Month: August 2024

MANILA, Philippines — The Philippines and Germany on Sunday committed to signing a defense cooperation arrangement this year, vowing to stand for the international rules-based order in the Indo-Pacific region. German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius and his Philippine counterpart Gilberto Teodoro committed to establishing long-term relations between their armed forces to expand training and bilateral exchanges, explore opportunities to expand bilateral armaments cooperation and engage in joint projects. The two met in Manila during the first such visit by a German defense minister, as their countries mark 70 years of diplomatic relations. Teodoro said the Philippines, seeking to modernize its military …

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KYIV, Ukraine — The American-made F-16 is an iconic fighter jet that’s been the front-line combat plane of choice for the NATO alliance and numerous air forces around the world for 50 years. Western countries have pledged F-16s to Kyiv, and some have arrived in Ukraine, officials in Washington and Ukraine confirmed to The Associated Press. The fighter jets are expected to start flying sorties in Ukrainian skies soon and will be a much-needed boost to the country’s current fleet of Soviet-era jets that are laboring to counter Russia’s invasion. United States President Joe Biden gave the go-ahead in August 2023 …

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CAMMARATA, Italy — On a scorching July afternoon, a municipal water truck rolls up in a cloud of dust on Liborio Mangiapane’s farm in southern Sicily. Some of the precious liquid gets transferred to a smaller cistern on a tractor that Mangiapane’s son will use to fill troughs for 250 cattle and sheep, but by tomorrow, all 10,000 liters from the truck will be gone. Crippling drought from a nearly rainless year, coupled with record-high temperatures, has burned out much of the region’s hay and is pushing farmers to the limit. For Mangiapane, every day is a struggle to find water, …

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Moscow — Russian President Vladimir Putin has offered condolences to North Korean counterpart Kim Jong Un over devastating floods that caused untold casualties and damaged thousands of homes, the Kremlin said on Saturday. The North, in turn, said Sunday that Putin had also offered “immediate humanitarian support” to aid its recovery efforts, to which Kim responded that he “could deeply feel the special emotion towards a genuine friend.” Pyongyang said this week it had seen a record downpour on July 27 which killed an unspecified number of people, flooded dwellings and submerged swaths of farmland in the north near China. “I …

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DAKAR, Senegal — Two men claiming to be Russian nationals and saying they were taken captive in Niger by militants linked to al-Qaida appeared in a video published on a media platform affiliated to the extremist group. The video, which appeared on the az-Zallaqa platform Friday night, showed two men who said they were seized by the militants while working in Baga in northeastern Niger. The men, seated side by side and dressed in traditional local clothing, spoke into the camera. One identified himself as Yury, saying he is a geologist and was working for a Russian company when he was …

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Ukrainian tennis player Alex Dolgopolov was once ranked 13th in the world. But shortly after Russia invaded his homeland in 2022, he volunteered to fight on the front lines. Anna Kosstutschenko met with the tennis star turned drone operator. Camera: Pavel Suhodolskiy. …

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KYIV, UKRAINE — Ukraine’s military said on Saturday it had attacked Russia’s Morozovsk airfield and several oil depots and fuel storage facilities in three Russian regions overnight. The attack on the airfield hit an ammunition depot where Russian forces stored guided aerial bombs among other equipment, the military said. “Russian combat aviation must be destroyed wherever it is, by all effective means. It is also quite fair to strike at Russian airfields. And we need this joint solution with our partners — a security solution,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy wrote on the Telegram messaging app. Zelenskyy said on Saturday that Russian …

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