👋 Сәлем*
Welcome to Wednesday, where Russia arrests a suspect in the assassination of a Russian general, Luigi Mangione is charged with first-degree murder, and Hong Kong is not playing around with its arcade games. And for Arabic-language media Al-Manassa, Al-Amir Osman wonders whether the time has come for Egypt to regain its former status as Middle East leader.
[*Salem - Kazakh]
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🗞️ FRONT PAGE
Spanish sports daily Marca dedicates its front page to Real Madrid star and Brazil winger Vinicius Junior who has been named “the best”, i.e. the men's player of the year at the FIFA Best Awards in Doha. The 24-year-old offered an outstanding performance both in Real's Champions League and La Liga-winning campaign in 2023-24, scoring a total of 24 goals. "Getting here is something very important to me. I’m doing it for many children who think that everything is impossible and who think they can’t get here,” said the São Gonçalo-born after receiving his first FIFA prize.
🌎 7 THINGS TO KNOW RIGHT NOW
• Russia detains suspect over general’s assassination, intensifies attacks on Ukraine. Russia says it has arrested the man suspected of planting and detonating the bomb that killed top general Igor Kirillov on Tuesday. The Uzbek suspect is seen confessing and describing his actions in a video published by Russian news outlet Baza. Meanwhile, Ukraine's top army commander said Moscow has intensified its attacks on the Kursk and Donetsk regions. A U.S. military official reported that a couple of hundred North Koreans had been killed or wounded during battle in the area. For more, we offer this analysis by France Inter’s Pierre Haski: The Simple Message In Russian General's Assassination: Ukraine Will Not Give Up.
• Israel strikes hospital and homes in Gaza, Palestinians sue U.S. government. An Israeli attack sparked a fire at the Kamal Adwan Hospital in Gaza and put the ICU out of service. At least 20 people died in separate strikes in Gaza and Beit Lahiya according to medics. In the southern Gaza, Israeli tanks pushed towards Mawasi, forcing families to flee north to Khan Younis. Palestinians families have filed a lawsuit against the U.S. State Department on Tuesday, accusing it of failing to apply a human rights Leahy Laws through its support of the Israeli military.
• UN calls for smooth political process in Syria, Israel to keep occupying buffer zone. The UN Security Council called for an "inclusive and Syrian-led" political process on Tuesday, and called on Syria's neighboring countries to refrain from actions that could undermine the security of the region. Meanwhile, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said during a visit across the border into Syria that Israeli troops would occupy the buffer zone they seized "until another arrangement" is found. From Daraj, we also feature a look at what Syria’s future means for neighboring Jordan.
• Luigi Mangione indicted for "act of terrorism." Accused of killing UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, the 26-year-old faces 11 counts, including murder in the first-degree, forgery, and terrorism. Manhattan district attorney Alvin Bragg said the attack "was intended to cause shock and attention and intimidation" and thus falls under the definition of terrorism. Murder suspect? Folk hero? Sebastiaan Faber from La Marea looks at the Luigi Mangione case from Europe in this piece, translated from Spanish.
• Rescue efforts underway after boat capsizes in DRC. At least 25 people, including children, have died and dozens are missing after a boat capsized on a river in the central Democratic Republic of Congo. The overcrowded boat sank a few hundred meters into its journey between the town of Inongo and the capital, Kinshasa. The search continues for the missing passengers.
• Filipina who spent 15 years on death row goes home. Mary Jane Veloso, who was sentenced to death in 2010 after she was found carrying 2.6kg of heroin in an Indonesian airport, was released and returned to the Philippines after 15 years. The two governments signed a deal which allows her to return home as a prisoner. Veloso always claimed that she was tricked into carrying the drugs when she left to go work in Indonesia. In Taiwan, the death penalty remains controversial despite public support, as explained by La Stampa’s Lorenzo Lamperti in this article translated from Italian by Worldcrunch.
• Try, try again! Hong Kong consumer watchdog announced its intention to implement regulations on its ubiquitous claw machines, following a steep rise in complaints over “unfair” gameplay. The Consumer Council said the “excessive difficulty or unfair settings could aggravate consumers,” with some spending hundreds of dollars to try and catch stuffed toys, figurines or tech gadgets.
#️⃣ BY THE NUMBERS
290
The European Union has officially launched Iris2, a new communication satellite program meant to offer an alternative to Elon Musk’s Starlink system. The 12-year, 10-billion-euro program involves a constellation of 290 satellites, operating both in medium Earth orbit and low Earth orbit, with the first communications expected to begin in 2030. It is designed to offer sublease communications capacity for both commercial and government use, and ensure the bloc’s autonomy and security amid increasing global concerns over cybersecurity.
📹 ON THIS DAY VIDEO — 4 HISTORY-MAKING EVENTS, IN 57 SECONDS
➡️ Watch the video: ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY
📰 IN OTHER NEWS
🇪🇬 The Middle East has entered a whole new phase of its history. This represents a real opportunity for Egypt to return to the forefront of leadership in a turbulent region facing serious challenges.
— AL-MANASSA
🇩🇪 Germany’s Chancellor has lost the voters' trust. The fallout of Olaf Scholz will be felt far beyond his own tenure and may weigh on Germany for years to come.
— DIE ZEIT
🇮🇳 Syria is the latest in a series of Indian foreign policy disasters. But can the government's clear lack of vision on that front explain the flagrant haplessness of the Indian state on the global stage?
— THE WIRE
📣 VERBATIM
“This is going to have a much bigger impact on public health than COVID-19.”
— As air quality in Delhi has worsened significantly since the beginning of the week, Frank Hammes, global chief executive of air technology company IQAir, warns of the considerable impact on public health, saying it will be worse than the coronavirus pandemic — which is estimated to have caused the death of more than 500,000 people in the country. On Wednesday, the city was placed in the “severe plus” category after the Air Quality Index reached 442 (i.e., 35 times the safe limit set by the World Health Organization). The expert told the BBC that despite the government's measures, like banning all construction and demolition activities and shifting schools to hybrid mode to limit the exposure of the youngest, the thick layer of toxic haze regularly blanketing Delhi will have a long-term impact on the health of the inhabitants.
✍️ Newsletter by Chloé Touchard & Laure Gautherin
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