Russia-Ukraine war: List of key events, day 1,453
These are the key developments from day 1,453 of Russia’s war on Ukraine. Listen to this article Listen to this article | 4 mins info By News Agencies Published On 16 Feb 202616 Feb 2026 Click here to share on social media share2 Share Here is where things stand on Monday, February 16: Fighting Russian forces launched attacks across Ukraine on Sunday, wounding six people in the central-eastern Dnipropetrovsk region, three in the northeastern Sumy region, and two in the southeastern city of Zaporizhzhia, the Ukrinform news outlet reported, citing local officials. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Russia has launched about 1,300 drones, 1,200 guided aerial bombs and dozens of ballistic missiles at Ukraine over the past week alone. About 1,600 buildings in the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, remained without heat on Sunday following recent Russian attacks on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure, officials said. Deputy Prime Minister Oleksii Kuleba said Russian strikes overnight on Sunday had damaged railroad infrastructure in the southern region of Odesa and the Dnipropetrovsk region. The Ukrainian military said in a statement that it hit a key oil terminal in southern Russia, near the Moscow-annexed Crimean Peninsula, on Sunday. The attack was on the Tamanneftegaz oil terminal near the village of Volna in the Krasnodar region. Ukrainian forces also launched a drone attack on the Russian Black Sea port of Taman, which handles oil products, grain, coal and commodities, causing damage and triggering several fires, according to Veniamin Kondratyev, the governor of Russia’s Krasnodar region. He said more than 100 people were working to put out the fires. Kondratyev said there were more Ukrainian attacks on the Russian resort city of Sochi and the village of Yurovka, close to the seaside town of Anapa. They caused less significant damage, he added. Advertisement Russian air defences downed five drones approaching the Russian capital, Moscow, according to Mayor Sergei Sobyanin. A Ukrainian attack also left five municipalities in the Russian border region of Bryansk and parts of its capital without heat and electricity, Governor Alexander Bogomaz said. Russia’s Ministry of Defence said on Sunday that its troops had taken the village of Tsvitkove in the southeastern Zaporizhia region, according to the TASS news agency. Russia controls about 75 percent of the Zaporizhia region, but battle lines had been largely static since 2022 until recent Russian advances. Russia’s army chief, Valery Gerasimov, said on Sunday that Russian troops had seized a dozen villages in eastern Ukraine in February. He made the announcement while visiting Russian troops in Ukraine, the AFP news agency reported. Politics and diplomacy Ukraine’s National Anti-Corruption Bureau arrested the country’s former energy minister, German Galushchenko, who resigned in November amid a huge corruption scandal, as he tried to cross Ukraine’s border. Zelenskyy said in a statement that Ukraine has agreed to new energy and military support packages with European allies. The European Union’s foreign policy chief, Kaja Kallas, said she felt that the bloc’s governments were not ready to give Ukraine a date for membership into the EU, despite demands from Zelenskyy. Latvian President Edgars Rinkevics echoed Kallas’s comments, saying that “there is no readiness to accept a date” for Ukrainian membership. He added that he has little hope of an imminent peace deal between Russia and Ukraine. Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico has accused Ukraine of delaying the restart of a pipeline carrying Russian oil to Eastern Europe via Ukraine to “blackmail” Hungary to drop its opposition to Ukraine’s future EU membership. North Korean leader Kim Jong Un presided over the completion ceremony of a new housing district in Pyongyang for families of troops who died in overseas military operations, state media KCNA reported. It is believed that more than 6,000 North Korean soldiers were killed while fighting alongside Russian troops in Ukraine. Russia will not end the militarisation of its economy after fighting in Ukraine ends, the head of Latvia’s intelligence agency, Egils Zviedris, told the AFP news agency on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference, which ended on Sunday. A wounded Ukrainian serviceman walks in a street in Kyiv during snow fall on Sunday, February 15 [Sergei Supinsky/AFP] Adblock test (Why?)
Israel’s move to register land ‘systematises dispossession’ of Palestinians
Listen to this article Listen to this article | 5 mins info Israel’s decision to resume the land registration processes in the occupied West Bank for the first time since 1967 will facilitate the dispossession and displacement of Palestinians in violation of international law, Israeli rights groups say. The land registration process – also known as settlement of land title – has been reinstated after nearly six decades, following the government’s approval on Sunday of a proposal submitted by far-right Minister of Finance Bezalel Smotrich, Minister of Justice Yariv Levin, and Minister of Defence Israel Katz. Recommended Stories list of 4 itemsend of list While Israel has increased the confiscation of Palestinian land through military orders, with the activity reaching record levels in 2025, the new move gives Israel a legal avenue that “systemati[ses] the dispossession of Palestinian land to further Israeli settlement expansion and cement the apartheid regime”, Bimkom, an Israeli human rights organisation that focuses on land and housing rights, said in a statement. Michal Braier, head of research at Bimkom, told Al Jazeera that land registration will be inaccessible to large segments of the Palestinian population who never had their land formally registered, or who may fail to prove ownership. In the occupied West Bank, land registration under the Jordanian Administration – which followed British Mandate rule and lasted from 1949 to 1967 – covered about 30 percent of the total area. As a consequence, about 70 percent of the West Bank is “completely unregistered”, Braier said, making it “very hard to determine who actually owns the land”. Advertisement Even for those whose land was registered, “the legal bar for proving land ownership is very, very high, in a way that most Palestinians won’t have the proper documents to prove it”, said Braier. ‘Full annexation’ In 1968, Israeli occupation authorities froze most land settlement procedures in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, making transfer of ownership down the family line hard to prove for Palestinians. Additionally, legal documents could have been lost or stored in homes that are now out of reach to Palestinian refugees displaced by the Arab–Israeli war (1948-49) – when the newly-founded Israel seized control of 77 percent of Palestine – and in the Six Day War of 1967, which ended with Israel capturing the Sinai Peninsula from Egypt and the Golan Heights from Syria, while occupying the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza. The Israeli anti-settlement group Peace Now said the newly reinstated process of land registration amounts to a “full annexation” of Palestinian land. “This is a way for Israel to take control over the West Bank,” Hagit Ofran, a Peace Now member, told Al Jazeera. “The government is asking for papers that are dating back to the British mandate or to the Jordanian time 100 years ago.” “This is something that, very rarely, Palestinians will be able to prove, and therefore, by default, the land will be registered under [Israel’s] name,” she added. Israel’s Supreme Court last month rejected a petition opposing the resumption of the land registration process, filed by local human rights groups Bimkom, Yesh Din, the Association for Civil Rights in Israel and HaMoked. The court deemed it “premature” to rule on the implementation of the government’s decision. Israeli settlers attempt to stop foreign activists and Palestinians from picking olives during harvest season in the village of Turmus Aya near Ramallah, in the Israeli-occupied West Bank [File: Mohammed Torokman/Reuters] ‘Totally invalid’ Israeli authorities have provided few details on how the process will unfold. Yet, a similar scenario has already played out in occupied East Jerusalem, where the settlement of land title that began in 2018 resulted in the expropriation of Palestinian land. Research conducted by Bimkom found that only 1 percent of the East Jerusalem land registered for ownership between 2018 and 2024 was registered to Palestinians, while the rest came under the control of the Israeli state or private Israeli owners. The move expanded Israel’s de facto annexation over East Jerusalem in breach of international law, including, most recently, an advisory opinion issued by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in 2024. Advertisement In its landmark ruling, the World Court found that Israel’s “expropriation of land and properties, transfer of populations, and legislation aimed at the incorporation of the occupied section are totally invalid and cannot change that status”. More broadly, the ICJ ruled that Israel’s long-term occupation of Palestinian territory – comprised of East Jerusalem, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip – was unlawful, and must be terminated “as rapidly as possible”. Braier said the Israeli government’s decision was its latest move expand control over Palestinian territory in breach of international law. “The government is not hiding its intentions. They want to expand settlements and push Palestinians into as small an area as possible.” Adblock test (Why?)
Netanyahu calls for dismantling Iran’s nuclear programme in any US deal
Listen to this article Listen to this article | 4 mins info Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has outlined the conditions he considers necessary for any prospective deal between the United States and Iran, including the dismantling of all of Tehran’s nuclear infrastructure. His comments on Sunday came as Iranian Minister of Foreign Affairs Abbas Araghchi headed to Switzerland for a second round of nuclear talks with the US. Recommended Stories list of 3 itemsend of list Speaking at the annual Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, Netanyahu said he was sceptical of a deal, but had told US President Donald Trump last week that any agreement must include several elements. “The first is that all enriched material has to leave Iran,” he said. “The second is that there should be no enrichment capability – not stopping the enrichment process, but dismantling the equipment and the infrastructure that allows you to enrich in the first place”. The third, he said, was resolving the issue of ballistic missiles. Netanyahu also called for sustained inspections of Tehran’s nuclear programme. “There has to be real inspection, substantive inspections, no lead-time inspections, but effective inspections for all of the above,” he said. Iran and the US resumed nuclear negotiations in Oman on February 6, months after previous talks collapsed when Israel launched an unprecedented bombing campaign against Iran last June, which started a 12-day war. The US joined in the attacks, bombing three Iranian nuclear sites. Netanyahu’s comments mark the first time he has spoken publicly on the discussions with Trump in Washington, DC, last Wednesday. The meeting was their seventh since Trump returned to office last year. Advertisement Trump told reporters afterwards that they had reached no “definitive” agreement on how to move forward with Iran, but that he had “insisted that negotiations with Iran continue to see whether or not a deal can be consummated”. According to a report by Axios, the two leaders agreed to intensify economic strangleholds on Iran, mostly on its oil sales to China. More than 80 percent of Iranian oil exports current go to China. The report, which cited US officials, said Netanyahu and Trump agreed in their meeting on the necessary end state: an Iran without the capability to obtain nuclear weapons. But they disagreed about how to get there. Netanyahu told Trump it would be impossible to make a good deal, while Trump said he thought it was possible. “Let’s give it a shot”, Trump said, according to Axios. Iran has long denied any intent to produce nuclear weapons, but has said it is prepared to discuss curbs on its atomic programme in exchange for the lifting of sanctions. It has ruled out linking the issue to missiles, however. The CBS broadcaster, meanwhile, reported on Sunday that Trump had told Netanyahu during a meeting in Florida in December that he would support Israeli strikes on Iran’s ballistic missile programme if the US and Iran could not reach a deal. The network cited two sources familiar with the matter. There was no immediate comment from the US or Israel on the CBS report. The renewed push for diplomacy comes after Trump threatened new attacks on Iran and sent a US aircraft carrier to the region, citing a deadly crackdown on antigovernment protesters in January. Tensions in the region remain high, meanwhile. On Friday, Trump said he was sending a second aircraft carrier to the Middle East, and openly discussed changing Iran’s government. Asked if he wanted a government change in Iran, Trump responded that it “seems like that would be the best thing that could happen”. Asked why a second aircraft carrier was headed to the Middle East, Trump said: “In case we don’t make a deal, we’ll need it … if we need it, we’ll have it ready.” For its part, Iran has promised to retaliate to any attack, saying it will strike US bases in the Middle East. The continued tensions have sparked fears of a wider regional war. Adblock test (Why?)
Iran seeks to get out of FATF blacklist amid domestic political divisions
Listen to this article Listen to this article | 7 mins info Tehran, Iran – Iran says it will continue efforts to get out of a blacklist of a prominent global watchdog on money laundering and “terrorism” financing despite “20 years of obstruction” from domestic opponents. The statement by the Financial Intelligence Unit of Iran’s Ministry of Economic Affairs on Sunday came two days after the Paris-based Financial Action Task Force (FATF) renewed its years-long blacklisting of Iran, according to a report by the official IRNA news agency. Recommended Stories list of 4 itemsend of list The FATF also ramped up measures aimed at isolating Iran from global financial markets with a particular focus on virtual asset service providers (VASPs) and cryptocurrencies. It recommended member states and financial institutions around the world to: Refuse to establish representative offices of Iranian financial institutions and VASPs or consider the noncompliance risks involved. Prohibit financial institutions and VASPs from establishing offices in Iran. On a risk basis, limit business relationships or financial transactions, including virtual asset transactions, with Iran or people inside the country. Prohibit financial institutions and VASPs from establishing new correspondent banking relationships and require them to undertake a risk-based review of existing ties. Even the flow of funds involving humanitarian assistance, food and health supplies as well as diplomatic operating costs and personal remittances are recommended to be handled “on a risk basis considering the “terrorist” financing or proliferation financing risks emanating from Iran”. What does the FATF move mean? Iran has been blacklisted by the FATF for years and is currently on the list in the company of just two other countries: North Korea and Myanmar. Advertisement Since October 2019, Iran has had “heightened measures” like supervisory examination and external audit requirements recommended against it and has been subject to “effective countermeasures” since February 2020. This contributed to making access to international transactions increasingly difficult or impossible for Iranian banks and nationals and made the country more dependent on costlier shadowy third-party intermediaries for transactions. The new countermeasures emphasise existing frameworks but also specifically cite virtual assets, signalling an increased focus. The fact that the FATF also urges countries and global institutions to remain wary of risks of having any dealings with Iran may mean even more limited transaction opportunities for Iranian entities and nationals. Small banks maintaining old correspondent relations with Iranian counterparts may also reconsider after being recommended to re-evaluate existing links. The isolation has hobbled state-run or private income streams and contributed to the continuous depreciation of the Iranian rial over the years. Links with Iran’s nuclear dilemmas The FATF, formerly known by its French name, was established by the Group of Seven (G7) countries in 1989 to combat money laundering but later had its mandate expanded to countering financing of “terrorism” and weapons of mass destruction. It has been formally raising concerns about Iran since the late 2000s, which is also when it started calling for countermeasures as international tensions grew over Iran’s nuclear programme and the country was sanctioned by the United Nations Security Council. But a year after Iran signed a landmark 2015 nuclear deal with world powers that lifted the sanctions, the FATF also acknowledged a “high-level political commitment” from Iran and agreed to an action plan for the country to address its compliance requirements. The centrist government of President Hassan Rouhani, who had clinched the deals, pressed ahead with ratifying several laws needed to fulfil the action plan despite opposition from hardliners who were firmly against the increased financial transparency and international supervision. But United States President Donald Trump unilaterally reneged on the nuclear deal in 2018, imposing a “maximum pressure” campaign that has remained in effect until today. The move empowered the argument from the hardliners in Tehran, who succeeded in blocking the ratification of the rest of the FATF-linked legislation, leaving the issue dormant for years. Advertisement Washington has retained the sanctions over the years with some of the latest – including the blacklisting in January of two United Kingdom-based cryptocurrency exchanges – allegedly connected to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. The UN Security Council sanctions were also reinstated against Iran in September when Western powers triggered the “snapback” mechanism of the nuclear accord. They include an arms embargo, asset freezes and travel bans as well as nuclear, missile and banking sanctions that are binding for all UN member states. Support for ‘axis of resistance’ The Iranian hardliners railing against any progress on FATF-related legislation have presented two main concerns. They assert that fully adhering to the watchdog’s guidelines would curb Tehran’s ability to back its “axis of resistance” of aligned armed groups in Lebanon, Iraq, Yemen and Palestine. The axis lost its base in Syria with the fall of President Bashar al-Assad in December 2024. Hardliners have also suggested that Iran’s ability to circumvent US sanctions may be significantly compromised by disclosing all the information required by the FATF. Iran has been selling most of its oil to China at hefty discounts, using a shadow fleet of ships that turn their transponders off to avoid detection in international waters. The country has also for years been forced to rely on a capillary network of currency exchanges and intermediaries, some of them based in neighbouring countries, such as Türkiye and the United Arab Emirates. To assuage some of the domestic concerns, two FATF-related laws ratified by Iran in 2025 were passed with special “conditions” and reservations infused in the text. One of the main conditions was that the ratified regulations must not “prejudice the legitimate right of peoples or groups under colonial domination and/or foreign occupation to fight against aggression and occupation and to exercise their right to self-determination” and “shall not be construed in any manner as recognition of the Zionist occupying regime”, a reference to Israel. Iran also said it would not accept any referral to the International Court of Justice and asserted that its own Supreme National Security Council would determine which groups qualify as “terrorist” outfits. Those
Thousands of Western nationals fought Israel’s war on Gaza: What to know
Thousands of Western nationals joined the Israeli military amid its genocidal war in Gaza, raising questions over international legal accountability for foreign nationals implicated in alleged war crimes against Palestinians. More than 50,000 soldiers in the Israeli military hold at least one other citizenship, with a majority of them holding US or European passports, information obtained by the Israeli NGO Hatzlacha through Israel’s Freedom of Information Law has revealed. Recommended Stories list of 4 itemsend of list Since October 7, 2023, Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza has killed at least 72,061 people in military actions that have been dubbed war crimes and crimes against humanity by rights groups. Rights organisations around the world have been trying to identify and prosecute foreign nationals, many of whom have posted videos of their abuse on social media, for their involvement in war crimes, particularly in Gaza. So, what does the first such data reveal about the Israeli military? And what could be the legal implications for dual-national soldiers? An Israeli soldier pushes a Palestinian man while military bulldozers demolish three Palestinian-owned houses in Shuqba village, west of Ramallah in the Israeli-occupied West Bank on January 21, 2026 [Zain Jaafar/AFP] Which foreign nationals enlist most in the Israeli military? At least 12,135 soldiers enlisted in the Israeli military hold United States passports, topping the list by a huge margin. That is in addition to 1,207 soldiers who possess another passport in addition to their US and Israeli ones. Advertisement The data – shared with Al Jazeera by Israeli lawyer Elad Man, who serves as the legal counsel for Hatzlacha – shows that 6,127 French nationals serve in the Israeli military. The Israeli military, which shared such data for the first time, noted that soldiers holding multiple citizenships are counted more than once in the breakdown. The numbers show service members enlisted in the military as of March 2025, 17 months into Israel’s devastating war in Gaza. Russia stands at third, with 5,067 nationals serving in the Israeli military, followed by 3,901 Ukrainians and 1,668 Germans. The data revealed that 1,686 soldiers in the military held dual British-Israeli citizenship, in addition to 383 other soldiers who held another passport in addition to their British and Israeli ones. South Africa, which brought a case of genocide against Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ), also had 589 of its citizens serving in the Israeli military ranks. Furthermore, 1,686 soldiers hold Brazilian citizenship, 609 Argentine, 505 Canadian, 112 Colombian, and 181 Mexican, in addition to their Israeli nationality. Israel’s military comprises an estimated 169,000 active personnel and 465,000 reservists – of whom nearly eight percent hold dual or multiple citizenships. Can dual nationals be tried for war crimes in Gaza? Ilias Bantekas, a professor of transnational law at Hamad Bin Khalifa University in Qatar, told Al Jazeera that “war crimes incur criminal liability under international law, irrespective of what the law of nationality says”. Otherwise, Nazi Germans, whose law allowed and obliged them to commit atrocities, would incur no liability, Bantekas added. “Dual nationality is immaterial to criminal liability,” he said. However, the major issue in prosecuting the accused “is getting [them] on your territory and putting them before a court”, he noted. Bantekas also added that there is no difference in the question of liability between native soldiers and those of dual nationalities. Dual nationals, in fact, “may in addition be liable under laws that prevent military service in foreign conflicts or joining armies of other nations”, the professor said. Prosecuting foreign nationals has been “pretty much the norm”, he noted. “Think of Nazi Germans tried by Allied war crimes tribunals after World War II, Japanese officers tried by US military courts, and crimes committed during the Bosnian conflict where alleged offenders were tried by various courts in Europe,” Bantekas told Al Jazeera. Advertisement Last May, the United Kingdom’s Foreign Office said that allegations of war crimes should be submitted to the Metropolitan Police. “The UK recognises the right of British dual nationals to serve in the legitimately recognised armed forces of the country of their other nationality,” it said. “Allegations of war crimes should be submitted to the Met Police for investigation.” Israel has damaged or destroyed more than 80 percent of Gaza buildings [File: AFP] Have foreign nationals been tried for Gaza war crimes? Nationals with dual or multiple citizenships have not yet been arrested for committing war crimes in Gaza. But rights groups, including lawyers, are trying to get them prosecuted. In the UK last April, the Gaza-based Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR) and the UK-based Public Interest Law Centre (PILC) filed a 240-page report to the Metropolitan Police. Accusations against the 10 British individuals, whose names have not been publicly disclosed, include murder, forcible transfer of people, and attacks on humanitarian personnel, between October 2023 and May 2024. In September last year, a case was filed in Germany against a 25-year-old soldier, born and raised in Munich, for participating in the killing of Palestinian civilians in Gaza, by PCHR, the European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights (ECCHR), Al-Haq, and the Al Mezan Center for Human Rights. The sniper, with shootings documented near Gaza’s al-Quds and Nasser hospitals between November 2023 and March 2024, was a member of a unit known as “Refaim”, “ghost” in Hebrew. Legal proceedings against members of the same unit are also under way in France, Italy, South Africa, and Belgium. The Belgian public prosecutor’s office also opened a judicial investigation last October into a 21-year-old Belgian-Israeli citizen, a member of Refaim. The mandatory military service law in Israel exempts dual nationals residing abroad, making the enlistment a voluntary act, an important distinction when such crimes are tried in foreign courts. Lawyers have reportedly noted that the voluntary nature of the soldiers’ service makes them more liable for alleged crimes. Men carry a body bag as they bury one of 53 unidentified bodies at a cemetery in Deir el-Balah in the central Gaza Strip on
As Sudanese city returns to life after two-year siege, drone threat lingers
Markets reopen in Dilling, South Kordofan’s second largest city. Yet residents face critical medical shortages and persistent aerial attacks. Listen to this article Listen to this article | 4 mins info Life is cautiously returning to the streets of Dilling, the second largest city in South Kordofan state, after the Sudanese army broke a suffocating siege that had isolated the area for more than two years. For months, the city had been encircled by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North (SPLM-N), cutting off vital supply lines and trapping civilians in a severe humanitarian crisis. Recommended Stories list of 4 itemsend of list While the lifting of the blockade has allowed goods to flow again, local authorities and residents said the city remains under the threat of drone attacks. Al Jazeera Arabic’s Hisham Uweit, reporting from Dilling, described a city “recovering slowly” from the economic strangulation. “For over two years, heavy siege conditions were imposed on the city. Movement disappeared, goods vanished and livelihoods narrowed,” Uweit said. “Now the eyes of buyers pick through the few available goods … as if the market itself is announcing its recovery at a leisurely pace, drawing determination from the patience of its residents.” Markets return to life The immediate impact of the army’s advance is visible in the local markets, which were largely shuttered during the blockade. Fresh produce, absent for months, has begun to reappear in stalls. “The market and vegetables have all returned,” a local trader told Al Jazeera. “Before, the market didn’t exist. Now we have okra, potatoes, sweet potatoes, chillies and lemons. Everything is with us, and the market has returned to normal.” Advertisement However, the resumption of trade masks deep scars left by the isolation. The blockade devastated the local economy, stripping residents of their savings and leaving infrastructure in disrepair. ‘The price of isolation’ While food supplies are improving, Dilling’s health sector remains in critical condition. The city’s main hospital is struggling with a severe lack of equipment and essential medicines, a shortage that has had life-altering consequences for the most vulnerable. Abdelrahman, a local resident suffering from diabetes, paid a heavy price for the siege. During the months of encirclement, insulin supplies ran dry. His condition deteriorated rapidly, ultimately leading to the amputation of both his legs. “He had a medical appointment after a month, but the month closed off his check-ups,” a relative of Abdelrahman said. “He is suffering severely. He is missing his insulin. There is a shortage of food, and he is tired. His health has declined sharply.” ‘Chased like locusts’ Despite the Sudanese army asserting control over access routes, the security situation in Dilling remains precarious. Authorities said the city is subjected to almost daily drone strikes launched by the RSF and SPLM-N, targeting infrastructure and residential areas. For Maryam, a mother displaced multiple times by the conflict, the breaking of the siege has not brought peace. She described the terror of the unmanned aerial vehicles that hover over their homes. “Now the drones bombard and chase us. They chase us like locusts,” Maryam said. “When they come, we just run to hide. When they hover over us, they burn the thatch [roofs], start fires and force you to leave your home.” She added that the constant threat of aerial bombardment makes normal life impossible: “If you are having a meal, like porridge, … the moment you see them, you leave it.” Uweit said that while the lifting of the siege is a “glimmer of hope” and a first step towards recovery, the dual challenge of rebuilding a shattered health system and fending off persistent military attacks means Dilling’s ordeal is far from over. Adblock test (Why?)
Bangladeshi PM-in-waiting urges opposition to work with BNP
NewsFeed “In the interest of the country, we must remain united.” Bangladeshi Prime Minister-in-waiting Tarique Rahman urged opposition parties to work with the incoming BNP government after its landslide victory in the first elections since Sheikh Hasina’s ouster. Published On 14 Feb 202614 Feb 2026 Click here to share on social media share2 Share Adblock test (Why?)
Deadly drone strikes cloud US-brokered Russia-Ukraine talks in Geneva
Listen to this article Listen to this article | 5 mins info A deadly exchange of drone strikes has killed one person in Ukraine and one in Russia and cast doubts on the prospects of a ceasefire before another round of negotiations to end the war next week. News of the deaths comes as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and US Secretary of State Marco Rubio signalled hurdles to reaching an agreement in Geneva as the conflict is about to enter its fifth year. Recommended Stories list of 4 itemsend of list Zelenskyy told world leaders at the Munich Security Conference on Saturday while he hopes “substantive” progress will be reached during the trilateral meeting next week, it often feels like the two sides “are talking about different things” in negotiations. “The Americans often return to the topic of concessions, and too often those concessions are discussed only in the context of Ukraine, not Russia,” Zelenskyy said. Rubio said it’s unclear if Moscow truly wants to make a peace deal. “We don’t know if the Russians are serious about ending the war,” he said before the same Munich event. “We’re going to continue to test it.” Among the most contentious issues in the negotiations is Russia’s demand for a full withdrawal of Ukrainian troops from the remaining parts of Ukraine’s eastern region of Donetsk that it still controls. Ukraine has rejected a unilateral pullback and wants Western security guarantees to deter Russia from relaunching its invasion if a ceasefire is reached. Rubio did not attend a Ukraine-focused meeting with European and NATO leaders held on the sidelines of the first day of the Munich conference on Friday, citing scheduling issues. In Munich on Saturday, Zelenskyy insisted Russia should not get away with its attack on Ukraine. He said he hoped the United States would stay involved in the peace negotiations and European countries would deepen their involvement. Advertisement Dutch Foreign Minister David van Weel told Al Jazeera while US President Donald Trump should be credited with moving talks forward, he should put more pressure on Russian President Vladimir Putin instead of Zelenskyy. “Putin has shown no goodwill to come to the table and make a serious deal. The Ukrainians are ready,” van Weel said. NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte, left, and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, centre, speak to journalist Christiane Amanpour at the Munich Security Conference on Saturday [Michael Probst/AP] Last week, Zelenskyy said the US had given the warring parties a June deadline to reach a deal, although Trump’s previous ultimatums have not resulted in a breakthrough. Two previous rounds of trilateral talks in Abu Dhabi, led by US envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, reportedly focused on military issues such as a possible buffer zone and ceasefire monitoring. Hundreds of thousands of soldiers and tens of thousands of civilians have been killed since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022, according to many estimates, making the war Europe’s deadliest since World War II. Russia is suffering “crazy losses” in Ukraine with about 65,000 soldiers killed on the battlefield over the last two months, NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte told the conference. Separately, Rutte told a media roundtable the NATO alliance is strong enough that Russia would not currently try to attack it. “We will win every fight with Russia if they attack us now, and we have to make sure in two, four, six years that same is still the case.” Among the latest casualties was an elderly woman killed on Saturday when a Russian drone hit a residential building in the Black Sea port city of Odesa, Ukraine’s State Emergency Service said. On Wednesday, Russian strikes also killed three children, including two-year-old twins and their father in the northeastern region of Kharkiv. In January alone, Russia launched more than 6,000 drone attacks against Ukraine, according to Zelenskyy. But he added Ukraine will soon produce enough interceptors to make Russia’s Iran-made Shahed drones “meaningless”. He also told the Munich conference that every power plant in Ukraine has been damaged in Russian attacks. In Russia, a civilian was killed in a Ukrainian drone strike on a car in the border region of Bryansk, Governor Alexander Bogomaz said. The attacks came a day after a Ukrainian missile strike on the Russian city of Belgorod near the border with Ukraine killed two people and wounded five, according to Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov. Advertisement Gladkov earlier said the attack also caused serious damage to energy facilities and electricity, heating and water supplies were cut off. Three apartment buildings in the city sustained damage, he said. Ukrainian member of parliament Oleksiy Goncharenko, meanwhile, accused Moscow of launching “energy terror” with attacks on electricity facilities in the heart of winter. “I can’t call it any other way because when it is minus 20 Celsius in Kyiv and you don’t have heating, you don’t have electricity in your apartment, you’re just freezing and that is awful,” Goncharenko told Al Jazeera in Munich. “I think it’s time for the United States to put real pressure on Russia. Yes, they are at the table, but it’s time to put real pressure to make them have real negotiations, because what we have today is not real negotiations.” Adblock test (Why?)
Rubio at Munich Security Conference: US wants Europe to be ‘strong’
NewsFeed US Secretary of State of Marco Rubio recalled the long-shared history between the US and Europe at this year’s Munich Security Conference, as he made it clear that Washington does not plan on abandoning the transatlantic alliance. Published On 14 Feb 202614 Feb 2026 Click here to share on social media share2 Share Adblock test (Why?)
Arundhati Roy ‘shocked’ by jury’s Gaza remarks, quits Berlin film festival
Jury chair Wim Wenders said filmmakers ‘have to stay out of politics’ when asked about German support for Israel’s genocidal war in Gaza. Listen to this article Listen to this article | 3 mins info Indian author Arundhati Roy has announced that she is withdrawing from the Berlin International Film Festival after what she described as “unconscionable statements” by its jury members about Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza. Writing in India’s The Wire newspaper, Roy said she found recent remarks from members of the Berlinale jury, including its chair, acclaimed director Wim Wenders, that “art should not be political” to be “jaw-dropping”. Recommended Stories list of 4 itemsend of list “It is a way of shutting down a conversation about a crime against humanity even as it unfolds before us in real time,” wrote Roy, the author of novels and nonfiction, including The God of Small Things. “I am shocked and disgusted,” Roy wrote, adding that she believed “artists, writers and filmmakers should be doing everything in their power to stop” the war in Gaza. “Let me say this clearly: what has happened in Gaza, what continues to happen, is a genocide of the Palestinian people by the State of Israel,” she wrote. The war is “supported and funded by the governments of the United States and Germany, as well as several other countries in Europe, which makes them complicit in the crime,” she added. During a panel to launch the festival on Thursday, a journalist asked the jury members for their views on the German government’s “support of the genocide in Gaza” and the “selective treatment of human rights” issues. German filmmaker Wim Wenders, who is the chair of the festival’s seven-member jury, responded, saying that filmmakers “have to stay out of politics”. “If we made movies that are dedicatedly political, we enter the field of politics. But we are the counterweight to politics. We are the opposite of politics. We have to do the work of people and not the work of politicians,” Wenders said. Advertisement Polish film producer Ewa Puszczynska, another jury member, said she thought it was “a bit unfair” to pose this question, saying that filmmakers “cannot be responsible” for whether governments support Israel or Palestine. “There are many other wars where genocide is committed and we do not talk about that,” Puszczynska added. Roy had been due to participate in the festival, which runs from February 12 to 22, after her 1989 film, In Which Annie Gives It Those Ones, was selected to be screened in the Classics section. Germany, which is one of the biggest exporters of weapons to Israel, after the US, has introduced harsh measures to prevent people from speaking out in solidarity with Palestinians. In 2024, more than 500 international artists, filmmakers, writers and culture workers called on creatives to stop working with German-funded cultural institutions over what they described as “McCarthyist policies that suppress freedom of expression, specifically expressions of solidarity with Palestine”. “Cultural institutions are surveilling social media, petitions, open letters and public statements for expressions of solidarity with Palestine in order to weed out cultural workers who do not echo Germany’s unequivocal support of Israel,” organisers of the initiative said. Adblock test (Why?)