Ukraine’s government has approved the 2025 draft budget, which has a strong focus on defense spending, Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said on Friday.
Shmyhal, writing on the Telegram messaging app, said the draft, to be submitted to parliament, provided for 2 trillion hryvnias ($48.2 billion)in revenues and 3.6 trillion hryvnias in expenditures.
The draft, put together 2-1/2 years into the Russian invasion of the country, also included a provision of 2.22 trillion hryvnias ($53.5 bln) for defense.
Shmyhal said preparations in drafting the budget, the third since the start of the invasion, had been completed “despite all the challenges and uncertainty.”
“The priority for this budget is very clear — the country’s defense and security,” he wrote. “We will again direct all domestic resources to these objectives.”
There would be, he said, “more money for Ukrainian weapons, equipment, drones.”
More than 400 billion hryvnias would be allocated for social security, with funds for indexing pensions and providing subsidies and a total of 211 billion hrynias on health care.
Local authorities would receive assistance and advantageous credits provided for entrepreneurs. Capital expenditure would be made more transparent and the government would press on with rebuilding projects and those in the energy sphere.
Ukraine government approves 2025 draft budget, PM says
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Ukraine government approves 2025 draft budget, PM says
Indian-administered Kashmir votes in first local polls since special status scrapped
- Voters queued under heavy security for three-phased elections staggered geographically due to security, logistics
- Turnout is expected to be high, unlike in past elections when separatists opposed to Indian rule boycotted polls
SRINAGAR: Indian-administered Kashmir began voting Wednesday in the first local elections since the cancelation of its special semi-autonomous status sparked fury in the troubled Himalayan territory, which is also claimed by Pakistan.
Many in the disputed Muslim-majority territory of 8.7 million registered voters remain bitter over the 2019 order by the Hindu-nationalist government of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to impose control from New Delhi.
A federally appointed governor has controlled the territory since, with the first regional assembly election in a decade viewed by many as being more about exercising their democratic rights than practical policies.
Voters queued under heavy security in the three-phased elections — the first for the territory’s assembly since 2014 — staggered geographically due to security arrangements and logistical challenges in the mountainous region.
“After 10 years we are allowed to be heard,” said Navid Para, 31, among the first to vote in the cool morning mountain air of Pulwama, near the main city of Srinagar.
“I want my voice represented,” he added.
About 500,000 Indian troops are deployed in the region, battling a 35-year insurgency in which tens of thousands of civilians, soldiers and rebels have been killed, including dozens this year.
“Our problems have piled up,” said retired government officer Mukhtar Ahmad Tantray, 65, in Srinagar.
“The reins (of power)... were handed over to the bureaucracy.”
Turnout is expected to be high, unlike in past elections when separatists opposed to Indian rule boycotted polls, demanding the independence of Kashmir or its merger with Pakistan.
“All the politics revolves around the dispute,” said trader Navin Kotwal, 73, from Doda in Jammu district.
“All I care about is that we want to be governed by educated representatives who can solve our problems.”
Vigorous election campaigns have featured unusually open debates but key decisions will remain in New Delhi’s hands, including security and appointing Kashmir’s governor.
New Delhi will also have the power to override legislation passed by the 90-seat assembly.
“People can go and plead with their local representative,” Tantray said. “Even if they cannot do anything, they can at least raise the issues.”
The last round of voting will be held on October 2. Results are expected six days later.
The territory, officially titled Jammu and Kashmir, is split.
One part is the overwhelmingly Muslim Kashmir Valley. Another is the Hindu-majority Jammu district, geographically divided by mountains to the south.
A third section, the high-altitude ethnically Tibetan Ladakh region, bordering China, was carved into a separate federal territory in 2019.
Some of the worst violence this year has been in Jammu, where Modi campaigned for votes on Saturday, vowing that “terrorism is on its last legs” in a reference to rebel groups fighting Indian rule.
Modi and his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) claim that the changes to the territory’s governance have brought a new era of peace to Kashmir and rapid economic growth.
The implementation of those changes in 2019 was accompanied by mass arrests and a months-long Internet and communications blackout.
While this is the first ballot for the local assembly since 2014, voters took part in national elections in June when Modi won a third term in power.
Farmer Syed Ali Choudhary, 38, from Jammu district, said a local elected government “will be a big relief after so many years” while acknowledging the assembly’s powers will “be much less” than before.
“Something is better than nothing,” he said.
“When we had a local government thousands of people could be seen visiting the secretariat every day. Now you hardly see any because people are upset.”
Many Kashmiris are resentful of the restrictions on civil liberties imposed after 2019, and the BJP is only fielding candidates in a minority of seats concentrated in Hindu-majority areas.
Critics accuse the BJP of encouraging a surge of independent candidates in Muslim-majority areas to split the vote.
A lack of jobs is a key issue. The area has an unemployment rate of 18.3 percent, more than double the national average, according to government figures in July.
Small-scale manufacturing suffered after tax barriers ended with the territory’s changed status.
Critics say the central government has awarded major contracts, such as construction and mineral extraction, to firms outside the territory.
“My biggest concern is unemployment,” said Madiha, 27, a jobless graduate who gave only one name. “The cost of living has reached the sky.”
The FBI is investigating suspicious packages sent to election officials in more than 15 states
- The FBI is collecting the packages, some of which contained “an unknown substance,” agency spokesperson Kristen Setera in Boston said in a statement
JEFFERSON CITY, Missouri: The FBI and the US Postal Inspection Service on Tuesday were investigating the origin of suspicious packages that have been sent to or received by elections officials in more than 15 states, but there were no immediate reports of injuries or that any of the packages contained hazardous material.
The latest packages were sent to elections officials in Alaska, Colorado, Georgia, Indiana, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Missouri, New York and Rhode Island. Mississippi authorities reported a package was delivered there Monday, and the Connecticut Secretary of State’s office said the FBI alerted it of a package that was intercepted.
The FBI is collecting the packages, some of which contained “an unknown substance,” agency spokesperson Kristen Setera in Boston said in a statement.
“We are also working with our partners to determine how many letters were sent, the individual or individuals responsible for the letters, and the motive behind the letters,” she said. “As this is an ongoing matter we will not be commenting further on the investigation, but the public can be assured safety is our top priority.”
It’s the second time in the past year that suspicious packages were mailed to election officials in multiple states.
The latest scare comes as early voting has begun in several states ahead of the high-stakes elections for president, Senate, Congress and key statehouse offices, causing disruption in an already tense voting season. Local election directors are beefing up security to keep workers and polling places safe while also ensuring that ballots and voting procedures won’t be tampered with.
The National Association of Secretaries of State condemned what it described as a “disturbing trend” of threats to election workers leading up to Nov. 5, as well as the second apparent assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump.
“This must stop, period,” the group said. “Our democracy has no place for political violence, threats or intimidation of any kind.”
The Colorado Secretary of State’s Office said a package containing white powder and with the sender listed as “US Traitor Elimination Army” was intercepted at a mail facility. It said the package was similar to those sent to other states and that early indications suggest the powder was harmless.
On Tuesday, the FBI notified the Massachusetts Secretary of the Commonwealth’s office that postal service investigators had identified a suspicious envelope delivered to a building housing state offices. The package was intercepted.
Packages also were sent to secretaries of state and election offices in Iowa, Kansas, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Tennessee and Wyoming this week. The packages forced evacuations in Iowa, Oklahoma and Wyoming. Hazmat crews quickly determined the material was harmless.
The Mississippi Secretary of State’s Elections Division said it received a package similar to those sent to other states and that the state Department of Homeland Security was testing it. The division said it has notified county election officials to be on the lookout.
Oklahoma officials said the material sent to the election office there contained flour.
“We have specific protocols in place for situations such as this,” Iowa Secretary of State Paul Pate said in a statement after the evacuation of the six-story Lucas State Office Building in Des Moines.
A state office building in Topeka, Kansas, was evacuated due to suspicious mail sent to both the secretary of state and attorney general, Kansas Highway Patrol spokesperson April M. McCollum said in a statement.
Topeka Fire Department crews found several pieces of mail with an unknown substance on them, though a field test found no hazardous materials, spokesperson Rosie Nichols said. Several employees were exposed to it and were being monitored.
In Oklahoma, the State Election Board received a suspicious envelope in the mail containing a multi-page document and a white, powdery substance, agency spokesperson Misha Mohr said. Testing determined the substance was flour.
State workers in an office building next to the Wyoming Capitol in Cheyenne were sent home Monday pending testing of a white substance mailed to the secretary of state’s office.
Suspicious letters were sent to election offices and government buildings in at least six states last November, including the same building in Kansas that received suspicious mail Monday. While some of the letters contained fentanyl, even the suspicious mail that was not toxic delayed the counting of ballots in some local elections.
One of the targeted offices was in Fulton County, Georgia, the largest voting jurisdiction in one of the nation’s most important swing states. Four county election offices in Washington state had to be evacuated as election workers were processing ballots cast, delaying vote-counting.
The letters caused election workers around the country to stock up the overdose reversal medication naloxone.
Election offices across the United States have taken steps to increase security amid an onslaught of harassment and threats following the 2020 election and the false claims that it was rigged.
Ukraine’s air defense units trying to repel Russian drone attack on Kyiv, Ukraine’s military says
KYIV: Ukraine’s air defense systems were engaged on the outskirts of Kyiv in trying to repel a Russian drone attack, the military administration of the Ukrainian capital said on Wednesday on the Telegram messaging app.
Reuters witnesses said they heard several blasts in what sounded like air defense units in operation.
Trump says will meet India’s Modi during US visit
Flint, US: Former US president Donald Trump said Tuesday he plans to meet next week with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who will be visiting the United States for several official events.
During a campaign event in Michigan, Trump slammed India as a “very big abuser” on trade, but said Modi was “fantastic.”
“He happens to be coming to meet me next week,” Trump told the crowd without providing further details.
Modi will be traveling this weekend to Wilmington, Delaware — President Joe Biden’s hometown — as part of the “Quad Leaders” summit alongside Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Japanese Prime Minister Kishida Fumio.
The four-way Quad grouping dates back to 2007, but Biden has strongly pushed the alliance as part of an emphasis on international alliances to rein in adversaries — especially China.
The upcoming summit marks Biden’s last with the group as US president, having abandoned his bid for another White House term, with Vice President Kamala Harris replacing him at the top of the Democratic ticket.
After the summit, Modi will attend the United nations General Assembly in New York, as well as a meeting with Indian community members.
Despite no longer being president, Trump met in Florida in July with Hungary’s nationalist Prime Minister Viktor Orban, a close ally who is hoping the Republican reclaims the White House in November.
Portugal battles ferocious wildfires as toll rises to seven
AGUEDA, Portugal: Thousands of firefighters on Tuesday battled wildfires in Portugal that have killed seven people and burnt more land in a matter of days than the rest of the summer combined.
Fanned by bellowing winds in the stifling heat, the three largest fires concentrated in the northern Aveiro region scorched some 10,000 hectares (24,700 acres) by Monday evening, according to a civil protection report.
Three firefighters died on Tuesday when their vehicle was trapped by the flames, civil protection authorities said, bringing the fire-related toll up to seven, with some 50 injured.
The two women and a man were killed while fighting flames in the central region of Coimbra, the interior ministry said. The trio was previously reported to have been killed in the north.
Across the Iberian nation, more than 4,500 firefighters, more than 1,000 vehicles and around 20 aircraft on Tuesday were battling some 50 fires in all, with an alert warning in force since Saturday afternoon extended until Thursday evening.
“We’re in for some very difficult times over the next few days,” Portugal’s Prime Minister Luis Montenegro — who canceled all his Tuesday engagements in response to the blaze — warned on Monday evening.
“Nobody is sleeping here, we’ve been up since two o’clock in the morning,” Maria Ludivina Castanheira, 63, said in the village of Arrancada, south of the coastal city of Porto, where villagers hurried to a small warehouse to fight a fire there.
“We opened the cages so that the pigeons could escape” and “we moved the chickens to a neighbor’s,” Antonia Estima, 39, said as she took a break from helping to fight the flames.
Portuguese authorities have invoked the European Union’s civil protection mechanism to obtain eight additional firefighting aircraft.
Following the two Canadair water bombers sent from Spain on Monday, aircraft made available by France, Italy and Greece were also expected to arrive.
In the municipality of Albergaria-a-Velha, a 28-year-old Brazilian employed by a forestry company died after he became trapped by the flames as he tried to collect some tools.
Another person suffered a heart attack on Monday, while on Sunday a volunteer firefighter died suddenly while taking a lunch break from battling a blaze near Oliveira de Azemeis in hard-hit Aveiro.
Raging since the weekend before worsening on Monday, the blazes have also left around 50 people injured, including 33 firefighters, according to the latest figures from the authorities.
Several roads are still cut off in the northern Portuguese districts of Aveiro, Viseu, Vila Real, Braga and Porto as well as in the central Coimbra region.
Monday saw the highest fire-risk weather conditions in the northern half of the country since 2001, according to experts interviewed by the weekly Expresso.
Scientists say that fossil fuel emissions are worsening the length, frequency and intensity of heatwaves across the world.
The rising temperatures are leading to longer wildfire seasons and increasing the area burnt in the flames, according to the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
