Monday, February 28, 2022
Can Europe handle refugees from the Russia-Ukraine war?
Hundreds of thousands of people are fleeing Ukraine to neighbouring countries.
Russia accused of using cluster bombs as fighting rages in Ukraine’s cities
Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second city, has seen some of the fiercest battles with Russian forces accused of using cluster munitions. Many civilians are reported to have been killed.
Six In The Morning Monday 28 February 2022
Captured Ukrainian marines and guards alive - Navy
Ukrainian soldiers who were reportedly attacked on Zmiinyi (Snake) island are still alive, according to a statement posted on Facebook by Ukraine's naval services.
"We are very happy to learn that our brothers are alive and well," the statement posted on Monday said.
The sailors "rebuked twice the attacks of the Russian invaders," but could no longer continue to protect the island, the statement continued.
Connection with the island was completely cut off and attempts to reach the sailors futile, after Russian armed forces destroyed its infrastructure, the navy said.
On Friday we reported how Ukraine was honouring 13 soldiers it said were killed while defending the island from Russian attacks.
‘They were fooled by Putin’: Chinese historians speak out against Russian invasion
An open letter written by five historians denounced the war. They hope to persuade Beijing to make their stance clearer
Vincent Ni China affairs correspondent
Sunday, February 27, 2022
Putin: Redrawing borders, rewriting history
News of the invasion of Ukraine floods the airwaves – we look at media narratives, historical myths and Putin’s push to redraw borders and rewrite history.
European Union announces delivery of weapons to Ukraine, new sanctions on Russia
The European Union said it will spend €500 million on weapons and equipment for Ukraine. For the first time in its history, the European Union will purchase weapons for a country under attack, said European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.
Six In The Morning Sunday 27 February 2022
Iskander missiles were launched from Belarus into Ukraine around 17:00 (15:00 GMT), an adviser to Ukraine's interior minister says.
It comes after President Zelensky's office announced today that Ukrainian and Russian officials are due to meet for talks on the Belarusian border with Ukraine - although they have not said when.
Anton Herashchenko posted the footage on Facebook.
"Iskanders launched against Ukraine from the vicinity of Mozyr," he wrote. "This means they've brought death somewhere... so this is the kind of ceasefire we have?"
A Ukrainian statement earlier said that Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko had "taken responsibility for ensuring that all planes, helicopters and missiles stationed on Belarusian territory remain on the ground during the Ukrainian delegation's travel, talks and return”.
Reviled, harassed, abused: Narendra Modi’s most trenchant critic speaks out
When I talked to the journalist Rana Ayyub in her Mumbai home last Wednesday she was calmer than she was when I had spoken to her three days earlier. But that is not saying much. Last Sunday her words were jumbled, her voice on edge. She said she had not slept. That she could not eat or keep food down. That she had had thoughts of self-harm.
“I was on a plane yesterday and I said to my brother, ‘Can you feel me sitting next to me?’ And he said, ‘Have you completely lost it?’ And I said, ‘No, I’m just not sure I’m sitting next to you. I feel like I’m in a dream.’ And afterwards, I spoke to my psychiatrist and she said, ‘You’re dissociating. You’ve had a traumatic experience –that’s your brain shutting down.’”
In fact, this is a highly rational response to what Ayyub is going through. In a crowded field, she may well be the most hated journalist on Earth.
Opinion: Germany finally stands up to Putin's Russia
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz's speech marks a new era in both Germany's relations with Russia and its defense policy. It was about time, says DW's Editor-in-Chief Manuela Kasper-Claridge.
It was a powerful speech on Ukraine that German Chancellor Olaf Scholz delivered in the Bundestag. It was clear that it's the end of ifs and buts, as well as the politics of hesitant little steps. Germany is sending weapons to Ukraine and massively investing in the Bundeswehr. This marks the beginning of a new era, a reality the chancellor himself repeatedly referenced.
Germany's coalition government has taken a clear stance against Russia the aggressor. Finally, NATO allies, in particular the Baltic states, know where they stand with Germany. There is a fear there that Putin's Russia wants to force them into its sphere of influence, along with Ukraine. Scholz made it clear that Berlin will not tolerate that and that it stands firmly behind its NATO
Security in EuropeHow Putin Has Revived the NATO Alliance
Just a few years ago, the French president declared that NATO was "brain dead." Now, after Russia's attack on Ukraine, it is more important than ever. It remains unclear, however, whether the alliance is prepared for the new challenges it faces.
By Matthias Gebauer und Ralf Neukirch
Jens Stoltenberg, the secretary general of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), found the expression to be so apt that he used it a couple of times. The current situation, he said in his first public appearance following Thursday’s Russian invasion of Ukraine, is the "new normal."
And that new normal looks like this: The United States is transferring combat helicopters, warplanes and paratroopers to the Baltic states, the British are sending an additional 900 troops to the region and the Germans are boosting their presence by 350 soldiers.
Taliban say no more evacuations until life improves for Afghans abroad
The Taliban will not allow any more Afghans to be evacuated until the situation improves abroad for those who have already left, their spokesman said Sunday.
Families wanting to leave in future would also need a good excuse for doing so, Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid told a news conference, adding a promise to allow anyone to go abroad was not "continuous".
More than 120,000 Afghans and dual nationals were evacuated up to August 31 when the last US-led troops withdrew, two weeks after the hardline Islamists seized Kabul.
Hundreds more were allowed to leave on flights after that, but the last official evacuation by air was on December 1.
Keio student hunkers down to tell world about Ukraine crisis
By YUSUKE SAITO/ Staff Writer
A Japanese university student in Kyiv who took shelter in an underground parking garage while Russian missiles rained down on the capital started posting messages on social media to describe his harrowing experience as invading Russian forces advanced across Ukraine.
Tsuyoshi Maehara, 20, a second-year student at Tokyo’s Keio University, has been studying in an integrated information technology project known as the Innovation Park Unit City in the Ukrainian capital since late January.
“I didn’t sleep a wink,” he responded after being contacted on the morning of Feb. 25. “It is extremely cold. But I feel safer here than at home.”
Saturday, February 26, 2022
Can anything stop Russia’s invasion of Ukraine?
International diplomatic response criticised as ‘weak’ and ‘ineffective’.
Germany decides to send weapons from its military to Ukraine
The German military will send 1,000 anti-tank weapons and 500 "Stinger" class surface-to-air missiles to Ukraine amid the ongoing Russian invasion, the government announced. Government spokesman Steffen Hebestreit said the weapons would be delivered as soon as possible to support the Ukrainian military.
Six In The Morning Saturday 26 February 2022
Kyiv warns of sabotage groups as curfew imposed
Women making firebombs to defend their city
Sarah Rainsford
reporting from Dnipro, eastern Ukraine
In the centre of this major Ukrainian city, we just found crowds of women crouched on the grass making Molotov cocktails. These are homemade weapons, to defend their homes and their streets in Dnipro against the advance of Russian troops.
There were teachers, lawyers and housewives surrounded by glass bottles, rags and fuel. They said they were trying not to think too hard about what they were actually doing because, as one woman told me, it was "too terrifying".
But they do want to be ready for anything. This city has not come under attack, but it’s already feeling the cost of this war. The military hospital has 400 beds, and they’re full of wounded soldiers from all over eastern Ukraine.
‘A flashy theme park’: outcry over Modi’s plans for the Gandhi ashram
The site Mahatma Gandhi lived at during 1917-30 is getting a very costly makeover many think is meant to distort his legacy
Hannah Ellis-Petersen in Ahmedabad
Like most things in Mahatma Gandhi’s life, his ashram in the Indian city of Ahmedabad was simple and austere. Yet between 1917 and 1930, these modest white bungalows, set on the bank of the Sabarmati river in the state of Gujarat, were the beating heart of Gandhi’s non-violent freedom struggle against British rule and his experiments in upending India’s oppressive caste system.
Gandhi – who would eventually lead India to independence and remains a global icon for peace – left the Sabarmati ashram in 1930, never to return, and in the years since, it has become one of India’s most sacrosanct sites. It is where Nelson Mandela, Bill Clinton, Xi Jinping, Benjamin Netanyahu and most recently Donald Trump all paid a visit to during their trips to India.
France intercepts Russia-bound cargo ship ‘Baltic Leader’ in the English Channel and ‘escorts’ it to Boulogne
The ship has been suspected of belonging to a firm targeted by EU sanctions after the invasion of Ukraine
The French navy has intercepted a Russian cargo ship in the English Channel that was bound for Saint Petersburg, the BBC has reported.
French officials told the broadcaster that the ship was intercepted according to new European Union sanctions imposed on Russian entities and individuals after Vladimir Putin launched an invasion of Ukraine.
The ship, named ‘Baltic Leader’, had been stopped in Honfleur, in the Normandy region of northern France, and has been “escorted” to a port in Boulogne-Sur-Mer, the BBC added citing an official.
Saudi Arabia: Many activists remain in jail
Family and activists hope that Raif Badawi will be released soon. However, the well-known blogger is not the only activist behind bars for expressing dissenting views.
If everything goes well, the imprisoned Saudi Arabian blogger Raif Badawi will be released next week after almost a decade in jail.
After years of campaigning for his release, human rights activists and his wife Ensaf Haider are pinning their hopes on a release by early March.
Badawi has spent almost ten years behind bars for publishing a blog called Free Saudi Liberals. He was sentenced to a decade in prison in 2014 for "insulting Islam" because he had discussed the separation of religion and state in Saudi politics on his blog.
Drugmaker Shionogi applies for oral COVID pill approval in Japan
Japanese pharmaceutical firm Shionogi & Co said Friday it has applied for approval of its oral COVID-19 drug, after mid-phase clinical trials showed efficacy in reducing the coronavirus in the body.
It is the first such pill developed by a Japanese drugmaker and will be administered to mild-to-moderate coronavirus patients, regardless of whether they are at risk of hospitalization, to prevent the virus from multiplying in the body.
The Osaka-based firm said it had filed with the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry for conditional early approval of the drug known as S-217622, following the results of phase-2 clinical trials.
America's disdain for Black men and boys hasn't diminished in the years since Trayvon Martin was killed
Updated 1311 GMT (2111 HKT) February 26, 2022
Police officers' aggressive handling of a Black teenager in New Jersey wasn't anomalous -- it was part of an age-old pattern of treating Black men and boys as threats to be subdued.
In a video that went viral last week, two Bridgewater Township officers break up a fight at a mall between two boys: one White, the other Black. While the White teenager is pushed onto a nearby couch, the Black teenager is pinned to the ground and then handcuffed. Civil rights attorney Ben Crump, who's representing the family of the Black teenager, said in a recent statement that the incident pulled into focus "the kind of racial bias that we need to root out of our system of policing."
But it's not only the country's policing system that fails to recognize the humanity of Black boys. The impulse in the US to treat them not as children but as brutes, as villains, extends far beyond law enforcement.
Friday, February 25, 2022
Can Ukraine defend itself?
President Zelenskyy calls for more support as Russian invasion intensifies.
LIVE: View of Kyiv as Russia launches major Ukraine invasion | DW News
Ukrainian forces battle Russian troops on multiple fronts, including the outskirts of Kyiv. Here is a live view of the Ukrainian capital.
Leave Tokyo & Save the Country | Japanese Regional Revitalization Experiment
Tokyo is one of the world’s most exciting cities, full of entertainment, restaurants, jobs, people. Why would anyone leave this for — the countryside? Kochi prefecture is on the far side of Shikoku, famous for its mountains, rivers, forests and Pacific Ocean coast, all packed into one place.
Russia invades Ukraine: Fighting reported in Kyiv | DW News
Ukrainian forces fought off Russian troops in the capital Kyiv on Friday as the United States, European Union and Britain announced personal sanctions against Russia's President Vladimir Putin.
Six In The Morning Friday 25 February 2022
Russia invades Ukraine
- A battle is underway for control of Ukraine's capital, Kyiv, with blasts heard throughout the night. The US has warned Russia is seeking to encircle the city, and a Ukrainian official said it has been hit by missiles.
- Russia’s assault on Ukraine began Thursday, and quickly spread across the country as Russian forces attacked from three sides by land, sea and air.
- US, EU, Australia and Japan announced new sanctions against Russia.
- Some 18,000 guns with ammunition have been distributed to reservists in the Kyiv region alone and all men from 18-60 are banned from leaving Ukraine.
Plastic summit could be most important green deal since Paris accords, says UN
World leaders to gather in Nairobi next week to discuss first global treaty to combat plastic waste
World leaders will come together online and in Nairobi, Kenya, next week, in what is described as a “critical moment” in progress towards the first ever global treaty to combat plastic waste. Inger Andersen, director of the UN Environment Programme, said an agreement at the UN environment assembly could be the most important multilateral pact since the Paris climate accord in 2015.
Public disgust and impatience over the growing mountain of plastic waste has led to an unprecedented “degree of focus” that could see member states agreeing a blueprint for a legally binding treaty to control plastics “from source to sea”, she said.
“Public impatience is something that is very powerful,” Andersen told the Guardian. “The public has had enough. We are all dependent on plastic, but they obviously want to see some resolution of this issue.”
Pakistan: New cybercrime law threatens to to stifle social media dissent
Pakistan's new social media-related cybercrime ordinance has drawn ire from civil society activists who say the "draconian" legislation is likely to be used against government critics.
Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan's government recently passed a cybercrime ordinance that prescribes a punishment up to five years in jail for posting "fake news" about government officials, the military and judiciary on social media.
Human rights groups have said the Prevention of Electronic Crimes (Amendment) Ordinance 2022 is merely a tool to curb freedom of expression in the South Asian country.
Swamped by state media, Russians near Ukraine toe the line
As the Kremlin's forces unleash devastating firepower in Ukraine, some Russians living near the frontier are buying the government's line portraying the invasion as righteous and necessary.
It is a line obediently parroted by state media, and the campaign to convince the population appears to be working in some parts.
"Bombardments in Kyiv?" asks 80-year-old Vladimir Karavayev doubtfully when questioned by an AFP journalist.
"There can't be any other solution then," he says eventually.
He regularly watches the evening news on Russia's tightly-controlled state television, and doubts there will be a "major conflict".
Former evangelicals are putting the American church under a microscope in pop culture
From Lucy Dacus to Danny McBride, more great art is examining evangelicalism’s relationship to America.
By
You might be tempted to call Monica West’s terrific 2021 novel Revival Season “magical realism.” It features, after all, a protagonist who may or may not have the power to heal people by laying her hands on them, and it takes place in a world where the miraculous is rare but not unheard of.
But West’s novel doesn’t take place in some alternate reality. It takes place in the Black evangelical church in Texas, a world that possesses a bone-deep belief that God can reach down into the world and enact miracles, if only his worshippers entreat him purely enough. And though I grew up in a rural, predominantly white evangelical church in South Dakota, the hardcore belief of West’s characters was familiar to me in a way that filled me with a kind of relief, even though I haven’t been an evangelical Christian for decades. Finally, somebody got it
Ukraine conflict: What is Swift and why are leaders divided on banning Russia?
By Russell Hotten
Business reporter, BBC News
European Union foreign ministers are later on Friday expected to discuss banning Russia from the Swift payment network, which is pivotal for the smooth transaction of money worldwide.
According to diplomatic sources, the move is being considered as part of a third package of sanctions on Moscow following the invasion of Ukraine.
Ukraine's president Volodymy Zelensky said an ban should be immediate to tighten the screw on Moscow. But several countries are reluctant to act at the moment.
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