KYIV, Ukraine: A top US official said Wednesday that Washington could not predict when a vital $60-billion military aid package for Ukraine would be passed in Congress, as Volodymyr Zelensky called for Western air defenses after a Russian missile attack killed at least five.
A fresh round of aerial bombardments by both sides left civilians dead on Wednesday as strikes escalate in the third year of the war.
Kyiv’s army is facing manpower and ammunition shortages amid political wrangling in the US Congress that has raised uncertainty over the future of Western support.
Addressing the stalled aid bill while on a visit to Kyiv on Wednesday, US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said: “It has already taken too long. And I know that, you know that.”
“I’m not going to make predictions about exactly when this will get done, but we are working to get it done as soon as possible... but I cannot make a specific prediction today,” he told reporters at a press conference in the Ukrainian capital.
Republicans in the US House of Representatives have been blocking a sweeping aid package since last year, with the funding caught up in domestic arguments over President Joe Biden’s immigration policies.
Washington is Ukraine’s most important military backer and has provided tens of billions of dollars in support since Moscow invaded in February 2022.
Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said Tuesday that he was shocked the package of aid has not yet been unlocked.
And on Wednesday, President Volodymyr Zelensky said the West had vital air defense systems that could save Ukrainian lives if delivered to his country.
Despite the aid delay, Sullivan said he was “confident” the impasse would be overcome.
“We will get that money out the door,” he said.
Both Moscow and Kyiv said civilians had been killed in fresh aerial barrages Wednesday.
“Five people were killed by a Russia missile in Kharkiv today,” Zelensky said in his evening video address.
Another nine were injured and five more were unaccounted for as search and rescue operations continued into the night, local officials said. They warned the death toll could rise.
Ukrainian police said a Russian missile slammed into an eight-story building and a factory in the city, which lies 30 kilometers (20 miles) from the Russian border, at around 1:00 p.m. local time (1100 GMT).
Pictures showed a blaze raging inside the building and at least five fire engines on site. Ukraine’s emergency services published photos as darkness fell, showing windows of the factory blown out and firefighters walking through the charred interior.
Zelensky reiterated his call for air defense systems after the attack.
“Our partners have these defense systems. And our partners need to understand that air defenses must (be used to) protect lives,” he said in a video address.
Directly across the border from Kharkiv, the governor of Russia’s Belgorod region said multiple attacks had killed three people.
“Since early morning, the Graivoron district has come under massive strikes, including with the use of multiple rocket launcher systems,” Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said Wednesday in a post on Telegram.
Two people were killed there, and another man was killed in the regional capital, also called Belgorod, when shrapnel from a shelling attack hit his car, Gladkov said.
Kyiv has escalated drone, rocket and artillery fire on the region over the last two weeks, in a wave of attacks launched ahead of Russia’s presidential elections. Pro-Ukrainian paramilitaries have also attempted armed raids across the border.
Some schools in Belgorod would shift to remote learning, Gladkov said, a day after he ordered 9,000 children to be evacuated from areas closest to the Ukrainian border.
In Moscow, Russian President Putin vowed he would restore order to the border regions, as the fallout from his invasion continues to spill into Russian territory.
“The first thing is of course to ensure security. There are different ways, they are not easy, but we will do them,” he said, without elaborating.
Speaking inside the Kremlin’s gilded Andreyev Hall, Putin also said his win in a weekend presidential vote in which he faced no competition would be followed by success on the battlefield.
“Victory in the elections is just a prologue to those victories that Russia so badly needs and that will definitely come,” he said.
Russian forces have secured their first territorial gains in almost a year and this week claimed to have made further advances in the eastern Donetsk region.
Ukraine also reported civilian fatalities in areas close to the fighting on Wednesday.
In the south of the country, Russian shelling killed two people outside the city of Kherson and in the east, another two were killed near Vugledar in the Donetsk region.
White House warns Kyiv it cannot say when Ukraine aid will come
https://arab.news/46gbx
White House warns Kyiv it cannot say when Ukraine aid will come
- Kyiv’s army is facing manpower and ammunition shortages amid political wrangling in the US Congress that has raised uncertainty over the future of Western support
Ukraine halts transit of Russian gas to Europe after a prewar deal expired
- Ukraine’s energy minister said Kyiv had stopped the transit “in the interest of national security”
- Until now, Russian natural gas kept flowing through Ukraine’s pipeline network after the 2022 invasion
KYIV, Ukraine: Ukraine on Wednesday halted Russian gas supplies to European customers through its pipeline network after a prewar transit deal expired at the end of last year.
Ukraine’s energy minister, Herman Halushchenko, confirmed on Wednesday morning that Kyiv had stopped the transit “in the interest of national security.”
“This is a historic event. Russia is losing markets and will incur financial losses. Europe has already decided to phase out Russian gas, and (this) aligns with what Ukraine has done today,” Halushchenko said in an update on the Telegram messaging app.
At a summit in Brussels last month, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky vowed that Kyiv would not allow Moscow to use the transits to earn “additional billions ... on our blood, on the lives of our citizens.” But he had briefly held open the possibility of the gas flows continuing if payments to Russia were withheld until the war ends.
Russia’s Gazprom said in a statement on Wednesday morning that it “has no technical and legal possibility” of sending gas through Ukraine, due to Kyiv’s refusal to extend the deal.
Even as Russian troops and tanks moved into Ukraine in 2022, Russian natural gas kept flowing through the country’s pipeline network — set up when Ukraine and Russia were both part of the Soviet Union — to Europe, under a five-year agreement. Gazprom earned money from the gas and Ukraine collected transit fees.
Before the war, Russia supplied nearly 40 percent of the European Union’s pipeline natural gas. Gas flowed through four pipeline systems, one under the Baltic Sea, one through Belarus and Poland, one through Ukraine and one under the Black Sea through Turkiye to Bulgaria.
After the war started, Russia cut off most supplies through the Baltic and Belarus-Poland pipelines, citing disputes over a demand for payment in rubles. The Baltic pipeline was blown up in an act of sabotage, but details of the attack remain murky.
The Russian cutoff caused an energy crisis in Europe. Germany had to shell out billions of euros to set up floating terminals to import liquefied natural gas that comes by ship, not by pipeline. Users cut back as prices soared. Norway and the US filled the gap, becoming the two largest suppliers.
Europe viewed the Russian cutoff as energy blackmail and has outlined plans to completely eliminate Russian gas imports by 2027.
Russia’s share of the EU pipeline natural gas market dropped sharply to about 8 percent in 2023, according to data from the EU Commission. The Ukrainian transit route served EU members Austria and Slovakia, which long got the bulk of their natural gas from Russia but have recently scrambled to diversify supplies.
Gazprom halted supplies to Austria’s OMV in mid-November over a contractual dispute, but gas flows through Ukraine’s pipelines continued as other customers stepped in. Slovakia this year inked deals to begin buying natural gas from Azerbaijan, and also to import US liquefied natural gas through a pipeline from Poland.
Among the hardest-hit will be EU candidate country Moldova, which was receiving Russian gas via Ukraine and has brought in emergency measures as residents brace for a harsh winter and looming power cuts.
Separately from Kyiv’s decision to let the transit deal expire, Gazprom said last month it will halt gas supplies to Moldova starting on Jan. 1, citing unpaid debt. Gazprom has said Moldova owes close to $709 million for past gas supplies, a figure the country has fiercely disputed, citing international audits.
Heating and hot water supplies were abruptly cut off on Wednesday to households in Transnistria, Moldova’s breakaway region that has for decades hosted Russian troops, as Russian natural gas stopped flowing to the territory, local transit operator Tiraspoltransgaz-Transnistria said.
In an online statement, the company urged residents to gather household members together in a single room, hang blankets over windows and balcony doors, and use electric heaters. It said some key facilities including hospitals were exempt from the cuts.
On Dec. 13, Moldova’s parliament voted in favor of imposing a state of emergency in the energy sector, as fears mounted that the gas shortages could trigger a humanitarian crisis in Transnistria, for decades dependent on Russian energy supplies.
Many observers have predicted that the looming energy shortage could force people in the separatist territory to travel to Moldova proper, seeking basic amenities to get through the harsh winter and placing further strain on resources.
Moldova, Ukraine and EU politicians have repeatedly accused Moscow of weaponizing energy supplies.
On Wednesday, Polish Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski called Ukraine’s move to halt supplies a “victory” for those opposed to the Kremlin’s policies. In a post on X, Sikorski accused Moscow of systematic attempts to “blackmail Eastern Europe with the threat of cutting off gas supplies,” including through a Baltic pipeline bypassing Ukraine and Poland and running directly to Germany.
Slovakian PM Robert Fico Slovakia’s Prime claimed Wednesday that the end of gas flows via Ukraine “will drastically affect us all in the EU but not Russia.”
Fico, whose views on Russia have sharply differed from the European mainstream, has previously hit out at Kyiv’s refusal to extend the transit deal, and threatened to end electricity supplies to Ukraine in response.
Moscow can still send gas to Hungary, as well as non-EU states Turkiye and Serbia, through the TurkStream pipeline across the Black Sea.
The steady reduction of Russian gas supplies to European countries has also spurred them to hasten the integration of Ukraine’s energy grids with its neighbors to the west.
Last week, private Ukrainian energy utility DTEK said it had received its first shipment of liquefied natural gas from the US, to be delivered through a newly expanded network spanning six countries from Greece to Ukraine – and marking a significant step in reducing regional dependence on Russian energy.
Separately, overnight into New Year’s Day, Russia launched a drone strike on Kyiv that left two people dead under the rubble of a damaged building, according to the city administration. At least six people were wounded across the Ukrainian capital, according to Mayor Vitali Klitschko.
Russian shelling also killed a man and wounded two women in Ukraine’s southern city of Kherson, regional authorities reported.
Mother’s fight for education breaks disability stigma in rural Bangladesh
- Rikta Akter Banu is featured on BBC’s 2024 list of 100 inspiring women
- She founded Rikta Akter Banu Learning Disability School in Kurigram in 2010
DHAKA: After three years of struggling to enroll her autistic daughter in a local school, Rikta Akter Banu had had enough. Refusing to accept the constant rejections, she decided to build her own school instead.
It all started in 2007, when Bristi Moni, now 23, was going to start her education. Having also cerebral palsy, which sometimes causes drooling, she was rejected by primary school teachers.
“When I first tried to admit Moni in 2007, I was told that children with special needs are not enrolled in general schools. But Moni was very eager to attend school. I tried again the following year, but once again my attempt failed,” Banu, a senior nurse, told Arab News.
She then traveled to Dhaka to the Ministry of Education and learned that every primary school had a quota to admit five children with disabilities. She cited the rule as she approached her local school again.
But despite the government rule, the authorities had not equipped the schools with the logistics and human resources needed to care for children with disabilities and she was requested to provide an attendant for her daughter. For some time, one of Moni’s friends, also a student, would help but the arrangement was not sustainable.
In 2009, Banu started building a school on her own.
“I was not ready to give up,” she said. “My husband donated a piece of ancestral land to build the school. To help with the construction, I sold a piece of land that I had inherited from my father. In total, it cost me around $8,000 to build the school.”
In 2010, the Rikta Akhter Banu Learning Disability School in Chilmari, Kurigram district opened its doors to the first batch of students.
Initially built for children who are autistic or have a learning disability, it now enrolls 300 students with different intellectual and physical disabilities.
“We teach the students various sign languages, body language, sports, music, sewing, and more. In addition, we provide them with primary health care, meals, and other services. We offer education up to grade 5,” Banu said.
“Our school is registered with the Department of Social Welfare, and as such, our curriculum is also approved by the authorities. A total of 21 teachers and support staff work at our school, with a portion of their salaries paid by the government.”
About 4.3 million Bangladeshis live with different types of disabilities. More than 50 percent of them have not received any kind of education.
The 2021 National Survey on Persons with Disabilities shows that only 23 percent of them have completed primary school.
Banu strives to expand the reach of her school. To run the institution, she spends about $2,500. As government support is limited, much of the amount comes from her own savings, contributions from teachers, and external donors.
“I dream of running a school with residential arrangements for all children with disabilities, so that children from distant areas can enroll here. Sometimes, family members hide these children away at home,” she said.
“My dream is that these children will receive an education and life skills while staying here, and find good livelihood opportunities with dignity. I hope the reputation of this school will spread across the country and around the world, so that many others will come forward to support learning opportunities for children with disabilities. They need cooperation and support, not sympathy.”
Last month, the Rikta Akhter Banu Learning Disability School was recognized for making a “positive impact on the community’s views around disability,” as Banu featured on the BBC’s 2024 list of 100 inspiring women.
It is also recognized at home but needs more support to flourish.
“Her school has become a symbol of possibility, showcasing how local solutions can address systemic challenges. Rikta’s work has not only provided education to children with disabilities but also changed perceptions within her community, fostering greater acceptance and understanding,” said Safi Rahman Khan, director of education, skills development and migration at Bangladesh’s largest development organization, BRAC.
“Her work is a testament to the power of inclusion and a call to action for us all to invest in initiatives that promote accessibility, opportunity, and respect for every individual. By supporting leaders like Rikta, we can create a future where no child is left behind, and every person can contribute to a more equitable and compassionate society.”
Driver kills 10 by ramming truck into New Orleans crowd in New Year’s Day attack
- A Daesh flag was located in the vehicle and the FBI is working to determine the subject’s potential associations and affiliations with terrorist organizations, agency said
NEW ORLEANS: A 42-year-old Texas man crashed a pickup truck into a crowd celebrating New Year’s Day in New Orleans’ French Quarter and then opened fire on police, killing 10 people and injuring 35, in an early morning attack the FBI said was a potential act of terrorism.
The suspect, identified by the FBI as Shamsud-Din Jabbar, a US citizen from Texas, died at the scene in the shootout with police, officials said.
“A Daesh flag was located in the vehicle and the FBI is working to determine the subject’s potential associations and affiliations with terrorist organizations,” the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the lead investigator, said in a statement.
Investigators found weapons and a potential explosive device in the vehicle, and other potential explosive devices were found in the French Quarter, the FBI said. It said the vehicle appeared to have been rented.
One city leader described the assailant as being in full military gear.
“This man was trying to run over as many people as he could,” Police Chief Anne Kirkpatrick said at a televised press conference on Wednesday. “He was hell-bent on creating the carnage and the damage that he did.” The incident occurred at 3:15 a.m. (0915 GMT) near the intersection of Canal and Bourbon Streets, a historic tourist destination in the city’s French Quarter known for attracting large crowds with its music and bars.
Kirkpatrick said the driver, who swerved around barricades, shot and wounded two police officers from the vehicle after it crashed. The officers were in stable condition, she added.
“We know the perpetrator has been killed,” said New Orleans City Councilman Oliver Thomas. “As we search for a motive, remember there is no making sense of evil.”
More than 300 officers were on duty at the time of the incident, police said. The city hosts the Sugar Bowl, a classic American college football game, each New Year’s Day, and will also be the site of the NFL Super Bowl on Feb. 9.
New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell called the incident a terrorist attack.
“This is a fluid situation and we are in coordination with numerous local and federal law enforcement agencies to ensure a complete and thorough investigation to bring those who may have been part of this incident to justice,” Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry said on X.
“Horrific act”
Verified video taken by an onlooker shows at least two twisted bodies in the street, with one of them lying in what appears to be a puddle of blood. A bystander is seen kneeling over one of the bodies as a group of uniformed military personnel in green uniforms and carrying firearms runs past.
The injured were taken to at least five hospitals, according to NOLA Ready, the city’s emergency preparedness department.
A couple told CBS News that they heard crashing noises coming from down the street and then saw a white truck slam through a barricade “at a high rate of speed.”
Zion Parsons, 18, told NOLA.com that he and his two friends were leaving a Bourbon Street eatery when they heard a commotion and saw a white car barreling toward them.
He said he dodged the vehicle, but one of his friends was struck, with her leg “twisted and contorted above and around her back.”
“You can just look and see bodies, just bodies of people, just bleeding, broken bones,” he said.
Louisiana US Senator Bill Cassidy said on CNN that despite the attack, law enforcement in New Orleans was ready for the Sugar Bowl on Wednesday night. “The Superdome has been locked down,” he said. However, the Sugar Bowl Committee was less definitive in a statement, saying, “We are in ongoing discussions with authorities on the local, state, and federal levels and will communicate further details as they become available.” In response to vehicle attacks on pedestrian malls around the world, New Orleans was in the process of removing and replacing the steel barriers known as bollards that restrict vehicle traffic in the Bourbon Street pedestrian zone. The project’s status was unclear at the time of Wednesday’s attack.
Construction began in November 2024 and was scheduled to continue through February 2025, according to a city website. Last month in Germany, a 50-year-old man was charged with multiple counts of murder and attempted murder after police said he plowed a car through crowds at a Christmas market in Magdeburg, killing five people and injuring scores.
President Joe Biden called the city’s mayor to offer full federal support. President-elect Donald Trump said his incoming administration would help New Orleans as it investigates and recovers from what he called an act of pure evil.
US military appeals court says plea deals related to 9/11 attacks may proceed
- In August, US defense secretary rescinded plea deals Pentagon had entered into with Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, accomplices
- Under plea deals, it is possible that three men could plead guilty to 9/11 attacks and in exchange not face the death penalty
WASHINGTON: A US military appeals court has ruled that plea deals related to the man accused of masterminding the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and two accomplices can proceed after Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin had earlier moved to invalidate the agreements.
In August, Austin rescinded plea deals that the Pentagon had entered into with the trio, including Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.
In November, a US military judge ruled that Austin acted too late on revoking the plea deals and that they were still valid. The order late on Monday by the US military appeals court upheld that ruling.
The Pentagon declined to comment. It has previously said Austin was surprised by the plea deals and that the secretary was not consulted because that process is independent.
Under the deals, it is possible that the three men could plead guilty to the attacks and in exchange not face the death penalty.
Mohammed is the most widely known inmate at the US detention facility known as Guantanamo Bay on the coast of Cuba. It was set up in 2002 by then-US President George W. Bush to detain foreign militant suspects following the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States.
Mohammed is accused of masterminding the plot to fly hijacked commercial passenger aircraft into the World Trade Center in New York City and into the Pentagon. The 9/11 attacks, as they are known, killed nearly 3,000 people and plunged the US into a two-decade war in Afghanistan.
Human rights experts, including at the United Nations, have condemned torture at Guantanamo Bay and elsewhere during the so-called war on terror and demanded an apology from Washington. Former President Barack Obama acknowledged in 2014 that the US had engaged in torture and said it was “contrary to our values.”
Separately on Monday, the Pentagon said that Ridah Bin Saleh Al-Yazidi, one of the longest-held detainees at Guantanamo Bay, was repatriated from the detention facility to his home country of Tunisia. He was held without charge for over 20 years.
The Pentagon said 26 detainees remained at the facility, of whom 14 are eligible for transfer.
South Korea to send Jeju Air crash black box to US
- South Korean and US investigators, including from Boeing, have been combing the crash site in southwestern Muan
- Officials initially pointed to a bird strike as a possible cause of the disaster
Seoul: South Korean investigators probing a Jeju Air crash which killed 179 people in the worst aviation disaster on its soil said Wednesday they will send one of the retrieved black boxes to the United States for analysis.
The Boeing 737-800 was carrying 181 people from Thailand to South Korea Sunday when it issued a mayday call and belly-landed before hitting a barrier and bursting into flames, killing everyone aboard except two flight attendants pulled from the burning wreckage.
South Korean and US investigators, including from Boeing, have been combing the crash site in southwestern Muan since the disaster.
“The damaged flight data recorder has been deemed unrecoverable for data extraction domestically,” said South Korea’s deputy minister for civil aviation, Joo Jong-wan.
“It was agreed today to transport it to the United States for analysis in collaboration with the US National Transportation Safety Board.”
Joo earlier said both of the plane’s black boxes were retrieved, and for the cockpit voice recorder “the initial extraction has already been completed.”
“Based on this preliminary data, we plan to start converting it into audio format,” he said, meaning investigators would be able to hear the pilots’ final communications.
The second black box, the flight data recorder, “was found with a missing connector,” Joo said.
Officials initially pointed to a bird strike as a possible cause of the disaster, but they have since said the probe was also examining a concrete barrier at the end of the runway, which dramatic video showed the Boeing 737-800 colliding with before bursting into flames.
They also said that a special inspection of all Boeing 737-800 models operated by local carriers was examining their landing gear after questions over a possible mechanical failure in the crash.
The ongoing inspections are “focusing mainly on the landing gear, which failed to deploy properly in this case,” said the director general for aviation safety policy, Yoo Kyeong-soo.
Local media reported the landing gear had deployed properly on Jeju Air Flight 2216’s first failed landing attempt at Muan airport before failing on the second.
The issue “will likely be examined by the Accident Investigation Board through a comprehensive review of various testimonies and evidence during the investigation process,” the ministry of land, which oversees civil aviation, said at a briefing.
At Muan airport, hundreds of people queued up Wednesday — a public holiday in the South — to pay their respects at a memorial altar set up to honor the victims.
So many people came to the memorial that the queue stretched for hundreds of meters and the local cell phone network was overloaded, local media reported.
Local officials sent out a safety alert asking mourners to go to a different memorial, as the one at the airport was too busy. Other altars for the victims have been set up nationwide.
Inside the airport, where families have been camped out since the accident, a medical space has been set up to administer IV drips to grieving relatives, many unable to eat due to stress, an official said during a briefing.
Officials have said the bodies were extensively damaged by the crash, making the work of identifying remains slow and immensely difficult, while investigators had to preserve crash-site evidence.
But the country’s acting president Choi Sang-mok, who has been in office less than a week, said Wednesday the process had finally been completed, and that more bodies had been handed over to relatives so that they could hold funerals.
“Our investigators, along with the US National Transportation Safety Board and the manufacturer, are conducting a joint investigation into the cause of the accident,” Choi said at a disaster response meeting.
“A comprehensive analysis and review of the aircraft’s structure and the black box data will reveal the cause of the accident,” Choi added.
The US investigators had arrived Monday and headed straight to Muan, with the initial on-site joint probe focusing on a navigation system known as a localizer that assists in aircraft landings.
The localizer, installed on a concrete structure at Muan International Airport, is the barrier that has been blamed for exacerbating the severity of the Jeju Air crash.
The plane was largely carrying holidaymakers back from year-end trips to Bangkok, with all passengers Korean nationals except for two Thais.
