KYIV: Ukraine said on Friday it had recaptured the devastated eastern village of Andriivka, setting the stage for further advances on the southern flank of Bakhmut, the city that fell into Russian hands in May after months of heavy fighting.
Kyiv’s troops were securing their foothold in the area, while Russian forces suffered significant casualties and lost equipment, the Ukrainian General Staff said in a morning report. There was no immediate comment from Russia.
“In the course of assault operations, they seized Andriivka in Donetsk region,” the General Staff said.
The village of Andriivka lies south of Bakhmut, the site of the fiercest and longest battle since the invasion by Russia in February last year. The General Staff also reported “partial success” near Klishchiivka, a village also south of Bakhmut.
“Capturing and holding Andriivka — is our path to a breakthrough on the right flank of Bakhmut and the key to the success of the entire further offensive,” said the Third Assault Brigade, which took part in the push.
Ukraine advanced cautiously in the area to minimize losses from mines and “very active” Russian defenses, brigade spokesman Oleksandr Borodin said.
“They defend their flanks very heavily here because they understand if (their) flank falls completely it will create direct problems to hold the city (Bakhmut) itself,” he said.
“There is no Andriivka left per se,... but as a place, as a square, it is an important square,” he said in televised comments.
HIGHER GROUND
The village lies on higher ground which will allow Ukrainian artillery to operate more easily in the area, said Kyiv-based military analyst Oleksandr Musiyenko.
During its three-month-old counteroffensive, Ukraine has reported slow, steady progress against entrenched Russian positions, retaking a string of villages and advancing on the flanks of Bakhmut, but taking no major settlements.
President Volodymyr Zelensky and other officials have dismissed Western critics who say the offensive is too slow and hampered by strategic errors.
Further south in Donetsk region, Ukrainian troops continued to hold back a Russian offensive toward the towns of Avdiivka and Maryinka, General Staff spokesman Andriy Kovaliov said in televised comments. He said the defenders had managed to repel all Russian attacks near Maryinka.
On the southern front, the General Staff said its troops were inflicting substantial losses on the enemy near the village of Verbove in the Zaporizhzhia region.
Reuters was unable to verify the battlefield reports.
Ukraine troops retake village south of Bakhmut
https://arab.news/p3t6k
Ukraine troops retake village south of Bakhmut
- Kyiv says foothold could help advance to Bakhmut’s south
- Village lies on higher ground
Mass shooting in gang-plagued Mexican state leaves 12 dead and more injured
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said the victims included children
MEXICO CITY: At least 12 people were killed, including a teenager, and more wounded in a Tuesday night shooting in the central Mexican city of Irapuato, authorities said on Wednesday.
The attorney general’s office in Guanajuato, the violence-plagued state where Irapuato is located, said some 20 others were hospitalized with gunshot wounds.
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said earlier on Wednesday that the victims included children, although the attorney general’s office later confirmed only one casualty was a minor, aged 17.
“It is very unfortunate what happened. An investigation is under way,” Sheinbaum said.
Local media reported the shooting happened during an evening party celebrating a Catholic holiday, the Nativity of John the Baptist.
A video circulating on social media showed people dancing in the patio of a housing complex while a band played in the background, before gunfire erupted. Reuters was not immediately able to verify the video.
Guanajuato has been for many years one of the most violent regions in the country.
On Tuesday, five other people were killed in other parts of the state, according to the attorney general’s office.
29 pupils taking high school exams killed in Central Africa crush
- In the ensuing panic, supervisors and students tried to flee, some jumping from the first floor of the school
- “I would like to express my solidarity and compassion to the parents of the deceased candidates, to the educational staff, to the students,” Touadera said
BANGUI: Twenty-nine students taking their high school exams in the Central African Republic died in a stampede sparked by an exploding power transformer, the health ministry told AFP Thursday.
Just over 5,300 students were sitting the second day of the baccalaureate exams at the time of the explosion early Wednesday afternoon in Bangui, the capital of the deeply poor nation.
In the ensuing panic, supervisors and students tried to flee, some jumping from the first floor of the school.
The injured were transported by ambulance, on the back of pickup trucks or by motorbike taxi, AFP journalists saw.
“I would like to express my solidarity and compassion to the parents of the deceased candidates, to the educational staff, to the students,” President Faustin Archange Touadera said in a video published on his party’s Facebook page.
Touadera, who is attending a summit of the Gavi vaccine alliance in Brussels, also announced three days of national mourning.
According to a document circulating on social media and authenticated by the health ministry, 29 deaths were registered by hospitals in the city.
“The hospital was overwhelmed by people to the point of obstructing caregivers and ambulances, a health ministry source stated.
UN peacekeepers, police and other security were seen around the Barthelemy Boganda high school and hospitals.
Education Minister Aurelien-Simplice Kongbelet-Zingas said in a statement Wednesday that “measures will be taken quickly to shed light on the circumstances of this incident.”
The minister added that a further statement would follow regarding selection of a date for the students to resume their exams program.
The Republican Bloc for the Defense of the Constitution (BRDC), a coalition of opposition parties, condemned what it termed “the irresponsibility of the authorities in place, who have failed in their duty to ensure the safety of students and school infrastructure.”
The CAR is among the poorest countries in the world and, since independence from France in 1960, has endured a succession of coups, authoritarian rulers and civil wars.
The latest civil war started more than a decade ago. The government has secured the main cities and violence has subsided in recent years.
But fighting occasionally erupts in remote regions between rebels and the national army, which is backed by Wagner mercenaries and Rwandan troops.
Municipal, legislative, and presidential elections are scheduled for August and December of this year but UN experts are calling for urgent institutional reform of the electoral authority before the polls and for “transparent internal governance,” as tensions between the government and the opposition intensify.
Kremlin says no date yet for next round of Ukraine peace talks
- Peskov said Russia was in favor of continued US efforts to mediate
- They have made no progress toward a ceasefire
MOSCOW: The Kremlin said on Thursday there was no progress yet toward setting a date for the next round of peace talks with Ukraine, Interfax news agency reported.
Another agency, TASS, quoted Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov as saying Russia was in favor of continued US efforts to mediate.
Resuming negotiations after a gap of more than three years, Russia and Ukraine held face-to-face talks in Istanbul on May 16 and June 2 that led to a series of prisoner exchanges and the return of the bodies of dead soldiers.
But they have made no progress toward a ceasefire which Ukraine, with Western backing, has been pressing for.
16 dead, thousands of businesses destroyed after Kenya protests
- The marches had been called to mark one year since anti-tax demonstrations
- “What unfolded yesterday was not a protest. It was terrorism disguised as dissent,” Kipchumba Murkomen, interior cabinet secretary, said
NAIROBI: At least 16 people died in protests across Kenya on Wednesday, Amnesty International said Thursday, as businesses and residents were left to clean up the devastation in the capital and beyond.
The marches had been called to mark one year since anti-tax demonstrations that peaked when a huge crowd stormed parliament and dozens were killed by security forces.
The anniversary marches began peacefully Wednesday but descended into chaos as young men held running battles with police, lit fires, and ripped up pavements to use as projectiles.
“What unfolded yesterday was not a protest. It was terrorism disguised as dissent,” Kipchumba Murkomen, interior cabinet secretary, said in a televised speech.
“We condemn the criminal anarchists who in the name of peaceful demonstrations unleashed a wave of violence, looting, sexual assault and destruction upon our people,” he added.
In Nairobi’s business district, the epicenter of the unrest, AFP journalists found entire shopping centers and thousands of businesses destroyed, many still smoldering.
At least two banks had been broken into, while businesses ranging from supermarkets to small electronics and clothing stores were reduced to ashes or ransacked by looters.
“When we came we found the whole premise burnt down,” said Raphael Omondi, 36, owner of a print shop, adding that he had lost machines worth $150,000.
“There were guys stealing, and after stealing they set the whole premises on fire... If this is what protest is, it is not worth it.”
“They looted everything... I do not know where to start,” said Maureen Chepkemoi, 32, owner of a perfume store.
“To protest is not bad but why are you coming to protest inside my shop? It is wicked,” she added.
Several business owners told AFP that looting had started in the afternoon after the government ordered TV and radio stations to stop broadcasting live images of the protests.
Amnesty International’s Kenya director Irungu Houghton said the death toll had risen to 16.
Rights group Vocal Africa, which was documenting the deaths and helping affected families at a Nairobi morgue, said at least four bodies had been brought there so far.
“All of them had signs of gunshots, so we suspect they all died of gunshot wounds,” its head Hussein Khalid told AFP.
“We condemn this excessive use of force,” he said. “We believe that the police could have handled themselves with restraint.”
“You come out to protest police killings, and they kill even more.”
A coalition of rights groups had earlier said at least 400 people were wounded, with 83 in serious condition in hospital. It recorded protests in 23 counties around Kenya.
Emergency responders reported multiple gunshot wounds, and there were unconfirmed local media reports that police had opened fire on protesters, particularly in towns outside the capital.
There is deep resentment against President William Ruto, who came to power in 2022 promising rapid economic progress.
Many are disillusioned by continued economic stagnation, corruption and high taxes, as well as police brutality after a teacher was killed in custody earlier this month.
Vehicle hits pedestrians near school in Beijing: Chinese police
- A grey SUV wedged against a tree as several people and clothing were seen in the road
- “On June 26, 2025, at around 13:00, a traffic accident occurred near the intersection of Yucai Road and Dongmen Street in Miyun district,” local police wrote
BEIJING: A vehicle crashed into pedestrians in an “accident” near a school in Beijing on Thursday, Chinese police said, with footage shared online appearing to show young people lying injured in the street.
Videos geolocated by AFP to an intersection in Miyun district in the northeast of the capital showed a grey SUV wedged against a tree as several people and clothing were seen in the road.
In one clip a bloodied young person was seen being given first aid by somebody in white overalls.
“On June 26, 2025, at around 13:00, a traffic accident occurred near the intersection of Yucai Road and Dongmen Street in Miyun district,” local police wrote in an online statement.
A 35-year-old man surnamed Han “collided” with people “due to an improper operation,” it said, adding those injured were taken to hospital.
It did not give the number of injured.
“The accident is under further investigation,” the statement said.
China has seen a string of mass casualty incidents — from stabbings to car attacks — challenging its reputation for good public security.
Last year a man who plowed his car into a crowd of mostly school children in central China was handed a suspended death sentence with a two-year reprieve.
In November 2024 the attacker named as Huang Wen repeatedly rammed his car into a crowd outside a primary school in Hunan province.
When the vehicle malfunctioned and stopped, Huang got out and attacked bystanders with a weapon before being apprehended.
Thirty people, including 18 pupils, sustained minor injuries.
Some analysts have linked the incidents to growing anger and desperation at the country’s slowing economy and a sense that society is becoming more stratified.
In November last year, a man killed 35 people and wounded more than 40 when he rammed his car into a crowd in the southern city of Zhuhai, the country’s deadliest attack in a decade.
And in the same month, eight people were killed and 17 wounded in a knife attack at a vocational school in the eastern Chinese city of Yixing.
