Palm Beach: Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau traveled to Florida on Friday for a dinner with Donald Trump at the president-elect’s Mar-a-Lago estate, as the incoming US leader promised tariffs on Canadian imports.
The unannounced meeting came at the end of a week that has seen Canada as well as Mexico scramble to blunt the impact of Trump’s trade threats, which experts have warned could also hit US consumers hard.
A smiling Trudeau was seen exiting a hotel in West Palm Beach before arriving at Mar-a-Lago, making him the latest high-profile guest of Trump, whose impending second term — which starts in January — is already overshadowing the last few months of President Joe Biden’s administration.
Flight trackers had first spotted a jet broadcasting the prime minister’s callsign making its way to the southern US state. A Canadian government source later told AFP that the two leaders were dining together.
Trump caused panic among some of the biggest US trading partners on Monday when he said he would impose tariffs of 25 percent on Mexican and Canadian imports and 10 percent on goods from China.
He accused the countries of not doing enough to halt the “invasion” of the United States by drugs, “in particular fentanyl,” and undocumented migrants.
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum spoke with Trump by phone on Wednesday, though the two leaders’ accounts of the conversation differed drastically.
Trump claimed that Mexico’s left-wing president had “agreed to stop migration through Mexico, and into the United States, effectively closing our Southern Border.”
Sheinbaum later said she had discussed US-supported anti-migration policies that have long been in place in Mexico.
She said that after that, the talks had no longer revolved around the threat of tariff hikes, downplaying the risk of a trade war.
Billions in trade
Biden warned that same day that Trump’s tariff threats could “screw up” Washington’s relationships with Ottawa and Mexico City.
“I think it’s a counterproductive thing to do,” Biden told reporters.
Trudeau did not respond to questions from the media as he returned to his hotel Friday evening after meeting with Trump.
But for Canada, the stakes of any new tariffs are high.
More than three-quarters of Canadian exports, or Can$592.7 billion ($423 billion), went to the United States last year, and nearly two million Canadian jobs are dependent on trade.
A Canadian government source told AFP that Canada is considering possible retaliatory tariffs against the United States.
Some have suggested Trump’s tariff threat may be bluster, or an opening salvo in future trade negotiations. But Trudeau rejected those views when he spoke with reporters earlier in Prince Edward Island province.
“Donald Trump, when he makes statements like that, he plans on carrying them out,” Trudeau said. “There’s no question about it.”
According to the website Flightradar, the Canadian leader’s plane landed at Palm Beach International Airport late Friday afternoon.
Canadian public broadcaster CBC said that Trudeau’s public safety minister, Dominic LeBlanc, was accompanying him on the trip.
Trudeau in Florida to meet Trump as tariff threats loom
https://arab.news/p2xa4
Trudeau in Florida to meet Trump as tariff threats loom
- The unannounced meeting came at the end of a week that has seen Canada as well as Mexico scramble to blunt the impact of Trump’s trade threats
Shock in Jakarta, MPs demand action after Israel assassinates Indonesian hospital director
- Dr. Marwan Al-Sultan, renowned cardiac surgeon, was killed in targeted Israeli airstrike
- Israel has killed at least 492 doctors and health workers in Gaza since October 2023
JAKARTA/DUBAI: Israel’s assassination of Dr. Marwan Al-Sultan, director of the Indonesian hospital in northern Gaza, has sparked shock in Jakarta, with parliamentarians calling for new international accountability mechanisms to hold Israel legally responsible for its crimes in Gaza.
A renowned cardiac surgeon and one of Palestine’s most senior doctors, Dr. Al-Sultan graduated from Liaquat University of Medical and Health Sciences in Hyderabad, Pakistan, in 2001.
He was killed along with his wife and children in an Israeli airstrike on their temporary residence in northern Gaza on Wednesday.
His surviving daughter, Lubna, told the media that the missile “targeted his room exactly, right where he was.” Her testimony confirmed statements from the Gaza Ministry of Health and the Jakarta-based Medical Emergency Rescue Committee — which funded the Indonesia Hospital in Beit Lahia — that the attack was a targeted assassination.
“The attack on Dr. Marwan was utterly savage and barbaric,” Dr. Sarbini Abdul Murad, chairman of MER-C’s board of trustees, told Arab News.
“It was a shock to hear the news. I couldn’t believe it. He was the only heart specialist left in the north. This is a huge loss.”
The Indonesia Hospital in Beit Lahia, one of the biggest health facilities in Gaza, was one of the first targeted by Israel when it started its deadly war on the Palestinian enclave in October 2023.
Dr. Al-Sultan had never left his post, remaining with patients through multiple Israeli offensives on the hospital and personally overseeing repairs to restore essential services, MER-C said in a statement recalling how in December 2024, he evacuated the facility while under Israeli siege.
The moment was recorded on a mobile phone, showing Dr. Al-Sultan leaving only after he had ensured the safety of every patient.
The Indonesia Hospital opened in late 2015. Coordinated by MER-C, its construction and equipment were financed from donations of the Indonesian people, with dozens of engineers and builders volunteering to design and build the facility and to prepare its operations.
The killing of Dr. Al-Sultan has spurred outcry in Indonesia, with the government issuing an official condemnation and lawmakers from the Committee for Inter-Parliamentary Cooperation calling on parliamentarians around the world to “push for international accountability mechanisms” to ensure that “crimes against humanity be immediately brought to international forums, including global parliamentary bodies, so that Israel can be held legally and morally accountable for its actions in Gaza.”
Israel has killed more than 56,000 Palestinians and wounded more than 133,000 others, since October 2023. The true death toll is feared to be much higher, with research published in The Lancet medical journal in January estimating an underreporting of deaths by 41 percent.
The study says the death toll may be even higher, as it does not include deaths caused by starvation, injury and lack of access to health care, caused by the Israeli military’s destruction of most of Gaza’s infrastructure and the blocking of medical and food aid.
Data from the UN and international health organizations shows that Israel has killed at least 492 doctors and medics in Gaza since October 2023.
Dr. Al-Sultan is the 70th health care worker to be killed in the last 50 days, according to Healthcare Workers Watch.
“He was a prominent medical figure, both as a heart specialist and director of the Indonesia Hospital,” Dr. Hadiki Habib, chairman of MER-C’s executive committee, told Arab News.
“We had feared that this could happen, but he had said that he would remain in Gaza and, if he were to be martyred, it would be in his homeland.”
Russian strikes kill eight in Ukraine
The Ukrainian army reported there were “dead and wounded” at a recruitment office in Poltava
KYIV: Russia launched a wave of attacks on Ukraine on Thursday, killing at least eight people and wounding dozens of others, Ukrainian officials said.
Among the sites hit were a military enlistment office in the eastern city of Poltava and port infrastructure in the southern city of Odesa.
Moscow has stepped up its drone and missile bombardment of Ukraine in recent weeks, with peace talks stalling and Kyiv’s key ally Washington signalling it could cut military support.
The warring sides last met for direct talks more than a month ago and no further meeting has been organized.
The Ukrainian army reported there were “dead and wounded” at a recruitment office in Poltava.
Emergency services posted images of buildings on fire and rescue workers at the scene of the strike.
“Two people were killed,” the emergency services said. The region’s police added 47 people were wounded.
In Odesa, two people were killed when “an Iskander missile” struck the seaport, Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Oleksiy Kuleba said on Telegram.
He added that six people had been wounded in the strike.
In Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region, strikes killed four people, the regional prosecutor’s office said.
“At least nine apartment buildings, three garages, a shop facade and a power line were damaged in the settlements,” it added.
In Russia’s Lipetsk region, debris from a Ukrainian drone killed a woman and wounded two other people, its governor said Thursday.
The debris fell on a building in Lipetsk, which lies about 400 kilometers (250 miles) southeast of Moscow, killing a woman in her seventies, Igor Artamonov wrote on Telegram.
Austria deports Syrian convict in EU first since Assad fall
- “The deportation carried out today is part of a strict and thus fair asylum policy,” Interior Minister Gerhard Karner said
- It was the first deportation of a Syrian directly to Syria in about 15 years
VIENNA: Austria on Thursday deported a Syrian criminal convict back to Syria, becoming the first EU country to do so officially “in recent years,” the interior ministry said.
Austria has been pushing to be able to deport Syrians back since the ouster of Syria’s leader Bashar Assad in December.
“The deportation carried out today is part of a strict and thus fair asylum policy,” Interior Minister Gerhard Karner said in a statement sent to AFP.
The ministry said it was the first deportation of a Syrian directly to Syria in about 15 years, and Austria was the “first European country to officially deport a Syrian criminal directly to Syria in recent years.”
Karner traveled to Syria with his German counterpart Nancy Faeser in April to discuss deportations, among other topics.
Karner, from the governing conservative People’s Party (OeVP), on Thursday vowed to “continue this chosen path with hard work and determination.”
Austria was among European Union nations that suspended all Syrian asylum applications after Assad’s ouster. It also stopped family reunifications.
Some 100,000 Syrians live in Austria, one of the biggest diaspora in Europe.
Austria’s anti-migration far right topped national elections in September though they were unable to find partners to govern, leaving the runner-up conservatives to form a new government.
Indonesian rescuers search for dozens of missing passengers after ferry sinks off Bali
- Authorities dispatched a helicopter, 9 boats, 13 underwater rescuers to find missing passengers
- KMT Tunu Pratama Jaya is second passenger ferry to sink off Bali in the past few weeks
JAKARTA: Rescuers were racing on Thursday to search for dozens of people missing after a ferry sank overnight near Indonesia’s resort island of Bali, leaving at least five people dead.
The KMP Tunu Pratama Jaya, which carried 53 passengers, 12 crew members and 22 vehicles, sank about half an hour after leaving Ketapang port on Indonesia’s main island of Java for a 50-km trip to Bali’s Gilimanuk port late on Wednesday.
Crew members on the ferry sent a distress call around 20 minutes after departure, but sank about 15 minutes later, said Mohammad Syafii, chief of the National Search and Rescue Agency.
As of Thursday afternoon, 31 people had been rescued as search operations continued for 29 others who were missing.
“Identities of the victims are still under data collection and verification by our team members on the field,” Syafii said during a press conference.
The agency has dispatched a helicopter, nine boats and a team specializing in underwater rescue to search for survivors, with assistance from local fishermen.
“Rescue efforts are facing challenges in the form of strong waves between 2 to 2.5 meters, and strong winds and currents,” the Indonesian Ministry of Transport said in a statement.
The ferry from Java to Bali usually takes about an hour and is often used by people crossing between the islands by car.
Authorities have yet to disclose whether any foreigners were onboard when KMP Tunu Pratama Jaya sank.
It is also common for the actual number of passengers on a boat to differ from the manifest in Indonesia, so there may be other passengers who are unaccounted for.
Some families were gathered at Ketapang port, located in the East Java city of Banyuwangi, for updates on the missing passengers, while survivors were taken to nearby medical facilities, including the Jembrana Regional Hospital in Bali.
Ferries are a common mode of transport in Indonesia, an archipelagic country comprising more than 17,000 islands.
However, they are prone to accidents due to bad weather and lax safety standards that allow vessels to be overloaded and operated without adequate lifesaving equipment.
In 2023, a small ferry capsized near Indonesia’s Sulawesi island, killing at least 15 people.
KMT Tunu Pratama Jaya was the second passenger ferry to sink off Bali in the past few weeks.
A fast boat carrying 89 tourists, including 77 foreign travelers, capsized in early June after it was hit by a big wave upon leaving a port on a smaller island off Bali. All the passengers aboard were rescued.
Danish police deploy to Israeli embassy in Copenhagen to examine a suspicious package
- Danish public broadcaster DR showed photos of several police and emergency vehicles near the embassy
- Police wrote on X that they had blocked roads near the embassy
COPENHAGEN: Danish police said Thursday they have deployed officers to the Israeli embassy in the Nordic country’s capital to examine a suspicious package.
Copenhagen police wrote on X that “we are present at the Israeli embassy, where we are investigating a shipment received.”
They added that “we currently have no further information.”
Danish public broadcaster DR showed photos of several police and emergency vehicles near the embassy, including what they reported was a hazmat emergency response team vehicle.
Police wrote on X that they had blocked roads near the embassy.
Anders Frederiksen, duty chief at the Copenhagen Police, told Danish daily Ekstra Bladet that “ordinary citizens in the area should not be worried.”
Security officials in many European countries have increased surveillance and protection of Israeli and Jewish institutions after a 12-day war broke out between Israel and Iran in June.
Last week, security officers arrested a man in the Danish city of Aarhus on suspicion of gathering information on Jewish locations and individuals in Germany for Iranian intelligence.
Prosecutors said the man was tasked by an Iranian intelligence service early this year with gathering information on “Jewish localities and specific Jewish individuals” in Berlin. They didn’t elaborate.
He spied on three properties in June, “presumably in preparation of further intelligence activities in Germany, possibly including terrorist attacks on Jewish targets,” prosecutors said.
German Justice Minister Stefanie Hubig said that “if this suspicion is confirmed, we are dealing with an outrageous operation,” adding in a statement that “the protection of Jewish life has the highest priority for the German government.”
Germany has requested the extradition of the suspect.
