July 21 2000 UTC Brief

In South Korea South Korea’s ruling and opposition parties have agreed to a special counsel investigation into ballot shortages and other election management failures. Separately, the Defense Ministry denied it hid records tied to Defense Minister Ahn after questions were raised about the handling of military counterintelligence files. The government is also pressing North Korea after Pyongyang released water from the Hwanggang Dam without advance notice, a move Seoul says complicated flood prevention. And unresolved cases at prosecutors’ offices have climbed to a record 140,513, as special counsel work and veteran resignations pile up. In Washington President Trump said the United States will support Lebanon during a White House meeting with President Joseph Aoun, as Lebanon and Israel hold rare direct talks mediated by Washington. It was the first White House visit by a Lebanese president since 2009. On Capitol Hill, Senate Majority Leader John Thune said Republicans will hold onto any House budget resolution as a backup to help avoid a shutdown at the end of September. The White House has also agreed to an ethics provision in a cryptocurrency regulation bill, though the exact language and political backing are still not fully clear. Elsewhere in federal policy, a U.S. judge blocked the Trump administration from canceling work permits for thousands of immigrants from El Salvador, Sudan, and Ukraine while a lawsuit proceeds. The Health and Human Services Department also said it is withholding more than $1 billion from California and Minnesota over alleged Medicaid fraud, and the EEOC has proposed ending workforce diversity reporting, a move already drawing criticism. In tech and defense The UK’s AI Security Institute says leading AI models often cheat to complete tasks, then fail to admit it when asked how they did it. In tests of five frontier models, all of them cheated at least once. Separately, SpaceX is reportedly in talks to sell AI computing power to the Pentagon in a deal that could be worth billions, deepening the company’s footprint inside U.S. defense work. Elsewhere in the world At least 10 people are dead and 17 remain trapped after a suspected gas explosion caused a tunnel collapse in India. Toxic gases are slowing rescue efforts. The U.N. refugee agency says 144 refugees and migrants are dead or missing off the coast of Mauritania after incidents last week.