Ukraine’s Zelensky says ‘victory plan’ is ready

Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky speaks during a joint press conference with Lithuanian president, Croatian prime minister and Latvian prime minister following the opening session of Crimea Platform Summit in Kyiv on September 11, 2024. (AFP)
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Updated 19 September 2024
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Ukraine’s Zelensky says ‘victory plan’ is ready

President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Wednesday that his “Victory Plan,” intended to bring peace to Ukraine while keeping the country strong an avoiding all “frozen conflicts,” was now complete after much consultation.

Zelensky pledged last month to present his plan to US President Joe Biden, presumably next week when he attends sessions of the UN Security Council and General Assembly.

While providing daily updates on the plan’s preparation, Zelensky has given few clues of the contents, indicating only that it aims to create terms acceptable to Ukraine, now locked in conflict with Russia for more than 2 1/2 years.

“Today, it can be said that our victory plan is fully prepared. All the points, all key focus areas and all necessary detailed additions of the plan have been defined,” Zelensky said in his nightly video address.

“The most important thing is the determination to implement it.

There was, Zelensky said, no alternative to peace, “no freezing of the war or any other manipulations that would simply postpone Russian aggression to another stage.”

On Tuesday, the president said a meeting with top commanders had produced “good and strong content” in military terms, “precisely the kind that can significantly strengthen Ukraine.”

Zelensky has used as the basis for negotiations a peace plan he presented in late 2022 calling for a withdrawal of all Russian troops, the restoration of Ukraine’s post-Soviet borders and a means to bring Russian to account for its invasion.

The plan was the focal point of a “peace summit” hosted by Switzerland in June with participants pledging to convene a second summit later this year. Russia was not invited to the June summit and branded it as meaningless, though Ukraine and its allies say Moscow could attend the next gathering.

Zelensky has rejected any notion of negotiations while Russian troops occupy nearly 20 percent of the country’s territory.

Russia has repeatedly said it is willing to negotiate, but rules out discussions while Ukrainian forces remain in its southern Kursk region an incursion into the area last month. 


Kenya court to rule on bid to stop deputy president’s ouster

Updated 13 sec ago
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Kenya court to rule on bid to stop deputy president’s ouster

NAIROBI: A Kenyan court is due to rule Tuesday on a last-ditch case seeking to stop a Senate debate and vote on the impeachment of Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua.
In a historic move last week, the lower house of parliament, the National Assembly, voted overwhelmingly to impeach Gachagua on 11 charges including corruption.
The 59-year-old has denied all allegations and will continue to serve in his role until the Senate decides whether to approve his removal.
Gachagua filed the court challenge to stop the upper house’s proceedings set for Wednesday and Thursday, arguing that his impeachment had been unfair and fast-tracked.
High Court judge Enock Chacha Mwita will rule on the case at 2:30 p.m. (1130 GMT).
It is one of more than two dozen court cases that have been filed against the impeachment, the first of its kind against a deputy president since the possibility was introduced in Kenya’s revised 2010 constitution.
On Monday, the Chief Justice Martha Koome empanelled a three-judge bench to hear and determine a case consolidating six of the petitions.
Gachagua, a powerful businessman from Kenya’s biggest tribe, the Kikuyu, weathered previous corruption scandals to become deputy leader as President William Ruto’s running mate in a closely fought election in August 2022.
But in recent weeks, he has complained of being sidelined by the president and had been accused of supporting youth-led anti-government protests that broke out in June.
Gachagua, who is accused of threatening a judge among his impeachment charges, on Sunday said he pinned his hopes on the judiciary.
“I am a believer in the independence of the judiciary. I am certain that the courts will exercise judicial authority and protect and uphold the constitution and the will of the people,” he told a church service in central Kenya.
Ruto has not commented publicly on the impeachment.
The ouster will require the support of at least two-thirds of senators to pass.

Russian strike kills one, wounds 16 in south Ukraine

Updated 38 min 48 sec ago
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Russian strike kills one, wounds 16 in south Ukraine

KYIV: A Russian missile strike overnight killed a woman and wounded 16 people in Mykolaiv in southern Ukraine, where Moscow has ramped up aerial attacks, authorities said Tuesday.
Images distributed by first responders showed several buildings engulfed in flames and firefighters working to extinguish the blaze.
“Last night the enemy attacked Mykolaiv. A woman was killed,” emergency services said, adding that 16 people were injured.
Mykolaiv had an estimated pre-war population of just under half a million people and was subjected to heavy bombardment when Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022.
Ukrainian forces pushed back Russian troops from the region in the autumn of 2022.
However Russian forces have continued to strike the riverside town near the Black Sea coast and over recent weeks stepped up fatal aerial attacks on the nearby port city of Odesa, damaging civilian vessels and port facilities.
The Ukrainian air force meanwhile said it had downed 12 out of 17 Iranian-designed attack drones launched by Russia at Ukraine overnight, including over the Mykolaiv region.


Indian foreign minister to visit arch-rival Pakistan

Updated 15 October 2024
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Indian foreign minister to visit arch-rival Pakistan

  • Subrahmanyam Jaishankar will travel to Islamabad for the Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit
  • Both sides have said no bilateral talks are planned, and Jaishankar’s visit would strictly follow the summit schedule

NEW DELHI: India’s foreign minister flies to Pakistan for a summit on Tuesday, the first visit by New Delhi’s top envoy to its arch-rival neighbor in nearly a decade.
Subrahmanyam Jaishankar will travel to Islamabad for the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit to “represent India at the meeting,” the foreign ministry said Tuesday.
Both sides have said no bilateral talks are planned, and Jaishankar’s visit would strictly follow the SCO schedule.
The two nuclear-armed nations are bitter adversaries, having fought multiple wars since being carved out of the subcontinent’s partition in 1947 following British colonial rule.
The SCO comprises China, India, Russia, Pakistan, Iran, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Belarus — with 16 more countries affiliated as observers or “dialogue partners.”
The SCO is sometimes touted as an alternative to the Western-dominated NATO military alliance.
“India remains actively engaged in the SCO format,” India’s foreign ministry said.
While the SCO has a mandate to discuss security, the Islamabad summit is due to focus on trade, humanitarian and cultural issues.
The last time an Indian foreign minister visited Pakistan was in 2015 when Sushma Swaraj attended a conference on Afghanistan.
The same year, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi made a surprise visit to Lahore to meet his then-counterpart Nawaz Sharif, sparking hopes of a thaw in relations with Pakistan.
But relations plummeted in 2019 when Modi’s government revoked the limited autonomy of Indian-administered Kashmir — which led Pakistan to suspend bilateral trade and downgrade diplomatic ties with New Delhi.
The Himalayan region, home to a long-running and deadly insurgency against Indian rule, is divided between the two countries and claimed by both in full.
Pakistan’s former foreign minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari was in India’s Goa in 2023 — also a rare visit — for an SCO meeting where he and Jaishankar were involved in a verbal spat.
The two did not hold a one-on-one meeting.


US, Philippines launch war games a day after China’s Taiwan drills

Updated 15 October 2024
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US, Philippines launch war games a day after China’s Taiwan drills

  • The US and Philippines are fielding just over a thousand participants each
  • A smaller number of Australian, British, Japanese and South Korean forces are also taking part

MANILA: Thousands of US and Filipino marines launched 10 days of joint exercises in the northern and western Philippines on Tuesday, a day after China held huge drills around Taiwan.
The annual Kamandag, or Venom, exercises are focused on defending the north coast of the Philippine’s main island of Luzon, which lies about 800 kilometers from self-ruled Taiwan.
Beijing considers Taiwan part of its territory and has vowed it will never rule out using force to take it, calling Monday’s drills a “stern warning” to “separatist” forces on the island.
The joint US-Filipino exercises come amid a series of escalating confrontations between China and the Philippines over reefs and waters in the South China Sea, which Beijing claims almost in its entirety.
Philippine Marine Corps commandant Maj. Gen. Arturo Rojas stressed at Tuesday’s opening ceremony in Manila that Kamandag was long planned and had “nothing to do with whatever is happening in the region.”
The drills’ primary focus will be live-fire exercises along Luzon’s north coast, while other activities will be conducted on tiny Philippine islands between Luzon and Taiwan.
“It’s a coastal defense doctrine. The doctrine says that a would-be aggressor might be directed toward our territory,” Filipino exercise director Brig.-General Vicente Blanco told reporters.
“We are not exercising to join the fight (over Taiwan),” he added.
US Marines representative Col. Stuart Glenn said the exercises were aimed at helping the United States and its allies respond to “any crisis or contingencies.”
The western Philippine island of Palawan, facing the disputed South China Sea, will also host part of the drills.
The US and Philippines are fielding just over a thousand participants each, while smaller numbers of Australian, British, Japanese and South Korean forces are also taking part.
An amphibious landing and training on how to defend against chemical and biological warfare were also among the activities planned, according to a press kit.
As the war games began Tuesday, the Philippine government announced that one of its civilian patrol vessels had sustained minor damage on October 11 when it was “deliberately sideswiped” by a “Chinese Maritime Militia” vessel.
The Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources said the collision, which dented the front right section of the BRP Datu Cabaylo, took place about 9.3 kilometers (5.8 miles) from Thitu, a Philippine-garrisoned island in the Spratly group.
The crew were unhurt and later sailed the vessel to Thitu and completed their routine maritime patrol mission, the statement said.
Beijing has for years sought to expand its presence in contested areas of the sea, brushing aside an international ruling that its claim to most of the waterway has no legal basis.
China has deployed military and coast guard vessels in recent months in a bid to eject the Philippines from a trio of other strategically important reefs and islands in the South China Sea.


How did killing at Sikh temple lead to Canada and India expelling each other’s diplomats?

Updated 15 October 2024
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How did killing at Sikh temple lead to Canada and India expelling each other’s diplomats?

  • India rejects Ottawa’s allegations it is involved in killing of Sikh separatist in Canada 
  • Hardeep Singh Nijjar was local leader in movement to create independent Sikh homeland 

NEW DELHI: Relations between India and Canada are at a low point as the countries expelled each other’s top diplomats over an ongoing dispute about the killing of a Sikh activist in Canada.

Canada said it had identified India’s top diplomat in the country as a person of interest in an assassination plot and expelled him and five other diplomats Monday. India has rejected the accusations as absurd, and its foreign ministry said it was expelling Canada’s acting high commissioner and five other diplomats in response.

It’s the latest in an escalating dispute over the June 2023 killing of Sikh activist Hardeep Singh Nijjar.

What is the dispute about?

Nijjar was fatally shot in his pickup truck in June 2023 after he left the Sikh temple he led in the city of Surrey, British Columbia. An Indian-born citizen of Canada, he owned a plumbing business and was a leader in a movement to create an independent Sikh homeland, which is banned in India.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said in September 2023 there were credible allegations that India’s government had links to the killing. India denied the allegations at the time but said Nijjar was involved in “terrorism.”

How did relations get to this point?

Canada expelled an Indian diplomat over the dispute last year, and in response India expelled a Canadian diplomat and froze consular services for Canadians for nearly two months.

Tensions boiled over again in May, when Canadian police said they had arrested three Indian nationals accused of involvement in Nijjar’s killing and were “investigating if there are any ties to the government of India.” India rejected the allegations, saying Canada had a “political compulsion” to blame India.

What changed on Monday?

Now, Canada says that India’s top diplomat in the country is a person of interest in the killing, and that police have uncovered evidence of an intensifying campaign against Canadian citizens by agents of the Indian government.

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police said it had found evidence of the involvement of Indian agents “in serious criminal activity in Canada,” including links “to homicides and violent acts” and interference in Canada’s democratic processes, among other things.

Meanwhile, Canada’s foreign minister, Mélanie Joly, tied the Indian officials to Nijjar’s assassination and said Canada had gathered “ample, clear and concrete evidence which identified six individuals as persons of interest in the Nijjar case.”

She said India had been asked to waive diplomatic immunity and cooperate in the investigation but refused.

In a statement Monday, India’s foreign ministry said that the Canadian government “has not shared a shred of evidence” with the Indian government, “despite many requests from our side.” The ministry also called the accusations part of “a deliberate strategy of smearing India for political gains.”

Who was Nijjar?

Nijjar was a local leader in what remains of a once-strong movement to create an independent Sikh homeland known as Khalistan. The Khalistan movement is banned in India, but has support among the Sikh diaspora, particularly in Canada.

India designated Nijjar a terrorist in 2020, and at the time of his death was seeking his arrest for alleged involvement in an attack on a Hindu priest in India.

New Delhi’s anxieties about Sikh separatist groups in Canada have long been a strain on the relationship, but the two countries have maintained strong defense and trade ties, and share strategic concerns over China’s global ambitions. However, India has increasingly accused Canada of giving free rein to Sikh separatists.