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Mali army fights separatists on Algeria border: spokesman

Mali army fights separatists on Algeria border: spokesman
The junta that took power in 2020 has made a priority of securing all of the country from separatists and Jihadists. (AFP/File)
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Updated 26 July 2024
AFP
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Mali army fights separatists on Algeria border: spokesman

Mali army fights separatists on Algeria border: spokesman
Updated 26 July 2024
AFP
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DAKAR: Mali troops and their Russian allies on Thursday battled separatist rebels near the border with Algeria, a spokesman for the rebels and a witness told AFP.

The junta that took power in 2020 has made a priority of securing all of the country from separatists and Jihadists. It has claimed several victories in recent weeks and on Wednesday launched an offensive on Tinzaouatene, near the border with Algeria.

Mohamed Elmaouloud Ramadane, a spokesman for the CSP-DPA mainly ethnic Touareg separatist alliance, said that Mali troops and “Russian mercenaries from the Wagner group” had “tried to take possession of Tinzaouatene, the last base of civilians who fled their abuses.”

“We have inflicted many casualties on the Wagner mercenaries and the auxiliaries of the Malian army,” the spokesman added.

The Mali army made no immediate comment, but a military source said the army was “continuing to secure national territory.”

A civilian source speaking from the Algerian side of the border said that firing could be heard in Mali.

Separatist groups lost control of several districts in 2023 after a military offensive that saw junta forces take Kidal, the pro-independence northern bastion and a major target for the government.

There have been several accusations of rights abuses of the civilian population by the army and Wagner forces. Mali authorities have denied the allegations.

Mali has been unsettled by violence by Jihadist and criminal groups since 2012. A junta led by Col. Assimi Goita took power in 2022 and broke the country’s traditional alliance with France, in favor of Russia.

Topics: mali

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Pakistan hunts separatist militants who killed dozens

Pakistan hunts separatist militants who killed dozens
Updated 15 sec ago
AFP
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Pakistan hunts separatist militants who killed dozens

Pakistan hunts separatist militants who killed dozens
Updated 15 sec ago
AFP
Quetta: Pakistani forces hunted separatist militants Tuesday who killed dozens when they pulled passengers off buses, blew up a bridge and stormed a hotel a day earlier.
Militants in Balochistan took control of a highway and shot dead 23 people, mostly laborers from neighboring Punjab province, attacked the hotel and the railway bridge which connects Balochistan to the rest of Pakistan.
Security forces have been battling sectarian, ethnic and separatist violence for decades in impoverished Balochistan, but the coordinated attacks that took place in several districts throughout the province were one of the worst in the region’s history.
The sites hit were cordoned off Tuesday as the search for assailants went on.
“But no arrests have been made so far, and no additional militants have been killed,” provincial government spokesman Shahid Rind said.
Monday’s death toll includes 34 civilians and 15 members of the security forces, while the military said troops killed 21 militants.
Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said the attacks were “deplorable.”
“In Balochistan, the doors for negotiation are always open to those who believe in Pakistan and accept its constitution and flag,” he said Tuesday as he addressed a cabinet meeting.
The Baloch Liberation Army (BLA), the most active militant separatist group in the province which has previously targeted Chinese interests in the region, said it was responsible for the attacks.
Sharif said their “sole aim is to halt Pakistan’s progress, sabotage the development projects under the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), and create divisions between Pakistan and China.”
The BLA is waging a war of independence against the state, which it accuses of unfair exploitation of resources by outsiders in the mineral-rich region.



Balochistan, which borders Afghanistan and Iran, is Pakistan’s poorest province, despite an abundance of untapped natural resources, and lags behind the rest of the country in education, employment and economic development.
The China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) has seen tens of billions of dollars funnelled into massive transport, energy and infrastructure projects.
But the safety of its citizens is becoming an increasing concern for Beijing.
Baloch separatists have intensified attacks on Pakistanis from neighboring provinces working in the region in recent years, as well as foreign energy firms including deadly attacks on Chinese citizens.
Punjabis are the largest of the six main ethnic groups in Pakistan and are perceived as dominating the ranks of the military.
Eleven Punjabi laborers were killed when they were abducted from a bus in the city of Naushki in April, and six Punjabis working as barbers were shot in May.
Kiyya Baloch, an analyst and former journalist tracking violence in Balochistan, said authorities are solely using force to suppress the two-decade conflict instead of seeking political solutions.
“This approach has led to increased retaliation from the youth and has caused the insurgency to gain momentum rather than diminish,” he told AFP.
“Never before have so many coordinated attacks occurred simultaneously across multiple districts of Balochistan,” he said.
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Australia to cap foreign student numbers at 270,000

Australia to cap foreign student numbers at 270,000
Updated 38 min 56 sec ago
AFP
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Australia to cap foreign student numbers at 270,000

Australia to cap foreign student numbers at 270,000
Updated 38 min 56 sec ago
AFP

SYDNEY: Australia plans to cap foreign student numbers from next year, the government said Tuesday, curbing a multi-billion dollar industry as it faces political heat on immigration.
New international student numbers for university, higher education and vocational training will be limited to 270,000 in 2025, Education Minister Jason Clare told a news conference.
“It will mean that some universities will have more students this year than next year. Others will have less,” Clare said as he unveiled the plan, which will require legislation.
Official data show that foreign students were worth more than Aus$42 billion ($28 billion) to Australian universities and vocational education centers in 2023.
Australian authorities granted more than 577,000 international student visas in the fiscal year to June 30, 2023.
Clare said the change would mean about the same number of international students starting a course next year as there was before the Covid-19 pandemic.
The 2025 breakdown will be 145,000 new foreign students for universities, 30,000 for other higher education providers, and 95,000 for vocational education and training, the government said.
The new limit aims to replace a recent policy of giving priority to students deemed to be at low risk of visa non-compliance — a system that has favored top-ranked universities while drastically slowing visas for other institutions.
“We acknowledge the government’s right to control migration numbers but this should not be done at the expense of any one sector, particularly one as economically important as education,” said Universities Australia chair David Lloyd.
International students were Australia’s second largest industry after mining, accounting for more than half of the growth in Australia’s economy last year, Lloyd said.
“Every dollar from overseas students is reinvested back into Australia’s universities. Having fewer students here will only widen the funding gap at a time universities need greater support.”
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said this month the industry was “absolutely vital” for Australia.
But he said universities should not be overly reliant on overseas students, in part because of the implications for migration.
About 69 percent of Australian respondents blamed immigration for high house prices, said an Essential poll for The Guardian published on Tuesday.
About the same share of people — 42 percent on each side — described immigration as “generally positive” or “generally negative,” it said.
Net migration to Australia surged 26.3 percent in calendar 2023 to 547,300, official figures show, with 751,500 people immigrating while 204,200 left.
Australia’s government also plans to protect the international education industry from “crooks who try to exploit it,” the education minister said.
More than 150 “ghost colleges” had recently been shut down, Clare said, describing them as “a back door” to let people work in Australia rather than get an education.

Topics: Australia Education

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Four dead in second night of Russian attacks on Ukraine

Four dead in second night of Russian attacks on Ukraine
Updated 43 min 44 sec ago
AFP
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Four dead in second night of Russian attacks on Ukraine

Four dead in second night of Russian attacks on Ukraine
Updated 43 min 44 sec ago
AFP

KYIV: Ukraine said Tuesday that its air defense systems had downed five missiles and 60 attack drones in a second night of Russian aerial bombardments that killed four.
The overnight attacks came one day after the Kremlin launched one of its largest-ever aerial attacks on Ukraine that battered energy facilities and left several dead.
The air force said on social media Tuesday morning that Russia had launched a total of 91 projectiles including 10 missiles and 81 Iranian-designed attack drones from several regions of Russia.
“Unfortunately, despite the effective work of our air defense systems, four people were killed and 16 were wounded,” President Volodymyr Zelensky said in a post on social media.
He said rescue work was ongoing at the impact sites and vowed a response to the attacks.
“Crimes against humanity cannot be committed with impunity,” he added in the post.
AFP journalists in the capital Kyiv heard air raid sirens echo over the city throughout the night as well as explosions, likely from air defense systems.
Since invading in February 2022, Russia has launched repeated large-scale drone and missile attacks on Ukraine, including punishing strikes on energy facilities.
Local authorities said earlier on Tuesday that two people had been killed in the southeastern Zaporizhzhia region and two in the central city of Kryvyi Rig after a missile struck a hotel.
The hotel strike comes just days after a team working for the Reuters news agency were hit by a missile in their hotel in the eastern Ukrainian city of Kramatorsk, killing a safety adviser working with the agency.

Topics: Ukraine Russia war

UN nuclear chief to visit Russian atomic plant near front line

UN nuclear chief to visit Russian atomic plant near front line
Updated 27 August 2024
Reuters
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UN nuclear chief to visit Russian atomic plant near front line

UN nuclear chief to visit Russian atomic plant near front line
  • IAEA’s Grossi to visit Kursk nuclear plant
  • Russia says Ukraine has attacked the site
Updated 27 August 2024
Reuters

KURSK: UN nuclear agency chief Rafael Grossi will visit on Tuesday Russia’s Kursk nuclear power plant, which Moscow says has been repeatedly attacked by Ukrainian forces that are just 40 km (25 miles) away after carving out a slice of Russian territory.
The safety of nuclear power plants has repeatedly been endangered over the course of the Ukraine war, which began in February 2022 when Russia sent thousands of troops over the border into Ukraine.
Moscow and Kyiv have repeatedly blamed each other for drone and artillery attacks on the Russian-controlled Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in Ukraine, though the Aug. 6 incursion by Ukrainian forces into Russia has put the spotlight on the Kursk plant — a major Soviet-era nuclear power station.
President Vladimir Putin accused Ukraine on Thursday of trying to attack the Kursk plant, which has four Soviet graphite-moderated RBMK-1000 reactors — the same design as those at the Chernobyl nuclear plant which in 1986 became the scene of the world’s worst-ever civilian nuclear disaster.
Ukraine has yet to respond to the accusations that it attacked the facility.
Grossi, who has repeatedly warned of a nuclear disaster if nuclear plants continue to be attacked, said he would lead an International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) mission to the Kursk plant “given the serious situation.”
He said the only way the IAEA could assess the plant’s security and validate the information it was receiving was to visit the site, which is owned by Russia’s vast nuclear state corporation, Rosatom.
“The safety and security of nuclear facilities must, under no circumstances, be endangered,” Grossi said. “The safety and security of all nuclear power plants is of central and fundamental concern to the IAEA.”

Foreign attack
Thousands of Ukrainian soldiers punched through the Russian border on Aug. 6 and then carved out a portion of Russia’s western Kursk region, the biggest foreign attack on sovereign Russian territory since World War Two.
Russia says Ukraine sent in thousands of troops along with sabotage units, swarms of drones, heavy artillery, dozens of tanks and heavy Western weaponry. Moscow says it will eject the Ukrainian soldiers.
Just 40 km (25 miles) away from the fighting, the Kursk nuclear power station sits next to the town of Kurchatov, named after legendary Russian physicist Igor Kurchatov.
Of the Kursk nuclear power station’s four Soviet-era reactors, two are shut down, but two — Number 3 and Number 4 — are operational. Reactor Number 4 was disconnected from the grid on Aug. 25 for 59 days of cooling repairs.
Construction of Kursk-2, essentially new reactors of the VVER-510 type, began in 2018. The two reactors are not operational yet.
The IAEA said on Aug. 22 that it had been informed by Russia that the remains of a drone were found about 100 meters (330 ft)from the Kursk plant’s spent fuel nuclear storage facility.
Radiation levels in the area are normal, according to Russian monitoring stations.

Topics: Russia-Ukraine Conflict Russia Ukraine

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Biden, Modi discuss Ukraine war after PM’s visit, situation in Bangladesh

Biden, Modi discuss Ukraine war after PM’s visit, situation in Bangladesh
Updated 27 August 2024
Reuters
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Biden, Modi discuss Ukraine war after PM’s visit, situation in Bangladesh

Biden, Modi discuss Ukraine war after PM’s visit, situation in Bangladesh
  • Last week, Modi visited Ukraine in the first visit by an Indian prime minister in modern Ukrainian history
  • Modi urged President Zelensky to sit down for talks with Russia to end the war and offered to help bring peace
Updated 27 August 2024
Reuters

WASHINGTON: US President Joe Biden and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday discussed the Russia-Ukraine war following Modi’s visit to Ukraine, along with the situation in Bangladesh where protests led to the ousting of former leader Sheikh Hasina earlier this month.

Modi posted online that he discussed the situation in Ukraine with Biden over the phone and “reiterated India’s full support for early return of peace and stability.” 

He also said the two leaders stressed “the need for early restoration of normalcy, and ensuring the safety and security of minorities, especially Hindus, in Bangladesh.”

The White House issued a separate statement, saying Biden commended Modi’s recent visit to Poland and Ukraine, and that both leaders expressed “support for a peaceful resolution of the conflict in accordance with international law, on the basis of the UN Charter.”

Last week, Modi visited Ukraine in the first visit by an Indian prime minister in modern Ukrainian history. It came at a volatile juncture in the war launched by Russia in February 2022. Moscow is making slow gains in eastern Ukraine as Kyiv presses a cross-border incursion.

Modi urged President Volodymyr Zelensky to sit down for talks with Russia to end the war and offered to help bring peace.

Modi’s Ukraine visit followed a visit he made to Russia in July where he embraced President Vladimir Putin on the same day that a deadly Russian missile strike hit a children’s hospital. That visit angered Ukraine and the US State Department said it raised concerns with India about ties with Russia.

Moscow has been a large weapons supplier to India since the Soviet Union days. Washington in recent years has looked to woo New Delhi to counter China’s influence.

Modi said the two leaders also discussed the situation in Bangladesh where about 300 people, many of them university and college students, were killed during protests that began in July with students agitating against quotas in government jobs before the events spiraled into demonstrations to oust long-serving former Prime Minister Hasina.

An interim government headed by Nobel Peace Prize winner Muhammad Yunus was sworn in after Hasina fled to India. Attacks were reported against Muslim-majority Bangladesh’s minorities, especially Hindus, amid the protests.

Hindu nationalist Modi’s own government in Hindu-majority India has faced criticism over the years over attacks on minorities, especially Muslims.

Topics: Biden Bangladesh Ukraine Joe Biden Narendra Modi Arab News Pakistan

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