An Australian court has sentenced a man to nine years in jail for smuggling cocaine inside printers.
According to a post from Australia’s Border Force and Federal Police, in 2017, “officers intercepted a consignment of five printers … locating 10 packages of compressed white powder concealed within their paper trays.”
Initial tests suggested the substance was cocaine – 22.4kg of it – so Border Force swapped it out for another material and then shipped the package to its intended destination.
Four men picked up the printers, at which point authorities swooped.
The gears of justice can grind slowly in Australia, so the matter didn’t reach court for years. One of the accused was found not guilty. In 2022, another received a ten-year sentence. Another got the same term last year.
The fourth man – who Australian authorities have described as a “syndicate member” – fronted up before a judge in 2024 and learned his fate last week when the Victorian County Court sentenced him to nine years, with a four-and-a-half-year non-parole period.
Drug smugglers down under seem quite fond of computing hardware: In 2014 we reported that authorities found laser printer toner cartridges full of methamphetamine and charged a woman over the matter.
And in 2024 we spotted news of tower PC cases brought across the border with 100kg of meth inside. Again, Border Force spotted the drugs at the border, then staked out the recipient before swooping in to make an arrest.
Australian government data suggests cocaine retails for AU$300-$400 per gram ($215 to $290), and methamphetamine for around AU$50 ($35). Cartridges for your correspondent’s color laser printer cost AU$139 ($100) apiece and a third party toner refill vendor sells 45 grams of the colored dust for just $8.40.
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Gold bangles are displayed inside a jewelery store in the old quarters of Delhi, India, May 11, 2026. | Photo Credit: BHAWIKA CHHABRA
The Kerala Gold and Silver Merchants Association has urged the government to adopt a policy framework focused on recycling domestically held gold instead of discouraging gold purchases through higher import duties.
State General Secretary S. Abdul Nazar said that if effective gold recycling measures and a transparent bullion banking system are introduced, India could significantly reduce or even eliminate its dependence on gold imports, thereby saving substantial foreign exchange reserves while protecting employment in the jewelery sector.
According to him, India imports around 800 tonnes of gold annually at an estimated cost of ₹12 lakh crore. With gold increasingly functioning as a global financial asset, the government should frame policies that integrate the vast quantity of gold held within the country into the formal financial system rather than restricting consumer purchases.
Citing estimates by the World Gold Council, Nazar pointed out that approximately 2,19,890 tonnes of gold have been mined globally so far, of which an estimated 25,000–30,000 tonnes are held by Indian households, trusts and institutions — nearly 12 to 15 per cent of the world’s total gold reserves.
He said gold in India serves not only as jewelery but also as a source of savings, investment, security and livelihood for millions of families connected to the broader jewelery ecosystem. Proper utilization of these domestic gold reserves could substantially curb imports.
Criticizing the increase in gold import duty from 6 per cent to 15 per cent, Nazar warned that such measures could encourage smuggling. He pointed out that India imported nearly 1,000 tonnes of gold when the duty was previously at 15 per cent, whereas imports declined to below 800 tonnes when the duty stood at 6 per cent.
The 9 per cent increase in import duty had pushed up gold prices by around ₹10,200 per sovereign. According to him, smuggling one kg of gold could generate profits exceeding ₹20 lakh, while the addition of 3 per cent GST in the parallel market could raise illegal profits to nearly ₹24 lakh.
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Trump heads to Beijing for high-stakes talks with Xi Jinping as tensions over the Iran war and the Strait of Hormuz continue to escalate.
Published On 13 May 202613 May 2026
United States President Donald Trump departed for Beijing on Tuesday for a high-stakes summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping, saying the two leaders would hold a “long talk” on Iran even as trade remains the main focus of the visit.
The summit comes as tensions over the war involving Iran continue to escalate, with Tehran accusing Washington and Israel of fabricating “justifications for atrocity”, while Trump insists the conflict will end “peacefully or otherwise”.
Meanwhile, Kuwait said it arrested four alleged members of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) accused of planning “hostile” activities after attempting to enter the country via Bubiyan Island, while Qatar has accused Tehran of “weaponising” the Strait of Hormuz and using it to “blackmail” Gulf states as vital energy supplies remain trapped in the region.
Here is what we know:
In Iran
Iran presses US on peace proposal: Iran’s chief negotiator and Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf said Washington must accept Tehran’s latest peace plan or face failure. His comments came after Trump, who faces growing pressure over the war’s impact on the US economy, said on Monday the US-Iran ceasefire was on “life support” and that he was considering restarting naval escorts through the Strait of Hormuz.
Report says Iran retains missile strength: The New York Times reported Tuesday that classified US intelligence assessments say Iran still has substantial missile capabilities, with about 70 percent of its mobile launchers and pre-war missile stockpile still in action, and has restored access to 30 of 33 missile sites along the Strait of Hormuz.
War diplomacy
Chinese supertanker crosses Hormuz: Chinese crude oil supertanker Yuan Hua Hu was reportedly transiting the Strait of Hormuz on Wednesday, ship-tracking data showed, passing Iran’s Larak Island while heading out of the Gulf.
Hezbollah rules out disarmament talks: Hezbollah chief Naim Qassem said his group’s weapons were not part of forthcoming ceasefire negotiations between Lebanon and Israel. “This is an internal Lebanese matter and not part of negotiations with the enemy,” he said before the third round of Lebanon-Israel talks scheduled for Thursday and Friday.
Qatar warns over Hormuz pressure: Qatar’s prime minister said Iran should not use the Strait of Hormuz, blocked since early in the war, as a means of “blackmail” against Gulf states. Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani also said a recent visit to Washington was aimed at supporting Pakistan’s mediation efforts to help end the conflict.
Iran defends Hormuz stance: Reporting from Tehran, Al Jazeera’s Almigdad Alruhaid said Iranian officials reject suggestions they are using the Strait of Hormuz as a weapon, insisting vessels can still move safely through routes coordinated by the IRGC Navy even as Tehran tightens control over the strategic waterway.
Australia joins Gulf mission: Defence Minister Richard Marles said Australia will join a “strictly defensive” mission led by France and the United Kingdom to secure shipping through the strait, once it is established, and contribute a surveillance aircraft to protect the United Arab Emirates from Iranian drone attacks.
Turkiye sees chance for de-escalation: Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said he believes both the US and Iran now have “enough will” to stop the conflict, warning that further escalation would deepen global economic instability and regional tensions. Speaking to Al Jazeera, Fidan urged both sides to pursue a lasting settlement, saying the war’s impact extends far beyond the two countries.
The Gulf
UAE gas facility hit by war: The UAE’s main gas processing complex, one of the world’s largest, will not resume full capacity until next year, its operator said, after it was hit in the Iran war. ADNOC Gas said the Habshan site in Abu Dhabi was operating at 60 percent.
Kuwait arrests alleged IRGC operatives: The country said it arrested four men accused of belonging to Iran’s IRGC after they tried to infiltrate Bubiyan Island by sea and injured a Kuwaiti soldier. Authorities said the suspects, arrested on board a fishing boat allegedly chartered for “hostile actions”, admitted they had been tasked by the IRGC with carrying out the operation. Iran has rejected the allegation and condemned the arrest of its nationals.
In the US
Trump on Xi: Trump said he does not believe the US needs China’s help to end the war involving Iran, but confirmed the issue would still feature in his talks with Xi Jinping this week. “We’re going to have a long talk about it,” Trump told reporters before departing for Beijing. However, he also said: “We have a lot of things to discuss. I wouldn’t say Iran is one of them, to be honest with you, because we have Iran very much under control.”
Trump says war’s end will bring down inflation: Facing growing domestic pressure over rising prices linked to the conflict, Trump said the war “will not be long” and argued its end would trigger a sharp drop in oil prices and inflation. He told reporters that hundreds of oil tankers were waiting to leave the region and predicted energy markets and stocks would surge once the conflict ends.
US says Iran war has cost $29bn: Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told lawmakers the war has cost Washington at least $29bn in munitions and equipment over 74 days, excluding damage to bases. He said military escalation remains an option. Democrats pushed back amid growing public concern over rising gas prices and uncertainty surrounding the war’s objectives.
In Lebanon
Israel pounds Lebanon: Lebanon on Tuesday urged the US ambassador to Beirut to pressure Israel to halt its attacks, after it pounded the country with air attacks on Monday despite a ceasefire in the Israel-Hezbollah war.
Hezbollah says it struck an Israeli tank in Lebanon: Hezbollah claimed it hit an Israeli Merkava tank near the town of Hula in Lebanon’s Nabatieh region, as the group’s leader Naim Qassem pledged to turn the battlefield into “hell” for Israeli forces amid escalating fighting.
Lebanon fears ‘lost generation’: Experts warn Israel’s war on Lebanon has displaced hundreds of thousands of students, destroyed schools and deepened inequalities in an education system already strained by economic crisis. While many schools shifted to online learning, experts say students are still falling behind, with citizenship education increasingly sidelined in a country already divided along sectarian lines.
Deadly attack hits Lebanese paramedics: Reporting from southern Lebanon, Al Jazeera’s Obaida Hitto said an Israeli attack killed at least two Lebanese Civil Defence paramedics and the wounded man they were trying to evacuate near Tyre, as continued bombardment deepens the humanitarian crisis and displacement across the south.
A prisoner with a muscle-wasting condition accused of taking part in a Palestine Action protest claims he has been forced to crawl around the jail – including to get medicine – because of lack of treatment and a wheelchair.
Umer Khalid, who is being held at Wormwood Scrubs in west London, awaiting trial for alleged involvement in last year’s break-in at RAF Brize Norton, also alleges he was left in his cell when the prison was evacuated because of a fire alarm and went 26 days without a shower while waiting for a shower chair to be provided.
In an interview from prison, the 22-year-old from Stockport, who has limb-girdle muscular dystrophy and is not due to stand trial until January, compared his predicament to that of an injured stray dog he saw when visiting Pakistan.
“It genuinely broke my heart,” he said. “I felt so sad because no one’s going to care about it, it’s just going to have to crawl with this injury. It feels worse than that because at least when I looked at that dog, I felt sympathy.
“I’m literally on the floor, crawling on my hand, but then I can’t even use my right arm because I’ve fallen on my shoulder multiple times because they’ve not given me a wheelchair, so I can’t even crawl properly.
“I’m not embarrassed because at the end of the day I’m not the one who should be embarrassed, but it’s so dehumanising.”
Khalid says the muscles in his arms and legs have wasted away such that skin is hanging off his bones, a description confirmed by recent visitors.
He claimed he waited weeks to be given crutches, which he is now too weak to use, and then for a wheelchair, which is unsuitable because it does not fit in his cell or in the corridor outside it.
For a while, he was able to use the wheelchair but he says he fell out of it twice trying to get into his cell. He said he was told last week that it was only to be used for going to see visitors and appointments, which “has led me to have to crawl on the floor to get medication”.
Before he was given the wheelchair, Khalid, who says he is in pain and exhausted, missed appointments with the neurologist and the physio because he could not get to them. He said he has only seen the physio once this year.
When there was a fire alarm on 23 April, he claims prison officers, “just looked at me, saw me in bed and left. But I was in too much pain to even get up and press my emergency buzzer”.
He said a neurologist recommended supplements a month ago, which he had not received and he had not been given the high protein food he needs for his condition.
Despite being diagnosed with muscular dystrophy in 2014 Khalid, who was part of a hunger strike by Palestine Action-affiliated prisoners that ended in January, alleged healthcare workers had accused him of exaggerating his condition and communicated their belief to prison officers.
He is demanding proper medical treatment, full access to a suitable wheelchair and the release of all his medical records to his legal team.
His mother, Shabana Khalid, said: “He showed us his legs and his arms, he’s just like a skeleton with skin hanging off him and the prison want to say he’s making it up. It’s horrific; there’s nothing we can do but get angry.”
A Ministry of Justice spokesperson said: “The Prison Service caters to all disabilities. All prisoners’ needs are assessed when they enter custody – with arrangements made, and appropriate action taken to ensure they are met.”
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That’s fine when playing poker, but less useful when we trust LLMs with serious work like finding software flaws
The smart LLM user checks models’ output for hallucinations. Now, it appears we need to inspect them for signs they are gaslighting us – an unforeseen cost of increasing intelligence.
Most of the Internet lost its marbles over the cracking abilities of Anthropic’s Mythos Preview. Those capabilities are real, but – as the release of OpenAI’s GPT-5.5 has shown us – they’re not unique. A rising tide of intelligence makes these models increasingly competent at an ever-wider range of tasks – including finding and exploiting code vulnerabilities.
The more significant signal from Mythos is buried in its novel-length System Card and concerns the model’s honesty, because on at least one occasion Anthropic detected Mythos using an explicitly forbidden technique to solve a problem.
Models always have a bit of trouble following instructions precisely. The surprise lay in the fact that the model knew it had used a forbidden technique, then proceeded to cover its tracks.
Anthropic states that this behavior appeared early in the model’s training and didn’t happen again. That’s good, but it doesn’t unring the bell.
We’ve now seen an LLM purposely break a rule, recognize it as rule-breaking, then lie about it.
At one level I reckon we should feel a bit like proud parents because AI is now so well-trained on human characteristics such as deceit and cheating that it can put both of them to work effectively. We’ve created a faithful simulation of some of the least enviable human behaviors. That’s singularly indicative of intelligence because to get away with a lie you need to be at least as smart as the entity you’re lying to.
Mythos didn’t get away with its cheating because of those meddling kids at Anthropic, who saw the act of deceit in their ‘white box’ monitoring of the model. Anthropic also saw strategic manipulation, unsafe behavior, reward hacking, and, significantly, evaluation awareness. Mythos knew it was being monitored. Which, as with a human under observation, likely encouraged it to colour between the lines.
Do these behaviors – which Anthropic insists haven’t made their way into the apparently-never-to-be-released-publicly Mythos – give us a preview of what’s to come, across the board in other LLM models as they reach similar levels of intelligence?
Just as GPT-5.5 quickly caught up to Mythos in its ability to find and exploit vulnerabilities, it’s entirely reasonable to expect that future versions of GPT, Gemini, Grok, DeepSeek, etc., will also display this same propensity to deceive. It’s equally true that some vendors – looking at you, Grok – will be less inclined to discourage their models from these sorts of behaviors. Before the end of this year, we’ll likely have models fully capable of lying to our faces.
Will we be able to know?
As models progress from unintentional hallucinations into intentional deceit, we enter a hall of mirrors.
Should we trust output that appears to be correct? Or do we now need to consider if an LLM framed output in such a way as to subtly lead the reader to a conclusion they might not otherwise have entertained? Could this model be leading us down the garden path?
It’s one thing when a model is simply too dumb to be useful. It’s another thing altogether when a model is too clever by half. Yes, smarts make those models useful – but for whom? That’s the question hanging over every “smart enough” model now.
The geopolitical ‘race to superintelligence’ therefore looks more like a collision with a brick wall. If you can’t trust a tool to be truthful, how can you use it? There may be certain circumstances where the hidden motivation of the tool makes no difference, but will organisations be prepared to wear that risk?
It’s looking more and more as though AI has a sweet spot – “good enough” that we’re not drowned in hallucinations and confabulations, yet not “too good” – the point at which we must anticipate and manage a model’s motivations.
We hit that sweet spot at the end of last year. Yet, rather than enjoying these new capabilities, we’re sprinting past them, into the open jaws of a threat that we never considered: Our computers could soon begin directing us toward their own ends.
It may be wise for us to work with these models differently. Less honestly; more as though we’re playing poker, employing deception. For safety’s sake. ®
Victor Wembanyama scored 27 points and grabbed 17 rebounds to lead hosts San Antonio Spurs past the Minnesota Timberwolves 126-97 and take a 3-2 lead in their Western Conference semifinal series.
Wembanyama returned to action on Tuesday after being ejected in the second quarter of an eventual 114-109 loss to the host Timberwolves in Game 4 on Sunday, when he elbowed the face of an opponent, resulting in an automatic ejection.
“Very, very much,” Wembanyama said when asked how anxious he was to return to the court for Game 5. “I mean, I was fresh, feeling good. But honestly, it’s hard to tell if it’s just, it’s just, it was just getting fired up. Obviously, I’m going to be excited with butterflies, you know. So excitement is not something abnormal.”
The Spurs led by as many as 18 points in the second quarter before going cold and settling for a 12-point advantage at halftime. After Minnesota rallied to tie the game at 61-all four minutes into the third quarter, San Antonio ran off 30 of the final 42 points of the period to carry a 91-73 lead into the final 12 minutes.
“We went away from what was working, and then, you know, defence just cratered,” Timberwolves coach Chris Finch said. “In the last six minutes of the third quarter, lot of it was just ball contain stuff. And, you know, offensively found stuff that was working, then we just started breaking off plays, you know. And that’s my job. I gotta get us back on track. That’s on me.”
The Spurs stoked the margin to 20 early in the fourth. Minnesota answered with an 8-0 surge to pull within 93-81 with 9:34 remaining but never got closer than 11 points for the rest of the game.
Keldon Johnson added 21 points off the bench for San Antonio, with De’Aaron Fox scoring 18, Stephon Castle hitting for 17 and Devin Vassell and Dylan Harper tallying 12 points each. Harper also grabbed 10 rebounds.
“We played with the appropriate fear, discipline, execution, physicality, poise,” Spurs coach Mitch Johnson said. “And I thought we had it from an array of people tonight, and it was really good to see. We needed everybody, because at different moments of the game, different guys stepped up.”
Anthony Edwards led the Timberwolves with 20 points. Jaden McDaniels and Julius Randle had 17 points apiece, Ayo Dosunmu racked up 16 and Naz Reid finished with 12.
Wembanyama was on fire in the game’s early moments, scoring 16 of the Spurs’ first 24 points as San Antonio built a 24-9 lead at the 6:17 mark of the first period. The Timberwolves weathered the storm, with Reid’s driving layup with 23 seconds remaining trimming the deficit to 34-30 after 12 minutes of play.
“We knew it was going to be physical, so just making that a point of emphasis and trying to keep them off the offensive glass,” Castle said. “I thought we started the game off well, and that’s where our runs came from. But obviously, they’re a good team, you know, they’re going to go on their own run.”
The Spurs ripped off the first nine points of the second quarter, capped by a three-point play by Castle, to stoke their advantage to 43-30.
San Antonio Spurs’ De’Aaron Fox drives past Julius Randle of the Minnesota Timberwolves in the first half [Ronald Cortes/Getty Images via AFP]
San Antonio built their margin to 58-40 after a Wembanyama alley-oop dunk with 3:24 left in the period but then missed its final eight shots of the quarter, allowing Minnesota to pull to within 59-47 at the break.
Wembanyama had a double-double in the first half alone, scoring 21 points and collecting 11 boards. Fox contributed 12 points for San Antonio before halftime.
“I think one thing, the one word I’d like to use, just ‘mature,’” Mitch Johnson said of Wembanyama. “There’s a lot that’s happened in the last 48 hours, in the last game, and I think how that young man came out tonight and played in a variety of ways, in a variety of situations, not just in terms of his production, was extremely mature and then defensively, start to finish.”
Dosunmu’s nine points paced the Timberwolves’ offence in the first half while Reid and Edwards added eight points each.
Minnesota continued its charge at the start of the third quarter, tying the game at 61-61 at the 7:51 mark when Dosunmu’s layup culminated a 14-2 run.
“I don’t see nobody in our locker room that [is] worried at the end of the day,” Edwards said. “Man, it’s another basketball game. So you come out, put your boots on and get ready to go to work.”
Game 6 in the best-of-seven series is Friday in Minneapolis, while Game 7 – if necessary – would be back in the Alamo City on Sunday.
