Former Spanish soccer chief Luis Rubiales found guilty of sexual assault for kissing player at World Cup
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(MADRID) — Former Spanish soccer federation president Luis Rubiales has been found guilty of sexual assault of stemming from his nonconsensual kiss of footballer Jenni Hermoso at the 2023 World Cup Final.
Spain beat England 1-0, taking home the 2023 World Cup title. Rubiales kissed Hermoso without her consent during the team’s trophy ceremony, which was captured on video and in photos.
Rubiales was suspended from his position in August 2023 after the incident. Nearly the entire coaching staff has resigned amid the controversy.
Rubiales had claimed that the kiss was consensual, but Hermoso publicly denied that claim.
After refusing to resign amid pressure from the Spanish government, players, soccer clubs and officials, he later resigned from his position. In October 2023, Rubiales was banned by FIFA from all soccer activities for three years.
The incident triggered protests and fed into the wider discussion about sexism and consent.
Rubiales could face more than a year in prison.
Last year, a judge said there was enough evidence for Rubiales and three other former executives with the Royal Spanish Football Federation to go to trial.
Prosecutors asked for a two-and-a-half-year sentence for Rubiales, arguing he held Hermoso’s head without her consent and that the nonconsensual kiss had personal and professional consequences for the soccer player, prosecutors told ABC News. He could also face a fine of at least 50,000 euros ($54,000), prosecutors said.
Prosecutors asked for Rubiales to be prohibited from communicating with or coming within a 200-meter radius of Hermoso.
The prosecutor’s office said it also requested one-and-a-half years in prison for the three former executives who the judge said may have put pressure on Hermoso to say it was a consensual kiss.
-ABC News’ Aicha El Hammar Castano contributed to this report
Flowers and candles are laid at the statue of John Paul II outside the Gemelli hospital where Pope Francis is hospitalized with pneumonia, in Rome on February 27, 2025. (Photo by DIMITAR DILKOFF/AFP via Getty Images)
(ROME) — The Vatican said that the pope “slept well during the night and is now resting” peacefully on Thursday morning as the pontiff begins his 14th day in hospital.
Pope Francis’ condition improved slightly on Wednesday, though officials say they “remain guarded” over his prognosis, according to the Vatican.
The slight renal insufficiency the pope had in recent days has subsided and a Tuesday CAT scan of the chest showed a normal evolution of the pulmonary inflammatory picture.
The blood chemistry and blood cell count tests carried out Wednesday have confirmed the pope’s improvement, but he remains on high-flow oxygen therapy and did not have any asthmatic-like respiratory crises.
The pope received the Eucharist on Wednesday morning and the afternoon was dedicated to work activities, the Vatican said.
Pope Francis’ condition remains “critical but stable,” Vatican officials said in a brief update on Tuesday.
“There have been no acute respiratory episodes and hemodynamic parameters continue to be stable. In the evening, he underwent a scheduled CT scan for radiological monitoring of the bilateral pneumonia. The prognosis remains uncertain,” the Vatican said Tuesday.
The pontiff, who has led the Catholic Church since 2013, was diagnosed with pneumonia last week, according to the Vatican.
(SEOUL) — Over 12,000 North Korean troops are estimated to be fighting against Ukrainian forces in Russia’s Kursk region, deputy U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Dorothy Camille Shea told the United Nations Security Council last week.
Of those dispatched to the region, an estimated 300 North Korean soldiers in Russia have died and over 2,700 have been wounded, according to South Korea’s National Intelligence Service’s closed briefing to the National Assembly on Monday.
North Korean defectors who finished their almost decade-long military service in their 20’s have shared their mixed sentiments and analysis with ABC News.
“So unfortunate, that’s all I can say,” North Korean defector Lee Cheol-eun said with a grimace after watching footage of North Korean soldiers fighting in Kursk, Russia, against the Ukrainian forces.
The 37-year-old served in the Korea People’s Army security department until he escaped the regime in 2016, meaning he knows better than anyone about having to follow orders in a system that one does not believe in.
“They do not know why they have to bleed and lose lives on that battlefield, I feel empty watching them,” Lee said.
“The soldiers dispatched to Russia must be the ones who are best trained about modern warfare and should have received the basic adaptation training upon arrival. The fact that they’ve been pushed into a situation where they have no choice but to die breaks my heart,” Defector Jang Seyul, who served in the North Korean People’s Army’s intelligence agency that focuses on cyber warfare simulations, told ABC News.
The North Korean soldiers on the Kursk frontlines are the infamous “Storm Corps,” according to South Korea’s National Intelligence.
North Korea is estimated to be training at least 40,000 to as many as 80,000 Storm Corps soldiers who spend 13 years serving in the military and cut off from the outside world.
Jang recalled how dominant they were during joint battle drills.
“People would refer to them as murder weapons. They received high-level training that the regular soldiers couldn’t imagine,” said Jang.
Jang says the Storm Corps were provided with slightly larger rations of food and that they are compensated better once they are discharged considering their longer tenure of service and harsh training.
The Storm Corps are not only prepared to be physically stronger but also highly indoctrinated, according to the retired Lieutenant General Chun In-bum of the South Korean Army, referring to them as “an elite force that is one grade above the average North Korean unit.”
However, in spite of their reputation, the Storm Corps soldiers in North Korea have been seen flailing helplessly under Ukrainian drone attacks, according to footage provided by Ukrainian forces.
Seoul’s intelligence service briefed lawmakers in a closed-door briefing on Monday, saying the main reason for mass casualties is due to the North Korean soldiers’ lack of understanding in modern warfare, such as drone target shots and charging without rear fire support.
General Chun In-bum said that it may be too early to determine if the North Korean soldiers were insufficiently trained, explaining that drone warfare is new to everyone on the frontlines.
“The North Koreans will be unaccustomed to the flatlands and the Ukrainian front, but that doesn’t mean that they’re not going to be adapting, especially if they are experiencing high casualties. It’s a great motivator when you see that your life is on the line,” Chun told ABC News.
Seoul speculates that North Korea may dispatch more troops in the near future. Chun believes the same.
“So even for just rotational purposes, I think there is a high probability that more soldiers will be deployed there. Whatever the situation is, the relationship between Putin and Kim Jong Un is going to solidify and, to a degree, I’m sure the Russian people are going to appreciate that the North Koreans are sending soldiers at a moment when they are in a very difficult situation,” General Chun said.
The dispatch of North Korean soldiers’ to Russia is still an open secret within the secluded regime which has limited access to news from the outside world. Defectors and experts on North Korea in Seoul having different opinions about how the North Korean public will react once they are aware.
General Chun assumes that for the family members of the deceased North Korean soldiers, the regime will compensate them with all the benefits possible in hopes they will come to appreciate their sons’ sacrifice for their country.
But Jang, on the other hand, sees the North Korean people as less loyal than the generation before them, suggesting the regime would have to put in greater effort into explaining the soldiers’ deaths.
“Average North Korean people are unaware of the dispatch. But people who secretly communicate with the outside world, and those who listen to the propaganda broadcasting signals sent from the South probably know what is going on,” Lee told ABC News. “I hope the survivors of the Russia dispatch will return home and inform others of the injustice of the North Korean system based on their experience abroad.”
(NEW YORK) — Atlantic editor-in-chief Jeffrey Goldberg joined ABC News Live to discuss the moment he realized he had been added to a Signal group chat with top government officials discussing a U.S. attack on Houthis in Yemen.
“My reaction was, I think I’ve discovered a massive security breach in the United States national security system,” Goldberg told Prime’s Linsey Davis on Monday.
This comes after the White House confirmed on Monday that the Signal group chat that inadvertently included Goldberg “appears to be authentic.”
“It’s almost automatically true that if the editor-in-chief of The Atlantic is being given access to this kind of information, weapon systems and packages and timing and weather in Yemen and all kinds of information about sequencing of particular events, then obviously there’s a security breach,” Goldberg told Davis.
Goldberg said he initially thought it might have been a “spoof” or “hoax,” but that “it became sort of overwhelmingly clear to me that this was a real group” once the attack occurred.
He said he removed himself from the chat and is “no longer privy to what, if anything, is going on in the chat.”
“I watched this Yemen operation go from beginning to apparent end, and that was enough for me to learn that there’s something wrong in the system here that would allow this information to come so dangerously close to the open, to the wild,” he said.
White House National Security Council spokesman Brian Hughes shared with ABC News the statement he provided to The Atlantic confirming the veracity of a Signal group chat, which Goldberg said appeared to include Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Vice President JD Vance, White House national security adviser Mike Waltz and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, among others.
“At this time, the message thread that was reported appears to be authentic, and we are reviewing how an inadvertent number was added to the chain. The thread is a demonstration of the deep and thoughtful policy coordination between senior officials. The ongoing success of the Houthi operation demonstrates that there were no threats to our servicemembers or our national security,” Hughes said in the statement.
Hegseth denied how the story was characterized, saying, “nobody was texting war plans.”
“I’ve heard how it was characterized. Nobody was texting war plans, and that’s all I have to say about that,” Hegseth told reporters on Monday.
In the wake of the Signal chat’s surfacing, top Democrats have called for an investigation into the incident.
“The leak of sensitive national security information by the Trump administration on a non-classified system is completely outrageous and shocks the conscience,” House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said in a statement.
