Hungary will start the process to withdraw from the International Criminal Court, an official said Thursday, just as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu arrived to red carpet treatment in the country’s capital despite an arrest warrant from the world’s only permanent global tribunal for war crimes and genocide.

Prime Minister Viktor Orbán gave the Israeli leader a welcome with full military honors in Budapest’s Castle District. The two close allies stood side by side as a military band played and an elaborate procession of soldiers on horseback and carrying swords and bayoneted rifles marched by.

As the ceremony unfolded, Orbán’s chief of staff, Gergely Gulyás, released a brief statement saying that “the government will initiate the withdrawal procedure” for leaving the court, which could take a year or more to complete. Netanyahu’s visit to Hungary, which is scheduled to last until Sunday, was only his second foreign trip since the ICC issued the warrant against him in November.

The ICC, based in The Hague, Netherlands, said when issuing its warrant that there was reason to believe Netanyahu and former Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant had committed crimes against humanity in connection with the war in Gaza.

The war began when Hamas-led militants attacked southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing around 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and taking 251 hostages, most of whom have since been released in ceasefire agreements and other deals. Israel rescued eight living hostages and has recovered dozens of bodies.

Israel’s offensive has killed more than 50,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which doesn’t say whether those killed are civilians or combatants. Israel says it has killed around 20,000 militants, without providing evidence. Israeli military’s response resumed last month, shattering a ceasefire.

After the ICC issued the warrant, Orbán invited Netanyahu to Budapest, and accused the court of “interfering in an ongoing conflict for political purposes.” That invitation was in open defiance of the court’s ruling and contradicted Hungary’s obligations as a signatory to arrest any suspects facing a warrant if they set foot on their soil.

All countries in the 27-member European Union, including Hungary, are signatories, but the court relies on member countries to enforce its rulings. Hungary joined the court in 2001 during Orbán’s first term as prime minister.

Republicans Jimmy Patronis and Randy Fine won special elections Tuesday in two Florida congressional districts, bolstered by President Donald Trump’s endorsement to fill vacant seats in reliably Republican strongholds.

Patronis, the state’s chief financial officer, fended off a challenge from Democrat Gay Valimont even though she far outraised and outspent him. He will fill the northwest Florida 1st District seat vacated by former Rep. Matt Gaetz, who was chosen to be Trump’s attorney general but withdrew from consideration amid allegations of sexual misconduct, which he has denied.

In north Florida’s 6th District, Fine won against Democratic challenger Josh Weil for a seat vacated by Mike Waltz when he was tapped to become Trump’s national security adviser.

The win bolsters Republicans’ margin to 220-213 in the House of Representatives. Special elections are often low-turnout events that can lead to surprising results. While GOP wins were widely expected in both districts — two of the most heavily Republican in the country — it’s notable that Democrats narrowed the margins considerably from November.

The races were among the first electoral tests of Trump’s new administration. The narrowing margins may signal a shift in public sentiment, driven by unusually strong enthusiasm as Democrats from across the country poured millions into the races. The opposition party hoped that backlash to the president’s overhaul of federal agencies and firing of federal workers would carve into the GOP’s margins at the polls.

Trump congratulated both candidates late Tuesday and said his endorsement helped them secure a victory.

“THE TRUMP ENDORSEMENT, AS ALWAYS, PROVED FAR GREATER THAN THE DEMOCRATS FORCES OF EVIL. CONGRATULATIONS TO AMERICA!” he said on his Truth Social platform.

At a waterfront restaurant in Pensacola, congratulatory text messages were already lighting up Patronis’ phone as early results were posted Tuesday night. Patronis worked the crowd of about 100 people, shaking hands and giving hugs, his wife Katie and two sons in tow.

“Let it be known that this election is a reminder the Florida Panhandle will forever be red, and it’ll forever be Trump country,” Patronis told his supporters. “And even their $6 million could not overcome one simple post on social media by Donald Trump.”

Fine spoke to about 100 supporters at the 2A Ranch Saloon in Ormond Beach, a barn-like building adorned with Trump decor, including cardboard cutouts of the president and a photo signed by first lady Melania Trump. Above Fine, a glowing “Trump is still my president” sign hung from the overhead balcony.

After the speech, Fine downplayed the narrowing margin, saying it was in the double digits and in a special election.

“I think it’s hard to say that’s an underperformance,” Fine said.

Weil said in a statement that the “race was closer than anyone ever imagined.”

“This result is also a warning sign to Donald Trump, Randy Fine, and the unelected oligarchs taking apart the government,” Weil said. In Volusia County, Trump received 58% and Waltz received about 60% in 2024, while Fine was hovering around the 50% mark with nearly all the votes reported.

Fine, a self-described “conservative firebrand,” had faced growing pressure during the race’s final days as some Republicans publicly criticized his campaign and fundraising efforts, questioning whether this race would embarrass Republicans less than 100 days into Trump’s administration. Weil’s campaign raised an eye-popping $9 million compared to Fine’s $1 million.

National Democratic leaders attributed Weil’s fundraising success to what they characterized as widespread outrage against Trump. That outrage failed to materialize in large enough numbers to overturn the outcome, foiling Democrats’ hope to pull off a huge upset that would have buoyed their party.

South Korea’s Constitutional Court will rule Friday on whether to formally dismiss or reinstate impeached President Yoon Suk Yeol — a decision that either way will likely deepen domestic divisions.

The court has been deliberating on Yoon’s political fate after the conservative leader was impeached in December by the National Assembly, which is controlled by the liberal opposition, over his brief imposition of martial law that triggered a massive political crisis.

Millions of people have rallied around the country to support or denounce Yoon. Police said they’ll mobilize all available personnel to preserve order and respond to possible acts of vandalism, arson and assault before and after the court’s ruling.

The Constitutional Court said in a brief statement Tuesday that it would issue its ruling at 11 a.m. Friday and allow TV stations to broadcast it live. Removing Yoon from office requires support from at least six of the court’s eight justices. If the court rules against Yoon, South Korea must hold an election within two months for a new president. If the court overturns his impeachment, Yoon would immediately return to his presidential duties.

Jo Seung-lae, a spokesperson for the main liberal opposition Democratic Party which led Yoon’s impeachment, called for the court to “demonstrate its firm resolve” to uphold the constitutional order by dismissing Yoon. Kwon Youngse, leader of Yoon’s People Power Party, urged the court’s justices to “consider the national interest” and produce a decision that is “strictly neutral and fair.”

Many observers earlier predicted the court’s verdict would come in mid-March based on the timing of its rulings in past presidential impeachments. The court hasn’t explained why it takes longer time for Yoon’s case, sparking rampant speculation on his political fate.

At the heart of the matter is Yoon’s deployment of hundreds of troops and police officers to the National Assembly after imposing martial law on Dec. 3. Yoon has insisted that he aimed to maintain order, but some military and military officials testified Yoon ordered them to drag out lawmakers to frustrate a floor vote on his decree and detain his political opponents.

Yoon argues that he didn’t intend to maintain martial law for long, and he only wanted to highlight what he called the “wickedness” of the Democratic Party, which obstructed his agenda, impeached senior officials and slashed his budget bill. During his martial law announcement, he called the assembly “a den of criminals” and “anti-state forces.”

By law, a president has the right to declare martial law in wartime or other emergency situations, but the Democratic Party and its supporters say South Korea wasn’t in such a situation.

The impeachment motion accused Yoon of suppressing National Assembly activities, attempting to detain politicians and others and undermining peace in violation of the constitution and other laws. Yoon has said he had no intention of disrupting National Assembly operations and detaining anyone.

Martial law lasted only six hours because lawmakers managed to enter the assembly building and voted to strike down his decree unanimously. No violence erupted, but live TV footage showing armed soldiers arriving at the assembly invoked painful memories of past military-backed dictatorships in South Korea. It was the first time for South Korea to be placed under martial law since 1980.

Earlier public surveys showed a majority of South Koreans supported Yoon’s impeachment. But after his impeachment, pro-Yoon rallies have grown sharply, with many conservatives fed up with what they call the Democratic Party’s excessive offensive on the already embattled Yoon administration.

In addition to the Constitutional Court’s ruling on his impeachment, Yoon was arrested and indicted in January on criminal rebellion charges.Yoon was released from prison March 8, after a Seoul district court cancelled his arrest and allowed him to stand his criminal trial without being detained.

Ten senior military and police officials have also been arrested and indicted over their roles in the martial law enactment.

President Donald Trump said Sunday that “I’m not joking” about trying to serve a third term, the clearest indication he is considering ways to breach a constitutional barrier against continuing to lead the country after his second term ends at the beginning of 2029.

“There are methods which you could do it,” Trump said in a telephone interview with NBC News from Mar-a-Lago, his private club.

He elaborated later to reporters on Air Force One from Florida to Washington that “I have had more people ask me to have a third term, which in a way is a fourth term because the other election, the 2020 election was totally rigged.” Trump lost that election to Democrat Joe Biden.

Still, Trump added: “I don’t want to talk about a third term now because no matter how you look at it, we’ve got a long time to go.”

The 22nd Amendment, added to the Constitution in 1951 after President Franklin D. Roosevelt was elected four times in a row, says “no person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice.”

Any attempt to remain in office would be legally suspect and it is unclear how seriously Trump might pursue the idea. The comments nonetheless were an extraordinary reflection of the desire to maintain power by a president who had violated democratic traditions four years ago when he tried to overturn the election he lost to Biden.

“This is yet another escalation in his clear effort to take over the government and dismantle our democracy,” said a statement from Rep. Daniel Goldman, a New York Democrat who served as lead counsel for Trump’s first impeachment. “If Congressional Republicans believe in the Constitution, they will go on the record opposing Trump’s ambitions for a third term.”

Steve Bannon, a former Trump strategist who runs the right-wing “War Room” podcast, called for the president to run again during a speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference last month.

Gallup data shows President George W. Bush reaching a 90% approval rating after the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001. His father, President George H.W. Bush, hit 89% following the Gulf War in 1991.

Trump has maxed out at 47% in Gallup data during his second term, despite claiming to be “in the high 70s in many polls, in the real polls.”

Trump has mused before about serving longer than two terms before, generally with jokes to friendly audiences.

U.S. immigration officials are asking the public and federal agencies to comment on a proposal to collect social media handles from people applying for benefits such as green cards or citizenship, to comply with an executive order from President Donald Trump.

The March 5 notice raised alarms from immigration and free speech advocates because it appears to expand the government’s reach in social media surveillance to people already vetted and in the U.S. legally, such as asylum seekers, green card and citizenship applicants -- and not just those applying to enter the country. That said, social media monitoring by immigration officials has been a practice for over a decade, since at least the second Obama administration and ramping up under Trump’s first term.

The Department of Homeland Security issued a 60-day notice asking for public commentary on its plan to comply with Trump’s executive order titled “Protecting the United States from Foreign Terrorists and Other National Security and Public Safety Threats.” The plan calls for “uniform vetting standards” and screening people for grounds of inadmissibility to the U.S., as well as identify verification and “national security screening.” It seeks to collect social media handles and the names of platforms, although not passwords.

The policy seeks to require people to share their social media handles when applying for U.S. citizenship, green card, asylum and other immigration benefits. The proposal is open to feedback from the public until May 5.

“The basic requirements that are in place right now is that people who are applying for immigrant and non-immigrant visas have to provide their social media handles,” said Rachel Levinson-Waldman, managing director of the Brennan Center’s Liberty and National Security Program at New York University. “Where I could see this impacting is someone who came into the country before visa-related social media handle collection started, so they wouldn’t have provided it before and now they’re being required to. Or maybe they did before, but their social media use has changed.”

“This fairly widely expanded policy to collect them for everyone applying for any kind of immigration benefit, including people who have already been vetted quite extensively,” she added.

What this points to — along with other signals the administration is sending such as detaining people and revoking student visas for participating in campus protests that the government deems antisemitic and sympathetic to the militant Palestinian group Hamas — Levinson-Waldman added, is the increased use of social media to “make these very high-stakes determinations about people.”

In a statement, a spokesperson for the United States Citizenship and Immigration Service said the agency seeks to “strengthen fraud detection, prevent identity theft, and support the enforcement of rigorous screening and vetting measures to the fullest extent possible.”

“These efforts ensure that those seeking immigration benefits to live and work in the United States do not threaten public safety, undermine national security, or promote harmful anti-American ideologies,” the statement continued. USCIS estimates that the proposed policy change will affect about 3.6 million people.
How are social media accounts used now?

The U.S. government began ramping up the use of social media for immigration vetting in 2014 under then-President Barack Obama, according to the Brennan Center for Justice. In late 2015, the Department of Homeland Security began both “manual and automatic screening of the social media accounts of a limited number of individuals applying to travel to the United States, through various non-public pilot programs,” the nonpartisan law and policy institute explains on its website.

In May 2017, the U.S. Department of State issued an emergency notice to increase the screening of visa applicants. Brennan, along with other civil and human rights groups, opposed the move, arguing that it is “excessively burdensome and vague, is apt to chill speech, is discriminatory against Muslims, and has no security benefit.”

Two years later, the State Department began collecting social media handles from “nearly all foreigners” applying for visas to travel to the U.S. — about 15 million people a year.

Wisconsin’s Democratic attorney general asked a court on Friday to block billionaire Elon Musk from handing out $1 million checks to voters this weekend, just days before the state’s hotly contested Supreme Court race was to be decided.

Attorney General Josh Kaul filed the lawsuit in county circuit court to stop Musk from making the payments, which he said he would make Sunday in Wisconsin. Musk initially said in a post on his social media platform, X, that he planned to “personally hand over” $2 million to a pair of voters who have already cast their ballots in the race.

Musk later posted a clarification, saying the money will go to people who will be “spokesmen” for an online petition against “activist” judges. After first saying the event would only be open to people who had voted in the Supreme Court race, he said attendance would be limited to those who have signed the petition.

Also on Friday, Musk’s political action committee identified the recipient of its first $1 million giveaway — a Green Bay man who had donated to the Wisconsin GOP and the conservative candidate in the court race, and who has a history of posting support for President Donald Trump and his agenda.

Musk deleted the post about the Sunday giveaway from his social media platform, X, about 12 hours after he initially posted it late Thursday night. He issued the clarification about an hour later.

He had posted that he planned to give $1 million each to two voters at the event on Sunday in Green Bay, just two days before the election that will determine ideological control of the court in the battleground state.

“I will also personally hand over two checks for a million dollars each in appreciation for you taking the time to vote,” Musk’s now deleted post said. “This is super important.”

Kaul asked the court to order that Musk stop promoting the Sunday giveaway and not make any future payments to Wisconsin voters. Kaul referenced the changing plans for the Sunday event in arguing that any payment to voters was a violation of state law.

Even though the original post was deleted, there has been no announcement that the payments will not be made, Kaul argued in the lawsuit.

After a campaign stop in Beaver Dam, in south central Wisconsin, Schimel declined to say whether or not he thought Musk’s proposal was illegal, or whether Kaul’s move was appropriate.

“I don’t know. I’m not his lawyer,” Schimel said of Musk after the event in a strip mall parking lot.

As for Kaul’s lawsuit, he said: “I don’t care what he does. That’s his business. I’m running for Wisconsin Supreme Court. I don’t get involved in those legal battles. And I don’t give legal advice.”

Andrew Romeo, a spokesperson for Musk’s PAC that planned to host the event, declined to comment on the lawsuit.

The Supreme Court race, with spending above $81 million, has shattered previous records for a U.S. judicial election, and has become a referendum on Musk and the first months of Trump’s administration.

Trump endorsed Brad Schimel, a fellow Republican, and hosted a telephone town hall with him on Thursday night.

“It’s a very important race,” Trump said in brief remarks by phone, in a call organized by Schimel’s campaign. “I know you feel it’s local, but it’s not. It’s really much more than local. The whole country is watching.”

Schimel, a Waukesha County judge, faces Dane County Judge Susan Crawford in Tuesday’s election. Crawford is backed by a wide range of Democrats, including the liberal justices who hold a 4-3 majority on the Wisconsin Supreme Court and former President Barack Obama. The retirement this year of a liberal justice puts majority control of the court in play.

Kaul’s lawsuit was initially randomly assigned to Crawford but reassigned to another judge in neighboring Columbia County within minutes.

An appeals court in California has refused to halt a judge’s order requiring the Trump administration to rehire thousands of federal workers who were let go in mass firings.

A split 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel turned back an emergency motion late Wednesday to pause the order from U.S. District Judge William Alsup in a case brought by labor unions and nonprofits as Republican President Donald Trump moves to dramatically downsize the federal workforce. Alsup is one of two judges who found legal problems with the way the firings of probationary workers were carried out.

Two of the three judges on the panel ruled against the request for an emergency stay. The dissenting judge said the government had a strong argument against reinstating the workers.

The government has appealed Alsup’s order to the Supreme Court, arguing that judges cannot “micromanage” federal worker policies or force the rehiring of more than 16,000 workers. A response is due by April 3.

Alsup ordered six departments to immediately offer job reinstatement to employees terminated on in mid-February: the departments of Veterans Affairs, Agriculture, Defense, Energy, the Interior and Treasury.

The judge, who was nominated by Democratic President Bill Clinton, said the firings were an attempt by the administration to sidestep laws and regulations governing a reduction in workforce by going after probationary workers, who have fewer protections.

Alsup said he was appalled that employees were told they were being fired for poor performance despite receiving glowing evaluations just months earlier.

Probationary workers have been targeted for layoffs across the federal government because they are usually new to the job and lack full civil service protection.

Lawsuits over the firings are among the many faced by the administration. More than three dozen rulings have at least temporarily slowed Trump’s second-term agenda.

Within hours of Alsup’s ruling, a judge in Baltimore found separate legal problems with the handling of the firings. In a lawsuit brought by nearly two dozen states affected by the layoffs, U.S. District Judge James Bredar said the administration did not follow laws set out for large-scale layoffs. That case involved a wider range of agencies, and the plaintiffs estimate about 24,000 probationary workers are affected.

The administration contends that states have no right to try to influence the federal government’s relationship with its own workers. Justice Department lawyers argued that the firings were for performance issues and are not the large-scale layoffs subject to specific regulations.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt cast it as an attempt to encroach on the president’s power to hire and fire employees.

There are an estimated 200,000 probationary workers across federal agencies. They include entry-level employees but also workers who recently received a promotion.

Leavitt is one of three Trump administration officials who face a lawsuit from The Associated Press on First and Fifth Amendment grounds. The AP says the three are punishing the news agency for editorial decisions they oppose. The White House says the AP is not following an executive order to refer to the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of America.

European automakers, already struggling with tepid economic growth at home and rising competition from China, on Thursday decried the U.S. import tax on cars as a heavy burden that will punish consumers and companies alike on both sides of the Atlantic.

The new 25% import tax announced by President Donald Trump on Wednesday “will hurt global automakers and US manufacturing at the same time,” the European Automobile Manufacturers’ association said in a statement.

The head of Germany’s auto industry association, VDA, said the tariffs would weigh on car makers and every company in the deeply interwoven global supply chain “with negative consequences above all for consumers, including in North America.”

“The consequences will cost growth and prosperity on all sides,” Hildegard Müller said in a statement.

The stakes are enormous for BMW, Volkswagen, Mercedes-Benz, Volvo, Stellantis and their vast network of suppliers, as well as the entire European economy. The U.S. is the biggest export destination for the European auto industry and in 2023, European automakers exported 56 billion euros worth of vehicles and parts to the U.S.. Europe’s auto industry supports 13.8 million jobs, or 6.1% of total EU employment.

Europe’s carmakers already face a shrunken domestic market and new competition from cheaper Chinese electric vehicles. Any trouble in the auto industry would weigh on European economy that did not grow at all in the last quarter of 2024 and just 0.9% for the entire year.

The most exposed are German and Italian carmakers since 24% of German and 30% of Italian non-EU exports go to the U.S.. Germany is home to major automakers such as Volkswagen, Mercedes-Benz and BMW.

“This would deliver a substantial blow to a sector that not only sustains millions of jobs but also contributes to a large proportion of the bloc’s GDP,” wrote analyst Clarissa Hahn at Oxford Economics. She estimated a decline in German exports of 7.1% and a fall of 6.6% for Italian ones.

U.S. carmakers are less exposed to possible retaliation because they export only 2% of their production to the EU. Still, shares of Detroit’s Ford and General Motors tumbled sharply before the opening bell in the U.S. Thursday because the U.S. industry relies heavily on cross-board trade by suppliers.

“The EU and the US must engage in dialogue to find an immediate resolution to avert tariffs and the damaging consequences of a trade war,” the European manufacturers’ association said.

German auto association head Müller called for immediate negotiations between the EU and U.S. on a bilateral agreement that would offer “a forum to discuss the various tariff and non-tariff barriers for automobile products and could lead to a more balanced approach.”

South Korea’s truth commission concluded the government bears responsibility for facilitating a foreign adoption program rife with fraud and abuse, driven by efforts to reduce welfare costs and enabled by private agencies that often manipulated children’s backgrounds and origins.

The landmark report released Wednesday followed a nearly three-year investigation into complaints from 367 adoptees in Europe, the United States, and Australia, representing the most comprehensive examination yet of South Korea’s foreign adoptions, which peaked under a succession of military governments in the 1970s and ’80s.

The government-appointed Truth and Reconciliation Commission said it confirmed human rights violations in 56 of the complaints and aims to review the remaining cases before its mandate expires in late May.

However, some adoptees and even a commission investigator criticized the cautiously written report, acknowledging that investigative limitations prevented the commission from more strongly establishing the government’s complicity.

That investigator, Sang Hoon Lee, also lamented that the panel on Tuesday deferred assessments of 42 other adoptees’ cases, citing a lack of documentation to sufficiently prove their adoptions were problematic. Lee and the commission chairperson, Sun Young Park, did not specify which types of documents were central to the discussions.

However, Lee implied that some members of the commission’s decision-making committee were reluctant to recognize cases in which adoptees had yet to prove beyond doubt that the biological details in their adoption papers had been falsified — either by meeting their birth parents or confirming information about them.

Most Korean adoptees were registered by agencies as abandoned orphans, although they frequently had relatives who could be easily identified or found, a practice that often makes their roots difficult or impossible to trace. Government data obtained by The Associated Press shows less than a fifth of 15,000 adoptees who have asked South Korea for help with family searches since 2012 have managed to reunite with relatives.

Lee said the committee’s stance reflects a lack of understanding of the systemic problems in adoptions and risks excluding many remaining cases.

“Personally, I find yesterday’s decision very regrettable and consider it a half-baked decision,” Lee said.

After reviewing government and adoption records and interviewing adoptees, birth families, public officials and adoption workers, the commission assessed that South Korean officials saw foreign adoptions as a cheaper alternative to building a social welfare system for needy children.

Through policies and laws that promoted adoption, South Korea’s military governments permitted private adoption agencies to exercise extensive guardianship rights over children in their custody and swiftly transfer custody to foreign adopters, resulting in “large-scale overseas placements of children in need of protection,” the commission said.

Authorities provided no meaningful oversight as adoption agencies engaged in dubious or illicit practices while competing to send more children abroad. These practices included bypassing proper consent from biological parents, falsely documenting children with known parents as abandoned orphans, and switching children’s identities, according to the commission’s report. It cited that the government failed to ensure that agencies properly screened adoptive parents or prevent them from excessively charging foreign adopters, who were often asked to make additional donations beyond the standard fees.

The commission’s findings broadly aligned with previous reporting by The AP. The AP investigations, which were also documented by Frontline (PBS), detailed how South Korea’s government, Western countries and adoption agencies worked in tandem to supply some 200,000 Korean children to parents overseas, despite years of evidence that many were being procured through questionable or outright unscrupulous means.

The Unification Church in Japan was ordered dissolved by a court Tuesday after a government request spurred by the investigation into the 2022 assassination of former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.

The church said it was considering an immediate appeal of the Tokyo District Court’s revocation of its legal status, which would take away its tax-exempt privilege and require liquidation of its assets.

The order followed a request by Japan’s Education Ministry in 2023 to dissolve the influential South Korea-based sect, citing manipulative fundraising and recruitment tactics that sowed fear among followers and harmed their families.

In the ruling, the court said the church’s problems were extensive and continuous, and a dissolution order is necessary because it is not likely it could voluntarily reform, according to NHK television.

"We believe our claims were accepted,” said Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshiasa Hayashi told reporters. He added that government will continue efforts to support victims of the church.

The Japanese branch of the church had criticized the request as a serious threat to religious freedom and the human rights of its followers.

The church called the court order regrettable and unjust and said in a statement the court’s decision was based on “a wrong legal interpretation and absolutely unacceptable.”

The investigation into Abe’s assassination revealed decades of cozy ties between the South Korea-based church and Japan’s governing Liberal Democratic Party. The church obtained legal status as a religious organization in Japan in the 1960s during an anti-communist movement supported by Abe’s grandfather, former Prime Minister Nobusuke Kishi.

The man accused of killing Abe resented the church and blamed it for his family’s financial troubles.

The church, which officially calls itself the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification, is the first religious group subject to a revocation order based on violations of Japan’s civil code. Two earlier case involved criminal charges — the Aum Shinrikyo doomsday cult, which carried out a sarin nerve gas attack on the Tokyo subway system, and Myokakuji group, whose executives were convicted of fraud.

To seek the church’s dissolution, the Education Ministry had submitted 5,000 documents and pieces of evidence to the court, based on interviews with more than 170 people.

The church tried to steer its followers’ decision-making, using manipulative tactics, making them buy expensive goods and donate beyond their financial ability and causing fear and harm to them and their families, seriously deviating from the law on religious groups, officials and experts say.

The Agency for Cultural Affairs said the settlements reached in or outside court exceeded 20 billion yen ($132 million) and involved more than 1,500 people.

A group of lawyers who have represented people suing the church welcomed the court decision as a major first step toward redress. They demanded an apology and compensation from the church as soon as possible.

The church, founded in Seoul in 1954, a year after the end of the Korean War, by the late Rev. Sun Myung Moon, the self-proclaimed messiah who preached new interpretations of the Bible and conservative, family-oriented value systems.

It developed relations with conservative world leaders including U.S. President Donald Trump, as well as his predecessors Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush.

The church faced accusations in the 1970s and 1980s of using devious recruitment tactics and brainwashing adherents into turning over huge portions of their salaries to Moon. In Japan, the group has faced lawsuits for offering “spiritual merchandise” that allegedly caused members to buy expensive art and jewelry or sell their real estate to raise donations for the church.

U.S. Education Secretary Linda McMahon said Columbia University is “on the right track” toward recovering federal funding after the elite New York City university agreed to implement a host of policy changes demanded by the Trump administration.

Appearing on CNN’s “State of the Union” Sunday, McMahon described “great conversations” with Columbia’s interim president, Katrina Armstrong.

“She said she knew that this was her responsibility to make sure that children on her campus were safe,” McMahon said. “She wanted to make sure there was no discrimination of any kind. She wanted to address any systemic issues that were identified relative to the antisemitism on campus.”

Armstrong announced Friday that the university would put its Middle East studies department under new supervision and overhaul its rules for protests and student discipline. It also agreed to adopt a new definition of antisemitism and expand “intellectual diversity” by staffing up its Institute for Israel and Jewish Studies, according to an outline posted on its website.

Earlier this month, the Trump administration pulled $400 million in research grants and other funding over how the university handled protests against Israel’s military campaign in Gaza. In order to consider restoring those funds and billions more in future grants, federal officials demanded nine separate changes to the university’s academic and security policies.

Armstrong’s decision acceding to the administration’s demands drew condemnation from some faculty and free speech groups, who accused the university of caving to President Donald Trump’s largely unprecedented intrusion on academic freedom.

Asked whether the university had done enough to secure its funding, McMahon said: “We are on the right track now to make sure the final negotiations to unfreeze that money will be in place.”

The Trump administration’s crackdown on Columbia University, where a massive pro-Palestinian protest movement began with a tent encampment last spring, has thrust the campus into crisis and sparked fears of similar actions at colleges across the country.

Federal immigration officials on March 8 arrested Mahmoud Khalil, an activist who served as a spokesperson and negotiator for pro-Palestinian demonstrators last year. Khalil, a legal permanent resident, is challenging his detention and potential deportation in court.

A court formally arrested the mayor of Istanbul, a key rival to President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, on Sunday and ordered him jailed pending the outcome of a trial on corruption charges.

Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu was detained following a raid on his residence earlier this week, sparking the largest wave of street demonstrations in Turkey in more than a decade. It also deepened concerns over democracy and rule of law in Turkey.

His imprisonment is widely regarded as a political move to remove a major contender from the next presidential race, currently scheduled for 2028. Government officials reject the accusations and insist that Turkey’s courts operate independently.

The prosecutor’s office said the court decided to jail Imamoglu on suspicion of running a criminal organization, accepting bribes, extortion, illegally recording personal data and bid-rigging. A request for him to be imprisoned on terror-related charges was rejected although he still faces prosecution. Following the court’s ruling, Imamoglu was transferred to Silivri prison, west of Istanbul.

The Interior Ministry later announced that Imamoglu had been suspended from duty as a “temporary measure.” The municipality had previously appointed an acting mayor from its governing council.

Alongside Imamoglu, 47 other people were also jailed pending trial, including a key aide and two district mayors from Istanbul, one of whom was replaced with a government appointee. A further 44 suspects were released under judicial control.

Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya said Sunday that 323 people were detained the previous evening over disturbances at protests.

Largely peaceful protests across Turkey have seen hundreds of thousands come out in support of Imamoglu. However, there has been some violence, with police deploying water cannons, tear gas, pepper spray and firing plastic pellets at protesters in Istanbul, Ankara and Izmir, some of whom hurled stones, fireworks and other missiles at riot police.

The formal arrest came as more than 1.5 million members of the opposition Republican People’s Party, or CHP, began holding a primary presidential election to endorse Imamoglu, the sole candidate.

The party has also set up symbolic ballot boxes nationwide to allow people who are not party members to express their support for the mayor. Large crowds gathered early Sunday to cast a “solidarity ballot.”

“This is no longer just a problem of the Republican People’s Party, but a problem of Turkish democracy,” Fusun Erben, 69, said at a polling station in Istanbul’s Kadikoy district. “We do not accept our rights being so easily usurped. We will fight until the end.”

Speaking at a polling station in Bodrum, western Turkey, engineer Mehmet Dayanc, 38, said he feared that “in the end we’ll be like Russia, a country without an opposition, where only a single man participates in elections.”

In a message posted on social media, Imamoglu called on people to show “their struggle for democracy and justice to the entire world” at the ballot box. He warned Erdogan that he would be defeated by “our righteousness, our courage, our humility, our smiling face.”

“Honestly, we are embarrassed in the name of our legal system,” Ankara Mayor Mansur Yavas, a fellow member of Imamoglu’s CHP, told reporters after casting his vote, criticizing the lack of confidentiality in the proceedings.

CHP leader Ozgur Ozel said Imamoglu’s imprisonment was reminiscent of “Italian mafia methods.” Speaking at Istanbul City Hall, he added: “Imamoglu is on the one hand in prison and on the other hand on the way to the presidency.”

The Council of Europe, which focuses on promoting human rights and democracy, slammed the decision and demanded Imamoglu’s immediate release.