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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