Month: July 2022

The world was sadder and more stressed out in 2021 than ever before, according to a recent Gallup poll, which found that four in 10 adults worldwide said they experienced a lot of worry or stress. Experts say the most obvious culprit, the pandemic — and the isolation and uncertainty that came with it — is a factor but not entirely to blame. Carol Graham, a Gallup senior scientist, says the culprit for declining mental health includes the economic uncertainty faced by low-skilled workers. “There are some structural negative changes that make some people in particular more vulnerable. And in …

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U.S. and Ukrainian officials say U.S. rocket systems provided to Ukraine are having a large impact in the fight against Russia, helping Ukrainian forces to hold off Russia’s military in the eastern Donbas region. A senior U.S. military official speaking on the condition of anonymity Friday to discuss the war said U.S.-supplied rocket systems known as HIMARS are having “a very, very significant effect” in the fight against Russia. Ukraine’s Defense Ministry spokesperson, Oleksandr Motuzianyk, also singled out the role played by the HIMARS long-range rocket systems. “In the last weeks, over 30 of the enemy’s military logistical facilities have …

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Ukraine’s deputy minister of culture said Friday that her country’s heritage is under attack by Russia and must be protected. “The president of Russia, Mr. Putin, announced that Ukrainian culture and identity is a target of this war,” Kateryna Chueva, deputy minister of Culture and Information Policy of Ukraine, reminded an informal meeting of the U.N. Security Council. She said the Russian bombs and missiles that have damaged and destroyed Ukrainian cities also have hit scores of important cultural sites. The U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) has verified damage to 163 cultural sites since Russia’s Feb. 24 invasion. …

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Liza, a 4-year-old girl with Down syndrome, was en route to see a speech therapist with her mother in central Ukraine when a Russian missile hit. She never made it to the appointment. Now the images that tell the story of her life and its end are touching hearts worldwide. Wearing a blue denim jacket with flowers, Liza was among 23 people killed, including boys ages 7 and 8, in Thursday’s missile strike in Vinnytsia. Her mother, Iryna Dmytrieva, was among the scores injured. After the explosion, the mother and daughter went in different directions. Iryna, 33, went into a …

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Here is a fast take on what the international community has been up to this past week, as seen from the United Nations perch.        ‘Broad agreement’ on deal to export blockaded Ukrainian grain    U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said Wednesday there is “broad agreement” on a deal between Russia and Ukraine, with Turkey and the United Nations, to export millions of tons of Ukrainian grain stuck in silos since Russia’s invasion on February 24. Breaking his silence to speak to reporters at U.N. headquarters, Guterres said important and substantive progress had been made and the parties are getting …

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Across Europe, there is a growing uneasiness that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is serving to overshadow another critical, even existential threat that could do severe damage to the West while serving the Kremlin’s interests. Instability and the rise of terrorism across Africa, according to multiple European and NATO officials, cannot be overlooked no matter how deeply Russian President Vladimir Putin pushes into Ukraine. And nowhere are concerns growing as fast as they are in the Sahel, the semiarid stretch of land spanning northern and western Africa from Senegal to Sudan. “By sending a couple of thousand Wagner paramilitaries, the Russians …

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The European Union’s executive intensified its legal standoff with Hungary on Friday by taking the country to the EU’s highest court over a restrictive law on LGBT issues and media freedom.  The EU had already tried for a year to make Hungary change a law that bans content portraying or promoting homosexuality. The European Commission said it “discriminates against people on the basis of their sexual orientation and gender identity.”  “The Commission considers that the law violates the internal market rules, the fundamental rights of individuals (in particular LGBTIQ people) as well as — with regard to those fundamental rights …

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Western finance ministers condemned Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine at G-20 talks in Indonesia on Friday, accusing Russian officials of complicity in atrocities committed during the war. The two-day meeting on the island of Bali began under the shadow of a Russian military assault that has roiled markets, spiked food prices and stoked breakneck inflation, a week after Moscow’s top diplomat walked out of talks with the forum’s foreign ministers. “Russia is solely responsible for negative spillovers to the global economy,” U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen told the Russian delegation in the opening session, according to a Treasury official. “Russia’s officials …

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“The simple truth is that, as we speak, children, women and men, the young and the old, are living in terror,” International Criminal Court Chief Prosecutor Karim Khan said at the opening of the Ukraine Accountability Conference in The Hague on Thursday, with about 40 nations in attendance. Khan said an “overarching strategy” is needed to bring those guilty of conducting war crimes in Ukraine to justice. Ukraine has granted the ICC jurisdiction over the crimes committed within the country, opening the door to the court’s investigations, since neither Ukraine nor Russia is an ICC member. Ukrainian officials said Russian …

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