Category Archives: US foreign policy

US charges Russians with war crimes for allegedly torturing American in Ukraine

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Four soldiers accused of kidnapping and torturing American from his home in Ukrainian village in 2022

The US justice department has filed war crime charges against four members of the Russian military accused of abducting and torturing an American during the invasion of Ukraine in a case that’s the first of its kind.

The four Russians are accused of kidnapping the American from his home in a Ukrainian village in 2022. The American man was beaten and interrogated while being held for 10 days at a Russian military compound, before eventually being evacuated with his wife, who is Ukrainian, US authorities said.

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The White House is changing its tune on Israel – but does it matter in practice?

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Biden’s rhetoric toward the Netanyahu government is toughening. But critics say his words aren’t backed up by the threat of action

A soaring civilian death toll and a deepening humanitarian crisis in Gaza has jolted the Biden administration into a stark change of rhetoric towards the Israeli government of Benjamin Netanyahu.

Out has gone cavalier White House disavowals against “drawing red lines” for Israel in Gaza; in have come blunt invocations of international law and the need to limit civilian casualties to a minimum.

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Republican lawmakers walk out of Ukraine aid talks after Zelenskiy cancels

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Ukrainian president had been expected to join Zoom call but ‘something came up at the last minute’

Several Republican senators walked out of a classified briefing on Ukraine Tuesday as it descended into a row over the border crisis, after the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, unexpectedly canceled a video-link appearance to appeal for continued US funding.

Zelenskiy had been due to update the senators on the latest developments in the conflict with Russia and press for them to support a procedural vote expected Wednesday on an emergency aid package that includes more than $60bn for Kyiv.

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US imposes visa bans on Israeli settlers responsible for West Bank violence

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‘We have underscored to the Israeli government the need to do more,’ Antony Blinken says during announcement

In a rare punitive move against Israel, the US has announced it will impose travel bans on extremist Jewish settlers implicated in recent attacks on Palestinians in theWest Bank.

The secretary of state, Antony Blinken, announced the decision on Tuesday after warning Israel last week that Joe Biden’s administration would be taking action over the attacks. Blinken did not announce individual visa bans, but officials said those would be coming this week and could affect dozens of settlers and their families.

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Israel is warned on civilian impact as IDF pushes further into southern Gaza

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UN and US urge against a repeat of the destruction and displacement its attacks inflicted on northern end of Palestinian territory

Israel has been urged by UN and US officials to avoid a repeat of the devastating impact that its operations in northern Gaza had on civilians as the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) expanded its ground offensive against Hamas further south to the city of Khan Younis.

Philippe Lazzarini, who heads the UN agency for Palestinian refugees in Gaza (UNRWA), said the expansion of military operations in southern Gaza was “repeating horrors from past weeks” by displacing people who had already been displaced, overcrowding hospitals and further “strangling the humanitarian operation” due to limited supplies.

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Former US diplomat arrested in Florida is accused of serving as an agent of Cuba

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Manuel Rocha, 73, who once served as ambassador to Bolivia, is accused of working to promote the Cuban government’s interests

A former American diplomat who served as US ambassador to Bolivia has been arrested in a long-running FBI counterintelligence investigation, accused of secretly serving as an agent of Cuba’s government, the Associated Press has learned.

Manuel Rocha, 73, was arrested in Miami on Friday on a criminal complaint and more details about the case are expected to be made public at a court appearance Monday, said two people who spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss an ongoing federal investigation.

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Three commercial vessels attacked in Red Sea by Houthi rebels, says US

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US military says the destroyer Carney shot down three drones as US Central Command says they believe attacks ‘fully enabled by Iran’

Three commercial vessels came under attack in international waters in the southern Red Sea, the US military said on Sunday, as Yemen’s Houthi group claimed drone and missile attacks on two Israeli vessels in the area.

“Today there were four attacks against three separate commercial vessels operating in international waters in the southern Red Sea,” the statement from the US Central Command reads. “We have every reason to believe that these attacks, while launched by the Houthis in Yemen, are fully enabled by Iran.”

This article was amended on Monday 4 December to correct a headline error that stated the three commercial vessels were US-owned.

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Kamala Harris addresses Cop28 amid mixed reaction to US climate pledges

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US vice-president, deputising for Joe Biden, tells summit that world faces a ‘pivotal moment’ in the climate crisis

The world is facing a “pivotal moment” in the climate crisis, Kamala Harris has told the Cop28 summit after the US vowed to phase out coal plants and slash methane emissions, but also came under attack for meagre assistance to developing countries and for its own booming oil and gas extraction industry.

The US vice-president, deputising for Joe Biden – who skipped the UN climate talks – said Biden’s administration had made the “largest climate investment in the history of our country, and some have said the world” via the Inflation Reduction Act.

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Exit from Edinburgh zoo may signal end to era of China’s panda diplomacy

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Beijing’s strained relations with the west are less easily mollified by loans of cuddly endangered bears

As the UK’s only giant pandas leave Edinburgh zoo , returning to their native country after a 12-year sojourn away from China, the era of panda diplomacy also looks to be coming to an end.

Tian Tian and Yang Guang will board the panda express back to Sichuan less than a month after three giant pandas left the Smithsonian national zoo in Washington DC, ending the zoo’s five-decade panda programme.

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‘Contrary to government policy’: India responds to US assassination plot claims

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US justice department alleges Indian agent directed plot to kill Sikh separatist Gurpatwant Singh Pannun

The Indian government has responded to allegations by the US Department of Justice that an Indian agent attempted to assassinate a Sikh separatist on US soil, stating that such a crime would be “contrary to government policy”.

The DoJ indictment, which was made public on Wednesday, included damning details regarding the alleged attempted assassination of Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, a US citizen, by an Indian intelligence officer referred to only as CC-1.

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Henry Kissinger, secretary of state to Richard Nixon, dies at 100

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The towering diplomat and Nobel prize winner shaped decades of US foreign policy but was seen by critics as a war criminal

Henry Kissinger, the former secretary of state under Richard Nixon who became one of the most prominent and controversial figures of US foreign policy in the 20th century, has died. He was 100.

His consulting firm Kissinger Associates announced his death in a statement on Wednesday evening, but did not disclose a cause.

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‘The people don’t want the Americans’: Gaza war fuels tensions in Iraq

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Attacks on US troops in Iraq have led to US airstrikes, highlighting the risk of spillover from the situation in Gaza

A salvo of machine gun fire, customary during funerals, illuminated the night sky as dozens of men converged in a dimly lit, unpaved alley on the edges of the sprawling slums of Sadr city to pay their respects. A giant picture of Ali Hassan al-Daraaji had been erected outside the family home in northeast Baghdad to announce his “martyrdom” in this week’s US airstrikes on Iraqi armed groups.

The series of strikes left a total of nine fighters dead, including Daraaji, the first Iraqi fatalities linked to the Israel-Hamas war. Even as a tenuous truce takes hold in Gaza, the pace and intensity of clashes in Iraq has picked up, highlighting the risk of spillover in a country that has long been mired in conflict.

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Taiwan poll shows dip in US trust amid growing concern over China

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Survey two months before presidential election reveals more than 80% of people think threat from Beijing has worsened

More than 80% of Taiwanese people think that the threat from China has worsened in recent years, while trust in the US has also declined in the past two years, in part because of the war in Ukraine damaging Washington’s credibility.

The results of a survey published this week reveal a portrait of Taiwanese society that is under increasing pressure as the self-governing island heads towards a presidential election in January that could have far reaching ramifications for its relationship with the world’s two biggest superpowers.

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Democrats supporting Israel oppose Bernie Sanders’ plan for conditional aid

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Senator’s urge for US to make Israel reconsider military strategy is met with fierce backlash, underscoring rift on left over war in Gaza

Bernie Sanders called on Congress to require Israel to change its policies as a condition to receiving US military aid – a statement that was met with fierce opposition by vocal Democratic supporters of the Jewish state, underscoring a deepening rift on the left over the Biden administration’s response to the war.

In a statement on Saturday, Sanders, a leading progressive voice, proposed leveraging US security assistance as a way of forcing Israel to reconsider its military strategy amid its bombardment and blockade of Gaza that has led to spiraling death, dislocation and destruction across the territory.

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Arab forces will not go to Gaza, says Jordanian minister in rebuke of Israel

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Ayman Safadi says credibility of international law at stake as he clashes with senior US official over terms for humanitarian pause

Jordan’s foreign minister has said Arab troops will not go to Gaza as he delivered a blistering criticism of Israel’s war on Hamas.

Ayman Safadi clashed with Joe Biden’s senior Middle East adviser on Saturday, saying a humanitarian pause should not be conditional on the release of hostages held by Hamas. The US envoy, Brett McGurk, said the onus was on Hamas to release hostages as a pathway to humanitarian aid increasing and a pause in the fighting.

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Democratic leadership says ceasefire protest ‘exceeded a peaceful demonstration’ and commends police amid activist criticism – as it happened

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Another video posted online appeared to show Capitol police officers rolling their bikes over candles that were laid out to mourn the 11,000 Palestinians killed by Israeli airstrikes.

In a caption accompanying the video, Jewish Voice for Peace Action said:

“Last night, in DC Jews and allies carried out a vigil and a nonviolent, moral act of civil disobedience to call on Democrats to support a ceasefire to save Palestinian and Israeli lives. Within moments, police brutally assaulted peaceful protestors, injuring over 90.”

“Every hour of this horrific bombardment, more Palestinians are killed. Every hour, the lives of the hostages hang in the balance. Every hour increases the risk of a broader regional war, endangering the lives of millions of people across the entire region.

We the base of the Democratic party are here to say if you care about Palestinians, if you care about Israelis, if you care about Jews, if you care about humanity, we need you to call for a ceasefire, a hostage exchange, a deescalation, and to chart a path toward freedom and safety for all. Instead of heeding our call for a ceasefire, police violently attacked nonviolent protesters with pepper spray.”

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Protesters urging Gaza ceasefire accuse Washington police of violence

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Ceasefire Now Coalition says 90 activists injured by police using violent tactics to break up protest outside DNC headquarters

Protesters against Israel’s military offensive in Gaza were locked in a battle of words with Washington police on Thursday after accusing officers of violently breaking up a demonstration on Capitol Hill that organisers insist was peaceful.

Leaders of the Ceasefire Now Coalition said 90 of their activists were injured in confrontations that took place after they staged a candlelit vigil outside the Democratic National Committee (DNC) headquarters on Wednesday evening.

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EU foreign affairs chief tells Israel not to be ‘consumed by rage’ in response to Hamas attacks

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Josep Borrell says ‘one horror does not justify another’ and calls for unconditional release of hostages

The EU foreign affairs chief, Josep Borrell, has urged Israel not to be “consumed by rage” in its response to the Hamas attacks of 7 October as the French president, Emmanuel Macron, acknowledged splits in Europe on the conflict.

Speaking from Kibbutz Be’eri – where at least 85 of the 1,200 people killed that day died and from where about 30 of the more than 240 were kidnapped – Borrell said “Israel must be defended”, but, “one horror does not justify another: innocent civilians, including thousands of children, have died in recent weeks.

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China praises ‘warm’ Xi-Biden meeting in change of rhetoric

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Foreign ministry says US and China have ‘most important bilateral relationship in the world’ after leaders’ talks

China has praised the “warm” meeting between Xi Jinping and Joe Biden in California, in a marked shift of rhetoric after months of negotiations aimed at restabilising what has been a testy relationship.

A readout from China’s foreign ministry said the US-China relationship was “the most important bilateral relationship in the world” and that “a stable and growing China is good for the United States and the whole world”.

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Joe Biden hails progress after Xi Jinping talks but Taiwan still the sticking point

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Account of the summit from China’s foreign ministry was mixed, portraying Xi as having taken a tough line, telling Biden to stop arming Taiwan

Joe Biden has claimed that his summit meeting with Xi Jinping has brought substantial progress, including agreements on limiting narcotics trafficking, restoring militaries lines of communication, and to start talking about the global risks posed by artificial intelligence.

However, it was clear that after more than four hours of talks in a mansion outside San Francisco, the meeting had not brought the US and China any closer on the fate of Taiwan, which Xi reportedly told Biden was “the biggest, most potentially dangerous issue in US-China relations”.

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