новини

Kyiv — Ukraine’s human rights ombudsman urged international organizations Sunday to respond to a claim that several Ukrainian prisoners of war were executed in Russia’s Kursk region, where Kyiv had launched an incursion in August. DeepState, a Ukrainian battlefield analysis site close to Ukraine’s Defense Ministry, said Russian troops shot and killed nine Ukrainian “drone operators and contractors” on Oct. 10 after they had surrendered.  Dmytro Lubinets said on Telegram that he sent letters to the United Nations and the International Committee of the Red Cross regarding the claim, calling it “another crime committed by the Russians.”  Earlier this month, Ukraine’s …

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moscow — Speaking behind the thick white walls of Moscow’s ancient Danilov Monastery, Archpriest Igor Yakimchuk is adamant: People must not be forbidden to pray in their chosen branch of Eastern Orthodox Christianity. He speaks calmly, but Yakimchuk is one of many Orthodox Christians in Russia who are angry about a law passed by Kyiv in August that targets a Russia-linked Orthodox church that long dominated religious life in Ukraine. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s administration accuses the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC) of spreading pro-Russian propaganda in time of war and of housing spies, charges it denies. Under the law, the Russian Orthodox …

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paris — A 22-year-old Afghan was indicted and imprisoned in France on Saturday, accused of supporting the ideology of the Islamic State (IS) and of having “fomented” a “plan for violent action” in a football stadium or a shopping center. His arrest, which took place Tuesday in Haute-Garonne, has “links” with the arrest of an Afghan living in the United States and charged Wednesday with planning an attack on the day of the U.S. elections, the national anti-terrorist prosecutor’s office (PNAT) said, confirming a source close to the case questioned by AFP. This 27-year-old Afghan, living in the southern U.S. state …

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VILNIUS, Lithuania — Lithuanians elect a new parliament Sunday in a vote dominated by concerns over the cost of living and potential threats from neighboring Russia, with the opposition Social Democrats tipped to emerge as the largest party but well short of a majority. The outgoing center-right coalition of Prime Minister Ingrida Simonyte has seen its popularity eroded by high inflation that topped 20% two years ago, by deteriorating public services and a widening gap between rich and poor. Polling stations open at 7 a.m. (0400 GMT) and close at 8 p.m. (1700 GMT). Results are expected after midnight local time. …

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PRISTINA, KOSOVO — Persistent ethnic tension in north Kosovo could trigger a repeat of violence seen in the area last year when four people died in a gun battle and NATO peacekeepers were hurt in clashes, a senior official from the military alliance warned Saturday. Kosovo is predominantly ethnic Albanian, but about 50,000 Serbs in the north reject Pristina’s government and see Belgrade as their capital. A former Serbian province, Kosovo declared independence in 2008, a decade after a guerrilla uprising. U.S. Navy Admiral Stuart B. Munsch, commander of the Allied Joint Force Command Naples — which oversees NATO’s peacekeeping force …

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DUBAI, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES — Iran has sent two locally made satellites to Russia to be put into orbit by a Russian space vehicle, the semi-official news agency Tasnim reported Saturday, in the latest space cooperation between the two U.S.-sanctioned countries. The development of Kowsar, a high-resolution imaging satellite, and Hodhod, a small communications satellite, is the first substantial effort by Iran’s private space sector, the report said. Russia sent Iranian satellites into orbit in February and in 2022, when U.S. officials voiced concern over space cooperation between Russia and Iran, fearing the satellite will not only help Russia in Ukraine …

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Kyiv, Ukraine — Russia said on Saturday it had downed 47 Ukrainian drones while Kyiv reported neutralized 24 drones fired by Moscow. The Ukrainian air force said many missiles were fired from the Russian border region of Belgorod, without specifying the number or the type. It said Russia had fired 28 drones at Ukraine, of which 24 were destroyed in the Sumy, Poltava, Dnipropetrovsk, Mikolayev and Kherson regions. The Ukrainian chief of staff also said Kyiv’s forces had struck a fuel depot overnight in the eastern Russian-occupied Lugansk region, setting it on fire. It did not give any details. Moscow did …

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