WARSAW, Poland: Poland reinforced its border with Belarus with more riot police on Tuesday, a day after groups of migrants tried to storm through a razor-wire fence on the eastern frontier where thousands have camped on the Belarusian side in the tense standoff.
The European Union accuses Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko of using the migrants as pawns in a “hybrid attack” against the bloc in retaliation for imposing sanctions on the authoritarian government for a brutal internal crackdown on dissent. Thousands were jailed and beaten following months of protests after Lukashenko won a sixth term in a 2020 election that the opposition and the West saw as rigged.
Polish authorities said all was calm overnight on the border — which is also the eastern edge of the 27-nation EU — but they were bracing for any possibility. The Defense Ministry said a large group of Belarusian forces was moving toward the migrant encampments.
During a special session of parliament, Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki described the situation at the border as part of an effort by Russia to disrupt a region that it controlled during the Soviet era that ended three decades ago.
“It must be strongly emphasized that the security of our eastern border is being brutally violated. This is the first such situation in 30 years when we can say that the integrity of our borders is being tested,” Morawiecki said.
Speaking during a UN Security Council meeting, Russia’s UN Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia rejected similar accusations, and noted that the migrants are not seeking to stay in Belarus but to get to Europe.
“So who is creating the crisis, building fences with barbed wire and concentrating troops at the border?” Nebenzia said, adding that the EU doesn’t want to accept the migrants, and “it is time to stop playing the blame game.”
Polish Maj. Katarzyna Zdanowicz estimated 3,000-4,000 migrants were along the border, including about 800 near the makeshift camps. Belarusian security services also were there to “control, steer and direct these people,” she added.
She said Poland’s assessment came from aerial observations, alleging that Belarus authorities were taking journalists to the area to promote their version of events.
Independent journalists have limited ability to operate in Belarus, and a state of emergency in Poland kept reporters and others away from its side of the border.
The scene was quiet as night fell, and migrants were seen getting water and other supplies on the Belarusian side, according to Zdanowicz, based on what observations from across the frontier. She said guards prevented some small groups from crossing, part of hundreds of such attempts Tuesday.
The Belarusian Defense Ministry summoned the Polish military attache to protest what it called “unfounded and unlawful Polish allegations” against the Belarusian military at the border. It also voiced concern about the buildup of Polish troops there, saying Warsaw did not notify or invite Belarusian observers per international rules for activity involving more than 6,000 troops.
Speaking on Belarusian state television, Lukashenko threw the allegation of a “hybrid war” back at the EU, pointing at its sanctions against Belarus and adding: “And you, bastards, madmen want me to protect you from migrants.”
“I am afraid that this confrontation at the border because of migrants might lead to an active phase. These are grounds for provocations. All provocations are possible,” he said, accusing Poland’s military of flying its helicopters low at the border, frightening the migrants.
In Moscow, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said the West bore responsibility for triggering the flows of migrants through their “aggressive wars in the Middle East and North Africa.” The migrants, he said, don’t want to stay in Belarus and “want to get to Europe that has advertised its way of living for many years.”
The crisis has simmered for months after Poland, Lithuania and Latvia accused neighboring Belarus of encouraging thousands of migrants, mostly from the Middle East, to illegally enter those nations. Many of the migrants often end up stuck in a forested area of swamps and bogs, pushed back and forth between Belarusian and Polish forces.
The Belarusian opposition urged the West to strengthen its sanctions on Minsk.
“It’s necessary to introduce tough sanctions, trade embargo and a full stop of transit of goods between the EU and Belarus,” Pavel Latushka, a leading opposition figure, said on a messaging app, urging Poland, Lithuania and Latvia, “as countries on the front line of a hybrid attack launched by the regime, to stop transit.”
On Tuesday, the EU tightened visa rules for Belarus officials, saying it was “partially suspending” an agreement with Minsk. The move affects Belarusian government officials, lawmakers, diplomats and top court representatives by requiring them to provide additional documents and pay more for visas.
Lawmakers in Lithuania voted to declare a state of emergency for a month along the Belarus border, restricting the movement of vehicles and banning all entry, except for residents, in a zone reaching 5 kilometers (3 miles) inland. Guards can check vehicles and people, and gatherings also are banned. It also applies to migrant accommodations in the capital of Vilnius and elsewhere.
At least 170 migrants were stopped from entering Lithuania on Tuesday.
In videos posted on Twitter by Polish police, the migrants were seen in tents and cooking over campfires in near-freezing temperatures. The police blared announcements that border crossing is allowed only at official posts, with visas, and the nearest crossing point in Kuznica was closed early Tuesday.
Refugee agencies UNHCR and International Organization for Migration called the situation “alarming,” and said they contacted governments in both Poland and Belarus to urge them to ensure that those in the makeshift camp get humanitarian assistance.
A man in the Polish village of Bialowieza told The Associated Press he has met many migrants who often are thirsty, hungry and in need of boots or medical care. He is among volunteers distributing food and other aid, and spoke on condition of anonymity because Polish authorities discourage such help.
“They are in really bad condition and the situation is getting worse” as temperatures drop, he said.
Some of the migrants believed they were in Germany and appeared to have been “very disinformed by Belarusian soldiers and guards,” the man said.
At least eight migrant deaths have been recorded by Polish and Belarusian authorities, most of them in Poland.
Morawiecki went to the border Tuesday, accompanied by Defense Minister Mariusz Blaszczak, to meet with border guards and other security officials.
“We do not know what else Lukashenko’s regime will come up with — this is the reality,” Morawiecki said, praising the guards.
Poland has received strong signals of solidarity from the EU and Washington in the confrontation with Belarus.
Germany’s outgoing interior minister, Horst Seehofer, said all EU countries “must stand together, because Lukashenko is using people’s fates — with the support of Russian President Vladimir Putin — to destabilize the West.”
Many migrants have flown to Minsk on tourist visas and travel by taxi to the border. The EU is seeking to pressure airlines not to facilitate such trips. Although direct flights from Iraq were suspended in August, migrants have been arriving in Belarus from Syria, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates and even Russia, according to recent internal EU reports seen by the AP. Smugglers use social media to advertise transportation from Belarus to Germany by car.
Pavel Usau, head of the Center for Political Analysis and Prognosis, said Lukashenko expects the West to make concessions.
“Lukashenko is provoking the West to take aggressive action, but, on the other hand, he expects that Western countries will yield to pressure and will be forced to engage in negotiations,” Usau said in an interview from Warsaw.
Tensions rise in migrant standoff at Poland-Belarus border
https://arab.news/n4739
Tensions rise in migrant standoff at Poland-Belarus border
- Independent journalists have limited ability to operate in Belarus, and a state of emergency in Poland kept reporters and others away from its side of the border
US plane hit by gunfire on Dallas runway: aviation agency
WASHINGTON: A Southwest Airlines plane was hit by gunfire while taking off from an airport in the US city of Dallas on Friday, the Federal Aviation Administration said.
“While taxiing for takeoff at Dallas Love Field Airport, Southwest Airlines Flight 2494 was reportedly struck by gunfire near the cockpit,” a statement on the FAA’s website said.
“The Boeing 737-800 returned to the gate, where passengers deplaned.”
The incident happened at around 8:30 p.m. Friday (0230 GMT Saturday), with the flight headed from Dallas, Texas, to Indianapolis, Indiana.
There were no reported injuries, according to a statement from Dallas Love Field Airport on social media platform X.
Investigation reveals a Russian factory’s plan to mix decoys with a new deadly weapon in Ukraine
- Unarmed decoys now make up more than half the drones targeting Ukraine and as much as 75 percent of the new drones coming out of the factory in Russia’s Alabuga Special Economic Zone
KYIV: A high-tech factory in central Russia has created a new, deadly force to attack Ukraine: a small number of highly destructive thermobaric drones surrounded by huge swarms of cheap foam decoys.
The plan, which Russia dubbed Operation False Target, is intended to force Ukraine to expend scarce resources to save lives and preserve critical infrastructure, including by using expensive air defense munitions, according to a person familiar with Russia’s production and a Ukrainian electronics expert who hunts them from his specially outfitted van.
Neither radar, sharpshooters nor even electronics experts can tell which drones are deadly in the skies.
Here’s what to know from AP’s investigation:
A deadly mix
Unarmed decoys now make up more than half the drones targeting Ukraine and as much as 75 percent of the new drones coming out of the factory in Russia’s Alabuga Special Economic Zone, according to the person familiar with Russia’s production, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the industry is highly sensitive, and the Ukrainian electronics expert.
The same factory produces a particularly deadly variant of the Shahed unmanned aircraft armed with thermobaric warheads, the person said.
During the first weekend of November, the Kyiv region spent 20 hours under air alert, and the sound of buzzing drones mingled with the boom of air defenses and rifle shots. In October, Moscow attacked with at least 1,889 drones – 80 percent more than in August, according to an AP analysis tracking the drones for months.
On Saturday, Russia launched 145 drones across Ukraine, just days after the re-election of Donald Trump threw into doubt US support for the country.
Since summer, most drones crash, are shot down or are diverted by electronic jamming, according to an AP analysis of the Ukrainian military briefings. Less than 6 percent hit a discernible target, according to the data analyzed by AP since the end of July. But the sheer numbers mean a handful can slip through every day – and that is enough to be deadly.
The drone lab
Tatarstan’s Alabuga zone, an industrial complex about 1,000 kilometers (600 miles) east of Moscow, is a laboratory for Russian drone production. Originally set up in 2006 to attract businesses and investment to Tatarstan, it expanded after the 2022 invasion of Ukraine and some sectors switched to military production, adding new buildings and renovating existing sites, according to satellite images analyzed by The Associated Press.
In social media videos, the factory promoted itself as an innovation hub. But David Albright of the Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security said Alabuga’s current purpose is purely to produce and sell drones to Russia‘s Ministry of Defense. The videos and other promotional media were taken down after an AP investigation found that many of the African women recruited to fill labor shortages there complained they were duped into taking jobs at the plant.
Russia and Iran signed a $1.7 billion deal for the Shaheds in 2022, after President Vladimir Putin invaded neighboring Ukraine, and Moscow began using Iranian imports of the unmanned aerial vehicles, or UAVs, in battle later that year. Soon after the deal was signed, production started in Alabuga.
The most fearsome Shahed adaptation so far designed at the plant is armed with thermobarics, also known as vacuum bombs, the person with knowledge of Russian drone production said.
The plan to develop unarmed decoy drones at Alabuga was developed in late 2022, according to the person with knowledge of Russian drone production. Production of the decoys started earlier this year, said the person, who agreed to speak only on condition of anonymity. Now the plant turns out about 40 of the unarmed drones a day and around 10 armed ones, which are more expensive and take longer to produce.
The vacuum bomb
From a military point of view, thermobarics are ideal for going after targets that are either inside fortified buildings or deep underground. They create a vortex of high pressure and heat that penetrates the thickest walls and, at the same time, sucks out all the oxygen in their path.
Alabuga’s thermobaric drones are particularly destructive when they strike buildings, because they are also loaded with ball bearings to cause maximum damage even beyond the superheated blast.
Serhii Beskrestnov, a Ukrainian electronics expert and more widely known as Flash whose black military van is kitted out with electronic jammers to down drones, said the thermobarics were first used over the summer and estimated they now make up between 3 percent and 5 percent of all drones.
They have a fearsome reputation because of the physical effects even on people caught outside the initial blast site: Collapsed lungs, crushed eyeballs, brain damage, according to Arthur van Coller, an expert in international humanitarian law at South Africa’s University of Fort Hare.
For Russia, the benefits are huge.
An unarmed drone costs considerably less than the estimated $50,000 for an armed Shahed drone and a tiny fraction of the cost of even a relatively inexpensive air defense missile. One decoy with a live-feed camera allows the aircraft to geolocate Ukraine’s air defenses and relay the information to Russia in the final moments of its mechanical life. And the swarms have become a demoralizing fact of life for Ukrainians.
Ten babies die in fire at Indian hospital’s neonatal unit
- The blaze broke out late on Friday at the Maharani Laxmibai Medical College in Jhansi district
LUCKNOW: Ten newborn babies died from burns and suffocation after a fire swept through a neonatal intensive care unit in northern India, a government official said on Saturday.
The blaze broke out late on Friday at the Maharani Laxmibai Medical College in Jhansi district about 285 km (180 miles) southwest of Lucknow, the capital of Uttar Pradesh state.
Emergency responders rescued 38 newborns from the ward, which housed 49 infants at the time of the incident, said state Deputy Chief Minister Brajesh Pathak.
“Seventeen of the injured are receiving treatment in different wings and some private hospitals,” Pathak told reporters in Jhansi. Seven of the deceased infants have been identified, while the authorities are working to identify the remaining three, he said.
One infant remains missing, said a government official who asked not to be identified as he is not authorized to speak to media.
The cause of the fire remains unknown. Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath ordered an inquiry into the incident.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi expressed condolences over the “heart-wrenching” incident.
“My deepest condolences to those who lost their innocent children in this,” Modi posted on the X platform. “I pray to God to give them the strength to bear this immense loss.”
Xi, Biden to meet as Trump return looms
- Trump’s comeback has cast a cloud of uncertainty over efforts by Washington and Beijing to ease their tense relationship
Lima: US President Joe Biden and Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping will meet for the last time Saturday, a day after both leaders warned of turbulent times ahead for the world as Donald Trump returns to the White House.
Their final encounter, taking place on the sidelines of an Asia-Pacific summit in Peru, has been overshadowed by the prospect of fresh trade wars and diplomatic upheaval when Trump starts his second term.
Trump’s comeback has cast a cloud of uncertainty over efforts by Washington and Beijing to ease their tense relationship, launched in a historic meeting between Xi and Biden in California a year ago.
The White House said Saturday’s Xi-Biden meeting at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit would “mark the progress” in the relationship between the United States and an increasingly assertive Beijing.
But it was also aimed at getting through a “delicate period of transition” and ensuring that competition with China “doesn’t veer into conflict,” US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said.
Trump’s crushing election win over Kamala Harris has caused shock waves around the globe and dominated the two-day meeting of heads of state of the 21-member APEC group.
The billionaire Republican has in particular signaled a confrontational approach to Beijing, threatening to impose tariffs of up to 60 percent on imports of Chinese goods to even out what he says is a trade imbalance.
He has also named two major China hawks in his top team, including his pick for Secretary of State, Marco Rubio.
Xi and Biden, who are meeting for the third time overall, warned separately at the summit on Friday of choppy waters ahead.
The Chinese president raised concerns about “spreading unilateralism and protectionism” in a written speech to the forum, China’s state news agency Xinhua reported.
For his part, Biden said the world had “reached a moment of significant political change,” as he met the leaders of Japan and South Korea — key US allies in Asia.
Biden said US ties with the two countries were essential for “countering North Korea’s dangerous and destabilizing cooperation with Russia” as Pyongyang sends troops to fight in Ukraine.
And with Biden racing to salvage what he can of his foreign policy legacy from Trump, he said the three-way alliance he had pioneered was “built to last. That’s my hope and expectation.”
A senior administration official insisted that Trump’s name had not come up during the meeting with the South Korean and Japanese leaders.
The return of Trump’s “America First” policies, however, threatens alliances Biden has built on issues ranging from the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East to climate change and trade.
During his first term, Trump repeatedly threatened to cut US defense commitments to Asian and European allies if they did not pay a larger share of the financial burden for their protection.
Economists say Trump’s threat of punitive tariffs would harm not only China’s economy but also that of the United States and its trading partners.
It could also threaten geopolitical stability.
China is building up its military capacity while ramping up pressure on self-governed Taiwan, which it claims as part of its territory.
Sullivan said Xi and Biden were set to discuss Taiwan and tensions in the South China Sea, where Beijing claims large swathes of maritime territory, he said.
They would also focus on keeping communication channels open, particularly military-to-military hotlines restored last year.
The APEC summit will wrap up on Saturday but Trump’s shadow is still set to cloud the international diplomatic agenda at a G20 summit in Rio de Janeiro next week.
Biden will also be heading there as part of a swing through Latin America in what is likely to be his last major foreign tour.
He will stop in the Amazonian rainforest on Sunday to highlight the impact of climate change — another key policy area likely to be affected by Trump, who has promised to “drill, baby, drill” for fossil fuels.
Tens of thousands flee as Super Typhoon Man-yi nears Philippines
- Around 255,000 people have fled their homes ahead of Super Typhoon Man-yi
- It will be the sixth major storm to pummel the archipelago nation in the past month
MANILA: A powerful storm sweeping toward the Philippines intensified into a super typhoon on Saturday, the state weather forecaster said, warning of “significant to severe impacts” from the wind and “life-threatening” storm surges.
Around 255,000 people have fled their homes ahead of Super Typhoon Man-yi, which is expected to make landfall later Saturday or early Sunday, becoming the sixth major storm to pummel the archipelago nation in the past month.
With wind gusts of up to 230 kilometers per hour (about 140 miles per hour), Man-yi was on track to slam into the sparsely populated island province of Catanduanes as a super typhoon or “near peak intensity,” the weather service warned.
Up to 14-meter (46-feet) high seas were expected around Catanduanes, while “significant to severe impacts from typhoon-force winds are possible” in the hardest hit areas, along with a “high risk of life-threatening storm surges” exceeding three meters, the forecaster said.
At least 163 people died in the five storms that pounded the Philippines in recent weeks that also left thousands homeless and wiped out crops and livestock.
The government urged people Saturday to heed warnings to flee to safety.
“If preemptive evacuation is required, let us do so and not wait for the hour of peril before evacuating or seeking help, because if we did that we will be putting in danger not only our lives but also those of our rescuers,” Interior Undersecretary Marlo Iringan said.
In Albay province, Legazpi City grocer Myrna Perea was sheltering with her fruit vendor husband and their three children in a school classroom with nine other families after they were ordered to leave their shanty.
Conditions were hot and cramped — the family spent Friday night sleeping together on a mat under the classroom’s single ceiling fan — but Perea said it was better to be safe.
“I think our house will be wrecked when we get back because it’s made of light materials — just two gusts are required to knock it down,” Perea, 44, said.
“That’s why we evacuated. Even if the house is destroyed, the important thing is we do not lose a family member.”
Scientists have warned climate change is increasing the intensity of storms, leading to heavier rains, flash floods and stronger gusts.
About 20 big storms and typhoons hit the Southeast Asian nation or its surrounding waters each year, killing scores of people, but it is rare for multiple such weather events to take place in a small window.
Evacuation centers were filling up on Catanduanes island in the typhoon-prone Bicol region, with the state weather forecaster warning Saturday of “widespread incidents of severe flooding and landslides.”
More than 400 people were squeezed into the provincial government building in the capital Virac, with new arrivals being sent to a gymnasium, provincial disaster officer Roberto Monterola said.
Monterola said he had dispatched soldiers to force about 100 households in two coastal villages near Virac to move inland due to fears storm surges could swamp their homes.
“Regardless of the exact landfall point, heavy rainfall, severe winds, and storm surges may occur in areas outside the predicted landfall zone,” the forecaster said.
In Northern Samar province, disaster officer Rei Josiah Echano lamented that damage caused by typhoons was the root cause of poverty in the region.
“Whenever there’s a typhoon like this, it brings us back to the mediaeval era, we go (back) to square one,” Echano said, as the province prepared for the onslaught of Man-yi.
All vessels — from fishing boats to oil tankers — have been ordered to stay in port or return to shore.
The volcanology agency also warned heavy rain dumped by Man-yi could trigger flows of volcanic sediment, or lahars, from three volcanos, including Taal, south of Manila.
Man-yi will hit the Philippines late in the typhoon season — most cyclones develop between July and October.
Earlier this month, four storms were clustered simultaneously in the Pacific basin, which the Japan Meteorological Agency said on Saturday was the first time such an occurrence had been observed in November since its records began in 1951.
