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BELARUS: Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko said on Friday that Russian tactical nuclear weapons set to be deployed in his country would protect it from Western threats, alleging that there were plans to invade Belarus from neighboring Poland.
“Take my word for it, I have never deceived you. They are preparing to invade Belarus, to destroy our country,” Lukashenko said in an annual address to lawmakers and government officials.
President Vladimir Putin said on Saturday that Russia would station tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus, its first deployment of nuclear armaments outside its borders since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.
Minsk said the missiles would offer protection after what it called a campaign of pressure from the United States and its allies aimed at overthrowing Lukashenko, who has been in power for 28 years.
In Friday’s speech, Lukashenko also called for an immediate ceasefire in Ukraine and for talks to start on a lasting peace settlement, warning that Russia would be forced to use “the most terrible weapon” if it felt threatened.
“It is impossible to defeat a nuclear power. If the Russian leadership understands that the situation threatens to cause Russia’s disintegration, it will use the most terrible weapon. This cannot be allowed,” he said.
LONDON: Charities have accused the UK Home Office of abandoning 55 asylum-seekers with severe disabilities and life-limiting conditions at a former care home in Essex County after one died.
One resident at the home, an Iranian with restricted mobility caused by a series of strokes, had seen repeated requests from his doctors for a wheelchair to be provided go ignored by the authorities before succumbing to a final, fatal stroke on June 18.
According to The Guardian, the facility is staffed by security guards and reception staff but lacks the trained care workers and nurses it is contractually obliged to supply.
Another resident told the newspaper: “Everybody is suffering in this place. It used to be a care home but now there is no care. We are free to come and go but to me, this place feels like an open prison. We have just been left here and abandoned.”
As many as 77 people are said to be residing at the home, suffering from health conditions including loss of limbs, blindness and mobility issues, with access to wheelchairs limited.
The charity Refugee, Asylum Seeker and Migrant Action was providing support for residents, but said it had run out of funds necessary for the much-needed disability equipment and other essentials for those living there who had fled warzones including Afghanistan and Sudan.
Maria Wilby, operational lead for the charity, said: “It is cruel to stick these vulnerable people here in the middle of nowhere. We are literally watching them fall apart.”
A resident with motor and sensory neuropathies leaving her largely bed bound was on one occasion left on the floor for 14 hours because the subcontracted security and reception staff were not allowed to pick her up as they had not been suitably trained.
The woman said: “I can walk a little if I have help but there is nobody to help me, so I’m confined to my room most of the time. My feet have swollen badly because I’m not moving.”
The Home Office had been warned about the facility’s suitability after it opened in November, with Tendring district council “robustly” expressing concern that it was “unsuitable” for asylum-seekers placed there and the existing community, given pressure on services and deprivation.
A council spokesperson said: “People placed here are vulnerable due to additional care needs, and we’ve been doing what we can in our remit, and the bounds of propriety, to help them.”
A retired National Health Service professional advocating for the asylum-seekers said the cases he was seeing were worse than those he had encountered in his 40-year NHS career, describing treatment of residents as “unpardonable.”
While claiming that it is “committed” to ensuring the safety and well-being of asylum-seekers, a Home Office spokesperson said it neither operated care homes nor commissioned “care.”
The spokesperson added: “It is not within out statutory remit. Asylum accommodation providers are contractually obliged to ensure accommodation is accessible for disabled people and where concerns are raised, we work with providers to ensure they are addressed.”
LONDON: Scottish authorities have condemned UK Home Office plans to house asylum-seekers on a cruise ship in Leith, likening it to a “floating prison,” the BBC reported on Friday.
Edinburgh Council leader Cammy Day said the council had shown solidarity with thousands of refugees from Afghanistan, Syria, Sudan and Ukraine, and was “absolutely committed to supporting them any way we can,” but opposed the idea of moving them to the MS Victoria.
“We were not consulted on this and urgently require further details from the UK government on their plans,” Day said.
“I know the Scottish government and Cosla (the national association of Scottish councils) are in the same position and, having written jointly to the minister of state for immigration, Robert Jenrick MP, we’ve yet to receive a satisfactory response to our questions and concerns.”
The ship has housed over 1,000 Ukrainian refugees, with the last set to leave on July 11, but Scotland’s Migration and Refugees Minister Emma Roddick said new plan is incomparable.
“Housing asylum seekers in vessels cannot be compared with their use to temporarily accommodate displaced people from Ukraine because of fundamental differences in terms of their rights and agency,” she added, noting that people waiting on asylum applications face strict restrictions on the right to work and no access to most mainstream benefits.
“If the government chooses to impose the use of the MS Victoria to accommodate people it must provide suitable funding for the council and devolved services like health and policing and ensure services are provided so people can be supported appropriately,” she said.
June 23 : Russia urged the International Atomic Energy Agency on Friday to ensure Ukraine does not shell the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, saying it was otherwise operating safely.
Alexei Likhachev, chief executive of the Russian state nuclear energy firm Rosatom, made the comments at a meeting with IAEA chief Rafael Grossi in the Russian city of Kaliningrad, Rosatom said in a statement, after Grossi visited the plant last week.
“We expect concrete steps from the IAEA aimed at preventing strikes by the Armed Forces of Ukraine, both on the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant and on adjacent territory and critical infrastructure facilities,” Rosatom quoted its chief as saying in a statement.
The IAEA said this week that the power plant was “grappling with … water-related challenges” after the destruction of the Kakhovka dam emptied the vast reservoir on whose southern bank the plant sits.
It also said the military situation in the area had become increasingly tense as Kyiv began a counteroffensive agaMOSCOW: Russia urged the International Atomic Energy Agency on Friday to ensure Ukraine does not shell the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, saying it was otherwise operating safely.
Alexei Likhachev, chief executive of the Russian state nuclear energy firm Rosatom, made the comments at a meeting with IAEA chief Rafael Grossi in the Russian city of Kaliningrad, Rosatom said in a statement, after Grossi visited the plant last week.
“We expect concrete steps from the IAEA aimed at preventing strikes by the Armed Forces of Ukraine, both on the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant and on adjacent territory and critical infrastructure facilities,” Rosatom quoted its chief as saying in a statement.
The IAEA said this week that the power plant was “grappling with … water-related challenges” after the destruction of the Kakhovka dam emptied the vast reservoir on whose southern bank the plant sits.
It also said the military situation in the area had become increasingly tense as Kyiv began a counteroffensive against the Russian forces that have seized control of swathes of eastern and southern Ukraine.
Moscow and Kyiv have regularly accused each other of shelling Europe’s largest nuclear power station, with its six offline reactors. International efforts to establish a demilitarised zone around it have so far failed.
Ukraine this week accused Russia of planning a “terrorist” attack at the plant involving the release of radiation, while Moscow on Friday detained five people who it said were planning to smuggle radioactive caesium-137 at the request of a Ukrainian buyer in order to stage a nuclear incident.
inst the Russian forces that have seized control of swathes of eastern and southern Ukraine.
Moscow and Kyiv have regularly accused each other of shelling Europe’s largest nuclear power station, with its six offline reactors. International efforts to establish a demilitarised zone around it have so far failed.
Ukraine this week accused Russia of planning a “terrorist” attack at the plant involving the release of radiation, while Moscow on Friday detained five people who it said were planning to smuggle radioactive caesium-137 at the request of a Ukrainian buyer in order to stage a nuclear incident. (Reporting by Reuters; Editing by Kevin Liffey)
BUCHAREST: A Romanian court on Friday extended by 30 days the house arrest of Andrew Tate, the divisive social media personality and former professional kickboxer who was charged this week with rape, human trafficking, and forming a criminal gang to sexually exploit women.
The Bucharest Tribunal’s decision comes days after prosecutors from Romania’s anti-organized crime agency, DIICOT, formally indicted the 36-year-old social media star after filing their criminal investigation to a Bucharest court.
Tate, who has amassed nearly 7 million Twitter followers and is known for expressing misogynistic views and hate speech online, was initially arrested near Romania’s capital, Bucharest, in late December, along with his brother, Tristan. Two Romanian women are also charged in the case.
All four defendants will remain under house arrest for 30 days, the court ruled, but the decision can be appealed within 48 hours.
DIICOT requested this week that judges extend the house arrest measure as they filed their investigation. Under Romanian law, judges have 60 days to decide whether the case is sent to trial, but nonetheless often takes longer.
The agency alleges that the four defendants formed a criminal group in 2021 “in order to commit the crime of human trafficking” in Romania, as well as in the United States and Britain. All four have denied the allegations against them.
There are seven female victims in the case, DIICOT said, who were lured with false pretenses of love and transported to Romania, where the gang sexually exploited and subjected them to physical violence. One defendant is accused of raping a woman twice in March 2022, according to the agency. The women were allegedly controlled by “intimidation, constant surveillance” and claims they were in debt, prosecutors said.
The Tate brothers, who are dual British-US citizens, won an appeal on March 31 to be moved to house arrest after spending three months in police detention.
Andrew Tate, who is known to peddle conspiracy theories online to his mostly young male followers, has repeatedly claimed that prosecutors have no evidence against him and that there is a political conspiracy designed to silence his views.
In a video posted on Thursday to his Twitter account, he labeled the charges against him as a “level 10 matrix attack” and said, “They’re trying to destroy me without evidence.”
Tate was previously banned from several prominent social media platforms for expressing hate speech and misogynistic comments, including that women should bear responsibility for getting sexually assaulted.
Several women in Britain also are pursuing civil claims to obtain damages from Tate, alleging they were victims of sexual violence.
During their investigations, prosecutors have ordered the confiscation of the Tate brothers’ assets, including 15 luxury cars, luxury watches and about $3 million in cryptocurrency.
KYIV: Ukraine said Friday it had downed an entire barrage of 13 cruise missiles fired by Russian forces overnight targeting an airfield in the west of the country.
“Thirteen of the occupiers’ cruise missiles were destroyed on June 23… This time the attack was aimed at a military airfield in the Khmelnytskyi region,” the Ukrainian air force said on social media.
Russia launched waves of aerial attacks with cruise missiles and attack drones over the winter, prompting Kyiv to appeal to its Western allies to bolster its air defense systems.
“The launches were carried out around midnight from the Caspian Sea from four Tu-95MS bombers,” the air force statement said.
The mayor of Khmelnytskyi Oleksandr Symchyshyn reported explosions in the town with a pre-war population of around 275,000 and praised Ukrainian air defense systems.
Ukraine also said that it had shot down a Russian reconnaissance drone overnight.