ReportWire

Tag: political

  • Paramilitary Expansion Shows Scale of War Preparations on NATO’s Eastern Frontier

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    UTENA, Lithuania—Some 1,500 paramilitaries descended on this industrial city in northeastern Lithuania late last month, taking up positions at government buildings and around critical infrastructure to prepare for what many in this frontier city now fear: a Russian invasion.

    Clad in military fatigues and armed with rifles loaded with blank cartridges, members of the Lithuanian Rifleman’s Union, or LRU, a state-funded paramilitary group, spent several days training to repel a possible enemy attack.

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    Eve Hartley

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  • U.K. Treasury Chief Says Budget Measures Will Tackle Debt, Inflation

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    The U.K. government’s treasury chief said measures outlined in her latest budget aim to halt a rise in debt while helping to cool inflation.

    Speaking to lawmakers, Rachel Reeves said Wednesday that her budget measures would ensure that the government doesn’t breach its fiscal rules and bring down price pressures.

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    Paul Hannon

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  • White House Defends Witkoff After Leak of Conversation With Russian Official

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    The White House is defending special envoy Steve Witkoff over a reportedly leaked conversation in which he told a Russian official that praising President Trump would help smooth over a call with Russian President Vladimir Putin regarding the war in Ukraine.

    Witkoff also suggested that Putin call Trump ahead of a White House visit by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, a conversation that gave the Kremlin an opportunity to press the case against giving Kyiv Tomahawk cruise missiles.

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    Alexander Ward

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  • The Reason Venezuela’s Maduro Won’t Resign Peacefully

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    Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro is facing unprecedented American military and diplomatic pressure to resign and leave his country peacefully. He is unlikely to take the offer.

    The days when dictators could live in gilded exile with fortunes in secret Swiss bank accounts are mostly over, primarily because of global mechanisms for adjudicating human-rights abuses and tracking ill-gotten gains. The 63-year-old strongman doesn’t believe he will get lasting amnesty, analysts said, feeling only safe among the cadre of loyal military men with whom he has spent a decade surrounding himself.

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    [ad_2] José de Córdoba
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  • Opinion | Trump Takes On the Muslim Brotherhood

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    Sanctions can strike the often-radical Islamist network a piece at a time.

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    The Editorial Board

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  • Opinion | The Truth About the War in Sudan

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    By

    Abdel Fattah al-Burhan

    Khartoum, Sudan

    Sudan is a country with a long memory: Our history stretches back to the biblical Kingdom of Kush, one of Africa’s greatest civilizations. The war now waged by the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) militia is unlike anything we’ve ever faced. It is tearing the fabric of our society, uprooting millions, and placing the entire region at risk. Even so, Sudanese look to allies in the region and in Washington with hope. Sudan is fighting not only for its survival, but for a just peace that can only be achieved with the support of partners who recognize the truth of how the war began and what is required to end it.

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    Abdel Fattah al-Burhan

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  • Opinion | Can Trump Deliver Putin?

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    The hysterics will get hysterical all over again when it turns out peace isn’t nigh.

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    Holman W. Jenkins, Jr.

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  • Ukrainians Resist Pressure from Russia—and Trump

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    By

    James Marson

    and Nikita Nikolaienko | Photography by Serhii Korovayny for WSJ

    KYIV, Ukraine—Nataliia Melnychenko stood outside a residential building hit by a Russian drone early Tuesday, with dark circles under her eyes. She hadn’t slept since the drone struck her building at 2:30 a.m.

    “I’ve learned over these years that Russian missile strikes usually follow every attempt at peace initiatives,” said Melnychenko. “On top of Russian attacks, we now also have pressure from our allies,” she added.

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    James Marson

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  • France Detains Last Suspected Louvre Thief

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    PARIS—French authorities said they’ve detained four more people in connection to the Louvre heist, including a man suspected of being the only thief to remain at large after purloining the nation’s crown jewels.

    Paris Prosecutor Laure Beccuau said two men, ages 38 and 39, and two women, 31 and 40, have been taken into custody for questioning. Beccuau said all four detainees came from the Paris region, without disclosing further details.

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    Noemie Bisserbe

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  • Top Army Official Meets Russians in U.A.E., Signaling New Phase in Peace Talks

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    Army Secretary Dan Driscoll met with a Russian delegation in Abu Dhabi on Monday and Tuesday, a sign that talks to end the war in Ukraine have hit a new phase involving direct negotiations with the Russians.

    Driscoll, fresh off peace talks in Kyiv and Geneva with Ukrainian officials, landed in Abu Dhabi on Monday to meet with the Russians, according to U.S. officials. After holding initial meetings, he planned to conduct more substantive engagements with the delegation on Tuesday, the officials said. 

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    Lara Seligman

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  • German Economy Shows Signs of Revival

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    The German economy may be showing signs of a life after more than half a decade of stagnation.

    Europe’s largest economy has suffered a series of recent blows, including a surge in energy costs after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, higher tariffs on its exports to the U.S and fierce competition from China in key sectors such as automobiles.

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    Don Nico Forbes

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  • Parts of Europe at Risk of Downward ‘Spiral’ if Older Voters Stymie Reforms, EBRD Warns

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    Economies that escaped from Communism more than three decades ago are at risk of falling into a downward spiral if older voters and political leaders prevent the changes needed to offset the hit to growth from aging populations, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development warned.

    The graying of the population is a headwind for economic growth and a driver of rising government debts around the world, but is particularly acute in parts of Europe that had been led by Communist parties until the late 1980s and early 1990s.

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    Paul Hannon

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  • Colombia Orders Probe Into Ties Between Military and Drug Traffickers

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    The Colombian military said Monday it had opened an investigation into allegations that senior army and intelligence officials advised the leader of an armed drug-trafficking group about how to secretly buy weapons and evade military scrutiny.

    The revelations, reported by the major Colombian media outlet, Caracol, have stoked fears that former guerrilla fighters who now smuggle cocaine have infiltrated high levels of the security forces under President Gustavo Petro, a former member of a leftist guerrilla organization. Petro has feuded with President Trump over U.S. airstrikes on alleged drug boats in the Caribbean Sea and Pacific Ocean and overseen fraying relations with the U.S. over soaring drug-crop cultivation and cocaine trafficking.

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    Kejal Vyas

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  • Exclusive | How the U.S. Drafted a Russia-Friendly Peace Plan for Ukraine

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    WASHINGTON—It started with an October order from President Trump to his national security team: Come up with a plan to end the Ukraine war just as they had halted the fighting in Gaza.

    On a flight back from the Middle East, in the afterglow of brokering a deal between Israel and Hamas, envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner began writing the first draft of what would eventually become a 28-point peace framework to end the four-year war, according to U.S. officials and a person familiar with the situation.

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    Robbie Gramer

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  • Opinion | What a Good Ukraine Peace Looks Like

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    President Trump on Monday touted “big progress” on talks to end the Ukraine war, and Kyiv is doubtless willing to make painful concessions to avoid surrender or U.S. abandonment. No one wants the war to end more than the Ukrainians who are fighting and dying.

    But the crucial issue continues to be what kind of peace? So it’s worth describing the conditions that would create a peace with honor in Ukraine and deter a new war whenever Vladimir Putin chooses to invade again.

    Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Sunday described the U.S. peace offer as a “living, breathing document,” and we welcome the red pen to the original 28-point plan that bent hard toward Vladimir Putin. That document would leave a neutered Ukraine that is banned from associating with Western security institutions and vulnerable to a new invasion.

    The overriding goal of any peace is letting Ukraine survive as an independent nation that can determine its own future. If its people want to align with Russia, so be it. But every indication is that they want to align with the West, including the European Union and NATO.

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    The Editorial Board

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  • School Kidnappings Have Become a Cruel Fact of Life in Nigeria

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    The mass kidnapping of children in Nigeria caught the world’s attention over a decade ago when 276 high-school students were abducted from Chibok, sparking the #BringBackOurGirls campaign on social media. The phenomenon returned to the limelight this month with another mass abduction and President Trump’s threats to intervene over what he said was the persecution of Christians in one of Africa’s most strategic nations.

    The reality is, the kidnappings never really abated.

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    Alexandra Wexler

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  • China’s Xi Calls Trump in Unusual Move to Discuss Ukraine, Taiwan

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    In an unusual diplomatic move, Chinese leader Xi Jinping initiated a phone call with President Trump on Monday, discussing Taiwan and Ukraine as Washington, Kyiv and Moscow try to hammer out a plan to end the war.

    China has provided crucial diplomatic and economic support to Russia since its 2022 invasion of Ukraine. Now as Trump pushes to make a decisive move to end the war, Beijing is seeking to play a more visible role.

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    [ad_2] Lingling Wei
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  • Big Gaps Still Left to Bridge in U.S. Peace Plan for Ukraine

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    Diplomats from the U.S., Ukraine and Europe are thrashing out changes to a Trump-backed plan to end the war between Moscow and Kyiv, a proposal that critics said was too skewed in Russia’s favor in its first iteration.

    Washington expressed optimism about the modifications during what it called “constructive talks” over the weekend.

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    Laurence Norman

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  • Rheinmetall Turns to Former Auto Workers to Fuel Hiring Spree

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    Germany’s largest arms manufacturer, Rheinmetall RHM -3.85%decrease; red down pointing triangle, expects its sales will be five times as much as they were last year by the end of the decade. A big factor underpinning its confidence—it is being flooded by job applications.

    The company is now looking to draw from a pool of workers laid off by the car industry and other big employers to fill the roles needed for its expansion plans, its head of human resources operations said.

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    Cristina Gallardo

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  • ISIS Prisons and Camps Are Festering in a Fragile Syria as Aid Peters Out

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    HASAKAH, Syria—In a wing of the notorious Al Sina prison in northeastern Syria, where some of the world’s most dangerous inmates are held, guards wearing balaclavas stood along a corridor lined with cells. A prisoner pressed his face to a small, square hole in one of the cell doors. Behind him, some 20 other prisoners in brown jumpsuits sat barefoot on the floor.

    “Is Biden still the U.S. president?” he asked a visiting journalist. The prisoner, a British Islamic State member, didn’t get an answer.

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    Sudarsan Raghavan

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