Russia strikes kill at least two in Ukraine

SYDNEY: Fast-moving floodwaters rose Wednesday in eastern Australia, inundating homes and leaving residents stranded on their roofs overnight, as authorities warned more rain was expected in coming days.
Storms have already dumped more than four months of rain in just two days in parts of New South Wales, engulfing homes, businesses and roads in muddy waters, authorities said.
“We have a situation where the rain has been falling quite heavily and hard and it has not been moving away. Part of that is because the ground is saturated and the rivers are swollen,” the state’s emergency minister Jihad Dib told reporters.
Taree, about 300 kilometers (180 miles) north of Sydney, is a key area of concern for emergency services after 415 millimeters (16.34 inches) of rain lashed the town since Monday – more than four times the mean monthly rainfall for May.
Authorities said that water levels of a river in Taree surged past a previous record in 1929, reaching 6.3 meters (20.6 feet) on Wednesday.
The rising floodwaters left locals stuck on roofs overnight, with rescuers unable to reach them due to the bad weather.
Taree resident Holly Pillotto, who was among those stranded on an upper level of her home, said she was desperate for assistance as floodwaters continued to rise.
“Our neighbors on the back verandah here are also stranded,” she told Australia’s Channel Nine. “It’s a really dangerous spot to be.”
Dib said that emergency services were “throwing everything we have into” reaching those affected.
State Emergency Service Chief Superintendent Dallas Byrnes said the situation was “incredibly dynamic and escalating,” with more than 150 flood rescues conducted overnight.
“We’ve got a lot of people getting rescued from rooftops and from upper levels of houses,” Byrnes told the national broadcaster ABC.
However, he warned that “conditions are quite treacherous and it may be that those aviation assets are unable to fly throughout the day.”
The agency said that about 16,000 people, or 7,400 dwellings, would remain isolated until at least Thursday.
More heavy rain is expected in the coming 48 hours – with some locations to receive 200 millimeters (7.87 inches) – before conditions begin to ease, authorities said Wednesday.
Scientists have warned that heatwaves and other extreme weather events are becoming more frequent and more intense as global temperatures rise because of climate change.

WASHINGTON: US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Tuesday he expected Russia to present a Ukraine ceasefire outline within days that will show if it is serious, as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky accused Moscow of buying time.
President Donald Trump spoke separately by telephone on Monday to Zelensky and Russia’s Vladimir Putin, after Russian and Ukrainian officials met in Istanbul on Friday for their first direct talks on the conflict in three years.
Putin has consistently rejected proposals for a 30-day truce put forward by Kyiv and its Western allies.
But Rubio said that Putin and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov indicated they would present their own terms “maybe in a number of days, maybe this week hopefully.”
The Russians will offer “just broad terms that would allow us to move toward a ceasefire, and that ceasefire would then allow us to enter into detailed negotiations to bring about an end of the conflict,” Rubio said.
He said that the presentation will “tell us a lot about their true intentions.”
“If it’s a term sheet that’s realistic and you can work off of it, that’s one thing. If it makes demands that we know are unrealistic, I think that will be indicative.”
Putin after Trump’s call said he was ready to work with Ukraine on a “memorandum” outlining a possible roadmap and different positions on ending the war.
And Italy’s Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni on Tuesday said that Pope Leo XIV was willing “to host upcoming discussions between the parties at the Vatican,” according to her office.
Rubio insisted to critical lawmakers that Putin “hasn’t gotten a single concession” from Trump. But Russia has also not indicated any new flexibility since Trump took office in January with vows to end the war through dialogue.
“It is obvious that Russia is trying to buy time in order to continue its war and occupation,” Zelensky said in a post on social media.
Jeanne Shaheen, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, told Rubio that Putin’s refusal to go to Istanbul despite the stated willingness of both Zelensky and Trump to meet showed “he believes it’s in Russia’s interest to carry out this war as long as possible.”
The European Union formally on Tuesday adopted its 17th round of sanctions on Moscow, targeting 200 vessels of Russia’s so-called shadow maritime fleet.
Kirill Dmitriev, the head of Russia’s Direct Investment Fund and lead economic negotiator with Washington, attacked the move, saying: “Western politicians and the media are making titanic efforts to disrupt the constructive dialogue between Russia and the United States.”
Rubio said that Trump for now opposed new sanctions for fear that Russia would no longer come to the table.
Moscow appears confident, with its troops advancing on the battlefield and Trump ending Western isolation of the Kremlin.
The memorandum mentioned by Putin “buys time for Russia,” Russian political analyst Konstantin Kalachev said.
“The cessation of hostilities is not a condition for it, which means that Russia can continue its offensive,” he added.
Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022 and has since destroyed swathes of the country’s east, killed tens of thousands and now controls around one-fifth of its territory.
People who spoke to AFP both in Kyiv and Moscow were skeptical about peace prospects and thought the Putin-Trump call had not brought them closer.
“I never had any faith in him and now I have none at all,” retired teacher Victoria Kyseliova said in Kyiv, when asked if she was losing confidence in Trump.
Vitaliy, a 53-year-old engineer from Kyiv, said Trump was no “messiah” and that his flurry of diplomacy has changed little.
Ukrainian political analyst Volodymyr Fesenko said Trump’s latest calls had only added to the uncertainty.
“This conversation not only failed to clarify the future of the negotiations but further confused the situation,” he said.
He said Trump had fallen for Putin’s tactics of trying to use talks “as a cover to continue and intensify the war.”
In Moscow, there was defiance and confidence.
“I believe that we don’t need these negotiations. We will win anyway,” said Marina, a 70-year-old former engineer.