NEW YORK: The United States will exit the World Health Organization, President Donald Trump said on Monday, saying the global health agency had mishandled the COVID-19 pandemic and other international health crises.
Trump said the WHO had failed to act independently from the “inappropriate political influence of WHO member states” and required “unfairly onerous payments” from the US that are disproportionate to the sums provided by other, larger countries, such as China.
“World Health ripped us off, everybody rips off the United States. It’s not going to happen anymore,” Trump said at the signing.
The move means the US will leave the United Nations health agency in 12 months’ time and stop all financial contributions to its work. The United States is by far the WHO’s biggest financial backer, contributing around 18 percent of its overall funding. WHO’s most recent two-year budget, for 2024-2025, was $6.8 billion.
Trump’s withdrawal from the WHO is not unexpected. He took steps to quit the body in 2020, during his first term as president, accusing the WHO of aiding China’s efforts to “mislead the world” about the origins of COVID.
WHO vigorously denies the allegation and says it continues to press Beijing to share data to determine whether COVID emerged from human contact with infected animals or due to research into similar viruses in a domestic laboratory.
Trump signs executive order withdrawing from the World Health Organization
https://arab.news/8c58c
Trump signs executive order withdrawing from the World Health Organization
- He said the WHO had failed to act independently from the ‘inappropriate political influence of WHO member states’
Afghanistan’s only luxury hotel closes as Taliban take over operations
- Serena Kabul Hotel was an exclusive property hosting mostly foreigners, diplomats
- It was the site of several Taliban attacks when US-led troops were in Afghanistan
KABUL: Afghanistan’s only luxury hotel, Serena Hotel in Kabul, closed down operations on Saturday as its management was taken over by a corporation run by the Taliban.
Set in landscaped gardens, overlooking the city’s Zarnegar Park in the Afghan capital’s downtown, it opened in 1945 as the Kabul Hotel.
Heavily damaged during decades of war, the five-star property was rebuilt by the Aga Khan Development Network in 2005, according to a design by Canadian architect Ramesh Khosla, who adhered to the classical Islamic architectural style.
Renamed Serena Kabul Hotel, it was inaugurated by former Afghan president Hamid Karzai, during whose term it endured two major attacks by the Taliban in 2008 and 2014.
The last attack took place under the rule of former president Ashraf Ghani in 2021, the year when Afghanistan’s Western-backed administration collapsed, US-led foreign troops withdrew after 20 years of war and occupation, and the Taliban took over the country.
“After nearly two decades of dedicated services to Afghanistan and its citizens ... Kabul Serena Hotel shall be closing its operations effective Feb. 1, 2025,” the hotel said in a notification on Friday.
“The operations of the hotel will, as from now on, be taken over by Hotel State Owned Corporation.”
The Taliban government-run corporation confirmed the takeover to Arab News, saying that the Serena Hotels group’s contract was terminated five years before it was due.
An official at the HSOC said it was fit to operate the hotel as it was “running several other hotels across the country.”
It was not clear whether the corporation would be able to uphold the five-star level of service as the hotel was the only luxury property in the country — an exclusive venue with expensive restaurants hosting mostly foreigners.
“Most Afghans couldn’t afford to spend the night or have a meal there, so they didn’t really have any attachment to it … there’s really only a select group of highly privileged people who have these fond memories of hours spent at the Serena. The average Afghan simply has no experience of it,” Ali Latifi, an Afghan American journalist based in Kabul, told Arab News.
It was also the subject of a famous blunder by an Indian news anchor, who in 2021 claimed that Pakistan’s intelligence agency had an office on the hotel’s fourth floor, despite the fact that the Serena Kabul has only two floors.
While the hotel was both famous and infamous, it had never been a symbol of Kabul and its society, Latifi said.
“It took a real level of privilege to even walk through the door there ... it was an elite place for privileged people.”
Mirwais Agha, a taxi driver who remembers construction works when the hotel was being rebuilt, had no idea how the property looked inside.
“I only saw the cement walls and big cars getting in through the doors every time I passed by the place,” he said.
“It was not for common people like us. It was for foreigners and some rich people. You had to pay dollars to get a meal in the hotel. It doesn’t really mean anything for us if it’s closing or its management is being charged. It never belonged to us.”
Pakistan separatist militants kill 18 paramilitaries in ambush
- The attack was claimed by the Baloch Liberation Army
- The official said 17 troops were killed, along with another who came to their aid in the overnight attack on Friday near Mangochar
QUETTA, Pakistan: Pakistani separatist militants claimed on Saturday an attack on a highway in a volatile southwestern province that killed 18 paramilitaries and seriously wounded three others.
The attack was claimed by the Baloch Liberation Army, a group behind rising violence in Balochistan province that borders Afghanistan and Iran.
A vehicle carrying unarmed border troops “came under gunfire from 70 to 80 armed assailants who had blocked the road,” a police official told AFP, speaking on condition of anonymity.
The official said 17 troops were killed, along with another who came to their aid in the overnight attack on Friday near Mangochar, a city close to the Afghan border.
The military said 18 paramilitaries were killed as they responded to militants who “attempted to establish roadblocks,” while 12 attackers were killed.
The BLA said in a statement it had killed 17 troops and had carried out multiple “operations.”
Attacks have increased in Balochistan province in recent months, often against security forces.
The BLA frequently claims deadly attacks against security forces or Pakistanis from other provinces, notably Punjabis in Balochistan.
The group has also targeted energy projects with foreign financing — most notably from China — accusing outsiders of exploiting the resource-rich region while excluding residents in the poorest part of Pakistan.
In November, the BLA claimed responsibility for a bombing at Quetta’s main railway station that killed 26 people, including 14 soldiers.
The group also said it was behind coordinated attacks by dozens of assailants in August that killed at least 39 people, one of the highest tolls in the region.
Violence has surged in Pakistan’s border regions since the Afghan Taliban returned to power in Kabul in 2021.
Pakistan has accused the Taliban government of failing to rout out militants who launch attacks from Afghan soil, a charge it denies.
More than 1,600 people were killed in attacks in 2024 — the deadliest year in almost a decade — including 685 civil and military security forces, according to the Center for Research and Security Studies, an Islamabad-based analysis group.
Indian troops kill eight Maoist rebels
- The gunfight broke out early on Saturday in the forested areas of Bijapur district
- “After a fierce gunbattle, bodies of eight Maoists were recovered today from the jungles of Bijapur district,” top police officer Sundarraj P. told AFP
RAIPUR, India: Indian commandos shot dead at least eight Maoist rebels in the dense jungles of central India on Saturday, as security forces ramp up efforts to crush the long-running conflict.
More than 10,000 people have been killed in the decades-long insurgency waged by the rebels, who say they are fighting for the rights of marginalized Indigenous people.
The gunfight broke out early on Saturday in the forested areas of Bijapur district in the state of Chhattisgarh, considered the heartland of the insurgency.
“After a fierce gunbattle, bodies of eight Maoists were recovered today from the jungles of Bijapur district,” top police officer Sundarraj P. told AFP.
Weapons recovered from the rebels included a grenade launcher and rifles, he said, adding that a search was still underway.
A crackdown by security forces has killed some 287 rebels in the past year, an overwhelming majority in Chhattisgarh, according to government data.
Amit Shah, India’s home minister, said last year the government expected to crush the rebellion by 2026.
The Maoists demand land, jobs and a share of the region’s immense natural resources for local residents.
They made inroads in a number of remote communities across India’s east and south, and the movement gained in strength and numbers until the early 2000s.
New Delhi then deployed tens of thousands of troops in a stretch of territory known as the “Red Corridor.”
The conflict has also seen a number of deadly attacks on government forces. A roadside bomb killed at least nine Indian troops last month.
Russian drone and missile attacks kill 6 in Ukraine
- A Russian missile strike on an apartment block in the Ukrainian city of Poltava killed at least five people and injured 13 more
- Some 22 people were rescued from the five-story building, which partially collapsed
KYIV: At least six people died overnight as Russian drone and missile strikes pounded Ukraine’s towns and cities, local officials said Saturday.
Meanwhile, Moscow’s troops continued their grinding advance through the country’s east.
A Russian missile strike on an apartment block in the Ukrainian city of Poltava killed at least five people and injured 13 more, including three children, Ukraine’s emergency services reported.
Some 22 people were rescued from the five-story building, which partially collapsed following the attack, said the Poltava region’s acting governor, Volodymyr Kohut. He also announced that the region would observe three days of mourning for the victims of the attack. Rescue teams remain at the site.
Elsewhere, a 60-year-old woman was killed by falling debris from a downed drone in the Kharkiv region, local Gov. Oleh Syniehubov wrote on social media.
The bombardment comes as Russian forces continue their monthslong campaign to capture the key Donetsk strongholds of Pokrovsk and nearby Chasiv Yar, fighting their way across farm fields and woodland and engulfing small rural settlements.
Russia’s Ministry of Defense said Saturday that its troops had taken control of Krymske, a suburb to the north of the contested frontline town of Toretsk in Ukraine’s Donetsk region. Russian troops have been fighting for the settlement in a grinding assault throughout the winter of 2024. The Institute for the Study of War, a Washington-based think tank, said last week that it expected the Russians to take full control of Toretsk “within days.” “Last night, Russia launched an attack on our cities using various types of weapons: missiles, attack drones, and aerial bombs,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky wrote on social media Saturday.
“Every such act of terror proves that we need greater support in defending against Russian terror. Every air defense system, every interceptor missile, means a life saved.”
The full-scale war between Russia and Ukraine, which began nearly three years ago and shows no signs of ending, has killed more than 10,000 Ukrainian civilians, according to the United Nations.
Many have been evacuated from areas along the roughly 1,000-kilometer (600-mile) front line where Ukrainian defenses are straining to hold the bigger Russian army at bay.
Civilians have endured hardship caused by Russian attacks on the power grid that have denied them heating and running water. Saturday’s missile attack prompted emergency power grid shutdowns in seven Ukrainian regions, including Poltava, state energy company Ukrenergo said.
Ukrainian strikes also hit Russia, with air defenses intercepting nine drones across the country’s Bryansk, Belgorod and Saratov regions, Russia’s Defense Ministry said in a statement Saturday morning.
The Taliban have no legal right to multibillion dollar Afghan fund, says US watchdog
- SIGAR said President Donald Trump’s administration and Congress may want to examine returning nearly $4 billion earmarked for Afghanistan
- Although no payments benefiting Afghans have been made, the fund is aimed at protecting and stabilizing the economy on their behalf
WASHINGTON: The watchdog for US assistance to Afghanistan said the Taliban have no legal right to billions of dollars in funding set aside for the country because they are not recognized as its government and are under sanctions.
In its latest report issued Friday, the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction, or SIGAR, also said President Donald Trump’s administration and Congress may want to examine returning nearly $4 billion earmarked for Afghanistan to the “custody and control” of the US government.
In 2022, the US transferred $3.5 billion in Afghan central bank assets previously frozen in America to the Swiss-based Fund for the Afghan People. The fund has grown to nearly $4 billion since then, according to the inspector general.
Although no payments benefiting Afghans have been made, the fund is aimed at protecting and stabilizing the economy on their behalf.
“The Taliban want these funds even though they have no legal right to them since they are not recognized by the United States as the government of Afghanistan, are on the US Specially Designated Global Terrorist list, and are under US and UN sanctions,” the report said.
Responding to the report Saturday, the Afghan Economy Ministry said more than $9 billion of Afghanistan’s foreign exchange reserves had been frozen and warned that any US action regarding the allocation, use or transfer of these reserves was unacceptable.
It urged the international community to return the money to the central bank to ensure the country’s stability.
The ministry also said that US expenditure had made no significant impact on the Afghan economy.
The SIGAR report follows Trump’s decision to freeze foreign aid for 90 days pending reviews to determine whether projects align with his policy goals.
According to the report, the US has spent nearly $3.71 billion in Afghanistan since withdrawing from the country in 2021. Most of that has gone to UN agencies.
Another $1.2 billion remains available in the pipeline for possible disbursement, the report said.
US humanitarian assistance may have “staved off famine” in the face of economic collapse, but it has not dissuaded the Taliban from taking Americans hostage, dismantling the rights of women and girls, censoring the media, allowing the country to become a “terrorist safe haven,” and targeting former Afghan government officials, added the watchdog.
The US remains the largest donor to Afghanistan, but the report said a lot of the money is taxed or diverted.
“The further the cash gets away from the source, the less transparency there is,” Chris Borgeson, the deputy inspector general for audits and inspections at the watchdog, told The Associated Press last August.
