Russian Invasion: Zelensky Requests Longer Mariupol Ceasefire

Russia pledged to observe a ceasefire Thursday in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol, where its forces have controlled all but a steel plant complex where Ukrainian troops are holed up along with civilians the United Nations is working to evacuate.

Russia said its daytime ceasefire would continue again Friday and Saturday to facilitate more evacuations from the Azovstal site.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, in an early morning address Thursday, said a long ceasefire was needed to evacuate the remaining civilians in Mariupol.

“It will take time simply to lift people out of those basements, out of those underground shelters. In the present conditions, we cannot use heavy equipment to clear the rubble away. It all has to be done by hand,” he said.

In Washington, State Department spokesperson Ned Price expressed scepticism about Russia’s commitment to a ceasefire.

The United Nations said Wednesday that the more than 300 civilians evacuated from Mariupol, Manhush, Berdiansk, Tokmak and Vasylivka were receiving humanitarian assistance in Zaporizhzhia.

“While this second evacuation of civilians from areas in Mariupol and beyond is significant, much more must be done to make sure all civilians caught up in fighting can leave, in the direction they wish,” said Osnat Lubrani, the UN’s humanitarian coordinator for Ukraine.

At US Urging, Fiji Seizes Russian Oligarch’s Yacht

Another Russian oligarch’s yacht was seized Thursday as part of efforts to punish Russia over its war in Ukraine.

At the request of the United States, Fijian officials took a $300 million yacht belonging to Suleiman Kerimov, the Justice Department said. Officials say the yacht is in Lautoka, Fiji.

Kerimov’s yacht, the Cayman Island-flagged Amadea, reportedly has been in Fiji since last month, arriving from Mexico. Defence lawyers claimed the vessel belonged to another oligarch.

Kerimov had already been sanctioned by the US in 2014 and 2018 for Russia’s activities in Syria and Ukraine. The European Union also sanctioned him.

In March, the US government announced a comprehensive effort to identify and seize the assets of wealthy Russians who have supported the government of Russian President Vladimir Putin as part of the response to Moscow’s February 24 invasion of Ukraine.

The initiative, led by the Justice Department, is called Task Force KleptoCapture.

US Attorney General Merrick Garland said Thursday in a statement there is “no hiding place for the assets of criminals who enable the Russian regime.” He also said, “The Justice Department will be relentless in our efforts to hold accountable those who facilitate the death and destruction we are witnessing in Ukraine.”

Russia Expels 7 Danish Embassy Staff

Russia has announced the expulsion of seven people from the Danish Embassy in Moscow in response to a similar move announced by Copenhagen four weeks earlier.

“They must leave the country within two weeks,” the Foreign Ministry in Moscow said in a statement Thursday.

The move came exactly one month after Denmark expelled 15 employees from the Russian Embassy in Copenhagen, accusing them of being intelligence agents. Denmark said it wanted to send “a clear signal to Moscow that we will not accept that Russian intelligence officers are spying on Danish soil.”

In its statement Thursday, the Russian Foreign Ministry added it had also denied a visa to a diplomat at the Danish diplomatic mission, and that it “reserves the right to take additional retaliatory steps to the unfriendly actions of Copenhagen, which will be reported to the Danish side later.”

Hundreds of European nations and other Western allies have expelled Russian diplomats and embassy staff members since Moscow launched its unprovoked invasion of Ukraine on February 24.

Japan PM: Tokyo to Use Nuclear to Cut Russian Energy Dependence

Japan’s Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said on Thursday that it would use nuclear reactors to help reduce its own and other countries’ dependence on Russian energy.

Japan has become more reliant on Russian gas since shutting down nuclear reactors after the 2011 Fukushima disaster in which an earthquake and tsunami triggered a meltdown, devastating its north-eastern region.

But facing elections in July and rising energy prices that are squeezing voters’ budgets, Kishida said nuclear would be part of the country’s future energy policy.

He said Japan would address the “vulnerability of our own energy selfsufficiency” by broadening where it buys energy from, promoting renewables and using nuclear power to diversify its sources of generation.

“We will utilize nuclear reactors with safety assurances to contribute to the worldwide reduction of dependence on Russian energy,” Kishida told an audience in London’s financial district.

Queen to Miss Traditional Royal Garden Party Season

Queen Elizabeth II will miss the traditional royal garden party season, where she would normally meet with hundreds of people on the grounds of her residences in London and Edinburgh, palace officials said Thursday.

The 96-year-old monarch will be represented instead by other family members, Buckingham Palace said in a statement.

Before the pandemic, the queen invited over 30,000 people each year to the gardens of Buckingham Palace or the Palace of Holyroodhouse in Edinburgh. The guests, who have all served their community in different ways, have the opportunity to speak with the queen and other royal family members at the parties.

The parties were set to return for the first time in three years starting next week.

The monarch has missed several major events this year and has been carrying out online engagements instead. She spent a night in the hospital in October and only conducted light duties for several months on her doctors’ orders.

Taiwan Can’t Afford New US AntiSubmarine Helicopters

Taiwan signalled Thursday that it had abandoned a plan to buy advanced new anti-submarine warfare helicopters from the United States, saying they were too expensive.

Taiwan had earlier said it was planning to buy 12 MH-60R anti-submarine helicopters made by Lockheed Martin Corp LMT.N unit Sikorsky, but Taiwanese media reported that the United States had rejected the sale as not being in line with the island’s needs.

Asked in parliament about recent changes to Taiwan’s purchases of new US weapons, Defense Minister Chiu Kuo-cheng mentioned the helicopter case first.

“The price is too high, beyond the scope of our country’s ability,” he said.

Two other arms purchases have also been delayed — M109A6 Medium Self-Propelled Howitzer artillery systems and mobile Stinger anti-aircraft missiles.

The Raytheon Technologies’ RTX.N Stingers are in hot demand in Ukraine, where they have been used against Russian aircraft, but US supplies have shrunk and producing more of the anti-aircraft weapons faces significant hurdles.

Chiu said they had already signed the contract for the Stingers and paid for them, and they would press the United States to deliver them.

Survivor Found Almost 6 Days after China Building Collapse

Rescuers in central China have pulled a woman alive from the rubble of a building that partially collapsed almost six days earlier, state media reported Thursday.

The unidentified woman is the 10th survivor of the disaster in the city of Changsha, in which at least five people have died and an unknown number, possibly dozens, are still missing.

She was rescued shortly after midnight on Thursday, about 132 hours after the rear of the six-story building suddenly caved in on April 29, the official Xinhua News Agency reported.

The woman was conscious and advised rescuers on how to pull her out without causing further injury, Xinhua said. Teams had used dogs and hand tools as well as drones and electronic life detectors in the search.

All the survivors were reportedly in good condition after having been treated in a hospital. Intermittent rain showers in recent days may have increased their chances of survival without food or water.

At least nine people have been arrested in relation to the collapse of what Xinhua has described as a “self-built building,” including its owner, on suspicion of ignoring building codes or committing other violations.

Also held were three people in charge of design and construction and five others who allegedly gave a false safety assessment for a guest house on the building’s fourth to sixth floors.

COVID-19 Caused 14.9m Excess Deaths Globally: WHO

The World Health Organization says the COVID-19 pandemic directly or indirectly caused 14.9 million deaths worldwide from January 1, 2020, to December 31, 2021.

The number is called excess mortality and represents the number of people who died versus the number that probably would have died without the pandemic.

“These sobering data not only point to the impact of the pandemic but also to the need for all countries to invest in more resilient health systems that can sustain essential health services during crises, including stronger health information systems,” said Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO director-general said in a press release.

“WHO is committed to working with all countries to strengthen their health information systems to generate better data for better decisions and better outcomes.”

WHO said 84 per cent of the deaths were “concentrated in South-East Asia, Europe, and the Americas.”

The death toll for men was higher than for women by 57 per cent to 43 per cent, WHO said. It was also higher for older people, it added.

Beijing Residents Brace for COVID-19 Lockdown

Unlike Shanghai, Beijing has yet to require that all its residents remain at home to contain the spread of COVID-19. Nevertheless, many people in its Chaoyang district and elsewhere are preparing for that possibility.

On Wednesday, city officials closed 60 subway stations, more than 10% of Beijing’s vast system. They did not say when service would be resumed, according to ABC News.

Beijing, a city of 21 million people, has been on high alert for the spread of COVID-19, as restaurants and bars pivot to takeout, gyms close and schools suspend classes indefinitely, according to CNBC.

People who live in “controlled” areas, neighbourhoods where cases have been discovered, have been told to stay in the city, and all residents must test for the virus three times throughout the week, according to ABC.

Chinese authorities reported 5,489 cases nationwide on Wednesday, of which 4,982 were in Shanghai, which has been under a draconian lockdown for weeks.

Somali Presidential Election Set for May 15

Somali lawmakers have set May 15th as the date they will select the country’s next president.

The presidential election committee, which includes 17 members from both houses of parliament, met in Mogadishu on Thursday and agreed on the date for the election.

In a vote by a show of hands, the members of the committee chose lawmaker Abdiqani Ugas as the chairman of the Presidential Election Committee, and lawmaker Mohamed Kerow as its deputy chairman.

The committee decided to hold the election on May 15th, just two days prior to the deadline set by international donors to cut their funding unless a new Somali government is formed.

In a brief statement, the deputy speaker of the upper house, Ali Shacban, said that this marks a step forward in completing one of the last duties of parliament -- to elect the president.

He said, obviously, our agenda was to elect the committee overseeing the election of the president and to set the date for the election. In the end, he said, “God made it easier for us, and now you can see how well we did.”

The presidential election has been delayed for more than a year because of political disputes that dragged out the process of electing members of parliament.

Rights Groups Cite 338 Violations in El Salvador Arrests

Five human rights groups reported Wednesday there had been complaints of at least 338 violations of human rights during El Salvador’s massive arrests of suspected gang members.

The five non-governmental organisations said the most frequently cited abuse was arbitrary arrest, as well as illegal searches of homes, injuries, robbery and the death of a detainee.

The majority of the cases involved young men between the ages of 18 and 30, according to the Cristosal Foundation.