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SYDNEY, Feb 8 (Reuters) - Australia's conservative opposition coalition reunited on Sunday after the junior partner ​National Party severed ties last month with the ‌Liberal Party over its decision to back government hate speech ‌laws drafted in the wake of the Bondi massacre.

"The coalition is back together and looking to the future, not to the past," Liberal Party leader Sussan Ley ⁠said alongside National ‌Party leader David Littleproud in a media conference televised from Canberra.

The coalition split, the ‍second in less than a year, was triggered after Australia's parliament passed the centre-left Labor government's anti-hate laws in ​the wake of the mass shooting that killed ‌15 in December. The laws were backed by the Liberal Party but opposed by some National Party senators.

"It's been disappointing, we've got to where we are but it was over a substantive issue," Littleproud said.

Under ⁠the long-standing partnership, the Nationals ​broadly represent the interests of ​rural communities and the Liberals city seats.

The coalition has come under recent pressure from populist Senator ‍Pauline Hanson's ⁠anti-immigration One Nation party, which has surged in polling, while the Liberal Party lost a swath ⁠of seats at last year's federal election, won by Labor ‌in a landslide.

(Reporting by Sam McKeith in Sydney; ‌Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan)

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — North Korea will convene a major political conference later this month, the country's state media said Sunday, where leaderKim Jong Unis expected to outline his domestic and foreign policies for the next five years.

North Korea

The ruling Workers' Party congress, which Kim previously held in 2016 and 2021, comes after years of accelerated nuclear and missile development and deepening ties with Moscow over the war in Ukraine that have increased his standoffs with the United States and South Korea.

North Korea's official Korean Central News Agency said the party's political bureau met under Kim's supervision and decided the congress would be held in late February. State media did not immediately specify a date or release agenda details.

The congress will likely continue for days as a highly choreographed display of Kim's authoritarian leadership. In recent weeks, Kim hasinspected weapons testsand toured military sites and economic projects as state media highlighted his purported achievements, crediting his "immortal leadership" with strengthening the country's military capabilities and advancing national development.

His recent activities and comments suggest Kim will use the congress to double down on economic development through "self-sustenance" and mass mobilization while announcing plans to further expand the capabilities of his nuclear-armed military, including upgrading conventional weapons systems and integrating them with nuclear forces.

Kim also could highlight his increasingly assertive foreign policy based on closer ties with Moscow and Beijing while hardening anadversarial approach toward rival South Koreaas he continues to embrace the idea of a "new Cold War," experts say.

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Kim's willingness to resume diplomacy with the U.S. is unclear. Relations derailed in 2019 after hissecond summitwith U.S. President Donald Trump due to disagreements over sanctions against his nuclear weapons program.

Kim has rejected Trump's overtures for dialogue since the U.S. president began his second term in January 2025. Kim insists Washingtonabandon demandsfor the North to surrender its nuclear weapons as a precondition for future talks.

Entering his 15th year in rule, Kim finds himself in a stronger position than when he opened the previous congress in 2021 during the shock of the COVID-19 pandemic. Navigating what was seen as his toughest stretch in a decade of power, Kim acknowledged his previous economic policies failed and issued a new five-year development plan through 2025.

He called for accelerated development of his nuclear arsenal and issued an extensive wish list of sophisticated assets including solid-fuel intercontinental ballistic missiles, multi-warhead systems, tactical nuclear weapons, spy satellites andnuclear-powered submarines.

Kim has exploited geopolitical turmoil to his advantage. He used Russia's invasion of Ukraine as a window to accelerate weapons testing and align himself with Russian PresidentVladimir Putin, who has accepted thousands of North Korean troops and large quantities of military equipment for the war.

Kim also has pursued closer ties with China, traditionally the North's primary ally and economic lifeline. Hetraveled to Beijing in Septemberfor a World War II event and the first summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping in six years.

While Kim's strict information blockade prevents precise assessments, South Korean analysts say the North's economy appears to have improved over the past five years, possibly due to a gradual recovery in trade with China and an industrial boost from arms exports to Russia.

JERUSALEM (AP) — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will meet with U.S. President Donald Trump in Washington on Wednesday aboutAmerican talks with Iran, his office said Saturday, while Iran's foreign minister threatened U.S. military bases in the region a day after the discussions.

"The prime minister believes that all negotiations must include limiting the ballistic missiles, and ending support for the Iranian axis," Netanyahu's office said in a brief statement, referring to Tehran's support for militant groups, including Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in the Palestinian territories. Trump and Netanyahu last met in December.

There was no immediate White House comment.

The U.S. and theIslamic Republic of Iranheld indirect talks on Friday in Oman that appeared to return to the starting point on how to approach discussions over Tehran's nuclear program.

Trump called the talks "very good" and said more were planned for early next week. Washington was represented by Middle East special envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, Trump's son-in-law.

Trump has repeatedly threatened to use force to compel Iran to reach a deal on its nuclear program after sending the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln and other warships to the region amid Tehran'scrackdown on nationwide proteststhat killed thousands.

Gulf Arab nations fear an attack could spark a regional war, with memories fresh of the 12-day Israel-Iran war in June.

For the first time in negotiations with Iran, the U.S. on Friday brought its top military commander in the Middle East to the table. U.S. Navy Adm. Brad Cooper, head of the military's Central Command, then visited the USS Abraham Lincoln on Saturday with Witkoff and Kushner, the command said in a statement.

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Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi told journalists Friday that "nuclear talks and the resolution of the main issues must take place in a calm atmosphere, without tension and without threats." He said that diplomats would return to their capitals, signaling that this round of negotiations was over.

On Saturday, Araghchi told the Al Jazeera satellite news network that if the U.S. attacks Iran, his country doesn't have the ability to strike the U.S. "and therefore has to attack or retaliate against U.S. bases in the region."

He said there is "very, very deep distrust" after what happened during the previous talks, when theU.S. bombed Iranian nuclear sitesduring last year's Israel-Iran war.

Araghchi also said the "missile issue" and other defense matters are "in no way negotiable, neither now nor at any time in the future."

Tehran has maintained that these talks will be only on its nuclear program.

However, Al Jazeera reported that diplomats from Egypt, Turkey and Qatar offered Iran a proposal in which Tehran would halt enrichment for three years, send its highly enriched uranium out of the country and pledge to "not initiate the use of ballistic missiles."

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Wednesday that the talks needed to include all those issues.

Israel, a close U.S. ally, believes Iran is pursuing a nuclear weapon and wants its program scrapped, though Iran has insisted that its atomic plans are for peaceful purposes. Israel also wants a halt to Iran's ballistic missile program and its support for militant groups in the region.

Araghchi, speaking at a forum in Qatar on Saturday, accused Israel of destabilizing the region, saying that it "breaches sovereignties, it assassinates official dignitaries, it conducts terrorist operations, it expands its reach in multiple theaters." He criticized Israel's treatment of Palestinians and called for "comprehensive and targeted sanctions against Israel, including an immediate arms embargo."

MILAN — The women's hockey competition atthe Olympicshas an influence you might not have expected.

Ohio State.

Perhaps you know the Buckeyes best as a football powerhouse. Yet with 12 current or former Buckeyes playing for five different countries at the Milan Cortina Olympics, "it's a women's ice hockey school, for sure," said Joy Dunne, an Ohio State junior who scored for the U.S. on Thursday in its 5-1 win against Czechia.

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Since Nadine Muzerall became the school's coach in 2016, the university has developed from a hockey also-ran into the NCAA champion in both 2022 and 2024. The team also appeared in the 2023 and 2025 title games. This season, it's ranked second nationally.

Five players from this season's team are now foes. Three current Buckeyes play for Sweden alone. Trash talk has been kept to a minimum, said Hilda Svensson, a Swedish forward who has become one of the NCAA's top scorers in her freshman year at Ohio State.

"We have been pretty nice to each other so far," she said, "but I think if we play against them, we're going to be a little bit more mean, maybe. And especially maybe against Joy."

The U.S. and Sweden aren't scheduled to face each other in the preliminary round, meaning any meeting between the squads would come in the knockout round. That possibility was discussed immediately after the tournament's draw was announced, Dunne said.

"Me and the Swedish girls really want to play each other because one's a big chirper and I think it'd be fun," Dunne told NBC News. "We battle a lot in practices, so it would just be nice to actually do it against each other in a game."

Dunne and the U.S. faced off against a current Buckeye teammate Saturday, when the U.S. played its second preliminary game against Finland. Its roster includes Sanni Vanhanen, a freshman forward at Ohio State who was part of Finland's 2022 bronze medal-winning team at the Beijing Olympics.

Muzerall's allegiances might lean toward her native Canada, where she has coached within the national team's developmental system. But holding ties to five teams makes rooting interests more difficult.

"You feel like a parent, an immense amount of pride," Muzeralltold reporters in Ohiothis week. "So, it's going to be tough to choose who I'm cheering for."

Ohio State's outsize presence at these Olympics should be seen as a credit to Muzerall's coaching, Dunne said. But the school is just one example of collegiate hockey's role as a de facto feeder system for national teams. Of the 230 total women's hockey players taking part in these Games, 122 have NCAA experience,according tothe governing body, including 40 active college players.

The Western Collegiate Hockey Association, a hockey-only conference that includes Ohio State, has the most representation among conferences, with 54 athletes.

Dunne isn't even the first member of her family to represent both Ohio State and the U.S. Her older sister, Jincy, was part of the U.S. hockey team that won a silver medal at the 2022 Olympics.

This is the first Winter Olympics since the creation of the Professional Women's Hockey League, and with 61 PWHL players heading to Italy to represent their countries, the league opted to take a three-week break from competition.

The NCAA season, however, did not pause.

"A part of me actually wants to fly over there and just go," Muzerall said.

Instead, the Buckeyes will play four games between Thursday's opening of the preliminary round and the Feb. 19 gold-medal game. Svensson said she was watching from afar as the Buckeyes try to compensate for their Olympic-sized roster hole.

"I'm so impressed how they did their last game against Duluth," Svensson said. "I hope they can just keep going and win against Wisconsin this weekend."

The Pro Football Hall of Fame will make changes to its voting process in light of controversy over Bill Belichick not being elected to the 2026 class in his first year of eligibility.

Hall of Fame president Jim Portertold the Associated Pressthat the vote will go back to an in-person meeting and discussion among the 50-member committee. Since the COVID-19 pandemic, the conversation and voting process was held virtually.

Additionally, the vote will occur closer to the announcement of the inductees at the NFL Honors event, held the Thursday prior to the Super Bowl. That scheduling change, likely for Super Bowl week in the host city, is intended to decrease the possibility of discussion and results leaking to the public, as happened when reports ofBelichick falling short of the 40 votesnecessary for election circulated among media.

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Porter also said the Hall would consider releasing vote totals and individual ballots to the public in future balloting, much like the Baseball Hall of Fame and Baseball Writers Association of America do. However, that won't be done for the 2026 class.

One part of the voting process that will be reviewed is a rule that groups coaches and contributors with older players who have been on the ballot for multiple years. Votersfelt they had to choosebetween longtime candidates who were running out of eligibility, such as running back Roger Craig (who was elected) and quarterback Ken Anderson (who was not), rather than vote for Belichick. That was viewed as a primary reason why the six-time Super Bowl winner was not elected.

Voters who might have violated rules by discussing the voting debate publicly and the process by which candidates were elected or left off the ballot could be replaced on the committee, according to Porter.

"I'm not here to tell them who the most deserving is,"Porter told the AP's Josh Dubow. "If the Hall was to tell who the most deserving is, we wouldn't need them to vote. We understand that. We just want the rules followed."

Five players were electedto the Pro Football Hall of Fame's 2026 class, as announced at Thursday's NFL Honors ceremony. Quarterback Drew Brees, receiver Larry Fitzgerald, linebacker Luke Kuechly, kicker Adam Vinatieri and Craig will be formally inducted into the Canton, Ohio, institution on Aug. 8.

Hideki Matsuyama and Ryo Hisatsune played in the final group at the WM Phoenix Open together on Saturday, and it was set up for the Japanese countrymen to do the same on Sunday.

One missed putt at the end of the day changed those plans.

Matsuyama overtook Hisatsune for the lead after three rounds when Hisatsune bogeyed the last hole Saturday at TPC Scottsdale in Arizona.

Hisatsune, 23, led his more-accomplished peer by one stroke through two rounds. Matsuyama's 3-under-par 68 propelled him to a 13-under 200 through three rounds while Hisatsune's late blunder led him to a round of 70.

"Yeah, it was a great day today. Kind of a first today for Japan to have two Japanese pros play in a final group," Matsuyama said through a translator. "I was hoping we could do it tomorrow, but, again, I hope tomorrow just to play well and stay on top."

Hisatsune, meanwhile, dropped into a four-way tie at 12-under with Maverick McNealy (65), Denmark's Nicolai Hojgaard (65) and South Korea's Si Woo Kim (66). The final threesome to go off Sunday will be Matsuyama, McNealy and Hojgaard.

Matsuyama and Hisatsune were tied at 13 under after Hisatsune birdied Nos. 10 and 17 to catch up. Matsuyama parred No. 18 and Hisatsune escaped a greenside bunker, leaving himself 5 1/2 feet to save par.

But Hisatsune's putt started left and stayed left, missing the cup altogether for a difficult bogey.

Hisatsune later said it was "special" to play alongside the 33-year-old Matsuyama, who became the first Japanese man to win a major when he captured the 2021 Masters.

"You know, he's like won Masters and then like 11 times PGA winner, so like very different for me," Hisatsune said. "But more chasing Hideki tomorrow, like going to also today as well."

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Two of those PGA Tour wins for Matsuyama were the 2016 and 2017 Phoenix Opens. Matsuyama brushed that off Saturday by saying this is a "brand-new tournament," and he had a funny response to a follow-up about what he likes about TPC Scottsdale.

"I like this course because even if I miss a fairway, I can still find my ball," he said. "Unless it's in the cactuses."

Matsuyama mixed three birdies and two bogeys over his first five holes Saturday. He took over the lead with an 11-foot birdie putt at the par-4 10th, and he added his last birdie at the par-5 13th.

Hojgaard, 24, is a three-time winner in Europe seeking his first PGA Tour victory. His bogey-free round was buoyed by five birdies in the closing six holes.

"It's easy to then go out and hunt the birdies a little bit, but I stayed patient, hitting into the right zones and hit some really, really good shots coming in and capitalized with some birdies, so it was a great way to finish," Hojgaard said.

Then there's McNealy, who at 30 is seeking his second PGA Tour title. He ranks second this week in greens in regulation (44 of 54) and made eight birdies Saturday. A bogey at the par-4 17th kept him from a share of the lead through 54 holes.

"You have to take every hole as it comes," McNealy said about an aggressive approach to Sunday. "If you hit the fairway, you can be aggressive if you have the right number. Miss the fairway, you just can't shoot yourself out of the tournament and make soft bogeys."

England's Matt Fitzpatrick held a share of the lead after consecutive birdies at Nos. 14-15, but he made a mess of the par-3 16th "Stadium Hole" and recorded a double bogey. A birdie-bogey finish left him at 67 for his round and tied at 11 under with Michael Thorbjornsen (65), Jake Knapp (66) and Akshay Bhatia (67).

World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler posted a 67 that featured a chip-in birdie from the sand at No. 10. He's five off the pace at 8 under entering Sunday.

--Field Level Media

WASHINGTON, Feb 7 (Reuters) - U.S. Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard on Saturday disputed claims by lawmakers that she sought to block Congress from accessing a ​whistleblower complaint, saying she took "immediate action" once notified of the need to provide ‌security guidance for its release.

A top-secret complaint filed with the intelligence community's inspector general last May by an ‌anonymous government official alleged that the U.S. spy chief's office sought to prevent the routine dissemination of certain classified intelligence for political reasons.

Gabbard was appointed to her post by Republican President Donald Trump last year.

A November letter from Andrew Bakaj, the whistleblower's lawyer, to Gabbard's office, which ⁠was also shared with the ‌House of Representatives and Senate intelligence committees, alleged that Gabbard had hindered the dissemination of the May complaint to lawmakers by failing to provide ‍necessary security guidance on how to handle it.

Democrats such as Senator Mark Warner, the vice chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, have said that Gabbard's agency, the Office of the Director of National ​Intelligence, was required under law to relay the May complaint to Congress within 21 ‌days rather than waiting until February.

In a social media post on Saturday, Gabbard accused Democrats of spreading a "blatant lie."

Successive inspectors general spanning the presidencies of Trump and his Democratic predecessor Joe Biden did not find the complaint to be credible, Gabbard wrote on X. The 21-day requirement "only applies when a complaint is determined by the Inspector General to be both urgent ⁠AND apparently credible," Gabbard wrote.

Reuters could not verify the ​contents of the original complaint. The Guardian newspaper and ​the New York Times have reported that it was related to the handling of an intelligence intercept related to someone close to Trump.

Gabbard also wrote ‍that she previously had ⁠not been informed by the inspector generals that the whistleblower had "chosen to send the complaint to Congress, which would require me to issue security instructions." Gabbard wrote ⁠that once made aware of the need to provide security guidance to share the complaint with lawmakers on ‌December 4, she took "immediate action" to do so.

(Reporting by Michael Martina in ‌Washington; Editing by Sergio Non and Will Dunham)