KYIV: Ukraine said Monday that its troops killed or wounded at least 30 North Korean soldiers who had been deployed by Russia to its western Kursk region, where Ukraine has seized territory.
Thousands of troops from North Korea have come to reinforce Russian forces, including in the Kursk border region where Russia has been clawing back territory after a surprise offensive from Ukrainian forces this summer.
“On December 14 and 15, army units from the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) suffered significant losses near the villages of Plekhovo, Vorozhba, Martynovka in the Kursk region of Russia — at least 30 soldiers were killed and wounded,” Ukraine’s military intelligence said.
The units are “being replenished with fresh personnel” from North Korea, which Western officials estimate has sent at least 10,000 soldiers to help Moscow.
Russia and North Korea have boosted their military ties since Moscow’s invasion.
Russia has begun deploying “a noticeable number” of North Koreans in assaults to push Ukrainian troops out of the Kursk region, Zelensky said on Saturday.
He said that according to his information, “the Russians include (North Koreans) in combined units and use them in operations in the Kursk region,” where Ukraine launched an incursion in August.
Zelensky said he has also heard the North Koreans “may be used in other parts of the front line,” and that “losses among this category are also already noticeable.”
Russia’s defense ministry said last week its troops recaptured some small settlements in the Kursk region.
Last month a Ukrainian army source told AFP that Kyiv controls 800 square kilometers of territory there, down from previous claims it controlled around 1,400 square kilometers.
At least 30 North Korean soldiers killed and wounded in Russia’s Kursk region: Ukraine
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At least 30 North Korean soldiers killed and wounded in Russia’s Kursk region: Ukraine
Putin suggests US ceasefire idea for Ukraine needs serious reworking
- Vladimir Putin’s heavily qualified support for the US ceasefire proposal looks designed to signal goodwill to Washington
- But Putin says any agreement must address what Moscow sees as the causes of the conflict
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 has left hundreds of thousands of dead and injured, displaced millions of people, reduced towns to rubble and triggered the sharpest confrontation for decades between Moscow and the West.
Putin’s heavily qualified support for the US ceasefire proposal looked designed to signal goodwill to Washington and open the door to further talks with US President Donald Trump.
But Putin said any agreement must address what Moscow sees as the root causes of the conflict, a major caveat that suggests any ceasefire will take longer than Trump wants.
“We agree with the proposals to cease hostilities,” Putin told reporters at the Kremlin. “The idea itself is correct, and we certainly support it.”
“But we proceed from the fact that this cessation should be such that it would lead to long-term peace and would eliminate the original causes of this crisis.”
Putin has said he wants Ukraine to drop its ambitions to join NATO, Russia to control the entirety of the four Ukrainian regions it has claimed as its own, and the size of the Ukrainian army to be limited.
He has also made clear he wants Western sanctions eased and a presidential election to be held in Ukraine, which Kyiv says is premature while martial law is in force.
Putin listed ceasefire-related issues that he said now needed clarifying and thanked Trump, who says he wants to be remembered as a peacemaker, for his efforts to end the war. Both Moscow and Washington now cast the conflict as a deadly proxy war with the potential to trigger World War Three.
Trump, who said he was willing to talk to Putin by phone, called the statement “very promising” and said he hoped Moscow would “do the right thing.”
Trump said Steve Witkoff, his special envoy, had held talks on Thursday with the Russians in Moscow on the US proposal, which Kyiv has already agreed to.
The US president said those discussions would show if Moscow was ready to make a deal.
“Now we’re going to see whether or not Russia is there, and if they’re not, it’ll be a very disappointing moment for the world,” he said.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said he thought Putin was preparing to reject the proposal but was afraid to tell Trump.
“That’s why in Moscow they are imposing upon the idea of a ceasefire these conditions — so that nothing happens at all, or so that it cannot happen for as long as possible,” Zelensky said in his nightly video address.
Territorial questions
The West and Ukraine describe Russia’s 2022 invasion as an imperial-style land grab, and have repeatedly vowed to defeat Russian forces, which control nearly a fifth of Ukraine’s territory and have been edging forward since mid-2024.
Putin portrays the conflict as part of an existential battle with a declining and decadent West, which he says humiliated Russia after the Berlin Wall fell in 1989 by enlarging the NATO military alliance and encroaching on what he considers Moscow’s sphere of influence, including Ukraine.
European powers have been deeply concerned that Trump could be turning his back on Europe for some sort of grand bargain with Putin that could include China, oil prices, cooperation in the Middle East and Ukraine.
Putin said the ceasefire would have to ensure that Ukraine did not simply use it to regroup.
“How can we and how will we be guaranteed that nothing like this will happen? How will control (of the ceasefire) be organized?” Putin said. “These are all serious questions.”
“There are issues that we need to discuss. And I think we need to talk to our American colleagues as well.”
Putin said he might call Trump to discuss the issue.
Trump said his administration has been discussing what land Ukraine would keep or lose under any settlement, as well as the future of a large power plant.
He was most likely referring to the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia facility in Ukraine, Europe’s largest nuclear plant. The two sides have accused each other of risking an accident at the plant with their actions.
Any delay in agreeing a ceasefire could give Russia more time to push the last Ukrainian forces out of its western Kursk region.
Russia in recent days has pressed a lightning offensive in Kursk against Ukrainian forces, which entered last August in a bid to divert forces from eastern Ukraine, gain a bargaining chip and embarrass Putin.
The Russian leader wondered how a ceasefire would affect the situation in Kursk.
“If we stop hostilities for 30 days, what does that mean? That everyone who is there will leave without a fight?” he said.
‘We are simply going to starve’: UN chief visits Rohingya refugees amid aid funding shortfall
- ’We are simply going to starve’: UN chief visits Rohingya refugees amid aid funding shortfall
COX’S BAZAR: UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres is visiting Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh as their food rations face drastic cuts amid a funding shortfall, threatening already dire living conditions in the world’s largest refugee settlement.
Guterres’ visit on Friday to the border district of Cox’s Bazar — his second to Bangladesh — is seen as crucial after the UN World Food Programme (WFP) announced potential cuts to food rations, following the shutdown of USAID operations.
The WFP has said it may reduce food rations for the Rohingya from $12.50 to just $6 per month starting in April because of a lack of funding, raising fears among aid workers of rising hunger in the overcrowded camps.
“Whatever we are given now is not enough. If that’s halved, we are simply going to starve,” said Mohammed Sabir, a 31-year-old refugee from Myanmar who has lived in the camps since fleeing violence in 2017.
The WFP said earlier this month that the reduction was due to a broad shortfall in donations, not the Trump administration’s decision to cut US foreign aid globally, including USAID. But a senior Bangladeshi official told Reuters that most likely played a role, as the United States has been the top donor for Rohingya refugee aid.
Bangladesh is sheltering more than 1 million Rohingya, members of a persecuted Muslim minority who fled violent purges in neighboring Myanmar mostly in 2016 and 2017, in camps in the southern Cox’s Bazar district, where they have limited access to jobs or education.
Roughly 70,000 fled to Bangladesh last year, driven in part by growing hunger in their home Rakhine state, Reuters has reported.
Sabir, a father of five children, said: “We are not allowed to work here. I feel helpless when I think of my children. What will I feed them?”
“I hope we are not forgotten. The global community must come forward to help,” Sabir said.
The WFP has emphasized that it requires $15 million in April to maintain full rations for the refugees. But fears are growing about the impact on food security during the holy month of Ramadan, which this year ends in the last days of March.
Bangladesh’s interim government, which took power in August 2024 following mass protests that ousted former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, is hoping that Guterres’ visit will help draw international attention to the crisis and mobilize aid for the refugees.
Guterres is scheduled to take part in a fasting break on Friday afternoon with refugees during Iftar, accompanied by Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus, the head of Bangladesh’s interim government.
“Without work or income, this will have catastrophic consequences,” 80-year-old refugee Abdur Salam said of the food ration cuts. “What kind of life is this? If you can’t give us enough food, please send us back to our homeland. We want to return to Myanmar with our rights.”
Driving ban puts brakes on young women in Turkmenistan
- There is no legislation specifically outlawing women under 30 from obtaining a driving license in Turkmenistan
- But it is one of many informal prohibitions that is universally followed, so women that do drive must do so without a permit
ASHGABAT, Turkmenistan: Mekhri feels “a sense of freedom and self-confidence” when she’s behind the wheel of a car – despite being forced to drive illegally because of an unwritten rule preventing women getting a license.
In Turkmenistan, the reclusive Central Asian state where she lives, young women are effectively banned from driving.
“I know the rules of the road. I drive calmly, don’t overtake anyone and know how to park,” the 19-year-old said.
Like other women interviewed by AFP in Turkmenistan – ranked by rights groups as one of the most closed and repressive countries in the world – she withheld her surname.
There is no legislation specifically outlawing women under 30 from obtaining a driving license.
But it is one of many informal prohibitions that is universally followed, so women that do drive must do so without this precious permit, which is indeed against the law.
“When my daughter wanted to enroll at the driving school, we were told that she could take lessons but that she would probably not pass the test,” said Guzel, Mekhri’s 57-year-old mother.
So instead of paying for lessons, Guzel assumed the role of instructor and now takes Mekhri outside the capital, Ashgabat, to practice.
“Where there are few cars, police officers and cameras, I let my daughter take the wheel and I teach her,” Guzel, who started driving when she was 40, said.
Among the other transport-related diktats imposed by father-and-son duo Gurbanguly and Serdar Berdymukhamedov – who have ruled the country one after the other since 2006 – are a ban on black cars.
Owners have been forced to paint the vehicles white, the favorite color of Gurbanguly, whose official titles are “Hero-Protector” and “leader of the Turkmen nation.”
Many young women share Mekhri’s frustration.
“I wanted to take my test at 18. At the driving school, the instructor immediately warned the many girls there: ‘You’ve come for nothing. You won’t be able to take it,” said Maisa, a 26-year-old saleswoman.
“But up to the exam, driving schools take both boys and girls, because they pay,” she said.
Goulia, 19, said her parents had wanted to buy her a car when she went to university so she could be more independent, do the family shopping and take her grandmother to hospital and the chemist’s.
“But because of the difficulties that girls like me face getting a driver’s license, my mother said she would have to postpone the decision,” she said.
“I’ve just turned 19 and I can’t get a license but the boys can and I don’t understand why,” she added.
Turkmenistan’s motor transport agency did not respond to an AFP request to comment.
Contacted via phone by AFP, one driving school said “women have the right to enroll in the course and take the exam” before abruptly hanging up.
But another instructor from Ashgabat acknowledged the informal ban.
“It is due to a sharp increase in accidents involving female drivers,” the instructor said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
“After an investigation by the authorities, it turned out they were simply buying driving licenses,” the instructor said – a claim AFP could not verify.
Rules have also been tightened for women over 30 who are not covered by the informal ban.
To register a car in their own name, they have to show a marriage certificate, family record book and a report from their employer.
Authorities routinely reject accusations that they are restricting women’s rights.
Responding to a recent United Nations report criticizing the country, the government said: “The motherland treats mothers and women with great respect.”
Ahead of International Women’s Day on March 8, President Serdar Berdymoukhamedov gifted every woman the equivalent of $3 – enough to buy a cake or six kilograms (13 pounds) of potatoes.
‘He is not a criminal’: legal immigrants caught up in Trump raids
- The agency said on social media that it had conducted several raids in Aurora, a Denver suburb, on February 5
DENVER: D Pablo Morales has nothing against Donald Trump, and when the US president promised mass deportations, he was not worried because as a legal migrant from Cuba, he thought they would only affect criminals.
But then immigration officers arrested his son, Luis — a rideshare driver who has never broken the law and was also in the US legally.
“He has all his papers, he has his social security number, his work authorization,” Morales told AFP, displaying the documents.
The two men were visiting friends in Denver when they were woken by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raid.
When agents knocked on the door, they calmly presented their papers thinking they had nothing to fear — until Luis was handcuffed and sent to an administrative detention center.
He has yet to be released.
Luis filled out paperwork to apply for residency in 2023 but, the agents told his father, he did not have a hearing date for his application.
Immigration lawyers say the blame lies with the backlog in the US immigration system, where cases often drag on for years because of a shortage of judges.
Luis has lived in New York for almost four years and is married to an American citizen.
“He is not a criminal,” insists his father.
“He’s a hardworking boy like me; we came to this country... to work,” explains this former employee of a Las Vegas casino.
ICE did not respond to multiple requests for comment on the case when contacted by AFP.
The agency said on social media that it had conducted several raids in Aurora, a Denver suburb, on February 5.
“100+ members of the violent Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua were targeted for arrest and detention in Aurora, Colorado, today by ICE,” it posted.
According to a report by Fox News, around thirty people were arrested, of whom only one was a gang member.
“I don’t understand,” said Morales. “They were looking for Venezuelans who are part of a criminal gang.
“If he is Cuban and he shows them his papers, I don’t know why they are coming to take him away.”
Local media reported an asylum seeker was also among those rounded up in that particular raid.
Trump rode back into the White House on a wave of anti-immigrant sentiment sweeping America.
He pledged to carry out “the largest deportation operation in history.”
However, data shows ICE deported fewer people in February — Trump’s first full month in office — than it did under Joe Biden in the same month last year, according to a report by NBC.
But its actions have been very visible, with military jets used to ostentatiously deport handcuffed people to Latin American countries, or to detention at Guantanamo Bay.
Colorado knows it is in the crosshairs.
Its capital, Denver, is a sanctuary city, where Democratic authorities limit the cooperation of local law enforcement with federal immigration police.
And Aurora has been cast by Trump and conservative media as a symbol of an “occupied America,” because of a viral video showing armed men breaking into an apartment there.
City police point out that crime has fallen in Aurora over the last two years.
Last month’s raids were little more than “photo ops” says Laura Lunn, an immigration lawyer.
“I think that the focus on Aurora was a fabricated story to begin with. They’re trying to solve a problem that never existed,” says Lunn, a member of the Rocky Mountain Immigrant Advocacy Network.
“The rhetoric that the government is using — conflating immigration and criminals — is really damaging, because those two things are not the same.”
ICE says that while its agents are targeting criminals, they are content to make “collateral arrests.”
During the first month of the Trump presidency, the proportion of people without criminal records detained by ICE increased from six to 16 percent, according to the New York Times.
Lunn says no one is safe anymore, even immigrants who are just awaiting their day in court but who have everything in order.
She advises her worried clients to always have photocopies of their files.
“People are being detained today that I would never have guessed even a month ago that they would be detained,” she says.
“It’s really hard for us to predict who might be at risk.”
World Food Programme to cut aid to 1 million people in Myanmar
- The World Food Programme (WFP) said on Friday more than one million people in war-torn Myanmar will be cut off from food aid starting in April due to “critical funding shortfalls”
YANGON: The World Food Programme will be forced to cut off one million people in war-torn Myanmar from its vital food aid because of "critical funding shortfalls", it said Friday.
The United States provided the UN's World Food Programme (WFP) with $4.4 billion of its $9.7 billion budget in 2024 but Washington's international aid funding has been slashed under President Donald Trump.
Myanmar has been gripped by civil war following a 2021 military coup, plunging it into what the UN describes as a "polycrisis" of mutually compounding conflict, poverty and instability.
The WFP says more than 15 million people in the country of 51 million are unable to meet their daily food needs, while the UN warned last year that Rakhine state in the west faces an "imminent threat of acute famine".
"More than one million people in Myanmar will be cut off from WFP's lifesaving food assistance starting in April due to critical funding shortfalls," said a statement.
"These cuts come just as increased conflict, displacement and access restrictions are already sharply driving up food aid needs," it added.
The statement did not mention the United States by name, nor any other donor countries.
But it said that without immediate new funding, "WFP will only be able to assist 35,000 of the most vulnerable people", including children under five, pregnant and breastfeeding women, and the disabled.
Trump's campaign to dismantle the United States' foreign aid contributions has put the humanitarian community into a tailspin.
"The situation across the country continues to deteriorate," said the WFP's Myanmar director Michael Dunford.
"It is essential that the international community does not forget the people of Myanmar in their time of need."
Trump's scheme to slash federal spending has been unofficially spearheaded by his top donor, the world's richest man, Elon Musk.
Some of the most concentrated fire has been on Washington's aid agency USAID -- which has a $42.8 billion budget and is a major contributor to WFP.
But USAID only accounts for between 0.7 and 1.4 percent of total US government spending over the last 25 years, according to the Pew Research Center.
