Trump expects Iran talks this week as Bessent says oil lifeline nearly dry; South Africa arrests Wedela suspect
CENTCOM still denies IRGC Remus 600 claim; Kyivstar HQ hit with no staff casualties; DOT still set Monday for ~34.5 mpg CAFE; SCOTUS third-country response still due Monday 4 p.m. Eastern.
5 PM CT video brief · 2:17Presenter voice and image generated with AI tools.Read transcript
I'm Nora Vale with your 5 PM World Brief for Sunday, September 27th. Trump expects Iran talks this week; Bessent says oil lifeline nearly dry. CENTCOM still denies IRGC Remus 600 claim. Russia hits Kyivstar HQ; defense ministry claims Vodafone Ukraine data-center strike. Zelenskyy: Kyiv data center hit twice. South Africa arrests first Wedela tavern suspect in Limpopo; eight still sought after shootings kill 27. DOT still set Monday to finalize ~34.5 mpg CAFE by 2031, down from 50.4. AAA had gas at $4.48 Saturday. No new Supreme Court orders this evening. Third-country deportation response still due Monday at 4 p.m. Eastern. In national weather, from the National Weather Service: Hurricane Nolo, with top winds near 115 mph, may bring impacts to parts of Hawaii. A round of heavy rain and embedded thunderstorms associated with the meandering Nor'easter is forecast to impact southern New England to the northern Mid-Atlantic through tonight and into Monday. Our opinion. Iran needs real enrichment limits in writing. Ukraine needs an endgame, not blank checks. Stop mandating the cars you drive. Clear the path to remove criminal aliens. Full stories and sources are at WorldBriefNow.com. I'm Nora Vale. Thanks for watching.
One day after rejecting Tehran’s seven-day Hormuz reopening plan, President Donald Trump told Axios in a Sunday phone interview that he expects U.S. negotiators to engage in more talks with Iran this week, saying, “They want to make a deal, but it is not the deal that I want to make. It is what we would have maybe agreed to a year ago. They overplayed their hand.” Two regional sources told Axios they expect another round of indirect dialogue as early as Monday, with Qatari mediators continuing shuttle diplomacy between Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi and U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff. Separately, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told Fox News Sunday that only about 15 million barrels of Iranian oil remain for delivery to China under Operation Economic Outcast and that Iran will soon have “nothing left to trade,” while U.S. Central Command again denied the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ claim that it seized a U.S. Remus 600 underwater drone in the Strait of Hormuz.
Russia hit the headquarters of Kyivstar, Ukraine’s largest mobile service provider, on Sunday, with the company telling Interfax Ukraine there were no casualties among staff, Reuters reported. Russia’s defense ministry said it also struck a data center belonging to Vodafone Ukraine, the country’s second-largest cell network; Vodafone Ukraine did not immediately comment. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Russia struck a Kyiv data center twice Sunday morning, wounding two children and an adult. Ukraine’s digital ministry has said recent data-center hits caused service outages for about 100,000 households in Kyiv and the surrounding region, according to Reuters.
South African police arrested a man in Tzaneen, Limpopo, believed linked to Saturday night’s tavern massacre in Wedela near Carletonville that killed 17 people and wounded 15, PrimeTime News reported Sunday, citing Gauteng Police Commissioner Gen. Tommy Mthombeni. Investigators said blood-stained evidence recovered at the tavern strengthened the case against the suspect in custody, while a manhunt continued for eight other gunmen who allegedly arrived in two vehicles with AK-47 rifles and pistols, took cellphones and fled. Separately, President Cyril Ramaphosa said technology had helped police identify images of the eight wanted suspects and stressed the need to curb gun crime, SABC News reported. A second township shooting in Lwandle near Cape Town early Sunday killed 10 and wounded 11.
The Transportation Department remains set Monday to finalize sharply lower Corporate Average Fuel Economy standards after President Donald Trump said Saturday he approved new rules that “TERMINATE” what he called the Biden administration’s EV mandate, the New York Post and Washington Examiner reported. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said a “major victory for America’s auto workers is COMING MONDAY.” A December proposal would set a fleetwide average near 34.5 miles per gallon by model year 2031, down from Biden-era 50.4 mpg; AAA had the national average for regular gas at $4.48 a gallon Saturday, the Post reported. Congress has already removed fines for missing mileage standards.
The Trump administration’s pocket rescission of about $810 million in congressionally approved spending — announced Friday and still pending as the federal fiscal year ends Wednesday, Sept. 30 — includes some $567 million aimed at Health and Human Services programs supporting refugees, asylees and other noncitizens, Fox News reported, citing the White House. The White House said the package also targets education programs for migrant students and other initiatives it argues do not benefit American citizens. Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, has called the move unlawful under the Impoundment Control Act; OMB Director Russ Vought has argued the Act does not forbid end-of-year rescissions.
As of Sunday evening, the Supreme Court’s public docket for Department of Homeland Security v. D.V.D., No. 26A406, still showed only Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson’s Sept. 24 order directing respondents to file a response by 4 p.m. EDT Monday, Sept. 28, with no further Sunday order listed on the docket page. The Court’s orders page listed no new Sunday miscellaneous orders — the most recent miscellaneous order shown was dated Sept. 23. The Trump administration’s emergency application asks the Court to stay a First Circuit order that blocked expedited third-country removals while the case proceeds.
SpaceX is still targeting Starship Flight 14 for Monday, Sept. 28, during a 75-minute window that opens at 8:15 a.m. EDT (7:15 a.m. CT) from Pad 2 at Starbase in South Texas, Space.com reported Sunday. If successful, the fully stacked vehicle — more than 400 feet tall — would reach orbit for the first time and deploy 26 Starlink Version 3 internet satellites on a roughly 10-hour mission, with the Super Heavy booster aimed at a Gulf of Mexico splashdown and the Ship at a Pacific splashdown off Chile. Prior Starship flights have all been suborbital; SpaceX coverage is expected to begin about 30 minutes before liftoff.
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