The US Supreme Court cleared the way on Tuesday for states to impose restrictions on transgender student athletes, upholding laws in Idaho and West Virginia banning them from women’s sports teams.

The justices overturned decisions by lower courts siding with transgender students who challenged the bans in the two states as violating the US Constitution and a federal anti-discrimination law.

The Idaho and West Virginia laws designate sports teams at public schools including universities according to “biological sex” and bar “students of the male sex” from female teams. Twenty-five other states have similar laws on the books.

Supporters of the laws say they are needed to preserve fair competition and protect athletic opportunities for girls and women.

Opponents say they single out a tiny number of vulnerable students for exclusion and discrimination, turning children’s participation in school sports into a national political battleground.

A court divided

The court decided 9-0 that the state laws do not violate the Title IX civil rights statute that bars discrimination in education “on the basis of sex”.

The justices, however, divided along ideological lines, with the six conservative justices in the majority, that ‌the laws also do not violate the Constitution’s 14th Amendment guarantee of equal protection under the law. The three liberal justices said a factual dispute ⁠in the West Virginia case should have precluded resolving that issue.

The ruling was authored by conservative Justice Brett Kavanaugh.

“Consistent with Title IX and the Equal Protection Clause, we hold that the states may maintain women’s and girls’ sports for biological females. They may determine eligibility for women’s and girls’ sports based on biological sex. The Constitution and ​Title IX do not require an overhaul of women’s and girls’ sports throughout America,” Kavanaugh wrote.

Read moreUS Olympic and Paralympic officials ban transgender athletes from women’s sports

Republican President Donald Trump‘s administration, which has cracked down ‌on transgender rights, has backed the states in the litigation.

The students who challenged the measures said they discriminate based on a person’s sex or status as transgender in violation of the 14th Amendment and Title IX.

“Sports are ‌different from, say, a typical employment or educational opportunity where equal protection often may require that the government generally treat an individual without regard to the individual’s sex,” Kavanaugh wrote. “In the sports context, by contrast, everyone agrees that the states may maintain separate women’s and men’s ​teams – in other words, that the states may make distinctions based on sex – because of the inherent physical differences between women and men.”

Cracking down

In another major transgender rights ruling, the Supreme Court in a case from Tennessee last year let states ban medical treatments such as puberty blockers and hormones for people under age 18 experiencing gender dysphoria. That ​term refers to the clinical diagnosis for significant distress that can result from an incongruence between a person’s gender identity and sex at birth.

The Supreme Court, which has a 6-3 conservative majority, has ​backed other restrictions on transgender people, letting Trump ban transgender people from the military and bar passport applicants from selecting the ​sex reflecting their gender identities for the document.

The court in 2020 delivered a landmark ruling protecting transgender people from workplace discrimination under a federal law called Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 that contains wording similar to Title IX.

Culture warriors

The issue of transgender ​athletes playing on women’s sports teams has become part of the increasingly vitriolic US culture wars.

Trump has taken a hard line on transgender rights since returning to office in January 2025. He has cast the gender identity of transgender people as a lie and issued multiple executive orders to limit their rights including one involving sports participation.

The challenge to West Virginia’s law was brought by Becky Pepper-Jackson and her mother Heather Jackson. Pepper-Jackson attends high school in Bridgeport, West Virginia and participates in shot put and discus.

Her lawyers argued that transgender girls who receive testosterone-suppressing treatment do not retain an unfair athletic advantage, and that the laws are broad bans driven more by politics than evidence.

Read moreUS college sports body bars transgender women from competing in women’s divisions

The Idaho challenge was brought by Lindsay Hecox, a transgender student who previously participated in soccer ⁠and running clubs at Boise State University, a public university.

Hecox decided to quit playing sports and sought to dismiss the case in part due to a fear of harassment and growing intolerance toward transgender people. Hecox’s lawyers argued that ⁠the development rendered this challenge moot.

The ​Supreme Court heard arguments in January. Its conservative justices raised concerns about imposing a uniform rule on the entire country amid disagreement and uncertainty over whether medications like puberty blockers or gender-affirming hormones eliminate male physiological advantages in sports.

Tuesday was the final day of rulings for the court’s current term, which began in October.

(FRANCE 24 with Reuters and AFP)

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, the ideological armed wing of the Islamic Republic of Iran, issued a stern warning last week that only certain maritime routes would be authorised for navigation. It added that any ships transiting the Strait of Hormuz outside of the framework defined by Iran “will not be guaranteed safe passage”.

In recent days, Iran has acted on its threat. It twice attacked ships in the strait following efforts to open Oman’s territorial waters to both inbound and outbound traffic from the Persian Gulf.

In the first attack on June 25, a cargo ship sustained damage by a missile of unknown origin while sailing 7.5 nautical miles (14 kilometres) south-east of Dahit, on Oman’s Musandam Peninsula. The vessel had taken an alternative maritime route to the one typically used in the Strait of Hormuz, instead transiting Omani territorial waters.

The aim was to avoid the corridor under the control of the Iranian maritime authority.

The ship’s route was recommended on June 18 by the Joint Maritime Information Centre (JMIC), a naval information centre supported by the US government.

According to JMIC, this route is “mine-free”, unlike the route usually taken in the centre of the strait.

Read moreMiddle East live: Only Iran will carry out Hormuz Strait demining, Tehran says in rebuttal to Macron

The attacks on the ships drew retaliatory US airstrikes followed by Iranian drone and missile attacks targeting Bahrain and Kuwait on Sunday, placing negotiations to reach a formal end to the war back on hold.

Although Washington and Tehran have since agreed to stop their attacks, traffic through the strait remains disrupted. Only one ship transited the Omani route to exit the Gulf, and another to enter on Monday, Kpler data showed.

A hazardous waterway

The Strait of Hormuz, though long considered an international waterway, is technically located in Iran and Oman’s territorial waters. However, ships have long used the maritime corridor off Iran for safety reasons.

“This stretch of water [off Oman] already existed, but it was rarely used because it runs along the coastline and poses greater safety risks,” said Dirk Siebels, a maritime safety specialist at Risk Intelligence. “If something goes wrong on board – an engine failure, a steering failure or any other incident – you are relatively close to the shore and have very little room to manoeuvre.”

Under ordinary circumstances, ships that transit the Strait of Hormuz abide by a system of navigation first established in 1968 by the International Maritime Organisation (IMO).

This “traffic separation scheme” functions “like a sort of maritime motorway in the middle of the strait”, Siebels said.

Two traffic lanes, separated by a buffer zone, allow ships to enter and leave the Gulf while minimising the risk of collision in what is essentially a bottleneck – the strait is barely 33 kilometres wide at its narrowest point.

However, this central corridor is now off-limits due to restrictions imposed by the Iranian authorities, who only allow passage along their own coastline with the approval of their maritime authorities.

Aside from the risk to vessels that dare to defy Iran’s constraints, there is the additional threat posed by the possible presence of sea mines.

On June 24, the secretary-general of the IMO, Arsenio Dominguez, sounded the alarm, saying that “we have received information that there are mines” in the usual shipping lane.

He warned that more than 80 mines would need to be cleared before any resumption of traffic.

“No one is in a position to say whether this is true or false,” Siebels said. “But it isn’t even actually necessary for mines to be present: all it takes is to sow doubt so that no one takes the risk of passing through. In any case, clearance of the mines must be carried out first.”

Whatever the speculation over mines, the international community was stepping up to address concerns. France on Monday announced it would work with Oman to clear mines from the Strait of Hormuz.

“We have decided ‌to collaborate, in conjunction with our partners, on ‌clearing mines from the Strait in order to secure maritime routes and guarantee free and unconditional passage through the Strait of Hormuz,” French President Emmanuel Macron wrote on X after meeting with Oman’s Sultan Haitham bin Tariq Al at ⁠the Élysée Palace.

An Iranian official hit back after Macron posted his statement on X, warning France and others against “provocations”.

Iranian deputy foreign minister Kazem Gharibabadi said on X that under the interim deal, “demining is carried out solely by Iran and by no other country”.

An increasingly busy route

According to Siebels, up until recently the route along the Omani coast had become increasingly busy. Around twenty ships had used it in May and early June, a figure that subsequently rose to about 60, according to the IMO.

Read moreHow can a joint France-UK mission help restart shipping in the Strait of Hormuz?

The alternative route was also intended to offer the nearly 11,000 vessels still trapped in the Gulf a way out. However, the UN-devised plan to enable their departure – using the two coastal routes – was suspended following Thursday’s attack on the cargo ship off the coast of Oman.

Under the memorandum of understanding signed last week between Tehran and Washington, Iran committed to clearing mines from the strait within 30 days. In recent weeks, France and the UK had committed to jointly lead a coalition of around 40 countries in providing mine-clearing expertise to help secure the vital waterway.

Iran said on Monday it had held its first meeting with Oman to discuss the management of the strait.

The issue of who controls this strategic strait is far from resolved. It remains a major point of contention between Tehran and Washington, and a key source of leverage in the protracted on again-off again negotiations between the two warring countries.

This article has been translated from the original in French by Nicole Trian.

US President Donald Trump said Iran has requested a meeting that will be held Tuesday in Qatar, despite Tehran denying any direct negotiations were planned with Washington on the deal aimed at ending the Middle East war.

The announcement came after Iran held its first talks with Oman on managing the Strait of Hormuz since the US-Iran deal was signed, and as Washington and Tehran agreed to halt their attacks, which had strained the agreement.

“IRAN HAS REQUESTED A MEETING. IT WILL TAKE PLACE TOMORROW IN DOHA!” Trump posted Monday on his Truth Social platform, without specifying the participants.

White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt later told Fox News that US envoy Steve Witkoff and Trump’s adviser and son-in-law Jared Kushner “will be flying to Doha for high-level meetings this week”.

Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baqaei on Monday said a delegation of the country’s own experts would travel to Doha this week, but staunchly denied any sit-down with the Americans.

“We have not yet entered the stage of negotiating a final agreement,” he said, noting that “over the coming days, we will not have any negotiation meetings with the US side at any level”.

Hormuz talks 

Iran‘s exercise of control over the highly strategic strait has sparked repeated flare-ups, the latest of which came early Sunday when US Central Command said it had attacked 10 Iranian military targets over “continued Iranian aggression against commercial shipping“.

Iran said it retaliated with strikes against US bases in Kuwait and Bahrain.

The blockade remains a key sticking point in the negotiations.

Iran and Oman border the strait, through which a fifth of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas passed prior to the conflict, and Iran said Monday they held their first talks since the deal was struck.

“During a trip to Muscat, the first meeting of the Joint Hormuz Committee was held,” said Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister Kazem Gharibabadi on X.

The strait comprises Omani and Iranian territorial waters, but under international law the two cannot generally block passage or charge tolls.

Iran warned on Sunday that any attempt by ships to bypass its preferred route through Hormuz would “increase tensions” in the Middle East.

Iran insists ships transiting the strait pass through a corridor near its own shores.

How the memorandum is to be implemented remains unclear, with Iran especially sensitive about the issue of de-mining.

In a joint statement following a meeting between French President Emmanuel Macron and Omani Sultan Haitham bin Tariq, Paris and Muscat said they would conduct joint de-mining operations.

In response, Gharibabadi insisted that under the agreement only Iran was to conduct de-mining efforts.

“The situation is sensitive and complex. We strongly advise France not to complicate it further with its provocations,” Gharibabadi wrote.

Traffic slowed over the weekend after a vessel was struck while transiting the waterway, with 29 commodity vessels crossing Saturday and 12 transiting Sunday, according to data from maritime tracking firm Kpler.

No vessels used a southern corridor through Omani waters according to data from Kpler, while another tracker, AXSMarine, found that 44 vessels had stopped publicly transmitting their position.

Read moreIran attacks Bahrain and Kuwait, threatens to halt talks after fresh US strikes

‘Hegemonic dreams’ 

The published text of the US-Iran memorandum of understanding, announced this month, says Iran will define the future administration of the strait in dialogue with Oman and the other Gulf States, but “in line” with international law.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said they were taking measures to control traffic in the strait and that vessels violating those measures would be dealt with more firmly than before.

Mohammad Mokhber, adviser to Iran’s supreme leader, wrote on X that as long as Iran managed the strait, Washington’s “hegemonic dreams in the region will not be realised”.

Experts said there would likely be more Hormuz incidents.

For Iran, “a drawn-out negotiation accompanied by controlled pressure in the strait can work to its advantage”, said H.A. Hellyer of the Royal United Services Institute, a London think tank.

Oil prices, which last week fell to pre-war levels, rose modestly on Monday. 

Read moreNetanyahu hails Lebanon deal as Hezbollah rejects agreement

Israel strikes

Lebanese state media on Monday said an Israeli strike hit the country’s south, the stronghold of Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah, despite a framework accord signed by the two countries last week aimed at securing a peace deal.

Hezbollah drew Lebanon into the Middle East war in March with rocket fire at Israel, triggering Israeli airstrikes and a ground invasion.

As part of the Washington-brokered deal, Hezbollah is to be disarmed, with the onus for doing so on the Lebanese army. Israeli leaders have said their troops will continue to occupy the south until then.

The Iran-backed militant group has fiercely opposed the agreement.

(FRANCE 24 with AFP)

From the show

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In tonight’s edition, worry builds amongst African migrants in South Africa ahead of the June 30th deadline set by  protesters demanding undocumented foreigners leave. Also, at least three are killed in Ghana as floods paralyze the capital. And Cape Verde offers greener pastures for LGBTQ+ people on the continent.

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Every few minutes, the mortuary owner’s phone rings. Since a record-smashing heat wave started taking lives and storage space for bodies in Paris and beyond, the funeral directors and mourning families calling him mostly have the same question: Do you have room for one more?

With all 32 places in his cold room taken, Zouhaeir Hertelli reluctantly has to gently say “Non,” over and over and over again.

“We’re facing a really catastrophic situation,” he said. “I’m getting hundreds of calls.”

As the historic heat wave shifted its deadly temperatures eastward this weekend to other parts of Europe, France began counting the human cost it left in its wake.

The statistical and public health work of tallying heat-related deaths could take weeks or months. But it’s already apparent that the toll exacted by the intense, unrelenting extreme temperatures was terrible in France, the first country hit from mid-June, particularly among older people who died at home.

“We’re dealing with an enormous spike of deaths because of the heat wave and we’re really full, full, full,” Hertelli said.

In its first preliminary estimate, the national public health agency said deaths surged during the heat wave’s peak in France last week, which roasted most of Europe’s largest country with temperatures that soared in many places above 40C and also broke records for nighttime highs – an exhausting one-two punch for fatigued bodies.

Public Health France said there were more than 1,200 deaths last Wednesday, when France registered its hottest-ever day, breaking a record that had been set just the previous day.

Read moreTwo children found dead in car as half of France bakes under highest heat warning

Deaths then increased to more than 1,400 on Thursday and another 1,400 on Friday, it said. By way of comparison, the pre-heat wave death rate in April and May was around 900 to 1,000 per day, it said.

The agency cautioned that its estimate of at least 1,000 additional deaths during those three sizzling days alone is expected to increase as more death certificates come in for people who died at home and in care facilities for older people, where most deaths are still not registered electronically.

“Mortality will as a consequence be higher than these first figures,” the agency said.

It said that 85 percent of the deaths registered so far during the three days it studied involved people aged 65 and above and that there was a sharp increase in deaths at home – up by about 40 percent – particularly in the Paris region.

Hertelli and others in the funeral industry said Paris mortuaries quickly ran out of storage space. City Hall said two temporary storage units, with 20 places each, were installed for municipal mortuaries and that city hospitals provided another 50 additional places.

Still, Hertelli said funeral directors he spoke to told him they were having to store bodies as far away as Chartres – 80 kilometers from Paris – and in other regions around the capital. To open more space, he said he has asked authorities for permission to temporarily install refrigerated containers outside his mortuary, which is next to Paris’s Orly airport, but is still waiting for a green light.

“Families are suffering,” he said. “We have no solution to offer them, because the funeral homes are full. So we are deeply affected, we have empathy for them, but there’s nothing we can offer. We are really facing a problem, a big problem,” he said.

Historic high temperatures in 2003, surpassed this time, were blamed for 15,000 deaths, provoking a national reckoning about care of older people, who were particularly hard-hit. More than 5,700 deaths were also attributed to heat during an exceptionally hot summer last year.

Véronique Bertrand, a Paris funeral director, said she fears that lessons have been forgotten.

Read moreFrance’s latest heatwave: ‘Temperatures will fall, and we won’t talk about it anymore’

“Most of the deaths that we are dealing with at the moment were people who were living alone at home, isolated. Given the circumstances in which they were found, there can be no other conclusion than that these were deaths caused by the heat,” Bertrand said.

“I think people absolutely need to wake up, that solidarity needs to come back, that what happened in 2003 led to a movement in that direction, with people thinking about their neighbours, of those around them who live alone and perhaps checking from time to time that they’re drinking water and are being looked after,” she said.

“With the passing years, we’ve perhaps forgotten that it could happen again and that things would even perhaps be worse.”

(FRANCE 24 with AP)