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Putin to join President Xi and world leaders at SCO meeting in China
TIANJIN: Russian President Vladimir Putin is set to arrive in the northern Chinese city of Tianjin on Sunday, where he will join President Xi Jinping and around 20 other world leaders for a major regional summit.
The gathering, organised under the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), will run until Monday and comes just days before a huge military parade in Beijing marking 80 years since the end of World War II.
The SCO comprises China, India, Russia, Pakistan, Iran, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Belarus — with 16 more countries affiliated as observers or “dialogue partners”.
China and Russia have sometimes touted the SCO as an alternative to the NATO military alliance.
In an interview published on China’s Xinhua news agency on Saturday, Putin said the upcoming summit will “strengthen the SCO’s capacity to respond to contemporary challenges and threats, and consolidate solidarity across the shared Eurasian space”.
“All this will help shape a fairer multipolar world order,” Putin said, Xinhua reported.
As China’s claim over Taiwan and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine have seen them clash with the United States and Europe, experts say Beijing and Moscow are eager to use platforms like the SCO to curry influence.
“China has long sought to present the SCO as a non-Western-led power bloc that promotes a new type of international relations, which, it claims, is more democratic,” said Dylan Loh, an assistant professor at Singapore’s Nanyang Technological University.
“In short, it offers a Chinese-inflected multilateral order that is distinct from the western-dominated ones in international politics,” Loh told AFP.
More than 20 leaders including Iranian and Turkish presidents Masoud Pezeshkian and Recep Tayyip Erdogan will attend the bloc’s largest meeting since its founding in 2001.
“The large-scale participation indicates China’s growing influence and the SCO’s appeal as a platform for non-Western countries,” Loh added.
Beijing, through the SCO, will try to “project influence and signal that Eurasia has its own institutions and rules of the game”, said Lizzi Lee from the Asia Society Policy Institute.
“It is framed as something different, built around sovereignty, non-interference, and multipolarity, which the Chinese tout as a model,” Lee told AFP.
Talks on the sidelines
Chinese President Xi met leaders including Egyptian Premier Moustafa Madbouly and Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet in Tianjin on Saturday.
Other bilateral meetings on the sidelines of the summit will be organised.
Putin is expected to hold talks on Monday with Turkey’s Erdogan and Iran’s Pezeshkian about the Ukraine conflict and Tehran’s nuclear programme respectively.
Putin needs “all the benefits of SCO as a player on the world stage and also the support of the second largest economy in the world”, said Lim Tai Wei, a professor and East Asia expert at Japan’s Soka University.
“Russia is also keen to win over India, and India’s trade frictions with the United States present this opportunity,” Lim told AFP.
The summit comes days after India was hit by a sharp bump up in US tariffs on its goods as punishment for New Delhi’s purchases of Russian oil.
India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi arrived in Tianjin on Saturday evening after a trip to Japan, marking the start of his first visit to China since 2018.
The two most populous nations are intense rivals competing for influence across South Asia and fought a deadly border clash in 2020.
A thaw began last October when Modi met with Xi for the first time in five years at a summit in Russia.
Modi was not on a list of attendees for the Beijing parade published by Chinese state media on Thursday that included Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto, Myanmar’s junta chief Min Aung Hlaing and North Korea’s leader Kim Jong Un.
Boston Marathon Monday morning is buzzing with the sunrise at Hopkinton, Massachusetts.
It’s a day of celebration, road closures, and a dazzling race as it hits the milestone of 130 years.
From weather forecast to start time, schedule, and route map, we have got you covered.
The 2026 Boston Marathon is expected to draw over 30,000 athletes from almost 130 countries, with entrants from all 50 states of America, per Boston Athletic Association.
The Boston Marathon is a hard nut to crack, and it just keeps getting tougher with each passing year.
According to the BMA, “This year’s cut-off time needed to gain acceptance into the Boston Marathon was four minutes, thirty-four seconds or faster (4:34) than the qualifying time for each respective age group and gender.”
Where does the Boston Marathon go?
The Boston Marathon kicks off on Main Street in Hopkinton, Massachusetts.
Athletes will then follow Route 135 through Ashland, Framingham, Natick, and Wellesley to where Route 135 turns toward Route 16.
The course follows along Route 16 until the fire station at Commonwealth Avenue, a point where runners will take a turn on the right and begin the stretch of Newton Hills.
After Heartbreak Hill from mile 20 to 21, runners will head across the Chestnut Hill Reservoir before turning left onto Beacon Street
From there, runners will have approximately four miles to the finish line.
They will continue through Brookline, Kenmore Square, and under Massachusetts Avenue.
Finally, the iconic turns await at the finish: right onto Hereford Street and left onto Boylston Street for the final sprint.
The Marathon finish line is set near the Boston Public Library in Copley Square.
What time does the Boston Marathon start today?
The 130th edition of the Boston Marathon will kick off the first race for Men’s Wheelchair at 9:06 a.m. ET, with the following start times for athletes competing in the day’s races as listed by the association.
Women’s Wheelchair at 9:09 a.m. ET
Handcycle & Duo Participants at 9:30 a.m. ET
Professional Men at 9:37 a.m. ET
Professional Women at 9:47 a.m. ET
Para Athletics Divisions at 9:50 a.m. ET
Wave 1 at 10 a.m. ET
Wave 2 at 10:25 a.m. ET
Wave 3 at 10:50 a.m. ET
Wave 4 at 11:15 a.m. ET
Boston Marathon 2026 will be covered live by ABC for all Boston-area viewers, with broadcast starting at 4 a.m. this morning, Monday, April 20, 2026.
Louisiana community is mourning the loss of 8 children who became the victims of a mass shooting in Shreveport on Sunday, April 19, 2026.
On Sunday morning, a tragic incident of mass shooting shocked the community in Shreveport when a gunman opened fire and killed eight children, between the ages of 3 and 11 years old.
The latest incident marks the deadliest mass shooting in a period of over two years.
Louisiana police have identified the gunman as a 31-year-old Shamar Elkins, who shot and killed his seven children and a cousin.
The shooting incident also resulted in wounding two women, including his spouse before the dawn’s first crack in a rampage at least in two locations.
After the shooting, which officials described as “homicide in nature,” the gunman escaped the scene in carjacked vehicle.
As a result of a police chase, the suspect in a crossfire was shot and killed by officers.
The Coroner’s office at the Caddo Parish has confirmed the identities of the victims.
These include Jayla Elkins, 3; Shayla Elkins, 5; Kayla Pugh, 6; Layla Pugh, 7; Markaydon Pugh, 10; Sariahh Snow, 11; Khedarrion Snow, 6; and Braylon Snow, 5.
Who was the gunman?
Shamar Elkins spent seven years in the Louisiana Army National Guard. From August 2013 to August 2020, as a signal support system expert and a fire support specialist, per CNN.
Elkins was never stationed and exited the Army in 2020, and their rank at the time of leaving was EI (private).
The outlet also reported Elkins’ past criminal record, as he had two prior criminal convictions in Caddo District Court.
As per the court records, Elkins married Shaneiqua Pugh, 34, about two years ago.
As per NYT, Elkins had a troubled domestic life and a strained relationship with his wife.
In a separate report by AP, which highlighted that the couple was in the middle of a separation and had a heated argument just moments before the shooting.
The shooting is seen as the deadliest in the U.S. since January 2024, when a 23-year-old man shot eight people, most of them his relatives, in a Chicago suburb.
Saturday Night Live veteran Tina Fey reflected on her years at the NBC sketch institution, acknowledging that some of her jokes were “on the wrong side”.
Speaking at the History Talks event in Philadelphia, Fey said she’s realized with time that not every punchline was fair.
The two times Globe Globe winner added candidly, “I was pretty dumb.”
Fey joined SNL in 1997 and later became head writer.
She recalled navigating some of the show’s most difficult broadcasts, from the first episode after September 11 to the anthrax scare and even President George W. Bush’s visit to meet Will Ferrell.
Over time, she said, the line between comedy and current events grew thinner, with politicians and public figures often responding directly to the sketches.
One of her most memorable stretches came in 2008, when she teamed with Seth Meyers and Amy Poehler to craft the now iconic Sarah Palin sketches.
Fey explained that the team worked hard to make sure their material was “a fair hit,” grounded in truth rather than random exaggeration.
“If it’s not true, it will not be funny,” she noted.
Reflecting on the influence of SNL, Fey said it was both thrilling and intimidating to know that what she wrote could be taken seriously by people in power.
She emphasized that the show never set out to control politics or the national narrative, but admitted that some of her own jokes didn’t age well.
Fey appeared alongside Nicole Kidman, Ted Danson, Kate McKinnon, Colin Jost and others at the event, which marked the nation’s 250th anniversary.
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