MOSCOW: Russian forces have captured two more settlements in areas of heavy military activity in eastern Ukraine, Russia’s Defense Ministry said on Wednesday.
Ukraine’s military noted fighting around both villages in eastern sectors of the 1,000-km (600-mile) front line, but did not acknowledge that either had fallen into Russian hands.
The Russian ministry identified the villages as Maksymivka, just north of the hilltop town of Vuhledar, captured by Russian forces last months after long months of fighting, and Antonivka, near the embattled town of Kurakhove, further north.
The General Staff of Ukraine’s military said Kyiv’s forces had repelled two attacks near Maksymivka and a nearby village in the vicinity of Vuhledar in Donetsk region. Four clashes were still going on.
The general staff reported a “tense” situation around the city of Kurakhove, with 39 Russian attacks on Ukrainian positions. It listed Antonivka as one of several villages in the area where Moscow’s troops were trying to advance.
Reuters could not independently verify battlefield reports from either side.
A Ukrainian officer, in a radio interview, said Russian forces were advancing in parts of the Kurakhove area, making the situation particularly difficult.
“There is a danger of encirclement,” Nazar Voitenko, press officer of the 33rd separate brigade, told US-funded Radio Liberty.
“I cannot currently assess the issue of withdrawal, but the situation is indeed extremely challenging. Compared to the summer, it has changed quite rapidly.”
After failing in their initial attempt to move on Kyiv, the Ukrainian capital, Russian forces have focused on capturing the eastern Donbas region, made up of Donetsk and Luhansk regions.
Russian forces hold about one-fifth of Ukrainian territory.
In September, Moscow’s forces advanced at their fastest rate since March 2022, according to open source data, despite Ukraine seizing a part of Russia’s southern Kursk region.
Russia says forces capture two more settlements in eastern Ukraine
https://arab.news/ynu29
Russia says forces capture two more settlements in eastern Ukraine
- In September, Moscow’s forces advanced at their fastest rate since March 2022, according to open source data, despite Ukraine seizing a part of Russia’s southern Kursk region
Record drought in Amazon impacts 420,000 children: UNICEF
The record-breaking drought is taking a toll on Indigenous and other communities in Brazil, Colombia and Peru reliant on boat connections, the UN agency said.
“We are witnessing the devastation of an essential ecosystem that families rely on, leaving many children without access to adequate food, water, health care and schools,” UNICEF chief Catherine Russell said in a statement.
The resulting food insecurity increased the risk of child malnutrition, the agency said, while less access to drinking water could spur a rise in infectious diseases.
In Brazil’s Amazon region alone, more than 1,700 schools and more than 760 medical clinics had to close or became inaccessible because of low river levels.
In Colombia’s Amazon, lack of drinking water and food forced 130 schools to suspend classes. In Peru, more than 50 clinics were inaccessible.
UNICEF said it needs $10 million in coming months to help the stricken communities in those three countries, including by providing water and sending out health brigades.
Weather observation agencies such as NASA’s Earth Observatory and the EU’s Copernicus service say the drought across the Amazon basin since the latter half of last year was caused by the 2023-2024 El Nino climate phenomenon in the Pacific.
Brazilian experts said the climate crisis was also to blame.
The insufficient rain and shrinking of the vital rainforest’s rivers exacerbated forest fires, disrupted hydroelectric power generation and dried out crops in parts of Brazil, Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Venezuela.
Thousands ordered to evacuate as powerful wind-fed wildfire burns homes in Southern California
Northwest of Los Angeles, the Mountain Fire exploded in size and prompted evacuation orders for more than 10,000 people as it threatened 3,500 structures in suburban communities, ranches and agricultural areas around Camarillo, according to a statement from Gov. Gavin Newsom. He said he has requested federal assistance for the area east of the Pacific coast city of Ventura.
The blaze was burning in a region that has seen some of California’s most destructive fires over the years. A thick plume of smoke rose hundreds of feet into the sky Wednesday, blanketing whole neighborhoods and limiting visibility for firefighters and evacuees. The fire grew from less than half of a square mile to 16 square miles (62 square kilometers) in little more than five hours.
Ventura County Fire Captain Trevor Johnson described crews racing with their engines to homes threatened by the flames to save lives.
“This is as intense as it gets. The hair on the back of the firefighters’ neck I’m sure was standing up,” he said during a news conference Wednesday afternoon.
At one spot, flames licked the burning remains of a home. Its roof was reduced to only a few charred shingles.
Two people suffered apparent smoke inhalation and were taken to hospitals, fire officials said. No firefighters reported significant injuries.
The erratic winds and limited visibility grounded fixed-wing aircraft, and gusts topped 61 mph (98 kph), said weather service meteorologist Bryan Lewis. Water-dropping helicopters were still flying.
First responders pleaded with residents to evacuate. Deputies made contact with 14,000 people to urge them to leave as embers spread up to 2.5 miles (4 kilometers) away and sparked new flames.
“This fire is moving dangerously fast,” Ventura County Fire Chief Dustin Gardner said.
Aerial footage from local television networks showed dozens of homes in flames across several neighborhoods as embers were whipped from home to home. Other footage captured horses trotting alongside evacuating vehicles.
Jade Katz, who said she is disabled and does not drive, waited for a friend to pick her up near her Camarillo Heights home with a suitcase full of medication and Bella, her Great Dane service dog. But the friend couldn’t reach her, so first responders sent a squad car to escort her to safety as she watched the neighborhood burn.
Officials said they were using all resources, including water-dropping helicopters and fixed-wing aircraft dropping fire retardant, but it was still burning out of control Wednesday afternoon. Andrew Dowd, a Ventura County fire spokesperson, said he did not have details of how many structures had been damaged.
Gus Garcia, who owns a ranch south of the fire, said he’s waiting to see whether conditions will change to decide if he should evacuate his horses and cattle. Around 12:30 p.m., his animals were still safe and he was trying to stay out of the way as others got their livestock out.
His ranch is surrounded by others with horses and alpaca, and Garcia said his neighbors in the canyon did not seem panicked.
“The horse community, they prepare for this because it’s always a possibility up here,” he said.
Meanwhile to the south, Los Angeles County Fire Department crews scrambled to contain a wildfire near Malibu’s Broad Beach as authorities briefly shut down the Pacific Coast Highway as flames burned near multimillion-dollar properties. Residents were urged to shelter in place while aircraft dropped water on the 50-acre (20-hectare) Broad Fire. It was 15 percent contained around 12:30 p.m. with forward progress stopped. Fire officials said two structures burned.
The National Weather Service office for the Los Angeles area amended its red flag warning for increased fire danger with a rare “particularly dangerous situation” label, and officials in several counties urged residents to be on watch for fast-spreading blazes, power outages and downed trees amid the latest round of notorious Santa Ana winds.
With predicted gusts between 50 mph (80 kph) and 100 mph (160 kph) and humidity levels as low as 8 percent, parts of Southern California could experience conditions ripe for “extreme and life-threatening” fire behavior into Thursday, the weather service said.
Forecasters also issued red flag warnings until Thursday from California’s central coast through the San Francisco Bay Area and into counties to the north, where strong winds were also expected.
Utilities in California began powering down equipment during high winds and extreme fire danger after a series of massive and deadly wildfires in recent years were sparked by electrical lines and other infrastructure. On Wednesday, more than 65,000 customers in Southern California were without power preventatively, and upwards of 20,000 in Northern California.
Wednesday’s fires were burning in the same areas of other recent destructive fires, including the 2018 Woolsey Fire, which killed three people and destroyed 1,600 homes near Los Angeles, and the the 2017 Thomas Fire, which destroyed more than a thousand homes and other structures in Ventura and Santa Barbara counties. Southern California Edison has paid tens of millions of dollars to settle claims after its equipment was blamed for both blazes.
Control of the US House hangs in the balance with enormous implications for Trump’s agenda
- A few individual seats, or even a single one, will determine the outcome and Democratic Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said the House “remains very much in play”
- If House Speaker Mike Johnson’s slim four-seat majority were to shrink any further, governing could come to a standstill
WASHINGTON: The US House majority hung in the balance Wednesday, teetering between Republican control that would usher in a new era of unified GOP governance in Washington or a flip to Democrats as a last line of resistance to a Trump second-term White House agenda.
A few individual seats, or even a single one, will determine the outcome. Final tallies will take a while, likely pushing the decision into next week — or beyond.
After Republicans swept into the majority in the US Senate by picking up seats in West Virginia, Ohio and Montana, House Speaker Mike Johnson predicted his chamber would fall in line next.
“Republicans are poised to have unified government in the White House, Senate and House,” Johnson said Wednesday.
President-elect Donald Trump, who won the Electoral College and the popular vote against Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris, has consolidated growing power around his MAGA movement, backing newcomers to Washington and setting the stage for his own return to the White House.
Johnson said Republicans in Congress are preparing an “ambitious” 100-day agenda with Trump, who he has said is “thinking big” about his legacy.
Tax cuts, securing the southern border and taking a ”blowtorch” to federal regulations are at the top of the agenda if the GOP sweeps the White House and Congress. Trump himself has promised mass deportations and retribution against his perceived enemies. And Republicans want to push federal agencies out of Washington and to restaff the government workforce with the help of outside think tanks, Johnson has said, to bring the federal government “to heel.”
But Johnson, after just a year on the job, has had difficulty governing the House, and the new Congress would be no different. Hard-liners led by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, Rep. Matt Gaetz and others have often confronted and upended their own GOP leadership in what has been one of the most chaotic sessions in modern times.
If Johnson’s slim four-seat majority were to shrink any further, governing could come to a standstill.
Democratic Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said the House “remains very much in play.”
With Democrats having defeated two House Republicans in Jeffries’ home state of New York, he said the path to the majority now runs through pickup opportunities in Arizona, Oregon, Iowa and California that are still too early to call.
“We must count every vote,” Jeffries said.
The House contests remained a tit-for-tat fight to the finish, with no dominant pathway to the majority for either party. Rarely, if ever have the two chambers of Congress flipped in opposite directions.
Each side is gaining and losing a few seats, including through the redistricting process, which is the routine redrawing of House seat boundary lines. The process reset seats in North Carolina, Louisiana and Alabama.
Much of the outcome hinges on the West, particularly in California, where a handful of House seats are being fiercely contested, and mail-in ballots arriving a week after the election will still be counted. Hard-fought races around the “blue dot” in Omaha, Nebraska and in far-flung Alaska are among those being watched.
Trump, speaking early Wednesday at his election night party in Florida, said the results delivered an “unprecedented and powerful mandate” for Republicans.
He called the Senate rout “incredible,” and he praised Johnson, saying he’s “doing a terrific job.”
From the US Capitol, Senate GOP Leader Mitch McConnell, privately a harsh Trump critic, called it a “hell of a good day.”
Senate Republicans marched across the map alongside Trump, flipping the three Democratic-held seats and holding their own against Democratic challengers who failed to unseat Sen. Ted Cruz in Texas and Sen. Rick Scott in Florida.
In West Virginia, Jim Justice, the state’s wealthy governor, flipped the seat held by retiring Sen. Joe Manchin. Republicans toppled Democrat Sen. Sherrod Brown in Ohio with GOP luxury car dealer and blockchain entrepreneur Bernie Moreno. And Republican Tim Sheehy defeated Democratic Sen. Jon Tester in Montana.
Democrats avoided a total wipeout by salvaging seats in the “blue wall” states. Rep. Elissa Slotkin won an open Senate seat in Michigan, and Sen. Tammy Baldwin was reelected in Wisconsin. Pennsylvania’s race between Democratic Sen. Bob Casey and Republican challenger Dave McCormick was still undecided.
In other developments, Democrats made history by sending two Black women, Lisa Blunt Rochester of Delaware and Angela Alsobrooks of Maryland, to the Senate. Just three Black women, including Harris, have served in the Senate, but never two at the same time.
All told, Senate Republicans have the potential to achieve their most robust majority in years — a testament to McConnell, who made a career charting a path to power, this time aligned with Trump whom he has privately called “despicable” in the run-up to the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol.
During a news conference Wednesday, McConnell declined to answer questions about his past stark criticism of Trump and said he viewed the election results as a referendum on the Biden administration.
He told reporters at the Capitol that a Senate under Republican control would “control the guardrails” and prevent changes in Senate rules that would end the filibuster.
“People were just not happy with this administration and the Democratic nominee was a part of it,” McConnell said.
What’s still unclear is who will lead the new Republican Senate, as McConnell prepares to step down from the post.
South Dakota Sen. John Thune, the No. 2 Republican, and Texas Sen. John Cornyn, who previously held that post, are the front-runners to replace McConnell in a secret-ballot election scheduled for when senators arrive in Washington next week.
Germany heads for early elections as Scholz coalition collapses
- Scholz said he would seek a vote of confidence by January 15 so that MPs “can decide whether to clear the way for early elections” earlier than scheduled
- The Social Democrat leader spoke after firing his rebellious Finance Minister Christian Lindner of the Free Democrats in a dramatic night session of what was a three-party coalition
BERLIN: Germany entered a major political crisis on Wednesday with the collapse of Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s ruling coalition likely paving the way for early elections next year.
The turmoil hits Europe’s biggest economy as it grapples with a sustained downturn and as Berlin worries about the impact Donald Trump’s return to the White House will have on trade and security ties.
Scholz said he would seek a vote of confidence by January 15 so that MPs “can decide whether to clear the way for early elections” which could be held by late March — six months earlier than scheduled.
The Social Democrat leader spoke after firing his rebellious Finance Minister Christian Lindner of the Free Democrats in a dramatic night session of what was a three-party coalition, declaring there was no longer any “basis of trust” with Lindner.
The embattled chancellor also said he would seek talks with the conservative Christian Democratic Union’s leader Friedrich Merz with the offer to “work together constructively on issues that are crucial for our country.”
Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck signalled that his Greens party, the third alliance partner, would stay on in a minority government and “continue to fulfil our obligations.”
The Greens’ Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said the political chaos in Berlin at such a globally volatile time meant that “this is not a good day for Germany and not a good day for Europe.”
Disparate parties
Scholz fired Lindner during a crunch meeting of senior figures from all three ideologically disparate parties, which have rowed for months over economic and budget issues.
Lindner had proposed sweeping reforms to jumpstart the troubled German economy that the other two parties opposed.
He had long flirted with bolting the unhappy coalition and repeatedly warned of “an autumn of decisions” as difficult budget talks loomed.
Scholz, after sacking Linder — who took three other FDP cabinet ministers with him — bitterly attacked the minister for his “petty political tactics” and accused him of a level of egoism that is “completely incomprehensible.”
Scholz cited the re-election of Trump, Germany’s economic woes and the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East as reasons for why Europe’s top economy now needs political certainty.
“We now need clarity on how we can soundly finance our security and defense in the coming years without jeopardizing the cohesion of the country,” he said. “With a view to the election in America, this is perhaps more urgent than ever.”
With the German economy expected to shrink for the second year in a row, Lindner has demanded corporate tax cuts, eased climate regulations and a reduction of social benefits.
Many of those ideas are anathema to Scholz’s SPD, Germany’s traditional workers’ party and the left-leaning Greens.
The bitter dispute has seen Scholz, Lindner and Habeck present contradictory economic plans and hold rival meetings with business leaders, deepening the sense of dysfunction and weakening Scholz’s authority.
Scholz said he had offered Lindner a plan with steps to bring down energy costs and boost investment for companies, secure auto industry jobs and keep up support for Ukraine.
But Linder — a fiscal hawk and strong opponent of raising new debt — had shown “no willingness” to accept it, Scholz said, adding that “I no longer want to subject our country to such behavior.”
Scholz and his mutinous coalition partners have drawn withering fire from Merz, who has long demanded early elections in which polls suggest he would be the frontrunner.
“We cannot afford to argue for another year,” CDU lawmaker Norbert Roettgen said after Trump’s victory. “Germany is important in Europe, and if the government can’t live up to that, then it must make way now.”
Late Wednesday, the head of the CDU’s Bavarian sister party CSU, Markus Soeder, demanded an immediate vote of confidence, warning that “there must be no tactical delays.”
Alice Weidel of the far-right Alternative for Germany party, now polling in second place, made the same demand, calling the end of the coalition a long-overdue “liberation for our country.”
UK identifies 4 cases of new mpox variant, the first cluster outside Africa
- Scientists believe it causes milder symptoms that are harder to notice, which makes it easier to spread because people may not know they are infected
LONDON: British health officials say they have identified four cases of the new, more infectious version of mpox that first emerged in Congo, marking the first time the variant has caused a cluster of illness outside of Africa. Scientists said the risk to the public remains low.
Authorities announced the first case of the new form of mpox in the UK last week, saying the case was being treated at a London hospital after recently traveling to countries in Africa with ongoing outbreaks.
This week, the UK Health Security Agency said it had now identified three further cases who lived in the same household as the first patient. They too are now being treated at a hospital in London.
“Mpox is very infectious in households with close contact and so it is not unexpected to see further cases within the same household,” said Susan Hopkins, chief medical adviser of the UK Health Security Agency.
The new variant of mpox was first detected earlier this year in eastern Congo. Scientists believe it causes milder symptoms that are harder to notice, which makes it easier to spread because people may not know they are infected. Its spread in Congo and elsewhere in Africa prompted the World Health Organization to declare a global emergency in August.
Britain recorded more than 3,000 cases of another type of mpox during a 2022 outbreak that hit more than 100 countries.
The new variant of mpox has also caused outbreaks in Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda and Uganda. Single cases in travelers have also been reported in Sweden, India, Germany and Thailand.
To date, there have been about 43,000 suspect cases of mpox in Africa, including more than 1,000 deaths, mostly in Congo.
On Wednesday, WHO said it had allocated 899,900 vaccine doses to nine African countries struggling with mpox epidemics.
