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Ukraine demands Poland punish protesting farmers for dumping grain

Ukraine demands Poland punish protesting farmers for dumping grain

Ukraine has called on Poland to punish those responsible for destroying 160 tonnes of Ukrainian grain in an attack at a Polish railway station. Kyiv sent a note to Warsaw demanding that the Polish authorities find and punish the guilty, Ukraine’s Deputy Prime Minister Oleksandr Kubrakov said on X on Monday. The official said the destruction of the grain at the railway station amid protests was an act of “impunity and irresponsibility”. “Those who have damaged Ukrainian grain must be found, neutralized, and punished. Two friendly civilized European states are interested in this,” Kubrakov wrote. Earlier, the official had reported that 160 tonnes of grain, en route to other countries via the port of Gdansk, had been dumped at the railway station near Bydgoszcz, in eastern Poland. It was reportedly the fourth instance of Ukrainian grain being spilled by protesting Polish farmers in recent weeks. Those who have damaged Ukrainian grain must be found, neutralized, and punished. Two friendly civilized European states are interested in this. Such planned demonstration videos and comments have similarities with the russian hybrid war. The @minfrastucture and the @UKRinPL… pic.twitter.com/O0corRKY2T — Oleksandr Kubrakov (@OlKubrakov) February 26, 2024 Polish farmers have been at the forefront of the widespread protests by European farmers over recent weeks. However, they have been protesting against “unfair competition” from Ukraine for over a year. The European Union suspended import duties, quotas and trade defence measures for imports from Ukraine in June 2022, after Russia’s war closed down many of the country’s usual grain export routes. However, the flow of cheap grain from the east quickly sparked protests by farmers and truckers in neighbouring countries. Encouraged by the former nationalist government, which ruled until last year, Poland’s farmers and truckers have blocked border crossings and motorways. Like peers across Europe, the new government in Warsaw has been wary of confronting farmers, apparently eyeing significant public support and the risk that a strong response to the protests could prove a boon for the far right at European Parliament elections in June. On Friday, a Ukrainian government delegation visited the border with Poland to discuss the protests. Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said Kyiv had developed a five-step plan “of mutual understanding” to find a compromise for both countries. “The blockade hits the entire Polish-Ukrainian trade and the economy of our countries. Not only Ukraine is losing from it, but Polish entrepreneurs who export goods worth $12bn annually to our market are losing from it.” The plan outlines Ukraine’s agreement with a European Commission proposal to restrict poultry, eggs and sugar exports, including an appeal to the EU to ban Russian agrarian exports. He added that Kyiv is also ready to apply a verification mechanism to grain, corn, sunflower and rapeseed exports. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Sunday that it was important for Kyiv to maintain close relations with Poland. Still, he added that his country is ready to defend businesses that had been hurt by the border blockades. Ukrainian border service spokesperson Andriy Demchenko said on television, “Unfortunately, the blockage continues.” “In total, 2,200 lorries are queueing on Polish territory and [Polish] farmers are letting several vehicles through per hour in both directions. More blocked are those lorries coming from Ukraine,” he said. Burning tyres Beyond Poland, farmers from across Europe, including France, Germany and Belgium, have been blocking roads and protesting against foreign competition, as well as environmental regulations, raised costs, and low prices for produce. Ukraine has said blockades on its grain exports have caused severe economic losses and affected its war effort. On Monday, tractors surrounded the EU’s headquarters in Brussels as ministers met to seek ways to streamline farming rules and red tape fuelling the protests around the bloc. Farmers burned tyres and set off fireworks in the street. Police used water cannon to douse the flames as the ministers discussed concessions. Adblock test (Why?)

Battle for The Last Frontier: Republicans look to take back historically GOP-held House seat in Alaska

Battle for The Last Frontier: Republicans look to take back historically GOP-held House seat in Alaska

Rep. Mary Peltola, the first Democrat to represent Alaska in the House in nearly 50 years, is looking to retain her post in Congress after flipping the seat from red to blue in 2022. It’s been more than a year since Peltola, who previously served for a decade as a member of the Alaska state House, was sworn in as the singular voice for Alaskans in the U.S. House of Representatives. Her purported loyalty to her party, however, has left Peltola unable to address constituent concerns on Capitol Hill, according to two leading Republicans who are looking to oust her from Congress. “Voters are furious,” Alaska GOP congressional candidate Nick Begich III told Fox News Digital about Peltola’s performance in office thus far. Peltola first won election to the House in an August 2022 special election to replace 49-year GOP incumbent Don Young, who died five months prior. She went on to win the state’s general election later that year to serve for a full term. HOUSE GOP CAMPAIGN ARM LAUNCHES AD BLASTING ALASKA DEMOCRAT FOR VOTING AGAINST MILITARY PAY RAISE “She was able to run a campaign that was pretty moderate in its tone and tenor in 2022,” Begich said of Peltola. “She liked to continuously invoke Don Young, our late congressman, as a central part of her campaign messaging. But the reality is she’s not voting anything like Don Young would have ever voted.” Begich, whose father represented the state’s at-large congressional district in the early ’70s, previously ran to represent Alaska in the House during the 2022 election cycle. Pointing to Peltola’s congressional record, Begich insisted the congresswoman’s actions had contributed to the inflationary pressure felt around the country, saying she “never saw a spending package she didn’t love.” “She’s a big government, big spending liberal Democrat,” the Alaska native said. “She has no interest in balancing the budget, no interest in assuring that our nation has a fiscal foundation that’s solid going forward. She’s simply interested in finding any and all packages that will allow her to buy votes back home.” Highlighting what he believes landed Peltola in Congress, Begich, who has received endorsements from Florida GOP Rep. Byron Donalds and former Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, said she “ran ostensibly as the outsider candidate, but has immediately become the D.C. insider candidate.” “She continues to see government as the ultimate solution to life’s problems,” Begich added of the Alaska lawmaker. “She does not believe in the importance of the private sector. … She seems to believe that the private sector is the enemy and the government is your friend. I couldn’t disagree with her more.” Like Begich, Alaska Republican Lt. Gov. Nancy Dahlstrom, who announced her campaign to unseat Peltola last November, said she believes Peltola’s congressional record has proven she isn’t what Alaskans need. “We like Mary as a person, but we don’t like her voting record. She’s not speaking for Alaskans,” Dahlstrom told Fox. ALASKA MAN INVOLVED IN VIOLENT KILLING CAPTURED ON STOLEN MEMORY CARD FOUND GUILTY OF FIRST-DEGREE MURDER Dahlstrom said her values differ from those held by the congresswoman and pointed to Peltola’s support for Biden’s re-election bid as proof of that. During a December appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Peltola claimed Biden’s “mental acuity is very, very on” and that he’s one of the “smartest, sharpest people” she met in D.C. “I am a much more law and order person,” Dahlstrom said. “My values and Mary’s values are a little bit different. Mary has endorsed Biden for re-election, and I think that Mr. Biden needs to go.” “Mary’s a nice lady, but we need a strong, strong candidate who wants to keep our country safe and lets us start prospering again,” added Dahlstrom, whose campaign has received endorsements from Alaska Republican Gov. Mike Dunleavy and House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La. Peltola — who serves as chair of the Blue Dog Coalition, a self-described group of “fiscally-responsible Democrats” — has faced criticism for a number of actions she’s taken in the House since joining Congress. Last October, she voted against H.R. 4394, an appropriations bill that included $26 million in critical funding for multiple Alaska port projects, including more than $12.5 million for the port in Anchorage. “Unfortunately, Peltola’s vote against the appropriations bill jeopardizes the timely completion of these critical repairs,” Bill Ball, an Alaska engineer and surveyor with four decades of experience, recalled at the time in an op-ed for the Anchorage Daily News. “By casting a ‘nay’ vote, she essentially signaled to her colleagues in Congress that Alaska’s port infrastructure is not a priority. This perception could make it significantly more challenging to secure the federal funding we need to address these pressing challenges.” “Peltola indicated she voted against the bill because she believed it to defund the Denali Commission — this proved incorrect, as the bill in fact contained full funding for the Denali Commission. But regardless of her reasons, her vote against it has inadvertently undermined the efforts of her colleagues to secure funding for vital Alaska projects,” Ball added. Alaska GOP chair Ann Brown echoed both Begich and Dahlstrom in criticizing Peltola, insisting that her sole representation of the state has been “one embarrassment after another.” “Living in Alaska, D.C. can help or hurt us. Having Mary Peltola as our sole Representative has been one embarrassment after another,” Brown told Fox News Digital. “Rep. Peltola has served the interests of lower 48 progressives by attacking our way of life, our jobs, and our businesses. Particularly, Alaska is home to many military families and veterans, which is why her vote against a military pay raise and VA funding last year was so devastating.” ALASKA FACES TEACHER SHORTAGE AS EDUCATION FUNDING DEBATE DOMINATES LEGISLATURE She said it’s clear to her that Peltola is “more interested in serving the interests of the Biden administration than the interests of everyday Alaskans,” adding that the lawmaker “has given her full-throated endorsement to a presidential candidate whose dwindling mental acuity is obvious.”

UN agency warns of ‘looming famine’ in Gaza

UN agency warns of ‘looming famine’ in Gaza

Famine is stalking Gaza as aid agencies struggle to deliver food to the north of the enclave, the head of the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) has warned. Humanitarian aid has not reached people in northern Gaza for more than a month, Philippe Lazzarini said on Sunday. “The last time UNRWA was able to deliver food aid to northern Gaza was on January 23,” Lazzarini wrote on social media. Aid agencies claim that Israel has been delaying deliveries. Tel Aviv denies that charge as it prepares to report to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) on the measures it has taken to avert suffering in the besieged enclave. Lazzarini said calls to allow food distribution in Gaza amid the ongoing hostilities between Israel and Hamas have been denied or “have fallen on deaf ears”. Warning against “looming famine”, the UN official said the situation is becoming a “man-made disaster”. The last time @UNRWA was able to deliver food aid to northern #Gaza was on 23 January. Since then, together with other @UN agencies, we have: 🛑 Warned against looming famine.🛑 Appealed for regular humanitarian access.🛑 Stated that famine can be averted if more food… — Philippe Lazzarini (@UNLazzarini) February 25, 2024 At least 500,000 people are facing famine while nearly the entire population of Gaza, 2.3 million people, is experiencing acute food shortage, figures from the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) show. On Sunday, a two-month-old Palestinian boy died of starvation, according to reports. Obstacles Israel – which controls Gaza’s border crossings – has opened just one entry point into the enclave since the start of the war and imposed “endless checking procedures” for trucks to pass through, UN agencies say. Right-wing Israeli protesters have also blocked aid convoys at the Karem Abu Salem entry point – known as Kerem Shalom by Israelis – into southern Gaza, saying the Palestinian people should not be given aid. Since February 9, the average number of trucks that entered Gaza daily was about 55, compared with 500 that used to enter before the start of the conflict, according to OCHA. The agency reports that the flow has sharply reduced further in recent days. Palestinian police officers have stopped providing escorts after at least eight of them were killed in Israeli attacks in southern Rafah, according to UNRWA and US officials. This has prompted others to leave their posts, paving the way for a breakdown in civilian order. Last week, the World Food Programme (WFP) announced the suspension of aid deliveries to northern Gaza after crowds of hungry people stripped goods and beat a driver. Convoys also faced gunfire, with verified video on social media showing Palestinians fleeing to take cover amid the sound of gunshots and clouds of fumes from smoke bombs. Palestinian children are also seen scooping up spilled flour from the ground. The lack of Israeli assistance is further complicating deliveries, UN agencies say. According to OCHA, the majority of aid missions between January 1 and February 15 for northern Gaza – 39 out of 77 – were denied by Israel and less than 20 percent were facilitated by Israeli authorities. ‘No limit’ However, Israel denies that it is obstructing aid deliveries. “There is no limit to the amount of humanitarian aid that can be sent to the civilian population of Gaza and northern Gaza,” Israel’s coordination office for its activities in Palestine (COGAT) wrote in a post on X. Israel is due on Monday to report to the ICJ what it has done to open the way to increased deliveries of humanitarian aid – one of the measures Israel was ordered to comply with by the UN’s top court last month to prevent genocide in Gaza. But Human Rights Watch said on Monday that Israel was not adhering to the court’s order, citing a 30 percent drop in the average number of aid trucks entering Gaza daily over the weeks since. “The Israeli government has simply ignored the court’s ruling, and in some ways even intensified its repression, including further blocking lifesaving aid,” said Omar Shakir, the agency’s Israel and Palestine director. Meanwhile, UN chief Antonio Guterres warned that a full-scale Israeli military operation in the southern city of Rafah would “put the final nail in the coffin” of aid programmes in Gaza. Adblock test (Why?)

Nigerians suffer along border with Niger as economic sanctions bite

Nigerians suffer along border with Niger as economic sanctions bite

Under the midday sun in northern Nigeria, three sisters trek across the border on their way to a wedding in Niger, carrying their babies on their backs. The 1,600km (1,000-mile) frontier has officially been closed since August last year, when West African leaders imposed sanctions on Niger following a military coup that overthrew President Mohamed Bazoum. The closure has taken a heavy toll on both sides. In Nigeria, it has sharpened the effects of an economic crisis and exposed already vulnerable communities to an increase in violent crime. The hardship has been immense, hitting traders especially hard – but for many, the border is still porous. The three women, who have family on either side, passed by the post at Jibia town in Nigeria freely on their way from northwestern Katsina state to Dan Issa village in Niger. Authorities tend to turn a blind eye to pedestrians, and motorists have also found other routes to skirt round checks. The women said the 800 naira ($0.50) fee for a motorbike taxi to their destination was too expensive. “We can’t afford it, which is why we decided to trek,” said 30-year-old Saadatu Sani. Women walk by the closed Niger-Nigeria border in Jibia [Kola Sulaimon/AFP] Hit twice Nigeria used to be one of Niger’s main trading partners, exporting $193m worth of goods to Niger in 2022, according to the United Nations, including electricity, tobacco and cement. Niger’s exports to its neighbour totalled $67.84m in the same year, including cattle, fruit and refined fuel. It is tougher for traders to cross the border, and they say the closure has had a severe effect. Truck driver Hamza Lawal said his business had ground to a halt. He said food had become so expensive people could “hardly eat three meals in a day”. Locals say they have been struck by a double catastrophe, with food prices soaring since the border closure as well as reforms brought in by Nigeria’s new president which have plunged the country into a wider economic crisis. After coming to office last year, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu ended a fuel subsidy and currency controls, leading to a tripling of petrol prices and a spike in living costs as the naira has slid against the dollar. The country’s inflation rate reached almost 30 percent in January, according to the National Bureau of Statistics. In Jibia, 100kg (220 pounds) of millet now costs about 60,000 naira ($40) – double the last year’s price. Hassan Issa, Doctors Without Borders (known by its French initials MSF) coordinator in Katsina, fears malnutrition rates will reach new highs this year. With Ramadan starting next month, he worries families in the predominantly Muslim state will “quickly exhaust their reserves during the festive period and find themselves with nothing very early in the year”. Musa Abdullah, 67, the head of the herders in Jibia [Kola Sulaimon/AFP] Bribes and banditry The border closure has also worsened insecurity in the region. Over the years, old tensions between herders and farmers have morphed into a deadly conflict involving criminal gangs. Armed “bandit” groups kill, loot and terrorise the population. They have stepped up attacks despite Nigerian military operations in the vast Rugu forest, one of their hideouts. The conflict has driven farmers from their land, and bandits also steal livestock. “We and the people of Niger are brethren, we are kith and kin,” said 67-year-old herder Musa Abdullahu. “They bring these livestock to us to buy. Since the border is closed they cannot bring the livestock to us … and the local livestock have all been rustled by these evil people [bandits],” he said. The economic fallout from the border closure has also led some Nigerians to turn to banditry. “Poverty can lead to theft and murder … anything for survival,” said Jibia’s traditional leader Sade Rabiu. But it is not just bandits that locals have to contend with. Philip Ikita, project director for the Mercy Corps NGO in Katsina, said insecurity has risen since the closure thanks to the actions of “government security agencies as well as the bandits”. At checkpoints along the road from Katsina city to Jibia, police, soldiers, local security groups, and self-appointed inspectors take money from road users. Ikita said officials were stopping traders “not really to enforce the law but … to negotiate heavy bribes”. “The bandits are underground, they can’t come out in the open,” he said. “The people that are supposed to enforce the law and protect us from bandits are the biggest burden to our free trade.” Adblock test (Why?)

Israel’s war on Gaza: List of key events, day 143

Israel’s war on Gaza: List of key events, day 143

As it continues with its offensive, Israel is expected to submit a report to the ICJ regarding its actions in Gaza. Here’s how things stand on Monday, February 26, 2024: Fighting and humanitarian crisis The Israeli military shelled and fired on crowds of Palestinians waiting for food aid trucks to arrive in Gaza City, killing 10 people, the Wafa news agency reported. At least 15 people were injured in the attack, which occurred on the coastal road in northern Gaza City on Sunday evening. They have been transferred to the nearby al-Shifa Hospital. “Reports that a two-month-old baby died of hunger in Gaza are horrific,” said UNRWA, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, in a post on social media. Photos and testimonies have documented the Israeli army targeting two Palestinian sisters, killing one of them, as they searched for food on farmland in Beit Lahiya in the northern Gaza Strip. The Israeli war cabinet has approved a military plan for “providing humanitarian assistance” in the Gaza Strip. Meanwhile, an Israeli military offensive in Gaza’s southernmost city of Rafah could be “delayed somewhat” if a deal is reached for a weeks-long truce between Israel and Hamas, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday. Regional tensions and diplomacy On January 26, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) gave Israel one month to “submit a report to the Court on all measures taken to give effect” to its order in the genocide case brought by South Africa. Israel is expected to submit that report today, Monday, February 26. Meanwhile, the final day of public hearings has begun in a separate ICJ case on Israel’s occupation of the Palestinian territories since 1967. In the United States, an active US military service member set himself on fire, in an apparent act of protest against the war in Gaza, outside the Israeli embassy in Washington, authorities said. US media reports said Aaron Bushnell, 25, livestreamed himself on Twitch, wearing fatigues and declaring he would “not be complicit in genocide” before dousing himself in liquid. He then lit himself on fire while yelling “Free Palestine!” until he fell to the ground. Violence in the occupied West Bank Israeli forces have erected a tower and placed surveillance cameras on it at the western wall of Al-Aqsa Mosque in occupied East Jerusalem, the Wafa news agency reports. The report comes as the Israeli government is expected to place restrictions on worshippers trying to pray at Islam’s third-holiest site during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, which will likely start on March 10. Israel plans to build more than 3,300 new homes in settlements in the Israeli-occupied West Bank in response to a fatal Palestinian shooting attack, a senior cabinet minister said. The decision drew an angry response from the US at a time of growing tensions over the course of Israel’s war on Hamas in the Gaza Strip. Adblock test (Why?)