I don’t think they will go down without a fight,” said Betti. “They will try something.” Even if Magyar succeeded in taking power, she is under no illusion that the system that Orbán and his party have spent years building will quickly unravel. “We know that, even if we change governments, the next four to eight years are going to be hard because they just absolutely took the country to shit. There’s no other way to say it,” she said. “It’s going to be hard, but it’s probably still going to be better.” That optimism was echoed by Ákos as he steeled himself for a result that he sees as decisive to his future. “I’m pretty hopeful,” he said, as he ground out his cigarette. “Like most of my generation, I’m awaiting change. Change in the government, change in the system, and a change in people’s thinking.” Such a change was desperately needed in today’s Hungary, he said, even if many refused to admit it. “I would certainly hope that the divisions between Hungarians will diminish over time, so that we realise that we are not each other’s enemies,” he added. “And that we have to share this country and work to make it a better place together.”

Lebanese forced to bury their dead twice as war robs them of final goodbyes

In Lebanon, the dead are usually given one last glimpse of their home town before they are laid to rest. Hoisted high above the heads of the living, their casket is slowly marched through the streets where they grew up. It is the hands of their loved ones that guide them into their final resting place, already dug, and gently sprinkle dirt on their body. In south Lebanon, war has robbed the dead of their final goodbye. As Israel expands its ground invasion, families have been forced to abandon traditional funeral rites and bury their loved ones in temporary graveyards farther north. In Tyre, 2-metre-wide ditches have been dug to house the dead. The epitaphs are brief: a number spray-painted in bright red on a thin wooden board to count the deceased. Rabih Koubaissi has stayed behind in Tyre to supervise the burials, despite the Israeli orders that people have to leave and airstrikes on the city. It is his second war in three years. In Islam, the imam explained, a body should not be exhumed after being buried. It is typically washed, wrapped in a white shroud and placed directly into the ground without a casket, where it should return to the earth without being disturbed. But in exceptional circumstances such as war, a special funeral rite can be invoked. In Islamic jurisprudence there is a technicality wherein bodies can be buried in a casket, in a procedure called wadiaa, literally meaning “deposit”. The theory is that it is the casket, not the body, that is being dug up again. “A Muslim can be buried in any Muslim cemetery. But people have emotional attachment – they want their loved ones buried in their ancestral land. It reflects belonging, heritage and presence,” said Koubaissi. The brutality of war has disrupted every step of the burial process, at times making it impossible to wash the bodies of the dead. “Sometimes we just receive pieces of bodies,” he said. “In those cases, we just collect what we can, place them in a shroud and a body bag, and then put them in the coffin.” Though temporary burials gave some peace of mind, they were ultimately a source of pain, Koubaissi said. “It’s very difficult. Families are being forced to bury their loved ones twice.” People from south Lebanon, however, are worried they may not get the chance to bury their loved ones back home. Statements from Israeli officials that the military will occupy the area south of the Litani River indefinitely have led to fears that it could be months, or years, before Lebanese people could finally lay their loved ones to rest in their ancestral homes. Even if Israeli soldiers withdraw, people worry what awaits them when they return to their villages. At the end of the 13-month war between Hezbollah and Israel in November 2024, people from Dhayra, a border village, rushed to rebury two residents who were killed by airstrikes months previously and buried in temporary gravesites in Tyre. When they returned home, however, they found their village graveyard in ruins. Israeli bulldozers had ripped up gravesites and the local mosque had been destroyed – the bodies had to be buried in an alternative graveyard. While the dead wait to be reburied, they have few visitors. After attending the rushed temporary funerals, most families have been forced to leave Tyre as the city has come under increasing attack. A young couple who remained in Tyre, despite the dangers, visited one of the temporary gravesites last week, tending to flowers at the foot of the grave of two young men from the town of Al-Qlailah. They are the only two graves which have pictures of the departed. The couple, overcome with emotion, consoled each other as they gazed at the photographs. Standing above the first grave in the row, Hecham Reda, a medic from the border village of Aita al-Chaab, began to cry as he recalled his friend. “Hadi was always with us, putting out fires, carrying the martyrs. In this war, he didn’t have time. The strike that hit him was fast, brutal,” said Reda, who fears, like many people from south Lebanon, that he will never get the chance to bury his friend back home. As Koubaissi overlooks the graves, airstrikes thud in the distance. He does not bother to look up when they hit. “The hardest part is when families ask you how their loved ones looked,” he said. “They cannot see them, but I have seen them. You can’t lie to them, but you can’t tell the truth either. So you try to comfort them. “It’s a very heavy feeling. We hadn’t even recovered from the last war before entering this one.”

Cubans study oil tanker diplomacy for signs of progress in secret talks with US

When a sanctioned Russian oil tanker, the Anatoly Kolodkin, docked at Cuba’s Matanzas oil terminal on Tuesday, unloading 700,000 barrels of crude, it was not immediately clear why the ship had been allowed to pass through Donald Trump’s oil blockade. In January, the US president had proclaimed on social media: “THERE WILL BE NO MORE OIL OR MONEY GOING TO CUBA – ZERO!” yet last week he told reporters, “If a country wants to send some oil into Cuba right now, I have no problem with it” – and waved the Russian ship through. Then, on Thursday, came news that Cuba was releasing 2,010 prisoners. The government framed the move as a humanitarian gesture for Holy Week, but observers were quick to link the two events – and see both as evidence that negotiations between Washington and Havana are continuing. The US oil blockade has caused an already stuttering Cuban economy to trundle into the ditch. Tourism is all but dead, after airlines from Canada, Russia, China and France ceased operations, and Iberia is leaving at the end of May. Most petrol stations are closed. Blackouts, long a problem, are now a daily grind. Those Cubans who still live on the island, estimated at 9.5 million after a 2 million-strong exodus in the last five years, are exhausted. “Everything is collapsing – health, education, transport, everything,” said one man outside a church in El Cobre, a famous site of pilgrimage in the east of the country. Meanwhile, the population is left studying the scraps of information leaked – always from the US side – about the talks. It’s a dialogue between apparently irreconcilable positions: Trump has vowed to “take” the island, while Cuba maintains that its political system is not up for negotiation. Initially many diplomats credited the tanker’s arrival to the worsening crisis on the island. “One option is that it’s a tactical move by the White House,” said one ambassador, attempting to parse the week’s events. “So that as the humanitarian emergency worsens they can point to something specific they did – even though we know it’s nothing in the grand scheme of things.” This, however, did not seem in character for Trump, whose humanitarian instincts have never been obvious. But the diplomat went on: “Or it could mean there is a bit of progress on negotiations. And this is a confidence-building measure.” The prisoner release suggests the latter. William LeoGrande, professor of government at the American University in Washington, said: “It suggests that the two sides may be making reciprocal gestures of good will to advance the conversations they have been having,” pointing to similar episodes in prevents efforts at detente. Meanwhile, another tanker with 200,000 barrels of Russian fuel – the Sea Horse – has been floating in the Atlantic. As the Anatoly Kolodkin arrived in Cuba, the Sea Horse moved to Venezuela, whose government since the US abduction of Nicolás Maduro has been keen to appease Trump’s demands. The choreography suggested the oil shipments were a series of carrots being offered to the Cuban government. While no amount of oil or pressure seems likely to encourage the Cuban regime to give up the power it has held since 1959, other events over the last week suggest a more transactional way forward. Since they were first permitted by the government in 2021, Cuba has become home to more than 10,000 small to medium-sized private businesses, called Mipymes. They are apparent in the small corner stores across the island, but also in the big container lorries running down the highways. The Mipymes have created a group of very wealthy Cubans, many with links to the regime and Gaesa, the army’s economic wing which controls large swathes of the economy. Raúl Guillermo Rodríguez Castro, who has been at the front of negotiations with the US, is not only the grandson of former president Raúl Castro, but also the son of the former head of Gaesa, Luis Rodríguez López-Calleja, who died in 2022. This week CNN interviewed another member of the Castro family, Fidel’s grandson Sandro Castro. Sandro is a 33-year-old influencer, often treated by Cubans with exasperation for the bling lifestyle he projects, but diplomats say he is also a successful businessman and importer. “There are many people here who want to do capitalism with sovereignty. I think the majority of Cubans want to be capitalist, not communist,” he told CNN. Normally such a statement – let alone his subsequent opining that the current Cuban president, Miguel Díaz-Canel, “is not doing a good job” – would have earned the speaker a visit from state security. But it seems not in this case. Díaz-Canel’s political defenestration has been touted by the US as one of the prices for negotiations to go forward. So perhaps a route forward is forming where Cuba’s economy would open up, while senior members of the regime, including several Castros, retain power and influence. That would conform with Trump’s statement that he wanted a “friendly” takeover of Cuba, mirror events in Venezuela and – as Iran continues to frustrate his hopes of an easy victory – give him a win. “At the moment, it is this smallish group who is making all the money,” said another senior diplomat in Havana. “If the Americans are saying, ‘you can keep your businesses, but you need to open the economy up to the US too,’ then I can see that happening.” How that would sit with Marco Rubio, Trump’s Cuban-American secretary of state, who has long expressed his commitment to unseating the Castros, remains to be seen. “I suspect the hardliners in Miami would have a hard time accepting anyone named Castro in a position of authority,” said Pedro Freyre, a Miami attorney at the heart of the exile community. “But while the Castro name carries a heavy historical load, it may prove difficult to dislodge. Díaz-Canel is a leader by consensus without deep historical connections, which make him easier to move around.” More worryingly is where such a deal would leave the roughly 40% of Cubans who do not work for the private sector or receive money from relatives abroad. These people are often elderly and gave their lives to a revolution that promised to look after them from cradle to grave. The answer is probably nowhere good: they are now on the edge of starvation.