International

Zelensky warns of ‘nasty’ Russian attack ahead of Ukraine independence day

Published

2 years ago

August 21, 2022

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky

Volodymyr Zelensky has advised Ukrainians to be aware of potential “nasty” and “cruel” attacks by Russia’s forces, in the run-up to Ukraine’s independence day next week.

The Ukrainian president urged citizens to be vigilant ahead of the celebrations on Wednesday 24 August which will mark 31 years of independence from Soviet rule.

Mr Zelensky said Ukrainians must not allow Moscow to “spread despondency and fear” ahead of the national holiday that is to take place exactly six months after Vladimir Putin launched his invasion of Ukraine.

But, he warned on Saturday in his nightly address to Ukrainians: “We should be aware that this week Russia may try to do something particularly nasty, something particularly cruel. Such is our enemy.

“But in any other week during these six months, Russia did the same thing all the time – disgusting and cruel.

“One of the key tasks of the enemy is to humiliate us, Ukrainians, to devalue our capabilities, our heroes, to spread despair, fear, to spread conflicts… Therefore, it is important never, for a single moment, to give in to this enemy pressure, not to wind oneself up, not to show weakness.”

Residents of Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city which has regularly been hit by Russian missiles, will be under curfew for the whole of Wednesday, regional governor Oleh Synehub said.

“Remain at home and take heed of warnings!” he wrote to residents on the Telegram messaging app.

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In his speech, Mr Zelensky also indirectly referred to a series of explosions earlier on Saturday in Crimea, the Ukrainian territory annexed by Russia in 2014.

He said: “You can literally feel Crimea in the air this year, that the occupation there is only temporary and that Ukraine is coming back.”

Mikhail Razvozhayev, the Moscow-appointed governor of Sevastopol, the largest city in Crimea, said a Ukrainian drone had struck a building near the headquarters of Russia’s Black Sea fleet on Saturday morning.

“A drone flew onto the roof. It was flying low,” he said on Telegram. “It was downed right over the fleet headquarters. It fell on the roof and burned up. The attack failed.”

It was the second drone incident at the headquarters in three weeks. This month has also seen a number of explosions at a Russian airfield and ammunition depot on the peninsula.

Moscow’s forces there are on “high alert” and have found themselves “much more vulnerable than they thought they were”, a senior US defence official said, as reported by the Washington Post.

This weekend, fighting has intensified in the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine while “powerful explosions” rocked Melitopol in the south of the country, according to local mayor Ivan Ferodov.

Also in southern Ukraine, a missile wounded 14 civilians – including four children – in Voznesensk, a town 20 miles (30km) away from the Pivdennoukrainsk nuclear power plant, also known as the South Ukraine Nuclear Power Plant.

Vitaliy Kim, governor of the Mykolaiv region, said on Telegram that the children were among the wounded – with one losing an eye – when homes including a five-storey apartment block were hit.

The attack on Voznesensk was “another act of Russian nuclear terrorism”, said state-run Energoatom, which manages Ukraine’s four nuclear energy generators.

“It is possible that this missile was aimed specifically at the Pivdennoukrainsk plant, which the Russian military tried to seize back at the beginning of March,” it said in a statement.

Russia did not immediately respond to the accusation. Reuters news agency said that it could not verify the situation in Voznesensk, and that there were no reports of damage to the South Ukraine plant.

Earlier this week, missiles hit the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear power station in an attack that Ukraine and Russia have blamed each other for.

Vladimir Rogov, a Russia-appointed official in the nearby town of Enerhodar, said Ukrainian forces had launched at least four strikes on the plant.

Across the Dnipro river, directly opposite the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power station, the city of Nikopol was repeatedly shelled by Russian forces on Wednesday night, according to local mayor Yevhen Yetushenko.

Ukrainian officials said the missile attacks on the two power plants – the two biggest in Europe, and the Zaporizhzhia site the biggest in Europe – have revived fears of a nuclear disaster.

The Independent

Related Topics:Independence Russian Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky

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International

Syria not threat to world, rebel leader al-Sharaa tells BBC

Published

3 days ago

December 19, 2024

Trends Admin

Ahmed al-Sharaa

Syria not threat to world, rebel leader al-Sharaa tells BBC

The de facto leader of Syria, Ahmed al-Sharaa, has said the country is exhausted by war and is not a threat to its neighbours or to the West.

In an interview with the BBC in Damascus, he called for sanctions on Syria to be lifted.

“Now, after all that has happened, sanctions must be lifted because they were targeted at the old regime. The victim and the oppressor should not be treated in the same way,” he said.

Sharaa led the lightning offensive that toppled Bashar al-Assad’s regime less than two weeks ago. He is the leader of the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), the dominant group in the rebel alliance, and was previously known by his nom de guerre of Abu Mohammed al-Jolani.

He said HTS should be de-listed as a terrorist organisation. It is designated as one by the UN, US, EU and UK, among many others, as it started as a splinter group of al-Qaeda, which it broke away from in 2016.

Sharaa said HTS was not a terrorist group.

They did not target civilians or civilian areas, he said. In fact, they considered themselves to be victim of the crimes of the Assad regime.

He denied that he wanted to turn Syria into a version of Afghanistan.

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Sharaa said the countries were very different, with different traditions. Afghanistan was a tribal society. In Syria, he said, there was a different mindset.

He said he believed in education for women.

“We’ve had universities in Idlib for more than eight years,” Sharaa said, referring to Syria’s north-western province that has been held by rebels since 2011.

“I think the percentage of women in universities is more than 60%.”

And when asked whether the consumption of alcohol would be allowed, Sharaa said: “There are many things I just don’t have the right to talk about because they are legal issues.”

He added that there would be a “Syrian committee of legal experts to write a constitution. They will decide. And any ruler or president will have to follow the law”.

Sharaa was relaxed throughout the interview, wearing civilian clothes, and tried to offer reassurance to all those who believe his group has not broken with its extremist past.

Many Syrians do not believe him.

The actions of Syria’s new rulers in the next few months will indicate the kind of country they want Syria to be – and the way they want to rule it.

Syria not threat to world, rebel leader al-Sharaa tells BBC

BBC

International

Israel hits ports, energy sites in Yemen after missile intercepted

Published

3 days ago

December 19, 2024

Trends Admin

Israel hits ports, energy sites in Yemen after missile intercepted

JERUSALEM: Israel said Thursday it struck ports and energy infrastructure it alleges are used by Houthi militants, after intercepting a missile fired by the group.

Israel’s military said it “conducted precise strikes on Houthi military targets in Yemen — including ports and energy infrastructure in Sanaa, which the Houthis have been using in ways that effectively contributed to their military actions.”

The announcement came shortly after Israel said it had intercepted a missile fired from Yemen.

Al-Masira, a media channel belonging to the Houthis, said a series of “aggressive raids” were launched in the Yemeni capital of Sanaa and the port city of Hodeidah.

It reported raids that “targeted two central power plants” in Yemen’s capital Sanaa, while in Hodeidah it said “the enemy launched four aggressive raids targeting the port… and two raids targeting” an oil facility.

The strikes were the second time this week that Israel’s military has intercepted a missile from Yemen.

On Monday, the Houthis claimed a missile launch they said was aimed at “a military target of the Israeli enemy in the occupied area of Yaffa” — a reference to Israel’s Tel Aviv area.

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Also Monday, an Israeli navy missile boat intercepted a drone in the Mediterranean after it was launched from Yemen, the military said.

The Houthi militants have said they are acting in solidarity with Palestinians and pledged Monday to continue operations “until the aggression on Gaza stops and the siege is lifted.”

On December 9, a drone claimed by Houthis exploded on the top floor of a residential building in the central Israel city of Yavne, causing no casualties.

In July, a Houthi drone attack in Tel Aviv killed an Israeli civilian, prompting retaliatory strikes on the Yemeni port of Hodeidah.

The Houthis have also regularly targeted shipping in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, leading to retaliatory strikes on Houthi targets by United States and sometimes British forces.

Israeli military spokesman Daniel Hagari said the group had become a “global threat,” pointing to Iran’s support for the militants.

“We will continue to act against anyone, anyone in the Middle East, that threatens the state of Israel,” he said.

Israel hits ports, energy sites in Yemen after missile intercepted

International

Gaza mediators intensify ceasefire efforts, Israeli strikes kill 20 people

Published

3 days ago

December 19, 2024

Trends Admin

A Palestinian boy looks as others inspect the damage at a tent camp sheltering displaced people, following an Israeli strike, amid the Israel-Hamas conflict, in Al-Mawasi area, in Khan Younis, southern Gaza Strip, December 18, 2024. (Reuters)

Gaza mediators intensify ceasefire efforts, Israeli strikes kill 20 people

CAIRO: The United States, joined by Arab mediators, sought on Wednesday to conclude an agreement between Israel and Hamas to halt the 14-month-old war in the Gaza Strip where medics said Israeli strikes killed at least 20 Palestinians overnight.

A Palestinian official close to the negotiations said on Wednesday that mediators had narrowed gaps on most of the agreement’s clauses. He said Israel had introduced conditions which Hamas rejected but would not elaborate.

On Tuesday, sources close to the talks in Cairo, the Egyptian capital, said an agreement could be signed in coming days on a ceasefire and a release of hostages held in Gaza in return for Palestinian prisoners held by Israel.

Medics said an Israeli airstrike killed at least 10 people in a house in the northern town of Beit Lahiya while six were killed in separate airstrikes in Gaza City, Nuseirat camp in central areas, and Rafah near the border with Egypt.

In Beit Hanoun in the northern Gaza Strip, medics said four people were killed in an airstrike on a house. There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military spokesman.

Israeli forces have operated in the towns of Beit Hanoun and Beit Lahiya as well as the nearby Jabalia camp since October, in a campaign the military said aimed to prevent Hamas militants from regrouping.

Palestinians accuse Israel of carrying out acts of “ethnic cleansing” to depopulate the northern edge of the enclave to create a buffer zone. Israel denies it.

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Hamas does not disclose its casualties, and the Palestinian health ministry does not distinguish in its daily death toll between combatants and non-combatants.

On Wednesday, the Israeli military said it struck a number of Hamas militants planning an imminent attack against Israeli forces operating in Jabalia.

Later on Wednesday, Muhammad Saleh, director of Al-Awda Hospital in Jabalia, said Israeli shelling in the vicinity damaged the facility, wounding seven medics and one patient inside the hospital.

The Israeli military had no immediate comment.

In the Central Gaza camp of Bureij, Palestinian families began leaving some districts after the army posted new evacuation orders on X and in written and audio messages to mobile phones of some of the population there, citing new firing of rockets by Palestinian militants from the area.

CEASEFIRE GAINS MOMENTUM

The US administration, joined by mediators from Egypt and Qatar, has made intensive efforts in recent days to advance the talks before President Joe Biden leaves office next month.

In Jerusalem, Israeli President Isaac Herzog met Adam Boehler, US President-elect Donald Trump’s designated envoy for hostage affairs. Trump has threatened that “all hell is going to break out” if Hamas does not release its hostages by Jan. 20, the day Trump returns to the White House.

CIA Director William Burns was due in Doha on Wednesday for talks with Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani on bridging remaining gaps between Israel and Hamas, other knowledgeable sources said. The CIA declined to comment.

Israeli negotiators were in Doha on Monday looking to bridge gaps between Israel and Hamas on a deal Biden outlined in May.

There have been repeated rounds of talks over the past year, all of which have failed, with Israel insisting on retaining a military presence in Gaza and Hamas refusing to release hostages until the troops pulled out.

The war in Gaza, triggered by a Hamas-led attack on communities in southern Israel that killed some 1,200 people and saw more than 250 abducted as hostages, has sent shockwaves across the Middle East and left Israel isolated internationally.

Israel’s campaign has killed more than 45,000 Palestinians, displaced most of the 2.3 million population and reduced much of the coastal enclave to ruins.

Gaza mediators intensify ceasefire efforts, Israeli strikes kill 20 people

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