FOMC statement: Federal Reserve to raise interest on reserve balances (IOR) to 3.90% and the discount rate to 4.00%.

Yemen government forces have launched a counteroffensive around Taiz, but analysts warn that without a larger-scale push by the UN-recognized government the current operations are unlikely to prevent eventual Houthi control of the city. Saudi Arabia is providing air support for strikes west of Taiz as Houthis try to expand control; Houthi sources say a Saudi strike hit a communications tower. Local reports say a Saudi airstrike killed one civilian and wounded another. Fighting is concentrated in the mountainous Kahbub area, a strategic high ground that overlooks Houthi reinforcement routes and nearby territory, including approaches to the Bab al-Mandeb. The government front is being reinforced by the Giants Brigade, which has so far blocked further Houthi penetration of Taiz’s outskirts, but multiple experts caution that a prolonged, limited-intensity campaign may ultimately favor the Houthis.

The Ministry of Culture and Tourism has issued the 15th Five-Year Plan for Culture and Tourism Development, setting targets through 2030 to advance construction of a culturally strong and tourism-strong China, sustain growth in cultural undertakings, cultural industries and tourism, deepen culture-tourism integration, and strengthen culture’s empowerment and tourism’s growth-driving role. The plan assigns eight priority task areas: art creation and production; cultural heritage protection and transmission; public cultural and tourism services; major expansion of culture and tourism industries; coordinated market cultivation and regulation; technology enablement of culture and tourism; cultural and tourism exchange and cooperation; and balanced regional and urban–rural cultural and tourism development. It specifies 54 priority projects designed after full review to be pragmatic and feasible and calls for strengthened implementation support.