UNITED NATIONS: Ukraine’s president urged global leaders Wednesday to stand with his country and not seek “an out” instead of a “real, just peace” more than two years into Russia’s war.
At a time when he faces growing pressure from Western allies and some of his fellow Ukrainians to negotiate a ceasefire, President Volodymyr Zelensky told the UN General Assembly there’s no alternative to the “peace formula” he presented two years ago. Among other things, it seeks the expulsion of all Russian forces from Ukraine and accountability for war crimes.
“Any parallel or alternative attempts to seek peace are, in fact, efforts to achieve an out instead of an end to the war,” he said.
“Do not divide the world. Be united nations,” he implored. “And that will bring us peace.”
Russia hasn’t yet had its turn to speak at the assembly’s annual gathering of presidents, prime ministers, monarchs and other high officials. Low-level Russian diplomats occupied the country’s seats in the huge assembly hall during Zelensky’s speech. Russian President Vladimir Putin is not attending this year’s high-level meetings at the General Assembly.
The war in Ukraine was center stage the last two times that world leaders convened for the UN’s signature annual meeting. But this year, the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza and the escalating developments along the Israeli-Lebanese border have gotten much of the spotlight.
Ukraine and Russia, with one of the world’s most potent armies, are locked in a grinding fight along a 1,000-kilometer (600-mile) front line.
The war began when Russia invaded in February 2022 and has killed tens of thousands of people. Russia has gained momentum in Ukraine’s east; Ukraine, meanwhile, startled Russia by sending troops across the border in a daring incursion last month.
Zelensky argued Tuesday at the UN Security Council that Russia needs to ” be forced into peace,” saying there’s no point in pursuing peace talks with Putin.
In Moscow, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov responded Wednesday that the Ukrainian president’s call for compulsion was “a fatal mistake” and “a profound misconception, which, of course, will inevitably have consequences for the Kyiv regime.”
Zelensky is expected to present a victory plan this week to US President Joe Biden.
Ukraine urges world leaders not to seek ‘an out’ from Russia’s war instead of true peace
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Ukraine urges world leaders not to seek ‘an out’ from Russia’s war instead of true peace
- “Any parallel or alternative attempts to seek peace are, in fact, efforts to achieve an out instead of an end to the war,” Zelensky said
- “Do not divide the world. Be united nations,” he implored
Trump denies reported Musk-Rubio clash in cabinet meeting
- But stresses that cabinet secretaries will now take the lead on staffing choices, implying that he had taken the opportunity to rein Musk in
- Also insists that cuts be made with a “scalpel” instead of a “hatchet,” in reference to Musk's indiscriminate firing of federal employees
WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump denied on Friday a report that his senior adviser, billionaire Elon Musk, had clashed with Secretary of State Marco Rubio and another cabinet official during a White House meeting.
According to The New York Times, Musk argued with Rubio and separately with Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy during a cabinet meeting chaired by Trump on Thursday.
Musk is leading the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) in a drive to slash costs and cut jobs across government departments, reportedly leading to tensions with department heads.
Musk reportedly faulted Rubio for having fired “nobody,” except for a staff member from Musk’s DOGE. He also told Rubio he was “good on TV,” as if to say he was not good for much else, the Times said.
An incensed Rubio lashed back at Musk for not being truthful. He countered that 1,500 State Department officials had accepted early retirement, and sarcastically asked whether he should hire them back just to sack them again more spectacularly.
In another exchange, Duffy accused DOGE of having tried to sack vital air traffic controllers right as he deals with the aftermath of several plane crashes, prompting Musk to accuse him of a “lie,” again according to the New York Times.
Trump reportedly intervened to halt the argument and suggest that henceforth the controllers be hired from the “geniuses” studying at the prestigious Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
After the meeting, Trump announced that cuts would continue but with a “scalpel” rather than a “hatchet,” implying that he had taken the opportunity to rein Musk in.
But, asked on Friday about the reported dispute, the president dismissed it.
“No clash, I was there, you’re just a troublemaker,” he told a reporter who asked about the report.
He went on to insist of Musk and Rubio “they’re both doing a fantastic job ... they both get along fantastically well.”
Since coming to office, Trump’s administration has sacked or announced the departure of tens of thousands of federal employees in a scorched-earth efficiency drive.
Several US media have reported friction between Musk and senior officials, who accuse his young crew of DOGE officials — recruited from Silicon Valley — of exceeding their authority.
The meeting was convened following complaints about the Musk operation’s blunt-force approach from agency heads to top White House officials, including chief of staff Susie Wiles.
The White House Office of Legislative Affairs has been inundated with calls in recent days from frustrated Republican members of Congress all over the country, some of whom have faced anger from constituents at home.
(With AFP & Reuters)
DR Congo offers bounty for arrest of M23 leaders
- The M23, which, according to UN experts, is backed by some 4,000 Rwandan soldiers, resumed its fight against the government in Kinshasa in 2021 and has since seized swaths of territory in North Kivu, which borders Rwanda
KINSHASA: Authorities in the Democratic Republic of Congo are offering a $5-million reward for help in arresting leaders of the M23 group that recently captured two major northern towns, the Justice Ministry announced.
“A reward of $5 million is offered to any person who helps arrest the convicts Corneille Nangaa, Bertrand Bisimwa and Sultani Makenga,” the ministry said in a statement.
Nangaa, a leader in the River Congo Alliance, or AFC, a military-political coalition to which the M23 belongs, is a former president of the DRC’s electoral commission.
Bisimwa and Makenga are, respectively, the president and military chief of the M23.
Tried in absentia in Kinshasa, all three men were convicted and sentenced to death in August 2024.
DRC authorities are also offering a bounty of $4 million for any information leading to the arrest of the three men’s “accomplices on the run” and “other sought individuals,” the statement said.
The M23, which, according to UN experts, is backed by some 4,000 Rwandan soldiers, resumed its fight against the government in Kinshasa in 2021 and has since seized swaths of territory in North Kivu, which borders Rwanda.
A lightning offensive in recent weeks has captured the provincial capital, Goma, and Bukavu, the main cities in the neighboring province of South Kivu.
The DRC’s mineral-rich east has been ravaged for three decades by conflict and atrocities.
According to the Financial Times, the US is in exploratory talks with the DRC over a deal that would give Washington access to critical minerals in the country.
Congo approached the US last month, proposing a deal that would offer exploration rights to the US in exchange for support for the government of President Felix Tshisekedi, the newspaper reported, citing public documents.
Security sources said on Friday at least 35 people were killed when pro-government militia attacked a village in the restive eastern Democratic Republic of Congo,
The attack happened at about 3 a.m. on Thursday in the village of Tambi, in the Masisi area of North Kivu province controlled by the Rwanda-backed M23 armed group.
A security source said that at least 35 people were killed in the attack, while local sources and an eyewitness put the death toll at more than 40.
A community leader and a medical source said villagers had recently returned to the area after having fled fighting between the M23 and the Congolese army and local militia.
“The militia went to attack Tambi where residents had started to return ... they opened fire and civilians were killed,” said one community leader, who said 43 people died.
“They put some victims in a church and then shot them. Those who were in the fields were killed there.”
The community leader, a local health worker, and a local resident said another group of civilians sought refuge in a house and died when the militia set it on fire.
“We counted 47 bodies in the morning,” the resident said, adding that they were buried in a communal grave.
Some of the victims were unable to be identified because of their burns, he added.
Protesters on International Women’s Day demand equal rights, end to discrimination, sexual violence
- On the Asian side of Turkiye’s biggest city Istanbul, a rally in Kadikoy saw members of dozens of women’s groups listen to speeches, dance and sing
- In many other European countries, women also protested against violence, for better access to gender-specific health care, equal pay and other issues
ISTANBUL: Women took to the streets of cities across Europe, Africa and elsewhere to mark International Women’s Day with demands for ending inequality and gender-based violence.
On the Asian side of Turkiye’s biggest city Istanbul, a rally in Kadikoy saw members of dozens of women’s groups listen to speeches, dance and sing in the spring sunshine.
The colorful protest was overseen by a large police presence, including officers in riot gear and a water cannon truck.
The government of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan declared 2025 the Year of the Family. Protesters pushed back against the idea of women’s role being confined to marriage and motherhood, carrying banners reading “Family will not bind us to life” and “We will not be sacrificed to the family.”
Critics have accused the government of overseeing restrictions on women’s rights and not doing enough to tackle violence against women.
Erdogan in 2021 withdrew Turkiye from a European treaty, dubbed the Istanbul Convention, that protects women from domestic violence. Turkiye’s We Will Stop Femicides Platform says 394 women were killed by men in 2024.
“There is bullying at work, pressure from husbands and fathers at home and pressure from patriarchal society. We demand that this pressure be reduced even further,” Yaz Gulgun, 52, said.
Women across Europe and Africa march against discrimination
In many other European countries, women also protested against violence, for better access to gender-specific health care, equal pay and other issues in which they don’t get the same treatment as men.
In Poland, activists opened a center across from the parliament building in Warsaw where women can go to have abortions with pills, either alone or with other women.
Opening the center on International Women’s Day across from the legislature was a symbolic challenge to authorities in the traditionally Roman Catholic nation, which has one of Europe’s most restrictive abortion laws.
From Athens to Madrid, Paris, Munich, Zurich and Belgrade and in many more cities across the continent, women marched to demand an end to treatment as second-class citizens in society, politics, family and at work.
In Madrid, protesters held up big hand-drawn pictures depicting Gisele Pélicot, the woman who was drugged by her now ex-husband in France over the course of a decade so that she could be raped by dozens of men while unconscious.
Pélicot has become a symbol for women all over Europe in the fight against sexual violence.
In the Nigerian capital of Lagos, thousands of women gathered at the Mobolaji Johnson Stadium, dancing and signing and celebrating their womanhood.
Many were dressed in purple — the traditional color of the women’s liberation movement.
In Russia, the women’s day celebrations had a more official tone, with honor guard soldiers presenting yellow tulips to girls and women during a celebration in St. Petersburg.
Germany’s president warns of backlash against progress already made
In Berlin, German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier called for stronger efforts to achieve equality and warned against tendencies to roll back progress already made.
“Globally, we are seeing populist parties trying to create the impression that equality is something like a fixed idea of progressive forces,” he said. He gave an example of ” large tech companies that have long prided themselves on their modernity and are now, at the behest of a new American administration, setting up diversity programs and raving about a new ‘masculine energy’ in companies and society.”
UK govt cuts funding for Islamophobia reporting service
- Tell Mama, founded in 2012, provides ‘invaluable’ data, police sources tell The Guardian
- The organization, which received 10,700 reports of Islamophobia last year, faces closure
LONDON: The UK government is ending funding for Islamophobia reporting service Tell Mama, The Guardian reported on Saturday.
The project, founded in 2012, is now facing closure weeks after it reported a record number of anti-Muslim hate incidents across the country.
Since its launch, Tell Mama has been wholly funded by the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government.
The ministry told Tell Mama that no grant would be provided by the end of March, without providing alternative arrangements.
Data provided by the service to police under a 2015 sharing agreement has been “invaluable” for monitoring community cohesion and responding to threats, police sources told The Guardian.
Tell Mama received 10,700 reports of Islamophobia last year, with 9,600 being verified. Muslims were the most targeted group in hate attacks in the year ending March 2024, according to police figures. They made up 38 percent of victims nationwide.
Tell Mama’s founder Fiyaz Mughal said its resources were being cut while “the far right and populists across Europe are growing significantly. There are going to be more individuals targeted, we know that in the current environment, and where are they going to go?
“This is an injustice at a time where I have never seen anti-Muslim rhetoric become so mainstream.”
Tell Mama provides a crucial point of contact for vulnerable people who often feel unable to contact the police, Mughal said.
“I’m not aware of any other organisation that can do this work and even if a new agency tried, it would take them 10 to 15 years to reach where Tell Mama is,” he added.
On Feb. 28, the government announced a new working group on anti-Muslim hatred that will create a new definition of Islamophobia and “support a wider stream of work to tackle the unacceptable incidents of anti-Muslim hatred.”
But Mughal accused the government of “saying one thing and doing another,” adding: “Labour talks a lot about countering Islamophobia but they are cutting the only project doing anything on a national scale — supporting victims, working with numerous police forces and supporting prosecutions.”
The National Police Chiefs’ Council said Tell Mama’s contributions “have allowed for the effective analysis of community tensions and informed actions to reduce such tensions.”
A spokesperson for the ministry responsible for the cut said: “Religious and racial hatred has absolutely no place in our society, and we will not tolerate Islamophobia in any form.
“This year we have made up to £1 million ($1.29 million) of funding available to Tell Mama to provide support for victims of Islamophobia, and we will set out our approach to future funding in due course.”
Polish PM says appeasement led to ‘more bombs’ from Russia in Ukraine
- “More bombs, more aggression, more victims,” Tusk wrote on X
WARSAW: Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk on Saturday slammed deadly Russian overnight strikes on Ukraine as the result of “what happens when someone appeases barbarians.”
“More bombs, more aggression, more victims. Another tragic night in Ukraine,” Tusk wrote on X, formerly Twitter, following Russian attacks that killed at least 14 people in Ukraine’s east and northeast.
