👋 Rimaykullayki!*
Welcome to Monday, where U.S. airstrikes on Yemen’s Houthis kill at least 53, Canada’s new Prime Minister Mark Carney chooses Europe for his first foreign trip, and our quiz question comes from Tusk, Donald Tusk. Meanwhile, Wenke Husmann in Germany’s Die Zeit reports on a researcher’s seven-point plan designed to help the youth (and their parents!) navigate our troubled times.
[*Quechua]
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🗞️ FRONT PAGE
“Dark Day for Macedonia,” headlined Macedonian daily Sloboden Pechat, with photos of first responders at the nightclub in Kocani, North Macedonia, which caught on fire and killed 59, injuring more than a hundred more. Police have detained 15 people, including the owner of the property and former government officials, on suspicion of bribery and corruption related to the use of the venue which was not designed for such events.
🌎 7 THINGS TO KNOW RIGHT NOW
• Trump says he’ll discuss ending the war in Ukraine with Putin on Tuesday. U.S. President Donald Trump said he and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin will discuss whether they “can bring that war to an end,” following positive talks between U.S. and Russian officials in Moscow. The U.S. has been pushing for a 30-day ceasefire proposal that Ukraine accepted last week, as both Moscow and Kyiv launched overnight drone attacks at each other. Read more in this piece by French analyst Pierre Haski.
• U.S. launch new airstrikes on Yemen’s Houthis, killing at least 53. The U.S. carried out new airstrikes on Yemen on Monday, Houthi rebels say, with the number of dead rising to 53, including five children. This follows a wave of airstrikes on Saturday from the U.S., in response to the Iran-aligned Houthi movement’s threats to international shipping. Houthi leader Abdul Malik al-Houthi said the group would target U.S. ships in the Red Sea as long as the U.S. continues attacks on Yemen.
• U.S. deports Venezuelans despite court order. The Trump administration deported more than 200 alleged members of a Venezuelan gang from the U.S. to a supermax prison in El Salvador on Sunday, despite a federal judge’s court order forbidding it from doing so. The order prevented the Trump administration from invoking a centuries-old wartime law to justify some of the deportations, but the flights had already departed and the White House responded the order had “no lawful basis.”
• Canada’s new prime minister to meet Macron on first foreign visit. New Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney has arrived in Paris to meet with French President Emmanuel Macron on Monday in a bid to seek alliances as U.S. President Donald Trump continues to attack Canada’s sovereignty and economy. This marks Carney’s first foreign official trip since he took office on Friday, and he’ll next head to London to meet UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer and King Charles III. Read more in this piece: How Trump Could Wind Up Killing NATO — With His Treatment Of Canada Alone.
• Syria’s new leaders join EU donor conference for the first time. Syria’s interim government is participating in an annual donor conference on Monday in Brussels to muster support to ensure a peaceful transition after President Bashar al-Assad was ousted in December. The EU has held its annual donor drive for Syria for the past eight years but it mainly focused on supporting refugees in neighboring countries and it excluded Assad’s government over its role in Syria’s civil war. For more, check this Daraj analysis translated from Arabic by Worldcrunch: A Syrian's Lament, Assad Is With Us Still.
• South Korea opposition urges swift ruling on impeached president. South Korea’s opposition Democratic Party on Monday urged the country’s Constitutional Court to rule swiftly on suspended President Yoon Suk Yeol’s impeachment, saying delays are “irresponsible” and are deepening social division. The court has continued deliberations well into the third week — making Yoon’s case the longest deliberation in the Constitutional Court’s history. Some 100,000 people took to Seoul’s streets over the weekend to call for Yoon’s immediate removal from office following his short-lived declaration of martial law in December.
• News Quiz! What has Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk offered to U.S. actor Jesse Eisenberg to help him land “the new James Bond role”?
A. Poker lessons
B. Skydiving vouchers
C. Military training
D. Martini mixing classes
[Answer below]
#️⃣ BY THE NUMBERS
31 days
A new photo was released of Pope Francis, who had not been seen in public since being admitted to Gemelli Hospital in Rome on Feb. 14, with pneumonia in both lungs. The image shows the 88-year-old pontiff celebrating mass in a chapel, as his condition continues to be fragile yet stable.
📹 ON THIS DAY VIDEO — 4 HISTORY-MAKING EVENTS, IN 57 SECONDS
➡️ Watch the video: ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY
📰 IN OTHER NEWS
⚖️ Frustrated that schools are not taking complaints of sexual harassment in their establishments seriously, some parents in Egypt are taking matters to court. But despite judicial and legal progress, young girls are continuing to pay the psychological price.
— AL-MANASSA
🇨🇺 Certainly things don't work in communist Cuba, but this neither justifies the embargo that has all but strangled it for decades, nor the obsession with sweeping a singular experiment in governance and social welfare into the globalized banality of our time.
— EL ESPECTADOR
🔍 Young people have been living in a world of escalating drama for the past five years, since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic. It's also a challenge for parents. The seven-point plan of a leading researcher can help navigate these unprecedented times.
— DIE ZEIT
📣 VERBATIM
“They better back off.”
— U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said the U.S. won’t stop attacks on Iran-aligned Houthi rebels in Yemen, saying the strikes by the U.S. are about protecting shipping in the Red Sea, a major cargo shipping lane in the Middle East. Houthi leadership said that the attacks by the Americans would cause the rebel group to escalate the conflict, calling the U.S. attacks a “war crime.” Some American officials have signaled that the violence could last for weeks.
✍️ Newsletter by Anne-Sophie Goninet & Jacob Shropshire
Let us know what’s happening in your corner of the world!
Quiz Answer: C. In a tongue-in-cheek comment in a video posted on X, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk offered military training to U.S. actor Jesse Eisenberg to help him land “the new James Bond role.” Eisenberg recently gained Polish citizenship after telling the story of the Jewish population during World War Two in his Oscar-winning film “A Real Pain.”