ZAPORIZHZHIA, Ukraine: Russia plans to annex much of eastern Ukraine later this month, a senior US official warned, and the Mariupol steel mill that is the city’s last stronghold of resistance came under renewed assault a day after the first evacuation of civilians from the plant.
Michael Carpenter, US ambassador to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, said Monday that the US believes the Kremlin also will recognize the southern city of Kherson as an independent republic. Neither move would be recognized by the United States or its allies, he said.
Russia is planning to hold sham referendums in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions that would “try to add a veneer of democratic or electoral legitimacy” and attach the entities to Russia, Carpenter said. He also said there were signs that Russia would engineer an independence vote in Kherson.
Mayors and local legislators there have been abducted, Internet and cellphone service has been severed and a Russian school curriculum will soon be imposed, Carpenter said. Ukraine’s government says Russia has introduced its ruble as currency there.
More than 100 people — including elderly women and mothers with small children — left Mariupol’s rubble-strewn Azovstal steelworks Sunday and set out in buses and ambulances for the Ukrainian-controlled city of Zaporizhzhia, about 140 miles (230 kilometers) to the northwest. Mariupol Deputy Mayor Sergei Orlov told the BBC that the evacuees were making slow progress.
Authorities gave no explanation for the delay.
At least some of the civilians were apparently taken to a village controlled by Russia-backed separatists. The Russian military said some chose to stay in separatist areas, while dozens left for Ukrainian-held territory.
In the past, Ukraine has accused Moscow’s troops of taking civilians against their will to Russia or Russian-controlled areas. The Kremlin has denied it.
The Russian bombardment of the sprawling plant by air, tank and ship resumed after the partial evacuation, Ukraine’s Azov Battalion, which is helping to defend the mill, said on the Telegram messaging app.
Orlov said high-level negotiations were underway among Ukraine, Russia and international organizations on evacuating more people.
The steel-plant evacuation, if successful, would be rare progress in easing the human cost of the almost 10-week war, which has caused particular suffering in Mariupol. Previous attempts to open safe corridors out of the southern port city and other places have broken down, with Ukrainian officials accusing Russian forces of shooting and shelling along agreed-on evacuation routes.
Before the weekend evacuation, overseen by the United Nations and the Red Cross, about 1,000 civilians were believed to be in the plant along with an estimated 2,000 Ukrainian defenders who have refused Russian demands they surrender.
As many as 100,000 people overall may still be in Mariupol, which had a prewar population of more than 400,000. Russian forces have pounded much of the city into rubble, trapping civilians with little food, water, heat or medicine.
Some Mariupol residents left on their own, often in damaged private cars.
As sunset approached, Mariupol resident Yaroslav Dmytryshyn rattled up to a reception center in Zaporizhzhia in a car with a back seat full of youngsters and two signs taped to the back window: “Children” and “Little ones.”
“I can’t believe we survived,” he said, looking worn but in good spirits after two days on the road.
“There is no Mariupol whatsoever,” he said. “Someone needs to rebuild it, and it will take millions of tons of gold.” He said they lived just across the railroad tracks from the steel plant. “Ruined,” he said. “The factory is gone completely.”
Anastasiia Dembytska, who took advantage of the cease-fire to leave with her daughter, nephew and dog, said she could see the steelworks from her window, when she dared to look.
“We could see the rockets flying” and clouds of smoke over the plant, she said.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky told Greek state television that remaining civilians in the steel plant were afraid to board buses, fearing they would be taken to Russia. He said the UN assured him they could go to areas his government controls.
Mariupol lies in the Donbas, Ukraine’s eastern industrial heartland, and is key to Russia’s campaign in the east. Its capture would deprive Ukraine of a vital port, allow Russia to establish a land corridor to the Crimean Peninsula, which it seized from Ukraine in 2014, and free up troops for fighting elsewhere.
More than 1 million people, including nearly 200,000 children, have been taken from Ukraine to Russia, Russia’s Defense Ministry said Monday, according to state-owned news agency TASS.
Defense Ministry official Mikhail Mizintsev said that number included 11,550 people, including 1,847 children, in the previous 24 hours, “without the participation of the Ukrainian authorities.”
Those civilians “were evacuated to the territory of the Russian Federation from the dangerous regions of the Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics,” and other parts of Ukraine, according to the report. No details were provided.
Zelensky said Monday that at least 220 Ukrainian children have been killed by the Russian army since the war began, and 1,570 educational institutions have been destroyed or damaged.
Failing to seize Kyiv, the capital, Russian President Vladimir Putin shifted his focus to the Donbas, where Moscow-backed separatists have been battling Ukrainian forces since 2014.
Russia said it struck dozens of military targets in the region, including concentrations of troops and weapons and an ammunition depot near Chervone in the Zaporizhzhia region, west of the Donbas.
Ukrainian and Western officials say Moscow’s troops are firing indiscriminately, killing many civilians while making only slow progress.
The governor of the Odesa region along the Black Sea Coast, Maksym Marchenko, said on Telegram that a Russian missile strike Monday caused deaths and injuries. He gave no details. Zelensky said the attack destroyed a dormitory and killed a 14-year-old boy.
Ukraine said Russia also struck a strategic road and rail bridge west of Odesa. The bridge was heavily damaged in previous Russian strikes, and its destruction would cut a supply route for weapons and other cargo from neighboring Romania.
However a satellite image captured by Planet Labs PBC and analyzed by The Associated Press showed the bridge still standing as of noon Monday.
Another image, taken Monday, showed nearly 50 Russian military helicopters at Stary Oskol, a Russian base close to the Ukrainian border and some 175 kilometers (110 miles) northeast of the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv.
The helicopters were stationed on the tarmac, runway and grass of the otherwise civilian airport, with military equipment nearby.
In the war in Ukraine, Russia has been flying military attack helicopters low to the ground to try to avoid anti-aircraft missiles.
US official: Russia plans to annex parts of eastern Ukraine
https://arab.news/494tk
US official: Russia plans to annex parts of eastern Ukraine
- Russia is planning to hold sham referendums in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions
- At least some of the civilians were apparently taken to a village controlled by Russia-backed separatists
Voter turnout slumps, Modi ‘wave’ missing from India’s 2024 polls
- India’s general election started on April 19 and is taking place in seven phases till June 1
- Voters are battling extreme temperatures as parts of India gripped by heatwave
NEW DELHI: Voter numbers have slumped in the first and second phase of India’s general election, with experts saying that the “wave” of enthusiasm that brought incumbent Prime Minister Narendra Modi to power in 2014 was no longer present in the ongoing polls.
More than 968 million people have been registered to vote in the world’s biggest general election, in which Modi and his Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party are aiming for a rare third consecutive term in power.
The first phase of voting was on April 19 and the polls are taking place over six weeks, with results expected on June 4.
India has a total of 28 states and eight federally governed territories. Some regions complete the process on a single day, while others spread it out over several phases.
The second phase was on April 26 and the other voting dates will be May 7, May 13, May 20, May 25 and June 1.
Friday’s turnout was estimated by the Election Commission of India at 61 percent — compared with 68 percent in the second phase five years ago. In the first phase, it was 65 percent against nearly 70 percent in 2019.
The lower turnout showed “apathy toward politics,” D. Dhanuraj, chairman of the Kerala-based Center for Public Policy Research, told Arab News.
“I think it is clear now that there is no wave in favor of any party as such. In 2014, there was a wave, in 2019 there was a wave,” he said, referring to the enthusiastic pro-Modi balloting in the past two general elections.
“(In) 2024, there was a talk that there was a wave, but I think it is becoming clear that there is no such wave, no wave that would give exponential majority in the parliament to any party.”
Modi and his BJP-led National Democratic Alliance are challenged by an alliance of two dozen opposition parties — the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance, or INDIA — led by the Congress party, which has ruled the country for close to 45 years since independence in 1947.
Congress plunged to a historic low when it was swept out of power by the BJP in the 2014 and 2019 general vote, and won its second-lowest number of 52 seats in 2019, when Modi’s party enjoyed a landslide victory, winning 303 out of 543 seats in the lower house of parliament.
The party or coalition that wins at least 272 parliamentary seats forms the government.
In 2024, Modi has been aiming for 400 seats for the National Democratic Alliance led by his BJP. But the target, often cited ahead of the first phase, has not been repeated.
Although pre-poll surveys suggested Modi would easily win, it is no longer projected to be a landslide as in in the two previous elections.
“It was the electoral rhetoric of the BJP to cross 400 seats, but this reality is not happening, it seems now,” Satish Kumar Singh, political analyst in Delhi, told Arab News.
“The BJP gave that slogan just to galvanize voters. When there is less voting that also means that the BJP might not have a whopping majority, it might be close to a simple majority.”
Another factor deterring voters from standing in long queues at polling stations was the hotter-than-normal summer, with temperatures in some states on Friday exceeding 40 degrees Celsius.
“There is no wave but heatwave in this election,” Singh said. “That is keeping the voters away from the polling booths.”
Not all experts expected the lower turnout to affect the ruling party’s chances in the polls.
“There seems to me no empirical evidence that if voter turnout increases it supports any side — the ruling (party) or the opposition,” said Sandeep Shashtry, political analyst and vice-chancellor of Jagran Lakecity University in Bhopal.
“I think we cannot make a generalization about the wider implications.”
Anti-war protesters dig in as some schools close encampments after reports of antisemitic activity
- Protesters nationwide are demanding that schools cut financial ties to Israel and divest from companies they say are enabling the conflict
- Early Saturday, police in riot gear cleared an encampment on the campus of Northeastern University in Boston while several dozen students shouted and booed at them
NEW YORK: As students protesting the Israel-Hamas war at universities across US dug in Saturday and vowed to keep their demonstrations going, some universities shut down encampments after reports of antisemitic activity among the protesters.
With the death toll mounting in the war in Gaza, protesters nationwide are demanding that schools cut financial ties to Israel and divest from companies they say are enabling the conflict. Some Jewish students say the protests have veered into antisemitism and made them afraid to set foot on campus.
Early Saturday, police in riot gear cleared an encampment on the campus of Northeastern University in Boston while several dozen students shouted and booed at them from a distance, but the scene was otherwise not confrontational.
The school said in a statement that the demonstration, which began two days ago, had become “infiltrated by professional organizers” with no affiliation to the school and protesters had used antisemitic slurs.
“We cannot tolerate this kind of hate on our campus,” the statement posted on the social media platform X said.
The University of Pennsylvania took similar action Friday when interim President J. Larry Jameson called for an encampment of protesters on the west Philadelphia campus to be disbanded, saying it violates the university’s facilities policies.
The “harassing and intimidating comments and actions” by some protesters violate the school’s open expression guidelines as well as state and federal law, Jameson said, and vandalism of a statue with antisemitic graffiti was “especially reprehensible and will be investigated as a hate crime.”
“I am deeply saddened and troubled that our many efforts to respectfully engage in discourse, support open expression, and create a community that is free of hate and inclusive for everyone have been ignored by those who choose to disrupt and intimidate,” he said.
At Columbia University, where protesters have inspired pro-Palestinian demonstrations across the country, negotiations continued with those at the student encampment.
The university’s senate passed a resolution Friday that created a task force to examine the administration’s leadership, which last week called in police in an attempt to clear the protest, resulting in scuffles and more than 100 arrests.
Though the university has repeatedly set and then pushed back deadlines for the removal of the encampment, the school sent an email to students Friday night saying that bringing back police “at this time” would be counterproductive.
Decisions to call in law enforcement, leading to hundreds of arrests nationwide, have prompted school faculty members at universities in California, Georgia and Texas to initiate or pass votes of no confidence in their leadership. They are largely symbolic rebukes, without the power to remove their presidents.
But the tensions pile pressure on school officials, who are already scrambling to resolve the protests as May graduation ceremonies near.
California State Polytechnic University, Humboldt, gave protesters who have barricaded themselves inside a building since Monday until 5 p.m. Friday to leave and “not be immediately arrested.” The deadline came and went. Only some of the protesters left, others doubled down. After protesters rebuffed police earlier in the week, the campus was closed for the rest of the semester.
In Colorado, police swept through an encampment Friday at Denver’s Auraria Campus, which hosts three universities and colleges, arresting about 40 protesters on trespassing charges.
Students representing the Columbia encampment said Friday that they reached an impasse with administrators and intend to continue their protest. After meetings Thursday and Friday, student negotiators said the university had not met their primary demand for divestment.
In the letter sent to Columbia students Friday night, the university’s leadership said “we support the conversations that are ongoing with student leaders of the encampment.”
Columbia’s president, Minouche Shafik, faced significant criticism from faculty Friday, but retained the support of trustees.
A report by the university senate’s executive committee, which represents faculty, found Shafik and her administration took “many actions and decisions that have harmed Columbia University.” Those included calling in police and allowing students to be arrested without consulting faculty, misrepresenting and suspending student protest groups and hiring private investigators.
Also Friday, Columbia student protester Khymani James walked back comments made in an online video in January that recently received new attention. James said in the video that “Zionists don’t deserve to live” and people should be grateful James wasn’t killing them.
“What I said was wrong,” James said in a statement. “Every member of our community deserves to feel safe without qualification.”
James, who served as a spokesperson for the pro-Palestinian encampment as a member of Columbia University Apartheid Divest, was banned from campus Friday, according to a Columbia spokesperson.
Protest organizers said James’ comments didn’t reflect their values. They declined to describe James’ level of involvement with the demonstration.
In France, students at the Paris Institute of Political Studies, which counts President Emmanuel Macron among its many famous alumni, students blocked access to a campus building and classes went online as the wave of protests reached overseas.
Police clashed with protesters Thursday at Indiana University, Bloomington, where 34 were arrested; Ohio State University, where about 36 were arrested; and at the University of Connecticut, where one person was arrested.
The University of Southern California canceled its May 10 graduation ceremony Thursday, a day after more than 90 protesters were arrested on campus. The university said it will still host dozens of commencement events, including all the traditional individual school ceremonies.
Universities where faculty members have initiated or passed votes of no confidence in their presidents include Cal Poly Humboldt, University of Texas at Austin and Emory University.
Russia says it struck Ukrainian energy plants in response to Kyiv targeting its own energy sector
- The strikes were “in response to attempts by the Kyiv regime to damage Russian energy and industrial facilities“
- Ukraine has systematically targeted Russian oil refineries and other facilities in drone attacks in recent weeks
MOSCOW: The Russian Defense Ministry said on Saturday that its forces had carried out 35 strikes in the last week against Ukrainian energy facilities, defense factories, railway infrastructure, air defenses, and ammunition stocks.
It said in a statement that the strikes, which spanned April 20-27, were “in response to attempts by the Kyiv regime to damage Russian energy and industrial facilities.”
Ukraine has systematically targeted Russian oil refineries and other facilities in drone attacks in recent weeks, ignoring US requests not to do so.
Ukrainian officials said Russian missiles had pounded power facilities in central and western Ukraine on Saturday, increasing pressure on the ailing energy system as the country faces a shortage of air defenses despite a breakthrough in US military aid.
The Russian Defense Ministry said its campaign of strikes had been conducted using sea- and air-launched long-range precision weapons, including Kinzhal hypersonic missiles and drones.
It said it had also targeted and hit Ukrainian troop formations as well as what it described as foreign mercenaries.
Philippine capital’s financial center to become halal hub
- Makati Halal Hub to act as a platform for manufacturers, traders and consumers
- Philippines’ central business district is perceived as trendsetter for other regions
MANILA: Philippine businesses in Makati City are joining hands with the Department of Trade and Industry to make the country’s financial center a halal hub, the head of the Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry’s Makati branch said on Saturday.
Makati City in Metro Manila is often referred to as the Philippines’ central business district. It has the highest concentration of banks and multinational and local corporations in the country. Foreign embassies are also based there.
The predominantly Catholic Philippines — where Muslims constitute about 10 percent of the nearly 120 million population — plans to raise 230 billion pesos ($4 billion) in investments and generate around 120,000 jobs by expanding its domestic halal industry by 2028.
The DTI signed on Friday a memorandum of understanding with PCCI Makati to join the government’s efforts to tap into the global halal market, which is estimated to be worth more than $7 trillion.
“To be able to implement its policies more effectively — such as the promotion and development of the country’s halal industry — they (the government) have to collaborate or strike a partnership with the business community or the businessmen who will be responsible in making this a reality,” PCCI Makati President Toots Cortez told Arab News.
“We can be the catalyst. We will begin by creating awareness, especially among the MSMEs (micro, small and midsize enterprises) because, according to the records of DTI, 99.5 percent of business in the Philippines are composed of SMEs.”
The agreement on establishing the Makati Halal Hub will position the city as a “central point for innovation and business in the halal sector, spanning a variety of industries including food production, financial services, and more,” the DTI said in a statement, as it expects the initiative to “provide substantial opportunities for Filipino entrepreneurs and international investors alike, fostering a robust economic ecosystem.”
According to the vision, the hub will act as a platform facilitating connections between manufacturers, traders, buyers, distributors and consumers in the halal sector.
“If we can group together and promote halal, I think that will be the best approach … You don’t need a big budget,” Cortez said.
“There are many Muslim embassies in Makati City, many restaurants and major establishments … Many tourists come to Makati, so if we can convince the establishments in Makati to be accredited as halal, that’s a good beginning from our side as a catalyst.”
He believes that the industry’s promotion in the city will make an impact as Makati is widely perceived as a trendsetter for other Philippine regions.
“The others, they follow the lead,” Cortez said. “They follow the lead on what’s happening in Makati City.”
US food regulator gathering information on Indian spices after alleged contamination
- MDH and Everest spices are among the most popular in India and are also sold in Europe, Asia and North America
- Hong Kong this month suspended sales of four MDH and Everest blends, while Singapore recalled Everest spice mix
HYDERABAD: The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is gathering information on products of Indian spice makers MDH and Everest after Hong Kong halted sales of some of their products for allegedly containing high levels of a cancer-causing pesticide.
“The FDA is aware of the reports and is gathering additional information about the situation,” an FDA spokesperson told Reuters on Friday.
Hong Kong this month suspended sales of three MDH spice blends and an Everest spice mix for fish curries. Singapore ordered a recall of the Everest spice mix as well, saying it contains high levels of ethylene oxide, which is unfit for human consumption and a cancer risk with long exposure.
Reuters is the first to report the US FDA’s review of alleged contamination of Indian spice products.
MDH and Everest did not immediately respond to Reuters requests for comment on this matter.
Everest has previously said its spices are safe for consumption. MDH has not responded to queries about its products so far.
MDH and Everest spices are among the most popular in India and are also sold in Europe, Asia and North America. India’s food regulator, the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI), is now checking the quality standards of the two companies, following the moves in Hong Kong and Singapore.
India’s Spices Board, the government’s regulator for spice exports, said on Wednesday it had sought data on MDH and Everest exports from authorities in Hong Kong and Singapore, and was working with the companies to find the “root cause” of the quality issues as inspections started at their plants.
In 2019, a few batches of MDH’s products were recalled in the US for salmonella contamination.
