(Reuters) -Texas authorities have arrested the wife and a friend of a man accused of killing five of his neighbors, saying the two helped the suspect evade capture for four days, a local prosecutor said on Wednesday.

Francisco Oropesa was apprehended on Tuesday after a manhunt conducted by local, state and federal officials. He was found in a closet under some laundry in a home in Montgomery County.

The bloodshed erupted on Friday in nearby San Jacinto County after neighbors asked the suspect to stop firing his semiautomatic rifle in his yard because it was keeping their baby awake. Instead, the 38-year-old man reloaded, entered the home of the neighbors and killed five, including an 8-year-old boy, officials said.

The suspect’s wife, identified as Divimara Nava, 52, was arrested Wednesday morning and was being held in Montgomery County, San Jacinto County District Attorney Todd Dillon said at a news conference.

“We believe that Nava was providing him with material aid and encouragement, food and clothes, and had arranged transport to this house,” Dillon said.

Nava was facing a felony charge of hindering apprehension and prosecution of a known felon, according to jail records.

A friend of the suspect was also arrested on a marijuana charge and will be charged with helping the suspect flee the neighborhood in Cleveland, Texas, where the crime took place, Dillon said.

A $5 million bond will be set for the suspected gunman when he appears later Wednesday before a judge in a local jail where he is being held on five counts of murder, San Jacinto County Chief Deputy Tim Kean said at an earlier news conference on Wednesday.

The suspect was arrested in the town of Cut and Shoot, Texas, roughly 17 miles (27 km) west of Cleveland. Both are about 50 miles (80 km) north of Houston.

Officials acted on a tip from an unidentified person who was eligible for an $80,000 reward offered for information leading to the arrest, San Jacinto County Sheriff Greg Capers said on Tuesday.

Most of the victims were shot in the head. All were from Honduras and among the 10 people living at the address, but they were not all family members, Capers said.

The suspect is a Mexican national who was deported from the United States four times since 2009, U.S. immigration officials said.

(Reporting by Brendan O’Brien in Chicago; Editing by Mark Porter and Lisa Shumaker)

By Humeyra Pamuk and Daphne Psaledakis

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The United States is extensively engaged on the case of a U.S. journalist who disappeared a decade ago, including with Syria and other countries, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Wednesday.

Austin Tice, a former U.S. Marine and a freelance journalist, was kidnapped in August 2012 while reporting in Damascus on the uprising against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. He was 31 at the time.

His family believes he is alive and still being held in Syria. The identity of Tice’s captors is not known, and there has been no claim of responsibility for his abduction.

President Joe Biden last year said Washington knows “with certainty” that Tice has at times been held by the Syrian government. Syria’s government has denied kidnapping or holding Tice.

“We’re extensively engaged with regard to Austin – engaged with Syria, engaged with third countries – seeking to find a way to get him home. And we’re not going to relent until we do,” Blinken said in a Washington Post interview on Wednesday.

The Wall Street Journal on Wednesday reported that the Biden administration has renewed direct talks with Syria over Tice’s case and those of other Americans, citing Middle East officials familiar with the efforts.

When asked about Tice, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said she could not confirm any meetings.

Washington suspended its diplomatic presence in Syria in 2012 with the onset of the country’s civil war.

State Department deputy spokesperson Vedant Patel in a briefing said the United States has pursued every channel to seek Tice’s release.

“We have pursued every channel we can to seek his safe return to his family and will continue to do so, and that includes discussing the case with a number of countries in the region,” Patel told reporters.

(Reporting by Humeyra Pamuk and Daphne Psaledakis; editing by Jonathan Oatis)

MOSCOW/KYIV (Reuters) – Russia accused Ukraine on Wednesday of a failed attempt to assassinate President Vladimir Putin in a drone attack on the Kremlin citadel in Moscow, and threatened to retaliate.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said Kyiv had nothing to do with the reported overnight incident.

“We don’t attack Putin, or Moscow, we fight on our territory,” Zelenskiy told a press conference during a visit to Finland, of the war against Russian occupiers.

A senior aide to Zelenskiy called the accusation a sign that the Kremlin was planning a major new attack on Ukraine, at a time of potential turning point in the war as Kyiv prepares to mount a long-anticipated counteroffensive.

Shortly after the Kremlin announcement, Ukraine reported alerts for air strikes over the capital Kyiv and other cities.

Russia said that two unmanned aerial vehicles were aimed at the Kremlin.

“As a result of timely actions taken by the military and special services with the use of radar warfare systems, the devices were put out of action,” a Kremlin statement said.

“We regard these actions as a planned terrorist act and an attempt on the president’s life, carried out on the eve of Victory Day, the May 9 Parade, at which the presence of foreign guests is also planned.”

Fragments of drones were scattered in the Kremlin grounds but there were no injuries or damage, it said.

Putin himself was safe. The RIA news agency said he had not been in the Kremlin at the time, and was working on Wednesday at his Novo Ogaryovo residence outside Moscow.

“The Russian side reserves the right to take retaliatory measures where and when it sees fit,” the Kremlin added.

Former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev, now deputy head of Russia’s Security Council, said the incident “leaves us no option but to physically eliminate Zelenskiy and his clique”.

SMOKE OVER KREMLIN

Two of numerous videos published on Russian social media channels show two objects flying on the same trajectory toward one of the highest points in the Kremlin complex, the dome of the Senate. The first seemed to be destroyed with little more than a puff of smoke, the second appeared to leave blazing wreckage on the dome.

Reuters checks on time and location indicated that the videos could be authentic, though some Western analysts said it was possible Russia might have staged the incident to pin the blame on Kyiv and justify some kind of crushing response.

Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak said the drone accusation, along with an announcement that Russia had caught suspected saboteurs in Ukraine’s Russian-occupied Crimea region, “clearly indicates the preparation of a large scale terrorist provocation by Russia in the coming days”.

In Washington, the White House said it was aware of reports that Russia had accused Ukraine of attacking the Kremlin with drones to try to kill Putin but could not authenticate the allegations.

Russia says it launched its “special military operation” to counter a threat from Kyiv’s relations with the West. Ukraine and its allies call it an unprovoked war of conquest by Moscow, derailed by a failed assault on the capital Kyiv early last year and Ukrainian advances in the second half of 2022.

Over the past five months, Ukrainian ground forces have kept mostly to the defensive, while Russia launched a huge, largely unsuccessful winter assault, capturing little new ground.

KHERSON SHELLED, 18 KILLED

In Ukraine’s southern Kherson region on Wednesday, 18 civilians were killed and 46 injured in heavy Russian shelling that hit a hypermarket, a railway station and residential buildings, Ukrainian officials said.

At least 12 of those killed were in Kherson city, which has been repeatedly shelled from areas of Kherson province occupied by Russia. The dead included three engineers trying to repair damage to the power grid from earlier Russian bombardments.

“When the enemy can achieve nothing on the battlefield, it strikes at peaceful cities,” Ukrainian military spokesperson Serhii Cherevatyi said.

Elsewhere, oil depots were ablaze in southern Russia and Ukraine alike as both sides escalated a drone war ahead of Kyiv’s promised spring counteroffensive against Russian forces.

Ukraine said it had shot down 21 of 26 Iranian-made drones in an overnight volley.

Ukraine and Russia have both been carrying out long-range strikes since last week in apparent anticipation of a Ukrainian counteroffensive, which Zelenskiy said would begin soon, aided by supplies of sophisticated Western weaponry.

Moscow says it has struck military targets, though it has produced no evidence to support this. Kyiv, without confirming any role in incidents in Russia or Crimea, says destroying infrastructure is preparation for its planned ground assault.

Zelenskiy visited Finland on Wednesday, his fourth known trip abroad since Russia’s full-scale invasion. Leaders of Denmark, Iceland, Norway and Sweden also attended his visit.

Zelenskiy said his goals were to beef up Ukraine’s military and secure an eventual place in the NATO alliance, a goal endorsed by the five Nordic nations in a statement.

Blinken said later the U.S. government had authorised another $300 million worth of arms and equipment for Ukraine.

(Additional reporting by Felix Light, Jake Cordell, Max Hunder, Olena Harmash, Essi Lehto, Anne Kauranen, Doina Chiacu and Daphne Psaledakis in Washington, Andrew Gray in Brussels; Writing by Peter Graff and Mark Heinrich; editing by Philippa Fletcher and Andrew Cawthorne)

DUBAI (Reuters) -Iran seized a second oil tanker in a week on Wednesday in Gulf waters, and the U.S. State Department called for its release, in the latest escalation in a series of seizures or attacks on commercial vessels in Gulf waters since 2019.

The Bahrain-based Fifth Fleet of the U.S. Navy said the Panama-flagged oil tanker Niovi was seized by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy (IRGCN) at 6:20 a.m. (0220 GMT) while passing through the Strait of Hormuz.

In Iran’s first response, Tehran’s prosecutor announced the oil tanker was seized on a judicial order following a complaint by a plaintiff, the judiciary’s Mizan news agency said. No further details were provided.

The incident comes after Iran on Thursday seized a Marshall Islands-flagged oil tanker in the Gulf of Oman called the Advantage Sweet. That tanker is being held by Iranian authorities in Bandar Abbas, the Marshall Islands flag registry said on Tuesday.

Maritime security firm Ambrey has said it believed the Advantage Sweet’s seizure was in response to a recent seizure via a court order by the United States of an oil cargo aboard the Marshall Islands tanker Suez Rajan.

The Niovi oil tanker seized on Wednesday had been travelling from Dubai toward the UAE’s Fujairah port when it was forced by IRGCN boats to change course towards Iranian territorial waters, the Navy said.

The Niovi last reported its position at 0231 GMT on Wednesday off the coast of Oman in the Strait of Hormuz with Fujairah as its destination, Refinitiv ship tracking data showed.

According to the International Maritime Organization shipping database,, the Niovi’s owner is Grand Financing Co, and the ship is managed by Greece-based Smart Tankers, which did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Vedant Patel, a deputy spokesperson at the U.S. State Department, told reporters the Biden administration and the “international community” call on Iran and its Navy to release the ships and their crews. “Iran’s harassment of vessels and interference with navigational rights in regional and international waters are contrary to international law and disruptive to regional stability and security,” Patel said.

About a fifth of the world’s crude oil and oil products passes through the Strait of Hormuz, a choke point between Iran and Oman, according to data from analytics firm Vortexa.

“Heightened military activity and geopolitical tensions in these regions continue to pose serious threats to commercial vessels,” the Marshall Islands flag registry said in an advisory on Tuesday.

“Associated with these threats is the potential for miscalculation or misidentification, which could lead to aggressive actions.”

Since 2019, there have been a series of attacks on shipping in the strategic Gulf waters at times of tension between the United States and Iran.

Indirect talks between Tehran and Washington to revive Iran’s 2015 nuclear pact with world powers have stalled since September over a range of issues, including the Islamic Republic’s violent crackdown on popular protests, Tehran’s sale of drones to Russia and acceleration of its nuclear program.

(Reporting by Jonathan Saul, Nadine Awadalla, Ahmed Elimam, Parisa Hafezi and Humeyra Pamuk and Timothy Gardner; Writing by Lisa Barrington, Editing by Louise Heavens, Alexandra Hudson, Bernadette Baum and Daniel Wallis)

DAMASCUS (Reuters) -Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi met counterpart Bashar al-Assad in Damascus on Wednesday in the first visit by an Iranian head of state since Syria’s war began in 2011, underlining close ties as Syrian relations with Arab states thaw.

With military and economic support from both Iran and Russia, Assad regained control of most of Syria from rebels that were backed by regional countries now seeking dialogue with him.

Raisi’s visit comes as Iran and regional rival Saudi Arabia rebuild relations after years of tensions, and as Arab states that shunned Assad – including Riyadh – rebuild ties with his government.

Assad, speaking alongside Raisi, welcomed “the development” of ties between Tehran and Riyadh.

Assad also stressed the importance of meetings between officials from Syria, Turkey, Russia and Iran in Moscow.

He said the goal should be to secure the withdrawal of “the occupying forces and halting support to terrorist groups” – an apparent reference to Turkey’s troops in northern Syria and its support for Syrian rebels.

Syrian officials have repeatedly said that any moves towards normalising ties between Damascus and Ankara can only come after Turkey agrees to pull out thousands of troops it has stationed in the rebel-held northwest of Syria.

Raisi praised Syria for resisting what he described as U.S. pressure and confronting “takfiris”, a term used to describe jihadists such as Islamic State. “Iran will always stand by Syria … and supports its sovereignty,” he said.

Raisi and Assad signed a long-term strategic cooperation agreement, including a memorandum of understanding on oil industry cooperation, the Syrian state news agency reported.

Assad said he hoped the visit would give a “strong push” to trade and investment.

Arab nations which had isolated Syria over its violent crackdown on protests in 2011 are developing a roadmap to end the 12-year war and reintegrate Syria into the Arab fold.

A U.S. State Department spokesperson said on Wednesday that the deepening of ties between Iran and Syria should be of great concern, not just to U.S. allies and countries in the region, but to the world more broadly. The spokesperson, Vedant Patel, told reporters Washington has made clear to partners that it does not support others normalizing ties with Damascus.

Speaking to pro-Iran broadcaster al-Mayadeen on the eve of his visit, Raisi said the trip would “consolidate and develop” ties with Syria and other allies, including Lebanese armed group Hezbollah, which also intervened in Syria on Assad’s behalf.

Iranian and Syrian flags lined the airport road in preparation for the arrival of Raisi and his delegation, which included Iran’s ministers of oil, defence, foreign affairs and telecommunications.

Tehran has already supplied Assad’s government with credit lines and won lucrative business contracts in the telecoms and mining industries, among others.

In parallel, Iran has become more entrenched militarily in Syria. An Israeli rocket strike on Damascus in February killed Iranian military experts and Tehran has used the flow of aid in the aftermath of a deadly February earthquake to bring in arms.

Assad has never publicly acknowledged that Iranian forces have operated on his behalf in Syria’s civil war, saying Tehran has only military advisers on the ground.

(Reporting by Firas Makdesi in Damascus, and Laila Bassam in Beirut and Parisa Hafezi in Dubai; Additional reporting by Humeyra Pamuk in Washington; Writing by Maya Gebeily and Tom Perry; Editing by Gareth Jones, Mark Heinrich and Daniel Wallis)

By James Oliphant

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -Republican Florida Governor Ron DeSantis had counted on a productive state legislative session this spring to turbocharge his coming 2024 presidential bid.

Things haven’t quite worked out that way.

As the two-month session draws to a close this week, DeSantis is arguably in worse political shape than he was when it began, having tumbled in public opinion polls, seen endorsements go to rival Donald Trump and watched as key Republican donors expressed doubts about his viability.

The Republican-dominated state legislature has indeed churned out bills at DeSantis’ behest, allowing him to crow that Florida is “the beating heart of the conservative movement.” But a sweeping abortion ban, permitless concealed carry for guns, and more anti-diversity and anti-“woke” measures have been largely overshadowed by his ongoing feud with Walt Disney Co.

And some of those legislative accomplishments, particularly the so-called “heartbeat” law that bans abortions after six weeks, could place DeSantis in political peril down the road, either in the Republican state nominating contests or in the general election should he become the party’s nominee.

Even so, DeSantis plans to launch his presidential run in some manner later this month, followed by a more formal event in June, sources close to the governor said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

He is expected to pitch himself to voters as more electable than front-runner Trump, who has used DeSantis’ absence from the race to attempt to frame him as a second-rate politician who owes his success to Trump’s backing when he first ran for governor.

With the first presidential nominating contest still nine months away, political analysts say DeSantis has plenty of time to turn his fortunes around.

“Anybody who has raised over $100 million and won reelection as governor of what used to be a swing state has a lot to sell,” said Whit Ayres, a veteran Republican pollster. “He’s got to do a better job of selling than he has done over the last six weeks.”

FAST AND FURIOUS

Friendly state lawmakers have moved at a relentless pace during the session to equip DeSantis with tools to make the case that he stands as his party’s leading warrior pushing back against rampant crime, illegal immigration and liberal polices favored by educators and investors.

“He got everything he wanted,” said Ron Book, a longtime Republican lobbyist in Tallahassee, Florida’s capital.

A spokesperson for DeSantis provided a list of the governor’s legislative accomplishments and declined to comment further.

On Tuesday, DeSantis signed a bill that forbids asset managers in the state from using environmental, social and governance (ESG) considerations when making investment decisions and prohibits banks from denying loans based on borrowers’ political beliefs.

The legislature on Wednesday sent DeSantis a bill that includes a series of reforms for Florida’s higher-education system and eliminates funding for diversity and inclusion programs at public universities.

Lawmakers also expanded last year’s controversial law that prohibits gender-identity instruction to include more grade levels and added a ban on educators using pronouns different than the one a student was born with.

Legislators are still wrangling over a bill that would ban gender-affirming care for minors, and it remains unclear whether a version will pass before the session ends Friday.

DeSantis has presided over a major expansion of the state’s voucher program that allows all students in kindergarten through 12th grade to receive taxpayer-funded assistance to attend private schools – long a goal of conservative activists.

The governor can trumpet a bill he signed on Monday that expands the state’s death penalty law to include criminals found guilty of raping a child under 12, in defiance of U.S. Supreme Court rulings on the issue. Earlier, he signed a measure that scrapped the state requirement that a jury must be unanimous to return a death sentence.

Lawmakers on Tuesday passed an immigration measure that would provide more money for DeSantis’ program for relocating undocumented migrants. However, language that would have made it a crime for Florida residents to transport or house migrants within the state was stripped from the bill after fierce pushback.

On guns, DeSantis and the legislature didn’t go as far as some gun-rights advocates wanted. But a new law that allows residents to carry a concealed weapon without a permit or training could still help give him traction with conservative voters.

“Nobody in the party can call him a squishy moderate,” said David Jolly, a former Republican U.S. representative from Florida.

POTENTIAL PERILS

The six-week abortion ban remains the thorniest outcome of the session for DeSantis’ national aspirations. The governor did not expressly advocate for the bill, and he signed it without fanfare to replace the current 15-week ban.

The issue has turned radioactive for Republican candidates in general elections. It was instrumental in helping Democrats ward off heavy losses in last year’s midterms and was central to a liberal judge’s recent victory in a high-profile Wisconsin Supreme Court race.

“It would have been helpful for DeSantis to not have to relitigate the abortion issue right now,” said Chris Stirewalt, a political analyst at the American Enterprise Institute.

But, Stirewalt said, the strict abortion ban may aid DeSantis in early voting states such as Iowa and South Carolina that have large blocs of evangelicals.

DeSantis will need a boost to wrest the nomination from Trump, who has maintained his grip on the Republican Party despite his 2020 election loss and his recent indictment on charges related to hush money payments to a [censored] star.

When the legislative session began in March, the former president held around a 15-percentage-point lead over DeSantis, according to polling averages compiled by Real Clear Politics. Trump’s lead has nearly doubled since then.

Even armed with a raft of new policy victories, Jolly said, DeSantis has to be concerned that his poll numbers have slid as he has tried to raise his national profile with a book tour, interviews and a multi-country overseas trip.

“The more people see him and get to know him, the less they like him,” Jolly said. “The question is how does he turn that around? That’s his biggest struggle.”

(Reporting by James Oliphant; Editing by Colleen Jenkins and Jonathan Oatis)

(Reuters) – Here’s a look at what we know about the alleged overnight drone attack on the Kremlin, and the questions it raises.

WHAT HAPPENED?

Two of the numerous videos published on Russian social media channels show two objects flying on the same trajectory towards one of the highest points in the Kremlin complex, the dome of the Senate, with the clock on the nearby Spassky Tower showing 2:27 and 2:43 in the early hours of Wednesday. The first seemed to be destroyed with little more than a puff of smoke, the second appeared to leave blazing wreckage on the dome. Reuters checks on time and location indicated that the videos could be authentic.

WHAT IS RUSSIA SAYING?

Russia called the incident a terrorist attack and an attempt to assassinate President Vladimir Putin, for which it said it reserved the right to retaliate.

Western security analysts dismissed the idea that the attack was meant to kill Putin, given that the drones appeared to have been aimed at a highly visible point of the huge, walled Kremlin citadel, rather than any residential quarters, and that Putin often works from elsewhere. His office said he was not there at the time.

WHAT DOES UKRAINE SAY?

Ukraine denied responsibility. “We don’t attack Putin, or Moscow, we fight on our territory,” President Volodymyr Zelenskiy told a press conference in Helsinki.

WOULD UKRAINE BE ABLE TO MOUNT SUCH A STRIKE?

Possibly. Ukraine appears to have mounted drone strikes deep inside Russia and Russian-annexed Crimea on many previous occasions, including twice last December on an air base for Russian strategic bomber planes. It typically has not claimed responsibility for such actions, although Ukrainian officials have often celebrated them.

IF IT WAS UKRAINE, WHAT WOULD THAT MEAN?

Ukraine has frequently surprised Moscow with its military prowess, staging attacks far beyond the front lines, but a hit on the symbolic centre of Russian power would be its most audacious act to date.

“If we presume it was a Ukrainian attack, consider it a performative strike, a demonstration of capability and a declaration of intent: ‘don’t think Moscow is safe’, Russia specialist and security analyst Mark Galeotti wrote on Twitter.

Some commentators described it as a humiliation for Russia, drawing comparison with a 1987 incident when a young West German pilot, Mathias Rust, evaded Soviet air defences and landed a small plane on Red Square.

COULD IT BE A RUSSIAN ‘FALSE FLAG’ OPERATION?

Some Western analysts said it was possible that Russia might have staged the incident itself in order to pin the blame on Kyiv and justify some kind of crushing response. The aim could be “to make Ukraine look reckless, either to weaken Western support or try to shore up Russian domestic support”, said Phillips O’Brien of the University of St Andrews.

James Nixey of London’s Chatham House think tank said that, if it was a “false flag” operation, “it reeks of desperation … And it’s a high-risk strategy likely to be exposed”.

WHAT WILL THE U.S. MAKE OF IT?

The Biden administration has poured cash and weapons into Ukraine to help it defend against Russia’s invasion, but would likely be nervous of the unpredictable consequences that any Ukrainian attack on the Russian capital could entail. The White House said it had not been able to verify the Russian claim of a Ukrainian attack, and U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Russian assertions should be taken with a “very large shaker of salt”.

WHAT IS THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE TIMING?

The incident comes at a moment of high tension and a potential turning point in the war, as Ukraine prepares to mount a long-anticipated counter-offensive.

Perhaps more immediately, it coincides with preparations for Russia’s Victory Day holiday on May 9, marked with a military parade across Red Square, under the Kremlin walls.

Some of the videos of the incident showed spectator stands that had already been put up for the parade, directly over the wall from the Senate. Security for the parade had already been tightened.

WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?

The statement from Putin’s office pointed to a significant response. Former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev said it was time to “physically eliminate Zelenskiy and his clique”, and parliament speaker Vyacheslav Volodin called for the use of “weapons capable of stopping and destroying the Kyiv terrorist regime”.

Western analysts questioned how far it was possible for Russia to escalate, given the death and destruction it has already inflicted on Ukraine with mass missile strikes.

Matthew Ford, associate professor at the Swedish Defence University, said further strikes on Ukrainian energy infrastructure would be less effective now that spring has arrived, and that disruption to grain supplies would hurt Russia’s own allies. He also questioned whether Russia was capable of taking out Zelenskiy. “The closest they got was last spring. How they could pull it off now – that seems very unlikely,” he said in a telephone interview.

(Reporting by Reuters; Writing by Mark Trevelyan; Editing by Kevin Liffey)

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said senators will consider legislation to bolster the Biden administration’s ability to crackdown on popular video sharing app TikTok as they craft wide-ranging legislation to address Chinese threats.

In March, Senators Mark Warner and John Thune joined by 24 other senators proposed the Restrict Act to grant the Commerce Department new authority to review or block a range of transactions involving foreign-owned apps like TikTok that pose national security risks. “This is one of the things we will look at for sure,” Schumer said Wednesday at a press conference citing Warner’s bill.

(Reporting by David Shepardson)