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Israeli Cabinet member meets US officials as cease-fire talks get underway in Egypt
A top member of Israel's wartime Cabinet is meeting with U.S. officials in Washington while talks are underway in Egypt to broker a cease-fire in Gaza before the Muslim holy month of Ramadan begins next week.
Benny Gantz, a centrist political rival of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, traveled for talks with several senior U.S. administration officials this week.
An official from Netanyahu’s far-right Likud party said Gantz did not have approval from the prime minister for his meetings in Washington and that Netanyahu gave the Cabinet official a “tough talk” — underscoring the widening crack within Israel’s wartime leadership nearly six months into the Israel-Hamas war.
Israel did not send a delegation to cease-fire talks in Cairo because it is waiting for answers from Hamas on two questions, according to an Israeli official. Israeli media reported that the government is waiting to learn which of the hostages seized by Hamas in an Oct. 7 attack are alive and how many Palestinian prisoners Hamas seeks in exchange for each.
The U.N. says a quarter of Gaza’s 2.3 million people face starvation. The number of Palestinians killed in the Gaza Strip has soared above 30,000 since the war began nearly five months ago when Hamas-led militants stormed across southern Israel, killing 1,200 people and taking about 250 others hostage.
Currently:
— Harris is to meet with Israeli Cabinet official who is in Washington despite Netanyahu’s rebuke.
— A 4-year-old Gaza boy lost his arm – and his family. Half a world away, he’s getting a second chance.
— Find more of AP’s coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/israel-hamas-war.
Here's the latest:
HAMAS CALLS ON PALESTINIANS TO RISE UP DURING RAMADANBEIRUT — Hamas is calling on Palestinians in Israel and the West Bank to rise up against Israel during the upcoming Muslim holy month of Ramadan.
Hamas spokesman Osama Hamdan, speaking to reporters in Beirut on Monday, said Palestinians should “make every moment of Ramadan a confrontation.”
US military aircraft airdrop thousands of meals into Gaza in emergency humanitarian aid operation
The U.S., Qatar and Egypt have been trying for weeks to broker a cease-fire between Israel and Hamas in Gaza and to convince the militant group to release some of the scores of hostages it is still holding from the Oct. 7 attack that sparked the war.
The mediators hope to broker a truce before Ramadan, which is expected to begin around March 10.
The month of dawn-to-dusk fasting is a time of heightened prayer, reflection and charity for Muslims around the world, but Israeli-Palestinian tensions often spike over access to a major holy site in Jerusalem.
Hamas has repeatedly called for a broader uprising in the occupied West Bank, where violence has surged since the start of the war, and among Israel’s own Palestinian minority.
Hamdan did not provide any specifics about the ongoing cease-fire negotiations. Addressing his remarks to Israel and its top ally, the United States, he said: “What they have not gained in the battlefield, they will not gain through political machinations.”
The war began when Hamas-led militants broke through Israel’s defenses on Oct. 7 and stormed into several communities near Gaza, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducting around 250 hostages. Hamas freed over 100 hostages during a weeklong November cease-fire in exchange for the release of 240 Palestinian prisoners.
Gaza’s Health Ministry says the war has killed over 30,000 Palestinians. Around 80% of Gaza’s population of 2.3 million have been driven from their homes.
Israeli strike on Palestinians waiting for aid kills 70
A FOREIGN WORKER IS KILLED IN MISSILE FIRE FROM LEBANONKIRYAT SHMONA, Israel — Israeli rescuers say a foreign worker was killed and several others wounded by an anti-tank missile fired from Lebanon.
The Magen David Adom rescue service said Monday it was treating seven people, including two in serious condition.
Associated Press reporters saw the Israeli army transporting several Thai workers, some limping and bleeding, to ambulances near the northern Israeli town of Kiryat Shmona.
Israel and Lebanon’s Hezbollah militant group have traded fire nearly every day since the start of the war in Gaza. Hezbollah, an ally of Hamas, says it is trying to pin down Israeli forces in the north to aid the Palestinian group.
Hezbollah did not immediately claim responsibility for Monday’s strike.
The Lebanese group said in statements Monday that it had stopped two attempts by Israeli forces to cross into Lebanese territory overnight and that it had launched an artillery attack on an Israeli barracks.
Also on Monday, U.S. envoy Amos Hochstein arrived in Beirut to meet with Lebanese officials in an attempt to tamp down tensions.
The near daily clashes between Hezbollah and Israeli forces have killed more than 200 Hezbollah fighters and at least 37 civilians in Lebanon. Around 20 people have been killed on the Israeli side, including civilians and soldiers.
Tens of thousands of people on both sides of the border have been forced to flee their homes because of the ongoing fighting. Israel has vowed to continue attacking Hezbollah, even if there is a cease-fire in Gaza, in order to push its fighters away from the border.
Farm workers from Thailand and other Asian countries have flocked to Israel in recent years, drawn by higher wages. Several foreign workers were among those killed and abducted in Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack out of Gaza, which triggered the war.
OPEC+ production cuts deepen with extensions from Saudi Arabia, Russia and other oil giants
Some members of oil cartel OPEC, led by Saudi Arabia, and allied producers like Russia are again deepening their voluntary crude supply cuts.
Announcements from several OPEC+ countries extend reductions of some 2.2 million barrels a day, the secretariat for the multinational organization noted Sunday. Saudi Arabia led the pack by extending its previously-implemented cut of 1 million barrels a day through the end of 2024's second quarter.
The extension, which was first shared by the state-owned Saudi Press Agency citing a Energy Ministry source, means the kingdom's crude production will stand at about 9 million barrels a day through the end of June.
Also on Sunday, Russia announced an additional voluntary cut of 471,000 barrels per day for the second quarter — across a blend of production and exports.
Iraq, United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Kazakhstan, Algeria and Oman will be continuing reductions as well, according to OPEC's secretariat, in smaller amounts.
The OPEC+ countries participating in production cuts, which have gradually piled up since October 2022, have pointed to goals of balancing the oil market — noting that volumes will be gradually returned subject to market conditions.
The price of Brent crude, the international benchmark, stood at about $83.55 per barrel at the end of last week, up from $77.33 seen a month ago. Despite the recent increase, Brent's going price is still modest — notably far below the soaring oil prices following Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2022 — and in line with analysts' previous expectations.
Sunday's latest extension of cuts are in addition to voluntary reductions that were announced in April 2023 and extend through December of this year — including 500,000 barrel-a-day cuts from both Saudi Arabia and Russia.
Hundreds of inmates flee after armed gangs storm Haiti's main prison, leaving bodies behind
Hundreds of inmates fled Haiti's main prison after armed gangs stormed the facility in an overnight explosion of violence that engulfed much of the capital. At least five people were dead Sunday.
The jailbreak marked a new low in Haiti's downward spiral of violence. It comes as gangs step up coordinated attacks in Port-au-Prince and while embattled Prime Minister Ariel Henry is abroad trying to salvage support for a United Nations-backed security force to stabilize the country.
Three bodies with gunshot wounds lay at the prison entrance, which was wide open, with no guards in sight. Plastic sandals, clothing and electric fans were strewn across normally overcrowded concrete patios that were eerily empty on Sunday. In another neighborhood, the bloodied corpses of two men with their hands tied behind the backs laid face down as residents walked past roadblocks set up with burning tires.
Haiti’s government urged calm as it sought to find the killers, kidnappers and perpetrators of other violent crimes that it said escaped during the outbreak of violence.
“The National Police is taking all measures to find the escaped prisoners and arrest those responsible for these criminal acts as well as all their accomplices, so that public order can be restored," the Communications Ministry said in a post on X, formerly Twitter.
Arnel Remy, a human rights attorney whose nonprofit works inside the prison, said on X that fewer than 100 of the nearly 4,000 inmates remained behind bars. Those choosing to stay included 18 former Colombian soldiers accused of working as mercenaries in the July 2021 assassination of Haitian President Jovenel Moïse. On Saturday night, several of the Colombians shared a video pleading for their lives.
“Please, please help us,” one of the men, Francisco Uribe, said in the message widely shared on social media. "They are massacring people indiscriminately inside the cells.”
On Sunday, Uribe told journalists who walked breezily into the normally highly guarded facility, “I didn't flee because I'm innocent."
Colombia's foreign ministry called on Haiti to provide “special protection” for the men.
In the absence of official information, inmates' family members rushed to the prison to check on loved ones.
“I don’t know whether my son is alive or not,” said Alexandre Jean as she roamed around the cells looking for any sign of him. “I don’t know what to do.”
The violence Saturday night appeared to be widespread, with several neighborhoods reporting gunfire.
There were reports of a jailbreak at a second Port-au-Prince prison containing around 1,400 inmates. Armed gangs also occupied and vandalized the nation's top soccer stadium, taking one employee hostage for hours, the nation's soccer federation said in a statement. Internet service for many residents was down as Haiti’s top mobile network said a fiber optic cable connection was slashed during the rampage.
In the space of less than two weeks, several state institutions have been attacked by the gangs, who are increasingly coordinating their actions and choosing once unthinkable targets like the Central Bank. As part of coordinated attacks by gangs, four police officers were killed Thursday.
After gangs opened fire at Haiti's international airport last week, the U.S. Embassy said it was halting all official travel to the country and on Sunday night urged all American citizens to depart as soon as possible. The embassy said it would also cancel until Thursday all consular appointments.
The Biden administration, which has steadfastly refused to commit troops to any multinational force while offering instead money and logistical support, said it was monitoring the rapidly deteriorating security situation with grave concern.
A National Security Council official said violence serves only to delay a democratic transition while destroying the lives of thousands. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, reiterated U.S. support for elections, inclusive governance and the restoration of democracy.
The epicenter of the latest violence Saturday night was Haiti's National Penitentiary, which is holding several gang leaders. Amid the exchange of gunfire, police appealed for assistance.
“They need help,” a union representing police said in a message on social media bearing an “SOS” emoji repeated eight times. “Let’s mobilize the army and the police to prevent the bandits from breaking into the prison.”
The clashes follow violent protests that turned deadlier in recent days as the prime minister went to Kenya to try and salvage a proposed U.N.-backed security mission in Haiti to be led by the East African country. Henry took over as prime minister following Moise's assassination and has repeatedly postponed plans to hold parliamentary and presidential elections, which haven’t happened in almost a decade.
Haiti’s National Police has roughly 9,000 officers to provide security for more than 11 million people, according to the U.N. They are routinely overwhelmed and outgunned by gangs, which are estimated to control up to 80% of Port-au-Prince.
Jimmy Chérizier, a former elite police officer known as Barbecue who now runs a gang federation, has claimed responsibility for the surge in attacks. He said the goal was to capture Haiti’s police chief and government ministers and prevent Henry’s return.
The prime minister, a neurosurgeon, has shrugged off calls for his resignation and didn’t comment when asked if he felt it was safe to come home.
US military aircraft airdrop thousands of meals into Gaza in emergency humanitarian aid operation
U.S. military C-130 cargo planes dropped food in pallets over Gaza on Saturday in the opening stage of an emergency humanitarian assistance authorized by President Joe Biden after more than 100 Palestinians who had surged to pull goods off an aid convoy were killed during a chaotic encounter with Israeli troops.
Three planes from Air Forces Central dropped 66 bundles containing about 38,000 meals into Gaza at 8:30 a.m. EST (3:30 p.m. local). The bundles were dropped in southwest Gaza, on the beach along the territory's Mediterranean coast. The airdrop was coordinated with the Royal Jordanian Air Force, which said it had two food airdrops Saturday in northern Gaza and has conducted several rounds in recent months.
Many of those killed or wounded in Gaza stampede for aid were shot by Israel's army, EU arm says
"The amount of aid flowing to Gaza is not nearly enough and we will continue to pull out every stop we can to get more aid in," President Joe Biden said Saturday in a post on the social media site X, formerly known as Twitter.
U.S. Central Command said on X that “the combined operation included U.S. Air Force and RJAF C-130 aircraft and respective Army Soldiers specialized in aerial delivery of supplies, built bundles and ensured the safe drop of food aid.”
The U.S. airdrop is expected to be the first of many.
Three Biden administration officials said the planes dropped the military Meals Ready to Eat (MREs) — shelf-stable meals that contain a day's worth of calories in each sealed package — in locations that were thought would provide civilians with the greatest level of safety to access aid. Afterward, the U.S. monitored the sites and was able to see civilians approach and distribute food among themselves, according to the officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to provide additional details that had not been made public.
Biden on Friday announced the U.S. would begin air dropping food to starving Gazans after at least 115 Palestinians were killed and hundreds more wounded in the Thursday attack as they scrambled for aid, the Health Ministry in Hamas-ruled Gaza said.
Hundreds of people had rushed about 30 trucks bringing a predawn delivery of aid to the north. Palestinians said nearby Israeli troops shot into the crowds. Israel said they fired warning shots toward the crowd and insisted many of the dead were trampled.
Biden approves military airdrops of aid into Gaza after chaotic encounter left more than 100 dead
White House national security spokesperson John Kirby said Friday that the airdrops were being planned to deliver emergency humanitarian assistance in a safe way to people on the ground. The United States believes the airdrops will help address the dire situation in Gaza, but they are no replacement for trucks, which can transport far more aid more effectively, though Thursday’s events also showed the risks with ground transport.
Kirby said the airdrops have an advantage over trucks because planes can move aid to a particular location very quickly. But in terms of volume, the airdrops will be “a supplement to, not a replacement for moving things in by ground.”
The C-130 is widely used to deliver aid to remote places because of its ability to land in austere environments.
A C-130 can airlift as much as 42,000 pounds of cargo and its crews know how to rig the cargo, which sometimes can include even vehicles, onto massive pallets that can be safely dropped out of the back of the aircraft.
Air Force loadmasters secure the bundles onto pallets with netting that is rigged for release in the back of a C-130, and then crews release it with a parachute when the aircraft reaches the intended delivery zone.
The Air Force's C-130 has been used in years past to air drop humanitarian into Afghanistan, Iraq, Haiti and other locations and the airframe is used in an annual multi-national “Operation Christmas Drop” that air drops pallets of toys, supplies, nonperishable food and fishing supplies to remote locations in the Federated States of Micronesia and the Republic of Palau.
Since the war began on Oct. 7, Israel has barred entry of food, water, medicine and other supplies, except for a trickle of aid entering the south from Egypt at the Rafah crossing and Israel’s Kerem Shalom crossing.
The United Nations says one-quarter of Gaza’s 2.3 million people face starvation. Aid officials have said that airdrops are not an efficient means of distributing aid and are a measure of last resort.___
Last surviving member of the first team to conquer Mount Everest says it is crowded and dirty now
The only surviving member of the mountaineering expedition that first conquered Mount Everest said Saturday that the world's highest peak is too crowded and dirty, and the mountain is a god that needs to be respected.
Kanchha Sherpa, 91, was among the 35 members in the team that put New Zealander Edmund Hillary and his Sherpa guide Tenzing Norgay atop the 8,849-meter (29,032-foot) peak on May 29, 1953.
“It would be better for the mountain to reduce the number of climbers,” Kanchha said in an interview in Kathmandu on Saturday, “Right now there is always a big crowd of people at the summit.”
Since the first conquest, the peak has been climbed thousands of times, and it gets more crowded every year. During the spring climbing season in 2023, 667 climbers scaled the peak, but that brought in thousands of support staff to the base camp between the months of March and May.
There have been concerns about the number of people living on the mountain for months on end, generating trash and waste, but authorities have no plans to cut down on the number of permits they issue to climbers.
There are rules that require climbers to bring down their own trash, equipment and everything they carry to the mountain or risk losing their deposit, but monitoring has not been very effective.
Biden approves military airdrops of aid into Gaza after chaotic encounter left more than 100 dead
“It is very dirty now. People throw tins and wrappings after eating food. Who is going to pick them up now?” Kanchha said. “Some climbers just dump their trash in the crevasse, which would be hidden at that time but eventually it will flow down to base camp as the snow melts and carries them downward.”
For the Sherpas, Everest is Qomolangma or goddess mother of the world, and is revered by their community. They generally perform religious rituals before climbing the peak.
“They should not be dirtying the mountain. It is our biggest god and they should not be dirtying the gods,” he said “Qomolangma is the biggest god for the Sherpas but people smoke and eat meat and throw them on the mountain.”
Kanchha was just a young man when he joined the Hillary-Tenzing expedition. He was among the three Sherpas to go the last camp on Everest along with Hillary and Tenzing. They could not go any further because they did not have a permit.
Pope Francis has been taken briefly to a Rome hospital after his weekly audience
They first heard of the successful ascent on the radio, and then were reunited with the summit duo at Camp 2.
“We all gathered at Camp 2 but there was no alcohol so we celebrated with tea and snacks,” he said. “We then collected whatever we could and carried it to base camp.”
The route they opened up from the base camp to the summit is still used by climbers. Only the section from the base camp to Camp 1 over the unstable Khumbu Icefall changes every year.
Kanchha has four children, eight grandchildren and a 20-month-old great-granddaughter. He lives with family in Namche village in the foothills of Mount Everest, where the family runs a small hotel catering to trekkers and climbers.
Brazil passes 1 mln cases of dengue fever
Brazil has registered a total of 1,017,278 probable cases of dengue fever and 214 confirmed deaths from the disease, while another 687 deaths are under investigation, according to the latest report released Thursday by the Health Ministry.
The incidence rate of dengue fever in the South American country is currently 501 cases per 100,000 inhabitants.
New attempts at Gaza cease-fire are underway, Israel's Gantz says
Brazil could see twice as many cases of dengue fever this year as in 2023, when 1,658,816 cases were recorded, Health Minister Nisia Trindade said.
According to the World Health Organization, since 2009, the global incidence of dengue has grown drastically, spreading to many areas previously unaffected by the disease.
Biden approves military airdrops of aid into Gaza after chaotic encounter left more than 100 dead
The U.S. will begin airdropping emergency humanitarian assistance into Gaza, President Joe Biden said Friday, a day after more than 100 Palestinians were killed during a chaotic encounter with Israeli troops.
The president announced the move after at least 115 Palestinians were killed and more than 750 others were injured, according to Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry, on Thursday when witnesses said Israeli troops opened fire as huge crowds raced to pull goods off an aid convoy.
Biden said the airdrops would begin soon and that the United States was looking into additional ways to facilitate getting badly needed aid into the war-battered territory to ease the suffering of Palestinians.
“In the coming days we’re going to join with our friends in Jordan and others who are providing airdrops of additional food and supplies” and will "seek to open up other avenues in, including possibly a marine corridor,” Biden said.
Israel and Hamas indicate no deal is imminent after Biden signals Gaza cease-fire could be close
The president twice referred to airdrops to help Ukraine, but White House officials clarified that he was referring to Gaza.
Israel said many of the dead were trampled in a stampede linked to the chaos and that its troops fired at some in the crowd who they believed moved toward them in a threatening way. The Israeli government has said it is investigating the matter.
The head of a Gaza City hospital that treated some of those wounded said Friday that more than 80% had been struck by gunfire.
Biden made his announcement while hosting Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni at the White house.
Biden hopes cease-fire, hostage deal to pause Israel-Hamas war can take effect by next Monday
“Aid flowing to Gaza is nowhere nearly enough," Biden said. "Now, it’s nowhere nearly enough. Innocent lives are on the line and children’s lives are on the line. We won’t stand by until we get more aid in there. We should be getting hundreds of trucks in, not just several.”
The White House, State Department and Pentagon had been weighing the merits of U.S. military airdrops of assistance for several months, but had held off due to concerns that the method is inefficient, has no way of ensuring the aid gets to civilians in need and cannot make up for overland aid deliveries.
Administration officials said their preference was to further increase overland aid deliveries through the Rafah and Kerem Shalom border points and to try to get Israel to open the Erez Crossing into northern Gaza.
The incident on Thursday appeared to tip the balance and push Biden to approve airdrops. White House national security spokesman John Kirby said that airdrops are difficult operations, but the acute need for aid in Gaza informed the president's decision.
He stressed that ground routes will be continued to be used to get aid into Gaza, and that the airdrops are a supplemental effort.
“It’s not the kind of thing you want to do in a heartbeat. you want to think it through carefully," Kirby said. He added, “There’s few military operations that are more complicated than humanitarian assistance airdrops”
Pressure has been mounting for Biden to move more aggressively to ease Palestinian suffering, including from lawmakers of Biden’s Democratic Party. Even before Thursday’s deaths, Sen. Jack Reed, chairman of the Senate’s Armed Services Committee, wrote Biden this week to urge that the administration deploy a military hospital ship and support units to help treat Gaza’s wounded and open a sea route to Gaza for delivery of humanitarian aid.
“Yesterday’s event, I think, underscores the need to find more creative ways of getting assistance in faster and at greater scale,” Kirby said.
Egypt, France, Jordan, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates have already used airdrops to get aid into Gaza since the conflict started in October.
Biden in his visit with Meloni at the White House also sought to assure European leaders that the U.S. remains behind Ukraine even as he's been unable to win passage of a supplemental foreign aid package that includes $60 billion for Ukraine in addition to $35 billion for Israel and Taiwan. The legislation has passed the Senate, but Republican Speaker Mike Johnson has refused to put it up for a vote in the House.
Ahead of Meloni's visit, White House officials said they don't have good answers for allies about finding an end to the impasse with House Republicans and reopening the American spigot of aid to Kyiv that's badly needed as Ukraine tries to fend off Russia's invasion.
Biden, along with top Democrats and Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell, strongly urged Johnson during a White House meeting this week to take up the foreign aid package, but Johnson responded by saying that Congress “must take care of America’s needs first.”
The leaders also discussed efforts by the U.S., Egypt and Qatar to broker an extended cease-fire between Israel and Hamas, Italy's priorities for a G7 presidency, migrant flows into Italy from North Africa, and their countries' China policies.
Biden said earlier this week that a cease-fire deal could be reached by Monday, before tempering his optimism after Thursday's incident. But on Friday, Biden said he still held hope that a deal can be struck, possibly before Muslims around the globe begin observing the holy month of Ramadan that is expected to begin on March 10.
“I'm still hoping so,” Biden told reporters on Friday evening before departing the White House for the presidential retreat at Camp David, Maryland. "We’re still working real hard at it. We’re not there yet.”
Meloni said solving the humanitarian crisis in Gaza was Italy's top priority.
“We need to coordinate our actions to avoid an escalation, and this regard we fully support the U.S. mediation efforts,” she said.
Looking for a leap year lift? Check out this silly French newspaper that only publishes on Feb. 29
Read all about it, right now — or you’ll have to wait another four years. Satirical French newspaper La Bougie du Sapeur only comes out on Feb. 29.
It’s a leap year-only publication, filled with cringe-worthy puns and commentary on events of the past four years.
The 2024 edition includes an article suggesting France doesn’t need schools anymore thanks to artificial intelligence. Another floats the idea of dismantling the Eiffel Tower during the Paris Olympics to reduce security risks -- and having IKEA produce a manual for rebuilding it.
Some friends started the newspaper as a joke in 1980, naming it after a comic book figure who was born on Feb. 29. The last edition — in 2020, as the world went into COVID-19 lockdowns — sold 120,000 copies. Revenue from newsstand sales goes mainly to a charity for people with disabilities.
Its editors are proudly politically incorrect, and some articles seem rather, well, dated. But that’s the point. That, and lifting the mood a bit.
When the world goes out of whack, reads its once-in-four-years editorial, ‘’Sometimes you have to laugh about it.’’
Pope Francis has been taken briefly to a Rome hospital after his weekly audience
Pope Francis, who has been suffering from the flu, was brought to a hospital in central Rome after the papal audience on Wednesday, arriving at the Gemelli Hospital on Tiber Island in a small white Fiat 500 and leaving again under escort in the same car after a short period. The Vatican had no immediate comment.
The 86-year-old pope was pushed in a wheelchair into the audience hall at the Vatican earlier in the day, appearing weary as he dropped heavily into his seat. In recent weeks he has walked the short distance to his chair, but he has been struggling with mild flu symptoms the past week.
The pope also canceled appointments Saturday and Monday due to the flu, but appeared as usual for the Sunday blessing from a window overlooking St. Peter's Square.
Last week, Francis coughed repeatedly during Ash Wednesday services that he presided over at a Roman church, and opted not to participate in the traditional procession that inaugurates the church’s Lenten season.
This time of year in 2020, just as the coronavirus pandemic was starting to hit Italy, Francis also suffered a bad cold that forced him to cancel several days of official audiences and his participation in the Vatican’s annual spiritual retreat. The Vatican had already scrubbed the retreat for this year in favor of personal spiritual exercises
The Argentine pope had part of one lung removed as a young man because of a respiratory infection, and in 2021 had a chunk of his colon removed because of an intestinal inflammation. He has been using a wheelchair and cane since last year because of strained knee ligaments and a small knee fracture that have made walking and standing difficult.
The Pope used his brief words at the end of Wednesday's audience to mark the 25th anniversary of the ratification of the Anti-Personnel Mines Convention, expressing his “closeness to the numerous victims of these insidious devices that remind us of the dramatic cruelty of war.”
He also appealed for peace in the Middle East, Ukraine and prayed for the victims of attacks in Burkina Faso and Haiti.
At the end of the audience, the pope spent about an hour greeting the faithful from his wheelchair, stopping to talk, bless babies and exchange gifts.
World Trade Organization to open biennial meeting in the United Arab Emirates as challenges loom
The World Trade Organization will open its biennial meeting Monday in the United Arab Emirates as the bloc faces pressure from the United States and other nations ahead of a year of consequential elections around the globe.
The WTO's 164 member nations will discuss a deal to ban subsidies that contribute to overfishing, extending a pause on taxes on digital media like movies and video games, and agricultural issues.
But headwinds remain for the organization and the world's economy, particularly as the recovery from the coronavirus pandemic remains uneven across nations. Meanwhile, there are more than 50 elections affecting half the planet’s population planned for this year — perhaps none more critical for the WTO than the U.S. presidential election on Nov. 5.
Running again is former President Donald Trump, who threatened to withdraw the U.S. from the WTO and repeatedly levied tariffs — taxes on imported goods — on perceived friends and foes alike. A Trump win could again roil global trade.
WTO Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, a dual Nigerian and American citizen, has pushed to insist the organization remains vital as 75% of the world's trade is done on its terms.
“What we are focused on at the WTO are what are the appropriate reforms we need to do — no matter who comes into power, when,” Okonjo-Iweala earlier this month, insisting that the trade body remains relevant. ”If we get to what you’re saying — that the WTO becomes irrelevant — everyone, including you and me, will be in trouble.”
But even if President Joe Biden is re-elected, the U.S. has deep reservations over the WTO. The United States under the past three administrations has blocked appointments to its appeals court, and it’s no longer operating. Washington says the judges have overstepped their authority too often in ruling on cases.
The U.S. also has criticized China for still describing itself as a developing country as it did when it joined the WTO in 2001. Washington, Europe and others say that Beijing improperly hampers access to emerging industries and steals or pressures foreign companies to hand over technology. The U.S. also says China floods world markets with cheap steel, aluminum and other products.
Then there's the voting format of the WTO itself. Major decisions require consensus. That means countries must actively vote in favor for proposals to take effect.