Kamala Harris announces $1.5 billion US aid for Ukraine at peace summit in Switzerland
The $1.5 billion includes $500 million in new funding for energy assistance
US vice president also announced more than $379 million in humanitarian assistance
Updated 15 June 2024
Reuters
LUCERNE, Switzerland: US Vice President Kamala Harris announced more than $1.5 billion in aid in part for Ukraine’s energy sector and its humanitarian situation as a result of Russia’s 27-month invasion of Ukraine.
The announcement was made as Harris attended a Ukraine peace summit in Lucerne, Switzerland, where she was to meet Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky and address the summit’s plenary session.
The $1.5 billion includes $500 million in new funding for energy assistance and the redirecting of $324 million in previously announced funds toward emergency energy infrastructure repair and other needs in Ukraine, the vice president’s office said.
“These efforts will help Ukraine respond to Russia’s latest attacks on Ukraine energy infrastructure by supporting repair and recovery, improving Ukraine’s resilience to energy supply disruptions, and laying the groundwork to repair and expand Ukraine’s energy system,” Harris’ office said.
She also announced more than $379 million in humanitarian assistance from the State Department and the US Agency for International Development to help refugees and other people impacted by the war.
The money is to cover food assistance, health services, shelter, and water, sanitation and hygiene services for millions of Ukrainians. Harris, who will spend less than 24 hours at the gathering in Lucerne, Switzerland, will be standing in for President Joe Biden at the event. The president will be just ending his participation at the G7 summit in Italy and returning to the United States to attend a fundraiser for his reelection campaign in Los Angeles.
Harris will meet with Zelensky and address the summit’s plenary session. Biden met with Zelensky both at the G7 summit, where they signed a US-Ukraine bilateral security agreement, and in France for events surrounding the 80th anniversary of the World War Two D-Day invasion.
White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan will represent the United States at the summit on Sunday and help establish working groups on returning Ukrainian children from Russia and on energy security.
Mauritius ex-PM freed on bail in money-laundering probe
Police detained the 63-year-old along with his wife Kobita Jugnauth on Saturday and questioned them over money-laundering charges
Prime minister from 2017 to 2024, Pravind Jugnauth is a member of one of the dynasties that have dominated the leadership of Mauritius
Updated 8 sec ago
AFP
PORT LOUIS, Mauritius: A court in Mauritius on Monday released on bail the island’s former prime minister Pravind Jugnauth in a money-laundering probe after seizing suitcases of cash in raids on his alleged accomplices’ homes.
Police detained the 63-year-old along with his wife Kobita Jugnauth on Saturday and questioned them for several hours, police sources told AFP.
Kobita Jugnauth was later released and Pravind Jugnauth was placed under formal arrest in the early hours of Sunday.
In court in the capital Port Louis, the ex-premier denied the accusations.
The judge released him pending a bail payment of 150,000 rupees ($16,000), in a written ruling seen by AFP.
Police and court documents detailed searches at the homes of two other suspects who run a local leisure company.
They said officers seized documents bearing the names of the Jugnauths, as well as luxury watches and suitcases of cash.
Prime minister from 2017 to 2024, Pravind Jugnauth is a member of one of the dynasties that have dominated the leadership of Mauritius, a stable and relatively prosperous Indian Ocean island nation, since it became independent from Britain in 1968.
He oversaw a historic deal with Britain for Mauritius to regain sovereignty over the Chagos Islands following a long-running dispute.
He and his Militant Socialist Movement suffered a crushing defeat in tense elections in November.
He ceded office to center-left rival Navin Ramgoolam, who became prime minister for the third time.
Ramgoolam’s government reopened the Chagos negotiations, reportedly seeking greater financial compensation and to renegotiate the length of the proposed lease for a joint UK-US military base.
Under the Chagos deal, Britain will retain a lease for the base on the island of Diego Garcia.
Both Mauritius and Britain have said US President Donald Trump’s administration will have a say on the final terms of the agreement.
The base is currently leased by Britain to the United States and has become one of its key military facilities in the Asia-Pacific.
During the election campaign, both camps promised to improve the lives of ordinary Mauritians who face cost-of-living difficulties despite strong economic growth.
Ukraine and Europe worry about being sidelined as Trump pushes direct talks with Russia on war’s end
European leaders are now looking to recalibrate their approach in the face of the Trump administration’s unfolding Ukraine strategy
White House officials on Sunday pushed back against the notion that Europe has been left out of the conversation
Updated 55 min 36 sec ago
AP
WASHINGTON: President Donald Trump’s approach to ending Russia’s war against Ukraine has left European allies and Ukrainian officials worried they are being largely sidelined by the new US administration as Washington and Moscow plan direct negotiations.
With the three-year war grinding on, Trump is sending Secretary of State Marco Rubio, national security adviser Mike Waltz and special envoy Steve Witkoff to Saudi Arabia for talks with Russian counterparts, according to a US official who was not authorized to publicly discuss the upcoming diplomatic efforts and spoke on condition of anonymity.
It is unclear whether Ukraine or European officials will be represented in discussions expected to take place in Riyadh in the coming days. The official said the United States sees negotiations as early-stage and fluid, and who ultimately ends up at the table could change.
The outreach comes after comments by top Trump advisers this past week, including Vice President JD Vance, raised new concerns in Kyiv and other European capitals that the Republican administration is intent on quick resolution to the conflict with minimum input from Europe.
“Decades of the old relationship between Europe and America are ending,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyin an address Saturday at the Munich Security Conference. “From now on, things will be different, and Europe needs to adjust to that.”
White House officials on Sunday pushed back against the notion that Europe has been left out of the conversation. Trump spoke by phone in recent days with French President Emmanuel Macron and is expected to consult with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer this week.
A protester holds a poster reading "Germany is also being defended in Ukraine right now" during a demonstration supporting Ukraine in Munich on February 15, 2025. (AFP)
During his visit to Munich and Paris, Vance held talks with Macron, British Foreign Secretary David Lammy, German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte as well as Zelensky.
“Now they may not like some of this sequencing that is going on in these negotiations but I have to push back on this ... notion that they aren’t being consulted,” Waltz told “Fox News Sunday.”
“They absolutely are and at the end of the day, though, this is going to be under President Trump’s leadership that we get this war to an end,’’ Waltz said.
Rubio, who was in Israel on Sunday before heading to Saudi Arabia, said the US is taking a careful approach as it reengages with Moscow after the Biden administration’s clampdown on contacts with the Kremlin following the February 2022 invasion.
Trump spoke by phone with Russian President Vladimir Putin last week and the two leaders agreed to begin high-level talks on ending the war. They were initially presented as two-way, but Trump later affirmed that Ukraine would have a seat — though he did not say at what stage.
It was not immediately clear whether any Ukrainians would take part in the upcoming Riyadh talks. A Ukrainian delegation was in Saudi Arabia on Sunday to pave the way for a possible visit by Zelensky, according to Ukraine’s economy minister.
“I think President Trump will know very quickly whether this is a real thing or whether this is an effort to buy time. But I don’t want to prejudge that,” Rubio said told CBS’ “Face the Nation.”
“I don’t want to foreclose the opportunity to end a conflict that’s already cost the lives of hundreds of thousands and continues every single day to be increasingly a war of attrition on both sides,” he said.
Heather Conley, a deputy assistant secretary of state for Central Europe during Republican President George W. Bush’s administration, said that with Trump’s current approach to Moscow, the US appears to be “seeking to create a new international approach based on a modern-day concert of great powers.”
“As in the 19th and early 20th centuries, it is only for the great powers to decide the fate of nations and to take — either by purchase or force — that which strengthens the great powers’ economic and security interests,” Conley said. “Each of these powers posit claims or coerce countries in their respective regional spheres of influence.”
There is some debate inside the administration about its developing approach to Moscow, with some more in favor of a rapid rapprochement and others wary that Putin is looking to fray the Euro-Atlantic alliance as he aims to reclaim Russian status and wield greater influence on the continent, according to the US official who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Trump said last week that he would like to see Russia rejoin what is now the Group of Seven major economies. Russia was suspended from the G8 after Moscow’s 2014 annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea region.
“I’d like to have them back. I think it was a mistake to throw them out. Look, it’s not a question of liking Russia or not liking Russia,” Trump told reporters. “I think Putin would love to be back.”
The anticipated Saudi talks also come amid tension over Trump’s push to get the Ukrainians to agree to give the US access to Ukraine’s deposits of rare earth minerals in exchange for some $66 billion in military aid that Washington has provided Kyiv since the start of the war, as well as future defense assistance.
Zelensky, who met on Friday with Vance and other senior US officials in Munich, said he had directed Ukraine’s minister to not sign off, at least for now.
Zelensky said in an interview the deal as presented by the US was too focused on American interests and did not include security guarantees for Ukraine.
The White House called Zelensky’s decision “short-sighted,” and argued that a rare-earth’s deal would tie Ukraine closer to the United States — something that Moscow doesn’t want to see.
European officials were also left unsettled by some of Vance’s remarks during his five-day visit to Paris and Munich last week in which he lectured them on free speech and illegal migration on the continent. He warned that they risk losing public support if they don’t quickly change course.
Vance also met while in Munich with Alice Weidel, the co-leader and candidate for chancellor of the far-right and anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany party in this month’s election.
Throughout Europe, officials are now looking to recalibrate their approach in the face of the Trump administration’s unfolding Ukraine strategy.
Macron will convene top European countries in Paris on Monday for an emergency “working meeting” to discuss next steps for Ukraine, French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot said Sunday.
“A wind of unity is blowing over Europe, as we perhaps have not felt since the COVID period,” Barrot told public broadcaster France-Info.
Austria says stabbing attack suspect swore allegiance to Daesh
Daesh calling for lone wolf attacks in America and Europe following a New Year attack in New Orleans, according to SITE Intelligence.
Daesh has not claimed responsibility for the attack so far
Updated 16 February 2025
Reuters
VILLACH: The Syrian asylum-seeker suspected of carrying out a deadly stabbing rampage in the Austrian town of Villach had sworn allegiance to Daesh and was radicalized online, authorities said on Sunday.
A 14-year-old boy was killed in Saturday afternoon’s attack in the center of Villach and five other people were wounded, three of whom are in intensive care, police said.
Interior Minister Gerhard Karner told a press conference in Villach that the 23-year-old Syrian man, who was arrested seven minutes after the first call to the police, had been rapidly radicalized on the internet and that the Daesh flag had been found in his apartment.
HIGHLIGHTS
• Police said the man, who is being charged with murder and attempted murder, had recorded himself swearing an oath of allegiance to Daesh.
• More harm would have been done had it not been for another Syrian, a food delivery driver, who saw the attacker and drove into him with his vehicle to stop him, authorities said.
Karner, a conservative, told reporters there was sadness and sympathy for the victims, then added: “But in these moments there’s also understandably often anger and rage. Anger at an attacker who randomly stabbed innocent people here in this town.”
Police said the man, who is being charged with murder and attempted murder, had recorded himself swearing an oath of allegiance to Daesh.
More harm would have been done had it not been for another Syrian, a food delivery driver, who saw the attacker and drove into him with his vehicle to stop him, authorities said.
Daesh has not claimed responsibility for the attack so far. However, the media section of Daesh’s Afghan branch, Daesh-K, recently circulated a post by Daesh calling for lone wolf attacks in America and Europe following a New Year attack in New Orleans, according to SITE Intelligence.
The bloodshed in Villach followed the thwarting of a plot in August to carry out a suicide attack at a Taylor Swift concert in Vienna by a teenager who had also sworn loyalty to Daesh.
Wife of detained Ugandan politician ‘worried’ over hunger strike
Besigye was abducted in Kenya in November, and has been facing the death penalty on treason charges in a court martial
Updated 16 February 2025
AFP
ADDIS ABABA: The wife of detained Ugandan opposition figure Kizza Besigye said on Sunday she was “very worried” about his health, nearly a week after the ex-presidential candidate began a hunger strike.
Besigye, 68, is a leading opponent of the country’s President Yoweri Museveni — in power for nearly 40 years — whom he has unsuccessfully challenged in four elections.
On trial for “threatening national security,” Besigye went on hunger strike on Feb. 10 to protest his detention, with his lawyer describing him as “critically ill.”
“He’s not been eating, he’s only drinking water,” his wife, UNAIDS executive director Winnie Byanyima, said on the sidelines of an African Union summit in Addis Ababa.
HIGHLIGHTS
• Kizza Besigye, 68, is a leading opponent of the country’s President Yoweri Museveni, whom he has unsuccessfully challenged in four elections.
• On trial for ‘threatening national security,’ Besigye went on hunger strike on Feb. 10 to protest his detention.
“He says it’s his only act of protest at the illegal detention that he’s being put through.”
When Besigye was last seen in public, during a court appearance on Friday, “he looked very frail and dehydrated,” she said.
She added that she was “very worried about his condition now.”
Besigye was abducted in Kenya in November, and has been facing the death penalty on treason charges in a court martial.
Museveni rejected last month’s Supreme Court ruling that civilians should not be tried in military courts.
Byanyima has previously labelled the trial a “sham.”
“I am in a fight for justice,” she said. “If this happens to him, that he continues to be held illegally, that some trumped-up process is used to convict him, this is not just about him, it’s about the fate of democracy and the rights of Ugandans,” she said.
The UN and several rights organizations have voiced their concern about the suppression of the political opposition in Uganda in the run-up to the 2026 presidential elections.
Rights group Amnesty International branded Besigye’s case a “travesty of justice.”
US-Russia talks should not rewrite Europe’s security: Finland
The new US administration has warned its NATO allies that Washington will no longer be primarily focused on the continent’s security and may have to shift forces elsewhere to focus on China
Updated 16 February 2025
AFP
MUNICH: Finnish President Alexander Stubb on Sunday said that talks between the US and Russia over the Ukraine war must not rewrite European security and allow Moscow to establish “spheres of interest.”
Washington blindsided Kyiv and its European backers this week by launching talks on ending Moscow’s three-year invasion in a call with Russia’s Vladimir Putin.
The new US administration has also warned its NATO allies that Washington will no longer be primarily focused on the continent’s security and may have to shift forces elsewhere to focus on China.
The Kremlin has pushed for the negotiations to discuss not just Ukraine but also broader European security.
HIGHLIGHTS
• Washington blindsided Kyiv and its European backers this week by launching talks on ending Moscow’s three-year invasion in a call with Putin.
• The new US administration has warned its NATO allies that Washington will no longer be primarily focused on the continent’s security and may have to shift forces elsewhere to focus on China.
That has sparked fears among Washington’s allies that Putin could return to demands he floated prior to the 2022 invasion aimed at limiting NATO’s forces in eastern Europe and US involvement on the continent.
One issue talks “should not discuss is new European security arrangements,” Stubb, whose country shares a 1,300-kilometer border with Russia, told the Munich Security Conference.
“There’s no way we should open the door for this Russian fantasy of a new, indivisible security order, where it can do spheres of interest.”
The stance from the new US administration has sown further concerns in Europe as Trump demands NATO countries spend more on their own defense.
Pentagon chief Pete Hegseth this week warned that Washington will no longer be primarily focused on the continent’s security and may have to shift forces elsewhere to focus on China.
Stubb insisted that Ukraine’s push to join NATO and the EU should be “non-negotiable,” even after Washington appeared to rule out Kyiv joining the military alliance as part of a peace deal.
Stubb laid out a vision for how negotiations could work — saying that the West should hit Russia with tough sanctions ahead of talks to pile on the pressure.
He said European countries should help support any eventual ceasefire, with the US acting as a “backstop.”
