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Tag: political figures – intl

  • Supreme Court returns for first private meeting of the term amid even more controversy | CNN Politics

    Supreme Court returns for first private meeting of the term amid even more controversy | CNN Politics



    CNN
     — 

    The Supreme Court returns to Washington to face a new term and the fresh reality that critics increasingly view the court as a political body.

    In the wake of a series of controversial decisions made possible by former President Donald Trump’s three nominees, including the seismic reversal of Roe v. Wade, the justices find themselves catapulted into the very center of the political discourse.

    Their opinions feature prominently on the campaign trail, approval ratings have plummeted to new lows and Democrats in Congress are vowing to regulate the third branch in the midst of allegations justices are skirting ethics rules and attacks on the very legitimacy of the court.

    So far, they have struggled to respond. At public appearances they grasp at the promise of judicial independence while sending mixed signals about changes that might be afoot.

    Tuesday, the justices will meet in person for their first closed-door conference of the term.

    Chief Justice John Roberts is at the center of it all.

    How he navigates this term will shape the trajectory of his tenure going forward. Some say he’ll remain on the sidelines, out of the fray. Others say he cannot afford to do so.

    Earlier this year, Roberts declined an invitation to appear before the Democratic-led Senate Judiciary Committee to discuss Supreme Court ethics, citing separation of powers concerns. In May, speaking before an audience in Washington, Roberts said he wanted to assure the public that the court is committed to adhering to the “highest standards of conduct.”

    It was one line in one speech.

    But at the end of June, as controversy continued amid a raft of high-profile decisions that largely broke along ideological lines, Roberts made an unusual choice. In a 6-3 opinion striking down President Joe Biden’s student loan forgiveness program, the chief strayed from the case at hand.

    He said that it had become a “disturbing feature of some recent opinions to criticize the decisions with which they disagree as going beyond the proper role of government.”

    He appeared to be responding to the dissent penned by Justice Elena Kagan and joined by Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson. “In every respect, the Court today exceeds its proper limited role in our Nation’s governance,” Kagan began.

    Noting her disagreement, Roberts took the occasion to write, “we do not mistake this plainly heartfelt disagreement for disparagement.” He added: “Any such misperception would be harmful to this institution and our country,” he wrote.

    It was unclear if the line was directed at his dissenting colleagues or critics outside of court or both, but it was an unusual digression from a justice who, by definition, lacks an obvious pulpit to defend his branch of government.

    The way forward for Roberts is not obvious.

    Even if he did believe a formal ethics code is necessary, it’s unclear whether he would need a unanimous vote to move forward. Conservative Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito might, for instance, balk at such a move arguing that it would never satisfy critics whose true goal is to damage the institution.

    Some believe Roberts ultimately will steer clear of the controversy.

    “I don’t see him moving in any direction to encourage further disclosure reforms, and I don’t see Congress as being able to get sufficient traction,” Cate Stetson, a lawyer at Hogan Lovells, said at the Cato Institute earlier this month.

    But if the court does nothing, pressure will continue.

    Senate Judiciary Chair Dick Durbin, a Democrat, traveled to the Supreme Court on September 12 as an invited guest to the annual meeting of the Judicial Conference – the policymaking body for the federal courts.

    Sitting next to the chief justice on Roberts’ home turf, Durbin lobbied him to adopt an enforceable code of conduct directed specifically at the justices, according to a source.

    Roberts and others have continuously stressed how difficult it would be to adopt such a code, particularly when it comes to recusal issues.

    In April, all nine justices released a new statement hoping to provide “clarity” to the public about their ethics procedures, noting that they consult a “wide variety of authorities” when addressing specific ethics issues. They noted that while the Judicial Conference has a code of conduct followed by lower court judges, the conference “does not supervise the Supreme Court.”

    The statement outlined complications that distinguish the Supreme Court from the lower courts.

    At the lower court level, for instance, federal judges can substitute for each other if one judge recuses from a case. That’s not true at the high court where only members can hear a dispute.

    The statement did little to appease critics who say the justices can no longer continue to voluntarily follow rules that govern lower court judges. They must, critics say, have a code of conduct that binds them directly.

    Response from the bench

    Some conservatives believe there is no impending judicial crisis. Instead, they say, critics of the court are manufacturing a controversy to delegitimize the institution and staunch the flow of conservative opinions.

    Carrie Severino, president of the conservative Judicial Crisis Network, who is also a former clerk for Justice Clarence Thomas, tweeted recently that the problem is not corruption.

    “The problem is the coordinated campaign by dark money activists, radical politicians, and a willing media to imply there is corruption, undermining the Court’s integrity and selectively smearing the justices they disagree with,” she wrote.

    Alito, who wrote the opinion overturning Roe, has taken a radically different approach than the chief justice.

    In an interview in July that appeared on The Wall Street Journal’s editorial page, Alito said forthrightly that Congress should stay out of the Supreme Court’s business.

    “I know this is controversial view, but I’m willing to say it,” he said. “No provision in the Constitution gives them the authority to regulate the Supreme Court – period.”

    Alito said that he marveled “at all the nonsense that has been written about me in the last year” and noted that in the face of a political onslaught he was rejecting the notion that judges and justices “should be mute” and leave it to others to defend them.

    “I’ve said to myself, nobody else is going to do this, so I have to defend myself,” he wrote.

    A month earlier he sought to preempt a ProPublica report that had not yet been published concerning allegations that he should have disclosed luxury travel from 2008.

    Over the summer, other justices were asked about ethics and the court’s legitimacy by friendly questioners at universities and judicial conferences – although they never addressed specifics.

    Unlike Alito, Justice Elena Kagan suggested in August that here was some daylight on the question of whether Congress has a role to regulate the Supreme Court. Last week, she told an audience in Indiana that she thought it would be a “good” idea if the court were to adapt the ethics code used by lower court justices to fit the Supreme Court.

    For her part, Justice Amy Coney Barrett noted that criticism of the court is nothing new. At an appearance before a judicial conference in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, she said that “critiques of the court” are part of its history. Public criticism “comes with the job” she said.

    Justice Brett Kavanaugh had a different message in Ohio saying he was “hopeful” that there would be some “concrete steps” taken soon to address the ethics issue.

    But his sentiment may have been aspirational.

    As the justices grapple with how to respond, they are hampered by an additional factor.

    Change at the high court comes slowly. The court’s unofficial mascot – the tortoise – can be found at the bottom of bronze lampposts on the building grounds. The tortoises are meant to symbolize the slow and steady pace of justice.

    Almost nothing at the high court comes quickly, and the institution is not new to controversy. The justices may decide to ride out the storm.

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  • Russia gives Kim Jong Un an inside look at its warplanes and frigates | CNN

    Russia gives Kim Jong Un an inside look at its warplanes and frigates | CNN



    CNN
     — 

    North Korean leader Kim Jong Un inspected warplanes, toured an airfield and visited a Pacific Fleet frigate on Saturday as the latest stop on his tour of Russia took him to Vladivostok.

    Russian state media reported that Kim had met the Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu at the Knevichi airfield in Vladivostok before both men were accompanied by the commander-in-chief of the Russian Navy, Admiral Nikolai Evmenov, on a visit to the Pacific Fleet frigate Marshal Shaposhnikov.

    The North Korean leader was shown the ship’s central command center and its modern missile weapon control systems, the Russian Ministry of Defence said via Telegram.

    The Russian defence ministry added that Admiral Evmenov had talked to Kim about the “expanded capabilities of the new control systems, which allow Kalibr sea-based cruise missiles to be effectively used against sea and coastal targets at a distance of more than 1,500 kilometers from the ship.”

    Afterwards Kim was gifted a replica of the ship and left a comment in the frigate’s guest book, though the ministry did not reveal what he wrote.

    The stop in Vladivostok is Kim’s latest in a tour of Russia and its Far East region that follows his meeting with President Vladimir Putin earlier this week, at which the North Korean leader appeared to endorse Moscow’s war on Ukraine.

    The meeting has led to speculation around the potential for some kind of military cooperation between Moscow and Pyongyang.

    The ministry said on Saturday that the frigate had been selected to showcase the modernization within the Far East region “which clearly demonstrates the capabilities of the shipbuilding industry.”

    Earlier in the morning, Kim and Shoigu had toured the Knevichi airfield in Vladivostok, according to Russian state news agency RIA Novosti, where Kim was shown Russian aircraft including the Tu-160, Tu-95MS and Tu-22M3.

    Kim also saw the Su-34, Su-30SM, Su-35S fighter jets along with the Su-25SM3 attack aircraft, RIA added.

    The Kinzhal hypersonic missile system and Russia’s Tu-214 long-haul passenger airplane were also on display, it said.

    On Friday, North Korean state media reported Kim had been “deeply impressed” by a visit to a Russian aircraft manufacturing plant.

    Kim toured facilities for aircraft design and assembly at the Komsomolsk-on-Amur Yuri Gagarin Aviation Plant, where he was struck by “the rich independent potential and modernity of the Russian aircraft manufacturing industry,” the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported.

    He met test pilots, climbed aboard a Su-57 fifth-generation fighter jet, and watched a test flight of the airplane, KCNA said.

    The facility Kim toured on Friday is Russia’s largest aviation manufacturing plant and builds and develops warplanes for the ministry of defense, including Su-35S and Su-57 fighter jets, according to the Russian state media agency TASS. Kim’s late father, Kim Jong Il, visited it in 2002.

    On Friday’s visit Kim “expressed sincere regard for Russia’s aviation technology” and how it had undergone “rapid development, outpacing the outside potential threats, and wished the plant success in its future development,” KCNA reported.

    After the tour and a luncheon, Kim left a message in the visitor’s book saying, “Witnessing the rapid development of Russia’s aviation technology and its gigantic potential” before signing it with the date and his name.

    According to a Russian government press release on Friday, Deputy Prime Minister Denis Manturov said Moscow saw “the potential for cooperation both in aircraft manufacturing and in other industries” with North Korea.

    “This is especially relevant for achieving the tasks our countries face to achieve technological sovereignty,” he said in a statement circulated on Telegram.

    North Korean leader Kim Jong Un visits an aircraft manufacturing plant in the city of Komsomolsk-on-Amur in Russia on September 15, 2023.

    While exact details remain scant on what sorts of talks have taken place behind closed doors, observers say it’s clear what each is looking for from the other.

    Moscow is desperate for fresh supplies of ammunition and shells as its war with Ukraine drags on – and Pyongyang is believed to be sitting on a stockpile.

    Meanwhile, after years of sanctions over its nuclear weapon and missiles program, North Korea is equally in need of everything from energy to food to military technology, all of which Russia has.

    When the two leaders met at the Vostochny Cosmodrome in Russia’s Amur Region, a reporter asked Putin whether Russia would help North Korea “launch its own satellites and rockets” – to which Putin responded, “That’s exactly why we came here.”

    The Russian president also said Kim “shows great interest in space, in rocketry, and they are trying to develop space.”

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  • The West fears a closer Russia and North Korea. China may not | CNN

    The West fears a closer Russia and North Korea. China may not | CNN


    Hong Kong
    CNN
     — 

    A rare meeting between Russia’s Vladimir Putin and North Korea’s Kim Jong Un at a space launch center in the Russian Far East earlier this week has triggered alarm from countries from South Korea and Japan to Ukraine, the United States and its partners in Europe.

    But China, the biggest economic lifeline for both Moscow and Pyongyang whose border lies less than 200 miles (321 kilometers) from where the two leaders met, may have a different view.

    Rather than look to oppose or limit cooperation between Russia and North Korea, Beijing may see more benefits than risks for itself in this emerging axis, analysts say – particularly in regard to its great power rivalry with the US.

    And while it’s unclear exactly how much insight Chinese officials have into negotiations between North Korea and Russia, analysts say the meeting itself may not have gone forward with some level of consideration of China’s ties to the two.

    “(Given) the importance of the support that China provides to both, China is of course looming in the background,” said Alexander Korolev, a senior lecturer in Politics and International Relations at the University of New South Wales in Australia.

    “China is too important for both North Korea and Russia, so for them it would be foolish to do something behind China’s back that it wouldn’t like,” he said. “The China factor is there.”

    Neither North Korea or Russia has released details of any agreements reached during the more than five hours Putin and Kim spent together during a tour of the Vostochny Cosmodrome, closed-door talks, and a lavish state dinner – where both leaders toasted to their countries’ growing friendship.

    But observers say it’s clear what each is looking for from the other.

    Moscow is desperate for fresh supplies of ammunition and shells to feed what’s become a war of attrition in Ukraine – and Pyongyang is believed to be sitting on a stockpile. Pyongyang, after years of sanctions over its nuclear weapon and missiles program, is in need of everything from energy to food to military technology – all of which Russia has.

    To be sure, North Korea potentially pumping munitions into Russia could raise awkward optics for China, which accounts for the vast majority of North Korea’s trade and remains Russia’s most powerful diplomatic partner after its Ukraine invasion.

    The international community has long looked to Beijing to exert pressure over its government to follow the rules.

    And in recent months Beijing has been at pains to frame itself as a proponent of peace in the conflict in Ukraine – part of a bid to win back lost goodwill in Europe, which has recoiled over Beijing’s decision to continue to strengthen its ties with Russia despite its war.

    Beijing has already signaled what its official response to any military cooperation between the two would be, with its Foreign Ministry this week repeatedly telling reporters that Wednesday’s meeting was “between the two countries” – implying it’s not China’s business.

    But while China itself has appeared careful to avoid any large-scale military support of Russia, analysts say it may see potential support from North Korea as a boost to its own geopolitical calculus, where Russia remains a crucial partner amid rising tensions with the West.

    “(If) North Korea is really prepared to provide ammunition to Russia, it would be good for the Chinese expectation that Russia doesn’t experience a major military defeat in the battlefield in Ukraine,” said Li Mingjiang, an associate professor of international relations at Singapore’s Nanyang Technological University.

    “In that respect, it’s good for China’s geopolitical interests … in terms of China and Russia on the one hand and Western countries on the other,” he said.

    China, which supported communist North Korea in the Korean War some 70 years ago, has maintained a complicated relationship with its rogue neighbor.

    Like Russia, it has backed past United Nations sanctions against North Korea’s weapons programs – though it’s also been accused of practicing an arbitrary implementation of these controls and in recent years has blocked efforts to strengthen sanctions and led efforts to ease them.

    Now, as China feels constrained by what it sees as an increasingly hostile US and its allies, it may welcome a stronger coordination with both Russia and North Korea as counterweights, analysts say.

    In that vein, a shift in the relationship between Russia and North Korea which sees Moscow lending support to Pyongyang could also take pressure off China – and strengthen its position in the region.

    “China would support a more capable North Korea in many respects – economically, militarily – and a North Korea that continues to serve as a troublemaker for the US,” said Li.

    One reason? “When you have a more assertive North Korea it will lead to some sort of incentive for the US and South Korea to seek China’s cooperation in terms of dealing with North Korea,” he said.

    Meanwhile, mutual support between the two sanctions-hit neighbors could mitigate international pressure on China over its strong ties to both.

    “Since China is not the sole supporter of either, it reduces China’s isolation for its support of both,” Yun Sun, director of the China Program at the Stimson Center think tank in Washington, who said that while their tightening of ties is not without drawbacks for Beijing, its leaders would still likely see this as a “net gain.”

    Even a transfer of military technology from Russia to North Korea, which may be concerning to China given its interests in regional stability, may have a silver lining, according to Sun.

    China has a stake in avoiding seeing tensions between North Korea and US-allied South Korea escalate into conflict, which could spark to an influx of refugees across its own borders — as well as American military response.

    “Such a (military technology) transfer will be destabilizing for the region, but China will turn the table and blame the US and its allies for pushing both Russia and North Korea in a corner. This reinforces China’s opposition to the ‘Asian NATO’ it sees US as orchestrating,” she said.

    But despite the potential gains, experts also say China is not immune to the risks that can come from a stronger Russia or a stronger North Korea.

    “Beijing has a large stake in global trade,” said Leif-Eric Easley, a professor at Ewha University in Seoul.

    “(It) can ill afford collateral damage from destabilizing pariah state behavior, such as the invasion of Ukraine and habitually threatening the use of nuclear weapons,” he said.

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  • Kim Jong Un to visit Russia at Vladimir Putin’s invitation | CNN

    Kim Jong Un to visit Russia at Vladimir Putin’s invitation | CNN



    CNN
     — 

    Kim Jong Un will travel to Russia at the invitation of his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, Pyongyang and Moscow said on Monday, amid warnings from the United States that the two leaders could strike an arms deal.

    The US government said last week that such a meeting could take place as part of Russia’s efforts to find new suppliers for weapons to use in its war against Ukraine.

    Neither country specified when or where the visit would take place, nor what would be on the agenda of any potential face-to-face. The Kremlin said in a statement Monday that Kim would pay an official visit to Russia “in the coming days,” while North Korean state media said they would “meet and have a talk.”

    However, it appears likely that the two leaders will see each other in the far eastern city of Vladivostok, where they met for the first time in April 2019. Putin reportedly arrived in Vladivostok on Monday, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said, according to state TV Russia 24. Kim, meanwhile, appears to be on a train heading to Russia, a South Korean government official told CNN.

    The visit will be Kim’s first foreign trip since the Covid-19 pandemic. With its borders sealed because of that for much of the past three years, North Korea has only recently begun to relax travel restrictions.

    It will also be only Kim’s 10th trip since assuming power in 2011. All of those came in 2018 and 2019, as the North Korean leader engaged in negotiations over his nuclear weapons and missile programs in three meetings with then-US President Donald Trump – one in Singapore, one in Hanoi and one in the demilitarized zone (DMZ) separating North and South Korea.

    Kim also made four trips to China over those two years to meet with Chinese leader Xi Jinping. The remaining trip was to the DMZ in 2018 to meet with then-South Korean President Moon Jae-in.

    Vladivostok lies 130 km (80 miles) from the border with North Korea.

    The North Korea leader is said to prefer traveling in an upscale armored train – as did his father before him – but rail travel accounts for less than half of his foreign trips. Three of this nine trips have been made in planes and two, both to the DMZ, by car.

    Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu also visited Pyongyang in July in an attempt to convince it to sell artillery ammunition.

    Last Tuesday, White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan warned that North Korea it will “pay a price” if it strikes an arms deal with Russia, though he did not elaborate on these potential repercussions.

    North Korea is already under United Nations and US sanctions imposed over Pyongyang’s weapons of mass destruction program.

    The potential Putin-Kim meeting could lead to Pyongyang getting its hands on the sort of weapons those sanctions have barred it from accessing for two decades, especially for its nuclear-capable ballistic missile program.

    It also comes after more than a year and a half of war in Ukraine has left the Russian military battered, depleted and in need of supplies.

    Following Monday’s announcement from both countries, the White House urged North Korea to “not provide or sell arms to Russia.

    “As we have warned publicly, arms discussions between Russia and the DPRK are expected to continue during Kim Jong-Un’s trip to Russia,” said National Security Council spokesperson Adrienne Watson in response to Russia and North Korea’s announcement.

    The statement also urged the country to “abide by the public commitments that Pyongyang has made to not provide or sell arms to Russia.”

    After reports emerged of North Korean arms sales to Russia in September 2022, a North Korean Defense Ministry official said at the time that Pyongyang had “never exported weapons or ammunition to Russia before and we will not plan to export them.”

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  • Why did Modi gift a cotton scarf to G20 leaders and what’s the significance? | CNN

    Why did Modi gift a cotton scarf to G20 leaders and what’s the significance? | CNN



    CNN
     — 

    Narendra Modi’s decision to gift world leaders a hand spun scarf in New Delhi on Sunday was an act rooted in history and symbolism for the Indian prime minister, as he aimed to spotlight the country’s freedom movement on the global stage.

    As leaders of the Group of 20 (G20) nations walked into the Rajghat memorial for Mohandas K. Gandhi, India’s beloved father of independence who was assassinated in 1948, they were greeted with khadi scarves, a key symbol of his non-violent resistance campaign that helped win India’s independence from British colonial rule.

    Modi was seen draping the handwoven, off-white cotton material around the necks of US President Joe Biden and British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, among others, posing for photos in front of a large backdrop of the Sabarmati Ashram in the state of Gujarat, one of the many residences Gandhi held across India.

    For Gandhi, a man who has become a global icon of peace and non-violence, khadi scarves were an emblem of self reliance, an item of clothing that could be made locally by Indians, and designed to boycott imported or British-made products during India’s colonial rule.

    It showed Indians that they were capable of growing their industrial potential, freeing the country from depending on its erstwhile colonial governors.

    Gandhi often weaved his own khadi clothing on a charkha, or spinning wheel, a device that has come to symbolize the country’s political and economic emancipation.

    At Rajghat on Sunday, world leaders gathered in silence with the scarves around their necks, standing in front of a raised marble platform, built to mark the spot of Gandhi’s cremation.

    “As diverse nations converge, Gandhi Ji’s timeless ideals guide our collective vision for a harmonious, inclusive and prosperous global future.” Modi wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter, on Sunday.

    Within the country, Gandhi’s legacy has left an indelible mark on Indian culture. His face is printed on every Indian rupee notes, while buildings, museums, streets and landmarks are routinely named after him.

    But while Modi made Gandhi an integral part of the G20 summit this weekend, the freedom fighter’s legacy within Modi’s own Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) remains complicated.

    The BJP has its roots in the Rashtriya Swayam Sangh (RSS), a prolific Hindu-nationalist organization that counts Modi among its members.

    The RSS adheres to Hindutva, an ideology that favors the country’s majority Hindus and has expressed favor for a vision of an explicitly Hindu state, instead of the secular one Gandhi envisaged and helped create.

    When India won its independence from the British in 1947, right-wing Hindu nationalists rallied for the carving of British India into two separate states: Hindu-majority India and Muslim-majority Pakistan. Gandhi, on the other hand, was against the country’s partition, instead advocating for a united India of all faiths.

    Less than a year later, Gandhi was assassinated by Nathuram Godse, a former RSS member. And in recent years, there has been a growing fringe movement that worships the assassin, seeking to rehabilitate his image as a Hindu nationalist icon.

    At the same time, the BJP and its supporters have been accused of downplaying the legacy of India’s first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, a longtime Gandhi admirer and ally.

    Modi has condemned Godse’s worship and continuously praised and paid his respect to Gandhi, both inside and outside of India.

    But opposition politicians called out Sunday’s memorial service for what they said was a double standard.

    “Every RSS-BJP worker must watch this video. Your hero, Nathuram Godse, killed Mahatma Gandhi,” wrote the newly formed INDIA alliance, a group of political parties that have come together to unseat Modi in next year’s general election, on social media.

    “For decades, you propagated falsehoods against Gandhi Ji. You yourselves are filled with hatred towards him and continue to diminish his contributions and spread lies about him.”

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  • Biden heads to Vietnam in latest attempt to draw one of China’s neighbors closer to the US | CNN Politics

    Biden heads to Vietnam in latest attempt to draw one of China’s neighbors closer to the US | CNN Politics


    Hanoi, Vietnam
    CNN
     — 

    President Joe Biden will arrive at Chinese leader Xi Jinping’s doorstep on Sunday with a deal in hand to draw yet another one of China’s neighbors closer to the United States.

    In just the last five months, Biden has hosted the Philippines’ president at the White House for the first time in over a decade; he has fêted the Indian prime minister with a lavish state dinner; and he has hosted his Japanese and South Korean counterparts for a summit ripe with symbolism at the storied Camp David presidential retreat.

    At each turn, Biden’s courtship and his team’s steadfast diplomacy have secured stronger diplomatic, military and economic ties with a network of allies and partners joined if not by an outright sense of alarm at China’s increasingly aggressive military and economic posture, then at least by a growing sense of caution and concern.

    The latest page in the US’s Indo-Pacific playbook will come via the establishment of a “comprehensive strategic partnership” that will put the US on par with Vietnam’s highest tier of partners, including China, according to US officials familiar with the matter.

    “It marks a new period of fundamental reorientation between the United States and Vietnam,” a senior administration official said ahead of Biden’s arrival in Hanoi, saying it would expand a range of issues between the two countries.

    “It’s not going to be easy for Vietnam, because they’re under enormous pressure from China,” the official went on. “We realize the stakes and the President is going to be very careful how he engages with Vietnamese friends.”

    The US’ increasingly tight-knit web of partnerships in the region is just one side of the US’s diplomatic strategy vis-à-vis China. On a separate track, the Biden administration has also pursued more stable ties and improved communication with Beijing over the last year, with a series of top Cabinet secretaries making the trip to the Chinese capital in just the last few months.

    The latter part of that playbook has delivered fewer results thus far than Biden’s entreaties to China’s wary neighbors, a dichotomy that was on stark display as Biden attended the G20 in New Delhi, while Chinese leader Xi Jinping did not.

    The president did not appear overly concerned when questioned Saturday about his Chinese counterpart’s absence at the summit.

    “It would be nice to have him here,” Biden said, with Modi and a handful of other world leaders by his side. “But, no, the summit is going well.”

    As Biden and Xi jockey for influence in Asia and beyond, merely showing up can be seen as a power play and Biden sought to make the most of Xi’s absence, seizing the opening to pitch the United States’ sustained commitment both to the region and to developing nations around the world.

    In Vietnam, it’s not only China whose influence Biden is competing with. As he arrived, reports suggested Hanoi was preparing a secret purchase of weapons from Russia, its longtime arms supplier.

    On Monday, Biden plans to announce steps to help Vietnam diversify away from an over-reliance on Russian arms, a senior administration official said.

    As China’s economy slows down and its leader ratchets up military aggressions, Biden hopes to make the United States appear a more attractive and reliable partner. In New Delhi, he did so by wielding proposals to boost global infrastructure and development programs as a counterweight to China.

    Beijing and Moscow have both condemned a so-called “Cold War mentality” that divides the world into blocks. The White House insists it is seeking only competition, not conflict.

    Still, the desire to pull nations into the fold has been evident.

    Traffic whizzes through Hanoi's old quarter

    On Saturday, Biden held a photo op with the leaders of India, Brazil and South Africa – three members of the BRICS grouping that Xi has sought to elevate as a rival to US-dominated summits like the G20.

    If there is a risk in that approach, it is leaving nations feeling squeezed by rival giants. For Biden, however, there is an imperative in at least offering poorer nations an alternative to China when it comes to investments and development.

    But increasingly, China’s neighbors – like Vietnam – are seeking a counterweight to Beijing’s muscular and often unforgiving presence in the region, even if they are not prepared to entirely abandon China’s sphere of influence in favor of the US’.

    “We’re not asking or expecting the Vietnamese to make a choice,” the senior administration official said. “We understand and know clearly that they need and want a strategic partnership with China. That’s just the nature of the beast.”

    Days before Biden’s visit and the expected strategic partnership announcement, China sent a senior Communist Party official to Vietnam to enhance “political mutual trust” between the two communist neighbors, the official Chinese Xinhua news agency reported.

    Asked about Biden’s upcoming visit to Vietnam, China’s Foreign Ministry on Monday warned the US against using its relations with individual Asian countries to target a “third party.”

    “The United States should abandon Cold War zero-sum game mentality, abide by the basic norms of international relations, not target a third party, and not undermine regional peace, stability, development and prosperity,” ministry spokesperson Mao Ning told a daily briefing.

    Vietnam has also sought to maintain good ties with China. Its Communist Party chief was the first foreign leader to call on Xi in Beijing after the Chinese leader secured an unprecedented third term last October. In June, Vietnam’s prime minister met Xi during a state visit to China.

    Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken meets with Chairman of the Communist Party of Vietnam's Commission for External Relations Le Hoai Trung at the Department of State.

    But even as it seeks to avoid China’s wrath, Vietnam is increasingly pulled toward the US out of economic self-interest – its trade with the US has ballooned in recent years and it is eager to benefit from American efforts to diversify supply chains outside of China – as well as concern over China’s military build-up in the South China Sea.

    Experts say those tightened partnerships are as much a credit to the Biden administration’s comprehensive China strategy as it is a consequence of the way China has increasingly aggressively wielded its military and economic might in the region.

    “China has long complained about the US alliance network in its backyard. It has said that these are vestiges of the Cold War, that the US needs to stop encircling China, but it’s really China’s own behavior and its choices that have driven these countries together,” said Patricia Kim, a China expert at the Brookings Institution.

    “So in many ways, China’s foreign policy has backfired.”

    The upgrading of the US-Vietnam relationship carries huge significance given Washington’s complicated history with Hanoi.

    The two countries have gone from mortal enemies that fought a devastating war to increasingly close partners, even with Vietnam still run by the same Communist forces that ultimately prevailed and sent the US military packing.

    While the upgrading of that relationship has been a decade in the making, US officials say a concerted drive to take the relationship to new heights carried that years-long momentum over the line.

    A late June visit to Washington by Vietnam’s top diplomat, Chairman Le Hoai Trung, crystallized that possibility. During a meeting with national security adviser Jake Sullivan, the two first discussed the possibility of upgrading the relationship, according to a Biden administration official.

    As he walked back to his office, Sullivan wondered whether the US could be more ambitious than a one-step upgrade in the relationship – to “strategic partner” – and directed his team to travel to the region and deliver a letter to Trung proposing a two-step upgrade that would take the relations to their highest-possible level, putting the US on par with Vietnam’s other “comprehensive strategic partners”: China, Russia, India and South Korea.

    Sullivan would speak again with Trung on July 13 while traveling with Biden to a NATO summit in Helsinki.

    The conversation pushed the possibility of a two-step upgrade in a positive direction, but it wasn’t until a mid-August visit to the White House by Vietnam’s ambassador to Washington that an agreement was in hand. Inside Sullivan’s West Wing office, the two finalized plans to take the US-Vietnam relationship to new heights and for Biden and Vietnam’s leader, General Secreatary Nguyen Phu Trong, to shake hands in Hanoi.

    The trip was still being finalized when Biden revealed during an off-camera fundraiser that he was planning to visit. The remark sent the planning into overdrive.

    Still, US officials are careful not to characterize the rapprochement with Vietnam – or with the Philippines, India, Japan and Korea, or its AUKUS security partnership with Australia and the United Kingdom – as part of a comprehensive strategy to counter China’s military and economic heft in the Indo-Pacific.

    “I think that’s a deliberate design by the Biden administration,” said Yun Sun, the China program director at the Stimson Center. “You don’t want countries in the region or African countries to feel that the US cares about them only because of China because that shows a lack of commitment. That shows that, ‘Well, we care about you only because we don’t want you to go to the Chinese.’”

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  • Zelensky dismisses compromise with Putin, pointing to Prigozhin’s death | CNN

    Zelensky dismisses compromise with Putin, pointing to Prigozhin’s death | CNN


    Kyiv
    CNN
     — 

    Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky has said the death of Yevgeny Prigozhin – the Russian mercenary leader whose plane crashed weeks after he led a mutiny against Moscow’s military leadership – shows what happens when people make deals with Russian leader Vladimir Putin.

    As Ukraine’s counteroffensive moves into a fourth month, with only modest gains to show so far, Zelensky told CNN’s Fareed Zakaria he rejected suggestions it was time to negotiate peace with the Kremlin.

    “When you want to have a compromise or a dialogue with somebody, you cannot do it with a liar,” Volodymyr Zelensky said.

    The Wagner leader’s dramatic death, which followed a short-lived rebellion that threatened the authority of the Russian president, was a warning to be heeded, Zelensky suggested.

    While the United States and other key Ukrainian allies continue to supply weapons to Kyiv, and stress that conditions to pursue a “just and durable” peace are not yet in place, a handful of world leaders, such as Brazil’s Lula Da Silva, have put the onus on Ukraine to end the war.

    As evidence for his position, Zelensky cited other countries which have been attacked by Russian soldiers and continue to be partially occupied by them.

    “Did you see any compromise from Putin on other issues? With Georgia? With Moldova?” Zelensky asked rhetorically.

    Ukraine has made incremental gains in the south amid fierce fighting with Russian troops, accounts from the front lines suggest.

    Geolocated videos on Friday showed a wasteland of shell holes, abandoned trenches and wrecked military hardware in the area between Robotyne, Verbove and Novoprokopivka — a triangle of villages that hold the key for Ukrainians to getting closer to Tokmak, an important hub for Russian defenses.

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  • North Korea says it launched new ‘tactical nuclear attack’ submarine | CNN

    North Korea says it launched new ‘tactical nuclear attack’ submarine | CNN



    CNN
     — 

    North Korea launched a new “Korean-style tactical nuclear attack submarine” on Wednesday, according to the state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), during a ceremony attended the country’s leader Kim Jong Un.

    The new submarine “will perform its combat mission as one of core underwater offensive means of the naval force of the DPRK,” Kim said during the ceremony according to KCNA. DPRK stands for the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.

    The submarine, named “Hero Kim Kun Ok,” would herald “the beginning of a new chapter for bolstering up the naval force of the DPRK,” KCNA reported.

    “There is no room to step back in the drive for the expansion of the naval vessel-building industry as it is the top priority task to be fulfilled without fail,” Kim said according to KCNA.

    The announcement comes after North Korea said it had simulated a nuclear missile attack over the weekend to warn the United States of “nuclear war danger.”

    The simulation was in response to joint military exercises conducted by the United States and South Korea, earlier in the week, KCNA reported at the time.

    The US-South Korea live fire exercises, based on a counterattack against invading forces, began on August 31.

    US and South Korean Presidents had pledged to step up military cooperation following a May summit meeting in Seoul, and after North Korea conducted more than a dozen missiles tests this year, compared to only four tests in 2020, and eight in 2021.

    North Korea is set to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the country’s founding on September 9.

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  • Gabon’s military coup has overthrown a powerful political dynasty. Here’s what to know | CNN

    Gabon’s military coup has overthrown a powerful political dynasty. Here’s what to know | CNN



    CNN
     — 

    A military coup thrust the Central African nation of Gabon into turmoil Wednesday, unseating the president – whose family had held power for more than half a century – just minutes after he was named the winner of a contested election.

    Ousted President Ali Bongo Ondimba, also known as Ali Bongo, has faced accusations of election fraud and corruption since he began ruling the oil-rich but poverty-stricken nation nearly 14 years ago. Following the coup, residents in the country’s capital were seen celebrating and embracing soldiers on the street.

    But much remains uncertain, with Bongo reportedly under house arrest, his son arrested, all borders closed and the government ostensibly shut down. International leaders have expressed concern and condemnation of the coup, some warning their citizens in Gabon to shelter in place.

    Here’s what you need to know.

    The military’s power grab began Wednesday, shortly after Gabon’s election authority said Bongo had been re-elected president following last weekend’s election.

    Men in army uniforms announced on national television that they had seized power. They said the election results were voided, all borders shut, and numerous government bodies dissolved, including both houses of parliament.

    The coup leaders said Bongo had been placed under house arrest, surrounded by “family and doctors.” The ousted president’s son, Noureddin Bongo Valentin, was arrested alongside six others for “high treason.”

    A video aired by the Agence France-Presse news agency shows Bongo seated in what looks like a library, saying he was “at the residence” and didn’t know what was happening. “My son is somewhere, my wife is another place,” he said.

    It was not immediately clear under what circumstances the clip was filmed.x

    Meanwhile, the junta named Gen. Brice Oligui Nguema – who was once the bodyguard of Bongo’s late father, the previous ruler of Gabon – as a transitional leader.

    Speaking to French newspaper Le Monde on Wednesday, Oligui claimed Bongo was enjoying “all his rights” as a “normal Gabonese” citizen.

    Videos of celebration in Gabon circulated online Wednesday, including footage of soldiers carrying Oligui on their shoulders and shouting “president.”

    Residents in the capital Libreville were seen dancing on the streets, according to videos shared with CNN and posted on social media. In one video obtained by CNN, people can be seen shouting “liberated!” and waving the Gabon flag in the Nzeng Ayong district of the capital, alongside military vehicles.

    Similar scenes played out in other parts of Gabon, including the second-largest city Port-Gentil.

    Some members of the Gabonese diaspora also celebrated Wednesday, with students from Gabon gathering outside the country’s embassy in Dakar, Senegal.

    “I assure you that what the Gabonese people wanted was just for the Bongo PDG system to leave power,” one student said, referring to Bongo’s political party, according to Reuters. “Because as we said, 60 years is too much.”

    Gabonese soldiers hoist up Gen. Brice Oligui Nguema in Libreville on August 30, 2023.

    It’s hard to say – and there’s still a lot we don’t know.

    The junta will temporarily restore the country’s constitutional court, resume domestic flights and establish the “institutions of the transition,” a spokesperson said Thursday. The military is expected to swear in Oligui as transitional president before the constitutional court on Monday.

    It also pledged to continue public services in the country, and to follow the country’s commitments domestically and internationally.

    The military imposed a curfew from 6 p.m. to 6 a.m. and national borders will remain closed “until further notice,” a junta spokesperson said. However, Oligui has ordered signal to be restored to international radio and television channels.

    But questions remain over what will happen to the country’s leadership; what awaits Bongo and his family; and what the coup means for Gabon’s international standing and diplomatic relationships.

    On Thursday, Gabon’s main opposition members expressed gratitude to the military – but called on it to resume the election process, complete the vote count and grant victory to Bongo’s main challenger in the election.

    The opposition representative invited military leaders to talks, and to “limit the consequences in the lives of our compatriots.”

    Ali Bongo, 64, took over from his father, Omar Bongo, who died of cardiac arrest while receiving treatment for intestinal cancer in Span in 2009, following nearly 42 years in office.

    The elder Bongo came to power in 1967, seven years after Gabon gained independence from France.

    He ruled over the small nation with an iron fist, imposing a one-party system for years and only allowing multi-party rule in 1991, though his party retained its grip on government.

    Ali Bongo began his political career in 1981, serving as foreign minister, congressman and defense minister before becoming president in 2009, according to the Gabonese embassy website in the United States.

    Gabon's then-President Omar Bongo Ondimba with bodyguard Brice Oligui Nguema and French President Nicolas Sarkozy in Paris on July 2, 2008.

    But the Bongos have their fair share of critics, especially given the country’s enormous wealth gap. A French financial police investigation in 2007 found the Bongo family owned 39 properties in France, 70 bank accounts, and nine luxury cars worth a total of 1.5 million euros, according to Reuters.

    Each of Ali Bongo’s three election victories has been deeply disputed, sometimes sparking violent nationwide protests. This week’s election has been decried by the opposition as fraudulent; Bongo’s team has rejected allegations of electoral irregularities.

    Similarly in 2016, after Bongo was named the election victor, his main challenger said the decision by the country’s constitutional court to validate the contested result was “biased.” Another failed coup attempt against Bongo took place in 2019.

    Gabon's ousted president Ali Bongo Ondimba appears in a video aired after the coup on August 30.

    There have been multiple coups over the past three years in Africa’s former French colonies – Mali, Guinea, Burkina Faso, Chad, Niger, Tunisia and now Gabon – that threaten a reversal of the democratization process the continent has undergone in the past two decades.

    Coups in Africa were rampant in the early postcolonial decades, with coup leaders offering similar reasons for toppling governments: corruption, mismanagement and poverty, according to political analyst Remi Adekoya.

    These justifications still resonate with many Africans today, he wrote for CNN in 2021 – and in many countries, people feel these problems are worsening. All the while, the population is growing in the world’s youngest continent, intensifying already fierce competition for resources.

    These conditions have helped drive more recent coups – with many young Africans disillusioned with allegedly corrupt leaders and ready for radical change, as seen by the celebrations in Gabon Wednesday, and similar celebrations after the Guinea coup two years ago.

    The Gabon coup has been widely criticized by other African nations and in the West. The African Union, representing 55 member states, condemned the coup and has suspended Gabon from participating in all of the group’s activities “until the restoration of constitutional order.”

    The Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS) also condemned the takeover and called for dialogue to return the country to civilian rule. It is expected to hold a meeting with the heads of state of member nations to discuss “the path to follow” regarding Gabon.

    United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres also condemned the coup Wednesday, according to his spokesperson. Guterres expressed concern over “reports of serious infringements of fundamental freedoms” during the contested election, but urged all parties to respect the rule of law and human rights.

    US State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said Wednesday the United States is “strongly opposed to military seizures or unconstitutional transfers of power,” and urged coup leaders to “preserve civilian rule.” He added: “The United States stands with the people of Gabon.”

    The US embassy in Gabon advised its citizens in the country to shelter in place and limit “unnecessary movements around town.” Americans in Gabon should “keep a low profile … avoid demonstrations … make contingency plans to leave … (and) have evacuation plans that do not rely on US government assistance,” it said on its website.

    The European Union’s top diplomat said the bloc “rejects” the coup, though he said the EU shared “deep concerns” about how the electoral process was held. He said the EU currently has no plans to evacuate its staff based in Gabon.

    Similar statements were made by other European nations including the United Kingdom, Germany, and Spain.

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  • Putin’s war is forcing Russians to ditch a favorite holiday destination | CNN

    Putin’s war is forcing Russians to ditch a favorite holiday destination | CNN



    CNN
     — 

    For more than nine years, Russian tourists vacationing in Crimea didn’t need to give much thought to the fact that their country was waging war on Ukraine – or that their sun lounger was parked on occupied territory.

    But with Kyiv’s counteroffensive underway, the southern Ukrainian peninsula is no longer the safe haven such holidaymakers had become accustomed to since Moscow annexed it in 2014.

    Crimea has experienced a spate of attacks in recent weeks, including a seaborne raid by Ukrainian special forces on Thursday and a series of drone attacks on Friday. The bridges that connect Crimea to Russia and to southern Ukrainian areas under Russian control have been struck repeatedly in recent months.

    Ukraine has claimed responsibility for some of these strikes and Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov has warned its assaults will continue.

    The attacks are forcing Russian tourists to reconsider their plans. Svitlana, a Russian woman who used to work as a manager at a tourist agency in Crimea, told CNN the security situation has caused her work to dry up.

    Svitlana asked for her last name to remain private, as she was scared about the consequences of speaking to Western media. She left Crimea earlier this summer and moved to St. Petersburg in Russia.

    “I recently went there again in the hope that everything will end soon and they will agree on something to end the conflict. But I stayed for four months and realized that nothing will end anytime soon,” she told CNN.

    “Tourism is all gone. There was less tourism last year and this year it has completely disappeared. Last year, tourists canceled reservations when it all started and this year they didn’t even book,” she said.

    Crimea is economically dependent on the tourism industry, which is why the Russian-installed local authorities keep encouraging visitors to come despite the attacks. The Crimean Ministry of Resorts and Tourism has set up a new helpline for Russian tourists this summer and said it was working with hotels to make sure those who arrive or leave late because of security issues do not face additional charges or cancellations.

    Tour operators and hotels are also offering heavily discounted trips and free perks to lure in more tourists. The Russian Union of Travel Industry said that hotel prices in Crimea have dropped by 30% this summer season compared to 2022 because of falling demand.

    But the discounts are not working. The Russia-appointed administration said the average booking rate for August stood at 40%, meaning the majority of hotel rooms remained empty this summer.

    Svitlana said that most people who are still vacationing in Crimea are booking low budget holidays, either camping or staying in the cheapest hotels or private accommodation. People who could afford to stay in the more upscale resorts are going to other, safer destinations.

    She told CNN she did not enjoy her time in Crimea. “I’m so tired of the constant warplanes overhead, of the constant military in the city, of the wounded, of these poor people running away with frightened eyes, of the military equipment that almost crushed me a couple of times,” she said, recalling an incident when an armored personnel carrier nearly collided with her car.

    Crimea has always been popular with Russian tourists, many of whom remember vacationing there during Soviet times. But the number visiting the peninsula ballooned following Moscow’s annexation in 2014.

    While 5 million came in 2015, the first full year under Russian control, that number had risen to 9.4 million by 2021, according to the Russia-installed Crimean tourism ministry.

    Svitlana still remembers the bumper season. “Profits brought that year were more than in the last 10 years. During the pandemic, people stayed at home and then rushed into (Crimea) when everything opened,” she said.

    Ukraine says the influx of Russian citizens hasn’t been limited to tourism. Ukraine’s Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said in March that 800,000 Russians had moved to Crimea permanently since it was annexed.

    People relax on a beach on the Black Sea in Yalta, Crimea, on June 19, 2023.

    The peninsula has seen a flow of cash from tourism and the Russian government, which has poured money into Crimean infrastructure.

    Chief among these investments was the $3.7 billion Kerch Strait Bridge, Europe’s longest bridge and a pet project of Putin. Its 2018 opening was hailed as the physical “reunification” of Crimea with the Russian mainland.

    The 19-kilometer (nearly 12-mile) bridge made it even easier for Russian tourists to travel to Crimea at a time when the rest of the world had become a lot more expensive. Many Western countries imposed economic sanctions on Russia following the annexation, and the value of the ruble nosedived.

    After Moscow launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February last year, a number of countries closed their doors to Russian tourists. The European Union suspended its visa facilitation agreement with Russia, making it harder for Russians to apply for an EU visa. According to the Association of Russian Tour Operators (ATOR), trips by Russians to European countries were down by 88% in the first half of this year compared to the first half of 2019, the last year unaffected by travel bans or pandemic restrictions. There are no direct flights between Russia and the EU.

    Crimea suddenly became one of the few sunny beach destinations Russian tourists could still visit without having to spend a lot of money.

    “People come to Crimea because Europe is closed and prices are very expensive in Turkey now. Where else can we rest? Sochi (a resort city in Russia) is crowded, (and has) crazy prices. We have nowhere else (to go) so people go to the Crimea,” Svitlana told CNN.

    But the Kerch bridge’s strategic and symbolic importance has made it an attractive target for the Ukrainians.

    The first strike came last October, when a huge explosion severely curtailed road and rail traffic on the bridge. While Kyiv did not comment on the incident at the time, the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) acknowledged in June that it was behind the attack.

    Another major assault came last month, when a Ukrainian experimental sea drone caused serious damage to the road lanes of the bridge, and, according to Russian officials, killed two civilians.

    The attack was frightening enough to scare away many of the Russian tourists who had still been planning to come. The Russia-appointed head of the State Council of the Republic of Crimea, Vladimir Konstantinov, said that 10% of holiday bookings in Crimea were canceled in the following days.

    ATOR said hotel bookings dropped 45% in the second half of July compared to the first half.

    Security on the bridge has increased following the attacks and ATOR said last month that on some occasions, traffic jams stretching for eight miles formed on it.

    The authorities told tourists to avoid the bridge and travel instead through occupied Ukraine, a route that is about 800 kilometers (500 miles) long and cuts through numerous areas heavily impacted by the war, including Mariupol, which was nearly leveled by Russian bombardment last spring.

    “There are military and police checkpoints along the route,” the guidance tells tourists wanting to travel to Crimea through the occupied areas, adding that clearing each checkpoint shouldn’t take “more than 10 minutes per vehicle.” The guidance suggests bringing cash and downloading all maps in advance so that they can be accessed without internet.

    Explosions are seen in June near the Kerch bridge that connects occupied Crimea to Russia.

    The security situation is unlikely to improve any time soon.

    Kyiv’s forces have stepped up attacks in the past two months, striking both the peninsula and ships navigating Ukrainian territorial waters around it several times. The Crimean port city of Sevastopol is a major naval base for Russia’s Black Sea Fleet.

    The Ukrainian military said that its latest operation against the peninsula on Thursday morning had left at least 30 Russians dead.

    Ukraine has been using aerial and sea drones to target ammunition depots, oil storage facilities and other structures. “All these targets are official targets because it will reduce their capacity to fight against us (and) will help to save the lives of Ukrainians,” Reznikov, the defense minister, said last month in an interview with CNN.

    Asked if Ukraine’s goal was to permanently disable the bridge, Reznikov responded that it was “normal tactics to ruin the logistic lines of your enemy, to stop the options to get more ammunition, to get more fuel, to get more food.”

    According to the Ukrainian government, more than 50,000 people fled Crimea to other parts of Ukraine after the annexation. However, Crimean NGOs estimate the number of refugees might be twice as high, as not everyone has officially registered with the government.

    Roughly 2.5 million people lived in Crimea before the annexation.

    Many of those who left had their properties confiscated and auctioned off by the Russian authorities, with the proceeds going to Russia’s armed forces, according to the authorities. Holiday homes owned by Ukrainians living elsewhere – including a Yalta apartment belonging to President Volodymyr Zelensky himself – were nationalized by Russia, according to the Russia-appointed chairman of the State Council of the Republic of Crimea, Vladimir Konstantinov.

    Svitlana told CNN that some of the properties confiscated by the Russian authorities were passed onto Russian citizens and people coming to Crimea from Russian-occupied areas in southern Ukraine.

    Those loyal to Kyiv who have stayed have been subjected to a brutal regime. Human rights groups have documented cases of activists, politicians, public figures and residents being kidnapped and held by pro-Russian authorities.

    Remaining Ukrainian citizens have been forced to apply for Russian citizenship. Those who have refused have been persecuted, according to the Crimean Human Rights Group.

    CNN has spoke to one Ukrainian resident of Crimea who confirmed the atmosphere of terror. The person was so scared for their safety that they asked for their identity to be concealed and no quotes to be published.

    Ukrainian officials, including Zelensky, have repeatedly said the war will not end until Crimea is back under Ukrainian control.

    Before its annexation, Crimea was home to about 5% of the Ukrainian population and accounted for almost 4% of its GDP. “We cannot imagine Ukraine without Crimea. And while Crimea is under the Russian occupation, it means only one thing: The war is not over yet,” Zelensky told CNN in an interview last month.

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  • Zimbabwe’s President Mnangagwa reelected after tense contest | CNN

    Zimbabwe’s President Mnangagwa reelected after tense contest | CNN



    CNN
     — 

    Zimbabwe’s incumbent President Emmerson Mnangagwa was declared the winner in the country’s presidential elections on Saturday after securing an absolute majority in a tense presidential contest that was marred by delays.

    “The Zimbabwe Electoral Commission has announced the 2023 presidential election results. His Excellency President Emmerson Mnangagwa was declared the winner with 2,350,711 votes, consisting 52.6% of the vote, followed by Nelson Chamisa of the Citizens Coalition for Change (CCC) party who scored 1,906,734, which is 44% of the vote,” Zimbabwe’s Information Ministry tweeted on Saturday.

    The 80-year-old’s victory extends the Zanu-PF’s decades-long stranglehold on Zimbabwe’s politics, having been the dominant party in the country since it gained independence from Britain in 1980.

    Chamisa, 45, had been upbeat about victory, and has now rejected the results announced by the electoral body. It’s not immediately known if he will mount a legal challenge.

    His party earlier decried the late deployment of voting materials that triggered widespread voting delays and also cited some alleged irregularities in the voting process.

    In a statement on Wednesday, the CCC said some of its candidates were omitted from the ballot papers, which in some cases, it added, were printed with the photos of the ruling party’s candidates on CCC’s rolls.

    The electoral commission did not respond to those allegations.

    Voting continued for a second day in parts of Zimbabwe where polling started behind schedule on Wednesday. A presidential decree extended voting until Thursday in three provinces, including the capital Harare where Chamisa’s party enjoys popular support.

    Observers commended the peaceful conduct of the polls but said the election process fell short of many regional and international standards.

    The European Union Election Observation Mission (EU EOM) said in a preliminary report released on Friday that “fundamental freedoms were increasingly curtailed” during the elections, adding that “acts of violence and intimidation” resulting in a “climate of fear” were also witnessed during the polls.

    Around 40 election monitors were arrested by Zimbabwe’s police Thursday for allegedly co-ordinating the release of results ahead of the final tally of the ballots.

    Human rights group Amnesty International said the arrests occurred “after the Zimbabwe NGO Forum released a report detailing irregularities that they had observed on election day.”

    This was the second election in Zimbabwe since authoritarian leader Robert Mugabe was deposed by the military in 2017.

    Mnangagwa, nicknamed “The Crocodile,” succeeded Mugabe after helping to orchestrate the coup that ousted him. He retained his grip on power the following year when he beat Chamisa in a hotly contested presidential vote.

    In that election, in 2018, Mnangagwa won 51% of the total ballots, while Chamisa took 44%. The results were disputed by Chamisa, who described the election as “fraudulent and illegal” and mounted a legal challenge. However, Mnangagwa was sworn in after Zimbabwe’s constitutional court upheld his victory.

    Analysts said the outcome of the latest election was easier to predict. “I’m not sure that it will be a game-changing election,” said Eldred Masunungure, an expert in politics and governance at the University of Zimbabwe. “I don’t see any signals or any indications that it is a watershed election,” he told CNN ahead of the Wednesday polls.

    Mnangagwa’s Zanu-PF party also told CNN it expected to win by a landslide. “We are going to wallop the opposition,” its national spokesperson Chris Mutsvangwa said in the buildup to the election.

    “It will be a landslide against the opposition,” he added.

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  • Putin sends condolences to Wagner chief Prigozhin’s family after crash | CNN

    Putin sends condolences to Wagner chief Prigozhin’s family after crash | CNN



    CNN
     — 

    Russian President Vladimir Putin made his first public comments Thursday on the plane crash believed to have killed Yevgeny Prigozhin, saying the Wagner leader had made “serious mistakes in life.”

    Putin said he was sending condolences to “Wagner Group employees” on board the plane that crashed on Wednesday.

    The crash took place northwest of Moscow and killed all on board, said Russia’s aviation agency, including Prigozhin, chief of the mercenary group that gained prominence for its brutal methods worldwide and its battleground victories in the Ukraine war.

    “First of all, I want to express my sincere condolences to the families of all the victims, this is always a tragedy. Indeed, if they were there, it seems … preliminary information suggests that Wagner Group employees were also on board,” Putin said during a meeting with the head of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) Denis Pushilin in the Kremlin. 

    Speaking about Prigozhin in the past tense, Putin said he’d known the Wagner chief “for a very long time,” and that he was “a talented man, a talented businessman.”

    “He was a man of difficult fate, and he made serious mistakes in life, and he achieved the results needed both for himself and when I asked him about it – for a common cause, as in these last months,” the Russian president said.

    The crash of Prigozhin’s plane happened two months after Prigozhin and Wagner staged their insurrection, the biggest challenge to Putin’s rule in over two decades.

    Just days after the mutiny, a furious Putin made it clear that he viewed the actions of Wagner as a form of treason. While he did not mention Prigozhin by name, he accused “the organizers of the rebellion” of betraying Russia itself.

    A witness to the crash told Reuters he saw a wing fly off the plane before it headed toward the ground on Wednesday. “It glided down on one wing. It didn’t nose-dive, it was gliding,” he said.

    Prigozhin’s apparent death follows a series of incidents in which Kremlin critics have died or had attempts made on their life.

    No evidence has been presented that points to the involvement of the Kremlin or Russian security services in the crash. The cause of the crash is unknown and Russian authorities have launched a criminal investigation.

    Putin pledged this investigation would be thorough. “But what is absolutely certain, the head of the Investigative Committee reported to me this morning. They have already launched a preliminary investigation into this incident. And it will be carried out in full and brought to completion,” Putin said. 

    US President Joe Biden, prominent Russia critic Bill Browder and Ukrainian presidential aide Mykhailo Podolyak have all suggested they believe Putin was behind the crash.

    CNN spoke to several individuals in Russia about the crash on Thursday. All agreed to be identified only by their first name so they could speak freely without fear of retribution.

    No one CNN spoke to believed Ukraine was responsible for the crash. Many openly speculated about its cause, including whether Russian President Vladimir Putin brought down the jet as retribution for Prigozhin’s failed mutiny in June.

    “He was killed by Putin, who does not forgive betrayal,” said Alexey from Moscow. “Putin was behind it or it could have been his Politburo but Putin knew and approved.”

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  • Top Russian general who vanished after Wagner rebellion fired as head of aerospace forces | CNN

    Top Russian general who vanished after Wagner rebellion fired as head of aerospace forces | CNN



    CNN
     — 

    A top Russian general who went missing after the mercenary group Wagner’s insurrection in June has been fired from his role as head of the country’s aerospace forces, Russian state media reported Wednesday citing unnamed sources.

    Gen. Sergey Surovikin has spent four decades as part of the Russian military, including a brief stint running Russia’s war effort in Ukraine.

    He was put in charge of the conflict in October 2022, shortly after a major explosion severely damaged the Kerch bridge connecting the annexed Crimean Peninsula to mainland Russia. Surovikin was removed from that post just months later.

    He has not been seen in public since June, when he released a video pleading for Wagner leader Yevgeny Prigozhin to stop his insurrection. A Russian lawmaker said in July that Surovikin is “resting.”

    Documents shared with CNN in June suggested that Surovikin was a secret VIP member of Wagner. The New York Times reported in June that Surovikin may have had advanced knowledge of the rebellion, prompting widespread speculation about his role the mutiny.

    Surovikin’s ouster comes about a month after another senior general, Ivan Popov, was removed from his post after accusing Moscow’s Defense Ministry leadership of betraying his troops by not providing sufficient support.

    Surovikin’s military career began with service in Afghanistan in the 1980s before commanding a unit in the Second Chechen War ​in 2004. He was named the commander-in-chief of the Aerospace Forces of Russia in 2017, the position he was reportedly removed from on Wednesday.

    As the head of the aerospace forces, Surovikin oversaw the Kremlin’s campaign in Syria, during which Russian combat aircraft were accused of causing widespread devastation in rebel-held areas. While Surovikin was rewarded in Moscow for his service in Syria, Human Rights Watch alleged that Surovikin may have been responsible for attacks that violated the laws of war and killed at least 1,600 civilians.

    The brutality of those alleged attacks earned Surovikint the nickname “General Armageddon.” One of his former subordinates, Gleb Irisov, told CNN last year that Surovikin was disliked because of the way he tried to implement his infantry experience into the air force

    “He made a lot of people very angry – they hated him,” Irisov said.

    The news of Surovikin’s removal was initially reported by prominent Russian journalist and former chief of the now-closed Echo of Moscow radio station, Alexey Venediktov.

    The Venediktov posted on his Telegram channel on Tuesday that Surovikin had been dismissed from his post but would continue serving the Ministry of Defense in another capacity.

    According to sources cited by Russia’s business news outlet RBC, Surovikin’s removal from his post is due to his transfer to a different role, and he is currently on a short vacation.

    Surovikin’s official bio on the Russian Defense Ministry’s website still lists him as the head of the aerospace forces.

    CNN has reached out to the Russian Ministry of Defense for comment.

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  • China’s defense minister warns against ‘playing with fire’ on Taiwan during Russia meeting | CNN

    China’s defense minister warns against ‘playing with fire’ on Taiwan during Russia meeting | CNN



    CNN
     — 

    China’s defense minister Li Shangfu on Tuesday warned against “playing with fire” when it comes to Taiwan in a veiled jab at the United States as he addressed a security conference in Russia.

    Speaking at the Moscow Conference on International Security, Li said attempts to “use Taiwan to contain China,” would “surely end in failure,” according to state-run news agency Xinhua.

    Li’s comments echoed previous statements by Chinese officials but the location of his speech was significant and symbolic given Moscow’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine.

    China’s ruling Communist Party claims the self-governing democracy of Taiwan and has vowed to take control of it, by force if necessary. It has repeatedly castigated American interactions with the island, with which Washington does not have official diplomatic ties, including for the sale of US arms to Taipei.

    Li, who was sanctioned by the US in 2018 for purchases of Russian weapons, joined the Moscow security conference as he began a six-day trip to Russia and its close ally Belarus.

    Senior defense officials from more than 20 “friendly states,” including Belarus, Iran and Myanmar will also attend the forum, Russian state media previously reported, citing Moscow’s defense ministry, which organizes the annual event. No Western countries were invited, state media said.

    The visit is Li’s second to Russia since assuming his role as defense chief earlier this year. It comes as Beijing has continued to bolster its security ties with Moscow, despite its unrelenting assault on Ukraine, which has triggered a humanitarian disaster with global ramifications.

    In a pre-recorded message to the same Moscow conference, Russian President Vladimir Putin accused the US of adding “fuel to the fire” of global conflicts, including through its support of Ukraine.

    China has used similar rhetoric in its own official comments about the conflict, despite maintaining that it remains a neutral party and a proponent of peace.

    Li on Tuesday also told attendees that China’s military was “a firm force in maintaining world peace,” and that Chinese leader Xi Jinping aimed to stabilize global security in “a world of chaos.”

    “We are willing to work with other militaries to strengthen mutual trust in military security strategies and practical cooperation in various specialized fields,” Li added, according to Xinhua.

    Russian state-run media Sputnik also cited Li as saying that military relations between China and Russia do not target any third party – a point Chinese officials have made in the past. The Xinhua report did not include the statement.

    Li met with his Russian counterpart Sergei Shoigu to discuss cooperation between the two countries’ militaries, Xinhua said. China and Russia regularly carry out joint exercises – including a joint naval patrol off the coast of Alaska in recent weeks.

    The Chinese defense chief also held bilateral meetings with Iran, Saudi Arabia, Kazakhstan, Vietnam and other countries’ defense departments and military leaders on the sidelines of the conference.

    Li’s comments on Taiwan come on the heels of a backlash from Beijing as Taiwan’s Vice President William Lai, a front-runner in the island’s upcoming presidential race, makes planned stopovers in the United States during travel for an official visit to Paraguay.

    China’s foreign ministry condemned the stopover on Sunday, calling Lai a “trouble maker through and through.”

    The US maintains an unofficial relationship with Taipei after formally establishing diplomatic relations with Beijing in 1979, but is bound by law to provide the democratic island with the means to defend itself.

    During a speech in New York, Lai declared Taiwan will “never back down” to threats from China.

    “No matter how great the threat of authoritarianism is to Taiwan, we absolutely will not be scared nor cower, we will uphold the values of democracy and freedom,” he said.

    China has in recent years ramped up its military intimidation of the island, including following meetings between Taiwanese leaders and US lawmakers.

    Putin’s invasion of Ukraine has also drawn increased attention to Taiwan as a potential security flashpoint in Asia.

    Despite broad differences with the geopolitical circumstances of Russia and Ukraine, the optics of a seemingly more powerful aggressor launching an attack driven by a vision of unification have heightened focus on China’s intentions toward Taiwan.

    Some analysts have suggested that China was watching Western reaction to Russian aggression in Ukraine with an eye to understanding possible responses to any potential, future moves against Taiwan.

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  • Niger junta says ‘high treason’ evidence gathered to prosecute ousted president Bazoum | CNN

    Niger junta says ‘high treason’ evidence gathered to prosecute ousted president Bazoum | CNN



    CNN
     — 

    The National Council for the Safeguard of the Homeland (CNSP) of Niger, the military council that toppled the government in July, said in a statement on Sunday that they have gathered the necessary evidence to “prosecute” Niger’s ousted President Mohamed Bazoum for “high treason” and “undermining” the security of the country.

    “The Nigerien government has to date, gathered the necessary evidence to prosecute the deposed president and his local and foreign accomplices before the competent national and international authorities for high treason and undermining internal and external security of Niger,” the CNSP said.

    The CNSP said Bazoum regularly receives visits from his doctor and the last visit was on Saturday, August 12.

    They added that the doctor did not raise any problem as to Bazoum’s state of health and members of his family.

    On July 26, the CNSP seized power in Niger, sparking international condemnation and renewed uncertainty in a volatile part of Africa beset by coups and militant extremism.

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  • Where in the world is Wagner warlord Prigozhin? At large and in charge, apparently | CNN

    Where in the world is Wagner warlord Prigozhin? At large and in charge, apparently | CNN



    CNN
     — 

    Late last week, imprisoned Russian opposition leader Alexey Navalny was handed a harsh judgment: After a court hit him with a new 19-year sentence in a penal colony, he was sent immediately to a punishment cell.

    It was a stark contrast to the fate of Yevgeny Prigozhin, the head of the Russian mercenary group Wagner. Back in June, Prigozhin led the abortive mutiny that presented the biggest challenge to Russian President Vladimir Putin in over two decades of rule. While Prigozhin’s troops stopped short of Moscow, a furious Putin said in a televised speech that those on the “path of treason” would face punishment. Almost two months later, in the case of the Wagner chief, this simply hasn’t happened.

    Clearly, the price for confronting Putin is not fixed. Perhaps more surprisingly, Prigozhin hasn’t even kept a low profile since the June uprising.

    Just weeks after the insurrection, Prigozhin popped up on the sidelines of the recent Russia-Africa summit in St. Petersburg, shaking hands with a dignitary from the Central African Republic (CAR).

    To be sure, the mercenary boss was not striking a martial pose: While subscribers to his Telegram channel have become accustomed to seeing him in camouflage and tactical gear, Prigozhin was spotted in a polo shirt and mom jeans, cutting a seemingly more mild-mannered figure than in months past.

    But pity the poor Russian diplomat who has to explain why Prigozhin – whose forces shot down Russian military aircraft and killed Russian military servicemembers on their march toward the capital – remains at large.

    That’s exactly what happened when CNN’s Christiane Amanpour confronted Andrei Kelin, the Russian ambassador to the United Kingdom, about the bizarre spectacle of Prigozhin’s post-mutiny appearance.

    Wagner’s insurrection, Kelin conceded, might constitute a form of “high treason.” But the ambassador went on to explain that Putin has decided to let bygones be bygones.

    “The president has qualified it when it has started, then it was all over,” Kelin said. “Now he’s traveling someplace, so we do recognize some hero deeds by Wagner groups,” alluding to Wagner’s apparent battlefield successes around the eastern Ukrainian city of Bakhmut.

    Amanpour, however, pressed Kelin further.

    “What I would like to understand, why is it that people like (jailed dissident Vladimir) Kara-Murza, the intellectual, others, Navalny are in jail for verbally protesting and disagreeing with the Russian government, but… Prigozhin, who tried to commit a coup against the Kremlin, maybe even against the President himself – an armed coup – is still wandering around free in Russia? He was photographed meeting with African leaders during this week’s summit in St. Petersburg, why is he not in jail for treason?”

    Kelin evaded at first, saying he didn’t recall that Russian soldiers died during the Wagner mutiny. Pressed by Amanpour, Kelin conceded that he had no explanation. Longtime observers, too, are searching for explanations about Prigozhin’s future.

    Andrei Kelin, Russia's ambassador to the United Kingdom, was interviewed by CNN's Christiane Amanpour on August 4.

    Experts believe that the Wagner boss still has value to Putin, even though the stature of both men has diminished.

    “Prigozhin’s stock with the Kremlin has clearly taken a hit,” said Candace Rondeaux, director of Future Frontlines, an open source intelligence service at the think tank New America. “But since Putin lost even more stock after the mutiny it seems he believes some utility remains in keeping Prigozhin around.”

    Prigozhin’s business acumen – and his skill at concealing commercial gains through an opaque network of front companies and offshore operations – are an asset for Putin’s Russia, which has been hit by sweeping Western economic sanctions, Rondeaux said.

    “At this point, Prigozhin’s networks of shell companies are the best insurance Putin has to keep Russia’s war economy,” she said. “But it’s not likely to stay that way forever – eventually something has got to give. And there is a good chance once it does we’ll see more spectacular events closer to the border between Poland and Belarus.”

    Rondeaux was referring to the recent relocation of some Wagner fighters to Belarus. The move – apparently part of a deal brokered to end the June mutiny – has already raised alarms in Poland, a NATO member next door to Belarus.

    Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki recently said that 100 troops from Wagner were moving toward a thin strip of land between Poland and Lithuania, with the possible intent of posing as migrants to cross the border.

    It’s unclear exactly how many Wagner troops are in Belarus, and whether or not they have access to heavy weaponry. But Morawiecki seemed to be pointing to one potential scenario for Wagner mischief: Promoting some kind of destabilization along NATO’s eastern frontier.

    And then there are Prigozhin’s plans for another region: Vulnerable and unstable countries in Africa, where Wagner has already conducted a series of operations.

    Speaking after Wagner fighters relocated to Belarus, Prigozhin suggested he remained focused on this core African market.

    “To ensure that there are no secrets and behind-the-scenes conversations, I am informing you that the Wagner Group continues its activities in Africa, as well as at the training centers in Belarus,” Prigozhin said in an audio message shared on Telegram accounts associated with the Wagner group.

    Prigozhin’s forces are already implicated in activities in Sudan – where Wagner has supplied the militia battling Sudan’s army – and has operated extensively in the CAR and in Libya.

    He may also sense opportunities in Niger, after a recent military coup threatened to spark a major regional crisis. In a recent Telegram message, Prigozhin hinted that Wagner might be ready to offer its services there.

    “What happened in Niger has been brewing for years,” Prigozhin said. “The former colonizers are trying to keep the people of African countries in check. In order to keep them in check, the former colonizers are filling these countries with terrorists and various bandit formations. Thus creating a colossal security crisis.”

    Then followed his hard sell. “The population suffers,” he said. “And this is the (the reason for the) love for PMC Wagner, this is the high efficiency of PMC Wagner. Because a thousand soldiers of PMC Wagner are able to establish order and destroy terrorists, preventing them from harming the peaceful population of states.”

    That might be dismissed as pure bluster and salesmanship. But it’s worth noting that Prigozhin’s sale pitch was at odds with the view of the Russian Foreign Ministry, which called for the “prompt release” of Nigerien President Mohamed Bazoum by the military.

    And that’s where things can still get interesting back in Russia. By defying Putin and evading punishment, Prigozhin seems to have built and sustained a competing center of gravity to the Kremlin.

    In a recent analysis, Tatiana Stanovaya, senior fellow at the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center, said Prigozhin had effectively chipped away at the “power vertical” – Putin’s longstanding system of top-down rule.

    “Putin’s much-hyped ‘power vertical’ has disappeared,” she wrote. “Instead of a strong hand, there are dozens of mini-Prigozhins, and while they may be more predictable than the Wagner leader, they are no less dangerous. All of them know full well that a post-Putin Russia is already here – even as Putin remains in charge – and that it’s time to take up arms and prepare for a battle for power.”

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  • Ukrainian drone strikes are bringing the war home to Russia. What does it mean for the conflict? | CNN

    Ukrainian drone strikes are bringing the war home to Russia. What does it mean for the conflict? | CNN


    London
    CNN
     — 

    Ukrainian drone strikes taking place inside Russia once seemed an unthinkable prospect. But such attacks have become an increasingly common feature of Moscow’s war – with an emboldened Kyiv warning that more will come.

    A string of drone strikes have peppered Russian cities including Moscow throughout the summer. Friday saw one of the most dramatic yet – sea drones targeted a major Russian port hundreds of miles from Ukrainian-held territory, leaving a warship listing.

    They have distracted from a Ukrainian counteroffensive that is yet to produce tangible results on the battlefield, and brought the war home to Russia.

    But they are not without risk for Kyiv, which is attempting to seize the front foot in the war while maintaining relations with Western nations wary of any hint of escalation.

    Here’s what you need to know.

    Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky warned last week that war is “gradually returning” to Russia, after the latest in a series of drone attacks to take place inside the country that Moscow has pinned on Kyiv.

    Last weekend’s incidents saw buildings in Moscow targeted by drones. On Tuesday, a drone struck the same skyscraper in Moscow that was hit on Sunday.

    It followed two similar attempted attacks that were reported by Russian officials earlier in July, and numerous such incidents in June. In May, an apparent drone attack above the Kremlin led to dramatic images of blasts in the skies above the seat of Russian power.

    Ukraine has typically not taken direct responsibility for the attacks, though its responses have become more bullish in recent weeks. “The distance and deniability between Kyiv and these attacks is significantly less,” Douglas Barrie, a senior fellow for Military Aerospace at the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), told CNN. “There now seems to be almost a tacit recognition that it was (them).”

    Ukrainian Minister Mykhailo Fedorov, whose Digital Transformation Ministry oversees the country’s “Army of Drones” procurement plan, had said there would be more drone strikes to come as Kyiv ramps up its parallel summer counteroffensive aimed at pushing Russian troops out of Ukrainian territory.

    It is difficult to establish exactly which weapons systems are being used in the attacks, and precisely which buildings are being targeted, with both the Russian and Ukrainian sides refusing to be drawn on the details of the incidents.

    But there are clearly vast differences between these attacks, which are limited in scope, have caused few casualties and have not been aimed towards residential buildings, with those that Moscow has launched indiscriminately at Ukrainian population centers.

    “Whether or not they’re actually arriving on their intended targets, the targets do seem to be buildings that are linked with the prosecution of the war in Ukraine,” Keir Giles, a Russia expert at Chatham House and the author of books on Russia’s invasion and foreign policy, told CNN. “In that respect, it’s a very different approach to what we’ve seen in Russia, with indiscriminate terror attacks.”

    Giles notes there is “an open question of exactly how Ukraine is doing the attacks.” But the strikes have “shown up the incapacity of Russia’s defenses,” he added.

    The one-way unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) that have seemingly been launched “carry a pretty small warhead and they’ve been used in small numbers, so in terms of direct military affect, it’s limited to put it mildly,” said Barrie.

    “The kinds of systems that Ukraine is using are simple, comparatively speaking, but for their purpose they’re effective,” Barrie added.

    Crucially, there is no suggestion that the weapons have been donated by the West. “These are systems (Ukraine) can manufacture themselves,” Barrie said, allowing Kyiv to send military messages to the Russian people alongside its defensive war at home, which NATO nations have been supporting with military aid.

    “It’s fundamentally about showing that Moscow is not out of reach,” Barrie said.

    The attacks appeared to have targeted buildings involved in Russia's war effort.

    Kyiv will happily accept the limited military impact of the drone attacks, because the strikes play a far more important role in the war.

    “Ukraine has identified that Russian popular opinion and attitudes to the war is one of the key areas that they need to target in order to bring the war to an end,” Giles said. “As long as Russia can pretend that the war is something that happens elsewhere, nothing is going to dent that popular support.”

    Ukrainian officials have openly discussed the propaganda element of the strikes. Yurii Ihnat, a spokesman for Ukraine’s Air Force, said the latest drone attacks on Moscow were aimed at impacting Russians who, since the Kremlin invaded Ukraine in February 2022, felt the war was distant.

    “There’s always something flying in Russia, as well as in Moscow. Now the war is affecting those who were not concerned,” he said. “No matter how the Russian authorities would like to turn a blind eye on this by saying they have intercepted everything … something does hit.”

    Early signals suggest that the recent attacks have caused unrest among an already jittery class of military pundits in Russia.

    Noting criticisms from at least one prominent military blogger that Russia had not secured buildings against such attacks, the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) wrote in a recent update that “Russian authorities will likely struggle to balance the need to quell domestic concern over continuing drone attacks deep within the Russian rear with Russian President Vladimir Putin’s continued refusal to fully mobilize Russian society for the war and its corresponding consequences.”

    A dramatic drone incident in May appeared to target the Kremlin.

    Assessing public opinion in Russia is notoriously difficult. But anecdotal accounts at least speak to the impact of drone strikes on those in the vicinity of the attacks.

    “My friends and I rented an apartment to come here and unwind, and at some point, we heard an explosion – it was like a wave, everyone jumped,” one witness told Reuters after last weekend’s strike in Moscow. “There was a lot of smoke, and you couldn’t see anything. From above, you could see fire.”

    “It does seem to be achieving the kind of startle value that you might expect, where Russians are realizing that they are not personally protected from what is being done in Ukraine,” Giles said of the early indications of the strikes’ consequences.

    Whether the trend will cause a wider rupturing of Russian support for the war is far from clear.

    On the one hand, Putin’s longstanding pretext for the war has relied on baseless claims that Ukraine was a threat to Russian security, and that the so-called special military operation in the country was needed to defend Russia’s interest. Playing up recent attacks could be used to support that argument as the war drags on.

    But after almost eighteen months of disorganization and discord, the reality that Russia’s military plans are flailing has been increasingly hard to deny. And Putin’s authority has previously appeared most vulnerable at moments when the impact of the war hits home in Russia – such as during last year’s chaotic military mobilization, and during June’s Wagner rebellion.

    In that context, it is easy to see why regular reminders of the conflict inside Russia serve Ukraine’s strategic interests.

    For all of its intended propaganda impact, sending drones into Russia is not a risk-free move for Kyiv.

    The most immediate consideration is a reprisal; the Kremlin has tended to link attacks on Ukrainian cities to previous strikes on Russia, in a “tit-for-tat” approach intended to cause panic in Ukraine.

    But Ukrainians are by now well acquainted to the threat of Russian air bombardments, and there has been no evidence that such assaults have dented determination in the defensive effort there.

    A more prominent concern is how the West reacts to such strikes. A year ago, the prospect of Ukraine sending drones into Russia was unthinkable, given the tacit contract between NATO nations and Kyiv that the West would readily support a defensive war, but would be more wary of any actions that draw NATO into direct conflict with Russia.

    There is nothing to suggest Ukraine has used NATO-provided weaponry in Russia – doing so is likely a bridge they would not consider crossing at this time – but it has clearly become more emboldened to take the war to Russia. And in return, Western leaders appear generally relaxed about the approach.

    “The long-standing prohibition on striking into Russia that has been put in place by the suppliers … was misplaced and misconceived,” Giles said. “For all of this period, it has played Russia’s game by Russia’s rules.”

    There does remain a degree of variance in how Western leaders view attacks on Russian territory, with the United States being particularly concerned. “As a general matter we do not support attacks inside of Russia,” White House spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters late last month, according to Reuters.

    But Kyiv’s confidence and an increasing willingness to chip away at Russian support for the war will likely mean that such strikes remain a feature of the conflict.

    “It’s impossible to tell how this will develop but we should certainly expect at least this level of a steady drumbeat of demonstrations of Russian vulnerability to continue,” Giles said.

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  • Deadly communal violence flares in India a month before world leader summit | CNN

    Deadly communal violence flares in India a month before world leader summit | CNN


    Gurugram and New Delhi
    CNN
     — 

    Separate outbreaks of violence this week, including the alleged shooting of three Muslim men by a police officer on a train, have exposed the deep communal fissures in India weeks before it welcomes Group of 20 (G20) leaders to the capital.

    Violence erupted in the northern state of Harayana state on Monday after a right-wing Hindu organization led a religious procession in the city of Nuh.

    Clashes spread to several districts of the finance and tech hub, Gurugram, also known as Gurgaon, home to more than 1.5 million people and hundreds of global firms, where violent mobs predominantly targeted Muslim-owned properties, setting buildings ablaze and smashing shops and restaurants.

    At least six people died, including a cleric who was inside a mosque that was set alight, and more than 110 people have been arrested, authorities said.

    Gurugram’s district counselor urged residents to remain home and ordered the closure of some private education institutes and government offices.

    As the violence unfolded, about 1,300 kilometers (807 miles) south in Maharashtra on a train traveling to Mumbai, another deadly attack demonstrated the depth of the country’s sectarian divide.

    Haryana Police conduct checks near Nuh Chowk on August 1, 2023 in Gurugram, India.

    A police officer opened fire on a moving train, killing four people, including a senior constable and three Muslim passengers, according to local reports and some family members CNN has spoken with.

    In a video that has emerged of the aftermath and quickly gone viral, the officer can be seen standing over a lifeless body, rifle in arm, as terrified travelers huddle at the end the coach.

    The officer glances at the body, then scans the carriage before saying: “If you want to vote, if you want to live in Hindustan (India), then there’s only (Narendra) Modi and Yogi (Adityanath).”

    Referencing the country’s leader, and the Hindu monk turned chief minister of India’s most populous state, he appeared to be advocating for their popular, but deeply divisive policies.

    One of the victims, Asgar Ali, was a bangle seller on his way to take a new job in Mumbai when the fatal attack took place, his cousin Mohammed told CNN, adding that Ali is survived by a wife and four children.

    “We haven’t heard a lot from the authorities,” he added. “But I believe this happened because we are Muslim.”

    Police have arrested the officer and a motive is yet to be determined, authorities have said. However, opposition politicians and activists have called the attack a “hate crime” that targeted India’s Muslim minority population.

    Police haven’t released the names of the passengers. CNN has contacted the Maharashtra police but is yet to receive a response.

    Asaduddin Owaisi, a member of parliament and leader of the All India Majlis-e-Ittehad-ul-Muslimeen political party called it a “terror attack that specifically targeted Muslims.”

    Another lawmaker and member of India’s main opposition Congress party, Jairam Ramesh, said it was a “cold-blooded murder” that was the result of a polarized media and political landscape.

    The image of India that Modi and his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) want to project is one of a confident, vibrant, and modern superpower – and it will be one they want on display in India when G20 leaders meet in New Delhi next month.

    But analysts say these scenes of violence underscore an uncomfortable reality as the BJP’s Hindu nationalist policies gain momentum in the world’s largest democracy after nearly a decade of Modi’s rule.

    On Wednesday, hundreds of members from the Hindu extremist right-wing Bajrang Dal group took to the streets in several cities, including Delhi, burning effigies and chanting slogans against Muslims in protest against what they called “Islamic jihad and terrorism.”

    Asim Ali, a political researcher based in New Delhi and no relation to Asgar Ali, said that official silence over sectarian assaults and rhetoric is encouraging for the radical groups and such attacks have become “more brazen” since BJP ascended to power nearly a decade ago.

    “When you don’t take action against these elements, the message that gets sent is that it’s okay,” he told CNN. “If the government spoke (against it), it would help.”

    Ethnic violence has been raging in the northeastern state of Manipur for the last two months, a topic that has received little public comment from Modi.

    Ali fears sectarian tensions may only worsen next year as India heads into a bitterly fought election with Modi seeking a third term and an opposition building a coalition to unseat him.

    The latest communal violence come against a broader rise in hate crimes against minority groups.

    A study by economist Deepankar Basu noted a 786% increase in hate crimes against all minorities between 2014 and 2018, following the BJP’s election victory.

    The BJP, however, says it does not discriminate against minorities and “treats all its citizens with equality.”

    But Basu’s study shows – and news reports indicate – the brunt of these hate crimes targeted Muslims. And activists point to a host of recent incidents that they say contribute to India’s sharp communal divide.

    Last month, the BJP chief minister of the state of Assam, Himanta Biswa Sarma, blamed Muslims for the soaring prices of tomatoes. His accusation came weeks after he lashed out at former US President Barack Obama, saying Indian police should “take care of” the many “Hussain Obama” in the country, referring to the country’s Muslims.

    Former US President Obama is not a Muslim.

    Meanwhile Adityanath, the chief minister of Uttar Pradesh who was referenced by the police officer allegedly involved in the train shooting, is among the most divisive of the BJP politicians.

    Since he took office, the state has already passed legislation that, critics say, is rooted in “Hindutva” – the ideological bedrock of Hindu nationalism.

    It has protected cows, an animal considered sacred to Hindus, from slaughter, and made it increasingly difficult to transport cattle. It also introduced a controversial anti-conversion bill, which makes it difficult for interfaith couples to marry or for people to convert to Islam or Christianity. Some cities named after historic Muslim figures have also been renamed to reflect India’s Hindu history.

    Adityanath is also known for his provocative rhetoric against Muslims.

    He once praised former US President Donald Trump’s travel ban barring citizens of several Muslim-majority countries and called for India to take similar measures, according to local channel NDTV.

    India has one of the largest Muslim populations in the world with an estimated 170 million adherents, roughly 15 percent of its 1.4 billion population.

    Adityanath’s cabinet members have previously denied allegations they are promoting Hindu nationalism.

    But prominent Muslim author and journalist, Rana Ayyub, who has written extensively about India’s sectarian shift, says the current political rhetoric “emboldens” radical right wing groups who feel increasingly protected and untouchable in today’s India.

    “It feels like an Orwellian novel playing out in front of you,” she said, adding she fears for the safety of her Muslim friends and family. “I think the silence of the country is a tacit approval for these hate politics.”

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  • Zelensky urges Trump to share Ukraine peace plan but says he won’t give territory to Russia | CNN Politics

    Zelensky urges Trump to share Ukraine peace plan but says he won’t give territory to Russia | CNN Politics



    CNN
     — 

    Volodymyr Zelensky urged Donald Trump to share his peace plans publicly if the former US president has a way to end the war between Ukraine and Russia – but the Ukrainian president cautioned in an interview Tuesday that any peace plan where Ukraine gives up territory would be unacceptable.

    “He can publicly share his idea now, not waste time, not to lose people, and say, ‘My formula is to stop the war and stop all this tragedy and stop Russian aggression,’” Zelensky told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer, following his speech Tuesday at the United Nations General Assembly. “And he said, how he sees it, how to push Russian from our land. Otherwise, he’s not presenting the global idea of peace.”

    The Ukrainian president added: “So (if) the idea is how to take the part of our territory and to give Putin, that is not the peace formula.”

    Trump, the front-runner for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, has claimed that he would be able to cut a deal with Zelensky and Russian President Vladimir Putin to end the war in Ukraine within 24 hours. Pressed Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press” about whether the deal would let Putin keep the land he’s taken, Trump said, “No, no. I’d make a fair deal for everybody. Nope, I’d make it fair.”

    Trump, asked at the time whether it would be a win for Putin, said, “You know, that’s something that could have been negotiated. Because there were certain parts, Crimea and other parts of the country, that a lot of people expected could happen. You could have made a deal. So they could have made a deal where there’s lesser territory right now than Russia’s already taken, to be honest.”

    Zelensky’s trip to the United Nations comes as Ukraine is facing its stiffest headwinds in the US to date over support for the war. A faction of the House GOP conference is openly hostile to providing Ukraine with any additional military aid, and it remains unclear whether House Speaker Kevin McCarthy will be willing to sign off on more funding.

    In the interview, Zelensky gave a positive assessment of Ukraine’s ongoing counteroffensive, which has sparked concerns that it’s failing to achieve expected results. And he reiterated Ukraine’s desire to obtain long-range missiles from the US, which President Joe Biden is still considering, saying it would be “a loss” for Ukraine if they do not receive them.

    “We are on the finishing line, I’m sure of that,” Zelensky said.

    Zelensky told Blitzer that he’s planning to meet with McCarthy when he travels to Washington later this week. Asked about those skeptical of offering more funding to Ukraine, Zelensky said that it was difficult for those who have not seen war up close to compare domestic problems like civil rights or energy to the existential threat facing a country under attack.

    “It’s so difficult to understand when you are in war, and when you are not in war,” Zelensky said. “Even when you come to the war, to the country which is in war, when you come to one day, you can understand more than you live, you hear, you think, you read. No, you can’t compare. It’s different situation. That’s why I’m thinking we can’t compare these challenges.”

    Biden last month asked Congress to approve an additional $24 billion in emergency spending for Ukraine and other international needs. While there’s bipartisan support for the funding package in the Senate, there’s no sign yet that the Republican-led House will play ball.

    Following his speech Tuesday at the UN General Assembly, Zelensky is traveling to Washington, DC, where he will hold talks with Biden at the White House, along with a visit to Capitol Hill. Zelensky addressed a joint meeting of Congress in a surprise appearance last December.

    Zelensky’s trip to the Capitol this week gives him the chance to make a personal pitch to skeptical lawmakers to approve more aid for the war. The Ukrainian leader is slated to speak at an all-senators meeting, though a similar meeting is not planned for the House.

    McCarthy, who is expected to meet with Zelensky along with other House leaders, declined Tuesday to commit to more funding for Ukraine.

    “Was Zelensky elected to Congress? Is he our president? I don’t think so. I have questions for where’s the accountability on the money we’ve already spent? What is this the plan for victory?” the California Republican said.

    ‘Nobody knows’

    Asked whether a major breakthrough was possible this year in Ukraine’s military counteroffensive, Zelensky said, “I think nobody knows, really.”

    “But I think that we will have more success,” he said, noting gains Ukraine has made in the east.

    Zelensky said he remained focus on obtaining more long-range missiles from the US, arguing that Ukraine did not want them to target Russia but to keep the battlefield capabilities level between the two sides.

    Biden is expected to make a final decision soon on sending the long-range Army Tactical Missile Systems, also known as ATACMS, CNN reported earlier this month.

    “It would be a loss for us” if the weapons are not provided, Zelensky said, adding it would result in “more casualties on the battlefield and elsewhere.”

    He also reiterated the need for more air defense systems, particularly the US-made Patriot air defense system, saying they were needed to help protect civilian areas.

    Zelensky downplayed tensions between the US and Ukrainian officials over Ukraine’s military strategy in Russian-occupied Crimea, when asked about skepticism from officials in Washington over Ukraine ramping up missile strikes to try to disrupt Russian logistics and resupply efforts.

    “We think the same way,” he said.

    Still, Zelensky defended the strategy.

    “Temporary-occupied Crimea – it’s a place they store weapons to kill our civilians,” he said. “They’re shooting from Crimea into our territory. And of course, we have to see where their rockets are coming from, and we have to basically deal with it.”

    This story has been updated with additional details.

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  • Chinese tensions loom large over Biden’s summit with Asian allies | CNN Politics

    Chinese tensions loom large over Biden’s summit with Asian allies | CNN Politics



    CNN
     — 

    The Camp David invitation President Joe Biden extended to his Japanese and South Korean counterparts this week – the first summit held at the legendary presidential retreat since 2015 – was a significant show of camaraderie for two increasingly essential US allies.

    Undergirding the talks is the three nations’ mutual concern over China, whose leader Xi Jinping Biden has sought to cultivate, despite a hardening view of the leader as an autocrat and adversary.

    “This is a guy who I think I understand,” Biden told Democratic donors last week in Utah after describing Xi’s China as a “ticking time bomb.”

    “We’re not looking for a fight with China,” he went on. “But we’re looking for a rational relationship to have with China.”

    Work toward a “rational relationship” has been halting, despite Biden’s long ties with Xi. After months of acrimony, administration officials have recently begun visiting Beijing in a bid to reestablish regular communication. Yet tensions persist, and US-China ties remain deeply fraught.

    Perhaps no other relationship in the world is quite as consequential than the one between Biden and Xi, who last spoke in person on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Bali last November in the hopes of establishing what US officials called a “floor” in the US-China relationship.

    Biden told CNN’s Arlette Saenz on Friday he hopes to follow up on last year’s meeting with Xi “this fall.”

    “I expect and hope to follow up on our conversation from Bali this fall – that’s my expectation,” Biden said.

    The talks were watched closely in Tokyo and Seoul, where China’s military and economic aggressions are an ever-present reality and a motivator in mending a long-tarnished relationship. At Camp David on Friday, agreements on joint military and technology initiatives will be made against the looming backdrop of Beijing’s growing power.

    “China is just fact on the ground, a huge player in Asia. You can’t dismiss it away,” explained a senior administration official. “You’re trying to shape the environment in ways that both advance our interests, secure our partners, and send a clear signal about what kind of actions we think would be provocative.”

    As of Thursday evening, discussions were underway about how to describe China in the joint documents that are expected to come out of the summit, Japanese Foreign Ministry press secretary Hikariko Ono told a group of reporters.

    It wasn’t so long ago that Xi was invited to his own high-profile summits hosted by an American leader. President Barack Obama hosted him at Sunnylands, the sprawling Palm Springs resort intended by its builder as the “Camp David of the West,” for lengthy talks in 2013. President Donald Trump served him chocolate cake at Mar-a-Lago.

    Those types of engagements are difficult to imagine now, particularly amid growing tensions around Taiwan, a battle over emerging technology, human rights concerns and a leader Biden has deemed a “dictator.”

    Even though Biden often recounts the hours of meetings he held with Xi as vice president, he has been challenged in new ways by his relationship with Xi as the two men have risen to the leader level.

    “When they engaged last time neither of them had power,” the official said. “Xi has an enormous amount of power now. Biden senses that, understands it.”

    Biden-Xi meetings are now treated as the “biggest possible gametime” for Biden, the official explained.

    “The most intense, the most focus that I’ve ever seen President Biden is in advance of these engagements with President Xi,” the official said. “The President’s level of focus is off the charts. He wants intelligence briefings, he wants to bring his advisers together, he wants to hear different perspectives and he brings outsiders in.”

    That preparation demonstrates just how consumed Biden and his entire administration are by what the official called “relentless” competition between the US and China.

    Still, Biden’s hugely consequential personal relationship with Xi remains a work in progress.

    Some officials say that Biden has struggled to develop the type of personal relationship with Xi that he deeply values in fellow world leaders who share democratic values. When Biden met with Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India at the White House in June, they bonded over shared frustrations with Xi, according to a second senior administration official.

    Biden often speaks to his personal relationship with Xi publicly on the campaign trail, and he has continued to highlight the many hours they have spent together.

    “I’ve spent more time with Xi Jinping than any world leader has,” Biden told donors at his fundraiser, recounting the hours they’d spent getting to know each other when each was their country’s number two.

    At the same event, Biden offered a warning that reverberated throughout the region. Describing China’s weakening economy as a “ticking time bomb,” Biden said it could prompt China’s leaders to lash out.

    “That’s not good because when bad folks have problems, they do bad things,” Biden said.

    It was the latest example of Biden offering candid observations donors off-camera. Earlier this summer, Biden himself demonstrated a willingness to characterize Xi in a negative light, calling him a dictator at a fundraiser.

    Biden and Xi have spoken by phone several times and met in-person once, and officials said they expect the two men to speak again soon, potentially on the sidelines of an Asian leaders summit Biden is hosting in November in San Francisco.

    And the extent to which their personal relationship will impact US-China relations overall has yet to be determined.

    “How much does their personal relationship, their experience over you know, decades come into play? And I think the answer to that, honestly, is unknown,” the official said.

    When the two leaders met in Bali, Biden drew on his personal experience in speaking with Xi about Taiwan – making commitments while he looked into Xi’s eyes, that appeared to have an impact.

    “The President basically said, look, we’re not going to destabilize the status quo. We believe in the maintenance of peace and stability. We’re not going to push for Taiwan independence. And I could tell that had an impact on [Xi],” the first senior administration official said.

    While leader-to-leader level engagement remains important in the eyes of US officials, its not the primary factor dictating the Biden administration’s China policy.

    A senior State Department official explained it this way: “Biden and Xi do understand each other. That is borne out of years of getting to know one another. But Biden knows they aren’t changing one another’s minds.”

    Former US officials closely watched Biden and Xi bond during the Obama administration, but they are not surprised by the tenor of the current relationship.

    “The relationship that Biden and Xi had during the Obama administration was an unusual one. The two vice presidents bonded. They had extensive and deep conversions together. It felt like a healthy relationship,” explained Danny Russel, the assistant secretary of state for Asia during the Obama administration. “It is understandable to me that Biden might feel frustrated that the quality of the relationship he has with Xi now has little resemblance to what it used to be. Xi essentially won’t return his phone calls, and has become increasingly hardline, autocratic and ideological.”

    Without the leaders’ relationship serving as the launchpad to steady the ship, Biden administration officials continue to put intense efforts into shoring up alliances. While investing in alliances has been central to the Biden administration’s foreign policy approach since day one, it has developed an outsized importance.

    The trilateral meeting at Camp David on Friday between Biden, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol on Friday will put those efforts on display.

    “This summit is formalizing and institutionalizing a major strategic shift of the region,” explained a third senior administration official. “China has previously seen an unbridgeable wedge between Japan and South Korea. But now we are stronger because we are bringing them together, doubling down on our alliances.”

    In the backdrop to challenging China by drawing in US allies, the Biden administration has maintained a willingness to engage at the working level with Chinese officials. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Secretary of the Treasury Janet Yellen and Climate Envoy John Kerry have all visited Beijing in the last two months.

    Their visits come as US officials continue to believe that engagement is key in order to prevent competition from veering into conflict. But they are not banking on those engagements resulting in major deliverables.

    “It is about getting caught trying,” said a diplomat from the Indo-Pacific who has been briefed on the visits. “The Biden administration has always been clear that talking is best, they will keep showing up, and communication is necessary. But it is really to show the rest of the world that they are not giving up, even though they are not expecting anything major out of the engagements.”

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