The United Arab Emirates (UAE) announced Tuesday that “all trade, commercial exchanges, and financial transactions with Iran have been halted until further notice,” alleging that Iran had fired two ballistic missiles toward it. 

The country’s foreign ministry said the decision comes “in light of regional escalations that undermine regional and international peace and security.”

Earlier Tuesday, the UAE’s Ministry of Defense reported that two missiles launched from Iran toward the country, both of which fell into the sea. The statement said it “affirms its readiness to respond to any threats and to resolutely counter any attempts to undermine the security of the country or the safety of maritime navigation in the region.”

Read More: Trump Again Threatens to Bomb Oman

Esmaeil Baghaei, a spokesperson for Iran’s foreign ministry, rejected the Emirati claim on Tuesday, saying that it “undermines ongoing efforts to strengthen trust between countries in the region and prevent the escalation of insecurity,” according to the semi-official Fars news agency. 

“The impact on the Iranian economy could be significant,” Simon Henderson, director of the Bernstein Program on Gulf and Energy Policy at the Washington Institute, tells TIME. “The UAE is one of the top non-oil trading partners with Iran.”

As of April, the UAE accounts for 12.5% of Iran’s exports and 30.43% of its imports, according to Iranian news agency WANA. 

Iran’s dollar currently ranks as the least valuable currency in the world, and its government told a Russian news agency in April that the war has already cost it some $270 billion in direct and indirect damages.

Regional instability amid the war in Iran

Stability in the region is fragile, as a number of incidents have been recently reported in the Strait of Hormuz. On Tuesday, a vessel reported that it had been struck by an unknown projectile, causing damage to the engine room and a crew casualty, according to the U.K. Trade Maritime Operations Centre (UKMTO). Last Thursday, a separate vessel was struck by a drone. 

The UAE has previously reported the detection of missiles coming toward it, most recently on July 12, when it confirmed that a missile fell outside of its borders.  

In May, the defense ministry reported that it had intercepted six unmanned aerial vehicles within 48 hours that “attempted to target civilian and vital areas in the country.”

One drone, launched from the direction of the UAE’s western border, struck an electricity generator near the Barakah Nuclear Energy Plant on May 17. Its origin has not been confirmed and is under investigation.

During the first few weeks of the conflict, Iran launched a series of more aggressive strikes on targets in the UAE, hitting military, energy, and civilian infrastructure. Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) vowed at the time to “punish aggressors throughout the region,” pointing toward U.S. military assets stationed in the country, as well as other Gulf states. 

Tehran resumed targeting U.S. allies in the Middle East, including Kuwait, Qatar, and Bahrain during the return to hostilities in early July, when negotiations based upon a Memorandum of Understanding collapsed. 

Where do peace plans between the U.S. and Iran stand?

Peace talks between the United States and Iran have made little progress in recent weeks.

President Donald Trump said Tuesday that “there are no talks or conversations going on, or scheduled,” between the U.S. and Iran. He also reaffirmed that the naval blockade on Iranian ports and vessels remains in place, amid ongoing claims that the Strait of Hormuz is “open and operating.”

Marine traffic data suggested Wednesday that some ships were indeed passing through the Strait, but still at significantly lower levels than before the conflict began. 

Earlier this week, the President also threatened to “bomb the s---” of Oman, a U.S. ally and mediator between Washington and Tehran, should it “get in the way” of U.S. attempts to gain  effective international control of the Strait of Hormuz. 

Oman and Iran have reportedly been working toward an agreement to manage traffic through the Strait, which carries roughly a fifth of the world’s oil and gas supply. 

The U.K. government has indicated its willingness to reconsider its digital services tax amid increasing pressure from the Trump Administration.

The concession came in response to an interview published Monday in which U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer told The Times that President Donald Trump’s threats to scrap a trade deal with Britain and impose a 100% tariff were “not a bluff.”

When asked if the interview might lead Downing Street to change its stance on the tax, a government spokesperson told TIME, “We remain open to discussing U.S. concerns and working with partners internationally.”

The digital services tax imposes a 2% levy on the revenues of “search engines, social media services, and online marketplaces which derive value from U.K. users.” Several other European countries, including Portugal, Spain, and Poland, have also implemented similar taxes.

Greer said Britain was using American companies as “piggy banks” and that he was “not going to tolerate that.”

“We have very good relations with the U.K. We’ve had very constructive relationships, we’d love to keep talking to them about this issue. The President is quite serious about digital services taxes all over the world,” he said.

Read More: Why Trump Is Threatening to Impose a ‘Big Tariff’ on the U.K.

“This tax is about making sure that businesses pay their fair share of U.K. tax based on the value they derive from U.K. activities. It is an interim measure, and we are still committed to removing it once a global solution is in place,” the spokesperson said, adding that both countries “share a strong trading relationship.”

A White House official tells TIME that “the Administration continues to address digital services taxes and other tech issues with our trading partners.”

Rising trade tensions between the U.S. and the U.K.

The U.K. and the U.S. agreed to a “groundbreaking” Tech Prosperity Deal in September 2025, which was expected to bring billions of dollars in investment from U.S. tech companies into the U.K. technology sector.

However, relations between the two countries have splintered since the onset of the Iran war.

"This is not Winston Churchill we're dealing with," Trump said of former British Prime Minister Keir Starmer at the height of tensions in March, as he accused the former U.K. leader of "ruining" relations.

Trump later warned the U.K. that he would implement a “big tariff” in April if the country did not drop its digital services tax on U.S. tech companies. And in June, he threatened to impose a 100% tariff on imports from any country that taxes digital services provided by U.S. companies.

“This tariff will supersede trade deals made with the country, whether implemented, signed, or not,” Trump said June 26.

The Trump Administration has not yet made any official tariff announcements linked to these threats.

However, the U.K. government, which has recently come under new leadership, has signaled that it is open to discussions.

Burnham aims to bridge relations between the two nations

Prime Minister Andy Burnham, who took office in July, has indicated intentions to mend the relationship between the two countries.

Asked whether there was a deadline for discussions with the new Burnham government, Greer declined to set one, instead emphasizing cooperation with the U.K.

“I don’t set artificial timelines. All I know is the President is eager to enforce our trade policy, he’s eager to make sure our companies aren’t discriminated against,” he said.

Since taking office, Burnham has appeared keen to repair relations with Trump. The two have spoken by phone, and Burnham extended an invitation for Trump to visit Manchester in the future—where the 2027 G20 summit is rumored to be taking place and where Burnham served as mayor before becoming Prime Minister.

But he may be hesitant to remove an important source of revenue for the U.K.

Between 2021 and 2025, the tax generated more than £2.4 billion ($3.2 billion) in revenue for the British government.

Read More: ‘We Won’t Be Bullied’: U.K. Responds to Russian Threat Over Ukraine Drone Support

Trump has pushed the U.K. on policy in the past, including his consistent calls for Britain to allow new North Sea oil and gas licenses—something the Starmer government intended to ban.

On the eve of Burnham’s entry to Downing Street, Trump claimed: “The people of Aberdeen, in Scotland, are dancing in the streets because the new Prime Minister, Andy Burnham, has stated that he will be opening up, all the way, the invaluable North Sea Oil."

Burnham has signaled that he is open to reconsidering Britain’s access to North Sea oil and gas.

“I’ve got something of an open mind, you know. I don’t have a sort of fixed position,” he said in early June.

Trump has continued to tout the new British Prime Minister’s willingness to reconsider the issue.

“One of the things he is going to do, I think he's going to open up the North Sea. That'll make the U.K. pretty rich,” Trump said on Monday in the Oval Office.

Burnham, however, has yet to make a final decision.

The International Criminal Court (ICC) said Wednesday that it “deplores” sanctions imposed this week by the U.S. State Department on its president, Judge Tomoko Akane, and Abdoulaye Seye, a Senegalese senior trial lawyer for the Office of the Prosecutor.

The State Department announced the sanctions Tuesday, accusing Akane and Seye of having “directly engaged in efforts by the ICC to investigate, arrest, detain, or prosecute officials whose government has not consented to ICC jurisdiction.” 

The sanctions include the freezing of assets in the country, blocking financial transactions, and prohibiting entry to the U.S. They were imposed under an Executive Order issued by President Donald Trump in February 2025, which reads: “The United States unequivocally opposes and expects our allies to oppose any ICC actions against the United States, Israel, or any other ally of the United States that has not consented to ICC jurisdiction.”

Neither the U.S. nor Israel is a state party to the Rome Statute, the treaty that founded the ICC and went into effect in 2002, and therefore do not recognize the jurisdiction of the court. 

Read More: Trump Administration Vows to Dismantle the International Criminal Court

“These sanctions are a flagrant attack against the independence of an impartial judicial institution which operates pursuant to the mandate conferred by its states parties,” the ICC statement said. “Such measures targeting judges, prosecutors and staff who work towards the fulfilment of the mandate that was conferred to the ICC by states undermine the rule of law.”

The Court further warned that the sanctions put “international legal order” at risk.

In his first term, Trump imposed sanctions on ICC Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda and another senior official, Phakiso Mochochoko. These were later lifted under the Biden Administration. 

The ICC says that nine of its 18 judges are now under sanctions from Washington, as well as both deputy prosecutors, a former prosecutor, and one other member of staff. 

Why does the Trump Administration oppose the ICC?

Announcing the sanctions on Tuesday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio called the ICC a “corrupt and fatally politicized supranational court.” He accused it of repeated attempts “to assert authority over nationals of the United States and other countries that have not consented to its jurisdiction or ratified the Rome Statute.”

The Trump Administration has long pushed back against the ICC’s investigations and charges against nationals from both the U.S. and Israel. February’s Executive Order said the ICC’s recent actions against both countries “set a dangerous precedent.”

The State Department also launched a campaign in July to “dismantle” the ICC’s jurisdiction, saying it will “systematically disable the ICC’s ability to operate, target American servicemen or officials, or otherwise threaten American sovereignty.” 

But the tensions trace back to Trump’s first term, when the ICC sought to investigate possible war crimes committed by the CIA and military personnel in Afghanistan. Bensouda requested authorization in 2017 to investigate those allegations. Trump then brought sanctions against her in 2020.

The U.S. has also rebuked its actions in recent years against Israel.

In November 2024, the ICC issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the recently dismissed Defense Minister Yoav Gallant. Both were accused of “crimes against humanity and war crimes" pertaining to the ongoing Israel-Hamas War, including “starvation of civilians as a method of warfare” and “intentionally directing attacks against a civilian population.”

The conflict was ignited by Hamas’s terror attack in southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, which left some 1,200 people dead and 250 taken hostage. Since then, over 73,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza—1,262 of whom have been killed since a cease-fire began last October, according to Gaza’s Ministry of Public Health on Aug. 15. 

The prosecutor also pursued arrest warrants for Hamas leaders Mohammed Deif, Ismail Haniyeh, and Yahya Sinwar, all of whom have since been killed. 

During Rubio’s Senate confirmation hearing in 2025, he addressed the warrant for Netanyahu. “This is a test run. This is a trial run to see, ‘Can we go after a head of state from a nation that’s not a member?’” he said, adding: “If we can go after them and we can get it done with regards to Israel, they will apply that to the United States at some point.”

Israel has denied the ICC’s war crimes accusations and challenged its jurisdiction. The Pre-Trial Chamber initially rejected that challenge, but in April 2025 the Appeals Chamber sent it back for reconsideration. The arrest warrants against Netanyahu and Gallant remain in effect.

Netanyahu commended Rubio’s sanctions announcement on Tuesday, describing the ICC as “a kangaroo court that cloaks its abuse of power in the language of international law while undermining the very principles of justice.” 

Literacy rates have steadily risen around the world over the last decade, according to a 2025 UNESCO report—important progress on a key UN Sustainable Development Goal, as the ability to read, write, and use numbers is “crucial for thinking critically and navigating information-rich society and economy in a safe, effective and responsible manner.” Access to digital learning has largely been associated with higher test scores for students globally. As technology continues to advance, tech companies have pounced upon the opportunity to bring education systems around the world up to speed with the ever-more connected digital world and the proliferation of new tools like generative AI. 

To assess the top EdTech companies in the world, TIME partnered with Statista on a data-based research project evaluating the thousands of companies in the space on strong financial performance and industry impact. The end result is a list of the 500 top-performing companies in education technology.

Methodology: How TIME and Statista Determined the World's Top EdTech Companies of 2026

The top ranked company on the list is Duolingo, which was also the top-ranked EdTech company in the U.S. this year. The company, which started as a language learning app, has expanded into math, chess, and music. Duolingo now has over 60 million daily active users and generated more than $1 billion in bookings last year. As UNESCO advocates for more multilingualism, which can offer social, cognitive, and economic benefits, Duolingo’s chief product officer, Cem Kansu, believes that there are still more language learners the app has yet to reach. Roughly 15% of Duolingo’s users are in the U.S., with the majority distributed globally and Asia as one of their fastest growing regions recently. “Asia for English learning especially is a huge market,” Kansu says. Around half of Duolingo’s users are under 25, and use the app as an educational supplement—a lesser known product called Duolingo For Classrooms is designed specifically for teachers to assign Duolingo lessons as homework for students. 

Duolingo stands out among other language learning tools with engaging designs that motivate users to return and practice every day (more than 20 million users have a streak longer than one year); micro-lessons that use implicit learning rather than drilling grammar rules; and keeping its free tier to bring in new users.

“It is extremely important that we provide a very extensive free user experience because Duolingo was built around the idea of providing access to education,” says Kansu. “If someone that had to immigrate from Syria to Turkey had to learn Turkish to integrate, we want to provide access to them. On top of that, an excellent free product provides an amazing growth flywheel for Duolingo.” 

Word of mouth has certainly made Duolingo mainstream, but the company broke through the noise through its unconventional marketing tactics and its capitalization on cultural moments like the World Cup (daily learners studying Norwegian on Duolingo were up nearly 19% globally and 24% in the U.S. compared with the previous month), shows like Squid Game (Season 1 of Squid Game drove a 40% increase in new U.S. Korean learners on Duolingo immediately after its premiere), and Bad Bunny performing in the Super Bowl halftime show (engagement with Spanish jumped 35% the week after). 

While platforms like Duolingo are driving interest in learning and lowering the barrier for entry globally, in the U.S., where there appears to be a “learning recession” as standardized scores for math and reading drop, there are rising concerns about the use of technology in classrooms and too much screen time for children.

Emily Weinstein, a researcher at the Center for Digital Thriving at Harvard, says some students are using up to seven different apps to manage everything from grades to sports team schedules. Kids have reported feeling constantly tethered to these tools to monitor the “endless stream of notifications about what they're supposed to know and do,” which can add to the academic pressures they’re already experiencing, Weinstein says. Educators have also told her that these tools often arrive without the necessary onboarding. 

“Whenever you're thinking about technology in education, you should really think about it like a three-legged stool. You have the actual technology, you have the person using it, and then you have the place where they're using it,” says Stephen AguiIar, an associate professor at the USC Rossier School of Education. “In an ideal world, the technology works, the person knows how to use it, and it's used in the place where it's helpful or where it actually makes a difference. 

I think a lot of the backlash is about poor fit, where you have AI or EdTech companies entering a space they frankly know very little about, and then you have backlash from people who see things just not working. And what's a little unfortunate is that it doesn't always have anything to do with the core technology.”

A central problem is that educational institutions in the U.S. have been underfunded for decades, which creates strains in the system. “Whenever you put a system in strain, one of the things that happens is administrators rightly look for ways to cut costs and to become more efficient, even though education isn't an efficient enterprise,” says Aguilar. “Education is not this thing where you drop off your kids, they sit there for a little bit, knowledge gets poured into them, and then they come out a little smarter. That's the business way of looking at it, and it is fundamentally incorrect. Companies that do a little bit of a better job, they're really thinking about what teachers need to execute their work better.”

As some AI tools fuel the proliferation of digital cheating, there's a reckoning that's happening among educators about how they’re evaluating and assessing learning through traditional assignments, papers and homework, as well as how they’re teaching, experts say. Some leading EdTech platforms like Canvas-owner Instructure (no. 45) and Inspera (no. 31) have rolled out tools to deter AI cheating, including resources to help instructors understand the culture around cheating and how to change their focus from catching students cheating to creating an environment that encourages academic integrity. 

“The systemic issue is we don't have a sense of trust and integrity around the work, then we're trying to layer on EdTech as a solution, and kids are finding ways around it because they're missing the core thing that is going to give them pride in the work,” says Weinstein. “One of the things that we collectively need is to use this AI moment to have conversations in our classroom and school communities about what the purpose of learning is.”

From her research, Weinstein has found that listening more to student perspectives could fundamentally change how we understand what it looks and feels like to be a student in this context, and how these different technologies are shaping learning trajectories. “When you're talking to a young person, you can suddenly see that their good intentions are not always enough in a context where the market forces and design features are pulling them this way and that,” she says. “When I sit down with a kid and look at their ChatGPT logs, I can see such a difference in when they have turned to an EdTech tool for learning and when they have turned to it for a grade.”

Duolingo’s Kansu says that even though Duolingo For Schools’ dashboard for teachers had fairly good adoption, designing products for schools is not easy. “What we're realizing is if we just continue teaching better, Duolingo will become a great complement to classrooms anyway,” he says. “I'm hoping that Duolingo is always put in a bucket of good screen time…Meaning, any minute you spend on Duolingo, you are doing something good for yourself. Any fun minute you spend is also of extremely high learning value.”

Rising Stars

This sub-ranking highlights companies 10 years or younger with the highest revenue growth rates over the past three years out of those who submitted company data via the online application process.

Pope Francis, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, the Syrian White Helmets and the architects of the Iran nuclear deal are among the oddsmakers’ favorites to win this year’s Nobel Peace Prize, which is due to be announced on Friday.

The award is given annually to a person or people who “shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses”.

The official list of nominations remains a secret, however the committee has said that there are 318 nominees.

Here are the top candidates, based on betting odds from William Hill and Ladbrokes.

1. Pope Francis

Pope Francis has been tipped to win the award each year since he became Pope in 2013. This year he has continued to be vocal in calls for compassion towards refugees and migrants, and is a progressive voice in the Catholic Church, a historically conservative organisation. He was TIME’s Person of the Year in 2013. British betting company William Hill told TIME that Francis had received more bets than any other candidate.

2. Angela Merkel

In the years since German Chancellor announced that she would allow one million refugees into Germany during the height of Europe’s refugee crisis in 2015, she has been high on the list of Nobel favorites. This year she said she had no regrets about the policy despite the political cost, which was made manifest in last month’s German elections where she came out with a reduced majority. In 2015, TIME named her Person of the Year.

3. White Helmets

Widely predicted to win the prize last year, only to be pipped by Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos, the White Helmets or the Syria Civil Defense are a volunteer organisation that came to prominence pulling civilians from bombed-out buildings in Syria. Named after the iconic white helmets that are often their only protection, the group claims to have saved 99,000 lives since the Syrian civil war began in 2011.

4. Federica Mogherini & Mohammad Javad

The EU’s foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini and her Iranian counterpart Mohammad Javad are the architects of the Iran nuclear agreement, a deal reached in 2015 that de-escalated tensions between the U.S. and Iran over the latter’s nuclear program. Under the agreement, Iran agreed to eliminate its stockpile of potentially weaponizable uranium, and allow international observers to oversee the country’s nuclear program, in exchange for the lifting of nuclear-related sanctions.

5. ECOWAS

An outsider choice with 5/1 odds from Ladbrokes is the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), the regional union who this January intervened in Gambia to ensure a peaceful transition of power after the incumbent president of 22 years, Yahyah Jammeh, refused to relinquish power to democratically elected Adama Barrow. The military intervention forced Jammeh to step down and go into exile, with a number of troops remaining to assist Barrow with his consolidation of power and establishing Gambia’s new democratically elected government. The intervention was bloodless, although a number of people fled the political instability in the Gambia during the crisis. The last troops are expected to leave the Gambia this year.

The Nobel Peace Prize is announced at 6am E.T. on Friday.