Sudan factions agree day's truce designed to 'break cycle of violence'

Sudan's warring sides have agreed a nationwide, 24-hour ceasefire from Saturday morning, U.S. and Saudi Arabian mediators said, following a week of intensified fighting after a previous truce deal lapsed.

The mediators said the ceasefire was "an effort to break the cycle of violence" between Sudan's army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), which began battling each other eight weeks ago, sparking a major humanitarian crisis.

The conflict has displaced more than 1.9 million people, some 400,000 of whom have crossed into neighbouring countries. The urban area around Sudan's capital Khartoum, home to at least five million people, has been turned into a war zone, and unrest has also flared in the conflict-scarred western region of Darfur.

Fighting continued on Friday, with residents reporting artillery fire and clashes in the north of Omdurman, across the confluence of the River Nile from Khartoum, and air strikes in Bahri, a third adjoining city that makes up the wider capital.

"There are heavy strikes near us and bullets from every direction in Al-Thawra neighbourhood in Omdurman," said Sanaa Ahmed, a 24-year-old resident. "We are really afraid and we don't know what to do."

Medical charity MSF said fighting had intensified significantly in Khartoum since Tuesday, resulting in a surge of patients to a hospital where it is working.

Another city where the conflict has triggered clashes is El Obeid in North Kordofan State southwest of Khartoum, which lies on a main route between the capital and Darfur, the RSF's power base.

A doctors' group said in a statement that the city had been suffering from water outages for more than a month, shortages of food, medicine and fuel, and two weeks of power cuts. Twelve kidney dialysis patients had died due to the impact of the war and dozens more were at risk, it said.

'SENSELESS WAR'

The ceasefire is due to start at 6 a.m. (0400 GMT) local time on Saturday.

The two sides agreed to "refrain from prohibited movements, attacks, use of aircraft or drones, aerial bombardment, artillery strikes, reinforcement of positions and resupply of forces, and will refrain from seeking military advantage during the ceasefire," a Saudi-U.S. statement read.

They also agreed to allow delivery of humanitarian assistance, it said.

Both sides have broken a string of ceasefire agreements, including a 12-day truce deal that expired on June 3 and was brokered by Saudi Arabia and the U.S. at talks in Jeddah.

Fighting subsided slightly during the period of that truce deal and limited amounts of humanitarian relief were delivered, though aid agencies say their operations have been badly impeded by bureaucratic controls, fighting, and looting of aid supplies.

The army said last week that it was pulling out of the Jeddah talks, though both sides kept delegations in the Saudi city for consultations.

If the parties fail to observe the new ceasefire, "facilitators will be compelled to consider adjourning the Jeddah talks", the Saudi-U.S. statement said.

The army confirmed in a statement that it had agreed to the 24-hour ceasefire while asserting "its right to respond to any violations". The RSF said in a statement it was committed to respecting the truce.

The conflict in Sudan derailed the launch of a transition towards civilian rule four years after a popular uprising ousted strongman President Omar al-Bashir.

Sudan's army and the RSF fell out over the chain of command and military restructuring plans under the transition.

"We have provided both parties numerous opportunities to end this senseless war," the U.S. State Department's Bureau of African Affairs said on Twitter.

"We call on both sides to adhere to the commitment made today for a 24-hour ceasefire, which would allow Sudanese people to receive critical humanitarian assistance."

Reuters

One of the clearest symbols of the failure of the Buhari administration was former Minister of Aviation, Hadi Sirika’s attempt at pulling the wool over the eyes of Nigerians by presenting a hastily repainted Ethiopian Airline plane, chartered for the trick at a high cost, to claim that he had delivered on his mandate of delivering Nigeria Air before the end of his mandate. The tragicomedy was not funny because Nigerians knew about the billions spent on the project with nothing to show for it. Maybe the big question was: Why was Sirika re-appointed to deliver on this mandate, when he had been given the opportunity in the first term of the administration but had failed miserably? For his failure, he was promoted from junior to senior minister in 2019 and his “empire” carved out of the Ministry of Transport, so that he would have sole authority on the matter. The signal was clear: the reward for failure under Buhari was promotion.

It would be recalled that in September 2018, Hadi Sirika’s Nigeria Air project was suspended by the Federal Executive Council (FEC), dashing the hopes of many Nigerians who would have loved to see a national air carrier that we could proudly call our own ferry us around the world, while we make a lot of money in the process, as British Airways, Emirates, Air France etc. are making out of our resources. We know the difficulties of government ownership of airlines and what led to the liquidation of Nigeria Airways in 2004, as such when Sirika announced in December 2015 that his strategic objective as Aviation minister was the establishment of a successful private sector national airline for Nigeria, I put him on my “I like” list. With the suspension of the project and the knowledge that it was all Sirika’s fault, I feel bitter because he could have succeeded if he had consulted widely and planned well. Instead, he conducted one of the most opaque attempts at establishing a project in Nigeria, with no information given about this, almost no consultation with the necessary stakeholders and absolutely no transparency in the process. His second failure is more painful, even if it was expected.

I have followed the airline issue closely and noticed that on numerous occasions, between December 2015 and July 2018, Sirika assured Nigerians that the project was on course but he never gave any details on what was being planned. I noticed that a lot of aviation stakeholders were asking question on what the plans of the minister were but there was no response. It became clear that for him, the airline was his personal project and he did not see the need to discuss it with stakeholders and create a consensus on the best strategy to adopt. Given the total information blackout from the Minister, a lot of speculations arose that he was planning to use the assets of Arik and Aero Airlines taken over by AMCON to start the new line. Others speculated that he was begging Qatar Air and/or Ethiopian Airways to come and set up an airline for us. Speculation became the sole mode of engagement because the minister refused to engage with anybody.

It was only in July 2018 at the Farnborough International Air Show in the United Kingdom that Sirika announced that the name of the proposed new national carrier is ‘Nigeria Air’ and that the proposed national airline would be unveiled before the end of 2018. Then came the bombshell – government would invest $300 million in the new venture and own only 5% of it. With great fanfare, he then launched the logo of the airline for which he had paid some foreign company $600,000 and multiple criticisms arose. The most effective, I recall, was the tweet by Mustafa Chike Obi, former managing director of AMCON, on 21st July 2018 asking why Nigeria was paying $300 million for only 5% of the new carrier, while Air France/KLM had paid $286 million for a 31% share of Virgin Atlantic. The tweet went viral and there was massive reportage in the media that the minister was planning a scam. It was in this context that the next day, the Minister announced that the entire bill for the start-up would be borne by government, which would have 100% and not 5% ownership, but would subsequently sell 95% to the private sector. It was incredible that even at that stage, Sirika was not willing to share basic information on the strategy for the establishment of the airline. After assuring Nigerians for three years that the project would be 100% private, he turned it to a 100% government project and did not even want to tell Nigerians about it.

Part of the problem was that the same Sirika had refused to inaugurate all the governing boards of the parastatals in the aviation sector, despite repeated admonishment from the President, the APC party chairman and the Central Working Committee of the ruling party. He, therefore, single-handedly ran the entire aviation sector. This meant that he was all powerful and it pleased him that he was the master. For his second term from 2019, boards were not even appointed for the parastatals in the aviation sector to please him. Buhari made it a one-man show. In his last two weeks in office, Sirika reorganised the entire ministry, added aerospace to it, appointed new managing directors and directors and even boards for the parastatals. Clearly, having served and failed for the eight years he was there, he decided to stamp his mark of failure on the future of the aviation industry.

In 2018, it was the Economic Management Team (EMT) led by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo that examined the Nigeria Air project and discovered with consternation that the Minister had committed the government to a major and immediate investment to set up the carrier, despite knowing fully well that the project had not been budgeted for. Meanwhile, somehow, an $8.8 million preliminary cost had apparently been provided by government. What the money was spent on has not been explained up till now. It was symptomatic of the Buhari regime that for all these failures, he was promoted and asked to deliver the same mandate he had failed to perform earlier. Currently, Nigerians are correctly calling for a probe of Sirika’s second failure. Buhari may be the only human being who could believe that giving him four extra years would produce a different outcome. Today, we are still in stage one of the five-stage process of establishing an airline after eight years work by Sirika.

The real issue about Sirika was that he was close to the President and therefore could act with impunity, fail in his assignment and remain in power, while running the ministry as a personal fiefdom. How could the President even consider a major structural re-organisation of the ministry in his last week in office, knowing fully well that the Tinubu administration was coming in? The bigger picture, of course, is that the lack of scrutiny extended basically to all the other ministries and in the coming weeks and months, we will start learning details of how other ministers ruled and ruined the country. May accountability return to governance.

PT

A 57-year-old man of Nashville, United States of America, claims that he has managed to lose 60 lbs (27kg) of body weight by eating McDonald’s fast food three times a day for 100 days straight.

If you’re trying to lose weight, fast food is probably the first thing you cut out, but one Nashville grandfather’s dieting experiment will probably make you see things from a totally different perspective. 57-year-old Kevin Maginnis had been doing a media tour explaining how he managed to lose a considerable amount of body weight by eating McDonald’s Big Macs, quarter-pounders, french fries, and apple fritters three times a day for 100 days straight. Maginnis also claims that the unusual diet also helped him bring down his cholesterol, blood sugar, as well as his heart attack risk rating. And all he did was cut the portions he ate in half.

“Half a plate to lose the weight – three-quarters of a plate to maintain the weight, any food, including McDonald’s,” Maginnis told NBC’s Today Show. “I was pre-diabetic before – down into healthy ranges now.”

Maginnis first announced his unconventional diet in a TikTok video that went viral, but 100 days after starting it, he actually came back with some impressive results – he managed to drop from 238lbs (108kg) to 179.5lbs (81.4kg), by eating fast food three times per day. After seeing him shed the extra pounds, his wife joined him on his quest to show that portion control is the way to go.

“She’s Mclovin’ it,” he jokingly said. “I think she’s beautiful now so it’s just the health reasons. We want to get into a better overall healthy weight.”

Even though he has been told that eating McDonald’s isn’t sustainable in the long run, Kevin is confident that he has found the perfect way to lose extra weight without feeling miserable. He can still eat whatever he likes, as the McDonald’s menu offers plenty of variety, but he only eats half a portion, saving the rest for his next meal.

“I wait until I have that actual heat, not my head craving foods but my body actually at that place where it’s really truly hungry,” the 57-year-old said. “Hunger, it turns out, is one of the best seasonings you can add to anything.”

“I’m never depriving myself. I’m eating McFurries, I’m eating cinnamon rolls, I’m hitting Big Macs, I’m eating French fries,” Maginnis added. “I’m just delaying myself because I’m going eat the whole thing. I’m just not going to eat it all in one sitting.”

Dieticians will say that even by cutting portions in half, Kevin is still getting well over the recommended 2,300 milligrams of sodium daily” and that many of the ingredients in fast food aren’t ideal for a healthy diet, but he claims that, while consuming different macronutrients is definitely important, shedding the pounds first is more important for his health than focusing on the foods he eats.

“Eating different macronutrients that are going to help my brain function — if I’m dead, my brain function is not going to improve, so let’s get rid of this obesity killer first,” Maginnis said.

Kevin isn’t the first person to lose weight on a McDonald’s diet. Back in 2014, John Cisna, a school teacher from Iowa, ate fast food for 90 days and lost 37 pounds.

Oddity Central

It’s no secret that we physically shrink as we get older, but did you know that your brain (yes, your brain) is also getting smaller? Before you panic, it’s important to know that age-related shrinkage is normal. But if you want to get a head start on improving your brain health, here’s what to do.

When your brain starts to shrink

Most studies indicate that brain volume starts to change in your 30s or 40s; however, “it’s in your 60s or 70s that we start to see more promenade atrophy, or changes in the brain happening, both in normal aging and in disease related,” says Dr. Charles Bernick, staff neurologist at Cleveland Clinic Lou Ruvo Center for Brain Health.

“We know that normally with age, brain volume declines in a somewhat predictable manner. The weight of the brain declines 5% per decade after the age of 40,” he continues. “That’s due to a combination of loss of cells, degeneration of fibers, reduction in volume of the cells themselves.”

Why your brain starts to shrink

There is a difference between age-related shrinking of the brain, or atrophy, and disease-related shrinking. The concern, according to Bernick, comes into play when the shrinkage is more than what you would expect for age because it can reflect a disease process, whether it’s due to vascular changes in the brain, or a disease like Alzheimer’s.

While there’s no way to monitor brain atrophy due to normal aging, symptoms to look for include changes in mental function, such as memory loss, difficulty with problem solving or finding words.

“Atrophy is only uncovered if you become symptomatic, such as having changes in your memory or cognitive function,” explains Bernick. “Those would be the reasons to have brain imaging done, where you might pick up shrinkage or atrophy.

Symptoms would trigger an evaluation, such as an MRI brain scan, to detect atrophy. There are also automated tools that can determine whether certain volumes are outside the expected range for age, he says.

Ways to maximize your brain health

While it’s not possible to prevent normal brain aging, there are strategies you can use to maximize your brain health and help reduce your risk of developing disease, such as Alzheimer’s. These methods include:

Regular exercise

Diets that are rich in antioxidants, such as a Mediterranean diet

Staying mentally engaged

Getting proper sleep

Attending to other vascular risk factors, such as monitoring and managing blood pressure, cholesterol, diabetes

Refraining from smoking

Although some sources claim that brain health supplements, such as creatine and omega-3 supplements can help, Bernick says the science is “murky at best.”

“Our recommendation would be to focus on proper nutrition and getting vitamins and minerals through diet,” he says. “Eating a balanced diet that includes a wide variety of fruits and vegetables, whole grains, and healthy fats should be your first approach. It’s only if you’re deficient in certain vitamins or minerals that you should look toward supplements.”

Fortune

President Bola Tinubu has signed into law the bill on uniform retirement age for judicial officers.

Tinubu signed the bill into law on Thursday.

In a statement by Abiodun Oladunjoye, state house director of information, the president pledged that his administration would strengthen the judiciary and empower judicial officers.

The bill, titled: “Constitution of the federal republic of Nigeria, 1999 (fifth altercation) (No.37) bill, 2023”, was the first to be signed by Tinubu since taking the oath of office on May 29.

The law extends the retirement age of high court judges — and others — from 65 to 70 years.

The retirement age of justices of the appeal and supreme courts is already pegged at 70.

The legislation also ensured uniformity in the pension rights of judicial officers of “superior courts of record” specified in section 6(5) of the 1999 constitution (as amended).

On May 2, the national assembly directed Amos Ojo, its clerk, to transmit the bill to former President Muhammadu Buhari for assent.

However, Abubakar Malami, immediate past attorney-general of the federation, advised Buhari to decline assent to the bill.

In a memo dated May 23 and addressed to the office of the chief of staff to the president, Malami said the bill appeared to be “far-reaching, unduly wide, ambiguous”, adding that it made no “justification” for the extension of retirement age and benefits for judges.

The former AGF said the bill if approved, may lead to further agitation for the extension of the retirement age of justices of the supreme court and court of appeal.

The Cable

Labour Party and its presidential candidate in the February 25 election, Peter Obi, on Thursday evening, sought an order of the Presidential Election Petition Court in Abuja to interrogate the Independent National Electoral Commission.

LP and Obi, among other things, are seeking details relating to the information and communication technology experts used by INEC in the conduct of the election.

LP and Obi are challenging the declaration by INEC that Bola Tinubu of the All Progressives Congress won the election.

In two separate motions argued by their lawyer, Patrick Ikweto, Obi posed 12 questions to be forwarded to INEC as part of efforts to support their petition which questioned the integrity of the election.

The petitioners averred that the interrogatory application if acceded to, would assist them in solidifying their claims that the conduct of the election was flawed.

However, counsel for INEC, Kemi Pinhero, objected to the move, on the grounds that the application was brought outside the time specified and allowed by law.

He contended that moving the application outside the pre-hearing session had robbed the court of jurisdiction to hear it.

Also, both the counsel for Tinubu, Akin Olujimi and counsel for the APC, Lateef Fagbemi, opposed the request.

The presiding Justice, Haruna Tsammani, reserved ruling on the interrogatory applications by Obi and his party.

He also adjourned further hearing in the petition till Friday (today).

Meanwhile, the Peoples Democratic Party and its candidate, Atiku Abubakar, on Thursday, called their first subpoenaed witness at the Presidential Election Petition Court despite vehement objection by the respondents.

The witness, Friday Egwuma, who was an INEC ad hoc staff, told the court that he served as Presiding Officer at Polling Unit 17, Aba North in Abia State.

Egwuma told the court that he experienced technical glitches at the point of uploading the captured presidential results to the INEC Results Viewing Portal.

He alleged that the results could not be electronically transmitted in real-time after capturing it on the Bimodal Voters Accreditation System.

Egwuama gave the testimony during his cross-examination by the counsel for INEC, A.B. Mahmoud.

He pointed out that the difficulty he encountered was only in relation to the presidential results as other results pertaining to the senatorial and House of Representatives elections were electronically transmitted to the portal seamlessly.

He, however, noted that there was an option to use an offline mode in such a situation.

Earlier on, before the witness testified the respondents had opposed the admissibility of his deposition.

The court reserved ruling on the objection until final judgment.

Punch

National Hajj Commission of Nigeria (NAHCON) has announced a policy that will require Nigerian pilgrims in Madina to be moved to Makkah five days after they arrive in the city for the Hajj pilgrimage. 

NAHCON’s Deputy Director of Information, Mousa Ubandawaki, in a statement on Wednesday, said the rule which would take effect from today was due to complaints of overcrowding of Nigerian pilgrims in the City of Madina. 

Ubandawaki stated that while the commission is giving 100 percent opportunity for Nigerian pilgrims to visit Madina in the first phase or before Arafat, the move was to avert sanctions against the country if there are pilgrims overcrowding in Madina.

“The commission had to adopt the new policy after wide consultations and exhaustive deliberation. Moreover, it is a known fact that Nigerian pilgrims live in the exclusive Markaziyya area during their stay, a decision which has been overwhelmingly commended and for which the commission never intends to compromise.” 

He stated that the policy was to avoid being penalised for airlifting more pilgrims into Madina than the available accommodation or being forced to take the pilgrims to another area which is well below the standard of the current Markaziyya. 

“As tough a decision this may seem, we felt it is a necessary action we need to take so that we won’t be at the receiving end of Saudi laws, and at the same time it was considered more utilitarian for Nigerian pilgrims to spend five days in Madina thereby allowing more pilgrims to travel to Madina in the first phase from where they would be moved to Makkah to continue with their Hajj rites than to delay their departure for wants of bed spaces in the Prophet’s city,” Ubandawaki said. 

He called for the understanding and support of the pilgrims, Hajj officials and other stakeholders for the successful implementation of the policy.

Daily Trust

Federal government has declared Monday, June 12, as a public holiday in commemoration of Democracy Day.

In a statement on Thursday, Oluwatoyin Akinlade, permanent secretary of the ministry of interior, said the country’s democratic journey has experienced stormy and smooth paths.

“But the ship of state, its institutions and most importantly, the Nigerian people have remained steadfast on the tenets of democratic governance,” she said.

“On this memorable occasion therefore, Nigerians and friends of Nigeria are invited to appreciate the progress that has been made, celebrate the milestones covered and look forward to a better future for the country’s democracy.”

In June 2018, former President Muhammadu Buhari declared June 12 as the new date for the celebration of Nigeria’s democracy.

The decision was to posthumously honour MKO Abiola, presumed winner of the June 12, 1993 presidential election.

Before the new date, Democracy Day was celebrated annually on May 29.

The Cable

RUSSIAN PERSPECTIVE

Ukraine has taken ‘significant’ losses this week – US

The Ukrainian military has suffered “significant” casualties in its faltering attempt to mount a counteroffensive against Russian forces, US officials told CNN on Thursday. While Kiev has kept quiet about its losses, Moscow estimates that the offensive has already cost Ukraine almost 5,000 lives.

Ukrainian troops hoping to break through Russia’s defensive lines have met “greater than expected resistance from Russian forces,” the American network reported, citing anonymous “senior US officials.”

CNN’s sources described how Russian forces used anti-tank missiles and mortars to put up “stiff resistance” and inflicted “significant” casualties, as the Ukrainians struggled to get their Western-provided vehicles through densely-laid minefields.

After months of delays and mixed messages from Kiev, Ukraine’s counteroffensive began on Sunday with an attack by six mechanized and two tank battalions along five sections of the frontline near Donetsk, and in other regions to the north and south. Further attacks followed, and although pro-Ukrainian sources described these thrusts as “probing” attacks, it was clear by the beginning of this week that the counteroffensive had begun in earnest.

The fiercest fighting took place on Wednesday night along the frontline near Zaporozhye, where the Russian military has spent several months constructing multiple lines of minefields, trenches, gun emplacements, and anti-tank obstacles. The Ukrainian 47th mechanized brigade attacked with a total strength of up to 1,500 troops and 150 armored vehicles, but Russian troops – backed by artillery and air support – repelled the assault, Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu said on Thursday.

Key to Russia’s defense has been its suppression of Ukraine’s air defense systems, allowing its fighter jets and attack helicopters to operate with impunity over the frontline.

The minister claimed that during a two-hour battle, the enemy lost 30 tanks, 11 armored personnel carriers and up to 350 troops. According to Shoigu’s daily updates, Ukraine has lost around 4,995 soldiers and almost 100 tanks since Sunday.

Despite the apparently colossal losses, US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan told CNN earlier this week that Washington believed “that the Ukrainians will meet with success in this counteroffensive.” However, General Mark Milley, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, urged caution, telling the network on Monday that it was “too early to tell what outcomes are going to happen.”

“Everyone knows perfectly well that any counteroffensive in the world without control in the skies is very dangerous,” Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky said in a Wall Street Journal interview on Saturday, adding that “a large number of soldiers will die” during the operation.

** Ukraine rejects Türkiye’s Kakhovka dam proposal

Ukrainian Minister of Foreign Affairs Dmitry Kuleba has vehemently dismissed Türkiye’s proposal for an international investigation into the destruction of the Kakhovka hydroelectric dam, calling the initiative a “game to indulge the Russians.”

This comes after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan held phone conversations with his Russian and Ukrainian counterparts on Wednesday, offering to organize an international commission to investigate the attack on the dam, which would include experts from all three countries, as well as the UN.

Speaking on the Ukrainian 1+1 news channel, Kuleba stated that he was sick and tired of the UN and others who were proposing to investigate the explosion and accused them of playing a “game of quasi-justice.”

“It’s absolutely clear who’s who,” Kuleba said, dismissing any suggestions that Ukraine could have been responsible for blowing anything up. “Take it easy, gentlemen,” he said. “We've already been there. It's all just a game to indulge the Russians.”

Later in the interview, the minister admitted that some sort of investigation into the dam’s destruction would take place eventually, but that it would not be anytime soon.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky has also blasted the UN and the Red cross for failing to act amid the flooding caused by the dam’s destruction.

The Kakhovka dam was partially ruptured on Tuesday morning, causing flooding in multiple towns and villages along the path of the Dnieper River. 

Moscow has insisted that the “deliberate sabotage” of the dam was ordered by Kiev to cut off the water supply to Russia's Crimean peninsula. Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov has also suggested that the attack might be linked to Ukraine's attempts at launching a large-scale counteroffensive.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has labeled the incident a “barbaric act” that has led to a “massive ecological and humanitarian catastrophe” and accused Ukraine of “committing war crimes” and “openly using terrorist methods.” He also warned Kiev and its Western backers against gambling on a path of dangerous escalation.

** Ukraine was ready to sign peace deal with Russia but gave up under US pressure — Patrushev

The Ukrainian leadership was ready to settle the conflict with Russia but gave up under the US pressure, Russia’s Security Council Secretary Nikolay Patrushev said on Thursday.

"Had it not been for the US pressure on those whom they installed at the head of Ukraine, this situation would have not happened, Even the Ukrainian leaders themselves were ready for signing a peace treaty and gave Russia written proposals that we, in principle, approved," Patrushev said, obviously referring to the negotiations between the Russian and Ukrainian delegations in Turkey in March last year.

However, as Patrushev went on to say, "in the morning, they [members of the Ukrainian delegation] gave [the proposals] to us during the negotiations and in the evening they said: ‘No, we give them up.’"

"This happened only because the United States had put pressure on them and said that no negotiations must be held," the secretary of Russia’s Security Council stressed.

As Patrushev pointed out, "there are interested parties in this conflict," first and foremost, the United States and Great Britain.

Istanbul document

The first Russian-Ukrainian negotiations after Russia launched its special military operation in Ukraine took place in Belarus in early March 2022 but the talks yielded no tangible results.

A new round of negotiations took place in Istanbul on March 29, 2022, following which Russian Delegation Head, Presidential Aide Vladimir Medinsky announced that Moscow had for the first time received Kiev’s principles of a possible future agreement in witting, stipulating, in particular, Ukraine’s neutral, non-aligned status commitments and its refusal to deploy foreign troops and armaments, including nuclear weapons, on its soil.

Russia pulled out its forces from the Kiev and Chernigov areas. However, the negotiations on the peaceful settlement were totally frozen after that and, as Russian President Vladimir Putin said, Kiev gave up the accords reached in Istanbul.

In October last year, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky enacted a decision by the country’s National Security and Defense Council on banning any talks with Putin.

WESTERN PERSPECTIVE

Hundreds plucked from flooded homes; Ukraine dismisses counteroffensive reports

Hundreds of Ukrainians were rescued from rooftops on Thursday, two days after waters from a huge breached dam submerged villages, fields and roads in the southern region of Kherson, as Kyiv dismissed reports its counteroffensive had begun.

Drone video showed areas where often only the roofs were visible above the flooding. The region's governor said some 600 square kilometres, or 230 square miles, were under water.

The collapse of the Nova Kakhovka dam came as Ukraine prepared a counteroffensive, likely the next major phase in the war in which tens of thousands of people have been killed, millions uprooted and entire cities reduced to ruins since Russia's "special military operation" began on Feb. 24 last year.

NBC news, citing a senior officer and a soldier near the front lines, said the offensive had begun. The Washington Post cited "four individuals" in the armed forces saying the same thing.

Asked about the reports, a spokesperson for the General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces told Reuters: "We have no such information."

In its daily Ukraine briefing, Britain's defence ministry on Thursday reported heavy fighting along "multiple sectors of the front", adding that Kyiv held the initiative in most areas.

Ukraine's military said the flooding in Kherson had forced Russian troops to retreat by five to 15 km and had "practically halved" Russian shelling.

A senior Russian commander briefed President Vladimir Putin on how his forces had repelled a large-scale Ukrainian attack in the southern Zaporizhzhia region, the TASS news agency reported.

Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu said earlier on Thursday that Russian forces had withstood fierce overnight attempts by Ukrainian troops to break through the frontline in Zaporizhzhia and had inflicted heavy losses on them.

Reuters could not independently verify the battlefield reports.

TRADING BLAME

Russia and Ukraine have traded blame for the bursting of the Soviet-era Kakhovka hydroelectric dam, which sent waters cascading across the war zone of southern Ukraine in the early hours of Tuesday, forcing tens of thousands to flee.

Moscow and Kyiv also accused each other on Thursday of shelling the area as rescue workers in rubber dinghies tried to save people and animals from the still rising flood waters.

Russian shelling wounded at least nine people in Kherson on Thursday as residents were being evacuated, Ukraine's interior ministry said.

The Prosecutor General's office initially said one person had been killed by the shelling but later said no deaths had been reported. A Reuters reporter in Kherson said he could hear what appeared to be artillery fire.

The Kremlin similarly accused Ukraine of shelling Russian rescue workers in the area.

Friends and family of stranded residents posted appeals online with names, photos and GPS locations of residents. The coordinator of a volunteer group on the Telegram messaging app said the appeals were getting more urgent because people were running out of drinking water.

One man, Sergei, told Reuters the last time he spoke with his 83-year-old father-in-law in the Oleshky region was several days before the dam collapse.

"The latest information is that there was a lot of water in the street, as high as a person," he said. "Houses collapsed and went under water."

Ukraine said the floods would leave hundreds of thousands of people without access to drinking water, swamp tens of thousands of hectares of agricultural land and turn at least 500,000 hectares deprived of irrigation into "deserts".

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, who has appealed for a "clear and rapid" international effort to help flood victims, held emergency talks with officials in Kherson, one of five Ukrainian regions which Moscow claims to have annexed but only partially controls.

The U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said aid agencies had delivered bottles of drinking water, water purification tablets, hygiene kits and jerrycans.

"Drinking water remains the most pressing need," it said.

MINE HAZARD

The Kremlin said Putin had no plans to visit the region but was monitoring the situation.

Putin, without providing evidence, has accused Ukraine of destroying the Russian-controlled dam at the suggestion of its Western allies.

Kyiv said several months ago the dam had been mined by Russian forces who captured it early in their invasion, and has suggested Moscow blew it up to try to prevent Ukrainian forces crossing the Dnipro river in their counteroffensive.

It is not known how many people may have died as a result of the flooding. The Russian-installed mayor of Nova Kakhovka, near the dam site, said on Thursday at least five people had died but the total death toll is sure to be much higher.

Kherson's Ukrainian governor, Oleksandr Prokudin, said 68% of the flooded territory was on the Russian-occupied left bank of the Dnipro River.

The "average level of flooding" in the Kherson region on Thursday morning was 5.61 meters (18.41 ft), he said.

The water level at the Kakhovka reservoir was approaching a dangerous low, the state company overseeing the facility said on Thursday, saying this could affect the nearby Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Station and water supply to other regions.

The U.N. atomic watchdog said on Tuesday the plant, Europe's largest, has enough water to cool its reactors for "several months" from a pond located above the reservoir.

Ukrainian and Russian officials have also warned of the danger posed by mines planted during the war and now scattered by the floods.

Rebel mobilisation in southern Sudan raises fears of conflict spreading

Residents of Sudan's South Kordofan State reported mobilisation by a large rebel force on Thursday, raising fear that internal conflict could spread in the country's southern regions.

The rebel force, the SPLM-N, is led by Abdelaziz al-Hilu, and is estimated to contain tens of thousands of men as well as heavy weaponry.

It is unclear what position Hilu might take in the conflict that erupted in the capital Khartoum on April 15 between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), but its mobilisation raised fears of clashes, residents said.

SPLM-N forces had moved into several army camps around Kadugli, the capital of South Kordofan, prompting the army to reinforce its positions, they said, adding that the RSF had closed the road between Kadugli and El Obeid to the north, depriving the city of supplies.

In past months there had been skirmishes between the SPLM-N and the RSF.

In the capital Khartoum, where fighting has been concentrated, residents reported sporadic battles and air strikes on Thursday.

Those included clashes in the south of Khartoum around a military complexcontaining weapons factories where the army has been trying to regain control from its paramilitary rivals.

Reuters was not able to independently confirm the accounts.

The war has triggered a major humanitarian crisis that threatens to destabilise the region. More than 1.4 million people have been displaced within Sudan and a further 476,800 have fled into neighbouring countries.

LAWYER KILLED

Beyond the capital, unrest has flared in the western region of Darfur, already struggling with the impact of two decades of conflict and displacement.

In El Geneina in West Darfur, the city worst hit by recent violence, a lawyer who had worked on the cases of displaced people and eight members of his family were killed in an attack on their house earlier this week according to the Darfur Bar Association, a group that monitors the conflict.

A medical union reported that a new wave of attacks had begun on Wednesday in the city, which has been cut off from communications for several weeks.

Fighting in Khartoum and the adjoining cities of Bahri and Omdurman has intensified since a 12-day ceasefire between the army and RSF formally expired on June 3.

The recent ceasefire, brokered by Saudi Arabia and the United States at talks in Jeddah, had been repeatedly violated, but had allowed for the delivery of limited amounts of humanitarian aid.

Mediators told Reuters that a proposal had been put forward at indirect consultations in Jeddah for a 24-hour truce that would be more closely monitored than previous truces.

A U.S. State Department spokesman said on Wednesday said there had been no formal resumption of talks in Jeddah but Washington remained "deeply engaged" with the two sides.

The conflict in Sudan derailed the launch of a transition towards civilian rule four years after a popular uprising ousted strongman President Omar al-Bashir.

The army and RSF, which together staged a coup in 2021, fell out over the chain of command and military restructuring plans under the transition.

Reuters